Donna woke with a start. Like most mornings, it only took her a second to realize this was a bad call. Waking up was just about the worst thing you could do, in her experience, and why she did it every single day was beyond her. This day, however, was already proving worse than most.
She went to sit up, and regretted it. Pain shot through her head, and she squeezed her eyes shut again with a groan, falling back onto her pillow. Only, she wasn't lying on a pillow; she was lying on something very hard and very cold, and it hurt very much to fall back onto it. Was she on the floor?
Oh, for God's sake, if you've been out drinking again… she threatened herself, though it was rather half-hearted. She couldn't muster up an actual punishment—she was already falling back asleep. And then she wasn't, because she became aware that she wasn't lying on carpet or hardwood. It was stone. That wasn't right.
Wincing, she rolled over on her back and swept her hair out of her eyes. She'd been hoping for her own ceiling in her own bedroom. Instead, she found herself staring up at complete darkness. Forgetting her headache and drowsiness, she scrambled to a kneeling position and looked around. She was in a room, less than four by four meters, with walls and floor made of rough stone bricks. The ceiling was not the void of space, as she had initially feared; it was simply too high to see in the dim glow of a single torch mounted on one wall. There were no windows, no door, and no lights. The room was completely barren.
A million questions swirled through her mind, but she found she couldn't grasp any of them. She searched her memory for any clue as to what had happened, and came up with nothing. Her brain felt like it was stuffed with cotton; she couldn't think properly, and any focus eluded her. She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts, but regretted it as soon as the pain came back in full strength.
No, she had no clue where she was. She could only assume she'd gotten herself into deep trouble. Panic rose in her chest, her heartbeat starting to pick up. It was far too tight in there for her liking; she'd never been particularly claustrophobic, but now she wasn't quite convinced the walls weren't moving in on her.
Alright, just stay calm, she told herself, focusing on taking deep breaths. Glad for the cool breeze wafting from above, she pulled herself to her feet with a wince and began wandering the limited space available, inspecting her surroundings. She felt oddly heavy, as if the gravity were stronger than it should have been, though she supposed it could be a side effect of whatever sedative had been used to get her into this strange pit. Was she on Earth? What had the Doctor gotten them into this time?
The Doctor! Where'd he gone?
"Well, that's just typical," Donna muttered.
Then her eyes fell upon a roll of what seemed to be parchment, hanging from the wall sconce. Curiosity dulled the fear for a brief moment and she held onto the feeling—the Doctor wouldn't let fear get in the way of investigating, she told herself. Working the scroll out of the tie that held it to the bracket, she unravelled it slowly, careful not to tear the paper.
WE THANK YOU FOR YOUR SACRIFICE, it read, in handwritten black ink.
A chill ran down her spine.
"Well, what the bloody hell does that mean?" she exclaimed out loud, suddenly uncomfortable with the silence. "'Sacrifice', what sacrifice?"
At that moment, a deep groan shook the floor and walls. Rusty mechanics squealed as they shifted, somewhere far, far below. The stone began to rumble and shake; Donna looked around wildly for some sort of escape. It had suddenly occurred to her that she was trapped in this tiny pit, and would probably never be found if it collapsed. She flung herself at the wall, feeling around for a hidden doorway or a loose brick, but then, inexplicably, the floor was rising beneath her feet.
It gave a sharp jolt, throwing her to the ground. She could do nothing but hold on as she was carried up on the stone platform, vibrating as it ground deafeningly against the walls. The sconce was knocked clean out of the wall as the floor rose, sending the torch flying across the room. Donna lunged for it but it hit the ground and went out, plunging the shaking room into complete darkness. Heart pounding, head spinning, she stayed where she was, curled up on the floor, and covered her face with her arms against the constant rain of dust and small rocks. She lay there, trying not to panic, until at last the room stopped moving with a loud clunk. It took her a moment of blinking into the darkness, after everything had gone still and quiet, to realize that she had been deposited into a new room.
A keening wail split the silence. She scrambled to her feet, hand pressed to her mouth to stifle a gasp, and strained to adjust to the low light. There was something else there with her—she could hear scuffling and voices, echoing like she was in a vast chamber. Turning on the spot, trying to locate the source of the noise, she forced herself to slow her breathing. She didn't want whatever was there to hear her.
The cry sounded again, from directly ahead of her. Nearly tripping over her own feet, Donna backed away—and screamed as she walked right into another person.
