HELTER SKELTER
Chapter Six The Doctor went back to the storage room and continued testing the guns at a firing range that the TARDIS moved next door. He let the others have fun while he fired the blaster at a target and made notes on how many actually worked. After he was finished, he used the invoice to do some research in the library. Occasionally, the TARDIS would let him hear what was going on with his companions, patching in their conversation and laughter from the living room and it made him smile listening to them while they watched the rest of the Back to the Future movies and Ferris Bueller's Day Off. He also listened while Amy described compact discs and MP3 players to him and it gave him an idea. He stopped his research and asked the TARDIS to produce two IPods for Paul and William and upload music on both that would span from the '50's to 2010 so he could give the MP3 players to his new companions as welcoming gifts. Around four in the morning, everyone decided to call it a night and went to their rooms. About an hour later, the Doctor was walking down the corridor where his companions were sleeping and noticed Martha was lying between Paul and William's doors. She perked up when he neared her and wagging her tail, she walked over. The Doctor knelt down and stroked her fur while she panted and gave him occasional kisses on the cheek. "No wonder they wrote a song about you, you're a very sweet, loving and protective pup," he said to her while he licked his nose. "I'd hate to think that your master died and left you behind with William to care for you. Must have been strange the first time around but that's not the case now, eh?" He chuckled when Martha wagged his tail and licked his cheek. "Martha, my dear," he warbled while Martha licked his hands and arms, "hold your head up, you silly girl, look what you've doooone." He laughed when Martha amped up her affection upon hearing that. "You know that's your song, don'tcha?" he said as he scratched behind her ear. "Blimey, I need a dog like you on the TARDIS. All I've ever had in here was cats but cats are low maintenance. I'm so busy I don't think I'd have time to properly tend to someone like you and I would hate for someone as lovely as you to end up starving for love and affection. Besides, you need to be with your masters, they need you far more than I do." He buried his nose in her fur and smiled when Martha tried to get closer to him. "Silly giiiirl," he sang to her. He kissed her snout and smiled as he got up from the floor. Martha whined slightly and the Doctor raised his eyebrow when Martha followed him while he walked away. He continued to sing Martha, My Dear while the dog followed behind him. The next morning, the others woke up and had a quick breakfast with some coffee. While they were eating, the Doctor came into the room with Martha following him. He pointed down at the dog. "First off, I came to check on you lot and she was outside your doors guarding you. I gave her some love and she seems to have adopted me because she's been following me around the entire night. Sorry, Paul, I think she wants to be a time dog now." "No, Martha, come back to me!" Paul said as they laughed. They laughed harder when Martha ran to him and the Doctor feigned anger. "Fine! I won't be feeding you Bonio treats anymore then," the Doctor said while Paul scratched his dog's sides. "The other thing I wanted to say is after you eat, I want to show you a few things I found while you were sleeping last night and Paul and William, I want to give you both a welcome to the TARDIS gift." "Really?" Paul said. "You don't have to do that, just being thought of as your companion is gift enough." "Yes, but I watched you lot while you watched Back to the Future and the TARDIS let me listen in from time to time and I'm glad to have you both here so I want to give you another thing from the future, on condition that you keep it hidden like the mobile." "I will," he and William said in unison. "Good. Not that I don't trust you but I'm very careful when I give things from the future to people. But I trust you both. Anyway, I think I'll have some coffee while you finish your breakfast and then afterwards I'll let you know what I found out about our crate." After they finished their breakfast, the Doctor sat with them at the kitchen table. Paul scratched Martha's head while the Doctor pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket and laid it on the table. "Okay, I tested all 500 of the blasters and found that 462 of them are functional," he said to them. "So, it wasn't a complete waste," Rory said. "They could still salvage some of the shipment." "Yes, but it took me hours firing the blasters at a target to find this out. I'm not sure how much time they had but I'm sure they didn't want to spend hours