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Authors: Eric Saward

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BOOK: Doctor Who: The Visitation
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'You're right. I hadn't thought of that.'

 

Puzzled, Nyssa looked at Adric. What are they talking about? her expression said. But Adric could only shrug his shoulders. 'Is there something wrong, Doctor?' he asked.

 

'Charcoal, potassium nitrate and sulphur are constituents of a primitive explosive,' he said. 'It's known on Earth as gunpowder.'

 

'For all we know we could be very near to a place where they manufacture the stuff,'

said Tegan nervously.

 

'I wonder.'

 

Through the smoke the outlines of three men carrying makeshift clubs could be seen hurrying towards them. The lower halves of their faces were covered in rough, sacking masks.

 

'They're footpads,' said Tegan quietly. 'I think it's time we returned to the TARDIS.'

 

They all agreed, but found, when they tried to turn back, their retreat cut off by two more armed men, clubs raised, charging towards them.

 

'What now?' said Adric. 'We can't fight all of them.'

 

'We bluff our way.' The Doctor stepped forward, smiling. 'Ah, good morning, gentlemen...' But before he could finish the first of the band was upon him, lashing out with his club. The Doctor ducked and weaved, trying every trick he knew to disarm him.

But his attacker was no stranger to hand-to- hand fighting.

 

As the second man closed in, Adric ran behind him, dropped to the ground and made himself into a tight ball.

 

'Now!' shouted Tegan, and both she and Nyssa shoulder-charged the man, sending him tumbling backwards over Adric's crouched body.

 

The Doctor fought on, his opponent beginning to tire. The man lunged again, but this time the Doctor was able to side-step the blow and grab his attacker's tunic. The Doctor pulled hard, at the same moment extending his leg, causing the bewildered man to trip and crash to the ground.

 

'Hurry, Doctor,' shouted Tegan. 'The others will be here in a moment.'

 

They ran off leaving their two attackers bewildered and winded. They ran as fast as they could, low branches of trees grabbing and whipping at them as they went. They ran until their lungs ached. Suddenly Adric fell to the

ground, his foot twisted in a hole.

 

The others stopped while the Doctor bent down to feel Adric's leg for broken bones.

Tegan remained on guard, watching for the three pursuers. 'Hurry, Doctor,' she shouted. 'I can see them. They're still following.'

 

'Come on,' grunted the Doctor as he pulled Adric to his feet. 'I'll help you.' But Adric couldn't place any weight on the damaged ankle. 'We must carry him,' the Doctor said urgently.

 

'I'll be all right in a minute.'

 

'We don't have a minute!' shouted Tegan.

 

'Then leave me.' Adric pulled himself free of the Doctor's grip and collapsed. 'Save yourselves.'

 

Tegan and Nyssa were beginning to panic as the three men drew nearer. 'We can't leave Adric,' said Tegan. 'They'll kill him.'

 

'I think not,' said a rich, plummy voice from above them.

 

Startled, they looked up and saw the portly frame of a man in his forties lounging on the limb of a tree. 'May I be of any assistance?'

 

'You think you can help us?' said the Doctor.

 

The stranger fingered the handles of two flintlock pistols protruding from a shabby sash at his middle. 'Indeed I can. I also have a convenient refuge nearby where the boy can rest.'

 

Tegan turned to the Doctor. 'How do we know we can trust him?'

 

'You have little choice.' The man removed his pistols and cocked them. You either trust me, or you give yourselves up to your pursuers...' He took careful aim. '...who would promptly cudgel you to death.' The guns exploded, causing a dozen pigeons to take flight and the three pursuers to dive for cover. 'Bull's-eye!'

 

 

'But you missed,' said Tegan.

 

'My intention was to scare, not maim.'

 

With considerably more flamboyance than the situation demanded, their unexpected rescuer thrust his pistols back into his waistband, adjusted a filthy dirty cravat at his neck, cocked his leg over the branch he was sitting on and slid to the ground.

