Chapter 8 (Down)
The Doctor, Holly, Flick and Mark had made good process since leaving the area they had found the node. The Doctor wasn’t letting on much about where they were, but Holly was sure he knew more than he was letting on. He had asked Flick to guide them to the clearing she had been found in as a child, but instead he was heading up the group – almost as if he already knew.
Holly knew a lot about the Doctor now, but she wondered if she would ever know everything about him. There was more and more under each skin that you peeled away.
“So you investigate strange happenings then?” said Mark, as they ducked under some low hanging branching.
“I guess you could say that,” said Holly. “It’s a little more involved than that though.”
“So you’re like Mulder and Scully or something?” suggested Flick.
Holly smiled back at her. “Something like that. Except we don’t just stick to Earth.”
“I beg your pardon?” frowned Mark.
“Holly...” warned the Doctor from ahead.
“Come on, Doctor, they need to know the truth.”
He sighed and Holly saw that as his reluctant signal for her to continue.
“We’re not from this time. We’re time travellers.”
“Don’t be daft!” laughed Mark.
“Let her finish,” said Flick.
“The Doctor is from another planet. We travel from place to place, saving planets and saving different time periods.”
“This is crazy talk,” said Mark.
“Mark,” said Flick, stopping him and putting a hand on his chest. “I’ve already told you what happened to me twelve years ago. You know there are unexplained things out there. Why is this so hard to believe?”
Mark looked a little derailed by her. Holly smiled at him. She could tell he had feelings for her. They both had feelings for each other.
“Look,” said the Doctor, turning back. “Can we just take this as the truth and move on. We need to find the clearing so we can investigate further.”
“It sounds cool to me,” said Flick.
“You’re so ready to believe?” said Holly as they began to move again.
“Why not? I’ve always known there was something else out there.” She looked up at the twinkling stars above. “It’s stupid to think that we’re the only life forms out here.”
“This is madness,” said Mark. Flick turned and gave him a stern look again. “But I’m more than happy to believe it if you do Flick,” he added with a smile.
Holly smiled and laughed to herself. “What are we looking for then, Doctor?”
The Doctor didn’t reply.
“Look, I know there’s more to it that you’re not telling me,” said Holly.
The Doctor sighed. “All in good time. We need to find the entrance first.”
“Entrance?” said Flick. “Entrance to what?”
“Entrance to the spaceship.”
The Doctor grinned. Flick looked from Holly to Mark and then back to the Doctor again.
“A spaceship in Grantham,” said Mark. “Madness!”
Flick turned back to him and smiled. “Just try and believe Mark. Please.”
“Anything for you, Felicity,” he smiled.
She was about to turn away from him when there was a sound from below. A clunking of metal and a slight vibration in the ground. Then, in an almost comical fashion, something opened up in the leaves underneath Mark and in a instant he was gone, dragged straight down into the ground.
Flick screamed and dropped to the space where he had been standing. She scrabbled around in the dirt, but found nothing.
“Stand back,” said the Doctor, pushing his way past Holly and shoving Flick to the side as gently as he could.
“Where’s he gone?!” shouted Flick.
The Doctor dug his fingers a little into the ground until they hit something. He clawed away at the dirt and leaves until a metal hatch was uncovered.
“It’s some kind of entrance,” said the Doctor. He ran his sonic screwdriver over the top of it. “Hmmm, there’s no way through. It’s only opened from the inside.”
“An entrance to where? The spaceship?”
“Yes and no. It’s not the entrance we need. It’s some kind of chute.”
“Do you think Mark’s okay?” asked Flick.
“I don’t know,” said the Doctor, getting to his feet. “But I’d hazard a guess that there may be more of these chutes lying around here so be careful where you stand.”
“But Mark –“
“Felicity,” said the Doctor, putting his hands on her shoulders and looking into her eyes, “the only way to get your friend back is to find the main entrance. We find it and we find Mark, yes?”
Flick nodded. It made sense. She just needed to calm herself down.
“We’ll get there,” said Holly, reassuringly.
“I don’t care how we get there,” said the Doctor, moving off again. “Let’s just get there.”
“We’re not far now,” said Flick, pulling herself away from the metal covering. “It’s a few hundred metres this way.”
“I know,” said the Doctor.
It hadn’t taken long to pack up the gear. The remaining Scout leaders were terrified. Joy hadn’t been much help, but Richard had helped Graham and Andy pack her stuff away. Now the remaining leaders were gathered around the fire helping to put it out.
“I want my money back from this disaster,” said Graham, pointing at Tom.
“It was funded by the Scout groups,” said Andy with a frown.
“I know that,” said Graham, “but they’ll be wanting their money back as well.”
“I can’t begin to apologise enough for this,” said Tom. “Something clearly has wandered in that shouldn’t be here.”
“A bloody alien,” said Graham.
“I don’t believe a word of that,” said Tom. “Aliens don’t exist.”
“Well, according to Joy Castle, they do now,” said Andy. He wasn’t one for believing such fanciful stories, but Joy was one of the most level-headed people he knew. If she was spooked then it was genuine.
“More likely wild animals,” said Tom.
“Look, I don’t care what it is,” said Graham. “We just need to get out of here.”
“Agreed,” said Andy. “I can’t wait to be sat with my feet up with a cuppa watching the telly again.”
“What about the rest of the group?” asked Linda. “Flick and Mark?”
