Here we are, the last chapter of this installment! I've really enjoyed these four parts, and I hope you have as well. Warning for a cussword, if that upsets you.
It doesn't get much worse than this, Barry thought, looking around. Surrounded by three ruthless aliens and half a dozen scarecrows…that, in and of itself, was a normal Saturday for him. Usually, though, the Doctor was around, and would've thought up half a dozen clever plans in the time it took for the villains to finish gloating.
Guess I'll have to do this myself.
He clenched his fists, ready to rush forward. Over to one side, out of the corner of his eye, there was a shimmer of golden energy, and the three beings swung their heads to one side, like dogs picking up a scent.
"It's him!" No-Longer-Baines snapped. Barry didn't know what had happened, but it was all the distraction he needed. He blurred into action, sending the three aliens flying, then literally ripped his way through the scarecrows in less time than it takes to tell.
"Go!" he shouted. "Everyone, get out! Run!"
Thankfully, none of the villagers needed further encouragement, stampeding out en masse. Barry nodded to Martha, and they joined the exodus of fleeing people.
Back at the school, John raised the alarm and prepared the boys to fight, utterly ignoring the attempts of his friends to dissuade him.
"We need to find that thing, now," Barry fretted, leaning back against the wall. "And I still haven't heard from Max."
"Wait a minute," Martha said. "Back at the dance, there was that moment, remember? It was like someone opened the watch, just for a second."
"So whoever has it is on our side," Barry ran a hand through his hair, and Martha giggled.
"What?"
"It's just…when you do that, you look just like him."
Barry smirked, then sighed. "Really wish he was here now."
"We're just going to have to manage on our own," Martha told him, and it had the cadence of an unspoken promise: We will be okay.
He took her hand, and she pulled him to his feet.
"You can't do this!" Martha insisted to John, who was keeping up a steady flow of guns and orders. "They're just boys. You can't ask them to fight. They don't stand a chance."
"They're cadets, Miss Jones," Smith snapped. "They are trained to defend the King and all his citizens and properties."
"Not against aliens!" Barry shot back, wanting to grab the man and shake him. Before Smith could say anything further, Mr. Rocastle, the headmaster, stormed in and started bellowing. John, with occasional assistance from Joan, Barry, and Martha, explained what was happening.
"You boys, remain on guard," Mr. Rocastle nodded. "Mister Snell, telephone for the police. Mister Philips, with me. We shall investigate."
"No," Martha reached out. "But it's not safe out there."
"Mister Smith, it seems your favourite servant is giving me advice. You will control her, sir," the man said, and left. Barry and Martha rolled their eyes at each other.
"We have got to find that watch," she whispered, and he nodded.
The two friends watched from the back of the courtyard as Rocastle and Philips confronted No-Longer-Baines and the little girl.
"Where's Jenny?" Martha whispered.
"I dunno, but I don't like it," Barry frowned. "If there's a wasp in the room, I like to know where it is."
Steve's voice rang in his head. In a fight, when you don't know what's happening, what's happening is always bad.
"Baines, step apart from this company and come inside with me," the headmaster demanded.
"No, sir," the creature hissed. "You, sir, you will send us Mister John Smith. That's all we want, sir, Mister John Smith and whatever he's done with his Time Lord consciousness. Then we'd be very happy to leave you alone."
"You speak with someone else's voice, Baines," Rocastle noted, and Barry gave him points for perceptiveness and courage if nothing else. "Who might that be?"
"We are the Family of Blood."
Family, he thought to himself. One in Jenny's body, one in Baines', one in that girl. Mom and two kids, maybe? Or husband, wife, and daughter…no, Barry, of course alien families work different. Assuming they all fit those bodies and didn't just grab those people at random…
"Well, I warn you, the school is armed."
"All your little tin soldiers," the alien smirked. "But tell me, sir, will they thank you?"
"I don't understand."
"What do you know of history, sir? What do you know of next year?"
"You're not making sense, Baines."
"1914, sir. Because the Family has travelled far and wide looking for Mister Smith and, oh, the things we have seen. War is coming. In foreign fields, war of the whole wide world, with all your boys falling down in the mud. Do you think they will thank the man who taught them it was glorious?"
Barry shivered to himself.
