Doctor Who: Drift (36 page)

But in the absence of being able to communicate, we have to put ourselves in its place, try to see the world from its point of view. I think it’s raw emotion, crystallised, and I think it recognised you as a friend because you shared so many of the same feelings. That’s why it seeks out intelligent minds: it craves an intelligence to govern all those mixed emotions and make sense of the world around it. A world where it doesn’t belong.’

The Doctor wasn’t so very old that he couldn’t see the world through the eyes of a child. ‘It’s a frightening world,’ he said,

‘when you feel very much alone.’

He thought he saw the first roots of understanding in Amber’s frown.

* * *

She risked a look: Parker had lowered his fist and relaxed his hold. He shrugged. ‘What am I doing? I can’t hit a girl.’

Leela blazed. ‘Then that is your weakness.’

Dragging herself from under the agent, she kicked out with her boot and struck him deep in the crotch. It was satisfying to see him crumple to his knees, eyes bulging painfully.

Irving Pydych had been cheered a little when they had ren-dezvoused with Garvey and his guys on the western shore.

Now. peering up at the pylon, all that cheer had evaporated.

Sergeant Garvey had bravely driven the Hum-Vee back onto the ice, while Pydych held the free end of the tow cable.

The winch having unwound the steel cable to full stretch, there was plenty of slack. More than enough, Pydych was sure, to hang himself.

‘This strikes me as a tiny bit dangerous. Especially with my vertigo. I did mention my vertigo, right?’ He hefted the weighty hook in his hand. ‘Are you sure that’s where they want this thing attached?’

Melody regarded him a little too sympathetically for his liking.

‘If it makes it any easier,’ she offered, ‘I can make the climb with you.’

Pydych glanced up again at the tip of the pylon, all the power lines swinging in the wind. Even if he wasn’t a born cynic, it was hard to believe anyone would make an offer like that.

Morgan watched the distant figure of O’Neill clinging precariously near the tip of the pylon. He wasn’t shy of such hazardous work himself, but his comms man knew what he was doing around electrical things He’d parked the Hummer out on the ice and now all he could do was wait while O’Neill hooked the cable to the power.

Hopefully without—

A massive explosion turned his attention north. A petroleum fireball ballooned up from the wrecked silhouette of one of the Snowcats.

Morgan broke into a run. Then slowed up some, as he worked out it was some distance past the hotel and the other vehicles. Then broke into a run again, as inspiration lit up inside him, at least as fierce and bright as the burning vehicle.

He badly needed to talk to his brother.

When the police band crackled to life. Makenzie was glancing in the rear-view for a glimpse of Martha, hoping to be able to tell how she was doing back there.

He recognised his brother’s voice under the static, but didn’t believe what he was hearing.

He snatched up the mic. ‘Are you out of your mind, bro?

The lead car’s almost-’

‘Trust me. Mak,’ the voice came back, clearer this time, as if the radio wanted to convey all of the emotion in that simple appeal.

Makenzie swung his truck out of the convoy and accelerated along the line of vehicles.

Ray tossed the rifle away like it was a rattlesnake. He backed up in the same instant, turning over his hands and searching every inch of his jacket and sleeves for signs of ice.

Snowflakes kept spattering on his uniform and giving him miniature heart attacks.

Zabala rattled off burst after burst at the raging tangle of ice now turning its attention towards them. She emptied her magazine into it, shattering it away to nothing.

Apparent nothing. Ray reminded himself.

He tapped Zabala’s arm and urged her to follow him as he belted down the street.

Derm backed up and rammed in his last magazine. Kyle sprayed the ice creatures with carefully rationed three-round bursts. Derm raised his rifle - and shifted aim: downwards.

He opened up into the trench of gas and prayed for sparks off the asphalt.

The trench lit up -
after
one of the ice-marionettes lashed out with a whip-like limb.

The spindly arm grew frozen claws into Kyle’s face.

Reflexively, Derm swung his rifle and squeezed back on the trigger. The weapon clicked on empty.

Derm roared and charged at the newly forming ice creature.

Rifle held forward between both hands, he drove it into the wall of flames. The face of a man Derm once knew was still attached to the creature as it was swallowed by the fire.

It was an image to penetrate even the thickest of skins.

There wasn’t any time for niceties such as precision placement of the explosives. The Doctor had to simply set the timers, and arrange the six charges in a rough circle under the Stormcore. He was relying on the TARDIS force field to deflect most of the blast upwards and outwards.

‘Sorry, old girl,’ he patted the lamp as he finished planting the last charge in the snow. ‘Best cover your ears.’

Ducking back, he turned and grasped Amber’s hand to lead her in a mad dash through the wind-woven threads of the blizzard.

‘Will they kill it? Those bombs?’

Even in the screaming winds and the lashing ice, the Doctor could hear the worry in Amber’s shout. ‘No! Hopefully they’ll break the creature’s hold on the device and send it tumbling down the mountain! And with any luck, the storm nucleus won’t want to let go of its prize!’

He could have done with being able to cross his fingers.

But he had lost all contact with his free hand, the nerves in that arm having turned to ice.

They may have left Melvin Village behind, but they were still a community. Anyone else might have found it impossible to persuade all those frightened folk to leave the convoy strewn in a broken herring-bone pattern and make the remainder of the trek on foot. And the extent of their trust might have overwhelmed anyone other than Makenzie Shaw.

There wouldn’t be any milk and honey flowing in Winnipesaukee, but Makenzie would settle for the chance to get Martha to a hospital.

Watching the folks file briskly past, he managed a smile, and prayed for Amber’s safety.

