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It was all over the news.
“NEW MODERN ART MUSEUM GOES UP IN FLAMES: CAUSE STILL UNDETERMINED.”
You had been fine the whole way home. It had almost felt surreal, like nothing had ever happened. Like you hadn’t been nearly killed by mannequins, and you weren’t technically an accomplice to arson. But when you saw it on the telly, you just got that feeling in your stomach—the kind of feeling you get when you’re on a rollercoaster, like your stomach is going to fly up into your throat—and that’s when you realized.
I could have died.
So, in reaction, you did what most normal, sane human beings would do. You laughed. Because, honestly, while that—whatever it was—had been the most terrifying experience of your entire life (which wasn’t saying much), it had also been the most exciting. That wasn’t really saying much either, because ‘exciting’ for you usually meant cooking something that wasn’t a 5-minute heat-up meal or a hot pocket. But, still.
It was fun. You had loved every minute of it. And given the chance, you’d do it again.
Not bloody likely that I’ll get another chance, though, is it? You thought, and sighed. Come to think of it, you didn’t even know the Doctor’s real name, much less how to find him again.
In the kitchen, the phone rang.
You sighed, and got up off of your lumpy couch to go grab it.
“Hello?”
“Oh, thank god, you’re all right.” That would be Charlie Hegner. Full-time best friend, part-time accomplice to doing questionable things that may or may not be illegal. Also, coincidentally, one of the few people who would actually care had you burned to death in the art museum.
Speaking of that, you probably should have called him. Whoops. You winced.
“Yeah, Charlie, I’m fine. Sorry I didn’t call. Rough day.” I was nearly murdered by some weird guy’s modern art project. But, you know, that’s totally normal.
Charlie sighed, relieved. “That’s okay, that’s fine. I’m glad you’re all right.” He paused. “Oh, and I was wondering, if you wanted to get together this weekend, maybe go down to the pub or something?”
“Uh. Yeah, sure, I suppose. Can we figure it out later, though? I’m kind of tired.” Okay, that was a lie. But only a teeny one. As if you could sleep after all that had happened. No, you needed answers.
“Oh. Oh, uh, yeah, that’s fine with me.”
“Okay.”
Cue awkward pause.
“So, bye, I guess?” He said.
“Yeah. See you.”
You set the phone down and glanced at the clock. You frowned. It was nearly eleven at night, and your mind was still whizzing about with all sorts of questions. So, obviously, there was only one solution.
Time to google.
The next three hours were spent parked in front of your computer, bathed in the cold blueish glow of the screen, as you typed in the word “doctor” as well as what felt like eighty million different names for whatever his glowing blue thing was called. Pen, key, master key, hell, even chopstick. Nothing worked. Though, the chopstick one did bring up a nice little Chinese restaurant up in Cardiff. But more to the point, you couldn’t find a single damn scrap of information about the mysterious “Doctor”.
You spent four hours in front of that damned computer screen. It felt like your eyes were going to pop out of your skull and start rolling around on the floor.
One last search.
Just one.
You hesitated, and then typed in, “Doctor” and, “glowing screwdriver”.
It was the first result that came up.
“‘The Doctor’: A True Urban Legend”.
You clicked the link. At worst, it was a sleazy news article, and at best, maybe it would help. So you began to read.
The Doctor.
A classic (if somewhat obscure) urban legend, present in cultures all around the world. This myth (if it is indeed one), speaks of a man spotted repeatedly through history, whether in photographs or fables passed down from long ago. Sightings of this mysterious being are nearly always precipitated by a catastrophe of grand proportions, which begs the question:
Who is this man? And more importantly, what does he want from us?
The article went on to describe in great detail a multitude of different sightings: From carvings in Ancient Rome to sightings in Moscow, tales from Egypt and even from the northernmost point of Argentina. It was impossible. Completely and utterly impossible. You weren’t sure if you even believed any of it. But still, you kept reading.
As you will notice, each sighting of the mysterious Doctor contains the same three basic elements: He is always referred to as “the Doctor”, he always carries his “sonic screwdriver” (though I haven’t quite figured out what that refers to), and he is always accompanied by tragedy, only to leave when the disaster has passed. Whether the Doctor is the cause of these disasters, remains unknown.
That leaves two possibilities: Either the Doctor is purposely sabotaging the human race, or he is attempting to save it.
Which, of course, leads me to wonder:
What, exactly, is he saving us from?
You blinked, and frowned, scrolling down through the rest of the page. There was nothing more.
“No, no, no-- that can’t be it,” you whined. “That’s a cliffhanger. That’s not fair.”
With a disappointed sigh, you exited out of the browser window, and slumped in your seat. It was nearly three in the morning, and you were exhausted. It physically hurt to keep your eyes open at this point, and you swore you could hear your bed calling your name.
