An unnamed world, known by its inhabitants merely as "the world"; sometime in the future yet a simpler time to those who live there. The Big City.
It's night in the Big City, the time when the shady underside of humanity pokes its head out like a serpent and looks around to see what sort of mischief it can get up to. A time when most good, law abiding citizens are home in bed, and the revelers have taking over the night in seedy bars and cocktail lounges.
Down at the 10th Precinct, the dedicated men of the Police Department work late into the night, doing their best to ensure public safety. Here we find Detective Abradel "Del" Crast buried up to his neck in paperwork. The detective takes a swig of the swill that passes for coffee in this place and rests his head in his hands. Checking the clock, he finds it's "too late" AM. As he reaches for his hat to head home for the night, the phone on his desk rings loudly.
Swearing under his breath, Abradel grabbed the ringing phone after only a moment of hesitation. It was tempting to go home and find a cold bottle and a warm bed, but duty called and he'd never been able to resist answering, more fool him. It had cost him friendships, relationships and more, but it was a part what he was.
Holding the reciever to his ear with one hand and running his the other through his close-cropped hair he asked, "And what can I do for you at such a fine hour of the day?"
"This is officer Reilly on the beat. There's been an unusual death, sir. Corner a' 9th and 47th, third floor."
Keeping the sigh entirely internal - there was no point asking why someone else hadn't been called, since it was likely everyone else was equally busy - Abradel simply said, "Understood. I'll be there as soon a I can." He finishes reaching for his hat and plants it firmly on his head, waiting in case the officer had anything else to say before heading out the door and to the scene.
The officer seems in a hurry to get off the line; he hangs up while Crast is getting his hat. The trip to the building at 9th and 47th is only a mile or so from the station house, and there's not much traffic this time of night. Detective Crast makes his way there in good time.
Outside the building, three officers, including Reilly, wait on the sidewalk outside the building. On the ground level, the building hosts a Chinese restaurant. Fire escapes crisscross the face of the building from floors 2-4.
Reilly stops talking to the other officers and walks you to the door.
"Third floor walk-up; no lift. Second door on the right, 2B. Clooney's on the door making sure no one gets in and messes with the crime scene."
"Well then, let's walk and talk." Crast began to do that, continuing in with a nod at the officers securing the crime scene, slipping past and following the directions up. The smell of the food that had long since seeped into the material of the building made his neglected stomach rumble, but he suspected that the scene would quickly resolve hat issue "Give me the lead up, please. What do we know?"
Reilly, a rather portly man, sighs. He'd been angling to avoid the stairs again, but acquiesced to Crast's request. "Not much. Body was found by a neighbor. He heard some noise and found the door to 2B hanging open.
The woman's name is...was...Betty Miller."
Crast rounds the corner and sees Officer Clooney standing at the door. He immediately straightens up his posture at the sight of Crast. The apartment door is still open.
Inside, the livingroom is in mild disarray. A lamp has been knocked over, and a woman in her mid-20s lies on the floor as if she just collapsed on the spot she stood.
The Specialist looked at Allisoun,
"Well there is no doubt about it we are lost, this should have been the way to the back upper secondary control room. Past the empty Qulant-line armory, through sky tank hanger 8, along from the relinking backup chamber and backup flux-core repair units halls along from the larger items Laundry room and too.. well this should be back upper secondary control room."
She looked at the large hypotonic mushroom garden all around. Tapped her arm-AI and up came a map in front of her. It was so complex one could get a migraine if one looked at it too long. Parts of it seemed to drop throw N-space to other parts the looped in on themselves and back again. Some of it just waved goodby to euclidean space, and went off and had a party with more fun-loving and cooler spaces. It winked out of being. She looked around the massive space. It started to rain, water drops from the irrigation systems some 100s of feet above.
"You know the older types of TARDIS were bordering on cute. All small chambers and rooms, the control room was positively pocky. Not like this best at all, When they decommissioned this monster they ripped out all the big deadly stuff and left him in one massive mess. I have a feeling He's been sulking ever since."
She patted one of the plant pots,
"Sorry about that old boy, they should have treated you better, you being a war veteran and all that."
