The TARDIS materialized in a dark alleyway and the blue door opens.
Stepping out first, Matt, as he looked around the alleyway. It smelled worse than an alleyway behind a seedy pub and he cautioned Ripley as she stepped out of the TARDIS last.
Closing the door behind them, Ripley locked it, and hid the key as Matt investigated where the TARDIS took them. He ended up stepping out of the alleyway and noticed they're in a city with bright lights near the ocean, there's a bay, he smelled the salty air carried by the summer breeze that felt heavy and warm.
Turning his head, Matt saw Ripley stepped out of the alleyway, looking around. She noticed the bay as ships sailed in the dark sea.
"Feels nicer than home," Matt compared the temperatures.
While it felt nicer than a biting cold breeze that returned to the greater London area, Ripley didn't care for the salty smell carried in the breeze here.
Looking around, Ripley spotted rubbish bins, overfilled with discarded things, and grabbed the newspaper laying on top. It's seen better days, but it's readable enough for her to see a journalist questioning the mayor's silence in the bizarre cases of disappearing homeless.
Showing Matt, he glimpsed at the newspaper and read how the journalist tried, but no avail, to get concrete answers from the mayor on the whereabouts of dozens of homeless that've disappeared within days.
The mayor continued his silence and the journalist railed against the mayor for it, however, it appeared that there's not much information regarding what happened other than the police haven't conclusively settled on the cause.
"Disappearing homeless?" Matt blinked as he read the newspaper. "Is that why it brought us here?"
Granted, it was a normal day, back home, and they didn't have anything major needing their attention in their universe, but still, it's rather disconcerting when the TARDIS practically badgered them into stepping inside. It never does that unless it's something that needed Matt and Ripley's attention.
Ripley's weary as she read the journalist's article on the homeless disappearances and spotted details regarding police coverups of the deaths and the grotesque nature of the homeless corpses found.
Matt read with her and the accusations seemed damning, but there's trouble with the journalist, he's facing defamation lawsuits from the mayor's office over his articles.
"There's no record of the homeless deaths and nor any reports," Matt read the statement given by the now-talking mayor.
Lowering the newspaper, the two shared a look, before Ripley tossed it back in the bins.
"Homeless deaths?" Matt frowned.
Ripley spotted a newer newspaper heaped near a closed convenience store and grabbed it.
"Cassandra Williams, the mayor's response to increasing inquires over homeless violence, given her own agency and body," Ripley read the news article.
There's a picture of her, smiling for the camera, and she's happily shaking the hand of the mayor.
An interview, Cassandra stated she wanted to help the violence lessen and the homeless to seek aid. She's opened clinics for the homeless to seek out and receive the aid they needed and she ended her interview with the reminder of vaccination and good health.
"Stranger and stranger," Matt mused.
Ripley tossed it in the bins, too. Looking around, there's no one out, still, and judging from the newspapers, it's a Friday night.
Usually, back at home, the dance floors lit up and there's people dancing the night away.
… Ripley couldn't dance to save her life and Matt's not the one to judge on the account of his feet getting in the way whenever he tried dancing.
"Okay, missing homeless, alleged homeless deaths, Cassandra, nobody out," Matt frowned as he summed the first few things they've noticed since coming here.
With one arm swaying in the wind and the other around Ripley's shoulder, Matt's eyes glistened in the light as he tried looking for more clues. He couldn't see anyone out but them, not even a crowd. It didn't appear anyone went inside clubs, they're all closed, and it's rather telling considering it's a Friday night.
While walking, the two found a notice board posted near a bus stop, saying that there's planned outages for most of the week. It reminded people not to take elevators or anything that could've trapped them in an outage.
Looking at the dates, Ripley found the date they're present, and saw a planned outage in an hour and would last hours after.
"Planned outages?" Matt blinked as he read the sign with her.
Reading further down, he learned the area surrounding the city's prone to bushfires, and the outages helped lessen the chances, and they'd continue well until fall.
It'd explain why there's nobody out, the planned outage would've ruined any plans. Likely, people planned, and businesses started closing just before the outages.
Five hours after the planned outage started until the power came back, turning the seemingly empty city into a ghost town proper.
Hospitals and the like, with their generators, remained on throughout the outages, and for businesses, a lull.
