Sup guys. Y'all holding up okay? If you need something to take your mind off things, you should watch Dandadan. If you take my hand and trust me and get through the first episode, you will experience peak.
Marion felt like she was falling sideways off a cliff. Except gravity was centered 90 degrees along the cliffside. When her feet finally touched the floor she came to a slow stop as the friction of the soles of her boots skimmed the TARDIS floor and she only just barely avoided slamming face first into the TARIDS wall.
She wondered if there was an actual REASON why she had to be tossed around the way that she was or if it was out of spite.
Before she could turn around, Melanie Bush was already talking to her.
"Marion! Oh, there you are! You're just in time! Look!" Mel was dressed in a blue and white top with white and blue pants and was excitedly standing in front of a rather lovely looking pool under a rather peaceful looking orange and blue sky.
Marion remembered it being nowhere near as lovely as it looked on account of all the murder robots.
"We're going to a place called Paradise Towers. Oh Marion, doesn't that look like fun?" Mel handed Marion a thick brochure before she could get a word in edgewise.
Marion flicked through it. It looked quite interesting. But, Marion knew a little bit better than that. She stared over at the screen and grimaced softly.
"Yeah…" Marion looked down at her outfit and her blue sweater.
"You're not much of a swimmer are you Marion?" Marion turned her head. The Seventh Doctor was leaning on the console looking at the TARDIS scanner. He almost looked bored as he looked over at the admittedly gorgeous pool.
"No. Not really." Marion said slowly. "I mean, if I get dropped into a body of water, I know how to not die, but I don't really swim much."
After the incident, she hadn't spent much time near pools, and even before it she never went far enough out into the ocean.
"You could still relax around the pool!" Mel reminded, "Just dip your feet a bit! Come on, aren't you exhausted? You deserve to take a break."
"I am pretty tired" Marion replied.
"Paradise Towers is supposed to be an architectural wonder." the Doctor added, "It was built in the 22nd century. If you'd rather not go to the roof pool we could look around. Perhaps Inspector Henson could ensure that no one bothers us as we explore."
"Maybe…" Marion replied. That also sounded like fun too. She probably would still skip out on it if she had the option. At least long enough to take a quick nap. It was a good thing that she had landed in the TARDIS console room, rather than her room because she knew for a fact that she would be under the covers about now. And then Mel and the Doctor would be out there and hopefully end up alright, but possibly not.
"Alright, let me change real quick," Marion replied.
If nothing else, she could at the very least change into something fresh.
What Marion remembered of the serial told her that colors were important. She stared at the clothing in the closet. For a moment, she stared. She had asked the TARDIS to take her here instead of her room. She didn't want to take too long. She just needed to decide if she wanted to wear something in blue and red, or something that didn't have any of those colors at all.
Her eyes caught onto something red. She pulled it out on the hanger. It was Six's coat. There was still a cat pin on the lapel. Marion stared at it for a moment longer, and then put it back. Most of the clothing in the rack she was looking at seemed to be stuff that had belonged to previous Doctors. She could see some of Three's Jackets and a cricket uniform and one of Four's hats and what might've been the exact same blue dress shirt the Doctor had been wearing in the Mind Robber.
Marion looked at a different rack. She found some clothing that she had worn before, but none of them seemed right. And then she pushed aside a jacket and-!
"Oh, hello!"
Marion joined the Doctor and Mel back in the TARDIS console room dressed in a black button-up shirt covered in red and blue hibiscus flowers. The shirt was soft in a way only a shirt that's been worn and washed often can be and it was slightly too large for her. She wore it open, with a white tank top tucked into her pants. She had found a pair of boots that seemed sturdy and easy to walk in. Marion wasn't sure if they were steel-toed or not. But they were surprisingly comfortable, and she was pretty sure that she could kick through something if she got a good enough swing. The pants were tan linen with thin vertical brown stripes. They fit her waist, but they were slightly too long. Still, between the slight heel in her boots and the way she rolled up the pants legs Marion figured that it was probably fine.
"Is that what you're wearing?" the Doctor asked.
"Yeah," Marion replied. "Why?" Did he have an issue with her outfit?
"I found it in the closet next to some of your old clothes," she added pointedly.
The Doctor didn't comment further.
"I think you look lovely!" Mel exclaimed. "Doctor, can we go now?" she turned her head.
