The
Doctor woke suddenly. A loud commotion
in the hall was what woke him. He still
felt tired and heavy, but his mine was clearer.
He lay in bed and listened to the voices and footsteps as they
approached him. The door burst open with
two loud crashes and seconds later the curtain that surrounded the Doctor’s bed
was thrown back.
The Doctor watched as a man
approached the bed. The man looked
familiar.
“You can’t do this,” one of the
other men shouted.
The man who approached the Doctor’s
bed turned at looked at the man who had just spoken, “What can’t I do? Cure him?
I’m a healer, it’s what I do.” He
turned back to the Doctor, “It’s good to see you awake, Doctor. We almost lost you. Can you sit up? I’ve got your medicine for you.”
The Doctor struggled to get up. The man held out his hand and helped to pull
the Doctor into a sitting position.
There was no nausea this time, but the Doctor was quite dizzy. The man held a thin, round, white disc in his
hands. It had a pungent, familiar
smell. The man put the white smelly
thing into the Doctor’s mouth.
The taste was incredibly powerful
and the Doctor choked on it.
“I know, it tastes strange and is
hard to swallow, but it works,” the man said.
The Doctor closed his eyes and
swallowed hard. Once it had gone down,
the Doctor immediately felt a little better.
His brain finally registered the taste, “Ginger?”
“It is,” the man said, “also known
as inciver.”
The Doctor’s eyes got wide. He looked around. There were four Weyk men in the room with
him. “Where’s Merry?” he asked.
The men exchanged glances with each
other. The one who had spoken earlier
shook his head.
“Where is she?” the Doctor yelled.
“Doctor, my name is Doru. I’ve been working with Merry since you took
ill.”
The Doctor’s eyes narrowed, “Then
where is she?” His voice was deep and
dark.
“She has been put into the cell, by
the Mayor,” Doru answered.
The Doctor flung the sheet off of
himself and threw his legs over the side of the bed. He stood up and felt a wave of
dizziness. He grabbed the bed and
steadied himself until his head cleared.
Doru stepped forward and took the
Doctor’s arm, trying to help support him.
“Doctor, you are too weak. You
need to rest.”
The Doctor threw off Doru’s grip. “I’m
well enough to go find Merry.” The
Doctor was still holding onto the bed.
“What happened? Why is she in the
cell?” He was taking in deep breaths,
trying to get control of his spinning head.
The man who spoke first stepped closer
to the Doctor. In a pompous tone he
announced to the Doctor, “She dug up the inciver plant from the city gardens.”
“That’s all?” the Doctor said. He stared at the man. His eyes were like ice.
The man shrunk back from the Doctor’s
gaze, but his tone was still pompous, “The penalty for digging up the sacred
plant is death.”
“Death?” the Doctor yelled. “Take me to her!”
The Doctor followed Doru out the door and
down the hall. He was having a hard time
keeping his balance and his socked feet slipped on the floor. “Explain to me
what happened, Doru.”
Doru kept walking, but he slowed his
pace so the weak Doctor could keep up with him.
“Merry worked out that the inciver plant that we were searching for was
the root of a plant. That plant is
unfortunately for her, our sacred plant.
It is forbidden for anyone to even touch it, much less dig it up. She made a deal with the mayor that if she
dug up the plant and it was inciver and cured our sick, that she would be
forgiven of her crime and set free, but if it was not the right plant or failed
to cure the plague that she would be willing to pay the penalty and be put to
death.”
“What?” the Doctor cried. “Has it worked? It worked on me. Has the plant been administered to anyone
else?”
“Yes, many people now,” Doru answered.
“And?” the Doctor asked, “Has it
worked?”
Doru smiled. “It has.
The people are getting better. No
one has died in the last three hours.”
The Doctor grabbed Doru’s coat with
tremendous strength for so weak a man, and spun him around to face the
Doctor. “Then why is Merry still in the
cell?”
“Because the Mayor’s an idiot,” Doru
answered. “Believe me Doctor; I’m on
your side. Come on, we are going to bust
Merry out of there.”
The Doctor was exhausted, but determined
to help Merry. They walked out into the
bright sunshine of the day. “How long
was I out for?” he asked.
“About 12 hours. You almost didn’t survive the first
hour. But Merry, when she realized that
the inciver is what they call ginger on Earth, she had some with her. It was a tiny amount of it in powder
form. She gave it to you, in what were
probably your final breaths, and immediately, you began to get better. It wasn’t enough to cure you, but it was
enough to stop the illness from killing you.
She saved your life Doctor.”
“And every other citizen of this city,”
the Doctor added.
They took a carriage to the security
cell facility. The Doctor noticed more
people on the street than there had been the day before. “The people are out again,” he said.
Doru smiled. “Yes.
Within an hour of Merry’s digging up the inciver, we had enough prepared
that a team of healers were able to go to every household and administered the
remedy. The people are better already.”
When they arrived, the Doctor climbed
down. He could feel his own strength
coming back to him. They walked into the
building, but a guard was waiting for them.
“I’m sorry, but you cannot go back,” the
guard said.
The Doctor took a step forward, “Let me
in.”
