Part 4 (2/2)

'Really, my dear Rani, you and I should be friends. I am one of your greatest admirers.'

'Don't bother with flattery.' She was too shrewd to be taken in by such an obvious ploy. 'I know why you're here.

I saw the Doctor.' She had. When he pa.s.sed on the dray and his tracer had let out its erratic bleeps.

'Then you know why I need your co-operation.'

'Co-operation! I want nothing to do with you!' She was adamant.

'You may change your mind when you hear my proposition.'

'I'm not concerned with your pathetic vendetta, one way or the other.' She checked the seal on the phial. 'Now clear off and let me get on with my work.'

Her obduracy was not unexpected, but coercion came easily to the Master. 'Either you collaborate or I bring this little venture to an extremely untimely end!' Deliberately, he jiggled Tim Ba.s.s's catheter tube, causing the skull image on the monitor screen to flutter.

'Jos.h.!.+ Tom! Kill!'

Her two muscular a.s.sistants reacted immediately.

But so did the Master.

A rapid blast from the TCE and Tom disintegrated in the enveloping red haze.

Unerringly, the TCE set Josh in its sights.

'No, Jos.h.!.+ Stand still!'

With life-saving subservience, Josh obeyed the Rani's imperative command.

Another woman, someone quite unlike the Rani, was also interested in Josh's welfare. Cradling their baby son in her arms, Josh's wife had sought an appointment with Lord Ravensworth.

'My Josh, your lords.h.i.+p. He's been missing for days.'

'It's not just her Josh that's missing. Our Tom's gone too.' This was from an older woman. Both had come to the office in the forlorn hope that the mine owner could offer an explanation.

Before he had a chance to answer, the Doctor b.u.t.ted in.

'When?'

Neither woman replied; his lords.h.i.+p's frown indicated his annoyance at the Doctor's interjection.

'Forgive me, Ravensworth. It is important.' He elaborated his question. 'When did they go missing?'

The older woman replied. 'Nowt's been seen of them since they come off s.h.i.+ft together.'

'Perhaps they've joined those Luddites?' Peri's contribution distressed the women.

'Joined that mob of lunatics,' the older woman retorted.

'Smas.h.i.+ng and rampaging day and night! Frightening folks out of us beds!'

The younger woman was equally vehement. 'My Josh wouldn't join them. My Josh wouldn't harm anyone. He's gentle as a lamb is my Josh.'

If she could have seen her Josh at that moment, she would not have spoken with such certainty.

Acting on the Rani's instructions, he was in the bath chamber where, unceremoniously, he rolled the still unconscious miner onto his back.

'You and the Doctor are a well matched pair of pests!

Now I need a new a.s.sistant!' Directed at the Master, the Rani's ill-tempered remark confirmed that saving Josh's life had nothing to do with kindness; she simply did not want to be inconvenienced. She unscrewed the ventilated lid of a small oval container. Inside, wriggling and glowing fluorescently, was a colony of sickly-green maggots.

Selecting a plump specimen, she held it to the miner's lips and forced his mouth open. The maggot, squirming, was popped onto his tongue.

Even the Master shuddered as the miner, his Adam's Apple bobbing, chewed, then swallowed the revolting morsel.

His eyelids blinked wide.

The pupils became suffused with a blue glow. Gradually the blue faded and the eyes stared fixedly into s.p.a.ce. Just like Josh's eyes.

The Master's admiration for the Rani soared. 'I wasn't wrong. I knew with you as controller it wouldn't be hypnotism. Not from a chemist of your calibre! What are they? Parasites you've specially impregnated?'

'There's an easy way to find out. Try some.' She offered the container with its slimy, squiggling grubs, not expecting him to accept.

He didn't. Make a selection, that is. He grabbed the lot!

Furious, she tried to retrieve them. No chance. The Master was never going to surrender such a valuable acquisition.

'Brilliant! Quite brilliant!' The tribute was sincere.

'When the Time Lords exiled you they made a cardinal error.'

'Yes. They did. And they'll learn to regret it!' There was no doubting the Rani's threat. 'So will anyone else who interferes!'

6.

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