Doctor Who: Target - Novelisations [142] - The Daleks' Master Plan Part II - The Mutation of Time by John Peel

Author:John Peel
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science-Fiction - Doctor Who
ISBN: 9780426203445
Publisher: Target Books
Published: 1989-12-14T23:00:00+00:00

9

Hostages

With a crash, the coffin lid hit the floor. The enshrouded figure in the coffin struggled into a sitting position, both bandaged hands stretched out before it, groping for something. Sara, normally the bravest of people, was utterly terrified by this apparition. Steven wasn’t in much better shape. Though both of them knew that corpses don’t rise from the grave, it was hard to actually believe that – after all, they were in the depths of a pyramid, surrounded by funerary apparatus, the only light being provided by smelly rush torches blazing fitfully in the still air.

The mummy groaned, and other noises continued to come from it. The voice sounded vaguely familiar, and Steven and Sara found their fear draining, to be replaced by puzzlement.

With one accord, they moved over to the cloth-wrapped figure, and began to tug at the wrappings about its face. In a moment, they had uncovered very familiar features.

‘Well,’ said the Monk, taking a deep breath. ‘Thank goodness for that!’

‘The plan has failed!’ the Red Dalek grated, facing Mavic Chen within the Dalek time-machine.

‘We cannot know that for certain,’ the traitor argued. ‘I agree, the time-traveller has not yet contacted us, but we have no idea of what difficulties he may have faced in trying to convince the Doctor of his good intentions.’

‘He was given one Earth hour,’ the Red Dalek answered.

‘That has now expired!’

Chen brought his fist down in fury on the closest control panel. ‘In the present situation we cannot afford to measure time exactly!’

‘He has deceived us,’ the Dalek insisted.

‘I don’t think he has,’ Chen argued. ‘He dare not! When will you Daleks ever learn that all things do not work to a pattern? You can’t plan an invasion down to a second! Flexibility can also lead to conquest.’

‘Silence!’ The Red Dalek had had enough of this unproductive discussion. The human believed that he was superior to the Daleks; he would discover his mistake in the second before he was annihilated. ‘All Daleks will disembark!’ it commanded to the technician Dalek. ‘All forms of life are to be treated as hostile and are to be exterminated.’

The assembled Daleks chorused their understanding, and began to file out of the door. The Red Dalek faced Chen once again. ‘You will come with us.’

Mavic Chen knew that the heavy-handed tactics of the Daleks were bound to cause problems – and that he would inevitably be blamed for them. ‘Recovery of the Taranium core was made my responsibility,’ he fumed.

The Red Dalek raised its gun-stick, and pointed it towards him. ‘Orders will not be questioned.’

Slapping the panel again in fury, Mavic Chen was forced to admit defeat. ‘If you insist on this approach,’ he warned, ‘I shall not be answering for the consequences!’ He brushed out of the time-machine ahead of the Red Dalek, and stomped off after the task-force.

Sara and Steven had finally got the Monk unwrapped from the funeral clothes, and had been forced to listen to his long-winded and self-justifying account of what had happened.

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