stories and stuff from Coral Nulla

Month: August 2014

[From the archives] A joke

“Why are those ducks staring at us? Are they impressed with our kayaking?”
“No, they’re actually laughing telepathically.”
Telepathically?
“That’s what that noise in your head is.”

[From the archives] Untitled Doctor Who story

I wrote this story with input from my 7-year-old half-brother. It’s intended to be set just before A Town Called Mercy.

One morning, on the planet of Pelia, a blue box slowly faded into view, making a peculiar noise. It appeared inside the town of Polo, next to a huge, towering skyscraper. There were giant, rocky mountains surrounding the town, which kept the town from growing bigger, although it was quite big already. Flying cars whizzed around, taking people away from Polo.


The people of Pelia would look rather peculiar to you or me. Their arms and heads were swapped from the traditional humanoid, so that they had two heads on the sides of their bodies, and one arm sprouting from the top. It made things a little difficult, and as such, some Pelian scientists had developed additional arm attachments.

However, it was not a Pelian who stepped outside of the blue box when its door opened. The man who stepped out resembled the traditional human, although he very much wasn’t.

This man wore a bow tie, which he thought was rather cool, and a tweed jacket. He stepped outside and took a look around the town. He was going to step back inside the box, as there didn’t seem to be anyone around, when, suddenly, he saw something move.

Something silver.

Then the screams started.

He abandoned the blue box and ran towards the sound of screaming. Huge metal men, also following the standard humanoid shape, were attacking these peculiar people with heads instead of arms. The man, however, did not find this surprising, and instead took more interest in how to stop the metal men.

He took out a strange contraption, which was stick-like and made a noise, which occurred at the same time as the tip lighting up green. He pointed this at the metal men and seemed simultaneously satisfied and unhappy with the result, which appeared to be nothing much.

The metal men took notice of this action.

“YOU ARE THE DOCTOR,” said one of them, in a strange, robotic voice. The many heads of the Pelians looked even more terrified.

“Good to see you too!” replied the man, who must be the Doctor.

“MEANING UNKNOWN,” answered the metal man.

“You are the Cybermen and you are attacking this planet, the planet Pelia, home to Pelians. Why?”

“WE WANT MONEY.”

“Of course, of course, Pelia, gold, Pelian gold, sells for millions across the universe, and now you’re here – for some big money-making scheme? Why would a Cyberman want money?”

“MONEY CONTROLS THE UNIVERSE. WITH MONEY WE WILL CONTROL THE UNIVERSE TOO.”

“But gold harms you.”

“WE ARE PREPARED.”

The Cyberman gestured towards a large truck, with crates and crates ready for gold, as well as special machines to collect it without touching the Cybermen.

The Doctor spied an entrance to what must be a mine. He remembered that gold was found whole in the ground of Pelia, which meant it was so readily available that they could ship huge quantities across the universe. It was also rather harmful when touching Cybermen, and would run out on Pelia in fifty years, leaving it abandoned in seventy.

The Doctor stared hard at the Cyberman, which made no further efforts to attack him or the Pelians. When the Doctor was satisfied, he made a break and ran straight into the mine, which was actually abandoned due to it being very dangerous. The Doctor, however, had no idea of this, and so was only alerted to the fact when it started collapsing in on him.

He remembered times like this when he’d have a companion with him to race down collapsing mines and spaceships and corridors and things. Now it was just him. For now. He’d visit Amy and Rory soon, he made himself promise that.

The Doctor pulled out large handfuls of gold from the walls of the caves, and started running back up before the mine collapsed completely.

He ran straight into a mound of collapsed rock. He stopped, rubbing his nose.

He looked around. Aha! There was a pickaxe, abandoned in the wall. It would take a while, but he’d make it through, hopefully in enough time to stop the Cybermen.

He swung it at the mass of boulders. It promptly broke.

The Doctor put his hand into his deep pocket. He felt something, and pulled it out, surprised. He looked at it. Of course! It was a trading window into the Obsidian Mainframe, the universe’s biggest trading centre. And he was holding in his other hand a mass of gold.

He connected through the device. He found someone willing to buy gold for credits and he inserted some of the gold into the machine. Come on… Yes! He should have plenty enough now for some explosives.

He found someone else who was selling explosives, which he bought and received through the device. He put the device away in his pocket and popped down a couple explosives.

“If there’s anyone out there, now would be a good time to run very far away!” he warned.

He gave it a couple of seconds before lighting the explosives and running very far away.

KABOOMBOOM! They went off, and the Doctor ran back to where the boulders used to be. However, the explosion had caused the rest of the dangerous mine to start collapsing. The Doctor ran and just managed to get away from the cave-in.

“Hello! What did I- oh.”

The Doctor turned to a very serious expression. He noticed heavily that there were no Pelians there anymore.

“What have you done to the nice people of this planet?” he questioned, noting that there were also significantly less Cybermen and also no truck.

“THEY MAY HAVE BEEN CONVERTED.”

“I didn’t think Cybermen had a sense of humour.”

“WE HAVE BEEN UPGRADED. OUR MINDS ARE IMPROVED, AND SO IS OUR SPEECH.”

“Sounds like you have someone controlling you.”

There was no response from the Cyberman.

Eventually, it spoke again.

“YOU ARE TOO LATE, DOCTOR. WE HAVE TAKEN MOST OF THE GOLD FAR AWAY FROM THIS PLANET AND DEALT WITH THE PEOPLE TO EXPAND OUR WORKFORCE. WE ARE HERE TO FIND MORE GOLD THAT WAS LEFT, AS WELL AS… YOU.”

At this, the Doctor struck out with his remaining gold, and fried the Cyberman, which begun to spit a liquid resembling milk, as Cybermen often, peculiarly, do when they are defeated.

The Cyberman slumped to the ground and the Doctor started to go in the general direction of the blue box.

“YOU WILL NOT RETURN TO YOUR TARDIS,” said a Cyberman, and we can only assume that it meant the blue box.

The Doctor replied with a stony look and another bash of gold. Following this, he began to run to his TARDIS.

After a couple more Cybermen were defeated, mostly because the Doctor could run faster than Cybermen, he reached his TARDIS.

This TARDIS was in fact a spaceship and a time machine, all in one bigger-on-the-inside blue box. With this he went after the rest of the Cybermen, who had escaped in their own, larger-on-the-outside spaceship.

But it was not the Doctor who defeated them. Instead, it was a larger, black spaceship, which appeared from behind a planet and fired lasers at the Cybership. The TARDIS landed inside the Cybership only to see it implode, sending the Doctor flying back into the TARDIS and hitting his head on the controls.

The Doctor pressed a button to shut the door, and set off, rubbing his head. That other spaceship needed investigating, but, first, he must visit the Ponds. Perhaps a visit to Mexico was in order.

I think I might do a sequel. What do you think?

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