Tears of Time

Episode 1

For Time Begins Anew - Part 1:

Hey, guys! This is my first crack at fanfiction in quite some time, so thanks for reading! This is structured similarly to an actual series of Doctor Who, with 12 episodes total - each episode will be a different story, and each story will be divided into 4-6 chapters. I've come up with some interesting ideas, so stay tuned for alien worlds, historical sagas, dabbles into some really interesting mythology, and more. Reviews are always appreciated, as I lack motivation, and they give me that little push I need to keep going. Thank you so much for checking this out, and enjoy the show!

The lady stared up at the stars, the brilliant worlds burning and pulsing before her. As they slowly made their way across the universe, the woman fixated on the blackness that filled the gaps, and she wondered everything.

Leaning up against a rusted and rickety guardrail, Lyra Schafer saw the magnificence of the heavens revealed to her from the balcony of her 3rd story laboratory. Oftentimes, she would work long nights, nearly driven mad by the monotony of switches and lights and metal, and she would decide to rest her eyes on that which always astounded her - the nighttime sky. She could stay there for hours, contempt with letting her eyes wander from star to star, imagining what life could be out there. Only a glance at her feet beneath a black and white gown wrapped in a protective apron brought her back to reality. No matter how close she felt to the stars, the cruel realities of 1850 never seemed to end. With a despondent sigh, Lyra turned back to face the doorway to the laboratory. She pulled on the gilded handle, and was met with her life's work.

Lyra figured it was about time to make her final preparations. She pulled out her pocket watch for a quick glance - it was 9:45, almost time for her presentation. Across the laboratory, bits and pieces of every sort cluttered dusty workbenches, chalkboards were furiously marked with long sticks of chalk worn away into stubs, and candles wound down to nothing deep into the night. Vats of chemicals bubbled and fizzed, and tools of all shapes and sizes hung upon the pale walls. Sometimes, these images would haunt Lyra's dreams, yet she always found refuge in her thoughts of the stars. They were what kept her grounded, and helped her as she realized her calling - creation.

A booming thud nearly knocked the well-used wooden door at the face of the laboratory off its hinges. Lyra jumped, nearly spilling a container of potent chemicals onto her magnum opus - what her presentation was to cover. Resting on a wide workspace in front of her, a beige dropcloth coated a vaguely rectangular shape that stretched up into the rafters of the room. Lyra raced to open the door, nearly collapsing over a pile of papers resting by a desk, unable to be placed there due to clutter. In a swift yet regrettable motion, Lyra opened the door, forcefully swinging it into the adjacent wall. Outside the wall stood two men, one burly and one thin, dressed in exquisite suits and top hats. The lanky man held a thin journal and a dripping fountain pen, in preparation for what was to come. The burly man twitched his moustache, flashing a concerned glance to Lyra.

"Madame, is everything alright?" The burly man asked confusedly.

Pushing herself off of the ground, Lyra let out a nervous chuckle, stuttering over her words. "Y-y-y-yes. Everything's quite alright." she sputtered out, oblivious to the compass which became tangled in her brown hair. "You must be here to judge my acceptance into the committee. Mr. Browning? And Mr. Wilde, I presume? I apologize for the mess I've made," she continued, with a sheepish look glancing to the floor.

The burly man, Mr. Browning, gave her a stern look, replying, "Well, if your organizational skills are as good as your creations you've written to us about, there is no chance of you ever persuading us. Very well, show us what you have produced." The thin man, Mr. Wilde, looked down at his journal bitterly, writing what could only be critical thoughts.

Lyra hurried in front of the massive cloth-covered object, not even bothering to glance behind her. Her only focus was maintaining eye contact with the two men. Browning and Wilde ran a manufacturing plant not far away from Lyra's laboratory in the outskirts of London, near the river Thames. A positive impression upon the men could mean a lifetime of mass-producing her inventions, finally enabling her to make a proper living off of her passion. Lyra desperately wanted to reach out and clamp her trembling arm in place, but restrained her free arm out of fear of the two men. Doing her best to avoid stuttering, Lyra began her presentation.

"Gentlemen, as the owners of Blackstone mill, you must know how imperative proper maintenance of equipment is, particularly that it must not overheat. Overheating could create more injuries than you are liable for, and could be devastating on a wide scale. Thus, I propose a safer way to keep pressing machines and steam engines safe from overheating and collapse. She grabbed the beige cloth and ripped it towards the two men, refusing to break eye contact. Besides, what lay beneath had filled her mind for the past several months - there was no need to even look at it in order to describe it.