 

'Richard Mace, ladies and gentlemen, at your service,' he said, and gave a small formal bow. 'If the boy can walk,' the portly man grunted, 'my camp is this way.'

 

Uncertain what to do, Tegan and Nyssa looked at the Doctor for guidance.

 

'Why not?' the Doctor said brightly, bending down to help Adric to his feet.

 

Tegan looked for the pursuers, but couldn't see them. 'Who were those people chasing us?' she said.

 

'Local villagers,' said Mace, striding off into the wood. 'I don't think they'll bother us any more.'

 

But he was mistaken. While one of the men returned to the village for help, the other two, very discreetly, continued to follow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Three

Richard Mace pushed open the heavy door of the barn and bid the others enter.

 

The barn was cool and dry with a friendly smell.

 

In the loft, rats could be heard scampering about, while sunlight poured through a small window set high in one of the gable walls. Tegan wandered around the huge barn kicking the chaff on the floor, wondering why, as it was now early September, it only contained last year's debris and not this year's harvest.

 

'Is this home?'

 

'For the last night or two. Fortune has made me itinerant.'

 

'Why were those men chasing us?' asked the Doctor, completing his examination of Adric's leg.

 

'You really don't know?'

 

'We're new in the area.'

 

'You must be new to the world, sir.' Mace removed bread and cheese from a box normally used to store farm tools and started to attack the food with a knife. 'Haven't you heard? There is plague about.'

 

Tegan shuddered. 'Where?'

 

'Everywhere! That's why the village is guarded with such vigilance.' Mace cut a chunk of cheese from the wedge and offered it, with a thick slab of bread, to Nyssa. 'The villagers are terrified of strangers and the pestilence they might carry.'

 

'Of course!' exclaimed the Doctor. 'The reason for the sulphuric smoke: purification fires.'

 

'Is it because of the plague that you're not staying in the village?' said Tegan.

 

'Alas, the plague has made everywhere unfriendly.'

 

'Hence the guns?'

 

'Indeed.' Mace opened the wooden box and removed an earthenware jar. 'Once I was a noted thespian, until forced into rural exile by the closure of the theatres.' He struggled to remove the jar's stopper. 'Now it is only with the aid of pistols that I am able to command the attention of an audience.'

 

 

'You sound like a highwayman or robber,' said Tegan, instantly regretting her remark.

 

'Gentleman of the road, madam!' he said bowing. 'But do not be afraid. I only plan to rob you of a little time and company.'

 

Adric flexed his damaged leg. 'Aren't you concerned we may have plague?' he said as he pul ed himself to his feet.

 

'After many weeks alone in the woods I am prepared to risk everything for an hour of good conversation.' Raising the jar to his lips, he swallowed several mouthfuls of wine.

As he drank, tiny rivulets of red liquid trickled from either side of his mouth.

 

'Shouldn't we go, Doctor?' said Tegan.

 

'Soon,' he replied distractedly, staring at an ornament around the actor's neck. There was something familiar about it, but the Doctor couldn't quite remember what.

 

Mace set the jug down and returned to cutting up bread and cheese.

 

'How bad is the plague?' said Adric.

 

'The worst I've ever seen. Far more virulent in these parts than in the city.' He paused for a moment, then said quietly, 'I suppose that is to be expected.'

 

Tegan looked puzzled.

 

'Did you not see the comet a few weeks ago? A portent of doom if ever I saw one. Its aurora had barely faded from the sky when the first local case of the disease was reported.'

 

'That can't be possible,' the Doctor said vaguely, his mind only half concentrating on what was being said.

 

'Sir?'

 

'You're not due for a comet for...' he struggled to remember, '...well, at least, for quite some time.'

 

'Are you sure it wasn't a meteor?' said Nyssa.

 

'Call it by any name you wish, but I tell you the sky was lit as I've never seen it before.'

He patted the jar of wine. 'And it had nothing to do with this.' Mace grunted. 'I have seen many falling stars. This one was without parallel.'

 

'Of course!' the Doctor said excitedly.

 

 

The others looked at him in surprise.

 

'What's the matter?' said Nyssa.

