Contents
Cover
About the Book
About the Author
Title Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty-Four
Chapter Fifty-Five
Chapter Fifty-Six
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Chapter Sixty
Chapter Sixty-One
Chapter Sixty-Two
Chapter Sixty-Three
Acknowledgements
Copyright
About the Book
‘Trip-trapped Trolls,’ Donna read. ‘That’s not a very nice headline.’
‘They keep finding dead people who were…prominent on the internet. And the papers seem to think it’s funny.’
When internet trolls start to drop dead, the Doctor thinks there might be more to it than just a sedentary lifestyle and high blood pressure.
From the backstreets of South Korea to the jungles of Brazil, the Doctor and Donna follow the leads until they find the source of this online infection. But they aren’t the only ones interested in these sudden deaths at the computer screen, or what’s causing them.
Before long the Doctor and Donna are fighting for their lives – and the lives of everyone else on planet Earth who uses the internet. Including people very dear to Donna…
This novel features the Tenth Doctor and Donna Noble, as played by David Tennant and Catherine Tate.
About the Author
JENNY T. COLGAN has written 16 bestselling novels as Jenny Colgan, which have sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide, been translated into 25 languages, and won both the Melissa Nathan Award and Romantic Novel of the Year. Aged 11, she won a national fan competition to meet the Doctor and was mistaken for a boy by Peter Davison.
Chapter
One
Donna hurled down her phone in frustration.
‘Your call is important to us . . .’ came the recorded voice on the other end of the line.
‘Well, it isn’t, is it?’ said Donna into the speaker. ‘Because if it was, you wouldn’t have that robot repeating that at me for forty-five minutes. What do you do with unimportant calls? Send them electric shocks?’
‘So, this is fun and everything,’ said the Doctor, glancing up from where he was busying himself at the other side of the TARDIS console. ‘But could you possibly hang up and explain yourself? You’ve been buried in that phone ever since you got asked to leave the spa . . . almost as if you were avoiding me.’
Donna turned her head to hide the fact that she was blushing. The Doctor’s mouth twitched.
‘I’m not!’ said Donna. ‘I just have to get through to my bank to cancel my credit card. Except the idiots aren’t picking up.’
There was a long pause whilst the TARDIS wheezed a little, as if to cover up any embarrassment.
‘Come on. What did you do? Tell me!’ said the Doctor.
Donna put down the phone and folded her arms. ‘It was all a big misunderstanding.’
The Doctor took off his glasses and gave her a look. ‘It’s a spa, Donna. What’s to misunderstand? Lie down, get smeared with . . . I don’t know, goo . . . put bits of you in different temperatures of water . . .’
‘You have no idea what goes on at a spa, do you?’
‘None at all. Wish people would stop giving me the vouchers.’ He straightened up. ‘Anyway, could you explain to me why we just had to leave one? In a hurry?’
‘Well, I was having this massage, right . . . stripped down—’
‘I don’t need every single detail.’
‘No, listen, right. I was having a massage by this robot, and it was dead good, and normally in spas you tip the staff so I thought maybe I should tip it, and there was a slot, and . . .’
‘You put your credit card in it?’
‘It had very powerful and firm robotty fingers!’
‘You inserted a magnetic strip into a magnetron robot?’
‘If their stupid robots blow up if you stick tiny bits inside them, they should come with a warning sign!’
‘You should come with a warning sign.’
Donna sighed and hung up the bleeping phone. ‘Well, it was not relaxing. Maybe I should go see my friends.’
‘Thought you didn’t like your friends.’
‘I don’t like Nerys. The rest of them are all right. Yeah. Mates. That’s what I need.’
The Doctor looked slightly wounded. ‘I’m your mate.’
Donna looked at him. ‘Of course you are, dumbo. OK, right, the nine best things about Lee were . . .’
‘Actually,’ said the Doctor glancing down at the dials. ‘I was thinking of popping by Earth, as it happens. Kate Bush is playing live. This is rarer than the fourth phase rising of the nineteen golden Osirius horned moons. And every bit as glorious.’
Chapter
Two
‘Who do you think you are, you cow? Wind your fat neck in.’
Alan’s fingers rattled happily off the keys as he pressed ‘send’ and sat back in contentment. That would show her.
Now, wasn’t there another young actress who’d been in the papers showing rather too much flesh, in Alan’s opinion. He could go and point that out in the comments section.
He took a handful of cheese puffs in one hand then scratched his armpit. With his other hand he clicked on his filthy mouse.
He felt a draft, but ignored it. Was probably making the motor run too much again. Stupid computer.
It felt cold in the room, though. Alan rarely felt the cold – with his bulk he was generally too warm rather than the opposite – but there was a definite chill in the air, as if someone had left a window open.
He spun round. Nothing. His mother was out. There shouldn’t be anyone around. There wasn’t. He liked to do this kind of thing alone.
