Doctor Who_ Storm Harvest - Mike Tucker [91]
the advancing rebels.
Bisoncawl leapt out again, firing. The Doctor peeped round the corner. Bisoncawl’s plasma blasts were ricocheting low off the walls.
He didn’t seem to be trying to hit the enemy.
The Doctor looked on, puzzled. Bisoncawl was blowing the covers off the service hatches. Suddenly dozens of small robots, each equipped with whirring blades, streamed from every side of the corridor. They immediately began tearing into the flanks of the advancing rebels, who screamed and fell, shooting wildly. The Doctor closed his eyes – the robots’ whirring blades and laser-torches were splattering the walls with blood.
An awful silence fell, then Bisoncawl began shooting once again.
He was plastering the corridor with plasma fire, incinerating the service robots.
‘Come,’ he said to the Doctor. ‘The lift.’
Phillip Garrett had watched the carnage with confusion and pain. The vicious struggle of human against Cythosi had seemed to mirror and mock his own feelings.
Now, in the quiet after the shooting, he felt unnaturally calm. His physical form had finally stopped its agonising shifts and ripples. He was stable now He was human.
He always had been human. He mingled now with his fellow humans, sharing in their triumph, feeling their exhilaration. They clapped him on the shoulders and gave him drinks. Some danced with him.
Finally, he returned to the Krill holding tank. The area was deserted except for a single guard. Garrett smiled as he approached him.
‘I’ve come to relieve you,’ he said. ‘Go and enjoy yourself.’
The guard grinned and trotted towards the door.
Casually, Garrett raised his gun and put a plasma bolt in the man’s back.
He turned and peered into the tank. The eggs were indeed hatching.
He looked down at the huge cylinder he still carried. The weapon which gave him power over the Krill.
Everything was in place now, For the first time he understood his life – understood why he, Phillip Garrett, had been made to live among aliens, to live as one of them. A Cythosi.
The Dreekans had seen it first. They had recognised him – they had hailed him as their liberator-god, Treeka’dwra. Had he been on Earth he might have been called Moses, or Jesus or Mohammed. He was here to free his people, and to destroy their oppressors – and he had been 176
given control of the ultimate weapon with which to achieve his sacred goals.
Ace and Rajiid huddled together for warmth, tucked into the curve of a large tree. The wind tore at the branches overhead and raindrops splashed off the leaves around them. Every few minutes the wind would drop and they could exchange brief snatches of conversation, but then the storm would build in a crescendo again and all they could do was tuck their heads down and try to protect themselves from the driving rain.
As the wind died down again Ace cocked her head to one side.
Above the wind and hiss of rain she could hear something else. A roar, a vibration, building all the time. She looked at Rajiid in alarm.
Water began to fountain around the roots of the tree, loosening the soil, coating Ace and Rajiid in thick gelatinous mud. There was an ominous crack and the tree shifted. They threw themselves forward as it toppled into the jungle. Seconds later the surge of water hit them.
They tumbled down the hill, carried on a tide of debris. Ace felt a sharp pain as she cannoned off a boulder tumbling into a ravine.
Everything span around her, then something cracked into her skull and the world went still and black.
‘Commander! What is the situation?’
Bisoncawl saluted his superior.
‘The rebels have control of the lower decks. They’re disorganised, but heavily armed.’
‘What do you estimate are the chances of successfully retaking the decks?’
‘General Mottrack...’ the Doctor tried to cut in.
‘It ought to be possible to take the decks back,’ said Bisoncawl, ‘but it will not be quick or easy.’
‘General, I really think we have more to worry about than a dispute below stairs.