Post by Witcher Wolf on May 25, 2005 10:18:09 GMT -5
The author notes, this hasn't been edited and is provided as is. It is also definitely the new series Doctor and not one of my own creation, enjoy!
The real ‘Time Machine’
I had scarcely enough time to comprehend what was happening when I depressed the lever on my machine, pulling the world away from me in a vibrant display of colours and a chaotic symphony of sound and light. This was to be my second test flight of my: Time Travel machine since I (the often maligned subject of many jeers and sneers by my scientific brethren) had begun work upon the project twenty or so years ago.
Once more outside of the bubble created by my device I could see the transition of day and night, age and season all flowing past like water rushing down a waterfall and crashing into a pool below. Save this time of course the pool was time itself and the water could be likened to a river or a stream. Buildings fell in the ravages of the passage of tick and tock, tumbling down and crashing to the floor.
Where they had fallen new constructions grew, as I expected to see. But there was something different about this particular flight, something was not quite right. I sensed it before I even saw it – a peculiar trick of the light that was accompanied, and I thought this seemed odd – by a wheezing-groaning sound emanating from all around me.
I thought through my experience at such travel I could no longer be surprised, that I would be the master, or lord of time as it were. Yet now my machine simply stopped and the lights went out, the panels were all at zero and the lever was frozen solid in the slot. I couldn’t move it, and believe you me – I tried.
But this was not the only perplexing thing, peculiarly enough and I speak with all honesty of my experience here. I was in some sort of room; a massive architecture like none I had ever seen was before me. Such a wondrous looking place replete with outlandish wall decorations, circles of some kind lit with a sickly kind of green radiant light.
My machine rested upon a floor that seemed to be made from metal, yet was also lit underneath by this green radiance. The centre point of this bizarre chamber was given over to an almost hexagonal contraption that defied scientific explanation, a column of some material stretched high into the ceiling and again the hum and wheeze could be heard as plain as I am speaking to you now.
As I rose from the seat of my device, I took the lever as always as a precaution and tucked it into the top most pocket of my smoking jacket. It felt comfortable there and I somehow knew it would be safe, even I would be safe even though I could well be upon a vessel that hailed from mars.
I will note at this point I did have thoughts upon a particular novel, but decided that it would be a little too outlandish to pursue at this time. I felt giddy in the presence of this new technology and rather like Little Red Riding Hood - I a-feared that the owner of this contraption might come eat me, just like the Big Bad Wolf.
I neared this marvel and dared not touch it, it was alien to me and every surface had some kind of control upon it. A lever here sat opposite a switch there and a dial or two, each panel was as perplexing as the next – yet it also seemed to be somehow familiar, as if it were indeed akin to my machine.
“Don’t touch!”
A voice warned me off and I turned in a fluster, to see someone dressed as if they’d stepped off a London dock. I immediately was brought to mind of an Irish Navvy or some other lower-class member of society. A jacket made of coarse leather was the order of the day for this fellow, coupled with the short hair and large ears he made an odd sight indeed.
“Excuse me?” I replied in an offended manner, adjusting my coat and looking for suitable places to move myself out of harms way.
“I said, don’t touch,” the oaf repeated himself, and now I could place his accent it sounded as though he came from the north.
“Who are you? And what are you doing on my time ship?”
I was about to reply to the first part of the question when the words, time ship stopped me dead in my tracks – I must have looked as though I were a goldfish with my mouth flapping open and closed, a humorous sight indeed to this stranger.
“Time ship?” I finally managed with a slight pause for breath.
“Magnificent Time Ship,” he added and grinned, it did bring to mind a certain wolfish image for a moment and I suppressed a shudder.
“I am Herbert George Wells,” I said and straightened my back with a sudden change in posture, I would not be intimidated.
“Herbert George Wells,” the stranger replied and then grinned once more, “the Herbert George Wells?”
“Yes?”
“On my TARDIS!”
“Yes, no wait, perhaps…” I answered. “What is a TARDIS?”
“Time and Relative Dimensions in Space. T.A.R.D.I.S.” I should have known something like this was coming from the cocky arrogant self-assured and rather boyish nature of this fellow.
“And /what/ is a TARDIS?” I repeated growing a little irritated with this man’s evasive motions around my original question, or perhaps he’d merely misunderstood.