Parker lay flat on his back, with only his head and his hands raised in grudging deference to the pistol that Leela had produced and aimed at his chest. She didn’t seem altogether at ease with the automatic, but he didn’t doubt her intention or her ability at this range

Behind her, the mountainside erupted like a nuclear volcano.

Leela turned to take one look, then she was bolting for the nearest trees. Parker didn’t hesitate to scramble to his feet and follow, as the mushroom cloud collapsed into an avalanche.

White, he decided, was the colour of holy crap.

Joanna couldn’t help thinking of Emilie Jacks, out to burn all her bridges the moment her cult had disintegrated. This

was
different, though, she told herself.

She rode pillion behind Captain Shaw. She held a gas can, tipped at an angle to spill its contents in a trail behind them.

The snowmobiles slalomed between the abandoned vehicles on the lake, each of them trailing gasoline.

Sure, this was very different: they were saving something here.

For her though, any victory would carry an aftertaste, like the acrid fumes drying her mouth.

Melody waited at the base of the pylon and welcomed a decidedly pale Corporal Pydych with a congratulatory pat on the back. He was shaky on his legs but he would survive.

‘I hope you realise it was hell up there.’ He stamped around, as though to make sure the ground was real. ‘This had better work.’

The cable trailed all the way back to the Hum-Vee out on the ice. Makenzie Shaw had led the refugees of Melvin Village ashore, taking them on to the town of Winnipesaukee. But they couldn’t sink that vehicle until Morgan and his people got here. Whatever they were doing about cracking the lake open, they were cutting it mighty fine.

‘Have a little faith in the technology,’ Melody advised, sounding a little maudlin despite her brave smile. ‘According to the Doctor, the Stormcore should do most of the work.’

Drawing the current into a concentrated stream, she thought. And, in the process of channelling all that raw electricity, probably-burning out its own circuits.

She didn’t suppose Parker would be happy for one minute.

But there was a limit to what she was prepared to pay for a ticket home.

The snowmobiles were all they had left. Morgan had sent his Command Vehicle onto the ice to crack it open and sink the Hummer into the cold waters, as one essential component in the Doctor’s bizarre scheme. The human cost had been so high here that the expense of the vehicle hadn’t even entered into the account.

He swerved the snowmobile around and rode it up the bank of the western shore. Hopping off, he spared a look for Joanna, then watched the other snowmobiles cruising in to join them: among them, Landers and Zabala; O’Neill and Derm. His faithful second had been the last to emerge from the blizzard, cutting it close to the wire.

Morgan raised the remote detonator and thumbed the button.

It died like a giant wave on a lonely shore: spectacular and largely unseen.

The drama was played out behind a white curtain and the lighting could only do its best under difficult conditions.

There wasn’t even much of a soundtrack.

Most of the lakeside audience had the sense to cover their ears as the multiple blasts ripped apart the vehicles in a great firecracker chain: and they kept them covered as they watched the snake-formation of the convoy sink, shedding its skin of fire on the waters. But the pyrotechnics were only for openers.

Melody had the sharpest pair of eyes here. She grabbed a pair of binoculars off one of the soldiers in the hope she might see
something.
Anything.

She could make out the avalanche, exploding out over the lake, but she guessed her imagination was doing most of the work. Painting it as a galaxy of ice cast down from the heavens, to break apart over the burning waters. Cold stars formed in the nebula, ice panicles clustering together in fear of the flames. They were the last to die, melting away in scattered islands, like polar ice caps on an overheated globe.

After that, there was nothing left to see.

Melody handed the binoculars back to the soldier and shrugged like she’d seen nothing. In her mind, she could visualise the chemical reactions continuing beneath the surface, steady currents setting to work on the dissolved particles.

Mostly it was just cold science. But there was an element of poetry even in that.

Currents. It was always the victim of currents.

Drowning in fire and water, grains of consciousness, crystals of emotion crying out to one another, dragged away by currents as powerful as destiny, to die in a burning energy field.

No, not to die. To sleep.

The Doctor stood close to Amber, letting his gaze fall slowly down the mountainside. Parker and Leela had joined them only a moment ago. A snake of fire rippled across the lake, faint but satisfactory under the veil of the blizzard.

‘That should do nicely,’ said the Doctor.

‘What will happen to it?’ He didn’t need to see the child’s face to know she was crying.

‘Electrolysis, essentially. The purified crystals collect around an electrode. In this case, a small truck.’ The Doctor pressed Amber’s shoulder kindly. ‘A crystal that size, I imagine it’ll be taken somewhere safe, where it can be properly looked after.’

Amber raised half a smile. The Doctor answered with a full one.

‘Which reminds me, I’m sure Agent Theroux here will be delighted to conduct you safely down the mountain. I expect your mother will be anxious to know you’re well.’

Predictably, Parker was set to object, but the Doctor grinned and waved the blood sample like a bribe. Parker marched over and grabbed it. ‘Okay, okay. But where are you going?’

The Doctor tapped his nose, then looked dismayed at the veins of ice still lacing his hand. He was having some trouble focusing, but he was fairly sure they were starting to recede.

‘Leela and I are going home,’ he said.

‘Doctor!’ Leela raced up, excited. ‘You have found the T-’

He silenced her with a finger to his lips. ‘Shh! Leela! One wrong word now and you could cause another avalanche.’

Parker huffed indignantly. ‘Don’t sweat it. Doc. I might have hijacked your ship if I’d thought about it, but I’ll be damned if I’ll accept a lift.’

‘Ah, well, we’re often better off finding our own way.’

He beamed at Amber.

‘But it doesn’t hurt to accept a little help now and then.’

He spun about and strode off up the slope. ‘Come along, Leela, and do throw away that gun, they’re terribly habit-forming, there’s a good girl.’

* * *