Edited note: This story is now finished - you can read part two here and part three here.
Chapter One - A Curious Meeting In Westminster
The meeting had finished late. The ladies were particularly animated this evening, angry at the latest failure of Parliament to hear their appeals. In spite of all assembled striving for the same goals, they had argued endlessly over the best way to make the authorities listen. By the time the Suffragists had come to a set of conclusions they could all agree to - or at least a set of compromises - it was already dark.The streets were unusually quiet. Even though her home was close, Miss Georgie Stanton would have preferred to have engaged the services of a Hansom Cab. Having been unable to do so, she had taken a deep breath and resolved to walk the few streets to her family house.
It was a dark night, air fresh and crisp with the promise of more snow overnight. Her shoes and walking-cane crunched through recently-fallen snow, while the gas lamps glowered and flickered as cool air whistled around them. Many wondered why a woman of her youth should carry a walking-cane. "If men can bear them as a fashion statement," she replied, "why shouldn't I?"
Georgie became aware of a shadow behind her. She glanced over her shoulder and could see a bulky shape moving in the darkness. She ignored it and continued walking.
She could hear its footsteps, now. They were soft and quick on the road, yet somehow clicking on the cobblestones, rather than crunching in the snow as were her own steps. Also, whoever this person was, they were catching up with her. Could they mean to accost her?
Georgie Stanton was no shrinking violet, she thought to herself. If, simply because she was on her own at night, this fellow thought he could menace her on the street then he would have another think coming!
She turned. She could not see any figure clearly, just the same dark shadow on the edge of the light being radiated from the gaslight. She called out, "I say, is there somebody there?"
The figure gave no response, but Georgie could hear him getting closer.
She set herself back on her route and resumed walking, much more quickly this time. It seemed to her that the footsteps behind her became faster and more urgent. The fellow was giving chase!
Georgie picked up her hems and began running, or at the very least the quickest trot she could accomplish in her bulky dress. Oh why are we ladies bound by such impractical attire? she muttered to herself, still able to hear the figure approaching.
The line of houses on this side of the street came to an end and Georgie found herself following the railing of one of the private gardens which the neighbouring town-houses used in a communal fashion. She came to the gate and tried it, but it was padlocked closed.
She saw that it was not a terribly high fence though and set herself to clamber over the iron work so that she might find refuge, or at least a place to hide, on the other side. Once again, however, her heavy skirts frustrated her and she simply could not clamber over the railings to the other side.
The footsteps came closer and closer. Georgie pressed herself against the railing, feeling the reassuring weight of her walking-cane in her hand. This ruffian would know some pain tonight if he attempted to lay a hand on her, she told herself.
The figure drew closer and Georgie could make out the shape of a man, walking briskly down the street toward her. But - and at this she could almost not believe her eyes - she could see right through him!
It was a ghostly apparition, the size and shape of a man, yet almost entirely translucent. He darkened a patch of the street some yards from Georgie, but he cast no shadow of his own and left no footprints in the snow. Georgie's eyes were wide with horror and she had to bite her lip to keep from crying out. In spite of her fear she still found herself analysing the evidence before her. She was convinced the apparition's steps clicked upon stone, rather than the snow that lay all about.
Just as she thought the spirit was close enough to set upon her, it passed by her. It came uncomfortably close, but to her relief it did her no harm and continued running along the street past her. She watched, her throat dry with terror as the ghostly figured pattered away down the street. It seemed to look over its shoulder for a moment, then it veered left...
...and ran through one of the houses on the left!
It was as though the brick wall of the town-house was not even there. The figure simply evaporated into the wall.
Weighing more fright upon her, Georgie spun around to see three more apparitions lurching in the same direction. They ran in the direction of the lone figure. They bounded down the street to roughly the point where the figure had disappeared into the house. They seemed to look about them and then they split up; one of them disappeared into the same building, another crossed the street and disappeared through another wall in the same fashion while the last carried on down the street and disappeared into the darkness.
Georgie's heart was frozen. She could barely move or speak with fear as the night around her closed to a deeper silence. She stood, immobile.
A new sound broke the night hush. There was a wheezing, grating sound, like the sound of ironworks being dragged across the rock floor of an empty stone cavern. The sound rose and fell, she realised, in time with a curious light that was glowing from the alley 'tween two houses across the street.
It was an unearthly light. Too warm to be cast by the moon, yet too silvery and icy ever be considered daylight or the comforting fiery glow of a gaslight.
Yet, it was also a reassuring light. There was no evil in it. In contrast to her recent experience it was a comforting beacon; a promise of succour and safety.
