Invasion Of The Cat-People Part 21

Tim nodded and shrugged. 'Basically, they're both money cards. In some tarot packs they're Coins not Pentacles. Both their presence, their position and their right-way-upness would suggest you could be in for some riches - not necessarily monetary though. Possibly spiritual. In fact given your constant travelling with the Doctor I should guess that money is the least of your problems. Flitting through time and s.p.a.ce means you're hardly going to have a reliable bank account. No, I think it means soulful rather than material wealth. The Ace tends to suggest a change of circ.u.mstances leading to this alteration though.' He sat back and waved at the cards. 'Want to do something else?'

Polly shook her head. 'I'm a bit tired. And that's given me a lot to think on. I wonder which card you are.'

'Me? Oh, I'm all the bad ones.'

Polly laughed. 'Never. You're too nice to be bad.'

Tim smiled and began clearing the cards away. Then he stopped and reached forward, putting a finger under her chin. 'Polly,' he began. 'Polly, listen to me. Think about the events in c.u.mbria.'

'Yes?'

'Concentrate on them.' Tim began humming quietly.

'Tim, stop that, what about. . . about . . . ab . . .' Polly sighed deeply and flopped back in her chair. 'Oh, it's such a nice day outside. I wish we were going to the seaside - or back to Cornwall. Oh, Tim, do let's. Cornwall is so nice in the summer. I could take you to Lizard Point, or the stone circle above the cliffs. There's one not far away with a huge upright circular stone with a perfect hole through it. A prehistoric Polo mint . . . Do you still have Polo mints in 1994?'

'Polly.' Tim hummed again and Polly yawned. 'Polly, your friend the Doctor. He's nice, isn't he?'

'Oh, yes, he's lovely. You'd really like him. He's a bit kooky at times and all that but he has some fab clothes in the TARDIS and let's us play around with them whenever we want.'

163.

Tim nodded. 'Of course he does. He's certainly "fab", but will he trust me? Will he understand what I'm doing? And why?'

'I expect so, Tim. What are you doing? What are you doing to me?'

Tim's humming stopped. 'To you? Why do you think I'm doing anything to you?'

Polly yawned again and stretched, speaking through her yawns. 'I don't know. Of course you're not.' She flopped her arms on to the table, letting her fingers gently stroke Tim's thumbs. 'You're dead nice, you know that? Dead nice.'

'Yes, Polly, I am. And it's very important that you remember that whatever I do is for the good of Earth. For everyone on it.'

'Oh well,' giggled Polly, 'you'll get on fine with the Doctor. That's all he ever wants.'

Tim nodded quickly. 'I know, I know. But I think our methods might clash - he might not see things entirely the same way I do. And it's very important that he does. Or, failing that, it's just as important that he doesn't know exactly what I'm doing.'

'What are you doing?'

'Oh, that isn't important. You wouldn't, couldn't understand. What matters is that you trust me. Implicitly.

Do you trust me?'

'Implicitly.'

'Good. How tired are you?'

'Not very, a bit exhausted that's all.' Polly tried to sit up.

Tim hummed. 'I think you're very tired.'

Polly yawned yet again. 'You know, I think you're right.

Dead clever, like I said. If I didn't know better, I'd think you were using your reso-whatnots on me.'

Tim smiled. 'As if.'

Polly settled back and fell asleep.

Within a few seconds she felt herself rise up. Her eyes popped open and she could see her body below her, curled up on the train seat, a soft smile on her face. Polly knew that she ought to be happy, the smile told her that. Yet 164 something was wrong. The sleeping Polly was happy, so why wasn't she?

She looked around her sleeping self. Tim was gone. In fact the carriage was empty of life apart from her. She wanted a better look and saw the outside of the train as it sped below her. Fighting an instinctive twist of vertigo, she heard herself mutter, 'More. I want to see some more.' To her astonishment, the roof of the train melted away to reveal nothing - not one living person except her sleeping self.

And the shadows. Each seat that she thought ought to have been occupied but seemed empty actually had a shadow on it. It reminded Polly of the leaflets the anti-nuclear protesters at Leeds had shown her. Human beings caught in an atomic blast reduced to silhouettes burned on to brickwork. A dark blob was moving down the centre of the train. The ticket collector, of course.

Where was Tim?

'Gone, my dear. Never really there. He's not what he seems.'

'Who . . who are you?' Polly whimpered. The voice, soft, feminine but slightly mocking, had reverberated all around her but seemed to lack any point of origin.

'I am a friend, Polly my dear. A good friend. You can trust me. You must, if you want to save Earth.'

'Everyone wants to save Earth. Everyone wants me to trust them. You, the Doctor, Tim . . . why?' The train had vanished completely. Polly was in s.p.a.ce, blackness, just tiny pinp.r.i.c.ks of light in the distance wavering and flickering. She could feel movement and realized it was herself - she was not exactly falling but nevertheless definitely unstable. 'Well?'

