Doctor Who BBCN02 - The Monsters Inside Read online

  ‘Wish I could, pal,’ the Doctor snapped. ‘But I’m going nowhere without Rose Tyler.’ He ignored the gun, took a step closer to the guard. ‘You must have seen her. Long blonde hair, about so high.

  Where is she?’

  ‘See this, boys?’ the leader said, ignoring him. ‘Got ourselves another goldmine. Alien, the scan says.’

  ‘I’m just the Doctor, all right? Now, where am I, the local nick?’

  ‘Talks alien, all right,’ one of the guards commented.

  The Doctor sighed. ‘All right then, am I in custody?’

  There were sniggers at this.

  ‘Am I in custody, he asks!’ the leader sneered. ‘Just in case you hadn’t noticed, this is Justicia, “pal”. Whatever you came here for, you’re human property now.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Found guilty of trespassing on Justice Alpha, a designated prison planet. You and your bit of human skirt.’

  The Doctor barged forwards. ‘What have you done with –’

  But the guards burst into laughter as the Doctor rebounded against an invisible shield and was sent staggering back inside the cell.

  ‘She’s nothing,’ crowed the leader. ‘Already gone, dealt with. No complications.’ He grinned. ‘But you, goldmine. . . You’re alien. And aliens get the special treatment.’

  The Doctor suddenly became aware of a barely audible hiss in his ears. He spun around to locate the source, but the movement made him dizzy. His vision was blurring. He shouted out in anger but it was too late, the gas was doing its work. He sank to his knees. ‘Where’s Rose?’ he croaked. ‘What. . . What did you do. . . ?’

  ∗ ∗ ∗

  10

  ‘Right then, boys.’ The leader’s voice echoed through the darkness in the Doctor’s cell. ‘Let’s get his brain tagged and ship him out. Then it’s feet-up time again. . . ’

  There had to be over 100 seats in the dull grey cabin, but Rose was the only occupant. She sat listlessly in a corner, looking behind her at the silent lines of padded seats every few moments to check she was still alone.

  The silver ship had spat her out into an empty room with dodgy lighting. She’d heard what sounded like whispers in her mind, fingers thumbing through all the thoughts in her head. Then she’d passed out.

  When she woke up here, for a moment she almost expected to find the Doctor waiting for her. That everything had just been a mix-up, a misunderstanding.

  But no.

  Rose rested her head against the tinted glass of the small window beside her, felt its coldness on her cheek. Outside she saw the star-speckled blackness of space. Three suns huddled together in a cloud of incandescence, their white light picking out the stark, mysterious slivers of distant worlds. One of them must be the planet of the little red flower. Her first new world.

  The spaceship set off, silently, without warning. Rose wiped the tears welling in her eyes with her sleeve, which was still caked in mud. She noticed a big, lumpy handprint there. It was the Doctor’s.

  For a moment she felt the strength of his hand on her wrist again, pulling her back.

  Rose placed her own hand against the mark. ‘I’ll get to you.’ She screwed up her eyes, whispered fiercely to herself. ‘Just you wait.’

  When the Doctor woke he was lying on a metal couch and a woman was watching him.

  She was short and plain with a thatch of mousy hair. While her matronly frame was dressed in shapeless grey coveralls, she’d perched a pair of bright pink glasses on her pointed nose, framing her beady blue eyes, as if to say, Look! I’m very interesting really!

  11

  The Doctor tried to move. He couldn’t. ‘Where’s Rose?’ His voice came out as a croak, and he licked his claggy lips. ‘The girl I was travelling with?’

  ‘Please don’t struggle, Doctor.

  You’re in a restraint field.’

  The

  woman referred to the small futuristic clipboard she held. ‘I’ve read the full account of your discovery, capture and dispatch. You’ve been classified as Miscellaneous Alien Doctor. An irregular, disruptive non-human entity.’

  ‘Seems fair comment,’ the Doctor remarked. ‘But we’re wasting time –’

  ‘Doctor, I can promise you there’s no shortage of time here.’ She looked at him and seemed almost sorry. ‘I’m Senator Lazlee Flowers.

  Welcome to the SCAT-house.’

