by Doctor Who
‘They’ll go to any lengths,’ the blonde added. ‘They’re even jumping in the river, trying to get a better look.’
The Doctor raised his eyebrows. ‘Aha! Trying to get to the Ascendant, are they? Or on the trail of all those people who’ve disappeared around here lately?’
The redhead shrugged awkwardly. ‘You know how the press likes to blow these things up.’
‘Ruddy cheek! Blowing things up is a job for the armed forces.’ He smiled, glanced down at the visitors’ book to see who had been called on already today. ‘Anyway, I’m here to see, er, V. Swann.’
‘Vida from Ocean Research.’
‘Yep, that’s her. Floor thingummy, isn’t it?’
‘Derek will take you,’ said the redhead, nodding to the burly security guard.
‘No need for that, I can find my own way. I’ve got clearance and everything.’
‘And I operate the lift, sir,’ said Derek firmly. He gestured to the large grey doors in the wall behind him, which swished open at the press of a button.
‘Oh. Well, then.’ The Doctor treated Derek to his very biggest grin.
‘Take me to your Vida.’
Rose found it wasn’t just Anne she had to look after. Mickey had been sick, and was now sat on the bottom step with his head between his legs.
‘This feeling just came over me,’ he moaned. ‘My mouth went dry, I got all dizzy and then. . . ’
‘I think we all heard what happened next, thanks.’ Rose grimaced, slipped her hooded top around Anne. The old woman had gone deathly quiet, staring out into space.
‘Just so you know, I wasn’t sick ’cause I was scared or nothing.’
‘Don’t be silly. I’m just glad what happened to the soldiers didn’t happen to you.’
24
‘You mean you’d actually care?’
She sighed. ‘Don’t milk it, Mickey.’
‘Milk! If only. I’m dying of thirst.’ He wiped his lips on the back of his hand. ‘What about the old girl, then, she all right now?’
‘Dunno. Anne? How’re you doing?’ No response. It was as if she’d retreated into herself. ‘She needs rest. Somewhere clean and comfy.’
‘Rules out my place,’ said Mickey. ‘What about your mum’s?’
Rose nodded, glanced at her mobile. ‘At least Anne’s doing better than the soldiers. Hope that ambulance gets here in a minute.’
‘An ambulance won’t be necessary.’
The dry, dusty voice made Rose jump up. She turned to find that a spindly old man in full naval uniform had appeared behind them on the steps, flanked by two more soldiers. From all the braid and bling on his cap and blazer he was someone pretty important too. He wore dark glasses, and a thin white scarf was bundled about his neck.
‘What d’you mean it won’t be necessary?’ Rose demanded. ‘Didn’t you see those soldiers up there? They had some sort of fit.’
‘They will recover shortly,’ the newcomer informed them, stalking down the steps towards them.
‘Who are you, then?’
‘Rear Admiral John Crayshaw.’ He smiled faintly, cheerlessly. ‘Now, I understand this woman tried to throw herself from the bridge.’
‘She’s all right now,’ said Mickey, wincing as he tried to get up. ‘We were just going.’
Crayshaw shook his head, the pink evening sun flashing off his dark glasses. ‘I think perhaps I should look after her personally.’
Rose frowned. ‘Why?’
‘This area is out of bounds to members of the public.’
‘Because so many members of the public have disappeared?’ Mickey challenged. ‘We’ve read the papers. We know something weird’s going on, and it’s linked to that ship.’
‘I am managing a routine situation and everything is under control.’
Crays haw kept looking at Anne. ‘Very well, you may go. Remove yourselves from this area.’
‘We’re going,’ Rose assured him.
25
‘And no plans to return?’
‘What’re you on about?’
He looked unsettlingly pleased with himself, but said nothing. As if he was enjoying some secret joke.
Rose turned her back on him, moved off with Mickey as fast as Anne would allow. She heard his bone-dry voice barking orders as they left.
‘You – wait for the ambulance and send it on its way. Guard this approach. If anyone tries to copy the old woman’s antics, apprehend them and contact me at once. And you – with me.’
