"So, that was a nice, quiet trip." The Doctor commented with a smile, fiddling with the controls of the TARDIS. "What do you say we try for another one, eh?"

"Quiet?" Sarah Jane repeated, looking the Doctor up and down.

The Doctor glanced back at her. "What?"

"Sorry, it's just-" The woman laughed, "In all the faces I've known you, 'quiet' never described any of them."

"Hey," The Doctor snapped his fingers, pointing. "I can do quiet, I'm great at quiet."

"No." El spoke up, sitting on the seat nearby.

The Doctor looked at the girl. "What?"

"Not quiet." El said. "Lots of things. Not quiet."

The Doctor recoiled, affronted, as Sarah Jane and El laughed. "I can't believe this! My best friend and my little girl ganging up on me! Who wants to join in next, you, old girl?" He sarcastically directed to the TARDIS and shook his head. "And I may not be calm, but I can do quiet! In fact, I know one of the greatest places in the universe, that's bustling and full of life, and beautiful and peaceful at the same time!"

"Okay." Sarah Jane granted. "Prove it."

The Doctor smiled smugly. "Oh, I will."


"Venice!" The Doctor shouted enthusiastically, throwing his arms out as they all stepped out of the TARDIS. "Venezia!"

El smiled, eyes wide to take everything in as she looked around at the market stalls, people going about their day, the stone architecture that looked like it had long since weathered the test of time, and the canals running straight through the city.

"La Serenissima!" The Doctor smiled, looking around.

"Italy." Sarah Jane remarked, looking around. "No evil energy helixes terrorizing the country this time, I hope?"

El tilted her head.

"Long story." The Doctor told the girl. "Fought an energy entity that stowed away on board the TARDIS in this country, and-" He pointed to Sarah Jane. "That was almost a hundred years ago! But never mind that, look, look, look!" He gestured around. "It's such a beautiful city! Oh, I love Venice. Me and a lot of others. Byron, Napoleon, Casanova-" The Doctor stopped, checking his watch quickly and anxiously. He let out a sigh of relief. "Oh, he's not born for another 145 years… That's a tremendous relief."

El raised an eyebrow. "Casanova?"

"I owe him a hen." He answered, moving on his way through the city.

"A hen?" Sarah Jane repeated. "Why do you owe him a chicken?"

"I said hen." The Doctor replied. "I didn't say chicken."

The Doctor tried to move through an arched doorway, deeper into the city.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!" A man's hand shot out, cutting off the Doctor. "Where do you think you're going? Papers, please."

The Doctor merely smiled, offering the man the psychic paper. "All to your satisfaction, I should hope."

The inspector began to look over it, before he quickly gasped, looking to the others. "I-I'm so sorry, your holiness." He apologized, bowing to the Doctor.

The Time Lord blinked, before gesturing for the other man to raise up. "Don't worry about it, you were just doing your job." The Doctor looked between the man and the others, leaning in. "Sorry, what exactly is your job?"

"Checking for aliens," The inspector answered, as Sarah Jane fought back laughter. "Visitors from foreign lands what might bring the plague with them."

Sarah Jane quickly sobered. "Plague?" She turned to the Doctor furiously. "Your idea of a quiet trip is to bring a girl with a quite-probably compromised immune system to a time where there's a plague in full swing!?" She hissed.

"Don't worry, Viscountess." The inspector bowed to the woman. "No, we're under quarantine here. No-one comes in, no-one goes out, and all because of the grace and wisdom of our patroness, Signora Rosanna Calvierri." He gestured down to the book he carried, a family crest or seal stamped into the leather of the cover.

Sarah Jane leaned towards the Doctor, whispering. "I don't recognize that name."

The Doctor glanced at her. "So?"

"So, if Venice was quarantined by a woman in a fairly high-up position, why don't I?" Sarah Jane rhetorically asked. "Something's wrong here."

The Doctor smiled proudly, pointing at her. "I knew there was a reason I brought you along." He turned to the man. "Yeah, see, I heard the plague died out ages ago?"

"Not out there!" The inspector pointed to nowhere in the distance. "Signora Calvierri has seen it with her own two eyes! Bodies piled high in the streets, she said!"

"Did she now?" The Doctor lowly asked, before suddenly smiling. "Well, thank you for your time." He turned to the others, taking El's hand. "Come along." He directed, heading deeper into Venice.


As they walked down the streets next to the canals, a hullaballoo began to be generated, a crowd gathering and staring awestruck at something across the way.

The Doctor frowned, running over and leaning on a railing, trying to get a look.

A line of girls, most of them only just out of their late teens, were being led by a regal woman dressed in black. The girls following her were all wearing veils, dressed in white in a way that, for the people of the time, was obviously meant to be provocative in some manner.

