Doctor Who_ The Zarbi - Bill Strutton [8]
Doctor Who smiled, agreed. ‘No. No pigeons. Still - that isn’t what’s holding the ship here... come on...’
‘Right.’
This time it was Ian who took the lead. They came round the base of the great statue and there Ian halted again.
A round pool of liquid shone dully in the ground ahead of them. It was small, only a few paces across. A mist wreathed slowly upward from it.
Ian called, ‘Doctor? Here...!’
He pointed and went on to the brink of the pool. He looked down at it and called back, ‘I suppose it could be water? Any type of life would need that.’
And he stooped to gather up the liquid in both hands.
Doctor Who yelled, ‘Chesterton - wait!’
Ian paused and the old man came rushing forward as if panicked by something. He thrust Ian aside from the pool so roughly that he staggered and almost fell.
‘What’s the matter?’
Doctor Who ignored him. He bent over the pool, stared down into it, then held out a hand and clicked his fingers.
‘Your tie - that’ll do... let me have your tie.’
‘My tie?’ Ian said, gaping a little.
‘Quickly man, come on!’
Ian shrugged and removed the tie around his neck.
Doctor Who snatched it without a word, held it up in his hand, and poised it over the misty pool.
‘Now let’s see...’ he murmured.
Ian shouted an alarmed protest. ‘What are you doing?
Hey...!’
Doctor Who might have gone deaf, for he took no notice. Instead he slowly lowered the tie into the pool, absorbed and intent, while Ian goggled.
As the tie dipped into the milky water of the pool a thick smouldering arose on the surface around it. The fumes drifted across and caught sharply at Ian’s throat. He coughed and stared. Doctor Who dipped the tie deeper, waited, and then pulled it out. He turned and displayed this triumphantly to Ian.
The lower end of the tie had completely gone, eaten away, leaving only a frayed and smouldering remnant.
Ian choked, partly in fury, partly from the fumes still rising from the pool.
‘Well, of all the...!’ he spluttered.
‘You see?’ Doctor Who said simply.
‘You... you’ve ruined it! That’s my Coal Hill School tie!
And you - you just...’
‘... I just what? Saved your life! You were about to put your hands in it, were you not?’ Doctor Who gestured towards the pool. ‘There could have been the remains of a Coal Hill School teacher in there, instead of just his tie...’
The Doctor offered the remnant of Ian’s tie back with a lofty disdain. Ian snatched at it furiously. Doctor Who snorted, ‘Water, indeed! Water! What did they teach you at that school - apart from that ridiculous pastime of kicking a bladder about on a field? Mm?’
Ian shrugged. He had to grin. ‘Ah well,’ he said, and flung the rest of his tie into the pool, and watched it smoulder and vanish. Doctor Who chuckled, dug him consolingly in the ribs, wheeled, and took a couple of thoughtful paces away from the pool. He halted and stared around him at the strange landscape, pondering.
‘Silica...’ he muttered. ‘Interference... possibly electronic?.... and now... acid. Similar properties to formic acid, I shouldn’t wonder. Strange... very strange...’
His voice trailed away into a mutter.
Ian watched the smouldering thinning away on the pool and roused himself to proceed on their exploration of this place.
As he did so, the head and shining eyes of a great ant-like creature appeared from behind a rock on the crag overlooking the pool.
It stared down at Ian and Doctor Who, both unaware of its presence.
Ian turned. The creature moved, vanished. A fragment of rock rolled from its place and fell.
Ian checked suddenly and stared more closely back at the pool. A ripple broke its surface and spread sluggishly towards him. He paused, his attention frozen, and yelled,
‘Doctor – quickly!’
‘Eh?’
‘There’s something in there! I saw a light – then something broke the surface!’
Doctor Who joined him, staring sceptically at the now still surface, and sniffed disbelievingly.
‘A light?’ The Doctor looked around them and snorted.
‘Reflection of one of those planets, most likely...’
‘I tell you I saw it! There were two lights,