The Song of the Space-Whale VI

10. INT. ORKAS MEDICAL UNIT (NIGHT)

Peri is still lying under the bright blue glow. The others are standing around.

JURAS
Will she be all right?

FELLBRY
There’s a chance.

JURAS
There’s always a chance. What do you THINK?

FELLBRY
I think she hasn’t got a hope in hell.

DOCTOR
Your bedside manner needs work, Dr. Fellbry. Or did you just get out of bed the wrong side this morning?

FELLBRY
Yes, I can imagine your tailor saying something very similar.

DOCTOR
Sticks and stones, Fellbry. Sticks and stones.

The Doctor roughly shoves him out of the way and checks the displays.

DOCTOR
The damage is extensive but not insurmountable. We just have to wait for the cellular modification to do its work.

JURAS
But what is that thing? What’s it doing?

Fellbry looks at her in clear surprise.

FELLBRY
You don’t know?

DOCTOR
If she did it would be rather silly for to ask. Now, my dear – what was your name?

JURAS
Juras. Juras Maateh.

DOCTOR
Well, Juras, this is a human cell modifier. It is studying the molecular structure of Peri, then it will isolate the molecular structure of the infection and then destroy everything that matches the pattern. With a bit of luck, there will be no permanent damage to Peri and her cells can recover.

JURAS
And if we’re not lucky?

FELLBRY
She’s dead already.

The Doctor rounds angrily on Fellbry.

DOCTOR
Are you always so chronically upbeat or is this a special effort on your part?!

FELLBRY
Get out of the way, fashion victim!

Fellbry nudges him to one side.

FELLBRY
I’m not on the Orkas to stand around listening to an unbelievably warped Eco-terrorist explain basic medical technology to some other mental deficient! And, anyway, Juras Maateh, I don’t recognize the name. Did you receive your broad spectrum shots?

Juras swallows, not certain how to reply.

DOCTOR
Stop victimizing poor Juras and get on with your job.

FELLBRY
MY job?!

DOCTOR
You’re a doctor, you save those who can be saved so GET – TO – WORK!

Fellbry scowls and returns to Peri. The Doctor catches Juras’ eye, winks, then licks a finger tip and draws a line in the air. One up to him. She smiles.

DOCTOR
Hello, Juras. I’m known as the Doctor. So, Where are you from? Originally, I mean.

JURAS
Er, Nilatis Four.

DOCTOR
The Triic colony world?

JURAS
Yes.

DOCTOR
So you’re not from Trion?

JURAS
Well, yeah. I mean, I’m a Trion, obviously. Just out here... doing things.

DOCTOR
Except Trion was renamed Verset around nine centuries ago. Nine centuries?

He checks his pocket watch.

DOCTOR
Make it a round ten. Which begs the question of why, if no living person has ever heard their world called Trion, why do you immediately recognize it?

JURAS
I’m something of a traditionalist.

DOCTOR
So am I, I suppose. I don’t think I’ve been to Trion, but I knew someone from there. An Imperial Clansman. We traveled together for a time. I wonder what he’s up to these days?


11. INT. A CAVE (DAY)

TURLOUGH – his hair longer and with an unkempt beard of stubble – leans against a wrinkled wall, wearing a battered and grubby space suit sans helmet. He is exhausted. Taking a deep breath he pulls away from the wall and moves deeper into the cave he stands in. It is curved, the walls dark and organic. Snow is everywhere, with masses of packed ice in places. Another man, dark haired, STAFEL, in equally battered overalls, is kicking away the loose snow. The cold is making his shiver.

TURLOUGH
Give it up, Stafel. We’ll both start to freeze soon. Leave it till tomorrow.

STAFEL
Oh, I though you weren’t talking to me.

TURLOUGH
Don’t be childish, Stafel. It’s bad enough we’re stuck here without your infantile whining. Save it for Olwin, if anyone.

STAFEL
All that turbulence will have loosened something!

TURLOUGH
No doubt – but why should it be useful? A couple of electron packs and an old boot. That’s all anyone’s found up here – what makes you think there’ll be anything better?

Stafel doesn’t quite keep the annoyance entirely out of his voice.

STAFEL
Well, I don’t know. That’s WHY I’m looking.

TURLOUGH
I’m sorry! It’s just... Four months. Minimum. I’m beginning to wish I was back at Brendon. The only benefit of being stuck in here is that no one else can hear me say that. At least there was a sky on Earth...

STAFEL
There was also war, poverty, racial intolerance and the natives were so stupid that believed it was impossible to travel faster than light. That’s what you said, isn’t it, Vislor? Honestly, sometimes I wonder if you can talk about anything else!

