Doctor Who_ Loving The Alien Part 9

'Here,' he said, pa.s.sing the flask to Mullen.

52.Mullen took the flask and slugged heavily from it.

'Thanks,' he said quietly when he'd drunk his fill, and handed the flask back. McBride took a slug himself.

'Any chance of a smoke?'

McBride took out a packet.

'Lucky Strike,' said Mullen. 'Nice touch'

McBride put a cigarette in Mullen's mouth, then one in his own. He lit both. The men smoked for a moment in silence.

'The Doc's fine...'

Mullen grunted. McBride smiled blandly. Why was there never enough to G.o.dd.a.m.n say in hospital rooms?

And why was there always so much you couldn't say?

'Nice room.'

Like what the nurse had just told him outside the door.

'They brought me to the Royal London,' said Mullen. 'It used to be on my beat. Years ago. Wonder if this is the room the Elephant Man had.'

McBride was slow on the uptake. 'Oh, yeah. I heard of him. Some sort of a freak, wasn't he?'

His words tailed off as he realised.

"They had to take my legs,' said Mullen quietly.

'I know.'

McBride could see Mullen was shaking.

'What the h.e.l.l am I going to do without legs?' Mullen hissed, his sudden fury bringing him close to breathless tears.

McBride didn't know what to say.

'I guess you should be glad you're alive...'

Mullen didn't reply, but stared, unblinking at the far wall of the room. The silence iced over.

'The Doc couldn't stay,' ventured McBride. 'He's running about like crazy, trying to do ten things at once, just like the last time. He's one worried guy.'

Mullen didn't reply 'Did you see that giant ant? What a monster!'

'I don't give a d.a.m.n about any giant ant,' said Mullen slowly, his anger rising, 'any more than I give a d.a.m.n about Cybermen down the sewers or reds under the b.l.o.o.d.y bed!' He was shouting now 'I was right, McBride, it is is always you. Whenever you come charging into my life I'm dropped straight in it. You put me here, McBride. You've crippled me just like you crippled my career. Well, you and the Doctor can go and chase your giant ants, but leave me alone! Just... go.' always you. Whenever you come charging into my life I'm dropped straight in it. You put me here, McBride. You've crippled me just like you crippled my career. Well, you and the Doctor can go and chase your giant ants, but leave me alone! Just... go.'

McBride didn't know what to say. He got up to leave, then stopped 53 and turned.

'No.'

This wasn't fair. This wasn't G.o.ddam fair.

'You know, Mullen there was a time when you gave a s.h.i.+t.'

'You reckon?' Mullen sounded bitterly sarcastic. 'When was that, then?'

'Back when we first ran into each other. When the Doc and Ace showed up.'

'When my life was first screwed up by you and your lunatic friends.

When your obsession with the d.a.m.ned Cybermen started.'

'You were the same! We had to do something. Only we really knew what they were messing around with. We had to try.'

How many times over the years had they got into this same argument?

It had all started just days after the Doc and Ace left just when they thought it was over. Mullen had located a partially collapsed sewer full of dormant Cybermen. Not knowing what to do, and scared to go to the authorities after their recent experiences, they had dynamited what remained of the tunnel and sealed the monsters in.

As if that was going to solve anything. Inevitably, come the end of the war, the sewers were rebuilt. Nothing was made public, but he and Mullen recognised at once what was going on. The building work was held up for weeks while the area was surrounded by wooden h.o.a.rdings and military vehicles came and went. The official story was an unexploded bomb. They'd tried to warn the authorities what they were dealing with, and when that failed they'd made the whole thing public.

'You didn't pay for it with your b.l.o.o.d.y career!' Mullen growled. 'I was lucky not to be charged under the Official Secrets Act. I should have been a superintendent by now.'

What was the point? Over and over again, over years.

'You've changed, Mullen. You're not the guy I knew in the war.'

'Oh, here we go! The war! Vera b.l.o.o.d.y Lynn! Well, it's me that's still cleaning up the mess from that war, and look where it's put me.'

Suddenly Mullen switched his radio back on. The guy was still going on about the Russians.

