Doctor Who: Galaxy Four (13 page)

But the moment the Chumbley paused, Maaga shouted for the Drahvins to spread out and opened fire again. In no time a raging battle was being fought,

Maaga and her soldiers firing when they could and constantly shifting position in an attempt to confuse, the Chumbley stabbing away at them with equal regularity. Lasers lashed this way and that, howling through the steamy atmosphere and turning it into a nightmare of destruction.

And Maaga had her wish. In the distance she dimly made out three of the sentries coming to the assistance of the one which stood alone. She smiled in grim satisfaction and loosed off another bolt at the machine below, knowing that all their shots were in vain against it, but equally sure that they were providing the necessary distraction. All was not yet lost.

Drahvin Two watched the Chumbley before her pivot and move away, its multi-coloured, lights flashing and its chittering fading as the distance increased. Drahvin Two hefted her weapon and crept toward the Rill centre.

‘They sound very close,’ Vicki said, tilting her head to the sounds of battle.

‘Too close,’ Steven added. ‘Isn’t it possible to charge faster, Doctor?’

The Doctor was absorbed in the dials and gauges before him and the strange markings upon them. ‘No, no, utterly impossible. The control panel would be blown out.’

‘How do you know?’ Steven asked. ‘Can you read those dials?’

‘Unfortunately, no. I wish I could. But I worked it all out in the TARDIS. That’s sufficient for me.’ Vicki was nervous. ‘Another earthquake like that last one and it could be too late for any of this. The ground could open up beneath us.’

But the Doctor was lost again and moved out of sight behind the equipment, trying to interpret the symbols and not succeeding with so hurried a scrutiny. Probably they were not for reading, anyway, since the Rills communicated by thought. They could be mere notchings which triggered impulses to be picked up by the Rill minds. He would probably never find out, more was the pity.

Momentarily separated from the Doctor, Vicki turned to Steven. Her eyes widened and she tapped him on the shoulder. He turned and followed her gaze, to see Drahvin Two standing inside the entry and levelling her gun at them. ‘Stand still,’ the Drahvin said.

Neither had any intention of moving so much as a finger.

Realising that he could not see his companions, the Doctor made to return to them, only to find himself being buffeted toward a newly-opened entry to the Rills’ ship by a determined Chumbley. ‘This way, Doctor,’ the Rill said. ‘Quickly.’

He found himself pushed inside. The door slid to behind him. Ammonia stung his nostrils.

Drahvin Two squinted through her sight at Vicki and Steven. She was about to reach a moment of fulfilment. The knowledge filled her with happy anticipation. ‘You escaped once, but you will not do so again.’

Vicki stared in chill horror at the gun-vent from which would leap the laser beam. ‘She’s going to kill us.’

Steven nodded grimly. ‘Then be killed herself.’

‘Death does not frighten me,’ the Drahvin said. ‘I die as a warrior Drahvin and my people will honour me.’ Her finger tightened on the trigger. ‘Whereas you...’

A laser hissed past Steven’s shoulder and the Drahvin’s mouth jerked open. She stood rigidly, her eyes wider now, but still fastened upon them. Her trigger finger remained fixed. Then she fell and it was no ordinary fall. She went over like a felled tree. Her gun smashed into the floor and bent uselessly to the side. She lay like a graven image, cast in the one mould and doomed never to escape from it.

Vicki and Steven stood in disbelief, until the Chumbley responsible rolled in behind them, chattering away to itself for all the world as though this were an everyday occurrence.

Steven was still stricken with awe at the sight of the statue-like Drahvin lying before them. ‘What have you done to her?’

‘She is merely paralysed,’ the Chumbley said. ‘Alive but unconscious.’

‘Aren’t you going to bring her round again?’ Vicki asked.

‘We think not. The poor creature does not possess the ability to adjust to life on our planet and we see no reason for her to suffer what will happen at dawn. Better to leave her as she is. Why do you not join the Doctor?’

Steven looked about him. ‘Where is he?’

‘I’m inside the ship!’ the Doctor called. ‘Come and see for yourselves!’

Both hesitated. ‘Do you think we ought to?’ Vicki asked in some trepidation.

‘Come along,’ the Doctor insisted.

