Doctor Who_ The Gallifrey Chronicles Part 35

Reloaded

'What?' Marnal said, keeping the gun pressed to the Doctor's forehead.

Rachel was trying to remember. She didn't want to see the Doctor shot, and wanted either to stop the execution or buy enough time to get away from it.

'The Matrix was something on Gallifrey, wasn't it?' There had been too much to absorb in Marnal's books, but she remembered that snippet.

'It was the repository of all acc.u.mulated Time Lord knowledge,' Marnal said.

Rachel smiled. 'That's right, it was the main computer.'

'So much more than that,' Marnal said quietly. 'When Time Lords died their memories were uploaded into the circuits of the Matrix.'

'And if all the Time Lords are dead,' the Doctor said, 'then logically all their memories would be in the Matrix.'

'The Matrix was destroyed with Gallifrey,' Marnal said. 'Yet another consequence of your '

'No,' the Doctor stated firmly.

'Then where?'

'As I said to G.K. Chesterton, "Gilbert, the best place to hide a leaf is on a tree." It follows that the best place to hide a lot of memories would be. . . '

Marnal pulled the gun away. 'You're lying.'

The Doctor shook his head. Marnal was clearly concerned by the sudden movement. His whole att.i.tude to the Doctor had changed in an instant, become full of concern.

'I don't understand,' Rachel said.

The Doctor clutched his lapels and looked insufferably smug.

'So please explain,' Rachel added.

'You spent all that time concentrating on what isn't in there. Not once did you wonder what was there instead instead. I had memories.' He paused to chuckle.

'Oh boy, did I have memories.' The Doctor paused, a little theatrically. 'My brain contains the entire contents of the Matrix.'

'It's impossible,' Marnal said, but his gun was down and he was swaying uncertainly.

209.

'No, it was simple. Before Gallifrey was destroyed I edited out my own memories using the TARDIS's telepathic circuits, and downloaded every Matrix file into the s.p.a.ce I'd cleared.'

'One brain couldn't contain all that information. How many Time Lord minds would be stored there?' Marnal asked.

'One hundred and fifty-three thousand eight hundred and forty-one of them,' the Doctor replied instantly.

'You've counted?'

'The maths is simple enough. You just have to remember to subtract five at the end.'

'All those minds can't be talking to you. You'd go mad.' Rachel said, although she'd always had her suspicions.

'No. They're supercompressed and stored away. I can't access them. If I tried. . . Well, it wouldn't be pleasant. I suspect it would kill me.'

'Are they alive in there?' Rachel asked.

The Doctor shrugged. 'They're dormant. They sleep in my mind. Beyond that. . . well, we get into metaphysics, and I try to avoid all that.'

Marnal was staring right at the Doctor's forehead. 'How are you planning to wake them up?'

'I only worked out they're in there a few hours ago. A cerebral scan made by an instrument that once accessed the Matrix, so knew what to look for, confirmed it.'

'You must have a plan.'

'I'm sure I did, but I must have accidentally deleted it with the memories. All I was left with was a very strong built-in aversion to opening the floodgates.

If I probe what is in there too hard or, heaven forfend, get my memories back, the Matrix databanks will be overwritten and all the information will be lost forever.' The Doctor grinned. 'Of course, if you have any ideas how to get them out. . . ?'

'The Matrix was corrupted by Faction Paradox,' Rachel said. Marnal and the Doctor turned to look at her.

'It was we saw it happen when we watched that recording of Gallifrey being destroyed. What you have is infected by '

'When I pulled the lever the future version of Faction Paradox was erased from the time line. It never existed to corrupt the Matrix. There was a tiny window of opportunity less than a minute after that, but before the energy beam destroyed Gallifrey.'

Marnal raised the gun, a little half-heartedly. 'You're bluffing.'

The Doctor bent over and pressed his temple against the muzzle. 'If you're sure of that, then go for it. I won't mind.'

210.

