EPISODE ONE |MR. ROBOTO
It happened long ago, and yet it wouldn't for so many years to come. It was inevitable, a fixed point in time that should always happen as it did – again and again, for all of eternity. Of course, the way it should happen depended entirely on perception. If a tree falls in the woods and there is no one around to hear it, does it make a sound? What should happen was awful. The end of an entire civilization, and for naught. The war came and passed, his people were obliterated – at the hands of their own kind, none the less – and the Daleks, they found a way to survive. They lived on, and built their empire again, but Gallifrey was no more, the last Time Lord standing was the one who doomed his entire civilization. The last of the Time Lords, the Doctor. If it happened like that, no one can really tell you. It did, and it didn't, both at the same time, and both on an infinite loop again and again for the rest of eternity, or until someone figures it out. As long as nobody dares to look back, Gallifrey stands – and falls, all at once.
Hunter would have you think that that was the reason why he didn't look back, why he moved so far and did so much to escape the horror – but, of course, that was not the reason. The young man, only four hundred years old, simply didn't want to die. But escaping the Time War was not easy. It came at a price, and the price was to escape reality itself – at least, reality as he knew it. Which raises another question, of how real reality really is, for his new found life felt just as real as the old one. In this newfound reality of his, Hunter wasn't the last of the Time Lords – he was the only Time Lord to ever exist. Never before, nor ever again, would his kind walk this particular universe – for this everlasting, ever expanding perfect reality he'd stumbled upon did not nor ever would have a Gallifrey, or a Time War.
The young Time-Lord boarded on a stolen TARDIS, keen on going to the end of the universe and past, but instead found so much more. There was a crack, a crack in time and space, in the very walls of reality, hidden deep within the Medusa Cascade. Just wide enough for a TARDIS go slip inside, slip through, straight to another universe. It happened faster than the speed of light. In one moment he was fleeing the war, in the next, he was in a suburb. At least it looked like a suburb. Actually, no, it looked like an alley.
Stepping outside of his TARDIS, the first thing Hunter noticed was that everything looked different – even he did. But he hadn't regenerated, no. It was like- like the third dimension of everything had just disappeared. For no good reason what so ever. The second thing he noticed was that inside the TARDIS – currently disguised as a dumpster - the third dimension still existed. The third thing he noticed was that he was going to need a change of clothes. Leaving the alley, now dressed in dark jeans, a plain gray shirt and a black leather jacket, Hunter saw the cars pass by, the people going about with their days as if something was wrong – was it the lack of a third dimension? Or something else? The Time Lord didn't have to look too far for a restaurant – in fact, there was one right behind his alley – and once he did, Hunter could also tell it was about lunch time. He ordered some sushi, or maybe a lot of sushi, and was greeted by the staff singing about the seaweed being always greener at somebody else' lake. Maybe this was normal as well. Did the crack lead to a musical? Should Hunter prepare himself for dancing cats? He decided to look into it after lunch.
On his way back to the TARDIS, though, Hunter came to face with the definite proof that this was not a normal musical. The people were running now, something about a tornado or whatever, so boring. Everyone was running – everyone but the strange woman in the alley. No, she is dancing and singing, but she's also something else – she's desperate. She doesn't want to dance or sing, but it is quite clear that she does not have a choice.
"Help!" she sings, flailing her arms open and swirling around herself. "Won't you please, please, help me?"
Hunter stepped back, not sure what was going on. Not sure if it was safe to do anything. Instead, he observed as his woman – red hair and green eyes, tears streaming down her pale face – danced faster and faster, and then, as if the day couldn't get any more weird, the lady burst into flames. Out of nowhere, she just- burned, from inside out. The Time Lord stood there in shock, asking himself what the fuck had he just witnessed, when the sound of sirens made itself loud and clear above all else. Great, police officers were coming and here he was, standing in front of a burning lady. More out of instinct than anything else, Hunter jumped back into his TARDIS, leaving the door – lid? – cracked open just enough so he could see – and hear – these people. The cops arrived mere seconds afterwards, a deputy following the sheriff with a fire extinguisher, the younger cop opening his mouth to say something as he pointed the device to the now dead victim – only to instead watch in horror as this girl is on fireeee came out of his own lips. Hunter had to stiff a laugh, a very inappropriate one at that, at the glares the sheriff gave the younger man.
The police was in there for a long time, and after a while Hunter decided to take what he'd learned about the place so far and see what else he could get from it on the TARDIS's computer. He moved quickly, already familiar with the interior of the ship despite only owning it for a few hours so far. He'd stolen it from the battlefield, knowing full well that it wasn't like whoever owed it was going to use it again. He watched, with his own eyes, as the previous owner of this ship died – at the hands of a Dalek. The man had barely left the ship, running to the front line like some kind of mad man. And so young, too – or at least he looked young. There's no way of knowing with Time Lords. He ran with a woman, a woman of long dark hair. Hunter only saw them from behind, but they both seemed to have some kind of deep connection. On their final moments, Hunter saw the mysterious couple holding hands. They fought until they couldn't fight anymore, and then they welcomed death as one. Just remembering it gave Hunter the chills, his blue eyes staring back at him on the TARDIS' monitor. It all happened so fast. He saw them fall, saw all the destruction around himself. He saw the TARDIS, and he knew. He knew he would die in that battlefield. He knew there was no winning this was. There was only mutually assured destruction. And in that moment, in that split second, Hunter proclaimed no more. He ran into the TARDIS, run as far away as he could. And the TARDIS brought him here. Lawndale, Tallahassee. Fucking Florida. In the- The early 2000s. No, no, the late 1990s. What the fuck.
