Once, in a town built from dreams and a lot of work, there lived 2 women. A dead one, and an immortal one. They lived in the bottom of a well, trapped down there by an evil wizard. This town had no name, and no one ever mentioned the two women. It was an open secret, and the townsfolk would never look into the well, for if they did, the magic that kept this town together would cease, and the Governess would get angry, and banish that person to far, far underground.
So, the two women were left in their well.
Until a hero came upon them, and rescued the women. That hero, as all great heroes are, was a middle-aged woman with a red double-decker bus. Her name was Iris Wildthyme, and this is the story of how she burned down this town. It starts with our hero suffering from the worst hangover of her life, escaping three fighter ships.
"Oh boy!" said Iris as she swiftly turned left on the steering wheel of her bus, trying to avoid high impact blasts beam from the ships chasing her. "I really shouldn't have drunk so much at that party."
A blast from one of the ships shook the bus violently, making Iris nearly fall on the floor. She shouted out loud "Boring old ponces! How was I supposed to know that it was illegal to try on the your prince's crown! I mean, I admit it was tasteless, but punishable by death? That's too far!" Not like the people shooting at her could hear her, (or would care if they did) but it made her feel better.
She looked in her rear view mirror, and saw that the three Finas fighter units were gaining on her. In the distance, she could see more of them. That wasn't good. Her bus might be able to escape a few Finasian warships, but a whole battalion would be a problem. Iris needed to think of something, and fast. Scanning ahead, she noticed a planet not too far from her direction. Without a thought, she clicked her levers, and hit her ship's analogue to the accelerator.
The bus was suddenly flying through space like a hummingbird. Meteorites hit the windshield, and Iris winced at the damage the ship must be going through. Gritting her teeth, she leaned her TARDIS towards the rapidly approaching planet's surface.
Another blast from the ships rocked her bus. However, the increased acceleration meant that instead of just being bumped, her bus went spinning rapidly. Iris soon found herself moving like a spastic fruit-fly in her jumbled, out-of-control double-decker bus.
Now, the people of this town are simple, peaceful folk. Unlike many other civilizations in the Andromeda system, they had not yet developed technological capability, nor were they used to outsiders. So it was quite a shock when a double decker bus rammed into their (thankfully, uninhabited) church, which shattered all across the snow.
Most of the townsfolk ran away from the mysterious giant red thing. Then, they watched with awe as a middle-aged woman stumbled out. She had on a fine-looking red jacket, and looked like a bad attempt at being very classy. With a cigarette in one hand, she said, in a rough, gravelly voice, "Um, does anyone here know how to fix a damaged time-travelling bus? I can pay. Not with money, though."
A man slowly lumbered up to Iris, his big shoes making large indents in the snow. He looked down at the woman, who waved uneasily at him.
"Are you the local mechanic?" asked Iris.
"No," said the man. "I'm a priest." He looked at the crumbling building. Then at the bus. Then, he said "Your contraption just destroyed my church."
"I don't like your tone, mister!" said Iris. "I'll have you know that contraption is my very cherished ship! Not only that, but I have a perfectly good explanation. I was escaping from some Finasian warships, who shot down my ship. The Finasians are a little angry at me for trying on their prince's crown. Apparently, that's punishable by death. In my defense, I was drunk."
The man shook his head, and pointed at the church. "You are going to pay for that, or you're going to be arrested."
Iris looked back at the ruins of the building, and asked the large man nicely "Do you people accept credit card?"
"No," said the man. He clearly wasn't amused by Iris at all. "As the Governor of this town, I must ask you to accompany me to the police station."
"Now, now. Lets talk about this—hang on. I thought you said you were the priest, not a governor," started Iris, backing away slowly.
The Governor was about to respond, when a loud cracking noise came out from the ground below.
The Governor suddenly got a stricken look on his face, and waved Iris away. "I'll deal with you some other time!"
Screams came out from the surrounding area. The ground was breaking apart, and shifting around. Something was coming up, and it seemed angry.
"What's going on?" asked Iris. "Whatever it is, I didn't do it!"
The Governor scowled. "Of course you didn't do it. Someone must have looked down into the well. The Feeders are awake now. They'll be looking for the person who disobeyed our rules."