"Not much time to investigate, tonight," Ripley noted that unless Matt used his Sonic Screwdriver to light the way, they're not getting far into investigating the reason why the TARDIS brought them here.
"Well, let's make it count," Matt sighed.
The pair walked until they came across a park and in it, a destroyed homeless camp. It looked as though a tornado came through and tore everything up. Rubbish everywhere, tents torn up, articles of shredded clothing, everything covered in what looked like black oil, the sheen reflecting off the lights in the distance.
The smell's too pungent for them to get near and they only looked afar, but there's no homeless anywhere, not even a fire, the rusted oil barrels all pushed over their sides, expelling the ashes and rubbish used to burn.
"What do you suppose happened?" Matt asked Ripley.
Ripley looked at the destruction of the homeless camp and shook her head. They couldn't go near it and they couldn't see much without any bright lights, there's none in the park.
Unable to see the camp proper, the pair opted to wait until morning to try again, where they'd have the sun on their side.
Matt walked with Ripley out of the park and stopped when they noticed a campaign sign on the wall near the entrance.
Cassandra Williams.
She's got her own campaign signs around the city and there she is plastered on it with a smile and bright texts hovering over her. It showed that some work went into making her look the way she did in the photograph.
Her campaign slogan: MAKE THE CITY CLEAN AGAIN!
She's committed to helping the homeless with their varied issues and in return reclaim the city that's shown to have become a hovel for homeless.
Next to her campaign poster, there's another poster, this one also by her, strongly emphasized vaccinations and other medical necessities. She even said her patrol handles the costs, just for people to come into clinics and hospitals, no questions asked.
"She's really pushing for this," Matt noted that Cassandra's vehemently for people to receive medical attention when possible. She didn't want anyone getting sick and wanted everyone to get their treatments.
Seemed noble enough, he thought.
Ripley looked at the writing and shook her head, "Excessively, if anything."
Granted, there's a lot of reasons to push for vaccinations and medical necessities.
With flus and other nasties, better safe than sorry.
Looking at the time, Matt noticed the outage happening in five minutes. He got out his Sonic Screwdriver, just in case, and cautiously walked with Ripley close by.
"What should we do?" Ripley asked him as they walked.
Thinking, Matt didn't know where else to check, the outage would've made it even more difficult, and there's a chance they won't find anything on the first night.
"I don't see anyone out here. No homeless. No nothing," Matt responded as he glimpsed around the empty streets, no vehicles or people, he spotted buildings slowly turning off their lights as he walked with Ripley down the sidewalk.
"Nothing's going to be opened until tomorrow, anyway, might as well go back to the TARDIS," Matt concluded.
By the time the outage's over, it's morning.
Nodding, Ripley walked with Matt, arm around her shoulder, arm around his waist, and the pair watched as they're plummeted into darkness.
Every storefront turned dark, no torchlight in the streets, just darkness, and Matt used his Sonic Screwdriver to light the path back to the TARDIS.
The green light illuminated the sidewalk as they retraced their steps.
Far different without the lights, the city took on a whole different visage, and it felt foreboding without the sound of people and animals. It's just the sound of the waves coming from the bay and the ships in the yonder.
"Suppose we'll start with the journalist and work our way up," Ripley suggested the course of action in the morning.
The journalist wasn't holding back punches when writing the scathing articles about the mayor. They'd ought to interview him and see what the story is on the disappearing homeless and the allegations of coverup. Ripley memorized the journalist's name and where the he writes for, so in the morning they'll look for him.
"Maybe tomorrow look for something to eat, too," Matt mused at the thought of having breakfast. While Ripley kept plenty of supplies in the TARDIS, he didn't want to rely on them.
He'd also wanted to expand his culinary horizons, so to speak, try food from around the universes and back. Yes, he'd gotten sick more than once, but at least he learned what he liked and didn't. Having trying many things over the course of their adventures, Matt's certain he might not go back to his usual fish fingers and custard for a snack.
"Yeah, then look for the journalist," Ripley formulated the plan for the morning.
As they walked, Matt discussed plans for their next date.
"I double checked. Wednesday night's the only slots available," Matt discussed the available time slots for a movie. It's been popular that it sold out most of the month, but there's an opening for Wednesday night, nearly the graveyard hours.
