Strange Darkness;Always the Third Doctor!;Jo Grant;Katy Manning;Jon Pertwee;UNIT;TARDIS;
Strange Darkness
Episode Four
Written by Jeri Massi
The Doctor's relentless skill saved the life of Inspector Jules. The emergency surgery was carried out right on the spot, on the blood soaked floor, between the blood drenched door posts of the morgue. Two hospital doctors helped, and the Doctor himself sutured the wound closed while nurses and other attendants rigged up bag after bag of blood through IVs. And somehow, Jules' life was saved.
He was transferred into a surgery for follow-up work, with the Doctor supervising. Finally, when the way was clear to check the morgue, the Brigadier drew his sidearm and entered the silent room with Jo. There were no other live intruders hiding inside.
"Stay back," the Brigadier told her as he approached the body of Mr. Harding, which was the only body in the narrow, cold room. She could see that the sheet had been thrown back. There was a discarded sack on the floor, as well as a few tools that had been left behind in the intruder's flight. She was still numb from the sudden attack on Jules, and she stayed back. The Brigadier turned to her.
"I've seen enough. That chap was trying to get the head off. We'll get UNIT soldiers to guard this room. That body is staying here."
He went out without further word to her, and she did not see him again for the rest of the day. By the time she found the room that had been designated for Inspector Jules, he was being wheeled in from the surgery, his face as white as chalk.
"Have his family been notified?" she asked one of the nurses who came with him.
"We've notified his office, Miss," she told Jo. "There's really nobody else to call. Mrs. Jules died several months ago. Cancer. They had no children."
"I'll stay with him," Jo said.
"All right."
There was a good deal of machinery to be set up around the injured Inspector. A respirator, a heart monitor, and a device to sound an alarm when the IV bag drained too low, were all assembled with silent efficiency by the attendants and technicians. They finished, dimmed the lights, and left the door half open.
Seated by the bed, Jo hesitated and then took hold of Jules' hand.
"Hey," she whispered. "It's me, Jo Grant. You've done real well so far. You're still on the case."
He did not respond. His face was nearly gray. She quieted down, kept hold of his hand, and waited.
Hours later, the Doctor appeared in the doorway. He hesitated, then entered. At sight of him, Jo's heart suddenly raced, and she felt a sudden, inexplicable impulse to cry, which she squelched. There was no reason to cry, and the last time she had done that, it had helped to get her thrown off the case. She calmed herself quickly as he spoke.
"How is he?"
"Color's better," she said.
The Doctor walked over to her side of the bed. He leaned over Jules, touched the unconscious man on the good side of his throat to get the pulse, rested a hand on his forehead, and felt the skin on his cheeks and the back of the hand that Jo held.
"He's doing well, Jo," the Doctor murmured. "I think he'll be all right."
As she did not answer him, he crossed the small room, found a chair, and pulled it up alongside her. "What have you found?" he asked, all business.
"We checked at the Women's Health Centre," Jo told him. "There didn't seem any abnormalities."
"Dr. Rocelyn Mayes?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "Very professional. Been there several years. She was--" Jo hesitated. "She was slightly rude to Inspector Jules. Talked about men being self-centered and thinking of women as possessions. Not in those words, exactly, but that was what she was saying."
He brushed aside her comments. The Doctor was far more interested in how the men were being influenced rather than in who was doing it. "Did you get a look at that room that Bilkins and McClellan described?"
She nodded. "The room is all closed off, Doctor. I had a chance to look at the air system."
"Yes, and?" he asked.
"I don't know. You might want to look at it." She described the room and told him about the vents. She told him about the air freshener hose that had doused her.
"I was sure it might hold some poison or something that had done it to the men," she told him. "But it was just air freshener. It made me sick because I took the whole shot in my nose and mouth."
"But that's only one vent and one dispersal unit, Jo," he said. "There are three others we could check."
She noticed that he was now using the word we to her, but she said nothing. At her silence, he added, "The Brigadier and I followed up on a syringe that I think held something additional to its intended medicine. There may be a link to the Nutritional Clinic similar to the link to the Women's Health Centre: tenuous for the moment, but a lead in at least two of the cases."
