Whilst packing tinned food and bottles of water, Roger took good care to keep an eye on the Doctor's "porcupine bomb". He had wrapped it in a tarpaulin, making it look like a badly-made football.
Electrically-detonated, the mad Doctor Smith had said. There was a long wire soldered to one of the blank cartridges, ending with two crocodile clips. That must get attached to a battery.
Greatly daring, Roger took ten minutes to open up the Bedford's bonnet, wrenching out various bits of radiator and piping until he'd cleared a space big enough for the tarpaulin-wrapped bomb to sit. He then attached the crocodile clips to the starter motor, which got broken open with the butt-end of a rifle.
The ignition keys went into his pocket. On no account was he going to risk an accidental explosion!
Towed by two Sahariana's, the Chevrolet was third vehicle in the little convoy that made it's way westwards, towards the wadi hideaway. A third Sahariana remained in the depot, where Torrevechio stood on watch. If any aliens approached, he would drive back to the wadi to warn them. No siren – Roger and Dominione agreed that silence, and apparent abandonment of the depot would be better than making a big fuss.
Sarah remained anxious about the Doctor's continued disappearance. Misfortune must have befallen him, or he would have been back here long ago with the TARDIS.
Could the bio-vores have taken it back to their homeworld? If so, how could the Doctor ever get it back again?
'Don't fret, Miss,' encouraged Doretti, driving the Sahariana. 'Doctor Smith is so daft he's clever.'
'That's a back-handed compliment if I ever heard one!' replied Sarah
Another disappearance was discovered when the three vehicles reached the wadi bed and stopped.
'Where's Albert?' asked the Professor. 'I thought he was in the back of the Bedford.'
'Where's Private Menzies?' asked Roger. I thought he was in the back of the Bedford.'
'Where's the liquer-bombs?' asked Sarah, looking in the back of the truck. Dozens of bottles were missing.
Oh no, what mischief are those two idiots planning! thought Roger, not daring to speak the words aloud. On cue, he heard a ragged and uneven engine fire up and begin to run, the sound brought to them on the desert wind. The engine chugged away, misfiring, until it revved enormously and began to fade audibly.
'They have taken the plane. They plan to drop spirit-bombs – Molotov cocktails – on the monsters,' said Dominione, flatly. He didn't want to look at Lieutenant Llewellyn, whose face went puce with anger.
'What can they hope to do!' he raged. 'An unarmed aircraft with some bottles of spirit. Damn their eyes, they're going to call those monsters down around our ears!'
Nor was that all their misfortune. Torrevechio came bowling over the desert in the reserve Sahariana, waving and gesturing.
The bio-vores were on the move. En masse. Once he got to the wadi rendezvous, he had even more unpleasant details.
'There must be nearly a hundred of them, the big black vehicles. Not only that, they have a rolling barrier of sand in front of them, like a miniature sandstorm, ten metres tall. At ground level you can't see a thing.'
Sarah guessed the truth of this.
'That's what they're good at, manipulating sand, isn't it? That must be their equivalent of a smokescreen.'
'What I'd like you to make for me are triangular glass sheets, capable of sustaining a weight suspended beneath. I want poles, lightweight poles, in half-metre and two metre lengths.'
The attentive audience in Lord Url's castle listened carefully, whispered amongst each other and made chopping gestures of agreement. Yes, it could be done.
'Let's see – fifty glass triangles, fifty long poles, one hundred short poles.' He'd calculated that the triangles must be fifty square metres in area, judging by the average mass of a bio-vore.
Bio-vores set-to amongst the machines of the textile hall and in the artificer's workshop, diligently creating the strange items requested by Thedoctor.
Nurbonissa, now in charge at the castle, dared to ask questions.
'Thedoctor, what are these objects for? Are they shields?'
Grinning, the Time Lord shook his head.
'Not at all. No, Nurbonissa, these articles, if properly assembled, will give you a dimensional advantage over your enemies at the trans-mat platform.'
The young alien made the backwards-rearing gesture of surprise.
The Doctor tapped his nose.
'Patience! Just wait and see. Firstly, we need night-time.'
