Heritage by Dale Smith

Author:Dale Smith [Smith, Dale]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, General, Science Fiction, Adventure, Science Fiction; English, Comics & Graphic Novels, Doctor Who (Fictitious Character)
ISBN: 9780563538646
Google: ZAUIAAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0563538643
Publisher: Random House UK
Published: 2002-10-06T07:00:00+00:00

‘He killed himself because of me,’ he said calmly. ‘Because of what I did.’

Ace leaned in, closer.

Still the words would not stop coming out of Cole. They had a life of their own now, would not rest until they were all out in the cold night air. They poured from him, no longer willing to be subject to his will. They were free, at last.

‘It wasn’t easy for Ben,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘I don’t have a clue what he told Sweetness. I don’t have a clue what it was like. But he survived. He let Heritage have its future, like we deserved it, but I don’t think he minded too much that his farm was so far from the town. He kept his distance. I would’ve, too.

He never spoke to Sheriff, or the doctor, or Wakeling. Wouldn’t even look at them. But me... I don’t know why, but he still talked to me.

‘That’s why he came to me,’ Cole said flatly, ‘when he needed help.

‘Sheriff thought he’d accepted it. That he was doing what was best. Wakeling just thought he was too scared, too scared of what Wakeling was turning into. But he wasn’t. He was just looking for a way to prove it. He was looking for the murder weapon.’

The Doctor looked down at Cole, his expression unreadable.

‘Sheriff had hidden it?’ he asked, his voice sharp through the crisp air. ‘Why not destroy it?’

Cole shrugged.

‘I don’t think he could bear to have it near him for too long.

He just took it out to the desert and lost it. He didn’t think anyone would find it out there.’

‘But Benjamin did,’ the Doctor mused softly. ‘And when he did, he brought it to you.’

Cole nodded sadly.

‘He wanted me to arrange an off-planet call without Wakeling knowing. Even back then all off-planet talks were routed through Wakeling. He was paranoid someone would tell.

As if we could do that without turning ourselves in too. But when Ben came to me and he asked me to help, begged me, I told him I’d arrange it, and to wait for my word.’

Cole looked up at the Doctor. Tears were prickling in his eyes, waiting to burst through at any moment. So far he had managed to hold them in, like he had kept everything else in for all those years. But how much longer that would last now, he didn’t know. The Doctor was getting everything from him, without asking, without saying a word. Why should he be satisfied until he had taken everything; tears, heart, soul, everything? And if it would lift the weight Cole had been struggling under these last few years, he’d happily give it to him.

‘I couldn’t think about anything else. It was there, in front of me. All I kept seeing was Sheriff telling us all how it would be, and us agreeing like sheep. If I let Ben tell the universe, they’d take me, too. They’d put me on the same prison ship, and everyone would know what I’d done.

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