Doctor Who: Terror of the Vervoids (4 page)

Another polite manoeuvre was taking place. In the lounge.

Mustering all his charm, the Doctor approached Janet.

‘I wonder if you can help me?’

‘I’ll do my best.’

‘I’d like a copy of the passenger list.’

The ‘professional hostess’ expression on Janet’s pretty face flickered with disquiet. Fleetingly. She was soon back in control. ‘A copy of the passenger list, Doctor?’

‘Yes.’ He had not missed the sudden impromptu reaction. ‘Can you get it for me?’

A sentry yawned expansively. He had been on duty outside a cabin marked
ISOLATION ROOM
for three hours.

Relief was due in thirty minutes but boredom was stretching those thirty minutes into an eternity.

An abrupt stiffening to attention. The tall, thin Bruchner, his narrow vulpine face made to seem even longer by receding hair, was hurrying along the corridor carrying a kidney dish, swabs and syringes.

Brusquely, he motioned the sentry aside. Then, pulling the surgical mask, already dangling under his chin, up over his mouth and nose, he entered the isolation room.

The sentry’s orders were to allow only Professor Lasky and her two colleagues to pass. But he was puzzled.

Bruchner was an agronomist. The study of plants was his work. Yet here he was, masquerading with all the trappings of a doctor. For besides the surgical mask, he wore the ankle-length protective gown of a surgeon about to perform a delicate operation...

Bruchner’s superior, Professor Lasky, was putting herself through torture on a spine-stretching rack in the gym.

Her handsome features contorted in agony, the eminent scientist was vehemently subjecting herself to the routine she had evolved to keep her fit during the long and sedentary journey. The blonde head continued to bob up and down without a pause as Mel entered.

Following instructions already issued by Rudge, Mel unhooked a headset from the collection hanging from a shelf, and slipped it on.

A blast of aerobic music accosted her eardrums!

‘Sorry, Miss.’ Rudge, in the observation cubicle, was looking through the narrow dormer window that presented a view into the gym.

His apology was patently insincere as he adjusted the volume on the audio deck which occupied most of the cubicle. The rest of the small antechamber consisted of shelves crammed with labelled instruction tapes covering every type of exercise and keep-fit routine any space traveller could acquire.

He spoke into the microphone. ‘If you get tired of aerobics, just select another tape. They’re all complete with instructions and music.’

Leaving Mel to limber into a programme of lithe gyrations, he returned into the corridor, almost colliding with Doland who was scurrying towards the gym.

Less tall than Bruchner and more stockily built, Doland had a mane of thick, wavy hair framing his sallow complexion. Usually imperturbable, his behaviour now was quite the opposite.

‘We’ve got a problem, Professor! In the hydroponic centre!’ So intense was his alarm that his normally low-keyed voice was raised several decibels.

Lasky’s booming tones matched his. ‘The hydroponic centre! What’s happened?’

Doland’s distraught behaviour caused Mel to lift an earphone to listen. He caught the action and waited for her to replace it before he continued.

‘It’s been broken into!’

Without hesitation, Lasky dismounted from the rack.

‘Get Bruchner down there!’ She was already stalking from the gym. ‘He’s in the isolation room.’

Intrigued, Mel watched their agitated departure.

So did somebody in the audio cubicle...

As the doors swung to behind the agronomists, the observer began towards the gym – then stopped as another passenger, unaware of the drama, entered to get her daily dose of suntan from the vionesium sunlamp.

Frustrated, the observer picked up the mike and flicked the switch that would connect with Mel’s headset and override the music.

‘Who’s speaking?’ Mel’s expression changed as the unfamiliar voice whispered into her headset. ‘Yes. Yes, I heard, but who are you?’

Receiving no reply, Mel whipped off the headset and, in a whirlwind of arms and legs, dashed into the cubicle.

No-one.

Elbowing through the door, she peered along the corridor.

Deserted too.

In determined strides, Mel made for the lounge.

She did not know who had spoken.

She did not recognise the voice.

What she did realise was that the message the voice had uttered must be relayed to the Doctor immediately.

5

No longer wearing his surgical mask and gown, Bruchner bustled into the cargo hold in the wake of Lasky and Doland.

Lasky stormed to the hydroponic centre, halting at the mesh fence. A hole big enough to permit access had been forced. ‘You appalling dunderhead, Doland! Couldn’t you have repaired this?’