Night-time was essential for two reasons. Firstly, it would render the defenders much more vulnerable. Secondly, it created a thermal environment essential for his scratch plan to succeed.
Several hours later, dusk was falling as the Doctor demonstrated how to use the assembled triangles. Practice for the bio-vores took place, until they were at least familiar with their personally issued equipment. A few accidents reduced the number of attackers to forty seven.
Nurbonissa still foresaw problems.
'The defenders have been re-inforced by units from other polities across the northern hemisphere. They outnumber the attackers you plan to send. They have many weapons. How can only fifty rebels triumph?'
'Courage, mon brave,' replied the Doctor. 'This is only part two of the plan. We still have to execute part one. Chin up!'
The cheerfullness wasn't faked. This time, the Doctor felt he had the upper hand, and all the assembled aristocrats of the entire northern hemisphere couldn't stop him. The only cloud on his horizon was the knowledge that Sarah and the human survivors at Mersa Martubah might be struggling without him.
'Tut!' he scornfully told himself. 'I'm sure they can manage without my help for a few hours. Nothing to worry about!'
Albert felt enormous relief, followed by jubilation, that he could get the Lysander airborne.
Taxiing, they told you at the University Flying School, was tricky. It certainly was in the desert, with huge clouds of dust to fly through when taking off! Made even less certain by the misfiring engine, which ran not quite smoothly enough and made him worried.
Glancing behind, the sight of a grimy, bandaged Private Menzies, sitting on a pile of Amaretto bottles, didn't exactly fill him with confidence. Davey was swigging from an opened bottle, which made Albert indignant.
'Hoy! Don't drink the ammunition!' he called, attention back on the ground below again.
'Look yonder!' called Davey, pointing south-east out of the rear compartment and spitting out liquer. 'The damn nose-goblins are attacking the depot!'
Keeping out of dust billows, Albert saw the frightening sight of dozens upon dozens of black, glassy vehicles moving towards Mersa Martubah. The things were arrayed in lines, reminiscent of a pefect armoured formation on manouevres. Slowly they moved forward, dust streaming out behind them.
'Get your Ronson ready!' he shouted.
Davey slid one of the windows open, allowing a powerful stream of cold air into the rear compartment, churning up dust and glass fragments. He fired the tarred fabric strip on bottle after bottle, throwing them out of the opened window, hearing the far distant chink of the bottles smashing below.
Albert kept low, very low, flying only just above the crawling black monsters. That way they didn't have the faintest chance of bringing a weapon to bear. He looked back as the Lysander rocketed south-east, seeing the symmetrical lines broken, with bright blue fires burning atop some of the vehicles.
'Take that for Tam, ye swine!' yelled Davey, shaking a fist. Albert was more bothered about the falling oil-pressure guage. Was that a trail of faint blue smoke behind them? Damn it, he was mounting this desperate raid because he'd entirely failed to even notice, let alone take part in, the battle that killed Corporal Mickleborough. Going out with engine failure was a silly way to end it!
'Get ready, Davey, the dig's coming up!' he shouted. The long-abandoned line of tents blurred past beneath them, then the aircraft was over the sand basin. Davey once more threw lit bottles outwards as the Lysander cruised at fifty miles per hour over the sinister glossy black buildings of the excavation. Albert banked over the far wall of the basin, coming back again and noting with glee the blind panic suffered by the aliens below.
No experience of aircraft! he enthused. Especially not an aircraft that flew over and dropped flaming bombs on them.
They might have gotten away successfully, if the Lysander had not flown over the giant circular platform of the Dias, where various crates and scrolls were deposited. One second their right-hand wing was over the platform, the next it was gone, nine feet missing.
Instantly Albert lost control, the aircraft spiralling downwards around it's axis with incredible speed, smashing into the HQ building. It blew up, the explosion made even bigger by the collection of spirit bottles carried, a bright blue sheet of flame erupting outwards between the building columns.
