Doctor Who: Target - Novelisations [056] - The Sontaran Experiment by Ian Marter

Author:Ian Marter
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science-Fiction - Doctor Who
ISBN: 9780426200499
Publisher: Target Books
Published: 1983-05-14T22:00:00+00:00

5

Mistaken Identities

Sarah felt the white-hot sand begin to move beneath her.

The grains prickled against her skin like millions of needles as they jostled and clustered. Weakened though she was, she tried to brush them away, but the more she struggled, the thicker they swarmed over her body. The whole desert was alive around her. She dragged herself to her feet, clawing blindly at the masses of stinging grains which covered her in a steadily growing layer. Her shrivelled eyes seemed to be prised out of their sockets and the burning particles began to force themselves up into her brain. She tried to cry out and was choked by a stream of sand which welled up from her blazing stomach.

With a stunning flash of light like an explosion, she found she could see again. The floor of the crevasse was crawling with enormous ants advancing in a seething mass from all sides. The air was filled with the rustle of their antennae as they fought to get at her, a helpless victim trapped at the centre of the nest. Even as she watched, transfixed, the creatures began to grow larger. Her whole body bristled with the ravenous insects and, quickly stripped of all its flesh, it soon became a fantastic buzzing skeleton which splintered and finally collapsed under the monstrous throng.

Harry stood poised on a narrow ledge above a cutting between two enormous outcrops of rock, pressing himself back as far as he could into a shallow niche behind him.

With both hands he gripped a heavy stone, the shape and size of a rugger ball, and strained his ears to judge the approach of the slow, ponderous footsteps which were coming along the gully towards him.

Suddenly the footsteps stopped. Harry stood on the tips of his toes, raising the stone as high as he could above his head. He held his breath, waiting for the slightest movement. Something flashed into view round the edge of the niche and Harry pitched forward, hurling the stone downwards with all his strength. He crashed face-down on top of the boulder and froze as a deafening bellow ripped through the air behind him. He lay quite still, the breath knocked out of him, waiting to be trampled or torn to pieces by the enraged Alien.

‘Not a bad try, Harry,’ boomed a familiar voice. Harry rolled over on to his back and gasped with re-lief as he saw the Doctor looking down at him with a grin. ‘But I shouldn’t try to convert it if I were you,’ the Doctor added, heaving the murderous missile off the squashed remains of his hat and shoving the crown back into shape.

Harry shook his head ruefully. ‘Sorry about that, Doctor… I th… thought you were the… the Humpty Dumpty thing,’ he stammered breathlessly.

‘Humpty Dumpty?’ the Doctor echoed, cramming the hat so firmly back on his head that the crown was pushed up into a dome and his ears were bent over by the brim.

For a moment Harry just lay there, struck dumb by an uncanny resemblance, and all he could manage was a series of frantic nods.

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