The Doctor and the Angels - chapter 9
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The Doctor and Sarah Jane had not been in their room longer than five minutes before there was a knock on the door. The Doctor opened it while Sarah sat on the tiny bed and gingerly pulled back the covers. The sheets looked and smelt clean, and she breathed a sigh of relief at this small comfort. The girl at the door was indeed only slightly taller than Sarah and perhaps sixteen years old. She was holding a pile of folded clothes which she reached over and placed on a small dressing table in the corner. She glanced over at Sarah, looking waiflike in the Doctor's huge overcoat and sent her sympathetic smile.
"Sorry to hear about the fire. I hope no-one was hurt?"
"No," Sarah hastily improvised, "I was alone, my uncle only got back from his business trip a couple of hours ago. My parents are, er, away."
The girl nodded.
"That's a blessing, at least. Well, here are some clothes, anyway. It's not much but they should fit you."
"Thank you," Sarah said gratefully. She felt a dreadful fraud at accepting charity in this way; although on refection she was somewhat of a charity case now, stuck here with, well, nothing.
The girl took her leave and she was alone with the Doctor. His comforting presence made the world of difference even if it was indirectly his fault she was here in the first place. He sent her a firm look.
"Sleep, Sarah. Tomorrow we'll think of a way out of this."
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Martha Jones sprinted down the hallway, as the lights extinguished ever more quickly behind her; making it seem that the darkness itself was pursuing her. She ducked into a small control room and slammed the door, shoving a chair under the handle for good measure. There were several CCTV screens in here, showing views of the building from a variety of angles. Most of them were dark, the lights completely out in those areas. Several were showing nothing but static. Dr Shaw and the Brigadier were nowhere to be seen. One screen, however, showed Harry, still in the medibay, examining something in the cupboards. Martha picked up the phone on the desk and dialled quickly, forcing her fingers not to shake. On the screen Harry glanced around before locating and picking up the receiver. The screen was silent but Martha heard his voice in her ear.
"Hullo?"
"Harry!" she exclaimed, "It's Martha - listen - where's David?"
"In the lavatory, down the hall.. Should I fetch him?"
"No!" Martha almost shouted, "sorry… but I think he's on his own now. There's - at least I think - there's an Angel in the building."
"What?" Harry's voice sounded startled, "How?"
"I don't know. But you need to barricade the door, and you need to stay put. Don't open that door unless you're sure it's one of us, understand?"
"Yes, of course," came the worried reply, and Martha pressed the button to cut the phone off, dialling again for the viewing room she'd left the Brigadier in. There was no CCTV in that room and she fervently hoped that he was still there.
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Liz backed out into the hallway from the darkened lab into an almost equally darkened hallway. Clearly it was a power cut rather than a burned out light bulb and she sighed. It was all very well, she thought, having all this fancy equipment, but some windows wouldn't go amiss. She reached into her pocket for her penlight, glad that she had thought to take it out of her lab coat before she'd left it behind in her UNIT. She fiddled blindly with it, turning it round in her hand to press the button. It shone with a half beam and she frowned. The batteries must be running low. Swinging it up to judge the strength of the beam she gasped as her eyes met those of the statute in front of her. Her heart almost leapt out of her chest at the sight as it loomed over her.
Don't look away, she reminded herself, but there was no denying the panic that started to set in as her penlight rapidly dimmed.
The arms that grabbed her, one around her chest, the other, her waist, felt more human flesh than stone but she failed to stifle her scream.
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The Doctor glanced over at Sarah's sleeping form and sighed deeply. Here they were again, perhaps not in mortal danger on this occasion, but still in a pretty sticky fix. A Timelord wasn't much of a Timelord without a time machine, after all. The last time he'd been stranded he'd at least had UNIT to base himself at. To give him equipment to play with, enemies to pursue… but life in the slow lane without any of that... his eyes fell on Sarah as she murmured in her sleep and he brightened a little; life in the slow lane with Sarah Jane Smith for company need not be so very dull.
He reached into his waistcoat and retrieved the plastic wallet the woman from UNIT had handed him. She had known him; that meant he at least made it back to UNIT, and after all they would keep the TARDIS safe for him. He'd get it back eventually, even if he had to simply live the next 90 odd years on Earth to get there.
Sinking into the chair in the corner, he emptied the file onto the tiny desk. The contents resembled a police evidence file; a collection of printed and handwritten notes on loose leaves of paper, photographs, a copy of a compact disc…no, a DVD the Doctor realised, although of course he had nothing to play it on. He started to thumb through the pages, carefully examining them. The photographs all appeared to be taken in or around Wester Drumlins; most of them depicted Angels, although there were several that showed the message written supposedly by himself to the mysterious Sally Sparrow. One photograph stood out from the rest; it was a black and white family photograph of a young woman surrounded by her young children - this one was accompanied by a letter. A victim of the Angels, the Doctor realised, as he read her missive.
The last few pages were by far the most enlightening - stapled together, they held a transcript of a conversation between himself and Sally; his own parts printed, her responses filled in in hastily scrawled shorthand. A one sided conversation completed at a later date - it wouldn't't be the first time, he mused. He rubbed his chin and a last tiny scrap of paper fell out of the folder. He glanced at it as it fluttered to the floor and then snatched it up as he recognised the writing. It was undoubtedly his own penmanship, but with the subtle differences that marked it as belonging to a different regeneration.
It was brief. It said:
Village Churchyard
3pm
26th September 1921
DON'T BE LATE. AND DON'T BLINK
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