Doctor Who: Bad Therapy (14 page)

74

Why indeed? Harris considered. The Doctor had withheld the information about the dead boy, Eddy Stone. And the story about the taxi was, frankly, ridiculous. But at the end of the day the Doctor was his last hope. Harris had realized some weeks ago that he wasn’t going to get any further with this case on his own. It jeered at the basic principles of police work.

‘I don’t want to lose this one, Doctor. I don’t want to have the strangest case I’ve ever encountered snatched out of my hands. It’s not so much that I do believe you, but that I don’t have anything else to go on.’

The Doctor stood up, and exhaled. ‘But are you ready for where it may lead you, Chief Inspector? Shall we go?’

Harris was baffled. ‘Go? Where?’

‘I think it’s time that you met a friend of mine. Or rather a friend of Eddy Stone’s.’ The Doctor’s eyes twinkled. ‘And then we might try and hail a taxi.’

‘There’s one good thing about being a widow,’ Patsy murmured absently as she tugged her wallet out of her suit trousers, ‘you don’t have to keep asking your husband for money.’

Chris stopped in his tracks, just as they reached the door of the pub. ‘I didn’t know you’d lost your husband. I’m sorry.’

Patsy stood in the open doorway for a moment, her back to Chris, framed by the soft light of the saloon bar. Then she turned around, with what looked like a brave smile on her face. ‘Don’t be. It was a long time ago. Five years.

I’m a different person now. Come on, let’s find this contact of the Major’s.’

Every eye in the pub turned to look at them when they entered. The conversation actually stopped for a few long seconds. Chris tensed; half expecting a burly local to swagger over to them and snarl,
We don’t like strangers here.

However, no one did. Patsy stared aggressively back at the men who eyed her up as she made her way to the bar to order drinks.

‘You’d think they’d never seen a famous person before,’ she said loudly, as Chris joined her.

‘Actually, Patsy, I think it’s the suit.’

Patsy laughed heartily, turning several heads. She appraised Chris’s flashy clothes. ‘Yes, you might have something there, I don’t think even the people around here still wear Zoot suits.’

Chris blushed. ‘No, I meant your su– What? Are my clothes out of date?’

She reached over and played with the wide lapel of his jacket. ‘Christopher baby, if this were 1948, you would be the height of London fashion. However, I think most Zoot Suiters are claiming their pensions. I mean where do you buy your clothes? The Shop That Time Forgot?’

Chris made a mental note to personally jettison the TARDIS wardrobe. He paid for the drinks and they took a corner table. After being in the pub for only 75

a few minutes, a thin-framed man in his early fifties, who introduced himself as Pop, sidled across from where he had been playing dominoes with a few other men. ‘I’ll meet you outside, five minutes,’ he whispered, without once looking directly at them, and then headed off in the direction of the Gents.

‘Well you wouldn’t exactly make detectives,’ Pop scolded, when he found them waiting amidst the beer crates at the back of the pub.

Chris decided not to say anything.

‘Half the village is talking about you two.’ He spared a particularly harsh look for Patsy. ‘Women wearing suits – I ask you! You might do that sort of thing up in London, but not around here.’

Despite his gaunt face and stooped frame, Chris guessed that Pop was a military man. Something about the casual way that he took charge, behaving as if his opinions were absolute truths and therefore not negotiable. Chris could tell that Patsy had taken an instant dislike to the man and was preparing her own brand of sarcastic retaliation. Ever the peacemaker, Chris got in first.

‘We’re here as a favour to the Major, and are acting on his behalf. I appreciate that we could have been a little more inconspicuous, but we’re here now.

What do we need to do?’

Pop looked Chris up and down, and then nodded, grudgingly accepting this.

He scratched at his stubbly chin for a moment. ‘It’s all set for tonight. Here’s where we’ll meet. . . ’

The Petruska Psychiatric Research Institute.

From the clinical notes of Julia Mannheim, MD PhD.

Strictly Confidential.

Case #541.

The mannequin is lying sprawled in a plastic chair. The director is standing in the corner of the room, looking impassive. He’s sweating. Perhaps he’s tense? I’ve never been able to tell what he’s thinking or feeling. But I doubt it can be optimism.