“Fine. Sleep wins.” You sighed, and got up from the chair, heading to your room.
“But I swear to god, I’m going to find you, Doctor,” you said from the doorway, looking up at the ceiling as if he could actually hear you. Who knows, maybe he could. “No matter what.”

-----

The next day, you woke up at nine. Which was absolutely fantastic, because usually you had to get up at five to go in for work. So that was the good part of someone blowing up your job.
The bad part was that, obviously, you no longer had a job.
You figured you’d be all right for a week or so, what with the money you’d saved up. It was meant to be for a new telly, but now you figured there were more interesting things in life than that.
Like, for instance, finding the annoyingly elusive Doctor.
You had scoured the web a bit more after getting up, and hadn’t found much-- a few other articles, with mostly the same information as the first one, along with some guy’s poorly-designed website that actually included a few pictures. You recognized the Doctor’s distinctive leather jacket instantly. That was him, so at least you knew you were on the right track.
“All right,” you said to no one in particular, since your flat was empty except for yourself, “Step two.”
You pulled out a piece of notebook paper and a pen, and began scribbling down everything you knew about him. If the internet was going to be of no use, then you’d have to rely on plain old brainpower, which-- not to brag, or anything-- would probably be more than enough to get the job done.
So. Anyway. The list.
From what you remembered from the night before, the Doctor had been looking for a relay on the roof-- you figured it was probably the kind of relay that takes a transmitted signal and makes it louder, which means--
“Which means, there’s still a transmitter out there. Which means, he’s still out there. Which means--”
You hurried over to your computer, and googled what store had the most mannequins in the London area. Because you figured, well, if you were a crazy supervillain intent on projecting life into shop-window dummies, you’d want to put a relay where the most concentrated amount of mannequins were, so as to amass a giant army of plastic creatures and thus take over the world. Cue evil laughter, etcetera.
The mall.
“Oh, obviously, the mall,” you said, whacking yourself in the head, and then hurrying over to grab your coat and put on your shoes. You left your flat (doubling back to lock the door, because you had been in such a hurry it completely slipped your mind), and then grabbed a bus down to the mall.
It was relatively empty, because it was a Tuesday and everyone who’s job hadn’t been blown up by a madman was at work already. Finding the Doctor (if he was even there) should be relatively easy, you figured. If his jacket didn’t stand out, his ears sure would.
“Okay, that was a bit rude,” you mumbled to yourself, pulling out your phone from your pocket to check the time. “I figure I’ve got a good six hours to find him before he--”
“Hey-- watch it, would you?”
“Oh, sorry,” you said automatically. “My mistake, I was just looking for someone--”
You froze, for a split second. So did the man in front of you. The very familiar man in front of you. The very familiar man in front of you who also happened to be the Doctor.
“[Name]?”
“Doctor!”
“What are you doing here? You’re not plastic, are you?” He frowned, and tapped you on the forehead. ”Nope. All right, bye then.”
And then the Doctor walked away.
“Hey-- wait! I was looking for you,” you said, running after him. “You have to tell me what happened. The other day.”
The Doctor laughed. “No I don’t.”
“Yeah, you do,” you said, walking a bit faster so that you could keep up with his longer strides. “You blew up my job. I deserve an explanation.”
“I told you to go home.”
“Oh, stop it. You’re not my mum,” you grumbled. The two of you were quickly approaching a side hallway, that led away from the main shopping center and towards what you assumed were the elevators. The Doctor, naturally, turned that corner, and you, naturally, followed him.
“Where are you going?” You said. “And what were those things? They were mannequins controlled by some kind of signal, right?”
At that, the Doctor actually acknowledged your existence, by giving you an odd look. “How did you know that?”
“I didn’t. I just-- you said there was a relay, and relays make transmitted signals louder, so there had to be some sort of signal. And a transmitter, too.”
He looked at you for a moment more, and then nodded approvingly. “That made sense. Good job.”
You grinned. “Thanks. So-- are you looking for the transmitter? Is that why you’re here?”
The two of you turned another corner and approached an elevator door. The floor had gone from white, clean tile to plain concrete. A storage area, you assumed. It made sense; that was where the mannequins had come to life in the art museum, for whatever reason.
“I am looking for the transmitter,” the Doctor admitted, as he stepped into elevator and pressed the button for the basement floor. “But I need something first.”
“What?”
“A head.”
“You have a head.”
“A plastic head,” he amended. “See, an arm or a leg, that’s too simple. But a head is perfect-- I can trace where the signal is coming from.”
“So how are we going to get a plastic head?” you asked. “Capture one of the killer mannequins?”
“Yes.”
“Sounds dangerous.”
The elevator dinged. The doors opened, to reveal a dark hallway. The Doctor grinned. “Exactly.”

