Doctor Who and the Auton Invasion

by Terrance Dicks

  ‘Steady on, Brigadier,’ protested Doctor Henderson. ‘He’s still very weak, you know.’

  But the Brigadier ignored him. ‘Look here, my man, can you hear me? Who are you?’

  The man opened his eyes indignantly. ‘Don’t be silly, my dear chap. You know who I am. I’m the Doctor.’

  ‘You most certainly are not!’

  ‘Come, come now, old chap. Remember the Yeti? And the Cybermen? You can’t have forgotten already.’ And struggling to a sitting position, the Doctor looked at his old friend in astonishment. ‘Don’t you recognise me?’ he asked plaintively.

  ‘I am quite positive that we have never met before.’

  The Doctor passed his hand over his face in puzzlement. It didn’t feel right. ‘Oh dear,’ he said. ‘You really are sure? I can’t have changed that much.’ He seemed to brace himself, then asked, ‘I wonder if I might borrow a mirror?’

  At a nod from the Brigadier, Henderson produced a mirror from the bedside locker and handed it over. The Doctor looked into it. The face of a stranger was looking back at him.

  The Doctor’s mind reeled under the sudden shock. Fragments of the recent past flashed disjointedly before his eyes. His capture by the Time Lords. The trial. The faces of Jamie and Zoe as they said goodbye. The Doctor looked round him wildly. He saw the young army officer, the girl, the doctor, Lethbridge-Stewart peering at him suspiciously. Suddenly their faces began to spin round him, like the faces they’d offered him to choose from at the trial. He made an unsuccessful attempt to stand up, then collapsed backwards upon the bed.

  The Brigadier made an attempt to re-awaken him, but Henderson stepped firmly between them.

  ‘Whoever or whatever this man is, Brigadier, he’s still my patient. He’s tired and weak and he needs rest.’

  The Brigadier rubbed his chin. ‘Extraordinary business. Quite extraordinary.’ He came to a decision. ‘When will this man be well enough to travel?’

  Henderson shrugged. ‘Hard to say at the moment.’

  The Brigadier turned to Munro. ‘As soon as he’s well enough, I want him transferred to the sick-bay at UNIT H.Q. Meanwhile, carry on with the search!’

  ‘Very good, sir,’ said Munro. They moved away from the bed.

  ‘And keep that police box under guard. I’ll send a lorry with some lifting tackle down to bring it back to H.Q.’ The Brigadier looked again at the man on the bed and shook his head. ‘I don’t know why this chap should choose to impersonate the Doctor. But I intend to find out.’

  ‘Er – yes, sir. Quite, sir,’ said Munro, who was now completely baffled.

  The Brigadier turned to the equally puzzled Liz. ‘My apologies, Miss Shaw, we seem to have had a wasted journey. Doctor Henderson, is there another way out of this building?’

  Henderson looked up from his patient. ‘Turn left instead of right and you can get out through the kitchens.’

  ‘Thank you, Doctor Henderson. I’ll be in touch. Miss Shaw, Captain Munro.’ The Brigadier strode briskly from the room, Liz and Munro following. Liz didn’t resent the brusqueness of his tone. She sensed just how disappointed the Brigadier had been by his failure to meet his old friend, the Doctor.

  In the entrance hall of the hospital, things were very much calmer. Most of the pressmen had gone, accepting the Brigadier’s statement and making the best of it. Mislaid Government space equipment wasn’t as good a story as a monster from Mars, but it was better than nothing. Only Wagstaffe was still hanging about and he wasn’t quite sure himself why he bothered.

  Suddenly he heard the sound of a car. He reached the hospital steps just in time to see the UNIT car drawing away. If the Brigadier’s got nothing to hide, why is he sneaking out the back way, thought Wagstaffe irritably. He wandered across to the door to Casualty, where Mullins was still on guard. ‘Any chance of a word with Doctor Henderson?’

  Mullins shook his head. ‘No use asking me. You can wait if you like.’

  ‘Never mind. I’ll ring the office and then get back.’ He was moving towards the ’phone when Mullins’ voice stopped him.

  ‘Somebody’s there. Been there ages, he has.’

  Wagstaffe looked across to the booth. Beneath the hood he could see the figure of a man standing motionless.

