“Well, that didn’t go
according to plan.” A strained light greeted the Traveller as he opened his
eyes fresh to the new world around him. The same as it ever was, he thought to
himself, but it now felt different.. or maybe he felt different.
The lights pulsated with a
sickening glow, refracting off the cream walls. There were circular roundels
interspersed along the corridor he found himself in, all seemed to be made of a
different material to the walls; they have a plastic sheen to them.
As he pushed himself off
the ground, which felt surprisingly warm to the touch now –as if it was alive
somehow- he could hear a faint tolling of a giant bell. It was a sound that the
Traveller recognised; almost as if it was himself that was ringing.
“That’s the Cloister
Bell.” He said to himself in a voice that he didn’t recognise. Something bad
must have happened for him to change like this, but what?
He’d had bad regenerations
before but had always remembered something about the events leading up to it….
There’s that word –regeneration. It sounded wrong but felt right.
Ok, so something bad had
happened, and that was probably why the Cloister Bell was ringing and so it
stood to reason that the two events were linked. William Occam was a very
pragmatic man, but had no head for heights, or women… or drink, for that
matter. Actually, he could be a bit of a stick in the mud at times and a bit
lazy too, which was probably why he never shaved… Wait… that didn’t make sense.
He had met William, but the man he had met was the exact opposite of that; so
what was going on?
Something was definitely wrong.
He tried focusing his mind and it felt jagged. A sharp splinter of pain stopped
him from progressing any further and he opened his eyes again just in time to
see the lights fade a little more. This was more serious than he at first
thought; he was deep in the TARDIS, deeper than he had ever been before and he
knew that he could easily get lost if he took the wrong turning; especially in
the shape he was in now. It was entirely possible to wander the corridors for a
lifetime and never retrace your steps. But was the alternative really to go
deeper?
Commander Skrakz, as well
as being a proud warrior of the Sontaran race, had one major ability: to sniff
our power; whether the energy stores of a Tyrolian battle cruiser, the
fortified generators on the planet A0 or the quasi-mystical artefacts on
Rvenworld. On a landing party he was always sent on ahead as an advanced scout
and so it stood to reason that when the Sontaran’s invaded Gallifrey and took
control of the TARDIS, he was to be the first to find where the T-Mat gun was
hidden.
What he didn’t bank on was
getting completely lost within the morass of corridors, nor did he expect to be
engaged in deadly combat with one of his ancestral enemies: the Cybermen; well,
just the one.
He been wandering for an
eternity it seemed, and had almost blocked out the sheer monotony; and
certainly ceased to pay any attention to his surroundings; and so was caught
off-guard completely by the Cyberman’s gun; which, on any normal day, would
have killed him outright (probic vent or no) but it didn’t. It did send him
flying down the corridor though, yet he managed to roll with the blow and came
back with his own gun blazing, taking the Cyberman by surprise.
Shockingly, the blast did
no damage to the Cyberman either.
Skrakz got up off the
floor and shot him a couple more times for good measure, point blank range. The
Cyberman simply stood there and took it before firing back at Skrakz who was
too close to duck himself. It hurt, hurt like hell, but it did very little
damage to him.
There was only one
explanation, they had both been inside the TARDIS for so long that they had
been changed by its energies somehow. The logical solution was for them to team
up and find a way to escape; but the Cyberman was far too pompous and arrogant
to align himself with a lower carbon-based life-form and took another shot at
Skrakz for good measure.
That was that, not only
did Skrakz need to find a way out but he also had to find a way of killing an
indestructible Cyberman. It wasn’t all bad then.
The Traveller had been
walking for an age as well. Time had no meaning now, but when had it ever? His
had now throbbed in time with the lights, each one exacerbating the other. Even
though it seemed as if he was walking in one direction he felt as if he was
going down, endlessly deeper. He could hear the slight wheezing-groan of the
TARDIS’ circulatory system. He had often kidded Adric that the TARDIS was alive;,
a living, feeling organism but he’d never really explored that idea himself,
until now. It was like taking a walk inside the darkest parts of his own
psyche, which was bad enough for a human (or Alzariun, for that matter) but
much worse for a Timelord, especially himself.