Description
body div#devskin0 hr { }

It was all over the news.
“NEW MODERN ART MUSEUM GOES UP IN FLAMES: CAUSE STILL UNDETERMINED.”
You had been fine the whole way home. It had almost felt surreal, like nothing had ever happened. Like you hadn’t been nearly killed by mannequins, and you weren’t technically an accomplice to arson. But when you saw it on the telly, you just got that feeling in your stomach—the kind of feeling you get when you’re on a rollercoaster, like your stomach is going to fly up into your throat—and that’s when you realized.
I could have died.
So, in reaction, you did what most normal, sane human beings would do. You laughed. Because, honestly, while that—whatever it was—had been the most terrifying experience of your entire life (which wasn’t saying much), it had also been the most exciting. That wasn’t really saying much either, because ‘exciting’ for you usually meant cooking something that wasn’t a 5-minute heat-up meal or a hot pocket. But, still.
It was fun. You had loved every minute of it. And given the chance, you’d do it again.
Not bloody likely that I’ll get another chance, though, is it? You thought, and sighed. Come to think of it, you didn’t even know the Doctor’s real name, much less how to find him again.
In the kitchen, the phone rang.
You sighed, and got up off of your lumpy couch to go grab it.
“Hello?”
“Oh, thank god, you’re all right.” That would be Charlie Hegner. Full-time best friend, part-time accomplice to doing questionable things that may or may not be illegal. Also, coincidentally, one of the few people who would actually care had you burned to death in the art museum.
Speaking of that, you probably should have called him. Whoops. You winced.
“Yeah, Charlie, I’m fine. Sorry I didn’t call. Rough day.” I was nearly murdered by some weird guy’s modern art project. But, you know, that’s totally normal.
Charlie sighed, relieved. “That’s okay, that’s fine. I’m glad you’re all right.” He paused. “Oh, and I was wondering, if you wanted to get together this weekend, maybe go down to the pub or something?”
“Uh. Yeah, sure, I suppose. Can we figure it out later, though? I’m kind of tired.” Okay, that was a lie. But only a teeny one. As if you could sleep after all that had happened. No, you needed answers.
“Oh. Oh, uh, yeah, that’s fine with me.”
“Okay.”
Cue awkward pause.
“So, bye, I guess?” He said.
“Yeah. See you.”
You set the phone down and glanced at the clock. You frowned. It was nearly eleven at night, and your mind was still whizzing about with all sorts of questions. So, obviously, there was only one solution.
Time to google.
The next three hours were spent parked in front of your computer, bathed in the cold blueish glow of the screen, as you typed in the word “doctor” as well as what felt like eighty million different names for whatever his glowing blue thing was called. Pen, key, master key, hell, even chopstick. Nothing worked. Though, the chopstick one did bring up a nice little Chinese restaurant up in Cardiff. But more to the point, you couldn’t find a single damn scrap of information about the mysterious “Doctor”.
You spent four hours in front of that damned computer screen. It felt like your eyes were going to pop out of your skull and start rolling around on the floor.
One last search.
Just one.
You hesitated, and then typed in, “Doctor” and, “glowing screwdriver”.
It was the first result that came up.
“‘The Doctor’: A True Urban Legend”.
You clicked the link. At worst, it was a sleazy news article, and at best, maybe it would help. So you began to read.
The Doctor.
A classic (if somewhat obscure) urban legend, present in cultures all around the world. This myth (if it is indeed one), speaks of a man spotted repeatedly through history, whether in photographs or fables passed down from long ago. Sightings of this mysterious being are nearly always precipitated by a catastrophe of grand proportions, which begs the question:
Who is this man? And more importantly, what does he want from us?
The article went on to describe in great detail a multitude of different sightings: From carvings in Ancient Rome to sightings in Moscow, tales from Egypt and even from the northernmost point of Argentina. It was impossible. Completely and utterly impossible. You weren’t sure if you even believed any of it. But still, you kept reading.
As you will notice, each sighting of the mysterious Doctor contains the same three basic elements: He is always referred to as “the Doctor”, he always carries his “sonic screwdriver” (though I haven’t quite figured out what that refers to), and he is always accompanied by tragedy, only to leave when the disaster has passed. Whether the Doctor is the cause of these disasters, remains unknown.
That leaves two possibilities: Either the Doctor is purposely sabotaging the human race, or he is attempting to save it.
Which, of course, leads me to wonder:
What, exactly, is he saving us from?
You blinked, and frowned, scrolling down through the rest of the page. There was nothing more.
“No, no, no-- that can’t be it,” you whined. “That’s a cliffhanger. That’s not fair.”
With a disappointed sigh, you exited out of the browser window, and slumped in your seat. It was nearly three in the morning, and you were exhausted. It physically hurt to keep your eyes open at this point, and you swore you could hear your bed calling your name.
