In the small geriatric ward, Sally Sparrow stood across from former DI Billy Shipton as he coughed weakly before he continued his message.
"There's a man in 1969. He sent me with a message for you."
"What man?" She asked, puzzled.
"The Doctor." Billy explained as though it were obvious. Sally paused momentarily as she remembered the strange message at the old mansion, signed by the same weird title and from the same time Billy had mentioned.
"And what was the message?" She asked carefully.
Billy shrugged. "Just this: Look at the list."
"What does that mean?" Sally questioned, somewhat disappointed and perplexed. "Is that it? Look at the list?"
"Angel said you'd have it by now." Billy explained, peering at Sally expectantly. "A list of seventeen DVDs."
Sally's eyes widened and she hurriedly searched in her pocket for the list. The list of seventeen DVDs that Larry Nightingale had put together with the same strange Easter Egg inside them. The same strange message… from a man called the Doctor.
London, 1969
Terry sat back in her chair, sipping a cup of tea as she watched the camera screen where the Doctor was adjusting his glasses. She smiled dreamily.
"What are you looking at?" Martha asked, peering over Terry's shoulder.
"Oh, just the Doctor…" Terry trailed off as she watched the Doctor push his glasses up his nose.
Martha looked from the Time Lady to the Time Lord, and then wrinkled her nose.
"Okay…"
The companion left the Time Lady, who quickly pulled herself together as Billy joined her and peered at the camera for a final check.
"And…" Billy adjusted the angle slightly and then gave the Doctor a thumbs up, "action."
The Doctor peered at the autocue Terry had set up and he began to read while Terry followed along, reading the script that Larry Nightingale had scribbled on with Sally's one-sided conversation with the Doctor.
"Yup. That's me." The Doctor announced.
He paused, before he added, "Yes, I do."
He paused again.
"Yup. And this."
He paused and then inquired, "Are you going to read out the whole thing?"
He paused before he launched into his introduction: "I'm a time traveller. Or I was. I'm stuck in 1969."
On cue, Martha popped her head in next to the Doctor. "We're stuck. All of space and time, he promised me. Now I've got a job in a shop - I've got to support him and his girlfriend!"
"Martha." The Doctor chided as he gestured at the camera.
"Sorry." Martha muttered, glancing at the camera again before she moved out of the screen so that the Doctor could speak alone. Terry gave her friend a thumbs up for her performance before she read Larry's scribbles as they started documenting in detail Sally's responses to the Doctor.
'I've seen this bit before.'
"Quite possibly." The Doctor said into the camera, right on time.
'1969, that's where you're talking from?'
"Afraid so." The Doctor nodded.
'But you're replying to me. You can't know exactly what I'm going to say, forty years before I say it.'
"Thirty eight." The Doctor replied.
Thirty-eight years into the future, Sally questioned, 'How? How is this possible? Tell me.'
"People don't understand time. It's not what you think it is." The Doctor evaded answering immediately.
'Then what is it?'
"Complicated." The Doctor replied shortly.
'Tell me.'
"Very complicated." The Doctor answered, and Terry's lips quirked up slightly as, in her head, she heard the indignation in Sally's voice when she responded.
'I'm clever and I'm listening. And don't patronise me because people have died, and I'm not happy. Tell me.'
The Doctor paused to pull a face, before he launched into an explanation (or an attempt at one) while waving his hands around to try and demonstrate his words as he said, "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly… timey-wimey… stuff."
His voice trailed off toward the end and Terry had to grin. It was interesting, seeing how despite the fact that the entire thing was scripted, it felt very organic because it was exactly like how the Doctor would speak. Part of the confusing thing about time travel.
Looking down, Terry read Sally's next words: 'Yeah, I've seen this bit before. You said that sentence got away from you.'
"It got away from me, yeah." The Doctor spoke aloud thoughtfully.
'Next thing you're going to say is, well I can hear you.'
"Well, I can hear you." The Doctor answered as he looked toward the camera again.
'This isn't possible.'
"Well," the Doctor corrected himself. "Not hear you, exactly, but I know everything you're going to say."
'How can you know what I'm going to say?'
The Doctor cocked his head. "Look to your left."
