The Cadaverites Part Nine
Captain Tybalt looked sternly at Golyubov.
'Don't start speculating. Recall the mission orders.'
The co-pilot looked out to port, making a cross noise in his throat.
'Moving at four hundred knots on vector one nine one, to proceed until crossing the Arctic Circle, and to proceed for another three hundred miles after. Orienting on Yakudno, to proceed on vector to zero six, arriving on target zone at oh six two five. Making one inspection pass, launch AS2 missile, observe detonation to confirm mission complete.'
Return home, do not discuss mission, do not reflect on civilian casualties, continued Tybalt silently. He knew his crew well enough to know that they were wondering what the hell a Soviet bomber was doing, bombing a Russian town.
There hadn't been any explanation in the briefing from Met and Ops. No, they merely gave a mechanical recount of the weather to be expected and where to fly at what height and speed. Once finished, then they could wondering. Not now, when such speculation might affect morale and performance. Bogdanov, the bombardier, had a combination of flushed face and the appearance of a cold sweat, and you could tell because his oxygen mask hung away from his face. He checked the metal clipboard with it's pre-launch protocols for the hundredth time, indicating items with a pen.
'Will you stop doing that!' growled Tybalt. 'It won't magically change just because you looked again!'
'Sorry, Captain,' muttered the bombadier.
'I'm altering course by two degrees,' announced Golyubov. 'We've picked up a wind from Finland, and I need to compensate.'
Nodding without paying a great deal of attention, Tybalt was working out the blast radius of the AS2 missile they'd be launching in a couple of hours. The estimates were thrown out slightly by detonation being below ground level, in a mining quarry from what Ops told them. Once they launched the AS2 it would travel to the target, whilst they executed a smart one hundred and eighty degree bank, gained height and put the afterburners on. Detonation would be observed by the flash, never mind orders about hanging round ground zero to wait and see if the missile warhead detonated.
'That reminds me – everyone check your helmet flash-protector.'
The flash-protector was a silvered screen that was pulled down over the helmet visor to protect the crew from the flash of a nuclear detonation. Each crew member tried in turn, Lyupanov having to use main force to drag his down.
'Just leave it down, then,' ordered Tybalt. Lyupanov was the radioman, and had nothing to do until the missile detonated, when he would transmit the codeword "Hammer" back to the airbase. Until then he could put up with a darkened view of the instrument panel in front of him.
A long way further to the south-west, Colonel Proskurov and his artillery convoy were making slower progress. They, however, had a far shorter distance to cover. On the other hand, they did have to contend with snowfalls on the road. A particularly bad one meant getting out with shovels to clear a path; there was simply no way on earth that the Colonel would allow a convoy carrying nuclear weapons to risk skidding off the road by driving through the drifts.
'How are we for time?' he asked Godunov, who was driving. The major looked at his watch and briefly looked at the cab roof whilst calculating.
'Slightly ahead of schedule, by approximately fifteen minutes.'
'Good. I want a margin for safety reasons, in case we get more obstructions, and I want to survey the firing site properly.'
The courier's orders had included an off-road site for the S-23 guns to deploy in, reached by an old logging track from the highway. Being an experienced officer, Colonel Proskurov didn't intend to blindly rely on a map nor orders drawn up by a bureaucrat in Semipalatinsk; he would damn well get down and snoop around on the snowy ground himself first. If he did deploy in that clearing then the guns would be firing at a little under maximum range, indirectly and ranging on a map.
'Perhaps we're trying to scare the Chinks, sir,' commented Godunov. 'Showing them what we've got.'
'In which case it would be wiser to use a range out in the Far East, Alma Ata or somewhere like that.'
He checked the map of Trevilho that the courier had brought. Small town, no military buildings that might be reinforced, an amorphous scatter on the tundra. They might as well make the first shell's impact point the central point of the town square, doubtless marked by a plinth with Lenin's likeness in some dramatic pose sat upon it. Would he be charged with damaging Soviet property? he wondered whimsically.
Taking up his protractors, he carefully inscribed a pencil circle on the map, centred on the town square. Four more circles at each of the cardinal points on the outskirts of Trevilho, then four more in the gaps left, then another circle over the original. Ten artillery shells, one for each circle. This pattern left small gaps in the overlay, but blast pressure would destroy anything in those areas, especially since they'd be hit ten times over.
Proskurov sighed. Not the best of days. He sent one of the motorbike escort on ahead with a radio to act as a spotter for fall of shot.
Vassili had been called in to help the Doctor "gimmick" a man-portable radio. The engineer, like most Russians, had done his national service and recognised the military radio. Quite what the stranger wanted was less clear.
'A miniature motor? And elastic bands?' replied Vassili doubtfully. 'Perhaps in a child's toy.'
'Then go and get it!' snapped the Doctor, running out of time and patience. This period of grace before the Cadaverites attacked was unexpected, and must be exploited fully. When the earnest but puzzled Russian returned to the mayor's office five minutes later with a clockwork motor and half a kilo of rubber bands from the town's junior school, they were snatched from his hands eagerly.
'Excellent!' said the Doctor, and ignored anyone else from that moment on. Finally an urgent tugging on his jacket brought him back to the present.
'Yes? What is it? Good grief, if Isembard had to put up with this level of interference -'
Colonel Stefan opened his mouth and then stopped at the mention of "Isembard".
'Who is this "Imbarsed" person? Oh – never mind, Doctor. I have heard and seen enough in the past few days to last a lifetime. What I meant to say is that the Politburo gave me an artefact before I left the Kremlin. It had been lost for at least fifteen years, until a search turned it up in the dead files. The Trevilho Plaque.'
With that, the Colonel handed over a small, flat, dull metal rectangle. One side was covered with elaborate heiroglyphics not from planet Earth, the other remained blank.
'The Trevilho Plaque, eh.'
Colonel Stefan shrugged.
'They asked if I would pass it on, Doctor. I have done so.'
The Doctor scraped the metal oblong, then tasted his finger.
'Technetium? Ytterbium? No – zirconium! This is zirconium. Thank you, Colonel. Most useful.'
Stefan shrugged. Useful or not, he didn't see what the metal oblong could do to help them. If that The Doctor thought it useful then – well, then who knew what might result.
'Pay attention at the back you bloody useless layabouts!' shouted Valentin. His best parade-ground voice came in useful here, reaching above the background hum of conversation and mechanical operation. The totally atypical content made his audience pay attention.
