Doctor Who_ Last Man Running - Chris Boucher [6]
Less intelligent predators tend to specialise in their prey and the way they detect and capture it. The creature that had been stalking the Doctor was unusual in this respect. For its huge size it had a tiny and very limited brain, but it was still a general hunter and it could have followed any of the different trails he was leaving, though not all at the same time. To switch between tracking modes was confusing for it and time-consuming, so it tended to pick one sort of trail and stick with that. Its purpose, the driving force in its dim control core, was to kill whatever it caught up with. For the creature, killing was not of course an idea it understood: killing was simply a process for improving its energy balance by absorbing the nutrients its quarry contained. Such simplicity put it among the most dangerous of predators; stupidly adaptable, mindlessly determined, pitilessly ferocious, it was a classic killing machine. With a little more intelligence its rise to dominant species on its home planet would have been irresistible.
‘Can we deny the existence of something that has been thought of?’ the Doctor now asked himself.
But before he could answer, something he hadn’t thought of scuttled across his peripheral vision. He glanced back towards the movement. Deep among the trees and a long way off something was coming in his direction. Fascinated, he watched it methodically working its way forward. It was scuttling backwards and forwards like a hunting dog quartering the ground for a scent trail. Except that this was no dog. The Doctor marvelled at it. He could hardly believe what he was seeing. Surely it was too big to be what it appeared to be; an exoskeleton would not support a thing that size.
Nowhere, as far as he could remember, had he ever encountered one that was taller than the TARDIS.
Mallophaga could not grow to that size or move like that, so logically, whatever it was, it could not be a member of the order Mallophaga. But it certainly looked like one. Broad flat head with nasty-looking mandibles, long slightly flattened abdomen wider at the back end, legs at the front end. Yes it definitely looked like one.
‘That can’t be a bird louse,’ he said aloud. ‘What is it, I wonder?’
The creature stopped quartering abruptly and almost immediately began to move in a direct line towards him. It had reacquired the original vibration trail it was following. It had felt the Doctor speak.
‘It does seem to have six legs, though,’ the Doctor said.
‘So if it’s not a chewing louse of some sort, that could make it quick over the ground.’
With the location of its prey now identified and confirmed, the creature began to run. Its need to kill fast was an intensifying hormonal feedback loop, an unbearably deepening hunger, evolved to optimise the energy transfer.
The longer it took to stop its target and absorb the nutrients the less benefit there was to be gained from the kill. There would come a point when pursuit cost more in energy than could be absorbed from the prey. The creature was not adapted to recognise that point and break off the chase. This was a predator that would keep on going until it reached its target or until it ran out of energy itself. Its options, though it did not recognise them as such, were to kill or to die trying.
It took the Doctor a moment longer to realise that the thing was coming after him. Then he, too, began to run.
Chapter Two
Kley checked the readouts again. There was still no sign of the systems coming back on line. They must have reached the ship by now, she thought. What was holding things up?
They were both reliable enough, for toodies, and bright, particularly the girl. Both competent technicals. The girl lacked motivation but young Pertanor more than made up for that. He’d make a good SI. In fact she decided