Doctor Who: The Ice Warriors (13 page)

Aware how close she and Storr were to death, Victoria answered weakly, ‘He was crushed to death... by the ice.’ She sensed Varga’s rising anger, and quailed before it. ‘It wasn’t my fault!’ she cried.

‘I gave you your life,’ the warlord hissed venomously,

‘but you ran away. Because of that, one of my men is dead!’

He gestured to Isbur, the warrior closest to the girl. ‘Take her inside!’

Victoria didn’t resist—there was no point. But as she entered the spaceship’s gleaming airlock, lsbur’s fist upon her arm, she threw Storr one last anguished look.

With a broad smile, Storr extended his hand to the Ice Warrior. The gesture was ignored.

‘Identify yourself!’ rasped the alien leader.

‘My name’s Storr,’ stated the hunter pleasantly. ‘I’m a scavenger—a Loyalist!’

Varga was interested—Storr could see that. ‘You are from the Base?’ the Martian whispered keenly.

‘No fear! I’m against the scientists! They’re devils, the lot of them!’

‘Then you know nothing of their machines?’

‘I don’t want to! They’re out to destroy our world—and I want to help you destroy
them
! I’m on your side!’

It was Zondal who spoke now, as Varga lost interest.

‘What good are you to us?’

‘I know the land here—lived here all my life. I can help you!’ But he had seen Varga’s chilling response, and knew the truth at last.

‘You are not a scientist...’ uttered the warlord, coldly,

‘therefore you are useless and unnecessary.’ He gave a nod—

and Storr crumpled before him, scythed dawn by the sonic guns.

‘Now to question the girl...’ Varga whispered hoarsely, and turned back towards the spaceship.

Clent turned from studying the Ioniser monitors to find Miss Garrett standing at his shoulder. Her face was tense as she passed him a seismic print-out. ‘The glacier is moving again!’

Clent drew in a sharp breath. ‘The fifth surge today,’ he exclaimed, and moved across to the electronic wall chart that marked the glacier’s grim progress. ‘The Ioniser isn’t holding it...’

‘We’re down to half power,’ Jan pointed out nervously.

‘We daren’t go above that level...’

Clent’s features tightened with anger. ‘If only we knew what was inside that spaceship. Until we do, we’re helpless!’

Because of the one missing factor, they couldn’t put their problem to ECCO, the all-knowing computer; Clent had not even notified World Control—for him, an unprecedented omission.

‘We most decide soon,’ insisted Jan.

‘Not until we know the facts, Miss Garrett!’

‘Supposing the Doctor fails?’ she demanded. ‘Suppose we never find out?’

‘We’ll face that when we have to.’

‘But we must be prepared! There has to be a contingency plan if everything else goes wrong!’

Clent looked at Jan dispassionately. ‘Nothing will go wrong. The Doctor will succeed. He
has
to!’

When the Doctor at last reached the ice cavern, he found Penley crouched over Storr’s dead body. After a moment’s pause, Penley covered the lifeless face for the last time.

Penley attempted to explain. ‘Storr came up here to talk to the aliens. He thought they’d be able to do some good for the youngster I found here.’

‘Jamie?’ asked the Doctor eagerly. ‘You know where he is? And what about the girl—Victoria?’ Penley threw a brief glance at the spaceship door. ‘She must still be inside there with them. The lad’s back at our hide-out. I think he’ll be all right, but...’ His voice trailed away sadly.

The Doctor looked at him soberly. ‘Better let me know the worst. Is it bad?’

‘He must’ve been shot by the alien ray guns. There may be some spinal damage—paralysis.

The Doctor looked grim. ‘Then there’s only one place for him, isn’t there?’

Penley nodded. ‘The medicare centre at Base...’

‘Take my airsled,’ the Doctor said firmly. ‘Get Jamie on to it and take him back there—if it’s as bad as you say.’

‘It’s his only hope.’

He lurched against the Doctor as the icy ground shuddered beneath them. ‘The glacier’s moving,’ observed the Doctor.

‘It’s getting worse,’ agreed Penley. ‘Let’s get out of here!’

‘You carry on,’ came the reply, ‘I’ve got a job to do.’

Penley nodded towards the spaceship door. ‘In there?’

The Doctor nodded. ‘There’s Victoria, for one thing—

and for another, Clent has to know whether the alien reactor unit will explode if the Ioniser is used properly.’ As Penley stared at him in surprise, the Doctor smiled, ‘I adapted your notes on the Omega Factor.’

