Part 3 (2/2)

'We're going to have to do something about that Narcissus complex of yours,' Homunculette scowled.

'If you give an intelligent ent.i.ty a chameleon circuit, you can hardly expect her not to develop a sense of vanity. And don't bother getting comfortable, by the way. We arrived in the East Indies ReVit Zone twenty-four seconds ago, local time.'

'I know,' said Homunculette. 'I heard you hiccup. One of these days, we're going to have to get that fixed, as well.'

2.

STRANGE MEN AND THEIR COMPANIONS.

According to the calendar on her wrist.w.a.tch (j.a.panese design, capable of telling the time at thirty leagues below sea level and going ”eep” right in the middle of school a.s.sembly), Samantha Angeline Jones had known the Doctor for seven months, three weeks, and six days. By Sam's reckoning, this meant he said or did something profoundly strange every 2.1 hours, on average. Including the hours when Sam was asleep, natch. Often, she'd wake up in her room on board the TARDIS in the early hours of the (relative) morning, only to discover that the Doctor had done two or three deeply inexplicable things during the night, leaving the evidence lying in messy little heaps around the s.h.i.+p's corridors.

But today was a good day for high strangeness, even by the Doctor's standards. Since she'd woken up, Sam had been mystified by a grand total of five different things.

Strange thing number one: the Doctor's departure. Sam had wandered into the grand dome of the TARDIS console room to find him preparing to leave the s.h.i.+p. The doors had been open, and he'd been standing at the threshold, straightening his jacket as if readying himself for an important boardroom meeting. He would have looked pretty smart, if it hadn't been for the grappling hook slung over his shoulder.

Strange thing number two: the Doctor's explanation. He'd looked almost embarra.s.sed when he'd seen Sam, and had accelerated his rate of jacket-straightening accordingly. 'Going for a quick game of chess,' he'd said. As he'd walked out of the TARDIS, he'd warned her not to follow him under any circ.u.mstances. Sam had obeyed his instructions, for once. Just to prove she could, really.

Strange thing number three: the computer simulation. After the Doctor had left, Sam had sniffed around the console room for a bit, for the simple reason that she didn't often get the chance to fondle the controls without having the backs of her hands slapped. She'd found a computer monitor screen set into one of the panels, a screen she'd never noticed before, so either it was a new addition to the layout or it had only recently been unearthed from beneath the bits of hardware and empty yoghurt pots that kept cluttering up the console. Like everything else on the TARDIS, the computer had looked positively anachronistic. The graphics had been bright and blocky, the kind you used to get on those c.r.a.p old microcomputers they had in schools back in the '80s.

On the display, there'd been a crude representation of an office block, a grey slab covered in big square windows. Stuck to the side of the building, tilted at ninety degrees so its base was attached to the outside wall, there'd been a rectangular blue blob. The TARDIS, Sam had guessed.

As she'd watched, an animated graphic had popped out of the building. A little pink man, tumbling from a top-floor window. The man-graphic had fallen in an arc, dropping past the TARDIS and vanis.h.i.+ng off the bottom of the screen, while at the top of the display the computer had reeled off a series of complex equations to do with the figure's descent velocity. After a while, another man had fallen out of the window, at a different angle, but he'd also missed the TARDIS.

The little men had kept coming, until, finally, one had hit the tiny TARDIS. Immediately, the man had vanished, and the TARDIS graphic had flashed victoriously. Then the whole sequence had begun again, starting with the first, doomed, pink leaper.

Strange thing number four: the Doctor's re-entry. While Sam had been trying to figure out the point of the computer simulation, there'd been a thumping sound from somewhere behind her. She'd turned, to see the Doctor lying on his back near the TARDIS doors. He'd been sprawled at a peculiar angle, arms outstretched, as if he'd just fallen out of the sky. He hadn't been carrying his grappling hook.

Sam had folded her arms, which was what she usually did when she wanted an explanation. The Doctor had lain there a while, not moving, a huge grin plastered across his chops. Finally, he'd sat up, flicking a rogue wisp of hair out of his face.

'Internal gravity compensators,' he'd beamed. 'Do you know, I had no idea whether that would work?'

And finally, strange thing number five strange thing number five: the Doctor's sudden determination to be somewhere else. As soon as he'd picked himself up off the floor, he'd darted across to the console and had started hammering new algorithms into the systems, eventually punching (yes, actually punching) the dematerialisation switch. Even now, he was busy darting around the controls, fingering this, wobbling that. Sam hadn't unfolded her arms yet.