The Doctor looked down at the console. "We'll be there any second." he flipped another switch. The TARDIS hummed softly under Marion's feet as the TARDIS beeped and then let out a final "woosh" as it came to a full stop and then a small thump.
"Well," the Doctor said, "Here we are!"
He walked off and went for his umbrella. Marion took a hat from where it was resting on top of the rotor and tossed it to him. The Doctor didn't even look up as he caught it as if her throwing a hat at him like a frisbee was expected of her.
Mel walked out of the TARDIS first.
"Oh no!" she cried.
Marion followed after her.
Marion understood the "Oh no".
The place was made of high concrete walls and littered with trash. It reminded Marion of the alleyway behind a store the day before trash pick up day. At the very least, there wasn't a strong smell of rotting food. It just smelled dusty.
The Doctor seemed far more enthusiastic about the situation than Mel was. He nudged aside a box with his book and a rat who had been hiding inside of it.
"Ah! Highly intelligent creatures. Marion, you like rats don't you?"
"No one likes-"
"Did you know that rats purr? Well, it's not called purring when they do it. It's bruxing. I might've gotten a pet rat, well, two because they don't do well alone. But, you know," Marion hummed. "I kind of wanted a cat more. And you can't really have both. Not good for the rats. They'd get stressed. Plus. Lifespans. I'd cry."
"Just look at this." The Doctor made a beeline towards a decal spray painted on the wall and her brushed his fingertips against it and then his eyes caught on to something else. He leaned down and retrieved a large bit of machinery. "Oh! And this too!"
"It's just rubbish."
"Nothing's just rubbish if you have an enquiring mind!" the Doctor tossed the circuit board aside. It hit the ground with a low clatter.
"No, Doctor!" Mel turned her head away from him. "Marion!"
"No," Marion said, "The Doctor has a point," she tapped her fingertips against the side of a large tube of metal. "There was this shelf in the studio full of odds and ends and things like this. You'd be surprised how often you'll find yourself needing a bit of something or another while you're working on something, but you don't need enough of it to justify buying a whole thing. You'd just walk on over to the scrap trap, and there you go! Thirty square inches of thirty-second-inch thick chipboard, and it doesn't cost you a cent to use it. Very useful."
Mel looked betrayed.
"You don't happen to know another planet with a swimming pool, do you?"
"Well, there are other pools on Earth?" Marion said slowly. It admittedly sounded more like a question than an answer. "Nice ones too."
The Doctor and Melanie began to wander further around the area. Vines pushed through cracks in the walls. The building was brutalist in style. Which meant in Marion's opinion you couldn't add enough vegetation.
"Why did I have to jettison the pool from the TARDIS?"
"Well, it was leaking," Mel recalled.
"One time the Doctor took me to a really nice beach. You could see so many stars if you looked up. Planets too. From there you could see both Earth and Gallifrey. Maybe after this we should go back to that planet if we can." Marion said slowly, "It felt-" Right. Wonderful. Safe. "Peaceful."
"Well, that was a beach," replied Mel, "Not a pool."
"Well, yeah." Marion nodded. "Still."
Marion liked beaches more. There was more you could do there other than swimming and getting sun. Like collecting shells and truly understanding the relationship between Charlie Brown and Lucy on a spiritual level when you reached down to retrieve a shell that the waves had just parted to reveal only to get slapped in the face by an oncoming wave. Or staring out into the ocean at night and truly understanding the belief of the night sky being an ocean of its own as the moonlight fails to shine enough light to tell where the sea stops and it begins and trying to figure out nonconcerning way to describe how if not for the fears of death or injury you'd want nothing more than to walk into the sea. Or making sandcastles.
Normal beach stuff.
The Doctor reached up at some of the fallen vines with his umbrella. This part of the room had even more stuff. It felt more lived in.
"There is a rather spectacular swimming pool on the planet Griophos, I understand."
"Oh, we could try there," Mel replied, walking towards the TARDIS.
"Just one snag." the Doctor said in a tone that sounded like he was only just barely keeping up with the conversation.
"What's that?"
"It's for the exclusive use of the Gulmaris."
"Who are they."
"If I'm remembering right, flesh-eating squids."
"Octopi-" the Doctor corrected. "And don't let them hear you make that sort of mix-up. They don't take kindly to it. Personally, I'd rather stay here and explore. I wonder what happened?"