A look of horror came onto Iris's face. "Did you say...Feeders? Are they giant hands? What did you say the name of this place was?"
"It has no name," said the Governor quickly. Clearly annoyed by the woman asking silly questions, he marched off towards where the villagers were gathering and arguing.
Iris put out her cigarette, and dropped it to the ground.
"Well, Auntie Iris," she said to herself. "Time to see if I can nip this problem in the bud."
She ran toward the screams. As she drew closer, she saw blue, craggy hands poking their way out of the snowy ground, writhing across the snow, making patterns with their fingers. They had no eyes—they were hands, after all—but they seemed to be searching for someone, or something. The giant hands would grab someone, then pause, and throw them to the ground, then pop back into the ground to try again. Iris darted from rock to rock, being careful to avoid being grabbed by the hands. She needed to get to that well, and whatever happened, she could not let those hands grab her.
A redhaired boy was wriggling out of the grasp of one of the hands, and called out for someone to help. He saw Iris hiding behind a rock (large red hats are not conducive to stealth), and called out to her.
"Help me!" he said. Iris peeked out from her crouched position, and cursed. The well was right behind the boy. If she ran there now, she might be able to to the well, and all of this fuss would be over. Thinking it over, she decided that it wouldn't be very nice to let a lad die in a giant hand, and looked in her handbag for something useful. She found lipstick and perfume, a lighter, a note with a key attached, a flashlight, and invisibility gloves. Iris realized that these would all be completely useless, and proudly walked out in front of the giant hand, hoping she'd think of something.
"Woo hoo, Mr. Big Hand! I know who you're looking for!" said Iris.
The hand, which had been about to drag the unlucky redheaded boy under, paused for a moment.
"The person who looked in your well—I know who it is," said Iris. "But, if you want me to let you know, you'd better drop that young boy down. In fact, all you hands better stop. Now!," declared Iris. A loud cracking sound all around her made Iris think for a second that the hands had decided not to take her offer, and she was about to have a very gripping death. But the redhead was released, and ran off. The other hands gathered around her.
"Alright, loveys," said Iris. "The location of the person who looked in the well was..." Then she started running toward the well.
Before she could get even a few feet farther, about 20 hands grabbed her. Soon, Iris was being dragged into the ground. The only thing left was her handbag.
And then a young blonde woman named Iris Wildthyme walked up to the handbag, and peered into it. She took out the note, and read it.
Dear 4th self
- If you're reading this, that means I couldn't get into that well. I know you caused the situation. I don't blame you. I just need you to jump into the well, and then find out what's going on. Oh, and bring an extra bottle of gin, will ya?
-Regards, your 6th self (assuming there aren't any weird hidden regens I'll find out about in a mysterious retcon)
"Oh, hell," said the younger Iris. "My future's coming to bug me again." She pulled out the pink blaster by her side, and slowly approached the well. To a normal person's eyes, it seemed like a everyday place to drink water. From the moment Iris came here, however, she could feel something was different. That well sparkled with temporal energy. It made Iris's hair stand up on the back of her neck whenever she went came close to it. The locals had consistently told her to not look at it—it was hard to get them to even acknowledge it. If anything, the forbidden nature of it made her want it more.
If the villagers had mentioned that looking in the well caused giant hands to drag you underground, she might have had second thoughts about it. If only Panda hadn't been sleeping off nights of drinking and dancing (these villagers may not have modern technology, and kept to themselves, but they knew how to party), maybe he could have warned her against this. It would have been nice to have him around.
Iris creeped slowly toward the well. She peered inside it again, and just like before, it looked like a normal object. The temporal energy coming from the well, however, was staggering.
"Hey!" said a man behind her. He was pointing a crossbow at her. "S-stay away from that well."
"Listen, lovey," said Iris. "You should probably put that thing down. Might poke your own eye out with it." Before he could respond, she fell backwards, into the well, and through the water.
She held her breath, and cursed in her head for not having something to cover her hair. The water actually seemed to be getting warmer and warmer as she sank, and it felt like she was submerged in a live wire—all the energy from the well was surging through her. Something powerful was down here, and she was walking (well, sinking) straight into it.