  ‘Know who he is, do you?’ asked Mullins. ‘Funny bloke. Eyes that go right through you.’

  Wagstaffe shook his head. ‘Never seen him before. He’s not one of the regular boys. You say he’s been there quite a while?’

  Mullins nodded. ‘Ever since that Brigadier came through.’

  Wagstaffe moved towards the ’phone booth. ‘Better winkle him out, then, hadn’t we?’

  ‘Rather you than me,’ said Mullins.

  Wagstaffe crossed to the booth and tapped his arm.

  ‘Think you could get a move on, old chap?’ he said pleasantly. ‘You see I’ve got a rather urgent story to ’phone in and…’

  His voice tailed away as the man in the booth swung round on him. Like Mullins before him, Wagstaffe recoiled from the fierce impact of those glaring eyes. He tried to go on.

  ‘I mean, you have been in there quite a while and…’ The man in the booth brushed past him, walked across the entrance hall and disappeared through the exit doors.

  Wagstaffe looked at the telephone. It was still on its rest. He hadn’t been using the ’phone at all, he thought. All that time he had just been standing there. Like a waxwork.

  ‘Shoes,’ said the Doctor feebly. ‘It’s most important. Must have my shoes.’

  The nurse smiled placidly as she took his pulse.

  ‘I’ve already told you,’ she said, as if to a child, ‘you don’t need your shoes because you’re not going anywhere.’

  That’s all you know, thought the Doctor to himself. He slumped back on the pillows as Doctor Henderson entered.

  ‘How is he, nurse?’

  ‘He seems well enough, Doctor. But his pulse is pretty peculiar.’ She handed Henderson the graph. He studied it gloomily.

  ‘Ten a minute! Still, for all we know that might be normal for him. Heartbeat?’

  ‘Strong and steady, sir. Both of them.’

  Henderson sighed and bent over the Doctor. He spoke with professional cheerfulness. ‘Hullo, old chap. How are we feeling now?’

  ‘Shoes,’ said the Doctor again.

  Henderson turned to the nurse. ‘Poor chap’s mind seems to be wandering.’

  ‘He seems to be worried about his shoes. I think he believes they’ve been stolen.’

  ‘Well, if he’s worried about them, he’d better have ’em. Might as well humour the poor fellow.’

  The nurse fished under the bed and produced a rather battered pair of elastic-sided boots. Immediately, the Doctor reached forward, snatched them from her and clasped them protectively to his chest. He sank back on the bed, a blissful smile on his face, and seemed to go to sleep.

  Henderson gave him a worried look. ‘I wonder if there’s any brain damage. I’ll run some tests on him as soon as he comes out of it.’

  The nurse looked at her peculiar patient. ‘He’s certainly been acting very erratically.’

  Henderson frowned. ‘Think I’ll test his blood pressure while I’m here. Get the apparatus, will you please, nurse?’

  As the nurse left the room Henderson checked the charts on the end of the Doctor’s bed, shaking his head in sheer disbelief. How could you treat a patient whose anatomy seemed to contradict all the known laws of medicine? Those incredible X-rays!

  On the bed, the Doctor opened his eyes cautiously. Henderson, brooding over the papers, was turned away from him. The Doctor up-ended his shoes, first one, then the other. From the second there dropped a key. With a sigh of relief, the Doctor closed his eyes, the key clasped tightly in his hand.

  For a minute or two the little room was silent. The Doctor seemed to doze. Henderson was immersed in the charts. Neither of them seemed to notice when two men, one of them pushing a wheel-chair, slipped silently into the room.r />
  Henderson, vaguely aware that someone was there, glanced up absently, expecting to see his returning nurse. He drew back in horror at the sight of a giant figure looming over him. He opened his mouth to shout, but an enormous hand swatted him to the floor as easily as if he had been a fly. A second before he sank into unconsciousness, Doctor Henderson noticed something peculiarly horrible about that hand. It was completely smooth and white, and there were no fingernails.

  The two huge figures moved swiftly and efficiently. The Doctor was hoisted effortlessly into the wheel-chair. Surgical tape was slapped as a gag over his mouth. A blanket from the bed was bundled round his night-shirted form and he was wheeled from the room. The entire kidnapping had taken place in a matter of seconds. On the floor, Henderson groaned and stirred, struggling slowly to his feet. Feebly he shouted for help.

