Doctor Who_ To The Slaughter Part 44

'Please say again.'

'Link fifty-one!' he yelled. The woman was drooling on to his face, and he thought he might be sick. 'Link fifty-one, Praxidike! Confirm network linkage completion!'

'Network linkage completion achieved. Destructive charges primed.'

'Isolate link two, Leda!' he spluttered, as the wretched woman's hands pressed at his throat.

'Please say again.'

237.

'Isolate. . . ' he croaked, weird speckles of colour balling at the back of his eyes as the pressure on his throat grew stronger. 'Isolate. . . Link. . . '

Sook had used the console as a ladder to haul herself back to her feet. She leaned heavily on Halcyon's cane, shuffled over greedily to where the thin man lay sleeping.

The Doctor was sprinting back to the control room, Mildrid hard on his heels.

'Halcyon!' he yelled as the control room came into sight. 'Have you done it, man? Well?'

The answer was, 'Not very'. Halcyon was lying sprawled beneath the console. A white-faced woman bleeding badly from a head wound sat astride him. Mildrid kicked the woman off. She rolled and got back up, hissing and received a finger-jab to her throat. This time when she hit the deck she stayed down.

'Thank you, said the Doctor. He crouched beside Halcyon. 'Now then, are you you all ' all '

Halcyon roared and b.u.t.ted him in the face. The Doctor fell back with a cry, and Halcyon pressed home the advantage, struck him on the jaw and sent him tumbling into the bubblescreen. It popped in a flash of filmy light. 'Mildrid!

Stop him!'

She raised her arm to strike Halcyon, but he ducked aside and landed a blow to her shoulder that she didn't even seem to feel.

Mildrid shoved him back against the console. 'You've had this coming, Halcyon, you. . . you vandal vandal!'

'Wait!' thundered the Doctor accusingly. 'Halcyon! You ducked!'

'I. . . ' He stopped, leaned back against the console. His voice was tiny in the tense atmosphere. 'I can see see.'

'Unexpected side effect of the psychic attack?' breathed the Doctor.

Mildrid stared between them. 'What does he mean, he can see?'

'The error of his ways?' said the Doctor, studying the damaged computer controls. 'You may not have to beat him up after all shock's brought him round.'

She frowned. 'Like a shock brought round Kreiner. . . '

'Yes. A jolt to the senses, emotional whiplash. The brain jumps a groove!'

Another screen bubbled out of the console's cracked housing. 'Network linkage completion confirmed,' it slurred. 'Do you wish to commence demolition?'

'Is Leda isolated from the destructive sequence?' the Doctor asked.

'Network linkage completion confirmed,' it said again with still less enthusiasm. 'Do you wish to commence demolition?'

'Power's failing! We don't have long. Halcyon!'

238.

'I. . . I can can see!' see!'

'Yes, and you can listen too, so listen to me!' he yelled. 'Did you isolate Leda from the network?'

Halcyon seemed preoccupied. 'I'm not sure about my suit, you know. What do you think?'

Sook stared down at the sleeping man. She knew him. Kreiner. His name was Kreiner.

Swaying a little, she raised the cane and placed its sharp bra.s.s tip against Kreiner's right eyelid.

'Focus, Halcyon,' the Doctor pleaded. 'Once more did you isolate Leda?'

Halcyon swept his head slowly from side to side, staring around in wonder.

'Is that a no?' cried the Doctor.

'No!'

'So it's a yes?'

' No! No! ' muttered Halcyon, staring at his gloved hands. 'No, I didn't manage it.' ' muttered Halcyon, staring at his gloved hands. 'No, I didn't manage it.'

'Good work. Computer, commence demolition!'

'What are you doing?' Mildrid shouted.

'Object link one: Taygete. Countdown commencing,' said the computer.

'One hundred. Ninety-nine '

'No countdown,' snapped the Doctor. 'Demolition of all linked objects to proceed at once.'

Mildrid rushed forwards. 'You can't!'

'I have to,' the Doctor bellowed back, wiping tears from his eyes. 'Shock tactics a jolt to the senses. We need a fireworks display those people on Callisto will never forget!'

'I won't let you!' She ran towards the Doctor.

'Computer,' he cried as Mildrid launched herself into a flying jumpkick. 'Activate charges! Now! Now! ' '

239.

Chapter Thirty-one.

A giant, collective shout seemed to rise up from Callisto as the heavens exploded in spectacular light.

Trix stared, awed and terrified at the incredible patterns. It's the magnetic It's the magnetic field, field, she thought, she thought, it's bursting through the atmosphere, we're all going to be it's bursting through the atmosphere, we're all going to be dead! dead!

Behind her, Tinya was staring up too in baffled terror. And people in the street, whether they were cowering or raging or chewing each other's ears off they all broke off to watch, to wonder and to fear.

Trix recovered enough of her wits to knock the gun from Tinya's limp hand.

