Last time:
When the Doctor asks the TARDIS to take him on a vacation, it travels to a volatile time loop instead. The Doctor leaving would wipe out the Solar System, so he goes to investigate if just to not be directly responsible for the tragedy when he goes his way. He disembarks in Joey Drew Studios and finds evidence of the Slvsonians doing something dangerous on Earth that involves living ink and two missing people.
Chapter 2 –In Which Angels are Watching
The Doctor kicked himself free and stepped away. "Hullo. I'm the Doctor. You are?"
The thing flexed its hands, revealing that its fingers ended in sharp points. It lunged – fingers digging into his arm hard enough to leave deep gouges.
IT'S TIME TO BELIEVE.
The Doctor choked back his lunch. His time senses screamed in his own mind.
The ink creature swiped again.
The Doctor dodged.
It lunged.
He kicked.
It lunged again.
He planted his foot in its head, and it melted back into a thick puddle. "So sorry. Come find me again when you're ready to talk like a reasonable being. I can help you."
The Doctor flinched when he caught the words coming out of his own mouth. So much for not getting involved. It may have been too late anyway.
He cursed the Slvsonians under his breath. Looking toward the room's last ink puddle, he said, "What an awful fate. Created by the Slvsonians' imagination farm and for what? To be bound to humans and turned into living cartoon characters? Or to get linked to a time loop for…? We could help each other, if any of the consciousness you gained is reasonable."
The ink puddle didn't respond, so he hopped over it and landed in a hall. He looked around and found relatively clear planks for the floor. In front of him was an open gate with a lever beside it. To the right was an empty niche. To the left led off to be explored.
Taking the left, the Doctor went further into the halls. At the next fork, he turned right, and nearby was a table with another audio tape. He stepped up to it and found two names: Wally Franks and Thomas Connor.
Alright let's go over this again. If the pressure goes over 45, I screw the safety bolt in tighter, right?
No! For the last time, you do that, you'll blow every pipe in this place! If it reaches 45, you unhook the safety switch.
You sure? You know, this sounds harder than comparing ear wax to bee's wax!
Look, it's not that difficult! Just keep an eye on the gauge!
Look pal, if you think I'm doing my job AND yours, I'm outta here!
The Doctor snorted. It came out flat. "Looks like the pipes in this place did blow. And then you started fighting, didn't you?"
He moved down the hall, pressing himself to the wall avoid dripping ink and tensing when he saw a pool of the stuff in his way. "If anyone's in there, don't attack me." He leaped over.
The hall broke off into a small room where he could see a pulley system behind a metal grate. He pressed his hands to it and leaned forward.
There were thick metal chains extending above and below, past what there was light to see. Glancing over his shoulder, he pulled out his screwdriver. With a bit of patience, he pulled up a clunky spigot pouring ink. It attached to a box and gears.
The Doctor could smell the ink from where he stood, and the machine gave off dizzying bursts of mental and temporal energy.
He scanned it. Pipes, psychic circuitry, and a lot of ink. No controls.
He stuck his sonic in his pocket and turned around. He continued down the hall, slowing only to glance at an inky – not psychic – message on a wall: THE CREATOR LIED TO US.
Around the next corner was a dead end, but he continued forward to examine a Little Miracle Station whose door was ripped off its hinges. Inside was another message in ink: FEEL FAMILIAR?
Black was smeared inside the hiding station itself, but the bulk of it was splattered across the door and the surrounding wall – enough that an ink being may have bled out. Or a Slvsonian. Slvsonian blood was black. The Doctor winced.
He skimmed a finger across the congealment. Echoes. Faint. Only one voice clear as static: "...you're innocent but you still know..."
Unlike the others, the voice was like splinter-filled silk rather than a taser.
The Doctor gripped his sonic and scanned the gore – mostly ink, but a few nucleotides in there too – Lz. "What did you do, give it a few drops of your blood to help it along? You really ought to be careful with whose memories you pass along like that."
As soon as he turned around, he saw it – a stone statue of Bendy. It grinned down at him from a niche above the hall.
The Doctor gulped. "Statue. Time energy. I've heard the stories. Please tell me you're not…."
His eyes watered. He couldn't hold them open.
The statue's grin was wider than before.
He bolted. He whipped around corners and trapped himself in a dead end. There was a lever and a vent that busted through the wall. Too small for him.
Nothing for it. He turned around quickly, mentally chatting with himself about the value of keeping his eyes wide open.
No Angel.
So where'd it go?
As quietly as he could, he went to peek around the corner. There he saw, in the formerly empty alcove, the statue.
Boards creaked as the Doctor padded toward the Bendy. "Why didn't you attack me? Sated? Plotting something? Or are you…?"
He stopped an arm's length away from Bendy and stared at him for a moment.
He blinked.
When he opened his eyes, he was still in front of the statue. Machines still ground in the monochrome studio.
The Doctor put a hand on the statue's round stomach. It tickled his mind and sipped milliseconds off his life, so he reached for his screwdriver. "Hello. I'm the Doctor. I hope you don't mind if I take a look at you. I won't hurt you. Well, as long as you don't give me reason to. It's just… I've never actually seen one of your kind before."
