The Forgotten Army Read online

  Just as he'd made the oil in the Zoo's gate hinges explode, the Doctor aimed the sonic screwdriver at the place where the mammoth's ear met its head. A strange high-pitched whirring filled the air. As the machinery inside the mammoth started to vibrate,

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  the mammoth's fur shook, rippling all over its body like a cat under a hairdryer. The whirring changed to a keening screech that increased in intensity the longer the Doctor aimed the sonic screwdriver at the beast.

  Then, with a loud thunk, a little hatch sprung open on the side of the mammoth, just below its ear. Inside the white fur, and below the skin, was hidden an intricate machine of shining metal and whirring levers. A delicate spiral of cogs and levers connected each muscle. From a distance it looked like the inside of an expensive watch, or the innermost workings of a town clock. The mechanism was sparkling clean, glinting in the moon light. Where the ear met the head, there was a masterpiece of engineering. Amy could see wires, pistons and sensors, and things she'd never seen in her Technology class in school. The Doctor whistled, as if he couldn't help but admire the boldness of a plan that involved someone disguising alien technology as a mammoth.

  With another blast of the sonic screwdriver, the cogs started to rattle, then stopped entirely. A few levers twitched, then there was a loud bang, and they settled down. The Doctor waited and watched.

  I think that's shut it down...' He looked delighted. 'This is so much better than just burgers! It was a disguise all along!

  How brilliant! Just brilliantly stupid! Imagine the poor creatures that made this. They came to Earth, went to the trouble

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  of disguising their spaceship, but, they got it wrong! It's the twenty-first century, and they built a spy robot pretending to be a mammoth!'

  'Says the Time Lord disguised as a geography teacher.'

  'Shut up, I look cool - you should pay more attention, Leadworth girl.' The Doctor went up to the shiny hatch.

  'Still, the Shadow Proclamation could be tied up for years debating this. Sending a robot spy craft down, pretending to be an extinct animal, no doubt looking for something or other. I guess it was meant to scope out the planet for a suitable invasion... I'm just amazed they got the colour wrong.'

  'Do you ever stop talking?' Underneath everything. Am y thought she could hear a stomp-stomp-stomp. She was worried by what she'd heard, but couldn't quite trust her ears.

  'I don't think it's deactivated...'

  Amy felt a tingle run down her spine. She listened again, and was sure she could hear the sound of heavy footsteps, getting louder and louder, building in size and reach.

  In the cage next to them, an elephant started to trumpet in panic, bashing the bars of his cage, eager to get away.

  'Just listen!' Amy implored. There it was again. Stomp.

  Stomp. Stomp. Still quiet, but definitely getting closer.

  'What could be making that noise?'

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  she asked. 'Did you say anything about a Trojan horse?'

  'No, that would be impossible. There's barely room in there for...' The Doctor looked at the size of mammoth. 'Well, maybe one or two people.'

  They both started to back away.

  The noise came again. STOMP. STOMP. STOMP.

  'But that sounds like hundreds of feet marching.’ Amy insisted.

  The Doctor nodded grimly. 'Like an army. Could be some kind of TARDIS technology... A different dimension, but I'd have noticed. Maybe it's a temporal gateway, but the readings are wrong.

  Amy looked at the Doctor. 'Doctor, what if they wanted the fur to be wrong? What if they wanted to make it rare so it'd be brought here? What if they wanted to be caught?'

  Ever nearer, and even louder - STOMP! STOMP! STOMP!

  Then the noise stopped.

  It was so quiet Amy was sure she could hear her own heartbeat.

  Very, very quietly, the Doctor and Amy moved their heads to listen to the mammoth. There was a sound like a key being turned in a lock.

  FATOOM! The entire belly of the mammoth hit the floor.

  The Doctor and Amy gazed in wonder. The mammoth had been split neatly in half and now

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  looked like a dismantled toy - normal on top, but all of its lower half descended to the floor. Bright lights blazed out from within the mammoth and, finally, its innards were revealed. The inside of the mammoth looked like a gleaming alien spaceship. The muscle and skin had been no more than a thin shell around a metal body, packed with fantastic-looking alien technology.

