Doctor Who: Time Flight by Peter Grimwade Read Free Book Online

ask me, the man's a lunatic'
     
    'I don't believe I did,' said Captain Stapley.
     
    The passengers and the Concorde crews toiled away at the side of the circular inner room, like marauding
     
    insects assailing the walls of a giant hive. It was a strange sight. Blue-rinsed American matrons, a pop star and his manager, financiers, stewards from the airline: they all applied themselves, without thought of protest, to the interstices of the blocks, uncaring of the debris that rained on their smart clothes.
     
    They took no notice either of Captain Stapley or Professor Hayter.
     
    Stapley watched them in amazement. 'What do you think's behind that wall?' he asked the Professor.
     
    'Another wall, I shouldn't wonder. It's called hard labour.'
     
    The Captain sighed. He started to explain. 'The Doctor's theory is that it's a hi-jack in time rather than space ...'
     
     
    The professorial features contracted into a sneer.
     
    'This isn't the Soviet Union, Professor,' the Captain battled on. 'The Doctor ...'
     
    'This Doctor needs his head examined,' announced Professor Hayter.
     
    The Doctor stood between Kalid and the TARDIS. 'So you're the conjuror?' he finally spoke.
     
    'I am Kalid,' the oriental replied grandly.
     
    'You say that as if you expected a round of applause.' The Doctor answered with a lack of respect that obviously displeased the magician.
     
    'Have a care, Doctor. You are not summoned to my domain to play the clown.'
     
    'Your domain?' The Doctor's flippant tone changed to one of assumed interest.
     
    'Here Kalid rules!'
     
    'Then I apologise for my levity.' The Doctor bowed with exaggerated politeness. Kalid, however, failed to spot the irony of the gesture and inclined his head in return. 'Not to mention my curiosity,' added the Doctor, hoping for some sort of explanation.
    'What troubles your mind?' 'What you're doing in this time zone for a start.' 'Shall Kalid not travel where the spirit leads him?' The Doctor was silent for a moment. He glanced round the chamber before turning back to Kalid. 'Would the spirit have anything to do with the ruin of that spaceship outside the Citadel?' There was no response to the Doctor's probing. 'Spaceship?' asked Kalid blandly. 'Yes,' said the Doctor, unconvinced by the other's assumed ignorance. 'Space is within us,'
    Kalid persisted enigmatically. 'Then how exactly do you travel?' 'By the power of the Great One.' Kalid narrowed his eyes. 'In the deserts of Arabia I learned all the magic
     
    arts.'
     
    The Doctor had had enough of this play-acting. 'Seven league boots, eh? Magic carpet? I suppose it makes for convenience.' He jeered at the artful pomposity of the grotesque figure before him.
     
    Kalid's anger was very real. 'You mock me, Doctor!' His sunken eyes burned like live coals and he uttered a terrible warning. 'Do not doubt that I could summon furies and cacodaemons, a company of cherubim, or Lucifer himself!'
     
    The Doctor knew this was no idle threat. 'Yes, you're surrounded by a lot of powerful bioenergetics,' he agreed. But there was more - or perhaps less - to Kalid than that. 'I can't help feeling, Kalid,' he continued 'that there's something a great deal more mechanistic about all this.'
     
    'Mechanistic?' Again the innocence.
     
    'What are you doing sitting at the end of a time contour, like a spider in a web? And what do you want with my TARDIS?'
     
    Kalid smiled. 'My familiar spirits have told me of your miraculous cabinet. The spirits have told me you would come.'
     
     
    'Your spirits are certainly well informed,' said the Doctor, irritated by the inscrutability of the man.
     
    'I hold the whole genius of Night bound to my will,' Kalid ranted on, puffing himself up like a great toad. 'And now the Great Elemental has summoned you, Doctor. Destiny has brought you to me.' He continued to talk in riddles.
     
    'But not just me, Kalid.' The Doctor was determined to get some sense out of him. 'What do you want with all those