You will probably want to read the Introduction before you start.
Prologue
“…and with half of the world plunged into darkness, it’s only to be expected,” said the newsreader, clearly improvising. “But a 40% increase? That’s massive, even in these circumstances.”
“The simple fact is that people are beginning to understand the implications,” answered the government representative, his dark rings of glasses rubbing a faint red mark on his nose, and a lose strand of hair hanging annoyingly from his fringe. “Those areas in daylight may be more at risk, and we need to start launching programmes to help people cope with its persistence. Consider Greenland – one in five people attempt suicide at some point in their lives. Daylight causes insomnia. They’re at risk too. The way things are looking without intervention, those living in darkness will starve, and those living in daylight will face more personal, subtle problems. We need to install preventative measures, and we need to create a completely new order for this new world. Those in the dark will need new technology. Those in the light will need support-“
Robin flicked channels. Nobody mentioned the sunset. Those who lived in the sunset were forgotten, stuck between points. No one truly understood the sunset, or grasped what it would mean for society: what it would mean to be trapped, permanently, at a point of change; at neither day nor night.
“You were warned,” said an American preacher; an overweight man with an obscene t-shirt and a condescending smile. Robin guessed Westboro Baptist Church. The stopping had silenced geniuses and made idiots louder. “We warned you. We came on here and warned you. You’re all sinners, and now we’re warning you again. Repent. You’ve got to repent. When God comes – and he will come, soon, you mark my words – he’ll judge you the way you are. It could be any time, so you’d better start repenting, because this is your last chance.” Robin was reminded of the lyrics of Santa Clause is Coming to Town. The audience booed, and the preacher raised a sloppily-produced sign. Robin flicked channels again.
“According to new statistics, the gravitational effects of the stopping could see not just an ending for human life, but for bird life, too, as already a number of deaths have been reported across the globe. As what was considered by our ancestors a bad omen, could this be the beginning of the end?” Trinity Wells had said it now. Things were definitely serious. “Yes, according to the Pharos Institute, who are currently waiting to hear back from their leading professor.”
Robin gave up and turned off the television. She looked outside. It was nearly sunrise now – or would have been, if sunset hadn’t broken its way into the whole night. There was no point in sleeping, because people had given up. Structure was lost, and only clocks were a measure of time. Without them, time would be an abstract thing. Time, as the human race knew it, had stopped.
“The simple fact is that people are beginning to understand the implications,” answered the government representative, his dark rings of glasses rubbing a faint red mark on his nose, and a lose strand of hair hanging annoyingly from his fringe. “Those areas in daylight may be more at risk, and we need to start launching programmes to help people cope with its persistence. Consider Greenland – one in five people attempt suicide at some point in their lives. Daylight causes insomnia. They’re at risk too. The way things are looking without intervention, those living in darkness will starve, and those living in daylight will face more personal, subtle problems. We need to install preventative measures, and we need to create a completely new order for this new world. Those in the dark will need new technology. Those in the light will need support-“
Robin flicked channels. Nobody mentioned the sunset. Those who lived in the sunset were forgotten, stuck between points. No one truly understood the sunset, or grasped what it would mean for society: what it would mean to be trapped, permanently, at a point of change; at neither day nor night.
“You were warned,” said an American preacher; an overweight man with an obscene t-shirt and a condescending smile. Robin guessed Westboro Baptist Church. The stopping had silenced geniuses and made idiots louder. “We warned you. We came on here and warned you. You’re all sinners, and now we’re warning you again. Repent. You’ve got to repent. When God comes – and he will come, soon, you mark my words – he’ll judge you the way you are. It could be any time, so you’d better start repenting, because this is your last chance.” Robin was reminded of the lyrics of Santa Clause is Coming to Town. The audience booed, and the preacher raised a sloppily-produced sign. Robin flicked channels again.
“According to new statistics, the gravitational effects of the stopping could see not just an ending for human life, but for bird life, too, as already a number of deaths have been reported across the globe. As what was considered by our ancestors a bad omen, could this be the beginning of the end?” Trinity Wells had said it now. Things were definitely serious. “Yes, according to the Pharos Institute, who are currently waiting to hear back from their leading professor.”
Robin gave up and turned off the television. She looked outside. It was nearly sunrise now – or would have been, if sunset hadn’t broken its way into the whole night. There was no point in sleeping, because people had given up. Structure was lost, and only clocks were a measure of time. Without them, time would be an abstract thing. Time, as the human race knew it, had stopped.
The Eighth Doctor Adventures
Series 1 - Episode 5
Sunset Forever
Written by The Genie
“Over here,” said Christine, calling Robin from by a tree. She was wearing a dress patterned with exotic flowers, leaning back restfully against the tree as it were how she slept. Primrose Hill was vacant. People were at home, trying to sleep by burying themselves under their blankets, even though they could hear their children tiptoeing up in the night to catch another glimpse of the changed world.
“I always loved this time of day,” remarked Christine.
“Sunset or sunrise?” asked Robin, joining her by the tree. A few purple-tinted clouds hung over the city, fading into a bright, godly orange over the horizon. The Shard seemed to be red-tipped, like a bloody knife; a weapon, piercing into the clouds.
“Both.” She kicked off her flip-flops. “There’s still dew on the floor. I don’t know why. Time has frozen, but the day goes on.”
***
“Point Zero.” The Doctor shone a torchlight as he stepped out of the TARDIS. There was a piercing orange light shining through gaps in the distance, but nothing to illuminate finer details.
