A/N: Right, it's been ages. I don't have an excuse at all, actually, as this chapter was already written, and has been since before I posted chapter 2. It's a spectacular sort of laziness that prevents you from even posting a chapter that's already been written. Anyway, enjoy!

Chased by a Chimera

"What's your name?"

"Tyler. Tyler Rose Machaon."

He smiled with an odd sense of déjà vu. "Well, Tyler Rose…run for your life!"

She brought his relived memories to a halt as she said "Um, it's blocking the hallway. And that's the only exit to this room. I don't particularly feel like rushing it, so, um, rethink that plan. Also, I'm still more or less immobile. I don't even know how these sheets did this."

"You're cool under pressure…"

"I can scream and freak out if you want. Would that be helpful? No? Then untie me so we can get the hell away!"

He untangled her, then cried "To the window!"

"What? No, no, no, no!"

"It's the window or the hallway. Your choice."

"Oh, god, I am so going to regret this," she said, making her way over to the window and opening it. She inhaled sharply when the cold November wind touched her skin, still wearing only pajamas. She quickly pulled on a pair of slippers as this man, the Doctor, held a little silver stick that made a queer buzzing noise up to the screen of her window, before pushing it out and jumping.

She stuck her legs out of the window, perched on the sill. "Hurry up!" he called. She sighed. She hated heights. "On the count of three…" she muttered. "One, two…three!" She pushed off of the sill, and slid down the slanted roof descending beneath her windows. "This is sort of fun," she thought. Then the roof ended.

Tyler fell off of the end of the slanted roof, screaming loudly, and fell into his arms. "There we go!" he said, swinging her to the ground. Panting, she said "You're completely insane!" He smiled, and said "Yep!" popping the 'p' cheerily.

"Now come on!" he exclaimed, heading off to the left.

"Um, Doctor?"

"Yes, what now?"

"That way's a dead end. Cul-de-sac. You probably want to come this way."

"Oh. Right then! Off we go!"

Right behind them, the…well, it looked sort of familiar, but she wasn't sure what it was, and she didn't want to ask it. Well, anyway. It jumped out of the window, slid down the roof with an ear-splitting roar, and landed on all fours on the ground. It shook its heads and took off after them. She screamed and upped her pace.

The cold pavement stung her feet through her thin, white, knit slippers. The soles were cheap, the slippers were cheap, and as much as she loved them for wandering about indoors, she quickly discovered that such slippers are not the ideal choice for running away from a…that.

Searing, hot light illuminated her world from behind. Suddenly, it clicked.

Fire-breathing. It breathed fire. Lion head, two heads, goat head! No, three heads, she had missed it, that's why she hadn't thought of it. She checked behind her, and yes, a third head, on its tail. Bingo. Snake head. Lion, goat, snake. Poison, poison and fire and…goat. Bad temper, maybe? Smells? Not important. It was there, and, well, trying to kill her.

"Chimera!" she cried.

"Am not!"

"No! It's a chimera! That thing that's chasing us, or had you forgotten?"

"Oh, that happens every day for me. Care to explain?"

"I thought I was the stupid one."

"You can be stupid or you can be dead, now tell me what you know!"

"Three heads!" she was running out of breath at this point, getting tired. "Lion, goat, snake. Lion and goat are on the front, they breathe fire. Snake at the back, on the tail, it's poisonous. Kind of nasty. Potentially named after a volcano or based off of wi-"

"Blimey, you're the expert."

"Bit of a mythology buff, yeah. Greek mostly, that's what it is, ancient Greek."

"Oh, I knew this was related somehow! This is still a major waste of time, though."

"Thanks. I feel loved."

"I do know it now! It's the snake head, I couldn't see it. It's not an ancient Greek mythological monster, it's an alien, called a…well, a Chimera."

"I told you-"

"This way!" he cut her off, dragging her left onto a side street.

They ran for a few more minutes in silence. Tyler huffed; she hadn't had to run very much at all in the past few years. She had the distinct recollection of being better at it than this, but that wasn't going to help her now. She had to concentrate on breathing. The cold was starting to get to her, the initial adrenaline wearing off and being replaced with fatigue. The Doctor seemed to notice her slacking pace, because he asked "How do you kill a chimera?"

"What?"

"You're not going to outrun it, and as much of a waste of time as you are, I'm not letting you get eaten. You're the expert, how do you kill it?"

"Um, two accounts, that I've read; one: from the back of a flying horse, you shove a lead lance down its throat, suffocating it, and two: from the back of a flying horse, you shoot it with a bow and arrows." She was panting heavily.

"Suffocate it, suffocate it! Have you got a pond or something around here?"

"I don't even know where we are!"

"Don't you live here?"

"Never bothered to learn my way around."

"You're being extremely useless again."

"Sorry!"

"Not my fault if you die!"

"This way!" she said suddenly, turning onto a downwards sloping street.

"What, suddenly remembered where you keep your lakes?"

"Yes!" she cried shortly, running onwards.

After a few more turns onto downhill streets, he caught on.

"You don't actually know where you're going, you're just heading downhill to find water."

"Bingo. Now shut up and run, box man."

"It's the Doctor."

"I remember. Shut up and run, box man."

She almost ran right past it; in the dark, the water looked like a hole, but she skidded to a halt. "There! C'mon!"

