Doctor Who_ The Art Of Destruction Part 14

'Not right now they won't,' the Doctor called back. Fynn heard the squelch of the cannon, flinched as a huge clod of mud splattered against the wall of the complex, brushed frantically at his clothes in case one of the insect things had landed there. Saw the Doctor holding open the door to the lab unit and threw himself inside, shivering so hard he could barely draw breath.

'Get up,' the Doctor snapped, slamming the door shut behind them and locking it.

'Don't understand. . . ' Fynn rolled over on to his back. 'What made the magma form attack us now?'

'It didn't attack us, it attacked Rose.' The Doctor hauled him back up by the shoulders, pale and trembling. 'First, Solomon then Rose.'

'Who next?' Fynn whispered.

'I need you alert,' the Doctor snapped. 'Be alert. Your planet needs lerts.'

Fynn stared at him blankly. 'That Wurm will be after us.'

'Of course he will. So we've got to work fast.' He reached in his pocket, then scowled. 'And without the sonic screwdriver. Come on. . . the lab. We'll have to lock ourselves in.'

'What are you planning?'

'Those lovely experiments of yours,' the Doctor said. 'I'm guessing 132 you tried to create an interface between human flesh and fungus at a cellular level, right?'

Fynn nodded, tried to focus his thoughts. 'I tried to create hybrid cells. I had some limited success, but '

'Well, luckily I'm not limited, not by anything.' The Doctor bundled him away down the deserted corridor. 'I'm a genius. So I'm gonna succeed where you failed, right?' He closed a set of fire doors and bolted them shut. 'And I'm gonna do it in about five minutes flat. Easy.' He set off again, practically carrying Fynn by the scruff of his neck. 'Easy-peasy.'

Fynn pulled free of the Doctor's grip, tried to hold still a moment.

'But why, what are you '

The Doctor dragged him along by the arm instead. 'The guardian converted the fungus into a sentry ent.i.ty, but your 'shrooms threw off their chains alien protein chains and re-established their original form.' He strode along to the lab and kicked open the door. 'That's got to be down to the basic cellular mismatch. If we can come up with a way to harden the cell membranes into cell walls just long enough to drive out the magma infection '

'without killing the subject '

'then, hey presto! We'll have an anti-golem serum. And that could be Rose's one chance. If we can only reach her. . . '

He slammed his hand down on the bench. 'We will will reach her. Fungus samples! Where where where?' reach her. Fungus samples! Where where where?'

Fynn hurried to the hidden safe in the wall, keyed in the access code. 'I return to the theoretical work whenever I can, but still I'm no nearer a breakthrough.'

'That's why you had to shift towards guano and growth chambers?'

'When the crop is hardy enough, I can continue with the real work and with official sanction, proper resources. . . ' He started selecting the likeliest of his aborted preparations. 'Edet Fynn, the man who saved the world. That is my dream. Time will tell.'

'Won't it just.' The Doctor looked at him sadly, as if he knew something Fynn didn't. 'Well, my dream's jumping the queue right now, so let's shift.'133.

'Doctor, you had this idea in mind before your friend was infected, didn't you? Why?'

'There are two sides in any war,' said the Doctor, locking the door and dragging a workbench over to place against it. 'Tried persuading the Wurms to pick a fight somewhere else didn't work out. But the Valnaxi fought the Wurms for ages and ages. They might just know of some weakness we can use to end this carnage, before the Earth cops it.'

'But they were all wiped out.'

' Something's Something's playing G.o.d to those golems. A battle computer or a defence ent.i.ty. Something that might be able to help us.' Straining, he heaved the lead box with the bat inside it on top of the workbench. playing G.o.d to those golems. A battle computer or a defence ent.i.ty. Something that might be able to help us.' Straining, he heaved the lead box with the bat inside it on top of the workbench.

'So, I thought I could whiz up some golem-repellent to use on myself.'

He grabbed a dataget, powered up and trained it on the first of the phials Fynn produced from the safe. 'The magma should infect me like it did the fungus, but with any luck it won't be able to take full control. Then I'll be able to commune with the magma forms without becoming one of them.'

'Experimenting on yourself?' Fynn powered up the gene-translator, stared at him. 'You'd take that risk?'

'Things we do to save the world, eh, Fynn?' The Doctor grinned as he rolled up his sleeve, as if he was actually enjoying this in some twisted way. 'Now, we'll use some of my blood as a base. It's as clever as the rest of me highly adaptive, with regenerative properties. Have to remove the extra-cellular matrix so it's compatible with all other Earth animal life, of course. . . '

' Earth Earth animal life?' animal life?'

The Doctor pointed to the lead box. 'Then we can test it on Tolstoy the bat in there, see if he can throw off the golem effect. Of course, it won't put right the genetic mutation, but. . . ' He studied the dataget's readout then slapped it down on a bench. 'Right! We'll start from scratch, I think. Instead of trying to merge a cell wall with a cell membrane, how about we build one around the other? A wall that will decay before permanent damage can occur, leaving the orig134 inal cell intact.' He nodded to himself. 'We can adapt the Kilbracken technique.'

