Doctor Who_ Placebo Effect Part 27

Dark Peaks a.s.sa.s.sins were almost the most efficient.

Unfortunately for them, a combined team of a West, South and Twin Suns a.s.sa.s.sins had been waiting at the bar, disguised as a Snarx, a Lurman and a Klepton. One of them tossed a coc.o.o.n grenade at the Dark Peaks group, and a moment later all three a.s.sa.s.sins were bound together by a tight white substance.

The three disguised a.s.sa.s.sins shed their skin suits and left them on the floor. If anyone else in the bar wanted to watch, or show any interest, they knew better.

The Dark Peaks a.s.sa.s.sins squirmed momentarily but all that did was tighten their bonds. The South Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin removed the retractable knife from the motionless claws of the lead a.s.sa.s.sin, aimed carefully and then released the spring, severing the back of each of their necks. Green blood began oozing out of the three trapped a.s.sa.s.sins and soaking into the coc.o.o.n substance, turning it vivid green.

Four and a half minutes later, the three Dark Peaks a.s.sa.s.sins were dead, completely drained of their blood. The West Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin kicked the corpses over and the coc.o.o.n soaked up the remaining blood on the floor.

The three Foamasi left their dead fellows behind as they walked out, knowing that the bar operator would invoice them for the mess later.

Sam unlocked the door to the TARDIS and ushered Kyle in. She smiled, imagining what his reaction would be, and was not disappointed.

The poor lad had been through so much in the last few hours that another shock merely added to his growing confusion with the world. He wandered towards the central console, listening to his feet clicking on the parquet floor and staring at the bust of Ra.s.silon, then at the bra.s.s dials and switches and finally at the panoramic hologram on the ceiling.

He pointed straight up.'Micawber'sWorld,'he said simply.

Sam nodded. 'Where is your home, Kyle?'

'Iota 9. It's a small colony world on the other side of Sauron.'

Sam tapped in the name on the TARDIS databank. The ceiling blurred and Iota 9 appeared. It was one among about thirty planets, all circling a ma.s.sive sun.'Gravity here must have taken a while to get used to,' Sam said.'It's obviously beefed up artificially to mimic the gravity on a much bigger world than yours.'

Kyle agreed. 'But after I'd been travelling to different places for a few months, my body got used to the changes. It takes about a day, and I'm OK each time Reverend Lukas moves us on...' He suddenly grabbed Sam's arm, but not too roughly.

'Can I tell you something?'

'Of course.' This wasn't getting the Doctor's thingumajig, but that could wait.

Kyle needed to talk.

'For the last few years, all I have done is dedicate myself to the Church of the Way Forward, believing that what it stood for was right. But that... that thing in the tunnels. What it did to that newscaster, and Veronique and probably the others. Reverend Lukas said he believed it to be the G.o.ddess, but it can't be, can it? I mean, the G.o.ddess isn't like that, is she?'

Sam took his hand, gently stroking the back of it. Ever since she had begun travelling with the Doctor, Sam had been forced to grow up. To stop thinking about how the universe affected her, and how it affected everybody. Her time on Ha'olam had made her feel more mature, and she had been forced to cope alone with so much - people's traumas, people's depressions and her own guilt and all too frequent despair. But this was the first time she'd ever had to deal with a crisis of faith.

She remembered home again. The Sundays at church. Mum wasn't particularly a believer, but Dad was a sort of lapsed Catholic. Mum agreed to go along, taking Sam as well, to help him. To make Dad feel part of his church again. To do her bit, Sam had once gone to a confessional. She knew she shouldn't, that it was not something non-Catholics should do, but nevertheless she did. Not because she wanted to confess anything particularly, but because she had thought it might make her dad happy.

The priest had been very understanding. Incredibly so, as she explained why she was there, how sorry she was for not believing in G.o.d and wasting the priest's time.

But he said he understood and one day, she would look back on that moment and really understand why she had done it.

Perhaps now she did, standing here in the far future, away from home and family, facing someone else asking her the same sort of questions about a deity she had asked the priest: why he was believed in, why he let wars and suffering happen and why, if he was so all-powerful, there was hunger, poverty, human-rights violations and everything else she could think of still in the world.

Kyle didn't want to know those things, but here he was, having to question everything that in his life until today had been stable, neat, ordered and something he accepted without question, without hypocrisy or malice.

'I do not - I cannot - share your beliefs, Kyle,' she said softly.'But for what it's worth, I don't believe that creature is your G.o.ddess. I believe Reverend Lukas has made a mistake.'

Kyle shook his head. 'Reverend Lukas cannot make mistakes.'