The place they’d materialised was massive; a giant cavern as far as the eye could see, grey-walled and grey-floored. It was windy despite being enclosed, and dotted with temples and other majestic buildings of some grand, alien architectural configuration and style. Statues sat like streetlamps along the winding pathways.
“It’s beautiful,” breathed Autumn.
“As I said,” continued the Doctor, “Point Zero. Literally. That’s where we are – Point Zero of the universe.” He shone the light upwards – the roof of the cave was just about visible, but effectively at sky-height. “See the universe as a graph. Well, the universes. A giant graph, spanning in all directions; a four-dimensional graph. But all those directions have a zero-point, and that’s this. We’re at the heart of the universe. This signal is coming from the heart of the universe. I suppose that explains how it got everywhere.”
“And what’s at the heart of the universe?” asked Autumn. “Civilisation, by the looks of it.”
“Not anymore,” said the Doctor, cynically. “But something. Maybe it’s a natural mechanism to do with the planet.”
“Wouldn’t the civilisation be relevant?” Professor Graves lifted a lump of rock, feeling the weight of it. Ordinary; the gravity was the same as Earth’s, although the air was definitely fresher. “The civilisation at the heart of the universe, and it happens to be religious, intelligent life?”
“Maybe they’re enlightened.” The Doctor shrugged. “I’ve always had a theory that evolution is different across the universes. Time working differently, maybe. At the far end, perhaps apes could become people in a year. Natural selection is that bit fiercer. But it’s just an idea. If this is the root of it, maybe this is just like the average of everything. The midpoint. Completely unremarkable.” He doubted his own words. There was something about this place – something unnaturally chilling. He lifted his sonic screwdriver, reducing it all back to science.
“The trace is stronger now,” he confirmed. “The same energy as we found on Earth – the same radiation and this place is full of it. Let’s hope it’s not dangerous.” The screwdriver made intermittent blipping noises. “This way.” He led them down the path.
It was a long and winding path, but there was plenty to admire. Autumn noted all the smaller details; the scratches on walls, or the deliberate carvings; the locks on doors and the tiles on roofs. After spending so long confined in space, staring at life from afar, to see it up close again was a gift, and everything seemed somehow relevant, fitting into the bigger picture. She recalled the images of planets; those spheres of vivid colour, and imagined these details merging together like pixels to form it. Distance reduced detail, but it was the only way to see it all at once.
They stopped, reaching the wall. The curved cavern became more tangible to them as they stood at the foot of it. There was a dip in the rocks; a tunnel, but not a naturally-formed one. It was a perfect circle, and through it was darkness. Graves found the darkness repelling, not even daring to step over the threshold. Autumn found it daunting and, for that reason, all the more alluring. Likewise, the Doctor allowed his curiosity to get the better of him; the prospect of a kind of dark life that existed beyond what he understood. More thrillingly, beyond what the Time Lords understood.
“This is where the trail leads. You two, stay here. Have a look inside the temples.”
“But-“
“Don’t argue, Autumn,” instructed the Doctor. “I’m in charge here and this is dangerous.” Autumn scowled but did as she was told. “In we go,” murmured the Doctor, stepping over the threshold and out of the universe he knew and understood. He realised he’d have to surrender his sense of logic; be prepared to learn that what he knew of the world was just a something out of a twisted pre-school textbook: that science was the new magic.
He walked on and smells disappeared. The screwdriver light stopped flashing and all noises stopped. The breeze got fiercer. He considered turning back; this was like going into hell. A long tunnel, but dark at the end. If you don’t turn back, you’ll die. You know you will. He shook the thoughts away. And if you live, nothing will be the same for you again. Do you really want to know the truth about the universe? About everything? Could you really comprehend it?
He hit a wall and looked up. There was a circle on the wall, glowing a bright, cold blue, and a silver panel in the centre of it. He looked down, feeling his legs shivering. Air vents – that explained the breeze. Turning around, the world behind him was now darkness. He was on the other side of the mirror, so to speak – but it’s not too late to go back. You can still turn around. It wouldn’t be wrong… Yet the more his mind fought it, the more his heart encouraged it.
The panel on the wall slid across, and the whole thing soon followed suit and gave way smoothly.
Then he saw it.
Primrose Hill, London
“What happened, Robin?” asked Christine. Despite the emptiness of the hill, it wasn’t silent. The London traffic provided a faint atmosphere in the distance, and birds sung in the trees, more beautifully than ever. The experts would probably call it an elegy. “What caused you to go back?”
“My friend died,” said Robin. “And this man, this man who I thought was my friend, he caused it.”
“He killed her?”
“No, not exactly. But he took her to the place she died. She…” Robin sniffed and reached for a handkerchief. “She killed herself.”
“I’m sorry about your friend. But you can’t blame a taxi driver.”
Robin frowned, not understanding, but the words sunk in eventually and formed sense in her mind. Christine’s advice always did.
“The problem is, if I don’t hate him, I’ll hate myself. If I hate him, it just about makes it bearable.”
“Not necessarily.” Christine brushed her hair with her fingers. “If you love him, that will remove any hate. Did you love him before?”
“Well…” Robin considered. Memories of Christmas came flooding back. The Doctor had replaced Christmas memories. Once they were the policemen at the door, and the numb agony as she searched for tears that somehow wouldn’t come. Now they were memories of magic and of well-earned goodbyes. The Doctor did that. “I wasn’t in love with him. But he was like an angel.” She looked up at the sky, and imagined the Doctor above the clouds, his blue box soaring above the purple. “I loved him like an angel.”
