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The creature wearing the Doctor’s body had finally worked its way through the shields and security measures surrounding the Canines’ ship. It had taken a surprisingly long time to deactivate them all with its mind. The Doctor’s brain was obviously not as powerful as it had thought. It opened the door with a thought, and as the hatch swung open a ramp unfurled. The creature stepped onto the ramp, its tentacles writhing in anticipation. Suddenly it was stopped in its tracks. It had detected another thought source in the room. It turned in time to see Nick fire a shot at it. The ectoplasm diffracted the effect of the stun shot, and the Doctor’s body remained undamaged. Another attacker was on the creature’s other side. It was Alf, using the same type of stun gun as Nick. They fired at it from either side, with a volley of shots. It reached out with its thoughts, entering their minds and releasing their self-control. It directed their kill instincts onto each other and set them free to shoot each other to pieces. Yet another thought source stopped this. It was the original host, the girl. Her mind had been strengthened somehow, and she could calm their kill impulses. It reached out with its thoughts, stripping her of her defences, reducing her to a quivering wreck. It prepared to kill once again. And once again, it was distracted by another thought source. It was the Omnisci, Noan. He raised his gun to it. The creature laughed. ‘You won’t even be able to hit me. Not when I control your mind.’ Noan fired his gun and the explosive charge barrelled through the air and struck the Canines’ ship. The ship exploded throwing them all to the ground. The protection of the creature’s armour meant it came out the best. ‘Thank you for deactivating the ship’s defences for me.’ Noan was mocking it. Noan had come to a realisation. The creature was a mind reader. It had no actual body of its own - it relied on other people. And it relied on their minds too - not only for sustenance, but also for knowledge. It had been reading their intentions and countering them. Noan had simply cleared his mind of his intention and let the creature deflect his aim into the ship. He had tricked it. The creature felt foolish. It shouldn’t have damaged the Doctor’s mind so much or he would have spotted that for it. It would have to start thinking for its self again. It had been so long since it had been the master strategist - would it still remember how to do it? It savagely tore its way into Noan’s mind, slashing its way through his thoughts to find the information it wanted. Noan fought as much as possible but it was useless. The creature sliced his mind to pieces and found what it wanted. The only other working ship on the planet belonged to the Omnisci, in the conference room. It started towards it, leaving behind the Omnisci’s ruined mind. And when he knew it wasn’t looking, or thinking, Noan smiled. The water level in the hall had risen, and now the Collector was completely submerged. He could still not right himself, but at least he was completely covered by water. He had been thinking, deeply about what to do when the creature got here. He still had no idea. That was when the door was splintered open by a hulking ectoplasmic form. It waded through, tentacles writhing. A fuzzy image in the middle revealed the Doctor. The creature had taken his body for its host. The Collector decided a direct approach was best. He reached out with his mind, to try and enter the creature’s. He was swatted back easily. The creature then slid its own mind into his and extended psychic claws into it. It took a long sharp rake of the Collector’s mind. The Collector tried to resist. He was the most powerful telepath in the Universe and he was powerless to prevent this. The creature’s ability obviously passed beyond mere telepathy. The Collector felt the creature start to pick away different bits of his mind, further diminishing him with every second. He tried to throw useless memories in its way but it would only be so long before he started to cut through them. ° Who are you? ° He tried to distract it. ‘Once long ago, in ancient times, I had a name. It was whispered, through the endless tunnels of darkness at the heart of eternity. The echo left death, and pain, and the name its self stilled hearts and left minds ravaged. Once long ago, the name that was prescribed me silenced worlds, to the beating of the last heart. But it was never my true name. I have no name. They are weakness.’ ° What are you? ° ‘The result of balance. You, and everything else, are life. I am the balance. There are many of you and one of me. And everything you are is death to me, just as everything I am is death to you. I will silence the Universe.’ ° But… ° ‘Silence.’ The creature struck out with a single thought and devastated the Collector’s mind. ‘I will leave this planet, and I will destroy it. Then I will travel to the next one, and end that too.’ The Collector lay, on the floor, his body wracked with spasms, and wasted by the power of the creature. His mind was debilitated, barely even able to create cohesive thoughts. The creature hadn’t even bothered to hurt him, just to disable him. The creature proceeded towards the ship, and the black substance of its shell unfurled for it. Its link with the Collector’s mind was still open. It prepared to silence his mind forever. When the Collector did something unexpected. He transmitted a single thought down the link. A single, cohesive, powerful thought. It emerged from the spastic patterns that crackled across its lobes, the static forming of ideas that should have dissolved. Through sheer force of will, one was created and sent on its way. The creature was too surprised to stop it. And when it didn’t do anything to it, it almost laughed. Until it realised what it had said (and to whom). Until the remainder of the Doctor’s mind committed suicide. The creature fought to stay alive, but the Doctor’s body crumpled, and folded. The psychic armour retracted into it, and the beating of its hearts stopped. The tiny electrical signals in its brain halted. The Doctor died, and the creature died with him. The Collector’s thoughts sparked back together. His mind was being healed by some other presence. They knitted into cohesive thought patterns, as the other presence weaved the Collector back together. The Collector then reached out with his mind and picked up the Doctor’s body. He squeezed life back into the Doctor’s heart, started the generation of electrical impulses in the brain. He restored the body to life, in time for Nick and the others to rush in. They stood watching the Doctor’s body, hover in mid air, above the neck level water. They watched as the body was lowered again, slowly slipping into the liquid until it soaked the bottom of his beard. And then they watched as it opened its eyes. And smiled. Normal eyes, with a friendly smile. ‘Hello, Nick.’ It was the Doctor’s voice. Nick felt uplifted by it. ‘Doctor…’ Nick asked, ‘How are you alive? What happened?’ ‘Ah. Well, when I recognised the presence that attacked me, Nick, I simply formulated this plan. I knew what it would do, so I asked the Collector to create an imprint of my mind and that is what you carried to my body.’ ‘An imprint nearly burst my skull?’ ‘Well,’ said the Doctor modestly, ‘I have a very big mind.’ ‘Big head, more like,’ Alf muttered into Nick’s ear. ‘The imprint was made to carry one specific function: self-destruction. The plan was for the Collector to transmit that thought to the imprint and my body would commit suicide. Then my real mind could be placed back in my body.’ The idea of the Doctor having a complicated and deceptive plan had a strange feeling of familiarity for Alf. ‘However, we still need to get away. These spider things seem most unpleasant. So I have a favour to ask of you, Noan.’ Nick was amazed how confident he felt now the Doctor had slipped back into control of the situation. ‘Can you separate the morphic fields of the creatures in the zoo from the morphogenetic field, and place them into the genetic field of the time amulets?’ Noan looked unsettled. ‘That may kill me.’ The Doctor looked pained. ‘I know. And I wouldn’t ask, if it wasn’t entirely essential.’ ‘Very well,’ Noan agreed. ‘But in truth, Doctor, it is I who should kill you, for what you did to my people when we last met.’ Nick was slightly confused. He knew that morphic fields were the entelechy that guided and shaped the form of living things. He knew the morphogenetic field was the field that combined the morphic fields. As far as he understood it, the time amulets created a genetic field between the users before transporting them. If the Doctor wanted Noan to place the other morphic fields into the genetic field of the time amulets that could only mean… ‘I’m ready,’ Noan said. ‘Good,’ said the Doctor, and Nick and Alf joined hands as he clasped theirs. And then they weren’t in the zoo any more. Instead they were on the Canines’ ship. It was large, dark and smelly - the only light came from the image of the planet on a view screen. There was dog excrement on the floor. Noan collapsed, but every single creature in the zoo, apart from the spiders, was on the ship. The Canine crew approached them, circling the zoo contents in a pack, growling. Then the creatures from the zoo leapt on them. The Doctor took the opportunity to run to the nearest control bank. He bent his head to the controls and sniffed them all, before standing upright and bashing lots of them in a distinct series. There was a dull thump, and the planet shattered. It was dead. And so were the spiders. Noan was talking to the Collector. He had survived the ordeal of manipulating the fields. He had even managed to walk again. It may be years before his field manipulating abilities returned to normal. He was dangling his legs in the tank that was the Collector’s temporary home, at the heart of the Canines’ ship. ° I’m pleased to say that the Canines have agreed ° Really? ° The Collector seemed astonished. ° I consulted the Omnisci yesterday. The vote was unanimous amongst every member of our species. ° ° Every member? ° ° We aren’t as numerous as we used to be. And we have… vested interests in the preservation of as many morphic fields as possible. ° They both turned to look as the Doctor and his companions entered. The Doctor was grinning broadly. ‘Hello Noan, Collector. We just came to say goodbye.’ ° You’re leaving us Doctor? ° ‘Yes. We really have stayed as long as we can. Although I must say something before I go. Don’t keep everyone in the zoo, will you? Let them go, if they want to. I’m sure some will stay, just for the attraction of their own terraformed planet.’ ° Fair enough Doctor. Goodbye. ° ‘Yes,’ echoed Noan, ‘Goodbye.’ The Doctor turned to Nick and Alf. ‘Ready?’ he asked. They both nodded to him. He took their hands, and they took each other’s. The genetic field was completed. They were about to disappear, when Nick asked something. ‘Doctor… what did the hitch-hiker show you in your own mind?’ The Doctor remained silent as they all faded away, his face growing dark… "What did the hitch-hiker show the Doctor? To find out the answer to Nick's question and more besides, tune in next week for Ruins of Self; part the first - the first of a seven-part special!"
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