Doctor Who BBCN08 - The Feast of the Drowned

  The Feast of the Drowned

  BY STEPHEN COLE

  Published by BBC Books, BBC Worldwide Ltd,

  Woodlands, 80 Wood Lane, London W12 0TT

  First published 2006

  Copyright c Stephen Cole 2006

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Doctor Who logo c BBC 2004

  Original series broadcast on BBC television

  Format c BBC 1963

  ‘Doctor Who’, ‘TARDIS’ and the Doctor Who logo are trademarks of the British Broadcasting Corporation and are used under licence.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

  ISBN 0 563 48644 9

  Commissioning Editor: Stuart Cooper

  Creative Director and Editor: Justin Richards

  Consultant Editor: Helen Raynor

  Production Controller: Peter Hunt

  Doctor Who is a BBC Wales production for BBC ONE

  Executive Producers: Russell T Davies and Julie Gardner Producer: Phil Collinson

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover design by Henry Steadman c BBC 2006

  Typeset in Albertina by Rocket Editorial, Aylesbury, Bucks Printed and bound in Germany by GGP Media GmbH, Pößneck For more information about this and other BBC books, please visit our website at www.bbcshop.com

  Contents

  Prologue

  1

  ONE

  5

  TWO

  11

  THREE

  17

  FOUR

  23

  FIVE

  31

  SIX

  39

  SEVEN

  49

  EIGHT

  59

  NINE

  71

  TEN

  81

  ELEVEN

  97

  TWELVE

  111

  THIRTEEN

  123

  FOURTEEN

  131

  FIFTEEN

  141

  SIXTEEN

  151

  SEVENTEEN

  161

  EIGHTEEN

  171

  NINETEEN

  181

  TWENTY

  191

  Acknowledgements

  199

  About the Author

  201

  How can something so big sink so fast? The thought kept drumming through Jay Selby’s head. He splashed and slithered over the slippery deck. It listed so sharply to starboard he could barely keep his footing.

  The wind whipped at his uniform, stung his skin. He stared around as if he might sight the enemy. Nothing. The black sky, the churning darkness of the North Sea, there was no difference between them.

  ‘No lifeboats!’ The shouts rose above the roar of the sea. ‘They’ve taken the lifeboats!’

  There was a crew of 173 on board HMS Ascendant, tough, capable sailors all of them. They shouldn’t be screaming, Jay thought. He clung on to a rail as a crowd of ratings scrambled past him. They shouldn’t be screaming. We shouldn’t be sinking so damned fast.

  The frigate was armed to the teeth: Sea Wolf missiles, torpedoes, the Vickers gun. She could clobber anything from a submarine to an enemy fighter, so why were they sinking without a single shot fired?

  One of the ratings slipped and fell. Jay staggered over, helped him up. It was Barker, the loudmouth, the blond joker; part of the gun crew. He looked terrified.

  ‘We’ve got to get to the upper deck,’ Barker shouted. ‘They took –’

  ‘The lifeboats, I know.’ Jay dragged him to his feet. ‘But what took them?’

  Barker gripped hold of Jay’s arm, shaking with cold and shock.

  ‘Sonar didn’t show ’em. Like they came out of nowhere.’

  1

  Jay pulled himself free, slipped an arm around Barker’s shoulder.

  ‘Upper deck, then,’ he shouted. ‘Come on. The Lynx must have got clear, it’ll be circling. They’ll radio our –’

  ‘You didn’t see?’

  ‘I was in the stores, didn’t see nothing.’

  ‘The chopper’s gone.’ Barker stared at him, pale in the weak glow of the frigate’s failing lights. ‘The whole aft section. . . ’

  Then the deck lurched again with incredible force. As if launched from a cannon, they crashed into the black mirror of the sea. It was hard as glass, smashed the air from him. Jay clutched hold of Barker as they dropped down through the freezing water. He couldn’t see a thing but he knew he had to keep calm, reach the surface. His limbs felt so heavy but he started to kick, to push himself up. Something rushed past him, going down. Wreckage? One of the crew?

  What?

