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If he'd seen this building when he first started travelling with the Doctor, Jamie reflected, he'd have been struck dumb in awe. It would have seemed to him that he was standing in the mythical Castle of Glass, for nothing else he'd ever heard of would have fitted the description half as well.
Now, a few years older and wiser, he looked around with different emotions. He could appreciate the beauty of the building, but from a far more informed point of view. Rather than wondering what race of giants or fairies could have constructed such a thing, he instead wondered at the time and care that had been lavished on it. This wasn't so much a fortress as an expeditionary camp, a first step onto another world. What was the point of building such a vast, magnificent structure for the use of no more than six people?
Then again, there were more urgent matters to consider. He crossed an atrium full of elaborately-tended flowerbeds, descended a staircase that would have been wide enough for all six of the facility's staff to walk abreast, and found the Doctor in a chamber larger than his laird's great hall, bent over a tangle of circuits. On the floor beside him lay a motionless young woman; from her plaited blonde hair Jamie recognised her as Sally, the most junior member of staff. Her proper title was a long word that Jamie hadn't bothered to remember, but it meant her job was to study alien lifeforms.
"Doctor?" Jamie said, quietly in case he was disturbing something important.
Gently, the Doctor set down the gadget he was working on. "Yes, Jamie, what is it?"
"Whatever it was you did to the forcefield, it's working," Jamie said. "Those insect-beasties are still out there, but they've not managed to get any closer."
"Splendid." The Doctor rubbed his hands.
"But yon Controller said the force field wouldn't last more than an hour or two. And when it stops working we'll be back where we were."
"Exactly. So we need to find something a little more permanent."
"Oh, aye." Jamie nodded. If there was an invading army on the march, it was better to be inside the strong walls of a castle than not; but disposing of the invading army altogether was obviously the real solution to the problem. "How? They're just wee beasties. You canna talk to them."
"No, but they're being directed by a mind somewhere. I'm hoping I can make contact with it."
"Through her?" Jamie asked, nodding at Sally's unconscious figure.
"She insisted that she should be the one. She understands the lifeforms of this planet better than anyone else." The Doctor snapped a few switches down. "Hello? Hello? Can anybody hear me?" He patted Sally's face. "Are you there?"
Sally's eyes snapped open.
"The food is mine," she said, her voice devoid of emotion. "Give it to me."
"Now, I want to suggest a compromise," the Doctor said.
"No compromise. No delay. I hunger."
"Is the 'food' us?" Jamie asked.
"I'm afraid so." The Doctor set his gadget down again, stood up, and put his arm round Jamie's shoulders. "Go and find the Controller. Tell him that he should get his people to the escape capsule. If the forcefield does go down, he may need to get out of here in a hurry."
Jamie hurried away on his mission. Behind him, Sally, or the creature to whom she was lending her voice, said "Escape is impossible. I am everywhere."
⁂
By the time Jamie returned, the force field was still holding, but even he could see that it couldn't hold out much longer. The lights of the base were flickering under the load, and through the glass walls he could see swarms of flying creatures flocking overhead. Even if the escape capsule managed to get away, there was no guarantee how far it might get.
"Do not resist," Sally was saying, as Jamie stopped in the doorway. "It is a waste."
"Oh, I don't think so." The Doctor was still tinkering with the circuits that were spread out on the floor; to Jamie it looked as if he was using half of his mind, if that, to carry on his conversation with Sally. "Now, have you considered my offer?"
"Your threats have no meaning. You will be mine. You will be food."
"You won't reconsider?" The Doctor turned to Jamie. "Jamie, can you go up to the gallery and tell me what's happening out there?"
Obediently, Jamie climbed the stairs and walked halfway along the gallery, which ran down one side of this vast hall. The gain in height wasn't much, but enough to give him a commanding view of the rocky plain surrounding the base. Armies of creatures, ranging from ant- to lobster-sized, were taking up their positions with as much discipline as any Redcoat.
"They're getting ready to move in," he said.
"Then in that case, I'm sorry," the Doctor said. "But you leave me no alternative."
Picking up two handfuls of circuitry, he very gently brought them closer to each other. A high-pitched sound filled the air, just on the limits of hearing.
"What— What are you—" Sally said, her voice still flat and toneless.
"I'm broadcasting signals on the resonant frequency of your creatures' carapaces," the Doctor said. "I imagine they aren't feeling very well."
"No. You cannot. You will. Will not. Not."
"I'm afraid I just have."
"Doctor!" Jamie called down from the gallery. "They're coming to pieces. All those beasties outside, I mean."
"That's the idea, Jamie. What about the ones in the air?"
"They're dropping like flies."
"Good. Now all we have to do is—"
"Doctor, they're falling on us!"
"Yes, I know, Jamie." The Doctor looked up. "Oh, my word!"
The sound coming from his apparatus rose to a high-pitched squeal. With a terrible crack, the glass outer wall cracked from top to bottom, a network of smaller cracks radiating out from it. The Doctor jumped up and ran to a panel on the wall.
"Controller!" he shouted. "Launch your capsule, now!"
There was a distant rumble, and the building shook. A moment later, a column of fire and smoke could be seen ascending, the capsule at its tip.
"Jamie, get down from there. We need to get back to the TARDIS."
"What about Sally?" Jamie asked, hurrying down the stairs.
"She'll have to come with us."
"I wondered if she might," Jamie said, hoisting the unconscious xenobiologist onto his shoulders. "She's quite pretty. For a lass."
"Now, Jamie, we've no time for that." More cracks were opening all the time, each accompanied by its own splintering sound. If any of the creatures outside had still been alive, they could have marched in unopposed, but it seemed that the Doctor's sonic weapon had made a clean sweep of them. "Now, the TARDIS is this way."
"So why's this place falling down, then? Did we lose?"
"I'm afraid that's my fault. I dropped the tuner, and it managed to hit the resonant frequency of this building." The Doctor jumped to one side as a glass slab dropped from above and shattered at his feet.
"Oh, well, there were all those flying beasties coming down on us. That must have been a bit of a surprise."
"Not a bit of it, Jamie. They were already dead."
"Then what—" Jamie broke off as they reached the TARDIS. "You'll have to open the door: I've got my hands full."
The Doctor darted forward and unlocked the door. A moment later, he, Jamie and Sally were in the console room. The latter groaned; Jamie set her down, and with the Doctor's help gave her a hasty explanation of where they were and what had happened.
"You mean our base was destroyed?" Sally asked, sounding as if she was having difficulty taking it all in. "All my work, just gone?"
"I'm afraid so," the Doctor said, patting her hand.
"It's his fault," Jamie said cheerfully. "If he hadn't dropped yon tuner thing... and why did you drop it, anyway, if it wasnae those beasties?"
"That, Jamie, was partly down to you," the Doctor said. "You were wearing your kilt."
"So?"
"And standing on a glass floor. When I happened to look up... well, it was an accident waiting to happen, wasn't it?"