No, that was too hard. Her head was hurting. She decided on the other senses. She couldn't hear anything. No, wait, she could just hear something. It was very faint. It sounded like some kind of chant coming from outside. The room smelt of stone, but why would these savage people be using stone? Didn't they usually make their huts and buildings out of dung or mud or something? But then again, they were on another planet. Maybe things were different here, or maybe she was just too uneducated on the matter.
Touch. Ouch! Her leg hurt. She was sat on a cold stone floor, her back against the wall and her legs stretched out in front of her. Her thigh was hurting and she decided to leave it alone. And she certainly couldn't taste anything. Her throat was as dry as sand paper as well.
So here she was; locked away in a cold dark prison cell awaiting probable execution. She remembered she’d be carried for quite a while, but she kept passing in and out of consciousness and god knows how long she'd been here for. She didn't want to give in, but she had nothing else to hope for. So she just sat and waited for the inevitable.
“I beg your pardon!?” spat the Doctor.
Nivere was putting out the fire. “That girl will delay our exploration. We must go on.”
“No,” said the Doctor defiantly. “I'm not leaving her to die.”
“She's probably dead already. It's been a long time,” said Bridges unhelpfully.
“I see it didn't take long for you to recover from your plant attack then?” said Ivy spitefully to Bridges.
“Well I propose to put it to the vote.” He turned to the others. “Which ones will come with me to the tribe and rescue Caroline?”
Danny and Ivy immediately crossed to the Doctor’s side, slowly followed by Dennington. There was an awkward silence amongst the others.
“Is that it?” asked the Doctor.
“It's not worth the risk,” said Aamina. “She was foolish enough to get herself into this situation so I don't see why we should help.”
“If it wasn't for that woman you'd probably be dead,” said Dennington, reminding her of the spear attack.
Nivere stepped forward. “Mr Dennington, you have been a good friend of mine. Are you going to turn your back on this expedition now?”
Dennington felt himself give-way under the respect that his Captain offered him. “Captain, I'm not turning my back on the expedition. We can pick it up later. What's the rush?”
“Look around you,” said Nivere. “From what we've heard this place has more defence systems and traps than the city of Exxilon. I want to get to the Eye as soon as possible.”
“Then I can't go with you. Not yet,” said Dennington sadly.
“Very well. Then I must insist that the Doctor comes with me.”
“Now wait just a minute -” began the Doctor.
“No,” interrupted Nivere.
“If you insist on this, then Coldstone and Dennington can go and look for the woman. The Doctor and Danny stays with us.”
“No,” said Danny. “Caz is my friend. I want to help her.”
“Agreed. It’s my fault that she’s in this situation,” said the Doctor.
“Absolutely not. I don’t trust you, Doctor.”
“You stupid old cow,” growled Danny.
Grasp made a move to grab Danny, but Nivere held him back.
“Look,” said Ivy, “it’s fine, Doctor. Me and Mark will go and find Caroline. You just carry on and get to the Eye. It’s pointless arguing with her.”
Danny shook his head and turned away.
“Are you sure about this, Ivy?”
“I’ve spent enough time with you to know what I can and can’t do. And I can do this. We’ll bring back Caroline safely. I promise.”
The Doctor, Grasp, Nivere, Aamina, Danny and Bridges walked down the gently sloping hill to the beginning of the path. It wound on into the distance through the shrubbery and a chill went up Danny's back as he stepped onto it.
“How do you feel?” asked Nivere, as if expecting something to happen.
“Absolutely fine,” said the Doctor. “In fact I've never felt better.”
“That's odd,” said Bridges. “Especially after your friend has been kidnapped.”
The smile disappeared from the Doctor's face.
“That's enough, Bridges,” ordered Nivere.
The path itself was fairly wide, enough for four people to stand side by side, but the darkness had engulfed the way ahead.
“What?” asked Aamina.
“Nothing,” said Bridges, who had sidled up alongside her.
“No,” said Aamina coming to a stop.
“Is something wrong?” asked Nivere, who had noticed Aamina's puzzled expression.
“What…?” she stuttered, and clutched her gun tightly. “No…No…No…No. No. No.”
Nivere grabbed her. “Calm down. What's wrong?”
Aamina span free and began firing off shots into the distance. The bolts of orange energy flew off into the darkness, illuminating the landscape.
The Doctor and Danny ran up.
“What's going on?” shouted the Doctor over the din.
“Looks like she's gone mad, Doc,” said Danny.
“Stop it Aamina,” shouted Nivere. Realising Aamina wouldn't stop she gestured to Grasp.
The lizard-man had his blaster in his hand and switched it to stun. Then he shot a couple of energy pulses into Aamina’s chest and she fell backwards into Nivere's arms.
“Was that really necessary?” asked the Doctor.
“Don't worry, Doctor, she's only stunned.”
“Even so…” said the Doctor, checking Aamina.
“Doctor, she could have killed us,” said Bridges.
“She wasn't in control of her actions. You saw her.”
“It's this path,” said Nivere. “The Dream Path is having an affect already and Aamina is it's first casualty.”
“So how do we proceed, Captain?” asked Grasp, weapon still in hand.
“Bridges and the Doctor can carry Aamina for the rest of the way.”
“I think it'd be best to try and wake her, don't you?” suggested the Doctor.
“No. She'll be dreaming now. It might be dangerous to wake her.”
“You seem to know quite a bit about this,” said the Doctor suspiciously.
