DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN DOCTOR WHO OR IT'S CHARACTERS. ALL CHARACTERS BELONG TO THEIR RIGHTFUL OWNERS.

Author's Note: After reading a couple of Doctor Who books and then listening to several of the series audiobooks, I've decided to write a couple of Doctor Who book myself. Hope you enjoy this book.

P.S. Constructive Criticism is welcomed. I do mean it. Be it grammatical errors, spelling errors, whatever kind of errors or what to change because it's a Wattpad cliché. Just say it! I want and need to improve as a writer.

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        Bonaventure Rutherford was your average space pilot. A tall, strapping young man with perfectly parted hair as black as an endless void and a killer smile to boot. Though his reputation wasn't as sharp as his appearance, he did his best to please his superiors. His commander had decided to give him one last chance to prove himself for a position on The Great Intrepid.

        But Bonaventure had fallen flat on his face. He was being followed by a medium lunar-ship of space pirates who planned on riding his ship, scrap it for parts and then scrap him for parts. Bonaventure tried to execute his best evasive manoeuvres, but he couldn't seem to shake them off.

        The pilot hadn't meant to disrespect their captain. All he had to do was strike an accord with the captain to trade an ion charged fuel converter for his backup generator. Which would give a ship a few months of extra power. But he messed up. Big time. How was he supposed to know that shaking the hand of a Mon al' Kip was equal to giving one the finger and them slapping them in the face? The young pilot was only two years out of the academy, and they never covered on how to deal with pirates or alien customs. And his negation skills were rubbish.

        As a boy, Bonaventure was always intimidated by his siblings. Their cutting remarks and commands resonated within his brain. The captain's reaction reminded him of his sister's rage after she had caught him snooping around her bedroom. Only his sister didn't literally try to kill him. And she didn't brand compact plasma titanium pistols modified with heat-seeking scanners from the jungles of 2200 Peru at him either.

        Pushing away the memories, the desperate pilot focused on the navigation screen, setting its coordinates to a planet heavily guarded by a forcefield that was famed for its advanced engineering. He would be safe there and then could refuel and then fly back to base.

        He felt a hard jolt after the pirates had fired a shot from their canons, and it barely missed the wing. If their spaceship was bigger and had more powerful canons, Bonaventure would have been turned to dust in a millisecond. But that was only luck.

        Pure stupid luck.

        Just then, Antole Killian, Bonaventure's captain's booming voice was on the comms. "Rutherford, you better have some good news for me son." The man sounded agitated, and Bonaventure felt a pit drop in his stomach for the sorry soul, and his soul, who had just angry his commander; like he was just about to do.

        "Sir, I-" Bonaventure stammered as he dodged another blast of cannon fire. "I-I lost the-" He swallowed. "Sir, I failed."

        Captain Antole Killian screamed in anger, "What do you mean you failed?! Rutherford, you had one job! I knew that I should have sent Linkrost with you! No! I should have sent her instead of you!"

        Bonaventure didn't bother arguing, he simply accepted the man's fuming words. "You're right sir! I should have-"

        "Where in God's name are you, Rutherford!? Never mind, I don't want to know. Just get your sorry ass back to base. We'll rendezvous at Libra! And then decide your punishment. Over and out!" And Captain Killian's voice went silent.

        Swearing, he cancelled his coordinates to the planet and replaced them with the one to the Libra base. Bonaventure swerved to the right, the left and then nosedived. The more he thought about his failure to complete this assignment, the more helpless he felt in his impending doom of being captured and tortured at the hands of his pursuers.

        Gritting his teeth, he chanted in desperation, "Come one, Bonnie boy! You're stronger than this! You can do this. You can do this. You can do this!"

        With each chant, a few buttons and switches were switched to the on position, diverting all the ship's armour energy to the thrusters. Giving him an extra boost of speed. Hurdling toward a green-like nebula fast, he dared to peek at the ship's scanners.

        To his surprise, the pirates were quickly tearing off their pursuit.

        He was in the clear!

        He made it!

        Bonaventure shouted with joy and punched the air, "Yeah!"

        Suddenly, the hairs on the back of his neck and arms stood up on end.

        He felt... off.

        A cool breeze blew through the open vents and an unsettling chill ran up the pilot's spine. Bonaventure hadn't laid a finger anywhere near the air conditioner.

        Why did it get so cold?

        There was a pinch on the back of his neck, and he winced, hand instinctively touching it to rub the sore spot. Up ahead, Bonaventure could see the dented and decrepit remains of a cargo ship. Shards of glass pinged his ship from the battered windows from a luxury starship not thirty yards away. He had nearly made a head-on collision with a thruster from a large model J vintage Othello cruiser had he not looked up in time.

