Doctor Who - 03 - The August Sky

.11. Somebody Has Died

The violence of first tremors threw Wilfred off the bed, and as he opened his eyes he saw huge windows first bulging inwards and then shattering, glass flying everywhere. He half crawled to the middle of the room, moaning in fear. He could see the waves rising above the Cardiff Bay Barrage; the sea water of Bristol Channel, which usually was much lower than the sweet water of the Bay, was now sloshing across the barrage, waves rising high as houses and speeding towards the Mermaid Quay. The August sky seemed slashed with bright streaks – stars were raining down on earth. Next second, all the lights went out.

Wilfred could hear people screaming in adjoining apartments. He got to his feet with effort, only to be pushed backwards by another wave of tremors. He landed on a soft sofa, just as the heavy ceiling lamp smashed in the spot he had been standing a moment ago.

He was looking through the non-existent window at the bleeding sky and at the waves biting the side of the building. His eyes were glossy with terror.

"Oh, my God!" he intoned. "Oh, my God! All the stars! All the people! Oh, all them poor souls!"

***

Harriet Jones was rushed from the third floor of 10 Downing Street, and into the cabinet room, surrounded by a circle of secretaries and bodyguards. They were still dressed in their official clothes; Harriet wore a white sleeping gown and fluffy slippers. Lamps were swaying and the furniture was sliding back and forth across the tilting floor. The heavy door slammed behind them, cutting them off the rest of the world, locked in the impact chamber of the cabinet.

The situation was so familiar, Harriet almost laughed. Was there a Slitheen waiting for them outside.

"Vinegar," she whispered under her breath. "Is it Hannibal again?"

"Yes, Prime Minister?" her secretary shouted. Harriet looked at him, slightly confused.

"No, nothing, Phillip," she said. "It's just..."

The huge table broke in half and tilted sideways, hitting the floor with a thud.

"Phones are dead!" somebody yelled.

"Computers as well!" somebody else chipped in.

"We have no..."

Another thud.

"Is it an attack? Are we under attack?"

"It's the end! It's the end! It's the end!"

"Now, be quiet!" Harriet interrupted. "All of you! We know nothing! But we'll be all right! Just... don't lose your heads, will you?"

"Prime Minister, it'd be better if..."

The lights went out.

***

Rhys heard the Hub's door slamming loudly, just before the lights were replaced with emergency red glow. He got up shakily, holding on to the wall, one hand searching the pockets of his leather jacket, and then his denim trousers. He found the mobile and dialled Gwen's number.

He could hear everything around him breaking but he didn't give a damn. She was out somewhere, with the rest of them, they didn't even tell him where, and now the world was ending, and she was alone. Well, she wasn't, but she wasn't with him either.

There was nothing, his mobile was silent, and as he looked at the screen he saw that there was no reception. He swore and then he apologized to anyone who could be listening.

"Please," he whispered. "Let me find her. Let me get to her. Please, please, let me out!"

***

The TARDIS hit the front of the wave head on, and everything became a tumult of images. She was holding it, holding there, just holding on. There was no up and no down, no then and no now, now back and no forward. And there was no future. The TARDIS faced the wave, and was holding it back. But she couldn't hold all of it, and she couldn't hold it for long.

The Doctor was clutching to the pillar, screaming. Locks in the floor opened and all the memorabilia, collected by centuries, were flying now around him, hitting him, shattering. There was fire. And ringing. A loud, deep toll of the Cloister Bell.

***

"It's an earthquake!" Martha shouted, crawling closer to Jack on all fours.

"It's more than that," he answered. He was looking up, at the sky. His face was as grey as dust.

Car alarms and fire alarms were wailing in the distance, and people were screaming in terror. There was a constant rumbling of convulsing ground.

"What do you think? Five points?" Ianto yelled.

"Not funny," said Gwen.

"It is a bit," Ianto shouted. "An earthquake in Cardiff. It is funny."

"You're mad," Mickey moaned nearby.

"It's dark," Jack said.

"What?"

"That's the city, over there." He pointed at something underneath the broken sky. "And there's always a halo. It's all the lights in the centre. But it's gone. There's no light. No power."

"Brilliant," Gwen snorted. "Now what?"

"We need to get to the Hub."

"And how are you planning to do that?" Ianto asked, sprawled flat on the ground.

Jack got to his knees.

"I'll drive."

"You're mad!" Mickey exclaimed.

***

Wilfred raised his hand and wiped tears rolling down his cheeks. Tremors subsided, but the waves were still sloshing around the Bay. And the stars were still falling.

"Oh, all them poor souls!" Wilfred whispered.

***

"It stopped," Phillip's voice announced. Harriet pushed away a snide comment, just waiting to slip out of her mouth. She felt her way to the nearest chair and slumped down, totally exhausted.

"Is everybody all right?" she asked and got a hum of "Yeses" in return. "Good. Now. Can we focus on establishing contact with the rest of the world? And does anybody have matches? A lighter? Two dry sticks?"

***

Sylvia Noble slowly made her way to the window and looked outside. The entire street was dark, except for a few cars flashing their hazard warning lights and wailing madly. There were people rushing out of their houses; it seemed that half Chiswick was out on the street, gawking at the sky.

Sylvia wrapped a shawl around her arms and stepped outside as well. Mr Singh, her neighbour, waved towards her with a flashlight. She screwed her eyes, her face pale and tired, Donna's shawl pressed to her mouth and nose.

"Have you seen that, Sylvia?" Mr Singh shouted. "Have you seen that sky?"

She only nodded. She looked up, at the sky full of glorious stellar fireworks.

"It's not even thirteenth," Mr Singh wondered. "It should be the thirteenth of August for meteor showers. But it's the twenty second, am I right?"

"Yeah," Sylvia agreed absent-mindedly.

"What does it mean, though?" another neighbour, Mrs Bowden, asked over the fence.

"Somebody has died," Sylvia whispered, her lips pale. "Somebody has died."

***

The TARDIS was drifting, dark and quiet.