‘Did you now...’ murmured Penley, with new respect.

‘But you’re the chap to handle it,’ insisted the Doctor.

‘Do you think you can cope with Clent?’

‘I dare say I can manage to stay sane.’ He looked down at Storr’s body. ‘I’ll take Storr back to his hide-out with me.

He’d’ve preferred it there.’

With that, he dragged his friend to the Doctor’s airsled.

When Penley was well clear of the glacier, the Doctor activated the tiny communicator. ‘Doctor to Clent.’ he called.

‘I’m going in now, old chap. Wish me luck.’ Then he tucked the device away.

With that, he moved boldly towards the sleek metallic door, and hammered on it with his list. ‘Open this door at once!’ he demanded brazenly. ‘Open up, I say!’ To his surprise, the door opened immediately, and he stepped inside the airlock. It closed behind him, and he waited for the inner door to open—but it did not. Instead, a harsh voice spoke from a loudspeaker set in the ceiling panel.

‘Identify yourself!’

The Doctor spoke sternly. ‘I am a diplomatic messenger.

I don’t answer questions until I am properly received by a suitable person!’

‘You will answer now!’ snapped the voice. The Doctor folded his arms, tilted his chin up defiantly, and remained silent.

‘Unless you answer inside ten seconds,’ the voice continued, ‘the atmospheric pressure will be reduced to zero—a perfect vacuum.’

The Doctor’s face filled with alarm.

‘In that condition, your Earthling body will explode.

Countdown commences now. Ten... nine... eight...’

The Doctor’s eyes found the atmospheric level indicator by his side—the pressure was decreasing fast!

‘If you insist,’ he shouted acidly. ‘But I don’t think much of your hospitality!’ The pressure gauge sank lower. ‘I’m a scientist—from the Base—I want to help you!’ The level stopped sinking, and. a second later, it rose to normal. The inner door slid open, and the Doctor found himself confronted by the Martian warlord inside the spaceship.

Flanking him were several other Ice Warriors.

‘You are a scientist?’ queried Varga coldly. ‘You do not look like one!’ he gazed at the Doctor’s eccentric dress.

‘He looks more like the human we destroyed—the scavenger,’ remarked Zondal sourly. ‘He could be an imposter. We should destroy him also!’

‘If you kill me, you’ll ruin any chance you might have of escape! Or perhaps you intend to stay inside this glacier permanently.’ Varga stepped forward arrogantly. ‘I am Varga, the Martian warlord. Explain how you can help us!’

‘There are certain conditions that have to be met first,’

insisted the Doctor.

‘You are our prisoner!’ hissed the warlord furiously. ‘It is I who set conditions and ask questions!’

The Doctor held up his hand, and smiled. ‘Listen!’ The faintest of tremors ran through the spaceship. Its sound sensors were picking up the creak and grind of the ice mountain outside. ‘It is you who are the prisoners,’ the Doctor pointed out gently, ‘... and I who can set you free!’

‘On
my
terms!’ snarled the warlord. He gestured to Isbur. ‘Bring the girl!’ Turning back to the Doctor, he continued. ‘Now we have two hostages, we make the bargains here!’

‘You haven’t got time to bargain—before long, the glacier will crush and destroy you and your ship! But we have a device that can melt the ice and release you!’

‘We know of this device,’ hissed Varga. ‘The girl has told us its name—the Ioniser.’ His voice changed to bitter anger.

‘Do not try to trick us! We know it is a weapon aimed to destroy us!’

Before the Doctor could answer this charge, Victoria was led in by Isbur. When she saw the Doctor, her face fell. ‘Oh, Doctor, they’ve got you too!’

‘Don’t worry, Victoria, we’re not beaten yet.’ He smiled cheerfully. ‘Jamie’s safe and well, for a start!’

Victoria’s face flooded with relief and hope, but Varga’s harsh whisper brought the Doctor back to the nub of the matter.

‘If what you say is true, why have you not freed us before?’

The Doctor’s eye flicked beyond the Martian to what looked like a complex technical area. Could it be the engine room? Somehow he had to find out without giving his hand away! He hesitated. ‘Er... there are certain difficulties.’

But the Doctor’s probing glance had confirmed the Warlord’s suspicions. ‘You are afraid of us!’ he exclaimed keenly. ‘You are afraid our ship will explode!’

The Doctor tried to put the problem simply. ‘If the Ioniser causes a nuclear holocaust, it’ll defeat its original purpose—to hold hack the glaciers!’

