WHETHER THE WEATHER
Whether the weather be fine, Or whether the weather be not,
Whether the weather be cold, Or wether the weather be hot,
We'll weather the weather, Whatever the weather,
Whether we like it or not.
To be honest, I never thought I'd have to take that poem literally one day, twice in a row. Well, thinking back at how slippery this day started… There's a silly little saying on Earth for that: Coincidences attract each other. Or was it opposites? Can never remember which it is… Clara would probably know.
Where was I?
Ah, yes… Slippery! Turns out it wasn't my best idea to visit the Rain World of the Soon Penxor before picking up Clara from her rather boring everyday life. To make a long story short, I ended up with a few pockets full of leeches and a Tardis full of water. The result of that was an unsteady, slidy trip in which Clara accused me of willful negligence and endangerment, among other things. I probably stopped listening after the first minute, or I just deleted it. One or the other.
"Okay… I think those were the scariest five minutes of my life," Clara told me after we'd materialized, giving me that big-eyed look that always makes her eyes bulge.
I looked over at her with a frown, trying to figure out if she was joking or not. "What do you mean, scary? This was hardly any different to how she usually flies," I protested.
Clara nodded enthusiastically. "Exactly. Your terrible driving skills, plus a wet and slippery floor… You know, I was really looking forward to this trip earlier, but now I'm not so sure."
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that," I muttered, turning my attention back to the screen in front of me. I performed a short scan of the surrounding area and checked a couple of readings about the composition of the atmosphere and radiation levels. Not that I didn't know where we'd landed, it's just a routine thing.
Clara crossed her arms and leaned past the central column to make eye contact with me. "Well?" she asked.
"Well what?" I retorted.
"Well," she said and eyed me with a quizzically raised brow. "Aren't you going to tell me where we are?"
I regarded her for a moment, until she crossed her arms and cleared her throat impatiently.
"It's a surprise," I finally said, fishing out a long piece of cloth from inside my jacket. "Which is why you'll have to close your eyes now."
Clara frowned at the fabric and took a step back. "A blindfold? Seriously?"
"Shut up and close your eyes," I ordered.
That seemed to do the trick. Taking her smile as a signal, I moved forward and tied the cloth firmly around her head. "No peeking," I warned, grasping her wrist. "Keep a hold of my hand and follow my voice. It's a bit of a walk, so bare with me."
To my surprise, she let out a short laugh. "Only if you don't walk me into anything," she joked.
"Course not, boss," I replied.
As anticipated, the walk took a while and by the end of it, Clara was once again complaining about things. Continuing to ignore her muttering, I guided her to the right spot and removed the blindfold. "Welcome to Kel-Eyros," I said.
The muttering stopped. I watched with satisfaction as Clara's eyes grew big and round and her mouth dropped open. She looked a bit like a fish, doing that.
"Impressed?" I asked her, smiling.
"Wow…" She breathed and nodded slowly. "I'm… yes. That is… impressive… Wow."
We were standing on top of a high cliff. In front of us, as far as the eye could see, solidified, semi-transparent shapes glistened in the red light of dusk. A sea of ice, its towering storm waves frozen in time. Thin wafts of fog were coiling their way around the sharp, ragged edges and somehow made the landscape look alive.
"It's beautiful," Clara said beside me.
"It certainly is," I agreed.
We stood in complete silence for a while, until Clara turned her head, eyeing me.
"Go on, give me the science," she said, smiling. "We both know you want to."
"Funny you should say that, because I was just contemplating if I should bring it up," I answered, rubbing my hands together.
I started explaining to her that Kel-Eyros is an uninhabited planet with a very interesting, if extreme, weather system. In one hemisphere, the temperatures are so low that liquid nitrogen can be found in huge, underground lakes. However, on the other side of the planet, the wind is so hot that it sets the earth alight.
"The only reason why we can stand here and admire the view is because we're on the edge of both extremes. A narrow space where 'freezing' and 'scorching' mix to form 'pleasant'. A small area where the planet is habitable," I continued, "Unless the weather changes."
Clara perked up at this. "Unless the weather changes?" she repeated, slightly alarmed.
I shrugged in response. "Every few thousand years, there's a big shift in the weather system. It's what happened here. That ocean used to be the pleasant part of the planet, until a shift occurred and it was shock-frosted. The next one shouldn't be due for another 500 years, so we're in the clear."
Thinking back, it occurs to me now that I probably shouldn't have said that. Because, as soon as the words had left my mouth, the floor started to quiver with a low rumbling sound. The air in the distance, now barely illuminated by the setting sun had started shimmering ominously.
"Doctor…?" Clara's hesitant voice drifted over to me. "Tell me that this isn't what I think it is."
I swallowed audibly. "Depends on what you think it is," I answered.
Clara slowly moved back from the edge of the cliff. "It's a shift, isn't it? Oh god, we'll freeze to death if we don't get out of here!"
"More like scorched," I corrected, "Winter is over. Summer's coming…"
As if on cue, one of the distant icebergs burst as the heat reached it, sending a deafening bang across the landscape a fraction of a second later. Then another of the gigantic structures blew up, and another.
Clara glared at me furiously. "Oh, great! 500 years, you said! You probably landed us here 500 years late! Or 500 years early!", she shouted "Should've known you'd get us into trouble again! You always get us into trouble!"
"Clara, as much as I'd love to discuss this right now," I shouted over the thunder of bursting ice, "there's a scorching hot wall of air coming our way and I would very much like to keep my skin!"
Grabbing her hand, I started pulling Clara with me and we ran as fast as we could, counting the bangs as the boiling air rushed forward. Soon, she overtook me and I was the one being pulled along. I must give it to Clara, for someone with legs as short as hers, she can certainly build up speed.
Needless to say, we made it to the Tardis in the nick of time, where I just about managed an emergency hop into the outer atmosphere of the planet. It would have been a very educational experience to watch the weather shift commence from up there, but Clara was too busy shouting at me. She only stopped when she made me promise that I'd never 'surprise' her again.