At 7:30 the alarm went off telling me it was time to start another boring day. I got up, got dressed, brushed my long black curly hair, and put on some light eye make-up around my light gray eyes before leaving my room to meet Rose at the door. Rose picked up her bag, gives mum a peck on the cheek and grabbed our keys.
"Bye!" we called to her.
"See you later!" We ran down the stairs of the block of flats where we lived to catch the bus. At Henricks, the shop where both Rose and I worked, Rose worked on the floor putting things away while I worked behind a desk helping customers look for what they needed. Yes, it is as boring as it sounds. During our lunch hour, Rose, Mickey and I sat next to a fountain, having a laugh, eating, teasing each other. Then we got up to leave, saying goodbye to each other.
"This is a customer announcement: the store will be closing in five minutes. Thank you." The announcement came over the intercom. Finally, the day was almost over all I had to do was take the lottery money to Wilson then Rose and I could go home. The security guard handed me the package with the money in it.
"You want me to come with you?" Rose asked me.
"Nah, just go wait at the bus stop, I'll meet you there in five minutes. Don't leave without me!" We laughed as we went our separate ways. When the lift pinged, signaling I was in the basement, I had expected Wilson to meet me as he always did. Something about this place had always scared me.
"Wilson?" I called out. When I received no answer I went farther down the corridor. "Wilson, I've got the lottery money. Wilson?" I knocked on Wilson's door. "You there? Look, I can't hang about 'cause they're closing the shop. Wilson!" I looked at my watch, knowing I was going to be late for the last bus at this rate. I pulled out my phone and text Rose to go ahead and leave. There wasn't much since in both of us walking the long way. Suddenly, a sound was made further along the corridor. I immediately looked in that direction.
"Hello? Hello, Wilson, it's Ashlee. Hello? Wil-Wilson?" I stopped outside a fire door for a moment, and then opening it, finding myself in a room that looked as though it was used for storing the shop dummies. I turned the light on and walked further into the room.
"Wilson? Wilson?" I tried another door on the side, when the door I entered in slammed shut. Shocked, I ran back and shook the handle, but it wouldn't open again. I turned my head to look behind me as I heard a small sound.
"Is that someone mucking about?" I went back into the dummy room. "Who is it?" I turned around just in time to see a dummy step out of its alcove and towards me. I back away slowly. "Heh… you got me, very funny." The dummy said nothing and didn't stop advancing. Then two more joined in. "Right, I've got the joke! Who's idea was this? Was it Derek's?" the dummies still advanced, another coming from behind me. "Derek, is this you?!" All the dummies were now alive. I backed up, away from them and tripped over a box. I quickly pull myself up again and back against the wall. The dummy in front of me lifted its arm to strike. I closed my eyes ready for the blow to hit me, when a hand grabbed mine. I opened my eyes and snapped my head to look at the owner of the hand.
"Run." was all the strange man said. We ran, just in time, through a fire exit. The dummies were in pursuit. The man led me into a lift . The doors closed as one of the dummies slammed its arm in between the doors. The man quickly grabbed the arm and gave a good five hard yanks before pulling it off allowing the doors to close.
"You pulled his arm off!" I yelled at him. What if a person had been in there?
"Yep!" he tossed me the arm. "Plastic." He said it like it explained everything to me.
"Very clever, nice trick! Who were they then? Employees? Is this a coworker thing?" I asked him.
"Why would it be your coworkers? Did you do something to them to make them angry? He asked turning slightly as though to get a better look at me.
"I don't know…".
"Well you said it! Why employees?"
"Cause… to get that many people dressed up and being silly… they gotta be employees playing a trick on me. They all know I don't like it down here, so that would be a good way of getting me to laugh every time I was here." I explained. The man just grinned at me.
"That makes since! Well done!" he turned back around to face the door.
"Thanks." I smiled at him.
"They're not your coworkers." He sounded serious.
"Whoever they are, when Wilson finds them, he's gunna call the police." I told him.
"Who's Wilson." He turned back to me confused.
"Chief electrician."
"Wilson's dead." He stepped out of the lift with me following me.
"What?"
"Hold on!" he said pushing me to the side. "Mind your eyes." He did something to the lift causing it to spark then walked away.
"Who are you, then? Who's that lot down there? I said, who are they?" I ran to catch up with him.
"They're made of plastic. Living plastic creatures. They're being controlled by a rely device in the roof. Which would be a great big problem if I didn't have this." He showed me an electronic device. "So!" he opened the fire exit for me. "I'm going to go up there and blow them up, and I might die in the process. But don't worry about me, no. Go home, go on! Go and have your lovely beans on toast." I went through the door looking back at him. "Don't tell anyone about this, because if you do, you'll get them killed." I nodded my head as he shut the door behind him. I turned away to go home, shocked by all I had learned, when the door opened again.
"I'm the Doctor, by the way, what's your name?"
"Ashlee."