“Look at this, Robin,” she said as if something good was happening. “Time has frozen. Haven’t you ever thought you could stop time and think? Now you can. Maybe the world is waiting for you to make a decision.” She looked Robin the eye. “The right decision. We’re trapped in the sunset, and you need to choose either the darkness or the light.”
Point Zero
This temple was not in fact a temple, but a library. Either that, or they worshipped books, thought Autumn. Bookshelves lined the walls. These were old books, leather-fronted and printed on a rough, Papyrus-like texture of paper – but there was no dust gathering on them, or signs of wear in their binding. It was like someone had stepped inside history and cleaned it.
She examined a particular scroll, recognising the language. She’d lost count of the amount of language packages she installed on her cell computer system to pass the time; the most popular languages of the universe, in the hope that when she escaped, she could use them in her career; someone who could fluctuate between different cultures, blending into any she so desired.
“Over here. I recognise this.”
Graves glanced over her shoulder. “It looks ancient.”
“It is.” Autumn began to decipher.
***
Light. After so much darkness, it was like something alien. And not just light, but a complete white, all around. The Doctor knew he was standing on something, but when he looked down, the ground was white too, and there was no space between up, down, left or right. Everything was the same pale white, like being trapped inside a computer screen, and it went on forever. He wondered if he was suffering some kind of strange sight impediment.
He realised he wasn't, as someone stood before him; an ordinary-sized man garbed fully in leather. His face was cut in half; a smooth line divided it into two up until his nose, where the line moved left slightly and continued up, giving his face the appearance of a jigsaw piece. One half was ordinary and human; a white, clean, green-eyed male; the other half was that of a robot – complex mechanisms whirring away, lights, and a robotic eye, staring unblinkingly at him. The Doctor noticed that the human eye also stayed open.
“Hello,” said the Doctor.
“You should not have come.”
The voice was that of a Cyborg; half-human, half-robot, with intonation but a definitely digital quality.
“Who are you?” asked the Doctor. His held felt strange. This place was… strange. It didn’t fit.
“We are the Enlightened Ones.”
“That civilisation outside. Did you destroy it?”
“No.” The reply was cold and unsettling, lacking in any human quality. “It was our civilisation.”
“But it’s recent… oh, I see.” The Doctor clapped. “I was right! My theory about evolution. How long did it take you to get from temples to this?”
“In your time, six months,” answered the man. “Our evolution is stunted now. We cannot develop any further.”
“This is astonishing.” The Doctor moved around. “This reality you’ve crafted for yourself. You really are clever. So this plan, you were behind it?”
“It is our experiment.” A hologram came out of nowhere; a picture of a cube, coloured a bright luminescent blue. The cube changed, suddenly, forming a sphere. “We created a device to transmit a signal. Anything caught within that signal is within our control. What you just saw was a small-scale test of the device’s capability. The atoms within the signal were rearranged in a random formation and created a sphere. The odds were next to none.”
“The energy trace,” said the Doctor, nodding. “I knew I’d never seen it before. The amount of control you have, sitting at the centre of the universe, bending the laws of physics. I knew civilisation here could be dangerous.”
“The energy has a temporal aspect. This altered perception and movement of time, separated geographical area temporally. This gave the effect of your planet coming to a halt. Time passed at a normal rate, but was perceived differently. This includes movement on a wider scale. The ship orbiting your planet was trapped in a time-frame.”
“It wasn’t a miracle after all. It didn’t even happen. So you’ve got this energy, you’ve put it out there, and you can control anything covered by it from here, like magic glue. What are you planning to do with it?”
“The experiment you saw was on a smaller scale. We will move all atoms covered by the signal, creating a random formation across the universes.”
“No!” exclaimed the Doctor. “No, you can’t do that! You’ll destroy everything, all life! All structure will be lost. The reactions that would take place…” He shook his head. “No, no. I can’t let you.”
“The cube formed a sphere in a random formation. The formula we used is unpredictable but points towards a hidden structure to the universe. There may be a greater life dictating everything; a designer. We must complete the experiment to unlock this life.”
“No.” The Doctor raised his sonic screwdriver. “You’ll destroy yourselves.”
“We have concentrated ourselves into the atom at Point Zero. We will be save from the cataclysm.”
The Doctor’s sonic screwdriver sparked. He dropped it and it faded into the white. The Enlightened Ones were in control.
“So this is what evolution does, then? Brings enlightenment and turns you into monsters. Your curiosity is about to destroy everything. Everything!”
***
“They’ve been planning this since the start. They’re obsessed with the idea of a higher life.” Autumn put down the scroll. “That’s what the energy trace is. They’re going to unravel everything and see what the universe throws back.”
“If they’re tucked away in their own little pocket, there must be a tangible transmitter here. Something to have sent that signal. It came from the tunnel, but what if it’s all around us? What if the whole planet is a transmitter?”
“Good thinking!” Autumn lifted a blaster from her pocket and fired it at the wall. The bookshelf collapsed, sending planks spinning sideways and books fluttering through the air like birds, crashing and dying. Behind the shelf was a massive control unit. “Secondary control. They must have activated it from here and set it on a timer. So we can cancel it…”
Graves scanned the different buttons, slowly understanding but not wanting to. “Go back to the Doctor’s ship and rescue him. Do you know how to fly it?”
“Yes.” Autumn headed for the door. “If this doesn’t work…”
“It doesn’t bear thinking about.” Graves clasped his hands together in prayer. “Go, Autumn.”
