Doctor Who_ Father Time Part 32

One swift stroke and this would be over.

He leaned in, imagining that he could hear and feel her hearts beating, faster than they should have been. His hand reached for the knife again. He felt his fingers tighten on the hilt.

He could feel the cool warmth of her body.

She looked him in the eye.

Her lips brushed his.

They were kissing.

And it was only when they broke away from each other, some time later, that Miranda realised she hadn't been thinking thinking for a while. for a while.

Ferdy was watching her, confused.

Bob had done the same after they'd kissed. But all Bob had done was realise she was kissing him as part of some experiment, not out of any pa.s.sion. Bob had sensed her coldness towards him. With Ferdy everything had been different.

'If you don't want to...' she began.

Ferdy looked into her eyes, which made her feel exposed. Then he moved forward, kissed her again, held her tight to him.

'I want to,' he said, sounding surprised at his decision.

They kissed, and Miranda found her hands were all over the place. Ferdy's were, too, but she didn't mind that at all.

'Not here,' she said, knowing they were getting carried away. 'Do you have your own place?'

'No,' Ferdy admitted. 'I have a car.'

She knew very little about him, Miranda realised. She wanted to. She corrected herself: she wanted to, but not yet.

Miranda looked deep into his eyes. 'Why don't we go to my place?'

Miranda lay on her bed, Ferdy leaning over her, kissing her, stroking her side.

They were taking their time, they'd agreed there was no rush.

Her dad and Mrs Castle were out. She'd known that as soon as she'd seen that the Trabant was missing from the driveway, but she'd done a sweep-search of the house, keeping Ferdy close by, anyway. Knowing they were alone, she'd led him upstairs.

They'd stood there, kissing, holding each other, in no doubt at all what they'd do next. A moment later they'd been on the bed, unable to keep their hands off each other.

Ferdy broke away from her mouth, and began to nuzzle her neck and collarbone. He loosened her tie and undid the top couple of b.u.t.tons of her blouse to make it easier. She undid a couple more. Ferdy was confident, and that was steadying her own nerves a little. They shifted around a little, and the weight of him beside her on the bed felt normal, relaxing.

'I love you,' he told her, looking very intently at her.

'No you don't,' she said, laughing.

He paused.

She strained to get a look at his face. 'I'm sure you like me, I'm sure we'll love each other. But we only met a few days ago. It's not like it's our destiny to be together. I don't know anything about you, I don't know where you're from, whether you've done this sort of thing before.' He looked worried. 'There will be time for all that,' she rea.s.sured him, hugging him.

Ferdy was looking down at her. Miranda didn't feel at all shy: she felt more comfortable than she ever had, even getting changed in front of Dinah. It was as if she'd known him for a long time.

'Miranda,' he said, very seriously. He was clearly going to say something very important. For a terrible moment, Miranda thought he was going to propose to her. 'Miranda, I '

She realised he was going to tell her he had a girlfriend.

Downstairs, the front door opened.

Ferdy's head snapped around. He looked terribly panicked.

'Miranda! We're back!' a voice called.

She began b.u.t.toning up her blouse, doing it so fast she got it muddled and had to start again. 'It's Dad,' she told him. But he had already relaxed at the voice. 'Were you expecting someone else?' she asked lightly.

Ferdy forced himself to chuckle. 'No.'

She kissed him on the forehead. 'Do I look OK?' she asked him. 'I mean, it's not too too obvious.' obvious.'

Ferdy shook his head. 'You look fine.'

'Stay here,' she told him, heading for the door.

The Doctor was peering up the stairs. He'd seen Miranda's coat the moment he'd entered the house. He had run out of patience half an hour ago, at the police station, when the desk sergeant's best suggestion had been that the Doctor make sure he set his burglar alarm. Finally, the police had agreed that if the alarm went off, they'd treat it as their top priority.

Miranda was coming downstairs. Debbie looked over at her while the Doctor and his daughter hugged each other. Her school shirt wasn't very well tucked in, and she'd not checked her tie.

'Is there anything wrong?' the Doctor asked.

'No,' Miranda replied quickly. 'I was just playing a CD,' she lied badly. 'I didn't hear you.'

'Why aren't you at school?' he asked.

'I felt a bit faint again,' she said.

'Tell you what,' the Doctor suggested, 'I'll make a pot of tea and see if that helps clear away the cobwebs.'

Miranda started to say something. Debbie decided to intervene.

'You'd rather listen to that CD?' she asked Miranda.

'Yes,' she said, relieved.

The Doctor looked a little deflated. 'Oh. Well, come down when you're ready.'