Droning eastwards, at five thousand feet, the pinprick flashes of Albert and Davey's first attack drew the attention of a pilot aboard a Blenheim Mk V, christened "Guynemer". His aircraft was one of a flight of three, and the only one to still have bombs aboard. Their target, an Italian freighter, had been hit and sunk by the first and second aircraft in the flight.
The aircraft were from the FAFL, frankly-obsolete but generously given by the British to their prickly French allies, who took great relish in attacking anything Italian. The Germans would get their turn, was the common consensus of the squadron, but for now – kill Italians!
'Sst! Regardez,' said the pilot to his co-pilot, indicating the flashes below. By this time the Lysander had flown away, but the pilot knew what he'd seen. The co-pilot looked, aware that their Lysander reconaissance plane went missing in this area.
A mass of black dots, enemy MT doubtlesss, crawled over the gravel and grit of the land below, preceded by a remarkably regular sandstorm, one that roiled and rolled yet always remained just ahead of the advancing black beetles.
'L'Italiens,' said the co-pilot, making a gesture as if spitting. 'Putains.'
The pilot looked over his shoulder, as if he could see back to the bomb bay, then back at his colleague.
'Oui!' said the co-pilot, grinning with a nasty smile. 'Ecoutez moi, mon amis Italien,' he spoke into an imaginary loudspeaker. 'Attendez! Attendez! Votre mort commencez en vingt seconds. Merci.'
The bomb run commenced at three thousand feet, depositing two-hundred pound bombs along the middle row of vehicles. Under such a smashing assault, a whole row was pulverised into fragments. Other vehicles were crippled by bomb fragments, and the precise array of black tanks became a chaotic flurry.
Nor was that all. The Mk V Blenheim had been fitted with four machine guns in the nose, for ground attack. All three aircraft made passes at low level, firing twelve thousand rounds of ammunition. Any bio-vore out of cover was killed. Bio-vores under cover, in their vehicles, were killed when bullets found entry and ricocheted around interiors.
The twenty surviving black tanks rearranged their ranks, retreating to the depths of the desert towards Makin Al-Jinni.
'Chars Italien?' mused the pilot of Guynemer. Those crawling black things didn't look Italian. Still, if a Lysander had attacked them, they must be the enemy.
'L'allemagne, peutetre?' shrugged the co-pilot. He grinned his nasty grin. 'Peutetre, mon capitain, chars Anglais.'
The pilot wagged a cautionary finger.
The three aircraft of the FAFL went back to the squadron at Sidi Rezegh, unaware of the role they played in the preservation of the human race.
In the wadi, the human survivors saw the flight of bombers alter course, swooping down and bombing the oncoming bio-vores, then returning to spray the wreckage and survivors with a hurricane of bullets.
'Good Lord. I think we just survived another attempted attack by the monsters, unscathed,' remarked Roger.'Truly a deus ex machina moment, eh, Professor?'
Sarah and the Professor both looked unhappy. Templeman put his feelings into words.
'The aircraft with Albert and your private has not returned, Lieutenant Llewellyn. It should have returned by now. The dig isn't far away, if that's where they went.'
Roger's face fell. Of course. How could he have forgotten? He held onto faint hope that they might have ditched the Lysander in the desert and be making their way back to Mersa Martuba on foot. After hours of waiting, he finally admitted to himself that the aircraft, with two men aboard it, was not coming back.
Sarah was now seriously worried about the Doctor. He must have been captured by the bio-vores, being gone this long!
Sub-Senior Kosadi was now Senior Kosad. He had decided to shorten his name without the formal ceremony, feeling that it gave him more kudos amongst the Warriors defending the trans-mat station complex. The only bio-vore who might have protested, Senior Fosor, was unable to complain, having been Eviscerated by Sub-Senior Kosadi when the latter felt his play for command was merited under the circumstances.
And the circumstances?
Rebellion! Mass revolt and murder committed by Farmers in their thousands! Figures were debatable, but perhaps half of the Farmer population of Lord Excellency Url's new bailiwick – he legally acquired it after removing Lord Excellency Sur – were in a state of open revolt. No communications with Sur's keep nor, as of a few hours ago, Url's castle, were possible.