A scan revealed a hollow stomach with psychic ink inside it. And there was something else closed in there too – something thin and organic – but the ink's interference prevented him from getting a better reading.
The Doctor blinked again. Still nothing happened.
He grinned at the Angel. "Your people have a bad rep, but that can't be your whole species, can it? I'm a Time Lord, and I like to think I'm an exception too. Sorry I have to put a stop to this time loop."
He blinked, and once again, nothing happened. He pretended not to have goosebumps as he walked through the open gate.
On the other side was an elevated walkway that ran around a corner, past two restrooms, and down to a room that had a lift shaft in one spot and an open door on one wall. He looked over his shoulder for the Angel.
Nothing. He allowed himself to relax.
At least momentarily – in the room he counted two Little Miracle Stations. There was also a psychic message by the shaft that had him grimacing: WE ALWAYS FALL.
When he checked on the lift, its gate opened, but it never came. He pulled on its chains and found that they ended in a severed link. He peered down into the darkness. "Hello?"
He was greeted by his own echo.
He stepped away and turned toward the open door, which was labeled LEVEL K. Through it, he could see another psychic message: the word DOWN and an arrow pointing that direction.
As he wound down the staircase, he found things that most humans wouldn't think to put in a stairwell: desks, shelves, bacon soup…. He found more words as well. WAY read a psychic message. ON another one.
A choppy, off-tune whistling wheezed from a landing below.
"Hello?" the Doctor called.
The whistling stopped.
He creaked down the staircase, but there was only a large ink puddle. He grimaced, backtracked past the overlooked THE, and didn't return until he had a clean plank in hand.
When he did, the puddle was gone.
Glancing around showed him crates, cobwebs, and a toilet. No people. "I don't mean you any harm. I'm just looking for someone who can tell me what's going on here."
Only the background thrumming of gears answered him.
He continued down, keeping his eyes on the ink and the messages. At one point, he stepped over a pile of musical instruments. He also found a radio and a message HOW COULD ONE RESIST THIS? Oddly, he also passed a flight of stairs that led down from the main flight of stairs.
After he'd gone far enough down to string together the message – BE KIND TO PEOPLE YOU MEET ON THE WAY UP BECAUSE YOU'LL MEET THE SAME PEOPLE ON THE WAY DOWN – he climbed to investigate the off-shoot staircase.
The Doctor found a room at the bottom of the off-shoot stairs. In the room was a table with a cassette player on it, labeled as containing the voice of Henry. Brow raising, the Doctor picked it up and pressed play.
Only two weeks into this company and already it's gotten interesting. Joey is a man of ideas… And only ideas.
When I agreed to start this whole thing with him I thought there would be a little more give and take. Instead I give, and he takes. I haven't seen Linda for days now.
Up the stairs and around the corner, something creaked. The Doctor glanced over his shoulder.
Nothing yet. He stepped sideways and pressed himself against a wall.
Still, someone has to make this happen. When in doubt, just keep drawing Henry.
On the plus side, I've got a new character I think people are going to love.
The Doctor blinked. When his eyes opened, there was a shadow on his face. He turned his head.
A Weeping Angel was grinning at him, still in the form of Bendy.
The Doctor pointed to the cassette player. "Henry co-founded this studio and created Bendy, didn't he? Do you know what he and Joey were trying to do here?"
He blinked.
Only two weeks into this company, and already it's gotten interesting….
The Angel was sitting in the corner, grinning at the cassette player in its hands. A small Bendy plushy sat on its leg, its pie-cut eyes staring at the Doctor through its thick black stitches.
"Or maybe you're looking into it too." The Doctor backed away from the Angel. He creaked up the stairs and onto Level 11, which was just below Level K.
He looked around and found a Little Miracle Station and – yuck – a hallway flooded with ink. Grumbling to himself, he went back to pull the stairwell's door off its hinges. He soniced the knob itself off and used the door as an awkward skim board, moving forward by grabbing the walls.
A flat two-horned head and pie-cut eyes peeked out around the next corner. It looked part of a battered Bendy cut-out that someone had to be holding up.
"Hello?" he called.
The face disappeared.
He pressed the board forward faster and reached the end of the flood in two seconds. He stepped onto a small wooden platform with a door and a window into a small empty room. Not even a cut-out. "Where'd you go?"
He stepped into the room to investigate. There was another door – locked. He soniced the lock itself, but there was just a closet on the other side. No secret doors or passageways – just an ordinary break room. Well, an ordinary toonish break room in sepia tone with a psychic message next to the vending machine: THE DRINKS WERE ON JOEY.
He shook his head.
His neck hairs tingled as he returned to the stairs and walked to the next level, P. There was a soft click from the room with Henry's recording, and the hairs jolted. There had to be eyes on the back of his neck.
Squeak!
The Doctor turned.
The Weeping Angel was grinning at him and holding its demonic plushy.
"You should play Fugitive with a bunch of teenagers sometime. I'm sure they'd appreciate the nightmares." The Doctor separated himself from the Angel with the stairwell door.
