Doctor Who: The Clockwise Man

by Richards, Justin

  'Penny,' Rose corrected her.

  The Doctor grinned. 'Actually she's Rose. The phrase is, "like a bad penny".' His grin faded. 'Have trouble with the local idioms, do you?'

  'I know an idiom when I see one,' Melissa said coolly. 'Tell me, are you here to put a smile on my face? Do come in, let me offer you a cup of tea.'

  The Doctor sniffed. 'So, too late for lunch then?'

  Across the street a lone figure stood in the shadow of a tree. It watched the door open, saw Melissa Heart standing there. It looked on with interest as she stepped aside to allow the Doctor and Rose to enter the house.

  A cab rattled past, obscuring the view of the house for several moments. When it had passed, the door was closed and the Doctor and Rose had gone. The figure stood watching, thinking. . .

  The house was deep, running back to the river. Rose could see the boats on the Thames from the window of the large room that Melissa took them to. But it was not the view that caught her attention.

  Melissa Heart led them to a group of armchairs arranged around a low table. On the table was a teapot, sugar bowl and milk jug and three cups.

  'I hope you've not made the tea too many times while you waited,' the Doctor said. 'We had other appointments.'

  She poured the tea without comment.

  'Deceptively spacious,' the Doctor went on, hands in pockets as he looked round. 'Doesn't look so big from outside. Which reminds me,' he went on, slumping down into one of the chairs, 'We've mislaid some property. You don't know where it is, I suppose?'

  The mask stared at him blankly.

  'Thought not.' He raised the teacup, as if in a toast, then pointedly put it back on the saucer without drinking.

  The room was large, but dominated by a long table that ran down one side of it. At the far end of the room, windows gave out on to a short terrace beside the river. On the left wall was a large fireplace, and in alcoves either side of it two matching suits of armour stood on low plinths. Their faces were blank polished metal visors. Each rested its clenched metal gauntlets on the pommel of a long sword that jabbed into the plinth between its feet.

  The wall opposite the fireplace was adorned with several oil paintings and a large shield with two more swords crossed behind it. The wallpaper had faded and the paintwork was peeling. Dust lay everywhere, as if Melissa Heart had taken up temporary residence in an empty, abandoned house and made only the barest attempt to settle in.

  Rose had not sat down. She was standing beside the long, polished wooden table that ran the length of the room. Arranged along it was a line of masks. There must be twenty or more, she thought. She recognised the ornate butterfly mask that Melissa had worn when they first met at Sir George's.

  There were others that were just as stylised. Some had crude expressions painted on them with bold, iconic strokes. A broad uplifting smile contrasted with its neighbour – a mouth drooping with sadness and tears dripping from the eyes. Further along, a face with straight mouth, wrinkled forehead and crow's feet round the dark-rimmed eyes stared angrily at the ceiling. One white face was completely blank. . .

  'Why do you wear masks all the time?' Rose asked. After all, why not be direct?

  Melissa picked up the happy face. She turned away from them briefly, and when she turned back she was smiling. She put the Pierrot mask in the space where the smile had been.

  'Some say it is because I am so beautiful none can look at me. Others say it is because I am so ugly.'

  'Beauty's in the eye of the beholder,' the Doctor said. 'So it's possible both those theories are true.' He leaped to his feet and surveyed the masks arranged on the table. 'A face for every occasion.'

  'You think I am beautiful?' Melissa asked. She sounded amused.

  'Beauty's only mask deep. Maybe you just don't like people to see your face.'

  'Why?' Rose asked. 'Zits?'

  'Could be,' the Doctor agreed. 'Or she's afraid her face will give away what she's really thinking. How much better to wear a mask to show others what she'd like them to see.'

  'Isn't that what everyone does?' Melissa asked. 'Perhaps I am simply more honest about it.' She turned, the mask pointing straight at the Doctor. 'How honest are you, Doctor? Are you really what you seem to be?'

  The Doctor's face twitched into a half-smile. 'And what do I seem to be?'

  A man out of his time and place, judging by what you keep in your pockets. By the way your jacket is made and the company you keep.'

  'Oi, don't be rude,' Rose said.

  Melissa did not turn, but her voice was steel-edged. 'Please don't make me wear my angry face. Your manner, your demeanour, your vocabulary, your attitude. They all mark you out as an exception here.'

