Doctor Who: Space War (7 page)

‘If you tell us everything,’ said the President, ‘I shall ensure that you are treated leniently.’

‘But I don’t know what you are talking about,’ Jo cried out. ‘We’re not working for any Draconians. Don’t you realise someone’s trying to cause a war between you and the Draconians, and you’re falling for it?’

General Williams released Jo’s shoulders, as though in despair. ‘We’re wasting time. I propose depth interrogation with no further delay.’

Jo burst into tears. ‘I don’t care if you use your stupid mind probe. I’m telling you the truth, and so was the Doctor.’

The President regarded Jo as tears cascaded down her cheeks. Then she spoke firmly, but with a touch of kindness. ‘You’re very young, my dear, and no doubt you’ve been led astray. But unless you tell us the whole truth immediately I shall be forced to let General Williams deal with the matter. The lives of millions of citizens may be at stake, and they are my only consideration. So you have the choice. Help us now by confessing everything. Or, if you prefer that the truth be wrung from you, afterwards you will be imprisoned for the rest of your life as a traitor to your planet.’

The Doctor’s mind flashed on for less than a second. The optic nerve registered the picture of a green snout and pale green eyes looking down at him. Then blackness returned; he felt he was swimming in a sea of thick, dark oil.

A voice said, ‘The Earthman is recovering. Come and look.’ Feet moved on a highly polished floor. Voices mumbled. The blackness gave way to light. Slowly the Doctor opened his eyes. He now saw four green snouts, eight pale green eyes. He was sitting in a chair with arms; he moved his hands and feet slightly —there were no restraining straps or ropes. He looked up at the Draconians and managed a smile.

‘How nice of you to invite me. Have I been spirited away to Draconia?’ He looked about the room, noted the false impression of curved walls. ‘No, I’d say this is the Draconian Embassy on Earth, tarted up to look like Draconia. Where’s Jo?’

The Draconian First Secretary spoke. ‘Your companion is still with your fellow Earthmen.’

The Doctor didn’t bother to point out that he was a Time Lord and not an Earthman. ‘Do you people realise what you’ve done? You’ve finally convinced them that we’re both Draconian agents.’

‘We know,’ hissed the Draconian Ambassador, ‘that you are both agents of the Earth Government, part of some plot against our Empire. You are working for General Williams. He hates our people. He is employing you to create tension among the people of Earth, to overthrow your own President, to bring the present crisis to a state of war.’

The Doctor looked up into the Ambassador’s nostrils with astonishment. ‘My dear chap, what a complicated mind you have. The ones trying to create war are the Ogrons—or at least the people behind them.’

Neither the Ambassador nor the First Secretary seemed to take the slightest notice of this last remark. The Ambassador continued, ‘Tell me the details of the General’s plot, so that I can expose him to your President. ‘There is still a chance of peace. We have mind-probing machines just as efficient as those used by Earthmen. Either you speak now or we shall force you.’

‘Can’t you believe that you’re on the wrong track?’ asked the Doctor. ‘There is a plot but the Earth people aren’t behind it, any more than you are.’

The Ambassador stepped back. ‘Take him away.’ Two guards moved forward to grab the Doctor.

The Doctor smiled disarmingly. ‘There’s really no need to lay your claws on me, gentlemen. I’ll go with you quietly.’ Pretending to be about to rise from the chair, the Doctor suddenly thrust forward with his feet on the floor, pushed the chair over backwards, performed a somersault, sprang to his feet and darted for the french windows. One of the guards raised his blaster gun, its adjustment set to kill.

‘No.’ commanded the Ambassador. ‘Don’t shoot.’

The Doctor sprinted across a formal lawn, surprising an elderly Draconian gardener busy watering the flowers. Embassy guards gave chase, but the Doctor had a good start. He made for the concrete wall at the end of the lawn, scaled a tree, and dropped over the wall into the road outside the Embassy grounds. The road, lined with blank walls, ran as far as his eyes could see in a dead straight line. A small tubular hover-car, all black except for a chromium bumper, came hurtling down the road at high speed. The Doctor stepped forward and waved his hands to attract the driver’s attention. As the vehicle approached he saw it had no driver. Only then did he realise it was making straight for him. He flattened himself against the wall. It pulled up directly in front of him, a mounted television eye on its roof turning to ‘look’ at him.