Gathering her wits she crossed the street quickly and spied into the path between the two buildings. There was a tall, rectangular, blue-coloured beacon of some kind. It sported a glowing lantern atop the structure, although this did not appear to be the source of the light. The light itself issued from both the windows and from the doors in the side facing her. The words "Police Public Call Box" were written in an illuminated strip along the top. One of the doors was ajar and Georgie felt her curiosity getting the better of her.
As she put her head tentatively through the opening, her first thought was that she must have been mistaken about what she had seen outside. She had thought it to be a small container of some kind, perhaps large enough to fit four men of good acquaintance if they stood shoulder to shoulder. Yet, the room which greeted her angled away above her head and spanned out several yards ahead of her. The walls were dark, crafted from some kind of black stone. What she had taken to be stone was elegantly carved - again, her assumption - to look as though it had been grown rather than crafted.
The light she had seen could only have come from the central adornment. A raised sculpture of, it seemed from this side, six edges each bearing a face covered in all manner of metalworks and coloured glass orbs, which seemed somehow illuminated from within. At the centre was a glowing heart. A tall glassy chamber containing the light most wondrous. She marvelled at such an artifice.
Georgie was about to return outside to see how she could have been so mistaken about the nature of this hall, when she noticed a pair of feet protruding from beside the central structure. They were pointing towards the cavernous ceiling.
"Hallo?" she called out, "are you in need of assistance. There came no response.
She moved slowly round and saw that there was, indeed, a man lying on the floor. He was dressed most unusually. He was clad in black clothing, made from a kind of leather but darker and much smoother than the rough hide she had seen the navvys wearing.
A number of things happened at one. The door Georgie had come through swung shut with a bang and a click; That pure light in the middle of the room had begun to rise and fall, rhythmically, almost in time with the rising chest of the unconscious figure on the floor; The groaning, rasping noise she had heard from outside resumed, much clearer and purer from in here.
The last thing that happened was the deep chiming of a bell, clear and somehow naturally foreboding; nearby and yet also sounding as though it came from the very bowels of the earth, or high up above the canopy of this room.
As the bell sounded, the eyes of the man on the floor flicked open and darted to and fro around the room. He seemed to take in a great deal in moments: the figure in his room; the moving light and the bell - most of all, the ringing bell.
"Ah", said the man, suddenly, "the cloister bell. That can't be good. That can't be good at all!"
Georgie was relieved that the figure spoke in a genteel manner. He sounded like a perfect English gentlemen.
The man got up and almost entirely ignored her for a moment, leaning over his curious sculpture in the centre of the room and watching the light move up and down.
Then his attention turned to her, quick and sharp. "Hello," he said, "Let me introduce myself." He seemed to drift for a moment, not totally sure how to progress. To Georgie it seemed his thoughts were bouncing from subject to subject. "Strange circumstances," he stated, then asked, "Are you alone?"
Georgie's confusion turned to indignation with remarkable alacrity, largely because she could now see that this stranger did not appear to be in danger of any harm whatsoever.
"Yes, I am, thank you," she said, curtly. "Where am I," she demanded, "what is this and what does that bell mean?
The stranger paused to think for a moment, as though not sure which of those was the best answer with which to start. "I'm The Doctor. You are presently in ... " he floundered for a moment then offered, "... a Tardis."
"A Doctor?" she replied immediately, "You hardly look like one. What are you wearing?" The leather he wore was a deep black. The top part was a jacket, open at the front with some kind of teeth for metal fastening. The trousers were made of the same thick black leather, but with a stripe on the outside of each trouser leg - like a pair of dress trousers, she thought - and the knees featured some sort of padded ribbing.
The man looked down at himself and then at her own clothes and smiled. "Oh, my bike leathers?" he said, "it's, um, standard garb for racing around on fast vehicles." He flashed her a smile.
Georgie rolled her eyes in an exasperated manner. "What are you on about?" she exclaimed, "My name is Miss Stanton, and I would like you to let me go. I don't know what sort of place this is." She looked around at the dark walls and the curious light with sudden suspicion. "Is this an opium den?" she asked.
"No," he replied, assuredly. "So, um, how did you happen to be in the Tardis? I wasn't aware of things for a while there. My vehicle must have taken a lurch or a lunge and I must have bashed my head on the console or something and ummm," he broke away, again, distracted by another thought. "Yes... not ideal," he finished, abruptly, before adding, "She tends to do that from time to time."
"Tardis?" Georgie repeated, completely unfamiliar with the word, "What are you talking about? I was walking down the street and these ... things approached me. I thought they were phantoms and I then came across this 'Police Box'. Are you something to do with the Peelers? You told me you were a Doctor!"
The man seemed to consider her words for a while. "Right, okay... Peelers," he said, out loud, "Which era would that place you in?" He looked at her with a sudden flash of inspiration, "God save the Queen? Umm... by which I mean Queen Victoria?"
