So is she.

He stares.

It's not just that it's a wildly out of place object, in a dark alleyway on the bad side of town that smells like gasoline and cigarettes and piss.  It's the way that everything goes quiet, when he looks at it, even though he couldn't hear anything before.  It's the way it shines from the inside, fluorescent through its frosted windows.  It's that shade of blue, that's just like any other shade of blue and yet somehow it -

He's transfixed, he doesn't know why.  He walks toward it, softly.

What's that song he doesn't hear?  Solemn and misty -

He traces the backs of his fingers across the surface of the wood, like petting a cat.  It's cool, it's smooth.  And it's real.  He hadn't realized he'd been wondering.

He hears a sharp swipe of laughter, from around the corner, and snatches his hand away -

(And he knows they're not laughing at him, whoever it is can't even see him, he's not stupid.)

- and stuffs it in his pocket, and hunches into his coat.  Walks away.

*

It's the next morning, and he's lying in bed in his pajamas, and -

So, on the one hand, his shift starts in ten minutes, and just the other day his manager chewed him out about how he can't miss any more days of work and especially can't miss any more days of work without letting anyone know that he's not coming in or else (reading between the lines, because he's capable of reading between the fucking lines) he's gonna get himself fired, and it's not like he doesn't have any money in his savings account but it's not enough to survive on very long, if he needs to survive on it because for example he got himself fired from his job because he's a lazy shitclown who blew off work one too many times, and he can still get to wok on time if he gets up now and scrambles into some clothes and grabs his keys and shit and runs out the door since the convenience store where he works is just around the corner (which incidentally makes it a lot more pathetic, to his thinking, that he keeps missing work) -

 - but on the other hand, he sure doesn't seem to be moving, right now.  He sure doesn't seem to be getting out of bed.  He sure seems to be making the deliberate decision to blow off work, again, when he knows it'll get him fired.

He wakes up, again, to the sound of his phone ringing, and has the unpleasant realization that he went back to sleep.  He looks at the clock, and it's the middle of the day, which means he's three hours late for work.  He looks at his phone, and the caller ID says "Manager."

So yeah he's definitely fired.

And suddenly he's fucking furious, and he doesn't have anything to be furious at because it's his own fucking fault, and he picks up the phone and hurls it at the wall of his tiny fucking apartment.  THUMP.

There's a muffled "go fuck yourself" sort of sound from the next apartment over.

He grits his teeth and glares at nothing, and rolls his neck.

His phone stops ringing, after a few moments, and just like that it all drains out of him.  Who gives a shit, right.

He lets himself fall backward, back into bed,

and goes back to sleep.

*

And so: he's out at night, again.

First thing he does that night is stop by his favorite ATM and take out a couple hundred bucks.  If he's gonna stop trying to be a person and just wander around until -

 - well, he might as well have a nice meal, and some walking-around money, while he's out.

He walks, hunched into his coat, down dark streets, and steps into a bright, buzzingly lit 24-hour diner, across the street from yesterday's alley. 

He orders a soda and eggs over easy and slumps into a booth, and stares out the window.

The box is still there, impishly blue.

He rests his head against the glass, cool and smooth, and looks at it.

He startles, a little, at the sound of a plate being set down, and looks; the cashier's brought him his food.

"Thanks," he says quietly.

"No problem, kid," the cashier says.

"Hey," he says, looking up from his eggs.  "Do you know what that thing across the street is?"  He gestures with his fork toward the blue booth.

Cashier shrugs.  "I bet it's some kinda public art thing," he says disinterestedly.  "Been there a few days."

He picks at his eggs and takes a sip of his soda and looks out the window at it again.

It's still and quiet and waiting.

He finishes his eggs.

He fishes a couple bills out of his pocket and tosses them on the table.  "I'm all set here.  Keep the change."

He leaves, and jogs across the street.

He reaches out and brushes the door gently, with the tips of his fingers, and lets them stay there.

It's quiet, it's perfectly quiet; but he can feel the electric feeling that there is something inside this box.

It says "pull to open" but the door doesn't looks like it swings outward.

He loops a finger, gently, through the little metal handle, and pulls.

No dice, darling.  Sorry.

...pushes.

It feels like it's locked.

"Are you not for me?" he murmurs.  Not whispers, not unvoiced, but low and quiet.  "Should I go?"

He barely knows what he's saying, and he definitely knows it doesn't make any sense.  But.

(It makes perfect sense to her.  But she doesn't talk.  She's a box.)

What is it about this damn thing...

His eyes trace over the words.  They're not interesting words, but he's transfixed by them, somehow, as part of a whole.

(Well, maybe she does talk, a little.  But can he listen?)

"Do you have a key, somewhere?  ...Is this a quest?  My plot hook?"

Hee.  He's cute.

He'll stay there in silence, for a while, one finger still twined gently into the little handle.  It's a little bit before it occurs to him that he's smiling.

Eventually he gets hungry again, though.

He pats the door to the box.  "I'll come back," he murmurs.

He doesn't want to go back to the diner across the street, because he doesn't want to risk the cashier seeing him twice in one night and noticing him as the guy who came in twice in one night, because he's, you know, insane; so he takes a bit of a walk.

He thinks about the box, while he's walking, while he's eating, while he's walking back.

When he does get back to the alley, there's someone else there - someone sleeping on the ground, curled up under a lumpy blanket.  And Bryce feels intensely uncomfortable at the thought of walking past them to get to the box, at the thought of doing - whatever it is he's been doing - with someone else right there, even if they're asleep.

Also, what the hell exactly has he been doing?  Crooning over a weird public art installation?

His eyes rake over the alley, the box, and he -

- feels a flash of guilt -

- turns and walks away.

He goes home, and goes to sleep.

He doesn't wake up until the next evening.

He feels - strange.  It's not exactly a bad feeling.  He's sort of - floating.  Ethereal, in limbo.  He's just been fired from his job and he doesn't have any leads on another one, and he doesn't really have anywhere to go - not anywhere he could bear to show his face, anyway - and unless he puts in a truly heroic level of effort into finding a new job, a level of effort that he can feel himself not being going to put in, he's not going to be able to find any new income before his savings run out.

So he doesn't really have any prospects of surviving.

