Doctor Who - The Silent Stars Go By

by Unknown

  asked Sol.

  'Yes, actually,' said Rory. 'Where I come from, they have them quite often. We're used to them. But this is pretty fierce. It's a bad winter. And, obviously, any winter's going to be a bit worrying if you're not supposed to have them.'

  He got up and looked over at the doors that led into the Incrypt.

  'Maybe I should just go and see how they're doing?'

  he suggested. 'I'm sure I could help.'

  'It's not allowed,' replied Sol. 'The council voted.'

  'What are they looking at exactly?' asked Rory.

  'Well, the words of Guide, of course,' said Sol, sitting up and looking at Rory with a frown. 'The covenant that Guide provides for us, as is held in the Incrypt. Guide knows an awful lot. More than any of us, and it usually takes quite a time and a lot of cleverness to sort of sift out what Guide is telling us.'

  'This is your Guide Emanual?' said Rory.

  'That's right,' said Sol. 'Surely you have the same in your plantnation?'

  'We've got tourist information points and a weekly free paper.'

  'What?' asked Sol.

  'Never mind,' said Rory. He paced a little. 'I wish I knew where Amy and the Doctor were. I hope they're OK. The Doctor always knows what to do. I keep trying to imagine what he'd say or do if he was here.'

  'Hello! Hello? Can anybody hear me?' the Doctor's voice suddenly boomed out across the assembly.

  Sol and Vesta both leapt up in considerable dismay.

  The voice seemed to come from directly behind Rory. He turned around very slowly.

  The assembly hall was bathed in a soft yellow radiance, warm but bright, that was somehow shining out of the floor, the walls, and the ceiling. Glittering traceries of energy had appeared along the circular metal patterns inlaid in the wooden floor, and up the seams in the hall's beams and roof posts.

  The centre of the hall was no longer the assembly room at all. It appeared to have become, in the blink of an eye, part of a very modern-looking white chamber.

  The row of benches in front of the council rail had turned into what looked like a computer workstation complete with two high-backed chairs.

  Rory was standing halfway inside the assembly hall, and half in the new, white room.

  The Doctor, beaming from ear to ear, was right in front of him, along with Amy and two young Morphans that Rory didn't recognise.

  'Doctor!' Rory cried.

  'Rory!' exclaimed the Doctor in delight. 'Rory Williams Pond!'

  'Not my actual name,' smiled Rory.

  'I was confident we'd make contact with someone,'

  the Doctor said excitedly. 'I didn't dare hope it would he you!'

  Dumbfounded, Amy rushed towards Rory so that she could hug him. He spread his arms wide to meet her.

  'How did you get here?' Rory laughed.

  The anticipated hug didn't go according to plan.

  Much to their mutual surprise, Rory and Amy passed through each other like ghosts. They stopped in their tracks, turned and looked back at each other.

  'What just happened?' asked Rory.

  'Why can't I touch Rory?' demanded Amy. 'What's going on? It's spooky! I just went right through him.

  How can I not touch him if we're in the same room?'

  'Well, because you're not actually in the same room at all,' said the Doctor.

  Amy reached out her right hand to feel Rory's face.

  She succeeded merely in pushing her hand through his head.

  'Urn, OK, stop doing that,' Rory told her.

  'That's so freaky!' Amy exclaimed.

  'Yeah, still, stop it,' said Rory.

  'You must be in the assembly in Beside,' said the Doctor. 'Well done, Rory. That's exactly where I needed you to be.'

  Rory gave a no problem shrug as though he'd planned it all along. 'Where are you?' he asked.

  'We're in Firmer Number Two,' replied the Doctor,

  'which is one of the big mountains you would be able to see from the window if it wasn't night-time.

  Actually, we're deep inside it, so you wouldn't see us anyway.'

  He was speaking rather too loudly and rather too clearly, as though he was using a telephone with a poor connection.

  'Remember the mountains, Rory?' he asked. 'The strange ones that I didn't think were mountains?'

  'I do, Doctor,' said Rory.

  'Well, they're really not mountains. They're giant machines called terraformers, or terramorphers, or whatever you want to call them. They've been set up to change this world. To re-engineer its climate and make it more Earth-like.'

  'Earth -esque, surely?' smiled Rory.

