by Ian Marter
Then Turner suddenly leaned over to his commanding officer. 'Sir, I know it sounds silly, but could those recent UFO reports have anything to do with all this?'
'Flying saucers?' Isobel exclaimed excitedly, nudging Zoe. 'Golly, what a scoop!'
The Doctor held up his hand for silence. 'Are there by any chance any photographs of the UFO sightings, Brigadier?' he asked eagerly.
'We've got quite a few in the files,' Lethbridge-Stewart replied, more worried than ever. 'Jimmy, would you fetch them?'
As the Captain hurried out, the Doctor dipped the remains of his sandwich into his neglected tea. 'Unidentified Flying Objects...' he ruminated, biting into the soggy mess, his eyes widening and his nostrils flaring with anticipation. 'Why didn't I think of that before...?'
Professor Watkins was in a state of nervous anxiety when Packer thrust him into Vaughn's office.
'What was all that shooting? Where is my niece? If you've hurt one hair of her head, Vaughn...' he babbled shrilly, blinking myopically at his tormentors.
'I assure you that Isobel is perfectly safe,' Vaughn purred blandly. 'At the moment anyway.'
Watkins struggled feebly in Packer's restraining grasp. 'I demand to see her!' he shouted.
Vaughn nodded and smiled. 'And so you shall, Professor. Just as soon as your machine is completed to my satisfaction.'
Watkins peered at him suspiciously. 'Why am I being taken back to London?'
Vaughn patted his arm affably. 'I am assigning Mr Gregory to work with you, Professor. You deserve some assistance with such an important assignment.'
'I don't need any assistance,' Watkins panted breathlessly.
'On the contrary,' Vaughn retorted calmly, 'you will have only twenty-four hours in which to complete the device to my specifications.'
The Professor shook his head violently. 'Never! Never!' he vowed defiantly.
Packer bent the Professor's podgy arm up behind his back and Watkins's plump body contorted with pain.
'If you cooperate, your niece will go free,' Vaughn promised. 'Otherwise...' He gestured ominously.
'You expect me to believe that?' Watkins scoffed.
Vaughn pointed to the bank of monitor screens behind his victim. Watkins turned and saw several still images of Isobel's frightened face staring out at him. Then Packer twisted his arm still further and shoved him brutally to his knees. Watkins knelt between them, moaning and whimpering helplessly.
Vaughn shrugged complacently. 'My dear Professor, you have no choice but to believe it,' he murmured silkily, his teeth flashing in the darkening room. He glanced distastefully at Packer but did not reprimand him for his excesses. Then he helped Watkins to his feet and smiled sympathetically. 'Now Professor, do please try and be sensible and do as I ask.'
In the UNIT Operations Room, the Doctor was poring intently over a microfilm viewer, studying a selection of remarkably clear pictures of various strange elongated hexagonal objects arranged in different formations.
The Brigadier peered hopefully over his shoulder.'Mean anything to you, Doctor?' he asked after a prolonged silence.
The Doctor ran the film back and forth several times. 'Possibly, Brigadier. How long ago were these objects first sighted?' he murmured.
'Odd reports have trickled in for over a year, Doctor. We send fighters up to investigate, but no luck. Nothing.'
Captain Turner craned over the Doctor's other shoulder. 'The strange thing is they always seem to disappear somewhere over Northern Essex,' he remarked.
'That's where the International Electromatix rnanufacturing complex is!' Isobel exclaimed.
'Exactly,' said Turner, smiling at her.
The Doctor sat back, rubbing the side of his nose speculatively. 'Jamie, when you were hiding in the crate you said that whatever it was in there moved...'
Jamie shuddered at the vivid memory. 'Aye, Doctor. There's something wrapped up in all that plastic web stuff right enough.'
The Doctor meditated for a moment. 'Did you recognise anything about it, Jamie?'
'Och no, Doctor. It was far too dark and I was too scared,' Jamie admitted candidly.
The Doctor remained silent for a while, trying to visualise the vague shape they had seen in the crate inside the railway wagon.
'What do you think it was, Doctor?' asked Zoe in a hushed voice, remembering only too well her and Isobel's ordeal in the cramped, stuffy containers.
All at once the Doctor stood up abruptly, startling them. 'I'm not sure, Zoe, but I think we'd better find out as soon as possible.'
