Chapter One

Murder Is Easy

The rain was pouring down in buckets outside of the small, out-of-the way train station as businessmen and tourists hurried past, heads bowed and occasionally looking at their mobile phones. In the twenty-first century, there wasn't much anyone seemed to want to do except text. Everyone was so occupied in their own little social worlds that seemed so important to them that no one at all noticed the peculiar sound that was coming from around a corner. A sound that was almost exactly the sound you'd expect to hear if the fabric of time and space was pushed carelessly to the side by a 1960s police box and closed neatly behind it. But nobody turned to stare, no-one clicked a picture on their phone and sent it careening throughout the vast tunnels of the internet and turned it into a viral phenomenon. Which, coincidently, was just how the owner of the box liked it.

The door creaked open, almost hesitantly, and an ordinary-looking girl in a light blue dress and black jacket stepped out. She looked back and forth, examining the place, before her eyes came to rest on a large sign announcing where they were.

"All clear, Professor!" she called cheerily into the blue police box. "The train station, just like you said. Which makes a change."

"Ace." A small man with a brown overcoat and a funny little hat perched on top of his head stepped out to join her. He looked up at the sky, and the overcast clouds, and finally at the wetness all around them. "Oh, dear. It does seem to be raining quite a bit, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, and I'm getting drenched," his companion said, pulling her jacket tightly around herself, as if to ward off the rain. "Would you mind actually putting that brolly of yours to work?"

"Respect the umbrella," he scolded, but pulled his red-handled umbrella from his side and opened it with a masterful flick of his wrist. He held out his arm to his friend, and she linked hers neatly through it. They walked side-by-side into the station, chatting and grinning together.

"What do you know about train stations, Ace?" the Doctor asked. She wrinkled her nose a bit.

"Not a lot. I didn't exactly pay attention in school, did I?"

He shook his head a bit, and then began to lecture her about the full history of underground subways and railway lines in full. She was only half-listening to him, and let her mind wander a bit, glancing around. There was a mother with several children, looking more than slightly harassed as they all tried to pull her in different directions at once. A lot of people texting. A young couple, not much older than her, sitting across a table, writing to each other on phones.

Wait.

What was that? Voices, raised. "Dammit, let me go!"

The Doctor, next to her, kept chattering on, oblivious. She held up a hand to stop him.

"Professor, can you hear that?"

He stopped. "Hear what?"

She listened anxiously, glancing back and forth. "It sounded like two people arguing. And... somebody hit something."

The speakers above them crackled into life. "Train Line Two, arriving."

The Doctor smiled at her. "It was probably just your imagination."

"Yeah, probably." She relaxed a bit. She couldn't hear anything, now. Her eyes flicked across the station again, and saw someone. The figure was indistinct, but he was quite clearly pushing a woman sharply in the chest. Onto the tracks.

And then, an ear-deafening screech as a train pulled into a station, and another scream, more human. Before she knew it, she was running, dragging the Doctor along with her. She stopped at the side of the tracks. "Oh, no," she whispered. The side of the train was splattered with blood. And down, next to the train...

"Poor girl."

"Suicide, do you think-"

"-should call her family-"

"-who's going to get the body?"

A crumpled, broken figure, on the ground. She was blonde and petite, and had a pink Hello Kitty satchel slung over her shoulder. A brown leather cord lay inexplicably over her body, and shards of glass (maybe from a broken window?) glinted around her. Ace absorbed this all with an almost detached interest. Someone had died, and there was no way that they could have stopped it. They hadn't even expected it to happen. It was meant to be a break from saving the world.

You don't often get a holiday with the Doctor, though. She knew that perfectly well.

"Ace." Someone was tugging at her sleeve. She looked over. It was the Doctor. "Ace, come away. Please."

She allowed herself to be led over to a bench, and the Doctor sat down next to her. "Are you all right?"

Reality snapped back to her with a twang like a rubber band, and she blinked. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm good. It was just..."

"Unexpected?" he offered quietly. She suddenly realised that he probably thought she was in some state of shock. And on some level, she probably was. But she couldn't afford to think like that right now. A girl had died. She had to do something. No, they had to do something.

"I'm fine," she said, nodding firmly. "Doctor, that girl didn't commit suicide. She was pushed. I saw her."

He looked at her entirely seriously. "Did you see who pushed her?"

And that was the amazing thing about the Doctor. He believed her, even when she half didn't believe herself. He had a remarkable ability to make anyone at all seem incredibly important, no matter how lowly they seemed.

"He had a beige coat," she said hesitantly. "And... I think he pushed her with his right hand."

"Good." He jumped up, and strode over to the rapidly growing group of people gathered around the side of the track where the girl's body lay. Ace, after a moment, followed him. They stood together at the edge of the platform, looking down. "What do you think?"

She thought for a moment. "Whoever did it wouldn't want to stick around. He would have hopped the next train out of here."

"My thoughts exactly," he said, tapping her on the nose. "And there's only one train going out of this station right now."

She looked over, to the other side of the station. The logical- no, the only place the murderer could have ran to was that compartment of that train just over... there. The train in question was meant to be leaving at half past eleven. She looked up at the clock. 11.34.

"Professor, the train's leaving!" she exclaimed in horror. He was already dashing across the station, clutching his hat to his head, and yelling at her to follow him.

"Doors closing."

He leapt inside the compartment, jammed the door open with his brolly, pulled Ace easily inside, and plucked the makeshift holder from the gap. Ace gasped for breath, and looked around. Apart from them, there were six passengers in the compartment. Three women, three men. A nice even split, which left them with three possible murderers.

On a train compartment, with someone who had just murdered a girl- pushed her onto the tracks, no less. Ace could think of better ways to spend a break from saving the world.

And the worst bit was that the train was arriving at the station in 15 minutes exactly. If they didn't catch the person by then, he'd escape. Possibly to kill someone else.

To be continued...