  The two massive figures pushed the wheel-chair with its silent burden along the corridor. By a side door a man stood waiting. He was immaculately dressed, with handsome regular features. He stood completely still, like a waxwork. The only alive thing about him was his fiercely glowing, burning eyes.

  As the two giants with the wheel-chair appeared, he opened a small side door leading to a yard. The two men wheeled the chair through the doorway and the third man hurried after them into the hospital yard.

  The little party moved swiftly and silently round the corner. At the top of the steep hospital drive stood a small plain van, the back doors already open. The Doctor in his wheel-chair was pushed rapidly up to the van.

  Suddenly the Doctor sprang into life. Gripping the sides of the wheel-chair, he gave a tremendous shove with both feet against the back of the van. The wheel-chair shot rapidly between the two kidnappers and landed backwards in a hedge. Adroitly the Doctor spun it round, and with another tremendous shove launched himself down the steep hospital drive. Gathering speed, he raced down the drive at a tremendous rate.

  His kidnappers made as if to follow him, then at a sign from their leader leaped into the van. The leader took the wheel and started turning the van in order to pursue the Doctor.

  Doctor Henderson staggered through the hospital foyer, ignoring the astonished receptionist and reeled out onto the steps. He called hoarsely, ‘There they are. Stop them! Stop them!’

  At this precise moment, Captain Munro drove up in a UNIT jeep. He saw Henderson collapsing on the front steps, the Doctor disappearing through the main gates in a wheel-chair, and two very odd looking men clambering into a van driven by a third. The van went off in pursuit of the Doctor.

  Immediately Munro swung the jeep round in a tight circle and set off after the van. Driving one-handed he lugged out his service revolver and tried a few shots at the tyres, but with no luck. Tossing the revolver on the seat, he concentrated on his driving.

  The Doctor meanwhile was whizzing at tremendous speed down the short, steep hill that led to the hospital. He was very much aware of the pursuing van gaining on him rapidly. It was almost upon him when he spotted a gap in the hedge that bordered the hill. A tiny, narrow track led deep into Oxley Woods. The wheel-chair lurched onto its two side wheels and almost overbalanced as the Doctor flung it into a right-angled turn that sent him rocketing down the path.

  The kidnappers’ van skidded to a halt at the head of the narrow track. The two huge, silent men jumped out, obviously intending to follow the Doctor on foot.

  Then behind them they heard the sound of the UNIT jeep coming after them. As if in obedience to some unspoken command, the men jumped in the van, which accelerated off down the road.

  Munro skidded his jeep to a halt at the head of the track. Grabbing his revolver, he shot again at the tyres. Again he missed, and the van disappeared out of sight round the corner of the road. For a moment Munro paused, wondering if he should give chase. He glanced down the little track. A few hundred yards down it he could see the wheel-chair. It lay on its side, one wheel still spinning. In front of the chair there seemed to be a huddled form. Munro decided that recovering the victim was more important than catching the kidnappers, and set off running down the track.

  But when he got to the chair he realised that what he had taken for the Doctor’s body was no more than a pile of blankets. Munro paused, listening. Faintly he could hear movement going away from him deeper into the woods.

  ‘Hey, come back,’ he called. ‘It’s all right, you’re safe now.’

  The Doctor was running at full speed through the tangled woods, ignoring the branches that lashed at his face and body. Totally confused by the sudden flurry of events, there was only one thought in his mind. Like a hunted animal making instinctively for its lair, he wanted desperately to reach the safety of the TARDIS.

  In one hand he clutched the reassuring shape of the little key that he’d hidden in his shoe. With the other he scrabbled ineffectively at the plaster over his mouth. He paused for a second to try to get it off. Then behind him he heard shouting and the distant sounds of pursuit. The Doctor decided that running was more important than talking and resumed his flight. He had no way of telling that his pursuer was Munro, who wanted only to help him.

  On the other side of the woods, Corporal Forbes and his patrol were running too. Forbes had heard the distant sounds of shooting from the hospital and had instinctively led his men in the direction of the trouble. In different parts of the woods, other patrols were converging on the Doctor.

