Doctor Who_ Wooden Heart - Martin Day [67]
‘An attempt to expel all the evil,’ said the Doctor. ‘But eventually it took on a life of its own – an evil life, of course. The prisoners and staff who didn’t turn on each other were… butchered… by this “dark angel”. Butchered from within.’
The creature in the heart of the chamber shifted again, changing colour slightly as if indicating its state of mind.
I can’t always control it. I did not want to kill, but… There was nothing I could do.
There was a pause, Martha finding herself transfixed by the awful shadow in the corner of the room. Was it her imagination, or was it becoming darker, and seemingly taking on a more solid form? Moment by moment, was it inching closer to them?
I needed another outlet. Another… arena, in which I could explore my feelings. What I had experienced, what I had seen…
‘The village!’ exclaimed Martha.
The Doctor smiled. ‘A free space in which humanity could be explored, analysed and observed.’
‘So it’s like playing The Sims – but with real people.’
‘Exactly – thought made flesh! The bubble world is partly powered by an entirely different dimension, maintained and guided by the Castor’s last prisoner.’ The Doctor again turned to the floating mass in the centre of the room, smiling as if greeting a long-lost friend. ‘In our universe, you have so many powers – so much insight, so much to offer… And they kept you trapped in the dark, a creature to be experimented on. A creature to be used.’
The one thing I could not do was escape. I am now a part of this place, and it is part of me. I could only experience life through the world I had created…
‘But isn’t that amazing?’ exclaimed the Doctor, wheeling around like a theatrical showman. ‘Over the years… Life gave birth to life, life evolved and changed… Life became real and sentient, capable of great emotion – capable of true choice. Capable of good and evil!’
It was once an innocent world, a world with parameters. They are breaking down…
‘That’s a good thing,’ said the Doctor, draping an arm around Jude. ‘Take my friend Jude here. She’s thinking for herself, she’s making her own choices… She can even leave her world and exist within this ship!’ He puffed out his cheeks, a picture of simple delight. ‘You know, life never ceases to amaze me!’
‘That’s all very well,’ said Martha, ‘but in Jude’s world, the children are disappearing.’
Energy, said the creature simply. It is all slipping away from me…
‘The Castor has been in this dark area of space for too long,’ said the Doctor. ‘It’s running out of power. Even a strict regime of day and night hasn’t solved the problem. So the children have disappeared, the geography of the world has been truncated and looped…’
‘Why the children?’ asked Martha. ‘You said earlier that it was just random. So why not adults or babies – or even the monsters in the forest?’
The Doctor threw his arms around Jude again. ‘When you’re a kid, your mind is bursting with fears and dreams and daft ideas! You can believe six impossible things before breakfast, and still have room for a multitude more!’
‘Children require more energy than adults,’ observed Martha.
‘You ask any parent,’ agreed the Doctor. ‘And with our friend here running out of processing power… Desperate times call for desperate measures.’
‘So the children simply disappeared…’
The Doctor nodded. ‘Like files deleted from a hard drive.’
‘But why did we see them?’ said Jude. The figures in the fog…’
The creature stirred again, what appeared to be veins just under its skin taking on a purple hue.
I wanted to show… compassion. I had to offer hope…
‘But at the same time,’ the Doctor went on, ‘the creator of Jude’s world knew it was a dangerous strategy. It could run out of energy – it could die – at almost any minute.’
‘Taking the bubble world with it,’ said Martha. ‘No wonder the prophecies were so gloomy.’
I need energy from this universe