by Doctor Who
Assuming the boat wouldn’t entirely fall apart in the meantime.
Jude was back at school, watching children swarming over the playing fields like ravaging ants. She was distant from them – distant and different. Shouted invitations to join in quickly became curses and jokes at her expense.
‘Boring little bookworm! Boring little bookworm!’
Jude found herself turning away, not sure if this was a memory or a dream or something else altogether. She became aware of the wind tugging at her hair, a gentle breath on her cheeks that cooled her humiliation – and then a whispered voice, which she felt rather than heard.
Don’t you want to hurt them? Make them stiffer?
Jude turned, trying to isolate the source of the voice, trying to answer it in her own mind – but her thoughts seemed sluggish and uncontrollable, like logs caught in a slow, powerful river.
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You could, you know. You’re brighter than all of them – you could think of something.
‘They’re just little kids,’ said Jude. Though she was aware of her lips moving, she wasn’t sure if she was actually making a sound. ‘They don’t know any better.’
Like all your people, perhaps. So young, so. . . immature.
Now Jude thought about it, the voice sounded a little like the Doctor’s – wise and thoughtful and cloaked in mystery. But it seemed to have no gender, no age, no accent. It was like every voice Jude had ever heard, rolled into one.
‘We have lived here for centuries,’ said Jude firmly, reacting more at the implied criticism of the entire village and its way of life than she had to the ridicule of the children.
You are young, and you have lived in peace for far too long. You have only recently encountered conflict and dissent. . .
Suddenly Jude was surrounded by fog, watching figures fighting in a small amphitheatre of light. Her eyes widened, she cried out – it was her father! And Uncle Petr was trying to throttle him!
She tried to run forward, but the fog held her in place, allowing the cold, empty voice to whisper once more into her ear.
This is what happens, you see. Free will, and then, within moments. . .
betrayal and fighting and selfishness. . .
‘No!’ shouted Jude, though neither struggling figure seemed to hear her. ‘They’re good people. They must be. . . They must be confused.’
Would you not like to intercede? How far would you go to protect your father?
‘I just want my father to be all right! But I like Petr as well. He’s always been kind to me.’
The two fighting men vanished, the fog spinning Jude around and presenting one image after another: her mother forcing her to eat boiled yellow tubers (They’re good for you, make you big and strong!’), that lad at school she thought she’d liked but who ended up being a two-faced idiot (‘I pretended to like you ’cos I wanted to get close to Leya – that’s all’), the one argument she’d ever had with her father. . . She couldn’t even remember what the circumstances were 141
now, but Jude had ended up locked in her room without food for an entire day.
Don’t you wish things were different?
The voice was quite insistent now, a harsh edge creeping in – Jude was reminded of a child, in danger of losing an argument, or a teacher whose authority was being questioned.
Memories and fears flashed around Jude in quick succession, a dizzying jumble of images and sounds. She forced her eyes shut and started to shout, to scream at the top of her voice, to force out confused words until her head throbbed with the effort of it all.
‘I don’t want to change anything,’ she said. ‘I did the best I can! Let me out of here!’
The boat pitched suddenly to one side. Martha felt her legs slide from beneath her. Saul pulled her to her feet just as a plume of spray and another sudden lurch announced the arrival of one of the shark-like creatures. This one seemed to want to hurl itself over the side of the boat. It landed awkwardly, making the entire craft list terrifyingly.
Even Saul was off balance now, and Martha slipped over and onto the floor. Within moments she was sliding towards the creature. Her trainers couldn’t get a grip on the boat’s soaked wooden boards. All she could see was the creature’s gaping mouth.
Just in time, Martha was able to push herself to the side, avoiding the snapping jaws as the beast thrashed around. Her feet found pur-chase on the flattened edge of the boat; she twisted away from the great blunt head as it tried to find her.