And yet - he's relaxed, free, almost happy.  He knows he's not going to survive, so he doesn't have to try to survive.  He doesn't have to be a person, any more.  When nothing remains, everything is equally possible.

He grins a little and closes his eyes, and buries his face in his pillow, pleasantly, and dozes for a little while.  He can sleep all he wants, now.

He considers his situation sleepily, sprawled out on his little bed.  He's never done anything even close to this before, thrown aside all his infinite obligation and hurtled himself toward inevitable disaster, carelessly and blithely, utterly free.  What would he like to do today?

He gets up, pulls on his coat and his shoes.  He didn't bother changing out of his clothes, last night, so he's already dressed.

He heads for the alley.

He sees, from the other side of the street, that there's someone leaning against the wall, in the mouth of the alley.  Tall, and thin, and wrapped in something like a blanket or a long coat.  Standing there, very still.

He - doesn't cross the street.  Instead he ducks into the diner again.

He should probably eat something anyway.

Eggs over easy, and a soda, and this time he gets fries as well.  Who eats eggs and french fries?  Him, apparently.

Between bites, he rests his head against the glass.  He's still got a good view of the box, and of the stranger standing by it.

Stranger has appeared to turn their attention to the box.  They're still standing very still, though.

...maybe whatever drew him to the box is drawing other people to it.

...that's kind of a creepy thought, actually.

...he tries to turn his attention back to the food.

He finds his eyes straying to the box, again, though.  Catches whoever's skulking around it craning their neck, to look around.

Like they can tell they're being watched, somehow.

No, he's being paranoid.  He rubs his eyes and stares at his plate.

Takes another bite of food.

Chews.

Swallows.

No reason to look again.

No reason for his hands to be trembling like they are.

He looks.

The stranger looks back at him.

He jumps, takes in a breath, looks away.

Okay they're not looking straight at him any more.  Probably it was just a.  Weird coincidence.

Bite of eggs.

Just eat, and don't keep looking out the window at the person your brain decided to be paranoid about, and don't be going crazy, Bryce.

The next time he looks, the stranger's gone.

He doesn't feel like leaving the diner right now, though.

He orders another plate of fries, and eats them, one by one, slowly, hoping the sun's gonna come up soon.

*

A plane lands.

"What's the purpose of your trip, ma'am?"

"Sightseeing."

"How long will you be staying?"

"Three weeks."

"Have a place to stay?"

"I have a hotel room booked - " she gives an address.

"What's your occupation?"

"Freelance journalist."

"Mm.  Anything to declare?"

"No, nothing."

"I need to see your passport."

Stamp.

"All right.  Have a good vacation, Ms. Smith."

"I expect I shall, thank you."

*

He's shaken awake.

"You can't sleep here, kid, you gotta go."

He rubs his eyes.  "Sorry."  Scrounges a few bills out of his wallet and tosses them on the table; heads out.

It's not day yet, but the sky is turning paler blue, and orange on the horizon.  No sign of the stranger who was lurking around the alleyway last night.

What the fuck is he doing, and why does he suddenly feel on the verge of tears.

He sniffs, and wipes his eyes desperately, and - walks.  Away.  Not toward his apartment, not toward anything.  Fuck toward.  He walks away.

He barely remembers the way he felt last night.  He barely remembers any way he felt.  Waste.

The sun comes up, as he walks.

His steps slow, as the city brightens.

He stops.

He isn't going anywhere.  Whatever he thought we was doing, whatever he thought he was giving up on or getting away from - it's bullshit.  He can't even get being a melodramatic loser right.

He turns around.

Because his deranged obsession with this inexplicable fucking box is somehow now the only good thing in his life, and he wants to go lean against it like a creep some more.

He gets to the alley.

It's not there.

It's not fucking there.

It disappeared.

He actually almost falls over.  He doesn't; he staggers and leans against the wall of the alley, facing it, his arm braced against the wall and his face buried in the crook of his elbow.

To his utter humiliation, he gasps out a sob.

He slumps, to his knees, and starts crying.

He cries at the fact that the box is gone.  He cries at the fact that he cared about it, when it was just an inexplicable object that showed up one day and disappeared the next; he cries at the fact that he is feeling these emotions, that he did not ask to feel, that were forced upon him, that happened to him because of something he saw that he became attached to for no reason; he cries at the fact that he is a person that cries so fucking much.  He cries at the fact that he has the presence of mind, while crying, to move deeper into the alleyway so no one notices him crying, because if he still cares about things like not being embarrassed how upset can he actually be, and yet he is still crying.

He is still crying.

He coughs and sputters and breathes raggedly, as he cries; and he continues to do so, as he finally runs out of tears.

He breathes.

He wipes his eyes, his cheeks, his nose, with the sleeve of his coat.

He breathes.

His face is still hot, his eyes tangibly puffy and red.  He grinds the palms of his hands against them.

He needs something to drink.

He doesn't want to walk into the diner across the street, because the cashier might recognize him, and then someone who recognizes him would have seen him when he's just been crying; so he gets to his feet and trudges toward the other side of the alley.

Mechanically, he turns right, as the alley lets out; walks past an abandoned auto repair shop, into a convenience store.  Purchases a bottle of water.  He doesn't actually say any words or make eye contact with the cashier, which he assumes they think is pretty rude of him, but who gives a shit.

There's not really anyone around, but he still doesn't want to be out in the open right now.

He tries the door to the auto shop, not really expecting it to be unlocked, already digging in his pocket for a paperclip.

It opens.

...huh.  Okay.

He ducks inside and shuts the door behind him.

The first thing he notices is the running box fan.

(That's, uh, weird, actually, if this place is supposed to be abandoned.  Is someone else hiding out here?)

The second thing he notices is the grit in the air - he blinks, a couple times, and rubs his eyes.

The third thing he notices is that the box fan has a cut-open sandbag right behind it.  So maybe that's why the air feels so gritty, because there's a box fan blowing sand directly into his eyes.

He steps out of the path of the fan, which is a bit better but not completely, and takes a sip of his water, and glances warily around.

Looks like a reception area, not the sort of room you'd do actual auto work in.  The box fan / sandbag setup is on a counter on the opposite wall.  There's a red door, to the right of the entrance, which should lead to the garage.

That door catches his eye for some reason, though he can't say why.  Sip.