"Donna! Donna, it's me," said the figure in the darkness.
"Doctor!" She threw her arms around him, shaking from the adrenaline and almost giddy with relief. The presence of the alien man made the situation feel a whole lot more familiar.
"Easy," he hushed, hugging her back. He dropped his voice so only she could hear. "We're not alone in here."
Her eyes were just starting to adjust; there was one torch set in the floor near them, casting a dim orange glow over the space in which she'd ended up. There wasn't much to see, as there weren't any other sources of light, but the echo of their voices revealed that the little pit had opened up into a massive cavern. The ceiling was still too high for the firelight to reach. Two other beings stood where their own platforms had placed them, little more than dark silhouettes.
Before she could properly process what she was seeing, the Doctor was springing into action. Something had caught his eye—a pile of feathers curled up on the stone floor. As she eyed it, trying to figure out what it was, another wail escaped from somewhere within the bundle.
The creature on the floor had its arms—wings?—wrapped around its head. It was shivering, whimpering quietly as the Doctor crouched down next to it.
He placed a very light hand on its shaking body. "Hello there," he said gently. "How about you just sit up a bit? Nothing's gonna hurt you."
The creature shuddered, and slowly lowered one appendage away from its face. It blinked up at them with one wide, doe-like eye. Deciding to trust the Doctor, it pushed itself upright with great hesitation, revealing a sharp, angular face fringed with wispy feathers and a beak in place of a mouth.
"What is that?" Donna asked the Doctor, not quite discreetly enough for the alien to miss.
"Donna," he chided, settling into a cross-legged position. "Why don't we start with names?" he told it. "I'm the Doctor, and this is Donna."
The bird-creature took a few deep, whistling breaths before it could compose itself enough to speak. "My name is Hssii'shi," it replied at last, beak clicking with each syllable, "of the colonies on Cal'shi."
The Doctor hummed in understanding. "He's a Calidriss," he explained to Donna. Then, to Hssii'shi, "No wonder you don't like this place."
Hssii'shi nodded vigorously. "It smells of underground. Oh…" he moaned, looking timorously around the cavern. "Of all places, why here?"
He seemed like he wanted to start again with the wailing, but the Doctor kept him talking.
"Tell me, Hssii'shi, do you know how you got here?"
He thought for a moment, ruffling his feathers, and shook his head.
"Donna?"
"I got nothing," she said.
The Doctor stood up. "Anyone? Can either of you remember how you got here?"
The two others standing near them gave murmurs confirming that they did not.
"Alright. Then I guess it's time for introductions." He sat down next to Donna and patted the floor, indicating that the others should do the same.
Hesitantly, one more figure sat down—the other crossed its arms and remained standing, removed from the group. It was hard to make out its features, but Donna thought she caught a glimpse of red skin and horns sticking out of a hairless head. Now that the other had taken a seat, she could see that they were all clearly from different worlds, though none were of a species she knew.
The Doctor prodded her shoulder, indicating that she should start them off.
"Oh. Well, I'm Donna. I'm human." She looked to the Doctor, wondering whether that was enough information.
"Wonderful," the Doctor said. He surveyed the group, with a glance at the one who'd refused to sit. "My name is the Doctor and I'm a Time Lord. Your go," he urged the avian to his left.
He gave a start. "Right. Right, my name is Hssii'shi, and I'm from Cal'shi."
"I've been to Cal'shi," remarked an alien resembling an incredibly gaunt, pale man, wearing what looked to Donna like a toga. He spoke slowly, his voice breathy and low, but she found she could hear him quite clearly. "A lovely planet. I am Narriss Athar of Ventos."
"Making friends already," said the Doctor cheerily, though his eyes seemed to narrow imperceptibly. Maybe it was the light, Donna figured, but she made a mental note to ask him about this… Narriss, once they were alone.
He nodded to the red, horned alien who had remained standing.
"Dakro," she grumbled, foregoing a real introduction. She was dressed much more practically than Narriss—or Donna, who was getting a bit cold, now she thought about it—with a well-worn jacket, pants with more pockets than could really be justified, and muddied black boots. Her golden eyes flashed at the seated group, and Donna could just see the short spikes lining her brow and circling her head. "My species and planet of origin are my own business."
"Aw, c'mon," the Doctor needled. When he got nothing but a glare, he shrugged. "So! Now that we all know each other, does anyone know where we are?"
Donna shot him a surprised look. "I thought you would know."