  'Touché, Mr Pond,' laughed the Doctor. 'So, it'll take years to do. Centuries. It's a long-term project.

  Anyway, we're inside one of them.'

  'OK...'

  'Specifically,' the Doctor said, 'we're in a telepresence communications chamber. We found it by accident. It's part of a communications network that probably once linked all the Morphan communities.'

  'It's like you're here,' said Rory, still not quite believing his eyes.

  'It's conjury!' Sol Farrow murmured. He and Vesta were rigid with fear. Their eyes were very wide.

  'Who's that?' asked the Doctor.

  'That's Sol Farrow,' said Rory. 'And this is Vesta.'

  'Vesta Flurrish!' the Doctor cried. 'Alive and well!

  How fantastic is that? Very pleased to virtually meet you, Vesta. As you can see, I've got your sister and Samewell here with me. They're perfectly safe. Well, they're relatively safe. Well, they're here with me.'

  Vesta and Bel stepped forward and gazed at each other.

  'I was so worried about you,' said Bel.

  'You look like you are made of light,' said Vesta.

  'She is!' cried the Doctor. 'To you, she is! The telepresence system generates a live hologram field.

  It's like 3D. I love 3D! Especially the cardboard red and green glasses. Anyway, it creates a hologram of you, where you are, here with us, and vice versa, so we all seem to be in the same room.'

  'It's really freaky,' said Amy, poking her fingers into Rory's face.

  'Again, stop it,' he said. He looked back at the Doctor. 'What's going on, Doctor?' he asked. 'There's something really bad happening in this town. There's this thing—'

  'With red eyes!' Vesta blurted.

  'Yes, red eyes,' Rory agreed.

  'That would be an Ice Warrior,' the Doctor nodded, suddenly more serious. 'I'm sorry to say, there's more than one of them around. It is a real problem, Rory.

  They're a threat to the Morphans, to all human life on Hereafter. We've got to work together to stop them.

  Throw a spanner in their works.'

  'How?' asked Rory.

  'First things first. You need to get the Morphans ready,' the Doctor told him. 'The Ice Warriors are mobilising. They could strike at any moment.'

  'Is Elect Groan there, Vesta?' asked Bel. 'Can you fetch him? Any other members of the council...

  Chaunce, Old Winnowner, anyone? They have to hear about this.'

  'They're all in the Incrypt, consulting the word of Guide,' said Vesta.

  'Now that is very interesting,' said the Doctor.

  'Go and fetch them, Vesta!' Bel urged. 'Hurry now!'

  Vesta nodded, and darted away. Sol was still staring in wonder at the luminous figures.

  'Doctor?' said Rory.

  'Yes, Rory?'

  'I - hang on. Amy, seriously, stop poking your fingers through my nose. Doctor, why are you talking so urgently?'

  'Am I?' asked the Doctor.

  'Yeah,' said Rory. 'It's almost like... you haven't got very much time.'

  'Well, there's no time like the present!' the Doctor enthused. He really wasn't very good at lying sometimes.

  'Doctor...' said Rory, a cautioning note sounding in his voice. His take me seriously voice.

  'What?' ask the Doctor.

  'What's that high-pitched noise?' asked Rory.

  In t
he hologram field deep under Firmer Number Two, the Doctor looked back at the shimmering, lifesized image of his friend and shifted uncomfortably.

  The noise of the focused sonic drill was steadily getting louder.

  'Hang on, Rory,' the Doctor said. 'Stay right there.'

  He walked out of the glow of the hologram field and over to the open hatch. The noise was echoing down the corridor. The Ice Warriors were already cutting through the second of the hatches that the Doctor and his companions had locked in their path.

  'Samewell?' he called.

  The young man ran over to join him.

  'Keep watch here,' the Doctor told him. 'As soon as the Ice Warriors appear through that door down there, yell out so we know about it, and then lock this hatch.

  It'll slow them down again.'

  'Guide is my witness, I understand,' Samewell said.

  'As soon as you've done that, I want you to take Amy and Bel out the other way, out the way you scouted. Got it?'

  'Yes, Doctor.'

  'It's important.'

  'Cat A. I understand. Where will you be while this is happening?' Samewell asked.

  'I'll be right behind you,' the Doctor said. 'But I need you to lead the way so you can open the doors with your hand.'