He disappeared off to the kitchen.

Debbie stayed where she was. 'A CD?' she said, a little archly.

Miranda blushed. 'I've not even got a player.'

'Bob?' Debbie asked.

Miranda went a deeper shade of red. 'No. Someone else.'

Debbie chuckled. 'I was young once,' she said. 'Unlike your father.'

'I don't think Dad would understand,' Miranda told her.

'No... no, I doubt that he would.'

'But you understand what I'm going through?' Miranda seemed sceptical.

'Not all of it. But I know enough to keep your father out of your way,' she promised. 'Come down when you're ready.'

Miranda was still blushing. 'Thanks.'

Miranda closed her bedroom door, leaned on it for a few seconds, superst.i.tiously, as if it would help jam it in place.

Ferdy was standing in the middle of the room. He was tall, but not broad-shouldered. He was about the same height as Bob, but looked like he came from a different species. Ferdy could be a model, she thought, or a sports star.

'Where were we?' she asked, a little mischievously. The thought that her dad or Debbie might accidentally come in amused rather than worried her. This was a big house, they had as much privacy as they needed.

Ferdy was looking very serious. 'I was about to tell you something.'

She went over to him, hugged him, felt all those muscles. He didn't budge.

'Something important?' she asked.

'Yes,' he said. He broke away from her, indicated that she should sit on the bed.

She did, puzzled. Perhaps he's married married, Miranda thought, as she sat on the edge of the mattress. He sat alongside her. Or he had some terrible illness, or he was an escaped criminal.

'What?' she asked, a little exasperated.

'You are different from other people,' he began, choosing his words carefully.

'Flatterer.'

'No. I mean I know you are different. You have two hearts, you're stronger and fitter than other people, you've got greater mental capacity: better memory, faster responses. Have you ever wondered why you are different?'

He wasn't proposing to her.

'Of course,' she said, leaving aside how he knew all this about her for the moment that information was obviously on its way. 'But my dad's the same. There are probably lots of us it's just we don't talk about it. It's not like it's a problem, like some disease or syndrome or anything.'

'There are two of you,' Ferdy said. 'Two of you on this entire planet. You and the Doctor.'

'Oh, there can't be' She laughed. 'What would be the odds of that? It's rare, I know it's rare, but '

'Two of you,' Ferdy insisted.

'You can't possibly know that,' she told him, still not angry with him. 'You've been round and checked, have you?'

'I know because I know that you are not of this world, you are not of this time.'

Miranda frowned.

'You are not human. You and the Doctor are two of a kind: time-travellers. You have a unique destiny.'

Miranda looked around, wondering why she wasn't getting the joke. 'You don't read Teen t.i.tans comics by any chance?'

'Miranda, you are the last of your race,' Ferdy continued, 'and you alone '

'Wait a minute.' She laughed, a little nervously. 'You said Dad was one, too. And he's not even my real dad my parents didn't have two hearts. What are you on?' She didn't understand why Ferdy was doing this. She waited for the punchline. She wanted him to get whatever it was off his chest, so they could get back to 'Those weren't your real parents.'

'They were.' She stood up, annoyed now. 'Ferdy, where are you getting this from?'

'The Librarinth. It's a place where all the records are stored, along with art treasures, blueprints, genetic codes. Most of it is still out of bounds, but my family have limited access.'

'I think you ought to go.' She didn't know what he was doing this for, and it was beginning to scare her. She'd invited a maniac into her house. Into her bed bed. She started heading towards the door.

Ferdy grabbed her arm. 'I have travelled more than a million years into the past to avenge the death of my brother,' he told her. 'I came here to kill you.'

And then he pulled a long, curved knife from his jacket pocket.

Chapter Twenty.

Don't Leave Me This Way Miranda listened as Ferdy told her. The knife stayed in his hand the whole time.

He told her about the far future. He told her that in the future the universe had been devastated, drained of energy, with whole galaxies uninhabited and uninhabitable. Somehow no one was quite sure how this was the fault of her people, the last remnants of which imposed their rule on the other survivors.

Ferdy Ferran was the ruler of one of these other groups. From his description, his civilisation sounded like a fascist dictatorship, although he seemed proud of that. There were many other groups, including from what Miranda could put together a group of goblin shapeshifters and a race of robot gangsters. These huddled on their shattered planets, eking out what they could with whatever resources were left. They had advanced science, but precious few resources to apply that science in a practical form.

For a thousand years, the tyrant Emperor had controlled all time and s.p.a.ce travels, and operated a secret police force that ruthlessly crushed all dissent before it had even happened, using arcane technologies.