Текст книги "Doctor Who- The Silent Stars Go By"

Автор книги: Dan Abnett

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Chapter

10

Underneath the Mountain

They were going to eat her.

There was no doubt in Amy’s mind about that. They were scurrying towards her along the hallway floor in a great tide of wrinkled, grey-pink bodies, with chattering teeth that looked like they were coated with metal and designed for biting through wire.

She wasn’t exactly sure why she thought they were going to eat her. It wasn’t as though they had a malicious look in their eyes, because they didn’t have eyes. They just had sockets where eyes were supposed to be, sockets that looked like surgical excisions, sockets that had been emptied and then packed with brown material the texture of foam, like the covers to headphone buds or a voice mic. They had claws that resembled bird-foot articulations built from old compass and divider sets. They had tails that looked like the coating of black electrical cable stretched over bike chain.

‘Oh my god, you’re all completely horrible!’ she exclaimed, and began to retreat very fast. They responded by accelerating towards her, rushing in a sudden flood, the larger rats pushing smaller ones aside or trampling them. The nasty, wrinkly grey flesh on their bodies was taut enough to reveal the outlines of their ribcages.

‘And you’re hungry!’ she yelped, finally understanding what had tipped her off. They were famished, and they were behaving the way any hungry creatures did when they detected food.

She started to sprint. They were after her. Their jaws snapped wide, ready to bite, revealing dentition that would have looked much more at home on posters for a film about memorable summers on Amity Island.

One of the rat-things leapt at her. It missed, but it nearly took a chunk out of her left calf with a snap of its teeth. Another leapt. She swatted it away with her hand. A third sprang at her and she struck at it but failed to connect, and it seized her mitten in its mouth, attaching itself to her through-sleeve elastic like a fish to a line.

‘Get off!’ she yelled, and swung the thing hard so that it bashed into the hallway wall. It took two fairly deliberate smacks to make it let go of the mitten and fall onto the floor.

By then, the main portion of the rat flood had reached her. She screamed in horror. What was about to happen was going to be unpleasant. About as unpleasant as unpleasant ever got.

What actually happened next was unpleasant, but not in the way she had been expecting. There was a shrill noise, like some kind of alarm or whistle. It stabbed into her ears like knitting needles and made her cry out in pain and stumble to her knees. It was an awful sound. It was the sort of sound that felt like it would break your ears, microwave your brain, and make smoke come out of your nose.

It actually did that to several of the rats. Some dropped dead in their tracks. Others fell, twitching and writhing in pain. The rest simply recoiled and fled.

Their frantic metal claws made skritchy, squealy, teeth-on-edge noises as they fled down the metal hallway, noises that Amy would not have enjoyed at all if she’d been able to hear them. Her ears, however, were still ringing from the monstrously shrill sound.

Shaking her head, she got up. The Doctor was standing right behind her, with Arabel and Samewell, both looking scared, behind him. The Doctor was smiling.

‘______ ,’ he said.‘______.’

‘What?’ Amy asked.

‘______,’ the Doctor replied, still smiling, but looking concerned.

‘Give me a clue,’ she said. ‘Is it a book? How many words? Why aren’t you talking to me?’

The Doctor turned and said something equally inaudible to Arabel and Samewell.

‘It’s my ears, isn’t it?’ asked Amy. ‘That sound knackered my ears, didn’t it?’

The Doctor turned back to her. He pointed to his sonic screwdriver, and made a sad face. ‘______,’ he said.

She could read his lips. She knew what sorry looked like.

Sol Farrow was a strong man, noted for his labour in the fields and heathouses. Sol was not quite as big as Jack Duggat, for Jack Duggat was the biggest of all Morphans in Beside, but he was an ox of a man nevertheless. Elect Groan have given him the task of nightwatching Beside’s westgate, and offered him his choice of arms to take. Sol had chosen a fine, longhandled shovel with a shipskin tongue. He’d also taken a good sickle from the tool store, and hooked it into his belt under his heavy winter coat. Sol did not intend to be found wanting. He’d heard the stories over the past weeks, all of them: the tall figures glimpsed in the woods, the killed cattle and sheep, the stars that did not stay still. What were those things in the woods?

