'What's happening?' Fitz gasped as he pursued the Doctor into the shuddering console room.
The mechanical grinding was deafening. The sound consumed the dark, tomblike chamber, rising up through the console, the pitch rising and falling with the central column, a glass cylinder containing rows of glowing rods that rotated and pressed together like champing teeth.
The wall circles pulsed, each pulse a little weaker than the one before. As they dimmed, the circles turned amber. In the growing shadows, the statue of Napoleon gained a sinister profile.
The Doctor had dashed to the central console and was stooped over the instruments, his fingers scrabbling across the switches and levers and buttons. Reacting to a bulb flash, the Doctor made adjustments in a unbroken sweep of action, like a pianist performing a solo. The movement was unconscious, fluent, rapid.
His stomach heaving with seasickness, Fitz held on to the console for dear life. The panels were cold to the touch. 'Doctor?' His breath formed a vapour and his cheeks prickled. It was like winter had fallen early.
The Doctor spoke in short bursts, his attention focused on the flitting dials.
'I'm not... sure. The TARDIS? It seems something - something is trying to pull her down.'
'I thought it might be good news.' Anji joined them at the console, brushing her bob of hair out of her eyes. 'What is this something?'
'I don't know.' The Doctor shook his head, and waved for Fitz and Anji to move out of his way as he circled the controls. 'I don't know. Some external force. But she doesn't like it. Anji - can you hold down this lever for me? The one at the top.'
The roundel lights faded out. The only illumination came from the column and the monitor, a television bracketed to the ceiling that flickered with rolling static. The three of them were now surrounded by endless blackness. Where there would normally be archways leading to the kitchen, laboratory, filing room and library, there was now absolute nothing.
'Why don't we just, I don't know, pull away?' suggested Anji hoarsely over the screeching.
'It's too strong.' The Doctor sprinted around the console, resetting switches in his usual random way, his black velvet frock coat flailing after him. One of the components exploded, sending a fizzle of sparks outwards. The Doctor snatched back his hand and sucked his finger. 'But whatever it is, the TARDIS is prepared to tear herself apart rather than materialise.'
'Isn't that a bit dangerous?' Fitz yelled.
'Only for us. I've boosted all the circuits, diverted every ounce of power... but it's no good. It's not enough.' He thumped the console, muttering. The monitor's interference flashed in his eyes. 'Come on, old thing, this isn't the time to be difficult, how many times must I apologise?'
Fitz exchanged a worried glance with Anji. It had all happened so quickly. The TARDIS was supposed to be indestructible and yet something was overpowering it.
'There's only one thing we can do.' The Doctor moved Anji aside and rested a hand on a lever. 'If this does what I think it does -' He tensed, clenching his teeth, and pulled.
'And what's that?' said Anji, leaning over the Doctor's shoulder.
'Complete systems shutdown.' The Doctor watched the central column revolve to a halt. 'The TARDIS can't fight any more. She's too tired.'
The screeching ended with a heavy crump. The floor stopped shaking. They had landed.
For a moment, they waited in the sudden, total silence. Even the ever-present background hum had stopped. Three figures alone, their breath drifting in the air.
Anji was the first to speak. 'So let me get this straight. A "something" was dragging us off course, and the only way you could stop the TARDIS from destroying itself trying to get away... was by turning the TARDIS off?'
'That's the essence of it, yes.' The Doctor's voice echoed in the cryptlike darkness, as if there was a chorus of ghosts mocking his every word. 'Every system, every circuit, deactivated. Dead.'
'Which means that whatever this "something" was, it has succeeded?'
'Oh yes.'
'And this place that the TARDIS was so desperate to get away from - that's where we are?'
'Yes.'
'Oh,' said Anji, 'I see.' She hugged herself through her chunky jumper. 'On balance, that's probably quite a bad thing, isn't it?'
'And there is one other small but noteworthy problem.' The Doctor twisted some knobs on the console to no effect and looked up. He seemed amused and worried at the same time. 'We can't dematerialise.'
Fitz struggled to take it all in. 'You mean we're stuck here? Wherever - whenever - here happens to be?'
'Unfortunately, yes.' The Doctor levered open one of the lockers underneath the console. He retrieved a torch, and flicked it on. A pool of light appeared, shifting over the roundelled walls and casting nightmarish shadows before settling on the exterior doors.
'So where are we then?'
The Doctor shook his head. 'I have absolutely no idea. All the instruments are dead.' He looked up. The monitor was blank. 'So shall we go and look?'
'Forgive me for stating the obvious, but are you sure that's a good idea?' said Anji. 'We don't know if there's any air, we don't know -'
'Good idea or not, we don't really have any choice.' The Doctor strode up the steps leading to the main double doors, and waved Fitz over to join him. 'Now, without any power to open the doors, we'll have to use brute force.' The Doctor placed a hand inside a door roundel and braced himself against it. Fitz followed his example and gripped the surface of the other door. 'Ready?' Together, they heaved the doors apart, opening inwards.
An icy wind blasted into the room, sending a flurry of snowflakes across the floor and forcing the doors wide open. Faced with the biting cold, Fitz pocketed his hands for warmth, gritting his teeth to prevent them chattering. Outside there was darkness. Nothing but the rumble of thunder and the howls of the storm.
