Divided Loyalties

by Gary Russell

  ‘What a fascinating life you have led, my dear. So many accomplishments - the world, your world that is, is justifiably proud of you. Now, let’s see where Monsieur LeFevre rescued you from. Ah yes... Earth. The Thames estuary - near Kent, is it? Heading towards the English Channel, flying solo... 6th January 1941.’

  The Toymaker’s eyes popped open and he smiled. ‘The Second World War. One of my favourite periods. Madam, allow me to introduce you to Lieutenant-Colonel Mark Conrad, US

  Marine Corps.’ He stood before a statue of a man in battle fatigues, although again she couldn’t quite place the uniform.’

  He wasn’t much of a challenge, I must say. Part of the force that stormed Avranches in July 1944. Oh, of course, for you that hasn’t happened.’

  ‘The Americans are not taking part in this war,’ the woman said flatly, but something about the Toymaker’s confidence sapped hers.

  ‘They will, madam, they will.’ He clicked his fingers as if he was trying to remember something. Out of thin air, a mechanical man appeared and she stepped back. It was like something out of a Buck Rogers serial. On its chest was a small projection screen. The Toymaker pointed at it. ‘Is this yours?’

  On the screen was her plane - the one she had been flying when Monsieur LeFevre appeared beside her. At first she had assumed he was a stowaway but he told her to fly towards a cloud. The next thing she remembered was standing beside the plane in a vast wooden hangar, LeFevre telling her that his master wanted a word.

  ‘Why am I here, Mr Toymaker?’

  ‘I am preparing a new game for one of my old foes, madam. I’m seeking out some extra players and Monsieur LeFevre saw you on my memory mirror and thought you looked as if you enjoyed a good challenge.’

  ‘I am on official government business, sir. There is a war on in case you have forgotten, and the Auxiliary Air Force need me to get that plane to... to...’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I. .. I can’t remember where I was flying to...’

  The Toymaker smiled. ‘I think she is coming around to our way of thinking.’

  ‘If you torment cardsharps and such like, why am I here?’

  She finally put aside her fears. Whatever phantom zone she had found herself in, she would conduct herself with all the strength of a true daughter of Hull. ‘I don’t gamble!’

  ‘Don’t gamble?’ The Toymaker laughed loudly. ‘Don’t gamble. Dear lady, you are in a rather flimsy flying contraption, crossing a vast expanse of water amidst some of the worst weather of the year, during a war, and you say you don’t gamble. You were gambling your life versus the elements.

  Merciful heavens, madam, the greatest gamble possible. And you lost!’ He roared the last words out, almost shaking with outrage. ‘And you say you don’t gamble. Monsieur LeFevre saved your life, madam, offered you a place in history. Play the game and you will reach your destination safe and sound.

  Fail and... well, what can I say?’ The image of the plane vanished from the metal man’s chest, leaving the Toymaker holding a scale version of it in his hand.

  A model. A toy.

  And yet something told her it was more than that. The scratches she could see on the wing tip were similar to the gash her craft had received moments earlier. And that crack in the cockpit...

  ‘My God,’ she breathed.

  ‘How very kind, but ―lord‖ will do. Or ―master‖.’ The Toymaker pointed to a table that hadn’t been there seconds beforehand. ‘A simple game of cribbage, madam. How can you lose?’

  She looked at the model aircraft, which LeFevre had taken from his master, and her eyes were drawn to the empty cockpit. Then she looked at the statues.

  Or whatever they really were.

  And she fixed the Toymaker with a steely stare for which she was famous back home. ‘I doubt I have a chance to win, Toymaker, but I won’t go down without a fight. Prepare for the crib game of your life.’

  ‘I love spirited people’ He looked over to LeFevre.

  ‘Refreshments, Gaylord. And my congratulations on finding me the first worthy opponent since... well, yourself!’ He began dealing.

  ‘You begin, Ms Johnson. After all, it’s your game...’

  7

  Pretending to See the Future

  ‘And you say the communications were cut off just as we...

  arrived?’

  ‘Almost to the second, Doctor.’

