Engines of War Read online

  Within seconds, it was over.

  The TARDIS, ravaged by the storm, limped from the Eye under its own volition, drifting into a loose orbit around Moldox. Inside, the remains of the possibility engine fizzed and popped, where once Borusa had been lashed, but now there was nothing.

  The Doctor lay unconscious on the floor beneath the console, within an arm’s reach of the body of his dead companion.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  It had taken the Doctor three days to find the homestead. Three days of asking questions in the tumbledown human camps, travelling between them like a nomad. It wasn’t easy uncovering a trail that had gone cold a decade and a half earlier, but persistence had put him on the right track.

  He’d found mouldering records in an abandoned municipal building, and Coyne had helped as much as he could, filling in some of the blanks. For the rest he’d had to rely on the word of strangers, but in their dazed and jubilant state, they didn’t seem to mind lending a hand to an unfamiliar face. He supposed they took him for what he was – another lost soul, drifting from place to place, searching for answers, for a home. Only, it wasn’t his own home he was looking for.

  He was encouraged to see that the humans on Moldox were slowly beginning to find each other. The scrappy groups of resistance fighters and travellers who had eked out an existence during the occupation had begun to merge, finding strength in numbers, and were tentatively taking steps to move back into the towns and cities. Their resilience was uplifting.

  All evidence of the Daleks themselves was gone – the saucers, the patrols, the shells of defeated mutants – everything, save for the damage they had caused and the wreckage they had left behind.

  The humans he spoke with seemed confused. They understood there had been a war, that terrible hardship had been forced upon them, but the enemy seemed distant and forgotten – a symptom of the temporal excision performed by Borusa and the possibility engine.

  Time would serve as a reminder, the Doctor supposed. Time, and the ongoing threat of the war still raging in the heavens. No matter what Borusa had done, the horrors faced by the people here were simply too wretched to be forgotten for long. Those memories would eventually surface, and they would share in their grief. In the meantime, however, people would get on with rebuilding their lives.

  The homestead, when he eventually found it, was nothing but a burnt-out husk. The walls had been reduced to rubble, blackened like the stumps of rotten, uneven teeth. Decaying remnants of furniture were strewn about the place, and it was clear the site had long ago been looted for anything valuable or useful. Weeds poked inquisitively through the fractured earth, ropey tendrils encircling fragments of shattered lintel, broken chair or rusted bed head.

  It was a solemn job, unearthing the remains of the other three humans – Cinder’s mother, father and brother – which had long been covered by the dust and detritus of the Dalek occupation. Now, they were just bones and rags, scattered by scavenging animals. Yet it felt right to reunite this lost soul with the family who had once loved her, who had been taken from her by a war for which she held no responsibility.

  In the records he had found evidence of her true name. It was a beautiful, human name, and in death he had restored it to her, carving it into the wooden post he’d found to serve as a marker for her grave. He wondered if, when the time came, there might be someone to do the same for him.

  The Doctor stood in the ruins beside the grave of his friend and looked up. Night was closing in, and the auroras danced hypnotically across the heavens, their exotic colours mingling like oil separating in water. Behind them, the Tantalus Eye cast its all-seeing gaze upon him. He felt as if he were being somehow singled out, as if he alone stood at the eye of a storm, the only one able to clearly see the chaos that was engulfing the universe around him. He’d come to Moldox feeling maudlin, but now he felt nothing but burning rage.

  He stared back at the Eye, defiant. The War had gone on too long. There were too many victims, too many casualties. He couldn’t stomach what his people had become. The war had changed them. Their desperation to survive at any cost, their arrogance and sense of entitlement had combined to lead them down the bleakest of paths. Somewhere down the line they had ceased to value the things they should have held sacred, the lives of those fledgling races that the Time Lords should be shepherding into the future, rather than casually consigning to the past.

  Their conflict with the Daleks was going to destroy everything. All of creation cowered in their wake, and the only thing that either side could see was the war itself, and their unending crusade for victory. They had to be stopped before anyone else was caught in the crossfire.

  The Doctor turned up the collar of his jacket. He would make a vow, to Cinder, and to what was left of the universe. He would bring an end to the War. Whatever it took. He would put a stop to it now. This was it. This was the day he drew the line.

  A blackbird was picking at the freshly turned earth in search of worms, and he watched it flutter away into the darkening sky, finally admitting defeat.

  Then, alone at last, he quietly uttered his promise. Just two simple words, but leaden with the weight of his resolve:

  ‘No more.’

  Acknowledgements

  My thanks go out to Justin Richards, Albert DePetrillo and the Doctor Who production team for bringing me back into the Doctor Who fold, and for giving me the opportunity to send the War Doctor on a brand new adventure.

  Also to Cavan Scott, for his constant support and encouragement. His messages helped me to keep going when it looked like I still had a mountain to climb.

  Finally, I couldn’t have done this without the patience and support of my family, who made time in our busy lives to accommodate the writing of this book. I love you all.

  JUSTIN RICHARDS

  ISBN 978-0-8041-4088-1

  ‘Vastra and Strax and Jenny? Oh no, we don’t need to bother them. Trust me.’

  Marlowe Hapworth is found dead in his locked study, killed by an unknown assailant. This is a case for the Great Detective, Madame Vastra.

  Rick Bellamy, bare-knuckle boxer, has the life drawn out of him by a figure dressed as an undertaker. This angers Strax the Sontaran.

  The Carnival of Curiosities, a collection of bizarre and fascinating sideshows and performers. This is where Jenny Flint looks for answers.

  How are these things connected? And what does Orestes Milton, rich industrialist, have to do with it all? As the Doctor and Clara join the hunt for the truth, they find themselves thrust into a world where nothing and no one are what they seem.

  An original novel featuring the Twelfth Doctor and Clara, as played by Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman

  MIKE TUCKER

  ISBN 978-0-8041-4090-4

  ‘Well, I doubt you’ll ever see a bigger insect.’

  Gabby Nichols is putting her son to bed when she hears her daughter cry out. ‘Mummy, there’s a daddy longlegs in my room!’ Then the screaming starts … Kevin Alperton is on his way to school when he is attacked by a mosquito. A big one. Then things get dangerous.

  But it isn’t the dead man cocooned inside a huge mass of web that worries the Doctor. It isn’t the swarming, mutated insects that make him nervous.

  With the village cut off from the outside world, and the insects becoming more and more dangerous, the Doctor knows that unless he can decode the strange symbols engraved on an ancient stone circle, and unravel a mystery dating back to the Second World War, no one is safe.

  An original novel featuring the Twelfth Doctor and Clara, as played by Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman

  JAMES GOSS

  ISBN 978-0-8041-4092-8

  ‘Release the Doctor – or the killing will start.’

  An asteroid in the furthest reaches of space – the most secure prison for the most dangerous of criminals. The Governor is responsible for the cruellest murderers. So he’s not impressed by the arrival of the man they’re calling the most dangerous criminal in the q
uadrant. Or, as he prefers to be known, the Doctor.

  But when the new prisoner immediately sets about trying to escape, and keeps trying, the Governor sets out to find out why.

  Who is the Doctor and what’s he really doing here? And who is the young woman who comes every day to visit him, only to be turned away by the guards?

  When the killing finally starts, the Governor begins to get his answers …

  An original novel featuring the Twelfth Doctor and Clara, as played by Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman