Doctor Who_ The Room With No Doors - Kate Orman [35]
‘Before you go. . . ’ said the Adjudicator helplessly. The Doctor turned back to look at him. ‘Kame,’ said Chris. ‘Do you know what happened to him?’
‘No,’ said the Doctor.
‘Well, don’t you think you should talk to him at least?’
‘Would that I had time,’ said the Doctor hurriedly. ‘Right at the moment, people coming back to life are the least of our troubles. It’s people being killed that I’m worried about.’
‘So what are you going to give the daimyo?’ said Chris. ‘Not jelly babies this time.’
‘Tea,’ said the Doctor. ‘I’ll see you in a day or so.’
That afternoon the farmers went back to their neglected fields. Kame patrolled the surrounding lands on horseback, spoiling for a fight. The headman, Son-71
chou, posted lookouts all over the place, even enlisting some of the children.
If any more samurai showed up, this time they’d have plenty of warning to get everyone inside the gates.
Chris wondered just how much protection those gates would be against something more than samurai. Anachronistic weaponry, for example. Or demons.
He spent an hour walking around the village, taking stock of its primitive defences. There were hills behind and a river to the east, offering some protection from soldiers on foot or horseback. The pine forest was a problem, offering a place to hide attackers – or villagers? He decided to send a few farmers out to look for a good bolt-hole in the woods, just in case. With provisions.
The fence went right around the village, a rough mass of tree trunks and thick branches, tied together with dried vines and odds and ends of rope.
According to Sonchou, it had helped repel a small band of brigands a few years ago, the farmers stabbing up at the attackers with sharpened bamboo poles as they tried to scramble over the top. He wondered if they still had the poles.
Chris sat on a step outside the shrine, chin resting on his fist. They could make a few preparations now, but the truth was they didn’t have a cat’s chance in hell – not against a decent number of samurai, and definitely not against demons. Aliens. Whoever.
What they really needed was a stone fence. Of course, it might be a bit difficult to whip one up this afternoon, in time for the next lot of armed madmen.
The samurai – Butterfly and Plum – wouldn’t be deterred by the various shocks they’d had. That pod was just going to attract more and more attention.
He sighed. It was just one catastrophe after another. At least so far no one had died, except Kame, sort of.
Oh great, now he was counting corpses. Great.
He realized that Penelope was standing next to the well, watching him –
no, she was looking up at the shrine behind him, wringing her hands. She was doing pretty well, thought Chris, for someone who’d chucked herself in the deep end of time travel. She hadn’t died of future shock, or past shock, or freaked out or anything. Maybe it hadn’t had time to sink in yet.
She noticed him watching her and stepped up. ‘I wish to make myself useful,’ she said. ‘At the very least I can help defend the village.’
‘If we have to,’ said Chris. The Doctor would be looking for some way to avoid fighting. Something really clever that no one else would have thought of. . . He sighed. ‘Where’s your time machine?’
‘Still hidden in the forest,’ said Penelope.
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‘You’d better get some villagers to help you bring it inside the fence,’ he said. ‘In case we do get attacked.’
‘It won’t be any help as a means of escape,’ she said sadly. ‘I have attempted repairs, but it appears to be defunct.’
‘Maybe we can think of something,’ said Chris. ‘Or maybe when the Doctor gets back, he can take a look at it.’
‘He will only poke fun at it.’ Penelope sat down on the well beside him, glumly cupping her chin in one hand. ‘If Joel’s machines seem miraculous to me, I cannot imagine what the far century from which you and the Doctor come must be like.’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Chris. ‘I mean, attitudes and lifestyles are different in different times, and the technology is always different, but people are still people. I mean, in your time