  ‘Well,’ the Doctor smiled at Commander Oakwood, ‘I can see why you thought we might be involved.’

  ‘Thought?’

  ‘Ah, so you still do, eh?’ The Doctor took a step back. ‘We really are on the side of the angels, you know.’

  Adric butted in, unhelpfully adding ‘And when we do something wrong, then you’ll know not to trust us.’ The silence which greeted this made him frown.

  ‘Oh, thank you, Adric,’ the Doctor said. ‘Helpful as ever.’ He looked sheepishly at the bridge crew. ‘What my young friend here is trying to say is -’

  ‘Irrelevant, Doctor,’ cut in Oakwood. ‘Fact is, we haven’t got a clue what’s happened on Dymok and, convenient as it would be if you were to blame, it would be an enormous coincidence... not to mention a stroke of luck for our security teams.’

  Nyssa piped up. ‘We have a saying on Traken about that -

  we say that the universe is made up of coincidences all coming together to make one happy accident.’

  Oakwood, Townsend and the others gave her quizzical looks.

  ‘Tell me, Doctor,’ said Paladopous, ‘d’you travel with these people out of friendship or have you committed a crime and they are your penance?’

  The wave of short, but necessary, laughter, broke the tension on the bridge and everyone relaxed a bit, although Nyssa and Adric were left wondering what they’d said.

  The Doctor put on his half-frame glasses and began sifting through the traffic records on Townsend’s computer screen, replaying the last transmissions from Dymok, while Tegan tried to avoid being stared at by Paladopous.

  After a few moments she turned round to him and, slightly more forcefully than even she intended, she went straight for the jugular. ‘Is it common practice to eye up every woman on your station, or are you just really sad?’

  Oakwood tried to stop a smile growing on his face, while Townsend raised an eyebrow in mock alarm. Paladopous had the decency to look embarrassed, made an excuse and left the bridge.

  ‘Tegan,’ the Doctor leaned towards her. ‘We are trying to make friends here.’

  ‘You may be, Doctor, but I just want to go home.

  Remember?’

  He gave her another one of those looks. ‘We need to talk about things. What happened when you tried to touch the TARDIS?’

  Tegan opened her mouth to speak but no words came out.

  She didn’t know the answer to his question, and this worried her. As usual, though, she answered with a touch more aggression than she intended. ‘What do you mean?’

  The Doctor smiled suddenly, and Tegan felt herself calm down, almost as if someone had turned off her aggro switch.

  ‘Well,’ he said, ‘as soon as I can find out what the problem is here, we’ll have proved our innocence and can be on our way.’

  ‘And will that be difficult?’ she hissed at him, hoping no one would hear them.

  ‘In what way?’

  Tegan sighed. ‘In every way. You know, in that it’s difficult to get me home. In that it’s difficult to land on a planet when you want a space ship and vice versa. In that it’s difficult to go somewhere where people don’t start dropping dead by the dozen...’

  Tegan stopped, realising she had gone too far.

  The Doctor peered over the top of his lenses. ‘Tegan, has anyone told you how nice it is to have you around?’

  ‘Not recently, no’

  ‘No? Hmmm, I wonder why that is?’ The Doctor returned to his task.

  With an exaggerated sigh Tegan straightened up and smoothed down her uniform. (Nyssa had promised to go
through the TARDIS wardrobe with her soon so that they could both choose something new to wear instead of forever getting the TARDIS to work its overnight magic on her lilac air hostess outfit.)

  Weird that - so far, she and Adric had always worn what they were wearing when they arrived in the TARDIS. Even Nyssa had only swapped an impractical skirt for trousers. It was as if none of them wanted to feel settled, to feel relaxed enough to change their clothes. As if the Doctor might actually live up to his promise and take them home - in her case, ready to board that aeroplane and start her old life again.

  Or perhaps all three of them were just clinging on to the remnants of their old lives, their previous existences which, deep down, they knew they would never get back to.

  Tegan shook that thought out of her mind - it was for a less stressful time.

  Everyone on the bridge was intent on their work, and she could see nothing of Adric and Nyssa.