  And you're interested in exceptions?'

  'Only one. Are you the one I'm searching for, Doctor? I rather think you are.'

  'I rather think I don't know what you're talking about.'

  Now Melissa did turn to Rose. 'You shield him, protect him despite everything, don't you? Adhering to the letter of the law. Despite what he has done.'

  'What has he done?'

  'Yes,' the Doctor said brightly, 'do tell.'

  'Don't be crass!' In a single gesture Melissa scooped up the angry mask from the table and held it in front of her smiling face. The smile slid out from behind and the angry face was pushed into place in its stead. 'I warned you not to anger me. You know what I am talking about. Why I am here.'

  'Humour us,' the Doctor said. 'Why are you here?'

  Her voice was disconcertingly level and controlled behind the angry mask. 'Why, to kill you of course.'

  She stepped back and snapped her fingers – a gunshot of sound in the large room. As the noise faded, Rose became aware of another sound – a background ticking. Instinctively, she glanced at the empty mantel above the large fireplace across the room.

  So she was looking almost straight at one of the suits of armour when it shuddered and moved. It lifted the heavy sword in its metal hands and stepped stiffly down from the low plinth. The featureless mask of its helmet swung slowly, jerkily at first, as it scanned the room. It paused, seeming to see Melissa Heart. Then it fixed on the Doctor as he stepped across and took Rose's hand. He was tense, ready to run.

  The suit of armour stared blankly at the Doctor and Rose. The sword raised slowly, poised to strike the killing blow as it lumbered towards them, cutting off their escape. Its internal mechanisms and gears were clicking through their inexorable motions like the ticking of a clock.

  EIGHT

  'Clockwork, I assume,' the Doctor said. 'How clever.' He sounded calm, but his eyes were moving rapidly as he hunted for a way of escape.

  'More clever than you have been,' the Painted Lady told him. She had stepped away from the Doctor and Rose to allow the clockwork automaton to approach them. Its sword was still poised, ready to strike.

  'Oh?'

  'I know how important it is to use one's initiative and avoid traceable, anachronistic technology.'

  'Ah.'

  'That was how I found you, of course.'

  'Of course. The TARDIS, and then the sonic screwdriver,' he explained to Rose.

  'I almost dismissed the readings at first, they were so far off the scale. And just when I was thinking you were not on this little planet at all. That all my efforts would be for nothing.'

  'Been looking for a while then,' the Doctor said. He was pulling Rose with him round the table, away from the approaching suit of armour, keeping the table between them. Melissa's mask moved slightly as she watched.

  'Faceless killers on the streets,' Rose said. 'Wonder who that could be then.'

  The metal figure lunged forwards suddenly, slashing downwards with the sword. The Doctor and Rose both jumped back. The sword whistled past the Doctor and sliced into the table. It cut through the Pierrot mask, neatly dividing black from white. The Doctor reached across and grabbed at the blade, trying to pull it away from the knight.

  His hand came away cut and bloodied. 'Maybe n
ot,' he said. 'That's sharp.'

  'More than she is,' Rose retorted. 'Who's she really looking for?'

  The Doctor shrugged. 'Someone you expected to meet at Sir George's, was it? You already had your suspicions. Some alien cuckoo in the nest of 1920s London? You can't have been sure, because you still came to see me.'

  Melissa Heart did not reply. Her face stared at them as blankly as the clockwork knight's.

  Rose was thinking about what the Doctor had said. The implications. 'She's alien?'

  'Behind the mask.' He glanced towards the door, checking the way was clear. 'Well, must dash. Sorry.'

  But as they turned to run, the second of the two knights beside the fireplace jerked into mechanical life and stepped swiftly across to block the way.

  'So much for initiative,' Rose said.

  'Diplomacy?' the Doctor wondered. 'Don't suppose you'd care to discuss the mistake you're making?'

  Melissa stepped up beside the table, tapping an elegant finger next to the happy mask. 'Don't make me laugh.'

  The Doctor sighed. 'Thought not. Anachronistic technology it is then.' He pulled the sonic screwdriver out of his pocket, aimed it squarely at the clockwork knight now approaching them from the doorway, and. . .

  Nothing happened.

  Melissa was wearing the smiling happy mask now. 'I did of course remove the power source before I returned that device to you.'

