Dr. Who - BBC New Series 25 (10 page)

‘And it… what? Makes you see what you’re most scared of?’

‘In this case, yeah. The intention being that instead of hanging around you run very fast in the opposite direction.’

‘So you can’t tell, just from looking at this glamour thingy, who’s using it?’ Donna asked.

‘No, could be any one of… ooh, seventy-three thousand, nine hundred and twenty-four different species,

give or take.’

‘And how come it disappeared when you zapped it?’

‘Must have had an in-built displacement system, which means that whenever anyone mucks about with it, it alerts the craft it’s shielding, which then hops off somewhere else.’

‘Could do with one of them for my car,’ said Donna.

She looked round at Gandhi, who was sitting crosslegged on the elephant behind them, listening to their exchange with interest. ‘Sorry about this, Mr Gandhi,’ she said. ‘We must sound like total nutters to you.’

‘On the contrary,’ said Gandhi, ‘your conversation is fascinating.’

‘You mean you believe all this alien planet stuff? Just like that?’ She indicated the Doctor. ‘First time I met him, I thought he’d escaped from somewhere.’

Gandhi’s eyes sparkled with interest and intelligence.

He might be an old bloke, Donna thought, but even in the short time she’d known him she’d decided he was one of the sharpest people she’d ever met. Like the Doctor, he gave the impression that nothing got past him, that he could adapt to any situation.

‘You have no reason to lie to me,’ he said, ‘and how can I do anything but accept the evidence of my own eyes?’

‘But none of this… bothers you?’ Donna said. ‘I know tons of people who’d shut themselves in the wardrobe if they found out all this stuff was real.’

Gandhi smiled his neartoothless smile. ‘Forgive my impertinence, Donna, but I believe this highlights the

cultural difference between the East and the West. You see, the bridges of the West are made of concrete and steel and wire, whereas the bridges of the East are made of spirit. To communicate in the West you move and talk, and everything must have a definite resolution, but in the East we sit and contemplate and suffer and dream. There are no boundaries for us. Everything remains possible.’

Donna looked at him in admiration. ‘That’s… brilliant,’

she said. ‘Yeah, I totally get that. I’ve never thought of it like that before.’

Perched on his elephant, the Doctor grinned. ‘That’s Mohandas for you,’ he said. ‘The soul of an Eastern prophet and the spirit of a Galactic pioneer.’

Gandhi placed his palms together and gave a little bow.

‘You are too kind, Doctor.’

‘Nah, not me,’ said the Doctor. ‘Doesn’t pay to be
too kind. Always be just kind enough and you won’t go far wrong.’

By the time they arrived back at the camp, the sun was high in the sky. Donna was glad to get her feet on solid ground again. The continuous motion had made her feel sick, and even with the umbrella to keep off the worst of the sun it had been getting very hot and a bit smelly.

‘Right,’ the Doctor said, jumping down from his elephant, ‘onwards and upwards. Gopal, Mohandas, see you later. If you hear news of Shiva, or any other deity, popping up in any nearby temples, give us a shout. Donna, seeing as the Campbells are mates of yours, will you take Cameron home? I’ll join you there in a bit.’

He turned away, but Donna said, ‘Hang on, where are

you
going?’

‘Back to the TARDIS. I want to scan the area for hotspots of zytron energy, see if I can find out where that ship’s gone.’

He turned away again. Donna asked, ‘What
is
zytron energy anyway?’

He turned back, sighed. ‘It’s appallingly dangerous is what it is. It’s cheap and adaptable, but unstable and hard to contain. It attacks, mutates and eventually destroys living tissue. Put bluntly, it turns whoever and whatever it infects into a ravening psychopathic monster.’

Donna pulled a face. ‘You’d better go and sort it then.

See you later, spaceman.’ Before the Doctor could turn away for the third time, she said sternly, ‘But don’t go getting into any trouble without me, OK?’

‘As if,’ said the Doctor innocently.