"Doesn't Marion know?"
"Well of course. But I don't. That's part of the fun of exploring with her. I can make my guesses and she can tell me if I'm right."
"But what if you're wrong."
"Oh, then she says nothing at all. Unless, it could get me killed of course."
"Is there something that's going to get us killed?"
"Nothing more certain than normal."
"See!" The Doctor pointed from Marion to Mel with his umbrella.
Mel clearly wasn't completely satisfied with that answer.
Which, was fair.
"Well. Mel looked around, it's seen better days. Still, now that we're here, I suppose I might as well see what the pool's like."
"That's the spirit, Mel. This could be fascinating." the Doctor said, walking off with Marion following right next to him. "Are you coming?"
"'Course."
"Yes, but one thing, Doctor. If anything goes wrong and we get separated, we'll meet at the pool, all right?"
"Oh, very well. But we've only just arrived. There's no need to start worrying yet."
Marion felt worried for a moment, then in a blink there were three thuds practically in unison as three crossbow bolts firing right next to the trio's heads.
Marion stared at them, for a moment, and then turned to look at the girls who had fired them.
They were still holding the crossbows aimed at their heads, which wasn't ideal. But also, Marion was familiar with the uneasy feeling that came when someone was pointing a gun at her, or more specifically the Doctor.
The point was that Marion doubted that any of the Red Kangs had any intention of actually firing anything other than warning shots.
The Red Kangs had some of the wildest most 1980's hair Marion had ever seen in person with red highlights and were dressed in various shades of red and black. All of them were holding crossbows that, on close inspection, had clearly been hand made. And none of them looked old enough to be out of highschool. The one standing in front looked like she could be the oldest, and even looked around sixteen give or take a year.
"Nice shots!" Marion remarked. Her half smile fell, "I'd rather you not do that again."
Marion was in a mood. She had certainly been in worse, more erratic moods. She felt relatively fine right now. She was sure that she had been in headspaces where the knowledge that the Kangs weren't actually going to fire both because of her knowledge of the show, and the distinct lack of anxiety and pain would not be enough to keep her from threatening the girls. But she was in a relatively okay headspace at that moment. At least, comparatively.
"Marion, just who are they!"
One of the girls answered before Marion could even open her mouth. Her hair was more curly than the rest, and it looked to be more dark red than black.
"We're the Kangs!"
"Red Kangs. Red Kangs are best. Who's best?" she called out to the rest of her group and the group called back.
"RED KANGS! RED KANGS! RED KANGS ARE BEST!"
"So who's the best?"
The Kang who had first spoken held her crossbow to Marion's face.
She blinked.
"Well, the red kangs I suppose!"
The girl lowered her crossbow slightly.
"Are there other colour's of Kangs?" the Doctor asked.
The first Kang spoke first. "Yeah, the Blue Kangs but they're-"
The rest of her group finished for her.
"COWARDLY CUTLETS"
"And the Yellows," a girl with straighter hair and a bit more black than the rest added, "but they're only one now."
"Why is that?" the Doctor asked.
"Just is." the first Kang replied.
"Not got very enquiring minds, have you?" the Doctor said, stepping forward. The girls raised their crossbows, and it was fascinating how almost amusing that was with the knowledge that they had little to no intention of actually firing them.
"Quiet, Doctor!"
Mel, who didn't know this, pushed the Doctor back, this getting the Kang's attention.
"Are you a Blue Kang?"
"No. No, I'm not a Kang. I'm Mel. I don't know what the Kangs are."
"A primary color-based girl gang," Marion replied with a shrug.
Marion noticed the Kangs staring at the flowers on her shirt. She wondered if she should have looked for something that was a solid red. Something to contrast with Mel's blue. Maybe a yellow to truly add some contrast.
"We're the Kangs. Red Kangs," the Kang with the straight hair said pointedly.
"Yes. Yes. Red Kangs are Best Kangs."
"Perhaps they'll ask you two to join." the Doctor nudged.
"I hope not."
"I'm afraid that I would have to decline."
"Bin Liner!" said the Kang with the curly hair firmly.
If Marion was remembering correctly, that was the girl's name. Marion wondered if it was a name that she had picked out for herself of if it was the name that she was born with. And she wondered if the name seemed common in this version of the 22nd century, or if it was more akin to naming yourself something like "Sock" or "Moss".