Revealed to the two men was a massive tank, filled nearly to the brim with water. Metallic rivets and strips held the entire tank together, and a labyrinth of tubes graced the sides of the tank, leaving the front face clear for viewing. Both men's eyes went wide - Browning's mouth gaped open in disbelief, and Wilde nearly dropped his writing utensils before coming to his senses and furiously scribbling down notes. A sprig of brown hair dropped into Lyra's face, but that was no matter; things were going much better than she ever expected.

Browning was at a loss for words. He managed to spit out, after minutes of stuttering, "H-h-h-how on earth were you able to produce this? It's utterly magnificent! Indescribable!"

With a confident smile stretched across her face, Lyra relished the looks of disbelief of the two men. She replied, "The water in the tank is rich in nutrients and elements hand-selected after weeks of testing in order to provide the best cooling. It circulates in the tubes which wrap around machinery, allowing coo-"

"I am not interested in that balderdash in the slightest!" Browning replied, "How in the world did you obtain that being? I've never seen anything like it!"

"What are you talking about?" Lyra answered, chuckling at the bewilderment of the two men. She turned to face the tank, confident in her abilities: "As you can plainly see he-"

Lyra's smile dropped. There was something there that was not present minutes ago when she covered the tank. Not a minute detail, like an extra pipe or a bubbling leak, but… something else. Staring at her from the depths of the crystalline blue waters was a cephalopod. Lyra pictured the books and articles she had read about these creatures, but none of them matched what lay before her. This one was approximately half a meter long, with white, bony spikes lining the outsides of its 12 tentacles. Large eyes pierced into Lyra's soul, and the being's near-transparent body tapered into two massive flaps beyond the head. They took up nearly all of the cephalopod's body, and Lyra could only imagined what they looked like fully extended. There was no rational explanation for how it could have entered the water-filled tank, as Lyra had not touched the tank for nearly an hour. Before then, the tank was only filled with water.

"What in the Lord's name is that?" Lyra finally managed to say. "It looks like it could be some type of squid, or mollusk, or something of that sort. But never have I seen something as bizarre as this."

Continuing to stare into the waters, Lyra noticed a slight hissing noise. She glanced around her to ensure that her compressed air tanks scattered about were all shut off completely. That was, until she noticed the bubbles trailing from the center of the tentacles. The animal, however strange it was, was alive, and Lyra detected faint signs of movement. She reached her hand towards the pane of glass ahead of her, and rested her hand near the animal's tentacles. As if it was waiting for a cue, the animal sprang to life electrically. Its tentacles flared back towards its mouth, revealing a sharp, stony beak amidst a ring of spikes. But most importantly, the once transparent cephalopod glowed with a ferocity Lyra had never seen in any other animal. A rich blue light rippled through the cephalopod's body, and the massive flaps that Lyra had questioned flapped rhythmically, synchronized with the pulsing lights the animal gave off. Periods of light followed by periods of dimness repeated in a cycle, and Lyra shot back in terror.

"The creature," sputtered Lyra, "I wonder if it is trying to tell us something? Trying to communicate, perhaps?"

Browning was held captive by the majesty of the creature, something unlike any other animal on the Earth, and certainly not like any other one in London. He dug into his deep trouser pockets, scrambling for his billfold. He thrusted faded and wrinkled notes towards a startled Lyra, whose breathing was only now beginning to return to normal. "How much?" he begged, "How much for this creature? It simply must be mine!"

"I'm sorry, but I wished to sell you the tank for your factory, not this… being." Lyra carefully stated. "I cannot tell you how this creature appeared here. It's almost as if it came into the tank by itself, suddenly materializing here. In fact, from what I can observe, it appears that this creature may not have even came from this world at all!" A smile that lit up the room filled Lyra's countenance; the topic of life from other worlds was simply too good to pass up, even in formal conversation.

"I don't believe that nonsense in the slightest! Clearly, you planned this from the beginning! After all, could you imagine? Life beyond our world? There's only just stars and rocks out there! Where could one obtain the water this animal needs to thrive?" Browning punctuated, as Wilde continued his frantic scribblings and musings.

