‘Then you should practise until you do.’
Patterson sighed and wondered if he was getting sunstroke, because he was beginning to feel unsteady. Either that or the bunker was beginning to feel unsteady, which wasn’t exactly likely. Up above him he heard Agnew giggle and then say, ‘Wonderful. Oh, wonderful!’
‘I beg your pardon? I haven’t even hit it yet.’
Agnew was suddenly furious, ‘Well, if you’re not going to make an effort, I’m leaving!’ Then he burst out laughing – which was very peculiar for someone who apparently intended to seem angry. ‘Yes! Off I go!’ And then Agnew was suddenly running – quite fast – away from the bunker and back along the path to the Fetch Hotel. ‘It’s a trip to the Spa for me. You’ve left me quite exhausted, Mr Patterson.’ Agnew guffawed weirdly. ‘But don’t you worry. The fun is on its way.’ He yelled over his shoulder as he pelted into the cover of the trees: ‘Good bye Mr Patterson. Absolutely good bye.’
Ian Patterson frowned. Then he felt unsteady again. Then he wiggled his sand wedge, set it down and reached into his golf bag for his putter. When he looked at the bag he could have sworn it moved slightly. Then, as he gingerly pulled out the putter, he had the distinct impression that something hot and wet had reached up and grabbed hold of his feet.
‘JELLY BABY?’ THE DOCTOR was feeling enormously hungry. He offered round the crumpled white paper sweet bag more out of habit than because he didn’t currently want to eat every one of them at once, followed by a big roast dinner and a full Maori hangi all to himself. His headache had got worse and also felt as if it belonged to someone else, or maybe something else. Bryony didn’t seem to want a jelly baby, but he tried encouraging her. ‘Go on. Have a purple one – they taste of Zarnith.’ It seemed that sharing a jelly baby might make him feel less lonely.
LONELY
The vast thought swiped in at him and, although it didn’t knock him out this time, he did stumble and he was aware that Bryony was staring at him with concern. He told her, ‘No need to worry. The world’s my lobster. Honestly, I couldn’t feel better.’
Like all good youngsters on Gallifrey, the Doctor had been brought up with a strong awareness of how little other species knew about, well…anything and how they usually shouldn’t be told about, well…anything, because most of the information a Time Lord might be able to offer them would at least make them retire to the country and keep bees – should their planet have bees, or similar life forms – if not actually drive them irreversibly insane.
‘Everything’s absolutely fine. And by the way, do you like honey?’
Just for an instant the Doctor contemplated what would happen if he were to become irreversibly insane.
And then someone not very far away screamed horribly, which was a great relief, somehow. The Doctor knew exactly what to do when he heard horrible screaming – run towards it and help.
SO WHILE DAVID AGNEW slipped his safari suit into a locker at the Fetch Hotel Spa and wondered whether he should have a massage first or sit in the hydro-therapy pool, the Doctor was loping across well-groomed turf towards continuing sounds of horror and repeated dull thuds.
Bryony found that she, too, was running as if this was just the right thing to do and, although she was scared silly, she was also completely exhilarated and – despite his hugely long strides – almost keeping up with the Doctor.
‘What are you doing? Grandmother’s this way…’ Xavier called.
But Bryony and the Doctor left the golf cart and the bemused twins behind, coming rapidly to the top of a gentle rise. From there they were able to see the thirteenth green quite far off with its pretty flag and manicured grass, along with a small flight of crows lifting away out of the trees and croaking in alarm. They could also see a deep bunker with Patterson at the bottom of it. He was flailing about in the pit like someone who had just found out a great deal of new and entirely unpleasant information about life and he was yelling. He was screaming. In his hand he had what was left of his putter, which was – as Bryony stared – both flaring and melting away with a cherry red glow. The club head had already gone and the metal shaft was disappearing. As glowing droplets of what Bryony could only think of as redness fell into the sand, they landed with odd thumps and very clearly made it shudder. Each impact was producing thin trails of gently green vapour.