The woman snapped back into life with a hard shout and a spiteful look but Trix was already running full pelt.

The Doctor was knocked clear over the console as Mildrid's kick connected with his chest. He crashed against the huge viewscreen as flaring brilliant white engulfed it. He saw Halcyon staring, transfixed, Mildrid readying herself for another go.

Then, the first shockwaves crashed into the station.

Sook raised the cane, ready to plunge it hard down through Kreiner's eye socket.

She hesitated, wondering for a moment.

Then she used the end of the cane to push off his thinkset first. He should know what was coming.

As his eyes snapped open and focused on her, the ship tipped up and they were both sent flying.

If Trix had to die, she'd made up her mind it would be as far away from that b.i.t.c.h as possible.

But running through the bright streets was a weird, unsettling experience.

The fighting had stopped. A beatific look had settled on the people. As the sunbursts of white light turned shimmering yellow and pale blue before the backdrop of endless night, people were weeping and shaking and holding each other. They were scrambling to their feet, or staggering out of hiding, or staring at their b.l.o.o.d.y hands, blank-faced.

241.

A great rushing babble of mutters and whispers and heart-tugging wails started up; the sounds of full horror sinking in. People questioning, crying, asking for help, letting out their pain.

Aware. Repulsed. Disbelieving. Messed up.

Themselves again, and trying to cope.

Sook woke up on her back, shaken and shivering. Kreiner was on all fours, scuttling towards her. His eyes were wide open and staring.

He reached out for her and gathered her up into a hug.

'Are you OK?' he whispered.

'I won't be if you squeeze much harder,' she hissed, 'I'm only held together with plasters and glue.'

He started to sob. She held him as it all came out, and found she was crying too.

As the control room stopped pitching like a kayak in rapids, the Doctor raised his head cautiously above the console. 'Everyone OK?'

'I'm alive, if that's what you mean,' said Mildrid coldly.

'Well, that's a start, anyway,' he said, rubbing his aching chest. 'Halcyon?'

'That shockwave must have knocked us halfway back to Callisto,' groaned the decoratiste decoratiste. He was staring at the screen, where carnation sprays of incredible colour were still blooming and bleeding. His dark gla.s.ses had cracked down the centre. Cautiously, he broke them apart, and blinked myopically in the brightness.

'For nothing,' said Mildrid, her voice worn and cracked. 'All Gaws and I did. . . All the planning and the skimping and sacrificing and the s.p.a.ceship-cleaning for nothing.'

'My grand orchestration,' breathed Halcyon. 'The likes of you called it a folly. And yet it has provided the means to save so many souls.'

'She's a forgiving old thing,' the Doctor remarked.

'I am not not,' huffed Mildrid.

He half smiled. 'I was talking about the universe,' he said.

They watched the glittering colours spiral and spatter through the blackness of s.p.a.ce.

'You know what?' said Halcyon flatly, rubbing his eyes. 'It's actually not anything like like as impressive as I'd imagined it would be.' as impressive as I'd imagined it would be.'

Falsh stared up at the impossible flashes and charges in the sky, a grim smile of satisfaction on his face. That took care of that, then. The Doctor had done 242 it and NewSystem would collect a small fortune for bringing off the largest-scale demolition in the solar system. A fortune Falsh would siphon off as a first step towards refilling his coffers.

He'd done it, pulled it off. He'd survived. The fire in the compound was still raging; no one could have escaped that. No one could hold him accountable now. If Klimt still lived he wouldn't risk his liberty coming after him. And the Doctor's evidence was circ.u.mstantial at best any good brief could crush it in a single hearing.

Falsh smiled. It was like magic. No one could trace a thing back to him now.

Little glints of light drifted through the patches of night between the flares and starbursts. Were they part of the patterns, or little ships flocking to Callisto to clean up this unholy mess? Falsh didn't know. And he didn't care.

He'd hole up, contact Nerren, get a ship rushed over and get away scot-free.

Trix ran through the wreck-strewn streets, through desolate, sobbing crowds and happy reunions, through sandbanks of the dead. Heading for the colossal domes of the Medicean Stadium. The entrances were gaping wide, unguarded, thick with spilled blood.

She had to reach the TARDIS, drag it down from the sky somehow, get inside. Shut out all this rawness, this pain and emotion. Retreat, retreat and wait for Fitz and the Doctor to come back to her, if they could.

Only when she reached the dim and darkened s.p.a.ce hangar did she pause for breath. An eerie sea of shin-height foam glistened and winked all around her.

She hesitated, panting for breath.

Perhaps there was another way through?

She turned and saw Tinya creeping up behind her.

Swearing, she waded into the slippery foam, holding the phial of precious mercury high above her head.

'You're not getting out of it, Trix!' Tinya shouted. A blaze of light burned over Trix's head, a warning shot. 'I will have your blue box!'