A Beautiful Life (Chapter 6)

Chapter 6 (Jungle)

“I beg your pardon?” said the Doctor, as the weak Surfacer started to pant and then collapsed down on top of Lilly.

“Get this thing off me,” said Lilly, struggling under the creatures weight.

The Doctor and Kitz obliged and shifted the thin creature off Lilly.

“It said help,” said Kitz, scratching his head as they turned the creature onto it’s back. It’s eyes were pale and it’s skin was cracked, but, despite being a little underweight, looked quite similar to the other Gandrans.

“It looks like us,” said Kitz.

“Have you never seen one before?”

“No,” said Kitz, peering closer at the creature. “Only shapes and shadows. We were never allowed down to the surface.”

“Well I got a little more up close and personal than I wanted to,” said Lilly, sitting herself up and brushing herself down. “And I’m soaking wet.”

“Your wound,” said the Doctor, moving his hand to her top.

“I’m fine,” she said, shuffling away. “I caught myself when I fell.”

“At least you’re alive,” said the Doctor.

A thin arm shot up from the unconscious creature and grabbed the Doctor. “Help…”

“What do you need help with?” asked the Doctor, leaning in closer.

“From…them…” it pointed towards the tree tops.

The Doctor and Kitz helped the creature to sit up. It looked groggy and put a hand to its forehead, closed its eyes exhaled deeply.

“You need to tell us what’s going on here.”

The creature opened its eyes and looked at the Doctor. There was something there behind its eyes. Some kind of sadness. The Doctor looked at it’s deep, black eyes and almost felt his own eyes start to water.

“They hurt us,” said the creature.

“What’s your name?” said Kitz.

“Obi. My name is…Obi.”

The Doctor noticed something with it’s arm. It was slightly greyer than the rest of it’s body. The skin was crinkled and the arm was much smaller than the other. It was deformed.

“Can we take you somewhere?”

“Nowhere safe,” said the creature. It closed it’s eyes and then opened them again. “Please, don’t blame us.”

“For what?”

“For what we do?”

“You mean eating people? You eat the dead, don’t you?”

The creature shook its head.

“You don’t eat them?” asked Kitz.

The creature nodded.

“You’re not making much sense.”

“We eat them, but they are not dead,” said the creature, screwing its eyes up in shame.

“What?!” spat Lilly.

“But we see them. The Age takes them.” Kitz looked puzzled

The creature shook his head. “I only wish that were true.”




Richard and Holly had so far not encountered anyone. They made their way across the bridge and to the platform. Either side of the platform and continuing down each side of the platform were burning torches, but the place looked deserted.

They made their way down a path which was lined with small trees and bushes until they emerged into a clearing on the platform. Sat in the middle of the platform was a huge, three-story circular wooden structure. In the middle was a arched-doorway, about seven-foot high and rimmed with gold beading. Small windows were dotted around the circumference at ground level, but no higher, which led Holly to believe that it didn’t have any other floors other than the ground floor.

Richard looked at Holly and looked a little concerned. “Do you think we should?”

“We’ve got to find answers, Richard,” said Holly. She straightened herself up. “There’s nobody about. Let’s go in.”

They made their way under the archway and into the darkness. Holly took out her phone and switched the torch on. The place didn’t look particularly exciting. In fact it looked better from the outside. The inside was mainly hollow with a few cubicles off the side. The floor was straw-covered and in the middle of the building was a wooden table.

“I’ve never seen a temple as boring as this,” said Richard.

“Which makes me believe that it’s not a temple.”

“You mean they use it for something else?”

“And just tell the people it’s a temple.”

Something caught the corner of Richard’s eye to the right. “Look at this?”

The two of them walked over to a cabinet. Inside were shelves and shelves of jars filled with some sort of clear liquid.

Richard went to open one of the jars but Holly stopped him. “What’s up?”

“We don’t know what that stuff is.”

“Looks like water to me.”

“In jars?” Holly shook her head. “Something isn’t right here.” She looked around her, sighed and then opened a jar.

“You just told me-”

She sniffed it and screwed her eyes up. “It smells like vodka.”

“It can’t be vodka, surely?”

“No, but it’s not water.”

“Maybe an embalming fluid for the dead or something?”

Holly was about to dip her finger in when a voice from towards the entrance made her jump.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

The two of them turned around. Silhouetted against the moonlight shining outside was one of the Gandrans. And they recognised the voice - it was Tees.

“We didn’t mean to intrude-” said Richard.

“But you did,” said Tees. He grabbed a torch and stepped into the cavernous temple. It lit up the nearby walls an orange colour. He looked angry, but did not break his eye line with the two Human beings.

“We just wanted to understand,” said Holly. “Something is not right here.”

Tees went to another side cabinet and took out a white, silver-studded glove. He snatched the jar off Holly and then dipped his hand into it. The liquid was absorbed into his glove and he put the jar back on the shelf.

“You want answers?” he asked.

Holly edged back a little.

“Here are your answers.” In a flash his gloved hand grabbed Richard’s arm. Holly yelled out in horror as Richard went stiff and rigid. He began gasping for air, clutched his chest and then collapsed to the ground.

“What have you done?” said Holly, dropping to her knees and checking Richard.

“The Age has come for him.” And then Tees burst out into a belly laugh that Holly wouldn’t have expected to come from such a diminutive creature.




