Doctor Who

by David Solomons

  The Head’s office was much like the hall. Portraits of grave-faced educators hung against the oppressive wood panelling. Some of the frames were singed, presumably damaged in the crash. Briefly, Graham wondered why anyone would have gone to the bother of transporting such dreary art all the way from earth.

  There was a door against the back wall marked FACULTY ONLY. According to Peyton, that was the way into Plainfield. Next to it sat a wide desk, which was presently unoccupied, and on top lay what appeared to be a stack of brochures. The image on the cover showed a smiling pair of schoolchildren standing on what looked like the surface of Mars, waving at the camera while wearing what could only be described as school-uniform spacesuits. Along the bottom of the picture ran the slogan Your child’s future begins here! It was a prospectus for the boarding colony.

  The door marked FACULTY ONLY swung open, and into the study shambled a creature that was human – more or less. In the centre of its shoulders sat a male head, plump and saggy like a piece of fruit that had been left too long in the bowl. Next to it was a second head, this one female, with a thin and tight-lipped face and dark hair piled into a bun. From one side of its body extended an arm that was bare and brawny, with a rolled-up white shirtsleeve and a pale, hairy forearm. It wore a wristwatch with a large round dial. Meanwhile, on the other side was an arm clothed in chiffon that draped across a dark, skinny arm ending in a hand with long, tapering fingers dotted with bright red nail varnish. In the middle, beneath a section of tweed jacket, bulged the sort of chest you’d encounter on a classical statue during a school trip to a museum.

  ‘Visitors!’ exclaimed the male head, in the same booming voice Graham had winced at outside the room. There was no doubt in Graham’s mind that he was the school’s Head. ‘We haven’t had visitors in such a long time.’

  The hairy arm shot out, indicating a couple of chairs.

  ‘Please, take a seat,’ said the female head.

  The creature limped to the desk. One powerful leg wore half a pair of red tracksuit bottoms and a single white trainer; the other was encased in an opaque black stocking that slid into a black patent-leather high heel. The legs were different lengths, giving the creature its distinctive gait. It had apparently learned to cope quite well with the whole odd arrangement, and was surprisingly nimble on its mismatched feet.

  At each shoulder and at the top of the tracksuit-clad leg, Graham could distinctly make out deep stitches of surgical thread wound into exposed flesh, as if the various body parts had been roughly sewn together. Aaron had said that not a single adult had survived when the SS Phaeton crashed. Clearly, what he meant was that not one whole adult survived. This creature wasn’t simply wearing a patchwork of clothes; it was a collection of different teachers. A leg from PE, an arm from science, another from modern languages, a Head and a Deputy Head – all surgically joined together.

  It was Frankenstein’s monster’s staffroom.

  As the creature lowered itself into the chair behind the desk, a jangle sounded at its hip. With a thrill of excitement, Graham saw a collection of keys looped on to its belt. One of them had to be the key to Plainfield – and to Vault Thirteen.

  ‘Welcome to Dorm,’ beamed the Head, throwing its arms wide.

  ‘We are the Faculty,’ added the Deputy Head.

  * * *

  —

  The inside of Ryan’s mouth tasted like something had died in there – something furry and evil. The room swam before his eyes, and he couldn’t feel his legs. It took him a moment to realise that he was lying in one of the beds, secured beneath its imprisoning bedsheet.

  That vile pink medicine must have contained a sedative. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been out of it, or what had happened to Yaz in the meantime. He tried to sit up, but the sheet pinned him like he was a plate of leftovers under a layer of cling film. With some effort, he twisted his neck to look across at the next bed.

  Yaz lay there, completely still, her eyes closed. For a moment he had a terrible feeling that she was dead, but then to his relief she let out a loud snore.

  He was distracted by a movement from across the room. His bleary eyes focused on M8-Tron fussing about next to a table. It was hard to tell exactly what the robot was up to, but then he caught the gleam of a blade under the bright lights and saw that it was cleaning a set of surgical instruments. As it went about its business, the robot hummed to itself.

  ‘Yaz,’ Ryan hissed.

