by Konig, Artor
Once in space, I knew, nothing short of near-nuclear violence would open the doors to the Wrens unless they had already been depressurised, but the storage hatch could be opened, one door at a time, giving us access to outside. The airlock setup was sound and secure, as was everything else on board the two craft.
Realising that it was nearly supper time, I sat down in the navigator’s couch of Number Three and accessed the radio-telescope of upper control. Quickly I fed in the co-ordinates that I remembered from the last fix on the incoming aliens, then let the system find out to where they had gone in the mean time. I looked at the signal which came in on the monitor, seeing at once that the Doctor was right; very much right. The distance they had covered in the last day was far more than they had covered before.
I roamed the wires of both upper and lower control, scanning the signals that were being emitted by the Crag. It didn’t take me long to discover that there was a leak; the Master’s setup was still transmitting. I took a fix on his antenna, finding that it connected into the system the Doctor had installed. I made a note of where the two were connected before shutting down the system. I closed up the Wren, trotting over to lower control to key in the locking sequence. As I passed him I told the Doctor that it was time for supper and could he kindly wind up whatever he was doing. He didn’t seem to hear me but there was no way at all that I was going to allow him to stay down here, so close to the entrance of the old spider’s lair, without me.
I hovered at his shoulder, telling him of my intention to make supper at five-minute intervals until the message seemed to get home. He finished what he was doing and shut down the power source for his laser. He followed after me meekly enough, but it was plain that his mind was far away. He left me to manage the supper and went up to upper control. I took this opportunity in both hands, going to the balcony where I found the heavily insulated lead close to the base of the roundhouse.
I ripped off the piratical connection and hauled the lead behind me as close to the kitchen as I could manage. I rigged up a heavy cable from the kitchen mains and connected it to the antenna lead. I gave the Master’s betraying radio transmitter the benefit of the castle’s power supply for all of fifteen minutes. Whatever sort of shielding the transmitter had, it wouldn’t be doing too much transmitting after that sort of positive interference, I decided. I resolved to check up on the matter after supper, just in case his transmitter needed any further attention. I disconnected my cables, turning my attention thereafter to the matter of food.
Byrtle seemed to be under the impression that I was neglecting him; he chose to remedy this distressing state of affairs by sitting on my shoulder and having an earnest conversation with my left ear. None of what he said was particularly helpful, but I found his attention reassuring.
The weather was such that I felt it beyond me to get the Doctor’s supper up to him in an edible condition; this I told him over the comlink. His reply was cheerful and he joined me for the meal after a few minutes. I told him what I had done to the Master’s radio and that seemed to cheer him up even more. He was still chuckling when I brought out the tubs of yoghurt for his dessert.
“You can,” I assured him, “Always leave those little details to me.”
“I know, Cassandra,” He chuckled, “I’m really glad you’re here.” He didn’t enlarge on that particular train of thought though he seemed as if he was about to. We were both rather silent when he left the kitchen that evening. The storm had given over its wrath to the silence and fear of snow. I watched as he marched through the drifting whiteness, the paving overwhelmed by this chill rime. Having made certain that he had passed through the roundhouse’s portal safely, I trotted about in the kitchen, getting everything shipshape. Two of the four days gone; the work left to be done still loomed before me though I had very little left as far as the packing went. I left Byrtle to his thoughts, my milk and biscuits safely in my hands. It was fairly early, all things considered, and I was pleased. After my shower I stood out in the cold on my balcony, watching the eternal grey of sea and sky go through their symphony of cold. The wind was still rather strong, but not strong enough to be a menace should the Wrens be needed.
I looked up at the roundhouse, seeing the lights on both the sixth and the fifth levels burning. I put myself to bed, only to remember that I was supposed to check on the Master’s radio. With a heavy sigh I trotted to the monitor in my study. It didn’t take me long to discover that the Master’s radio was strangely silent. I looked at the screen a bit longer before shutting down the system.
The comlink didn’t get a chance; I was up long before it was, although the darkness and the snow beyond my window had little appeal for me. The shower was welcome although I took a good long time to steel myself for it. The tiles on the floor of the bath room were unfairly cold and my slippers were less than ordinarily proof against the chill. It was then that I remembered that June had bought me another pair ages ago, before we had even arrived here. It occurred to me that I could dig them out of wherever they had been put; but I balked at this disloyalty. The slippers she had bought me, I remembered, were almost exactly the same as my own pair; but they were offensively new.
I finished my shower unresolved on the slipper issue, finally putting it off altogether by putting on my track-shoes. I thundered down to the kitchen in the best of good spirits, beating the Doctor there by a few lengths.
Byrtle wasn’t pleased to see either of us but a piece of plum seemed to put him into a better mood. The Doctor told me amiably about system three and four which he would undoubtedly finish putting together today. I listened quietly as I put breakfast together and made plans about lunch. We would both be down in the Nest for the entire day as I was supposed to install and test the recycling gear in both Wrens. This equipment was in the stores off lower control along with all sorts of other equipment.
