Doctor Who_ The Infinity Doctors - Lance Parkin [136]
Omega gave the same, small, flickering grin. ‘“Think’st thou that I who saw the face of God and tasted the eternal joys of heaven am not tormented with ten thousand hells in being deprived of everlasting bliss”?’
The Doctor tapped his lips. Quoting Mephistopheles wasn’t always the sign of a stable mind.
‘Faking a real life?’ Omega spat. ‘Such a life would be just as much a sham as being a hollow god.’
He paused, looked around. ‘Nothing is real now, nothing has meaning.’
He stepped away from the doorway, a tear in his eye.
‘You have destroyed all my hopes, you have condemned me to a meaningless existence.’
‘Not meaningless!’ the Doctor shouted. ‘You must find new meaning in your life, yes, but no life is meaningless.’
‘There is only one freedom left to me.’
The Doctor grabbed Omega’s arm. ‘There’s no need to take your own life.’
He smiled down. ‘Not just my own life. This universe is lost, this universe has no meaning. Time to end it.’
Outside, the dead stars and planets began vanishing.
Time and space began to wind down.
‘You can’t destroy the whole universe,’ the Doctor gasped from the doorway.
‘And why not?’
The Doctor shrugged. ‘Well, for one thing, where would you live afterwards?’
‘There will be no afterwards,’ he said quietly. ‘There will be no before. This universe will never have existed. There will have been no torment, no betrayal by friends and lovers. No disappointments or disease, no wars. No one will ever have died or lost a loved one. It will be a simpler place, a better place.’
The Doctor remembered the garden, and the beautiful woman with moon-white skin. ‘Everything ends,’ he said softly.
‘Indeed.’
The Doctor took a deep breath. ‘You’re right, perhaps It’s time to end it.’
Omega gave a grim smile. ‘You were a worthy opponent, Doctor.’
‘Thanks. Shake on it?’ The Doctor held out his hand, Omega clasped it.
‘One last thing,’ the Doctor noted. ‘Ever wondered what would happen if a singularity came into direct contact with an anti-singularity?’ He squeezed Omega’s right hand very tight.
Everything ended.
Larna watched as the aperture opened, as the column of energy burst forth once more. To her side were the smoking remains of Savar’s cloak. Around her the screaming and bombardment had stopped.
In front of her was the Doctor’s body, naked and inert. It was pale, but his chest was rising and falling, ever so slowly, his breath was condensing in the cold air.
She bent over him, taking her jacket off, covering him up.
‘Doctor?’
His eyes flickered open. ‘Larna?’
It was him, she knew it. ‘Where’s Omega?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said weakly, pulling himself into a sitting position. ‘Banished. Sealed away. Dead. I don’t know. His singularity came into contact with my anti-singularity. I don’t know what happened after that… there’s no such thing as an anti-singularity, I made it up, so there’s no theory to account for what happened next.’
‘And you?’
‘I… I think I might have just saved the entire universe from destruction.’
Larna helped him into his jacket.
The Doctor smiled, a little uncertainly. ‘Thank you, Larna,’
he said finally.
Larna laughed lightly, and kissed him. ‘Thank you, Doctor.’
Epilogue
So This is Victory
Sunlight poured through the cracks in the Capitol Dome, like a liberating army,
High above, maintenance teams had been working around the clock to repair the damage, and this would be the last sunrise that the Capitol would ever see. Golden sunlight picked out the vivid colours of the roof terraces, the intricate mahoganies of the Citadel walls, the golds and silvers and marbles of the clocks and monuments. It made the walkways and computer towers gleam. This was the home of the most powerful race in the cosmos, this was the capital city of the universe. A day since the defeat of Omega and the events of the previous week seemed like a distant nightmare. The rubble had been cleared, the damage from the riots and the bombardments had been cleaned away, the dead had been interred. Life was returning to normal.
The chimes of the Clock Tower