Jamie frowned. 'You mean, go back to Vaughn's place?' he cried in disbelief.
'Vaughn's obviously transporting the things from Essex to his London premises. That's where we'll find our answers,' the Doctor declared decisively. He asked the Brigadier if he had a map of the London set-up.
Lethbridge-Stewart looked disapprovingly at the bright-eyed little Time Lord. 'I don't think this is wise, Doctor. You've just been very lucky so far.'
Jamie shoved his thumbs firmly in his belt. 'If you think I'm going back in there...' he snorted.
'We must find out what is in those containers,' the Doctor interrupted brusquely.
In the ensuing silence, Captain Turner pretended not to notice the Brigadier's critical gaze and he went over and selected a plastic map sheet from a rack beside the Situation Map. 'Here you are, Doctor, this shows the entire area in detail,' he said, handing it to the Doctor.
The Doctor beamed. 'Thank you, Captain.' He grinned at the Brigadier. 'Your staff are invaluable. Most efficient.' Then he began to examine the map carefully.
Slowly Jamie drew his thumbs out of his belt. Then he got up and went over to the Doctor. 'Och, we canna get in the same way again. They're sure to be on the lookout,' he muttered, becoming absorbed in the map.
The Doctor smiled secretively to himself, picked up a pen and started drawing on the back of his hand, consulting the map from time to time.
The Brigadier cleared his throat guiltily. 'Well, Doctor, anything I can do to help?' he inquired heartily.
The Doctor traced his finger along a thin wavering line on the plastic sheet. 'Yes, Brigadier, there is. Do you think you could possibly obtain a canoe for me?' he requested mysteriously.
An hour later, Jamie was sweating profusely and puffing away as he paddled the small canoe along a bleak stretch of stagnant canal running between tall derelict warehouses. In the stern the Doctor sat steering effortlessly with his paddle. Occasionally Jamie cast a resentful glance over his shoulder, but the Doctor always managed to appear to be doing his fair share of the work at the vital moment, grinning encouragingly at the toiling Scot. Frequently the Doctor studied the rough sketch he had drawn on the back of his hand and he hummed scraps of sea shanties to himself in a tone-deaf groan.
Suddenly they found themselves in pitch darkness as the canal turned sharply and entered a long tunnel.
'Och, are ye sure ye ken where we are?' Jamie demanded doubtfully.
The Doctor hummed a few more bars, enjoying the added resonance the tunnel gave to his voice. 'Of course I do, Jamie. I know these waters like the back of my hand...' he giggled. 'We should be passing underneath Mr Vaughn's railway yards at this very moment.'
Cold, fetid water dripped on them and invisible fronds of clammy weed flapped in their faces from the tunnel roof. Jamie began to regret his decision to accompany the Doctor after all.
When they eventually emerged into the daylight again the Doctor steered towards a worn flight of slimy stone steps. 'These should lead into the back of the warehouse,' he whispered. 'Don't make a sound, Jamie.'
They tethered the canoe and cautiously climbed the treacherously slippery steps. Sure enough, they soon found themselves in a rubble-strewn yard behind the warehouse buildings. Two security guards with gauntlets and visors were visible in the distance where the railway lines entered the loading bay. Pressing themselves against the corrugated steel wall Jamie and the Doctor crouched down and made their way warily
along the back of the huge warehouse, hoping that nobody would spot them before they managed to find a way inside.
They were lucky. Not far from the corner, they came upon an emergency exit. One of the doors was slightly ajar and by contorting his arm, Jamie was able to reach through the gap and jiggle the jammed releasing bar until it eventually freed itself. Cautiously he opened the door and they crept stealthily into the warehouse, dragging the door shut behind them.
As they slipped between the stacks of containers, they heard sounds of activity nearby. Creeping noiselessly from stack to stack they took care to avoid the prying electronic scanners ceaselessly panning to.and fro from the roof girders. They soon reached a central area which was relatively clear except for a row of containers standing vertically on end, their lids open to reveal silvery cocoons like the one they had seen in the freight wagon earlier. Two men dressed in heavy protective suits with gloves and darkened visors were manoeuering a bulky apparatus mounted on wheels over to one of the open containers.
