by John Peel
‘Mmm?’ He looked at her with unusual concentration. ‘Yes, yes, I was.’
‘Who was it?’ When the Doctor looked blank, she added: ‘The scream?’
‘Oh, that. Oh, um, nothing, no one.’
Puzzled at this odd series of responses, Barbara walked over to the entrance. ‘Well, where’s Ian, then?’ The Doctor did not reply, and Barbara was worried. ‘What’s wrong? Where’s Ian?’
The Doctor looked up, and said softly, ‘Barbara, my dear... I...’ He spread his hands. ‘Chesterton is dead.’
‘ Dead? ’ Barbara whispered, not believing it. ‘Dead?’ She felt giddy and sick, and reeled back against the cave wall to support herself. Then she buried her face in her hands and began to cry. She couldn’t even imagine not seeing Ian’s cheerful face again, or not knowing that he was close when danger threatened. On Aridius, she had thought that she had felt as terrible as she ever would; this time it was even worse. She had allowed herself some secret reserve of hope before, but now the Doctor himself was claiming that Ian had perished. If Ian had died, how could she go on?
The Doctor put an arm about her, patting her comfortingly. His face, which she could not see, showed no such emotion: it held only triumph and a superior sneer. ‘We are no longer safe here,’ he said, gently. ‘We must get away.’
Faced with the prospect of doing something, however pointless, Barbara began to drag her tattered spirit back together. ‘But... Ian... are you sure ? Maybe he’s just hurt, and lying out there needing help...’
‘He was dead, Barbara. The plants got him. There was nothing that I could do, but it was over quickly. Now, come along. We must hurry.’ The Doctor steered her towards the entrance. Uncaring, Barbara stumbled along, and went with the Doctor into the darkness.
After a few more minutes, light was evident along the pathway. Up a gentle incline to the cave came Ian, carrying the unconscious Vicki in his arms. Behind him, waving the two light sticks at anything that moved, the Doctor followed, puffing and panting.
‘Nearly there, Doctor,’ Ian called over his shoulder. ‘Another twenty yards.’
Between gasps for breath, the Doctor called back: ‘They’re all around us. You know, Chesterton, they have an extraordinary range of movement for plants. Quite extraordinary.’
‘This isn’t the time for a botany lesson, Doctor,’ Ian objected. ‘All I’m interested in is that we’ll be safe once we get inside the cave.’
As he spoke, he crossed the threshold, and gently lowered Vicki on to the ledge there. The Doctor backed in after him, slashing with the light stick, as though fencing with a musketeer.
‘Chesterton,’ he commanded, ‘come and keep watch while I take a look at Vicki.’
Ian glanced around. ‘Now where has she... Barbara? Barbara!
The Doctor realized that there were just the three of them in the cave, and a frown crossed his features. ‘She must be here. Surely she wouldn’t have gone out on her own?’
Grimly Ian answered: ‘That’s what worries me—perhaps she wasn’t on her own.’ He took one of the light lances from the Doctor. ‘You look to Vicki, and I’ll just check around outside.’
The Doctor nodded, putting the other rod down. He knelt beside Vicki, cradling her head in his arms. He had been extremely worried about the child; she reminded him very much of his grand-daughter, Susan, his first and dearest travelling companion. Susan had grown and left him, but the loss was very recent, a loss that Vicki had helped to mask. If anything happened to the young child... ‘That’s it,’ he murmured, encouragingly, as Vicki began to stir. ‘Come along now, come along.’
Vicki’s eyes flickered open, and then focused on the Doctor. As soon as she realized what she was seeing, she gave a cry of panic, and tried to move away. Puzzled, the Doctor moved forward. Vicki threw back her head and screamed.
Chapter 11
To The Death!
Ian was looking about for tracks outside the cave when he heard Vicki scream. Immediately, he dashed back inside. There was nothing threatening there — merely the Doctor
bending over her. ‘What is it?’ Ian asked, worried. Pushing past the Doctor, Vicki ran across to Ian and held
him tightly. ‘Oh, Ian, it’s you! When I saw... it must be the Doctor, or you wouldn’t be with him.’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’ Ian asked, completely bewildered.
