by Doctor Who
drenched with filthy water, but the relief on her face mirrored that on Rose’s own.
The Doctor splashed forward and gave her an enormous hug.
‘Hello, you! I was just coming to get you!’
She hugged him back gratefully.
‘Talk about leaving it until just after the nick of time.’
‘Sorry. Got a bit caught up.’
Ali hurried over to them and Rose tousled her hair. ‘I thought I told you to get out of here.’
‘My torch packed up.’
‘She thought you were a monster.’ The Doctor grinned. ‘Personally, I think that’s a bit harsh. . . ’
‘Hey!’ Rose frowned at him.
The Doctor winked at Ali, then caught Rose by the arm, leading her a little way down the tunnel.
‘I’ve been worried about you. We had some. . . interesting visitors out on Black Island. Some old friends conjured out of the ether. Slith-122
een, Daleks, that sort of thing. . . ’ All flippancy had gone from his voice now. ‘Do I gather that Mr Nathaniel Morton has been a less than perfect host?’
Rose nodded, and proceeded to tell him everything that had happened since she had made it into the cellar, grateful for the chance to finally unburden herself to someone who might understand what was going on.
The Doctor listened, his face hard and his jaw tightening as Rose described the mind-scan that Morton and the others had subjected her to. When she finally reached the thing in the library, she lowered her voice so as not to alarm Ali. The little girl had already been through enough; she didn’t need to know that the worst monster was still to come.
The Doctor stroked his chin thoughtfully. ‘Cynrog. That’s not good.’
‘You’ve met them?’
‘Not met them, but know them by reputation. Not a very nice reputation either.’
‘And they’ve got a thing about frightening children, have they?’
‘No, that’s the bit that’s puzzling. The equipment is nothing that the Cynrog aren’t capable of. But they’re behaving oddly. All this sneaking about, hiding under masks. . . not like them at all.’
‘So how should they be?’
‘Oh, I dunno. Stamping about and giving orders. Blowing things up. That sort of thing. . . They’re warriors, subjugating the galaxy in the name of their great all-powerful god.’ He frowned, looking almost disappointed.
‘Well, let’s just count ourselves lucky that they’re not stamping around, blowing things up, shall we?’ Rose said. ‘What are we gonna do about stopping them?’
‘First things first.’ The Doctor pulled a crumpled photograph from his pocket. ‘Look familiar?’
Rose took it, squinting at it in the dim light. It was the photograph of a small boy.
‘Oh, my God! It’s the boy I saw in my dream.’
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‘I’ve been seeing a lot of him tonight. It seems that it’s not just monsters being brought to life.’
‘Where did you get this?’
‘Bronwyn Ceredig. Now, I need you to find out who this is. . . I think his name is Jimmy and I think he was her son. Find out what happened to him, Rose. Find out what Bronwyn knows.’
‘You think she’s something to do with this?’
‘That’s what I need you to find out! What I do know is that there’s a thumping great alien transmitter in the lamp room of the lighthouse that needs sorting out.’ The Doctor smiled that mischievous smile of his. ‘And that’s where young Ali here comes in.’
Peyne stared in frustration at the inert equipment that littered the cellar. All around it, Cynrog technicians scurried to and fro, pushing past her without catching her gaze. Psychic reception had fallen practically to zero.
Hadron hurried over to her.
‘Well?’ Peyne snapped.
‘The equipment is functioning perfectly, Priest Commander. And the generators are at full power. If we are not receiving a signal, then it can only mean that. . . ’
‘That the children are not asleep.’ Peyne gave a hiss of displeasure.
‘You think they have realised?’
‘The primitives in the village have no concept of what is going on.
No, I think our friend the Doctor has had a hand in this. A Time Lord desperately trying to uphold the principles of his people. Protecting the lesser species.’ Peyne’s voice was filled with contempt.
‘Do we still have his companion, the girl?’
‘Yes, Commander Peyne. Locked in one of the upper rooms.’
