‘Mrs Wormwood,’ said Sarah Jane, ‘I’d rather die.’
Somehow Sarah Jane sensed that Mrs Wormwood would just love to take her up on the offer. Her calm gaze met and held Mrs Wormwood’s fierce glare.
Then Mrs Wormwood forced a smile. ‘Well, we can’t have that, can we?’
There was a burst of music from the wall screen.
‘Bane has received ringing endorsements!’
On the screen the scene changed to the Blue Peter studio. Two attractive presenters, a young man and a pretty girl, clutched bottles of Bubble Shock.
‘Now I know we’re not supposed to advertise,’ said the young man. ‘But we have to make an exception for this!’ He held up the bottle.
‘You’ve got to try Bubble Shock,’ said the girl. ‘It’s just delicious!’
They both brandished their bottles. ‘Drink it!’
Good grief, thought Sarah Jane, this is serious. They’ve even corrupted Blue Peter!
Mrs Wormwood clicked off the screen, stalked back to her desk and sat down.
Sarah Jane followed. ‘Those scientists I was talking about, the ones who tried to analyse Bubble Shock- they said that Bane behaves very oddly when they try to test it. As if it’s resisting the analysis.’ She looked hard at Mrs Wormwood. ‘And nothing could do that. At least… nothing on Earth.’
‘What exactly are you suggesting?’ asked Mrs Wormwood coolly. ‘That Bane originated in outer space?’
‘Of course not,’ said Sarah Jane. ‘That would be ridiculous.’
‘Wouldn’t it though?’ said Mrs Wormwood - and smiled her terrible smile.
Chapter Four
Hunted
Davey’s little tour group had arrived at a giant metal vat surrounded by clouds of steam. Above it, an enormous funnel swooped down from the factory roof high above. Somehow, Maria sensed that this was the central point of the entire process.
Davey certainly seemed to think so. His face rapt, he gazed reverently up at the giant funnel. ‘So the pure spring water and fresh fruit juice ends up here, where Bane is added. And from here it’s bottled, all quality controlled, and packed up ready to be distributed all over the British Isles..
For the first time, there was real passion in his voice and Maria couldn’t help being impressed. Kelsey, on the other hand, a veteran of many visits, was thoroughly bored.
‘Listen,’ she whispered. ‘Well be done in twenty minutes. I’ll go and phone Suki, she can meet us at WH Smith’s in the precinct.’
Maria gave her a worried look. ‘You’re not supposed to use your phone.’
Kelsey sniffed. ‘What are you, a Girl Guide?’ Maria glanced at Davey, who was still going on about the virtues of Bane.
‘He’ll take it off you.’
‘Well, he’s not gonna see, is he?’ said Kelsey triumphantly. She grinned. ‘Suki’s dead rich.’
As Davey moved over to a display stand piled high with Bubble Shock bottles, Kelsey slipped quietly away.
‘Every bottle is dated and stamped with the Bubble Shock seal of approval,’ Davey was saying. ‘Making it the nation’s number one!’
Worried that he’d notice that Kelsey was missing, Maria tried a quick distraction. ‘This Bane stuff, the special ingredient. What is it, exactly?’
Davey paused for a moment, staring at her with shining eyes. His answer was very strange.
‘Bane is life,’ said Davey, with burning sincerity. ‘Bane is all.’
Maria looked thoughtfully at him. There was something very peculiar about Davey...
Mrs Wormwood and Sarah Jane were saying a rather chilly goodbye.
Mrs Wormwood rose and came from behind her desk. ‘Go ahead and print your story by all means. But do consider your career. Are you really going to expose all this as some kind of alien plot? You’ll be considered insane!’
‘I don’t care what people think of me,’ said Sarah Jane quietly. ‘Never have. I just want to find the truth.’
Mrs Wormwood shifted her attack to a more personal level. ‘But at such a cost. I take it, Miss Smith, you’re single?’
‘Yes, I am.’
‘No children?’
‘No.’
‘Such a wasted life,’ said Mrs Wormwood sadly. She raised her voice. ‘Miss Smith is leaving. Lesley will show you out, Miss Smith.’