The box fan hums.

He blinks another speck of sand out of his eye.  Sip.

He should probably get out of here.

 - and yet, it feels like there's something on the other side of that door.

Thump.

Okay yeah he definitely needs to get out of here.

His hand stops, on the handle to the exit door.

He has a feeling, absurd, from nowhere, that someone on the other side of that door might need his help.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

He's frozen, for a moment, between his urge to run and the pressure he suddenly feels to check, to see what's happening on the other side of that door.

Thump thump thumpthumpthump in increasing frustration.

just run, just let me run and pretend i didn't hear anything, it probably isn't anything, i don't want to be in this building right now

This time, instead of another thump, there is a harsh mechanical buzz, like some sort of power tool starting up.

oh god

He edges, fearfully, toward the red door, and reaches out with one hand, and pulls it open.

There is a garage, empty of cars.

There is a tall man, wrapped in blankets, hands clad in heavy-duty yellow gloves like gardening gloves, holding a running power drill in one hand.

And there is his blue box, and she is afraid -

And the man turns, and sees him through a welding mask, and, still holding the power drill in one hand, begins to walk purposefully toward him.

nonono

i'm sorry

He slams the door shut and glances desperately around for a chair to brace it with and doesn't find one and just runs, out the front door -

The metallic rattle of the door to the garage, sliding open, upward, in the thick-gloved hands of the blanket-wrapped man.

He's already running - he's barely looking - he's past the garage door and heading for the alleyway -

The pounding of heavy footfalls behind him.

He turns the corner -

And almost runs headlong into a complete stranger, who was running down the alley the other way.

" - there's a guy with a drill - "

" - always something - come with me - "

And she turns and bolts.

He follows.

"Do you know what's going on?  With the box?"

"The police box?  Most of it, but it'll sound mad and there isn't time - get in my car - "

She beeps open the doors of her rental car and scrambles in.  Once Bryce is inside too she peels out and swerves around in a u-turn.

"What did the person chasing you look like?"

"Uh wrapped up in blankets with a welding mask helmet thing on, and heavy gloves."

"You couldn't see his skin?  - would that work?"  The second more to herself than to Bryce.

"Would what work what - no, he was all covered up."

She rounds the corner, and when there's no other cars coming makes a probably-illegal pass to park on the left side of the street.  "You mentioned a box.  Does he have it?"

"Yeah, in the abandoned auto shop - what's going on?"

"Listen to me."  She puts a hand on his shoulder.  "If I'm not back in five minutes, or if the man who was chasing you starts coming toward this car, or you see a statue of an angel, just drive away from here.  Lose anyone who's chasing you and park it by the hotel on Rouge Street and Park Avenue if you can.  Then just run.  You don't have to be a part of this."

"I - "

" - I need to know, what that box is.  It's - in my head, or something."

The stranger glances behind her, out the driver's side window, down the narrow road she parked beside.

"It's something that belongs to a friend of mine.  It was stolen from him.  I'm here to get it back."

"Is it - "

Might as well go all in, at this point, he thinks.

" - like a person?"

"You already are a part of this, aren't you."

He - smiles a bit, because that sounds like a yes, sort of.

"I think I might be."

"All right - new plan, wait at the hotel for me instead if you have to run away.  I'll get back there and explain everything as soon as I can."

He is so fucking scared -

 - and the box was scared too, if the box is really a person and he's not going crazy then it was terrified, blankets man was coming at it with a power drill -

 - his fists clench in his lap, all of a sudden he hates the man in the mask or the angel or whatever the hell it is -

 - and he doesn't like hating but sometimes it's easier than being afraid -

"No, I'm coming."

He can feel his lip quivering, his throat feels like there's something stuck in it, but he's not gonna let himself run away again.

"It's not safe, and I can't protect you."

"Then don't," he says, a little louder than he means to.

He can't meet her eyes.

"It's scared, right?  The box."

"I think, if you feel like you felt fear from the TARDIS, you were feeling something real.  I don't completely understand it.  I think... it's something that prefers to usually be more like an object than like a person, but it is like a person in some ways.  And it can feel things."

"I ran away and left it.  I wanna try to help it."

Besides, the worst that can happen is he dies, right?  He shouldn't be afraid of that any more.

She fishes something from her purse: a small, silvery key.  Hands it to him.

"This is a key to the TARDIS.  I'm going to distract the man with the drill; you try to get the TARDIS open.  There's someone inside who can help us fight an Angel, a robot dog called K9."

( - okay, sure.)  He takes the key.  "Got it."

She draws something else from her purse, that looks like a tube of lipstick.  "Ladies first, I think.  Stay behind me and wait until I have his attention."

He nods, and follows her out of the car.

They stick close to the left-hand wall of the alley.  It's wider than the one they first came down, the one around the corner; wide enough for a car.  But not as wide as a real street.  Narrow enough to be a bit gloomy even in the daylight.

The stranger glances back and says, "I don't see any sign of him.  He might be in the shop trying to get into the TARDIS."

He keeps the key clenched in one fist.  The teeth dig into his palm a bit, and it feels warm with sweat.  He's shaking, a little.

At the door to the shop, the stranger stops and turns toward him.  "Can you get to the garages through this door?"

"One of them, at least, the one the box is in."

"All right.  It looks like the door to the nearest garage is ajar.  I'm going to go in through here - " she nods to the front door, that leads to the reception area " - and try to draw him out of the garage if he's in there.  Once he's occupied, you go in through the garage door - " nod " - and open the TARDIS."

Bryce gives a thumbs up.

She tries the door, and, when its locked, points the tube of lipstick(?) at the keyhole.  It makes an oddly melodic sort of whirring noise, and the deadbolt snaps open.  In she goes.

(okay, sure)

Bryce stays crouched outside the door, waiting to dash past it to the garage door.

He'll be able to see her as she opens the red door, from the reception area to the garage; and hear her as she yells to get the masked man's attention; and hear the man's pounding footsteps as he rushes her.

okay go go -

He sprints past the people-door to the garage-door and bends down and tries to heave it up and fuck this thing is heavy he's so out of shape - he grunts - gets it up high enough and ducks and rushes in, lets it fall behind him - 

( - he can hear the door crash shut and the drone of the mask man's drill and the whir of whatever the stranger used on the door, and the drill shuts off - )

 - no time go go -

 - it's dark but he can see well enough, he runs for the box -

He presses his forehead against it as he scrabbles for the keyhole.  "I'm sorry, I'm sorry I ran - "

There's a few scuffs from the drill, on her door, but she's okay.  The door swings open for him.