When Hunter came out of his TARDIS once again, the alley was deserted. Choruses of what if the town blows away? and the end of the world as we know it echoed in the air, one particular man driving by to the sounds of gah gah dammit. A storm was coming. Less boring.
The only problem of investigating under those circumstances, of course, was that the only people still on the street were running for their lives. The storm soon passed, the tornado never making it to Lawndale, and the people were soon on the streets again. Singing about how weird that day had been. And on the next morning, they were still singing. Hunter was able to trace an absurd amount of energy to the local high school, and – dreading every moment of it – decided to go undercover. And thus, Mr. Hunter – Substitute Teacher was born.
His first class was a nightmare. Hunter always knew he wouldn't like children, he just never expected to fucking hate them so much. There was a girl – Sandra, Sandy, Sandi? Whatever – who had to be the result of scientific experiments. There was no other reason. The little Dalek was so damn vicious Hunter would have thought her to be an actual Dalek if not for her futility. Her and her little friends disturbed him the whole time he was standing there, actively stopping him from interrogating anyone. When the Asian girl opened her arms and started singing about wheeen you're feeeling saaaad and loooow Hunter actually prayed for them to be Daleks. The next class was better. The concentration of energy was higher amongst that particular group of people. It had to be one of them.
"Excuse-me," asked a girl in glasses, surprisingly not singing. "Who are you?"
"I'm the substitute literature teacher," the Time Lord replied, keeping his face blank. "And I don't have a plan or anything telling me where you are in this subject, so- Just do as you usually do- Yes…" he turned to look at a boy on a football uniform who had his hand raised. "…You?"
"Kevin" the boy said, smiling widely. "I'm the QB. And we're in class, man!"
The blond cheerleader next to him giggled, but what really scared Hunter was that they were serious. "Brittany, cheer leader?" the girl introduced herself, probably just following her boyfriend's lead "Yes, aren't we, like, in school?" she followed.
The teacher was about to answer when yet another student raised her hand. "Jane Lane, Daily Planet. What do you have to say about the recent epidemic of braineaditis afflicting our youth?"
Hunter cracked a smile at that. He was about to answer, when the students on the back began to sing – quietly at first, but louder with every word – "Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto" and the sudden realization came over him – the energy was so strong it was affecting him now.
When his musical number was finally over, the class had been dismissed – a single song, which apparently had taken them all of 40 minutes for some reason. He was sitting on his desk, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened, when a voice broke him out of his trance. "So, what is your secret?"
Hunter looked up to find the girl in glasses and the other one – Jane Lane – were standing next to him. "She thinks you're an alien-" Jane spoke now, a soft smirk playing on her lips. "-but I say you're a robot. If I were a robot, 'I'm not a robot' is exactly what I'd say."
The Time Lord stared at them blankly for a moment. "What?" was the best cover he could come up with.
"You said you've come to help." The girl in the glasses spoke again. "Could that possibly be related to the outbursts of music and the several cases of spontaneous combustion?"
"It was on Sick, Sad World last night" Jane shrugged, and the Time Lord just stared at them blankly for a few seconds, until finally deciding to trust them. Worst case scenario, he finds a new place to live.
"Yes." He said, simply.
"Okay. I'm Daria."
"Jane."
"Hunter."
"Okay." The Time Lord got up. "Whatever the hell is causing all of this, it's coming from this school."
The girl in glasses – Daria – was about to say something, when a scream could be heard. "Shit" Hunter muttered under his breath, running towards the sound, and being followed closely by the two students – and several others, after them. The screams led them to a door marked as Principal's Office, and what waited for them inside was something they could never have predicted. A woman on her late 40s, the principal no doubt, was manically dancing in the middle of the room, singing something about the highway to hell, the smoke could be seen coming out of her. On the corner of the room, a man – no, not a man; a demon – with thick red skin, pointy ears and chin and several marks on his skin. His eyes were a deep shade of blue, matching his suit. He sat there with a wide smile, and a hunger in his eyes that Hunter had never seen before. It was Daria who sprang into action, running to the principal and trying to stop her. "Ms. Li!" the girl yelled, placing her hands on the educator's shoulders. "Stop".
The demon was no longer smiling and in seconds had gotten up to his feet. He stepped towards Daria, but faster than he'd gotten up, Hunter moved himself to stand on the space between the teen and the monster. Everybody had been silent, except for the girl – girls, Jane now had joined her, it seemed – trying to stop their principal, and the principal still singing, but then the woman stopped.
"In the holding tank I built for myself, it's feeding time"
The demon is smiling once again. Hunter is singing.
The songs on this episode are as follows:
Under The Sea - The Little Mermaid
Help - The Beatles
Girl On Fire - Alicia Keys
What If The Town Blows Away - Daria!
The End Of The World As We Know It - REM
Gah Gah Dammit! - Daria!
Spice Up Your Life - Spice Girls
Mr. Roboto - Styx
Highway To Hell - AC/DC
1 John 4:16 - The Mountain Goats
