It was a relatively normal day at the prestigious technological school Lester Vine Institute. Kenneth Vine, great-grandson of the man who'd founded it, lifted up his soldering visor and waved his hand in front of his face to clear away the smoke. "Mr. Days," he said, "are you sure this thing is going to work?"
His professor, Mr. Days, smiled. "I'm positive," he said. "We just need to find a proper target.
Kenneth ran a hand through his blond hair and looked at his creation. It was a hollowed-out cylinder of metal about two feet long with a small computer screen attached to the side and a handle and trigger. The computer screen showed vague shapes in different shades of blue, but nothing else.
Kenneth put down his soldering torch and held up the device. "The military will be thrilled with this," he said after emitting a low whistle. "How does it work?"
"It fires a pulse of energy that envelops the target object, veiling every sound it makes and rendering it completely invisible to any kind of radar." Mr. Days tapped the screen. "Well, except the one on this screen. We can still hear and see them."
Kenneth held up the device and looked through the scope. "What should we use it on?"
"I was thinking about using it on an animal first," Mr. Days said. "This technology is still unstable. We could seriously harm someone with this."
He went to the window of the laboratory and opened it, searching for a raccoon or bird or something. The forest outside of Lester Vine Institute stretched on for seemingly miles, far across the Washington border and into Canada. "Oh, look. Try using it on that squirrel there."
Kenneth went to the window and looked at the trees. Because the laboratory was on the third floor of the building, he could see the tops of the trees easily. He found a squirrel and took aim.
Mr. Days looked on proudly, his ancient blue eyes crinkling around the corners as he smiled. Suddenly his smile disappeared as he saw two figures moving through the forest. A girl, dressed in a teal turtleneck and blue jeans, walking through the forest and looking up at the trees. Behind her, a man in a brown jacket and crazy brown hair was looking at something in his hands.
"No, Kenneth, don't shoot!" Mr. Days cried, but it was too late. Just as the girl walked by the squirrel, Kenneth pulled the trigger, sending the energy pulse straight into her. . . .
Mr. Days turned and stared at Kenneth. Kenneth looked incredulously down the scope at the squirrel, still entirely visible, scampering away. But the girl was nowhere to be seen.
Mr. Days's mouth dropped open. "Kenneth," he stammered, "what have you done?"
MINUTES EARLIER
Crystal pressed one last button and looked at the Doctor from across the TARDIS engine console. "Why do you need me to help you fly this thing?" she cried.
"The TARDIS was meant to be piloted by six Time Lords at once," he replied, reaching up and spinning a dial around. "Two people is difficult enough. Try doing it by yourself. Oh, turn that green-ish dial over there up to the six—no, the seven!"
Crystal did as he asked. "You still haven't told me where we are yet!"
The Doctor, stretched over the console to hit five different buttons at once and a lever, stood up slowly, his back making suspicious cracks. "The year 2056," he said. "Brazil. The opening of the grandest theme park in the world yet. They have a Ferris wheel one mile in diameter."
"Really?" Crystal started for the door, looking back at the Doctor. "What else?"
"A roller coaster that goes so fast, three seconds of time are literally lost." The Doctor wiggled his fingers as if to show time's disappearance. "An object going faster than another object will have time travel more slowly. Theory of Relativity, that's why they call the roller coaster the Einstein. . . ."
The Doctor trailed off as Crystal opened the TARDIS door. There was no roller coaster. There was no Brazil. There was a temperate forest and a chill in the air.
Crystal gripped her arms tightly. She was wearing a baby-blue turtleneck sweater and blue jeans, but the temperature difference from here to the TARDIS was very evident. "I may be wrong," she said, "but this isn't Brazil."
The Doctor squinted up at the sky. The sun shone in the very center of a clear blue sky. He took out his sonic screwdriver and pointed it around, pressing the button. Upon close examination of the sonic, he announced, "Washington State, somewhere near the Canadian border. There's a successful college somewhere around here, though it won't become particularly famed until 2057 for its invisibility program."
Crystal was walking ahead, and the Doctor followed her subconsciously. "This place is beautiful," she said, trying to look on the bright side. "I mean, it's no Brazil, but it's . . . peaceful."
