X-NEWS: spcvxb.spc.edu junk: 545132 Xref: spcuna junk:545132 Path: spcuna!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!pipex!uknet!gdt!ch0mpc From: ch0mpc@midge.bath.ac.uk (M P Clifton) Newsgroups: alt.drwho.creative Subject: The Five Doctors Cabaret Extravaganza part 5 Message-ID: Date: 20 Jan 94 12:29:51 GMT Organization: School of Chemistry, University of Bath, UK Lines: 679 ******************************************************************************* ** The All-Singing, All-Dancing Five Doctors Pro-Am Cabaret Extravaganza ** ** part five ** ** (c) Matt Clifton 1994 ** ******************************************************************************* The computer technician had left, and the television and video he wheeled in on a trolley had been duly plugged in and switched on. This was sadly about as far as the company's technical knowledge stretched, and so they had had to call the technician back in to press the 'Play' button. Displayed on the screen was a somewhat fuzzy and out of focus picture of a barren, windswept vista, ringed by a series of mountain peaks and a tall, imposing tower. The tower would have been ever more imposing if there hadn't been a huge poster strung over two small towers with the words 'Eat at Rassilons' marked out in fluorescent orange. 'The Death Zone?', asked the Master. Borusa squinted myopically at the screen. 'Er...yes.' He peered closely at the small, barely-discernable figure; a man standing on one of the rock ledges, wearing a pair of sunglasses and a colourful set of Bermuda shorts, the ensemble topped off majestically with a ridiculously oversized pair of willy- shaped teeny-boppers. He prayed that none of the others would recognise him in his previous incarnation. "That's you in your previous incarnation, isn't it?", enquired the Castellan. "Uh...no...it's..uh..my mother." "Oh", said the Castellan. There was a pause. "Nice beard." Borusa cleared his throat. "Well, that's by the by. The main point is that you will need to know the Death Zone inside out. It is where the Doctor has been incarcerated and it is up to you to rescue him." The Master threw back his head and stroked his beard. At length he belched and examined a small black object he had found in his chin growth. "What's that?", he muttered, and started picking his teeth. "Are you listening?", asked Flavia. "No", replied the Master. "Oh, okay, yes I am actually." The Castellan stood and strode over to the map, indicating where on the diagram the Doctor's selves had been located. "Here, here, here, here, here, and here." He frowned. "Oh no, sorry, that's a piece of biscuit." He returned to the table and unfurled a large parchment. "There will be many dangers to overcome - both natural creatures and imported alien beings." "Damned imported alien beings!", shouted Borusa in a xenophobic frenzy of hatred. Spittle frothed from his nose and his face lit up with righteous apoplexy. As the noticed the ring of staring faces, he gradually calmed down and sat onto his beanbag. "Yes. Well." Chancellor Flavia now took up the reign of instructor. "The best approach is to enter the Tomb of Rassilon, deactivate the forcefield, and allow the Doctors to leave the Zone." The Master nodded sagely. "And how do you propose to get me into the Zone?" All three Council members stared at the renegade as if he were insane. "Well - you've got legs, haven't you?", spluttered the President. "You walk, you lazy sod." "A-hee-hee", mirthed the Master. "A-hee-hee-a-hoo-hoo. What about the open- ended, power-boosted, transmat beam?" "You mean - the _transmat_?" "_Yes_." Flavia stood. "Very well. I will show you the equipment." "WAHEY!!!", cried all three men in joy, as they filed out of the Chancellor's quarters and headed for the Council room. ******************************************************************** The door to the Chief Superintendent's office opened as Morse limped out, an odd look on his face. As he passed the receptionist on his way to the corridor, she heard him mutter : "So that's why they call him Strange..." Back in Morse's office, Lewis was competing a telephone call. At length, the Chief Inspector entered and walked to his desk. "Is that right? I see...OK...thanks...bye." Lewis put the receiver down. "Apparently, sir, our quarry is commonly known as the Doctor. No form yet, but the boys are still looking through the records. There's been a reaction from the military, but they're not going into specifics," he reported. Morse sat and stared out of the window. "Interesting." He thought for a minute more. "Right. Here's the plan, Lewis. You make some more phone calls, call whoever you like, doesn't matter, just