The Doctor pays no mind to how he looks with his matted hair and his ink-stained suit as he dashes from his TARDIS. He crosses the crimson moss to grab a blond Lz by his collar. "Two weeks ago, you executed a man touched by the Weeping Angels. Where did he appear?"
The Lz stiffens. "No more off-worlders!"
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The Doctor drops the Lz the moment he sees the firing squad off to the left, weapons trained on him.
Level P had some observation rooms and some empty boxes next to sets of valves. On a wall was an inky message: I DON'T WANT TO WORK HERE ANYMORE.
"I'll bet," the Doctor replied.
As he went to examine the valves, a speaker squeaked from inside an observation room. A legion of voices poured from it: "Down by the ink-pier's mournful lake was malice shown by our Lord fake. But on this day…."
The Doctor slowed, keeping an ear on the voices.
"Rejoice, my flock! A flashing dream: a new savior – one with no team who's yet a policeman of love descended from the stars above."
He stopped in his tracks. A policeman? Stars?
"As Saint Michael his dragon slays, Pinstripes will our demon erase."
The Doctor turned toward the speaker. "What?"
"We have hope of freedom again. And now… can I get an amen?" The speaker crackled off.
"What?" The Doctor's voice climbed in pitch. "What? No! No, I won't. I'm not killing anyone for you! I'm here to end the time loop, and that's it."
He got no answer.
The Doctor tugged on his hair. "Great. Just what I needed – a bunch of cultists telling me I have to save them by killing the aliens."
He pushed the thought to the back of his mind, stepping forward to examine a set of valves instead. As he did so, a psychic message caught his eye: WHY AM I DOING THIS?
He searched, but Level P had nothing of true interest. He calmed his hearts and steadied his furious breathing as he returned to the stairs. All was as quiet as it should have been.
Just a bit more color and this place would be cheery really.
He entered, Level 9, which had a balcony that ran around a main floor and a gate with a large image of Alice Angel and the slogan SHE'S QUITE A GAL. On the balcony was a doorway with chopped-up boards lying in front, some nails still in the frame as though it had been boarded up. Whoever had the ax must have been in there, but stepping inside, the Doctor could see nothing chopped up. What there was was a desk, a chair, and another recording: a Grant Cohen's.
They say the real problem with Mr Drew is that he never actually tells us little people anything.
Oh sure, according to him there's always big stuff coming, adventure and fame and the like.
But I'm the guy, see, who has to make sure our budgets don't go all out of whack just cause genius upstairs went out and got himself another idea. Speaking of which, and this is top secret, apparently Mr. Drew has another large project in mind now.. and it ain't gonna be cheap.
The recording clicked off.
The Doctor stood there a moment, hands in his pockets. His eyes scanned the room for any more hints. Records maybe? A filing cabinet?
Crates... Books covered in cobwebs… He swept aside the sticky webs and blew dust off the titles. There were business guides and an old phone book, but no records. The desk drawers held only an empty fountain pen and a motionless limbed inkwell itself made of ink.
The Doctor shuddered past the Weeping Angel on his way out of the small office. He hushed down the stairs, where he found yet another recording on some shelves: another of Thomas Connor's. This one complained about Joey Drew neglecting elevator maintenance.
He kept looking around, crossing a bridge, climbing some stairs, and sonicing open the gate. Inside was an ink-stenched hallway that led to corpses. Cartoon corpses. Put up on display with their chests ripped open!
Directly in front of him, that was Boris the Wolf. Over there was also Boris and Wolf. And Boris the Wolf. And clones of more characters he didn't recognize. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry."
They hung in cages from the ceiling, or else they were strapped to tables stood upright in a flood of ink.
The Doctor made his way to the first Boris clone, one that was displayed before the ink began. Ink. The corpse too was made of ink.
There were already narrow boards placed on thick barrels to serve as walkways. He watched his step.
His eyes caught on more corpses floating rather than strapped to anything. And there! Over there, yellow wood blending in with the yellow wall, that was different. That wasn't a corpse directly on display at least. That was a coffin.
SUSIE, according to Henry's psyche.
Out came the Doctor's screwdriver. He aimed it at the wood and – it whined. Scowling, he put it back in his pocket. "I'm going to regret this."
He mustered what mental shields he could and stepped into the ink. He sunk waist-deep, and he could still hear the buzzing and screaming – muffled – but he heard it. He swallowed rising bile, sludged his way to the coffin, and pried it open.
The smell hit his nose immediately. Inside, yep. Those were human remains. Just the hair, the clothes, and the skeleton left really. Adult. Female.
He shoved the coffin door shut and took a moment to keep his lunch. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so, so sorry."
He took a breath.
"...him to his death?"
He turned. Coming through the door were two more cartoon characters. Both were armed – a shapely Alice with a blade, and a metal-armed Boris with an ax. Their eyes cut through the room as they light-footed into it. Alice, the Doctor noted, had a halo, not unlike the display that the Lz had when using their psychic abilities, only not – the halo was another Pnetiiy overlay.
Boris slapped his ax into his palm.
No other place to hide, the Doctor slipped behind Susie's coffin and low into the ink.
Next time:
HE CAN'T BE SAVED.
Disclaimer:
I don't own Doctor Who or Bendy and the Ink Machine.