The Sands Of Time Part 2

But there was nothing there. Just another sarcophagus standing by the wall. It was tall and wide, shaped like an upright figure just as all the others were. The arms were crossed over the chest, each holding a staff. The headress over and around the face was alternate lines of black and a lighter colour, but it was too dark for Tegan to make out any details. She watched it for a moment. The sarcophagus stood silent, still, and lonely.

Just as Tegan was about to move on, she became aware of a faint humming sound. It was not unlike the background noise in the TARDIS console room. She looked round to see where it was coming from. Had the TARDIS door swung open behind her, perhaps caught and kept ajar by her cloak? But the door was not open; and the sound was coming from behind her. From the sarcophagus. From the sarcophagus which was now lit with an eerie inner light that seemed to emanate from the lighter strips of the headress and spill out down the rest of the body.

The strobing blue light mesmerised Tegan for a second. It held her attention and her mind. Then just as she broke free of the image and found her voice, the light cut out.

'Doctor,' she called across the room. Her voice echoed over the relics and skidded across the coffins.

In the distance, the Doctor's silhouette turned sharply in the direction of the noise and broke into a run. Lit for a moment in the doorway behind, another figure slipped silently and swiftly into the room.

The hand was large and rough and smelled of fish. Nyssa had enough time to notice each of these facts, and to let out the beginnings of a surprised shriek before the hand closed completely over her mouth. Her cry stopped as abruptly as her a.s.sailant grabbed her.

Across the room, Nyssa could see the dark figure of Tegan and the hurried outline of the Doctor as he arrived beside her and clasped her shoulders, asking her what was wrong. The tableau receded as Nyssa was pulled back through the room in the opposite direction. The man holding her grunted with the effort as he tried to prevent her from crying out or wrenching herself free.

Nyssa bit and wriggled and stamped, but nothing she did seemed to shake her attacker's resolve or his grip. She pulled at the huge hand clamped to her mouth, but without success.

In the distance the Doctor glanced briefly towards them. Nyssa could imagine him peering into the blackness and wondering where she was and what her stifled cry had been. Her eyes widened in blind appeal and she struggled all the more violently.

But the Doctor turned back to Tegan, moved her aside and started to examine the sarcophagus behind her. In a last desperate effort, Nyssa twisted in the doorway, her foot las.h.i.+ng out at a nearby display table and her half-free hand catching at the doorframe as she was dragged from the room.

'Look at the workmans.h.i.+p,' the Doctor said again as he wiped imaginary dust from the figure's face. 'Definitely Osiran influence.' He waved a hand at the stylised line of the eyebrows by way of proof. 'Well, at least we know what drew the TARDIS off course.' He turned back to Tegan, only slightly daunted by the fact that she appeared not to be paying any attention to him and was instead looking round the room behind them. 'Probably caused the stabiliser failure too, come to that.' He jammed his hands back into his pockets and leaned suddenly forwards. 'Tegan, if you don't want to know, then please don't ask,' he finished as if continuing the previous sentence.

As he had suspected, she did not register the change of subject or the criticism.

'Where's Nyssa?' she asked instead.

'Oh, I expect she's -'

The Doctor's expectations were cut short by the sound of a table cras.h.i.+ng to the ground. The sound echoed round the room as the table spilled its contents across the floor. Something smashed in a minor explosion of plaster. Something else skidded and rolled across the ground, spinning to a stop at the edge of the carpet.

Tegan and the Doctor both turned towards the source of the noise, towards the far end of the room. And saw the silhouetted struggling as Nyssa was dragged through the doorway by a large dark figure.

'Hey!' Tegan shouted, tripping on the edge of her cloak as she tried to break into a run. As she stumbled, the Doctor leaped past her and vaulted a collection of relics which stood between himself and the door. Behind him he was aware of Tegan struggling with her cloak. In front of him he saw Nyssa finally disappear from view, the door slammed shut behind her.

The door was unlocked. But the room beyond was empty.

The Doctor paused for the briefest of split-seconds. Then he was off again, racing across the small room, and cras.h.i.+ng through the door at the end of it. He heard it bang in to the wall in front of him and slam shut again behind him as he skidded down the stairs. He heard Tegan's m.u.f.fled shouts as she followed. He caught the smallest glimpse of Nyssa's flailing trailing leg as it disappeared round a bend in the wide stone staircase ahead of him.

But when he reached the landing below, there was no clue as to which way to go. The stairs continued on down, but three doorways gave out on to the floor he was now on. The Doctor paused for breath and to listen for any hint which way to go. But all he could hear was Tegan clattering down the stairs behind him.