She grabbed his had again, dragging him around the pond to the other side. Her heart caught in her throat when, just moments later, the beast rounded the curve. It had been so close behind them! If she hadn't found the pond, it probably would have eaten her. Actually, goats don't really eat meat, so…that's not what she needs to be thinking about. Focus. Focusing is good.

It bounded toward them, and she sincerely hoped that it didn't know how to swim. The flaws in this plan that hadn't been evident earlier were suddenly crowding into her mind; so much so, in fact, that she almost missed the colossal splash the creature made as it fell into the water.

"This is a creature of mythology." The Doctor said from behind her. "How would you neutralize it if you were an ancient hero-" he shushed her as she opened her mouth "without access to a lance or arrows."

"Um, I would think, if this were a myth, that...well, I've put out the fire with the water …if I neutralized the poison it would be a nice little lion-goat-snake hybrid?"

"Good! Yes! Got any water-purification tablets?"

"Oh, of course, because when I'm going to bed, I always make sure I have my water-purification tablets in my pockets! No! It's not going to work, anyway, this is real life! Not magic! Not a myth! You can't warp logic like that! It's not how things work! I don't have any water purification tablets, and you don't have a plan!"

"Okay, um, new plan…"

As he talked, he didn't notice her as she slowly kneeled beside the water, and placed the palms of her hands on the surface. In fact, it wasn't until her forehead was only a few inches from the water, as she bent over, that he broke from his frenetic mumblings to ask her "What are you doing?"

She didn't answer, but placed her forehead on the surface of the water, and hummed lightly. "No, tell me, what are you…" he trailed off as he watched a cloud reminiscent of ink rise slowly from the center of the lake, form a sphere just beneath the surface, and glide slowly over to Tyler's hands. She picked it up gently, then shrieked suddenly and dropped it. It burst like a bubble, leaving no trace of whatever it had been.

"What just happened?" she asked, a note of panic in her voice. "What did I just do?"

"I'm not sure, but you appear to have removed the poison from the chimera."

"Oh. That's…good. How did I do that?" she seemed to be a little angry now.

"I don't know. But look over there"

"The sphere thing…bit me…so angry, so…alone. So much hate. A freak." She was staring at her hand, holding it in the other, with tears forming in her eyes.

"Look!"

The chimera was pulling itself out of the water, looking much different than it had before. The hatred was gone from its eyes, it just looked a little sad, and confused as to its wetness. The snake head no longer had the appearance of an asp, but the markings of a garter snake. The lion head opened its mouth, but instead of the powerful roar they had heard before, it meowed. Like a cat. Tyler couldn't help herself, she started to laugh. The excitement and danger so present a moment before were gone, her strange actions were unimportant, she was alive, and there was a Greek monster mewling like a kitten in her neighborhood. Or maybe the next one over.

"Right, then." Said the Doctor. "Let's get you home, and get me to Greece."

"You can't just leave him here! He's helpless now, and they'll kill him if they find him, even if he isn't hurting anyone!"

"I usually just leave."

"That's going to catch up to you one day! You have to clean up the messes you make!"

"I didn't make a mess. I stopped a chimera!"

"It's still making a mess even if you make it to stop the world from exploding. Now call me a neat freak, but I'm cleaning this up! I need a phone."

"I…here." He handed her the silver stick thing.

"This is a phone?"

"No. Find a pay phone, press the button on the screwdriver, and dial. Should connect you."

"I don't have a screwdriver."

"Yes, you do. That's a sonic screwdriver."

"A sonic screwdriver."

"Yep."

"You're an alien from another world with superior technology and you put your money into a sonic screwdriver?"

"Yes. Do you want to make your call or not?"

She turned away in search of a pay phone.

Luckily, she found one on the corner of the street. She did as he instructed, and, on the second attempt, her call went through.

"999, what is the location of your emergency?"

"Um, corner of…Barnard and Rosedale? Listen, this is going to sound crazy, but there's this…thing…and it's okay, it's not hurting people anymore, but someone needs to come pick it up, like animal control or something. I…it chased this man called the Doctor and I for a good long time, and I know I sound like a nutter right now, but if you could just send someone that would be really great. It's…well, I'm already going to be committed to a mental hospital for this, so I'll just describe it while I'm there…it's sopping wet, one lion head, one goat head, tail of a snake, with a snake's head on. Any questions?"

"Torchwood is on its way, miss."

"Oh. Um…thanks." And the call ended.

Tyler wasn't aware that as soon as she had said "the Doctor," a call had been put through to UNIT, who had referred the operator to Torchwood, the on-duty members of which had jumped into their van at extremely high speed, the leader carrying a jar with a…hand in it?

She walked back to the Doctor, slightly dazed. She handed him his screwdriver, and the Doctor said "How long until the loony bin comes for you, then?"

"Is Torchwood the name of a mental hospital?"

"Not that I know of, no."

"Animal control branch?"

"Nope."

"Okay, well, they're coming, whoever they are."

"Fantastic."

A/N: Yay. I don't live in Britain, so if I got the whole calling emergency services thing wrong, that's why; I've never even done it in America. Next chapter coming soon, in which we shall meet Torchwood, talk again for a somewhat less ridiculously long time, and look for a wardrobe.