Dr. Who - BBC New Series 28

by Beautiful Chaos # Gary Russell

  There was a flash of lights from outside, and they heard a couple of cars pull up in the staff car park.

  ‘That was quick,’ Melville muttered, frowning slightly.

  ‘Downing Street or your Doctor friend?’ she asked, trying not to sound nervous. ‘Or maybe someone else from round here, concerned by the thing in the sky?’

  But Melville wasn’t listening, really. He was watching to see who was in the cars.

  The headlights were left full on, beaming in through the kitchenette window, so they couldn’t see who got out of the car, just heard the sounds of doors opening and slamming.

  Miss Oladini shivered. This felt… wrong.

  Melville presumably agreed, because he suddenly dashed for the outside door, as if to bolt it. He was too late. Someone shoved the door open.

  Melville stood in front of Miss Oladini, chivalrously protecting her from whoever the newcomers were.

  There were… well, a lot of them, different ages, not looking especially… government-ish. Or terribly threatening.

  But there was something about them, Miss Oladini thought, something about the way they looked around the

  kitchenette, their heads moving unnaturally as if they were seeing the inside of a kitchen for the first time.

  An old, fat man was at the front, a middle-aged man behind him. Behind them were an old woman and a trio of student-types, two men and a woman.

  ‘Where are the others?’ the first old man asked in an American accent.

  Professor Melville cleared his throat. ‘This is private property. This is the Copernicus Array. You can’t just turn up at gone midnight and—’

  The young student woman pushed past the others, looking at Melville as if she couldn’t quite understand why he was standing there. ‘You… work here?’ she said.

  English, that one.

  He nodded. ‘I am in charge of the radio telescope, and this evening I am in charge of the whole project. I should warn you that you have tripped an alarm and the police will be here in minutes.’

  Another student spoke. His voice sounded European, Spanish or maybe Italian. ‘I cannot detect any such alarm system. The human is lying.’

  Human? What a strange expression.

  But Professor Melville seemed unfazed by the choice of words, indeed, he almost relished them. ‘What planet do you represent? Are you connected with that Chaos constellation?’

  The large American spoke again. ‘You may be of use to us.’

  Without missing a beat, Melville pointed to Miss Oladini. ‘And my assistant. If you need my help, you’ll

  need hers, too. Everything at Copernicus requires two experienced operators.’

  Was he mad, Miss Oladini wondered.

  ‘She’s a highly qualified physicist and is an expert in the field of the cosmic sciences.’

  Definitely mad.

  ‘Something is wrong here,’ said the older woman, also an American, walking forward. Without warning, she reached out and touched Professor Melville’s shoulder. At first Miss Oladini assumed they’d both been electrocuted as a fierce purplish spark shot between them, and Melville staggered slightly, gasping in pain.

  ‘Professor?’ Miss Oladini found her voice, but immediately regretted it.

  Melville turned to look at her and, for a second, she could still see vestiges of that purple light in his eyes. ‘All right, I lied. She’s my temporary assistant,’ Melville said breathlessly. ‘She has no understanding of the Copernicus Array and is harmless.’

  ‘We can absorb her.’

  ‘Let her go, please…’

  Melville collapsed, and the three students stepped over him as they headed towards her.

  Miss Oladini did the one thing no amount of chats with Mrs Lovelace in Brentwood, or Health and Safety forms or 100 words per minute could have prepared her for. She spun round and ran for her life, clattering out of the kitchenette and back into the heart of the corridors and offices of the Copernicus Array. Somehow she knew she was running for her life.

  The cab was driving along past the Earls Court Exhibition Centre when the Doctor tapped on the glass and asked the driver, ‘Can you pull over for just one minute, please.’

  ‘Well?’ Donna asked the Doctor, as the cab slowed down.

  ‘Ummm, well… Actually you need to head home, because I’m going to ask this nice man to drive me somewhere else.’

  ‘Chiswick High Road?’

  The Doctor frowned, then remembered where the TARDIS was parked. ‘No. No actually, bit further than that.’

  Donna realised. ‘You’re going to see matey boy on the phone, at that telescope place. Copper Knickers or whatever it was called.’

