Doctor Who: The Rescue (4 page)

Blinking and coughing, Barbara and Ian stumbled out into the light, their throats rasping with the dust they had stirred up in the tunnel. Screwing up their eyes, they stood on the small plateau at the tunnel mouth and looked out over the deserted arid landscape which stretched far away into the hot hazy distance.

‘It doesn’t look too promising, does it!’ said Barbara, echoing Ian’s words in the TARDIS earlier as she shook the dust off her hair.

Ian leaned over the steep precipice. ‘Look at that!’ he exclaimed. ‘It looks like ruins and some kind of wreckage at the bottom of the cliff’

Barbara held onto his arm and cautiously peered over the edge. The vast silver and black wreck of the
Astra Nine
was awesome, like a gigantic metallic building that had fallen in an earthquake.

‘It must have crashed here,’ Barbara murmured in amazement. ‘I’ve only seen spaceships like that in pictures.’

Ian stared down at the shattered terraces below them.

‘Perhaps it didn’t crash, Barbara. It might have been destroyed on the ground with the buildings.’

‘There’s something printed on the side, Ian.’ Barbara shaded her eyes. ‘But I can’t quite make it out.’ She looked unenthusiastically at the horizon. ‘So it Iooks like Earth after all, I suppose. But when? There’s no sign of life anywhere.’

Ian shrugged. ‘Wherever or whenever we are, there must be people or... or things somewhere around.’ He walked gingerly along the crumbling ledge, trying to see the half-buried ruins more clearly.

‘Are we going to tell the Doctor about the ruins and the wreckage?’

Ian stopped. ‘Yes of course. Why shouldn’t we?’

‘Knowing him, he’ll insist on going down there to investigate,’ Barbara objected.

‘And why not? I’d agree with him for once. If the crew of that wreck are alive down there, surely we should...’

Barbara’s short shrill scream froze the words on Ian’s lips. He swung round, almost overbalancing, and saw her staring in dumb horror at the mouth of the tunnel. Then he gasped in shock as something stirred in the entrance to the cave and the monstrous creature emerged.

In the ruddy light from the sun the apparition looked even more terrible, its talons gleaming like bloodstained scimitars. It stared at the humans in turn, its breath rasping in snatched spasms.

Suddenly it spoke. ‘You are stangers here...’ The croaking voice seemed to come not from its flapping beak but from deep inside its carapace. ‘Where do you belong?

Do you come from Earth?’

Barbara glanced at Ian. He nodded. ‘Yes, we do,’ she said faintly.

The creature swung its nightmare head from side to side and sliced the air with its claws. ‘Then by what means did you travel here? Where is your craft?’

Ian stepped boldly forward and took Barbara’s trembling hand. ‘You must have seen it. It is there in the cave,’ he replied, his voice wobbling with suppressed fear.

The creature paused, its red eyes glowing malevolently.

‘You travelled here in that... that ancient artefact?’

Barbara gripped Ian’s hand tightly. ‘Yes, we did.’ She struggled to sound casual, but her voice quavered. ‘We realise it must sound fantastic, but we have no reason to lie to you.’

Ian gave her hand a congratulatory squeeze.

The alien creature half-turned towards the cave, as if to consider their explanation. Then it swung back to face them. ‘Are you the only personnel, or are there others?’

‘Yes, there’s the Doctor,’ Ian blurted out before Barbara could stop him.

The monster’s head jerked with sudden interest. ‘A doctor?’

Ian gave Barbara an apologetic look. ‘Yes, he’s in the TARDIS,’ he added shamefacedly.

The creature nodded slowly. ‘I must meet this doctor,’ it rasped. ‘I will conduct you all to our citadel.’ It gestured towards the tunnel with a scything motion of its claw.

Barbara and Ian knew they had no choice. Short of hurling themselves over the cliff there was no escape. After a mutual smile of encouragement, they stepped forward obediently.

But the creature raised a talon, barring Barbara’s path.

‘Not you!’ it rasped. ‘You remain here.’

Swallowing her fear, Barbara bravely retreated a step.

‘Don’t worry,’ Ian told her out of the side of his mouth.

‘I shan’t be long.’ Patting her arm, he edged past the grotesquely gesticulating creature and entered the tunnel.

But instead of escorting Ian into the cave, the hideous spectre began to advance on Barbara. She backed away towards the precipice, mesmerised by the flaring red eyes.