  They were trapped between the two advancing knights. Swords were raised, poised, ready to strike down at them.

  'Don't s'pose you have a mask showing smug self-satisfaction, do you?' the Doctor wondered.

  'It would suit her,' Rose agreed. She swallowed, her throat dry. Then she saw where the Doctor was looking – over Melissa's shoulder and out towards the Thames. Saw the figure standing at the window, desperately pushing at it from the outside.

  'Not for her,' the Doctor was saying. 'If you had smug self-satisfaction, you see. . .' He paused, as Freddie finally managed to heave the window open. 'I'd like to borrow it! Come on, Rose.'

  The swords crashed down, splitting the air where the Doctor and Rose had been a second before. Together, they leaped up on to the table, and jumped off across the room past Melissa Heart. Ran towards the open window. Behind them the knights' ticking did not miss a beat as they both turned and started round the table, following the Doctor and Rose.

  'Thanks, Freddie,' Rose gasped as she hurled herself after the Doctor through the window.

  'Don't hang about,' the Doctor called back.

  Rose grabbed Freddie's hand, and they ran stumbling after the Doctor.

  There was an alleyway leading round to the front of the houses, and they slowed to a walk once they were back on the road. Even so, Freddie struggled to keep up. He seemed both confused and euphoric.

  'What were those things? People in armour? Why were they attacking you? I didn't get hurt. Not at all' He inspected his hands closely as they walked, making Rose smile. 'I was afraid I'd cut myself opening the window. There were splinters and everything.'

  'Can be nasty, splinters,' the Doctor agreed.

  'Better not tell your mum,' Rose added. 'She'd go spare.'

  Freddie nodded. 'She'd be upset and worried.'

  'She'll be worried if you don't hurry home,' the Doctor pointed out. 'I'd come with you, but.

  'We're being followed?' Rose said, looking round.

  'Probably. There again, she has the TARDIS and she knows that's important. I'll be back, to coin a phrase.'

  'And those knights are really clockwork men?'

  Freddie's eyes widened. 'Clockwork?'

  'Yeah. We're not winding you up,' Rose said.

  The Doctor grinned at her, then turned quickly away. 'Of a kind, Freddie. Self-winding, I imagine. The movement is self-perpetuating, at least to a point. They never stop. They never give up.'

  'And they're after us. Great.'

  'Nice to be wanted. Wish I knew why.'

  'The Painted Lady wants to kill you?' Freddie said.

  'Oh yes,' the Doctor realised. 'That's why.' He frowned. 'Nope.'

  'Nope?' Rose checked.

  'Nope,' he assured her. 'That doesn't help. She's looking for someone she wants to kill. Isn't even sure they're. . .' He paused, glancing at Freddie. 'In London. Then she finds us and she's convinced, wrongly, that it's me she wants.'

  'But she was off to Freddie's stepdad's anyway,' Rose said.

  'She's very thorough,' the Doctor decided. 'So either the target isn't here, or else they're very thorough too. Very clever. Very good at it.'

  'At what?'

  'At hiding.'

  'Which means, they know she's looking,' Rose realised.

  'They know someone is.'

  'We're going back to the club,' the Doctor said to Freddie. 'I really do think you should get home. OK?'

  Freddie nodded solemnly. 'All right, Doctor. But you will tell me what happens? If I can help?'

  The Doctor reached out suddenly and shook his hand. 'You've already helped. You've saved our lives.' He nodded in appreciation. 'You're a hero.'

  Freddie grinned. The grin froze, then faded as Rose leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. 'Thanks,' she said.

  He was rubbing the cheek as he walked away, glancing round embarrassed.

  'I only kissed him,' Rose said.

  'He's a boy,' the Doctor told her.

  'I thought that's what they were for,' she grumbled, following him down the street.

  'Right, the plan,' the Doctor announced as they reached the Imperial Club.

  'Ready,' Rose affirmed.

  'Melissa will send her clockwork cronies after us as soon as it's dark.'

  'Sure?'

  He nodded. 'She's impatient now she thinks she's found me. And she's thrown caution to the wind. So we need to warn the other guests and organise some defences.'

  'Or run away?'

  'Putting off the inevitable. Here we know the territory, and we have friends. Anyway, she'll trash the place looking for us whether we're here or not.'

