These were the lovely bones that had grown around my absence: the connections–sometimes tenuous, sometimes made at great cost, but often magnificent–that happened after I was gone. And I began to see things in a way that let me hold the world without me in it. The events my death brought were merely the bones of a body that would become whole at some unpredictable time in the future. The price of what I came to see as this miraculous body had been my life.
...
It is a cool December night in the latter half of the twentieth century, in a small rural Pennsylvanian town called Norristown. There is nothing much special about this small town. There are homes, businesses, some churches, a movie theater, a few schools and a long main street. The settlement looks like one of those happy towns that people would see in Hollywood movies and television shows, but this town was silent tonight, all because of the disappearance of a young teenage girl.
The TARDIS lands on a cornfield in the middle of the night. Almost no light shined on the field which made it hard for the Doctor to check his scanner. After the elderly time traveler determined it was safe, he and his two companions, Steven and Vicki, walked out to take a look at the surrounding environment.
"Fascinating," says the Doctor while he scratches his chin.
"I don't think it is that impressive," Steven remarked.
"It's just a cornfield," Vicki retorted, "There is more to a world then a bloody cornfield."
Steven then gave Vicki a dirty look before the Doctor began to direct them through the corn field. When they finally got out of the field, the streets were full of nothing but the sound of rats stealing cheese from local shops. A troubled-looking middle aged man strolls down the street with posters in his right hand. He gently plants each of the posters to a street lamp or pole that happens to be in his way. After he disappears, the trio head to a street lamp with one of the posters.
The three of them each got a turn to read and after they were done, they were horrified. Steven ducked his head and hid his face while the Doctor lost all emotion from his wrinkled face and Vicki started to cry. A fourteen year old girl named Susie Salmon had recently disappeared on her way home from school. Vicki remembered in history class about how girls would disappear and never come back in this age.
"Can we do something to help?" Steven asked.
"I do not know," the Doctor responded, "I'm not sure if there is anything we can do my dear boy. I would like to help but I'm afraid that we could interrupt the time stream. I never heard of Susie Salmon but she could be an important part of history. Yes indeed, an important part." The old man then rubs his chin while trying to think.
"I think we should help," said Vicki, "We helped many people in the past and the future and we were involved in the making of history before."
…
Vicki starts roaming the streets in search of the man with the posters. She knew that he was somehow close to the missing girl; the look that was on his face was that of terror. She followed the trail of posters that were either planted on poles or left discarded on the ground where they await to be picked up by the wind. After minutes of searching, Vicki finally manages to find the mysterious man. He is speaking to a police man demanding some answers for the girl's disappearance. Vicki rushes over to him but just as she was about to reach him, she feels a huge pain throughout her body. She was thrown across the street and she lay on the asphalt while people swarmed her. She felt like she was somehow rammed. The pain was unbearable. She couldn't tell how long the people were around her. Blood was dripping from her mouth now. She was starting to cough up a lot of it, and each movement sent pain shooting through her entire body. This was it, she was going to die. At the age of 16, she was too young. Before anyone could do anything to help her, everything exploded in a shower of bright lights. Next thing she knew, she felt like she was falling. Vicki must've blacked out then. Just for a moment, everything went dark. When she awoke, there was a girl towering over her. She wore a red shirt with a blue coat and yellow khaki-like pants. The girl held out her hand to help Vicki up.
"Where am I?" asked Vicki.
"You are in a place I like to call the 'In-Between'," the girl responded, "You suffered a serious accident but you are not dead." Vicki then grabbed the girl's hand and helped herself up. This new world that she somehow just entered was like earth. There was a wide open field surrounding Vicki and the other girl with nothing but yellowish-gold grass and a single tree. The leaves on the tree then morphed into birds before they flew away into the sky. Everything in the world seemed surreal to Vicki's eyes, even the girl right next to her. She looked like that poor missing girl who broke Vicki's heart.
"Who are you?"
"My name is Salmon, like the fish; my first name is Susie."
...
"When was the last time you had seen Susie?" asked Steven to a young pupil. In order to investigate the case, the Doctor invented a rouse using his psychic paper in which he and the Doctor were Detectives with the local Police Force in Norristown. Steven felt it was wasn't going to work but nothing bad had happened yet.
"I last saw her on the day she went missing," the pupil responded, "she was happy that day. Susie decided to take a short cut home." The student then paused and choked on her words. "I hope she is alright."
"We are doing the best we can," reassured Steven. The young pupil then left Steven and the Doctor to join her friends at a vigil in front of the school, dedicated to Susie. The duo then followed the girl to the vigil where they went to interview another student, this time a young Indian boy around the age of seventeen years.
"Excuse me, my dear boy," said the Doctor to this seventeen year old, "Do you know Susie Salmon?"
"Yes," the boy responded, "she was a friend of mine. Susie was a very kind person; I don't understand why anyone would hurt her."
"We haven't determined if it was a kidnapping my dear fellow."
"I know that but most of the time, missing children never return home." The boy began to cry and the Doctor allowed him to leave. Steven began to feel disturbed by the recent series of events following the girl's disappearance. He wonders how any criminal investigator throughout time and space could even sleep at night, despite the stuff they work on.
"Are we doing the right thing?" Steven asked the Doctor.
"You said that you wanted to help," the Doctor responded.
"I'm not sure if playing detective will help find this missing girl."
"My dear boy, whining won't help save this girl either."
…
Vicki couldn't understand what was happening to her. She was recently struck by something that severely injured her and she is in the place between heaven and earth, and yet she is not dead. The girl standing in front of Vicki was already haunting her. Vicki couldn't believe what she saw with her own eyes. She doesn't understand how she is in limbo but she had just found the missing girl.
"I don't understand," said Vicki, "Where am I and who are you?"
"I told you," said Susie, "You are in a place called the 'In-Between'. I had just arrived here recently after I was murdered. You have not died but you were badly hurt."
"How was I badly hurt?!" Vicki demanded in frustration. She was beginning to lose her patience with Susie Salmon. Vicki felt bad for her because she disappeared but now the missing girl is telling Vicki that she is near death. There is a long and awkward silence between the two teenaged girls. Susie attempts to break it with a deep smile but the tears falling from her eyes show that she was hurt by Vicki's frustration.
"I don't want to be here," Susie cried, "I want to be home with my family and friends. My life was stolen from me by a deranged maniac. I'm lonely up here."
…
The Doctor and Steven were strolling through a near-by field. The plants being grown look very much like wheat but this field is not a farm. The duo then come up with theories as to what happened to Susie Salmon but Steven didn't want to think of the worst, at least not yet. Just then, Steven tripped over a small wool hat. He picked himself up and then bent down to pick up the hat.
"Hey Doctor, take a look at this," Steven called out. He believes that he had just found his first clue.