Terry smiled slightly as, in her mind's eye, she saw Larry's enthusiasm about his various theories for what the Doctor meant when he said "Look to your left", only for Sally to smash all of them as she said in exasperation-
'He means you. What are you doing?'
"I've got a copy of the finished transcript. It's on my autocue." The Doctor gestured with his hand to indicate the screen he was reading off of. For the most part.
'How can you have a copy of the finished transcript? It's still being written.'
"I told you. I'm a time traveller. I got it in the future." The Doctor shrugged like it was normal.
'Okay, let me get my head round this. You're reading aloud from a transcript of a conversation you're still having.'
"Yeah." The Doctor nodded. "Wibbly wobbly, timey-wimey."
'Never mind that.' Terry could almost see Sally sigh. The Doctor seemed to as well because he turned much more serious as he continued.
"What matters is, we can communicate. We have got big problems now. They have taken the blue box, haven't they? The angels have the phone box."
'What do you mean, angels? You mean those statue things?' It was obvious from the woman's words, even if Terry hadn't already known everything that would happen, that Sally had the angels in her sights again.
"Creatures from another world." The Doctor replied in a dark tone.
'But they're just statues.'
"Only when you see them." The Doctor answered.
'What does that mean?'
At Sally's question on his autocue, the Doctor launched into his explanation.
"The lonely assassins, they used to be called. No one quite knows where they came from, but they're as old as the universe, or very nearly, and they have survived this long because they have the most perfect defence system ever evolved. They are quantum-locked."
Before Sally could even ask, the Doctor was adding for her benefit, "They don't exist when they're being observed. The moment they are seen by any other living creature, they freeze into rock. No choice. It's a fact of their biology. In the sight of any living thing, they literally turn to stone. And you can't kill a stone. Of course, a stone can't kill you either. But then you turn your head away… then you blink… and oh yes it can."
Terry's lips set into a grim line and for a moment, she wasn't in 1969 anymore. She was in the Byzantium, watching the Eleventh Doctor as he spoke slowly into his walkie-talkie.
"But tell me, Bob, how did you escape?" The Doctor asked.
"I didn't escape, sir." Came the chilling reply. "The Angel killed me, too."
Shaking her head, Terry returned to the present as the Doctor continued earnestly to the camera where Sally Sparrow would see him in thirty-eight years, "That's why they cover their eyes. They're not weeping. They can't risk looking at each other. Their greatest asset is their greatest curse. They can never be seen. The loneliest creatures in the universe. And I'm sorry."
He stopped suddenly to apologise grimly.
"I am very, very sorry. It's up to you now."
He paused, letting the message sink in, before he continued.
"The blue box, it's my time machine. There is a world of time energy in there they could feast on forever, but the damage they could do could switch off the sun. You have got to send it back to me."
The Doctor paused again before he frowned deeply.
"And that's it, I'm afraid. There's no more from you on the transcript, that's the last I've got."
He removed his glasses with a flourish before he continued in earnest, "I don't know what stopped you talking, but I can guess. They're coming. The angels are coming for you. But listen, your life could depend on this."
He lifted his hand to emphasize his point.
"Don't blink. Don't even blink. Blink and you're dead. They are fast. Faster than you can believe. Don't turn your back, don't look away, and don't blink."
The Doctor lowered his hand and he was one hundred percent sincere in his next words as he finished his message for Sally Sparrow.
"Good luck."
With those ominous words, Terry clicked the camera off and the room fell into silence. Terry leant back in her chair and closed her eyes as she remembered a similar time she had heard those exact words associated with the Angels.
The Doctor stepped back from Amy, who continued to keep her eyes tightly closed, and he called to the wider group, "Good luck, everyone. Behave. Do not let that girl open her eyes."
He gestured at Amy. "And keep watching the forest. Stop those Angels advancing. Amy, later."
As the memory played in her mind, Terry frowned. She remembered seeing Amy sit still as a stone, her hands clenched tight as she fought her terror while her friends left her. She remembered the Doctor looking back to make sure Terry was following him. She remembered trailing behind him as they ran after River and Father Octavian… but then, she also remembered something else. Something she had forgotten.
