Having found the door, the Doctor was struggling determinedly to get it open. It wasn"t locked or fastened but it seemed to be stuck in some way, probably jammed by the fallen rubble inside.
Peri looked on worriedly. "I know it sounds crazy, but I"ve got the weirdest feeling that I"ve been here before."
The Doctor popped out of the tangle of vegetation and looked thoughtfully at her. "I often get that feeling. Of course, in my case I usually have been here before! In yours, it"s not possible."
He returned to his door.
Peri said, "Possible or not, I want to get away from here."
"Absolutely right," said the Doctor"s voice, m.u.f.fled by the overhanging vegetation. "We"ve got to find out what"s going on here."
Despairingly Peri realized that he hadn"t been listening to a word she"d said.
The Doctor gave a final heave. "Aha, that"s done it!
Come along Peri."
He disappeared through the dark opening of the doorway, and reluctantly Peri followed.
She found the Doctor standing in some kind of anteroom, choked with rubble and half-blocked with twisted metal girders. He was illuminating the wreckage with a pocket torch fished from one of his capacious pockets.
Peri felt a sting on her hand. "I seem to have scratched myself, Doctor."
The Doctor was shining his torch beam across the cluttered chamber. There was something that looked very like the head of a staircase on the far side.
"Mmm?" said the Doctor absently. "Oh, you"re young, you"ll soon heal."
Picking his way across the rubble, he began descending the stairway.
Peri hurried after him. "Thanks for the sympathy!"
It was a long steep staircase with metal treads and a black rubberized handrail and even in the gloom Peri found it hauntingly familiar.
The staircase led to a long narrow chamber, like a section of tunnel with a rounded roof. The Doctor and Peri separated, exploring.
The Doctor looked around him in fascination. "You know, I"m glad I decided to come here. I might stay for a year or two and write a thesis. Ancient life on Ravolox by Doctor"
Peri interrupted him. "Doctor look! There"s something here I think you should see."
The Doctor went over to join her - quite unaware of the grotesquely masked spear-carrying figure watching them from the top of a shattered wall...
3.
Barbarian Queen Dibber and Glitz were still trudging determinedly towards the area where they believed they would find the native villase, They realized they must be on the right track when a handful of spear-carrying skin-clad figures appeared in the woods ahead. gaping stealthily towards them.
They duated behind the cover of a st.u.r.dy tree.
"Look at them," said Glitz disgustedly. "Primitive screeds!"
Glitz hated primitive worlds. Unfortunately the police were too well-organized on the civilized ones, and a man had to take his business opportunities where he found them.
"Are they from the village?" asked Dibber, showing his usual lightning grasp of the obvious.
"Must be," said Glitz wearily.
Dibber raised his laser-rifle. "Let"s make it so there"s a few less for us to deal with."
Glitz perched down the barrel. "Na, no. all we need is a gesture gesture of strength." of strength."
He took a smooth metal cylinder from one of his belt pouches and lobbed it towards the advancing natives.
It landed on the path a link way ahead of them and exploded with a shattering report, sending up a shower of earth and leaves. When the smoke cleared, there wasn"t a primitive to be seen.
Glitz beamed. "Amazing the effect of a loud bang on the primitive mind!"
Realizing that no-one was dead, or even injured, the primitives reappeared from the woods and began advancing cautiously towards the waiting pair.
Glitz raised voice. "Come here, you ignorant, maggot-ridden peasant!"
As the leading primitive approached, Glitz glanced uneasily at Dibber. "You know, I always feel foolish saying.
this bit." Fixing the native with his most intimidating glare, Glitz muttered, "Take me to your leader!"
The Doctor and Pen crouched down in the gloomy, litter-filled tunnel, studying Peri"s find by the light of the Doctor"s torch. The find consisted of a sizeable metal plate, and it was obviously the remains of some kind of sign-board or notice. It consisted of two words in white lettering on a blue rectangle. The rectangle itself was set against a white background, and surrounded by a red circle.
The two words on the sign read "Marble Arch".
"Well," said the Doctor thoughtfully. "I suppose there is a billion to one chance there was a place called Marble Arch on Ravolox."
Peri gave him a scornful look. "And they wrote in English?"
"That"s another billion to one chance," admitted the Doctor. "It does begin to seem a little unlikely, doesn"t it?"
"Doctor, we"re on Earth, aren"t we?" said Peri desperately. "I said it felt like Earth."
The Doctor frowned. "It"s in the wrong part of s.p.a.ce to be your planet. Besides, according to all the records, this is Ravolox."
Peri tapped the sign. "Then how do you explain this?"
"Well, I can"t, not yet. Unless of course, they collected railway stations."
"That"s ridiculous!"
"But not impossible, Peri. Not as impossible as the only other explanation."
"What"s that?"
"That somehow or other your planet and its entire constellation managed to shift itself a couple of light-years across s.p.a.ce. After which, for some reason, it became known as Ravolox."
"What time are we in?"
The Doctor produced a pocket chronometer and studied it. "A long time after your period. Two million years or more."
"So what happened to London?"
"Wiped out - if this was London, that is."
"Oh, Doctor, I know it is - I can feel it!"
"Now don"t get emotional," said the Doctor severely.
"Don"t get emotional?" Peri was outraged. "This cinder we"re standing on is all that"s left of my world, everything I knew!"
Peri was near to tears.
In the Courtroom, the Doctor leaped to his feet. "Why do I have to sit here watching Peri get upset, while two unsavoury adventurers bully a bunch of natives?"
The Valeyard said coldly, "The reason will shortly be made clear, Doctor."
The Doctor looked around the Courtroom. "As a matter of interest, where is is Peri?" Peri?"
"Where you left her, Doctor."
"Where"s that?"
There was a note of mockery in the Valeyard"s voice.
"You don"t remember? Obviously a side-effect of being taken out of time. The amnesia should soon pa.s.s."
The Inquisitor was becoming impatient with all this byplay. "Shall we continue?" she enquired coldly.
It was more of a command than a request.
The Doctor sighed. "Can"t we just have the edited highlights?"
Very properly ignoring this frivolity, the a.s.sembled Time Lords turned their attention back to the screen.
The Doctor put his arm round Peri"s shoulder. "I know how you feel."
"Do you?"
"Of course I do, Peri. But you"ve been travelling with me long enough to know that none of this really matters. Your world is safe."
"This is still my world," said Peri despairingly.
"Whatever the period. And I care about it. And all you do is talk about it as though we"re in a planetarium."
The Doctor sighed. That was the trouble with humans, he thought, they just didn"t have the temporal perspective.
"I"m sorry... but look at it this way. Planets come and go, stars perish, matter disperses, coalesces, forms into other patterns. Nothing can be eternal."
Peri sighed. "I know what you mean. But I still want to get away from here."
The Doctor rose and began roaming restlessly to and fro. "I can"t leave yet. There"s a mystery here, questions to which I must have an answer..." He paused, staring intently at a section of wall. "Look, Peri - come here!"
He was wrenching at a handle set into the wall. He heaved, and a door opened with a faint hiss of air.
"Hermetically sealed," muttered the Doctor. He peered through. "It seems to lead down to a lower level. Some of the original inhabitants might have survived down there.
Are you coming?"
Peri shook her head. "No, I"ve seen enough. I"ll wait for you at the entrance." Peri sighed nostalgically, remembering her own time. "Where they used to sell candy bars and newspapers..."
"All right. I shan"t be long. Don"t go wandering off. And be careful."
The Doctor waved farewell and disappeared through the doorway. Peri turned away heading for the steps. Her foot turned on a fragment of rubble and she gave a little scream.
The Doctor popped out again. "I said be careful!"
Satisfying himself that Peri was all right he disappeared through the doorway again.
"Careful of what?" muttered Peri mutinously. "The spooks and ghosts you"re always telling me don"t exist?"
She looked round the surrounding gloom and shivered a little. "You could have left me the umbrella," she called.