Once the ground stopped moving, Amara and Elend found themselves in front of a circle. It looked identical to the one they'd just been in before, but Amara knew it wasn't the same one. The statue in front of them had the head of a cobra, and not a horse. She straightened up, her notebook falling to the ground.
She picked it up, turning to see where Elend was. He was holding his leather-bound book, flipping through the games, his backpack on the ground beside him. "What are you doing?"
"Hmm?" He looked up from it. He gestured towards the book and his eyes widened in realisation. "Oh, yeah. I'm looking to see if there's anything about what just happened here."
"What is that?"
"It's a compilation of all the research I've done about the island. Well, one of the volumes, anyway. There's quite a lot of speculation as to what the island is and what happened to it. Surprisingly, no two sources agree on everything." He went back to looking inside the book while Amara turned around, scanning their surroundings. She opened her journal as well, trying to see if there were any familiar landmarks she'd written about.
"We need to find out if there's some sort of a pattern or something with the movement." Elend announced from behind her. She turned around, her book half open. "If we try and find out how much we've moved, and how much the others moved relative to that, then we'd have some sort of a chance at finding them."
Amara nodded. "Yeah, that makes sense." She pointed towards her left- the direction they came in. "We'll have to go that way." Elend nodded and picked up his bag when Amara frowned.
"What's wrong?"
She shook her head. "It's just that- well, what if they-" She looked down at her notebook, before shrugging. "Probably the only thing that'll be recognizable." She went to the last page of the book and tore it off carefully before writing something on it, crumpling it, and placing it on the ground in front of her. She hated the fact that she had to technically litter, but she hadn't really brought anything with her that she could use for the same purpose, as the Doctor had initially told her they were going to a museum. She really should've brought something for backup in case he'd pulled bullshit like that. Which he had. She then opened her book and scrawled a 'Cobra head statue' on it.
She straightened up and turned to Elend, who was frowning. "Yeah, we can go now."
"What were you doing?"
"I left a note in case the Doctor and Althea come looking for us too. And then I just made a note of where we were so that we don't really get lost." She shrugged. "Well, ish."
Elend shrugged and said, "Right, anyway, let's try and backtrack to see if they're there."
She nodded and they started walking in the direction they came in.
Once the ground stopped moving, the Doctor immediately reached into his pockets, pulling out a smartphone with a phone cover that looked like the TARDIS doors. He turned it on, only to groan and put it back inside his pocket. No signal. He frowned. "No signal," He murmured, pulling out his screwdriver. He remembered boosting it up clearly- Amara and Rose had gotten lost while him and Jack Harkness had gone in the exact opposite direction in a Granthian marketplace, and when they finally found each other, Amara insisted they all had phones in case something like this had happened again since neither Jack not himself really used phones till then. So, he picked up two random phones he found inside one of the console panels- he strongly suspected that the TARDIS had put them in there for that very purpose- and boosted them up, before tossing one of them to Jack. So if there was no signal… something had to be disrupting it.
"What is that?" He turned around to see Althea, who was frowning at the phone in his hand. She had her hands on her hips and was pointing at it.
"It's a phone, it's used to communicate with people when they're not here."
Althea laughed, "Hang on, I think I've seen one of those in a museum. You really use one of those to communicate, and not something more modern?"
He shrugged. "I'm a time traveller. Modern doesn't really apply to me. Well, time in a regular sense doesn't generally apply to me, but Mara uses a smartphone, so I thought it would be convenient for me to use one too."
Althea frowned, but shrugged and turned around, taking a deep breath. "So, moving ground… was that there when you came here?"
"That's a recent addition, I'm afraid..." The Doctor turned on the scanner in his screwdriver, frowning when it buzzed twice before shutting off. "What the-" He hit the screwdriver a couple of times before trying again, only for the same thing to happen again. His frown deepened as he narrowed his eyes at the screwdriver, bringing it closer to see if there was something wrong with it.
"What are you doing?" Althea asked from behind him.
"Trying to figure out what's wrong with my screwdriver," He muttered through gritted teeth, hitting the sonic again before having another unsuccessful result.
"That's a screwdriver?" Althea scoffed, and he turned around, scowling. "It's a very good one!"
"What good would a screwdriver do anyway?"
"I'm scanning around, it's a multipurpose device!"
"Then why is it called a screwdriver?"
The Doctor turned around, a frown on his face. He stared at her for a moment before shaking his head. "What good would knowing that do?"