She lingered just a moment then got onto her eclectic scooter, ones she had picked up on earth the same time she had met... well picked up more like.. Allisoun her current sole companion. The Specialist was a timelord, well a dropout one. But still two hearts, a mind that made a stage 8 supercomputer AI like like a dunce. And the arrogance. It was a trite of Gallifrey. You grow up in a place where everyone is below you. Not just Metaphorically but physically, your whole race ends up with a massive superiority complex. The was earth saying she liked.
"Pride comes before a fall" and so many of her ex-classmates were no more because of that very reason. She knew she had it, that swagger, the untouchable attitude. It was deadly, and the only protection she had found for it was Allisoun. To gound her, to hold her to the mark, to remind her that "Tho art mortal" ha another earth saying. Allisoun kept her, self from herself.
She winked at Allisoun.
"Well AL, there is nothing for it but to retrace our steps and try again. Lets see if we can find some Icecream on the way back."
She says looking over at Allisoun.
"Well...."
She gives wry smile.
"That's was more the TARDIS defense systems than me. And for all, I know they are still walking around carrying what they think is a Time Torpedoes but what is in fact a SMEG Cooler freezer I kept some cherry coke in. Love that stuff, anyhow back to the point."
She powers up the scooter and sets off. As Allisoun pulls up by her side she carries on.
"As I said When they decommissioned this monster they ripped out all the big deadly stuff, they took out all the things like Time Torpedoes, Air tanks, Time Troops, Gravity-well bombs and earth-quake missiles. Even the two disintegrates were stripped out."
She made her electric scooter weave around a large statue of Rasalon made of some rare stone that shone blue.
"And they were not too carefull about it. It's why the TARDIS is in such a state. But! and this is the kind of but that kicks your butt. They left its defense systems intact on the whole."
They zipped up a kind of flyover pathway to another level.
"One of which shifts the internal spaces into an n-Dimenial maze, should any Checky intruders try and run off with stuff they should not. And no teleporting or transmitting out as well. The TARDIS just drops you right back where you started from but this time. And this was my touch. With your clothing on backward."
They zipped along racks of glowing pipes.
"O that's where the venting system is! must mark that down. Any way the TARDIS is still grumpy about being treated this way, so I suspect it's taking it out on that squad of Sontarans. Must be hell for them, born for war and you spend a near lifetime walking around getting nowhere fast with a Fridge and no one to hit with it."
She chuckles.
"O and did I ever tell you that Sontarans have a very sweet tooth, by now they will be well and truly addicted to all that refined sugar full-fat cherry coke goodness. A never-ending box of the stuff, I bet they weigh so much by now they can hardly walk."
She shouts up at the TARDIS
"HEAR THAT OLD BOY Ooo you're a cruel one."
As they moved into the lower deck of the control room and the scooter rank. The_Specialist pulled hers in to charge and got in the lift to the controls some 3 floors above.
"I bet soon as we get somewhere that has banded suger the TARDIS will dump them out to hit cold turkey with a vengeance. begging on the street for a lick of candy. O the dishonor."
She got out of the left and walked over to a large sofa-like seat, which was in an open-plan kind of office near the main control floor.
A feeling of amusement washed over them. She spotted Allisuns worried face.
"Telepathic... whats that earth word, yes 'circuitry', lets you know whats the TARDIS is feeling without some mad alarm. Like a cloister bell or having to work out what all the hums and whines are. I'm not joking some of the older TARDIS types had such low tech."
She sat and patted the seat next to her. Then looked down the side of sofa arm, to spot a small door that had not been there before, she opened it. Inside were two chilled bottles of vintage cherry coke. She took them and popped the caps off with a click from her arm-AI.
"Kinetic bottle opener, want one? In your day Coke was sold as pills but try some of the original stuff, wet and full of Cherry-fullness, is that a word, if not it should be."
She waved one bottle as she took a swig on another.
"Come one, we have nothing but time, haha, while we wait to hear if I am cleared of that little miss-hap."
Kneeling by the fallen woman, Abradel avoided touching the body. "Has the scene been processed yet?" he asked as began to look around, trying to see if there was any obvious wounds or clues. He'd need to wait for the coroner before he could do much with the body itself, so anything on the otherside would be hidden for now, but he could begin.
"No, we called you first. An ME is on the way, comin' from across the bridge."
Crast doesn't see any wounds, but as he crouches to get a closer look, he happens to set his hand down on something on the floor, right in front of a sofa. It looked like a special kind of plastic of some sort. Like a pull-tab to open something. Also from this angle, Crast could see a slight discoloration of the carpeting across the room. It wasn't really visible when looking directly down on it, like the lower fibers of the carpet had been affected by something.