The director walks over to the Toy which is lifeless, naked and limp. I can’t help feeling nauseous just looking at it. It’s like a shop window dummy, only instead of being firm and solid, it’s soft, as if somehow it’s been melted. With the support staff redeployed, there’s no one here to tend to them. Its flesh is beginning to discolour and is sagging around its joints.

The director lifts the Toy and holds its dead weight clumsily in his arms.

The director is a physically large man: tall, thickset and muscular. But even he is struggling.

76

Then the change begins. I’ve witnessed this over a hundred times and I’m still transfixed. Only now the awe I feel is mixed with revulsion. One moment there is only a pale expanse of shapeless flesh and then a woman is standing there. The transformation is instantaneous. It happens so quickly that you’re only aware of it afterwards. We’ve slowed the process down with a camera –

which is terrifying. Its features emerge as though its face has been pushed out from the inside of an inflated balloon. The surface of its face stretches to accommodate the new features. Slits in its face appear – tiny rips that form into a woman’s eyes, nostrils and mouth.

It’s always the same woman. I don’t know who she is. And I’ve never dared ask the director. She’s quite flawless. Chiselled features, raven black hair that’s so thick that it could be feathers. It’s that perfect beauty that makes you ache.

The director takes the newly made woman in his arms, and moves to kiss her. She looks tiny and brittle in his great treetrunk-like arms. And then – and this happens every time – she opens her almond-shaped eyes, catches sight of him, flinches, and begins to scream. She lashes out with her fists, kicks him repeatedly in the knees, tries to bite his face. She twists like a trapped snake, using every ounce of her strength to get out of his embrace.

The director roars with anger. And beneath the angry cry there is something else. A wail like a wounded animal. Simple, inarticulate pain. He throws her to the floor – hard. She cries out and, like a struck dog, makes a desperate graceless scramble for the corner of the room. Away from him, her defiance evaporates. She pulls her knees up to her chest and her cries become softer, quickly dissolving into whimpers. And as her moans lose their harsh edge, so her features begin to blur. They don’t completely vanish, just start to melt, until they’re only floating on the loose skin of her face. The mannequin’s head lolls forward drunkenly. Lifeless. A doll. An outsized child’s toy.

The director stares at the one-way mirror – no, he must be staring through it, because he is looking directly at where I am sitting.

‘Another failure,’ he roars at me and storms out of the room.

It’s over. That was Director Moriah’s last experiment. The Petruska Programme is finally over.

Julia Mannheim snapped the folder shut and threw it on to the desk in front of her. She hurried over to the door of the darkened observation room and fumbled for the light switch. The room filled with electrical light. With the lighting in the two rooms reversed, the window to the therapy room darkened, becoming impenetrable blackness.

As Julia Mannheim began to gather up her papers, klaxons sounded in the corridors outside.

77

What now?

Leaving her bundle on the desk she made her way into the long empty corridor. A window looked out on to the Institute’s grounds. The unkempt gardens looked peaceful and still in the light from the Institute. She heard the sound of one of the guard dogs barking excitedly.

‘Oh, no,’ she whispered. ‘Another breakout. That’s all we need.’

Julia Mannheim tugged her white labcoat more tightly around her stocky torso and bustled off down the corridor. She failed to notice the two veiled female figures enter the therapy room. A moment later they left the room, supporting the crumpled woman between them, and disappeared into the shadows.

The siren began as a low wail, rising in pitch and intensity before almost dropping away to nothing, only to begin the cycle over again. It came from somewhere within the metal perimeter fence.

‘Here we go.’ Patsy pushed herself away from the tree she’d been leaning against, smoking. She looked alert, ready for action.

Chris scanned the patches of night sky visible through the trees. Searching for lights reflected on the dark clouds, for any indication of a ship in the heavens. There was nothing.

Following Pop’s instructions, they had taken the West road out of the small town, leaving the country road to trace the perimeter fence of an old hospital.

Patsy had remained quiet throughout their journey, a serious expression on her face. Chris hadn’t seen her so intent and businesslike before. Their journey had ended at the edge of a small wood by the metal chain fence of the hospital.