testing the merchandise. The ones on top were the broken ones, they might have tested those and concluded that the entire shipment must be damaged," the Doctor said. "So they might come back for the crate," William said. "And they'll find it missing." "Yes, but hopefully they didn't have CCTV cameras hidden in the building so they won't know who took them," the Doctor said. "I didn't detect any security devices so perhaps they'll assume some teenagers or a tramp broke into the warehouse, found the crate and pinched it." "So now that you have them, are you going to use them?" Paul asked. "No, I'm going to destroy them," the Doctor said. "He doesn't believe in using guns," Rory told them. "I don't either," Paul said, "but if we're dealing with people from outer space who are more advanced than us…" "Then we use our minds, that is our greatest weapon," the Doctor said to him. "Guns are dangerous. Not only could they fall into our enemies hands and they could use them against us but there's already enough killing in the universe without us adding to the tally. Trust me, I been doing this for centuries and I can count on both my hands the number of times I've used a gun for any reason. Trust me; we're smart enough to figure out a way to stop them without resorting to firearms. Now, the other thing I did was I researched the species of our quarry. There are several demon-like aliens in the universe but the clue was when you told me Satan said his race existed in the Dark Times. That narrowed it down a bit and I concluded that they are Diablon." "And your people used to hunt them?" Paul said. "Yes. Well, the Time Lords, once they grew powerful enough, hunted them and the others that were devoted to creating chaos in the universe so it would be brought to some sort of order…or at least more orderly than it was when they were running things. Come with me though, I can give you a bit more background on them." Everyone, including Martha, followed the Doctor. He led them to the library and both Paul and William froze when they noticed they couldn't even see the back wall. "Blimey, how big is this place?" William said while he and Paul looked around. "I've no idea. The TARDIS is a living thing and she's constantly growing. The whole ship grows every day and even I have no idea how big she is now. But if I need something I can usually ask her to find it and she'll bring it to me. Which is what she did last night," the Doctor said, gesturing to a large wooden table nearby. On the table was a gigantic leather bound book. The Doctor opened it and found where he had marked a page with a large red bookmark. Everyone came in close and stared at the alien script on the page. "This book is one of several that documents the history of Gallifrey and its people. This is volume one," the Doctor said to them. "It is? This book is as big as a house, how many volumes are there?" Rory said. "Not sure, but the history of my people goes back for eons. Far longer than even the creation of the Earth and the Earth is 4.2 billion years old. But the reason I chose this particular book is because this one deals with the Dark Times and talks about how my people warred with the ones creating chaos in the universe." "How many were there?" Paul asked. "Several," the Doctor said. "All of them warring with the universe and warring and competing with each other. It was a huge mess until the Time Lords decided to put a stop to things. The Diablon were one of the races and they were hunted down and killed along with the other Dark Time creatures. Now according to this chronicle of it, the Diablon were hunted to near extinction, although it took a few millennia to do it but suddenly they disappeared." "Disappeared?" Amy said. "Yeah, no one knew what happened to them. The entire species just vanished," the Doctor said. "But according to this, there were rumors that they hid on some distant planet to escape the genocide of their species." "Earth," William said. "Yes but at this time, Earth was unknown to the Time Lords, if it existed, it was still in its infant stages. It's possible they could have hidden within the Earth to escape the heat and volcanic eruptions and lava that might have been on the surface or they could have chosen another planet and came here eventually. But…whatever they did, my thought is they eventually went underground here on Earth and found or made an island where they could carry out their activities but still be hidden from the Time Lords." "And Satan did say that their main activity was creating chaos on the Earth so it fits," Paul said. "Yes," the Doctor said, turning to another marked page, "one of the Diablon's main preoccupations were war and fighting wars. They also were ruthless when it came to conquering other planets. They did much like Rome did. They would conquer