Doctor Who BBCN08 - The Feast of the Drowned Page 16

  ‘Got to be more than that, though, hasn’t it?’ The Doctor had his ear pressed against the concrete like a safecracker trying to crack the combination. ‘I mean, yeah, it was handy to have you about to lure the vice admiral here. But they went to a lot of trouble to kidnap you and take you back to Stanchion House. Yesterday evening, Crayshaw wasn’t bothered if you were killed while helping me escape.’

  ‘He knew that we’d taken samples from the sea, that we knew of these things’ existence.’ She rubbed her tired eyes. ‘You thought earlier that they might be after our new tracers, to use as a weapon.’

  ‘That was before we knew what they were really up to. . . ’ He switched off the screwdriver for a moment, a gobsmacked expression spreading over his face. ‘Oh, now hang on a sec. . . ’ Mickey started choking. ‘My mouth’s gone dry.’

  ‘Mine too,’ hissed Vida.

  ‘Stop it, Doctor!’ Rose glowed into sudden ghostly existence right in front of them, cold and grey as the sea. ‘You mustn’t interfere. They’ll kill me if you do.’

  ‘Rose!’ Mickey shouted out and collapsed, clutching his legs.

  Water poured from the spectre’s eyes. ‘They’ll destroy me!’

  ‘You’re destroying them!’ the Doctor shouted back. ‘Listen to me, Mickey, Vida. Whatever you’re seeing, you mustn’t believe it. Shut it out.’

  ‘Can’t,’ croaked Mickey, staring transfixed.

  Vida felt her insides ache and burn, wanted to cry but no tears would come.

  ‘Rose, remember what I told you,’ the Doctor implored the vision.

  ‘We trust the people we love to tell the truth. We trust them not to harm us.’

  ‘What’s she doing?’ gasped Vida.

  ‘The apparition is strengthening itself with the water from your bod-158

  ies.’ The Doctor clutched hold of Mickey’s hand, pressed his forehead up close to Vida’s. ‘You must shut it out!’

  An enormous, crushing blackness was bulldozing through Vida’s head. But she could still hear the sound of Rose’s voice.

  ‘Don’t fight, Doctor,’ said the voice. ‘Surrender to us. Or your friends will die.’

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  ‘Fight it, Rose!’ Huntley was yelling in her face. How come the water didn’t deaden the sound? ‘Come on, fight it!’

  Rose heard him but couldn’t reply. Her brain felt so hot, the water around her should have been bubbling.

  Then she was aware of strong arms round her waist, and heard Jay’s voice in her ear. ‘Go with it, Rose. Go into the image. Open its eyes and look through them.’

  Jay was cuddling her. How many nights had fourteen-year-old Rose Tyler spent awake dreaming of this? She felt a sudden contented glow inside her. A glow that grew brighter, white-hot, like the supernatural shine at the centre of the TARDIS. She closed her eyes, but somehow that made the light brighter still, so she opened them again.

  And suddenly she could see Mickey on the ground in some poky little hole, and the Doctor, wide-eyed and fierce and desperate, while Vida was reaching out to someone else Rose couldn’t see, racked with pain.

  We trust the people we love to tell the truth.

  ‘Stop. . . hurting. . . ’ she said. ‘Just stop. . . ’

  ∗ ∗ ∗

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  ‘. . . hurting them.’

  Vida felt the blackness beginning to clear, saw that the image of Rose was losing form and focus.

  ‘You what?’ The Doctor started nodding encouragingly at the phantom. ‘Rose, say again!’

  ‘Doctor! Forget about me, just stop these –’

  The image burst into droplets and vanished. Vida felt sick. Her head ached, but she was alive.

  ‘What happened?’ asked Mickey, pushing himself up off the floor.

  ‘Grenade no good, then, Mickey? Fancy that!’

  Either he ignored the jibe or it didn’t register. ‘I thought I was being squeezed out, like a sponge. . . ’

  ‘Rose tried to put back what she took,’ said the Doctor. ‘She fought the hive influence. Hijacked the apparition and used it to communi-cate with us. . . ’

  Vida felt slow and unsteady. ‘How?’

