The Well-Mannered War Part 39

'h.e.l.lo, Doctor,' he said feebly.

The Doctor stalked over. 'I want a word with you.'

The TARDIS hung in suspense in the s.p.a.ce-time vortex. Its mighty time engines were held in stasis, their power held back by the Doctor's operation of the override switch. The indescribable maelstrom shrieked about it.

'It wasn't actually what you'd call a dirty deal,' said Stokes. He addressed Romana. 'Most of my, er, very long story was true, my dear. I only left out a teensy bit.'

'The teensy bit about the Black Guardian,' she replied bitterly.

'Is that what's he's called?' mused Stokes. 'I suppose it's apposite. No, the first thing I knew of him was just after my court case. I was landed with costs that wiped out my fortune, as I mentioned earlier, so I decided to go for a drink. I had several. In fact, I had a lot more than several. I think I b.u.mped my head. And that's when I saw him, this fellow in black with a bird on his head.'

The Doctor nodded grimly to Romana. 'He can contact lower primates only when their minds are knocked into an altered state.'

Stokes flushed. 'Who are you calling a lower primate?'

'You,' said the Doctor. 'Go on.'

'Well, it seemed like a dream afterwards,' Stokes continued. 'In a nutsh.e.l.l, he offered me the chance for some success. In exchange for which I had to provide a certain service.

'To betray and trap us,' accused Romana.

'No,' Stokes said finally. 'Honestly, no. I wouldn't have agreed to that, would I? And in fact the thing that made me think it really had been a dream was the ludicrous nature of the service I was asked to perform.'

'Which was?' the Doctor prompted.

Stokes pulled his hammer from his pocket. 'There would come a time, he said, when I had to smash something up. He didn't even say what, only that I'd know what it was when the time came, and that I should carry this wherever I went. And that it was something to do with you, Doctor, some sort of personal feud, and that I shouldn't mention him to you or Romana if ever we should meet. Of course I thought it was all subconscious rambling on my part.' He pointed to the crystal in Romana's hand. 'Until I found that in my pocket when I woke up. Occasionally it gave me directions. It pushed me towards the cryogenic process, for example, when I first considered it.

Very odd.' He sighed. 'Otherwise, everything I told you was true. So I can hardly be painted as the villain of this piece.' Determined not to feel cowed, he stuck his chest out. 'In fact, we all seem to have come out of it all right.

We're going to Dellah, now, I think you'll find, where you can drop me off.

And then you can take your feud with this Guardian chap elsewhere.' He extended his hand. 'No harm done, eh?'

The Doctor shot him a venomous look. 'Stokes, you've been very stupid, even for a lower primate.'

Romana's expression was as gloomy. 'You've been manipulated as part of a plan to bring the Doctor to this point. A string of small events, of small choices, calculated to reach this moment.'

Stokes frowned and looked at the central column, which was grinding ferociously, as if the energies trapped inside were straining desperately to escape. 'But we are going to Dellah, aren't we?'

'Yes, we're going to Dellah,' cried the Doctor, 'and we're dragging along with us a Hive of bloodcrazed insects that given the right conditions could become one of the deadliest life forms in the cosmos.' He pointed to a particular lever on the console. 'We've both been fooled, Stokes. And even when I realized I was being manipulated I was being manipulated. The Black Guardian timed our movements precisely. You set the coordinates, I rushed in, picked up the Hive and dematerialized.'

'So?' demanded Stokes. 'I think I must be missing the point.'

'This is the trap,' Romana explained. 'The Doctor was rushed, made to panic. We were going to drop the Hive off into a black hole, right away.'

She pointed to the materialization control. 'If we materialize here, it'll be released into populated s.p.a.ce at a crucial point in history. It'll destroy millions and reproduce without restriction. The web of time will be fractured irreparably.' She shuddered. 'And we'll be responsible.'

'No,' said the Doctor. 'I shall be responsible.'

The TARDIS rocked as a great shadow fell across its doors.

The shutters of the scanner screen slid open unbidden. The Doctor whipped round from his moment of introspection and blinked at the figure that was revealed. The imperturbable face could have been blasted out of solid rock; the ermine-lined robes were glossy and seemed to contain in their folds every dark thought the universe had ever contained; the headdress was mounted by a raven whose eyes were narrowed in pure, piercing hatred.

