Doctor Who: Timelash Read Free Page B

not alarm Peri, though she did glimpse the Doctor’s worried countenance.
    ’Can’t we go past it?’ It appeared an obvious suggestion to the young American. ’We are in a time-machine after all.’
    The Doctor smiled wryly at Peri’s blissful ignorance.
    ’It’s like saying you want to swim to the shore from the centre of a whirlpool. I don’t think we have a lot of choice in the matter, young lady.’
    A burst of mechanical clatter diverted the Time Lord’s attention back to the pulsating control console. As he scanned the delicate banks of temporal instrumentation, a glimmer of realisation crept on to his blank gaze. Peri noticed, and egged him on to share his discovery.
    ‘At least I know where the tunnel originates,’ he beamed. ‘1179 AD - Earth.’
    Peri was pleased. It could have been a lot worse. In fact, twelfth-century Earth sounded quite a nice place to stop off and explore.
    ‘Few Americans ever learn about this period in history first hand, Doctor.’
    Yet her fellow traveller was soon to put that notion to bed. The Doctor bellowed across the room at his assistant’s apparent lack of understanding as to what was about to happen. Simplifying with a curt gesture a gigantic explosion, he left Peri in no doubt as to what could follow.
    ‘And that, my dear Peri, is the most likely outcome of time particles colliding with a multi-dimensional implosion field.’
    She squirmed uneasily on the spot, looking for her saviour.
    ‘The interior of the TARDIS will attempt to realign itself, and as it does so, there will be an internal explosion.’
    Peri frowned. ‘Is that inevitable?’
    The Doctor simply offered a look in the same mould of his rhetorical questions. Peri stepped back. The last thing she wanted to do was stop her companion’s work, especially now she knew the gravity of things.
    ‘If you want to help,’ shouted the Doctor above the ever-increasing sound of console activity, ‘come and monitor these cosmic graphics.’ The Time Lord pointed at a small screen to the left of him as he continued working with a bank of levers. Peri needed little prompting as the TARDIS’s framework started to vibrate intermittently. She peered at her colleague’s face for some comment, but it was quite clear that things were getting a little hot. Even the Doctor could not offer a glib remark.
    Aram moved her cheek against the slimy touch of a cold damp floor. It was the first thing she sensed as the pain from the android’s shot repeated once more through her small frame, making her leg muscles contract involuntarily until the sensation passed.
    Slowly opening her eyes, Aram attempted to focus some attention on her surroundings. The darkness around was punctuated by a collection of multi-coloured lights making up a bank of mechanical controls. The incessant noise of running water emphasised her position deep underground, and her body reacted with a shiver to the cold atmosphere for the first time. Climbing to her feet, Aram clung to the side of the cavern, trying hard to regain her sense of balance.
    Announced with the sound of a high-pitched motor, a large mass began to move from out of the shadows into a thin filament of projected light that cast a bright space in the middle of the sodden floor.
    ‘So you nearly got away?’
    Aram scrutinised the shape of a high-backed chair, only to hear the occupant’s familiar voice once more. It was the Borad.
    ‘You will never betray me .’
    An injection of fear pumped across the rebel’s body, almost capturing control of her voice. Yet with a burst of courage, she yelled to the Borad to show himself. The ruler agreed, and gingerly the mechanical chair began to spin round. Instantaneously, on the point of eye to eye contact, a thick beam of powerful light encapsulated the young girl as she screamed her last. Her wide eyes gazed at her attacker for a split second until they were darkened, and saw no more.
    Opening a roundel set into a section of the TARDIS wall,