‘One hundred and five!’ he exclaimed. ‘Dangerously high!’ He stood up. ‘Probably the animal content of that compound is too high. I’ll have to adjust it at once.’ He hastened away. ‘Keep an eye on him!’
‘But does that mean that he might die?’ Dodo cried in alarm. But the Doctor was gone. She turned to Steven, her face pale and drawn.
The Doctor hurried back into the clinic to face Rhos.
‘That first batch was too strong,’ he told the microbiologist. ‘We’ll have to mix another one.’
A Monoid tapped him on the shoulder and passed him a phial. At the same time the Monoid spoke to Rhos in sign language while the Doctor looked on.
‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘What does he say?’
‘The Monoid has followed your research technique with interest. He says that he made several different concentrates, and that this phial is a weaker one, with a lower animal content.’
The Doctor was amazed. He held the phial up to the light and shook it. ‘Why, yes, I think it is. I can see the difference.’ He smiled at the Monoid. ‘Thank you, my dear fellow... thank you, indeed!’
He bustled back out of the clinic while the Monoid bowed in his wake.
Back in the jail-room the Doctor hastily used a fresh pad to apply the new dose of vaccine to Steven’s arm.
‘Any change in temperature?’ he asked.
‘One hundred and six,’ Dodo replied.
‘Then let’s see what this does.’ The Doctor took Steven’s wrist and felt for the pulse. ‘Racing away!’ He continued checking it for several minutes, then glanced up. ‘But wait a moment! It seems to be steadying. Check the temperature again.’
Dodo did so... and smiled.
‘It’s dropped!’ she proclaimed. ‘It’s down to one hundred and three!’
The Doctor bounced to his feet. ‘Then that seems to be the right formula. I must get some of it to the Commander and the others.’
‘But isn’t it a bit soon to be trying it on them?’
‘No! Time is of the essence in a crisis of this sort. And thanks to that clever Monoid I think we’ve made an important break-through.’
‘Clever Monoid... ?’
‘Yes!’ He paused for one moment. ‘And I’ll wager that he’d beat you hands down in a straight game of cards, my dear Dodo.’
He hurried out, leaving Dodo staring after him speechlessly. Then she sighed and turned her attention back to Steven, who by now seemed much calmer as he rested quietly.
The Doctor applied the same remedy to the Commander while Mellium, Rhos and a Monoid looked on.
‘This may take a while,’ said the Doctor. ‘But it’s already proving effective with that young companion of mine.’
‘But you’ve already said that he has defensive antibodies in his system to help him,’ Rhos observed. ‘Whereas the Commander has none.’
‘All that may mean is that the treatment may take longer to realise its full effect,’ the Doctor replied. ‘But I am hoping that the eventual outcome will be the same.’
‘I’m sure that you’re right,’ Mellium stated. ‘Somehow I have faith in you, Doctor.’
‘Thank you. No doctor could ask for more.’
Automatically he reached for the Commander’s wrist, then paused to glance at Rhos. ‘Just one main pulse in the wrist?’ he asked.
‘That’s right,’ Rhos nodded.
The Doctor made a note of his findings, then invited Rhos to check.
‘A little better, I think,’ he said, ‘Do you agree?’
Rhos concentrated for a moment, then nodded his head.
‘Yes, I agree.’
‘Good! Then let’s make our rounds of the other patients,’ the Doctor suggested. ‘Lots of work to do, very little time to do it in.’ He started out, Rhos following, then paused to address Mellium. ‘But still keep your father warm, my dear. Warm and comfy!’
Mellium nodded. ‘I will.’
As they made their way along a corridor, Rhos addressed the Doctor.
‘How long do you think it will take?’ he asked.
The Doctor shook his bead uncertainly. ‘No way of telling... not for sure.’
‘I hope for your sake – for all our sakes – that it is proved quickly. Zentos is poised like a vulture, ready to swoop if the treatment doesn’t work.’
The Doctor sighed, then perked up as they entered a large room that had been converted into a ward.
‘Ah! Good morning, everyone!’ he announced in his best bedside manner. ‘Or afternoon... or evening... or whatever! Ready for our treatment, are we?’ The rows of patients stared back at him in some amazement. He glanced around. ‘Well, where’s the ward sister, then?’
‘Ward sister?’ Rhos asked, uncertainly.
‘Yes!’ Then the Doctor shrugged. ‘But never mind.
Let’s get on with things as best we can.’
He and Rhos went over to the first patient.
Zentos was pacing up and down near the main panels in the Control Room. He paused to address Manyak, who was in the Commander’s seat.
‘What are our course readings?’ he asked.
‘Firmly on path according to the Main Edicts. We should not have to make a course correction for at least a hundred years.’
Zentos smiled thinly. ‘Any decision on that will have to be made by our children’s children.’ Then he frowned.
‘That’s if there are any.’
‘From what I’ve heard, the treatment prepared by the Doctor is having some good effect.’
‘I am still cautious of him and his companions,’ Zentos replied. ‘They could pull off some kind of temporary trick, just to fool us and put us off our guard.’ He paced restlessly. ‘Oh, I know you think I’m too distrustful,’ he continued. ‘But I have to be careful. This mission means everything to me.’
‘It does to us all,’ Manyak replied quietly.
Zentos glanced at him and paused for a moment.
‘Yes, of course,’ he agreed, in a suddenly subdued tone.
‘I know that, and I am sorry for behaving as though I am the only one who cares.’ Then he turned his attention to the Monitor screens. ‘Let’s see how the treatment is affecting the patients in the main ward.’
Manyak punched up a view of the ward on the screen. It showed the patients lying in rows, apparently quiet, while Guardians and Monoids wearing protective masks moved about, nursing them.
‘I fail to see any progress there,’ Zentos observed.
‘Where is the Doctor now?’
Manyak searched on his bank of screens and then pointed. ‘There. In the desert.’
The Doctor was riding on a fast moving conveyor across sand dunes, accompanied by Rhos and a Monoid. The Doctor mopped his brow.
‘Phew! It’s hot here,’ the Doctor observed.
‘We keep it at the temperature that would have been normal in such a place on Earth,’ Rhos replied. ‘There isn’t much of a population in this area, but there is an important element of animal life.’
In the distance a rising cloud of sand was seen. ‘Ah!’
said the Doctor. ‘Some sign of life over there. A caravan of nomads, by the look of it.’
The Monoid who was driving the conveyor needed no special bidding. He directed the machine so that it veered off in the direction of the desert caravan. The Doctor was intrigued by the fact that their journey to intercept it took longer than he had first estimated, such was the illusion of distance in the desert. But eventually they caught up with it, to find that it was composed of several camels, mounted by Guardians and Monoids.
Greetings were exchanged, then Rhos asked one of the Guardians: Are there any sick among you, suffering from the virus disease?’
The Guardian replied: ‘Two Guardians there... and a Monoid at the rear.’
The sick were lying back on improvised stretchers which were pulled by the camels.
The Doctor and Rhos wasted no time. With the aid of the Monoid they set about introducing the vaccine into their systems.
‘You had better make camp here,’ the Doctor suggested to the Guardian who had spoken with Rhos. ‘Rest, and give them a chance for the vaccine to work.’
‘A good idea,’ the Guardian said. ‘Our journey was beginning to tell on us. I’ve never felt so tired.’
‘Perhaps the fever is starting to attack them all!’ Rhos suggested.
‘Probably! In which case we treat everyone in this caravan, just to make sure.’
The work took some time but eventually all the travellers had been treated. It was only then that the Doctor paused to look around at the desert.
‘Ah, beautiful!’ he offered his opinion to Rhos. ‘Deserts have always been bewitching places, and I must congratulate you and the rest of the Guardians and the Monoids on the way in which you have faithfully recreated the Earth in all its beauty.’ Then he glanced off into the distance. ‘Even down to the recreation of pyramids!’
In front of the pyramids, a party of Guardians and Monoids were observing the distant caravan and the presence there of the Doctor and Rhos. A Guardian was directing remarks into his wrist communicator.
‘The Doctor has administered his treatment to a travelling party in the desert,’ he reported.
In the Control Room Zentos listened to this report. ‘Thank you,’ he replied. ‘We have them under scanner surveillance as well.’
Manyak was intrigued by this exchange and its implication. ‘Do you mean to say that you have spies following the Doctor and Rhos?’ he asked.
‘Just part of my security precautions,’ Zentos replied. ‘In case anything suspicious happens.’
Manyak shook his head in bewilderment.
