Doctor Who_ Time Zero Part 26

It took George longer than they expected to find what he was looking for. The landscape had changed over the past century over the past day even. The snow was getting deeper and drifting across the narrow path so that it was difficult to find a safe way down the steep incline. They trusted that the sled was more stable and followed its tracks down the lower slopes of the mountain.

Everyone except for Anji and the Doctor had mouthed in surprise to find the TARDIS back on the sled when they climbed up out of the ice cavern. If it really was made of fire in some way as the Doctor had said, Anji thought, it was certainly not giving out any useful heat. It was gathering snow, crusting over with the frosting like a Christmas decoration.

Eventually, just as Anji was sure she was as cold as she had ever been despite her thermal clothing, Jonas gave a startled cry.

'Here we are,' the Doctor announced. He slapped his hands together and blew into them. 'Aren't we, George? I recognise it from Fitz's description.'

Thorpe, Jonas and the d.u.c.h.ess just stared. Anji was used to the unusual, but even so she had to admit it made for a strange sight. It was as if a sheet of gla.s.s had been stuck end up in the snow. A frameless window emerging into the pale daylight. The surface was uneven where the air had frozen.

'I'd say the climate on the other side had changed considerably, wouldn't you, George?'

'It was sunny through the portal or whatever it is,' George confirmed. 'That was how we saw it. A patch of ground had thawed. Gra.s.s was growing.'

'Here?' Thorpe said. 'Gra.s.s?'

'Different time of year,' the Doctor pointed out. 'Winter now in the other world, perhaps.'

'It's just ice,' Jonas said. As ever he was holding his rifle ready, though it was shaking as he shivered.

'We should get back,' the d.u.c.h.ess said.

The Doctor grinned. 'Your old bones feeling the chill are they?'

'Very funny, young man.'

'What is that?' Thorpe's voice was low and urgent. He was pointing at the sheet of ice.

There was a shape just visible, moving, on the other side. Though it was obvious from where they stood that beyond the ice was merely more snow.

'It's something in the other world,' George said.

'Other world be d.a.m.ned.'

'Language, Mr Thorpe,' the Doctor said. He was staring at the shape. It was like a vague image on a badly*tuned television. It cleared slightly as whatever it was moved closer. Then it pressed against the ice, a scaly green*brown texture.

And an eye.

Staring directly at them, huge and watery.

The d.u.c.h.ess gasped. Anji stifled a scream. Thorpe stepped backwards.

'One of the creatures,' George said.

'Interesting,' the Doctor breathed. 'n.o.body make any sudden movements or do anything noisy.'

But his words were lost in percussion as the Jonas fired the rifle. The bullet shattered the ice over the portal. It crazed like gla.s.s before exploding into fiery fragments. The roar of the creature beyond mixed with the echo of the gunshot. The huge eye was rust red through the smoky window of air, gushing blood that froze on the scaled skin, crusted round the wound... And the enormous head was pulling away.

Jonas was rooted to the spot. Thorpe was shouting at him to wait for an order in future before firing. But there was no future. A ma.s.sive clawed foot lashed through the broken air and swiped savagely at the stocky man, sending him crashing backwards.

He didn't even have time to scream. His eyes were staring dead before he flopped into the snow, sending up a blizzard of white haze.

'Back to the sled run!' The Doctor pushed Anji and the d.u.c.h.ess ahead of him. Thorpe was already running, instinctively grabbing for George and almost failing as his hand closed on airy nothing.

The monster was pushing through the window, screaming in pain and frustration, head twisting back and forth as it tried to find its prey with its surviving eye.

It found the Doctor. He was following the others at a stumbling run through the knee*deep snow. Anji turned in time to see the creature bearing down on him, saliva freezing in icicles from its slavering mouth, tail lashing, clawed talons raking downwards, striking across the Doctor's shoulder, ripping his sleeve almost completely from his coat, knocking him headlong into the snow.

Anji started back, but Thorpe picked her up swinging her off her feet and bundling her ahead of him into the cab of the sled. The d.u.c.h.ess was already pressed into the tiny s.p.a.ce as Thorpe revved the engine.