  He blinked. ‘What?’

  ‘That’s SCAT for Species-led Creative and Advanced Technologies.

  An underground complex on the planet Justice Prime.’ Flowers gave a deep, bosom-heaving sigh. ‘I must say, your resemblance to humans is quite striking. Some of the, uh, entities we have here –’

  ‘I asked you about my friend.’

  ‘Oh, the girl. She’s human. Different department, I’m afraid.’

  ‘If you’ve hurt her –’

  ‘We’re not sadists, and we’re not savages. We want to rehabilitate her, not to harm her.’ Flowers’s voice had hardened a touch. ‘I don’t know how or why you infiltrated Justicia, but you must have known you’d be punished.’

  ‘Didn’t see any Keep Out signs.’

  ‘Doctor, the auto-beacons warn off all vessels straying within two light years of the Justicia system, and the deflection barrier operates at a distance of ten billion miles! Just how big do you need the Keep Out signs to be?’

  ‘Light years? Deflection barrier?’ The Doctor frowned. ‘Then. . .

  this entire solar system is one big prison?’

  ‘I believe people usually try to break out of it,’ said Flowers wryly.

  ‘But “prison” hardly does Justicia. . . er, justice.’ She tittered briefly at her little joke. ‘I prefer to think of it more as a testing centre.’

  12

  ‘Testing what?’ The Doctor swallowed hard. ‘What’s happening to Rose?’

  Flowers sighed. ‘Doctor, putting aside for a moment the question of how you came to be on Justice Alpha, are you honestly trying to tell me that you and the girl crossed the void between star systems in a small blue projectile with no visible means of propulsion –’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘– breached three lines of defences without even noticing –’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘– and that you really don’t have the faintest idea of where you are or what you’re dealing with?’

  He looked her in the eye. ‘What are we dealing with?’

  Flowers cleared her throat. ‘Any unauthorised entity trespassing on Justicia automatically earns a twenty-five-year prison sentence.’

  ‘What about a trial?’

  ‘You were scanned and assessed.’

  ‘Not good enough! Don’t you even care what I was doing –’

  Flowers raised her voice above his: ‘Not my department, Doctor.

  Inquiry and Appeals will process that information in due course.’

  ‘They’ll process it now!’ thundered the Doctor, straining against his invisible shackles. ‘I must have some rights?’

  ‘Er, afraid not.’ She came over to him and smiled down wistfully.

  ‘Our treatment of you is perfectly legal, under the terms of the Recip-rocal Alien Imprisonment Treaty.’

  ‘Never heard of it.’

  She shrugged. ‘If your home planet isn’t registered then you’ll be extradited – once your ambassador has registered a protest, and subject to legal damages being paid.’

  The Doctor stared at her. ‘And if I don’t have an ambassador? If I’m on my own?’

  ‘Then here you stay for the full term of your sentence.’ She clapped her hands with forced school-ma’am jolliness. ‘Still, I’m sure you’ll make the best of it.’

  ‘You’ve got two hopes – Bob Hope and no hope!’

  13

  ‘We try to make things as easy as possible,’ she breezed on. ‘For instance, a low-level implant has been placed in your brain.’

  ‘So now I’m tagged like a pigeon. Thanks.’
>
  ‘Not everyone here speaks human, you see. The implant aids inter-species translations, and helps you interface with the automatic systems here.’

  ‘I don’t get it, Flowers.’ He glared up at her. ‘You humans are out here in deep space, thousands of parsecs from home. You’re the aliens, mixing it up with other races on their home turf. Oh, but hang on –anyone not like you gets dumped in a ghetto out here?’

  Flowers shrugged. ‘EarthGov voted to group together non-human offenders. Alien prisoners have different needs to humans, so it made sense to put them in a customised jailhouse.’

  ‘And that’s why Justicia was built?’

  ‘Just the SCAT-house at first.’

  ‘Wait. Species-led, Creative and Advanced Technologies. . . This isn’t just a prison, is it? It’s a workhouse! A scientific labour camp!’

  ‘It’s a business,’ she corrected him. ‘You may be prisoners, but there’s still much you can offer humanity.’

