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She stared at the column, in the central of the console, and watched it slowly come to rest. All time they had been travelling, the few minutes it had taken, the column had moved, rhythmically up and down; now it had stopped. This meant they had materialised. She knew this already; but she had not seen the column moving so smoothly in a long time, or was it never before (she was still finding it difficult to remember so many things).
Their arrival on Earth had been sudden and traumatic. They had been thrown out of the time vortex, causing them to perform an emergency materialisation. One moment they were stood, together at the console, the next moment they were lying on the floor feeling very hazed and confused. As they stood up they found they had materialised in a West London junkyard, hundreds of the Tardis' circuits had been blown and even more holes in their memories had appeared (when they originally escaped from their home world they had lost so many memories, the sheer act of escape had robbed them of so many memories). Over the long, following months her grandfather had worked on their Tardis, repairing the damage done to it; while she attended the local school and pretended to be human, a teenage girl.
That Sunday morning she had entered the console room, from her own room, to find her grandfather rushing, excitedly around the console.
"It working. I believe it's working," he was saying, more to himself then her.
"What’s working grandfather?" She stared at him.
He looked up, almost surprised to see her there.
"Why, the Tardis is, child," he replied. "I have finished all the repairs and I believe we are ready to travel again."
"Travel? Where to?"
"Anywhere in time and space. Anywhere we wanted to."
"But I've got school tomorrow morning," she said, her voice suddenly taking on a whining tone, before she realised what she was saying.
"That school," he scoffed. "What can they teach you?"
"Grandfather, you agreed I could attend school for..."
"Yes, yes, I know," he said, cutting her sentence off, as he so often did (as usual she bite down upon her resentment). "We can still have a day trip somewhere, or do you have some 'homework' to do?"
(She ignored his sarcasm)
"Where were you thinking of going?" She asked.
"It's better if we stay in the same place, we don't want to get to lost, but what do you say we go back in time a few hundred years. Would you like to see London a few hundred years ago?"
"It would help me with my history essay."
"Susan, there's no need to be sarcastic."
"No grandfather... It would be nice, though, travelling in the Tardis again."
"Good, good... Well run along and get dressed child, you can't time travel in your nightdress."
She looked away from the console's column and saw him checking some of the dials on the console.
"Have we arrived, grandfather?" she asked.
"Err, just a minute child, just a minute," he muttered as he carried on checking the dials.
"Grandfather, what's the matter?"
"Nothing child, nothing."
"Grandfather!" She was tired of him constantly treating her like a little girl, she was... She couldn’t remember how old she was but she wasn't a little child.
"All right, all right," he stopped tapping at the different dials and looked up at her. "We have travelled back in time three hundred years but we have also managed to move to two hundred odd miles to the north. This old Tardis can be a bit temperamental."
"But we will be able to get back won't we?" a moment of panic gripped her.
"Don't panic child, I have the recall coordinates set. We’ll return to a moment after we left, it will be like we were never away."
"Good," she felt her panic easing.
"Now, seen as we are here we might as well take a look around. Don't forget your coat, it looks chilly outside."
It took them a moment to get their coats, her's from the wardrobe room and him his usual cape and hat, then they left the Tardis.
Outside, to her surprise, it was cold but very crisp weather. She could see her breath, with each exhale, forming a momentary cloud of vapour. The air was cold upon her face but not unpleasantly so. After the smog and damp of London it was a pleasant change. She stepped away from the Tardis and found that it had landed on the rocky bank of a small, rushing waterfall. The banks of the waterfall were solid, brown rocks. The waterfall, which was narrow and falling down only about four feet into a deep pool, was white rushing water. The landscape around the waterfall was open, rolling moorland that soon gave way to sharply climbing and dramatic hills. Though there wasn't a tree in sight, the moorland was rich, green grass. Beautiful and unspoiled landscape surrounding them. Standing there she found it all very relaxing and peaceful. Even if it had been an accident that they have arrived here she was glad they had, it was so refreshing.
"Oh no, no, no, no!" She heard him exclaim behind her.
"What is it grandfather?" She said as she turned around to face him, but just seeing that sight answered her question. He was stood the front of The Tardis staring intently at it. The Tardis was still in the shape of a blue, London Police Box, from over two hundred years in the future.
"I forgot to fix the chameleon circuit. Stupid, stupid error! Stupid!" He was shouting at himself, not her, but she easily recognised that mood he was. It was easier, with far less chance of him shouting at her, if she left him alone until the mood had past, which was usually quite soon.