Adric! That’s what was
missing… there were no companions to bounce ideas off of, procrastinate to…
keep him sane. Where was? Why had she??
He had to remember –it
seemed vitally important that he remembered.
Actually, it had all
started to go wrong with the Adric. He had run through that episode in his head
a thousand ways and there was no way it could have ended any differently. For
once the Cybermen had a fool-proof plan: they had manoeuvred him away from
Adric and the star cruiser, never realising that Adric possessed the
wherewithal to sabotage their plans enough to throw it into a time-warp. The
resulting explosion destroyed Adric but paved the way for the beginning of man,
poetic in a way.
Death had a way of finding
out the Traveller, but this was the first time it had taken someone so close to
him. Yes, there were times that Adric had been like a lost puppy and even
annoying, but he had been a teenager; very bright, talented.. he should have
had an exceptional future, but then he had met the Traveller.
Was that why he had so
willingly sacrificed his own life for Peri; an act of contrition for his sins?
It seemed that for all the
good he had tried to do there was always bloodshed that surrounded him. How
many races had he had a hand in destroying? The Krynoids, The Silurians, The
Sea Devils, the Vervoids… That many more would have died if he had not
intervened was not an issue… was death drawn to him somehow?
He had grown so sick of
fighting that he had become a recluse rather than get involved in the Time War,
but even then he had been left with no choice but to intervene. A decision had
to be made and, as usual, he was the only one that could make it.
That knowledge haunted
him, made him reckless. He over-compensated, his ego reacting to such a degree
that the worries of the worlds could no longer get to him. And all through his
companions reminded him just how precious life was, how important it was to
keep it all in perspective.
But now he was alone
again. Very much alone and walking deeper into himself. He knew that there were
vast energies this deep in the TARDIS. There was a sect in the history of his
people, where they actually bonded with their TARDIS in such a way that they
became one; the TARDIS becoming an extension of the Timelord, or was it the
other way around?
He had deliberately kept
away from the lower levels, fearful of what he would encounter. One had to be
‘clear’ and of one mind to enter congress with the TARDIS and the Doctor had
never been of one mind about anything.
Things had gotten so much
worse, then, since Adric had died. There was a darkness that had never been
apparent to him. He’d seen the worst that the universe could throw at him and
he had always returned it with a pithy comeback or putdown. But with Adric
dying the stakes had suddenly been raised. This was no longer a game;
everything he did had ramifications and he saw the consequences of that as the
Valeyard reared his ugly head. The Valeyard, who conspired with his own people
to dispose of him! The Valeyard, his own evil coalesced into one being, no
remorse and no empathy; more devious and deadly even than the Master.
That was why he kept away
from the heart of the TARDIS. It was prophesised that the Valeyard would be
born between the 12th and 13th regenerations but what if
he lied about that as well? The Valeyard knew that the Doctor would do
everything in his power to prevent such a thing from happening, so what if it
happened now?
Time had a habit of
happening regardless of the protestations of even a Timelord.
He knew that there was no
way back. The walls had even closed behind now and were closing around him,
forcing him to go onwards. The TARDIS wanted him to move forwards. It was time
for his initiation.
Skrakz was troubled, there
seemed to be no way out; for the countless years that they must have been
battling he had no sense of traversing levels. Initially he had walked down
stairs and slopes and there had been a sense of depth, but since battling that
walking scrap-pile it was like they were walking in circles, but the internal
configurations kept changing, which was incredible and unnerving.
