by Doctor Who
'It's more than that, Doctor,' said Rory. 'People with PTSD often exhibit the signs that we saw then.
It's called heightened sensory perception — they can smell or hear things associated with the trauma, usually things that most people can't normally smell or hear. The way he put his hands flat on the table, he was feeling vibrations. Tiny ones we'll never feel, but when he has a... a moment, everything is ramped up really high. The tiniest things can set him off.'
'My screwdriver?'
'Either the noise, or the green light, but when you activated it, it flicked a switch on in him, too.'
'But what in the sonic could make him remember the war?' Amy wondered. 'Is that what made him prematurely grey?'
'Diffuse alopecia areata is rare,' Rory said, 'and frankly a bit of a myth in the sense that shock doesn't really turn the hair grey. Not even in the First World War.'
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'I don't think it's the war,' said the Doctor. 'Not entirely. Although that might account for the nerves.
No, he said "They" were coming.'
'And that he could hear and smell them.'
'I thought he could smell fire,' said Amy. 'So if he doesn't mean burning, are you saying his senses have been changed enough to do that?'
Rory shook his head. 'We know so little about PTSD, it's tragic, even in our time, Amy. Different people react to different treatments because every case is, well, different. We had a few local soldiers come to the hospital after being in Afghanistan and Iraq, and some of them showed signs of PTSD, sometimes really powerfully, others just traces.'
Amy touched Rory's arm. 'You never talked about it. I had no idea you'd had people like that to deal with.'
'We didn't really talk about my work that much, did we Amy,' Rory said. Not unkindly, just stating a matter of fact. 'After the Atraxi and escaped Prisoner Zeros, I didn't really want to bother you with what I got up to every day at work. The hospital wasn't somewhere I thought you'd really want to keep visiting after what happened to you there.' He smiled at her. 'And it was quite nice to be able to go out in the evenings and weekends with you and not talk about work. I appreciated that.'
'I wonder who 'they' are, though,' said the Doctor, bringing them back to the subject in hand. 'If 011y's PTSD enables him to sense someone or something, 81
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we need to know what it is.'
'And he can sense them, Doctor. I can't explain how exactly, but it's very real and dangerous to people like Oliver. And fire is one of the strongest triggers out there - there are cases of people smelling a bonfire three miles away or if they were affected by gunfire, hearing thunder ten minutes before everyone else.' Rory headed to the door. 'They don't have a clue in 1936 what they are dealing with, or how fragile Oliver is. I ought to go and see him, check up on him.'
The Doctor shook his head. 'No, no, I can entertain 011y for a while. Amy, go and see your new special friend Tom - ah ah ah, shut up, Rory - find out a bit more about village life and how much it's changed over the last few years.'
'How do we know it has? 011y just said it was quiet, but he doesn't get out much.'
The Doctor smiled at her. 'Yes, but the first Mrs Porter is our clue here. I bet everything was fine until she died, vanished, fell into a deep hole, took a trip in a Gemini spaceship, whatever. Let's find out.'
He winked at Rory. 'And you, my walking medical encyclopaedia, need to head to the library and research everything you can about the history of this village. Because if the new Mrs Porter is going to dig something up in the schoolyard, I'd like a clue as to what it might be.'
'I trust you enjoyed your lunch,' said Nathaniel Porter, suddenly in the room with them.
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'Oh yes,' said the Doctor. 'It was the best cold meat salad I've ever had in 1936. Compliments to Mrs S and her kitchen. So simple, yet so brilliant.
Much like Rory here.'
Nathaniel Porter waved expansively. 'My home is your home, Doctor. All three of you must come and go as you see fit. I would hate you to ever think you are imposing, because you are not.' He clicked his fingers and the old man with the limp hobbled in. 'Old John here will be your personal aide during your stay.'
Old John looked anything but pleased with this arrangement but said nothing.
'Splendid.' The Doctor held his hand out to Old John. 'Hullo, dear, we've not been properly introduced. I'm the Doctor, that's Amy Pond, that's Rory Williams, and you've been here a very long time, haven't you? Splendid, I like a man with a history and a firm handshake.' He threw a look at Nathaniel Porter. 'Can tell a lot by a handshake.
