Doctor Who_ Camera Obscura - Lloyd Rose [38]
‘Split?’
‘Splintered. Fractured. Altogether there are eight of him.’
‘Eight?’ said Sabbath, fascinated. ‘Are you certain?’
‘I saw all of them at once. They worked in unison to kill me.’
‘Could there have been more?’
‘Possible, but I don’t think so. It was very difficult for them to be too far separated, because of the stress of the eight different sensory inputs.’
Sabbath leaned back in his chair, intrigued. ‘And it was one personality?’
‘Yes, not like octuplets. Some independence of movement, obviously, but a basic integration of physical and mental self.’
‘So the trick with the pinprick...’
‘If you pricked one, they all bled. If you hit one, the other seven felt the blow.’
‘We have no way of knowing how long he’s been like this?’
‘No. He’s only been touring with his act four months. I couldn’t trace him before that. I don’t think he’s the only example, either.’
‘Of the fracturing?’
The Doctor nodded. ‘There was a murder case only a few months ago. Eight people, an adult man and seven male children –’ He stopped. He jerked around to face the door through which the young woman had gone.
‘Interesting,’ murmured Sabbath.
The Doctor turned slowly back to him. ‘You hadn’t figured it out?’
‘I’m sorry to admit it, but no.’
‘So you just took into service a woman you thought was a mass-murderer of children?’
Sabbath shrugged. ‘I rescued her from a state institution. This is a war. All the combatants can’t be choirboys.’
‘You know,’ said the Doctor too quietly, ‘there’s a large pool of possible recruits that falls somewhere between choirboys and child-killers.’
‘Her gift is exceptional. She can actually see things you and I need instruments to perceive. I’m not surprised to find out she didn’t kill those children. That would have to be a psychopathic act, and she shows definite signs of a moral sense – her own, to be sure, but quite strong in its way.’
‘I’m so glad she doesn’t offend your sense of categories.’
Sabbath sighed again, with genuine, not theatrical, weariness. ‘All right, ride your moral high horse. Don’t sully yourself by association with me. Your integrity is much more important than our unity in the face of a force that might possibly unravel reality.’
I’ve been here before, the Doctor thought suddenly. In league with a moral monster. He strained for details, but gained only a sense of despair and helpless rage. And of fear. Falling...? It was no use. He wasn’t going to remember. He stared up at the intricate plaster fretwork of the ceiling. ‘My integrity...’ he said tiredly, feeling the weak, unnatural beat of his single heart. ‘You’ve destroyed that. I’m not complete. I’m not even incomplete. I’m separated.’
‘You’re alive to be separated,’ Sabbath pointed out calmly. ‘Technically speaking, this is the second time I’ve saved your life.’
The Doctor turned his cool, distant eyes on him. ‘Thank you so much,’ he said quietly. ‘I hope I can make you regret it.’
* * *
Chapter Nine
The Doctor didn’t make the seventeen steps back up to the flat, he collapsed about halfway. Fortunately the landlady was out and the maid busy with the washing in the cellar. He could lie in privacy, catching his breath, waiting for the tremor in his limbs to subside and enough strength to seep back into his body for him to make it up to the landing and through the door. This, at least, was his plan. It was foiled, the privacy part anyway, when the front door opened and Anji came in.
‘Doctor!’
She ran up the stairs and sat beside him. He looked terrible, greyish, and his eyes were strange. When she and Fitz had found him gone from the medical lab, they had both panicked. Fitz was still out combing the streets – he knew it was futile to the point of absurdity, but he couldn’t sit and do nothing. Anji, torn, had finally decided she’d be more anxious if she stayed away from the flat, wondering if the Doctor had returned and needed help, so she’d come back.
And now here he was, crumpled, eyes half shut,