by Gary Russell
‘Ma’am, my name is LeFevre, Gaylord LeFevre, resident of Louisiana, although much of my time is spent upon the waters, travelling between Minnesota and St Louis. Heck, ma’am, I’ve even taken a trip down to Mexico, but that’s a strange and primitive place and I don’t care to go there again in a hurry. May I?’
By now, Dieter had reached the gate, and LeFevre held his hand out to offer assistance over the stile. Although her instinct was to refuse, she found herself saying ‘Why thank you, Monsieur LeFevre, that’s very kind of you.’ For some reason, she was not the least bit surprised to find that she was wearing eighteenth-century dress.
‘Ma’am,’ he said once she was over, and as he tucked her arm under his, ‘it’s a pleasure, a mighty real pleasure to have your company on a day as fine as this. Is home like this?’ And Dieter suddenly thought of home - her tiny apartment on the twelfth floor of a thirty-storey block in Dusseldorf. Two rooms with grey, featureless walls and furniture, the sky blackened by the emissions from the kraftwerks and the windows failing to keep out the roar of the autobahns and flugplatz.
‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘No, monsieur, this is a paradise.’
‘I think, ma’am, you would like to stay a while then, enjoy our hospitality. A game to while away the hours?’
‘Hours...? No, I... I...’
‘Yes, ma’am?’
Dieter knew something was wrong. She glanced back to the fence, but beyond it were fields and trees. Surely something was missing? She didn’t remember fields and trees.
Something about darkness? Green light? A girl she was following?
‘Why, sir, I am daydreaming. Where are my manners? Of course, I’d love to watch you play at your sports.’
‘Watch? Why, ma’am, the challenge is in the playing. You must assist me.’
‘Me?’ Dieter flushed with embarrassment. ‘Why, sir, it’s not comely for a lady to play at sports.’
LeFevre laughed. ‘This is not the Middle Ages, ma’am. The Toymaker would be very disappointed if you didn’t join in the festivities over yonder.’
Toymaker? Why did that name ring a bell?
‘What game are we playing, good sir?’
‘Why, Ms Dieter... may I call you Ms Claudia?’
Claudia. There was a name she’d not heard for a while. She’d been ‘Oh, Nurse Dieter...’ or ‘Lieutenant-Commander Dieter... ‘
or ‘Dieter, do you think you could...’ for years now. The last person to call her Claudia was Merten back home in... in...
Nurse Dieter? Why on Earth did she think she was a medic? And where, if she was, did she practise? She had some bizarre whimsy that last night she had dreamt about outer space, being out among the stars.
What rot.
No, here she was, a lady of leisure, enjoying a fine summer’s day in the Black Forest with this fine American gentleman.
‘Where’s the picnic, Monsieur LeFevre?’
LeFevre smiled at her, as a father might smile at a child who finally understands a problem. Why was he doing that? Ah well, no matter - before them was a fine picnic being enjoyed by life-sized pűppchen. As one, they turned their china or wooden heads, with their painted faces and gay clothes, to say hello.
In her head she heard them calling to her and, smiling gleefully, she settled down with them.
‘Will you not join us, Monsieur?’
But LeFevre shook his head. ‘I have to ready this afternoon’s entertainment, ma’am, but I’m sure I shall rejoin you soon.’ He turned to leave, then stopped. ‘Oh, Ms Claudia, I don’t think you have been introduced to the gentleman who has prepared today’s events. Allow me to present my lord, the Toymaker!’
‘Enchanted,’ she said to the tall, elegantly dressed gentleman who was suddenly sitting amid the pűppchen.
The Toymaker bowed slightly. ‘Oh, you will be, Nurse Dieter. Tell me, dear lady, do you perhaps play the game of schachspiel?’
Adric decided he’d really had as much as he was going to take of all this.
It was bad enough that Niki Paladopous and the others on the bridge clearly had no recollection of him, but while they were dragging him to a storeroom that they decided would make a good cell, word had come in that one of the station’s crew had been murdered - stabbed in the back.