We're here to help sort out the problem with the dig.
I gather the locals are up in arms. Are you? Up in arms, I mean. Because you look the kind of fellow who doesn't get up in arms about very much, which makes you my new best friend...'
The Doctor was still gabbling as he led Old John down the dark corridor towards the hallway, leaving Amy and Rory looking at one another.
'Library?' said Rory.
'Sexy farmhand,' said Amy. 'I get the better DOCTOR WHO
deal.'
They turned to ask Nathaniel Porter about their respective missions and how best to achieve them, but the dining room was now empty.
'Where did he go?' Amy wondered.
Old John led the Doctor back to the hallway and to the front door.
'We have put Mr Oliver out in the rear garden, Doctor,' he said quietly. 'He likes to grow a few flowers. Keeps him... calm.'
The Doctor regarded Old John carefully. 'You don't much like it here, do you, John? Is it Mr John, or is John your first name?'
'Just call me Old John, sir.'
'No thanks. Sounds rude. How long have you worked here, John?'
'For ever, sir.'
The Doctor regarded the old man carefully. 'I know what you mean.' He followed him out into the warm summer afternoon. 'How did Oliver Marks end up here? At the Manse?'
'Something bad happened to him, sir,' said Old John. 'Mrs Porter, the proper one, took him in.
Friend of friends I believe. Not my place to ask, sir, you see.' He pointed at the impressive flowerbeds that lay curiously overgrown or barren. 'I was the gardener, see. Then, after Mrs Porter disappeared all sudden, like, I had a small accident and ended up retiring from the garden. Mr Nathaniel was kind 84
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enough to keep me on to help with Mr Oliver.'
The Doctor nodded sagely. 'You are a man of contradictions, John.'
'How's that, sir?'
'You work for a man you clearly don't like, who has married a wife you clearly don't approve of, and you've given up a job you clearly loved but stayed here to look after a man you barely know.'
Old John looked at the Doctor as if challenging him. Just for a moment, but it was enough to make the Doctor smile. 'I'll thank you, sir, not to judge me,' Old John said.
'Oh, John, I'm not judging. Certainly not.
Observing maybe. You look after 011y because he's your last link to the first Mrs Porter. You stay here because you believe one day she'll be back to make sense of all this confusion.' He patted Old John's shoulder. 'I admire loyalty. And hope. And that little bit of stupidity necessary to make both of them achievable in this modern world.' He pointed to the corner of the Manse, where Oliver Marks was sat in his wicker wheelchair, leaning forward, pruning some roses. 'And that man needs your help, John.
Yours and mine, am I right?'
'Maybe. Especially after the rest of the villagers started leaving.'
'Fairly normal, even now. Picture-postcard English villages are dying out, people moving to towns and cities for work, post-Depression.'
'It's not that, sir. People just started going 85
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overnight, like they couldn't get away fast enough.
Some stayed of course, as you've seen, loyal to the old family.'
'The Porters?'
&nbs
p; 'Been in charge of Shalford Heights since the thirteenth century. So they say.'
'Goes some way to explaining the lack of cricket on the green, people in the pub and why no one's ever built a church.'
'Oh there was one. Burned to the ground about twenty years ago. A small one, more a chapel really.'
And no one rebuilt it? That's... unheard of.'
'Mr Porter always said he planned to, but after the first Mrs Porter's death he just gave up on it.
Maybe that is a reason why people moved away.'
'Maybe. Maybe not.' The Doctor suddenly grabbed Old John's wrist, pulling his rough jacket up a bit, exposing the old man's wrist. 'Now I may not know much about the British social mores of the 1930s, but I'm willing to bet that a man wearing a leather bracelet-strap-bangle thing like that, especially with those little tassely bits and the beads, well I bet that's not very manly and popular down the Nag's Head is it?'
Old John pulled his wrist away, covering the strap. 'If it's all the same to you now, sir, I need to go and prepare Mr Oliver's set of rooms. He likes a nap just after lunch.'
