Chapter 8: Missy's Way
The Time Lady drew her robe tighter around her shoulders and peered up at the gleaming lights of the city in front of her. Everything was quiet tonight. A soft breeze wound around the buildings, scattering leaves as it passed. Streetlights buzzed dully overhead, swarmed with insects. It seemed like the whole world was asleep.
Missy snaked quietly through the streets, searching for the shop Clara had described. It had been enough time since the incident that the guards should be gone by now. She followed the wooden street signs until she rounded the corner to her destination.
To her dismay, there was still one guard remaining at the scene. He was scrawny and looked barely older than a teenager. Missy licked her lips. Time for Plan B. She gripped her umbrella tightly and approached the officer. This should be easy.
"Hello, dearie, are you lost?" Missy cooed in her best Kapponian accent. "It's past your bedtime, innit?"
The guard startled and looked up. He clutched his laser gun tightly to his chest. "Who are you?"
"Oh, you know," she shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm just passing in the night." She sashayed up to him and crooked a leather-gloved finger under his chin seductively. "I've been… lonesome and could use some company."
The guard raised his scaly eyebrows. He lowered the gun slightly. The hooded mystery woman did not appear to be a threat. Her voice was particularly captivating. Something about her accent. It was not unusual for ladies of the night to be prowling the streets at this hour.
She chuckled sweetly and laid her sleeved hands on his shoulders. She rubbed them slowly, pausing on his arms. "My, you must be so strong, dear. Look at these biceps."
He blushed bright green. "Look, miss, I'm on duty right now and–"
She lunged forward and grabbed him by the collar. "It's Missy," she growled.
She pressed her lips against his and shoved him up against the door of the shop. His back slammed into it with a thud. The guard moaned and reached for the doorknob behind him, fumbling with the lock. He managed to get the key in and turned it. They tumbled into the shop backwards, knocking over a mineral stand by the entrance. Colorful gems of all kinds crashed to the floor. His back impacted the floor heavily. Missy landed on top of him, straddling his hips. She grinned into the kiss. He had done exactly what she wanted him to. Men of any species were all the same.
In one fluid motion, Missy kicked the door shut and shoved her umbrella against his throat like a baton. She snatched his laser gun and tossed it to the side. It clattered as it skittered away on the stone floors. He smiled, baring sharp canines. "Kinky, aren't you?"
Missy slapped him across the face and growled in disgust. Rage flashed in her eyes. He represented the police which had taken the Doctor from her. Her childhood best friend. She pressed the umbrella into his throat harder, choking him. Gagging, he tried to raise his arms but she pinned them down with her knees. "Listen up, Butch. I want to know what happened here," she sneered. "I want you to get me into headquarters and get me the evidence from the Time Lord case."
"And what if I refuse?" the guard coughed, the smile gone from his face.
Missy smirked darkly. She pushed a button on the handle of her umbrella. Bright red electricity arced across the metal and through the Kapponian's neck. He screamed, contorting his body in an attempt to get away. Missy's gloves protected her from the shocks. The vermillion light danced in her eyes like a mad woman's. "Well, that's quite simple, dear." She bared her teeth at him, halfway between smiling and snarling. "Refuse, raise the alarm, run, and I'll kill you."
She let go of the button. The red lightning sparked and fizzled out, dancing across the floor as it faded into nothing. "Got it, love?"
He gulped against the rod and nodded.
"Good!" Missy leapt up. She spun the umbrella back to her side with a flourish. The guard slowly clambered to his feet, rubbing at his sore neck. Missy opened the door and bowed, gesturing outside. "After you, Butch."
"That is not my name," he wheezed meekly.
She jabbed her umbrella in his direction. "What was that?"
He raised his arms in defense. "Nothing! Nothing. Butch is my name."
Missy returned the umbrella to her hip. "Good boy."
Butch led the way to his police hovercar and swung open the gull-wing door. Missy kept the tip of her umbrella trained on him at all times. His gun had been left in the shop and he had no radio, so he had no choice but to do as she said. Electricity still crackled in his fingertips, a painful reminder of his own foolishness. He couldn't believe he had been tricked so easily.
"The evidence," she tapped the tip of the umbrella against the back of his seat. "Now."
The young Kapponian flinched at the motion. He gripped the steering wheel tighter. Every cell in his body screamed at him to fight back but he knew when he was outmatched. Growling, he turned the key in the ignition and lifted off with a whoosh. The hovercraft rose high above the streets and sped off into the night.
The city lights twinkled beneath them like dim yellow stars. Sandstone buildings glittered like they were covered in sequins. Off in the distance, misty mountains climbed endlessly into the sky. Triple moons cast their light upon a lush rainforest cut through by a winding river. Sapphire lightning flashed between the clouds. For such a primitive planet, it did have some nice views.
Within moments, the hovercar descended in front of an imposing building. It was taller than the rest around it, a testament to this society's priority for justice. Its windows were long and slitted. Barbed wire wrapped around the perimeter on steel posts. A prison, Missy realized. This must have been where they kept the Doctor.
Where they executed him.
She balled her fists in anger. Her violet nails dented crescents into her palms. Bile welled up in her throat. The audacity of this pissant civilization to think that they had the right to take away one of the universe's greatest beings. A Time Lord, no less. She sucked in a deep breath through her teeth and stilled herself. She could not blow her cover.
