Doctor Who: Terminus Read Online Free Page B

turned back to see what he wanted.
    He was walking towards her, and she saw with a start of fear that the door was closing itself behind him.
    No doubt it would open again when someone approached it, and if there was any problem in tracking it down there was always Nyssa’s book that they could use as a marker, but Tegan still felt as if a cell door had been slammed on her.
    But the big surprise was Turlough. He was looking sheepish. He was embarrassed .
    ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘That must have looked really selfish. I couldn’t let you come out here alone.’
    It was certainly a change of heart, but Tegan wasn’t about to take any bets on how long it might last. When she turned around to lead the way, there was that familiar uncomfortable feeling between her shoulders again.
    In fact, she’d been on the point of turning back. It no longer seemed like a good idea to try to catch up with the Doctor, and it was only the thought of Turlough waiting and smirking at her lack of resolve that had caused her to hesitate, but now that he was with her and tagging along, she felt even less able to give up the notion.
    So they followed the way laid down by the book, as the Doctor had done, pressing deeper into the unknown craft and walking in what they hoped were his footsteps. They paused only once, when the steady engine sounds from under the decks changed and became less intense. By then they were already some distance away from their starting point; there was no way that they might have seen their link to the TARDIS slowly fading out and leaving a blank section of corridor wall.
    The Doctor was either staying well ahead of them or else he’d turned off somewhere. Tegan and Turlough moved as fast as they dared without making too much noise, staying with the main line of the corridor; this way they stood the least chance of getting lost, because they’d be able to trace a straight line back to their starting-point.
    They met nobody. The place even had an empty feel about it, helped along by the low-level lights. For Tegan it was like an engine yard at midnight, and the only life was that which throbbed through the decks under their feet. Even so, this didn’t make her any less uneasy – lights of any kind, even at the lowest level, must have been provided for someone to see by. There were sliding doors at regular intervals down one side of the main corridor, but none was open.
    Thanks for that, at least, Tegan thought as they pressed on.
    ‘Was that her?’ Turlough said suddenly, and Tegan realised that she’d been letting her attention wander.
    ‘What?’ she said, but Turlough signed for her to be quiet.
    They listened for nearly a minute, and finally it came again: what Tegan had assumed to be the far-off moaning of air through the craft’s recirculation system was augmented by another, more distinctive sound. It was something very like a human cry.
    ‘Well?’ Turlough said.
    Tegan listened again, but the sound wasn’t repeated. ‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘I suppose it could have been...’
    But Turlough was already convinced. He even seemed to be sure of the direction, down a tunnel that intersected with the main corridor only a little way ahead. ‘Come on,’ he said, ‘we’ll catch up with the Doctor on the way.’
    ‘Wait a minute! We could get lost!’
    ‘All taken care of,’ Turlough said, and he held something out under the nearest of the dim lights.
     
    Tegan took a closer look and saw that it was the abacus.
    Turlough took hold of one of the crosswires and sprung it loose from the frame. The beads ran from it easily into his hand, and he crouched. ‘We’ll leave a trail,’ he explained, and he took one of the beads and set it in one of the cut-out squares of the floor grating.
    It sat neatly, too small to roll out and too big to fall through. ‘All we’ll have to do is follow the beads home.’
    Tegan couldn’t help being impressed. ‘Don’t miss a trick, do you?’ she said.
    Damn it if