'This empty bottle is the basis of a simple yet potent weapon in the best Soviet tradition. The Molotov cocktail.'
A lot of nods. One man, aged about sixty and with the look of a Caucasian, gasped and looked at the floor. Valentin focussed sharply on him, wondering who the elderly character might be and why he made such a business of the cocktail preparation.
Spain, mouthed the pensioner, looking directly at the ex-army officer. Valentin abruptly looked at a young woman in the front row.
'Bloody hell, woman, are you trying to kill us or them! The thickener goes inside the bottle and the rag goes outside.'
He pulled the bottle from her and filled it with petrol from the large can at his feet.
'Now, watch.'
He lit the rag tied around the bottle's neck, fired it with his lighter and pitched the bottle a good fifty metres overhand. With a smack and brittle bang, the glass broke and the fuel flared up in a temporary explosive blossom.
'Anyone on the receiving end of that would be occupied in dealing with a nasty fire. Which means you can dictate terms whilst they worry about fire-extinguishers.'
The townsfolk of Trevilho managed to drain many bottles of beer, vodka, mineral water and milk, the better to fill them with diesel fuel and petrol.
And all the while, as the Russians ran to and fro with glass bottles full of fuel, the Doctor continued with his radio gimmickry in the mayor's rooms. John and Masha came to visit.
'We've got hundreds of Molotov cocktails, a giant helium-powered banshee, an electronic ear-splitter, a dum-dum machine gun, a few dozen silver bullets and sharpened shovels.,' explained John.
'Splendid,' muttered the Doctor, not paying more than the slightest attention. 'Very good. Retreat carried out splendidly. Carry on General Slim.'
John and Masha exchanged looks.
'Er – I'm not a general, nor are either of us slim,' replied John. The Time Lord looked up in surprise.
'Well of course you're not! This unit is ready for testing. What are you here for?'
Masha looked at the silver-haired stranger with a penetrating glance.
'We came here, Doctor, to tell you that we have –'
An eerie, whining, oscillating wail started overhead, quietly at first, gradually gaining strength and intensity until it rattled the teeth of anyone listening. It carried on, across the square below and to the fields beyond.
The civilian manning the phone in the foyer rang the mayor's office to pass on the warning from the siren-cranking sentry on the roof: the Cadaverites were coming, and there were hundreds of them.
'Ah. I seem to have miscalculated numbers,' muttered the Doctor, picking up the radio and heading outside. Colonel Stefan joined him.
'Your radio gadget gets it's first test when they attack us, hey?'
'Trial by fire,' agreed the Doctor. He well knew that the aliens were desperate, that there would be no quarter offered tonight. No likelihood of withstanding an assault by several hundred of the Cadaverites, either, unless his radio jammer worked. Why the long delay in attacking he didn't know, but it gave them a fighting chance of surviving until morning (he wasn't to know about the desperate and futile attempts by the aliens trapped outside the mine to construct a shield of their own).
'John – er, Comrade Izvestilnyuk!' he shouted across the square. The officer came jogging over. 'John, you need to get over to the electricity sub-station with some other people. It's almost certain that the Cadaverites will attack it and try to stop it operating.'
Understanding that without power the town square lighting wouldn't operate, John gave a smart salute and speedily laid hold of half-a-dozen resigned or reluctant volunteers. His little band of defenders left the square to set up a hundred metres away at the sub-station, cradling Molotov cocktails, a single AK47 with three silver bullets and John's cut-down machine gun. Other buildings screened them from the protective lighting in the town square, isolating them.
'Hey, room for one more?' asked a breathless and sweating Vassili, trundling his trolley of gas cylinders up to John, who looked bemusedly at the device.
'Make sure it's pointed away from us, matey.'
The Doctor felt sure that the aliens would carry out a reconaissance before attacking; know your enemy, understand what you're attacking. If they did carry out any such preparation, he missed it. Suddenly the far side of the square filled with bobbing, weaving, hissing, gesticulating monsters. No longer bone-white. No, these aliens had wrapped themselves in what looked like black bandaging – actually heavy-duty adhesive tape – and were attempting to control the humans in the town square.
On a reflex, the Doctor turned on his radio-jammer. Instantly the Russians in the square began to react to the invaders, and the Cadaverites paused in their entirety for several seconds.
Check! exulted the Doctor. Yes, the aliens had managed to protect themselves against UV radiation at the level emitted by the town lighting, but they had been taken by surprise at his radio-jammer. Nor would they last long in daylight, not with the logarithmic increase in the amount of UV radiation present when the sun came up over the horizon.
'There he is, Masters!' shrieked a human voice at the forefront of the aliens. 'The Doctor! Your enemy! Let us destroy him!'
Zelinski, of course. Zelinski, pale-faced and with eyes practically starting from their sockets, pointing a shaking hand in his direction. Zelinski, whom the Doctor thought seemed on the edge of insanity.
A chorus of hissing hatred went up from the aliens, and they charged. A few were roasted by petrol bombs thrown by Russians in the square, too few casualties to stop them.
With a despairing sideways glance the Doctor saw Colonel Stefan press the firing button on an improvised electrical circuit, detonating the home-made directional napalm bombs that John had set up on town square trees. The Colonel showed precious little emotion.
Sudden orange and red gouts of flame by the dozen leapt outwards at all angles from the trees, creating a gigantic rolling barricade of fire five hundred metres long. In duration it only lasted for a second, if that, but it drenched the advancing aliens with a fire that consumed and killed them in the space of ten seconds. A disgusting charcoal stink went up from the remains, bleached alien bone mixed with those of a single human being, roasted flesh that smelt like a charnel barbequeue. The last flames and fumes of the pyre rolled up to the heavens, leaving an equally stunned collection of humans and surviving aliens.
John and his collection of stalwart volunteers saw, felt and heard the detonation of his napalm firestorm. The town and outskirts were briefly illuminated by the blast, and Colonel Proskurov's distant motorcycle observer also witnessed it, but in his case he had no idea what caused the effect.
'Fingers crossed that's seen a lot of the pasty white swine off,' called John to the others, hoping to keep morale bouyant. 'Souvenir hunters can go to look for fried alien tomorrow morning.'
The other members of the small defensive detail were awed by the size of the explosion, and reminded John that the Cadaverites were within range.
'Anyone feeling odd?'
None of the Russians seemed to be affected by sinister alien mind control.