Fosor had dallied in making requests for help from other aristocrats. He hadn't really believed that the Farmers could be so numerous and hostile. That changed after the massed hordes lying in siege beyond the dunes tried to storm the trans-mat complex, twice.
Thanks to the molten glass moat, and the heavy weapons sent in support from other Lords, they had beaten off both attacks, leaving a multitude of dead Farmers lying on the sands.
The defenders suffered casualties themselves. Not many, but still too many considering their paucity. A few dozen killed, a few dozen temporarily-alive who were quickly Eviscerated. Thanks to Fosor's delay in asking for help, the other Lords were now reluctant to send more than a fraction of their own forces, fearing the spread of revolt to their own Farmers. The trans-mat complex didn't have a Manufactory of it's own, or he'd have given orders for a few dozen Combat Cars to be constructed.
One of the more bizarre events during their siege was the materialisation, upon the trans-mat platform, of a nine-metre length of canvas and plywood, accompanied by a desperately cowering bio-vore whining about being attacked "from the air". Kosad had the wretch Eviscerated at once as a threat to morale, and for being completely mad as well.
Kosad ventured over to one of the science stations, checking to see how their besiegers were deployed. The life-signs scanners showed the frighteningly large mass on the landward side of the complex, waiting.
Waiting didn't really make sense, though, did it? Unless the masses beyond were waiting for night to fall.
'Can we increase the width of the glass moat?' he asked one of the technicians.
'No, Senior Kosad. The moat is at maximum width right now.'
Another technician raised an arm, wanting to ask a question.
'Senior Kosad, when can we expect bottled algae supplies? Some of us have not fed for today, yet.'
Kosad gestured to a panel, as if to make a technical point, in front of the technician, who turned back to face it. Kosad Eviscerated the technician on the spot.
'Supplies will only arrive once we defeat the rabble who have risen against us!' snapped Kosad. 'Bear that in mind! Victory or death, no other alternatives exist.'
He stamped angrily outside again, looking to see if he could catch any defender slacking or sleeping.
No. The defenders stood to their big-bore dart-throwers, the heavy stunners, the glass-mortars. All alert, all ready, all waiting expectantly.
Kosad and his garrison might have felt slightly complacent. This feeling was unwarranted, as they were pitching their wits against the Doctor, his knowledge of trans-mat systems and aerodynamics.
The defenders of the trans-mat complex were audibly assaulted by a tremendous crack, akin to the loudest peal of thunder imaginable. That was the arrival, on the trans-mat platform, of thirty thousand tons of silt and water displacing the air normally present on the platform. For a mere fraction of a second, the water piled a meter deep atop the platform retained a circular shape, before collapsing into full flow. This initial tidal wave of muddy water was followed by another one hundred and tweny thousand tons of icy clear water. Those bio-vores amongst the defenders who were not crushed or drowned outright were stunned into paralysed unconsciousness by the tidal wave, whose chill waters were exothermic anathema to them.
Out into the sands beyond rolled the tidal wave, onto the glass moat, cooling and cracking it amidst gigantic clouds of steam. Behind it, buildings collapsed under the weight of water, or when their foundations were washed away.
Those few scattered defenders who remained upright, and conscious, and aware, were then hit by stun rays and glass darts coming from the heavens, as forty three microlight gliders swooped in from the darkness and onto the trans-mat platform, arriving in a tumult of glass fragments and broken poles. These airborne commandoes stormed the trans-mat controls (abandoned when the technicians there had been swept away) and various buildings across the complex. From beyond the dunes, gradually getting closer, the sound of cheering, yelling Farmers could be heard as the besiegers broke from cover and joined in the capture of the complex.
Listening intently as he jogged closer, the Doctor couldn't help grinning foolishly in delight that his plan had worked. Recalling that bio-vores interpreted the humanoid grin as a threat, he reverted to a satisfied smirk. The half dozen bio-vores jogging alongside him as an escort felt happier when that feral grimace vanished.
Thanks be to Sorbusa, reflected the Doctor. If he hadn't mentioned that the complex on Target Fourteen fell into the sea, matters would have been far more difficult. The hang-gliders were a precaution, just in case the water got shut off too soon. Four had crashed along the way after taking off from the highest point of Lord Sur's castle, the penalty you paid for a primitive lighter than air craft with minimal crew training.
