Doctor Who_ Father Time Part 8

'You said you were being chased by a bull.'

'Yes,' Arnold said, a trace of guilt in his voice.

'But that wasn't true, was it? For one thing, you came from Cooper's Farm, and George Cooper only keeps sheep and chickens.'

'No,' Arnold admitted. 'I lied.'

'Why did you tell Deborah Castle that you were being chased by a monster?'

Arnold Knight was suddenly suspicious. 'Who are you?'

'Someone who believes you.'

'You wouldn't.'

'You went looking for little green men and flying saucers and you found them.'

Arnold blinked. 'How?' he asked.

'How did I know?' The Doctor shrugged. 'Call it an instinct. There's something going on, Arnold, something that's quite out of the ordinary.'

'It was a robot. A big robot.'

The Doctor bit his lip. 'Where was it?'

'Cooper's Woods. There were lights down there, and then it came for me.'

'Describe it.'

'About ten feet tall. Bulky. Chunky, but it could move gracefully you know, not like robots are meant to. It was humanoid two arms, two legs and a head.'

'Did it say anything?'

'No, it just came for me.'

'Did you try to talk to it?'

'No I was scared.' Arnold looked at the Doctor: he believed him. It was such a relief.

The Doctor paced around the room for a moment.

Then he smiled.

'There is nothing to discuss,' Mr Gibson told them in that too-calm voice of his. 'Arnold Knight must die.'

The Hunters glanced at each other, but didn't move from their seats. The inside of the Volkswagen suddenly felt claustrophobic.

'We are not killers, Mr Gibson,' the woman said.

'Not professionally,' the man added.

Mr Gibson gave a low rumbling noise, like a disapproving grunt. 'Arnold Knight has seen too much. The Doctor is in contact with the woman who ran him over. She did not believe Knight, but the Doctor will. Knight must be eliminated before the Doctor and Knight make contact. The Prefect's mission must not be compromised.'

'We are not sure that it is is the Doctor,' the man reminded Mr Gibson. the Doctor,' the man reminded Mr Gibson.

'I know him of old,' Mr Gibson said softly, but with a snarl in his voice. 'It's him.'

'If you're that convinced, then why bother with Knight, why not just kill the Doctor?' the woman suggested.

'Yeah do your own dirty work.'

Mr Gibson laughed an unpleasant sound like a motorbike engine revving.

'I will kill the Doctor, when the time is right,' Mr Gibson vowed. 'You have your orders now go!'

'Excuse me, nurse?'

Nurse Collins looked up, and was glad she had. A handsome man with long light-brown hair was looking over at her, fixing her with the most beautiful blue eyes.

'How can I help?' she asked, looking for his wedding ring. Nurse Collins wasn't married herself, and often checked to see whether men she met were or not. It was a habit she had.

'Arnold Knight, the man in traction, is after a gla.s.s of water. And I'm looking for the medical records.'

She was on the alert. 'Who are you?'

'I'm the Doctor,' he said disarmingly.

'Dr Hennessy?' she asked. 'I didn't think you were starting until next week.'

The doctor smiled amiably.

'Any record in particular?'

'Yes. Dawkins. Miranda Dawkins. She's ten, so it's probably a paediatric record.'

'I'll help you look. This way.'

They weren't far from the records room. He was lucky that one of her duties involved some clerical work in here, so she had the key.

The room was small and dusty, full of old filing cabinets. Despite that, the staff knew their way around, and she quickly located the file and handed it over. The man opened up the folder, took out the sheaves of paper and flicked through them, pausing only a couple of times. After only a few seconds, he stuffed them back in the folder.

'That was quick,' she remarked.

'I'm a fast reader,' he a.s.sured her.

'Are you this fast at everything?' she asked, leaning in. His skin was milky-pale, and flawless. He wasn't wearing aftershave, but she could catch the scent of his hair.

'No,' he said, laughter in his voice. 'If only. Thanks for showing me this, and don't forget Arnold Knight's gla.s.s of water.'

He handed the folder back to her and strode out of the door.

