Doctor Who_ Just War Part 3

'It's far too dangerous for a woman, and your skin makes you just a little bit conspicuous, don't you think?' The response was disdainful, and Roz wouldn't have talked to a child like that. She tried to appear calm. A hand touched her shoulder and she almost ripped it off. It was Chris.

'Don't worry, Roz, I'll be fine.' He beamed his gerbil smile.

Forrester looked at him, eager to go off to war. Oh G.o.ddess, she thought, please let him come back.

3 Bang on Time

Celia had changed into a thick floral dress. Gerhard thought that it suited her, and it must help to keep her warm. He had told her as much, but she hadn't seemed to hear him. The cold wind that had been blowing all day had finally developed into a thunderstorm. Celia also wore a heavy navy-blue coat, unlike Gerhard who had been trying not to s.h.i.+ver ever since they'd left the boardinghouse. It was dark now, and as usual there was a blackout in force. All over the island, the street lights had not been lit and curtains were in place. If it had been a clear night, it might have been possible to see the odd light on the French or even the English mainland, but tonight the horizon was black as pitch.

Gerhard had the distinct impression that Celia was steering him away from the town and out into the country. He could understand this - with the age difference between them the islanders were sure to gossip, and the local people would have thought of her as a collaborator. It was good that she was brave enough to risk that. They'd been walking along a narrow lane now for three-quarters of an hour. They talked as they went, and as a special dispensation, Celia had let them speak in German.

'It is cold, isn't it?'

This was not the first time that he had pointed this out on their walk.

'Don't worry, it'll be nice and warm where we're going.'

'And where is that exactly?'

They stopped and she looked him straight in the eye.

Gerhard was five foot eight, which was above average height for his age, but Celia was a little taller. For the first time, he found this disconcerting.

'Trust me.'

He moved a little closer. Celia took a step back. 'You can't kiss me yet.'

Gerhard's eyes lit up. 'Then later?'

Celia gave a sly smile. 'Let's keep walking, find somewhere quiet.'

'Who goes there? Declare yourself !' was shouted from twenty yards away, then torchbeams. Gerhard held his hand above his face.

'It is me, Gerhard. Is that you, Franz?'

It was indeed Franz, another one of the young soldiers boarding at the Doras'. Gerhard offered him a cigarette and explained about his date in German. Obviously, Franz recognized Celia. Technically, the curfew wasn't due to start for another couple of minutes, but Franz reminded them both that they shouldn't be out here this late. Couldn't they have picked better weather for a walk? Solemnly, Celia and Gerhard agreed. Then Franz and his (unseen) companion disappeared into the night. Gerhard reached out for Celia.

'May I hold your hand?'

'I'm sure I can allow that. Follow me.'

Gerhard watched as Celia clambered over a stile. He followed, but found the thin footboard a little more slippery.

He negotiated his way across it and jumped down into the small field. It had been raining for a while, but the ground underneath his boots was still firm. Before he had been posted here, Gerhard had taken part in the devastating a.s.sault against France - the Blitzkrieg. He'd marched hundreds of miles with his regiment. Gerhard knew that the thousand-year Reich would be based on such victories. The history books might not mention him by name, but Gerhard knew that he had played a part. He had been one of the first soldiers into Paris.

He remembered the victory marches, past the Eiffel Tower, past the Louvre, past Notre-Dame. His children would know: fifty years from now his children and his grandchildren would be proud of what he had done for Germany. The Brandenburg Gate would be a symbol, it would be the centre of the largest empire the world had ever seen. Celia was still young enough to bear those children.

She was running ahead of him now. As Gerhard watched, she unfastened her coat and let it fall to the ground.

She was so sure of herself. The girls in his home town of Waiblingen were not like her at all. The populations of small islands such as this tended towards the simple-minded, but this woman was as sharp as they came. She was beautiful too, with a wide, kind mouth and flowing blonde hair.