The Doctor nodded, still looking at his sonic. "You know, now that I think about it, it may have been this year that the college became famed. I don't quite remember."
Crystal didn't respond. She was too busy looking around at the wildlife. She saw a raccoon a distance away, watching her warily but with curiosity. A flock of birds took to the skies as she walked by. She saw a squirrel on a tree to her left, sitting on a branch and eating something.
"Hey, little guy," she said, grinning at the squirrel. "Squirrels are still the same in the year, what is it, 2050?"
"2056," the Doctor corrected.
Crystal stopped mid-stride. Something had hit her in her side so hard that the wind was knocked out of her. She looked over and saw nothing. Confused, she collapsed, gripping her side.
"Crystal?" the Doctor said, finally looking up.
"Ow," she groaned, struggling for breath. Her breaths came raspy and hard, as if her lungs were ten times smaller. She lay in a fetal position for a while, not getting up or moving.
"Crystal?" the Doctor repeated. He put away his sonic screwdriver and looked around wildly.
"I'm fine." Crystal finally managed to sit up. She shook her head slowly. "What was that?"
"Crystal!" the Doctor cried. "Where are you? Crystal!"
Crystal stood up. "Um, Doctor?"
The Doctor looked straight at Crystal, but his eyes simply passed over her. Crystal shook her head, laughing. "Is this your idea of a joke?" she said.
The Doctor swore. "Crystal, this is not funny! If this is a joke. . . ."
Crystal went up to the Doctor and tugged on his arm. "Doctor, stop it," Crystal said. "I'm right here."
The Doctor looked down at the place where Crystal was holding his arm. All he saw was an imprint in his sleeve. "What. . . ." He stood still.
Crystal gave his arm a firm shake. "Doctor," she pleaded.
The Doctor tentatively put a hand to the imprint, but felt something soft and slightly warm. "Interesting," he said in awe. "Crystal, if this is you and you can hear me, squeeze my arm once."
The pressure on his arm intensified for a brief moment.
"Wow," he breathed. "That's snazzy."
Crystal looked at the Doctor's face. "Doctor," she whispered. "Please."
The Doctor looked around for some kind of disturbance in the air or in the light. "All right, Crystal, I can neither see nor hear you. According to what I've seen of this time stream before, the invisibility program was designed to affect the target and anything the target was wearing or touching at the moment of impact. We have to find this college, the, ah, what was it called? Lester Vine Institute!"
Crystal nodded, squeezing his arm again. She was scared, very scared. If the Doctor couldn't help her . . . she didn't know who could.
The Doctor put a hand on where he thought Crystal's hand was. He moved his hand up her arm and to her shoulder. "Crystal, I'm guessing that's your shoulder. Stay close and keep hold of me. I don't want to lose you."
Crystal squeezed once more. The Doctor held up the sonic and the end lit up bright blue. "Lester Vine is somewhere to the east," he said, "through this forest. Follow me and don't let go."
As Crystal followed the Doctor, gripping him tightly, she was reminded of her first adventure with the Doctor, when he'd come to Florida. They weren't running from anything at this moment, though; they were running to something. She wondered if this institute would really be able to help her, or if they really were the cause of her invisibility.
It took them all of five minutes to reach the large, square, white building. Crystal thought that it was weird that a college would be in the middle of a forest and not in some old college town.
"Lester Vine Institute," the Doctor said. "I hope you're still there, Crystal, because if there's any place on earth that can help you, it's this building here. This is only the laboratories, though. The actual college is seventeen-point-four miles away."
Crystal nodded, but suddenly remembered that the Doctor couldn't see her.
There was a parking lot in front of the building, right next to the entrance. There were absolutely no cars except for a sleek-looking, lime-green pickup truck. Even though its design was way beyond that of any 2011 truck, it looked old.
As the Doctor and Crystal approached the entrance, the glass automatic door opened and a bespectacled old man and a blond younger one rushed out, in the direction of the pickup truck.
"I pinpointed the area of impact," the older man was saying. "Hopefully we can get there before any further harm is done. Any sane person would stay in one place when the other has suddenly become invisible."
Crystal looked at the Doctor. As if he could sense her gaze on him, he said, "Those are the men. Hey!" he called. "Over here!"
