Dead of Winter - James Goss [53]
I decided to rush upstairs to my room.
One step. Two steps. I crept up the stairs, feeling the wood creak beneath my feet. I tried to keep calm, to be brave. No worse than sleeping through a thunderstorm. No worse.
I reached the first landing and turned, and my legs turned to liquid.
Standing at the top of the stairs was another patient, the sad Austrian who couldn’t play chess, his mouth set in a toothless leer. Ever so quiet. Waiting.
I threw open the door to the cupboard under the stairs and hid in there, quivering.
Suddenly.
Horribly.
I realised I was not alone in there. I could hear breathing.
Then a terrible green glow lit up the cupboard under the stairs. I was about to scream, and then something stifled me. Oh it was HORRID!
Mother, they were the worst moments, truly. But don’t worry – see, I am writing this letter to you, so I must be fine. The Doctor made it all right in the end.
Then a voice said, ‘Shhhh.’
It was the Doctor. He was looking at me. The green glow was the light from his sonic screwdriver. He looked awkward.
‘Hello,’ he whispered.
‘Hello, monsieur,’ I whispered back.
‘Sorry about that,’ he said. ‘I was hiding.’
‘Me too.’
‘I know.’
‘Are there, by any chance, an awful lot of patients roaming the corridors behaving most creepily?’ he asked.
‘Yes.’ I nodded solemnly.
‘Oh well,’ he said. ‘All my fault. Something has got into them. They’re trying to find me. I gave them a tiny little bit of my brain. Not much. A few memories, a colour I never really cared for. Just enough to get away. The thing in the sea… it is taking hold of them. Something else has linked to it. Something powerful and dreadful that has only now realised what it can do. The psychic link must be broken. I think I know who it is, but… No.’
‘What are you going to do about it, monsieur?’ I asked him.
He groaned. ‘Why does it always have to be me?’
‘Mr Rory is ill. You’re the next best thing,’ I said simply.
‘Thank you,’ he muttered. He didn’t sound very pleased at that at all.
‘I can go and get Mr Rory, if you want. He’ll know what to do. But he probably shouldn’t be disturbed.’
‘No…’ the Doctor agreed with me. ‘He’s ill and…’ He sighed. ‘The thing is… I could stop all of this so easily. I just… It’s not the right thing to do.’
‘Then what is, monsieur?’ I asked.
The Doctor smiled at that. ‘Well, Maria, I should like you to be very brave and to go and find Prince Boris. See if he can reason with Kosov… he’s got a very strong connection to that thing in the sea. Maybe it’s Kosov who is controlling it. Don’t tell them where I am, but see if… see if Prince Boris can influence Kosov somehow. Things are very bad… but I think you can help me.’
He squeezed my hand.
‘Don’t worry, monsieur,’ I assured him. ‘I’ll go.’
The Doctor smiled. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘You are very brave.’
‘What will you do?’
‘I’m going to reason with Dr Bloom. Before it’s too late.’
Your ever loving
Maria
The Story of Rory
So there I am, talking to a fake alien version of my wife. And the truth is, it’s not so bad, actually.
Now, no, don’t look at me like that. There are things that you can write down that sometimes you can’t say to someone. No matter how much you love them. Because you love them.
There was a time when Amy really liked going clubbing. I’ve never been one of life’s dancers – I can jig around a beer bottle and that’s pretty much it. But not Amy – she’s hands in the air, woo, for hours and hours and hours. She even knows all the moves to Single Ladies. And, of course, there aren’t really clubs in Leadworth, so someone has to be the designated driver. That’ll be me. Rory Williams. Standing by the coats in the corner, swaying gently around an orange juice while Amy’s out there in the dry ice, laughing and dancing. She’s having a good time, so I stand there, pretending very hard, with a desperate grin on my face. Because I love her. And if I let on that I am bored out of my mind, then maybe she’ll leave me. I don’t want that to happen. So there’s me, and the