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The Trial
of a Time Lord
by Pip and Jane Baker
Part Nine
The Doctor enters the courtroom silently and with a look of sadness on his
face. He enters his docket and sits down while the Chancellery guards
close the main doors.
The Inquisitor sympathetically tells him that they are all aware of the
distress Peri's death has caused him, and she asks if the recess they've
just taken has given him time to overcome the stress.
The Doctor looks up and quietly tells her he doesn't believe there will
ever be sufficient time for that.
The Valeyard cynically gets to his feet and declares this sorrow of the
Doctor's to be a charade, which he bases on the "cavalier" manner in which
the Doctor allowed his young companion to be destroyed.
The Inquisitor snaps at him that the Doctor is fighting for his life, but
then acknowledges that the Valeyard does have a point. She turns to
the Doctor and asks him if he is ready to present his evidence in his
defence.
The Doctor seems to only half-hear her, still thinking about Peri, and
then he becomes slightly more "awake" as he tells the Inquisitor that he
is and that he is indebted to her for allowing him access to the Matrix
in the same manner the Valeyard had.
He stands and addresses the entire Court. "My excursion will be into the
future."
"The future?" asks the Valeyard with a curl on his lips. "Is it going to
be the Doctor's defence that he improves?"
"Precisely," nods the Doctor at the Valeyard, as though agreeing with him that
he needs improvement.
"This I must see," smiles the Valeyard. He takes his seat calmly.
The Doctor addresses the Court again. "My submission concerns a crisis which
threatens not only the lives of a group of people confined together with no
means of escape, but would, if unresolved, threaten every mortal being on the
planet Earth."
The Inquisitor tells the Doctor to proceed, and he turns to a stand like
the Valeyard's near his seat that contains some basic controls for the
Matrix screen. He presses a button, and the picture on the screen begins
to resolve.
The picture, once resolved, shows a planet in space with an extremely rich
rusty reddish color and what appears to be very rocky terrain.
Above it and in the foreground is a type of spaceship. It is a whitish-
orange and seems arranged in tiers, giving an impression reminiscent of
ocean-bound cruise liners.
The Doctor begins to explain the scene to the Court. He says the planet
is called Mogar, and is located on the Perseus Arm of the Milky Way.
He adds that it is rich in rare metals. He says that a top priority
consignment of these precious metals is being loaded on board "Hyperion III."
As he explains this, the screen view closes in on the ship and a name-plate
on the exterior of the hull can be seen to read this name in large letters.
The view pans along the hull until a window into the interior permits a
view of a large, lounge-like area within that has numerous luxurious seats,
an observation gallery near the window, and a sort of reception desk near two
of the entrances on the far wall.
The Doctor explains that Hyperion III is an intergalactic liner that ferries
between Mogar and Earth, and that this is a scheduled flight in the Earth
year 2986. In the lounge area, perhaps a dozen people can be seen walking
to and fro, crossing paths, travelling down the spiral staircase from the
observation desk, some carrying cases that appear to be luggage.
The Doctor explains that the crew is already aboard and that now the
last passengers are reporting in. "Many will never complete the journey.
For in order to protect a secret hidden on the space liner, _one_ will
become a murderer. . . "
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Defence Interface One "Terror of the Vervoids"
Within the lounge/reception area of the Hyperion III, a very angry woman
in her late forties storms across the deck towards the reception desk.
Her casual attire is colored red to match her face at the present moment.
Her voice seems to match everything as it has a kind of scratchiness about it
that makes a person want to flinch when listening.
Her tirade seems directed at a young woman in pink and white skirt uniform that
will eternally be in the style known as "stewardess." The angry woman
is complaining that she is expected to trust her life for millions of
miles to a bunch of incompetents who can't even get her luggage aboard
without losing it.
The young stewardess smiles sweetly and disarmingly (although it is to no
effect) and asks politely if the Professor's luggage is not in her cabin.
Behind the desk, a man with a very thick dark beard looks up and smiles
a little before leaving to allow the stewardess to come around to check
the records. The Professor is furious that she has to repeat herself.
The stewardess says she's sure they can sort this out.
As she does, an aging grey-haired man in a black uniform with white trim
enters and asks Janet the stewardess if there are problems that he can
help with. He seems to be pretending he didn't hear any of the earlier
shouting, but he doesn't pretend very well.
The Professor looks at him and asks who he is. He introduces himself
as Security Officer Rudge, and asks the Professor which cabin she went to.
The Professor seems furious that the Security Officer has to ask _her_
which cabin she went to. She tells him she went to cabin 6 as Rudge
begins looking over a chart given to him by Janet from the desk.
He looks up and asks to see the Professor's key. She shoves the key
in his hand, and he holds it up upside-down from the way the Professor
gave it to him.
"Uh, no," he says, "The other way round, I think. You are in cabin 9,
and that's where you will find your luggage, Professor."
The Professor snatches the key out of his hand, spits, "Let's hope so!"
and storms off perhaps even more angry.