***
The white faded into something else, accompanied by a wheezing and groaning. It darkened and warmed, and suddenly the Doctor was back in his TARDIS. That too must have been compressed to fit inside the pocket. Autumn piloted the console.
“We need to take off and get out of here,” said the Doctor, manically pushing and pulling at controls. The ship juddered and halted. Lights dimmed even more than usual and flashed on, brighter than before, as the ship groaned tiredly.
“They’re not letting us take off! Oh, they’re clever. But I’ve got an idea.” He bent down and unfastened a panel underneath the console, cutting a wire. The ship jolted more than he’d ever felt and both the Doctor and Autumn fell to the floor as it bruised them with its impact.
“What was that?” asked Autumn, brushing herself down.
“I turned off the mass stabilisers, inflicting the real weight of the TARDIS on the pocket. That would be enough to fracture most planets, but this is their technology.” The TARDIS shook slightly. “It’s given us just enough time to get out, though.”
Something flicked up on the TARDIS screen; a high-resolution image of Professor Graves in the temple, looking directly at the lens. “This should be coming through…”
The Doctor gathered he was intercepting a signal. The Enlightened Ones would also be seeing this.
“You might call yourselves the Enlightened Ones, but you didn’t anticipate this.” Graves tapped in some coordinates, the Doctor guessed, as Graves was looking down at something. “I’ve re-rooted the signal. Any moment now, it’ll all transmit back here, and all that excess energy will overwhelm this world. Your command will be asserted and the structure will break down and rearrange. But it will happen here, a million times as powerful, and it will shatter you apart too.”
“Back on Earth now, governments will be falling, and men obsessed with power will be climbing ladders, seizing the opportunity. A New World Order. They’re no different to you, bending the world to their whim. They’d call me a dinosaur because I prefer the old ways. But they don’t understand progression.” He looked back at the lens.
“Progression is when we move forwards together for each other’s sakes. Progression is striving for the greater good.” He tensed, bracing himself. “Doctor, Autumn, when you get back to Earth, tell them this. Tell them about what I’m doing.”
He hit the first button and it flashed red. “This…”
And the second, flashing amber like a traffic-light sequence. “Is… progression!”
He slammed the third and beamed. The signal cut off and the Doctor re-programmed the TARDIS’s coordinates as it left Point Zero for last time.
Primrose Hill, London
“He was my angel.”
Robin looked up, a tear in her eye. The orange had faded in the distance, with the purple taking over, and the clouds had changed formation.
“It’s stopped. But we didn’t see it.” Robin was right. There wasn’t a lightshow like the first time. Time had just started ticking over, leaving those attentive watchers oblivious.
“We never see the sunset,” said Christine, her voice heavy with meaning.
Robin turned around and saw the TARDIS parked outside her house, the sunset colours illuminating the windows. She’d dismissed the sound of its materialisation as the wind.
“Fixed,” said the Doctor, when Robin reached him. “The Earth’s back to normal. It never even stopped. Now…” He took out his key, offering it, glowing, to Robin. “I know what I’ve put you through. But I can change, if you’ll take me.”
“No,” answered Robin after a brief moment of consideration. “Sorry, I just can’t.” Her frown disappeared. “But there is something you can do for me. Break that promise I made you make.”
“What promise?”
“Not to travel with anyone again.” She took the key, holding it in her hand thoughtfully, and passed it back. “That belongs with someone else. Take someone with you, Doctor, because it’s the best thing that could happen to anyone. Just warn them first.”
The Doctor nodded, understanding.
“And it doesn’t mean I won’t miss you.” She found her eyes watering up and concealed her tears with a hug. The Doctor realised she was hiding her face. “Look after yourself,” she whispered, kissing him on the cheek. He stepped back inside his TARDIS, not looking back, and it faded away, blowing the leaves back furiously. Robin failed to control her hair as the gust tangled it. She offered the disappearing vessel a salute.
***
“So what was it?” asked Autumn, as the TARDIS appeared back on the London side-street. “That greater power that the Enlightened Ones were obsessed with.”
“I don’t know,” said the Doctor, embarrassed. “But they showed me a cube, with its atoms rearranged into a random formation using their equation, and it became spherical. That was impossible.” There was a glimmer of fascination in his eyes. “There was a miracle in the end.”
“They thought this was a miracle,” argued Autumn, gesturing to the sky. Night had fallen now. “It was just the effects of a greater science.”
“Well then,” said the Doctor, shaking it off. “I’d better go now. Goodbye, Autumn. Thank you for your help. I’m trusting you here because you saved my life. I think that counts for some community service.”
Autumn laughed.
“But no getting into trouble.” He gave her a swift handshake.
“Can I come with you?” requested Autumn. “I’d love to do more of this.”
“No. Sorry.”
Autumn’s face fell. “Why?”
“You’re a criminal. I don’t travel with criminals.”
“And you’re a hypocrite,” retorted Autumn, glaring and walking off down the side-street and into the shadows.
Whoops, thought the Doctor, entering the TARDIS.
“Bloody hell!”
The Doctor raised an eyebrow, looking in the direction of the voice. He knew he recognised it.
“This place…” The tramp sat up on the couch. “So, what does it do, then?”
Oh, great.
Coal Hill School
Robin knocked, brushing back her hair and noticing her face in the reflection of the door. Her makeup made her look younger than she was; happier and more professional. Of course, she was happy. Things had changed. Bottles of various alcoholic drinks had been thrown out into the skip, apart from a few empty ones on her worktop, their contents poured down the sink.
“Come in,” came the familiar voice of Mr McKnight.