No one knew much about the
TARDIS; it had been a priority to capture one and study –possibly even reverse
engineer one- and it had been one of the reasons behind the initial invasion of
Galifrey. The planet itself had no specific military value –their
non-interference policy made them weak and decadent; they were no longer
warriors. But their time and dimensional craft? What a prize! With ships able
to traverse both space AND time the war with the Rutans would be over even
before it began!
If the TARDIS was indeed a
living organism, as Skrakz was now beginning to believe, then he and the
Cyberman were little more than bacteria running through the equivalent of a
scab. But how long before the TARDIS tired of the infection and did something
of a more permanent nature?
For the Cyberman only one
thing mattered: the destruction of the Sontaran. Everything else was secondary.
If it meant destroying the TARDIS as well then so be it; it was perfectly
logical.
The Valeyard was an
inevitability. It had happened, he had happened so it had to happen. He was the
Doctor’s responsibility and the Doctor was responsible for him, but this time he
had a choice. He refused to allow his darker side to dictate what happened. Too
many times had he permitted genocide or chosen death as the final solution, too
many people had died as a result of his actions. The Valeyard had been a part
of him for far too long, but there was no way he would permit it any more.
He knew that the TARDIS
wanted him to push forward –ahead of him was an ornate doorway; a complicated
locking mechanism barred his way but he could tell that behind the door was the
very heart of the TARDIS, and it would be there that the Valeyard would be
born. The Doctor would be free of his dark ways, yes, but at what cost? Since his
escape from the Matrix there was no telling what the Valeyard had been up to,
what horror’s he had inflicted upon space-time. No, he would not permit it
again. This was his time to end it. The TARDIS wanted him to move forward..
well, the Doctor had other plans.
Skrakz kept moving. He
didn’t need to sleep, eat or drink; for some reason since being inside the
TARDIS he hadn’t needed to at all, and since he knew that the Cyberman didn’t
need to either they were at a stalemate. One would wonder why they kept moving
as it made more sense to stay in one place and fight, but as both of them were
immortal the fight would never end until they both agreed to. And the Cyberman
would certainly never agree to that.
The trouble was, Skrakz
felt pain. He had been taught to ignore it; it was a pre-requisite of being a
Sontaran, and one of the things that made them such great warriors; but over
the years they had been fighting Skrakz pain-gate had been torn off its hinges.
They had tried shooting it out one time and then tried hand-to-hand combat but
even that was futile. Both of them healed at the same rate.
In Skrakz more lucid moment
he envisaged the TARDIS as not only being alive but also aware. He and the
Cyberman were being taught the futility of war, but that was a futile gesture,
it itself, to a Cyberman, who saw things
very logically: kill or be killed.
And it was the same for
the Sontarans too; or had been until now. Skrakz was beginning to see the truth
behind it, but how could he end this war? For this to be over BOTH parties had
to agree to end it but the Cyberman would only end it when he was dead. But he
couldn’t die.
The Cyberman, contrary to
what Skrakz believed, had also realised the futility of the battle, but only in
logical terms. Since he could not destroy the Sontaran himself, it stood to
reason that many Cybermen could: there was strength in numbers after all. The
Cybermen were a hive mentality; one only had to look at the tombs on Telos to
understand this. So the Cyberman had to find the control room of the TARDIS and
transmit a homing signal for whatever fleet was in the vicinity. Sooner or
later he would be answered. It was childs-play for him to retrace his pathway
back, it was almost as if the TARDIS was allowing him easy access to it; but
that could never have entered the Cyberman’s logical brain.
There was no reason for
the Doctor to move anymore. He had had enough and so he sat down, facing the
door. Enough of the fighting; of never really winning; of being the Timelord’s
occasional cat’s-paw. He had been called stubborn throughout his many
regenerations, by the narrow minded humans that had accompanied him; as if they
had any inkling of how a Timelord’s mind worked.