Twenty Eight: The Idea, The TimeSarah encountered resistance in promoting her idea of rescuing the Doctor.
'There are only six of us left, and you and the Professor are not soldiers,' carped Roger.
'Neither you nor Templeman are soldiers, and there are only six of us,' grumbled Dominione.
'Oh really! You two are the living end!' snapped Sarah, quite convinced that her idea was being stalled simply because she was a woman. 'I am quite capable of driving a truck, or pointing a gun if it comes to that.'
On cue, the two officers exchanged looks.
'Sarah,' said Roger, trying to remain patient. 'Those monsters know where we are. We have killed a considerable number of them, quite besides the slaughter inflicted by those Blenheim bombers we saw. They are going to be out for our blood! You cannot simply decide to march into Makin Al-Jinni and declare that you want Doctor Smith returned.'
Tenente Dominione was more subtle.
'At which point does this present, this time, our here-and-now, become the one you want it to be? How do you know? How do you know that Dottore Smith going missing is not how the future ought to be?'
Because it's not! raged Sarah silently. That's not how it is and it's not how it's going to be if I can help it!
'Of course! You're both quite correct!' she merely said, smiling sweetly and in a quiet conversational tone.
Roger took this reply at face value. Dominione, more experienced in the ways of womanhood, looked at her sceptically. Sarah responded with an expression of utter innocence that made the Italian even more sceptical.
'I would suggest that since the bio-vore's attack on the depot has been thwarted, we could move back there,' said Sarah. 'Torrevechio's giant blow-torch could do with refuelling, and we might also consider our friends approaching from the west.'
Her veiled reference to the predicted arrival of the Afrika Korps, and the Regio Esercito in close company, made Roger uneasy. Pretty obviously the depot could not be defended from an attack, not when the garrison amounted to himself alone. He was outnumbered three-to-one by the Italians, even if they were still observing the informal truce. Preparing Mersa Martuba for demolition – well, that was a possibility, perhaps if they pretended it needed to be kept out of bio-vore hands –
- aha! he realised, pleased with his own cleverness, fondling the key in his pocket.
'Not a bad idea, Miss Smith. I think we can head back now. Dominione, can you send one of your chaps ahead to man the look-out platform?'
Their rag-tag convoy picked its way across the rock and sandstone to the depot again, a depot now looking very battered. Sabotage inflicted by previous attacks, not to mention all the fighting within the grid of storage stacks, lent an air of untidy chaos to the whole area. Captain Dobie, had he survived, would have been appalled.
Sarah's idea, of course, had been to steal transport as soon as possible, and then make her way to Makin Al-Jinni, to rescue the Doctor. Or at least find out what he was up to, staying away for so long.
Her intent was noble, her opportunities were limited, and her success was negligible. The bio-vores had removed all the spare Sahariana's from the depot for recycling. The Doctor's spiking a fuel bowser days ago had destroyed the parked ranks of Bedford and Morris trucks. Torrevechio and Doretti kept a fatherly eye on their Sahariana's, and the towed Bedford was useless, the clutch destroyed.
'Psst,' came a sound, rather like a soda siphon. Sarah looked around in puzzlement, wondering who was making a gin and tonic at this point of the day?
'Psst! Miss Smith!' came the whisper once again. Reflexively raising her eyebrows, Sarah realised that Professor Templeman was trying to get her attention.
The vehicles were parked along the N1 track, where the Professor leant out from a stack of pallets and gestured to Sarah.
'I know where there's a truck,' he managed in a hoarse stage-whisper, taking her upper arm in a punishing grip and leading her away from the parked vehicles and soldiers. 'Doctor Smith sent it in as a decoy, remember? after draining the radiator, but it will still run for a while. We can get out to the dig in it, anyway.'
For a second Sarah remained nonplussed. Why on earth would the non-worldly Professor want to get over to the depot?
