Doctor Who Fan Fiction ❯ Dr Who – Martha and Ten The Inbetweens and Backstories ❯ Chapter Twenty Three ( Chapter 23 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

`So where have the trails of time taken us then?' Martha asked as the Time Rotor finished pumping up and down. The monitor screen was no help, showing concentric circles rotating in geometric patterns.

The Doctor gave her an excited grin from across the console. `A day out at a family attraction. Castle Extremis, the most brilliant theme park in this part of the cosmos.'

He shut down the console and grabbed his brown coat from the coral strut as they headed for the door. `Guided tours of the fairytale castle, coffee shops, exhibitions and historical re-enactments.'

`A bit like Windsor Castle and Legoland then?'

`Yeah, s'pose so . . . sort of.'

`Hello,' Martha heard the Doctor say cheerfully as he stepped outside. `What's your name, then?'

Martha stepped out behind him, and by the time she had closed the door and looked around, who ever he was talking too had gone.

`It doesn't look like the most brilliant theme park in this part of the cosmos,' Martha said. `It looks like a damp, gloomy tunnel.' She sniffed. `And it smells.'

`It's not damp,' the Doctor said. He plunged his hands into his coat pocket and sniffed as well. `Well, not really. Not "DAMP" damp. Doesn't smell too bad, either.' He peered into semidarkness. `I'll give you gloomy, though. Lots of gloom. Looming gloom. A real gloom loom, assuming gloom can loom.'

It reminded Martha of the London Dungeon tourist attraction on Westminster Bridge Road. Her mum had taken them there when they were kids, and she remembered the musty smell, the gloomy lighting . . . and the rats. It was brilliant!

`So where are we really?'

`Really? Outside the TARDIS. In a smelly, gloomy, not really-damp-damp tunnel, I should think. Pity that girl ran off, we could have asked her.'

`What girl?'

`The one that ran off. When she saw you.'

Martha's eyes widened. `Excuse me, but it was you that frightened her off. I didn't even see her.'

The Doctor wasn't listening. He pulled the TARDIS door closed, then marched off down the gloomy passageway.

`Maybe we're a bit early,' he said. `Maybe they just haven't opened yet.' He hesitated as he reached a junction, pointing first one way then the other. `Eeny meeny miny mo,' he murmured. He set off along the left-hand passageway. His delighted voice echoed back to Martha. `Oh, it's mo!'

`Early as in, they're still having breakfast?' Martha wondered, catching him up.

`Or early as in the place is still a frontier fort under almost constant siege from either Anthium or Zerugma, and they haven't actually sorted out the peace treaty and built it yet.'

Martha ran to catch him up. `You said guided tours and coffee shops,' she accused. `Not frontier fort and constant siege. You said exhibitions and historical re-enactments.'

`Yeah,' the Doctor conceded. `But so much better when you arrive in the middle of the real thing. I mean, just think about it.'

`I am thinking about it.'

`Real siege warfare. Real people in real situations. Real history,' he went on.

`Real blood, real death, real destruction and real danger,' Martha pointed out.

The Doctor paused to inspect one of the torches flickering on the wall. He seemed to be rolling the idea round his mouth.

`That too,' he decided eventually. `You know, this isn't real though. Look at it - that's clever.'

Before Martha could stop him, he stuck his hand into the flames. `It's all right,' he said, seeing her expression. `Like I said. Not real. Brilliant, clever, realistic. But not real. They must have a fusion generator somewhere. Means we can't be far off. War's probably been over for years.'

`Probably?'

He was off again. `Well, possibly. Maybe.' He spun round and continued walking backwards so he could look at Martha behind him. `I don't know - let's find out. We need to find someone to ask really. Like that little girl.'

Martha stopped.

The Doctor stopped too. `What?' he asked, not turning to see what she was looking at.

`Maybe,' Martha said slowly, `we could ask the sinister cloaked figure who looks like he's enrolled as Chief Frightener at the Monastery of Doom?'

The Doctor's eyes narrowed. `Behind me?' he whispered, pointing over his own shoulder without looking.

Martha nodded.

