Doctor Who: Time and the Rani (2 page)

This was Professor Albert Einstein: the originator of the theory of relativity and father of nuclear physics.

The Rani had returned to Earth in her TARDIS, plucked him out of Time and transported him to Lakertya, to the arcade, where his anaesthetised form was now being installed in the eleventh cabinet.

'The collar, Beyus!'

Beyus clamped a polyethylene collar about Einstein's neck. His forehead puckering with distaste, he plugged first a cable and then a transparent tube into the collar.

Sam's clumsy efforts at assisting him hindered rather than helped.

'Stop dithering!' the Rani snapped.

'I - I don't want to harm him -'

Impatiently, the Rani thrust the timid Sarn aside. 'Seal it and label it,' she told Beyus.

He closed the glass front then stood, artlessly looking at the Rani.

'What're you waiting for?' she asked.

'You've not given me the name for the label.'

'Einstein.' The voice was cutting. 'Such insolence could cost your people dearly, Beyus.'

The threat alarmed the timorous Sarn. 'I am sure Beyus did not mean to appear insolent. He . . . would . . . never do . . . that. . .' Her brave defence faltered under the Rani's cold appraisal.

'I find your incompetence more than enough without listening to your puerile opinions.'

'Then why not let Sarn go? You've got me as hostage. You don't need her.' He laid a comforting arm about the young female's cowering shoulders.

'I
shall decide my needs. They, unfortunately, require the use of Lakertyans.'

'You've left me with no illusions about the hatred you hold for us.'

'Hatred? Another fantasy. I've no feelings one way or the other. Outside my experiments, you have absolutely no significance.'

'Your detachment is difficult to understand.'

'All you need understand is that these specimens are geniuses!' She began strolling the length of the cabinets. Each was labelled. The names
Louis Pasteur
and
Charles
Darwin
were alongside those of less familiar luminaries culled from galaxies throughout the Universe:
Za Panato, Ari Centos
and others.

'And if they're not kept in prime condition,' she continued as she checked the dials on the glass fronts, 'you'll have more than the skin of this bungling novice to worry about!'

Shaking with fear, Sam hid behind Beyus who was attending to the tubes and cables looping from the tops of the cabinets. Merged together, they were channelled, via a conduit, into the laboratory and then distributed among the pyramidal machines.

The Rani moved towards the door.

'Have you managed to procure the means to repair your laboratory apparatus?'

'Procure?' The Rani smiled. 'Procured, yes indeed!'

Beyus straightened the plaited black and gold band circling his skull. The joke was incomprehensible but its import was not: the Rani had obviously achieved her objective.

As she entered the lab, that objective was still sleeping on a bench.

The Rani listened to his first heart and then to his second; for Time Lords have two hearts.

In an impassive assessment of his condition she lifted his eyelids to inspect his pupils.

Assured of his continuing unconscious state, she turned her attention to the spherical chamber and punched out a number on a combination lock.

A panel glided open . . .

Palpitating magenta light bathed her haughty features and, attuned to the pulsations was a sinister, pervading throbbing.

The Rani seemed exalted, but the light's influence on the lab was baleful. Even the Doctor's pleasant features appeared misshapen and gargoylish as they were swamped by the sickly purple.

Almost as if he sensed the evil atmosphere, he groaned and stirred. Immediately alerted, the Rani shut the panel, cutting off the purple light, and crossed over to him.

On the knife-edge of consciousness, he blinked. 'Ah, that was a nice nap.' He struggled from the bench. 'Down to business. I'm a bit worried about the temporal flicker in Sector Thirteen; there's a bicentennial refit to book in for the TARDIS; must just pop over to Centauri Seven and then perhaps a quick holiday. Right. That all seems quite clear. Just three small points - where am I? . . . Who am I?' Trying to unscramble his muddled wits, he registered the Rani's presence: 'And who are you?

. . . You! The Rani!'

He shied away from her, but in his weakened condition his movements were uncoordinated.

Tottering, he grabbed a stool.

'Stay back! Stay back!'

Flourishing the stool with all the majesty of his supposed six-feet height, he overreached himself and toppled - all five-feet-six of him - against the machine.