'You are right, my sweet one. Better to trust none of us.

That way, you cannot be let down. Of course, you can have no firm beliefs, no opinions and no sense of righteousness from which to argue, fight or protest, but perhaps in the coming war that is good. Yes, I think it is good.'

'War? What war? Please,' Polly felt frightened, 'please tell me who you are.'

165.

There was a flash and Polly closed her eyes.

'Open them, my child. You are quite safe - your astral form is neither subject to harm, nor visible to any other than ourselves.'

Polly opened her eyes. To nothingness - vast, white nothingness. She turned a complete circle or a.s.sumed she did. The lack of any colour, any shade, any landmark made it impossible to judge if she had turned slightly, a lot, ten times or not at all. 'What . . . what is this horrendous place?'

'It is my domain,' said the voice. 'Observe.'

Images flickered into existence, but unclear. To Polly it reminded her of the girls' toilets at school, where the windows were long strips of frosted gla.s.s that you could run your pen down and feel the b.u.mps. Impossible to see out of, just brief s.n.a.t.c.hes of shade rather than colour, and distorted shapes. The shapes she could see now were moving slowly and the more she stared, the more she could see that it was a person pushing something.

'Away,' said the female voice and the shapes began to fade.

'No, wait,' called Polly and for a brief moment the figures formed actual shapes - a dark-skinned woman in rags, pushing a similar-looking man in a cart. He had his foot pulled up to his mouth and was sucking his toe. The woman looked at Polly. The bone structure, the proud forehead, flattened nose and almost feverish eyes that bore into her, screaming with ignored intelligence instantly told her these were Australian Aborigines.

'Yes, I can see you. Ignore everyone. Trust no one - especially me. And him.'

The man giggled and plucked out his saliva-covered toe.

'No, ignore no one - just me!' He began to laugh and the woman slapped his head. Immediately he stopped laughing.

And changed.

Both the man and woman were suddenly Victorian: she in a severe black dress, he in a smoking jacket, seated in a wheelchair with a chequered rug on his knees. 'h.e.l.lo again, Polly. They told us you were coming.'

166.

'We made a mistake,' the woman said. 'We trusted Atimkos - and she recaptured us.'

'Don't trust him at all - he's using your powers to destroy us all.'

'Enough, cretins.' It was the all-pervading woman's voice.

The Victorian man and woman distorted and opaqued again, then vanished.

'There, child. Confused?'

Polly nodded.

'Good. Because if you are confused, unsure and bewildered, no one can use you. Atimkos is one of us. Like me. Like Udentkista and Tarwildbaning who you saw earlier. Like Thorgarsuunela who no longer exists in your time-lines. We are the singers, we created much of your culture and existence. We can also destroy it.'

'Why are you telling me this?' Polly called out into the bizarre whiteness that enveloped her.

'Because the other humans I tried to enlist have proven to be unusable. Like you, they possessed a strand of the natural powers of this planet within their life essences, but none have ever been strong enough. I fear my manipulations may have damaged them. You are your only hope.' There was a pause, then the voice continued and Polly could almost see the smile in the tones. 'Remember, anechoic. That's all you need to use. Anechoic. Goodbye for now, sweet creature.'

'Wait!' Polly automatically cupped her hands around her mouth as she shouted, 'You mentioned some others. Where are they?'

'Goodbye.'

Polly felt herself being pulled gently away from the whiteness. As she began to lose what little sense of balance she had achieved in the past few moments, two figures blurred into view. At first she thought it was the Aboriginal/Victorian twosome but instead their clothes gave them away: two twentieth-century men, huddled together on the floor. The young one, possibly in his twenties, had his back to her and all she could see was dark hair and a tanned cheek, but the other faced her, staring. His head hung 167 slightly to the left, his eyes stared forward, blinking rapidly.

His brown hair was a straggly mess and foam and saliva grouped at the lower point of his mouth and his breathing was heavy and irregular. As she finally winked out of existence, Polly tried to reach out to him, recognizing him.

The last thing she heard was her own voice, screaming out: 'Professor Bridgeman!'

The leader of the night-demons was very, very angry. She was waving her silver club at Thor-Sun (who was not a laughing demon any more) and pointing at their silver tent, still set up on the roof of the building behind them. Adoon could not hear everything that was said but he had got the idea: Thor-Sun had brought the night-demons to Baghdad to find something important and she had failed to find it. The mysterious light that would destroy the city presumably which Dok-Ter had a.s.sured him certainly was not here. All Dok-Ter wanted to do was put the pretty shiny box in Thor-Sun's jacket and 'retire to a safe distance'.

