Doctor Who_ The Algebra of Ice - Lloyd Rose [59]
Was anything else done to you?’ Ethan shook his head. ‘Forgive me, but I must ask. Did you –’
‘No.’
‘One could hardly have blamed you.’
‘Did you catch them?’
‘No,’ said the Doctor. Ethan didn’t like the look in his eyes. ‘They must have discovered your escape almost immediately. By the time anyone got to the house, the vulture had flown. Vultures, you say. Unwin was there too, I suppose.’ Ethan nodded. ‘Anyone else?’
‘I don’t think so. I can’t be sure. Did they take the computers?’
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The Algebra of Ice
‘Oh yes. Ripped them right off their wires. Did you get to see any of the work?’
‘Some of it.’ Ethan moved his neck to get the stiffness out. ‘He hadn’t got much farther with the entropy rubbish, and he hadn’t built on anything I’d done. He showed me a different problem he was working on, but it didn’t look like much.’
‘Difficult?’
‘Well, certainly beyond Unwin’s abilities,’ Ethan said thoughtfully. ‘I’m fairly certain I could have done it. Might have taken some time.’
‘Any idea what the second problem was about?’
‘Not the foggiest.’
‘Hm.’ Not really to Ethan’s surprise, the Doctor had his umbrella with him.
Now he tapped his chin with it, humming thoughtfully.
‘Unwin’s quite brilliant,’ Ethan admitted. ‘But not brilliant enough to deal with entropy.’
‘None of you is.’
‘None of us?’
‘Humans.’
‘Ah yes, I forgot. But your lot are.’
‘My lot, and others.’
‘Oth– Hang on, you mean them? The ones who want to come through?’ The Doctor waited for him to work it out. ‘Unwin can’t get there on his own. But coming from the other side. . . ’
‘And from the other end of the computations.’
‘. . . they’ll join up with him.’ Ethan’s eyes darted unseeingly around the room as he put things together. ‘But that means that they’re. . . that they’ve solved entropy.’
‘Or at least controlled it to such a degree it hardly functions.’
‘But the laws of physics –’
‘In this universe.’
There was a pause.
‘Oh, of course,’ Ethan said a bit giddily. ‘I should have thought. Naturally there are other universes.’
‘Yes.’
‘Loads and loads, I’ll bet.’
‘A great many. Do you want any food?’
‘Hang food! What are we going to do?’
Chapter Fifteen
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Ethan started to sit up, but the Doctor gently pushed him back. ‘I’m working on that.’
‘You have been from the beginning, haven’t you? You sussed it out right away.’
‘Not quite right away. And not entirely. Even now, I’m not sure of our invaders’ motives. I don’t know what they want.’
‘They tried to pull you through,’ said Ethan.
The Doctor, who had begun to pace, stopped. ‘Sorry?’
‘They tried to pull you through,’ Ethan repeated. ‘Perhaps it’s you they want.’
‘Dear me.’ The Doctor tapped his chin some more. ‘I think you have a point.
That’s not a good thing at all.’
‘As opposed to invading Earth?’
‘As opposed to invading Earth if I’m not here.’
‘What?’ Ethan said blankly.
But as if he hadn’t heard him, still tapping his chin, humming, the Doctor left the room. Like the white rabbit down his hole, Ethan thought dazedly. Down his hole to another, magical, frightening world. Then he, like the dormouse, curled up and went to sleep.
‘I should have broken the sod’s bones,’ Ace said.
‘Darjeeling?’ said the Doctor. ‘Or Earl Grey?’ Since he’d come into the kitchen, he’d been preoccupied, to Ace’s annoyance, with making tea.
‘Bones,’ she said. ‘Bones, bones, bones. Now he’s got away.’
‘Oh, I don’t know.’ The Doctor turned grim eyes on her. ‘I don’t think that’s necessarily true at all. I think I may be able to find him.
‘How?’
‘It’s complicated.’
‘You always say that!’
‘That’s because it always is!’ He caught himself. ‘And this time, even more so than usual. I understand your anger, Ace. But you would have put all three of you at risk. We don’t know how many people were actually in that house. You did the right thing, and you got Amberglass out, which is what matters most.
It was very brave and very bright. You threw a spanner in their works. Brett will get what’s coming to him.’
‘But not from me.’
‘We can’t have everything we want,’ said the Doctor, in such a mild,