look busy. Write lots of notes, too. Might be a good idea to go and interview a few suspects, just to be professional." "Ah, come on, sir...," protested Lewis. "...meanwhile, I'll drive around Oxford in my expensive Jaguar for a while, visit a few pubs, do the crossword and get talking to the most interesting females I can find who aren't victims, murderers or suspects. Admittedly, that does narrow the field down a little..." "Ah, come on, sir..." "...may even pop home and recap on that Gotterdammerung from last night, or - what the hell - why skimp, I'll listen to the whole damn Ring Cycle if I have to. What do you say, Lewis?" "I say, Jeeves, what ho?" enunciated Lewis in crisp Received Pronunciation. Morse did a double-take. "I beg your pardon?" "Sorry, sir. I just got a bit tired of saying, 'Ah, come on, sir' in a Geordie accent. Although on reflection, I think it suits, sir," he added, then, "What did the Super want?" Morse winced. "Erm...well, we had a chat, basically, er, well, and a coffee, and, oh yes! That was it. He wants us to go to Wales!" Lewis stood up and held out a hand. "Congratulations, sir. I'm very happy for you. What is it - camping trip, B&B, or..." "No, no, no! Us!" said Morse indignantly, pointing to Lewis and himself. "On a case! Jeez!" Lewis could tell that the Chief Inspector was aggrieved. He almost never said 'Jeez!'. It appeared in his vocabulary about as often as 'Cowabunga'. "This Doctor fellow may have associates in a slate quarry near Aberystwyth. We'll leave today. Pack some gear. We'll need disguises, too. Strange suggested some kind of alien monster kit, if this bloke really is who we think he is." "Alien monsters?" "That's right." Morse rummaged around in his jacket pocket and fished out a slip of paper. "Something called...a Cyberman? And a Yeti." He replaced the list and gathered a few notes together. "Let's go and get sorted out." Lewis picked up his briefcase, folded his coat over his arm and headed out of the office. He paused in the doorway. "I've never been to Wales before," he mused. "Could be fun." "Cowabunga," agreed Morse, and followed him out into the corridor. ******************************************************************** "Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel", sang the Dalek, a temporary mental abberation giving him the strange, and totally erroneous, delusion that he was not in fact, a member of one of the most destructive and bloody-minded races in the universe, but really Perry Como. The feeling passed, and he shook his scanner eye wearily and trundled off after his prey. The Doctor and Susan were both nearing the limit of their endurance... at least, Susan was ; it was hard to tell if the Doctor felt the same because his translation unit still seemed to be malfunctioning. "How are you feeling, Grandfather?", she puffed. Her aged relative stopped, his hands going immediately, as if magnetically drawn there, to his lapels. "Hmm? Hmm? Ah...dear girl...eh? Ho, ho, ho...intelligent? my girl? eh, Chepplefoom...argh." Susan replaced the spiked club in her purse and dragged his limp body round the corner into what appeared to be a dead end. Leaving him slumped against the mirrored wall, she crept towards the main corridor, where the sounds of the Dalek trundling along and screaming various unintelligible obscenities in a Skaroid tongue could be heard approaching their hiding place. Again rummaging in her handbag, she produced a handful of marbles, which she sprinkled liberally over the corridor floor, before ducking back inside the darkened niche. The Doctor stirred, and opened his eyes. The Dalek rounded the corner, rather too fast, as he soon found out when his motor apparatus skimmed over the ball bearings and sent him in a spinning dive at high speed down the corridor. "SSSSSSHHHIIIIIIIIIITTTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!", he screamed, before smashing noisily into the corridor wall, and exploding in a mass of blobby green slime which bounced off the walls and onto the floor, quivering and whimpering ever so quietly. All was still. "It's very dangerous to whisk eggs or unblock sinks in a confined space", remarked the Doctor, coherent for once. They cautiously approached the chaotic mess of twisted metal, melted plastic, core-hardened daranium, and most perplexingly of all, raspberry blancmange - and stared out of the hole in the wall that the Dalek's head had shot through. When the airborne debris settled, a view of the outside world was clearly visible. It was a gloomy, windswept, barren sort of place, with a line of mountains grouped around a tall, thin tow...look, you've heard all this already. The