Marion wasn't sure how to go about asking that question, so she chose not to bother.
"Pardon?"
"Bin Liner" Bin Liner lowered her crossbow and poked Mel. "Mel," and then she pointed back at herself "Bin Liner."
"It's her name," Marion explained. "Bin Liner." Marion pointed at the girl, and then she pointed at herself. "Marion."
"Ah! I see" the Doctor tipped his hat, and moved to stand in front of Mel. "I'm the Doctor."
The girl with straight hair introduced herself as "Fire Escape".
The Doctor brought a hand to his hat and reached out a hand for the girl to shake. "How do you do?" Not recognizing the motion for what it was, the girls jumped back and raised their crossbows.
"No," Marion pulled the Doctor back. She knew that that Kangs weren't actually going to fire, but there were only so many times that she could see the Kangs point their crossbows at her friend. Her relatively chill mood had limits. "None of that now." She pushed the Doctor back and held out a hand.
"I was only trying to be friendly." "He's just trying to say hello."
Marion held out a hand keeping the Kangs from stepping forward.
"Say hello." the Doctor tried to wave, and then he nodded, and then he tried a serious of various gestures attempting to convey. "Hello? Hello?"
"He is attempting to offer a polite greeting," Marion said, very slowly stepping off to the side.
Fire Escape tapped Bin Liner on the shoulder and stared at her pointedly. "Ah, he wants to how you do." she nodded at her, "Do we?"
Bin Liner nodded back and Fire Escape turned to look at her.
Fire Escape held up her hand and held up her right arm holding up a fist and she punched forward and stopped. She opened her palm and then used her left hand to slowly push the hand down. She made another large hard step forward and mirrored the motion and then she did it one more time. Then she clapped her hands once and held out her palms towards the Doctor. The Doctor held out his hands to mirror hers and she pressed their palms together and then slowly lowered them down. Then she took a step back, and curtsied.
The Doctor glanced at Marion who glanced back and then shrugged. Marion faced the girl standing on the other side of Bin Liner and she and the Doctor repeated the same greeting motion. The girl hesitated for a moment, and then her eyes seemed to flicker from flower to flower until she nodded to herself and pressed her palm's to Marion, and then lowered them.
The Doctor and Marion took a step back.
Marion finished her greeting with a low bow, and the Doctor did a trick where he rolled his hat off his arm, into his hand, and then back onto his head. The Kangs curtsied again.
"You didn't have to do that." The Doctor said with a smile pointing upwards. "What about Mel then?"
The Kangs turned their heads away from her.
"What's the matter?"
Fire Escape walked towards Mel and then very pointedly turned her back on her.
"You we like," she turned her head to stare at Mel for a moment, as if to pointedly say "You, we don't like" "Doctor. What you wear is high fashion and ice hot, for an old one."
"Oh, thank you very much." the Doctor smiled, "But clothes don't maketh the man, you know."
"And you. Marion." the girl continued. She poked one of the flowers on Marion's shirt. "You wear Red and Blue both. Your clothes have flowers, like the ones that come from the Green." she gestured to some of the vines that creeped down. The vines were flowering vines then. Fascinating. Although she doubted that they were hibiscus. She wondered what color they were. Blue and red she supposed. Maybe even yellow. "All the colors, so all the colors." She didn't get called "ice hot" before the girl moved to Mel, but that was fine.
"Kangs all have colours." said Bin Liner, "Blue, yellow, red. What is Mel's colour?" The girl stared pointedly at Mel's very blue clothes.
"Oh, I don't have a colour." Mel said with a small smile. It was the sort of smile Marion remembered receiving from well-meaning adults as a teen and feeling condescended to about. "And I don't want to be a Kang-"
Fire Escape cut her off. "We don't want YOU to be a Kang. Not a Red Kang"
"Red Kangs are Best Kangs" one of the girls firmly.
And that started the groups shouting again.
Seeing a bunch of teenage girls jumping around in circles and shouting about one primary color being better than the others was a bit like high school homecoming week. Just with more crossbows, less vine references, and no one dressed up as Spider-Man.
The Doctor eventually decided that enough was enough. "Red Kangs are best. Yes, well, now, that we've been introduced, I think that some explanations are in order. We're visitors to Paradise Towers, only just arrived, so you can't really expect Mel to understand what you're talking about"
"No visitors!" Bin Liner said quickly. It was the first time that Marion had heard words come out of the girl's mouth that didn't sound confident.