TURLOUGH
You’d rather listen to Waldron prattling on about our deliverance?

STAFEL
At least he isn’t so damn cynical all the time.

TURLOUGH
See what I’ve seen and it’s hard not to be.

STAFEL
Maybe you just weren’t trying. Like you’re not trying now.

TURLOUGH
There’s nothing there! Even if there was, do you think it would help us?

Stafel snaps and rounds on Turlough.

STAFEL
If it’s a blunt instrument, I can use it to shut you up!

Turlough stares him down.

TURLOUGH
You’re a civilian, Stafel. I’ve trained to kill thugs like you without breaking stride.

STAFEL
Yes, that will be in the civil war you lost, won’t it!

Turlough opens his mouth to provide an acidic retort. There is a massive vibration. They are flung to the floor, sending up another cloud of ice. Another vibration. Snow and ice is shaken loose. Stafel sees a dark metal shape now exposed through the frost. Stafel immediately starts scrabbling with his bare hands.

TURLOUGH
More quakes. What’s happening?

STAFEL
Shut up and help me!

Turlough manages to shift some flakes of ice and Stafel wrenches a black tubular shape with a bright green cross section. Stafel looks at it.

STAFEL
A phospher lamp!

TURLOUGH
Wonderful.

STAFEL
What do you mean?

Stafel shakes it violently and the green section glows brightly and illuminates them both. Stafel laughs. Turlough doesn’t.

TURLOUGH
Last time I had to use those things, I was attacked. By Tractators!

STAFEL
Oh, and were ghosts and ghouls after you as well?

Turlough glares darkly.

TURLOUGH
Shut up, Stafel. You have no idea so just shut up. Now let’s get out of here before there’s another quake.

STAFEL
What’s causing them, though?

TURLOUGH
I asked that, but no one wanted to know. Waldron was too busy telling us it was a sure sign of divinity and deliverance. More hypocrites...

Another vibration. They stagger and fall as a shower of ice boulders drop down, smashing into each other. Shards of ice go flying. Turlough cries out and he and Stafel move away from the cave mouth as more boulders fall. Finally, there is silence.

STAFEL
Are you all right?

TURLOUGH
I’ve been better. You?

STAFEL
I’m fine. That’s the good news.

TURLOUGH
And THAT is the bad news.

Turlough points at the exit – now totally blocked with rubble.

STAFEL
No other way back to the village is there?

TURLOUGH
No.

STAFEL
They’ll dig us out.

Turlough sighs.

TURLOUGH
Assuming we don’t freeze first.

STAFEL
You’re really a manic optimist, aren’t you, Vislor?


12. MODEL SHOT

The Ghaleen swims away through space. The Orkas limps into view behind it.


13. INT. ORKAS MEDICAL UNIT (NIGHT)

Fellbry is studying the displays which show oscillating lines. They grow very active then die down to almost nothing. He checks another display. Same result. The Doctor is pacing, eyes fixed on his shoes as he places one after the other. Juras looks at Peri, concerned.

FELLBRY
Heart rate stabilizing. Brain activity rising.

JURAS
Is that good?

DOCTOR
It all depends on whether the levels remain there, doesn’t it?

FELLBRY
If you want to take over...

DOCTOR
Fine.

FELLBRY
What?

DOCTOR
Fine. Acceptable. OK. All-right. Froody. I’ll take over.

FELLBRY
Will you?

DOCTOR
This room is twenty-two shoe lengths wide and forty-seven shoe-lengths long. If I wanted to carpet the floor with shoes I would need one thousand and thirty four of them. And if I were to remove all the furniture and stack NOTHING but shoes in here, eighteen thousand, six thousand and twelve shoes would be required. Of course, that’s just my shoe size, yours I think is slightly smaller...

FELLBRY
All right! I need to deal with that dead crewmember anyway...

He storms off, shaking his head.

DOCTOR
Maybe he doesn’t enjoy mental arithmetic?

He reaches down and gently shakes Peri. She mumbles incoherently.

DOCTOR
Come on, Peri. Wakey wakey.

JURAS
Careful! She’s weak, she needs rest.

DOCTOR
Rest? Nonsense. Come along, Peri!

PERI
I’m awake... promise... Leamme lone, Howard.

DOCTOR
Now, now, Peri. No boring old Lanzarote for you, today we stop innocent space-whales from being slaughtered. I thought you enjoyed that more than ‘geriatrics on Miami Beach’ as you so delicately put it.

Peri chuckles weakly. She is awake, but can only just speak.

