Time Stands Still
Part I
Impossibilities
Rey looked at the strange man. 'Time Travel?' she asked carefully.
'Time travel.' he gave her another one of those smiles that looked just wrong on his old face. He didn't look like he belonged on Jakku. It didn't look like he belonged anywhere. His dark red over coat and bright white shirt were completely wrong for the desert world. On anyone else they would be sweating under the heat, he wasn't.
Rey frowned, there was something more about this. About the whole thing. She couldn't begin to explain what, but her instincts were telling her this strange Doctor was more than he appeared. 'Time travel's not possible.' she told him.
'I like to think of at least six impossible things before breakfast.' He smirked. 'If I can prove one impossibility would you believe another?'
She didn't know what he was getting at and said so.
'This is my ship.' he told her proudly, standing next to the big blue box she had noticed earlier. She was curious, because she could have sworn it wasn't there earlier, but when she saw him by her Speeder she had other priorities. 'It's called the TARDIS and it can travel anywhere in Space or Time.'
'It's a blue box.' She pointed out. Even as she said it she knew she was wrong. There was something more to it but she didn't know what. Or how she knew that. Just that she did.
The Doctor looked at her 'Only from the outside.' With that he opened the doors and Rey jumped back. Inside was a large round room, lined with a gallery of books, statues and large boards. In the middle there was what looked like some form of generator. Careful for some sort of trick Rey walked around the box. It seemed to be just as big as she first thought.
She looked again at the inside, 'Hologram?' she asked, unsure. She'd never seen a hologram so realistic.
Another wrong smile and he stepped inside. Either there was some very clever slicer manipulating the image, or it wasn't a hologram. Almost scared of the answer she followed. Only half expecting to step through the projection.
She didn't. Instead it was just as it appeared. Bigger inside than outside. A lot bigger. More than that, Rey had spent her life crawling on the inside of ships. She'd learnt what all the different bits of tech were, what they did and more importantly how much they were worth.
The technology inside was like nothing she'd seen before. Some of it looked ancient, the rest so far advanced she couldn't imagine what it did. 'How?' she asked breathlessly, looking up at the top of the central column.
'You wouldn't understand. It's far beyond you.' He dismissed her question. 'Now, time travel! Where would you like to go?' Flicking a switch on the column the door swung shut behind her.
'What? Wait!' Rey reached for the strange man, but he pulled a leaver and everything went crazy. First the column in the middle began to move, it sounded like a great machine grinding into life. Rey could feel the energies flowing out and being channelled back into the engines.
'One trip. My treat.' He offered. 'Where would you like? Exiting, relaxing? A party, or something wonderful?'
Before she could answer the whole room leapt to the right. 'What was…?' she asked as the impossible ship lurched again.
'Something's wrong!' The Doctor shouted, manipulating the controls as she held on to the railings. 'I've got no control!' the room span and Rey was thrown from the railing.
'What are you doing?' she screamed, already regretting following the stranger.
'It's not me.' he insisted, swinging a monitor around. 'It's the Time Vortex, we're caught in a temporal wake. A down stream in time.'
'What?' Rey asked again, her head spinning. Something was wrong. Very wrong. 'What's happ… happen…'
'Pudding brained primitive! I might as well be trying to explain quantum mechanics to a chimpanzee!' He growled. 'Alright; we're trapped in storm. Makes more sense? Good. Even if a temporal wake is nothing like one.'
'I can't…' She began when something hit her. It was like her mind had been closed before. Suddenly it had been forced open and the entire universe poured in. Trapped in a whirlwind of thoughts and ideas that weren't hers Rey was lost in the chaos of sights sounds and feelings.
The Doctor standing before an army of nightmares and the nightmares ran from him. The sky was on fire, great red streaks flying across space. A space station exploding. Droids, or what looked like droids, screaming exterminate amongst the ruins of a dead city. A war beyond scope. The sands of Jakku red with spilt blood while the sky was full of fighters and Star Destroyers. A girl, blonde hair, running from a monster. No, towards it, a sword in her hand.
A dark dead world, ravaged with storms, a castle on the hill A forest full of life, high above it a shower of debris from space. Beneath the castle, a giant hand reaches for the sky. The forest, a body burning. Evil dying and evil being reborn. The Doctor, his face changing, young and old. Herself, a glowing sword in her hand. A man on a cliff, his bearded face in shadows of old regret.
The same blonde girl on a strange world, laughing with her friends. A star going dark, it's life drained into a planet. Men in strange robes with high collars commanding a ship built for one purpose she couldn't begin to describe. A world destroyed as a Princess watches helplessly. A great glass globe on the top of a mountain inside a civilisation as old as time. Her father leaving her on Jakuu. A graveyard full of statues.
All the while a bell ringing in the distance.
Rey tried to make sense of it all. Tried to understand what it was she was seeing, feeling, even tasting but it was too much. Eventually the near constant stream of disjointed imagery just overwhelmed her. The last thing the young scavenger heard was the Doctor's voice, warning that they were about to land.
It was night and the moon was high in the sky. The Graveyard was as quite as it ever was in this town, which was to say not very quiet at all. 'Oh come on. Rise and shine. I've got homework to finish and if I don't get a near perfect score I'm going to be in so much trouble.'
'I wouldn't worry about that little girl.' a hungry voice came from behind her.
Rolling her eyes the girl sighed. 'Really? Let me guess new in town?'
The man, who looked like he lost what fashion sense he had at least a decade before, stepped out of the shadows and gave her a look that made her want to take a shower. 'Why it so happens I am. Are you the welcome party?'
'So not.' she told him. 'Look, it's been a long night and like I was saying I have other things to do. Can we get this over with quickly?'