'Then I guess the Doctor's radio-jammer works. Okay, look sharp. If they moved against - '
A tide of dark figures moved out of the darkness against the sub-station. The soldier with the AK47 shot three with quick accurate shooting before they closed the distance. Vassili spun the valve of his sound-machine open and the head-splitting, piercing wail swept over his comrades, and the aliens. The Cadaverites staggered as if running into a wall; their precautions might have protected against visible radiation but not against the high-pitched shrieking of the artificial banshee. Taking advantage of their trouble, John opened fire with his machine gun. It's rate of fire had been speeded up with the removal of much of the barrel, and the bullets went spraying everywhere, mostly to the skies.
'Hang on!' shouted one of the Russians, producing a leather belt. He stood behind John, looped the belt over the gun muzzle and held tight. The next burst went approximately where John had aimed, since his helper dragged the gun barrel down with the belt. Aliens hit in the legs or torso fell, shrieking in hate and dismay.
The Cadaverites stood their ground for all of five seconds, paralysed by the noise of Vassili's device. John and his un-named helper managed to hit several aliens in the head. Grueome disintegration resulted when the big bullets hit, the result of their being turned into dum-dum rounds. Any alien so hit lay dead, deserted by their selfish companions.
'Spade!' shouted John, his temper now aroused. He gave up the machine gun and strode forward with the sharpened spade, decapitating an alien too slow to escape. The other fled into the night, pursued by his shouted insults.
'What is this "toilet-paper"?' asked one of the Russians of Vassili, who turned off his gas-powered banshee.
'Must be an insult in Kiev. Ha! We beat them! Take that, you alien scum! We beat you!' shouted Vassili, shaking a shaking fist after the retreating enemy.
Many of the Cadaverites were killed by the giant petrol-bomb ambush. Those that remained understood that their ability to control humans had deserted them. Their target, however, still stood; the human-constructed shield, which they wanted for their own. Since controlling the human cattle wasn't possible, they needed to kill. To kill and occupy.
The next five minutes were nightmarish for the Doctor. Never willing to kill unless his own life was threatened, he nevertheless had to endure the sight of massacre and murder around him. Cadaverites raced into the square, to be killed by petrol bombs even as they killed Russians. Avram used his loudspeaker to front a wedge of Russians armed with axes, petrol bombs and Valentin with his machine gun. They fought across the cobbles, leaving a trail of dismembered aliens behind them, intermingled with dead Russians.
An alien sprang up behind Anya, who was guarding a clutch of terrified children. The Doctor shouted a warning: too late. It made a savage stroke at her neck and the young woman fell to the ground.
I will not let this happen! said the Time Lord to himself, considering abandoning his radio-jammer as the monster advanced on the children. Nobody else was near enough to help. Yet if he left the jammer –
A dying Anya dragged herself across the cobbles, lifting a petrol-bomb in her left hand. Her right clutched around the alien's ankle. Even across the hundred metres between them the Doctor could hear her shrill voice.
'Children! Run!'
The children ran, scattering. Anya smashed the petrol-bomb against the stone cobbles of the square, clinging on with her last dying breath to the alien, which shrieked and tore ineffectually at her grip on it's ankle. A bright flame consumed them both.
A wedge of three aliens attacked the Doctor. No subtlety, no warning, they simply ran over the town square directly at him.
He managed to get his sonic screwdriver into action and dropped two of them before the third leapt at him, slashing unsuccessfully at his arm, yet catching the fabric of his sleeve and jerking the device free, to clatter over the cobbles. The hissing black-clad figure jumped at him again and the Doctor twisted to one side to push the alien as it passed, throwing the Cadaverite further than it intended to travel and off-balance entirely. Still, it recovered in seconds, circling to attack him. This time the leap was shorter and the Doctor only just fended off the slashing talons with an akido parry. He cradled his arms in a karate posture, aware that lack of sleep, ceaseless work and injury over the past days had slowed down his movements. The alien seemed to realise that he wasn't at his best.
prepare to die, not-human!
'I don't intend to die for several centuries, thank you very much,' replied the Doctor.
your lifespan is measured in seconds –
The alien leapt at him, forcing him to throw his arms up in a parry, and yet it managed to fall to earth only just in front of him, kicking out with a foot that hit his left calf. Already off-balance, he fell heavily onto his back, and the alien pounced to straddle him.
Yes! We may yet triumph! gloated the alien, raising it's taloned right hand for a disembowelling sweep.
The blow never fell. Instead a small uniformed figure hit the alien in a diving tackle, clutching it around the upper torso and knocking it free from the Doctor. The twosome rolled across the cobbles, the Cadaverite trying to slash with its talons. The smaller figure produced a pistol, which it pressed against the alien's temple, and fired repeatedly. Eventually the hammer fell on an empty chamber and the Doctor helped the man to his feet.
'Colonel Stefan.' The officer snorted a weak laugh in greeting.
'We meet again. This time I can return the favour of the boiler-room.'
And suddenly the fighting stopped. If any aliens remained at large, they abandoned any attack on the town.
'Have we won?' asked Vassili. All sounds of violence had ceased.
'Maybe,' said John. He rapped the blade of his spade against the ground. 'I don't trust these leeches. They may try to come from a different direction.' He appointed two men to remain on guard at the sub-station while he and Vassili went to see what had occurred in the town square.
Doctor Pavel and volunteer nurses were about their business in the square when John arrived. The stink of burnt flesh, petrol and blood hung over everything.
'All over bar the shouting?' asked John of the Doctor, whom he found shepherding a flock of distraught children. 'Wasn't Anya looking after these kids?'
The Doctor silently and grimly nodded at the twisted, carbonised corpses of Anya and the alien she had killed. John felt a shock that travelled all the way down to his shoes.
'She stopped it from killing the little ones in her charge,' said Colonel Stefan, coughing as he inhaled smoke fumes. 'Brave young woman.'
'Killing the children?' choked John, barely able to speak for sudden rage. 'Killing the children!' Words failed him and he broke the spade handle across his knee.
A grimy Zhadov, cradling his cherished folding-stock rifle, stopped to point at the long wall of roasted aliens.
'We got that traitor Zelinski. His bones are in amongst that lot,'he said to John, with a degree of relish.
'I wonder,' mused the Doctor, pursing his lips in the trademark questioning way he had. He looked sideways at John. 'You and Zelinski set up those fire-bombs, didn't you?'
'Er – yes, we did. He must have known about the trap. He must have known and still led the Cadaverites into it. How could they not know it was a trap?'
Zhadov rubbed the soot on his bald pate.
'That's right. They ought to have known what he knew.'