"Make a note of this discolouration on the carpet, please, and make a note of this...pull tab?" He looked at it for a moment, but as tempting it was to grab it, chain of evidence was a thing for a reason.
Standing up with a fun click of knees he swear didn't happen when he was younger, Crast began to move around the room, carefully checking everything and only touching what he had to, and with gloves on.
There was a ping from the control floor, The Specialist jumped up and walked over to the space. As she did a true force holographic console make into being. An image came up showing the Gallifron TARDIS repair workshop outside.
"Someone at the door. Come on must be our secretive TVA sorry division sorry lets me try again CIA contact. The one who hid this TARDIS."
She turned and walked towards a small great door.
"Clear them hiding one TARDIS inside another. Repair bods think it is an old type 35, in for de-com. Let's hear what our new CIA contact has to say for themselves."
She stepped out into a long-forgotten alcove on the TARDIS workshop.
The outside of the tardis looked like a simple gray cylinder.
"Come out come out where ever you are?"
She said to the gloom.
Crast is pretty sure that someone walked from where the discolored spot is to where the woman was probably standing.
"We believe we've sorted things out here and are ready to authorize your departure. As such, we have a new mission for you, marching orders as it were."
"A CIA monitoring station in the Andromeda galaxy has found an unauthorized temporal incursion of unknown origins. The coordinates are in your TARDIS databanks."
Back in the control room of her type 70 TARDIS, The Specialist looked at the star chart moving around them.
"Well Allisoun our 1st mission, so here we go"
She thought and the TARDIS responded.
Type 70 TARDIS Dematerializing SOUND
Type 70 TARDIS Rematerializing SOUND
"Well we are here, and the TARDIS chameleon circuit is working fine, lets go have a look-see"
With that, the Specialist walked over to the door and out, Allisoun following. They stepped out into a large city at night, even at night lights were on and the place seemed like most large cities, resting before another day. In the sky were three moons. But the stars were lost in the light pollution. While Allisoun looked about, the Specialist tapped her arm PDA.
The TARDIS looked like a human-sized vending machine that was out of order.
"I'm getting a faint trace of Artron energy from the building across the street. Come on Allisoun let's go find out where."
The Specialist soon had them outside an apartment on the 3ed floor. She presses a few points on her arm AI and a small sheet came out the side. There was text on it. She folded it and slipped into her pocket. Then they entered the apartment to find a rather portly man, and another slimmer man looking at a body.
"Hello, I'm The Specialist and this is AL, do you mind if I take a look?"
With one hand she ran her arm AI over the body and looked at the results. With the other, she offered the letter.
"O fascinating!"
The City the TARDIS had landed in was in fact very odd looking for the temporal setting. This was the era of the tri-galactic Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire; humanity's technological knowhow had allowed them to span not only stars but galaxies. Yet this city and its buildings were seriously anachronistic, more like Earth in the 1950s.
"Um, Spec, did you notice these people are...black and white. I mean like, not multi-ethnic, but literally black and white, like everything else here? I mean, it's like we're in an old movie."
Crast: Two VERY ODDLY dressed women have just barged in on your crime scene. And they're...they don't appear...right. Like they're bright, but in a way your mind is having a little trouble defining, like their color had an additional level of depth. The younger of the two wore a jacket with the olympic loops on it with the word "Hong Kong" as well as blue jeans like some sort of beatnic.
"What, Really? is that odd Allisoun. To be honest I skipped the class on human physiognomy so the whole face thing is a mystery to me. But I will take your word for it."
--Flashback--
They stood a moment.
"Humm seems like most large human cities to me"
Then she looks at the clothing the city dwellers had on and odd fact the was a massive range of color.
"Now you mention it, Monochromaticiem, is that a word? if not it should be."
She looked at her arm AI, and tapped it.
"Right that's running, now lets go."
---Cut to the crime scene.---
Temporal Science - The Specialist doesn't think the monochromatic issue is related to any problem with time and/or space. She does make note of a temporal anomaly associated with the room, once there. One spot, in particular, roughly large enough to hold a humanoid-sized sentient being, if standing.
