Doctor Who: The Legends of River Song Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Authors

  Title Page

  Picnic at Asgard by Jenny T. Colgan

  Suspicious Minds by Jacqueline Rayner

  A Gamble with Time by Steve Lyons

  Death in New Venice by Guy Adams

  River of Time by Andrew Lane

  Copyright

  About the Book

  ‘Hello, sweetie!’

  Melody Pond, Melody Malone, River Song…She has had many names. Whoever she really is, this archaeologist and time traveller has had more adventures (and got into more trouble) than most people in the universe.

  And she’s written a lot of it down. Well, when you’re married to a Time Lord (or possibly not), you have to keep track of what you did and when. Especially as it may not actually have happened to both of you yet.

  These are just a few of River Song’s exploits, extracted from her journals. Sometimes, she is with the Doctor. Sometimes she’s on her own. But wherever and whenever she may be, she is never far from danger and excitement.

  This is just a tiny portion of her impossible life. But it will reveal more than you’ve ever known about the legend that is River Song.

  About the Authors

  Jenny T. Colgan has written 16 bestselling novels as Jenny Colgan, which have sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide, been translated into 25 languages, and won both the Melissa Nathan Award and Romantic Novel of the Year 2013. Aged 11, she won a national fan competition to meet the Doctor and was mistaken for a boy by Peter Davison.

  Jacqueline Rayner made a wish that she could combine her degree in Ancient History with her profession as a writer, and The Stone Rose was the result. She has written several other Doctor Who novels including Winner Takes All. Other major interests include vegetarianism, girls’ comics, cats and Golden Age crime fiction.

  Steve Lyons has written nearly twenty novels, several audio dramas and many short stories, starring characters from the X-Men and Spider-Man to the Tomorrow People and Sapphire & Steel. He has also co-written a number of books about TV shows, including Cunning: The Blackadder Programme Guide and the bestselling Red Dwarf Programme Guide. His previous Doctor Who work includes the novels Conundrum, The Witch Hunters and The Crooked World, audio dramas The Fires of Vulcan and Colditz, and work for the official Doctor Who Magazine. He lives in Salford, near Manchester.

  Guy Adams lives in Spain, surrounded by rescue animals. Some of them are his family. He isn’t a spy, but he is a boy, so naturally he’s always dreamed of being one. Having spent over ten years working as a professional actor and comedian, eventually he decided he’d quite like to eat regularly, so switched careers and became a full-time writer. Nobody said he was clever. Against all odds he managed to stay busy and since then he has written over twenty books.

  Andrew Lane has written more than 30 books in various genres – fiction and non-fiction, adult and Young Adult, crime and science fiction. Most recently he has been responsible for the internationally successful Young Sherlock Holmes series of novels (8 and counting) while the first book in his new Crusoe series will be published this year. His first novel was a licensed Doctor Who book – the Seventh Doctor novel Lucifer Rising – and he also writes Doctor Who audio dramas for Big Finish Productions.

  Picnic at Asgard

  Jenny T. Colgan

  Monday 5 May 5147

  Stormcage

  ‘Oi!’ was the first thing I heard.

  This was a good sign. Definitely boded well. I risked cracking open an eyelid.

  ‘What the blooming heck do you think you’re doing?’

  Trying not to throw up would have been the honest answer.

  It was the Time Hopper. Traded it with Frodene in the showers for ninety-five sugar mice that had unaccountably arrived anonymously 4,600 years past their sell-by date; and an incredibly rare and holy protective relic Father Octavian sent me years ago, with a letter begging that I keep it by me always in my quest for true repentance. Frodene likes it glinting on her tail.

  The Hopper can’t get you past the Tesla force field, of course, but – if you’re happy to stay in one place – amazingly, it works perfectly. Here I was, still in my cell, geographically perfect; but on the very day the cell was being built. The bars weren’t even fitted yet.

  ‘Where’d you spring from, then?’

  I noticed the workman’s surprised voice sounded slightly muffled, then realised to my annoyance that I couldn’t breathe. They hadn’t oxygenated the area yet. So annoying.