‘This is idiotic. You'll injure yourself,' she said.

'Why should you care? Complete indifference to the welfare of others is your hallmark.' A true summation of the Rani's usual attitude. 'Since you were exiled from Gallifrey, you've had nothing but contempt for all Time Lords.' Gallifrey was the home of the Time Lords.

'My contempt started before my exile.'

'Then why the solicitude? What is it you want from me? And where's Mel?' He peered warily about, trying to acclimatise. In an attempt to rise, he reeled into a monitor. 'I can't think . . . everything's jumbled.'

'You're still concussed -'

'Where's Mel?'

The ferocity of the demand punctured the Rani's charade of compassion. 'She's perfectly safe. But how long that remains so depends on you!'

After a wild, pointless parry with the stool, he jabbed at the buttons displayed beneath the monitor screen. 'You'll be up to something. Perhaps I'll get the answer from this.'

The screen brightened, showing a planet being orbited by a dark, forbidding asteroid.

A series of calculations were tabulated at the base of the screen.

'You won't recognise the planet. It's Lakertya. And there's no evidence it's ever been graced by your meddling presence!'

'And you're trying to divert me. So the answer is on here.' He pondered the calculations. 'Quarks . . . one up . . . one down . . . one Strange Matter!' Genuinely shocked, he glared bleakly at the Rani. 'That asteroid's composed of Strange Matter!

What monstrous experiment are you dabbling in now?'

'I didn't go to the trouble of bringing you here to discuss the ethics of my work.' Her calm was juxtaposed with the Doctor's agitation.

'Ethics! Don't be a hypocrite! Your past is littered with the mutilated results of unethical experiments.'

'Save the cant! I had all I could take of that in our university days.' The Rani and the Doctor had attended the same university as students: she specialised in neurochemistry, he in thermodynamics. It was his tutored expertise she needed, but she chose not to reveal the truth yet. 'Am I expected to abandon my research because of the side-effects on inferior species?' Selecting a syringe from a rack, she squirted a drop from its needle, ensuring it was ready for use. 'Are you prepared to abandon walking in the fields lest you squash an insect underfoot?' She advanced on the Doctor, syringe to the fore.

Her icy logic found no echo in the Doctor. 'Stay away from me! Whatever you've brought me here for, I'm having no part of! None at all!'

Having disposed of the stool while operating the computer screen, his only defence was his umbrella which had been brought from the TARDIS. Brandishing it like a rapier, he floundered towards the arcade door, pushing it wide in his bid for escape -

to be confronted by Beyus and Sarn.

The suddenness of the encounter, the surprise at the unusual appearance of the golden-maned Lakertyans, caused him to recoil. Unfortunately, his trousers being far too long, his heel got entangled in the overlapping hem and tripped him!

Despite the fact that he was to Sarn a weird alien, the gentle Lakertyan automatically went to his aid.

'Leave him there!' the Rani ordered.

'He may be hurt.'

Beyus, older and wiser, realised the Rani would brook no disobedience. 'Sam, don't interfere!'

However, ignoring them both, Sarn assisted the Doctor to his feet. Off balance, he staggered towards the crystal tank.

Savagely, the Rani, syringe at the ready, elbowed Sarn aside, sending her spinning across the lab. 'That's the last time you'll ever interfere!' The finality in her voice left neither Sarn nor Beyus in any doubt that the young Lakertyan's life was in jeopardy.

'Stay away from me or I'll smash this!' The Doctor rapped the crystal tank with the ferrule of his umbrella. 'I'll smash it to pieces!' The umbrella was clutched, ready to be wielded like an axe.

'Are you willing to sacrifice your companion as well?' asked the Rani coolly, implying that she held Mel in custody.

The Doctor hesitated, but even so he was firm in his reply. 'Yes. Both of us if need be. Fraternising with you could put more than just the two of us at risk!' He was referring to the awesome power inherent in the Strange Matter asteroid.

'Oh, spare me the high-minded moralising!'

'Spare the rod and spoil the broth.' The Doctor stopped, confused. ‘I mean, spoil the-'

'And I can do without your feeble attempts at humour.'

Feeble it may have been, but it was no attempt at humour. The Doctor was genuinely mixed up.

