A HIGHWAY OF DEMONS - Chapter Five

If you're not a fan of Doctor Who, Dylan, Buddy Holly or Don McLean look away. Likewise if you didn't go to Melbourne or Monash Universities in the '60's or '70's. It was fifty years ago that the music died and by the way, this is fiction.

A HIGHWAY OF DEMONS by Whispering Jack

CHAPTER FIVE - THE DAY THE MUSIC DIED

"A long, long time ago...

I can still remember how

That music used to make me smile.

And I knew if I had my chance,

That I could make those people dance,

And maybe they'd be happy for a while"

- Don McLean (American Pie)

The Tardis screeched and squealed as it always did when making landfall. Then came a dull thud and the Doctor made his simple announcement: "We are back on earth."

The Brigadier, Romana and K9 were still on Tralfamadore with Billy Pilgrim, mopping up some unresolved issues from our last adventure when the Doctor had suddenly taken ill and left us in fear that he was suffering a mortal injury. But instead of dying, he regenerated; the Doctor's body rebuilt itself in a younger, healthier form so that he now had long, shaggy hair and, for some reason, sported a multi-coloured scarf.

The renewed timelord wanted to fulfill a promise made long ago to teach me how better to understand Newton's laws of gravity. He often reminded me that "it's not all about apples falling off trees." Now I would learn what it was really all about!

He kept another promise on this voyage, allowing me to be the first out of the Tardis after landing. The honour of reconnoitering the surrounds of this strange place was a dubious one, however, as I soon discovered. Out in the open and exposed to the bitter cold of a fierce storm, heavy drifts of white snow were banking against the blue telephone box exterior of the Tardis. It sat silently in a narrow lane behind a brown-brick building bearing the ominous title, "The Duluth National Guard Armory". I stood there shaking as a sheet of newspaper blew across the cobble-stones. It landed at my feet and I bent down to grab it.

Leaning towards the glow of a lamp post, I read the news headlines of the day. The words and the stories were of little interest and had little impact on me but I was able to return to the Tardis and report that we were in Duluth, Minnesota and that the date was 31 January, 1959.

"Good, there's not a moment to lose. We're going out there!" said the Doctor.

The winds were still howling across Duluth's wide streets, carrying frozen sheets of snow and ice from the surface of Lake Superior. It was a terrible night to be out in the open but fortunately only a short distance separated us from our destination, the armory where we went not to secure arms for some forthcoming battle but to attend a rock concert!

The billboard outside announced that tonight was the night of the arrival of the "The Winter Dance Party". This package tour of the American Midwest was headlined by Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, The Big Bopper, Dion and the Belmonts and Frankie Sardo. We bought tickets and were ushered to seats which turned out to be surprisingly close to the front of stage. I sat next to a young man slightly older than me and I experienced a shiver of recognition when he introduced himself with a "Hi, I'm Bobby."

"Couldn't possibly be", I thought as I looked at his face for a second time, but I had learned never to be surprised at anything in the Doctor's presence. Not even the thought of being in a makeshift theatre in regional America sitting next to a pimply faced youth who was smoking funny cigarettes, contemplating his future and making eye contact with one Buddy Holly singing "I Guess It Doesn't Matter Any More".

After all, Holly had died more than five years ago.

Then again, I was no longer living in the present and I guess it really all didn't matter any more.

"Do you remember baby, last September …"

My thoughts went back to that September. If we were really back in January 1959, then last September was one of the worst months of my short life. My football team lost a grand final it should never have lost in September 1958 after finishing on top of the ladder. What made it even worse was that the defeat came at the hands of the dreaded enemy. Collingwood prevented my team, Melbourne, from equalling their record of four premierships in a row and I hated them more than the Daleks who were the worst enemies of all human kind.

September 1958 was also a time when the family moved to a place across the other side of town and I said goodbye to many old friends who I was unlikely ever to see again. Not long after we made the move, I tried to go back but I was too young and it was too far.

I was thinking aloud as the reality struck me that way back then, things were exacty as they stood right now: I had no direction home.

"Man that's a great line," said Bobby. "Can I use it in one of my songs?"

"Be my guest."

It was still early when the show ended so we went to the local bowling alley with Bobby in tow and were putting on our bowling shoes when the man walked up to our lane and asked, "Mind if I join you?"

Bobby and I froze but the Doctor looked straight into the eyes of the man in the familiar black horn-rimmed glasses who still had on the tuxedo that he wore for the show.

"I've been expecting you. Even picked out some size 8 shoes for you. Try them on, they should fit perfectly."

"How does he do it?" I asked myself. But I answered my own question with the all-embracing logic that he is the Doctor and a Timelord and that was enough.

I was a reasonable, bowler having played on the school team, but Bobby simply had no idea at all. I figured that even if he wasn't half-stoned, he would be pushing it to score one hundred on a good day. But in any event, he was more preoccupied with the auburn haired girl who sat down beside him. Sweet as apple pie, she was soon sharing his hand-rolled cigarettes and cheerleading on the sidelines – even when his ball invariably skewed out of the lane. Bobby just treated it all as a joke and giggled; he was our jester.

The competition between the Doctor and our musician friend was intense and the game reached the stage where Bobby and I were largely irrelevant. A crowd gathered to watch every thrust and parry of the contest as the lead see-sawed in a true battle of fluctuating fortunes.

