Doctor Who_ The Nightmare of Black Island - Mike Tucker [68]
Across the village children woke from their nightmares and watched in disbelief as their parents slumped back in chairs and on to carpets as sleep overtook them.
The village of Ynys Du reverberated to the sounds of heavy snoring. The Doctor closed his eyes as the razor claws reached out through the rain, waiting for the killer blow.
It never came.
He opened one eye cautiously.
The creature was staring at its claws, turning them this way and that. It looked down at the Doctor.
‘I think I chipped a nail.’
The Doctor blinked. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘A nail. Look.’ It held out a claw. ‘And that head. Do you think it’s going to be fattening? You never know with foreign food, do you?’
The creature skittered across the lawn, staring at its reflection in the tall windows of the rectory. ‘Do you think I look all right in this? I’m not sure if it suits me. I’m meant to be going to Maureen’s wedding next week and I’m really not convinced.’
As the Doctor watched, a flicker of energy lanced from the roof of the shattered rectory and danced around the creature’s outline. Balor seemed to be shrinking.
It started to scamper in circles, arms waving agitatedly. ‘Oh, God. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to make that mortgage payment in time. And what if I don’t get that job at the chemist? He says he wants to settle down, but I know he’s still seeing Pauline from the WH Smith in town. Three of Dai Williams’s chickens dropped dead last week. I hope we’ve not got that bird flu thing here. . . ’
161
The creature was shrinking faster and faster now, its scales fading, changing, its skin becoming pinstriped, masked, different football colours, a blur of shapes and images. The voice got more and more frantic, words blurring into each other. The Doctor could hear snatches of half-shouted fears: global warming, old age, cellulite, rent cheques, girlfriends, boyfriends, debts, affairs. The creature was a whirling blur now. And then, with a sudden pop, it vanished.
The Doctor stood in the rain in the middle of the lawn, staring at the spot where the creature had been. Choking clouds of black smoke billowed into the night air as more and more of the rectory succumbed to the flames.
A shattering explosion sent him tumbling across the grass. That was presumably the last of the Cynrog machinery.
He picked himself up and glanced across to the wreckage of the dining room. That room too was ablaze. The husks of those people who had held the mind of Balor for most of their lives were finally free.
The last of the Cynrog technicians were rushing about in confusion. The Doctor sighed. He had work to do. He couldn’t let desperate aliens wander free.
He clapped his hands. ‘Right, you lot. Your commander’s dead, your god is gone, I’m the rightful guardian of this planet and it’s time for you to sling your hook, before I get really angry.’
162
The young woman lay peacefully on the stretcher, blankets tucked protectively around her. The Doctor brushed a strand of auburn hair gently from her forehead.
The woman’s eyelids flickered open briefly to reveal sparkling grey eyes. The Doctor smiled at her. She caught hold of his hand and squeezed it.
‘Thank you,’ Bronwyn whispered. ‘For setting me free.’
The Doctor shook his head. ‘Your boy set you free. Your Jimmy. He showed me what you had seen. What I needed to do.’
Bronwyn smiled. ‘He was such a good boy.’
‘Who loved his mother. Always.’
A hurrying paramedic manoeuvred the Doctor firmly to one side, catching hold of the stretcher’s handles. His colleague took the other end and they hoisted Bronwyn off the beach and into the waiting ambulance.
The Doctor closed the doors behind them and watched as the ambulance roared off through the village, lights whirling. Bronwyn’s rejuvenation had been an unexpected bonus. As he had hoped, Ali’s readjustment of the