Doctor Who: Lungbarrow (27 page)

Badger looked about the library. 'Thirty-one-percent improvement.'

'It's your eye,' declared the Doctor. 'Not one of my essays.'

'We are ready now,' said Innocet.

'Oh, very well.'

The Doctor sat on the bed and watched as Innocet and Chris sat on a mangey pelt rug.

'I know.' Chris shut his eyes and tried to calm his ragged thoughts. 'It'll hurt you more than it'll hurt me.'

'Possibly not,' she said. 'Please open your eyes.'

She was staring at him as she had done before. Deep into him. Her grey eyes cutting and peeling away the layers of his thoughts.

'Um,' he said.

Think about Quences. What did you see in his room? When he... When he was...

Murdered, thought Chris. When he was brutally murdered.

The moment came easily.

The old man was laughing as Satthralope swept out of his room in a rage. He turned to work on the huge furry
mound on the table.

The memory cracked across. A dozen simultaneous murders in one broken mirror.

A figure in black. An elderly man with white hair swept back behind his head. He had fierce eyes and a beak of a
nose.

Yes, it is the man in the portrait.

In his left hand, he held a double-bladed dagger. Quences turned and the intruder stabbed down once through
both hearts.

The old General, blood bubbling from his mouth, gaped in disbelief at his murderer. 'You', he mouthed.

127

A black cloth was thrown over the mirror.

'Murderer! Murderer! It was you!'

'Innocent! Come back!' The Doctor's voice is echoing in the blackness.

'I saw you! Murderer!'

'Innocet, listen to me!'

Excuse me, thought Chris. This is my head.

'Murderer!' whispered Innocet.

Chris, opening his eyes, saw Badger loom behind Innocet.

'Badger!' The Doctor was there, pushing the brute back. 'I don't need protecting.' He turned to Innocet.

'Yes, it was me. My first self. I recognized me. You are right.'

'How could you see that?' she said, scrambling to her feet.

'I came in after you. I thought you might need a lifeline. Just as wel , wasn't it?'

'Then you admit to the murder at last.'

'Admit it? I don't even remember it.'

'Wait,' said Chris. 'Badger? That was you on the work bench.'

The robot creature shifted. 'Which bench?'

'The bench in Quences's room.'

'Leave this to me,' interrupted the Doctor. 'Badger, who murdered Quences?'

'I have no memory of such an event,' boomed the robot. 'Is it historical?'

'Do you have any memory of where Quences's will is?'

128

'I have no such memory.'

'That memory could have been erased,' said Innocet.

The Doctor walked to one of the boarded-up windows. He yanked back the panelling and squinted out at the black earth and rock that pressed in from outside. 'You used to be able to see the well from here. That old crumbling well in the orchard. Do you remember, Innocet? And you told me that once, on the very day I was born from the Loom, you saw a stranger down there. You said she was leaning over the wel , trailing her long hair into the water. And the sunlight was dappling al green and brown over her robes, so that you couldn't really tell if she was there at all.

And you ran down to the orchard to find her, but when you reached the well, there was no one there. Only fruit bobbing on the water and a scent of roses.'

'The rose woman,' said Innocet. 'I hadn't forgotten. I imagined it was an omen for the good of the House. Perhaps I was wrong. I've never known who you really were.'

'I don't believe in omens. Omens are empty thunderclouds with no drop of rain. The portentous sound of people grasping at broken straws.' He reached to support himself on a shelf, and then thought better of it. 'What can I say, Innocet? I don't
remember
killing Quences, but we've just seen it happen. It was me, the first Doctor. But I never came back here. That poor old man loved me, I think. And he was a bully and a tyrant too. But I could never kill him.'

'Then where were you?' she said.

'I wasn't here,' he replied. 'I was far, far away.'

'Where?'

He rapped his finger on the window pane in frustration. 'I can't remember. Sil y real y.'

Chris looked from one to the other. They were both staring at him. Piercing eyes that sheered away his thoughts and exposed the darkness underneath.

He knew who the woman by the well was. She had sat at the Door to the Past and she had the scent of roses.

129

The Quickness of the Hand

Alarms were sounding across the Capitol. Through a window, Innocet could see the sky. She had forgotten its vastness. It frightened her, filled with black storm-laden clouds against which the Citadel rose, a mountain forested by towers, turrets and bridges al lit gold by the evening sun. This was more than her imagination, more than a vision. She was there - her mind was transported to another place and another time.

Suddenly the Doctor was hovering beside her. She made as no resistance he took her hand and turned her to look at the room.

The study was full of old-fashioned books and papers. At a desk sat the first Doctor. His white hair was swept back over his head. He wore a dark-green tunic. Perched on his nose was a pair of multifocal spectacles.

He grimaced sourly and put down the document he was studying. It bore the crest of the House of Lungbarrow -

two silver-leaved trees, their branches reaching over to intertwine.

The Honourable

Quencessetianobayolocaturgrathadeyyilungbarrowmas

422nd Kithriarch to the House of Lungbarrow

expects your attendance on his Deathday

for the reading of his will and during his interment

The word ‘expects’ had been crossed out and ‘demands’ had been scrawled next to it in black ink.

The first Doctor flicked on a plasma screen. It displayed a perfunctory message
: Your application for duteous
advancement has been considered and rejected. You wil continue in your current duties as Scrutationary
Archivist.
It was stamped by the Registrar of Continual Observation.

He clasped his hands over his chest, apparently finding much amusement in the situation. 'It's a conspiracy. That much is clear,' he muttered, but his fierce eyes told a different story. 'We'll soon see who'l dance to your tune, eh?'

