One of the homo reptillia appeared carrying a tray with food bowls on it. His third eye glowed briefly and the cage door opened. The Silurian was just about to leave when another reptile appeared.
'What do you want?' the first Silurian gargled.
'I,' began the second, drawing himself to his full height, 'I am a Zoologist.'
'And I,' replied the other, eyeing him warily, 'I am a Zoo Keeper, so?'
Patiently, the first explained that he had been given a permit to examine the new creatures.
The Zoo Keeper sighed. 'An object was found in the woods, because of the equipment these two had on them, it was assumed that it was one of their things.'
'Really? How fascinating. Please show me.'
With a sour glance, the Zoo Keeper bade the scientist to follow, 'It's in the museum...'
As soon as they were gone, the Doctor and Leela sat up. 'At last,' the Doctor said, 'We know where our stuff is.'
Leela, he noticed was crouched in a decidedly aggressive pose, sniffing the air. 'What's the matter?'
She indicated the tray, 'Three food bowls and only two of us.' Her eyes fixed on the far wall. 'He must be in that pile of straw!' Without a second thought she dived into the pile, scrambling about and finally emerging with a weak, emaciated figure.
The Doctor rushed over. The pitiful thing was a man, his clothes were decidedly 20th century, lay in rags. His skin was full of blisters and in the last stages of skin cancer. Clearly, he didn't have long to live, minutes at the most.
The Doctor tried to make him comfortable but the man struggled and started to speak, his voice sounded desiccated.
'Is that you, Butler?' it coughed, 'Yates?' A thin smile appeared on his face and the voice faded to a whisper. 'Whitaker...we did it. The Golden Age...' The man drew in a deep breath and then no more.
Recognition dawned on the Doctor's face. 'Sir Charles Grover,' He shook his head sadly and closed the man's staring eyes. 'So this is where you ended up. I hope you like the place you've gone to better than the one you've just left.'
Leela looked, questioningly.
'I'll explain it to you sometime,' he said and stood up. 'We've got to escape.'
Leela began to ask how as the Doctor revealed the matches and went to the grille that blocked their escape. 'This thing,' he muttered striking a match, 'works on heat sensitivity. Ah!' The bars slid back into the wall.
'Where are we going?' asked Leela as they sped off in the direction the two Silurians had gone.
'Museum!' the Doctor shouted back, as loud as he dared.
The corridor led directly there. The museum was one huge room, full of exhibits and free of patrons except the two Silurians. The Doctor and Leela sat hiding behind a huge glass case. The two reptiles were examining the TARDIS. Finally they turned and started walking towards the exit.
'Nagara,' they heard the Zoologist say, 'will be envious when he sees my theory on the evolution of these creatures.' and then they were gone.
Quickly, the two companions searched the glass cases for their belongings. They found them in a glass case near the TARDIS and pride of place was the TARDIS key.
Removing his shoe, the Doctor said something like, "loosers weepers" before shattering the glass panel with his footwear. An alarm sounded and they scooped up their "equipment" ( the key, a yo-yo, Vince's knife, two dead beetles and an apple core) and ran to the TARDIS.
It was close.
No sooner had the Doctor locked the door of his ship, than half a dozen security guards and the two Silurians they'd seen earlier, rushed in.
Turning on the scanner, the Doctor just had to see the Silurians' facial expressions of astonishment before it filled with the space-time vortex.
And in the museum, the Silurian security chief was left to explain how he had lost some exciting new exhibits and some valuable zoo specimens in the same day!
written by
JAMES WATTS
copyright 2009
artwork by
JOE McINTYRE
ROWLAND DARBY
copyright 2009