Chapter 3

The TARDIS was floating in space as we passed Jupiter; the doors were open so I could show Anna.

"Wow, that is incredible. So if the doors are open how are we not dying?"

"There's a gravity shell around the TARDIS, it keeps the gravity and oxygen inside the ship."

We were done staring so I closed the doors and headed back to the control console.

"All right, we've got hundreds of planets and time periods to choose from. Where would you like to go?"

She thought for a moment. "I don't know, honestly it's kind of hot in here so I feel like going swimming."

"Not my first choice but I think the TARDIS has a swimming pool."

The doctor appeared in his holographic form. "Actually, I have a suggestion for both of you."

Anna was a bit surprised to see someone suddenly appear in the TARDIS.

"Ah hello doctor, Anna let me introduce you to the doctor."

He waved his hand hello while she just stood there awestruck.

"You're the doctor?" Anna asked curiously

"Well yes and no, I used to be the doctor before I died, technically I am still the doctor because I've still got all my memories and my personality traits, but no I'm not the doctor because that man right there is the doctor." He pointed at me.

"Wait so you're Will and the doctor?" she asked

"Yep, that's the name he went by and it's now mine as well as his genes and half his knowledge of the universe."

"Why only half?"

"Because then there's more to explore and discover. So doctor what did you have in mind?"

"How about the planet Veraclese?"

"Veraclese? Oh of course Veraclese that's a wonderful idea. Thank you doctor."

"No problem."

His form retracted and I started to put coordinates into the machine. The TARDIS shook and Anna tried to hold on to stop herself from falling over.

"So what exactly is Veraclese?" She asked

"Okay quick history lesson, it's the 51st century during human's expansion through space they find this quaint little planet filled to the brim with water, they colonize it and build small land cities while the rest of the planets surface is 80% water. It may only be a 10% difference than the earth but the climate is much more humid and it's filled with tropical forests, from what I remember it's a beautiful place."

The TARDIS stopped rumbling.

"Ah we've landed. Go ahead and take a look outside."

She ran up and opened the doors. "Wow."

"I know all the bountiful oceans and the lush forests, it's breathtaking isn't it?"

"Yep, this is defiantly the most interesting roof I've ever been on."

That raised my curiosity. "Roof?"

I stepped outside to see that we were indeed on a roof of a fairly tall building, I could see some smoke stacks in the background and in front there were large craters in the ground.

I went back to check the TARDIS's control station.

"This can't be right, the coordinates say that we're on Veraclese but this place should be teeming with water and I didn't see…oh."

Anna was curious now. "So what you're saying is that the oceans have just dried up? All that water just disappeared?"

"That's what it looks like. Well then, no use staying here then we could go see another planet."

Anna looked like she wanted to stay. "Or we could find out what's wrong and maybe…fix it."

I gave her a large toothy grin. "I was hoping you'd say that. This kind of thing usually happens, all I want to do is go out and travel but something happens and I end up fixing it. A bit tedious but always a fun time, right then let's be off allons-y!"

We exited the TARDIS and I locked the doors behind me.

"Well, we should probably start by heading to the bottom of the building here and then asking around see if we can find out what went wrong."

Anna and I walked towards the stairwell on top of the building and went downstairs to the third floor. It looked like a usual office building except some people were scrambling and talking frantically to people on the other line. There were also guards walking around with guns but I didn't notice this until I was stopped by one.

"Sir, the third floor of the city hall is under heavy security. State your business or I will throw you out." He said in a gruff tone.

"City hall, at least I know where I am." "Right sorry about that, here's my identification. I'm the doctor, by the way"

I pulled out my wallet and showed the paper to the man.

"Oh, sorry sir I didn't realize you're a representative from the high council otherwise I wouldn't have stopped you."

"Ah no need to worry you're just doing your job, these are troubling times we live in with all the water drying up you're just being careful. On another note, could you tell me where the mayor's office is, I seem to be a bit lost."

"Sure, it's down the hall second door on the left."

"Thanks."

Anna and I walked away from him and down that hall.

"I can't believe he bought that, where did you get those identification forms?"

"Oh there not identification forms. Here, look for yourself."

I handed her my wallet with the paper inside it. "It says here that you're the president of the united states of pudding. How did that guy take this as I.D?

I took the paper back, chuckled a bit at what she saw and explained. "Actually, the paper's blank, it's psychic so you see whatever you want to see or anything I'm suggesting." I laughed again. "And you wanted it to say president of the U.S.P? That's what I like about you Anna you're so random."

We arrived at the mayor's office, hoping that he could give us the answers that we needed. I knocked on the door which caused it to open slightly; I looked inside and noticed no one was in there.

"No one's inside, we should probably investigate."

Anna and I walked inside the room. It was just a desk with some file cabinets and some awards on the wall.

"There's probably something in this filing cabinet that explain what's going on, all I have to do is find the records of the water regulations of the city, decline in water levels…"

"Or you could check his computer." Anna said pointing to the computer.

"Yeah, I guess that would work to."

Anna tried to open up the computer only to find it's locked.

"Darn, the computer is password protected. Any idea what it is?"

"Yes, I believe the password is sonic."

I pulled the sonic screwdriver out of my pocket and used it on the computer, unlocking it and opening up several windows relating to the problem.

"What was that?" Anna asked.

"Right you two haven't been properly introduced, Anna this is my sonic screwdriver it can affect anything metal, electronic, radio, magnetic, and scans biological life."

"Wow, anything else?"

"Well it doesn't work on wood. Now let's have a look at these documents."

I pulled out the doctor's thinking glasses from my pocket and put them on reading the documents that appeared.

"Well that's interesting."

"What is?"

"It says here that they've noticed a steady decrease in the water of the oceans but no matter what they do they can't stop it."

"I don't understand, doesn't the water level usually go down over time?"

"Yes, but that's due to evaporation and then the water would go up into the air and create rain but it hasn't rained in about a month. This is dangerous, the high water level helped them create hydro-electricity which powered almost half of the city, and they've had to resort to burning coal which explains the smoke stacks and why the sky is gray."

"The sky was gray?"

"Yeah you didn't notice?"

"No, I guess I didn't look up."

"That's a mistake; it's amazing what you notice out of the corner of your eye. Isn't that right Mr. Mayor?"

We both looked up and saw who I assumed was the mayor standing in the doorway, Anna didn't notice because she was staring at the computer but I heard the door open so I wasn't shocked.

"Who the hell are you two?" He asked angrily.

"Right sorry I'm the doctor and this is my assistant Anna and we come on behalf of the high council."

He scoffed. "You two? You aren't even old enough to drive yet let alone work for the high council."

"Don't believe me? Here's my identification."

I pulled out the psychic paper and let him glance at it; needless to say he was surprised.

"Wow, you are from the council."

"Yes, we're part of an experimental group of teens with above average intelligence set out to complete tasks. The high council believes that if we are trained now we could lead this place and possibly all of Veraclese into a new age of peace and prosperity."

"Hm, very well. I'll admit that I'm intrigued by this and who am I to dispute the high council? So, why are you two here?"

"We're here to investigate the disappearance of this planet's water supply and we thought we should check on the nearby cities to see if they have any information and lucky for you we started here. So, any ideas as to why this is happening?"

He sighed. "No, and I wish I did so I could fix it. As you probably already knew from looking at our documents the water levels planet wide are decreasing at an alarming rate and here there practically completely depleted. But it isn't just that, there's something else?"

"Like what?"

"This settlement runs on hydro-electricity as its major energy supply, however due to the decrease in the amount of water we have we had to resort to using primitive fossil fuels. Unfortunately, due to the natural aspect of this planet the fumes it created starting having negative effects on the surrounding area, gray clouds cancel out the once beautiful blue skies, what little water we find is being poisoned by runoff, and the animals and plants around us are starting to feel the negative effects. Even worse the smoke is raising the temperature of this already warm planet; we've had to put cooling pipes throughout the entire city."

"It's the domino effect, one thing goes wrong and the rest of the pieces fall down sending this planet further and further into chaos." I said

"So, what can we do?" Anna asked.

We were interrupted as the mayor's phone rang and he picked it up.

"Hello? Yes…what's going on? Well what do you expect me to…okay…alright; I'll take care of it. Goodbye." He hung up the phone. "We'll have to follow up this conversation later, there's something that needs investigating." He pushed a button on his intercom. "Mary, could you send in Officer Johnson please?"

"Yes, Mr. Mayor."

A minute later a solider came in, in fact he was the same one I met in the hall. When I saw him I smiled a little. "Oh, it's you! This guy right here, this guy is good."

"Yes, that's why he's chief guard here. In any case Johnson, there's been a disturbance in sector six and I'm sending you out to investigate."

"Yes sir." He nodded.

I walked up to Johnson "Um, if you don't mind I'd like to tag along with you a bit, you know get a sense of what things are like out there."

