Doctor Who_ All-Consuming Fire - Andy Lane [106]
Eventually, the rakshassi settled onto the upper slopes of a mountain like a flock of birds congregating on a church steeple. I tried to take a breath, but the air was so thin that I found myself gasping. My eyes streamed but I could see a large crack in the ice where the mountain pierced it. A translucent tunnel poked out of it like some bloated worm. It looked like it had been made from circular patches of material or skin sewn together. It bulged, as if filled with air, and there was a zip-like arrangement at one end. It looked to me remarkably like a crude but workable pressurized corridor. The rakshassi were picking up their prisoners, one by one, flying them up to the mouth of the tunnel and throwing them in, then pulling up the zip after them. Dimly, through the skin of the tunnel, I could see another rakshassa inside the corridor operating another zip. Okay, it was a crude but workable pressurized corridor with an airlock. I had to admire their ingenuity, if not their good looks and personal hygiene.
Eventually it was my turn, and not a moment too soon. I was on the verge of passing out. After a short flight I was thrown into the tunnel, and after the zip was fastened behind me the rakshassa inside opened his zip and pulled me through into the main body of the corridor. A sudden rush of oxygen made me dizzy. Where was it coming from?
I reached out to touch the walls. They were smooth and leathery, and marred every few feet by a rough stitched seam. Beyond them, the smooth walls of an icy tunnel led upwards at a gentle angle.
My fingers ran over what felt like a distorted nose and a puffy cheek. I didn't want to know.
The rakshassa at the tunnel mouth grabbed my shoulder and pulled me past its hard body to join the end of a line of turbaned and breech-clothed fakirs. We all trudged along through the dark and the cold. The fakirs were singing some kind of gentle song, but I didn't know the words. I tried calling out for the Doctor or Holmes, or even Tir Ram, but there was no response.
For the first time I felt truly alone.
We emerged after what seemed like hours onto the surface of Ry'leh. The sight of the stars shining down on us cheered me up for a moment.
Through the translucent skin of the tunnel I could see that the peaks of the mountains erupted through the ice all around, giving the planet the air of a frightened hedgehog.
A group of large wooden caravans on skates were huddled together out on the ice. Gouges in the ice showed that this was the end of their journey, not the start. Mostly they were small, but one enormous one loomed over the rest, so big and so heavy that the ice seemed to bow slightly beneath it.
The pressurized tunnel, which I now realize was sewn together out of animal skins, led to another airlock, which was connected to a large wooden caravan on skates. This place was getting wilder and wilder. A rakshassa at the end of the tunnel was throwing prisoners willy-nilly into its dark interior. A queue had already formed. Every so often there would be a hold-up while the airlock was resealed and the caravan was towed away by teams of rakshassi pulling ropes, to be replaced with another one. The rakshassi outside the tunnel were all squeezed into impromptu spacesuits.
They had to fold their wings up to fit in. I hoped it hurt.
I shuffled forward, a few steps at a time, trying to come up with some witty comment but failing miserably. Miserably, yes, that was the word. When I got to the end, the rakshassa took a closer look at me, then pulled me roughly inside.
'You are special,' it assured me.
'Tell me something I don't know,' I snapped, but it was already busy throwing more fakirs into the caravan.
I slumped against the wall of the corridor for a while, glad of the chance to rest. One by one, the fakirs filed past me.
'Mr Summerfield!'
I jerked out of my reverie to find the youthful figure of Tir Ram standing in the line. His fine robes were ruined, but the Indians around him still knelt in his presence. My brain floundered