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173

DOCTOR WHO

Joe wasn't sure whether this was a good thing or not but, ready for adventures, he set off with the Doctor and his friends.

As they walked away from the building, the boy talkin g excitedly to the Doctor and Sam, Polly quietly asked Amy,

'So are you two dating?'

Amy scoffed at the question. 'Me and the Doctor? No way!'

Polly smiled. 'It's just you looked so together.'

Amy was shocked. She had no idea they looked like that.

Polly went on, 'You know, always laughing at his jokes, and the way you look at him like you think he's going to save the world every time he opens his mouth.'

Amy denied everything. 'Nah, he just needs me to keep an eye on him, make sure he doesn't get stolen by any tin y aliens again. I'm more of a Brad Pitt kind of girl. I'm not really one for all that floppy hair.'

Polly smiled at Amy. 'Nice try!'

They walked on in silence, until a thought struck Amy.

'Doctor, you know the story of the Trojan horse. What happened at the end? I can only ever remember the start of it.'

'They murdered everyone in Troy, and let the barbarians in through the gate,' the Doctor told her softly.

174

THE FORGOTTEN ARMY

'Oh.’ said Amy. 'I was always told we could learn from history. Fat lot of good that was. I may as well have slacked off on Friday afternoons.'

The Doctor grinned at Amy, 'Are you telling me you didn't?'

After walking in his bare feet and boxers for what felt like hours, Oscar made it back to base. With the lift out of action, he climbed all twenty-three storeys and swung open the door to an empty office. Everything was dark and quiet. His first thought was that the Vykoids had taken everyone, but it all seemed too neat. There were no signs of any kind of struggle at all. Oscar walked back into Strebbins's office and saw a handwritten note left on her desk:

"To whom it may concern. All units are on patrol. Investigating reports of missing officers.'

Oscar hit the desk in frustration. This was exactly what Amy had told him to stop. If the Vykoids took Strebbins and everyone she'd taken with her, they'd soon have every officer in New York tied up in the Subway. Not only that, but every armoured car and armed response unit in Manhattan would be out of action. New York would be cut off from the world and without defence.

On the other side of the city, the Doctor was standing in Polly's tiny apartment on Bleecker Street in Soho, talking to a group of thirty 10-year-olds. All of them

175

DOCTOR WHO

had seen the mayhem caused by the Vykoids, and had emerged from their apartments eager to help the mysterious man and his friends.

Joe had told his class that the man was called the Doctor, and he was probably a bit like Bruce Wayne. Two of the boys had come out dressed as Batman, keen to take their places as protectors of the city.

'Let me tell you a story. Long ago, in the frozen Arctic wastes, an alien army landed. Only now, thousands of years later, it isn't a story. And the army is ready to attack.' The Doctor looked round at them all seriously. 'And you are the last line of defence for New York. You all saw the mammoth come to life, and everything that has happened today is because of the mammoth. The aliens are called Vykoids, they are seven centimetres tall, and they move so fast they are almost impossible to see. There is a high-intensity chronactic-delay vortex affecting the city.'

Amy nudged him in the ribs and he turned to her. 'What?'

'In English, Time Lord.'

'Ah, yes, sorry there is a Time Freeze in place over New York. Somewhere in the city, the Vykoids are broadcasting a signal that is slowing everything else down. While we're moving so slowly, they can do what they like to us. Amy saw them steal a policeman's trousers and draw glasses on his face.'

Polly's class laughed, and the Doctor added: I 176

THE FORGOTTEN ARMY

guess it was quite funny of them, but never mind that. If we can find the source of their signal and turn it off, then they will be