He told himself not to be daft and turned back to open windows on his computer screen.
Alan liked to think he wasn’t afraid of anything; not afraid of putting his opinion
s out there, not afraid to tell celebrities the truth, as he saw it. Of course he didn’t sign his name to it; he wasn’t that stupid. But they made him so angry. He started again.
But before he’d got far, Alan felt a draft in the room. A cold draft. He felt the hairs go up at the back of his neck. Goosebumps raised themselves on his arm.
His computer froze.
He pounded the keyboard in fury. ‘Come on! Come on, you useless piece of garbage . . . come on.’
Suddenly, he felt an icy finger. Inside.
It pushed at his heart. Right inside. He felt it flip, push his heart over, and then, suddenly, a cold, cold hand began to squeeze.
Alan shouted out loud in horror. And then, something deeper came over him: he felt furious, enraged beyond anything. He picked up the keyboard, hurled it at the wall, followed by the chair. He screamed and yelled, pounding around; his fist went into the mirror in his frenzy of rage.
His dirty sweatpants snagged on the corner of the desk and he turned, to roar, but it was too late: he clutched at his chest, and abruptly fell over, making a noise like a crashing tree.
He tried to scream out for his mother; but she was out and besides, he had no more breath. Instead he could only gulp furiously, like a fish, his eyes struggling to focus on anything other than the dusty jumble of wires and cables like sleeping snakes, malevolently coiled around his bedroom floor, as he heaved his final breath, and his eyes saw nothing more.
The computer whooshed back into life. It made several beeping noises and a blue light flashed as a current rippled through it. Then, everything was silent.
Chapter
Three
‘Hettie!’
Donna dropped her suitcase and opened her arms. Hettie was standing in her pristine Chiswick doorway. She lived in one of the posh houses, down by the riverside.
She’d come a long way, thought Donna, since they had started out together at Belmont Primary. Then Hettie had been hilarious and wild and always up to mischief of one sort or another, egged on by Donna, and it had been that way all through their mad teenage years.
Then Hettie’s husband Cam had got a big job, and now she was incredibly stressed all the time and always having to go off for yoga retreats and needing lots of people to help her out with stuff and cleaners and nannies and things, which seemed to Donna a pretty stressful thing to do rather than just looking after your own kids, but that wasn’t something people with children particularly liked to hear, so she just left it.
But the old Hettie had to be in there somewhere, right? Always up with a ridiculous crack or a filthy remark about someone . . . That would help.
‘Het!’
Hettie looked at her wearily. She had become incredibly thin, and it made her look really tired and anxious. She was clasping her phone and merely glanced up at Donna before jabbing something out on it.
‘It’s been too long!’ Donna worried slightly that she wasn’t 100 per cent sure how long it actually had been – ‘More or less about the same time,’ the Doctor had said. ‘Don’t worry, you’re not here or anything.’
‘Why would I be here?’ Donna had said. ‘I travel with you.’
There’d been a short pause then, and she’d known not to push it.
‘Yeah,’ said Hettie, still pressing buttons, and there was a short, uncomfortable pause. ‘Well, you coming in then?’
Hettie’s house was spotless; immaculate. There wasn’t a sound to be heard.
‘Where are the kids?’ Donna asked brightly. She loved the twins; their black hair fell in dark ringlets and they were a blur of constant movement.
Hettie shrugged. ‘Kumon maths. Then karate, then Mandarin. Then tutorials.’
Donna put her bag down. Hettie didn’t put her phone down.
‘Hets, they’re six years old.’
‘Exactly,’ said Hettie. ‘I’m already too late to get them in to tennis. I can’t believe it.’
Donna frowned. ‘Where’s Cam?’
Cam was Hettie’s high-level husband. Well, he was high level now. He’d never been high level before; he’d just been a lazy, sweet average sort of a bloke who’d kind of turned up at the right time when Hettie had decided she wanted to get married and they’d kind of fallen into it, and Donna had always thought he was really easy-going and nice, but then suddenly everything had got very busy and important at work for him and that was that, she barely saw him again.
Hettie rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, it’s Cameron now. He doesn’t answer to Cam any more. Too busy and important. He’s at work. He’s always at bloody work. Of course. Leaving everything to me.’
A cleaner came to the door. ‘All done now, Mrs Wake.’
Hettie didn’t even turn round, simply shooed the cleaner away with the wave of a hand, still holding her phone. ‘I don’t think she can be trusted,’ she said to Donna, more than loudly enough for the cleaner to hear.
The woman’s back stiffened, but she didn’t turn round.
‘So she does the cleaning . . . When are you picking up the kids?’
‘Oh no, the useless nanny does that,’ said Hettie. ‘It’s about all she does.’ She sighed, and laughed at something on her computer screen, which was next to her on the sofa. But not kindly.