"Rrrequest that, you stand aside, sir!" bleeps the robot dog disjointedly.

(okay,,, sure,,,)

He gets out of the way.

"Heat ray incoming!" the robot dog crows triumphantly, and an orange beam lances from his mouth to the blankets draped over the masked man's back.

But he dodges, drops to the ground out of the beam's way -

(and there's no sign of the stranger, anywhere behind him)

Whatever it is in the mask has no trouble maneuvering on all fours, and scuttles forward toward the dog like an oversized insect.

"Rrrecommending tactical retreat!" bleeps the dog as he trundles backward, heat rays firing at the man's mask.

He glances, between the man, the dog, the TARDIS -

He clenches his fist -

(she said weeping angels can't move if you can see their skin)

(why else would he be covered up)

(he's not moving like a human)

He yells "Stop shooting" and there's no time to see if the dog listens he just screws up his eyes and runs and -

 - he's there, face to face -

 - he hooks his fingers under the mask and rips, flings, desperately -

It's not moving.

Okay.

He keeps - his eyes - open.

He stands up.  Steps back.  Keeps his eyes on the Angel's face.

Without turning his head, or moving his eyes: "Hey uh robot dog, does this thing stay a statue if you look at it?"

"Believe, it will.  And I can maintain visual contact, indefinitely.  But, rrrecommend, we test, from inside the TARDIS!"

"Good idea," he says.  "You first.  Say when."

Sounds of trundling and robotic humming.  After a moment:

"When, sir."

"Okay."

He steps backward.

Step.

Step.

Step, his hands groping behind him for the doorway.

Step.

Step.

Step.  There's the door.  He grabs onto it, uses it to orient himself.

(His eyes are starting to prickle, and water.)

Step.

Step.

Okay.  He's inside the box.

"Okay.  I'm inside.  Can you see it."

"Affirmative."

He shuts his eyes, for about half a second.

It's right where it was.

"Did it move."

"Angel rrremains stationary and made of stone, sir."

"This unit cannot grow tired or bored, and can maintain eye contact with the Angel indefinitely.  I suggest, that you rest and rrrecuperate inside the TARDIS."

He heaves a sigh and sits down.

He leans back - and then scrambles upright again, when he finds himself leaning back into empty space instead of hitting the inside wall of the box.

He stands up, slowly, and turns around.

All orangey, aglow, pillars curvaceous like living things, and an eerie green tower-console, in the middle of a room far too big to fit.

Hello, darling.

Come on inside, hon.  Just don't press any buttons.

He walks in, slowly.  He can't help himself; he stares.

Aww, you'll make me blush~

He smiles, a little.

Only a little, though, and only for a moment, before it fades.

He leans on the console, over the controls.

There's no sign of the woman - the woman who's name he didn't even learn.  They opened the TARDIS, but - what for?  The robot dog paralyzed the Angel, but - what next?

He sighs, and sits down on the floor.  And then lays down flat on the floor.  Splays his arms out.  Closes his eyes.

Wakes up.

He sits up and looks behind him.  The door to the TARDIS is closed.

He stands up and, hesitantly, step by step, approaches the door.  Puts his ear against it.

"Hey robot dog?" he says, loudly enough to hopefully be heard.  "Is it safe to open the door?"

"Affirmative!" comes the muffled reply.

He does.

There's the robot dog, and there's the Weeping Angel, still in a staring contest.

He lets out his breath, and slumps a little.  "Cool.  Great."

He's got nothing else.  He goes back into the TARDIS, shuts the door.

Leans against the wall.

"Fuck."

"FUCK!"

His arm windmills like he wants to hit something and can't find it.  He wrenches the door open again and storms out, and grabs a wrench from the wall, and swings it over his head as hard as he can at the Weeping Angel's back.

It doesn't even clang.  Just a dull thunk muffled by the blankets.

He tosses the wrench aside and makes a choked sound, like a sob.

Kneads his eyes.

Glares at nothing, and stalks across the room to the red door, that leads back to the reception area.  Where the stranger was fighting the Angel.

He is not done, he will not be done here, this will not be how it ends -

He wrenches open the door, and - he doesn't even know what he's looking for, but -

- but he sees her purse.

It's not nothing.

He takes it.

He roots through it shamelessly as he's heading back to the TARDIS.  Some makeup - looks like actual makeup, not whatever she used on the locked door - some cash, some miscellaneous toiletries -

A DVD, in a little plastic case.  A generic DVD, the kind you record something on yourself, in a generic circular case, that you buy to keep DVDs in when they don't have cases of their own.

It's not nothing.

To K9, quick and businesslike: "Hey, does the TARDIS have a DVD player?"

"TARDIS command console is divided into six terminals!  Clockwise from the terminal facing the entrance, the fourth terminal contains an adaptive disk drive and a suspended display screen!"

"Thanks."  Thumbs up.

Back in the TARDIS.  Clockwise is... he closes his eyes and holds his arms out... left.  He walks up to the pillar in the center, that K9 called the command console, and follows the circular catwalk around, to his left.  One... two... three... four.

Okay there's still a bunch of nonsense buttons and levers and greebles here that he doesn't understand but - that looks sort of like a disc drive, and that's a TV screen looking thing.  It's hanging down on something like one of those jointed arms like dentists have in their work-rooms, with the big bright lights on the end, so they can move the lights around but they stay suspended in one place otherwise.  He moves the screen to eye level and -

 - hesitates.

"...I'm trying to figure out how to - salvage this situation.  Can I use your DVD player?"

The disc drive flashes twice, encouragingly.

...Okay that feels weirdly like a yes.  He pops open the DVD case and inserts the disc.

The drive sucks in the disc in the weird way that disc drives do -

And the screen lights up, with a face he hasn't seen before.

"Who are you?"

Well, he's pretty well through the looking glass at this point -

"Can you see me?"

"No, but, really, who are you and how did you get in my TARDIS?"