'He hasn't had any lunch, John. He had one of his 86
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moments, as well you know. How did you know, by the way?'
'Mr Nathaniel told me.'
'And I wonder how he knew.' The Doctor smiled and gave Old John a little bow. 'Fine. Thank you, John. You have been most helpful.' And he stared at the old man until he shuffled off. Then, just as he was about to disappear from view, back towards the main door of the Manse, the Doctor called after him.
'Oh, John?'
'Sir?'
'I am on your side, you know,' the Doctor said quietly, but loud enough for Old John to hear.
'Always. Remember that.'
Old John touched his wrist, the one with the leather band on it. 'I hope so,' he said enigmatically and wandered away.
The Doctor smiled to himself. 'Top man, that,' he muttered, then turned to Oliver Marks.
'Nice flowers, 011y,' he said so loudly people in the village could probably hear. 'Quite the horticulturalist, aren't you.'
Oliver Marks put the flowers down and reached forward, grabbing the Doctor's arms. He pulled him right down, so the Doctor's face was level with his own. Unnaturally close. 'You can feel it too, can't you?'
The Doctor frowned but didn't pull away. 'Feel what, Oliver?'
'Them. They are coming. Touch the ground. Feel 87
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their approach. They are always coming, but now they are so close.' He gasped, almost as if it pained him just to speak like this. 'They killed everyone.'
'The Germans?'
'No!' Oliver yelled that. Then, back to normal, he said, 'I thought you'd understand. They're not human. They came. Killed everyone. Burned them to nothing. Can't you smell them?'
'Who, Oliver? Tell me who.'
'I don't know their names. They burned the people, the houses, the dogs and cats, the trees, the grass. They burned Daisy.'
The Doctor picked up the roses. 'Daisies. Is that why you like the flowers, Oliver? Because they destroyed the flowers?'
'Daisy is my fiancée. Was my fiancee!'
The Doctor closed his eyes in annoyance. At himself. How stupid. Of course Daisy was a person, not a flower.
'I shut my eyes, I see her screaming. I go to sleep, I see them in my dreams. Destroying everything in Little Cadthorpe. And now they're coming back.
For me. To finish me off because I saw them.' Oliver suddenly started crying.
The Doctor stood up, patting Oliver awkwardly on the shoulder. 'BRB, 011y.'
Oliver looked up through red-ringed eyes, uncomprehendingly.
'Sorry — be right back,' the Doctor translated and headed back inside the Manse. 'Phone, phone, 88
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phone - saw a marvellous old Ericsson in the hallway earlier,' he muttered to himself.
Yes, there it was: black Bakelite, on a table by the doorway to the kitchen.
'Top of the range for 1936, Nathaniel Porter, good on you.'
He got out his sonic screwdriver and traced the wire to a small black box on the wall. He zapped the box and then the actual cord all the way back to the phone itself. 'Hope this works, Doctor. Only get one chance with these old phones.' He returned the sonic screwdriver to his jacket pocket (but not before twirling it like a majorette's baton a couple of times) and then lifted the receiver off the cradle.
Using the old circular fascia, he dialled a number. It rang. 'Oh, Doctor, you are good,' he said to himself.
After a few seconds it was answered. 'Rory, it's me,' he started. 'Yes, yes I know. Yes, OK so you shouldn't get a signal in 1936. No, no, you're right it is impossible. However, I'm talking and you're listening. Well except you're not, because you're talking. As usual. Will. You. Just. Listen?' A beat.
'Oh, oh right, yes, you are listening. OK, you at the Library yet? Well, why not?' Another beat. 'Oh Rory, she's getting information from him, that's all.
You so have to get over this jealous streak, it's very unattractive. Well, to Amy, actually, but I suppose I also find it unattractive, yes. En. Ee. Way - can you look up anything about a village called Little Cadthorpe. No, I don't, but it sounds English. It's 89
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where I think Oliver Marks was traumatised. Yes, you were right, it wasn't the war... No, I am not being patronising. OK I am being patronising but sometimes you... never mind. What?' The Doctor sighed. 'OK. Please. Thank you. No, actually, I could take you to a couple of planets where it costs a great deal actually. No, clearly I'm not going to take you there, I'd be bankrupt on your behalf in minutes.'
