Doctor Who: Mawdryn Undead by Peter Grimwade

mention the company of a pretty girl. He poured a generous measure of his best malt. ‘Now calm down, my dear, and tell me about it in words of one syllable.’
    Tegan sipped the whisky and relaxed a little. There was something very reassuring about the man who had just introduced himself as Lethbridge-Stewart; resourceful, unflappable and utterly British (she was reminded for a moment of Captain Stapley, the Concorde pilot); the sort of person you could talk to about the TARDIS and who wouldn’t turn a hair.
    She took another sip and looked round the room.
    Everything ship-shape and Bristol Fashion — just like the Brigadier, who was waiting to hear her story.
    ‘A friend of ours and a boy from the school...’
    ‘Boy? What boy?’
    ‘Turlough.’
     
    ‘Turlough?’ the Brigadier frowned. ‘I don’t think we have a Turlough.’
    ‘So the boy was lying all along,’ thought Tegan to herself.
    ‘I’m a new boy here myself,’ the Brigadier explained, examining a register. ‘Trevor, Trumper, Turner...
    definitely no Turlough.’
    But whatever the reason for the schoolboy’s deception, the Doctor was Tegan’s main concern. She had to persuade the Brigadier to organise help. ‘They were travelling together when they came down on the hill.’
    The Brigadier’s attitude changed instantly. ‘Came down? Do you mean a plane crash?’
    ‘Well, sort of,’ said Tegan, not exactly sure how to explain an arrival by transmat capsule.
    ‘Good Lord, girl. Why didn’t you say so before!’
    Lethbridge-Stewart prepared to leap into action. ‘I’ll phone through to our local constable. He can co-ordinate the rescue services...’
    ‘No!’ protested Tegan, feeling a bit like the sorcerer’s apprentice. ‘It’s not like that at all. If we can just get some medical help and go back to the TARDIS...’ In her anxiety she referred to the machine as casually as if it had been a Mini parked at the end of the drive.
    ‘TARDIS!’ exclaimed the Brigadier. ‘Did you say TARDIS!’
    ‘Yes, but you don’t understand.’
    ‘I think I do, young lady.’ He smiled. ‘Tell me, Miss Jovanka. This friend of yours, is it by any chance... the Doctor?’
    It was a very worried Brigadier who sat, blinking miserably at the Doctor. Little by little his friend had teased the remembrance out of him; but the recall gave him no comfort. Now that he could remember the excitement of Tegan’s arrival at Brendon, he was the more appalled it could ever have been forgotten.
     
    ‘Not to worry, Brigadier,’ reassured the Doctor. ‘A simple protective mechanism of the brain. The important thing is to remember everything now.’
    The Brigadier looked grim. ‘Doctor, you don’t know what you’re asking.’
    ‘Something wrong?’
    ‘I’ve been in some pretty tight corners in my time, but unravelling all this...’ He was sweating. He felt himself starting to tremble. He was being forced back into the darkness; somewhere ahead was the bottom-less pit. ‘I just feel we’re on the verge of something really appalling.’ He struggled to put his foreboding into words. ‘I’ve never been so scared in all my life!’
    Turlough was furious. How dare they lock him in the sick bay. How dare his protector allow it. The Black Guardian was not only evil but incompetent. He snatched the cube from his pocket — but the crystal was dead. Perhaps he should transfer his allegiance to the Doctor; but without the TARDIS its owner, too, was surely trapped and unable to help.
    Turlough lay back and reviewed the events of the last few hours. He felt as though he had slithered right down one of those snakes in the ludicrous board game played by Earth children. He also felt very tired. He closed his eyes and was soon asleep.
    He must have woken up when the Headmaster slipped into the room, though he was too sleepy to remember how their unusually intimate conversation began.
    Mr Sellick was certainly a great comfort. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of,