Kim has not accepted her fate, but there seems very little to be done by now. That is, until a strange noise in the night disturbs her sleep and her feline curiosity is awakened along with her sense of adventure…
Author's note: If you are still with me: Here he comes! Thank you for your patience. Now this should turn into a decent Doctor Who story. And just you wait until Tegan starts playing her part too…
Part four
The two weeks since the announcement of her 'engagement' had done little to lighten Kim's mood. In fact, she learned that it would be inappropriate for her to bring her own maids, so she would loose the company of Allindra as well.
She had received a letter from her fiancé, who had expressed his wishes for their marriage and his understanding of her inability to bear him any children. The letter had not contained any words of endearment or suggestions that she could, in time, come to like the house of Matsudaira.
It was almost as if it was a business treaty. But then, so it probably was. She knew very little of her father's relations to Matsudaira Nobunaga, but she was sure that the Emperor gained more from this marriage than just getting rid of an annoying problem.
And there were the treatments.
She was repeatedly taken to the hospital wing, strapped to a table and forced to listen to long tirades about the Code and the Bushido, receiving various drugs that made her dizzy and electric shocks to 'enhance her memory and help her remember better' as it was put.
She had read a bit about psychology and psychiatry and she had absolutely no idea how this ridiculous 'treatment' could be perceived as anything but brainwashing.
She suspected Ashim of having invented it for her alone, though she had no idea what reasons he had for hating her enough to do this to her. Truth be told, it was probably really more of a punishment than anything else.
At least she had been told that the treatments would end after the first month. And they were less regular than they had been at earlier times. But they were nauseating and extremely scary all the same, even if she tried to maintain at attitude of indifference. She always ended up screaming and saying whatever they wanted her to. And after a while of doing so, they usually stopped and had her wheeled back to her own quarters in a wheelchair or on a gurney.
She always slept after such a treatment.
The last had been this day, fairly early, and she had fallen asleep as soon as she had been tucked into her bed by a frowning but quiet Allindra. Now it was well past midnight and she was suddenly wide awake.
Something had disturbed her sleep. Not a difficult thing to do, as she was plagued by dreams and visions after visits to the hospital wing, but usually nothing would disturb the sleep of a princess.
She sat up in her bed, the tip of her tail twitching and her whiskers standing out from her face. She bristled instinctively as she scanned the room for anything out of the ordinary.
There it was again. A faint sound, strange and grinding, like some great mechanical beast fighting to draw air into asthmatic lungs. No, this was a silly notion... And yet, it seemed, rather precise.
Quietly she got out of bed and walked to the door on bare feet; just the way she really preferred.
The door opened easily and quietly on well oiled hinges. There were no guards outside, but with the bracelet it was hardly necessary. Disregarding the times where an escort had taken her to the hospital wing, she had been able to order her part of the palace free of regular guards - only a few passed from time to time, making sure that everything was all right.
Kim knew that her father would have a fit if he saw her walking the corridors at night, wearing but a light grey tunic allowing for her arms and legs - and tail - to move freely, but it gave her a freedom of movement that she liked a lot. Trying not to think too much about how the count would prefer her to look and act, she slipped down the corridor and went into one of the halls, trying to discern the origin of the sound.
But the sound had stopped now. She listened in the semi-darkness, her whiskers, her ears and her every sense of perception open and alert. She could just summon the guards or a servant, but she preferred to solve this little mystery by herself.
This way she would not look foolish when it turned out to be a matter for the plumber!
Perhaps she had imagined it? Perhaps it was really just something in the ventilation system, something that really was not her problem.
No, there definitely was something different in here! She bristled and curled down, following her feline instincts and trying to penetrate the walls themselves. There was something...
Kim continued down a corridor, turned left, stopped in front of a small door and literally sniffed it. It lead to a storage room, possibly the one where her bed sheets were stored or one where some of the household utensils needed to maintain the palace wing were kept.
The door opened easily and she peeked inside, sensing that whatever she had heard, this was where she would find it.
The room was bigger than she had expected and it was clearly a storage room. There were several rows of shelves, packed with boxes and crates and whatever was stored here, it was not a regularly used room; even here, inside the imperial palace, she could find dust.
She slid the door closed behind her and ventured further into the room, imagining to have put on her 'stalking hat' as she thought to herself.