“Do not question our Captain,” snapped Grasp, his finger moving over the blaster trigger.
“Oh, I wouldn't dream of it,” said the Doctor, watching the lizard's finger.
“Is that supposed to be a joke?” asked Nivere.
“No,” the Doctor sighed. “I just think it'd be easier for us if we tried to wake this young woman up.”
“I've already said no. Now let's move.”
The Doctor sighed, realising that if he made one false move Grasp might blast him as well. He seemed extremely loyal to his captain, and if anyone put any foot wrong with her he'd probably end up killing them. Order's permitting of course.
The Doctor and Bridges hefted Aamina up and then carried her between them. Bridges had her arms and the Doctor had hold of her legs. What they really needed was a stretcher, but that was going to be impossible out here. The Doctor blinked a few times, he was getting tired, and then continued walking with the others.
No one had noticed that Danny had disappeared in the other direction.
All he could feel was burning. Burning all over his body. He wasn’t even sure how he’d gotten into this state, but he felt like his entire head was on fire. And it all felt so familiar.
He tried to look around, but nothing really stood out. Nothing recognisable. It was dark and he was aware that he was in a large, building, but there was nobody about. He was on his own.
He looked at his hands. They were burning orange. Energy whipping up from them. This had happened so many times before that he had lost count.
He turned to his side and there was the TARDIS in the darkness, it’s blue paintwork illuminated and slightly off-coloured by the orange glow from his body.
He winced in pain and keeled over onto the floor.
“No!” he cried.
Something wasn’t right this time. Something felt different. He knew he was regenerating. It was a natural thing for a Time Lord, but this time it felt different. This time things weren’t going quite so smoothly. That was always the trouble with regeneration. You could never be quite sure what you were going to get.
He clambered up to his feet and leant against his time machine. He tried to focus all of his will power onto just helping him get through this regeneration.
He could feel his face burning.
“Concentrate,” he said through gritted teeth. “Concentrate!”
Finally, with a burst of energy, he flung his arms out to his side and his face exploded in orange light. Finally. It was working.
He could feel himself physically changing. Not just his face, but all over. His clothes were becoming ever so tighter on him and he felt himself grow ever so slightly.
Then, finally, with a scream and a final blast of energy, the orange light dissipated.
And he felt different. Very different.
He grabbed his face and felt around. No hair. He was bald.
And he was aware that something was standing just behind him. He tried to turn, but there was nothing there.
He was about to speak when…
“No!” The Doctor opened his eyes. He was lying on the path. It took him a while to work things out, but slowly and surely he began to realise where he was again. Standing over him was Nivere, Grasp and Bridges with Aamina lying next to him.
“What happened?” asked the Doctor.
“You slipped into a dream,” said Nivere.
His eyes glazed over and then he shook the thought away. “Just a bad dream.”
“We expected as much. We've been having problems ourselves,” said Nivere, rubbing her eyes.
“Like what?” asked the Doctor.
“Like trying to fight off the dreams,” said Nivere. “You seem to have a lot on your mind, Doctor.”
“Yes. Wait a minute; is someone missing?”
“Yes. Danny’s gone.”
“What?”
“We must have lost him somewhere at the beginning of the path,” said Bridges.
The Doctor looked back, but Danny was nowhere in sight. “How could I have been so stupid?” he said. “Can we spare another search party, Captain?”
“Absolutely not,” said Nivere frostily. “That man is old enough to look after himself. And you're coming with us, Doctor. No more rescue missions.”
The Doctor's nose wrinkled at Nivere's coldness and he looked back. “I suppose we'll just have to hope Danny follows the path and meets us later.”
“We must move, Captain,” said Grasp, looking around him suspiciously. By now the sky seemed to have brightened ever so slightly and the lizard was beginning to feel uncomfortable.
“Agreed. The longer we stand around, the longer it will take for us to get down the path. Let's move.”
The party began to move off, unaware that something was watching them. Something from beyond the confines of their current position.
And the Doctor felt a pain in his chest once again.
The door to Caroline’s cell was thrust open and four women walked up to her, waking her from her drowsy sleep. They were dressed in various skins similar to ones she'd seen on school geography videos showing Kenyan people. They smiled at her sweetly and began to spray her with some sort of water. She coughed and spluttered as it got into her mouth. One woman left and then returned with some sort of red ceremonial robe which she proceeded to make her get into.
Great, the robe of death, she thought.
A couple of burley men then entered and dragged her from the stone chamber. She was taken outside and pushed to the ground. Here it was quite sandy, like she was in a desert or on a desert island. The sky was a dark blue apart from the fires that cast orange glows into it. This was it. She was going to die.
After a moment more of the tribe began gathering around her. They gazed at her in disgust and Caroline began to feel very afraid and defenceless.
She took a few steps backwards but bumped into one of the women who had dressed her. She turned around quickly and the woman smiled. But it wasn't a friendly smile. There was something dark behind her eyes.
“Look,” said Caroline nervously, “I don't know what you want with me.”
None of them responded.
“I haven't done anything wrong. Just let me go back to my friends.”
Still nothing.
Then the man, Yentob, who had attacked her, stepped out with his master, Slavin. He grabbed a spear from the nearest tribesman and held it into one of the fires. It began burning brightly and soon the end was covered in flames, it’s tip hot-orange.
“Please,” said Caroline, the tears beginning to well up in her eyes.
Yentob's face remained a blank slate as he held out the spear and advanced towards her.
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