Doctor Who_ Combat Rock - Mick Lewis [96]
You and your kind are cockroaches, infesting corners, creeping, creeping... But I will not stamp on you; Doctor, I shall embrace you. You will become a part of me too, just like the God-liar, the stealer and the whore. You are an offworlder of some eminence: that I detected some time ago – and offworlders are the biggest cockroaches of all: swarming, swarming...’ the ghost voice echoed, was silent. Just when the Doctor thought the grotesque figure was slumped in sleep, if such a thing were possible, it reanimated itself, rocking back and forth on its chair, as if striving to console itself. The voice was renewed, a whisper of malice in the gloom.
‘You trample our holy sites, despoil our ancient customs with rancid money, finance the Indoni vultures to gut our spiritual mountains for one to propel your craft. You are cockroaches from space, always creeping, always making filth of my land...’ A wail, a weakness. A sob. ‘Creeping, creeping...’ A hushed madness. Silence for a breath, two, three
...
Then: ‘Maybe I take your face... sew it to the head of the God-liar... or just your hair. Certainly your heart, and your soul.’
The Doctor blanched in the face of such terrifying insanity, and put his hands over his cheeks to calm himself, but there was nowhere for him to go now. This was truly the end of the river. He had to find light and reason amidst all this blackness. ‘Your people may have a just cause, but you are a sickness within their body Krallik. A cancer eating them from within. And you are wrong about one more thing: how can I be a warning to others, if I am unknown to them. I am just a wanderer, and of no importance to any outer system alliance. I cannot help your cause by dying for you, you see.’
The Krallik was silent, a dead thing. Had he... it... even heard the Doctor? But the time and space traveller wasn’t finished yet.
‘You said something else, Krallik you said you detected some time ago that I was an offworlder of some eminence.’
He stuck his chin out and glared defiantly at the figure in the chair. ‘ But you’ve only just met me!’
There was the whine of engines decelerating outside, and the first crackle and burn of pulse weapons being discharged.
The Doctor turned to face the direction of the noise, but there were no windows to see out of.
‘Sounds like the army have arrived, Krallik. Your little reign of terror has ended!’
The Krallik continued to rock back and forth, as if nothing mattered but his own madness.
‘Time to burn their minds and fry their eyes,’ Twist said, cutting the engines as the cruiser dropped clumsily onto the wooden dock.
‘Twist,’ Pan said as he checked the power pack on his rifle, ‘if you ever live through this it’ll be a miracle.’
‘But they got monkeys inside ‘em,’ Twist spat. ‘I see the bad monkeys in their souls.’
Pan ignored him, and thumbed the hatch mechanism. Then he reached for Victoria. She pulled away from him, but he snatched her anyway with a casual laugh. ‘Come to Pan, baby.’
Bass and Pretty Boy popped through the hatch first, pulse rifles ready. Pan heard one of their weapons discharge and a scream kicked in. Right, battle commenced then... He checked his Luger next. He was slipping: the pack was nearly empty.
It would do.
Saw was lumbering to the port, heavy gleaming rifle in one hand, chainsaw clenched in the other, although the big lug had not switched it on yet. Grave was behind him, and Pan couldn’t help noticing he was playing a movie on his wrist disc player. On the small screen someone’s head was being buzzed with Saw’s favourite weapon, the upper part of the skull lifting like the top of an egg teased away by a spoon.
Grave paused in the doorway to catch the scene.
‘Move, you sick freak.’
‘That’s right. We got to give them purple time.’ Twist was up from the pilot seat, and creeping down the cabin towards Pan, his fingers curled into claws, eyes rolling back in his head. Pan let him come. Twist tilted his head back as he drew close to Pan, stared first at Pan’s saturnine eyes, then down at the tattoo on his bare left bicep.