Doctor Who_ Interference_ Book Two - Lawrence Miles [91]
Sam wondered how James Stewart knew all this. Perhaps he’d read the script. ‘And that’s it?’ she asked. ‘The end of the world?’
‘No. By the 2060s, there’ll be new governments forming. New power blocs. But the same old patterns are going to repeat themselves. By the 2080s, things are going to be the same as they were in the 1980s. Two great empires, on the brink of war. Presidents and politicians with their fingers on the buttons.’
‘But that’s stupid,’ said Sam. ‘It means the whole thing’s worthless. Everything we’re going to go through. If no one ever learns anything, what’s the point?’
The numbers were actually trembling. Watching. Waiting. Ready to make equations that couldn’t be unmade.
‘Then what are you going to do?’ James Stewart asked.
‘Change it,’ said Sam.
‘You’re going to go into politics?’
‘No. You said that wouldn’t work, didn’t you?’
‘Did I?’
‘The same old patterns, that’s what you said. If I go into politics, so what? All politics is the same. It doesn’t matter what they say they stand for. They’re all playing with the same rules, aren’t they? It’s like… it’s like back when we lived in the jungle, and the biggest monkey got to make all the laws, so he made sure he was on top and everyone else was underneath. We haven’t changed. We haven’t changed the rules since then. All the leaders, all the prime ministers, they’re just big monkeys in suits. We need new rules. That’s the only way we can break out of this, isn’t it? By making new rules.’
‘I can’t make that decision,’ James Stewart told her.
‘I can. I want a better world. I want a different world. I mean, really different.’
‘Then what are you going to do?’ James Stewart repeated. A little more urgently this time.
‘Something else,’ Sam replied. ‘I don’t know what. I’ll think of something.’
And the numbers locked.
Then James Stewart got to his feet. The equations were popping like bubbles around his head.
‘Good,’ he said. ‘Good. It’s your decision. In your current state of mind, I could have just told you what to do. But I did that kind of thing quite a lot in my last lifetime, and I’m not sure it was ever worth it.’
‘Who were you before you were James Stewart, then?’ Sam asked.
The actor beamed. ‘Many people,’ he said. ‘Some of them very talented. But you’ve made your decision. It had to be yours. All I did was give you the facts. You interpreted them in your own way. A little bit of interference in the signals around you, but that’s all. If anybody ever asks, you’ll be sure to tell them that, won’t you?’
Sam nodded. She could keep that promise, even if she couldn’t actually understand it.
‘I always said I was beyond politics,’ James Stewart told her. ‘Now I think I was right. But not in the way I meant. Well… goodbye, Sam. I really have to be going now. Sarah should be coming back into the console room any minute, and… no, never mind.’
Without another word, he turned, and lowered himself through the trapdoor. Sam heard the soft thump of his feet on the carpet below, then the even softer sound of his footsteps, padding away down the hall.
* * *
A few minutes later, Sam’s father climbed up into the attic.
He didn’t say a word. But he seemed to know what had been happening, somehow. His face was pale, his eyes wide, as if he’d seen something he didn’t want to have to remember. He seemed confused as he stood over her, maybe embarrassed. He kept staring into the corners, searching for some way of starting a conversation.
In the end, he just got down on his knees, and put his arm around Sam’s body. Only one arm, Sam noted; the other one looked as though it had been broken, and now she thought about it, hadn’t James Stewart had the same problem? Well, that made a kind of sense. Her father and James Stewart were both part of the same process, so why shouldn