#Whoclass assignment: Short Story
The Planet Eaters
“Whatever you do, don’t touch them!”
The Doctor’s voice echoed through the high stone archways of the cathedral crypt. Liz, hurrying to keep up with him as he strode forward, caught sight of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart up ahead, standing beside an ornate tomb which had a long wooden ladder propped incongruously against it. Three bodies were tangled on the floor at his feet and, as the Doctor spoke, the Brigadier raised his head and tucked his swagger-stick under his left arm. “Thank you, Doctor, I had managed to work that one out for myself.” He quirked an eyebrow in Liz’s direction. “I sent for you an hour ago.”
While the Doctor bent to examine the bodies more closely, she answered the unspoken question: “The Doctor insisted on taking a short-cut.” Except, of course, it had turned out to be the exact opposite.
“Ah.” A brief nod from the Brigadier indicated that he understood what she meant, and he moved back a pace to begin briefing them, pointing his swagger-stick as he spoke. “The chap at the bottom is a maintenance man, Sid Reeves. The crypt’s being opened to the public in the Spring and the chapter wanted the tombs cleaned up – get the cherubs scrubbed, take the mould off the carvings, that sort of thing. The curate and the deacon came by just after lunch to check on progress, found Reeves on the floor. The curate rushed over to try to help, and he collapsed too. The deacon phoned the police–“
“Which explains the constable,” said Liz, pointing at the third body.
The Brigadier looked annoyed to have been interrupted, but said simply, “Quite. When he died too, the local constabulary contacted the army, who contacted us. So… any ideas, Doctor?”
“Hmm. Perhaps…” The Doctor stood up, and rested a hand on Liz’s shoulder. “Take a look at them, Liz – but do be careful!”
Liz opened her mouth to retort that she didn’t need to be told to take care, but the Doctor had already turned his attention to the ladder the maintenance man had used. He gave it an experimental shake, put a foot on the bottom rung and said, “Hold this steady for me, would you, Brigadier?”
The Brigadier’s immediate reaction mirrored Liz’s own, but after a moment he sighed, rolled his eyes and braced a hand and foot on the ladder while the Doctor began to climb. Liz gave him a rueful smile – the Doctor had as little respect for rank as he had for earthly qualifications. Less, probably. No sense measuring his rudeness by human standards – especially when there were more important things to deal with.
Taking care not to touch the bodies at her feet, Liz crouched on the worn flagstones to examine them more closely. All the men had their mouths open as though trying to suck in air – or scream perhaps. Her initial diagnosis would have been that they’d all choked to death – except for the strange film of what appeared to be fungus on their hands and faces. “That’s odd.”
She had spoken softly, but the Doctor’s voice replied from ten feet above her head. “Yes, isn’t it? Did you notice the smell?”
She had. A peculiar, oily aroma that spoke of rot and putrefaction. Not something she wanted to get too close to anyway.
“What’s odd?” The Brigadier, still diligently holding on to the ladder, leaned a little to one side to try to see what Liz was talking about – then jerked his hand away from the rungs in a hurry as the Doctor descended without any warning.
“Look here,” said Liz. She took care that her pointing finger was a good foot or so away from the fungus she’d seen. “These men have only been dead a few hours. But they’re…” She grimaced. “Well, they look as though they’re going mouldy.”
“It’s not mould.” The Doctor proffered a hand to help her to her feet, then turned to the Brigadier. “They’re spores - an alien lifeform known as the Dank. They float through space in tiny clumps, driven by solar winds and gravitational currents – it can take them millions of years to move from one planet to another. But when they do land somewhere, they promptly start multiplying – just as they have here.” He pointed up at the tomb and circled a finger in the air. “They’re all over the top of the tomb. They’ll likely be clustered at the top of the vault overhead too, and you’ll need to check whatever’s immediately above.”
“The Cloisters,” said the Brigadier, “I’ll get someone on that right away.”
“Yes, well tell them not to touch,” said the Doctor. “The Dank multiply faster when they encounter something warm – that’s why these poor fellows died so quickly.”
“How far are they likely to spread?” asked Liz.
The Brigadier nodded. “And more importantly – how do we get rid of them?”
“Ah, well. Therein lies your problem,” said the Doctor, rubbing his chin as he often did when pondering a tricky question, “This isn’t something you can shoot at, Brigadier, and blowing them up will only distribute them further and exacerbate their growth. As for how far they can spread – well, if they’re left to their own devices they’ll eventually cover the entire planet.”
“What!?” Liz stared up at the small brown patch on one of the tomb’s carved bosses, then looked down at the three dead men. To her horror, she could see that the spores on the bodies had already spread from their hands and faces to their clothes, and she took an involuntary step back. “You mean the Dank will consume everything?”