Doctor had heard of it, and had seen brochures and things, so was well versed in the horrors of the place in which he found himself. "The Death Zone", whispered the Doctor. He peered out and growled at the rain, which was a little unfair as the rain couldn't really growl back. Susan stepped around the dispersed muck to join her grandfather at the window. "How horrible. Whyever were we brought here?" The Doctor shook his head in consternation and shook his fist at the black clouds which were gathered in the sky. Again, not very fair, as retaliation in a similar vein was unlikely. "Who knows?", he shrugged. "I suppose the answer to that would lie...in the tower." He stepped through the hole and looked around at the unpleasant landscape. In some ways, it reminded him of his holiday in Wales. Odd, that. "Well, hadn't we better go there?" "Yes", he replied, spitting into one of the puddles, and heading off toward the mountain range. "Hah! Rewengee!!", sneered the rain, and launched a full-scale volley at the old man who, unfortunately, by this time, during the period when it was negotiating its way out of the many nested sub-clauses, which were utterly, by any definition of the word, pointless, had sodded off. Mooga. ********************************************************************* On the other side of the Zone, where the clouds had already made way for a bout of scorching sun, two figures clambered over a rockpile. Neither was suitably attired for mountain climbing - the Brigadier still wore his old military trenchcoat, and the Doctor still seemed to think he was at a Flanagan and Allen convention. "Charming spot, Doctor", gritted Alistair ascerbically. He had discarded the moustache some miles back down the hill - it was only a false one after all, and they had to dump a great deal of weight for reasons of necessity. In fact, the Doctor had thought long and hard about knifing the Brigadier and making off by himself, but had decided against it. Besides, the blubber fat might keep him warm in an emergency. "Yes," agreed the Doctor, admiring the pustulous zit in a small hand mirror, "I've been cultivating it for some years now. Injected all sorts of infections into that one, and oh boy, it's a whopper. I've been looking for an aircraft hangar to squeeze it into." The Brigadier stopped and looked around at the unwelcoming rock overhangs. "No, I meant here. Where are we, anyhow?" "Oh, Gallifrey, I expect. It usually is." So saying, the Doctor got out his recorder and began a recitation of 'I'm a UNIT officer and I shag Land Rovers', a tune he had penned himself on the journey. "Doctor, I'm tired and hungry and I haven't ordered the mass destruction of an entire race for a good twenty minutes. Now, please tell me where we are and why we were brought here." Sighing, the Time Lord pocketed the instrument and began to explain. - In a shadowy crevice at the base of two overhanging rock ledges, Sergeant Lewis and Chief Inspector Morse waited, hidden from the two travellers. They were no longer attired in the clothes they had worn at Kidlington HQ. Instead, Lewis now wore the metallic body costume and helmet of a Cyberman, incongruously jarring with the Ray-Bans he had put on to shield his eyes from the glare. Morse, though he had refused to don the Yeti outfit in the heat, was sporting a huge pair of earphones, attached through an amplifier to a microphone on the end of a cable snaking towards the Doctor and the Brigadier. Lewis flipped to a clean sheet in his notebook. "What are they saying now, sir?" he boomed metallically - then, realising his error, reduced the volume on his chest panel. Morse shushed him. "I can't hear...ah, now something about Tomb of Rassilon...yes, write this down, Lewis...'the greatest Time Lord ever was punished for his crimes and locked away in the Tower, where he lies in eternal sheep.'" Lewis paused, his pen beginning to form the word 'sheep'. "Are you sure that's what he said?" "I think so. Now, let's see...'ancestors had great flowers which Miss choosed in Bedfordshire.' No, it's no use - the signal's broken up." Morse removed the headphones, and risked a look over the jutting edge of the rock. He ducked down quickly. "Lewis! They're coming this way! Pull the microphone back in!" - "So, this Rassilon bloke must have woken up and re-started the Games, you mean?" concluded Lethbridge-Stewart thoughtfully. He looked around in the cool shade for a place to sit, and spied a suitable ledge. The Doctor entered the overhang after him, whistling the chorus from his latest composition, 'Here come the Army!': "Here come the Army!