"I'm going for a walk," she told them.
"Yes, yes, child. Don’t go far," he answered her but he wasn't even looking at her so she knew he was barely listening to her, he was too preoccupied with the problem before him.
She turned away and began to walk off, following the small path through the rocks and down to pool at the bottom of the waterfall. Once on the bank of the pool she decided to slowly walk around the edge of it. Walking around the pool, slowly, and back would give her enough time, time for his mood to calm down. The bank was steep and rocky, most of it a straight drop of a foot or so down to the pool, but the top of the rocks were flat and easy to walk on, and ran smoothly into the moor land. She had no problem walking slowly around the pool. As she walked she couldn't help but enjoy the beauty of the landscape around her. Since their arrival on Earth all she had seen of it, at first-hand, was dirty and smog choked London. She had glimpsed other parts of the planet but only in books or the few times she had watched the strange device of television - why only a one-way communication device.
She had walked almost three-quarters of the way around the pool, lost in a world of her own thoughts, when she almost tripped over the man. He was lying prostrate in the long moorland grass, at the edge of the pool. He was in his early twenties, yet his body was lean and wiry. His hair was dark and unkempt, his face dirty and unshaven. She recognised his uniform, she had studied it only a few weeks ago in her history class, he was a Jacobite soldier (they were in Scotland at the Jacobite Rebellion, she realised). His jacket had been ripped open to reveal his dirty white shirt, but the shirt was ripped across his breast. It was a ragged tare, the edge thickly stained with dark blood, exposing a deep and open wound in his chest.
She thought he was dead, until he left out a very slight and almost silent breath.
She bent down beside him and said:
"Hello? Can I help you?"
He slowly opened his eyes, week grey eyes staring up at her, and replied:
"Pretty lass, I have a powerful bad wound. I need a surgeon or a nurse."
"I'll get help," she said as she jumped back up.
As fast as she was able she ran back to the Tardis and her grandfather - she was still able to run fast (her body still had the strength she had possessed before, she couldn't remember why she had been so strong though). Her feet pounding over the rocks as she ran.
When she reached the Tardis she found him outside of it, just staring at it and muttering to himself with an occasional shake of his head.
"Grandfather! Grandfather!" She called out as she rushed up to the Tardis.
"What is it child?" He looked at her.
Catching her breath she stopped in front of him.
"You must help me!" She almost spat out her words, she spoke them so fast. "There’s an injured man down by the pool and if we don't help him he'll die."
"Now wait a minute, child," he said in that patronising/talking down tone he so often had - but she bit down her annoyance.
"But grandfather, he's dying!" She protested.
"Is he a time-traveller like us?"
"No, he's a Jacobite soldier. A man from this time."
"We can't help him then, we can't," he said then started to turn back to the Tardis.
"Grandfather!" She almost shouted at him. "If we leave him he'll die."
He turned back to her, his face now carrying a grave expression.
"Susan, we have to remember the web of time. This man, whoever he is, his fate is to die now. If we help him and save his life we'll be destroying the timeline. He could be mass murderer or someone who by one act brings down the government or a whole world. He could kill someone who would have gone onto greatness. This is his time to die and we have to let him die. This is the responsibility of time travel."
"The Grandfather Paradox" she muttered in reply.
"What did you say?" he asked.
"The Grandfather Paradox, it's about time travel. A man travels back in time and accidentally kills his own grandfather, therefore he doesn’t exist."
"Exactly. That is the responsibility we face." she nodded her head slowly in response to him. "We have to leave that man to die in peace because we can't alter one moment in history, not even one small thing, not even spare one life," he added. "Now, we had better leave."
"Yes," she mumbled a reply.
Meekly, deep inside knowing he was right, she followed him into the Tardis - the doors closing firmly behind her. She simply stood there, just inside the Tardis' doors, and watched him hurriedly setting the controls on the console. Her mood, her heart, her whole being felt heavy and pulled her down. They were just leaving that man to die, to bleed to death on the banks of that pool, and as much as she had wanted to help him and save his life she couldn't, she wasn't able to. She felt so useless. He had been right, of course, the Web of Time was important and they could not afford to break it. All the same, the responsibility was a heavy one.
She felt the TARDIS' floor shudder under her feet, as it began to dematerialise.
The End...
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