• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

'Now what are you doing?' shouted Nyssa.

Suddenly the oscillating time rotor jammed, causing the TARDIS to buck and rock even more violently.

'You realise', shouted Nyssa, 'that the TARDIS could have been damaged during the fight.' As though to confirm that this was the case, the TARDIS groaned like an enormous prehistorical animal in distress. 'We must try and think what the Doctor would do,' said Nyssa desperately.

'There's only one thing he ever does in situations like this,' said Adric, lifting his hand and delivering the console a hefty thump.

'Brilliant,' said Nyssa without enthusiasm.

But as she spoke, the time rotor began to oscillate and the TARDIS smoothly began to materialise.

Anxiously, they watched as the TARDIS took solid form.

'Shouldn't we hide?' said Tegan urgently. 'The android could be at the helm.'

The Doctor shook his head. 'He would have made a far better job of it.' Slowly the door of the time machine opened and Adric popped his head out.

'Doctor!' he said as he emerged. 'Tegan!' Adric's face bloomed. 'You're safe. You're all safe.' He shook Richard Mace's hands.

'So you made it at last,' said the Doctor sourly.

Tegan looked sharply at the Time Lord. 'Come on, be grateful,' she said.

'If nothing else it's saved us a long walk.'

With more pomposity than he intended, the Doctor said, 'I like long walks,' and disappeared into the TARDIS.

'Wel , I'm pleased to see you,' said Tegan, smiling broadly.

'And I, too, lad.'

The Doctor interrupted their greetings and urged them to hurry.

'Where's the Terileptil?' asked Adric.

Tegan shrugged. 'I don't know.'

The Doctor stood in the doorway of Tegan and Nyssa's room and surveyed the wreckage. 'Well done,' he said, as Nyssa came to join him. 'You did well.'

Nyssa smiled sadly as she looked at the shattered remains.

'I knew the sonic booster would work in theory,' he continued, 'but...' he shrugged '...in practice - that's something else. You were lucky.'

Horrified, Nyssa stared open-mouthed at the Doctor, as he returned to the console room, where Mace gazed about him in awe. Yet another experience no one would believe: a box larger inside than out. A magician's delight!

The Doctor flicked some switches on the console and the time rotor started oscillating.

'Where are we going?' asked Tegan.

The Doctor tapped the console absent-mindedly. 'In search of the Terileptil.'

'Do you know where he is?'

'Not yet.'

The miller's wagon rattled noisily along the cobbled street. The city stank of death, with chalk crosses hastily scrawled on the doors of many of its houses, indicating the huge number of plague-victims.

With difficulty, the Terileptil manoeuvred the horse into a narrow side lane. Somewhere in the distance a woman could be heard sobbing and, like some bizarre descant to the crying, a cat screeched in agony.

The Leader pulled hard on the reins and with a loud whinny, the horse came to a halt outside a bakery. Wheezing from the lack of Soliton gas, he slowly climbed down from the box of the wagon and entered the building. Inside, the wood-burning fires of the ovens roared and crackled, and cast a red glow around the room. Adjusting his cloak to protect his head from the heat, the Leader moved quickly past them and into the shadows, disappearing through a low, narrow door.

He shut the door behind him and leaned against it for a moment, staring ahead at the Soliton machine which was standing in the middle of the floor.

Gratefully he inhaled the room's atmosphere.

Stacked along one side of the smal room were piles of logs used to fuel the ovens.

Around the remaining walls, covering every available space, were hundreds of cages full of black rats. The sight was a sad one, as each rat squeaked pitiably, as though aware of their mission and destiny.

Revived by the Soliton in the air, the Leader moved further into the room, his feet scuffling across the reed-covered floor, and the two remaining Terileptils emerged from the