Chapter 16:
Invasion of the Pepper Pot Aliens
"The Nightmare Child" Butler groaned. "Why is it we never have to fight something that doesn't look like an evil death machine?"
Juliet snickered, mostly out of nervousness. "You don't think that looks threatening, do you Dom?"
"Not all of us have steel balls, big man" Mulch shuddered. Holly simply nodded, unable to chew Mulch out like she usually did when he made a lewd joke. She was too busy staring at the thing.
The thing in question was the mysterious object that had started this whole misadventure, which was looking slightly less mysterious, and now slightly more pants-wettingly terrifying. It resembled, in both shape and design, a deep sea angler fish, minus the forehead dangler. Its skin was mottled black, with metal domes and turrets jutting out from its sides. A large metal thing, resembling a Haven traffic tunnel ran along its spine, culminating in a large metal 'helmet' which covered the top of its head. Its fins reflected, looking to Foaly like cham-foil.
Under its belly were large, circular engines, pulsing and glowing as they seemed to repel gravity. Its face, though, was its most horrible feature. Its teeth, molded from black metal, jutted far above its jawline, reaching almost comical-looking heights. And its eyes were a dull blue, the same colour as the engines, with no pupil. It felt as if the monstrous thing was surveying them all, staring straight through them as a predator would do to its prey.
Holly turned away from the horrible thing, shifting her gaze to The Doctor. He looked as if died standing straight up; white as a sheet, and a glazed over look in his eyes. "What the hell is it?" she asked him. The look in his eyes betrayed him; he had seen this thing before.
The Doctor licked his lips, trying to wet his dried out mouth. "The Nightmare Child," he started, "was a warship. In the First Cycle of the Time War , the Emperor of the Daleks ordered the creation of a special Dreadnought Class ship. His..specifications were that the ship been both grown and made; a bio-mechanical super weapon, one that could use strategy and utilize animalistic defense systems as weapons. The resulting ship specialized in only one specific field."
"That field being?" Luskar asked.
"Complete annihilation of enemy fleets."
"Oh."
"So, your friend got a hold of it. But why bring it here? Trouble asked.
The Doctor pursed his lips. "The more important question is, how did he get a hold of it? The Nightmare Child was locked inside the War with everything else, and the Child's brain hates Davros on a psychological level. Last I remember, it swallowed his escape ship when the Emperor invaded his sanctuary planet."
"Whoopee for the giant space fish" Mulch cried, throwing his hands in the air. "That still doesn't solve the problem."
"What problem is that, O wise one?" Foaly whinnied.
"WHY IN THE HELL DID IT COME HERE?! DOESN'T THAT SEEM LIKE A PROBLEM, DONKEY BOY!?"
Just then, the beast gave a guttural growl, causing everybody to wince in pain and cover their ears. A metal sphere on the beasts side opened, and something shot out and flew down to the group.
It was Davros, riding on a floating disk. He smiled at the group; a vicious, predatory smile that seemed to say 'I beat you all. Take that!' He raised his one arm, and pointed at The Doctor.
"No more games, Doctor. I have what I desire, so this location has no more use to me."
Holly stiffened. "'What you desire'?" she said angrily. "What did you do to Artemis?"
Davros sneered at the girl. "...Therefore," he continued, "I see no to waste my time and resources destroying this waste of land. The only reason I would is because you are here."
"Say what you mean, Davros" The Doctor said.
"I am feeling fairly lenient. If you leave now, and stay out of my way, I will spare the lives of these pathetic creatures."
The Doctor smiled a sad smile. "I can't leave, and you know me well enough to know that I won't. My answer should be apparent."
Davros returned the Doctors smile with his own. " I do know, Time Lord." Davros clicked a button on his dashboard, and the bottom of the Nightmare Child opened.
Thousands of things flowed out of the opening, flying around until they create a levitating circle around Fowl Manor. One of the things detached from the circle, and flew down to Davros.
It was large and bulky, white in colour, and easily came close to matching Butler in height. It resembled a pepper pot; its bottom half consisting of a large circular tread, and bumps that ran up along its sides. The top half consisted of two arms, one that looked like a plunger, the other like the gun Butler had seen the trolls carrying. A black, segmented neck led to the head, a white dome with two side lights and an eye stalk.