  Lungs bursting, pressure swarming at his temples, Jay kept on kicking. His fingers were numb, hooked into Barker’s uniform. Don’t let go. It’s OK. You can do this. Wasn’t that what Keisha always used to say? You can do this. Whenever he messed up, whenever he just wanted out, she took hold of his arms just like Jay had hold of Barker now and told him.

  He thought of her back home. They were meant to be meeting up in just a couple of weeks. He was going to cook her steaks – juicy, fat, fillet steaks, the kind they had used to dream about, the melt-in-the-mouth sort Mum could never afford. ’Cause he was doing all right now, and he wanted to ‘how her that. Mum had never believed in a damn thing he did, but Keisha. . .

  Jay thought of her face, of the hurt in her eyes when he’d left.

  He kicked harder. I can do this.

  Then Barker’s body was wrenched away from him.

  Jay gasped. Water jumped in like an icy fist down his throat. He choked, floundered. Don’t lose it. Don’t lose it. His chest felt rushed, his limbs were cramping. But he had to go back for Barker. What had pulled him away – sharks?

  Thrashing in the water, Jay finally broke back through the surface.

  2

  Choking on icy air, spitting out saltwater, throat burning. Skin numb, no sensation, as if it had died ahead of him.

  He stared round. No sign of his ship, or Barker. No sign of anyone.

  Only him, floating alone in endless shadow.

  For a long, eerie moment he felt almost calm, lulled by the wash of the sea as it shifted all around him.

  Then something closed around his ankle and plucked him back beneath the waves.

  Jay windmilled his arms, tried to kick free. One of his crewmates, panicking, grabbing hold of anything in the water?

  Something rushed through the water again, close by. Something that slammed into his back and punctured the skin at the base of his neck. Jay felt sudden heat and pain. Wanted to open his mouth and scream. It wasn’t black down here any more, there was a red, warning glow coming from somewhere. Like he was being dragged slowly down into hell.

  I can’t do this, Keisha. He could see horrible shapes twisting and spi-ralling in slow-mo through the gloom. Cart wheeling corpses. Chunks of metal and equipment, juggled by unseen hands. Other things, too.

  Swift, hunting things. Creatures.

  Was it one of those gnawing now at the back of his neck, as hungrily as he and Keisha would take those steaks? He breathed in water, wanted the blackness back.

  But Jay could see everything now, and the cold dead eyes of the hunting creatures might just as well have been hi
s own.

  3

  ‘I’m so sorry, Keish.’ Rose Tyler sat on the threadbare sofa and held her old mate close. She couldn’t think of anything to say that didn’t sound useless and hollow, but she kept trying. ‘I’m really, really sorry.

  When Mum told me, I just. . . Well, it’s so hard to take in.’

  Keisha sniffed noisily and pulled away. She was one of Rose’s old clubbing crowd, wildest and loudest and craziest of the lot. She looked totally gorgeous when she was glammed lip. But right now her black curls were ratted and her light brown skin was snail-trailed with snot and tears. ‘Jay was my brother,’ she murmured. ‘And now he’s just gone.’

  There was a picture of him on the cheap Ikea sideboard – a big, grinning, burly boy. The chipped, imitation pine looked too thin to support such a warm and healthy figure.

  ‘Have they told your mum? The navy, I mean.’

  ‘Doubt it. Got no address for her, no phone number. . . She wouldn’t care anyway. Got her other family now.’

  ‘Yeah, but she still. . .

  I mean, she must. . . ’ Again, Rose found

  herself trailing off. This wasn’t helping.

  5

  Keisha wiped her nose on a sodden tissue. “Missing in action,” they told me. Yeah, right. His ship’s been towed up the Thames in, like, a million bits. Why can’t they just own up that he’s been killed and they can’t find enough of him to send back home?’

  ‘Keish, there’s always a chance –’

  ‘It’s been three months now, and nothing. Nothing left of anyone on that ship.’

  Rose felt so weird inside. She’d had a crush on Jay when she was fourteen. That was five years ago and, daft though it was, she’d never really been able to talk to him properly since. Now she never would, and it didn’t seem real.

