Cold Fusion - Lance Parkin [29]
‘I suppose it’s possible,’ Tegan conceded grudgingly.
Secretly, she found the thought quite comforting.
However long it took her to get back to Heathrow, she’d get there in the end, have a life, raise kids. Best of all, it had happened centuries ago. Her grandchildren would end up here, among the stars, just as her grandfather had emigrated from Yugoslavia to start a new life. He’d always called Australia ‘The New World’. Perhaps space travel was in her genes, part of the indomitable Jovanka spirit.
‘You could be right,’ Tegan conceded.
‘And it’s certainly not good etiquette to call in on your relations while time travelling,’ Nyssa continued knowledgeably.
‘Who says?’ Tegan was suspicious again.
‘The Doctor,’ Nyssa said, just a little too quickly.
‘When did he say that, then?’
Nyssa was silent.
Tegan set off again, her pace slightly brisker than before. ‘You had me going for a minute there.’
‘What if he tells you something about your future?’
Nyssa was saying. ‘He might know all sorts of things about you. He might know what your future husband was called.’
Tegan was leaving Nyssa trailing behind. ‘As long as it isn’t “Adric” I’m sure I’ll cope,’ she called back to her companion.
Medford entered the surveillance suite. The room was darkened. In the centre, a bearded member of the Scientifica sat in a padded chair. He had a green tunic, denoting that he was a member of the technical service grade. He wore a neat turban, also in green.
‘What’s your name?’ Medford asked him.
‘Falconstock, sir.’ His voice was resonant, he had a straight, almost military, bearing.
The Provost-General bent his arm and raised it to his temple. ‘We are not alone in the universe.’
Falconstock repeated the action. ‘Earth is under constant threat from alien attack.’
The Provost-General lowered his arm. Hesitantly, Falconstock did the same. ‘You remember the oath.’
‘Of course, sir.’
‘Marvellous. Repeat the rest for me.’
‘ “Ours is a top secret organization set up to investigate extraterrestrial forces at large in our existence. Our mission is to keep a constant search for anything mysterious so that HQ can be immediately alerted to an attack from the stars.
We pledge to keep our planet free from the perils of the universe.” ’
Medford smiled. ‘Good. Word-perfect. Show me the Chief Scientist.’
Whitfield appeared on the monitor, heading away from the camera. She was neat as ever and beautiful, to his eyes at least. The Doctor and Adric trailed behind her, taking in their surroundings. The fish-eye lens distorted them, like a fairground mirror. In the darkened surveillance suite, the colours of their clothing appeared even brighter.
‘Those gentlemen with the Chief Scientist are aliens, the vanguard for an invasion force. We’ve been expecting the attack for just over a year now, and we are ready for them.’
Falconstock seemed startled, unsure what to do. The Provost-General rested a hand on his shoulder.
‘No need to worry, for the moment at least.’ He eased into the other chair. ‘They are unarmed, and have no immediate hostile purpose. We’re going to watch them: record every word they say, log every gesture they make. I want you to cross-refer every name they use with the main database. Anything that isn’t in there, access the Imperial Datanet.’ He sat alongside the technician.
‘Yes, sir. Recording started.’
‘I want to find out exactly what they are planning, what they already know.’ Medford leant back, intently watching the monitor.
They were in the lift.
They were in the lift. A map was mounted on the far wall.
Whitfield stepped up to it, and tapped the transparent plate protecting the diagram of the building. ‘Scientifica is a tetrahedron, each side is two kilometres long. Therefore it is –’
‘One thousand seven hundred and thirty –’ the Doctor began.
‘Seven millimetres short of one kilometre six hundred and thirty-three metres high at the apex,’ Adric interrupted quickly.
Whitfield looked at him properly for the first time. ‘Yes.
Elementary