Growing Higher (short story)
Growing Higher was the second short story in the Short Trips anthology Short Trips: Zodiac. It was written by Paul Leonard. It featured the Eighth Doctor and Fitz Kreiner.
Summary
Eighty-two-year-old Sewa Singh lives on the Moon with his nineteen year old lover, Bernadette Franklin. Four months ago the artificial world Kuppam was destroyed resulting in the death of more than fifty thousand people. Sewa was responsible for the bearings' quality control and is blamed by the Earth authorities for the deaths.
United Nations officials are dispatched to bring him back to Earth to stand trial. Given his medical conditions, his lifespan would be significantly reduced were he to return to the higher gravity planet. Many lunar colonists believe that Singh is being used as a scapegoat and the trial threatens to spark a civil uprising in the colony.
Rather than let this happen, Singh decides to end his own life by walking on the lunar surface in a space suit with only a limited oxygen supply, committing suicide and avoiding a slow, painful death on Earth. The Doctor and Fitz arrive in the colony before the UN officials, distracting Bernadette for long enough to allow him to carry out his plan.
Characters
Worldbuilding
- Fitz and the Doctor pose as UN officers.
- Kuppam is an artificial world built by the Yamoyata Company.
- Khadri is a tiger reserve orbiting Earth.
- Sewa Singh was born in 2012.
Notes
- There is no reason given for Anji Kapoor and Sam Jones' absence in the story; if Compassion is accompanying them, she is learning to become human on Earth.
- The stories in Short Trips: Zodiac are inspired by the signs of the zodiac. This story's theme is Taurus.
Continuity
- Discreet blue eye-shadow was fashionable for men ten years earlier. (TV: Warriors of the Deep)