"...wow I actually can't tell.  Uh, if you can hear me say, uh, apple cucumber."

"You met Sarah Jane?  - did you go through her purse?"

"Okay," he says a bit pointedly, "I'm gonna assume you can't hear me because you didn't say - oh this is fucking stupid."

"Did she explain how this works?"

"No.  How what works.  Who cares?  I'm insane.  I'm probably hallucinating.  Jesus Christ."

The man on the screen groans.  "Completely bollixed.  I hate when this happens.  All right - you, Bryce Lynwood, watching this for the first time with no idea what's going on."

He starts.

Uh.  Okay.  Sure.

"I can't actually see you, this is an ordinary recording.  But there's a trick for when two people at different points of time need to communicate in real time.  I've got a recording of you that I got earlier in my timeline, and now you've got a recording of me, that you're watching on the TARDIS's display screen.  How this works is, I watch the recording I have of you while I'm making the recording you have of me, and I reply to everything you say to me.  Then the recording I make has my side of the conversation, and I do some time nonsense to get that recording to you before we have this conversation.  Then you do the same thing I did the other way around - watch the recording of me, make the recording of you replying to me, then sometime later do your own time nonsense to get the recording to me before I talk to you."

"...okay I think I followed that, but I'm not being recorded - no you just said you can't see me, right - "

"What you just watched, up until I started - talking to you properly - was my side of a conversation with you.  But it's my side of a conversation I have with you after you've already watched through the beginning of this recording once.  We're going to do the trick I just explained to you.  You're going to take your phone and record yourself responding to me.  But at the same time you start recording yourself, you're going to start this recording over from the beginning.  Watch through again, knowing what's going on, and recording yourself replying to me, and it'll be like a real conversation.  I'll be confused - obviously you just saw me being confused - because I expected Sarah Jane to be on the tape instead of someone I've never seen before."

There's no use saying it out loud, but he is kind of wondering at this point how the recording of him is supposed to get where it's going.

"Right - don't worry about getting your recording to me yet, we'll work that out after we deal with the Weeping Angel.  Once I say go, just hit the play/pause button, second from the left on the bottom of the display screen, then hit the leftmost button twice, then the second button again.  That'll start the whole recording over.  And make sure your phone's recording you once you hit play again.  Got it?"

He positions his finger over the pause button.

"Go."

Pause.  Restart.  Record on his phone.  Play.

"Who are you?"

"Now you can see me."

"No, but, really, who are you and how did you get in my TARDIS?"

Okay this is really weird but also kinda cool.  "I'm Bryce Lynwood.  I met your friend who I think is named Sarah Jane, she gave me the key."

"You met Sarah Jane?  - did you go through her purse?"

"We never really got around to introductions, but she said you sent her to get the TARDIS back.  The Weeping Angel got her."

"Did she explain how this works?"

He giggles a little.  "No, you did, but - you do in a second, once I tell you that I watched once already up to this point without understanding what was going on, and then you started talking to me-back-then and explained it."

Groan. "Completely bollixed.  I hate when this happens.  All right - you, Bryce Lynwood, watching this for the first time with no idea what's going on."

Hee.

"I can't actually see you, this is an ordinary recording.  But there's a trick for when two people at different points of time need to communicate in real time.  I've got a recording of you that I got earlier in my timeline, and now you've got a recording of me, that you're watching on the TARDIS's display screen.  How this works is, I watch the recording I have of you while I'm making the recording you have of me, and I reply to everything you say to me.  Then the recording I make has my side of the conversation, and I do some time nonsense to get that recording to you before we have this conversation.  Then you do the same thing I did the other way around - watch the recording of me, make the recording of you replying to me, then sometime later do your own time nonsense to get the recording to me before I talk to you."

"You pause for a minute here while I talk back like you can hear me.  ...Okay go."

"What you just watched, up until I started - talking to you properly - was my side of a conversation with you.  But it's my side of a conversation I have with you after you've already watched through the beginning of this recording once.  We're going to do the trick I just explained to you.  You're going to take your phone and record yourself responding to me.  But at the same time you start recording yourself, you're going to start this recording over from the beginning.  Watch through again, knowing what's going on, and recording yourself replying to me, and it'll be like a real conversation.  I'll be confused - obviously you just saw me being confused - because I expected Sarah Jane to be on the tape instead of someone I've never seen before."

" - and okay at this point I'm wondering how we get the recording I'm making now back to you in the past."

"Right - don't worry about getting your recording to me yet, we'll work that out after we deal with the Weeping Angel.  Once I say go, just hit the play/pause button, second from the left on the bottom of the display screen, then hit the leftmost button twice, then the second button again.  That'll start the whole recording over.  And make sure your phone's recording you once you hit play again.  Got it?"

"He's got it."

"Go."

"So, hi!  I know this is an emergency but that was kinda cool."

"Could've gone worse, I suppose.  I'm the Doctor, by the way."

"Hi, The Doctor.  So, uh, what - "

(It's not quite what he goes into that sentence expecting to ask, but what comes out is:) " - the fuck is going on?"

"What do you know so far?"

"You've got - a time machine and-or spaceship I guess, that was stolen by a Weeping Angel.  Weeping Angels can't usually move if someone's looking at them but this one wrapped itself in blankets and wore a mask so we couldn't see its skin.  Your time machine was - just kinda sitting around in an alley? before the Angel lugged it away into this abandoned auto shop.  It was on a forklift, I guess that's how the Angel got it here.  I poked around and found it, the Weeping Angel chased me away, I met Sarah Jane, I got the TARDIS open while she distracted the angel, and the Angel - uh, disappeared her - and your robot dog got out of the TARDIS and paralyzed the angel.  He's still keeping it locked down now.  ...Also I guess you're somewhere else in time even though your time machine's still here."

"Hold on, the Angel was wrapped up in blankets?  Wearing a mask?  And - and that counted as not seeing it?"

"...yeah."

"But then why don't they all do that?  They're so fast the blankets would've never stayed in place.  Then why'd it work this time, why wasn't this angel moving that fast? - ohhh because it's so weak, it's starving, that's why it was only able to send me back a year - you said Sarah Jane fought it, it was moving like a person?  Under the blankets?"

