Doctor Who: The Devil Goblins From Neptune (7 page)

'Who's to say?' Rose picked up his glass, holding the stem between surprisingly delicate fingers. 'What's real anyway?'

'Come, come, man, this is no time for cheap philosophy'

'I'll tell you who knows all about cheap philosophy.' said Rose, animated and tense again. 'The fools in Westminster.

Governments throughout the Earth. A few years ago the world's youth were on the verge of something marvellous, something really new and beautiful. But the governments have snatched that away from them, sold them false dreams of utopia and plastic nightmares of deadly aliens. I don't buy their lies for a moment, and neither do the people I associate with'

'Then why come here?' The Doctor's hand encompassed the whole club in an elegant gesture.

'The older the ties, the more difficult they are to break,'

sighed Rose.

'This club was founded on honour and decency, tempered by a belief in progress and change. The founders weren't any more interested in revolution or quick fixes than you are.'

'So?'

The Doctor stared at Rose. 'I think you're hiding something.'

'And I think you're a management stooge. The established order that you unthinkingly serve will soon be a thing of the past. It's just a question of time'

'I sympathise with the anger of young people,' said the Doctor. But order must be maintained.'

Rose jumped to his feet, stabbing a finger in the Doctor's direction. 'You sound just like a Nazi!'

'No, old chap, I -'

'I'm tired of apologists for the establishment, Doctor.'

Rose began walking across the room. 'Maybe I'll see you around,' he called over his shoulder, his voice heavy with sarcasm.

The Doctor glared at the floor, angry at the way the conversation had gone. He drained his glass, and wondered if there was still a way of appealing to Rose's better instincts.

There had to be.

The Doctor stood up, and made his way towards the door. Perhaps if he told Rose something of his involvement in the recent alien invasions then the man would see that he was serious and -

A man with a machine gun stepped into the Doctor's path. 'Do not move,' he said in a thick Russian accent. He jabbed the gun forward for emphasis. 'You are a prisoner of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.'

FIRST INTERLUDE.'

UP IN THE SKY

The man introduced himself as Jimmy Ferro, researcher into the paranormal. Bob Campbell was tempted to shut up shop there and then, but something told him that the scruffy man had more money than sense. And Campbell was always happy to relieve the foolish of their excess wealth - especially if they had long hair and had clearly never done an honest day's work in their life.

'Please,' Ferro said. 'I need to charter a balloon flight.

Immediately.'

Campbell scratched his chin. 'I don't tend to do charters -

a quick flip around the local barrows and circles, that's my forte.' 'I'll make it worth your while.

'And it's lunchtime. I really should be getting back to my good lady wife' Campbell teased him closer, like the expert angler he was. 'If I'm late she'll think I'm having a fling with some bird down at the White Hart.'

'Whatever you would normally charge,' said Ferro, 'I'll pay double.

'Well...' Campbell affected deep thought.

'Twenty pounds?' offered Ferro.

It was like taking sweets from a baby. 'Just the figure I had in mind.' Campbell glanced at his watch. 'Where would you like to go?'

'Over the Earl of Norton's land'

Campbell's face blanched with fear. 'Oh, sir, you don't want to be going there.'

'Sorry?'

'Only joking,' said Campbell. 'I'm quite a fan of them horror films. Dracula in India, The Haunting of Toby Jugg, Raiders of the Stone Ring - I've seen 'em all. I expect you have, too, what with your interest in the supernatural and all.'

'I don't bother with rubbish like that.' Ferro looked hurt by the very suggestion. 'I'm a serious scientist.'

'Of course you are.'

'Is going over Norton's land a problem?'

Campbell bustled about behind the counter, looking for a map. 'I wouldn't have thought so. What's Hippie Pete going to do? Shoot us down?'

An hour later, Campbell was beginning to wish he'd obeyed his instincts and flipped over the 'closed' sign. Ferro had been poor company, the journey had so far been monotonous, and even the pleasant feeling of the sun on his back did little to lighten the mood. Still, he kept telling himself, think of the money.