It seemed an unlikely place for a craft to land. He considered the alternatives: time corridor technologies, perhaps? an artificial wormhole?

The outline of a figure approached from the other side of the fence. Chris slipped behind a tree and was about to motion for Patsy to do the same, when he saw that she had already moved out of sight. The figure was at the fence now. It was still too dark to make out who it was, but Chris could see that he was dragging something heavy behind him. He heard, rather than saw, the fence move. There must be a breach in it somewhere.

If the newcomer turned out to be unfriendly it would be easier to engage him when he crossed to this side of the fence. He looked around for a weapon, just in case. The floor of the wood was a thick sludge of wet leaves and was littered with small branches. None were large enough to use as a club. Without weapons, their best bet would be to set an ambush. The classic manoeuvre would be for him to step out and distract the target whilst Roz slipped around behind them and. . .

78

He closed his eyes and gently rested his forehead against the trunk of the tree. Grief winded him, it couldn’t have hurt more if he’d been physically punched in the stomach. Tears pressed at his eyes, and he let them run down his face.

Goddess, he’d forgotten about her. He’d not thought about her since the train journey. How could he have got so caught up in things that he could forget her? So caught up in just living. He imagined Roz angry with him for being able to do anything at all. He should be mourning her, not running around the English countryside. What was he doing here? Alone. Just him and an alien woman hiding in a cold Essex wood, waiting for more space refugees to drop out of the sky.

Oh Goddess, I shouldn’t feel guilty for just being alive, should I?

Patsy’s voice distracted him. She’d stepped out from behind her tree, and was striding confidently over to the fence. A torch was directed at her, a stab of light in the dark forest, bleaching her face electric white.

Chris saw his chance and slipped around the other side of the tree, aiming to get behind the torchholder. Shouldn’t be a problem now his attention was focused on Patsy. Chris was coming up behind the newcomer when the torch was turned on him.

‘I wouldn’t try creeping up on me, lad,’ a familiar voice warned.

Chris tensed. So much for taking him by surprise.

Pop turned the torch on himself, its light cast ghoulish shadows across his craggy face. He grinned, evidently pleased with himself at having avoided their trap. ‘Now give me a hand. These two weigh a ton.’

Pop indicated a hospital gurney, which stood, incongruously, next to him.

Its wheels were caked with mud. Two people were strapped to it, lying head to toe. An elderly white woman and a small Chinese boy – who couldn’t have been more than four years old. Their eyes were closed. Drugged, thought Chris. They’d have to be to sleep through the bumpy ride across the field.

What
was
going on? These people were inmates of the asylum. They were even wearing straitjackets, for Goddess’ sakes! Pop was dressed in an orderly’s uniform.

What had he got himself involved in? Chris turned from the trolley to face Patsy.

Her face was illuminated by the orange glow of her petrol lighter as she lit a cigarette. She caught sight of the expression on his face and snapped, ‘Don’t start, Chris. We can talk about it later. Let’s just get out of here.’

‘The missus is right,’ Pop grunted, and took hold of one end of the gurney.

‘The guards will have let the dogs out. And worse.’

Chris sighed with angry resignation and gripped the other end of the trolley and started to pull it aggressively across the forest floor.

∗ ∗ ∗

79

Moments later, a shadowy figure quietly slipped through the tear in the fence.

It paused for a moment, as if sniffing the air. And then it headed off in the direction Chris and his party had taken. Keeping low to the ground, it moved smoothly and silently over the forest floor.

‘Why do I get the feeling that your young friend doesn’t like me?’

The Doctor didn’t take his eyes off Jack, who was walking a dozen or so yards ahead of them on the dark Soho street. ‘Well, Chief Inspector, you
are
a police officer.’

‘You’re suggesting the young man has something to hide?’

The Doctor risked a glimpse at the policeman before turning his gaze back to Jack. ‘Everyone’s got something to hide.’

Harris considered this for a moment. It was late and the streets in this part of town were quiet. They’d been following the young lad through the quieter streets of Soho for a good few hours. Bait, the Doctor had said, for his trap.