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DOCTOR WHO
THE ARK IN SPACE
Written by
Robert Holmes
Part Three
(Overlap from 'You fool, Libri')
[INT. Control room]
WOMAN [OC]: Hello, Space Station Nerva. This is the Earth High Minister. The fact that you are hearing my voice in a message recorded thousands of years before the day in which you are now living is a sure sign that our great undertaking, the salvation of the human race, has been rewarded with success.
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
WOMAN [OC]: (as the DOCTOR rises from the dead wasp) You have slept longer than the recorded history of mankind, and you stand now at the dawn of a new age. You will return to an Earth purified by flame, a world that we cannot guess at. If it be arid, you must make it flourish. If it be stony, you must make it fertile. The challenge is vast, the task enormous, but let nothing daunt you.
HARRY: Sounds like a sort of pre-match pep talk.
WOMAN [OC]: Remember, citizen volunteers, that you are the proud standard-bearers of our entire race.
[INT. Control room]
(NOAH still stands with his arm raised, listening to the recording.)
WOMAN [OC]: Of the millions that walk the world today, you are the chosen survivors. You have been entrusted with a sacred duty - to see that human culture, human knowledge, human love and faith shall never perish from the universe.
(NOAH grabs his green arm with the other hand and throws it against the console, repeatedly. This has no discernible effect. He lowers his head in anguish.)
WOMAN [OC]: Guard what we have given you with all your strength.
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
WOMAN [OC]: And now, across the chasm of the years, I send you the prayers and hopes of the entire world. God speed you to a safe landing.
(VIRA returns to tending the pods.)
HARRY: Well, I bet that did your female chauvinist heart a power of good.
SARAH: Why?
HARRY: Well, I mean, fancy a member of the fair sex being top of the totem pole.
NOAH [OC]: Vira! Vira!
VIRA: Noah! (She jogs into the tranquiller room.)
[INT. Tranquiller room]
VIRA: Yes, Commander?
NOAH [OC]: Vira, hear me. This is an order. Expedite revivification. Commence main phase now.
VIRA: But Noah, the safety checks-
[INT. Control room]
NOAH: Ignore safety checks! We, you, are in great danger. Get our, your people to the Earth before...
VIRA [OC]: Noah?
NOAH: (struggling to get the words out) Before the Wirrn. Vira, take command. Now hear me. You take command!
[INT. Tranquiller room]
VIRA: What has happened? Commander, are you there?
[INT. Control room]
NOAH: The Wirrn are here. They will-
(He stops his tortured speech. He can hold out no longer against what is infesting him.)
NOAH: (without difficulty) We shall absorb the humans. The Earth shall be ours.
[INT. Tranquiller room]
VIRA: Noah! Noah!
[INT. Control room]
(NOAH cries out and again labours to get his chosen words out.)
NOAH: Vira. Vira, there's no time. They're in my mind, getting stronger. Libri is dead. You will all die. Must save our people. You must!
(His fight against his left arm takes him past the TARDIS.)
VIRA [OC]: Noah? Noah!
[INT. Tranquiller room]
HARRY: The chap sounds in a bad way.
VIRA: What did he mean they're in his mind?
DOCTOR: Absorb? 'We shall absorb the humans'? Endoparasitism?
SARAH: (whispering to VIRA) He talks to himself sometimes because he's the only one who understands what he's talking about.
DOCTOR: If the Wirrn can do that, we've no chance at all. Complete physical absorption.
VIRA: Of us?
DOCTOR: They'll literally eat us alive. Vira, I must talk with Noah. You'd better come with me. He trusts you.
VIRA: My duty is to supervise the revivification.
DOCTOR: No. Noah has passed the command to you. Your duties have been widened.
VIRA: What is your intention?
DOCTOR: To find out exactly what it is we're facing. And only Noah knows that.
VIRA: But I cannot leave until the last of our technical section have awakened.
DOCTOR: Harry can handle that for you, can't you, Harry?
HARRY: Well, I-
DOCTOR: Well, you've watched Vira. You know the procedure.
HARRY: Yes, I-
VIRA: One gram of scropholine when the neural register enters the red zone.
