Steve Cole - Doctor Who - The Knight, The Fool and The Dead

‘Make sure you are away before the date given to you by the Kotturuh,’ said Brian, ‘just in case … Admiral?’

‘Admiral! No, thanks. Ship’s Doctor will do.’ The Doctor took a deep breath, summoning energy or will. Then he led Fallomax and Estinee over to his blue box in the corner of the lab. ‘Whatever the rank, I declare this fleet to have a new flagship! HMS TARDIS , ready for boarding …’

Estinee followed him in, and swapped boggling looks with Fallomax. The tiny box was wide as a field inside and glowing like a summer sunset.

The doors slammed shut behind them.

Chapter Thirteen

Estinee stood with the Doctor and Fallomax outside the Tombs of the Ended on Andalia. The plaza was littered with fallen flies, dust and corpses. Dead moss lay like ash. A few uncertain insects flicked tentative wings.

Together they watched a young Andalian creature scurry about. Tiny tusks squinted from the ridged forehead. It turned over bones and remains, absorbed and silent. Then, with no further thought, it took off gracefully into the sky and left them behind.

‘He doesn’t know what he’s lost,’ said the Doctor. ‘That’s the burden of those left behind.’

‘Right,’ said Fallomax, sweating in her Lifeshroud. ‘We’re the ones really suffering.’

It would take time, Estinee supposed, for new life to get a proper foothold here. ‘I was always sad when the harvest was gathered back home. Only the short stalks left behind, even though I knew they would grow and rise again.’ Estinee gazed around her. ‘It feels the same here.’

‘“All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass,”’ the Doctor said quietly. ‘But this harvest didn’t have to happen.’

‘It always happens,’ said Estinee. ‘That’s what my mother told me. Harvests have to happen just as children have to grow. Seasons and children are the only things that change …’

‘Famous last words, Mum,’ Fallomax muttered.

The Doctor stared up at the silent tombs. ‘You two can wait in the TARDIS if you want. I’ve got to take samples from the dead in here.’

‘I’ll help,’ said Estinee.

‘I’ll set up inside,’ Fallomax said.

Estinee did what she could as the suns tracked through the clear sky, but it wasn’t much. She hunted for living moss; the Doctor said he needed it for comparison, but she couldn’t find any. The Doctor told her to keep searching while he did the work of ten people at once in the TARDIS: gathering the rest of his samples, analysing them, dazzling Fallomax with new ways of doing things, using technology she could barely comprehend. And if the Professor couldn’t grasp them, Estinee decided it was wiser not to even try.

The way she saw it, the Kotturuh put limits on life with their magic spells. The Doctor was searching for the words of the spells in the Andalian DNA, and, once he had them, he would make a spell of his own to stop the Kotturuh for good.

But it was taking time that they didn’t have. The hours were counting down, not just to the End of Days on Skalithai but to something a lot more personal.

‘The Kotturuh wanted me to know a time and a place.’ The Doctor had said it so casually, just an hour ago, as he’d added something to a phial of fluid in the TARDIS lab. ‘They came to me before I could leave Mordeela and they left me babbling a date – five days from now, here on Andalia.’

‘That’s what I heard you muttering on the flagship?’ Estinee realised.

‘Their way of gloating. Warning me that I’m going to know death.’ The silence was heavy, and the Doctor waved it away. ‘Don’t worry, it’s all right. The Kotturuh think they see the future, but I’m a Time Lord – I’m from the future. And I know the future’s not written. Here and now … I can do anything.’

‘Well, that is kind of the basis for this whole plan,’ said Fallomax. ‘But don’t you think we should get back to Brian on the flagship and work there?’

‘Don’t worry, we’ll be long gone before five days are up.’

‘That’s almost when Skalithai is due to fall.’ Estinee lowered her voice. ‘Do you think the Kotturuh know our plans?’

‘If they do, and they’re bothered, that’s a good sign.’ The Doctor gave her a rare grin that felt like a gift. ‘It means we’re going to win.’

And just half an hour later, he whooped as if he really had. His phial of crystals was bubbling with black filings.

‘What?’ Fallomax stared at him. ‘What have you done?’

‘Not sure.’ He peered at the phial warily. ‘Got to double-check. Run it through the sequence accelerator.’

So saying, he sprinted from the lab. Estinee and Fallomax swapped a look and followed him back to the control room.

‘We’ll soon know if we’ve done it.’ He had already lashed up some bulky equipment on the console, and now poured the contents of the phial through a funnel he’d jammed into one end. ‘If we channel a little temporal energy through the solution we can achieve months of incubation in seconds …’

There was a loud, brassy ping and, with a mechanical chatter, strips of printed paper curled out from a slot. The Doctor pushed his glasses into place, snatched up the paper and scanned the results.

‘Well, well,’ he said. ‘Well, well, well, well, well.’

‘What?’ Fallomax’s cheeks had paled to pink. ‘You did it? No. You didn’t. Did you?’

‘It works. The reverse wave works!’ The Doctor threw his glasses into the air, grabbed her and kissed her head. ‘Look, Estinee! The Kotturuh cells have decayed, unravelled. Died off!’

‘We can fight back?’ Estinee stared, mouth open, feeling sick and excited. ‘How did you ever get Kotturuh cells?’

‘One of them grabbed me by the throat. Barest trace of Kotturuh DNA left behind, but enough to work with.’ The Doctor beamed. ‘I made a culture in the lab.’

‘That’s what you were doing? Why didn’t you tell us?’ Fallomax demanded. ‘I thought we’d never get anywhere without their DNA …’

‘Had to be a secret.’ He looked at Estinee. ‘The Kotturuh might’ve been listening in. Now it’s too late for them to stop us – cos we can stop them . I’ve simulated them firing their Genetic Wave at a Lifeshroud and bounced back our remixed, reflected version …’

Fallomax cupped her hands over her mouth. ‘You’ve built a weapon?’

‘More of a mirror,’ the Doctor conceded.

‘What will it do to them?’

‘Estinee’s “will to life” doesn’t sit well with the Kotturuh’s will to death. Depends on the intensity of what it’s reflecting, but …’

‘It could kill them?’

‘Maybe.’ The Doctor met her gaze. ‘I’m hoping to drive them back. Perhaps a bit more.’

‘You’re using me to do this?’ Estinee felt cold. ‘I thought you were just going to give them a lifespan, so they don’t live for ever any more.’

‘It’ll only affect them if they attack,’ said Fallomax. ‘This could be a way to curb their aggression, contain them—’

‘Or we could do it,’ the Doctor said quietly. ‘We could end the Kotturuh.’

Estinee looked at him. ‘I hate the Kotturuh for all they’ve done. But to kill them all …?’

‘If I don’t, it won’t stop!’ The Doctor looked suddenly agonised; she was reminded you didn’t always have to scratch deep to draw blood. ‘I know what happens, I’ve seen it. Left unchecked, the Kotturuh sweep across the entire universe, crushing life, bringing death, tearing apart civilisations that might’ve stood for eternity …’

‘A doctor’s meant to bring life, not death,’ said Estinee. ‘You’re a doctor!’

‘Or am I an admiral? Or a knight, or a fool? Does it matter what I am?’ He reeled away from the console, paced about. ‘I’d be saving so many lives. Lives that will go on and on. See, in my time, death is a constant, everywhere you go. The price we pay for progress. The pain we pay for love. The way to win a war.’ He turned to look at her and Fallomax. ‘But it doesn’t have to be. I can stop the Kotturuh here and now and change everything. Reinvent the future.’