Doctor Who_ The Paradise of Death - Barry Letts [65]
Breakfast?
The door slid open and a guard appeared, gun in hand.
‘Right, you lot. Get back! Back!’ As soon as he was satisfied, he turned and gave a jerk of his head.
Onya Farjen appeared pushing a sort of trolley, followed by another guard, who turned his back on the room, his gun ready. The food on the trolley, while by no means equalling the feast of yesterday, was a substantial collation for a prison breakfast. Jeremy could almost imagine that he could smell fried bacon. He could feel the saliva gathering in his mouth. It was true, then. Your mouth really did water!
‘Listen here,’ the first guard was saying. ‘You stay back until I’ve closed the door again. Then you can stuff yourselves silly, for all I care. Got it?’
‘How could we resist such an elegant invitation?’ said the Doctor.
Onya, who had wheeled the trolley well into the room, almost to the window, looked up with a worried expression. ‘Guard!’ she said sharply. ‘Look at this.’
What had she found? Had the Doctor been up to something? Surely she wouldn’t give him away?
‘What is it?’ said the first guard.
‘Come and see,’ she said. Whatever it was, it was important – an amazing discovery, clearly.
The guard, casting suspicious glances around, came slowly over to her. ‘I can’t see anything,’ he said.
‘No, no.’ she said impatiently. ‘Down there.’ She pointed to the angle of the wall under the window. The guard bent down and peered at the floor.
With a sharp controlled jab, not moving her hand more than six inches, Onya struck the bending man on the back of the neck; he collapsed, soundlessly.
‘Oh dear,’ said Onya. ‘Are you all right?’ She turned to the door and called to the other security man. ‘Yed! I think he’s fainted!’ The man moved into the doorway, staring uncertainly across the room.
‘Hai!’ The Doctor was if anything even faster than Onya had been. Yed went flying into an aerial somersault which would have been quite a feat if he had been conscious of what he was doing. But he wasn’t. He landed in a crumpled heap by Jeremy and Sarah.
‘I say,’ said Jeremy.
‘Oh, very neat, Doctor.’ said Onya. ‘I couldn’t have done it better myself.’
‘Who are you?’ said the Brigadier.
‘No time for explanations now. Come on. fast as you like,’ said Onya, leading the way out of the suite at a fast clip.
Another sister, thought Jeremy. and set off after them all, with a bitter farewell glance at the loaded trolley.
It was the breakfast trolley – and the fact that the food on it was still hot – which told Freeth that the escape had taken place minutes rather than hours ago.
In spite of the Chairman’s strictures on the efficiency of his security, Tragan’s emergency system snapped into action. By the time the fugitives had reached the flycarpark, via the staff exit, the alarm bells were sounding
– and even as Onya ushered them urgently into a small blue flycar, almost pushing the trailing Jeremy, a guard appeared at the far end of the walkway. Without even pausing to challenge them, he raised his weapon and fired.
With a cry of pain, Onya fell into the car. ‘He got my shoulder,’ she gasped; and as the Brigadier helped her into a seat, it was apparent that her right arm was hanging uselessly by her side.
From the seat Sarah had scrambled into, she could see the guard running towards the car, with another close behind. It looked as if the escape was over almost before it had begun. But even as the thought crossed her mind, the strange whine of the engine (Propulsion unit? Whatever.) interrupted it.
‘Don’t worry,’ said the Doctor, his hands fastening onto the controls. ‘I can fly it. Here we go.’ And even faster than in Waldo’s car, they shot out into the sunlight.
‘All units. All units. Apprehend fugitives leaving the area of the Presidential Palace.’ The thin distorted voice came from a speaker concealed in the control panel.
‘It’s tuned to the frequency of the security patrols,’ said Onya.
‘And there’s one now,’ she added as the wail of a distant siren replaced the fading