54. Destiny with Robots.
1. The Bush.
"There's a Request For Help signal, Doctor." Meran reports a brief activity on the Console screen.
"Where from?" the Doctor appears unconcerned, at least for now. He's focussed on a maintenance issue that Chloe, Simeon and he are working on.
Devyon's fascinated just watching. As a retired scientist he loves watching tricky repairs even though he knows he has no hope of understanding how the Tardis works! . He's along for the ride, along with his two daughters, Chloe and Alyssa, rather than be bored at home.
"It says Mechanistan," Meran reports.
As a friend of a friend, his presence is more tenuous, but driven rather by fear of the Master making a commanding house call requiring his cooperation when he might be in.
"We'll be five minutes," the Doctor says.
Usually he relents and stops the repair, leaving it for another time, but today he's repairing the landing circuit! .
"We won't be able to land anywhere until this repair's complete," Simeon adds.
"Actually, I could short circuit here on this board and add a jumper over here," the Doctor says. "Let's try it!"
A spark jumps where the Doctor touches the board. .
Simeon's taken aback. "What did you just do?" he asks. He's used to standard in-factory changes, but these ad-hoc in-flight changes frequently alarm him. His Gallifreyan background in a Tardis factory is only sometimes useful to the Doctor (ref. 32).
The Doctor strides to the Console and reads the message.
"Cave men?" he says.
"Most of the message is missing, fogged or unintelligible," Meran says. "Where's Mechanistan?"
"I've never heard of it," the Doctor says emphatically. "There's no such place!"
"We could trace the origin of the transmission," Chloe prompts.
"Yes, we could!" the Doctor confirms irritably. He doesn't like being interrupted mid-repair.
He taps several buttons, and the screen shows a beautiful green planet with a screen highlight over one area.
Simeon arrives at the Tardis Console and taps the screen. "We should go there!" he says.
The familiar grinding noise confirms that the Voice Control system had already been on. .
The Doctor's annoyed by this – he'd far rather have thought about it first. After all, in a time machine there's any amount of time for thought!
As they open the Tardis door, a thick bush prevents much progress.
"I've seen this bush before," the Doctor says. He turns to Simeon pointedly. "Have you?"
He puts Simeon on the spot. . The bush has appeared inconveniently on a recent occasion (ref. 52).
Simeon has been changing a few things for the Doctor's Tardis recently, along with the Doctor, to upgrade the Tardis's defences. There have been numerous changes made and Simeon wonders which one has added this bush as some form of localised defence (ref. 52).
"I wonder if it's one of the disguising attributes causing this," he says.
The Doctor doesn't doubt it. He smiles to remove any sting from his words. "We should adjust it later, when we get back," he says dismissively. He simply wants to get on. .
The branches push to the side easily enough on their way out, so the Doctor isn't unduly concerned.
They emerge from the large bush around the Tardis. It seems obvious where they've parked as the bush doesn't blend in with surrounding foliage! .
Chloe sees a possible improvement on their all trailing around together.
"Doctor, can we split up? Can I take half of us, and you take the other half? We can find out much more that way."
"Alright, then," the Doctor says. "See you later!" Surely a Request For Help can't be too dangerous!
The tactic of splitting up works on half of the occasions, but really doesn't work all the time.
Chloe takes Alyssa and Devyon leaving the Doctor with Meran and Simeon. They walk quietly away along a different path.
Meran's been persuaded to leave the Tardis Console behind and join the outing. .
The Doctor takes a path that leads through some encroaching trees towards a building where some people are performing some simple housekeeping tasks.
Suddenly a prominent door opens, and a man steps out.
"How have you escaped?" he booms. .
Meran thinks he means How did they get out of the bush?
"We just pushed some branches aside," he says.
The Doctor instantly identifies that the challenge isn't about the bush at all.
"We've arrived to help," he says.
"Help who?"
The Doctor then recognises that there might be sides here; more than one side to be on, and these might not be the ones needing to be rescued! These people don't look like they want or need help - they're far too confident and arrogant. It's as if they're top dogs here.
The Doctor thinks quickly. "Who are you?" he asks.
"I'm Bling."
"I'm the Doctor. This is Mechanistan, isn't it?"
"It is! We recently renamed it!"
That explains why the Doctor hadn't heard of it!
"Tell me about what's happened here," the Doctor says, but the figure appears to want no such communication. He claps his hands and yells, "Guards!"
The Doctor notices something about the sound made when the figure claps his hands but only has a brief time to think about it before a group of guards arrives and propels them away from the house.
After only a few minutes walking they approach a cave entrance where an iron gate is briefly unlocked for them to pass through into the cave.
Meran is taken aside by the guards while the Doctor and Simeon are pushed through the open gate.
"And stay there this time!" It's as if they're expected to have been there before.
Then Meran is led away.
"What do you want with him?" the Doctor calls out concernedly, but he receives no reply.
Meran's quaking as he's led away. Why has he been singled out?
A short distance away from the cave, but out of earshot, the guards stop.
"Show us where the branches are that enabled you to escape!"
What should Meran do? If he shows them where the Tardis is, everything might be lost! But any other branches might be alright, mightn't they?
Meran thinks quickly. He recalls having to push past some local trees on the way to the house. He leads them to those trees. They need cutting back to allow the path to be used properly.
The guards appear to be satisfied until one of them notices the bush concealing the Tardis.
"Oi, this wasn't here last week!"
Meran's heart is in his mouth again, but might he use this moment of distraction to run?
He runs!
How can they achieve anything when they're all so split up?
