Doctor Who_ Time Zero Part 20

'Just thought I'd ask.'

'I don't need to salve your vanity...?' He c.o.c.ked his head slightly to one side an obvious question.

'Doctor,' the Doctor said. He smiled. 'But you can call me...' He studied Hartford's expression. 'Doctor,' he finished.

'Medical doctor?' Thorpe asked. He was looking meaningfully at Hartford as he spoke.

The Doctor did not answer him. Instead he pointed across the room to where there were tables and chairs set up round a kitchen area. At the side of the tables was a bed, a figure lying unmoving in it. 'You need a second opinion?'

'Later,' Hartford decided. 'Show them to their rooms first, then bring the Doctor back here.'

By the time they reached the first room, Curtis could barely stand without Holiday's help.

'What's wrong with him?' the Doctor hissed at Holiday.

But the big man frowned at him. 'It's nothing,' he said quietly, 'He gets like this.'

'Perhaps I should take a look at him?'

'No!' Holiday snapped with sudden and surprising vehemence. 'I will attend to Me Curtis.'

Thorpe pushed the door open. The room beyond was small. There was a single bed, a wardrobe built into an alcove, and a desk and chair. In the corner was a small armchair.

Curtis staggered inside. Holiday made to follow, but Thorpe stopped him. 'One per room,' he said.

'But Mr Curtis is ill,' Holiday pleaded.

'Then you'd better hope he gets better before your next pay day.' Thorpe smiled, white teeth matching his coverall. 'Go in there now and you won't be there to collect the cheque.'

'I'll be all right,' Curtis croaked. He slumped down in the small armchair. There was an audible crack. His body seemed to sag for a moment, then the chair exploded. The arms fell away to the sides and the back collapsed. Curtis was left sitting, dazed, on the floor.

It was as comical as it was sudden, and Thorpe guffawed with laughter. 'You're well out of it there,' he told Holiday and swung the door shut on the image of Curtis struggling to get to his feet.

Holiday mopped his forehead with a snow*white handkerchief and they continued down the corridor. They were almost at the studded steel door at the end when behind them, another door opened. A small woman with tangled fair hair stepped out. She reacted when she saw Thorpe and the others. 'I heard a sound,' she said nervously. 'A sort of cracking. Maybe a shot.'

'And you think that's a good enough reason to leave your room?' Thorpe asked. His eyes glinted in the uncompromising light.

She swallowed. 'I I...' But she seemed unable to go on.

Thorpe sighed. 'That's the third time, Miss Ashworth,' he said quietly, 'Three strikes and you're out.'

The woman's eyes widened in terror.

The Doctor stepped quickly forwards. 'Look, I'm sure we can work '

But he got no further. Thorpe's pistol was raised, pointing at the woman's head. She whimpered and cringed away, hands flying to her mouth.

Holiday took a step back, his own mouth open in horror. The d.u.c.h.ess screamed.

The shot echoed round the corridor, the sound continuing long after the woman's body had slumped to the floor. The blood pooled around her shattered head and Thorpe clicked his tongue.

'There was no excuse for that,' the Doctor said. His voice was quiet, yet it carried easily to the others. 'No excuse whatsoever.'

Thorpe turned slowly to face him, the gun still smoking in his hand.

'You want to make something of it?' he asked.

The Doctor met his gaze. 'That was a destructive act, pure and simple,' he said. 'There's nothing creative about killing. Nothing can be made of it. You do it so easily, have you ever thought about how much harder it is to preserve and save lives? How much more of a challenge that is?'

'I know my limits,' Thorpe replied. 'I know where my talents lie. Be careful I don't get the urge to demonstrate them again.'

The gun was still levelled. Slowly, Thorpe raised it so it pointed directly between the Doctor's eyes.

Then he sighed. 'Son of a...' He shook his head and lowered the gun. His gaze was focused beyond the Doctor, further down the corridor. 'Here we go again.'