‘Watch out, Doctor,’ Rose murmured. ‘Captain Bird’s-Eye is on the warpath.’
The Doctor had been taken up to the third floor, and now Derek the doorman was leading him down a corridor. For a state-of-the-art engineering complex it was all surprisingly homely – patterned carpets, dashing naval figures in frames on the whitewashed walls, grand sash windows letting in plenty of light. Filing cabinets and busts on plinths jostled for space on either side of the walkway, which was barely wide enough to accommodate the guard’s girth.
Not a sign of a workshop or a lab or a bit of old boat anywhere, reflected the Doctor glumly. He wasn’t going to find much up here –besides a dubious welcome from Vida Swann.
‘Her office is at the end on your right,’ Derek announced.
‘You’ll need your pass.’
‘Of course.’ The Doctor produced his white card with a flourish and carried on down the corridor. ‘Well, thanks for the guided tour. Bye.’
But Derek didn’t shift, watching him with a hangdog expression.
The Doctor paused uncomfortably outside the office door. ‘I’m here.
Safe and sound.’
Derek nodded. ‘In you go, sir.’
‘Oh, yeah. Right.’ He contemplated the white card for a few moments. Would those soldiers have access privileges for this level? If not, the next few minutes could be seriously embarrassing. ‘Here we go, then!’
26
He rammed the white card home. With a quiet bleep and a click, the door jumped off its catch. With a triumphant wave at Derek, the Doctor disappeared inside.
The office was small; room for a desk and an internal door and not a lot else. On this second door, a piece of paper had been taped over an existing nameplate, and he stepped forward to read it. In block capitals was printed:
VIDA SWANN – LIAISON OFFICER
EUROPEAN OFFICE OF OCEANIC RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
Then suddenly the door opened outwards and bashed him on the nose. ‘Ow!’
‘Whoops! Oh, God, I’m sorry!’ A willowy blonde swept out from behind the heavy oak door and grasped his face with both hands. ‘Are you all right? Are you bleeding?’
‘I’m fine!’ he protested.
‘Shall I get you a tissue?’
‘I don’t need to blow it, thanks.’ He pulled his face free of her grasp.
‘Well. Hello, then. You’re Vida Swann.’
‘Yes, I am.’ She looked around the antechamber as if expecting someone else to be there, and looked blank for a moment. ‘Um, this is where my assistant should be sitting. If anyone had actually bothered to give me an assistant.’
‘I tend to pick mine up on the job,’ said the Doctor, dabbing gingerly at his nose. ‘They come in very handy, I find.’
‘It’s a good one, I hope it recovers.’
‘You what?’
‘Your nose.’ She smiled. ‘Good for sniffing out trouble, I’ll bet.’
‘Um – yes. You could say that.’ He smiled back at this most unstuffy of officers. Her hair was dyed blonde and hung to her shoulders.
Her own nose was long and straight, and she had a gently pointed chin. But her eyes really took his attention, blue-green and vivacious.
‘How d’you do?’ he said. ‘Sir John Smith, Scientific Adviser. To the Admiralty, actually.’
27
‘Are you indeed?’
Vida’s hands strayed to straighten her smart
jacket. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t here to welcom
e you, you and your. . . ?’
‘Oh, I’m here on my own.’
‘You are?’
‘I am.’ He showed her the psychic paper. ‘So, listen, could you direct me to where the trouble actually is?’
Vida frowned. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘You know. Those bits of the Ascendant brought back from the deeps.’ He gently massaged his nose. ‘I mean, I can’t sniff them out for myself, now, can I?’
‘I suppose not.’ She parked herself on the empty desk and looked at him thoughtfully. ‘So why did you want to see me, Sir John?’
‘I didn’t,’ he said. ‘Er, not when I know you must be so busy. I mean, liaising with people all day long. . . and without an assistant. . . ’
‘It is difficult,’ she sighed, gripping the edge of the desk with both hands, and leaned back casually. ‘I mean, we’ve got all these army types getting in the way, so paranoid about intruders. . . Rear Admiral Crayshaw creaking about the place, hushing everything up so no one will talk to me – and a Vice Admiral coming over from Norfolk tomorrow who’s inspecting the wreck. . . ’
‘Norfolk!’ The Doctor beamed. ‘I love it in Norfolk. So flat! Walk all day and never get out of breath. Ever done the Elvis Experience at Yarmouth?’