“Hi,” said Robin, nervously, trying to gather herself. “I’m sorry about turning up unannounced like this. Look, this is probably stupid, but I wanted to come back. I had a wobble earlier but I’m fine. I get wobbles. I lost my son. Childless mothers get moments where they want to curl up in a ball and cry out, believe me, but those moments are worth it for the good stuff. The good stuff is what I can offer you.” She paused. Mr McKnight raised his eyebrows, taken aback. “I used to do my job fine. I did what I was supposed to, I went home and I lived my life. Now things have changed, and I believe the loss of my son has made me better. It’s made me realise how important these young lives are, and how fleeting they can be. It’s made me understand families and grief, and the kids who haven’t had it easy. I believe if you give me a chance, I can be better than I ever was. I believe I can use my pain to help others. And I won’t be a liberty, I swear. This job will change me.”
“Well,” said Mr McKnight, smiling. “You can have the job.”
“Thank you!” Robin stopped. “But just like that?”
“No.” Mr McKnight handed a reference sheet printed by his secretary. Robin noticed the haphazard noting style, but was drawn to the quote.
An amazing, life-changing worker who saved hundreds of children on Christmas Eve of all days. A great teacher and an inspiration with an infinite complexity and appreciation for others. A brilliant specimen of a human being.
“I’ve checked the guy’s ID and he’s pretty high up. I don’t know why you didn’t just mention it before.”
“What was his name?” asked Robin.
“I’m not sure. I think he said Gabriel…”
Robin smiled. That impossible man – he’d never stop.
The Village
“Why are you standing out there again?” Paul approached Valerie, taking her hand. Valerie kept her eyes fixed on the foggy beyond; the long, endless, pastures of grass.
“Come back to the village square,” urged Paul. “Come back home. Come on…”
“Okay,” said Valerie, spooked. “Sorry. I go a bit mad sometimes.”
“It’s fine. We all do.”
“Just some contact. That’s all it would take! A bit of contact, anything, from the outside world. Just to know they’re still out there!”
“Maybe they’re trying,” suggested Paul, turning back to catch a glimpse of the horizon. “Maybe the signals just aren’t reaching us. I really do believe that those fields go on forever.”
“I always loved this time of day,” remarked Christine.
“Sunset or sunrise?” asked Robin, joining her by the tree. A few purple-tinted clouds hung over the city, fading into a bright, godly orange over the horizon. The Shard seemed to be red-tipped, like a bloody knife; a weapon, piercing into the clouds.
“Both.” She kicked off her flip-flops. “There’s still dew on the floor. I don’t know why. Time has frozen, but the day goes on.”
***
“Point Zero.” The Doctor shone a torchlight as he stepped out of the TARDIS. There was a piercing orange light shining through gaps in the distance, but nothing to illuminate finer details.
The place they’d materialised was massive; a giant cavern as far as the eye could see, grey-walled and grey-floored. It was windy despite being enclosed, and dotted with temples and other majestic buildings of some grand, alien architectural configuration and style. Statues sat like streetlamps along the winding pathways.
“It’s beautiful,” breathed Autumn.
“As I said,” continued the Doctor, “Point Zero. Literally. That’s where we are – Point Zero of the universe.” He shone the light upwards – the roof of the cave was just about visible, but effectively at sky-height. “See the universe as a graph. Well, the universes. A giant graph, spanning in all directions; a four-dimensional graph. But all those directions have a zero-point, and that’s this. We’re at the heart of the universe. This signal is coming from the heart of the universe. I suppose that explains how it got everywhere.”
“And what’s at the heart of the universe?” asked Autumn. “Civilisation, by the looks of it.”
“Not anymore,” said the Doctor, cynically. “But something. Maybe it’s a natural mechanism to do with the planet.”
“Wouldn’t the civilisation be relevant?” Professor Graves lifted a lump of rock, feeling the weight of it. Ordinary; the gravity was the same as Earth’s, although the air was definitely fresher. “The civilisation at the heart of the universe, and it happens to be religious, intelligent life?”
“Maybe they’re enlightened.” The Doctor shrugged. “I’ve always had a theory that evolution is different across the universes. Time working differently, maybe. At the far end, perhaps apes could become people in a year. Natural selection is that bit fiercer. But it’s just an idea. If this is the root of it, maybe this is just like the average of everything. The midpoint. Completely unremarkable.” He doubted his own words. There was something about this place – something unnaturally chilling. He lifted his sonic screwdriver, reducing it all back to science.
“The trace is stronger now,” he confirmed. “The same energy as we found on Earth – the same radiation and this place is full of it. Let’s hope it’s not dangerous.” The screwdriver made intermittent blipping noises. “This way.” He led them down the path.
It was a long and winding path, but there was plenty to admire. Autumn noted all the smaller details; the scratches on walls, or the deliberate carvings; the locks on doors and the tiles on roofs. After spending so long confined in space, staring at life from afar, to see it up close again was a gift, and everything seemed somehow relevant, fitting into the bigger picture. She recalled the images of planets; those spheres of vivid colour, and imagined these details merging together like pixels to form it. Distance reduced detail, but it was the only way to see it all at once.
They stopped, reaching the wall. The curved cavern became more tangible to them as they stood at the foot of it. There was a dip in the rocks; a tunnel, but not a naturally-formed one. It was a perfect circle, and through it was darkness. Graves found the darkness repelling, not even daring to step over the threshold. Autumn found it daunting and, for that reason, all the more alluring. Likewise, the Doctor allowed his curiosity to get the better of him; the prospect of a kind of dark life that existed beyond what he understood. More thrillingly, beyond what the Time Lords understood.
