Doctor Who_ Human Nature Part 29

'Wouldn't you fight, then?' Hutchinson glared at him. 'Would you be a coward?'

Alexander watched a distant expression wash over Hadleman's face. Finally, he put the Pod back down on the ground and met Hutchinson's gaze. 'I would fight if I thought the cause was just, as far as any of us can tell that sort of thing. And, believe me, there will be plenty of cowards on the battlefield, and plenty of heroes who make the decision not to go there.' Rather embarra.s.sed by his eloquence, he shrugged and sat down.

Alexander stared at him sadly. 'I love you,' he mouthed, though Hadleman couldn't see.

Hutchinson probably wouldn't have let the matter rest there, but into the clearing walked Smith and Benny.

Smith glanced around the group. 'I'm sorry,' he told them. 'We failed. They still have Mrs Redfern.'

'Well then, there are enough of us!' Hutchinson gestured to the boys once more.

'There are only two of them. Never mind all this anarchist bunk.u.m -'

'Socialist bunk.u.m,' said Alexander.

'It's time for some good old British grit. Play up and play the game, chaps! We've nearly done it, we've knocked out three-fifths of their force! Listen, I have a plan...'

Smith stared at the young man as he started to make the words again, to spread his hands in grand gestures. Unseen, he wandered around the campfire to where Alexander and Hadleman were sitting. Smith bent down and picked up the Pod.

'Mine, I think.'

Alexander looked up at him. 'Is it?'

'Oh yes.'

'Take care.'

'I will.'

Bernice was standing with Tim and Anand's group, much to Merryweather's delight. The Captain had discreetly moved around the fire to sit by them. Benny was making loud coughs and trying to start other conversations as Hutchinson went through the motions of his speech. Every now and then she looked at what Smith was doing, desperate for him, yet not knowing what advice she could possibly give.

Still, she was surprised when he appeared behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. 'It was good to know you.'

'Doctor, you're not - '

'Smith. Dr Smith. Call me that now, at least.'

Benny carefully adjusted his tie, whispering so that Tim couldn't hear her. 'You're not planning on -'

Smith patted her gently on the arm. 'Walk with me a little way, I don't want to listen to that.' He indicated Hutchinson, walking around the campfire, pointing in the air.

They wandered through the forest until they came to a dark glade, where the rising sun stretched the shadows of the trees into long, spectral shapes. Benny rubbed a hand across her face. She was so tired that she felt like she might fall asleep any moment. The sensation had come over her in the last few minutes.

'I've discovered a lot in the last few weeks,' Smith began. 'I've found out that being the Doctor... it's not about having special knowledge or abilities. It's about not being cruel. It's about not being afraid.' He walked into the middle of the clearing, searching for the right words. 'There are monsters out there, yes. Terrible things.

But you don't have to become one in order to defeat them. You can be peaceful in the face of their cruelty. You can win by being cleverer than they are.' He turned back to Bernice. 'I tried to give up so much - my responsibilities, my past, my guilt.

But others kept these things safe for me. Now, for one last time, I, John Smith, will be the Doctor again, and go on an adventure, and defeat the monsters. It doesn't take an object to let you do that. It takes determination. And hope for humanity.

And love.'

Benny went to him and held him. 'What you said about sacrifice, John. It doesn't have to be like that. There's always another way.'

'Not this time.'

'I just don't want anybody to have to die. Hadleman, my old Guy, Rocastle. Poor Constance. But especially you. Both of you.'

'Then let me do this, before more children get killed.' His words seemed quieter somehow, as if they were coming from a distance, part of the whole distance of the glade. When she came to write this section of the narrative up for her diary, Benny felt that she was somehow writing fiction.

Especially considering what happened next.

She stepped out from the trees, a beautiful dark-haired woman. 'John...' she called.

Smith and Benny turned and stared at her. 'Verity,' said Smith.

August stood by the door of the dome, gazing out into the darkness. 'It is quite a beautiful world, don't you think, son? I like the trees particularly.'

Hoff ducked his head outside and looked. 'Hmm. Trees are trees. I'm worried about Greeneye. Don't you think we should have bargained?'

'And gone back to square one? No. Once we've got the Pod, we'll rescue him. Oh, and talking of which -'

A small, shadowy figure was making his way slowly through the forest.

Hoff picked up his gun and went to stand beside Joan. She had been sleeping fitfully, but now she'd woken once more.

'You know, you really could come to some kind of accord with John,' she said.

'He's a good man. We all feel for our own kind. Perhaps - '

'Shut her up,' August snapped.

Hoff slapped a dart into Joan's neck and the woman froze, breathing shallowly.

The figure in the darkness approached the dome. To the east, the sky was blue, and a p.r.i.c.kly expectation was settling on the forest, the calls of waking birds mingling with the departing sounds of night hunters as the sun rose.

August stepped forward. 'Dr Smith. Have you brought the Pod?'

'Yes.' The figure stepped forward, his left hand in his pocket, his right holding the red sphere. 'Where's Joan?'

