Doctor Who_ St. Anthony's Fire - Mark Gatiss [63]
Bernice clambered out and ran across the clearing into the tree shadows. The grass and lianas at her feet had been compressed into a familiar square but of the TARDIS there was no sign.
She turned to Liso, who had come up behind her, and shrugged. ‘It’s gone.’
Liso looked round the clearing. The jungle seemed sweaty with unease, raucous bird‐like squawks erupting from all around. ‘You say this “Doctor” can help us?’
Bernice nodded. ‘If anyone can find out who’s done this to your people, the Doctor can. He’s a bit of a specialist in these matters.’
Liso sat down on a fallen trunk, his breeches soaking in the moisture from the bark. He put his heavy head in his claws and a shudder of grief fluttered involuntarily through him.
Bernice sat down beside him and put an arm around his shoulder. To her surprise, he did not resist.
‘What is it?’ she asked gently. ‘Porsim?’
He looked up, his one good eye blurred with tears. ‘I suppose so. More than that. I feel… I feel as if I’ve lost something.’
His back bowed, he let his head sink onto his chest and began to weep bitterly.
‘If it’s family…’ began Bernice.
‘I have no family,’ said Liso hoarsely. ‘It’s not that. I’ve lost… I’ve lost my certainty. Everything that’s kept me going all these years.’
He laughed dully. ‘It’s quite something for me to admit that Grek was right. That this whole conflict, the war against the Cutch, has been pointless. Fighting amongst ourselves when the real enemy was out there all the time.’
Bernice cocked her head to one side thoughtfully. ‘But now you know who you should be fighting, what’s to stop you getting together? Uniting against them?’
Liso’s face filled with a kind of horrified pity. ‘Such naïvity. It’s not easy forgetting… well, even if we could work together…’ He tailed off, stroking his empty eye‐socket.
‘But we have. And you were threatening to chuck me off your airship once upon a time.’
‘It’s more complicated than you think, Bernice. You cannot fight the Keth. They are death. It is finished.’
His head sank back into his claws. Bernice turned away and brushed a lock of glossy black hair from her eyes.
‘Blimey,’ she said.
* * *
The Doctor blinked into consciousness and, for a moment, had no idea where he was. Space was a broad, black panorama around the confines of his helmet. In a rush, he remembered being struck by the asteroid fragment and spinning away from the mysterious ship.
He felt a strange tugging sensation on his skin and realized he was slowly gliding through space, caught in some kind of tractor beam. The vast prow of the black ship, its hull covered in strange, spiky protuberances, loomed into view.
The Doctor tried to look back, to see whether the TARDIS was still there, but he felt woozy and the pull of the beam was too strong. There didn’t seem to be anything he could do to break away.
Idly, he wished he still carried the specially adapted, vacuum‐resistant propulsion‐powered cricket ball which had got him out of that spot with the Urbankans. But the useful toy was nestling in an old coat pocket in some dusty corner of the TARDIS.
A vague humming sound began to pound in his head and, as he was dragged remorselessly towards the strange craft, the Doctor drifted back into unconsciousness.
* * *
Ran thumped the TARDIS console in frustration. On the scanner screen, he could see the vast alien ship and the tiny figure of the Doctor. The path which the ship had blasted through the ring system had left a strange, hazy hole.
Ran looked about and threw up his claws in desperation. If only there were some way he could help.
But the roundelled walls revealed nothing and the hum of the TARDIS around him only heightened his sense of isolation.
He glanced down at the twinkling console displays, all now registering an alarming crimson, and then out at his beloved planet, spinning unperturbedly in space.
Ran stood up straight and held his arms at his sides, a vague plan forming in his mind. His face twitched