  'Whoa. What is that?' Amy looked at the Doctor as, with a loud creak, the head of the mammoth turned to face them. 'I thought you said it was turned off.'

  The Doctor shrugged. 'Looks like I was wrong.'

  'Will it shoot?' Amy asked.

  'Don't be ridiculous,' the Doctor replied. 'It's a mammoth, it doesn't have laser guns. It will gore us with those tusks...'

  Amy failed to feel reassured.

  With a loud hiss, the mammoth's belly was swathed in smoke, and from within the haze came the sound of boots marching, many times louder than before. STOMP! STOMP!

  STOMP! Hundreds of boots, stamping hard as they marched along the metal insides of the beast.

  Above this barbarian sound, they could hear a high-pitched

  'Left, right, left, right, left, right'.

  As the stomp got louder, the animals of the Zoo were getting restless, uniting in fear, as a mood of chaos spread in the chilly air. The unholy cacophony

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  of bellows, yowls and panicked growls echoed around the enclosures.

  Amy instinctively took a step back, freaked by the massed cries of the Zoo animals.

  The Doctor took a step forward. 'Now that is interesting.'

  He peered into the hazy light. 'Someone has put an entire army in there. There's something coming out, Amy, down here, look!'

  He dived onto his belly, and Amy joined him on the floor.

  They were now at eye level with the metallic lower half of the beast. As the smoke cleared, they could see that on top of the living muscle was what looked like the deck of an aircraft carrier. It was marked up with arrows, tiny lettering labelled Muster Points and Lift Zones. With a whirring noise, tiny gun turrets rose out of the deck and swivelled to point at the Doctor and Amy.

  Everything stopped.

  Amy looked to the Doctor. 'Should we, er, be so close to it?'

  'Probably not...' the Doctor agreed.

  They started to get to their feet, but it was too late.

  The mammoth let out a massive blast from its trunk, and the entire Zoo fell silent. It sounded like no animal Amy had ever heard, as if someone had combined the hunting cry of a hungry wolf howl, with the deathly rattle of a cat screech and the murderous growl of a grizzly bear. This was a 89

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  bloodthirsty call. But it was no animal sound... This was alien.

  When it faded, Amy took her hands away from her ears.

  'What was that?'

  'I think we're about to find out...' the Doctor replied.

  Green-tinged energy beams zapped from the bottom of the mammoth to the top, illuminating the inside with a crackly glow. The beams joined together, weaving around each other, until they formed a living, swirling sphere of green energy. Burning like a poisonous star, the plasma whirl of green light grew in strength, becoming brighter and brighter.

  Amy shielded her eyes, as it swelled to twice its size and then shrank back down to its burning core. There followed a massive explosion of green energy, zooming out across the Zoo like a shockwave, making the animals ripple as it passed through them. It was a ripple that never lost its power. A wave that kept on crashing. Unstoppable, it spread out from the Zoo and made its way across New York.

  At first nothing changed.

  That felt we
ird,' Amy told the Doctor. 'It was like I was weightless for a second.' She waved her hand in front of her face. 'All my fingers working, and still not webbed. All looking good.'

  'Amy, you know we said the Zoo was in the 90

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  middle of the city... How accurate do you think that was?'

  'It's pretty much the middle of Manhattan, halfway down the island, and right in the centre. Oh...' Amy stopped when she realised what the Doctor was thinking. 'So that green thing... this is probably where they wanted to set it off from?'

  The Doctor nodded back towards the belly. 'This wasn't a mistake. This is an invasion.'

  The marching noise had stopped. And standing in formation on the deck of the belly was a phalanx of hundreds of tiny, vicious alien soldiers.