“Mayor’s orders,” the guard stuck out
his arm and pushed the Doctor in the shoulder.
“No one is allowed to see the Human.”
“Then let me see the Mayor,” the Doctor
said. He was quickly losing his
patience. The guard pulled out a
communicator and spoke into it.
The Doctor pulled Doru aside. “Listen, I’m not feeling so well. Is there a restroom around here?”
Doru looked at the guard, who pointed to
a door at the far end of the room. The
Doctor staggered towards it and pushed the door open. He stepped in, but he didn’t let the door
close completely. He watched the guard
through the opening. As soon as the
guard and Doru had turned their backs to the door, the Doctor slipped out and
ran as fast as he could in his socked feet.
By the time he reached the end of the corridor, he was breathing hard
and his hearts were pounding in his chest.
The sickness had been a nasty one.
It had sapped every bit of his energy.
He moved on as fast as he was able
without feeling the urge to pass out. He
made his way down a flight of stairs and into the holding cell area. The hall was clear as far as he could make
out. Quietly he moved to the first door
and peeked in through the door’s tiny window. It wasn’t Merry. He moved to the next one. Not Merry.
He was about to peek into the window of the third door when he heard
voices behind him. The Doctor ran down
the hall and slipped under the hall warden’s desk, which thankfully, was empty.
The guard from the front hall and Doru
turned the corner and started to walk down the hall towards where the Doctor
was hiding.
“When I find him,” the guard was
growling, “he will be sorry he ever came here.”
“I think he already is,” came Doru’s
snide remark. “If you had just helped
us, he wouldn’t be missing and you wouldn’t be in trouble.”
“My orders were not to let anyone in.”
They stopped quite close to where the
Doctor was hiding. The Doctor was sure
the pounding of his hearts would give him away.
“Well, she’s alone. He hasn’t found her yet. Let’s go check the other floors,” the guard
said. The Doctor listened as their
footsteps went back down the hall and then disappeared. He peeked up from behind the desk. The coast
was clear. He hurried over to the area
where the guard had been standing. He
looked into a cell door window and saw Merry, sitting in a chair; her face
berried in the handkerchief he had given her.
She was alive.
The Doctor reached for his sonic
screwdriver and realized he wasn’t wearing his coat. He had gotten out of bed and left so quickly
that he hadn’t noticed he wasn’t wearing his coat or even his waistcoat. His white shirt was only halfway buttoned and
was something of a mess with half of it being untucked. No shoes, no coat and no sonic
screwdriver. He felt cold.
Voices came from the end of the hall
again. This time he would meet
them. He quickly tucked in the shirt
half that was hanging out. He stood his
full height and waited calmly.
“There you are Doctor!” Doru shouted. Doru was accompanied by the guard and the
Mayor.
“Mayor,” the Doctor said calmly, “what
is the meaning of keeping this lady locked up in a cell?” His eyes were cold. “From what I can tell, she saved your people
and you’ve got her locked up like a criminal.”
“Doctor, she broke a law,” the Mayor’s
voice was stern. “It is my duty to make
sure the laws of the land are obeyed otherwise we would have chaos.”
“Let’s see, if I were to go out into
your city and I asked all the people whose lives were just saved by the sacred
plant, what do you think they will say was more important? The life of a plant or their own lives and
the lives of their family members? I’ll
give you a hint. They don’t care about a
silly law regarding a plant,” the Doctor said.
The Mayor stood still and speechless.
“Now, let her go,” the Doctor demanded.
For several moments nobody moved. Then, without taking his eyes off the Doctor,
the Mayor said, “Open the door.”
The guard typed a code into the panel by
the door and the door swung open. Merry
ran out and embraced the Doctor.
“You’re OK!” she said. “I’m so glad you are alright.”
“I am thanks to you,” the Doctor said.
“Are you alright?”
“I’m fine. I was so worried about you.” They hugged for a few moments longer before
she pulled away and looked him in the face.
“You look tired, Doctor.”
He smiled. “I am.”
Doru stepped forward, “Come with me,” he
said. “I’ll take you back to the hospital.
You can get your things and rest.”
Merry went to Doru and hugged him
too. “Thank you, Doru.”
“Why do you thank me Merry?” Doru asked.
“I didn’t protect you when you needed it most.”
“I know and I’m very upset with you for
that,” Merry smiled, “but without you, we never would have saved the Doctor’s
life.”
Doru smiled. “We saved more than the Doctor’s life.”
“Do you mean it worked?” Merry jumped excitedly.
“It did.
The people are getting well,” Doru said.
Merry hugged Doru again, “Oh, I’m so
happy!”
The Doctor watched Doru and Merry. He was glad to see Merry so genuinely
happy. They walked past the Mayor and
the guard without a second look and out into the sunshine. When they got back to the hospital, the last
thing the Doctor wanted to do was go back to bed, but he knew he needed the
rest in order to get better. Merry
tucked him in and then pulled up a chair to sit alongside him. She took his hand into hers and she stroked
it for a few moments.
“Just sleep now Doctor,” she
whispered. “Just sleep.”
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