"You can switch off, I think, now Liz!" As the Doctor disentangled himself from the dead Nestene, Liz deactivated the device. Her hands were shaking and it took her a moment before she could stand up and go through to the factory floor. See smiled as she saw that the Doctor appeared to be unhurt, but the sight of Channing's remains, and the limp tentacles hanging from the tank behind the Doctor made her feel momentarily queazy. If those things had succeeded…
"Don't look so glum," said the Doctor, making his way across to her and collecting her in a hug, "We did it!"
He was right, she realised. They'd triumphed – science had triumphed - and a little celebration was surely in order. "Let's go and tell the Brigadier!"
"If this thing worked properly, he already knows," said the Doctor. But he gave her a smile, straightened his clothes and followed her back down the metal stairs to the doorway where they had entered the factory.
Liz stopped for a moment at the top of the external steps, admiring their handiwork – so many plastic forms in overalls lay motionless on the ground. Then she realised that not all the motionless bodies were plastic, and not all of them were in overalls: there were soldiers down there too, broken, bleeding, some of them quite clearly dead. She heard the Brigadier in the distance yelling "Medic!" and charged down the steps.
UNIT's commanding officer was on his knees beside one of the fallen soldiers, and Liz wondered for a moment where his jacket was, till she realised he was using it to try to staunch the blood pumping from the Private's stomach. "Let me," she said, dropping to her knees opposite the Brigadier. She lifted the blood-soaked tunic to see how bad the damage was, and knew in an instant that there was nothing she or anyone else could do. She pressed the tunic back, glanced up, and met the Brigadier's gaze. She realised she didn't need to say anything: he already knew.
But he turned his attention to the young Private and, as Liz made a futile attempt to stem the bleeding, she heard him say, "You're in luck, Turner. No mere field medic for you – you get a proper Doctor to fix you up."
"Aye, and a pretty one too at that." Turner's voice was weak, shaky, and Liz marvelled at the human capacity to focus on trivia even at times of extremity.
"Don't let her hear you say that!"
Liz snapped her head up, in time to catch the Brigadier's force a smile and a wink at the soldier, and felt annoyed with herself for being annoyed. The Brigadier was just trying to take the lad's mind off the pain, make him believe that everything would be alright.
But Turner, it seemed, wasn't fooled.
"Sir?"
"Yes, Turner?"
"I'm not going to make it, am I?"
"Just lie quiet, Private, and let the doctor do her job."
"No… it's alright… it's just…" The soldier's right hand, bloodied where he had clutched at his wound, found the Brigadier's right arm, slid to his wrist, then held on to his hand. "In my locker – there's a ring. For my girl." His voice was growing weaker, but Liz could hear the determination in his whisper, and she turned her head away, not wanting him to see that her eyes were getting moist. "Please see she gets it, sir. Don't send it to my folks, they don't like her. But I want… Mary… to have it."
"I'll see to it, Alan," she heard the Brigadier say, quietly. "I promise."
"Thank you, sir." All the tension went out of the body beneath Liz's hands, and she sat back. There wasn't anything anyone could do for him now.
She watched, biting her lip as the Brigadier pulled off his beret, eased the soldier's hand to the ground, and closed the staring eyes.
"'Thank you, sir'," he muttered, "I send him into a battle that gets his insides blown away, and his last words are 'thank you, sir'." He stood up, smearing the other man's blood across his forehead as he tried to rub the sweat away, and shook his head. "It doesn't make sense." He looked across at Liz for a moment, then back down at the body at his feet. "It never does."
Liz dashed a hand across her eyes and stood up, trying to think of something to say. A few days ago she had thought that he was joking when he spoke of alien invasions and battles to save the earth. Now, it was all too real. "None of this was your fault…"
"Doesn't make it any easier." He took a deep breath, straightened up and yelled, "Benton!" Then, as footsteps pounded up behind him he said, without turning, "Stretcher parties, sergeant. See to it."
"Yes, sir."
Benton saluted, but the Brigadier was already moving away. Liz saw that he was heading towards the stairway where the Doctor was wandering about with the device he'd told her was a 'sonic screwdriver' and, with a last respectful glance at the body of young Private Turner, she followed.