'I want to know what happened to Albert,' confided the Professor. 'Bourgebus was killed, poor devil, by these monsters. I just hope Albert wasn't, too. Damn it, did you know he never told me about being able to fly?'
Since there were only six of them in total, it wasn't hard for Sarah and the Professor to slip away to find the abandoned Chevrolet, which had rammed itself into a stack of telegraph poles, badly damaging the bumper and radiator. The ignition key remained where the Doctor left it, in the ignition. Templeman shuffled his considerable bulk into the driver's seat and they were off.
Their first obstacle was a long, uniform mound of sand that crested above the flat desert floor, winds whipping flurries off the top and into their cab. Templeman carefully drove up the dune at an angle, managing not to stall the truck.
Once down the other side they saw a ghastly landscape of shattered black tanks, bomb craters, shrapnel strikes and bio-vore bodies. This was the killing ground the Blenheim bombers had struck.
Sarah shut her eyes and gritted her teeth. The bio-vores were vile opponents, worthy of death, but this ghastly slaughter made her feel ill. War, she sternly told herself, is the worst possible human – no, not just human - the worst possible sentient endeavour.
'You can open your eyes now,' said the Professor in a consoling tone. When she did, the baking heat of desert gravel and rock played in her face, untainted by death or destruction.
'What's that?' she asked, pointing out at the desert half a mile ahead. What looked, bizarrely and impossibly like a river, ribboned across the unforgiving terrain. The meandering strip grew more regular, until they reached it and recognised a "glass moat", as the Doctor would have described it. Ten yards across, featureless and smooth but for the sands drifting across it.
'It must be that molten glass Lieutenant Llewellyn mentioned,' worried Sarah. Their truck would sink in that stuff! And no way could they possibly cross on foot.
'If it was molten, then that blown sand would sink into it,' said Templeman, revealing his ability to apply logic. 'Also, we would be feeling the heat from here.'
Gunning it's now-protesting engine, the Chevrolet darted across the smooth surface entirely unharmed.
'Brilliant!' beamed Sarah, before remembering that they were shortly due to enter the lion's den.
'They've gone!' snarled Lieutenant Llewellyn. 'Don't ask me how but those two – those two – those – '
' "Civilians"?' suggested Dominione. He couldn't follow the English officer's speech, so the guess was based on the absence of that most charming and attractive young lady Miss Smith, and the altogether less pleasant Professore Templeman.
The tenente whistled to Doretti, who doubled over, his sub-machine gun over one shoulder.
'I fear we need to recover our civilian counterparts, Caporale,' ordered Dominione. 'Also,' he added, not looking at Lieutenant Llewellyn, 'We need to see if we can get beyond radio-jamming range in order to communicate with the Regio Esercito.'
'Sir!' saluted Doretti, able to maintain a poker-face.
'Cacciatore – we – ah – we – we – hunt,' tried the tenente in speech to Roger, mimicking tracking a person down. They took the command Sahariana, heading out over the desert towards Makin Al-Jinni.
The Doctor surveyed the vista before him.
The huge trans-mat complex, previously held in force by Warriors and others of Homeworld's elite, now lay in the hands of the Farmers. He regretted the fact that several hundred defenders had to die, killed defending a complex and a social system that was on it's way out. If only, if only –
A group of Farmers dragged a sodden, partly-stunned bio-vore from the recesses of a first floor science room. Those escorts flanking the Doctor, amongst others, hissed in recognition, grinning.
No, realised the Doctor, not grinning, actually baring teeth in a ritual threat. That prisoner, whoever he was, would be dead in seconds.
'Stop!' he boomed, recalling his music hall training. The group, and their struggling prisoner, stopped, waiting for his next speech.
'Enough killing has taken place here today. We must send these survivors to other lord's lands, across the archipelago, across the sea and across the continent.'
If the Doctor had ordered the Farmers present to sit upside down on the floor and hum "Rule Britannia", he would have been obeyed, so high was his stock.
The drenched prisoner, divested of equipment, was brought before the Doctor, making a pathetic spectacle.
'Hello! So pleased to meet you! I'm The Doctor, formally known to your fellows as "Thedoctor".'