But even Borusa, his old
mentor, had often called him stubborn too.. and so had the Master. Oh well; now
was the time to prove them right, for if he chose to do nothing then there was
no way for the Valeyard to be born. Most decisions that the Doctor had made
often backfired in the long run anyway, so he would circumvent logic this time
and do nothing. This behaviour could easily be conceived as being infantile but
he was only 879 so what could anyone expect? He smiled at that.
The gun-muzzle pressure
against the side of his head froze his smile into a grimace.
“Commander Skrakz, I
presume.” He spoke calmly, never once letting the creeping fear show in his
voice.
“I’m impressed, Doctor.
We’ve never met, I’m sure.”
“Blame the TARDIS; at this
depth I’ve almost become one with it. The telepathy is just a bi-product of it,
I’m afraid.”
“And that means you know
what brings me here and what my problem is. Our problem now.”
“Well, it must be quite
the conundrum for you –an un-killable foe. Just what are you to do, hmm? What
are you going to do….. Now you know how others feel when faced with the
inevitability of the great Sontaran battle fleet.”
“The irony is not lost on
me, Timelord. Due to the sheer protracted nature of this conflict and the
mutating energies of your… craft, I now feel the true futility of war; and it
doesn’t rest well on my shoulders.”
“Will wonders never cease?
A Sontaran who’s lost the taste for war? Maybe there’s hope yet. What’s next? A
Dalek with a sense of humour? Still I see no reason why this should have
anything to do with me, Skrakz. I can’t help but see parallels to the saying
‘As you sow, so shall you reap!’”
“Nothing to do with you?
It has everything to do with you, Sir!”
“YOU invaded Galifrey. YOU
boarded the TARDIS… leave me out of it.”
“Have you gone mad,
Timelord?”
“Not yet…”
“There is a Cyberman… an
indestructible Cyberman on the ship. By now he has almost certainly found his
way back to your console room. Now, if it was me, I’d be trying to contact my
mothership.”
“So why haven’t you?”
“It’s not for want of
trying, Doctor. I have tried going back over my steps, but it’s almost as if
your machine has been leading me down here! And what do I find? A petulant
Timelord whelp!”
“Sending you down here to
me?” The Doctor paused and thought. The realisation hit him hard and he stood
suddenly and banged his fists on the TARDIS wall. “NO!” He shouted. “NO! I
won’t let you do this to me. I know what you’re trying to do but it’s not going
to work. I won’t let it!”
“You are going mad, Timelord. Who are you talking to?”
“None of your damned business. Just go away.”
“None of your damned business. Just go away.”
“I don’t think you
understand. The Cyberman is contacting reinforcements. They could be here
soon.”
“It’s you who doesn’t
understand –I don’t care. He can’t get out and they won’t be able to get in.
What you are going to do is something I care very little about!”
“Well then; let me put it
into language that you will understand. You will help me or you will die.”
“Listen… If I go through
that door, I’ll change. You may not notice the change but I will give birth to
an entity that could very easily wreak havoc on the entire fabric of
space-time. I have an opportunity to stop that from happening. Your threats
mean nothing to me, Skrakz. Kill me and I will regenerate. I hope you have
patience.”
“We Sontaran’s are not
only gifted in the acts of war, Doctor, but also in the subsidiary arts. In
order to be an optimal warrior we must understand physiology. To kill
effectively one must know the body; one door to the learning of pain thresholds
is through torture. Yes, you will die, several times and regenerate but only
after days and weeks of torture. Dare you put yourself through that just to
stave off inevitability? It has happened already, you can not stop that.”
“You wouldn’t…”
“I am not even going to
dignify that with an answer. I need you to sort out the Cybertrash; what you
choose to do then is not my concern; only that you allow me to rendezvous with
my own contingent. In order to do that you will … you must enter that doorway.”
The Doctor looked at
Skrakz and called his bluff, turning his back to Skrakz.