“Oh!” He exclaimed like an excited school boy. “It’s a time machine, not like yours though with all the bells and whistles, the umbrella is a classic touch – I loved the umbrella, you should have made little toys of those…they’d have sold for a fortune on Ebay.”
“Ebay?”
“Ah…a little after your time Herbert…you mind if I call you Herbert?” He stuck out his hand and I was suddenly reminded of the Artful Dodger from Oliver Twist.
I threw caution to the wind and gave it a firm shake, asking once more. “And you would be?”
“Oh me?” he smiled a little and said. “I’m the Doctor.”
“Doctor, who?”
“Just the Doctor, no name, no forwarding address and no time to chat!”
He was off then like a shot from a gun across the room and his hands flew over the controls of his time ship, these panels seemed to react to his touch and I was left looking at my own in somewhat of an envious nature.
“Is there a problem?”
“The Universe sits on the edge of a knife and the whole Galaxy could go down the drain, in a moment’s notice,” he replied while grinning, sparks and fire flicked up from the controls of his vessel and he seemed to be enjoying it. “There’s always a problem, and where there’s a problem I’ll be smack bang in the centre of it.”
“For good or ill?”
“That depends on your perception of what’s good and what’s not!” He moved around to the other side of this odd console and made a few more adjustments. “Pass me that will you?” He requested a device that looked akin to a hammer.
I looked at him then at the hammer, then back at him. “Are you going to use this how I think you are good sir?”
“How do you,” he struck the console panel with it, “think I am going to use it then?”
“Like that.”
The room I was in gave a lurch and I was flung head over heels towards my own ship, catching onto the chair for some semblance of support. I breathed a couple of times, heavily and adjusted my jacket again, checking for the lever – it was still nestled like a sleeping child safe and sound.
“Time quake, not a nasty one but enough to knock the TARDIS off course,” he muttered in an irritated fashion. “That’s the problem with travel like this, it’s like a lottery,” he took one hand extended a finger and pointed at me. “Lucky Wells, it’s you!”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about Doctor but I will be blunt, this is all over my head,” I leant upon my machine.
“Over your head?” he blinked and seemed oddly amused again. “You’re Herbert George Wells,” he repeated and gave me another warm grin. “You write some of the most famous books on the planet, you create mass hysteria by proxy in 1938 when the radio play causes people to evacuate a city, fantastic!”
“I do?”
“Yes, I am a fan of course, not as big a fan as I am of Charlie boy…but you’re fantastic! All those aliens, those travels, I knew it was all inspired but I never realised how!”
“How?”
“You do have a habit of being clueless don’t you?” I was a little put out by this statement, but I suppose I seemed that to such a knowledgeable man as this.
“I do not try to make a habit of it sir,” I replied in a ruffled manner.
“Oh no offence Wells, just an observation. Here you are in the console room of my TARDIS and you’re saying time travel goes over your head?” He wandered over to have a closer took at my machine and produced a curious rod of some sort; it made a rather unpleasant whine of a noise and emitted a blue light.
“Fantastic,” he seemed to favour this word above all others. “It works, but you don’t know how it works do you? I mean here I am, the last of the Time Lords and owner of this Type 40 magnificent machine,” I swore I heard a pleased sound come from the interior of the Doctor’s console room. “Master of Time and Space and you pop up, a little ape from a backwater planet and stumble into my console room, what are the odds of that?”
“An ape?” that seemed to me hardly fair and then I looked at the Doctor myself. “You sir, you look like an ape as well,” I could give as good-as-I got in a war of words.
“Oh I know we might look similar Wells, but I am…I assure you, not an ape,” he peered again at my time machine and chuckled. “Umbrella, really wonderful, got to love that design!”
“You and I were in the same place at the same time?” I queried as suddenly it started to sink in, the comment about not being an ape threw me for a while.
“Travelling, yes,” he said and made another motion with that device of his. “Ah there it is, don’t mind me!”
Before I could stop him he’d purloined the lever and was now looking at it, scrutinising it with a particular fascination. “A time crystal, all the rest is just for show really. Do you know how many of these exist in the whole of time and space?”
“No?”
“One, you’re the proud owner of it. The rest were destroyed as a result of the Time War,” for a moment I detected a hint of sadness but it quickly passed and he put the lever back in its slot. “What are the chances of that eh, a million to one wouldn’t you say, just like aliens coming from mars, except they don’t come from mars – they’re from all over the place.”
