"I've been the sheriff for the island for almost forty years, give or take," Sheriff Lucas informed the pair as he discussed the unusual disappearances, they used their psychic papers to convince him that they're investigators, trying to find closure for one of the victims, with Al giving them the details needed to pass off as genuine articles. "We're used to the occasional missing surfer, the ornery drunks that fall off the pier, but ten people within two month's almost unheard."
Since he became a deputy and ascended to sheriff, Sheriff Lucas had his share of missing people.
With the island a tourist destination, he's used to tourists going overboard with excess, resulting in their untimely deaths as they drunkenly forget themselves.
However, a span of two months and ten people go missing's unheard of, that it took work for him to calm everyone.
Too close together for his comfort, the worse he found's that only two of the ten knew each other, the other eight didn't know from a hole in the ground.
"What do you think happened to them?" Lila asked the sheriff as he sat down in his chair, an audible grunt as he felt his age.
Readjusting in his seat as he looked up to them, Sheriff Lucas stated that he believed that they gotten drunk, due to the abundance of beer bottles found at the beach area where they'd allegedly gone to one night, and were swept out to sea.
Some were lost to the storms the island endured.
Nasty storms, nearly destroyed the wharf and everything around it.
Of course, because the island is "simple" minded, the tourists wouldn't believe their warnings about the storm, thus they're lost to the sea.
"You're not going to find their bodies," the sheriff let out a sigh as he sat his arms on the desk, his hands clasped together.
In his belief, the lost tourists were swept out to sea, either by riptides or the storms, they'll never find the bodies, already lost to the underwater currents and the sea life that consumed them.
Maybe as feet washed ashore, but that's about as close as they'll get to closure on their missing ward.
"Has anything like this happened before?" Theodore inquired if similar incidents occurred and Sheriff Lucas mulled answering him before he gave it.
Not like this.
They're discussing the disappearances more when a woman walked through the door of the sheriff's department, holding a basket with her arm through the handle.
She called out to the sheriff and he waved her through.
"What brings you to our shack, Dolores?" Sheriff Lucian asked the woman as she came up to the desk, Theodore and Lila moving to the side as they looked on.
Wearing a bright yellow dress with straps, a red strap around the waist with a bow accenting the yellow, her brunette hair neatly combed with a yellow headband keeping it in place, Dolores answered with her cherry red lips forming into a smile, "Well, your wife said you'd be here. She asked me to bring your lunch."
Reaching into her basket with her free pale hand, nails manicured with orange nail polish, Dolores brought out a boxed lunch, Sheriff Lucas giddy as he thanked her, reaching out to take it from her.
"How's the vineyard?" Sheriff Lucian asked about his wife's work at the vineyard, located further into the island, and Dolores stated that the sheriff's wife contemplated hiring seasonal workers due to the quality harvested this year.
Snorting, Sheriff Lucian goes, "She'd chase them off, with her temper of hers!"
He then quickly added not to tell his wife what he said as Dolores chuckled.
She stopped when she noticed Theodore and Lila, asking about them, the sheriff telling her what they told him, investigators for one of the missing people.
Skeptical, Dolores pointed out the same thing the two heard before, that with the town being a tourist destination and the storms, their missing person won't easily turn up, in one piece.
"We understand, but his mother's desperate for answers," Theodore tells Dolores how the missing person's mother reportedly cried herself to sleep for days after being told about his son's disappearance.
She wanted closure and that's what they're there for.
"I don't know what to tell you, it'd take an act of god for you to find anything," Dolores showed doubt at the pair's capabilities finding the missing person, by now his body's already torn up into pieces by the myriads of whatever lived out in the ocean.
Noticing the time, Dolores mentioned she needed to return to the vineyard, before remembering to reach back into the basket she carried, bringing the sheriff a bottle of this year's harvest.
"Bribing an official's illegal, Dolores," Sheriff Lucas wagged his finger at her, her chuckling at this before shrugging her bare shoulders.
Smiling, Dolores says, "Your wife's orders, sheriff."
She's just the delivery woman, nothing more.
Sighing, Sheriff Lucas shook his head as he held the bottle, before placing it in his desk, for later.
"Oh! Are you staying long?" Dolores blinked as she looked towards Theodore and Lila, delighted when she heard they're staying for a few days depending on their investigation.
She then asked if they're wine drinkers, with Lila pointing to Theodore, describing him as the sort that partakes in wine.
Lila preferred beer.
"Oh well, you should come out to the vineyard sometime, we have vintage and recent bottles on sale. I shouldn't say anything, but, with it no longer tourist season, we sell them for less," Dolores tells the pair how the vineyard often sold its wine to tourists for a higher price, but reduces it when the season's over, a trick of the trade.
Reaching into her basket yet again, Dolores handed Theodore a business card with the vineyard's information on it.
Declan Family Winery & Vineyard on Maple Road
"Do come by sometime before you leave, we just had some new bottles made!" Dolores waved them goodbye as she left the sheriff's department.
Holding the card in his hand, Theodore looked it over, he heard Sheriff Lucian mention that the wine's a bulk of the island's income.