"Don't you forget, boy, I've been a soldier," Rocastle snarled. "I was in South Africa. I used my dead mates for sandbags. I fought with the butt of my rifle when the bullets ran out, and I would go back there tomorrow for King and Country!"
"Et cetera, et cetera."
No-Longer-Baines, who'd been walking away, spun, and Barry saw a glint of metal. He lunged forwards.
The alien in the body of a boy completed its turn in slow motion.
Ten steps away.
He raised his arm.
Nine.
The gun came to rest pointing directly at Philips' heart.
Eight.
The tip of the gun glowed green.
Seven.
A globe of energy formed.
Six.
The globe became a bolt of energy, a green arrow lancing towards the helpless man.
Five.
The bolt shot out of the gun.
Four.
It crossed through the air in much less than an eyeblink.
Three.
The air sizzled.
Two.
Barry lunged in a tackle that would've made any football coach proud, and struck the man around his knees. They went down, and Barry rolled smoothly to his feet.
The bolt of energy, now unimpeded by any living matter, descended towards the ground.
Barry lunged again.
The energy blast struck.
Barry ripped the gun from the boy's hand, pivoted, and threw an uppercut.
Dirt and grass flew upwards.
Barry zipped back to where he'd been standing by Martha.
The grass and dirt pattered gently back down.
Credit to him, Baines—or whatever was inside him—barely blinked. "Run along, you two. Run back to school. And send us Mister Smith!"
Barry and Martha slipped back inside and, with a shared nod, headed to John Smith's study.
"I know it sounds mad," Martha told Joan, who was already there, "but when the Doctor became human, he took the alien part of himself and he stored it inside the watch. It's not really a watch, it just looks like a watch."
"And alien means not from abroad, I take it," she said calmly.
"The man you call John Smith, he was born on another world."
"Like in the H.G. Wells stories," Barry put in, shifting amongst a pile of papers (at normal speeds—the last thing they needed was more of a mess to search through).
"A different species."
"Yeah."
"Then tell me. In this fairy tale, who are you two?"
"Just his friends," Martha said, checking the desk drawers. "I'm not…not your rival."
"And human, I take it?"
"Human," Martha confirmed, standing. "And more than that, I just don't follow him around. I'm training to be a doctor. Not an alien doctor, a proper doctor. A doctor of medicine."
"Well that certainly is nonsense," Joan sniffed. "Women might train to be doctors, but hardly a skivvy and hardly one of your colour."
Barry drew in an outraged breath, but before he could say anything, Martha was stepping forwards, holding up her hand.
"Oh, do you think? Bones of the hand. Carpal bones, proximal row. Scaphoid, lunate, triquetal, pisiform. Distal row. Trapezium, trapezoid, capitate, hamate. Then the metacarpal bones extending in three distinct phalanges. Proximal, middle, distal."
Barry silently gave her a fistbump, smirking.
"You read that in a book," Joan floundered.
"Yes, to pass my exams," Martha insisted. "Can't you see this is true?"
"I must go," Joan said, turning away.
"If we find that watch, then we can stop them."
"Those boys are going to fight. I might not be a doctor, but I'm still their nurse. They need me."
Barely had they finished searching the room when the crack of rifles echoed outside.
"It's starting," Barry whispered.
"Go!" Martha ordered, but he looked out the window and grinned. "I don't need to."
Brilliant against the night sky, a bolt of saffron lightning burst over the hills an into the courtyard, scattering scarecrows hither and yon in a matter of seconds, before bursting into the school itself and flickering out around the form of a tall, white-haired man.
"Max!" Barry exclaimed, rushing up and pumping his hand. "Good to see you, man! Right on time!"
"Thank you," the other man nodded, a bit stiffly. "I have been scouting. Have you the watch?"
"The watch?" Martha asked, hurrying up. "No, Barry and I have been looking for it."
"It's in the hands of a schoolboy," Max told them. "We need to acquire it as quickly as possible for safekeeping."
"We thought it might be one of the kids," Barry piped up. "You were right, Martha."
Max nodded.
"Let's find Smith, see if he knows which child it is."
It wasn't long before John, Joan, Max, Barry, and Martha were all sitting or standing in the master's study. Max stood a little apart from the others, while Joan flipped through John's diary.
"The scarecrows are pulling themselves back together, but that little girl is gone," Barry observed, peering cautiously out a window.