‘Then the Doctor might regret siding with these humans.’ She licked her lips with a flick of her tongue. ‘Can the equipment be modified to induce sleep in the target subjects?’
Hadron’s brow furrowed. ‘Theoretically it is just a matter of recalibration of some of the components in the emitter.’
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‘Then do it! Force the children back into their dream state. The Synod will not wait much longer and I am keen to be free of this world.’
‘Peyne?’ Morton’s voice bellowed from upstairs.
Peyne hissed in irritation.
‘Peyne, I want to talk to you!’
‘I expect a report from you in fifteen minutes, Priest Technician Hadron.’ Peyne’s voice made it perfectly clear that she would brook no more delays. ‘Take as many novices as you need from other duties to get the work done, but get those children dreaming again!’
Hadron hurried back towards the machinery, summoning technicians as he went. Peyne turned and made her way up the cellar stairs.
Morton was waiting for her at the top.
‘What is going on, Peyne?’
The old man’s face was red and beaded with sweat. Peyne wrinkled her nose in disgust.
She shut the door to the cellar, determined to keep her tone civil.
She still needed Morton’s cooperation, at least for the present. It would do them no good for the man to get unduly agitated.
‘It seems our friend the Doctor has some understanding of what we are doing here, of how we are generating the creatures at any rate: It seems that he has persuaded our dreamers not to sleep tonight.’
Morton’s hands tightened on the arms of his wheelchair, knuckles whitening.
‘Why is he interfering?’
Peyne gave an unpleasant smile. ‘Because he’s a Time Lord. He thinks that it is his role to put right the wrongs of the universe. They always were an arrogant race and this one is no different.’
‘Damn him!’
There was anguish in Morton’s voice. It was this anguish that was responsible for what they had started here, this anguish that Peyne had used to drive Morton ever further, that had brought them here to this ancient rectory and so close to completing her mission.
It had made Morton ambitious and dangerous.
‘Is the Doctor’s friend still locked up?’ he snapped.
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Peyne nodded. ‘In one of the upper rooms.’
Then get her! Bring her down here.’ Morton was shaking with rage.
‘If the Doctor insists on interfering, then he and the girl will regret it.’
Peyne gave a smile of amusement. It never ceased to amaze her how far this primitive was prepared to go for his own survival. She had chosen wisely when she picked him.
The technicians are busy. I’ll get the girl myself.’
‘Bring her to the ward.’
With that Morton spun his wheelchair on the spot and wheeled himself out of the hallway. She liked seeing him like this. Too often he moped and moaned his way through the day, constantly whining about his condition. Anger made him powerful, anger let her see what lay within him, and it thrilled her.
She crossed the hall, climbing the old staircase to the upper floor. It might be interesting to let Morton have free rein with the girl, to see just how far he was prepared to go. If nothing else, it would provide the technicians with a much needed diversion from the monotony of their duties.
She crossed to the door of
the room where the girl was locked and pulled the snub-nosed disintegrator pistol from her pocket. The girl should still be groggy from the drugs that she had been given, but there was no harm in being cautious. She reached out to open the door then stopped, puzzled. The key wasn’t in the lock. She reached for the brass handle and turned it. There was a soft click. The door was unlocked!
With a cry of anger, Peyne kicked the door open and stopped in amazement.
Sprawled out on the bed, arms folded behind his head, was the Doctor.
He sat up unhurriedly and gave her a quizzical look.
‘Room service, I hope. I’d love a cuppa.’
Snarling, Peyne raised the gun.
Beth Hardy looked up from her work as she heard the heavy rumble of her husband’s Range Rover in the car park. She placed the glass 126
she had been washing back on the bar and wiped her wet hands on her apron.
She had taken down every single glass from the shelf above the bar and washed them, one by one, then polished them until they gleamed and put them back again. The job had taken hours. It was stupid, but it was the only thing she could think of to take her mind off Ali.