Like many humans when presented with a reality too strange to digest, she found herself saying something absurd, just to prove she was still there and could hear her own voice. So – as she continued to run forwards – she remarked, breathlessly, ‘Well, that’s unusual for this time of year.’
The Doctor half turned his head back towards her with a huge grin. ‘Splendid. You really are. I knew you would be.’
By the time the Doctor had reached the edge of the bunker, he had already assessed the situation, in as far as he could. There was obviously something under the bunker’s surface – something large and carnivorous, perhaps a sandmaster, which shouldn’t be anywhere near this solar system, but never mind about that. Or else something worse…‘Take my hand.’ There had, by now, been arm-waving, screaming and running about and the Doctor was sure that the telling of a wild story was just around the corner…‘My hand, take it!’ The Doctor reached forward and held out his arm as the chap continued to fire – if you could call it firing – what seemed to be a very rudimentary fusion lance at the area around his own feet. ‘Take my hand!’ The man shouldn’t have a fusion lance on twentieth-century Earth. No one should.
Patterson did as he was told as the last of what was indeed his fusion lance’s fissile core sputtered and got actually much too hot to hold, although there was no way he was letting go of it while it was still any defence at all. ‘Oh, thank you. Thank you.’ He felt his free hand being grasped in remarkably strong fingers and found himself looking into precisely the type of reliable, experienced face he might have wanted a rescuer to have. ‘Thank you.’
Just then he noticed Bryony arriving and shouted, ‘No, keep back, darling!’ And he was suddenly very angry that whoever his rescuer was had put the most wonderful human being on earth in danger by bringing her along. Although it was lovely to see her. Even though he was mortified that he’d called her ‘darling’. And then Patterson felt an altogether different strong grip close back in around his ankles and this time there was a definite tug downwards.
Bryony watched, horrified, as Patterson’s feet seemed to sink and jerk unnaturally backward and the rest of him fell forward towards the sand, then jerked to a halt, suspended lopsidedly by the one wrist the Doctor was gripping. Whatever device he’d been holding, dropped out of his grasp and he windmilled his free arm to try and catch at the Doctor with both hands. It was as if Patterson was drowning and clutching up towards his only hope. The Doctor himself was wrenched over the lip of the bunker when Patterson fell and was left hanging down into the pit, only his legs and waist still on the grass. The glowing, steaming, rippling sand waited below with a kind of dreadful appetite. Both men were clinging to each other desperately by this point, but it seemed certain that Patterson was very likely to drag the Doctor into whatever trouble he was facing, rather than the Doctor being able to haul him out.
So Bryony, without pausing for a second, raced down to grab the Doctor’s ankles.
The Doctor managed, ‘Just keep calm. Everything’s perfectly all right.’
‘No it’s not!’ chorused Bryony and Patterson.
‘No…True…’ The Doctor clung on with steely certainty to Patterson’s hands while deciding that whatever was under the bunker might not be a sandmaster, it wasn’t behaving like a sandmaster…and that metallic taste was very strong, along with a sense of true, primordial horror. ‘Very true…’ With relief, he felt Bryony working out exactly the most sensible thing to do and taking hold of his feet. She really was a wonderful girl. ‘Everything is immensely dangerous, but I do feel we’re managing terribly well under the circumstances.’ And if he’d had the spare energy, he would have la
ughed. This was, after all, why one became a rogue Time Lord, wandering the universe…to be right on the spot when somebody needed rescuing from a glowing green death pit…a pit infested with something he was sure he should be able to remember…
Then the Doctor slipped a few inches nearer the position beyond which he would inevitably topple into the glowing green death pit himself. Which he guessed would be unpleasant. So he decided to stop raising everyone’s morale and concentrate on keeping everyone alive by holding very tight and trusting Bryony.