"Yeah, I wasn't even sure it wasn't a human before I pulled the mask off.  Look, can you back up a second, what did the Weeping Angel do to you and Sarah Jane?"

"A Weeping Angel's a weapon, an instrument of kidnapping.  There was a war, a long time ago, a war between time travelers, and Weeping Angels were one of the weapons used in that war.  An Angel gets its hands on its target and sends it back in time, far back in time, dozens or even hundreds of years, and the people who deployed it go back as well to the same time and place and pick up the victim.  Then they send a signal to their past selves in the future, let them know the mission's going to be successful so they know to deploy the Angel.  This one must've got caught by some other kind of weapon, something that flings its target through time and space - and it wound up on Earth for some reason.  But Weeping Angels eat TARDISes, and this one didn't have anything to eat.  It must have been hiding out for who knows how long, getting hungrier and weaker until I came along.  It must've recognized my TARDIS and sent me back to get me out of the way, then carted it off.  If you saw it in the alley then you saw it while I was still around, we just missed each other.  But I had the only key, the only one that wasn't locked inside it anyway.  I sent a package to Sarah Jane, she's an old friend of mine, with the key and a letter explaining what was going on, and the disc that was supposed to be her side of the conversation we're having now.  Actually I just sent it off, she doesn't get it for at least a few days, maybe a few weeks, from my perspective.  Overseas shipping."

He nods along.  "So the Angel did the same thing to Sarah Jane as it did to you?"

"It's probably getting weaker, it may have only sent her back a few months."

Nod.  "So okay maybe this is a stupid question, but - the Angel sent you back in time, and you sent Sarah Jane in your future to get into the TARDIS and - what, send it back in time to you?  Why didn't you just wait out the year?"

"If I had tried to wait out the year, then I could've run into someone else the Angel sent back in time after it sent me back in time, and they might've given me information about what happens in the future.  For the future to be determined by your actions, your actions have to not have been determined by that future - otherwise it's just an arbitrary future determining itself, with you as an intermediary.  And if you know the future, you can't stop that knowledge from affecting your actions.  Whether you try to stop it or try to bring it about, you're doing it because you know what's coming.  So if I want to make sure the TARDIS is safe from the Angel, I have to take actions that cause its safety while minimizing the chance of getting advance knowledge of what happens to it."

"...But you're getting advance information right now."

"Well, I've already done all that.  I didn't watch this tape myself until I'd already done everything I reasonably could to affect the events this tape would tell me.  I've kept my actions in the past and the information I get from the future in the right relative order.  From Sarah Jane's perspective, I make the plan, give Sarah Jane my instructions, she executes the plan, it goes however it goes, then she reports back to me by watching her tape.  From my perspective, I make the plan, set the plan in motion, I watch my tape and learn what happens in the future.  I lose the ability to affect the plan, but I already affected the plan before I learned its outcome.  So the Sarah Jane who already executed phase one is talking to the me who can't affect phase one any more, but we share the ability to influence what happens in phase two.  (Obviously it's you who's reporting back not Sarah Jane, but it sounds like if she were on her own she wouldn't have gotten the TARDIS open at all, so that worked out all right.)"

"...okay let's just stipulate that this all makes perfect sense.  What do we do next?"

"We need to get me and the TARDIS and the Angel and preferably Sarah Jane all in the same place at the same time.  I can pilot the TARDIS and Sarah Jane can do it well enough to bring it back to me, but we're both stuck in the past."

" - could you wait out the year now?  Since you know what happens in the future, and it's me and K9 immobilizing the Angel, so it can't send anyone else back in time to meet you and trap you in a stable time loop you don't like?"

"In theory, maybe, but I have other reasons not to want to stay in one place too long..."

" - Sarah Jane could, maybe.  Except she didn't pack for that long a trip - and she's not exactly in the country legally, that could get dodgy - and she's technically using someone else's legal identity as long as she's displaced backwards in time.  And if she runs into the Angel between when it shows up on Earth and when past-her and you and K9 beat it, then past-Angel could send her back again even farther."

"...Yeah, shouldn't the Angel be on the lookout for that, actually?  If it's sending people back in time to get rid of them.  - It came at me with a power drill, actually, did I not say?  I guess it wanted to send me back and let me bleed out."

"Well, that's cleverer than what it did to me."

"  - and it is clever, it has to be clever, because we know it can think of wrapping itself in blankets to stop people seeing its skin - and if it was attacking with a drill it can use tools... what about Sarah Jane, did she get hurt?"

" - shit, I don't know - no, I think I remember hearing her shut off the drill with her buzzy lipstick thing.  And I don't think the Angel had the drill when it came at me the second time, after it got rid of her."

"It still could've hurt her, though, before it sent her back - don't know why it wouldn't have done me, unless it thought it could send me back farther until it tried - but either way it knows now that it can't send people back far enough to get rid of them properly, so it's trying to injure them before it sends them back, so they die in the past."

"...and if we run with the assumption that it thought it could send me back a few hundred years, but only found out after it did that it could only send people back a year or less - first thing it does is canvas the area, see if anyone it sends back in the future hangs around to cause trouble for it later - and if it doesn't find anyone, it gets to decide what that means, and it decides to try to make the reason that happened that anyone else gets killed first."

"Hold on I'm barely following you - you're saying that first it sees you, it tries to send you back far enough that even if you wanted to wait out the displacement you couldn't, but it finds out it can only send you back a year.  And it thinks, well, anyone else I send back could easily wait out the year, I better check around on the assumption that you or one of my other victims is waiting around to try to... get back at me, or stop me from doing it again.  Or maybe they don't understand time travel and think they can stop me from doing it in the first place.  Or whatever.  One way or another someone I send back, in the future, could run into me now in my present before I send them back.  So it tries to do some detective work at that time, after it sends you back, to see if anyone it will send back in its future is hiding around there somewhere.  And either it doesn't find anyone, in which case - now it's free to decide why it doesn't find anyone?"

"It has evidence from its future suggesting that it doesn't send anyone back in the future that successfully hides out nearby until it could find their hiding place.  It can see that and think, one reason I wouldn't find anyone I sent back in time is because no one I sent back survived that long, because I killed them.  And it can decide, based on that, to lethally injure anyone who comes after it before it sends them back."