The shivering bio-vore, barely able to concentrate, looked at the small alien with wonder.
'You do not seek to kill me or drain my life-energy?'
The Doctor pursed his lips and made a rude sound.
'Certainly not! In return, you need to look around you and witness what has happened here. Pass the message on.'
Senior Kosad (the prisoner) looked around, seeing the temporarily-alive bio-vores who had been defending the trans-mat complex – seeing them – and here he needed to make sure his eyes were functioning properly - seeing them helped into thermal recovery, sent to triage stations, divested of weapons and equipment. No Eviscerations. None. None at all. Plus, he was alive. By all normal criteria, he should be long dead.
'What is this!' he whispered in complete and utter confusion, darting a glance back at Thedoctor.
'Equality!' snapped the Doctor. 'Tolerance. Compassion. The respect of one sapient life-form for another.'
Kosad spent what might have been five seconds or five hours watching the rescue and recovery operation going on. "Rescue" and "recovery" were concepts he had to invent before actually confronting the words themselves.
Finally, he was brought to face the small alien.
'Goodbye, Kosad. I doubt we will ever meet again. Think of what you have seen here, however!'
The Senior drew himself up to full height, towering far above the small alien.
'I shall. Your name cannot be Thedoctor. I salute you, Doctor.'
With a wail of sirens, Senior Kosad went off to a bailiwick half the world away.
Nurbonissa came to ask questions, only to be pre-empted by the Doctor.
'Before you ask, Nurbonissa, yes we did need to release those prisoners. That's fifty of them sent away to other Lord's lands. Your agenda and their message will travel, Nurbonissa. Farmers not being ruled or exploited or Eviscerated. Medicine and surgery for the sick and the injured. A methodology to revitalise Waste- to revitalise Homeworld.'
Other bio-vores of the escort came in to listen.
'Will our rebellion succeed?' asked one.
'Undoubtedly!' replied the Doctor. 'I'm not one to pay credit to old Vladimir Illyich, but one of his phrases is most appropriate here: "Nothing is as powerful as an idea whose time has come." '
Privately, the Doctor felt quite pleased at progress here on Homeworld. The aristocratic system, with it's feudal fascism, had suffered a near-fatal blow in the space of a few days. Given a few months, the Farmers would have achieved liberation.
'What methodology?' asked another of the escort.
The Doctor produced a glass scroll, etched with his trusty sonic screwdriver (a liberated trophy from Lord Sur's castle), remembering what he'd written there.
TOWARDS AN AQUEOUS ECO-RETRIEVAL OPTION
Recall your amphibious past. Your long-distant ancestors came from the sea. Currently, the land is not conducive to long-term survival.
Ergo, treat the land as an occasional resort. You currently harvest and crop sufficient algae to sustain your population from a single level.
Create other such levels by marine inversion manipulation. This will increase algae harvests by a factor between 5 and 10.
Using the trans-mat Infiltration Complex on Target Fourteen, you can irrigate the desert hinterland by importing millions of tonnes of water. This would be a long-term project.
By using the same Infiltration Complex, you can acquire alien piscine life-forms and re-populate your oceans with marine life.
Heavier than air flight is possible.
When Imgellisa was presented with the scroll, he got a box with it.
'Seeds,' explained the Doctor. 'From the TARDIS' life-science laboratory storage. Date palm, coconut palm, saguarro cactus, yucca, various succulents. Take good care of them.'
The big alien made a nodding gesture in compliance.
'We have one request to make of you, Doctor.' The three-syllable name had been shortened to two by all who spoke to him, out of respect. 'We do not want to be tempted by the Infiltration Complex on Target Seventeen, the world you call "Earth". Can you destroy it when you return?'
'Absolutely!' said the Doctor, with entirely unfounded enthusiasm, returning to the TARDIS and waiting for the trans-mat to send him back to Earth.