Marnal s.n.a.t.c.hed the gun away and the Doctor had to pull himself up to avoid falling over.

'So where are your memories now?' Rachel asked.

'Gone,' the Doctor admitted. 'Gone where, I don't know,' he added thoughtfully.

'Do you want all those other memories in there?' Rachel asked.

'Clearly I must have thought I could find a way to get them out. I've checked, and the TARDIS circuits aren't compatible so I can't just download everything into the old girl. But that's got to be the basic idea: find or build a computer that can hold the files and run the programs. I didn't save Gallifrey, but I did save all the Time Lords. That's got to be better than nothing. Home is where the hearts are, that's what I say.'

'We must dedicate ourselves to the task of building New Gallifrey,' Marnal said. 'Nothing else matters.'

'Millions are dying back on Earth,' Rachel said, shocking the Doctor. 'If you can do anything to help them, you have to do it.'

'Why didn't you say. . . ?' the Doctor asked, pale. 'Marnal didn't say anything about deaths on that scale.'

'Humans don't matter,' Marnal stated, and the way he was fussing around the Doctor you'd have thought he was pregnant. 'We have to get you to a place of safety, and you have to stay there. Your TARDIS will be your sanctuary. We will marshal our resources, summon what allies we can. Together we will construct a city for the saved.'

'No,' said the Doctor. 'We go back to Earth.'

'The code of the Time Lords states '

'Phooey to the code of the Time Lords,' the Doctor said angrily. 'In fact, I'm sure we're quorate, so let's vote on changing Time Lord foreign policy right here and now. I warn you, I do have a block vote.'

Marnal raised his gun.

The Doctor held out his hands, inviting Marnal to shoot. 'Remember?' he asked, impatiently.

Marnal scowled and lowered the gun. 'We only need your brain,' he said darkly.

'Well, it's coming with me, back to Earth,' the Doctor insisted. 'I have the feeling I'm going to need it.'

As Marnal, the Doctor and Rachel made their way across the terrain they were beginning to get a sense of it, even in the darkness. Marnal knew this would make a fascinating entry for his diary, and found himself trying to commit as much as he could to memory.

211.

The food cave was the size of a city. It was a natural bowl in the rock Marnal thought it had originally been an impact crater and had been covered over by Vore builders. The soil was thick, with the consistency in places of a peat bog. Rachel had added to the Vore's stockpile of chyme a couple of times at first, but now said she was used to the smell. The Doctor was alert, looking for the best exit.

There were pathways running down the sides of the crater. Off the path, individual Vore scurried like rats on a landfill. They must have been tending the mushroom garden, although it was impossible to make out exactly what they were doing.

Down in the valleys there were mile-long, perfectly straight lines of Vore everywhere. They trudged forwards, carrying pulped-up spheres of mushroom paste as big as they were. They moved in perfect unison, all of them swaying slightly, but exactly the same way. There was no sign of the beginning or end of the line, no sign of the Vore who must have chewed up the mushrooms to turn them into paste, or the ones set the Sisyphean task of rolling the paste into b.a.l.l.s.

The whole place was quiet, the layer of fungus acting to absorb sound, the Vore going about their task with the silence and dedication of monks.

'No obvious physical differences to indicate a caste structure,' the Doctor said to himself. 'Perhaps a slightly higher intelligence means they can be generalists.'

The three of them were about halfway up a slope, heading towards a small tunnel opening that hadn't seen much Vore traffic. The creatures weren't reacting. The Doctor's supposition that they operated by smell, and so perceived the three of them as oddly mobile food, was almost certainly flawed, but was the best theory they currently had to go on.

The Doctor reached the opening first, and gave Rachel a hand up on to the small ledge that marked it.

'If I'm right. . . ' the Doctor began. 'Yes! Look, the TARDIS.'