The Doctor stared keenly at the machine, the two lines running from his nose to the corners of his mouth deepening with grim concern. The apparatus consisted of a large central assemblage of tubes and wires topped by a curious corkscrew antenna; two thick umbilical cables led from the heart of the machine, ending in large crocodile clip connectors.
'Oh my goodness me,' the Doctor murmured, 'I was right.'
'What is it?' Jamie whispered.
'It looks like a multiphase bioprojector to me, Jamie.'
Jamie nodded, as if he were perfectly familiar with such things.
The two operatives had finished attaching the ends of the cables to the centre of the cocoon and they retreated behind a glass screen fitted to the apparatus and busied themselves with the complex array of controls and instruments. The antenna started rotating faster and faster, like a gigantic drill-bit. A low-pitched hum gradually filled the vast echoing building and rose relentlessly in pitch and intensity. A faint glow appeared inside the cocoon, growing stronger as the hum increased.
The Doctor drew Jamie further back behind the stacks of crates as the glow became a strobing glare which was almost intolerable to look at. A vaguely humanoid outline stirred inside the cocoon and a silver form began to flash with stronger and stronger pulses. Jamie and the Doctor covered their ears as the pulsating hum became an unbearable staccato shriek. In a sudden burst of thousands of silver fibres the cocoon exploded and a huge gleaming figure jerked spasmodically out of the crate, flashing and sparking.
Jamie went cold all over and his spine was tickled by a million icy needles. He gasped as the glittering giant strode forward trailing shreds of its chrysalis and breathing with a nightmarish mechanical rasp. He turned to the Doctor as the overwhelming noise quickly died away and only the monster's heavy rhythmic breath disturbed the awed silence.
'Cybermen...!' he whispered, a tremor of disgust rippling through him as he recalled his brief encounter in the freight wagon.
With the Brigadier absent on an emergency visit to the Ministry of Defence, Zoe and Isobel were left in the Operations Room chatting to Captain Turner, while the other personnel absorbed themselves in their Taskforce duties.
'So what do you think will happen now?' asked Zoe.
'Well, it's not really a UNIT matter now,' Turner explained, 'so we'll probably hand it all over to the police.'
Isobel looked disappointed. 'Pity, I could've got some great pictures and made a bomb selling them to Fleet Street,' she brooded.
Turner shot her a flirtatious glance. 'Perhaps you'd allow me to make up for it by buying you dinner,' he suggested gallantly, eyeing Isobel's long shapely legs appreciatively.
Isobel looked delighted. 'Why not? Are you stinking rich or something?' she teased.
Turner laughed. 'Not on a Captain's pay, I'm not, but money isn't everything you know.'
Isobel considered his dark, handsome features. 'No, perhaps it isn't,' she agreed.
At that moment the door opened and Sergeant Walters brought in Jamie and the Doctor. They looked tired and drawn.
'What happened?' asked Zoe, eagerly running to meet them.
Jamie put his arm round her shoulder. 'Some auld friends of ours are back,' he murmured.
Slightly miffed by Turner's attentions to Isobel, Zoe put her arm affectionately round Jamie's waist. 'Oh, really?' she grinned. 'Who?'
'The Cybermen.'
Zoe looked appalled.
'I'm afraid there's no doubt about it,' the Doctor confirmed gloomily. 'I suspected as much some time ago, but I didn't want to cause unnecessary alarm, my dear.'
'What on earth are Cybermen?' demanded Isobel.
'Cybermen are inhuman killers from another galaxy,' the Doctor informed her gravely, sipping some leftover cold tea with a preoccupied air.
Captain Turner floundered out of his depth. 'You mean they're... well, they're from another world, Doctor?'
'That must have been their spacecraft on the other side of the Moon,' Zoe confided to Jamie.
Isobel giggled nervously. 'What exactly are they? Little green men?'
Only Turner smiled with her.
'I'm serious,' Zoe protested. 'We've met them before. They're fiendish, sadistic monsters.'
'Well... where exactly are they now?' Turner demanded, realising that the three intrepid strangers were in deadly earnest.
'They are being stockpiled at Vaughn's London headquarters,' replied the Doctor. 'There could be thousands of them.' He sat down, shaking his head.