  ‘Like flashier guns for its armies? Bigger bombs? Faster war-ships?’

  Flowers got defensive. ‘Not all our work is for the military. Besides, if you get good results, you get time off your sentence – as well as a.

  00137 royalty on intergalactic sales. That’s a gross figure –’

  ‘You’re telling me.’

  ‘– but still extremely generous.’ So saying, she switched off the restraint field.

  The Doctor sat up on the couch and appraised her coolly. ‘Bit risky, isn’t it? Letting me loose? I’m not exactly full of sunshine and love right now.’

  ‘I don’t think you’ll attack me, Doctor,’ Flowers said confidently. ‘I’m happy to answer your questions, help you acclimatise. Besides, I know you’re an intelligent individual.’

  ‘Clever people can still do terrible things.’ He rubbed his arms and legs. ‘Like converting an entire solar system into a prison camp. Got 14

  bored with the aliens, did you? Thought you’d let in some humans too?’

  ‘The Empire was expanding so fast, colonising planet after planet.

  The star cops were spread too thinly to police them all effectively.

  Crime rates began to soar. Prisons became over-crowded, unwork-able.’ Flowers poured him a glass of water. ‘So Justicia approached EarthGov and offered to handle the overspill. Almost had their hands bitten off.’

  The Doctor took the glass and drained it. ‘What was in it for Justicia? Cash?’

  ‘Expansion. The extra money helped Justicia develop and market inventions from the SCAT-house more efficiently. We’ve always been the heart of the business.’ She poured him another glass. ‘Then, as more and more planets decided to offload their prisoners here, and as more and more of this solar system was given over to housing them. . .

  Justicia’s Executive realised what an opportunity they had. A chance to expand their research from the purely scientific.’

  ‘A testing centre, you said.’

  Flowers nodded, her face grave.

  ‘But besides my patience. . . ’ He drained the water in a single gulp.

  ‘Testing what?’

  15

  Rosesleptfitfullyonthelongshuttlejourney. Shemusthavelosther watch in the fight, so she had no way of knowing how much time had passed – but the world they’d left now looked more like a marble than a pool ball through the little window beside her.

  She rocked in her seat as the ship came to a gentle halt. Instantly she stood up, pressed her back to the wall, wondering what would come next.

  A door slid open at the front of the cabin and a man and a woman came inside. Both were black, and wore grey uniforms, peaked caps and sour expressions. They looked as if they’d stepped out of some American cop reality show, and sure enough their voices held a trace of transatlantic too.

  ‘Your name is Rose Tyler?’ said the woman. She was slim and wiry, her scraped-back hair emphasising the severity of her features.

  Rose nodded, folded her arms. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’m Warder Blanc, this is Warder Norris.’

  Norris was big and broad, with a don’t mess attitude written all over his surly face. His cap seemed too small for him; it plunged his 17

  forehead into furrows that deepened to crevasses when he frowned.

  ‘You’ve been assigned to Detention Centre Six on Justice Beta.’

  ‘Detention? Don’t you think I’m a bit beyond writing lines after school?’

  They didn’t react, just stood there impassively. Rose decided to try a more mollifying approach.

  ‘Look, there’s been some kind of mix-up,’ she said. ‘I’m not from round here. As far as you’re concerned, I don’t exist.’

  Blanc turned to Norris and nodded. ‘They said she wasn’t carrying identification.’

  ‘Look, I could show you a credit card or something, but I left my bag in this big blue box thing. If you want to take me back there, I’ll –’

  Norris snorted, looked at her as if she was dirt. ‘We’re wasting time.’

  He nodded to the door, indicating that she should go through it.

  Rose didn’t move. She didn’t want to leave the ship. Didn’t want another barrier between her and getting back to the Doctor.

  Blanc took a step closer. Her face softened. ‘Look, Rose, I know you must be feeling so many things right now. Scared. . . sorry. . . Maybe a little out of your depth. You’re innocent, you shouldn’t be here.’

  Norris nodded, unconvinced. ‘That’s the usual story.’

  ‘In my case it happens to be true.’