'Good game?' she asked, more than a little tersely.

The Doctor answered with a wave of his hand. 'He cheats,' he said. 'I'm sure he cheats. He moves pieces around between regenerations.'

'Who does?'

'The General.' He finally looked up at her, an expression of dopey-eyed concern on his face. Sam realised he was checking out her clothes. 'Are you sure that's suitable?'

Sam looked down at herself. She was wearing what she liked to think of as The Basics, a pair of M&S jeans, army boots she'd found in an Oxfam shop in Sh.o.r.editch, and a t-s.h.i.+rt from the TARDIS wardrobe that had apparently been very fas.h.i.+onable in 1976. 'No Idea. I mean, seeing as you haven't told me where it is we're going or anything.'

The Doctor glanced down at the controls again. Sam wondered if he'd already forgotten their destination. 'Borneo. East Indies ReVit Zone. Late twenty-first century.'

'Borneo? That's hot, yeah?'

'Well, quite.'

'No problem, then. Short sleeves and army boots. Good for a sunny day.'

'I said it was hot. I never said it was sunny. Expect erratic weather and severe atmospheric pollution.' The TARDIS ground to a halt as he spoke, the column at the heart of the console coming to rest with an all-conquering thunk thunk. As if the s.h.i.+p had run smack bang into the physical universe and bruised its nose.

Sam reached for the lever which, experience had taught her, activated the scanner. The Doctor slapped the back of her hand, and reached for an entirely different lever that did exactly the same job.

The ceiling s.h.i.+mmered, the dome filling up with an image of the environment outside the s.h.i.+p. Sam a.s.sumed this was some kind of holographic technique, although the last time she'd said that to the Doctor's face he'd grumbled something about primitive life-forms always trying to bring technology down to their own level. Which was rich, Sam had thought, coming from a man who used maser-modulated artron energy to make toast. A forest canopy painted itself across the ceiling, the branches stretching across a featureless grey sky.

'Late twenty-first century,' noted Sam. 'Some of the rainforests made it, then.'

'No they didn't. That's why this is a ReVit Zone.' The Doctor pressed another switch on the console, apparently at random. As luck would have it, the switch was the one that opened the doors.

Two and a half minutes later, Sam found out why the Doctor had asked about her clothes being suitable.

The heat wasn't the problem. A rainforest, she told herself, isn't just an English forest with the temperature turned up. The background noise, the smell, the p.r.i.c.kling feeling you get when the sweat starts pooling up under your arms and your b.r.e.a.s.t.s; it's a whole new range of experiences. Heat or no heat, she felt like she needed more clothes, like she had to put on an overcoat and/or a big floppy hat. It was a psychological thing, she realised. Clothes were a defence, a barrier between her body and the environment. She could practically feel the bacteria crawling into her system. The insect bites didn't help, either.

'Also, we're being watched,' said the Doctor, with his usual flair for pseudo-telepathy.

He was inspecting the undergrowth near the TARDIS, striding around the trees with his hands behind his back, politely avoiding the more intelligent-looking plants. Sam scanned the greenery, but the only animal life she could see was a single toucan, eyeing her up from the branches of a tree. Presumably, that was what the Doctor had meant.

'That's not what I meant,' the Doctor said.

Sam considered folding her arms again, but decided it wasn't worth the bother. 'So,what exactly are we doing in this place? Not that I desperately want to get out of here or anything.'

She emphasised the words I desperately want to get out of here I desperately want to get out of here, but the Doctor didn't take the hint. He started shaking his head. 'Something the General said. The East Indies ReVit Zone. Something to do with me. At least, that's what he implied.'

'What General?'

'The General. I get the nasty feeling there's a loose end somewhere around here, and I'm missing it.' General. I get the nasty feeling there's a loose end somewhere around here, and I'm missing it.'

The Doctor turned to the toucan, and shrugged apologetically. Sam didn't look up at the bird again. Mainly because she was worried she might see it shrugging back. 'Right. Loose ends. What do we look for, exactly?'

'We look for whatever it is the person responsible for the thing we're looking for doesn't want us to find.' The Doctor paused, to let that sink in. Or possibly for breath. 'While we were materialising, the TARDIS noticed something. Something out of phase with the normal event chronology. Have you seen Brigadoon Brigadoon, by the way? Big family spectacular. Lots of Scottish people with unconvincing accents.'

'Er... I've seen Braveheart Braveheart, if that's any good.'

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