Doctor Who | The Deepsky Atlas | Chapter Nine

[eponymous_rose]

Title: The Deepsky Atlas (9/?)
Author: eponymous_rose
Word Count: 1886
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Adventure, Humour
Characters: Fourth Doctor, Harry Sullivan, Sarah Jane Smith

Summary: And everything, just this once, makes a valiant effort at changing.

Part One: Circinus | Part Two: Caelum
Part Three: Eridanus | Part Four: Setus
Part Five: Dorado | Part Six: Leo
Part Seven: Libra | Part Eight: Gemini



CHAPTER NINE

As a general rule, Harry Sullivan didn't much like being kept in the dark.

In fact, he'd been hoping for the attachment to UNIT precisely because he rather fancied the idea of getting to do some real James Bond work: dashing about in disguises, healing the wounded, and making it home in time for a spot of tea before the next adventure. Harry liked acting, liked being the one to go out and get things done.

And so some part of him had protested rather vehemently when the Doctor had insisted that, instead of discussing matters with Caelum and the- the giant monster, Harry go upstairs with Sarah - who had, of course, insisted that she was quite all right, and politely pointed out to the Doctor that he was the one with blood all down his shirt, not her, so it wasn't really fair to-

But the Doctor could be terribly manipulative when it suited him, and Harry again had the uncomfortable feeling that he was doing exactly what he was supposed to do as he quietly but firmly led Sarah back through the passageway leading to the ground floor. She was subdued after the initial protests, and he knew by the way she was holding her arm that she must have hurt her shoulder when the creature had thrown her into the wall, but it was dark enough in the corridors that he expected he'd probably do more harm than good in trying to fix it.

"Oh, come on, Harry!" she said, finally breaking the silence as they emerged into a great library, having found the right passage with only a modicum of fuss and bother. Her voice was a bit too jovial. "You're not the least bit curious about what they're discussing down there?"

Harry cleared his throat. "Not in the least. Now, sit down and let me have a look at that arm, old-" She shot him a look that would probably have made their multiocular friend blink. "-Sarah," he finished lamely.

"It's all right," she said, and shifted her arm around as though to prove it. Harry moved forward at her hiss of pain and snagged her hand before she fell.

"I think your shoulder must be dislocated," Harry said, and paused, hands hovering stupidly over the limb in question. "Er," he said. "Do you mind if I-"

Sarah sighed; her face had lost some of its pallor, and she certainly seemed to be rallying. "Harry," she said, "if you do anything involving the- the crunching of bone, warn me beforehand. Apart from that, I'm rather indifferent."

"Good-o," said Harry, and prodded carefully at her shoulder. "Can you shrug, Sarah? Just a bit, mind."

She did as he asked, with a wince. "What do you think they're all on about down there?" she said, in a small voice. He met her eyes for a moment, and she glared back, as though daring him to comment on her weakness. Wordlessly, he dug in his pocket and held out his handkerchief. She stared at him like it was some sort of alien artifact.

"Your nose, Sarah," said Harry, rolling his eyes. "It's bleeding again."

"Oh," said Sarah, automatically reached for it with her bad arm, and winced. "Oh, I'm just a terrible wreck, aren't I?"

"You, Sarah Jane?" Harry grinned. "Never." She swatted at him with her good arm, but it was a halfhearted attempt. With his best stern, medically authoritative look, he took her arm and began prodding her shoulder experimentally. "What's more, the Doctor looks much worse that you do."

Sarah snorted. "Flatterer. Oh, you know him. He'll just pop off to sleep for a bit, wake up wondering why we're being so lazy and hanging about here when we could be nearly getting killed somewhere much more interesting. I shouldn't worry." For a long moment, she was silent except for the odd wince or admonishment when he touched a sore spot, but she kept casting anxious glances back to the opening of the passage.

"I'm sure he's all right," said Harry.

Sarah sniffed. "I know that," she said. "I wasn't worried." She paused, and again her gaze turned towards the passageway.

"Oh," said Harry, nodding. "Just keeping an eye out for anything following our tracks, then?"

"That's right," said Sarah quickly.

"Ah," said Harry. "Look, would you mind staying still a minute?"

"Sorry." But a moment later, she'd turned again to face the darkened corridor.

"You don't trust that, er, that monster, then?" Harry found himself following her gaze, and the passage seemed for a moment to be impossibly dark, full of imagined shadows - even some light from this library would surely shine through at some point!

Sarah snorted. "Any further than I could throw him! I don't know what the Doctor thinks he's playing at- ooh, careful!"

He muttered an apology and turned his attention back to the task at hand. "The good news is," he said after a moment, releasing her shoulder, "I don't think it's dislocated after all. Looks more like some bruising, a bit of swelling. Maybe some small fractures, but we'd need better facilities than these to see them."

Sarah peered around. "Lots of books," she said. "I don't suppose that's any help?"

"I don't suppose it is," said Harry, and realised she was staring over his shoulder, at the bookshelf behind him. He turned to follow her gaze. "What is it?"

But even as he asked, he noticed the big volume midway across the shelf. "Well," he said. "That's a bit odd. Shakespeare here, of all places! Still, I don't suppose there's any reason why he shouldn't have enjoyed a spot of intergalactic-"

"Look beneath it, Harry," said Sarah.

