Doctor Who_ The Zarbi - Bill Strutton [11]
‘Get back to the ship!’
But Doctor Who stood there, warily free of the great mesh of the glistening web.
‘Don’t move! Stay absolutely still!’ the Doctor commanded.
‘It hurts!’ Ian gasped. ‘It... stings...!’
‘Don’t move, I say!
Ian ceased his struggling. He winced at the strands of the web which lay stingingly across his face. Doctor Who was peering at the web for all the world as if it was a specimen of great scientific interest. He reached out a wary hand, touched it, and drew immediately back.
‘Hmmm!’ he grunted. ‘No good – I’ll have to go back to Tardis – get something to free you with.’
‘... all... right...’
‘Now keep as still as you can! I’ll try not to be too long!’
Ian managed a faint nod. The web strands which held him powerless prickled even through his coat-sleeves and across his chest.
Doctor Who backed away, took his bearings, and looking cautiously around him, circled the crag.
Vicki gasped and backed away, clutching her ears as the noise invaded the ship again and pierced her ears like a knife. As she stumbled backward into the control room, the exit doors whirred and closed.
The ship gave a sudden lurch. She shrieked and put out her hands to grab the control panel. The whole room tilted to one side. She held on desperately as the ship lurched again, and looked wildly up at the inspection window.
Tardis seemed to be moving!
The whole control room tilted and jerked with its slow movement, and in answer to it the view of the dark landscape outside through the inspection window, now clearing, tilted crazily this way and that.
In her terror Vicki flicked desperately at the switches on the control table, pausing only for an agonized moment to press her ears against the intolerable noise that rumbled and chirruped all around her.
The control column glowed in response to a switch and began moving up and down.
But no other controls answered. The ship lurched again.
Scraping sounds came from its hull. Yes, it was moving all right! Through the inspection window the crags moved slowly passed, tilting jerkily as the ship scraped and slithered forward.
Breathing heavily, Doctor Who climbed painfully around rocks and paused, seeking a new path back to where Tardis lay. He had made a circuit of the defile and ahead of him he recognized the circle of crags and the bare, dead surface on to which they had emerged to explore this planet.
He came hurrying and stumbling down towards it, puffing a little, peering this way and that around him.
He slithered down on to smoother ground, halted, came forward, and stared about.
At first he thought he was mistaken.
But the image of this place, which he had first seen through the inspection screen was etched unmistakably on his mind.
There was no doubt about it. This was the spot where they had first stepped out of Tardis .
He was standing almost on the actual site where the ship had been.
Doctor Who stared around him and passed a trembling hand over his brow.
‘The ship!’ he muttered. ‘It’s... gone!’
CHAPTER TWO
The Zarbi
Barbara walked slowly onward as if in a trance. She seemed unconscious of the deafening hum which resounded echoingly all around her. Her eyes were fixed glassily ahead. She stumbled unseeingly, but rose and came on, her arm still outstretched before her as though it were pulling her forward.
She did not even see the peril ahead of her.
Right in her path glimmered an acid pool, giving off its slow, vaporous mist.
She came slowly but directly towards the pool, seemingly drawn by it. Her steps came nearer and nearer, yet still she did not look down, or appear aware of it.
Then a light shone from a near-by crag and the fore-quarters of one of the huge shiny creatures inhabiting this place reared its shape against the sky. Its luminous eyes glared downward and abruptly it raised a glistening foreclaw.
Barbara was now at the brink of the pool. It seemed certain that her next pace or