Doctor Who_ All-Consuming Fire - Andy Lane [127]
And now we sit here, Holmes and I, warming ourselves before the fire. I write these words in my ledger and Holmes busies himself with the newspaper. It is four years to the day since we said goodbye to the strangest man we have ever met.
I sip my brandy. Rain splatters across the window. There is a storm in the offing.
Holmes looks up and smiles at me. I smile back, and wonder whether we will ever see the Doctor and his companions again.
More rain, like gravel thrown against the glass.
And thunder, echoing far away.
Epilogue
March 1843 - Jabalhabad, India
As Bernice read the last few words, she shivered.
'Any good?' Ace asked casually.
'Not bad. Want to read it?'
'Nah. I'll wait till the film comes out.'
Bernice laughed.
'I don't know how much of this is Watson and how much is Conan Doyle, but whoever it was is all right,' she said. 'It's a bit verbose at times, but the plot moves fast. A lot of the facts have been changed, mind you. I don't remember half of these things happening. And it's odd reading about Holmes and Watson, rather than-'
'What about the characterization?' Ace interrupted.
'He's got you down perfectly, but I think he misses the essential me.'
Ace grinned.
'What about the Professor?' she asked.
Bernice glanced at the Doctor, who was resting his chin on the handle of his umbrella and gazing sombrely across the lawn towards the old man and Siger Holmes, father-to-be of Sherringford, Mycroft and Sherlock.
'A good question,' she said quietly.
The Doctor's gaze shifted from his former self to his latest companion. The corners of his mouth twitched slightly in what passed for a smile.
'A question,' Bernice said.
'Fire away,' he replied, his voice muffled by the umbrella handle.
'I wouldn't say that too loudly when Ace is around.'
This time his mouth curved into a definite grin. Ace snorted, but her eyes were laughing.
'This book...' Bernice continued.
'What about it?'
'Well, a lot of the material about Victorian London is bizarre. Odd.
Grotesque, in fact.'
'That's the way it was.'
'But surely there wasn't really an air-driven underground railway running out of Euston?'
'There was indeed.'
'And strychnine as an additive to beer, and sugar being refined with bull's blood?'
'Without a doubt.'
'And the Fenians building a submarine to attack the Royal Navy with?'
'Indubitably.'
'The more I delve into history, the weirder it gets.'
'My sentiments exactly.,'
'Something I don't get,' Ace said, frowning. The setting sun cast a rose-tinted glow across her face, and she squinted. The Doctor smiled at her.
'Go on,' he said.
'Well, the big worm-thing, Azathoth, was turning its worshippers into the lobster things - the rakshassi.'
'Indeed it was.'
'Why?,
'Ah. A good question. I suspect that Azathoth was still in the larval stage of its race when it developed its powers, and had become trapped there, a mutant imago, if you like. Perhaps, had it been normal, its adult form would have resembled the rakshassi.'
'So it made everyone love it and then made them look like mum and dad,'
she said scornfully.
'It's only a theory' the Doctor replied, affronted.
'It's well weird, that's what it is.'
The Doctor gazed across at where the girl sat painting the landscape.
'Families are,' he murmured.
Across the lawn, the old man pulled a gleaming Hunter watch from the fob pocket of his waistcoat and consulted it. Unconsciously, the Doctor mirrored the action. Bernice gazed from one to the other, stunned more by the fact that it was the same watch than the same person.
'It's five past time to leave,' he said.
They rose. The Doctor gestured to his two companions to go first, sighed deeply, then raised his hat to the old man and walked away.
He didn't look back.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter