Since I was hugging the Doctor, I barely even stumbled when I landed, and was able to quickly move the locket back around just my own neck.

"Ow," The Doctor hissed through clenched teeth, a hand against his forehead.

"Yeah, that happens every time. Though I didn't feel it this time," I called back to him as I quickly began moving around the house, gathering papers that I left on the counter that I had prepared before last time.

"Every time? I probably took most of it this round, then," The Doctor figured, spinning around and poking at random things in my living room. I stopped shuffling with my papers for a second and smiled at his antics. It was a strange sight I never thought I'd see—the Doctor leafing through my old DVD collection. "Sleepless in Seattle, really?" He grinned back at me.

"Um, none of your business!" I chided playfully, placing the papers in a manila folder and heading over to the coat closet. "Besides—Nora Ephron? Directing genius."

The Doctor peeked over my shoulder at a touchscreen panel I was messing with against the wall of my coat closet. "What are those papers? And what's that?"

"These papers," I turned away from typing for just a second to shove the manila folder into his chest. "Are going to be your identification, since I'm about 85% sure that either everyone will see through your psychic paper, or it won't be nearly enough documentation. Your codename is Ace and you're from the Farnborough unit shadowing me for a possible transfer to the French unit, which is also why you need access to my orb."

"You've really thought this through…" he shuffled through the documents. "And Farnborough?" He asked, thinking it was just a myth.

"In this universe, yeah." Finally, the code I typed into the panel worked, and the coats in the closet sunk into the ground, revealing an open space in the closet to step into aside from the fact that my normal floor wood paneling was now glowing blue. I stepped in and turned around. "Come on."

The Doctor stepped in, and before he could say anything, I rambled on—trying to brief him as quickly as possible. I had no idea how much time Dylan had bought me, or if he had even bought me any. I also grabbed a random actual white Doctor's coat and gave it to him, for good measure.

"Some things you need to know. They're trying to ship my orb to the Paris unit, which is what we call an Artifact's Graveyard because they usually just stay locked up there forever and it's impossible to get them out. No one knows who you really are except for Meredith Powell, my number one best friend, short and blonde. My number two best friend, Dylan Ismael, brown-skin-green-eyes-broad-shoulders, doesn't know about you or anything, but I did ask him to stall the orb shipment for me. Professor Zodiac is my mentor and second dad, baldhead, thick Indian accent, can't miss him. My actual dad, Alejandro Rivera, is off on a mission and not here right now. However, his girlfriend Sally is here, also kind of short—dark-skin-tight-curly-hair."

The Doctor nodded, adjusting the new coat around his shoulders, processing everything I just told him all at once. "Anything else?"

"Oh yeah, my name is Scarlette."

888

"Scarlette! Thank god," Dylan rushed up to me, hugging me almost unbearably tight as soon as he saw me in the bleak white hallway, not caring much for the Doctor at first despite the fact that I knew he noticed him.

"Dylan! What happened?" I pulled away.

Dylan stepped closer to me. "You didn't hear? Someone was murdered in the storage facility. Looks like I didn't even have to stall the shipment after all—nothing's getting in or out."

"Sorry—did you say murdered?" The Doctor interrupted, stepping next to me.

"Ten-Four." Dylan confirmed sternly, much in the way he was used to confirming orders in the field—which probably only confused the Doctor. "Who is this guy?" Dylan asked me, as if he weren't standing right there.

"This is Ace, who I've mentioned a few times, from the Farn unit." I gestured toward the Doctor, stepping aside.

"Good to meet you," the Doctor smiled politely, shaking his hand. "Ace—my code name, not my real name. Though it is nice, don't you think? Snappy. Ace." He smiled to me, as if in thanks for the code name, and then turned back to Dylan expectantly.

Dylan squinted at him, still firmly shaking his hand, albeit very slowly. "Sure…" Dylan spun on his heel and pulled me closer to him by my upper arm, whispering in my ear as we began walking, the Doctor following behind. "Where the hell did you find this one?"

I couldn't help but laugh a little. "Long story."

888

"Scarlette! Just the girl I needed. Location of the murder was just released and it seems we now require a statement from you," Zodiac explained, coming in from an adjoining hallway on my right and immediately matching my pace.

"You all speak of murder here as if it happens often," The Doctor inquired from my left side.

"Apologies, sir, may I have your identity?" Zodiac asked. The Doctor was about to respond verbally, until he noticed Zodiac had his hand outstretched, so the Doctor reached into his jacket and pulled out the folder I gave him. Zodiac scanned the contents quickly. "Ace, to answer your question—nothing that happens here happens often, so it seems we approach every random event—which is all of them, with normalcy. I assure you there hasn't been a murder in our grounds since '96, which is more than what Farn can say," Zodiac peered at him over the tops of his glasses condescendingly.