‘That is what I suspected...’ breathed the warlord, and then gave that peculiar choking laugh that so often meant danger. ‘You dare not act against us!’

‘We don’t want to harm you, or your ship,’ repeated the Doctor irritably. ‘I keep telling you, our action would release it—you’d be free!’

‘But if the ice melted too quickly,’ Zondal pointed out,

‘there would he severe flooding.’

‘And our engines would be useless!’ hissed Varga. ‘We would be at your mercy—and there would be
no
escape!’

‘You can walk out of here now,’ suggested the Doctor.

‘You’d be safe—even if your spacecraft
was
destroyed.’

‘But without this vehicle,’ whispered the grim-faced warlord, ‘we cannot return to our planet.’

The Doctor was about to inform the Ice Warrior that his distant home planet—Mars—had long since died, when he stopped himself, horrified. With nowhere to return to, the Martians would be forced to stay—but it wasn’t in their nature to remain guests for long. They were conquerors, colonisers and invaders; and with their deadly weapons, probably invincible! Suddenly, the Doctor thought of a vital question.

‘Why did you come here in the first place? What was your mission, Varga. Tell me!’

‘To investigate this planet... and report,’ answered Varga. His next words confirmed the Doctor’s worst suspicions. ‘We find that we are... superior.’

The Doctor’s mind seethed with alarm. This small squad of Ice Warriors, with or without their space vehicle, could devastate and dominate Earth—continent by continent—if they chose to! And he had a definite feeling that this would have been part of that original Martian plan, conceived so many centuries ago, and halted only by a freak landing on that prehistoric glacier. Suppose there were other scout ships, buried in the ice? Varga mustn’t be given the chance to put his secret orders into practice—which meant there was only one way out, dreadful but necessary. He began speaking with what seemed an unnecessary loudness—but not for Victoria’s benefit. Clent had to be persuaded to act—and act now!

‘You do realise,’ stated the Doctor emphatically, ‘that at a certain point almost immediately, fact—my Base will have to activate the Ioniser
regardless of the consequences
?’

Zondal didn’t catch the urgent emphasis. He sneered in disbelief. ‘And risk destroying you—and themselves? They are not fools!’

‘Better that.’ the Doctor started to say, ‘than—’

In a flash, Varga’s fist had grabbed his arm, exposed the tiny communicator and wrenched the device free, switching it off in the process. He examined it closely, then laughed.

‘A communicator! How useful!’

The Doctor had always known the risk of discovery.

Realising what he had been trying to do, Victoria gasped in fear of Varga’s retaliation. Neither of them expected his response.

‘When the time is right,’ hissed the warlord arrogantly,

‘we will use this device ourselves.’ He stepped closer to the Doctor.

‘You have been most helpful, Doctor. You will forgive interruption of your warning to your friends. Shall I complete it for you?’ He laughed cruelly. ‘
Better that than... be conquered
by these Martians!
And you are right!’ He gestured towards the engine complex, and his next words struck fear into both the Doctor and Victoria.

‘There is one thing we need to complete our power,’

hissed the Martian arrogantly. ‘Then we shall be invincible—

and this planet will be ours to conquer as we please!’

8

Leader Clent stared at the blank video screen and said nothing for several seconds. It seemed that with the Doctor’s message ending so abruptly—their last chance had vanished.

‘What can we do?’ asked Jan. ‘The Doctor! We’ve got to help him!’

Clent shook his head. ‘You heard what he said.

Regardless of the consequences, he wants us to take the risk and use the Ioniser.’ He frowned. ‘But he’s not only offering himself as a sacrifice—it’s us as well!’

‘If only he could have said more... Perhaps he means the spaceship’s reactor
isn’t
dangerous?’

‘But the aliens
are
...’ replied the Leader grimly. ‘It’s no good guessing, Miss Garrett. We must have facts!’

She had to agree. ‘Until we programme the computer with the correct information, it cannot instruct us how to act.’

Clent turned back to the Ioniser monitors. They were stable, but almost dormant at half power. ‘If only the Ioniser would hold...’

‘At present output, it’s steadily losing ground to the glacier.’ Inside her mind, a silent voice shouted Jan’s real opinions. Forget the glacier! Do something to save the Doctor and the girl! We owe them that much! We cannot let them die! Aloud she said, ‘We dare not increase power... not yet.’

Clent turned to her. She sensed the deep confusion in his mind. He was torn between duty, humanity and the need for action—knowing that whatever decision he took, the result could spell disaster... Suddenly, the computer hummed into life.