'Good evening, Arnold,' a strange voice called out. It was a woman's voice, but it was deep. The woman was tall, angular, and she had such a good figure and bone structure that she should have been beautiful, but she wasn't.

'Hope we find you well,' said a man with a high-pitched voice. He looked like her twin brother.

'Who are you?'

'Oh, that doesn't matter,' the woman said.

'We're not killers,' the man said. 'I think we should make that clear from the start. I don't want you to think that we are killers.'

Arnold reached for his alarm b.u.t.ton. 'It was you in the car. It was you that didn't stop to help when I was run over.'

The man saw what he was doing, and grabbed his wrist, twisting it. 'Now, Arnold, just because you're scared doesn't mean you have to act like a complete spaz.'

'I-I'm not scared,' Arnold stammered.

The woman shook her head. 'You are.'

Arnold nodded.

'You're right to be,' the man told him. 'You've seen all sorts of things you're not meant to have.'

'We weren't going to kill you,' the woman added. 'We didn't think anyone would believe your stupid stories. We know the police didn't. But then the Doctor turned up.'

'The Doctor?'

'Yes. He knows the woman, the fat cow who ran you over. He'll be looking for you, and when he finds you, he'll believe you. Then he'll get involved and he'll interfere with our employer's plans.'

The man had pulled a device from his belt it looked like a wand.

The woman kissed Arnold on the forehead. 'We don't want to kill you, but Mr Gibson insists.' She drew back.

'Don't worry,' the man a.s.sured Arnold, pointing the wand at him. 'This won't hurt.'

The man lunged forward, stabbing the wand down through Arnold's forehead where the woman had just kissed it. Arnold heard the bone splitting, but didn't feel any pain. There was a low hum, then a jolt down his back, like an electric shock, then it felt as if his stomach had caught fire. Arnold tried to move, but he couldn't. He was being surrounded in a green aura, he could see his nerves and bones. He was being eaten away.

He had only two thoughts. Indignation. Indignation that this man had told him it wouldn't hurt and it was absolute searing agony. And serenity. A calmness that came from knowing he was right, that he'd found the extraordinary proof that he had been looking for, that he was right and everyone else had been wrong.

Arnold screamed.

Chapter Six.

Talking to Strangers Miranda sat at her desk, waiting for the Doctor to start the lesson.

The Doctor was at the back wall, examining the pictures.

'With it being so cold and wet at the moment, we spend a lot of playtime in here, drawing.'

The Doctor nodded. The back wall was covered in old squares of computer paper, Blu-Tacked up. Almost every picture was of s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps and alien monsters, vividly brought to life in crayons and paint.

'What's that?' the Doctor asked.

Miranda wasn't sure. 'I think that's Metal Mickey it's a robot on telly.'

The Doctor nodded, and moved on to the next picture. 'It's fascinating that they all come up with the same images: flying discs, death rays, green monsters.'

'They're just copying off the TV,' Miranda told him. 'They see that sort of stuff in cartoons and comics, that's all. Or they just copy off each other.'

'But all of them drawing s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps and monsters.'

'That one's Monkey and Pigsy.'

The Doctor peered at it. 'But all the others...'

'It's the UFO. All the boys think they're Luke Skywalker or Flash Gordon.'

'What about the girls?'

'We have to make do with being Princess Leia.'

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. 'Make do with being a princess?'

'She doesn't do anything. Just gets captured and waits for the boys to rescue her. That's all women do in that sort of thing. I'd rather be Luke. Or Darth Vader.'

Miranda wondered where the Doctor had gone to school. She just couldn't see him running around a playground she couldn't imagine his school days at all. It was always odd to think that teachers had once been boys and girls, but it was impossible with the Doctor.

'Why do you think the UFOs are coming here?' he asked.

'They could be here because they want to conquer Earth,' Miranda suggested.

'What makes you say that?' the Doctor asked, genuinely wanting to know.

'Well, that's what they do in films. There's that one with the flying saucer that lands outside the White House, and the army surrounds it with tanks and guns and then a giant robot comes out and blasts them.' Miranda hesitated. 'I don't know why they'd start by conquering Greyfrith, though.'

'Perhaps they are here to help,' the Doctor suggested.