Another man has just entered with a case in his hand, of about medium
height and a thick beard with traces of grey in it.
Janet smiles at him as he signs a register on the desk, and she tells
"Mr. Grenville" that _he_ is in cabin 6.
He looks up, gives the pen back to Janet and thanks her. He sets off
across the lounge. Rudge begins to follow him and annoyingly begins
to introduce himself and promise that if he has any problems. . .
"Mr. Hallett! How pleasant!" Rudge's banter is cut off by a greeting
and an outstretched hand from an elderly gentleman who seems to recognize
Mr. Grenville as a Mr. Hallett. He goes on to say he's glad there is
at least one face on the ship that doesn't belong to a stranger.
Mr. Grenville tries to explain that there must be some mistake, and he
then tries to leave the lounge. The old man persists, however, and
insists he is correct and that Mr. Hallett here and he met several years
ago on Stella Stora when he came to investigate shortages in a grainery.
Mr. Grenville seems a little upset about this, and explains earnestly
that his name is Grenville and that he's never been to Stella Stora,
and that he is obviously confusing him with someone else.
He turns and quickly leaves the lounge, with all eyes looking at him.
In particular, a group of three people including the angry Professor
from before watch and seem to look a little worried.
Also watching are a pair of aliens completely encased within environment
suits in a gold and brown color scheme. Their faces are completely
invisible behind the face-plates of very sturdy-looking helmets.
The old man tells Rudge that he could have sworn he was correct as even
the voice was the same.
Of the group of worried people, the tallest is a man with a moustache and
a balding head. He walks closer to the other man and the Professor.
(The other man is shorter, about the same age, forty, and he has brown
curly hair.) "An investigator?" asks the tall man.
The Professor leans forward and calls the tall man Bruchner. She tells
him quietly and conspiratorially to go and check the safety measures
on the isolation room immediately.
What appears to be the cargo hold of the Hyperion III is bustling with
activity. A group of perhaps two dozen workers in grey coveralls and
all wearing welding masks seem to be delivering cargo into the hold
of the Hyperion.
From an upper level overlooking the hustle below, Mr. Grenville watches
quietly. Unnoticed by anyone, he climbs down a metal ladder and spies
some spare coveralls and a helmet hanging on the wall, which he takes.
A man in a purple guard-like uniform, armed with an energy weapon and a
checklist, turns to one of the people in the coveralls and tells the person to
get everyone ashore as that was the last batch of cargo they just unloaded.
The people in coveralls begin moving out of the hold towards a rear exit.
No one seems to notice Mr. Grenville donning a helmet and joining their
precession out of the hold.
Hyperion's bridge is manned by only two men behind a single console
looking at a large viewscreen that shows a forward view of empty space.
The room is large but otherwise undecorated. A dark, stone-like greyish
black is the color scheme of the chamber.
The view on the screen seems to start moving, and a sound of rumbling
engines can be heard.
One of the men speaks over a tannoy system to the rest of the ship.
"Hyperion Flight One One Three. . . "
". . . is now in progress." The liner cruises swiftly out of orbit of
Mogar and into open space.
The time column of the Doctor's TARDIS is rising, falling, and flashing,
and the console room's hum also indicates that the ship is in flight.
"Twenty-three, twenty-four," counts a young woman. She seems to be in
her early twenties and looks very thin. This is offset vastly by her
almost out-of-control wild red, curly hair that reaches halfway to her
waist. She is wearing a yellow-colored blazer and pants that look
suitable for exercising in. Exercise is an appropriate term because
at the moment she is reading numbers off a stopwatch and watching as
the Doctor, in usual clothes except for his coat, is riding an
exercise bike with mobile handlebars that rise and fall. Each time
the young woman calls a number from the watch, he has to push the
bars down and up in addition to pedalling the pedals, all to the
accompaniment of some annoying-sounding all-treble exercise music.
He is obviously not enjoying this and is looking at the woman with anguish
and is probably wondering why he's putting up with this.
He counts along with the woman up until the number thirty.
At this point, she turns and heads for the TARDIS interior door. As soon
as she is out of sight, the Doctor stops working the bike but continues
to shout the numbers as though he were still exercising.
At about thirty-eight, the woman returns carrying a glass of some orange
liquid in her hand, and the Doctor quickly resumes his exercising.
At the number forty, the music and the Doctor stop, and the woman gives
him the glass, telling him it'll perk him up.
"Carrot juice!!" he shouts in complaint.
The woman tells him it'll do him good as carrots are full of vitamin A.
The Doctor leans forward and asks her, "Mel, have you studied my ears
lately?"
Mel answers that she's more concerned with the Doctor's waistline.
"No," he goes on, making motions at his ears, "Is it my imagination,
or have they started to grow longer?"
Mel tells him to not worry until she calls him "Neddie." She toasts
his carrot juice with a glass of her own and tells him to drink up.