There were seven rows of shelves, and the wall was lined with big crates and closets. The big crates fascinated her as she tried to imagine what was in them. One, as she looked closer, seemed to hold a closet, made from expensive woods and lacquer and currently stored here until it would be used again. Another held a small statue, made from a dark green stone and packed in those little flamingo pellets that were to protect it - and which poured all over the place when Kim tried to look inside the crate.
The next was a peculiar one, a dusty blue box with sides made from wood squares and a few pieces of frosted glass, and when she tried to push open the doors, they didn't budge.
It took almost an entire second before Kim realised that it was no ordinary box; then she realised what was different about it: It was not as cold to the touch as the others and moreover, it was humming quietly.
She removed her hand with delicate slowness and took another survey of the box. It looked a bit like a phone booth, what with the window squares in the side; only she now discovered the faded letters atop it: "Police Box". That was odd, what would a police box, whatever a police box was, be doing in a storage room in the south-eastern wing of the palace?
What was it about this box that made such an impression on her? By rights, it should make her skin crawl and her every instinct warned her about potential attempts, terrorist attacks and the likes; for all she knew, it could be humming because it contained an explosive device. And yet, some even deeper instincts made her less uneasy. Somehow this box, whatever it was, was not dangerous. Not really.
She tried to press the door to the box again, to no avail. Then she decided, with a mixture of anger, curiosity and plain stubbornness to force the thing opened. There should, at least in this part of the palace, be nothing that she was not allowed access to.
Kim tried to pry the doors, first with her bare hands, then with claws and finally even with the small dagger she wore as a ceremonial and yet quite sharp weapon. But none of it worked as even the dagger's tip could find no point of entrance between the closed doors.
Her continued attempts at prying the door with the dagger made it slip, and with a small cry of anger she jumped back, sheathing the dagger and wiping a few drops of blood from her palm with the hem of her sleeve.
Immediately after this, with a determination formed by the box's continued denial of access, she took two steps backward and kicked at it, right where the lock by rights should be.
When she later contemplated that night in the store room, she remained amazed that her howls of pain never summoned any guards.
The door, though wooden, weather-beaten and seemingly frail, did not budge at all. Instead she fell over and sat there, nursing her foot and trying to subdue her own whimpers of pain.
Okay, so that didn't work.
Carefully she got up, only to discover her own frailty. As she put weight upon her foot, she only just avoided crying out in pain. Something was wrong, and a searing pain shot up though her right leg.
This was truly adding injury to insult, she decided. She could choose to wail out, summoning guards, maids and eventually get medical help for her foot, but this would only add to the disgrace. The annoying fact remained that she had injured herself in a feeble attempt to kick open a stupid box, most likely a theatrical prop left behind. Perhaps the doors simply could not open and all this would make her look a fool.
Quietly she started limping away from the accursed thing. Returning at some other time would definitely prove the better part of valour. Muttering to herself, she reached the door to the corridors and placed a hand on it, noticing that she was trembling slightly from the pain in her foot.
"Excuse me."
Kim almost jumped, only just avoiding falling again. Instead she whirled around to see a man standing at the end of one of the rows of shelves. He was wearing a pale outfit with red stripes here and there, one that did not immediately fit any of the designated uniforms for palace staff, and he was smiling a kind smile at her, apparently having absolutely no idea who she was.
"Who are you?" Kim demanded, trying to remain dignified as well as avoiding putting weight onto her foot.
"I am the Doctor," he announced and made a sweeping bow before her. "And you?"
"I am..." Kim hesitated and looked at him again. "Kimoto Takita," she continued. "What is a doctor doing in the storage room at this hour?"
"Just having a little look around," he said and took a few steps closer, oblivious to her rank and name. "Are you hurt?"
"It's nothing," Kim blushed and looked down. Right now, the mere thought of admitting what had happened made her flush.
"Allow me," he said. "After all, I am the Doctor!"
"Yeah, but this is a storage room."
"Indeed," he observed, looking around as if only discovering this now. "It would seem that you are right. Would you prefer to go elsewhere?"
"Could you help me?" Kim asked, swallowing the last remnants of dignity. After all, he seemed to be a doctor and not one of those administering the treatments, and if he was here, he had to be cleared to be here. And her foot really did hurt!