a planet and enslave its citizens and compel them to fight for them so they had a neverending supply of soldiers. One of the ways they conquered planets was to infiltrate its economic, political and cultural systems and manipulate them so that eventually they would collapse. After that, they revealed themselves and their true intentions and conquered the world. Then once that world was secure, they moved on to another and another and another. So…apparently at one point they discovered Earth and set up shop here. And from the point they came till now, they've been waging a silent war of conquest and you and William happened to get caught up in it. The difference is you two are one of the very few who have been able to escape them and get word out to others." "And Ian is another," Rory said. "Yes…" the Doctor muttered. They noticed the pensive look on his face. "What's wrong?" Amy said. The Doctor closed the book and turned around with his butt on the edge of the table. He scratched Martha's ears when she came up next to him. "Something's not right," he said to them as he scratched her ears. "Regarding Ian. It seems like his escape was far too easy. He gives us directions to a warehouse that should be heavily guarded, especially if they're shipping things like alien weaponry, and yet, it was deserted with no security measures other than locked doors." "You think he's lying to us?" Paul said. "He's a spy then?" "Not sure, but I've lived for centuries and I've seen enough to know when something doesn't add up," the Doctor said. "I saw inside your mind, William, when I blocked all that brainwashing rubbish they did and I saw how extensive it was. They actually had you believing you were Paul by the time they were through, yeah?" William nodded and Paul patted his shoulder. "So you think that they brainwashed this guy to think he was some bloke named Ian?" William said. "It's possible. You know all too well how effective their brainwashing techniques are and let's face it, I doubt very seriously if any of the Diablons are gonna let someone as high-profile as Paul McCartney slip through their fingers or for that matter, someone they spent hours and hours brainwashing to be his replacement. If Ian was in trouble, why didn't he go to a flat on the ground floor, why did he go to the fourth floor? And it seems a bit too coincidental that he chose the flat of a couple of friends of Roger Daltry, who happens to be a mate of yours," the Doctor said to Paul. "I think this was planned in order to lure you and possibly William into a trap before you did exactly what you're doing now, try to stop them." Paul cursed under his breath. "I knew this might happen, this is what I've been trying to warn the others about but as you saw, John, George and Ringo would rather walk around with their heads up their arses than admit that me and William and possibly them might be a target. And now…I'm beginning to wonder if something might happen to Roger as well or Carol and Devon. Shit!" "We don't know for sure if he really is a spy," Amy said. "Yes, for now, let's just act like we don't suspect him," the Doctor said. "Just pretend to take his story at face value and assume that he did escape. Then we observe his actions and that'll clue us in to whether his story is genuine or not. Don't worry, Paul and William, we're not about to let them get a hold of you again." Paul nodded. The Doctor rubbed his eyes and glanced at him. "It's early morning now outside the TARDIS. Do you need to be somewhere?" he asked. "No, we have a couple of days off since the album is basically finished. All that needs to be done now is use the photographs to make the album cover and make the LPs for them and that's nothing to do with us. That's why I agreed to do this and help you. If we had more to do I would have gone and done it or at least left last night after we got done searching the warehouse. Like I said, John thinks I'm abandoning the band to go play time travelin' detective." "And I said not to worry about it. As long as you can juggle both things, there's no need for him to worry," the Doctor said. "Besides, I own a time machine so if you need to do this and then be somewhere, I can take the TARDIS into the vortex so you can rest up and then go to your appointment. If this is what you want to do, I can help you by allowing you to help us and then get plenty of rest so you can go and be a Beatle afterwards." "Thank you, I'm grateful that you're doing that for us," he said while William nodded in agreement. "You're welcome. I always welcome any help I can get especially since I believe we'll have our hands full trying to flush the Diablon out of hiding and get them off of Earth." "I don't understand though," Amy said. "Paul never mentioned him and William helping us out when we last visited