Georgie looked at him, oddly, and said, "How can you not know who our monarch is?"
"Well, this may come as a surprise to you but there are some individuals with the ability to travel between various different times." He offered this completely reasonably.
She gave him a look of... well, not contempt, because that would be beneath her but perhaps as much polite ladylike condescension as she could muster. She was used to Gentlemen treating her as a creature of dull wits, but her grandfather had raised her to use her mind and apply it well; characteristics which had brought her to the doors of the struggle for equality.
She replied, "Ha! Do you think me a fool simply because of my sex, sir? Are you a friend of Mr Wells? Is this some sort of gentlemen's prank?"
"Ah yes..." the man's eyes glinted with recognition, "Mr Wells..."
Without warning, the whole room moved violently. It didn't seemed to rock or shake. Rather it seemed as though the whole room shunted six yards to the left.
The man grabbed a railing, deftly, but Georgie was not so lucky. The elaborate centre decoration slammed into her hip hard, knocking her to the ground.
All was still, once more. Georgie could feel a dull ache and she imagined she would have some terrible bruising once she had a private moment to inspect the injury. She looked over at the man who had so far only introduced himself as a Doctor and could not help but give him a pleading expression.
The Doctor rushed over to her, "I'm so sorry, Miss Stanton. I should have warned you that this might happen! She can be a little flighty. I should have warned you to hold onto something. Are you okay? Are you injured?"
"I'm okay," Georgie gasped, a little breathlessly, "what was that, an earthquake?"
"I'm afraid that the Tardis is not a static building, rather a means of transport. As such, she sometimes arrives at places which are not entirely stable."
Georgie flashed him a withering look, "must you continue with this foolishness?"
The Doctor gave a rueful grin, "I suspect this may be one of those things that can only be proved through seeing it with your own eyes."
At that moment the room shunted once again. This time The Doctor wasn't so quick and slipped to the floor. Georgie's vision flashed with pain as the central structure hit her hard on the forehead. When all was still once more, she raised her hand to her skin and it came away slick with fresh blood.
The Doctor was up quickly, hands moving quickly over the devices on each panel. "I'm very sorry, Miss Stanton," he explained, "but whatever is going on outside, the Tardis it is not happy at all. I'm afraid I'm going to have to put us down, whereever we are."
The grating noise ceased as did the low vibrating hum which, until now, Georgie had been feeling through her feet since coming into this place. She also noticed that the ringing bell had halted, although she was not sure when that had happened.
"Right," The Doctor announced, "before we go anywhere we should sort out that nasty bump of yours." He held out a hand.
Chapter Two - The Great War
Georgie was grateful for the civilised nature of The Doctor's ministrations. In spite of her fears of being dishonoured in some way, this Doctor had seemed to be able to assess her injuries and treat them without the necessity of her removing a single item of clothing.
He had led her through a door adjoining the chamber they were in to a long corridor. To one side he led her into a small room with a reclined examining chair and a table full of instruments which were unrecognisable to her. He had pointed some form of wand at her for a moment. Was he now some kind of magician? Then, he had picked up a metal box from the side, pressed a few switches and invited her to hold the device near any part of her that hurt. She used the device herself, pressing it first against her forehead, then discretely against the tender swelling on her leg. The pain seemed to dissipate almost immediately. She was even more amazed when The Doctor had passed her a hand mirror and she could see no evidence of a cut, scar or even blood on her forehead.
He reassured her that his "Tardis" didn't usually behave like that in flight. This was a very unusual effect and he was very concerned about what was causing it. As they both moved back into the big room, he was fussing over the centrepiece once more.
Georgie still refused to take on board anything he had said about travelling. For a room this size to be capable of moving it would have had to have been a far more obvious vehicle than she had noted from the outside, even with the darkness combining with her previous state of fear.
Ultimately, the thing she wanted most at the moment was to get home and climb into bed.
"Shall we take a look outside?" The Doctor suggested.
Georgie hesitated for a moment, "do you think those creatures will still be outside?"
"The console isn't showing any kind of life forms within the immediate vicinity, but there is plenty of life out there." Georgie didn't know what a lot of that meant, but took it to mean, "no."
"Very well then, Doctor," she gave a gracious little bow and gestured toward the doors, "show me what you think is outside."
The Doctor smiled and stepped past her to open the door. He pushed the door open and stepped through.
Georgie could see cobblestones on the floor and brickwork to the side. Her first thought was that the snow had melted and that they had - as she had suspected - moved nowhere at all. But then, she saw the low arched roof, illuminated by electric lighting, strung at irregular intervals along the ceiling. She saw the semi-circular alcoves to either side, each containing some sort of barrel. It looked like a wine cellar!
