Doctor Who: Ribos Operation (12 page)

The Shrieves had surrounded the Concourse in the steadily
growing daylight, and in the middle of the square the Seeker
was swaying slowly from side to side uttering a long,
incomprehensible chant with the bones pressed against her
temples. The Captain of the Shrievalty waited nearby, the fur of
his helmet streaming in the relentless icy wind. In the shadows
under the colonnade the Graff Vynda Ka and Sholakh were
watching impatiently.

Eventually the Seeker squatted on her haunches and sank
into a deep trance.

‘Our forces have established concealed positions covering all
exits, Highness. We are in control of the entire area,’ Sholakh
murmured. ‘No one will escape.’

The Graff nodded, his face an expressionless mask with
hooded eyes and thinly compressed Lips. ‘No one,’ he echoed,
his thick gauntlets creaking as he twisted them slowly in his pale,
blue-veined hands.

As the Doctor, Romana and Garron approached the Concourse,
K9 suddenly halted them with a brisk warning: ‘Hostile presence
ahead—nineteen point five metres.’

The Doctor went cautiously to the corner of the alleyway
and immediately returned. ‘The Graff’s Guard’s are covering the
entrance,’ he whispered.

Garron said he knew another way into the square round the
back of the arcade and squeezed himself along a narrow gully to
reconnoitre.

As soon as he had gone, Romana steeled herself for yet
another skirmish with the Doctor while they waited behind a
thick buttress.

‘The Relic Chamber is no doubt unguarded, Doctor,’ she
murmured, trying to sound as reasonable as possible. ‘Therefore
we should take advantage of this distraction to retrieve the
Segment.’ To her surprise the Doctor did not snap at her or
scowl. Instead he grinned.

‘But the Segment is not in the Relic Chamber,’ he explained.

Romana looked stunned. ‘But the Crown of Ribos is...’ she
began, pulling the Locatormutor Core from her robe.

The Doctor took the Core and switched it on. ‘Look,’ he said
tuning the signal, ‘there, you see?’

Romana stared at the Core dumbfounded. ‘But... it’s
pointing to the other side of the city,’ she exclaimed.

‘Precisely my dear; it is pointing to our friend, Unstoffe; and
more precisely still, to the lump of Jethryk he is carrying,’ the
Doctor smiled.

‘The Jethryk? But I thought...’ Romana went suddenly
quiet—inwardly furious at her lack of perception.

The Doctor switched off the Core. ‘I’m surprised you didn’t
realise it yourself—bright girl like you,’ he grinned. ‘I did warn
you about getting led up the garden path...’

‘But what made you realise it was the Jethryk?’ Romana
gasped admiringly.

After glancing warily about, the Doctor quickly explained:
‘You remember we computed two different bearings on the
location of the Segment in the TARDIS? Obviously the Segment
was moved a considerable distance in between those two
readings. Now the Crown of Ribos is never moved—never even
touched—whereas the Jethryk was brought to Ribos by Garron
shortly before we ourselves arrived. Simple really.’

Just then Garron came scrambling back along the gully. ‘All
clear this way,’ he panted.

‘Excellent,’ the Doctor answered. ‘By the way, your friend
Unstoffe got your message.’

How do you know that?’ Garron exclaimed.

The Doctor flourished the Locatormutor. ‘This little gadget
tells us where the Jethryk is and its pointing way over there...’

‘Unstoffe has the Jethryk!’ Garron said, with a side-long look
at the Doctor and then at the Core he was waving.

‘Exactly. Follow me, gang,’ the Doctor cried diving eagerly
into the gully.

Garron hurried after him side by side with Romana, trying
hard to conceal his eager fascination with the Locatormutor
from the sharp eyes of the unfriendly young female. He did not
know who these two strangers were, but he was determined to
make good use of them if he could in order to get his hands on
the precious nugget first...

For some time the Graff Vynda Ka had been stamping about
with cold and irritation under the arcade when at last the Seeker
rose on her spindly legs, whirled around and cast her two bones
onto the paving. Then she bent over them muttering to herself.

‘He has gone,’ she suddenly cried with a malicious grin at
the watching Shrieves.

The Captain strode forward. ‘Gone?’ he shouted, glancing
round the Concourse. ‘Impossible. My Shrieves are positioned at
all possible exits.’