Vida cleared her throat. ‘That would be Norfolk, Virginia. Largest naval base in the world. Main port on the Eastern Seaboard.’
‘Ah.’ The Doctor clicked his tongue. ‘I should probably have known that, shouldn’t I?’
‘Probably,’ she agreed. ‘But to be honest, I first had my suspicions about you when my PC read your pass card as belonging to Sergeant Jodie North on perimeter security detail – whatever your forged ID
might say.’
‘Ah again. Part two of the previous “ah”.’
‘You see, since I don’t have an assistant, it’s helpful for me to know who’s entered my little waiting room,’ she explained.
28
‘Yeah, I can see that would come in handy.’ The Doctor blew out his cheeks, shoved his hands in his pockets. ‘On top of that, I probably look a bit young to have been knighted, don’t I?’
Vida nodded. ‘There was that too.’
An uncomfortable silence ensued.
‘I’m the Doctor, by the way.’
‘Hello.’
‘You’ll be calling security, then?’
‘Already have.’ She slid off the desk. ‘Panic button under here –’
‘– which you set off while leaning back in that cool and understated manner! Very good. Oh, very good.’ The Doctor nodded approvingly
– and lunged for the outer door. ‘See ya!’
‘Wait!’ Vida called after him. ‘Who are you working for? Why did you really come here?’
But the Doctor was already running down the corridor. Security would be swarming everywhere in another few moments. Should he take the stairs, the lift or a window?
The windows were no good. No convenient fire escapes or helpful drainpipes out there, just a two-storey jump on to a gravel-strewn roof.
The lift was humming. Someone was coming up. Several someones in khaki, most likely.
He threw open the fire door to the stairs, which were echoing already with the clump of boots on concrete.
The Doctor was trapped.
29
Seconds later, the corridor was bulging with armed soldiers. Vida Swann peeped out from her doorway and shook her head at the overkill.
‘No sign of the intruder,’ one of the troops reported. ‘Strengthen the guard on the main entrance, and make sure all the fire exits are covered,’ said the squad leader. ‘Hit the main alarms. We’ll fan out and check the other levels.’ His troops parted as he turned and strode up to Vida. ‘The intruder was unarmed?’
‘Yes, I’m sure he was,’ said Vida. ‘He was just a harmless crank.’
‘When we’ve bagged him,’ said the squad leader as a siren howled into deafening life, ‘we’ll be the judge of that.’
‘We?’ she shouted, covering her ears. ‘Don’t let Crayshaw hear you might be thinking for yourselves.’
The squad leader smiled. ‘He’s on his way up to talk to you.’
‘Oh, good.’ Vida smiled back. Then she slammed her office door in his face.
Unable to take the stairs, the lift or the windows, the Doctor had taken the cupboard.
31
It was a stationery cupboard, perched at the end of the corridor near the lift doors. Squashed up against fax paper, Post-its and stacks of biros in an assortment of colours, the Doctor held his breath as the lift doors opened and soldiers poured out into the narrow space.
It wouldn’t take them long to realise he must be hiding somewhere on this level. Which was why he slipped out of the cupboard behind them and into the lift before the double doors had time to slide closed again. No Derek this time, so the Doctor stabbed the ground-floor button himself. Hardly taxing – why did they need a security guard in the lift, anyway?
Then he saw the sheer metal plate beneath the working controls, like a covering. It was locked and wouldn’t budge, so he fished out his sonic screwdriver. The tool’s bulbous tip glowed blue as ultrasonic frequencies bombarded the workings of the lock.
The lift had barely reached the second floor before the plate fell open – to reveal five more buttons, none of them marked. Intrigued, the Doctor changed the settings on the screwdriver and cancelled out his ground-floor choice. It suddenly seemed that he could go down further. Far further.
‘What lies beneath?’ he wondered aloud as the lift continued its descent.
