Jackie and Nyusi managed to drag the would-be victim back to their room at the inn. Jackie looked at the pale violet creature and wondered about having sex with him. But then decided against it, since he was only five feet tall. "Why is he purple?'
"He's clearly an Eloise," replied Nyusi.
"A what?"
"The people who are the native residents of the city are the Abelard, the first of the three sentient species on this planet. This man is an Eloise, the second species."
"Oh, they're different colors, like I'm white and you're black."
"Uh no. They're not the same species, and their common ancestor is hundreds of millions years old. The Abelard are actually closer to the third sentient species on the planet."
"And why do you think you're white?" interrupted the Eloise. "You look olivish/orange to me." But then he fainted again.
"Who are the third species?' asked Jackie.
"They're a race of sentient dolphins. But they live in saltwater and so are only rarely seen in Manethysia." Nyusi involuntarily sighed. "Read the guide." But now the Eloise was reviving. "You're human…that's good. The Doctor said humans would be helpful…"
"What's your name?" Nyusi asked. "And who is the Doctor?"
"My name is Phrropox. B-b-but that's n-n-not import-t-ant. The Doctor is."
"The Doctor? There's only one on this planet?" Jackie wondered.
"She's not from this planet. She's a gr-gr-great and won-wonderful person, who travels in time."
"Now hold on," Nyusi interrupted. "My company has heard of someone who calls themself that. There are reports going back fifteen centuries. But not only is there no consensus of what he is or what he looks like, he is very clearly a him."
"I wouldn't know," Phrropox gasped. "What I do know is that's she tr-tr-trapped on this planet. I had friends who knew of her. She managed to contact them, but when we tried to meet her, those creatures came and slaughtered all of them. Th-th-they nearly killed me."
"We should go to the authorities." Jackie suggested.
"No!" Phrropox shrieked. "The Al-Zephani, the Jo-jo-joelamosia, they're helping the k-k-killers." Nyusi recalled the Al-Zephani diving for the ground, and considered that Phrropox was right. But then suddenly an image appeared in the room. It was of a woman. The woman was blond, oddly wore suspenders and a long blue coat and appeared to be in her mid-thirties.
"Watch out!" she shouted. And then the image vanished.
"The Doctor!" gasped Phrropox, who scuttled to a corner and cowered there.
"Jackie, go look outside, and see if anybody's nearby," Nyusi ordered. Jackie got up to do so, cursorily looked around, then came back, not bothering to close the door behind her.
Nyusi clenched his teeth. "Jackie, please close the door. And try to be quiet." Just then Jackie's phone rang. Jackie picked it up and started talking, and as she did so her voice rose to cover the hundred plus light years. "Hey girlfriend! No, this is the most boring vacation ever! I mean I can't shag, I can't do drugs, I can't tan, I can't even go for a swim. And I'm stuck with this roommate, and while he is kind of hot, he is such a killjoy…"
"Jackie! What did I just tell you?" Nyusi hissed.
"I'm not speaking loudly," Jackie answered back, quite incorrectly. "But actually this really interesting thing is happening. You see, now something exciting is happening. Why just an hour ago…"
Nyusi snatched the cell phone and turned it off. "Are you insane?! We're in the middle of some kind of interplanetary plot, and you're chatting about it on your cell phone?!"
But just then the Doctor appeared right in front of them. "Now, I don't know if you can hear me. What's happened to me is very strange and a little difficult to explain."
"We can hear you."
"Now I don't know if you can hear me. What's happened to me is very strange and a little difficult to explain."
"Is she stoned?" Jackie wondered out loud.
"Now, I have to tell you that all of three of you are in terrible danger. The best thing is to wait here until the sun sets. Hold on a minute…"
"What is it?' Nyusi asked.
"Hold on a minute…hold on a minute…hold on a minute…"
"S-s-something's gone wrong!" Phrropox whimpered. "She's tr-tr-trapped!"
"Sets sun the until here to is thing best the. Hold on, that's not right," the Doctor realized.
But then she vanished again.
"OK, that was weird." Jackie said. Just then there was a knock at the door. Phrropox hid himself behind a bed while Nyusi answered. It was the innkeeper. "We are wondering if you have seen any Eloise."