"Is that where the Brigadier is?" she asked. "The Nutritional Clinic?"
He shook his head. "UNIT has spent the afternoon scouring the area for that man who attacked Inspector Jules," he told her. "He was inside the morgue, attempting to sever the head of the deceased, trying to get it out of here before the body was transported or autopsied. If they find him, they can find the source of this misery."
"Has anyone else been killed?" she asked.
Again, he shook his head. "Not yet. We've got messages out on emergency broadcast, warning people not to take medications without checking the seals. We've been able to temporarily close down every clinic that has dispensed the yohimbe product that we think was used to infect Drayer."
"But that leaves the Women's Health Centre open," she said.
"Yes. We have to find some probable cause before we can issue an order against it." He looked at the unconscious Jules, and then added. "There is still great danger. If this is entirely attributable to a chemical substance--and we don't know that it is--then it has been released through a variety of carrier substances. We feel fairly sure that of the killers, only Drayer used the yohimbe extract. So the others got it some other way."
She approached the subject of Rocelyn Mayes again. "Whoever is doing this has to understand chemistry and medication processes. It would have to be a doctor or researcher."
"So you think a practicing physician is doing it?" he asked. "You know, Jo, even in medicine there are levels of sophistication. I don't think a physician who's spent the last ten years working in clinical application would be able to do this."
His dismissal of her idea was not impolite, and yet at his words she felt a lump come up in her throat, and she blinked back tears. For a moment she couldn't speak. And then she wondered why she should get her feelings hurt. He frowned and looked at her more closely.
"So what's your next step?" she asked, looking away from him.
He glanced at his watch. "We've gotten the go-ahead on the autopsy of Harding. I'll be with that tomorrow morning. It's nearly seven now. Have you had dinner?"
"No," she said. "The orderly said they would send something up for me."
"There's still time for us to go and find that other nurse, that Addie Davis that gave the syringe to Drayer." He stood up. "We can track her easily enough through the police information services." This time the we was unmistakable in its intent. He intended for her to go with him.
She looked up at him, surprised. "I need to stay here."
"Jo, he'll be unconscious for hours."
"There's nobody else. He shouldn't be alone. Besides," she added, and her voice definitely shook. "At the moment, he's my direct report." Yet again, she blinked back tears and at the same time felt a new frustration with herself. She had rather admired the cool way that Jules had treated the Doctor and the Brigadier regarding their actions, and she wanted to be cool and calm, too.
He put his fists on his hips, irritated at the apparent hurt feelings and at her refusal to go with him. "Jo, be serious." His tone made it clear that no matter what else she pretended to be, she was first and foremost his assistant. "You ought to go with me and be of some real use."
She regained her calmness and spoke steadily, assisted by his arrogance. "I don't have my passes; I don't have my clearance; I don't even have my notes." She tightened her hand on Jules' hand without thinking.
"All right, have it your way, then. I'll see the Davis woman myself." He made it sound as though this would be a thankless job, but she already knew it involved nothing more than driving across town and being given tea and cake while Nurse Davis assured him that the syringe had come from the clinic's supplies. She said nothing as he strode to the door. He glanced back at her once, and then strode out.
She gasped and closed her eyes for a moment. On top of everything else, she had a splitting headache, the kind that lodges right behind the eyes and throbs. She opened her eyes and looked at Jules again. His eyes, gentle and sparkling, were open. He was looking at her sleepily, apparently content with the world at that moment.
"Hey," she whispered. She stroked back his hair with her other hand. "You're all right. It was touch and go, but you came through for us." She smiled at him, And he smiled back. His hand tightened on hers. "I'm right here," she told him.
He mouthed a few words and she had to lean closer so that he could say them again. She figured them out on his second attempt: "You should sleep."
"I will." she promised. He smiled and closed his eyes, and his hand held hers tightly again for a moment. Without thinking, she stroked his hair back from his forehead and looked at him, his face still pale but no longer that dead, white-gray color it had been a few hours before. What had really saved Jules was his quick reflexes. He had been turning as the switchblade caught the flesh at his throat. It had slashed across the side, not deep enough to penetrate all the way to the windpipe, nor to entirely sever the artery.
