Author's Note: As always, thank you to cyanb for being my beta reader.

Part II

Jeff Angelo leaned against the railing and stared around him. The place he found himself was spacious, but cluttered. It had a sort of odd, vintage feel to it, though there was an odd control console in the middle of the room.

"Jeff, are you in some sort of trouble?" the Doctor asked.

"Yes!" Jeff exclaimed. "I am! And, and, it's your fault, Doctor!"

"My fault?" He looked shocked.

"Yes," Jeff said. He slid down to the floor and rubbed his eyes. "My stomach hurts all the time, I get headaches..."

The Doctor pulled a silvery instrument out of his jacket pocket and flicked his wrist. Tines popped open and a green light came on. It hummed as the Doctor ran it up and down, then held it up to examine it. "Oh, Jeff, you are ill."

"All the time," Jeff said. He let out a low moan and clutched his head. "It's the stress."

"What does all this have to do with me, Jeff?" He asked. He snapped the device closed and slipped it back into his pocket. He dropped down next to Jeff. "Tell me all about it," he said, "the Doctor is in." He folded his hands and looked expectant.

Jeff sighed. He reached into a pocket and pulled out a plastic bottle. He spun the cap open and took a slug. At the Doctor's raised eyebrow, he gestured with the bottle, and said, "Pink bismuth." He recapped it and stuck the bottle in his own pocket. "Okay, you remember that day you came into my bedroom and borrowed my laptop?"

"Yes, of course. Had to deal with the Atraxi."

"That's just it. You remember what you told me that day..."

"To erase your internet history?"

"No! I mean, yes, and thanks, that was good advice." Jeff wiped his palms on his trousers. "But... you told all those alien experts that I was your best man. You told me that after it was all over, I would have my pick of jobs; that first, I had to be brilliant."

"Of course." The Doctor gave him a broad grin. "And you were brilliant, Jeff. You were!"

"And that's just it, Doctor: I'm not!" Jeff gave him a bewildered look. "But because of you, because of what I did that day, for you, everyone, all those important people, thought I was brilliant. They still do.

"Doctor, they offered me a job. Professor Z showed up in Leadworth one morning and told me that I came highly recommended. He said he wanted me for his team. He offered me so. Much. Money. And private insurance. It even covered my grandmother. I couldn't say no.

"But I'm useless, Doctor! I have no idea what I'm doing. I mean, Professor Z keeps sending me out to handle these alien encounters, and I just muddle along, doing my best to try to figure it out. I've gone on five cases, so far."

"How did you do?"

"Took care of them all."

"That's great, though!" The Doctor patted him on the shoulder.

"It wasn't me. It was just, I don't know, blind luck. I sort of go along, follow the clues and things fall into place. But it isn't me doing it, I'm not a detective, or an alien expert, or one of those Torchwood people. I'm just me: Jeff Angelo from Leadworth.

"Every day, I wonder when they're going to figure me out. Every day, I wonder when Professor Z is going to show up with the security personnel and tell me, 'this is it, Jeff, it's all over, we know you're rubbish, and it's over for you, lad.'"

"Does he really talk like that?" the Doctor asked, surprised.

"No." Jeff hung his head. "It really will be over for me, though. This last alien I was supposed to deal with is huge, and muscular, and had a mouthful of sharp teeth, and..."

"What?" the Doctor asked. He gaped at Jeff. "Say that again?"

"Um..." Jeff shrugged. "Huge, muscular, sharp teeth..."

"Anything else?"

"I don't think he likes sunlight."

"Oh. Oh, no." The Doctor jumped to his feet. "This could be bad, this could be very bad."

"You're telling me," Jeff said. He gave a weak chuckle.

The Doctor ran over to a floor panel and drew it aside, then bent and grunted as he dragged a large trunk out of the recess. It was a big thing of leather and brass, like something Jeff's grandfather might have brought back from the second World War, with all his possessions in it. He flicked the latches and tossed the lid open, then began to sort through the things it contained.

"Where is it, where is it... here!" He pulled out a massive leather tome. He brought it back over to Jeff and sat down cross-legged in front of him. The book was worn and tattered. When the Doctor opened the thick leather cover, dry, yellowed pages were revealed.

"What is it, Doctor?" Jeff asked.

"An old bestiary from the thirteenth century, German. Das Buch von Unnatürlichen Biester. In those days," the Doctor said as he flipped through pages, "people believed in all sorts of monsters and creatures and things that crawl and go bump in the night... of course," he said, as he glanced up with a thoughtful look on his face, "while many of them were only monsters of the imagination, as it were, some were actual monsters. Or rather, aliens that were so different to what humans knew, that they seemed to be monsters.

"Some were, of course. Alien monsters, but monsters, nonetheless." He went back to searching through the bestiary. "Ah. Like... this one, for instance." He turned the book so that Jeff could see it. "Look familiar?"

"Oh!" Jeff jerked back, then took a deep breath. He leaned in to look at the sketches in the book. "Der Geimansame Troll," he read from the illuminated page.

"Yes," the Doctor said. "The common troll." He shook his head. "I wonder what they thought an uncommon troll would look like."

"What is it, though? It looks just like that alien I was chasing."

The Doctor sighed. "A Shallarite. From a rather inhospitable world way out on the end of the spiral arm. Imagine a shark, in humanoid form and adapted to life on land, and given a certain amount of intelligence. Strong, fast, ravenous." He snapped the book closed.

"You have that right," Jeff said. "We tracked it down because it ate..." He paused and looked down. "It ate some people."

"And the strength and speed?"

"It picked up my SUV and threw it across a street. And it snatched a gun out of my hand so fast I didn't see it move."

"A gun?" the Doctor asked. He gave Jeff a disappointed look.

"They assigned it to me," he said. "It wasn't a real gun, anyway. It was some sort of alien stunner. All it does is knock people down and daze them. It didn't do anything to that... what, Shallarite? It didn't bother him at all, though. Except when he crushed it in his hand and destroyed it. I think that numbed his hand." Jeff heaved a deep sigh. "The only reason he didn't kill me is that the sun came up."

"Yes," the Doctor said. His tone was thoughtful. "Shallar Prime is a very dark world. Thick atmosphere, high gravity, perpetual cloud cover. Not a lot of sunlight to get through, and what does come through is very dim. Shallar's star is a dim white dwarf. I imagine Earth's sun is much too bright for the Shallarite's comfort." He returned the book to the trunk and dropped the lid.

"You said it could be very bad, Doctor," Jeff said. "Those were your exact words."

"Yes." The Doctor leaned back against the console. "You see, Shallarites aren't just ravenous. They never stop eating. They just eat and eat and eat, until they get eaten by something else."