Adoon had immediately offered to do this - even Ben-Jak had agreed that Adoon's experience at, well, removing objects from various traders and visiting businessmen's pockets made him the obvious choice. Replacing was just as easy as removing. They had approached the building but Adoon had suddenly felt nervous and afraid. At first he had tried to hide it, but the nearer they got, the worse it got. He almost called out in panic at one point, wanting to know where Dok-Ter was. Ben-Jak had found him first and agreed that even he was frightened. Adoon had relaxed slightly. If a prince could be afraid, so could he. There was no shame in it. Dok-Ter and Ben-Jak had then talked about a magic lantern that the night-demons had brought with them. Adoon did not exactly understand what it did, but Dok-Ter explained that they used it to keep everyone else away. Anyone approaching the area would feel afraid and leave. Dok-Ter had then darted off and after a few moments returned with the magic lantern in pieces. He was very happy and Adoon had announced that all his fears 168 disappeared then. Although he did not tell the others, this was not strictly true - they had lessened certainly, but Adoon was not foolish enough not to acknowledge to himself that the night-demons really terrified him and although Thor-Sun was only one person, she was also very scary.

Right now he weighed the silver box Dok-Ter had given him in his left hand, staring at Thor-Sun. The coat she wore had two big pockets on either side and one inside. Inside pockets were easy to get stuff out of, but impossible to put anything in. He chose her left-hand pocket - she always pointed and demonstrated with her right hand, suggesting that she was right-handed. Therefore, her left side was slightly more vulnerable.

He bit his lip, waiting for the right moment. Behind him, out of sight, he knew Dok-Ter and Prince Ben-Jak were watching, counting on him to achieve his mission.

Swallowing hard, he again stroked the silver box, feeling his sweat oozing around it.

Thor-Sun turned away, her back to him. This was his chance.

He bolted forward, yelling as if the night-demons were chasing him. As if he had not been looking, he careered into the startled Thor-Sun, knocking her sideways. Adoon reached out to steady her, muttering hurried, breathless apologies. 'I'm sorry, my lady . . . be warned, there are creatures of the night here! Night-demons, they will destroy us all -' He suddenly froze. Walking towards them were the night-demons, two at the back talking to a third - the one that Dok-Ter had stolen the silver box from! 'Demons!'

he cried and ran back the way he had come.

He was aware that a couple of the night-demons were giving chase but then he heard Thor-Sun order them to stop.

He dived behind a bazaar awning and whipped around to watch them, completely hidden from their view.

'It was only some pathetic human child. If your deflector field was set at a less emotion-stimulating level, he probably wouldn't have blundered in here.' Excellent, that was exactly 169 what Dok-Ter had hoped she would say. Adoon slipped backwards to where he knew Dok-Ter and Ben-Jak were waiting. They greeted him enthusiastically.

'Good on yer, mate,' was Prince Ben-Jak's praise. DokTer just smiled, and Adoon could see from the richness of his blue eyes how pleased he was. 'Now,' said Dok-Ter, 'all we have to do is wait.'

They did not have to wait long before the screech of 'traitor!' was heard from Thor-Sun. They strained to hear, knowing that risking an actual look could be suicide.

'Oh yes, it was the Dok-Ter all right. Your accomplice!'

That was clearly the night-demon that Ben-Jak called Lotuss.

Thor-Sun was angry. 'My . . . my accomplice? What are you on, stale catnip or something? What possible reason could I have to a.s.sociate with him, litter-runt?'

The night-demon's leader shouted for them to stop.

'Clearly this cannot go on. We will settle this by finding the Dok-Ter once and for all.'

'How, Your Majesty?' That was Thor-Sun.

'Easily. If the Dok-Ter has Lotuss's power-pack, we can trace it. Chosan, get the fellinite tracer from the shuttle.'

Chosan obviously left because there was quiet, interspersed with the occasional hiss, which suggested to Adoon that Lotuss and Thor-Sun were facing off in frustration. After a moment Chosan must have returned because the night-demon's leader commanded something to be operated and Adoon heard a strange beeping noise. It suddenly grew faster and louder.

'My power-pack. It's near here!' said Lotuss.

The beeping suddenly peaked and Adoon put his hands to his ears.

'What? No, get off. . .' Thor-Sun was struggling with something and then she stopped. 'What the -'

'My property, I believe,' Lotuss hissed. 'Traitor.'

'Explain this,' demanded the leader.

Dok-Ter was grinning at the exchange. He and Ben-Jak put their thumbs into the air - Adoon took this to be a 170 ritual sign of success and joined in. Ben-Jak ruffled his hair and Adoon smiled. He had helped the two strangers succeed in stopping the demons. 'Now comes the tricky part,' said Dok-Ter. 'We need to get caught and taken back aboard their shuttle.'

Ben-Jak was staring as if Dok-Ter were insane. Adoon wondered if in fact he was. 'But Dok-Ter, why?'

'Because we need them to get us back to the TARDIS.

We're going to need it to stop both Queen Aysha and Thor-Sun's people. Of course, in the meantime all I have to do is convince Queen Aysha not to kill us.'

'And?'

'And what?'