The Doctor tells her she'll worry sooner when he starts to bray, and he
swallows the drink. He grimaces horribly at the taste.
In a dark room filled with electronic equipment, a young man sits and
tunes a radar control. He is somewhere in his mid-twenties, has brown
hair, and wears a white uniform with a green loop-like flash across his
chest.
He adjusts a radar sweep on a monitor. The equipment registers the
readings, "WARNING. UNIDENTIFIED CRAFT. GRID REF. -14.28.8, EXTREME
RANGE NO ID POSSIBLE." The number changes to -22.26.8 as the sweep
crosses the box-like blip on the screen again.
Janet the stewardess walks down a cramped, wood-panelled corridor with
many doors at intervals. She is carrying a cup of a hot drink.
Suddenly a gloved hand reaches forward from behind her and touches her
on the shoulder. She whirls around with a gasp and tells the person
that he startled her.
The person in question is one of the aliens. His head bobs up and down
and an unintelligible gibber is heard.
Janet reminds the alien that he doesn't have his translator switched on.
The alien reaches to a diamond-shaped device on his chest and presses
a switch. With a beep, the device lights up green, and English words
can be heard when he next speaks.
He asks why they did not depart on schedule. Janet tells him that they
were delayed for a late arrival, somebody from his planet as a matter of
fact.
"A Mogarian?" asks the man.
Janet answers yes, and the Mogarian turns abruptly and walks away. Janet
turns her head with an "oh well" look on her face and heads for the end
of the corridor. She opens a door marked as the communications room.
The young man leans back as the room brightens up a little from light
from outside as Janet enters carrying the cup of steaming something.
Janet asks him if anything interesting is going on. The man turns and
tells her there may be as he's found an unidentified craft, and he's
tried all the standard signals on it.
"Without response?" asks Janet, giving the cup to the man and leaning
forward to get a better look at the screen.
"Not a bleep," answers the man as he takes a drink from the cup.
Janet suggests it could be a piece of space flotsam. The man looks at
her, smiles, and says, "You make delicious coffee, Janet," as though to
put her off.
Janet leans against the console suggestively and says, "Well, if you
don't want the benefit of _my_ advice. . . " and then walks out playfully.
The man looks after her with a smile, takes another sip from his coffee,
and then turns his attention back to the unidentified blip.
He says aloud that he'll try her on a high frequency.
While his attention is focussed on his attempts at contact, he does not
notice the door open again to admit someone else who closes the door
behind them.
The person sneaks up on the young man and presses a hypodermic spray
device onto the man's neck and presses the trigger. With a hiss, the
spray injects something into the man, and he instantly slumps forward
onto the console, unmoving.
The person shifts the man's hand slightly to allow him access to certain
controls, which he begins to adjust. The console begins to emit a
series of controlled bleeps like a sort of Morse code. . .
The Doctor reluctantly drinks his carrot juice, still seated on the
exercise bike. He looks over at Mel who is now rapidly jumping rope
in the opposite corner of the console room. He shakes his head in wonder.
Suddenly the console begins sounding with a Morse codelike bleeping
sound. The Doctor bends down to unbuckle his feet from the bicycle
pedals, and he shouts for Mel to quickly press the red button to get
the message on the screen.
Mel stops jumping rope and goes to the console and repeatedly presses
a control. She doesn't seem to be having any success as the console
is still bleeping. The Doctor runs over to join her, having to be
careful of spilling carrot juice. He tells her to press it again,
and she protests she is doing so.
He gets to the panel and presses another button. Mel tells him he said
it was a red button.
He looks up and asks, "Did I? Must be the carrot juice making me color
blind!"
He and Mel both look at the computer screen on the console and read a
message labelled with a flashing "MAYDAY MESSAGE" on the top.
The message reads "-PERATIVE TRAITOR BE IDENTIFIED BEFORE LANDING EARTH
MAYDAY END"
Mel reminds the Doctor that they have to respond to a MayDay call, and
the Doctor tells her its coming from practically on their doorstep.
In the Hyperion cargo hold, a solid blue police box begins to materialize
with its customarily unhealthy-sounding noises.
Once solid, the door opens and Mel jumps out. She looks up and down the
wide alley in the center of the hold they've landed in and tells the
Doctor to come on and hurry.
The Doctor steps out, putting his usual color-clashing coat on as he
closes the door to the TARDIS. He tells Mel that he is constantly
amazed by how he manages to keep up with her.
As he tells her this, she has already paced down the alley and back again,
looking around and seeing no one. She reminds him that no one would
send a MayDay call unless it were a matter of life and death.
The Doctor points his finger at her head and suggests they exercise their
grey cells for once, rather than their muscles.
He begins to look around the hold for himself, much more slowly and
paying more attention to the upper level.
Unseen by either of them, a man in purple guard's uniform and armed with
a yellow hand-held weapon sneaks around some of the cargo, keeping an eye
on the pair of them.
The Doctor tells Mel that that was no ordinary MayDay call as it had been
specifically aimed at the TARDIS.