A dark-skinned man suddenly cut in trying to get to one of the girls. "Isabella!" He shouted, lifting the veil on each one of the women, trying to find the correct one.

"What's he doing?" El asked, sensing anxiety radiating from him. He was looking for the girl, but not to hurt her. His thoughts seemed to focus on… rescue.

The situation didn't look that bad. So… why would this 'Isabella' need to be rescued?

"I don't know." The Doctor replied, looking on as the man lifted the veil of the one he was searching for, and she recoiled in the sunlight.

One of the girls pushed the man to the ground, hissing.

The Doctor's head shot up. That was not normal human vocal modulation.

El tilted her head, watching as another man stood over the first, taunting, before going off. Two guards came to drag the first away, and El frowned.

"What was-?" She turned to the Doctor, stopping, and she sighed. "Hate it when he does that."

Sarah Jane merely nodded in agreement.


The Doctor kept at a brisk pace through the streets, quickly getting to the other side of the canal. Spotting the man from before walking through an archway, the Doctor followed.

"Who were those girls?" The Time Lord probed without preamble, hopping on a small stair behind the man.

The man turned around, looking the Doctor up and down. "I thought everyone knew about the Calvierri School."

The Doctor crossed his arms, shrugging. "It's my first day here. It's okay," He hopped down, "Parents do all sorts of things to get their children into schools. Should probably get El into one now that I'm thinking about it. Then again, experience is the best teacher, and she is traveling with me, so… Sorry, rambling, back on topic. School?" The Doctor looked back to him. "Those school uniforms looked a bit… risqué, but not like anything else untoward was happening, so… why are you trying to get her out?"

"Something happens in there." The Italian man answered. "Something magical, something evil." He gulped. "My own daughter didn't recognize me… and the girl who pushed me away, her face… like an animal."

The Doctor frowned, throwing an arm around the man's shoulders. "I think it's time that I met this… Signora Calvierri."


El and Sarah Jane walked down the streets of Venice, past a woman who was sweeping up straw in an alley.

"'Don't wander off,' he says to us." Sarah Jane grumbled. "And what's the first thing he does when he spots something mildly interesting? Wander off."

An agonized scream echoed through the place, and the two froze.

"Every time!" Sarah Jane turned on her heel, running off towards the source.

Sprinting around a corner, the two stopped upon seeing a man hunched over a woman, biting into her neck.

He quickly registered their presence, and stood up, throwing a veil up to cover his face, as he walked back through the streets.

El focused on the man, as Sarah Jane went to look over the woman. Something about the man was wrong, like her mind didn't want to register his existence, even though he was standing there.

Sarah Jane let out a sigh, as she flipped up the cover on the watch-like device on her wrist. "She'll be fine. Only a minor amount of blood loss. Who-" She turned, catching El sprinting off after the man. "El!" She shot to her feet, running after the girl.

Following El through the winding paths, Sarah Jane stopped, as El stood at a doorway, looking out onto the ocean.

"El, what you were thinking?" Sarah Jane reprimanded.

"But… he was just…" El looked out in confusion. Feeling out with her mind, she still registered his presence, but there was nothing there to see. Even the water looked mostly undisturbed.


"Isabella!" The man, who the Doctor learned was named Guido, tried to push his way through the front gates of the school.

As the guards tried to deal with him, the Doctor sneakily strode past, around the side closest to the canal. The Doctor soniced the gate open quietly, proceeding inside.

The Doctor climbed down the spiraling stairs, into a basement level of the school.

The Time Lord's eyes locked on a mirror, and he smiled, walking over to it. "Well… hello, handsome." It was the first look he'd gotten at this new face since regenerating into it, and he was all alone, so one could forgive him for being a bit self-indulgent.

….God, he really did look like a teenager trying to look older than he was.

"Who are you?" Five voices inquired in unison, and the Doctor jumped, turning around.

The students were down here with him. The Doctor's eyes ran over each one, and back to the mirror in confusion.

Even though the five stood there, at an angle that should've clearly allowed the mirror to reflect them, there was no such reflection in the polished surface.

"B-" The Doctor kept gesturing back and forth between the mirror and the girls. "How are you doing that?" He finally asked, excited more than he had ever been. He hadn't met people with no reflection before. "I am loving it! You're like Houdini only you're five slightly scary girls, and he was shorter, will be shorter." He clapped his hands. "Sorry, rambling."

"I'll ask you again Signor." They all spoke as one, slightly tilting their heads. "Who are you?"

"Why don't you check," He flashed his wallet. "This out."

The girls tilted heads angled further, and the Doctor looked at the wallet. He groaned, looking at the slightly mischievous smile of the First Doctor's face.

