Pirate Loop, The (18 page)

Captain Florence stood, blood pouring from her wound, and it looked like she was considering. Then she shrugged.

'Nah,' she said, and shot him.

Martha screamed, running forward. Captain Florence fell backwards, her body limp. And the Doctor stood quite calmly as the pink light consumed him.

'All right, dear?' said a voice he recognised. The Doctor opened his eyes to see a cartoon sheep smiling back at him. It had been drawn on the side of a chipped mug of tea, which was being held in front of his face. He struggled to sit up and gladly took the tea.

Thank you,' he said. He found himself in the alleyway between the huge and noisy machines of the engine rooms. The TARDIS stood in the space where it had first materialised, and in front of it stood several of his friends. Mrs Wingsworth had handed him the tea. Behind her stood Archibald and Dashiel and several mouthless men. Archibald waved. The Doctor grinned back at him, at them all.

'Well,' he said. 'That's a relief. I wasn't sure that would really work!'

The badgers stood in silence, not sure what to do. Martha stared fixedly at the spot where the Doctor had died, the pink light having eaten him up entirely. She felt nothing, nothing at all. She was dimly aware of a hairy paw taking her hand, of Jocelyn saying something to her. She was dimly aware of hot tears scoring down her cheek. She was dimly aware that nothing mattered any more.

'Right,' said Stanley the badger pirate. 'I'm captain now.' None of the other badger pirates protested. He leered at them. 'An' that means you do what I say!' he roared. A few of the badgers nodded. 'Good,' said Stanley. 'Now, we're gonna shoot these two.'

Martha and Jocelyn were pushed forward into the open space where the Doctor and Captain Florence had fought. Stanley raised his gun at them, then lowered it again.

'Nah,' he said. 'I don't do the shooting. I just give the order. Isobel! You can shoot 'em.'

'Er,' said the badger pirate Isobel. 'Captain Florence took my gun.'

'Huh,' said Stanley. 'Right. Ruby Tulip. You can shoot 'em.'

A small badger woman with wide and lustrous eyes stepped forward. She raised her gun.

'Er,' she said. 'Which one first?'

Stanley scratched his hairy face with a paw. Then he ip-dipped between Martha and Jocelyn. And chose Martha to die first.

'I'm not scared of you,' she told him.

'Yeah,' he said, awkwardly.

'You just killed the one person who could have changed your lives,' she said.

'Yeah,' said Stanley. 'We kinda know that.' He nodded to Ruby Tulip. Martha braced herself, determined not to scream. And Ruby Tulip pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened. Ruby Tulip stared at her gun, shook it around a bit, and tried again. Nothing happened.

'Gotta do everythin' myself,' muttered Stanley, and he raised his gun at Martha. Nothing happened. 'Er,' he said.

He glanced round at the other badgers, and those with guns tried to shoot Martha. Nothing happened. Jocelyn ran to Martha and threw her arms around her, so hard it almost winded her.

'We're gonna be OK!' said Jocelyn.

'Er,' said Martha, utterly baffled. 'Yeah, I think we are.'

'Wha's goin' on?' snarled Stanley, thumping his gun against the floor and trying to get it to shoot.

'An' where's the captain's body?' asked Isobel beside him.

They all turned to look. Captain Florence had lain at their feet, the dagger protruding from her chest. And now there wasn't even any blood on the floor.

Martha felt something turning over in her stomach. A sudden rush of excitement. They were still stuck in the time loop! 'Look,' she told the badgers, pointing to the great bay window that looked out into the vacuum of space.

Space crackled with pink and blue energy. The pink and blue began to swirl like a whirlpool, getting ever brighter. The badgers shielded their eyes as it exploded white. And from the ball of white light, crackling with pink and pale blue lightning, emerged the Starship
Brilliant.

Its solar sails glittered silver, the hull and the long fin hanging underneath it sparkling in the starlight. There were no red jelly blotches along it – there was no sign of any damage at all. It was pristine, perfect, good as new. And that could only mean one thing...

'Allo, allo, allo!' called a voice from all around them. 'This is the good ship
Brilliant.
Can someone say something back?'

'Doctor!' laughed Martha, recognising his voice. 'You're alive.'

'Oh yeah,' he said back to her. 'Never been better. Told you it'd all be fine. In fact, we're all fine over here. Having a bit of a party. Hope you weren't worried.'

'Course not,' she lied. 'Anyway, I thought you said you were going to get us out of the time loop.'

'Well, yeah,' he admitted. 'And then I had this better idea.'

'So you made the time loop bigger so that it included the pirate ship.'

'I suppose I did,' said the Doctor. 'Now, there's canapés for everyone over here. Think your badger friends might like to join us? See you in a bit!' And the line to the
Brilliant
went dead.

The badgers all round Martha began to murmur to each other. Stanley threw his gun to the ground at his feet, and there was sudden silence.

'I give the orders!' he yelled.

'Er,' said the badger woman, Zuzia. 'Can we go to the party?' She furrowed her hairy forehead as a thought came slowly to her. 'Please,' she added.

'No!' shouted Stanley. 'I'm in charge! I'm the captain!'

The badgers shuddered with fear of him. But Kitty Rose raised a paw nervously.

'What?' snapped Stanley.

'Er,' said Kitty Rose, with all the other badgers looking at her. 'What can you do to stop us jus' going?'

