Doctor Who_ Shakedown Part 6

Chris got up, went over to the desk and collected his various weapons, stowing them away about his person. He paused for a moment, looking curiously at Garshak. 'Forgive me if I'm being too personal but you're not exactly a typical Ogron, are you?'

'I'm an experiment,' said Garshak. 'A freak.'

'I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry.'

'Not at all,' said Garshak expansively. 'I quite like telling the story.' He leaned back in his chair. 'A scientist came to our planet with a plan for brain augmentation. It was a scheme to turn what he called lower species, like ours, into more useful servants, capable of a greater range of tasks. He paid a local chief handsomely to volunteer a group of us. The scientist experimented on us with drugs, with brain surgery, with neurological stimulation.'

'What happened?'

'Half of his subjects went mad and died. A few others recovered, with their intelligence very slightly improved. The rest of the survivors were unchanged. In only one case was the experiment completely successful.'

'You?'

'Me.'

'What happened to the scientist?'

'When he realized he'd succeeded, even once, he was eager to buy more subjects and go on with his experiments. I was fully recovered by then. I persuaded him to change his plans.'

'How?' asked Roz. Somehow she already knew the answer.

'I killed him,' said Garshak. 'I killed the chief who'd sold us as well. Then I stole the scientist's s.h.i.+p and took the other survivors off with me. I felt responsible for them somehow.'

He shrugged ma.s.sive shoulders. 'We became mercenaries, bodyguards, the usual sort of thing. We ended up here at the time the job of Police Chief became vacant. They'd been having rather a high turnover in police chiefs in Megacity.'

'And they gave you the job?'

'There was one other candidate, a Martian Ice Warrior, but I persuaded him to withdraw.'

Roz held up her hand. 'I won't even ask...Come on Chris.

Goodbye, Chief.'

'Justice by your side,' said Garshak.

'Fairness be your friend,' chorused Roz and Chris automatically. They looked at each other in consternation.

Garshak smiled. 'Adjudicators. I thought so.'

'Ex-Adjudicators,' corrected Roz coldly.

'I didn't know there were any.'

'Only us,' said Chris.

'It must be rather lonely.'

'Like being an intelligent Ogron,' said Roz. She turned and marched from the room. Chris nodded to Garshak and followed.

As they descended the stone staircase Chris said, 'Interesting character.'

Roz snorted.

They went outside and stood on the steps of the police barracks, looking up and down the long rutted road for hovercabs. There weren't any.

Chris saw a com-unit by the door and slotted in the hovercab driver's disc. After a moment a voice said, 'Hovercab seventy-nine. Wa' you wan"?'

'Pick-up outside police HQ, two pa.s.sengers back downtown,' said Chris. 'Triple fare if you get here right away.'

'Tha.s.s me you see pulling up,' said the voice. There was a crackle and the disc popped out of the com. Chris pocketed it and grinned at Roz. 'Better the devil you know!'

They stood waiting, trying to breathe as little of the warm polluted air as possible.

On the flat roof of the police barracks opposite' a wiry cloaked figure checked the sights on a laser-rifle and levelled it, using the low parapet as a rest.

A white spot appeared above the door of the police building. It drifted downwards towards Roz and Chris.

3.

Sentarion Bernice Summerfield stood outside the hot and dusty little s.p.a.ceport and stared at the towers and spires and turrets of Sentarion City. They gleamed in the desert sunlight, huge birds wheeling around them.

Even a cynic like Bernice Summerfield couldn't help being impressed.

Sentarion, the university planet, the greatest concentration of scholars and scholars.h.i.+p in the known galaxy. A place where nothing mattered but the acc.u.mulation of knowledge and the cultivation of wisdom, where the only pa.s.sions were the pa.s.sions of the mind.

It was the academic dream that Bernice Summerfield, planet-wise, widely experienced and totally unqualified archaeologist, had aspired to all her life.

It felt like coming home.

True, her impressive credentials were forged, her research project was a cover story, and she was once again a p.a.w.n in the Doctor's dark and devious schemes but why let a few inconvenient facts spoil things?

Bernice Summerfield felt terrific. Despite the long journey in the primitive planet-hopper that had deposited her on Sentarion and immediately blasted off again, she felt fresh, alert and alive.

She knew why, of course. 'You'll like Sentarion,' the Doctor had told her, sounding like a Gaztak trying to sell you a second-hand s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p. 'Quite apart from the academic side, it's a low-gravity, high-oxygen planet. Takes years off you. Last time I was there I felt like a lad of a hundred.'

Bernice drew a deep breath of the clear, dry air. Air like wine, she thought. No, more like Eridanean brandy. I wonder if there's anywhere I can get a drink? She looked at the gleaming spires. I wonder how the h.e.l.l I get to the University?

Sentarion was a desert planet, very largely uninhabited. Its sun, bigger and closer than that of Earth, shone fiercely in a clear blue sky. The complex, crystalline spires of Sentarion City gleamed across the rocky desert, from somewhere in the distance. Bernice suspected that it was further away than it looked. Its relative closeness was an optical illusion, produced by the clean, clear desert air.

