Alone at 3 a.m.
by Andrew Lawston

Alone in one of his workrooms, illuminated only by the faintest smear of
light from the wall roundels, the Doctor reached up to run a hand
through his hair.
 
And missed.

That's the real trouble with regeneration. You get used to friends not
recognising you. The deepest shock comes in realising you don't
recognise yourself. He remembered the days after he joined UNIT, when he
had to persuade the Brigadier that the physical trauma of his
transformation was still affecting him, to excuse the fact that he kept
banging his head on low doorways. His old friend still teased him about
the time he had tried to leap cross-legged on to a stool in the UNIT HQ
bar.

Difficult times, embarrassing times.

The last few days had been particularly embarrassing, he reflected. He'd
been as thick as a dog. He frowned, no, that was one habit he would have
to lose immediately. Eventually, he was sure his friends could come to
regard it as amusing, maybe even endearing. But being amusing was not a
priority now.

The Doctor sighed and stood up. That at least seemed to be easier. This
new body seemed to be significantly more... streamlined. That was
something that did suit him.

However, the thing that was really niggling the Doctor about his new
self, as the TARDIS raised the lights and he scowled at his reflection
in a full-length mirror, was this worryingly gullible streak. Despite
the regeneration, despite the Rani's drugs, despite everything, surely
he should never have been so foolish as to mistake his current best
friend for the Rani in a bad wig. And to be fooled into repairing the
villain's equipment while thinking it was his own laboratory! The whole
episode beggared belief. Mel had been extremely understanding, but he
couldn't shake the feeling that she was laughing at him.

Embarrassing times.

"No," he said to his reflection, which looked more than a little
disappointed. This was not just the regeneration, he had been
manipulated too much of late. The Trial had been confusing, with all the
fake evidence and more amnesia, but he had left under the distinct
impression that his actions on Thoros Beta had been directed by the High
Council to aid their own attack on Crozier's experiments. A while before
that he'd almost destroyed the whole universe by giving the Master a
lift to Logopolis. He was still not entirely sure what had been going on
with that business with the Key to Time, but he had certainly managed to
upset someone.

He had become too simple. Too easy to predict his actions. The Doctor in
his TARDIS. Set him down on a planet, point him at an injustice, and
watch him solve your problems for you. He'd learned during his trial
that the warnings of time spillage from the Vipod Mor had been
deliberately directed towards his TARDIS by the High Council,
understandably anxious to make sure that events there ran their course.

The Doctor almost smiled sadly as he watched his reflection harden into
the solid expression of righteous anger so familiar to him from his last
face. No, blustering arrogance was out of the question. As it was so
fundamentally empty, it needed to be bolstered by physical presence.
Which was something the Doctor had lost in huge quantities. He had no
doubt that this body in rage could still alarm, but never impress.

But he would need to be impressive somehow. Things were happening, there
was no question of that. He had been aware for some time of ancient
forces beginning to stir, of the unresolved little problems to which he
knew he must attend soon, and of a few situations in which he knew he
was destined to become involved.

In short, he could no longer afford to be predictable, or manipulable.

"I should be stronger," he declared to the empty room.

"But you are a genius, Doctor," the Melrani taunted in his mind's ear.

He could never allow himself to be taken in like that again. He snapped
his fingers in sudden decision...

And the TARDIS re-located the control console in front of him. He
activated the scanner, which showed a rock orbiting Earth. It took the
slightest nudge to push it into a decaying orbit.

If he didn't want to be manipulated, he would just have to become more
devious. The Cybermen and that Peineforte woman would be first. They
both had designs on the Nemesis. It would be child's play to push them
into destroying each other, and then... yes, why not? The Cybermen would
certainly use the validium after all, and all the Doctor had to do was
pre-program it. He performed a quick calculation. It would crash back to
Earth in around 1990. That would be a few years before the Daleks traced
the Hand of Omega to Earth. With luck, they would think the Cybermen had
found it first.

But of course, if they did find it...

The Doctor stopped himself. There were limits.

"This is a new approach, nothing more."
 

Mel seemed surprised to see an extra spring in the Doctor's step that
morning. Perhaps she really had put his foolish behaviour down to his
confused post-regenerative state.

"Sleeping late, Mel?" he enquired with an innocent grin. He could see
that quip had hit home, lodged deep below the layers of her conscious
mind which had already told her that it was an innocent remark, of
course she was entitled to an occasional break from her fitness régime,
she was only human after all, and was adding a little fire to the
blisters of self-doubt which plagued the young programmer. She thought
she'd hidden her vulnerability from me, the Doctor realised. Now she's
worrying I've just seen past her aggressive vigour, wondering how much I
know, how much I care. Interesting.

"Sorry, Doc," squealed Mel with a guilty smile, "At least you look fit
for a fiddle today,"

And deep inside, the Doctor winced.

"I've been meaning to ask you," he continued lightly, "What you thought
of Glitz."

Mel shrugged. "I didn't speak to Sabalom much when we arrived at the
station. And even less when we got to the actual courtroom. Why?"

The Doctor paused for a moment before responding, feigning
thoughtfulness. "When we were avoiding the Valeyard, Glitz mentioned
you. I'm afraid he was quite taken with you."

"What did he say?" Mel asked far too quickly in a casual tone of voice.
Again the Doctor paused.

"Well, you know Sabalom, you know how he prides himself on his wit. Just
after I escaped from the hands in the quicksand, he said something about
the lengths to which he'd go to impress a girl." With that, the Doctor
turned away, apparently dismissing the subject.

Mel ran round the console to join him. "And you think he meant me?" The
Doctor waved a hand slightly irritably, and moved Mel out of the way to
adjust some more controls.

"Actually, I thought he meant the Inquisitor at the time. He always used
to value... maturity, in all senses of the word," Mel turned away for a
moment.

She believes it, thought the Doctor, she's prepared to believe that a
man as shallow as Sabalom Glitz would prefer an ageing Time Lady with
all the warmth of the ice caves of Telos. This really is for her own
good.
 
"But he did later say something about gentlemen preferring redheads,"
The Doctor continued. "I'm sure he was disappointed not to see you again
before we left."

Mel fought to suppress a smile. "Really, Doctor, you said yourself that
the man was a complete crook! I've got better things to do than listen
to this!" And with that, she bounced from the console room.

When she had gone, the Doctor smiled. Soon she would be safely on her
way. He looked around the empty room happily, then saw his smile turn
into a frown deep in the heart of the central column. The room seemed a
lot larger suddenly, and cold.

He shrugged. He could live with that. The question was, could anyone
else?

THE END