Doctor Who_ Return of the Living Dad - Kate Orman [53]
The boy looked at the picture, squinting. She held it closer. ‘No,’ he said faintly.
Woodworth turned the picture around. It showed a young man with long blond hair, caught by an amateur photographer. Heathrow, 1982. Another snap showed the same man talking to Lethbridge-bloody-Stewart earlier this year. He was supposed to appear in disguise sometimes, too, but these were the only photos Woodworth had been able to get her hands on.
‘That’s a shame,’ she said, tucking the pictures away.
‘Tell me something, just between us, all right?’
He nodded.
‘What are you? An alien? Some kind of mutant?’
‘I’m human,’ he murmured.
‘Don’t you dare say that,’ she snapped. ‘I don’t know what kind of weird mutation or experiment you are, but don’t you ever dare claim you’re a human being.’
He looked at her, uncomprehending. ‘Not to me,’ she said. ‘Never to me.’
She sat down again. ‘I’ve been doing this job for a long time. A long time. Almost nobody knows the whole story about any of this stuff. UNIT keeps things from C19. C19
keeps things from MI5. MI5 keeps things from Parliament.
And they all keep things from the public. You know who has to know all of it?’
‘The Doctor,’ he murmured.
Woodworth vibrated like a well-struck gong.
‘Good,’ she said. la Jareshth told us a lot, you know, but she hadn’t actually seen him.’ The boy looked at her, but didn’t say anything. ‘Never hitchhike,’ she told him. ‘You never know who might pick you up. Right, my lad. If you can tell us something about the Doctor, I might be able to keep you out of the hands of the dissection team.’
‘You dissected her?’
Woodworth shrugged. ‘She didn’t know anything.’
‘You killed her? But what about —’
‘Her human rights?’ smiled Woodworth.
His eyes focused, suddenly, just for a moment. ‘You’re going to have to cut me up,’ he said, ‘because I’m not going to help you.’
‘Now, son,’ she said gently. ‘You think about what you just said for a moment.’
She looked around at the white plaster walls. ‘This is an old house, you know,’ she said. ‘You might feel heroic, but you’re just another one of the hundreds who’ve ended up here. You’re not unique. Do you know how long I’ve had this job?’ He didn’t answer, but she wasn’t really talking to him anyway. was one of the few they didn’t purge in the seventies. That’s the gratitude you get for keeping the country safe, for keeping the planet safe all these years. So you see, son, I’ve seen dozens like you. It means nothing to me to send you down to the basement.’
He pulled against the straps. ‘I haven’t done anything,’
he said. ‘You don’t want to keep the planet safe, you don’t even care why I’m here.’
‘Don’t you try to put the blame on me!’ snapped Woodworth. ‘How dare you come here, and let diseases loose, and terrorize people in their beds!’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know why you aliens can never get it through your skulls. This is what human beings do. You push us, and we push back.’ She picked up one of the dentist’s probes, tapping it against a fingernail. ‘There’s no Amnesty International for you. No human rights. You can come upstairs with me and answer some questions, or you can go down to the basement.’
‘Go to hell,’ breathed the boy. His eyes were closed.
‘Anybody can die,’ said Woodworth. ‘Any amateur can manage it. But it’s one thing to make your heroic decision, and another thing to have to live through the next few hours.’
He didn’t say anything. Perhaps he was unconscious.
She picked up the clipboard and checked a box in red pen.
‘Does this mean dinner is off?’ Woodworth whirled. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ ‘Doctor!’ said the boy. ‘Jesus Christ up a flagpole!’ said Woodworth.
18 Chris Chris bang bang
Chris wandered back into consciousness. His first thought was that he had a nasty flu. His head pounded, his mouth was dry, he was a little giddy, and his bedroom light was unbearably bright.
He squeezed his eyes open. ‘Mom?’ he said to the blurred human shape above him.
‘Shh,