The whole vehicle shook as the creature slammed into it. A slimy wet trail followed its jaws down the windscreen. The whole gla.s.s front cracked across like ice.

Then Thorpe thrust the sled into gear, and it powered forwards. It wasn't moving fast, but it was angled away from the monster and threw it sideways from the windscreen.

'Stop!' Anji was shouting. 'Go back.'

'No way.' Thorpe was staring forwards. The d.u.c.h.ess was curled up shivering in fright and cold. The creature was roaring behind them. Through the side window of the cab, Anji could see it rearing up its hind legs and screaming after them.

And between its feet was the huddled dark form of the Doctor's body. Unmoving.

Of Hartford's team of fifteen, he could only now contact six others. Eight if he included Thorpe and Jonas. A garbled message from Thorpe, laced with static and white noise, told him they were on their way back to the Inst.i.tute.

When Hartford saw the sled with its cracked windscreen and battered sides splutter into the main courtyard, his eyes narrowed and his blood boiled. He could see the 'ghost' or whatever he really was running beside the sled, leaving no footprints in the snow. The door of the cab opened with a grating protest of bent metal, dropping on its twisted hinges. Thorpe and the two women Kapoor and the d.u.c.h.ess climbed out. No Jonas. No Doctor.

That was when Hartford lost it.

This was supposed to be a simple covert op. Straight in, grab material, straight out and back to retirement this time, he had promised himself (again) for good. Minimum risk, and that was from the Russian troops who were either dead or locked in their barracks in their underwear. Instead, he had found that what he was tasked to retrieve either did not exist or had yet to be invented, or just possibly was frozen in a cave somewhere down the mountain. And his people were dying. Or disappearing. All he had to show for the mission so far was a collection of small black lumps of stone, and they were fixed so hard you couldn't prise them up from the floor.

Thorpe stood to attention as Hartford let him know just what he thought and how he saw the situation. When he was slightly calmer, he ordered Thorpe to get the two remaining scientists to the Great Hall. He'd discover once and for all if there was anything in this G.o.d*awful place worth taking. Then they'd move out and blow it to bits behind them. The charges were laid, even if several of the team who had placed them no longer answered their radios or seemed even to exist. He could start the countdown from his watch. Thirty minutes from when he decided then it would be over.

There was just Thorpe and Hartford with them in the Great Hall. Thorpe had an a.s.sault rifle slung over his shoulder. But he looked haggard, older, tired. Anji wasn't surprised, he had been through a lot more than she had in the incredulity stakes. But she had seen the Doctor mauled and then trampled, probably. Killed, almost certainly. That was something that she had thought was impossible. No, not 'thought', more just sort of believed. a.s.sumed. It numbed her every bit as much as the intimation of Fitz's mortality.

Thorpe, she felt, was used to death. Close to death. But despite her time with the Doctor, despite losing Dave, Fitz, and now the Doctor himself, she could never come to terms with it.

Thank G.o.d for that, she thought.

Looking at Thorpe and Hartford, tasting the fear that hung in the air around them, she knew there would be more death yet.

The Grand d.u.c.h.ess seemed to have regained her composure and was sitting opposite Anji, though she seemed not to want to talk. Which was fine. Vladimir Naryshkin and Miriam Dewes were led in by one of Hartford's henchmen, who was then dismissed to 'check on the charges.'

George was standing behind Anji. He had tried to sit on the table, but found he fell through it. The expression of surprise on his face was more comical than the event.

Anji rubbed her throat. It was sore, and she remembered as her fingers explored the tiny red lump that she was not alone. 'I hope you're getting all this, whoever you are,' she muttered. She smiled at the d.u.c.h.ess's frown she had heard too.

It was like listening through cotton wool. Anji had to concentrate, she was so tired, so numb, to hear what Hartford was saying to the scientists. He was shouting, ranting. He had Thorpe pointing his rifle directly at Naryshkin.

'Whatever you have that's of value, I want it. And I want it now.'

'It's all experimental. Theoretical,' Miriam said. Her voice quivered. She was obviously nervous, afraid for her life. But at least she could talk. Naryshkin seemed to be in a world of his own, just staring at the the tabletop and not even listening.