PERI
You took your time, lady.

JURAS
There weren’t many uniforms in your size, OK!

PERI
I got attacked by the creature from the pipes!

JURAS
How was I to know?

PERI
You going to tell me your name now?

DOCTOR
It’s Juras Maateh.

PERI
Oh, she tells YOU. Everyone always tells YOU!

DOCTOR
It’s a knack. I did wonder how you two had met.

PERI
She’s a stowaway.

Juras shushes her, casting an anxious look in the direction of the doorway.

DOCTOR
Is she? A stowaway?

JURAS
So? I may or may not be a stowaway, but you’re an Eco! A proven Eco! And she’s your accomplice!

DOCTOR
And so might you be. That Captain Queeg is a difficult man, I might just spill the beans and say that you’re on my side.

JURAS
I’m not.

PERI
You sure? You sounded pretty worried about the Ghaleen?

DOCTOR
Yes. You do seem a bit anxious. And it’s not because the Ghaleen are sentient and harmless and about to be murdered in cold blood. What do they mean to you?

JURAS
Nothing. It’s what’s inside it that matters.

DOCTOR
And what’s inside it?

PERI
Treasure?

JURAS
No. A... friend of mine. Very important.

DOCTOR
Oh? What’s his name?

JURAS
He’s called Vislor.

The Doctor clearly doesn’t know the name.

DOCTOR
Not Jonah, then?


14. MODEL SHOT

The Ghaleen swims upwards.


15. INT. A CAVE (DAY)

Turlough, muscles straining, manages to lift a large chunk of ice before he loses his hold and it slides roughly to the ground. Stafel leaps out of the way.

STAFEL
We’ll never shift this lot.

TURLOUGH
And you accuse me of being a pessimist! Come on!

Turlough starts examining the boulders for another bit he’d be able to shift.

STAFEL
I’m not pessimistic, I’m realistic. We wait for the others to dig us out. In the meantime, we try and work out what caused the quake. Work out if, if it will happen again. I mean, do you have any ideas?

TURLOUGH
Thousands.

STAFEL
Well don’t keep me in suspense!

TURLOUGH
I think we’re under attack.

STAFEL
‘Attack’?

TURLOUGH
Yes.

STAFEL
Who’d attack a space-whale?!

TURLOUGH
I don’t know! Terileptils, Gardsormr, Daleks, Cybermen... It could be anyone.

STAFEL
So what are the quakes? Death throes?

TURLOUGH
Maybe not. They might be applying some kind of tractor beam on us. The Ghaleen fights back, and we get caught in the middle. Knowing our luck, it’s a whaling ship.

STAFEL
No one would ever try and kill a space whale!

TURLOUGH
The old Hiedradi teams used to make the corpses into their main battle cruisers. Maybe someone’s decided to step up production, stop looking for the already dead ones and kill those who are still fresh.

STAFEL
I’m right.

TURLOUGH
Are you?

STAFEL
You are a pessimist. We’re fine now, aren’t we? So where’s the tractor beam now?

TURLOUGH
Why do you insist on asking these questions? Do you HONESTLY think I’ll now?

STAFEL
It must be the Clansman arrogance, Vislor. You just appear so knowledgeable.

TURLOUGH
If you want knowledge, then its likely the village didn’t escape the quakes unscathed. They’ll have their own problems to sort out, THEN they have to notice we’re missing, organize a search party, find us, dig us out...

STAFEL
And check the Raft Ship.

TURLOUGH
I doubt Waldron will be interested in that – or us! Now, come on!

Stafel helps Turlough shifting another block.


16. MODEL SHOT

An establishing shot of a small village of low buildings constructed out of space debris – girders, hull plates, bubble wraps and the like. Several smashed shuttles act as houses. This village sits on a sloping hillside under an amber sky. It is in fact a cavern, encrusted with luminous barnacles that provide the light. There is the constant sound of dripping water, mingled with a soft heartbeat and whalesong.


17. INT. THE VILLAGE (DAY)

The main square of the village. It is in a bad way – walls have collapsed, shrapnel, cables and wires are sprawled around the place. Crusty matter has fallen like rubble. Half a dozen CASTAWAYS are present – different ages, sexes and even species wearing ragged clothes, even bits of space suit. A bearded man in his late fities, WALDRON staggers and grabs a chunk of wall to stop him falling. His wife, KALEN, moves to help him, concerned.

WALDRON
Now.. now is everyone accounted for?

KALEN
Waldron, are you sure you’re all right?