'Of course he can. He's human, like you or me. He's fallible. He's searched for so long for answers, but become so wrapped up in the search, so scared of finding nothing, that he didn't want any answers. That's why this thing caught him like that. But the G.o.ddess can't be down there, Kyle. Not your personal G.o.ddess, because the purity and clarity you wanted to find, you already showed me you knew where it was.' She tapped his chest.

'You yourself told me that. Who am I, or who is Reverend Lukas or that monster to tell you differently?'

Kyle let go of her hand.'Where are you from, Sam?'

Sam got up and twisted a dial. The hologram of Iota 9 s.h.i.+mmered and became her home.'Earth.'

'No, really, where are you from?'

Sam chuckled. 'No, really, I am from Earth. But not 3999: 1997 actually.

The Doctor and I travel in time.'

'Oh.' Kyle looked around the TARDIS again.'I see.'

'You don't seem surprised.'

Kyle got up and began looking into the library, then at the wall of clocks. 'I can't deny the evidence of my own eyes, Sam. I mean, this was a blue box.

Now it's a treasure cave. And I can see a corridor down there, so it must be huge. For anyone to build anything this huge they can be only one of two things. A G.o.d or a vastly superior being to everyone else on Micawber's World. And as you know, I don't now believe in G.o.ds or G.o.ddesses. Not any more, I don't think. So I have to accept the evidence and believe you.' He looked up at Earth.'I've never been there. What's it like?'

'Now? No idea. But in my time, flawed, fractious, dangerous and beautiful. I miss it now and again.'

'If you travel in time, why don't you and the Doctor go back to 1997 then?'

Sam did not look at him, but stared instead at the representation of Earth.

'Just as the G.o.ddess has been your mission, Kyle, so travelling with the Doctor is becoming mine. He does so much good, you know. And I'm so lucky to be able to see it with him, see and learn so much through him.'

She smiled, sadly.'How could I go back?'

She tweaked the dial and the hologram zoomed in, through the clouds, across Europe and on to Britain. It went further. England. Southern England. London. Finally it rested on the image of East London, near the Thames. Tower Bridge, the Tower of London and the entrance to the Rotherhithe tunnel could actually be picked out.

Sam breathed very deeply. Something inside her sank, but she couldn't say exactly what she was feeling. 'But maybe someday I should. Just to say h.e.l.lo. It's been such a long time now, and I feel guilty I never -'

The holographic Earth suddenly zoomed back out and dropped away until it was the size of a football. Then the hologram floated down from the ceiling and hovered in front of Sam. 'I never knew it could do that...' she gasped.

The hologram moved towards her, easing her backwards. And she laughed. 'Oh all right then, TARDIS. I get the message.' The hovering globe of light moved her towards the corridor.

'What's happening? asked Kyle, following her.

'I'm being reminded that I came to get something for the Doctor.'

They went into the corridor and into the galley area. "The lab is through here,' she called over to Kyle, but then feinted to the left. The hovering globe followed and she pressed a b.u.t.ton on the nearby microwave oven.

The door popped open and the globe shot in. Sam slammed the door behind it, trapping the hologram. Sam turned the microwave on but didn't turn up the settings. 'That should scramble your circuits for a while.' She looked to the galley ceiling. 'Now, stop bossing me around, OK?'

Bewildered, Kyle looked up, but couldn't see who Sam was talking to. She placed the Meep toy, now looking a bit bedraggled, atop the microwave.

'And you, keep guard,' she said, and then walked on.

Kyle then followed her into a small ante-room, which was a miniature storage area, full of test tubes, Bunsen burners, welding kits, Petri dishes and every other kind of scientific handheld paraphernalia.

'Biomolecular scanning whatnot... Here it is!' Sam showed Kyle something but he didn't recognise it.'OK, Mr Dale, time to hit the road and help the Doctor win the war against the monsters.'

'Can he?'

Sam smiled and slipped an arm around Kyle's.'Of course he can.

That's why I have faith in Him '.

The Dark Peaks Lodge was where the action was, there was no doubt about that. His parents had been members of the South Lodge, but that was weak and pointless now. Any power it might have held once was long past. The Dark Peaks were the future. They were going to reclaim the economy, the standing, the honour and make Liasici a great planet once more.

And to add to that prestige, here he was, a young Foamasi -honoured by the mission to guard the human prisoners. Of course, they were well-fed, watered and exercised. The Dark Peaks Lodge weren't thugs, they were just doing what was necessary to ensure a better tomorrow for the Foamasi citizens.