"Nice to meet you, Ashlee. Run for your life." He shut the door again and I ran. I was so distracted I nearly got myself run over by a taxi as I ran. I was just so focused on trying to get as far away as possible from the building. As I looked back one last time, I saw the top floor blow up. I then ran home.
At home News 24 was on the television. Mum was on the phone talking to someone and Rose was sitting on the edge of the sofa, watching the report. I walked in just in time to hear the reporter.
"The whole of Central London has been closed off as police investigate the fire. Earlier reports in the…" I tossed the dummy arm onto the chair next to Rose as mum walked in holding a phone to her ear.
"I know, it's on the telly! It's everywhere! We're still waiting to…" when she saw me she dropped the phone a held me as close as she could. Rose jumped up making it a family hug.
"I'll go and make you some tea, okay sweetheart?" I just nodded my head. She picked up the phone and continued talking about my luck at having been able to walk in the door. Rose took me over to the sofa and held me gently as though I would break. She kept asking me questions about what had happened and I kept avoiding them. When mum came back she handed me the mug.
"Honestly, it's aged her. Skin like an old bible. Walking in now you'd think I was HER daughter! Oh, and here's himself…" Rose and I looked at the doorway to see Mickey.
"I've been phoning your mobile, you could've been dead! It's on the news and everything! I can't believe that your shop went up!" he told Rose puller her into a hug away from me.
"I'm alright, honestly, I'm fine! Don't make a fuss. Besides, Ash was there, not me." She told him making them both look at me.
"Well, what happened?" he asked me.
"I don't know." I told him.
"What was it though, what caused it?" he kept pestering me.
"I wasn't in the shop, I was outside. I didn't see anything…" I told him remembering what the Doctor told me about getting people killed if I told them anything. That was when Mum walked in holding the phone to me.
"It's Debbie on the other end, she knows a man from the Mirror – five hundred quid for an interview!"
"Oh that's brilliant! Give it here!" I grabbed it and hung up on Debbie.
"Well, you've gotta find some way of making money. Both your jobs are kaput and I'm not bailing you out." The phone rang again. "Beth! She's alive!" mum answered it leaving the room. "I tell ya, sue for compensation! They were within seconds of death…"
"What are you drinking? Tea? No, no, no good, that's no good. You're in shock, you need something stronger." Mickey said taking my mug away.
"Why" I asked, wanting my mug back. I wasn't really drinking the tea but it was something to hold on to so my hands didn't fidget.
"You deserve a proper drink, you, me and Rose, we're going down the pub, my treat. How about it?" Mickey said pulling Rose up and holding his hand for me.
"Is there a match on?" Rose asked smiling while I just stared at his hand.
"I'm just thinking about you and your sister, babe!" Rose kept smiling at him and I shifted my eyes to the telly, watching the news about Henricks hoping the Doctor made it out.
"There's a match on, ain't there." She kept smiling at him, doing there cuddly couple.
"Well, that's not the point. We could catch the last five minutes." He almost begged.
"Go on then. I'm fine, really. Go. Get rid of that..." she gestured to the arm I had thrown on the chair. Mickey pointed to his lips and Rose gave him a kiss. He pushed her back onto the sofa next to me and they laugh. He got up to go and Rose put a leg out to trip him up. When he righted himself Mickey picked up the arm and waved at us with it.
"Buh Bye!"
"Bye!" Rose said while I just waved. Mickey pretended to strangle himself with the arm then left. Rose shook her head fondly and turned her attention back to the news.
"...fire then spread throughout the store... there is very little chance of saving the infrastructure..." Not to long later I went to bed, dreaming about the strange man with his leather jacket.
The next morning at 7:30 my alarm went. I turned it off and sat up in my red sheeted bed.
"There's no point in getting up, sweetheart. You've got no job to go to." Mum called to both me and Rose. I went ahead and got up and put on a red tank with black pants and my black heeled boots. I calmed my mane and put on my eye make-up. I went to have breakfast in the living room with my family as mum spoke to both Rose and myself.
"There's Finches... you could try them. They've always got jobs." Mum tried
"Oh, great. The butchers." Rose said.
"Well it might do you good! That shop was giving you airs and graces. And I'm not joking about getting compensation - you've had genuine shock and trauma! Arianna got two thousand quid off the council just because the old man behind the desk said she looked Greek! I know she IS Greek, but that's not the point - it's a valid claim." Mum said walking to her room to get dressed. I turned when I heard the cat flap move and stood up heading to the door.
"Mum, you're such a liar, I told you to nail that cat flap down. We're going to get strays!" Rose told her.
"I did it weeks back!" mum called back.
"No, you thought about it!" I told her. I saw the screws had fallen onto the floor. Then the cat flap moved, violently. I jumped from the shock, and then poked the cat flap open to see who was on the other side only to I see the Doctor's face. I gasped and jumped up quickly opening the door.
"What're you doing here?" he asked me.
"I live here." I told him like it should have been obvious.
"Well, what do you do that for?" he asked me.
"Because I do! And I'm only at home because someone blew up my job." I reminded him. The Doctor pulled out this silver rod that made a whirring sound.