Unfortunately, the Doctor had no idea what he was talking about, and looked to me for help. I only smirked as the Doctor stuttered. "Of course—sorry, sir, I didn't mean—"

Before the Doctor could apologize anymore, Zodiac burst into a deep, booming laughter. "Oh, I'm only playing! I'm always telling Steven at Farn that he's far too intense. Aren't I, Scarlette?" Zodiac nudged my arm.

I nodded. "Always might even be an understatement."

"Your structure is just so rigid, in my opinion. Has anyone briefed you on our departments yet?" Zodiac asked the Doctor.

The Doctor tried his best to seem like he knew what was going on. "I—"

"I was just about to do that!" I interrupted.

"Oh, well why don't we let Dylan do that—You have to come with me right now, Scarlette," Zodiac stopped in his tracks outside a door that was annoyingly familiar to me, motioning that was where we had to go.

I was about to protest, when Dylan turned me to face him by grabbing my elbow. "It's fine, Scarlie, you're always doing transfers—I got this one." He smiled.

I wanted to try to protest again, but Dylan quickly lead the Doctor away, and Zodiac ushered me into the room.

888

"Scarlette's in the science unit, studying the objects and creatures we find. I'm in the field retrieving them, and our good friend Meredith over here, last but not least, is the techie, using computers and codes to help both of us." Dylan approached Meredith, who was in a busy corner of a large room with other members of the technology department. It bore the most resemblance to a typical office floor with cubicles—aside from the fact that it was not typical at all.

The cubicles were huge—every space having at least five monitors and towers of servers to themselves, and parts of them seemed to be glowing different colors—what the Doctor assumed to be alien tech adopted to create a filing system. The lights were off in the wide, basketball court-sized room because they weren't needed—pieces of technology were emitting light all over the place. And if that didn't make things seem atypical—there was also the fact that Meredith's space was extremely distinctive: fluffy pink objects adorning as much space as it could.

Meredith immediately shot up from her seat upon noticing the Doctor and Dylan entering the room, adjusting her glasses on her face hastily. "Oh, Dylan! And—Ace!"

"You've met?" Dylan asked.

"No, Scarlette just told me." Meredith recovered so quickly that if the Doctor hadn't known better, he would have assumed it was intended. He assumed she had to learn to be that good when working with someone with Dylan's skill set.

"GUYS!" Nova burst into the space before anyone could continue, gasping for breath.

"What is it?" Dylan worried.

Meredith only sighed. "Oh, not again. I know that face you're making."

"I'm not making a face," Nova defended herself.

"Yes you are," The Doctor stepped forward. "Adventure face."

Dylan and Meredith both raised their eyebrows, for entirely different reasons.

888

"So why did Zodiac need you?" Dylan asked, everyone struggling to keep up with my pace and direction. As soon as I found them, I darted right back out of the room and began walking and zigzagging through hallways as fast as I could. With the place on lockdown after the murder, all of the transports were shut down—but it also gave me an advantage.

"The murder took place in the transfer unit." I breathed, sharply turning right again.

"So?" Meredith asked nervously, skipping a little in her step to keep up.

"In the section where my orb was."

Dylan grabbed me by my wrist and stopped me in my tracks. "Scarlette, I know what you're thinking, it's not a good idea."

"What am I thinking?"

"That this is the perfect opportunity to take your orb."

"Wrong." I began walking again. "I was thinking, that this is the perfect opportunity to show Ace our transfer unit."

"Right! I'd love to see that," the Doctor smiled.

"Scarlette, this is the worst opportunity for that." Dylan ignored the Doctor.

"You didn't let me finish. To show Ace our transfer unit… and how to steal an artifact from it, while solving a murder." I stopped at a gray metal door and tapped on it, revealing a keyboard with strange symbols on it. I typed a certain pattern into it before it opened.

"…How did you even do that?" Dylan asked, bewildered.

I stepped in, motioning for them to follow. I didn't have the energy to explain how long it took for me to figure it out, and settled for, "I know how stuff works."

888

We stepped into a dark hallway that was only glowing dim shades of blue due to some lights tracing the wall on the floor, and as soon as the doors closed, Dylan asked—"Ace isn't here as a transfer, is he? You called in a friend to help take the orb."

It was technically the truth, so I nodded, following the right wall. "Yes. And it's not Ace, it's the Doctor."

"The Doctor… what?" Dylan asked.

"I believe the correct term is Doctor Who," Meredith smirked, and I nudged her side.

