The stairs twisted down into an old boiler room. Ace could see through gaps in the surrounding wall tangles of piping and a huge boiler painted a flaking cream. An alien machine lay in a cleared space, backed against the grimy wall. It consisted of a small dais with two upright cabinets with severe alien lines on either side.
Ace immediately jumped onto the dais. ‘This is some severe technology,’ she said gleefully.
The Doctor pulled her off the dais and opened the nearest cabinet. Inside, matt black boxes nested in fibre optic connections.
‘Very elegant, very advanced – flux circuit elements.’
‘What does it do?’
‘It’s a transmat – a matter transmitter – but transmitting from where?’ He carefully traced the connections to the power regulator.
Ace realized she could hear a low threshold hum. She looked around the cellar for its source before focusing suspiciously on the dais. Its surface was definitely beginning to glow.
‘Professor?’
‘Range of about three hundred kilometres.’
The glow began to elongate upwards, forming a jelly mould shape one and a half metres high. Colours shot across its surface.
‘Professor,’ Ace called warily, ‘something is activating the transmat.’
‘Yes, very likely,’ mused the Doctor as he easily located the control node. ‘It has a remote activator.’ He turned sharply to Ace. ‘What?’
Ace nodded at the dais. The jelly mould shape had begun to fill up with shapes, and for a moment she saw something moving weakly among a cradle of translucent filaments.
‘You’re right!’ cried the Doctor. ‘Something is beginning to come through.’ He plunged back into the transmat’s circuits.
Ace hefted her baseball bat uneasily, watching as the shape solidified one layer at a time. In a moment the outer shell flowed together like coalescing globules of mercury.
‘It’s another Dalek,’ said Ace.
‘Excellent,’ said the Doctor.
The casing was almost fully formed. It was pale cream with gold trimmings, different from the one the Doctor had blown up earlier. Different, wondered Ace, how different? ‘Will this one be friendly?’ she asked.
The Doctor looked surprised. ‘I sincerely doubt that.’ He quickly rigged two cables together. ‘Now if I can just cause the receiver to dephase at the critical point…’
The hum oscillated out of the range of human hearing. Ace realized that the climax was approaching – the Dalek was slowly becoming solid – so she raised her baseball bat. ‘Doctor!’ Ace cried.
The Doctor twisted something inside the machine. ‘Get down,’ he shouted and pulled Ace away and onto the ground.
The transmat howled as splinters of light arced from the dais. There was a vast grinding sound and the air filled with a blizzard of Dalek fragments.
Ace looked up to find herself staring at the twisted end of an eyestick. It was coloured gold and stared blindly back. She quickly got up and bent to examine the transmat. Whisps of dust whirled around in the decaying transmission field before they too settled on the surface of the dais.
‘The controls have gone dead,’ she told the Doctor.
‘The misphase must have caused an overload.’
‘What did you do to it?’
‘I persuaded one half of the Dalek to materialize where the other half was materializing. They both tried to coexist at the same points and the resultant reaction destroyed them.’ He made an expansive gesture with his arms and then patted the top of one of the cabinets. ‘Dangerous things, transmats.’
‘So no more Daleks can be transported through here.’
‘Well,’ the Doctor said cautiously, ‘we seem to have slowed them down a bit, at least until the operator can repair the system.’
The word operator bounced about at the back of Ace’s mind for a moment. Hold on, she thought. ‘The operator?’
‘The Daleks usually leave an operator on station to deal with any malfunction.’
A very bad scenario started to occur to Ace. ‘And that would be another Dalek?’
‘Yes,’ said the Doctor.
There was a wrenching crash from behind the supporting wall.
I have a bad feeling about this, thought Ace as she and the Doctor turned towards the sound. A cream and gold Dalek was pulling away from the heating system’s pipes. It must have been there all the time – I looked right at it and ignored it, Ace berated herself. She had a sick certainty that it wasn’t going to be easy to ignore in about ten seconds. Ace shifted her grip on the bat and wondered if the Dalek had any weaknesses. She wasn’t too upset when the Doctor yelled at her to run for it.
