I’ve always been a Doctor Who fan, and I want a TARDIS. The flying boat in “They Came by Night” is my version of the TARDIS and in book 2 Sam will discover a room that’s bigger on the inside….
I always loved the scenes where the TARDIS is out of control and things are blowing up and catching fire… that was the inspiration for this excerpt from the 2nd book (not finished yet)
Smoke poured from the windows of the boat as it drifted lower scraping the treetops.
“We’re definitely going to crash!” shouted Sam.
Red ran aft and looked over the edge and his eyes went wide. “There’s thousands of the little critters down there.”
“Throw something overboard!” screamed Rose.
Red looked at Bestich.
“No, not him,” said Sam.
“What’s the heaviest thing we have left?” said Red.
Sam looked at the flamethrower.
“Not the dragon’s breath,” moaned Red, but he was already looking at the fastenings. Sam jumped into the fore area to pull the fastening bolts out.
“The critters are climbing the trees!” screamed Rose. “They’ll be able to jump in the boat any moment.”
Red and Sam pulled the last fastening bolts out and started to lift it off the carriage.
“HELP!” screamed Bestich. One of the critters had jumped onto the ship and was biting his nose. With his hands tied he could not brush it off so he was vigorously shaking his head but the creature stubbornly held on to his nose. It’s furry body was being thrown from side to side and its tale jittered up and down as if it were in an uncontrolled frenzy.
“It’s tasted his blood, and it likes it,” said Rose.
“Well, no accounting for taste,” said Red.
Together Sam and Red tilted and then threw the flamethrower off the front of the ship. The lightening of the load helped lift the ship a few feet higher, but more and more critters were jumping from the trees.
Rose smacked the critter that was latched to Bestich’s nose and then used her net to catch it and throw it overboard. Red swiped at more of the critters with his ax and Sam tried to summon some icor to blow the critters off the deck.
“There’s barely any icor here at all,” said Sam.
Bestich was bawling but between sobs he screamed. “Use your prosthetic you stritzing piece of …”
He never finished his sentence because another critter jumped at his face and latched on to his ear.
“Stritz!” shouted Sam. “We are losing height again. Brace for impact!”
There was an almighty crashing sound and waves splashed over the decking, washing the critters into the sea.
“WE MADE IT TO THE SEA!” shouted Rose.
“I told you we would make it,” said Sam.
“Thank God that’s over,” said Red
“Hmmmpfff,” said Bestich.
Rose, Same and Red looked at Bestich and saw a bedraggled critter clinging to each of his ears and another one latched to his lips.
Sam found the sight funny and giggled. Red burst out laughing. Rose walked over and swatted the critters off.
“Okay, now comes the tricky part,” said Sam. “Whose going to explain all this damage to Violet ?”