The Doctor turned. A man was walking towards them along the corridor. He was of average height and build, perhaps in his thirties. He was wearing furs, the hood pulled back so that his unshaven face was clearly visible. His dark hair was brushed back.

The man seemed not to notice the other people in the corridor, did not remark on the dead body of the woman staining the floor. He made no effort to step over or around any of them, but kept walking. Only when he had pa.s.sed them, and almost reached the door at the end of the corridor did he turn. But again he seemed not to be looking at them, and in a moment he was gone fading through the door as if it were not there.

The d.u.c.h.ess gasped. Holiday had gone white.

Thorpe laughed nervously. 'Gets me every time,' he said as he put his gun away.

'What was it?' the d.u.c.h.ess asked breathlessly.

'A ghost?' Thorpe shrugged. 'Who knows.' He heaved open the heavy door and nodded for them to go through. There was no sign of the man in the next section of corridor.

Holiday was shown into a room almost identical to the one Curtis had been given. But when it was the d.u.c.h.ess's turn, her room was rather larger.

'The honeymoon suite,' Thorpe told her with a grin. She did not smile back.

The Doctor peered in past the large man. 'I like the view,' he said. Through the single large window he could see the main castle entrance. In the distance a mountain mirrored the shape of the rebuilt gatehouse. The two were almost perfectly aligned.

Thorpe swung the door shut, cutting off the view, and the Doctor gave a sigh of disappointment.

'You'll have more than enough time to admire the views,' Thorpe told him. 'I'll show you your room on the way back to the Hall. Then you can examine the patient.'

'What's wrong with her?' the Doctor asked as they made their way back down the corridor.

'Been outside too long without her coat. Hartford will tell you.'

In his room, Curtis lay heavily on the bed. He was sleeping fitfully, his face streaming with sweat.

He turned over and muttered at the sound of the door opening. But he did not wake as someone slipped inside the room and closed the door quietly behind them.

Nor did he wake as they lifted the leather*bound journal from the desk where he had lain it. Only when the door clicked shut again did his eyes flicker open for the briefest moment. His coal*dark eyes stared up at the ceiling for a while before closing again.

Had he looked to the desk, he might have noticed that the journal was gone.

'I want to know what happened to the two people I sent outside with her.' The voice seemed to be floating through layers of cloud. 'I want to know what happened to the other prisoner.'

Anji could feel her eyelids flickering. She could see the light beyond, yet they just seemed too heavy to open. She lay still, gathering her strength. Where was she? Was this...? No, that was ridiculous. The voice she knew the voice. It was Hartford, she realised with a s.h.i.+ver.

But now there was another voice answering. Speaking loudly and precisely, and somehow Anji felt that the words were addressed directly to her.

'You realise,' the voice said, 'that there may be some initial amnesia brought on by hypothermia.'

Anji almost gasped out loud. She knew this other voice too.

Hartford again: 'What?'

She was about to open her eyes, about to struggle into a sitting position and grin insanely because now everything would suddenly, irrationally, be all right.

'She may not be able to remember what happened,' the Doctor was saying, 'When she eventually comes round. Which may not be for quite a while yet.'

That was certainly meant for her, Anji decided. She tried to relax, though she could feel her heart beating anxiously and excitedly. 'Who is she, anyway?' the Doctor asked.

'It doesn't matter who she is,' Hartford snapped. 'I just want her fit enough to answer my questions as soon as possible.'

A hand took hold of Anji's wrist to check her pulse. She opened her eyes the merest fraction, and saw the Doctor's face close to hers. He was bent low as if to listen to the rhythm of her breathing. 'Stay unconscious,' he murmured.

That was easy, Anji thought. A dull mist was descending again in her mind and she could feel herself drifting back to sleep. With an effort she fought it back, and strained to hear what was going on.

It took several minutes for Hartford to bore of watching the Doctor. When he did he went over to talk quietly with Thorpe on the other side of the large room. The Doctor could see them examining what looked like a wrist.w.a.tch. Hartford was shaking it angrily.

'...worse if anything...' Hartford's words drifted over as he turned to look back at the Doctor.