‘What is the matter?’ the thing demanded harshly.

‘What are you afraid of?’

Barbara hoped against hope that Ian would have the sense to rush into the cavern and warn the Doctor while the monster was distracted. ‘Keep away from me!’ she gasped, edging ever closer to the gaping drop behind her.

‘I am a friend,’ the thing assured her. ‘You can trust me.’

‘Can I?’ Barbara whimpered in desperation, craning to see if Ian had done as she hoped he would. There was no sign of him in the tunnel entrance.

She was just about to attempt to dive past the grasping talons and make a bid to reach the tunnel herself when the creature suddenly reached out and seized her arm.

Shrieking with terror, Barbara struggled to get free, but the sharp claws cut into her flesh. She recoiled in disgust as she felt the hot stale breath on her face. Relentlessly she was propelled backwards ever closer to the precipice, her assailant’s pustular antennae quivering only centimetres from her cheeks. Powerless to resist, she felt the crumbling lip of the ledge under her heels and the next moment she was flung off the cliff with a savage sweep of the creature’s powerful arm. She fell headlong down the steep scree, her dying scream echoing briefly among the ruins far below.

The creature goggled over the precipice at its brutal handiwork for a moment. Then it turned towards the tunnel entrance with a vicious hiss of satisfaction, raising in its claws a kind of rectangular club about seventy centimetres long. The weapon’s head consisted of a ring of lenses and at the thinner end there was a small control grip with trigger and primer buttons and a liquid crystal sight.

Despite its awkward pincers, the creature seemed able to manipulate the delicate adjustments quite successfully. It directed the lens head at the tunnel mouth and took careful aim with one globular red eye.

The Doctor peered intently at the translucent chunk of rock Ian had given him, his eye hugely enlarged in the lens of the old-fashioned brass-handled magnifying glass. From time to time he consulted a dog-eared notebook on the control pedestal beside him, nodding and muttering to himself as he compared the specimen with the data scrawled untidily in the book. Eventually he shook his head in frustration at the barely decipherable notes.

Plonking the magnifying glass on the control panel, he delved into his coat pocket and unearthed a pair of halfmoon spectacles. He slipped them onto the end of his nose and tried again. But it was no better. Clicking his tongue with irritation he snatched off the spectacles, picked up the magnifying glass again and held the notebook at arm’s length, screwing up his eyes into tiny points.

Still unsuccessful, the Doctor stuck the spectacles back on his nose and peered through the magnifying glass as well, moving the notebook to and fro in a vain attempt to decode his own atrocious handwriting. Finally, with an exasperated sigh he flung the lot onto the control pedestal.

‘My handwriting gets worse and worse...’ he complained to the empty TARDIS, massaging his tired eyes behind the spectacles, his nostrils flaring with annoyance. He mooched around the pedestal several times, his head bowed, fiddling with the fob of his watch chain. Then he stopped and squared his shoulders resolutely.

‘I really must stop moping about Susan!’ he told himself sternly.

He picked up the chunk of rock and studied it for a long time. At last he put it down carefully on the control panel, his mind made up. ‘Not a shred of doubt,’ he announced to the deserted chamber. ‘We have materialised on the planet Dido... Thirteenth planet in the rotating binary star system Proxima Gemini in the Galaxy Moore Eleven, Subcluster Tel... Remarkable! I’m so looking forward to meeting these friendly, civilised creatures again after so many years.’

The Doctor stood staring up at the murky image on the monitor screen. Then he sighed ruefully. ‘I do not imagine there is any point in my telling Chesterton that I brought them here intentionally,’ he mused. ‘No, no, no, of course not. I was fast asleep, was I not? Pity.’ Brushing his dusty hands carelessly on his lapels, the Doctor took off his spectacles and slipped them into his pocket together with the notebook.

He was just about to settle himself in the armchair for a peaceful nap when there was a sudden frantic hammering on the door. Glancing at the screen, the Doctor saw Ian’s pale and frightened face distorted into a bulbous mask.

‘Doctor... Doctor... For heaven’s sake open the door!’

Ian yelled, his eyes huge with panic.

‘I wonder what he’s done with young Barbara...’ the Doctor muttered hurrying to the controls and operating the door switch.