Vicki wiped her nose on her sleeve, and tried to smile. ‘I’m sorry I acted like that,’ she said to the Doctor, ‘but when I saw you, I thought you must be the robot.’
‘Robot?’ the Doctor repeated. ‘My dear child, neither of us has the faintest idea what you mean.’
‘There’s a robot,’ she explained. ‘The Daleks made it. It’s exactly like you.’
‘A robot that looks like me?’ The Doctor couldn’t quite believe it.
‘Exactly like you, in every detail.’ Vicki looked at them, and could see that the two men were wondering if she was quite in her right mind. ‘When the TARDIS took off, I snuck into the Dalek ship and hid. The Daleks made a copy of you, to infiltrate our party. Infiltrate and kill, that’s what it said.’
‘So that’s it.’ The Doctor looked at Ian, worried. ‘This is serious. Barbara would never have left this cave—unless you or I had suggested it.’
Ian realized what the Doctor was getting at. ‘Or a robot that looked like you. We’ve got to find her, and quickly.’ He ran from the cave, into the night.
‘Chesterton, wait!’ the Doctor called, futilely. ‘Ah, there’s no point... This is the time for action, not words.’ He returned to Vicki. ‘Do you feel well enough to move?’
Vicki nodded. ‘And I’m going to stay close to you, so I know who the real Doctor is.’
Smiling affectionately at her, the Doctor handed her a light rod. ‘Come along, then, child. Pray that there’s still time to save Barbara!’
Barbara had not been at all reassured as she had set off into the forest with the Doctor. He seemed so strange, but she put it down to his having seen Ian killed, and his sense of loss over Vicki. Yet, even making those allowances, he was still behaving very oddly. Barbara peered through the gloom, frantically brandishing her light stick if she heard any noises from the vegetation. She could barely see the Doctor, who was scouting the way ahead.
‘Is there anything there, Doctor?’ she called, anxiously.
After a moment, he said, ‘No... No, I don’t think so.’
‘Then hadn’t we better be moving on?’ Barbara asked. She kept her mind fixed on rescuing Vicki; it made the pain of losing Ian seem a little easier to bear.
‘I think we’ll stay here,’ the Doctor answered, coming back towards her. ‘Yes, this place will do very nicely.’
‘But I thought we were going to get the Dalek time machine!’ Barbara couldn’t believe that the Doctor was simply going to stay out in the forest at night.
‘Mmm? Oh, there’s no need for that, Barbara.’ The Doctor was almost up to her, and in the light from her rod, Barbara could see that he looked like a hawk that had just seen a wounded pigeon.
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ she asked, backing away. Somehow, the Doctor frightened her, with that eager expression on his face. Abruptly, she noticed that he didn’t have his light stick, and yet apparently had no trouble seeing in the dark. What was happening?
‘Barbara! Barbara!’
The yell had come from quite close in the trees, back in the direction from which they had come. Barbara’s heart soared as she heard the familiar voice.
‘That was Ian !’ she exclaimed. ‘You lied to me, Doctor. You lied . Why?’
The Doctor didn’t answer. Instead, he simply advanced towards her again. Barbara continued to back away from him, waving her rod at him. She took a deep breath and screamed out Ian’s name.
‘First you,’ the Doctor said, extending his arms. ‘Then the others.’
As Barbara moved backwards, one of the tendrils from the vines snatched at her feet. As s
he felt the sharp whipsaw, Barbara cried and stumbled. The Doctor moved far faster than she imagined he could, and pounced at her. His arms shot for her throat, but Barbara dropped her rod, grabbing his wrists. His strength was incredible, and she could barely even slow his attack. His hands were almost on her throat when Ian ran up behind the Doctor. Swinging his rod, Ian dealt the Doctor a blow to the head that sent him flying aside. Without apparent pain, the Doctor rolled over, glared back at them, and then ran off into the jungle.
Before Ian could follow, Barbara clambered to her feet and gripped his arm tightly. She didn’t want to lose him again!
‘What’s happened to him, Ian?’ she whispered. ‘Why did the Doctor try to kill me?’
‘That wasn’t the Doctor,’ Ian answered. ‘It was a robot manufactured by the Daleks.’
‘A... robot ? But... it was so... so real.’ Everything was getting to be too confusing for Barbara, but one thing was clear: Ian was alive, and she was too glad about that to worry about a robot.
