Authors: Nicholas Briggs
He was distracted from his thoughts by Lillian, running across the street to them.
‘It’s set, it’s ready,’ she said, breathlessly. ‘It will go live in about thirty seconds.’ She had clearly run all the way from the
Sunlight 349 Holo-News
building. ‘What have you been doing here? How are you going to make sure that everyone—’
The Doctor smiled and clicked a control on his sonic screwdriver. It emitted a truncated buzz. Then the Doctor gestured all around.
Every single screen around him had suddenly changed to display the large white circle and blue lettering of the
Sunlight 349 Holo-News
channel logo. Lillian gasped in awe.
‘I know,’ said the Doctor, beaming. ‘Clever. And that’s what everyone on this planet is seeing.’
‘No … not just that,’ said Lillian.
‘Oh,’ said the Doctor, a little crestfallen. ‘What?’
‘It’s the first time I’ve ever seen our channel on any of these screens,’ she said. ‘It’s usually all the game show and quiz stuff. No one wants to watch the news when they’re shopping. Huh … no one wants to watch the news at all.’
Suddenly, the picture changed, and the Doctor’s face filled all the screens in the mall. His image seemed to hesitate for a moment.
‘Is it working?’ the Doctor on the screen asked, his voice booming out all over the shopping mall. Ollus laughed. Sabel ssshed him.
‘This is serious,’ she whispered, loudly.
The real Doctor spun round to clock people’s reactions in the mall. He knew that this image was now playing on every holographic screen throughout the
planet. They were on the brink of global meltdown.
‘I’m going to get the sack, aren’t I?’ ventured Lillian.
‘Oh, I’d say that’ll be the least of your worries,’ said the Doctor, feeling a keen sense of anticipation.
‘Right, then,’ said the Doctor on the screen. ‘Here is a special announcement for everyone on Sunlight 349 …’
The people walking around the shopping centre were starting to stop and take notice.
‘The Daleks are the most evil creatures in the known universe,’ said the Doctor on the screen. He waited for the impact to sink in.
The real Doctor waited for the reaction. A couple of the people in a small, gathering crowd looked at him and then back at the screen, then back again.
‘Yep,’ said the Doctor with a smile. ‘That’s me all right.’
‘They are ruling this planet and all the Sunlight Worlds for some terrible, unknown purpose,’ continued the Doctor on the screen.
Then the crowd started to chuckle.
‘No, wait,’ said the real Doctor. ‘It’s not a joke.’
But the chuckling continued.
‘Now, I know the Daleks have transformed your lives,’ the Doctor on the screen was saying, ‘that they’ve saved many of you from poverty and starvation …’
The chuckling stopped as the growing crowds settled down, agreeing with this.
‘But they’re not doing this for you,’ said the screen Doctor. ‘They’re doing it for themselves, because they have a weapon that they’re going to use to destroy planets.’
A few scoffing noises came from the crowd, and minor outbursts of laughter started up.
‘Why are you laughing?’ asked the real Doctor. He turned to Lillian. ‘Why are they laughing?’
The Doctor on the screen continued, his expression strong with the certainty that he was about to start a revolution. ‘Today, I saw five people killed. And for what? For daring to question the authority of the Daleks!’
The people in the crowd started to scoff now. Some were openly hurling abuse.
‘And I have no doubt that unless we all band together to take action, many more people will be killed by the Daleks,’ said the screen Doctor. ‘So I urge you. Stand with me and—’
One of the crowd members had stepped forward, jabbed at an on-screen control and changed the channel. The crowd let out a huge cheer of approval as the latest edition of
How Nice Is Your Brain?
started. A high-energy theme tune with a bewilderingly fast bass line and a cloying, chiming melody of tinkling bells and bizarrely ascending strings rang out to the delight of the crowd.
‘I’m Mathias Sunam!’ said a brightly dressed man with a frighteningly insincere, fixed smile and sweat on his top lip. His face was on every screen in the mall. ‘And I’ll be your host for the latest, nerve-melting edition of
How Nice Is Your Brain?
’
The Doctor felt utterly defeated. He turned to Lillian.
‘Did that really just happen?’ he asked her.
She nodded slowly.
Sabel and Ollus were staring up at the screens, enraptured by what they saw. The first contestants were already stepping up to the podium on the holographic TV show
How Nice Is Your Brain?
