Chapter 2 (Zero Point)
“Okay, you need to tell me exactly who you are,” said India, moving a little closer to Holly. “Did the Master send you or didn’t he?”
“No,” said Holly, looking frustrated as she concentrated on the readings on the console. She wasn’t sure how long it was going to take, but she knew that she was up against it. “Far from it in fact.”
“What’s that meant to mean?” asked India.
Holly turned to look at her. “How about you tell me how you met the Doctor.”
“I asked the question first.”
“Please,” said Holly, “tell me how you met the Doctor and I’ll tell you everything. I promise you I’m not a threat at all.”
India sighed and then relaxed a little. “I met him in a town called Huxley the other year.”
“You’re American though.”
“I’m an exchange student,” said India. “I was cutting home through the cemetery when the dead started to crawl out of the graves. The Doctor and Lilly were there and rescued me.”
“Interesting,” said Holly, thinking about to her time meeting the Doctor and Lilly. She had seen them in the cemetery at the time of her granddads funeral and then later met the Doctor one night when she and Roxy were out and about. “So the dead still came back to life?”
“What do you mean by ‘still’?” asked India. “They were all over the place. It took the Doctor a few days to work out how to keep them under control.”
“With Richard Hicks?”
“Yeah,” said India. “How do you know this?”
“I promise I’ll explain. What happened next?”
“I was injured by one of the dead people and when I woke up I was recovering in the TARDIS.”
“And then?”
“Really? Come on, give me a little bit of info here. This is all too one-sided for my liking.”
“This is important, India.”
India sighed. “We then went to this jungle planet and fought these cybernetic aliens called Cybermen. Then myself and Lilly got locked up in prison. Shall I go on?”
“No,” said Holly, looking sad, “it’s fine.”
“Now how about you give me a little bit of info?”
Holly nodded. “Fair enough.” She leant against the console and looked at India. “You may find this hard to believe?”
“Try me.”
“Everything that you’ve experienced with the Doctor and Lilly I experienced, albeit in a slightly altered way. It looks like you’ve all come off worse.”
“What? That doesn’t even make sense.”
“I met the Doctor in Huxley a few weeks after my grandfather’s funeral. We fought the dead, the Cybermen, ended up in prison, lived on an estate in the 90’s. The full works. Everything you’ve experienced.”
“How is that possible?”
“Because the Master has done something to the timelines. My experiences were the original experiences, and then the Master went back and changed something meaning that I never met the Doctor allowing you to be free to meet him instead.”
“What? That’s some crazy crap there!” said India.
Holly was about to continue when the escape pod began its landing sequence. Holly turned to the console and monitored the landing. When the pod fully materialised with a loud thump she checked the readings.
“Where are we?” asked India.
“Something called the Zero Point. Has the Doctor ever mentioned it to you?”
“No,” said India. “Should he have?”
“I don’t really know,” said Holly, “but apparently it’s something that can help put this right.”
“And what happens to me when you put things right? That’s assuming I believe the crap you’ve just told me.”
“Honesty? I don’t know,” she flicked on the scanner, “but your world seems pretty nightmarish from what I’ve seen. The Master, yeah?”
India looked away from Holly. She didn’t want to talk about it.
Regardless the two girls were distracted by the image on the scanner. Instead of showing where they were it instead showed static and a flickering flashes of white.
“Could it be damaged?” asked India.
“I don’t know,” said Holly. She checked the readings on the console. “If it is then it’s the entire escape pod. We’re not getting any readings whatsoever.”
“Maybe we should just turn back.”
“I can’t,” said Holly. She looked back at the scanner. “We need to take a look out there.”
The escape pod had landed in an extremely long, but narrow black corridor. The walls were comprised of polished, black, marble bricks. The ceiling had spotlights shining down at regular intervals and the floor was made up of marble flagstones.
Holly and India exited the escape pod and turned back to look at it. The escape pod had the same properties as the TARDIS and should have blended in to its surroundings, but this hadn’t happened. Instead of looking like the rock it had done when it left, it instead resembled the solid metal box of its base form.
“Let’s hope the escape pod isn’t damaged,” said India, “I don’t fancy getting stuck here.”
Holly touched the walls. “It’s cold.”
“And what’s that sound?” asked India.
Holly listened carefully. There seemed to be some kind of low-pitched rumbling coming from down the corridor.
“Which way do we go?” asked India.
The corridor stretched off both ways. Holly scratched her head. “Let’s just head forward, shall we?”