She couldn't wait to see what it was.
The energy was getting higher and higher. By now, she could barely see the top—was this well really that deep? And Iris was beginnng to run out of oxygen. Seriously, Iris was beginning to think that maybe this wasn't a good idea-
And then Iris was suddenly not in water. Actually, she was on a stone floor. She quickly got up, and surveyed the area. It looked like a jail of some kind. There were bars over the walls, and chains blocking whatever doors she could see, besides one main passageway.
And at the end of that passageway was a girl, sitting on a chair. She had on a black jacket, and long black hair. Her eyes pierced into Iris's, and looked far older than any girl her age had any right to be. It was only one person it could be, only one person with that fire, that weariness in their eyes.
"Doctor?" said Iris. "I have to say, this new body doesn't suit you."
The girl rolled her eyes. "I can tell you that I'm certainly not the Doctor, though I do know the man." The girl got up from her chair, and cocked her head at Iris. "Why are you here? You don't seem like you're from the village."
"I'm not. I'm Iris Wildthyme, transtemporal adventuress. I came here on a flying Number 22 Putnam red bus—in order to party. Now, after encountering a message from myself from the future, I'm wet, tired, in need of a serious drink, and possibly about to be arrested and/or flattened by giant hands." Iris paused to catch her breath. "Did you get all that? I know it might be a bit confusing."
The girl shrugged. "No, it made sense. I've heard stranger things. By the way, we need to get a move on. Now that you're here, we have a small window of time to actually get out of here."
"Oh, so soon? I just got here," said Iris.
"We have about 30 minutes. After that, the door to get out of here will be closed," said the girl. "And we can't leave immediately, because I need to fetch my friend, Clara." The girl looked at Iris's pink gun. "Do you know how to use that thing?"
Iris nodded. "Definitely. Am I gonna need to?"
"Almost certainly. By the way, my name is Me," said Me. "Ready?"
"No," said Iris. "Not at all."
A few minutes later, Iris found herself walking alongside Me in a dank, dirty passageway. What looked like lines of electricity were going through the walls, and occasionally she could hear buzzing coming from the walls.
"The villagers who live here think this is simply a well. It isn't. This is an internal battery for temporal energy. It keeps the entire town running—the buildings, the people, everything," said Me.
"Keeps it running? Are you saying that they're robots?" asked Iris. They had seemed real enough last night, espescially that dashing young man name Dashing.
"Worse that that," said Me. "Have you noticed that this town doesn't seem to have a proper name—it's just the Town? And tell me, what are the name of the villagers?"
"Well, there was the bartender, called...the Bartender. And the cute man who ordered drinks on everyone called...Richie. And my friend Panda met a girl named Lady," said Iris. She frowned. "These names are a little...simplistic."
"Because this town isn't real," said Me. "That's why the names are all so story-like. Because, right now, we'll living in a story."
"Oh!" said Iris. "I should have realized it. Only a fictional character would have a name like Me."
Me gave a glare that made Iris's blood run cold. "That's my real name. I'm a real person."
Iris raised her eyebrows. "And where are you from? Your parents gave you that name?"
"She gave herself that name," said a soft voice up ahead. "And even if she did tell you where she was from, you wouldn't believe her." A woman wearing a blue-colored dress was walking toward them. She had a circular face, with large eyes. The woman was on the cute side of attractive, and wearing a blue dress that looked like a waiter's outfit. Her brown eyes seemed perceptive, almost piercing. Iris assumed this was the "other friend" Me was talking about. "Hello, I'm Clara Oswald. You must be Iris."
"Well, yes. How do you know?" said Iris.
Clara looked concerned. "You didn't tell her?"
Me shook her head. "We can't."
Clara gave Me an annoyed look. Me rolled her eyes back at Clara, and shrugged. Iris felt very left out.
Finally, Clara shook her head, and turned her head back at Iris. "Iris, I know you're probably confused. We'll explain everything later, but for now, I need you to go with us. There's a very small window to get out of here. You see, this place requires people to be inside it in order to function. It lives on the thoughts of the people who's trapped in it. It's been using us as that power for a while, living off us."