She shrugged, her hands on her waist. "I dunno, you were the one who called it a screwdriver and I got curious. Anyway, what's going on here?"
"That's a question whose answer I'd very much like to find out." The Doctor put his screwdriver back into his pocket and looked around. They were in a place that was similar to the one they'd been in before, except, it wasn't the same place. There was nothing wrong with the place- it was a typical deserted island in every way possible- well, except for the whole moving ground thing- but maybe that was what was the problem. "Right after we find Amara and Elend."
He turned around to see what Althea was doing. She'd taken out a scanner from her bag and placed it on the ground, diving her hand back into her backpack, pulling out a notebook. "What are you doing?"
"Trying to find out if there's something wrong with the ground. It moved, remember?" She replied, not looking up at him as she looked away from the scanner and wrote something in her notebook. What was it with people and their notebooks and their constant noting down of things anyway?
"What's the notebook for?" He nodded at the leatherbound object in her hand.
"A log of everything I've found out here. It would help the research."
"Can't that wait?" The Doctor placed his hands into the pockets of his overcoat. "We just got separated from the others, shouldn't finding them be our biggest priority?"
"I'm sure they're both perfectly fine, Doctor." Althea placed the book beside her and picked up the scanner again. "Plus, if I figure out the angular velocity of the island and the approximate radius from the centre till here, we might be able to pin down their location with a few calculations. And I'm sure Elend would be trying to figure that out right now." She looked up at him. "There's nothing to be worried about."
"Really? I hadn't noticed. You know, between the moving ground and the separation, I really did think there were things to be worried about." He said sarcastically, tilting his head to the side.
Althea looked up and rolled her eyes. "Yeah, and I'm positive the sarcasm would help them more than anything." He scowled at her and she sighed. "Listen, your friend will be fine, Elend isn't the type of bloke who would run into danger the first chance he gets."
"Even if he was, I doubt he'd stand a chance against Amara. She'd pull him in the exact opposite direction." He murmured. He knew Amara was more than capable of handling herself, but he couldn't help feeling overprotective. Especially since she was so early in her timeline at that point. He knew she'd be able to do some navigation given the fact that she'd been diligently noting down every single landmark they saw ever since they stepped out of the TARDIS, but the whole moving island thing would prove to be a challenge. He just hoped she was safe and would find him soon.
"Like I said," Althea stood up, looking at the scanner, "They'll be alright." She frowned. "Hang on- it's not giving out any proper readings."
The Doctor frowned and held out his hand for the scanner. Althea handed it over. The screen was flickering, showing fluctuating reading the whole time, listing at least seven different compositions of the soil on the ground before buzzing out into a blank screen.
"That's weird." He murmured, turning the scanner over. "That battery seems to be full." He turned it over again and tried using the sonic on it, but all the sonic gave was a weak buzz before seemingly shutting off. The Doctor frowned and turned to Althea, handing her scanner back to her. "There's something interfering with electrical or sonic impulses." He concluded, putting his sonic back into his pocket again. "That's what's interfering with the mobile signal, your scanner, and the sonic."
Althea took in a deep breath and sighed. "Well I'll be." She put the scanner back in her backpack and slung it over her shoulders. She started walking towards the centre of the circle.
"What are you doing?"
She turned around. "Well, we're in a new circle. New research potential, especially if there's something here that'll help me figure out what the hell is happening." She continued to walk towards the centre. The Doctor shrugged and started doing the same thing.
He walked towards one of the statues when Althea called out, "Doctor, I think there's something you might want to see here!"
He frowned and walked towards where she was. She was standing in the middle of the circle, close to another fountain, which had a sculpture of dancing dolphins in the middle. The ground in front of her was cracked, and…
The Doctor frowned and squatted in front of the ground beside Althea, dipping his finger into the water inside the crack. He put his finger into his mouth, ignoring Althea's scrunched up face at that. He frowned, bringing his finger in front of him. "It's salty." He murmured, sticking his tongue out. "Still got that Atlanticky taste to it-"
"What do you mean? Like the ocean?" Althea pointed to the water in the crack.
"Yeah. And not just some inland water body or something. That is the proper ocean seeping through. I can taste it."
"You figured all that out by licking the water once?" Althea raised an eyebrow, and the Doctor shrugged. "I have heightened senses. Compared to humans, at least. Also, it's taken me years of practice."
"Hang on- did you say that it's the ocean seeping through?" Althea said as the Doctor placed his hand into the water again.