The secretary came forward and led Sarah Jane towards the lift.
As she reached it, Sarah Jane turned. ‘Oh and by the way - what planet do you come from?’
Mrs Wormwood smiled. ‘Nice try!’
The secretary stepped into the lift and Sarah Jane followed. The doors slid closed behind them.
Mrs Wormwood waited for a moment then touched the corn-unit in her ear.
‘Lesley. Kill her.’
The tall secretary behind her, Sarah Jane stood facing the doors as the lift glided smoothly downwards. Reflected in the mirror-like surface of the doors, she saw the secretary raise her arm for a killer karate- chop. ..
Without turning, Sarah Jane jabbed backwards in a vicious elbow-strike. It took the secretary in the solar plexus and she collapsed, gasping.
The lift doors opened and Sarah Jane sprang out and ran down the corridor.
Kelsey reached a dark and deserted corridor and decided it would be safe enough. She took out her mobile, flipped it open and scrolled through the long list of her mobile phone mates. ‘Sally, Sam, Sammy, Sam2
Two guards appeared at the far end of the corridor. Instinctively, Kelsey snapped off the phone and ducked through the nearest door.
She crouched down by the wall beside it, and heard the booted feet of the guards pass by. After a moment she rose and looked around her.
She was in a dark and cavernous metal chamber. A variety of heavy pipes ran up the walls and disappeared into the ceiling high above. The room was Tiled with strange alien-looking machinery which hissed and gave off fierce puffs of steam.
There was a strange and terrifying atmosphere about the place - something indescribably sinister, like the feeling of a hovering alien presence.
‘Blimey,’ muttered Kelsey to herself. ‘Don’t put this on the tour, do they?’
She flipped open her phone, scrolled to ‘Suki’ and pressed the call button.
‘Hiya, Suki...’
All hell broke loose.
The phone emitted a high-pitched piercing shriek which seemed to stab through Kelsey’s brain. She yelled and dropped the phone, which slid across the floor.
An alarm blared, deafening her with its howl. All around her the pipes and machinery started to shudder and clank, and steam-jets hissed out furiously.
Kelsey ran for the door but more jets of steam drove her back. From high above there came a terrible slurping roar. Kelsey looked up.
Something horrible was glaring down at herwith one giant eye.
Kelsey screamed...
In the Data Room, sirens howled and machinery shuddered. The sheeted form on the table shook and twitched and its eyes snapped open...
On the main factory floor the alarms were also howling and screaming. Davey herded his little group towards the exit like an angry sheepdog.
‘I’m sorry everybody, we have an emergency. That’s it, keep moving please...’ He grabbed a passing guard by the arm. ‘Get them out,’ he snarled. ‘Get everyone out!’ He turned and disappeared up a nearby staircase.
From high in the ceiling a huge alien eye gazed down on Kelsey. A giant green tentacle appeared and flailed down towards her.
Kelsey screamed even louder and backed away.
The guard bustled the tour group down a metal staircase.
‘Hurry along there please, quick as you can!’ Maria, tailing behind at the back the tour group, suddenly stopped.
‘Kelsey,’ she muttered. She couldn’t just leave her. She turned and ran back up the staircase and along the corridor.
Kelsey backed away into a corner, staring up at the heavy-lidded eye of the alien horror reaching out for her. ‘No,’ s
he screamed. ‘No, please.
In her ultra-modern office, which was filled with the scream of alarms, Mrs Wormwood stood with a hand to her corn-unit. ‘What is it?’ she shouted. ‘What’s happening?’
The lift doors opened and her secretary staggered in, looking very much the worse for wear. ‘Mrs Wormwood,’ she gasped. ‘She escaped.’
‘Sarah Jane Smith,’ hissed Mrs Wormwood.
Alarms ringing in her ears, Sarah Jane ran along a dark factory corridor.
Not far away, Maria was doing exactly the same thing. ‘Kelsey!’ she called. ‘Kelsey, are you there?’
There was no reply. Just the wail of the sirens. Maria ran on.