It sounded like a Rule. The kind of Rule that even rebellious kids followed because it was less a "you need to do this because we said so" Rule and more of a "this is a Rule that I have seen people die for breaking" sort of Rule.
The kind where no one would even joke about breaking. She counted out more Rules on her fingers.
"No visitors, no ball games, no fly posts, no visitors."
The Doctor squinted at her. "You mean visitors aren't allowed?"
"No visitors ever."
"Not since Time Start," added Fire Escape.
"There's always a first time. I mean, not everyone you're going to meet's going to be a Kang."
"No-" Fire Escape nodded, "There are Old Ones, and the Caretakers and the-"
Bin Liner cut her off. She grabbed the Doctor by the shoulders and shoved him back and away from the other girl as if close proximity would allow the Doctor to read her mind and know what it was that Bin Liner didn't want him to say.
"Ware tongue!" she admonished.
Marion couldn't quite remember what it was that she was saying. She was either talking about Pex or she was talking about the evil robot things.
Probably the latter. Their reaction was more related to something that she was frightened of mentioning. Not the guy the group all made fun of.
"And?"
"That is all!" Bin Liner said sharply.
"I see." the Doctor leaned down slightly, "And who are these, er, Caretakers?"
"They wipe away our wallscrawl, chase us down Carrydoors, catch us if they can."
Marion was fascinated Kang's dialect. She wondered if it was a side effect of the way English evolved, or if they were in fact not speaking English at all, and it was being translated in a unique and more literal way, or if the Kangs were simply talking the way teens of their age talked. It reminded Marion slightly of Anglish.
"I see," the Doctor nodded, "And all the young ones are Kangs."
"Yes."
"Or girls, I should say. There don't seem to be any boys."
The Doctor stared at Marion and flickered his eyes pointedly towards the TARDIS, and then he nodded her head. Marion subtly shook her head. The Doctor's eyes widened and Marion as if to be certain and Marion tilted her head towards the TARDIS and shook her head again.
"Explain Later" Marion mouthed.
They were going to end up at the Kang hangout regardless of if they made their way towards the TARDIS or not. Even if they could make a break for the TARDIS without getting caught, which they technically could if Marion hit enough Kangs on the back of the head, the situation in paradise towers needed to be dealt with.
"Boys? Boys?" Fire Escape looked around confused. As if hoping that if she said the word enough, the meaning would click. "What are boys? There are Old Ones, and the Caretakers and Kangs and the-" she cut herself off "That is all."
"Ah yes. The four genders. Old Ones, Caretakers, Kangs, and Redacted."
"What is Redacted?" Bin Liner demanded.
"It's something you aren't meant to talk about." Marion said with a nod, "Because it's bad or dangerous or secret."
"Redacted." Bin Liner nodded, "Yes. Redacted."
"Marion," said Mel, "Can't we leave now? And try someone else that has pools?"
"Ah." Marion said quickly. "Now don't be so hasty. We've only just arrived."
"But Marion?"
"Mel!" Marion said pointedly. Marion nodded her head sharply towards the Kangs.
"So!" Marion clasped her hands together. "Where exactly do the Red Kangs gather together? I mean I would assume that the best Kangs would have the best place to hang out?"
Marion stared at the Doctor for a moment. He nodded.
"Oh! Yes." the Doctor "We would love to see where it is exactly that the Red Kangs have made their home!"
Fire Escape smiled, "So you want to see where we hide-in do you?"
"Yes." Marion replied, "Exactly."
Bin Linder nodded, "We heard you talk about the pool."
"The Great Pool In the Sky."
"Exactly," Marion
"You will come with us to the hide-out."
"But of course!" Marion nodded.
Fire Escape nodded and said something to Bin Liner who nodded back. Then the girl picked up a phone that was hanging on the side of the wall. She dialed something and then she brought the receiver to her ear. After a moment, she frowned and turned to look at Bin Liner.
"Red Kang I-spy says we can't go through usual carrydoor, Blue Kangs out and lurking."
Bin Liner frowned. "And the yellow?"
"No Yellows." she shook her head, "All unalive now."
"All?"
"All?"