'Were you here for the concert?' he asked, desperate for some sort of communication with Ferro.

Ferro shook his head, his eyes fixed firmly on the instruments cradled in his lap.

The balloon flew over a small river, bordered by thick hedges. A cow had somehow pushed its way through and stood in the muddied water, a forlorn look on its face as if it didn't know what to do next. Campbell smiled. 'I sometimes think I'm the only one not swept up in this new way of looking at things.'

Ferro grunted; it was impossible to tell if it was in affirmation or disagreement. He probably couldn't give a monkey's either way.

Campbell continued regardless. 'I don't know what to make of young people these days,' he said. Nothing's sacred.' they want to have their cake and eat it.' Campbell let some more hot air into the balloon, and the basket rose higher into the sky. 'Call me old-fashioned, but I never even thought about "freedom" when I was their age. Just got on with the job at hand. But these young people, they go down to London, they take drugs, and they become homosexuals.

That's the permissive society for you, isn't it?' He paused for a moment, thinking. 'Those hippies who saw fireworks in the sky? I blame the drugs.'

'I suppose it's a matter of interpretation, muttered Ferro.

It was the closest they'd come to a conversation since taking off. 'What is?'

'The lights in the sky.' The young man glanced up for a moment. 'I heard all the reports, and that's why I'm here. I believe those people saw something, something real and measurable and scientifically provable.' He fiddled with his instruments again, and made a few notes in a spiral-bound notepad.

'And what did they see, then?'

'The "stars" were the result of the warp engines of a flying saucer reacting with an atmosphere unusually rich in carbon.'

'A flying saucer? Oh, I see. Our little green friends get on well with the hippies, do they?'

'Grey. Most authenticated sightings of alien life forms have indicated a grey skin colour.'

'Doesn't have quite the same ring to it, though, does it?'

pondered Campbell. 'Little grey men, I mean. Makes them sound like chartered accountants.'

Ferro stared blankly back at Campbell.

'Oh, never mind,' muttered Campbell under his breath.

He glanced at his watch. 'We ought to be thinking about landing soon.'

'Just a few more minutes, please,' said Ferro. 'I've picked up some interesting readings, but nothing's very clear here.

Probably the effect of the coastal breeze.'

Campbell looked down at the landscape again, the fields etched by darkening shadows. They flew over a small village, and for a moment the twisted church spire seemed close enough to touch. But Bob Campbell never misjudged heights, and they flew comfortably over.

Something flickered in front of the sun.

Campbell turned to the side, expecting to see a small cloud, but there was nothing there. Must have been a bird.

There it was again. Something tiny and dark, dancing in front of the sun, then swooping down towards the coppice of trees near Bradley Hill. A rook, perhaps? Whatever it was, it almost seemed to know how best to conceal itself, like a fighter plane during the war, using the burning sun to blind the eyes of its enemy.

Campbell squinted at the sun, but could see nothing against its glare.

Then a shadow passed over the sun again. There was a muffled sound from towards the top of the balloon, as if something had landed. The wicker basket swayed slightly.

'Nothing to worry about,' said Campbell. 'Probably just a -

' There was a scrabbling at the fabric of the balloon, an awful tearing noise. Something that sounded almost like laughter.

The ground began to rush upward.

BLOOD OF THE LOMB

'Do not move!' The stock of the machine gun rested against the Doctor's side. Two more men appeared, hands on pistols concealed inside tweed jackets.

'Honestly,' said the Doctor, more irritated than surprised.

'There was a time when nobody could get in here without either a lot of money or proof of genealogical descent from royalty. Or preferably both. He paused and cast a quick glance at his three assailants, realising for the first time that they were the three men who had attacked him and Benton the previous day. 'You are persistent, aren't you?' he noted drily. With a mixture of resignation and genuine curiosity he raised his hands and smiled warmly 'I'm aware of the protocol in these situations, gentlemen. In my time I have been threatened by experts. So... Take me to your leader!'