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The Doctor wandered back from the TARDIS workshop into the console room, holding his now repaired sonic screwdriver. 'There we are, good as new.'

He flipped it into the air and caught it, before putting it in his inside jacket pocket. It had been broken when he had prevented the Supreme Commander of the Zerugian Forces, General Orlo from derailing the peace process by staging a military coup.

The TARDIS had helped him to repair the sonic device and restore the operating software from a backup. The TARDIS regularly backed up the data and installed updates via its roaming Wi-Fi connection. A couple of years ago, after a problem in The Albion Hospital, it had uploaded a nifty little app for resonating concrete.

And when his sonic screwdriver had been destroyed in the Royal Hope Hospital, the TARDIS had produced a replacement that still had the 200 year old subroutine hidden in the operating system architecture. It was running an implanted calculation that he would find useful in a few hundred years time.

'Here, I made us a brew,' Martha said as she handed him a cup of tea.

'Hah! And in my favourite mug, thank you.' He waggled his eyebrows and took a slurp.

She often wondered why the San Kaloon mug was his favourite, and presumed that it was a present from his ex when they had visited the glass pyramid. She took a sip of her tea, and had a frown on her face.

'So let me get this straight. We're going 100 years into the past to hide that glass diary where you found it yesterday, yeah?'

'That's right. Manfred Grieg gave me some valuable insights into what had gone on in the castle, and helped us save the day.'

Grieg had been Chief Minister to the Lord High Advocate for Anthium and the Governor of Castle Extremis, Kendal Pennard. It had been Chief Minister Grieg who advised Pennard on the strategy used to recapture Extremis after the Second Occupation of the Zerugian forces.

'But what about cause and effect? Isn't this the effect before the cause . . . so that the cause can't have the effect?' Martha continued.

The Doctor looked at her in amazement. 'Martha Jones! So you have been paying attention. Top marks.'

'But isn't that one of those loopy paradox things that you keep saying will implode the universe?'

'If you don't know what you're doing then yes it can . . .' He scratched the back of his head as he tried to work out the best way of explaining it. 'You see, you're assuming that time is a strict progression of cause to effect.

'Am I?'

'Yeah, but don't worry about it, most humans do. But actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey . . . stuff.'

'Well I'm glad you cleared that up,' she said sarcastically.

'Okay, think about the time I took my tie off in front of you in Chancellor Street, or when Good Queen Bess wanted to chop my head off.'

'Oh yeah, I see what you mean,' she conceded, but still had her doubts. `But what about those maintenance robots, Bill and Bott? They didn't recognise you when you found the diary.'

`Or they pretended not to know me,' he said mysteriously as he finished his tea.

`Why would they do that?'

`Wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey,' is all he would say as he headed for the door. `I'll be back in a few minutes.'

`This stone's had it, Bott,' Bill said, jabbing at the wall with his metal arm. A spray of pale dust erupted from the metal point.

`Better replace it then, Bill,' Bott said. `Give me the measurements and I'll cut one to fit, then we can chop this one out.'

The Doctor, standing in the doorway watched with interest as the robots went about their task.

`You know,' he announced as Bott lifted the crumbling stone out of the wall, `you're very good at this.'

`Had a lot of practice,' Bott told him.

`Best in the business,' Bill said.

`And who might you be?' Bott asked.

`Not time and motion come to check up on us?' Bill said.

`Not time and motion, no. Well . . .' The Doctor stuffed his hands in his coat pockets and walked across to inspect the hole they had made in the wall. `Not motion, anyway.'

`So - can we do something for you?' Bill enquired.

`Or are you just going to stand around and get in the way?' Bott asked.

`Sorry.' The Doctor stepped back and gestured for them to carry on.

Bott lifted the stone he had just cut and lined it up with the hole. Bill steadied the heavy load as Bott inched it forwards. The man cleared his throat. Bill and Bott stopped. The stone remained motionless.

`Problem?' Bill asked.

`Something you'd like to say?' Bott checked.

`No, no. It's looking good,' the Doctor said. `Excellent in fact. Brilliant. I was just wondering though . . .'