  ‘Sorry! Gotta go!’ I said in a slightly strangulated voice, quickstepping over his tools and stopping merely to grab his keycard and his oxygen supply.

  I am almost one hundred per cent sure… maybe seventy-nine per cent sure… that one of his colleagues would have got to him with back-up oxygen in time.

  And after that, we would both need a day off.

  Asgard

  He was waiting, arms folded, leaning against the TARDIS, pretending he wasn’t fidgeting. He hates waiting. If he’s not arriving in the nick of time, it isn’t worth it.

  ‘Come on!’ he said. ‘It’s open and everything! We’re missing it!’

  ‘Hello, Sweetie.’

  ‘I thought,’ he said, unfolding his arms, ‘you only called people that when you couldn’t remember their names.’

  ‘Not true,’ I replied, ditching the stolen helmet. ‘It’s also if I can’t remember their gender. Anyway, I had to stop at the market.’

  He looked dubiously at the wicker basket I’d brought. ‘What are we having to eat?’

  ‘Stop being fussy.’

  ‘I just want to—’

  ‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘If you’re picking the location, I’m picking the food. And, by the way, the location is ridiculous.’

  He turned round, gleefully, the vast golden gates spread out before us, shining like mad in the morning sun. ‘Isn’t it?!’

  ASGARD™. A planet-sized theme park. It is ridiculous. Beyond ridiculous. ‘A celebration of all things legendary.’ The skies were a heaving, rolling pink, always with a strategic ray of sun bursting through triumphantly; you could take part in a great fire funeral, or join the Beating Tunnel Ship of 10,000 Drums ride; or fly mechanical eagles through thrilling rock falls. They have a 5,000-metre waterfall with a hotel built into the cave behind it that’s lit entirely by naturally occurring prisms.

  ‘This place is so tacky,’ I said, as we walked through the vast bright shining gates towards the Rainbow Bridge, with thousands of other excited-looking tourists; children bubbling with excitement, wearing their toy winged helmets and brandishing bendy hammers indiscriminately and then being told off for it.

  ‘Don’t anger the Gods!’

  ‘Are you going to be like this all day?’

  I nudged at him to look at the family near us. They were Pharax. Blue, at any rate. Three parents, and a clutch of children at various stages, including one nearly fully grown, and obviously a teenager. His clothes were ill-fitting and drooped, and he slouched, as much as a flint exoskeleton could slouch.

  The lad’s expression showed plainly how annoyed he was at being dragged here, even as his younger siblings bounced and hopped cheerfully round his feet and pointed at things they wanted to buy later. And he kept taking out an electronic device, whereupon one of his parents would tell him to put it away and he would scowl and do it reluctantly.

  ‘Teenagers are the same in every galaxy,’ I said.

  ‘I know,’ said the Doctor, smiling. ‘Bril
liant.’

  And there was a slight pause. And I told myself sternly I wasn’t bringing it up.

  ‘Certainly, sir, madam,’ the attendant in the booth was saying, as the Doctor waggled the psychic paper at him. ‘It’s a great honour to have you here today. Let me make sure you have VIP passes to everything. Gets you to the front of all the rides.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the Doctor, looking wounded. ‘Oh, no, I mean, we would never push in in a queue.’

  ‘Doctor!’ I hissed. ‘I’m not waiting for hours to go on stupid rides! Take the passes!’

  ‘But it’s not fair!’ he said.

  The attendant was beginning to look suspicious, which always has a wobbly effect on psychic paper.

  ‘Just take them!’ I said.

  ‘And your complimentary horned helmets!’ offered the attendant.

  ‘No, thank you,’ I said, at the exact same second the Doctor said, ‘Cool!’

  We joined the hordes of day-trippers streaming onto the Rainbow Bridge.

  ‘I’m not skipping the queues, though,’ he said mutinously.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘That’s why I brought a book.’

  Still, you would have had to be a lot more churlish than me – and have spent a lot less time staring at a brick wall – not to be impressed by the Rainbow Bridge.