To his surprise they had reached a gorse-covered clifftop: the dark sea glistened twenty feet below them. This was one of the small coves that lined the coast of these islands, but not one that he recognized. He was surprised that no barbed wire had been laid here. For a moment, Celia stood poised on the edge of the cliff, and Gerhard could have sworn that she was about to throw herself off. She was staring into the distance, oblivious to everything around her: the rain, the sea, Gerhard himself. Then she turned to him, grabbing his hand again.

'Are you scared?'

Gerhard realized that he hadn't been breathing for the last few seconds. 'Yes. No. Where are we going?'

'Follow me.'

They scrambled down a steep rocky path onto the beach. The sand was damp.

Celia noticed his hesitation. 'What's the matter?'

'Celia, this beach will have been mined, so will the sea.'

'Don't worry. It's too small and out of the way to bother with. I've been here a couple of times before. What time is it?'

'Aren't you wearing a watch?'

She leant over and whispered in his ear, 'I'm not wearing anything at all apart from this dress.'

Gerhard fumbled for his wrist.w.a.tch. 'It's about midnight.'

'Just before or just after?'

'Just before.'

Celia nodded thoughtfully. 'Shall we go for a swim? We could go behind those rocks and get ready. We won't need costumes, it's so dark and there's no one else around.'

Gerhard nodded dumbly, and followed her. They worked their way across the sand, reaching a pile of rocks that had fallen from the cliff last winter. Behind the largest of these they were sheltered from the worst of the storm. Celia leant against the cliff face. Gerhard stood close, mesmerized.

'What's the time now?'

'Why worry about - ' He edged closer. Celia pushed him away.

'Just tell me the time.'

'Just gone midnight. For G.o.d's sake, why?' Gerhard was baffled. Did Englishwomen have to wait until a certain time at night? It wouldn't surprise him. Before he could formulate any suspicions, Celia was speaking again.

'Can you hear something odd?' she asked softly, her head c.o.c.ked to one side.

Gerhard listened, but all he could hear were the waves and the wind. No. There was something else. A noise from the sky. It was too quiet to be a plane... it was unlike anything he had heard before. He glanced at Celia who was staring over his shoulder, a look of astonishment on her face.

Gerhard turned.

There was a huge explosion.

Gerhard's training kicked in automatically and he fell to the floor, his hands over his head. It had been a comet, or some shooting star. A blossoming orange light, burning his eyes. It was too high up to be a sh.e.l.l or a bomb. Celia was already crouching alongside him, covering her ears, staring past him. Gerhard kept his head down. A deep resonant boom echoed from the granite cliffs, repeating and repeating.

The ground rocked in sympathy. Celia stood shakily, dusting the sand from her skirt.

Something hit the sea.

There was a terrifying cras.h.i.+ng noise, Gerhard could hear the waters surge and boil. A small tidal wave washed across the beach, swirling over Celia's bare ankles, drenching him as he cowered at her feet. A second later a rumbling underwater explosion sent plumes of water dozens of feet into the air. Tiny fragments of what looked like wood and leather clattered against the cliff face. Red-hot pieces of metal rained from the sky. There was the unmistakable smell of death.

Celia stood pressed against the cliff face watching this scene. Finally she said something and Gerhard didn't understand it.

'Cruk!'

Bernice Summerfield watched the fire falling and felt the adrenalin that she had spent so long trying to suppress flow through her, warming her. For three months she had not dared to think like this: she had hidden herself in someone else's clothes and someone else's name. The beach was lit now by hundreds of tiny burning pieces of debris that threw evil shadows across the cove. She could feel the heat from here; she could feel the rain and the wind and the rock against her skin. The earth still trembled from the explosions.

G.o.d, she felt younger already! Gerty had scrambled to his feet, but now stood watching the spectacle, his mouth open.

'I suggest you get out there and see what's going on,'

Benny said, trying to look suitably apprehensive.

Gerhard looked at her for a second, then nodded, scurrying across the beach to the sh.o.r.e. The Doctor's note had warned Benny about the explosion, but that hadn't stopped her jumping out of her skin when it actually happened. And she had absolutely no idea what was going on, as per usual. For starters, it would be nice to know exactly what had exploded. Well, there were enough clues lying about.

