Doctor Who_ Original Sin - Andy Lane [72]
Beltempest just laughed. ‘Don’t worry! We’re heavily shielded, didn’t I tell you?’
Although the Doctor couldn’t see anything, his sensitive Time Lord senses could make out the soft sounds of Provost-Major Beltempest’s fingers caressing the controls, and the slight shift in local inertia as the ship came around on a curving path towards the sun.
‘Sorry about the light,’ Beltempest said, with no trace of sincerity in his voice. ‘Perhaps I should have warned you about that as well.’
Peering through the gaps in his fingers and squinting hard, the Doctor could just make out Beltempest’s bulky, four-armed shape like a cardboard cut-out in front of the glowing white screen. It looked as if his ears were folded across his eyes.
‘Yes,’ the Doctor said ‘perhaps you should.’ Then, louder: ‘Can’t you polarize the screens or something?’
‘I already have,’ Beltempest rejoined. ‘They’re on maximum.’
Sniffing, the Doctor tried to tell if there was any burning insulation. That was usually the first sign that a ship’s shields were failing If only they’d travelled in the TARDIS. He wouldn’t have worried then. Type 40s were rated for environments up to and including quasars.
If only he knew where the TARDIS was.
123
If only he knew where Bernice was.
He shoved the thoughts to the back of his mind and locked them up in a small cabinet that he reserved for stray worries. Time for that later. Concentrate on the here and now. He sniffed again, but the shields seemed to be holding. Beltempest had been right.
As the Doctor’s eyes adjusted better to the light, he began to make out features on the surface of the sun: darker spots the size of planets and lighter cracks that broke the surface up into jigsaw piece areas. Typical stellar photosphere. He could still remember the droning voice of Lady Genniploritreludar, the Arcalian lecturer in stellar engineering back in the Academy. ‘Theta Sigma, pay attention at the back there. Recite for me, if you will, the fifteen stages in the life cycle of the main sequence sun.’ Odd, the things one could remember when one tried. He still had problems recalling the operating codes for the TARDIS, but trivial points of fact from nine hundred years ago were as sharp as a pin. It probably had something to do with the Time Lords mucking about in his mind before they regenerated him and exiled him to Earth. They liked to think they knew what they were doing, and they had assured him after that Omega business that they had repaired all the damage, but he was sure that his memories were still holed like a gruyère.
Outside the ship, a smaller, darker circle moved rapidly across the face of the sun. Ionized gas streamed behind it like veils.
‘What’s that?’ the Doctor asked.
‘What’s what?’
‘That object. It looks like it’s orbiting.’
‘You can see it?’
Beltempest turned and unfurled his ears a fraction so that he could squint at the Doctor.
‘Only just,’ the Doctor said. ‘But it looks like a planet.’
‘It is.’ Beltempest gestured back over his shoulder. ‘That’s Dis.’
‘A planet orbiting inside the photosphere of a sun?’
‘What better place for a prison?’
The Doctor shrugged. ‘A good question,’ he said to himself. Man’s ingenuity in finding uncomfortable places to imprison other men would never cease to amaze him.
The ship was engaged in a tail-chase with the planet now, and as their spiral path bottomed out, the edge of the simcord screen cut off the light from the sun. The streaming plasma still washed out all the details from the control room, but at least the Doctor could make out some of the details of Dis. The planet bristled like a hedgehog but, unlike the hedgehog, the bristles had an offensive as well as defensive capability. Mountainous laser turrets and plasma-gun emplacements, their sides melted and seared by the heat, tracked 124
the ship as it approached. It wasn’t a new experience for the Doctor, being the target of so many weapons, but he still didn’t like it.
Beltempest guided the ship by intuition into