"Must've got the wrong signal. You're not plastic, are you?" He knocked on my forehead. "No, bonehead. Bye, then!" He made to go, but I grabbed his arm and pulled him back inside.
"You, inside. Right now." I shut the door behind us.
"Who is it?" mum asked me and I poked my head into mum's bedroom.
"It's about last night, he's part of the inquiry. Give us 10 minutes." I told her before walking away from them.
"She deserves compensation." Mum told him when I left her doorway.
"Huh, we're talking millions." The Doctor told her.
"Don't mind the mess. Do you want a coffee?" I asked him when I saw him in the living room.
"Ash who's he?" Rose asked me.
"Might as well, thanks! Just milk." He smiled at me and I turned to Rose with a small smile on my face.
"Rose could you put a pot on? Please, and close the door and window. Thanks." Rose went into the kitchen and started making coffee with a look on her face.
"So what happened last night? How did you get out?" The Doctor picked up a gossip magazine.
"That won't last, he's gay and she's an alien."
"Look, I'm not blaming you, even if it was just some sort of joke that went wrong." I told him. The Doctor picked up a book and flicked through it.
"Sad ending." He tossed it back down.
"They said on the news they'd found a body, was that Wilson's?" The Doctor picked up an envelope and read it.
"Ashlee Tyler." He looked in mirror. "Ahh, could've been worse!" he proded his large ears "Look at me' ears."
"You act as though you've never seen yourself in a mirror." I said as the Doctor shuffled a pack of cards.
"Luck be a lady!" he said looking at me. I just smiled at him. The Doctor shuffled the cards again and manages to make them all go flying. "Maybe not."
"I want you to explain everything." I told him sitting on the arm of the chair. We suddenly heard scuffling from behind sofa.
"What's that then? You got a cat?" he asked me.
"No..." I told him. "We did have, but there's these strays, the come in off the estate." The Doctor leans behind the sofa and the dummy's arm leaps out and grabs him by the neck. "Oh, my God." I grabbed the arm trying to pull it off. Rose choose that time to wander in with the coffee. Behind her, the Doctor was being strangled viciously by the hand while we tried in vain to fight it off. Rose didn't quite seem to register that the Doctor was being harassed by the rubber hand.
"I told Mickey to chuck that out..." She said putting the coffee down on the table. "Honestly, give a man a plastic hand, I'm surprised you're playing with it, Ash... anyway, I don't even know your name... what was it?"
The Doctor threw the hand off and it flies across the room attaching itself to my face. I screamed and the Doctor and Rose leaped up and tried to pull it off. The Doctor, Rose and I crash onto the coffee table, breaking it, and roll onto the floor. The Doctor finally got it off my face and pushed me and Rose back onto the sofa as he got out his silver tube, disabling the hand.
"It's alright, I've stopped it. There you go, you see?" he tossed it to her. "'Armless." I started laughing at him.
"Do you think?" I said in between giggles. Rose used the arm to whack him on the shoulder.
"Ow!" he rubbed his now sore shoulder. The Doctor took the arm from her then walked out and started running down the stairs, Rose and I right behind him.
"Hold on a minute, you can't just go swanning off." I called to him.
"Yes I can. Here I am, this is me, swanning off. See ya!" he said waving back at us.
"That arm was moving, it tried to kill my sister!" Rose yelled at him.
"Ten out of ten for observation."
"You can't just walk away, that's not fair! You've got to tell me what's going on." I said walking close to him.
"No I don't." we reached the bottom of the stairs and went through the doors.
"Alright then. I'll go to the police. I'll tell everyone." Rose threatened.
"Rose if you do that, people could die." I told her.
"So, his choice. Tell us, or I'll start talking." I looked at her in shock.
"Is that supposed to sound tough?" The Doctor asked her.
"Sort of." Rose answered
"Doesn't work." He started walking off again.
"Who are you?" I asked as we followed again.
"I told you! The Doctor." He sounded like he was tired of saying his title.
"Yeah. But Doctor what?" I asked.
"Just the Doctor."
"The Doctor?"
"Hello!"
"Is that supposed to sound impressive?" Rose asked him.
"Sort of."
"Come on. You can tell me. I've seen enough. Are you the police?" I asked
"No. I was just passing through. I'm a long way from home." He sounded sad when he spoke of his home.
"But what has Ash done wrong? How comes those plastic things keep coming after her?" she asked him.
"Oh! Suddenly the entire world revolves around your sister! Ashlee was just an accident, got in the way, that's all." he told us.
"It tried to kill her!" she said
"It was after me, not her! Last night, in the shop, I was there, you blundered in. Almost ruined the whole thing. This morning, I was tracking it down, it was tracking me down... the only reason it fixed on you is that you met me." He told me.
"So, what you're saying is, the entire world revolves around you." I told him.
"Sort of, yeah." he said.
"You're full of it!" I told him smiling.
"Sort of, yeah." He said grinning back.
"But, all this plastic stuff - who else knows about it?" I asked.
