Doctor Who_ Wetworld - Mark Michalowski [21]
‘What are you looking at?’ asked Ty, trying to see. ‘Oh.’ She stopped.
Because highlighted by the Doctor’s torch, scratched into the wall, was a shape: a rectangle, about twice as tall as it was wide, with a little bump on the top.
‘What is it?’ whispered Candy. ‘Did the otter do it?’ ‘It’s the right width for one of their claws,’ said the Doctor, tracing the outline of it with the beam from his device.
‘But what is it?’ repeated Ty.
‘That,’ said the Doctor, a very worried edge to his voice, ‘is my spaceship. That’s the TARDIS.’
‘Looks like it’s our lucky day, then,’ came an out-of-breath voice from the door. They both turned to see Orlo, sweating and panting and supporting himself on the doorframe. ‘Because now we’ve got two ships! I’ve found the One Small Step!’
Martha moaned and opened her eyes. She was lying in some sort of hospital ward – a pretty basic one, she had to admit, but a hospital ward nonetheless. Most of it seemed to be made out of wood. Basi-cally, a big log cabin.
A wide window on the other side of the room gave out onto a view of low, spaced-out houses, built of a mishmash of wood and bits of plastic and metal. It looked like a low-tech Butlins. The light outside was very strange, though. Dull orange, like some sort of weird twilight. Martha wondered how long she’d been here, and whether she’d slept through a whole day. Of course, she realised, that meant nothing. A day on another planet could be any length, couldn’t it? And the night she’d spent in the chamber had seemed pretty short. As the memory came back to her, she suddenly felt her face grow cold and clammy. The hairs on her arms stood up as though an icy shadow had passed over her.
Where was the Doctor? She had a vague memory of him peering into her face, but she wasn’t sure whether she’d imagined it. She looked up suddenly as a wave of darkness flitted across the window –
but there was nothing there. Martha shook her head. She was sure she’d seen something, something huge and shadowy. Maybe they’d given her some painkillers or sedatives that were making her mind play tricks.
And then out of the corner of her eye, she saw something sinuous flick out from under the bed, whipping across the floor before it pulled back out of sight. Martha flinched, gritted her teeth and pulled her hands up to her chest. Her mouth was dry. Slowly, she leaned out over the side of the bed and peered down, half-afraid of what she might see. Visions of huge, slimy tentacles crowded at the back of her mind, thrashing about like hungry tongues, threatening to squeeze her sanity out.
But the polished wooden floor was clear. She tried to swallow but her mouth was like cotton wool.
On the cabinet beside her was a glass of water. She picked it up gingerly, her hand shaking, and swallowed it down in one gulp. Instantly she felt a lot better. The coolness, the wetness of it felt so good, so right. For a moment, she just wanted to dive into an icy pool, or a river or the sea. . .
She shook her head, suddenly disorientated, and the warm, hard surroundings of the hospital room swam back into view. Looking around for more water, she noticed a clipboard and a pen on the cabinet. Setting down the glass, she picked them up and saw they were her notes. Even though she hadn’t quite finished medical train-ing, she knew more than enough to be able to tell that she was in pretty good condition. Heart rate, blood pressure, blood oxygen – all normal enough. That was a relief. There was mention of some drug that she’d never heard of. Maybe it was a tranquilliser. Didn’t seem likely they’d give her anything that could cause hallucinations, surely.
Stress, Martha decided firmly. That’s what it was. She