The Doctor winked. ‘Then Team C rocks!’

And with that, he grabbed Mae’s hand and ran off in the direction of the first scream.

The Doctor and Mae found the original screamer in one of the delivery rooms attached to the maternity ward. It was a young, pregnant woman with blonde hair – which was currently plastered to her scalp by a sheen of sweat. She lay with her knees raised on a bed of crumpled, damp sheets – a thin, hospital-issue blanket covering her body.

She stopped screaming as the Doctor entered the room and began to pant heavily. ‘Hello, Ruby!’ he said, reading the woman’s name from the chart hanging above her bed. ‘I’m the Doctor. What seems to be the trouble?’

The woman screamed again and grabbed hold of the Doctor’s hand, squeezing it in a vice-like grip.

‘Ow ow ow ow ow!’ The Doctor yelped, trying unsuccessfully to pull his hand away. ‘Blimey! Forget nuclear weapons. Send an army of pregnant women over to Cuba and the whole thing will be solved within a day.’

‘He’s coming!’ screeched Ruby between gasping breaths. ‘I can feel it! He’s coming!’ She screamed again, squeezing the Doctor’s hand even harder.

The Doctor whipped out his sonic and used it to relax the woman’s fingers long enough to free himself. ‘Who’s coming, Ruby?’ he asked, trying to shake the feeling back into his bruised hand. ‘Who?’

‘It’s possible she might mean this, Doctor,’ said Mae, whipping back the blanket to reveal the woman’s floral nightdress. There was a large bulge beneath the patterned material.

‘Crikey!’ said the Doctor, suddenly very uncomfortable. ‘That is a new one – in every sense of the word.’

He spotted a nurse lying on the floor at the foot of the woman’s bed. ‘Oh good!’ he cried. ‘Something different to look at.’ He quickly stooped to examine the nurse with his sonic screwdriver.

Mae took the Doctor’s place at the bedside, wetting a towel in a water jug and using it to mop the woman’s brow. ‘What’s wrong with the nurse?’ she asked.

‘She’s fainted,’ the Doctor replied. ‘Which is a bit odd, when you think about it. You’d imagine she’d be used to this sort of thing.’

‘Doctor …’ said Mae, slowly backing away from the bed.

The Doctor ignored Mae and tapped the comatose nurse on the cheek. ‘Hello?’ he called softly. ‘Anyone at home?’

‘Doctor!’

The Doctor rooted through his pockets and tutted. ‘Left my Soborian smelling salts in my wet jacket.’

‘Doctor!’

‘What is it?’

‘It’s the Shroud!’

The Doctor stood like a startled meerkat, eyes scanning the room. His gaze fell on the pattern of flowers of Ruby’s sweat-soaked nightdress. The pictures of daisies on the front of the dress, the part that hung over the soon-to-be-mother’s stomach, formed a face. The face of a man. Just like the face in Mae’s burn, it began to bulge outwards, the mouth twisting horribly as it snapped open and closed.

‘Woman!’ the face yelled. ‘You know damn well that ain’t my baby! I ain’t payin’ no child support for someone else’s kid!’

Ruby turned her face to one side so she could bury it in the pillow and began to cry, her whole body shaking with each sob.

The Shroud’s head was now fully formed. It twisted round to glare up at Ruby. ‘That’s it, woman – keep on cryin’!’ it spat. ‘That’s all you ever do!’

‘Oh, my God!’ said Mae, almost unable to look.

‘Who is that?’

‘That’s my man, Tyler,’ sobbed Ruby. ‘But don’t listen to a word he says. He is the father of my child.’

‘I don’t doubt it for a second,’ said the Doctor. ‘I just don’t think he’s supposed to be in there with it!’

‘He was in prison,’ said Ruby, ‘but they told me he died in a fight.’

‘I’m afraid that’s likely to be true,’ said the Doctor. He stepped up to the bed, sonic held out before him. ‘I know you’re not really Tyler. You are the Shroud!’

The flower-patterned head turned to glare at the Doctor. ‘The Shroud shall feast!’ The voice took on the same deeper tone as before and seemed to reverberate from every corner of the room all at once.

‘Not in my hospital!’ said the Doctor, letting loose with the sonic. The face bellowed like an angry bull and began to sink back into the material of the nightdress. As soon as it had disappeared, the Doctor grabbed the blanket and threw it back over Ruby. ‘Do not let anyone get another peek at your nightie,’ he said. ‘And that’s an order.’

He spun his screwdriver like a six-shooter and flashed Mae a wide grin. ‘Another one bites the dust!’

Then Ruby screamed again. ‘He’s coming!’ she cried. ‘He’s coming!’

The Doctor turned with a sigh. ‘I told you to keep the blanket on!’

‘Er, the blanket is on, Doctor,’ said Mae with a smile. ‘She’s talking about someone else this time.’

The Doctor looked confused for a second, then his eyes widened. ‘Ah!’

He dashed to the door of the delivery room and looked both ways along the corridor. ‘Hello? Bit of an emergency here!’ There was no reply. ‘Baby on the way?’ Nothing. ‘Free biscuits!’

‘Free biscuits?’ said Mae.

The Doctor shrugged. ‘That one would have worked for me.’ He dropped to his knees beside the unconscious nurse and tapped her cheeks again, harder this time. There was no reaction. ‘Oh, you’re no good to me.’

Resigned to his fate, the Doctor removed his jacket and straightened his bow tie. ‘Mae,’ he directed. ‘Get me some clean towels, lots of hot water and something to bite on.’

‘Doctor, you’re delivering a baby not amputating a leg – and this isn’t Victorian England!’ said Mae. ‘Ruby won’t need anything to bite on.’

‘I know,’ said the Doctor, swallowing hard. ‘That’s for me.’

20 August 1929

Benjy ran as fast as his young legs would carry him, revelling in the warm, late-summer breeze on his face and the joyful barks of Tess at his side. His sneakers swished through the grass, and his shadow stretched out long and thin ahead of him in the early evening sun. Soon, he and Tess would have to turn and head for home – but he wanted to reach the fence first. The sturdy wooden barrier marked the boundaries of the ranch, and in many ways, Benjy’s childhood itself.

The fence was as far as his father allowed him to go when he had finished his chores around the house. For some reason, Ben was always nervous about what might be waiting for him on the other side. Of course, that was old Mrs Grady’s land and she didn’t take kindly to trespassers – but he knew that wasn’t it. It was as though he was safe on one side of the fence, but not on the other. Still, he wasn’t going to waste time worrying about that on a beautiful day like today.

He knew that fall was just over the horizon, with all the work it required on the land, along with a return to the schoolroom and lessons long forgotten over yet another seemingly endless summer. He longed to see his friends again, of course. To splash about in the lake with them before the weather turned too cold, and then to waste away entire weekends lazing at the edge of the fishing hole. But until then, the only things that mattered in this world were a boy and his dog.

There was the fence. Despite the stitch burning into his side, Benjy put on a final burst of speed, determined to reach it before Tess did. She was an old dog now, retired from her working days with his father, and kept as the family pet. He looked down at her now as he ran, her dark eyes wide with the sheer thrill of the adventure. The two of them running together once again.

Benjy reached the fence first, slapping his hand against the rough wood as a way of securing his win. He fell back against it, his breath ragged and his cheeks red from the exercise. Tess barked happily and leapt up at him, her front paws reaching his chest, and he threw his arms around her, holding her tight, but still mindful not to put pressure on the hard lump swelling out of her stomach. She yelped if you even accidentally touched it nowadays, and the last thing he wanted to do was hurt her.