Doctor Who: The Enemy of the World (11 page)

One glance at Victoria’s face convinced Jamie that he had no choice but to talk—to tell Benik exactly what he wanted to hear. But as he opened his mouth to speak, Salamander walked into the room followed by Donald Bruce. They almost tripped over the semi-conscious guard lying across the threshold.

The Deputy swallowed his surprise in a flash and released Victoria with a furtive shove. ‘I was not informed that you had left the Sanctum, Leader,’ he muttered, glancing resentfully at Donald Bruce and then looking Salamander up and down with a puzzled frown.

‘I had a shower and slipped into something more relaxing,’ Salamander replied quickly, with a glare that put Benik firmly in his place. He turned and surveyed the prisoners with narrowed eyes, his white teeth flashing behind his curling lips. ‘And what have they confessed to so far?’

Benik tried not to look at Bruce’s grimly contemptuous face behind Salamander’s back. ‘Nothing yet, Leader,’ he admitted at last.

‘Nothing?’ Salamander exclaimed. He waved Benik away. ‘You are wasting time. Bruce and I will take over.’

Benik stood motionless a moment, almost visibly curling up with disappointment. Then he thrust his pistol away and walked to the door.

‘And take your puppy dog with you!’ Salamander flung over his shoulder.

Benik helped the dazed guard to his feet. ‘But Leader, you should have protection,’ he protested.

The Security Commissioner shook his head and gave Benik a faint smile as he took out his own pistol and levelled it at the two prisoners.

When the white-faced Benik had dragged the stumbling guard out of the room, Salamander turned to Jamie. ‘And now Señor McCrimmon...’

‘We’ve nothing to tell ye,’ Jamie snapped defiantly, to Victoria’s horror. She could not see how they could avoid a full confession now.

‘Is that the way to greet an old friend,’ the Doctor asked gently, his cynical smile changing abruptly into a mischievous grin.

The shock of hearing the Doctor’s familiar voice and of seeing Salamander’s cruel glint transformed as if by magic into the familiar impish twinkle, made Victoria jump back in alarm. Then she flung her arms round him and hugged him with affectionate relief. ‘Doctor, you’re a genius!’ she cried, laughing.

Jamie thumped the Doctor heartily on the back, smiling with delight and shaking his head in admiration.

The Doctor wagged a cautionary finger and put on his Salamander expression. ‘Take care, Lieutenant McCrimmon!’ he snarled.

Donald Bruce had been watching these antics with an impatient frown. ‘Doctor, this is getting us nowhere,’ he complained.

The Doctor looked hurt. ‘I do not agree. You must admit you’ve just witnessed most convincing proof of my ability to impersonate Salamander,’ he retorted indignantly.

The World Security Commissioner nodded exasperatedly. ‘Yes, yes, Doctor. But please do let’s get on with what we came here to do. We don’t have much time.’

At that moment Theodore Benik was storming into the Security Control Room on the other side of the Administration Block. ‘Why was I not informed that the Leader had left the Sanctum?’ he demanded, his eyes blazing at the duty officer.

The officer glanced at his security systems display. ‘The Leader is still inside the Sanctum, sir. The electrolocks are still engaged,’ he reported, looking puzzled.

‘Impossible. You must have a fault here,’ Benik snapped, leaning over and jabbing a series of touch-buttons.

The officer checked his display once more. ‘I assure you that the Leader has not left the Sanctum, sir,’ he insisted, turning to Benik almost apologetically.

But the Deputy Director had gone. He was hurrying along the anonymous concrete corridors towards the Sanctum. When he reached it, he tried the access switches.

Nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing. The heavy shutters remained sealed.

Benik turned and stared down the corridor in the direction of the Behaviour Analysis Unit where he had left Salamander not five minutes previously. Something odd was going on and Benik was determined to find out what it was.

Salamander stopped the capsule halfway up the shaft between the underground Control Suite and the Sanctum on the surface. Moving clumsily in his protective suit, he opened the shield and led Swann out into a steeply sloping tunnel dimly lit by a string of naked bulbs slung along the roof. A warm breeze blew down the roughly hewn tunnel, and Swann gazed along it expectantly.

‘Where does it lead to?’ he asked eagerly.

‘Into a ruined building on the surface,’ Salamander told him. ‘I assemble the supplies up there and then they come down on the conveyor.’