Mel suggests that means its from someone who knows the Doctor.
Someone in a Mogarian's environment suit also watches, unnoticed.
The Doctor wonders that if such was the case why the message wasn't signed.
Mel suggests it could've been panic or desperation, and says they won't
find out by hanging about down here. She starts to set off when the
Doctor stops her by grasping her at the shoulders.
"We won't go blundering into a trap, either," he warns her.
Mel looks at the Doctor in wonder and says she's never seen this side
of the Doctor before, as he's usually the one who goes charging in
regardless.
The Doctor looks distantly at a wall and asks, "Can't you sense it, Mel?"
Mel asks what he's talking about.
"Evil," he answers. "There's evil in this place."
Another man in a guard's uniform nears the TARDIS.
The Doctor tells Mel he has a better idea for somewhere they could go.
He turns and walks towards the TARDIS, telling her about this place,
when Mel calls for him.
He turns and sees that she's being held at gun-point by a guard.
"So much for your enthusiasm," mutters the Doctor. "Let me do the
talking." He steps forward to address the guard, when the second
guard comes out from behind the TARDIS and pokes the tip of his gun
into the Doctor.
The Doctor turns and smiles at him, promising that he can explain everything.
The guard tells him to shut up and move.
A conference is taking place on the bridge of the Hyperion III.
A navigator is paying attention to the instruments, while the officer
in charge has his seat turned around to face the young communications
officer who was hyposprayed earlier. Standing next to the officer
and facing the young man is Security Officer Rudge.
Rudge is asking if the man heard anything.
He answers he didn't hear a sound.
Rudge asks if he saw anything.
The man says he's already told them about that.
Rudge tells the "laddie" that no one is blaming him, but he had thought
that now that he had a clearer head he might. . .
The seated officer interrupts Rudge and asks the young man, whom he calls
Mr. Edwardes, about the security tape.
Edwardes answers that the tape was deactivated.
The seated officer (grey-haired himself but more focused-looking than
Rudge) says this indicates knowledge of their procedures.
Rudge puts in that these were just his thoughts too, although from his
facial expression, one wonders. He calls his superior by the rank of
Commmodore, and he replies that he's sure Rudge was thinking that.
The Commodore asks what happened to the other equipment, and Edwardes
answers that its in perfect working order.
The Commodore adds that this means there was only one objective the
assailant could have had.
"To send a message," adds Rudge.
The Commodore looks up at him in dismay and says, "I was trying not to
state the obvious, Mr. Rudge." He turns back to Edwardes and tells
him to report to the medic before returning to duty.
Edwardes answers with a "Thank you, sir," and begins to leave the bridge,
but stops when the doorway becomes filled with two guards escorting
the Doctor and Mel at gunpoint into the bridge.
The Doctor is complaining about the guard who is still poking his
"contraption into my spine!" He suddenly stops and smiles at the sight
before him, clearly recognizing the Commodore.
The lead guard looks at the Commodore and explains that he and his fellow
heard a noise in the cargo hold, investigated, and found these two.
"Is it?" asks the Doctor happily. "Yes it is!" He extends a hand for
a handshake to the Commodore and calls him, "Captain Tomker Travers!!"
The Commodore stands and informs the Doctor testily of his new rank.
The Doctor is taken a little aback, and then realizes aloud that as
a commodore is in command of this ship, it must be a Grade One security
craft.
Rudge answers that it is, and demands to know how the Doctor got on board.
The Commodore turns to him and tells him not to bother wondering as he
already knows how, but he doesn't know why.
The Doctor puzzedly asks if it was the Commodore who sent the Mayday call.
The Commodore is now equally puzzled, and Mel interjects that they had
to respond to such a call.
Edwardes leans in to the group and says, "That's true, sir."
The Commodore looks at him and dresses him down a little by telling him
he is fully conversant with the navigational code. He adds that he
thought Edwardes was reporting to the medic.
Edwardes smiles in embarassment, nods, and heads out the door.
The Commodore tells the Doctor he authorized no Mayday call, and that
shortly after his communications officer was attacked, he's turned up.
Mel doesn't like his tone. "And a fat lot of thanks we got for all our
pains."
The Commodore tells the young woman, whom the Doctor introduces as Melanie
(known as Mel) that the previous occasion that he met the Doctor found
him involved in "a web of mayhem and intrigue."
The Doctor reminds him quietly that he did save the Commodore's ship.
The Commodore agrees but wonders if it would've been in danger in the
first place without the Doctor's intervention.
Melanie reminds him that whatever happened then doesn't alter the fact
that a Mayday call was sent to them.
The Doctor notes that it wasn't by the Commodore, though, and turns to
leave, saying he'll just make this "hail and farewell."
The Commodore tells the Doctor to stand easy, as he'd prefer to have him
where he can see him rather than swanning around outside. He tells the
guards to conduct the Doctor and Melanie to the lounge, and then
informs the Doctor and Melanie that they are restricted to the passenger
quarters.