  ‘Where to then, mate?’ the exasperated taxi driver asked.

  ‘Essex. Just off the A127.’

  The driver snorted. ‘At this time of night? I live in Bounds Green. I told you I was off home.’

  ‘Then it won’t take you as long to get home from there, will it “mate”,’ Donna snapped. ‘How much will it cost?

  Cos I guarantee the Doctor’s not got much cash on him.

  And as I already subbed Granddad tonight, I might as well do him too.’

  ‘One hundred.’

  ‘OK,’ the Doctor said.

  ‘OK?’ squawked Donna. ‘How is a hundred quid “OK”?’

  The Doctor ignored her and leaned towards the driver.

  ‘But I need to get there a bit quick.’

  ‘Hundred and twenty, then.’

  ‘Whatever,’ the Doctor sighed. ‘Donna, I’ll see you tomorrow. You can get another cab home from here, yes?

  Oh, and Donna?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You got that hundred and twenty pounds on you?’

  Donna looked like she was going to clobber him, then spoke to the driver. ‘Essex,’ she snapped. ‘Via a cashpoint, please.’

  The Doctor raised an eyebrow. ‘Donna?’

  ‘Sunshine,’ Donna grinned. ‘If I’m giving you a hundred plus to go to a snazzy radio telescope, I’m coming along for the ride.’

  The Doctor beamed. ‘Hoped you’d say that.’

  And the taxi drove up towards Kensington as the Doctor and Donna made plans.

  Wilf and Netty were saying their farewells, apologising for bringing the night to a premature end.

  ‘We’ll do this again soon,’ Ariadne Holt told them.

  ‘And have the actual presentation.’

  ‘I’m so sorry to have to dash off,’ Wilf lied, ‘but something has come up. I need to see Miss Goodhart home. Please forgive me.’

  ‘Nothing to forgive,’ Crossland said, slapping his back.

  ‘Any excuse for a dinner party, eh? Next week’s meeting?’

  On his face, Wilf had a fixed smile, but his eyes told a different story. ‘I’d really enjoy that,’ he said.

  Netty leaned in and whispered to him. ‘They’ll be all right. The Doctor knows what he’s doing.’

  Wilf smiled at her, trying to look more reassured than he actually felt.

  He wondered if he should have gone with them.

  And he wondered more what Sylvia was going to say when he turned up just after midnight without them.

  The Copernicus Array was in darkness when the cab pulled up in the public car park. Donna paid the grumpy driver, who headed Londonwards as quickly as possible.

  ‘Can I just ask how we get home from here?’ she hissed to the Doctor as they snuck about in the darkness. ‘It’s a long way back.’

  ‘Walk?’

  Donna poked his shoulder, and as he looked at her, she motioned downwards, implying he should look at her clothing.

  ‘You look lovely,’ he smiled, putting his brainy specs on.

  ‘Well thank you, Casanova, but that wasn’t my point. I am dolled up to the eyeballs in a party frock that isn’t designed to be worn on a forty-mile trek across England.’

  She sighed. ‘I had to borrow this, you know. Veena’s not going to forgive me if it gets damaged.
And if she doesn’t forgive me, God knows what she’ll do to you when I tell her who it was that made me walk all that way in it.’

  ‘Don’t tell her, then.’

  Donna gave up and tried a new tack. ‘OK, so why are we here and why are the lights off? Surely, if it’s an observatory and it’s night time, this place should be at the

  height of its working day?’

  ‘Good point, well observed. And that’s why we’re crawling around in the car park and bushes and not marching up to the front door.’

  ‘But I thought your mate worked here.’

  ‘He does.’

  ‘So why aren’t we marching up to the front door and saying, “Hello, mate of the Doctor’s, you called, we came”?’

  The Doctor was staring at a car parked across the lawn in the staff car park. ‘What’s wrong with that car?’

  Donna peered through the gloom. ‘They don’t know how to park straight?’

  ‘And?’

  ‘They’ll ruin the grass?’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And… the lights are dying?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘So?’

  The Doctor grinned. ‘Think about it. How old does that car look?’