  Touching the TARDIS... she had reached out to touch the TARDIS and... Something was nagging at the back of her mind, something she meant to tell the Doctor.

  For some reason she started thinking about Brisbane.

  Home. Her father’s farm.

  Why now?

  She looked back at the Doctor, busy working alongside Townsend, and realised that whatever it was she needed to tell him was irrevocably gone.

  Which meant it probably wasn’t important.

  Stung by Tegan’s rebuke, Paladopous had met up with Nyssa and Adric in the mess, where Braune had escorted them a few moments earlier. The lieutenant was now preparing something for them to eat - or rather, preparing something for Adric. Nyssa just wanted a glass of water.

  ‘So, where are you from?’ He decided he needed to strike up a conversation, and that was as good a place to start as any.

  ‘Traken,’ said Nyssa.

  ‘Traken? Never heard of it. Is it in Europe?’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ said Adric between mouthfuls of pink goo,

  ‘it’s in another part of the galaxy.’

  ‘Mettula Orionis,’ Nyssa said. ‘Or was’

  ‘Was?’

  Nyssa shrugged. ‘It was destroyed. The whole constellation.

  By the man in my father’s body.’

  Paladopous wondered if he should follow this one up.

  ‘Come again.’

  ‘Oh look, it’s really quite simple. I should have thought even an average-intelligence Earthman would grasp it,’

  snapped Adric. ‘The Doctor’s oldest enemy, the Master, killed Nyssa’s stepmother and then absorbed her father because he was dying.’

  ‘Who, her father?’

  ‘No! The Master, of course. He needed a new body and he used the power of the Source on Traken to merge with Tremas and thus rejuvenate. Then later, when he attempted to take over the universe, he used entropy to completely wipe out the system Nyssa comes from. She’s the only survivor.’

  Paladopous wasn’t entirely sure how much of this was true and how much was the food doing something odd to Adric’s brain. He looked at Nyssa. ‘Is this true? Is your father trapped inside this Master character?’

  Nyssa said it was. ‘I’m not sure how much of my father is still there or whether he’s 100 per cent the Master now. I once asked the Doctor if there was any way to separate them, get my father back.’

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘I... I don’t think he ever gave me an answer. I don’t suppose it’s possible to do so, really. But I do often think about my father. When I close my eyes at night, I see him, my mother, Kassia, the Keeper, all of them in the garden on Traken’ she sighed deeply. ‘I miss him enormously.’

  Paladopous reached out and touched her small hand, hoping she wouldn’t react like Tegan. Instead, Nyssa just looked down and then smiled at him. ‘I’m all right really. I’ve got my studies, my science experiments and everything in the TARDIS. The Doctor is fun, and Tegan and Adric are there. We all keep each other sane, I suppose.’

  ‘I’m an orphan, too,’ said Adric, presumably noticing that he hadn’t yet become the centre of attention.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes, and I’m from another universe entirely. My parents are dead, my brother’s dead, my people are really spiders grown inside river-fruit. It’s great where I come from’ He paused. ‘And the Doctor was different then, too. Much older-looking. It’s funny - as he gets older, he becomes a younger man.’ He grinned at Paladopous. ‘Isn’t life odd?’ He finished off his food.

  ‘Anyway, I preferred the old Doctor.’

  Adric!’

  ‘It’s true, Nyssa. It was just him and me for ages. We had adventures and everything’ He reached out for his drink but as he touched it, the world seemed to swivel and he fell off his chair.

  ‘What the...’

  He reached out to grab Nyssa as he fell.

  But she wasn’t there. Wherever ‘there’ was.

  He wasn’t in the station anymore - he could feel a wind and see leaves rustling on trees.

  And rolling along the floor towards him was a river-fruit. He was home - on Alzarius!

  ‘Adric!’

  He whirled around - the voice, it was... it was Varsh. His brother! And there were his parents, Morell and Tanisa! But weren’t they dead?

  ‘Come home, Adric,’ they said in unison. ‘We need you here. The Starliner needs your mathematical excellence - we can’t start it without you.’