  ‘Maybe she had help. Maybe the waterhive’s influence is being spread thinner as its victims rack up. Maybe it’s because her travels with me have affected her body’s make-up in some way. . . ’ He shrugged and smiled to himself. ‘Or maybe just because she’s Rose.’

  ‘You were right,’ said Vida. ‘Assistants can come in very useful.’

  Mickey had pulled a small bottle of water from his pocket. He offered her a swig and she accepted it gratefully. ‘I’m just glad they didn’t send Andrew in against me.’

  ‘It’s me they see as the threat. So they used someone known to all three of us.’

  ‘Will they try again?’

  ‘They might not know they’ve failed,’ said the Doctor cautiously.

  ‘Her image cut out – could be the aquatic equivalent of a blown fuse in their neural network. They’ll need to try and fix it, which might buy us some time.’

  ‘I suppose it shows that these creatures aren’t completely unbeat-able.’

  ‘You’ve done pretty well at proving that, Vida,’ said Mickey.

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  ‘They try to shoot you while escaping with him, and you escape.

  They try to kidnap you and drag you back here, and you escape.’

  The Doctor got to work with his sonic screwdriver again. ‘Good point, Mickey.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Their attitude to Vida, like I said, hasn’t been all that consistent, has it? The waterhive went to a lot of time and trouble spiriting you away from your offices. Why?’

  Vida frowned. ‘Just unlucky, I suppose.’

  ‘No!’ he shouted. ‘It’s because of me and what I got up to in your labs! That sample of water from the drainage pit – I must have made it shout for help.’

  Vida was far too tired and scared to be offended. ‘So Crayshaw’s minions came running, thinking that since I work there, it’s me who’s doing it.’

  ‘They didn’t know any better. Their water tried to get inside my head, but it couldn’t.’ He licked a finger and smoothed one eyebrow.

  ‘My God, I’m just too good.’

  ‘So what were you doing to that water?’ Mickey demanded. ‘Vida, you know, those subatomic filaments you were hoping to release from the Ascendant, those tiny transmitters and receivers?’ His face was lit creepily in the blue glow from the screwdriver. ‘I’d just mixed some into the alien water to see what happened.’

  ‘And what did happen?’

  ‘Nothing. Bit of a disappointment, really.’

  ‘How d’you know it was nothing? You didn’t have the gear to pick up the filaments’ signals.’

  ‘I know. But the water didn’t seem to care. No frothing, no churning, no bubbling over, nothing. . . ’ He froze. ‘Nothing. Nothing?’ He yanked down hard on the housing of the screwdriver, made it flare into bright blue life. ‘Nothing!’

  And then the wall exploded. Vida threw herself backwards into Mickey as the three of them were peppered with chips of concrete.

  ‘That’s a pretty big kind of nothing,’ Mickey choked, as Vida helped him back up.

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  ‘And so was that nothing in the water,’ the Doctor crowed, waving his arm about to dispel some of the thick concrete dust. ‘The hive didn’t want those tracers to use as a weapon. It didn’t want us to have them – in case we used them as a weapon!’

  Vida stared at him. ‘You mean that something in the tracers can stop the flow of the hive consciousness, mess up the apparitions, the flow of commands. . . ’

  He nodded, grinning broadly. ‘But it’s better than that! Rose has just proved that the alien signals can be overridden. That the human voice can still be heard. If we could somehow use the transmitters in the tracers to amplify that effect, we could stuff these creatures right up! I’m sure we could!’

  Mickey was smil
ing too, bless him, caught up in the moment. ‘And so, we’ve got some of these tracer things, right?’

  The Doctor pulled a face. ‘Er. . . Not as such.’

  Mickey closed his eyes, seemed to shrink. ‘Then we’re the ones who are stuffed.’

  ‘I know where we can get some,’ Vida announced, almost reluctantly. ‘But how the hell would we activate them?’

  ‘Never mind that.’ The Doctor grabbed her by the waist. ‘Where?

  Where are they?’

  She shrugged. ‘We had a great big batch of them stowed aboard the Ascendant, remember? It went down before they could be released into the ocean.’

  Mickey jerked a weary thumb over his shoulder, pointing back the way they had come. ‘That would be the Ascendant lying in pieces back there?’

  The Doctor waved him into silence. ‘Do you know where they were stored?’