Steven gave Vicki a shrug and they made for the ship’s entry, a Chumbley accompanying them.

Maaga and her two remaining Drahvins sat on the ridge, totally exhausted, their guns on the ground beside them. They were soiled and scarred from the flying splinters of soil and rock, their clothes torn and burnt. It had been a mighty struggle, but finally the machines had retreated beneath their fire. It had been just as well, Maaga reflected, because had they stayed much longer her soldiers would have started to fall; she might even have gone down herself. As it was, her left arm was seared from a ray which had come too close. It pained her greatly, but she forced herself to keep their mission well to the front of her mind. They had to take the Rills’ ship; the trees of steam were a live reminder of that, if reminder were needed, and she duly awaited the next eruption, not really wondering what it would bring, only if they would be able to survive it. Each one, she knew, would be more severe than the last, on and on in steady progression to the final burst. What they had seen so far was merely the prelude. The full piece would follow ere long. She did not intend to be there when it did.

Had it not been for those machines, she was convinced they could by now have taken the ship and, in the process, destroyed the Rills, But right then she could see no way of defeating them, though there had to be one. Never in her life had she come across an unbeatable foe. She needed time to think. She was not to get it.

Drahvin Three raised her head to listen. ‘The machines are returning, Maaga.’

‘Again,’ Maaga said bitterly and returned to her defence position, noting that her power pack was getting dangerously low. They could not fight for much longer.

The Chumblies came rollicking in across the landscape, chirping and bumbling among themselves and shrugging their way impassively over any obstacles that impeded their path. The only detour they made was to skirt the many steam trees blossoming everywhere. They came to a halt a short distance from where the three Drahvins were concealed and trained their weapons on the spot. Then they fired. Maaga and her soldiers hugged the ground grimly as they prepared to fight out this new assault.

The Rills were sealed off behind a partition of what looked very much like glass or clear perspex. A smoky, greasy gas wreathed them and the Doctor and his companions experienced difficulty in breathing because of the little that had escaped. Vicki and Steven stared hard at what confronted them. No words could convey the reality of what the Rills looked like, but it was enough to make the heart jump and flutter like a trapped bird. The most shocking things to Vicki were the six hands, so human in appearance, yet attached to such monstrous bodies. But she felt no revulsion, perhaps because she had come prepared, but more probably because she now knew how gentle they were beneath their startling exterior. She made herself exhale completely, then inhale only partially in an attempt to calm herself.

‘Now you know what we look like,’ the Rill said.

‘So we do,’ the Doctor replied, ‘and you, us.’

‘We apologise for the glass partition, but you will understand that we must keep our atmosphere in here.’

Adjusting more quickly than Vicki to the sight, Steven found himself puzzled. ‘Well, I’m used to you already. So why do the Drahvins hate you so much?’

‘We are ugly, so they are frightened. It is a natural reaction, particularly in beings of limited brain-power.’

‘Which is them,’ Vicki said in annoyance. ‘I’ll bet you aren’t ugly in your own eyes.’

‘No, to us our appearance is normal. Yours is not.’

‘Only to be expected,’ the Doctor said. ‘But tell me, don’t you move at all–other than your eyelids, that is?’

‘We live on a different time-scale to you. To us, your movements’ are like those of insects, jerking this way and that for no reason at all. When you came into this chamber you came like gusts of wind and as I look at you, you are twitching in a way I would find exhausting. Not even your eyes remain still.’

The Doctor was fascinated. ‘How do we compare in relative terms? Do you know our time measures?’

‘Now that I know your language, yes. A year to you would be about a week to us. You are burnt out when we are still too young even to learn.’

Not me, the Doctor thought, but my companions, I’m afraid so.

‘How old are you then?’ Steven asked.

‘In your terms I am some five hundred years old.’ Vicki was startled into some rapid arithmetic. ‘Only ten years old!’

‘We are capable of much at that age.’

‘I’ve encountered people who lived such a time-span before,’ the Doctor said. ‘They arranged it for themselves and as centuries passed they became deeply cynical. There was no joy in their lives. In fact, I could see no purpose at all in their continuing to exist.’