HARRY: Right.
DOCTOR: He'll be all right.
(The DOCTOR leaves.)
VIRA: And the injection must be right over the pectoralis major.
HARRY: Ah, yes, now that I do understand.
SARAH: Good luck. (She follows VIRA to the door.)
DOCTOR [OC]: And Sarah, you stay and help Harry.
HARRY: Yes. Come along, Nurse Smith.
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
(HARRY walks to the pod where the cart sits. Red lights are flashing ad the base of this pod. He checks the reading with the band on the man's head.)
HARRY: Yes, you see, this chap's in the red zone, so-
(He prepares to perform the injection.)
SARAH: Hey, there's another one seems to be awake here.
HARRY: Well, after ten thousand years, Sarah, he can't be in that much of a hurry.
SARAH: Oh, I hope you know what you're doing.
HARRY: Oh, yes, dead simple really. Medicine by numbers.
SARAH: Oh, yes, dead simple.
HARRY: It's just a question of fixing a fresh ampoule thing into here.
[INT. Perimeter walkway]
(As the DOCTOR and VIRA approach, the door slides up. NOAH now has a full-fledged pseudopod for an arm, and the infestation extends down his side and over most of his face. He cannot stand fully upright any longer either.)
NOAH: Keep back! Don't touch me!
VIRA: Noah.
NOAH: No, 'keep back', I said!
DOCTOR: Noah, tell us one thing. How much time do we have?
NOAH: Time?
DOCTOR: Before the Wirrn reach their adult form?
NOAH: It feels near, very near. The tearing free and the great blackness rushing through.
(He drops the gun and passes. The DOCTOR picks it up.)
VIRA: Noah and I were pair-bonded for the new life.
DOCTOR: Let's go back.
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
(Two men are learning of recent events.)
ROGIN: (of command grade) Dune and Libri? And Noah?
SARAH: I'm sorry. It must be a terrible shock for you.
LYCETT: (of green grade) So there's just two of us left to check the ship?
SARAH: And Vira. She's taken command.
LYCETT: Where is she?
SARAH: She's gone with the Doctor. They're trying to contact Noah.
ROGIN: There's been a snitch-up. Didn't I tell you, Lycett? Five thousand years ago, I said there'd be a snitch-up.
LYCETT: Ten thousand.
ROGIN: Oh, beautiful. We should have taken our chance with the solar flares and gone into the thermic shelters. We'd have been happily dead by now.
LYCETT: What was it that killed them? Their lungs, was it?
HARRY: Hmm?
LYCETT: Dune and Libri. We were told our lung tissue might atrophy.
HARRY: Er, well, no, actually.
SARAH: Something got in here.
HARRY: That's right. Some sort of space creature.
SARAH: It cut through your alarm-clock system.
ROGIN: What-? (He has spotted the vespid form.)
SARAH: Look. Oh, it's okay. It's dead.
DOCTOR: But, unfortunately, its larvae are still very much alive.
LYCETT: Vira!
ROGIN: Vira, it's gone wrong!
VIRA: Welcome, Lycett, Rogin. You feel well?
LYCETT: Yes, (he pauses) Commander.
(A green larva wiggles its way anti-clockwise along the perimeter walkway. We return to HARRY, who assists the DOCTOR in moving the wasp body into the middle of the room.)
HARRY: What are we going to do with it?
DOCTOR: How much anatomy do you remember, Harry?
HARRY: Quite a lot, I think, but you need a blooming entomologist for this thing.
DOCTOR: We need to find its weaknesses, and we need to find them quickly.
VIRA: Can we help?
DOCTOR: Not at the moment, thank you.
VIRA: Then we will commence the main phase. Lycett, Rogin.
(They leave.)
DOCTOR: What was that she just said?
SARAH: They're going to start the main phase.
DOCTOR: What? (to HARRY) Carry on with that thoracic incision. Not too deep.
[INT. Tranquiller room]
LYCETT: But the safety checks?
VIRA: We shall override them.
ROGIN: Why?
LYCETT: We can't.