The Doctor nodded. “And everyone. It will take them a long time – hundreds of years, thousands perhaps. But eventually, yes Liz, they will literally eat the entire earth. Then they’ll split into millions of small colonies and float off into space to find more worlds.”
“Well, we can’t allow that to happen.” The Brigadier put his hands behind his back and rocked on his heels. “What’s the answer, Doctor – disinfectant?”
There was a dry edge to his voice that made Liz think his suggestion wasn’t entirely serious, but the Doctor’s acerbic response was: “Really, Lethbridge-Stewart, must you always leap immediately to wondering how to wipe things out?”
“You’ve just indicated, Doctor, that these Dank creatures are going to eat my planet,” the Brigadier retorted. “It’s my job to make sure they don’t – and it’s your job, Doctor, to advise me on the best way to achieve that. If you have any ideas that don’t involve killing the damn things, now’s the time.”
“Alright, alright. Give me a moment to think.” The Doctor waved a dismissive hand and began to pace about, scratching his head and rubbing the back of his neck in gestures that told Liz he was deep in thought. The Brigadier summoned a UNIT corporal Liz hadn’t noticed from one of the crypt’s shadowed recesses, and sent him off with orders to check the Cloisters for spores. Liz looked up at the tomb, and the alien fungus attacking it, and shivered. It suddenly felt very cold under those ancient carved stones, and she folded her arms in a futile attempt to warm up. Did she imagine it, or was that nasty smell of decay just a little stronger now?
“If I could only get my TARDIS operational,” the Doctor murmured to himself, “I could...” He spun on his heel suddenly, snapping his fingers as he turned to face the Brigadier. “Of course! You need to get on to Professor Cornish at once – see if they have any rockets scheduled for lift-off in the next month or so!”
Liz thought back to their recent adventures at the British Space Centre, and wondered how the Doctor thought they might be able to help this time.
The Brigadier looked as confused as she felt. “I don’t see how–“
The Doctor stood in front of the tomb and spread his arms. “Take the top off the tomb,” he said, “Find the Dank colony outside and check how far they’ve spread through the vault up there. Cut around them – remove everything for, oh, about two feet away from where they’ve spread. Wrap it all in plastic – it’s not a natural substance so it will take them a while to chew through it – and launch the lot into space.” He looked down at the bodies that had brought UNIT to the scene, and added, sadly, “These poor chaps will have to go too, I’m afraid. And the flagstones they’re lying on.”
“But where are we sending them?”
Liz had caught up with the Doctor’s reasoning, and smiled as she answered the Brigadier’s question: “It doesn’t matter! Right, Doctor? Just so long as the rocket is sent into deep space, it doesn’t matter which direction.”
The Doctor beamed at her, a teacher pleased with a star pupil. “Exactly. The Dank will feed on the soil and stone and plastic for a while, then they’ll begin to eat through the metal of the rocket casing. After that, they’ll be free to float through space again – but they’ll be heading away from earth.”
“Right.” The Brigadier rested his swagger-stick on his shoulder as he looked up at the vaulted ceiling. “So it’s just a matter of digging up the Cloisters’ manicured lawn, wrecking part of an historic twelfth-century crypt and dismantling an important fifteenth-century tomb.” He sighed. “I’d better go and speak to the Dean.”
***
Epilogue
The Space Centre’s polished floor vibrated as the countdown reached ‘zero’ and the rocket’s engines ignited. As it lifted off the launch pad, its planet-eating cargo stowed behind the nose-cone, Liz sighed with relief. “Do you really think we got them all?”
“As sure as I can be, Miss Shaw.” From where they stood, at the edge of the media platform, the Brigadier looked across the room to the communications console, where the Doctor was monitoring the launch. “The Doctor wouldn’t agree, but from where I stand, Earth is a big place, and I can’t guarantee that every square yard has been searched. What I can promise is that if we find any more of those things, we’ll get them off-planet as quickly as we can.”
The picture on the giant screen in front of them showed the glow of the rocket’s exhaust as it hurtled into the stratosphere, and the Doctor gave a nod to the communications technician and strolled across to join Liz and the Brigadier. “Well, that’s that. The Dank are en route for Andromeda and they have a food supply to keep them going till they reach deep space, then they’ll revert to their dormant state.”
“And none of them will drift back this way?”
“It’s highly unlikely, Brigadier. If they do, they won’t get here for centuries, so it won’t be your problem. But once I get my TARDIS up and running I’ll be able to check in on the place for you every now and then. Which reminds me… this Inferno Project you’ve been asked to provide security for - do you think you might prevail upon the authorities to let me tap into their nuclear reactor to power up my TARDIS console? With a little assistance from Liz here, I’m sure I can get the old girl up and running in no time.”