All at once the TARDIS shook violently and then rocked drunkenly from side to side. The Doctor winced as he heard the thump of falling rocks bouncing off the frail wooden structure. The image on the scanner screen was obliterated as a storm of sand and dust erupted in the cavern. Next moment the sound of a massive explosion flung open the door and sent a whirlwind of sand and splintered rock into the chamber. The Doctor clung to the control pedestal, more out of concern for his precious machine than for his own safety, until the police box finally settled back onto an even keel.

Coughing and choking, he staggered to the door and tried to see through the swirling dust. ‘Chesterton? Where are you? Are you all right? I can’t see a thing!’ he spluttered, shaking his head to try and stop the awful ringing in his partially deafened ears.

There was no reply: only the clatter of crumbling rock and the trickling rain of settling sand all around.

The Doctor ran back inside, rummaged behind a panel in the wall and unearthed a powerful torch. He returned and, guided by its intense beam, he began to search the area around the police box, kicking in feeble desperation at the fallen rock scattered everywhere and calling Ian’s name over and over again. Eventually the torchbeam picked out Ian’s spreadeagled body lying among boulders against the far wall of the cavern.

The Doctor scrambled over. ‘Chesterton! What happened? Are you all right?’ he gabbled anxiously, kneeling beside the motionless figure half-buried under the debris.

Ian opened his eyes and then groggily struggled into a sitting position. ‘Barbara...’ he croaked weakly, cradling his aching head in his hands.

‘Where is she?’ cried the Doctor, directing the torchbeam around the partly demolished cave.

Ian painfully extricated his legs from underneath the stones and tried to remember. ‘She... she was outside... on the cliff...’ he mumbled, still dazed and shocked.

The Doctor helped him to his feet. ‘As soon as you have got your breath back, we shall go and find her,’ he said, dusting off Ian’s jacket. ‘The whole roof seems to have collapsed over there...’

Ian stared along the torchbeam at the impenetrable wall of fallen rock. ‘It’s completely blocked the tunnel, Doctor!’

he gasped, clasping the Doctor’s sleeve. ‘I’m afraid Barbara’s been...’ He winced with pain and tried to relax his wrenched spine.

‘I hope there will not be any further falls,’ the Doctor muttered grimly, turning to glance at the battered police box. ‘I fear the TARDIS could not stand up to too much more of this sort of treatment.’

‘I don’t think
I
could either,’ Ian complained bitterly, trying to gather his shattered wits. ‘Listen, Doctor, I don’t think this was an accident.’

The Doctor shone the torch in Ian’s face and peered at him anxiously, unsure of the young man’s state of mind.

‘Not an accident? What on Earth do you mean?’

Ian clung to the Doctor’s arm for support and struggled to collect his thoughts. ‘Well, there was this... outside the cave we met this... it came up behind us...’ he mumbled helplessly.

‘
It
came up behind you? What came up behind you?’

demanded the Doctor impatiently.

‘This thing... It was horrible... Hideous... With a face like one of those Aztec mask things... But it was alive... It spoke to us...’

The Doctor nodded mysteriously to himself. ‘With red eyes and talons and sabre fangs...’

Ian nodded eagerly. Then he stared wide-eyed at the Doctor. ‘Yes, but how did you know?’

The Doctor smiled. ‘This is the planet Dido, Chesterton. I have been here before. In fact, I know it quite well. The inhabitants are extremely hospitable.’

Ian looked aghast. ‘
Hospitable!
Well, this thing certainly wasn’t at all hospitable! It ordered me to come and fetch you while it forced poor Barbara to stay outside...’ he protested, his words falling over one another as his memory grew clearer. ‘Then when I came into the cave there was this terrific bang and the tunnel collapsed behind me..

Thoughtfully the Doctor shone the torch slowly round the cave, while Ian, finding his strength gradually returning, staggered across to the huge mound of debris brought down by the explosion and started trying to shift the rocks blocking the tunnel. But after only a few seconds’

breathless struggle, he collapsed exhaused.

‘It’s no good, we shall have to find another way out of here,’ the Doctor told him, still shining the torch around the walls. ‘Assuming, of course, that there is one,’ he added pessimistically. ‘This figure who accosted you, Chesterton, was it armed?’ The Doctor suddenly inquired.

Ian thought for a moment. But even thinking proved painful. ‘I... I don’t think so... Oh yes, Doctor...’ Ian held up his hands. ‘It was carrying a sort of club thing with crystals or something at the end... It was about this long.’

The Doctor compressed his lips and nodded. ‘That could account for it,’ he muttered with a preoccupied air.