Gully scowled and stared at it for a while longer. ‘What are you supposed to do with it?’
‘Pick it up.’
Gully nervously extended a tentacle. Despite the pain, the Doctor couldn’t help it. He stifled a smile.
‘Are you laughing at me?’
‘Come on, Gulls. If you can’t laugh at a time like this.’
Gully scowled even more and curled the end of his tentacle round the receiver, which simply slipped off the other end.
The Doctor chuckled even harder. ‘Oh, you’re adorable,’ he said. ‘Tell them you’re on the other fishing line. No, hang on . . . the jellyphone!’
‘You will pay for this,’ said Gully seriously. He managed to fumble the phone onto one of his suckers. Then, down the receiver, ‘Hello?’
‘Jello!’ shouted the Doctor, slightly hysterical.
But the voice on the other end came loud and clear. ‘Doctor!’
‘Donna?’
‘Doctor! Help!’
‘Also, let me say to you: help!’ said the Doctor, struggling to lift up his head. ‘So. I’m guessing you’re not outside with a small liberating force?’
‘Doctor! Your stupid TARDIS won’t fly!’
‘But I told you how to for ages! You said you were listening! And I said, write it down, and you said you didn’t need to write it down—’
‘I’d seen you do it, hadn’t I?’
‘Yes, well I’ve seen you put eyeliner on but I’m under no illusions that I could do it without stabbing myself in the eye!’
Back in London Donna hauled the receiver inside the TARDIS door, pulled it to the console and started pushing buttons.
There was a horrifying crash and fumble and the sound of a TARDIS wheezing in clear distress on the other end of the line. Gully smashed the receiver down to the floor in the mistaken belief that this would hang up the line.
‘Just press the blue button!’ the Doctor was screaming. ‘Blue button! Big blue button i have told you a million times!’
There was a heaving noise then a crashing sound.
‘Yeah, OK, so that was the big blue button,’ said Donna. ‘And we’re still here! Also, you need to get the lighting sorted out in here.’
‘Enough,’ said Gully. He picked up the telephone and, in a totally revolting motion, threw it into his mouth and swallowed it down in one.
His body was completely translucent, and the Doctor watched, fascinated, as the receiver slid down into his stomach, with much gulping and regurgitating noises.
‘The line’s gone funny!’ shouted Donna. ‘It sounds all bubbly.’
The Doctor forgot all about the pain on his skin and tried to think. ‘Come on, come on,’ he beamed.
He only had to make a psychic connection over the width of a planet. That wasn’t far, surely. No distance at all to them. Surely it would pick up on Donna. The TARDIS liked Donna. It liked her more than any companion the Doctor could remember. It rarely sulked or got jealous.
But now. Something was wrong. What was it? What was missing?
There was a long pause. The Doctor twisted himself around, hoping he would see the familiar outline materialising despite itself. Come on. Come on. Gully was coughing and choking like he was trying to cough up the Bakelite and plastic, but wasn’t having much luck.
‘Do you want me to pull that out for you?’ said the Doctor eventually.
Gully nodded, unable to speak, as the Doctor manoeuvred two fingers free of his bonds, took hold of the cord and pulled. The entire disgusting contraption eventually coughed and spluttered its way to the ground with a bang. The Doctor wiped his fingers on the rope, slipping another finger outside.
‘Donna? Donna? Can you hear me?’
Gully started coughing. It was not a pleasant sound.
‘Gently does it. And pull up the lever. Calm down. Calm down. Breathe.’
Donna took a deep breath and slowly did both things at once and, agonisingly slowly, the central section wheezed into life.
The Doctor shut his eyes. ‘Donna,’ he shouted eventually. ‘Where’s Fief?’
‘Uh, he’s . . . he’s having a bit of a wander about.’
There was a pause. Donna knew exactly what the Doctor would think about this, and went pink.
Gully recovered sufficiently to aim once more for the telephone, picking it up with one of his suckers. Just as he went to smash it against the wound in the Doctor’s neck, the Doctor yelled, ‘Find him, Donna. We gave him our word.’