"Eloise?" Nysui feigned ignorance.
"Our first brother-who-is-not-a-brother" (this was the local term for how the Abelard referred to the other two sentient species). "But the Joelamosia believes this Eloise is a dangerous trouble-maker. There was a disturbance in the marketplace earlier this afternoon. The Joelamosia insists that you and the other earthling will be in mortal peril if he is not captured."
"And what does this Eloise look like?"
"Purple, like all Eloise. Not in robes, since they are immune from the radiation. Also, somewhat short. Even shorter than the disgusting and stupid prostitute you share the room with."
"Hey!" Jackie loudly objected.
"Well, we certainly haven't seen anyone like that," and Nyusi quickly closed the door.
"Oh, this is-is-is awful!" Phrropox stuttered. "If only I had some Popcap games!"
"Hi there!" the Doctor appeared for a third time. Jackie reached out to touch her, and the Doctor instantly vanished.
"Now what do we do?"
Suddenly the Doctor appeared again. "Don't touch me!" she commanded crossly.
"But what are you?"
"She's a projection!" Nyusi and Phrropox proclaimed in unison.
"Now can you hear me?" the Doctor asked. "I think I can hear you."
"Yes, we can hear you!" Nyusi replied. "You must be the Doctor."
"Oh good. How did you know that?"
"Phrropox told us," and Nyusi pointed to the shivering Eloise.
"Oh did he? And you two are?"
"My name is Dr. Carlos Nyusi, and this is Jacqueline Hawkins."
"Oh good. I need your help. But the problem is that asking you puts you both in mortal danger."
"Ah," muttered Jackie. "Well, what can we do?" But then she noticed something odd. "She seems to be frozen." She approached the projection of the Doctor, this time far away from it so she wouldn't touch it, and waved her hand in front of it. "Hello, can you see me?"
Suddenly the Doctor jerked spasmodically, then stood up bold upright. "Oh I thought this would happen. That's so inconvenient!"
"What exactly is the problem?" Nyusi asked.
"Oh there's a problem. Well there's a really big problem, there's the even bigger problem that is behind that. And there's the relatively minor problem that is going to be much more important very quickly. Let's start with that."
"What problem is that?"
"It's these projections. They can only last for 163 seconds."
"It hasn't been 163 seconds."
"Or less. Sometimes it's less." And the Doctor vanished.
For the next five minutes, Jackie paced, Nyusi waited impatiently and Phrropox crouched in a corner when he wouldn't be seen. But then the Doctor appeared again.
"All right. Listen very carefully. I'm the Doctor and I have a time machine. But I lost it. There are beings, called Weeping Angels. They look like statues. But they aren't. If you look at them they have to stay still. But if you blink or take your eyes off them, they can move well, in a blink of an eye. Anyway, they can kill you. Or they can take your potential temporal energy…" The Doctor noticed Jackie's eyes starting to glaze, "…well they can zap you into the past, and that's what they did. But instead of just leaving me on this planet, there's this strange anomaly. I'm trapped in a narrow temporal/spatial zone, and can only communicate outside it with my sonic screwdriver. And to make things worse, the Angels were working for someone else, someone really powerful."
"Those thugs who were trying to shoot us!" Jackie realized.
"Those people are working for that someone else too. They somehow know I'm in Manethysia. But they shouldn't have. So that they do is really disturbing. But they haven't quite found me yet."
"But what can we do to help you?" Nyusi asked. But then the Doctor vanished.
"Well, that's not very helpful," Jackie whined. "We just have to sit here and wait for her to come back and tell us what to do. And hope those assassins don't come and kill us."
Nyusi pondered this unhelpful situation sitting on his bed for a couple of moments. Then he sat up bolt upright. "No! There is something we can do!" He dashed over to his desk, and started looking for something.
"What is it?" Jackie wondered. "What can we do?"
"Well it's not so much what we can do. But there is something I can do." But Nyusi could not find what he was looking for on his desk. He looked through his luggage but couldn't find anything either.
"Damn it! I need paper!" Nyusi got ready to leave, dashed back to get some robes in case he needed to leave the inn, then dashed out again.