Ian realized that she was scared and exhausted. He placed his arm protectively about her shoulders. ‘It’s all right,’ he assured her. ‘It’s all right. It won’t fool us again. Let’s get back to the others. They’re just back this way.’
Barbara was happy simply to hold on to Ian, and let him lead the way. Over the course of their journeys, they had grown very fond of each other. Just how fond, she was beginning to suspect from the loss she had experienced on hearing of his supposed death twice so recently.
It was a short walk before they saw another light, and then Vicki, slashing about with it. Ian laughed, and called out: ‘Doctor Livingstone, I presume.’
‘Ian!’ Vicki saw Barbara, and ran over. Barbara could hardly believe her eyes — both of the people she had given up for lost and dead! She grabbed Vicki, almost asphyxiating her in a tight embrace.
‘Where’s the Doctor?’ Ian asked, prising the two women apart.
‘He’s right behind me,’ Vicki said, happily.
Right on cue, the Doctor stepped out of the bushes to the left of the trail. At the same moment, the Doctor also stepped out of the bushes to the right. The three friends stared at both figures — and could not tell them apart.
One of them pointed to the other. ‘Chesterton! Don’t just stand there —that’s the robot!’
The other Doctor spluttered in fury. ‘ Me ?’ he howled. ‘ You’re the impostor!’
‘Then prove it, my dear fellow,’ the first Doctor said, smugly. ‘There’s really no need to lose your temper. Just prove that you are the Doctor — if you can!’ He smiled at Ian and the girls, obviously certain that the other Doctor couldn’t prove any such thing.
The other Doctor straightened, and gripped his lapels. ‘I don’t have to prove anything.’
‘You mean you can’t ,’ the first Doctor snapped back.
This was too much for the other Doctor. He raised his cane, and brandished it. ‘Why you...!’ He moved forward.
The first Doctor backed off slightly. ‘Look out, Chesterton!’ he snapped. ‘It’s getting violent!’
Ian could see this. Holding his light lance firmly, he moved to stand between the Doctors, staring levelly at the one waving his stick. ‘Put that down,’ he said, softly.
‘Get out of my way!’ the Doctor roared, still furious.
‘And if I don’t?’ Ian asked.
‘Then you’ll get the same treatment as that confounded impostor!’ To back up the threat, he brandished his cane at Ian.
The other Doctor moved in front of Vicki and Barbara. ‘Watch him, Chesterton, watch him,’ he cautioned.
Ian was watching him. He had no desire to be brained by either the real or the fake Doctor. The problem was that he still wasn’t certain which of them was which. ‘You’re still insisting that you’re the real Doctor?’
‘You don’t want to listen, one way or the other, do you?’ The Doctor had had enough, and whacked at Ian with his cane. Ian parried the blow with his lance, and then riposted. One advantage of having served briefly in the retinue of King Richard the Lionheart was that Ian had picked up some fine sword-fighting techniques. The Doctor—real or robot—was hopelessly outclassed. In a second, his stick went spinning. Ian poised, ready to make the final blow with his lance. Yet, he was still uncertain.
‘Chesterton!’ the other Doctor called. ‘Now’s your chance destroy it! I know it looks like me, but it’s just wires and electronics. Destroy it!’ Ian still hesitated, so the Doctor added: ‘You have to defend us! Barbara and Susan are relying on you!’
‘What did you say?’ Barbara grabbed at the Doctor. ‘What did you say?’
‘What do you mean?’ the Doctor asked, confused. ‘You said Susan !’ Barbara exclaimed.
‘Of course I did.’
‘Ian!’ Vicki cried. ‘That’s not the robot— this one is!’
At the cry, Ian turned, his rod held ready. The robot, realizing that it had somehow made a mistake, turned and ran into the undergrowth. The real Doctor picked up his stick, and he and Ian set off after the fake.
This time, the robot was the one facing the problem. Since it had no light stick, the native plants did not get out of its way. It was forced to plough straight through anything that was in its path. Having infra-red vision didn’t help when fighting a jungle. In a matter of moments, it heard Ian and the real Doctor close behind. Faced with little alternative, the robot spun and raised its cane.
