by Doctor Who
‘There’s not far to go now.’ The Doctor climbed up the stairs, out of the sludge. ‘Come on, Jay! Now!’
But Jay was convulsing, shouting wildly at the thrashing waters.
The Doctor was about to go back for him when a piratical figure burst out of the waist-deep water. It was a man, pearly-eyed, dressed in material once grand and finely embroidered. His hair was black, but his face was chalk-white and bloated-looking; he looked as if he belonged to another time long since past. Then a second figure rose silently from the cold, churning liquid – a pale, thin man with a close-cropped beard. His bulging eyes gleamed like the iron cross that weighed upon his dark greatcoat, and his peaked cap bore the eagle insignia of the Third Reich Kriegsmarine.
Where had they sprung from? The Doctor started back clown the steps.
‘I’m not gonna do it!’ Jay shouted, but a second later the pirate and 55
the U-boat captain had dragged him back down beneath the freezing waters.
The Doctor splashed noisily after them, but caught a glimpse of dark movement at the corner of the access tunnel. It was as if the three figures had been swept away by some sudden, impossible current, though the water had become calm and still.
There was nothing he could do for Jay now.
‘I’ll be back,’ the Doctor promised, then frowned. ‘Or did someone already say that?’ He cleared his throat. ‘I shall return! No, this isn’t the Philippines. . . I’m just going outside, I may be some time? Oh, blimey, no. . . ’
He turned and hurried away up the steps. The soldiers must surely be waiting for him by now. At least they hadn’t been ordered on to the tug. Why was that? Because Jay had been at large and the soldiers weren’t supposed to know about him? Well, now that the poor bloke had been taken by those creatures, the coast was clear – or rather, the tug was. He emerged into a cramped ship’s corridor, aware that it could be crawling with soldiers at any moment.
The Doctor ran on until he reached a locked bulkhead.
With a blast of sonic blue he opened it and ducked inside, into the tug’s cabin. The windows were shrouded by a heavy tarpaulin; it was anyone’s guess how many soldiers out on the bank had their guns trained on him. But at least it kept out prying eyes, and perhaps he could find something of use here. . .
He glanced round the ship’s controls. It looked to have once been a standard notch tug – connected to a specially designed cargo barge through a notch in the stern, effectively making them one ship. But some of the controls had clearly been customised: one touch-sensitive screen showed a glowing green schematic of the base of the tug, which looked to be locked on to the top of the cargo loading shaft.
And now that he came to listen, he could hear the ring of steel heels on metal. Someone was on board.
Coming his way.
The little newsagent’s was a bright window in the dark of the parade.
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As Rose pushed inside through the door she found herself hemmed in by mags and crisps and chocolate and bog rolls. There weren’t many papers left and none of them were screaming about the Ascendant.
She hedged her bets and picked up a heavy posh one and the Star.
An Asian woman sat on a stool beside the till, a tired smile on her face. ‘Looking for anything else, love?’
‘Sort of.’ Rose pushed past two grubby deep-freezes filled with pizza, falafel and ice cream. ‘I heard you had ambulances here today.’
The woman grinned. ‘Actually we did all right out of it. Had a real rush on the bottled water.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘Advanced dehydration, the medics said. “Dangerous lack of water in the body”. That’s what made ’em drop. And it was weird, ’cause it weren’t as if they even knew each other but they were all the same. . . ’
The woman frowned. ‘Never seen that happen on Casualty. Anyway, must have scared all the people watching, ’cause they bought up all the water we had, still and sparkling.’
Rose bit her lip. She shuddered at the memory of Jay’s ghost, water gushing out of his mouth, and the way the soldiers had collapsed.
‘When they fell, those customers – did they sort of have fits?’
The woman nodded. ‘Oh yeah, and some of them were sick and all. It was disgusting. But the medics said that’s the symptoms you’d expect. But long term – not, like, in two seconds flat. They were all right before, see.’
‘Yeah,’ said Rose, ‘I think I do.’ There was a link here, had to be.
