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To Marion's pleasant surprise. The Powers That Be actually let her enjoy the Kew Gardens before yanking her away. She got to get a few nice sketches while Peri told her about the different flowers and trees that they came across.
And, if some of those sketches featured a faceless figure that somewhat resembled Peri well, there wasn't anything wrong with that. It fit well enough into the image. And the drawing of the flowering Rhododendron shrub that Peri was using as a jumping-off point to tell her something interesting about the Ericaceae family just didn't look right without her in it. Plus, she needed the drawing practice
Naturally, of course, the moment she got back into the TARDIS, Bitch Force seemingly decided that she'd had enough of a break. She got in a single step and then she felt something just above her ankle and she started free falling towards the ground.
Marion felt disoriented for a moment. She hadn't slammed into anything. It was like she had shifted 90 degrees and that she had gone from standing up straight, to lying down on the floor but she was still standing.
She closed her eyes and leaned against the TARDIS wall. It hummed in circular grounding motions against her back. Marion breathed in and breathed out. As soon as she felt steady enough that she wasn't going to trip over her own feet, she reached into her bag and took out one of her food bars.
Finishing that off helped with her spinny vision somewhat. So she was now ready to figure out when she was.
The first thing she noticed was that the hallway she was in wasn't bright. It wasn't too dark to see. But it was pretty dim. That narrowed things down significantly.
The second thing she noticed was that her wondering where she was was fairly stupid because she recognized the hallway. She hadn't been focused enough to really note the hallway, before, but there was only one TARDIS where it fit.
The walls were dark and patterned like honeycombs and lit with a soft, bold, blue from a source she had trouble properly identifying. The floor was the same color, and glowing orange pillars looked like, but probably weren't rock salt pushed from under the floor, curled up to the ceiling, and pierced through.
This had to be Thirteen's TARDIS. No one else shared this aesthetic. It looked less like the inside of a somewhat sentient spaceship and more like the inside of a crystal cave.
The TARDIS hummed thoughtfully under her fingertips.
"I'm alright," Marion assured. "Just thinking."
The TARDIS sent humming energy forward and backward and forward and backward.
"You want me to follow you?"
The TARDIS pulsed twice.
"Thanks,"
Marion followed after the pulse until she could hear voices and ran through the rest of the way.
Marion got a good look around the room. The Doctor was dressed the same way she always was. In her jacket and burgundy shirt, But Ryan, Graham, and Yaz were dressed in a more turn of the 20th century style.
Marion looked down at what she was wearing.
It was fine. She had fixed her hair a little bit before she'd visited the gardens and despite having run through the woods and having briefly been bark, her clothing was in decent condition. It didn't exactly fit in well with the whole 20th-century look, but Marion didn't really care. It wasn't stylish, but it probably wouldn't seem too out of fashion.
There was a good two hundred and fifty or so year period where skirts, button-ups, shirts, and waistcoats were a pretty solid outfit combination if you wanted to blend in.
Of course, as the Doctor proved, if you didn't care one way or the other if you blended in you could wear anything at any time in any time period unless you really felt like putting in the time and effort to do something else. Most of the time, the most that would happen is that people would call out what you were wearing as odd and that would be the end of that. Thirteen's outfit was contemporary and discreet compared to Six's coat.
"Doctor," said Yaz, "Marion's gone."
"She'll be back any moment." Marion could hear Thirteen's voice clearly in the room. "She rarely misses out on things like this. Unless she's sleeping." a pause, "Oh. You know, she might be in her room asleep. Oh. I'd hate to wake her up. She gets cranky if she doesn't get her sleep." another pause. "But she also gets cranky if I go off without her and end up getting into trouble. She's cranky a lot sometimes, that one."
"Doctor…"
"Suppose we could just pop in and out. If we're quick, she'd never notice. If she is asleep I mean."
"Doctor?"
"It's just be some sightseeing. And you can get a lot of sightseeing done in seven hours. You'd be surprised."
"Doc, she's right over there," said Graham.
"What? Oh! Marion! There you are!" The Doctor walked towards her.
The Doctor looked her over. If she had been any other version of the Doctor, Marion had a feeling that her hands would be on Marion's shoulder but Thirteen wasn't as tactile as the others. She still stood close and stared her in the eyes.
"Your eyes are the same color." The Doctor remarked. "Unless you're wearing contacts."
Marion knew that tone of voice Thirteen was realizing that she was young. Marion wondered the Doctor noticed her doing the same when she took note of the Doctor's appearance and who she was travelling with.
"No, they're the same color. I haven't got shot in the face yet."
"How do you know you'll get shot in the face?" Ryan asked.