There was a sudden ringing noise: Saul had unsheathed both swords. Though the boat was still at forty-five degrees to the lake’s surface, he let out a battle shout and jumped nimbly towards the creature. First one blade, then the other, made silver arcs in the air.
Martha instinctively glanced away.
The creature seemed barely to feel the attack. It arched its spine-covered tail high over its head, as if intending to smash it down against the matchstick boat.
Martha grabbed her chance, scrabbling for one of the oars that had 142
come free and swinging it wildly towards the creature as it came at her.
Suddenly – and with a look that Martha would have sworn was a mixture of resentment and disappointment – the creature wriggled off the boat. With a huge, rending shrug of its entire body, it disappeared beneath the waves.
The boat rocked fiercely from side to side; Martha wondered for a moment if she were about to pitch over into the dark lake, but Saul’s great arm steadied her. She was about to thank him when, with a roar of water and flesh, the wounded monster emerged once more, to the far side of the tiny ship. It brought its entire head down onto the boat, using its protective horns to smash through the wooden planks.
Martha saw a crack appear beneath her feet; she wasn’t sure how much punishment the little vessel could take.
Petr sprang to his feet, swinging at the attacking creature with one of the oars. Water was cascading into the boat now, over the side where the beast was pushing down, through numerous holes and splits in the tar-covered woodwork.
The monster snapped at Petr’s oar, splintering it, then lunged towards them, hissing. Petr jumped out of the way just in time; within moments Saul was at his side, running forwards with swords outstretched.
The creature twisted sinuously, avoiding Saul’s attack and raking its horns across the floor of the craft. In a flash its teeth snapped shut around Saul’s legs.
Saul cried out, instinctively dropping both weapons and trying to escape, but the creature held firm. Martha jumped across to help, gripping Saul’s arms while Petr held him about the torso. They were all waist deep in water now, only pockets of air trapped within the boat stopping it from sinking entirely. The one thing Martha cared about was releasing Saul from the jaws of the beast. But the man’s legs were trapped, and he struggled desperately.
Suddenly, another creature lunged forward and out of the water –but its cavernous mouth was pointed towards its wounded fellow. It attacked, and withdrew, in the blink of an eye.
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The creature attacking Saul immediately released its grip and, twitching uncontrollably, it slipped back into the lake.
The water around what was left of the boat was a frothing frenzy as the creatures piled one over another in their desperation to feed.
Martha saw that the original beast, still flailing randomly, was now the focus of the attacks; leaching blood into the water, it was simply too tempting a target.
First one creature hurtled towards it through the water, snapping its jaws shut and then twisting around and around like a crocodile. A second soon followed. The suffering creature, now mortally wounded, attempted one brief retaliation.
Countless more slid towards it,
mouths gaping wide. Within moments the entire area was filled with white, overlapping shapes, the water frothing and foaming as if alive.
A low, injured cry – and the water now lapping at her chest – reminded Martha that her own predicament wasn’t over y
et. ‘Come on,’
said Petr, holding her arm and half-jumping, half-swimming back to where Saul had fallen.
The hunter had become caught on the large wooden board that normally housed the boat’s main rower. Behind him the entire prow of the craft was upright in the air, like the doomed Titanic recreated in miniature. Saul was silent and motionless but for the long, broken-sounding moans he made every few seconds.
Taking an arm each, and pushing through the splintered remains of the boat, Martha and Petr tugged Saul away from the water that broiled with the creatures. Saul’s eyes suddenly shot open when his head and shoulders hit the cold water of the lake, and he began swimming as best he could, though Martha noticed that he wasn’t using his legs. They trailed behind him like streamers of useless flesh and cloth.
The three swam furiously away from the boat as it slid entirely beneath the water, sometimes pausing to help each other, sometimes almost selfishly forcing tired arms and legs through the cold lake.
Anything to put distance between them and the writhing predators.
Martha hoped that the creatures would be more occupied with each other – and the huge, wounded beast that had prompted their feeding frenzy – than with the blood still seeping from Saul’s legs.