Harry did, leaning down to take in the bottom shelf, and saw a volume of poetry by T.S. Eliot, and one by William Butler Yeats, Dylan Thomas, Tennyson, Keats, Poe, Pound, Frost-

"Well," he said again. "Somebody's made themselves quite a collection." He straightened. "Probably some eccentric alien's idea of an Earth exhibition. The Doctor did say this place used to be a kind of trading post, didn't he? I'll bet they had all sorts of people here. Wonder if the time distortions have any-"

Sarah cleared her throat and pointed slightly to Harry's right. He blinked at her, then ducked down to look more carefully at the books-

Two glowing orange eyes flickered at him from the darkness behind them.

With the lack of grace that he'd always felt would be the Achilles Heel to his aspirations of James Bondness, he gave a yelp and fell flat on his backside.

There was definitely something living back there, behind the books - he could hear it moving, could hear it shifting about in the small space behind the paperbacks, and the occasional book slipped off the shelf with a thump. The eyes narrowed at him, and the creature shifted its weight and-

"Mrow?" it said.

Harry blinked. Another book toppled out of position, and a little tabby wove its way between the remaining tomes. Sarah, he realised, was snickering.

"Hello, puss!" she crooned, and the cat trotted over to her, purring.

Harry sighed and got back to his feet. "Well," he said, "you might have warned me!"

Sarah grinned and scratched the cat behind the ears. "Sorry," she said, and the lack of sincerity in her voice was positively palpable. "I thought it must be something terrible, too, at first." She directed her attention to the cat, which was staring at a loose thread on her trouser leg with some fascination. "And what are you doing here, puss? All alone in a great old lighthouse on a planet that's who knows where?"

"You'd think Caelum would have mentioned seeing a cat about the place," Harry said.

"You'd think he might have thought to mention the giant basement and the monster living down there, too!," she retorted. "I think there's something going on with the time distortions, here, Harry, pulling people in from different times. The Doctor's probably trying to get Caelum and that creature to tell him their stories. Maybe the cat just got itself caught up in all this, wound up stuck in the lighthouse like everyone else."

Harry shrugged. "That sounds reasonable," he said, though, all things considered, his definition of 'reasonable' had recently become rather more all-encompassing. He clicked his fingers to get the cat's attention; with a questioning meow, it trotted over to him. "Not exactly a wild little thing, is it?"

"Ah, has Pye been startling you lot?"

Sarah and Harry jumped at the new voice, a low, gruff, monotone. The cat gave a plaintive meow and dashed over to the newcomer, who was a rather ordinary-looking chap, all told, ginger with a bit of a balding pate and a squint over his thick reading glasses.

"Look, I didn't hear you come in," said the man, scratching the back of his head. "I thought I locked the back door. We're open, you only had to come round the front."

"Sorry?" said Sarah, who recovered first from her bewilderment.

The man peered at her bruised face and bloodied nose. "Look here, are you all right?"

Sarah and Harry exchanged a nervous glance. "The, er, the cat startled her and she ran into a bookshelf," said Harry quickly. Sarah, dabbing her nose with his handkerchief, glared at him briefly before venturing a quick smile at the man.

"Yes," she said. "Clumsy old me. Fancy that, being scared of a little moggie." Harry cleared his throat, and she smiled sweetly at him.

"All right," said the man, with a suspicious glance. "Just let me know if you're looking for anything in particular." He rounded the corner.

"Wait," said Sarah, and started after him. She gasped. "Harry, come look at this."

Harry followed her around the corner and froze.

Where there should have been still more stacks of books, or at the very least a great stone wall, there was a massive pane-glass window - which was startling in and of itself, but what was still more unnerving was that the window looked out onto a busy street, full of people and cars and-

"What's happening?" Sarah said.

The man was behind a sort of counter, and- and there was a cash register on top of it, of all things! He cast them a still more suspicious glance. "Look, are you sure you're all right, miss?"

"Oh, she's fine," said Harry. "Quite all right. Aren't you, Sarah?"

Wordlessly, she turned back round the corner, and Harry followed, with a resigned shrug at the man at the front. "This isn't right, Harry," said Sarah. "The Doctor and I, we- we were here, and it was just a library!"

"This is very strange," Harry said, but at that instant his gaze happened to land on the back wall. He paused. "I don't mean to alarm you, old girl-"

"Too late," said Sarah. "I'm alarmed."

They stared in mute horror at the spot where the passageway had been, the corridor leading back through the very heart of the lighthouse, back to the massive altar, and the Doctor-

In its place was a perfectly innocuous old wooden door. Tacked firmly to its surface was a scrap of paper that read:

NO EXIT
PLEASE USE FRONT DOOR

Comments

[hms-surrender.livejournal.com]

Oooh, creepy!

Hehe, love Harry's aspiration of being James Bond.

[brimmins.livejournal.com]

Ahh! Just when I think I can be satisfied with the knowledge of what happens next, now I can't wait to find out what happens next-next. I love Sarah's "I wasn't worried." n_n Great!

[dree-drey.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. That can't be good.

[rhia-starsong.livejournal.com]

Oh, my. I do love Harry so much. Is there more of this by any chance?

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

Hee, now that's fortuitous timing: I was hoping to have the next part up tonight!

Glad you're enjoying - thanks for the comment! :)

[rhia-starsong.livejournal.com]

Hive mind syndrome at its best!