Splash. Splash. Splash. Splash.

The deluge of torrential rain fell in sheets from the tar black sky, soaking the ground and turning the dirt to a brown, sludgy mud. All around, the city covered in soupy mist, the building and street barely visible in the ongoing barrage of water. Above, the sky was thick with heavy, pregnant clouds.

Quinley ducked behind a building, attempting to catch her breath. The streets were empty, a shock, even with the rain; Parisian streets were always bustling, no matter the weather, but now, they were uncharacteristically silent. She poked her head around the corner, and, seeing the street was empty as far as was visible, began to run again. Quinley's legs were aching, and she had a severe pain in her side, but she kept moving in spite of her discomfort. She had to. She wasn't running for pleasure, or even to escape the rain. No, she was running to escape, running for her life.

She turned a corner and continued down the street, running toward l'Arc de Triomphe. A few more turns and she was on l'avenue Victor-Hugo, sprinting as fast as she could at the famous landmark. As she neared the monument to Napoleon's successful ego, three figures standing in La Place Charles de Gaulle slowly came into view. The one, a woman no older than Quinley, herself, had fiery red hair that was plastered to her forehead. The ginger wore a short skirt over dark tights and high top trainers. The other two people, both men, were harder to make out from the distance, but Quinley was almost positive one of them was wearing a red fez.

When she saw Quinley approaching, the ginger tugged on the fezzed man's sleeve, drawing his attention to the running girl. The closer she got to them, the more she could see through the mist. The man was, indeed, wearing a fez on his floppy dark hair, along with a crimson bowtie around his neck, a tweed jacket, and braces. He looked like a nerdy professor, but he seemed to enjoy his clothing, and exuded confidence, straightening his bowtie as she slowed to a stop in front of him. He opened his mouth to speak, but a voice from behind him cut him off.

"Quinn?" A man pushed his way in front of the Fez. He was the same age as Quinley—in fact, he had just turned twenty-three a few months prior—and his short, brown hair, almost awkwardly lanky build, and large nose were extremely familiar. "Quinley Smith?"

"Rory Williams," Quinley panted, attempting to catch her breath and inspecting her old friend. "What are you doing here?"

"Well… I… uh…" he stammered, running a hand through his rain soaked hair.

A loud crash behind her told Quinley she hadn't lost her pursuers. She groaned and glanced around quickly, searching for a decent way out.

"What's the matter?" the Fez questioned, watching her look around. Something in his pocket beeped, and he pulled it out. The machine looked like a television remote, only slightly larger, with a giant red light on the top. "Close. Very close. Amy, Rory-"

"Keep watch, don't blink. We know, Doctor," Amy, Rory's girlfriend, now wife, finished, turning toward the crash.

"Yes. Good." The man Amy called the Doctor turned. "Now, Quinley Smith, how are you still here?"

"What d'you mean? I ran."

"No. No, they should have caught you by now. Why haven't they caught you? Why are you still here?"

"I…" She coughed, throat raw from the heavy breathing, and shuffled her feet, wincing as her calves protested. She would have to rest for a long time to feel any relief from running. "Back on the avenue d'Eyleau, I sort of—I don't know—tricked them. It. Whatever."

"What? How?"

"Well, they were chasing me," Quinley said, feeling her legs begin to give. She slowly lowered herself to the soaked ground, feeling the rain hitting her both from above and below, bouncing off the ground and back up onto her legs.

"How long?" She squinted up at the Doctor, confused. He knelt beside her. "How long have they been chasing you?"

"Since the Passy Cemetery, I think. Dunno. I've been running from them practically all week."

"All week?" The Doctor mumbled, clearly thinking about something. "Sorry, interrupted you there. Continue."

"They were chasing me," resumed Quinley. "And every time I would look back, they would stop. Go back to being statues of angels. Creepy, snarling angels. As if looking at them makes them unable to move." The Doctor nodded, and Quinley could practically see the cogs of his brain turning as he thought. "I passed a little boutique that had some antique mirrors in the window. When I looked back, they weren't behind me, so I stopped to breathe. Soon, they were there, in front of me."

"What did you do?" Rory called over his shoulder.

"I looked at them and I moved," she answered. "Then I turned and got out of there. When I next looked, they were still there, captured by their own reflections in the mirror."

"Brilliant!" exclaimed the Doctor, cupping her cheek in his hand. "Bloody brilliant." The machine in his hand beeped again and he immediately turned to inspect it. "But why? What do they want with her?" he mumbled to himself while tinkering with the few buttons on his remote.

"If I may ask, Fez man, what's that?" Quinley raised an eyebrow at his hand holding the now constantly beeping machine.

"Rory, Amy, they're getting closer," he called before answering her. "I'm sorry? Fez man? Fezzes are cool. And it's a Timey Wimey Detector."

"Timey Wimey?"

"Or Wibbly, if you prefer."

"Oh. The Wibbly Machine. You know, I've heard of that," said Quinley sardonically. "What is it, though? Like a proximity detector set for the statue things?"

The Doctor looked shocked. "No, not at all. It's a piece of advanced technology that-" He was interrupted by the machine's beeping. Instead of many quick blips in rapid succession, the machine now emitted one long, singular droning. "Oh, that's exactly what it is."