  ‘New. So it should’ve beeped to tell them they’d left their lights on. So they ignored it. And if it’s that new, the thingy wotsit that makes the lights work shouldn’t lose power so soon. Dad left the lights on overnight a couple of years ago and they were still on the next morning and the car was fine. And his car was ancient.’

  The Doctor walked towards the car, sonic screwdriver in hand, and scanned the vehicle. ‘Huge energy drain, locally,’ he muttered.

  Donna tapped his arm. ‘Hey, you seen that?’

  The Doctor followed her view. Up in the sky was a grinning face made of stars. ‘City glow must’ve hidden that on the drive out here,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Fireworks?’

  ‘Let’s hope most people think so,’ he replied.

  ‘Not fireworks, then.’

  ‘Not fireworks,’ he confirmed. ‘A Chaos Body at work.’

  ‘What’s a Chaos Body when it’s at home?’

  The Doctor shrugged. ‘No idea. Your granddad introduced me to the concept last night. But a new star that can draw other stars across the sky into an alignment like that? Pretty chaotic I’d say.’

  ‘Me too.’ Donna wandered up to the front door of the Copernicus Array building. ‘Well, we’re not gonna learn much out here, are we?’ She found a number of bells and rang the one that said EMERGENCY ONLY.

  Nothing happened.

  ‘Local energy drain, I’d guess.’ Donna smiled at him.

  The Doctor sighed and caught up with her, zapping the door with the sonic and pushing it open.

  Total darkness.

  ‘So, who’s this Professor matey of yours, then?’

  The Doctor was using the blue glow of the sonic as a torch, trying to identify office nameplates. ‘Met him years ago. One of a number of people on this planet who I can turn to from time to time if I need specialist help. And they can call me if they need me, vice versa.’ He pointed upwards. ‘Professor Melville’s office is one floor up, the

  array’s control room is out the back, across the gardens and turn left.’

  ‘Dull office or exciting telescope?’

  The Doctor grinned, looking slightly spooky in the blue light of his sonic. ‘Are you trying to influence my choices, Donna Noble?’

  ‘Course telescope not, Doctor. I wouldn’t telescope dream of trying to telescope tell you what to do or where to go.’

  The Doctor gave her a look at the last comment, and she laughed. ‘Well, all right,’ she said, ‘but not in that sense.’

  ‘For some reason, I think we should investigate the telescope.’

  ‘It’s like Derren Brown’s in this very room,’ Donna laughed.

  They followed the corridor from the front door till they reached a set of French windows leading out to a patio.

  The Doctor sonicked them open, and they went back out into the cool night air.

  ‘We’re being watched,’ Donna said after they’d been walking for a couple of minutes.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘My hair is curling,’ she replied. ‘That and the fact that I can see them ahead of us.’

  The Doctor peered further into the gloom.

  There was a group of men and women standing by the entrance to the Array itself.

  Donna looked up at the cold metal structure of steps and walkways leading to a cabin that was dominated by

  the bowl-shaped radar dish that made up the Array.

  ‘I’m impressed,’ she said.

  ‘By them?’

  ‘No, by the Array. Never seen a radio telescope before, except on the telly. Nice.’ She suddenly called out to the group. ‘Nice dish you’ve got, thanks for letting us come and view it. Is there a gift shop? Love to buy my granddad a mug with a picture on it. Or a fridge magnet.’

  ‘Or,’ the Doctor joined in, ‘a tea towel. Do you do tea towels? Everyone does tea towels these days. Never been sure why you’d buy a tea towel of somewhere, but there you go.’

  No response from the group.

  ‘I’m actually looking for a Professor Melville,’ the Doctor continued. ‘Is he here? Is he all right?’

  A small man with a scar on his cheek stepped forward.

  ‘Is that him?’ Donna whispered.

  The Doctor shook his head. ‘Nope. Shame.’

  ‘Excellent,’ the man intoned, a slight accent marring his otherwise precise English. ‘You are the Doctor.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘We can sense that you are not… entirely human.’

  ‘“Entirely”?’ The Doctor seemed affronted. ‘I’m not remotely human, thank you. Dreadful species. Always fighting and grumbling.’