‘You spoil that boy,’ Sir Edgar grunted as his wife left the dining room with a tray of boiled eggs and hot buttered toast. Two minutes later her panicked cries brought everyone running.

‘What is it, Mother?’ asked Adelaide.

‘It’s Cameron. He’s gone,’ Mary replied in a weak voice, and promptly swooned in her arms.

Ten minutes later, after a thorough search of the house and grounds, it was confirmed that Cameron was nowhere to be found.

‘He’s been kidnapped, I know he has,’ said Mary, who was now lying on the chaise-longue in the drawing room, looking white and ill.

‘Nonsense,’ said Sir Edgar, though he too looked anxious.

Ronny appeared, having given the grounds another onceover. ‘His bicycle’s missing from the shed,’ he told them.

‘There you are,’ said Adelaide, trying to remain positive. ‘He’s probably gone off on one of his expeditions.’

At that moment, there came an explosive hammering on the front door. They all looked at each other, frightened by the urgency of the sound, but unwilling to speculate what it might mean. For a few moments they stood in silence, waiting. Eventually there was a tap on the drawing room door and Becharji entered.

‘Major Daker is here, sahib,’ he said to Sir Edgar.

Sir Edgar glanced at Ronny. ‘What does he want?’

‘He says that he needs to speak to you, sahib.

Urgently.’

‘Better show him in then,’ said Sir Edgar.

Seconds later Major Daker clomped into the room. He looked even more red-faced than usual – and, Adelaide noted, unusually dishevelled. He glanced round as if surprised to see them all there, and then turned his attention to Sir Edgar.

‘Begging your pardon, Sir Edgar, but I need to speak to you at once.’

‘Is it about Cameron?’ Adelaide blurted.

Daker blinked at her, surprised. ‘Cameron? No, why?

What’s he done?’

‘He’s gone missing,’ she said.

Daker stared at her for so long that she felt unsettled.

She noticed how bloodshot his eyes were, the whites almost pink.

‘Sedition,’ he muttered eventually.

‘I beg your pardon?’ said Ronny.

Daker swung round on him. ‘Don’t you see? They want us out and this is their way of trying to force our hand.’

Ronny and Adelaide looked at each other, baffled.

‘Who do?’ Ronny asked.

‘The natives, of course. The Indians. I came to tell you that three of my men disappeared last night. Taken from their beds two of them, right under the noses of their colleagues.’ His eyes clouded over, as if he had lost his thread, and he rubbed vigorously at what Adelaide noticed was a darkish lump behind his left ear. Then he said, ‘It’s all very well these people fighting amongst themselves, but I tell you, they’ve overstepped the mark this time.’

A little unnerved, Adelaide said, ‘I’m sure Cameron’s not been taken by anyone. He’s been so cooped up recently, what with—’

But, with a terse shake of the head, Daker cut her off.

‘We have to come down hard on these people, show them who’s boss.’ He snapped suddenly to attention. Adelaide almost expected him to salute. ‘With your permission, Sir Edgar, I would like to instigate a thorough search of the city. It is my intention to leave no stone unturned.’

Sir Edgar wafted a hand, too anxious about his son to put up with the Major’s bluster.

‘Do whatever you think fit, Major Daker,’ he said. ‘I trust you’ll let us know the instant you hear anything of

Cameron’s whereabouts?’

‘You have my word, sir,’ Daker said, and this time he did
salute.

He turned and exited the room, rubbing at the lump behind his ear.

The Doctor was a blur of movement, leaping around the TARDIS console, flicking switches and spinning dials.

When the locational calibrator stuck, he whacked it with a rubber mallet and it burped into life, like an old man shocked out of an afternoon nap. Every five seconds, he checked the scanner screen, across which a complicated mass of data was scrolling. ‘Come on, come on, get to the point,’ he said as his eyes flickered across the numbers and symbols. Finally, after another few madcap circuits of the console, he shouted, ‘Aha! There you go, you beauty!’