Marion shrugged, "I just assumed. Don't know how else my eye could change color like that. Suppose I could've gotten stabbed."
"Never mind that," The Doctor said, "Forget I said anything. Where were you?"
"Killingsworth. With you and Peri and the Rani and- the. And George Stevenson."
Marion was going to add "The Master" but it occurred to her that the Doctor MIGHT not want to hear about any mention of the Master…
Had Marion warned the Doctor about Oh? She hoped that she had.
Or maybe this was before Oh and she had the chance now? But then again, who knows what the Master would do with his cover blown. Or (and Marion knew that thinking this would requite uncharacteristic amounts of optimism) considering the fact that apparently the Ainley!Master hadn't existed, she could intervene enough where the Master was concerned for him to, well she didn't think that she could fix him into being a "good person" but maybe a less bad one?
Yaz stared at Marion. "You met George Stevenson?"
Marion shook her hand in a so-so motion. "A bit. Didn't have a lot of time to stop and chat. There was this whole business with mad scientists and sleep experiments and turning people into trees."
"Into trees?"
"Yeah. I mean, I was the only one who got turned into a tree."
"You got turned into a tree?"
"I got better." Marion clapped her hands, "So, I can see you aren't dressed the way you normally are. Except for you Doctor. Where are we? When are we? Early 20th century."
"Yes!" The Doctor replied, "New York!" she looked down at the console. "Or at the very least, fairly close to New York. We might be in South Toronto. Suppose I could try again. But we're close enough that it might not be worth it. We might end up farther than where we started. I just need to…" the Doctor trailed off. "Hold on. That's interesting."
The Doctor moved around the TARDIS, tapping different things, and pressing different buttons, half of the time it didn't even look like she was actually hitting something on the TARDIS that was meant to be hit and was, instead, knocking her knuckles against the side of the time rotor.
"Marion, do you mind checking the ambient energy reading?"
Marion stared down at the console.
"Do you know how to do that?"
"No. Sorry."
"Alright. That's fine. You had to learn at some point. It's not too complicated. It's even color-coded. There's a panel, the TARDIS'll show you where it is. I want you to slide it aside. It's 1900s, roughly around…Niagara Falls. It should be light blue."
Marion followed the Doctor's instructions. She closed her eyes, until she felt something that felt warm. And slid it aside. Behind the panel was slowly moving and shifting liquid or at the very least, something liquid like. It wasn't blue.
"It's like a pale green,"
"Does it at least have a blue tint?"
Marion squinted at the shifting stuff.
"Maybe a little bit? It's very pale green. Sort of minty. It's like, 50's green."
"Is that bad?" Asked Graham.
"Too early to know." the Doctor said quickly, "Could be nothing. Plenty of people like to do sightseeing. Especially this time period. Especially this part of Earth. It is New York after all. But, it couldn't hurt to check it out. We can do some sightseeing along the way." The Doctor took her sonic screwdriver out of her pocket and spun it. "Just need to make sure it's not something meddling where it shouldn't be. This is the turn of the century after all. Best make sure it's nothing."
It wasn't nothing.
Marion knew that it wouldn't be nothing. But she had sort of hoped that she would be wrong. That she could see Niagra falls in person without having to run, without anything weird.
But no…the Bitch force had clearly decided that since she had been allowed to enjoy the Kew Gardens and before that, have a nap, she was more than free to go on yet another adventure.
The moment they had gotten out of the TARDIS. The Doctor had walked around normally, taken out her sonic screwdriver. Soniced the air. Looked down at her screwdriver. Paused, checked it again, and then her nose scrunched up before she spun on her heels to stare at their group.
"Change of plans, we can sightsee later."
"Doctor!"
The Doctor reached into her bag and tossed something at Graham.
"Marion and I will be right back, we just need to check into something. Shouldn't take more than a moment. Or two moments. Or three. It might take several moments. In the meantime, do us a favor, and see if you can find a night train heading to New York. It might be a better idea to take a train there than the TARDIS."
And with that, the Doctor took off.
Marion met the Doctor stride for stride and the two of them only stopped just long enough for them to reach a nearby building, a generator. The Doctor scanned around the air for a bit.
"It's moving," the Doctor said.
She scanned around a bit more.
"This way."
The Doctor reached into her coat and retrieved a headlamp. She activated it. And continued to charge forward until she came to a large metal door.
She could hear loud thumping on the other side of the door, and hushed whispers. The Doctor soniced the lock, but the door was jammed. Marion kicked it open. It slammed against the wall with a bang.
Two people were crouched behind crates and they stared up at the two of them in confusion. One of them was Nikola Tesla.
"Hello! Marion Henson. That's the Doctor. Nice to meet you."