The mayor looked a bit nervous. "Um, I don't think that would be such a good idea, I mean what if you got hurt the council would have my head and…"

"Sir, I can take care of myself and even if something does happen to me I'll try not to hold you responsible So Johnson, will you have me?"

He gave me a look over. "You don't seem like much but I'd never turn down help as long as you can handle yourself."

"I promise I'll carry my own weight…" I held out my hand "Gentleman's agreement."

He looked at me a bit more until he shook my hand. Suddenly as he was shaking my hand I saw visions, I saw a boy riding a bicycle falling off and scraping his knee, I saw an older man out with a girl as they were being jumped by a robber and then the man punched the robber in the face, afterwards that man enrolled in the police force, then he got married to that woman from before, then he was holding a little girl at a house, then he was wearing the same armor as the guards in here, and finally he died by some feral creature with scales. It lasted for what felt like minutes but in reality it was seconds and when it was over I had a headache and stumbled a bit.

Johnson looked concerned. "Are you okay?"

I regained my composure. "Yeah, I'm fine let's get going. Anna, stay here in the building until I get back okay? I don't want you wandering off."

She nodded and I headed off with Johnson down the staircase.

"What the hell just happened?" I asked myself.

"I could ask you the same question." I head the doctor say in my mind.

"Ah doctor, I forgot that you were in my head."

"Well technically I'm not in your head, the TARDIS is and I'm just using it like a radio relay to speak with you. But back to the matter at hand, what happened to you? The TARDIS felt your system go all wonky for a second there."

"I don't know but I saw the events of someone's life flash before my eyes, I think it was Johnson."

"Johnson?"

"An officer that I met here, I know you usually don't like men with guns but he seems like a nice guy."

"Hmm, I don't know how you would be able to see the events of someone's life; I'll need to look into that. But that isn't the only strange thing that's been going on."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, the TARDIS did an environmental scan and it's showing a large amount of moisture in the air."

"But that's impossible, the reports say it hasn't rained here in at least a month so how can there be that much water in the air combined with the hot temperatures and it still hasn't rained."

"I don't know but I'll keep in touch if I find out anything else."

I didn't even notice but Johnson had walked all the way down the stairs and now we were walking through a dimly lit hall to a mechanical door which he opened by pressing a button on a panel. In front of us was a hole in the ground that was huge and in the distance I saw a forest.

"I'm guessing this isn't the front entrance." I said sarcastically.

Johnson chuckled a bit. "Nah, it's the back. Used to be used as an emergency dock for the mayor to escape from in a worst case scenario now it's nothing more than another ditch on this doomed planet."

He walked out into said ditch and I followed him, keeping his pace right by his side. "Oh I wouldn't say doomed, you've got me and all those other people up there working on your problem."

He scoffed. "Yeah well no offense to the higher ups but politicians rarely if ever can get things done for the better."

I laughed. "Amen to that, but if there's one thing I've learned from being out in the world it's that the wrong man in the right place or vice versa can make all the difference in the world."

He looked at me a bit curiously but we continued walking along. I had a theory which I needed tested.

"So Johnson, you got anybody close to you?" I asked.

"Isn't that a little bit personal?" He asked defensively.

"Maybe, but you can't blame a fellow for being curious. I mean you give off this sense of being the righteous lawman trying to keep the peace but it isn't just for yourself it's almost like your protecting someone else, is that right?"

"Well if you aren't going to let this go then yes I've got a family, a beautiful wife, a sweet little girl only five years old and she thinks the world of me. What about you?"

"Well, I certainly don't have anybody that I love like in a relationship but I've got a mum and dad, but they're pretty far away right now."
We would have continued but Johnson raised his hand and stopped me in my tracks. "Did you hear that?" He said cautiously.

"I don't think so." Suddenly I saw a nearby bush rustle and we cautiously moved closer.

"Hello, is something there? It's okay you don't have to be frightened. I'm the Doctor and I won't hurt you." I tried to assure it.

Then something rose from the bush, it had beige skin tone but it was partially covered in scales with webbing between its fingers which had sharpened claw like nails, its eyes were yellowish with a sideways iris.

"Um doctor, I don't think it's worried about getting hut." Johnson said conservatively.

"Yeah…run!"

We both turned around and ran away from that thing as fast as we could. We managed to stay ahead of it for a little while but then it started running faster and catching up with us.

As we ran closer back to town hall, a man in a security camera room called the mayor in his office.