The Seeker gathered up her bones and closed her eyes,
shutting out all protests. ‘He is no longer in this place. The one
you seek is in the Catacombs,’ she croaked hoarsely.

The Captain stood threateningly over the old crone but she
sat back on her haunches shaking her frizzled head, her mouth
agape in a toothless hole and her eyes narrowed into bright
green slits.

Closely followed by Sholakh, the Graff marched over to the
Captain. ‘You assured me the thief would be taken,’ he snarled
kicking the squatting priestess. ‘Get this rotting hag to sniff him
out at once.’

The Captain shook his head. ‘The thief has taken refuge in
the Catacombs, sir. He will die there. The matter is ended,’ he
said calmly, turning to dismiss the search party.

The Graff’s nostrils began to flare and his face to twitch
violently. ‘It is not ended,’ he barked. ‘He has my gold.’

The Captain met his challenging stare with unruffled
firmness. ‘My Shrieves will not go into the Catacombs after your
gold,’ he retorted.

‘Why not? What are these Catacombs?’ Sholakh demanded.

‘An ancient labyrinth beneath the city,’ answered the
Captain. ‘The home of the long-dead and of the Ice Gods. No
one who has ventured beyond the Hall of the Dead has ever
returned.’

‘My Guards are made of sterner stuff,’ Sholakh snorted,
‘they are not afraid.’

The Captain looked hard at Sholakh. ‘Your Guards?’ he
murmured. ‘But you are men of business.’

At once the Graff stepped in with a placatory smile. ‘Of
course, Captain. They are members of a special unit recently
formed in the Upper Provinces for the protection of the trading
routes.’

‘Then let them protect your gold, sir,’ retorted the Captain,
turning on his heel and walking brusquely away.

The Graff went after him. Barely able to contain his
outraged anger, he struggled to remain calm. ‘You can direct us
to these... these Catacombs, Captain?’ he requested.

The Captain considered a moment. ‘Life is more precious
than gold,’ he said quietly. Beside him the Seeker was rocking
back and forth. Suddenly she uttered a dry cackle and catching
the Captain’s eye she nodded malevolently.

The Captain shrugged. ‘Very well, if you are determined to
go, sir,’ he agreed reluctantly. ‘But I warn you—none of you will
ever return.’

The Seeker leapt to her feet and beckoned them to follow,
gesticulating and chuckling to herself as she led the way eagerly
out of the Concourse and away from the Citadel towards a
remote and abandoned part of the city.

With K9 whirring along just ahead of them, the Doctor, Romana
and Garron hurried down the icy slope towards the entrance to
the Hall of the Dead. The Locatormutor Core was bleeping
steadily in the Doctor’s hands, indicating the whereabouts of
Unstoffe and the nugget of Jethryk.

‘He can’t be very far ahead now,’ the Doctor muttered as the
signal became gradually faster and faster. Cautiously they
entered the vast necropolis, the massive door swinging shut
behind them with shrieking hinges. As K9 lit the way between
the rows of tiered galleries with his photon radiaprobe throwing
up great fluttering shadows, the Doctor clambered nimbly about,
shining his pocket torch into the gaping rectangular tombs.

‘Fascinating...’ he murmered, surveying the crumbling
skeletons and tattered shrouds of the long-dead occupants.
‘Quite extraordinary.’

Romana shrank against Garron’s perspiring bulk as several
skulls suddenly clattered down from their resting places and
rolled grotesquely about on the paving before coming to rest at
her feet.

‘Your young associate certainly has a good nose for hiding
places,’ the Doctor remarked to Garron as he swung himself
back down to the ground and switched on the Locatormutor
again.

The signals were distinctly weaker. ‘Come along, we must
catch up at once,’ Romana said, stepping gingerly over the skulls
and looking daggers in the Doctor’s direction.

‘Took the words right out of my mouth, my dear,’ the
Doctor cried, adjusting the signal and then setting off along a
side-turning with K9 buzzing along beside him. Romana and
Garron hurried co catch up.

Constantly changing direction at the endless junctions
between the galleries, they followed the indications given by the
monotonously bleeping Core deeper and deeper into the
mausoleum. Garron scarcely took his eyes off the strangely
glowing device carried by the Doctor, but from time to time he
glanced furtively at his two companions as if he were hatching
some crafty plot at the back of his devious mind.

