Doctor Who - Past Doctor Adventures - 66 - The Eleventh Tiger (1st Doctor) by David Mcintee

Author:David Mcintee
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Comics & Graphic Novels, General, Science Fiction, China, Doctor Who (Fictitious Character), Fiction, Martial Arts
ISBN: 9780563486145
Publisher: BBC Worldwide
Published: 2004-05-02T07:00:00+00:00

Eventually, driven by the occasional restless twitch in his calves, he decided that perhaps working through a sequence of t‟ai chi moves in the open air would help. He had trained to be a martial monk when he was a child, and found that such a pattern smoothed out the balance of his energy and helped him sleep afterwards.

He hadn‟t stuck with the training long because other interests had caught his attention, and he had found an aptitude for calculating the motions of the stars and planets. His father had apprenticed him to an astrologer, with the intent that this would prove more satisfying for the young Ko and more profitable for himself.

So far his father had been proved right, and Ko was one of the most respected men in the little town. Until this group of Black Flag troops had come. He wasn‟t sure how holding the town was supposed to hurt the Chings in the government, but politics had never been Ko‟s strong suit.

Ko knew there were guards who would try to stop him going outside the building, but he also knew, from his time training in the monastery, that there was a trap door through which he would be able to get up on to the roof, and then he could climb down a pillar to an exercise court.

First he had to go through the kitchen. A small serving hatch in a wall near his room led straight to this part of the building and, although he wasn‟t a teenager any more, at forty he was the youngest of the astrologers, and he had little difficulty in climbing through the hatch.

He padded through the deserted kitchen and up some steps, and reached what used to be a store room. He was not alone. One of the two aides to the abbot - the muscle-bound one - was sitting on a stool, alone in the dark.

To the astrologer‟s eyes, the monk would be asleep in a matter of moments. Ko held his breath, desperately hoping not to do anything that might disturb him and wake him up.

He watched carefully, waiting for the moment when Zhao‟s attention was well and truly gone. Slowly, the monk‟s eyes became unfocused, his eyelids drooping slightly. They didn‟t close all the way. As Zhao‟s consciousness faded, Ko discerned the beginning of a faint sulphurous glow emanating from his dilated pupils.

In a few seconds Zhao‟s breathing was shallow and steady, and he was beginning to snore, but his eyes projected beams of light. Then he got up and walked to the centre of the room.

Ko had never seen anything like it. He certainly never expected to see such a thing again.

The doors at the end of the room swung open, and Gao and the abbot entered. Both of them were projecting beams of fiery light from their eyes. They moved to the centre of the room and stood next to Zhao. The three monks were a few feet apart from each other, facing a spot in between them.

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