'So Vaughn must be working with the Cyber Leaders...' Zoe concluded almost inaudibly.
The Doctor sighed and nibbled at a curled up sandwich. 'That deep-space communications installation Jamie and I spotted is no doubt being used to guide and communicate with a Cyber Fleet,' he told them.
Turner whistled. 'So that's what all those UFO things were... But there's been hundreds of sightings!' he breathed.
Isobel looked shocked. She turned to the Doctor anxiously. 'How do you think my uncle is involved in all this?' she asked.
'I don't know yet, my dear,' said the Doctor gently. He turned sharply to the Captain and asked him where the Brigadier was.
Turner told him. 'I'd better get onto him immediately at the MOD and give him your news,' he added breathlessly.
The Doctor held up a restraining hand. 'Wait a moment, Captain. I believe that your people discovered that visitors to Vaughn's headquarters seemed somehow different afterwards?'
'You think the Cybermen are controlling them?' suggested Zoe.
'Controlling them?' Turned echoed uneasily.
Zoe explained that the Cybermen were able to exert control over human minds but that the victims could appear to be almost normal.
'Who is the Brigadier immediately responsible to?' the Doctor inquired urgently.
'To Major-General Routledge, Doctor. He's with him now.'
The Doctor sprang to his feet as if galvanised into activity. 'Contact the Brigadier at once!' he cried. 'We must warn him!'
The Brigadier was pacing angrily round and round Routledge's dark and musty office, slapping his brown leather gloves against his leg, his eyes flashing with indignation.
'No cause for alarm!' he shouted scornfully. 'Billy, do you realise that they actually took potshots at a UNIT helicopter?'
Routledge leaned on his desk, smiling wryly. 'Alistair, your chaps were trespassing over their restricted area. What do you expect?'
'Oh, for heaven's sake, Billy, if Vaughn can't trust my mob then he must have a skeleton in the cupboard.'
The Major-General looked up sharply at this, his green eyes showing a momentary fear. 'I'm sorry. There is no action I can authorise,' he declared in an official tone.
Lethbridge-Stewart forced himself to calm down. 'Look, I know Vaughn's a powerful chap but there should at least be a discreet inquiry into his organisation,' he proposed reasonably.
Routledge started to blink rapidly. He mopped his forehead with a spotted handkerchie
f and cleared his throat awkwardly. 'It isn't our province,' he stalled, loosening his club tie and undoing his top shirt button.
'Then whose damned province is it?'
Routledge waved his hands about ineffectually. 'All you've given me is vague reports, Alistair. No conclusive evidence.'
This was too much for Lethbridge-Stewart. 'No evidence?' he shouted incredulously. 'What do you need, Billy? Corpses? Wreckage?' He stopped, noticing that a sickly pallor had crept over Routledge's face. 'What's the matter, Billy? Are you all right, old chap?' he asked with sincere concern.
Routledge dabbed at his glistening brow again. 'Course I am... It's nothing...' he mumbled. 'Probably all a terrible misunderstanding. Leave it with me, Alistair. I'll talk to the Home Office.'
The Brigadier waved his gloves dismissively. 'Talk's no good. I want immediate action, Billy.'
Routledge clutched at his temples and shook visibly. 'Impossible!' he shouted adamantly.
The Brigadier leaned across the desk, his eyes narrowing suspiciously. 'What sort of a hold has Vaughn got over you?' he murmured ominously.
For a few minutes Routledge remained silent, slumped awkwardly in his chair. Then he suddenly sprang up. 'Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, your forces will take no action whatsoever without my personal authorisation!' he hissed dangerously. 'That is an order.'
Taken aback by this abrupt transformation, the Brigadier stood to attention. 'General Routledge, you can override my authority but not that of UNIT Central Command, sir,' he declared through clenched teeth. 'I shall telex a full report to Field-Marshal Thatcher in Geneva and act according to his instructions. Good day, sir.'
With that, he turned smartly on his heel and strode out, jamming his cap firmly on his head.
Routledge sank shakily into his chair. After a while he touched a button on the videophone and the neat secretary appeared on the screen.
'Yes, General?'
With a supreme effort, Routledge pulled himself together. 'Get me International Electromatix Head-quarters. Mr Vaughn. Top priority scramble...' he snapped, struggling to preserve his composure.