"You both seem rather healthy, considering this place has been feeding off you," said Iris. The buzzing sounds she had been hearing suddenly seemed louder, and she was beginning to feel tired.
"That's because we're both pretty unusual," said Clara. Iris could tell Clara was the type of girl who was pretty sure of herself, but tried to hide it.
A large booming sound came from the walls. It sounded like chains moving, only much louder. The walls of the passageway they were moving through began to vibrate loudly.
"It's started. Come on, let's move," said Me. The girl ran forward, with Iris and Clara following behind.
And then the prison walls began to come apart. They literally began to deconstruct and shatter, leaving a snow-filled hill in front of them. Above, the night sky was black.
And around them were machines. Cogs and gears were moving. Iris could see pistons soaring up and down, and realized the buzzing she heard was the sound of engines busily working. Robot hands lubricated the engines, and scraped off the rust.
"What are the bloody hell is going on?" asked Iris.
"I tod you, this village is constructed. This is the machine that keeps it going," said Me. "You see the blue light going through the machines? That's our temporal energy. Both Clara and I have been trying to get out of here, trapped like a gerbil in a cage. Just running and running."
"The more we struggle, the more this machine will take from us," said Clara. "We've spent years trying to figure out how to get out of here. We've tried to climb our way out of the well—no matter how far we travel up, we never get to the top. We try to break down the walls, but we can't ever get a dent into the place. We've tried digging, but neither one of us have the strength or patience to dig our way out."
"Wait, years? You've been down here for YEARS?" said Iris. Something moved above her head, making her look up. She squinted, trying to see if she could see something in the cliffs above (what sort of place was this?).
Then two jaws launched from the depths above, straight at her.
Me pulled her out of the way in time, and the creature aiming for her landed at the spot where she had been. It look like a giant man, except it had blue leathery skin, red eyes, and a large razor-teeth filled mouth. It pointed at Iris with a right hand attached to an exceptionally long wrist, and Iris realized those were the same hands that were dragging people down.
"Are you the next host for this town?" said the large oaf.
"I don't remember signing up to that," said Iris. She quickly took her pink blaster from her side, and pointed it at the creature, but felt another wave of dizziness, and fell over. She noticed Me, who now seemed to be fiddling with a device behind her, exchange a worried look with Clara. Picking herself back up, she declared to the monster "And I have no plans on staying down here any longer."
"You should be honored to become a host. Your life will keep this town alive for eons," said the oaf. He raised himself fully, and Iris saw he was twice her height. He loomed overe the three women, casting a large shadow. "It's already started."
Iris blasted the oaf with a blast, and he screamed in pain. Swinging his large fists at Iris, he missed and hit a piece of rock. Iris aimed at him again, but felt another wave of dizziness.
"W-what's happening to me?" asked Iris. She dropped her gun, and fell onto the snow-covered floor, her vision fracturing, and her head suddenly splitting. She could faintly hear the sound of the monster roaring in her ear, and could barely smell something's warm, stinky breath on her cheek. That annoyed her, but she felt so tired...maybe it was time to sleep...
Then she felt a heavy kick at her side.
"Get up!" said Clara. "We need to move. This place is draining you, and unlike us, you're mortal. So get up off the floor, and get up!"
Iris pulled herself up off the floor, and saw Me firing a flintlock rifle at the giant. She fired it at the giant's leg, making him yowl.
"Listen," said Maisie to Iris while reloading. "Clara and I are getting out of here. If you continue being dead weight, I have no problem leaving you here to live out the rest of your lives. So either we can leave with or without you. Make your choice."
Even as Me talked, Iris could see more of the giants climbing down from above. Iris had a feeling they wouldn't appreciate seeing one of their buddies with wounds all over his body.
So, despite still feeling like she was having a terrible hangover, Iris ignored it and got up slowly. She reminded herself to wring the little girl's neck when she got out of here, though.
Iris nearly fell over again, but Clara caught her. The woman gave Iris a quick smile, and said "We'll get out of this together, okay."
