Doctor Who_ Wetworld - Mark Michalowski [8]
‘So,’ said the Doctor after a few minutes of plodding through the darkened forest, illuminated only by the shreds of red moonlight shining through gaps in the clouds. ‘Tell me about yourself. What’s your name?’
Candy looked sideways at him. He’d kept a few yards from her, clearly aware that she still felt uncomfortable about him.
‘Candice Kane,’ she said.
‘Nice to meet you, Candice Kane,’ This time he didn’t stick out his muddy hand for her to shake. Both of them were jammed firmly in his trouser pockets. ‘So how long have you been on Sunday, Candice?’
‘Almost a year,’ she said.
‘That long, eh? And how many of you are there?’
‘Fewer than 400 of us now,’ Candy replied, wondering why he was asking. Surely he must know about the flood.
‘This settlement,’ he went on, gesturing ahead of them. ‘Have a name?’
‘The old one was called Sunday City – this one’ll be the same, once we’ve got it up and running again.’
‘Human imagination,’ he said with a grin. ‘Never underestimate it. And what year is this?’ he asked, before suddenly apologising again.
‘I’m sounding like a tourist, aren’t I?’
‘What year?’ She looked at him sideways. ‘You’re not one of those New Julian weirdos that want to go messing with the calendar and everything, are you?’
‘Oh no,’ the Doctor replied confidently. ‘Just space travel, you know: relativity, time dilation. All that stuff.’
‘Right,’ Candy said slowly. ‘Well round here it’s the usual 2108.’
‘Ah. . . The First Wave,’ he said thoughtfully as if to himself. ‘Anyway,’ he added briskly, as if he didn’t want her thinking about what he’d said, ‘you said “up and running again”. Problems with the first one?’
Candy took a breath and, knowing that they still had another half-hour’s walk to go, told him the story.
The first wave of settlers had come to Sunday just over a year ago, and all 800 of them had set up along the banks of the river, rapidly building quite a decent little town from the prefabricated huts and buildings they’d brought with them, self-sufficient in almost everything, they anticipated a tough but fair start to their new lives. They had a couple of trucks, a fabricator plant to churn out more construction panels, a generator station. Everything looked like it was going to be fine – they’d have a nice little city up and running for the next wave of colonists.
But then, three months ago, the communications and observation satellite they’d left in orbit detected something disturbing. Sunday’s orbit would take it through the debris cloud of a recently destroyed asteroid, smashed to dust when it passed close to one of the system’s gas giant planets. The settlers were worried – but when they analysed the data on the asteroid fragments, they relaxed a little: they were all fairly small, none of them large enough to cause an Extinction Level Event. As the planet entered the debris cloud, the Sundayans sat back, watched the skies and hoped for nothing worse than a nice light show.
‘And I take it,’ the Doctor interrupted, ‘that the outcome wasn’t good.’ Candy nodded, pushing aside bushes as they squelched through the forest. The soft pattering of rain could be heard.
‘Most of the fragments burned up in the atmosphere – it was the best fireworks show we’d ever seen. I mean,’ she enthused guiltily,
‘really spectacular. These huge fireballs and streaks across the sky. We all stood outdoors and watched. The little kids loved it.’
Candy paused, remembering the light show.
‘A couple of pieces got through,’ Candy continued. ‘They didn’t just burn up like all the others. One of them struck the ground a couple of hundred kilometres away – shaking the ground, knocking a few of the half-constructed buildings down. Everyone panicked. People were screaming and crying, but the scientists said we’d be OK – the dust cloud it threw up was tiny, really. Nothing to worry about.’ She paused. ‘It was the last piece, though. That was the problem. The meteorite hit the ocean, just a kilometre or so offshore – about six from Sunday City.’ Candy stopped again, remembering