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Nyssa?’
‘I can’t remember. Does it really matter?’
‘Of course it matters! Can you imagine what would
happen if you walked out of the TARDIS in 1977 and met
yourself in 1983?’
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘Not ridiculous, but almost certainly catastrophic.’
‘You mean I could be two people?’
‘Certainly.’ The Doctor tried to impress upon the
bemused Brigadier the seriousness of the Blinovitch
Limitation Effect. ‘You could exist twice over, but because
you’re basically the same person any close contact would
short-circuit the time differential created by the journey in
the TARDIS. The energy discharge would be entirely
unpredictable.’
The Brigadier struggled hard to remember what had
happened when he and Tegan reached the top of the hill in
1977. From the darkness one faint, misty image emerged; a
vanishing TARDIS... he was left beside the obelisk... alone!
He tried to explain the distant, curiously upsetting
recollection to the Doctor.
Neither of them saw Turlough dart forward to the
buzzing transmitter. There was a noise like a firecracker
and the Doctor swung round from his conversation with
the Brigadier to see a small whisp of smoke over the
apparatus. He rushed forward to inspect the damage.
It did not take him long. ‘We won’t be going to the
ship,’ he announced.
‘The transmitter is useless. I’ve lost all contact with the
TARDIS.’
The Doctor’s dismay was nothing to the relief of Mawdryn
when the drone in the TARDIS stopped sounding; any
communcation from outside would be disastrous to his
plans. ‘Dematerialise!’ He commanded.
Nyssa prepared to obey.
‘Wait!’ Tegan held back her fellow companion. ‘If that
sound came from the communications system, someone
might be trying to get in touch with us.’
The girl was not as stupid as her brashness suggested.
Mawdryn’s putrid flesh quaked.
‘Perhaps it was the Doctor,’ added Tegan.
‘I am the Doctor!’ shrieked Mawdryn. ‘Dematerialise
immediately!’
Nyssa hesitated.
‘Time is running out. We must leave this place at once.’
The gentle Nyssa could no longer endure the distress of
a man who might be the Doctor. Her hand moved to the
lever that would activate the TARDIS.
‘No!’ Tegan dragged Nyssa away from the console, but
already the slow rise and fall had begun.
The journey to the ship did not take long; within
minutes of real time, they had entered the warp ellipse and
the old police box made a second incongruous appearance
inside the sombre vessel.
Nyssa opened the scanner.
‘The ship!’ cried Mawdryn.
‘Is it indeed,’ muttered the Brigadier suspiciously. The
marble hall he could see on the scanner was not his idea of
the inside of a spacecraft.
Mawdryn prepared to leave. ‘You will stay in the
TARDIS,’ he informed the Brigadier and the girls.
Tegan quickly placed herself between Mawdryn and the
double doors. ‘If you’re in a regeneration crisis you’ll need
all the help you can get.’
‘No!’ He was surprised at her continuing defiance.
‘She’s right, Doctor,’ said the Brigadier, trying at the
same time to show respect for a possible Time Lord, yet
still support the plucky Australian.
‘I must go into the ship alone.’
Tegan stood her ground. She was not going to let the
creature from the transmat capsule out of her sight.
Mawdryn
staggered
giddily.
The
atmosphere
of
the TARDIS had helped restore his strength, but his
conflict with the Earthchild had dissipated that new-found
energy. In a weary, broken voice he began to plead with
her. ‘You do not understand the nature of the
transmogrification. The unique restorative conditions of
that vessel’ – he indicated the screen, then turned to his
three fellow passengers — ‘the presence of other life-forms
would inhibit the reparation.’
The Brigadier and Nyssa glanced uncertainly at each
other, while Tegan glared implacably at Mawdryn. ‘We’ve
all seen the Doctor regenerate before and the evidence
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