• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Windscreen, and rough tarmac beneath. And the pressure on his chest had been caused by his falling on to his front against the truck's door. The truck.

'The memories came back like objects viewed through fog. Houghton. The bullet meant for him. Hayes. The chase.

The entire truck had rolled over on to its side, somehow throwing the Brigadier right into the cabin. Behind him he detected moans from the men in the back. Houghton was just coming to. The young lad with the radio seemed to be out cold.

The driver, bleeding from a wound across his forehead, pushed ()pen the other door, and began pulling himself upwards, on to the side of the truck, which was now effectively on its roof. Houghton and the Brigadier followed suit, leaving the rest of the men to untangle themselves.

The police cars, lights still flashing, and UNIT jeeps had formed a circle around the downed truck. Rifles pointed in their direction. The Brigadier jumped down on to the concrete.

For the first time in years he suddenly remembered his encounter with an Italian border checkpoint, soon after he had joined the army. Lethbridge-Stewart had tagged along with a group of young soldiers who had decided to use some leave to explore the beaches of the Med. They were only interested in cheap booze and foreign crumpet, but they'd taken a wrong turn, and had ended up heading towards the border. When Private Partridge had seen passport control he'd had a rush of blood to the head, and had decided to do a handbrake turn to try to go back the way they'd come.

Within seconds they'd been surrounded by Italian police with machine guns. Partridge had just laughed. Their CO had been much less amused when he'd got to hear of the incident. 'Sorry, sir,' said the driver, interrupting the Brigadier's reverie. should have been able to -'

'Perfectly all right, old chap.' said Lethbridge-Stewart.

'Nothing more you could have done.'

The Brigadier noticed Hayes, standing to the side of one of the UN jeeps. He looked extraordinarily pleased with himself as he raised a loudhailer to his lips. 'You men,' he ordered through the howling feedback of the device, 'put your weapons down. Place your hands above your heads.'

'Damn,' said the Brigadier under his breath.

'Sorry, sir?' queried the driver.

'I said, I suppose we'd better do what he wants.'

Lethbridge-Stewart turned to Houghton. 'Don't worry, I'll take full responsibility for this.'

'Like hell you will, sir,' said Houghton. He was raising his hands above his head, but there was a nervous tension in his voice. 'I'm not about to play dead for this lot.'

Before the Brigadier could say anything Major Houghton drew his pistol and threw himself on to the road, clearly hoping to make a fight of it.

He was dead before he hit the ground.

The Brigadier ran to Houghton's side as the noise of the machine-gun fire faded, and stared at the body and the blood that flowed on to the tarmac.

He pushed the man's eyes shut, and turned round as Hayes walked over towards him.

'That was stupid.' said the Major-General. 'In any event, it would have been so much easier if my friends in the police force had found you with a warm gun in your hand,' he said, with barely a hint of sympathy. 'This escapade should have ended back in the warehouse.'

'Every drop of blood is on your hands, Hayes, not mine,'

spat the Brigadier.

'Lethbridge-Stewart, is that any way to talk to -'

'You've made an enemy of me, Hayes.' said the Brigadier angrily. 'Whatever happens, I'm going to make sure you damn well pay for what you've done.'

John Benton's acting career had ended in junior school when his cameo as Third Shepherd in the nativity play was critically panned after he forgot his one line.

But he had just put in a performance that Humphrey Bogart would have been proud of.

The Venus People had recognised him, of course. He had expected that. Arlo came out to see him, and looked at Benton as though he were something that had just crawled out from