“This is where the trail leads. You two, stay here. Have a look inside the temples.”
“But-“
“Don’t argue, Autumn,” instructed the Doctor. “I’m in charge here and this is dangerous.” Autumn scowled but did as she was told. “In we go,” murmured the Doctor, stepping over the threshold and out of the universe he knew and understood. He realised he’d have to surrender his sense of logic; be prepared to learn that what he knew of the world was just a something out of a twisted pre-school textbook: that science was the new magic.
He walked on and smells disappeared. The screwdriver light stopped flashing and all noises stopped. The breeze got fiercer. He considered turning back; this was like going into hell. A long tunnel, but dark at the end. If you don’t turn back, you’ll die. You know you will. He shook the thoughts away. And if you live, nothing will be the same for you again. Do you really want to know the truth about the universe? About everything? Could you really comprehend it?
He hit a wall and looked up. There was a circle on the wall, glowing a bright, cold blue, and a silver panel in the centre of it. He looked down, feeling his legs shivering. Air vents – that explained the breeze. Turning around, the world behind him was now darkness. He was on the other side of the mirror, so to speak – but it’s not too late to go back. You can still turn around. It wouldn’t be wrong… Yet the more his mind fought it, the more his heart encouraged it.
The panel on the wall slid across, and the whole thing soon followed suit and gave way smoothly.
Then he saw it.
Primrose Hill, London
“What happened, Robin?” asked Christine. Despite the emptiness of the hill, it wasn’t silent. The London traffic provided a faint atmosphere in the distance, and birds sung in the trees, more beautifully than ever. The experts would probably call it an elegy. “What caused you to go back?”
“My friend died,” said Robin. “And this man, this man who I thought was my friend, he caused it.”
“He killed her?”
“No, not exactly. But he took her to the place she died. She…” Robin sniffed and reached for a handkerchief. “She killed herself.”
“I’m sorry about your friend. But you can’t blame a taxi driver.”
Robin frowned, not understanding, but the words sunk in eventually and formed sense in her mind. Christine’s advice always did.
“The problem is, if I don’t hate him, I’ll hate myself. If I hate him, it just about makes it bearable.”
“Not necessarily.” Christine brushed her hair with her fingers. “If you love him, that will remove any hate. Did you love him before?”
“Well…” Robin considered. Memories of Christmas came flooding back. The Doctor had replaced Christmas memories. Once they were the policemen at the door, and the numb agony as she searched for tears that somehow wouldn’t come. Now they were memories of magic and of well-earned goodbyes. The Doctor did that. “I wasn’t in love with him. But he was like an angel.” She looked up at the sky, and imagined the Doctor above the clouds, his blue box soaring above the purple. “I loved him like an angel.”
“Look at this, Robin,” she said as if something good was happening. “Time has frozen. Haven’t you ever thought you could stop time and think? Now you can. Maybe the world is waiting for you to make a decision.” She looked Robin the eye. “The right decision. We’re trapped in the sunset, and you need to choose either the darkness or the light.”
Point Zero
This temple was not in fact a temple, but a library. Either that, or they worshipped books, thought Autumn. Bookshelves lined the walls. These were old books, leather-fronted and printed on a rough, Papyrus-like texture of paper – but there was no dust gathering on them, or signs of wear in their binding. It was like someone had stepped inside history and cleaned it.
She examined a particular scroll, recognising the language. She’d lost count of the amount of language packages she installed on her cell computer system to pass the time; the most popular languages of the universe, in the hope that when she escaped, she could use them in her career; someone who could fluctuate between different cultures, blending into any she so desired.
“Over here. I recognise this.”
Graves glanced over her shoulder. “It looks ancient.”
“It is.” Autumn began to decipher.
***
Light. After so much darkness, it was like something alien. And not just light, but a complete white, all around. The Doctor knew he was standing on something, but when he looked down, the ground was white too, and there was no space between up, down, left or right. Everything was the same pale white, like being trapped inside a computer screen, and it went on forever. He wondered if he was suffering some kind of strange sight impediment.
He realised he wasn't, as someone stood before him; an ordinary-sized man garbed fully in leather. His face was cut in half; a smooth line divided it into two up until his nose, where the line moved left slightly and continued up, giving his face the appearance of a jigsaw piece. One half was ordinary and human; a white, clean, green-eyed male; the other half was that of a robot – complex mechanisms whirring away, lights, and a robotic eye, staring unblinkingly at him. The Doctor noticed that the human eye also stayed open.
“Hello,” said the Doctor.
“You should not have come.”
The voice was that of a Cyborg; half-human, half-robot, with intonation but a definitely digital quality.
“Who are you?” asked the Doctor. His held felt strange. This place was… strange. It didn’t fit.
“We are the Enlightened Ones.”
“That civilisation outside. Did you destroy it?”
“No.” The reply was cold and unsettling, lacking in any human quality. “It was our civilisation.”
“But it’s recent… oh, I see.” The Doctor clapped. “I was right! My theory about evolution. How long did it take you to get from temples to this?”
“In your time, six months,” answered the man. “Our evolution is stunted now. We cannot develop any further.”
“This is astonishing.” The Doctor moved around. “This reality you’ve crafted for yourself. You really are clever. So this plan, you were behind it?”
“It is our experiment.” A hologram came out of nowhere; a picture of a cube, coloured a bright luminescent blue. The cube changed, suddenly, forming a sphere. “We created a device to transmit a signal. Anything caught within that signal is within our control. What you just saw was a small-scale test of the device’s capability. The atoms within the signal were rearranged in a random formation and created a sphere. The odds were next to none.”