‘Stay where you are,’ shrieked the Dalek. ‘Do not move.’
Ace made the stairs marginally ahead of the Doctor, but only because she vaulted the handrail. Bouncing off the rail as she turned the corner, Ace saw a rectangle of light above – the doorway.
Behind her there was a crash: the Dalek screamed orders, and somebody – the Doctor? – cursed in a language that had more vowel sounds than consonants. She virtually dived through the doorway, and collided with somebody on the other side.
‘Sorry,’ she said stupidly as she recognized the headmaster. She was about to warn him about the Dalek when his knee hit her midriff and sent her winded to the floor.
Tripping on the stairs caused the Doctor to remember some very obscure Gallifreyan colloquialism. He ignored the Dalek’s orders and instead concentrated on getting up the stairs. He recognized it as a low caste warrior – and they rarely said anything interesting.
A whine behind him indicated that a Dalek motivator was powering up to design limits. The Doctor turned to see the Dalek lift easily on a band of colour and follow him up the stairs. So that’s how they do it, he thought, and charged up the steps to safety. He was just wondering why the Dalek hadn’t opened fire when the door slammed in his face.
The headmaster was throwing the last bolt of the door when he was hit in the stomach by fifty kilograms of enraged teenager. As the headmaster toppled gasping to the ground, Ace frantically jerked the bolts free and opened the iron door. The Doctor fell out, back first, and Ace caught a glimpse of cream and gold before she threw the door closed and slammed home the bolts.
‘What’s the matter with him?’ asked the Doctor, looking at the prone headmaster.
‘Stomach ache.’
The Doctor grabbed the headmaster’s arm and started to drag him away from the doorway. ‘Give me a hand.’
Ace was outraged. ‘Professor! He tried to lock you in.’
‘Ace,’ the Doctor said sternly. Ace took the other arm and together they pulled the man clear. The Doctor checked behind the man’s ear and exposed a dull red implant grafted into the skin. Ace looked at the Doctor – his face was grim but not surprised – then they both ran out of the school. As they reached the exit a vast bang echoed down the corridor.
‘That was the door,’ said the Doctor as they quickly ran across the playground.
A military Land-Rover was parked outside. The portly uniformed man beside it with sergeant’s stripes looked bemused as Ace and the Doctor bore down on him. He opened his mouth to speak.
‘What are you doing here?’ demanded the Doctor. The sergeant’s mouth closed and then opened again. ‘Never mind. Get this vehicle out of here.’
‘I was ordered to deliver the ATRs to this position, sir,’ he said defensively.
The Doctor’s eyes snapped round to the truck, ‘ATRs – anti-tank rockets?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Wicked,’ said Ace, ignoring another stern look from the Doctor, ‘we can use them against the Da…’
‘No,’ said the Doctor. ‘Violence isn’t the answer to everything.’ He turned to the sergeant. ‘You’ll have to pull back.’
‘My orders were to stay in this position,’ the man said stubbornly.
‘This particular position,’ the Doctor said evenly, ‘is about to become somewhat unte
nable when that Dalek catches up with us.’
‘Except it hasn’t come out yet,’ Ace pointed out somewhat snidely.
‘I wonder why not?’
Ace noticed that the sergeant’s eyes were getting a bit glazed. ‘Maybe it went back to fix the transmat?’ she suggested.
‘Probably,’ agreed the Doctor.
There was a short pause.
‘Don’t just stand there,’ said the Doctor sharply to the sergeant. ‘Break out the rockets.’ The sergeant quickly cracked open a crate and pulled out a bulky metal launcher. He seemed reluctant to hand it over. ‘What’s your name, sergeant?’ barked the Doctor.
‘Kaufman.’
‘Sir!’ snapped the Doctor.
‘Quartermaster-Sergeant Kaufman, sir!’ He saluted smartly as the Doctor relieved him of the rocket launcher. ‘To get it ready, sir,’ he started helpfully, ‘you…’
The Doctor snapped the sights upright, pulled the trigger guard into position, released the firing restraint pin and checked the battery power. Kaufman mutely handed over a rocket which the Doctor slotted into the correct position before re-engaging the safety. He gave the assembled weapon to Ace.
