Doctor Who_ Last Man Running - Chris Boucher [96]
Kley shot the medic as he tried to rise and as Sozerdor stirred she put a shot into him. Then she swung the gun at Leela as she ran. Kley poured a withering stream of shots in her direction and as Leela plunged towards the cave a chunk of rock blew out and caught her a glancing blow above the right eye. Leela fell. Kley took her time and aimed more carefully at her.
Belay came back to life with a rush. Silently, head down, he ran at Kley and before she could shoot he leapt at her, knocking her to the ground. They rolled and struggled for possession of the gun.
The pilot and medic from Drop Two had got the go and left the ship when the shooting broke out. They were halfway across the open ground when they saw the other team go down. That should have been it. They could still get back to the ship, back into orbit, get the crew back on board and burn out the place. But they hesitated when they saw one of the survivors tackling the one with the gun. Maybe it was all right.
Maybe they could save the rest of them after all. Maybe they could be heroes.
They pulled their guns and ran on towards the struggling figures.
Leela recovered her knife and got back to her feet. She was dazed. Where was Belay? The copies seemed to be fighting among themselves. The two men from the ship looked dead.
Two of the copies were crouching over them. What were they doing? What were they looking for? Guns! They were getting the guns. As it all came back into focus, Fermindor rose with one of the guns in his hand and immediately took a shot at her. She ducked back and into the cave.
As soon as the shooting started, the Doctor knew it was already too late for subtlety and persuasion. ‘Get those ships out of there and do it now. Go on!’ He did not wait for a response but pushed past Kley and set off after Leela. He should have paid closer attention to what she was doing, he thought angrily, aware as he had been all along of the way the machine was working on her instincts. He should have been ready for her impatience and aggression to touch off this fight. He should have stopped her. Maybe he could still stop her.
He was running, half crouched, keeping close to the rocks.
He had gone some distance before he realised he had no idea of what he was going to do. He ran on.
Belay was enraged at the Kley copy, and desperate, and so fiercely terrified that he lashed and wrenched and smashed and kicked and found himself suddenly in possession of the gun. He shot Kley at the closest of close ranges, pouring fire into her until the gun was empty and bits of burning flesh and chunks of bone were spattering over him. He screamed and scrambled away. Above him, the figure of Fermindor was firing at the cave. He turned and stared down at him and aimed the gun, and then something weird happened.
Fermindor’s head exploded in a cloud of white bone fragments and muddy goo, there’s something wrong here Boo, and the headless body flopped and slopped towards him. He saw the gun in its hand and he grabbed at it. And now he was standing over himself with a gun shooting. He wrested the gun from Fermindor’s hand and he fired at himself. And still there was running and shooting. He kept his finger on the trigger and he cut himself in half and he cut down the figures who were running at him and yelling or was it him yelling...?
Belay killed the pilot and the medic from Drop Two with more accurate shooting than he would have thought possible if he had been in a state to think. He felt better now that there was just him and not him and him again. Rinandor came across and took the gun from his dead hand. He had always liked Rinandor. She didn’t seem to be confused that he was dead.
‘I’m still alive, Ri,’ he said. She pointed the gun at his face, and then he remembered that it wasn’t really Rinandor.
Not far in from the entrance, the neck of the cave narrowed.
Leela let her eyes adjust to the dimness before she moved any further. This was the cave she had seen in the place of the communing. This was the cave she had seen them all in.
The wider part