Doctor Who_ Blue Box - Kate Orman [97]
He had fallen to his knees on the rocks, and in front of him were the contents of his pockets: coins and trinkets, transistors and toys. On a piece of paper there was a design drawn, its lines and curves carefully marked out in a pattern of geometric relationships and symbols. It was Bob’s occult sigil, the diagram he had given the Doctor to protect him from whatever cosmic forces Swan might be able to yield.
And bless you, Bob, bless you, it didn’t mean a thing.
In that split-second of distracting nonsense, the Doctor’s thumb pressed into the trigger of the device.
120
We waited for hours. Bob and Peri waited to see what was going to become of their lives. I waited to see how my book was going to end.
And then the door opened. The Doctor came through. His black suit was dusty and damp and one of the knees was torn.
Otherwise, he looked entirely undamaged.
‘Doctor!’ shouted Bob. The Doctor gave a little bow.
‘You could have called!’ said Peri, trying hard not to burst into tears.
‘How do we know it’s him?’ I said.
The Doctor raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Do I strike you as the somnambulistic victim of neural reprogramming?’
Peri hugged him. ‘You are OK, aren’t you?’
The Doctor nodded. He looked tired, but satisfied, like someone returning from a long day’s good work.
Bob said, ‘What about Swan? And Luis? What about the Savant? Is the Earth safe? What happened?’
‘Well,’ said the Doctor, ‘I’ll tell you.’
Mondy had continued monitoring Swan’s calls the whole time.
He had overheard me setting up the meeting in the diner, and passed it on to the Doctor. The moment the Doctor was finished at Swan’s house, he put the pedal to the metal to try to catch us up. He knew the number of the payphone across the street because he’d been there five minutes ago. When he called me and then Swan at the payphone, he was just around the corner.
The police radio we had ‘borrowed’ let him broadcast a phony message about the roadblock on the bridge. (In fact, the slow traffic was quite normal. ) He had hoped to channel Swan’s movements until she was as isolated as possible – it hadn’t been his plan to end up in a tourist attraction. But at least, in the depths of winter, there hadn’t been that many people around.
The Doctor admitted, with a mixture of humility and grouch, that he had overestimated his own ability to withstand the Savant’s mental onslaught. ‘I deal with brainwashing and other such nonsense all the time,’ he said, with a dismissive wave of his hand. ‘This was different. It was far more invasive, far more physical. The more I fought, the more I thought, the more it was able to turn my own mind against me.
Bob’s diagram bought me a moment of grace. For just an instant, I wasn’t thinking at all.’ Bob looked equal parts chuffed and puzzled, but he was happy to accept his role in saving the day.
Peri kept giving the Doctor hugs. She even made a cup of tea and brought it to him, while they both joked about it. She looked more relaxed than she had since I had first met her, and not only because the crisis was over: she had made up her mind about where she wanted to be.
We saw Mr Ghislain once more. The Doctor pulled some strings to get us access to the rest home where Swan and Luis had been placed for observation, and perhaps a few more so that I could come along for the visit. I don’t know what strings he pulled to allow Mr Ghislain to bring his parrot.
I don’t know for sure who Ghislain or the Eridani really were. I prefer my initial guess: Russian agents whose technology – a supercomputer with organic components, possibly intended for space exploration – had got loose, perhaps after a deal with a double agent went sour.
Swan and Luis had been moved to a little patients’ lounge for our visit. They sat side by side on a