Alex opened her heavy eyelashes only to find that she was alone in her bedroom, first light pink beams were touching her walls. She groaned, rolled on another side to hide her face from a shiny thing far far away from her planet. She felt bad, she hadn't got much sleep that night, her dreams doomed with horrors she could vaguely remember now.
Alvin was lying beside her on the bed, his heavy body radiating with heat. Her tip of the finger touched his nose. Cold and wet. The dog licked her open palm playfully.
"Two organic living beings…" The Doctor's voice sounded inside her head.
Alex jumped away from the dog, fell out from the bed. She remembered what was the nightmare about. But no... No, no, no, no! That can't be right, she was real, she wasn't artificial! That was a dream, now she felt like a real human! She was born in Leeds in 1985, her father James and mother… She slowly turned her hand around, and there, half mockingly, was a wet trace of Alvin's saliva.
Alex heard something really heavy fell on the floor in the living room. That must have been the Doctor. She must have been still working on that metallic killer that tried to attack her yesterday. Alex should probably check on her, she might know answers, she got that little thingy, that handy screwdriver that made noises and could see through your body. She must tell her the truth.
When she stepped out of the bedroom though she wasn't sure she needed to know if she was real or not.
"I know where our chap came from." The Doctor said with her back on her. It seemed she was done with the robot; she was dragging it to the exit now.
"Where?" Alex asked absentminded. The Doctor gave her a pleading look; she quickly got a hint and pulled the robot's legs up in the air.
"Well," the Doctor said as they carried it outside. "I don't know exactly where it came from, but I have got coordinates received by the screwdriver. I could have checked the place by myself but it's quite far away."
"And what are you going to do?"
"Me?" The Doctor halted, her eyes bulged out of the orbits. Alex felt the robot's heavy legs slipping out of her hands. "You don't want to be in?"
"I still don't believe much in what's going on. If it's not in my head." She shrugged. She knew it was real, but she needed some good proofs she wasn't going mad.
"It's not in your head, I can prove it to you."
"Can you?" Alex asked her, the hope in her heart spreading so rapidly.
"No."
They put the remnants of the robot inside the ambulance car.
Alex's shoulders hunched down. The day wasn't getting any better as she had assumed yesterday. "You, a robot trying to kill me, a fake neighbour with whom I lived for almost a year," she gave away a nervous laugh, "that's just too good to be true."
"It is true though." The Doctor said. "And it's kind of good. Depends on what you think is good."
"You've just told me yourself, you can't prove that."
"Yes." The Doctor considered her words, her chin up and eyes darted to the sky. She stayed like this for some time and Alex was afraid she was experiencing another concussion side-effect again. The Doctor unfroze with a little hint of a smile on her face as if the sky told her exactly the words she needed. "But what would you do if it was true? That is is, wouldn't you want to leave this empty place?"
Alex flinched at the mention that the city was empty. It reminded her that there were only two people for many kilometres and the same paranoia that hadn't let her sleep before crept up her spine again. Still, she refused to freak out in front of the Doctor.
"You see, even if it was, I still have a job to do." Alex tried to sound nonchalant. "A logotype, and, well, other dozens of orders I promised to perfect."
"Ah, an old human appetence to make it right and decent," the Doctor chuckled. "You know that Greeks had to make columns a bit curvy and tilted just so their eyes could see it right? Imperfect perfection. Took three generations to come up with such artifice."
"And why do you tell me that? It's not like this knowledge will help me in any way."
"I never said it will." She put her hand on Alex's shoulder and gave her a warming smile. "But you know what will? What will really make you better?"
"What?"
"A fresh air."
"But I'm outside."
"Not like this. I think now you're more inside than outside. And this inside is no bigger than the room on the second floor of this house over here, am I right? I've seen it before. Something bad happened and you shut the world out. Day after day after day after day you just do the same, repeating your routine. You might say that it's better than destroying planets or even galaxies, but all you do is just destroying yourself. Of course, if you prefer to stay then it's okay, it's your choice. I told you it is dangerous and I can't guarantee I'll have enough time to prevent bad things happening to you. Anything can happen to you…" Her voice downed to the murky point. "Sorry, I'm really bad at it, really didn't mean to scare you away." The Doctor averted her eyes and hid them with her hands from Alex.
"Bad at what?" Alex asked.
"Unstranging strangers," she puffed behind hands.
"Why would you want to make me your friend? I'm not special."
"No, you're not. But that's my second profession. Making unspecial special. You saved my life, and I owe you something worthwhile, more than a winning ticket. Winning ticket, seriously?! Pah! But I can't do it without my TARDIS. So, are you in or not?"
"Customers won't be happy." But Alex gave it a second thought. The Doctor was right at some point, but she didn't want to voice it out, it was too much for her. "On the other hand…" she squeezed her eyes, thinking it over. Whatever was happening and whatever that Doctor offered her was a total madness with an extra layer of something dangerous. She cast a glance at the Doctor who was waiting patiently for her answer, "they're already not happy."
"Good." She nodded. "You're driving."
"What? The ambulance?"
"I told you it's quite far away, and I don't see any other car. Besides, we need to return their property," the Doctor winked. When she was closing the back door of the ambulance car, the dog jumped in it. "Seems like we have a company!"
Alex watched the Doctor in shock while she energetically popped in the cabin. "Come on! This will be exciting, I promise you!"
Alex betted it would when she took her place in the driver seat.
Mr Collins saw the ambulance car leaving the neighborhood somewhere to the South. He knew it was wrong and against rules. He knew that because he felt a sudden rush to do the same and somewhere in the chain of errors of errors of errors was an abrupt stop command from beyound his mind.
He smiled sadly because of something only he could understand. His shaking hands closed the curtains.
So old, so cranky. He tried to remember how he felt yesterday. Probably he had felt better.