The blond man looked up first. "Professor," he said.
The other paused, hand rested on the door handle. "Oh!" he said, walking towards the Doctor. "Hello. Do you happen to be missing someone?"
The Doctor moved his hand vaguely in Crystal's direction until he found her head, then patted it lightly. "Not missing, exactly."
The old man extended a hand, which the Doctor took. "I am Professor Vincent Days, and this is my best student, Kenneth Vine, great-grandson of our institute's founder." He beamed proudly.
The Doctor nodded, apparently trying his best to look impressed. "Interesting. I'm the Doctor, and my friend Crystal is over here somewhere."
Kenneth smiled generally towards Crystal. "Um, hello," he said.
Crystal blushed, glad that she was invisible. Kenneth had an almost Canadian accent, which she'd always found cute.
Mr. Days patted Kenneth on the shoulder. "I'm sorry about your friend," he said. "Mr. Vine here was testing out our most recent invention, an—"
"Invisibility device?" the Doctor interrupted.
"I . . ." Mr. Days cleared his throat. "So, you have read about us in recent scientific journals?"
The Doctor raised his eyebrow even further than it was usually raised. "More or less."
Mr. Days held out an inviting hand. "Please, come in. We're not usually open to the public, but we can make an exception today."
The Doctor nodded again, smiled. "Of course."
Mr. Days didn't take them on the grand tour of the facility, thankfully. He took them straight to the third floor, where the invisibility device had been constructed. Mr. Days picked up what looked like a cross between an oversized gun and a cannon and pointed it at the Doctor.
"I'm not going to shoot," he said in response to Kenneth and the Doctor's panicked faces. Keeping the scope pointed at the Doctor, he looked at the screen on the side of the device. In the midst of the blue shapes, there was a bright red blotch in the shape of a girl, who Mr. Days assumed to be the Doctor's friend. "All right, Crystal," he said, moving a switch on the side of the screen. "You can talk and we can hear you."
Crystal sighed in relief, and she heard her sigh played back over the screen. "Thank goodness," she said.
"Are you in any pain?" Mr. Days said.
Crystal shook her head, and the image on the screen mirrored her. "No. I had the wind knocked out of me when I got hit, though."
Mr. Days nodded. "I'll admit, I hadn't expected it to work so well on the first try. I'm sorry Mr. Vine hit you. He was aiming for a squirrel."
Crystal tried not to sob. "I'm scared," she said, her voice almost cracking. "I don't want to stay invisible forever, having to be heard over some stupid little screen."
The Doctor found Crystal's shoulder again and rubbed it reassuringly. "Don't worry, Crystal," he said. He pulled out the sonic screwdriver and pointed it at Crystal. After a few seconds of the high whirring that was now familiar to Crystal . . . absolutely nothing happened.
The Doctor stifled a curse. "It affected the atoms in and around her body completely," he said. "I haven't seen anything like it. . . . I've seen perception filters that make you think they're invisible, but literally all light passes through her."
This did nothing to help Crystal's panic. "What—why—does that mean—will I be able to turn back to normal?" Her voice was shaky over the screen's speakers.
The Doctor set his jaw resolutely. "I am going to help you, Crystal," he said. "I will."
At that moment, the ground shook.
Crystal steadied herself on the Doctor's arm. "What was that?" she said.
But her words never reached the Doctor's ears. The screen on the invisibility device wasn't working. It showed only static and gave a few fuzzy syllables that might have been Crystal, then blacked out completely. Then the lights illuminating the room went out as well, leaving the sun streaming through the window as the only light source.
Mr. Days tapped the screen, but the Doctor pushed him aside and used the sonic on it. Mr. Days stepped back. "What are you doing to it?" he cried.
"I'm trying to fix it, thank you very much," the Doctor said angrily. "If you're opposed to me helping my friend, then please, speak up."
Neither Mr. Days nor Kenneth said anything until the Doctor said incredulously, "It . . . it's as if it never worked in the first place. The circuits are completely wiped."
Mr. Days shook his head slowly. "I . . . I don't understand," he said.
