Doctor Who_ Father Time Part 35

'I tried to give her a normal upbringing,' the Doctor told her. 'Sometimes, I know I was a bit of a Victorian parent, but '

Betty laughed, and the Doctor realised why. 'No offence,' he chuckled.

'Maggie's always going on about Victorian values,' Betty said. 'I was there. The life we have today, it's better.'

The Doctor's portable phone rang. He took it out of his briefcase.

Betty clapped her hands together. 'That's so clever,' she said.

'Debbie?' the Doctor said into the phone. 'Isn't it past your bedtime?'

Miranda woke, surrounded by the unfamiliar.

The room was circular, as was the bed. There was a metal structure hanging over it, giving the impression that it was a four-poster. The wall looked like plastic, and had little niches and backlit computer panels set along it.

There was a pulsing in the background, an electronic sound. Beneath that a humming, like a generator, or engines.

She was still wearing just her Batman T-shirt.

There was a woman standing at the foot of the bed. She was tall, wearing a form-fitting black outfit in what looked like sculpted rubber. She was in her mid-thirties, Miranda guessed. Her dark hair had been sc.r.a.ped back and gelled to her scalp. He lips were painted a vivid scarlet. There was something familiar about her that Miranda couldn't place.

'I have clothes for you,' the woman said. The voice was a trained monotone, clearly how the formalities dictated she should speak, but there was more warmth in her eyes.

Miranda stood, stretched a little to ease some of the cramp in her legs and arms.

The woman held up a one-piece undergarment, rather like a silk swimming costume, and swept her free hand to indicate the rest of the clothes: a polo-necked top that Miranda could tell would be a tight fit, a stiff-collared, shoulder-padded tunic in very dark green, baggy trousers that looked as if they'd been borrowed from an aviatrix, and heavy-dutylooking boots.

Miranda tugged her T-shirt off and started to put the ensemble on. The woman helped, sensing that Miranda didn't want any more a.s.sistance than was absolutely necessary. She threaded the belt, buckled the shoes, adjusted the b.u.t.toning on the tunic to make it fit better.

The clothes felt good, comfortable, made-tomeasure.

Another Miranda appeared in front of the original, startling them both. This one was smartly dressed in odd clothes. She looked like Miranda from some parallel universe where she ruled over Earth. Miranda held up her hand, as did her double.

'A mirror,' she said, her double silently mouthing the same words.

'A hologram,' the woman confirmed, slightly disdainful. Clearly holograms were common in these parts.

Miranda looked at the woman again, then back at the hologram.

'Do you have a brush?' she asked, unsure what was nagging at her.

'And cosmetics.'

'I don't wear them,' Miranda told her. 'I just want to brush my hair out.'

The woman nodded and walked over to one of the niches in the wall.

'I'm on the flying saucer, aren't I?' Miranda asked.

'You are aboard the Supremacy Supremacy. The flying saucer brought you here.'

'A mothership.'

The woman sat her down and began brushing the knots from her hair. The brush was gentle, and the bristles seemed to be moving independently, but the woman's technique was rather brusque.

'What is your name?' Miranda asked.

'I am the Deputy.'

'That's your t.i.tle, but what's your name?'

No answer.

'Where are we? I mean, where is the ship?'

'Earth orbit,' a man's voice said.

Miranda whirled. It was a stocky man in a green uniform. He was in early middle age, but had seemingly made no effort to keep fit. His jowls hung down, his arms were almost flabby. He was wearing a cloak, which disguised some of his bulk.

And she recognised him.

'Ferran?' Miranda asked, standing up.

He stepped forward, arms outstretched. 'I've come back for you.'

Debbie was sitting up in bed, all four pillows propping her up. 'I'm watching News at Ten News at Ten. Put it on. Be quick.'

'OK. Hang on.'

There was a pause; she heard him putting the phone down. Debbie took the opportunity to find a cigarette and light it.

'What am I looking ' He stopped mid-sentence.

Trevor McDonald was reading out the final item, but the Doctor would barely be listening: he'd be looking at the accompanying pictures.

A large silver disc, hovering over an exotic Indian building.

Cut to an excited Indian man. 'It was UFO ship. It was there for just a minute, just a minute, then it went straight up, up into star.'

An image of a silver disc was being shown hurriedly (and amateurishly) captured on some tourist's cine camera and Trevor McDonald was saying, 'Scientists insist that the UFO is really a common cloud formation in the area, which is p.r.o.ne to monsoons.'

'Where exactly?' the Doctor was already saying.

'They only said "Northern India". I'll phone Reuters, get them to pin it down.'

'Good. Have you checked the '

'I've only just seen the report. I'll go downstairs.' She got out of the bed, found her slippers on the other side. The phone was cordless she leaned her head against her shoulder to pin it to her ear. The heating hadn't gone off yet, but it was starting to get chilly.

'It was them,' Debbie said. 'It looked like the ship from Greyfrith.'

He didn't pause for a moment. 'Of course it was them, but whatever they were doing in India, they've finished doing it.'