"Certainly!" He beamed as if this was the best thing he had been asked today. Still smiling, he stepped to her side, offering his arm as if they were attending a formal dance. She took it and allowed him to support her weight so that she could avoid putting any weight onto her injured foot. Together they strolled out of the storage room and into the dimly lit corridor, where he followed her taut instructions until, after a few painful moments, they reached her room.
He helped her sit in a chair and knelt before her to help her get her sandal removed from the foot. Then, still without any comments, he quietly examined her foot with his cool, dry hands.
"It's not very serious," he finally said, gently letting her foot down until it rested on a small footstool. "You seem to have bruised it somehow, but a few days' rest and you should be as right as rain, I suspect."
"Thank you," Kim said, still staring at him and trying to penetrate his innocent appearance.
"You're welcome, Miss Takita." As he saw the frown on Kim's forehead, he hastily added: "Or would that be Takita-san? I am sorry, but I am a bit out of habit with Japanese custom. It is Japanese, isn't it?"
"You're not Imperial staff," Kim said. It was not a question, rather an observation. "You're an outsider, an intruder."
"Technically, I suppose that you are right."
"I should summon the guards and have you arrested!"
"But that would not be very polite, now would it?"
"No," she sighed. "No, it wouldn't. But it would be what was expected of me."
"And do you always do what is expected of you, Takita-san?" he asked, meeting her emerald eyes with his own blue penetrating gaze.
She was silent for a time as their eyes met, neither of them looking away and neither speaking. It was as if a link had formed and Kim was unwilling to break it. In those ageless eyes she suddenly saw that he, much like her, was not human. And she knew that this fact was amongst the few they shared.
And one more thing.
He did not feel at home where he officially belonged either!
"For being a creature of such an old house of codes and conduct, you are being rather rude!" the Doctor observed, finally averting his eyes.
"What do you mean?"
"Your peeking into my mind is not a very polite action to take, not judging by the best of possible rules," he said as he got up. "And you should know better; one day such a habit will get you into trouble, young lady."
Kim had inherited fragments of her mother's abilities and regularly used snippets of them at her leisure, envying those who could perform any real control, mind-speak or telekinesis. But this was the first time somebody had discovered what she was doing.
"I... I'm sorry," she mumbled. "I didn't mean to... erh..."
"Off course you did, but that's all right," he said with a smile as he sat down on the edge of the nearby bed. "Do you mind?"
"Not at all."
"Thank you. Now, you wouldn't happen to know your way around the storage rooms of this palace, would you?"
"Hmmm, no. Not really."
"Oh, you did seem quite at home in the one where we met."
"Yeah, well... I'm not supposed to peek into storage rooms. I am a princess, not a servant, you know."
This, at least, seemed to provoke a reaction from the strange doctor. He rose to his feet and stared down at her. "Not Princess Kimoto Takita?" he exclaimed.
"Well, kinda," she replied, trying to suppress a smile. "I would get up and bow formally to you, but as you know, I injured my foot. Now, I think you owe me an explanation. Who are you, not to recognise the only sheerar-human hybrid within several thousand miles and not even noticing the imperial coat of arms on my tunic? I would have imagined that every single Honshurian to enter the palace would figure out who I am within moments. For a doctor, you are sadly uninformed!"
He took the verbal beating in good spirits and quietly lowered himself onto the edge of the bed again. "You are the daughter of Emperor Inin Takita IV then?"
"You have the honour."
"Indeed," he muttered and looked around as if noticing the extravagant furniture and priceless paper tapestries for the first time. "Well, that does explain it..."
"You are a bit strange, you know that?"
"Oh, people have told me so before," he shrugged. "But I don't suppose that you could help me?"
"You are avoiding my questions," Kim observed quietly, insecure about what to make of this stranger.
"Quite. Would you know a bit about where in such a hopefully well-equipped palace I may find spare parts for an influx booster stabilizer?"
"Influx booster stabilizer?" Kim repeated dumbly.
"Precisely."
"No."
"Do you think you could possibly try to find out about it?" the Doctor continued looking hopefully at the young half-sheerar. "I really would appreciate it, you know. I am a tad stranded until I can fix it."
"Yeah… well, I guess I could have somebody look into it…" Kim pulled thoughtfully at a few whiskers as she tried to comprehend what was going on. "Yeah, I do know a few people around here who wouldn't ask too many questions as long as I am not directly… Hmmm…"
She was silent for a moment, contemplating the situation and weighing for and against, trying to decide what to make of it all. Then she finally met the Doctors eyes.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, her face level. "And why do you need a booster stability fluctuator or what ever it was?"
