Cold Fusion - Lance Parkin [52]
All she could do was watch the Machine. The lights were almost dazzling now. The cavern was filled with a brilliant radiance. A couple of the vast power cables were beginning to twitch. At the base of the Machine, a crack of white light had appeared. It grew wider.
Whitfield’s eyes were fixed on it. ‘It’s a doorway,’ she whispered.
The Doctor and Adric were being frogmarched to the detention cells on level three-zero-eight. Adric was in front of the Doctor. Each had an escort. Behind them there were half a dozen Adjudicators, four of whom were holding up laser pistols. Medford was in front of them with another three troops. It was midnight, and the Provost-General had just been informed of a successful military operation against Pryanishnikov Station, an enemy stronghold to the north.
‘Provost-General to security control: clear corridor three-zero-eight-zed. ‘
‘We are not spies,’ the Doctor insisted.
‘Then you should have no objections to undergoing a mindscan.’
The Doctor was about to reply when there was a buzzing from his wrist.
‘Hand me that,’ Medford ordered.
The Doctor slipped the time sensor off and passed it over.
‘What is it?’
The Doctor clearly felt that he had nothing to lose. ‘It detects disturbances in the time field. I arrived on this planet to track down such a temporal anomaly and every time that sensor has buzzed It has meant that –’
Five of them were in the corridor, their stiff black robes blowing in some alien breeze. They were advancing, fading in and out of reality with every step.
The Adjudicators levelled their weapons.
‘Don’t shoot!’ the Doctor warned them, trying to step forward. The Adjudicators ignored him. Bright red energy bolts sliced through the air. The apparitions stopped, but the energy passed through them, hitting the wall behind them.
‘Cease fire!’ Medford ordered.
There was a pause. The ghosts were drifting forward, but more slowly than before. Then the lead one held his hands out, palms flat.
‘ Chal’Ar, Char. ’ He swept his right arm down. The Adjudicator to the right. was swept off his feet and was hurled against the wall as if he’d been caught In a tornado.
‘Telekinesis,’ Adric observed.
The Adjudicator to the left aimed his blaster and fired.
The bolt reached the ghost, but stopped before it hit him.
The ghost took the energy of it in his hand, examined it for a moment, then hurled it back. The Adjudicator was hit in the chest, dying instantly.
The Provost-General was barking orders into his communicator, ‘All Adjudicators, respond. Priority: Scientifica has been invaded by hostile alien forces. All officers in the area to take up defensive positions.’ The Adjudicators behind them rushed forward.
The Doctor tugged at Adric’s arm. ‘I think we might use this diversion to escape, hmm?’
They slipped away.
‘Where do we go now?’ Adric asked. Behind them, the Adjudicators were firing their guns again.
‘We try to find the Patient.’
The hatch on room one-zero-zero was sealed with tape, and there was a guard on it. Forrester was still unarmed, and didn’t want to kill a member of the Bureau unless she had to. She certainly didn’t want to try when he had a gun and she didn’t.
What happened next was almost too good to be true: the officer’s communicator buzzed and before the radio message had been completed, the Adjudicator had left his post. He was still clattering down the corridor as she arrived at the metal door. She broke the tape with the sharp edge of one of the keycards and opened it up using another security code. The bolts drew back with a crack and the hatch swung open. It was dark inside. There seemed to be an anteroom of some kind leading to the life support chamber proper.
That door was open already. Roz moved into it. The life support chamber was full of smashed medical equipment.
Every piece of glass in the room was cracked, all the metal was twisted. Everything was covered in thick blue slime.
The cryotube was there, but