She had been in a hurry to get away. Despite not wanting to leave Amy behind, Terry had run as quickly as she could to get away from the small clearing they were leaving Amy in. Because she'd had a feeling she needed to run before she could see the future Doctor - the one who had been trapped in the exploding Tardis.
At the time, Terry hadn't thought much about it. She'd just assumed she was afraid of altering the Doctor's future by being there at a vital moment in his timeline. She hadn't even thought about the queasy feeling in her stomach that said her fear went beyond something so simple; that said something deep inside of her had been afraid of meeting the future Doctor. She'd dismissed the thought back then as absurd. But now?
Remembering how she'd suddenly lost all her memories of the events of the Pandorica and the Big Bang at the time of the adventure, due to a certain someone (the same someone the future Doctor had been trying to kill when he flew the Tardis into the Big Bang), Terry scowled.
'Daemon, you really are a right b-'
"So, that's the message you want me to give to her?" Billy checked as he tucked away the camera carefully. He then moved around the counter to say goodbye to the trio gathered by the doorway, just as the Doctor shook his head.
"No, that's the message you'll hide for me in the seventeen DVDs on the list." The Doctor explained. "The message I want you to give her is this: Look at the list."
Both Martha and Billy frowned in confusion, so Terry elaborated, "Someone in the future will have put together a list of the seventeen DVDs where you'll hide the Doctor's filmed message. By the time you give her the Doctor's message, she'll have just gotten that list."
"How do you know that?" Billy wondered. The Doctor shook his head again.
"We can't tell you. Timey-wimey stuff." He waved his hand.
Billy nodded slowly before he thought of another question. "What about the DVDs? Will she understand why those seventeen DVDs?"
Terry shook her head while the Doctor answered vaguely, "She'll figure it out eventually."
Billy eyed the pair thoughtfully and then he stated, "But you can't tell me."
"No." The Doctor agreed, growing quite sombre. "And I'm sorry, Billy… but you'll never know."
Billy looked puzzled but at the Doctor's slight shake of his head, the former DI didn't press any further. Instead, he asked, "And when should I call her to give her your message?"
Billy saw some emotion flit quickly across Terry's face before the Time Lady looked away while the Doctor answered quietly, "You'll call her ten minutes after she left you in 2007."
Billy opened his mouth to say something, but the Doctor went on without letting him speak.
"You'll call her the day you will die. Before the rain stops…"
Billy froze, mouth still open. Martha gazed at the man sympathetically while Terry looked back over, her gaze sadder and older than it had been, as Billy tried to absorb the shock and pain of the Doctor's words.
"I'm sorry." The Doctor repeated. After a long moment, Billy shook his head.
"No, don't be, Doctor." The man answered bravely. He took a fortifying breath before he looked back between the Time Lords. "And I will not be able to see her before that?"
"It would tear a hole in the fabric of space and time, and destroy two thirds of the universe." The Doctor answered.
Billy bowed his head, struggling to accept his future, before he looked up as Terry spoke next.
"I know that nothing we say right now will be that comforting. But please take this word of advice from someone who has your best interests at heart: it's better to let go of what might have been. Instead, live here and now, in your new present. You may be surprised what life might bring."
The man stared at her for a long moment before he finally nodded.
"Thank you." He whispered. Terry nodded and she fell back while the Doctor shook Billy's hand.
"Good luck, Billy Shipton." The Doctor said warmly.
The three made to leave when Billy called after them, "Who are you, really, Doctor? You and your lady and your friend?"
The trio paused and looked at each other before they looked back at Billy.
"We're just that - the Doctor and my angel and companion." The Doctor answered simply.
With that, the three friends left, hurrying out into the busy street. Billy watched them disappear into the crowd, melding into the darkness as night crept in over the city. Somehow, as he watched the tall, tousled brown head disappear from his view, Billy knew that this was the last time he would see the strange threesome. And yet, despite the fact that his heart panged a little bit as the knowledge that he was truly alone in this new life sank in, Billy smiled. He might be alone for now and he might only have thirty eight years left to live… but he had thirty eight years to live. And besides, at least he knew he was going to see Sally Sparrow one last time before the end.
With that thought, Billy squared his shoulders. Turning around, he began his work. There was a lot to do, after all.