'Perhaps he found a way to prevent them from controlling him,' mused the Doctor, closer than he knew; a search of Zelinski's corpse would have revealed silver bullets clutched in each hand.
'What's that!' exclaimed the Colonel. A faint shouting could be heard from the direction of the sub-station. John and Vassili ran back the way they had come, followed by a considerably slower Colonel Stefan, to discover their two sentries lying dead outside the building, and the sound of metallic smashing inside. Driven by a rage that blocked out rational thought, John burst inside, to discover three aliens busy trying to destroy the transformer. One died on the spot as a sharpened spade clove it's head in two, a second was staked in the heart by the broken handle. The third whirled round to discover the big human dubbed "The Killing One" had arrived, and that it had arrived undetected thanks to the camouflage of fury. The alien squealed in alarm, a sound cut off as it's throat was crushed by two big hands that exerted tremendous force and wrenched it's skull clear of the spinal column.
Vassili came in with his sonic banshee, only to see the lifeless corpse of a dead alien being thrown into a corner.with great force by Izvestilnyuk. The Ukranian sat on the floor to calm down for a few seconds.
'Too late,' he said. 'They've been and smashed up the transformer.' He wept bitter tears for the space of three breaths. 'And they killed Anya. The girl we rescued from the mine.'
Vassili hauled the other man to his feet.
'She rescued the children, Comrade. She couldn't have done that if you hadn't rescued her.'
He turned his attention to the transformer, which looked pretty battered, panels ripped off and wiring yanked out. Sparks occasionally sputtered outwards from the vandalised controls.
'Doesn't look good. How long do we have?'
'About sixty minutes,' said the Doctor, arriving to see exactly what damage the aliens had wrought. 'John, get to the town hall, round up everyone you can see and get them under the shield. Don't sit there feeling sorry for yourself, man! There's more work to be done!'
A snarling, muttering John left, hoping to come across some live aliens to work off his temper upon.
'Right. Let's get to work on this,' announced the Doctor to Vassili. 'First priority is to provide power to the shield. Can the transformer do that?'
Vassili pointed out where wiring had been ripped out of the plant.
'Not without those wires there.'
'Get me those rubber gloves, then.' For twenty long minutes the Doctor toiled away at the wiring, using his sonic screwdriver to loosen and lengthen wires that remained intact and functional. Bypassing, adapting and repairing other smashed panels and controls took another twenty minutes.
Evgeniy came in to see if he could help, having been forced to leave the town hall when the word came round to evacuate.
'You can cross your fingers!' said the Doctor, checking connections and turning the power off temporarily, in order to connect the cable leading to the shield grid in the town square. Once that had been safely done he turned the power on again, only for a fuse to pop loudly.
'Damn!' he muttered. Evgeniy checked over the bulk of the transformer, located the fuse box and flicked it open.
'Ah. A bit of a problem here, Doctor.' He indicated the fuse, which had flicked open. 'This type of fuse will flick off after you reset it, when the current comes on again.'
'Then we need to keep it shut,' replied the Doctor.
'If you do that, Doctor, then the other fuses will blow.'
A very annoyed Doctor clenched his fists in consternation. They were nearly out of time! Given time and resources he could easily solve this problem –
'I have a solution,' coughed Colonel Stefan, hanging around the doorway to the sub-station. 'You get to the square and I will hold the fusewires in place.'
The Doctor stared at him. Colonel Stefan stared back. Staying in the sub-station, well outside the protective shield, was a sentence of death and both men knew it.
'Get going,' snapped the colonel to Evgeniy and Vassili, who edged out and left.
'Colonel - '
'Don't start,' wheezed the officer, leaning against the wall. He took a hand away from underneath his left armpit, exposing a great tear in the material that showed a gaping wound underneath, still leaking blood. The material underneath was sodden with gore. He smiled sadly at the Doctor.
'Not long for this world, am I? Besides, I don't think I'd like the future and what it brings. Get going. And you can pass on three words to your large and aggressive young companion – "Loyally I Serve".'
'Done,' agreed the Doctor.
The colonel leaned wearily against the transformer and pressed the fuses into place. With a last glance goodbye the Doctor raced off, into the town square.
'Come on, John, we need to get to the Tardis.'
'We do?' exclaimed John, waving a hasty goodbye to various people in the square. The Doctor estimated that numbers had dwindled to no more than two hundred out of the eight or nine hundred there originally.
'Yes, and how long do we still have?'
'Minutes,' gasped John as they raced up to the Tardis.
The blue box stood serenely amidst the rubble and snow, a cable trailing up to it, ending in a miniature dish.
'Don't step on that, and watch out for the one inside.'
Once safely inside the Doctor turned on the scanner and focussed it towards the town square. He activated the time rotor and tapped in a set of co-ordinates, waiting and watching.
'Fire!' shouted Colonel Proskurov, cupping his hands to shout, and keeping his mouth wide to equalize the blast pressure. Godunov pulled the lanyard firmly and the big gun boomed, firing the shell towards Trivelho. The firing's shockwave knocked snow from firs around the clearing and sent echoes rolling between the treetrunks.
Lipinov, the gunlayer, timed the fall of shot on his wristwatch, clicking it to a stop when the forward observer called in.
'Adjust for a fifty metre overshoot, traverse half a degree left,' sang out the radioman. Lipinov made the corrections very carefully. His skill meant they were minor corrections indeed.
The Colonel gestured to the stoney-faced Spetznatz troopers in the GAZ, who brought over the S1 shell on a cradle. He kept them there whilst his fingers, stiff with cold, shook out one of the special fuses and screwed it into place.
'Load,' he instructed them and they staggered away to the gun breech. Lipinov, Byelbin and Godunov loaded the shell in, then the propellant charges, then closed the breechblock.
'Fire!' shouted the Colonel.
The first shell to fall on Trevilho was a straightforward high-explosive shell, a forty kilogramme round. As such it impacted at the near edge of the protective shield, creating a brief flash, no sound and very little awareness amongst the Russians below. Above the shield, the round's explosive arrival was immediately obvious to the watching artillery observer, creating a distant thunder and a plume of smoke.
The second round that fell was the first S1 nuclear round. The brief bright flash was all that Colonel Stefan saw, an actinic light that consumed him without pain or fear in an instant too quick to be measured.
John and the Doctor saw the first pico-second of the shell's impact on the shield, a glowing burst of shatteringly bright light, before the Tardis whisked itself away. Not before John saw the whole assembled populace in the square vanish. For a second he goggled in horror and surprise.