He wrinkled his nose. "'Fraid not, this time. I can't be expected to know every old stone building I wind up in, can I? But I will tell you this," he added, "wherever we are isn't nearly as old as it looks, and it isn't Earth. Someone's collected us all and brought us here."
"How did we get here, then?" Hssii'shi asked, feathered tail twitching across the ground.
"I would assume we were sedated and put in those rooms against our will," Narriss said. "If I am remembering correctly, I was just departing from the city spaceport. Then, everything goes blank."
The Doctor perked up. "Yes, good. Donna, what were you doing? What's the last thing you can remember?"
Donna thought for a minute, frowning in concentration. Any attempt to dig up memories brought fresh pain to her head. "I remember doing errands. On Earth," she added, in case the Doctor assumed otherwise. "Then… you showed up, I think. And that's it."
He nodded, staring off into space. "That's about all I've got as well. Hssii'shi?"
The little bird clicked his beak a few times. "I remember being on the planet Lorr. I… I went on a tour, to see the jungles. Oh—then I boarded a flight going back to the Core…" He gave a few rapid shakes of his head, as if trying to dislodge another memory. "That's all."
Looking rather pained to be doing so, Dakro spoke up.
"I remember something."
The Doctor, looking pleasantly surprised, tilted his head to show he was listening.
"I have two livers," she began. "I guess the sedative didn't work so well on me. I remember being on my ship—we were hauling supplies and ammo to the Essak Nebula."
"Essak," he interrupted thoughtfully. "Is there a war on?"
Dakro gave a sharp laugh. "Where've you been?"
"Oh, I'm really not from around here." He leaned over and whispered to Donna, "This'll be about the twenty-sixth century."
Raising one horn-studded brow, she continued. "Next thing I know, the ship's being fired on. We were right near the nebula when we were boarded by a vessel about five times our size; they jammed our communications and took out our engines, then dragged us into a docking bay." She paused for a moment. "I don't know what happened to the others, but I guess that's when they got me."
"Well, that narrows it down, then," the Doctor mused. "Lorr and Ventos are both near the nebula; I'm betting this planet is too."
Donna was beginning to feel overwhelmed. She was the only one in the group who didn't know a thing about the Essak Nebula, or whatever war was going on right then, or where in the universe they could possibly be. It was only the Doctor's presence that let her hang on to some semblance of calm; she reminded herself that he would surely get them out, wherever they were, and that he would explain everything he knew when he got the chance. She made an effort to unclench her fists, and she realized that she was still holding the note she had found in her room.
"Wait!" She unfurled the now-crumpled paper. "Did anyone else find one of these?"
Narriss nodded slowly, and produced an identical scroll from somewhere within his robes. The Doctor pulled his out of a pocket, and Dakro did the same; Hssii'shi, who had not explored his cell at all, didn't have one.
"'We thank you for your sacrifice,'" Donna read. "What does it mean?"
"Well, I would guess that someone has fallen under the impression that we are sacrifices," Narriss hummed.
"But to what?" the Doctor murmured, examining the parchment closely.
Something moved in the far periphery of Donna's vision. She whipped around, heart in her throat, to see that torches at the far end of the hall were lighting themselves. Like lightbulbs, they flickered on all the way down the hall, allowing them to see properly. Her mouth fell open.
Hundreds of torches had been placed up and down the stone pillars, all through the hall. In the light, the space dwarfed the six beings. The ceiling was arched, at its highest point no less than twenty meters above the ground. Massive, thick veins of glittering gold were embedded in the stone, streaking lengthwise across the ceiling like molten metal. The pillars lined both sides of the hall, dark and smooth, marbled in the same gold as the ceiling. Tucked behind them were two stories of hallways with a number of archways leading out into whatever lay beyond this room, reminding Donna of images she'd seen of the Palace of Versailles. Where the little square holes in the floor had been, the stone now blended in seamlessly. At the other end, as the final torches were lit, she saw a massive pair of ornate wooden doors.
The Doctor stood, having stowed his scroll inside his jacket, and pulled Donna up with him. "Well, isn't that interesting," he murmured.
The rest of the group was staring upwards, open-mouthed—or rather, open-beaked, in Hssii'shi's case. Then Donna took her gaze away from the grand hall and noticed another person, crumpled on the ground a ways away from the bunch.
"Doctor!" She rushed over to the sixth detainee. This being looked sort of like a human woman, with bluish skin and brown markings—tattoos?—all over her face. Her navy hair was tied back messily, and she wore something resembling medical scrubs and a long black lab coat. She lay very still. Donna felt a sinking sensation come over her.
