Part 19 (1/2)

Much of the fuselage had been burned away, and a good deal of what was left was torn and twisted. The craft's spine seemed to have snapped a series of cranes, straps and huge wedges were holding the thing together.

'Is Dr Drakefell not joining us?' asked the Doctor.

'Nope. Keeps saying he has to do it... but he won't.'

'Ah, well... You might have to give me a hand, Davey. I rather injured myself during our nature ramble.'

Immediately O'Brien hoisted the Doctor high into the air and deposited him in what presumably was the entry-hatch. The Doctor 97 clambered inside.

The craft was compact, sleek and well designed, and bathed in a soft light that seemed to have no discernible source. No s.p.a.ce around the pilot's chair was wasted, yet the s.h.i.+p was elegantly and ergonomically designed so that movement within its confines was fluid and easy.

O'Brien dropped through the hatch and let out an awed whistle.

'I've never seen anything like this. I wouldn't even know how to start the windscreen wipers.'

The Doctor was barely listening. He was looking for something.

'Aha! Found it'

He lowered himself into a painful squat over a flat metal plate, about six inches by four, set into the deck.

'Do you know what this is, Davey?'

'Not a clue. The ashtray?'

'It's a dimension stabiliser. Or rather, in this case, a dimension de-stabiliser. It's what he used to get here.'

'The guy who's supposed to be me?'

'Yes. He used it to bore a tunnel through the walls of reality itself.'

'Hang on, I thought you said the explosion did that when the s.h.i.+p our s.h.i.+p blew up.'

'From our side, yes. Reality is a funny thing, Davey.'

'No kidding,' said O'Brien, looking around him.

'Have you even considered what might have happened if, say, the day your father first met your mother at the County Fair he'd decided to stay at home and do the gardening instead? No Davey O'Brien. The world turns on the tiniest of axes, Davey.'

'The flip of a coin,' said O'Brien sombrely.

'Quite. Now suppose I told you that there was another universe many, in fact where your father did stay at home gardening, and one where he went to the show and met somebody else first, and one where you won the toss and went up in the Waverider. Your alter ego, the chap who piloted this perhaps he won the toss. There are infinite parallel universes, some of which the ones closest to our own, are similar to ours in almost every detail. I can perfectly believe that this s.h.i.+p was sent up on a mission identical in spirit to your own. What they they did deliberately happened did deliberately happened here here by accident that's the only real difference.' by accident that's the only real difference.'

O'Brien puffed out his cheeks.

'It's all quite a lot to take in. I thought one world was chaos enough now you say there are... millions.

'And more,' said the Doctor. 'But they should never be crossed not in this way, at least. Dimension stabilisers were developed to repair 98 damage to the time lines, not inflict it.'

He used to carry one in the TARDIS...

'Do you have a screwdriver on you by any chance?'

O'Brien rummaged in his pocket.

'Swiss Army knife,' he said sheepishly, handing it to the Doctor.

'Twenty-four blades. It's about all they'll let me have.'

'I used to have something similar,' said the Doctor, flicking through the a.s.sorted blades. 'Just a bit more hi-tech.'

He squinted at the plate he was trying to detach from its housing.

'Strange screw-heads...'

He flicked again through the blades, thrust one into a narrow slot and twisted. He repeated the procedure five times, then held the little knife aloft, admiring.

'What is this blade for?' he asked.

'I'm not sure,' said O'Brien. 'I think it's the one for taking stones out of horses' hooves.'

There was a creaking on the fuselage above their heads. They both craned about to see Drakefell standing at the edge of the hatch, watching them.

'Well done, Dr Drakefell,' said the Doctor. 'You see? Not all that monstrously alien.'

He lifted the dimension stabiliser from its base. Its underside was a thick knot of cables and wires that plumbed the machine into the guts of the s.h.i.+p.

'Hopefully with this I can repair the damage to the time lines before it's too late,' he said.

The Doctor tugged lightly at a wire. This was delicate and dangerous work. He had to isolate the little machine from the ma.s.sive power supply that drove it, and that took up about a third of the s.h.i.+p. Any power surges would blow the hanger sky-high.

There was a sequence to this. If he could remember it...

'What if you can't?' Drakefell asked.

'The holes will expand... more will appear. The fabric of s.p.a.ce/time will start to unravel and the universes will bleed into each other. I've already encountered a swarm of giant ants.

'Giant ants?' queried O'Brien.

'Yes,' said the Doctor, tugging at a stubborn cable. 'Giant ants. Size as an absolute concept has no meaning between dimensions. Some universes would fit in your pocket.

'My G.o.d,' said Drakefell hoa.r.s.ely. 'What you're saying is I could have brought about the end of Creation... everything.'

'Oh, I doubt it will be that bad,' said the Doctor. 'Not now that I've 99 got my hands on this.'

He patted the dimension stabiliser like a not-entirely-to-be-trusted-with-your-fingers dog.