Were they real, real giants of the forest, regarding the plantnation with evil intent? Or were they just figments of the imagination, sprites conjured by the fearful mindset of the Morphans?

Sol Farrow was a sound man, and would have normally supposed the latter. People jumped at shadows, and at sounds in the night. They saw things sometimes that weren’t really there. The hard winters and the snow, well, that was a misfortune, a hardship they had to bear, but it was making people agitated, and in that agitation, their minds raced and imagined.

Now he was not so sure. There was too much that couldn’t be accounted for, more than could be explained by imagination and a rogue dog.

How many men had not returned from the search today? There was no trace of them. If they’d been taken by something, like the livestock had been taken, then the population of Beside had suffered a mortal blow.

Nightwatching had not been done in his time, or his father’s, or his father’s father’s. According to the practices listed in the word of Guide, nightwatching had been done in the early times, when the Morphans first came to Hereafter. Nightwatch had been posted around the first camps, while the towns were being raised and constructed. Back then, the Morphans had not known much about the world Hereafter, and had no idea what hid in the dark when it fell.

Bill Groan had reinstated the practice of nightwatch after the third livestock killing. He posted watchmen at the compass gates of Beside, plus another at the heathouses, another at the well, and two to patrol from the byre to the dairy. Another watchman would beat the bounds of the plantnation through the night. Bill Groan had been determined that no mad dog would get into the town and threaten the children or the old.

A precaution. That’s all it had seemed at first. And a burden, because men like Sol had to stand out all hours in the cold weather.

After the day they’d just had, it seemed like a necessity.

It was bitter cold, and light snow was falling. Sol could hear the hiss and whisper of it. From his vantage, with the town at his back, he had the edge of the woods and the open land of fairground ahead of him. To his left, he could see the slight glow of the solamps in the heathouses. To his right, like a dark and cloudy phantom behind the snow, he could just make out the bulk of Firmer Number One.

The cold was getting to him. He had a small brazier for warmth, crackling near his feet, a flask of broth, and he made sure he did not stand still for too long.

Pacing kept his feet warm. He left the end of his shovel resting on the ground, supporting it with one hand, and kept the other hand tucked inside his coat for warmth.

Every few minutes, he would change hands and stuff the other away.

Sol put both hands on the shovel and raised it. He had heard something. He was sure he’d heard something. Across fairground, out near the woods. It sounded as though something had moved. He waited, listening, peering into the darkness, seeing nothing. It was probably just snow-gather building up on a branch, finally snapping it under its accumulated weight or sloughing off. Since the snows had come, that sort of odd sound, noises of slumping and fluttering as fallen snow redistributed itself, had become very common.

Sol glanced back towards Beside. Lamps were burning throughout the heart of the settlement. It looked reassuring, almost cosy. He longed to be down there, at a fireside, talking with friends and eating a good supper. That community and companionship was what life was about. The hard toil and struggle of the Morphan existence was made bearable by the simple reassurances of hot food and a hearth, and a circle of friends.

Sadly, Sol reflected, that was not why the lamps were lit in Beside tonight. The council and the community were meeting in the assembly.

Crisis talks, Cat A.

Bill Groan stood in the porch of the assembly hall under the light of a solamp, listening as Old Winnowner read out the list.

Eight names. Eight good Morphan men of Beside who had not returned at day’s end. Eight fathers, eight strong labourers, part of the backbone of the community. How could eight men go missing in the snow during the daytime? A fall or other mishap might take one, two if things were really unlucky. But eight?

They were all his friends.

Winnowner read the other names on the list.

Harvesta Flurrish, of course, the poor girl whose disappearance had started the search in the first place.

Winnowner had reminded Bill that it was the anniversary of Tyler Flurrish’s death. Perhaps Vesta had been marking that loss. Perhaps that was why she had not come for labour at the chime of Guide’s Bell. It seemed a particularly cruel twist of Guide’s will for her to disappear on the anniversary of her father’s passing.