        He felt his energy begin to drain and thought that his eyes were playing tricks on him when the murky silhouette of a battleship deep within the nebula. Bonaventure shivered at the impeding cold air.

        Nearly jumping out his uniform, there came a roar of static that rang through the cockpit comms. A man's voice was being cut off by long intervals of the white noise. "You-" static. "unauth-" static. "-r busi-" static.

        The confused, and chilled, pilot couldn't tell what the man was trying to say from all the static. "Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?" He felt another pinch on the back of his neck. "This is Cadet Bonaventure Rutherford of the One Hundred and Seventy-First Battalion of the planet Drakelin."

        The voice and the static continued. "st-" static. "ch-" static. "to" static.

        "Hello? Hello!? Can anyone hear me!?" Bonaventure was now almost yelling, straining to understand what the other was trying to say.

        This time a woman's voice came through. "ast-" static. "-ance" static. "will" static. "fire" static.

        The ghzzzzzzzzzzht of the static had cut.

        Will fire?!

        There was no hum from the engines below.

        In the dim light of eerie green nebula, Bonaventure looked up to the ceiling. The pilot groaned with anger, grinding the yoke in his cold dry hands.

        The ship's engines had stopped, and backup generator had to be kicked on manually. And usually, a ship this size would be operated by a minimum of two people.

        Unbuckling himself, but not before turning on the autopilot for good measure, Bonaventure ran down the gangway and slid down the ladder that led down to the storage room and engine room. Mumbling to himself, the irritated pilot raved "Just my luck! Why couldn't this happen anyone one else? And why is it so damn cold in here?!"

        He found a torch at the bottom of the ladder and ran into the darkened belly of the ship. Several steps later, he entered the engines room, running inside.

        Crouching down in front of the backup generator, his hand danced frantically on the buttons of the keypad in the light of the flickering torch.

        "Come on. Come on! Turn on you hunk of junk!" He yelled with impatience.

        The power light had finally turned green after eight agonizing seconds. The backup generator whirred to life and the systems came back online.

        Bonaventure clapped his hands and smiled in relief.

        And then an alarm rang out that the pilot had only heard a small handful of times.

        "Aw come on!" he groaned.

        He abandoned the now dead torch and made a mad run back to the cockpit. Just when he had just barely set foot on the top deck, the grinding sound of metal scraping metal pierced his ears. An abandoned castaway ship had collided with his and he was knocked off his feet. He flailed his arms as the floor underneath him gave way, but he didn't land on the floor. The antigravitational lock had been disabled!

        Desperate to return to the controls, buckle himself turn the autopilot off, Bonaventure swam back through the air and into the pilot's seat like a shark was at his heels. It took three powerful strokes to return to his seat.

        A screen on the console began to blink a bright red. That could mean only one thing and one thing only.

        Missiles.

        What? Where did that- No, no, no, no, no, no, no!

        Fumbling with the buckles, he sloppily strapped himself in. Yoke in his grasp, Bonaventure punched the lever for the thrusters and flipped on the communication radio.

        "Disengage! I repeat disengage!" He yelled into the comm, sweat beginning to form on his on his brow. His ship nosedived underneath a passing behemoth of a Junker, but the missiles were still locked on.

        Bonaventure's ears rang, and his head pounded with pain. He felt nauseous and tried to keep himself level-headed. Gripping the control wheel to stay alert, he forced himself to focus on dodging the missiles through a series of loop-the-loops, spins, hard turns, and small bursts of thrust from the engine's back up power. All the while avoiding oncoming and drifting debris in various sizes from various ships. But after his last nosedive, he couldn't do it again without feeling like he'd puke, which never happened.

        He yelled into the comm. "Disengage! I repeat, disengage, damn you!"

        Usually, in a spaceship, Bonaventure was a different person. Daring and adventurous with a gut of iron. In his free time back at the base's flight simulations, he enjoyed pushing the systems to their limits and loved the adrenalin rush that followed. They were so realistic that some pilots had trouble differentiating whether it was just a simulation or the real deal.

        This was nothing like the simulations.

        He strained to stay focused, but his body wasn't letting him. His ship was struggling just as hard to keep going. The missiles were now only meters away and all hope dwindled like sand slipping through his fingers.

        Bonaventure hunched down as close into the ship's controls, hoping with distraught it would give him some form of extra protection.

        He braced for impact.

        Squeezed his eyes closed.

        And breathed.