The Doctor looked away from them and up into the sky, in despair. Was there nothing that could be done for this Dalek generation? Were they so beguiled by the petty pleasures of the Sunlight Worlds that nothing could make them realise the terrible danger they were in?
Lillian walked close to the Doctor and put a hand on his shoulder.
‘This … this is how
I
felt,’ she said. ‘Looks like I’ll have lost my job for nothing.’
‘Oh no,’ said the Doctor.
‘How would you know?’ she asked.
‘No,’ said the Doctor. ‘I meant, “oh no” as in, look up there!’
He pointed right up into the sky. A small, glowing
dot was descending towards them. As they watched, the artificial sunlight glinted off it, revealing as it got closer that it was a metallic, disc-shaped object. An object all too familiar to the Doctor.
‘A Dalek ship!’ he shouted at the top of his voice, in warning. But he was drowned out by a game show that had its audience in the palm of its glossy, bejewelled hand.
‘Are you sure it’s a Dalek ship?’ asked Lillian.
‘Of course I’m sure! I’ve spent all my lives fighting the Daleks, I know a Dalek ship when I see one!’ screamed the Doctor in frustration over more jangling music from the screens.
Lillian moved close to the Doctor, speaking right into his ear. Her voice was trembling. ‘What … what do you think they’re going to do?’
‘Do? Oh, probably offer us all tickets to see
How Nice is Your Brain?
or something,’ sneered the Doctor. ‘No, don’t you see?’ he asked. ‘I’ve gone and done it now. The people here may not believe me. There may not be an uprising in progress, but I’ve gone and done it and prodded the hornet’s nest.’
‘You mean … they’re going to attack?’ asked Lillian, her eyes widening. ‘They’re going to kill us, like they killed those resistance people and the train drivers?’
The Doctor turned resolutely to the crowd and brandished his sonic screwdriver.
‘Listen to me!’ he cried out to them.
But they were simply not interested.
‘Right,’ he said and activated the sonic screwdriver, switching off all the screens. There was a massed groan,
like this was an inflatable crowd that had suddenly been punctured. But then, bit by bit, random cries of abuse started to fly the Doctor’s way.
‘That’s better,’ said the Doctor, climbing on top of a bench, so that he could be seen by the maximum number of people. ‘Now I’ve really got your attention!’
‘Go back to wherever you came from, you nutter!’ an old man hollered out at him.
‘Yes, thanks for that,’ smiled the Doctor. ‘But if you want to stay alive long enough to insult me again, you’d better LISTEN!’
For a moment, the crowd was stunned into silence by the fierceness of the Doctor’s voice. He drew breath to speak again. Already he could hear the silence dissolving into mutters, but he persisted.
‘You may not believe what I had to say on the screen, but it’s too late now.’
Behind him, he could hear the sound of the Dalek saucer descending. Its anti-grav engines were now preparing for touchdown.
‘The Daleks are coming!’ yelled the Doctor. ‘Run! Run for your lives!’
The crowd stared back at him, the mumbling and muttering gained momentum. Someone wandered over to the main screen and touched a number of controls. Suddenly all the screens were back on and the contestants on
How Nice Is Your Brain?
were on their podiums, smiling nervously. A huge round of applause ignited in the crowd. It was so loud, it almost drowned out the sound of the saucer landing.
The Doctor ran his hand through his hair and shook
his head. He looked down to see Sabel and Ollus, still staring up at the screen, caught up in it all, clapping their hands together along with everyone else. He turned to see the saucer complete its landing, having skilfully manoeuvred itself into the limited space available. The anti-grav motors powered down with a deep, vibrating hum.
‘Should we … should we run for it?’ asked Lillian tentatively.
The Doctor stared at the saucer. A hatchway was already opening and a ramp was sliding down. People in the crowd were starting to turn and look at it. Some pointed and smiled, others carried on their applause, directing it at the Dalek ship now.
Some cheering started.
Cheering … for the Daleks?
‘I don’t know,’ said the Doctor, feeling sick inside. ‘I feel like my whole universe has been turned upside down.’
Then he looked down at the children. Whatever happened, he knew he must protect them.
‘Sabel, Ollus!’ he called. They reluctantly looked up at him as he jumped down and took their hands. ‘Stay close,’ he said. The children tutted, irritated that they had been taken away from their entertainment.