In the desert the Doctor addressed Rhos. ‘But, come!’ he said. ‘There is still work to be done elsewhere.’
Rhos nodded and moved back to the conveyor. Then the Doctor glanced at the Monoid, who had not stirred.
Instead, he was studying a lizard as it basked on a rock in the light, its tongue flicking in and out. The Monoid stared at it with rapt attention; then the Doctor tapped him on the shoulder.
‘Time to go,’ the Doctor said gently.
The Monoid looked up at him with his swivelling eye, then bowed and moved back to the conveyor. The Doctor stared thoughtfully after him, then looked back at the lizard, marvelling at the way it remained so still while its eyes swivelled, like the Monoid’s, darting back and forth to take in the scene around it. Then he shrugged and turned away to join the others in the conveyor.
They set out once more across the desert.
The Commander stirred in his sleep and opened his eyes.
Immediately Mellium spoke to him.
‘How do you fed now, Father?’
‘A little better, I think,’ he replied. ‘But thirsty.’
Mellium offered him a cup and he sipped some water, then leaned back.
‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘What is happening? Have there been any more deaths?’
‘No. The Doctor and Rhos are passing on the same treatment to others that they gave you.’
‘Good!’ He nodded with satisfaction. ‘I’m sure that the Doctor means well and will do everything he can.’
In a farmhouse in the cultivated zone the Doctor and his assistants attended to a Guardian and his wife who had been attacked by the fever.
The Guardian’s mother stood in the background, watching their careful ministrations. Then the Doctor stepped back. ‘That’s all we can do for the moment,’ he announced. ‘We’ll just have to wait a little while and see what happens.’
‘In that case, perhaps you would care for refreshments?’
the mother suggested.
‘That would be welcome!’ the Doctor exclaimed. He and the others followed the mother downstairs.
The Doctor looked around. ‘Interesting,’ he remarked.
‘I’ve been in some farmhouses before, but never one quite like this.’
It was totally functional in design. There were no pictures on the walls, no ornaments anywhere, nothing that gave it life or individuality. It obviously served merely as a shelter for the people who lived there.
The mother served up plates of fruit and glasses of juice.
‘Thank you,’ the Doctor said. ‘I am sure this is very healthy for one.’
While the others remained seated to eat their food, the Doctor wandered out of the living room onto a porch.
Before him stretched rolling agricultural land. In the fields he could see Monoids working, harvesting the ripe crops and planting seeds. The mother joined him on the porch.
‘You’re the one they call the Doctor, aren’t you?’
‘I have that singular honour.’
‘And you and your companions travelled from the Earth... but the Earth of many years ago?’
‘Most aboard this spaceship are slow to believe in the fact that we can travel through time,’ said the Doctor.
‘I am an old woman. I have seen much in my life... and I have learned that anything is possible.’ Her eyes took on a faraway look as she stood for a while, lost in her memories.
‘For the others, my son and his wife and the other young people, there was really no choice. They had no future unless they took the long voyage in this spaceship.’
‘And you? Did you have a choice?’
‘Oh, yes. Many of my generation chose to stay on Earth and take their chance, living out their lives in the place where they had always been.’
‘Do you regret leaving?’ the Doctor asked her.
‘This is an artificial place,’ she reflected. ‘Oh, it has its purpose... but everything about it is manmade. Nothing...
natural.’ She sighed. ‘The real Earth is coming to an end...
but at least it was an Earth one could smell and feel and touch, knowing it had a real history.’
‘Where did you live on Earth? In what country?’
‘Oh, we didn’t have separate names for any part of it,’
the mother replied. ‘Those went out a long time ago. But I lived in farmland where there were mountains behind us and a large ocean in front.’
‘It sounds attractive.’
‘It was the place where I was born and grew up. And the place where I was married.’ She sighed. ‘But my husband died and that’s why I felt that I didn’t want to go on living there any more.’
‘What did your husband do?’
‘He was a farmer like myself. He came from the other side of those mountains to court me, giving up the lands that belonged to his family. Now he is buried in the field behind our old farmhouse there.’ She looked around. ‘You won’t tell the others that I told you that, will you?’
‘Of course not... but why not, especially?’
‘Because burial had been prohibited by Earth Law for many Segments. Only cremation was allowed; but I chose to bury my man when he died. I... I considered it my right.’