Part Four (First Half)
The Doctor could have sworn he saw Craig go over that
ridge while he was hot on the boy’s trail. Alas, the child somehow managed to
elude the Time Lord, vanishing out of sight entirely. Feeling despondent over
his failure, he returned to the others just as there was some discord among
them.
“I’m gonna break each of your bloody faces!” he heard
Maureen in particular shout. It took three people (General Dwonch, Major
Simmons, and Captain Yates) just to hold her back from O’Neil’s men.
“What’re mad at us for?!” Louis Ferretti (one of O’Neil’s
lieutenants) retorted.
“You didn’t have to laugh at him like that,” Jo scolded,
clearly referring to the spectacle earlier with Craig and his staff. “He’s just
a boy!”
“The kid said he could get us home,” Ferretti argued. “If
he can’t back up a deal like that, then he might as well face the music.”
Maureen nearly tore through the restraint placed on her
by Dwonch, Simmons, and Yates. Thankfully, the Brigadier was there to diffuse
the altercation. “Alright! That’s quite enough – all of you!” He turned to Jack
and ordered, “Colonel, I realize I’m in no position to give you commands, but I suggest you get a
hold on your men.”
O’Neil tried not to act spiteful towards the Brig’s
advice. “Duly noted.”
When Kelsey finally noticed the Doctor had returned, she
immediately rushed over to him. “Did you find Craig?” she asked with a look of
hope.
It irritated the Doctor being the bearer of bad news.
“No, he disappeared past that ridge before I could reach him,” he told Kelsey,
who hung her head in sadness. “But I reassure you that we will find him.”
“You’re dang right we will,” Dwonch attested. “We’re
going out there to look for the lil’ fella.” She looked to the two other C.O.’s
– O’Neil and the Brigadier – and advocated, “How ‘bout it, gentlemen?”
“A mass search party for one child?” the Brigadier
interpreted her course of action.
“What’s the matter, Brig?”
O’Neil addressed in a snarky tone, presumably as payback for the Brig’s ill
advice moments ago. “Too much legwork for you and your boys?”
The Brig knew when another man was challenging him.
Unbeknownst to O’Neil, he was not one to back down. “On the contrary, Colonel…I
was merely surveying the general’s plan. I know my men are adept for such an assignment. Are yours?”
Dwonch could no longer stomach this contest. Rolling her
eyes with disgust, she pressed, “Let’s just get a move on, shall we?”
While the teams prepared for the search, Ferretti
approached O’Neil and whispered, “You can’t be serious about wastin’ our time
looking for some whiny little kid. What about gettin’ back home?”
“That ‘Doctor’ of theirs said the kid disappeared over
that ridge,” O’Neil mentioned. “Nobody just vanishes out of thin air in the
middle of a desert. If there’s a chance that kid did find a way off this planet, you better believe we’re gonna find
him and ask how. Besides, Ferretti, this is punishment for hassling the poor
squirt.”
Ferretti’s mouth always got him in trouble. Left with no
other choice, he joined along on the mass search party for Craig. It was hard
enough trekking through the harsh desert climate with the sun (which seemed to
have been twice the size as the one that orbited Earth) barreling down on him;
but, throughout the trek, he detected Maureen’s icy glare directed his way. He
didn’t want to admit it in front of the other soldiers, but the tall, angry
Englishwoman terrified him.
Maureen’s intense focus on Ferretti was interrupted as
Major Simmons walked in place right beside her. “It’s you, isn’t it?” she asked
in a hushed tone. Maureen densely looked on the major, not having the slightest
idea what she was talking about. Her reaction only managed to amuse Simmons.
“You’re still gonna pretend you’re not
Neas? Don’t think I didn’t notice when you pulled out that sonic screwdriver to
help make your lil’ friend look like the hero.”
Maureen groaned. “You always were the observant one,
Hill.”
Simmons’ smile widened when she heard the abbreviation of
her first name come out of Maureen’s rose-red lips – a trait she knew the real Neas had a habit of committing in
their past journeys together. “I knew it!” she cheered, albeit still very
hushed. “So you really did try to get us off this planet through your TARDIS.
What happened? I mean, we all saw it right there one second, then it was gone
in the next?”
“It’s dimensional interference,” Maureen explained.
“Possibly due to the Stargates.”
“Star-gates? As
in plural?” Hillary reiterated. “We only came through one.”
“From one point in time, remember? Three Stargates
crossed between three time periods and two dimensions.” Maureen rubbed the side
of her head, her fingers combing through the long, flowing locks of her brown
hair. “Somethin’ about all of this doesn’t feel right…like it was all by design
and not accidental.”
“Like it’s all a trap?” Simmons deciphered.
“Exactly.” Maureen sighed, both her hearts feeling heavy.