The pressure from the Doctor's arm disappeared. He looked around, looking for any imprint on the floor, any slight shadow, any movement of an object. There was a soft growling sound over to the Doctor's left, and as he looked, some kind of very expensive-looking device crashed to the ground.
The Doctor held up his sonic and pressed the button. A low sort of shriek, as if in pain, came from somewhere close in the room. Rustling. The Doctor looked around cautiously, and the sound of foreign breathing disappeared.
"Is she still in here?" Kenneth asked quietly.
The Doctor slowly edged towards where the shriek of pain had come from. "Crystal," he said, "if you're here and you can hear me, then . . . ah . . . pick up a pencil, or something."
A few feet away from the Doctor, a pencil hovered in midair, wobbling as if the hand that held it were shaking.
The Doctor took off his coat hurriedly and moved over to the hovering pencil. "We won't be losing you again," he said, holding out the coat. An invisible hand took it, and it moved around until Crystal was obviously wearing it.
Crystal stood up, and the jacket shook violently. The sleeves went up to Crystal's face, and she bent over.
The Doctor put a reassuring hand on her shoulder as sobs racked her body. "Crystal," he said, "we are going to get that device working again. We need to figure out what those creatures were."
He looked up at Kenneth and Mr. Days. "How did you make that little computer?"
Mr. Days shrugged. "I . . . it took weeks to build it. I don't know how much time we have."
"We don't have weeks. Crystal was attacked by something, and if it's coming back, then we have a day at most, minutes at least. You have the machinery here; just tell me how you programmed it."
Kenneth and Mr. Days looked desperately at each other. Kenneth timidly met the Doctor's eyes. "The camera should still have the software to pick up her heat signal," he said. "That's the visual. But the sound is a bit tricky, even trickier than getting the invisibility to affect her voice."
"I don't care how tricky it is," he said impatiently. "I've completely rewired the entire energy system for the Vagragalda home planet in under six minutes with only the aid of a part-time electrician. 'Tricky' I can do."
He pushed past Kenneth and pried open the computer with his bare hands. The screen separated from the rest of the computer, and he examined the circuit board closely. "Mid-21st-century technology, bah. I need a pair of tweezers."
He held out a hand expectantly as Kenneth fumbled around for a pair. He put it in the Doctor's outstretched hand, and the Doctor moved around a few wires, clipped a few things off of the circuit board, added a few scraps of metal that were lying around. He used the sonic on the computer and closed it up, seeming satisfied.
"Crystal," he said, "say something. Anything at all."
Crystal's breaths were shaky over the speaker. "Can you hear me?" she whimpered.
"Yes!" the Doctor said victoriously. Her image on the glowing screen was not in the odd blobs of orange and blue, but instead in real color, though Crystal's form shimmered strangely. "We can hear you just fine. And we can see you, too."
He went over to where Crystal was standing and scanned her with the computer. He pointed the gun at her, and Crystal flinched. Groaning, the Doctor snapped the computer off of the gun and once again brought out his sonic.
"There," he said. "Now we won't have to lug around that huge thing." He moved the screen so that her image filled it.
She had bite wounds on her arms and legs. The Doctor's jacket was slowly being seeped with invisible blood. Crystal looked horribly shaken up, and she trembled.
"Oh," the Doctor said. "I see." Still pointing the screen at her, he felt her arm and tenderly touched the bite marks. Crystal took a sharp breath in pain.
"Sorry," the Doctor said. "You seem to have been bitten by more than one creature. The patterns of teeth are completely different in each place. Could you see them?"
"No," Crystal replied, voice cracking. "But I could hear growling . . . and snarling . . . I could feel their teeth, they had a lot of teeth . . . I could see where they bit, but I couldn't see their teeth. It was so scary . . ."
She began to cry again. The Doctor put an arm around her shoulder. "It's all right, Crystal," he said. "I just need to figure out what attacked you. Let's see, it was invisible, and had lots of teeth. There are exactly twenty-eight species in the universe, across time and space, that can turn invisible. Fourteen of them are carnivorous, and ten of those have teeth."
"There were lots," Crystal said. "They weren't very big, though. Doctor, you can help me, right?"
The Doctor gave her a look. "Not very large," he mused, "and they hunt in packs . . ."
