‘Chesterton, if I had any doubt at all about what we were contemplating, the sight of that disgusting thing has totally dispelled them. And they call the Thals mutations! Now then. How do you feel about riding in the machine, eh?’
Naturally, it was a tight squeeze. The Dalek machine was about five feet in height, but by crouching down and pressing my arms to my sides, I could just make it. There were several levers and switches inside but I had no idea which worked the individual rods.
‘I’m a bit afraid to try these out, Doctor,’ I said, ‘in case they have some communications system or other.’ The Doctor was busy wiping mud off the eye-stick.
‘Well, you won’t need them. We’ll replace the lid on top of you and push you along and make it look as if we were simply following you.’
He called the other two back and together they lowered the lid over my head. I could breathe well enough and I found that by turning my head slightly I could get one eye near enough to a rubber eye-piece and have a wonderfully clear view ahead and around me, very much like normal vision.
‘Try speaking,’ I heard Barbara say.
‘Yes, all right.’
‘We can hear you well enough,’ murmured the Doctor.
‘But make it sound more like a Dalek,’ said Susan.
I tried to imitate their flat, expressionless voices and Susan’s face appeared in front of me, smiling and waving a hand in triumph.
‘That’s marvellous, Mr Chesterton.’
I felt a movement as they pushed me and we started to move towards the door. The Doctor went ahead and used the sucker-stick to guide the way and we turned into the corridor and moved down it.
It was a tremendous relief to leave that room, but as the others turned the machine round to move it out, I caught a glimpse of the bundle under the cloak. I could just see a small green hand with three fingers struggling weakly to lift up the material that covered the body. The fact that it failed and fell limply to the steel floor didn’t make me feel any better.
At that moment, they pushed me round a corner of the corridor and my blood went cold. About twenty yards ahead of me I saw a Dalek machine and it began to turn and face us.
CHAPTER SIX
The Will to Survive
The Dalek in front of me stopped moving and I tried not to think about what would happen if it fired. The Doctor was ahead of me and a little to one side, pretending to be urged forward by the long rod with the sucker attachment. But he would be right in the line of fire. I felt I knew how men in the Tank Corps suffered when an enemy bazooka suddenly appeared.
‘Steady, Chesterton,’ I heard the Doctor whisper, and then he raised his voice angrily. ‘Stop pushing me, confound you! I’m going. I’m going!’
We came to rest about six feet away from the Dalek and I was quite certain I wasn’t going to do any speaking first. I was too afraid of making a mistake. I kept thinking about the way the wall had melted in the cell. A bead of sweat ran down my forehead, trickled past my left eyebrow and ran down my nose.
‘They are going to level eight?’
I detected a slight lift at the end of the sentence as the Dalek spoke and it was the first time I had noticed real tonal quality in their speech.
‘Yes.’
The Dalek examined us all for a few seconds then began to swing away.
‘There have been no instructions. The matter will be referred.’
I thought desperately and didn’t come up with anything. Then the slight figure of Susan appeared in my eye-line.
‘I won’t go!’ she shouted. ‘You’ve no right to keep us prisoners!’
She started to run, making to go past the other Dalek and along the corridor. The machine startled me with its speed of movement. It whirled round and I saw the sucker-rod extend outwards and bury itself in the wall just ahead of Susan, stopping her abruptly.
‘Go back to the others.’
Susan turned slowly and stood next to her grandfather and Barbara appeared on the other side of him. The Dalek turned its eye-stick towards me and I saw its bulbs flashing.
‘I will help you move them into the lift room.’
I didn’t dare say anything. Those flashing bulbs reminded me that I hadn’t any idea whether mine were working or not. The Dalek extracted its suction pad from the wall, swung round and passed the pad over one of the bulbs on the wall. A door slid open and Susan stepped through it. Barbara stood directly in front of the Doctor so that he could grip one of the rods on my machine and pull me. We must have been inches away from the door. Barbara had already gone through when the Dalek’s eye-stick suddenly shot downwards and looked where I imagined the Doctor’s hand was holding my machine.
‘Step away! Take your hand away!’ The Doctor lifted his hand and, of course, I came to rest. The eye-stick turned to me.
‘What is wrong? Are you damaged?’
I decided stubbornness was the best approach.
‘They are to go to level eight,’ I intoned. There was an indecisive pause and then the eye-stick wavered and the body of the machine swung away. The Doctor seized his chance and pulled at one of the rods on my machine, and eased me through the doorway, then he pushed me around so that I faced outwards. The Dalek turned slowly, the eye-stick’s lens enlarging and contracting.
The Doctor waved his hand on the inside wall-bulb and the door began to descend. I watched it as it moved downwards, expecting every moment for it to stop and then start opening again when the Dalek reached the conclusion that it was being tricked, but all that happened was that I heard its voice briefly announcing into what I could only imagine was some sort of internal microphone system that the prisoners had been sent up to level eight. Then the door closed and the sound of its voice was cut off.
The Doctor bent down on his knees, examining the wall-bulb.
‘Give me your shoe, Miss Wright,’ he said.