"Yeah," He murmured, "Pretty interesting phenomenon, if you ask me, it's almost like- oh no." He looked up at Althea, who was looking slightly alarmed. "The island's sinking." She finished his sentence for him, and he nodded, standing up. "We need to find the others and get out of here." He stuffed his hands into his pockets and started walking towards the horse statue.
"But- how can that even happen?" Althea called out behind him, pacing as fast as she could behind him.
"How can an island that was geographically nonexistent end up coming into existence out of the blue?" The Doctor countered, not turning around.
"It wasn't nonexistent, it was just not noticed by us!" Althea said, and muttered, "Probably. Anyway, it can't be sinking into the ocean again, we just found out about it two years ago! We haven't even scratched the surface with all the research!"
"As far as I'm aware, islands don't really care about the extent of research that's been put into them by humans, and research or no research, the island's sinking and unless you want to drown here with it, I'd suggest you come with me."
"Of course I don't want to drown, but Elend and I are the first people here! Apart from you and your friend. But still! Why did it have to decide to sink now, couldn't it wait for a few years, maybe?"
The Doctor rolled his eyes and turned to her and she shook her head. "I know, I know, it's an island, it doesn't decide to sink by itself or whatever, but that doesn't rule out the fact that this is completely unexpected and makes no sense!"
The Doctor shrugged. "You're the first people here, meaning it could've had the whole sinking thing coming a long time ago."
"That does make sense," Althea muttered, but looked up at the Doctor with the same frown on her face. "But that doesn't explain how this wasn't the case before. As far as I remember, the circle we'd been in before didn't have water seeping in at all."
"That is a valid suspicion…" The Doctor murmured, scratching his head. He was then knocked off balance as the ground started to move again. Althea screamed and grabbed onto the Doctor as the ground started moving faster. However, both of them ended up falling down and had to just sit there uncomfortably until they'd finished moving past a bunch of forests and random buildings until they came to a stop in another circle, which had a huge ruined archway at the other end of it.
The Doctor scrambled to his feet immediately after they stopped and ran towards the cracked centre of the circle and stopped dead in his tracks when he saw that the water level had increased, confirming the nagging suspicion that had lingered at the back of his head ever since Althea pointed out that the first circle didn't have water in its cracks.
"What's- oh my God," Althea said when she caught up with him. "The spinning- that's what's causing it to sink."
The Doctor turned around, a determined expression replacing his previously shocked one. "We need to try and find Amara and Elend and get out of here. Immediately."
When the ground started to spin again, Amara had almost figured out the extent of spinning they'd done. So, one could imagine her annoyance when everything was ruined because the island decided to become its own merry-go-round.
"-Well, according to the beliefs I was raised on," She was saying to Elend after she'd noticed a familiar landmark and noted it down on her new "map" of the place so far when he'd asked her about her opinion on the whole thing. "Atlantis is called Dwaraka, which was basically an island city ruled by the an incarnation of the lord Vishnu- he's basically one of the three powerful gods in our culture and he took human form multiple times to protect justice and righteousness, in case you were wondering, but judging by the fact that this is an island in the Atlantic and the fact that this place looks more like a Minecraft world than a prosperous city, I'm assuming this isn't it."
Elend had asked her what the hell Minecraft was, which she should've really expected as a follow up question, so she explained the basics of the game to him- or well, what she picked up while watching Arya play the game, at least. That tangent ended up leaving tears slowly start to prickle her eyes, but she swallowed them and held them back. Thinking about how she was never going to see her family again while she was stranded on an island with her only means of transport and the only person she knew away from her was miles away from ideal.
She was, however, ironically saved by the ground starting its moving routine again. Thankfully, her and Elend were moving on the same slab of ground, but that didn't make it any less annoying. She'd let out a colourful string of words when they stopped and huffed as she opened her notebook again and looked around to see if there was anything familiar around so she could attempt to calculate the extent of deviation from their original path.
"So soon?" Elend wondered aloud, looking around. "It didn't happen so soon when we'd come here. I don't even think half an hour's passed since the last time it happened."
Amara shrugged. "Maybe the pattern's such that the time intervals keep reducing?" She turned around, only to be met with more trees, all of which looked the same. She flipped back a few pages of her notebook to see if any of the trees matched the description of something she'd written. "The real question is, how long do we keep spinning each time? And how much do we move as a result?"