VIRA: That is my decision. Now, take your operating stations.
DOCTOR: Vira, the main phase must wait.
VIRA: Noah said we should expedite the revivification programme and get our people to work.
DOCTOR: Noah was wrong. How long would it take?
VIRA: Seventy-two hours for complete revivification, another twenty-four to evacuate the Ark.
DOCTOR: Four whole days? At the rate at which the Wirrn are developing, they'll have pupated to imago long before then, and you know what that means?
VIRA: We must try!
DOCTOR: You can't do it, Vira. The Ark will be crawling with those creatures within hours.
VIRA: Doctor, the fate of all humanity might be decided within the next few hours.
(She nods to the other two, who begin working at the console.)
DOCTOR: Vira, if you fail, your people will die in pain and fear. If I fail, they'll die anyway, but at least only the six of us will know anything about it.
VIRA: You have an alternative plan?
DOCTOR: Between the larval and imago forms, there must be a pupal stage. Now, the Wirrn will be dormant and defenceless. If we can find their weaknesses...
VIRA: We might destroy them?
DOCTOR: Yes.
VIRA: Very well. Stand down.
DOCTOR: Good.
LYCETT: There's a power flutter in Section Four, Commander.
VIRA: What does that indicate?
LYCETT: Some external fault. Shall I check the stacks?
DOCTOR: No! The larvae have taken over the infrastructure. They seem to need solar radiation.
ROGIN: We should have stayed on Earth, Lycett. I liked the Earth. I like heat.
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
HARRY: Curious lung structure, Doctor. Look at it.
DOCTOR: Yes, fascinating. A superb adaptation.
SARAH: What is it?
DOCTOR: Obviously, the creature's lungs recycle the wastes, almost certainly by enzymes. Quite wonderful. Carbon dioxide back to oxygen.
SARAH: You mean the way plants make oxygen?
DOCTOR: Exactly right. It must live in space, probably just occasionally visiting a planetary atmosphere for food and oxygen, the way a whale rises from the ocean.
HARRY: Judging by the size of his mandibles, this chap doesn't live on plankton.
DOCTOR: No.
VIRA: Noah spoke of a great blackness rushing in. He meant space, but how did he know?
DOCTOR: He now has the race memory of a Wirrn. Symbiotic atavism, to be precise. I'm going to need your help now, Vira.
(He has removed the outer layer from one of the wasp's compound eyes. He carries this with him.)
[INT. Tranquiller room]
DOCTOR: Do you have any spare extension leads, Rogin?
ROGIN: Yes, but what do you want-
DOCTOR: Hurry, man. Fetch them.
VIRA: What are you going to do, Doctor?
DOCTOR: A little experiment. Circuit display, Lycett.
(The diagrams are displayed on a round monitor on the wall.)
VIRA: It's forbidden to alter those circuits.
DOCTOR: I need the neural cortex amplifier. Not for long. Don't worry.
(While the DOCTOR attaches leads to the membrane, green is pressing itself against a grille and making hissing noises.)
DOCTOR: Right, switch on the video circuit, Lycett. It'll take a little time to warm up.
HARRY: Doctor, what are you trying to do, exactly?
DOCTOR: Well, sometimes latent neural impressions can be revived.
HARRY: Really?
DOCTOR: Yes.
HARRY: I've never heard of that.
DOCTOR: Advanced technology. Gypsies used to believe that the eye retained its last image after death. Not so far out. (glancing at the monitor again) No, it's not going to work. Switch off, Lycett.
SARAH: Now what?
DOCTOR: It should work. The coil isn't giving a strong enough stimulus. I'll have to link in my own cerebral cortex. That's the only thing.
VIRA: That is highly dangerous.
DOCTOR: I know. Two more leads, Rogin.
VIRA: The power could burn out a living brain!
DOCTOR: I agree. An ordinary brain. But mine is exceptional.
VIRA: I cannot permit it. The shock might kill you.
DOCTOR: I think not. Unless, of course, the experiment was interrupted. That could be dangerous.
SARAH: Do you have to do it, Doctor?
HARRY: Yes, why take the risk?