What horrible fate had befallen her, Bill wondered.

Had the dog got her? Had it cornered her and brought her down like a lamb? Or, Guide help them all, was there some truth in these stories of giants in the woods?

Arabel Flurrish was missing too. No one had seen her or Samewell Crook since the morning meeting. Bill Groan knew Arabel Flurrish well. She was one of the brightest and best, strong-willed and quickwitted. Bill had no doubt Bel would rise to a high Morphan office like Nurse Elect in her time. Vesta was sweet and kind, but Bel was strong and driven. Bill was certain Bel had gone out to look for her sister anyway, permission or no permission. It was typical of her headstrong behaviour. Samewell Crook, well he was driven by his hopeless heart and good nature. He was so struck on Arabel, if she’d told him to jump in the mill race with his boots on, he’d have done it. He’d gone with her, to help her, that was obvious too.

But they hadn’t come back. By nightchime, they had not returned. Worse still, just after noon, Jack Duggat had discovered that the two strangers had vanished from the compter too. Jack had gone down to take them some food and water, and found the cage open.

Had they let themselves out? If so, how? The lock on the cage was a good, strong one, and it had not been forced.

Bill suspected that Bel, perhaps in some delusion, had let them out. He would not put such unilateral action past her, especially when she was so lacking in patience and concerned for her sister. She’d been eager to question the strangers, after all. Perhaps they had promised to show her where her sister had gone in return for release?

Even so, how had Bel opened the cage? A want of patience was a true vice, and certainly one of Arabel Flurrish’s personal flaws, but even she, fired up and on a mission, could not manufacture a key out of nowhere.

Perhaps the matters weren’t connected. Perhaps Bel and Samewell had gone off, and the strangers had got out of their own accord.

All Bill Groan could plainly see was that in the middle of the hardest winter the Morphans had ever known, two strangers who seemed to come from no plantnation, which was the only place anyone could have come from, turned up on the self-same day eleven Morphans of Beside went missing.

‘They’re taking their seats, Elect,’ said Chaunce Plowrite, stepping out of the assembly to speak to Bill.

Bill Groan nodded.

‘We should go in,’ said Winnowner. In the low solamp light, she looked older than ever. Age and effort, and the stress of the current times had shaved more years off her. Bill felt a tightness. Winnowner Cropper could be difficult and set in her ways, but he relied upon her. A doctrine of continuity had kept the Morphans alive for twenty-seven generations, and it was just as vital as the doctrine of patience. One generation learned from the last. Knowledge and skills were stockpiled and maintained. The young did not have to make the same mistakes their predecessors had done, because the result of mistakes were taught so they could be avoided. Time and effort were not wasted by learning through experience. Morphans prospered by listening to their elders and learning.

Hereafter was a hard place to live and a slow place to terrafirm. It did not offer second chances, but if you paid attention to the wisdom of your elders, it reduced the chances of you needing any.

Bill could not bear to think of Winnowner going. He did not know what he would do without her. He could not imagine being Nurse Elect and not having her years and counsel to call upon. If this crisis of ice and mysteries had hastened the end of Winnowner Cropper’s life, then he…

He tried not to think about it. The plantnation records and oral histories both attested to the fact that it was always a sorry time when the last of a generation passed. It always marked the end of an era, and reminded the Morphan community of the vulnerability and the sheer duration of the lifecycle they had been born into. Bill knew that Winnowner’s death would be a watershed in his service as Elect, and his life too. He prayed to Guide that it wouldn’t happen when they were in the midst of such an unprecedented Cat A calamity.

‘We should go in,’ she repeated.

‘And tell them what?’ Bill asked.

‘Speak fairly to them,’ she replied. ‘There’s nothing we can do tonight except keep warm and keep watch.’

‘And tomorrow?’

She shrugged. ‘We search again.’

Bill sighed. ‘What if they are true?’ he asked.

‘If what are true, Elect?’

‘The stories of giants.’