Travelling back in his own, familiar, big blue box allowed the errant Time Lord to check on dates: his arrival back at Makin Al-Jinni occurred on the 1st of April 1941, which meant he had very little time to spare before the entire Axis forces present in North Africa passed either through or nearby the depot at Mersa Martuba. Hours, in fact. Hours before the bio-vore garrison killed or captured humans en masse, sufficient to perpetuate the alien existence on Earth. There might be losses on both sides, but the bio-vores could repopulate far, far faster than humans, given the bio-morphic energy available.
Luckily he had arranged for a bait-and-switch delay with the Farmers back on Homeworld. Thus, when the TARDIS appeared on the platform at the Earth end of the trans-mat link, nearly fifty Warriors surmounted the platform, pointing weapons (in some cases firing those weapons) at the blue box.
A minute later, those Warriors were suddenly firing at the big blue box whilst standing on the trans-mat platform on Homeworld. Under a barrage of stunners from Farmers lying in pre-arranged wait, the imported Warriors wilted and dropped, to be dragged from the platform.
Back went the TARDIS. As expected, the second sting didn't capture many Warriors, only a dozen. Back went the TARDIS. The Doctor relocated the time-machine off to one side of the trans-mat, down on the desert floor and away from harm or attention.
This time, and after waiting for long enough to complete another chapter of "The Yawning Heights", the Doctor dared to open the doors of his spaceship, having taken a peek beyond on the scanner and seen that nobody was lying in wait.
'Ah, the fresh air of a desert dawn!' he enthused to the Infiltration Complex. Indeed, the air had a calm, cool quality that only existed at dawn and dusk, and the sun had not yet risen high enough to begin it's relentless solar assault.
He cast glances to left and right, seeing running bio-vores, those familiar black tanks chugging slowly over the complex floor, and the Headquarters building burnt and battered, great chunks of masonry blasted out of the massed pylons. A twisted, contorted pile of metal and wooden framework lay further inside the colonnaded building.
'I suspect a posthumous award is in the reckoning,' mused the Time Lord to himself. A glass shard went whining past his nose, causing him to jerk back and pay attention to matters closer at hand.
'Take me to your leader!' he called, biting his cheek at the use of the old science-fiction cliché.
The bio-vores responsible for shooting at him on a reflex and thus inaccurately, stopped when they realised that the small alien, Thedoctor, the one who ought to have been killed a dozen times over, had returned.
Being frog-marched by creatures many times more powerful than he meant the Doctor went when they wanted, not where he wished. He ended up in one of the three smaller buildings dedicated to scientific purposes, facing an unfamiliar bio-vore.
'Detachment Leader, we captured this alien on the trans-mat platform. He demanded to be brought here,' announced one of the escorts. Tellingly, he remained facing the Detachment Leader, and did not exhibit any trace of respect. The Doctor recognised these as two symptoms of a lesser daring to indirectly threaten a superior. There must have been endless killings amongst the command levels here!
'Just a warning!' exclaimed the Doctor, brightly and with considerable enthusiasm. All eyes were upon him. 'Yes, just to say that the trans-mat on Homeworld is now under the control of Farmers. In - ' and he checked his half-hunter ' – about five minutes from now, they will be accepting their last ever transmission from here on Target Seventeen, back to Homeworld.'
Predictably, this rumour went around the complex in seconds, leading to a sudden rush of bio-vores for the trans-mat platform. Within five minutes of the Doctor's message about the last chance to get home, only a few dozen bio-vores were left alive and in the complex. Detachment Leader Kaybol (who had been Under-Technician Kaybollatri a few hours ago) stamped around until finding the Doctor, who was lounging on a pillar, contemplating his work and how long it might take until Homeworld enjoyed genuine freedom.
'You are under sentence of death!' crowed Kaybol. 'You will be executed!' He sounded positively happy. 'Eliminated! Eviscerated!'
'Don't push out the funereal boat too soon,' rejoined the Doctor. 'Most of your garrison here seem to be either dead or back on Homeworld.'
Kaybol grinned the feral bio-vore grin and made as if to lunge at the Doctor.
'Fool! All I need now is a source of fodder. Even hay, as you term your fodder, will do.'
'It'll take more than hay or hazel,' caried on the Doctor. 'You're entirely cut-off from Homeworld with no escape.'