  ‘I was there this morning. The ship’s stores, where Crayshaw had his gloat over me. Still on board the cargo trailer.’

  ‘Oh, t’riffic,’ said Mickey. ‘So basically, we’re stuck way down here, about as far underground as it’s possible to be, while the stuff we need is floating on top of the river.’

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  ‘Looks like it,’ the Doctor agreed, his eyes darting all around. You could almost hear his mind working its way through a million mad strategies. ‘Still, look on the bright side, Mickey.’ He flashed a small but dangerous smile. ‘For you, the only way is up!’

  ‘I did it,’ Rose breathed. She was slumped on the floor, numb all over from the freezing water, but something fierce and satisfied burned inside her.

  ‘What happened?’ asked Jay. She realised he was squeezing her hand.

  ‘I saw my friends. Spoke to them – just for a minute.’ She struggled up. ‘It was so hard, though.’

  Jay looked up at Huntley. ‘How come I can’t do it?’

  ‘I had an unfair advantage,’ said Rose. ‘I think. . . I think maybe the TARDIS gave me a bit of a push.’

  Huntley raised an eyebrow. ‘The what?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Rose, can you talk to Keish?’ Jay asked urgently.

  ‘I can try,’ she told him, squeezing his hand back.

  High up in the cab of the tanker, Keisha stared out calmly at the nightmare London had become. Crowds of people were swarming through the streets as if led by an invisible Pied Piper, anxious and determined.

  They surged up to the blockades that barred all access to the Thames, shouting and screaming to be let through. Sometimes the army fired shots in the air, trying to scare them back, but the crowd barely reacted.

  Keisha understood these people. They were on a mission to save the ones they loved, and so was she.

  Jackie sat to her left, the gent driving to her right. He was pale and sweaty, stinking out the cab, gripping the wheel so tightly that his knuckles shone white. ‘We can’t let these people hold us up any longer,’ he said, and revved the powerful engine. ‘If we drive on the pavement we can reach that barrier, smash straight through. A bus got through last night – we should try it.’

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  ‘But there are all these people in the way,’ said Jackie distantly.

  ‘My Nicky needs me,’ the driver said.

  ‘Maybe if you honk the horn,’ Keisha suggested.

  ‘What, and warn the soldiers? They’ll shoot us!’ He revved the engine again, shut his eyes, like he was psyching himself up. ‘No, it has to be this way. You can see that, can’t you?’

  But all Keisha could see was Rose. Her friend was floating in front of her like a ghost. She looked terrible. Her face was ‘cored with bloody lines. Her eyes were all wrong – silvery, smooth, no pupils.

  Keisha opened her mouth to cry out but Jackie was already lunging forwards, as if she could grasp the vision’s hands.

  ‘Oh, my God, Rose, sweetheart, we’re coming!’

  ‘No, Mum!’ Rose shouted. ‘It’s. . . a trick. Evil. You’ve got to stop. . . ’

  ‘But Rose!’

  ‘Keish? Jay’s safe. But he won’t be if you come.’ She gritted her teeth. ‘Whatever you see, keep everyone back. . . away from here. . .

  Get me?’

  Keisha wiped away her tears. ‘What can we do?’

  ‘We’re sorting it.’ She closed her eyes, pressed her face against the windscreen. Jackie reached out a trembling hand to the glass.

  But then the image was gone, just water on the windscreen blurring their view of the chaos outside.

  ‘I’ve got to get to Nicky,’ the man shouted, revving the engine. His hand shook as he shoved the tanker into first gear. ‘Nothing else matters.’

  The huge lorry lurched towards the crowd like a giant dog straining at the leash.

  And Jackie punched out the driver with a single blow to the jaw.

  His feet slipped from the pedals and the lorry choked and stalled.

  ‘Didn’t you hear my Rose?’ she snapped, rubbing her fist, though her knuckles weren’t as red as her eyes. ‘ It’s a trick. ’

  ‘What were we doing?’ Keisha whispered, trembling. ‘What were we gonna do?’

  Jackie pulled her in for a frightened hug as more gunshots were fired off above the rioting crowd. ‘And what are we going to do now?’

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  ∗ ∗ ∗

  Mickey pelted up the emergency stairs, Vida close behind. The Doctor had sent them through on their own while he doubled back the other way. He was the main target, so he figured there was a better chance of them making it up and out of the building without him.