The Doctor leaned back on a table for a moment, fingering his chin. "Four of those species hunt in packs, and one lives on Earth—"
There was that familiar spark of intelligence and glee in his eye. "Of course!" He clapped his hands together and rubbed them. "Egnia Palronis! And before you ask, oh so dimly, well, what the heck is the Egnia Palronis, it's what attacked Crystal."
He held up the screen and moved it around, giving the room a quick scan. Mr. Days cleared his throat. "I'm sorry to be so dim," he said, "but what the heck is the Egnia Palronis?"
The Doctor looked as if someone had asked him what time travel is. "Small, wolf-like creature, built like a pit bull. Completely blind. Hunts by smell. Excellently designed, though; two pairs of nostrils, feathery antennae where their eyes would be, with a mind more a part of a puzzle to work perfectly with the minds of other Palronis in its pack."
Looking thrilled that his friend was in danger, he put the screen absentmindedly on the table he leaned against. "But they're not very bright, even collectively," he said. "Incredible battle strategy, but they can't cut power or cause a rumble like that. Now, what could cause that rumble, that blackout? And how could a pack of animals more intelligent together than apart synchronize their attack with both things?"
"You're asking an awful lot of questions, eh?" Kenneth said. "Why are you asking those questions out loud when everyone in here is dumber than you?"
Mr. Days coughed indignantly and opened his mouth to protest, but the Doctor silenced him with a look. "Because sometimes, if I hear the questions out loud, it helps me. My brain is much bigger and more complex and funny than yours."
He started to pace around, but Crystal's voice came from the speaker. "Your brain is more . . . funny?"
"Yeah, it's funny, you got a problem with that?" The Doctor glared in Crystal's direction before continuing his pacing. "When I used my sonic on them, they ran. They can't hear particularly high or low sound frequencies; all of their senses have degraded in favor of smell. So, why did they run?"
Another rumbling sound came, and the Doctor looked back at the open door. "How many entrances are there to this laboratory?"
"Three," Kenneth said. "One there, one around the corner, and one upstairs."
"Seal them," he said. "Seal each of the exits. All three. Whatever is hunting Crystal is coming back."
He raced to the nearest door and slammed it shut. Just as he did so, something threw its weight against the door. Cursing, he locked the door and used the sonic on it. "There," he said. "Kenneth, can I call you Ken?"
After a pause, Kenneth nodded.
"All right, Ken, you get the door around the corner. Make sure it's deadlocked. Mr. Days, get the other entrance. If those things get in, we won't be able to see them, and they can get Crystal or any of us. And one thing about the Egnia Palronis . . ."
He looked at Kenneth, Mr. Days, and then Crystal, lingering on Crystal the longest, hoping that he was looking into her eyes. "They hunt to kill," he said.
Kenneth and Mr. Days stood still, watching the Doctor. "Well?" the Doctor said. "Are you going to seal the doors?"
The two men almost literally jumped into action. "Stay by those doors!" the Doctor called after them. "I'll watch this one. Nothing comes through. If something happens, anything at all, a little scratch or sniff at the door, then let me know."
The Doctor and Crystal watched them leave. Then the Doctor held up the screen and looked into Crystal's eyes. "Now to figure out how to get you back to normal."
"Doctor, I'm scared," Crystal whimpered. "I don't want to stay like this forever. I don't want to be hunted down by invisible wolves—"
"Egnia Palronis," the Doctor corrected helpfully.
Crystal fell silent. "Whatever," she growled. "I don't want to get hurt again, Doctor."
"Crystal." The Doctor held Crystal's face in his hands. He felt her tears roll onto his fingers. "I want you to know something. You may be in very real danger right now. But do you know what, Crystal?"
Crystal sobbed once, then quieted.
"Crystal Dean," he said solemnly. "Whatever is out there is not going to hurt you. And if they do, guess who they have to answer to?"
Crystal smiled, and her face was shown on the screen. The Doctor smiled back at her and let go of her face.
Crystal suddenly paled. "Doctor?"
"Yes?"
"What's that noise?"
The Doctor turned to the door. It was still shut. But there was another pair of lungs breathing in the room. Several other pairs of lungs.
