Doctor Who: The Mark of the Rani (3 page)

Fastidiously brushing the last vestiges of chaff from his sleeve, he gazed at the bath house. A sardonic smile stretched his lips at the sound of the bolt being thrust home.

‘Primitive. An insult.’ The smile faded. ‘But first things first. I’ve a death to arrange.’ He strode purpose-fully off in pursuit of the Doctor.

‘What’ve they got in there? Coal, or diamonds?’ Peri’s remark was justified. A guard, flintlock pistol tucked in his belt, was at the pit entrance. Straining at the leash, fangs bared, his dog snarled a challenge to all intruders.

‘Machinery, Peri. More specifically, George Stephenson.

And he’s–’

‘You told me. One of the architects of the Industrial Revolution.’

‘And I didn’t exaggerate. Without his genius, your precious twentieth century would be a much sorrier place.’

The pit gave the impression of being a fortress protected by strategically positioned armed sentries.

‘We have to get past, Peri.’

‘Easier said... That dog doesn’t look as though it’s been fed today!’

In typical fashion, deciding to brazen his way in, and giving his pink lapel a confident tug, the Doctor strutted forward.

‘Oy! Where dost think tha’s going?’ The guard lengthened the leash and the dog leapt ferociously, jaws snapping.

‘To see George Stephenson. Can you tell me where he’ll be?’

The Doctor’s bluff cut no ice with the guard. It would be jeopardising his job to disobey orders. And there could be little doubt what they were!

‘No-one gets in here without a pass.’

‘My dear man, a pass? I am a VIP.’ Autocratic as ever.

But useless.

‘If tha be here for t’meeting, tha’d have special pass.’

Meeting? The Doctor’s curiosity was aroused. What meeting could the man be blathering about?

Resignedly accepting that once launched on a course of action the Doctor was unstoppable, Peri adopted the role of mediator. ‘We’ve been travelling. The pass obviously never reached us.’

The guard remained obdurate. ‘Then tha’s name will be on’t list.’ He consulted a clipboard which the Doctor instantly commandeered. ‘James Watt, Thomas Telford, Michael Faraday, Humphrey Davy,’ he read aloud. ‘Good heavens, Peri, d’vou recognise these names?’

Peri did. She’d learned about them in school. All of them. This was a period in England when genius seemed to bloom. ‘I’m not totally illiterate! What’s the noun for a collection of geniuses? A bevy?’

‘An inspiration, perhaps? I don’t know. But I do know the men who will be at this meeting transformed history.’

The guard had had enough of their nonsense. He snatched the sheet. ‘Is tha name on’t list?’

‘An oversight.’

‘Oh, aye. A genius too, art tha?’

‘Indeed I am.’ Modesty was not one of the Doctor’s virtues. ‘I’m also an inventor.’ He waggled the tracer under the guard’s nose. The dog growled.

More afraid of the slavering fangs than of the Doctor’s disapproval, Peri took over. ‘I must apologise.’ A winsome smile. She’d always been told she had an attractive smile.

‘The Doctor’s a little eccentric.’

Attractive it certainly was. The guard relented. ‘Doctor, is he? I could maybe ask in’t office.’

‘Would you? How kind.’ Another bewitching smile.

‘Harry!’ His deputy came from the hut. ‘The gate. Best lock it!’ He shortened the dog’s lead. ‘This way. Miss.’

‘Eccentric? Me? Preposterous!’ Chuntering indignantly, the Doctor followed obediently.

The remark amused Harry. Nevertheless, he, too, exercised obedience and secured the gate.

In doing so, he flirted with death.

The contretemps between the Doctor and the guard had permitted the Master to catch up. Now the locking of the gate was preventing him from entering. He toyed with the TCE – his unique and deadly Tissue Compression Eliminator. A short blast and this paltry minion would be despatched to oblivion.

Luckily for Harry, the renegade Time Lord was not ready to reveal his presence. Angrily changing tack, he prowled the perimeter fence seeking an alternative way in.

A winning smile from a petite young lady might have enchanted the guard, but it had not beguiled him. He escorted Peri and the Doctor into the unoccupied office.

Furnished with a polished mahogany desk and an Windsor chair, this was manifestly the domain of an important personage. A glass-fronted bookcase housed a modest library of leather-bound volumes. Fluted oil-lamps completed the decor.

‘If tha’ll sit thee down, I’ll see if I can find Mister Stephenson.’