'Doctor!' he gasped. 'Doctor – they've gone!'
'Hmm?' replied the Doctor, engrossed in reading and manipulating dials. 'Yes, yes, I suppose they have,' he replied in an vague tone.
'What happened!' exclaimed John, alarmed and worried. 'Were they vapourised? Did the atomic explosion kill them?'
The Doctor stopped fiddling with the Tardis' controls and straightened up, looking at John with peculiar intensity.
'"Vapourised"? "Killed"? Good grief, John, what do you think of me! I did not help to rescue these people merely to get them killed.' He turned on the Tardis scanner, rotated it around and focussed it upon the town square. An hallucinatory picture combining a smoking crater, the energy field and an atomic explosion appeared.
'About twenty years, I should judge,' he said quietly. 'I didn't tell you or the Russians the complete truth, John, mostly because I didn't think any of you would believe or understand it.'
A silent and scornful look was his reply. The Doctor changed tack.
'If those people in the town square survived an attack by nuclear artillery, do you think the Soviet Union would have left them alone? Do you think they would have been allowed to live, let alone enjoy liberty? No. Their lifespan would have been measured in weeks, if not days. What would be the point of saving lives today to have them die tomorrow.'
The Doctor gestured at the empty square.
'I solved that problem. The survivors in Trevilho town square will not have to worry about Soviet persecution.'
A gesture from the Time Lord directed his view to the scanner.
'The intercalation between the atomic shell arriving, its detonation and the departure of the Tardis all played a part. What? You didn't realise that the cable leading here meant interfering with the timelines of the people in the town square?'
'I can barely make sense of what you're saying,' replied John.
The Doctor sighed. He explained: the power from Trevilho's own electricity supply created an electromagnetic shield that prevented the first shell from doing any damage.
The second, atomic, shell was another matter entirely, able to destroy all beneath it. Which it would have done if the Doctor's energy grid hadn't used the energy release of the detonation to power the shield, creating a positive feedback effect and preventing any injury being inflicted on the people underneath. The Tardis' cable with it's interfering time vector hysteresis produced the final effect – a transfer across space and time.
'For a duration of pico-seconds,' said the Time Lord, looking well-satisfied. John looked unconvinced.
'A force field requires vast amounts of energy,' pontificated the Doctor. 'To deal with a single shell's kinetic and chemical energy took the entire output of the town's power supply. To repel a nuclear explosion takes more energy than the entire output of European Russia.'
His audience remained silent. The Doctor had a cocky edge to his voice that meant he wasn't going to admit being defeated.
'So I designed the shield to use the energy of the nuclear explosion itself, in a positive feedback effect, to move the people.'
'Move them where?'
the Doctor looked conspiratorial.
'Not "where", rather "when". Why else would I need to use the Tardis? Thanks to that cable running from here, conveying hysteresis vector data, anyone under the shield when that weapon detonated will have been thrown forward in time.'
Blinking in surprise, John looked at the scanner, which merely displayed shifting monochromatic displays.
'How far forward in time?' he asked, anticipating with some dread an answer like "forty five minutes" or "twelve hours".
'Hmm. Let's see. The link was maintained for approximately eighty pico-seconds.' He stroked his chin whilst calculating. 'That's about eight hundred-thousandths of a second.'
'Oh, great!' exclaimed John. 'What a big difference that will make!'
The Doctor tutted disapprovingly.
'Not a linear relationship, John, and the differential was boosted by the ergs from the nuclear explosion. I would make a best-guess estimate at twenty years forward.'
Gradually John realised how clever the Time Lord had been. Shifting the survivors into the future meant not being killed by fallout or residual radiation, not after that long. Given that there were two hundred survivors, the Soviet government couldn't ignore them, but that few people weren't a threat to political stability.
'So everyone under the shield got moved to 1989? Wow. And they're all safe?'
The Doctor's eyes twinkled mischievously.
' "safe" is a relative term, but I think they have a good chance of surviving. I have to confess being apprehensive about saving even that many people out of the town population.' Seeing John looked puzzled he explained one of his underlying worries. 'The Time Lords. My own people. They take a keen interest in anyone who meddles about in time and might well have arrived to investigate what you and I were up to. All I can conjecture is that projecting those people into the future didn't impact on the time-space continuum in any great way – or I was intended to save them all along.'
John let out a long sigh of relief.
'Well, that's that, then. Let's go home.' His bouyant tone trailed off into a more suspicious one.
'I'm afraid that isn't possible yet. I still have unfinished business to deal with.'
The second S1 round had been aimed at the western edge of the town, but overshot slightly, impacting near the outskirts of the ragged encampment of refugees. None survived. Several members of the cordon were injured by the blast, despite being pulled back three hundred metres into trenches. After all ten shells had been fired the town looked as though giant rollers had worked over it. Nobody outside the shield survived, not even those hiding in reinforced cellars.
'Strange, how that first S1 shell didn't detonate properly,' commented Colonel Proskurov, still slightly awed at the giant mushroom aggregated from the smaller ones, that now hung like a funeral pall over the town's ruins. Godunov didn't reply, being more concerned with watching a jet aircraft circling high up.
'Looks like we have observers, Colonel,' he said. A dark speck detached itself from the jet, falling freely at first, and then developing the contrail of an engine at work. Proskurov and Godunov watched for long enough to determine the missile's heading: outside Trevilho to the east, at the quarry workings marked on the secure map.
'Colonel,' said Godunov slowly, a feeling of creeping unease coming over him. 'D'you think that's a nuclear-armed missile?'
'Devil take them, I bet it is!' snapped the Colonel. He turned and ran to the towing vehicles, the motor bikes and BRDMs where the crews were sitting, sipping hot drinks out of thermos flasks.
'Out! Get into the lee of these vehicles and lie down – NOW!' he bellowed, following his own instructions. Gunners and escorts didn't pause to see why the Colonel had gone mad; they jumped and ran and dived with admirable speed.
'Ow!' yelped one gunner. 'That's hot!'
'You spilled my soup, you clumsy - ' began another man, to be silenced as an incredibly short bright flash cut into the dawn around them. Almost a minute later came a rustling in the pines as they bowed under the shockwave, accompanied by the rolling bass thunder of a nuclear detonation.
'On your feet, double time,' shouted Godunov. 'Come on, do you want to go home to your wives glowing like lightbulbs!'
The small detachment went to work hurriedly, hitching up the artillery pieces and driving back onto the road with all the speed they could muster. The escorts, aware that they didn't have any nuclear warheads to shepherd, were rapidly disappearing into the distance when the gunners reached the road.