She had known, from the expression of his eyes on waking, that he was deeply touched to find her there. And she had to stop and think about him for a moment. Inspector Jules was an odd mix of a human being--a tough police officer, shrewd, and no-nonsense. Yet he was also patient, tolerant, and good-natured. There was a streak of loyalty in him that she had already seen, and a sensitivity that surprised her. It shouldn't have matched the toughness, and yet it did. Just like his method of asking questions, sorting facts, and heading off troubles did not match the complete disorder of his office and desk. He was a man of physical contrasts as well: a dumpy, stocky frame of fast reflexes, a face with beautiful eyes under the frowsy eyebrows and unruly hair that curled only on the ends.
And she knew that he had treated her with a kindness that had been thought out, carefully planned, perfectly executed. It was such a difference from the Doctor's careless consideration and momentary flashes of tenderness. Jules enjoyed her companionship with a delightful, warm, human need. Somehow in his life of contrasts he had found time to make friends with her while investigating the trail of some monstrous string of crimes, yet neither pursuit had detracted from the other.
"I am far too tired," she whispered to herself. She desperately wanted to sleep, and she again felt a need to cry.
* * * *
Addie Davis and her husband Bert were a pleasant, handsome couple, a trifle more worldly wise than the people the Doctor had yet interviewed. He was ushered into a comfortable living room that had a touch of the exotic about it--a Chinese fan on one wall that his expert eyes recognized as authentic; African teak fixtures adorned another corner. A bottle of expensive American whiskey was set out with a decanter and richly cut glasses, but the Davises offered him tea, which he accepted.
"It's been such a shock about Mildred--that's Mrs. Drayer, Doctor," Mrs. Davis told him as she brought him his tea. He was in a comfortable, leather easy chair. Richard Davis sat at one end of the sofa and fixed the Doctor with a slightly curious eye. "Were you called away from a party?" he asked.
"Hush, Richard," his wife said, then she added to the Doctor, "But the Drayers were a happy couple from what I understood from Mildred."
"You didn't know them both?" he asked.
"I'd met him now and again, but Milly and I worked together, oh, about five years I suppose, for NHS. We were on the same floor for the longest time. Then we both went with private employers: the schedule is ever so much easier to live with, and the pay was better for both of us. I went to the Nutrition Clinic. She was with a cosmetic surgeon, I believe, but more of a receptionist than anything else. Still, she didn't mind. Kept her off her feet and the money was there, wasn't it?"
"Mr. Drayer told us that it was you that gave his wife the preparation of yohimbe."
She nodded. "I still see Milly now and again. I was surprised when she came into the clinic for advice. I guess they'd been having a bit of trouble--in bed. It happens. Well, she told me about it before the nutritionist saw her, and I gave her one of our disposable kits. I thought it unlikely that her husband was having prostate trouble. Probably too much stress."
"He didn't come to the clinic himself?" the Doctor asked.
She suddenly giggled. "Men often don't, Doctor. Not with trouble like that." She shrugged. "I couldn't see the harm of having him try it. Milly can certainly give an injection, and yohimbe is only contra-indicated for heart trouble. It's a safe preparation, as you must know."
"Yes." He nodded. "Normally. The police have confiscated the disposable kits from the Clinic, Mrs. Davis." He set the tea on the coffee table. "And the Clinic has been closed pending the investigation. Two of the victims were clients of the Clinic: Mrs. Drayer and a Mrs. Harding."
"Yes, Mrs. Harding," she said. "But the Hardings never took the yohimbe extract at all. I'm sure of that." She became slightly defensive, and her husband also frowned. "You've really closed down the Clinic, Doctor? That's my job, and it's run on very proper lines."
"We cannot risk another incident," he told her. "We have discovered that the yohimbe extract was tampered with, a second drug added to the syringe."
Her mouth dropped open. "Why, that's impossible. I gave it to Milly in its original packaging."
"What did the packaging look like?"
