John Frobisher was a man of responsibility. To his superiors and
paymasters as Permanent Secretary, to those who worked under him in the
Home Office, but above all to his family. He was no saint, he had done
things a good man should never do and never have to regret - keeping
that side from his family had driven him into the arms of another woman
on more than one occasion. But the weakness was balanced by loyalty to
his wife and children, which gave him an inner strength no one would
have suspected he'd possessed. Perhaps it was a week without proper
sleep, facing living nightmares, rooms full of bodies and realizing his
boss was a far greater monster than anything called 456. Perhaps it was
the simple truth he had been painted into a corner.
There was only one way out now. Only one way to spare his daughters from
the living death the 456 offered. Only one way to save his wife from
the horror of their loss. Only one way that guaranteed to spare them
from the hell the world was becoming, because even if he somehow found
another way to keep his family safe, they would be at the constant mercy
of anarchists and vengeful parents demanding retribution after he had
helped ruin their lives - always assuming of course the 456 didn't
release another virus and wipe out the human race altogether.
His family were gathered upstairs in the girls' bedroom like it was a
birthday or the morning of Christmas. This would not be as joyful an
occasion, but at least they'd be together.
Frobisher was quite nervous around guns. It was only back in 2003, when
he became Director of Crime Policy, that he'd been given training in how
to use them - and even then under strong protest.
The tiny part of him that was still sane was impressed at how good a shot he was.
Barely a second stood between the headshots that struck dead Lilly and
Holly, extinguishing their lives before they could even ask what he was
doing. Anna, his precious Anna, was smirking with almost hysteria,
probably remembering that Hallowe'en prank when the girls pretended to
be victims of their father dressed up as Dracula. The horror hadn't had
time to sink in yet, and a third bullet from Frobisher's requistioned
pistol made sure it never should. She sprawled over the bodies of her
children in a strangely protective gesture.
John Frobisher wanted to believe that death happened faster than any
pain could be felt. He wanted to believe that some glorious afterlife
existed and that his family were waiting for him.
Well, he had the consolation that whatever they were experiencing - be it paradise or oblivion - he was about to join them.
He closed his eyes and put the painfully-hot barrel into his mouth.
The fourth and final bullet tore up into his skull even as his legs
failed him. The agony and darkness took over, there was blood rushing
and...
John Frobisher was floating near the ceiling, looking downwards at the
blood-spattered bedroom and the four cooling bodies. His mind was fuzzy
and disoriented, and the sight of the murder-suicide seemed far away and
unimportant. He couldn't shut his eyes against the sight; he wasn't
seeing with his eyes. He had no arms to reach out to the bodies of his
family, no tongue or mouth or lips to cry out their names. There was
blood on the walls, seeping into that crack on the northern side of the
room, the crooked smile in the brickwork they'd never got round to
fixing. The blood gathered in the smile, a blood-drenched grin laughing
at him.
Frobisher watched as the bedroom, then the world beyond, all dissolved.
He was somewhere else, somewhere that was nowhere. In the dimness, the
crack remained glowing with light.
In the other direction there were familiar faces in the nothingness -
his parents, his wife, his children, laughing delightedly. The dead
man's fear vanished as though he'd never been afraid. Yet he felt
compelled to turn - or something that felt like turning - to see the
crack in the dark beneath him, a widening mouth on chaos. Somehow, the
ghostly vision of the world outside didn't feel unimportant any more.
There were riots on the street, the children were screaming, the sky was
ablaze and somewhere a mother saw her child die and could do nothing.
Frobisher knew he was running out of time - he could be a ghost forever
walking the haunted places of the Earth or he could embrace the sweet
and warmth of whatever lay beyond.
The crack yawned open wide.
A third choice.
Part of him still wanted to fix things, make amends, make a difference.
He felt no anger or misery at how his life ended, he was well and truly
beyond that now. But he wished he could have done more, helped the
others, stood apart from what he'd known what was wrong. He could have
been a player not a piece. He reached out insubstantial hands towards
the gaping chasm. Through it, he could see himself and his family
cowering in fear and... snow? Ash? His family in togas and Roman
clothes, fleeing through the doorway of an old blue police box. A skinny
man in a pinstripe stood in the light that blazed through the
indeterminate greyness. He held out a hand.
"Come with me," said the man.
Come with me. Make a difference. Make amends. Be fantastic. Be brilliant.
Frobisher ran through the absolute, all-encompassing darkness, away from
the quiet dark stillness to the noise and light and life. He was being
swallowed up, torn to shreds as the darkness pressed in on him. Even as
he curled and twisted like smoke, dissolving into nothing, John
Frobisher grabbed hold of the proferred hand and was wrenched backwards
into the blue box, into the light.
Geronimo.
The light began to fade. He was standing in a vast blue-grey metal room,
before a six-sided table framing a glass pillar that stretched to the
ceiling. A short dark-haired woman was looking at him with a mixture of
concern and amazement. Awareness was returning. The TARDIS. Clara. The
bowtie hanging loose around the collar of his ill-fitting shirt. "Right
then," he heard himself say. "Eyesight? Not bad. Bit blue. Ears? Not
pointy, right way up, more or less level." He grabbed at his face,
fingers tracing the outlines of his skull. "Face? Well... I've got one."
His eyes widened as the last trace of the Permanent Secretary to the
Home Office melted away. "Oh no... French!"
"French?" repeated Clara cautiously.
"I've deleted French! Plus all cookery skills, and the breast stroke and
hopping. Never mind hopping - who needs to hop?" He grimaced and
shifted inside his ill-fitting clothes. "Ohh, the kidneys are
interesting. Never had that before – interesting kidneys."
"Are you all right?"
"I don't know," the Doctor admitted. "Do I look all right?"
Clara shrugged. "I don’t know!"
The Doctor bent down so they were eye-to-eye. "How's the face? Seems all
right from the inside. Nice action, responsive. Bit less heft on the
chin. How is it?"
Clara looked into the features of John Frobisher without recognition,
comparing it to the twelve other enfleshments she had seen the Doctor
wear. "It's… okay," she said at last.
"Okay?" repeated the Doctor sususpiciously.
"It's a bit… you know," she trailed off, trying to explain the strange feeling the face conjured.
"No I don’t," the Doctor reminded her patiently. "I haven't seen it yet!"
"Maybe it's just new?" Clara suggested.
It
was new. It made a difference.
And it would continue to do so.