  Blanc shrugged. ‘Whether it’s true or not, Rose, you can’t prove that to me and Norris right now. And even if you could it would make no difference. We’re just warders, there’s nothing we can do.’ Her eyes were unexpectedly soulful. ‘Tomorrow you can put in your plea to the Governor. But right now, you’ve got no choice but to go through that door. So let’s just take it one step at a time, right?’

  Rose nodded.

  ‘OK, good,’ said Blanc, a little smile settling into place.

  Norris gestured she should go through the door now.

  Taking a deep breath, Rose did so.

  ‘We brought along some of the girls to help you settle in,’ Blanc called after her. ‘They’re waiting outside. They’ll show you the ropes, watch out for you.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Rose huskily.

  18

  The door led on to a see-through plastic tunnel. Like the one ET was carried through when he was dying. The two warders didn’t move to follow her, and she didn’t wait for them. She strode out, gathering momentum with each step. This wasn’t a time to show weakness. If this was some kind of borstal, wherever the hell it was, she guessed that showing fear was about the worst thing she could do.

  The tunnel led on to a white boxy room. Four girls stood in grey smocks and surly expectation.

  ‘Hi. I’m Rose.’ She pushed a hand through her ratted hair self-consciously.

  The girls didn’t respond except to bunch their fists, their eyes cold and challenging.

  Instinctively, Rose knew that if these girls were here to show her any kind of rope, it would be a noose.

  She glanced back behind her. No sign of the warders. Nice. She couldn’t believe she’d actually fallen for that soft-soap act.

  ‘Back off,’ she warned as the girls approached. ‘If you knew the kind of day I’d had, you would not mess.’

  The girls kept coming, but Rose noticed that three of them had looked to one to make the decision for them. Their leader was burly but pretty in a trashy sort of way, with short, spiky red hair.

  Rose targeted her. ‘Here to put the new girl in her place, right?’

  The girl smiled. She had no front teeth. ‘My name’s Kazta. And your place equals under my boot.’ Suddenly she lunged forwards, her hands clawing big clumps of Rose’s hair.

  ‘Scalp her, girls!’ Kazta shouted.

  Rose gasped in pain, stamped down hard on Kazta’s foot. Kazta grimaced but on
ly pulled harder on Rose’s hair as her pet thugs lumbered forwards, wielding what looked like metal spoons sharpened to deadly points.

  Rose stopped trying to pull away from Kazta and instead scooped her up in a big hug. Kazta squirmed to get free, but Rose held on to her tight, swinging her around like a shield so the others couldn’t strike.

  19

  Then she pressed her mouth up to Kazta’s ear and yelled as loud as she could.

  Kazta recoiled, fell backwards into one of her cronies. But Rose was already sprinting for the door at the far side of the room.

  It wouldn’t open.

  ‘Justicia develops new and pioneering strategies for law enforcement, punishment techniques and mental correction,’ Flowers explained. ‘All criminals deported here serve a productive purpose. They help Justicia find effective ways of controlling social disorder.’

  The Doctor jumped off the couch. ‘So you’re testing your inmates.

  Running experiments on them. Like building those pyramids. What was that all about?’

  Flowers hesitated. ‘I believe they’re investigating whether spells of hard labour in tough conditions can shock petty offenders into giving up crime.’

  ‘Hard labour?’ He snorted. ‘Looked more like torture to me.’

  ‘So you were spying?’

  ‘Couldn’t miss it!’

  Flowers could feel her cheeks flushing. ‘Justicia’s findings help make policies that benefit countless human societies across the Empire.’

  ‘Policies you flog to them at a tidy profit.’

  ‘They help create happy, healthy colonies with low crime rates and a minimal prison population.’

  ‘Minimal cos they’re shipping their crims off here, dirt-cheap!’ The Doctor’s disgust was plain on his face. ‘After all, Justicia needs all the guinea pigs it can get, right?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ said Flowers stiffly. ‘I’ve already told you, the SCAT-house is concerned only with scientific research. I’m neither consulted nor informed.’

  ‘Oh, well, that’s you off the hook then.’ The Doctor stepped stiffly forwards. ‘Don’t you ever stop to wonder what’s happening on the rest of these Justice worlds? What’s happening to Rose?’