Although Lasky was the charismatic leader of the scientific team, her abrasive reprimand incited resentment in the equally well-qualified Doland. But he was a man of restraint whose feelings did not easily surface.

‘I assumed you wanted to see the damage for yourself.’

His pique was tempered with deference.

Sarah Lasky was not prepared to be placated. ‘And I suppose it never penetrated your thick academic skull to check the pods?’

It had. That was the first thing he had done on discovering the violated mesh. ‘They’re stable,’ he asserted.

Even so, she plunged into the dank growing-area, her angry features jaundice-hued by the ochre low spectrum light.

In the eerie glow, the tall plants remained broodingly dormant. There was no evidence of the pulsating prompted earlier by the shaft of white light. Nothing to indicate that it had ever happened. The sole movement was the liquid gurgling through transparent feeder-tubes.

‘Professor Lasky!’ It was Bruchner calling urgently.

Anxious to avoid the verbal flack his colleague was suffering Bruchner had gone directly to the work but where he had found the empty seed jar.

‘The Demeter seeds, Professor! They’ve gone!’

Puzzlement rather than alarm was the reaction of the three agronomists as they gazed at the empty jar...

Racing along the corridor towards the lounge, Mel had forgotten all about Lasky’s and Doland’s strange behaviour in the gym. Only the relayed message was on her mind.

And the need to deliver it to the Doctor.

He, meanwhile, was engaged on other matters: subjecting Janet to his beguiling wiles.

‘You’re very persuasive, Doctor, but I can’t possibly –

ah, here’s the man who could give you permission.’

Rudge had entered the lounge.

Rudge! The Doctor had no desire to join combat with the Security Officer. ‘No, no. Don’t bother –’

Too late!

‘Permission for what?’ asked Rudge.

It’s not important. A mere whim. I’m subject to whims.

So I’m told.’

‘The Doctor wants a passenger list.’ Janet supplied the answer.

A sheepish grin quivered on the Time Lord’s lips as he prepared for the inevitable chastisement.

None came. Instead: ‘Why not? Indeed the idea makes good sense.’ Examining the Doctor through half-closed lids, Rudge offered the clipboard.

‘If I could spot a familiar name...’ faltered the Time Lord lamely, skimming through the list.

‘We’d have our culprit’ – Rudge intervened unctuously

– ‘And you’d be bidding us farewell. Should’ve thought of that myself. Sign of age. Due to retire after this trip.’

Diminutive she might be, but Mel’s entrance into the lounge would have done credit to a small posse of wildebeest! Not only the Doctor but every other occupant glanced up as she clattered in.

‘Er... no... no... Complete strangers, I’m afraid.’ The Doctor returned the clipboard.

‘Pity!’ Rudge sounded sincere.

‘Many thanks.’ With affected indifference, the Doctor sauntered across the lounge to his keyed-up companion.

Conscious that the security officer was watching them, Mel spoke quietly but urgently. ‘He’s been in touch. He wants you to meet him in Cabin Six!’

‘Did you see him? Get a name?’

‘No, just a message through my headphones when I was in the gym. Let’s go!’

She was about to move when the Doctor stopped her.

‘Mel, before you rush off, d’you know what a Judas goat is?’

‘Um – er – yes, a decoy goat that’s tied to a stake to lure the tiger into the open.’

‘Getting badly mutilated in the process. I think I shall refuse the role.’ He began to mount the spiral staircase.

‘Then where are you going?’

‘For a non-provocative stroll around the deck.’

‘What about Cabin Six?’

‘Tiger trap!’

Tiger trap indeed. For Cabin Six was a shambles. The scene of a tremendous struggle. Sheets and pillows were strewn about the floor. Clothes torn from the wardrobe.

Tap-tap-tap on the door.

Another tap-tap. Then the handle revolved.

Mel ventured tentatively in. ‘Hello, anyone at home –’

Her voice took on a dying fall as she registered the disorder.

Circumspectly she ventured further in, stumbling over a discarded black and white shoe.

Lying on the bed was the briefcase the passenger Grenville had dumped in his frustration at being recog nised by the elderly Mister Kimber. Only now the briefcase was savagely ripped asunder and its contents ransacked.

... a soft footfall from the bathroom...