“Are you an alien?” It was a question that I had to ask, his patter was so fast and furious I was sure he could be nothing but.
“Yes, but don’t mind about me or my race, we’re not important…well…I am but we’ll talk about that after.”
“After what?”
“So many questions Wells my boy, but not enough time to answer them all,” he laughed, “strange that eh, here am I, with a time machine and you too – and not enough time!”
“Oh…”
“I can’t interfere in what you have to do,” he was fussing now like a thing possessed over my machine, making appreciative noises and so on. He poked and prodded, cajoled it and finally the lights returned to life.
“What did you do?” I questioned, now being more than a little curious as to the Doctor’s motives.
“I fixed it,” he grinned for what seemed like an eternity and tapped his device. “Your time field had become destabilised, drew you into the TARDIS, it’s all well and good – you can go home and do all the things that I am about to tell you about.”
I felt a little saddened as I heard these words, for I was first and foremost an explorer and a man of science yet perhaps it was for the best. The things in the Doctor’s TARDIS were beyond me and they should remain beyond all of us I dare wager.
As I stood there on the deck of this man’s ship he explained to me a number of things, a few ideas and my mind became full of possibilities and concepts – I was inspired and vowed to write as much of it down as I could remember, providing I got back in one piece, these test flights were not known to be this strange – this had been the oddest yet.
He spoke to me of a Great War of the Worlds, that he assured me, I would write and then a chronicle of sorts of my proper flight. I was intrigued and also somewhat frightened as he explained the horrors I had to face – he told me to be strong however and remain firm in my convictions and that it would all turn out ‘right’ in the end.
So emboldened I bade farewell to this Doctor and his machine, setting myself back in the operator’s seat I set the lever in motion and the dials to my own time. I must admit that as the console room faded from view and was slowly replaced by my own study and workroom I felt sadder than I have ever felt before.
I was left wondering and ruminating on so many things, so many threads of stories to be written. I half postulated upon including the Doctor in my travels but he gave me express instructions to leave him out of it.
I was left to reflect upon my chance meeting with a curious man, the odds he had said were a million to one and it was then that I made a note.
“The chances of any creature coming from mars were a million to one.”
It would make a suitable beginning, eventually.
The real ‘Time Machine’
I had scarcely enough time to comprehend what was happening when I depressed the lever on my machine, pulling the world away from me in a vibrant display of colours and a chaotic symphony of sound and light. This was to be my second test flight of my: Time Travel machine since I (the often maligned subject of many jeers and sneers by my scientific brethren) had begun work upon the project twenty or so years ago.
Once more outside of the bubble created by my device I could see the transition of day and night, age and season all flowing past like water rushing down a waterfall and crashing into a pool below. Save this time of course the pool was time itself and the water could be likened to a river or a stream. Buildings fell in the ravages of the passage of tick and tock, tumbling down and crashing to the floor.
Where they had fallen new constructions grew, as I expected to see. But there was something different about this particular flight, something was not quite right. I sensed it before I even saw it – a peculiar trick of the light that was accompanied, and I thought this seemed odd – by a wheezing-groaning sound emanating from all around me.
I thought through my experience at such travel I could no longer be surprised, that I would be the master, or lord of time as it were. Yet now my machine simply stopped and the lights went out, the panels were all at zero and the lever was frozen solid in the slot. I couldn’t move it, and believe you me – I tried.
But this was not the only perplexing thing, peculiarly enough and I speak with all honesty of my experience here. I was in some sort of room; a massive architecture like none I had ever seen was before me. Such a wondrous looking place replete with outlandish wall decorations, circles of some kind lit with a sickly kind of green radiant light.
My machine rested upon a floor that seemed to be made from metal, yet was also lit underneath by this green radiance. The centre point of this bizarre chamber was given over to an almost hexagonal contraption that defied scientific explanation, a column of some material stretched high into the ceiling and again the hum and wheeze could be heard as plain as I am speaking to you now.
As I rose from the seat of my device, I took the lever as always as a precaution and tucked it into the top most pocket of my smoking jacket. It felt comfortable there and I somehow knew it would be safe, even I would be safe even though I could well be upon a vessel that hailed from mars.
I will note at this point I did have thoughts upon a particular novel, but decided that it would be a little too outlandish to pursue at this time. I felt giddy in the presence of this new technology and rather like Little Red Riding Hood - I a-feared that the owner of this contraption might come eat me, just like the Big Bad Wolf.