‘I’ll come with you –’

‘Nay. Tha’ll bide here wi’ young lady.’ He unhooked the leash. ‘Stay!’

With the guard’s departure, the ferocious hound crouched vigilantly on the threshold.

‘Good dog. Good Fido.’ The Doctor immediately tried to sidle past. ‘Good boy, then. Let the nice Doctor through.’

His reward was a menacing growl.

‘I guess he’s not susceptible to your irresistible charm!’

jibed Peri.

‘Occasionally - just occasionally - your smugness infuriates me!’

Reacting to his tone the dog’s growl grew more intimidating.

‘Keep your voice down!’ said Teri, ‘Time Lords may not get rabies, but humans do! And that dog looks more than ready to bite!’

‘Will you stop prattling about the dog!’ The Doctor’s tetchiness was not just due to Peri’s snugness. ‘Something’s going on here. I don’t fully understand what.’ He raised the lace curtain and rattled the window.‘But I’m increasingly convinced it’s got to be stopped!’

‘Could be you’re jumping the gun.’

‘Really? That’s your assessment?’ He abandoned the window. ‘Did you see the date at the top of that list? In less than two days, a meeting will take place here of the greatest practical talents the human race has ever produced. A coincidence?’

‘Unlikely, I agree.’

‘Well, hanging about in an office isn’t going to provide the answer!’

Snarling, ears pricked, the dog rose on its haunches.

Convinced that at any moment the aroused animal would attack, Peri retreated to the Doctor’s side. ‘I warned you to cool it!’

‘It’s not me.’

The dog hared its tangs and sprang. But not at them.

Instead it leapt from the office, yelping and howling.

‘Doctor - that dog’s really spooked. I wonder why?’

Sprinting between the sheds, the dog raced for the pit gate.

Once there, it threw itself at the bars in a desire to maul the black velvet-clad figure tampering with the padlock, Having failed in his quest for an alternative access, the Master had returned.

In a bedlam of harking, almost demented, the animal repeatedly hurled itself against the gate. Silencing the brute was easy. A single burst from the TCE, a pathetic whine, and then one dog less in the Universe...

But succumbing to his callous impulse had brought the Master a further difficulty. Attracted by the din, emerging from the hut, Harry had witnessed the slaughter.

After ensuring there were na other observers, the Master levelled the TCE again. The petal-shaped segments of the bulbous nozzle separated and a searing white light homed in on its target.

Harry’s luck had run out after all.

4

‘It’s stopped!’

The Doctor, having vacated the office, was again using his tracking device to locate the power that had re-routed the TARDIS. Misinterpreting Peri’s remark, he rapped the tracer. ‘No, it’s still functioning.’

‘The dog! It’s not barking!’

The Doctor paused, listening, suddenly very solemn. ‘

"There was silence deep as death".’

‘That’s morbid.’

‘Possibly.’

The grim quotation merely vocalised the overwhelming foreboding of evil that plagued him; an evil so tangible, he felt the source must be close by.

Showing no remorse, the Master was again examining the gate padlock when the shattering of glass interrupted him.

Indiscriminately, Ward and his fellow aggressors were wreaking havoc upon the village street.Ever the opportunist, he decided to recruit them.

‘You there!’ His curt command halted them. ‘You were in the lane, smashing machinery.’

‘Never mind machinery. What’s tha’ doing here?’ Ward was in no mood to be treated as a subordinate.

‘That’s easy. He’s one of brainy ones on’t list. Arrived here early for this scurvy meeting.’ For Rudge, the world was infested with enemies.

‘Aye, come to rob us of us jobs!’

‘Hold hard. I intend you no harm.’

‘Talks funny, don’t he?’ Green mimicked the Master. ’

"Hold hard".’ He scooped up a stone. ‘This hard enough?’

‘Imbeciles! Are you incapable of using your brains?

What advantage will attacking me bring you?’

The stone was heavy in Green’s fist. The urge to aim was strong.

‘You let the man you should have destroyed go free!’

The Master’s compelling personality as much as his rhetoric, inhibited even their uncontrollable aggression.

Ward, rubbing the crimson mark on his neck, took the accusation personally. ‘I did? Let who go free? What’s tha’

on about?’

‘In the lane. He pretended to help you. Help! He’s a crony of Stephenson’s. An inventor, here to mechanise the mine.’

‘Dust know what he’s getting at, Jack?’ Rudge certainly did not.