We ate in silence, watching the snow mount up on the windowsills. It was dreary but somehow the realisation that the lower ledges on the south side of the crag would yet be warm, that the snow would have melted before it settled down there, within walking distance of where we sat gave us, or at least me, a sense of reassurance. I transferred my attention from my breakfast to the sandwiches I was ambitiously planning. I intended to make enough to see us through tea so we had no need to come upstairs until supper time. I found some neglected cake and packed that as well. My satchel by this time was very much the worse for its long labours. The Doctor was already on his way down the stairs by the time I was ready to leave the kitchen.
The long and lonely passage down through the various levels of the keep seemed the more lonesome for some of the globes on the stairway having given up. I noted the patches of dark on my way down, reminding myself to do something about it at some time before evening.
I settled down to my work quickly, dumping my load of food on the counter in lower control before opening up the storeroom there. The equipment was not cumbersome; the only really large components being the storage units. However it was somewhat tricky to get them past the bottleneck the Doctor had created by insisting on doing his work in the doorway. I hadn’t really got the heart to tell him he was in the way and he didn’t seem to notice. But I managed to get the units to the Wrens without too much loss of temper.
It took me the rest of the morning to get the units hooked into the Wrens’ systems; lunch was forgotten by both of us in the fever of getting things done. By the time I was happy with the way the two Wrens were organised, it was almost teatime. I surfaced from my labours, peering about the desolate chill of the Nest. Some leaves had made their way down onto the level concrete floor; from where I knew not; and they blew around in a little eddy of wind some way behind the craft.
The effect, combined with the lonely spot of activity by the portal to lower control, was one of utterest desolation. I felt that chill and the grim sentiment that hunger inspired as the thrill of getting things done waned. The chronometer on the dash of Number Three told me I had scant ho
pe of ever seeing lunch today. It was then that I realised how hungry I actually was.
Then as well I realised that there was nothing left for me to do; if it was left up to me I could start out on that flight at that very moment.
When it came down to it I wasn’t eager to go. I trotted over to the Doctor, who was standing and stretching, his laser in one hand and his orange goggles in the other. He was looking rather pleased with himself; and lying on the ground before him were four rugby balls with wings. There was no heap of components; and his diagram was looking very hard-looked at.
“Lunch?” He asked hopefully, “I could do with a bit.”
“Sort of.” I told him evasively, “Sort of tea time as well. All finished on my side.”
“All done here as well. That means we can set off first thing in the morning. Bit of good timing there. We can have an early night, a good breakfast then beetle off into the far and distant yonder before the sun is up. We’ll float off the laser quartet as soon as we’re in a suitable orbit for them. I’ll work out the orbits tonight and plot our course to contact point. Lunch, then?” He asked again as if in need of some subtle reassurance.
“Lunch it is; a little late though.” I agreed amiably. For all it was a quarter to four, we made a good meal. After this, the Doctor and I went over everything in both the Wrens, checking all the stores and all the systems as far as we could within the Nest.
After we had done that we loaded the four laser stations into the rear hatches of the two Wrens, through which the stations passed easily with their solar collectors folded down. We spent a good hour or so organising an ejection system for the stations, one that would not require us to go into the hatches ourselves.
Once the Doctor was happy with the state of the craft we closed them up and made our way back up the stairs.
Byrtle was unfairly welcoming in his greeting; it was as if he knew we were going to leave him for a good part of forever; not as if we had simply neglected him for the day. We made as much of a fuss over the solemn grey bird as the supper preparations would allow. I reminded the Doctor to pack a case full of clothes for him to take down in the morning, an idea which seemed rather novel to him. “We won’t be able to scrub and change all that often while we’re up there; and nobody’s going to see us for the trip.” He protested half-heartedly.
“I’ll be seeing you when we land.” I told him firmly, “And I’ll expect you to be looking your best.”
“Oh.” He replied sadly and he left it at that. We shared a silent meal rather earlier than we were used to. We were both on edge, I knew not why he was uneasy, but my own reasons were simple enough, had I taken the time to analyse them. But undefined as they were, they troubled me through the night after I had seen the Doctor off into the snow and dark of that winter evening. My milk and biscuits stood beside my bed, neglected and forlorn as I sat by my desk, writing.
It was rather late before I finally settled down to sleep, setting my comlink for its usual early hour. It was round about then that I realised that I had not had the chance to pick any fruit. I resolved to think about it in the morning but promised myself nothing more than that. I had packed several bottles of the Doctor’s celebrated vitamins and I felt that such would have to suffice. Although I fully realised that I may never see a real plum again, it was plain enough that the time I had reserved for such frivolities had run out; there was no time left; the crunch was here awaiting our awakening on the morrow’s morn but nothing more.
The morning came sooner than I had expected with the comlink beating me to the draw by an unknown margin. I lay there, curled up with my eiderdown drawn up well beyond my nose, wondering if I should snatch a few more minutes nap. It didn’t take me long to realise that those few minutes were not mine to snatch. I pulled down the duvet, peering at the western window whose curtains I had not closed the evening before, to see if it was really worth my while to get up. It wasn’t; the snow was piled high on the old stone windowsill, the wind was clearly visible beyond, the darkness had a silvery hint that spoke of appalling arctic cold.