Culture - That's it! The Specialist didn't recognize this place by the name of the planet, Voth according to the TARDIS, but she's pretty sure this is a place called Sunset Alley, which is a theme park designed around the Film Noir era of Hollywood movies. The designers evidently went so far as to make everything, actors included, appear like a 3D black and white movie.
Abradel looked up at the pair. Clearly off planet tourists - if the strange dress didn't give it away the colours certainly did. They always looked so garish to the detective, although as he understood it they could barely tell one shade of grey from another. There loss.
Following next to the path the potential suspect Crast walked to the door, making sure to block there view of the fallen woman. The dead deserved as much dignity as could be managed and gawkers were one of the last things he'd want when he was dead. Not being dead would probably be higher on the list, but...
"Ladies. How can I be of help?" He kept his expression and tone neutral, on the off chance that they were witnesses and not simply some resident in the building with a truly morbid curiosity.
The Specialist smiled at the atypical detective type. Critty look, check dogged appearance check, and the hard-bitten expression. Raymond Chandler would have been proud a real like Frank Marlo.
"Well detective, it's more what we can do for you. I'm The Specialist and this is my assistant. I think you will find my credentials check out."
She held up her arm AI and she hopped the TARDIS had worked its magic and crafted for her an ID that would fit.
Will Save:
Crast is suspicious, but for now, the strange outsiders seem to be working for the Feds.
"AL looks around the rest of the apartment, look at for anything odd"
The Specialist gives Crast a big grin. She walks into the room being very careful to touch nothing.
"So lets see what we have shall we"
The Specialist looks over the body and scans it with her arm AI.
Then take also scans the anomaly space, where a figure could have been.
Frowning - he wasn't aware there were any offworlders in such a high position, Crast stood aside and watched to make sure the strange woman didn't touch anything. Even looking at her was uncomfotable, too much stimulation for the eyes, but she at least seemed to be following scene etiquette.
Moving over to the officer, he murmured, "Officer Reilly, would you mind popping out and seeing if we can get some confirmation that the lady is here with authority, shall we?" Calling in such an odd 'Specialist' was just smart. If she screwed something up he did not want this on his head.
Medicine - The woman appeared to have died of a heart attack, but the cause is in question.
Perception - Nothing of consequence.
Physical Scienes/Temporal Sciences - Someone transmatted in here, and they were heavy traces of chronons as well, indicating the person or persons had recently traveled through time.
"Officer Reilly, would you mind popping out and seeing if we can get some confirmation that the lady is here with authority, shall we?"
"Sure thing, detective."
She looks closely at the discoloration on the carpet.
"So a suspected heart attack. Odd then that someone should have transmitted in this location at the same time someone dies don't you think Detective. And what do you make of this discoloration on the carpet?"
She places her hand over it, not touching it just over it.
She seeks to Feel what happened here resentily
"The carpet makes it look as though someone walked the same route as the discoloration, to the lady's current position. I haven't had time to ascertain if that's correct, and if so if it was the lady walking to where she passed or someone walking to her, nor am I certain what the source of the discoloration is." Crast glanced at the body, but what he could see certain didn't rule out heart attack. That didn't mean it was natural.
In her mind, The Specialist rewinds time, gaining access to recent events. She's always had this ability, well since the regeneration, anyway. She pushes further than she's usually able; it's a slight strain on her right heart, but she manages it.
Finally, she gets the flicker of another person - a human male, pale skinned and in grey clothes - appearing in the area where the transmat occurred. He has something in his hand. A hypodermic needle of some sort? He walks toward the woman, but that's all the vision will give.
The Specialist looks up to find Allisoun standing over her, the young woman's steady hand on her shoulder.
"Are you okay? Did you see something?
She blinks a few times and then focuses on Allisoun.
"It's all right Allisoun, just needed to push a little to see the crime scene. Detective you need to check the body for puncher marks from a hypodermic needle. If the person who transmitted here, came with the intent of killing by means of a heart attack. Then that would be the best way to do it and leave no outward signs."
She then bent down and took just a few fibers from the decoration.
Allisoun, we need to go back to the lab. For tests, Detective thank you we will be in touch. Allisoun come along."
"Sorry, she's just kind of like this." Allisoun nodded at Detective Crast, and followed The Specialist out of the room.
Shortly thereafter, the ME, a Dr. Alfred Robles, arrives at the scene. Robles is a short, squat man, meek in appearance but with a determination behind his eyes. With him is a photographer, and he carries a medical kit.
