Doctor Who_ The Burning Part 25

'Roger,' she said, shaking her head. 'Oh, Roger.'

'Do it.' Nepath said again, louder. His voice was shaking.

She shook her head, the fire brightening in her eyes.

'Do it!' he screamed at her.

The entire huge structure was buckling under him. He could feel the tremors shaking it to pieces as he ran. Colonel Wilson was breathing heavily, drawing in great breaths of the acid air as he raced towards the point where Grant was struggling to reach the top of the dam.

He was not sure why he was running, why he was risking his own life. Except that a man was in trouble, might die. Any life was worth a risk, he decided as he continued to run. If Grant was indeed alive... But so many people had died today too many. If he could save just one more then that was one fewer death. One fewer family left to mourn. One fewer set of eyes to wipe dry hearts to break, nightmares to scream awake from.

A hand was reaching up towards the railing as he leaned over. So close. He could see every detail of Grant's straining face, as if it was etched in stone. The wall below him was crumbling away under the strain. The rip running upwards, closing on the man clutching upwards for Wilson's own hand reaching down.

Wilson was lying on the buckling ground, stretching to reach. His fingers grazed the ends of Sir William's, fumbled, caught them. He managed to get a grip on the man's wrist just as the section of brickwork Grant was clinging to broke away and crashed down into the white water below.

Grant continued to stare up at Wilson, expression set, eyes dead and blank. The water splashed up over him, soaking him. But it seemed to stain him darker rather than soak into the man's clothes. And the weight...

Struggling to keep his own balance, to avoid being dragged over the edge, Wilson pulled. He managed to get both hands round Grant's wrist, braced his legs against the stanchion that held the iron railing in place and felt it creak and give.

Then the weight was gone. But he was still clinging on. His arms jerked upwards, and still he held on, rolling back from the edge as he clutched Grant's hand tightly.

He stared in disbelief at the severed forearm. It had broken away snapped under the weight. Like brittle stone. Wilson struggled to his feet, dropping the hand in horror. It twisted, turned, fell to the ground at his feet. And exploded into a thousand slivers of cold, fragile rock. When he looked over the edge, leaning on the bent railing, he was in time to see the figure of Grant disappear under the water, shattered arm still outstretched. The body sank at once, carried away in the torrent, smashed to pieces by the pressure of the raging water. Like a statue.

The Doctor stepped aside as she approached.

'Roger.' She was shaking her head in sadness. 'Oh Roger, don't you know? Can't you tell?' She folded Nepath in her arms, holding him tight.

But despite the warmth, despite the proximity of her body, he remained rigid and cold. 'Do it,' he said to her. 'For me.' He held her slightly away from him, and looked deep into her eyes, into the flickering fires inside her. 'I have to know,' he told her. His whole body was shaking, racked with the sobs as he struggled to control his emotion. 'Please, I have to know before I can go on with this.'

Beside them the rolling river of molten rock had spread across the moorland. It was close enough for them to feel the heat, close enough for the glow to illuminate them in silhouette as they stood, holding each other, clinging to each other.

'Oh Roger,' she said again. 'Believe in me.'

He heard only her voice. Felt only her touch, her warmth. His heart was aching, burning as he ran his hands through her hair, held her face close to his. 'For me,' he repeated.

She shook her head, her arms coiled round him. 'No,' she breathed. 'You need me. I need you.'

'Is that why you won't do it?' the Doctor asked from behind them. 'Not because of any love or care for him. But because you need him. You need him to delude himself, to help you. Whatever the cost,' he snarled. 'Whatever the cost to him him.'

'We don't need him,' she spat back, still holding Nepath tight. 'Not now.'

'We?' the Doctor challenged. 'That's a bit of an admission, isn't it?' There was a hint of satisfaction in his voice.

Nepath felt himself go cold, despite the warmth of her embrace. 'Is that it?' he demanded. 'Have you deceived me?' He was choking on the words. 'Tell me it's you, Patience.' He tried to pull free. 'I have to know.'

'Oh, Roger,' she said again, her voice honeyed and cloying. 'Don't make me do this.'

He pushed her away, held her at arm's length. 'I have to know,' he shouted.

She sighed. 'Very well. If that is truly what you want...' And she drew him close again, enfolding him in her warm embrace.

Over her shoulder, crying into her hair, through each delineated strand he saw the fire erupt from her feet. It leaped out from her heels, running as if following a trail of gunpowder across the broken bubbling ground. When it reached the river of magma, fire met fire and was absorbed by it, drawn in. He tried to push her away in dismay, anger and disgust.

But she held him close. Through the brittle broken threads that had been her hair he saw the smoke drift aside to reveal the Doctor standing, watching. Impa.s.sive.

Inscrutable.

And behind the Doctor, a white wall was rus.h.i.+ng towards them. It broke and crashed down over the sea of burning rock that lay across the landscape. The sound was incredible. The white steam blotted out the yellow smoke.