'Here.' Hoff activated a control and Joan stood up. He took a key and loosed her from her chains.

August studied the little man before him. 'You've finally given up, then? No last-minute tricks? No desperate gambits?'

'Only a request. Reconsider. What's in that sphere is vast and terrible. It's a tremendous responsibility. Do you really want to take it on?'

'I've thought about it long and hard, believe me.' August reached out, and, with an antic.i.p.atory pause, took the Pod from the other man's palm. 'I've prepared for this transformation. I've had psionic blockers placed in my brain to filter Time Lord personality data and stop it replacing my own. What I'll get is all the information, all the memories, but none of the compulsions or traits that made the Doctor what he was. He will, in effect, die, but in so doing he will create a new species. A very strong one. Now.'

He slowly raised the Pod to his forehead. Blue sparks began to dance between the two surfaces.

They touched.

August screamed in pain and doubled over, his hand clutching the Pod in determined agony. Hoff stared at the scene, covering the others with his gun.

Suddenly, August jumped to his feet again and spun to look at Hoff, his arms extended. His pupils were s.h.i.+ning silver, information spiralling across them. 'Hoff, I can feel it, it's wonderful!'

He spasmed again, twisting into a crouch, his hand still wrapped tight around the Pod.

His eyes met those of the little man in the shadows.

A look of horror pa.s.sed across the silver pupils.

And then it was gone.

August slowly straightened up and tossed the Pod from hand to hand. He smiled a satisfied smile and stretched. 'Let her go, Hoff. We've got what we wanted.'

Hoff stared. 'It worked? You're a Time Lord?'

'Yes! I feel as if I could fly!' He walked up to Joan, and waved a hand before her sightless eyes. 'I want her to see me.' He plucked the dart from her neck and she jerked back to life, staring at the man who stood before her.

The smile was enough to tell her what had happened. 'You...' Her eyes narrowed, and she glanced between the three men in the dome. Then she said carefully: 'You gave him what he wanted.'

[image]

'No.' The man with the umbrella stepped forward. 'I didn't.'

August touched Joan's chin, extremely tenderly. 'He's right.'

Hoff frowned, realising that something was happening that he didn't understand.

He grabbed Joan, pulling her away from August, and pressed his gun into her neck.

'Wait!'

'Hoff...' August spread his hands, amazed. 'What's wrong?'

'I want to see his hand. The one he's got in his pocket. Then I decide what I do next.'

'Well, you could always -' The man in the shadows revealed his left hand, and flexed his little finger. His calm expression darkened into a stormy frown, and he growled: 'Run.'

August lunged at Hoff.

Hoff threw Joan aside and brought up his gun.

The blast went straight through August's side.

But the force of August's run sent both men tumbling backwards towards the wall of the dome.

The Doctor threw the Pod across the room. It slapped against a control on a distant instrument bank. He jumped at a closer panel, and, faster than the eye could follow, clattered hundreds of switches into new positions.

Hoff threw the gasping body of August aside and swung up his gun towards the Doctor.

But the Time Lord had already spun the final dial.

The first time barrier swept into the room through the wall of the dome and into the sphere atop the control panel that the Doctor was working on. Hoff shouted as the s.h.i.+mmering wall went through him. 'No!' he bellowed. 'Don't!' He dived at Joan and held on to her like a lifejacket. 'You'll kill her too!'

'I'll kill no-one,' the Doctor snarled.

The second timeframe arrived a moment later.

The two walls collided, with all of them between them.

Hoff fell from Aphasia's wrist, a tiny newborn trailing blood.

Greeneye caught the baby and dropped him into a vat of liquid nutrients. 'Isn't he wonderful?' he said.

Hoff had never known he'd heard that before. Serif was busy dabbing at Aphasia's wrist as she sobbed. August looked proudly down into the vat and smiled.

'Well, that's the last one. What shall we do now?'

Laylock was standing by the door of the dome they'd erected. Every now and then, he'd glance out at the burning fields in the distance. 'What indeed?' he whispered.

Hoff lay back in the liquid and luxuriated in it. He was at peace, for the first time in his life. And the last.

The Doctor watched the image of the scene spiral away, replaying itself time after time between the s.h.i.+mmering membranes of the timeframe. He was watching with his eyes closed, because he knew that if he opened them, he'd really be just standing in the dome.

And it was good to be able to watch with his eyes closed again.

Good to be the Doctor.

August stood before him in the timeless time. He held out his hand. 'The Doctor, I presume?'

'Good to meet you, Dr Smith.' The Doctor shook the hand of the being who used to be August, marvelling at how familiar the new expression on the alien's face was. 'I got you killed. I'm sorry.'

'Don't be. Joan would never have accepted me like this, in this body. Does she know?'

'I don't know.'

'Then don't tell her. Do I call you Father?'

'If you want. I haven't heard that for a while.'

'It doesn't seem appropriate.'

'No.' The Doctor looked past August's, or rather, Smith's, shoulder.

Verity was standing there. 'Doctor. Dr Smith.'

Smith spun round and gazed at her. 'Verity. My dear.'