Doctor Who_ Happiness Patrol Part 4

'But where did it come from?'

'I think it belonged to some killjoy brought here by the Happiness Patrol. But it's all right he doesn't need it any more.'

The Doctor flicked a speck of dirt off the go-kart's b.u.mper. 'So if my friend and I were to get into it and drive off, what would you do?'

'Nothing,' said Priscilla P.

'Nothing?'

Priscilla P gave the Doctor her most charming smile.

'Absolutely nothing.'

The Doctor feigned surprise. 'You wouldn't raise the alarm, shoot us, or order a missile strike from low orbit?'

Priscilla P looked horrified at the suggestion. 'I told you, Doctor. I would do nothing.'

The Doctor went back to Ace who was peering into the go-kart, trying to identify the components of a Terra Alphan engine. 'You're right,' the Doctor told her.'It is b.o.o.by-trapped.'

Something was obviously worrying Priscilla P. The longer the Doctor and Ace spent examining the go-kart, the jumpier she seemed to get. She was now right at the far side of the waiting zone, as far away from them as possible.

'What are you doing?' she called, trying to disguise the anxiety in her voice.

It was the Doctor's turn to play innocent. 'Nothing,' he cried, giving Priscilla P a little wave.

This did not seem to allay her fears. She could now see Ace fiddling with the controls, examining the ignition.

'You're not thinking of starting that?' she asked, trying to sound as unconcerned as possible.

'No,' said Ace, continuing her work on the ignition.

Priscilla P knew her duty. She had worked for many years in the Happiness Patrol, mostly on night patrols.

And although she regarded waiting zone duty as demeaning to one of her experience in the field, she knew she had been entrusted with two high-category prisoners.

But she also realized that every so often a moment arrived when duty had to come second to self-preservation.

Watching the Doctor and the foolish girl tampering with the go-kart, she knew that moment had arrived. She edged away from them, slowly at first, crossing the line of the waiting zone. She checked one last time. 'You're sure you're not thinking of starting that, Doctor?'

'Positive,' said the Doctor.

That was enough for Priscilla P. She didn't trust the strange man with the straw hat and umbrella she was going. She bolted round the corner, away from the waiting zone, ran down a long arcade, and dived into a recessed alcove, dimly lit by a single ancient ornate lamp. She crouched, covered her ears, and waited for the explosion.

The Doctor had extricated a bomb from under the go-kart and was wondering what to do with it. It was a situation he had been in before, but one that he never relished. Ace wasn't helping. She was now sitting in the driver's seat of the go-kart, impatiently drumming her fingers on the wheel.

'Here,' she said. 'Give it to me.'

The Doctor tried to concentrate on the job in hand. 'Get off,' he said.

But Ace wouldn't go away. 'It's a bomb, isn't it?'

'Ace, I'm trying to defuse it.'

'Let me have a go.'

The Doctor had spotted the detonator. He started to remove it. 'I'm trying not to blow us both to pieces.'

Ace started sulking. 'I never get to have any fun.'

Working very carefully, the Doctor completed the delicate operation. 'Start the go-kart, Ace. You can drive.'

He vaulted into the pa.s.senger seat as the machine exploded into life. The tyres screeched as they took a sharp left. The go-kart roared past a long stone arcade.

'Look!' shouted the Doctor, trying to make himself heard above the din. Ace turned her head just in time to see the amazed expression on Priscilla P's face as they raced past the alcove where she was still waiting for the explosion. She leapt up from her hiding place, a hand fumbling for her fun gun. By the time she was in the street firing after the go-kart, Ace and the Doctor were well out of her range.

Priscilla P heard a noise behind her, and spun round on the b.a.l.l.s of her feet, the fun gun primed for use. But it was only Susan Q, her subordinate in the Happiness Patrol.

'Priscilla,' said Susan, 'I hope I haven't caught you at a bad time.'

There was no love lost between Priscilla and Susan.

'What do you want?' barked Priscilla.

'I was supposed to be collecting one of the prisoners for the Happiness Patrol auditions,' said Susan.

Susan had broken one of the unspoken rules of Terra Alpha, and Priscilla was quick to put her right. 'We don't have any prisoners on Terra Alpha. We don't have any prisons and we don't have any prisoners.'

Susan gazed after the Doctor and Ace, who were disappearing round a corner in the distance. 'Well, we certainly don't have any now, do we?'

6.

Helen A, relaxing in her suite of rooms, took the news of Ace and the Doctor's escape badly. At times like this times of great disappointment in those on whom she had conferred responsibility she always found consolation in the same way. She crossed the room to the large gilded cage in the corner and gently lifted the embroidered sheet to reveal the only creature who never let her down, her Fifi.

Fifi was of a species indigenous to Terra Alpha. A small, ferocious, dog-like creature with a row of sharp dorsal spikes which flicked into an upright position when she was alert. Her body was covered with a scraggy wispy fur and her eyes glowed like a cat's. For years Fifi's species had been considered impossible to train by the Earth settlers on Terra Alpha and had been hunted for sport. The walls of many wealthy Alphan homes were adorned with the tails of Fifi's ancestors. This had continued until a few years ago, when the species had been wiped out all except Fifi.

Helen A led a special expedition to the interior to hunt down the last of these vicious predators. After many weeks of searching, Fifi was located in the foothills of the mountains of Claffam. Helen A always left her party and hunted alone; she was many miles away from the others when she came face to face with Fifi on a rocky escarpment.

They liked each other immediately.

Several hours later, long after all the other hunters had returned to camp, Helen A arrived, with Fifi trotting obediently at her heels.