The receiver crumpled under the weight of Gully’s tentacle. He picked up a razor-sharp shard of ragged Bakelite, and advanced towards the Doctor.
Chapter
Fifty
Donna would never have admitted to anyone that she was scared of the TARDIS’s inner corridors. The very sense that they went on for ever gave her vertigo; it always made her feel like she was balancing on the top of a long plunge down into water. She took out her lipstick to mark the walls as she twisted and turned along it. Fear . . . more fear. It was not what she needed right now.
‘Fief? Fief? Come on, where’ve you got to? We need to go!’
She tried not to let a note of panic creep in, either to her voice or her heart. That feeling she had had when the icy finger had touched her – it had scared her, deep down, deep within. And her instincts – to shout, to kick out about it, to run around demanding somebody fix her. Desperately she fought a battle to control it. She closed her eyes and breathed. She was so, so scared. She told herself not to worry; she could call Asha, get a blood transfusion. She’d be fine.
If she could do it in time.
‘Fief!’
She wouldn’t panic, or run or get lost, she told herself. She was going to be the calm, elegant, super-organised, graceful head under pressure . . .
‘Fief!’
Her voice was rough and furious. She didn’t even notice.
Donna charged down a long corridor past a massive sea of ornately carved, wood-latticed Arabian doors, surrounded by ancient calligraphic tiles. From behind some, alluring music played and the smell of sandalwood filled the corridor. She blinked, looking at them for a moment, then ran on, to the right, which was more familiar, lined with roundels, then down a carved stone staircase with a distinct chill despite the ancient tapestry carved around the central pillar.
‘Fief!’
And the Doctor. He needed her. He wouldn’t say it out loud, but she could tell. There was something about the tense pitch of his voice, the hurried anxiety of his tone. She knew he did. She tried to do some deep breathing exercises. They took too long.
At last, she heard the voice.
‘Donna? Why are you shouting?’
She found him, of all places, in the ballet studio, with its great metalled north facing windows, and unaccountable view of bustling late nineteenth-century St Petersburg, snow falling.
‘What are you doing in here?’ she said, looking around. The pointe shoes were, as usual, all neatly hung from nails in the wall; the piano closed, but with the sheet music standing by.
‘It looked . . .’ said Fief simply, fiddling with his earpiece. ‘I was curious . . .’ He raised his hands. ‘It looked like music. I don’t know what that is. I wanted to.’
For the oddest moment, Donna wanted to play him some music. Just a little. If there were time . . . Then she remembered again that he would kill her without a second’s hesitation, and the shard of ice in her heart hardened.
‘We’re going,’ she said brusquely.
Fief did not even glance back at the beautiful studio.
They stood at the console. Donna hesitated just a moment.
If she left now . . . could she get back to the hospital in time? Find Asha?
But what if Asha was busy? What if she was away? Donna thought back to how tortured the Doctor had sounded on the phone. She paused, hesitated over the button.
One second, two. Then she pushed what she had to before she could change her mind, even though every instinct in he
r told her to run to Asha, scream, insist she was made well again or there would be . . . consequences . . .
‘OK,’ she said resolutely. ‘Brazil.’
Fief took his glasses off and fixed her with his yellow eyes. ‘What’s the matter?’ he said, in his neutral voice that could sound kind, if you wanted to put kindness in it.
Donna wanted to cry. She didn’t even know what would happen; would he kill her if he knew? If she was no longer going to be useful?
‘Nothing,’ she said.
The TARDIS started to wheeze its rematerialisation.
Fief was still looking at her. ‘You seem somehow perturbed,’ he said.
‘The Doctor’s in trouble,’ said Donna gruffly. ‘Which means we’re all in trouble. Are you ready if I need you?’
‘I thought you didn’t want destruction?’
‘I don’t,’ said Donna, a steely tone in her voice. ‘Unless it’s to save the Doctor. In which case I want you to burn down the entire world.’
Fief looked at her.
She blinked twice. There was something in her, something that made her feel strange; ferocious and pale. Something pulsing within her. She did not return his gaze.
