The Many Hands by Dale Smith

Author:Dale Smith [Smith, Dale]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, General, Science Fiction, Time Travel, Doctor Who (Fictitious Character), Edinburgh (Scotland)
ISBN: 9781846074226
Google: yUTGQ62XO04C
Amazon: 1846074223
Publisher: BBC BOOKS
Published: 2008-05-15T07:00:00+00:00

away, do you understand?'

Monro looked to the coffin on the table. Martha

remembered the brass plaque: John Monro. For a moment,

she thought of her own father. Leaving her mother and

advertising his midlife crisis to the whole of London with

the help of Annalise. What would she do, when the time

finally came? Beg the Doctor to take her back and change

it all? She knew she'd give anything to have him back.

Then she remembered the pale highwayman.

'Look, I know you miss your dad,' Martha said. For a

moment, Monro looked like he might cry. 'But this isn't

right. You know it isn't. I don't think they're even the same

people they were when you bring them back. Do you?'

Monro paused, just for a moment.

'Why are you listening to her?' Alexander yelled.

He threw down the hands he was about to experiment

on. As the hands dropped onto the operating table, he

tugged his heavy leather gloves off, letting them fall to the

floor. A moment later, Alexander was nearly on her. The

look on his face almost made Martha sick: there was so

much of his father's gentleness there, but the anger twisted

it and made it so ugly. She took a breath and a step back,

bringing her arms up to defend herself.

Alexander was hit clean in the chest by a clay battery.

He flew backwards, his body twitching as the

electricity earthed itself through him. As if in sympathy,

the hands lay twitching violently on the operating table.

Alexander seemed to fly for several long seconds before

he landed hard behind the table with a loud thump. Martha

looked at Monro, but Alexander's father was just standing

holding the other battery as if he expected someone else to

admit that they had hit his son.

'Mr Monro?' she asked.

He blinked, twice. 'Mary,' he said, looking at her. 'He

was going to hurt you. Are you all right?'

Martha looked over to the table. 'I think we should

worry about your son.'

Monro just looked at her like a small child. 'My son?'

he said. 'Alexander isn't my son.'

But it was too late for questions: Alexander rose

silently from behind the operating table. His nose was

bloody, and he was smiling a grim smile that really didn't

bode well. His leather apron had swung around to one side

as he'd fallen, and Alexander just casually reached out and

plucked it off. It fell to the floor, revealing that his shirt

had opened almost to the waist.

Martha gasped.

She could see Alexander's pale white chest. Underneath

the skin around his heart, there were five lumps poking

out. It was only as they flexed convulsively that she

realised they were the fingertips of a hand that was

growing beneath the skin. Martha took a step back; she

could still run, there was no one behind her. But

Alexander's father was just standing there meekly, waiting

to be caught.

'Mr Monro,' she said urgently. 'It's all right. Don't be

afraid. You just need to come with me, OK? It'll be all

right.'

Alexander laughed coldly at that. 'Do you think you

can turn him against me?'

Martha held her hand out to Monro. 'Mr Monro,' she

hissed. 'Please! He's not your son.'

Monro just blinked dull-wittedly. 'I know,' he said.

'You don't understand,' Alexander said flatly.

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