India nodded as the two of them made their way slowly down the corridor. The further they got the faster they began to walk, becoming a little more comfortable with their surroundings.
“So the Master hasn’t caused you any problems in your timeline?” asked India.
“So you’re starting to believe me?” asked Holly, with a smile.
“Look I’m not stupid. I’ve travelled with the Doctor and Lilly for months now. I know what time travel can do. I just never expected...this.”
“It must be hard to accept.”
“What, that my entire timeline from the moment I met the Doctor was any created because you didn’t meet him? Yeah, that’s pretty hard to accept.”
Holly raised her eyebrows. She seemed like a nice enough person, but she had to excuse India’s frustrations. This was a difficult situation for her to get her head around. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, we’ve had problems with the Master. Hence why I’m here now.” Holly frowned. “Can I ask you a question about your Lilly?”
“Go ahead; it doesn’t look like this corridor is going anywhere.”
“She seemed very lost back there.”
“And she isn’t in your timeline?”
Holly considered how much she should actually tell India. “When I met Lilly she was lost. The more we travelled the more I got to know her and the closer we got. The closer she got the better she got until she was ready to reunite with her father and give him a chance. She temporarily left us and we were on our way to visit her when the Master did this.”
India shook her head. “Sounds like you had a better time than we did. I tried to be friends with her, but she wasn’t interested. She always went on about Caleb and just got worse as time went on. The Doctor kept trying to help her, but it wasn’t working. She killed people as well. But he kept giving her more and more chances.”
“Why did you stay with them then?”
“Because I thought I could save the Doctor from her.” India shook her head again. “Lilly wanted to let go and go to the Master. The Doctor wasn’t willing to let go. The Master just kept coming time and time again.”
“So it was all me,” said Holly, trying to wrap her head around it.
“You must have had a big impact on her life for her to change that much.”
Holly didn’t know how to feel. She always wanted Lilly to find her own path. She knew she’d gone some way towards helping her to heal, but she hoped that she had also done it on her own steam. She felt quite concerned that the weight of Lilly was hanging on her shoulders.
“Wait!” said India, holding out her arm to stop Holly.
Holly nearly stumbled over but managed to stop herself. She looked down. A set of polished, black stairs led down through a gap in the floor. She had been so caught up in her thoughts she hadn’t even spotted them.
“Do we go down? asked India.
“We’d have to take a run and jump to get over to the other side of the corridor,” said Holly. “So I guess we have no choice.”
There was a flash from back the way they had come. Both girls turned to face the sound. Slowly, one-by-one the lights were starting to flash out. The rumbling wind was getting louder and louder.
“Go!” said Holly.
The wind instead started turning into a screech, echoing all around them.
“RUN!” shouted Holly.
The two girls ran as fast they possibly could down the stair case. Holly looked up as the last light above them shattered. The screaming was getting louder and louder. She turned her focus back to India and the stairs as they ran as fast as they could. She daren’t look back, but she had the feeling that something was right behind her. She could feel something gently breathing on the back of her neck.
“There’s a door!” said India.
Holly could just make out a wooden door at the bottom of the staircase. She prayed that it was unlocked as India ran head-on into the door.
Holly felt the tips of finger nails grasp at her neck as India barrelled through the door, streaming the staircase in bright light from the other side. Holly closed her eyes and followed her through. She tripped over something and fell forehead, hearing the door being slammed shut behind her, blocking out the screams from whatever was following them.
Holly opened her eyes to see India on her hands and knees, trying to catch her breath.
“What the hell was that?” asked India.
“Did you get a look at it?” asked Holly, looking around her. They were in a stone anti-chamber with candles burning on the walls.
“No, I daren’t turn and look at it,” said India.
Another door at the end of the corridor opened and Holly and India tensed. From the other side came a bald-headed man with a short-trimmed grey beard. He wore a set of striped blue and white pyjamas and wore a red dressing gown over them. He was holding a lantern and smiled when he saw the girls.
“Who are you?” asked India.
“Ah, hello,” he said. He was British and had a kind smile. “Welcome to the Zero Point.” He helped the girls to their feet and shook both of their hands. “You must be Holly Dangerfield and you must be India Macleod, yes?”
“That’s right,” said Holly. “But who are you?”
“I’m the Keeper of Zero Point.”
“Don’t you have a name?” asked India.
He tapped his nose and smiled. “You can just call me the Keeper.”
To be continued...
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