  One eyelid fluttered open, and Yaz squinted in the harsh overhead lights.

  ‘We have to get out of here,’ he whispered urgently. ‘I think that weird robot is about to perform some kind of operation on us. And I’m guessing it’s not the kind where you get ice cream afterwards.’

  Yaz followed his gaze to the bustling robot and, recognising the imminent danger, began to wrestle with her own restraining bedsheet. Ryan renewed his struggle, squirming furiously in the hope of freeing himself.

  M8-Tron, meanwhile, had apparently completed its preparations. The robot’s triangular body pivoted round, and it squeaked across the shining floor towards their beds. In each of its six hands, it gripped a different surgical instrument: there were scissors, a grasper, spreaders, a needle, a scalpel and a rotating saw.

  Ryan wrenched one shoulder against the sheet and finally felt a corner give. ‘Yaz, we’re getting out of here.’

  ‘Silly boy,’ cooed M8-Tron, closing in fast. ‘No one leaves the Sanatorium.’

  With a deep breath and a grunt of effort, Ryan tried again. This time, the bedsheet came loose. The robot loomed above him, a dark triangle against the lights. Three of its arms arced downwards. He saw the glint of multiple blades, and rolled sideways just in time to avoid the scalpel and needles that stabbed through the sheet where moments ago he had been lying. He tumbled out of bed and hit the floor, then quickly got to his feet. His legs felt like wet noodles.

  ‘Ryan!’ cried Yaz.

  He side-stepped the robot’s next attack, glimpsing the blur of its scything saw-arm and feeling it split the air next to his face. He spun round, grabbed the vase of rotting flowers on the bedside table, and hurled them into M8-Tron’s face. A combination of desiccated daffodils and dirty water splashed into the robot’s hollow eyes, and for a moment it was distracted.

  A moment was all he needed. Ryan ripped off Yaz’s sheet, yanked her out of bed, and together they bolted for the door.

  The robot, having recovered from the assault, gave chase.

  They sprinted back out of the Sanatorium, not sure where they were headed, but desperate to outpace the maniacal M8-Tron.

  ‘Such naughty children.’ Its irritatingly upbeat voice pursued them along the corridor.

  Ryan tucked in behind the sprinting Yaz. She seemed to float, while he plodded. All his life he’d been rubbish at sports, but especially at school. He wasn’t diagnosed with dyspraxia until he was in high school, and before that his clumsiness frequently made him the subject of cruel playground taunts. He couldn’t kick a ball into an open goal to save his life, but what he lacked in co-ordination he made up for in determination.

  ‘You keeping up?’ shouted Yaz.

  Ryan struggled to speak and run at the same time. ‘Remember when you were at school,’ he puffed. ‘And everything came easy to you and your body never let you down embarrassingly in high-anxiety situations?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  The passageway swept sharply to the left, and as they rounded the bend Ryan saw the doors to a lift.

  ‘Stop at once!’ yelled M8-Tron. ‘That section is out of bounds!’

  Ryan’s heart was hammering in his chest, and he could hear the blood thrumming in his ears. Yaz glided towards the safety of the lift, while he still toiled in the runner-up position. Behind him, the squeak of M8-Tron’s wobbly wheel grew louder. The robot was catching up.

  Then he slipped on the polished floor. Losing his fo
oting, he tumbled to the ground, striking his head. Dazed, he could hear Yaz shouting at him to get up, and he dumbly tried to obey. The lift doors were closing. He raised his head, but as he did so he felt the cold touch of M8-Tron’s fingers. The robot looped a school tie briskly over him.

  ‘Naughty, naughty,’ it reprimanded. ‘We don’t want you to miss graduation.’

  The tie tightened round Ryan’s neck, and his world once again went dark.

  ‘We’re Mr and Mrs Smith,’ said the Doctor. ‘So lovely to meet you.’ She extended her hand and clasped the Faculty’s hairy hand, pumping it enthusiastically. Then she stepped back and, much to Graham’s surprise, slipped an arm into his. ‘We’re checking out potential schools for our two little ones.’ She jogged his arm. ‘Isn’t that right, darling?’