Ian was about to come at it with his light stick, but the Doctor gripped his hand.
‘This is my fight, Chesterton,’ he insisted. Raising his own walking stick as if in salute to his opponent, he then stepped forward and struck. The robot parried the blow, recovered, and struck back. The Doctor whipped his stick into the path of the blow, and then closed in.
Vicki and Barbara arrived, panting. In the light of the three alien rods, the travellers could see two identical Doctors laying into one another with their sticks, each violently seeking to brain the other.
‘We’ve got to help!’ Vicki cried.
‘How can we?’ Barbara asked, practically. ‘We can’t tell them apart.’
‘So how did you, back there?’ Ian wondered.
Barbara smiled slightly. ‘The robot called Vicki Susan .’
‘Susan?’ Ian considered it for a moment. ‘Of course! Both of the previous times we met the Daleks, Susan was with us. And Vicki looks enough like Susan for the Daleks to assume that she still was the same girl!’
The fight came to an abrupt conclusion as they watched. One of the Doctors caught his opponent a vicious blow to the head, and then slammed the silver head of his cane down on to the chest of his fallen foe. The Doctor on the forest floor didn’t rise again. The victorious Doctor straightened up, pulled his handkerchief from his pocket, and mopped his forehead.
‘Most enervating,’ he muttered. He turned to face three pairs of anxious eyes. ‘Oh, relax. It’s really me this time.’
Nervously, Vicki whispered: ‘How... how can we be sure?’
‘Mmm?’ The Doctor looked as though the thought had not occurred to him. ‘So I’m to be tested again, eh? Well, would the Daleks know that Chesterton was dubbed Sir Ian, Knight of Jaffa, by Richard Coeur de Lion? Or that you, Vicki, led a revolution on the planet Xeros? Or that Barbara escaped with the Menoptera from the Crater of Needles?’ He waved his stick at the fallen figure. ‘And if that doesn’t convince you, then perhaps this will.’
The figure had been broken by the blows the Doctor had dealt it. In the light from the rods, the travellers could see that wires and electronic parts had been exposed.
The Doctor patted each of them on the arm. ‘Now, my friends, I think it’s high time we returned to the cave. We could all do with some rest. Especially me—I’m not as young as I once was.’ Abruptly, he broke into a youthful smile. ‘But it’s nice to know I can still hold my own in a fight, eh? Even if it was against myself.’ Chuckling to himself, he led the way back through the night.
The Patrol Leader stopped in front of the TARDIS. Another Dalek halted behind him. ‘The enemy time machine,’ the Leader grated. ‘With this in our control, they cannot escape.’
A third Dalek, from one of the patrols, arrived. ‘There is no trace of the humans.’
‘And the robot?’
‘Contact has been lost.’
The Leader considered. They had had a number of skirmishes with the native fungoids and other plant life. Their inner power packs were running low. ‘Organize a full-scale search of the jungle as soon as it is light,’ it ordered. The sunlight would recharge their solar panels. The energy might be needed. The Doctor and his accomplices were proving to be more trouble than had been anticipated.
‘I obey.’ The third Dalek moved off.
The Leader turned to the other Dalek. ‘Remain on guard, in case the Doctor returns.’ It then moved back to the time machine. The Dalek Prime would have to he notified of the progress. It was a report that the Leader preferred not to have to make. Again it was of failure.
Ian sat in the cave mouth without a light stick. He didn’t dare advertise his presence to the Daleks, wherever they might be. As he sat there straining his eyes to see in the darkness, he could hear the sounds of the jungle all about him. Strident cries, deep-throated roaring noises, and the occasional sounds of something crashing through the paths below told Ian that whatever animal life there was here lived and hunted mostly by night. He couldn’t blame them—the plants were probably slower in the dark.
In many ways, this was a terrible planet. It was literally a world where only the strongest, most deadly predators could survive. Perhaps that was a sign from fate—here, the small party would have to face the Daleks now. It was a case of the survival of the fittest, with the Doctor and his friends on one side and the Daleks on the other. A ruthless world like this was probably the most appropriate place for the final battle.
There was a noise from behind as the Doctor moved to join him. ‘Chesterton, you get some sleep now. I’ve had a little nap and feel quite refreshed. I’ll watch for a while.’