Marion felt a flare of worry. She grabbed the Doctor by the arm and tugged her sharply to the side.
"Mind if we join you?" Marion smiled brightly at Tesla and the woman she was with. Her name was important like all names were important. But Marion couldn't remember it. She didn't wait for an answer before she tugged the Doctor after her and shoved them both behind the pile of boxes. The Thirteen was a lot easier to drag along with her than Four had been. That was probably on account of her being about 9 inches shorter.
Marion imagined that that took a bit of getting used to. Going from short to tall and back again. It was a wonder she hadn't slammed into doorways or misjudged whether or not something was in her reach or tripped over her own feet.
Maybe that was part of the regeneration process. Getting your brain to understand what your new body could do.
There was a burn mark on the wall near where the Doctor's head had just been.
"Don't suppose you've seen anything strange recently." The Doctor said conversationally.
Marion heard the sound of loud footsteps. Then she heard the sound of laserfire and saw a flash of green and then there was the dull thud of a body hitting the ground.
"Other than that, I mean," Marion remarked. She held on tightly to the Doctor's hand. She could feel her heart beating loudly in her chest.
The woman looked down at the body.
"It's Mister Brady!"
"Why would a potential investor be shooting at us?"
"More urgently, who shot him?"
Another shot fired and just missed her shoulder.
"Let's not find out!" Marion said quickly. "Back the way we came. C'mon." Marion pushed on the Doctor and the woman's backs. "Come on!"
"Why should we follow you?"
"Because, hopefully, we've got a way out of here. Let's go."
The eight of them regrouped in the boxcar of a night train heading for New York.
Traveling across the Canada-United States border on a train without any real documentation was a hell of a lot easier now than it was in her time.
Marion didn't voice that thought.
"Here we go," the Doctor gestured around the car, "Perfect getaway vehicle! Full speed, straight to New York. What did I say? Night train, right on schedule." Their group was out of breath from running to catch it the rest of the way except for Marion.
"Did you find out what was causing this energy thing, then?" Ryan asked.
"No," replied the Doctor, "but we found these two."
Graham doffed his bowler hat. "Welcome aboard the Orient Express. We travel in style."
"This is Graham, Yaz, and Ryan." The Doctor introduced, "We were going to do the sights when I picked up a funny energy reading. Thought I'd check it out. Ran into a tiny bit of trouble at the plant. Nothing to worry about. We've lost them. So, here we are. I'm the Doctor, by the way, this is Marion. Why don't you tell me who you are and who's shooting at you?"
"Dorothy. Dorothy Skerritt." the woman introduced.
Dorothy. Marion would do her best not to forget that.
"I am Nikola Tesla, and I assure you I have no idea."
"Tesla! I knew you looked familiar." The Doctor turned around to smile at the fam. "It's only Nikola Tesla!" she looked at Marion and whispered loudly., "You didn't tell me that I was going to meet Tesla!"
"Who?" Yaz asked.
"Nicholas something," Ryan replied.
"Ryan, that's genuinely disappointing."
Then again, Marion hadn't known half of the industrialists that Six had been so excited to meet so maybe she wasn't one to talk.
"Total genius!" the Doctor enthused. "I always wanted to meet you. Shame you're a big fat liar."
Marion was suddenly hit by a wave of nausea. It felt physical. Like something hitting her in the head. Tesla was surely about to say something more, but Marion cut him off
"Doctor, something's wrong!"
"Marion? What-"
The train suddenly stopped. The train car lurched to the side like something had slammed up against it. The door in the back of their car swung open.
Marion shoved herself forward and moved to push the rest of them behind her and back.
"Go," Marion said. No one moved for a moment. "Didn't you hear me Go-go-go-go-go. Now," Marion opened the door and gestured forward frantically.
Arriving here had given Marion a crash course in remaining coordinated despite an awful case of vertigo. Marion felt heat and shoved her head to the side just as a beam of green light flew by her face.
Marion shut the door behind them. The Doctor used her sonic screwdriver on the door and sealed it shut. Marion pressed her back against the door and her eyes flickered around the room, looking for something large and bulky to slam into place.
She couldn't find anything that wasn't bolted down.
"Keep going!" Marion shouted.
Opened the back of the train car. There was a short gap in between their car and the next car. Yaz jumped it easily.
Ryan stood in the doorway and shook his head.
"No way!"
"Go on, Ryan." encouraged Graham.
"You've got this!" Yaz called.
Ryan jumped across the gap. Yaz caught him.
The thing on the other side of the building banged loudly against her back. She wondered why he didn't try shooting through the door. Maybe the gun couldn't shoot through wood. Or, if Marion was remembering right, they wanted Tesla alive, and wouldn't risk shooting blindly and killing him by accident.
