Doctor Who_ The Room With No Doors - Kate Orman [32]
Twenty minutes?
Penelope risked a whisper. ‘Did you hear something?’
‘No,’ said Joel. ‘It’s gone much too quiet.’
‘Maybe we should get out of this box.’
They both looked up at the lid. Joel said, ‘Let’s give it another few minutes.’
The shouting started again.
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The heads had spent about three minutes inside the shrine. They must have been jammed in there earlobe to earlobe. At last they came floating out in single file, twittering, rose above the village, and drifted away like neglected balloons.
Chris murmured, ‘Maybe the samurai will be too freaked out to check out the shrine.’
Captain Hadankyou was standing in the square, his katana still drawn after the sudden invasion. He shouted orders to his scattered warriors and stomped across to the shrine.
‘Maybe,’ said Chris, ‘they won’t notice anything unusual.’
There was a brilliant flash of light inside the shrine. Captain Hadankyou came flying out, backwards, landing in an undignified position in the dirt.
One of their guards jumped down and ran towards his fallen commander.
The Doctor tried to head towards the shrine, but the other guard shouted,
‘Stand still!’ The Time Lord fidgeted, trying to see what was going on.
‘Power discharge?’ said Chris. ‘If that thing is a satellite. . . ’
Captain Hadankyou had obviously decided that a full-scale assault on the shrine was the only honourable step to be taken. He shrilled orders to his men, who surrounded him, weapons drawn.
‘Five credits on the pod,’ said Chris.
‘No bet,’ said the Doctor.
The mass assault on the shrine was hampered by the fact that only one person could get through the door at a time. Undaunted, the samurai pushed their way into the small building, all trying to be first.
Chris realized his hair was blowing around. He pushed it out of his face.
‘Looks like we’re in for nasty weather,’ he said.
‘Hmm,’ said the Doctor. ‘I think the pod has finally noticed all the attention it’s getting.’
‘You know what?’ said Chris. ‘I bet it’s a sentient machine.’
‘Now that I’ll take you up on,’ said the Doctor. ‘I’m leaning towards a cun-ningly disguised super-weapon myself.’
‘Could be a sentient super-weapon,’ said Chris.
Outside the shrine, one of the samurai yelled as he was lifted into the air by an invisible hand. A group of the warriors found themselves being pushed back from the shrine by a force they couldn’t see.
The Doctor said, ‘All those with psychokinesis, raise my hand.’
Chris asked, ‘Projected energy fields?’
‘Perhaps,’ said the Doctor.
Lightning jumped out of nowhere and struck a nearby tree. A tree jumped out of the ground and struck a nearby samurai. Chris realized that the vil-66
lagers were watching the proceedings from a safe distance, the little crowd forming a semicircle. Confident in their god’s powers.
The warriors who had gone into the shrine emerged at a run. One was afire, his banner burning. He rolled hard across the ground, putting out the flames.
Captain Hadankyou shouted more orders, and his samurai formed a line opposite the shrine.
‘Standoff,’ said Chris.
‘Mmm.’ The Doctor saw his companion’s frown and sheepishly put his crossword back in his pocket. ‘They’ll probably strut about briefly to re-establish their credentials, and then make a very rapid tactical withdrawal. I don’t expect anything else of interest will happen.’
Penelope and Joel heard the noise at the same moment. They froze in their awkward positions.
Someone, thought Penelope, must have come into the hut without their realizing. Someone was moving around out there. Up there. Perhaps – hopefully – someone had come to take Kame’s body away.
Mr Mintz reached out and grasped her arm. Penelope froze in place, surprised by the gesture.
She stayed perfectly still as someone removed the body from the trunk’s lid.
She even stayed still when she heard them leaving, and was possessed by a violent urge to push open the lid of the trunk and emerge, raving, back into the light.
When Kame came roaring back out of the