Only when he tried to stand aside, to break free, to step away from what had been his sister, did Nepath realise that he was still held tight in her embrace. An embrace of cold, dead stone.

s...o...b..ld reached the edge of the collapsing dam just as Wilson did. Wilson toppled backwards as the ground beneath his feet gave way. s...o...b..ld lunged forwards and grabbed the exhausted soldier. He managed to drag him clear, up to the higher ground. Behind them the whole of the dam was cras.h.i.+ng down into the water.

A cold breeze ruffled their hair, swept along by the ma.s.s of water as it spilled out across the moorland. The smoke was swept away before it, to reveal the unreal landscape beneath.

Solidified, bent and broken structures emerged from the water as it calmed. Like the trunks of long*dead trees or broken statues they thrust up through the land in tortured, twisted parodies of shapes. In the distance, they could see the steam thrown up as the water met the magma, rus.h.i.+ng over it, leaving it solid and dead. The church tower was an island in the midst of the rising water.

At the bottom of the slope, making their way up towards where the soldiers were standing in jubilant awe, a line of the amorphous glowing figures was to be seen. They glowed with inner fire, arms of flame outstretched before them. As the water rose to their feet, they seemed to slow as if trudging through treacle. One of them staggered forwards, leaving its leg behind a stump of broken stone that was soon submerged beneath the rising water.

Moments later, the water was over them, bubbling and glowing with the angry smothered fire. Then the glow faded, and the bubbles ceased, and the water continued to rise.

The water was round Nepath's feet, almost sweeping him off balance. He struggled and kicked and clawed to be free of her. But the stone cold arms held him in their tight embrace, wrapped around him, entwined, ungiving.

He saw the Doctor climb up on to the outcrop of rock, standing above the water, looking down at him. His expression was still unreadable.

The water was up to Nepath's knees. His braced his feet to try to stay upright. He managed to reach out past her shoulder, his hand brus.h.i.+ng aside strands of hair, breaking them away so that they clattered down her back and splashed into the rising water at his waist. He reached upwards, towards the Doctor, fingers clutching.

'Doctor!' He had to shout, to scream above the tearing wrenching thunder of the water at his chest, pressing in at him. The stone dead weight of her held him down, kept him from climbing on to the rocky outcrop. 'Doctor, please!'

His hand was almost at the Doctor's feet, stretching. reaching, desperate.

The relief was palpable. He sobbed and cried with it as the Doctor stepped down, one foot splas.h.i.+ng into the water. Nepath reached out round her, clutching, clawing towards him. The Doctor was standing on a ledge, his feet level with Nepath's shoulder. The water washed over the Doctor's shoes as he lifted one foot out of the water.

'Help me!' The water was in his mouth, making him gag and swallow as he screamed.

He saw through the spray that the Doctor had his foot on Patience's back, between her shoulder blades. Nepath clawed at it, grabbed it, scrabbled to get a grip.

The Doctor's foot pressed hard into her back. As if testing her balance.

'No Doctor!' His words were a spray of bubbling acidic water.

The foot drew back. Nepath rocked forwards, head free of the water for a moment. A clear view for a second: Of the Doctor giving a sudden, single, violent kick at the stone of Patience Nepath's back.

Then he was falling, her weight on top of him, The view through the bubbling white water was a blur bearing him down, The Doctor watching him as he sank slowly holding him tight, Then turning and walking away so tight, the bubbles of his own final breath misting out the image in an embrace of death.

never once looking back.

Chapter Twenty.

From the Embers It was as if, s...o...b..ld thought, the whole of Middletown had been picked up and deposited somewhere else. The water had receded, but the ground floor of the Rectory still smelled of mud and mould. The church had fared better, with its stone floors and walls. There was little in the way of soft furnis.h.i.+ngs to absorb the water and retain and exude the smell of the damp.

The lower part of the west wing of the Grange had been washed away by the water as it raced past, so that the house slumped to one side awkward and broken. It was convulsed down one side with the main windows collapsed in on themselves, into a bizarre approximation of a wink.

But the landscape was completely changed. Where the fissure had been, a narrow, jagged lake cut across the ground, fed by the river that now ran through the shattered remnants of the dam, retracing its previous course. The moorland was more like a marsh now, boggy and hazardous. All around, even in the streets of the main part of the town, weird rock formations jutted up from the broken ground, as if reaching up towards the sky to escape the receding waters.

The huts and machinery at the mouth of the mine had been swept away, leaving shattered driftwood and lumps of bent ironwork in their wake. The engineers had inspected the workings. They were worried about subsidence and collapse, though there was little above the old workings that could be damaged. Colonel Wilson had told s...o...b..ld, in confidence, that most of the tunnels were under water now. But the changing landscape, the way the ground had moved had forced open new natural tunnels and crevices, and Wilson said he had seen s.h.i.+ning rivulets of what might just be tin ore embedded in the walls of several of these newly exposed shafts and tunnels.

s...o...b..ld's own sense of loss seemed emphasised, exaggerated by the imminent departure of his house guest. They had to remove the window of the Doctor's bedroom in order to get his large blue box out. Now it was strapped to a cart in the Rectory driveway. A horse one of Urton's recaptured after his stables were washed away stood ready to pull its load out of the driveway and away from Middletown.