"A clear little bag, heat-sealed closed."
He shook his head. "That was not the original packaging. Which distributor did you get the yohimbe kits from?"
"I don't know, Doctor. We have a stock boy who takes care of receiving."
He stood up. "I'm sorry for the inconvenience of your lost work," he said. "Tomorrow we'll start tracing the routes that the yohimbe extract took to get to you."
She became slightly defiant. "I told you: the Hardings never used the yohimbe extract."
"Then we must check what they did use, madam. Thank you for the tea."
* * * *
"Jo?" A hand was gently laid across her forehead. She blinked sleepily and opened her eyes. The Doctor was looking down at her. Sunlight streamed into the hospital room. He pressed the back of his hand to her temple and then the to side of her face. Her headache was gone. "Are you awake, my dear?" He was smiling a slight, gentle smile.
She sat up on the unfolded pull-out chair. She had a dim memory of an attendant helping her get it set up the night before. "How is he?" she whispered. She rubbed her eyes and glanced at the sleeping Inspector Jules.
"He was awake before you," the Doctor told her. He crossed to a wheeled tray and poured coffee for her. "They gave him a bit of breakfast, and he's dozing again. Neither of us thought it wise to wake you."
She accepted the coffee from him. "What about the autopsy?"
"Over and done," he told her. "It's nearly eleven o'clock, young lady." As he turned to get toast from the tray, he glanced over his shoulder at her. "Inspector Jules and I both agreed we should let you sleep. You've been driving yourself hard on this case."
He came and sat next to her on the end of the sleeper and held the plate of toast. She was ravenously hungry and helped herself. The coffee was hospital coffee, not very good, and she wondered if he were feeling guilty enough to be coaxed into finding decent coffee from a vendor somewhere.
"Look," he said gently. "I am sorry, Jo. I suppose it was harsh to dry your tears and then send you packing. I didn't mean it that way."
"It doesn't matter now," she said. She decided not to try for better coffee. "I know I can do what I have to do, what I ought to do. The only real question is if you'll let me do it." She took a huge swallow of coffee and forced herself to sound more diplomatic. She looked at him, her eyes earnest. "Look, if it were aliens, or something the time lords wanted done, I would know my place. Maybe I'd still be following you around, but I would know I was out of my depth. But this is different."
"How is this different, Jo?" he asked her.
"These are people just like me. This is an investigation I understand. I was attacked by one of those men--because he was suffering. It's not like you understand the nature of what's happening, and I don't, Doctor. I understand." She held his eye with hers.
"If one of our own people were to attack you," he said gently. "It would destroy more than just your life, and more than just his life. UNIT itself could suffer a tremendous lose of cohesiveness, of ability to function."
"As far as we know, there's nothing to stop a UNIT man from attacking any other woman," she said. "There's no point in exempting me."
He lowered his eyes and nodded. "All right," he said. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out her passes and keys. "Here you are. And I am sorry."
She took them and then handed them back. "I don't have any pockets. Will you hold them for me?"
He nodded, took then and pocketed them, and continued: "I didn't do it out of--meanness, Jo. Or because I thought you couldn't do the job." She went back to eating while he labored through this apology. "It's just that, well, I was worried for you. I was concerned about Cally attacking you. I mean, I care about you Jo. All right? I care about you, and I don't want you getting strangled." He slapped his knee with his free hand. "I was trying to protect you!" He seemed satisfied with this.
"Could we get real coffee?" she asked.
But he wasn't finished. "What about that, eh? I am hundreds of years older than you, and here I go playing 'round with your life, and you're not yet twenty."
"I'm over twenty, and I'm doing my duty. And," she added. "I would like a decent cup of coffee. I'm sure you owe me that much."
The toast was gone. She looked wistfully at the barren plate as she swallowed the last corner of crust.
"Autopsy first," he said. "I did learn something. I'll wake the Inspector."