But why water? Because the ship had sunk and drowned everyone aboard?
‘So, you buying those papers, then?’ the woman prompted. ‘Oh, Yeah, sorry.’ Rose reached in her pocket and handed over a couple of quid.
The woman took the coins. And then she fell backwards off the stool, collapsed in a heap together with a small avalanche of cigarette packets.
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‘God! Are you all right?’ Rose crouched beside her, looked about for anyone who could help.
But there was only the ghost of Jay, stood shivering between the samosas and the dog-eared birthday cards. ‘Help me, Rose. Come to me,’ he pleaded. A stream of water poured from his nose as he gave her a tiny, hopeful smile. ‘Please. Before the feast.’
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‘Youain’ttoldher,haveyou?’ saidKeisha. ‘Youain’tnevertoldher.’
Mickey sat down carefully beside the sleeping Anne. ‘No. And neither have you. Because it was nothing. Less than nothing.’
She looked at him scornfully. ‘You’re telling me.’
‘Ancient history.’
‘That’s why you’re so scared it’s gonna come out, is it?’
‘It won’t. Why would you tell her? You’re just as much in the wrong as me.’
‘You took advantage, Mickey.’
‘I never! I would never do that –’
‘Thought you couldn’t remember?’
Mickey buried his head in his hands. It was the truth, he couldn’t.
When Rose had pushed off with the Doctor for the first time, he’d just watched her disappear, he’d done nothing. And yeah, pathetic though it was, he’d gone asking round Rose’s mates just in case they’d heard from her – even Keisha. She was going through a bad patch; what else was new. But she was upset about Rose pushing off too and they’d decided to drown their sorrows together.
59
Things got hazy then, but Keisha had wasted no time filling in the awful blanks next morning. . .
Suddenly Anne sat bolt upright, made him jump. She wore an ec-static look on her face, staring at the wall. ‘Peter!’
‘What?’ Mickey stared, could see nothing.
‘Jay,’ said Keisha, her eyes shining. ‘Look, Mickey, he’s here. It’s Jay!’
‘Oh, you have so got to be kidding me,’ said Mickey, a shiver crawling up his back. ‘There’s no one there!’
But Keisha was nodding to empty space. ‘Yeah. Yeah, I’ll come.’
Someone was screaming upstairs, calling for help. From outside in the street too, there came frantic shouts for an ambulance. Mickey ran to the window and saw a gang of lads were lying sprawled in the road.
One was being sick, another yelling into his mobile. ‘Yeah, I need an ambulance! They just went down, man! I think they’re dying!’
Mickey turned back, saw Anne slowly walking to the door, like a sleepwalker.
‘No, you don’t,’ he muttered, rushing round to try to stop her. ‘Anne?
You gotta stop this. Whatever you can see, right, it’s not real. Just a dream.’
Anne’s eyes hardened as they focussed on him. ‘Get off me,’ she snarled, pushing him away. He stumbled over a pile of magazines, lost his balance and fell. Anne wasn’t moving like a sleepwalker now.
She was like a bat out of hell, heading for the front door.
‘No!’ Mickey shouted, jumping to his feet. But then his whole body seemed to cramp up and the sick feeling he’d had back at the bridge returned, worse than ever. He doubled u
p, fell to his knees. Heard the front door quietly click shut as Anne left the flat. He crawled on his hands and knees, trying to go after her, but he knew it was too late.
You messed it up.
Then he saw Keisha was making for the door as well.
‘No way!’ he said hoarsely. ‘You ain’t going too.’
‘I’ve got to go to Jay,’ she said calmly. ‘I can’t just leave him, can I?’
He forced himself to stand. ‘Now why don’t we wait for Rose to get back and we can –’
60
‘He needs me, Mickey.’ She tried to push him aside but Mickey wasn’t having it a second time. He grabbed hold of Keisha and bundled her into the little bathroom, slammed the door shut. His head was throbbing, the screams and shouting were still going on upstairs and outside, and now Keisha was shrieking at him to open the door, banging it, kicking it. It took all his strength to hold it closed.