'And you know what? You might as well forget the Blitz spirit, McBride, cos there'll be no singing down the b.l.o.o.d.y tube stations next time round. Two seconds and it'll all be over. The lot.'

The two men lapsed into silence. McBride lit another cigarette.

The door opened and a middle-aged nurse bustled in.

'We don't permit smoking around the patients, she said. 'You'll have to put that out or go outside.

54.McBride lurched from his seat and headed for the door.

'Open wide.'

The nurse briskly popped a thermometer under Mullen's tongue.

'Doctor is coming to see you, she said.

Out in the corridor McBride slumped against a wall, drumming the back of his head slowly against the dull paintwork and pulling deeply on his cigarette. He'd screwed up. Mullen's legs had been shattered by the bomb. They'd had to amputate immediately.

McBride should have known he'd be the last person Mullen wanted to see right now A red rag to a bull.

A man in a long white coat pa.s.sed him and entered Mullen's room.

A moment later the nurse emerged.

'Your friend is very lucky,' she said to McBride.

Lucky, he thought. Yeah, d.a.m.ned lucky, getting both your legs blown off.

'Dr Hark is one of the brightest in his field. A pioneer. He's come down specially.'

A long finger of ash dropped from McBride's cigarette to the floor.

The nurse tutted.

McBride had had enough. He strode across to where a stack of shallow metal kidney-dishes sat on a shelf, stubbed out his cigarette in the topmost bowl and headed for the exit.

He left the doors swinging and took the steps two at a time. Stupid to have come here.

And yet he couldn't resist a look when he pa.s.sed Mullen's window.

Mullen looked, if anything, worse than before. Paler, an expression of horror on his face. The man in the white coat was standing over him, talking earnestly.

Mullen was slowly shaking his head.

McBride spun round and hurried back to the entrance. He couldn't leave it like this. However much they clashed, this was still Mullen.

He pa.s.sed the doctor in the corridor, chatting to another man in a white coat.

'Perhaps we should have given him more time,' the other man was saying.

'He'll come round,' the doctor replied, smiling.

McBride crashed into Mullen's room.

'What's happened?' he barked.

Mullen was silent. He looked as if he'd seen the Devil.

'They want to fit me with artificial legs,' he eventually whispered.

'State of the art. Electronically controlled by my own nervous system.'

55.McBride shuddered.

'They're going to turn me into...'

He couldn't finish the sentence, but McBride knew what he meant.

He felt suddenly weak, and sat down.

'Don't be a jerk, he said with painfully unconvincing lightness.

He took out his hip-flask again and offered it to Mullen. Mullen was shaking so much he couldn't hold it to his lips. McBride did it for him.

'It might be a good thing,' he said as Mullen drank. 'If it gets you on your feet again...'

Bad choice of words.

'My feet are scattered across Bermondsey. Give us a ciggy.'

McBride lit two.

'So just tell them no if that's what you want. They can't make you do anything.'

'Can't they?' asked Mullen. 'That doctor I think he's connected with some sort of research programme. Government stuff, hush-hush.

And you know what that lot are like. They're already pumping me full of G.o.d knows what drugs. They've got stuff that'll make you agree to anything.'

'I won't let them do it,' said McBride.

'When are you going to realise you can't fight these people, McBride? We're drifting closer and closer to war with the Commies.

They need Cyber technology more now than they ever did.'

Mullen took a deep drag.

'No, there's only one thing you can do for me, McBride.'

'Sure, name it.'

'Give me your gun and go.'

It took a second for Mullen's words to sink in.

'What, you... No way, Mullen. You ain't gonna shoot yourself.'

'I'm not going to be turned into a monster a freak,' Mullen spat through gritted teeth.

'I'll stop them!'

'Like you stopped the research programme? When will you grow up, McBride? Everything's too big nowadays for the likes of you and me to change anything. The stakes are too d.a.m.ned high! We count for b.u.g.g.e.r all!'

Mullen stubbed his cigarette angrily into the wall.

'I'm finished, McBride. The best I can look forward to is life in a wheelchair, and the worst...'