Bryony wasn’t that big or powerful, but she did know that her strongest muscles were in her legs. If she’d lain down and hoped her weight would act as an anchor on the Doctor, she would very probably have been pulled over into the bunker when the Doctor finally slipped forward past his tipping point. Instead, she lifted the Doctor’s feet – it was a risk and he did find he was drawn even nearer the bunker as she did so, letting poor Patterson hang ever closer to the shining, oozy, hungry sand. But next she was able to crouch and then slowly stand, leaning back and letting her weight and her legs do the work of pulling. If she both tugged on his ankles and then let herself fall backwards, still gripping the Doctor, they might be OK. She concentrated all her will and strength into saving both her new friends.
Whatever was holding Patterson fast seemed utterly immoveable, but finally it did give way a bit, then a bit more and then, just when the Doctor gave a long and pained shout, it gave up entirely.
SAD
Another plunging, metallic word battered into the Doctor’s mind.
Bryony landed suddenly on her back. The Doctor’s legs were tangled in her own and then she was scrambling free as the Doctor was finally able to yank Patterson up and away from danger, Bryony hurrying to reach down and help with the last hard tug.
For a long space the three of them lay in a breathless heap, the turf beneath them shaking and sand – hot, steaming sand – raining down.
But gently, unmistakably, the turf calmed, settled, the sand stopped falling and all was peaceful.
The Doctor was the first to gather his senses, sit up and study his two companions. The girl was…an excellent girl…but the man was – of course – not a man, in the Earth sense…clearly not from round here. Not from anywhere near here…More like someone from Yinzill…In fact, exactly like someone from the planet Yinzill, which the Doctor should have noticed at once…It wasn’t something a massive intellect should just miss…
He rubbed his face, found his hat – it had rolled to a safe distance and was calmly waiting for him – and dusted it to give himself something to do. This was all very bad.
BAD
The alien thought was slightly gentler this time and seemed to be leaving, somehow. The Doctor felt as if a large hand was being opened inside his skull and then withdrawn. His headache was back. He also wished that so much of rescuing activity didn’t involve arm strain and tension in the lower back. Beings were always dangling off building, or cliffs, or into evil-minded pools, or bunkers and they always did need to be hauled back to somewhere less risky. There was a lot of hauling, generally.
HURT
BADHURT
After which everything was back to normal, expect for this renewed feeling that more bits and pieces had sort of been vanished away from his mind.
He didn’t have any time to worry about this, because Bryony – human beings were wonderfully insane – then also sat up, stood up and went to lean over into the bunker and fetch out what was left of the lance. It looked like the blackened stump of a golf club handle. Although it surely wasn’t.
As she bent and reached forward into the sand both the Doctor and Patterson yelled, ‘No!’
But it was too late.
Or, at least, it would have been, if rummaging about a bit with her fingers, lifting up the lance and then turning round with a puzzled expression had still been dangerous activities to try. In fact, they were perfectly safe and meant Bryony could stare down into her hand, examine what she’d found and say to Patterson, ‘It’s very small.’
Patterson was dishevelled and defensive. ‘It was quite big when I started.’
Bryony peered at it with distaste. ‘Well, it’s not big now. But it is ruined. Do you want it back?’ She wagged it in Patterson’s direction.
‘Not…well, no, it won’t work now. It’s…’ Patterson rubbed his sore wrists and stood up, blushing.
‘I’ll chuck it back, then.’ And Bryony slung it back into the bunker, where it landed with a thump while another ‘No!’ rang out across the golf course. The Doctor and Patterson flinched.
But nothing happened. ‘What?’ Bryony turned to them and frowned at the Doctor. ‘You were pulling him out of the bunker and onto the grass – obviously you think it’s safe on the grass…We’re all on the grass…I’m on the grass…So we’re safe, right?’
‘Well, I wouldn’t say—’
‘And how is it you know about these kinds of things, Doctor? People being dragged underground by a golf bunker kinds of things…?’ She waited while the Doctor wondered why she was sounding cross. He’d saved the day, after all. Again. That was cause for thanks and congratulations and maybe that tea he’d been promised.