In yet another corridor, Davey, followed by two guards, was running towards the source of the disturbance. It seemed to be coming from the heart of the factory - the pipe room, directly below the Nest of the Bane.
Mrs Wormwood marched across the floor of the factory, followed by two guards.
‘Find that woman,’ she ordered. ‘And this time, kill her properly!’
Kelsey crouched, screaming, in a comer of the pipe room, staring hopelessly at the hideous alien creature above her.
Davey burst into the room followed by the guards.
‘What have you done?’ he shouted furiously.
Kelsey gestured above her. ‘Get that thing away from me!’
‘She is not a thing!’ shouted Davey. ‘You are the thing!’ He gazed upwards at the monstrosity. ‘She is my mother, the mother of us all.’
One of the guards saw Kelsey’s mobile on the floor and snatched it up. ‘Sir!’
Davey whirled round. ‘Well, turn it off!’
The guard threw the phone back on to the floor and ground it to fragments under his boot-heel. The alarms fell silent.
Indignation overcame Kelsey’s fear. ‘Oi, that’s my phone!’
The thing in the ceiling gave a ferocious howl.
Davey looked upwards. ‘There’s nothing to be scared of, Mother,’ he said soothingly. ‘Our precious Bane Mother.’
Maria ran down yet another corridor and emerged into a machine room. Guards ran by on the other side of the room. She ducked behind one of the machines and they passed without seeing her.
It was easier to think now the howling of the alarms had stopped. Maria remembered that Kelsey had given her her mobile phone number. Maria took out her phone, found Kelsey’s number and punched the call button. The alarms broke out again in full force, howling and screaming all over the factory. She switched off the phone, but the alarms blared on.
Maria heard booted feet pounding towards her...
Chapter Five
Escape
Maria ducked behind one of the machines as guards ran by on the other side of the room. She crouched down motionless, hardly daring to breathe.
They passed without seeing her. She waited a moment or two and moved on.
‘Kelsey?’ she called softly. ‘Kelsey, are you there?’
In the pipe room, Davey reacted to the renewed alarms in rage.
‘Another one!’ he snarled.
Kelsey, still paralysed with fear, huddled in her corner, staring up at the alien monstrosity above. Great studded octopus-like tentacles reached down, flailing blindly, as if groping for her...
The room shook as the giant creature above them roared in rage and pain.
It was in the Data Room that the effect of the alarms was most severe.
Consoles shuddered and vibrated and gave off showers of sparks. A technician crouched over the main data console, struggling to close it down.
Suddenly, the console exploded in smoke and flame, hurling the technician across the room.
The sheeted figure on the slab sat up, eyes widening in fear. The sheet fell away revealing the shape of a young boy in a white tunic and shorts.
The boy pulled the breathing-mask from his mouth and began ripping away the wires and sensors that connected him to the surrounding machinery. He swung his legs off the slab and stood up, gazing in astonishment around the smoke-filled room. It seemed as if it was all new to him. Everything was new to him. He had just been born.
Another console exploded. The boy jumped back in alarm. He looked down at the unconscious body of the technician. One overwhelming desire filled his newly conscious mind - the need to escape, to get away from this terrible place.
He fled like a frightened animal through the open door, and ran in blind panic along the endless corridors.
Maria too was running along yet another darkened corridor. She had given up looking for Kelsey now, and was hunting desperately for an exit.
She turned a corner and ran straight into a white-clad figure.
They both stopped and drew back, staring at each other.
‘Um... Hello!’ said Maria.
‘Um... Hello!’ said the boy. He said exactly the same words with exactly the same intonation, like a recording.
Maria studied him curiously. He was oddly dressed, in a white tunic and white shorts. He seemed to be about her own age, perhaps a little younger. Yet, despite his age, there was something blank and innocent about his face. It seemed completely unmarked by experience of any kind.
‘Who are you?’ asked Maria.
It happened again.
Who are you?’ repeated the boy.
‘I’m lost,’ said Maria.
‘I’m lost,’ said the boy.
Maria stared at him in exasperation. Was he just going to repeat everything she said? Like a parrot?
From somewhere further down the corridor they heard the clang of a metal door opening, excited voices and the pounding of booted feet.