The Doctor crossed to the coat stand and bundled off two knee-length overcoats. He passed one to Fitz, one to Anji. He didn't collect a coat for himself, although by rights he should have been freezing in his mock-Edwardian get-up; a cravat, a burgundy waistcoat and stiff-collared shirt.
Anji wrestled herself into her coat. 'We could always just stay in here.'
Fitz found his coat cumbersome. It was like wearing a rug two sizes too big. 'And freeze our tits off?'
The Doctor raised his eyebrows. 'I'm afraid Fitz has a point. Without the life-support systems, we wouldn't last too long.' The Doctor grinned. 'Come on. Let's see where we are. It might not be so dreadful.'
Buttoning his coat, Fitz followed the Doctor and Anji over to the doors. Looking out into the gloom, a foreboding weighed heavily on his heart. He had the feeling that leaving the safety of the TARDIS was going to prove a desperately bad mistake.
****
Anji's shoes crunched into the snow. Buffeted by the wind, she covered her eyes and squinted into the night. They were in some sort of forest; leafless trees stretching away in every direction. The ground was uneven and treacherous, black crests of rock jutting out of the whiteness.
It might not be so dreadful? The Doctor had to be joking.
To shelter from the wind, Anji pulled herself into the cover of the TARDIS. The Police Box sat lopsidedly, one corner wedged under the piling snow. It was little more than a mournful shape in the darkness, but it was the only reassuring thing in sight. Incongruous, and yet familiar.
Fitz staggered over to her as the Doctor locked the TARDIS door. 'We're in Narnia. We're in sodding Narnia!'
The Doctor pocketed the key, using his free hand to sweep his mane of hair out of his eyes. 'I don't think so somehow, Fitz. No lamppost.'
'Can't you land us anywhere warm for once?' said Anji. 'This is even worse than Endpoint.'
'Yes, but at least we're on solid ground,' said Fitz. 'Small blessings, eh?'
The Doctor made a series of short hops. 'Gravity about Earth normal.' He lifted his head and drew in a breath as though savouring a wine. 'Atmosphere about the same, too. Clear, thin, possibly due to the altitude. Rather bracing, all in all.'
'So we're back on Earth, then?' suggested Anji. If only they were a brisk walk from a log cabin and steaming drinks... But that was probably too much to expect. More likely, they had landed in the middle of someone else's nightmare. She shivered. The cold seemed to get right into her bones.
'I suppose we could be. But -' The Doctor had a faraway look. 'But maybe not. Curious. No, it seems... wrong, somehow.'
'Wrong?' Fitz's chin was shaking.
'I can't put my finger on it.' A worry flickered on the Doctor's brow. 'A sensation that things are out of place. Not quite so.' He broke his train of thought and looked around himself. 'Well, which way do you think we should go?'
The Doctor's torchlight drifted over their surroundings. Shapes formed in the shifting eddies of snow. To Anji, every direction looked much the same. There were no paths, no signs of life. 'Does it matter?'
'Probably not. But we'll go this way,' decided the Doctor, pointing the beam uphill. 'Due north.'
'How do you know that's north?' said Fitz.
'Because that way's east.' The Doctor waved to the right. 'So, logically, this must be north.'
'And how do you know that way's east?'
'Because this way's north.' He marched up the hill. 'Do try to keep up.'
****
'There must have been some sort of an accident,' said Fitz, huddled into his coat. His fingers were numb, his cheeks were sore and he suspected that his shoes were leaking. Exhausted after their climb, he slouched against a tree trunk. Anji halted beside him and breathed on to her cupped hands. The Doctor strode forward to examine the upturned vehicle.
The van lay on its side, half-buried. Its tyres and metalwork were caked with snow, the only exposed area being the underchassis. The axles and mudguards were encrusted in grime. The windows and wing mirrors had smashed. The rear section of the van was open, revealing a cage framework. The design of the vehicle seemed very functional and old-fashioned; like a Bedford delivery van. Fitz had seen dozens of similar vans, convoying their way through war newsreels.
'Well, whatever happened it was a long time ago,' said the Doctor, squatting on his haunches by the bonnet. He scraped some snow away to reveal russet-coloured metal. After a pause, he stood up, clapping his hands clean. 'Most, most curious. The metal has rusted all the way through. But the level of corrosion - it's quite astonishing. The oxidisation process alone couldn't account for it.'
'What do you mean?' said Anji.
'This metal has not just corroded. It's been eroded. This must have lain here undisturbed, for hundreds, possibly thousands, of years.'
'Don't move, plutos!'
There was a series of loud clicks from all around them. The sound of safety catches being taken off.
'Plutos? Wha-' Fitz looked up into a stinging, brilliant beam. Beside him, Anji and the Doctor shielded their eyes.
Out of the swirling mist emerged six soldiers. Each held a bulky machine rifle. In the reflected light, Fitz could see the soldiers' uniforms, torn and spattered. One of the soldiers had a red-spotted sling; another had a bandaged forehead.
They drew nearer. Their faces were tired and gaunt. Their eyes burned with anger.
The Doctor grinned a congenial grin. 'I suppose you would like us to put our hands up?'