"Who's the detective in charge here?" Robles asks.
She headed back to the TARDIS. Once there The Specialist with
Allisoun headed to a large Lab and workroom.
The Specialist placed her arm AI on a small table and downloaded the scan date, then she place the few fibers in a small glass vile and down a shoot.
"Right then while the tests are being done let's have a look at the crime scene with the scan data."
A hollo-projection came into being, The Specialist then used the telepathic circuitry to project what she saw of the scene.
A nondescript gray form of a male came into being and moved just as she had seen. It played in a loop.
"This person is who was there from the transmat."
Watching the woman flounce away as fast as she came, Crast couldn't help but wonder what the hell that had been about. "That would be me," he said to the ME. "Abradel Crast. When you check her out, could you do me a favour? It looks like a heart attack, but there's a couple of oddities. Would you look for hypodermic marks and do a full blood work up?" He had no reason to assume the crazy woman was right, but he didn't see any reason not to follow up either.
Specialist and Allisoun
The Specialist is unable to perceive much beyond what she noted at the scene. Ideally, Detective Crast might have picked up some detail she missed.
Crast
The ME makes his initial examination of the body.
"Well, your guess was on the money regarding that hypo, Crast. In fact, there are two strange marks here on her neck, but one I can't identify."
"Here," he points to an area on her jugular, "is your hypodermic injection site. But down here..." he moves his fingers to the back of her neck, just to the left of the atlas vertebra "I have no idea what this is. Looks like a hickey. It's like something was extracted through her skin and tissues. But I don't know what sort of machine could do that, or why."
Crast nodded. "It's enough to confirm it's murder at the least," he said simply. "Whatever else was done will hopefully come out at the autopsy." He didn't bother explaining it wasn't his guess - it would be in the report. Something was wrong here, he could feel that much in his bones.
He took a quick look at the wound, wondering what was sucked out of the poor girl. Blood was the obvious answer, and that would show up on the medical report.
"Well that's odd, nothing on the mass peck and this color thing."
She moves over to an older-looking device.
"We are going to have to do this old school"
She looks into some kind of scanner.
"This makes no sense.. I must have missed something, come on AL. let's see if we can have another word with that cleaver detective."
She stops and heads to some kind of comms link computer system
"Best give us the right credentials on the local net, should someone ask who we are."
It prints out two cards.
"There you are, one for me and one for you, they should hold up. Just have to act the part. Officer AL."
Then they head out to see where the detective was.
The Specialist can't get much from her scans of the body. Hopefully the local medical examiner can find some clue she missed; odd as it was to admit, occasionally, very occasionally, these humans were quite surprising in their resourcefulness.
As far as the physics of the situation in the crime scene, The Specialist was able to track down the source of the residual Artron energy as having a signature of a Vortex Manipulator coming out of the 53rd century.
She was reading her Arm Ais screen,
"Well well well, they used a Vortex Manipulator, new tech back in the human 53rd century. And nothing as sophisticated as Gallifreyan Chrono-tech. Vortex Manipulators are cheap and nasty, and only two kinds of beings use them, criminals and Time Agents. With a murder, it seems we may be dealing with a time Criminal"
She hurried back to the crime scene. When they got there she waited to be notest.
Crast glanced up and was careful not to frown as the strange Specialist appeared again. "What can I do for you now, ma'am?"
The Specialist and Crast meet in the hallway. At this point, the ME has taken the body to the morgue, and Crast was just leaving, having completed the investigation of the scene. Crast has not heard back on his look into the Specialist's credentials, but such things take time. The door to the crime scene is taped off, but of course Crast could enter if he wanted to.
"Hello, Yes hello again. Detective Coast, do you have time for a coffee. There must be a place near here. And it would be nicer to ask you about what your team found than here in the Hall way"
"If you wish," Crast said, still guarded. The documentation had been fine, and the other officers at the scene had obviously seen it too, but something was off about the strange women. It put him on edge, especially around such a strange murder case.
As they walked towards the coffee shop that most of the precinct's late shift lived in when on break, or at the least sent the rookies out to get there joe from, Crast filled her in on the details that he felt she needed "You were partially right about the needle - something was injected, and we're wait for the blood work. The other part is that something was extracted. A second injury site, near the first. Significant sub-dermal bruising more consistent with suction than force, the ME reckoned. No idea what was extracted yet. If anything was."