A metallic voice spoke. ‘Get in.’ A door in the side of the vehicle slid open.

‘What if I refuse?’ said the Doctor.

‘You cannot refuse,’ said the voice. ‘You have nowhere to run to. Get in or be destroyed.’ A slender tube on a stalk rose up from the roof of the vehicle, turned and pointed itself at the Doctor. ‘You are an escaped prisoner. Escaped prisoners may be killed. It is an order.’

Defeated, the Doctor got into the hover-car. Instantly the door slid shut. He was a prisoner again.

Security guards flung open the door of the cell and pushed the Doctor inside.

‘No more attempts to escape,’ one of them growled. ‘But I was kidnapped,’ protested the Doctor. The door was slammed in his face.

Jo sat up from the bunk where she’d been trying to sleep. ‘Doctor! What happened?’

Briefly he told her. ‘The Draconians believe we’re working for General Williams.’

‘Oh no,’ she groaned. Then she alerted. ‘Do you hear that sound?’ She put her fingers to her temples as the strange sound increased.

‘Is it the sound you heard on the spaceship?’

Jo nodded. Already it was affecting her mind. She fought to keep her thinking clear. ‘Where’s it coming from?’

Before the Doctor could answer they heard the firing of blaster guns in the corridor outside. Alarm bells clanged and the Security guards shouted, ‘Draconians! We’re being attacked! It’s war!’

The two prisoners listened helplessly, trying to understand what was happening. All at once the crackle of energy from blaster guns ceased. Someone outside was operating the mechanism that locked the cell door. It opened. Two enormous Ogrons stood in the doorway. They were pointing their guns at the Doctor and Jo.

‘This is a military situation,’ General Williams was saying. ‘We should attack now!’

The President switched off her wall television screen. The news service had been showing pictures of the violent anti-Draconian riots. ‘No, General. I will not be responsible for starting a war.’

She was tired, exhausted by the constant pressure of her office. For a moment she closed her eyes. Her mind went back to how the previous war between Earth and Draconia began. After much bitterness as to the exact line of the agreed space frontier, Earth and Draconian delegations were to meet on a neutral planet. She was young then, acting as aide to one of the senators selected for the Earth delegation. Young Lieutenant John Williams was a junior officer, responsible for communications. As they approached the planet, their ship ran into a neutron storm and was damaged. The ship’s captain and all the senior officers were killed. Williams was left in command. For the young inexperienced lieutenant it was a terrifying responsibility: a damaged spaceship, full of important political Earth leaders. Just as he got the ship under control again he saw a Draconian vessel approaching. They expected to meet an unarmed civilian ship like their own; instead, the Draconian ship approaching was a fully armed battle cruiser. Williams could get no answer to his signals to the approaching ship. Convinced that the Draconians were about to attack, he blasted the battle cruiser with the retro-rockets of the unarmed Earth ship. The Draconians’ power source exploded, disintegrating the battle cruiser and killing outright the entire Draconian peace delegation. The Earth ship was thrown clear. The Draconian Empire instantly declared war on Earth. It was a full-scale war of inter-stellar ballistic missiles and lasted three days, killing over five hundred million Draconians and Earthmen.

‘I will not be responsible for starting a war,’ the President repeated. ‘We do not attack.’

‘Madam President,’ said the General, ‘the Draconians are taunting us. They arc even now using their Embassy here on Earth as a military base. Their First Secretary’s trick in phoning you then kidnapping our prisoner, and now this latest outrage—an all-out attack by their Embassy guards on our Security Headquarters—are acts of war! If you don’t act against them decisively you can and will be replaced. Your political opponents are clamouring for war.’

The President was faced with a problem. If she failed to please her people they would replace her; once out of office, she could never hope to achieve the good things that she wanted to do for Earth. ‘I shall break off diplomatic relations,’ she said. ‘The Draconian Ambassador and his staff will be expelled from our planet. But unless you can give me conclusive evidence of Draconian war plans, I will not strike the first blow.’

‘The proof we need is in the minds of those two traitors, Madam President. We shall have to use the mind probe.’

The President had once seen the mind probe used on a prisoner. She shook her head. ‘Not on the girl, General. Perhaps I can persuade her to tell the truth. But as for the man, I give you permission to go ahead.’

