Doctor Who_ Happiness Patrol Part 18

'They only came later,' Helen protested. 'I told them to be happy. I gave them a chance. But they wouldn't listen.'

She paused, thinking back. 'I know they laughed sometimes, but they still cried, they still wept.'

The Doctor regarded her with pity. 'Don't you ever feel like crying?' he asked softly.

'Of course not, Doctor,' snapped Helen A. She had rid herself of her previous self-doubt and was spouting her philosophy again. 'It's unnecessary. And those who persisted had to be punished.'

'But why?'

'For the good of the majority. For the ones who wanted to take the opportunities that I gave them.'

The Doctor laughed derisively. 'And what were these opportunities that you gave them?' he asked. 'A bag of sweets? A few tawdry party decorations? Bland soulless music?' He stared at her. 'Do these things make you happy?'

Helen A was shaken. It was clear to the Doctor that she hadn't even considered this.

'Of course they don't,' he snapped, answering his own question. 'Because they're cosmetic. Because real happiness is nothing if it doesn't exist side by side with sadness.' He held his hand in the air and the Kandy Man's coin appeared between his fingers. He tossed it into the air.

'See,' he said, showing her the coin. 'Two sides, one coin.'

He held out the coin to Helen, offering it to her, but she knocked his hand away and the coin fell to the ground. She felt the Doctor was patronizing her and was angry again, recovering the old tigerish pa.s.sion that had destroyed her enemies on her way to power. 'You can keep your coin, Doctor,' she snarled. 'And your sadness. I'll go somewhere else. I'll find somewhere where there is no sadness. A place where people know how to enjoy themselves.'

'I'm sure you will, Helen A,' said the Doctor, 'but it won't be a life worth living.'

Helen A ignored him. 'A place where people are strong where they hold back the tears. A place where people pull themselves together.'

'Where there's no compa.s.sion.'

'Where there's control.'

'You mean a place without love,' said the Doctor.

Helen A looked at the Doctor long and hard. A smile played round the corners of her mouth. 'I always thought love was overrated,' she said. But as soon as she had spoken her expression changed to one of desolation.

'Fifi,' she said simply.

'Fifi?' said the Doctor, puzzled. What had Fifi to do with anything? But now Helen was running past him. He spun round and there indeed was Fifi, dragging herself towards them, with a great gash in her side. He was astonished that she had survived the rock fall but could see that she was barely alive and had undertaken the terrible journey to the surface only so that she could die in the arms of Helen A.

'Fifi!' cried Helen A, scooping her up, tears cascading down her cheeks. 'Fifi!' She held her close, rocking her backwards and forwards, like a mother with a baby.

With one last, great effort, Fifi lifted her head to Helen A. But then her strength ebbed, and Helen A, still holding her tight, felt Fifi relax in her arms as she gave up the unequal struggle. Great sobs racked Helen A's body as she buried her head in Fes fur, her tears mingling with Fifi's blood.

The Doctor walked back to the doorway where Ace was waiting for him.

'Should we do something, Doctor?' she asked.

'It's done,' he said.

They walked up the street, leaving Helen A to mourn over the body of the only creature she had ever loved.

15.

By first light, most of Forum Square had been repainted.

Soft colours now mingled with the bright colours preferred by Helen A. Susan Q, Earl and Wulfric had come to say goodbye to the Doctor and Ace. The mood was subdued, but enlivened by the constant bickering of Daisy K and Priscilla P, who were putting the final touches to restoring the TARDIS to its familiar deep blue.

'What's your next stop, Doctor?' asked Earl, when Daisy and Priscilla had finished and disappeared down the street to the execution yard, their next job.

'Good question,' said the Doctor.

But Ace had an idea. 'Can't we go after Joseph C and that toerag Gilbert M?'

'Forget Gilbert M,' said Susan Q. 'It was the Kandy Man who was dangerous.'

'Yes,' agreed the Doctor. 'Hatred, evil, emulsifiers, bigotry, lecithin and non-dairy fats.'

'Stop it, Professor,' moaned Ace. 'You're making me hungry.'

'Right,' said the Doctor, 'it's been a long night. We must be off. How about you, Earl?'

'I'll stay here to teach this planet the blues again.'

'Thank you for giving them back to us, Doctor,' said Susan Q. The Doctor looked puzzled. 'The blues, I mean.'

He smiled. 'There aren't any other colours without the blues.'

The Doctor doffed his hat to Susan Q and Wulfric and shook hands with Earl, and he watched with Ace as they set off down the street to check on progress in the execution yard, accompanied by the mournful sound of Earl's harmonica.

Ace had discovered a bit of the TARDIS that Daisy and Priscilla had missed and she was rectifying it with a spray can that she had found in her rucksack. 'Are they all right?' she asked.

'Happiness will prevail,' said the Doctor, gently guiding her through the open door of the TARDIS.