"Doctor!" yelled Amy. "They're here!" Both the Doctor and Quinley turned to examine where she was pointing. There, at the intersection of l'avenue Victor-Hugo and le rue de Presbourg, stood four stone figures with wings, frozen in place.

"Oh, brilliant," muttered the Doctor. "Just bloody brilliant. We need to get out of here. Especially you, since we have no idea what they want with you."

"Isn't it obvious?" Rory questioned. "Amy, I'm blinking… now."

Quinley stood. "He's right. We need to leave."

"Rory, I'm going to blink… now." Amy's eyes closed and reopened quickly.

The Doctor walked a few steps away, tapping his chin with his Timey Wimey Device. Quinley tried to follow him, but, instead of cooperating, when she tried to move, her legs decided they had had enough movement and gave out. Quinley found herself back on the ground, water still splashing up and soaking her.

The Doctor noticed her plight and ran back, immediately throwing her arm over his neck. "Come on, Ponds, Miss Smith, we need to move."

"I can't," she announced. "I'm sorry."

"Sure you can. Amy keep your eyes on the angels. Rory, if you could… wait." Rory stopped mid-step. "Go back." Rory did as he was told and faced the angels again. "You said they had been chasing you all week." Quinley nodded and he lowered her gently so that she was sitting on the ground again. He moved to her side and sat in the water. "They should have gotten you by now. Why haven't they?"

"I don't know. But, before today, they were just on the sidelines, off the streets or on top of buildings. Always watching. Today was the first they ever came close to me."

The Doctor kneaded his eye sockets with his palms. "Today. Why today? What is today?"

"The eleventh of July. Three days to le quatorze juillet." The Doctor took a bronze and silver tube from his pocket and pointed it at her. Four silver prongs extended, revealing a green light at the end, which he pointed at her eyes. "Oi! Stop pointing that thing at me."

"Why today?" he repeated, staring at the tube. "Oh no. No, no, no, no, no. Impossible." He stood and began to pace. "Well, completely possible. In fact, quite probable. Despicable, deplorable, but probable. In which case…" he trailed off, looking between Amy and Rory, then finally to Quinley. "We have to move." She opened her mouth to protest, but he cut her off. "I know, but this, right here, we're being trapped. Amy," the Doctor called to the ginger. "Are any of the angels' mouths open?"

"Yeah," came the reply. "Two."

"Then it's begun. We need to get out of here and quickly. We need to get to La Place de la Porte Maillot. Quickly. Come on!" He grabbed Quinley's hands and pulled her to her feet; he dropped one, but kept her right securely grasped in his own, helping her to keep her balance. "Amy, Rory!" called the Doctor, spinning around, preparing to run. "Let's… oh my." There, on the edge of the mist, stood four more angels in the shadow of L'arc de Triomphe. "Keep looking at them," he instructed fiercely. "Don't blink. Don't turn your head. Don't get distracted. And whatever you do, don't look them in the eye. Fascinating race, the Weeping Angels." The Doctor squeezed her hand. "Only race to kill you gently."

"Somehow, I don't see how 'killing' and 'gently' can go in a sentence together."

"They send you back in time about—oh, I don't know—a hundred years or so, and let you live the rest of your life in the past. Then they feed on the energy of your life's potential greatness."

From above, a crack of thunder shook the ground. The sky flashed with lightning. The heavens opened up, and the rain fell harder. It hit the top of Quinley's head with a noticeable and almost painful 'plop'. She couldn't help thinking about the appropriateness of the weather—she was going to die, or as the Doctor put it, disappear, and the sky was enraged. Rain rolled down her face and into her eyes, but she didn't dare wipe it away. She was too terrified. She had to keep looking at the angels. Her life depended on it.

"What do they want?" questioned Quinley. "Why me? Why do they want me?"

"Because you're brilliant." The Doctor still had not let go of her hand, and she was grateful. She didn't trust herself to stand alone. Quinley was shaking, and she couldn't tell whether it was from overexertion, the cold of the rain, or the terror that gripped her and refused to let go. "And because I'm brilliant. They feed on temporal shifts, changes in a person's time stream that create great amounts of temporal energy. They've chased you all week to here, to this very spot. They've chased you to me."

Quinley thought the man sounded absolutely ridiculous, not to mention completely egotistical. Behind her, Amy and Rory were continuing their audible blinking system, reminding Quinley that she hadn't blinked in several minutes. She winked her eyes alternately, keeping one eye on the angels at all times. Finally, she spoke. "That sounds bloody ridiculous."

"Yet you're still listening."

Quinley ignored him. "But why chase me to you?"

"Because they wanted to trap you here. They wanted to see how I reacted to you. They're trapping you to create a paradox. They want to alter not only your time stream, but mine as well."

"But you said they take you back hundreds of years. You're barely thirty, let alone two hundred."

It was the Doctor's turn to ignore her. "I don't think they want to take you back a hundred years. They want to take you back six years. To 2005. They want to alter the past six years of my life, and everything that's happened or is happening, or will happen since."

