‘Who is in control here?’ Rago rasped.
Scnex cleared his throat. ‘I am the Director,’ he replied calmly.
‘If you would care to make an appointment...’ Bovem began.
Rago turned on the Deputy, his boots and gloves creaking eerily. ‘Listen and obey,’ he commanded. ‘I require information.’
Chairman Tensa strode forward. ‘I must protest. Such discourtesy to the Council is tolerable!’ he cried.
Rago stared at him incredulously. ‘Protest?’ he hissed.
‘You defy me? You defy a Dominator?’
Tensa stood his ground. ‘Our Director’s rank demands respect,’ he retorted.
‘Demands... respect?’ Rago echoed, his harsh voice brittle with mockery. ‘Your leader is nothing to me. I respect only superior force.’ He swung back to loom over Senex who had risen with great dignity. ‘I command you to supply...’
‘Sir, you would do better to request rather than command,’ Tensa interrupted, forcing his way between Senex and the massive alien.
‘After all, your visit is not even on the Council Agenda; objected an aged Councillor.
Tensa opened his mouth to continue.
‘Quark!’ Rago rapped, stepping quickly back and pointing at Tensa’s outraged face. ‘Destroy.’
A ghost of a smile, chased by a look of sheer uncomprehending horror, flitted across Tensa’s fine features. Before he could speak, the robot bleated its warning and then discharged a brief, devastating bolt of energy. Tensa’s robe fluttered to the floor around the pulverised remains of his body. The Councillors recoiled and fell back in their chairs in stunned silence.
Rago towered over Sencx. ‘I have no desire to repeat such action,’ he stated tonelessly. ‘Let it demonstrate that we Dominators are to be obeyed without question.’
Senex stared back at the alien, his eyes dulled with shock.
‘You will place at our disposal the strongest of your species,’ Rago instructed him.
After a long pause, Senex recovered his voice. ‘You...
yon seek our assistance?’ he said in a dreamlike monotone.
Rago smiled a bleak, humourless smile. ‘Assistance? I require slaves. Nothing more, nothing less,’ he retorted.
Somehow Senex managed to talk through his numbed lips. ‘Had you come to Dulkis in peace we should have done all in our power to assist you, but we cannot bow to...’
‘What we require, we take,’ Rago thundered dismissively. ‘We control ten galaxies. Our mission is to colonise certain others. For this task our Quarks are needed, therefore we must replace their functions on our home planets.’
‘With slaves,’ Senex added flatly.
‘Exactly. Those selected from your population will be fortunate. They will be saved.’
‘Saved?’ croaked Bovem. ‘Saved from what?’
‘Only the strongest are suitable,’ Rago hissed, striding wards the wall and rounding on the cowering assembly.
‘You will co-operate or perish. The choice is yours.’ The wall opened and the alien and his robot disappeared. After a long time some of the Councillors ventured forward and knelt by the broken body in their midst.
‘Can we not punish them?’ the aged Councillor cried in a choking voice, wringing his gnarled hands incessantly.
Bovem glanced round at each member in turn. ‘What did the alien mean... some of us would be saved?’ he breathed. ‘Saved from what?’
Sinking back into his chair, Senex shook his head and sighed. ‘Perhaps from ourselves,’ he murmured hopelessly.
‘Perhaps from ourselves...’
When the Doctor and Zoe arrived back at the saucer with Toba, the control centre was humming with activity.
Quarks marched about, plugging themselves into computer terminals and systems displays as they performed the complex sequences of the drilling operation. Tuba began to stride up and down, bloated with self-importance and revelling in his temporary role of commander.
‘Report progress to Fleet Leader,’ he instructed a Quark.
‘All perimeter bores completed. Central bore approaching optima...’
The Doctor stood in the shadows with Zoe, his hands plunged deep in his pockets, long furrows stretching each side of his nose. ‘We must find out what they’re drilling for,’ he exclaimed.
‘Fat chance with all these Quarks everywhere,’ Zoe grimaced.
‘Hmm. If only we could distract them somehow,’ mused the Doctor, peering vainly about for inspiration.
At that moment, two symbols started flashing on the Quark control unit. Toba rushed over and thumped the panel with his giant fist. One of the symbols stopped flashing and remained
‘Another Quark has been destroyed and a third has been damaged,’ Toba raged.
‘This could be just what we need,’ the Doctor muttered, pulling Zoe further into the shadows. They watched the frenetic alien intently.
‘Quarks follow!’ screamed Toba.
