The Time of Change

Attack of the Cybermen

Every window is blown from its sill, shattered glass showering down on us like poisonous rain. I dart to the Doctor's side as my back door splinters into a million pieces. The roof caves in, and it collapses with a deafening crash, shaking the very snow-coated earth beneath our feet. Another boom signifies that the wall at the front of the house has crumbled. I watch fearfully as the walls on all sides give up one by one, until nothing is left of my home but a burning pile of wood and debris. Everything inside—everything—has been destroyed. My clothes, my photographs, my paintings and art, my bedroom, all of it gone. Ash begins to fly around us, the remnants of my life scattering in the wind.

Silence engulfs the street briefly before I hear my neighbors on the other end of begin shouting, "What was that?" The closest house to mine (or what used to be mine) rests on the far corner of the same block. With the snow gathering and sticking to the hard ground, it may take people a minute to arrive on scene. A hollowness creeps into my heart unlike any other. My chest feels heavy, as if someone is sitting on it. Within the span of a few moments, I have lost everything I have ever worked for.

Suddenly, I hear it: a sound almost like the steady thump of footsteps approaching. For a fraction of a second I think I imagined it, that I placed a different context onto the crackling of the wood, but the noise prevails in constant rhythm. I wedge closer to the Doctor, staring at the wreckage that used to be my home. I both hope he hears it too and pray he doesn't.

Out of the smoke and fire comes a gleam of silver. I jump when I see it but continue to watch. Another flashes a little to the left of the first. This time I point my index finger at exactly where it was. The Doctor glances at me, then at where I'm pointing, but in his firm gaze is something different than before. Recognition. Hatred. Fear?

Suddenly an electric bolt strikes the grass not two inches from where I stand. He pulls me into him, and we watch as a small army of robots emerges from the destruction. They are tall, but their movements are jerky, synchronized in an awkward manner. Their legs lift and stomp back into the ground again. On the head of the suit is an unprotected, uncovered opening. Through it, I can clearly see a human brain.

"Doctor?" I whisper tremulously. He reaches into his inner coat pocket and pulls out a tubular item. Its tip is split several ways like a flower bud. I see him touch a tiny button on the side, and the metal petals open. In the center is an orb of neon green light that sounds like a high-pitched, sped-up version of the TARDIS. It whirs softly, but the noise rings out with a great volume in the dead-silent yard. He points it threateningly at the approaching sentry.

"What are you lot doing here, eh?" he asks loudly, addressing the robots. At once they all come to a stop. Now that they're still, I attempt to count their number, and it looks as if there are about eight of them. "You're an awful long way from home, aren't you? Seems to be a bit of a bad habit for you lately. Now, there's no way that you came here all on your own, so what I am going to ask is, who sent you?" He taps the tubular item to his temple once, then adds, "This is reckless, but Cybermen aren't reckless. What's the point in demolishing a civilian home?"

Cybermen. A little bell rings in my head, reminding me of how he said at the water tower that I would meet them soon. I suppose "soon" is now.

"We are here for the Doctor," the Cyberman in front says in a techno-monotone. I shiver, but it has nothing to do with the cold.

The Doctor scoffs. "Ah, no, you're not, otherwise you would've killed me in 1896 when you had the chance," he tells them. "You're here for something, but it's not me. Why do you want her?" he demands harshly, inclining his head toward me. "Don't you think you've killed her enough as it is?"

My heart stops. Killed?

The Cyberman takes an earthquake-inducing step forward and points its arm at the Doctor, its fist clenched tight. I feel the Doctor stiffen beside me, his strange device still aimed at the Cybermen. "Questioning is futile," it tells him. I know it isn't possible for something with no emotion in its voice to sound cold, but that's how it sounds: spiteful and cruel. Fear bubbles to life in my veins once again. "You will be deleted."