第 30 页

Benton's reverie was halted as the Brigadier pushed the sheet of paper he had been reading in Benton's general direction. Taking the hint, the sergeant picked it up and glanced down it.

It was a personal letter, from Beech and Co, solicitors, of Putney. It detailed the claims of their client, one Fiona Lethbridge-Stewart, regarding her filing for divorce upon the grounds of irreconcilable marital breakdown.

Benton passed the letter back. 'I'm very sorry, sir.'

The Brigadier harrumphed. 'At least I get the car and rights to see Kate. Very little else.'

'It's good that she's not contesting you seeing your daughter, though.'

'Hmmm. Only because she knows that I'm unlikely to be able to do so very often.' The Brigadier tapped at a framed photograph on his desk with his pen, knocking it onto its back.

Benton could see it showed all three LethbridgeStewarts gathered around a Christmas tree. He guessed it must be two years old, because he knew the Brigadier had been in Geneva all over last Christmas.

'Oh well, back to business. What can I do for you, Sergeant Benton?'

Benton stood up immediately to make his report. 'Corporal Bell has radioed in, sir.' He produced a full transcript of her report and handed it over.

The Brigadier scanned it with professional speed and then grimaced. 'I hope Yates doesn't do anything stupid.'

'No, sir. We don't want to lose our new captain, sir.'

The Brigadier looked up, raising his eyebrows questioningly.

Benton cleared his throat. 'Talk amongst the lads, sir. Bets are on that Mike gets his pips soon.'

'Really, Sergeant? And why do they think that?'

Benton opened his mouth to give an answer, and then realized he did not have one. 'Don't know, sir. Just idle chit-chat.'

The Brigadier stood up, straightening his uniform. He bent down, putting the solicitors' letter into a drawer. 'You've been with me since the beginning, John. Don't you think that you're in the running as well?'

Benton licked his lips. 'Permission to speak candidly, sir?'

'Of course.'

'It's not me, sir. I know that. You know that. Mike Yates knows that. He's an officer, sir. Like you, it's in the blood. The lads respect him, admire him if you like. So do I. Frankly, I couldn't give orders to someone like him any more than I could to you, sir.' Benton knew he was flushing slightly. 'Really, sir, I'd much prefer it if he was a captain. It would be good for morale, provide a chain of command and help things run more efficiently. Added to that, sir, I don't want that responsibility. I'm a soldier, not a politician. Mike's a better juggler of high-ups than me. I can deal with grunts on parade, but give me one of those bods from C19 or the Ministry, and I'm out of my depth.'

'Good grief, Sergeant.' The Brigadier smiled. 'I don't think I've ever heard you say so much.'

Benton could not help but smile back. 'Been practising this speech, sir.'

The Brigadier nodded. 'I'll take your thoughts on board, Sergeant, if I get the budget to fund a promotion.' Benton turned to go, but the Brigadier continued: 'Oh, and Sergeant Benton?'

'Sir?'

'Thank you for being candid.'

'Sir.'

'Now,' and the Brigadier was all business again. 'This report of Bell's. If it is the new C19 Blackbird she saw, she recommends getting Parkinson to trace it. According to her, we have its transponder codes fed in.'

'Already taken care of, sir. I'll go and ask Parkinson if he's got a destination yet.'

The Brigadier nodded. 'Thank you, Sergeant. Somehow I thought you might have done that already. Report back to me when you have a location. Then I've got a task for you.'

'Sir?'

The Brigadier pointed at the map of the south coast behind his desk, which Corporal Hawkes had transferred from the communications room. 'I'm going to take one squad to wherever the Blackbird is. I'll try and get the Doctor and Sergeant Yates back safely. However, according to Bell, there was a Silurian with the Doctor. That means that they are using Smallmarshes regularly. I want your squad to rendezvous with Bell and keep an eye out for the blighters. I don't care if you have to stay there for a night or a week, but until I can speak to the Doctor again, we don't know what the Silurians are planning. I want you there just in case they attack. We got caught out last time; I don't want it to happen again.'

'Very good, sir. I'll check up on Parkinson.' Benton saluted and headed back to the communications room, grateful that as a confirmed bachelor he would never have to go through a divorce.