Nevertheless I dragged myself out of bed, scampering off to the shower as quickly as convenient. The warmth of those gentle needles of mineral-rich water enlivened me to the point where I could look this day’s bleak future squarely in the eyes and decide, once and forever, that I would go ahead with this dangerous project, that I would see it through to its end, bitter or otherwise. I knew as well that there would be no gathering of fruit this day or maybe any other. This day at least it would be simply too dangerous to face the paths down the crag to where the fruit trees hid themselves.
I found myself a clean tracksuit, slipping it on along with my new shoes. Then I started to pack a case with other clothes, taking a few minutes off from that to tell the Doctor over the comlink to do the same. It sounded as if he was in the shower, but I assumed that he had heard me. I trotted down to the kitchen, my case in one hand, my dirty dishes and old clothes in the other. I left my case by the stairway before going about the breakfast routine with unusual gravity. It was as if I was noticing what I was doing for the first time, or as if I knew it may be the last time.
My mood was very gloomy by the time the Doctor joined me. He plonked his case down right in the middle of the floor in the one place where we were both likely to fall over it. His greeting was sombre, his countenance dark with some unresolved emotion. His eyes told me that he was going to ask me to stay behind; but I gave him hardly a chance, going so far as to suggest that he stay behind, that he guide the operation from upper control, leaving the piloting squarely in my hands where it should be. That actually provoked a laugh from him, “I’m glad you haven’t changed your mind, Cassandra,” He told me, “But you should consider staying behind. After all, I created the Wrens; I am more familiar with their total capability than you are.”
“You’ll die in the Wren if you don’t learn to delegate flying duties to me.” I told him blackly, “I feel it somehow. I wish you would listen; I can handle those blighters by myself; I don’t need you cluttering things up for me. Anyway we need somebody here to create a back-up plan in case this mission fails.”
He didn’t reply to that; the mood in which we ate our breakfast was tense and dark. After it was done I opened Byrtle’s window and heaped his dish with food. His water I changed, then I made a fuss of him before turning from the kitchen to the stairs. The Doctor was already at the top of the stairs, as if this moment held no significance for him. I clattered down the stairs, noticing that I hadn’t changed the blown globes on the narrow and winding staircase. I looked at each dark globe as it came, my heart filled with gloomy forebodings. I placed my case down by Number Three, seeing that the Doctor was in lower control, keying in the crafts’ unlocking sequence and logging the two War Machines out.
I trotted along to where he was standing, seeing that he was typing out a comprehensive flight plan and listing the known potentialities of the menace. He also keyed in a broadcast schedule for twelve day’s time that would transmit the message to the major centres of the world if we didn’t key out a specific signal before that time, just in case we didn’t succeed and return to base and his laser stations were ineffective. It somehow reassured me to see how seriously he was taking the journey; but it occurred to me that if he hadn’t been taking the whole thing seriously right from the word go the Wrens would never have been created. He looked up from the console at me, that warm smile on his face one last time.
“Are you ready to go?” He asked.
“Ready.” I told him confidently. He nodded and we turned away from lower control.
I stashed my case behind me, strapping it under the navigator’s couch before trotting around to the co-pilot’s door, checking that then finally seating myself in the pilot’s couch. I ran through all the systems including the ejector process for the two laser stations that Number Three carried. I strapped myself firmly into place, put on my helmet and lay back on the soft dark green fabric of the couch. I looked a
cross to where Number One stood, passive but filled with potential. As I watched the rotors began to turn. I at once activated jets and turbojets, feeding the huge power of the nuclear turbines to the rotors. I lifted off just behind the Doctor; my nose was at his tail all the way out of the Nest.
The day beyond those walls of stone was unspeakably dreary. I keyed open the tight-beam link with Number One and followed as the leader rose up through the grey clouds and swirling mist. The snow didn’t have the chance to cling as her sleek nose cut through the storm. I keyed in the super-stage at the lower level as the craft tore through the storm into the gloomy pre-dawn star-scape beyond the clouds. The wing-wrack came in just beyond that. After we were high enough for his purposes, the Doctor nosed Number One hard-a-port then flipped his craft to the starboard while he kept it on a level plain. Number one station flashed out of the hatch. He straightened up, maintained his course for a quarter of an hour and then repeated the manoeuvre. He came over the link ten minutes later, telling me to get ready for the release of number three. I followed through with that manoeuvre, once, then twice, casting the two laser stations into their prescribed orbits.
I watched as the Doctor tested each station, our own craft now high above them as we crossed over the sun side of our world. He was pleased with the deployment. I checked over the functions of the Wren in silence as he went over the laser station programming. I turned on the recycling gear and checked the life support functions before checking the targeting system. At last I mapped the exact position of the seven craft we were after and read over the proposed flight path the Doctor had chosen. I saw a slight miscalculation on his primary course projection; this I corrected. I set the targeting for the seven craft and waited for the Doctor to finish with his testing.
“All clear, Cassandra.” He told me, “Let’s go.”