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  The aliens had heads like angry trolls, all hairy and mean, and wore huge spiked helmets like the Kaiser's army in the First World War. Their short bodies were festooned with weapons: vicious curved swords, stabbing daggers, hand grenades and the most extraordinary guns Amy could ever have imagined.

  A high-pitched voice yelled 'Present Arms!' and the massed ranks of aliens raised the guns so they were aiming right at the Doctor and Amy. Their leader marched forward through the rows of alien soldiers, holding himself like a man who knows his rightful place is in command. He carried a baton, and had a magnificently plumed red helmet. As he passed each row, he bellowed at the troops, making 93

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  them snap into order. They were all clearly terrified of him.

  Only one thing stopped Amy from shrinking back with fear. The soldiers were about seven centimetres tall.

  'They're like toys!' She burst out laughing. 'How cute.’

  She stretched her hand out above the battalion to measure their size. 'Wow! There's a whole army of them!

  Can I keep them, Doctor? Oh, please say I can? They had the perfect invasion plan, so long as no one stands on them by mistake.'

  The first row of soldiers armed their weapons and aimed them at Amy's hand.

  The Doctor was very quiet and very serious. He gently moved Amy's hand away, and addressed himself to the figure that was obviously their General. His tiny features were twitching with frustration and rage. Amy thought he looked like Wayne Rooney at his angriest and most stubborn, red faced and blotchy, ready to scream at the world at the least hint of subordination.

  'Sorry about her, she's new, well, so to speak. I'm the Doctor, and what are you doing here?'

  The General turned to his troops and signalled them to lower their weapons. He stepped forward, hit a button on his baton, and rose on a lift, until he was eye to eye with the Doctor. The little alien pointed his baton at the Doctor and scanned his

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  eyes, then turned sharply to Amy and repeated the move.

  'You confirm my observations. One humanoid, early stages of evolutionary development. No gills. Limited intellect. And one unidentified species.'

  'Time Lord, Oncoming Storm, Defender of Earth, take your pick. But who are you?' the Doctor asked the forceful little alien.

  'I am Erik, General of the 99th Vykoid Expeditionary Force. I have at my disposal the might and fury of the Vykoid Army. And you will surrender to me!'

  Amy looked at General Erik with curiosity. He had the unconvincing swagger of a new boy on his first day at school.

  Brash and knowing, yet a look that suggested he'd be only too easy to unsettle.

  'Nah,' the Doctor was saying. 'Not surrendering to you in a beast like that. You've come prepared for the wrong century, make that wrong millennia... You're not going to get anywhere if those are your wheels. Now look, not to worry, I can help you get home, but I won't have a war. I forbid it. No one gets hurt today.'

  To capture the moment, Amy slid her phone open and snapped a picture on her mobile phone. General Erik's face reddened with rage.

  'That's not helping,' the Doctor said to Amy. 'Peace in Our Time wasn't interrupted by passers-by uploading the pictures onto Facebook...'

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  'Peace in Our Time didn't last long anyway.’Amy pointed out. 'It didn't end up saving any lives.'

  General Erik waved his baton angrily. 'You are fools. We will take no lives. Our slaves will work for the glory of the new Vykoid Empire.'

  Amy could see the Doctor flinch at the word, his revolve hardening. 'What do you mean - slaves?' he demanded.

  With the confidence of the victor, General Erik calmly explained. 'We have a more worthwhile occupation for these New Yorkers. I have observed them today, and they are a weak and unproductive species. The Desiccated mines of Cassetia 2 have been waiting for workers. We hoped to take the famous mighty beasts of Ancient Earth to do the work of millions of Vykoids. But as there are none left, I shall return instead with millions of your well-fed drones.'