  ‘No, Adric, here.’

  He turned, and saw Deciders Draith and Garif staring at star charts. They were the leaders of the colony - surely he had to obey them.

  ‘Adric,’ Draith was saying, his long grey beard blowing in the wind, ‘you’ve seen the universe. Come and use your skills to plot us a route home.’

  ‘Adric?’

  It was Jiana, his old friend. He had grown up with her, but she had run away from him when he said he wanted to be an Outler, a rebel, like Varsh. He never saw her again...

  ‘Adric, you are so brave, so clever. You’ve done all those things. Beaten the vampires, saved the Tharils, fought the Master, trapped the Ferutu and even burned up the Terileptils and their plague rats. You’re my hero’ And Jiana swooned against him.

  Gingerly, he eased her off and went to give the Deciders a quick once-over, calling to his family that he’d be with them in a moment.

  ‘You’ve got it all wrong,’ he said with a deep sigh as he looked at the star charts. ‘Why didn’t you listen to what the Doctor told you to do?’

  The Doctor had, of course, told them exactly how to get home but, as usual, no one had listened to him.

  No one except Adric.

  He had been there the longest. Aboard the TARDIS, that is.

  Ever since Romana and K9 had stayed in E-Space, it had just been the Doctor and him. Exploring the universe. Having lots of adventures. Together they had visited planets of fire and water, faced off armies of monsters and defeated terrible despots. Armed with the Doctor’s guile and cunning matched with Adric’s charm, wit and mathematical skills, they had vanquished the wrongdoers wherever they had gone.

  The Doctor liked Adric - that was obvious. They had been a team.

  A family.

  Until the girls came along.

  ‘I am your friend, Adric. I am someone who understands you.

  Who wants to help you,’ said a new voice from... the air.

  ‘Who are you?’

  Then Adric wasn’t beside the Deciders any more.

  Unsurprisingly, neither Jiana nor his family were with him either. He now stood inside the Deciders’ hall... no, he was on the bridge of the Starliner, the huge ship that was going to take his people back to Terradon, the planet they’d never actually been to. Which was certainly a bit confusing, but he understood it.

  The man who was talking to him was standing at the top of the command centre, where Decider Draith usually stood.

  The man who was talking to him was about the same height as the Doctor - the real Doctor, the one Adric had o
riginally met, rather than the one he had become. The Doctor Adric knew. And trusted.

  The Doctor Adric missed.

  The man who was talking to him was dressed in a strange long robe decorated with dragons and swirly patterns, and wore a straight flat hat, similarly embroidered. He was smiling, holding his hands outstretched, welcoming.

  ‘How can you help me? I don’t need help. I’m fine.’ Adric knew he had often been suckered into other people’s plans. At least, he knew that’s how the others thought of it. But no - he always had a plan. He always pretended to go along with people, ready to switch back to the Doctor at the last minute.

  But not this time. This time he would not play the fool. He would not give Tegan the chance to put him down in that oh-so-superior way she did.

  He wouldn’t need those pitying looks from Nyssa, who always said she knew what he had been planning, but still joined forces with the new Doctor and Tegan and assumed he had been fooled.

  Not this time.

  This time Adric would show them.

  ‘Good. That’s very good.’ The man’s smile widened.

  ‘What’s good?’ asked Adric. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Oh yes you do, young Adric. You understand very well. We are alike, you and I. Strangers in a strange land. Losers in a lost land even.’

  ‘How so?’

  Suddenly the man was right in front of Adric, although he hadn’t seen him move. He put his face very close, and Adric could feel his breath, smell how sweet and nice it was, feel tiny gusts of air on his nose each time the man breathed out as he spoke.

  ‘I, too, am from another universe, Adric. Born elsewhere and forced to live out my life in a place not my own. Oh I know you wanted to travel with the Doctor and see places you had only ever dreamed of before. But the truth is, you want to go home now, don’t you?’

  Adric shook his head. Of course he didn’t. He liked it here with the Doctor. If only he was still the Doctor, rather than this Doctor...