“It’s all my fault Craig’s lost out there somewhere. The lil’ bugger was so
bent on provin’ himself to be as worthy a leader as I am. Truth is…he’s a
better leader at nine years old than I am at over 30,000 years old.”
Hillary saw the anxiety on the English brunette’s face.
“You’re really worried about him, aren’t you?”
“Of course, I am. He’s one of my best friends in the
entire multiverse.”
“Hey, you guys! Check this out!” The enthusiastic voice
of J.P., who walked much further ahead of the search party with Kelsey, drew
everyone’s attention to one of the indigenous animals of the planet – a beast
that resembled a camel but woolly. Of course, J.P. described it in much
different terms: “It’s a big ol’ horse-sheepdog!”
“More like a giant iguana with fur,” Kelsey said,
stroking the beast’s wool.
“You kids be careful!” Dwonch cried out, sounding like a
concerned mother. “That thing could be wild!”
“No, it’s domesticated,” Jackson indicated the harness
strapped to the beast.
J.P. and Kelsey used that very harness to climb atop the beast.
That action triggered some parental instincts within all the adults, each and
every single one urging J.P. and Kelsey to climb off the beast. Unfortunately,
as J.P. played with the reigns, he whipped them like he would with an actual
horse, prompting the beast to gallop away with two screaming children on its
back.
“As if we hadn’t enough to worry about!” O’Neil griped.
The adults moved in pursuit of the galloping animal. It
was undoubtedly a fast creature, outpacing them all. Luckily, it left a trail
behind for them to follow, and they caught up with J.P., Kelsey, and the beast
right at the top of a dune.
“Are you kids alright?” Hillary asked just as soon as
they caught up with them.
Both J.P. and Kelsey had huge smiles plastered across
their faces.
Seeing them was enough confirmation for Dwonch. “Yeah,
they’re alright.”
Once the children’s safety was acquiesced, the team’s
focus shifted to the sands below, seeing a large mining region near some tall
rock pillars. Several people worked in very primitive conditions with ragged
coverings set up for protection from the sun.
“Well, if there was any question of civilization on this
planet, we just found it,” Maureen observed.
The Doctor looked through a pair of binoculars to get a
closer glimpse at the workers. “They’re human…or humanoid, at least,” he said before seeing one of the miners stop and
spot them. He warned the other workers, who all ceased in their mining as well
to look on the visitors.
“So much for keeping a low profile,” the Brigadier
bemoaned.
“Doesn’t look like they’re any threat,” Simmons
indicated. “They’re not charging at us for an attack…just staring at us.”
Maureen made the first move in approaching the miners.
The others followed suit, including the beast they discovered. One of the
youngest workers, a fresh-faced boy with dreadlocks, approached and addressed
the newcomers in a language none of them could decipher.
“Anyone speak…whatever he’s saying?” Dwonch asked.
“TARDIS translation circuits would be handy right about
now,” the Doctor said.
“Jackson, you’re the linguist,” O’Neil told Daniel. “Try
to talk to them.”
Daniel the Linguist was just about to do so when, out of
nowhere, all of the workers began to genuflect to them. The one fresh-faced,
dreadlocked worker also bowed momentarily before running off.
“What’s going on?” Simmons wondered aloud.
The young worker returned a short moment later, joined by
others leading another beast like the one that J.P. and Kelsey rode on earlier.
Atop the beast was someone seated behind curtains. They parted to reveal a
middle-aged man, presumably the elder, peering out towards the strangers. He
got down from the beast, took his staff, and approached with his entourage
following behind. The young worker informed him of the situation, and the elder
responded prior to speaking to the team.
“Kasuf,” he uttered, gesturing to himself. He bowed to
the group just as the workers had, while holding out his staff horizontally.
“Kasuf?” Jo repeated. “What does that mean?”
The Doctor closely followed the elder’s gesture. “I do
believe it’s this fellow’s name, Jo.”
The elder known as Kasuf straightened and made another
gesture, which seemed to have invited the team to come with him. “He’s inviting
us to go with him,” Daniel decoded.
“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea,” O’Neil said.
“Colonel, if any of us wish to go back to our homes, it’d
be in our best interest to go along with the natives of this planet,” the
Brigadier advised (O’Neil was beginning to tire of him doing that in front of
his men).
“He’s right,” Daniel vouched. “This is our best shot.”
As O’Neil mulled it over, Maureen discreetly scanned the
rock that the natives had been mining. Simmons took notice of her activity and
questioned, “What you got?”
Maureen gave a quick glimpse at her device before
concealing it again.
“It’s the same material as the Stargate,” she told
Simmons. “And then there’s another alien mineral that I recognize.”
“And what’s that?” Hillary inquired.
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