Read Doctor Who: The Rescue for Free Online

hand free and striding purposefully towards the TARDIS.
    Ian dusted himself down. ‘Thanks, Doctor, that’s the most thorough medical check-up I’ve ever had in my life!’
     
    he said, scowling resentfully.
    The old man was busy investigating a deep narrow crevice almost hidden behind the police box. ‘I have never claimed to be an expert in Hippocratic affairs,’ he retorted, probing the niche with the penetrating torchbeam. ‘Do come along, my boy. I think this may be our only chance of finding Barbara.’
    Ian stumbled through the settling dust to join him. ‘Did you say the inhabitants of this planet were hospitable?’
    The Doctor manoeuvred himself into the fissure and shone the beam of the torch ahead along the dark defile.
    ‘Extremely friendly. One of the most civilised species I have ever encountered. Now, do come along, Chesterton!’
    His faraway voice echoed down the tunnel.
    Ian squeezed himself through the crevice. ‘Well, on first acquaintance with them I think I’ll take the Daleks anyday,’ he retorted, catching up and shoving brusquely past the Doctor where the twisting gully suddenly widened for a metre or two. ‘Come along, Doctor, we’ve got to find Barbara quickly. I think your friendly inhabitants have forgotten their old-fashioned good manners!’
    Gaping in astonishment at Ian’s remarkable recovery, the Doctor followed, shining the torch ahead of them. ‘Do be careful, my boy!’ he warned.
    ‘Don’t worry, I will...’ Ian said over his shoulder. ‘These Didoi things are obviously jolly dangerous.’ As they made their way cautiously along the musty, tortuous chasm which led deeper and deeper into the mountain the torch beam cast huge monstrous shadows on the walls around them. The Doctor stared thoughtfully at Ian’s back. ‘But I wonder why...’ he said after a long silence. ‘What can have happened to change their nature so profoundly?’
    Before Ian could reply, a thunderous rasping bellow reverberated around them, almost as if the sides of the ravine were grating together in protest at their intrusion.
    Ian stopped in his tracks and the Doctor careered into him and dropped the torch. It went out. The awesome sound had a shrill cutting edge that suggested the cry of some fantastic mechanical animal constructed by a mad subterranean Frankenstein.
    They stood in the dusty darkness listening to the long dying echoes. Ian backed against the rock wall. ‘Perhaps we’re just about to find out, Doctor...’ he whispered.
     

4
    Chalk white and motionless, Barbara lay spreadeagled at the bottom of the cliff’, half-buried in a pile of rubble that had once been a simple but elegant dwelling. In one hand she still gripped the stem of a small thorn tree which she had managed to grab as she careered helplessly down the almost vertical scree. Her face and her hands were covered in scratches and bruises and dried blood, and one cheek was swollen like a huge purple fruit. Her clothes were torn and filthy and it would have been impossible for any observer to tell whether she was still breathing.
    Then the sand and glassy stones nearby were scuffed aside as something approached and stood staring down at her, breathing heavily. Despite the pale curtain of haze across the reddish sun, a long shadow was cast across her inert body. It was like an image of Death itself.
    The thorn tree was twisted out of her fist. Her arms were seized and she was dragged off the mound of debris and down onto the burning rock-strewn plateau. The shadow’s breathing became faster and more laboured as it hauled her through the prickly scrub, as if it was struggling to get its prey safely into its lair before any rival beast could rob it.
    Keeping an anxious eye on the exterior hatchway, Vicki hurriedly finished arranging the blankets over her bunk, smoothing them as flat as possible to conceal something underneath with nervous little fluttering movements of her delicate hands.
    She seemed to know that