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Suddenly, out of the all-pervading blanket of fog, a dark shape began to form. Martha heard Petr almost whoop with joy. It seemed that these monsters patrolled only the deepest waters, and now Martha and the others were almost in reach of land – and safety.
Even Saul, who had been in danger of falling behind, seemed energised. Martha concentrated on her own progress, kicking for shore in desperation as much as relief. The water was colder than ever, and she couldn’t stop shivering, swallowing mouthfuls of brackish water, but not caring if that meant she could emerge from the lake more quickly.
Still half-expecting to feel the vice-like grip of merciless jaws on her legs, still wondering if her aching arms and legs had any energy left in them, Martha forced herself up onto the rocky beach at the edge of the island. She collapsed for a moment, panting.
Petr was already standing and looking about him. ‘I can’t believe we’re here,’ he said quietly. ‘All my life, we’ve looked out over the waters, but we never dared. . . ’ He looked down at Saul – only a villager could understand the importance of what they had just achieved. ‘I never imagined I’d ever stand here.’ He gripped his brother’s hand, hauling him upright. ‘Never dreamed we’d be the first to set foot on the island.’
And, just for a moment, a look of grim satisfaction passed between the brothers – a look of achievement and pride. A look of warmth and respect.
Martha, shivering, couldn’t help but break the moment.
‘Two questions,’ she said. ‘Do either of you really know what we’re doing here?’ She looked out over the dark waters of the lake, through the patchy fog, trying to see one last glimpse of the shark creatures.
‘And how are we going to get back?’
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Jude stumbled suddenly into blinding light, a cork popping out of darkness and dream. Her body was stiff, as if she had been asleep for a thousand years, and her mind fogged with images. Absolutely disorientated and blinded, she fell against an upright, dark shape –and cried out, thinking it was the creature again.
‘It’s OK,’ said the Doctor, his voice calm and reassuring. ‘It’s me.’
‘What happened?’ asked Jude, still panicked and holding fast to the Doctor’s arms.
‘That creature was rummaging through our minds,’ said the Doctor.
‘For some reason, it decided that we should live.’ And suddenly his face broke into a grin and he pointed at the dark shape further down the corridor. ‘Doesn’t look so frightening now we’re this side of it, does it? Looks sort of. . . lonely.’
Jude turned, grinning. If they’d walked through the creature, then that meant. . .
‘That’s right,’ said the Doctor, turning his back on the dark angel.
‘The heart of the Castor!’ He jogged towards a huge door, rounded and formed of some bronze-hued metal, and almost embraced it, flinging his arms wide in every direction. ‘Come on!’ he called to a hesitant Jude. ‘Nearly there!’
∗ ∗ ∗
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‘Nearly there!’ said Petr, pausing just for a moment. In truth, the island in the centre of the lake was at most only a few hundred square metres in size, but Saul had been unable to walk unaided and it had taken them some minutes to leave the beach. Now they approached the island’s one feature – a great, rocky outcrop that rose up suddenly from the brown sand.
Martha risked a look back. Standing in the village, the island had not seemed very far away, but their journey had been daunting and now the cluster of buildings and houses was entirely invisible in the distant fog.
She turned back to Petr and Saul. Saul hadn’t said much since their arrival on the island; he winced often when applying weight to his left leg, and Martha knew he was in a great deal of pain. She’d offered to check his wounds, but Saul had refused. However, he took advantage of this momentary lull to turn and glance at his older brother.
‘Thank you,’ he said simply, his voice sounding brittle and dry.
Petr glanced away. ‘Those creatures would have killed us all. It was simply self-preservation.’
‘I meant for not killing me back there!’
Petr stared at the dark, rocky outcrop, as if trying to read some meaning in its jagged edges and vertices. ‘Would you have let me?’ he said.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Would you have deserved it?’
