The scale of the elegant and complex structure was breathtaking. The crater contained an entire city, a fantastic city of the most sophisticated design and engineering. But it was a dead city too. Totally deserted and dark. The structures were scarred and broken and decaying and the elegant bridges buckled and collapsing.
The floor of the crater was strewn with debris and abandoned machinery. It was a sad monument to a once glorious community.
‘I never guessed that anything like this was here...’ Vicki murmured, her eyes glistening as she gazed up at the miraculous constructions silhouetted against the sky.
Barbara’s lips parted in wonder and she clasped Ian’s hand. ‘It’s beautiful,’ she whispered.
Ian marvelled at the advanced techniques used in the design of the graceful bridges overhead. ‘All this couldn’t have been built by Koquillion’s mob!’ he said. ‘Monsters like that couldn’t have created this.’
Barbara shook her head in agreement. ‘Perhaps those silver creatures built it.’
‘Talk of the devil!’ Ian exclaimed, catching their arms.
‘Look up there.’
Almost directly above them, two silver figures were striding along one of the rings of terracing connected by the spiral highway about half-way up the side of the crater.
‘They seem to be carrying something,’ said Vicki warily.
They watched in silence as the two gleaming creatures turned through an impressive-looking entrance on the terrace and disappeared into the mountain.
‘Come on, let’s follow them!’ Ian suggested. ‘If those things did build all this stuff they must be highly intelligent and civilised creatures. And anyway, there must be a way through from the tunnel by the wreck if they’ve come out up there. Perhaps we can find the TARDIS that way!’
‘Assuming that those are the same silver things we saw before, of course,’ Barbara pointed out. ‘Still, it’s definitely worth a try. And I’d rather try my luck with them than with that overgrown garden worm back there!’
Vicki held back, looking frightened. ‘But we know nothing about the silver things,’ she objected. ‘Except that they killed all of us except for Bennett and me.’
‘But you told us that Koquillion said that
his
people were responsible,’ Ian reminded her impatiently. ‘Surely you aren’t suggesting that the silver things have anything to do with Koquillion?’
Vicki buried her face in her hands, overcome by confusion and grief at the loss of her father and of the other personnel from
Astra Nine
.
Ian put his arm round her shoulders. ‘Come on, Vicki,’
he murmured gently. ‘You’ll be quite safe with us.’ He led the way up the spiral road, keeping his arm round Vicki to prevent her from running away a second time. He knew that they had no hope of catching up with the mysterious aliens, nor of shadowing them at close quarters, but there was just a chance that their appearance up on the terrace would give a clue as to the route back to the cavern and the TARDIS.
After an exhausting climb up the sloping highway they reached the level on which the figures had disappeared into the ruined entrance. But it took them quite some time to retrace their steps along the terrace to the point above the end of the ramp where the huge doors – which had toppled out of their frames – lay balanced precariously against one another like collapsed playing cards. The doors seemed much older than the rest of the structure as if an ancient temple or ceremonial entrance had been incorporated into the much more recent and highly developed architecture. Venturing gingerly inside, they found themselves in a large tunnel lined with massive slabs of smooth jade-coloured stone which emitted a pale emerald light all around them.
‘I hope this stuff isn’t as radioactive as it looks!’ Ian exclaimed, instinctively keeping to the centre of the long polished rectangular corridor.
‘It reminds me of those greenish numbers on the dials of luminous clocks,’ Barbara said, taking Vicki’s hand in an attempt to reassure their nervous companion.
All the way along the corridor were doors leading off, but all of them were sealed tight shut, with no visible means of opening the smooth metal panels flush with the walls. Eventually they came to a large drum-shaped lobby with several tunnels branching off. All but one of them were blocked by heavy metal shutters.
Ian turned to the others. ‘Well, we don’t have much choice I’m afraid,’ he said, setting off across the circular plaza and into the single open tunnel.
This passageway was not so brightly illuminated as the long entrance corridor and it soon deteriorated into a crude dusty tunnel through the bare rock, with a treacherously uneven sand floor along which they stumbled more and more blindly. Here there did not seem to be any veins of fluorescent material to give a little light. The tunnel grew narrower and narrower and began twisting and turning madly. Then it would abruptly widen out into a small cavern before narrowing again into little more than a mere crevice.