‘What is it?’ said Donna.
‘Oh some idiot’s just said something really stupid on my messageboard . . . Wait for it . . .’
The lights on her devices flashed red.
‘Oh yes, there they go, all piling in. Ha! That’ll teach ’em.’
She started typing something flamboyantly fast, her greige-painted nails tapping against the keyboard, the clicking noise incredibly loud. Donna sat there awkwardly.
Finally Hettie finished whatever she was doing, and looked up at Donna as if she’d forgotten she was even there. ‘Glass of wine?’
‘Yeah’ said Donna, hoping it might help.
‘So,’ said Donna, as they sat down again on the impeccably plumped cushions.
Hettie immediately picked her device up and scanned it, a scornful smile playing across her lips, as well as the occasional wince.
Donna looked around. Everything in the room matched: silver grey with purple accents everywhere. It was too neat and tidy for a normal person to have done it. ‘Did you get someone else to do this room?’ said Donna.
Hettie nodded. ‘Blooming interior designers. Bloody thieves more like.’ She resumed her typing.
Donna sipped her – clearly very expensive – wine politely. ‘So . . . anyway, I was seeing this bloke. Kind of. And . . . are you busy or what?’
Hettie looked at her blankly, pulling an expensive-looking shawl around her as if she was freezing, even though it was perfectly warm in the house. Too thin, Donna found herself thinking glumly. But still, she could feel a draft.
‘Sorry,’ said Hettie, not sounding it. ‘Just waiting on my useless bloody personal trainer to cancel as per bloody usual. I’ll tell him.’
Again with the clicking.
Donna blinked. This was mad. ‘Het,’ she said. ‘What’s wrong with you? What’s happened?’
Hettie sniffed and looked at the device again. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘This isn’t you! We should be sitting up and gossiping and swapping funny stories about awful boyfriends and . . . not banging on about annoying “personal trainers” and posting on internet messageboards.’
There was a pause. Hettie’s face changed, became stony-hard. ‘Well, I find that very offensive,’ she said.
‘I didn’t . . . I didn’t . . . mean . . .’ Not for the first time, Donna cursed the way she was too quick to speak up. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean it to sound harsh.’
‘I’m just saying,’ said Hettie. ‘I don’t think it’s appropriate to speak to me like that in my own home.’
‘OK, OK, I’m sorry’ said Donna. ‘Seriously. Sheez.’
‘This is my safe space,’ said Hettie. ‘My sanctuary.’ She turned back to her handheld and started tapping buttons on it in a
very passive-aggressive way, as if Donna wasn’t there at all.
Donna stared at her for a moment. ‘Are you all right, Het?’ she said one more time, in her kindest voice.
‘I’m fine,’ said Hettie, not looking fine. Not looking fine at all. Her hand was at her chest, as if something was hurting her. She went back to furiously tapping buttons, not looking up.
Donna felt incredibly uneasy and not at all sure what to do. ‘Um, so,’ she said, shifting on her seat. ‘So, I’ll just . . . I’ll maybe just . . .’
‘Yeah, actually something’s come up?’ drawled Hettie, pressing ‘send’. ‘Sorry. Maybe you can’t stay after all . . .’
‘You know what,’ said Donna, annoyed she hadn’t got that in first. ‘That’s fine. Bye! I’ll see myself out.’
Donna walked down the road, heart pounding, adrenalin surging through her system.
It was odd: she’d faced monsters – frightening ones, and touching ones – and terrible situations and grave danger in her travels with the Doctor. But, somehow, falling out with a friend felt kind of just as bad. And she wasn’t sure how she felt about that.
As she walked, something pinged in Donna’s pocket. It was her own device, with a message, indicating she had been ‘unfriended’ from all her social media accounts. Unfriended by Hettie.
She swallowed. What had she done? Had she been judge-y? Disapproving?
The old Hettie, they could have talked it over, joked, had a laugh. But the new one . . . She’d been so aggressive, and defensive, and had marshalled her devices around her like battlements.
Donna searched her memory. Maybe because she hadn’t been in contact for a while? Maybe she hadn’t clicked on enough pictures of Hettie’s children. Hettie might not see them that much, but she posted a lot of pictures of them.
It felt, Donna thought as she stomped along in the cold evening, harder and harder to keep track of who was offended about things, and why. Why people kept getting themselves cross. It seemed curious, considering how much real trouble there surely was to worry about in the world.
But that didn’t stop her feeling sad; didn’t stop her running the friendship through her mind – all the fun they’d had at school, the mad nights out they’d shared, the laughs . . .
It was the oddest thing. When she’d lost Lee – well, it was heartbreaking; whether he’d been real or not, he had felt so real to her. But people understood that. They understood heartbreak and loss. Even the Doctor, Donna reckoned, understood that. Or perhaps especially him.
Doctor Who: In the Blood Page 1