I neared this marvel and dared not touch it, it was alien to me and every surface had some kind of control upon it. A lever here sat opposite a switch there and a dial or two, each panel was as perplexing as the next – yet it also seemed to be somehow familiar, as if it were indeed akin to my machine.
“Don’t touch!”
A voice warned me off and I turned in a fluster, to see someone dressed as if they’d stepped off a London dock. I immediately was brought to mind of an Irish Navvy or some other lower-class member of society. A jacket made of coarse leather was the order of the day for this fellow, coupled with the short hair and large ears he made an odd sight indeed.
“Excuse me?” I replied in an offended manner, adjusting my coat and looking for suitable places to move myself out of harms way.
“I said, don’t touch,” the oaf repeated himself, and now I could place his accent it sounded as though he came from the north.
“Who are you? And what are you doing on my time ship?”
I was about to reply to the first part of the question when the words, time ship stopped me dead in my tracks – I must have looked as though I were a goldfish with my mouth flapping open and closed, a humorous sight indeed to this stranger.
“Time ship?” I finally managed with a slight pause for breath.
“Magnificent Time Ship,” he added and grinned, it did bring to mind a certain wolfish image for a moment and I suppressed a shudder.
“I am Herbert George Wells,” I said and straightened my back with a sudden change in posture, I would not be intimidated.
“Herbert George Wells,” the stranger replied and then grinned once more, “the Herbert George Wells?”
“Yes?”
“On my TARDIS!”
“Yes, no wait, perhaps…” I answered. “What is a TARDIS?”
“Time and Relative Dimensions in Space. T.A.R.D.I.S.” I should have known something like this was coming from the cocky arrogant self-assured and rather boyish nature of this fellow.
“And /what/ is a TARDIS?” I repeated growing a little irritated with this man’s evasive motions around my original question, or perhaps he’d merely misunderstood.
“Oh!” He exclaimed like an excited school boy. “It’s a time machine, not like yours though with all the bells and whistles, the umbrella is a classic touch – I loved the umbrella, you should have made little toys of those…they’d have sold for a fortune on Ebay.”
“Ebay?”
“Ah…a little after your time Herbert…you mind if I call you Herbert?” He stuck out his hand and I was suddenly reminded of the Artful Dodger from Oliver Twist.
I threw caution to the wind and gave it a firm shake, asking once more. “And you would be?”
“Oh me?” he smiled a little and said. “I’m the Doctor.”
“Doctor, who?”
“Just the Doctor, no name, no forwarding address and no time to chat!”
He was off then like a shot from a gun across the room and his hands flew over the controls of his time ship, these panels seemed to react to his touch and I was left looking at my own in somewhat of an envious nature.
“Is there a problem?”
“The Universe sits on the edge of a knife and the whole Galaxy could go down the drain, in a moment’s notice,” he replied while grinning, sparks and fire flicked up from the controls of his vessel and he seemed to be enjoying it. “There’s always a problem, and where there’s a problem I’ll be smack bang in the centre of it.”
“For good or ill?”
“That depends on your perception of what’s good and what’s not!” He moved around to the other side of this odd console and made a few more adjustments. “Pass me that will you?” He requested a device that looked akin to a hammer.
I looked at him then at the hammer, then back at him. “Are you going to use this how I think you are good sir?”
“How do you,” he struck the console panel with it, “think I am going to use it then?”
“Like that.”
The room I was in gave a lurch and I was flung head over heels towards my own ship, catching onto the chair for some semblance of support. I breathed a couple of times, heavily and adjusted my jacket again, checking for the lever – it was still nestled like a sleeping child safe and sound.
“Time quake, not a nasty one but enough to knock the TARDIS off course,” he muttered in an irritated fashion. “That’s the problem with travel like this, it’s like a lottery,” he took one hand extended a finger and pointed at me. “Lucky Wells, it’s you!”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about Doctor but I will be blunt, this is all over my head,” I leant upon my machine.
“Over your head?” he blinked and seemed oddly amused again. “You’re Herbert George Wells,” he repeated and gave me another warm grin. “You write some of the most famous books on the planet, you create mass hysteria by proxy in 1938 when the radio play causes people to evacuate a city, fantastic!”
“I do?”