  'Ah,' said Samewell, nodding. 'Right. Got you.'

  The Doctor left Samewell standing watch at the door and walked back into the hologram field.

  Amy and Rory were face to face, looking at each other.

  'I was really worried about you,' Rory said to her.

  'And I was worried about you,' she replied. 'You only went back for a coat. How hard is that?'

  'Uh, I think you got captured while I was getting a coat,' said Rory, 'so this whole series of disasters started with you.'

  'It started with the TARDIS missing Christmas by about a bajillion years, actually,' replied Amy.

  'Well, I was really worried anyway,' said Rory. He raised his hand, palm open, fingers slightly spread, as though he was pressing it against a window pane. Amy echoed the gesture with her left hand, so they could

  'touch' hands through the holographic medium. An elasticated mitten dangled from her cuff.

  Their hands passed through one another. They both stepped back sharply, shaking their heads.

  'I thought that would be, like, really sweet,' said Rory, disappointed. 'I thought it would be a proper moment, like in those films when the hero's in jail, and the girl visits him, and they put their hands up on either side of the glass partition of the visitor's cubicle? You know, like that?'

  'Yeah,' she said.

  'But it was just a bit creepy,' he said.

  'It really was,' she agreed.

  Rory saw the Doctor reappear.

  'What is that noise, Doctor?' he asked.

  'Nothing to worry about,' said the Doctor cheerfully.

  'He's just saying that so you won't worry,' said Amy.

  'What is that noise?' asked Rory.

  'The Ice Warrior Men are drilling through doors to get at us,' Amy told him.

  'What?' Rory asked, very alarmed.

  The Doctor looked at Amy. His shoulders drooped and he sighed sadly.

  'It's not even like it's a difficult name to remember, like Jagrafess or Castrovalva,' the Doctor said to her. 'I mean, a friend of mine just made it up on the spot. Ice Warriors. It's simple. It's not hard. Why are you having such trouble with it?'

  'Probably the stress of the situation,' Amy snapped.

  'Is she telling the truth?' Rory asked the Doctor.

  'Not at all,' replied the Doctor. 'The word "men" has never had anything to do with their name. They're just plain Ice Warriors.'

  'God help me... Are they drilling through the door, Doctor?' asked Rory insistently, trying his best not to shout.

  'They are doing that,' the Doctor admitted.

  'Doctor! You've got to get out of there!' said Rory.

  'Has Vesta gone to get the council?'

  'Yes,' said Rory.

  'Well, we haven't really got time to wait for them to come back,' said the Doctor thoughtfully. 'Listen, Rory, it's actually all very simple. The Ice Warriors want this planet. They want to conquer it and colonise it. They want to take it from the Morphans. But they need it to be colder. Tons colder. They don't want the Morphans warming it up to make it all Earth-like. Their idea of Earth-like isn't like the Morphans' idea of Earth-like, and—'

  'Skip that part, Doctor,' Amy advised.

  'OK, Rory,' said the Doctor, focusing. 'The crucial point is that the Ice Warriors have sabotaged the terraformer systems. They've reset them to plunge Hereafter into an ice age.'

  'Hence the sudden winters,' said Rory.

  'Exactly,' the Doctor agreed. 'An ice age will suit the Ice Warriors just fine, but it will wipe the Morphans out. I'm not prepared to allow that. So... I'm going to sabotage the Ice Warriors' sabotage, Rory. I'm going to undo what they've done, and accelerate the global warming processes of the terraformers. I'm going to make Hereafter a very uncomfortable place for any Ice Warriors to be.'

  'OK,' Rory nodded.

  A sudden bang reverberated down the corridor outside.

  'They're through, Doctor!' Samewell yelled from the door.

  'Close that hatch, Samewell,' the Doctor shouted back, 'and get everybody through into the next room like I told you to!'

  'Yes, Doctor!' Samewell replied. He put his hand on the palm-checker and the hatch slammed shut.

  'Sorry. Really running short on time,' the Doctor said, turning back to Rory. 'Like I said, I need to reset the terraformers, but they're a huge and very complicated set of systems. I don't want to cause a global disaster by, you know, fiddling around. I need plans or schematics to work from. Rory, all the Morphans I've met keep mentioning "Guide". Guide, as I understand it, has principles that they live by.