But there was more to including Jules in the conversation than just waking him. The consulting surgeon came in, displeased to find a small meeting going on in the room. Jo and the Doctor were ushered out for nearly thirty minutes while the inspector was "seen to" by the surgeon and an orderly. There was a good deal of tense and heated discussion going on inside, and UNIT's science officer and his assistant listened shamelessly at the crack of the door. But all they could conclude was that the Inspector wanted some answers about the length of his stay and how much he could push himself.
When they were at last let back inside, Jules was sitting up on pillows, his hair wet and combed back, his face shaved (except for the mustache) and washed. Except for the wad of tape and gauze at his throat, he looked nearly well, though he was still relying on an IV.
"Your visits are to be limited to thirty minutes," the surgeon told him. "And you dare not leave that bed for another twenty four hours. If that wound were to re-open, it would be the end of you. So you'll just have to sit there and like it!" He strode out.
"Touchy fellow," Jules muttered.
"Hmmm. You're good at aggravating doctors," the Doctor told him.
"And they generally respond by saving my skin," Jules told him. "Thank you."
"I've had my revenge, old boy. I nicked back my assistant while you were asleep."
Jules glanced at Jo, indignant. "Did he really?"
She smiled at him. "I'm afraid so." But they held each other's glance for a moment. She was grateful to him, and she genuinely liked him. He patted her hand and winked.
"Right then," he said. "Where's the case? Any word on that fellow that slashed me up?"
"Not yet, but we've got some information on the late Mr. Harding." The Doctor fished in his jacket pocket and produced some notes. "Took a look at his brain, since that seemed to be the object of the attempted theft."
"Ugh," Jo said.
"And?" Jules asked.
The Doctor glanced at the notes. "There was slight edema around certain hormone production centers--swelling and fluid retention."
"What's that indicate?" Jules asked.
"Well it could indicate a lot of things. One possibility is that there was inflammation, increased activity in certain pathways that we would consider exclusively male responses."
"Sexual activity?" Jules asked.
He shook his head and then caught himself. "Well, not what most people think of when they think of sexual activity. Aggression and dominance are present in male sexual activity, but they are not limited to sexual activities, and there are other influences that temper them and even minimize them during sexual behaviour."
"I think I'm getting lost," Jo said. "These were not sexual crimes. We know that."
He looked thoughtful as he realized the complexity of the matter. "Jo, look at it this way. If somebody were to tremendously excite the point of a man's brain where testosterone is produced, what would happen?"
She hesitated. "I think--I think he would produce more testosterone."
"Yes, and?"
Jules interrupted. "He could become more aggressive, even blindly aggressive, perhaps paranoid. We see it in athletes who take testosterone by injection. The most overdosed cases attack people."
The Doctor nodded. "And what would happen if the same thing were done to a woman?"
"Do women produce testosterone?" Jo asked.
"Yes, in much more limited amounts."
"I suppose the same thing would happen," she said. "Except maybe she would physically change as well, start to develop male characteristics."
The Doctor shook his head and folded his arms. "No. That's what would happen if she were given injections of testosterone. But if you tried to excite that part of her brain that governs the production of testosterone, it would be inhibited by other factors. She would produce more, certainly, but she's not designed to produce very much. She would, in effect, exhaust some hormonal functions temporarily. She would get a headache. She might show some symptoms of hormonal imbalance for a few minutes or a few hours, depending on the length of the exposure to the stimulus to her brain. She would likely become very emotional and ultimately very sleepy. She would sleep several hours longer than normal, and during that time her system would probably right itself."
Jo's mouth fell open, and the Doctor nodded at her. "Yes," he said. "Exactly what's happened to you the last twenty-four hours, it seems. Anyway, the sleepiness checks out." He didn't say anything about her struggle against tears the evening before, but she realized that he had observed her rising emotions.
"You think that dose of air freshener did it?" Jules asked.
"But it really was air freshener," Jo said.
"It may have been carrying a passenger," the Doctor told her. "We saw from the yohimbe extract that whatever is being used, it can be combined with certain other chemicals without losing its own chemical identity."
"But what about Harding?" Jules asked. "He never went near the Women's Health Centre. Poor chap was on his last legs from leukemia."