THE END
The Planet Eaters
“Whatever you do, don’t touch them!”
The Doctor’s voice echoed through the high stone archways of the cathedral crypt. Liz, hurrying to keep up with him as he strode forward, caught sight of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart up ahead, standing beside an ornate tomb which had a long wooden ladder propped incongruously against it. Three bodies were tangled on the floor at his feet and, as the Doctor spoke, the Brigadier raised his head and tucked his swagger-stick under his left arm. “Thank you, Doctor, I had managed to work that one out for myself.” He quirked an eyebrow in Liz’s direction. “I sent for you an hour ago.”
While the Doctor bent to examine the bodies more closely, she answered the unspoken question: “The Doctor insisted on taking a short-cut.” Except, of course, it had turned out to be the exact opposite.
“Ah.” A brief nod from the Brigadier indicated that he understood what she meant, and he moved back a pace to begin briefing them, pointing his swagger-stick as he spoke. “The chap at the bottom is a maintenance man, Sid Reeves. The crypt’s being opened to the public in the Spring and the chapter wanted the tombs cleaned up – get the cherubs scrubbed, take the mould off the carvings, that sort of thing. The curate and the deacon came by just after lunch to check on progress, found Reeves on the floor. The curate rushed over to try to help, and he collapsed too. The deacon phoned the police–“
“Which explains the constable,” said Liz, pointing at the third body.
The Brigadier looked annoyed to have been interrupted, but said simply, “Quite. When he died too, the local constabulary contacted the army, who contacted us. So… any ideas, Doctor?”
“Hmm. Perhaps…” The Doctor stood up, and rested a hand on Liz’s shoulder. “Take a look at them, Liz – but do be careful!”
Liz opened her mouth to retort that she didn’t need to be told to take care, but the Doctor had already turned his attention to the ladder the maintenance man had used. He gave it an experimental shake, put a foot on the bottom rung and said, “Hold this steady for me, would you, Brigadier?”
The Brigadier’s immediate reaction mirrored Liz’s own, but after a moment he sighed, rolled his eyes and braced a hand and foot on the ladder while the Doctor began to climb. Liz gave him a rueful smile – the Doctor had as little respect for rank as he had for earthly qualifications. Less, probably. No sense measuring his rudeness by human standards – especially when there were more important things to deal with.
Taking care not to touch the bodies at her feet, Liz crouched on the worn flagstones to examine them more closely. All the men had their mouths open as though trying to suck in air – or scream perhaps. Her initial diagnosis would have been that they’d all choked to death – except for the strange film of what appeared to be fungus on their hands and faces. “That’s odd.”
She had spoken softly, but the Doctor’s voice replied from ten feet above her head. “Yes, isn’t it? Did you notice the smell?”
She had. A peculiar, oily aroma that spoke of rot and putrefaction. Not something she wanted to get too close to anyway.
“What’s odd?” The Brigadier, still diligently holding on to the ladder, leaned a little to one side to try to see what Liz was talking about – then jerked his hand away from the rungs in a hurry as the Doctor descended without any warning.
“Look here,” said Liz. She took care that her pointing finger was a good foot or so away from the fungus she’d seen. “These men have only been dead a few hours. But they’re…” She grimaced. “Well, they look as though they’re going mouldy.”
“It’s not mould.” The Doctor proffered a hand to help her to her feet, then turned to the Brigadier. “They’re spores - an alien lifeform known as the Dank. They float through space in tiny clumps, driven by solar winds and gravitational currents – it can take them millions of years to move from one planet to another. But when they do land somewhere, they promptly start multiplying – just as they have here.” He pointed up at the tomb and circled a finger in the air. “They’re all over the top of the tomb. They’ll likely be clustered at the top of the vault overhead too, and you’ll need to check whatever’s immediately above.”
“The Cloisters,” said the Brigadier, “I’ll get someone on that right away.”
“Yes, well tell them not to touch,” said the Doctor. “The Dank multiply faster when they encounter something warm – that’s why these poor fellows died so quickly.”
“How far are they likely to spread?” asked Liz.
The Brigadier nodded. “And more importantly – how do we get rid of them?”
“Ah, well. Therein lies your problem,” said the Doctor, rubbing his chin as he often did when pondering a tricky question, “This isn’t something you can shoot at, Brigadier, and blowing them up will only distribute them further and exacerbate their growth. As for how far they can spread – well, if they’re left to their own devices they’ll eventually cover the entire planet.”
“What!?” Liz stared up at the small brown patch on one of the tomb’s carved bosses, then looked down at the three dead men. To her horror, she could see that the spores on the bodies had already spread from their hands and faces to their clothes, and she took an involuntary step back. “You mean the Dank will consume everything?”