“Yes, I am a fan of course, not as big a fan as I am of Charlie boy…but you’re fantastic! All those aliens, those travels, I knew it was all inspired but I never realised how!”
“How?”
“You do have a habit of being clueless don’t you?” I was a little put out by this statement, but I suppose I seemed that to such a knowledgeable man as this.
“I do not try to make a habit of it sir,” I replied in a ruffled manner.
“Oh no offence Wells, just an observation. Here you are in the console room of my TARDIS and you’re saying time travel goes over your head?” He wandered over to have a closer took at my machine and produced a curious rod of some sort; it made a rather unpleasant whine of a noise and emitted a blue light.
“Fantastic,” he seemed to favour this word above all others. “It works, but you don’t know how it works do you? I mean here I am, the last of the Time Lords and owner of this Type 40 magnificent machine,” I swore I heard a pleased sound come from the interior of the Doctor’s console room. “Master of Time and Space and you pop up, a little ape from a backwater planet and stumble into my console room, what are the odds of that?”
“An ape?” that seemed to me hardly fair and then I looked at the Doctor myself. “You sir, you look like an ape as well,” I could give as good-as-I got in a war of words.
“Oh I know we might look similar Wells, but I am…I assure you, not an ape,” he peered again at my time machine and chuckled. “Umbrella, really wonderful, got to love that design!”
“You and I were in the same place at the same time?” I queried as suddenly it started to sink in, the comment about not being an ape threw me for a while.
“Travelling, yes,” he said and made another motion with that device of his. “Ah there it is, don’t mind me!”
Before I could stop him he’d purloined the lever and was now looking at it, scrutinising it with a particular fascination. “A time crystal, all the rest is just for show really. Do you know how many of these exist in the whole of time and space?”
“No?”
“One, you’re the proud owner of it. The rest were destroyed as a result of the Time War,” for a moment I detected a hint of sadness but it quickly passed and he put the lever back in its slot. “What are the chances of that eh, a million to one wouldn’t you say, just like aliens coming from mars, except they don’t come from mars – they’re from all over the place.”
“Are you an alien?” It was a question that I had to ask, his patter was so fast and furious I was sure he could be nothing but.
“Yes, but don’t mind about me or my race, we’re not important…well…I am but we’ll talk about that after.”
“After what?”
“So many questions Wells my boy, but not enough time to answer them all,” he laughed, “strange that eh, here am I, with a time machine and you too – and not enough time!”
“Oh…”
“I can’t interfere in what you have to do,” he was fussing now like a thing possessed over my machine, making appreciative noises and so on. He poked and prodded, cajoled it and finally the lights returned to life.
“What did you do?” I questioned, now being more than a little curious as to the Doctor’s motives.
“I fixed it,” he grinned for what seemed like an eternity and tapped his device. “Your time field had become destabilised, drew you into the TARDIS, it’s all well and good – you can go home and do all the things that I am about to tell you about.”
I felt a little saddened as I heard these words, for I was first and foremost an explorer and a man of science yet perhaps it was for the best. The things in the Doctor’s TARDIS were beyond me and they should remain beyond all of us I dare wager.
As I stood there on the deck of this man’s ship he explained to me a number of things, a few ideas and my mind became full of possibilities and concepts – I was inspired and vowed to write as much of it down as I could remember, providing I got back in one piece, these test flights were not known to be this strange – this had been the oddest yet.
He spoke to me of a Great War of the Worlds, that he assured me, I would write and then a chronicle of sorts of my proper flight. I was intrigued and also somewhat frightened as he explained the horrors I had to face – he told me to be strong however and remain firm in my convictions and that it would all turn out ‘right’ in the end.
So emboldened I bade farewell to this Doctor and his machine, setting myself back in the operator’s seat I set the lever in motion and the dials to my own time. I must admit that as the console room faded from view and was slowly replaced by my own study and workroom I felt sadder than I have ever felt before.
I was left wondering and ruminating on so many things, so many threads of stories to be written. I half postulated upon including the Doctor in my travels but he gave me express instructions to leave him out of it.
I was left to reflect upon my chance meeting with a curious man, the odds he had said were a million to one and it was then that I made a note.
“The chances of any creature coming from mars were a million to one.”
It would make a suitable beginning, eventually.
I love the tie-in at the end (although I'll have that song in my head for days now ;D) Brilliant idea though! 
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