The Doctor swept the screen around and pointed it at the pack of Egnia Palronis. They were exactly as the Doctor had explained them—stocky build, with blunt faces. They had feathery antennae as long as Crystal's arm and just as wide. Their fur was thick but very, very short, and rusty brown. The shortest of the pack came up to Crystal's waist, and the tallest up to the Doctor's.
They stood, growling, not moving at all but remaining stock-still. Like stone. Crystal hid behind the Doctor.
"I don't think that will do much good," the Doctor said. "They can smell fear—your adrenaline rushing, your blood pumping, your sweat. That's why they attacked you, and why they could pinpoint you so easily. You're afraid."
Crystal crouched lower.
The Palronis bristled, then sat down grudgingly, as if some unseen or unheard command had caused them to. The Doctor could now see collars around their necks—tight-fitting bands of leather with little devices on them.
They kept their noses pointed at the Doctor and Crystal, still emitting small barks on occasion. They fidgeted as if resisting the urge to stand up and rush at them. The Doctor, curious, edged closer to the Palronis and held out his sonic screwdriver. At a single tap of the button, they shrieked in pain and clawed at their muzzles, slinking away
"Interesting." The Doctor pocketed his sonic and looked over at Crystal. "Those collars around their necks, they emit a smell that only they can detect, and they're trained to have certain reactions in response to certain smells."
No response came. He rushed to the screen and held it up to where Crystal was standing—or had been standing. She was no longer there. Just a dark patch of blood.
The Doctor cursed his own ignorance. He had been tricked while other Palronis took Crystal. When he examined the screen more closely, he realized that the sound had been cut out. He wouldn't have been able to hear her.
The door hadn't opened, so the Palronis wouldn't have been able to leave through there. He scanned the area and saw that the trail of blood led across the room, away from him, and stopped at the bottom of the stairs. He looked up just in time to see Crystal's sneakers disappear at the top of the stairs.
Mr. Days was up there.
Why hadn't he seen it before? Mr. Days hadn't seemed horribly surprised at the power outage, or at the little computer's hard drive being wiped. And the Palronis had to have come through an entrance wide or tall enough for their antennae not to be touched—they were weird creatures like that—and the Doctor himself had put Mr. Days in charge of the upstairs door. Where Kenneth was, he wouldn't have been able to hear the Palronis come in.
The Doctor rushed up the stairs, holding out the computer in front of him. Mr. Days was crouched down, patting the head of a Palronis while others just vanished through the door he guarded.
"Mr. Days," the Doctor said crossly.
Mr. Days looked up at the Doctor, a bored look on his face. "Oh, hello, Doctor. I see you've found me out. Great job, woo hoo, and all that."
He continued to pet his Palronis, grinning into its blunt face. "I figured you wouldn't be able to find me, but apparently the way you hardwired that computer made it difficult to erase."
"That rumbling," the Doctor said, "was an electromagnet, wasn't it? It would have taken a ridiculous amount of power to charge up a magnet strong enough to erase the hard drives of every single electronic device within sixty feet. That explains the power going out."
"Ah, yes," Mr. Days said. "I was doubtful at first, but you live up to your reputation. You are, truly, the Doctor."
The Doctor stiffened. "You have heard of me?"
Mr. Days stood up, taking off his glasses. He toyed with them for a moment, saying, "Most of Earth may not have heard of you, but Earth is not populated by only humans." He turned a small dial hidden on one of the hinges on his glasses, and his form shimmered before revealing his true body.
The Doctor's eyes widened at the sight of the Sabinar. He had a very humanlike build and had the same facial features as he had before, but to say that he looked like a human was like saying a dinner plate looked like a toaster. His fleshy skin was bluish-black and webbed with tiny green veins. Horns curled back from around his face. His feet were now sort of like bear's feet, only without all of the fur.
"Vincent Days," the Sabinar said. "Fitting name, don't you think? Vincent means to conquer. And Days? I plan to rule all of time. To Conquer Days . . . I'm very pleased with the effect."
"You can't rule all of time," the Doctor said coldly. "Not if I have anything to do with it."