Ian stopped. ‘This doesn’t seem to have been such a good idea after all,’ he apologised in a disheartened voice. ‘I think perhaps we should go back... and try again.’
Vicki clutched his sleeve in the darkness. ‘There is some... some sort of light... There...!’ she whispered.
Ian and Barbara looked all around them, straining to see.
‘Where?’ Ian whispered. ‘Can you see anything, Barbara?’
‘No.’
‘
There
!’ Vicki’s disembodied voice insisted. ‘By your feet.’
Ian and Barbara looked down. A faint yellow light was flashing on and off in a long thin line.
‘It must be a crack!’ Barbara exclaimed excitedly. ‘And that looks like the TARDIS’s beacon!’ She knelt down and put her eye to the narrow fissure. ‘It
is
the TARDIS, I can see it!’
With renewed enthusiasm, Ian and Barbara led the bewildered Vicki further along the crevice and the flashing light grew stronger at every step. At last they reached a tortuous section of tunnel where it simply disintegrated into a mound of rubble and they found themselves staggering down the heap of boulders brought down by the explosion caused by Koquillion’s sonic laser. A few seconds later they were standing on the cavern floor.
Speechless, Vicki stared incredulously at the scarred and dusty police box.
‘I wish the Doctor and I had known there was an easier way out!’ Ian muttered ruefully, nudging Barbara.
Barbara noticed a sort of large bundle dumped by the door of the police box and she ran forward with a cry of joyful recognition which immediately turned into a strangled whimper of concern. ‘Ian quickly! Help me!’ she gasped, kneeling by the bundle. ‘Oh Ian, I think he’s dead...’
‘... Am I... Are we in... Is this the TARDIS...?’ The Doctor’s voice seemed to be coming from a very long way off and he squinted up at the two hazy figures as if they were miles away.
‘He’s coming round at last!’ Barbara cried joyfully, kneeling down beside the chair and wetting the Doctor’s glistening brow with a handkerchief.
The Doctor blinked and shook his head from side to side to clear his vision. ‘Barbara? Is it really you, my dear?
Where are we?’ He tried to get up but collapsed back into the armchair, weak as a lamb.
‘We’re safely in the TARDIS,’ Ian said, bending over him with a cheerful smile. ‘I took the liberty of borrowing your key, Doctor.’
‘But how did you... where did I...’
‘We found you outside the TARDIS, Doctor,’ Barbara explained gently. ‘You’d had some kind of shock.’
The Doctor stared around at the familiar bright humming interior of the TARDIS. ‘Yes, yes, of course... I remember now... They must have brought me back...’
Sitting suddenly upright, the doctor gazed earnestly into his companions’ eyes, tugging at their arms in his excitement.
‘But where are they? Did you see them?’ he asked urgently.
‘
They
? Who are
they
?’ Ian asked, totally mystified. The Doctor shook his head as if trying to concentrate.
‘Bennett... They got Bennett!’ he muttered, still rather befuddled. ‘They saved my life. Of course, Bennett was Koquillion, you realise that?’
Ian exchanged baffled glances with Barbara.
‘Bennett was Koquillion?’ Barbara echoed incredulously. Ian leaned closer to the Doctor, utterly bewildered ‘What do you mean, Doctor?’
The Doctor suddenly pushed Ian away and hauled himself unsteadily to his feet.
Barbara pulled Ian aside. ‘Later, Ian, later. He can’t talk now. We must let him rest.’
The Doctor took a few faltering steps around the control room, rubbing his temples and frowning to himself. ‘The girl... Vicki... where is she?’ he demanded urgently, almost fiercely, of them. ‘Did you bring her too?’
‘She’s outside, Doctor,’ Barbara said quietly, trying to soothe him.
The Doctor nodded approvingly. ‘Good, I’d like to talk to her. I think I’ll get some air...’ he said, taking Barbara’s handkerchief and mopping his face.
As he moved towards the door, Ian stepped forward to take his arm. The Doctor snatched his own arm away. ‘It’s all right, Chesterton, I can manage. I’m not an invalid yet!’
he snapped tetchily.
Ian retreated next to Barbara and they watched the Doctor open the door and go outside.