Then there was a rapping at the door. ‘Keish? You all right?’
‘Rose?’ Mickey croaked. ‘Get after Anne. She’s gone.’
‘She’s what?’ Rose banged at the door. ‘Is Keisha all right?’
‘She’s gone crazy, wants out of here too. Says she saw Jay –’
‘So did I, out in the shop. There’s all these people collapsing. . . ’
‘I know how they feel,’ said Mickey. ‘Go on, get after Anne. Move!’
‘Take care,’ she shouted, and then she was gone.
‘Take care?’ The door almost jumped from his grip as Keisha yanked on it again, bellowing with rage. ‘I should be in care.’
Gritting his teeth, he kept holding on.
Rose ran through the night-time streets. Sirens howled like wild beasts speeding closer. Electric blue flashes ate into the shadows as an ambulance tore by. She tossed her head this way and that, looking for any sign of Anne, and kept imagining she could see Jay standing there, watching her from the shadows, smiling and dripping wet.
His image hadn’t hung around for long. He’d begged her to come to him, and she’d felt this urge to go after him, just like that. But it had been so long since she’d seen him last, and what she’d felt for him aged fourteen was embarrassing, just schoolgirl stuff. To hear him call to her so desperately, with that heartfelt need in his eye. . . it didn’t quite add up to her. She couldn’t quite believe he meant it.
‘Please,’ he’d said, one more time, and then exploded in a huge gout of water. The mags were all drenched, and Rose found herself thinking the owners would be really upset, and that jolted her memory that the Asian woman was lying on the floor and not looking good.
Rose had dialled for an ambulance – her hands were shaking so bad she could hardly hold the phone – and as soon as she had persuaded another customer to mind the woman till it came, she’d run straight 61
back to Keisha’s. If Jay had appeared to her, Keisha must have seen him too. And sure enough, Keish was freaking out, trying to get to him just like Anne was trying to get back to Peter. What the hell was going on? And where the hell was the Doctor when they needed him?
If he’d got himself into trouble and needed her help. . .
With a tiny glimmer of cheer she realised she might just be set to kill two birds with one stone. Anne would be heading back to the bridge she’d tried to jump from before – yeah, that made sense – right on the doorstep of the Doctor’s disappearance. But what if the old girl wasn’t on foot? What if she’d got the bus or something?
Rose stopped running, checked her purse. Just shrapnel, a couple of quid, tops – not enough for a cab. But the cab driver wouldn’t know that, and this was a matter of life and death. . .
She ran off in the opposite direction, towards the taxi rank.
‘I have every right to be here,’ Vida told herself, affecting a vague attempt at a swagger along the tug’s dowdy corridors. ‘I don’t especially want to be here, but if I’m going to find out anything useful before I’m thrown out of this dump. . . ’
She approached the tug’s cabin, and then paused at the sound of movement. Someone was inside. More warily, she edged towards the open bulkhead. . .
And then the intruder peered round the doorway. Each clocked the other and jumped at the same time.
‘You!’ cried Vida.
‘Me,’ he agreed. ‘And my nose for trouble. You were right, it’s very good. I’m the Doctor, hello.’
‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘Use your bonce, Vida! I’m trying to break out of your secret underground military citadel, what d’you think I’m doing here?’
‘Just who are you? Press?’
‘Press what? One of these?’ He jabbed a button on the touch-sensitive screen.
‘Very funny. You’ve –’
62
‘I’ll tell you what’s not so funny,’ he snapped. ‘The Ascendant’s been taken apart like an animal for dissection by means unknown to the human race. And I’ve seen the result of some kind of alien vivisection experiment on one of its crew.’
She stared. ‘Alien?’
‘Yes, alien.’ He leaned forwards and hissed the word in her face.
‘Alien, alien, alien, alien, alien. You didn’t know?’
‘I know you’re crazy,’ she said.
‘Then shouldn’t you be scared? We’re alone down here and you’re fresh out of doors to throw in my face.’
