Doctor Who_ Corpse Marker - Chris Boucher [66]
‘Oh hell,’ Con wailed, ‘no! Grimwade’s Syndrome my tin bum. You mean he’s a raving robot twitchy, don’t you?’
‘Ander Poul listen to me,’ the Doctor commanded in his most imposing voice, hoping he could cow him into sitting still.
‘Listen to me. Robots are trying to kill you.’
‘ What? ’ Con squawked.
The Doctor ignored him. ‘But I promise you they are nothing to do with me.’ Poul had lowered his hands and was listening. ‘I know you’re in trouble and I want to help you if I can.’
‘You are Taren Capel,’ Poul said but it could have been a question. He sounded less sure of himself. Even the facial tics were becoming less marked.
‘Are you sure you’re not this Taren Capel character?’ Con asked loudly. ‘Sounds like an undercover alias to me, Doctor.’
‘I was an undercover agent,’ Poul said.
Con lost concentration momentarily. ‘Another one?’ The flier dipped and wobbled.
‘My job was to fmd you.’ Poul looked and sounded almost reasonable now.
‘Not me,’ the Doctor said. ‘You were looking for Taren Capel.’
‘I thought I’d found him.’
The Doctor reached out and patted his shoulder. ‘You did find him. You were there when he was destroyed. So was I.’ He smiled at him. Poul smiled back. The Doctor relaxed a little. The man certainly seemed calmer. ‘We must have a long chat after we land,’ the Doctor said. ‘In the meantime you just settle back and relax. Everything’s going to be fine.’
Poul sat back and was closing his eyes when Con said, ‘You think he’s right? You think it is Taren Capel in the corpse marker?’
The Doctor held it up slightly for a better look. The scream took him completely by surprise. He barely had time to realise that it was Poul screaming and that suddenly Poul was no longer calm before the man was plunging over the back of the seat, flailing his arms and howling hysterically. The Doctor struggled to restrain him and tried to push him back out of Con’s way. He could see that the young pilot was not panicking exactly but the screaming had obviously unnerved him as had the flurry of action. In the melee one of Poul’s elbows or it might have been his knee caught Con in the ear and he recoiled from the blow, ducking back and to one side. He lost control of the flier temporarily and it began to topple and plunge.
‘Are you all right, Con?’ the Doctor shouted.
Con straightened up his position. ‘What’s the matter with that lunatic?’ he yelled, fighting to restore stability and bring the flier back level. ‘Is he trying to kill us all?’
‘I don’t think he knows where he is or what he’s doing.’
‘Make him understand,’ Con demanded. ‘Stop it, you twitchy bucket-brain!’ he raged at Poul and took one hand off the controls to lash out at him.
‘Stop that!’ the Doctor ordered. ‘You’re only making things worse.’
Poul was keening and moaning and thrashing about but the Doctor was finally managing to constrain him enough to be able to force him into the back seat again. ‘Poul. Poul. Listen to me, Poul. Poul. Poul. Listen to me, Poul.’ The Doctor repeated the phrases over and over like a carnival mesmerist. ‘Be calm. Calm down. Be calm. Calm down.’ Not letting go of Poul, he gradually turned himself round and knelt up on his own seat so that he could manoeuvre him down. ‘There’s nothing to be frightened of, Poul,’ he said, easing the terrified man into the back seat.
‘Yes there is,’ Con said. ‘I’ll kill him if he does that again.’
‘Sit down, Poul,’ the Doctor said. ‘And relax. Sit down, Poul.
And relax.’ He repeated this mantra until Poul did as he was told and sat down and went limp. The Doctor watched him carefully for a while but there was no change in his behaviour: he simply sat staring at the floor of the flier.
‘What in hell set him off?’ Con asked.
The flier lurched and dropped through a pocket of clear air turbulence. The Doctor turned round and sat back down in his seat. ‘I think it was the robot deactivation disc,’ he said.
Con angled the flier upwards to regain the lost height.
‘Typical twitchy.’
‘There’s no such thing,’ said the Doctor, searching the seat.
‘And if there was he certainly