/Hear their marching feet Uniforms all neat/Get your children off the street" The whistling stopped abruptly as he bumped into the back of Lethbridge- Stewart, who had halted in the centre of the cave. Peering around the waist of his fat friend, the Doctor saw the reasons for this. Crouching at the other end of the overhang was the unmistakeable silver figure of a Cyberman. It turned from its task, and saw them. They prepared themselves to be fried to cinders by a deadly laser-blot. "Hello," said the Cyberman, in an anxious tone. "Er..." It fiddled with the volume control on its chest panel. "I mean, HELLO! HELLO! ER! HELLO!" "Hello!" said the Brigadier, and offered a friendly hand. The Doctor shushed him warningly, and advanced towards his enemy. "Cybermen, now, is it? Trust Rassilon to assemble the most fiendish of the galaxy's creatures to impede my progress. Don't you agree?" he asked the Cyberman, playing for time, and sure that the answer would be something along the lines of "I'm going to kill you, you bastard", only not in exactly that phraseology, because, of course, Cybermen were completely emotionless. The Cyberman paused before replying. "Um...UM...YES. INDEED. TRUST OLD RASSILON, EH? TCH, TCH, TCH. BLOODY RASSILON. CAN'T BE TRUSTED. NO INDEED." There was another short pause. "ER...THIS RASSILON, NOT A FRIEND OF YOURS OR ANYTHING, IS HE?" The Doctor peered curiously at the metal giant. "You...you don't know who Rassilon _is_, do you?" Before them, the Cyberman drew himself up to a full six feet. Hadn't they been taller than that before? wondered the Doctor. "COURSE I DO. COURSE. RASSILON? ME AND HIM GO WAY BACK. I MEAN WAY. Ah, come _on_, sir - ", it said in a normal, Geordie-accented voice, "-let me arrest them now." From behind a large rock, a fearsome hairy head made an appearance. A bulbous, brown creature with bulging eyes, no nose to speak of (or to speak _with_, although the Nostril People from Blarg would possibly argue with that), and a wide, roaring mouth with bloody, salivating fangs. A Yeti. "A Yeti!", cried the Doctor, somewhat unnecessarily. "Run, Brigadier!" They ran. "After them, Lewis!", yelled Morse, from within the monster suit. Secretly, he thought: I'm chasing an alien being and a high-ranking secret army soldier in a slate quarry in an ancient arena on a far-off planet, dressed in the hide of a Sasquatch. This would _never_ have happened in Kidderminster. The two policemen bounded off toward their quarry. ************************************************************************ "No. No. Terrible, terrible...this will never do." The TV director paced furiously over the barren Welsh landscape, throwing a pebble into the air and booting it into the backside of a nearby cow, who ambled off, mildly offended. The assistant producer wrung his hands and gazed for the umpteenth time over the bland rubbley view. "Um...well, it's not too bad. If you -" "I...asked...for a slope. A slope. A land area of non-zero gradient. A hill. Any hill. Uphill. Downhill. Molehill. Now find me a slope." The young assistant wandered off to chat with the girl waiting in a mauve raincoat by the troupe of cameras. After a few moments of discussion, the man burst into laughter, and stood for a while guffawing and holding his sides. The girl, whose suggestion it had been that had precipitated this display of mirth, seemed to be perfectly serious, and glared, po-faced, at the other. When the laughter died away, the assistant seemed to consider the idea with more thought. He leaned out at an angle to his left, then to his right. He performed this odd ritual several times, then walked back to the director, who was still angrily striding to and fro. The assistant producer ran up and explained the idea. The director mulled it over for a second or two, then punched him in the face. - Several hours later, the crew had come to an amicable arrangement, and the cameras had been set up. The man on the fog machine received his cue and issued forth reams of billowing smoke. Funny, that was the third spontaneous human combustion that day. Along the mist-enshrouded road came Bessie, heralded as usual by the deep throaty roar of the sound fx team, who ran along beside the vehicle smoking large cigars and coughing into microphones. As the dense fog settled around the car, the third Doctor put his foot on the brake and stood up to find out what new danger the Death Zone had expectorated into his handkerchief. When he saw Sarah Jane Smith standing at a ludicrous angle some metres away on the perfectly flat terrain, he was sorely tempted to put his foot down and run her over. But for some insane reason she was pretending to tumble along the ground, screaming and gasping and putting