"It's just the Doctor, mate. Good to really meet you this time," The Doctor offered a hand again and Dylan shook it, though not reacting any better than last time. "I'm really an expert at this sort of thing."

"No you're not," I rolled my eyes.

"I sort of am." The Doctor retorted playfully.

Dylan, who was walking ahead of us, held out an arm and stopped us in our tracks. "Well then, if you're such an expert, what do we do about that?" Dylan pointed at a bright blue floating square shape in the distance that was blinking red and approaching us quickly.

"Well, basically…" The Doctor started.

I prepared myself, knowing what he was going to say next. "Oh, great."

"RUN!"

888

We all ran for our lives, but saw no other way we could go once we made it back to the entrance—which was locked shut. We turned to face the blinking square that was growing bigger and nearer to us, our backs against the wall as if we could sink into it and hide.

"What are we going to do now?" Meredith panicked, beginning to hyperventilate.

The Doctor ran from one side of the wall to the other in front of us, moving his hands along the wall and trying to find something. "Is there a panel with some sort of installation protocol, or an alarm code? Or maybe this thing is sentient, or—."

"This thing obviously isn't sentient!" Dylan chided.

"Dylan! You never know!" I argued.

"Seriously, Scarlette, what the hell has gotten into you?" Dylan argued back. "It's not sentient, there aren't going to be any control panels, and we shouldn't have come in here in the first place!"

The Doctor stopped feeling at the walls now—him and Meredith exchanging looks as they paid attention to us despite our impending doom. I huffed. "Someone was murdered by my artifact, that's what's gotten into me!"

"I know you hate thinking about it, but we really do murder people here all the time!" Dylan glared.

I was so frustrated at his statement that I couldn't think of anything to shout besides—"NO!"

I stared at the orb blasting towards us, and shut my eyes tight out of fear and frustration—until everything went white.

For a brief second, I thought I had died, until I heard Meredith stumble with an "oof," noise and opened my eyes, noticing that the square had disappeared, and normal fluorescent lights were on.

I looked to the doorway to see that Sally had caught Meredith, who stumbled out of it when the door was suddenly open. "Uhh… hey!" Meredith greeted awkwardly.

Sally released Meredith's arms and stepped into the room, giving me a pointed look and raising her eyebrows. "How about—the next time you think about trying to solve a murder on your own…" Sally approached me slowly. "Ask me for help, too."

I breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked, "How did you know it was my idea?"

Sally laughed, gesturing towards Meredith and Dylan. "Oh please, with these two golden stickers?"

It's not as though I was a rule-breaker, but Dylan and Meredith were known for being exceptionally good and loyal. Sally walked up to the Doctor slowly also, looking him up and down. "And you must be Ace," She shook his hand, before turning back to me. "Whose credentials were definitely faked. But don't worry—only I caught it." She winked.

"So I assume that allows you to know I am actually The Doctor," He smiled, and shook her hand.

"Nice to meet you. I know Scarlette brought you here, but I don't completely trust you." Sally admitted casually.

"Good choice." The Doctor nodded.

888

"So, I've been looking into it a little, but I'm going to need to access the security footage to find out more," Sally walked us up to a locked steel door.

"Wouldn't the security footage be damaged?" Dylan asked.

"Of course. But it's not the footage that we need—it's the way it was damaged." Sally explained. "Meredith… we could use your expertise here."

Meredith seemed lost in thought until her name was called, and her eyes went wide once she realized what Sally was asking of her. "OH! —Oh no, I can't do that…"

"Why not?" The Doctor asked.

"Because it's… illegal?" Meredith stated this as more of a question, but anyone who knew her knew that this was definitely her answer. For a reason only few know, Meredith swore off any action that would even be considered the tiniest bit illegal to her years ago.

"Oh, for the millionth time Meredith—everything we do here is technically illegal," I pointed out.

"Hey," Dylan put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "You're helping solve a murder. That's not a bad thing."

Meredith sighed, before stepping up to the door and tapping on it until a screen showed up. She stared at it for just a few moments until gears in her brain seemed to click, and she began typing in symbols at lightening speed, her eyes darting behind her glasses, until the door slid open.

888

Sally immediately knew where to look and brought the hard drive back to us after climbing up a server tower to get it. "Just as I expected."

"What?" Dylan asked.

"I suspected it would be a field agent who did this since murdering with a gun is something they might have to do—and the fact that this footage has been physically damaged rather than through a computer further proves my point." As soon as Sally had this revelation, both her and the Doctor turned to look at Dylan, but I didn't want to entertain the idea. "Whoever did this was trying to steal the orb, but then got caught and shot the unsuspecting agent who interrupted them."

