Doctor Who_ Infinite Requiem Part 29

'What about Suzi?' Bernice asked. 'Shanstra got into her mind in a pretty serious way. I know I wouldn't want anyone rummaging like that in my mental underwear drawer.'

'Suzi could have been a problem,' said the Doctor. 'I must admit, I didn't really know what to do about her.'

Benny noticed he was leaning over a monitor screen on the console, and memory came back of the way she had seen him in the tertiary console room after all that time, silently contemplating something.

'Do you know,' she said, 'after all that, I've forgotten totally what was it you were looking up when the TARDIS intercepted that distress signal?'

'Earth military records,' said the Doctor moodily. The time rotor rose and fell. He looked up. 'Do you want to see?'

'Cheynor to Phoenix Phoenix. Estimate three minutes to arrival.'

The skimmer was heading out into the wilderness now, out to where the Phoenix Phoenix stood like a beacon, like a sanctuary, ready to welcome them. stood like a beacon, like a sanctuary, ready to welcome them.

Suzi Palsson turned to look at Darius Cheynor, and for the first time in many years, she thought she saw something new in the face of a man, something she could understand, which she could respect.

'Coming in for ground run,' Cheynor said. 'Activating retro-thrusters now.'

Bernice, stunned, looked up from the scrolling information on the console monitor screen.

'You're not going to do anything about this, are you?' she said, her face pale in the reflection from the screen.

The Doctor's eyes flicked back and forth. 'You know I would, if I could.'

221.

'But it's not as if it's history!'

'I'm afraid it is.'

'Doctor!'

'There was never any way of stopping it from happening. If it hadn't been then, it would have been some other time, with even more innocents caught up.' He looked up, his face shadowed with sadness. 'And at least we know, now, that Shanstra's influence could not have survived.'

She looked into his eyes and realized he meant it.

And what was most shocking of all to her was that really, she knew. She understood why it had to be.

The fireball was visible for several kilometres. It lit tip the dunes and gullies of Gadrell Major's wasteland. Smoke poured into the air, carrying with it a torrent of twisted metal and shattered plexigla.s.s.

The burnt-out sh.e.l.l of Cheynor's skimmer pirouetted upwards, turning in slow motion. It crashed, bounced, scattering flames and sparks as it tumbled down the length of a slope and came to rest on the end of a trail of fire.

Silence reigned.

222.

Epilogue.And Study War No More EXTRACT FROM PERSONAL LOG, LIEUTENANT-COMMANDER HOLST LEIBNIZ ACTING CAPTAIN, EARTH s.p.a.cEFLEET VESSEL PHOENIX, 29TH MAY, 2387.

The obvious theory is that the Phracton infiltrators somehow planted the bomb after Captain Cheynor's return to Gadrell Major. There were rumours of something like this, of course: a breakaway group who still held Cheynor responsible for what they saw as an ambush in Londinium Plaza. Just shows how little they understood of what's happened here on Gadrell Major.

I am at a loss to understand how they feel their cause can be advanced by the elimination of lives in this way.

This sharp, angry coda to all our struggles is made all the more bitter by the loss of a civilian life. I, as acting captain of the Phoenix Phoenix and officer responsible for the evacuation of Gadrell Major, have the task now of locating Suzanne Palsson's family and informing them. and officer responsible for the evacuation of Gadrell Major, have the task now of locating Suzanne Palsson's family and informing them.

Whatever I say, it will be inadequate, almost counterfeit. It must not mention the Doctor, Bernice, the Sensopaths, all of the strands that meshed together to bring Suzi and my captain together into that fateful vehicle. I must be reductive, I must be simplistic.

The Doctor. Yes. He said something very strange to me as we parted. He told me that at least I had been allowed to stay alive.

As if he knew. And yet, despite knowing, could do nothing.

What the Doctor gave us, I thought, was hope. A real hope, not the kind of false dependency with which Shanstra ensnared her followers to absorb their minds. The Doctor tried to bring hope through repentance, through the knowledge that it was never too late to make a fresh start not for the sake of any spurious deity, but for yourself, and for your fellow human beings.

There may, now, be hope. Cheynor's death is a watershed. The new Phracton Commandant's view is this: if the Phracton extremists really did think that Cheynor was responsible, that he betrayed the Swarm, then they now feel that honour has been satisfied, that justice has been done. The Commandant feels that he is in a position to do business with the extremists, if I can help him.

Of course, this puts me in a difficult moral position. To go into negotiations with a clean slate is for me to say yes, I agree, it was right to kill Captain 223 Cheynor. And yes, it did not matter that you killed Suzanne Palsson. I can tell them that yes, this was war, and there are casualties in war.

So easy.

SUPPLEMENTAL ENTRY.

I wasn't going to add anything to this, but it's late at night now and we are on course for the s.p.a.ce station.

The funny thing is, I can conjure up Darius Cheynor as clear as anything if I close my eyes, and let my mind wander into that special place it's not supposed to have. A small part of me, maybe, trying to feel like him. Trying to finish what he started. Kind of . . . being him.

Something is not quite right in my head, I know that much. My blessing is a curse, it always has been, but this time it is more as if . . . something is there.

Watching.

LOG ENTRY ENDS.