Lot of drinkers, around these parts, it seems.
He joked how they should open a brewery and charge a premium, but offer discounts to get tourists to stop dirtying up the beaches.
"Don't let her fool you, their wine will drop your arse the moment you stand up too quick," Sheriff Lucian then warned Theodore to drink the wine from the winery with caution.
It goes down smooth, acts playful, but should Theodore attempt to stand after drinking a bottle, he's about to fall flat.
Ask how the sheriff knows this.
"We'll take your word for it," Theodore nodded in acknowledgement to the sheriff's warning about the wine.
Though it's pricy for some people, the wine made on the island's worth its weight.
He asked if there's anything more the pair wanted to discuss and Theodore decided that they spent enough time in the sheriff's department, declaring that they'll take their leave, so to leave the sheriff to his lunch in peace.
Walking out of the building with his large hands in his stitched pockets, the card tucked away, a look in his eyes as he's deep in thought, Theodore walked down the concrete steps, with Lila's arm interlocked with his.
"Would explain why they only found beer bottles," Lila brought up how the reports only showed beer bottles found.
If the wine's expensive during tourist season, not many people would want to spend lavishly for a bottle to puke it up soon after it hits them like a wall of bricks.
A treat for when they go home, maybe, a gift, perhaps.
Cue Theodore reaching out, asking Al about sales records with the missing persons, seeing if they'd bought bottles at any point during their stay on the island.
To a resounding surprise, all ten missing persons bought wine at some point during their stay on the island shortly before they disappeared.
Coincidence, yes, but it's rare that all ten missing people bought a bottle.
The one allergic to alcohol, bought it for their mother as a gift, it was still in its box when the police investigated the room, they stayed in.
"Considering that during the season, they're over a thousand pounds a bottle, I'm not surprised they'd keep them bottled, and drink the beer!" Al whistled at the price point of the wine.
With it winning awards and endorsements, the winery's able to charge whatever it wanted, and someone out there with more money than sense will pick up a few bottles during tourist season.
Which, Al warned that off-season prices varied between five-hundred to eight-hundred depending on the year they looked at.
There's vintage pieces that are worth triple the price point, but the winery never sells them.
"Never?" Theodore questioned the reasoning behind the winery refusing to sell certain vintage wines and Al elaborated that they raffle them off during the holidays.
Helps raise money and whatnot.
They're keen keeping them off the shop floor.
Someone who managed to win a bottle said along the lines of, "it's to die for!"
As expected, there's people sitting on their bottles, in hopes of striking it rich, since seldom anyone gets a select vintage from the winery.
Al priced the maximum price for a bottle if someone waited twenty-years and it doesn't go bad in that time, roughly 200k pounds, give or take.
That's if they won a recent vintage.
Looks like there's vintages from all the way to before the Bikini Bottom testing.
Those are looking to be nearly a million pounds, again, assuming they don't go bad within the time they reached that price point.
"I'll never understand that, collecting wine like baseball cards. At least the baseball cards don't risk going rancid or turn into vinegar," Lila disparaged wine collectors getting into a frenzy over collecting vintage bottles of wine.
Everything easily went wrong with wine if it's not stored properly, everywhere from rancid to turning into expensive vinegar, the pieces of the cork breaking apart from age and getting into the wine itself, and people risk their money on this?
"Hm, I'm more align of cigar collecting, myself. More uses out of a cigar than wine, personally," Al commented that he didn't care for wine collecting, either, however cigar collecting's something he prefers.
Laugh all you want, but Gurkha Royal Courtesans are in the millions, worth investing in, as Al smugly smoked his, leading Theodore to point out that he's incapable of enjoying the cigar, just information fed from his scanners telling him what the cigar's composed with and how it smells and tastes when it's lit.
"Give me credit, at least I know the difference between the basic cigar and this one. You know how many people don't know the difference between grape juice and boxed wine?" Al defensively pointed out that some people don't have the refined taste to differentiate between box wine and grape juice, much less the difference between common cigars sold and the refined cigars like Gurkha Royal Courtesans.
His keen sensors would knock the taste out of every judge and connoisseur, believe him!
"I'll take your word on it," Theodore opted not to argue with the TARDIS on his staunch opinions.
Al then pointed out that with his book deals, he wanted to treat himself, and he made it clear that he didn't go for the first thing he saw, he looked for good deals.
"How on earth could you possibly get a discount on expensive cigars?" Theodore cast doubt on Al's ability to get the £813k cigars for less, short of stealing them from some private collector or other.
Al then said with the biggest grin a generated avatar could muster, "Turned out the seller's wife is a huge fan of mine and well, in exchange for early prints, I get a few dozen cigars."
Shocking, Al knows, but the man was desperate to please his wife, and having the first editions of her favorite erotica, aptly signed, helped Al obtain at least six boxes worth of the expensive cigars.
There's still more to come, Al's got him in his palm, the moment the missus asks for another first edition, Al gets another box.
Before anyone calls him an opportunist, the wealthy man giving him the cigars's worth quadrillion pounds by Al's estimate, he can afford the cigars hand over fist.