out her arms to steady herself. "Would it be futile to ask what the hell you think you're doing?" the Doctor barked at the girl. When she seemed not to have heard, he slammed his hand down on the car's hooter - the sudden noise made Sarah stumble. She took two faltering steps before falling, screaming, down a ravine. "I suppose you want me to get you out of there," sighed the Doctor. He pulled a length of rope from the glove compartment, and shifted into reverse. "Ereht fo tuo uoy teg ot em tnaw uoy esoppus I", he sighed, pushing the rope back into the glove compartment. He then shifted back into forward gear, put the car into reverse and drove off to find Sarah. ********************************************************************* Although the rain had stopped, the clouds had parted to admit the scorching beams of the swollen Gallifreyan sun. Susan didn't mind all that much, in fact, it made a nice bloody change from bloody England and the bloody weather, she told herself, but the Doctor seemed to be suffering from the heat. Not that he said anything about it. Or anything coherent at all, come to that. So, as they walked, she had told him her news ; how David Campbell had died mysteriously in that mysterious 'drugs overdose in an exploding building with a pitchfork in the chest and his head cleaved in two by a meataxe' mystery. It had been a mystery to everyone, most of all Susan, who had been so mystified that immediately following the funeral, she had sold up and moved to Miami. After an hour and a half in the sweltering sun, the Doctor could bear it no longer. He began looking around for a suitable rock on which to sit - most of them, however, had beach towels with 'Von Genshler' stencilled in Gothic script. Bloody Germans. Finally he located a large, plasticky-looking one, and sat on it. He realised why it looked plasticky. It was made of plastic. It wobbled. "You rest," ordered Susan. "I'll go and see what's ahead." She walked a few paces further into the field, shielded her eyes with one hand and scanned the horizon. The prospect of finding anyone or anything with the capacity to help them in this nightmare scenario seemed bleak. All she could see were trees, rocks, cliffs, a plateau, a TARDIS, scree, hills, and plains. Nothing. She looked back the other way. Plains, hills, scree, TARDIS, plateau, cliffs, rocks, trees. Sighing, she returned to the rock where her grandfather sat and stared dolefully at the horizon. Slowly, the TARDIS edged its way into her line of vision. She missed it. It edged out the other side, stopped, then edged back the other way, this time wearing a hat. Susan still completely failed to notice. The TARDIS jumped three feet into the air, and returned to the ground, making an obscene noise as it landed. No response. It waved at Susan. It grinned at Susan. It began a Russian dance whilst juggling three small hamsters, all the while getting closer to their rock. Susan remained firmly staring at the distant skyline. Finally the TARDIS picked up a smallish stone and dropped it on the woman's head. She looked up. "Doctor! The TARDIS!" Oh, thank _Christ_, thought the time machine. The Doctor looked up and saw his beloved home. "Goodness me! Well! Would you ever!" Certainly, thought Susan to herself, but not with _you_. They walked through the door. - Inside the TARDIS, the old man's fourth generation descendant was sipping tea with Tegan and Turlough and regaling them with tales of the time that he was Governor of the Colonies in the Raj, although they both knew he had never been any such thing. "And then Raffles and I..." began the Doctor, then tailed off as he saw the two people enter the console room. He gaped. The first Doctor gaped. For five full minutes the two of them stood there, opening and closing their mouths until Turlough shoved a handful of ant's eggs into their faces. "You!" exclaimed the younger, but older, Doctor. "I!" exclaimed the older, but younger, incarnation, and shook hands with his alter ego, completely ignoring the Blinovitch Limitation Effect that they had all been banging on about five stories previously. Susan began to understand. "Oh, I see." "Eh?" Turlough obviously hadn't. Neither had Tegan, who put her hand on her hip and pouted. "Will you please stop reciting the alphabet and tell me who you might be?" she demanded. The first Doctor threw his head back and gathered his lapels. Susan sat down, realising she was in for a long wait. "I might be any number of things, young lady... a hobo, a wanderer, a medicine man, a heroic adventurer, a cocaine smuggler, a paedophile..." Susan started visibly. "Doctor..." she warned. "A molester of squirrels, a pervert, a