Doctor Who_ The Dying Days Part 12

The Corporal control ing the display pressed a control on the desk and the loudspeakers began burbling with standard comms traffic between the Lander and Orbiter. The voices of the astronauts would pipe up every so often. Everything sounded perfectly normal.

'This is a live feed. They haven't even mentioned the archway, so it didn't lead anywhere interesting. End of story.

Right?'

'Wrong,' the Doctor declared. Now he was sitting draped over a chair, his feet on the desk. 'When did the astronauts enter the tomb?' he asked the room.

'About ten fifteen,' Bambera supplied.

The Doctor peered at the clock - it was twenty past six.

47.He leapt to his feet. 'We have a little under forty hours before the invasion.'

'Invasion?!' Lethbridge-Stewart was not the only person to express his surprise at the Doctor's p.r.o.nouncement.

He knelt down by Summerfield, grabbing her shoulders, staring straight into her eyes. 'You know your Martian culture, Bernice. What's the punishment for tomb robbery?'

'Disturbing the tomb of a Marshal is just about the worst sacrilege under Martian ecclesiastical law,' she said.

Lethbridge-Stewart found himself picturing little green men in dog collars.

The Doctor was nodding his head. 'It's the human equivalent of bursting into Westminster Abbey and digging the place up with a bul dozer.'

'I suppose,' she conceded, aware that everyone in the room was staring at her. Lethbridge-Stewart smiled encouragement at her. The spark of recognition pa.s.sed between them - here the Doctor goes again here the Doctor goes again.

'So what's the penalty?' the Brigadier prompted her gently.

'Anyone caught in there would face summary execution.' Summerfield realised what she was saying. 'Those astronauts are dead.'

Something pulsed at the very back of Lethbridge-Stewart's brain, primal sorrow for the astronauts, their families, the whole human race.

'Yes,' the Doctor was insisting, 'But it's worse than that. The Martians don't just punish the criminals, do they?'

Summerfield blanched. 'The robbers' entire clan would also face retribution: ma.s.sive reparations, the loss of territory and industrial facilities.'

The Doctor addressed the room like a prosecuting counsel. 'Those astronauts have stirred up a hornet's nest.

Without knowing it, they have just condemned the entire human race to death. Wars.h.i.+ps wil already be on their way.'

One of the Captains laughed, the same that had spoken before. He was a young lad, with blond hair. 'And you've got evidence for that, I suppose?' He'd probably only just been seconded to UNIT, he still had that swaggering scepticism that all the new recruits had for the first couple of months.

'He has, Captain Ford,' Bambera nodded. 'Eye witness evidence. I saw them entering a cave myself. s.p.a.ce Centre denied that ever happened, they threw me out when I tried to watch the video link. In the absence of any other explanation, and in the light of his experience, I am prepared to entertain the Doctor's a.s.sertion that the astronauts found a Martian tomb.'

'What about the radio transmissions?'

'Faked.'

Everyone turned to face Alexander Christian.

The Brigadier leant forward to explain. 'We have had the ability to fake s.p.a.ce-to-surface transmissions since my day. A military satellite, designation Haw-Haw, was put up by the Black Star rocket in 1971. It was capable of jamming extraterrestrial signals and broadcasting messages that looked like they came from deep s.p.a.ce.'

'Who controls this satellite?'

'It always used to be the s.p.a.ce Security boys.' Alexander Christian informed the room. Bambera nodded, jotting down a note.

The young UNIT Captain straightened. 'With respect, sir, can we prove these transmissions are faked?'

Bambera scowled. 'We can try. It should be straightforward enough to match voice patterns and so on. See to it when we've finished here, Captain Ford.'

The Doctor was holding his hand up, like a schoolboy in a cla.s.sroom. 'Brigadier,' he interrupted, 'there must be a genuine signal, too. Try retuning to find the real telemetry from the Orbiter - it shouldn't be too difficult to find.'

Bambera nodded.

Captain Ford was objecting again. 'Ma'am, even if the transmissions are fakes, it doesn't prove we're dealing with aliens. There aren't any records of Martians in the UNIT archive.'

'We've never faced them before,' Lethbridge-Stewart informed him.

'The Doctor and I certainly have,' Summerfield interrupted. It was the first time she had spoken unless she had been answering a question put to her, and she was aware of the sceptical looks around the room, unsure whether to continue.