  So much had happened in her own life since then. . . She’d seen so much death in so many far-flung times and places, she was sort of hardened to it. Now someone from her old life here in London was never coming back, and Keisha was showing her the repercussions up close and personal. Rose found she had no idea how to relate to it.

  The Doctor was being no help at all of course. He just stood there, staring out of the window. She wasn’t sure if he was sulking ’cause she’d dragged him along here today, or if he was actually just enjoying the grey concrete view of the surrounding high-rises from here on the third floor. Who could tell? She’d known him for ages now, but still she couldn’t always read his moods.

  ‘Who’s your mate?’ Keisha whispered, wiping her nose. Rose shut her eyes. A 900-year-old alien, actually. He lives in a police box that’s really a spaceship called the TARDIS and we fight monsters and save planets. It’s brilliant, you should try it. Maybe not, she decided. ‘He’s just the Doctor.’

  Keisha shot her a suspicious look. ‘I don’t need a doctor.’

  ‘Not that sort of doctor, Keish, he’s. . . Well, he’s. . . ’ Rose floundered, looked over at him in his brown pinstripe suit and grubby sneakers, hoping for inspiration. ‘He’s sort of like those disk doctors down the big PC shops. Good with computers and that.’

  ‘Oh.’ Keisha nodded, apparently satisfied. ‘You met him when you went away that time, yeah?’

  ‘Kind of.’

  6

  ‘Suppose you must have met all sorts, living abroad for a year. . .

  while your poor old mates left behind were worried sick.’ Rose caught the disapproval behind the smile. ‘We thought that loser Mickey had topped you or something.’

  ‘Long time ago now.’ Rose hid behind a rueful smile, ringing inside.

  When she’d first gone off into space and time, the Doctor claimed he could bring her back to Earth the day after she’d left. But he’d messed up. They’d come back a whole twelve months later.

  ‘You could have told us you were going.’ Keisha nudged her. ‘Better yet, could have taken us with you! And you’ve been hack in the country for months and months, ain’t you? Where’ve you been? It ain’t been the same round here without you, babes. I’ve really missed you.’

  ‘It’s good to see you too,’ Rose said. ‘I’m just sorry it took. . . something like this to put my bum in gear and make me get my act together.’

  ‘S’all right. Nothing really lasts, does it?’ Keisha shrugged, staring into space again. ‘Friendships. . . family. . . ’

  Rose shook her head. ‘Hey, come on, Keish. Look, I’m gonna be around for a few days –’

  ‘A few days!’ The Doctor snapped into life, whirled round, gave her a look as sharp as his angular features. Then he realised Keisha was watching him and his face softened. He started nodding. ‘Yeah. A few days, course we are. Thought so.’ When Keisha looked away he grimaced and mouthed at Rose, ‘A few days?’

  Rose gave him an and your problem is. . . ? look back, then squeezed Keisha’s hand. ‘So anyway, I’ll be around. A proper mate. We can do stuff – go out, or. . . maybe just stay in, yeah? Watch videos or something.’

  ‘What did Jay do in the navy?’ the Doctor asked abruptly.

  Keisha blinked. ‘He did something in the ship’s stores. Spare parts and stuff.’

  ‘Naval Stores Sub Department.’ The Doctor wore a proper boy’s smile. ‘Oh, that’s a brilliant job. There are 42,000 spare parts on your average frigate – think what you could make with that lot! And they call those stores assistants Jack Dusties, don’t they? Why is that?’ The 7

  smile became a crooked grin. ‘Imagine if your name was Jack Dusty and you became a Jack Dusty! And then if Jack Dusty the Jack Dusty went to the planet Jacdusta in the Dustijek nebula and joined their navy, he could. . . ’

  Keisha was staring at him as if he had two heads. Rose had turned her pack it in glare up to 11 and he finally noticed.

  ‘Chips,’ the Doctor said suddenly. ‘Chips would be good now. Who wants chips?’

  ‘Sounds great,’ said Rose quickly. She pressed a fiver into his hand, in case he tried to pay with a twenty-zarg note or something. ‘The Chinese round the corner does them good and greasy.’