"And," the Doctor added. "He resisted the effects of whatever dose he was given. He actually warned his wife to get away from him, and he seemed to be less influenced, more aware of losing his ability to control himself." The Doctor reached into his other pocket and produced a prescription bottle of pills. "I think that these inhibited the dose he received."
"What is it?" Jules asked.
"A neural blocker devised to relieve nausea after chemo-therapy. It seems to have blocked some of the receiver cells that would have been influenced by the dose."
Jules sat up straighter. "Jo, hand me that phone," he said. She passed him the phone. He glanced at the Doctor as he dialed. "I don't know what did it to Harding, but now that we know Jo got a dose of it, we've got to close that Women's Health Centre down."
"Tell your men to stay well out of the building," the Doctor said. "And tell them to hunt down and isolate any man that's been in that building for the last day."
"What now?" Jo asked.
Just then, the Brigadier strode in. "Doctor," he said by way of greeting, and then with a colder, more formal tone, "Miss Grant."
She made her voice pleasant and professional. "Good morning, Brigadier."
He ignored her and turned to the Doctor. "No sign of that fellow with the switchblade," he said. "We've made a round-up of all the supplies kept at the Nutritional Clinic. We've questioned the staff, but . . ." He shook his head.
"Did you question the stock boy?" the Doctor asked.
"I meant the professional staff--"
"Well now that you've found nothing, start with the non-professional staff!" the Doctor snapped. "I'm not saying the stock boy did anything, but certainly he'd be the most likely to have seen something irregular. Oh!" Exasperated, he turned to Jo. "You look into it, will you, Jo?"
She nodded. Jules hung up the telephone and returned it to the table alongside his bed. "Done!" he exclaimed. "My lads are on their way to close the place down, but they'll do it by means of a bull horn. Nobody's going inside. Good morning Brigadier!"
"You seem very well sir," the Brigadier said. "I'm glad to see it."
"Nothing more embarrassing than having your throat cut when you're right in the middle of telling someone off," Jules told him cheerfully. "Care for some lukewarm coffee?"
"No thank you. I started my day hours ago." And the Brigadier dropped a disdainful eye on Jo Grant. The Doctor ignored him. "Jo, why not borrow the Inspector's car and see to questioning the rest of the Nutritional Clinic staff," he said. "I'm going to the Women's Health Centre and look the place over."
"Doctor, you will be careful," she said.
"Of course. I'll turn off the HVAC system, for one thing," he assured her.
"I meant about Dr. Mayes," she said.
"I told you, Jo: if there's a neural exciter that works to overproduce testosterone, then it must have been developed by some high level medical researcher, not a practicing physician."
"How do you know she was never a researcher?" Jo demanded.
Jules spoke up. "She's been with the Women's Health Centre for over ten years. We checked her history. Before that she was with general practice through NHS." He glanced at the Doctor. "However, there are factors that make her a possible suspect." He paused and looked the Doctor up and down. "Still, you don't have much to fear from her. Just don't take anything she prescribes until we've checked her further, okay?" He smiled.
The Doctor nodded. "All right. Those decanters of air freshener are our one chance of finding any of this stuff intact. It deteriorates quickly. I couldn't retrieve any from the yohimbe syringe."
"Was it the vitamins did it to Harding?" the Brigadier asked.
The Doctor nodded. "I think so. There were magnesium salts left in residue on the coatings of the tablets. So something was there, but once the bottle was opened, the substance that had been sprayed onto the pills broke down." He glanced at the Brigadier. "And listen, whatever the brand name of that air freshener is, it will need to be confiscated from distributors. I'm afraid you're not going to be a very popular man, Brigadier."
"That's all right. But I'll need a lift back to HQ to get the paperwork started and make the calls to start the shutdowns on these products."
"Right!" the Doctor turned to Jo. "See to that, will you, Jo? I'll see you both back at the lab."
And he strode out. The Brigadier and Jo looked at each other. This promised to be a rather long car trip.
"Jo, take my radio," Inspector Jules told her. "I know you're just gathering information, but I don't want you alone out there."