Finally, it came down to the last frame and the man in the horn-rimmed glasses needed three strikes to win the game. The first two balls were right on target and each time the pins were sent skittling in ten different directions.

An expectant hush descended on the crowd as he prepared to deliver the final blow. Bobby had just rolled another one when the man in the black horn-rimmed glasses grabbed it from his hands and sucked in deeply, filling his lungs to their maximum capacity. He stepped forward casually to bowl the last ball of the night.

It swung ever so gracefully from his left hand across the lane and appeared to be heading for the oblivion of the gutter but, suddenly, it swung back with precision in a slow arc as it hit the mark. Nine pins went down and the other wobbled uncertainly. The bowler nervously adjusted his glasses and the crowd froze as the final pin toppled to ground, followed by the cheers.

Buddy had just scored his third strike.

Pandemonium broke out as legs and fists started flying everywhere. I heard The Doctor scream, "We've got you now Davros", and the next thing I saw was the bulky presence of Brigadier Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, head of UNIT holding Buddy/Davros in a hammer lock and leading him out through a side exit to the boos of the large throng of confused onlookers.

The dark swarthy man named Dmitri (or something like that) who assisted the Brigadier thanked the Doctor most profusely and left shaken but relieved after the Timelord uttered his reassuring words.

"Your secret's safe with us. The world will never find out about Buddy's third strike!"

The rest of us remained in shock as we drank our coffees in a nearby diner. Bobby was getting along well with the auburn haired girl and the Doctor waited for them to say their goodbyes before offering his explanation of the night's events.

Bobby thanked me again for finding him that line for his song, we shook hands and he and the girl from the north country drifted off arm in arm covered in soft snowflakes.

The Doctor explained that Davros was the megalomaniac scientist who created the Daleks and he was using them to become the supreme ruler of the universe. His plan was to create a drug culture among the youth of the world by sending subliminal messages through the songs of popular entertainers. Earlier in the day, he and his Dalek lieutenants abducted the leading performers of The Winter Dance Party, took on their persona and then performed on stage in their place.

The Doctor had learned that there was a plot brewing while recuperating on Tralfamadore. He secretly took the Brigadier along on the Tardis for insurance and it was Lethbridge-Stewart who found the real Buddy Holly, along with Valens and the Big Bopper, bound and gagged but alive and well in a back room at the armory.

"But what made you certain that it was a fake Buddy you were playing with at the bowling alley?"

"Davros was horribly scarred and crippled after an explosion on his planet, Skaro. He had a robotic "eye" mounted on his forehead and only one functioning arm. During the concert when we made eye contact, I immediately sensed something artificial. It unnerved me a little and you might have noticed at one time that my hands were clenched in fists of rage but I quickly settled down.

"My suspicious were all confirmed when he bowled with his left arm. The real Buddy is right handed but Davros bowled with his left and it was that unusual ball movement from left to right that finally gave him away. That, and the fact that he was terribly off key while singing That'll be the Day."

The story didn't end there. Two days later, as The Doctor was preparing for our return trip to collect Romana and K9, he received word that Davros and his Dalek cohorts had escaped from custody. He rummaged around in his toolbox and found the newspaper I had brought into the Tardis when we had first arrived in Duluth. Although he was a Timelord and always aware of the correct time, the Doctor looked down at his watch and thought for a nanosecond.

"Good, they're appearing in a few hours time at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. There's not a second to be lost. Where's the Brigadier?"

Not everything went according to plan. A malfunction in the timegears meant we missed the concert by a good few hours. Then the Tardis overshot Clear Lake and we landed in the middle of some godforsaken wilderness during yet another massive snowstorm. The Doctor was, as usual, unperturbed as he trained his itelescope™ skywards and fixed on a small moving light in the heavens.

"There it is. Take a look up there!"

The screen on the scope revealed an impossible sight. What appeared to be a four-seater Beechcraft Bonanza was cruising at eight miles. I was stunned.

"A plane that small and light couldn't possibly be travelling at such an altitude!" I stammered.

"Son, think carefully. Our own Tardis looks like a British telephone box but in truth, it's a highly sophisticated intergalactic time and space transport vehicle. Davros' getaway vehicle is much the same thing." He paused and added, "Now, the time and the co-ordinates are just right. I'm going to take a pot shot."

He pointed his sonic screwdriver in the direction of the light and pressed the starter button.

There was a brief flash and, in the afterglow, the light disappeared.

"Eight miles high and falling fast."

"And that ..." he added, "is what Newton's Laws of Gravity are all about!"

An apple for the teacher.

The following day's newspapers carried the story of how a Beechcraft Bonanza, chartered in Mason City, Iowa had crashed, instantly killing the pilot and three much admired musicians, Buddy Holly (aged twenty-two), Ritchie Valens (seventeen) and J. P. Richardson (twenty-four), who was also called the Big Bopper.

The true story was very much different. For their own safety the real musicians were taken that night on the last train to the coast by the Brigadier to a secret sanctuary where they entered the UNIT Protective Custody Scheme. They and their families have remained hidden in this place where they have been free to sing, write and record their songs until the mandatory period of fifty years elapses at which time they can be safely released.

But for the sake of the world, on that day the music had to die.

"So ... Bye bye Miss American Pie,

Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry

Them good ole boys were drinkin' whiskey and rye

Singing "This'll be the day that I die,

This'll be the day that I die.""