Marion wished that the TARDIS had set its destination to be a little bit earlier than it had.
The Kangs were children. They weren't young children. And they were most certainly at the age where they would resent being referred to as children. But that didn't change the fact that they were kids, and an entire group of them were dead.
She wished that the TARDIS had arrived sooner and in a slightly different location, so that they maybe could have saved at least the last one.
Marion thought all this. But what she said was. "Oh dear."
The Doctor stepped near the phone. " Excuse me, did you say a whole tribe of Yellow Kangs have been wiped out, I mean, made unalive, just like that? But why? You didn't kill them, did you? They didn't kill them did they?"
Fire Escape seemed offended that such a thing had been suggested. "To make unalive is not part of the Kang way. No ball games, no fly posts, no wipe-outs."
The Kang conflict was a turf war, but not exactly a bloody one. And now that Marion was thinking of it, she wondered if it had started out as just a game. Perhaps some form of capture flag or, based on the name "Kang" King of the Hill. A game that had gone on for too long and was taken too seriously until they forgot that they were even playing a game at all.
"Who did it, then?" the Doctor demanded, "The Caretakers? The Blue Kangs? I mean, who?"
"It takes place." Fire Escape replied matter of factly.
"Come on. We've been in the open spaces too long. We must go. Ware Blue Kangs. Build high for happiness." she saluted.
"Build high for happiness!" the Kangs repeated.
The Kangs made more of an escort than a hostage situation, and so as long as they kept up the pace, they were largely allowed to move impeded which allowed for the three of them to talk.
"Marion, can you tell us now why are aren't in the TARDIS flying away from this awful place right now?"
"The Kangs wouldn't have let us Mel. And Doctor, you know that you were curious."
"Well, I suppose…"
"What do you mean they wouldn't have let us?"
"I mean that if we had run for the TARDIS we would be tied up and dragged along."
"What?"
"They mean well…" Marion paused, "Well, that's- anyway, the point is that we were going to be going no matter what. At least if we go this way, our hands are free." Marion held up her hands and wiggled her fingers.
For a moment, it seemed like they might successfully make it to the Red Kang base without anything annoying happening. And then Marion felt a wave of concern and anxiety and a shock of nausea. She walked ahead of the Doctor and Mel, around near where Bin Liner and Fire Escape had been leading the way. A few moments later, Marion turned the sound of rapid and constant footprints. Marion very quickly pushed herself forward the girls back and there was only a moment in between them staring at her in confusion wondering why she had attacked them to seeing the approaching caretakers and taking off.
"All right, you Wall Scrawlers." shouted the man in the front. "Let's be having you."
"Go!"
The Kangs scattered. Marion backed up and then when caretakers in their grey uniforms broke out into a sprint, Marion ran too. The Doctor and Mel were already disappearing down the corridor. Their unbound hands and the fact that they hadn't fully been on the stairwell meant that they were able to spring off much further away in significantly less time.
Marion, was certain of her abilities to outrun everyone in this room, Caretaker and Kang alike. She didn't need to do that. She didn't want to do that. She wanted to keep ahead, but not so ahead that they didn't lose interest in them.
Marion darted down the stairs, and then a few steps before the bottom, it occurred the Marion that the thing that she had just stepped on wasn't the stairs at all and she was plummeting.
Marion didn't shout. She didn't want the Doctor or Mel to hear her shout and turn around. It would be for the best if they didn't realize that she wasn't following them for as long as possible. She landed on top of a pile of dead vegetation. She felt something snap in her arm and she bit back a low hiss as the bones in her formerly broken wrist moved back into place and the bruising in her wrist slowly faded.
Marion rolled over to her back and moved to sit up and caught a brief bit of grey as two men each grabbed one of her upper arms and yanked her to her feet where there was a third man standing close inches away from her face.
The Caretakers were dressed the way you would expect fascists to be dressed in 20th-century sci-fi.
"Who are you!" the man demanded.
The Doctor was safe with Mel. Or at the very least mostly safe. And as long as they were out of the square before the Doctor realized that she as gone, he would continue to be mostly safe. As long as they didn't do something stupid like trust the cannibal ladies and get eaten. And she would know if something had suddenly changed.
Marion stared up at the man.
Did she want to be annoying, or did she want to appeal to their love of authoritarian bureaucracy? She decided that the best thing to do was to try the latter first, and then swap into being a little shit once they put two and two together and realized that she was utterly full of it. Marion forced a small smile on her face.