Adric’s protestations that he had neither a knife, nor blood on his hands or clothes - or any reason to kill the unfortunate man - had no effect. The lieutenant - or Commander Paladopous as he now called himself - just locked him in the cell, suggesting that Earth Security would question him when they were ready.
‘Of course, it might take them a week or three to get here, so you’ll have plenty of time to think on what you’ve done!
Adric thought about this for a few moments after Paladopous’s footsteps had faded away. Obviously something was askew - Adric had faced anger alongside the Doctor(s) often enough to see that. Personality transplant aside, Niki was acting completely irrationally for a
‘commander’. Therefore, he was influenced by something. And that something had not only wiped Adric’s origins from the lieutenant’s mind, but had also blotted out his memory of the crew who had gone to Dymok along with the Doctor, Tegan and Nyssa.
Ah well, there was nothing Adric could do about it right now
- better to wait for a chance to make his escape when they brought him some food. Starving a prisoner to death was unlikely to be Earth Security’s preferred method of getting a confession, so he was reasonably confident that a window of opportunity would present itself soon.
With a sigh - cells were so boring - he closed his eyes and settled back on the hard floor to wait.
The door opened, but Adric kept his eyes shut, waiting to see who spoke.
‘Adric?’
‘Is that you?’
He sat upright, suddenly cold.
Morell? Tanisa?
‘Mother? Father?’ Adric stared up at his parents. The three of them were inside a cave overlooking the Starliner on Alzarius.
Adric’s heart sank. ‘Oh. It’s not really you, then. Another trick, like last time.’
His mother frowned and his father crouched down in front of his son. ‘See. You had the dream again?’
‘Dream? What dream?’
‘The same one you have had for the last couple of nights, my love. The one about travelling between the stars, with your faithful robot dog and his friends the wizard and the ice maiden.’ Tanisa had joined her husband by Adric’s feet. ‘Oh I am so sorry. We really did think that the solitude and the altitude of the cave would solve the problem!
‘I think, son, it would be best if you came back down with us. With Varsh gone, your mother needs both of us to help around the home.’
Adric looked from one to another. ‘Look, I really don’t know what you are talk-’ He stopped, putting his hand to his throat.
His voice sounded odd. Alien, really. Certainly very different. He tried again.
‘All right, I’ll try it your way. What is the true origin of Mistfall?’
Adric thought that if he queried his phantom parents on this subject - to which he knew the answer but they didn’t -
and they answered correctly, he would know this was a trick of the Toymaker.
His voice still sounded strange. Smaller, Weedy. A different pitch... oh no...
He touched his throat harder. No thyroid cartilage. His hands were smaller, thinner. He checked the other relevant parts of his body but he was right.
‘No... I’m young again...’
Morell smiled. ‘Of course you are, Adric. You don’t reach eleven until the next season.’
Adric shook his head. ‘But I’m... I’m fifteen years old!’
His mother laughed. A lovely laugh he hadn’t heard properly in years. ‘Oh, my sweetheart, you are funny. Come, back to the home. I’ve your favourite stew cooking and Jiana is anxious to see you. I think she may have her eye on you, my little one.’
Adric scrambled to his feet, trying to back away, but his parents seeme
d so big. Which they would to a ten-year-old.
‘No. I am Adric. This is the space station Little Boy II not Alzarius. I am in N-Space not E-Space. You are dead, as is Varsh and... and...’
His protests stopped as his voice faded, and the world seemed to move around him, almost swamping him.
His mother and father seemed giants now, looming over him, pointing and smiling.
‘Itchy kitchy koo,’ his mother said. ‘Do you want yum-yums?’ She was holding out a plate of mushed river-fruit.
‘Your favourite.’
Adric had always loathed river-fruit. He tried to say so, but nothing happened.
Then the images blurred. His mother and father twisted, darkened and mutated into two other forms. Gradually recognition dawned - they were Tegan and Nyssa. The girls were poking at him, laughing spitefully, jeering at his attempts to push them away.