Immediately the robots disconnected themselves and followed Toba out of the control centre in a sparking, chattering line. Soon Zoe and the Doctor were left quite alone.
‘Who would destroy a Quark?’ Zoe wondered.
The Doctor grinned broadly. ‘I think I can guess!’ he cried, rubbing his hands together gleefully.
‘Jamie!’ Zoe exclaimed after a momentary pause. ‘So they did escape after all.’
‘Alive and kicking by the sound of things,’ the Doctor agreed. ‘Good lads! We must make the most of our opportunity.’ He scurried off round the huge circular chamber, peering closely at print-outs, displays, inspection panels and crystal switches, and muttering furiously to himself the whole time.
Zoe did her best to keep up with him. ‘What exactly are we looking for?’ she asked breathlessly.
‘I want to find out what they feed this thing on,’ replied the Doctor, darting into an elaborate assembly of flickering tubes.
Zoe trailed after him. ‘Well, the Quarks seem to use ultrasonics, so presumably it’s a fuel capable of producing random amplified fields and accelerated phases,’ she suggested.
‘Hmm, it must be quite powerful too,’ added the Doctor, poking thoughtfully among the coloured fluorescent columns.
‘Well, that’s what I just said.. ‘ Zoe stopped and blushed, realising too late that she had been sent up. ‘Look, if you don’t want my help, Doctor...’
‘Oh but I do, Zoe,’ the Doctor assured her, backing carefully out of the mass of tubes and standing upright again. ‘Now, my dear, where do you think the essential power source is lurking?’
Zoe walked around fora few seconds frowning with concentration. ‘Well, if they use ultrasonics...’
‘No, no, no...’cried the Doctor, ‘more likely to be some form of particle acccicmtion.’ He dropped to his knees and started to crawl round and round the central control dais, his nose to the deck like a bloodhound. Eventually he stopped, sniffed, crawled backwards a few metres, stopped, sniffed, crawled forwards a metre and finally stopped.
Then he tapped a small panel in the side of the dais.
‘Here we are!’ he cried. ‘Just as I expected.’ He tapped again and than listened. ‘Or is it?’ he demanded, kneeling up and staring enquiringly at Zoe.
She shrugged impatiently.
‘Well, there’s only one way to find out.’ Taking a small penknife from his pocket, the Doctor began prising at the edge of the access panel, still muttering away. Suddenly the panel sprang free. Carefully the Doctor removed it and peered inside. He cocked his head and listened. Then he sniffed a few times and to Zoe’s astonishment, licked his finger and poked it into the opening for several seconds.
‘Oh dear...’ he sighed. ‘Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear...’ He clicked his tongue and shook his head.
‘Whatever’s the matter Doctor?’
Instead of answering, the Doctor pulled out a compact, tubular instrument, shook it, blew on it and then tied it to a long piece of string. Cautiously he lowered the gadget into the opening, paying out the string as it went.
Suddenly a series of sharp clicks emerged from the gadget. The Doctor frowned and nodded energetically. ‘I thought so...’ he murmured, paying out more string. The clicking increased dramatically as the Geiger counter registered radiation.
‘Atomic reactor?’ Zoe asked, craning over the Doctor’s shoulder.
The Doctor stared down at the clusters of spherical vessels filling the entire area under the dais. ‘No, my dear, nothing as crude as that,’ he replied at last. He hauled the Geiger counter out of the trap and thoughtfully wrapped the string tightly round it. ‘No. This is almost certainly a form of negative mass flux absorption system.’
Zoe’s eyebrows shot up. ‘A what?’
‘A sort of radiation vacuum cleaner,’ the Doctor explained. ‘It would account for the sudden disappearance of radioactivity from the Island.’
You mean this thing sucked it all up?’
‘In a manner of speaking, Zoe, yes.’
Zoe pondered a moment. ‘Then what on earth are they drilling all those holes out there for?’
The Doctor tapped his nose with the cocoon of string. ‘I wish I knew, my dear... I wish I knew...’ he mumbled vacantly.
When Toba and his cohort of Quarks reached the fourth perimeter target near the gorge, Baran was still lying dazed by the rig. Toa yanked him to his feet.
‘A Quark has been destroyed, another damaged. Who was responsible?’ he hissed.
The frail Dulcian whimpered helplessly. Toba shook his victim like a bundle of sticks. Baran stared like a terrified animal. ‘I did not see... I was working... I was almost hit...’
he pleaded.
The Quarks had formed a circle round the rig and were scanning the area with wickedly slicing antennae.
