Doctor Who_ Nightshade - Mark Gatiss [44]
waist and scanning the room for his discarded clothes.
‘I don’t- ‘
‘That’s OK. She needs the rest. I don’t want to wake her.
‘Left, left, then right,’ called Hawthorne, throwing himself You can go now - er?’
into a swivel chair as paper poured from the printout to the
‘Ace.’
floor.
‘Right.’ Vijay smiled. ‘Thanks.’
‘Get Vijay,’ said Cooper, ‘and Holly if she’s awake. Their Ace let her eyes linger briefly on his finely muscled chest rooms are marked. No time to explain!’
and then, mentally admonishing herself for her wandering
‘But...’
thoughts, exited.
‘Go!’
She ran all the way back to the control room where Ace scrambled to her feet and dashed off into the interior Cooper ushered her into a chair. Both she and Hawthorne of the building. Emergency lights flashed around every were totally engrossed in the eruption of data which blank wall, heightening the hectic atmosphere. She raced crackled like a bonfire around the huge room.
past lockers and storerooms, even a TV lounge, before she spotted a door marked ‘H. Kidd’.
Sleep was a beautiful release and Betty Yeadon, for once Ace paused, panting for breath, knocked and threw open free of her nightmares, wallowed in it. Muted colours the door. Empty. She cursed.
flashed across her closed lids as her breathing settled into a The next door bore the legend ‘Vijay Degun’ and a sign soft, regular pattern.
cannibalized from a cardboard ‘Fragile - With Care’ notice The room around her was empty, Robin’s vacated chair which now read ‘agile - Wit...’
pushed back against the wall. The frosty night outside Ace didn’t knock this time.
whispered around the drawn curtains.
Inside the room, Holly and Vijay lay curled naked against Betty turned over in her sleep as a bubble of memory one another, a mess of blankets pulled haphazardly around floated to the surface of her unconscious. There was a dull them.
thud somewhere below.
Ace cleared her throat in embarrassment and Vijay sat up Plash
sharply, his thick black fringe obscuring his eyes.
The curtains stirred slightly and there was another smaller
‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘They want you in the control sound, as if bare winter branches were scraping at the room. There’s some sort of emergency.’
window.
Vijay looked momentarily nonplussed and ran his hand Plash
through his hair as if to wake himself up. ‘Right,’ he said at She opened one eye, feeling the weight of drowsiness last.
gushing through her brain like thick soup.
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DOCTOR WHO: NIGHTSHADE
DOCTOR WHO: NIGHTSHADE
Thud
Betty looked at the bottom of the door. A four-panelled, She opened both her eyes and felt suddenly alert. The glossy white door, under which a pool of black sea-water bedside clock ticked loudly.
was slowly forming.
Plash
She tried to speak, call, scream, but her throat tightened Plash
into a rasping croak. All that came out, in a whisper so low Betty pulled herself back to the headboard and dragged she scarcely heard it herself, was a name.
the blankets around her. The rustling sound came again and
‘Alf?’
she glanced feverishly around the room.
From behind the door came a soft, low chuckle.
Thud
Thud
‘Doctor! Doctor, wait!’
She gazed at the closed bedroom door. There were four Robin called after the little figure who’d made amazingly panels in it. A white, glossy door. Silence hissed about her.
rapid progress across the coal-black moor. The moon bled Thud
pale light on to the Doctor’s face as he turned and looked Plash
back. Robin ran to catch up with him, feet sinking into the Thud
mud.
There was something coming up the stairs. Dragging its
‘Hello again,’ said the Doctor as the boy reached him, out feet.
of breath. ‘Shouldn’t you be with your mother?’
Thud
‘It’s OK. She’s sleeping,’ said Robin. ‘I - I just wanted to...
The other sound reminded her of rain-soaked shoes.
well, your friend, the girl...’
Plash
‘Ace?’
She knew who it was. What it was. The dream that wasn’t
‘Is that her name? Ace.’ He turned the name over on his a dream. The wet footprints in the carpet. The