Foaly felt sick. The eye stalk held the same eye that they saw in the video. These things were what destroyed Olympus.
The Dalek, for of course this what it must be, swiveled its head to face Davros. "Your or-ders, Lord Davros" it said, booming in a low bass voice.
Davros smiled. "Up to your discretion, Dalek Supreme." With that, the wizened man clicked another switch on his dashboard, and his floating disk flew him up into the air, and back up to the Nightmare Child.
The Dalek Supreme took time to view each of the strange creatures before it. "You are The Doctor" it said, resting its gaze on the Time Lord.
"Hello" The Doctor said.
"You are the Predator, the enemy of all Daleks. Daleks law states that you must be exterminated on sight. You must die to ensure the safety of the plan."
"Oh, there's a plan now, is there" The Doctor seethed. "Is that why you kidnapped an innocent boy from his home?"
"Data banks state that subject Artemis Fowl the Second is guilty of numerous human crimes, therefore does not warrant the label 'innocent'."
The Doctor turned to his friends. "I'm sorry, what?"
"Tell you later" Juliet said.
"The human's legal status is irrelevant," the Dalek said. "His intellect is the unchanging variable, the necessary requirement in the completion of the plan. You will not interfere."
Butler got up close to the alien, looking it straight in the eye. "And if we do?" he said coldly.
"Exactly what I was going to say" The Doctor said.
"Then precautions will be taken." The Dalek turned its eye to the sky. "All Daleks will arm weapons systems"
"Affirmative" echoed the thousands of Daleks in the sky. A great hum was heard, and the sky lit up with the energy of the alien weapons.
The Doctor tensed up. It was Attack Pattern 15. Time Lord veterans had called it the Flying Ring of Death. The Daleks would circle you from the sky, and decimate everything. In this case, everything meant the dumbstruck LEP officers on the ground, staring at the aliens that had appeared.
Trouble sensed what was about to happen. "GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE!" he shouted.
"All Daleks will now release" The Supreme Dalek droned. "Exterminate!"
"Exterminate! Exterminate!" the Daleks screeched, and a literal block of light, the condensed beams of so many weapons, dropped down straight onto the LEP officers on the ground, who didn't even have time to hear Troubles order.
Holly had to turn away and squeeze her ears closed, but she still saw the light through her eyelids, and could still hear the screaming. When she opened her eyes, when the screaming stopped, what she saw made tears flow like they wouldn't stop.
A neat black circle had been burnt into the ground. So great was the intensity of the beams that the skin of all the officers had burned away, leaving black skeletons lying all over the ground, their joints fused in mad poses by the heat that still came off them in waves of smoke. The shuttles and equipment were nothing but pools of liquid metal, seeping into the ground and across the fields.
Butler was horrified. He had seen men turned inside out from grenade blasts, but the scene he saw from his vantage point marked the first time he wanted to cry from the horror; only his training kept him from weeping. Luskar and Trouble were the same; Foaly threw up, and Mulch put his arm around Juliet , who had dropped to the ground weeping into her hands.
The Doctor stood firm, in silent fury. He marched, slowly, straight up to the Supreme Dalek and grabbed its eye stalk, pulling it so the thing was staring him in the face.
"You...will... regret that. .Understand?"
The Dalek was silent. Then, "All Daleks, return to the Nightmare Child in preparation for Phase Two."
The Supreme Dalek emitted a glow beneath its treads, and slowly levitated up into the air. The Daleks were flying now, in a organized swarm, back into the belly of the Nightmare Child. When the last of the Daleks had entered, the opening closed again, and the living warship slowly flew to rest at the center of the lake that bordered Fowl Manor, leaving behind a dwarf, a centaur, a goblin, two elves, two humans, and a Time Lord that silently swore he would destroy the vile creatures in its belly once and for all.
The Doctor turned on his heels, and strode to the door that still stood in the decimated room. He turned his head at his new companions. "Do you know anyone who has enough power to bend time?"
Holly rubbed away her tears. "Yeah, we know one. Why?"
"Because I have a plan." The Doctor took the TARDIS key out of his pocket. "Lets go get Artemis back."