"My library card. Of course, I gave the psychic to Sarah Jane." He shook his head, abruptly stopping as he considered something. "Pale, creepy girls who don't like sunlight, and can't be seen in… aha! Am I thinking what I think I'm thinking?" The Doctor giddily asked. "But the city. Why shut down the city? Unless-"

"Leave now, Signor." The girls commanded. "Or we shall call for the steward… if you are lucky."

"Oho." The Doctor giggled. He gulped, mirth vanishing as the girl's began to hiss, teeth turning into long fangs. He tugged on his jacket, walking effortlessly towards the exit as they began to advance. "Tell me the whole plan!" He suddenly commanded, whipping around.

The girls all hissed at him.

"One of these days that's going to work." The Doctor mumbled to himself, running up the stairs.


"Dad!" El ran over to the Doctor. "Where'd you go!?"

"Ah, sorry!" He looked between her and Sarah Jane. "Vampires! I just met some Vampires!"

"Vampire?" El repeated.

"Yes, Vampires!" The Doctor hopped up and down with her. "Bloodsucking monsters with no reflection and a really bad temper and there's some here in this school!"

"But…" Sarah Jane searched. "Vampires!?"

The Doctor looked the woman up and down. "You've met the Loch Ness Monster!"

Sarah Jane held up a finger but conceded his point. "Well, if the girls in there are being… Vampirized somehow, we need to find a way inside."

The Doctor smiled excitedly. "Come and meet my new friend."


Guido was reluctant at first, but after being made aware of the fact that the trio intended on infiltrating the school and putting a stop to whatever was going on inside, he gladly began to lend his assistance.

They leaned over a map of Venice, trying to figure out a way into the school without being seen by the Vampires.

"As you saw, there's no clear way in." Guido pointed, shaking his head. "The House of Calvierri is like a fortress. But," He amended, "There's a tunnel underneath it," He ran his finger along a section of the map. "With a ladder and a shaft that leads up to the house. I tried to get in once myself, but I hit a trapdoor."

"We can pry open that trapdoor, easy." The Doctor glanced to El.

"Doctor," Sarah Jane crossed her arms, "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Well, what's the alternative?" The Doctor looked between them. "They won't except her because she's too young, and they won't except you because you're too…"

Sarah Jane's eyes narrowed.

"I was going to say educated!" The Doctor quickly waved his hands. "They wouldn't take you in because they'd already assume you'd been to school."

"Because I'm old?" Sarah Jane questioned.

"Yes! No!" The Doctor switched up. "You're not old! You're young! …but distinguished enough to be my sister!"

Guido looked between them. "Actually, I thought you," He pointed to Sarah Jane, "Were his mother."

Sarah Jane looked to the Doctor.

"…older sister?" The Time Lord amended.

"Oh, aunt!" El recognized, speaking up.

"Yes," The Doctor pointed. "Your aunt Sarah." He quickly looked over to the barrels in the corner, sniffing at them, before recoiling. "Eugh, gunpowder."

Sarah Jane sighed, shaking her head. "Doctor, I do have one question. What would Vampires want with Venice?"

The Doctor shrugged. "I don't know… if they are Vampires."

Sarah Jane uncrossed her arms, standing straight. "What are they, if they aren't?"

The Doctor remained silent for a moment. Vampire really wasn't a species name, more like a catch-all term, like how there were a hundred different breeds of dog. Lots of planets all over the universe bred Vampiristic organisms. But there was one group that started it all, one group responsible for inspiring every Vampire myth in the cosmos, and for being the progenitors of every Vampire-like organism in existence.

The Doctor leaned forward clasping his hands. "A long long time ago, the Time Lords were a young race like any other. Expanding so quickly into the stars to the point of hubris, and out there we found something. Or rather… something found us."

El tilted her head curiously. "What was it?"

"The Yssgaroth." The Doctor answered. "The Great Vampires. They used to consume whole worlds, leaving only dead husks. But they're feared by everyone and everything in the universe, and for good reason. With the possible exception of the Daleks, they are the most feared, hated, reviled beings in all the cosmos."

"What's so bad that it would willingly disguise itself as that?" Sarah Jane asked.

"That…" The Doctor licked his lips. "Is the question."


"We're here." Guido quietly proclaimed, as he punted the boat into a small inlet, night long having fallen.

Team TARDIS disembarked, watching as Guido moved the boat back the way they came.

The old rusty metal gate creaked as the Doctor pushed it open, taking the lead with a torch.

"Okay, I'll take the lead." The Doctor declared, walking up the steps, as Sarah Jane and El followed. "Anything happens to me, go back to the TARDIS, and activate Emergency Program One. It'll solve the problem."

"Yeah." Sarah Jane replied, as they pushed through the door at the top of the stairs, proceeding down the tunnel. "Fat chance of that happening."

The Doctor glanced at her. "Why do you say that?"

"I'm not stupid." Sarah Jane retorted. "I know exactly what that program does."