"Right.  Or it can search around and find someone in which case it probably kills them.  And even if it finds one person it can still have that idea about other people - so either it didn't see Sarah Jane waiting out the three months in the past and so it injured her before it sent her back, or else it did find her and they fought again.  In her future and its past."

"And it already beat her once," he says darkly.  "So if Sarah Jane meets the angel a second time in the past, it probably injures or kills her and sends her farther back, and if we avert that by rescuing her after the first time it sends her back, then it doesn't see her again and tries to kill her the first time they fight.  So either way we can't stop the Angel from doing something to hurt her."

"But if she decided to wait out the year somewhere else, when the angel couldn't find her - no, then it doesn't find her in the past and decides to try to kill her in the future again, right?"

"Right.  - Good point, in fact."

"Which if I'm keeping up correctly I think means that I have to figure out how to fly the TARDIS back to wherever Sarah Jane is.  Uh, whenever she is, I guess?"

He waves aside the correction.  "Don't overthink it, I know what you meant."  He sighs.  "If neither of us can get to the TARDIS... but I wouldn't want to bank on being able to teach you or walk you through it without being there in person."

"...Sarah Jane said the TARDIS was - like a person.  Was she right?"

"...she has some person-like qualities.  The TARDIS does, I mean."

"I think.  I've been... talking to her.  We sort of - I sort of - connected with her, or something, when I first found her in the alleyway.  And... she might've gotten my attention when I first came into the abandoned auto shop.  And I apologized to her for running away and I think she accepted my apology, and I asked to use her DVD player - because she'd told me not to touch any of the controls - and I think she said yes."

...He smiles a little.  "Oh, I think she likes you, Bryce Lynwood."

He smiles back, a little.

"But - " as he turns serious again.  "Would that help with flying her?"

He scratches his stubble contemplatively.  "It's better than not, but it won't get you all the way there.  ...Her navigation doesn't work very well, and some of that's her navigation actually not working very well and some of it is her having her own opinions and nudging us where we need to go, sometimes.  She can't properly fly herself but she might be able to help.  It's hard, though, for TARDISes to think or act like that.  I think that's why they have pilots."

"I could... try to help her through it.  Not that I know how to fly her either, but - be there for her.  She's easy to talk to.  Easier than people, I mean."

He grins a little again, at that.

"And you've got K9, he couldn't press any buttons but I think he knows what they all do.  And moving straight back through time staying in the same place relative to the Earth isn't the hardest trip in the world even with bad navigation."

"I - could try it, but - I'm imagining trying to fly a space shuttle with one guy on the phone and one guy who can't press any of the buttons, telling me what to do.  And like, that seems self-evidently stupid.  I'd die instantly."

He leans back a little and sighs.  "Yyyye-ap, granted, there are a lot of ways it could go wrong."

"...There is a sort of - thing - you could do, though.  It's called the Catalax maneuver.  Relatively simple, hit a few buttons and pull a few levers in the right order, not too bad if you muck it up.  You'll sort of - skid, a few months backward in time, if you do it right.  Problem one is that's not enough time to get back to me, you'd have to hope Sarah Jane wound up inside the Catalax window.  And problem two is that it's not good for the TARDIS.  She'd be laid up for a few days at least before she could make another trip.  Which isn't too bad tactically speaking - assuming the repair shop is still abandoned a few months ago, you can just shoo people away, and you'd probably have to wait a little while for Sarah Jane to show up anyway if you're aiming to show up before she does.  But it's not something I like to ask of her."

"It - hurts her?"

"It does."

He sighs, leans on the console.  "Is there - anything else?  ...I bet this wouldn't work but it seems like we should be able to, like... like what if we said, okay we'll have you from the future come rescue you from the past, and the first thing you do once you're rescued is become you from the future and go rescue your past self, right?  That's - self-consistent or self-stable or whatever it's called, when a time loop isn't a paradox?"

"It'd be self-consistent if it happened but there's no way for us to cause it to happen.  I can cause you to show up from the future with my TARDIS by sending you this message, which I don't need a TARDIS to do.  The causal chain starts from a decision I make, and an action I take, outside the time loop.  If my future self came back from the future and gave me the tools I needed to go back and rescue myself, if you tried to follow the chain of causality, you'd find it going in a circle.  Nothing my past self, my rescued self, did from outside the time loop would cause it to happen.  Which means that I can't do anything to implement that plan, since my future self hasn't come back to rescue me.  If he did, it wouldn't be because of actions I took to make it happen, it'd just be once-in-a-universe blind luck."

He nods.  "I - think I get that.  Okay.  And - I don't know, there's no one else who can fly the TARDIS...?"

"No one else on Earth, in your time.  There was a - "

"No.  No one else."

"Okay.  Can I have a minute to stretch my legs and think - no, I'll just pause both recordings and start recording again in like five minutes, would that work?"

"It'd work.  Don't take too long, though."

He nods.  Hits the pause button on his phone and on the display screen.

Sets his phone down, on an empty patch of terminal, and closes his eyes.

There's two concentric circular catwalks, circumscribing the TARDIS's command console; one just up against it, for standing on while you fly it, and one separated from it by space and railings, connected by a few pathways with little three-step stairways.  He moves to the outer catwalk and - walks.  Slowly, in a circle around the console.

It's all spinning in his head, the past day.  It probably hasn't even been an hour, since he met Sarah Jane, and in that time he's run for his life and pressed her for answers and help her unlock the TARDIS, and defeated a Weeping Angel, and met another stranger and talked to him across time, crammed his head full of a new alien time-travel logic.  And everything about the mysterious blue box that's dogged his thoughts - it's a person, it's a spaceship, it's bigger on the inside, it knows him and it's been talking to him and it likes him, it's a she, should he be calling her it if she's a person?  The man who called himself the Doctor called her an it, but he also called it a her.  And it's his friend, and the only way it's safe for him to fly her back to Sarah Jane is to hurt her.

It's so much.

And yet he doesn't want to cry, not really, which is insane in itself because when doesn't he cry.  The world's gone insane around him - or maybe he's gone insane, maybe he's just huddled in that alley hallucinating all of this - and it could just be an adrenalin high, but he feels like - even as it whirls in his head, even as he lets it whirl in his head and just walks, in a circle, around the console - he feels like he's getting a grip on it.  Everything else can fall away, it doesn't matter what happens except in the next five or ten or thirty minutes.  He's focused in, on this.