Stanley's jaw dropped open in amazement at the very idea. And in the moment that he didn't say anything, that he didn't shout her down or lunge at her, the other badgers knew the answer. They dropped their guns, they laughed and cheered, and hurried away to the lifts.

Martha, Jocelyn and Stanley stood alone together in front of the great bay window. Tiny capsules were already zipping away from the pirate ship and they watched them clustering round the
Brilliant.
A bay door opened in the side of the starship and the capsules queued up in an orderly fashion to be allowed aboard.

'You should come with us,' said Martha to Stanley, and put her hand on his shoulder. 'Join the party.'

'Huh,' said Stanley, shaking her hand away.

'She's right,' said a voice that Martha thought for a moment belonged to Jocelyn. They turned to see Captain Florence walking down from between the passageway of hanging silks. Her collarless blouse was torn and bloodstained, but otherwise she looked just fine.

'Captain,' said Stanley quietly, knowing his brief time as boss was now over.

Martha gazed at the captain. 'You can't do anything to hurt us now,' she said.

'Yeah,' said Captain Florence. 'Can't beat ya. Might as well come to this 'ere party.'

Martha, Captain Florence, Jocelyn and Stanley made their way to the lift. As it took them down to the hangars where the capsules awaited, Captain Florence turned to Martha.

'The canner-peas,' she said quietly. 'You're gonna 'ave to show me what to do.'

Martha grinned at her. 'Don't worry,' she said. 'Everything's going to be fine.'

Music played all through the
Brilliant,
lively, poppy stuff. On the bridge and in the passageways, the Balumin taught badger pirates how to dance. Captain Georgina, Thomas and the rest of the human crew were no better at the complex dance steps. Gabriel and the other robots tried to serve drinks and nibbles but got grabbed by the dancers and made to join in.

Martha made her way through the laughing, chatting, dancing party and headed for the cocktail lounge. Mrs Wingsworth was regaling Dashiel with tales of her adventures aboard the pirate ship, and he tried not to be rude about getting up when Jocelyn walked into the room. Martha watched Mrs Wingsworth gape in astonishment at such terrible manners, then turn to the badger woman sat next to her and continue with her story.

The Doctor stood behind the bar, busy making milkshakes. 'Martha!' he said.

'Hiya!' she said, sitting on one the tall bar stools. He handed her a glass of pink and yellow milkshake.

'Haven't done this in ages,' he said. 'And they've got really good ice cream!'

She was happy just to sit there and let him make drinks for everybody. The party tumbled all around her, wild and mad and fun. And far too full of different people.

'The
Brilliant,'
she said to the Doctor. 'You made it bigger on the inside.'

'Well,' admitted the Doctor, scraping chocolate sprinkles onto six milkshakes all at once. 'A bit. The maths works out. If you're not using time, you can stretch space around.'

'Right,' she said, not needing to understand him. 'And you're gonna tell me how you made their guns stop working?'

'That was good, wasn't it?' said the Doctor. 'I left a note for Gabriel earlier. Said the guns were being used on the passengers, and wouldn't it be better if their power was used for something else.'

'So when the
Brilliant
came back it used the power in the guns?' said Martha.

'Aw,' said the Doctor. 'There's only a tiny bit of power in a gun. So it didn't
need
the extra energy. But since the
Brilliant
was warping stuff anyway, it seemed like a good idea.'

'Right,' said Martha. 'And you didn't break us out of the loop. You just extended it.'

'Yeah,' said the Doctor. 'I was in the TARDIS and the problem wasn't to get us out of the time loop, it was fixing the gap. Which the TARDIS could do with a little bit of effort, warping space and time a bit until things lined up nicely. Soon as you hit a point where the numbers balance out, the loop takes over for itself. And while I was at it I extended the loop so it lassoed the pirate ship in with us. So we're in it, the pirate ship's in it and so's everything in between. And now it's a complete loop, it will just run and run for ever.'

'But there was a delay,' said Martha. 'Before, people came back if you just looked away.'

'Yeah,' said the Doctor. 'That's because the loop was broken and the
Brilliant
was always trying to fix it. Now if they die or they run out of canapés they'll all come back in one go. Every hour or so.'

'Which is why you wanted to know the time,' she said.

'Yeah,' said the Doctor. 'We were just coming up to the end of the hour when Captain Florence shot me. Another few minutes and I'd have had to wait for the next go round. Which would have looked less clever. Now. Make yourself useful.'

He had loaded a tray with tall glasses of milkshake, each glass festooned with straws and paper umbrellas. She gathered up the tray carefully and he pointed to the table of mouthless men in leather aprons and Bermuda shorts, all looking slightly uneasy. She guessed that, like the badgers, they'd never been invited to parties.

While the mouthless men drank their milkshakes – using the straws provided – Martha watched Archibald giving lessons to other badgers on which canapés were best. She went to join them, kissed Archibald on his hairy cheek, and took one of the cheese and pineapple sticks from him.

He grinned at her. 'This is Toby,' he said. 'An' Oliver and Patrick. They're learnin' about blinis.'

Martha shook the paws of the three badgers, then nodded at the female badgers who watched her with fascination. 'Who are the girls?' she asked Archibald.

'Er,' said Archibald coyly. 'Tha's Zuzia and Kitty Rose,' he said. 'They don't say much. They jus' watch us and whisper.'

Martha watched Zuzia and Kitty Rose whisper to one another, and then giggle like teenage girls. Archibald, she realised, was something of a hit.