Chapter
Fifty-One
The TARDIS wheezed and deposited itself somewhat unsteadily on some springy green grass outside the large ice walls. Donna came outside and pressed her fingers against the strange cold smoothness of the walls. Then she kicked crossly at them.
‘Well, this is no use,’ she said, getting back in the TARDIS. ‘This is useless! Stupid TARDIS, can’t you get us inside? Come on! We don’t have much time.’
She could feel the frustration growling inside her.
But, she told herself, this was pretty simple. It had to be. Rescue the Doctor then head back to Asha and get a blood transfusion. Asha could do it, she’d work it out no problem. She felt her fingers connect to the wall of ice she could feel inside her. It felt good. As if something was building; something that had to be let out.
She was glad now she had Fief. They would have to be quick.
She slammed the door of the TARDIS. ‘Maybe inside the impenetrable wall of ice?’ she sneered.
The TARDIS wheezed and dematerialised obediently.
‘You’re Type 40!’ said Gully, surprised and unavoidably impressed. He had now commenced on the Doctor’s shoulders.
The Doctor winced and glanced upwards, his heart unutterably glad.
‘I have never met a Calibran,’ he said through gritted teeth, ‘who wasn’t the most rabid type of engine spotter. Total sprocket nerds, the lot of you.’
‘You just don’t see very many of those these days.’
‘You don’t.’
‘When you’re dead, I shall steal it,’ said Gully. ‘Or sell it. Can’t decide.’
‘Good luck doing either,’ said the Doctor. He blinked several times. His breathing was growing raw. ‘She dies with me.’
‘Guess I’m auctioning you off alive, then,’ said Gully. He pulled up his tentacle again and ran it across the Doctor’s open wound. The Doctor groaned. ‘You’d think this would get boring,’ Gully added. ‘But it doesn’t.’ He coiled a tentacle tight round the Doctor’s waist, rendering him completely immobile and they both stared at the slowly opening door.
‘Donna!’ said the Doctor, delighted.
Donna surveyed the scene – the extraordinarily beautiful room, and then the Doctor, his head an utter mess of painful wounds, coiled upside down in the gigantic poisonous tentacles of a huge mutant alien octopus.
‘Typical,’ she sighed.
Chapter
Fifty-Two
‘Put him down,’ said Donna.
The Doctor frowned. Something wasn’t right. She didn’t sound like herself. The playful quality in her voice had gone; she sounded rough and bitter. ‘Are you all right?’
‘You do know you’re missing quite a lot of skin,’ she hissed back at him. ‘And also you’re upside down? Oi, Captain Calamari. I know you. And I don’t like you. Is this whole mess your fault?’
‘I’m just a trader,’ said Gully. ‘Guards!’
He called for the men. Fortunately, and more by accident than design, the TARDIS had landed in the doorframe and completely blocked the entrance. There was one window. Fief stood by it and knocked out enough of them that the rest got the message. The Doctor winced.
‘Put him down,’ said Donna again, angrily.
‘Nah,’ said Gully. He lashed out with a tentacle and caught Donna on the side of her head.
Over her head, a small dagger shot out. It pinned Gully’s tentacle to the floor. Fief didn’t even turn round.
‘Oh, I see you’re quite the team,’ said the Doctor.
‘Don’t make me angry,’ said Donna to Gully in a quiet voice.
Gully was carefully attempting to prise the dagger out of his sucker.
Donna turned to the Doctor. ‘What is there? What do we need?’
The Doctor wriggled. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘if I could move. Which I have to say I’m finding—’
‘Don’t waffle,’ barked Donna, as Gully started to advance. ‘Just tell me.’
The Doctor blinked. ‘The ice wall,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘The ice wall. If there’s something in here that can make ice . . .’
Donna nodded, and snapped her fingers. Fief disappeared. Donna stared at Gully, not speaking. He had given up trying to remove the dagger, and instead had simply stretched out his leg. It grew thinner and thinner until finally, it snapped.
‘That’s disgusting,’ said Donna at exactly the same moment the Doctor said, ‘That’s amazing.’ The tentacle started to regrow itself in front of their eyes.