‘The surface!’ Swann cried excitedly, starting to scramble hastily up the scree-strewn slope.

Salamander grabbed his arm. ‘Wait. Not that way. ‘This way is much safer,’ he said soothingly, steering Swann towards a dark, narrow gully leading off the main tunnel opposite the capsule.

Swann allowed himself to be pushed through the niche into a deep, unlit cave scattered with splinters of rock and huge boulders. He stumbled uncertainly forward towards the slit of light ahead of them. A warm, sweet-scented wind suddenly flooded the gully and Swann soon found himself standing blinking in the strong sunlight at the entrance to the cave.

For several seconds he was speechless, shading his eyes and staring at the brilliant blue sky and at the bright leaves of the vegetation covering the slopes of the ravine below them.

Then he turned to his guide, his face alive with ecstasy.

‘It’s beautiful! It’s so beautiful,’ he murmured. ‘I had almost forgotten. The sky... the trees down there...’ He stared across at the miraculous panorama shimmering in the heat beyond the ravine. ‘You could have brought the others this far, just to see,’ he said quietly, his eyes lost in the landscape.

Behind him Salamander shook his head. ‘You forget Swann, one or two did come in the past. But they succumbed to the contamination. Already you have been here too long without protection.’

Swann walked a few paces to the edge of the ravine as if mesmerised. ‘But everything looks just as it used to,’ he exclaimed. ‘Where are the mutations you talked of? The sky is so clear. You spoke of the dust belts, the darkness at noon...’

Unseen, Salamander had picked up a sharp sliver of flint. ‘You are taking a terrible risk coming out here like this, my friend,’ he murmured, raising the crude weapon high over the back of Swarm’s head. ‘But I did my best to warn you.’

Just too late Swann turned, and the savage blow sliced into his skull, sending him reeling with his hair rapidly filling with blood. His piercing scream echoed through the cavern and the tunnel for several seconds as he fell back onto his back, staring up into the azure sky with the hot sun beating relentlessly into his strangely smiling face.

Tears welled out of his eyes and ran, mingling with his blood, in streams onto the dry ground.

After a while his head moved slowly from side to side as his lips worked in agonised desperation to form words.

‘Nothing... ‘ he breathed hoarsely, his entire body shaken by convulsive sobs. ‘Nothing’s changed... ‘

In the bottom of the ravine the WZO police officer guarding Giles Kent and Astrid Ferrier had taken up his position outside the motor caravan to give himself a better chance of stopping any surprise move by the two hostages.

Inside, Giles was moving about agitatedly like a penned animal while Astrid watched him calmly.

‘I have to get in there, Astrid!’ he muttered. ‘This is our one chance and we can’t risk Bruce bungling things.’

Astrid shook her head firmly. ‘No, Giles. We can’t risk losing Bruce’s confidence by breaking the agreement. At least he’s agreed to investigate.’

Giles gave a short cynical laugh. ‘That great elephant wouldn’t recognise evidence if it was staring him in the face.’ He seized Astrid by the shoulders and almost shook her. ‘Look, if I was in there, I could lead them straight to the nitty gritty,’ he said, his jaw clenched with frustration.

Astrid stared back at him impassively. Eventually she spoke. ‘If I distracted the guard, it might give you say fifteen minutes to reach the fence,’ she murmured.

Kent hugged her. ‘Good girl. Just take care of our friend outside for a few minutes and leave the rest to me,’ he said.

Astrid thought for a moment and then began rummaging among the remains of the provisions which still lay in a jumbled heap in the locker. ‘I’m ready, Giles,’

she said, brandishing a bottle of tomato ketchup which had survived the attack by Benik’s guard earlier.

A few minutes afterwards Giles Kent was lying face down on one of the divans, his body spread-eagled and motionless. His hands and shirtsleeves were mottled with vivid red droplets.

Astrid leaned over him and smashed one of the windows with a sharp blow of the bottle. Then she let out a long, terrifying scream as she carefully replaced the bottle in the locker. The caravan door was wrenched open and the police officer sprang inside, vizor down and machine pistol levelled. ‘What happened?’ the officer shouted, keeping his distance. ‘What happened?’

Astrid pointed to the shattered window, gibbering and moaning hysterically, ‘Shot... someone shot... through the window,’ she stuttered.

