THE HORNS OF NIMON

BY: ANTHONY READ

Part Two

Original Air Date: 29 December 1979
Running time: 25:00

K9: Affirmative.

DOCTOR: Estimated time to impact?

K9: Master?

DOCTOR: How long have we got?

K9: Estimated time to impact

DOCTOR: That's what I said.

K9: Eighty nine point four seconds.

DOCTOR: Eighty nine point four seconds. No dematerialisation, no defence shields, and only half power on full drive. K9, I think we're going to find out what it's like to be a cricket ball. Well, it's been a great, great partnership, old girl.

K9: Master.

DOCTOR: Oh, come on, K9. This is no time for emotional quibbling, you two. You've been a good dog to me, K9.

DOCTOR: The best I ever had.

K9: Thank you, master.

DOCTOR: It's a pleasure.

K9: Time to impact now fifty eight seconds d*ad.

DOCTOR: I wish you wouldn't say things like that, K9. Fifty eight seconds d*ad. Did I say cricket ball?

COPILOT: The beacon! We've made it. We're back on course.

ROMANA: We must go back.

COPILOT: Get away from those controls!

ROMANA: We can't just leave the Doctor back there!

COPILOT: Get up! Get up. Into the hold. Move!

COPILOT: Your friend can rot in his black hole for all I care.

DOCTOR: Brace yourself, K9. This is it.

DOCTOR: K9? K9? Are you all right, K9?

K9: (cough) Affirmative.

DOCTOR: How am I, K9?

K9: There appears to be no damage to your circuits.

DOCTOR: Oh. Oh, good! Good, good. Well, let's hope the same is true of the TARDIS. You're a good boy, K9.

DOCTOR: Ha ha! We did it!

K9: Please clarify.

DOCTOR: Well, I just put a lot of spin on the TARDIS, and the asteroid simply sliced us up out of the gravity whirlpool. Oh, you know, K9, sometimes I think I'm wasted just rushing around the universe saving planets from destruction. With a talent like mine, I might have been a great slow bowler.

NIMON: You dare to speak to me of failure? Be mindful of the terms of the pact, Soldeed.

SOLDEED: I am, Lord Nimon.

NIMON: Be mindful of what you have undertaken to perform. The tributes must be brought before me.

SOLDEED: They will be, Lord Nimon.

NIMON: There can be no stumbling in the great journey of life.

SOLDEED: Indeed not, Lord Nimon. We shall trace the ship. It is just possible the Anethans have att*cked her to rescue the prisoners.

NIMON: And what have you done to exact vengeance and reparation for such a deed?

SOLDEED: Nothing as yet, Lord Nimon. I came to you as soon as I heard the news.

NIMON: You are idle, Soldeed. Neglectful of your undertakings.

SOLDEED: No, Lord Nimon. We have very nearly fulfilled our half of the contract. The condition of our ships makes it difficult for us to att*ck Aneth. If you would advance us a little of that technology you have promised us, we could complete our agreement and claim reparation from Aneth for both of us.

NIMON: No, Soldeed. The terms of our agreement are very clear. You are buying from me the power to conquer a galaxy. I will be paid in full.

SOLDEED: But, Lord Nimon

NIMON: In full!

SORAK: Soldeed?

SOLDEED: I have spoken with the Nimon.

SORAK: And what does the Nimon say?

SOLDEED: He speaks of many things. He speaks of the great journey of life.

SORAK: Again? What does he mean by the great journey of life?

SOLDEED: Mean? It is, it is a metaphor.

SORAK: For what?

SOLDEED: He also speaks of a retribution he shall exact from you, Sorak, if you do not find that ship or get a fresh shipment of sacrifices from Aneth immediately. We must att*ck Aneth.

SORAK: But Soldeed.

SOLDEED: We must do it, Sorak.

ROMANA: With eight of us it should be possible to overpower him and take over the ship.

SETH: It would be no use.

ROMANA: Of course it would! I can fly the ship. We go back for the Doctor then we take you all home, back to Aneth and your families.

TEKA: No!