The Doctor was firmly strapped in a metal chair, an iron skull-cap held on his head by tapes. The mind probe room was small, its walls brilliant red. The machine a simple black box with controls and a small television screen, occupied one corner. The General stood over the Doctor, issuing orders to the Security technician in charge of the apparatus.

‘I shall ask you again,’ said the General. ‘How long have you been an agent of the Draconian Empire?’

‘I am not, and never have been, anyone’s agent,’ replied the Doctor truthfully. ‘Does this gadget really work?’

The General’s face went scarlet. ‘If we have to turn it to full power, you will wish you’d never been born. How did you get on the cargo ship?’

‘In my own spaceship.’

General Williams nodded to the technician. ‘More power.’

The technician turned a control and the General looked at the television screen. To his surprise he saw a blue oblong box floating through space, a flashing light at one end. The picture represented whatever was in the prisoner’s mind. The General concealed his astonishment and turned back to the Doctor. ‘Why did you help the Draconians attack the cargo ship?’

‘I didn’t and they weren’t Draconians. They were Ogrons. They were also Ogrons, and not Draconians, who unsuccessfully attacked this prison after I’d escaped from the Draconian Embassy.’

Now the screen showed an Ogron entering the space cargo ship through the air-lock. The picture blurred, then was replaced by one of the Ogrons opening the door to the prison cell. As the amazed General stared, the Doctor and Jo were dragged from the cell down a prison corridor. Earth Security guards suddenly appeared in great numbers, counter-attacking the Ogrons, finally snatching back their two prisoners and forcing the Ogrons to retreat.

‘These creatures that you keep producing in your imagination,’ said General Williams, ‘what are they?’

‘Ogrons,’ said the Doctor, bored by tiresome questions.

The General turned to the technician. ‘Your machine can’t be working correctly. Either that, or the prisoner can pretend to remember things.’

The technician looked worried. ‘I’ve checked all the circuits, sir. What you see on the screen are definitely the prisoner’s thoughts. Maybe he’s been brainwashed, sir. Perhaps he believes what he’s saying is the truth.’

General Williams considered. ‘We must break through his conditioning. Step it up to full power.’

The technician hesitated. ‘Full power, sir?’

‘You heard my order.’

Reluctantly the technician turned the conrols of the mind probe. He was conditioned to have no feelings for prisoners, but he knew from experience that the full force of the mind probe could quickly destroy human brain cells, rendering a prisoner imbecile and useless for further questioning. ‘It’s now on full power, sir.’

General Williams looked closely into the Doctor’s contorted face. ‘Are you a Draconian spy? When do they plan to attack us? Who first recruited you? Who are the other Draconian agents on Earth. Answer! Answer! ‘

Waves of intense pain poured through the Doctor’s mind. On the television screen only whirling patterns appeared. Using all his energy, the Doctor tried to overcome the pain. Then, suddenly, the mind probe machine blew a fuse. Smoke billowed out from it. The technician switched off immediately.

‘General Williams,’ said the terrified technician, ‘I think he’s destroyed the machine.’

Williams stepped back and regarded Doctor. ‘Then we shall destroy him.’

Jo stood before the President’s desk. ‘But I keep telling you the truth. You just won’t believe me.’

The President smiled. ‘Sit down, my dear.’

Jo sat.

‘Naturally you wish to be loyal to your friend,’ continued the President, her voice kind. ‘But your first loyalty is to Earth. Don’t you want to help prevent a terrible war?’

‘Of course we do. But someone else is trying to start it, not the Draconians.’

The President maintained her smile. ‘How I wish I could believe you. But we have so many eye-witnesses to Draconian attacks. They’ve made
two
attempts now to rescue you from custody.’

‘The first time was Draconians,’ Jo admitted. ‘But the second time it was Ogrons.’

The President shook her head regretfully. ‘I am trying to help you, but you insist on these lies! The telephone flashed and she answered. ‘Yes?’

A girl’s voice said, ‘General Williams to see you, Madam President.’

‘Send him in, please.’ She turned back to Jo. ‘I can’t help you if you won’t help yourself.’

‘I very much want to help myself,’ said Jo. ‘But you wouldn’t believe my answers even if I gave them to you.’

General Williams entered through the round door. ‘Madam President, the man’s made a full confession. He’s admitted they’re both in the pay of the Draconian Secret Service.’