Advent Calander (Day 4)

Todays Calander behind door 4 is a story called GALLOWS GATE ROAD by Rupert Laight and is part 1 of 2 and the second part is expected tommorrow.

The first thing the Doctor heard when he woke was the sound of something tapping at a window.
He sat up in bed, ran a hand through his tangled hair and stared around him. Where am I, he thought. This isn't the TARDIS. It's a bed. A very uncomfortable bed. What am I doing in bed? I haven't got time for bed. This is madness.
The Doctor tested his memory. The last thing he remembered was... well, what was it? The TARDIS. He remembered the TARDIS. He'd been at the console when an alarm sounded. An alarm to indicate what?
After that, everything was blank.
Thoroughly confused, the Doctor looked around him. It was dark, apart from a line of light that seemed to edge the bottom of a door.
The Doctor rolled out of bed - surprised to find himself wearing pyjamas - and, squinting through the gloom, could just make out the room's sole window. It was covered with black material, pinned around the frame.
'Blackout,' he murmured to himself, and detached a corner, allowing bright morning light to flood the room.
The Doctor was standing in a small attic bedroom with a low, sloped ceiling and peeling, yellowed wallpaper. It was furnished simply with a narrow single bed and a chest of drawers, on top of which were his clothes, neatly folded.
He turned back to the dust-covered window and saw what had been making the tapping sound. The uppermost branches of a tall oak tree were scratching against the pane.
Got to find out what's going on, thought the Doctor, and he pulled on his clothes and flung open the bedroom door.
'Hello, Doctor,' said a voice on the brink of breaking. 'Did you sleep well?'
The Doctor looked down. A boy of about thirteen with ruddy cheeks and close-cropped ginger hair smiled up at him.
'How do you know my name?'
'You told us last night.'
'Us?' asked the Doctor, confused. 'Who's us?'
'Me and mother,' said the boy. 'Don't you remember?'
'Of course I do.' The Doctor thought hard but, for some reason, couldn't recall. 'Jog my memory.'
'Must be the cold, it's frozen your brain,' said the boy, and he held out his hand. 'I'm Robert. Robert Mann.'
'Nice to meet you, Robert Mann,' replied the Doctor, shaking the boy's hand enthusiastically. 'Or meet you again, I should say.' The Doctor paused a moment at the top of a staircase, still baffled as to how he'd got here.
'Come on then, or we'll be late for breakfast.'
As they descended, Robert reminded the Doctor of how he had rung the doorbell the previous evening, unable to tell them why but, as it was late, Robert's mother had offered him a bed for the night in their boarding house.
'I wonder what I wanted,' mused the Doctor. 'Oh well, who cares?' He paused. 'Hold on, that's not like me.' Then the worry vanished from his mind again. 'It's nice here,' he said. 'Maybe I'll stay.'
By now they had reached the bottom of three flights of stairs and were standing in the house's entrance hall.
'Needs a bit of a dust, doesn't it?' said the Doctor, running his finger along a picture rail.
'Can't get the staff,' said Robert. 'There is a war on.'
'A war? Is there? Which one?'
The boy chuckled. 'Are you pulling my leg?'
'Never pulled a leg in my life. And I don't joke about time. What year is this?'
Robert stared at him. 'It's 1940, of course.'
'I travel a lot,' said the Doctor. 'I get confused.'
'I wish I could travel,' replied Robert. 'I want to be an explorer when I grow up. Just like Marco Polo. He discovered spaghetti.'
'And pinched my caravan!'
'You're very strange.'
The Doctor grinned. 'It has been mentioned.'

the rest of story can be seen here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/s4/misc/advent08/december_04