Stifling a scream, Mel grabbed the heavy shoe ready to defend herself as the divider slid open – a towheaded figure tilled the gap.

‘Phew! You might’ve warned me you were in there!’

‘You’re not supposed to be in here, Mel.’

‘What about you? Going for a stroll! You just said that to put me off!’ The brown eyes glinted with indignation.

‘Why risk sticking two heads into the noose?’ The Doctor’s response was automatic. He had wandered to the dressing table where a handful of silver seeds lay scattered.

‘Ever heard of safety in numbers?’

‘Hmmmm. Never thought of that.’ Intrigued, he was scooping the seeds into his palm.

Mel’s concern was still with the chaos in the cabin.

‘Looks as though someone’s been in a fight for their life.’

‘The question is, Mel, did they succeed?’

Cabin Six was not the only place in chaotic disarray. The
Hyperion
’s waste disposal unit was too.

A crumpled, uniformed attendant was spread-eagled on the floor where he had been left after an attack. Beyond him, a wheeled laundry bin had a sheet trailing over its side. Further on, closer to the massive steel iris shutter of the waste disposal unit, where warning lights were blinking furiously, was a single black and white shoe.

Coming from beyond the shutter was the scrunching, churning :limiter of the grinding blades.

To dispense with waste while in flight, all debris was fed into the powerful machine, pulverised, then evacuated into space... To all intents and purposes, the owner of the shoe had been given the same treatment...

Clutching his head, the attendant roused himself. Still confused, he instinctively followed the accepted drill and crawled towards the alarm.

The klaxon’s wail penetrated even to the bridge, almost drowning the bleeping of the Commodore’s intercom.

‘Yes?’ he growled into the intercom.

‘Would you conic down, sir?’ Rudge’s voice.

‘Where?’ Monosyllabic exasperation.

‘Waste disposal unit. There’s been an – er – accident.’

‘Accident? Can’t you deal with it?’

The wheedling tones again. ‘I think you should be here, sir.’

Curtly, the Commodore flicked of the intercom. ‘What I’ve done to be landed with him, I fail to comprehend!’

Rising, he snatched up his white, tvaked cap adorned with the gold braid of rank. ‘Take over!’ he rapped to the Duty Officer, and strode from the bridge.

The klaxon’s frantic howling penetrated to Cabin Six too.

The Doctor poked his head out into the corridor.

‘What is it?’ he yelled to Janet as she trotted past.

‘Emergency in the waste disposal unit,’ she replied, anxious to get to the lounge and reassure the passengers.

The Commodore’s rugged face was suffused with anger.

‘Accident! Why can’t you use plain language, Mister!’

He addressed a chastened Rudge. ‘Whoever’s been dumped in there has been pulverised into fragments and sent floating into space! In my book that’s murder!’

The Commodore was in little doubt that that was what had happened: the knocked-out attendant; the sheet trailing from the wastebin; the discarded shoe lying adjacent to the shutter; all led to this macabre verdict.

‘Tell them to cut the klaxon,’ he shouted to a guard as he crossed to the injured attendant. ‘Have you called a Medic for this man?’

‘Of course, sir. Straight away,’ Rudge replied haughtily.

It had no effect on the Commodore. ‘Then I suggest you begin earning your salary! Find out who that belongs to!’

He was referring to the shoe.

‘I may be able to help you there.’ It was not the Security Officer’s voice but the Doctor’s. Unnoticed, he and Mel had arrived.

‘Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.’ Sarcasm fitted the Commodore’s mood.

‘Perhaps I should leave it to the Security Officer,’

challenged the Doctor.

Mel stepped into the breach. ‘The passenger in Cabin Six sent for the Doctor. When we got there, he was gone.’

‘It doesn’t follow he wound up in the pulveriser.’ Mel’s contribution did nothing to mellow the Commodore’s temper.

‘The room was a wreck,’ the Doctor volunteered.

‘And there was a single shoe exactly the same pattern as that.’ Mel indicated the discarded shoe.

‘To be complete, the syllogism requires only the grim conclusion...’ The Doctor gestured towards the pulveriser.

The Commodore was scathing. ‘And naturally you’ve never met the man or know why he sent for you!’

‘We don’t even know his name.’ That was true. When Mel received the message, no name was given: just the request for the Doctor to go to Cabin Six.