He stares at the console.

All things considered he should probably talk to the TARDIS about this.

He walks up the catwalk and leans on the console and looks up.  At the pillar.  He doesn't know why, but it feels right.

"Hey."

Hey.

"I've been talking to - the Doctor.  I don't know how much of the conversation you were following.  Or if you could."

"The gist of it is - he and Sarah Jane are both stuck back in time.  Sarah Jane is hurt, so he wants to travel back and make sure she's okay; and he thinks it's dangerous for him to stick around in one place for a year, without you around."

Reasonable.

" - I keep - feeling like I'm hearing things from you.  Am I?"

<333

Yeah, you are~

Little grin.

"I hope that was a yes."

"So - he wants me to pilot you back in time, to pick him up or to pick up Sarah Jane.  But - I don't think it'd be safe for me to really fly you, and I don't think he does either - so he suggested something else, something called a Catalax maneuver, which would be easy for me but I guess hard or painful or - unpleasant - for you."

Spin up for a short journey and then hit the emergency brake and the nitro boost at the same time.  She's familiar; she's done it once before.

"Was it - okay?"

Some models are designed for it, but this one isn't; she'd need to recuperate for a little while, heal up her brakes.  Not the most fun she's ever had.

But she'd be okay.  It was her idea, the last time.

"I didn't want to do something like that without asking."

He's a sweetheart.

But it's a good plan, and she's up for it.  Not like he's planning to make this a regular thing.

He smiles, and - feels himself welling up, a little.

"What does it feel like?"

Like landing on your feet when you should've rolled, maybe.  Not that she has feet.  People with bones and nerves and things might have it worse, she's not sure.

It's sweet of him to worry.  But he can tell the Doctor she's okay with the plan.

"Okay.  Thank you."

He sits back down and resumes both recordings.

"Hey.  I, uh, talked to the TARDIS.  She said she'd be okay with trying a Catalax maneuver."

"You talked to her?  Like a proper conversation?"

"I think so.  She said it was her idea, the last time you did it, and... she called me sweet, for worrying."  He can't help but smile, as he says that.

"She really does like you."

Bashful grin.

"Right - " and he's palpably more animated, now, as he speaks " - we've got a few more details to work out."

The plan develops:

The Doctor is going to leave his video camera and his recording of Bryce in the auto shop for Sarah Jane to find.  If the recording continues after the Doctor shuts off the camera, Sarah Jane will tell Bryce as much as she knows about how far back she was sent, and walk him through how to perform a Catalax maneuver that will land him as close as possible to her, without making her wait.  If the recording ends, Bryce is just going to go as far back as he possibly can - the Doctor walks him through how to do so, in advance - and wait for her to show up.

The TARDIS has a levitating stretcher in storage which the Doctor tells Bryce how to find, and a first aid kit which will help make sure it's safe for him to get her on it, even on his own, if she's too hurt to move.  He also gives Bryce directions to one of the bedrooms and one of the kitchens, in case Sarah Jane can't do it herself.

K9 agrees to stay behind and wait for the TARDIS to return, on condition that if something happens that prevents them from coming back promptly, whoever can gets out of town and goes into hiding, then meets back up with him just after the moment the TARDIS disappears, so he's not in danger of being found by curious humans and taken apart.

"And we'll deal with the Angel once everyone's here," Bryce says.

"Well, apparently it's more than a match for any one of us," the Doctor says, "so yes."

He straightens up.  "Ready to say goodbye?"

He nods.  "See you soon, Doc."

"Here's hoping."  And the screen goes dark.

"Are you all right?"

 - he breaks into a grin.  "Yeah.  I'm okay.  I got into the TARDIS and K9 and me got the Angel paralyzed.  - can I assume you dropped your purse intentionally for me to find?"

She smiles.  "I did.  I'm glad you're safe."

"Are you all right?  We uh, kind of figured you might be hurt.  The Doctor and me, I mean, we got in touch."

She grimaces a little.  "The Angel hit my head for me, but not too badly."

"We uh.  There's probably not like a tactful way to say this but.  We figured it was trying to injure you badly enough that you'd die in the past."

"Well I'm not the happiest I've ever been but I'm not that badly off, don't worry," she says.  "Do you and he have a phase two?"

"I talked to him, and - to the TARDIS - and she and I are going to do something called a Catalax maneuver and hopefully get sent back the same amount of time you did.  The Doctor said you could walk me through it."

"I can," she says.  "It was the first thing I ever did with the TARDIS too, in fact.  It was her idea then."

"That's what she told me.  The second part, I mean, that it was her suggestion."

Nod.  "Now, for a Catalax maneuver the thing to do is set the coordinates for a time jump about twice as far back as you want to go, to start with.  I've had a look on my phone, and according to Google it's about seven months ago, so you'll set it for fourteen months back.  The trouble is, they're not in Earth units..."

There's a few moments of setup, mostly twiddling dials on one of the six terminals.

"...if you stand at the six o'clock terminal, you should be able to see two levers on the terminal to your left, and a sort of pole or plunger to your right, that you can pull out and turn and push in.  Don't do anything with it yet.  The leftmost lever starts the journey; the lever to its right is the handbrake.  The plunger is the boost control.  Pull the leftmost lever, wait for the pillar in the center to light up and start moving.  You'll hear a warbley sound and the floor will probably shake, that's normal.  Pull out the plunger, turn it a quarter turn to the right, then push it in as hard as you can while you swipe the handbrake at the same moment.  If you do it right there'll be an absolutely ghastly noise and all the lights will go off for a second, then there'll be an alarm.  Hit the button on the ten o'clock terminal I showed you before to override that alarm."

"Lever one, wait a moment, pull the plunger, turn the plunger, then push and hit the second lever at the same time.  Got it."

"Over to you, then."

" - I'm actually gonna pause you for a second, while I do this.  If that's okay."

"If you're confident.  Hit play the instant something goes wrong, I'll talk you through it as best I can."

"Thanks."

Pause.

There's a slight noiseless hum, an anticipation in the air, from the coordinates he's punched in.

"I'm gonna do it, in a second.  Are you ready?"