The day was like any other, slightly overcast and bright, the sun shining its rays over the small park where the distant echoes of laughter could be heard from the playground a bit away from the road. Victoria hummed lightly as she sat on the park bench, crumpling up crackers as she tossed them out to the flock of grey and white pigeons, all scampering about to get to the crumbs. It felt nice outside, and it seemed like a good day to feed them.
However, as Victoria did so, something felt off. It was a faint feeling, almost nonexistent, yet it was there. She watched the flock of birds curiously, all of them doing, well, normal pigeon things, until she saw one in particular. It was massive compared to the rest. Against the other pigeons, it looked black. It was staring directly at her with intelligent eyes.
It's merely a hungry pigeon, she thought. What real harm could it do by just staring?
So she held out a hand full of crushed crackers. Most of the pigeons flocked over eagerly for more food, however the dark pigeon remained where it was. It tilted its head at her and ignored the crumbs she dropped. Her brow furrowed in confusion.
What a weird bird, she thought.
Suddenly, it flew up. The rest of the birds scattered along with it. In the midst of the confusion of pigeons and feathers, Victoria failed to notice that the strange bird had landed on the bench beside her.
She glanced over at it, staring at it, as it stared back. For a second, it seemed as though it could see right into her, read her thoughts, but then she convinced herself otherwise. It was a bird, just a bird, nothing more, nothing less. Sometimes animals were strange like that. She crushed up another cracker in her hand, then threw it out onto the ground again, hoping to get it off the bench without having to shoo it. The bird didn't stir.
Victoria tried waving her hand at it. When it didn't respond, she started shooing it.
However, the bird still didn't stir
What was with this bird? Victoria frowned, wondering why this bird wasn't frightened by her at all.
"Go on, shoo," she said, waving her hand at it again. It just tilted its head, as if thinking she were funny. She scowled a bit. "Go on!"
It tilted its head, but in that instant, she heard this sickening crack. The sound had come from the bird.
Victoria scrambled away from it when she heard another crack. As it moved, the noise because louder. It started growing and twisting, the size of it inflating to twice, then three times, then nearly four times it's original size. Its face contorted changing and reconfiguring, almost as though it were an entirely different thing in general, which is must've been. It opened its mouth and let out a disgusting roar, and Victoria could've sworn her heart stopped. She stood up quickly, backing away from the creature with wide eyes, words failing her as she stared in horror. What happened, just, what in God's name had happened just now?
The beast looked at her, staring at her with eyes that nearly paralyzed her. It was a struggle to even keep backing up, her brain telling her to run but her body telling her to freeze. It was like a battle of tug-o-war between herself. It began to approach her, and she opened her mouth to scream but nothing came out. Why of all the times, was no one around?
Victoria then heard a high pitched whine, a noise she'd never heard before. She covered her ears, trying to shut out the noise as she watched the creature, and it roared again, but this time it looked as though it was in pain. It was panicking, and then suddenly one of the street lamps exploded, and it let out another bloodcurdling cry. It seemed as though it was distracted now, but she couldn't take her eyes away from it. She needed to run, she needed to do something other than stand there like an idiot.
But just then, she felt something take her by the hand. She whirled around, ready to sock anyone to the ground when she saw someone's face. Someone normal looking, thank the lord, but someone she'd never seen before. It was a man, and he looked winded, but he said one word that gave her the strength to move.
"Run!"
He was pulling her along, now. She stuggled to make her body run properly. She glanced over her shoulder to see that the creature had recovered from the noise and was now glaring at them, looking angry, which definitely wasn't a good sign. She nearly let out a scream she saw it start flapping its wings.
"Don't just look back at it!" the man told her fiercely, gripping her hand just a bit tighter as he did.
"Too late!" she retaliated. "You couldn't have said anything sooner?"
"Don't blame this on me!"
The two continued running to somewhere Victoria didn't know, her heart racing a mile a minute. "Where are we going?" she screamed, and but he didn't look back at her.
"The only place it can't get into!"
Victoria looked up ahead to see a blue telephone box. How long had it been since she'd seen one of those? Or, had she ever seen one? To her memory, the only one she'd ever seen had been red, and not blue.
"A phone booth? Wouldn't it just break it?!" Victoria snapped.
"Trust me!" The man whipped out a small key from his pocket.
They stopped running so that the man could unlock the phone booth. Victoria's eyes widened in fear as the creature kept approaching. I'm going to die, she thought. I'm going to die just because this guy wants to make a phone call-
"Come on!" He grabbed her arm and yanked her inside.
Victoria took a deep breath, bracing herself for whatever impact could suddenly overwhelm them, clenching her eyes shut. It was silent, however, save for the sound of something sort of...electronic, almost. She carefully opened one eye, and then the other, looking on the inside. Her breath hitched in her throat, as she looked all around in astonishment.
This was certainly not the inside of a phone booth.
"It's..." she began, and then she looked over at the man, who walked over to the center of the machine.
"Bigger on the inside," he finished for her, turning to her and flashing her a grin.
Now that Victoria wasn't so panic stricken, she could see his features. He was tall, probably taller than her, though that didn't take much, with short, messy blond hair, and vibrant, green eyes, the color of shining emeralds. He was wearing a long, brown coat and a bowtie secured firmly around his neck.
He turned his attention back to the machine, and began configuring with it as she could hear the faint screech of the beast outside. In an instant, she remembered why she was inside this thing to begin with. "What is that thing? And who are you?"
He didn't look up this time as he continued to work a mile a minute. "I'm called the Doctor. And that thing is something that shouldn't be here."
"Well that's obvious!" she replied, throwing her hands up into the air. "And Doctor who?"
"Just the Doctor," he answered. "Nothing more, nothing less."
"Okay then, Doctor," Victoria said, crossing her arms. "Seriously, what is that thing?"
The Doctor turned back to her. "It's something not from this world, it's from an entirely different universe. Far beyond anything you've ever seen. Somehow, it's gotten to earth, and it won't stop until its gotten what it's wanted, and I'm not sure what that is, yet. That thing, as you so put it, is called a Nocte Avis. In other words, a creature of the night."
Hi guys! So this is yet another collaboration fic between Bri Nara and I.
I got her into Doctor Who and then one sick day later, we wrote this together. I'm happy to introduce the adventures of Doctor!England and Companion!Seychelles! We had a blast writing this, so I really hope it sounds alright. We wrote it together, editing each other's writing and alternating writing and such, so make sure you give her some credit, as well! We based this off of our own imaginations, so if you've never seen Doctor Who, this "bird" creature never actually appeared in the series (that we know of!).
Any feedback is greatly appreciated, so please review and tell us what you think!
Thanks, and hope you enjoyed!
-Mattie and Bri