DOCTOR: If I can find out what it was that killed that creature, we might have a chance of fighting the Wirrn. That's our only hope.
SARAH: Yes, but do you have to be the one-
DOCTOR: It's not just our existence that's at stake, Sarah. It's the entire human race.
(He begins attaching the two electrodes to his temples.)
DOCTOR: It may be irrational of me, but human beings are quite my favourite species. Vira?
VIRA: Yes, Doctor?
DOCTOR: Take this. (he holds out the gun) Don't hesitate to use it if anything goes wrong. You won't have much time.
HARRY: What do you mean?
DOCTOR: Switch on, Lycett. Lycett?
(LYCETT does so, and the DOCTOR spasms and cries out loudly in pain.)
HARRY: Doctor!
VIRA: He's joining his mind to the Wirrn. He could remain a part of it forever.
DOCTOR: (as an image begins to coalesce on the monitor) Look, it's working.
(There is a sound from the cryonic chamber.)
LYCETT: What was that?
ROGIN: We'd better look.
(ROGIN and LYCETT leave the room. The others watch as the monitor displays the Ark in Earth orbit and approaching.)
[INT. Cryonic chamber]
LYCETT: Over here.
(The men look at the ventilation grating between pods D4 and D5. Something has smashed through it, and a green trail extending into the room.)
LYCETT: (squatting at the grating to examine it) Case-hardened diranium, bent like tin.
ROGIN: Lycett, look out behind you!
(The larva moves toward him. LYCETT climbs up into a pod.)
ROGIN: Shut the door! Shut the door!
(The larva is now at the pod.)
HARRY: (entering) What's going on?
ROGIN: (pushing him from the room and leaving himself) Get out!
[INT. Tranquiller room]
ROGIN: They've killed Lycett!
(He closes the door to the chamber.)
ROGIN: There's some sort of huge grub in there.
HARRY: Stop the experiment.
SARAH: No, you can't! You'll kill him!
VIRA: The armoury, Rogin. Get the fission guns.
ROGIN: Right.
HARRY: I'll come with you.
(The monitor shows the Ark's defence system sending electricity in the general direction of the eye. The DOCTOR cries out, reliving the pain. One of the legs shown from the monitor's perspective opens the panel in the control room and exposes the wires. There is banging on the door from the cryonic chamber.)
VIRA: Hurry, Rogin!
SARAH: That door won't hold much longer.
(As the DOCTOR sweats, the screen shows the Wirrn opening a pod.)
VIRA: Dune.
[INT. Perimeter walkway]
(The sliding doorway to area Q opens in front of the running HARRY and ROGIN. They bend down to get through sooner. A partially human NOAH steps out behind them.)
NOAH: Fools! Human fools!
(ROGIN fires before NOAH himself can do so. The electricity keeps NOAH back as ROGIN continues firing. The door lowers again, and the two continue running.)
[INT. Tranquiller room]
(The full height of the door is now occupied along one edge with greenness. Back at the other wall, the monitor has gone dark. SARAH switches it off and pulls the electrodes from the DOCTOR's head.)
SARAH: Help me with him, Vira.
VIRA: Wait. Come away.
DOCTOR: Wirrn. Wirrn.
VIRA: Doctor.
DOCTOR: Wirrn!
VIRA: Doctor! Doctor!
(VIRA points the gun at the DOCTOR.)
SARAH: No, you can't! I won't let you!
DOCTOR: Can't what? Is it time to get up?
SARAH: Doctor, you're going to be all right.
DOCTOR: Is that noise in my head?
(HARRY and ROGIN rush in. They begin firing at the green mass. VIRA joins them. However, the giant larva has made it through and doesn't seem particularly deterred. It turns round, underside toward us now. The DOCTOR rises and starts walking toward it.)
HARRY: Doctor, come back.
SARAH: Doctor, don't! Doctor! Doctor!
(From the front, she pushes the DOCTOR away from the larval Wirrn.)
DOCTOR: Aim lower!
(They obey, and the larva falls into crawling posture and retreats through the door. ROGIN and HARRY keep firing until it's all the way through the door, then continue. They return and close the door again.)