‘We passed through that phase,’ the Rill observed. ‘But that was long ago, though we do have a racial memory of it. It was the younger Rills who noticed, from the example of their elders, that to live for so long with no pleasure and no creativity was futile and was turning life itself into an extended period of waste and bitterness. They it was who slowed us down to our present span and they it was who taught us the exquisite pleasure of possessing time to think and explore. That is why we are here. Ours is a journey taken solely to extend our knowledge and our information banks. It was deeply informative and enjoyable until we encountered the Drahvins.’ Then, as an afterthought, he said, ‘Yet even they are interesting, as are you. When we have the leisure we shall contemplate the physical similarity between you and them and your totally different psychological structure. That will give us great pleasure.’

‘Not all mankind is like us,’ Steven said.

‘Or even many,’ Vicki added.

The Doctor was mildly surprised at her tone.

‘Hush, child, Earth is jammed with good people.’ ‘If you say so.’

He would have to have a talk with her, the Doctor decided. This sort of attitude wouldn’t do at all, particularly in one so young and with so much to look forward to. Her life would not add to much measured against eternity, but that was all the more reason to savour every grain of it. Not a speck of life flickered into existence then blacked away that did not, however slightly, determine the course of the life that followed it. Why affect it for the worse? A good talking-to was what she needed and what she would certainly get.

He saw that tears were coursing down her face. ‘Are you all right?’

‘I feel rather ill,’ she choked.

‘It must be the ammonia,’ Steven said.

The Doctor nodded. ‘I should have thought of that.’ ‘You had better return to the workshop,’ the Rill advised. ‘Our atmosphere is not good for you.’ ‘Indeed not,’ the Doctor agreed. ‘Take the child out, Steven.’

Steven put an arm about Vicki and helped her to the doorway, where she turned and looked back at the Rill. ‘I don’t suppose we shall see you again.’

‘It is improbable.’

‘Then goodbye.’

‘Goodbye to you, young lady.’

The Doctor bustled out after them; taking his watch out and reading the elapsed time.

Seeing him, Steven asked, ‘How much longer have we got?’

‘Oh, I should think about an hour,’ the Doctor said absently, still preoccupied with what the Rills had said. ‘Something like that.’

‘Can’t you be more definite?’

‘What d’you want from me, for Heaven’s sake, a countdown?’

Steven clamped his mouth tightly. It was useless talking to the Doctor when he was in this sort of mood. It was his habit to dismiss everything for the sake of the job in hand. In this case it was recharging the Rill ship and what he was dismissing was the Drahvins.

Maaga felt suicidal. Nothing they did affected the machines in the slightest. Their power packs were now nearly empty and they had made no headway at all. A glance at her soldiers confirmed that they too were exhausted and near to dropping, despite their conditioned devotion to duty. There was a limit to everything and they were dangerously close to it. But still the machines kept up an intermittent fire to ensure that they kept their heads down. Time and again their bolts flashed above, so that Maaga wondered if the dreadful things had any power limits at all. It did not seem so. If they did then they did not seem unduly concerned about it, trundling to and fro and loosing off their rays almost with indifference. Perhaps that was the most insulting thing about them to her. Not only were they machines, but they were incapable of caring. She damned the Rills to eternity.

But she had noticed that now all the robots were grouped together, with no regard for their flanks. It could be that the Rills were not sufficiently experienced in fighting to know that, however superior in armament, their machines should be kept well spaced out. Her mind gnawed at the problem as though she were a general pondering his Clausewitz in order to find a way out, which in fact she was.

‘We are not defeating them,’ Drahvin One said in a drab voice.

‘I can see that,’ she snapped.

‘Perhaps we should attack them with iron bars as Two did,’ Drahvin Three suggested.

‘You would not get near them before you were gunned down. They are all together, so we shall go round them. If we succeed, make straight for the spaceship. Do not worry about the buildings. We need the ship, so concentrate on that. Come.’

She led them from the ridge, skulking off amid the continuing plumes of steam, their guns still at the ready.

‘How much longer?’ Steven asked in exasperation.

The Doctor looked over his shoulder from his examination of the gauges. ‘Patience, my dear fellow, patience.’

‘Dawn is only about half an hour away,’ Vicki warned.