"In other words," completes Melanie, "Welcome aboard."
The Doctor and Melanie are led out by the guards, who still have their
weapons aimed at them as they leave. The Commodore retakes his seat.
Rudge watches them leave and doesn't mind telling the Commodore that
he could've done without stowaways on his final service report.
The Commodore tersely tells Rudge that he's not going to get a smooth
ride on this trip.
Rudge turns and protests at the Commodore's attitude, saying its a mite
unfair.
The Commodore clearly doesn't care if he is, and then tells Rudge not
to be too diligent in policing the Doctor.
Rudge asks for clarification of that instruction.
The Commodore answers, "Give him enough rope and he will snare our
culprit for us."
On one end of the cargo hold is an area fenced off with standard metal
wire fencing covered over by plastic sheeting. The area glows with a
deep red-orange light, and a sign on the fence reads, "WARNING. HIGH
INTENSITY LIGHT FORBIDDEN. Infra-spectrum light only."
In one corner of the fencing near the security door, a tear has been
torn big enough for a person to slip through.
A Mogarian slowly and quietly creeps across the area, being careful
not to disturb the dozen-or-so huge vegetable pods that stand upright
in the center of the room in some soil.
He moves towards a sheet-metal shed on the right side of the area and
opens the door. He goes inside, leaving the door partway open.
Inside, he turns on a light and begins looking around. A sliver of
the light passes out the door and onto one of the vegetable pods.
From within the pod, a rhythmic whirring sound begins, accompanied
with a soft glowing light.
The Mogarian finds a clear plastic jar labelled "DEMETER" in which are
about a dozen silver-colored seeds. The Mogarian opens the jar and
pours the seeds onto the cover of the jar. He takes the cover and
the seeds with him as he leaves, turning off the light as he does so.
Once the light is out, the noise from the pod stops, as does the glow.
The Doctor and Melanie are lounging in, strangely enough, the lounge.
The Doctor remarks that this is a far cry from the care-free life
Mel had in Pease Pottage. She tells him she's not complaining. She
looks over at the Doctor and his worried expression and comments on
just how worried he looks.
The Doctor tells her he can't rid himself of the feeling that he is
being used, because whoever sent the message knew him.
Mel suggests there is a made-to-measure candidate in the form of the
Commodore, who has met the Doctor before.
The Doctor shrugs this off, thinking the Commodore would have said so.
Mel is skeptical, saying she's not sure he'd admit he needs outside
assistance.
The Doctor thinks she's raised an intriguing possibility, but that's all it
is.
Mel looks up at a Mogarian entering the lounge, then leans forward in
conspiracy and suggests that the Doctor solve the mystery as that would
be the quickest way out of this.
The Doctor is reluctant, telling her it'll also be the quickest way into
trouble.
Melanie suggests that the Doctor could ask for a copy of the passenger list.
The Doctor tells Mel not to hustle him.
Melanie asks who's hustling, and tells him she's merely suggesting that
he might recognize a familiar name. "Simple, isn't it?" she smiles.
The Doctor looks at Mel, knowing what she's trying to do, and asks,
"Meanwhile?"
Melanie freely admits that in the meantime she will wander around, poke
her nose into nooks and crannies and see if anyone tries to make contact.
The Doctor sighs, but doesn't really try to stop her as she stands
and reminds him they were restricted to the passenger quarters and that
this is only the lounge.
The Mogarian watches as she leaves the lounge.
Melanie stops in one of the cramped corridors to the passenger's
quarters. She looks to her left and right, deciding where to go.
She spots a door that juts out into the corridor at a slant as do all
the others and crosses to try and get it open. She stops her efforts
suddenly as she sees Rudge come around the corner of the corridor.
She turns and looks at a map of the ship on the wall as though she
had been looking for something in particular.
Rudge stops next to her with a smile, and he asks if there is something
he can help her with.
Mel points out that there seems to be a gymnasium on the map. Rudge
says they need one on a long trip such as this one.
Mel tells him she thought she might do a bit of limbering up. Rudge
smiles down on her and offers to escort her there.
Mel openly asks if this is so he can keep tabs on her, and he tries to
innocently ask why he should want to do that, but doesn't really pull
off the innocent part.
The Doctor suddenly gets up from his seat and strides quickly to the
reception desk to ask Janet a question.
She says she'll do her best to help him, and he asks with a honey-sweet
smile if he could see a copy of the passenger list.
Bruchner comes down a corridor wearing a dark blue surgical cloak and
gloves. He places a similar mask over his face and enters a room
guarded by one of the ship's guards. The room is marked "ISOLATION ROOM."
The Professor is wearing a purple track suit and doing sit-ups in one
part of the middle-sized gymnasium.
The room is brightly lit and colored, and dotted about with gymnastic
and exercise equipment of the usual sorts. One wall has what appears
to be a small recording studio set into it, complete with a clear window
looking out into the gym.