"No one." he said.
"What, you're on your own?" I frowned at him.
"Well, who else is there? I mean, you lot, all you do is eat chips, go to bed, and watch telly! When all the time, underneath you, there's a war going on!" I took the arm off him.
"Okay, start from the beginning. If you're gonna go with this living plastic how did you kill it?" I asked him.
"The thing controlling it projects life into the arm. I cut off the signal, dead." he told me.
"So that's radio control?" Rose asked. I had forgotten she was here.
"Thought control. Are you alright?" he looked over to me worried.
"Yeah. So, who's controlling it, then?" I asked.
"Long story." he said avoiding the question all together.
"But what's it all for? I mean, shop window dummies... what's that about? Is someone trying to take over Britain's shops?" We all laughed at Rose's comment. Who would want to take over our shops?
"No." The Doctor laughed out.
"I know." I told him laughing. "It's not a price war." We started laughing again but quit when he turned serious. "They want to overthrow the human race and destroy you. Do you believe me."
"No." we said.
"But you're still listening." We stopped walking which didn't stop him at all. I ran to catch him again.
"Really though, Doctor. Tell me – who are you?" I asked once more. This time, the Doctor stopped and turned to me.
"Do you know like we were saying? About the Earth revolving?" he walked back to us. "It's like when you were a kid. The first time they tell you the world's turning and you just can't quiet believe it because everything looks like it's standing still, I can feel it." He took my hand in his, and it felt right. The heat from his hand burned my own, but I didn't care. "The turn of the Earth. The ground beneath our feet is spinning at a thousand miles an hour, and the entire planet is hurtling around the sun at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour, and I can feel it. We're falling through space, you and me. Clinging to the skin of this tiny little world, and if we let go…" he let go of my hand and it froze. "That's who I am. Now, forget me, Ashlee and Rose Tyler." He took the arm and waved at us with it. "Go home." And with that he walked away from us towards a blue box.
"Come on, Ash. Let's go." Rose pulled my arm towards the estate. After we rounded the corner we heard a noise. I ran back around the corner to where he was only to see the blue box he was walking towards gone. I looked around for it, but when I couldn't find it I just walked back to Rose.
"I want to look something up on Mickey's computer." I told Rose, walking back towards the flats.
"Do you really think he's on the internet?" She asked me as we walked.
"Only one way to find out." I told her walking quickly.
When we got to his flat Rose knocked on the door to prevent me from barging in as soon as he opened.
"Yahey, there's my woman! And her constant shadow!" he said opening the door for us, slapping Rose's bum in the process. "Kit off!"
"Shut up." She said smiling and giving him a kiss.
"Coffee?" he asked us as we walked in his flat. Rose stood in front of me so I wouldn't push him down to get to his computer.
"Yeah, just me and only if you wash the mug. And I don't mean rinse, I mean wash. Can we use your computer?" Rose asked walking slightly past him as he went into the kitchen and I went to his room.
"Yeah. Any excuse to get in the bedroom." he joked with her as she followed me.
I turned the computer on and typed "Doctor" into a search engine. No relevant results were found. I typed in "Doctor Living Plastic". Still nothing.
"Why are you so ubsessed with this bloke? I've never seen you so interested in a man before." She asked me.
"There's something about him, I can't explain it. It's like I was waiting for him to fall from the sky. I sound like a high school kid with a crush, don't I?" I laughed at myself and my foolishness.
"You sound like I wanna sound." I looked at her after she said that to see a large smile on her face.
"Thank you." I turned back around and typed "Doctor Blue Box". The first result reads "Doctor Who - do you know this man? Contact Clive here..." I clicked on it and a webpage with a blurry photograph of the Doctor and the words "Have you seen this man? Contact Clive" are presented to me. I clicked "Contact Clive".
Mickey, Rose and I were sitting in the car.
"You're not coming in! He's safe, he's got a wife and kids." I told Mickey, I wasn't going to stop Rose. She was to stubborn
"Yeah but who told you that? He did. That's exactly what an Internet lunatic murderer would say." Mickey told us, trying to prove his point. Rose and I got out of the car anyway, grinning. Mickey didn't look too happy, and gave a man putting out his rubbish the evils. I knocked on the door of a house and a young boy answered it.
"Uh, hello, I've come to see Clive? We've been emailing." I told him.
"Dad! It's one of your nutters!" The boy called out into the house and a man appeared.
"Sorry. Hello. You must be Ashlee. I'm Clive. Obviously!" We all shook hands.
"Hi, I'm Ashlee and this is my sister Rose." I introduced us.
"I better tell you now - my boyfriend's waiting in the car, just in case you're going to kill me!" We all laughed at how that sounded.
"No, good point. No murders." Clive said waving at Mickey who nodded back with distrust in his eyes.
"Who is it?" a woman asked coming down the stairs.
"Oh it's something to do with the Doctor! She's been reading the website. Please come through, I'm in the shed." Rose and I followed him to the shed while the woman went to the door carrying a washing basket.