Since that day, they had remained fiercely loyal to each other. Fifi retained her hostility to everything else, but would do anything to please Helen A. Similarly, Helen A turned to Fifi at times of crisis. She loved to indulge Fifi, and now slipped some chocolate truffles into her cage. Fifi growled contentedly.

This idyllic scene was interrupted by a sharp knock at the door. Helen A replaced the embroidered sheet over the cage and opened the door to Daisy K. She motioned to a chair, carved after an original found in the ashes at Versailles after the bomb, and Daisy K sat down. Helen A knew that Daisy K had not been at the waiting zone at the time of the escape, but Daisy K had been the officer in charge of the relevant sector of the city, and as such the break-out was ultimately her responsibility.

Helen A pretended she had not been told of the escape.

'I understand that you arrested an alien spy earlier.'

Daisy K took a deep breath. 'Yes, but he's just disappeared.'

'Excellent,' said Helen A. She approved of disappearances.

'You don't understand,' said Daisy.

'I don't understand?'

'I mean he's vanished.'

Helen A smiled at her. She decided to make Daisy K squirm. 'Well, as long as he's disappeared.'

'He hasn't actually disappeared he's vanished,' said Daisy K. 'He'll disappear as soon as we can find him.' She waited for the explosion. But Helen A sounded calm.

'Do you mean to say that not only has he not disappeared, he's also escaped?'

Daisy K tried to sound confident. 'As soon as we find him, he'll disappear.'

Helen A's voice dropped, almost to a whisper. 'It's been a long night, Daisy K,' she said. 'Don't let me down.'

The engine of the go-kart was purring like a cat as Ace and the Doctor sped through the dimly lit streets of the capital of Terra Alpha. They had put some distance between themselves and the Happiness Patrol, and could no longer hear the wail of the pursuing sirens.

'Nothing like a nice quiet night, eh, Ace?' said the Doctor.

'Yeah,' said Ace as they screamed round a corner. 'It's about time we had a rest.' But just as she was finishing her sentence, the engine started spluttering. Ace slammed her foot down, but the go-kart glided gently to a halt.

Half an hour later the Doctor's feet were still sucking out from under the go-kart as he tried to find out what was wrong with the engine. They had been hearing the sirens for about five minutes now, getting louder as the Happiness Patrol hunted them down. Ace was keeping a look-out from a street corner when she saw a patrol on foot turning over rubbish and looking into doorways. She recognized Daisy K from earlier in the evening.

She ran back to the go-kart and the Doctor. 'Any luck, Professor?' she asked his feet.

The Doctor did not appear from under the machine. 'I need a little more time.'

Ace took her decision. 'You've got it,' she said, and ran back to the corner. She put her fingers to her mouth and blew.

The Happiness Patrol stopped searching when they heard the piercing whistle. Daisy K looked up from the smelly pile of rubbish she was wading through to see Ace calmly walking down the street towards her.

'Oil' shouted Ace, just in case they hadn't seen her.

Daisy K levelled her fun gun at Ace. 'I arrest you for the evasion of Happiness Patrol auditions,' she said.

Ace shrugged. 'Where are they?'

Daisy K suspected more insolence she didn't like this c.o.c.ky girl in her leather jacket. 'What do you mean?'

'I'm ready for your auditions,' said Ace. 'The question is, are they ready for me?'

Daisy K snapped her fingers and within a few moments Susan Q was at her side. 'Take her back to headquarters,'

she barked. 'We'll continue the search for the spy.'

Ace was already being marched away by Susan Q when the Doctor finished his work on the go-kart engine and it spluttered back into life. 'That should do it, Ace,' he said as he scrambled out from underneath the machine. 'Nice of the Happiness Patrol to leave us in peace.'

Pulling himself to his feet, he saw that he was alone.

'Ace?' he called hopefully, but he knew that she would already be involved she would be embracing the danger with every ounce of that huge heart.

The Doctor sighed as he jumped into the driver's seat of the go-kart and slipped the vehicle into gear. He was not a moment too soon, for Happiness Patrol guards raced round a corner and opened fire just as he started moving. The Doctor weaved across the road to give them a harder target.

He felt the machine jolt under him as a bullet ricocheted away, but there was no damage and he screeched round the corner to safety.

A few streets away Earl Sigma heard the sounds of gunfire and took his harmonica from his lips. But gunfire on Terra Alpha was not a strange sound to anyone who had been there for more than a couple of days, and soon he was playing again as he walked along. A slow, plangent, haunting melody, ripped from the deepest recesses of his soul and released into the thick black air of the Terra Alphan night.

But Earl was being watched. As he walked by, a manhole cover was quietly slid to one side, and bright eyes watched in the darkness. The cover was replaced when he was out of earshot, but another was opened as he walked down the next street. This time there were four, eight, sixteen eyes, all watching his progress watching and waiting.

Ace could feel the nozzle of Susan Q's fun gun in her back as they walked through the streets heading back towards the centre of Terra Alpha.

'What's your name, then?' she asked. 'Valerie V, Zelda Z. Wendy W ...'

She felt a stab of pain as the gun was jabbed in her back.

'Quiet!' ordered Susan Q. She motioned to Ace to stop walking.

Susan Q held a finger to her lips. And then Ace understood why they had stopped to listen to the music!

They could just hear the faint strains of Earl's harmonica floating across the rooftops. The music was beautiful, but sad, so sad...

'Do you hear the music?' Susan Q spoke softly.

'He sounds sad,' said Ace. 'If it's a he.'

'Yes, he does.'

Ace's anger erupted. 'So you want to arrest him, put him in jail, shoot him...'

But Susan Q was different from the other members of the Happiness Patrol that Ace had come across. Ace could see that she cared about this music.