‘Oh look, Nyssa,’ said Tegan. ‘It’s Adric being Adric. If he can’t get what he wants he lies on his back, kicking and screaming like a baby.’
‘Well, Tegan,’ said Nyssa, ‘that’s our Adric. A big spoilt brat who thinks he’s all grown up when he’s nothing more than a pathetic child. Oochy koochy coo!’
In the distance Adric heard a long shrill cry, like that of an irritating baby that demands attention.
He realised the sound was both in his head and coming from his mouth, the mouth of a six-month-old Adric.
And he screamed even louder.
Tegan could remember her dream now. Brisbane. The robot. The Toymaker and the other man, the one who had been trying to warn her against something. Was she supposed to be wary of the Observer? Well, frankly, after what had happened to her during her travels in time alongside the Doctor, she wasn’t ready to trust anyone.
The sleepers had all awoken by now. They were all before her, three or four sitting, regimented, on each slab, all just staring at her.
‘Their god has deserted them,’ the Observer said. ‘You are the Chosen, the one they need to lead them now.’
‘Why me?’
‘Because you are pragmatic, straightforward and say what you think. Adric and Nyssa are too caught up in their own little worlds to be of any help.’
Tegan thought about this. ‘Hang on,’ she said slowly. If I’m the ―Chosen One‖, how do you know about Nyssa and Adric?
And the Doctor for that matter? Surely you could have chosen anyone in the universe who is ―pragmatic‖ and the rest of it.
Why me?’
She faced the Observer and dared him to come up with a glib response. ‘It’s not me at all, is it? I’m just a convenient way of getting at the Doctor!’
The Observer smiled. ‘You do yourself an injustice, Tegan. The Doctor has a part to play certainly, but no, it is you I... we needed. You are our ―Chosen One‖ because of who you are, not who you travel with.’
‘With whom you travel,’ Tegan corrected him automatically. She glanced back at the masses who faced her, imploring looks on their faces.
‘They need someone to lead them, Tegan.’
‘Lead them into what exactly?’
‘Battle. A battle of the mind. They have slept for years. Let me explain.’ And once again the Observer touched Tegan’s temple, and the world fell away around her...
3
All That Glitters
Imagine space.
Imagine the dust and clouds coalescing together, forming a planet - a blend of hard physics, chemistry, biology and an amazing amount of luck. Why should this one planet form here, in this insignificant speck of space, 150 million kilometres from the nearest sun?
And why, within a few million years, should the Dymova emerge from their evolution, wasted physically but with an enormous mental range that could have elevated them to godhood among lesser races?
Those are the quirks of fate that created Dymok, Tegan Jovanka.
And the reason you must help is easy. Instead of becoming gods these poor, pitiful creatures opened their minds to invasion by another, who claimed to be their god. He promised them an eternity of pleasure, of happiness.
And what was his price?
To give him their dreams - to sleep and let their subconscious imaginations power his own dreamscapes. His own malevolent plans for universal domination.
He did this, this Great Old One from another universe. This Guardian of Dreams who said he would be there to protect them.
Oh, indeed, he has protected them - he allowed me to survive, to ward off unwelcome visitors in case they disturbed the sleepers. He gave me powers beyond those even the sleepers possessed - I could obliterate planets with but a thought. I could unpick your air-hostess uniform, one stitch at a time, over a week until it fell apart - from a million light years away.
But it did not alter my loneliness - my abandonment.
Can you imagine what it is like to be suddenly cut off from your friends? To accept an offer on a whim without thinking about what the consequences might be? And then suddenly it is over - your god betrays you, gives you promises but in fact abandons you for ever, leaving you to go through the motions, performing tasks against your will because there is nothing else to do in the vast vacuum of boredom?
My mission, Tegan Jovanka, has been to protect my... the sleepers. To watch over them and ensure that while our god, our false, wicked and sly god, picks their mental powers bare to support his own fantasy realms, they remain alive in the hope that one day someone will come amongst us, help us find a new future. A new direction.