'You know,' s...o...b..ld said as he shook the Doctor's hand, 'when it catches the light, there seems to be some texture to it.' He nodded towards the box.

'I know what you mean,' the Doctor agreed. Together they stood and examined the box from a short distance. 'Almost like panelling of some sort. Just a hint, a shadow of a shadow.'

'Where will you go?'

'I have no idea.' He took the reins and led the horse slowly forwards. Its hooves crunched on the gravel. The wheels creaked into motion behind them. 'But it will be interesting finding out.' As they walked, the Doctor let go of the reins. The horse followed obediently beside him.

The Doctor pulled a tattered piece of paper from his pocket and opened it. s...o...b..ld could see that there was writing on it. An even handwriting, almost mechanical it was so consistent, faded and smudged. It said: Meet me in St. Louis', February 8th 2001.

It was signed with the same perfect writing. The name looked like Fitz Fitz.

'We're well into January now,' s...o...b..ld said. 'Perhaps that means a minute past eight o'clock in the evening.' He tapped the 2001 2001.

The Doctor stopped. The horse stopped too. The Doctor folded the paper again and returned it to his pocket. 'Perhaps,' he said. 'But I don't think so.'

'Do you think the mine will open again?' s...o...b..ld asked. The sun was s.h.i.+ning in his eyes, so that the Doctor was a silhouette against the skyline.

'Who can say? The future is a closed book, I'm afraid.'

I suppose so.' s...o...b..ld agreed. 'When we first met, we talked of predestination, I seem to recall. We debated whether our lives had any meaning, any individuality whether they are there for us to shape as we will.'

'Or whether they are set in stone. Yes,' he said quietly. 'I remember.' He nodded thoughtfully. 'But so long as we don't know, perhaps it really doesn't matter.'

s...o...b..ld hesitated before he spoke. 'Doctor,' he said. tentative and slightly nervous at his own words, 'there is one thing I should like to know very much.' His breath misted in the cold air.

'Yes?' The Doctor's tone suggested he knew already what it was.

'Who are you?' s...o...b..ld asked.

'Ah,' he replied at once. Then he was silent for a while, and so still as he considered that he might have been a statue. 'That is something,' he eventually replied, 'that I must find out for myself.'

'Is it... is it something you really want to know?

'Yes. Yes it is.' He was walking again now, clicking his tongue to encourage the horse to follow. They turned the corner of the driveway and the empty moorland stretched out ahead of them beyond the gates. 'It's something I am burning to know.'

Before he could press the Doctor further, s...o...b..ld was distracted by a noise. At first he thought it was the cartwheels scratching on the gravel of the drive. The gravel was thin, all but washed away by the flood. The wheels clattered on the frozen ground beneath. But the sound was more of a sc.r.a.ping. and it was coming from the other side of the cart, from the heap of stones and earth where the perimeter wall had collapsed, where Betty...

Betty 'Excuse me,' s...o...b..ld heard himself mutter as he ran. He pushed past the Doctor, the horse, the cart. The stones in front of him were moving, s.h.i.+fting, falling. Something was emerging, something pale and delicate from amongst the heavy rock and stone, from out of the dead land.

Fingers Clutching round a large stone, reaching for the cold air.

He grasped the hand in his own, felt it cool and fragile in his grip as with his other hand he rolled the stone away. He had to let go of her to clear the rubble, to dig with his nails into the frozen dirt, to drag her clear.

She collapsed at once, a tangled weeping mess at his feet. He fell beside her, pulling her to him, crying into her shoulder as he held her. Her face was smeared with her tears and the earth. Her clothes were torn, ragged, stained and in places charred by the fire. Her right hand was a blackened ma.s.s, the flesh peeled back like burned paper.

The fire, he thought, had consumed her. But she had been at its centre, in the eye of the flames, the burning.

They rocked back and forth, crying quietly. 'Oh Jephthah,' he wept into her scorched hair, 'what a treasure hadst thou?'

'One fair daughter,' she wept back. 'Oh Father... Father.' She held him tight in her embrace, their tears mingling where their cheeks met.

Eventually they climbed to their hesitant feet. Eventually he led her gently back to the drive. Eventually he realised they were alone.

A single line of cart wheel tracks led out of the gates and across the sodden moorland. Into the distance.

Disappearing into the empty wilderness.

Acknowledgements

Any novel is a collaborative effort. In the case of The Burning The Burning I am more than usually indebted. I am more than usually indebted.

I owe thanks to Ian Smith for advice on all things military pertaining to the era (and the loan of a nice red jacket just like Michael Caine had in Zulu), though if there are any mistakes they are of my own devising.

In formulating an approach to the 'evolving' character of the Doctor I have to thank Ben Dunn, Dave Owen, Rebecca Levene, Paul Leonard, Lance Parkin, Terrance d.i.c.ks, Gary Russell and Peter Anghelides for their help, confidence, endors.e.m.e.nt and support.

I thank both Jac Rayner and Steve Cole for their help there too. And for far more than that.