"Oh, but I will." Mr. Days grinned. "With my beloved Egnia Palronis, my invisible pack, at my side, I will rule over all." He gave his Palronis an affectionate pat, and it returned with a satisfied grunt. "My enemies will mysteriously be ripped apart. I will be completely innocent. And thus I will take over first America, the most powerful nation on earth—then the Earth itself!"
Mr. Days opened his mouth to continue his monologue, but the Doctor held up a hand. "Hey, listen. That sounds all . . . great, but why did you need Crystal? Why trick poor Kenneth into shooting that invisibility device at her, and her specifically?"
Mr. Days shrugged. "I did not trick that boy. I told him to aim for a squirrel. But when I discovered that she was your companion, well, I could not pass up the opportunity to lure you, my only opposition, into my trap."
The Doctor glanced at the screen of the computer. "What trap?"
Mr. Days laughed. "Kenneth only thinks he invented the first invisibility ray. I was creating invisible tech with the help of these glasses ages before he was even born."
The hair on the back of the Doctor's neck prickled. On the computer screen, he saw four small, powerful-looking guns, each pointed at him. No matter where he moved, the guns still aimed at him, ready to fire.
"Some of your enemies may not put into account your regenerative abilities," Mr. Days said. "But I'm certain that if I press the button on this controller, you will be ripped to pieces by the bullets. Nothing to regenerate.
The Doctor looked warily at the four guns, two in front of him, two behind him. He could not go anywhere where he would not be tracked by the guns.
"Any last words, Doctor?" Mr. Days threateningly held up a little black controller. Scared, the Palronis left the room, stubby tail almost tucked between its legs.
The Doctor looked back at Mr. Days sadly. "Here are my last words," he said. "You may think that you have won. But listen. I am the Doctor. I am a force to be reckoned with. Even in death, I am a forcetobereckonedwith. And do you know what?"
The Doctor's face became more triumphant. "Oh, you're thick. You're very, very dull. You, my friend, are not bright at all."
Mr. Days was taken aback. "Wh-what?"
The Doctor held out his arms. "You want to know something about invisibility?"
"Enough!" Mr. Days angrily pressed the button on the controller. The guns shifted, but nothing happened. The Doctor grinned. "Something about invisibility—makes it hard to make guns."
Mr. Days dropped the controller. "What?"
"The guns. Any kind of gun would be too complex to make in a limited field such as your glasses. You had to make or buy the guns and then make them invisible. But that affected the mechanisms to the point where they did not work anymore."
He kicked at one of the guns and said, "So where's Crystal?"
The color drained from Mr. Days's face. "Th-the girl?"
The Doctor nodded.
Mr. Days looked scared for a moment, then he pointed at the open door that he was supposed to be guarding. The Doctor scanned his face, then snatched Mr. Day's face away and moved the tiny dial so that Mr. Days appeared human again. "I am going to let you leave," he said. "When I get back, you had better be gone, and you had better leave all your plans for temporal domination to rot to dust. But if you're here . . ."
He let the threat hang open-ended between them until it was almost palpable. With one last glare, the Doctor left through the open door and followed the sound of Crystal's shrieks to the outside.
Crystal was standing on top of Mr. Days's truck. She was holding out a metal rod that would have probably been used for crafting devices. The Palronis were circling the truck, growling up at her. She eyed them warily, occasionally swinging the rod at one of the beasts if it got too close, shouting "BACK!"
"Crystal!" the Doctor cried, racing towards her.
She looked up, and sighed in relief when she saw him. Tears streamed down her face. "Doctor, thank goodness—BACK, I said!"
She swung the rod again and edged away from the bests. "Can you please help?" she said. Her voice quivered, along with the rest of her body.
Wordlessly, the Doctor used his sonic screwdriver on the Palronis. They whimpered, pawing their muzzles, and raced off into the woods.
He stepped onto the bed of the truck and held out a hand to help Crystal down. "There," he said, as she limped down onto the asphalt of the parking lot. "They won't be coming back anytime soon. They'll be whining and baying until their collar malfunctions, runs out of battery or comes off."
"What will happen to them?" Crystal asked.
"What will happen?" The Doctor blinked. "They're from Earth, remember? They live here. They can care for themselves. Unless that idiot Sabinar Days comes back, they won't have any real reason to attack humans if they keep to the wilderness."