WALDRON
I’m fine, Kalen, honestly. Now... three are missing. Vislor and Stafel were exploring the caverns, they should be all right. What about Olwin?

KALEN
She was over there, near her hut.

They look in that direction. The caravan-like structure has totally collapsed.

KALEN
Oh, no, Olwin...

They hurry as fast as they can towards the wreckage.


18. INT. ORKAS MEDICAL UNIT (NIGHT)

The Doctor has removed the cell modifier. Peri is dozing.

DOCTOR
You really expect me to believe that while you were on a pleasure cruiser above Njordr Nerthus, it was struck by an asteroid.

JURAS
Yes, I do expect you to believe it. It’s true!

DOCTOR
You and most of the crew managed to escape, but several people were left in the wreck as it was depressurizing and then a Ghaleen – the Pilot outside - turned up and saved the lot of them.

JURAS
Yes!

DOCTOR
By eating them.

JURAS
Yes. Vislor was one of them, and the space-whale was clearly the pilot. The markings confirmed it.

DOCTOR
So you decided to travel across the galaxy here, then by chance smuggled yourself onto the Orkas whaling ship that just so happened to be heading for the exact same Pilot of the heard. You’re either very lucky, in some sort of conspiracy or...

JURAS
Or...

DOCTOR
You aren’t a practicing Occultist, are you?

JURAS
NO! I’m an Imperial Clanswoman! The Occult? Ridiculous.

DOCTOR
An Imperial Clanswoman? The Clans were dismantled over five centuries ago.

The Doctor approaches her.

DOCTOR
Just what are you hiding?

JURAS
Nothing! Vislor is inside that whale! We know they live on solar rays and x-ray bombardment, they don’t eat living creatures! We know they have internal pressurization, so it’s possible for living forms to survive within...

DOCTOR
And the Ghaleen are friendly enough to do that.

JURAS
But the Ghaleen as you call them hardly visit planets to let castaways off. Who knows how many are inside?

DOCTOR
So what do you want me to do?

JURAS
Your blue box thing, your pod...

DOCTOR
TARDIS.

JURAS
It’s a space capsule, we can use to get to the whale.

DOCTOR
At the moment I couldn’t guarantee getting to the other side of the Termination Bay.

JURAS
But we have to get Vislor out of there before...

DOCTOR
Before the Ghaleen is culled? How about, instead, we stop the Ghaleen being culled and work out how to rescue your friend when we have time to spare.

JURAS
And how do we do that?

DOCTOR
By using our grey matter. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about the universe than bullets and bombs aren’t the answer to everything. Nine times out of ten, you need to understand your way out of the situation.

JURAS
And how do we understand our way out?

DOCTOR
First, we establish the current events aboard the Orkas.

The Doctor crosses over to Fellbry, who is turned away from him, adjusting some controls. The Doctor moves to pat him on the shoulder, but at the last Fellbry whirls around, suspicious. The Doctor lowers his hand instantly.

FELLBRY
What did you want?

DOCTOR
Civility?

Fellbry rolls his eyes.

FELLBRY
How’s your friend?

DOCTOR
Oh, she’ll live. Toxins removed, biomass restored – it’ll be a few hours before she’s up to anything beyond relaxing in bed, so you best leave her be. Or you could improve you general disposition.

FELLBRY
You can just go -

DOCTOR
However, I would like the benefit of your advice.

Fellbry is taken aback. The Doctor is now polite and looking up at him.

FELLBRY
My what?

DOCTOR
Advice. You may be a bit irritable today, but you’re clearly a man of great learning and knowledge – setting up the cell modifier so quickly and so efficiently? I know better than to take you for a fool. You must know so much.

Fellbry shrugs with false modesty, ego stroked by the Doctor.

FELLBRY
I try to keep up with events.

DOCTOR
Yes, I can imagine. Now this injury Peri had, was the poison definitely from a Tuthon?

FELLBRY
As far as I can tell.

DOCTOR
Well, that’s good enough for me. I’m a total ignoramus when it comes to this sort of thing. What actually is a Tuthon? Some sort of rodent? Does the Orkas have rats?

FELLBRY
Of course not. Tuthons are humanoids.

DOCTOR
Are they?

FELLBRY
Yes, from Ziphius.

DOCTOR
No, those are Ziphians, I’m sure. Tall, wrinkly reptilian bipeds...

FELLBRY
Tuthons are the hunter caste of Ziphians.

DOCTOR
Oh, I see! The hunter caste!

FELLBRY
Yes.

DOCTOR
What do they hunt?

FELLBRY
The whales of course.

DOCTOR
Of course.

- to be continued...