'You think Miranda was in India?'

She went into the lab, moved aside the poster with the periodic table on it.

'There are only two people on this planet in this time that Ferran is remotely interested in he didn't come for me.'

'But how would he know that Miranda was there if you didn't?'

'I don't know.'

'You've spent enough time trying to find her. None of the leads we've had said India.'

None of the leads had actually led anywhere, though, she reminded herself. She activated the time detector, let it warm up.

'It's on the student trail,' he said thoughtfully. 'We never went there together, so she might want to see it. It's a beautiful country I've not been there for... twenty-seven years. Heavens, how time flies. What's the detector saying?'

Debbie was already leaning over the display.

'A source, two hours ago. It arrived in s.p.a.ce, er, and it went back up to the same point. It...'

'Just read it out,' he suggested.

She read out the numbers the display was showing. She could hear the Doctor scratching them down.

'It's still there,' the Doctor said, puzzled.

'How many years has it been?' Miranda asked.

The woman in black, the Deputy, had taken her place behind her master. Miranda studied Ferran's face. It was covered in lines now, and those cheekbones of his had given way to fat. She glanced at his wrist. He was still wearing his computer bracelet, but even that was looking past its best now.

'Twenty,' he snapped. 'Three for you, twenty for me. You have aged rather better than I have. You knew I'd come, didn't you?'

'No. I thought I was rid of you.' Ferran looked confused. 'You must have known,' Miranda said.

'We were lovers,' Ferran told her.

Miranda chuckled. 'We nearly nearly were,' she corrected him. 'But so what?' were,' she corrected him. 'But so what?'

Ferran's face twitched, as if he was desperately trying to keep control. 'I travelled a million years to see you again.'

'You must have known I wouldn't have come willingly. Otherwise why would you have abducted me instead of just talking to me?'

'I thought you would be pleased,' Ferran insisted, his voice almost a whine.

Miranda realised she should have been angry, but she had no feelings at all, just a blank where her feelings should have been. She looked at the Deputy who wore the same dead expression Miranda's face must have. 'We're heading back to your time, aren't we?'

'Not yet. This ship is magnificent, but we've developed a fault in the time engine. The self-repair circuits have it under control. We will return to our native time in three Earth days. You are probably wondering how I tracked you down.'

Miranda was a little embarra.s.sed to realise it hadn't even occurred to her.

'Cate,' Ferran prompted. So the Deputy's name was Cate.

The Deputy stepped forward and handed Miranda a golden circlet, indicating that she should put it on her head.

Miranda slid it into place, and felt whispering in her mind.

'What does this do?' she asked.

'Enhances natural telepathy allows you to operate some of our machines.'

The wall behind him became a writhing ma.s.s. A man and a woman in bed. There was an earnest voiceover, a man speaking German.

She watched for a moment, wondering why he was showing her this, until she realised the woman looked like her or had been made to: the blonde hair was a wig, the face was slightly more angular. The man was her German tourist, or again an actor who looked like an idealised version of him. The room was his hotel room, the one she'd just left. But the layout was all wrong, the decoration too elaborate, too ethnic, too beautifully lit. There hadn't been the sitar playing when she'd been there.

'That's not me,' she said.

It was the night the Berlin Wall fell, the voiceover was saying.

Ferran watched the couple, spellbound. Cate had her back to the screen. 'Your friend won the Best Foreign Non-Interactive Film Oscar for this in 2017. He wrote and directed it. It's autobiographical, about how the major events of his life happened on historically significant dates. He was born the day the Beatles split up. It ends with him marrying his wife on the day Princess Diana died.'

'Is that Jodie Foster?' Miranda asked. A number of people had said she looked a bit like her.

'It's her daughter,' the Deputy replied without hesitating.

The narrator never saw Miranda again, he told his audience, as, on the screen, they held each other close, radiant, trying to catch their breath. He had looked for her, he said, but all anyone would talk about was the flying saucer the locals said they'd seen that morning. And she was gone from his life, but he would never forget her.

'The director died,' Ferran said, without any sense of regret. 'He left a wife and three sons. Nothing of any historical significance happened that day.' He paused. 'Some of his work was preserved in the Librarinth. It's the only trace you've left on history. After the police reports on Sallak's death, that's it.'

'I tried to lie low.'

'You did, but you couldn't hide from me. I've had a team of researchers looking for records of you for fifteen years. That's all they could find, but that was enough. The Doctor made more of an impact, of course. The Lloyds building, Baghdad, Waco, the Martian invasion, that business with the Kulan... but I'm getting ahead of myself.'

'I've not seen him for years.'

'I've traced his every movement, every credit-card transaction, every official record. He wasn't punished for Sallak's murder. He claimed self-defence. When that matter was settled, he dedicated all his time and effort trying to find you.' He smiled, checking a timepiece sewn into the cuff of his tunic. 'At the moment he's on the M25. In five minutes he buys petrol from a Sh.e.l.l garage near Junction 19 and makes a substantial cash withdrawal from the cash machine there.'

The Doctor hurtled along the M25.