  The Doctor's face fell. He looked more than a little disgusted. 'Amy, have you heard of the island in the Pacific made up of dried seagull droppings? After hundreds of years it turns into guano and it's mined to be made into explosives.' Amy pulled a face as the Doctor kept on. 'Well the Cassetia asteroids were excreted several millions years ago by a mighty Space-Boar. A race of giant carnivores, they ate only rotting meat from the swamps of Malmatine 5, and grew so huge they evolved into creatures capable of travelling in space. A herd of

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  Space-Boars ate their way around the universe for 20,000

  years before producing the asteroids. Some say it's the worst smell in the entire galaxy. The most concentrated foul stench you can possibly imagine. I've heard terrible stories of the Vykoid slave mines. The smell is so foul, that one whiff can make your hair fall out, and turn your eyes green. The atmosphere of the mines actually prolongs the lives of the slaves. Anyone they take will work for three hundred years or more...'

  General Erik's plan seemed insane to Amy. There were millions of people in New York, and there was no way the miniature army could simply kidnap all of them. 'Doctor?

  Can't they, you know, take the animals here?'

  'Not exactly fair on the poor animals, is it? But hang on, good point, why can't you take beasts from elsewhere?'

  Amy thought she could see General Erik grinning. 'You will be easier to defeat.'

  Amy was surprised by his confidence. The Vykoid army had the enchanting freedom of shipwrecked men, with nothing more to lose, and everything to gain. Amy whispered in the Doctor's ear. 'We can stop them, right?'

  The Doctor grinned at Amy. 'Oh, yes!' Turning his head away from General Erik, he addressed the neat ranks of soldiers, gazing into their beady little eyes. 'Listen to me, army of Vykoid warriors. Your

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  war is over. Your time has gone. There is not a single person or creature on the planet that you are fit to touch. Return to your planet, and tell everyone you meet that the people of Earth are born free. You got a problem with that? Come see me!'

  The Vykoid troops watched the Doctor stony-faced.

  'And don't listen to old Sour-Face here.’ the Doctor went on, pointing at General Erik. 'Look around you! This is a place of beauty and life. You will not harm anyone. Now, scram, before I have to do something about it.'

  General Erik became even more furious. 'I will not be undermined in front of my troops by this lumbering beast.

  By a pacifist! All my years of training in the Vykoid army have prepared me for moments like this. I have heard the legends of the great Vykoid heroes, and soon it will be my time to join them.' He puffed out his diminutive chest and went on. 'I too will have a statue built for me, in the Hall of Honour on our home planet! Efficiency and punctuality are the backbone of any successful military campaign, and since we seem to have woken up several thousand years too late, I am not about to waste any more time.'

  His speech finished, Gen
eral Erik turned his back on the Doctor, and barked at his men: 'Activate the Temporal Lock!'

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  quick-marched back into the mammoth. They obviously hadn't been deterred by the Doctor's speech, and seemed only too keen to follow General Erik's commands.

  'Doctor?' Amy raised an eyebrow. 'What's a temporal lock?'

  The mammoth was beginning to stir into life once more.

  Lights were clicking on inside its body, shining out of its eyes and ears. With a grinding noise, the mammoth's trunk was raised into the air, and started to revolve like an aerial.

  The Doctor scrambled to his feet and took Amy's hand. 'I think, given the circumstances, it would be a good idea if we run'

  Amy couldn't tear her eyes from the Vykoid troops.

  Everything they did was so regimented and neat. She thought that this might just be the best-organised army she'd ever seen.

  General Erik was shouting commands and waving his hands around, and the front ranks appeared to be preparing to attack something.

  With a sudden feeling of dread, Amy realised who they were getting ready to attack. 'Running... yeah... I'm definitely with you on that.'

  But before they could move, the air around them glowed green, just as it had when the circular wave had exploded. Amy could feel every cell in her body vibrate, like she was undergoing her own mini-earthquake. After it had passed through her,

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  she could see the effects travelling over the whole Zoo - the rhinos and elephants shuddering as they shook.

  'What was that?' she asked.

  The Doctor patted himself up and down. 'I feel... the same as before... but... Oh, Amy, look at that.'

  In the few seconds they had looked away, the Vykoid Army had equipped themselves with hundreds of tiny combat vehicles, rather like toy jeeps, and were preparing to move out.