Chapter Six

"Get up, boy. You have work to do."

The voice didn't enter his mind through his ears. It was already there, buried in his thoughts. Boy mumbled a denial and buried his head further beneath the covers, as though the darkness could drive away his Master's commands.

"Get up, boy!"

Boy's feet started moving of their own accord. They slid from beneath the covers and Boy stood. He was shaking as what was left of his mind tried to fight against the orders that had been buried in his subconscious. Tears ran down his face.

Doctor. His friend. The one who'd cared for him like a father and shown him a whole new universe.

But Boy couldn't disobey his Master.

--

Donna was trying her best to convince the Doctor that he needed her here more than he need to protect her, but a sound cut across her arguments. A bell was ringing out, reverberating through the TARDIS.

"The cloister bell," the Doctor muttered, his concern obvious.

"Doctor, what is it?"

"It's a warning. A very serious one." He gave the console screen a glance then headed through the door into the heart of the TARDIS. Donna hurried after him.

"What does it mean?"

"Either the TARDIS is in imminent danger, or the entire universe is."

Donna followed him down a corridor, then another one. It seemed she spent half her time chasing after him without any real idea what was going on.

The Doctor stopped short. Someone had pulled one of the round panels from the corridor wall. Donna peered inside, seeing some switches and lights. The Doctor clearly saw something more significant in there.

"No, no, no, no, no," he muttered. The flip of one switch silenced the ring bell, then the Doctor turned and raced back to the console room.

"Doctor! What's going on?" Donna ran after him, but got no reply.

She arrived at the console room a few seconds after he did. The Doctor was pulling Adric away from the controls. The central column was moving rapidly and various lights on the console were flashing. Something sparked on one of the panels.

As the Doctor looked around to see what had gone wrong, Adric took advantage of the momentary distraction to pull free of his grip. Adric pressed new switches.

"Adric, stop!" The Doctor wasn't even trying to be calm and soothing now. His anger and worry were obvious as he tried to figure out what was going on. Donna didn't know quite what could happen if something went wrong with those controls, but she guessed that the least that would happen was that the three of them would die. With all the power of a time machine, she was willing to believe it possible that the TARDIS could destroy half the universe.

Donna rushed over to help keep Adric away from the controls while the Doctor went to the screen and tried pressing a few buttons of his own.

Then there was a faint bump and the column went still. There was a moment of silence.

The Doctor checked the screen and then looked up at Adric. The boy was quiet, not even struggling against the grip Donna had on his arms. There were tears on his face and he stared at the floor.

"Where are we, Adric?" the Doctor asked.

"I'm sorry, Doctor."

"Adric, where have you brought us?"

Adric stamped his foot down hard onto Donna's and twisted in her grip. The moment of pain loosened her hands enough that he pulled away. He ran straight for the main doors and out into whatever world they'd landed on.

"Adric!" the Doctor called after him. He hurried to the doors and looked out, then went back to the console.

"What's he done?" Donna asked. "Where are we?"

"I don't know. He forced a feedback error into the sensor circuits. That's the only way he could trick the cloister bell into going off, but it means I can't see where we are." The Doctor read something off the screen. "We've got a bigger problem."

"What?" Donna didn't want to think what could be worse than being on an unknown planet with a lunatic who could control the TARDIS.

"Adric's clever, but he's not that clever and I certainly never taught him how to fool the cloister bell. Someone else must have told him what to do."

"The Master."

The Doctor nodded. "Wherever we are, Adric brought us here because the Master told him to."