Suddenly K9 stopped dead, antennae furiously revolving.
‘Sentient life forms approaching,’ he announced curdy.

‘Approaching?’ the Doctor queried, checking the Core signal.

‘Affirmative, master,’ K9 declared. ‘Ninety metres.. from the
rear.’

The Doctor spun round and shone his torch back along the
gully they were following. ‘Well, if you say so, K9,’ he shrugged.

‘Eighty-three metres and closing...’ the robot rapped out.
‘Optimum counter-action immediate concealment in adjacent
cavities.’

The Doctor glanced quickly round. ‘I’ve had a much better
idea,’ he said, heaving K9 into the nearest ground-level tomb
and motioning Romana and Garron into a neighbouring one.
Then he clambered up into one of the niches above them and
settled his large awkward frame down beside the shrouded
skeleton as best he could.

They huddled in the airless, dusty recesses and lay utterly
still, scarcely daring to breathe. They heard the heavy tramp of
marching boots and the sinister clatter of armour advancing
steadily through the Hall of the Dead towards them. The dark
vault above was slashed by powerful torchbeams and echoed
with urgent shouts.

Sholakh halted his Levithian Guards at the fallen skulls and
ordered a thorough search of the surrounding galleries. But the
Graff Vynda Ka swept on ahead. ‘Do not waste time here,’ he
cried. ‘The thief will have gone deeper than this.’

Shortly afterwards the Graff’s search-party entered the
section where the Doctor and the others were hidden, and
surged along the gully, their torches prying irresistibly into
every nook and cranny. As they drew rapidly closer the Doctor
tried frantically to attract K9’s attention, but without success.
Easing himself to the edge of the stone pallet, he cautiously
peered over and called his mechanical pet as loudly as he dared.
Still there was no reaction from K9.

The Doctor ducked back just in time as the bristling torch
beams played over the gallery. Unfortunately his shoulder
nudged the rotten shroud beside him and it split open, releasing
the gaping white skull to topple over the edge and smash into
smithereens on the floor of the gully below him.

‘We have him. Charge weapons,’ Sholakh barked.

The Doctor froze in his cramped niche as the Guards
primed their laser-spears with an echoing whine. Then during
the unbearable silence which followed, he felt about in his
overflowing pockets for the dog whistle. After a brief and
desperate search he found it, but before he could manoeuvre the
tiny object to his lips there was a vicious sizzling sound, and
razor sharp fragments of stone began to fly in all directions as
the laser spears raked the rows of tombs with methodical
efficiency from end to end.

While the jagged masonry sliced through the air around
them, the Doctor and his companions suddenly made out
another sound above the hiss and whine of the lasers: a series of
harsh gurgling roars which shook the huge mausoleum like an
earthquake. The bombardment ceased abruptly, and they heard
Sholakh screaming orders to his Levithians as a colossal
Shrivenzale appeared at the far end of the gully in the direction
of the Catacombs.

The Guards stared in disbelief at the cascades of brilliant
sparks spraying from the creature’s scrabbling claws and
serrated tail, lashing the splintered stonework. They took cover
among the branching galleries, hurriedly priming their weapons
as the Shrivenzale crawled angrily towards them. It tossed and
reared in the bright torchlight roaring with nain as burst after
deadly burst ripped into its thickly scaled body and its armoured
hide began to melt and split. But still it dragged itself towards its
attackers, sending them scrambling into fresh cover as it bore
down on them.

Sholakh rallied his scattered forces in a side gallery and
ordered a ceasefire. All the torches were switched off and the
Levithians waited in silence.

Gradually the Shrivenzale’s monstrous bellowing subsided.
The Doctor lay motionless in his niche, listening to the laboured
breathing of the wounded creature only a few metres away from
him as it hesitated in the darkness, sniffing the air suspiciously.
To his immense relief he heard the beast slowly dragging its
massive bulk round, and the crumbling galleries shuddered as it
began to retreat towards the Catacombs.

As the Shrivenzale lumbered back to its lair, the Graff Vynda
Ka and Sholakh listened until its raucous gasping had died away.
Then Sholakh snapped on his torch and swept it over the
confusing prospect of identical junctions and tiers of graves.

‘We must go on until we find him,’ the Graff rapped,
shining his own lamp directly into his Commander’s frowning
face. ‘Well, Sholakh? Surely that creature has not taken away
your courage?’