Doctor Who_ Bad Therapy - Matthew Jones [98]
Mikey’s reaction to the question was not what Jack had expected. Instead of getting annoyed, he just looked away, embarrassed.
‘I ain’t got no brothers,’ he said, finally. ‘Two sisters back in Kingston, but no brothers.’
The Doctor nodded, as if this was exactly the reply he had expected. ‘Go on. Please.’
‘When I came to London, to England, I was on me own. I don’t get on with me family, but I still miss them, you know? And then one evening I got home from the site – Jack was out with his man –’ Mikey glanced at Jack and then quickly away.
‘And?’ the Doctor asked, his face alive with curiosity. He was standing close to Mikey, peering up intensely at him and making tiny circling motions with his hands, urging the lad on.
‘And he was just there, you know? On the step, crying his eyes out, like a little lost calf. The kid needed someone to look after him, so I did.’ Awkwardly, Mikey met the Doctor’s intense gaze. ‘I always knew that it was too good to be true, but I don’t care. He’s me kid brother now, and –’ he shrugged ‘– and I love him.’
The Doctor grinned, suddenly and naturally. ‘I just love human beings,’ he said and reached out and tapped Mikey on his flat nose. ‘No logic to your behaviour at all, and yet you’re so irresistible. How do you do it?’
Mikey frowned and backed off, wiping the tears from his face with the back of his hand. ‘Are you making fun of me?’
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‘Perhaps just a little and I really don’t mean to. Of course he’s your brother.
Don’t ever doubt it. You wanted him so much that you willed him into existence. The answer to all your prayers sitting on your doorstep, like a birthday gift.’
Jack didn’t like the way the Doctor was talking. It was frightening to think that the Doctor wasn’t human, that he came from somewhere else, somewhere Jack couldn’t imagine. But that wasn’t what really disturbed Jack. While listening to Mikey’s story he had found himself thinking about his own life. Of an afternoon outside Holborn library.
He only half heard the Doctor turn to where Tilda stood in the doorway and say, ‘You arranged for Mikey to find Dennis on his doorstep, didn’t you? For how long have you been planting your little gifts throughout the city. How many? Fifty? A hundred?
Tilda stood in the doorway, hugging her thin arms to her rakish chest. ‘I’ve lost count. My people need friends, Doctor,’ she said. ‘Special friends to care for. To provide what is most needed.’
‘To be what is most needed,’ the Doctor corrected.
Jack’s eyes rested on Tilda’s impassive face, but he was seeing an image from his past: the most beautiful boy he’d ever set eyes upon stooping to help him retrieve his fallen library books. Ocean-blue eyes framed by long dark lashes.
What Jack had most needed.
‘Eddy,’ Jack said, tears welling up in his eyes again.
‘Yes, like Eddy Stone,’ Tilda said neutrally.
Jack felt something inside himself die. A little flame of hope and. . . love, snuffed out, leaving him hollow inside.
‘Time for action,’ said the Doctor. ‘We’re not out of this yet.’
The little boy looked like an angel in sleep. Like a cherub. Julia Mannheim had to remind herself that the anaesthetized child was not real but only a mass of cloned cells grown from human tissue. An organic instrument, with as much autonomy as her reflection in the mirror.
So, why do I always sweat when I do this? Julia looked up to see Moriah’s dull grey eyes on her as she prepared the instruments for surgery.
The director had explained everything and of course it made perfect sense.
The unconscious boy had ended up at the Institute due to an unfortunate mistake at Chelmsford General Hospital. The Doctor was a patient left over from the project. What else could explain his bizarre behaviour and strange stories? Moriah had asked. Julia had already begun to admonish herself for being taken in by a patient’s delusions. She was supposed to be a doctor after all.
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Quickly, she found the glands at the base