Despite the fact that Iris was slowly growing suspicious of both the people trapped here, and was already hating Me (what sort of name was that?), she found Clara's assurance rather sweet, and smiled back. "Thanks for the cheer-me-up, darling," she whispered into Clara's ear as they followed Me.
They walked up the hill. All Iris could see is snow and more machinery, but Me and Clara apparently knew their way around the place, and soon they were at a door. Iris was still feeling faint, and the rush of adrenaline was the only thing keeping her going. Behind them, they could hear the sounds of the creatures moving around them. Iris reached for her blaster, and realized she didn't have it.
"Me, I'm gonna need to borrow your gun," said Iris as the giants began to crawl towards her. Me was behind her, inputting a series of instructions into a panel on the door.
"Here, take this instead," said Clara. She passed Iris a small wand-like device. "It's a sonic wand."
"What the bloomin' hell am I supposed to do with this?" asked Iris, as 5 very angry monsters advanced upon them.
Clara ignored Iris's complaints, and waved the wand at the monsters. The creatures began wailing, and held their hands to their heads.
"See. It's as simple as that," Clara said cheerfully. Then her wand blew up in her hand. Clara dropped it, her eyes wide with shock. She laughed apologetically at Iris. "Err, haven't got the hand at making sonic devices yet."
Rolling her eyes, Iris shouted "Supercalafragilistic!" at the monsters, while waving her wand around lazily. The wand emitted a sonic pulse that made the whole cavern shake.
"Dammit, you're gonna bring the whole place down on us!" said Me. She inputted the final number on the panel, and the door opened up. She beckoned the other two to hurry up, and the two ran through the door. They entered a large room filled with people. Me and Iris immediately closed the door, as several very angry oafs tried to push their way in.
"Give me the wand!" said Clara to Iris. Iris gave the device to the woman, and Clara pointed the device at the metal lock of the door. It closed instantly.
"If that one had blown up in your face, I'll swear I would have killed you," muttered Iris.
Clara laughed. "Might have found that a little difficult." Iris suddenly realized that Clara had no pulse, and also was very cold.
"God," Iris thought to herself, "I'm gonna need a drink after this."
The first thing Iris noticed about the room they were in was that it was filled with people. Many of these people she recognized from the village. Some of them she hadn't seen before. All of them were connected by tubes to the ceiling, which was drawing blue energy from them. Their eyes were closed.
"These are all other people that the machine is using. It's a little harder to get temporal energy from normal people, so they have to get more invasive," said Me.
Then Iris saw one woman wearing a red hat who she definitely recognized.
"It's me!" said Iris, looking at her future regeneration hooked up to a tube.
"Yes, I'm here. Glad you noticed," Me deadpanned.
"No, you annoying youngun," said Iris. "It's my sixth regeneration!"
"Did you just call me-" started Me, before Clara shushed her.
"This is you from the future, right?"said Clara. "You're a Time Lord?"
"Depends on which continuity you believe in," said Iris. She pulled the tube from her older self. "Wake up!"
"She's under a hypnotic spell. It's going to require a long time to wake her up,"said Me.
"I know just the thing to wake her up," announced young Iris. "If you wake up right now, I promise to personally deliver a crapton of gin to your bus. Free of charge."
The older Iris's eyes flew open. "Hello, loveys! I'll hold you to that." Red-hatted Iris frowned at her younger self. "Ah, I remember being here."
"So, can you give me any tips?"asked young Iris.
"When Jimmy says "don't worry, it'll only hurt for a bit", don't trust him," said older Iris.
"No, about this life-or-death situation," said younger Iris.
"Sorry, I forgot," said older Iris. "I remember being here, but I don't know what I did."
"Probably the Blinovitch Limitation Effect," said Clara.
"Nah. I just used to get blackout drunk a lot in those days; made my memory all fuzzy. I was a little too wild in those times."
The younger Iris glared.
"It's a compliment, my dear," said older Iris. "So, why is everyone hooked up to tubes?"
"They're draining people's life energy to keep the town alive. They used time sensitive people to do that, and when they ran out of those, they used the villagers," said Clara.
"Why keep a town alive using people's life energy? Can't they use taxes like everyone else?"said younger Iris.
"This town is a construct of someone's mind. This whole place is a piece of fiction, and it's being sustained by that person," said Clara.
"Who's they?" said older Iris.
"Some sort of wizard. At least that what he said. He caught the ship of Me and me, and stuck us in this place. He's placed some sort of perception filter on the well. And if someone tries to get us out, he sends them down here," said Clara.
"What a bloody jerk," said the younger Iris.
"I do not like being called a "bloody jerk", four-limbs," said a deep, dark voice.
Iris, the other Iris, Clara, and Me looked up to see a 9-foot tall person in flowing, blue robes.
"This is the person who stuck you down here?" said younger Iris. "Looks like a second-rate D&D cosplayer."
"How dare you," said the wizard. "Not only did you detain my guards," he said, pointing at the door that the oafs were trying to get past, "you also are destroying my engine. I am making a whole new world using mnemonic idea generation. I shall take the energy from you to create a new world!"
"Mnemomic idea generation! You just made that up!" said the older Iris.
"N-no I didn't," said the wizard. Out of his robes, came a long staff that floated in mid-air. "DIE!"
Purple lasers shot out of his staff. The two Irises both jumped out of the way. Unfortunately, they both jumped away to the same place, and accidentally smashed into each other. Clara rolled out of the way, and aimed her sonic wand at the wizard, before remembering that her wand was still broken. Me was about to shoot her crossbow, but she was shot in the chest by a bolt, and died.
"Me!"said the younger Iris. She ran up to Me's dead body, and was shocked to find no pulse. "You monster! You killed a young girl. I don't care how long you've spent creating this town—you're going down."
Clara, dodging blasts of energy from the wizard's staff shouted "Don't worry about Me! Use the wand!"
Iris pointed the wand at the wizard. His staff's lasers decreased in brightness, and began to make fizzing noises.
"Stop that!" shouted the wizard. He flew over to the younger Iris, raising his arm in preparation to sweep her away. He was interrupted by the other Iris, who jumped onto his head and waved a lighter in his face.
"My robes! They're on fire!" said the wizard. He flew around the room, trying to get the older Iris off himself. Meanwhile, Clara took the wand from the younger Iris, and pointed it at the staff. Soon, the staff stopped shooting lasers at her, and pointed itself at the wizard.
"You've taken control of my staff!" said the wizard.
"Yep. Was pretty easy, once I analyzed it with the sonic," said Clara. "So, now tell us—why did you trap us here? Why did you make the town? What was your master plan?"
"I'll never tell you!" the wizard snarled. His voice resounded off the halls, and made his robes flutter.
Clara suddenly squinted. "Hang on, I saw something under his robe."
"Listen, love, now's not the time to be distracted by those sort of thoughts," chided older Iris.
"Shh," said Clara. "Take off your robes, now!" she ordered the wizard.
"No!"said the wizard.
Clara pointed her wand at the wizard, and the robes he was wearing disappeared.
"Can I get one of those?" asked young Iris.
The wizard, without the robes, was actually much shorter than he had first seen. In fact, he looked just like a young version of the oafs before, and was wearing large stilts.
"You're just a child!" said older Iris and younger Iris at the same time.
"No, I'm not! I'm just a height-challenged teenager!" said the wizard, in a now high-pitched voice. His face was getting red. "My race creates worlds out of other people's thoughts. This town is my school project! I was gonna get a good grade, but you've just messed it up!"
Clara's jaw dropped. "You've kidnapped my friend and I, and countless other people marooned our ship, and left us in this bloody well, just to get an A+ on your report card! If I was your teacher, I would fail you!"
"It's a competitive school. Every edge counts," said the wizard. "However, complications rise up all the time in class work. I'll just have to deal with you, and then find another group of people to drain. Maybe some Karn Sisters will do?" With that, he waved his hand, and 2 scepters came out thin air. "TIME TO DIE!"
"Child!" said a deep voice. It sounded a lot like the way the wizard had spoken when he was in the robes.
"Maz Terrrich?" said the wizard. The scepters clatterred to the ground.
There was a short pause. Then the voice said "Do you remember who I am?"
"Yes, Maz Terrich," the wizard said. "You're my teacher. Are you here to grade my project?" The wizard was smiling hopefully.