  'So where do we start?'

  The Doctor tapped his chin as he thought. 'You've seen Mr Pooter, so you go and convince him of the danger. I'll find Wyse and the others.'

  'I haven't seen Mr Pooter,' Rose protested. 'Well, I mean I have seen him. But I haven't seen him.' She paused, a thought coalescing in her mind. 'Hang on. Reclusive character, hiding away, no one ever sees him. . . You don't think. . .?'

  'No. He'd hardly hide away from assassins by adopting a laughably silly name then opening a club in central London and taking in guests.'

  'No?'

  'No. That's the daft sort of double-bluff I'd do to draw out the enemy. Dangerous and ill-advised. Go on. Then meet me in the Bastille Room sharpish.'

  'Yes, sir!' Rose snapped an ironic salute and started up the stairs.

  The Doctor turned to find Crowther watching him. 'You'd better come and listen to this too,' the Doctor told him. 'How many guests are staying here at the moment?'

  'Besides yourselves, Doctor, and Wyse. . .' Crowther counted on his fingers as he followed the Doctor along the panelled corridor. 'There's old Sir Henry, but he's confined to bed. Oliver Maffeking has gone to stay with friends tonight. Now that the Hansons have moved on, that just leaves Ranskill, Coleridge, Wensleydale. Several others. And Repple and Aske, of course.'

  'And the staff.'

  'Indeed, sir.'

  Wyse was sitting in his usual chair. He looked up as the Doctor entered, and smiled and nodded in greeting.

  'Find Aske and Repple and the other guests and see if they can join us,' the Doctor said to Crowther. And any of the staff who are about.'

  'Is it important, Doctor?'

  'Vital. Go on.'

  The Doctor walked slowly over to join Wyse. 'I've a story to tell you,' he said. A true story, though you might find it hard to believe.'

  'How intriguing.' The man's eyes glinted with amusement and he gestured for the Doctor to sit down. 'I've heard some pretty rum stor
ies in me time, I can tell you. So, what's this one all about then, eh?'

  'It's about a Painted Lady. It's about clockwork killers. A manhunt. Mistaken identity. Assassination. The usual ingredients.'

  'Might be usual for you, Doctor,' Wyse said. His eyes met the Doctor's deep gaze. 'Yes, might very well be. You know,' he said, standing up, 'I was thinking it was a tad early for a brandy just now. But actually I think I will. Join me?'

  'If it makes you feel better.'

  Several decanters were arranged on a low table by the fireplace. Wyse poured two brandies, then returned to his chair, handing the Doctor one of the glasses. 'Now then,' he said. 'Shall we begin?'

  The stairs ended on a small landing outside a heavy wooden door. Rose had been worried she might not be able to find Mr Pooter's rooms. But there was just the one door, no choice. No problem. Rose took a deep breath, swallowed and knocked loudly on the door.

  There was no answer. She knocked again. Still nothing, so she pressed her ear to the door. There were sounds coming from inside, she was sure. Movement, a hum like a fridge. Ticking of a clock.

  Rose stepped back from the door, suddenly unnerved. What if it wasn't a clock? What if. . . ?

  Then the door opened. Or rather, a part of the door opened. It was heavy, dark wood, made of several rectangular panels separated by beading. One of the panels at the bottom of the door swung open. Light spilled out on to the bare boards of the landing. Harsh, white light.

  She stepped back, trying to see through the open panel. But she could make out nothing but the light. Then slowly a shape formed within it. Something was coming out. Something dark, silhouetted against the artificial light.

  With a laugh of relief, Rose realised it was the cat. It stepped out on to the landing, claws clicking rhythmically on the wooden floor. She reached out to stroke it, but her hand froze in mid-air.

  The white triangle of fur under the cat's head was stark against the black body as the creature looked up at Rose. Its lozenge-shaped emerald eyes fixed on her. And suddenly they were no longer green, but red. Deep, blood red as if lit from within.

  The animal's mouth opened wide in a hiss of anger. Surprised, Rose straightened up and took a step backwards. Her foot slipped over the top step and she lurched sideways with a cry – arm out to grab the banister rail and save herself from falling. At the same moment as she almost fell, the eyes blazed. Two beams of electric red shot out from the cat's eyes, scorching their way across the wall behind where Rose had been.