"Have we fallen through in the street into a cellar?" she asked The Doctor, looking up at the roof. The brickwork above the Tardis was completely undamaged. In fact, she could see no way in which the box could have moved in or out of this room.
Box! She spotted her own realisation: the room she had been in was a box, after all! She moved around it in disbelief, looking at each of the the sides. She could put her arms comfortably around each panel. But she had been inside and it was a huge room. Was this some kind of magician's trick?
Georgie looked around for the Doctor. He was already wandering away through the cellar, looking all about him with curiosity. Georgie caught up with him.
"Eastern European, I'd say," The Doctor was muttering aloud, "not sure what the current date is, but this was built in Earth's 18th or 19th Century, by the look of the stonework. I'd say the electric lighting puts today's date to be much later."
Georgie looked at this madman with horror. "Who are you?" she demanded.
He gave her a roguish grin, saying "I'm a sort of adventurer, if you like. Shall we explore further?"
At one end of the cellar was a set of steps, leading up. They headed towards these and as they walked slowly along, The Doctor cautioned her, "judging from the electric lighting in here I should say that not only are we in a different place than you will be expecting, but it may be much later in time as well. You may see things you have not seen before. I suggest you brace yourself."
Georgie gripped the handle of her walking-cane for comfort, "we shall see, Doctor."
The steps led up to a walled courtyard, or bailey. It was a pitch-black night and insistent rain was pattering off all the hard stone surfaces.
The Doctor stood out in the rain for a moment, the raindrops smashing against his dark leather jacket. He seemed to be looking up into the sky. "Do you hear that?" he asked her.
Georgie strained to listen for any sound other than the thrumming rain. There was another sound there. She couldn't quite place it. The closest sound she could compare it to would be bellows. That was it, it was the sound a fire made while feeding a furnace.
To her surprise, there suddenly seemed to be a man on fire falling out of the sky. He was dropping towards them, head first, flames leaping from his back and legs. In the last few moments he swung about, putting his feet ahead of him, but the flames increased. He landed heavily on his feet and all at once the flames coming from his back were extinguished. There was a whining noise and the clicking of cooling metal.
She gazed in terror at his face. His visage was featureless and golden, with two giant black insect eyes staring at her. She was about to scream when she checked herself. Silly girl, she thought, it's just a helmet.
The Doctor spoke first, breaking the silence. He was looking at the metal cylinders on the newcomer's back with wide-eyed excitement. "That looks like fun!" he exclaimed.
The newcomer seemed to stare at the the two of them, looking at them with his head on one side. "You don't sound like Germans," came a muted, rattling voice from within the helmet.
"German?" Georgie exclaimed, "I'm certainly not German!"
The newcomer reached up and removed the helmet. He was a very handsome man, Georgie thought, with a strong jawline and wavy blonde hair. He said, urgently, "Have you seen anyone else like me?"
"Like you?"
"There were four of us," he explained, "did anybody else make it through?"
The Doctor shook his sad, "You're the first person we've seen since we arrived. Although it must be said that that wasn't very long ago."
"Who are you?" Georgie asked in wonder at this flying man.
He looked suspiciously at them for a moment, his hand resting on a very oddly-shaped pistol in a hip holster. Then his eyes seemed to relax as he decided they weren't a threat. "I'm Captain Conrad Seager, U.S. Army's 4th Rocket Corps. Service number twenty-one-dash-zero-zero-three," he rattled out as if by rote.
"I'm Miss Stanton," Georgie told him, offering out a politely poised hand for him to kiss. He took it and shook it firmly. "Umm, yes," she responded, "who was it you were looking for?"
The Doctor was examining the fellow's clothing. He was also clad in leather, but it was a tan, natural looking leather. It seemed much tougher and less fine than The Doctor's own clothing, but something of the cut of the jacket and line of shiny buttons put Georgie in mind of a military uniform. The jacket reminded her of pictures of the old American Confederates, in their military tunics. Captain Seager's jacket had a US flag on the upper left arm.
"Are you on some kind of war mission?" The Doctor asked, excitedly.
Captain Seager eyed him warily, "I'm not at liberty to say, sir. But I do need to find the rest of my team. We were fired upon as we approached by anti-air weaponry. I just about managed to make it through and put her down, here."
"You are on a mission then!" The Doctor's enthusiasm was boyish, "I thought as much."
Captain Seager's eyes darted upward suddenly. Georgie followed his gaze; she could just about make out figures moving around along the high walls all around them.
"Quick," Captain Seager urged, "we need to get inside, if we haven't already been spotted."
"Yes," the Doctor agreed, "if this is some sort of theatre of operations, we should seek cover."