Melanie takes a pair of headphones off a wall and moves in front of the
window. She watches Lasky in her exercise routine.
Rudge is standing behind the console in the studio, and he tells Mel
over an intercom to put the headset on. Mel does so. He turns on a
tape that blares the sort of music Mel was using in the TARDIS earlier
at full volume, and Mel pulls one earphone away to indicate that the
sound is too loud.
Rudge apologizes and turns the sound lever down. He tells her that if
she gets tired of aerobics, she can select another tape, and that they
all come complete with instructions and music. She smiles at him and
starts to jump around in exercise as he leaves.
The other door to the gym opens and the third member of the Professor's
party enters. He runs over to the Professor, and noting Mel's presence
lowers his voice. He tells Professor Lasky that they have a problem
in the hyrdoponics center. Melanie watches them as though she is
listening, even though she is still listening to the music as well.
The man explains that the center has been broken into. Lasky stops
her routine completely and tells him to get Bruchner down to the center.
She rubs a towel on her face briefly and then follows the other man.
Melanie watches them leave and another man carrying towels enter and
place the towels inside a large plastic pin.
She stops suddenly as she realizes the music has stopped. She turns
as though listening to someone speaking over the headphones, and she
turns to the studio and answers the person, saying she heard but she
wants to know who is speaking. The studio lighting is dark and she
cannot see through the window.
Melanie runs around the side and into the studio. It is empty, and she
explores a little more and finds another way out that leads into a
corridor. She looks up and down the corridor and can see no one.
The Doctor conjures a bouquet of magician's flowers out of his sleeve
for Janet, and she remarks that he is very persuasive, but that she
can't possibly let him see the list.
Rudge enters from behind the Doctor, and she points him out, saying that
he's the man who could give him permission.
The Doctor looks nervous at Rudge's arrival and changes his mind, telling
Janet he's not interested any more.
Rudge is suspicious, and asks the Doctor what he wanted permission for.
The Doctor doesn't mention what he wanted, saying it was just a whim and
that he's subject to them, so he's told.
Janet tells Rudge the Doctor wanted to see a passenger list.
Rudge asks why he shouldn't, and in fact endorses the idea, saying it
makes good sense.
The Doctor looks at Rudge in surprise, and goes on to say that if he could
just spot a familiar name. .
Rudge completes the sentence, saying they'd get their culprit and the
Doctor would bid them farewell. He says he should have thought of
this himself. As the Doctor looks over a datapad given to him by Janet,
Rudge remarks that this is a sign of his age, and that he's due to retire
after this voyage.
The Doctor looks up from the list and admits that the names are all of
complete strangers. Rudge says this is a pity.
The Doctor thanks Rudge, then goes back towards his seat.
Before he gets there, Melanie runs in and intercepts him. She almost
whispers that "he" has been in touch, and he wants the Doctor to meet him
in cabin 6. The Doctor asks if she saw him
or got a name, and she says all she got was the message. She then wants
to get going, but the Doctor is again reluctant.
He asks her if she knows what a Judas goat is, and Melanie answers that
she does know a Judas goat is one that's tied to a stake to lure a tiger
out into the open.
The Doctor notes that such a goat gets badly mauled in the process. He
decides he's going to refuse this role, and then sets off up the spiral
staircase to the observation level.
Melanie asks where he is going then, and he answers that he's off on a
non-provocative stroll around the deck.
Lasky enters the hold and heads for the hydroponic center. The other
scientist follows her, as does Bruchner entering behind them.
Lasky looks at the damaged portion of fence, and asks the scientist
whom she calls Doland if he couldn't have repaired this. Bruchner opens
the proper door with his palm print on a pad and enters the center. Doland
answers that he thought Lasky would want to see the damage for herself.
Lasky insults Doland, saying it never penetrated his thick academic skull
to check the pods. Doland says it was the first thing he did, and they're
stable.
Bruchner comes back out the door carrying the empty jar marked Demeter.
He tells Professor Lasky that the Demeter seeds are gone.
The silver seeds sit on top of a piece of paper near a single shoe.
The entire cabin is disheveled and a wreck, with material spread out all
over the place.
The door to the cabin opens and Melanie peers in. She calls hello and
asks if anyone's at home. She moves in completely and looks at the
ransacked mess. She hears someone coming from the bathroom area and
leaps for a weapon of some sort. She grabs and brandishes the deadly
weapon of the shoe.
The Doctor comes out of the bathroom, smiles at Melanie, and tells her
she's not supposed to be in here.
Melanie asks what his excuse is, as he told her he was going for a stroll.
She realizes this was just said to put her off. The Doctor answers that
there isn't any sense in putting two heads into the noose.
Melanie asks if he's ever heard of safety in numbers, and the Doctor
hums a doubtful hum in answer.
Melanie looks around the room again and notes that it looks like someone
was in a fight for their life.
The Doctor agrees, and turns to the table with the silver seeds. He picks
up the piece of paper and pours the seeds off the paper and into his palm.