The three-dimensional schematic hovered in front of her.

Using her pad, Liz could select and illuminate whichever section of the Earth Reptile's physiology she required.

To her right hovered another hologram, this one a wire-frame of the same figure, picked out in green. Every so often, Liz made a slight adjustment to her readings and spoke a command into the pad. The schematic's internal organs would dilate, shrink or move slightly at her command, then she would place one hologram over the other and see if it required any adjustments to the basic body shape.

She had been working one-handed at this for some time now, ninety per cent of her concentration focused on the job at hand. The other ten per cent was thinking about Jana, and the bizarre set of circumstances that had led her here. Jana was clearly a trained assassin; her expert use of a C19-issue pistol left no doubt of that. The fact that she had so casually shot dead this Chukk person, and then taken a pot-shot at Liz herself, conclusively proved that she possessed little in the way of a conscience. Sadly she was dead, and the solution to the mystery of who had employed her would have to wait for another day.

Sula moved into the laboratory as quietly as possible, but Liz was aware of her. Something triggered some kind of warning in her mind, like the time she had seen the Silurian - no, Earth Reptile - in the barn at Squires' farm, or on top of L'Ithe when she and Jana had first arrived. She had learnt to suppress that feeling, the primeval fear of the race. Not just because it would be inappropriate, not to say awkward, if she got the heebie-jeebies every time she saw Sula or Baal, but because it was scientifically important to prove that those fears could be overcome. If mankind and the Earth Reptiles were one day to live in peace (God willing, let it be during her lifetime), then this race-memory thing was going to have to be squashed or people taught to overcome it.

Sula passed Liz a mug of liquid, taking the pad away and placing it on a tray she held. 'Liz, you must drink this. It acts as a support to the webbing we put on your wound. It backs up the antiseptic.'

Liz looked at the liquid. 'Lovely, but is it safe for mammals like me?'

Sula thought about this. 'I don't know. No mammals have ever been given any to my knowledge. Then again, no mammals had been treated with the webbing and that hasn't killed you.'

'I suppose not. Oh well, all in the name of science. Bottoms up!' And Liz swallowed the contents of the mug in one go. 'If I could have done that with a pint of Guinness,' she said, wiping her lips on her sleeve, 'I could have won a flyer at the Christmas bash.'

Sula just stared at her, obviously not understanding a word of it.

'Never mind,' said Liz. 'Just ignore me. I'm rambling.'

Sula took the mug and looked inside it. 'You were supposed to sip it gently over half an hour.'

Liz frowned. 'Oh well, I'm not dead.' She swapped the mug for the pad. 'Thanks.' Then she suddenly smiled at Sula. 'You and Baal seem to have accepted me as more than just an ignorant Ape all of a sudden. Why?'

Sula's skin seemed to grow a fraction darker, but she did not reply.

'I'm sorry,' said Liz. 'I didn't mean to embarrass you. I just genuinely wondered.'

Sula crossed to the particle disseminator, placed the tray on the floor and activated a viewscreen. On it was pictured a small ape-like mammal. 'Your ancestor,' she said simply.

Liz stared at it. Living history. Real prehistory rather than a jumble of artistic interpretations made up from fossils. 'My God, it's beautiful.'

'Really?'

Liz glanced at Sula and then back at the screen. 'Aesthetically, no. But scientifically, yes. We could learn so much from you. For hundreds of years we have wondered what the past was like. You were there. You can tell us.' Liz excitedly pointed at the image on the screen. 'Hell, you can show us. There are so many questions that could be answered if we all co-operated.'

'I don't know if the Triad would agree.'

'Sadly, those in power never do. I doubt many of our world leaders would leap at the opportunity either. It's up to ordinary people like you or me to show them how necessary co-operation is.'

'For so long my mother and others like her have taught us, almost bred into us, a total loathing for Apes. You have over-run our world, destroyed so much of its natural beauty. We were taught to destroy you.'

