Doctor Who_ War Games - Malcolm Hulke [24]
"Not much of a view,’ said Zoe.
‘But I think we have found the blank centre of the map,’
said the Doctor. ‘Come on.’
They stepped out. Their sidart was one of foul similar tall black boxes standing in a large metal chamber. Metal corridors led off at either end of the chamber. An ofFicer of the 19th century Austro-Hungarian army came along, chatting with a man in civilian clothes of the same period.
Neither took any notice of the Doctor and Zoe.
‘Let’s follow,’ the Doctor whispered.
As they trailed the Austro-Hungarian officer they passed another man in a black overall who sat at a console at the end of the line of sidrats.
‘He, I imagine,’ the Doctor whispered, ‘controls these things.’
They passed through several corridors, glanced into study rooms and libraries and kept seeing men dressed as officers from the armies of world history. They even saw two young women dressed in blue slacks and shirts with scarlet neckerchiefs and blue berets.
‘The Spanish Civil War,’ the Doctor said quietly.
‘Women fought in the front line there.’
Zoe noted that most of the people they came across were going in the same direction as the couple they were following. Soon the reason became obvious. The Austro-Hungarian officer arrived at double steel doors, both wide open. Either side stood guards in silver metallic uniforms carrying stun-guns.
‘The lecture has already started,’ said one of the guards.
‘Take your places quietly.’
Through the double doors they found themselves in a huge room—the war room. At one end a wiry man with a small white beard was addressing a mixed group of Romans, Germans, Aztec warriors, soldiers from all ages.
The Doctor and Zoe quietly sat down at the back.
‘Since you are newly arrived from the home planet,’ the scientist with the white beard was saying, ‘you may not be aware of our main problem. It is to keep the specimen’s personality as a fighting man, while at the same time placing him under our control. As you know, we take human specimens from their own world and, after the process, put them into a sector of this planet that we have made to look the same.’
‘So this isn’t Earth!’ Zoe whispered.
‘Shhh,’ said the Doctor. ‘I had rather guessed that.’
‘With most human specimens,’ the scientist went on,
‘the process is lasting. But with certain humans of strong character the effect of the process fades.’
A man dressed as a Roundhead from the days of Oliver Cromwell put up his hand. ‘How often does this happen?’
‘Our failure rate is only five per cent, or one in twenty,’
replied the scientist. ‘It is not much, but these individuals cause us a lot of trouble. They find they can pass through the time zone barriers, and some have joined together into resistance groups. They are upsetting our master plan.’ He paused to let the importance of his words sink in. ‘To overcome this problem I have further refined our processing techniques. To demonstrate my new process I have chosen a particularly difficult specimen. This man shook off the process completely.’ The scientist turned to one of the guards in silver metallic uniform. ‘Bring in the specimen.’
The guard turned and opened a small door. Another guard came through the open door pushing a wheel chair.
Strapped to the chair was a young British army officer—
Lieutenant Carstairs.
Zoe grabbed the Doctor’s arm in excitement. ‘He’s all right! They didn’t kill him!’
The scientist looked down at the helpless Carstairs.
‘Describe what you can see.’
Carstairs looked around. ‘A room filled with a lot of scientific mumbo-jumbo. Strange people in funny clothes.’
‘As you see,’ the scientist said to the assembled group,
‘he is conscious of his surroundings and hostile. Now watch.’
The scientist fitted a metal cowl over Carstairs’s head.
Carstairs struggled violently against the bonds holding his wrists and ankles, but to no avail. The scientist went to a little control panel and activated some switches. The metal