He opened the door to the garage. There had never been a car, and, well, he didn't bother to ask himself why; that would probably make more errors in his head. He didn't need a car anyway. All that he was looking for was a canister of fuel.
The Doctor was relieved that Alex agreed on her little escapade. She wasn't sure she could get the car to the place without any incident. She slightly drove her hand out of hoody's pocket: tips of her fingers were still glowing, though not so bright as before.
"Turn left," the Doctor said, listening carefully to the sonic screwdriver commands. When they reached the fork, Alex did as she was told.
The Doctor saw that there were more questions in her companion's head, but she fought against nudging her to actually ask them. If they were going to stick together, Alex should learn how to be initiative. Thankfully it didn't take too long when Alex cleared her throat as they turned again.
"Sorry, are you an alien?" Alex asked. Well, that wasn't the question the Doctor expected but what would have she rather expect from the person who faced it all for the first time? They always ask this kind of questions, ordinary questions, questions to know each other better, in the beginning, she just needed a bit practice.
"Sort of." The Doctor shrugged, hiding her hand back into hoody's pocket. She caught the woman's glance at her so she gave her a sheepish smile. Alex returned her eyes to the road.
"You said you hadn't been on the plane, then how did you appear in the pine grove?"
"Oh, so those were pines!" The Doctor exclaimed. She was so going to have culture one in her garden. She caught a strange look from her companion and sunk into the seat. "I was in the TARDIS. We were crashing, I think I accidentally hit her badly."
"What is exactly this TARDIS?"
"A ship. The best ship in the known Universe, to be precise."
"You hit your ship so hard that it crashed?" Alex sounded confused.
"It's…" her tongue clicked the roof of her mouth, "difficult. Very."
"So you're an alien."
"Yep. I am. And you are human?" The Doctor asked her, trying to sound convincingly sincerely.
Her shoulders hunched down, and she had a long time before she answered, "Well, yeah."
"Nice to meet you."
They drove silently for a minute or so.
"I don't get it, you don't look like an alien." Alex gave her a look and shook her head.
"An alien is just a term to use when you don't know someone's origin. I'm a Gallifreyan."
"That is you."
"Yes, me." The Doctor pointed to her chest.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you."
"Don't you worry. You didn't."
They saw the dog's maw peer out between two seats. The Doctor smiled, she put a hand on his head and lightly patted it. On the other hand, Alex wasn't so glad to see Alvin, her eyes cautiously peeped at him, her expression was nervous.
The ambulance car was driving by with red-and-blue lights down the road. There wasn't a person on the street, it looked like this part of the city wasn't occupied at all. Houses were in cracks and looked abandoned, windows were sealed, the pedestrian zone was dirty with old rotten heaps of autumn leaves. The only sound was made by the engine of the car, outside there was nothing, not even a common sound of nature.
They parked the car outside of the old building with broken windows. A big red sign announced that it was, or rather had been, a hospital. Dirty brown bricks had been long ago red, the doors of the building were missed. It stood there ominous, not quite fitted in the street, too high than other houses, too dark.
On the other side of the street was a grocery store. And though it wasn't working anymore, it looked much friendly and Alex hoped they needed to get there than to the hospital.
Alas, the Doctor's little device was leading them exactly where Alex wanted to be the least.
The Doctor didn't notice the state of the hospital and didn't feel nervous at all. With a little shake of her head to Alex, she stepped inside. Alex cautiously followed her.
They were stepping on broken glasses, it crisped under their boots. The dust was swirling around in the air, god knows for how many years, and one of them got in the Doctor's nostril. She sneezed loudly, an echo hitting wall after wall and only when it touched every surface of the building it melted.
"How old is this place?" Alex asked, her voice reverberating like the Doctor's. She swept the yellow dust from the reception table, fingers smeared it in small circles.
"About fifty years." The Doctor said.
A piece of parget fell from the roof and smashed on the floor near Alex giving her a fright. "Oh, gosh." She exclaimed.
The Doctor waved the sonic around, her eyebrows knitted in concentration.
"There's no one there except for us."
"I think it's great news for today."
"It's not right. This place looks abandoned, except it mustn't be." The Doctor put the sonic closer to her ear. "There must be something."
"What did you expect to be here? An army of robots?" Her question bounced off walls. She gave a nervous glance back at the ambulance car. Now when she voiced it out it didn't sound like a crazy idea.
"There must be a transmitter somewhere. A core. I've told you that that robot over there can be switched on. Well, the control center is here, we traced it."
"Umm. I have an idea where we could check."
"Yes?"
"The robot said that I have reached the end of my life. So…" the woman squinted her eyes uncomfortably, "morgue?"
"Oh." The Doctor hid the sonic back into the pocket. "That actually makes sense. Good work."
"Huh," she chuckled nervously. If that was a good work she wasn't really keen on really going down there.
If not for the dust, corridors looked quite polish and clean. They followed the green pointer to the morgue using stairs as the elevator seemed to be permanently under repairs. Finally, they reached the sign they needed.
The door at the end of the corridor was shut with a large chain on a handle. As it was meant to keep what was inside from the outside. Alex gulped, as The Doctor discarded the chain in one swift motion of screwdriver. The very handy thing that sonic device was. The Doctor called for Alex with her hand, the other clenched the sonic screwdriver firmly.
A cry stuck in Alex's throat when the door was open.
About hundred empty eye sockets watched at her lifelessly.
Heya, yeah, I know, something crazy is already happening. You'll never guess what Mr Collins is about to do! (deliberately ignoring the last part) Seems you'll have to wait for the next chapter *evil laugh with a bit of self-pity of a typical student with no time to eat*. P.S. The chapter isn't short, it's just I didn't leave any author's notes for comments because I answered them on the twitter.