"She? She read a website about the Doctor? She's a she?" she asked closing the door.
When we got to the shed, Clive started showing us around. It had quit looking like a shed to become a shrine to the Doctor.
"A lot of this stuff's quite sensitive, I couldn't just send it to you. People might intercept it, if you know what I mean. If you dig enough – keep a lively mind – this Doctor keeps cropping up all over the place. Political diaries, conspiracy theories, even ghost stories. No first name, no last name, just the Doctor. Always the Doctor, and the title seems to have been passed down from father to son, it appears to be an inheritance. That's your Doctor there, isn't it?" he pointed to a photo of the Doctor on a computer screen behind us. I turned to look at it instantly recognizing the face.
"Yeah." I told him with a slight nod.
"I tracked it down to the Washington public archive last year. The online photo's enhanced, but if we look at the original…" He showed us a series of photo of the Doctor standing in a crowd. The last picture showed President Kennedy smiling and waving in a car next to his wife.
"November the 22nd, 1963. The assassination of President Kennedy."
"Must be his father…" Rose said while I stayed quit. That couldn't have been his father, they looked too much alike.
"Going further back, April 1912." He went and brought us a photo album trying to convince us that this was the same Doctor we had just seen just moments ago. "This is a photo of the Daniels family, Southampton. And friend." He pointed to a man in a suit, the Doctor. "This was taken the day before they were due to sail off for the New World. On the Titanic. And for some unknown reason, they cancelled the trip and survived. And…" he showed us a sketch. "1883. Another Doctor. And look – the same lineage. He's identical. He's one washed up on the coast of Sumatra on the very day Krakatoa exploded. The Doctor is a legend woven throughout history. When disaster comes, he's there. He has a storm in his wake. And he has one constant companion."
"Who's that?" I asked.
"Death. If the Doctor's back, if you've seen him, Ashlee, then one thing's for certain – we're all in danger. If he's singled you out, if the Doctor's making house calls, then God help you."
"Who is he? Who do you think he is?" I asked him.
"I think he's the same man. I think he's immortal. I think he's an alien from another world." I just looked into his eyes as he said this. He honestly thought the Doctor was an immortal alien.
"Thanks you, Clive. You've really helped me out." I told him turning with Rose to leave. As we left the house and got closer to the car Rose started talking to Mickey, who was just sitting in the car with a smile on his face.
"Alright! He's a nutter! Off his head! Complete online conspiracy freak. You win!" we got into the car with her having shotgun and me sitting behind them.
"What're we going to do tonight? I fancy a pizza." She asked us.
"Pizzaaa! P-p-p-pizza!" Mickey said starting the car.
"… or Chinese…"
"Pizza!" Mickey decided. We then drove off but he didn't drive straight the whole way. I'm surprised we didn't get pulled over by an officer.
At the restaurant we sat at a table for four with them sitting across from each other.
"Do you think I should try the hospital? Suki said they had a few jobs going in the canteen. That's it then, dishing out ships, I could do A Levels, I dunno. It's all Jimmy Stone's fault. I only left school because of him, and look where he ended up. What do you think?" Rose asked eating some chips.
"So, where did you meet this Doctor?" Mickey asked turning to me.
"I'm sorry, wasn't I talking about me for a second?" Rose asked him.
"Because, I reckon it started back at the shop, am I right? Is he something to do with that?" Mickey ignored her and continued looking at me strangely.
"No." I told him.
"Come on."
"Sort of." I finally admitted, but I didn't want to talk about it to anyone.
"What was he doing here?"
"I'm not going on about him, Mickey. I'm not." I finally told him.
"Look I know it sounds daft but, I don't think he's safe. I think he's dangerous." Rose told Mickey while looking at me. I knew she meant for me to stop looking, but now I don't think I ever would.
"But you can trust me sweetheart! Babe, sugar, darling, sugar." Rose and I looked at him confused. "You can tell me anything. Tell me about the Doctor and what he's planning and I can help you. Because that's all I really wanna do." He said turning to me again.
"What're doing that for?" Rose asked him.
"Your champagne." The waiter said holding a bottle next to Mickey's head. His voice caught me off guard.
"We didn't order any champagne." He waved the waiter off. "Where's the Doctor?" he asked me again grabbing my hand and crushing it.
"Ma'am, your champagne." I looked up at the waiter to tell him off but was presently surprised to see the Doctor next to me.
"It's not ours, Mickey, what is it? What's wrong?" Rose grabbed the hand Mickey had on mine.
"I need to find out how much you know, so where is he?" he squeezed my hand harder.
"Doesn't anybody want this champagne?" I looked up to see the Doctor standing next to me holding the champagne.
"Look, we didn't order i—Ah. Gotcha." I looked at Mickey to him smiling at the Doctor and felt him release my hand, which I quickly pulled off the table and held close to my chest. I looked up at the Doctor to see him shaking the bottle.