  This area of the park was always a stunning gold and pink dawn, fresh fingers of the sun warming your shoulders; and a 5,000-piece orchestra played you across on great swells of sublime music. You could glimpse the endless waterfall in the distance, but the river below was wild and deep and clear and looked like the most refreshing, cold and delicious thing ever, like liquid sunlight. (They had glasses of it for sale at a concession stand, so you could find out – for an exorbitant fee.) Still, you really did feel like you were leaving one world behind, and I smiled, feeling quite excited.

  ‘I’m not doing the mining,’ I warned him.

  ‘Come on! “Join 5,000 trolls digging for real gold and diamonds in a hundred real mountain tunnels a mere eagle ride away!”’ the Doctor read from the map. ‘What’s not fun about that?’

  ‘You’re forgetting I only narrowly avoided the hard labour mines…’ I began, but he’d gone. I glanced around. He’d better not be looking for trouble. This was not the day for that. Plus, I had to talk to him about …

  I spotted him by the stone sides of the bridge, kneeling in front of a very small rotund humanoid child, who was sobbing inconsolably.

  ‘It’s OK,’ he was saying. ‘You’re not lost. Well, not for long. Nobody can stay lost for long. Not when I’m about. Here, look at this.’

  He took his screwdriver out and made it shoot tiny coloured fireworks in the air. Which I had thought was a waste of space when he did the modification, so shows all I know.

  The child’s eyes widened and it reached up a sticky hand.

  ‘I know, it’s my favourite, too,’ said the Doctor. ‘But don’t touch. What’s your mother’s name? Do you know?’

  ‘Mama,’ said the child.

  ‘Yes,’ said the Doctor. ‘Good start. Got anything else to go on?’

  ‘Want Mama!’

  ‘Let me just programme this to get a DNA trace—’

  The child grabbed hold of the sonic very tightly and refused to let it go.

  ‘The thing is, if you give it back to me, I can find your mama.’

  ‘Find Mama!’ ordered the child. ‘Give LIGHTS ME! ME LIGHTS!’

  ‘Let me just…’ said the Doctor, switching the fireworks setting off.

  ‘WAAAAH!!!!’ The child screamed fit to wake the dead.

  Suddenly a vast lumbering mountain of a person huffed over and grabbed the child by the hand.

  ‘Mure! There are you are! Oi! What the blooming heck do you think you’re doing?’

  I was hearing that a lot today.

  ‘Well, your child was lost, and I was—’

  ‘He ain’t lost!’

  ‘But I was—’

  ‘WANT LIGHT MAMMA!!!!’

  ‘Give him that light, then.’

  ‘But I was…’

  ‘GIVE IT.’

  ‘Manners…’ said the Doctor weakly.

  I stepped out in front. ‘Excuse me,’ I said, in a voice I have known to get excellent results. ‘Were you planning to join in the funeral pyre ritual later? Because if you weren’t, I’d be quite happy to facilitate it.’

  ‘River,’ said the Doctor.

  The woman looked at me, sizing me up.

  I smiled broadly, and pulled back my coat to give her a quick glimpse of my prison tattoo. (It’s temporary: I needed to gain Frodene’s trust. Well, I hope it’s temporary.)

  The woman balked and backed away. ‘Well, you can see who wears the trousers with you two,’ she spat, marching away. ‘Come on, Mure.’

  ‘What’s wrong with wearing trousers?’ asked the Doctor, puzzled. He said goodbye sweetly to the child, who was being roughly hauled away, great big puddles of bright snot pooling on his upper lip.

  ‘Want light,’ the boy hiccupped sadly, looking over his shoulder, as his mother shook him roughly, then jammed some sweets in his mouth.

  I wondered. Now? Should I do it now? I couldn’t stop thinking about it. This would have been the moment, I know. To ask him. Asking the Doctor for advice on my personal life. Oh lord, I have had better ideas.

  The thing is, normally I love making him laugh, when I do things he wouldn’t. But I am never truly as brave as I pretend to be, and, actually, I have a theory that he is absolutely the only creature in the universe who is.

  Regardless: I couldn’t bear the idea of him laughing at me.