Fynn frowned. 'The what?'

'Chemical parlour trick. Instead of cloning the cells, you conjure a sort of 3D photocopy.'

Fynn's head was spinning. 'But how can you know if it will stop the magma force from taking you over?'

'I can't for sure. But we can run a quick trial using this.' Suddenly Adiel's necklace was dangling from the Doctor's fingers, the tiny specks of gold glowing in the crystals. 'Hopefully not enough of the substance to be really harmful but enough to test our solution. Now maybe you could shut up, think positive and get working.' He looked up from the dataget, his eyes burning into Fynn's. 'Remember what we saw happen to Kanjuchi, the way he swelled up, mutated? Same as the vulture and poor old Tolstoy here, as all the golems.' He prepared to take his blood sample. 'That's the point where body chemistry is too far gone to reverse the damage caused by the Valnaxi pathogen. Rose will not not reach that point OK?' reach that point OK?'

Fynn nodded grimly and started preparing a laser syringe. 'But how long before that Wurm reaches us?'

The battering of locked doors carried from outside.

'Start a stopwatch and we can do a little experiment,' the Doctor suggested, holding out his arm. 'Maybe they'll publish our findings.'

Fynn activated the syringe. 'Posthumously,' he murmured. Basel huddled close to Adiel as Faltato dragged them through the narrow, red-lit pa.s.sages. There had been no sign of golems or blobs or rebels or anything else it was just them and the alien monster from h.e.l.l, two of its slavering tongues wrapped around their waists. They had used a weird, bubble-like container to cross from the Wurm ship to the eastern lava tubes, floating high over the battlefield. The golems were fighting with frightening fury to keep the Wurms away from the double doors that gave entrance to the caverns, but had left Adiel, Basel and even Faltato alone. Basel figured 135 that the Wurms were a bigger threat than three random aliens, and Adiel guessed he was right. What other explanation could there be? Now two more of the crusty, translucent containers bobbed slowly after them, ready to be filled with Valnaxi treasures and sent back to the Wurm ship.

'A brief diversion,' Faltato announced suddenly. 'I want to check on something. There's something fishy going on.'

You could say that, thought Adiel wearily; as understatements went, it was up there with war is h.e.l.l war is h.e.l.l.

He swung them into a narrow tunnel she recognised, one that ended in a huge pile of rocks. Basel could see a golden haze beneath it, like fireflies swarming.

He turned to Adiel. 'This is what you were gonna show me and Rose before you dumped us in the other tunnel?'

'Yeah,' she said. 'The thing I saw Solomon bury.'

'The deactivation plaque,' said Faltato haughtily, withdrawing his tongue. 'Study the rock-fall. a.s.sess what tools you'll need to clear it.'

Basel walked in silence along the tunnel to see.

'So, this deactivation plaque can turn off the golems and the guardians?' said Adiel behind him.

'If fed the right security codes, it will deactivate the warren's defences,' agreed Faltato, before adding heavily, 'Hence the name.'

'Then why isn't it better protected?' she argued. 'The magma should have thanked Solomon, not killed him. Why isn't this place crawling with golems?'

'That Wurm thing said this place wasn't working right,' Basel reminded her. 'But. . . there were even scorpions and spiders and things in that crummy chamber where Solomon got killed. So why not here?'

But even as he approached the rubble-strewn plaque, the rocks began to rumble and stir. One toppled off the pile and skittered down to land at his feet.

Basel frowned, tried to lift it. The thing should have weighed a ton, but this was rough and light like pumice. He pushed at some more of the debris, which either tumbled from the pile or crumbled to dust.

'This ain't right,' he called back. 'The rock's gone funny.'136.

Faltato galloped towards him, dragging Adiel along behind. 'The rock has been exposed to some kind of intense energy field,' he muttered. 'Just hours ago the rock was solid enough. . . It is as if the binding force has been extracted.' He shook his pointed head as he swept more of the dusty debris clear, exposing the plaque. Then all five eyes narrowed in what might have been a frown.

'What is it?' Adiel asked warily.

'This isn't a deactivation plaque,' he murmured. 'It's designed to look like one, but the data-feed is a fake.' He gestured with a pair of pincers to a hole in the plaque, where lights like magma glowed inside, linked by gla.s.sy tubes. 'I don't know what this technology does, but it shouldn't be here.'

'Well, if this thing doesn't deactivate anything, what does does it do?' it do?'

breathed Adiel.

'What did it do?' Faltato corrected her. 'It has been damaged, hence the energy leak. But its purpose. . . ' His legs rattled together, a sinister, unsettling sound. 'Why am I discussing this with bipeds?'

Adiel shrugged. 'Perhaps you should tell the Wurms.'

