Doctor Who: Festival of Death: 50th Anniversary Edition Read Online Free

He moved away from the screens, hands deep in his pockets. ‘I’m not sure whether to be impressed or not. It’s certainly very big.’
    ‘A graveyard of ships in space…’ Romana corrected herself. ‘In hyperspace. But why?’
    The Doctor took out his bag of jelly babies, selected one, and munched it. ‘Do you know, I think we should find out. I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck curling. Which can mean only one thing.’
    ‘Which is?’ Romana asked. Now the Doctor mentioned it, there was an eeriness in the air. Like a temporal detachment. Or a ghost walking over her grave. She stopped herself; she refused to be drawn into another of the Doctor’s incorrigible flights of fancy.
    ‘Time to get a haircut.’ A grin enveloped the Doctor’s face and he moved towards the airlock.
    Lamp fittings were either cracked or empty, the panelling was warped, and the carpet was threadbare. The smashed limbs of statues lay strewn across the hall. The interior of the leisure cruiser had seen better days.
    Romana and the Doctor walked carefully through the derelict ship. The airlock had opened on to an access tube, which had brought them aboard the cruiser through an airlock duct. Romana noted that the walls were scarred with holes blasted into the woodwork by some sort of energy weapon.
    ‘Signs of a struggle,’ she remarked, pulling her jacket around her. ‘Quite a battle by the look of it. Do you think there’s anyone left alive?’
    The Doctor pulled a face. ‘Whatever happened, it was a long, long time ago.’ He prodded a finger at a tapestry. The material crumbled to charcoal in his hands. ‘So much for art alone enduring. And what’s this?’ The Doctor slapped his hands clean and pulled aside a heavy curtain to reveal a doorway. It opened on to a stairwell that spiralled into the level beneath. The Doctor motioned Romana inside.
    This level of the cruiser had been recently inhabited; the cabins had been converted into shops, the ceiling covered with coloured sheets. The impression was of a narrow street bazaar. The shops, for the most part, were offering souvenirs, jewellery, clothing. Or, at least, the remnants of them. Everywhere, there was devastation.
    Behind their smashed windows the shops were blackened husks. Leaflets, food containers and abandoned goods littered the corridor. The overhead public-address speakers hissed and the Chinese lanterns hanging in each doorway flickered, filling the corridor with an unearthly twilight.
    ‘“The Beautiful Death”.’ Romana examined a bill poster, crinkled on to a nearby wall. The poster advertised the forthcoming event in bold, swirly lettering. Beneath the words an angel smiled, arms outstretched in rapture. The angel had the face of a skull.
    ‘“Midnight. The Great Hall”.’
    The Doctor peered at the poster. ‘“Turn On, Tune In, And Drop Dead.” How peculiar.’
    ‘This place looks like a bomb hit it,’ commented Romana.
    ‘If we’d only arrived earlier. Story of my life.’ The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck. He seemed troubled. ‘You know, I have a very nasty feeling that –’
    In the distance, there was a cry for help.
    The Doctor hightailed down the corridor in the direction of the sound, his scarf flapping in his wake. Treading over the litter, Romana picked her way after him.
    The corridor opened on to a high-ceilinged deck, a once-elegant staircase sweeping down from an upper gallery. The staircase was littered with corpses. They had hideous wounds, their skin and clothes forming a roasted glue. The stench of death clung to the air.
    Hand over her mouth, Romana drew nearer. Most of the bodies were human, although there were some other races: translucent, milky creatures with bulbous eyes, and two short, humanoid lizards. The corpses were dressed in colourful clothes: kaftans, duffle coats, capes and tie-dye T-shirts. Though it was hard to tell where the tie-dye ended and the blood began.
    ‘Over here, Romana.’ The Doctor