* * * *
The Women's Health Centre had been cordoned off and the front doors bolted with a fearsome looking chain and lock by the time the Doctor arrived. Curious onlookers wandered up to the police officers assigned to watch the building. The initial crowd that had been drawn by the commotion of the evacuation had finally dispersed, but word was getting out to the local offices and neighborhoods that something was up at the Centre.
The problem of a crowd was not helped when a tall, energetic man drove up in an Edwardian roadster, barged through the people, and ordered to be let in. Some hurried calls via radio were made, and the impatient newcomer was at last admitted through the doors, which were locked behind him.
Inside, the silent Health Centre was a much different place now that it had been evacuated. The blinds were drawn, dimming the normally cheerful front room. A faint clicking and humming warned that the climate control system was still on. Hastily, the Doctor found his way to the offices and examination rooms in the back. From there he found the back steps and the rear door that led to a parking lot and service road. At the foot of the steps he at last located the alarm system, circuit boxes, and climate control panel. He switched off the air system. Just to be safe, he threw the circuit breakers that controlled the fans.
He felt safe enough to check the vents that Jo had described, and he returned upstairs. With the help of his sonic screwdriver, he was able to get one of the grills off. The automatic decanter inside the vent was fastened down, but came up easily enough. He pocketed it.
That finished the job, but the back offices were too tempting. The Doctor crept back to the rear of the building and looked for filing cabinets. This was one way to get all the information they would need on distribution of the air fresheners without needing a warrant.
The Doctor had no idea of just how many file drawers needed to be kept in a medical office. It took a long time to find the receiving files. They were kept in a bare cubicle of an office. The file folder was overpacked, and as he pulled it from the file drawer, half its contents spilled onto the floor.
With a sound of exasperation, the Doctor knelt to pick them up. As he straightened, he found himself looking up the barrel of an automatic handgun. It was fixed on the tiny spot between his eyes. For a moment, his eyes insisted on fixing on only the gun; then he looked a little higher. An attractive, middle-aged woman, clad in an expensive pantsuit, was looking down on him with a fixed expression.
"I assure you, I have every reason to be here," he said politely. "You must be, uh, Dr. Rocelyn Mayes. How do you do?"
"Sit on the floor," she told him.
"All right." He sat down on the carpeted floor. "Say, do you mind telling me what you're doing here?"
"Put your hands on your knees."
He did.
She seemed stunned to find him there, as though it had not dawned on her that anybody would search the building after the orders to evacuate had been given and the front doors chained.
"You took the vent apart," she said.
"I did."
She seemed about to ask him a question along that line, and then she did not. She hesitated and then said, "Turn over. Get on your face."
She was just out of reach for him to attempt anything. He complied with her order.
"Spread your arms out."
He did. The room was so small that one of his arms went under the narrow desk. She turned his accessible hand palm up.
"You know, this really is unnecessary," he told her. "I'm not going to hurt you."
She answered by dropping to one knee, right on his back, and thrusting the muzzle of the gun into the back of his head. "If you move, I'll pull the trigger."
"Well, can I at least sneeze?" he asked. "I don't like this carpet much."
She searched his pockets, threw aside the decanter, and took the other items that she found. "They call you Doctor," she said, reading through some of the notes.
What she did next surprised him. She grasped his hair and pulled his head back, keeping the gun right where it was.
"Am I on your short list?" she asked in his ear.
"For questioning, yes."
"Who is the girl? She was with the detective yesterday."
"She's an agent working with UNIT."
"Why do you have her passes?"
"She didn't have a pocket, so I'm holding them for her."
"What is she to you?"
"Nothing. We both work for UNIT. I come equipped with pockets, that's all."
The last two minutes had been filled with surprises for the Doctor, but what Dr. Rocelyn Mayes did next surprised him further. She kissed the side of his head. The muzzle of the gun came around the other side of his head and pressed against his temple. "Do you like being helpless, Doctor?" she asked in his ear. "Tell me truly, how it feels." She kissed him on the side of his head again and pushed the muzzle against his temple more firmly on the other side. "Give me the answer I like, or I'll pull the trigger. There's only one right answer, so you'd better get it right first time." Click here to view Episode Five.