"Barry, Martha, there must be something you can do," Joan said hopefully.
"Not without the watch."
"You're this Doctor's companions," John accused. "Can't you help? What exactly do you do for him? Why does he need you?"
"Because he's lonely," she whispered.
"And that's what you want me to become."
Just then, there was a knock on the door.
"Hello?" Martha called warily. The door swung open, everyone tensed…and Timothy Latimer stepped into the room, holding out his hand. In his palm nestled a familiar circle of metal.
"I brought you this."
"Tim," Barry breathed. He'd gotten to know the boy pretty well over the last two months. He knew what it was like to be bullied, and to want to hide yourself away amongst the books.
"Man, why didn't you say anything?"
Tim looked up at him, and there was an unaccustomed confidence in those eyes.
"Because it was waiting. And because…I was so scared of the Doctor."
"Why?" Joan asked gently.
"Because I've seen him," Tim said, advancing slowly. "He's…like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night and the storm in the heart of the sun."
"Stop it," John whispered.
"He's ancient and forever. He burns at the centre of time and he can see the turn of the universe."
"Stop it!" John ordered. "I said, stop it."
"And he's wonderful."
Barry and Martha smiled at each other.
"I've still got this," Joan offered. "The journal."
"Those are just stories," John snapped.
"Now we know that's not true," she told him. "Perhaps there's something in here that will tell us how to defeat these creatures for good."
"In the meantime," Max said, stepping forward and holding out a hand. "Give it to me. I'll keep it safe."
"What?"
"No!"
"Very well." Max's lips twisted into a smirk that looked utterly wrong on his normally gentle face. "I tried."
He snatched the watch from Tim's hand, and disappeared in a gust of wind and lightning.
"Oh my God, no," Martha breathed, but by the time the last syllable had left her lips, Barry had gone as well.
How could I have been so stupid? Barry castigated himself. Family of Blood. Of course.
The two speedsters poured through the halls of the school, students and staff practically frozen statues as they whipped between and around them, running across floor, walls, and ceiling with equal ease.
Can't outrun him…unless…
Barry had spent two months in the school, wandering the corridors, visiting classrooms, admiring the Herefordshire scenery, counting down days until they could bring the Doctor back again. He knew the building, as well as he'd known his old high school or better. As Max, ahead, spun to the left and raced down a corridor, Barry turned to his own left, where a balcony looked out over the moors.
He remembered a conversation he'd had with the northern Doctor, a couple days after first joining him:
"Fightin's a dangerous business. The trick is to know which risks to take."
"How do you know that?"
The Doctor had given him a very dry look. "You wait and see if you win. Then you know those were the right risks to take."
Never phased in mid-air before. This is either gonna work really well…or really not.
Without slowing a step, Barry launched himself off the balcony, straight into thin air, towards the outer wall of the school, and focused, closing his eyes. For an eternal instant, he was inside the stone…and then he came bursting out, just as the other speedster turned the corner.
The two men tumbled together in a blur of limbs and lightning down the corridor, the fob watch rolling out of Max's hand. He jumped to his feet, but Barry swept a leg through his ankles, knocking him over again. The face of his friend and sensei contorted into a snarl utterly at odds with his usual tranquil appearance.
Barry remembered the early days of getting his speed, how he'd gotten hurt a few times until he got the hang of it, how Cassandra had run his body into a wall when she'd been possessing him, the struggle to adapt to how the world suddenly moved through molasses.
The alien possessing his mentor's body had had a little practice with super speed, it seemed, but not nearly enough. Barry, however, had spent practically every night and more than a few days training with a speedster who was faster and more experienced than him. The resultant fight was, even in speedster time, very, very short, and ended with Barry delivering a brutal uppercut with every bit of the power of his legs, hips, shoulders, and arms behind it, that knocked out the other like a light.
"That was for Max, you son of a bitch."
When he stepped into John's study a minute later, it was to a very different scene. The Family seemed to know that their ploy with Max had failed, and they'd started bombing the village. Martha was sitting in a corner with Tim curled up against her, both despondent. On the far side of the room, the door was open, and he glimpsed John and Joan sitting on John's bed, her head resting on his shoulder.
"You got it," Joan said, looking up, and there was in her voice equal amounts of relief and despair.
