Millie and Karen, the
two little criminals, were rampaging about the store with a paper tube
liberated from the trash can, their mother smiling indulgently as she rummaged
for change. The Raincoat lurked in Adult, engrossed in whatever literary
perversion he'd discovered. Goldfinger tossed aside his final magazine of the
night and stretched his lanky frame in the soft chair, yawning. And the
muttering stranger continued to scour the shelves, reading and touching each
spine.
Kayley and Michelle
exchanged a glance. In the dozen years since inheriting the shop the sisters
had become adept at silent communication. Goldfinger still hasn't spent a dime.
The Blunder Twin's mother is looking very tired. It's your turn to ring the Raincoat.
I'll do the closing yell.
Kayley tensed her small frame and bellowed, 'Attention in the store! Book Boulevard is closing for the evening!' She took a breath. 'Please make your final selection and bring it to the cash register! Thank you!'
The raincoat, ten feet
away in the small shop, turned and smiled mildly. Kayley smiled sweetly and
went to walk through the store. Goldfinger grinned, pointed and with a
practiced, 'Tomorrow, ladies' was out the door. Michelle mentally
computed the inventory loss: one or two magazines. One day she'd figure out how
he did it. Mildly cursing her younger sister, she distastefully took the
Raincoat's money and bagged his purchase. He slunk out.
'All clear' called Kayley from the back, as the rows of lights clicked off. Michelle locked
the door, flipped the open sign, and briefly surveyed the wet street outside.
There was nothing new to be seen. Early evening traffic, mist from the sidewalk
and the crushing familiarity of the old street. She sighed, lost in reverie.
Kayley watched her
sister from the stock room door. Sometimes that was all she'd do, peer out at
the world. She sympathized with her sister's mood but did not share it. The
bookstore was a joy to her, but seemed to be a burden, a responsibility, to
Michelle. Shrugging her shoulders, she entered the stockroom and sat at the
safe.
'Chell? Want to
knock off early tonight? I can handle it', she called. Michelle seemed to
not hear her. 'Hey! Get out of jail free card! Going once! Going
twice!' She waited for the traditional 'Sold!' but the outer
store was silent.
Moody tonight, that's
for sure. She left the safe, peered out the door and felt her heart kick.
The muttering stranger
was poised at the cash register. He held a glittering sword inches from
Michelle's face. Neither made a sound. It was a moment suspended in time for
Kayley; she would never have again been so captivated but for what happened
next.
Behind her, in the stock
room, a noise began to rise. It was the sound of a tired engine, or an
orchestra tuning up, or the creak of an ancient loom, or all three. A spinning
light and a blue bulk beneath began to appear. For a moment her mind disbelieved,
then the object, like a developing photograph, somehow became an objective
reality.
Years later, she would
laugh. When the TARDIS (this is the boxes name) appeared so impossibly, all she
could wonder was at how efficient law enforcement had become. For there, above
the white-framed windows, were the words, Police Public Call Box.
The windows were set in
a pair of doors, and these crashed open and bagpipe music blared. A pair of
figures emerged. One, a youngish man dressed like a math teacher, supported a
red haired girl who seemed on the point of collapse. The music stopped.
'That's it, Amy! Walk it off, walk it off!' he said in a British accent. He glanced about the room and Kayley had the impression he'd absorbed every detail. He turned to her and smiled, a bit shyly. 'Hello, Kayley! I wonder if I could trouble you for some information?' Without pausing for breath he continued. 'I'm terribly glad that music has stopped. That's something to be grateful for, at least. Oh! There's something you don't see every day!'
He led the girl - Amy, was it? – out onto the sales floor. Kayley, long past attempting to understand what was going on, followed. 'Hello! I'm the Doctor and this is my friend Amy. Pardon the frogs! She really can't help it, poor thing!' Yes, there were now frogs hopping about the floor. 'And look at you! Pointing that sharp and, if I'm correct, extremely rare Mixtomortian Grief Blade at Michelle, there. Hello, Michelle! Kayley, if you could, please?'
The Doctor deftly
transferred Amy to Kayley's arms and, searching his pockets, advanced on the
stranger. 'Here we are!' He produced a magnifying glass and bent over
the blade. He murmured to himself, moving closer to the point.
'Yes, quite
magnificent! But look at this!' Impossibly, he angled the glass just as a
car turned the corner outside. Its headlights, concentrated by the glass into
an intense beam, struck the stranger's eyes. Without a whisper he collapsed
into a puff of smoke. In a split second the Doctor pocketed the glass and
caught the sword. Frowning slightly, he weighed it, released it, and it
vanished like its owner.
He grinned with delight,
then noticed the three girls staring at him: Amy with familiar affection,
tinged with a mild, exhausted dementia (and, at the moment, a bright yellow
parrot on her head); Kayley with something approaching, but not quite utter, disbelief;
and Michelle with absolutely riveted wonder.
'Ah.' He
clasped his hands behind his back, turned his left boot on its heel and shyly
examined it. The frog on his other toe eyed him solemnly. It blinked its eyes
and vanished as he clapped his hands and rubbed them briskly.
'Michelle! Amy and I are wondering where we are and when we are. Could you please supply this information? I was going to ask your associate in this fine –' he glanced around '—book shop, but I'm afraid she's already burdened.'
Michelle blinked. 'Um, you're in Baltimore. It's August 2nd.'
'And the year?'
'What! Wait a minute! Who are you? Who was that guy with the sword? Where did he go? What's a Mixtomortion Grief Blade? Why is there a blue monkey in my Science section? And who is sleeping beauty, there?'
The Doctor quailed slightly at the barrage. 'Oh, oh. I'm the Doctor, as I'm sure I said. I don't know who the man was, though I have my suspicions. A Mixtomortion grief blade is a ceremonial sword from the inner court of the Great Regretted Dynasty of the Lesser Green continent of planet Mixtomortus in the constellation of Ursa Middling - you can't see that one from here, I'm afraid, the Blue monkey, unless I'm very much mistaken and such a species is indeed indigenous to this area, is the result of a careless menu selection by my friend Amy, and did you just say, "Sleeping?"'
'Did you just say, "menu selection?"'
But the Doctor had already turned, alarmed. He took three long strides and raised a hand to slap the dozing girl. Kayley turned her away. 'Hey! What are you doing! She's exhausted! And getting heavy!'
'You don't understand! She ate a Bilholly Strange Fruit!'
'Explain.'
'After we wake her up! And then we need to keep her awake! Trust me, it's vitally important!'
'All right. Do it.'
Amy gasped at the slap
and suddenly, with a cartoonish 'boing', a suction cup-tipped arrow quivered on
the Doctor's forehead. He sighed. Michelle touched his shoulder and pulled off
the arrow after he turned.
'It's real.' she said.
'For the moment, yes, but it's merely a manifestation of my friend's imagination. She's rather terrifically intoxicated, I'm afraid.'
'Well, then, let's sober her up. What do you say, Kayley? Cold water, coffee and a bacon scramble?'
'Right this way. One sober redhead coming up!'
9:45 P.M.
A splash of cold water, a bacon and egg fry and several cups of coffee later, they sat around the receiving table in (for Amy's sake) appropriately uncomfortable chairs. The girl, who proved to be Scottish, was surprised that it was 1977, but the small loch monster swimming in her coffee cup seemed unbothered. Kayley frowned at the creature. 'Doctor? What's a strange fruit, anyway?'
Amy giggled as the monster grew wings and fluttered up to bother the light fixture. 'He's in the TARDIS with your sister. Look out, he'll take her away. Whoosh.'