'Then what is he he doing here?' Hartford demanded, pointing across at George's nebulous form. doing here?' Hartford demanded, pointing across at George's nebulous form.

Before Miriam could attempt to answer, someone cleared his throat in the doorway. It seemed to break the spell for a moment as they all turned to look.

'I do apologise. I was told everyone was to come here.' It was Holiday. Anji recognised him at once from the Doctor's description, and despite the situation, she stifled a smile. The big man was rubbing his hands together as he crossed to the table where Anji and the d.u.c.h.ess were sitting and pulled out a chair. He blinked when he saw Anji, and spared George a nervous look.

'Where's Curtis?' Hartford asked. A nerve was ticking under his eye.

'I can only apologise again, sir,' the manservant said. His hands were working, but his voice was calm and deferential, as if he was sorry the port had run out. 'He was not in his room when I looked just now. I believe Mr Hump, is it?'

'Just Hump,' Thorpe said.

'Just Hump then, he went to look for Mr Curtis. And told me to come here. In fact to come here "you son*of-a-b.i.t.c.h and don't get lost or the Colonel will skin you alive." Sir.' There was no hint of amus.e.m.e.nt in tone, but as he looked away from Hartford he raised his eyebrow almost imperceptibly at Anji.

Hartford seemed not to notice or care. 'Curtis,' he barked at Thorpe. 'I need Curtis. He set this place up. He knows what's really going here. Where it's hidden.'

'There is nothing hidden here,' Miriam said. 'Please believe us.' Hartford rounded on her immediately, pointing his fingers like playground gun. 'Oh yes there is. And I shall have it. You'll tell me, one of you will tell me. Otherwise I'll kill you all. It's hidden here and I want it.'

Miriam did not reply.

But Anji could see Miriam was frowning. 'Hidden,' she was mouthing to herself, as if thinking barely aloud. 'In here...'

'Get Curtis,' Hartford bawled at Thorpe.

'Sir.' Thorpe left at a run.

Hartford drew his pistol. 'I am going to count to ten,' he said. 'Then, if n.o.body tells me where it is hidden, I am going to shoot Comrade Naryshkin.'

Naryshkin glanced up at his name. But his face showed no sign he had understood.

'One.'

'You can't,' Anji shouted. 'Don't you understand yet? There is no time experiment.'

'Two.'

'It's black holes,' Miriam pleaded. 'That's all we do.'

'Three.'

'Optic black holes, and we haven't succeeded in making one yet.'

'Four.'

'We have to slow light further before we can achieve an event horizon.'

'Five.'

'Please!'

'Six.'

Miriam stood up. Hartford watched her, but kept the gun pointed at Naryshkin.

'Sit down!' he shouted. 'Seven.'

'You want what's hidden?' Her voice was strained with nerves. 'Hidden in here?' She edged towards the fireplace.

'Tell me. Eight.'

What was she doing? Anji watched as Miriam reached up and conuted the stones across the top of the fireplace.

'Third from the left,' she said. 'Third from the left.' Her hand was shaking as she reached for the stone.

'This had better be good,' Hartford said. The gun was still aimed directly at Naryshkin. 'Nine.'

Miriam was tugging at the stone, pulling at it, clawing the edges with her nails. 'It's here, behind this stone. It has to be. Wait, please. It says so in the journal.'

Anji's blood froze.

'What journal?' George asked from behind her.

'Nine and a half,' Hartford said, without a hint of amus.e.m.e.nt.

'I took it from Curtis's room.' She turned to look at Anji, desperation in her eyes as she saw that Hartford was moving the gun, bringing it across so that it was now aimed at her.

'But it's a fake,' Anji screamed. She turned to the d.u.c.h.ess. 'Tell her!'

'Ten.'

The d.u.c.h.ess was on her feet her hand over her mouth.

Miriam was again scrabbling at the stone. 'The gun,' she whimpered. 'I know it's here. It has to be.'

Naryshkin looked up as if aware for the first time of something of what was happening.

'Time's up,' Hartford said His voice was hollow and empty. His finger squeezed the trigger with an expertise born of practise and experience.

And a body crashed lifeless to the floor.