"Well, I suppose you could find it in plenty of places. Ice on Mars, lakes on the moons of Saturn, locked up in comets 'round the sun. But maybe you lot don't know all that quite yet." a charming voice with a clear scottish influence resonated from behind the three. Lyra jumped slightly, causing her heart rate to skip up and down just as it had before. There was a fourth person standing, cast in silhouette form beneath the creaking door frame. Dressed in a top hat and pristine black suit, he stepped forward, gray hairs streaking across his worn and weary face. "Of course, maybe you'll never find out where it came from! It's a shame, really. I go quite a ways back with this chap and his kind."

Browning stared down the tall stranger, and with a determined look stretched over his face, he began; "I don't care who you know, mister. I was here first, and therefore, I possess all the rights to this being! That is, once Ms. Schafer here presents us with an offer for this marvelous creation."

"The tank is for sale, but the creature is not." Lyra replied, colder than ever.

"Well, if the tank is suitable for life of this form, perhaps I can search for one of these beings and house it in your brilliant casing. How much for the tank, then? A year's wages? Two years?" Browning persistently declared.

Lyra's hands began to shake. "A year's wages?" Lyra thought to herself, "more money than I've seen in my life? Can I lose this opportunity?"

The strange, scottish man interjected once more. "Look, I gave you an offer, you two! Don't you want to know where that squishy fellow in there came from? We're talking about a living creature here, not a piece of property to be squandered over!"

The room was silent for a few, critical moments. Browning gazed upon the stranger unhappily, asserting, "Alright. I see just what you're trying to do with me. You want all of that for yourself! You're plannin' on giving her a better offer, aren't you? Well, you can't fool me!"

"Please, mister. I'm not trying to hurt you, or anyone else. I'm not trying to buy anyone out. All I'm asking is that-"

"Frankly, I don't care whatsoever what you ask!" Browning grew red in the face, and shook as he spoke to the man. "If you're trying to drive me out of this deal, consider it done! I don't need this tank or this creature anyway! I could create a million more tanks just like this if I wished, and I could search the seas of the world and find a million of these beings!"

"You've got it all wrong!" The stranger continued. "You don't understand what is in front of you, right now, wriggling around in that tank. That is all I was ever wanting to-"

"Fine! I suppose you want to cheat me out of a deal! I can make a hundred more deals far better than you can, with or without this creation!" Browning pivoted furiously towards Lyra. "Consider our deal over. I refuse to invest. Not with this man scheming and colluding against me!" He motioned for Wilde to join him, and with a final hiss in his tone, he spat out, "Good evening, Ma'am!". The two exited, as Browning swung the rickety door shut behind him, rattling the foundations of the lab.

Lyra turned from the still-vibrating door to the man in the top hat, her gaze as sharp as a sword. Tears began to well in her green eyes, and she stormed towards the man, who was pinned up against a wooden-panelled wall behind him. "My late mother and father taught me how to be a proper lady. They told me never to lay hands on a man I did not give love and consent to. As of now, I may have to make quite an exception on your behalf!"

The man was thrusted forward by his shirt collar, pulled into clear view of the woman's face. "Do you have any idea how much that money could have changed my life?" she angrily continued, "that I've been struggling so much to provide for myself? I thought I could finally make a living through my inventing, and yet you let me down in the end! You have no authority, and certainly no right, to ever set foot in this space again!"

With a tone as calm as when he appeared, the man spoke, "You're asking the wrong question."

"Excuse me?"

"I said, you're asking the wrong question. It's not, 'Do you know what that money could do for me?' No. The real question you should be asking yourself is, 'What the hell is a cephalopod from the oceans of Europa doing in a laboratory in London, 1850?' You humans move past what should make you curious right away, and jump to personal gain. It's really irritating, isn't it?"

"Why can't I ask both questions? Why can't I wonder how my life could be changed by my system?"

After a moment of quiet reflection, the stranger chimed in again: "You've got it all wrong again. Your life isn't going to be changed anytime soon by that tank right there. But that cephalopod is going to transform everything you thought you knew about the universe. I do take it that you've always been fascinated by the heavens and the stars, haven't you?"

"How.. how did you know that?"

"All the clues were there really, I just put them together. And also, I saw you stargazing before those two idiots came in here." The man flashed a wide, tooth-filled smile at Lyra. "I'll be right back. Trust me, you won't miss it!"

And just like that, the man sprinted for the door, vanishing into the night. Lyra tracked him past the frost-stained windows that filled the laboratory, but she could not seem to find him for some time. Gazing down three stories, she could have sworn she saw the man break into a sprint down the street, vanishing behind a carriage passing by. She pressed her face up against the cold, icy glass, refusing to believe in what she just witnessed. "It's probably just some drunk fellow from the tavern, going 'round banging on people's doors." Lyra reasoned. "What's so special about him?"