  Instructions. I think they're actually referring to a real guide, to codified information that the original colonists left behind to cover all the details of operating and maintaining the systems.'

  'I reckoned that too,' Rory agreed. 'It's such an important part of their lives, they treat it as a sort of holy text. I've heard them calling it "Guide Emanual".'

  'Emanual, or e-hyphen-manual?' the Doctor asked, intrigued.

  'Exactly,' said Rory. 'E-manual. An electronic manual. I think it's stored digitally. There's a place adjoining the hall called the Incrypt. That's where they keep it.'

  'I need a copy,' the Doctor said.

  'Well, they won't let me in there,' Rory replied.

  The high-pitched dentist's drill whine had started howling on the other side of the hatch. The Ice Warriors were right outside.

  'Come on!' Samewell said to Amy and Bel. 'We've got to go! Right now! Doctor says so!'

  'Doctor?' Amy said to the Doctor.

  'Rory, I need the e-manual,' the Doctor said.

  'I understand that,' Rory replied, 'but they won't let me near the Incrypt.'

  'You've got to try, Rory,' said the Doctor.

  'OK.'

  'Rory, I mean it,' the Doctor said. 'We can't stay here. It's not safe any more. We've got to go. I'm going to try to find another telepresence terminal like this one. Soon as I can, I'll contact you again. Please, have the e-manual ready for me then!'

  'I'll do my best, Doctor!'

  'I know you will,' the Doctor said.

  'Doctor, we've got to go now!' Amy yelled.

  'Amy!' Rory called out, trying to see her past the Doctor. 'Please be careful! Just be careful!'

  'You know me,' she called back, waving to him as she tried to pull the Doctor away. She hoped he couldn't see the tears in her eyes. It wasn't fair she could see him but not touch him. It wasn't fair that they were going to have to say goodbye and start running. It wasn't fair that she might not actually get to see him properly ever again.

  'Go! Go!' the Doctor told Amy. 'Get Samewell and Arabel out of here and run!'

  'Not without you!' Amy protested.

  'Oh my g
od!' cried Rory, utterly powerless to act.

  'It's not a choice. All of you run!'

  'I've got to disable this terminal so the Ice Warriors can't access it,' the Doctor said. 'Amy, go!'

  Reluctantly, Amy ran across to the far door where Samewell and Arabel, both trembling with fear, were waiting. 'Come on, Doctor!' she yelled.

  The Doctor was adjusting the remote control, resetting the systems of the main console. 'See you later, Rory Williams Pond,' he said, grinning at Rory's holographic image.

  'Please, Doctor, go!' Rory said to him, looking anguished and helpless.

  Something exploded. It made a loud noise like a gunshot. A sudden stench of burning metal filled the chamber. The drill had bored all the way through the lock.

  The hatch shunted open and two Ice Warriors shoved their way into the telepresence chamber. One had a broadsword. The other had an ornate battleaxe, the haft and blade all forged from one gleaming piece of metal.

  Arabel screamed.

  'Doctor, run!' Rory and Amy both yelled at the same time.

  The Doctor turned, and saw the Ice Warriors bearing down on him. Two more had come into the room behind the first pair. The Doctor threw the remote-control handset at the Ice Warriors in an attempt to distract them, and then made to dart away sideways to reach Amy and the two Morphans.

  The Ice Warrior with the axe hurled his weapon with extraordinary strength and grace. Superb martial skill sent the gleaming axe spinning through the air, making a chopping, swishing sound as it flew. It was thrown wide, not to kill the Doctor, but to force him back and cut off his escape.

  The Doctor recoiled with a cry of alarm as the axe whooshed past him. It struck the console and buried itself, blade first, in the control bank. The impact blew out the power systems. The holographic image of the assembly hall, of the frantic Rory and the speechless Sol, blinked, flickered and vanished. A hot shower of sparks blew out of the console in a small explosion that knocked the Doctor to his knees.

  Amy wailed, 'Doctor!'

  The Doctor tried to get up. A massive green pincer clamped his right wrist. He cried out in pain.

  'Go! Amy, go!' he yelled, struggling to pull free.

  She was in the hatchway, staring at him in utter horror. Samewell and Arabel were trying to pull her out of the room, but she was fighting them off.

  'Doctor!'

  'Get out of here!' the Doctor bellowed back.