Ten Little Aliens: 50th Anniversary Edition (30 page)

Creben stands back from the glowing red maze, pleased with himself.

‘All done and dusted?’ We can’t believe it. Life support’s fixed
up
, and we’ve got back the crystals. Maybe, just maybe, we stand a chance of getting out of this.

Creben nods.

‘Let’s get back to the control room, meet the others.’

‘Yes, I think we –’

Before he can say anything else, the other voice comes booming out at us all. Sounds like a woman… but with some edge to it we can’t place…

To switch to Polly’s viewpoint, select section 19 on
here

To switch to Shade’s viewpoint, select section 26 on
here

To switch to Tovel’s viewpoint, select section 23 on
here

To witness these events from Creben’s viewpoint, select section 15 on
here

Or you may withdraw from the neural net – but only after experiencing Frog’s perspective. Select section 27 on
here

11

Haunt

‘You can discard those tools,’ the Doctor tells us. ‘They won’t be needed.’

We shrug. He knows what he’s talking about, we’ve worked that much out about him. We drop the tool kit to the cold ground.

Goal one will be achieved – to get life support back on line. Provided Tovel and the Doctor can make sense of the Schirr systems, that is. The Doctor says he can. We see he’s resolved to win out here, just like us.

At the point we’re standing in, the tunnels cross. We catch
movement
up ahead. Something swift and stealthy, dodging past.

‘Did you see that?’ the Doctor’s asking. He’s sharp, pointing ahead into the gloom.

‘I saw it,’ we say. We start in pursuit, run off along the tunnel. The fleas flick off our bare face and hands as we go.

‘I will wait for you here,’ the Doctor calls.

We’re sprinting away. We reach the intersection and take the left.

It’s there. The figure. Not running any more. Shrouded in murky shadows from the ember-glow of the ceiling, facing us.

Denni. Can you glimpse her there in the dark?

A hand slaps down on our shoulder. Heavy as stone. We turn, catch a glimpse of one of the cherubim, standing behind us.

We shrink back but it’s got hold of us. Digging in its fingers.

Another one forms from nowhere in front of us.

‘Do all you can,’ we bellow, so loud that everyone in the web can hear, however far away they are. ‘Work together. Keep the neural network open. That’s an order.’

The stone hand clamps down on our face, its wide palm scrapes our skin, rough and cold. Its fingers pull

Marshal Haunt has been severed from the network

To switch to Polly’s viewpoint, select section 7 on
here

To switch to Shade’s viewpoint, select section 8 on
here

To switch to Ben’s viewpoint, select section 14 on
here

To switch to Creben’s viewpoint, select section 18 on
here

Or if you were instructed to return to the section you came from, go there now

12

Polly

We didn’t stay hugging Shade for long. We were both too jumpy. So we moved on, out through these endless, endless tunnels. Denni’s out here somewhere. And angels. And Lord knows what else. Once we found glass on the ceiling, half-hidden by weed. It made us dizzy. Brought us through to a new tunnel, one of those concealed entrances Ben mentioned. So what do the Schirr hide here?

‘Look,’ we breathe. Our feet crunch into the scree as we stop suddenly. ‘There’s light up ahead.’

Shade pulls the heavy grenade launcher from the harness on his back, and checks it over. He tries not to let us see his hands are shaking, and he goes ahead first, slow and cautious. We wonder, if it came to it, if he would run off and leave us here, alone, to whatever Denni’s sending after us now.

He stops. Turns back to us and smiles. ‘Come on.’

The light, white and harsh but beautiful all the same in this world of darkness, is nothing to be scared of after all. It’s only starlight, from that window in the rock we looked out through an age ago.

‘Beautiful, isn’t it,’ we say, as the two of us stare out at the star-speckled night. We hear his breathing, slow and steady behind us.

‘“Our destiny is in the stars,” my ancestors used to say,’ Shade murmurs.

‘On Earth?’ we ask softly.

‘Where everything began.’

Our soldier’s becoming a priest. ‘I thought you were running from the Earth?’

He pauses for a second. Sighs. ‘I guess it’ll always be my home.’

Ours too. A sigh escapes us as we think of all we know and love back in London, in our own time. Black cabs. Cocktails.
Parties
on roof gardens. ‘I’d give anything to see the Earth right now.’