`Yes?' Bott said.

`What?' Bill asked.

The Doctor was holding something. Something he had taken from his pocket. It was rectangular, and looked like it was made of translucent plastic or glass. `I was wondering if I could pop this behind the stone?'

`Why?' Bill asked.

`What for?' Bott wanted to know.

`Well, actually it's to impress a friend of mine. A young lady,' the man confided. `Then I'll come back later, and find it again. As if by magic.'

`Behind our stone,' Bill said.

`This stone we're about to put in,' Bott added.

`That very one,' the Doctor agreed.

`How will you get it out again?' Bott asked. `We're not having you messing up our work you know.'

`This is serious stuff,' Bill said. `Not some parlour trick. This stone'll be in place till it crumbles away and needs replacing again.'

`And that won't be for a hundred years, give or take.'

`With the slow decay you get from the osmotic rendition caused by the barrier,' Bott agreed. The energy barrier that protected the castle from surprise attack also caused the stone of the castle to slowly erode.

`So, I'll need to come back in a hundred years?' the Doctor confirmed.

`Afraid so,' Bott told him.

`Near enough,' Bill agreed.

`Right. OK. Fair enough.' The Doctor beamed at them. `I'll do that then.'

Bill and Bott looked at each other. Then they looked at the Doctor, who was still grinning at them with satisfaction.

`Sure?' Bill asked.

`Absolutely.'

`Positive?' Bott checked.

`Hundred per cent.'

`Is that glass?' Bill asked.

`Sort of,' the Doctor told them.

`It'll scratch,' Bott told him.

`Wrap it in a bit of cloth,' Bill suggested. `There's some down there by the cutting tools.'

The Doctor wrapped a piece of cloth round the glass book, and then he pushed it carefully to the back of the hole Bill and Bott had cut in the wall. He stepped back to allow them to fit the new piece of stone. When they'd finished, the hole was closed, hiding the small bundle of cloth.

`Thanks.'

`No problem.'

`Don't mention it.'

`See you in a hundred years.' The Doctor paused in the doorway. `Oh, and if you could make like you've never seen me before, that'd be a big help.'

`With impressing the young lady?' Bill said.

`Amongst other things. I'm cheating a bit by being here really. Tell you what,' he said as a thought occurred to him.

`Don't sneak on me, and I'll put in a word for you with the Galactic Alliance.'

`You're with the Galactic Alliance?' Bill was impressed.

`Didn't think they operated in this sector,' Bott said.

`All a bit hush-hush,' the Doctor told them. `But we're always on the lookout for reliable agents.' He knew that a couple of "sleeper agents" already in place, observing everything that went on in the castle and storing the information in their electronic memory would be just the thing he needed, or had needed, or would need . . . needy-weedy, wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey.

These two maintenance robots would have access to all areas of the castle, and receive their work rosters via encrypted narrow-beam data transmissions that wouldn't go through main communications channels. That meant that no one else would detect them, especially a certain Supreme Commander of the Zerugian Forces.

`What do we need to do?' Bill asked.

`You can rely on us,' Bott assured him.

`I know,' the Doctor said. `Someone will be in touch. And they will give you a special code, though they won't expect you ever to need it.'

`Sounds like work for work's sake,' Bott grumbled.

`And we know all about that,' Bill said.

`You will need it though,' the Doctor went on. `It'll be important, really important. And when I ask you for it, I want to hear that release code loud and clear, understand?'

`Yes, sir,' Bill and Bott said together.

`Er,' Bill said, `release code for what?'

But the Doctor had gone, and the word that the Doctor would put in for them would be the weapons release code for the Galactic Alliance peace keeping troops who would help to defeat the military coup.

Moments later, a breeze blew the dust across the floor as Bill and Bott worked on the next section of wall that needed repairing. If there was a strange sound accompanying it, a sound like reality itself splitting open, then Bott's drill was making so much noise they didn't notice.

In the TARDIS, there was an insistent beeping emanating from the central console.

“That sounds like a warning beep to me” Martha thought to herself. “Here we go again!”