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

Fallomax looked uneasy. ‘You’d really mess with the way things are meant to be?’

‘Who gets to choose what’s meant to be?’ The Doctor didn’t wait for an answer. ‘The Time Lords, that’s who. My people. They came up with the Laws of Time and tried to enforce them but, in the end, death came for them too. They all burned – last act of a Time War that left the universe hollowed out and a billion galaxies in bits. Death gone mad! That’s what creation has to look forward to. But if I crush the Kotturuh, sweep away their Design, think of the suffering that could be stopped. The worlds that could be saved! Ascinta, Perganon, Gallifrey – worlds you’ve never dreamed of! Think of it – the Time Lords may never fall, the Daleks may never evolve, the people of Mondas never wear out so they never become Cybermen …’

Estinee swapped a blank look with Fallomax. ‘We don’t know what these things are.’

‘You won’t need to know. It’s perfect!’

‘But all the people you’ve known—’

‘The people I’ve lost,’ the Doctor snapped. ‘They’ll always have lived, I’ll still have known them. I’ll remember and honour their lives. But this way, who knows, maybe I’ll meet them again – and they can stay with me for ever! With lives no longer defined by endings … with a continuity to the ages … think what so many worlds could go on to achieve!’

‘Sounds kind of like you’re trying to convince yourself,’ said Fallomax. ‘Not us.’

‘I don’t have to convince you. It’s not your call.’ The Doctor stared down at the equipment on his lab bench. ‘There’s this story about a man who cheats Death … a story I’ve known well, for a very long time. Sometimes it felt like my story. The choices I’ve tried to make. The parts I’ve had to play. But in the end, you have to stop playing.’ He spoke distantly, as if remembering across the years. ‘There were times when I couldn’t be the Doctor. When I had to become something else … to do what I didn’t want to do. But this – oh, I want this! Death, decay, limits – they can all come to an end, and I’m calling it.’ He shouted to the vaulted ceiling, or perhaps to the stars beyond it: ‘If I’m the last Time Lord standing, I’m staying that way, whatever it takes – victorious!’

Snatching up the phials he strode away, out of the control room.

‘He’ll be taking those to the lab for tests and fine tuning,’ said Fallomax quietly. ‘The most incredible ideas come out of his head, but the rest of him? It’s all but empty.’

Nothing left to lose , thought Estinee. She looked at Fallomax. ‘Do you want to kill the Kotturuh?’

‘I … just want all this to stop.’ Fallomax turned from her and crossed the control room. ‘I’d better go and help him with those tests. Find out what he thinks we should do next. If I can remember the way …’

Estinee watched her go. She was alone in the control room. I don’t want to kill anyone , she thought miserably. Not even Kotturuh . She lay on the floor and closed her eyes. Curled up on her side, lonely in the blue firelight of the control room.

A Kotturuh drifted from the coral shadows behind her like a ghost. It hovered over the console and its glittering claws flicked over the controls.

Chapter Fourteen

Fallomax could hear the Doctor’s voice from the TARDIS laboratory all the way down the corridor, spilling over static. She had no idea how the ship could be so big inside something so little, but it felt like she hadn’t walked so far in her Lifeshroud in years. The damn thing chafed and weighed you down. The thought that she might finally take it off and still feel safe …

With a pang of guilt, she thought of wide-eyed Estinee, so shocked at the idea of killing.

‘Whatever it takes, sweetheart,’ she muttered.

‘Brian, this is the Doctor …’ He was still calling in the laboratory. ‘Interference from somewhere … Brian? Are you receiving me?’

She hesitated outside, eavesdropping.

‘Brian, it’s the Doctor! Are you …?’

‘Commander Brian, receiving you, Admiral ,’ came the calm response at last. ‘How is your great endeavour—’

‘I want you to take Chalskal’s fleet and attack Mordeela.’

A pause. ‘Please repeat your instructions, Admiral.’

‘I’m not an Admiral!’

‘For appearances,’ Brian said more quietly.

‘All right. All right, Commander . This is Admiral-the-Ship’s-Doctor ordering you to move out of Skalithai space. Get into a holding orbit around the Mordeela exclusion zone.’

As he talked on, Fallomax waited in the doorway to the laboratory. While the phial was irradiated in a machine filled with Kotturuh crystals, the Doctor was talking to Brian over a monitor screen. The Ood was still wearing his black suit, but with a red sash worn diagonally which looked suspiciously like it had once been part of Chalskal’s poncho.

‘Admiral, are your orders that we take the fight to the Kotturuh?’

‘We take a leaf from their book,’ said the Doctor, ‘threatening what they love and value most. Maybe they’ll call off their attack on Skalithai to defend their gateway.’

‘Go against their own Design? That seems unlikely.’

‘Agreed,’ said Fallomax, with a mock salute to Brian. ‘They have an unbreakable shield to defend their gateway.’

‘Oh, I think I have an idea of how to get past it,’ said the Doctor. ‘If the Kotturuh agree to be contained – agree to leave the universe alone – then we’ve won.’

‘They will never agree to that,’ said Brian. ‘The Design is their only cause and religion. You know that.’

‘If that’s how it is,’ said the Doctor, ‘then what happens next is on them.’

‘On that subject, Brian,’ said Fallomax, ‘how long did the crystals hold the charge on Chalskal’s Lifeshroud before they ran down?’

‘For just over six hours,’ Brian reported, ‘then they exploded. Mr Ball found the detonation to be unexpectedly violent. He was relieved that something soft got in the way.’

The Doctor frowned. ‘Chalskal?’

‘The Ambassador should be able to bow again within a month or so. He is receiving excellent treatment on Skalithai.’ Brian gave a discreet blink. ‘The authorities assure me he will soon be well enough to stand trial.’

‘Oh.’ The Doctor experienced a momentary worry at Brian’s smoothness. ‘Don’t they want to confiscate his fleet or something?’

‘Why no,’ the Ood chided him. ‘Once I explained the mercenary nature of this organisation, they were horrified at the thought they might be liable for the bill. I assured Skalithai that you would be only too happy to pay for them.’

‘I would?’

‘You would. You may even have offered the troops a bonus to reassure them that they would not be abandoned by the new management. It was very kind of you.’

‘It was.’ The Doctor felt that tilting worry of control edging away from him. ‘Brian?’

‘Yes?’

‘Do I really need an army?’

The Ood stared in some consternation at his translator sphere and shook it slightly. Then he looked back at the Doctor, patiently, pityingly. ‘You are facing off against Death. You cannot propose doing that just by yourself.’

‘I normally manage it just with my friends,’ the Doctor said.

‘But Admiral,’ said Brian, ‘ we are your friends. Now, when should we expect you back on board?’

‘Soon, Commander,’ sighed the Doctor. ‘I need to finish working on something first. Out.’

Brian’s face faded from the screen.

Fallomax looked at the Doctor. ‘You know, Doctor suits you a whole lot better than Admiral.’