Proskurov stopped briefly to clamber onto the cab roof, looking backwards at the enormous column of smoke and fire climbing into the heavens beyond the smoke from his own gun's efforts. Not a religious man, he nevertheless found his lips moving in a silent prayer.
He climbed back into the cab, sombrely silent for a minute.
'Come on, Felip, get us out of here,' he commanded.
The Doctor looked at the scanner, then back at John, and again, with considerable annoyance, at Masha. He had discovered her when changing into his characteristic Edwardian cape and frock coat.
'I did begin to wonder why you never turned up in the town square,' muttered John. 'Daft bint.'
The unfamiliar Arabic didn't appeal to Masha. She might have gotten angry or upset if the circumstances had been more normal.
'So. While I was working on the time rotor and my attention was elsewhere, you sneaked in to keep me company in the "strange blue box".'
Mutely, Masha nodded.
'You were startled to find it bigger inside than out. You hid behind a door over there, then found you couldn't leave to follow me once the external doors were closed again. Am I right?'
Once again a silent nod.
The Doctor sighed. Really, humans could be so irritating at times! He remembered when Zoe tried to sneak into and hide in the Tardis, a memory that brought a hastily-suppressed smile to his face. He needed to maintain a steely exterior resolve.
'We are not going to go far. Only to the mine, which by now will probably have been hit by a nuclear missile.'
'Oh!' squeaked Masha.
'Since I have altered history in such a manner as to permit the Cadaverites to survive that nuclear explosion, I need to make amends.'
'How do you intend to do that?' asked John. The Doctor shrugged
'I have no idea!'
Deep within the cavern, in a rock cleft where scattered items of clothing lay, the Tardis materialised. Masha recognised it on the scanner instantly; the cleft where she and Anya had been kept prisoner to tend to the Cadaverite's victims. A collection of small rocks and dust lay over the floor, sure evidence that the nuclear missile had been shaking the cavern's foundations.
'What do we do now?' asked John, peering out of the doors to the cavern beyond.
The Doctor looked back over his shoulder.
' "We" do not do anything. I shall go forth on my own, thank you. No, John, I cannot trust you to remain calm in the presence of these aliens. Nor can you conceal your mental activity.' Before he left Masha pressed the silver knife into his hands.
'Take it. It can't do any harm and it might help.'
A sulking John remained in the Tardis, keeping a wary eye on Masha.
'He'd better not get into trouble, then, without you and me to keep an eye on him.'
The Doctor found moving silently to be difficult, since the floor was covered with bits of rubble. Every footstep seemed to grate and echo around the chambers, until his movement was gradually concealed by the ceaseless padding of unclad alien feet. Cautiously, he peered around a corner, to see a column of Cadaverites walking past with armfuls of rubble.
'Of course! Removing the fallen roof so they can get outside!' he whispered. How could he deal with so many creatures? And, just as important, how quickly could he manage to stop them? Given their numbers and diligence, it wouldn't take many hours to remove the fallen roof, prop it up and get access to the mines. Once in the mine they had far less to fear from the intelligent cavern lining, and they could once more emerge into the world outside.
The shift of aliens moved away to dump their final loads of rubble and didn't return, giving the Doctor an opportunity to sneak out into the main cavern. His problem remained, as ever, trying to prevent any aliens escaping.
'I wonder – that cavern roof,' he said quietly, noticing long narrow fissures in the ceiling, possibly the result of the explosion outside transmitting a shearing force to the walls. With some difficulty he climbed up the side wall and thrust his sonic screwdriver into the widest crack he could find, and turned up the power to full.
A grating crack and a distinct shudder in the rock rewarded his efforts. Uninterrupted, he might well have succeeded in creating a very considerable rockfall. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Horribly strong hands closed about his ankles and pulled, making him fall heavily to the cavern floor and before he could even sit up a crowd of Cadaverites laid hold of him. The sonic screwdriver lay on the floor until a vengeful alien stamped on it.
The non-human! Captured again.
Kill him! Kill him!
No – take him to the Greater Will.
Interrogate then exterminate!
Amidst a clutch of gleeful aliens, the Doctor was dragged along and back to the familiar council place, where the Greater Will members looked down on him again. The ten of them exhibited all the vicious amusement of their previous encounter.
So you came back to us, not-human
Thank you for your inspiration in collapsing the cavern roof
So welcome! Now we are safe from human interference.
Do not worry, not-human. You will not be troubled by our presence for long.
A chorus of hissing laughter greeted that last mental communication.
'You know, I think you are some of the most repellent creatures I have ever met, including the Daleks and the Cybermen,' replied the Doctor, trying to sound nonchalant. A guard standing behind delivered a punch to his neck, forcing him headlong.
Yes, you will not be here for long
But that is no reason not to make your time here exquisitely unpleasant
You shall be converted also, the better to serve us
'That won't work. As you pointed out, I'm not human,' replied the Doctor, with a touch of sarcasm in his reply.
Maybe not, but your suffering will be most amusing to watch
The Doctor shook his head in mingled wonder and dismay. No wonder the civlised Karausians sought to expel these criminally insane monsters! He didn't really fear conversion – at the worst he would re-generate, at best contract a severe infection requiring anti-biotics to treat.
How did you get here, not-human
The question the Doctor dreaded them asking, one reason he'd been provoking them to stop them wondering how a single person managed to get into the very bottom level of the mines and the cavern itself. He suddenly went limp, taking his guard by surprise, and snatched Avtandil's silver knife from an inner pocket, slashing it around him in a wide arc. The tip caught the guard under the chin. The alien shrieked once and died. The Doctor turned immediately and hurled the knife at the members of the Greater Will, catching one a glancing blow on his calf. Predictably, the alien collapsed and died on the spot.
Such effrontery bemused the Greater Will for a second, long enough for the Doctor to turn and run.
He didn't get very far. A fist-sized rock came spinning out of the darkness and knocked him to the floor. The very next instant he went down under a pile of scratching, punching aliens.
Do not kill him.
At least, not yet
Tie him up! Tie him up! We will consider a suitable punishment!
A reeling, bleeding and severly scuffed Doctor was dragged away to the terraces where a few days ago he had witnessed hundreds of humans being unwillingly transformed into aliens. The stoney tiers were now deserted. Accompanied by his guards, the Doctor was hauled up a flight of steps to a sweeping row of empty stone biers.