"Now!"
Graham jumped across next then Dorothy.
Marion felt more loud and strong bangs against her back and then they stopped altogether.
Marion leaned back against the door, not hearing a single thump. Marion frowned.
"It's quiet," Tesla remarked.
Marion stepped away from the door and looked up, her head's movement making her vision momentarily sway.
"It'll be coming from the roof next."
"How do you-"
The boxcar's inhabitants heard the sound of loud creaking coming from the ceiling, and a few particles of dust fell to the ground. The hooded figure jumped through the ceiling. His gun glowed green. Right before he fired, Marion slammed herself into the Doctor's side and sent them both to the ground. The laser fired just above her head.
Marion quickly got off the Doctor and leaned back so that the Doctor was behind her. The hooded figure turned around face to face with Tesla. The Doctor stood up and aimed her sonic at the ceiling. A metal bar fell on the figure's head sending him to the ground.
The Doctor snatched the figure's weapon.
"I'll take that."
"He won't be down for long." Marion said quickly, "We need to go. Now."
Tesla jumped across the gap. Then the Doctor. Then Marion. Marion crouched down and rummaged through her bag for her prybar and started working on decoupling the cars from each other.
Marion could see the hooded figure approaching the doorway just ahead of her and she could feel the Doctor standing behind her.
"Missing something?" she heard the Doctor call above her.
She heard the sound of electricity crackling just above her. Her arm burned sharply. She hissed.
"Marion!"
"I'm going as fast as I can."
Marion stuck the prybar in the small gap between the bolt and the car itself. She shoved it in and pushed it down. A moment later, it started to pop up.
"Marion!"
Marion grabbed the lifted bolt with her hand and yanked. It popped out with a rusty scraping noise. Marion stood up just as red electricity slammed against where her fingers had just been. The Doctor pulled her back and away from the edge by the back of her waistcoat.
The two of them watched as their traincar got further and further away from the one with the hooded figure. He stood with his hand reaching out to them, but he didn't try the thing with the red lightning again. The further the hooded figure got away, the more her arm pain faded until it became dizziness and nausea and then it became vertigo then anxiety and then she felt fine and calm. She took a deep breath.
"Marion, is everything alright?"
"For now, it should be. We don't need to worry about that guy leaping over the gaps anyway."
The hooded figure glared at them for a moment, and then turned around, slamming the door behind them.
Marion hoped nothing important was being carried on that side of the train.
"You've got good reflexes." The Doctor remarked.
"Thank you."
"Try not to lose them."
"Alright?" Marion said slowly. "I'll try. We should get back inside,"
The Doctor pushed the door to the boxcar open. They joined the rest of the group inside.
The Doctor put the blaster down on a nearby crate.
"Silurian Blaster. Nasty, deadly thing. But here's the funny part. Whatever was firing it wasn't Silurian. So, Nikola Tesla, why is someone chasing you with an alien gun?"
"What on Earth is a Silurian?"
"Aliens."
Now, that wasn't technically correct. Marion knew that it wasn't correct. However, the truth didn't really matter here. And also the truth was.
"A race of lizard people who hid underground to hibernate due to a belief that the Earth would be destroyed by a meteor, and then overslept allowing for humanity to spread. I believe there might be one living in London, as a detective! If she's still doing detective things. I mean."
And sounded deranged. Aliens was simpler and this wasn't a situation where the distinction mattered.
"Anyway, that's not important right now. What's important is the fact that you aren't telling us the full truth Tesla."
"Why do two keep saying that?" Tesla asked.
"Are they always this impertinent?" Dorothy looked behind them and at Yaz, Ryan, and Graham.
"Yes" "Yes" "Yes"
"First thing I asked you, I said, have you seen anything weird? And there's one important thing you've failed to mention. See, I started this evening chasing an unusual energy reading." The Doctor pointed at Tesla and then reached into her coat for her sonic screwdriver. She pointed it at the man and scanned him. "I followed that signal, loud and clear, to the Niagara Generator. So why am I still detecting it on board this train with you? Whatever it is, hand it over."
"This is one of the most miraculous things I've seen in my life. It's a mystery I intend to solve. And I have no intention of handing it to total strangers."
"Strangers who just saved your life," Yaz pointed out, "Whatever you found is putting you in danger."
"Yeah. Both of you. You all right with that?"
Dorothy moved to Tesla's side. "If anyone can make sense of this, it's him."