While Gerhard busied himself, Benny looked around. It didn't take her long to find a flat piece of metal debris. It was still red-hot despite the driving rain, so she piled wet sand over it with her hands to cool it down. After a minute she retrieved it, slipping it into her dress pocket. She could feel it warm against her leg. Gerhard was peering out to sea, but it wouldn't be much longer before his n.a.z.i pals arrived. She recovered her shoes and hurried away.

Benny went straight home. She had to dodge only one n.a.z.i patrol on the way back to St Peter Port, an armoured personnel carrier that had been heading for the crash site.

Air-raid sirens were blaring, and carefully orchestrated drills were being performed. Every dog on the island seemed to be barking. Everyone on the island would have been awoken by the explosion, fearing that it was an air-raid. The only planes flying overhead were German, though, heading for England.

Benny clambered over the high garden wall of the guest-house, and let herself in through the unlocked back door.

Home security was lax in the 1940s and burglary was hardly a major problem on a n.a.z.i-occupied island. She'd found that she could come and go almost as she pleased. She quickly secured the blackout curtain behind her and went straight to her room.

Once she had bolted her door, Benny moved over to the dresser. She fished what looked like a radio out from the hidden compartment. A couple of months ago, the Germans had confiscated all the radios they had found. She might have guessed that listening to German military transmissions was not allowed, but it was a criminal offence just to listen to the BBC, although most people still did it. If the Germans had discovered Benny's radio, though, they would be preoccupied with how technically advanced it was. The Germans led the world in magnetic tape-recording, yet they were years from producing anything so compact. A German scientist would find it almost impossible to explain even in the broadest terms how the radio receiver or the tuning mechanism worked and would have a few questions to ask her. How could such a high-quality speaker be manufactured? Where was the battery? Benny often took the Spatio-Temporal Alarm Beacon on her field-trips: it was her link with the Doctor and it allowed her to monitor local transmissions. She looped the headphone over her ear and flicked it on. The BBC World Service came up with the usual blend of made-up and heavily censored stories, concentrating on the one battle the British had won, making no mention of the twenty they had lost. The war sounded so much more heroic on the radio than in real life. She flipped open a small panel on the side and punched in a code number. A second later the 'message sent' LED lit. Benny glanced at the LCD clock on the side: 00:52.

It was late, and she was exhausted. It had been a long day - technically it was already tomorrow. Rationing was so tight now that most islanders couldn't summon up the energy to walk very far, and Benny had just made a five-mile round trip. She unb.u.t.toned the dress and shrugged it off before towelling herself down. She slipped into bed and was asleep within minutes.

Outside a man was walking up the sandy beach, straight from the sea. No one saw him arrive, and so no one saw that as he strolled up the beach he left no footprints in the sand.

For the first time in months, Benny slept through the return of the German bombers. She woke as the door handle jerked downwards. She was instantly alert, reaching under her pillow. With her other hand she grasped the mattress, without really knowing why. They always came when your guard was down.

The door opened. She had bolted it.

She tensed. To have come so far... It was a friend, it was her only real friend. He raised his hat, closing and bolting the door behind him with his free hand.

'Good morning, Miss Doras. That is your name, isn't it?

How are you?'

Benny relaxed again, sinking back into the sheets. She smiled too, her first real smile for far too long. It was good to see him again, to hear his voice.

'Mustn't grumble.'

She saw the Doctor's eyes flicker with pride.

'Sorry I took so long, but I had to stop off on the way for your milk, and I took a bit of a wrong turning. Anyway, I thought you could do with a good night's sleep after all you've been through.' He handed her a plastic bottle of semi-skimmed milk, a litre not a pint. The use-by date was '27 April', but it didn't say which year. She hadn't asked him for any milk. The container was icy cold. Benny sat up to take it from him.

'The door was bolted,' she noted.

The Doctor was examining the leaves of a house plant which sat on the window sill. 'Um?'