Words with Enemies
Chapter Three: The Perfect Day
By Gale Force
Date: 3 January, 1983
Location: Kilauea Volcano, the Big Island, Hawaii, Earth, Orion Arm, Milky Way, Local Group, Virgo Supercluster, Laniakea
I.
The TARDIS materialized inside a large room painted drab brown and with steel shelving lining the walls, on which were stacked dozens of white banker's boxes.
The TARDIS exterior cameras showed no one moving outside the TARDIS, nevertheless the Doctor stuck his head out of the door cautiously and looked around. It was a habit ingrained over nine hundred or so years.
The Doctor exited followed by Amelia.
"Where are we, Doctor?" Amelia asked cautiously.
"It's 3 January, 1983," the Doctor informed her, "and we're in the Kilauea Volcano Observation Center. The volcano has just started to erupt…one of the most spectacular eruptions of modern times. It's night-time – it's a glorious sight."
He opened the door of the storage room, this time walking out into the corridor without bothering to look around.
"Is it okay for us to be here," Amelia questioned, following after him, one hand on a smartphone in her pocket.
"Of course. This observation center is open 24 hours a day, and they're getting hundreds of visitors in looking at the eruption every hour. We're here just a few minutes before midnight."
"Wonderful," breathed Amelia. "To see a volcano eruption at midnight – it'll be beautiful."
The Doctor nodded. "We'll stay here for 24 hours. You'll get to see the volcano at night, and tomorrow we'll look around in the daylight. I'll show you your AA – that's rough CLINKER type lava, and your PAHOEHOE – that's the smooth lava. But there'll be more to see. Have you got to the Ts yet, in your Scrabble® Dictionary?"
"Not yet. Why?"
"Tomorrow, I'll show you TEPHRA. That's a type of material ejected from volcanoes during eruptions. There'll be a lot of it tomorrow."
"Lovely jubbly," said Amelia.
"TEPHRA," said the Doctor musingly. "What else will there be to see…that you'll find useful for your little word game? Oh, VOG! What about VOG?"
"What about VOG?" queried Amelia.
"It's a term, recently introduced into English, but I think it'll be in your dictionary. It's air pollution caused specifically by volcanic eruptions. Kilauea will still be erupting 30 years from now, and it'll be belching tons of sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere during that time."
They were following the signs to the observation deck. As the Doctor had assured her, they were surrounded by dozens of people – everyday volcano enthusiasts who wanted to see the nighttime eruption.
For an hour they stood on the glassed-in observation deck, watching the spectacle a mile away from them in perfect safety.
As they watched, and as Amelia took photo after photo and glanced at him occasionally with shining eyes, the Doctor rubbed his face.
He'd had an affinity with volcanoes for some time, ever since he'd accidently landed at Pompeii with Donna, on the day before Mount Vesuvius erupted.
The Doctor rubbed his face absently.
As if sensing his thoughts, Amelia turned to him.
"3 January, 1983," she said. "Isn't this a fixed point in time?"
"Yes," said the Doctor warily.
"There are a lot of fixed points in time on Earth, aren't there, Doctor?"
"I can see where you're going with this," the Doctor said, crossing his arms.
"I'm just trying to understand, Doctor. If you somehow cause the earth to go into a 24-hour time loop during the age of the dinosaurs, so that mankind never exists…that's a lot of fixed points in time that aren't going to happen!"
"They've already happened," the Doctor said. "And I'll always remember them."
"Well, that's all right then," murmured Amelia.
She tried a new tack.
"And what about you…and how much you love Earth. If you do this thing…there'll be no more Earth, really, will there? Just…dinosaurs."
"I thought you liked dinosaurs!"
"I'm sure I'll love them, Doctor. From a safe distance," she added. (One really had to impress upon the Doctor that you wanted to see things happen from a safe distance.)
"I'm just thinking of you," she continued. "You're going to get bored, if there's no Earth to visit whenever you feel like a serving of fish-and-chips, or to have a chat with old Rembrandt or...Da Vinci…or Beethoven…all those chaps."
"I have my memories to sustain me," the Doctor said coldly. "No, Amelia, my mind is made up. I want the Earth to have a perfect day, and by Jingo it will have a perfect day."
There was a light of fanaticism in the Doctor's eyes that Amelia did not like at all. He had drummed into her incessantly, over the last year that she'd been traveling with him, of the importance of "fixed points in time" and how they could not be changed.
Now he was prepared to eradicate all those "fixed points in time" with a vengeance.
Why? She wondered. Why is he so bound and determined to do it now?
"Because," the Doctor said quietly, as if reading her thoughts. "I'm tired, Amelia. I'm tired of always landing on the Earth…and on other planets to…and seeing all the suffering…rescuing a handful of people while the world rushes inexorably to its doom…but if I give each world its perfect day…well"
"What do you mean, each world?" Amelia asked. "You're going to time loop every inhabited world in the universe with your Time Spinners?"
The Doctor nodded. "That's my plan," he said cheerfully. "But let's not talk about that now. Not while we're witnessing this fantastic spectacle."
Amelia smiled, and nodded, and turned back to watch the incandescent red, orange and yellow lava spew into the night sky. It was the most beautiful sight she'd ever witnessed.
And what made it extra special was the oohs and aahs of everyone around her who was witnessing the same event, with a group sharing of awe and emotion.
People. It was the people that surrounded them that made the earth special, that made witnessing natural phenomena special.
The Doctor couldn't seriously be thinking of time-looping every single planet in the Universe. Even to think such a thing was the thought of a madman….
Amelia blinked her eyes to stop a warm rush of tears. The Doctor couldn't be going mad, could he?