Doctor Who_ The Dying Days - Lance Parkin [108]
97
'No we won't,' I said firmly.
The officers were all glaring at me. I motioned for my companion to come forwards. It looked like he had been crying.
'This is Raymond Heath. He's got a story for us.'
'H-hello. I was a civil engineer at the EG Plant just outside Reading. We were making a fertiliser, al very hush-hush. Lord Greyhaven was in personal charge of the project, and he told us that what we were doing would eventual y be used on Mars. We assumed he meant when the humans colonised it.' he paused. 'Real y it was for the Martians themselves. On that first Friday morning, a Martian shuttlecraft arrived at the plant. A Martian scientist, Vrgnur took over, and anyone who objected was kil ed. Vrgnur stays in his shuttle, but the whole refinery is patrol ed by Government troops with machine guns. No-one's allowed to leave - we had to sleep in the canteen.'
The assembled officers were al staring at him, making him even more nervous than he natural y was.
I smiled at him, trying to put him at his ease. 'But if all you were doing was making fertiliser ... '
Ray became more animated. 'But we weren't. The project changed when the Martian arrived. Now we were growing some bacteriological weapon. A red gas.'
I stepped forwards again. 'This is the poison gas that the Martians used on Adisham - it's what kil ed the Doctor.'
The members of the audience that had known the Doctor shifted in their chairs, Lethbridge-Stewart included. I continued: 'Adisham was just a test. I think the gas is the weapon that the Martians will use to destroy humanity.'
Ray nodded. 'They were testing the gas on prisoners. They would turn up in Prison Service vans and be led into the - ' he broke off. 'This was happening in Berkshire. It still is. They forced us to do it, at gunpoint. I - ' he was having difficulty speaking now. I put her arm over his shoulder.
'They were gassing prisoners?' Captain Ford asked quietly.
I nodded. 'Fifteen miles away from here, and then burying the bodies in mass graves. Ray managed to escape, he's been wandering the countryside ever since.'
'But how did the Martians manage to set all this up without anyone knowing?'
'The Home Office must have helped set it up,' Bambera said. 'They must co-operating with this. People knew.'
'And now we know,' I said quietly. 'So do we stay here and let it carry on?'
There was fire in Lethbridge-Stewart's eyes. 'No. We fight it,' he said. 'We fight it and we stop it. In twenty four hours, the last Martian will have left British soil.'
'How, exactly?’ Bambera asked.
The Brigadier broke into a broad smile. 'I’m glad you asked me that question ... '
98
Chapter Thirteen
Earth Attacks!
Friday, May 16th 1997
'What's the latest from Portsmouth, Simon?'
'Our boys have picked up about a hundred survivors, Prime Minister. There are some photos on your desk.'
Greyhaven found the pictures next to the proposed new designs for banknotes. He stared at pictures: piles of rubble where buildings once stood, ships pitched over onto their sides, with great cracks and punctures in the metal. More victims to Xznaal's brutal efficiency. He'd never done it himself, but Greyhaven knew that some small children poured water over ant nests, to watch them suffer. The ants wouldn't be able to comprehend what was going on. Perhaps they had ant religion, with a complex set of beliefs regarding divine behaviour. Even if they found a way to communicate with their destroyer and asked him 'why?' they wouldn't get a proper answer. The best they could hope for would be 'why not?'
He hadn't been back to the Greyhaven Building overlooking the Thames since the night the Martian ship had arrived. The cleaner would have made the bed, and removed every single trace that Eve had ever been there, except perhaps for an empty jewellery box. Watching banks of red fog rage around Adisham, Greyhaven could have destroyed Xznaal then and there, but he decided to wait. The Martians still