Doctor Who_ Wetworld - Mark Michalowski [22]
She just needed to rest, that was all. Absently, she unclipped the pen and tapped it against the clipboard as she lay back on the bed. . .
A couple of kilometres downriver, at the point where the tidal wave had deposited its makeshift dam, the banks on both sides were a seething mass of otters: hundreds and hundreds of them, running hither and thither, like a colony of ants. They were diving into the water and returning with paws full of mud, depositing it on the banks, slapping it into numerous rapidly growing hillocks. Like creatures obsessed, they were steadily breaking down the dam that had held the settlement in its watery grave for all these months.
‘Andthere’smore,’gaspedOrlo,bendingoverandrestinghispalms on his thighs as he struggled for breath.
‘What?’ demanded Col, suddenly concerned. Orlo shook his head, unable to get the words out.
‘The. . . the settlement,’ he finally managed. ‘The first settlement.’
‘What about it?’
‘You can see it. Just the tops of the buildings. But they weren’t there yesterday, I’d swear. I saw them when I went to check on the ship.’
‘The water level must be falling,’ mused the Doctor, tapping his bottom lip with his fingers.
‘We need to tell everyone,’ Candy said. ‘Get them all out there –’
‘Hold your horses a second,’ the Doctor cut in. ‘If the water level’s suddenly falling, it has to be for a reason. The last thing you want is everyone out there, scampering around like excited schoolkids on a field trip when we don’t really know what’s going on.’
‘Doctor,’ Ty said, ‘this is our colony. And this is the biggest thing to happen since the flood. If we can get the settlement and the ship back. . . ’ She let the sentence tail off, leaving the possibilities unspoken. ‘You’ll what? Fly back home?’
Ty was aghast.
‘No way! We’re here for the duration, Doctor. But if the ship’s accessible, it means we’ll be able to set up another generator, using the ship’s power core. We can stop having to burn wood every time the generator we’ve got packs in. And if we can find the smart-fabricator, we can get to work on the settlement properly.’
The Doctor’s eyes narrowed suddenly.
‘Power core. . . ? Just what kind of ship is this One Small Step of yours? What model?’
‘ It’s a mark II world-builder, ’ said Candy.
The Doctor’s expression froze, his brows set in a thundery line.
‘ A mark II? You’re sure? Not the mark III?’
Candy shook her head.
‘Deffo – me and Orlo used to use the ship brain on the journey for learning stuff. The welcome screen definitely had “mark II” on it.
Why? What’s wrong?’
The Doctor had slumped back against the desk, his arms folded.
‘You’ve got a problem with that?’ asked Ty. Candy could see she was getting ratty.
‘Not me that’s going to have the problem with it,’ he said darkly. ‘I mean, you lot leave the Earth because it’s overpopulated and polluted, looking for something new and better – and what do you do? You bring a mark II world-builder with you. A ship powered by one of the most filthy fission reactors your species has ever come up with?’ He shook his head. ‘It’s like moving out of your house because the roof’s leaking, and before you’ve even unpacked, you’re up a ladder, ripping the slates off the new one!’
‘And you’d know all about setting up a colony, would you Doctor?’
Ty’s voice was edged with defensiveness.
‘Well I know quite a bit about how you humans go about it.’ There was something about how he said ‘you humans’ that made the hairs on Candy’s arms prickle. ‘I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve sung your praises, you know, told everyone about how endlessly inventive, how incredibly adventurous you lot are. Snatching vic-tory from the jaws of defeat, battling against the odds, yadda yadda yadda.’ He fixed Ty with a dark gaze. ‘I tend to forget about the times when you’re stupid, stubborn and fail to learn from your mistakes.’
Ty was gritting her