Doctor Who_ Storm Harvest - Mike Tucker [76]
The Doctor tapped his lips with the handle of his umbrella. He looked up to see Holly Reif enter the control room and waved her over.
Holly looked at the Cythosi in disbelief. ‘What the hell are they?’
‘Would you believe good Samaritans?’ the Doctor said, his eyes twinkling.
‘No!’
146
‘Holly, I’m glad you’re here.’ Brenda crossed from her office. She squeezed her friend’s arm. ‘How are you doing?’
Holly shrugged. ‘OK. Glad to be busy.’
‘Well, we could use some help here. The Cythosi are having trouble patching into our NavSat grid and we need to be able to track that hurricane.’
Q’ilp puffed nervously on his cigar and nodded at the lumbering Cythosi technicians. ‘We can trust them?’
Brenda cast a look at the Doctor. ‘Our friend here thinks not, but at the moment they’ve been nothing but perfect guests and have already stepped up the repulsor-field efficiency by 12 per cent.’
Holly raised her eyebrows. ‘I’ll have to see if I can pick up a few tips. So, Doctor, what’s your problem with them?’
A Cythosi pushed past, forcing the Doctor and Brenda to step back.
The Doctor sniffed the air.
‘That!’ he cried in triumph.
Holly’s nose wrinkled. ‘So they smell a bit on the damp side...’
‘Oh my God...’ Brenda’s eyes opened wide.
The Doctor looked at her expectantly. ‘Yes?’
‘That smell. It’s the same as the creature that attacked me!’
‘Exactly.’ He lowered his voice. The Cythosi have had an operative here all the time. They are responsible for everything that happened here, and they are Mr Garrett’s allies.’
‘So all this...’
‘Is a deception to gain your trust. They are after the weapon, and at the moment they have no idea where it is.’
Q’ilp’s face cracked into a toothy smile. ‘So MacKenzie and your friend...’
The Doctor put a finger to his lips. ‘Ssh.’
The massive figure of Bisoncawl lumbered over. ‘General Mottrack would like to see the Doctor in the command shuttle,’ he grunted.
The Doctor raised his eyebrows. ‘Really?’ He pulled his pocket watch out. ‘Well, it is nearly tea time. I do hope the general has put the kettle on.’ He doffed his hat. ‘If you will excuse me, ladies and dolphins?’
He trotted out of the control room, dwarfed by the Cythosi commander. Brenda, Q’ilp and Holly watched him go.
‘He’s quite mad, isn’t he?’ said Q’ilp.
Brenda nodded. ‘Quite. But he’s also the only one with the faintest idea of what is going on.’ She clapped Holly on the arm. ‘Come on, you. We’ve got a hurricane to look after.’
* * *
147
Ace stopped and stared back at the beach below her, now a thin strip of yellow bordering the deep blue of the sea. She rubbed her hand across her brow. It had been a hot, exhausting climb, with only the freshening wind to cool them down. Rajiid had been surprised at just how unfit he was. MacKenzie was still several metres down the path, red and panting.
The path had veered off from the far end of the beach, following the banks of a sizeable river that tumbled across the sand from a source high in the mountain. The three of them had set off into the interior of the island with confidence, but the pretty postcard vistas of palms and tropical flowers had soon given way to thicker, less friendly jungle, and before long Ace and Rajiid had been wielding their machetes, trying to make a passable track through the encroaching foliage.
The river, too, had become less inviting. At first Ace had waded through the cool shallows watching the fish pooling at her feet, enjoying the pull of the current against her skin. Now the water was a raging torrent, tumbling over savagely jagged rocks, the spray turning the path into a treacherous slide of mud and wet leaves.
They had just finished an exhausting climb alongside an almost vertical waterfall. Only now that she was at the top, with enough time to catch her breath, did Ace finally have time to realise how breathtakingly beautiful