The Oncoming Storm ²

The Snowmen pt.2

*Institute*

"Danger. Danger."

"What's wrong?"

"There is danger here. An intelligence. An intelligence beyond anything else in this time and place."

"Doctor Simeon, sir. There are two people demanding to see you."

"No callers, not in here, not ever. Did they leave their name?"

"Sir, it's Sherlock Holmes" a figure in a hat, cape, walking cane, and with a Meerschaum pipe, unlit walks in followed by another figure.

"Oh, nice office. Big globey thing. Now, shut up, don't tell me! I see from your collar stud you have an apple tree and a wife with a limp. Am I right?" the Doctor asks.

"No" Simeon replies, I shake my head.

"Do you have a wife?" the Doctor asks.

"No."

"Bit of a tree? Bit of a wife? Some apples? Come on, work with me here" the Doctor says.

"I enjoy The Strand magazine as much as the next man, but I am perfectly aware that Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character. Get out!"

"Do you have a goldfish named Colin?" the Doctor asks.

"No" the servant replies.

"Thought not. Now, ooo. I see this is one of your business cards. It says so on the front" the Doctor takes the card from my hands.

"Who are you two, and what are you doing here?"

"This. Wakey, wakey!" the Doctor hits the globe with his cane.

"That is highly valuable equipment. You must step away now" I walk up to the Doctor.

"We are the Intelligence."

"Ooo. Talking snow. We love new things" I say.

"You both are not of this world."

"Takes one to snow one" I look at him.

"Right, let's see. Multi-nucleate crystalline organism with the ability to mimic and mirror what it finds. Looks like snow. Isn't snow."

"You both must leave here now."

"Shut up, we're making deductions. It's very exciting" the Doctor says.

"Now, what are you, eh? A flock of space crystals? A swarm? The snowmen are foot soldiers, mindless predators" I say.

"But you, you're the clever one. You're Moriarty. So, you turn up on a planet, you generate a telepathic field to learn what you can, and when you've learnt enough, what do you do? You can't conquer the world using snowmen. Snowmen are rubbish in July. You'll have to be better than that. You'll have to evolve" the Doctor says, while the Doctor was talking, I had soniced the doors locked.

"Sir, it appears to be stuck!" the servant says.

"What have you done? Have you locked the doors?"

"You need to translate yourself into something more, well, human" I say.

"Kick it down," Simeon says to the servant.

"To do that you'd need a perfect duplicate of human DNA in ice form. Where do you find that?" the Doctor asks.

"Sir?"

"Get in here, quickly!"

"I've got a master key somewhere, sir."

"Now, let's see. Most opened file, most viewed page" I say tossing Simeon's scrapbook in the air, and it lands open at a newspaper cutting headed Tragedy at Darkover House "you know, you really should delete your history. Governess frozen in a pond. Gotcha!"