SETH: We must go to Skonnos for the sake of Aneth and our families.

TEKA: If we don't go, the Nimon will destroy Aneth. The only way we can be free and our people stop living in fear is to defeat the Nimon.

SETH: Quiet, Teka. No one must know.

ROMANA: No one must know what?

TEKA: Seth is going to destroy the Nimon and take us home in triumph! His father's keeping a lookout so that he can have a welcome party ready.

ROMANA: He might not be so optimistic if he could see this lot. Well, you can hang around. I'm going to find a way out.

SETH: What's the matter?

ROMANA: The sonic screwdriver. I must have left it behind.

SORAK: Soldeed.

SOLDEED: Well? Have you arranged for another ship to att*ck Aneth?

SORAK: No, sir. It's the lost ship. We've located it!

SOLDEED: What?

SORAK: It's reappeared on the scanners. We've just had a signal. Apparently they had some sort of accident. The captain was k*lled, but it's all right now. And they're due to dock in two hours.

SOLDEED: Prepare for the ceremony at once.

SORAK: Yes, sir.

SOLDEED: The great pact nears it's completion! The Nimon be praised! Skonnos shall rise and conquer!

ROMANA: So what is this Nimon?

TEKA: The great god of Skonnos. They say he's a terrible creature with awesome powers.

SETH: If we don't pay tribute, the Nimon will destroy us.

ROMANA: Sounds like an insecure personality to me.

SETH: He lives in the power complex.

ROMANA: That fits.

SETH: Anyone who enters never returns, except the one called Soldeed.

ROMANA: Soldeed?

SETH: Well, yes. The great scientist and engineer of Skonnos. It is he who built the complex for the Nimon.

TEKA: They say he's the only scientist left on Skonnos.

ROMANA: Really? Why is that?

SETH: The great Civil w*r. Only the army survived.

ROMANA: That sounds like a well-organised w*r.

SETH: It was then that the Nimon arrived.

ROMANA: And started demanding tributes?

TEKA: Yes, but Seth's going to change all that, aren't you.

SETH: Yes. Yes.

ROMANA: You seem to have taken on quite a task.

SETH: It is.

ROMANA: Well, you don't sound awfully confident about it. I thought you were meant to be the great hero of Aneth.

SETH: But I'm not. I don't want to be a hero. I've never wanted to be. It's just that I've chanced to be around when things have happened. I'm not even a prince. I'd run away from home. I was on the road. They found me, and rather than be sent back, I made up some story. The King believed it and, well, here I am.

ROMANA: You have got problems, haven't you.

SETH: Look, I just have to do what I can. Please, don't tell Teka.

ROMANA: Don't worry, Seth. Your secret is safe with me.

SETH: Promise?

ROMANA: Cross my heart. Both of them.

COPILOT: You! I need you to help me land the ship. We're nearly there. Through there.

COPILOT: Weakling scum!

DOCTOR: Right, K9. Without our gravitic anomoliser, this is the best we can do. Let's give it a try, shall we? Ah, come on, old girl.

DOCTOR: That's very odd. Wouldn't you say that was odd, K9?

K9: Odd not computable, master.

SORAK: I have the honour to present the tribute from Aneth.

SOLDEED: Why have they brought only five crystals? There are two missing. Where are they?

ROMANA: I can answer that.

SOLDEED: Who are you?

ROMANA: I'm Romana. Who are you?

SORAK: How dare you speak to the great Soldeed like that!

ROMANA: I have a complaint to make.

SOLDEED: What?

ROMANA: Yes, that pilot of yours

SOLDEED: Who are you?

ROMANA: I've told you. Now where's the Doctor?

SOLDEED: Doctor? What doctor?

ROMANA: The one that creature left behind.

SOLDEED: Who is this woman and where does she come from?

ROMANA: I come from Gallifrey, if that means anything to you.

SOLDEED: If you speak again, I shall have you eliminated on the spot. Now you, tell me.

COPILOT: She's a space pirate, sir. She and her companions att*cked our ship. They k*lled the captain but I managed to drive them off.