After the Doctor’s speech, the bar had emptied quickly, everyone hurrying back to their homes to wake their children and their neighbour’s children. Outside, the village was now a cacophony of music and air horns. Someone had even found a box of fireworks from somewhere – Eric Molson from the corner shop probably – and the occasional bang from some of the bigger rockets was still rattling the windows in their frames. In among the noise was something that had not been heard for a long time in Ynys Du: the sound of children laughing.
A few had returned to the pub, their children in tow. Tables all across the bar were scattered with board games hauled from Ali’s bedroom, and the restaurant had been turned into an impromptu dance floor. Parents and children alike jiggled and danced to a collection of 1950s classics. Somewhat appropriately, ‘Rock Around the Clock’ was playing at the moment.
Beth watched as a young boy, the youngest of Bob Perry’s kids, slumped into a chair in the corner of the lounge bar, rubbing at his eyes with the sleeve of his dressing gown and giving a huge yawn.
Almost immediately his mother was at his side, hauling him back to his feet and twirling him out on to the dance floor. Beth could see the determination in her false smile, hear the strain in her laughter. Most of the children were young and already tired by week after week of troubled sleep. They simply weren’t going to be able to keep them all awake for ever. Sooner or later one of them was going to give in to their fatigue, and then the things would start to appear again.
Beth closed her eyes and whispered a silent prayer. She had realised almost immediately the connection between the monsters and the children. She had seen things that Ali had drawn in her sketchpad and written about in her notebook stalking down the high street, all 127
claws and teeth and childish colour schemes. These things hadn’t been real creatures; they were children’s monsters, combinations of every dark fairy tale, every schoolyard horror story, every half-glimpsed late-night movie.
What had scared her more than the monsters was the thought of some government agency arriving to investigate, some faceless bu-reaucrat bundling Ali into the back of a van and taking her away.
Beth had also been having nightmares since all this had started, but hers were not of monsters. In hers her daughter lay in a sterile hospital room, tubes and needles littered across her skin, faceless men in white coats prodding and pulling at her. She wasn’t going to let that happen.
And so she had kept her fears to herself, not talking to her friends, not talking to her husband. She was sure that most if not all of her neighbours suspected the same as her. Half-finished conversations, furtive nods, smiles of sympathy, but no one with the courage to do anything. They had made the monsters part of their normal lives, fitting them into their nightly routine, as familiar as brushing teeth or putting the cat out.
Beth almost laughed out loud. It was ludicrous. The entire village had tried to convince itself that nothing was wrong, but the truth was that everything was horribly, terribly wrong, only they were powerless to stop it. If the Doctor was right, then they were being manipulated, controlled by the machinery in the lighthouse, chained to the village, kept afraid and impotent, too scared to help themselves.
But now the Doctor was here, now they weren’t alone.
He had been heading out of the front door when Mervyn had shrugged on his jacket and offered to drive him up to the rectory. The Doctor had given him a dazzling smile and in that moment Beth had known that everything would be all right, that he really was going to bring their daughter back.
That had seemed like hours ago, and ever since she had been cleaning glasses, straining to hear past the music and the din outside, waiting for the sound of their car pulling into its parking spot.
She crossed to the back door and pulled back the net curtains. The 128
headlights from the car were dazzling her. She couldn’t see properly. . .
Then the headlights snapped off, the passenger door sprang open and a small figure emerged.
Beth cried out, hauled the door open and rushed into the rain. Ali stood caked in mud with a guilty look on her face, the look she always had if she’d just been caught raiding the sweet jar or reading by torchlight under the covers of her bed.
Beth swept her up into her arms, oblivious to the mud, not sure whether to laugh or cry. Ali squirmed in her grip, embarrassed.
‘I’m all right, Mum.’
‘Quite a handful, your Ali.’
Beth looked up. The Doctor’s friend, Rose, was standing there shivering. Her face was pale and streaked with dirt. She looked exhausted.
‘Thank you.’ Beth could feel her vision blurring. ‘Thank you so much for bringing her back.’
Rose shuffled uncomfortably. ‘Yeah, well, don’t thank me too soon.