“Fine. Sleep wins.” You sighed, and got up from the chair, heading to your room.
“But I swear to god, I’m going to find you, Doctor,” you said from the doorway, looking up at the ceiling as if he could actually hear you. Who knows, maybe he could. “No matter what.”

-----

The next day, you woke up at nine. Which was absolutely fantastic, because usually you had to get up at five to go in for work. So that was the good part of someone blowing up your job.
The bad part was that, obviously, you no longer had a job.
You figured you’d be all right for a week or so, what with the money you’d saved up. It was meant to be for a new telly, but now you figured there were more interesting things in life than that.
Like, for instance, finding the annoyingly elusive Doctor.
You had scoured the web a bit more after getting up, and hadn’t found much-- a few other articles, with mostly the same information as the first one, along with some guy’s poorly-designed website that actually included a few pictures. You recognized the Doctor’s distinctive leather jacket instantly. That was him, so at least you knew you were on the right track.
“All right,” you said to no one in particular, since your flat was empty except for yourself, “Step two.”
You pulled out a piece of notebook paper and a pen, and began scribbling down everything you knew about him. If the internet was going to be of no use, then you’d have to rely on plain old brainpower, which-- not to brag, or anything-- would probably be more than enough to get the job done.
So. Anyway. The list.
From what you remembered from the night before, the Doctor had been looking for a relay on the roof-- you figured it was probably the kind of relay that takes a transmitted signal and makes it louder, which means--
“Which means, there’s still a transmitter out there. Which means, he’s still out there. Which means--”
You hurried over to your computer, and googled what store had the most mannequins in the London area. Because you figured, well, if you were a crazy supervillain intent on projecting life into shop-window dummies, you’d want to put a relay where the most concentrated amount of mannequins were, so as to amass a giant army of plastic creatures and thus take over the world. Cue evil laughter, etcetera.
The mall.
“Oh, obviously, the mall,” you said, whacking yourself in the head, and then hurrying over to grab your coat and put on your shoes. You left your flat (doubling back to lock the door, because you had been in such a hurry it completely slipped your mind), and then grabbed a bus down to the mall.
It was relatively empty, because it was a Tuesday and everyone who’s job hadn’t been blown up by a madman was at work already. Finding the Doctor (if he was even there) should be relatively easy, you figured. If his jacket didn’t stand out, his ears sure would.
“Okay, that was a bit rude,” you mumbled to yourself, pulling out your phone from your pocket to check the time. “I figure I’ve got a good six hours to find him before he--”
“Hey-- watch it, would you?”
“Oh, sorry,” you said automatically. “My mistake, I was just looking for someone--”
You froze, for a split second. So did the man in front of you. The very familiar man in front of you. The very familiar man in front of you who also happened to be the Doctor.
“[Name]?”
“Doctor!”
“What are you doing here? You’re not plastic, are you?” He frowned, and tapped you on the forehead. ”Nope. All right, bye then.”
And then the Doctor walked away.
“Hey-- wait! I was looking for you,” you said, running after him. “You have to tell me what happened. The other day.”
The Doctor laughed. “No I don’t.”
“Yeah, you do,” you said, walking a bit faster so that you could keep up with his longer strides. “You blew up my job. I deserve an explanation.”
“I told you to go home.”
“Oh, stop it. You’re not my mum,” you grumbled. The two of you were quickly approaching a side hallway, that led away from the main shopping center and towards what you assumed were the elevators. The Doctor, naturally, turned that corner, and you, naturally, followed him.
“Where are you going?” You said. “And what were those things? They were mannequins controlled by some kind of signal, right?”
At that, the Doctor actually acknowledged your existence, by giving you an odd look. “How did you know that?”
“I didn’t. I just-- you said there was a relay, and relays make transmitted signals louder, so there had to be some sort of signal. And a transmitter, too.”
He looked at you for a moment more, and then nodded approvingly. “That made sense. Good job.”
You grinned. “Thanks. So-- are you looking for the transmitter? Is that why you’re here?”
The two of you turned another corner and approached an elevator door. The floor had gone from white, clean tile to plain concrete. A storage area, you assumed. It made sense; that was where the mannequins had come to life in the art museum, for whatever reason.
“I am looking for the transmitter,” the Doctor admitted, as he stepped into elevator and pressed the button for the basement floor. “But I need something first.”
“What?”
“A head.”
“You have a head.”
“A plastic head,” he amended. “See, an arm or a leg, that’s too simple. But a head is perfect-- I can trace where the signal is coming from.”
“So how are we going to get a plastic head?” you asked. “Capture one of the killer mannequins?”
“Yes.”
“Sounds dangerous.”
The elevator dinged. The doors opened, to reveal a dark hallway. The Doctor grinned. “Exactly.”