"Might be too late for you to get home," Ripley noted that the only theatre playing the movie's ways away from Matt's flat and by the time he circled around and dropped Ripley home, it's closer to two in the morning!
Matt nodded as he agreed.
It's the only spot opened and the policies of the theatre allowed Matt to swap the tickets for an earlier showing, but there's none. He checked the night before just to make sure.
"All that construction, you sure you're going to be fine getting home?" Ripley asked.
There's construction undergoing for a new grocery store near Matt's flat. They've got the block sequestered for the equipment and tore up the road to get to the pipes. There's supposed to be flags and others to guide vehicles at night, but they've been lacking as of late.
Matt replied, "I've gone around the roundabout on a Friday night, I can get through fine."
He noticed Ripley worried and he promised her that he can handle getting home after their date fine.
"Yeah, but remember the last time you went through that way and they didn't even have a flagger, almost hit the sod in the Bentley because he sped up?" Ripley remembered an incident when they started building the grocery store.
The construction workers weren't at fault for the mistakes, it was the road workers who were supposed to get the signs up in visible areas and flag people.
Matt was on his way to work when he had to pump the breaks because there wasn't a flagger to keep the traffic flow proper. One half of the road's closed off and he would've needed to drive around the side to get to the open section, but there wasn't a flagger. Ended up nearly hitting a Bentley because the man in it didn't take it slow like Matt.
Nobody's hurt, no cars were dented, but the man in the Bentley was nasty when he passed Matt.
Sighing, Ripley asked Matt, "Maybe I worry too much, but I don't want you driving out that way at night. Why not just stay at my place until morning, then you can look at Chaplin and his friends getting themselves whacked by construction equipment?"
Rather Matt go home at night, through the construction zone to his flat, Ripley wanted him to stay at her flat until morning. Though, Ripley didn't doubt Matt's driving, she just worried since they've gotten the road torn up in spots and with the wonderful signers and flaggers, the last thing she wanted was hear Matt getting caught in a hole.
It brought a smile on Matt's face and he rubbed her shoulder with his hand.
"You sure you don't mind?" Matt blinked.
Ripley replied she didn't and Matt planted a kiss on the side of her head. Afterwards, he said, "Well, at least I'm already at work."
Attempting to return to the TARDIS proved difficult as everything looked different at night and as they walked, they heard someone struggling.
It sounded close and Matt stepped in front of Ripley as he walked forward. He continued walking until he noticed a man on the ground, holding his gut.
"Sir, are you okay?" Matt knelt beside him with Ripley near him.
The man groaned as Matt used his Sonic Screwdriver to look at the man's gut and seen he'd been stabbed.
Helping him keep pressure, Matt and Ripley helped him stay calm.
Once he calmed down enough, Ripley ran to find a pay phone and dialed out to the authorities.
Returning to the men, Ripley knelt by the wounded man.
He'd look like a homeless man, worn clothes, greasy face, and an unkempt beard.
"It's okay, help's on the way," Ripley told the man.
He groaned, "No… don't… don't let them get me… please…"
He begged the pair not to let "them" get him and they're confused.
Ripley asked him if it's the people who hurt him and he didn't say much other than he vehemently didn't want "them" to get him.
The pair couldn't ask him much because an ambulance sped into the area and EMTs pushed themselves out of the back.
A vehicle pulled up behind the ambulance and it wasn't a police vehicle, the pair weren't sure because it was too dark out for them to see the emblem.
The homeless man begged for them not to let "them" get him as EMTs approached with a gurney.
Forced to step back, the pair watched at the EMTs carefully hoisted the homeless man on to the gurney, strapped him in, and pushed the gurney towards the back of the ambulance.
Neither spoke a word to Matt or Ripley as they watched the homeless man disappear into the back with the EMTs closing the ambulance doors and it drove off.
The vehicle behind it drove off and followed the ambulance.
"What did he mean?" Matt looked to Ripley.
Ripley played back what the man said in her head.
She replied, "I don't know… but I don't like it."
There's no police cars that showed up to take their statements. Nobody talked to them. The EMTs collected the homeless man and that's it.
"What was that vehicle doing, anyway?" Matt wondered.
Ripley frowned, "I don't know."