Lazro, the soldier standing guard at the door to Kesar’s quarters was running to join them, pulling Prion backwards. Kesar himself helped Lazro, and eventually they managed to drag Prion back. At the same time, Jamie was finally able to get his fingers under Prion’s and lift them away. Trayx hurled himself backwards, gasping and spluttering for breath as he collapsed on the floor.
Prion turned, struggling violently to shake off his attackers. Kesar was flung away across the room. The Doctor and Jamie were rushing to grab Prion’s arms. But already he had a grip on Lazro. He had the man by the shoulders and was lifting him off the floor.
Jamie pulled at Prion’s arm, trying to drag it back down, practically hanging from it. Lazro was shouting, struggling to break free. The Doctor was ripping open Prion’s tunic, calling to Jamie to try to hold the automaton still for a moment.
Then suddenly, Lazro was flying through the air, pitched head first across the room. He crashed into the wall, his head connecting with a loud crack. Slowly, he slumped down to the ground. His feet ended up curled above the rest of his body. His head was against the floor, angled awkwardly and bearing most of his weight. A trickle of blood emerged from the corner of Lazro’s open mouth, running down his cheek towards a sightless staring eye.
Prion was turning again now, his hands clamped round Jamie’s shoulders as they had been moments before round Lazro’s.
‘He’s got me, Doctor!’ Jamie shouted. ‘Hurry up!’
Kesar was helping Trayx to his feet, and they stumbled back towards the struggling figures.
Trayx pulled a hand blaster from a holster at his side. ‘Stand clear,’ he shouted, bringing the blaster up.
‘No,’ the Doctor shouted back. His hand was inside the tunic now, grasping at Prion’s chest. ‘I’m nearly there. Hold on, Jamie.’
‘What?’ Jamie shouted back. He was above Prion’s head now, his arms flailing and legs kicking as he struggled without effect to get free. Prion was poised to hurl him after Lazro.
And stayed poised.
The Doctor stepped back, grinning. ‘There,’ he said in evident satisfaction. ‘That should do it.’
‘Doctor.’ Jamie’s voice was calmer now. He had stopped struggling when he realised Prion was frozen in position. But the robot’s grip still held him tight. ‘How do I get down?’
The Doctor’s grin sagged into a deep frown. ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘I have no idea.’
The image above the table had cut out suddenly. One moment it had shown Jamie’s face, upside down, as Prion was about to fling him across the room. Then it was gone. Blank.
‘Contact lost,’ VL9 said. ‘Primary Automaton unit deactivated.’
Cruger’s quiet laughter turned to a grunt of annoyance.
Unseen, on the unlit gallery above him, a darker shape moved, flitted across between balustrades.
In the deepest of the shadows, Darkling settled back as comfortably as he could to watch the scene below. He stifled a yawn, shaking his head in a vain effort to clear it. A few moments later he was asleep.
‘That’s it.’ The Doctor pushed Prion’s tunic back into position and dusted it down with the back of his hand. ‘You can put Jamie down now,’ he said.
‘Of course,’ Prion replied, slowly swinging Jamie back down to the ground.
As soon as Prion let go of him, Jamie stepped back, away from the robot. ‘You keep away from me, you metal monster.’
‘What has happened?’ Prion asked simply.
‘Somebody tapped into your command frequency,’ the Doctor told him. ‘I’m afraid things got a little unpleasant there for a while.’
‘Then it is possible they could do so again,’ Prion observed without emotion. ‘You will have to close down this unit.’
‘Yes,’ Jamie agreed, ‘well, I’m all in favour of that.’
‘It does seem prudent,’ Trayx said.
‘Oh, nonsense,’ the Doctor huffed. ‘I’ve set it up so that Prion here is operating on a frequency that changes randomly every few milliseconds. Even he doesn’t know what frequency he’s on at any given time now.’
‘Is that possible?’ Kesar asked.
‘Evidently.’
‘Then why is this not the normal operating procedure?’
‘Well,’ the Doctor admitted, ‘it’s probably a bit advanced for your engineers, but fortunately I’ve managed to adapt the systems a bit. So long as nobody has programmed any nasty behaviour directly into his processing core, everything should be all right now.’