El furrowed her eyebrows. "What does it do?"

"Sends us home." Sarah Jane answered before the Doctor could. "And leaves him in whatever mess he made for himself."

"Nope." El instantly proclaimed. "Not doing that."

The Doctor stopped, turning to her. "Welp, I'm your dad now, so what I say goes." He stood, trying to look authoritative… before a gust of wind blew out the torch. "Look, can we just go and see the Vampires, please?" He whispered.


Deep within the Calvierri House, there was a circular trapdoor made of heavy steel covering the ladder down into the tunnels. The metal bar keeping it closed slid away by itself, and the two pieces of metal swung open, the Doctor popping his head out like a gopher.

"Okay, we're clear." The Doctor climbed out first, helping El out, and then Sarah Jane. "Great going." The Doctor complimented, and El beamed. He looked around, narrowing his eyes. "Can't see a thing…" He reached into his pocket, pulling out a fluorescent light attached to a handle.

El blinked, looking into the Doctor's pockets. "What else do you have in there?"

The Doctor reached back in, pulling out a yo-yo, handing it to the girl. She frowned, occupying herself with it, as he went over to a chest set against the wall. Opening the chest, the Time Lord recoiled as he caught sight of the rotten, desiccated corpses lying inside.

"Doctor," Sarah Jane began, sounding like she was trying to hold back the urge to wretch, "What happened to them?"

"They've had all the moisture, every last drop of water, sucked out of them…" The Doctor answered, touching one. The skin felt leathery, the bones like they would give at any moment. He looked to the skull, and frowned, seeing similar fangs to the one the girls he encountered had possessed.

"But…" El approached, tilting her head. "You said Vampires suck blood to make more of themselves. Why did these people die?"

The Doctor looked back to her, tongue poking out of his mouth. "Maybe not everyone can survive the process."

"Who are you?" A half-dozen voices asked at once. Six of the girls came walking slowly out of the alcoves, fangs barred.

The Doctor jumped, pulling El and Sarah Jane close to him as he looked around.

El gasped, shaking. "F-Fish!" She pointed at the girls.

"What?" The Doctor looked down at her, then back to the approaching Vampires. "Nevermind, run!" He ordered, waving around the light, causing the Vampire girls to recoil, hissing as it burned at them.

The three burst through one of the doors, running down a hall. The Doctor came to a sliding stop, in front of a woman and two men.

"Ah." The Doctor blinked. "Rosanna Calvierri, I presume."

The door behind them clanged as the girls came marching in.

Rosanna tilted her head sarcastically. "Did you not think we had prepared for intruders?"

"Ah, well…" The Doctor turned around, waving the light.

"This way!" A voice shouted.

The Doctor whipped around to see Guido's daughter, Isabella, motioning for them to follow. Deciding on whether or not to follow the one person who might kill them, as opposed to stay with the nine who would definitely kill them, the Doctor chose the former.

"Run!" The Time Lord ordered, pushing Sarah Jane and El in that direction.

"Seal the house." Rosanna ordered, as Isabella guided them out.

On the way, they passed through a green, glowing room, what looked like an injection chair of some sort standing in the center. He would've stopped to take a look, but Isabella kept moving, so he kept pushing El and Sarah Jane ahead of them.

"El, you said fish." Sarah Jane recalled, as they all sprinted down the stairs. "Why did you say fish?"

"Not people, fish!" El elaborated. "Big, walking fish… people… things!"

"Aliens!" The Doctor laughed, as they reached the bottom. "The old 'aliens pose as a mythical creature' plot. Classic! Run, run, run!" He ordered, ushering El and Sarah Jane to the front as they ran down a series of tunnels under the house. "That must be what the chair I saw was for!" He turned around, waving the light to delay their pursuers, before keeping up. "They can't convert humans without technological assistance. And they did it without having anything other that a bit of wood and tubing!"

"Stop being impressed!" Sarah Jane ordered, as they came to the door at the end.

A bell chimed as they opened the door, the morning light bombarding the city. Guido stood at the end, watching, as Isabella ushered the others out.

"Get out!" She ordered. "Quickly, quickly!" She moved to follow, but froze up, gasping in pain as the sunlight hit her. That was all the delay the others behind her needed to grab her, pulling her back inside.

"No!" The Doctor hollered, as the door slammed shut. He went to go bang against it, spasming as the door suddenly became electrified. The Doctor fell back, narrowly catching himself on the rails, as Sarah Jane and El went to help him.

"D…" El shook, looking at the Doctor as Sarah Jane scanned him. "Dead?"

"No." She let out a relieved sigh. "Just sleeping."

El slowly nodded, and turned around, looking at Guido. They'd managed to get inside, and get some idea of what was going on… but the reason why they went there in the first place, to rescue Isabella…

They'd failed.