The odd thing was that there was no road. Nothing, not even a track. Just the s.p.a.ceport and the city, out here in the desert.

Logic told Bernice that the problem must have a solution.

The University had visitors, somehow they had to be able to reach it. There was no one to ask, the s.p.a.ceport was shut up and deserted. Her planet-hopper was the only arrival of the day.

Maybe it's a test, she thought. You march across the desert to prove your dedication, and the survivors get to study.

She glared at the gleaming spires, so near and yet so far, irritation rapidly replacing admiration. So how am I supposed to get there? Fly?

That was when she saw the big bird. It appeared out of the heat haze and flew clumsily towards her, huge wings beating slowly up and down.

Then she saw it wasn't a bird at all. It was a flying craft, with wings that flapped up and down like those of a bird.

What was the word? An ornithopter, that was it!

Bernice watched as the strange craft thumped to the ground just in front of her. There was someone something in the c.o.c.kpit, a stubby creature with a s.h.i.+ny black carapace. It looked like a giant beetle.

'Professor Summerfield?' it squeaked. 'For University?'

'Er yes,' said Bernice. Tor University.'

'Please to mount.'

Bernice hesitated. She'd never really liked flying, even in s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps where you couldn't usually see where you were going. The thought of trusting herself to this rickety contraption terrified her.

'Please to hurry!' rasped the pilot.

Bernice remembered a film about man's early attempts at flight that the Doctor had once shown her. This craft looked very like the primitive planes in the film the ones that crashed.

Telling herself the alternative was a march across the desert, Bernice lifted her pack, and climbed into the pa.s.senger seat behind the pilot.

The wings began flapping again and the ornithopter lurched back into the air. Whatever the power-source was, it was completely silent electricity perhaps. The only sound came from the creaking of the wings.

I bet there's no in-flight drinks service, she thought, and fished a flask of Eridanean brandy from a pocket of her pack.

It was all quite logical, Bernice told herself as she sipped the brandy. This contraption would never have got off the ground on Earth, but here on this low-gravity planet it was perfectly practical.

That's why there were no roads, they'd developed simple flying craft instead of ground cars. The things she'd taken for birds flying around the city were actually traffic.

As for the pilot, that was understandable too.

'Insects are the dominant life-form on Sentarion,' the Doctor had told her.

Bernice had shuddered. Bugs and creepy-crawlies had never been favourites of hers, though she'd been ashamed to say so to the Doctor, who seemed to find all life-forms equally fascinating.

She hadn't been much rea.s.sured when the Doctor went on, 'Very large insects as a matter of fact. The low gravity supports their exoskeletons, enables them to grow bigger and live longer. They've developed a very interesting civilization.'

She saw another ornithopter, a sleeker-looking model, flapping towards them from the city. It seemed to be heading for the s.p.a.ceport. Idly, Bernice wondered why, since hers had been the only landing of the day. Could be a s.p.a.ceport official, she told herself. Could be a hundred reasons.

Suddenly she realized that they were heading directly away from the city.

She leaned forward and shouted, 'I want to go to the University please. The University!'

'That is correct,' said the pilot. 'University!'

Bernice drew a deep breath. 'I want to go to the main University,' she shouted. 'The one in the City. I have to report to the Chancellor.'

The pilot ignored her. The ornithopter headed off into the desert, leaving the gleaming spires of the city behind.

'Hey, you!' yelled Bernice. She leaned forward and rapped the pilot hard on his s.h.i.+ny black back.

'Desist!' said the pilot. 'Do not cause problems!'

Bernice rapped again, harder. 'Take me where I want to go!'

The pilot swung completely round. Small eyes glittered in a narrow face. Suddenly a long needle-like spike shot out from its proboscis.

'Please do not be troublesome,' it squeaked. 'It is not seemly to kill you in flight. Wait until we have landed, and I will drink your life with the proper rituals. You will accept your death with dignity.'

'The h.e.l.l I will,' said Bernice Summerfield, and smashed the heavy brandy flask down on the creature's head. It shrieked and fell backwards, green ichor oozing from a large crack.

The ornithopter lurched and headed towards the ground.

Bernice scrambled forwards and struggled to reach the controls. But the pilot's body was wedged into the c.o.c.kpit, blocking her access. She heaved desperately at the body, trying to pull it free, but the squat insectoid form was incredibly heavy and somehow she just couldn't get a proper grip.

All the time the ornithopter went on plunging downwards.

The wings were moving much slower now, and the craft was going into a spin. She looked round for some kind of parachute, but there was nothing to be seen. Perhaps they hadn't been invented here.

Down, down, down spiralled the ornithopter, while Bernice wrestled desperately with the body of the pilot, which obstinately refused to move. If she had any sense she'd have waited to clobber him until they were on the ground. If she had any sense she wouldn't be here at all, she told herself. She wouldn't have listened to the Doctor's blandishments.