'Which way did they go?' Tegan asked as she reached the landing, her cloak swirling behind her.

The Doctor adopted a pained expression. 'Do you really think I'd be hanging around here if I knew that?'

'Great. So what do we do now?'

'We think.'

'Think?'

'Yes, Tegan, think think. It can be really quite useful - you should try it occasionally.'

Tegan snorted. 'And what good will thinking do Nyssa? We need to find her.'

'For example, why do you think they - whoever they they are - have taken her? are - have taken her?

Hmm?'

'It doesn't matter why, Doctor. We've got to find her.'

The Doctor smiled and waved a finger at Tegan. 'But if we knew why, we might know where. As it is, we have to guess. And I would guess they're taking her somewhere else.'

'Brilliant,' Tegan said, sounding as though she actually meant something quite different.

'Tegan,' admonished the Doctor. 'Somewhere else would suggest they're taking her outside the building. Away from the museum.' He nodded, primarily for his own benefit. 'So we need to be outside. We need to find their means of transport.'

'Transport?'

'They're not going to drag Nyssa kicking and screaming through the streets of London, now are they. Would you?'

But the Doctor did not wait for an answer to this. Instead he started down the staircase again. 'Come along,' he called back over his shoulder as he jumped down another three steps.

The night air was cold and dry. What breath Nyssa was able to exhale between the fingers of the clammy hand covering her mouth was forced through as a warm humid mist which drifted and thinned into the foggy distance. Nyssa had all but given up struggling and was trying instead to slow her progress as much as possible. She had heard the clatter of pursuit and her hope now was that the Doctor could catch up with them.

As she was dragged backwards out of a side entrance to the large building, Nyssa had no way of knowing where she was headed, but she had a good view of where she had been. She spent little time in considering how much this was like travelling with the Doctor, and more dragging her feet sluggishly through the thin sprinkling of snow which covered the frozen cobbles. Her heels b.u.mped over the small rounded stones and her calves were jarred by the jolting.

Further back along the dark shadow of the building, another door was opened into the foggy night. It swung heavily outward and sprung back slightly as it reached the limit of its hinge. A moment later the Doctor bounded through the doorway, followed closely by Tegan. At the same instant, the man pulling Nyssa stopped.

Nyssa's immediate thought was that the man would release her and make a run for it. The Doctor and Tegan were now so close that they must catch him. The Doctor was waving and shouting; Tegan was struggling to keep her cloak from under her feet. The fog parted before them as they dashed forward.

But then Nyssa felt herself hoisted roughly up a couple of high steps and bundled through a small door. At the same time the hand was released from her face and the ground jolted beneath her. She was thrown back on to an upholstered bench seat. In front of her a pair of eyes gleamed darkly, and gaslight reflected for a second from the blade of a knife. Behind her, Nyssa could hear the Doctor's continued shouts above the accelerating rhythm of the horse's hooves and the crack of the coachman's whip.

The carriage was soon swallowed up by the foggy night. For a while the sounds of the horse's hooves on the snowy cobbles and the clatter of the wheels made their increasingly m.u.f.fled way through the thick fog. Only when they were gone did the Doctor stop running. He drew in a deep breath, threw his rolled Panama hat down into the roadway and carefully stamped on it.

Tegan caught up with him in time to see him retrieve the hat, unroll it, dust it down on his coat and jam the cold, soggy result back on his head. Then he sat down in the snow, pulled his knees up to his chest, and stared into the night.

Tegan said nothing. She pulled her cloak closer round her and raised the deep hood, aware of the cold despite the enforced exercise.

'That street lamp.' The Doctor nodded towards the nearest one. 'Interesting, don't you think?'

'No.' Tegan crouched down beside him. 'Doctor, we lost Nyssa.'

'Yes, I know,' the Doctor said without a trace of sarcasm. Rather he seemed in a thoughtful mood. 'And we'd better find her.' He leaped to his feet and strode over to the lamp post. 'Given the lighting technology, the ambient sound and,' he waved an arm through the misty night, 'pollution, I should say we're round about late Victorian.'

Tegan could see no reason to disagree. 'Does that help?'

The Doctor thought for a moment. 'Probably not,' he admitted at last. 'But I like to get things straight in my mind. And we still need an exact date to reset the TARDIS navigation systems.' He walked round the lamp post, leaving a slushy trail in the snow. 'That Osiran lodestone must have picked up some residual vortex energy from the TARDIS time track. That would explain why we were drawn off course, and might have caused the stabiliser failure.' He stopped his circ.u.mnavigation and peered pensively at Tegan. 'Also why the sarcophagus appeared to glow. Probably leaking out the time differential to prevent a short.'