"Don't mind me. I'm just toasting the happy couple. On the house!" the Doctor popped the cork out and it hit Mickey squarely on the forehead. His forehead absorbed the cork and he spit it back onto the table. I quickly stood up in front of the Doctor who moved me behind him.
"Anyway." Mickey's hand turned into a club and he smashed the table in. Rose screamed and ran the other pulling me with her. The Doctor grabbed Mickey's head and pulled it off.
"Don't think that's gonna stop me." A couple at a table close to them screamed but all the Doctor was grin at the head. Rose turned and pressed the fire bell.
"Everyone out! Out now!" Rose called to everyone and immediately everyone started running for the exit. The headless Mickey stayed inside, blindly smashing table with his clubbed hand. Rose, The Doctor and I ran through the kitchen and out the back exit with the headless Mickey right behind us. When we were safe the Doctor pointed his metal rod towards the door while Rose ran to escape the yard we were in and I stood between them, not wanting to leave either behind, staring at the blue police box wondering how it moved.
"Open the gate! Use that tube thing, come on!" Rose called to the Doctor.
"What, this? This is a sonic screwdriver." He waved the screwdriver in his hand then put it in his pocket.
"Use it!" she commanded.
"Nah. Tell you what, let's go in here." He stopped in front of me for a moment then went and unlocked the police box. Headless Mickey was beginning to make dents in the metal door behind us from the other side. Rose ran in front of the blue box while I followed the Doctor in.
"We can't hid inside a wooden box! It's gonna get us! Doctor!" I heard Rose calling to us as I slowly started walking towards the middle of the room. Rose ran in not long after I did and slammed the door behind her, took a few steps toward the center then ran out.
"It's gunna follow us." I said walking up to him as he worked around the console and Rose came back in.
"The assembled hoards of Genghis Khan couldn't get through that door, and believe me, they've tried. Now, shut up a minute." The Doctor told me. Rose stayed near the door and I stayed close to the end of the railing closest to the console area. "You see, the arm was to simple, but the head's perfect. I can use it to trace the signal back to the original source. Right." He turned to us and gave us his full attention. "Where do you want to start?"
"Um…the inside's bigger than the outside?" Rose started.
"Yes."
"It's alien."
"Yup."
"Are you alien?" I finally spoke up from my spot.
"Yes, is that alright?" he asked me.
"Yeah," I said quickly nodding my head.
"It's called the TARDIS, this thing. T-A-R-D-I-S, that's Time And Relative Dimension In Space." Rose started crying and I turned and walked to her and held her close. "That's okay. Culture shock, happens to the best of us." The Doctor said, grinning.
"Did they kill him? Mickey? Did they kill Mickey? Is he dead?" Rose asked him.
"Oh… didn't think of that." He looked down confused.
"He's my boyfriend. You pulled off his head – they copied him and you didn't even think? And now you're going to just let him melt?!" she pointed at the head shouting at the man in front of us.
"Melt?" he turned in time to see Mickey's head melting with a bubbling sound. "Oh, no no no no no NO!" He started running frantically around the console, pressing buttons and pulling levers.
"What are you doing?" I asked letting go of Rose and running up to him.
"Reviving the signal, it's fading! Wait I've got it…" he looked at a screen in front of him. "No no no no no no NO!" the TARDIS shook violently making me grab on to the console as the noise I heard earlier kept going off. "Almost there! Almost there! Here we go!" I grinned looking at me and I couldn't help but smile back. The noise stopped and the Doctor held his hand out for me and I didn't hesitate to take it. We ran out the TARDIS without another word.
"You can't go out there, it's not safe!" Rose shouted at us, following us out. I was looking around noticing no one looking at us strangely but also looking to see where we'd gone.
"I lost the signal, I got so close." He leaned against the railing.
"We've moved! Does it fly?" Rose asked him looking around also.
"Disappears there, reappears here, you wouldn't understand." He said waving her off.
"But if we're somewhere else, what about that headless thing? It's still on the loose." I reminded him.
"It melted with the head, are you going to witter on all night?" he gave us a look.
"I'll have to tell his mother..." I felt bad, I had forgotten about Mickey in all this new information. The Doctor must have also because he looked at her questioningly.
"Mickey! I'll have to tell his mother he's dead, and you just went and forgot him, again!" Rose lectured him but he just rolled his eyes unconcerned about Mickey.
The Doctor rolls his eyes, unconcerned.
"You were right, you ARE alien." And with that said, Rose walked away.
"Look, if I did forget some kid called Mickey—" The Doctor started.
"Yeah, he's not a kid." I told him, watching Rose walk away from us.
"It's because I'm trying to save the life of every stupid ape blundering on top of this planet, alright?" He asked me and I turned to him glaring.
"Alright?!" I yelled back at him.
"Yes! It is!" I shook my head disbelievingly at him and this stupid argument.
"If you are an alien, then how comes you sound like you're from the North?" I asked him.
"Lots of planets have a North." He said folding his arm indignantly and looked away from me.
"What's a police public call box?" I asked him looking at the outside of his ship.