Meanwhile, Terry stopped in the shadows to turn and look back one last time at the brave man who would ultimately be the key player in saving them from the Angels' trap. But more importantly, he would live a full life. A good life, surrounded by good people. Right up to the end.
Closing her eyes, Terry saw the moment, thirty eight years into the future.
"He said you'd understand it one day, but that I never would." Billy informed Sally sadly as he nodded at the list of DVDs that Sally held.
Sally smiled and she answered reassuringly, "Soon as I understand it, I'll come and tell you."
"No, gorgeous girl," Billy replied softly. "You can't."
Sally stared at Billy, not understanding.
"There's only tonight. He told me all those years ago that we'll only meet again this one time. On the night I die."
Full realisation dawned and Sally whispered, "Oh, Billy."
Billy shrugged. "It's kept me going. I'm an old, sick man. But I've had something to look forward to."
He smiled widely for Sally, who looked on the brink of tears. Wanting to rid that expression from her pretty face, Billy took Sally's hand in his and he sighed, "Ah, life is long, and you are hot."
Sally laughed, as Billy had hoped. He smiled with her before he looked down at her soft hands between his.
"Oh, look at my hands." Billy sighed. "They're old man's hands. How did that happen?"
Sally stared down at the hands holding hers for a moment before she looked back up at Billy.
"I'll stay." She promised, sniffling a little bit as she kept the tears that threatened to return at bay for the sake of the man lying before her. "I'm going to stay with you, okay?"
Billy smiled sadly. "Thank you, Sally Sparrow."
Sally smiled too, although the action caused one single tear to escape despite her best efforts. Billy squeezed her hand before his eyes moved to the window where the rain that had first brought them together continued to patter softly against the glass.
"I have till the rain stops." He murmured. Sally turned to watch the rain with him. No further words were exchanged between the almost-couple but not once, even as his strength gradually left him, did Sally let go of Billy's hand.
"So, what was with the DVDs?" Martha asked as they got back to their little flat (although it was really more of a box with a toilet). "What was so special about the seventeen on the list?"
"They were all the DVDs Sally Sparrow owned." Terry explained as she settled on the corner of their single bed.
"She only has seventeen DVDs?" Martha asked. Terry raised a brow.
"That's what you ask?" She teased her friend. Martha shrugged as she settled on the opposite corner from Terry.
"I mean, she does later work in a DVD store, so I'd expect her to have more." Sitting back against the wall, Martha tapped the folder Terry had placed down on the bed in front of her.
"You know, it's a good thing she had all this readied to give to us. And that her boyfriend thought to make a transcript. At least we have a fighting chance now."
"Oh, ye of little faith." The Doctor said as he sat down next to Terry. "You don't think this plan will work?"
"I have faith in Terry, less in you after you lost the Tardis." Martha replied severely, but Terry saw the way her friend's mouth twitched with humour.
Martha settled back a little more comfortably before she asked, "So, now we just wait?"
"Afraid so." The Doctor answered while Terry nodded. "After she meets Billy again at the hospital, she should find Larry Nightingale."
"Together, they'll find the mansion with the Angels, he fills in the script, the Angels find them, he is no longer able to fill in in the script, the Angels chase them, they outrun the Angels and send the Tardis to us." Terry finished.
Martha nodded along before she frowned.
"But how's she going to do that if she can't get into the Tardis?" She asked. "The Angels have the key… oh, wait." Martha answered her own question with a nod. "She must have taken the key when she first saw the Angels, right? That's why they've been following her around?"
"Exactly." Terry nodded. Martha leant on her knee thoughtfully.
"And we're certain the Tardis will come to get us?" She asked.
"Well, Sally's notes indicate the Tardis left them behind after security protocol seven one two was activated." The Doctor answered, indicating Sally's folder of documents.
"And what is protocol seven one two?" Martha asked
"The Tardis detects a control disc - which is a DVD with the Doctor's message inside - which then sends the Tardis back to find the Doctor." Terry explained.
"Okay… And it works?" Martha questioned.
Terry just smiled as, right on cue, they heard a wheezing sound and the Tardis began to materialize around them.
"I think that means a yes." The Doctor chuckled while Martha laughed delightedly as the trio found themselves standing in the Tardis once more. Ready to head off on the next adventure.