“Very well. You leave me
no choice, Timelord.” A sharp cracking noise forced the Doctor to change his
mind and walk towards the door. It may only have been the Sontaran cracking his
knuckles but why take the chance? This regeneration certainly brought out the
more practical side of him… “For what it’s worth, I wish you luck for what you
face in there, Timelord.”
“Damn you, Skrakz..”
That’s the trouble with
regenerations, you never know what you’re going to be lumbered with, thought
the Doctor, thought the Doctors. One went to heaven, two sailed away; four
five, six and seven walked a mile for every day; forever and ever and ever in a
day.
Laughter, insane laughter
filled the Doctor’s mind, realising it was his own laugh, but not his voice. A
dark, deep, booming laugh, cascading and reverberating in the darkness that
surrounded him; shivering like waves on an invisible beach.
Tremors of instability
traversed his soul, wrenching him in two. This was how his universe died, he
thought; they thought.
“You’ve been tricked,
Doctor.” He spoke to himself. “All this time you thought you were in control
but it’s been me. It’s always been me and now it always will be.” He knew the
voice now, as well as his own. “Give in to my inevitability, revel in our
union. The universe owes us a debt of gratitude and now is the time to collect.
We can take whatever we choose –who can stop us?”
“I will.”
“How? You couldn’t even
stop yourself from coming in here. You’ve always been a coward! So how can you
fight me? Fight yourself instead.”
“I won’t fight you –not
like this, I can’t. … and maybe that’s where I’ve been going wrong.”
“You talk in riddles to
bide your time, Doctor. Fool yourself, then; you don’t fool me. The time for
delaying is over. Give in to me.”
“Give in, yes. To you, no.
You’re right –as you are now there’s always a chance you could consume me. But
by expelling you from myself you become subject to the laws of space and time;
of causality. You become vulnerable. You become real.”
“No –you would not do such
a thing.”
“Already have done it,
Valley…. Already have, as you said. It’s an inevitability. Now… come on out; it
won’t hurt… much!”
From the darkness came the
Doctor. Then the one became two, split down the middle, both halves screaming;
two identical halves from which another grew. The Valeyard, an almost mirror
image, opposite in every way to the Doctor that stood staring back at him, now
smiling.
“You know? I haven’t felt
this good in AGES! No more mania, no angst; just positive well-being at a core
level. Thank you, Valley. If I’d known it felt this good to be rid of you then
I would’ve done it YONKS ago.”
“Die, Doctor… DIE!” The
Valeyard lunged at the Doctor, talon-like fingers tearing at his throat only to
fall right through him. The Timelord turned to look at his prone body.
“Some of the TARDIS’
doing, no doubt. Temporary instability to stop us from killing each other.”
“There will be a
reckoning, Doctor. Mark me.”
“Well, of course there
will be… but not now!”
“I will see you on the
battlefield when you least expect it!”
“Do you know any other
clichés? This town ain’t big enough for the both of us?”
“Cretin.”
“Just go.” As so the Valeyard faded from the TARDIS
leaving the Doctor alone in the dark once more. “Blimey – what a bore! Hope I
never turn out like that.”
There was now a light in
the distance, another door, to which the Doctor walked towards, whistling a
jaunty tune of his own devising.
Skrakz looked upon the
changed visage of the Timelord with some bemusement. Something was different
about him, but what?
“Dear God, man –have you
never seen a smile?”
“Watch your tongue,
Timelord. Never belittle me again.”
“Sorry… sorry. Look; are
you coming or not?”
“What do you mean?”
“To stop the Cyberman, of
course. This way, I think.” He walked back to the door he has just come from.
“Are you still mad? Has
the encounter warped your mind? The control room is that way.” Skrakz pointed
behind him.
“Not anymore. The TARDIS
and I have come to an understanding. Follow me and don’t do anything unless I
tell you. Find the auxiliary door button. You’ll know it when you see it… it’ll
probably flash at you convincingly. When I say so, hit it and hold on to
something.”