Bronze-armoured Daleks were now filing down the ramp from the saucer. The Doctor stared hard at them. If he, Lillian and the children ran from them now, the Daleks could easily cut them down.
As four of the Daleks reached the bottom of the ramp, one of them continued its advance, whilst the
three others fanned out, crabbing sideways, quickly and efficiently positioning themselves near the exits of the shopping mall, eyestalks fixing on the Doctor.
‘That’s it, then,’ the Doctor murmured. ‘Trapped.’
The Dalek advancing towards him was very close now. The crowd’s applause for it and the other Daleks was getting louder. Someone had turned the sound down on the holographic TV screens. They were now all enraptured by the Daleks.
‘Oh, just stop it, will you?’ yelled the Doctor, the anger in him surging to the surface.
Stunned by this latest outburst from the Doctor, the crowd’s applause and cheering dissolved into a smattering of single claps and muted chatter. The Dalek, too, stopped, almost as if it had been commanded by the Doctor.
He stared at this Dalek. He knew he had seen this particular Dalek before. Once again, he could see the strange blurring effect in the middle of its upper grating section. And now there was a sharp, stinging pain in his head. He winced.
‘Are any of you seeing this too?’ he murmured to Sabel, Ollus and Lillian.
‘Seeing what?’ asked Lillian, clearly bewildered. Sabel and Ollus looked confused.
‘A sort of blur in the middle of that Dalek …’ but even as the Doctor uttered the words, he knew they could not see it. ‘Just me, then. So, Mr Dalek Litigator, what brings
you
here?’ he asked. ‘Oh yes, I recognised you, you see.’
‘You are illegally holding these children,’ the Litigator stated, firmly and precisely. The blur in its
grating seemed to have completely vanished now, and the pain was fading slowly.
The crowd started to mutter disapprovingly. Some people shouted out ‘Shame!’ and ‘Shouldn’t be allowed’ and other, more extreme comments.
‘You hypocrite!’ shouted the Doctor, slightly ashamed that his anger at the Daleks was probably making him look like a crazy person who just shouted a lot. ‘You’re “illegally” holding their sister.’
‘You will present proof of this unfounded allegation,’ the Dalek Litigator purred in what the Doctor felt for a moment were distinctly non-Dalek-like tones.
Ollus immediately blurted out, ‘We saw you take her! On Gethria! You took my sister!’
Ollus’s words rang out around the mall and the crowd fell utterly silent again. The Doctor patted Ollus on the shoulder and gently ssshed him, feeling some pride at the little boy’s bravery.
‘This child’s evidence is inadmissible,’ said the Litigator.
‘Why?’ demanded Sabel. ‘I was there too! We saw you take Jenibeth!’
‘You have both been influenced by the Doctor, who is known to be …
unreliable
,’ the Dalek Litigator said, focusing on Ollus, Sabel and then the Doctor in turn.
‘So what are you going to do?’ challenged the Doctor. ‘Exterminate us all?’
The crowd became tangibly uneasy.
‘Interesting, isn’t it?’ said the Doctor. ‘They all apparently trust you Daleks. They even applaud you. They’re grateful to you for having saved them
from galactic economic meltdown … But there’s still something, isn’t there?’
The Doctor moved away from Ollus, Sabel and Lillian and walked straight up to the Litigator. He prodded its casing. ‘Still something about a Dalek that a human being can’t quite trust.’
‘Silence!’ the Litigator barked.
A murmuring ripple went through the crowd. Ollus and Sabel cringed in fear and Lillian immediately stepped forward to comfort them. They clasped her, urgently.
The Doctor was grinning, showing some satisfaction to his old foes. He looked around at the Daleks covering the exits. He could see that they had become twitchy. Their gunsticks flicked from potential target to potential target, covering the area in case of an emergency. But their aim always returned to the Doctor.
‘Showing your true colours, are you?’ the Doctor taunted. ‘Who was it said a leopard can never change its spots? They were right, weren’t they? So go on, then …’
His voice descended to a whisper.
‘Exterminate me.’
The Litigator remained stock still. Its fiercely cold blue lens light constant in its penetrating stare.
‘Oh, you’re good,’ said the Doctor, daring to pat the Dalek’s dome section. ‘You’re very good. Yes, you don’t do that sort of thing any more, do you? Eh?’ Then he added, mockingly, ‘You spend all your time making lovely
nice
planets for
nice
people to live on now, don’t you?’