‘I’d give anything to take you there.’

He places both hands on our shoulders. Thinks his ship’s come in.

The thought of Ben comes to us, loud and clear.

Ben missed his ship that first night we met. He looked at me across the bar, miserable as sin. Not calculating. Not weighing up his chances.

We’ve tensed up just a fraction.

‘I always wanted to reach out and touch the stars,’ we say, and the subject is changed, Shade is waved off alone into the cold window of night before us.

We reach out our hand to the glass, as if to caress and capture the brightest stars in this sky.

Our hand tingles and passes through the window. We’re touching something hard-edged and cold. Pulling out a handful of stars from that amazing vista.

We’re staring dumbly down at three crystals in our palm.

‘The navigational crystals,’ Shade breathes. ‘They have to be. Hidden where a bunch of soldiers would never think of looking.’ His hands tighten on our shoulders. He flips us around like we were a rag doll and grins stupidly into our face. ‘Polly, you’ve done it! You’ve
done
it!’

We burst into giggles, stare at the crystals in wonder, as if they’re made of ice and might melt away.

‘Doctor,’ we say, closing our eyes. ‘Doctor, can you hear me?’

‘Gracious, my child,’ comes his voice in our head. ‘What is it you have there, hmm?’

We let him work it out for himself. We feel warm all over as he starts to chuckle.

‘Hidden in the stars,’ we whisper.

‘You know, I believe we stand a real chance now, my dear. Yes, Denni won’t have expected such resourcefulness. Those
crystals
were hidden most ingeniously, most ingeniously indeed.’ He titters to himself. Then his voice hardens. ‘I shall contact the others and inform them. Don’t be tempted to broadcast this good news across our little network. Remember, the Schirr infection is intensifying in Roba and Tovel, and poor Frog. If they overhear… so might others.’ It’s strange, we can hear an echo of his voice in our mind, but it’s other words that are sounding. As though he’s having other conversations too, even as he speaks to us. ‘Those little gems may yet give us the advantage in this struggle. Once you’ve finished here, head for the control room. Be on your guard. I shall join you.’

Shade’s just looking at us, the smile gone from his face. He’s puzzled. We realise the Doctor was speaking to us in private. We tell Shade the gist of what he said.

‘It doesn’t feel right, keeping this some sort of secret,’ he says. ‘You heard Haunt. We’re supposed to work together. A team. If we don’t trust each other…’

He tails off, looks at us, pained. ‘The Doctor wouldn’t have told us to keep it secret if he didn’t think it important,’ we say. ‘We should go straight to the control room like he asks.’

Shade nods doubtfully. We press on regardless.

To witness these events from Shade’s viewpoint, select section 24 on
here

To switch to Ben’s viewpoint, select section 10 on
here

To switch to Creben’s viewpoint, select section 15 on
here

13

Roba

We’re –

We’re looking through Schirr eyes, at our friends, our fellow
disciples
lined up on the platform in heroic golden light.

We all feel so old. Relics. Old and hollow as human threats. Empty promises.

Pallemar has betrayed us all and the master knows it now.

He towers over the traitor, covered in blood. He’s bludgeoned Pallemar’s body, torn his flesh open as if looking for a thing in him that has turned him from our cause.

How much Pallemar has told the humans we can’t know. Enough to buy his life and diplomatic immunity. He thought the master’s ambition too overreaching. In contrast his own stretches no further now than to be allowed to live. He wriggles in his chair, begging. Ten make the rituals strong. Pallemar must live. It must be ten.

Like him we watch his deep dark blood spurt out sluggishly from the holes the master has torn in him.

It doesn’t matter that Pallemar will die. The master has learned something new. He says we will become more than ten, many more. All we need shall be supplied. The plan
will
go ahead.

Puny, we stumble and blunder up on the stage. With the others we take our place. The master speaks of unexpected saviours.

He teaches us our lives will go on even as he blows open our bodies with his gun.

The air begins to hiss out of the stronghold we have fashioned here. It will not fill this room again until salvation is at hand. The master will be waiting, ready. For time will touch us soon and put us to sleep. We may know rest now while he will go on, surviving his single endless moment of death. When we are all dead he will stand alongside us and turn his gun on himself.