The exchange, though, did provide sufficient diversion for Sarn to slip surreptitiously through the exit leading to the outside.

'Urak!' The Rani's concentration was entirely on the Doctor. 'Urak! Get in here!'

Held in an oily, hair-matted claw, a silver-tubed gun jutted from the arcade.

A click.

From the sleek barrel in a shower of sparks came a wispy, electronic net. With devastating accuracy, it hovered above the Doctor . . . then floated down . . .

Shrouded in the glittering web, the Doctor fell to the lab floor.

Stunned.

Once again at the Rani's mercy.

3

With fleeting glances to check whether she was being pursued, Sarn fled along a rutted path bisecting the hinterland beyond the Rani's laboratory complex.

In her panic, she failed to seek the easiest route, stumbling over loose shale despite her lizardlike sure-footedness. But grazed and bruised ankles could not stop Sarn.

She knew from grim experience that the only hope of avoiding death was to hide from the Rani.

A warning light flashed in the lab, and a siren began to wail.

'The female Sarn . . . has escaped . . . Mistress Rani . . .' Urak's voice was low-pitched and resonant, with exaggerated emphasis on the hard 't', 'd', and V

consonants. The cadence, too, had an odd peculiarity: a pause after every three or four beats.

The Rani cast an irritated look at the stunned Doctor who was again lying on the bench: his tomfoolery had precipitated this situation!

'She won't get far!'

Nor had she. Lack of stamina was slowing Sarn and her distress had escalated. Not only did the windswept path afford scant protection, but the caterwauling of the siren primed her fear: the hunt was on in earnest.

The wail of the siren perturbed Ikona too. Unaware of its cause, or that he was heading towards the absconding Sarn, he wended through monoliths of jagged granite, the insensible Mel humped over his shoulder.

Gazing about for cover, he failed to detect that Mel was beginning to regain her faculties. Her sudden resistance threw him off-balance. Kicking and pummelling, she managed to break free.

Benefiting from her superb fitness, Mel quickly outstripped Ikona. Haring round a bend, she came to an abrupt halt.

So did Sarn.

Mel's physical appearance was similar to the Rani's!

Hissing with horror, Sarn scampered from the path.

Her shin hit a trip-wire, triggering a tremendous
whoosh!
Dust and gravel exploded skywards, temporarily blurring the golden figure.

When the dust settled, a huge, plastic, opaque bubble had formed about Sarn, imprisoning her. Attached to it, like a tumour, was a bulging metal plate. A jet of stream issued from its underside.

For a brief moment Sarn could be seen crouched inside - then the bubble began to spin . . . and spin. . . until, velocity surging, it shot forward, rolling faster and faster, out of control. Spinning from the path - it crashed into a craggy rock.

At the instant of impact, an incandescent, glowing heat spread from the metal plate, engulfing the bubble and its captive.

Illuminated by the white heat, Mel was forced to shield her face and avert her gaze.

When, as the heat abated, she dared to look, Ikona was alongside her.

But he paid Mel no heed.

His steps faltering, brows drawn in anguish, he continued past her to where the explosion had taken place.

All that remained of his young compatriot was an ivory skeleton.

On a monitor screen in the lab, a diminishing blob glowed in a section of the superimposed grid informing the Rani that a security device had been detonated.

'See the trap is reset,' she said to Urak.

'Certainly . . .' came the obsequious reply. 'Your powers are . . . truly wondrous. . .

Mistress Rani. . .'

Flicking off the monitor screen, she collected the high-pressure syringe and applied it to the still-stunned Doctor's wrist.

'What are you . . . doing, Mistress?'

From Urak's elliptical quadview, the Rani's actions, the door to the arcade, the panel of the spherical chamber and the exit to the grounds were all visible at once. As she spoke, the latter three aspects were blanked out and only the Rani's image remained.

'Making certain he suffers a healthy dose of amnesia when he wakes.'

'What is it . . . you do not . . . want him to . . . remember?'

'That doesn't concern you. Go and fetch the girl.'

'I did not mean . . .to offend, Mis . . . tress. If I. . . seek knowledge, it... is only to . . .

benefit from . . . your great and . . . wonderful wisdom -'