And.
It wasn't like Al demanded an entire case of them, he only asked for one box of the cigars for each first edition shipped and signed, that sounds fair, don't it?
"Dean Stockwell would be proud!" Lila commented that the genuine article would've found Al's exploits intriguing, if not ingenious.
Sure, Dean Stockwell got free cigars during his time on the show, but they weren't Gurkha Royal Courtesans!
Snickering, Al mused, "You think I could bribe him with them?"
A shrug, Lila responded with, "Don't think he smokes anymore."
Not that Al should suddenly turn up as is on the actor's doorstep, lest he cause a scare of a lifetime, anyhow.
"Worth a shot," Al shrugged.
Can't win them all, but it was worth trying, maybe as an unexpected birthday present?
He gave Theodore the schedule for the winery, telling him that it's not opened today, likely due to the rain last night, a lot of muddy paths out that way, in the forecast, it looks dry tomorrow, so they have a chance reaching the winery and vineyard, provided they take a path that Al outlined.
While they could've hitched a ride out there, Al says that there's a possibility that the locals won't take them out that way, since they're tourists coming during the off-season.
"We'll head out that way tomorrow, then, keep us posted," Theodore tells Al as he felt him disappear from his mind, ending his linked connection with Lila.
Unable to head out to the winery and vineyard today, left the pair in a peculiar situation, where they didn't have anywhere else to venture towards, seeing as some spots on the island remained impassible due to the rains from last night making them muddy.
"Whatcha wanna do?" Lila asks Theodore as they began retracing their steps back into town, following the same path they took getting to the museum and the sheriff's department.
Seeing how they're limited, most shops running an alternate schedule due to it no longer the tourist season, and they're considered tourists in the eyes of the locals, Theodore pondered their choices.
Couldn't swim, the risk of sudden riptides is a concern, and Theodore didn't pack his swimming trunks.
Pondering a great deal, Theodore then said, "Suppose we have a stroll, see where it takes us?"
One of his father's tricks, when in doubt, a simple stroll with the missus helped passed time, and sometimes point them in the right direction.
Arms interlocked, the pair began that, a stroll with the available pathways, getting a sense of scale and understanding of the isolated costal town, the culture that differed compared to mainland.
There's few children mingling outside, no teenagers, no young adults, a common occurrence in towns such as this, as opportunities stagnant, the younger generation depart for the mainland in hopes for better opportunities, few rarely coming back to their childhood home.
Those that remained on the island, either by choice or no means moving across to the mainland, staunch in their ways, would've preferred no tourists at all, but they're forced by the economic depression that'd ensure if there was no tourist money coming in, a rare fluke that a vineyard took on the island.
Even with the fishing industry to keep them afloat during the off-seasons, Theodore doubted it'll survive soon, the fishermen are aging out of their professions, and there's little new blood taking over.
Be it that the younger generation that would've taken over their fathers reign moved on or the stubbornness preventing the new blood from taking control.
The biggest test is how long the vineyard and winery remain on the island, while true they make hands over fist with their products, it'd be foolish if it wasn't aware that the town's on a decline, and business reigns in the end.
When the inevitable happens, the island would further stagnant, rotting from lack of new blood, hardly any money coming in, it'll destitute the remaining citizens, that they'll be pressed to make a difficult choice.
Leave the island and brave the mainland or stay and hope that there's a rebound, that'll never come.
A difficult situation, but not uncommon for places like the island.
Bullheaded citizens who won't see this will suffer the worst and though there's sympathy with them raised on the island since they were children, a difficult prospect abandoning it for better economics, they made their choices.
It's depressing, Theodore knows, but it's the truth, an ugly one at that.
"Farewell, thee Spanish ladies," Lila sighed as she held onto Theodore's arm as he led them around the town, seeing the parts that were left to secretly rot, as the town focused on trying to keep up the allure for the tourists every year.
Everything's propped up, painted over, trying to tease tourists with the allure of life in a costal town, while preventing them from seeing the depression seeping through the sun-bleached planks of wood.
The cost of trudging construction supplies over from the mainland would've eaten well into their meager budgets, the townspeople did what they could to make do with what they had, just in hopes of reaching the end of the darkened tunnel.
"Hey, what's that?" Lila saw something sticking out in one of the sand dunes ahead, where crabs are known to spawn, seeing the signs warning tourists from getting too close, for that reason.
Looking ahead, where Lila's pointing, Theodore's icy blue eyes narrowed, and he sees there's something slightly jutting out of the dunes.
Separating from Lila, Theodore went ahead, his leather loafers sunk in the soft sands as he walked carefully towards the dunes, mindful of his steps, though it wasn't crab spawning season.
Once he reached the dunes, his large hand reached out towards what looked like a piece of dry rotted wood.
A tug, it didn't come out of the dunes.
Another tug, still wouldn't budge.
Curios, Theodore moved sand away from it, there he sees something peering up at him.
A skull.
Looking at what he tugged at, it was the index finger, part of the hand's been eaten away by the crabs and their spawn.