Stellar Collision

Chapter 6

The blonde woman was riding a bus, sipping her coffee. She was spooked by the weird lady she'd just met. Then she was looking for a book on the shelf in a library. She seemed afraid of what she might find. She hugged a brunette girl with loving brown eyes.

He awoke just as it was growing dark outside, a thought still lingering in his head. "There's nothing better in the world than the love of a daughter", he murmured out loud.

Wait, dark? The Doctor sat all the way up. He could see once again! He held his hand in front of his face, fluttering his fingers eagerly. Things were admittedly a bit blurry but, he could see just the same.

Dayle entered the room just then from her bedroom, clicked on a lamp. "How we feeling? Sorry, I worked a 12 hour shift last night. Must've conked out myself." She yawned and stretched.

He looked up ready to tell her the good news and very nearly fell off the couch. Her curly blonde hair was mussed and there were pillow marks on her face. Her lovely blue-gray eyes looked sleepy but she smiled brightly at him, dimples showing. A bit healthier looking than in the dream. The hair looked like she had it done at a salon, her clothing looked like it came from a nice shop and her nails were long and polished. He glanced around at her flat. Certainly no cheap motel. Her home was quite posh and nicely decorated.

She had walked over to check the bandage on his head. "Hmm. It's actually looking much better." She sounded surprised, maybe even a little confused.

She looked up and saw he was staring at her. "John, are you ok? Wait, can you see me?"

"It was you. In the dreams." The Doctor squinted at her in disbelief. "In the motel room a-a-and working at the diner..."

Her expression changed slightly. "Excuse me? Motel room? What dreams?"

"I'm saying, it was you in my dream. I saw you smoking a cigarette and crying. I saw you checking your reflection. Working as a waitress. Then just now at a library. Hugging a young lady..." He gestured in open mouthed amazement. "And I've never even layed eyes on you until now. Oh. What could this mean?"

He barely registered that Dayle was now staring at him in alarm. And backing away from him.

"Hey, man. What the hell?"

The Doctor hopped up and begin pacing the room wringing his hands and gesticulating wildly while he thought out loud. "It was you, but it wasn't you. The same way Melody is River, but not really. It's got to have something to do with one reality bleeding through to another. Like, somehow, messages are coming through from the other universe."

He finally stopped when he saw the way she was watching him, 'fight or flight?' written all over her lovely face.

"What the hell is going on here John? Five hours ago, you could barely move, let alone walk unassisted. You sure as shit couldn't see. You had cracked ribs and an injury to your hip. Now you're jumping up and walking just fine. And you're seeing me in your goddamn dreams and talking about parallel universes. And your head! How the hell could your head have healed so fast? It's just not fucking possible..."

The Doctor interrupted her rant with a sharp whistle. "HEY. Has anyone mentioned that you swear far too much? Blimey. It's like talking to a squaddie. Listen, I'm going to make this very simple. I'm an alien. I'm a Time Lord from a planet called Gallifrey. I travel in time and space. My ship got caught in a neutron star collision and it was damaged and I was temporarily blinded by the resulting gamma ray burst. And somehow, I ended up in a totally different universe."

He finally took a breath and assessed Dayle's reaction.

She had been staring at him with her mouth open in surprise and her eyes indignant.

"Are you quite finished?" She asked.

He nodded.

"I can swear as much as I goddamn well please, thank you Mr. Lord of Fucking Time." With that, she opened the front door of her apartment and shoved him out into the hallway.

The Doctor stumbled into the opposite wall of the corridor as she slammed the door behind him and threw the lock. He looked around to see if anyone had seen his unceremonious ejection. Cleared his throat. Straightened his bow tie. "I think that went quite well."

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Dayle sat in a corner booth poring over the book about parallel universes. She wasn't sure what exactly-if anything- it meant to her life but she was positively fascinated by what she was learning. She'd never taken much interest in space or physics, had never even really been one to read or watch science fiction. But the author of this book managed to explain the concepts in ways she could understand them.

He talked about the infinite universe, inflationary theory, string theory and the Many Worlds Interpretation. About Albert Einstein and Georges Lemaitre and Alexander Friedman.

The book explained that: "The mathematics underlying quantum mechanics suggest that all possible outcomes happen, each inhabiting its own separate universe."

Dayle paused to sip from her coffee mug and wrap her mind around what all this meant. The book was pointing to theory after theory that concluded that parallel worlds are real and that every possible outcome of a person's life are split up and lived out on these different branches of reality. It was a mind blowing and exciting thought.

Had River really meant for Dayle to find this book? Was it some kind of message? Even a metaphor perhaps?

One of her coworkers, an older waitress named Carol appeared at her elbow walking the coffee pot.

"Are you going to get anything to eat sweetie?" Carol asked kindly, refilling the mug.

Dayle thought about the cash she was saving stashed in the bottom of her backpack. It seemed like she might well have to spring for a motel room somewhere tonight. But her stomach was definitely growling.

"Well, maybe I could go for a grilled cheese." Carol nodded and went behind the counter to call her order.

Dayle returned her attention to the book. She flipped back to one particular part that kept eating at her.

"It says that there's no such thing as a road untraveled. Yet each such road- each reality- is hidden from all others."

And what if somehow, there was a way to peek into another reality? She wondered. What if one of those alternate roads somehow became UNhidden.

She felt that funny flutter in her stomach again and she was overtaken by chills. A feeling akin to dejavu came over her.

For some reason, she flashed back to that strange dream she'd had a couple nights ago. The injured man with the bowtie. The space ship and the explosion.

She felt lightheaded and heard white noise and a ghostly British voice whispered through the static "one reality bleeding through to another..."

She leapt up, startled, nearly overturning her coffee. Just what the hell was THAT?

"Are you ok Dayle?" A concerned Carol was standing nearby looking at her curiously.

Dayle attempted to regain her composure. "Yes". She cleared her throat. "Just need to use the lady's room".

Carol looked after her strangely as she made her way to the restroom.

She hung her backpack on the hook on the door and splashed cold water on her face with shaking hands. Her reflection in the mirror looked peculiar to her. It was like someone she'd never seen.

The static had returned. "...messages are coming through from the other universe" the chilling voice whispered from some other plane.

Dayle placed her hands over her ears and backed into the wall. What the hell was happening to her?

One thing she knew for certain. She needed to find River and she hadn't the first clue how to do so. She had a strong suspicion though, that River would find her.