Nothing at the End of the Lane (short story)


 * For the fanzine publisher, see Nothing at the End of the Lane (publisher).

Summary
Barbara Wright, a disturbed young teacher at Coal Hill School, occasionally suffers from schizophrenic episodes and hallucinations. Aware that her students mock her behind her back, she loses her temper when her student Susan hands in a paper with the prices given in decimal currency, assuming that this is a deliberate taunt. Realising that this was an honest mistake, she tries to apologise and offers to tutor Susan privately, but Susan flies into a panic, insisting that her grandfather doesn't like strangers. Upset, Barbara gets Susan's home address from deputy headmaster Kint and goes around in person, but finds 76 Totters' Lane to be an empty junkyard. Unsure how much of this she has imagined, and plagued by recurring visions of monsters and a London in flames, she continues to suffer from her attacks -- or "episodes" -- and experiences a foul taste in her mouth. Kint warns her that the board of governers is not comfortable with her appointment, and advises her to start being more friendly and open. She therefore invites her friend and fellow teacher Ian Chesterton to dinner, and as she relaxes she tells him of her dreams and fears, particularly her fear of the new bombs being developed which kill people but leave buildings standing, and her feelings that sometimes she is on a different world. That night, she dreams that her television is talking to her, showing her swirling howlaround patterns and talking of adventures in time and space...

The next day, inspired, she tells Ian about her trouble with Susan, and he agrees to go to the junkyard with her. They wait for Susan to enter, but when they follow her in she appears to have vanished. Barbara believes she hears movement in a padlocked strongbox, but before she can investigate, a hostile old man appears and tries to drive them away. His words are confusing and cryptic, and Barbara, who is beginning to feel terribly ill, starts to believe that she imagined the whole thing. But when Ian insists upon fetching a policeman, the old man strikes him down with a picture frame and nearly beats him to death. Barbara momentarily loses consciousness when the old man attacks her as well, and experiences another episode -- the strangest yet -- in which she appears to have been travelling through time and space with Ian, Susan, and Susan's grandfather, the Doctor...

Her fellow travellers have just rescued her from a creature from a world where time-travel has been ruled impossible, a creature which attached itself to her mouth and gave her bizarre and terrible dreams as it tried to kill her. Her friends believe that they have saved her, but as she recovers, she realises that a part of the creature is still alive within her... and awakens back in the junkyard. The old man has dropped the key to the strongbox, but Barbara is too late; he has indeed locked Susan in a space too small for her and she has already suffocated. The old man attacks Barbara, trying to kill her, but Barbara grabs a rusting spear from a junked fence and defends herself, killing him instead. With her attacker's death, the sickness seems to go from her head as well, and as she leaves to fetch a policeman she sees a police box standing in the fog, as if waiting for her. Inside, she knows she will find the help she needs.

(Time-Placement: Either Barbara's journeys with the Doctor are all a psychotic fantasy, or the bulk of this story is a dream induced by an alien creature which attacked her on another world. If the latter then Ian and Barbara have been travelling with the Doctor for long enough to have befriended him. There are no other reference points.)

Characters

 * The Doctor
 * Susan
 * Ian
 * Barbara

Continuity
to be added

Timeline

 * This story occurs after ST: The Last Days
 * This story occurs before ST: Mire and Clay