The Doctor nodded. “And everyone. It will take them a long time – hundreds of years, thousands perhaps. But eventually, yes Liz, they will literally eat the entire earth. Then they’ll split into millions of small colonies and float off into space to find more worlds.”
“Well, we can’t allow that to happen.” The Brigadier put his hands behind his back and rocked on his heels. “What’s the answer, Doctor – disinfectant?”
There was a dry edge to his voice that made Liz think his suggestion wasn’t entirely serious, but the Doctor’s acerbic response was: “Really, Lethbridge-Stewart, must you always leap immediately to wondering how to wipe things out?”
“You’ve just indicated, Doctor, that these Dank creatures are going to eat my planet,” the Brigadier retorted. “It’s my job to make sure they don’t – and it’s your job, Doctor, to advise me on the best way to achieve that. If you have any ideas that don’t involve killing the damn things, now’s the time.”
“Alright, alright. Give me a moment to think.” The Doctor waved a dismissive hand and began to pace about, scratching his head and rubbing the back of his neck in gestures that told Liz he was deep in thought. The Brigadier summoned a UNIT corporal Liz hadn’t noticed from one of the crypt’s shadowed recesses, and sent him off with orders to check the Cloisters for spores. Liz looked up at the tomb, and the alien fungus attacking it, and shivered. It suddenly felt very cold under those ancient carved stones, and she folded her arms in a futile attempt to warm up. Did she imagine it, or was that nasty smell of decay just a little stronger now?
“If I could only get my TARDIS operational,” the Doctor murmured to himself, “I could...” He spun on his heel suddenly, snapping his fingers as he turned to face the Brigadier. “Of course! You need to get on to Professor Cornish at once – see if they have any rockets scheduled for lift-off in the next month or so!”
Liz thought back to their recent adventures at the British Space Centre, and wondered how the Doctor thought they might be able to help this time.
The Brigadier looked as confused as she felt. “I don’t see how–“
The Doctor stood in front of the tomb and spread his arms. “Take the top off the tomb,” he said, “Find the Dank colony outside and check how far they’ve spread through the vault up there. Cut around them – remove everything for, oh, about two feet away from where they’ve spread. Wrap it all in plastic – it’s not a natural substance so it will take them a while to chew through it – and launch the lot into space.” He looked down at the bodies that had brought UNIT to the scene, and added, sadly, “These poor chaps will have to go too, I’m afraid. And the flagstones they’re lying on.”
“But where are we sending them?”
Liz had caught up with the Doctor’s reasoning, and smiled as she answered the Brigadier’s question: “It doesn’t matter! Right, Doctor? Just so long as the rocket is sent into deep space, it doesn’t matter which direction.”
The Doctor beamed at her, a teacher pleased with a star pupil. “Exactly. The Dank will feed on the soil and stone and plastic for a while, then they’ll begin to eat through the metal of the rocket casing. After that, they’ll be free to float through space again – but they’ll be heading away from earth.”
“Right.” The Brigadier rested his swagger-stick on his shoulder as he looked up at the vaulted ceiling. “So it’s just a matter of digging up the Cloisters’ manicured lawn, wrecking part of an historic twelfth-century crypt and dismantling an important fifteenth-century tomb.” He sighed. “I’d better go and speak to the Dean.”
***
Epilogue
The Space Centre’s polished floor vibrated as the countdown reached ‘zero’ and the rocket’s engines ignited. As it lifted off the launch pad, its planet-eating cargo stowed behind the nose-cone, Liz sighed with relief. “Do you really think we got them all?”
“As sure as I can be, Miss Shaw.” From where they stood, at the edge of the media platform, the Brigadier looked across the room to the communications console, where the Doctor was monitoring the launch. “The Doctor wouldn’t agree, but from where I stand, Earth is a big place, and I can’t guarantee that every square yard has been searched. What I can promise is that if we find any more of those things, we’ll get them off-planet as quickly as we can.”
The picture on the giant screen in front of them showed the glow of the rocket’s exhaust as it hurtled into the stratosphere, and the Doctor gave a nod to the communications technician and strolled across to join Liz and the Brigadier. “Well, that’s that. The Dank are en route for Andromeda and they have a food supply to keep them going till they reach deep space, then they’ll revert to their dormant state.”
“And none of them will drift back this way?”
“It’s highly unlikely, Brigadier. If they do, they won’t get here for centuries, so it won’t be your problem. But once I get my TARDIS up and running I’ll be able to check in on the place for you every now and then. Which reminds me… this Inferno Project you’ve been asked to provide security for - do you think you might prevail upon the authorities to let me tap into their nuclear reactor to power up my TARDIS console? With a little assistance from Liz here, I’m sure I can get the old girl up and running in no time.”
THE END