"Grade? GRADE?" said the voice. "I refuse to grade this tosh. It's horrible workmanship. You've cut corners all over the place. Instead of taking a good idea, and nurturing it to fruition, you've decided to steal other people's energies to bolster your own. This is beyond inspiration, or even extrapolation—this is downright stealing!"
"I only wanted to get a good grade," said the wizard. He seemed close to tears.
"Well, at least the town works. Here's what you will do—you will make a new town, with new people. And instead of stealing people away, you will help it grow—without stealing other people's work. And then, if you do that well, maybe I'll think of letting you pass. Now GO!" shouted the voice.
"o-okay," said the wizard, who promptly teleported away.
"Well, that was lucky," said Clara.
"Was it?" said the voice. The owner of the voice came out of the shadows, revealing herself to be Me. "Or was it just my skills at voice manipulation?"
"That was bloody clever," said older Iris.
"Aren't you dead?" asked younger Iris.
"No, I'm immortal," said Me. "Courtesy of a Scottish geezer."
"Ah, of course," said the younger Iris. "The Scots often do that sort of thing." The older Iris nodded appreciatively. Clara rolled her eyes at the two.
Suddenly, the room there were in began to crack apart and shake. The people in the room went out of their trance, and were looking around.
"Er, I think he's trashing his school project,"said the older Iris.
"We need to leave," said Clara. "Everyone who just woke up! I know you're confused, but we need to go now!"
"How do we get out of here?"asked older Iris.
"I need to get a scan of the area using the sonic. Then we need to triangulate its position by calculating the frequencies of our echoes. From there, we might be able to get one of the oafs to let us know how far deep we are under the rock. Of course, this might not even be the same dimension as the village-"
"Um, baby, I think you're overthinking it," said Me.
"Shh, Me. Alright, Iris, do either of you know how to fix a sonic wand? I'm gonna need both of them."
"How about we just use the staff?" asked younger Iris.
Clara stopped talking. "Oh. That might work, too."
A few minutes later, Clara, Me, the 2 Irises (and each respective Pandas in their arms), and the whole town's populace were running into the restaurant that was parked in the middle of the town. The town itself was busy exploding.
"Honey, I don't think we'll all fit in there," said younger Iris, over the sounds of the ground melting.
Clara and Me ignored her, and beckoned people into the restaurant. With some reluctance, the younger Iris walked in. Then she saw why everyone could fit in there.
"It's a TARDIS!"said the younger Iris. The older Iris nodded.
"I knew, but I didn't want to mess up the surprise" said the older Iris.
"But wait, what happens to my TARDIS?" said the younger Iris.
"Hold on to your seats!" said Clara. "We're taking off!" The restaurant lifted off the ground.
"Wait, we need to go down and get out TARDISes!" said the younger Iris.
Then the town imploded into a black hole, with everything (including the two Iris's Putney Common Buses) going with it.
Throughout the ship, one could hear loud cursing from both Irises for several hours.
EPILOGUE
"So, there's one thing I don't understand," said young Iris, who had calmed down somewhat when older Iris assured her that she would find her bus in the future, though of course, older Iris didn't know exactly how. By now, all the townsfolk had been taken to a safe place. "How did you know my name?"
"Why, Clara told me," said Me.
"Speaking about yourself in third-person is very annoying," said one of the Pandas. The other one was drinking a Bombay Jewel.
"No, I didn't," said Clara.
"Clara, that isn't funny. You went right up to me, and said 'We need to take down that wizard. Once we look at the well, we'll be trapped by the wizard, and be rescued by a woman called Iris, who is very competent, very sexy, very awesome, and should be given a lot of gin.' To be honest, it seemed like an odd request, but I said okay. Then you said you were mind-wiping yourself of the plan, and to not remind you for...reasons you had. You refused to answer any questions, but told me to just get over to the town, and look in the well. By now, the mindwipe should have worn off so..."
"I don't even know how to mindwipe myself. What the hell is going on?"said Clara.
"Oh, I do love a good prank," said a voice that sounded a lot like Clara's.
The Cloister Bells began to ring.