  ‘Oi!’ said Donna.

  ‘See what I mean? Barely raised themselves above the use of guttural noises and, blimey, that stuff they call pop music. I mean, I know I’m getting on a bit, but it comes to something when you really can’t tell the boys from the

  girls or understand the lyrics, doesn’t it? Then of course there’s the food. Have you ever had one of their hamburgers?’

  The older man raised his hand to stop the Doctor’s gabbling, so he did, but smiled. ‘I could go on all night, but I’m guessing that might annoy you, so what do you say we just chat instead about why you’ve taken over these poor people’s minds?’

  ‘It’s lineage,’ the little man replied.

  The Doctor threw a look to Donna, and she could see that wasn’t an answer he’d been expecting. ‘As in genealogy?’ he called back.

  ‘Four of the humans here can trace their families back to one specific place in time. That gives me power over them.’

  ‘And the others?’

  ‘Drones. Slaves. Willing servants.’

  ‘Willing? Really? That’s nice. Not really true, though, is it? But if you want to believe it, fair enough.’ The Doctor started walking towards them, so Donna had to follow. ‘OK then, where are you from originally?’ He pointed up to the face formation in the skies. ‘Something to do with that, I’m guessing.’

  The small man with the scar shrugged. ‘All in good time, Doctor. Madam Delphi needs to speak with you.’

  He raised his arm in the Doctor’s direction and, before Donna could so much as gasp, a thick, crackling blast of purplish-red light shot out from his fingertips, smacking the Doctor straight in the chest and knocking his body back a couple of feet.

  He was almost unconscious by the time Donna reached him. ‘Get away… warn people…’ was all he managed before his eyes rolled back and the rhythmic rising and falling of his burned chest slowed to an unconscious crawl.

  Donna knew there was nothing she could do right away other than what he’d asked of her. She had to find help.

  ‘And the human?’ asked one of the others in the group.<
br />
  ‘Kill her,’ the man replied, and Donna saw the others all raise their arms in similar gestures.

  ‘Not today, thank you,’ Donna yelled and ran back towards the French windows, zigzagging as she ran, aware of bolts of purple energy crashing into the trees on either side of her.

  She was almost at the French windows when they exploded into metal and glass around her.

  Throwing her arms over her face, Donna ran straight through the debris and into the darkened mansion. She made her way into a hallway, where a huge wooden staircase went to the upper levels.

  ‘Seen the movies,’ she muttered. She headed to the rear of the steps where, sure enough, there was a doorway leading to a cellar.

  She wrenched it open, counted to three and slammed it shut, really loudly.

  She then tiptoed to one of the offices and slipped inside it.

  Seconds later, alerted by her ruse, a small group of the people from outside arrived at the cellar door. She watched as two of them walked down the steps, leaving

  one on guard. Damn, she had hoped they’d all go down and she could shut them in down there.

  The one on guard seemed to be looking around and for a second Donna thought he’d work out where she was hiding. Then another person she’d not seen before suddenly crashed into the man, sending him flying heavily into a wall.

  The newcomer rammed a chair against the door handle of the cellar, trapping the two inside as Donna had planned and then yelled straight at her: ‘Come on!’

  Donna ran straight to her new ally and allowed herself to be led down a corridor.

  ‘Kitchen…’ the newcomer breathed. ‘This way…’

  There was a small explosion and Donna guessed the duo had blasted their way out of the cellar. ‘Good idea while it lasted,’ she grinned. ‘I’m Donna Noble.’

  ‘I’m Miss Oladini,’ said Miss Oladini hurriedly. ‘Nice to meet you. Car?’

  ‘Came by cab.’

  ‘No, their car?’

  ‘Worth a try.’

  They crashed through the kitchenette door and into the staff car park, straight towards the abandoned car. Donna took the driving seat.

  ‘Keys?’ asked Miss Oladini.

  ‘No keys,’ Donna said. ‘Cos life’s never that convenient.’

  Miss Oladini reached down under the dashboard and yanked out some wires. ‘Misspent youth,’ she said.