The Doctor pretended to be absorbed in his patient's condition. He whistled softly when Hartford and Thorpe both left the Hall, leaving them alone.

'You can wake up now, Anji,' he said.

She sat up at once. 'What's going on?' she demanded. 'What are you doing here?'

'What am I doing here?' He frowned. 'There's trouble here, that's where I go. But what about you?'

'I was brought here, by Hartford and his lot.'

'Why?' the Doctor asked.

'I wish I knew,' she told him, ma.s.saging her forehead. 'They seem to be interested in me because they think I've travelled in time.' She moved her hand round to rub her neck, and gave a sudden yelp of pain as she drew her hand round to her throat.

Immediately the Doctor bent to take a look. There was small red dot where Anji said it was painful A puncture mark perhaps? He felt round it carefully. 'Just a spot,' he said doubtfully. 'I think.'

Oh great: Anji threw her hands up. 'First I get kidnapped, then I eject from a cras.h.i.+ng plane. After that I nearly freeze to death before becoming some sort accessory to several murders. And if that wasn't bad enough I'm now getting acne.'

'I saw a ghost just now,' the Doctor said matter*of*factly. He sat down beside Anji on the bed and grinned at her.

Anji nodded. 'Yeah, someone mentioned there is one. What is it? Headless horseman, grey lady?'

The Doctor continued to smile 'Not so, melodramatic.' His smile faded. 'But rather more worrying,' he said. 'It's George Williamson.'

17: Taking Notes

They ran headlong through the darkness, not knowing or caring where the pa.s.sage might lead. Fitz's shoulders were sore and bruised from colliding with the stone walls. At one point they reached a sharp bend, and George and Fitz both bounced off the wall and found themselves entangled in a heap on the floor. It hurt like h.e.l.l, but they were both laughing near hysterically as they pulled themselves upright and continued with rather more caution.

'I can't hear them following, George said, gasping for breath. 'Do you suppose they've given up?'

'I don't know,' Fitz replied. 'Maybe they can't get down the pa.s.sage. Or perhaps they're busy.'

'Busy? What with?' Fitz heard him catch his breath as he realised. 'Oh, Price. Yes...' George's voice tailed off.

'Caversham seemed to think they hunted by smell,' Fitz said. 'Perhaps the fire has smothered our trace.'

George's reply surprised him. 'I can see your face,' he said.

'What?' Fitz blinked in the darkness. And found that he could see George's outline against the blackness in front of him. 'Yes. There's some light getting in. From somewhere.'

The pa.s.sage ended in a stone wall, but light was seeping through the tiny cracks between the stones.

'There must be a way of opening this. Like in the Great Hall,' Fitz murmured as he felt round the walls. Sure enough his hand found a heavy iron ring set into the side wall. He grasped it and pulled. It was stiff and he could feel the rust flaking under his palm. But with a tortured grating sound the ring moved, and with it the wall in front of them swung slowly, heavily open.

It was moonlight they could see. The clouds were gone and the night was crystal clear. They were in a room about fifteen feet square with several doors off it.

There was a single, large window through which Fitz could see the main entrance to the castle, the crumbling gatehouse over it. And beyond that another peak the tip of the highest mountain was exactly aligned with the top of the gatehouse. He wondered vaguely if this was a deliberate design feature. But the roar of one of the dinosaur*lizards shocked him back to reality.

'There!' George was pointing down into the courtyard below.

Several of the creatures were milling about, searching through the rubble perhaps for food. Perhaps, Fitz thought, for the two of them.

'I think we're stuck here for now,' Fitz said, drawing back from the window, 'So what do we do? We've lost the packs, so we've got no food. No way of making a fire.'

'Let's get some sleep, while we can,' Fitz decided. 'In the morning, when we can see what's going on, we'll try to get past them and down the mountain again. With luck we can be back with Chedakin and away from here before tomorrow night.' But he did not feel nearly as confident as he hoped he sounded.

'Should we barricade ourselves in?' George asked, indicating the open doorways.