 

'Your necklace,' the Doctor said pointing at Mace, 'may I have a closer look?'

 

'If you wish.' Mace removed the ornament and handed it to the Doctor. 'But I hope you don't intend to lay claim to it,' he said a little stiffly.

 

The Doctor slipped on his half-frames. 'I shouldn't think so,' he said brightly, starting to examine it.

 

Mace felt uneasy. He watched for a moment as the Doctor scrutinised the object. 'I found it last night in the loft,' he said in an attempt to vindicate his ownership of the recently acquired possession.

 

The Doctor smiled. 'There's no doubt about it,' he said, handing the ornament to Nyssa.

 

Tegan looked worried. 'What's the matter?'

 

Nyssa dangled the object by its leather thong and flicked it with her finger.

 

'Wel ?' said Tegan, 'is no one going to answer me?'

 

'It's made from polygrite, isn't it?'

 

The Doctor nodded.

 

'But from such a primitive society?'

 

'Certainly not from this one.'

 

'Please, Doctor,' said Tegan becoming quite annoyed. 'What's going on?' 'First things first.' The Doctor crossed to the bottom of the loft ladder.

 

'You don't mind if I look up here, do you?'

 

Mace felt unnerved, but said, 'As you wish, sir.' However, he wasn't taking any chances.

The small flourish of his hand, which seemed to endorse his agreement, casually petered out on the handle of one of his pistols.

 

The Doctor started to climb the ladder. 'Are you fit, Adric?' The boy flexed his leg and, barely limping now, crossed to the ladder.

 

'He ought to rest, Doctor,' Tegan protested.

 

 

But Adric had already started to climb. 'Don't worry, Tegan. We Alzarians are different.

We heal much quicker than you.'

 

Mace smiled. He had pin-pointed his uneasiness about the Doctor and his friends.

Foreigners, he thought, wondering where exactly Alzarians came from. At least that explained their strange costumes. He glanced at Tegan's knee-length skirt.

 

'Come on, Tegan. We can look around down here,' said Nyssa.

 

'And what are we looking for?' The air hostess was still annoyed as no one would tell her what was going on.

 

'Anything anachronistic.'

 

Tegan snorted. 'I assume that excludes us?'

 

The Doctor and Adric clambered into the loft and started to rummage among the thin layer of straw covering the floor.

 

'How could an ornament made of polygrite have got here, Doctor?'

 

'Make your own guess.' The Doctor coughed as dust wafted up from the disturbed straw. 'A comet that shouldn't be there, a meteor that doesn't look like a meteor -

whatever the phenomenon was, it certainly wasn't natural.'

 

'A space craft landing?'

 

'Or burning up in the atmosphere.'

 

Adric straightened up. 'But for the ornament to be here, some of the crew must have survived.'

 

'Not necessarily. The ornament is hard enough to have endured the crash. But should we find something more delicate...'

 

'. . . then there are survivors,' said Adric.

 

'Right.'

 

'Doctor!' It was Nyssa. 'Is this what we're looking for?'

 

The Doctor leaned over the makeshift pole put up to act as a guard rail. Below, Nyssa stood with arm outstretched, the flat of her hand upwards. In her palm were three flat discs. 'Powerpacks,' she said proudly.

 

 

'Wel done, Nyssa!' The Doctor bounced down the ladder to examine the find.

 

Richard Mace cleared his throat to attract the attention of these excitable foreigners.

'May I ask what is going on?'

 

'Questions later,' the Doctor said urgently. 'First, tell me, who owns this barn?'

 

 

 

Gravel crunched underfoot as the Doctor walked briskly up the driveway of the manor house, a highly agitated Richard Mace in tow.

 

Two masked villagers, still following the Doctor's party, reached the main gate of the drive just in time to see Tegan, Nyssa and Adric catching up with the irate actor and the Time Lord, who were now arguing heatedly. Bewildered, the two masked men concealed themselves behind the gate and observed their quarry, wondering what they were up to.

BOOK: Doctor Who: The Visitation
13.85Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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