Kaufman still made the Doctor sign for it before they left. ‘Sorry, sir, regulations,’ he explained.
‘We’re not after the Dalek,’ explained the Doctor, ‘we’re after the transmat.’ He flattened himself to the wall one side of the entrance, motioning to Ace to take the position opposite. He carefully checked inside and then burst through the doors; Ace followed, rocket launcher ready for use.
The hallway was deserted.
‘Won’t the Dalek try to stop us?’
‘Quite possibly,’ he warned. ‘Stay close behind me,’
That’s clever, thought Ace, seeing as I’m the one carrying the weapon. She was just suggesting that the Dalek must have gone back down into the cellar when a bolt of energy slashed past her and blew a cast iron radiator off the wall.
They quickly hid behind a table that the Doctor had upended. Wisps of smoke rose from a charred hole in one of the classroom doors.
Things then happened very fast. The Dalek came through the door, smashing it into toothpicks, and fired. A trophy cabinet to Ace’s left burst in a shower of glass, the splinters bouncing off the walls.
Ace raised the launcher to her shoulder, lined up the sights as best she could, and pulled the trigger. There was a blast of heat behind her and a lot of smoke.
The rocket had barely started to accelerate when it struck the grille just below the Dalek’s eyestalk, but it was going fast enough to detonate. Superheated gases punched a hole in the Dalek’s polycarbide casing, ripped through the delicate circuits and soft organic parts, and blew them out of the back in a spray of shattered armour.
‘Ace,’ she breathed softly.
‘You destroyed it.’
‘I aimed at the eyepiece.’
The Doctor looked at her with something close to despair.
There was a clatter of army boots in the hallway. Mike was shouting orders as he came round the corner. ‘Keep sharp, watch your back, watch your…’ His voice wound down as he faced Ace, the Doctor and an obviously dead Dalek. ‘Doctor, Ace.’ He paused, eyeing the Dalek. ‘Any more?’
‘No,’ said the Doctor.
Mike, ordered a soldier back to fetch the group captain. Then he noticed the rocket launcher that Ace was carrying. ‘Did you do that?’
Ace waved smoke away from her face and nodded. ‘Makes a lot of smoke, doesn’t it?’ She handed over the weapon – it was getting heavy. Mike gave her a strange look, almost like awe, as he took it.
The Doctor considered his next move, watching as the group captain, Professor Jensen and her assistant, Miss Williams, entered the corridor. They represented a flaw, a deviation from the plan, as did the Dalek at Foreman’s Yard.
Gilmore looked coldly at the smoking Dalek. ‘You destroyed it, good.’
Anger coursed through the Doctor, shocking and unexpected in its intensity. ‘It is not good. Nothing about this is good. I have made a grave error of judgement.’
The plan was becoming blurred around the edges, and within that uncertainty people were beginning to die. ‘I’m beginning to wish l’d never started this,’ he said softly to himself.
He looked at the others, their faces filled with expectation, and he wondered if he was going to get them killed. He fixed Gilmore with his eyes. ‘Group Captain, I must ask you to evacuate the immediate area.’
‘That’s an absurd idea,’ snapped Gilmore.
‘Why, Doctor?’ Rachel interjected quickly, forestalling any dismissal by Gilmore.
‘I have reason, reasons,’ he corrected, ‘to believe that a major Dalek task-force could soon be operating in this area.’
‘Great,’ said Allison.
‘And where,’ demanded Gilmore, ‘will this task-force arrive from?’
‘One certainly is already in place, hidden somewhere in this vicinity.’
Now there is a comforting thought, said a voice in Rachel’s head.
‘The other,’ continued the Doctor, ‘probably from a timeship in geostationary orbit.’
How easily he says these things, as if they were commonplace, thought Rachel.
‘Come on, Doctor,’ Gilmore said stubbornly, ‘be reasonable.’
But the Doctor was not reasonable. ‘Do you dispute the non-terrestrial nature of the Daleks? Examine this,’ he gestured angrily at the remains, ‘or better still ask your scientific adviser.’
