Prologue
Holly leant back on the sofa and stared up at the time rotor as it gently rose and fell signalling the TARDIS was in flight. She looked across the console where the Doctor was busy examining their flight plan and making the occasional adjustment. She was missing Lilly, but now they were heading back to Gallifrey to see her she wasn’t exactly sure how she was going to react.
Lilly had left on her own accord, but with a promise that they’d be reunited one day. She was worried that Lilly would be angry if they returned before she was ready. Then again Lilly had spent most of their early days being angry, so there wouldn’t be much change there.
“Won’t be long now,” said the Doctor, looking up from the console.
“I hope Emily and Eve are going to be okay,” said Holly, thinking back to the mother and daughter they’d just left in the 1980’s.
“They’ll be fine,” said the Doctor. “They said they were heading into town to visit an estate agent.”
“Good,” said Holly. “That house was always going to be full of bad memories.”
“Well, we put it right; or rather Eve put it right. All is sorted now.” He smiled at her. “Time to sort you out.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to wait until first light?” asked Alice as she helped Lilly back into her strange suit.
Lilly shook her head. “I’m fed up of waiting. Plus the longer I’m gone the more chance there is that my father will know I’ve left.”
“But this is time travel we’re talking about,” said Alice, frowning.
“Yeah, well, it all gets a little bit screwed up sometimes. I only borrowed this suit. I fully intend to take it back. That’s if it stays intact.”
“Say hi to him when you see him, won’t you?” said Alice. Although she was happy to be making a future for herself, her future husband and her baby, she still missed the Doctor.
“Will do and thanks for the tea. I needed it.” She pulled on the gloves and then finally the helmet. She looked down at the device on her wrist and smiled. It was beeping.
“Got a fix?”
“Yep. He’s in the vortex. Oh, Jesus, the silly idiot’s heading for Gallifrey! I’ve gotta stop him before he ruins everything.”
“Take care, won’t you?”
“I always do,” said Lilly, as Alice opened the door and let her out into the garden. “Wish me luck!”
“Good luck.”
Lilly pressed a button on her wrist device. The suit started to glow orange. Lilly turned around and ran at the garden fence. Then, when the power in the suit had reached the highest point she jumped in the air. There was a flash and she disappeared leaving nothing but the faint smell of burning.
Alice shook her head as she shut the door. “It’s never a dull moment with the Doctor.”
“Not long now,” said the Doctor, as he smiled, flicking a switch and then taking a seat in an armchair he had dragged through the corridors to sit beside the console.
“Don’t get too comfortable,” said Holly, laughing at him as he opened a crumpled old newspaper. “Anything interesting?”
“Not really. December 1986. The Snow Cap Base had some trouble.” He looked closer at a picture of a grainy black and white image of a figure in a particularly strong blizzard. “Goodness me, I think I was there.”
The TARDIS shook ever so slightly.
“What was that?” said Holly.
“Turbulence I suspect,” he said, glancing up from his paper.
“Turbulence? Last time we had turbulence we were hitting those time speed bumps and landed in Edwardian times.”
“This is nothing to worry about,” said the Doctor, disappearing behind his paper and giving a dismissive wave of his hand.
“As long as you’re sure,” said Holly. He ignored her. She picked up a green jelly baby from a sweet tub beside the sofa. “Hey!” she said, throwing it as his paper.
The jelly baby hit the paper with a papery thud and fell to the ground. “Not the green ones, Miss Dangerfield,” he said, looking at the jelly baby on the floor. “They’re my favourite.”
“Oh, there’s plenty more where-”
Holly didn’t get to finish her sentence. The TARDIS lurched forward and threw her from the sofa. The console room momentarily went dark and then emergency lights flicked on as the TARDIS rattled and hummed.
“What the hell...?” she said.
The Doctor was already at the console, darting around and checking readings. “Something hit us.”
“In the vortex? Was it another time machine?”
“I don’t know,” he said, running his hand through his hair in frustration. “Some kind of object. It must have been travelling at some rate to knock us off course.”
“Knock us off course?” said Holly, disappointed.
“It’s shunted us elsewhere. Actually through the walls of the vortex.”
“The vortex has walls?” said Holly. “I thought it was just a big cloud of colours.”
“Yes,” said the Doctor, checking some more readings. “If you want to be literal we’ve just been pushed through the walls. I’m surprised we’re not as damaged as we could have been.”
“So we need to put down for repairs?”
“I’m afraid so, at least just to check we’re okay. But unfortunately I don’t know exactly where we are.”
“I don’t understand,” said Holly, scratching the back of her head.
“Neither do I,” said the Doctor, “but we’ll soon have the answers we need.” The time rotor was slowing down. “We’re about to land.”
In the vortex the unconscious Lilly floated aimlessly through the time tunnel in her specially designed suit. No life. No movement.
To be continued....
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