As he spoke, Prion’s head slowly fell forward until he was staring at the floor.
‘I think,’ the Doctor added, catching sight of this.
But Prion was already looking up again. ‘Sanjak reports they have been ambushed,’ he said. ‘Howper is dead. Helana Trayx wounded.’ He turned to Trayx. ‘Not a serious wound.’
‘Thank goodness.’
‘What about Victoria?’ Jamie asked.
‘No data. Sanjak requests assistance, says the VETACs seem to be monitoring their progress.’
‘Where are they?’ Jamie snapped. ‘I’ll go and help.’
‘Don’t be silly, Jamie,’ the Doctor said. ‘You’d never find them, and you’ll never get there in time.’
‘Doctor, Victoria’s in danger. They’re asking for help.’ Jamie did not wait for an answer, but ran from the room.
‘Oh dear oh dear oh dear.’ The Doctor was hopping from one foot to the other. ‘I’d better go and get him.’
‘No, Doctor,’ Trayx said. ‘You wait here. I’ll get him. Where is Sanjak?’
‘East Tower, level three.’
‘Tell him we’ll decide what help we can offer.’ Trayx was already at the door, shouting for Jamie to come back.
‘No, wait,’ the Doctor told Prion. ‘Don’t tell him anything yet.’
‘Why?’
‘Is Sanjak telling you where he is?’
‘Yes.’
‘All the time?’
‘His communicator is open, he reports progress and events as they occur.’
The Doctor nodded. ‘Then that’s it, don’t you see?’
Kesar said quietly, ‘The VETACs are monitoring the channel.’
The Doctor nodded vigorously. ‘If they can cut into your command frequency, Prion, then listening to our communications is child’s play. Just tell Sanjak to cut off all communications. That will be more help than more soldiers running about the place getting shot at.’
As he finished speaking, Trayx returned with Jamie, and had evidently caught the Doctor’s last words. ‘How will we know what’s happening to them?’ Trayx asked.
‘We won’t,’ the Doctor conceded. ‘But neither will anyone else.’ He put his hand on Jamie’s shoulder. ‘That’s more help to Victoria than anything else we can do for now, Jamie,’ he said quietly.
Jamie did not answer. But he seemed slightly more content to wait.
‘You’d better tell Cruger the same,’ Kesar said. ‘If you ever re-establish contact.’
‘You won’t re-establish contact with Cruger,’ the Doctor said.
‘Oh? How can you be so sure?’ Trayx demanded.
For answer, the Doctor led them to the corner of the room. ‘Let’s have a game of chess, shall we?’ He raised his voice. ‘Now then, General Cruger, I’m ready.’
In answer, the virtual chess table materialised in front of them. The Doctor stepped forward and moved a pawn. ‘Pawn to queen’s bishop four.’
A moment later, a black pawn moved forwards. ‘Pawn to king’s knight four,’ Cruger’s voice said clearly.
Jamie was astounded. ‘He’s in his quarters.’
The Doctor played another move. ‘No, he’s not,’ he said. ‘But there were times when he wanted you to think he was.’
‘Such as?’
‘What was he doing when Remas was murdered?’
‘He was –’ Trayx broke off.
‘He was playing chess with me,’ Kesar said.
‘Exactly. But he i
sn’t visible on the surveillance tapes. You just hear his voice, and see his moves.’
‘And when Sponslor was killed,’ Jamie said slowly.
The Doctor nodded. ‘He was playing chess against me. Or so we thought.’ He moved a bishop across the board. ‘In fact, it was just a machine.’ He watched the countermove, then brought the white queen forward. ‘And a very stupid machine too, I must say. Check.’ The Doctor stood defiantly in front of the board, hands thrust into his coat pockets. ‘Fool’s mate, in fact.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
RESIGNATION
CRUGER AND HADEN were standing at the side of the Banqueting Hall. All around them, the VETACs stood still and tall, a forest of metal. Only VC5 and VL9 were at all animated as they directed the VETAC legionnaires throughout the fortress. With the loss of the information from Sanjak’s reports, VC5 was organising a search of the East Tower and surrounding areas.
‘So close,’ Cruger said softly. ‘So nearly there.’