‘There is nothing in all of Guide’s words about giants,’ she said.

‘There was nothing about strangers either,’ he said,

‘but today strangers came.’

‘They were unguidely, and they brought conjury with them,’ she replied.

‘I understand that,’ he said. ‘I do. But just because something is unguidely, just because it is not part of Guide’s law, it doesn’t mean we can ignore it. It could be killing us, Winnowner. Do we let it?’

‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘Survival is the greatest doctrine of all. What is happening to us may be exceptional, and therefore not covered in specifics in Guide’s words, but Guide will not fail us. We must look again. Study the passages. Guide will instruct us in ways we have not yet imagined.’

Bill Groan nodded. ‘I think so too. We should start again tonight. All night, if it takes it.’

‘Agreed,’ said Winnowner. ‘We will go in and you will say some words of consolation and comfort. Then I will open the Incrypt, and we will withdraw with the council for study.’

Chaunce Plowrite held the door for them and they entered the assembly. It was crowded. Almost every Morphan had come out, except those on nightwatch or with evening labours to perform.

Or those already lost, Bill Groan thought.

There was a hum of chatter in the room, but it died away as they came in and joined the other members of the council to take their seats. Small and very obvious knots of agitation surrounded the families of the missing men.

‘What will you do, Elect?’ Ela Seed asked, standing up almost at once. Her voice was clear and loud, but strained with worry. Her husband, Dom Seed, was one of the men who had not been seen since Guide’s Bell had chimed middle-morning.

‘I will ask Guide for direction, Ela,’ said Bill Groan.

‘Is that not what we have been doing for weeks now?’ asked Lane Cutter. Several of the Morphans around her uttered a rumble of support.

‘It is,’ said Bill.

‘And what good has it done?’ Lane asked, her face severe.

‘Such talk is verging on the unguidely, Lane,’ said Chaunce Plowrite. ‘I know you are most concerned at Hud’s absence, but—’

‘Unguidely, am I now?’ asked Lane with a brittle laugh. ‘I think Guide has deserted us.’

There was a flurry of talk, some of it dismayed.

‘I agree,’ said Ela Seed. ‘I know we must trust in Guide, and I know patience is our greatest virtue, and I know that those who are patient will provide for all of the plantnation, but we cannot just wait by for this to overcome us. My husband…’

Her voice broke. Her sister rose to steady her.

‘We will consult Guide’s words tonight,’ said Bill.

‘Winnowner is going directly to open the Incrypt.

We will not rest until we have searched every passage and every section for truth and pertinence.’

‘It is either that,’ Jack Duggat scoffed, ‘or we wait for a miracle!’

Laughter, little of it warm, rolled around the assembly.

‘I think a miracle is what we might have found,’ said Sol Farrow, speaking from the back of the hall.

Everyone turned. He had just come in, bringing snow with him.

‘A small one, at any rate,’ he said, ‘but it gives us hope.’

He turned and beckoned. Two people came in out of the night.

‘Oh good Guide,’ murmured Bill Groan. ‘Vesta Flurrish?’

‘I found her coming in from the edge of the woods, Elect,’ said Sol.

‘I am unhurt, Elect,’ Vesta said. Her cold cheeks had flushed in the heat of the assembly room. She indicated the man next to her. ‘This is Rory,’ she said.

‘Um, hello,’ said Rory.

The Doctor picked up one of the dead rats by the tail and peered at it. It was heavy, and it swung slightly in his grip. ‘Nasty,’ he remarked. ‘And purpose built.’

‘What?’ asked Amy. Her hearing was returning, but the world was still sounding muffled. ‘Did you say purpose built?’

‘Manufactured,’ the Doctor said. He reached in and peeled back the dead rat’s lips to reveal its metal teeth.

‘It’s a rat,’ he said. ‘Definitely a rat. Genetically, a rat.

From Earth. But it’s been modified. Customised.

Enhanced. And on an industrial scale, given the numbers of them.’

‘It hasn’t got eyes,’ said Amy.