Lyra's brown hair fluttered up against her face, temporarily blinding her. "I could have sworn that I closed that draft up! Not again…"

But this was no draft.

A harmonious noise filled the room, starting faintly at first, but crescendoing to a glorious vibrance. It was a powerful noise, yet felt as weak as a man who groaned and wheezed. Lyra turned around, and realized that the source of the draft and the noise were one and the same. Atop the workspace, an object was coming into view, as if it was appearing from nothing. It eclipsed the tank and the creature - almost as if it could sense the impending object, the animal flailed its arms erratically, lights dancing over its wide fins.

Lyra was left gazing in wonder as the noise and draft stopped, and the object locked firmly into place. It was perhaps over 2 metres tall, painted a rich blue with a series of windows allowing for glances inside. Lyra had never seen anything like it before.

She peered closer to the object, a rather large blue box, and carefully studied the intricate wooden markings on the front face. Suddenly, a door swung out from the front of the box, startling Lyra and sending her to the floor below her. As she heard the crunch of a piece of glassware shattered by her clumsiness, she looked up to see the man from before reaching an arm out from within the box. "But.. how did… how… I…"

The man scoffed at her stuttering. "You think this is surprising? Then do I have news for you…" He paused, and carefully considered his next words. "You've always wanted to see the stars, haven't you?"

Lyra nodded, her eyes dancing and darting around, trying to comprehend what lay before her.

"Well then, why not start now?"

"But… that's a box. That appeared out of nowhere! What does that have anything to do with a little interest of mine?"

"That cephalopod showed up out of nowhere too, and you aren't criticizing it's life choices, aren't you? And besides, I think we both know that the stars aren't just a 'little' interest of yours. Look around this space!" the man shouted, "there are star maps covering the walls, I've counted no less than five globes, three telescopes, and 27 books and pamphlets about the stars and the nighttime sky. Like I said, the clues were all there. You desperately want to make things here on Earth and hopefully earn a decent living off of it, but did you see how excited you got when you realized that thing could have come from a different world entirely?"

"How long were you standing outside my workshop for? What were you even doing there in the first place?"

"That's the problem with people in general - you never get to the heart of the problem. If you must know, I was trying to shoot for Zanzibar. I was to have a lively conversation with the sultan of Omar, but I spilled my coffee on some of the controls in here. I was trying to figure out where I was, and picked up a life signal that was extraterrestrial in origin. I ran up to your flat up here, and came just in time to see your lovely space squid. But that's not important, not now at least - we have an extraterrestrial being in your run-of-the-mill laboratory, and - wait, do you live here?"

"Yes! I do live here, as a matter of fact!"

"Well, where's the bedroom? Where's the kitchen?"

"You just chastised me for not getting to the point, and now you're going off on a whim? Are you always this hypocritical? And if you must know," she continued on sardonically, "my bed is crammed back behind the bookshelf, and who really needs a kitchen when you have shelves and a wood stove? I don't exactly live like royalty, but that's none of your concern!"

The man sighed, and offered his hand out to Lyra once more. "Please, just get in here! I'm sure of all people, you'd be interested in my-"

"I'm not even sure two people could fit in that! And what on Earth did you do with my tank?"

The man's voice got quieter, as he realized how confused Lyra became. "It's… inside my…," the man hesitated, "...machine."

"Well, what does your 'machine' do? You know, other than come crashing into my life, tearing my dreams down?" She became just as red in the face as Browning had become earlier.

"Again, you're missing the point! Grab my hand, I'll pull you up here. Unfortunately, I don't think I can get her much lower…"

"Her? Why should I go with you in that thing?"

"Yes, it will all make sense in due time." The man gripped Lyra's hand firmly, and pulled her up to the workspace where the machine rested. Lyra thought for a moment that she should have resisted more, but something deep inside of her motivated her to keep going. "Follow me." And just like that, the man vanished into the box. "He couldn't have gone far," Lyra thought, "Maybe two feet?"

"Is this what you do? Find people and confound them to no end? She yelled into the blackness ahead of her, her voice echoing into the distance. She stormed forwards, angrily stepping forward into the darkness, one step, two steps, three steps, four steps, five steps. "Wait, that can't be right," she pondered, "this box is less than a meter wide. Then how can I keep moving forwards?"