The Doctor knelt next to her and took her pulse. For a long moment, he didn't move. Then he shook his head. "She's dead," he muttered.
"What happened to her?" Narriss had glided up behind them and now peered over Donna's shoulder.
"Bad reaction to the sedative, I'd guess. Blue skin indicates her species' blood is copper-based, they do tend to be rather sensitive to foreign chemicals." Sighing deeply, he stood and straightened his dirt-smudged jacket.
"Can't we do something?" Donna asked. "It's not right to leave her here."
The Doctor glanced around the hall. "I don't think anyone's going to take her back where they found her. I'm sorry, Donna. We can't bring her with us."
He looked genuinely regretful, and just a little bit angry. Donna realized that their captors, whoever they may be, had just crossed a line with their carelessness. She nodded, understanding but still disappointed.
Seeing the body seemed to be the last straw for Dakro, who came striding up to the Doctor with her lip curled in a snarl.
"Where the hell are we?" she demanded.
The Doctor glanced at her, seemingly unruffled, and then back to the hall. "Why do you think I would know?"
"I think you know a lot more than you let on," she said; a borderline accusation.
Now the others were staring at him too, but he took no notice. He was already wandering towards the wooden door at the end of the hall as he took in every detail of the place. With a final glance at the poor young woman, Donna went after him.
She prodded him in the arm, and he paused to look down at her. "You do know something, don't you?" she reckoned. "C'mon, what is it?"
"Know? Nothing. Not a thing." He squinted up, as if looking for something specific. "But I do suspect…" He trailed off, and took off at a brisk walk towards the door.
Donna glanced back at the three aliens, who looked quite confused, gave an apologetic shrug, and jogged after him.
"Suspect what, Doctor?" she prompted him when she caught up.
He grimaced. "Ah… it's just a theory, really," he said in a low, soft voice.
"Well, I'm getting the feeling the spiky one back there isn't going to be happy with that," she remarked, tossing a glance behind her.
"She'll have to wait. But," he added, coming to a stop with his back to the door, "try not to antagonize her. If we're to get out of this, we need them on our side."
Donna sighed, but didn't protest.
Hssii'shi came trotting up to them, but stopped a good ways from the door, unwilling to get too close just yet. He walked not unlike an ostrich, Donna noticed; the joints of his long, bony legs—located where a human's knees would be—bent backwards. He held his feathered arms tucked tightly at his sides, and he had a tendency to lean forward and stick his lengthy neck out as he moved. Narriss, looking less like a ghoul in the light, followed close behind, while Dakro hung back, watching attentively.
As Donna turned her attention back to the Doctor, a piece of paper nailed to the wall to her left caught her eye. "Oi! What's that?"
Pausing in his scan of the great hall, the Doctor looked where she was pointing and raised an eyebrow. Careful not to damage it, he tore it off the nail and read it before presenting it to her, his expression inscrutable.
Trying her best to ignore the creeping feeling of dread, Donna read the note out loud.
"'Labyrinth ahead.'" Then, in smaller text: "'The Beast awaits.'"
An unnerved hush fell over the group. They regarded each other wordlessly for a moment, then Hssii'shi began to pace in circles, warbling in distress. Narriss shivered, despite looking as if he had an internal body temperature of zero. Donna ran her eyes over the words again, making sure she had read them correctly. The Beast. That didn't sound so good.
"Oh, you are a beauty!" came the Doctor's exclamation, utterly at odds with the tense mood.
Donna held back a sigh. "What is it now?"
"Would you look at these!" he exalted, running both hands along the carvings in the door. "Hand-done, if I'm not mistaken."
"Doctor, can we save the connoisseurship for later? I think we have a bigger issue here!"
"No, Donna, look at them," he insisted. He pulled her away from the doors so she could see the carvings in their full height.
It was an incredibly detailed image of an incredibly convoluted circular maze. There was little to show scale, but from the size of the room they were in Donna guessed the whole thing could span kilometres. Along the edges of the carvings were symbols that might have been text—she couldn't tell. They vaguely resembled Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. At the very bottom of the diagram was a rectangular room that she assumed was the one they were standing in; about a dozen different paths branched off of it, including one behind the doors they faced, which seemed to meander towards the centre of the maze. And as she attempted to trace the path, her eyes came upon the very middle of the carving, which featured a face that vaguely resembled that of a wolf, glaring down at them with bared teeth and red gemstones for eyes.