"It's a telephone box from the 1950s." he patted the TARDIS fondly, grinning at me. "It's a disguise." I smiled and shook my head again.
"Okay. And this living plastic, what's it got against us?" I asked him getting down to business.
"Nothing, it loves you. You've got such a good planet. Lots of smoke and oil, plenty of toxins and dioxins in the air... perfect. Just what the Nestene Consciousness needs. It's food stock was destroyed in the war, all its protein plants rotted, so Earth... dinner!" he said still grinning.
"Any way of stopping it?" I asked a little worried about Mum and Rose. The Doctor pulled out a tube of blue liquid from his jacket grinning.
"Anti-plastic!"
"Anti-plastic..."
"Anti-plastic! But first I've got to find it. How can you hide something that big in a city this small?" he asked looking around again.
"Hold on... hide what?" I asked following him.
"The transmitter. The Consciousness is controlling every single piece of plastic so it needs a transmitter to boost the signal." He looked back at me.
"What's it look like?" I asked wanting to help him.
"Like a transmitter, round and massive, slap bang in the middle of London." He paced around, agitated, looking around for a clue. "A huge circular metal structure, like a dish." He stood facing me, his back to the railing of the bridge. Behind him, the London Eye loomed 450 ft above us, and he didn't even notice. "Like a wheel. Close to where we're standing. Must be COMPLETELY invisible." I looked at the Eye behind him, pointed at him with my eyes. "What?" I nodded towards the Eye. The doctor turned around, then back to me. "What?" I shook my head smiling, still looking at the Eye. He turned around failing to make the connection with what he saw and said. "What is it? What?" I didn't say a word and stared at the object behind him. The Doctor turned around and turned back to me. "Oh," he turned back to it then back to me once more. "Fantastic!" And with that said we were off running. On the bridge he grabbed my hand, the Doctor and I ran across LondonBridge towards the London Eye.
When we arrived at the Eye we stopped at the bottom.
"Think of it. Plastic, all over the world. Every artificial thing waiting to come alive. The shop window dummies, the phones, the wires, the cables..." The Doctor started.
"The breast implants..." I grimaced in pain at the thought of those coming to life
"Still, we've found the transmitter. The Consciousness must be somewhere underneath." The Doctor ignored me. I ran off to find the entrance to a manhole at the foot of the wall I leaned over.
"What about down here?" I asked him as he ran to join me.
"Looks good to me." He grinned at me and we ran down the stairs to the manhole. The Doctor took the lid off it, and red light and smoke poured out. The Doctor went down first making sure it was safe. When he confirmed that he called out to me and I made my way down. When I was on my way I felt hands on my waist the rest of the way down. I turned to see the Doctor staring at me. He then turned and opened the door to another chamber and we went down some more steps. The Doctor pointed to a huge, orange wobbling mass in the middle of the chamber.
"The Nestene Consciousness, that's it, inside the vat. A living, plastic creature." He told me as we stood by the railing.
"Well, then. Tip in your anti-plastic and let's go." I said to him.
"I'm not here to kill it. I've got to give it a chance." We went down some more steps, closer to the Consciousness. The Doctor leaned over the railing and addressed the Consciousness.
"I seek audience with the Nestene Consciousness under peaceful contract, according to convention 15 of the Shadow Proclamation." The Doctor called to it. The Consciousness flobbled around a bit. "Thank you. That I might have permission to approach." I paced behind him until I spotted a huddling mass and ran towards it.
"Oh, my God! Mickey! It's okay! It's alright!" I squatted next to him looking him over.
"That thing down there, the liquid, Ash - it can talk!" he told me.
"You're stinking! Doctor, they kept him alive!" I called out to him.
"Yeah, that was always a possibility. Keep him alive to maintain the copy." He said coming closer to us before standing on an edge overlooking the Consciousness.
"You knew that and you never said?" I asked him slightly angry he never mentioned that my sister's boyfriend may be alive.
"Can we keep the domestics outside, thank you?" I glared at him and helped Mickey to his feet. "Am I addressing the Consciousness? Thank you. If I might observe, you infiltrated this civilization by means of warped, shunt technology. So, may I suggest, with the greatest respect, that you shunt off?" the plastic globbed to him. "Oh don't give me that, it's an invasion! Plain and simple! Don't talk about constitutional rights!" It almost seemed as though the plastic was getting angry with him. "I - am - talking! This planet is just starting. These stupid little people have only just learnt how to walk, but they're capable of so much more. I'm asking you on their behalf - please, just go." The Doctor asked nicely but two plastic men approached him from behind.
"Doctor!" I called out to him as the men grabbed him. One of them took the anti-plastic out of his jacket pocket.
"That was just insurance! I wasn't going to USE it." The Doctor told the plastic below him but if just globbed angrily. "I was not attacking you. I'm here to help. I'm not your enemy. I swear, I'm not... what do you mean?" Doors above us opened revealing the TARDIS to us. "Oh, oh no - honestly, no! Yes, that's my ship." The plastic roared at him again. "That's not true. I should know, I was there. I fought in the war - it wasn't my fault! I couldn't save your world! I couldn't save any of them!" The Doctor told him.