"Yeah," Barry said quietly. He held it out, and John shied away. Barry met his eyes and the man quietly, reluctantly took it.
"I'm sorry," he said. "Really. I'm so sorry. I didn't…I never…"
"I know," Joan told him. "Barry, Martha, Tim, would you leave us alone, please?"
John Smith closed his eyes. His last thought was of his beloved Joan, the sight of her smile, and the feel of her lips on his. In a single motion, he snapped open the watch. Golden light, and centuries' worth of memories, flickered behind his eyes.
Running with my best friend, calling up at the sky.
The Untempered Schism.
Love, family, pride.
"The most beautiful thing I've ever seen."
"One minute ago we were trying desperately to get away from these savages."
"All right, now we're helping them."
"One day, I shall come back. Until then, there must be no tears, no regrets, no farewells. Just go forwards in all your beliefs, and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine. Goodbye, Susan. Goodbye, my dear."
"You'll end up a couple of burnt cinders floating around in Spain…in space!"
"Well then, here we go. The long way 'round."
"You probably can't remember your family."
"Oh yes, I can when I want to. And that's the point, really. I have to really want to, to bring them back in front of my eyes. The rest of the time they… they sleep in my mind and I forget. And so will you. Oh yes, you will. You'll find there's so much else to think about. To remember."
"There are corners of the universe which breed the most terrible things. Things which go against everything we believe in. They must be fought."
"Goodbye, Jamie."
"I won't forget you, you know."
"I won't forget you."
"For once in your life, Brigadier, do you think you could manage to get there before the nick of time?"
"No! No, he's a good man! Kill me, not him!"
"Doctor John Smith. How do you do, Miss Smith?"
"A tear? No, don't cry. Where there's life, there's…"
"You were the noblest Romana of them all."
"This is the end. But the moment has been prepared for."
"I must save Adric!"
"Change, my dear. And it seems not a moment too soon."
"In all my traveling throughout the universe I have battled against evil, against power mad conspirators. I should have stayed here! The oldest civilization: decadent, degenerate, and rotten to the core."
"It's not the end. This is just the beginning."
"Think about me when you're living your life one day after another, all in a neat pattern. Think about the homeless traveller and his old police box, with his days like crazy paving."
"Unimaginable power, unlimited rice pudding, etc, etc!"
"There are worlds out there where the sky is burning, where the sea's asleep and the rivers dream, people made of smoke and cities made of song. Somewhere there's danger, somewhere there's injustice and somewhere else the tea is getting cold. C'mon, Ace. We've got work to do."
"I can't make your dreams come true forever, but I can today!"
"I'm a Doctor. But probably not the one you were expecting."
"Doctor no more."
"Fantastic!"
"Don't think that's gonna stop me."
"How about this?"
"Now I'm gonna die in a dungeon! In Cardiff!"
"Hello, Sarah Jane."
"You were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. And you know what? So was I!"
"You already have, Bare. You already have."
"Its name lives on. Gallifrey."
"You called me Doctor!"
"I'm not just a Time Lord. I'm the last of the Time Lords."
The Doctor opened his eyes. Once more, he could feel the turn of the Earth beneath his feet, the whirl of Time around him, the dance of stars and endless possibilities above and yet to be. A smile stretched his lips, one that would've sent armies of monsters running for Mommy, and he straightened up, plans already buzzing through his mind. Let the creatures of the night beware: The Doctor was in.
The next morning, Barry and Martha stood outside of Max's house. The rain poured down, and they leaned into each other for warmth.
"Here he comes," Martha nodded as the Doctor strode up the hill, hands in his pockets.
"Right then!" he announced. "Molto bene! I gave Wolsley to Joan. She'll look after him. Max's cat," he added after a confused look from Martha.
"How was she?" Martha asked.
"Time we moved on."
"If you want, I could…"
"Time we moved on," the Doctor repeated, without rancor. "Oh, nearly forgot." He dug in his coat pocket for a moment before pulling out an envelope, which he handed to Barry.
"Found this last night. It was tucked under the TARDIS."
Barry turned the envelope over slowly. Barry Allen, it read, in a flowing cursive script. He ripped it open, revealing a single sheet of paper inside.
Dear Barry, it read.
