Doctor Who_ Prime Time - Mike Tucker [63]
The Doctor stared dispassionately. The surgeon general leant on the balcony rail.
‘Here is where we practise our craft, our art.’
‘Your butchery.’ The Doctor couldn’t take his eyes off the Master, trapped in the machinery. ‘This is where you intend to disassemble me, I suppose.’
‘All in good time Doctor, all in good time. Your public needs to see you one more time before we start to unravel your DNA.’
The Doctor turned, scrutinising the creature through narrowed eyes. ‘What is your connection to Channel 400? You are the ones responsible for the signal I encountered in the vortex aren’t you?’
The surgeon general smiled. ‘We know you, Doctor.
Know of your boundless curiosity. We knew that you wouldn’t be able to resist tracing that signal. From the moment that you landed on Blinni-Gaar you have been acting exactly as we have intended. Why, even your companion has proved useful.’
‘What do you mean?’ The Doctor’s voice was hard. ‘What have you done with Ace?’
The Fleshsmith turned and snapped on a monitor screen.
The Doctor stared at it in horror. Ace lay slumped on the floor of a garish stage set with Saarl dancing around her like an imbecile. The image of her gravestone formed a macabre backdrop to the scene.
The Doctor rounded on the surgeon general but the control box suddenly appeared in the Fleshsmith’s hand. ‘Careful now Doctor, we don’t want you irrevocably damaged. Not yet.’
‘Why are you doing this? Why is it so important to parade us in front of the galaxy?’
‘Because every viewer watching your discomfort is another few pounds of flesh to add to our stores. A resource to be collected, harvested.’
The Doctor nodded. ‘The device in the transmitter. You’re using the television signal to carry something of your own, aren’t you? Something buried in the transmission.’
The surgeon general regarded him balefully. ‘I see that the stories about you are not exaggerated, Doctor. Yes, we are using the Channel 400 programmes to carry a deconstructive enzyme, an agent that will break flesh down into a transmittable form. When the viewing figures reach their maximum – when everyone is watching you, Doctor – we will trigger the enzyme and activate our transmitters. The viewing public will be broken down into their constituent atoms and beamed here. We will fill the flesh banks with pure, raw matter.’
The surgeon general turned back to the monitor, watching as Ace was led from the stage and the Channel 400 logo span into frame.
‘One hundred and fifty billion people are tuned in at present, Doctor. One hundred and fifty billion bodies ready to become matter for us to work with.’
He held out a withered claw: ‘To be whole again, and to know that body can change, can regenerate, is all that matters.’
‘Why me?’ asked the Doctor. ‘You have the Master. Why do you need me as well?’
‘Oh, our Zzinbriizi copy told you most of the truth. The Master did come here hoping that we could engineer a body for him, and we thought that he would provide the DNA sequences that we needed.’
The surgeon general stared down at the figure entwined in the machinery. ‘But he is sick, Doctor. His system is ravaged by the cheetah virus, and the Trakenite body he inhabits is simply not what we were after.’ He gave a coarse, hacking laugh. ‘He really can’t call himself a Time Lord any more.’
‘Is he still alive?’
The Fleshsmith nodded. ‘We still need him to provide the dressing for the final episode, the final battle of the Doctor and his mortal enemy.’
‘I want to see him.’
‘Yes.’ The surgeon general nodded to his aides. ‘Remove the Time Lord from the sequencer, then take him and the Doctor to the arena.’
The Doctor was bustled out of the control area. The surgeon general lowered himself painfully into a chair. ‘It is nearly time. Get the Zzinbriizi to their positions. I will contact Lukos, and tell him to prepare his final transmission.’
The Fleshsmith’s crooked mouth flickered into a smile.
‘And then we shall see what the Doctor is made of.’
The Doctor was led through dark winding