"What's it doing?!" I asked him, getting scared for him
"It's the TARDIS! The Nestene has identified its superior technology - it's terrified! It's going to the final base. It's starting the invasion! Get out, Ashlee! Just leg it! Now!" He begged me. I dialed Mum on my mobile.
"Mum?!" I asked when she answered.
"Oh, there you are, I was just gonna phone. You can get compensation. I said so. I've got this document thing off the police - don't thank me!" she told me.
"Where are you, mum?" I asked her.
"I'm in town! Oh, look there's Rose! Rose!" She called to my sister.
Go home! Just get her and go home, right now!" I told her worried for them.
Darling, you're breaking up, look; we're just going to do a bit of late night shopping. We'll see you later. Tara!" she hung up on me.
"Mum?! Mum!" I put my mobile away and the Consciousness did something.
"It's the activation signal! It's transmitting!" The Doctor told us.
"The end of the world..."
"Get out, Ashlee! Just get out! Run!" he called to me as the ceiling falls in on the stairs.
"The stairs have gone!" I told him. I remembered the TARDIS and pulled Mickey with me and tried desperately to get into it. "I haven't got the key!" I turned and looked around.
"We're gonna die!" Mickey said looking up at the ceiling watching it crack. I watched the Doctor struggle to get to the anti-plastic.
"Just leave him!" Mickey told me. "There's nothing you can do!" I ran to a chain and picked up an axe.
"I've got no A Levels. No job... No future. But I tell you what I have got. JerichoStreetJuniorSchool under 16s gymnastic team." The chain came loose and I grabbed it. "I got the gold!" I swung across the gap over the Consciousness kicking the plastic men holding the Doctor into the Nestene, anti-plastic and all. The Consciousness started to writhe and scream under me. I landed safely in the Doctor's arms on my return to where I started.
"Now we're in trouble." The Doctor grinned at me. As the Consciousness started to explode the Doctor and I ran to the TARDIS. I grinned at the Consciousness before going in and closing the door running to the console as the shaking started up with us leaving the London Eye. When we landed Mickey ran backwards out of the TARDIS and fell over, looking terrified. He backed against the wall in fear. I stepped out and rang my mum. When they answered the phone she was frantic.
"Ash! Ash! Don't go out of the house, it's not safe!" I laughed in my relief to hear her voice and Rose's in the back ground.
"There were all of these things! And they were shooting! And they—" I hung up before Rose finished her sentence, smiling.
"A fat lot of good you were!" I told Mickey walking over to him and he whimpered.
"Nestene Consciousness?" I turned to see him leaning on the doorway of the TARDIS as he clicked his fingers. "Easy."
"You were useless in there. You'd be dead if it wasn't for me." I said teasingly.
"Yes, I would. Thank you. Right then! I'll be off! Unless, uh... I don't know... you could come with me." I looked at him and put my hands in my pockets. "This box isn't just a London hopper, you know, it goes anywhere in the universe free of charge."
"Don't! He's an alien! He's a thing!" Mickey said holding onto my arm.
"He's NOT invited. What do you think? You could stay here and fill your life with work and food and sleep, or you could go, uh... anywhere." I was temped to say yes.
"Is it always this dangerous?" I asked.
"Yeah." He nodded his head at me. That much danger and yet it made it even more tempting to just run to him. Mickey put his arms around one of my legs like a child begging his mother not to leave him behind.
"Yeah, I can't... I've um... gotta go and find my mum and Rose um... someone's gotta look after this stupid lump... making he doesn't do anything with my sister…" I laughed lightly and patted Mickey on the back. "So..."
"Okay. See you around." I opened my mouth to stop him from leaving me here and the Doctor never took his eyes off me, but he still backed up and closed the door. I watched the TARDIS disappear slowly.
"Come on, let's go find your girlfriend." I helped him up and we walked away. However, the sound of the TARDIS engines was getting louder again. We spun around as it reappeared. The Doctor popped his head out.
"By the way - did I mention, it also travels in time?" He grinned and went back in leaving the door ajar. I turned to Mickey.
"Tell Rose, thanks." I told him
"Thanks for what?" he asked me.
"She'll know." I ran into the TARDIS with a broad smile on my face.
Next time on The Doctor's Girl:
"This is the year 5 billion. This is the day... hold on." The Doctor looked down at his watch. The Sun expanded. "Welcome to the end of the world." I looked up at him.
"Who the hell are you?" I turned to see a blue man talking to us.
"Oh, I'm the Doctor, this is Ashlee Tyler. She's my plus one. That all right?" The Doctor asked the man.
"Representing the forest of Cheem, we have Trees. The Moxx of Balhoon. The Face of Bo. The Last Human, the Lady Cassandra O'Brien."
"Oh, now, don't stare. Look how thin I am." Cassandra told everyone, I was just shocked at what I saw. The ship shuddered.
"That's not supposed to happen..." he told me grinning.