He didn't seem to notice that she wasn't scared, instead he just seemed more and more confidant. 'Awe sweetness, where's the fun in doing things quickly?'
'Ugh. you really trying to come on to me?' she mock shuddered. 'You really have no idea do you.'
He laughed 'Let me guess, self defence classes. That's cool, but there are scarier things than muggers in graveyards.' His face morphed. Forehead bulging and teeth growing long and pointed. 'Feel free to scream. It won't do much good, but I might like it.'
The girl gave a mock yawn. 'Oh look a Vampire! What would little old me ever do.' she raised her hands in surrender, showing of her current favourite stake that up until now had been stashed up her sleeve. 'oops, guess it was lucky I had this old thing.'
The vampires face went white, which was quite an accomplishment for an undead creature without a blood supply. 'You? you're…'
'Yep.' she offered a smile. 'I think this is the part where you run away. Oh and screaming, not very manly.' But before he could turn and run there was a strange noise coming from all around them.
It sounded like machinery, or great lumps of metal screeching against each other. Out of nowhere a sudden wind picked up, it was so strong it nearly picked her up off the ground. Discarded newspapers and trash suddenly filled the cemetery, blowing like confetti all over the place. Feeling the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end she dove for the ground. just in time for a sudden ball of lightning to crack into life above her head.
From out of the lightning came a seven foot tall blue box. It flew out like it had been shot out of a cannon, spinning out of control. It bounced off a tree, smashed through a grave stone and rolled over the top of a mausoleum.
Jumping to one side it barely missed her again as it bounced into the Vampire, that was instantly dusted as a corner of the wooden box went straight through it's chest.
Eventually, mercifully, the box came to a stop. Creaking sightly as it rocked back on it's base and the wind died down. The was steam rising from the sides and the light on top glowed slowly.
It took nearly a full minute for her to stand up. When she had, and checked that she hadn't been hit anywhere she looked around. There was no one else. 'I thought I'd seen everything.' she whispered to herself. 'Okay, the guy's are not going to believe this.' Keeping one eye in the sky, incase another wooden box decided to fall from the sky she decided to get a better look.
Only to have something grab her ankle. It was the Vampire she'd been waiting for, she was standing on it's grave and a claw like hand had punched through the soft dirt. 'Oh, you have got to be…' Buffy started before having her leg pulled out from under her with a yelp.
The Doctor tried the controls again. The Time Rotor tried to move but gave up with a deafening clang and the TARDIS almost seemed to sigh. Behind him a fireball erupted as the energy had to go somewhere. 'What is wrong with you?' he asked, pumping the helmlic regulator to put out the fire. Spinning the screen around to face him again the Doctor tried to bring up the location. He got nothing.
The TARDIS's guidance system had been totally scrambled by the temporal wake. They had been caught in the rapids of time, churned up and tossed about by the strong undercurrents and spat out here. Even if the TARDIS could launch the engines were too damaged from fighting the current. Ironically they'd need time to cool down and repair.
That meant, for all intents an purposes they were trapped here, wherever here was. Turing to shout at the human he'd stupidly offered to give an adventure to the Doctor stopped. She was unconscious. 'Typical.' he grunted before stopping.
There was no reason for her to be unconscious.
He dashed over to her, pulling out his sonic screwdriver and running quick scan. Nothing, no head injury and no evidence that she was a Time Lord in disguise. Something had to have pulled them off course, had caused the Time Vortex itself to buckle like a sea in the middle of a storm. There was no evidence that she was a trick or a trap. Just human.
He didn't trust just human. Picking her up, noticing that she was too thin to weigh very much at all, he carried her to the base of the console. There he dug into one of the storage chests left there from his previous regeneration. Inside was what he was looking for. A spare chameleon arch headset. Hooking it into the bottom of the column he fitted the arch on his new friend.
'Wha?' she asked coming around.
'I'm trying to find out. Now sit still, this shouldn't hurt.' He said activating the device with a buzz. Rey shouted in surprise and pain. 'I lied, now don't move that.'
'What is it?' she asked again.
The Doctor went back to his chest, 'A scanner. It's going to find out why we were blown off course.'
'You think it was something to do with me?'
'One thing is new inside the TARDIS. Guess what that is.'
She rubbed her eyes before gently probing the edges of the Arch. 'I think I hit my head. I had the strangest dream.'
'Your head is fine.' He told her, pulling out the old monitor he had in the previous version of the Control room. With his screwdriver he attached it to the trailing cables and switched it on. 'Nothing.'
'You were there, we were running from something. Or too. It was so confusing.'
'Nothing. Not in your bloodstream, not in your cellular…' He trailed off. There was something. 'Stupid, stupid Doctor.' he swore. 'I should have know. Should have guessed. Stupid, stupid old man.' He should have guessed, should have seen it. He never thought a girl scrambling about in some forgotten battlefield would be like this.
'What's wrong?' she asked.
'I'm an idiot, an old fool that should looked before he invited some stranger into his TARDIS. No wonder we went off course. We could be anywhere, anywhere and I deserve it. Stupid old man.'
Rey took a deep breath. 'I think I've been very calm, but you need to tell me. What is going on?'
The Doctor looked at her for a long moment and almost felt sorry for her. She had no idea. Not of who she was or what she represented. As he tried to think of a way to explain so that she could begin to understand there was a loud knock from above and the doors opened.
'Hello? I was passing by and you kinda crashed. Is anyone hurt?' A young woman's voice called out 'Oh wow, it's bigger on the inside!'
The Doctor groaned, he recognised the accent. Of all the places to crash his TARDIS and get stranded. California.
End Part I