"Your belief in him is lovely, but it's not a question of his intelligence," Marion said pointedly, "It's a question of safety. Because, word of advice. When you pick up an odd piece of alien technology, and almost immediately, people in shadowy cloaks start chasing after you and trying to shoot at you, you should probably put it down and walk away. Or give it to someone who knows what it is and what they're talking about. Because, let me say from experience. When a ray gun hits you, it hurts. It hurts real bad. More than a normal gun hurts."
Marion's steady stare conveyed a message that made "Ask me how I know" a pointless thing to say.
"Well then," the Doctor said slowly. She stepped closer to the two of them. Her voice serious. "If you won't hand it over, you leave us no choice. We're not letting you out of our sights until we've worked this out."
"Honestly, if you insist on keeping that thing you found with you, it'd be in your best interest for us to stick with you anyway. In case those things come back."
"So," the Doctor beamed, "where's this lab, then?"
Turn of the 20th century New York smelled about like how you'd expect a heavily industrialized city in the early 20th century to smell.
Bad.
And that was all that really needed to be said on the matter.
Still, her nose was slowly growing used to it. And she had smelt worse smells. And your nose could get used to most things after a while.
At least the city was pretty to see. Marion had only been in 21st century New York City a handful of times, and all but two of those times had been layovers where she'd never actually set foot outside of the airport. Those didn't count.
Anyway, New York had changed so much throughout the twentieth century, that even if Marion had been familiar with the city then, that didn't mean she would be familiar with it now. Most of the major landmarks wouldn't be built for a while yet.
"Gilded Age New York," the Doctor introduced it. "This is when the modern world begins. New ideas, new technologies, new skyscrapers. More people getting rich quick, and more poor people than ever before."
"The United States of America is currently doing a little experiment where they see if companies and industrialists can be trusted to act in the best interests of employees and consumers without the government telling them to. They can't by the way. In case you were curious. I'm sure you guessed that."
"I always wanted to visit New York, see Times Square," said Ryan.
Marion thought for a moment. "It won't be called Time Square for another year. Don't remember what it was named."
"Empire State Building?"
"Won't be built until the 1930s. There was a whole-" Marion waved her hand. "Thing…"
"The Great Depression?"
"No- I mean yes. But that's not the 'thing'."
"Central Park?" Yaz tried.
"That was built in either the late 1850s or the early 60s. I don't fully recall. Dates and names was never my strong suit exactly."
As they walked down the road following behind Dorothy and Tesla, they got closer and closer to a large crowd of people. They were standing around in front of the lab, waving signs and umbrellas and shouting.
And like, it was 1903. There had to be more useful things to protest against than what some guy was doing in his lab with electricity. Marion didn't think that The Jungle had been published yet, so Marion supposed that there was no reason for them to the picketing outside of a meat processing plant as far as they knew but surely there had to be SOMETHING better they could stand around shouting about other than:
"No to the death current, no AC! No to the death current, no AC! No to the death current, no AC!"
Tesla stood across the street from the protesters. He grimaced, staring at them.
"Who are they?" Ryan asked.
"Protestors," Dorothy said simply.
"What are they protesting about?"
Tesla sighed deeply. "Me."
As soon as they recognized that they were in the presence of the man they had dedicated an afternoon to being mad about, they crowded around him.
"There he is! Do you have any idea what you're doing? Shame on you!"
"He's dangerous! Go back to Mars!"
"How many more people have to die before you admit your machines aren't safe?"
"My inventions never hurt anyone!" Tesla insisted.
A reporter with a hat lifted a pencil to his notebook. "Isn't it true your last invention caused an earthquake?"
"Those were only mild tremors!"
Ok, that bit was mildly concerning.
"Why are you building weapons on Long Island?"
"Mister Tesla isn't building any kind of weapon or going to answer any questions," Dorothy said sharply, "Excuse me."
"Foreign lunatic!" another man shouted, after Tesla, "You don't belong in America."
"Yeah!"
Tesla stopped in front of the door to his office. He clenched his fists and then spun around to face him.
"I am an American citizen! And you are trespassing in front of my lab."
With that, the man turned around and pushed open the door and marched inside of the building. The rest of them pushed through the crowd to join them. The crowd still shouting and jeering after them as they went.
On the counter in the room was a large pile of letters and mail. Nikola Tesla, went straight toward said pile and began sorting through it. Or more accurately, angrily slamming down certain letters as if they had personally offended him.
"Me, a lunatic!" he scoffed, "They wouldn't recognize genius if it hit them in the face."
"Are you all right?" Yaz asked the man.
"Oh." the man smiled brightly, "Absolutely, yeah. Their opinions do not affect me!" he said in a tone that was far too cheerful and calm to mean anything but the opposite. And after that, he slammed the door behind him.
"He'll just be a moment." Dorothy smiled.