The Doctor had his feet on the desk, his hands were folded behind his head. 'Bernice is from the twenty-sixth century,' he explained, delighting in the astonished expressions this revelation earned him. 'By then, the human race has colonised Mars and displaced the native Martian population. Bernice is an expert on Martian civilisation and culture. With the greatest respect, time is pressing.'

A couple of people at the table looked bemused by the revelations, but they'd seen enough in their time with UNIT to at least keep an open mind. They took their lead from Bambera, who was taking al the information in her stride.

'Doctor, I'll need some sort of proof of Martian involvement before I can even think of asking to deploy UNIT forces. And I need some evidence - anything - that points to a wider conspiracy. I'm afraid the MoD wil not believe the words of an escaped psycho. No offence, Colonel Christian.'

'None taken, Brig,' Alexander said lightly.

The Doctor was staring at the television screens, and knowing him, Lethbridge-Stewart imagined that he was taking in every piece of information, trying to find a clue in there. 'At the moment,' the Doctor blurted, 'because of the manned mission, almost every telescope in the country is pointing at Mars. Get them to check their records - at some point today there will have been a disturbance on the Martian surface. Check the photographs, and you'l see it bears an uncanny resemblance to an ICBM launch or a Moon rocket.'

'Do it, Corporal,' Bambera ordered. The prim Corporal could do that from her box of tricks, too, it seemed.

48.Bambera stiffened. 'OK, here's the score: if the Doctor is wrong, and there aren't any Martians, no-one wil ever know. s.p.a.ce Centre has everything pretty well covered up, and there's no problem. But, if there are Martians, UNIT need to know about it. From this point, we'l a.s.sume for the sake of argument that the Martians are out there and that they are mad with us. So, Doctor, Professor Summerfield, what are these Martians going to do?'

'Can't we tell them it was an accident?' Ford objected. 'We didn't even know that there were any Martians, let alone what their laws are.'

Bambera fixed the Doctor with a stare. 'I take it that ignorance of the law is no defence?'

'No,' the Doctor intoned gravely.

'What's al this about forty hours?' the Brigadier asked. 'It takes four months to travel to Mars, yes?'

The Doctor shook his head sadly. 'Martian science is far in advance of that of the human race.' Lethbridge-Stewart expected the Doctor to say something of the sort.

His old friend stood up, abruptly, and began pacing the room again. He ended up at the head of the table. All eyes were on him. 'From launch on Mars to arrival here, it wil take just under forty eight hours.'

The Doctor flashed a smile, and stabbed down at the corporal's keyboard. All the pictures on the video wall snapped off. 'That was very distracting. Now, by my calculations, the Martians will be in Earth orbit by Thursday lunch time. They will declare their intentions, presumably via radio. If they are not given what they ask for, they will take it by force.'

Bambera straightened. 'And that is it?'

'Isn't it enough?' Benny asked.

'Word coming in from Skywatch Control, Brigadier. They've retuned to the new frequency.'

'Now we'll have some evidence for you, Winifred,' the Doctor shouted triumphantly.

The signal from the Orbiter was piped through the loudspeakers again. This time there weren't any voices, just the steady bleeping of the computers on Earth and Mars talking to each other.

'There's no sign of the telemetry from the Lander, ma'am.'

'The Lander has been destroyed along with its crew,' the Doctor declared, almost casual y. 'And the war rocket has shown up on the photographs, hasn't it?'

The Corporal tapped a control and the video wal filled with astronomical pictures, images of Mars.

The prim young woman checked her own screen. 'Our watchers report that the Orbiter is still there, and there's been no sign of a s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p launch from the Martian surface. We have triple confirmation of that.'

The Doctor's face fell. 'Well,' he said, a note of uncertainty in his voice, 'keep looking, won't you?'

Eve was surrounded by her silk dress, the leather sofa, his wool suit. The smell of the whisky and the leather and his aftershave. Lord Greyhaven - Edward - had none of a young man's urgency, and was content to hold her and kiss her face and mouth, if that was all that she wanted. She straightened a leg, and together he half-pushed, she half-pulled down until she was laid the full length of the sofa, her head on the armrest. Her hand on the back of his neck, his skin rougher than anyone's she had known before. His weight on her, pus.h.i.+ng her further down into the cus.h.i.+ons. The smell of coffee.