One alien captor struck the stone with a long metal rod, ramming it upright into the granite. At least two metres remained sticking out of the stone, and the guards tied the Doctor to this improvised post. They all turned to stare at him in unison.
Your end will be slow
And painful.
Very painful.
'Not good conversationalists, are you?' jested the Doctor with a lightness of tone he didn't feel. 'I may not recommend this establishment to Cook's Tours, you know.'
A final malice-laden hiss and they were gone. One sentry remained at the foot of the terrace. The Doctor supposed a sentry was needed to prevent any vengeful Cadaverite from disembowelling him in retaliation for killing one of the Greater Will, and not because there would be anyone happening by to rescue him.
A Cadaverite walked past the sentry after a whispered discussion and up the stone steps, stalking determinedly up to the Doctor.
'Hsst,' it said in an undertone. 'I've come to rescue you.'
The secret emergency hotline between the Finnish and Swedish Prime Ministers had been established in 1957, a year after the Soviet Union demonstrated how it treated internal dissent in it's empire - crushing the government of Imre Nagy by naked military force. The line had been used infrequently: when the Berlin Wall had been erected in 1961; when the Velvet Revolution in Prague had been crushed in 1967 - once again by naked military force; when the Israelis transformed the map of the Middle East, again in 1967. The line's rationale was simple – it allowed the Finns to inform a neutral neighbour if they were ever under pressure from their larger, definitely not-neutral neighbour to the east. It gave the Swedes a form of information-buffer, just in case the tanks and planes of the Soviet North-Western Front ever began to move westwards.
Today it served as a conduit for the Finnish Prime Minister to tell his Swedish counterpart of the mysterious and dangerous events taking place only eighty kilometres from the Russo-Finnish border. Actually telling via Matti Pellonpaa, the interpreter who spoke Swedish (and Russian, and English, and French too).
'That's right, Tage,' said Prime Minister Holkeri, via Matti. 'The University thought it might be an earthquake, except the shock-waves were far too regular. Ninety seconds apart. Plus a much bigger one that came five minutes later.' This took the experienced Pelonpaa no longer to translate and say that it took the Prime Minister. On the other end of the line, a liverish and ill-at-ease Tage Erlander paid full attention and thought hurriedly.
'Why the hell would they do that? If those are nuclear explosions then the fallout will get carried over this way. What are they playing at!'
'You tell me,' replied Holkeri. 'I've got the Civil Defence head wanting to declare a state of emergency and a brace of generals who want to mobilise for war! Oh – wait a minute. I've got news from the police.'
A hum remained on the line whilst Holkeri read and rustled a piece of paper. Finally he finished and resumed the conversation.
'A party of hunters out near the Russian border reported hearing and seeing ten explosions, and let me quote this "of a magnitude so great that they could only be atomic in nature". The police say the hunters were witless with fright, not trying to hoax them. What do you think of that, eh?'
Erlander rubbed his sweating brow.
'We need to make representation to those Russian rascals. And why not call NATO in Brussels, also? We can pass the information on to them, and twist those Soviet bastard's tails at the same time.'
Valentin straightened his spine and relaxed his shoulders. The fact that he was able to meant he was still alive, despite circumstances. He remembered a similar event in February 1945 when a Nazi anti-tank gun put an armour-piercing shell through the glacis of his T34 outside Budapest, sending sparks flying everywhere, smashing the engine to scrap yet not touching a single one of the crew.
'If this is heaven, then you are an ugly angel,' announced Avtandil, standing next to him.
'What! Watch your tongue, you impudent young rascal!'
Valentin cast around, trying to see what lay around him. He could only remember that first explosive artillery shell, and then the second one that sent a cascade of light over the shield –
'Where the bedazzled hell of motherless whores are we!' exclaimed a male voice over to the left, followed by a meaty smack and an admonition not to swear in front of the child.
Avtandil checked to see that Avtandil was all present, both arms, legs, head, internal organs functioning as best they could. Heart beating a little fast. Apparently Avtandil was perfectly okay. He looked around, noticing that the telephone pylons had all disappeared. So had the town. What lay beyond a fifty metre circle centered on the town square was greenery, humped and lumped where the various buildings of the town might have been. A magpie cawed off in the shrubbery.
Evgeniy came over, staring out across the fresh landscape beyond the distorted cobbles that lay beneath their feet.
'Av – Avtandil. Tell me we are still alive.'
Avtandil slapped the other man on the back.
'We certainly are, Boss! Alive and kicking! God in heaven, did I ever dream of seeing this day!'
Evgeniy pointed out across the grass and weeds.
'Those bushes – that kind of growth takes years to accumulate. Years!'
Behind them an argument was taking place.
'I need to report in,' blustered a stranger. 'To find a phone or radio.' Misha, the weaselly little man (small but savage), pointed a sub-machine gun from the Great Patriotic War at him.
'You put The Doctor in trouble, I cut you in two. It's that simple.'
Doctor Pavel, looking as if he'd drunk a bottle of Stolichnaya in thirty seconds flat, came up to the pair of them.
'Gentlemen. Gentlemen. Can either of you explain why my wonderful German watch now says that the year is 1989?'
The group of two hundred and twenty three people were left alone for only half an hour before helicopter patrols of the MVD noticed them and called in to headquarters for instructions. The MVD headquarters call went all the way up to the top of the Politburo, where Premier Gorbachov found another reason for perestroika.
'How far in the future do you come from?' asked Masha.
'Not far. 1975. Well, that's where I come from. The Doctor – who knows how far in the future he comes from. Plus, he's not from round here. Not a human.'
Masha pursed her lips and nodded sombrely.
'He's a wizard. Just like my grandma told me: a wizard. He can see the future, he can create powerful forces by his hand's work, he can divine the infinite from a grain of sand. He has a heart of stone and a heart of gold, he is blessed with the curse of thirteen lives.'
John felt his jaw sag a little while his eyebrows rose. According to UNIT's resident sawbones, Harry Sullivan, the Doctor did indeed have two hearts. From occasional hints dropped to various companions (especially AB Benjamin Jackson) and interpreted, the Doctor had potentially another ten different bodily incarnations to run, whilst still in his third.
'How – how on earth did you know that!' he asked, faltering slightly.
Masha looked at him with disconcerting force.
'Am I not the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter?'
