Doctor Who Read Free Page A

something …
    Something …
    He couldn’t quite articulate the thought in his mind. All he knew was, he had to go to the console. He placed the opened pieces of the cube into his jacket pocket and jumped to his feet. His hands set to work, rapidly adjusting coordinates. The TARDIS was quick to respond, her engines groaning reassuringly. Moments later, they thudded to a halt.
    The Doctor breathed a sigh of satisfaction. He patted the console and smiled.
    ‘Clever old thing. Well done.’
    He pulled the console’s screen towards him, peering at the whirl of symbols and graphics on it. He’d never been here before, he knew that. But he had heard the name of the place.
    ‘The planet Gethria,’ he mouthed to himself.
    All the readings showed the planet could support a wide range of life forms, so he decided to go outside, pausing only briefly to activate the wall scanner to see what he could expect to be greeted with. He frowned as he saw the barren, desert landscape and some kind of gigantic, ancient stone monument. Hard, grey, granite-like. Just below it, there was a small gathering of humanoids.
    ‘Bound to be friendly,’ he muttered, half-suspecting his optimism might be misplaced. But the same kind of compulsion that had led him to set the coordinates for Gethria seemed to be driving him now. He was possessed of a feeling that he couldn’t quite understand. He just
knew
he must set foot on this world.
    The TARDIS had landed about half a mile away from the monument. This gave the Doctor plenty of time to survey the group of humanoids as he approached over the crumbling, dry surface of Gethria. He made no attempt to hide himself. He could, for example, have darted between rocky outcrops, alternately hiding and dashing for cover; but there was really no need, he thought.
    The closer he got to the gathering, the more it became apparent to the Doctor that these people were not the slightest bit interested in anything other than whatever it was directly in front of them. He couldn’t see what that was for now; but they were all staring down at it.
    As he got ever closer, some indistinct words drifted across to him on the dry, dusty breeze. Although he couldn’t quite make them out, they sounded sombre and respectful in tone.
    And then, before he had reached the gathering, as if responding to some unspoken signal, the humanoids began to depart, walking slowly, heads bowed, around the monument, heading off in the opposite direction to the Doctor. He felt almost compelled to stop, finding himself instinctively bowing his own head, as if he were attending …
    A funeral. That was it. It was a funeral. Yes. The dappled grey of the long, hooded cloaks these people were wearing … That was a popular form of funeral attire in … Oh, somewhere in the universe the Doctor had long forgotten about.
    And
there
was the grave. Right where they had all been standing. It had a rather beautiful but stark, engraved, orange headstone – evidently imported from far away. Embedded in the curve of its upper edge were half a dozen small items, encased in glass or something very similar, like fragments of memory caught in clear amber. As with the dappled grey cloaks, the Doctor remembered, the encasing of a person’s chosen mementoes in a gravestone was an age-old tradition in many parts of the cosmos.
    As the Doctor began to approach the stone for a closer look, he suddenly felt he was being looked at. Twitching a look to the right, he saw one of the mourners.
    It was an old lady. She had clearly paused to turn and look at him.
    Their eyes met. To the Doctor, it felt like she was waiting for something. A greeting? Recognition? Something … But for the Doctor, there was nothing. He did not know her.
    Perhaps she sensed this, it wasn’t clear, but after a few seconds, she turned her head away and walked off, following the other mourners at a steady pace, making no attempt to catch up.
    Shrugging, the Doctor turned his attention