'Ah,' said the Doctor. 'We were just talking about you.'

'That's him, isn't it?' Stokes asked.

'If it isn't it's somebody wearing his hat,' said the Doctor.

The Black Guardian's voice was as stentorian as he remembered, a rumble that seemed to shake the very fabric of time. 'Doctor,' he said, 'the time has come for us to do business.'

'I don't think so.'

The Guardian gestured with one ma.s.sive hand to the TARDIS console.

'The choice is clear. Press the lever and condemn the universe to chaos, or -' his eyes narrowed and his lips twisted '- remain suspended here in the vortex forever.'

The Doctor ambled over to the scanner and peered up at the face of his greatest enemy. 'You've been very clever, I must say. I know that to an elemental being like yourself the compliments of a mere mortal like myself must not count for much, but I'd like to congratulate you anyway. I should have seen your hand in it from the beginning.' He raised his voice. 'What better place than the end of the universe to set your trap? Your opposite number is at his weakest there and couldn't intervene.'

'Precisely,' said the Black Guardian. 'You walked into the situation on Metralubit as you always do, Doctor. It was easy for me to predict your moves.' He indicated Stokes. 'Using this creature and others as my players.' A smile cracked his unearthly features. 'I have been tracing your path through all time and s.p.a.ce, your past and your future, choosing my moment. I was at your side when you fought the wizard of Avalon, when you united the Rhumon and the Menoptera against the Animus, when you brought down Lady Ruath and her vampire hordes and when you fought the Timewyrm on the surface of the moon.'

'I'm not sure you should be telling me some of that,' said the Doctor. 'I haven't done it yet.' He wagged a reproving finger up at the screen. 'You're dabbling with the forces of continuity.'

'I care nothing for such abstract concepts,' snorted the Guardian.

'You've disrupted our timeline, broken the First Law,' accused Romana.

'The consequences could be catastrophic. Not to mention very confusing.'

'Catastrophe and confusion is his job,' the Doctor remarked.

'Throughout I have studied you,' said the Black Guardian, 'until my knowledge of your personality and my capacity to predict your next move were absolute. And I can predict your next move, Doctor.'

Stokes decided he was being left out of things. 'Excuse me,' he said, stomping over to the screen. 'There is still the small matter of our bargain.'

The Black Guardian turned to look at him and cackled. 'Ah yes. Menlove Ereward Stokes.' The cackle became a full-voiced, deep-throated, very fruity laugh. 'Who would do anything to be remembered to posterity.'

Stokes rearranged his coat in an attempt to appear more dignified and sniffed. 'Some of us are quite content with our small lives, you know. And besides, I'd certainly never heard of you until I met you. For a deity of all that is evil you're not actually very famous, are you? I haven't seen you on the front covers of any magazines, have I?'

'Famous,' chortled the Black Guardian. 'Magazines.' His deeply lined face creased with further mirth.

Romana sidled close to the Doctor. 'What are we going to do?' she whispered.

'We could always just sit and watch these two out-ham each other for all eternity,' he whispered back.

K9 joined in the hushed conversation. 'Options limited, Master,' he said.

Further debate was forestalled by the Black Guardian's next statement.

'Stokes,' he said, 'your petty concerns amuse me.' He waved his fingers in a dismissive motion, as if flicking them dry. 'Go to Dellah, take up your place, find your acclaim.'

Stokes felt himself drifting away from the console room. He saw the Doctor, Romana and K9 slide slowly away from him, and when he looked down he saw he was becoming transparent. 'It seems like I must -be going,' he said.

He waved goodbye. 'I'm sorry if I've caused you any inconvenience, and that if we meet again it'll be under more pleasant circ.u.mstances. You can drop in on Dellah whenever you want -'

His words were swallowed up, and suddenly he was somewhere else.

He was in a high, draughty corridor. Through a window he saw a set of bee-hive-like buildings made of baked red mud, arranged to form a quadrangle. Small groups of people, mostly young humanoids, were walking between the buildings. At the centre of the quad was an abstract sculpture that depicted a vicious, two-headed reptilian creature, gore dripping from its jaws. 'Good G.o.d,' he said. 'That's one of mine.'