The vehicle landed with a hiss and settled back onto the ground with a thud. The gull-wing doors swung out automatically. Missy stepped out cautiously.
"Come on," Butch whispered, his eyes flicking around shiftily. "We need to use the back entrance."
Missy nodded wordlessly and followed the tall Kapponian. She pulled her hood further down her face, ensuring that no security cameras could capture a clear picture of her identity.
Skirting around the chain-like perimeter, they reached a service entrance, meant only for shipments or laundry. Butch stopped just short of the door, holding out his keycard with a trembling hand. He could get fired for this.
Missy prodded the tip of the umbrella into his back and that was all the coaxing he needed to slide his card into the reader and open the creaky door. Dim moonlight revealed a dark hanger filled with boxes ready for intake in the morning. An orange button for a service elevator glowed brightly in the pitch-black room.
Butch ducked into the doorway and pressed the button. The elevator crawled up to their level. "Evidence locker is in the basement," he grated out, barely suppressing his irritation.
"Thank you, pookie. If you wouldn't be so kind," she twirled the umbrella in her dainty hand, extending it in the direction of the elevator doors. "Lead the way."
More of a command than a request, the Kapponian complied. He did not hesitate to think that she would follow through on her threat. Something in her eyes revealed a depth of madness that he had only seen in the worst of his prisoners.
They stepped into the elevator and descended deep into the underbelly of the concrete building. It reached the bottom with a mockingly cheerful ding! and groaned to a stop. The grimy doors shrieked open into a dull hallway. Pale bluish lights buzzed overhead, their plastic covers filled with the fried remains of various insects. It reeked of socks and old paper.
Wordlessly, Butch led the way. He paused, turning towards her carefully lest he set off her hair-trigger. "There is a problem. There is a secretary at the entrance to the evidence locker."
Missy raised her eyebrows. Of course they were going to run into someone else eventually. No matter. She patted her pocket knowingly. She had come prepared. "I'll take care of it."
He raised a scaly eyebrow but thought better than to ask. This hooded woman was full of all kinds of secrets. Instead, he approached the counter, smiling briefly in greeting to his colleague behind the glass.
"Officer Drychek, what brings you here at this hour?" the elderly secretary asked, eyeing the hooded figure he stood next to suspiciously.
Before he could answer, Missy stepped in. She pulled a wallet-like object from her robe and slapped it down onto the counter. Psychic paper.
"High Council Internal Affairs? Oh dear," the old Kapponian muttered. "Another inspection so soon?"
Officer Drychek glanced at Missy in confusion but wiped the look off his face before the evidence secretary noticed.
"That's right," she quipped.
The old man rose creakily from his wheeled chair and inserted a key into the lock. He opened the door, swinging it inwards towards a corridor of endless boxes. Missy nodded to the man in thanks and passed into the room like a ghost.
The door clicked shut behind them. It echoed through the spacious warehouse. The evidence secretary returned to his post. Alone in the vast warehouse, Officer Drychek pointed towards a set of shelves on the right side of the hallway. "I believe the Time Lord case is still in 'recent cases.' I doubt it has been filed away yet."
Missy's heels clacked against the cement floors. The noise reverberated eerily through the halls of black metal shelves surrounding them on every side. "Butch" pulled out a flashlight from his belt and shined it over the labels, muttering under his breath as he read.
"Aha, here it is." He put the end of the flashlight into his mouth and reached for the sealed box. He grunted with its weight and held it out to Missy. Her eyes widened. She could not believe she had gotten this far in one night. "Thank you, dearie, you've been most helpful."
He breathed a sigh of relief. "Great, now will you let me go?"
Missy narrowed her eyes. She pursed her cherry-red lips thoughtfully. She held out a hand from underneath the crate and gestured with her fingers. "Keys."
The officer handed her the keys to the hovercraft reluctantly. "Okay, now will you let me go?"
"Fine," she hummed. "But," she gripped his collar and pulled him down to eye-level, "if you breathe a word of this to anyone, I will find out, and I will make good on that promise." Her face was still shadowed enough that he couldn't make it out, but he could see the crazy in those deep blue eyes.
He swallowed nervously, remembering the sensation of that umbrella on his throat. She was much stronger than she looked to hold the heavy box in one arm and threaten him with the other. The tight collar pulled painfully against the burns on his neck. He nodded quickly, desperate to just get rid of her.
"Good," she smiled. She turned from him and headed out the way she came. The old secretary saluted her and marked down the number of the box she had taken. He unlocked the door for her and led her back to the elevators.
"Put in a good word for me at the High Council, eh?" he asked hopefully.
"Of course, darling," she hummed, her voice dripping like honey. "Bye bye now."
Missy ran out of the building with her payload in hand. The door swung shut behind her with a loud clack. Straightening her posture, she strolled outside like she belonged there. She dropped the box into the back seat of the hovercar and flew off to the south. She landed in a remote area a few blocks from the city's edge and ditched the car. Certain she was concealed by the darkness, she recovered her box and started on foot back to the jungle path.
She reached the path and stopped, contemplating the two mile walk in heels. The dark jungle chattered with the sounds of animal life. Who knew what lurked in the shadows? She steeled herself and dove beneath the canopy of trees. The moonlight disappeared under the thick cover and Missy vanished into the dark.
A/N: Don't forget to review! 3