"Will someone turn off that annoying racket?" said the other Panda.
"Don't worry. I just parked my bus into your TARDIS," said the mystery voice. "I should be leaving soon enough."
The owner of the voice showed herself. She had on a bright red smoker's jacket with ruffles on the collar and the sleeves. She had on black boots, and a long pipe in one hand. Her head was adorned with a black broad-brimmed floppy hat, which carried a small red jay's feather.
And she had the same face as Clara.
"You have my face!" said Clara.
"Very egotistical—to think a face is yours just because you have it, lovey," said the mystery woman. "But then again, you always were a little egotistical. It's a part of your charm, really."
"Are you an echo of hers?" said Me.
"No, love," said the woman. "I'm Iris Wildthyme, transtemporal adventuress."
Everyone in the room was speechless, except one of the Pandas, who was snoring.
"This is too stupid. I'm out of the story." said older Iris.
"Which regeneration are you?" said younger Iris.
"Hmm...I believe 144th. It's hard to keep count, though—there's always the weird regens I forget about—like the Prohibition Iris...or the times I waste a regen on keeping my face...so it might be more like 196th ...but let's just say 144th to keep things simple," said the oldest Iris.
"Why did you trick us into going here?" said Me.
"Because, at my younger ages,I needed a random adventure. It's fun to prank myself. Also, a lot of people were gonna die if you all didn't stop that wizard," said the oldest Iris. She grabbed a Bombay Jewel from Panda's hand, and drank it all. Wiping her chin, she continued "Plus, I saw it happen from my younger selves' point of view, so I had to make it happen." She waved at her youngest self (the older self had mysteriously disappeared).
"That's a very weak reason to place us in life-threatening situations," said Clara. "And it's really disturbing seeing you wearing my face."
"You'll get used to it, probably," said the Clara!Iris. "You and I begin great friends."
"What about Me?" asked Me.
"Nah, we never really got along. You're great at throwing parties, though," said oldest Iris
"So, what happens next?" said the youngest Iris.
"Well, if I remember correctly...Oh dear," said oldest Iris. "Clara, may I have some more alcohol? I'm gonna need it."
"Why?" said Me.
"Remember the Finasians who were chasing you, middle-aged Iris?"said Clara!Iris.
"Don't call me middle-aged, especially when you've regened more than 100 times more than me," said older Iris bitterly (not the youngest one, who is the one with the pink blaster. The other one.). "And the Finas—oh, crap." The older Iris stole another Bombay Jewel from Panda, who had just refilled his last one. She explained to the rest "When I first came here, I was escaping from Finasian warships because I wore the crown of their prince. That, apparently, is punishable by death. After I got here, I got sidetracked, cause I remembered what happened last time—when I was blondie with the pink laser gun- and I figured that maybe I could deal with it early. Obviously that didn't work. But now, those soldiers have found me. And they are pissed."
"Our TARDIS has defenses," said Clara.
"Except," said Me,looking at the scanners, "we have the Clara lookalike Iris's TARDIS in our ship. That temporal instability has weakened our shields. And, indeed, we have 25 warships headed for us." Me glared at the oldest Iris.
"Oops?" the oldest Iris said.
The TARDIS was rocked by sudden blasts.
"Damnit!" said Me. "Our shields are down, and we still don't have weapons on our ship!"
The oldest Iris was cackling while the TARDIS lights blinked, and the younger and older Irises kept on drinking. Me was manning the controls, and Clara was staring at her double dumbfounded.
"What's so funny?" screamed Clara.
"Keep your lid on," said the oldest Iris. "I'm laughing cause I know what happens next. Come on—Clara and Me, plus not 1, not 2, but 3 Iris Wildthymes? Do you know how much fun we'll get up to in the ensuing years? And I get to see it from 3 different perspectives!"
"It's still weird getting a motivational talk from myself," said Clara.
"Any tips for past you, before we get blown to bits?"said youngest Iris to the future her, who took out her blaster, ready for the ensuing fight.
"Don't trust Jimmy when he says it'll only hurt a bit," said the oldest Iris. "And sit back and enjoy. We're gonna have so much fun!"
And they did.