Part 21 (2/2)

Your bureaucratic officiousness could cause the destruction of the timelines, not to mention the death of Queen Elizabeth II!'

Mel covered her eyes as the victim of this tirade tried to calm her companion down, addressing him as if he was simple. A few seconds later, the Doctor fell back into his seat with an expression of fury. He spent the next five minutes cursing the inefficiencies of British public transport. Then, to Mel's alarm, he slumped forward across the table.

'Doctor she cried. 'Doctor, get up. You're scaring me, Doctor.'

166.

He sat up slowly, his expression pained. 'It isn't working.'

'What isn't?'

'All the things I've striven for. My mission is falling apart around me. I'm not in control.'

'So what's new?' she said, cajolingly. 'I don't recall Paradise Towers being any bed of roses either, but we got through that one.'

'It's not the same,' he said, his ferocity unnerving. 'It's not nearly the same. This affects Earth, it affects Time, it affects you and me and too many of those I have travelled with.' His eyes misted over and he seemed to be looking far, far away. 'I should never have lied to them.' He put a hand to his forehead, closed his eyes, and now he wasn't even talking to her. His attention had been turned inward.

'No, I won't accept your argument. You would have barged in and made things worse. I have this body now and I will do what's right!'

One gate had been twisted back on its hinges; the other was lying flat beneath Dr Who's battletank. The two boys in the vehicle's rear were levering themselves free and running, panic-stricken, out of the grounds and away from sight. Jason shouted something incomprehensible after them, an expression of abject betrayal on his face. Men in suits and uniforms were streaming towards him and Cruncher emitted a bloodcurdling war-cry as he stepped forward to deal with them. He closed with the first one and took him in a headlock, evacuating the breath from his lungs and dropping him, unconscious, on his back.

Chris moved in, closer than most of the public dared, but faltered behind the tank as bullets started to fly. Cruncher waded into the defenders regardless, laughing raucously and downing at least four with ruthless ferocity, even after the first few slugs had managed to penetrate his body. He pirouetted as a plume of blood erupted from his chest and he fell without grace, landing atop one of his hapless victims.

'Cor, 'struth!' exclaimed Jessie, at the door of the tank. Chris reached to pull her away from the fracas. As they touched, she dispersed into mist; another figment of his erstwhile 167 companions' imagination. The battletank went with her, its usefulness over.

Alone now, Dr Who and Jason were running for the main entrance, but guns covered them from both sides. Someone shouted that they should give themselves up and Chris wanted to add his voice to that cry, to prevent the duo's inevitable fate.

No matter what they had done, they didn't deserve this.

But Jason turned and screamed in defiance and, as Chris started forward but stopped, knowing that to enter the firing zone was futile, two great golden scoops appeared and shovelled the young man's enemies away, upending them into frenzied tangles of arms and legs.

Chris boggled. What were these two? He ran after them instinctively, across the forecourt, unsure what he could do if he caught them. But the security men recovered fast from their unexpected repulsion. A dozen weapons swung to cover him and Chris halted, arms high above his head, being sure not to look as if he posed a threat. Dr Who and Jason disappeared through the archway of Buckingham Palace's princ.i.p.al entrance. Chris was ordered to lie flat on his face and, slowly, carefully, he obeyed.

Someone shouted his name, and the last thing Chris saw as two men in uniforms rushed over to him and buried his raised head in the concrete, was Roz Forrester, standing on the far side of the outer railings.

As his arms were wrenched up behind his back and his wrists connected by uncomfortable manacles, Chris felt a heady surge of relief.

The train was still not moving. And, in the absence of engine noise, a thick silence had enveloped its hindmost carriage, where the Doctor cradled his head in his hands and looked tired and ill.

'So much guilt, so many choices,' he said, after remaining quiet for so long that Mel suspected he had dozed off. 'So many voices in my head.' He looked up and she was alarmed to see red rims about his eyes. 'So many failures before me. Goth, Hedin, the Master, Ruath, even Borusa. Myself, in one possible 168 future. I thought I'd averted that. How could I really have hoped to avoid it?'

Her uncertainty about him was beginning to erode beneath a sympathetic tide. At the same time, Mel felt some measure of fear. Of him; of what he had become. 'What voices?' she asked carefully.

'My past selves,' he grumbled.

'They still exist? I mean, physically? Or is this some sort of . .

.' She groped for the words.

'The body renews itself,' the Doctor said without emotion, 'but too often the mind can't handle the multiplicity of psyches.

It's why the number of regenerations was limited. But still, it's hard to stay in control.'

'How can your past selves exist?' she protested. 'They're you, aren't they?'

'They're part of me.'

'Part of your memories. What you're describing is a . . . a multiple personality disorder!'

He looked at her. His eyes were burning intensely. 'I'm sorry.'

She gave a nervous laugh. 'What for?'

He reached for her hand and she almost withdrew it. But she let him take it, with surprising tenderness. 'I couldn't let it go on. I had my mission and I did what I had to. But I'm sorry I sent you away, Mel, that you were stranded. I should have found a better way.'

'What do you mean?' She tried to laugh again. 'I left of my own volition, Doctor. You can't take the blame for what happened next.'

His expression spoke otherwise. Mel felt confusion, then sadness and frustration - finally, anger, as a long-denied truth was made unmercifully clear.

'Oh no,' she whispered in horror. 'You didn't!'

UNIT jeeps screeched onto the flagged plaza. Khaki-clad soldiers pushed back spectators and erected yellow tape boundaries to discourage their return. Bernice set her sights on the handsome, thirty-something man with Captain's pips at the 169 Palace gates. He seemed to be coordinating the effort. She glanced at Roz and shot an arm out in time to stop her from drawing her gun. 'If you do that, we'll be covered in army grunts in seconds!'

'It's to establish our credentials,' said Roz sullenly. 'We've got to do something. They're sending people into that building and they don't know what they're facing!'

'Unless Chris told them.' Benny nodded towards the truck into which their unprotesting friend had been bundled.

'That's another thing.' Roz scowled and fingered her weapon in its holster.

'There's a better way,' Benny said firmly. 'I know how to handle this lot.' She looked each way, saw that no eyes were on her, and vaulted the makes.h.i.+ft barrier, bearing down on the Captain and smiling as she sensed that Roz had fallen into step behind. Someone shouted as he spotted them, but Benny ignored the booted footsteps of troops hurrying to intercept. By the time they arrived, she had tapped the senior officer's shoulder and pushed a temporary UNIT pa.s.s beneath his nose.

'Sorry about this, Captain Tavistock. We'll get rid of them.'

The officer waved his subordinate aside, his eyes on Benny, his interest engaged. She smiled, reading Roz's impatience from her stance. She needn't think she was taking over here.

Captain Tavistock tore the pa.s.s down the middle and stuffed the two halves into Benny's hand. 'You don't look like a ”Jeremy Fitzoliver” to me.'

Well observed,' said Benny, equally cool. 'Now listen up: in about a minute, your two perps will come back out. That'll be your best and only chance to take down the young man in blazer and shorts. If he gets a second, he'll obliterate us with a burst of fictional energy. Shoot to wound if possible, but ignore his friend. He's not important.'

'Orders, sir?' asked a young corporal, bemused by all this.

'All right, Harvie. Tell Sergeant Head to get onto Geneva. We have a Code 4-2-3. The Brigadier will want to be here.' The soldier acknowledged his instructions and hurried off. Tavistock turned back to Benny and gave her a tight smile. 'I am right, 170 aren't I, young lady?' Roz sn.i.g.g.e.red at the term of address.

'You are with the Doctor?' said Tavistock.

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