The Doctor was marched along the corridor to the staircase and literally carried down to the back door by his two burly guards. The man with the machine gun gave a few curt orders in Russian, which the Doctor understood to mean they should wait until he had checked that their escape route had not been compromised. Then the Doctor was forced out into the sunlight, and bundled into the back of an unmarked van before he could take stock of his surroundings. A blindfold was slipped over his eyes by what seemed to be female hands and his arms were tied behind his back. The van moved off at an inconspicuous pace. The entire kidnap operation had taken only three minutes to execute.

At first everything was silent. Then he heard a woman's voice asking one of his guards if they had encountered any difficulties. The man began to reply that the mission orders had been carried out with precision when the Doctor chose his moment to ask the most obvious question that occurred to him.

'Excuse me?' he said in flawless Russian. 'Do you mind taking off this blindfold? My skin is very delicate and I bruise rather easily.'

His only reply was a brief grunt of what he took to be surprise. And then silence. After a pause he tried again.

'Hello,' he said brightly. 'I trust, since you've gone to all this trouble, that you want something from me. I should advise you that I can prove to be very uncooperative if I'm trussed up like a sack of potatoes'

Again there was no reply, although the Doctor thought he could detect a small ripple of ironic laughter from the other side of the van.

He stretched out his feet and felt them come into contact with something solid. He sniffed the air, detecting a faint odour of oil and an even fainter smell of soap. When he next spoke his voice was light and chatty in a way that belied his situation.

'I expect the Progressive Club will have reported my abduction to UNIT by now. They're a snobbish crowd, but hardly unobservant. Three clodhopping chaps can't walk in off the street and snatch a member in broad daylight without somebody noticing.' The Doctor's voice levelled out. He was attempting the same steady, regular speech pattern as he had used during the Soviets' first attack. Hypnotic suggestion, a way of extracting oneself from potential harm with merely the power of the spoken word.

'I was in Russia in 1917 during the October uprising,' he said simply. 'I love your country, such a proud people, so noble under tyranny. I met old Lenin in Petrograd, as it was then known. Splendid chap, loved cricket you know. He was exiled in London for fourteen years, hardly missed a day at Lord's during the summer...' He allowed his voice to trail away whilst he took deep regular breaths, and then resumed at the same pitch. 'Of course, I never agreed with what you did to the Romanovs - that struck me as a frightfully bad show. They were a decent-enough bunch, just a bit stuck in their ways. You'll find most royal families are like that, really.'

underneath the privileges and the pomp and circumstance, they're just as ordinary as you or I. Of course, I met the Old Tsar at the Dri Kaiser Bund in 1871. I remember I said,

"Nicholas," I said, "it's all very well you being Tsar of all the Russias, but you must use your despotic powers in a benevolent way. The Liberation Movement is a powerful one.

Listen to Tolstoy and Stakhovich." But he wouldn't -'

'Enough' The voice that stopped the Doctor in his tracks was high-pitched and angry.

'Madam,' the Doctor said bluntly, 'you have me at a disadvantage. In fact, you have me at several disadvantages all at once. I request that you at least allow me the decency of knowing to whom I am speaking'

'Niet,' said the woman angrily, and the Doctor felt the jab of what he took to be another Simonov in his solar plexus.

'Very well,' he said. 'I'll just sit here and shut up then, shall I?' 'Da,' came the reply.

'Wonderful language, Russian,' muttered the Doctor coldly. 'So expressive.'

The man's eyes stung from the fumes of Oxford Circus. He picked up the warm telephone receiver, and rested a coin against the slot. Several times his fingers slipped on the dial.

He felt sick. One job, one foul-up - one posting to Antarctica coming up.

'Good afternoon, Ministry of Defence.'

Pushing in the coin, the man cradled the receiver closer to his lips. 'Custodian Seven to Watchtower. Authorisation.'

Juvenal! The line crackled for a moment, and a polite male voice inquired, 'All right, what's happened?'

'Captain Yates,' said the man, 'I'm afraid things haven't gone according to plan.'

'Meaning?'

The Doctor lost me, sir, but I went to the club, and he's not there.'

'Not there?'

'Not there, sir. He signed in, but no one's seen him since.'