He was cackling quietly to himself when there was a heavy thump at the door.

He froze. Again, the thump.

Before he could even move, something as big as a coffin slid through the surface of the closed door. A battered, black box floating about waist-high above the carpet.

Astonished, he grasped his cane and approached the object.

It whirred and clicked at him. Little pulses of UV shifted on its surface.

The old Doctor tapped it gingerly with his cane. It whined plaintively like a lost animal. 'Shoo,' he said, 'whatever you are. Go on, you unpleasant object. Go away.'

Time passed.

'Did this really happen to you?' said Innocet.

The Doctor was floating above the first Doctor's desk, trying to read his journal. 'Apparently so. Astral travel is certainly more accurate than your average reconstruction. Just don't let go of my hand.'

'What was that box thing?'

'Innocet! And you, a classicist!' he scolded. 'Now shush. I think I detect a certain thickening of the plot.'

130

* * *

Journal Entry. Otherstide Eve.

Sixth day since the box's intriguing arrival and it stil defies my attempts to analyse it. I am certain that the
continuing security alarms across the Capitol are linked to its appearance. The Chancellery Guards are getting
very jumpy. I gather that no one was even aware of the existence of most of the alarms that are sounding. Which
is why it took so long to turn them off! And now there is talk of a curfew. Natural y, there are no bulletins to explain
what is happening.

They have searched my rooms twice, but the box, with its capacity to move faster than I can blink, continual y
eludes them. It continues to follow me about, whining like a lost street-whelp, and today I believe it actually saved
my life. A large piece of masonry fell from the renovation work on the Observation Tower. (I say 'fel ', but that may
be the judgement of one who looks too kindly on the world.) For the briefest moment I saw the missile descend
towards me, then there was a flash like lightning and it dissolved in the air above my head.

The next time I saw the box, it had a skein of fine dust clinging to its surface. I conclude that despite my
investigations, my 'visitor' will ultimately reveal its identity or purpose to me in its own good time.

Tomorrow is my name day, so felicitations all round no doubt. Also the old man's Deathday. He certainly chooses
his moment.

'
Arrogant as ever,' commented Innocet.

'It's a family trait,' said the Doctor.

'I cannot imagine what you find so amusing. This whole business is completely gruesome.'

'Frightening,' he agreed. 'I was just admiring his potential.'

***

'Agency vandals!' he cursed as he sorted through the mess.

'Otherstide felicitations,' said the black-haired old villain behind him. Glospin, old Glospin, leaning heavily on his cane.

The old Doctor's chin went up in that familiar attitude of defiance. 'What's this, Cousin? A nameday treat? Hmm?'

'I'm no Cousin of yours, remember?'

'How could I forget?'

'So I hope you weren't considering a visit to your former home.'

'Charmed, I'm sure.' The Doctor gathered up a fistful of papers. 'You come al this way, after all this time, when you must be due at the House yourself. What's the matter? Afraid of losing your inheritance!'

'My assumption as new Kithriarch has never been more assured,' said Glospin. 'Quences is senile. But don't entertain the delusion that anyone else wants you back. You have already been replaced.'

The Doctor gave an involuntary gasp of shock. 'Impossible...' He reached to his desk for support. 'And il egal too.'

'A little premature, I felt. But with a few chosen words in suitable places...' He smiled. 'And so I deemed it a courtesy to clarify a few outstanding matters first.' He took a document from his robe. 'Your Loom Certification.'

'What now?'

131

'I was studying the document recently when I discovered some anomalies in your genetic codings.'

The Doctor snatched away the document.

'That's all right, Wormhole,' said Glospin smoothly. 'It's just a copy. But if you look, you will see that your codes are entirely out of sympathy with the Lungbarrow Loom's genetic template.'

'Nonsense.' The Doctor's face sharpened with irritation as he studied the document. 'This is some childish attempt to complete my severance from the Family.'

'I undertook this purely out of my interests as a geneticist. But of course, due to the Family circumstances...'

'Insulting.'

'It's not entirely unheard of. People renew their regenerative cycles by jumping Looms, thus being reborn into new Families. Was that your plan, Wormhole? You certainly never belonged to Lungbarrow's Loom. Or do you come from further afield?' He was drawing closer, scrutinising the Doctor like some laboratory specimen. 'In short, exactly who or what are you?'

'Who?' the Doctor exploded. 'I don't know what petty loophole you've dug up, Glospin. But I am your Cousin. And don't think I'm not aware of your nasty Gallifreyan Allegiance proclivities. Or your involvement with the Intervention Agency.'

'Not exactly true,' said the persecutor, smiling. 'But I am ready to fascinate them with my discovery. . . for the correct remuneration.'

'Insanity!' The old Doctor shook his head. 'Haven't you had enough from me already?'

'No,' said Glospin. 'I want everything.'

'Out! Get out!' shouted the Doctor. He raised his stick and brought it down on Glospin. But his opponent was ready to give as he good as he got. The two old men were soon fighting like mongrels over an old bone.

The box came through the wal with a crash. Glospin screamed as a flare of light scorched his right arm.

He stared at the box, choking with pain. 'I'll see you ruined! Lungbarrow wil never take you back again!'

The box slid towards him, but he fell at the door and stumbled out into the Capitol.

'Lies.' The old Doctor was shaking. His cheek was bleeding where Glospin had clawed him. He swept his cane across the litter of damaged books. The strewn wreckage of a life's work. 'Lies.'

From the city outside came a new jangle of alarms. The box hovered by the open door, clicking excitedly.