The looks exchanged between the two pairs were wary ones, neither of either duo seeming willing or able to break the tension that hung in the air between them.
"Who are you?" Ian demanded.
"Who arrrrre you?"
The voice sounded like Ian's, but it came out... wrong. The cadence, the tone, the inflection were as though they were spoken by someone who barely understood English at all. Ian's eyes widened as he made a half turn to meet Barbara's gaze, her likewise looking very confused and disturbed by the entire ordeal.
"I don't understand." Barbara whispered, worriedly. "What are they?"
"I wish I knew." Ian whispered, turning his attention back to their doppelgangers. "We are Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright. Who are you and why do you look like us?"
"Weeeeeee arrrrre Ian Chessssterton and Bararararbra Wrightttt. Whooooo arrrre yoooou ananaanddddd whyyy do yoooooou look liiiiiike uus?"
"Are you copying us?"
"Arrrrre yoooou copyingggg us?" The two seemed just like the ones who faced them, yet something was... off. Some sort of distortion that Ian could not fully place. How they carried themselves, how they moved, even how they blinked spoke to something that just wasn't right. The words made the whole package all the worse for it.
"I don't think you understand. We're supposed to-" Barbara began.
"I don't thiiiiink yoooooou understaanananand! Weeeeee're suppppoooosed to-" The words came out in the voice of Barbara. Unfortunately, the mouth that had moved to speak them was not the mirror image of Barbara, but that of Ian. Slowly, Barbara began to back away as did Ian, keeping himself as a shield between her and the two duplicates. The two duplicates who began to move toward them in a slow, almost reptilian movement pattern.
"Barbara... when I say 'now', get ready to run." Ian said as they passed by one of the bookshelves that Barbara had in the room. Still keeping his eyes on the other two, Ian blindly reached and found a heavy book that he took into his hands. "Run!" He cried out, swinging wide with the book in a wide arc at their doubles. Barbara fumbled for and finally pulled the door open, dashing out into the hallway. Ian was not far behind, once the other Ian had grabbed the book from him and Ian had shoved it into the man's hands. Ian did not stay behind to view it, but he heard what sounded like shattering glass as the two of them made their quick escape.
"Grandfather! Something's wrong!"
"Hmm? Oh, yes, my dear. Bring the filaments over here. I need to whittle them down a bit." The Doctor said, almost dismissive as he puttered about with the TARDIS console.
"Grandfather! Please! Listen to me!"
"Susan, hush! I need to focus! Please, just bring the copper to me." The old man seemed far more concerned with the readouts. "An energy deficit? How could I have missed it? Hmm..."
"Grandfather!"
"What? What is it?" The Doctor finally turned to face his granddaughter, seeing a look of pure terror on the child's face. His scowl melted almost immediately into patriarchal concern and confusion. "...what is it, Susan? What's happened?"
"Grandfather, I... I don't think we're in London, 1963." Susan said. The Doctor came over, gently holding Susan at the shoulders.
"My dear child, the instruments made it plain, did they not?" The Doctor asked. "London in 1963. Right where we had left with Miss Wright and Chesterfax, wasn't it?"
"I think the instruments might have been wrong, Grandfather." Susan swallowed nervously. "I saw a-"
"Wrong? Wrong?! My ship, wrong? Certainly not. Hmmph!" The Doctor replied indignantly, leaving his granddaughter and returning to look over the console.
"Grandfather, the sign on the junkyard. It's wrong! It's all... it's all backwards!" Susan insisted.
"A failure in the telepathic circuits, then." The Doctor said. "Nothing I would be unable to fix up properly."
"Grandfather, on the junkyard sign as well!" Susan protested. "I think your instruments were wrong, this isn't 1963!"
"Instruments might have been wrong indeed! What nonsense! I hardly think that-" The old man stopped mid-sentence, gazing down at some of the gauges and dials he'd been meticulously maintaining. "I... well, I... well, dear me, this is strange. ... this is strange indeed."
"What is it, Grandfather?" Susan asked.
"This gauge, here... look at the numbers. What do you see?" The Doctor instructed. Susan did as she was told and read off the digits.
"3691/11/32. But, Grandfather, this isn't the thirty-seventh century!"
"Precisely!" The Doctor said, his face contorting in thought. "We must go and find your teachers at once!" He hobbled over to the coat rack by the door, pulling on his overcoat and getting his Astrakhan. "Where is my cane?"
"Over here, Grandfather." Susan said, retrieving it for him.
"Yes, yes, thank you, my dear." The Doctor said. "Oh, get the doors for me, would you?" Susan nodded and moved over, flipping the switch and sending the TARDIS doors whirring open once again. The two stepped out into what they had, up until then, viewed as no different than London, 1963. Viewed it as no different at first, at least.
"Over here, Grandfather. Look! Look!" Susan said, leading him over to the broken its of the bakery shop sign, holding it out to the Doctor and showcasing the reversed and inverted lettering. The Doctor took it into his hands, looking it over.
"Hmm... yes, yes, something feels strange about this. I do not like it." The Doctor said, setting the wooden fragment back to the ground again before turning back and locking up the TARDIS. "Come, my dear. You say your school is within walking distance?"