‘Sir?’
He answered Haden without looking at her. ‘The empire,’ he murmured, ‘so nearly within my grasp. Our grasp.’
‘Yes, sir.’ She waited, but he said nothing more. So she asked, ‘The Fifth, sir? What happened to them?’
‘We – I held them in reserve.’
‘For the war?’
‘Yes. The war.’ Cruger was staring across the room, his gaze apparently focused on the huge painting above the far doorway. ‘I knew there would be a war – it was inevitable.’
Haden frowned. There was something here that made no sense. Something that was worrying her. ‘But the war began,’ she said slowly, ‘because the Fifth Legion disappeared.’
‘An overreaction.’ His voice was quiet, but there was a harshness to it. ‘That is not how it was intended to be.’
‘I don’t understand, sir.’
‘There was dissent in the army when the Fifth was lost. Stirrings against Kesar within the ranks and the officers. They were in support of the ideal, but now the man, it seemed, had failed them.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘In their hour of need, at their opportune moment, he had let them down.’ Cruger’s upper lip curled, baring his teeth as he snarled, ‘But then Mathesohn turned it to his own advantage. He used it to persuade Trayx finally to make up his mind which side he was on.’ Now he was looking at her, his eyes bright with emotion. ‘That was not meant. It led to war, and it brought our forces firmly back under Kesar’s control.’
‘You expected the imperial forces to break from Kesar?’ He was making even less sense now. ‘But without Kesar there would be no chance of an empire. Who else –’ she began. Then she realised. In an instant, the absurd made perfect sense. She exhaled, the candle flames nearby dancing in the sudden breeze.
Cruger nodded. ‘Be mindful what you say,’ he breathed. ‘I shall yet become your Emperor.’
Helana was bent double, almost retching. Beside her, Victoria was in a similar state, and Sanjak was doing his best to keep alert while also drawing long deep breaths. Helana’s arm ached, but the pain had mainly subsided now. Victoria had bound it up with a length of material ripped from the skirt of Helana’s dress.
They had managed to evade the VETACs for a while now, and Sanjak had told them that their communications had been monitored. With luck – considerable luck – they could make it through the last few corridors to the landing area.
‘One minute more,’ Sanjak said. ‘Then we must move.’
‘Is it far?’
‘No. We’ve had to circle round a bit to lose them. But the staircase is just through the next section.’
Helana nodded. She was still too breathless to speak, but she now recognised where they were. Not far now. Not too far. With luck.
Now that Lazro was dead, there were only two soldiers left with Trayx’s group – Felda and Lanphier. Both were from the garrison. Felda was standing in the doorway to Kesar’s quarters. ‘They’ve started using heavy weaponry on the main doors,’ he reported. ‘They’re blastproof, but they won’t stand much more at this rate.’
‘How long do we have?’ Kesar asked.
Felda shrugged. ‘An hour,’ he suggested. ‘At the most.’
‘Then it’s time we went on the offensive,’ the Doctor said.
‘Really?’ Trayx raised an eyebrow. ‘How?’
‘I do have an idea,’ he admitted. ‘But first, it seems to me that the situation has changed rather.’
‘In what way, Doctor?’
‘Well, Jamie, we assumed the VETACs were here to kill Kesar because he’s a political embarrassment.’
‘We know that Mathesohn has sent assassins,’ Trayx agreed.
‘Ah, but now we also know, or at any rate strongly suspect, that General Cruger is the murderer. And you were surprised at the scale of Mathesohn’s action.’ Trayx nodded. ‘Isn’t it more likely,’ the Doctor went on, ‘that the VETACs are here in response to a signal, a signal we detected earlier? A signal sent by Cruger.’
Trayx considered this, his face grave. ‘The Fifth Legion was loyal to Kesar,’ he said. ‘Cruger would be programmed into their command chain.’
‘That is true.’ Kesar’s metallic voice cut across the room as he stepped forward to stand in front of the Doctor. ‘Cruger has command over the Legion. They will follow his orders unless and until countermanded by someone higher up the command chain.’