"Inspector Marion Henson." Marion started. Before either of the men could say anything more, Marion continued to talk, barely putting more than a few seconds worth of thought into what she was going to say next before she said it. "And so far, can I say, you could be doing better, but you could be doing a whole lot worse. That's absolutely something. Although," Marion squinted. "Using three men to apprehend one woman? And I'm already apprehended. That just shows a distinct lack of efficiency. I mean, surely just one of you could keep a delinquent in place while the others continue the search?" Marion lightly shrugged, and the men holding onto her arms looked at each other, and then they let go.
"Well, it's too late for that." Marion said slowly, "They've already all run off, haven't they? And then, you just let me go! Of course, I appreciate it, and it does make things easier, although, I would hope that your reaction is due to you being able to sense the honesty in my remarks as you didn't even stop to ask me to show you my identification first. Naturally, I will be showing you my identification now," she held up the psychic paper, flashed it where the man standing in front of her could see, and then she tucked it back into her bag.
Of the two men who had grabbed her, one had a beard and one did not.
Marion couldn't stop talking. "Now, where to next? I, of course, do have to take notes on the various goings on and occurrences and so and so's so I have something to add in my report, and while this aspect wasn't handled IDEALLY, I'm sure that this is just an outlier. I'm excited to see how you handle other protocols."
Marion didn't know what else she could say. She couldn't think of any more words, and she didn't want to overcorrect.
The man who was clearly in charge of the other two stared at her for a moment. Marion stared back. She hoped that the fact that she wasn't at all frightened helped, and the fact that ID would have shown something sufficiently convincing.
"My apologies Miss-"
"You may call me Miss Henson, or Inspector Henson, or Miss Marion or Inspector Marion, or just Marion, but not Mari."
"Miss Henson," the man nodded. "My apologies. We weren't expecting an inspection."
"Oh, it's quite alright." Marion nodded, "You weren't supposed to expect it. That's the point of an inspection, isn't it? If you knew in advance, you might try to clean up or act in a way that you don't normally behave. Not that you would do that first or even that you NEED to do that first, but it's- well, you can't be too sure about these sorts of things."
Marion wasn't quite sure what kind of person this Inspector Henson should be. She was already a rambler. But she needed to develop her out more. At the very least enough for her behavior to be consistent.
The man in charge of the other two walked next to her with him speaking and pointing things out as Marion hummed and nodded thoughtfully. The other two caretakers walked behind her. It wasn't as if they were trying to prevent her from making a break for it, (at least it didn't seem that way). They were just following behind as a part of the escort.
Still, that didn't mean that Marion was going to attempt to make a break for it. Even if they weren't attempting to stop her now, that good will couldn't possibly last for very long if she started to run.
Eventually, the man in charge stopped. Marion stopped as well.
"Ah," Marion nodded, "A break."
"Yes," The man nodded. And then he pointedly pulled a book out of his pocket and traced along a line with his finger. "We're allowed to stop one and a half minutes for every three thousand steps walked."
Marion hummed thoughtfully, "Oh! Good! You keep a copy of the rule book on your person at all times. That's very good. I'll make a note of it. And, do you tend to take your one-and-a-half-minute breaks after every three thousand steps, or would you say, for example, in the event that attempting to apprehend the wall scrawlers requires six thousand steps take a three-minute break. Or would you just stop regardless, or would you take your break at the end of the hunt but only rest for a minute and a half here."
The man that didn't have a beard said: "We don't take breaks if we're in the middle of something important, but we do add up the steps at the end and break accordingly."
Marion hummed thoughtfully. This Inspector Henson did a lot of thoughtful humming.
"Is that alright?" the other man asked.
"Oh." Marion nodded, "Yes, of course, that's alright. Ideal actually. We give you your breaks for a reason. If you go too long without breaks, you make a bunch of mistakes. Huh. That rhymes!" Marion shook her way, "Anyway, don't worry, it was just a survey question. There was no wrong answer, well, no, I suppose that there was a wrong answer, and that would have been if you had said that you stopped in the middle of pursuits in order to break for a minute and a half. That would be unacceptable behavior."
This Inspector Henson talked a lot. Maybe she was overly talkative. That was the kind of person she was. Someone overly nervous. Someone who wanted to do a good job and wanted to do things by the book. Sort of like the rest of them then.