He hung up and went back outside to Oliver Marks and his roses.
Chapter
6
In the school library which, he suspected, doubled as a library for the whole village if not further afield, Rory was flicking through an oversized book of newspapers when there was a gentle cough behind him. It wasn't the cough of someone who was ill, or even clearing their throat. No, this was that worldwide-accepted cough of someone who wanted to attract your attention but was too embarrassed to ask.
Rory smiled to himself and imagined what the Doctor would do. No doubt he'd oh so politely charm the newcomer, offer them a seat beside him and smile a lot, flatter them by doing that thing he did so well - staring them straight in the eyes, making them believe that, at that precise moment in space 91
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and time, they were the only person in the world who mattered. That the rest of the universe could go to hell, because the only person whose thoughts/
opinions/feelings that mattered was them.
Rory knew this because he'd been the subject of it many times. Well, he thought, actually 'victim'
was probably a better word. Well, he said victim, but that sounded too cruel, too... malicious, and the Doctor was many things but malicious, cruel and unpleasant wasn't one of them. Three of them.
Whatever.
'How can I help you?' he said, turning on his Doctor-charm-offensive mode as best he could.
Unfortunately, he forgot he was holding the big book of newspapers and whacked it into the cougher's midriff. Which was quite a large target as it turned out, and the lady concerned seemed a bit taken aback to have been assaulted in such a manner by a man she'd never met.
Rory couldn't blame her for this, especially as the earthenware mug she'd been carrying hit the ground with enough force to shatter into fragments. 'Oh my God,' he gasped. 'Oh my God, I'm so sorry.'
The rather... rotund lady held her tummy with one hand and started waving the other, wheezing something that was probably meant to be 'It's all right young man, accidents happen,' but instead came out as a series of rasping grunts.
'Your poor mug,' was Rory's next attempt at a platitude, but the foreboding look he got found him 92
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flushing bright red.
The lady finally com
posed herself and dropped, rather more elegantly than Rory would have suspected possible, to one knee to begin picking up the remnants of the smashed mug. When she had finished, she balled the bits in her fist and held it out to Rory. 'Bin,' she said. 'Under your table.'
'Bin? Oh right, bin, yes, absolutely.' He reached down, found a straw wastepaper bin and held it up.
The woman deposited the results of his clumsiness in the bin. 'You must be with the dig,'
she said as she hauled herself up. 'Nancy Thirman,'
she added, sticking out a damp, tea-stained hand.
Fearing further upset, Rory quickly shook it. The woman had a powerful shake, like a man's. Or a woman used to having to be strong and determined in a man's world.
'Good to have you in the village,' she added.
'Don't give a hoot what others might say.'
'Others?' Rory thought this was interesting.
'Yes, ruddy naysayers from the WI. Ignore the blighters, that's what I say. Now, other than bring you fresh tea, as I seem to be wearing your last one, what can I get you?'
Rory frowned.
'I'm the librarian, schoolteacher, former munitions worker and all-round good egg, even if I say so myself. And I do because, as sure as heck, no one else will. Not these days.' She tapped DOCTOR WHO
the big newspaper book Rory had just coshed her with. 'Good tome, if you want the official, sanitised version of stuff. Bit rubbish, of course, if you want the truth about the village.'
'The truth?'
'That's why you're here, isn't it? Don't want to read all that stuff and nonsense. You need the real history.' Nancy tapped her head. 'All in here. The truth. About the Porters.'
Rory gaped. He knew he wanted to know about the Porters, but how did she? Why would she even suspect? It crossed Rory's mind that maybe it was his fault - had he said something, done something, looked at something in the wrong way that had revealed his 'mission'? No, that was daft. He might not have been at the game for long but he'd gleaned enough from the Doctor and Amy not to make mistakes like that. Again.