"But, how?"

"If they make it so that you get to my past self before a certain woman does, they can change the life of nine people at least. That's enough temporal energy to feed an angel army, and it's not even including the energy they would get off the events that may not even happen, or would end differently." He looked at her, capturing her sapphire eyes in his own blue-green ones. "They would be able to survive forever, just from the energy created by one simple event."

"Oh."

"Oh is right."

"No. Doctor, who's looking at the angels?"

His eyes widened. "Oh." They both turned sharply. Standing less than a foot from them with outstretched arms were the four angels. The Doctor backed up a few steps, dragging Quinley along with him. "We really need to get out of this area. They aren't going to leave you alone unless you're out of this city. And even then…"

"They may never leave me alone," Quinley finished.

"Quite possibly. Wherever you go, wherever you are, you may see one of them, waiting for you. Most cases, they'll leave you alone, but, if you ever come to Paris again…"

"They'll be narked and attack?" He nodded. "Of course." Quinley sighed. "Watch them for a mo' would you?" The Doctor remained silent. Still clutching his hand, Quinley looked around at the city she loved so much. "Au revoir, Paris. Vous me manquerez. C'était amusant, mais maintenant je dois partir. Ne soyez pas triste. Vous ne devez pas pleurer. Sachez que je vous aime, que je vous ai toujours aimé, et que je vous aimerai toujours, quoi qu'il arrive. Soyez bonne. Soyez contente. Vous me manquerez." She mumbled her goodbye, feeling a little silly saying goodbye to a city, but she felt her eyes watering when she remembered what Paris meant to her, and she knew it wasn't from the torrent. She whispered to the Doctor. "Let's go."

He nodded and, still looking at the angels, led her around them. "Amy, Rory, keep looking at them, but move. We're leaving."

Quinley watched as they synced blinking one last time before stepping away, walking backwards toward the sound of the Doctor's voice. They were soaked to the bone, and Quinley could only imagine she was in a similar disarray: Clothes stuck to their skin, hanging in heavy folds, hair plastered to their heads. Amy's make-up was running, and Quinley was glad she hardly wore any.

As soon as Amy and Rory were a safe distance away, the Doctor pulled Quinley along, quickly breaking into a run. He led the three down l'Avenue de la Grand Armée toward La Place de la Porte Maillot. Quinley felt her legs protesting—tomorrow she would surely be unable to move at all—but she ran on, both because she was terrified of the angels and because the Doctor still had a firm grip on her hand. They soon passed the Rue d'Argentine, and Quinley counted off in her head: Three more intersections and they would be at La Place de la Porte Maillot, and the safety that the Doctor claimed was there.

Ahead, Quinley could make out five pale, statuesque figures standing in the mist at the edge of the rain. "Down here." She dragged the Doctor down the Rue Villaret de Joyeuse, ducking into the space between two apartment buildings. Amy and Rory followed, and soon, they were off again, sprinting between buildings. She led them toward the Rue Denis Poisson, but when they reached the open road, she turned north, ignoring the Doctor's protests of getting back to La Rue de la Grand Armée. Instead, she began a labyrinth of twists and turns through the buildings between the Rue Saint-Ferdinand and the Rue Débarcadère.

She slowed to a stop and, finally dropping the Doctor's hand, peeked her head around a building, looking to the Rue de la Grand Armée for any signs of the pursuing angels. "We're close," she announced. "And it looks like they aren't there yet."

"Let's hope it stays that way," added Amy, who was leaning against a brick wall.

The Doctor joined Quinley at the corner. "If we can just make it to there," he pointed toward a blue police box. "We'll be safe."

"Why? What's there?"

He ignored her. "Come on, Ponds." He grabbed Quinley's hand again. "Just a bit more." He took off, Quinley trailing behind him, Amy and Rory behind her, all running for the bright blue box.

Quickly, they got there, and, once again, Quinley's hand was dropped as the Doctor worked to unlock the box. While he patted down his pockets, looking for the key, Quinley inspected the box. Amy and Rory were facing opposite directions, on the watch for the moving statues. The box was wooden, with paneled windows on each face. At the top, repeated all the way around were the words 'POLICE PUBLIC CALL BOX,' lit up for all to see.

From above, Quinley heard the noise of wings. Ignoring it, thinking it was birds coming back out in the wavering rain, Quinley continued to circle the box. She came to the plane the Doctor was facing, still fishing for his keys. "So, what? We're just going to wait it out in here?" The Doctor nodded, looking up. His eyes went wide. "What?" He waved frantically for her to come to him. Confused, she obeyed. "What's the matter?" Then, she noticed it. An angel, standing exactly where she had just been, its arms outstretched, ready to grab her. Had the Doctor not looked when he did, she would have disappeared.

Suddenly, Quinley collapsed in the Doctor's arms. Whether from stress, fatigue, or shock, she was unsure, but she felt lightheaded and nauseated. In a moment of epiphany, the Doctor snapped his fingers, and the doors of the box opened. He draped her legs over his arms and picked Quinley up, carrying her into the box. Amy and Rory were suddenly there with them. The Doctor snapped again and the doors shut.