“The energy trace,” said the Doctor, nodding. “I knew I’d never seen it before. The amount of control you have, sitting at the centre of the universe, bending the laws of physics. I knew civilisation here could be dangerous.”
“The energy has a temporal aspect. This altered perception and movement of time, separated geographical area temporally. This gave the effect of your planet coming to a halt. Time passed at a normal rate, but was perceived differently. This includes movement on a wider scale. The ship orbiting your planet was trapped in a time-frame.”
“It wasn’t a miracle after all. It didn’t even happen. So you’ve got this energy, you’ve put it out there, and you can control anything covered by it from here, like magic glue. What are you planning to do with it?”
“The experiment you saw was on a smaller scale. We will move all atoms covered by the signal, creating a random formation across the universes.”
“No!” exclaimed the Doctor. “No, you can’t do that! You’ll destroy everything, all life! All structure will be lost. The reactions that would take place…” He shook his head. “No, no. I can’t let you.”
“The cube formed a sphere in a random formation. The formula we used is unpredictable but points towards a hidden structure to the universe. There may be a greater life dictating everything; a designer. We must complete the experiment to unlock this life.”
“No.” The Doctor raised his sonic screwdriver. “You’ll destroy yourselves.”
“We have concentrated ourselves into the atom at Point Zero. We will be save from the cataclysm.”
The Doctor’s sonic screwdriver sparked. He dropped it and it faded into the white. The Enlightened Ones were in control.
“So this is what evolution does, then? Brings enlightenment and turns you into monsters. Your curiosity is about to destroy everything. Everything!”
***
“They’ve been planning this since the start. They’re obsessed with the idea of a higher life.” Autumn put down the scroll. “That’s what the energy trace is. They’re going to unravel everything and see what the universe throws back.”
“If they’re tucked away in their own little pocket, there must be a tangible transmitter here. Something to have sent that signal. It came from the tunnel, but what if it’s all around us? What if the whole planet is a transmitter?”
“Good thinking!” Autumn lifted a blaster from her pocket and fired it at the wall. The bookshelf collapsed, sending planks spinning sideways and books fluttering through the air like birds, crashing and dying. Behind the shelf was a massive control unit. “Secondary control. They must have activated it from here and set it on a timer. So we can cancel it…”
Graves scanned the different buttons, slowly understanding but not wanting to. “Go back to the Doctor’s ship and rescue him. Do you know how to fly it?”
“Yes.” Autumn headed for the door. “If this doesn’t work…”
“It doesn’t bear thinking about.” Graves clasped his hands together in prayer. “Go, Autumn.”
***
The white faded into something else, accompanied by a wheezing and groaning. It darkened and warmed, and suddenly the Doctor was back in his TARDIS. That too must have been compressed to fit inside the pocket. Autumn piloted the console.
“We need to take off and get out of here,” said the Doctor, manically pushing and pulling at controls. The ship juddered and halted. Lights dimmed even more than usual and flashed on, brighter than before, as the ship groaned tiredly.
“They’re not letting us take off! Oh, they’re clever. But I’ve got an idea.” He bent down and unfastened a panel underneath the console, cutting a wire. The ship jolted more than he’d ever felt and both the Doctor and Autumn fell to the floor as it bruised them with its impact.
“What was that?” asked Autumn, brushing herself down.
“I turned off the mass stabilisers, inflicting the real weight of the TARDIS on the pocket. That would be enough to fracture most planets, but this is their technology.” The TARDIS shook slightly. “It’s given us just enough time to get out, though.”
Something flicked up on the TARDIS screen; a high-resolution image of Professor Graves in the temple, looking directly at the lens. “This should be coming through…”
The Doctor gathered he was intercepting a signal. The Enlightened Ones would also be seeing this.
“You might call yourselves the Enlightened Ones, but you didn’t anticipate this.” Graves tapped in some coordinates, the Doctor guessed, as Graves was looking down at something. “I’ve re-rooted the signal. Any moment now, it’ll all transmit back here, and all that excess energy will overwhelm this world. Your command will be asserted and the structure will break down and rearrange. But it will happen here, a million times as powerful, and it will shatter you apart too.”
“Back on Earth now, governments will be falling, and men obsessed with power will be climbing ladders, seizing the opportunity. A New World Order. They’re no different to you, bending the world to their whim. They’d call me a dinosaur because I prefer the old ways. But they don’t understand progression.” He looked back at the lens.
“Progression is when we move forwards together for each other’s sakes. Progression is striving for the greater good.” He tensed, bracing himself. “Doctor, Autumn, when you get back to Earth, tell them this. Tell them about what I’m doing.”
He hit the first button and it flashed red. “This…”
And the second, flashing amber like a traffic-light sequence. “Is… progression!”
He slammed the third and beamed. The signal cut off and the Doctor re-programmed the TARDIS’s coordinates as it left Point Zero for last time.
Primrose Hill, London
“He was my angel.”
Robin looked up, a tear in her eye. The orange had faded in the distance, with the purple taking over, and the clouds had changed formation.
“It’s stopped. But we didn’t see it.” Robin was right. There wasn’t a lightshow like the first time. Time had just started ticking over, leaving those attentive watchers oblivious.
“We never see the sunset,” said Christine, her voice heavy with meaning.
Robin turned around and saw the TARDIS parked outside her house, the sunset colours illuminating the windows. She’d dismissed the sound of its materialisation as the wind.