  I couldn’t bear it. After all, with my childhood… imagine, me. The very idea of raising a child. Absurd. Who would leave a child with someone as dangerous as me? How would I have the faintest idea what to do: I who had known absolutely nothing of parenting. How could I tuck a child into bed?

  And what if he thought I was asking him? That would be ridiculous. Completely stupid.

  After all, what kind of father would he make anyway? He lives in the moment, only for today. That’s what children do, not what they need. They need utter repetitive boredom, day after day after day, life exactly the same; a great big net of boring: of boring old love and times tables and vegetables. Nothing we could even begin to provide.

  But if not now, when? Because I am not getting any younger.

  Because he is.

  Not that I am thinking about that.

  ‘Hey!’ I said, as something landed on my hair.

  ‘You looked distracted!’

  ‘That is absolutely no reason to fasten a helmet on me!’

  ‘Chill out, Brunhilde!’ the Doctor said. ‘Now, there was a girl…’

  ‘You know, Vikings didn’t really wear horns on their helmets.’

  ‘Mythic ones did,’ he said, marching off, and the moment was gone.

  The main square of Asgard™ was heaving; everywhere were half-timbered buildings; a working smithy – huge – where you could get weapons hammered into shape, or jewellery; there were bakeries selling honey cakes, and, obviously mead stalls everywhere. The Doctor couldn’t stay still, zooming from one side of the square to another, cheerfully replying ‘Hello!’ back to grinning people who were clearly just being paid to say hello: it was all the same to him.

  ‘Starting shortly in the Valhalla Amphitheatre: the fearsome Dragon Wars of Thor,’ came a booming over the loudspeaker system. The crowds started to move in that direction.

  ‘Ooh,’ said the Doctor, looking at me expectantly. ‘How can you possibly want to watch a fake animatronic monster show?’ I said in disbelief.

  ‘Are you kidding? Somewhere people are screaming at a monster and I don’t have to do anything? Tremendous! Scream away! I shall have my feet up on the seat in front. Unless they tell me not to.’

  And he led on, exuberantly. I wouldn’t have told him so in a million years, but he rather suited the helmet.

  The v
ast amphitheatre was crowded with people from all over the galaxy. I couldn’t work out what the strange thing was I was feeling; then I realised. It was normality. Going to a theme park. For fun. With someone you cared about. Being hideously gouged for mead. I was enjoying all of it.

  We were ushered to special VIP seats front and centre.

  ‘VIP sucks!’ shouted someone behind us, and we both looked embarrassed and agreed. I looked round. It was the grumpy teenager from before.

  One of his triparents was trying to admonish him. I overheard him say, ‘Well, if you hate all this stuff so much, you’re more than welcome to go and get a job, Tomith.’

  ‘Yeah, and end up like you?’ The teenager sniffed and buried his head back in his device, completely ignoring what was taking place in front of him.

  Which was a shame, as I have to admit, I have seen some sights, but the Asgard™ dragon show was quite the most spectacular.

  First the orchestra played their most stirring music – and if you have never heard 3,000 violins play in harmony, I recommend it – then due to some clever atmospheric tweaking, the sun suddenly set above our heads in a million glowing shades of pink and purple streaking across a golden sky. As the stars popped out above us, thousands and thousands of tiny candles lit themselves, until the amphitheatre was a glittering fairyland and a collective ‘ooo’ could be heard from the crowd.

  I realised we were holding hands, but we weren’t running.

  A man brandishing a huge sword ran onto the floor of the amphitheatre, holding up his weapon. He looked tiny down there. Then behind him came more and more and more; as the orchestra beat the drums, an entire army emerged, standards raised, marching in perfect unison to the music; it was oddly stirring, as thousands of them lined up, displaying their marching skills. Then the music changed, and lots of women ran on too, with long plaits and beautiful embroidered garments, and the entire arena erupted into a victory war dance around the campfires which sprang up suddenly.

  Then just as we were lulled into the display, a single person, dressed in furs, tore onto the floor. He could have been an interloper, except for his sword, and he shouted loudly about a dragon, a dragon coming this way, whereupon the actors dissolved their dancing and made a huge line; brought out their weapons which all burst into huge lines of flame above their head, and the music changed to something ominous and scary.