Barbara took one off and handed it to him and he smashed the bulb to pieces with the heel. Then his hand darted inside one of his waistcoat pockets and pulled out, of all extraordinary things, a button-hook, and I saw him insert it into the hole he’d made in the wall. He probed about for a few seconds and drew out a couple of wires and, giving them a sharp downward pull, broke them. He sat back on his heels, replaced the button-hook in his pocket and rubbed his hands together.
‘I don’t think they’ll open this door again in a hurry.’
‘Perhaps you could get me out of this tin can then.’ He got to his feet, beckoning to the two girls urgently. ‘My dear fellow, you must be roasting in there. The hinge is at the front, Miss Wright.’
They gradually eased the lid open and I scrambled out thankfully. We were in a small sort of ante-room, little more than a large cupboard, really, and facing the door we’d just come through was an open lift.
‘Well, I’m glad to get out of that thing,’ I murmured. ‘Now I know how sardines feel.’
‘Come along, come along, we must get up in that lift and get away from the city,’ said the Doctor sharply. Suddenly we all heard the distant sound of alarm bells, and then Susan tugged at my sleeve and pointed to the door. Part of it was beginning to glow red and a small hole was forming. The Daleks were burning their way through!
With one accord we scrambled into the lift and Barbara selected the top one of the twenty buttons laid out in a panel on the inside. The lift began to shoot upwards. Susan looked at her watch.
‘It’s nearly six, Grandfather. The Thals will be arriving at any moment.’
The Doctor made a non-committal noise in his throat and avoided looking at any of us. Barbara gazed at him steadily and I thought she was about to say something when the lift began to slow down. Then it stopped altogether.
We moved out and found ourselves at the top of a building, one of the round, gasometer-type ones, I thought, and directly facing us was a wall of glass that domed over our heads, giving an impression of the top floor having been designed as an observation place. It certainly gave us a marvellous view
of the city and I guessed we were every bit as high up as the top of the Eiffel Tower. We walked over and surveyed the scene.
From above, the city lay spread out like a fantastic collection of engineering inventions. We were clearly in the highest building of all and as we moved along the corridor I began to get a better picture of the sort of country surrounding us. In the distance I could see the forest where the Tardis lay. It looked strangely comforting. On a line with it, starting at the ridge of rocks where Susan had first seen the city, there was a gradual descent and then the ground began to flatten out. I could see the beginnings of dense vegetation. Moving away still farther on another side of the city there was a line of enormous mountains that towered over us.
As we moved around the observation floor we came across what I can only describe as an example of Dalek sculpture. It was little more than a series of metal squares welded together, without any particular design or pattern, and since it had no attachments to the flooring or showed that it possessed any internal engines or served any purpose at all, we concluded it must be some form of bizarre decoration.
The Doctor moved us all back to the lift again and held a council of war.
‘Now we’ve seen several of these lifts. The only thing we can do is go down in one and try and break through the city.’
Barbara said, ‘Do you think we’ll be able to avoid the Daleks?’
‘I’m sure of it, Miss Wright. Remember that Susan has told us the Thals are coming to the city. The Daleks will be occupied with them. With care, we ought to be able to slip through to the forest.’
‘I thought so!’ said Barbara, angrily. ‘I knew that’s what was in your mind. Never mind about the Thals coming here because we’ve arranged it or that we know they’ve tried to help us. All you can think of is to use them as red herrings while we run for cover!’
The Doctor looked surprised at her outburst and I must say it startled me. Ever since I’d met her I don’t believe she’d lost her poise or her self control, even when she came face to face with the metal beast in the forest and thought it was still alive. The Doctor recovered himself.
‘Miss Wright, I’m not interested in your comments. We have our own safety to consider.’
‘You really mean to say you’d sacrifice these other people without giving it a second thought?’
‘Well, of course I’ve thought about it,’ he replied sharply, ‘but our duty is to get back to the Ship.’
‘Our duty to whom?’
‘To each other,’ the Doctor said.
The trouble was that I agreed with both of them. I knew what the Doctor was driving at and we were hardly cut out to defend the Thals in any battle that the Doctor obviously anticipated was going to ensue. At the same time it did go against the grain a bit to walk away without at least warning them. I was just about to put all of this into words when the lift behind us started to disappear out of sight.
‘Quick!’ shouted the Doctor. ‘No time to argue. They’ll be up in that lift in a moment.’
I ran over to one of the statues and manhandled it to the lift entrance.
‘What are you wasting time for, Chesterton?’
‘I’m not wasting time,’ I replied curtly. I was a bit fed up with him for always thinking the worst of people. ‘I’m cutting down the odds a little.’
Barbara helped me with the statue and we pushed it over the edge. It slipped out of sight and cautiously I craned my head into the aperture and watched it hurtling down the lift shaft. There was a terrific crash beneath and I saw a cloud of smoke billow out. I stepped back and winked at Barbara. The Doctor patted me on the shoulder.
‘I’m sorry, my boy. I judged you too harshly.’
‘There’s another lift over here Grandfather,’ called Susan, about twenty feet away. We moved over to her.
Barbara stopped suddenly and then ran over to the glass.