‘In which case,’ the Doctor said, ‘it now seems more probable that they are here not to assassinate you, but rather to rescue you.’ Kesar said nothing, and the Doctor leaned forward so that his nose was almost touching Kesar’s mask. ‘And you must know that. So why is it that you don’t seem especially enthusiastic about it?’
The stairs seemed to go on for ever, twisting upward ahead of them. Sanjak led the way, then Helana. Victoria was at the back.
‘Hurry,’ she urged them. Had she heard something behind them on the stairway, or was it imagination?
‘Nearly there,’ Sanjak called back.
Victoria felt a draught on her face as the door at the top of the stairs was opened. She turned the last corner, to see Sanjak standing in the open doorway.
‘Come on,’ he said as he stepped through. Victoria quietly closed the door behind them. There was no point in advertising the fact that they had come this way.
There was renewed enthusiasm in their gait as they crossed the top of the tower towards the shuttle. Sanjak was turning the whole time, checking every angle, swinging his blaster in arcs that covered the roof, the door, the ship. Helana was almost running, and Victoria could feel the weight lifted from her own steps, despite the fact that she knew this was probably the most dangerous stretch of all. If the VETACs were waiting anywhere for them, it would be here.
It was quiet, eerily quiet. The sky above them was pierced velvet, the stars shining through pinpoint holes. Even the air seemed fresher, although Victoria knew it must be cycled through the same filters and systems as the air inside the fortress.
They were almost there, Sanjak was reaching out for the entry coder by the main hatch. Then the hatch was opening, swinging out and upward. And Sanjak’s hand was still reaching.
Helana screamed, turning towards Victoria and burying her face in her shoulder. Sanjak stepped back, bringing up the blaster. Victoria could hear herself screaming too, detached, an observer as the VETAC stepped through the hatch.
It had to stoop slightly to fit through, gripping the side of the door with one hand as it emerged. With the other hand it lashed out, almost casually, at Sanjak. The blow caught the end of the blaster as he was still swinging it forward. The gun was torn from his hands and sent clattering across the roof. The VETAC reached out again. Behind the massive silver figure, another was stepping through the hatch. Then another. And another.
Helana stopped screaming, her breath exhausted, her sobs muffled by Victoria’s shoulder. From behind them, Victoria heard the sound of the door to the stairs being thrown open. In front of her, all she could see was silv
er – moving, blurring through her tears.
The heavy metal doors were glowing blood red. The VETAC legionnaires clustered around them were holding thermic torches. Under their combined power the doors were at last groaning and sagging from the strain. It would still take a while to burn through, but the task was feasible and they were making definite progress.
There was nothing in the computer brains of the VETACs that would impel them to update their commander on the situation. Through the command net VC5 already knew as well as they did what was happening. What they saw, he saw; what they knew, he knew. The network was the Legion.
The Doctor had finally agreed to explain his plan. They were seated round the chess table – Trayx, Prion, Kesar, Jamie and the Doctor. Felda and Lanphier brought them periodic reports from the main doors. None of these was good.
‘Now, I think they may have overplayed their hand with Prion here,’ the Doctor was saying. ‘The way they were able to tap into his command frequency has given me an idea.’
‘Yes, so what is it?’ Trayx asked impatiently.
The Doctor held up his index finger, his eyebrows midway between quizzical and smiling. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I’m glad you asked.’
But before he could further elaborate, Prion said, ‘I am receiving a signal.’
‘On the standard frequency?’ Trayx asked. ‘Sanjak knows better than to call in.’
‘Cruger, perhaps,’ Kesar suggested. ‘Or Darkling again.’
‘It is the commander of the Haddron Fifth Legion,’ Prion said. ‘He has a message for General in Chief Milton Trayx.’
‘Then let’s hear it.’
Prion continued to speak. But his words were not his own. The low, grating metallic voice of VC5 emerged from his lips, echoing in the confines of the room. For Jamie, it was one more reason not to trust Prion any further than he had to.
‘This is the VETAC commander. You will surrender Hans Kesar, Consul General, to us immediately.’
Kesar leaned forward, but Trayx held up a hand. ‘Say nothing,’ he told Kesar. Then, to Prion he said, ‘And if we refuse?’
Doctor Who: Dreams of Empire: 50th Anniversary Edition Page 22