Marion heard a loud thumping noise from the other side of the door. Like someone slamming something down in frustration. At least it wasn't the sound of broken glass.
Dorothy looked back and forth between the door and their group awkwardly. "Why don't you go on through?"
"Tesla's lab!" The Doctor sounded excited. "This is going to be something special!"
Tesla's room was a room that had been designed for about three of four times the amount of furniture it actually contained. The walls were paneled with wood. The floor was covered wall to wall with rugs.
"I won't lie." the Doctor remarked, "I was expecting more."
"I mean, he did just finish a major project. Maybe he just cleaned up. My desk always looked cleanest when I had just finished a project and could throw stuff away without worrying about throwing away something important." Marion looked around the room, "And, he's been doing stuff with electricity. It'd be unsafe to have too much stuff piling everywhere. His reputation is bad enough as it is without his lab catching fire and burning down half the block. It IS 1903 after all."
Marion's eyes flickered upward. The ceiling was solid.
"Yeah, this building doesn't have a sprinkler system. And it's almost an impossibility that this or any other building on this block is compliant with modern fire codes since none of those fire codes existed yet. And there's no reason to believe they'll get introduced any time soon since pretty much all of them were installed due to tragedies that haven't happened yet. That's how a lot of safety regulations and building codes are written. In blood. Having a mostly clean working space in a big city like this is a matter of necessity."
"So, Tesla. Is he something to do with the cars, then?" Graham asked.
"No." Marion replied, looking around the room. She didn't know enough about anything to know what she should and shouldn't touch so she didn't touch anything at all. "And honestly, if you ask me, that company ought to be called 'Edison' instead. It would be more accurate. Nikola Tesla," Marion explained, "was-is I suppose a genius inventor whose inventions paved- will pave the way for the inventions that make the 20th century the 20th century. Right now he's walking so everyone else can run."
"Before you have X-rays," the Doctor explains, "Tesla has shadowgraphs. Before you have drones, Tesla has automatons. Before Marconi gets the patent for radio, they have to take it from Tesla because he invents it first. His work on alternating currents helps electrify the world. He should have been the first billionaire by now, if he hadn't have torn up his contract. Business isn't his strong point."
"And he had these really neat ideas about wireless electricity."
"Like those pads you plug in to charge your phone?"
"Same kind of idea." Marion replied, "With magnets. But at a longer distance. I'll admit I'm not an expert in it. I studied architecture, not electrical engineering. I can barely use a breadboard even if I've got a pad of instructions on what to do right next to me. But I know a little bit about it. A lot of people say that it would've made power free. And it wouldn't have, not really, at least, not in the form he came up with, but it would've been very cool if it had gotten up off the ground. And who knows where it would've been by our time."
The door to Tesla's lab opened and Tesla came in holding something in his hand.
"Doctor? I believe you wanted to see this."
In Tesla's palm was a bronze orb. It was covered in intricate designs and it glowed a soft green. It wasn't the same shade of green that the liquid had been. But it was close enough that Marion wondered if the color she had seen on the console was the color you get when you mixed that shade of green with whatever shade of blue it was supposed to be.
The Doctor stared at it for a moment and breathed in softly in amazement.
"Is this what you found in the generator? Giving off all that energy, but why?"
Tesla light tossed the orb in the air. It it floated softly and gently in through the air before stopping to hover just about the Doctor's head. It made a soft electronic noise that Marion was quickly starting to identify as the futuristic/alien technology equivalent of the ticking of clockwork as it flittered back and forth in a way Marion could only compare to an electronic hummingbird.
"Whoa!"
"You see how it moves independently?" Tesla's voice was full of the thinly veiled excitement that only a person who is super enthusiastic to tell someone about a thing, but doesn't want to come on too strong and come across as weird to the person they want to explain it to, because that might mean that they be asked to stop talking is capable of. "I believe this is something I like to call remote control."
"Remote control?" Ryan repeated, staring at Tesla, "You came up with that?"
"I believe this is operating on a similar principle. If we could just work out its purpose..."
The Doctor's eyes flickered up at it. "I know what it is." Tesla stared at the woman in confusion,
"It's an Orb of Thassor. But I've no idea what it's doing here."
The Doctor held out her hand. The orb slowly floated down into her palm with an electronic-sounding chirp. She spun around on her heels and faced Marion, Yaz, Ryan, and Graham.
"The Thassor were one of the ancient races. Amazing storytellers. Inventors, explorers. They built these orbs as a way to spread information, to send out among the stars as a way to share their legacy long after they were gone."
"Why would someone try to kill us to get their hands on that?" Yaz asked. Marion thought it was a rhetorical question. But then she realized that Yaz was looking directly at her.
