The Tomb of the Cybermen by Gerry Davis

Author:Gerry Davis [Davis, Gerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, General, Science Fiction
ISBN: 9780426110767
Publisher: Target
Published: 1977-12-31T08:00:00+00:00

Victoria was not feeling either quick or intelligent. She was overpowered with sleepiness. Whenever she opened her eyes, the room seemed too bright for her, so it was easier to shut them. Why was she so sleepy, she wondered drowsily.

All the strain, she supposed. But she’d stayed up here because the Doctor was worried about something. There was something she should be on her guard against...

something... her head fell forward on to her chest.

‘You have hardly touched your coffee,’ said Kaftan’s concerned voice. ‘It must be cold by now. Here, I will give you some more.’

Why does she keep on about the coffee, wondered Victoria, half inside the place of sleep.

‘No thanks,’ said Victoria. ‘I feel much warmer now.’

‘That is good.’

‘I just feel sleepy,’ murmured Victoria and then gave in.

Her head settled back against the table and she relaxed into a full sleep.

Kaftan waited a moment, then went over to look at her.

Yes, the girl was breathing the deep slow breaths of sleep, her head on her arms, her hair flowing on the table.

Without wasting a moment more, she went straight to the control console, looked at it for a moment, pressed the levers and buttons, and taking a notebook from her pocket, pressed a sequence of buttons.

Below the gears of the hatch were engaged, and as she watched, the great metal lid creaked slowly down from its upright position, until it slammed shut with a clang that echoed down the icy blackness of the shaft.

What was that?’

Viner, whose fear made his ears sharp as a bat’s, lifted his head as the distant sound of the slamming hatch echoed as a muffled thump, along the metal corridor.

‘It sounded like...’

The Doctor, Jamie, Viner and the Professor turned and listened with dread as the vibrations trembled into silence.

‘It’s the hatch,’ said Jamie.

Only Klieg and Toberman seemed unworried. They exchanged quick glances. The Professor, his camera busy at the far end of the vault, seemed unconscious of the situation. Jamie, followed by Viner, turned and rushed along the frozen tunnel towards the entrance well, slipping and scraping on the ice-covered metal floor. It seemed longer now, an unrelenting climb. They got to the shaft, gasping for breath, their lungs hurting with the cold, and gazed up. Above them there was no friendly circle of light, only the faint phosphorescence of the shaft walls.

‘It’s closed!’ shouted Jamie, his voice cracking.

He started up the ladder, his fear making the larger-than-man-sized gaps between each rung hardly noticeable.

He must get it open. But as he climbed he remembered the heavy sound of the gears. No one with human strength could open that great metal hatch and he knew it.

Viner had started on the bottom rung of the ladder, but halfway up its icy gaps filled him with the fear of falling.

He gazed upwards, panicking.

‘What’s the use?’ he called to Jamie, who was still climbing. ‘We’re trapped down here, now. We’ll never survive in this cold.’

Jamie ignored him and climbed on. ‘Better get back,’

Viner added to himself. Let Jamie look after himself, he thought.

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