He says the question is if the person in the fight succeeded.
The dark-bearded navigation officer looks over at the Commodore as he
answers an intercom call coming into the bridge.
"Would you. . . come down, sir?" asks the voice of Rudge.
The Commodore looks like he can't believe Rudge's stupidity, and asks
exactly where he's supposed to come down to.
Rudge stammers that he's in the waste disposal unit, and that there's
been "an accident."
An alarm klaxon rings out in the corridors, and Janet walks quickly down
one of them. Melanie and the Doctor leave cabin 6 and see her. The
Doctor asks what's going on, and Janet tells them there's an emergency
in the waste disposal unit.
The Commodore is looking over the unconscious body of one of the crew.
He lies beside a large metal hatch that opens circularly and glows with
a red heat from some source far below the deck.
A small crowd of a couple of guards and Rudge look over the Commodore's
shoulder.
The Commodore speaks into a small phial-like radio device and orders that
the klaxon be cut. The alarm klaxon stops ringing, and the Commodore
stands to address Rudge.
He asks Rudge why he can't use plain language, as whoever's been dumped
into the hatch over here has been pulverized into fragments and sent
floating in space. "In my book, that's murder."
He also asks if Rudge has called for a medic for the unconscious man,
and Rudge answers after a brief pause that he did straight away.
The Commodore tells Rudge to start earning his salary and find out who
"that" belonged to. "That" is a single shoe Rudge is holding in his hand.
The Doctor comes walking down a ramp and offers his help with the shoe.
The Commodore isn't surprised.
Melanie explains that the passenger in cabin 6 sent for the Doctor, but
when they got there he was gone.
The Commodore says he doesn't follow how said passenger wound up in the
pulverizer.
The Doctor explains that the room was a wreck. Melanie sees the show in
Rudge's hands, and explains that there was a single shoe in the room that
is the match for the one Rudge has.
The Doctor suggests that this syllogism only now needs its grim conclusion.
The Commodore wearily asks questions he knows the answers to, like "Of
course, you've never met the man nor know why he sent for you."
Mel adds they don't even know his name.
Rudge tells them he was called Grenville, and that he was a mineralogist.
The Commodore asks if the Doctor knows why a mineralogist who wanted to
see the Doctor should be killed. The Doctor admits he doesn't know.
"Or why it is whenever you appear on the scene, people begin to die?"
asks the Commodore.
Melanie leaps to the Doctor's defence, saying she doesn't think he has the
right to say this to the Doctor.
"Yes, he does, Mel," sighs the Doctor.
Bruchner always seems nervous, so it is accurate to say he nervously
enters the lounge and nervously looks for Professor Lasky. He sees her
and nervously joins her.
She asks "Well?" and Bruchner nervously staves off his answer as he sees
the pair of Mogarians passing close by.
Lasky pulls him a little away and tells him not to worry about them.
She asks if the isolation room is safe, and Bruchner nervously answers
that it is, and that the emergency was in the waste disposal unit.
Lasky smiles and relaxes, advising Bruchner to do the same as it was
nothing to do with them.
Bruchner stares her down and doubts her assessment that the danger has
passed.
The Doctor and Melanie enter the gymnasium. The Doctor looks depressed,
and he slowly starts to walk on a treadmill.
"That's it then," he sighs, "End of the line."
Melanie doesn't understand what he means, and the Doctor says its obvious
that it was their contact who has been pulverized.
Melanie doesn't believe the Doctor is giving up, but he seems keen on the
idea.
Someone watching the pair from the studio leaves via the back entrance.
Before he does, he hears Melanie suggest that the Doctor investigate the
hydroponic center, since she's already told him about the argument she
overheard earlier between the two scientists.
The Doctor suddenly looks aggressive. He turns to Melanie and says,
"My dear Melanie, if you wish to pursue this completely arbitrary
course, pray, hurry along the hydroponic center! And leave me to my
static and solitary peregrinations."
Melanie looks at him strangely as he continues to mope around on the
treadmill. She sets off out the gym.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Hold it!" cries the Doctor. "Just a minute! I don't remember that!"
He stops the Matrix, and the Inquisitor asks him how he could remember
this as these events are in his future.
The Doctor protests that he reviewed that section earlier while preparing
his defence, and that there have since been changes.
He maintains this isn't what happened, and that the girl Melanie had
information that was important, and he wouldn't have ignored it. He
calls it completely uncharacteristic for him to do so. He also ppoints
out that the words were misused and that they didn't even sound like his.
The Valeyard stands and says that it is not completely uncharacteristic
for the Doctor to resort to excuses and subterfuge. He adds that the
Doctor is glossing over the death of Peri by conveniently presenting
them with another companion.
The Inquisitor says its not a convenience as the Doctor hasn't met her yet.
The Valeyard stands corrected, "But my assumption of why he has pursued
such an arbitrary course in aborting this tale still remains."
"Arbitrary course?" repeats the Doctor thoughtfully.
