Doctor Who_ Camera Obscura - Lloyd Rose [112]
Nathaniel went to the control cube at the side of the stage. She kept her eyes on the machine. As she watched, it seemed to become brighter. She heard a sweet musical hum, piercingly clear.
Was the metal really gleaming more intensely? Or was she imagining it? She clasped her hands together till her fingers ached, unable to look away. Could she do this? It was only a few steps. Think of it that way. Just a few steps. And then she was there, and it was just a few more steps...
‘You can go now,’ said Nathaniel softly.
She started. Nathaniel crossed and opened the door. She walked toward it as if in a dream. She glimpsed the inner chamber, glowing with sunlight and shade. She saw a corner of a wooden porch, the white wall of a house. Yes. She raised her chin. Her step lightened. Yes. She let Nathaniel take her hand and guide her in, heard him push the door to. In front of her, the second door opened. She stepped forward.
Yes.
* * *
Nathaniel stood tensely outside the machine, arms crossed, almost shivering. He could use a pipe. No. No more of that. No more of that, whatever happened. Oh God, he thought, whatever does happen to me, let it work for her. Let it not turn out an obscene joke. If she... if she came back... changed, it would be better to... He paced to the edge of the stage. No. He couldn’t do it. He wouldn’t be able to kill her.
But the other one would.
I really should devise a name for him, he thought giddily. We can hardly go on calling each other Nathaniel.
Of course, it wasn’t for much longer.
His head snapped up. There was a stumbling and struggling from the entrance. ‘Is that you?’
‘Who else?’ His other self lurched into view. ‘And I’ve brought a guest.’ Chiltern heaved forward something entwined in thorns and dropped it in front of him like a heavy package. It groaned.
Oh God, it was a man. Nathaniel raced up the aisle. ‘What have you done? Who is –’ He stumbled to a halt. ‘Doctor?’
‘Hello,’ the Doctor said thickly.
‘Are you out of your – Release him, for God’s sake!’
Sullenly, Chiltern slid the briers away. The Doctor rolled limply on to the carpet. Nathaniel knelt beside him. ‘This is monstrous!’
‘Well, what do you expect from a monster?’ Chiltern leaned sulkily against the back wall with his arms crossed, watching Nathaniel wipe the Doctor’s bleeding face and examine his torn arms and chest.
‘Are you badly hurt?’
‘No.’ The Doctor took the handkerchief from Nathaniel and pressed it to his wounded cheek.
‘That should be sewn up.’
‘No offence, but your sense of priorities is skewed. Where is the machine?’ The Doctor started to get up. Casually, Chiltern sent out a brier to whip around his neck, jerking him back with a thud. The Doctor gasped in pain and annoyance. ‘Can you call him off?’
‘Let him go,’ said Nathaniel.
Chiltern sighed. ‘We’ll compromise.’
He shifted the brier to the Doctor’s ankle. The Doctor carefully stood up, bracing himself on a chair back. He saw the stage and went white:
‘You’re not using it!’
‘Miss Jane,’ said Nathaniel simply.
‘What?!’ the Doctor yelled. ‘Are you mad too? I thought you, of all of them, had a moral sense!’
‘All of them?’ Nathaniel echoed angrily. ‘There is no “them”, Doctor. There’s only us.’ He nodded toward Chiltern. ‘There’s only me.’
‘You’re not like him.’
‘For God’s sake,’ Nathaniel cried, ‘why do you think that’s so? If he has no moral sense, it’s because when we were split it ended up in me. If he’s “evil”, I’m responsible. And if I’m “good”, it’s to his cost.’
‘Rubbish! That’s what Sebastian believed about you, that your madness was his fault.’
‘Sebastian was a complete human being. I am not!’
The Doctor stared desperately around the room. ‘Too late,’ he whispered. ‘Is it too late? Is it happening?’
‘Stop being melodramatic, Doctor! The machine has been used several times without causing damage to anything except the person in it.’
‘It’s cumulative, a kindling reaction. The fact that nothing has happened yet only means it’s getting ready to.’
‘That hardly follows.’
With a cry of rage,