  He’d been expecting the Doctor to roll out one of her big, confrontational speeches about protecting the universe from evil like the Faculty, and instead she had taken a slightly different approach. Would’ve been helpful if she’d informed me first, he thought, overcoming his initial confusion to play along.

  ‘Uh, yeah, that is quite right.’ His voice became gruff, as he tried to channel an old army man. ‘My father went to a boarding colony, I went to a boarding colony, and so will my son and daughter.’

  ‘Well, you couldn’t choose a better school than New Phaeton,’ said the Head, delightedly clapping one large hand against the other much smaller one. As it did so, Graham noticed a keypad embedded in the creature’s palm. The keypad that Porter had said controlled the students’ choking ties.

  ‘Apologies for detaining you when you arrived.’ The Deputy Head smiled. ‘But one can never be too careful – and the children’s welfare is our top priority.’

  ‘Naturally,’ agreed the Doctor.

  ‘Just out of curiosity,’ enquired the Head, turning to Graham. ‘Where did you go to school, Mr Smith?’

  ‘Mars,’ he blurted. It was the first planet that came to mind.

  ‘Home world of the Ice Warriors?’ said the Deputy Head, and the Faculty raised all four eyebrows. ‘I imagine that must have been quite a strict school.’

  The Doctor shot Graham a look, then turned sweetly to the Faculty. ‘How about a tour?’ She detached herself from her fake husband, and headed towards the door in the back wall. ‘Let’s start in here. Have you got the key?’

  The Faculty leaped to its feet and firmly guided her away from the door. ‘I suggest we begin with the most important part of the tour. The heart of our school.’ The two heads smiled in unison. ‘The children.’

  And so they trooped off along the corridor, listening to the Head and the Deputy Head take turns going on about the school’s marvellous facilities, which included everything from a fully equipped zero-G gymnasium to anti-aircraft defences.

  ‘Rassilon Junior and Sally,’ the Doctor whispered to Graham.

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘Our children’s names. In case it should come up.’ She gestured to the Faculty, currently several paces ahead of them and still boring on about the school. ‘Rassilon Junior loves anything with wheels, though he’s a cautious child, especially around roller coasters after an incident at Hedgewick’s World of Wonders. And Sally is passionate about dinosaurs and climbing trees.’

  ‘You’ve given this a lot of thought,’ whispered Graham.

  From up ahead came the sound of young voices raised in song. Graham could just make out the words.

  ‘And did those boots in ancient time walk upon Phaeton’s dusty land…’ they trilled.

  ‘Ah, the old school song,’ said the Head, sweeping open a set of double doors.

  Once, this had obviously been the ship’s hangar bay, but now served as the school’s assembly hall. A crumbling shuttle craft sagged at the edge of a yawning chamber, its parts long ago stripped to keep other, more important technology going.

  Hundreds of children, organised by age, filled the space on two sides, leaving a corridor between them. The Faculty proceeded down this corridor with its familiar limping gait, heading towards a stage at the far end that was drawn with theatre curtains. As it passed the children, they sang out. Graham noted the fear in their eyes, as they shot sidelong glances at the terrible creature who ruled their lives.

  The singers were accompanied by the plink-plonk of a badly played piano. Seated on the stage at an upright piano was a triangular white robot. Despite its six arms – or perhaps because of them – the sound it produced from the instrument was discordant and unsettling.

  ‘Please,’ said the Deputy Head, gesturing to two empty chairs right at the front of the hall. ‘You’ll be able to see everything from here.’

  The Doctor and Graham took their seats, while the Faculty heaved itself up on to the stage and made its way to a speaker’s dais set in front of the drawn curtains.

  ‘Thank you, M8-Tron,’ the Head said to the robot pianist, who ceased playing in a tumble of awkward notes.

  There was a whine of feedback from the public-address system as the Head and the Deputy Head cleared their throats.

  ‘Students, honoured guests, please join us in welcoming the class of 4028,’ the Head declared with an expansive sweep of its modern-languages arm.

  The curtains slid apart to reveal a row of seated students. Graham cast his gaze along the line, recognising among the blank faces Aaron, Peyton and Porter, the Head Boy – and, to his horror, right at the end of the row, Ryan.