“You worry about yourselves,” said Richard. “They’re with my friends. They’ll be safe. I’ll help you lot load up and then I’ll go back into the woods to find them.”
“Thank you,” said Linda, smiling at Richard. “That’s very brave of you.”
“Stupid more like,” said Richard.
They finished covering the fire with dirt and then Tom led the way from the camp to the dirt track. They were walking for about twenty minutes when Tom stopped. He stood looking down the darkened track, a look of confusion on his face.
“Problem, Jesus?” asked Graham.
“Something’s not right,” said Tom. “I know these woods like the back of my hand.”
“What’s not right?” asked Andy, hefting up his pack a little more. “Have you gotten us lost?”
“No,” said Tom. “This is the correct route. It’s a simple, straight-forward route.”
“Then what’s happened?”
Tom shone his torch ahead. The group gasped at what the light fell on. It was their darkened camp, the wooden structure partially collapsed and the dead fire smouldering out the last of its life.
“You took us in a circle,” said Graham, angrily.
“No,” said Tom. “Did any of you see us turn off the path?”
The rest of the group mumbled their agreements that they didn’t turn.
“It’s them,” said Richard, looking back towards the camp. “They’re doing this to us.”
“Doing what?” asked Linda.
“I don’t know,” said Richard, sitting down on the grass beside the pathway. “It’s some kind of, I don’t know, spatial disruption.”
“Oh, bloody hell,” said Graham, laughing.
“What else would you suggest?” said Richard. “I haven’t been doing this long, but I know when something’s not right. If we try and leave again we’ll just keep going around in circles.”
“It’s the aliens,” said Joy, who had calmed considerably, but was still looking fearful.
“Aliens. Spatial disruptions,” laughed Tom.
“Then what do you suggest we do?” said Andy, to Richard.
“There’s not much we can do,” said Richard. “We’re going to have to wait here until the Doctor can fix this.”
Nicole had calmed down and found she was now able to move her legs. She had slid herself along to sit beside Arthur, whose eyes were transfixed on the small, red alien standing in front of them. He had left the room when Nicole had screamed, but had returned with a tray of water and bread, which they had tucked into instantly. Neither of them had had anything to drink since that morning.
“Good?” asked the alien.
“Not bad,” said Arthur. “So, you say we’re prisoners?”
“Possibly,” said the alien. “My name is Takka. I am in command of this ship.”
“Ship? What, like a sailing ship or something?” said Nicole.
Takka smiled and shook his head, walking into the room. “A ship to sail the stars.”
“What? I don’t believe that,” said Nicole.
“Mrs Sibley,” said Arthur, “he’s a three-foot red man. He’s an alien. I don’t think we can doubt this is a starship.”
“Your companion speaks sense,” said Takka.
“Okay,” said Nicole, trying to process this latest bit of weird information, “so where’s the rest of your crew.”
Takka smiled again. “I don’t have a crew. I’m on my own.” He crossed over to them and sat down cross-legged. Nicole shifted away again. “As I said, my name is Commander Takka. I am part of the Volatine police force.”
“Aliens have police forces?” queried Takka.
Takka scratched his head. “I can see you’ve never met another species before.”
“May I interject?” said Arthur.
“Of course,” said Takka, nodding for Arthur to continue.
“My race – the Humans, that is – are very much isolated out here. We don’t really have contact with alien races. There have been rumours and murmurs, but we have yet to make a real first contact.”
“Then I shall endeavour to keep my mission here as secret as I can,” said Takka. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
“But you said we were prisoners,” said Nicole.
“All are prisoners until they can be identified. Once I realised you were not a threat, you became innocents.”
“Glad to know,” said Nicole, looking at Arthur, “but what about that ball of light?”
“My transmat,” said Takka. “Yes, I do apologise for my abruptness, but I had to make sure you weren’t the enemy.”
“And the enemy would be...?” said Arthur.
“I came to your galaxy over 500 Earth years ago.”
“What? Five centuries ago?!” said Nicole.
Takka nodded. “I was tasked with finding a crew of escaped criminals. After a few months of investigations I tracked their hyper drive trail to your planet, but they were nowhere to be seen. They had gone dark, their ship – the Corbix – hidden somewhere. So I put myself into hibernation and cloaked my scout ship knowing that eventually they would reveal themselves.”
“But it’s been 500 years,” said Nicole again. “That’s some hours you’ve clocked up there!”
“It is part of my job. I was born to do this.”
“How do you even know your race exists after all these years?” asked Arthur.
“We know the risks of doing our jobs, that is why, at birth, we are picked for certain jobs depending on our family backgrounds. My family were all officers in the force and so I was taken away and brought up within the forces academy.”
“So you never knew your parents?” asked Nicole, instinctively rubbing her belly again.
“No,” said Takka. “It is the way it is.”
“So are you saying then that you’ve now detected this starship? The Corbix did you say?”
“That is correct,” said Takka. “And it is underneath the wooded area you were discovered beside.”
“A starship full of criminals,” said Arthur, a look of concern on his face.
“Exactly where Andy and the others are staying,” said Nicole, looking worried.
“Indeed,” said Takka, “and we must remove your friends from harm.”
“Why? What are you planning on doing?” asked Nicole.
“They are criminals. I’ve been pursuing them for many years. I’m going to photon-bomb them.”
To be continued...
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