The officer glanced up at the shattered pane and then cautiously approached the body, keeping his eyes and the gun on Astrid. He turned Kent over and winced at the large red stain covering the whole of the left side of Giles’s shirt-front. The victim’s staring eyes told him all he needed to know. Gently he lowered the body back onto the divan and watched the chest for a few seconds.

‘Looks like he’s a goner, but there might be a pulse,’ he said, turning. ‘If you’ve got a...’

But the caravan was empty. Astrid had disappeared.

Throwing himself through the doorway just in time to see something moving through the edge of the undergrowth, the officer fired several long bursts from his pistol. Then, with a vicious curse, he set off in pursuit, firing volley after volley as he scrambled through the dense foliage.

When it was quiet Giles leapt to his feet and quickly went to look outside. Wiping as much of the red sauce off his shirt as he could, he washed his hands and then pulled on his tunic, buttoning it to the throat to hide the stains.

He picked up Astrid’s bag and found her small automatic still inside it. Slipping it into his tunic, he went to the door and glanced around once again just to be sure.

With a smile of grim determination on his haggard face, he set off in the direction of the Kanowa Research Centre.

He knew that time was desperately short and that he was about to take the biggest gamble of his life.

Astrid struggled up the scrub-covered hillside higher up the ravine, her lungs bursting and her throat feeling like sandpaper in the heat. She had taken care not to get too far ahead of her pursuer in case he gave up the chase and returned to the caravan before Giles could make his breakaway. She glanced at her watch. Ten minutes. Giles should have got the start he needed.

Above and to one side of her she saw the black slit of a narrow cave entrace. Dragging herself over the crumbling scree towards it, she suddenly heard a pitiful croaking voice crying out, ‘Somebody, please... please help me...’

Reaching the cave, she found the crooked, writhing body of an elderly man dressed in blood-spattered white overalls trying to drag himself aimlessly across the baking hot ground. ‘Who did this to you?’ she whispered, shocked and angry.

Swann tried to speak, but no sound seemed to come.

Astrid put her ear next to his swollen lips. ‘Sal...a... mand...’

he breathed. Swann clutched her arm and tried to turn his head towards the interior of the cave. ‘There... in there...’

he gasped faintly.

Astrid peered into the darkness. ‘Salamander is in there?’ she murmured doubtfully.

Swann nodded slowly with agonising moans. Suddenly he threw up his arms and tried to push her away from him.

‘You... you are danger... radiation...’ he croaked, staring at her in frightened bewilderment, the sweat pouring down his filthy, bloodstained face.

As gently as she could, Astrid lifted him under the arms and pulled him into the shade. ‘Don’t be afraid. I’m going to find water for you,’ she murmured, knowing full well that there was no chance of finding any, nor of saving the mortally injured man.

‘The others,’ he cried. ‘You must help the others...’

‘What others?’ Astrid asked. ‘I do want to help you. Just tell me.’

‘You must bring them up,’ Swann pleaded. ‘Prisoners.

Salamander kept us prisoners. Down there.’ With a final surge of strength, Swann seized Astrid’s sleeve. ‘Swear it, please,’ he cried, ‘swear it.’

Swann’s words echoed round the cave long after his body had slumped against her, dead. She felt for his pulse and then passed her hand over his hideously staring eyes to close them for ever, before gently laying him onto the rocky floor.

‘I swear it,’ she murmured. Tense with the conviction that she was about to discover the vital evidence against Salamander for which she and Giles had searched for so long, Astrid ventured cautiously into the enemy’s secret empire underground...

In the Behaviour Analysis Unit the Doctor was sitting hunched deep in thought on the edge of a bench. He had considered carefully all the information which Jamie and Victoria had just poured out concerning their experiences in the Central European Zone, and he had given his assessment of the evidence to Donald Bruce.

The Security Commissioner’s simmering disbelief finally boiled over. ‘Are you trying to tell me that Salamander has been attacking selected areas of the world by causing natural disasters artificially—and that he’s been doing it from here?’ he cried, controlling his urge to laugh in the Doctor’s face. ‘It’s preposterous.’

‘I believe it is quite possible, Bruce. If we can penetrate the Sanctum I think we shall find proof,’ the Doctor replied, getting up and walking round the laboratory, whistling quietly to himself.

At that moment the door opened and Benik hurried in carrying a large sheaf of documents. Bruce immediately launched into a tough barrage of questions directed at Jamie and Victoria, as if he were in the middle of interrogating them.