SOLDEED: Go on.

COPILOT: I captured this one, sir, at great personal risk.

SOLDEED: Yes, I'm sure.

COPILOT: Unfortunately, our engines had been damaged in their att*ck and I had to repair them.

ROMANA: That's a lie. We crashed into his ship, but it had already stopped and the captain was already d*ad.

SOLDEED: Silence. You have been warned. (to the co-pilot) How did you repair the damage?

COPILOT: I had to adapt the engines to use hymeTUsite, sir.

SOLDEED: HyMETusite.

COPILOT: HyMETusite. That's where the other two crystals went.

SOLDEED: You had to adapt the engines?

COPILOT: Yes, sir, or we'd never have got home at all. And I thought five crystals were better than none. And then there were the Anethans.

SOLDEED: Exactly how did you adapt those engines?

COPILOT: Well, sir. (silence)

SOLDEED: Go on.

COPILOT: The fuel cells, sir. I modified the fuel cells.

SOLDEED: You are a liar.

COPILOT: No, sir. Truly.

SOLDEED: You wouldn't have the skill or the intelligence to adapt those engines in a million years. You deviated from the set course, didn't you. Didn't you?

COPILOT: It was a computer malfunction, sir.

SOLDEED: Your story alters by the second. You endangered the tribute to the Nimon.

COPILOT: It was a computer malfunction, sir!

SOLDEED: You know the penalty.

COPILOT: No, sir!

SOLDEED: The Nimon shall deal with you.

COPILOT: But sir!

SOLDEED: Into the complex!

SOLDEED: In the name of the Second Skonnon Empire!

SOLDEED: And now, the rest of them. Including her.

DOCTOR: Right, here we go again. After five, four, three, two, one. (nothing) Come on.

DOCTOR: Ah ha! Success at last, right, K9? Let's try and find our way to Skonnos and recover our gravitic anomoliser.

K9: Ahem. Master?

DOCTOR: And Romana. Don't forget Romana.

SOLDEED: The final tribute at this very moment, gentlemen, is being paid to the Nimon!

ALL: The Nimon!

SOLDEED: I think you all appreciate the irony that in providing these tributes for us, the planet Aneth has given us the power with which we shall reconquer them and from there go on to build the Second Skonnos Empire!

Even now our factories await the secrets the Nimon shall unfold to us. Secrets that will give Skonnos the most powerful fleet of ships this galaxy has seen. The galaxy shall shudder at the name of Skonnos!

ALL: Skonnos!

SOLDEED: Our f*re shall infest their heavens. It shall be the greatest empire the galaxy has seen. An empire of f*re, steel and blood! Skonnos shall rule!

TEKA: What was that?

SETH: Must be the Nimon.

ROMANA: He doesn't sound very happy, does he.

SETH: I wonder where he is? All these corridors look the same.

ROMANA: Don't worry. I have a feeling if we don't find him, he'll find us.

SETH: That's what I'm worried about.

TEKA: How can you joke about it?

ROMANA: Come on.

SETH: But, there was a wall here.

ROMANA: Yes.

DOCTOR: There we are. Hello, that looks interesting. Reminds me of something. Yes, I think we'll take a look in there to start with.

K9: Sensors detect hemispherical defence shield.

DOCTOR: Why should that be, I wonder, K9?

K9: Strength, seven thousand three hundred megazones.

DOCTOR: Yes, just as I thought. Oh well, never mind. We'll just have to land somewhere near it. Somewhere unobtrusive.

DOCTOR: Ah, good morning. Or is it evening here? Lovely day, isn't it? Wasn't it? No?

DOCTOR: Oh no, not again. How is it wherever I go in the universe there are always people like you pointing g*n or phasers or blasters? Now don't do anything hasty. It's just a flying visit. Take me to your leader.

SETH: What is it?

TEKA: Is it d*ad?

ROMANA: Yes. It's as though something has sucked the life force out of it and left just a husk.

TEKA: That's what's going to happen to us, isn't it? It isn't just the hymetusite that's the tribute, it's us as well.