badger stuffer..." "Doctor..." "A criminally insane psychopathic bloodbath murderer, a chopper up and pureer of old ladies and their surgical supports..." "Grandfather!" hissed Susan, and kicked him in the shins. She smiled beatifically at him when he turned around, and answered Tegan's question. "He's the Doctor. Well, one of them anyway. The first, actually." Tegan leaned forward conspiratorially and pointed to the other Doctor. "Don't worry. They improve..." "A Bing bong Whizz! And a Zing! a Zong! Weeeee!", yelled the fifth Doctor in delight at seeing his old incarnation again. "...slightly," qualified Tegan. Turlough had been picking his nose with a sharp implement for the last five minutes, and now had no nostrils left. Hurriedly, he rummaged in his pocket for a spare nose, fitted it, and turned to the others. (Look ,guys, he's an alien, and they have weird physiologies. Plus, it's my story ,and I can do what I bloody well like.) "Isn't it a bit... well, illegal, you both being here at the same time?" "Illegal?" thundered the old man indignantly. "Young fellow, do you suppose someone is going to come in here and clamp me, eh?" Fat chance, thought Susan, Tegan and the fifth Doctor in unison. "These meetings very rarely happen. Except of course for now... and the hundred and thirty-five other times they've very rarely happened," explained the fifth Doctor. "Usually on anniversaries, flagging ratings, that sort of thing." He took Tegan by the shoulders. "Now then, why don't you -" If he asks me to make tea, thought Tegan, I will kill him. I mean really. Kill him. " - go and chair a meeting of the Australian Fem-Lib Association. They're convening now, in the kitchen." Pleasantly surprised, Tegan headed for the internal door. "Oh, and while you're there," added the first Doctor, as she entered the corridor, "make us some tea, there's a dear." ********************************************************************* The Triad of the High Council was gathered around the transmat in the Great Hall. It was a short, squat, affair, with a snazzy bank of flashing lights and micro-switches. It looked slightly stupid, as if its real function was not to transport a living being countless light years molecule by molecule, but to...I dunno, grill sausages or something. Chancellor Flavia crouched by the pedestal area with a screwdriver and a pen torch which she shined into the components, occasionally tutting. This was not because there was anything wrong with the device - but because the Master had tried to shrink her skirt with his TCE earlier on and she wanted a bit of revenge. Borusa entered from the inner chamber. "This..." he announced majestically, "...is the Seal of the High Council." He paused for a moment, expecting someone, at least, to make some pathetic attempt at a joke by parodying barking noises, but rather disappointingly, no-one did. The Castellan came forward and presented the Master with a small metallic-cased object. "This is a recall device. It will allow you to return to this room if you have anything to report, or if an emergency arises. However...don't use it unnecessarily, as it has a limited power supply." "Well...that's homing beacons for you," cut in Flavia. "Isn't anyone going to wish me luck?" smirked the Master. "Nope," chorused Borusa, Flavia, and the Castellan, kicking their legs in the air and making obscene gestures with their hands. "Oh well. See ya then." The Master walked into the transmat, and cloaked by a red glow, disappeared. Flavia took the Castellan aside. "Do you think he'll..." A bleep signalled the re-emergence of the red power glow. A shadowy figure in the transmat slowly became the Master, who grinned sheepishly at the trio's accusing stares. "Um...I think I forgot something. Sorry." He stepped out of the cabinet and milled around the room for a while aimlessly. The President sighed. "Is there anything you want?" he snapped impatiently. "Erm..sorry, no. I'll be off, then." The Master returned to the transmat and vanished for a second time. Borusa sat in his throne, and farted loudly. Ignoring the Castellan, who was running around the room holding his nose and making 'poo, poo' noises, he gestured to Flavia to join him. She did, but not without firstly donning breathing equipment. The President opened his mouth to address her...and the transmat beeped again. "Um...", said the Master, when he had gained full corporeality. "What do I have to do again? I forgot." "AARRRGGGHHHHH!!!!!" screamed Flavia, her fists flying wildly into the renegade's stomach. The Master deftly dodged her attack by sidestepping into the Castellan, who fell over. "Rescue....the....Doctor..." enunciated