The Doctor looked hard indeed at the Cadaverite, noticing that it didn't really look like a Cadaverite. Naked and bone-white, yes, with long talons, yes, but – the body was that of a human, a woman in her twenties at a guess. A ponytail of pure white hair survived at the nape of her neck. Her face seemed nearly human, the eyes definitely so, with a warmth a Cadaverite would never know. Could this be a ploy by the Greater Will, part of their plan to punish him?
'You don't recognise me?' asked the human-alien. She turned her face to one side, revealing a livid red triangular weal along her neck. 'You saved my soul, Doctor, when you pressed that knife against my skin.'
Dimly, he recalled vaulting up the stone steps to render a Cadaverite victim unconscious, and pressing Avtandil's silver knife against her neck.
'They don't quite know what to make of me. I look like one of them but on the inside I'm still Katarina Evdokia. Now, stay still and I'll release you.'
Whilst she sought to break the bonds, something metallic and heavy clattered in the Doctor's pocket against the steel pole.
The Trevilho plaque! He remembered being given the piece of metal by Colonel Stefan, deciding that it was made of zirconium and leaving it in his pocket. With his hands free, he pulled it out and looked at it, one side blank, one side covered in alien script.
Written in Karausian, which he couldn't read.
'What's that!' hissed Katarina Evdokia through thin lips. 'It burns! It glows! What is it?'
The Doctor hesitated before answering. The sentry at the base of the tier was beginning to stir, getting edgy about both prisoner and visitor.
'It was left here by the gaolers of these creatures. Nobody on Earth can read the inscription.'
Katarina looked at the metallic oblong as if mesmerised.
'I can,' she murmured. 'Replicative absorption gone wrong. I can read the letters of fire.'
The Doctor offered it to her and she took it, holding the metal delicately. Their sentry suddenly became alert and twisted to look at them, darting up the stone stairs three at a time, shrieking a warning to his distant brethren. He came on, rushing at the Doctor. This was unwise, as the released Time Lord used the steel pole to execute a flawless jao dai, knocking the alien senseless.
Across the entire cavern a great hissing went up from the aliens. The sudden tramp of many hundreds of feet became obvious.
'I think maybe we need to leave now,' said the Doctor, looking at Katarina, who looked at the plaque with a variety of ecstasy. She began to read the Karausian script, declaiming in proud loud tones, and the intelligent cavern lining began to pulse in response. Katarina finished reading with a defiant shout, hurling the plaque into the ranks of several hundred Cadaverites who were advancing on the twosome with deadly intent.
'Get down!' shouted the Doctor, suddenly realising what would happen. He knocked Katarina to the floor and covered her with his cape, knowing that the gigantic ultra-violet pulse to follow would grill him like a chicken in a rotisserie.
The anticipated wash of violent energy didn't come. Instead there was an insistent thrumming of energy at a very low level. The Doctor opened his eyes to see the intelligent cavern lining glowing with a lemon yellow in pulses of three seconds duration.
There was still the onrushing horde of Cadaverite killers.
Actually they seemed to have rather lost the killer part of their nature, he decided, looking at the collection of confused and wandering aliens. None of them were moving towards him or Katerina.
'Can I get up now?' asked a muffled voice.
'Oh, I beg your pardon,' exclaimed the Doctor, collecting the folds of his cape and allowing Katarina to emerge. 'Sorry. I thought we were about to be bombarded by a giant energy wave.'
Katarina shook her head and looked all around her.
'We were. We were, but not by the sort you imagined.'
Curiosity struck the Doctor.
'What was on that plaque you read out – did you understand it?'
Katarina nodded.
'Yes. Oh yes indeed. To paraphrase – "In case of emergency read this Conscience Catalyser out loud".'
For the space of a heartbeat the Doctor stood, amazed. The Karausians, civilised and intelligent, humane and forbearing, had left humanity with a method of dealing with their insane offspring. Simply read out the instructions enclosed, and the cavern lining would embed conscience by direct mental transfer.
'I should have known, you know,' he said to Katarina. 'Too clever and thoughtful to leave this world with a problem that didn't have a solution.' He looked over the Cadaverites, who were assembling in a great circular formation in the cavern. 'And that's where they will stay until they expire, thanks to the newly-acquired consciences they have.'
'Can I come with you?' asked Katarina in a small voice. The Doctor nodded, only half-listening, so taken was he with the Karausian's determination not to allow the Cadaverites to prevail.
'Here,' he said, offering his cape to cover her nudity. 'Let's get back to the Tardis.'
Masha, whom he might have felt would have least appreciated a naked, half-alien stranger, actually took the younger woman under her wing.
'Come, come, we'll find you clothes somewhere in this magic box. Besides, you can't wander around under the eyes of young men half-naked,' and she winked at John, who diplomatically found the Tardis scanner vastly interesting.
'What happens to the people you sent twenty years into the future?' he asked the Doctor.
'That,' replied the Doctor, 'Is a tale for another day.'
'And why didn't those alien rascals simply give their tricksy cousins a conscience in the first place?' asked Masha five minutes later. She presented Katarina in a short floral dress and a headscarf. 'Then none of this would have happened.' The young girl – easier to think of her that way than a human-alien hybrid – twirled on one foot and explained.
'That's not how the Karausians behaved. The prisoners were left to try and come to a realisation by themselves of their sins. Obviously that didn't work, and I don't think anyone expected the prisoners to still be alive after so many hundreds of years.'
The Doctor kept his own counsel. He liked to think that the threat from the Cadaverites was over. Of course there was no way of knowing if any other surviving alien groups lay hidden in subterranean caverns anywhere else. Just one of life's imponderables.
UNIT UK HQ
Aylesbury
Buckinghamshire
1974
Two weeks later, Lieutenant Walmsley caught the Doctor in his lab.
'Success!' he crowed, waving a bit of paper. 'My monograph was accepted and graded. I'm now on permanent UNIT UK strength.'
'I'm so glad for you,' murmured the Doctor drily. Meeting the officer again jogged his memory. 'By the way, Colonel Stefan told me to pass on a greeting to you. What was it now? – oh, yes – "Loyally I Serve". Does that make any sense to you? Oh. I see it does.'
Lieutentant Walmsley felt as if he'd been punched. "Loyally I Serve" was the regimental motto of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment, the old unit he had been transferred from. How the hell did a Russian officer know to say that to him?
'Having kept them here for two weeks, I am now going to take Masha and Katarina back to Russia. Would you care to come along for the ride?'
John backed off hastily.
'No fear! I know what happens when you take off in that thing and I'm not getting a roasting from the Brig again.'
The Doctor swept into the police box with a broad smile and a "Do svdniya!".