“Fixed,” said the Doctor, when Robin reached him. “The Earth’s back to normal. It never even stopped. Now…” He took out his key, offering it, glowing, to Robin. “I know what I’ve put you through. But I can change, if you’ll take me.”
“No,” answered Robin after a brief moment of consideration. “Sorry, I just can’t.” Her frown disappeared. “But there is something you can do for me. Break that promise I made you make.”
“What promise?”
“Not to travel with anyone again.” She took the key, holding it in her hand thoughtfully, and passed it back. “That belongs with someone else. Take someone with you, Doctor, because it’s the best thing that could happen to anyone. Just warn them first.”
The Doctor nodded, understanding.
“And it doesn’t mean I won’t miss you.” She found her eyes watering up and concealed her tears with a hug. The Doctor realised she was hiding her face. “Look after yourself,” she whispered, kissing him on the cheek. He stepped back inside his TARDIS, not looking back, and it faded away, blowing the leaves back furiously. Robin failed to control her hair as the gust tangled it. She offered the disappearing vessel a salute.
***
“So what was it?” asked Autumn, as the TARDIS appeared back on the London side-street. “That greater power that the Enlightened Ones were obsessed with.”
“I don’t know,” said the Doctor, embarrassed. “But they showed me a cube, with its atoms rearranged into a random formation using their equation, and it became spherical. That was impossible.” There was a glimmer of fascination in his eyes. “There was a miracle in the end.”
“They thought this was a miracle,” argued Autumn, gesturing to the sky. Night had fallen now. “It was just the effects of a greater science.”
“Well then,” said the Doctor, shaking it off. “I’d better go now. Goodbye, Autumn. Thank you for your help. I’m trusting you here because you saved my life. I think that counts for some community service.”
Autumn laughed.
“But no getting into trouble.” He gave her a swift handshake.
“Can I come with you?” requested Autumn. “I’d love to do more of this.”
“No. Sorry.”
Autumn’s face fell. “Why?”
“You’re a criminal. I don’t travel with criminals.”
“And you’re a hypocrite,” retorted Autumn, glaring and walking off down the side-street and into the shadows.
Whoops, thought the Doctor, entering the TARDIS.
“Bloody hell!”
The Doctor raised an eyebrow, looking in the direction of the voice. He knew he recognised it.
“This place…” The tramp sat up on the couch. “So, what does it do, then?”
Oh, great.
Coal Hill School
Robin knocked, brushing back her hair and noticing her face in the reflection of the door. Her makeup made her look younger than she was; happier and more professional. Of course, she was happy. Things had changed. Bottles of various alcoholic drinks had been thrown out into the skip, apart from a few empty ones on her worktop, their contents poured down the sink.
“Come in,” came the familiar voice of Mr McKnight.
“Hi,” said Robin, nervously, trying to gather herself. “I’m sorry about turning up unannounced like this. Look, this is probably stupid, but I wanted to come back. I had a wobble earlier but I’m fine. I get wobbles. I lost my son. Childless mothers get moments where they want to curl up in a ball and cry out, believe me, but those moments are worth it for the good stuff. The good stuff is what I can offer you.” She paused. Mr McKnight raised his eyebrows, taken aback. “I used to do my job fine. I did what I was supposed to, I went home and I lived my life. Now things have changed, and I believe the loss of my son has made me better. It’s made me realise how important these young lives are, and how fleeting they can be. It’s made me understand families and grief, and the kids who haven’t had it easy. I believe if you give me a chance, I can be better than I ever was. I believe I can use my pain to help others. And I won’t be a liberty, I swear. This job will change me.”
“Well,” said Mr McKnight, smiling. “You can have the job.”
“Thank you!” Robin stopped. “But just like that?”
“No.” Mr McKnight handed a reference sheet printed by his secretary. Robin noticed the haphazard noting style, but was drawn to the quote.
An amazing, life-changing worker who saved hundreds of children on Christmas Eve of all days. A great teacher and an inspiration with an infinite complexity and appreciation for others. A brilliant specimen of a human being.
“I’ve checked the guy’s ID and he’s pretty high up. I don’t know why you didn’t just mention it before.”
“What was his name?” asked Robin.
“I’m not sure. I think he said Gabriel…”
Robin smiled. That impossible man – he’d never stop.
The Village
“Why are you standing out there again?” Paul approached Valerie, taking her hand. Valerie kept her eyes fixed on the foggy beyond; the long, endless, pastures of grass.
“Come back to the village square,” urged Paul. “Come back home. Come on…”
“Okay,” said Valerie, spooked. “Sorry. I go a bit mad sometimes.”
“It’s fine. We all do.”
“Just some contact. That’s all it would take! A bit of contact, anything, from the outside world. Just to know they’re still out there!”
“Maybe they’re trying,” suggested Paul, turning back to catch a glimpse of the horizon. “Maybe the signals just aren’t reaching us. I really do believe that those fields go on forever.”
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Next Time
The Planet Makers
Joining an unconventional expedition team, the Doctor embarks on a journey across a man-made planet to fight the Krynoid - now more powerful than ever - before the planet's creators blow it up. Episode list: 1. The Time Museum 2. The Adulteress and Her Doctor 3. Peacepoint 4. Earthstop 5. Sunset Forever 6. The Planet Makers 7. Who Watches The Watchmen? 8. The Anger Games 9. Extinction 10. The Quest Through Time 11. A Village Called Nothing 12. Bigger on the Inside 13. Extermination of the Daleks |