The boy broke into a run, speeding off down the corridor in the opposite direction.
Maria hesitated for a moment, and then ran after him...
Davey gazed adoringly into the great alien eye above him.
‘Shroud yourself, Mother,’ he whispered. ‘We will find the source and destroy it.’
The eye closed and vanished and the great tentacles withdrew.
His corn-unit beeped, and he touched his ear. ‘Mrs Wormwood? We have the situation under control.’
‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ said Mrs Wormwood’s bitter voice.
She was marching into the Data Room, followed by two guards. She stared down at the empty slab.
‘The Archetype has escaped. Find him! And for the Bane Mother’s sake, turn off these alarms!’
In the factory corridors the sound of the alarms died away.
All through the factory, patrols of guards, thundered up and down the corridors, hunting for the fugitive.
Maria and the boy crouched under a metal staircase as yet another patrol passed by. When they’d gone, Maria smiled at the boy.
‘I’m not with them,’ she whispered. ‘I can help you.’
The boy smiled back - exactly the same smile...
They emerged from hiding. We’ve got to find a safe place to hide,’ whispered Maria. She peered around the corner and saw an empty corridor- with a familiar sign on one of the doors.
‘Yes!’ said Maria. ‘Come on.’
She ran through a door marked ‘Ladies’. Obediently, the boy followed.
They found themselves in a standard modern toilet. Rows of mirrors and basins on one side, rows of cubicles on the other.
‘We’ll be safe here for a bit,’ said Maria. ‘This is the one place men never go.’ She smiled apologetically. ‘Sorry for dragging you into the ladies.’
‘Why do men never go to the ladies?’ asked the boy.
Maria looked at him in surprise. It was a weird question - but it was the most original thing he’d said so far.
Like Maria, Sarah Jane was running along dark and smoke-filled corridors, dodging patrols of guards. Now she heard yet another patrol, coming up behind her. There were cries of, ‘Find him! Fie must be found!’ and the clump of heavy boots.
Who was ‘him’ wondered Sarah Jane. Weren’t they just after her? Were other fugitives b
eing hunted?
She turned a corner and found herself in an empty corridor with a familiar sign on one of its doors. Sarah Jane smiled to herself. The Ladies - the traditional refuge of every female in trouble. She hurried inside.
Once inside she looked round for a way of escape. She heard movement in a cubicle, flung open the door and found two small figures hiding inside.
She stared at them in amazement. ‘What are you doing in here?’
Maria and the boy emerged from their hiding place.
‘I could ask you the same!’ said Maria.
Sarah Jane looked at the boy. ‘Who’s he? Why is he dressed like that?’
‘Um. Hello,’ said the boy politely. He seemed to think the ‘Um’ was an essential part of the greeting.
Sarah Jane stared at him. There was something strange about the boy. A sort of - blankness. ‘What have they done to you?’
‘I knew I had to get away’ said the boy simply.
‘That goes for all of us,’ said Sarah Jane.
Two patrols of guards, one led by Mrs Wormwood, one led by Davey, came hurrying down the corridor from opposite directions. They stopped, confronting each other.
‘You’ve searched everywhere?’ snapped Mrs Wormwood.
Davey nodded. ‘It must have left the compound.’
‘Impossible!’ Mrs Wormwood sniffed the air like a hound on the scent. ‘There are still humans here. I can smell them. And one very particular person - still alive.’
She looked up and down the corridor - and fixed on a door. ‘Did you search in there?’
‘But it’s for their females only,’ stammered Davey. ‘We are males, their culture says we must never go in.’
‘Oh, you idiot!’ said Mrs Wormwood. Perhaps the Bane introduction course on human customs had been a little too thorough, she thought.
Led by Mrs Wormwood, Davey and the guards charged into the Ladies.
Once they were inside, a rapid search revealed that the place was empty Mrs Wormwood pointed to a smallish window. It was open.
Where does that lead?’
‘Visitors car park,’ said Davey. ‘A child could get through there.’
[Sarah Jane Adventures 01] - Invasion of Bane Page 3