They each looked around them. They could see four exits from the courtyard. There was the door back down to the cellar; there was a large double-gate set into the bailey wall; there was another large door in the adjacent bailey wall and a small man-sized door in the foot of one of the bastion towers.
"In there, quick!" hissed Captain Seager, he moved quickly in the direction of the bastion tower. He pushed the door open to find the bottom of a wide circular stairwell, ascending the bastion.
"Do you know where you are trying to get to?" The Doctor asked as he followed Seager through along with Georgie.
Captain Seager shook his head, "I may be a little off-course. I was in formation with my squad when we were attacked and had to get out of there fast. I had no chance to see where they managed to get to." He gave a little rueful smirk, "Plus, I can't always control my rocket-pack. It doesn't always take me where I want to go."
The Doctor smiled back, "I know the feeling. That sounds a little like my Tardis."
"Tardis, what's that?" Captain Seager asked, quickly.
The Doctor paused, before saying, "You may get to see it later."
Captain Seager nodded. He looked upward suddenly and placed a finger to his mouth. After listening for a moment, he began to climb the steps, indicating for The Doctor and Georgie to follow.
They reached a landing, of sorts, with two doors; each, presumably, led onto one of the ramparts leading away from the bastion. They could hear voices from behind one of the doors. German voices.
The Doctor was about to ask a question when, without warning, Captain Seager un-holstered his pistol and put his shoulder to one of the doors and burst out through the frame. The door burst open.
Georgie could see two men out on the rampart, shoulders hunched against the rain, with some kind of gun slung over their shoulders talking to each other face to face. Before she could call out, The Doctor grabbed her and pulled her inside the bastion stairwell. They stayed in the shadows of the door-frame. The Doctor could see enough to confirm what he had been worried about: Nazi uniforms. He was in the middle of Eastern Europe during the Second World War!
As Captain Seager burst into view, the eyes of the solder facing the door grew wide. He shouted "Aufhalten!" The man with his back to the door spun around, trying desperately to get his gun into his hand. Seager raised his own pistol and pulled the trigger.
There was a flash of green light and an arcing, scything sound, following by a burning smell. A beam from the pistol hit the soldier squarely in the centre of the chest. He dropped to his knees and fell forward on his face, completely still.
Georgie had seen very little violence with guns in her life. Mostly she had read about past wars and endured a number of hunting stories. Never had she imagined that a weapon could end a person's life so completely and suddenly. She felt sick.
The Doctor also gasped.
"What is it?" Georgie asked him, choking back bile.
"Our Captain Seager has a radium-powered weapon. That's very odd."
"Odd?" she replied, "it's barbaric!"
The other soldier raised his rifle to fire at the Captain, but was knocked off-balance as a second green blast caught him in the side of the ribs.
He was about to recover his aim and take a shot, when Captain Seager stepped forward and tried to snatch the rifle out of his hand. They grappled for a moment and there was a sudden loud "brakka-brakka!" as the gun discharged into the sky. Georgie was amazed. She'd never heard of a gun firing so many shots at once. From across the across the bailey came the sound of another German voice, calling out.
Seager was about to give up his struggle to snatch the soldier’s gun, when suddenly the enemy clutched at a pain in his chest and fell to the floor.
The Doctor raced upward a few steps, looking for an arrow slit which would give him a vantage point. "The uniforms aren't right, either" The Doctor commented under his breath, troubled.
"What's the matter?" Georgie asked, stepping up to where he was, trying to see as well.
"I know a little of this era," The Doctor told her, quietly. "It's one of the major landmarks in human history. Images of it persist down through the ages. All I can tell you is that their uniforms don't look right. They have all the skulls, colours and Swastikas of the Nazis, but the cut of the uniform is too ... dressy. Like they were designed in a slightly more old-fashioned time. But the machine-guns are right. On top of that, Captain Seager is using a weapon which was never invented here and is decades ahead of its time."
There was another metallic rattle of a German machine-gun. Captain Seager stumbled forward as two of the slugs smacked against the back of his helmet. He turned and ducked down behind the low stone wall, firing green energy which grazed past the soldier's shoulder. The soldier fired back; Seager ducked down once again as more hot metal thudded heavily into his headgear. He returned fire, green light illuminating the stone around him. The German's chest flashed brightly and he dropped to the floor.
Captain Seager came running back in, "I think I've caused a bit of a ruckuss." They could all hear the shouts of alarmed response scouring the ramparts.
"We should get out of this castle" Georgie had to stifle her voice, she wanted to cry out.
The soldier shook his head. "I can't leave," said Seager, "not until I've located the weapon."
The Doctor rounded on him, "what weapon? You said you didn't know where you were."
"I knew I'd been sent to this region to look for an experimental Nazi weapon. I think we've established that there is a pretty strong enemy presence here," Seager hissed, insistently, "Strong enough to make me think this castle probably contains what it is we're looking for." If you're with me, we should group together to take control of the castle."