‘Perhaps,’ said Saul, after a moment’s thought. ‘Perhaps we all do.’
Petr nodded. ‘That’s true enough, I suppose.’
‘I’m sorry for what happened,’ said Saul. ‘Between me and Kristine.
I know just saying “sorry” isn’t adequate, but –’
‘You’ve destroyed my world!’ said Petr suddenly. ‘It’s all over now.
Everything’s. . . worthless.’ He looked around, a man conflicted between anger and tears. ‘I don’t know why we’re here. Perhaps it’s better that the village is destroyed!’
‘You were preoccupied by your duties,’ said Saul carefully. ‘Kristine was lonely. . . ’
Petr clapped his hands over his ears. ‘I don’t want to hear it!’ he 148
said. ‘I don’t want to listen to excuses!’
‘There’s no excuse for what happened,’ said Saul simply.
‘And the lies! And. . . ’ The next word came out as a whisper, a harsh prayer or a mournful curse. ‘Thorn. . . ’
‘You still love Thorn,’ said Saul, breathing heavily, though with emotion or because of the pain, Martha wasn’t quite sure.
Petr nodded slowly, rubbing a hand across his eyes. ‘I do,’ he said.
‘I’m trying so hard to hate you – you, and Kristine, and Thorn – but. . .
I can’t.’ He looked around, glancing up at the starless sky and the distant shoreline, lost in the fog. ‘Come on,’ he said quietly.
Martha scrabbled around in the shingle, pulling out a long, water-smoothed piece of driftwood. She didn’t know if the lake had tides, or if the wood was just some random detail of the entire bubble world’s unreality, but it seemed sturdy enough, and she passed it over to Saul.
Saul grunted, forcing the stick under his arm like a crutch, before setting off for the rocky outcrop. The stunted spire of sharp stone at the heart of the island was bathed in diffuse light, great cracks and fissures becoming visible as the three travellers approached. Even more obvious was a great cave, concealed between an outreaching spur of rock on either side; it was like a dark mouth, slanted upwards, and Martha was reminded of the great maws of the creatures back in the lake.
They scrabbled over scree and jagged shingle as they neared the entrance, none of them sure what they were looking for, or knowing what to expect, but drawn by some simple, almost prim
al force towards the darkness. Martha supposed that, as a human, she had some innate urge to seek shelter in caves – and these people, however artificial their existence might be, were doubtless subject to the same drives. But she also felt a growing apprehension, for caves meant darkness and shadows and creeping, unseen things.
But a cave, at the centre of the island, seemingly in the centre of an artificial world. . . She suspected they’d find more there than just bat droppings and water dripping down stalactites.
Martha, suppressing a shiver and, with Petr and Saul close behind her, stepped into the echoing cavern.
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∗ ∗ ∗
The Doctor found some controls on the wall and within moments the door was rolling open.
Beyond was an enormous, rounded chamber, its walls punctuated with random red lights. By the time it had illuminated the floor and its occupant, the radiance took on a pinkish hue, giving the entire room an organic air.
Occupant.
Jude blinked quickly, not at all sure what she was looking at – but she understood, wordlessly, that she was looking at a person, not a thing.
The room was full of wires and tubes, but they were twisted and overlapping, creating complex patterns like a spider web covered in dew. In the centre, suspended some distance from the floor and slowly revolving and spinning, was some sort of creature. It had huge globu-lar appendages that pulsed with an internal light but seemed more like additional brains or heads, and smaller limbs – if that was the right word – that ebbed and flowed like hair in an invisible ocean. There was a central body, a bloated yet somehow still elegant succession of rounded shapes; most of the tubes and wires were attached here, the skin seeming pock-marked and blistered wherever the probes broke through the skin. Like the dark angel thing they had encountered, this entity seemed to fade and brighten from time to time. One moment it seemed almost invisible, as substantial as mist and memory; then it became full of force and flesh and was as real as anything that Jude had ever witnessed.