‘Well, there’s gratitude for you,’ he muttered in an aggrieved tone. ‘We should have left the old sourpuss outside in the dust!’
Barbara touched his arm reproachfully. ‘What about Vicki?’ she said after a pause. ‘I wish we could take her with us.’
Ian turned to her in surprise.
‘Well, we can’t leave her
here
, can we?’ Barbara argued.
Ian grinned. ‘I know: let’s take Vicki and leave the Doctor behind!’ he chuckled.
*
‘So Bennett murdered my father... and everybody...’ she said in a tiny voice. The Doctor nodded and gave her a gentle, comforting squeeze.
‘So I’ve got nobody. Nobody at all. I’m quite alone.’
Vicki whispered.
The Doctor shook his head. ‘Not quite alone,’ he murmured.
Vicki smiled wanly. ‘Oh, there’s the rescue ship, of course,’ she said in a voice devoid of hope or comfort.
‘No, that wasn’t what I meant,’ said the Doctor, turning earnestly to her. He gazed into her large sad eyes for a while and then put his hands on her shoulders. ‘I meant, you’ve got us,’ he blurted out suddenly. ‘My dear Vicki, would you like to come with us?’
Vicki turned her head to look at the shabby, dusty old police box standing in the gloom, ‘In that... that old hut there?’ she exclaimed.
Swallowing his pride, the Doctor put his head to one side and grinned mischievously. ‘Appearances can be deceptive, my dear,’ he warned. ‘We can travel anywhere and anytime in that old hut thing, as you call it. We are not bounded by Space or by Time.’
Vicki’s lips parted in wonder. ‘Then... then it’s true? It really is a time-machine?’
The Doctor nodded secretively. ‘Oh, it’s a great deal more than that, I assure you! If you seek adventure, I can promise you an abundance of it.’ He leaned closer to her, and spoke confidentially. ‘And you’d be among good friends who will take care of you,’ he promised.
Vicki looked from the old man to the TARDIS and back again. Her eyes shone with temptation, but there was also a cloud of doubt in them.
The Doctor patted her arm.. ‘I’ll leave you alone here to think about it for a bit,’ he said, wandering towards the door of the TARDIS. ‘I shan’t be long.’ And with a little hopeful wave, he disappeared inside.
Barbara and Ian were very relieved to see that the Doctor looked much calmer when he wandered back into the TARDIS control room. They hurried forward to meet him.
‘Doctor, we’ve been talking about Vicki...’ Barbara began enthusiastically.
The Doctor held up his hands; his severe face suddenly turned to smiles. ‘And I’m glad to see that you’ve reached exactly the same decision as I have myself!’ he said cheerfully. ‘So let’s find out what she has decided, shall we?’
The Doctor turned round to the open door and called Vicki inside.
There was a few seconds’ pause, and then Vicki walked tentatively across the TARDIS threshold. She stopped dead and stared around in astonishment. ‘But it’s... it’s so huge in here!’ she gasped. ‘And the outside is just... just...’
‘Just an old hut thing I think you called it!’ the Doctor interrupted with mock severity.
Smiling broadly, Barbara and Ian moved forward to greet her. ‘Vicki, are you going to come with us?’ Barbara asked hopefully.
The Doctor walked over to the central control console and pretended to be engrossed in checking over the controls. In reality he was waiting with bated breath for Vicki’s decision.
Vicki gaped at her bright, spacious surroundings. It was cool and calm inside the weird machine. She hesitated for a while, still trying to conquer her amazement. Then she glanced at the Doctor. He was peeking round the control mechanism of the console, anxiously trying to predict her reaction.
Then she glanced at Barbara and Ian: their expressions told her that they, too, had once experienced the same sense of wonder and awe that she herself was now experiencing. Their nods and smiles reassured her and convinced her that she truly was among friends.
‘If you’ll have me...’ she said huskily. She cleared her throat and smiled. ‘Yes, yes, I’d like to. Thank you...’
A tear welled up in the corner of Vicki’s eye and hung perilously poised on her lashes, so that she dared not blink for fear that it would roll down her face and give her away.
‘I don’t really think the
Seeker
will find the wreck anyway,’
she confessed. ‘There’s too little power left to maintain the signal.’
The Doctor fussed over the console, secretly sighing with satisfaction. Ian grinned and nodded his approval.