‘I’ll find something,’ she assured him, folding her arms. ‘Just tell me,
“Doctor”. What are you trying to achieve here?’
He folded his own arms, matching her movements. ‘What are your bosses trying to achieve with those sick experiments?’
She took a step closer. ‘You come snooping about, try to incriminate me by coming to my office –’
‘How many more of the crew are being held down there? What’s being done to them?’
‘– and now you turn up here! Don’t you think you’re pushing your luck?’
‘Oh, I’m pushing everything!’ He twirled round and hit several controls. ‘Look! Look at me go! Oh, hang on –’ he leaned over and flicked another switch – ‘missed one.’
‘Will you leave all that!’ she cried. ‘How the hell did you get past the soldiers? I had to show them faxed authorisation from Vice Admiral Kelper that I was allowed on board.’
‘He’s the one from Norfolk, Virginia, on his way to inspect the wreck?’
‘He’s a powerful man.’
The Doctor looked unimpressed. ‘Friends in high places and monsters in low ones. You’ve got all bases covered, haven’t you – especially the top-secret underground ones? Just what is happening down there?’
She hesitated. ‘I don’t know. Could be anything,’ she admitted.
‘Crayshaw won’t let me anywhere near the secret stuff. He’s been 63
trying to get rid of me from the moment I showed. And thanks to you very helpfully crashing my office and making me look like I’m involved with you –’
‘Steady!’ His eyes twinkled. ‘We only just met!’
‘– he’s made it very clear I’m on borrowed time here. Wants me out of the way.’
‘Hence the note from the admirable Vice Admiral. Even so, I’m surprised those soldiers let you on board with this flap on.’
She shrugged. ‘Seemed a bit out of it, to be honest. Especially poor old Private Jodie North, whose pass you pinched.’
He looked surprised. ‘Isn’t she in hospital?’
Vida shifted warily. ‘Why should she be? What did you do to her?’
‘Tried to help her. And her patrol. One minute they’re fine, all guns and aggro – the next, they’re nearly dead from advanced dehydration.’
‘What? Come off it.’
‘Weird, isn’t it? I mean, that’s not just me, it is weird, right?
Yeah. Weird. So any recovery would be quite miraculous. Unless. . . ’
He held out a hand for silence. ‘Shh!’
‘What is it?’ she said, frowning.
She stiffened.
The Doctor noticed at once, of course. ‘What? What did I say?’
‘Nothing.’
‘I did. Oh, that was a definite reaction, Vida Swann. A big fat one.’
‘You’re crazy,’ she insisted. ‘Talking about aliens –’
‘You didn’t run and raise the alarm this time, though, did you?’ He grinned. ‘Either you secretly believe me or you think I’m cute.’
‘You’re out of your –’
‘Which is it?’ He winked. ‘Or is it a bit of both?’
‘Those soldiers out there are fine, OK? You’re just winding me up!’
She crossly waved her piece of folded fax paper. This gave me all the leverage I needed to get inside here. Even Crayshaw can’t overrule –’
64
‘Leverage! I was almost forgetting. Lever – from levare, to raise!’
He clicked his fingers, looked wildly around before pouncing on the biggest, chunkiest lever in the cabin. ‘Well, poor old long-suffering Crayshaw must be about ready to levare hell round here. We’ll have soldiers storming this place any moment, clomp, clomp, clomp, big boring bovver boots stepping all over our toes. Ow!’
Vida jumped as, with a sudden, snorting roar, the tug’s engines started up. ‘What the hell are you doing?’
‘We can’t get off the boat with all those soldiers outside, can we? So we’ll just take her for a quick spin.’
‘You can’t!’
‘Can too! I wasn’t flicking switches just for show, you know. I’ve already disengaged from the cargo trailer.’ He flashed her a wild grin as he crossed to the ship’s wheel. ‘Now then, which way should we head? I know it’s a bit tricky with these tarps over the windows but –’
Suddenly gunfire rattled out. The tarp jumped and glass shattered as bullets tore through the windows. Vida threw herself to the ground, landed just beside the Doctor.