Liz nodded. 'But you see it now, don't you? You see how you and I are working together, co-operating.' Liz pointed at the mug on the tray. 'You say you didn't know if that would work on me. That it might kill me, even. Well, that's the joy of what we're doing: learning together. From what I've gathered from Baal's notes, you haven't been able to sort out your genetic problems, so you kidnapped a human boy and experimented upon him, right?'

'Yes.' Sula look ashamed.

'But it went wrong, and that's no one's fault. You don't understand our physical make-up any more than I understand yours. Only through co-operation will we get to an answer. The Doctor would have helped you.'

'But can you find the answer?' asked a male voice behind them. Both Liz and Sula turned and watched as Baal walked across the room, his eyes looking at the floor rather than them.

Sula was immediately concerned. 'Baal? What's happened?'

He sighed deeply and took her face in his hands. 'Our mother ordered the cruiser containing Tahni and the Doctor to be destroyed.'

'Her own daughter?' Liz was appalled, not just for Tahni's sake, but the Doctor's as well.

'My mother is, well, beyond reason. You must have heard the alarm chimes. She has taken the fleet to attack the Apes.'

Sula looked shocked. 'But why? What will that achieve?'

Baal shook his head slowly. 'Remember, our father was an elite, a Sea Devil Warrior. They bonded because she admired their ways. She sees extermination of the Apes as the only way forward, even if accomplishing that costs her own life.'

'Who has gone with her?' Liz asked quietly.

Baal shrugged. 'Her followers. Many of our people, more than half I imagine. Few of our generation though - most of the hybrids know better. We had planned our research to find a cure together.' He sat on a seat next to the map screen. 'If we are the only ones to survive this Shelter, we need to find a cure.'

Liz knew she ought to find a way to warn the human authorities of the impending attack. She also knew that, whatever their current doubts, Baal and Sula would never consent to this betrayal of their people. If she wanted their trust, she would have to earn it. 'Then let me help you,' she said. 'I'm a scientist, my field is chemistry, and I'm a human doctor. No one here is better qualified at least. What have you got to lose? You know your biology, I know mine. Between us, we ought to be able to find a cure for this problem.'

Baal and Sula stared at each other. Eventually, Sula touched his arm.

'Baal, our mother is wrong. What she has done to Tahni is unjustifiable. What we did to that Ape hatchling was unjustifiable. None of those things can be reversed, but we can go forward. Learn from our errors. Liz can help us. Please, let us all be equals now or we'll never leave this Shelter for fear of what we are and what will happen to us.'

Baal stared straight ahead. 'The Doctor asked me if I believed that what I was trying to do justified the way in which I did it.'

'The ends never justifies the means. It's an established science principle. One by which most respectable scientists live,' Liz said.

Baal looked her in the eye. 'Even if it means that ultimately you fail? Even if it condemns you to death because you weren't prepared to take risks?'

'Many of our scientists have argued that,' Liz said. 'It's a question of individual morality. Whether you can live with yourself regardless of the good or bad consequences. Science, Baal, isn't just a job, a vocation. It's a commitment to other people rather than just yourself Other people can live or die by your decisions, your successes or failures, more so than in any other profession.'

Baal walked towards her, holding out both hands. Liz grasped them. 'Together,' he said. 'Please join us and help us find a cure for our illness. Then, I promise, we will find a way to all live together on the surface.'

Liz let his hands go, and watched as he and Sula began discussing rearranging the laboratory. She was dimly aware of their conversations as they worked out ways of adapting their machinery and ways of working to fit in with her.

This is it, she thought. This is what it's all about. What UNIT, the Doctor and the Brigadier are all about. My place isn't with the Doctor, running around helping him repair his TARDIS. My place is working here for a while, helping to mend these people and fostering some kind of relationship between them and us.

Her eye was caught by a white light blinking on and off on one of the panels. Like a star twinkling. She found herself smiling. OK Nanna, this is it. I want to be here, I want to do this, I want to use my training, my knowledge to help these people. And I'm going to.

The Doctor was getting the guided tour. Along with the entire squad of black-clad guards from the beach, he was being escorted through corridors and laboratories, aircraft hangars and stadium-sized monitoring stations. The Vault was almost a small town buried beneath the Cheviot Hills.