Georgie's voice rose, "I have NO interest in using one of those ghastly weapons!"
He gave her a patronising look, "No worries there, sweetcheeks, I've only got the one!"
The Doctor considered, "If this is a site of strategic importance or scientific research, then they may be hiding something which can explain all the strangeness here - I know it's dangerous but I think we should look around a bit more."
An alarm sounded, violent and insistent. From the steps above them they heard the sound of a door clattering open and boots running down, towards their position.
Georgie looked panicked, "Can't we get out of here in your Tardis?"
"She doesn't seem very flight-worthy at the moment, I don't really want to fly her if there's a chance you will get injured again," The Doctor sighed, "Plus, she has a tendency of dropping me in places where the natural flow of history has become damaged. If she's dropped me here, there must be a reason. I can't leave till I've at least tried to fix it."
"So what do we do?"
The Doctor thought fast, "I think the first order of business is to find a better place to hide. And quickly!"
Chapter Three - The Lab
Boots clicked and clattered over the stones as the soldiers scoured the bailey and ran in and out of doors. Corridors were swept, doors opened, hiding places illuminated with torches.
But the stack of large packing crates at one edge of the bailey, under the ramparts, remained unchecked. One soldier had come close, but The Doctor had discretely performed some kind of tricks which Georgie hadn't been able to see which had distracted the enemy away to a different part of the yard.
Things seemed to be settling down. From the snatches of discussion she had overheard, Georgie understood that they believed the attackers to have fled the castle. The double gates in the bailey wall were opened and two soldiers raced out into the night. Georgie could just about see the edge of a snow-drenched forest leading down the valley, leading to the inviting lights of a quaint village some distance away. The snow had held out well against the rain. Whereever she was, Georgie thought, at least it was winter here too. That was one piece of stability she could hold on to.
When she thought it was safe, she asked, "Where are we, Doctor?"
The Doctor frowned and replied, "I'm confused myself, I'm afraid. I thought we were in the Second World War, but what with these curious uniforms and weapons, I just don't know."
"Second World War?" Georgie looked confused. "Does that mean there is going to be a First World War, still to come?"
The Doctor nodded, sadly. "I'm afraid so."
Georgie's eyes became twin hard points set in steel, deadly with resignation, "who is the cause of all this?"
The Doctor was troubled by the idea of finding a good way to answer this, or even giving Georgie an answer which would equate to knowledge of her own near future. "That's a very complicated question."
"The Germans?" she offered, being a regular debater of politics with her grandfather.
"Lucky guess," The Doctor told her.
The two soldiers returned from scanning the perimeter of the forest. It sounded like they could not even see any footprints leading away. One of the soldiers returned to the bastion, while the other stood in the bailey, occasionally turning and patrolling in a new direction. It seemed as though a more normal patrol routine had been resumed, while the rain had let up considerably.
The Doctor turned his attention to the containers they were hiding behind. He began to try and work one of the panels loose. Georgie watched on as Captain Seager assisted him, trying to pry the wood off the nails without causing a noise which would attract the attention of the German soldiers.
Inside was a large quantity of straw packing, but The Doctor reached in and dragged some of it aside. He pulled a metal baton from his pocket. It looked a bit like a spanner, but had some sort of jewel in the end. He pointed it into the box and the jewel lit up, flooding interior of the box with light. Georgie would normally have felt that she had never seen such an incredible thing, but it had been a very unusual day!
The Doctor reached in and extracted a piece of black metal. He hefted it in his hands and turned it over. He tried to flex it, but failed. "Curious," he commented, quietly, "it's very tough and light for its thickness. That's another thing that is more advanced than I would have expected." He pulled out another, larger piece. He turned it over to reveal a curious symbol. It was the same symbol Georgie had seen on the soldiers. The Doctor and Captain Seager recognised it as a Swastika. The Doctor looked grave.
"We need to see what these are being used for," The Doctor announced, "I'd say we should be keeping an eye out for chaps in white coats, yes?"
Captain Seager nodded, "Research rooms in castles like this are most usually located in a basement. To protect from air raids."
Georgie looked worried, "and how do we get past him?" she indicated the guard.
The rocket-soldier smiled, "leave it to me."
The Doctor and Georgie watched in anticipation. Captain Seager crept about halfway to the soldier then froze. The soldier seemed to move. They all waited, desperate to see what would happen.
The soldiers raised a hand to his mouth and coughed, twice.
They watched as Seager's shoulders relaxed. He crept further forward and, at the last minute, leapt upon the soldier. Seager grabbed the enemy's skull in his arms and attempted to twist his head to one side to snap the neck. He failed.