him." "When was that?" Paul said. "When we went to see ya on your 64th birthday. You said that we continued to hunt down the Illuminati but you didn't say you or William were a part of it." "Well, maybe I wanted it to be a surprise," Paul said. "Maybe you were gettin' senile in your old age," Amy muttered. They snickered when Paul eyed her. He grinned and smacked her on the head. "Keep talking and I'll hit you until you get senile now!" Paul said to her. "Doctor, can I hit Paul with this book?" she asked, pointing to it. "Um…no. This book weights about 90 pounds and I really don't want you to be known as the one who gave Paul McCartney brain damage. Especially since we'd then have to put up with him drooling and muttering random odd phrases while he followed us around." "Damn," Amy said while everyone laughed and Paul gave her a playful swat on the head. The Doctor smiled. He held up his finger, walked over to another table and lifted up a red velvet cloth. He picked up two small gift wrapped gifts and walked back to the group. "For you both," he said, handing one to Paul and the other to William. "Welcome to our group and know that you're joining a long and esteemed line of people who have traveled with me and helped fight evil." "Thank you," both men said in unison. They opened the packages and stared at the IPod boxes. "Oh wow, you gave them IPods," Amy said. "And an IPod is…" Paul said. "It's a music player," the Doctor said. "To use an analogy you'd understand, it's like a transistor radio except you chose what songs you want to listen to." "Really? Groovy," Paul said. "You'll have to let Amy and Rory explain how to work it and all the features but I asked the TARDIS to make a couple for you and upload a sampling of songs on them from the 1950's to 2010." "There are future songs on these?" Paul said. "Yes. Don't know how many but I'm sure there's a fair amount. But I don't know what songs are on them. She chose for me so I'm not even sure if you and William got the same songs. You could both have different playlists. But I thought since they were small and could be easily hid like the mobile, they'd be perfect gifts. Plus, being a musician and both of you are music lovers, I figured that you would enjoy these." "I will, thank you so much," Paul said. "Yeah, I don't know what to say. Thank you," William added. "You're welcome. Like I said, Amy and Rory will have to help explain everything and how to operate them. I'm not that familiar with them since I can use the TARDIS to listen to songs." "Well, at least you didn't get Paul another moped since he would have wrecked it before it left the TARDIS." "Piss off, Pond!" Paul said while they laughed. "You know what? In addition to all the Beatles songs we know about, I'm gonna record a brand new song called Piss Off, Pond and have that replace The End as the last song on Abbey Road, how'd ya like that?" "I'd like it just fine. And when you're shooting the photo of you lot going across the zebra crossing, you be sure to be on a moped so people can say you died in a moped crash instead of a car." They laughed when Paul smacked her head. "Yeah, I think I will record a song called Piss Off, Pond and then get Ringo to sing it since he's good at singing happy little tunes," Paul said while everyone laughed. "I think Ringo'll start out by singing, Piss off, Pond, go to Hell, you're ugly and fat and Lord, do ya smell!" They laughed harder when Paul ran after Amy tried to hit the top of his head again. She looked at William while Paul pretended to cower behind a nearby desk. "Since the pest is out of the way, I wanted to give you a gift as well," she said to William. "I'm already that thing's adopted sister but if you'd like me to be yours as well, I will." "No! For the love of God, William, don't! It's a trap!" Paul yelled while everyone laughed. "I would be honored!" William said. "You'll be soooorreeee." "Piss off, Paul!" Amy said. "No, you piss off, Pond!" "And on that note, I think I'll go to the living room and watch a film," Rory said while everyone laughed. "Leave the siblings to fight amongst themselves while I entertain myself with more adult things." "Good idea," the Doctor said while Amy, William and Paul laughed. "I will also leave the children to their playground games. I have more cerebral things to do. Come, Martha, you don't need to be near this lot, they might brain you with that book and then you'll be no use to anyone. Just…let me know when children's hour is over so we can plan the next part of our strategy, eh?" Amy, Paul and William giggled when the Doctor and Rory hurried out of the room followed by Martha who was happy to chase them. Once they were gone, Amy gave both her brothers hugs and explained to them how to use the IPods.
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