The Inquisitor asks the Valeyarfor his assumption, and he answers,
"That she too is going to her death!"
The Doctor shouts out that this isn't the case and that he is sorry he
can't explain but he has a feeling he's being manipulated and that the
evidence is being distorted.
"Preposterous! Absoluterly preposterous!" shouts the Valeyard suddenly.
He apologizes to the Inquisitor but says it was because he couldn't
stand the idea that the Matrix could lie. "No, it is we who are being
manipulated!" "No!" protests the Doctor. "To conceal the damaging
truth!" exclaims the Valeyard.
The Doctor protests this is total fabrication.
"The truth, Doctor!" shouts the Valeyard. "You sent your companion down
the cargo hold into a situation, I quote, 'Can't you sense it, Mel?
Evil? There's evil in this place?'"
The Doctor yells, "Every instinct of which I am capable, would have made
me prevent her!"
"Yet you did not!" concludes the Valeyard.
The Inquisitor tells the Doctor he must either continue with his presentation
or she must consider the evidence for the defence to be concluded.
The Doctor turns and presses his Matrix controls. He sits down as the
screen resolves in its usual squares to a picture of Melanie entering
the cargo hold.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Defence Interface One "Terror of the Vervoids"
Continued
Melanie enters the hold cautiously and begins to prowl around.
Edwardes sees her from her position on the level above and shouts to ask
why she is prowling around down there.
Melanie looks innocent and asks why she should be prowling.
Edwardes answers that its because the cargo hold is off limits, and he
suspects she knows it.
Melanie tells him she just wanted to have a peep at they hydroponic center.
Edwardes comes slowly down a metal ladder and joins her as she tries
to convince him that she won't touch anything and that it can't do any
harm.
He looks her over with a goofy smile on his face and tells her he'll
no doubt regret it, but he'll take her on a conducted tour if she
doesn't wander off on her own.
The two walk side by side across the hold, and Melanie asks him who the
woman with the dragon's voice is. Edwardes says she is Professor Sarah
Lasky, an agronomist as are her two assistants, Bruchner and Doland.
As they pass the TARDIS, Melanie asks if the hyrdoponic center was set
up especially for them, and Edwardes answers that they had to allocate
this whole part of the hold for them.
Melanie notes the sign forbidding all but low spectrum light, and she
asks why this is.
Edwardes tells her its somthing to do with photosynthesis, and as he
uses his palm print to open the door, he goes on to say that low
spectrum light allows the plants to stay dormant.
The door slides open, and he turns and tells her he'll go first to
make sure she doesn't break her neck.
He turns and goes inside, reaching up to touch a wire mesh around one
of the pods. He says the words, "At least until. . . . "
Electric sparks shoot from his hand, and Edwardes cries in the pain of
electrocution. His entire body glows with a white aura, and Melanie lets
out a scream that could make milk curdle.
Explosions fire off in a series across the ceiling of the entire hydroponic
center, and electricity sparks fly around like the place were a giant
Jacob's ladder.
Inside one of the large, green vegetable pods, something stirs, and a hole
opens up in the shuck. A flower-like green bud starts pushing its way out
of the pod.
Melanie screams in mortal terror. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .The Doctor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .COLIN BAKER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Melanie
BONNIE LANGFORD
The Valeyard The Inquisitor
MICHAEL JAYSTON LYNDA BELLINGHAM
Professor Lasky Commodore
HONOR BLACKMAN MICHAEL CRAIG
Rudge Janet
DENYS HAWTHORNE YOLANDE PALFREY
Doland Bruchner
MALCOLM TIERNEY DAVID ALLISTER
Grenville Kimber Edwardes
TONY SCOGGO ARTHUR HEWLETT SIMON SLATER
Atza Ortezo Guard
SAM HOWARD LEON DAVIS HUGH BEVERTON
Incidental Music Special Sound
MALCOLM CLARKE DICK MILLS
BBC Radiophonic Workshop
Production Manager Production Associates
IAN FRASER JUNE COLLINS
JENNY DOE
Production Assistant Assistant Floor Manager
JANE WELLESLEY KAREN LITTLE
Visual Effects Designer Video Effects
KEVIN MOLLOY DANNY POPKIN
Technical Co-ordinator Camera Supervisor
ALAN ARBUTHNOTT ALEC WHEAL
Vision Mixer Videotape Editor
SHIRLEY COWARD HUGH PARSON
Lighting Director Sound
DON BABBAGE BRIAN CLARK
Costume Designer Make-Up Designer
ANDREW ROSE SHAUNNA HARRISON
Desinger
DINAH WALKER
Producer
JOHN NATHAN-TURNER
Director
CHRIS CLOUGH
(C) BBC MCMLXXXVI
First transmitted on 1 November, 1986.
This synopsis by Steven K. Manfred
Synopsis copyright July 28, 1994.
Permission is given to all to copy this synopsis as long as it is not for
reasons of profit.
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