Marion looked around the room in a way where it it was obvious that she was looking, but it didn't look like she was making a show out of it.
"This hallway is a lot cleaner than that central square. I'll give you that." she said slowly, "It's a lot to maintain especially with all of those young girls running amuck. I can't expect you to catch anything." she tapped her fingers on something that had been spray painted on the wall. It depicted a girl with curly hair dressed in red with a white claw gripping on her head. Towards the bottom, there was another white drawing of some kind of device with a claw. They were quick and child-like, and it occurred to Marion, that the graffiti wasn't just the Kangs tagging the walls as part of a turf war, but them warning each other to stay out of a certain area because something terrible had been seen there and the wanted to warn their friends about it. "Is this new? Well, it's dry so new-ish. Not an issue. Most people aren't perfect. And most of the people who claim to be perfect are in fact just hiding their imperfections out of shame and that always results in more and more problems piling up which means that no one ever believes it when someone comes back with a five out of five report, well that's quite suspicious. But a person being otherwise perfect except for the fact that they've got a bit of vandalism well, that's not too bad of an issue. Tell, me what's that."
"What?"
Marion tapped her fingers on the claw, "Well, I assume that the scribble there is one of the girls, but what exactly is that claw thing? And the thing with a drill. I don't recognize them."
Marion did in fact recognize it, but Inspector Henson should not.
"Yes, well, the Wallscrawlers make up a lot of silly pictures." the man said. And Marion remembered a similar line being said to the Doctor. But it had been said to the Doctor in a much more sneering way. This man spoke to her in a much kinder way. Well, not kind. It was the sort of fake kindness you give to a person you don't think that you're allowed to be aggressive at.
"Yes." Marion nodded, "I'm sure that they're nothing more than a bunch of-" Marion cut herself off.
"A bunch of what?" said the man who had a beard.
Marion held a finger to her lips. Shh. She said quickly. In the distance, Marion heard a humming noise. It sounded loud enough that Marion considered that she might have heard it earlier if she had known to listen in. The Doctor wasn't with her. Hopefully, he was with Mel. And that of course meant that he was away from here and not in danger of whatever it was that was making that noise. Whatever it was that made her sick when danger was around only made her feel sick when it was the Doctor who was in danger. Not her. And of course, Marion understood that. There's no real point in giving a warning system to someone who's at no risk of dying.
Still.
"What?"
"Shhh!" Marion said. She listened and the sound of the cleaner got louder and louder. "What on Earth is that noise!"
"I don't hear anything." the man said sharply, "Look, Miss Henson, if there was anything wrong, there'd be instructions in here about how to deal with it, wouldn't there? Hmm?"
"Well, things need to end up in the book somehow don't they-"
Marion cut herself off. Something emerged from around the corner. It was large. Maybe around four and a half feet tall. It had kind of a narrow rounded head towards the top that reminded Marion of a stormtrooper helmet that had been flattened. It has two bright headlights and a right arm that was a drill and a left arm that was a buzz saw. Its middle arm was folded into itself but Marion knew that it was a claw. Marion didn't need anxiety or nausea to know that it was bad news. Marion took a step back, and then another, and then another.
"Has there been a new edition of the handbook I haven't been made aware of. Perhaps one that was printed in the last couple of weeks?"
"No Inspector," and it was funny that all it took was a giant monster for her to suddenly become "Inspector" instead of just "Miss"
"I see." Marion nodded. "Well, and you can correct me if I am wrong in my assessment, but I believe that as an Inspector when encountering unexpected phenomena that is not yet written in the books, I am in a position in which I can suggest viable protocols."
"I suppose."
"Excellent."
The machine began to roll closer to them. It's arm unfolding into a claw that opened and closed with a loud potentially bone crushing snap!
"RUN!"
Next Chapter: Clean Ups!
Mel: The Doctor is being the Doctor, but surely I can depend on Marion for some stability in these trying times.
Marion: *begins to enthuse about rats and the usefulness of clutter.*
Mel: Why do I bother?
This one might be a bit more typo-ridden than usual. I looked it over, but I'm kind of tired. Just like, emotionally. Nothing serious, just like, school.
I'll be honest, part of my motivation for writing Paradise Towers is that I get to clown on Architects.