IV
The Zagrite Supreme Admiral glowered at the security chief of his ship.
"How difficult," he asked, slowly and calmly "can it possibly be, to find one... stinking... INTRUDER?!"
The Chief stood firm in the face of the verbal assault, and answered back primly.
"He disabled all the main scanning systems, sir," he said. "Our foot troops have been unable to locate him."
"Well, you'd better hope they do," the Admiral growled, "or your head will decorate my desk."
He turned away, ignoring the Chiefs salute. The Chief spun on his heel, and walked off, already thinking plan through. Although his plans were not to capture the intruder, as his superior believed...
His deputy strode up beside him.
"Sir?" he inquired.
"His temper is out of control, and his tactics..." the Chief responded. "Well, they are pointlessly cautious for such a weak world as this."
"If you don't mind me saying sir," the Deputy replied, "I don't think this planet is worth the losses we're sustaining."
"How so?" the Chief asked.
"It's a waste of time," the deputy elaborated. "These people aren't surrendering, this world is third rate, and even when we do win, there's no honour in fighting such a stunted race. What'll people say about the Zagrites? That we slaughtered the defences of a planet that doesn't even have laser weaponry yet?"
The Chief considered his deputies words. The Notion of honour wasn't particularly important to him, as it was to his idealistic subordinate, but this world was indeed a third rater... and the losses they had sustained were far too high for such a simple people.
"And," his deputy added, "we can't not forget that these tactics were gleaned from an Alien, and we can't trust that they won't lead us into a trap."
The Chief nodded.
"All of this is true," he said, "but what can we do about it?"
"Mutiny," the Deputy said immediately. "All of our crew would follow you –"
"Apart from the Admirals personal guard," the Chief interrupted.
"Who number less than a hundred on a ship of a thousand," the Deputy insisted. "We could."
"But it goes against all of our laws," the Chief countered.
"We can declare that the Admiral was unfit for command," the Deputy suggested. "That he was endangering the lives of our troops. We can then evacuate our men, and go home, where the Admiral will be disgraced, his protests unheard, and a new Commander fro this ship assigned."
"Who, you?" the Chief scathed.
"No," his deputy replied earnestly. "You."
"Me?" the Chief said.
"You would become Captain, they would assign a new Admiral for you to serve under, and I would get your position, which is all I ever want," the deputy said. "Simple."
The Chief considered this, and was about to answer, when they were both distracted by the intruder walking up to them from around a corner, grinning, and holding his hands up.
"I surrender," he said. "And so does my associate."
A girl popped her head around the same corner the intruder came around, smiled and came up,m hands raised in surrender.
"Take us to your leader," the man said.
--
The Doctor winked at Eilidh as they were marched onto the bridge.
"We're in there," he whispered.
"As long as we can get out of there again," she whispered back, then straightened up as the Admiral noticed them.
"Ah Doctor," he said, smiling, "how nice of you to pop in."
"Well, I felt we left it too soon last time," the Doctor replied. "Wanted to have a chat about random killing of people, invading of planets, Quilt loo roll..."
"And this is your friend?" the Admiral continued, ignoring him.
"Yeah, this is Eilidh," the Doctor said, smiling.
"And how did she get on?" the Admiral asked.
"Transmatted her up," the Doctor said, afraid that the Admiral was getting somewhere.
"Anyone else?" the Admiral asked, smiling the smile of a shark.
"Nope," the Doctor said, innocently.
"Like I believe you," the Admiral growled. "Search the ship! He probably brought a whole army of his compatriots aboard!"
Security officers snapped to attention, then rushed off to obey the Admirals orders.
"I didn't, you know," the Doctor said. "No one here but me and Eilidh."
"If I had a penny for every lie you have told me," the Admiral began, but Eilidh interrupted.
"Even if you did find Jack, he's immortal!" she yelled.
The Doctor stared at her for a moment in absolute shock, and slapped his head with his hand.
"What did you say that for, Eilidh," he muttered.
"He knew we were lying," she hissed back, "so –"
"He was bluffing," the Doctor sighed. The Admiral coughed, and the Doctor turned back to him.
"You were lying then," he commented.
"Yeah, so sue me," the Doctor replied. "Wouldn't you?"
"Oh yes," the Commander said. "But then again, I don't like people lying to me. I think it's time for you to die."
He motioned to his guards, and they covered the Doctor and Eilidh with their weapons. The Doctor looked at Eilidh, and she stared back.
"Sorry about this," he said.
"It's ok," she replied. "I chose this. And I have a backup plan."
She put her hand n her pocket, as the Admiral raised his arm to give the execution order...
The Doctor locked eyes with him, glaring with disgust at this greedy little man.
"You'll regret this," he said.
The Admiral only smiled, and his arm dropped...
Eilidh flashed the laser she had picked up earlier out, blasting one of the guards.
The room suddenly shook, throwing all of them to the floor. The lift door opened, and Jack sprayed laser fire into the room, taking out three guards, and winging the Admiral.
"C'mon!" he yelled. "This way!"
The Doctor ran over to a computer console as Eilidh ran to Jack, entering a command to the ship to lock the main computer, and putting in a code no one would think to use.
The Doctor ran towards the lift, laser fire following him closely, impacting at his heels. The door shut, and the Doctor leaned against the wall breathlessly.
"Well, I locked out the main computer," he said. "They won't be getting into that anytime soon."
"How did you know we were in trouble," Eilidh asked Jack.
"A little bird told me," the Captain replied, smiling and winking at her.
"Oh?" the Doctor asked. "What kind of little bird, I wonder?"
The lift stopped, and the doors opened.
"This one," Jack said.
Standing there, in full battle armour, were a Zagrite officer, and two squads of his men.