‘No, because the designers didn’t think it needed them. These are sophisticated motion sensors.’ He pointed to the foam-like filler that packed the area where an ordinary rat would have had eyes.

‘Motion?’

‘In space, particularly interstellar space, it’s cold and often very, very dark. So motion is a much more sensible format to base your sensory function on.

There are some fairly advanced acoustic sensors there too.’

‘Wait,’ said Amy, shaking her head and frowning.

She knew it wasn’t possible and she knew it wouldn’t do any good, but she really wanted a cotton bud. Her ears felt like they were gummed up with glue. ‘Start again. We’re not in space.’

‘No,’ agreed the Doctor, lifting his arm so he could study the suspended rat from below. ‘We’re in the terraformer. That’s one of the very big machines that the original Morphans constructed to change Hereafter from Earth -esque to properly Earth -like!

‘You mean the Firmers?’ asked Arabel. ‘The Terra Firmers?’

‘The three mountains that aren’t mountains?’ asked Amy.

The Doctor smiled and nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I think we’re in Firmer Number Two, if I’ve been listening to Arabel correctly and my sense of direction is unerring.’ He looked at Amy. ‘And it is,’ he grinned.

‘We’re underneath the mountain?’ asked Samewell.

‘This is what a Firmer looks like inside. Well, part of it.’

‘And that factory noise?’ asked Amy.

‘The vast engines of the Firmer at work,’ said the Doctor. ‘Atmospheric processors, geo-seismic actuators, meteorological generators, seeding pumps.

It’s a world factory. It’s changing the world. And it’s been doing it for twenty-seven generations. It’s an extraordinary piece of large-scale engineering performing an even more extraordinary and even more mind-bogglingly large-scale piece of engineering.’

‘So returning to my original question,’ said Amy, pointing. ‘“Blind space rats? Huh?’”

‘Transrats is a better term,’ said the Doctor. ‘Like Transhumans. Re-engineering both genetically and biologically to be more rat than rat. A living tool, if you like.’

‘I’ve met more than one of those,’ said Amy.

‘During the great Diaspora Era,’ said the Doctor,

‘when mankind was spreading out from Earth, they were quite common on bulk generation starships or hibernation arks. Those vessels are huge, like small countries in space. And they travelled for many lifetimes to reach their destinations. The human passengers would spend thousands of years in suspended animation, ready to wake when they arrived at their final colonial destination, or else they would live out lives during the travel time. Whole civilisations could rise and fall on a generation starship in the time it took to reach another star.’

‘Seriously?’ asked Amy.

The Doctor nodded. ‘And eco-systems would develop in the ship interiors in the meantime. Pests, lice, dirt, rodents. Mankind quickly learned that the best way to keep a generation starship clean was to keep them purged. Rats eat anything. So mankind engineered rats that could survive in almost any conditions and could eat anything. Transrats lived in the dark corners of the ships, basically eating anything that wasn’t supposed to be there.’

‘So… these came here on the Morphans’ original ship?’ asked Amy.

‘Well, yes and no,’ said the Doctor. ‘The idea of them did, the technology. But they wouldn’t have lasted for twenty-seven generations. They’re not immortal, and they don’t breed. These were manufactured recently.’

‘Meaning?’

The Doctor exhaled thoughtfully. ‘Meaning there’s an automated manufacturing plant for this kind of thing here somewhere, and also a genetic stockpile containing rat DNA that it could access in order to breed new rats for conversion.’

‘A rat factory?’ asked Amy. ‘Making easy-to-build rats?’

‘Flat-pack rats,’ the Doctor agreed. He swung the rat he was holding around by the tail like it was a bolas.

‘Easy to build. Disposable.’

‘But why?’ asked Amy.

‘Presumably because there’s something wrong,’ said the Doctor. He stopped spinning the rat, realising it was pretty undignified for both of them.

‘The terraformer system has detected a loss of efficiency or some other defect,’ he said, ‘and it’s automatically starting diagnostic procedures to address it. Transrats would be a first step. Build some, release them into the systems, clean out any dirt, or clutter, or infestation, or glitches.’