‘They’re coming! Look – there’s a whole party of them!’
Round the corner of one of the square buildings came a magnificent old man, wearing one of the cloaks that Susan had brought back from the forest. He was easily six foot four or five and wore a kind of coronet on his head made of some very bright silvery metal. He was clean-shaven and very bronzed and his hair was pure white and short-cropped. He was obviously the leader; I could tell that by the signals he gave to the party of men behind him, cautioning them to be watchful and not to go too quickly.
We hammered on the glass to try to attract their attention and then we all tried shouting together, but the observation chamber was obviously soundproof, and anyway we were much too high up for them to notice us.
Barbara said, ‘We must help them, Ian.’
There was a short pause while the Doctor looked at us each in turn. Eventually, I took my eyes off the little group of men and nodded slowly.
‘All right. We’ll all go down in the lift. The Doctor will take you and Susan back to the forest. I’ll warn them. We can meet up later.’
‘I want to go with you,’ she protested.
‘You do as you’re told,’ I said roughly. I didn’t like being rude to her but it was the only way I could think of shortening the conversation. Barbara tightened her lips and moved away to the lift we had chosen and I followed with the Doctor, who was shaking his head from side to side.
‘Sentimentality, Chesterton. That’s all it is. Still, I won’t stop you.’
‘After all, Grandfather,’ said Susan hesitantly, ‘it was my fault that the Thals came here in the first place.’
We stepped into the lift and travelled the rest of the way in silence. When the lift stopped we crept out cautiously. I took the lead, the two girls in the middle and the Doctor bringing up the rear, and we moved in this Indian file fashion through another little ante-chamber and into the corridor, closing the door behind us.
The particular corridor we found ourselves in was obviously a main one and was nothing more than a series of cross-roads, with other corridors cutting across it, so it was a constant question which way to take. I decided to keep in a straight line and it was very fortunate that I did so because after about only two or three minutes we came into a small entrance hall and saw an open door, leading out into the city. I edged my way forward, telling them all quietly to stay where they were at the end of the corridor until I’d found out how safe it was. The outside of the building was totally deserted so I beckoned to them.
‘All right, Doctor. You can just see a part of the ashy ground over there. I’ve lost my bearings, I’m afraid, but I think the forest is away to the left so you may only have to circle a bit. There’s only one other thing I want to say.’ I looked at Barbara. ‘The Doctor’s quite right in one thing. There can only be one leader. Do everything he tells you. I’m only breaking away now because… well, perhaps because we owe the Thals something. Otherwise I’d take the Doctor’s orders and no arguments.’
Barbara’s eyes flashed dangerously.
‘If that’s intended for me, it was a waste of time,’ she said coldly. The Doctor found my hand and shook it.
‘Do your best, my boy, but make all haste to the Ship, won’t you?’ I nodded and smiled at Susan. Barbara walked away without another word. I watched the Doctor peer out of the doorway, take Susan’s hand and then the two of them disappeared. Barbara paused and then looked back. We stared at each other for a second or two, then she followed the others.
I leant against the wall for a moment, wishing I had a cigarette. It was the first time I’d really been alone since Barbara had appeared out of the fog on the Common. I couldn’t hide the fact that there was a slightly cold feeling at the back of my neck and it would have been comforting to have someone with me to work out what to do next.
I didn’t have a cigarette and I was on my own, so I had to get on with it. The Thals had to be warned of possible danger and told to get out and get out quickly. I looked around me. No hope here. The best plan was to move outside the building.
The opposite direction to the o
ne the others had taken led me deep into the city, and just as I was beginning to think I was lost I caught a glimpse of the first building we’d all found when Barbara had shown her first real signs of illness. I dodged from building to building carefully and stopped every few paces to search all around and above me, but there wasn’t a sign of a Dalek anywhere. I eased my way along a smooth metal wall to the entrance of the building and peered in.
The entrance hall where we’d originally decided to split up was considerably changed. All sorts of boxes and cartons were piled up in the centre of the chamber and there were also a number of metal carboys filled with what I guessed was water. The Thals were grouped around them and the leader was peering into one of the boxes and picking out some packets and examining them. Finally, he replaced them and indicated to one of his men to help him climb up on to one of the smaller crates.
I noticed that all the men looked strong. They were all taller than average and broad in proportion, and they all had very fair hair. All of them wore the same kind of cloaks and tightly-fitting trousers of some light brown colour which seemed to have the texture of leather. From the knees downwards I could see that a pattern of holes had been cut in the trousers about the size of shillings. On their feet the Thals wore a simple sandal with one thong through the first and second toes and then encircling the ankle and joining the sole at the back of the heel. Apart from the difference in features, there was no way to tell them apart and only the leader wore anything different at all – the silvery coronet on his head.
The leader looked around him.
‘Daleks!’ he called. ‘We come to you in peace. We have no way of repaying you for this food except by working with you. Together we can level the ground outside your city and make things grow in the fields. Rain is falling more frequently and there is every hope that the planet Skaro can be rebuilt. We shall take the food now and leave you our grateful thanks. Later we shall return and find out how we may work together.’
Doctor Who and the Daleks Page 9