He delved into his jacket. Now all he had to do was pinpoint the exact location by configuring the data with the old sonic and…

Suddenly he frowned. The sonic wasn’t there. He tried the other pocket. Not there either. Frantically he patted each of his pockets in turn, then turned them out, scattering plum stones, a rubber spider, scribbled notes, a book, a tangle of green and yellow wire, sweet wrappers, a yo-yo and all sorts of alien bits and bobs across the floor.

‘No, no, no, no, no, no, no!’ he shouted, trying to remember when he had last used the sonic, and more importantly where he had put it afterwards.

It had been in the temple. He’d used it on the glamour.

And then, and then…

He slapped himself so hard on the side of the head that it sounded like the crack of a whip.

‘Idiot!’ he yelled.

‘
Hey!’ shouted Ranjit, then wished he’d kept his mouth shut. The little kid was still some distance away, and as soon as he saw Ranjit coming, he ran.

It had been the sunlight flashing off its shiny surface which had caught Ranjit’s attention. He had turned to see the little kid showing off the Doctor’s magic torch to a group of his friends. The kid was waving the torch in the air, and all the other kids were oohing and aahing.

Straight away Ranjit realised that the torch must have flown out of the Doctor’s pocket when he had jumped down from the elephant.

Maybe the kid had seen it fly out, or maybe he had found it later in the dust. Either way, Ranjit knew that the magic torch was a very precious piece of equipment and that the Doctor would want it back.

The kid was running now, up the dusty banking onto the road, then towards the field beyond. The kid was younger than Ranjit, maybe seven or eight, but he had a good lead and the grass in the field was long enough for him to hide in.

Ranjit gave chase, his bare feet slapping the sunbaked earth, sending up a trail of dust. People turned to watch him as he pounded by, but no one challenged him or tried to stop him. He reached the top of the rise just in time to see the kid plunge into the high grass on the other side of the road. The grass came up to the kid’s neck. All Ranjit could see of him now was his head bobbing up and down, like a ball floating on a green sea.

Ranjit knew he would catch the kid eventually, but his fear was that the kid would panic and throw the torch away. If he did, they might never find it in the long grass.

With this in mind, he halted on the edge of the field and cupped his hands around his mouth.

‘Stop!’ he shouted. ‘I only want to talk to you!’

But the kid didn’t stop. If anything, he ran faster. Ranjit sighed and went after him. It was not easy running in the long grass. The sun had dried it out, making it hard and spiky. It scratched his legs, drawing stripes of blood here and there. Ranjit knew that the feld was probably full of creatures that could bite and sting: snakes, spiders, scorpions. If one of them bit him, he might think it was just the grass scratching him. Venom might race around his body without him even knowing it.

And if that happened, who would help him? Who would see him if he collapsed in the long grass? His Uncle

Mahmoud’s next-door neighbour had been stung by a scorpion once, a big one. Uncle Mahmoud had sucked out the poison. He had told Ranjit that it tasted like goat’s milk, but Ranjit hadn’t believed him.

He was gaining on the kid now. The kid was halfway across the field, Ranjit only thirty or forty metres behind.

Ranjit’s head throbbed where the rock had hit him, but otherwise he felt pretty good. On the way to the temple that morning, Bapu had shared his breakfast with him –bread, oranges, grapes, sour lemons and strained butter with a juice of aloe – and so for the first time in days his belly felt full and his limbs strong.

All at once, the kid spun round, pointing the magic torch at Ranjit.

‘Leave me alone or I’ll shoot you!’

Ranjit stopped, his legs stinging, sweat trickling down his face. He laughed. ‘That’s not a gun.’

The kid was thin, with dark hollows under his eyes. He turned the torch on. It glowed blue and made a high-pitched noise, but nothing else happened.

‘You see,’ said Ranjit. He held out his hand. ‘Now give it to me.’