“Doctor,” said Holly, her head in her hands once again, “I’ve known you – or a variation of you – for a long time now. When are you going to realize that sometimes you need to tell me some things?”
“I can’t say that I wouldn’t have done things exactly the same as my other self,” said the Doctor, shrugging his shoulders.
“This guy didn’t seem like a prisoner though,” said India. “I mean why would you put someone who is a prisoner in a place with so much power?”
The Doctor shook his head. “When I say that he was a prisoner, that doesn’t necessarily mean that he was a criminal.”
“Ugh,” said Holly, shaking her head and closing her eyes. “Clarity, Doctor, clarity.”
“He was a Time Lord back in the day. I suppose you could call him a pre-cursor to me. His name was Mortimus. He used to monitor the timelines from the central processing centre on Gallifrey. He became…curious.”
“Let me guess – he decided to leave Gallifrey,” said Lilly.
“Sort of. He watched and watched and watched until he couldn’t watch anymore. He wanted to go and help. Now the difference between myself and Mortimus is that I don’t like to interfere.”
“Hah!” said Lilly.
The Doctor shot her a look. “I try not to interfere. At least not like Mortimus did. He used to meddle with time. He stole a TARDIS and rattled around the universe altering timelines and changing things. That’s when he earned the name the Time Meddler.”
“So he made the world a better place by changing things?” asked India.
“Not exactly,” said the Doctor. “At first he did, but soon he realized he could change things to benefit himself and started to act irresponsibly. I ran into him on quite a few occasions, but eventually the Time Lords caught up with him.”
“And so they put a known meddler of time in charge of time itself?” asked Holly.
“You can’t control time from the Zero Point. That’s the point. He was placed there at the end of existence to keep him away from anymore interfering. His punishment was to watch forever.”
“But you said he should have defused my wrist strap,” said Holly.
The Doctor smiled. “Believe it or not Mortimus changed. Some truly horrible things had happened to him during his time.” The Doctor looked distant for a moment. He looked sad. “He realized his mistakes and gladly took on the role at Zero Point. He’s been there ever since but has never put a foot wrong.”
“Until now,” said Holly.
“Until now,” said the Doctor. “He can’t escape from there. At least he shouldn’t be able to. And why would he revert back to his old self anyway?”
“Perhaps he was playing a long game,” said Lilly. “Like my father.”
“You mean he’s been biding his time, pretending to be good whilst he tries to break out?” said India.
The Doctor looked frustrated. “That doesn’t sound right to me. He had changed – I know he’d changed. So why do all this now?”
“People change,” said Holly, glancing over at Lilly, who saw her looking.
“Why don’t we just go back there and ask him?” said India. “I mean what harm could it do?”
The Doctor rapped his knuckles on the console and then looked up at Holly, India and Lilly. “Mortimus is the only person who can defuse that wristband and re-weave you into this new timeline. Maybe we should pay him a visit.”
“No,” said Holly, shaking her head. “I’m not willing to give up on everything yet. The Master changed my own history and I’d like it back.”
“You’ve already seen what happens if you try and correct it,” said the Doctor. “Time fights back. It doesn’t want to be changed.”
“You don’t understand,” said Holly, her eyes welling up with tears. “I found myself here in this silly old ship. It wasn’t always easy, but I’d like to think the three of our lives were better for it. Yours was at least, Lilly. You found some kind of peace at least.”
Lilly laughed and shook her head. “No chance in helping me, you silly cow.”
Holly stormed over to her and looked down at her. “Believe it or not myself and Lilly….well, we had feelings for each other.”
Lilly smiled. “You’re not my type. In fact I couldn’t give two shits about types. I’m exactly who I want to be.”
“Then I saved my Lilly before it was too late then,” said Holly, looking defiant.
“Well done on the saving,” said Lilly. “You got her erased from time.”
Holly was about to reached down and grab Lilly when the Doctor stepped between them and intervened. “There isn’t any time for this.”
There was a deep, low thud and the TARDIS juddered slightly.
“It’s the Nightmare, isn’t it?” asked Holly, already knowing the answer to her question.
The Doctor nodded. “It’s never going to stop following you, Holly, wherever you go.”
Holly looked and felt completely and utterly dejected. She had trusted the Doctor. She had truly believed that going to the Zero Point would have saved her, but now all she was worried about was how, if she could be re-weaved into this timeline, she was going to put her life back on track. The Lilly she knew was gone. The Doctor was also a totally different person.
There was the thud again.
“We need to go back to the Zero Point,” said India, “it’s the only way to stop this and save Holly.”
Holly smiled. This young girl was the one person who, despite everything, was willing to help her.
Holly noticed there was a flashing light on the side of the console. She frowned at it, recognizing seeing that same light before. “Doctor, what is that?”
The Doctor was so perplexed from the problems they were under that he didn’t even notice. He looked down at the blinking LED. “That’s the communications panel.” He crossed over to it and flicked the responder switch. “Hello?”
“Are you ever going to let me in?” came a familiar voice.
“Oh, no,” said India, backing towards Holly.
“Leave us alone,” said the Doctor, genuine worry on his face.
“Let him in,” said Lilly.
All three of them turned to face her. She was holding a small pistol and was aiming at Holly.
“Oh, Lilly, please…” said the Doctor.
Lilly squeezed the trigger and it just missed Holly and hit one of the metal beams surrounding the TARDIS console.
India yelped and Holly ducked.
“LILLY!” growled the Doctor.
“How many times do I have to tell you,” said Lilly, “that I have no desire to stay here and be reintegrated into society?”
“You can’t mean to go with him,” said Holly.
“You don’t know me, woman,” said Lilly, aiming the gun back down at her.
“Listen to my daughter,” came the voice over the speakers. “Now open up the doors and let your Master in.”
“You have no choice,” said Lilly. “I want to go with him.”
Holly closed her eyes. The Master had actually gotten what he wanted by erasing her. Without Holly to help ground Lilly had she had gone off the rails. He had succeeded.
“If you don’t open those doors I will shoot this woman through the head,” said Lilly. “Don’t believe me?” She squeezed the trigger and a shot rang out, hitting Holly in the right shoulder. She screamed and fell to the floor.
“NO!” shouted the Doctor, dropping to her side immediately.
Holly clutched at the wound in her shoulder as the blood seeped through her top. It was like pain she had never felt before and she could feel herself swaying, the room drifting out of focus.
“Now open the doors!” yelled Lilly.
“Let her go, Doctor,” said India, crossing over to the console and opening the double doors into the TARDIS.
Outside the doors the Master had clamped his own TARDIS onto the Doctors. He console room was in darkness as he calmly walked across the threshold into the Doctors ship. He wore a black suit with a high collar and had grown a beard. His eyes twinkled as he looked around the console room.
He tutted. “Dear me, Doctor, this place as seen better days.” He looked down at Holly and frowned. “And who is this?”
“It doesn’t matter to you,” said the Doctor. “No, I suppose it doesn’t,” said the Master. “Now, let me have my daughter back.”
To be continued...
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