Touch The Sky: Doctor Who/Studio C [Book 3]

Journey's End (Part 3)

"So..." Mallory started quietly. "Rose saved my life, indirectly."

"I guess so," Matt replied under his breath, checking the street they were about to cross three times before he was satisfied there were no Daleks. "As if the day couldn't get any weirder..."

They fell into silence once more. "Can I say something stupid?"

He let out a dry chuckle. "Why not?"

"Do you think... if we manage to survive this... we should name the baby Tyler? After her?"

Matt shrugged. "Weren't you thinking another M name?"

She shook her head. "I dunno. Besides, we could be dead before tomorrow, so does it really matter?"

On that morbid note, they fell back into silence until they spotted a familiar form.

"Cyndi?"

The redhead spun suddenly from her pacing the street, not quite able to hide the anxiety in the hard lines of her posture. The smile she plastered on didn't fix her image any. "There you are," she said to Matt and Mallory. "I was starting to worry."

Mallory only stared at her for a moment before asking, "Where's Mark?"

Cyndi broke eye contact before muttering, "Called away."

"By who? UNIT? Is it to do with that key thing of his?"

"Something like that," Cyndi said. "But we appear to have a bigger problem." A whisper of unintelligible words washed over them and she shuddered.

"What was that?" Matt asked sharply.

"It shouldn't exist," Cyndi said flatly, starting to pace again. "Even we Time Agents thought it was a myth, some pretend remnant of the Time War that never really was." Before they could protest that that didn't really explain anything, she continued. "It calls itself the Nightmare Child—a creature that feeds on thought rather than matter. Well, I shouldn't say that—it prefers thought. A single memory could sustain it more than an entire planet... but an entire planet will do if it can't find anything else." She shook her head. "The rumor was that the only reason it made an appearance in the Time War was that it could, theoretically, be controlled by a telepath of sufficient strength."

I saw your command ship fly into the jaws of the Nightmare Child, the Doctor had said to Davros—and now it was here, too. "And...where it is, exactly?" Mallory asked warily.

Cyndi glanced up. "Out in the Cascade, somewhere. Waiting."

Matt cursed under his breath. "So we don't just have those bloody Daleks to deal with—and evidently the madman that created them in the first place—but this Nightmare Child?"

"And no telepath to control it with," Mallory added, as if the situation needed to get worse. "There's no way the Daleks will give the Doctor a long enough break to worry about it—if a Time Lord has that 'sufficient strength' in that first place."

"He might," Cyndi said. "Fortunately, you have me."

A terribly long moment passed. "Cyndi, you're a psychic, not a telepath," Matt finally said.

"Formerly," she replied stiffly. "Currently... I think that perhaps I could. We might have a weapon against the Daleks besides the Doctor."

~~~

"PRISONERS WILL STAND IN THE DESIGNATED AREA," a Dalek ordered, ushering Sarah Jane, Mickey, Jackie, and several dozen others with their hands pressed to the back of their heads into a massive, vaulted room. Scores of Daleks hovered along, watching their prisoners for the slightest sign of rebellion.