A shard of glass hovers charmed in the air to our left. The master’s key. An escape switch to be thrown the day new life shall come to us. Time will run back. Our wounds shall be undone and we shall live again.

The others are screaming out as they die. Our nose twitches in pleasure at the sweet smell of their open flesh. The master’s gun fires. We scrabble with both hands for our precious guts as they dribble out, feel heat and darkness. The last of the air seeps from the room leaving only death, only darkness as time stops.

Blackness. Cold.

Blackness.

To switch to Frog’s viewpoint, select section 16 on
here

To return to Haunt’s viewpoint, select section 17 on
here

14

Ben

There’s a red haze up ahead in the dark, like neon. This could be an Amsterdam sidestreet in winter. Except we doubt some leggy blonde with some bad English is waiting round the corner.

We grip poor old Roba’s gun as tight as we can.

Through some maze of red lines floating in the air, we see it’s only Creben. Not quite the blonde, but we’re less likely to catch something nasty. Probably.

‘Creben. I’m glad to see you.’ The red lines look almost like some floating net, waiting to catch anyone who comes by. ‘You all right? What’s all this?’

‘It’s what we came here to fix. That’s all.’

We look at him. ‘That’s all? This is it! We’ll be all right!’

‘We’ll be able to breathe for a while longer, certainly. But since Denni brought us here with the intention of changing us into something else, it was never likely we were going to suffocate before that happened, was it?’

That told us. Take down the bunting. ‘One of them fleas got up your jacksie, did it?’

He’s not listening. Looking at us, dead suspicious. ‘Where’s Tovel?’ he says. ‘Weren’t you with him?’

Yeah, but we just left him on his tod to get on with it. We don’t want to have to tell that to Creben.

‘He’s not good. I had to leave him.’

He’s probably poking about in our head, checking us out. ‘Did you now,’ he says sceptically.

‘Yes, I did.’ Like he’d have done any different. ‘He can’t move, Creben, all right? He’s half-turned into one of them.’ Just the thought of it makes us feel sick. We shut our eyes, try and reach out to him, but it’s a no-go. We’re just not good enough at this caper. ‘Anyway, the Doctor
said
I should leave him. S’pose it makes sense. You know, try and help the rest of us before going back to help him.’

‘And what can you do?’ Creben asks. Smug basket.

It’s not actually a bad question. But we don’t have to answer it, because suddenly Haunt’s screaming in our head: ‘Do all you can.’ We glimpse heavy stone. ‘Work together.’ Hooked grey talons reaching out for our face. ‘Keep the neural network open. That’s an order.’

Her voice just stops.

‘She’s out of the web,’ Creben mutters.

‘Dead?’ He doesn’t reply, and there’s my answer. ‘But the Doctor was with her!’

‘I’m still here, my boy.’ Thank God. ‘Marshal Haunt ran on ahead, we saw someone…’

‘Denni?’ we ask.

The Doctor’s thinking stuff through, we can tell. ‘It seems highly likely, yes,’ he says.

Wonderful. Still out there, still psycho. Haunt’s dead, now. ‘Thought this network thing was meant to help us watch out for each other?’

‘And through each other.’

That’s Tovel. For a second we look at our communicator, like
he’s
talking through that, but of course, he’s banging on inside our ears.

‘You all right, Tovel?’ We’re still looking at the communicator. Maybe it might boost our voice or something, make us less faint.

‘Comes and goes,’ breathes Tovel. At least he’s not just staring into mid-air. Stay on side, mate. You can do it. ‘Now listen,’ he says. ‘Forget Haunt, you have to. Concentrate on the circuit display. If the Doctor’s right, it’ll take two of you to make the repairs on that thing.’

‘Tell us what to do,’ says Creben quietly. He’s staring at the glowing red maze, dead intently, like it’s some group palm and he’s reading all our lifelines.

He’s got that prissy little smile of his back on his face.

If you have not yet witnessed Marshal Haunt’s severance from the network, select section 11 on
here
. Then return here and select another viewpoint

To witness these events from Creben’s viewpoint, select section 18 on
here

To switch to Polly’s viewpoint, select section 7 on
here