‘Evidence of alien assault,’ one of them squawked.
Toba gripped Balan’s stick-like arms mercilessly. ‘Is there a resistant force on this Island?’ he demanded hopefully.
‘There is no force on Dulkis,’ Baran answered feebly.
The Dominator flung the old man aside and gazed around, his green, red-rimmed eyes alight with malice. ‘Quarks, search the Island. Destroy any alien specimens not accounted for. Total destruction!’ he raved, his huge nostrils flaring hideously. Having ordered a Quark to escort Baran back to the saucer, he marched away to the central bore target by the ruined museum.
There, Kando and Teel still laboured to clear the remaining debris under the relentless surveillance of a pair of Quarks.
‘Perimeter four has been attacked and a Quark eliminated,’ Toba spat, stamping up to them.
Kando turned excitedly to Teel. ‘Kully must have...’
Too late her she bit her lip and blushed.
Toba seized her by the hair and twisted viciously. The willowy girl folded like a wounded gull. ‘What do you know about this?’ Tuba screamed.
‘Leave her...’ Teel blurted out, wielding a metal strip.
Dropping Kando, Toba turned on the youth. ‘Do you dare to defy a Dominator?’ he challenged in an awesome whisper.
Suddenly Teel hurled himself forward, flailing uselessly at the enormous armoured figure standing over the pale, quaking girl.
Toba did not move, but merely gloated with creaking grunts of pleasure as Teel battered vainly against his plated chest. Eventually, the Dominator tired of the game as his assailant’s slim arms quickly weakened.
‘Quark. Restrain!’ he commanded.
One of the robots advanced on Teel, opening its probes like a pincer.
‘No!’ Kando gasped, scrambling up.
Toba seized her wrists and shook her like a dish cloth.
‘No one ever questions a Dominator,’ he rapped.
The Quark caught Teel round the waist and lifted him effortlessly off the ground. Then it tightened its grip and Teel almost folded in half.
‘Stop. Please stop!’ Kando cried, hanging limp from Toba’s gloves.
‘Power!’ Tuba ordered.
There was a dull cracking sound and Teel uttered a long hollow moan of agony.
‘Stop. I’ll tell you...’ Kando shrieked.
‘Release!’ commanded Toba.
The Quark immediately opened its probes and Teel dropped to the sand, writhing silently.
‘Who attacked my Quarks?’ Toba demanded, thrusting his face into Kando’s as he raised her level with him.
‘It... it must have been Kully.’
‘The specimen Kully is destroyed,’ retorted Toba, twisting Kando’s slender wrists in opposite directions. She struggled to speak, but the excruciating pain paralysed her throat.
Then the Dominator’s emerald eyes shrank into tiny brilliant points. ‘The other boy... the stupid one. He must be responsible.’ he hissed. ‘Where is he?’
Kando shook her head and then closed her eyes, waiting for the end. But her tormentor suddenly released her and she slumped at his feet, huddled and trembling.
Toba loomed or his two victims, as if he were about to crush them out of existence. ‘One of you must know where the stupid one is,’ he breathed at last.’ And you will tell me...’
The Doctor only just had time to replace the inspection panel in the dais when the Quark drove Balan into the control centre. While the robot went over to monitor the bore-project display, the Doctor and Zoe managed a furtive conversation with the exhausted Educator. Zoe was overjoyed to hear that Jamie had probably destroyed another Quark and damaged a third. Despite Balan’s condition, the Doctor plied him with whispered questions in an attempt to solve the mystery of the drilling operations.
‘Balan, when the Dulcian scientists exploded the atomic device on the Island all those years ago... where did they obtain the fission material?’
Balan cast his clouded mind back as best he could. ‘I believe that their requirements came from somewhere in the northern hemisphere...’
‘The other side of the planet. Then why are the Dominators drilling here?’
Balan shrugged wearily. ‘Perhaps because the planet’s crust is very thin just here.’
The Doctor slapped himself on the forehead. ‘The magma!’ he gasped, turning to Zoe. ‘The molten planetary core...’ He turned back to Balan. ‘Could the magma be radioactive?’
The Educator looked uncertain. ‘The minor eruptions which occur here from time to time have never registered such radiation, Doctor.’
‘But are we sure these Dominator, are drilling for fuel?’
Zoe interjected.
The Doctor gestured at the schematic display in front of the Quark. ‘It’s the pattern that intrigues me, Zoe,’ he murmured. ‘Four drill holes arranged in a square, with a fifth hole where the diagonals cross in the centre...