She opened her eyes and there was a tray full of coffee pots and cups on the gla.s.s table. His secretary had come in with them and left without making a sound. Eve s.h.i.+fted up onto one elbow, about to say something.

Greyhaven eased himself back, until he was upright. He placed a hand on her side, just beneath her ribcage.

'I have something for you,' he said very seriously. He leant over her to get to the tray.

'Coffee?' she asked, laughing.

'That too. If you'l excuse me, I just have one little thing to do.'

She moved her legs, allowing him to stand. He crossed the room, closing the door behind him. After a moment, she could hear his voice drifting across from his office. One side of a conversation.

Eve looked around guiltily, as though she was being watched. Then she made a decision to listen in. She tiptoed across the room. 'We have crossed the Rubicon.' Edward informed someone that she couldn't see.

Eve eased the door open and peeked through the crack. Edward was alone.

'Understood. But how?' It was a man's voice, and she recognised it. Edward was addressing a hands free telephone, or intercom. There was a speaker on the desk that hadn't been there before. It came as a relief that Greyhaven wasn't talking to himself.

'I pride myself on my resourcefulness. You wil see.' Eve edged back behind the door, aware that this was a private conversation.

'If you are sure, then I am sure, Teddy.' The line clicked, dead.

Edward had picked up a small bra.s.s box from his desk, squeezing its side. A faint warbling sound started up.

Greyhaven slipped the box into his jacket pocket and pressed something on his desk. A panel slid back into place, concealing the intercom he'd been talking to. Greyhaven gathered up another little box from the desk and then straightened, heading back her way.

Eve dashed back to the sofa, and had arranged herself on it as he opened the door. Edward was carrying a long, thin box, which he pa.s.sed over to her as he sat down. The sort of box jewellery came in. Eve pulled herself up, a little clumsily. Inside was a gold necklace.

'Not too ostentatious, I hope.' He pa.s.sed it over.

'It's beautiful.' It was understated, elegant and worth a small fortune. 'When-?'

'Adelle, my secretary chose it for me this afternoon. She has more taste in that area. Try it on.'

49.Eve lifted her hair, letting him wrap it around her. It was heavier than she had expected. When he had finished, he withdrew, looking a little uncomfortable.

'It's so expensive.'

'I'd much rather spend my money on my friends than on my carpet.'

She leant over him, kissing him on the forehead, then the bridge of his nose. He s.h.i.+fted, allowing her closer.

Half a world away, the Prime Minister checked his tie in the mirror.

This was going to be a big speech. There had been a lot of uncertainty for the last couple of years. But with the British and American elections out of the way, things were going to settle down for a while. This speech would set the tone for Anglo-American relations, and he wanted to grab the imagination with it, not just say the same old things about 'special relations.h.i.+ps'.

The Prime Minister always got nervous before a speech, whether he was addressing the United Nations or the Women's Inst.i.tute, and it had become a habit to come to the washroom, splash his face with water and check his appearance. The wash basins in the White House were relatively lavish affairs: large and spotlessly clean.

The washroom door swung noisily open. It was his bodyguard.

'Is everything all right?' the Prime Minister asked, reaching for the hand towel.

The bodyguard shot him twice, once in the chest and once in the back of the head.

Alarms were sounding around the UNIT Offices. Bambera's phone rang. The Doctor watched silently as she picked it up and listened for a couple of seconds before replacing the receiver.

'Corporal, patch through the datafeed from Skywatch One.'

That was the radar station in Ess.e.x that kept its dish pointing upwards. Twenty years ago it had been able to detect an artificial object a million miles away. Who knows what its range was now?

A roughly cylindrical object was in plain view, and no more than 200,000 miles away. It was moving fast across the screen.

The Doctor leapt to his feet. 'We're too late!' he gasped.

'It is now on a direct heading for Earth,' the Corporal announced.

The Doctor stared straight at Bambera, pointing at the screen. 'Your people want proof? That That is pretty compelling evidence, I would say.' is pretty compelling evidence, I would say.'

Lethbridge-Stewart turned to face his old friend. 'Doctor, you said that we had two days.'

The Doctor grabbed a handful of his hair and stared at the screen. 'Martian s.p.a.cedrives are notoriously slow. I don't understand how they have got here so quickly.'

Alexander Christian rubbed his chin. 'It's simple old chap. The radar signal was jammed. It's been on its way here all this time and no-one down here was any the wiser.'