"Yes, Grandfather. Let me show you the way." Susan said, taking his hand and leading him out of the junkyard and into what she would assume was a busy London street even for so early in the morning. However, there was not another soul in sight of the pair of them as they moved along. "This is... strange."
"What is?" The Doctor asked.
"Well, I know that it is early in the morning, but London in 1963 is a city of over eight million people." Susan said.
"I don't understand."
"Where is everyone?" Susan explained. "You'd think at least someone would be outside." The Doctor frowned a bit, pondering that. Everything around them seemed... muted. There were no sounds of people, vehicles, or any other sign of life outside of the pair of them.
"Come, Susan... let's go... I don't think we would do well to linger here." The two moved along, both missing the pair of eyes watching them as they moved toward the Coal Hill School.
"Oh, Ian, what shall we do?"
"Keep running. We need to get back to the car and back to the junkyard." Ian said through rapid breaths as the two made their way away from the nightmare show in Barbara's classroom. Turning a corner, they suddenly stopped at an intersection of the hallways.
"Ian-"
"We can stop here for a moment. I think we've lost them." Ian said.
"Ian, look at the display case!" Barbara said. Ian turned on his heel, looking at the glass display case where many academic and athletic awards won by students were kept. At first glance, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Through his adrenaline rush, though, Ian was able to focus upon the finer details.
"The letters are wrong." Ian said.
"They're reversed. Inverted." Barbara said. "But why?"
"I don't know." Ian said, his face scrunched in confusion. The pair had no small amount of trepidation hanging in the air over them as they pondered this and wondered what it might mean.
"And where is everyone? The pupils? The other teachers? The headmaster?" Barbara asked. Ian had to agree, now that he realized it, that the silence around them was very strange indeed. Even so early in the morning, there were at least a few people shuffling about. Here, however, there was no one besides themselves. At least, there was no one besides themselves until they heard the rapidly approaching footsteps. No doubt, their doppelgangers on approach.
"We need to get back to the junkyard. C'mon!" Ian said, taking Barbara's hand and once more running away from their mirror images. The pair made it out to the car park, Ian once more moving to open the passenger door for Barbara and finding the steering wheel was now on the left side. "What in the world?"
"Your car isn't an American model." Barbara said.
"No, no, it isn't." Ian said. Looking around quickly, he once more noticed the lack of people. Apart from themselves and those two things they'd (he hoped) left behind in the school, there seemed to be no sign of anything living. "This is getting odder and odder..."
"You can still drive the car, I hope?" Barbara asked.
"Of course, of course, yes. C'mon." Ian said, gesturing for her to enter at the other side and soon he did as well. He noted the gauges on the dash had likewise been inverted and reversed as had the words on the awards in the trophy case. Nevertheless, he quickly got the key into the ignition and soon enough they were off back down the road.
"I don't understand how we didn't notice any of these things before." Barbara said. "When we drove down here, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Did it?"
"No, it didn't." Ian said as they passed down empty street after empty street, seemingly with no one about in any capacity besides themselves. "Something is very wrong here, Barbara. I don't believe we've come home at all."
"No, we most certainly have not." Barbara shook her head. "The Doctor will know what to do. I hope."
"So do I." Ian said.
"Look! It's Susan!" Barbara pointed out through the windshield at the young woman, walking alone in the street. Ian pulled the car up to the side of the road and parked, both he and Barbara getting out and making their way to her.
"Susan! Are you alright?" Ian asked as they approached. Susan did not respond, instead merely looking at the two of them. "Susan?"
"Suuuusan, pleaaaaaaseeee! Saaaaay sooooomethiiing!" Barbara's voice came out of Susan's mouth, causing both to recoil from her.
"She's another one!" Barbara exclaimed.
"Step back, Barbara!"
"What's this, then? Hmm?" The voice of the Doctor was heard coming around the corner. 'Susan' turned to see the old man and herself coming around the corner. "Who is this? Who are you?"
"Doctor! Two more of them were at the school! They tried to-"
"Dooooooooctor." The voice was different, this time. Not Barbara's, not Ian's, not the Doctor's or Susan's. This voice sounded as though it were being heard through water, as if someone being drowned were trying to speak.
"Yes, yes, I am the Doctor." The Doctor said, balanced on his cane. "Who are you? What is your species and planet of origin?"
"Dooooooctor. Loooooocaaaated." The duplicate of Susan spoke once more. Then, the most curious thing began to happen. They watched as her form suddenly took on a glassy sheen, like that of a mirror. Her breathing stopped, her subtle movements of the face and musculature ceased, and her eyes closed. The four time travelers then heard a cracking noise and watched as cracks did indeed start to splint across the young woman's form. Spidering all across her body, not differentiating between what should be flesh and what should be clothing before the body suddenly exploded. The Doctor and Ian shielded Susan and Barbara from the pieces, themselves trying to avoid the blast as well.
When the danger had passed, the quartet looked down at the spot where the mirrored woman had been standing, only to find splinters of glass upon the concrete...
NEXT TIME
THE ULTIMATUM
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