The Doctor had hefted the stricken creature up into his arms and was now following Kitz through the jungle. The creature had given rough directions to some encampment he came from and they were now making their way there.

Lilly had protested, wondering if it was the wrong course of action, but the Doctor had summarised that something wasn’t quite right here and that they needed to get to the bottom of it.

They had not been walking for long when there was a rustle of trees and bushes and three more creatures emerged, holding spears. Each of them looked similar, but each of them had a different deformity. The lead creature’s right side of his face looked like it was melted, the creature to the far right only had one arm, and the creature to left had an enlarged foot.

The lead creature snarled at the Doctor and company as they approached.

“Please,” said the Doctor, laying the stricken creature to the floor and lifting up his arms, “we mean you no harm.”

“You are not Gandran,” said the lead creature. It looked like it was almost a struggle to speak his words, his mouth barely opening.

“No,” said the Doctor. He stepped forward a little. The creatures raised their spears and the Doctor stopped. “I’m a Time Lord.”

“We have not heard of your kind,” said the lead creature.

“Makes a change,” smiled the Doctor. “What’s your name?”

“Why did you kill Obi?” The creatures snarled.

The Doctor looked down at the creature. “He’s not dead.”

“No, absolutely not,” said Kitz, stepping forward.

“Keep away, Superior,” growled the leader.

“Superior?” said Lilly.

“You come from above,” said the leader. “You come from up there.”

Kitz looked up to the trees and then back down. “I do, but I am nothing but a mere soldier.”

“You are all Superiors.”

“They call you Surfacers,” said the Doctor. “Presumably because you live on the surface of the planet rather than above. That much is obvious, but why do you call them Superiors.”

“That does not matter,” growled the leader.

“We must kill them,” said the creature with the enlarged foot.

“There’s no need for that,” said the Doctor, stepping back and shielding Lilly and Kitz.

“Doctor, I think we need to run,” said Lilly.

“No,” said the Doctor.

“You must heed your friends words,” said the leader. “We like a good fight.”

The leader raised his spear.

“No!” came a desperate cry from the ground.

All eyes looked down to where the voice was coming from - the injured Obi. He had his eyes open and his arm raised up.

“They are from the Superiors,” said the leader.

“Please, Josk, they helped me. They are not like the others,” gasped Obi.

The leader, Josk, crouched down beside Obi and held his withered hand. “All Superiors are the same.”

“The small one isn’t,” said Obi. “He is kind. He has helped me.”

Josk looked to Kitz and then to the Doctor and Lilly.

“It’s true,” said Lilly. “We don’t really know what’s going on here.”

“But we’re trying to get to the bottom of it,” said the Doctor. “You have to believe me that we are not here to hurt you.”

Josk looked to each of them, then to Obi and then lowered his spear.

The Doctor breathed a sigh of relief. “You need to tell me all that happens down here.”




Tees closed in on Holly as she backed away from the still body of Richard. She reached for a torch on the far wall and grabbed it, holding it up in front of herself in defence.

“Do you not want the Age to take you?”

“With your mystery vodka juice? No thanks,” said Holly.

“But the Surfacers are getting hungry.”

“So that’s what you do, is it?” Holly backed away towards the door. She didn’t want to leave Richard’s body there, but there was not much she could do on her own.

“Explain,” said Tees.

“That glove protects you from that poison. You touch the skin of a living creature and it kills them. Then you take their bodies away and give them to the Surfacers.”

“We have to keep them down on the ground somehow,” said Tees. He had grabbed a jar of the poison and was getting ready to throw it at Holly.

“It’s sick,” said Holly. “Why would you even do it?”

“The body withers and dies,” said Tees. “The Surfacers are not like us. They are mutations. They must be kept below.”

“But why throw your own people to them?”

Tees threw the jar at Holly. She dodged it and it smashed on the wall to her right. “There is no food below. We pick the fruit from the trees and eat the meat of the birds, but down below there is nothing.”

“So they come up for food and you fight them off?”

“We decided that the old people were too weak for our tribes, so we devised the idea of the Age. Our people were convinced that at a certain age they would pass on. But instead we threw their bodies to the Surfacers to keep them down below.”

“And if the families ask about their loved ones bodies?”

“They are given ashes. Ashes of burnt wood and trees.”

“You’re insane,” said Holly. “Throwing your own people to your enemies. Where do they even come from?”

Tees lunged at Holly again, but she was quick and dodged through the door to the platform outside. Tees emerged from the doorway into the moonlight. Now he had a dagger and was pointing it towards her.

“You should not have come to our planet.”

“It looks like this planet needed us here.”

Tees raised the dagger and launched himself at Holly. She fell back against the wooden railings and closed her eyes, waiting for the blow. Instead she heard a smash and a cry come from Tees. Without opening her eyes she rolled herself out from underneath him. When she was sure she was clear she opened her eyes.

Standing over Tees prone body was Richard holding a smashed jar of the poison. Holly stared at him in disbelief. “But…the poison. You were…”

“Not dead,” said Richard. He rubbed at his chest. “It didn’t kill me.”

“Then what happened?”

“It felt like my body went numb. It’s some sort of paralysing liquid. Obviously I’m a Human being so the effects didn’t last as long on me.”

“So Tees and his people aren’t killing them at all,” she said, getting to her feet and looking down at the unconscious leader. “They’re making it look like they’re dead…” A look of horror was on Holly’s face. “And they’re throwing them to the Surfacers whilst they’re still alive!”

To be continued...