Doctor Who_ Storm Harvest - Mike Tucker [56]
There was a crash from the other room. A smell assaulted his nostrils. Something was in there. The Doctor could hear its harsh, animal breathing.
He stepped back through the door.
‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Our mysterious colony monster. How do you do?’
Brenda Mulholland stood at one of the observation ports in the perimeter wall, her entourage surrounding her. The sea was choppy, the weather was turning against them. That was all they needed.
Police Chief Bodle was talking rapidly into an intercom. He fell suddenly silent.
‘I see,’ he said gravely. ‘Co-ordinator, an SOS has been received from the Island Queen. She’s a pleasure cruiser. She’s being attacked.
These things – these... Krill – are swarming all over the ship. They’re literally tearing it to pieces.’
Brenda closed her eyes. She shouldn’t have to take these sorts of decisions. She was chief rep on a holiday world, for God’s sake.
‘There’s a queue of ships outside the harbour,’ said Judd, the harbour master. ‘They’re demanding to be let in. There’s mass panic 108
breaking out on board.’
Brenda peered at the harbour mouth. Ships jostled for position outside the repulsor field. ‘The shutters stay closed,’ she said hollowly.
Something was happening in the sea. The waters were starting to seethe and bubble. They boiled with fury
‘Sweet Mary...’ whispered the harbour master. ‘I’ve never...’
The sea boiled over. It exploded upwards at the metal wall. Krill –
hundreds, thousands of them – were hurling themselves from the water, flying towards them. The automatic laser defences kicked in. Sights swivelled, guns aligned, vicious bolts of blue lightning exploded against the frantic horde.
The Krill were clanging deafeningly off the wall. It sounded like the mother of all hailstorms. Many fell back into the sea, their talons raking the huge metal shutters. Others managed to pierce the metal with their razor claws, to hang on. They began ripping at the wall, tearing vicious slivers from its outer shell. The lasers targeted them and fired, time and time again. It was enough in most cases to blow the creatures from their handholds, back into the sea, or on to the rocks below. It didn’t stop them. They just picked themselves up and began to climb, relentlessly sinking their claws into the sheer metal wall and dragging themselves upwards.
Still more Krill surged out of the sea, flying upwards in jets of spume, crashing on to the wall.
‘There are too many of them!’ Walter Creegan, Garrett’s assistant, cried. ‘The defences can’t cope!’
He was right. The Krill were overwhelming the guns.
There was a sound of rending metal. It sounded like screaming. It was coming from everywhere. Slowly the Krill were ripping their way into the colony.
‘Will the wall hold?’ Brenda barked.
‘Well I... We have to consider...’
‘Will it hold them, Creegan?’
‘It might. The storm shutters weren’t designed to take this sort of punishment.’ He stifled a sob. ‘I wish Garrett was here,’ he whispered.
‘So do I,’ Brenda said stonily. ‘There are some questions I want to ask him.’
The creature was advancing slowly on the Doctor. The Doctor was backing slowly away. Predator and prey, they circled the room.
‘Really,’ the Doctor babbled, ‘do you think this is any time to be thinking about lunch?’
The alien continued to advance. The Doctor tried to make out its 109
shape through the gloom. It was much bigger than a human, that was for sure.
‘Is this what you did to your friend Garrett? Ate him when he ceased to be of use to you – or when you were feeling a little peckish?’
The alien snarled and swatted a chair across the room.
‘Yes, good idea,’ said the Doctor. ‘Let’s sit down and talk. You’re an intelligent fellow – I really think you’d regret killing me.’
The Doctor was being driven into a corner.
‘Listen to me,’ he demanded. ‘Have you any idea what you’ve started out there? The forces you have unleashed might well overwhelm us all. You know what they did to the race who created them.