Donna hurried over to start untying the Doctor. ‘Seriously, couldn’t you get out of this by yourself?’ she said crossly.
‘I did!’ said the Doctor. ‘My hands were free! I was just moving on to the other bit.’ He took a key out of his mouth. ‘Look at that.’ He tumbled over easily onto the floor. ‘Are you all right Donna? You seem—’
‘You talk too much.’ Donna didn’t even mention the weals on the Doctor’s skin. She was so furious with him for letting himself get caught like this when there was so much else to do.
The Doctor blinked in puzzlement. This wasn’t like her. This wasn’t like her at all.
He was just about to swing down when Gully’s suckers popped out of the end of his new tentacle. The beast roared in triumph and advanced on them again. He caught Donna with a slash, and she dropped to the floor, in agony, then stood up again.
‘I will . . . I will do things to you that will carve their name on humanity’s tomb,’ she screamed at him, rushing straight at him, to the Doctor’s great surprise.
Exactly then Fief burst through the door, holding an enormous incredibly heavy gas canister. ‘This?’
‘Yes!’ said the Doctor. ‘Quickly!’
‘Stand back!’ said Fief, loudly. Then he looked at Gully. ‘Not you.’
And he sprayed the liquid nitrogen straight in the beast’s maw.
Chapter
Fifty-Three
The octopus froze rock solid where he stood, a surprised look on his wide face. He turned completely white, encased in the ice that built the walls from pure nitrogen.
The Doctor grinned as they hurried over to the manhole. ‘I think he’s just chilling . . .’
‘We don’t have time for you being funny,’ said Donna. ‘Do what you have to do and let’s get going.’
The Doctor touched her lightly on the shoulder.
‘Don’t!’ she said. ‘Just . . . Let’s get a move on.’
The Doctor regarded her with some concern. Then he moved towards the great manhole in the middle of the floor. It pulsed, as before, with some strange, unseen energy.
‘Well,’ he said, glancing up at both of them. ‘Here it is, Fief. Here’s what your boss wants finished.’
Fief nodded. It looked ominous, a blue lig
ht shining out from under it.
‘We have to fix this,’ said the Doctor.
‘No,’ said Donna. ‘Fix the humans first, then come back and fix this.’
‘But this . . . There’s no time. We have to do this.’
‘We go, then we come back.’
‘But Donna, what if we can’t fix people in time? What if all of the Rempaths get uploaded? What if the feedback loop runs too fast? Then we can’t get back to fix it; everything will be destroyed.’
‘Bend the laws of time!’
‘I can’t,’ said the Doctor. ‘Not here. Not now. If we go off and we take too long, then everything will be lost. There’s nothing against it happening. Nothing. It will be us taking off from a bloodstained rock, Donna.’
Donna had tears of frustration in her eyes.
It was growing hot in the room. Even with the little fan turning. There were already droplets rolling off the frozen statue of Gully.
‘I’m . . . I’m running out of time,’ she said, and at last the Doctor understood.
‘Oh, Donna.’ He stood up.
‘Shut up!’ she screamed. ‘I don’t have time for anyone to be nice to me!’
The Doctor nodded. ‘Can you . . . Do you think you can keep yourself calm—’
‘What do you think?’ She whipped round and grabbed the – by now completely disgusting – phone that was lying on the desk. ‘I can call Asha,’ she whispered. ‘Tell her to be ready. How long will it take to do what you need to do in the tunnel?’
The Doctor sighed. ‘I dunno, Donna. I have to get in there first, take a look; figure out the circuitry.’
More water dripped off Gully. The end of one tentacle emerged from its ice prison. It started to twitch.
‘She can cure me,’ said Donna. ‘She can! She can cure me! I saw her do it. We did it with Gramps. I need her.’
‘Call her,’ said the Doctor.
Chapter
Fifty-Four
Donna’s hands shook as she slowly dialled the number Asha had pressed into her hands.
‘Donna . . . Donna. I’ve been trying to reach you!’ the girl’s voice came.
Doctor Who: In the Blood Page 17