Doctor Who_ The Infinity Doctors - Lance Parkin [83]
Men like us, then, Norval thought. Had this been their last refuge? An ark where the last people of the universe had lived? If that was the case, then they hadn’t made it to the end. Even the race capable of building this place hadn’t been able to prevent their own extinction, as the universe collapsed and faded around them.
The end had been a long time coming: there were no bodies frozen in place, no evidence that buildings had been smashed by a tidal wave of snow. But neither was there any evidence of spaceports, or an evacuation effort.
‘There are no roads between the cities,’ he noted.
‘No,’ the Magistrate said, ‘but the distances between the cities are so vast. They must have used transmats or aircraft.’
‘Assuming that there was any contact between the cities at all,’ Norval replied. ‘There is no space debris, no satellite network, no artificial moons. It may have been the case that the cities just didn’t know of each other’s existence. Each city certainly has a distinct architectural style.’
Hedin’s voice: ‘It’s difficult to say, but some of the buildings are a lot older than the others. This place could have been settled for a very long time…. tens of millions of years at least. Spacefarers would have seen this place from many light years’ distance, it must have dominated the heavens of a thousand worlds. Ships could have arrived quite independently of each other. This place is so large that their sensors might not have registered other life: Civilisations larger and more mighty than most galaxies ever saw could have risen and fallen here, without ever encountering their neighbours.
‘Are there any life signs?’
Norval checked. ‘I am still some distance away, and the Effect is preventing a perfect view of the object, but if there is life down there then there isn’t very much of it. Should I fly closer?’
There was a pause.
‘Magistrate?’
‘No. Best to be cautious.’
Savar strode through the Capitol, the Doctor at his side, the Lady Larna following. He sensed the fear of the Watchmen at the door to Temporal Monitoring as he approached and the Doctor negotiated their way in.
Temporal Monitoring echoed with the murmured words of those watching from the Gallery and the hum of the Infinity Chamber machinery. This was a public occasion, with crowds filling the galleries, cameras recording the momentous events for posterity. The Temporal Monitoring Main Chamber hadn’t changed since his day. The Gallery was a hundred feet above the floor of the chamber, filled to rafters with the plebeian classes, baying and calling as if this were some theatrical production, with the Time Lords below them staring solemnly in space, as though it wasn’t.
He looked around. ‘Where are the Council?’
‘The Council are here, just in the wrong place,’ Larna told him quietly.
They were standing around the Chamber, looking down at an image of the object. It was being relayed from a TARDIS
by the look of it. There were various sub-images: magnified details of features on the surface. Frozen cities. It looked like there was an ice age down there. Every planet must be like that in the far future, without suns to warm them. The Doctor broke away from them, striding towards the Councillors.
‘What is the Doctor doing?’ Savar asked.
‘He has gone to talk to the Council. They haven’t noticed him yet.’
‘Lord Norval, how large is the Needle?’ he heard the President ask.
‘It is certainly large enough to qualify for the Bdo scale,’
another voice – coming from a loudspeaker – announced. ‘It is a tube, approximate one light year long, but barely fifty thousand kilometres in diameter. One end is embedded in the black hole. The timespace distortion Effect emanating from the intersection radiates in the visible