If only his parents could see him now. They would be proud of him. Instead, they were just a pile of ashes on a street somewhere on Liasici, gunned down by members of a rival Lodge, accused of drugs-running, or prost.i.tution pimping, or whatever. It really didn't matter - they had been in an opposing Lodge and one that had been compet.i.tion for the Dark Peaks.

They deserved their fate. But nevertheless, there were times when he wished he could tell them how well he had done. How far he had progressed.

He tapped his communicator. Where was the relief guard? No response.

He tried a couple of other places - the guardhouse, the bar, the hidden headquarters.

And each time he looked at his viewscreen, all he could see were dead Foamasi - all bearing Dark Peaks tattoos on their shoulders.

Instinctively, he put his hand to his own, worn like a badge of honour. Of cla.s.s.

But if the others were all dead, what was going on? Where was their Patriarch? Why wasn't he standing amid the carnage, declaring vengeance?

A cold chill ran through the young Foamasi. What if the Patriarch was dead too? No, he couldn't afford to think that.

The only other place he could think to try was Carrington Corp. The two Dark Peaks insiders there might have some answers.

He was about to try to make contact with them, when three Foamasi came around the corner towards him. He took in the sight in an instant - each one had a different tattoo, and they were working together. West, South and Twin Suns.

'You can surrender your prisoners,' said the Souther. 'Or we kill you and take them anyway. The Dark Peaks are finished here, and back on Liasici too.'

The young Foamasi considered this.

With a shrug, he turned and unlocked the door, peeking in.'You can come out, humans. You are free to go.'

With trepidation (and who could blame them?) the human woman led her young son out, staring around, blinking in the natural light.

'Your mate is at the Foamasi Emba.s.sy,' said the Wester to them. 'Go now.'

Without waiting for a second order, the two humans walked quickly away.

In fact, as soon as they were past the other three Foamasi, they began running.

'I wish to join your campaign,' said the Young Foamasi to the three a.s.sa.s.sins. He felt his heart thumping wildly. Was it excitement? Fear?

Concern? He looked at his chest. No, it was probably the sleek knife that had just embedded itself there.

'You change ideals too quickly,' muttered one of the other Foamasi. But he couldn't tell which one as all three were being swallowed up by some inexplicable darkness.

And it was ever so cold...

Sam yelled at the Doctor to stop as she came out of the TARDIS and he zoomed by in a hovercar. The car dropped to the ground. 'Get in. Both of you!'

With a sigh, Sam dragged Kyle to the hovercar and they squeezed in the back.

As it took off, Sam pa.s.sed her trophy to him.

"Thanks Sam, but I don't need it now. I already know what secret the pills carry. A two-minute time-bomb that releases a mutagen in the carriers which then -'

"Turns them into greeny-brown slugs that can take over your body and change it in a matter of seconds the moment you get into contact with it.

We know.'

'You do? How?'

'If you'd listened to me last time, I could have told you.' Sam began relating her and Kyle's adventures in the tunnels.

The doors to Chase Carrington's office were kicked in savagely. Both Carrington and Suki Raymond looked up from the pills in their trays.

'What do you -' Carrington started to say, but the West Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin yanked away his human head to reveal - Not the Foamasi head the a.s.sa.s.sins expected to find, but a roughly Foamasi-shaped head, covered with pupal mucus of a Wirrrn grub. The other a.s.sa.s.sins grabbed Suki Raymond, ripping the whole bodysuit off.

That Foamasi too was now almost completely covered in pupal mucus.

Despite this, the West Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin kept his cool, hurling the expanding knife they had taken from the Dark Peaks a.s.sa.s.sin straight at the Foamasi that had previously been Suki Raymond. It penetrated slightly, but then the half-Foamasi, half-Wirrrn snapped it off and dropped it to the floor.

The South Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin instantly drew a heavy-duty blaster and opened fire, but this only caused the Chase Carrington Foamasi/Wirrrn to shed a layer of skin.

With a nod to the others, the Twin Suns a.s.sa.s.sin ran forward and dived at Suki Raymond, sending both of them cras.h.i.+ng into the plate-gla.s.s window and through it. Seconds later, both bodies smashed into pieces on the walkway far below.

Sensing the death of its compatriot, the Carrington hybrid tried to swing its mottled arm at the West Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin, but he ducked, grappled the hybrid to the floor and grabbed his blaster, tapping at the power pack.

The South Lodge a.s.sa.s.sin grabbed the pills from the table and then threw himself through the office doors, slamming them shut behind him just as the blaster overloaded with a flash of white and a large fizzing noise.

After a few seconds, he opened the doors to the office, which was empty - of everything. The walls, floor and ceiling had become like glazed marble, the contents of the room evaporated by the heat of the blast. The Foamasi and the hybrid had been atomised completely.