This isn’t over yet, and I don’t think you’re gonna like the next bit.’
‘No.’
Beth curled a protective arm around her daughter’s shoulder, her face a mixture of anger and disbelief. ‘You can’t ask us to do that. Not again.’
Rose sighed. She had known that this was going to be the tricky bit ever since the Doctor had outlined his plan. They were sitting in the old-fashioned kitchen of the pub, a welcome refuge from the cacophony of the bar. Ali sat draped in an old tartan blanket, a huge mug of hot chocolate in her hands. Her parents sat protectively on either side of her. They had barely let her out of their sight since she had got back inside the house.
Rose had changed into an old sweatshirt and some tracksuit bottoms that Beth had lent her, feeling warm for the first time in what seemed like an age. She drained the last dregs of coffee from her mug.
‘Look, I know that this is hard for you, but the Doctor says. . . ’
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‘The Doctor says. . . ’ Mervyn slammed his palm down on the table, sending cutlery flying. ‘He went up there to rescue Ali and now you just want to put her in danger again?’
‘She’s not going to be in any danger!’ Rose was getting exasperated now. ‘I told you, there’s a transmitter in the old lighthouse. That’s what’s been causing the nightmares. That’s what’s been controlling you, stopping you sorting this out for yourselves. All we’ve got to do is knock it out and the Cynrog are powerless.’
‘The Cynrog.’ Mervyn snorted. ‘Aliens with masks that live in the rectory.’
‘Yes! Disable the transmitter and it stops whatever they’re up to.’
‘Then why don’t I just go up there with a big hammer and smash the thing?’
‘No!’ Rose banged her mug down. ‘That won’t help.’
The Doctor had explained to her that simply destroying the transmitter wasn’t going to do any good. Worse, it might trigger something that affected the kids permanently. It had to be disabled carefully and precisely, he had been very clear about that. S
he reached into her pocket and pulled out the sonic screwdriver, placing it on the dining table in front of her.
‘This is what’s gonna do the job. This and someone small enough to get where it needs to be used.’ She nodded at Ali. ‘She can do it. Just let her come with me and we can finish this.’
‘No.’
‘Mr Hardy. . . ’
‘I said no!’ Mervyn rose to his feet, knocking his chair backwards.
‘I’m warning you, girl. . . ’
‘Or what?’ Rose could feel her own anger building now. ‘What are you gonna do? Hit me? Throw me out? We’re the ones trying to help you. Me and the Doctor. If you’re too stupid to listen to what we have to say. . . ’
‘Stop it!’ Ali’s voice was shrill and piercing. ‘Stop it, stop it, stop it!’
She pulled at her father’s sleeve. ‘Why are you shouting at Rose, Dad? She can stop it. She and the Doctor can stop the monsters!’
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Mervyn stared down at his daughter, not knowing what to say to her. Ali leaned across and picked up the sonic screwdriver, turning it over in her hand carefully. She looked up at Rose.
‘Can this thing really fix everything? Make it like it was before?’
Rose nodded. ‘The Doctor’s told me exactly what he wants us to do, but we’ve got to hurry.’
Ali hopped down off her chair. ‘Well, let’s go, then.’
‘Ali, no. . . ’
Mervyn reached out for his daughter, but she stepped away from him.
‘Dad, I don’t want nightmares every night. I’m tired of being afraid to go to sleep and letting the monsters get out. I want to be able to play with my friends without being scared. I don’t want you and Mum worrying about me.’
She looked over to her mother. ‘Mum, I know you cry every night.
I don’t want you to be unhappy because of me. Rose and the Doctor can put it right. I want to do something to help. Please. Let me do something. I’m not a little girl any more.’
She turned to Rose. ‘What is it that you want me to do?’
The Doctor watched as Morton hauled himself painfully up the stairs, step after agonising step, towards the wheelchair that waited for him on the landing. One of the masked Cynrog reached down to help him, but he batted the proffered hand away angrily and slumped breathless into the ancient metal-framed chair.