Chapter 2

Rose and the Doctor had tied up the mysterious figure and were now carrying him to the TARDIS. They laid him in front of the time machine as the Doctor took the key out of his pocket. However, Rose noticed that the doors were slightly ajar, and pushed one open. He froze and stared at the doors.

"Rose," he said quietly. "Did you leave the TARDIS unlocked?"

She shook her head slowly. They exchanged a worried look and he gently pushed the second door open, peering inside. He quickly sonic'ed the room and declared that there were no life forms detected. Rose sighed relief and helped the Doctor carry the man inside.

"Why was the TARDIS open?" she asked slowly.

The Doctor ran his hands through his hair and let out a long breath. "Rose, did you notice.. that all the lights in here are off?"

She gasped as she looked up and realized this was true. "What's going on? What's wrong with the TARDIS?"

"She's dead. Stone cold." He patted one of the levers on the controls. "Right now, this wooden box is just that: a wooden box."

"How can that be?" Rose exclaimed. "That would need really powerful alien technology, right? And you can't find any aliens?"

The Doctor sonic'ed in a full 180 degrees to confirm this, shaking his head. "Just humans and a Time Lord for miles around." He frowned. "There aren't even any dogs, I always thought there were lots of dogs in Paris. Lots of poodles."

"Doctor!" Rose sighed, amused.

"Right, sorry." He scratched his head. "Anyways, the only species other than the Time Lords that would be able to completely disarm a TARDIS would be the Daleks, and..." He paused. "Yeah, I think that's it."

She gritted her teeth. "So, are we on the lookout for Daleks then?"

The Doctor closed his eyes. "I hope not. That's all we'd need, with this crazy maniac at our hands."

He turned and stared at the man who was squirming on the TARDIS floor. Giving him their full attention, Rose knelt down beside him as the Doctor began to do a full-body scan with his screwdriver.

'Who is he?' Rose thought. 'Why did he attack us? We didn't do anything to him...' She wondered what could possibly have been running through his mind when he tried to kill the Doctor. She shook her head, not believing that anyone could hurt for no reason. All through her adventures with the Doctor, they had been frequently kidnapped and attacked, but there was always a reason. Greed, revenge, hatred, these were all horrible motives, but they were motives nonetheless, they were reasons. It was one of the things that got her through the day, through the adventures, through all the times she thought she'd die or that the Doctor would die - it was that everything happened for a reason.

What was his reason?

The Doctor finished his scan and held up his screwdriver to read. "Heavy injury to the face, rest of him is fine." He looked down at the man and knelt beside the man. "Can you tell me your name?"

The man was silent. Finally, he muttered, "Je ne parle pas français."

Rose frowned. "The TARDIS isn't translating." She paused. "Because it's not working."

"Right," the Doctor said solemnly. He pulled a small device out of his pocket that looked like a cordless earbud. He handed it out to her. "Here, put it on." She did. "They'll translate for the time being. Might not work 100%, but it's better than nothing."

"I learned a little French too, when I was in high school," she said. "And you speak it fluently, right?" He nodded, and they turned their attention back to the strange man.

"Why did you attack us?" he questioned, this time switching to French. No response.

"Can you tell me your name?" he repeated.

The answer that was given made the Doctor's blood run cold and his two hearts skip a beat.

"My name," he whispered in a raspy voice, "..is Erik."