ROGIN: It's gone back through the grille.
HARRY: That was a close one. You all right, Sarah?
SARAH: Yes.
HARRY: Doctor?
DOCTOR: Why? Why have they gone over to the attack?
VIRA: They want to destroy us.
DOCTOR: But they've only to wait. In their adult form, they'll be a thousand times deadlier. Fission guns will have no effect then.
SARAH: How many of them will there be?
DOCTOR: At a hatching? A hundred.
HARRY: A hundred? We won't stand a chance. How can we fight a hundred of those?
DOCTOR: Electricity. Only by electricity. That's the one thing I found out.
SARAH: Electricity? How-
DOCTOR: Yes. It was the auto-guard that killed the queen. Half a million volts.
HARRY: We found the queen in the cupboard.
DOCTOR: Amazing willpower. I could feel it struggling against death until its task was done. Yes. Rogin, is there any way we can electrify the infrastructure?
ROGIN: Not from here, Doctor. We'd have to run cables from the control centre.
DOCTOR: Control centre? Right, let's go!
HARRY: You can't go that way, Doctor.
ROGIN: Noah's waiting out there. Put one foot inside the transom and you'll be dead.
DOCTOR: Yes, I was forgetting Noah's extra mobility.
VIRA: We're trapped.
DOCTOR: No. The Wirrn are using Dune's knowledge of the Ark. Perhaps there's something he didn't know.
ROGIN: Dune was first tech. He knew it all.
VIRA: He helped design the systems.
DOCTOR: Nobody knows it all. Perhaps he's forgotten that these transmats are reversible?
ROGIN: Oh ho ho-ho, that's clever.
DOCTOR: Isn't it? And as you appreciate it, Rogin, you can go first. I'll give you a hand. Come on.
(ROGIN stops smiling, but he does climb over the console and into the tranquiller alcove above it.)
ROGIN: Oh well, I never liked it here anyway.
(The DOCTOR operates the transmat, and ROGIN fades out.)
DOCTOR: You next, Harry.
(HARRY climbs up.)
[INT. Control room]
(ROGIN is sitting. He watches HARRY arrive on the couch.)
HARRY: I say!
ROGIN: Are you all right?
HARRY: What a marvellous way to travel.
ROGIN: It always sets my teeth on edge. (He touches them.)
[INT. Tranquiller room]
(SARAH is in the alcove. Some of the lights go down, and the hum of the power dies out.)
DOCTOR: That was a power drain. Hello, control centre?
ROGIN [OC]: Hello, Doctor. We've got a power failure.
DOCTOR: It's general, then. Do you have a fault reading?
ROGIN [OC]: Section Four. That's the secondary stack. There's no power coming from there at all.
(As his voice fades into light static, the room grows still dimmer. The alcove is in darkness, and SARAH is sitting up.)
VIRA: All power systems are self-repairing.
DOCTOR: Hmm. Malicious damage excluded.
SARAH: Oh well, obviously I am not going anywhere. Help me, Doctor.
(He lifts her down.)
VIRA: The oxygen pumps have stopped.
DOCTOR: Of course. In their pupal stage, the Wirrn don't need oxygen. An easy way of killing us.
VIRA: Well, suffocation is not the most unpleasant death.
DOCTOR: What? We're not finished yet. You two stay here.
SARAH: Where are you going?
DOCTOR: The infrastructure. If they've entered the pupal stage, they'll be dormant.
(At the door panel, he cranks the door open manually.)
DOCTOR: Give me a chance to get down there and switch the power back on.
VIRA: You're forgetting Noah.
DOCTOR: No, I'm not. I think his job's done now. He'll be metamorphosing too.
(The DOCTOR leaves.)
[INT. Power stacks]
(The DOCTOR moves clockwise along the perimeter walkway and then enters the area of the solar stacks. On the walls, there are cases of pupae, including next to the observation window. About to open the hatch, he hears a scritching noise and pauses. He turns and sees a metamorphosed Wirrn approaching. Within is just a hint of Noah's face.)
The above notes, transcription, etc. by Anna Shefl
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