The door slammed shut behind her, and the only light visible seeped in through the front windows. But where were the side windows she had seen earlier.

"Confound people? Not exactly."

And then, Lyra's surroundings burned brilliantly, brought to life with light. She wasn't standing in a mere box - she was almost two meters away from the door. The man stood before her, next to her…

The tank, cephalopod and all, rested under the crimson and gold lights that shined from all corners. It was then that the true magnificence of this space was revealed to her. What once seemed too cramped for even two people could hold a hundred, perhaps more. She spotted bookshelves, chalkboards, and many gadgets and machines she could never even dream of. And central to it all was a powerful column, with tiles that held levers, buttons, switches, and fabulous yet indescribable controls. Moving her eyes up the column, Lyra noted the red and yellow lights in the center of a clear framework, and massive rotating wheels that came to life at the top. It was not just a machine. It felt alive to Lyra, as if it the metal floors she stood on flexed while the machine took a breath.

"You said you wanted to see the heavens. This is my ship, and it will take you there and beyond. Some call it a bringer of hope, while others call it the most dangerous craft in the universe." The man smiled as he did earlier at Lyra. "I prefer to call it something else - TARDIS."

"What is it? Does it have some type of observatory? Did, did you build this? How is it-"

"Why must you ask so many questions? Can't you just skip to 'It's bigger on the inside than the outside?' Most people would have gotten there by now at least. I can assure you, you will get answers in due time, but first, I think we really need to get moving. Otherwise, who knows what'll happen to your squishy young acquaintance here," the man said, gesturing towards the cephalopod, who was no longer blue. Instead, its broad sails unfurled and changed to vibrant reds and yellows, matching the lights that flashed and glared inside. "So, whadda you say? Trip of a lifetime?"

Too struck with wonder to speak eloquently, Lyra shared the same smile as the man before her and said, "You can pilot this ship? Where to?"

"Anywhere in the universe and back, through anything time throws at me." The man rested his hand on a silver lever, stuck in an upright position underneath the rotors above. "I am no mortal. I'm a Time Lord. Extraterrestrial. I have more in common with that fellow in the tank over there than you. To you, that may not mean much, but to me, it means everything. I walk in eternity, unconstrained by the rules of the universe." He smiled even brighter at her. "Well, maybe not all the rules, but who cares? I travel to everything that ever could happen, and everything that would happen, because in those could haves and would haves, that is where history is made. You could have made that deal with little regard for our little friend here. But you did something different - you wondered. You imagined what could have happened. And if we're being serious here," he continued, "I think you took pity on it. You said earlier about what your late parents taught you. Perhaps you simply couldn't bare leaving it alone, just as you've felt alone in your workshop. But you can't see the universe in your books and studies. The universe is calling to you, Miss… I never really got your name."

"Miss Schafer. Lyra, if you want to know."

"Welcome aboard, Lyra. Shall we begin, perhaps with this fellow here? I've encountered his species before, on Europa, one of Jupiter's moons." With that, he pulled the lever he rested his hand on earlier, sending all of the lights around with a blur. The same noise that had filled the workshop earlier rang through the caverns of the machine. Lyra tried to take it all in, but she knew that she could not. Soon after, the man lifted the lever up once again, bringing the machine to a halt.

"I'm the Doctor, by the way - people just call me that. Not an actual doctor, so don't go passing out much, alright? That's all I'm asking."

"People really call you that? Just, 'Doctor'?"

"It started ages ago, and they've never really stopped. But that doesn't matter now. Lyra, go back to the door, and open it up for me, would you?"

Confused by the request, Lyra turned around, grabbed the door handle, and pulled the door open. It was then that she knew why the mysterious Doctor had asked her for this. Below her, she saw that astounding blue marble, the Earth. Winds roared below, ocean waves pounded, and she could almost feel the majesty of the planet spinning, hurtling itself through spacetime. And beyond that, was the barren and cratered moon, and innumerable stars. It seemed so tranquil to her.

"To answer your question from earlier, no. This place is not an observatory. It doesn't need one, when you can see all of creation from the doorstep. Welcome to the universe, Lyra."

Lyra stared up at the stars, the brilliant worlds burning and pulsing before her. As they slowly made their way across the universe, the woman fixated on the blackness that filled the gaps, and just as she had done on the balcony not less than an hour ago, she wondered.

Lyra wondered everything.