Part 9 (1/2)

'I've never bottled out of anything before, but... I'm really, really scared, Doctor.'

The Doctor put his hands on her shoulders. 'I'm sorry Ace,' he said. 'Forgive me.' There was a pause. 'Why don't you go back to the TARDIS?' he added carefully. 'You'll be safe in there whatever happens.'

Ace's doubts were immediately resolved. 'No chance,'

she said instantly.

The Doctor opened his mouth to continue but she antic.i.p.ated him and cut off his speech before he had uttered a syllable. 'I said no chance, Doctor.' Ace's jaw was set firmly in the manner that the Doctor knew meant there was no arguing with her. 'I'm coming with you,' she said, and, picking up the tape player once again, hurried forward towards the dark tower.

The Doctor sighed, and beamed after her in admiration as he moved to follow. He knew all along he had been right about Ace.

Unfortunately, neither of them noticed that the tape, which was still playing silently, was about to reach its end.

Inside the crypt, Karl was also smiling in satisfaction as the final attachment for Cyber programming was fitted to De Flores' body. The Cyberman responsible stepped back and pressed the preliminary switch.

A few feet away, at the communications console, things were not proceeding so happily. 'The Cyber Fleet is still not receiving our transmissions, Leader,' said the Lieutenant.

The Cyber Leader was perplexed. He reviewed the situation again, and once more reached no conclusion. 'Is there any pattern to the jamming signal?' he asked, exasperated.

'It is meaningless,' replied the Lieutenant tonelessly.

'Let me examine it,' ordered the Leader.

The Lieutenant pressed a switch and the monitor speaker opened up. The crypt was flooded instantly with the music of the jazz quartet. The Cybermen stood still, bemused.

The music came to its finale and ended. The sound of cheers and applause which replaced it stirred a deep, long forgotten and almost extinct wisp of memory in the Leader's brain cells. He scanned them to attempt to identify it.

'I have heard that sound before,' he said slowly.

The applause continued, mixing with cheers, whistles, and cries for more. The the sound stopped and there was a loud click. The communications console instantly sprang back into life: lights reilluminated, circuits were once again complete, and the normal buzz of healthy electronic activity became audible once again.

The Lieutenant turned immediately to the Leader.

'Transmission channels are clear again, Leader,' he reported perfunctorily.

'Splendid. Their arrival is imminent.'

Weakly, De Flores struggled in his technological prison.

'You fool,' he croaked. 'The statue's power is nothing without the bow.' He rattled his wires desperately but to no avail, and fell back against the wall. His eyes were turning purple and his face was deathly white. The Cyber Leader glanced at him contemptuously, but could not resist speaking for the benefit of his Lieutenant.

'We shall shortly obtain the bow,' he replied.

De Flores cackled with the laughter of the deranged. He was clearly exerting all his considerable mental power to countering the programming energies, although clearly growing weaker by the moment. 'Obtain it?' he repeated.

'From the Doctor?' he cackled again. 'You delude yourself.

He is no common adversary.' De Flores summoned the last of his waning strength to draw himself up to his full height. 'Do you imagine,' he boomed imperiously, 'he will simply walk in here and hand it over?'

'Good afternoon,' came a familiar voice. In astonishment, they all turned towards the doorway where Ace and the Doctor stood, the latter raising his hat politely with one hand. In the other he held the bow of Nemesis.

There was a cataclysmic silence. Even the Cyber Leader was overcome, although he was the first to speak. 'Doctor,'

he managed.

The Doctor smiled cheerfully. 'Yes, here we are,' he confirmed as though they had arrived a few minutes late for a tea party after a minor parking problem. 'Sorry we couldn't be here earlier, but we were held up on the way.'

His voice echoed in the stunned silence. The Doctor was fully in charge of the moment, and enjoying himself tremendously. He gestured courteously to Ace. 'You remember my companion Ace, of course?' he looked around at them all anxiously for confirmation.

As he did so, the Cyber Leader uttered a metallic snarl and s.n.a.t.c.hed at the bow. The Doctor, however, was far too quick for him and skipped nimbly aside.

The Cyber Leader glared at him. The strength of the Cyber Leader's will was so palpable that Ace shuddered.

Although she was still in the doorway, Ace noticed that in dodging the Cyber Leader, the Doctor had deliberately moved well inside the crypt. She could see no escape for him now.

The Cyber Leader broke the silence. 'What do you want?' he asked thickly.

The Doctor grinned at him and gave the bow an affectionate stroke. This was not lost on all the crypt's occupants, whose eyes moved as one in fascination to it.

When they looked up again for his reply, the Doctor was smiling indulgently at them.

'You Cybermen do go in for obvious questions don't you?' he said, with mock sadness. 'But then you always have talked in such a dull way. You know, everything's always...' and he adopted an extremely convincing Cyber voice, 'Kill him, or Excellent.' The Cybermen started in reaction to the insult but the Doctor was back to his own voice again and still ahead of them. 'So what do I want?

Well, obvious questions beg obvious answers. Nothing.

That's what I want.' He looked at the Leader with apparent concern. 'Have I lost you?' He spoke clearly, as though to a child. 'Nothing. Nothing.' And suddenly he became steely. 'Nothing lasts for ever.'

The Cyber Leader made a dismissive gesture, as if to cut through the swathes of unnecessary talk he was enduring.

'Give me the bow,' he rasped.

But the Doctor moved out of reach again, and again, Ace noticed, further into the crypt and among his deadly enemies. 'Patience, patience,' he admonished. 'I thought we'd have a little chat first. Relive old times. Look to the future.'

'You have no future,' replied the Leader, with flat finality. 'Neither does your companion, nor any of her race.'

As the metallic voice grated, Ace was stealing a glance at the Nemesis. It was brighter than she had ever seen it, and its intensity was increasing by the moment, as though the entire statue were preparing for ma.s.sive and unimaginable activity. It was reacting to the bow, which she now saw was s.h.i.+ning equally brightly in the Doctor's hand. Ace began to see the Doctor's purpose. The Doctor, meanwhile, was replying to the Cyber Leader, and holding the attention of all the other beings in the crypt.

The Doctor seemed blithely unconcerned at the imminent destruction of himself, Ace, and the entire planet on which they stood. 'I'm afraid I have to disagree with you,' he was saying cheerfully. The Cyber Leader, however, had clearly suffered as much delay as he was prepared to tolerate. He held up an imperious silver hand.

'Enough,' boomed the voice, 'we shall complete the statue.'

The Doctor ignored him. 'There is, however you care to approach it, always a future,' he ruminated.

Ace took a deep breath. Despite the Doctor's seemingly boundless confidence, she felt things were bad enough without his going off on one of his lengthy discourses on the subject of time. It was, after all, his favourite theme, with which like a jazz musician with a good tune, he never ceased finding new aspects to explore and develop.