Doctor Who_ The Infinity Doctors - Lance Parkin [96]
Gordel passed over a small bowl of the mushrooms to the Doctor. ‘You will enjoy these, although you will think that they are a little too sweet at first.’
The fire had been started with broken-up furniture, fuelled with some of the largest books. The Doctor bit into a mushroom, and wondered what treasures had already been lost to the flames. At the same time, there were more pressing concerns. He had to see a man about a God.
‘Yes, these are sweet, you’re right. The taste grows on you, though.’ He held up one of the books. ‘Do you read these before you burn them?’
‘We are the last ones. Even the immortals are long gone now,’ Pallant said, not answering the question. He’d sparked off a whole new set for the Doctor, though.
‘You are the only life remaining in the entire universe?’
‘Perhaps, perhaps not. A few pride of Maltraffi survive, the mushrooms survive. There may still be other forms of sentience which I will never make contact with. Beings of dark matter, abstractions, that sort of thing. There may even be other people here, but we will never meet them, and that is all that matters.’
‘It is impossible to die here, at least until the final end,’
Willhuff added.
‘Yes, of course… I was just going to ask what the Maltraffi eat, but this is a TARDIS, everything here exists in a state of temporal grace. That’s why the collection here survived the proton decay that’s affected the rest of the universe.’
The Doctor picked up another, newer book. This one was handwritten. A diary. He slipped it into his pocket to read later. Not very good manners, but his hosts weren’t being very forthcoming, and time was drawing short. The Doctor looked up at the sliver of the night’s sky visible through the gap in the roof. Total blackness, all its possibilities and potential mined and exhausted.
Helios looked up from his bowl of mushrooms for the first time. ‘The Librarinth is a vast place, containing the greatest artefacts from many thousands of civilisations. We thought we would bring you here because Earth is a world for which you have great affection.’
Willhuff was reaching down and searching through a cloth sack at his side. The contents of the bag rattled, clinked, rustled. What was in there, the Doctor wondered, plunder from the rooms they’d visited? If they really were the last people left alive then it was hardly stealing, was it?
‘Isn’t there a room like this for Gallifrey?’ the Doctor joked.
‘We found this.’ He handed the Doctor a small pocket book.
He examined it before opening it. It was bound in reptile hide of some kind, with an omniscate embossed on the cover. He flicked it open.
‘A book of prophecy,’ Willhuff explained. ‘The Other Scrolls.’
‘Surely all the prophecies are used up by now?’ the Doctor lightly. ‘This is as much use as last year’s calendar.’
‘It talks about the future of Gallifrey and your people,’
Pallant told him.
‘Well,’ the Doctor said, gently closing the book. ‘I don’t think I should look at it.’
The men were silent.
‘You’re showing me this for a reason?’ The Doctor opened it up again, flicked to a page near the end, some superstition preventing him from reading the very last page. He glanced down and read a sentence at random.
He slammed the book shut, suddenly pale.
‘By your logic, it has already happened,’ Gordel assured him.
‘It won’t happen that way.’ The Doctor threw the book into the fire, where it hissed and crackled. ‘It may be in your past, but it is still in my future. I have free will, I can prevent it from happening that way.’
‘I am sure that you won’t.’
‘You certainly seem very sure.’
‘There are few records about the library itself,’ Willhuff said, changing tack again.
‘No records? You mean of where everyone went? Is there no indication of when this place was abandoned?’ The Doctor paused. ‘Who built this place? Your ancestors?’
‘God,’ said Willhuff reverently.
The Doctor almost choked on his mushrooms.
Pallant was holding out his hands. ‘There are