'The Valnaxi block their signals, they won't be able to hear me.'

Faltato looked troubled. 'Later, perhaps.'

He turned and shuffled back up the side tunnel.

'Why was he discussing it with us?' Basel murmured. Adiel regarded the monster bobbing about on his endless legs. 'I think because he's scared,' she said.137.

[image]

Fynn pulled the latest sample from the centrifuge, prepared a slide and slotted it under the intron microscope.

Maybe this one would. . . 'No. No good,' he reported. 'The fungus cell "photocopies"

are forming a barrier round your own cells, but they break down in seconds.'

'That's a bit rubbish. . . ' The Doctor was on the opposite side of the lab, bent over beakers and jars of foul-smelling chemicals. 'Mix in a little of samples A and E.' Suddenly he jerked his head up, hair waving about wildly. 'Oh, hang on, A and E Accident and Emergency, that doesn't sound hopeful, does it? Tell you what, make it A and H. AH!

Ahhhhhh.' He smiled and nodded to himself. 'Yeah, that sounds more like it. Should make the cell walls less reactive so they'll last longer.'

'But even if this works, how are you going to administer the cure?'

asked Fynn. 'You remember Kanjuchi. . . The skin hardens like metal, so no syringe will '

'It's all right, I've thought of that,' the Doctor told him, holding up a dataget. 'I've adapted this thing. Now it's a data- give give as well. When the serum's perfected we can scan it then broadcast it as an electrochemical irradiation.' as well. When the serum's perfected we can scan it then broadcast it as an electrochemical irradiation.'139.

Fynn stared, speechless. 'You subverted the DG's entire function in just a few minutes?'

The Doctor looked puzzled. 'Course I did. Rose's life is at stake. Now worry about your own work!'

Fynn did as he was told, in a baffled daze. Everything the Doctor instructed him to do seemed to fly in the face of all established genetic theory. And yet it was working after a fashion. 'How long do you think you can make the cells endure?'

'Dunno,' he said. 'Long enough, I hope.'

There was a crash from not far down the corridor. Fynn shuddered.

'That Wurm will be here to catch us and kill us any minute.'

'On the case,' the Doctor informed him, holding up a couple of stoppered phials. 'Whipped up an explosive mixture in my spare time. Don't stop working I'll take the other door, cut through the common room and double back round to draw Korr away.' He slapped down one of the phials on Fynn's workbench. 'If the Wurm gets past me, use this. But hide under the bench first it's a big bang and it'll probably bring the roof down on you.'

Fynn stared at the phial, then turned his attention to mixing the samples. 'Be careful, Doctor.'

'Yeah. One day.' He ran to the far door, threw it open and ran out into the corridor.

The barricade jumped as the Wurm slammed itself against the main doors. 'I can smell you, bipeds,' Korr hissed. 'Return to me or die.'

Fynn stared at the door the Doctor had taken; it was still standing ajar. He could run too. Hide. Wait for all this to be over. With a tremor of fear, he realised that the Doctor could have done exactly that. What if he'd run out, leaving Fynn behind as a distraction, with nothing more to protect him than a phial full of bad smells? Then he remembered the pain in the man's eyes at what had happened to Rose and went back to work with renewed determination.

'Life from death,' he murmured, mixing his samples together. 'Life from death.'

140.

The Doctor pelted through the darkened corridors, working his way round back to the lab block in a wide circle, ready to confront Korr. He couldn't afford to waste much time on the Wurm; if Rose was to stand the tiniest chance, he had to be ready to move the moment Fynn finished the concoction.

If it didn't work, with the TARDIS buried under tons of alien earth, there was no chance left for any of them.

He reached the lab block, ran on and on until at last he kicked open the final set of double doors and saw the Wurm slinging its fat, tumescent body against the main lab. The barricade looked set to collapse any moment.

'Korr!' the Doctor bellowed.

'So.' The Wurm writhed, stretched out its blind head towards him.

'The little biped with the big mouth.'

'This is your last chance. I'm warning you leave this place now or you'll never leave it.'

'Threats, little biped?' Korr hissed. 'If you had the means and will to destroy me, you would have launched a surprise attack from within the laboratory you have defended. Therefore, this is a distraction tactic. You wish to stop me from entering the laboratory.'

'I don't have time for this!' The Doctor held the phial above his head. 'This can can destroy you. Don't make me use it.' destroy you. Don't make me use it.'

Korr raised the stump at his shoulder and, with a hydraulic hiss, a slim metal tube rotated into position. 'This weapon can destroy your laboratory. I can fire it before your projectile can touch me. Unless you surrender now, I shall do so.'

'Do that and you'll destroy the memory wafers you need to power the visual device I gave to your king,' the Doctor countered. 'We'll both come out losers.'

'You are creating a weapon in this laboratory,' Korr rumbled, 'a powerful weapon that will stop us from using your see-through device.'

'No! It's not a weapon '