‘Glitches, huh?’ said Amy. She looked at the ratthing the Doctor was holding. ‘They seemed really hungry.’

‘Because they’re not the solution to the problem afflicting the terraformers,’ said the Doctor. ‘It’s not a problem you can eat.’

‘But if they got out,’ said Bel. ‘They’d attack sheep…

goats…’

‘They might,’ the Doctor agreed. ‘Hungry, and outside the system control of the terraformer, they could go on a frenzy. That would explain the livestock kills.’

‘So the Ice Men haven’t been killing and devouring sheep, then?’ asked Amy. ‘ Warriors. I meant Warriors.’

‘No,’ said the Doctor, ‘which sorts out one of my original problems. I suspected Ice Warriors from the start. The moment I realised that something was trying to manipulate an entire planet’s climate and make it colder, I immediately thought of Ice Warriors.’

‘Well, who wouldn’t?’ asked Amy.

‘Quite,’ said the Doctor.

‘That was your hunch? The hunch you said you’d got?’

‘Yes,’ replied the Doctor. ‘It fitted the modus operandi of the Ice Warriors, except for one small detail. They’re herbivorous.’

‘So they wouldn’t be eating livestock,’ said Amy, ‘but these rats would.’

The Doctor swung the dead rat by the tail like a conker on a string. ‘Yes, if they got out. But the terraforming system should be sealed enough to prevent them escaping into the wild.’

‘You reckon the Ice Warriors broke into the terrafirmer and did something to sabotage it,’ said Amy, ‘and you also reckon the terrafirmer detected that sabotage as a problem and built the transrats to deal with it. Makes sense that the transrats would have got out through whatever hole the Ice Warriors made to get in. That’s how they got out and started eating sheep.’

‘Nice deduction, Pond,’ said the Doctor.

‘Why would these Ice Warrior things attack the Firmers, though?’ asked Arabel.

‘Because they want an Earth-like planet too, but their idea of Earth-like is colder not warmer,’ replied the Doctor.

Arabel shook her head. ‘I don’t…’ she began.

‘Your ancestors,’ said the Doctor, ‘the original Morphans, were looking for a planet like Earth.’

‘Like Earth before?’ asked Samewell.

‘Yes, like Earth before. But the chances of them finding a world that was exactly like Earth before were slim. I mean, the variables are huge. The best chance they had was to find a planet that was sufficiently like Earth—’

‘Earth-esque,’ said Amy.

‘Precisely right,’ said the Doctor. ‘If they could find a planet that was sufficiently Earth-esque, then they could use the sophisticated terramorphing systems they had on their colony ark ship to tweak the climate and make it perfect. That’s what you’ve been doing for twenty-seven generations. You’ve been watching over things while the terrafirmers tweak and finetune Hereafter to make it just right.’

‘And these charming Ice Warrior blokes,’ said Amy,

‘have a very different concept of just right.’

‘They need an Earth-like planet too,’ said the Doctor,

‘but their idea of Earth-like is not like your idea of Earth-like, it’s like—’

‘Way too many likes there, Doctor,’ said Amy.

‘OK, in broad terms you’re both looking for the same sort of world, but their ideal environmental baseline is between fifty and seventy-five degrees cooler than humanity’s.’

‘So they’re fighting against us?’ asked Arabel.

‘I’ve known them sabotage biomes before,’ said the Doctor grimly. ‘I’ve seen them doing their own terraforming. I even saw them try it on Earth once. On Earth before, before Earth before was lost. I’ve never seen them hijack someone else’s terraforming system and recalibrate it. Typical Ice Warrior pragmatism.’

‘How did you stop the rats?’ Samewell asked. He copied the Doctor and picked up one of the dead rats by the tail.

The Doctor put down the rat he was dangling. He fished his sonic screwdriver out of his jacket pocket. ‘I noticed the enhanced acoustic sensors,’ he said. ‘I guessed they’d be particularly sensitive to sonic attack.

I hoped a little high-frequency burst would be enough to zap them or drive them off.’