He turned and found himself at a door. On its frosted-gla.s.s front was embossed PROFESSOR M. E. STOKES.

He pushed open the door. Inside was a large desk stacked with unattended paperwork and several battered filing cabinets. He walked in slowly, still amazed by the sudden transition.

On the desk was an unaddressed black envelope. He unsealed it and found a black card. Inside, written in sparkling gold and in an excessively stylized hand, were the words 'Mr Stokes. Hoping you find the rewards you seek. B.G.'

Stokes sat down at his desk and thought for a very long time. The events of the last few - days? months? years? millennia? - rallied around his head like images left from a fading dream. He had been humiliated, scorned and made to look a fool. Here was his chance for a fresh start. He decided on certain things.

He would forget the Black Guardian. He would forget Metralubit. And he would, most definitely, never so much as think about the Doctor and company ever again.

After Stokes had faded the Black Guardian gave another of his grotesque smiles. 'Mr Stokes has arrived safely on Dellah, you'll be pleased to hear.'

He gestured to the console. 'Why not materialize and join him there?'

K9 motored forward angrily and snarled up at the scanner. 'Do not mock my master.'

The Guardian cackled. 'Ah, the metal dog. Did you enjoy your moment of elevation on Metralubit? It amused me to bring out the superiority that has always bubbled beneath that servile sh.e.l.l.' He turned to Romana. 'It amused me also to encourage your righteousness, so typical of the Time Lord race.'

Romana tried to think of a suitably haughty reply but failed. Her eyes turned to the Doctor, who was circling the console and examining the varied systems displays. He stopped by the crackling, pinging navigation panel and the small flas.h.i.+ng unit that represented the Hive's energy signature.

Could some extraordinary solution present itself? Could that incredible, eight-hundred-year-old mind pull the rabbit out of the hat? 'I have to admit,'

he said to the Guardian, 'that you've sewn this up very well.' He looked up at the scanner. 'You said you could predict my next move. Go on then.'

The Black Guardian smiled. 'You are both very long lived, for mortals.

Almost ageless. You will wait here in the vortex for many years. You will explore every possible technological solution. You will vow never to press the lever and bring yourselves back out into the cosmos.' His tone darkened, and as it did the lighting in the console room dimmed and there was a rus.h.i.+ng noise from outside. 'But eventually, Doctor, you will. I know you. You cannot stay in one place and in one time. It would drive you insane. It will will drive you insane. And to save yourself you shall become my agent, of your own choosing. You will press the lever. You will release the Hive, and it shall feast on the universe and plunge all time and s.p.a.ce into chaos.' drive you insane. And to save yourself you shall become my agent, of your own choosing. You will press the lever. You will release the Hive, and it shall feast on the universe and plunge all time and s.p.a.ce into chaos.'

As he spoke Romana's imagination conjured up an image of the Doctor, many years older, his spirit shattered, hunched over the console, a feeble hand wrapped around the materialization control. She shuddered.

'I thought it would be something like that,' said the Doctor. Some of his good humour seemed to have returned, and it was as if he was goading a minor warlord rather than the protector of all the universe's evil. He pointed to the materialization lever. 'You want me to press this switch.'

'You are going to,' the Guardian said, his voice lowered to a horrible whisper. 'I have waited an eternity to see you do it. A few centuries more will not trouble me.' He indicated the frame of the screen. 'I shall always be here, Doctor, watching and waiting.'

The Doctor nodded affably. 'It's nice to know I'm worthy of your special attention;' His voice hardened.

'But you've forgotten one thing.'

'I have forgotten nothing,' stormed the Guardian.

The Doctor carried on as if he hadn't spoken. 'You forget that there are plenty of other switches and levers on this console. You've forgotten one in particular.' He pointed to a small black box that was wired on to the side of the panel nearest the door. 'What about that, then?'

Romana was shocked. 'The emergency unit,' she exclaimed. 'You won't use that.'

The Doctor wheeled on her. 'Can't I? I've had enough of people telling me what I will or won't do.'

K9 came forward. 'The emergency unit is designed to remove the TARDIS from time and s.p.a.ce, vis-a-vis reality as we understand it. Its usage is most inadvisable.'

'We could end up anywhere,' Romana protested.