Doctor Who_ The Taint - Michael Collier [24]
He knocked. 'Mrs Kreiner?' No reply. 'Mrs Kreiner!'
He heard a clunk from inside the room, then the sound of someone trying to turn a key in the lock. Instinctively he twisted the doorknob and pushed open the door.
The Doctor reeled backward the moment he was inside. The room was awash with disorientating sparks of colour and brightness, sending shadows lurching around the Spartan interior. The sonics were uncomfortably loud - Bulwell had a pair of tartan earmuffs incongruously on her head, and she moved towards the Doctor at speed, trying to bustle him out.
She got him as far as the doorway. 'Get out, you idiot, you'll ruin it!'
'Ruin it?' The Doctor stared at her, appalled. 'What on Earth do you think you're doing? Don't you realise how dangerous it is to subject a frail woman with a history of mental illness to something as crude as -'
'It's none of your -'
'My business , Nurse Bulwell, encompasses infinitely more than you could imagine.' The Doctor's voice dropped lower. 'Get out of my way.'
***
Watson shut his eyes and took a chance, slipping his hand round Lucy's waist. He felt her freeze under his touch for a moment, then relaxed slightly as she responded, caressing the warm, rough skin of his fingers.
'The old woman. Can you feel it?' he whispered.
Lucy nodded. 'She's coming undone.'
***
The Doctor took a step towards Nurse Bulwell. Resolute, she folded her arms, and was surprised when somehow, in the space of a blink, the Doctor had pushed past her and was back in the room.
He was giving the large reel-to-reel tape player a cursory examination.
'Don't touch that! You might damage something,' she yelled over the din.
With a cold glance at her he left the machine and went to study Mrs Kreiner. The lights played around him and the sounds pulsed and distorted.
***
'Can't you feel it?' demanded Watson of the others.
Russell screwed up his eyes. 'I...'
'Step closer,' hissed Watson.
Lucy grabbed Russell's hand and tugged him nearer. 'Do as he says.'
Russell looked at Taylor, who shrugged. 'Maybe it'll hurt less if we stay together.'
***
The field was smeared with different shades of green, white blobs denoting clusters of flowers. People sat, laughing and full up, around picnic hampers on gingham blankets, while dogs and children played frantic games with balls and sticks. Two boys sailed small toy boats in the washy blue of a pond, and it was all so serene, so goddamned bloody perfect -
Oscar Austen screwed up their world, crumpling the paper up tight into a ball and hurling it at the scrubby grass beneath his feet. Rubbish. Painting peace didn't give it to you. He was pathetic, standing there scrawny and hunched up in the empty garden, tiny wooden paintbrush in his hand. What did he know about happiness in green fields?
He looked up at the sky, and it seemed to tumble in around him, as if someone were able to screw up heaven itself. He felt himself the centre of the event, as the world crushed in on him, no place for him here, outside.
The clouds burst over him and he was drenched -
He was sweating, eyes red hot in his cold head. The Restraint Room. No painting perfect worlds, now - they'd sewn up his arms against his body.
He'd been bad again, but he'd woken up, now, surely, so why did everything feel so wrong?
Something nibbled at his foot. He kicked out, in revulsion. There were rats, or something like rats, in the room; no, it wasn't a room: he was in the cave again. People were screaming, singing, covered in fat, slithering creatures.
The ceiling was a sky, uncrumpling, and it was becoming yellow. This place stank of sulphur. Crystals sparkled in the white rocks. His mother was there, casting a red shadow. But this was his place, not hers.
The demons crawled over his mother, scuttling about her like bloated crabs. Her lips were thin and cracked as her mouth slowly opened. She'd swallowed a tunnel. It could lead him out of here if only he could understand what she was mouthing at him, if only his arms weren't tied,