Free Doctor Who: Bad Therapy by Matthew Jones

French – if he kept his head down they’d never find him. He could just hide for ever. With Eddy gone, there wasn’t anything left to stay for. Nothing left to protect.
    Jack swallowed. How had this happened to him? How had his life become so screwed up?
    It’s too late for thoughts like that, Jack Bartlett, he told himself. Far too late.
    But there was something nagging at him. Something that the Doctor had said before he’d left. A something that was preventing him from climbing out of the window, down the fire escape and getting away. It was after the Doctor had told him that Eddy was dead. The Doctor had sat beside him, placed a hand on his shoulder.
    ‘We can stop them, you know,’ the little man had said. ‘The people who killed your friend. The people who killed Eddy. You and I, together, are quite a match for all their bullying and wickedness. But I can’t do it alone or perhaps I’m not willing to. You’ll have to help me.’ And then the Doctor had gone. ‘A quick reconnaissance,’ he’d said. ‘Won’t be long.’
    The idea was ridiculous. How could the two of them stop the blackmailers?
    How could he and the Doctor catch Eddy’s murderer alone? It was a stupid, impossible idea. But something about the quiet in the Doctor’s voice had appealed deeply to him. He’d felt his racing heartbeat slow as he’d listened to the Doctor’s gentle Scots burr, almost hypnotized by its comforting softness.
    And he had felt hope, for the first time since that terrible day when the blackmailer’s first letter had fallen on his mat. He’d felt that maybe he could do something after all.
    No. It was too dangerous. His plan was better. Safer. He’d walk into town 39
     
    tonight and then hitchhike to the coast. He felt better after having made the decision. It stirred him into action. He pulled on his donkey jacket, swung his bag on to his shoulder and, after whispering goodbye to the room which had been his home for the last year, pulled back the curtain and reached for the window catch.
    Jack froze when he saw the face grinning, goofishly, back at him through the glass, feeling as if he’d been caught in some terrible act. The Doctor was standing on the fire escape, gesturing excitedly at Jack through the glass. Jack turned slightly to hide the incriminating duffel bag on his shoulder from view as he pulled up the window.
    ‘I’ve tracked our elderly friend to his lair,’ the Doctor said, his words tumbling out chaotically in his enthusiasm to share his news. ‘A nightclub in Soho.
    Does the name “Ritzys” mean anything to you?’
    Jack shook his head. ‘That’s great,’ he said, trying to sound as if he meant it.
    The Doctor must have heard the uncertainty in his voice. He paused for a moment, and then caught sight of the bulging bag on Jack’s shoulder.
    ‘If you’re still interested, that is?’
    The roof of Ritzys nightclub was long and flat, its surface broken only by small skylights which protruded turret-like from its surface. The sound of a band playing skittle tunes on the dancefloor down below reverberated through the roof. Jack could feel the beat through the soles of his shoes.
    He pulled his jacket tightly around himself: the roof offered no protection from the rain which had begun to fall in earnest. What was he doing here?
    He must be out of his mind.
    If the Doctor felt the rain he didn’t show it. Jack watched from the edge of the roof as the little man scampered between the skylights, peering into each for a moment only to move on to the next. When he’d evidently found what he was looking for, he called Jack over.
    The skylight looked down on to an office at the back of the club. Through the glass Jack caught sight of the old man who had visited him earlier in the evening. He was standing in front of a desk, behind which sat a young man with a crew cut, wearing a sharp, black suit. Their voices were raised in anger, but the beat of music below and the rhythm of the rain on