Doctor Who_ The Devil Goblins From Neptune - Keith Topping [93]
'I had a dream - a nightmare, I suppose,' said Boyd. 'You know how well I normally sleep.'
Fisher nodded. 'I could hear you snoring,' he said, with a gleam in his eyes. 'What happened in your dream? You know how important they are to us.'
'When I was younger,' said Boyd, had a recurring dream.
The situations were different, but one character remained the same.' a small man, almost a dwarf. Pure evil. A hooked nose, eyes deep in shadow. He would often fool my family, appearing in some sort of disguise, but I always saw through him. I tried to warn them, but - you know what it's like in dreams - you try to cry out, but you can't. And this man - this creature - used to turn towards me. And then he'd smile. And that smile was terrifying. I always woke up at that point.' Boyd found himself staring deep into the fire, watching the writhing orange and yellow tongues of flame.
'I don't suppose I've dreamed about him since I was eight or nine.'
'And yet you started seeing him in your dreams six or seven nights ago.'
Boyd smiled, barely surprised. 'Yes. Every night since.'
Fisher pushed his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket, his breath a white mist against the dark sky. 'Do you remember the lights in the sky that night? The shooting stars? They were like dreams painted across the sky,' he said with a grand gesture.
'Comets and meteorites are portents of doom in a lot of cultures,' said Boyd.
Fisher nodded, getting to his feet. 'What we saw that night went beyond superstition. There is someone I must see.' He looked down at the researcher. 'You have more Dreaming than most kartiya.' he said, affectionately using the word for a white outsider. 'And you've always been much more open with me than I have with you.'
'Oh, I don't know -' said Boyd immediately.
'Perhaps you had better come with me,' interrupted Fisher. 'But promise me that you will not speak of this to anyone.'
'Of course,' said Boyd. 'Who are we going to see?'
'Nedenah,' said Fisher after a pause. He walked slowly down the shanty town's one street, and out into the desert.
Boyd followed a few steps behind, somehow sensing that the old man wanted to wrestle with his own thoughts without interruption.
They headed out towards the rose-red canyon to the west of the town, at length coming to a cave, its dark maw partly hidden by stunted bushes and tall grass. Boyd stood for a moment in the entrance, admiring the art scrawled all over the walls. There were snakes, roos and human faces, painted in shades of brown and yellow, and then more realistic and intricate snapshots of everyday life.' children playing with spears, marriage ceremonies, funerals.
Suddenly he noticed a round shape, studded with portholes, painted right at the apex of the stone tunnel. Around the saucer were white crosses, which seemed to represent the stars, and a crowd of human figures.
And then he looked more closely, straining his neck.
What he'd taken to be children were, in fact, small humanoid figures, their faces abnormally large, their eyes pale green and elliptical.
The old man was already some distance into the system of caves, having switched on his torch. Boyd hurried after Fisher, knowing that explanations would come only if and when the Aborigine felt them to be appropriate.
The tunnel began to twist downwards, seemingly into the guts of the Earth. It was like descending into some great creature, and, in a moment of improbable fancy, Boyd thought he could hear an enormous heart beating sonorously in the distance. He slipped on the damp floor, cracking his knee on a protruding rock, and Fisher stopped, although he didn't turn to look at him or offer assistance. The moment Boyd got to his feet Fisher pressed on, leading the white man through a seemingly endless sequence of dark chambers where water fell like a thousand whispers.
And then, at last, they emerged into an enormous cavern. The oppressive silence within, and the way the darkness