Doctor Who_ Full Circle - Andrew Smith [1]
'There's something out there, Mr Fenrik,' he stammered. 'Something... I don't know.' The man was petrified, perspiring with fright.
Fenrik addressed Selman's companion. 'Huikson?'
The swarthy steward seemed unworried. 'We were standing outside there, sir.' He pointed to the sealed entrance door, a thick, heavy, impenetrable barrier. 'At the bottom of the ramp. Selman said he thought he saw or heard something...'
'I saw them! Moving!' Selman cried. 'They're big.. I only glimpsed them, Mr Fenrik, but they're out there, I swear it, they're out there and they're coming to get us!'
'There's been no word from any of the watches posted by the hull ruptures,' said Fenrik. He recalled that Selman was - or had been on Terradon - a lawyer. Fenrik hated lawyers.
Huikson looked more than a little embarrassed. He tried to make excuses for Selman. 'The mist's getting thicker, sir. Drawing in a bit. Gets the imagination going. You know. Happens.'
They all heard the scraping sound on the other side of the entranceway.
Something was out there.
It came again. A hard, metallic grating sound.
When it came yet again there was obviously more than one of them.
Fenrik swore under his breath. He looked at Selman, saw him quivering and whimpering with fear, and inwardly damned the man for being right as he snatched down a wall radio and spoke into it. 'Commander Fenrik. Alert the ship - unidentified intruders are massing outside. Number unknown. Everyone is to be made ready to defend the starliner.'
The message went out over the passenger address system and everyone prepared themselves. There was not the level of panic that Fenrik might have feared - for many, this appeared to be a relief from all the tension and rumour of the past seven days. The enemy were here. They could at last do something concrete about dealing with that enemy.
Fenrik was joined in the boarding area by some thirty men carrying knives, tools, metal piping, anything that could be used as a weapon.
It seemed to have been a false alarm. The sounds from the door had stopped. For half an hour Fenrik and his men stood in total silence, save for the occasional reports coming in from the groups stationed by the hull ruptures. These reports stated that no movement outside the ship had been detected, no signs of life.
'Open the entrance.'
Fenrik's command prompted a number of uncertain, worried gazes from among the men around him. Then Huikson punched the appropriate sequence into a button panel by the door and the heavy portal started to rise up into the ceiling.
'They could still be out there, sir,' Huikson warned.
'I know,' Fenrik replied matter-of-factly, then moved towards the entrance. Dense, curling tongues of milky vapour lapped at him as he stepped out onto the shallow boarding ramp.
His men gathered behind him, infected by his courage, as Fenrik tried to peer out into the fog. It was futile. Visibility was down to six to eight feet.
Alzarius was silent.
They'll be back, Fenrik thought to himself as he turned to face the others.
'All right. Relax. There's nothing out there. Pass the word to the other - '
They appeared from nowhere, snarling and screaming, tall and hideous, dozens of them lumbering clumsily up the ramp.
Fenrik was the first to die, felled by a blow from a scaly, clawed hand.
In that same instant, hundreds more of the creatures began their attack on other vulnerable areas of the vessel.
The people of the starliner started the defence of their ship and of their lives.
It was to be a long and difficult battle.
II
When Mistfall comes
The sun is swallowed whole
By sky-borne darkness
The world turns to cold
When Mistfall comes
The globe transforms its face
Grey fog clouds probe
They reach to every place
When Mistfall comes