TEKA: The Nimon did this, didn't he? Seth will k*ll him.

SETH: If he can be destroyed.

TEKA: You'll destroy him.

ROMANA: He'll be waiting for us somewhere.

SOLDEED: What is this?

DOCTOR: Ah, hello. I'm the Doctor.

SOLDEED: The Doctor?

DOCTOR: Yes. I just dropped in.

SOLDEED: Dropped in?

DOCTOR: Mmm. You must be Soldeed.

SOLDEED: I am.

DOCTOR: I thought so.

SOLDEED: Release him.

DOCTOR: Thank you. I say, that looks interesting. Very interesting.

DOCTOR: Having a little trouble with the neutrino converter?

SOLDEED: Neutrino converter?

DOCTOR: Neutrino converter.

SOLDEED: What do you know about such matters?

DOCTOR: Oh, I've seen similar things here and there.

SOLDEED: Oh, come now, Doctor. This is my invention.

DOCTOR: How very odd, how very extraordinary, then, you don't know what a neutrino conversion is. Did you know that someone's building a black hole on your doorstep?

SOLDEED: What?

DOCTOR: Yes. I got stuck in it, along with one of your spacecraft.

SOLDEED: Digging a black hole on my doorstep.

DOCTOR: Yes, yes. A good thing I got stuck in it, too, otherwise your ship would still have been there.

SOLDEED: So it was you that rescued my ship?

DOCTOR: Yes, well, with a little help from my friend. Nice girl. I don't suppose you've seen her, have you? Blonde, about so big, always sticking her nose in things that don't concern her.

SOLDEED: No. Why should I have seen her?

DOCTOR: I just thought she was heading this way.

SOLDEED: I haven't any idea what you're talking about.

SORAK: Soldeed, I searched that ship as you ordered, and I found this.

SOLDEED: Oh.

DOCTOR: Oh, no idea what I'm talking about? How do you explain that, Soldeed?

SOLDEED: What is it?

DOCTOR: It's my gravitic anomoliser from my TARDIS. (to Sorak) Now, where's Romana?

SOLDEED: Out of harms way, where you should be, you meddling fool.

SOLDEED: After him, you fools, you dolts!

DOCTOR: Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking, I'd like to say one thing and let me make it perfectly clear, I stand before you desperate to find the exit. Can anybody help me?

SOLDEED: Doctor, in the name of the Second Skonnon Empire

SORAK: He went into the Complex.

SOLDEED: But of course. All according to plan. The Nimon will take care of him. Ha ha. Goodbye, Doctor. Bwahahahaha!

SETH: Are they d*ad?

ROMANA: No. They seem to be in some sort of suspended animation. This must be the Nimon's deep freeze.

TEKA: What's that?

ROMANA: Well, by the look of that poor husk in there, I'd guess that the Nimon feeds by ingesting the binding energy of organic compounds such as flesh. This must be his storeroom, his larder. This poor thing must be waiting her turn.

TEKA: That's horrible!

SETH: Look, what are we going to do?

ROMANA: Well, there's no point hanging around here. Let's see if we can find a way out.

COPILOT: Oh no you don't. Stay where you are.

ROMANA: And what are you doing? We're in this together, you know.

COPILOT: You may be, but I'm going to get out of here. Now, get through there. I want you all together.

COPILOT: Nimon! Nimon! They're here! I've brought you the tribute from Aneth!

NIMON: Who dares call the Nimon?

COPILOT: Er, it, it's me, I do, sir. I've brought you the latest sacrifices.

NIMON: I need no one to bring the sacrifices to me.

COPILOT: They were very rebellious, sir. I brought them all the way from Aneth. They were trouble, sir. Soldeed thought

NIMON: He did not send you to bring me sacrifices. He sent you to be ex*cuted.

COPILOT: No, really!

NIMON: You are a liar and a coward.

NIMON: You shall die.

COPILOT: Mercy, Lord Nimon. I brought you the tribute!
{"type": "series", "show": "Doctor Who", "episode": "17x18 - The Horns of Nimon - part 2"}