"No, wait…" They looked back to me. "Why would someone want to steal my orb?"

Sally sighed. "Here at 51, the requirements for promotions are not studies—but experience, and specifically, years of experience. You three," Sally nodded to Meredith, Dylan, and I, "were put together because you're all head-starters. You got into 51 before you were supposed to, so now you all have more years than everyone else. That makes you an easy target for many who put in effort but got in at a normal time—or possibly even late. People disagree with you, Scarlette—because not only are you the only head-starter in the science department—but you're the earliest one we've ever had."

"This orb was a huge breakthrough for you. You proved yourself ahead through this, so someone might be trying to take that away from you—or maybe help you out by destroying it in case it malfunctions in France since we never got to finish tests. There's a chance they wanted to experiment on it by themselves—but the damage to the footage really hints at a field person. It has to be an un-advanced field agent who has something against you… or maybe something for you."

888

When we approached the room where my orb was being held—or the crime scene, I pulled the Doctor to the corner of the room, while Meredith and Dylan spoke with Sally. "Do you know what it is?"

The Doctor stared at it. "I do. But that has to wait for later," The Doctor looked back to me. "Right now, I need to know, how many field agents do you communicate with?"

I shrugged, not expecting the conversation to turn this way. "Really just my dad and Dylan—the only other people I talk to are from the science department."

"Who do you think it is?" He asked carefully.

"I think it's Sally," I lowered my voice even more. "She used to be a field agent before getting promoted to head of transfers, and tried to advocate for a law against head-starters before she started dating my dad. She just seemed to stop talking about it after that… so maybe she was doing that to get close to me and make me stop thinking about it? Or maybe destroy it in my favor to secretly prove herself or something?"

"It can't be Sally…" The Doctor trailed. "I think it's Dylan."

"Dylan?" I asked incredulously. "It can't be Dylan!"

"Why not? He's an un-advanced field agent who may have something either for or against you—it makes sense. He's the only other field agent you talk to besides your dad."

"No, it just can't be. I've known him forever—he's my best friend, and…" The Doctor raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to add something as I nervously glanced around. "It just can't be, okay?"

The Doctor took a deep breath. "Okay."

888

"Where did Sally go?" I asked, upon returning back to the group and noticing her absence.

"I don't know," Dylan shrugged. "Meredith and I started talking and she just left…"

"Okay…" I looked to the exit, suspicious.

"I think she just had something to do," Dylan added.

"Doctor, what are you doing?" Meredith asked, softly, gently, in a voice that distracted Dylan and I.

The Doctor was standing only about a foot away from the orb, which was the only item in a glass case shelf, with part of the shelf perfectly missing to fit the size of the orb. "I'm just going to see…"

The Doctor reached out his hands slowly to touch the orb by the sides, and Meredith panicked. "No, stop that, don't touch it!"

The Doctor paused for a brief moment, his hands in mid-air, craning his head back to Meredith. "Why not?"

"Because it's not yours." Meredith reprimanded.

"I think it might be," The Doctor reached his hands out further, grabbing the orb quickly.

"NO!" Meredith screamed, standing directly behind the Doctor and pointing a gun that appeared to have certain edges that bulged out—a gun that appeared to have alien properties.

"Meredith, put that down!" Dylan demanded, stepping closer to her, but not moving to pry the gun from her hands.

"Meredith, what are you doing?" I asked, walking towards her and the Doctor slowly.

"It was me, okay? I did it. And Sally went back because she realized she knew how to extract the video from the damaged hard drive. She was going to find out!" The gun was shaking in Meredith's grip. It looked unnatural in her small hands.

"Why?" I asked vehemently, barely believing what I was hearing.

Meredith's voice was shaking as much as her hands. "Before I came to 51, Scarlette, I had a little sister. She was just like you. She was smart, and pretty, and taller than me, brunette, in love with science—really nerdy. And we were best friends, best friends until the day I was being chased by 51 and she abandoned me. She ran away with her stupid boyfriend and I never saw her again and I got trapped in 51 and she didn't, because she died instead! And when I met you, I knew you were just like her, but I knew there wouldn't be a stupid boyfriend to take you away because we're all stuck in here. But then the Doctor came along and you travel all over the place in another universe with him. And then it was real."

I shook my head, standing right next to the gun's aiming range, facing her. "Meredith—the Doctor's not my boyfriend, and he's not going to take me away from you."

Dylan was beyond confused. "Another universe! What—?"

