Doctor Who_ Deep Blue - Mark Morris [79]
It was evident that not so very long ago this particular hybrid had been an attractive young woman with long blonde hair and honey-coloured skin. Now these attributes merely emphasised the extent and hideousness of her transformation. Her arms and long legs, exposed by the sleeveless yellow T-shirt and denim shorts she wore, were as hackled with Xaranti spines as her fine-boned face. Her eyes were black and bulging and her back had split open to produce the usual bristling mass of Xaranti legs. Moreover, she was hunched over as if her spine was arching, and her shoulders were large and knuckly with excess muscle. When she opened her mouth to hiss, Tegan noticed she was still wearing lipstick.
‘Hang on! ‘ Mike Yates yelled and slammed on his brakes.
The hybrid scrambling for purchase on the roof catapulted off, landing on the road in a tangle of human and alien limbs.
The one which was standing above Tegan, swiftly getting its bearings and readying itself to spring, actually fell forwards towards her. Tegan, still crouched beside the oblivious Doctor, still clinging to one of the truck’s metal ribs, screamed and closed her eyes as she twisted her head aside, the gun in her hand forgotten. She sensed the hybrid’s presence above her, smelled its dark, rotten-fish smell, then something banged painfully into her outstretched leg. Next instant she was aware of the wind of something swooping past her, followed almost simultaneously by the thump of a heavy and relatively soft object impacting with a hard surface.
She opened her eyes. Although the rotten-fish smell still lingered, the Xaranti hybrid was gone. Tegan looked over the side of the truck and saw it sprawled in the road, already struggling to stand. Before it could do so, the truck moved forward again, picking up speed as quickly as it was able, and Tegan looked away, concentrating instead on holding on.
Within seconds the hybrids were too far behind them to launch a further assault, leaving Tegan with a lasting impression of the female hybrid’s striking blonde hair streaming behind it, flashing white in the sun, as it climbed to its feet.
The hospital was some five miles away from the concentration of streets which crammed themselves as close as possible to the sea. In these more salubrious surroundings, the presence of Xaranti seemed non-existent.
Nevertheless their influence was clearly felt; it was obvious they had been here and moved on, drawn like lemmings, perhaps, to the sea. Every so often Tegan would see a body sprawled on a road or pavement, or perhaps lying on a neatly-clipped front lawn or gravelled driveway. At one point she saw a man lying on the ground, still gripping the lead of his dead Alsatian; both owner and dog had been eviscerated.
The eerie silence that accompanied these appalling sights seemed more sinister than the presence of the Xaranti themselves. Tegan clutched Mike Yates’s gun nervously, once or twice even found herself using it to scratch absently at the worsening itch across her chest and shoulders.
It had been Mike’s idea to take the Doctor to the hospital where Charlotte and her mother were under observation. He had thought it would be a safe haven for the time being, well away from the point of conflict, but the extent of the hybrids’
sudden and violent emergence had taken them both by surprise. Now they were sticking to their original plan simply for want of a better one. If when they got there the hospital seemed too dangerous, Tegan supposed they would move yet further afield, to a place where the Doctor’s condition could be assessed and perhaps treated, where he might be given time to recover.
As usual, their reliance on the Doctor to sort things out made Tegan nervous. One day - even