Gilmore turned on her. ‘Well, Professor Jensen?’
Rachel knew Gilmore wasn’t going to like her reply. ‘The Doctor is right. It’s alien.’
Gilmore looked betrayed. ‘You’re positive?’
‘Yes.’
The group captain thought about it. ‘Professor, a word please.’ He drew Rachel away from the others. ‘This Doctor chappie, do you trust him?’
‘He knows what he is talking about and considerably more, than he is telling us. I think we should go along with him for now.’
‘And after?’
Rachel shrugged. ‘We could ask for an explanation.’
‘We might,’ said Gilmore, and there was steel in his tone, ‘do a bit more than ask.’ He turned back to the Doctor. ‘I’ll have to get a decision from my superiors.’
‘When?’ asked the Doctor.
‘I should get a decision either way by tomorrow morning. I’ll see you all then.’ And with that he strode out.
‘Can you look after Ace for me?’ the Doctor asked Rachel.
‘Of course.’ As he was turning to leave she ventured: ‘Doctor, I have questions I would like answered.’
‘So have I,’ said the Doctor. ‘I’ll return in the morning.’
Ace ran up to him. ‘Doctor, where are you going?’
‘I have to bury the past.’
‘I’m coming with you.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s not your past, Ace. You haven’t been born yet.’ He plucked the baseball bat from her rucksack. ‘I’ll take that.’ Settling it under his arm he left.
Rachel took Ace’s hand and looked into her eyes. ‘What did he mean, haven’t been born yet?’
Ace smiled but said nothing.
The workshop was a vast globe one kilometre across, its walls studded with sensors. Cables as thick as corridors snaked uneasily around its vertical circumference. People worked amid this vast technology, insect-like in protective garments.
In the exact centre hung a radiance like a tiny sun, pulsing unevenly to its own secret rhythms.
The Triumvirate met in a gallery high in the upper hemisphere. Of these three Gallifreyans who would reshape their world, two were to become great legends; the other would vanish altogether from history.
Omega turned away from the gallery window. He was a huge man with wide shoulders and muscular arms, a definite drift from the regenerative norm. Some Gallifreyans, however, said his present incarnation was a throwback, a genetic memory
from the dark time. He opened his arms like some barbarian king and grinned at Rassilon.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘we have succeeded.’
‘In what, Omega,’ Rassilon said quietly, ‘have we succeeded?’
‘Why, the key to time,’ Omega said unconcernedly. ‘You as much as any of us have made this instrument possible.’ He turned to the third person in the room. ‘Is this not true?’
‘It is,’ said the other.
Disquiet was in Rassilon’s pale eyes. ‘And what shall we do with this power once we have it?’
‘Why, cousin, we shall become transtemporal, free of the tyranny of moment following moment.’ Omega thumped his chest. ‘We shall become the Lords of Time.’
‘Let us hope,’ Rassilon said evenly, ‘that we are worthy of such stewardship. Time imposes order on events; without order there is no balance, all is chaos.’
‘Then we shall impose order…’
‘I forbid it,’ the other said suddenly.
‘I was merely explaining…’
‘Remember the Minyans,’ said the other.
‘But we know so much more, we have learnt from our mistakes,’ protested Omega, but he met the other’s eyes and became silent.
‘We have obviously learnt nothing; we shall carry that stain forever.’ He moved to the balcony and stared out at the device that burned in the chamber beyond. ‘Whatever other chains we break.’
Rassilon and Omega joined him at the window.
‘Is it not a magnificent achievement?’ said Omega.
‘Yes, it is that,’ conceded Rassilon, ‘a fantastic device.’
‘Or a terrible weapon,’ said the other.
4
SATURDAY, 02:17
THE DOCTOR WALKED alone in the dark city down near the docks. How many times have I walked here, in this sprawling maze of streets and people? he thought.
Do they have fogs in London in 1963? He couldn’t remember–there were so many details, so many worlds. Such a vast glittering universe, and yet it is always here.
This planet.
Its children will be flung out into the stars, to conquer, to fight and die on alien planets. Indomitable, fantastic, brilliant and yet so cruel, petty and selfish.