"YES HE CAN!" Meredith interrupted Dylan's confusion. "So I came in here to try and shoot the orb to destroy it, but then someone walked in and I just—" Meredith couldn't finish her sentence, and began sobbing. "You could die out there and I wouldn't know!"

"She's not going to die. And technically, I can't die either—not by a gun. You know who I am." The Doctor had his hands up defensively, and was looking Meredith in the eye.

"Oh yeah—I know who you are! I know who you are so well that this gun isn't just a normal gun—it shoots once and the bullet lodges in your body, waits thirty seconds, and then shoots upwards. It will shoot twice. It will stop your regeneration." Meredith gained a new sort of anger as her sobs turned into something else.

In that moment, the door opened, and a small group of people flooded in—but I didn't dare take my eyes off of Meredith.

"Stop this!" I interrupted, this time standing between her and the Doctor. "This isn't you!"

The Doctor put a hand on one of my arms, trying to urge me out of the way, but I forced myself to be unafraid of Meredith, and put my hand over his to move it away as I kept walking forward. "I know who you are, Meredith. This isn't you."

I slowly reached out my hand to put it over hers—the one holding the gun. I moved her hand down slowly, until the gun was lowered to the ground and I took it out of her grasp. I held it out to the side and Dylan took it from me, as Meredith stared at the floor, crying. "This isn't me… this isn't me."

I began crying too, and hugged her close to me. "I know, I know."

As we cried on each other's shoulders—knowing this was the end of something, a voice boomed in the background, confirming our suspicions. "Meredith Powell, you are under arrest for murder, and a Protocol 8 Emergency Court is to be established under your name…"

As the officer rambled on, Meredith's sobs became worse.

888

"Meredith's court date is tomorrow… I have to be there," I explained to the Doctor as he poked around at the TARDIS console.

"I know," he looked up at me. "Has anyone said anything about the orb being missing?"

I shook my head. "No, Sally took care of it and gave me a pass after everything."

Despite the fact that I just took the Doctor to my home—there has never been this many things left unsaid between us. I stared at the orb, which was placed in a circle-shaped holder on the console, the coffee color with bright white lights floating around inside it like fireflies now, and wondered what it did. The Doctor hadn't told me yet—but then again, there was everything else we weren't telling each other: why he was so mad at me, why he then suddenly wanted me to stay, why Amy was mad at me and then forgot, how I knew what was happening next, and how I had no idea how I felt about any of it.

I walked over to the TARDIS doors and turned to face him. "Take Amy somewhere nice for me."

He nodded, and I pushed the button.

888

Dylan Ismael paced in Scarlette Rivera's living room. He realized that even with the amount of weirdness he went through that day with her, even with the fact that she was obviously lying to him—he still felt the same way about her.

She was brave when she stopped Meredith from shooting, but not only that, she cared and understood. She could have easily been mad, but she held Meredith and cried. She understood the weight of that moment. She understood Meredith. She understood Dylan.

He liked to think that even if he didn't know everything that was going on with her—he still understood her. He knew her character. He knew her heart.

He knew he had to tell her.

He had been thinking about this for a while, and thought that he had never been more sure of this in his life. Until—just like the hundreds of times before, Scarlette Rivera proved him wrong.

Somehow—she materialized in the middle room (rather than walk through the door, like Dylan expected), and didn't even seem phased by his presence. Instead, she walked up to him, grabbed both his hands, and said very urgently—"Dylan, I really need to say something to you."

In a few hours' time, Dylan did not realize he was any less in love with Scarlette Rivera after she told him the truth. The only thing he realized was that he was in love with Nova, too.


A/N: If you actually read this chapter I thank you SO much! I hope you enjoyed it. I actually wrote a bunch of scenes out, and then put them together like puzzle pieces- so you'll notice it seems like there are a lot of breaks. I wanted to make this only one chapter long so we can get right into the action.

Please tell me your thoughts on all these characters, I love them all with all my heart and I raised them all myself. After this book is done, I will release a small collection of stories as to very specifically how every single one of these characters got into Area 51- this includes Meredith (and whatever happened with her sister... and why she can't stand 'illegal' things, the irony) Dylan, Zodiac, Alejandro (Scarlette's dad), Sally, and of course Scarlette/Nova herself!

The words you know basically refer to Nova knowing about the Doctor's future! LUNA ALLI ROSE! I missed you! I'm glad you're back! Thank you so much for your faith in me- not many people had to run into the Doctor/Ace and he left quite abruptly at the end there, so he sort of lucked out. Trouble definitely occurred! I guarantee there will be much more River to come in the future and it will all be very messed up and exciting. Hope you liked this chapter!

The next chapter should be up very shortly! Please leave a review and let me know your thoughts!