The pair wrestled to the ground. The soldier must have been better trained and stronger than Seager expected. Seager managed to keep a hand over the soldier's mouth to keep him from calling for reinforcement, but the soldier seemed to be winning the battle of strength.
The Doctor looked around, searching for a way to help Seager. Georgie saw his eyes fall upon a small piece of stone masonry. He raised his hand towards it and twitched his fingers. The stone flicked across the ground and clattered on the ground near the soldier. Neither of the two men fighting seemed to notice however.
The Doctor was about to make a second attempt, when he saw that Georgie was striding across to where the two men were grappling.
Her approach was noticed by the Nazi soldier too late. As he looked up in surprise, Georgie brought her walking-cane across his face. He slumped down, unconscious, on top of Seager.
Captain Seager groaned, "that's great, thanks. Any chance you can get him off of me?"
Georgie grabbed an arm and hauled, as Seager rolled the limp German onto the cobbles. Seager grabbed the soldier's machine-gun. "MP40," he commented, "anybody want this?"
The Doctor raised his palms and said, "I don't really do guns."
The look on Georgie's face convinced Seager not to offer it her way. "Suit yourselves, he said and slung it over his shoulder."
Georgie spotted a little handle sticking out of the prone soldier's boot. She curtseyed gracefully and extracted a short blade. "I might keep hold of this, though," she muttered to herself and concealed it within the folds of her skirt.
"Come on," said the Doctor. He knelt down by the body and grabbed a set of keys from the soldier's belt. He located and used the key to get them into the door in the bailey wall.
It was unlocked, thankfully and led them into a narrow corridor within the rampart walls. Searching around, they came across a set of steps leading down into a well lit area.
In comparison to the rest of the castle, these steps were modern and the rooms they led into were also modern. Based on the direction of the steps, these rooms must have been built by tunnelling under the castle's courtyard.
Whatever it was, The Doctor and Captain Seager were excited to find evidence of engineering tools and spare parts. Ahead they could see a pair of double doors, with window revealing some kind of workshop-cum-laboratory. The doors were labelled "Achtung - Verboten" (although to Georgie and The Doctor they simply read "Warning - No Entry"). The room beyond appeared to be empty.
Captain Seager was about to push the doors open, when the Doctor grabbed his arm. "Wait!" he said, "look."
The Doctor pointed to a thin wire coming from the top of the door, leading to a box in the corner. "It's an alarm," he explained, "open this door without disabling it and all we get is guys with guns and boots."
Captain Seager let out a long breath. "What do you suggest?" he asked.
"Just give me a moment," The Doctor said.
He took out the wrench-thing that Georgie had seen before and worked it along the wire. It made a buzzing noise, like a happy insect. After a few moments he snapped it back and returned it to his pockets.
"All done," he announced, "let's go."
They pushed the doors open and stepped into the lab. There were rows of benches, each featuring tools and mechanical and electrical spares. There was more of the black metal which The Doctor had found in the packing crates.
Georgie walked over to one of the benches. She picked up the object in the centre and turned it around with curiosity. It was full of bundles of cables and pieces of clockwork, but in overall form it reminded Georgie of nothing so much as a person's arm. She held it up in silence for The Doctor who saw it and frowned.
At one end of the lab was a big pair of metal doors. Next to these, they noticed a partitioned office in the corner of the workshop. Making eye contact with each other they crept over to the small room. Peering through the glass they could see an old man hunched over a desk, poring over plans and paperwork spread all over the surface.
The Doctor seemed to hesitate for a moment, as if coming up with a plan. Then he seemed to shrug and simply pushed the door to the little office open.
The old man looked up with curiosity. "Why, hello," he said, in a friendly manner, "how can I help you?"
"I suggest you don't call out or cry for help," The Doctor told him.
The man seemed confused by this, "why ever should I do that, my dear boy?" he enthused. "Have you come to see my work?" he added, hopefully.
"We would like to know more about what you are doing here, yes," The Doctor moved in, conspiratorially, "you seem to be working with some quite advanced engineering and if I didn't know better I'd say you were working with limb prostheses." The Doctor's expression turned dark and he added, "but I do know better. So I'd like to hear about it."
"Ahh," said the old man proudly, "you are interested in the prototypes. It's been so long since anybody showed and interest in my work besides 'when will it be ready' or 'work faster'."
"It is very advanced," The Doctor said, "have you created this yourself or have you had ... external assistance."
"Well, yes, the work that I have been asked to continue is very advanced and I must confess I've spent a lot of my time simply trying to understand how to make it work. But, we seem to be cracking it!"
The Doctor picked up some of the design draughts and had a good look at them, before passing them to Captain Seager, who studied them, intently. "What exactly is the nature of the work?" The Doctor asked.