"The old girl just sort of short-circuited on me," the Doctor replied and looked almost a little embarrassed. "And what I need is spare parts for an influx booster stabilizer."
"It still sounds to me as if you are really not answering my questions," Kim said with a teasing smile, her white canines glinting in the dim light.
"I will have you know that I am answering precisely in accordance with the truth!" the Doctor huffed, frowning at her.
"The truth, maybe. But not all of it, I wager?"
"All of the truth," the Doctor warned, "is an awful lot of truth, young lady!"
"All right, all right. But if I help you, would you help me in return?"
"Most certainly, milady."
"I really should be howling for the guards by now, but you have arrived at just the right time for the both of us to benefit from your presence here," Kim explained. "That is, if you can help me."
"You are talking about your escape from the Palace and from Honshu II," the Doctor said in a hushed voice. "I should have guessed that, as always, the old girl does very little without purpose."
"Who is the old girl?"
"Oh, it's really just something I call her," the Doctor smiled. "It is my TARDIS!"
"Right…?"
"My craft," he explained patiently.
"And where, may I inquire, is that tardyce of yours?"
"TARDIS," the Doctor gently corrected her. "It's an abbreviation, it stands for Time And –"
"Never mind," Kim broke in. "But where is it? How did you get past the guards?"
"Ah, that would seem to be peculiar, now wouldn't it?"
"Yes."
"I arrived in that storage room. My TARDIS is not very hard to fit into a room."
"That blue box!" Kim exclaimed, staring at the Doctor. "It was your Tardeece? I sensed the vibrations. It seemed almost alive."
"Well, it does have certain –"
"But why that silly sign on it?" Kim broke in.
"Silly sign?" the Doctor repeated, taken a little aback.
"Police Box! It doesn't make much sense, now does it?"
"Now that's a long explanation. It came to be once and just sort of remained that way."
"It's not a very big craft, is it?"
"Ah, no. Not very big."
"But big enough to make room for two people?" Kim continued, taking her foot down from the footstool and eagerly leaning forwards to gaze levelly at the Doctor.
"Yes, I should say that would be possible," the Doctor replied hesitantly. "Look, I am really not sure this is a very good idea at all."
"If I could get you those parts, spares for that… that booster-thingy you talked about, would you help me to get away from the palace?"
"I really…"
"It's a good offer, you know," Kim murmured gently, a soft purr in her voice. "If you are apprehended inside palace grounds, a foreigner, an alien, an intruder, you should count yourself lucky if you survive the interrogations only to rot away for half a century in a cell."
"But…"
"And as I understand, that tardeece of yours is broken; you need the parts, right?"
"Why yes, but I really…"
"So I help you and you help me, I think it's a very reasonable deal."
"All right then," the Doctor sighed. After all, he had arrived here for a reason and it was just possible that it was in order to help this young girl escape. Her current fate was by far not a match with the one he knew about, which was to take part in a future where important things would happen. "You help me and I help you."
"It's a deal then!" She got up and extended a hand for a shake, but then she all but fell to the floor as she, forgetting in all the excitement, put most her weight on her injured foot and immediately lost balance as it crumbled underneath her. The Doctor jumped to his feet and captured her hand and then her weight before she could actually fall.
"You really should rest that foot, you know," he admonished Kim, sweeping her entirely off her feet and carrying her like a child to the bed, where he put her down. "And I should leave the bedroom of a Princess and retire to my craft, awaiting the morrow."
"I still think you owe me an explanation," Kim groaned, her foot hurting again.
"We can make a deal," He answered, drawing a light blanket over her. "But I don't owe you much besides that."
"Whatever you say, but how do I know you won't just be gone tomorrow?"
"You don't really, but I do need that spare part."
"Right then."
"Good night, Princess. Sleep tight."
"G'night then, I'll start looking for that part tomorrow."
"I'll be looking forward," he said with a smile. Then he was gone.
Kim stared at the door as it slid shut behind him. He was strange, downright weird, but she felt that he could be trusted. More than Ashim anyway, not that that in itself spoke volumes…
She curled up, resting her bad foot on a bundle of the blanket and tried to sleep while thoughts of escape fluttered through her tired mind.
Not for the first time.
o o o
To be continued…