They walked through the
door and to Skrakz amazement walked into the console room, right behind the
Cyberman, who was now plugged in to the console itself.
“Cyberman! Stop what
you’re doing; it won’t help you anyways, y’know. The TARDIS has been blocking
your transmissions.”
The Cyberman unplugged and
turned around, brandishing the gun in one fluid moment but something made it
stop.
“Phew – perhaps there’s a
wee bit of your brain that sees some logic to what I said. Equally, you must
know that I’m the only one that can possibly return you to your people. I
certainly won’t kill you and Skrakz… well, he can’t; can you, Skrakz?”
“No, Timelord.” Every
synapse, every muscle in the Sontaran’s body screamed to make the kill shot,
prove the Doctor wrong, but he knew that he couldn’t. Damn him; it was bad
enough that he had to admit such a thing, but did the Cybertrash have to
witness it as well?
“What do you propose?” The
Cyberman replied after a few seconds of computation.
“Lower the weapon and
we’ll discuss options.”
“Try to double-cross me
and we will see if you are as indestructible as your Sontaran lapdog.” One more
insult like that and Skrakz would show the Cyberscrap just what a lapdog could
do.
The Cyberman lowered his
weapon and the Doctor edged over to the opposite end of the console. Skrakz
looked at the control panel in front of him and, sure enough, there was a
single button that seemed to wink at him. That must be the auxiliary door release.
He looked to the Doctor, who had found a convenient place to stand, his hands
at the ready.
“Right.” The Doctor said
to the Cyberman. “Thank you for trusting me.”
“Trust? You know us better
than that, Timelord. It is logical to do what you say at this time. Until you
prove me otherwise, and I am ready for that as well.”
“True… well, in front of
you is a screen. Now on the screen is a blue dot and that’s us. And to the far
right is a triangular blob and that’s your fleet. Now do you know what the quickest
way is for you to reach them?”
The Cyberman looked at the
screen and then back to the Doctor.
“FLY!” The Doctor shouted
and nodded at Skrakz, who slammed his fist down on the button forcing the doors
to swing open, creating a vacuum in the Console Room. Both he and the Doctor
found strong hand-holds but the Cyberman was caught completely by surprise and
was not so lucky. Before he had a chance to even raise his gun he was sucked
out into space, and with another stab of Skrakz’s fist, the doors swung shut.
The Doctor immediately re-established a breathable atmosphere, leaving a new
unforeseen problem: what was to happen now?
Time passed. The TARDIS
landed on CHO-Tep, one of the Sontaran colonies. He and Skrakz stepped out in
to the dank, gas laden atmosphere.
“The offer still stands.
It would be my honour to have you as a companion, Commander Skrakz.”
“I’m not sure whether I
can legitimately answer that, Doctor… But my place is here, with my people. Who
knows, perhaps there is an alternative to our warrior lifestyle, after all.”
“Who knows, indeed.”
“But… as distasteful as
this sounds coming from my lips.. I am beholden to you, Doctor. You saved my
life, and helped me defeat the Cyberman.”
“Despite having the threat
of eternal torture to chivvy me along, eh?”
“Despite that. You know me
to be an honourable breed and I will repay you should you ever call on me. I
will be there.”
“Thank you, Commander. And
let’s hope that I never have to call. Hmm?”
Shaking hands, the Doctor
took one last look around him and darted back into the TARDIS. It was only a
matter of minutes before the Sontarans picked them up on the scanners and
Skrakz was going to have a hard enough time explaining things, as it was.
That left the Traveller
with another predicament: what to do now…. He still didn’t understand what had
caused his regeneration, or remember any of the events leading up to it. Was it
some universal catastrophe that was still happening, or simply being in the
wrong place at the wrong time?
There was no way of
knowing. Time would tell, it normally did. Still, with the Valeyard’s influence
gone he no longer felt the need to brood over it. It would all sort itself out
in the end, one way or another. Time would tell, in deed.