Rose had her mobile up against one ear and Anne’s head lolling against the other, as she and Mickey walked her unsteadily down a quiet back street. The old woman seemed to be drifting in and out of awareness, as if she was happiest in some other place that only she could see.
The thrum of the connected tone purred in Rose’s ear, then a click.
‘Hello, Mum? It’s me.’
‘Where’ve you been?’ The classic Jackie Tyler greeting. In the old days it was hurled at her after stumbling through the door in the early hours after a night out with Keish and Shareen. That she still got it now after fighting googly-eyed monsters or facing off mean military types was comforting in a weird sort of way. ‘Rose, you all right?’
‘I’m fine. Almost home.’
32
‘What happened to you? Thought you were coming round this afternoon?’
‘Well, Keish was in a bit of a state and then I –’
‘It’s that Doctor again, isn’t it?’ Rose rolled her eyes at her mum’s disapproving tone. ‘He’s dragged you off on one of his “adventures”.’
‘Mum, something weird’s going on.’
‘When isn’t it, I’d like to know?’
Anne groaned suddenly, turned her head from Rose. ‘Who’s that?’
Jackie demanded. ‘Who have you got there?’
‘Can we come round, me and Mickey? There’s this old woman, right, she’s had a funny turn. Needs a bed for the night.’
‘Running a doss house now, am I? Well, sorry, sweetheart, but I can’t. I’ve got Dennis coming round tonight –’
‘Dennis? I thought he was well out of the picture!’
‘Well, he said he never meant it. And a dotty old lady floating round the place won’t exactly get him in the mood to make it up to me, will it?’
‘All right, whatever. I’ll catch you later, yeah?’
‘Just take care of yourself, Rose. Don’t get into trouble.’
Bit late for that, she thought. ‘Same goes for you. He’s got more arms than an octopus, that Dennis.’
‘Tell me about it!’ said Jackie dreamily. ‘Bye!’
Rose sighed and slipped the mobile back in her pocket. ‘So much for giving Anne my old bed.’
‘It’ll have to be my place after all,’ said Mickey. He’d drunk most of a big bottle of water and was looking slightly better for it. ‘The way she is now, she won’t even n
otice the sheets ain’t been changed for a couple of. . . ’ He caught the accusing look on Rose’s face. ‘Um, weeks.’
‘Let me go,’ Anne whispered hoarsely. ‘Let me go to him.’ Rose tightened her grip on the old woman’s hand. ‘Have a bit of a rest first, yeah?’
‘I want to go back!’ the old woman said, more loudly. A couple across the street looked over, curious.
Rose bit her lip. What were they supposed to do, hold her against her will? ‘Have a cup of tea first. Get your strength.’
33
‘I know you mean well,’ said Anne, suddenly lucid. ‘But you don’t understand. No one could ever understand.’
‘Yeah. Yeah, they could.’ Rose stopped walking. ‘Mickey, we’ve got to take her to Keisha’s.’
‘What?’
‘You heard her. Someone who understands! They’ve both lost someone on that ship – it could be good for them to meet each other.’
‘Fine,’ said Mickey. ‘I’ll go with you to the door, but no way am I having anything to do with her.’
Rose sighed. ‘I’ll bet she’s really sorry about what she did, Mickey.’
‘Yeah, well, so am I.’ He looked away, quickened his step a little, and that was the end of the conversation.
Vida stood in her office, trying to compose herself. Crayshaw always unnerved her, and she couldn’t really work out why. He was old, cold and uncompromising, but there were enough of his type around and she was well used to them. Dealing with difficult people didn’t faze her, she enjoyed the challenge. So what was it about him?
The inevitable beep sounded from her computer: CRAYSHAW, JOHN ANTHONY, REAR ADMIRAL, CLEARANCE A1. He was here.
Vida sat down on her chair and straightened the knot of her tie.
Crayshaw entered without knocking – a habit of his, like wearing dark glasses indoors and that stupid scarf around his neck. Some put it down to eccentricity, others to illness, but Vida felt it was more a deliberate attempt to put others off guard, to intimidate. He might play the old, frail naval hero when it suited, but there was a stubborn strength about him the years could not remove.