Marion hummed. "Just because it started out as an Orb of Thassor doesn't mean that they're the only people to ever get ahold of it. Doesn't matter what the original purpose of technology was, people can repurpose it into doing whatever they please." Marion suddenly remembered with no shortage of delight that for the first time in a while, she was talking to humans from a close enough time period to when she was originally from for her references to actually make sense to someone outside of perhaps the Doctor. "It's kinda like how software engineers will take anything and try to run Doom on it."
The Doctor looked at Marion for a moment, and then down at the orb. She set it down on the table and sonicked it. Tesla walked over to her, trying to see what she was doing.
"Well Marion, you're right, it's been repurposed. But it's not being used to run a video game. But I can't work out what it's doing instead." She leaned down to get a closer look at it. Tesla leaned on the other side, as if he could spot whatever the Doctor was looking at, "This is all wrong," The Doctor took out her sonic and scanned it over again. "Something this elegant shouldn't be giving off this kind of noise. Its energy readings are off the charts!" She raised the sonic. Shook it once, twice, and again and then read the reading once more.
Tesla became far less interested in the Orb and far more interested in the Doctor's Sonic Screwdriver.
Valid.
"That instrument detects energy? Is... is this your own design?"
"I made it!" the Doctor exclaimed, "Mainly out of spoons."
"You're an inventor!"
"I have my moments." The Doctor replied.
"She's a genius." Marion chimed in.
"I knew it!" Tesla's hand shook, "So you-so you can understand how it feels, you know, when you have an idea and-and to make it real. I don't think there's any greater thrill."
"I couldn't agree more." the Doctor nodded.
"You... you spoke of aliens," Tesla said slowly, "People, you know, laugh at the very idea."
"But not you."
"Well, apparently I'm not like other people. It can be difficult, you know, to feel no one else sees the world the way you do. It's like you're, er..."
"Out of place." the Doctor finished.
"Changing the world takes time. You have to be patient."
"I try. But you saw them outside. They... they talk as if I was dangerous or mad, or..."
"Don't pay them any mind Mr. Tesla." Marion said firmly. "They're idiots." And also probably suffering the long term effects of lead in the water and rotten meat and food from companies who were allowed to put whatever the hell they wanted inside and lie about it.
The door to the lab opened and in came Dorothy holding a letter. A letter that, if Marion was remembering correctly, would contain nothing but bad news.
"Sir," said Dorothy, "this was just delivered. It's from Mister Morgan."
"Excellent," He took it from her and addressed the Doctor, "Mister Morgan is the investor behind my Wardenclyffe project. With his help, we…" he opened the leather and froze. His eyes moved back and forth as he read it once, twice, and again, as if perhaps if he read it one more time he'd find some line or word that he had missed that would tell him something other than: "He's pulling the funding."
"What?"
" I er- can't complete Wardenclyffe without it. I'm never going to be able to prove it works."
At this point, Marion would've liked to pat him on the back and tell the man that he'd get it eventually, but the problem was that that would be a lie. Tesla did other things, but the Wardenclyffe tower itself was never completed. Offering condolences when you didn't know the future one way or another was one thing. Straight up lying?
Well.
Marion wasn't the most honest person. She was willing to admit that. She didn't really see a problem with directly lying to people's faces, but only when lying made it easier to keep people safe. Either because the person she was talking to was unaware enough about the circumstances around the truth for them to treat it with the gravitas that it required, or because in order to make it so she was listened to when she spoke the truth she had to say a handful of lies about who she was.
The list of people who could be reliably trusted to do what she said when she said it was small. It mostly included the Doctor (about 95% of the time), companions, and (thankfully) UNIT.
Most people were not willing to listen to Marion when she told them they needed to trust someone or not trust someone or go somewhere or not go somewhere. They didn't know who she was and they didn't trust her because they had no reason to trust her and she didn't have the most authoritative face. She was a woman in her early twenties who could pass for someone in her late teens if she wanted.
Claiming that she was an Inspector, was merely the easiest way to get people to trust her enough to listen when she told them to do things. Things to avoid deaths. Things to get the bad guy. Things to stop them from hurting the people that she cared about.
There was no benefit to lying to Tesla now. To do so would give him false hope at best, and at worst, when she said little things that ended up coming true, cause him to believe the he had somehow defied fate and had done worse that she predicted. It might make him put time and energy into something fruitless and lead to something wonderful never coming into fruition.
From a nearby window there was a bright flash. Marion's vision went white for a moment.
"Who's that?" Ryan asked.
"A really, garbage spy. I mean using a camera like that? What? Are you hoping that the flash'll be light enough to blind whoever you're spying on so they don't know what happened?"