"Let me tell you a story," the man began, a big smile on his face, clearly content with having an audience, at last. "When I was a boy, there was a terrible accident at the mines near my village. One man was recovered alive, but he never regained the use of his legs. Imagine - just imagine - if we could have given him new legs through robotic construction! Or new arms! It's just unimaginable. With the right technology, we could completely renovate the human body!"
"Are these prototypes solely to be used for the victims of injuries, then?" The Doctor pressed.
"Well that's the thing," the old man went on, "with the sophistication of the work we are doing it was obvious that it was theoretically possible to piece all of these limbs together to create an autonomous machine. A new creation! Think of it, man's days of manual labour could be at an end!"
"I see," The Doctor scratched his chin, "who is in charge of this work?"
The old man shuffled uneasily, "well I suppose technically the authority rests with Commandant Jurgens, but I like to think it is in line with my own desire to develop and push the boundaries of science."
"And are you yet at the stage where this device is ready to be prototyped?"
"Oh," the old man's face fell, "has Commandant Jurgens sent you down to chase me for results? How disappointing. I've told him and I'll tell you. At the moment they require too much remote-control. They are not sophisticated enough to work without us driving them. It's not practical at the moment. It's not ready for combat testing."
"So they can't act on their own volition, yet?"
"No! And, none of the designs for radio links I've been given are fast enough to allow these machines to live up to half of their potential."
The Doctor took another look at the paper designs. "This is interesting," he said, indicating areas of the diagram to Georgie, "the arms and legs are extremely complex and full of detail, but the head or chest - where you would expect the most important parts of the mechanism to be located - are almost empty. It's almost as though part of the design is missing." He leaned closer, "there is some very complex wiring around the ears though. They'll be very good listeners!"
The Doctor straightened up and addressed the old scientist, "I'll say one thing, though, if you don't mind me being rude. It's fairly clear to me where the original design ends and where your additions have been made. Good work with adding the radio technology for control though, mind. Well done!"
Suddenly the piercing alarm resumed. Georgie surmised they must have found the unconscious guard.
The doors they had come into the lab through slammed shut and they heard the noise of bolts turning, locking them in the lab.
"What's that?" the old man said, "another alarm? Oh bother, it's always such a nuisance when they do this. All the doors lock. For some reason they seem to think an emergency is lessened when nothing and nobody can get in or out!"
The Doctor, Georgie and Captain Seager all looked at each other.
Another sound drew their attention. There was a deep, booming, banging noise from behind the big metal doors.
The old man got up from his seat and stepped back out into the lab, looking at the doors, curiously.
"Err," said The Doctor, "does that noise always happen when the alarm goes off?"
The old man waved a hand, distractedly. "Certainly not," he said, "now where did I put that control."
He hurried around the lab, picking up bits of equipment on each workstation and searching through piles of paper. The banging noise from behind the door continued, becoming louder and more urgent.
"Aha!" he announced, picking up a box from one of the surfaces. His face fell, "oh, I thought ... this radio transmitter isn't sending any signals at all! I don't see how the prototype can be moving on its own."
The Doctor hurried over to him, "you say this machine can't work without control?"
"No," the frail little man replied, "not yet. I've asked for more resources and Commandant Jurgens promised he would find a way to help me finish the prototype, but it hasn't happened yet."
The booming noise got louder and louder. Georgie chipped in, backing away from the metal doors, "what exactly is the prototype?"
The old scientist walked up beside her, pointing the radio-control at the doors and trying various dials. "It's the new robotic soldier," he told her, "the Metallensturmtruppen."
"Metal Stormtrooper," the Doctor repeated.
The metal doors smashed aside and a tall black figure stepped through metal and brick debris. It stepped into the room and seemed to stare around itself. Its entire body was panelled with the black metal pieces they had been examining around the castle. In the centre of its chest was a white circle bearing the Swastika emblem of the Nazi party.
"No! It can't be possible!" the old scientist sounded scared and excited at the same time. He jabbed at the remote controls again. "It's simply not possible!"
The Metal Stormtrooper rounded quickly on the scientist. Its limbs were spindly, but agile, in contrast to its bulbous head and chest components.
It reached out a dexterous arm and gripped long fingers around the old man's head. It picked him up, seemingly with ease, while the old man screamed in discomfort. It seemed to think for a moment; then, without warning, it shook the old man's violently by the head. The screaming stopped instantly, replaced by the blood-curdling sound of snapping bones and tendons. The machine threw the body across the lab, where it crashed into a pile of equipment. The limp body did not move where it fell.
The three intruders stared at the thing in horror, backing away. Georgie stepped back, knocking a clipboard off the edge of a workstation.
The Metal Stormtrooper advanced.
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