'Does that that help?' help?'

'Possibly. If the sarcophagus and Nyssa's kidnapping are connected.

Though I don't see how they could be. Perhaps this gentleman can enlighten us.'

It took Tegan a second to realize what the Doctor had said. Then she looked round to see who he was talking about. She was still looking when she became aware of the sound of footsteps. Almost immediately, a figure pushed its way through the fog in front of them and stepped into the gaslight.

The man was tall, his figure fleshed out by the cloak he wore. A tall black hat exaggerated his height as he walked towards them. His face, as it caught what light there was, was thin. He looked to be in his late thirties.

'Ah, there you are,' he said in a deep, measured voice.

The Doctor and Tegan exchanged glances. 'You were expecting to find us here?' the Doctor asked.

'Indeed, sir.' The stranger switched on a smile. 'I have a communication.'

'For us?' Tegan pushed forward to see the man better. 'Something to do with Nyssa?'

The man frowned and seemed genuinely surprised. 'To do with what?'

Tegan shrugged and turned away.

The man continued: 'I'm sorry, Miss Jovanka, I did not understand the reference.'

Tegan stopped dead. 'You know who I am?' She turned slowly back. The Doctor too seemed surprised.

'Indeed.' There was an awkward pause. Then the man seemed to sense that perhaps he needed to elaborate. 'How could I forget you so soon?' he added helpfully.

'You've met before?' the Doctor gestured between the stranger and Tegan.

The stranger laughed, a surprised rather than an amused laugh. 'But of course,' he said. 'As you well know, Doctor.'

Tegan decided to try a different approach. 'How did you know we were here?'

The man shrugged. 'Lord Kenilworth said I would find you here. But if I had missed you, I a.s.sume you are still at the Savoy.'

'Absolutely.' The Doctor moved Tegan aside and reached out a hand. 'Spot on. Now, about this communication.'

'Of course, sir.' The man fumbled inside his cloak and drew out an envelope. He handed it to the Doctor. 'It's for tomorrow afternoon, as agreed. Now, if you will excuse me, I must be getting back. I still have various duties to discharge this evening.' He bowed slightly to them both, then turned and walked into the fog. In the distance, Big Ben began to chime midnight.

The Doctor examined the envelope. He showed it to Tegan. On the front it was addressed in a neat efficient hand to The Doctor The Doctor. 'Curiouser and curiouser,' he muttered as he opened it.

Tegan stood on tiptoes and looked over the Doctor's shoulder as he pulled out the card inside. He glared at her briefly, and she smiled back. Then he held the card so they could both see it in the light from the gas lamp above.

It was a plain white card, edged in gold. It was about five inches long by three inches high. Tegan read it twice.

'Not that unusual, Tegan,' the Doctor said after a while. These events were not uncommon. The Victorians loved to marry ceremony with antiquity and some semblance of learning.'

[image]

'Maybe, Doctor' Tegan said, 'but I'd say it's pretty weird to get invited at midnight by a complete stranger to a mummy unwrapping party.'

The thin layer of snow cracked and collapsed under Tegan's feet. Her breath formed clouds in front of her face, and her feet ached. She felt as if they had been walking for days, though she suspected that it was probably only about an hour all told. She was barely paying attention to the Doctor's lecture on the history of Victorian London and glanced only occasionally at the features of interest he pointed out along their route.

He should get an umbrella and do the tour-guide job properly, she thought as he took her arm again and waved a learned hand at yet another bridge across the Thames. But for the most part she was thinking about Nyssa, and she suspected that behind his erudite manner the Doctor was as well.

Finally seeming to sense that he was making no progress in distracting Tegan, the Doctor had quietened. They made their way along the Embankment in silence broken only by the background hum of the city and the foghorns of the boats on the river. A gaslight haze lay over the nearby rooftops, fading into gloom and darkness in the distance.

'It smells,' Tegan said at last. She felt this was a fair comment on the Doctor's appreciation of Victorian architecture.

'Smelt a good deal more before they put the sewer in,' the Doctor said, immediately back into his undaunted spiel. 'All the sewage used to just go into the river. Now it gets carried ten miles East.'

'What happens to it there?'

The Doctor lowered his head and kicked at a swell of soft snow. It exploded in a puff of white dust. 'It just goes into the river at Barking,' he muttered and quickly went on: 'Another marvellous feat of Victorian engineering.'