"When I was first blessed with my speed, I spent a lot of time bouncing through the years, trying to get a handle on it. One day, when I wasn't all that much older than you are now, I came across a gravestone with the date of my death. That's tomorrow.
Of course, you and I both know time can be rewritten. But if you're reading this, chances are that my race is run. That's fine. I've lived a good, long life.
Know that I am proud to have been your teacher, Barry. I'm very glad we got to spend the time together that we did. Know this, too: The universe is, instant by instant, recreated anew. Therefore, there is in truth no past, only a memory of the past. Blink your eyes, and the world you see next did not exist when you closed them. Therefore, the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it. I think the Doctor will understand, even if you don't, yet.
Martha Jones, you are truly exceptional. Your courage and good heart will serve you well, even in the darkest midnight. Doctor, I hope I get to see you one more time before I pass. If not, know that I am honored to have called you friend, Brother of Coyote.
And perhaps, in some future, beyond the bounds of the world, we will all meet again. Until then, go forward in all your beliefs, and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine. Be well. Be kind, be brave, and be strong. And never stop running.
I am, and shall always be,
Your friend,
Max Gideon Crandall (Mercury)
PS: There's a book in my top dresser drawer. Notes and thoughts on the Speed Force. It may be of help to you. Next to it, there's a piece of paper with diagrams for a set of goggles that my friend Charles McNider drew. I never got around to putting them together, but Martha may be interested. Make sure Wolsley gets a good home.
Silently, he passed it to his friends, who took it and read it over.
"He was a good man," Martha murmured. "We won't forget him."
"No," agreed the Doctor. "His memory will live on, forever."
"Goodbye Max," Barry whispered.
Eyes stinging, he folded up the letter and tucked it into his pocket.
"Oh, and I never said," the Doctor added. "Thanks for looking after me."
The three friends held each other tightly.
"Doctor!" came a shout, as they headed up towards the TARDIS. "Barry. Martha."
"Tim Timothy Timber!" the Doctor called cheerfully, spinning around.
"Hey, buddy," Barry waved.
"I just wanted to say goodbye," the boy said. "And thank you. Because I've seen the future and I now know what must be done."
Barry swallowed.
"It's coming, isn't it? The biggest war ever."
"You don't have to fight," Martha told him.
"I think we do."
"But you could get hurt."
"Well, so could you, travelling around with him, but it's not going to stop you."
The humans exchanged wry grins at that.
"Tim," said the Doctor. "I'd be honoured if you'd take this."
He held out the fob watch.
"I can't hear anything," the boy said, frowning.
"No, it's just a watch now. But keep it with you, for good luck."
"Look after yourself," Martha said, giving Tim a hug and a kiss. Barry clapped his friend's shoulder and nodded.
"You'll like this bit," the Doctor grinned, and stepped into the TARDIS.
November 11, 2007
"Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe."
Timothy Latimer looked out across the green, letting the pastor's words roll over him. There, as if they'd never aged a day, stood the Doctor, Barry, and Martha, her fussing over the poppy in the Doctor's lapel as Barry watched with his hands in his pockets. Tim's hand closed over the watch he'd kept all these years, and he smiled.
"They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them.
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain."
So, just to be clear:
The Family can access their host bodies' memories, but it takes a little effort to do so; it's not automatic. Additionally, Max had some psychic training, meaning he was able to wall away his memories of Barry, Martha, and the Doctor. I thought of including a bit where Father of Mine mentions that, but it didn't really fit with the flow.
Also, Wolsley the cat is a reference to the original (excellent) novel by Paul Cornell the TV story is based off of.
On Barry's saving Philips' life: Bear in mind that fairly early in season 1 ("Power Outage"), canon Barry was able to cross about twenty feet of space, grab "Wells," and run him back in the time it took a lightning bolt to cross several feet. Plus this Barry's had his speed for about three or four months, plus spent some time in the Speed Force, so he's past that point.
Oh, and the reason Mother of Mine was missing from the school fight is that she was guarding the TARDIS. The Doctor wrapped her in unbreakable chains, and threw Father of Mine into a black hole. Even a speedster isn't getting out of that.
Kudos to whomever gets the Discworld and Star Trek references. Are they intentional? Well, Max is a time traveler, after all...
As always, if you have any other questions, thoughts, or comments, please don't hesitate to drop a review. Be safe and well, everyone.