  ‘Take a long look, children,’ the Deputy Head continued. ‘Today we are here to say goodbye to them, for today they graduate.’

  ‘I thought graduation was tomorrow,’ said Graham in alarm.

  ‘Our arrival has accelerated matters,’ said the Doctor. ‘Don’t worry, it always does. Can’t tell you how many invasions of earth have been brought forward because of me. I remember when a fleet of Dahensa warships suddenly appeared over London –’ She caught Graham’s eye. ‘Probably not the moment.’

  ‘No,’ he confirmed.

  The Doctor glanced towards the stage. ‘Invaders are all the same, and the Faculty’s no different. They don’t want anyone spoiling their big day.’

  A junior pupil approached, handing Graham and the Doctor each a sheet of paper. At the top of the page was written ‘New Phaeton Graduation Day’, and beneath it the running order for the service, including a list of hymns.

  The Head boomed again. ‘Now we shall sing hymn number one-three-eight, “How Deep the Faculty’s Love for Us”.’

  There was the scrape of chairs on the floor as the school rose as one. Reluctantly, the students on stage followed the example of their younger counterparts. With a nod from the Deputy Head, the robot began to bash the piano once more, and the assembly hall filled with nervous singing.

  The Faculty touched a control on the dais. There was a brief pause, then a grumble of machinery. Slowly, the wall behind the stage parted to expose the outside of the ship and the very edge of Dorm’s protective dome. Built into the base of the dome was a large, round metal door – the outer seal of an airlock. Surveillance drones were regularly launched through this door into the wasteland beyond the ship, but for ten years no human had ventured outside. Until today.

  A panel of lights turned from red to green, and with a pressurised hiss the internal airlock door swung open. Beyond lay a space the size of a large lift, ready for the graduates.

  ‘Steeped in the disciplines of mathematics, Latin, physics and survival,’ said the Head proudly, ‘I estimate that the ablest students may live as long as three hours out in the world.’ It applauded wildly, but no one else joined in.

  Graham regarded the students seated on stage. For people facing certain death, they seemed remarkably calm. He peered into their faces, and the dull gleam in their eyes told him that they had been drugged into meek obedience – all of them but Ryan. He looked terrified.

  The singing faltered, as a murmur of unease rippled through th
e hall. Some of the students at the front pointed. They’d spotted something beyond the dome.

  Graham saw it too.

  On the horizon was the distinctive shimmer of the Spectres. They were closing in on Dorm.

  * * *

  —

  Yaz wandered the deserted passageways of the SS Phaeton, feeling guilty about leaving Ryan behind to the mercies of M8-Tron, but knowing that if she’d stayed to help she would have been captured too. She silently swore she’d find him and the key to Vault Thirteen. However, she couldn’t deal with the medical robot on her own. She needed the others. The trouble was, they weren’t on this deck.

  There was also one other obstacle to her plan. She was lost.

  The lift that had brought her to this level was somewhere far behind, in a maze of corridors that all looked the same. As yet, she hadn’t come across another lift. All she knew was that this was deck thirteen, and that M8-Tron had yelled that it was out of bounds.

  ‘I wonder why,’ she muttered quietly to herself, as she reached another junction identical to all the others. ‘Eeny, meeny, miny…’

  The impact of the original crash had shattered the Phaeton’s interior, but some sections were more damaged than others. This one was the worst spot she’d encountered so far. Dust lay thickly on every surface, as if no one had visited this part of the ship in years. The ceiling had caved in at various points, peppering the route with debris. She stepped over a lump of twisted metal, and continued on down the passageway.

  At the next junction, she found a directional sign on the wall, obscured by an accumulation of dirt. She rubbed away at it to reveal the words COMMUNICATION CENTRE.

  A few minutes later, she found herself in a control room similar to the one where the TARDIS had set down. But, where that one had been filled with activity and the hum of power, here the monitoring positions were unmanned and the equipment silent. Nonetheless, she was at the very heart of the ship’s communications systems. No wonder this place was out of bounds.