  ‘I’ll try to draw their fire,’ he’d said, disappearing through the hole in the wall into the gloom of the basement. ‘Well, their water, anyway.

  In a manner of speaking.’

  There was a clanky-looking service lift in the basement area. Vida had the smart idea of sending it right up to the top floor while they took the emergency steps to Ground. ‘That way, if they hear the lift going, they’ll get busy laying an ambush for us – while we walk out of the front door.’

  It had sounded great in theory. But there were so many steps!

  ‘Let’s rest,’ said Vida, leaning against the stair-rail.

  Mickey nodded, tugging at his T-shirt, which was damp with sweat.

  ‘Only for a sec, though,’ he said. ‘The lift must have reached the top floor by now.’

  ‘That’s not the only thing that’s bothering me,’ said Vida.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Even assuming the tracers weren’t destroyed in the wreck of the Ascendant, and even assuming we can get our hands on them. How do we deploy them?’

  ‘How do we what?’

  ‘There are, what, 4,500 million gallons of water in the Thames, right?’

  Mickey frowned. ‘I’ve gone metric, I’ll take your word for it.’

  Vida ignored him. ‘And with the average current, what. . . three knots max? It’s going to take time to disperse them – even if we had a transmitter to set them off, which we don’t. Even if we knew what the Doctor had in mind –’

  ‘Which we don’t,’ Mickey agreed. ‘But he’s done this world-saving stuff before. It’s best just to go –’

  ‘With the flow?’ Vida shuddered. ‘Come on, then. We haven’t got much further to go.’ She pushed off again. ‘Another few flights.’

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  But as she spoke there was an echoing clang from somewhere down below, as if a fire door had been flung open.

  Quickly followed by the sound of rushing water.

  Mickey peered over the edge of the handrail and saw dark, frothing fluid surging up the steps, just a few turns of the staircase behind them. ‘Leg it!’ he yelled.

  He pushed himself to speed up, taking the steps two, three at a time, his legs buzzing with pins and needles. His throat burned with thirst, but he guessed copping a mouthful of intelligent water wouldn’t make him feel much better.

  Vida was starting to lag behind. He paused for just a moment, offered
his hand. She took it and they set off again, silent as they ran, forcing themselves to move faster and faster. Because the water was gaining on them now; it was splashing against the walls as it thundered up, churning and gurgling.

  Finally they reached the top of the stairwell. A formidable metal door was set into the concrete. ‘Please don’t let it be locked,’ gasped Vida.

  Mickey tugged on it. It was locked. ‘You still got soldier-girl’s pass-card?’

  ‘I don’t know!’ She scrabbled at the pockets of her dusty black trousers as the water crashed noisily around another corner, not far behind them now. ‘Got it!’ She jammed it into the slot beside the heavy door.

  A small red light started winking on the card-reader, like an obscene gesture.

  ‘What’s wrong with it?’ panted Mickey.

  ‘Don’t tell me she’s not got access to this level,’ Vida wailed.

  She pulled out the card and shoved it in again, beat a fist on the door in frustration as the water tore round the final concrete corner and gushed up the steps towards them.

  ‘I did all I could,’ Rose told Jay. ‘I think I got through to them, but I don’t know. . . ’ She blew out an underwater sigh. ‘It’s crazy up there.

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  In fact –’ she stood up shakily – ‘I think we need to go there ourselves.

  To the surface.’

  ‘That’s twice you’ve played against their rules,’ Huntley warned her.

  ‘They could be on to you now.’

  Rose bit her lip. ‘Then I’ll keep them busy while you escape.’

  ‘Escape? But. . . ’ Huntley dithered. ‘Can we still breathe air?’

  ‘It’s hard, but I did it,’ said Jay. ‘The waterway to the river was guarded, so I tried the cargo lift shaft. Managed to get all the way up.

  But I was too slow. They found me, took me back.’

  Rose nodded. ‘The Doctor saw you, he tried to help.’

  ‘And now there are guards making sure no one else has a go,’ Jay concluded.

  ‘The tug’s gone anyway,’ said Rose. ‘So no escape that way. We’ll just have to leave the same way we came in.’