Free Doctor Who: Dragonfire by Ian Briggs

finger tightened on the trigger of her gun. 'I shall have to make very sure.' She levelled the gun more carefully, and Glitz stiffened.
    'Hello! Not interrupting anything, am I?' The Doctor's voice interrupted cheerfully from the hatchway of the Flight Cabin.
    Belazs spun round to point the gun at him. 'What are you doing here?' she demanded.
    'A very difficult philosophical question. Why is everyone around here so preoccupied with metaphysics? I've just persuaded your friend outside that experience is causal and existence doubtful. He's probably turned himself into a puff of blue smoke by now. But do carry on... don't let me interrupt.' The Doctor gaily waved Belazs back to whatever it was she was about to do with the hand-gun when he came in.
    'I think she's going to kill us,' said Glitz nervously.
    The Doctor looked at the gun again. 'Ah, an existentialist...'
    'Quiet!' commanded Belazs. 'Only one of us can escape from Svartos and Iceworld aboard the Nosferatu -and that's going to be me?
    'What about the boss - Mr Kane?' asked Glitz. 'Does he know about this little enterprise of yours?'
    'Kane and I are finished. All I'm waiting for is the opportunity.'
    'Doesn't strike me as the kind of gent who'll let you run off without so much as an au revoir.'
    Belazs turned angrily on Glitz. 'Kane doesn't own me!'
    'Oh, I think he does,' disagreed the Doctor, drawing her attention away from Glitz. 'I think he bought you just like he buys everything in Iceworld.'
    'What do you know about it?' cried Betezs angrily, as Glitz cautiously began to unfasten his seat belt.
    The Doctor saw Glitz, and continued to distract Belazs. 'I think he bought you a long time ago. He paid seventeen crowns each for Glitz's crew. How much did he pay for you?' He saw that Belazs was about to lose her temper, and continued to provoke her. 'How much did you sell yourself for? Was it worth it? Were you worth it?'
    Belazs was too angry to notice that Glitz had slipped out of his seat belt as she furiously thrust her palm up at
     
    the Doctor, brandishing the scar. 'That's what I sold myself for! Kane's mark! I should cut my hand off for doing it!'
    Glitz seized his moment and threw himself on Belazs. She saw him come at her and tried to turn her gun on him, but he had the edge and pinned her arm down. He wrenched the gun out of her hand, and once he had it secure in his own grasp, he pushed her away. She fell to the ground. Glitz covered her with the gun.
    'Go on, then. Kill me!' she cried, through tears of anger and bitterness.
    Glitz turned to the Doctor. 'Come on, Doctor. We've got the Nosferatu.
    Let's get away from here.'
    'No, Glitz. You'd be exactly like her then. Forever in Kane's debt.
    Forever wondering if the movement you think you just saw in the shadows is Kane, come to recover his dues. Pay Kane his money. Even if it costs a thousand crowns. Even ten thousand. Pay off the debt.' The Doctor turned to Belazs. 'Your debt to Kane, I don't think you can ever pay off...'
    The Doctor turned and left.
    Glitz followed. He felt slightly sorry for the woman they left weeping bitterly on the floor.
    The mindless crewmen and women descended the Ice Face without slowing down. Where Mel and Ace had struggled with ropes, and Glitz and the Doctor had inched their way from foothold to foothold, their pursuers climbed down as though the Ice Face were a secure ladder.
    Wherever they placed their feet, there was a foothold. Wherever they reached their arms, there was a handhold. The razor-sharp ice cut deep into them, but their cold flesh didn't bleed. Like corpses, they staggered onwards. They knew that they were close to the living creatures they must kill.

CHAPTER SEVEN
    Ace and Mel were trudging through the gloom of the Ice Passages, but Ace was cheerful. 'My head feels as though I was out on a real bender last night!' she laughed.
    'You had a very lucky escape with that nitro,' cautioned Mel.
    Ace shrugged. 'You make your own luck in this life.'
    Suddenly, she