  ‘In foil trays, I suppose?’ The Doctor looked suddenly crestfallen.

  ‘You know, chips have never tasted the same since they stopped wrapping them in newspaper. I liked them in newspaper.’

  ‘Well, there’s a newsagent’s next door. Buy a paper with the change on your way back!’

  He perked up. ‘Good thinking. Yeah, nice one. OK! Back in 3

  minute.’

  He picked his way through the clutter in the poky flat to the front door and slammed it closed behind him.

  Rose could relax at last. ‘Sorry. Sometimes he gets a bit. . . ’

  ‘Fruit-loops?’

  ‘Hyper.’

  Keisha nodded. ‘He’s cute, anyway. Not really like your mum described, though.’

  Rose smiled to herself. ‘You could say he’s pretty indescribable, yeah.’

  They sat in silence for a while, the atmosphere lightened a little by the Doctor’s odd outburst.

  And then a ghost appeared in the corner of the room. . . Rose stared dumbly, her skin puckering with goosebumps. Keisha gripped hold of Rose’s arm, dug her nails in tight.

  It was Jay. He was standing between them and the turned-off telly, a terrified, translucent phantom, soaked and shivering.

  ‘D’you see him, Rose?’ Keisha whispered, starting to shake.

  8

  ‘Am I crazy, or –’

  ‘No, I see him,’ Rose croaked, rooted to the spot. ‘I see something, anyway.’

  ‘Then he’s not dead! He – he’s all right!’

  Rose didn’t answer as she gently prised Keisha’s fingers free.

  Whatever was standing in front of them was a long way from being all right.

  ‘Help me, Keish.’ Jay’s ghostly voice was muted and faint, and his lips didn’t move in time with the words. ‘Help me.’

  Keisha swallowed. ‘Jay? Jay. . . What is it, babes?’

  ‘Come to me,’ the phant
om whispered.

  ‘Come?’ She shook her head, fresh tears falling. ‘I – What d’you mean?’

  ‘Come to me.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘You gotta come to me,’ Jay said. ‘Before the feast.’

  ‘Feast?’ Rose summoned her courage and got up unsteadily. ‘Jay, if that’s you –’

  Jay turned to look straight at her. ‘Little Rose Tyler.’ She felt a shiver graze her spine as a smile crept on to his face, as his image grew a little brighter, a little more solid. ‘You gotta come too.’ He took a silent step towards them. ‘Please.’

  Trembling, Rose sat straight back down on the bed. ‘Come where?

  I don’t –’

  ‘You’ve got to get to me before the feast.’ He was growing fainter.

  ‘Jay!’ Keisha shook her head. ‘Stay with me, babes. Don’t go.’

  Then, as Rose stared in horror, Jay’s features began to run, like a chalk drawing left out in the rain. His uniform too, it was dripping away. His jaw dropped open and Keisha screamed as water gushed out from his mouth.

  Then the image was gone. All that was left was a large pooling puddle on the carpet in front of the telly. Then that seemed to soak away, leaving nothing behind.

  Rose started as Keisha’s icy fingers grabbed at her hand. ‘Gone,’ she breathed. ‘Was that really him? Was that Jay?’

  9

  ‘I dunno.’ Rose squeezed her friend’s frozen hand.

  ‘That was him,’ Keisha decided, wiping her eyes with her free hand.

  ‘Why was I so scared? It was him, Rose! He needs me!’

  ‘Me and all, apparently,’ Rose reminded her, still reeling. ‘But what’s all this about a –’

  ‘Feast your eyes!’ cried the Doctor, bursting into the room with a steaming white plastic bag. Rose gasped and Keisha almost jumped a mile. ‘Hot, salty chips. Foil trays, no papers I’m afraid – newsagent’s is shut, full of fainting customers. Maybe it’s his prices, what d’you reckon? Anyway, ambulance is on the way so I didn’t hang around.

  Where are the plates? Nothing worse than cold chips. . . ’

  ‘Doctor,’ Rose began shakily.

  Finally he seemed to take in that something was wrong and his features sharpened in alarm. ‘You all right?’