"I would reckon that the angular speed's the same throughout every piece of moving land, judging by the fact that the island appears to move in concentric circles, so they'd all have moved by the same angular distance, but the distance each one's moved would depend both on the time we've spun and the radius of the island. The time can be easily calculated, but for the radius- we'd need to find the centre of the island." Elend murmured, rubbing his chin, "Or walk around the entire perimeter of the circle once and roughly calculate the radius through that. Assuming it's a uniform annular disc, that is. And that we don't move again- that would probably mess up everything."
"That would take a lot of time and require a calculator, I don't think dividing a huge number with six point two eight would be a walk in the park." Amara murmured, turning around again. She'd never really been one for calculations. She'd always been the idiot who'd done well in the examination but always lost a pesky half mark because she'd done a multiplication error. The day she'd given up maths to take a course in literature was probably the best day of her life.
"I'd probably be able to do it, speed calculation was a huge requirement for university for me." Elend said, making Amara's eyes widen appreciatively. "I've just gained a whole new level of respect for you." She chuckled, before turning and narrowing her eyes. "Hold on, I don't think I've seen that before." She pointed to a stone cabin-like structure in front of her. It was covered in moss and vines, almost covering the entire outer structure of the hut such that only a few small bits of the original grey stone peeked out.
Elend walked past her towards it. "It must be some sort of a checkpoint in the woods or something." He walked towards the doors of the cabin, which were on the side.
Amara, however, stayed back. "Are you sure you want to go in there?" It was irrational, but every single horror movie Amara had ever seen (well, if watching one from behind the pillow while looking at pictures of golden retrievers every five minutes to calm herself down counted), all the ghost problems usually seemed to stem from the fact that some idiot decided to get inside a place that looked intimidating for good reason. And judging by the fact that she was stuck inside a fictional universe, taking a chase was probably the last thing she wanted to do.
Elend, however, didn't have any such reservations. "Well, for all we know, it could have something we could use to get in contact with the others!"
"Or it could have freaking Kanchana inside." Amara muttered, folding her hands.
"What was that?"
"Nothing, I just said that I'll stay here and keep a watch in case the others come by!" She yelled back, clearing her throat. "Tell me if you find anything!"
Elend gave her a thumbs up before he produced what looked like a pocket knife from his pocket and used it to pry open the door, which creaked as it did so. Amara backed away a little, gasping as her feet almost got stuck in the wet, clayey mud behind her.
She shivered, tightening her arms around herself. She took a deep breath, looking around once again. She pulled her phone from her pocket and turned it on, her expression falling as she still saw the 'no signal' message on the top right. She'd tried to contact the Doctor once they'd started walking, but was met with no signal, which she found suspicious judging by the fact that she's gotten her phone boosted up long back when she was with Nine. Another part of her said that it was normal for it to happen at times- Rose lost signal when her and Ten were stuck in that spaceship with the devil- but they had the devil disrupting the signal then.
Her eyes slightly widened as another possibility hit her brain. What if something like the devil was the reason her signal was getting disrupted? And what if that was the thing that was initiating the whole spinning island thing? It was heavily unlikely- well, so was ending up inside a universe where the Doctor existed. Her grip around herself started to tighten even more as her breathing started to become faster again.
It had been a while since she'd seen the Doctor. What if something had happened to him? What if he and Althea were hurt, or trapped, or captured, or… dead? A small part of her reprimanded her for thinking irrationally and that the odds of that were near impossible judging by the fact that she'd literally met a Doctor from the future and also because there seemed to be nobody else on the island, but that part was drowned out by the fearful one that kept repeating itself inside her head and making her heart rate start to build up more and more. She felt the familiar heat start to form around her and the lump in her throat come into being. She swallowed, trying to keep the slight nausea inside as she gripped her arms tightly with her hands.
She was brought out of her thoughts when she heard a scream from inside the cabin. She jumped, her heart rate at an all time high, before she shook her head, realised where she was and what was going on and ran towards the doorway.
She was immediately hit with the smell of something rotting. She coughed and placed a hand over her nose as she looked for Elend. He was standing and staring at something in the corner of the room. She frowned and stepped in, looking down for a moment as her foot seemed to have touched water. True to her suspicions, the stone floor was covered with a small layer of water.
"Elend?" She called out. "What's wrong?"
He slowly moved aside, still not looking at her, and she walked forward to see what he was looking at. When she did, she gasped and backed away, her heart rate starting to increase yet again. Leaned against the wall was the bloated and half decomposed body of a man who had his skull bashed in and his eyes open, his lips swollen and slightly blue like the rest of his pale body.