‘Doing nowt but trying to save his skin!’ Jack was ready to crack his knuckles on the stranger’s superior chin!

‘Ask him. Ask him why he’s trying to take the bread from your mouths.’ The Master’s contempt for these ignorant mortals was barely disguised; but he needed them. He had worked out a plan and these morons were to be part of it. They were to be used to get rid of that scourge of the Universe, the Doctor.

‘Us’ll do more than ask! Where is he? Dost know?’

‘He’s just gone into the pit.’

Inflamed by his lies, the wiry Green battered the padlock.

‘Let me.’ The Master intervened; the pandemonium might bring opposition. He wanted their entrance to go unannounced.

Shielding his actions from his dupes, he produced a pencil laser, talking all the while to divert them. ‘You can’t miss him.’ A thin laser beam lanced the padlock.‘Mean looking. Wearing yellow trousers, a multicoloured coat and a vulgar plaid waistcoat.’ The description was for Rudge’s and Green’s benefit. Ward had already been subjected to the Doctor’s sartorial splendour!

The padlock melted. He swung the gates wide and the three miners swarmed through.

‘A word of warning. Go carefully. He’s treacherous.’

‘Careful, Peri! Careful!’

Keeping pace with the impatient Doctor, Peri had stumbled, knocking over a safety lamp as they skirted the pit shaft. ‘A Davy lamp, isn’t it?’

‘No. A prototype. Stephenson’s got a couple of years’

work to do on it yet.’ The discourse came absently as he swept the tracking device in an arc. ‘But you’re correct.

Davy gets the credit. Controversial decision, I’ve always thought. Which reminds me – where is Stephenson?’

‘He could be anywhere in this place. Even underground!’ Gulping, she peered over the rim of a shaft.

Seemingly stretching to infinity, the bottom could not be seen. The giddy drop induced her to sway, experience vertigo, feel as though she were about to he plucked into its inky depths...

A hand clutched her shoulder.

‘Peri, you have an extraordinary capacity for seeking out danger.’ The Doctor’s words were lost on Peri. She was staring beyond him to where the miners were advancing.

‘Doctor!’

Imperturbably, he lectured on. ‘You must learn to avoid getting into situations –’

‘
Doctor
!’

Too late. A lump of coal came whistling past his ear.

Intuitively, he bundled Peri behind a truck. A random missile? Or was it meant for him? The introspective debate was rudely terminated. With arrogant ease, the brawny Ward sent the truck trundling along the track and the three vengeful aggressors closed in.

‘Peri! Get away from here!’

‘But –’

‘Don’t argue! Go!’ His concern for Peri made him unwary. His toe stubbed against a rail causing him to stagger. A smart punch from Green jerked the tracer from his grip, lobbing it over the edge of the shaft. After what appeared to be an eternity, there came a faint thud.

‘Now you really have gone too far! The effort that went into constructing –’

A man of deeds rather than chitchat, Rudge lunged at the Doctor. A crash barrier might have averted disaster.

But this was the nineteenth century and there was none.

Briefly, they tottered on the brink... then fell...

The Doctor grabbed for the lift rope.

So did Rudge.

The Doctor succeeded. Not so Rudge.

His protracted, diminishing scream underscored the sickening drop to the bottom.

Incensed by the fate of his companion, Green snatched up a pit prop and, with frenetic fury, stabbed at the Doctor, trying to force him to lose his tenuous hold on the rope.

Releasing one hand, the Doctor reached for the edge of the shaft to steady his dangling body. A spade, wielded by Ward, chopped at the straining fingers... missing by a hair’s breadth as the Doctor snatched them away.

He clung desperately onto the rope. But his weight and the constant blows were beginning to tell. Resourcefulness was basic to his nature, yet even that had deserted him.

Could it be that escape was impossible? Ridiculous though it seemed, he wondered if falling to one’s death was the same as drowning. Would all his previous lives flash before him? The drop was long enough!

‘Get away from him!’ Peri had not capitulated. ‘Leave him alone!’

She pelted chunks of coal at Ward and Green. A hit and miss affair. Some found their targets, some found the beleagured Doctor.

‘Help! Please help! They’re crazy! They’ll kill him!’

If her aim was erratic, her predictions were perilously near to being accurate; the Doctor’s stamina was fast ebbing away.

Spurred on by his weakening grasp, the antagonists thrust with increasing fervour.

Bang
!

A burst of gunfire!