"Sabinar?" Crystal shook her head, wincing as she grabbed her bloody arm.
"Oh," the Doctor exclaimed. "We should take care of that, shouldn't we?"
Crystal nodded. She grabbed the Doctor's arm as he aided her to the entrance of the laboratory.
Mr. Days's helpless little goon, Kenneth, was more than happy to help Crystal when he discovered that he'd been working for Days—an alien—the whole time. He joked that he always knew that he was alien, but not that much so. The Doctor simply brushed aside the attempt at humor and impatiently asked him to call up an ambulance. He told Kenneth to keep an eye on Crystal while he went downstairs to turn off the electromagnet.
He reached the basement and saw a block of metal the size of a refrigerator, hooked up to various wires and devices that would charge it. The Doctor ripped the wires off, shutting it off immediately, and noticed a computer near the electromagnet.
Somehow, it had still functioned normally, even with the magnet. It must have been very advanced technology. The Doctor examined the line of code on the screen and remembered that the Sabinar were an almost completely technology-oriented species—being able to read the code of most computers. The Doctor read the code, a repeated pattern of 0's and 1's that spelled out Target status: invisibility failing. Target status: invisibility failing. Target status: invisibility failing . . .
"Of course," the Doctor murmured. True invisibility never could have lasted very long; at most, it would have lasted twenty minutes before fading. There had to be some sort of machine keeping the effect alive, and the electromagnet must have been it, or part of it.
He rushed back upstairs to the laboratory room to see that Crystal was fine—completely visible, and being attended to by paramedics. The power was returning. Crystal looked up at the Doctor from where she sat on a table and grinned.
"Hey," she said. "They told me I lost a lot of blood, but they gave me some sort of shot . . ." She looked wary for a moment. "Is it dangerous?"
"No, no," the Doctor replied. "It'll make your blood cells regenerate faster. It'll make you very tired, though—"
As if on cue, Crystal's eyes rolled back into her head and she slumped over. Kenneth caught her before she could fall and looked at her fondly. "Will she be all right?" he asked the medics.
They nodded. The one bandaging her arm cut the wrap for the last bandage and nodded at the Doctor and Kenneth. "She needs to stay on the down-low for as long as possible. If she exercises too much, she could injure herself or do damage to her internal organs."
The medics packed up their bags and said, "She'll need to be checked on in a week or so. Bring her by the hospital downtown, and we'll do our best to keep her in good health."
After they'd left, the Doctor picked up the sleeping Crystal, and her head lolled to one side. He started to leave.
"Doctor!" Kenneth called.
The Doctor turned to see him. "Yes?"
Kenneth fished for the right words. "Ah . . . thank you."
The Doctor nodded. "You're welcome." He tried to leave yet again.
"Where are you going?"
The Doctor smiled to himself. "Yes." He left Kenneth in a stupor as he walked away, through the forest, carrying Crystal as she slept on.
When Crystal came to, she was sitting in a comfy chair in the TARDIS console room. She looked up tiredly at the Doctor, who was worriedly staring at something on the engine console's screen.
"Doctor?" she said sluggishly.
The Doctor looked at her and discreetly pressed a button. "Yes?"
"What were you looking at?"
"Nothing." The Doctor tilted the screen. "Look, see? Nothing. Just the outside."
Crystal saw the trees outside and the puffy white clouds in the sky, but nothing else. She was still suspicious.
"Where to next?" she asked, starting to get up. The Doctor held out a hand to signal her to stay put, and she realized that just trying to stand up exacted much on her energy.
"Well," the Doctor said, "I was thinking about the planet Viridian. Lovely place, populated almost entirely by the evolved form of dogs. Or, or or or, we could visit Theyar, an almost parallel Earth. It's scary; if you read the history books parallel with Earth history books, there are wars, nations, advancements, and even names that are very similar. Or," he added with a smirk, "we could visit Midnight."
"Midnight?"
"A diamond planet. Gorgeous. Has some of the most amazing spa's and resorts in the universe. Shall we go?"
Crystal nodded eagerly.
"Well, hold on tight." The Doctor pulled a lever, and said a word. A word that Crystal did not recognize, but which she would learn to love.
"Allons-y!"