  The young sentry left guarding the TARDIS could hear the noises too. He’d been on duty in this gloomy, sinister forest since early dawn. He was cold, tired, hungry and ready to panic. The crack of the shots from Munro’s revolver had already alarmed him. Now from all round seemed to come shouts and the sound of men crashing through the woods. He spun round nervously from side to side, trying to cover every direction at once.

  Suddenly he caught a glimpse through the trees of a ghostly white figure bearing down upon him. He brought his rifle to his shoulder.

  ‘Halt,’ he called in a cracked voice. ‘Halt or I fire!’

  Hemmed in by the sound of the UNIT patrols moving in all round him, the Doctor suddenly caught a glimpse of the square blue shape of the TARDIS through the trees. Summoning up the last of his strength, the Doctor flung himself towards it in a last desperate sprint. As he burst from the bushes surrounding the clearing, he saw to his horror the soldier with his rifle aimed straight at him. The Doctor tried to shout but the tape was still over his mouth. There was the crack of the rifle shot, a searing pain in his head and then blackness. The Doctor spun round and crumpled to the ground.

  Seconds later Forbes and his patrol reached the clearing.

  ‘I had to shoot, Corp,’ babbled the sentry. ‘He attacked me. Came straight at me!’ Forbes looked at the still figure of the Doctor.

  ‘Attacked you, did he? An unarmed man, in a hospital nightshirt?’

  ‘I challenged him, Corporal, honestly. He didn’t answer.’

  Forbes knelt and examined the Doctor, turning him gently over onto his back. ‘He couldn’t answer. Somebody’s taped his mouth up.’ He looked at the Doctor’s white face. A smear of blood was startlingly red on the forehead. Forbes felt for a pulse in the neck. He could feel nothing.

  Munro ran up to the clearing, saw the group of soldiers gathered round the motionless Doctor.

  ‘What’s happened, Corporal? Is the man all right?’

  Forbes looked up. ‘No sir. I think he’s dead.’

  5

  The Hunting Auton

  Captain Munro paced nervously up and down in the hospital entrance hall, rehearsing what he would say in his coming interview with the Brigadier. He sighed. However you put it, it sounded just as bad. He heard the sound of a car drawing up outside and went out onto the hospital steps.

  The Brigadier got out of his staff car, cold anger in every line of his stiff figure. Munro threw up a brisk salute. The Brigadier touched his cap brim with his swagger stick in a brief acknowledgement and said, ‘Well?’

  Munro sighed. It was going t
o be even worse than he had feared. ‘There was some kind of a raid, sir. They knocked out Doctor Henderson and our sentry, and tried to get the patient away.’

  ‘Who did?’

  ‘We’re not sure, sir,’ said Munro.

  ‘Tried and succeeded, it seems,’ said the Brigadier sourly.

  ‘Well, not entirely, sir. I turned up just as they were getting him out of the building. The patient got away in the confusion, they chased him, and I chased them.’

  ‘And lost them.’

  ‘Well – yes sir. You see, the man ran into the woods. He seemed to be making for the police box where we found him. I thought it was more important to get him back.’

  ‘Instead of which the poor chap was shot down by one of our sentries?’

  ‘It was a very confused situation, sir,’ said Munro defensively.

  ‘It was a complete and utter botch-up!’ snapped the Brigadier. ‘How’s the poor chap now?’

  ‘Well, that’s just it, sir. No one seems to know.’

  The Brigadier said, ‘I’d better see him.’

  ‘There is one piece of good news, sir,’ said Munro hopefully, as they walked along the corridor. ‘Our chaps have turned up one of these meteorite things. Or, rather, the bits of one. It’s on its way here now.’

  ‘I’m delighted to hear that the Army managed to achieve something, besides the shooting of a harmless civilian,’ said the Brigadier as they entered the hospital room.

  Doctor Henderson, still a little shaky himself, was leaning over his patient, once more stretched out on the hospital bed. The Doctor lay completely motionless. Henderson and the nurse were applying some instrument to his head.

  Henderson looked up and nodded as the Brigadier entered, and said: ‘Extraordinary. Quite extraordinary. Look at these readings.’

  The Brigadier looked and was none the wiser. He said: ‘How is he?’

  ‘This registers the activity of the brain,’ explained Henderson. ‘Normally this line fluctuates considerably even when a person is unconscious.’

  The Brigadier looked at the chart. ‘Not a lot going on, eh?’ he said, feeling that some comment was expected.