"Well… found the Beast," she remarked, in a weak attempt at humour.
"I didn't sign up to be eaten," Narriss hissed, evidently unamused.
Hssii'shi's wailing only increased in volume.
"Alright, everybody calm down," the Doctor ordered.
Donna snorted. "Oh, that's gonna help."
"Listen!" He stared each of them in the eye to make sure they wouldn't speak again. "Alright. If we're going to make it out of this place, you're going to have to trust me. At least a little," he added, sensing that Dakro took objection to that. "And we will make it out of here."
"I think our best chance of surviving would be you telling us what you know," Dakro said pointedly.
The Doctor looked pained for a second before he sighed and gave in. "Fine. The technology involved in building something like this must be immense; this place has been designed to look much older and much less advanced than it is. Someone would really like us to believe we've been left alone in here with something that wants to eat us. First thing you do when you have a giant maze, purposefully made to look like it's been abandoned for ages, and all the technology you could hope for?" His voice dropped to almost a whisper. "Install a security system."
"So we're being watched," Dakro stated. "Why?"
He shook his head. "I don't know yet, but I imagine it could be to make sure that this Beast ends up getting its sacrifices. And you know what else?" He turned to Donna. "The TARDIS seems to be having trouble translating that writing on the doorway. So either we're inside some sort of… weak psychic shielding, enough to interfere with written language but not strong enough to stop us all being able to talk… or it's been destroyed."
"That sounds bad," Donna guessed.
"Ah, could be worse. At least we aren't on Klom. Have you got your phone?" he asked abruptly.
Frowning, Donna went through all her pockets and found nothing.
"Shame," he said, "I was hoping to get a picture, see if we can use it as a map. No one else has any technology?"
They each checked anywhere that they could have left something useful, and each came up empty-handed. The Doctor patted himself down as well, and a look of distress came over his face. Then, struck by an idea, he lifted up a leg and began hopping around on one foot, trying to untie his shoe. When he managed to work it off, out came his sonic screwdriver.
"Well, at least there's some good news," he said, twiddling it between his fingers before he stowed it inside his jacket and worked his shoe back on. "I must've hid it before they captured us. How clever of me!"
"What is it?" Dakro asked.
"It's my sonic," the Doctor replied joyously, as if that were helpful. He clasped his hands together. "Well. Shall we see where this leads?"
Donna was tempted to say no, but she stood back as the Doctor threw all his weight against the doors. With a great wooden creak they swung slowly outwards, splitting the ornate carvings in two. Even Hssii'shi had gone quiet; they hardly dared to breathe. With a final push, the Doctor flung the doors all the way open. They crashed against the walls, leaving nothing between the group and the labyrinth.
The tunnel that lay ahead of them was a world away from the ornate entrance hall at their backs. Gone were the polished marble and gold accents, replaced by rough stone bricks that made up the walls, floor and ceiling. It was as if the designers had only intended to show off with the entrance, before making it clear they were not honoured guests here. The tunnel wasn't cramped, at around ten meters tall by ten wide, but the torches on the walls were placed far apart, so that the darkness seemed to press in on them. A warm breeze wafted down the tunnel like the breath of a great monster, carrying a hint of decay and the sharp smell of wet stone. This was a real, proper Labyrinth, and something about it unsettled Donna greatly.
"Alright then!" The Doctor turned and spread his arms wide in invitation, like he was presenting something spectacular rather than a dark, damp hole. When no one moved, he folded them across his chest.
"Aw, come on. I know you're curious." He gave that familiar manic grin, eyes gleaming in the dim light. "What's down there? Why are we here? You don't want to find out?"
"Not particularly," Dakro muttered.
He regarded her for a moment, gaze dark and unreadable; Donna got the feeling he was looking right into her. For whatever reason, they seemed to have developed an instant rivalry, and she didn't believe it was just a difference in leadership styles. It was something else, she was sure of it, and she was determined to find out. Add it to the list, she sighed inwardly. There were many things that baffled her about the current situation.
"If there's a way out, it's down there," he told her. "You don't have to come with us, but believe me: we're your best chance at survival."
She held his gaze and contemplated this. Finally, she gave an imperceptible nod.
The Doctor smiled, and the tension vanished into thin air. "Right then." He offered Donna his arm, and she joined him at the cusp of the tunnel. "We're off."