"That was Harold Green," Dorothy explained, "One of Edison's men."
"Is that Harold Green?" Marion frowned.
"As in Thomas Edison? Light bulb guy?" Yaz asked
"All right. We all know Edison," Graham held his hands up, "It's Tesla you've never heard of."
"Oi," Ryan poked Graham, "he's literally standing right there."
"Graham, I can excuse," "Hey." "But how do you two not know about Nikola Tesla! How have you not even heard of him. I know that your education system isn't going to go into American inventors, but you're on the internet aren't you?"
Tesla frowned. He looked frustrated and tired. " Edison. Edison. Of course it's Edison. He's plagued me every step of my career."
"Edison champions a rival form of electric current to Mister Tesla's AC."
"Direct current. Of course, he would champion something so slow and inefficient. That man is a liar and a thief."
"And a hack!" Marion added.
"I thought you were a fan of his," replied Graham.
Marion stared at the man. "What on Earth gave you that idea?"
"You said that the car company ought to be named after him. Rather than-" his eyes flickered towards the inventor.
"Ah." Marion replied, "I see the confusion. I wasn't complimenting the company. I was insulting it. And the man."
"Why."
"You find out the answer to one of those questions very soon and another in a few years"
"Are we saying Thomas Edison is after the Orb of Thassor?" Yaz asked?
"Don't be daft. How's Edison's men going to get their hands on a Slymurian laser blaster?"
"Silurian," Marion replied, "And much easier than you would think." Marion replied, "You'd be surprised at the amount of historical figures who ended up in just the right place at just the right time and got ahold of something that they shouldn't. But this isn't one of those times for the record. I think Edison is only tangentially related to what's going on." Marion said.
"We still should talk to him though," Ryan asked. "Shouldn't we?"
Marion shrugged. "Probably."
"Let's go and find out." said the Doctor. "You three," the Doctor pointed to Yaz, Dorothy, and Tesla, "stay here and guard the Orb. You three," she pointed to Graham, Marion, and Ryan, with me. Time we paid a visit to Mister Thomas Edison."
Marion felt that she ought to earn some sort of medal for not asking about Louis Le Prince the moment she and Edison were face to face. Nothing insane. Not real gold or anything. It could be made of cheap foil for all she cared. Just a little something that showed that someone out there understood the amount of restraint she was showing.
Like Tesla, Edison's lab was surrounded by a crowd of onlookers and reporters. Unlike Edison however, these people were excited to see him. They were enthusiastically asking him normal questions that ranged from:
"What cool and exciting inventions are you working on today Mr. Edison!" to "What's it like being a genius businessman Mr. Edison" to "Wow. Nikola Tesla sure is deranged. Isn't he?"
It was 1903 so Marion felt that surely there should have been a bit of "Hey Eddie, why the fuck is up with the stray cats and dogs and the elephant." but Marion had vague recollections of hearing somewhere that he'd done it using an AC current in order to prove a point about AC being dangerous.
Didn't make it any less fucked up, but these people might be of a mind that it never would have happened with the DC.
"Ladies and gentlemen," the man called out to the crowd, "AC is the most deadly force known to science. For the public's safety, the Niagara Generator should be shut down."
Marion didn't think that that was even in the top ten but that was neither here nor there.
"And let me guess." the Doctor walked forward towards the man. The crowd parted "An Edison Generator built in its place."
The man tugged on his lapels and laughed in a way that reminded Marion of One, only it was annoying instead of fun.
"Thomas Edison, we need to talk-"
"As I was saying…"
"We could talk here, but I think you'd prefer to go somewhere more private."
"You want to make an appointment, speak to my secretary."
"Alien weapons. How are you getting your hands on them?"
Another laugh. "Alien weapons." he leaned down to look at them. "You have the wrong inventor, ma'am. It's Nikola Tesla's been talking to Mars. I keep my feet on the ground."
"So, you don't recognise this?" Ryan lifted his jacket where he had stashed the Sontaran gun they had found earlier.
The Doctor had seen Marion about to slide the gun into her bag and had firmly shook her head.
It's not like Marion was going to store the gun in her bag long-term. What would she do with it? Use it for prop comedy? That was probably unsafe. What if it fired by mistake?
Actually, that was probably the reason the Doctor told her not to take it with her. Surely the Doctor didn't think that she'd be pointing it at people.
"Let's take this inside."
Next Chapter: Seeing Red
The Fam: Marion what do you know about early 20th century New York?
Marion: Most of the food is probably poison, half the buildings are potential death traps, and in a little over a century, people will be trying revert back to this.
Hi guys. If this ending feels abrupt, it's because both this chapter and chapter sixty-eight were unreasonably long. So they got split into three.