‘And deafen me,’ said Amy.

‘I trusted your ears wouldn’t be quite as sensitive as theirs,’ said the Doctor.

‘Well, I’ll take earache over being eaten alive by rats any day,’ Amy started to say.

Samewell let out a screech of alarm. The transrat he’d picked up wasn’t dead. It suddenly shivered, twitched, and woke from the fugue state the Doctor had blasted it into. Its huge jaws opened like a spring trap. Massive steel-veneered teeth gleamed in the half-light. Swinging itself by its tail, the rat started to snap and gnash at Samewell.

‘Put it down!’ Bel yelled.

‘Don’t put it down! Keep it at arm’s length!’ Amy shouted.

‘Aaaaaaaaaahhhh!’ Samewell observed.

The Doctor clicked open his screwdriver and calmly aimed it at the aggressive creature. Nothing happened.

‘Ooops,’ he said.

‘Doctor!’

He fiddled with the screwdriver.

‘I’ve asked too much of it today already,’ he said,

‘what with noise-cancelling the Ice Warriors and zapping the transrats, it’s really drained. It’s gone into sleep mode.’

‘Doctor!’

Amy lunged and grabbed the rat’s tail out of Samewell’s grip. He was still yelping in alarm. The transrat snapped at her repeatedly, trying to chomp her arm or her face.

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Amy snarled and swung it by the tail hard into the tunnel wall. It went limp and she dropped it. ‘Worked last time,’ she said.

‘Who is this Rory?’ asked Bill Groan.

‘He’s my friend, Elect,’ replied Vesta. ‘We met in the woods. We were both threatened. He looked out for me.’

‘I see,’ said Bill Groan.

‘I may have hit him on the head with a mallet too,’

Vesta admitted.

‘But that’s totally not important,’ said Rory.

‘He’s a stranger,’ said Chaunce Plowrite.

‘Yes,’ said Vesta.

‘Another stranger,’ said Old Winnowner. ‘That’s three today.’

A hush had fallen on the assembly. Everyone was staring at Vesta and Rory. Rory felt pretty uncomfortable. In the solamp light, the faces around him were stern and unforgiving. They seemed to be searching for answers, as though they might peel back or melt away his skin to find the secrets they were looking for. There was pent-up emotion in the hall.

These were people who had lived hard lives and, no matter how hard they worked, they did not expect those lives to change. Something profound mattered to them, something that threatened what little comfort and solace they had in their lives, and they wanted answers.

Despite sensing that, Rory could not help asking the question.

These other strangers, the other two? Were they… a girl with long red hair and a tall bloke?’

Everyone around him started muttering and chattering.

‘He admits to knowing them,’ said Old Winnowner.

‘Are they here?’ asked Rory.

‘They were here,’ said Bill Groan. ‘They escaped.’

‘How could they escape?’ asked Rory. ‘What did they escape from? Why did they need to escape?’

‘They were found to be unguidely and discovered in the practice of conjury,’ said Old Winnowner. ‘We placed them in the compter.’

‘You locked them up?’ asked Rory. ‘You locked the Doctor and Amy up? That’s a really bad idea.’

‘They are his friends!’ Vesta broke in. ‘He was travelling with them. Travelling here to well-wish us at the time of festival!’

‘They were miscreants sent to—’ Winnowner began.

‘Travelling from where?’ asked Bill Groan, cutting her short.

‘Rory and his friends come from a plantnation that we have not heard of,’ said Vesta.

‘That’s not possible!’ said Bill Groan.

‘It’s unguidely!’ cried Winnowner.

‘It’s the truth!’ replied Vesta. The voices around the hall had become quite a hubbub. ‘What is your plantnation called again, Rory?’

‘Leadworth. It’s called Leadworth.’

‘This is nonsense and it is against Guide’s way!’ said Chaunce Plowrite.

‘Look, I don’t mean to cause trouble,’ said Rory, trying to impose some calm. ‘Where I come from doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that there’s something out there. Something in the woods. And it’s dangerous. You’ve got to prepare to defend yourselves.’