Borusa between gritted teeth. The Master bowed graciously. "Oh yes. I knew it was something like that. I was thinking perhaps I had to get something from the shops or post a letter or something. Okay. Right. Cheerio." Once again he strode into the matter transmitter and faded to a nothingness. Swiftly, the three Time Lords remaining ran, as one, over to the control panel in order to switch the sodding thing off before... "Too late!" groaned Flavia as the red spangly glow turned black and coalesced into a Master-shape. She was not fast enough to stop the Castellan operating the dispersion switch, which resulted in all but the Master's face vanishing from sight. He grinned toothily at the President's apoplectic countenance. Borusa opened and closed his mouth a few times before he could get his words out. "What...do...you...want...now?' he slowly enunciated. "Could I have a glass of water please?" ***************************************************************** The blackened, skeletal remains of the corpse greeted the Master as he materialised on the wastelands of the Death Zone. It lay on the ground, its spine arched permanently in a twisty, turny shape ; its face and arms blackened, the flesh stripped and burned by some sort of energy blast. A small sign stuck into the ground near the unfortunate victim read 'Ha, ha, you bastard, that'll teach you." He certainly wouldn't be doing that again. Actually, it was pretty unlikely that he would be doing anything again, except perhaps participating in a fancy dress party, in disguise as a piece of toast. "One of my predecessors", muttered the Master, carefully avoiding the spectral figure. Before he could go as far as to wonder where the other one had got to, the indistinct, and somewhat inappropriate sound of an ice-cream van cut across the whine of the wind. As he ran to hide behind a large rock, he saw the vehicle round the corner and grind to a halt where he had been standing. The incongruous notes of 'Boys and Girls go Out to Play' still rang across the landscape, and briefly the Master's memory flitted back to the time at the Academy when he and the Doctor had occupied their time creating new and ever more obscene lyrics for it. Now the van was in sight, he could make out the words painted in jolly colours on its side and rear. Above the glass-fronted serving hatch were inscribed, 'Death Zone Memorabilia. All Tastes Catered For.' On the van's hindside was written, 'Watch Out! Yeti Crossing!' Fearing a trap, the Master drew the compact black weapon from his cloak, and checked the settings. He twisted the barrel, altering the power of the gun to 'Just an Inch off the Top' to 'You're Going to Need an Electron Microscope when I've Finished with You, Pal'. Flitting shadow-like from rock to rock, he reached the side of the van, knocked briefly on the glass panel, and swiftly moved to the side, gun raised. The serving hatch slid aside, and a curious face peered out. "Don't move", hissed the Master, holding the gun against the man's neck. "Oh, okay",replied the driver, and promptly died from lack of dialogue. Holstering his gun and shoving the corpse out of the way, the Master rummaged through the selection of tacky wares displayed on the shelves. Although the majority of it was fairly standard: a postcard, picture side completely black, bearing the inscription 'Death Zone at Night'; a Time Lord cloak stencilled with the letters 'I went to the Tomb of Rassilon and all I bought was this stupid Patraxian Overgarment'; and a stick of rock shaped into the semblance of the Great Key of Gallifrey, among others. Only one item held any interest for him. It was a small, plain leaflet which purported to instruct the purchaser in the many sights and sounds of Ye Olde Death Zone. From what the Master had experienced so far, the many sounds would as likely as not include a great deal of screams and nasty chewing noises, and quite a few of the sights might involve variations on seeing your best friend being impaled, skinned, diced, and thrown into a stew. Nevertheless, he pocketed the guide. Throwing a last disdainful look at the ex-proprietor of the business, he bounded out of the truck and took five paces before a laser bolt slammed into the vehicle and turned it into a blazing fireball. Silently the Master cursed himself for neglecting to bring any muffins. And then the badgers appeared. END OF PART FIVE -- ***************************************************************************** * Doctor: The fluid link's run out of mercury, see? * * Ian: No it _hasn't_. The Daleks (original script) * *******Random Grouch**************************ch0mpc@midge.bath.ac.uk********