The tunnel was only a few feet long. At the other end was the cavern the TARDIS had landed in. The time s.h.i.+p was visible about four hundred yards away. The cavern buzzed and droned with Vore activity. The creatures crawled over every surface, even over each other. The air was thick with them. They were keeping a respectful distance from the TARDIS itself, and it was Marnal's fancy that those nearest it were facing it with the same deference that a primitive faced an altar or idol.

'I should have packed a dog whistle,' the Doctor muttered, incomprehensibly.

'They don't seem to notice us. Can we make a run for it?' Rachel asked.

'I think the Vore in there are guards. They'll be on the lookout for us. A 212 four-hundred-yard dash over uneven rocky terrain, then hold them off long enough for me to unlock the door and the three of us to get through it?'

'I'll get us there,' Marnal a.s.sured them both.

'How?' the Doctor asked.

'I have a gun, remember?'

'It didn't do you much good last time,' the Doctor reminded him. 'There are probably ten billion Vore on this moon. Fire two shots a second, hit one every time, a.s.sume they don't breed and that you don't eat or sleep, and it'll be the fifty-ninth century before they're all dead.'

Marnal shook his head. 'We only need to get the ones between us and the TARDIS. They didn't react when I shot one before.'

'Those are clearly on guard duty. I'm sure they'll signal for reinforcements.

Wait!'

Marnal had drawn the maser, set it to kill. He fired towards the TARDIS, scattering the Vore, creating a path.

The Doctor was running behind him, pulling Rachel along. She was screaming.

A Vore dived at them, Marnal shot it down. They'd covered a hundred yards.

Rapid fire, aimed in front, just clearing the way. There were two obvious flaws in the plan. The first was that firing ahead left every other direction unguarded. Vore were sweeping around, on the ground, in the air and charging at them from behind. The other problem was that it was obvious where the three of them were heading. Reinforcements poured down to block the way to the TARDIS. Two hundred yards run, two hundred to go.

Very little time indeed to adjust the settings, but Marnal managed to lower the power and range, increase the spread. A wide-angle attack, close range, hitting everything within an arc of about fifteen degrees with Serious Indifference. This got them leaving, and even ones that hadn't been hit seemed to get in the mood. Most were moving out of the way. One hundred yards to go.

By now, only one Vore remained in front of them. It stood with its back to them blocking the TARDIS door, but there was no indication it knew this was what it was doing.

Marnal raised his gun.

The Vore twisted around and sliced down with its claw, taking the muzzle of the gun and the tips of Marnal's fingers off. The Vore lashed out again and Marnal yelled. He looked down to see its claw puncturing his chest, then being pulled out smeared in blood. He sank to his knees, surprised but not yet in pain. His chest felt warm. The Vore that had killed him simply scuttled off, clearly concluding its work was done. The Doctor was opening up the TARDIS and pus.h.i.+ng Rachel inside.

213.

The Doctor came back, pulled Marnal up and half-dragged him inside the TARDIS. He ran to the console and shut the doors, then rushed back to Marnal's side. Rachel was already there. 'You were right,' Marnal coughed wetly.

The Doctor eased him down. Rachel was examining him, making him comfortable.

'There's no need to do that,' the Doctor said quietly.

'I have to try.' But her body language made it clear she knew it was hopeless.

'Get the medical kit,' the Doctor suggested. 'First door on the left, down the corridor, second door on the right, down the corridor, third door on the left, down the corridor, fourth door on the right, top shelf of a white cupboard.

You can't miss it.'

Rachel ran to get it.

'I'm dead, Doctor.'

'Yes.'

'I meant it. You must restore Gallifrey. That has to be your mission.'

'I will do everything within my power.'

Marnal managed a smile. 'Then it is as good as done. I know now you really did lose your memories. You saved as much of Gallifrey as you possibly could, more than anyone else would have. I once dreamt that all Time Lords would be like you, that we would explore the universe once more, help those who needed it, destroy those who would destroy. You do good. . . but perhaps it is as well that you are one of a kind.'