Doctor Who: Out of Time

Chapter 5: White and Grey

From the extensive length of the bland white walls of the facility, the Doctor guessed that the main body of the base would expand quite far into the side of the cliff. It wouldn't surprise him if it turned out the facility reached down to the core of the planet and continued out the other side. Either way, he was most definitely a prisoner, and unless he thought of a really clever idea soon he would never know if the facility came out the other side of the planet or not.

The corridors were devoid of any other forms of life other than the Doctor and his escort, glaring white wall lights lit up the right side of the corridor and cast the convoy's shadows onto the left. Abruptly, the party stopped next to a doorway inset into the right hand side wall. This doorway was as bland as the walls themselves, and had strips of light surrounding the frame. The door itself was metal, comprised of two unimpressive halves which met in the middle, and was immaculately white.

To the Doctor, it appeared that the designers of this place had favoured utility over aesthetic, which, when compared to the bright and colourful world outside, unsettled him slightly. The door ahead opened with a hiss, both halves sliding without fault into the walls either side of the doorway. Another set of similar doors opened half a second later behind the main ones, the only difference being that these were similar. What lay beyond those doors was a room with a length and width of 2m, every surface was a frosted silver colour, and the only sign that it wasn't faultless was a panel to the right of the doorway.

The Doctor was ushered inside the room, and centralised, his guards standing in the corners of the room. Good, now he knew how many of them there were. Since being in front he hadn't known just how many they thought they needed to escort him down a corridor. The doors closed behind them, and a soft hum sounded from above and below the room, then the soft pull of gravity on the Doctor's body told him that they were going up. This was an elevator. Obviously – he was getting slow.

=-=

Anwen screamed herself back into consciousness. Then, after realising she had woken up somewhere strange and full of beds, some occupied, some not, she looked around in utter bafflement. She expected herself to have died. Perhaps this was Heaven – perhaps not. This looked like somewhere people came to die with some hope of survival. Most likely, and hopefully, it was a medical room inside a Rebel base. Presumably it was a big one for it to have this many beds – and mattresses. The room was rectangular, and housed 10 beds, five on each side. The walls were grey, some cracks threatened to open a hole in time and space, and two bulbs at either end of the ceiling illuminated the room.

The door to her left burst open and Podvel came running in, a look of relief on his face, but also the hint of sorrow and loss beneath it. Upon seeing him, Anwen remembered where she had been and what was happening before she awoke here. Herself, her mother and Podvel had been hiding in their cellar from the BSD – and then she woke here. What happened? It took her a second to realise she hadn't actually voiced the words, and put more effort into the second try, "Wha...happ..." was all she could manage before she was taken over by a loud and painful cough.

"Easy there – don't try too hard to speak, you've been out for a while." Podvel sat down on a chair next to her bed and handed her a metal cup of water. "It took a few days to get here from the settlement; I'm surprised either of us survived." She drunk the water quickly and coughed some more, but this time to clear her throat.

Her voice was hoarse, "Where are we, Podvel?" Anwen knew his expression was that of someone with a lot to say but not sure in what order to tell it.

"Your mother, she-"

"I know. If she was still here she'd either be in this room with me or she would've been the first through that door, if not already sat where you are now." She closed her eyes to suppress her emotions. "I can't let that get to me now...I'll mourn later..." She opened her eyes, staring at Podvel with a scary new intensity he hadn't expected. "Where are we?"

He gulped. "We're in the Sanctuary, Anwen. The most hidden and well defended of all the settlements."

Anwen's eyes widened. "The Sanctuary?" Her expression was not unexpected, after all, normally only a select few settlers and the most trusted Rebels are granted access into Sanctuary. It's every settler child's dream, their bedtime stories. This truly was the Heaven of the dark side.

Podvel nodded. "Yes. The Leadership wishes for an audience with you. I think they want you to join us."

Anwen stared at him in disbelief. "Me? A Rebel?" It was true, she had trained her whole life, mainly because she had had nothing better to do, to become a Rebel – but now she had friends and family she would never see again that in her heart needed avenging. They were good people. She knew that the Leadership knew this. No doubt, a soldier with a reason to go against the enemy was better than a soldier without such reason. Either way, if it got her close to the BSDCC and the BCM then she would do anything to destroy the thing that took her family and friends away. There were rumours about the BCM, that it was sentient – she'd just have to find out for herself. "Alright." She said. "Get me out of this room, and I'll grant the Leadership their audience with me. Also, I think the person to my right has died, they smell of decomposition."

Podvel frowned and stood up. He walked around Anwen's bed to the other one and shook the occupant, causing him to recoil and cover his nose after an even worse stench overlapped the original. "Yeah, I think they're dead. I'll go get you some clothes."

As she watched him leave she shouted after him. "If it was you that changed me into this sheet I'll punch you!" She then covered her nose and stopped herself from imagining her parents in a similar state.