"Sir, the two people you sent out are returning and they're being chased by a subject."

"Put the doors on lockdown, the last thing I need is that thing getting in here."

"Yes sir."
The man pushed some buttons and began the closing process.

We were almost home free at this point, we could see the building ahead of us but we also saw the doors slowly closing. Before we could make it the mutant thing pounced on me knocking me on my back. It tried to claw me but I held its arm before it could make contact. Before it over powered me Johnson came over and kicked it off of me.

"Come on, the doors are closing we have to hurry."
"Right."

I got up and we dashed for the door again, it was almost closed so Johnson pushed me forward, tripping me up but getting me inside before the door locked itself. Quickly realizing what happened I got up and started banging on the door.

"Johnson!" I yelled trying to get through to him.

"It's alright man, get out of here."

"No, I'm not leaving you behind." I pulled the sonic screwdriver out of my pocket and tried to use the panel. "If I can hack this panel I can get you inside, you'll be safe."

"Sorry can't happen, if you open the door this thing will get in here and attack everyone, not just me."

"Please Johnson, you're an innocent man who doesn't deserve to die, let me help you." I sounded desperate now but I didn't want him to die.

"This is just the way it has to be, nothing to do."

From behind the door I could hear gunshots as well as the sound of claws ripping through flesh knowing exactly what was going on behind that door.

"JOHNSON!" I screamed one last time before admitting defeat. I couldn't believe this my first trip out and someone has to die because of me.

"He was the first person I let down…" I clenched my fist in anger. "And today he's going to be the last."

Filled with anger I marched up the stairs back to the mayor's office. When I reached it I noticed that it was open and there was no one inside.

"Hey! Let go of me!"

I heard struggling from down the hall and walked down to see what was going on, I saw Anna being held back by the mayor and she looked rather uncomfortable. I walked up to him rather angrily and pulled his arm off of her.

"Get your hands off her; don't you know it's rude to grab a lady?"

He looked surprised to see me. "Doctor, I wasn't expecting to see you back so soon."

I looked at him with anger. "So soon, or ever?"

"I'm sorry."

"Sir, I was coming back with Johnson and we were being attacked by a creature, then as we come closer the door starts to close. I made it to safety but not without his help and now he's dead, now I wonder who could have made that door close by itself? Probably someone who could get in contact with the security of the building." I leaned really close to his face not breaking my angry expression. "Someone like you."

He looked flabbergasted. "Are you accusing me of…"

"Oh no, I'm just speculating at this point however one does get a bit suspicious. Now, what is my friend here in trouble for?"

"Well, she was trying to get into the science lab without authorization."

"Hm, that's actually a good thing I was looking for the science lab, if you don't mind I'll be taking a little look around." I opened the door when the mayor tried to stop me.

"Hey, you aren't allowed in their either."

"Try and stop me." I said threateningly.

I walked about three feet into the dark room before I heard someone draw a weapon; I turned around and saw another guard with an assault rifle pointed at me.

"Sir, I request that you step out of the room immediately."

"And I request that you put that thing down before you do something you regret." I taunted back.

He raised the rifle higher. "I'm going to give you until the count of three before I open fire. One…"

I slowly reached for my pocket so that he wouldn't notice."

"Two…"

I quickly pulled out my sonic Screwdriver and pointed it at his gun.

At first he was confused. "What are you do…"

Until suddenly the gun went off in his hands leaving them bruised. "Aah, what did you do?"

"Me? Oh nothing just used my sonic device here to vibrate the ammo cartridge to cause the gun powder inside the bullets to heat up, setting off a blast without doing too much harm to you while disabling your gun." I put the device back in my pocket. "Come along Anna, the plot thickens."

She walked up next to me until the mayor tried to stop us again.

"Don't you two dare go in there, I don't care if you're from the council I'll call six more guards I'll…"

I cut him off and gave him my serious expression. Mayor, someone died here today and I know there's blood on your hands. If you want to walk out of this with you head held high you will let me in there, I'm going to fix whatever's wrong with this place, and then you will answer for your crimes."

He stood there speechless, looking both enraged and defeated at the same time.

"Now then, Anna let's go."

We both walked into the laboratory to find out what else was going on in this messed up world.

So, there's something strange going on with this drought and the lack of water. But, it seems the mayor is in some shady business to. What exactly is going on? What was that fish like creature? What's the true cause of the water's disappearance? Find out next time. Until then please favorite and review or PMK me with a question.