Bryony folded her arms as significantly as she could and frowned more. ‘Do you want to explain what on earth is going on?’ The Doctor opened his mouth, but seemed unable to let any words emerge – Bryony was a little bit unnerving when she was angry – and so she turned to Patterson. ‘And who are you, Mr Patterson, and where are you from and what were you firing, or burning, or…what was that, exactly? And don’t tell me it was a big sparkler, or an experimental…umbrella…or that you got struck by lightning, or something else unbelievable, because I’m not a complete idiot.’ Patterson looked so bewildered at this and was so clearly on the verge of crying – Bryony could genuinely be quite fierce – that she softened a little and patted his arm. ‘My dad always used to say that to me – “Bryony, you’re not a complete idiot. I think we lost some of the bits.” ’
Usually people found this funny, even if it was a very old joke, but Patterson just swallowed hard and said, all in a rush, ‘My broodfather hated me. He said I was a waste of perfectly good cloning equipment and I agree, I do, I really agree, but…’ He stared from the bunker to Bryony and then to the Doctor and then took a deep breath, but before he could say anything, the twins appeared over the hill, Xavier driving the golf cart. They both waved tranquilly and shouted, ‘Hello! Hello!’
Honor gambolled delightfully down the slope as if dishevelled strangers and steaming pits were all part of enjoying a normal and lovely summer’s afternoon. ‘We wondered if anyone would like a lift back in the golf cart again.’ She didn’t even glance at the plume of greenish vapour still hanging above the bunker. ‘We’re sorry there’s only one cart, which really isn’t big enough to fit five passengers. Grandmother did talk about having more, but she thinks that walking is good for people and should be encouraged and no sitting about unless you’re incredibly old – Grandmother is incredibly old – or you can sit if you’ve had to look at somebody who’s fainted, or had to be somebody who’s fainted. Good afternoon, Mr Patterson.’
Patterson watched his hand being shaken solemnly by the little girl and then Honor led him up the hill as if she was the adult and he was the child.
The Doctor and Bryony followed on, Bryony noticing that she felt sore all over from the recent struggle. As they went, she asked, ‘Doctor, do you get the impression those children are a little unusual?’
The Doctor laughed. It was marvellous that the one thing she chose to mention as unusual was the children. Everything else that had just happened had simply made her inquisitive and cross. Magnificent. He took off his hat and waved it at Xavier. ‘I suppose twins are often slightly remarkable…’ Xavier waved back. ‘But yes…’ He racked his brain, trying to recall where he’d read about adorable barefoot pairs of creatures. There was nothing like reading to prepare you for life, but if all the words w
ere slipping and going dim…if everything you’d read was going to be taken away soon…
He felt a spasm of true panic.
Clearly an alien entity – or Patterson – was flooding this area with telepathic energy at immensely high levels, thousands of psychons, maybe tens of thousands…What could do that? And also lie in wait to devour other beings, just eat them up? Or rather, eat them down? He should know the answer to that. He almost knew that he did know, or had known a very good answer…And clearly the energy was already animating matter…Sand would be quite easy to form into shapes, limbs, silicon support structures, jaws…It didn’t bear thinking about what might come next, but he definitely felt relieved that he was still thinking…even with gaps…
And the Doctor was a determined individual. He didn’t give up easily, if at all. As long as he could think, there was hope. He looked up at the perfectly blue 1978 sky – not too radioactive, not too toxic, a gorgeous pearly dab of light when viewed from outer space – and he thumbed through recollections: the perfectly umber skies of Gallifrey, the first time he’d smelt a dew-laden Earth dawn in seventeenth-century France, swimming in the thick silky waters of Praxus Minor, avoiding the overly affectionate pseudo-sharks of Praxus Minor – and it seemed that his head was still stuffed with every kind of this and that. Maybe he’d just misplaced an occasional item, made filing errors due to telepathic shock.
Nothing to fret about.
The Doctor glanced down and noticed he was holding Bryony’s hand. As if he needed to know someone was there to help him. It was extremely unlikely that a solitary Earth girl with almost no effective technology and not a clue about the space-time continuum, psychon dynamics or transchronic psychology would be of any help to him in any way. He didn’t let go, though. He held on tighter than ever.
The Drosten's Curse Page 4