A fresh start - that is what the ‘Chosen One’ offers. I hope.
They will listen to you - you are different from them, different from the cruel god.
You are their saviour.
Oh, you don’t want to be their saviour?
Then let me show you what will occur if you, our last best hope, abandon us now.
You see, the sleepers have awoken - and this has severely depleted the god’s powers. Oh, he has a reservoir of their dream-spinning for now, but it cannot last much longer. He uses it too quickly, too eagerly for although it is not his to take so blithely, he does.
Observe. You see Dymok - do you see the building collapse - the black pyramid shatter and sink? Do you see the Dymova, unable to escape as their world crashes down upon them and strikes them dead?
And so, you ask, why do we not escape - flee this terrible god who has so mistreated us?
Because we are dependent upon him. If we abandon him, we die. If he abandons us, we die. It is a truly parasitic relationship.
But with a new ‘Chosen One’ to defend us, to talk with the god, to offer up a new menu of dreams, less stale and abstract than the ones sleepers offer now, we will be free.
But, you must ask, what of you? Will you not become a prisoner of your dreams as we have?
No, of course not. In a moment I shall reveal a secret to you, and you will understand everything.
But what of the Doctor? Your companion, your saviour?
Your planet’s history is littered with martyrs, saints and saviours. You have your heroes, your legends and your gods. To you, the Doctor is all of these things rolled into one enigmatic package. You question how he flies through the vortex, unravaged by the passage of time, protecting you along the way. He shows you the wonders of the universe - and the dangers as well. And despite all I have explained to you, all I have demonstrated, I see within you the desire to continue with him.
You marvel at his craft. His technology. His ability to change and repair his body when it is damaged.
Is he not a god to you? Is this not what gods can do?
No, he is flawed, and that is why you admire him. He cannot be a god because he makes mistakes - and that is how you can deal with him, how you and he can co-exist in his god-like world.
The Doctor is here to make another error, create another flaw. He is here to repair the damage he did to a lost soul a long time ago. And thus betray you and your friends.
Allow me to illustrate my point by selecting
one of your memories...
Hello?
Hello where am I?
Oh, it’s the TARDIS... hey, I recognise this. Yes, that’s me and Nyssa and Adric and the Doctor in the TARDIS and we’ve just taken off from that fake place, Castrovalva.
If. If I hadn’t been trying to operate the TARDIS data bank by looking up ’If’, we wouldn’t have found the file IF for Information File, and if we hadn’t gone there we wouldn’t have needed to look up the Information File and thus I wouldn’t have needed to think about ’if’ and... circular logic gives me a headache. Circular logic got us there, to a world of circular logic that bizarrely made no sense.
On the way back, we were discussing the Doctor’s enemy the Master; who had created the circular logic city as a trap but was caught in it himself as it collapsed back into the pure mathematics which had created it.
Or so Adric said.
The Master had been dying, the Doctor said. Time Lords can only regenerate, change their bodies, twelve times -
thirteen lives. If a Time Lord tries to trigger a thirteenth regeneration it usually kills him. But the Master had attempted it anyway and, rather than dying, he ravaged his own body, becoming little more than a walking cadaver
On Traken, before I joined the TARDIS crew, Nyssa’s father Tremas had demonstrated the power of the Source, a massive energy capsule that powered the planet The Master used the power of the Source to extend his own life o n c e a g a i n ,
tr i g g e r i n g
t h a t
f a t e f u l
th ir t e e n t h
regeneration, but he needed extra material, a whole ne w body which he could merge with, absorb and take on.
Nyssa’s dad was the unlucky one and the Master ended up looking like a younger; rejuvenated version of Tremas. I re me mber, as we lef t the M as ter to h is f ate in Castrovalva Nyssa asked the Doctor if that was it. Was her father lost for ever or was there some way he could separate the two men?
We had just seen the Doctor die and become reborn in a new body.