Part 1 (1/2)

SO VILE A SIN.

Ben Aaronovitch and Kate Orman.

The body on page one

BEGIN TRANS.

TO: CinC Thangase liKhosi Oxhobileyo [Lady Leabie Forrester]

FROM: XO 10mH [Executive Office 10th a.s.sault Regiment]

RE: OPERATIONS, VALHALLA, CALLISTO.

BKGRND: 10mH to make OD(C) [Orbital Drop (Capsule) ] within security perimeter of the Valhalla Citadel and commence operations against elements of the 61st ImLand ArmInf Division. The objective being to gain control of the Citadel and neutralize Command and Control elements of local ImLand forces and seize the person and household of Emperor.

ACTION REPORT: OD(C) at 11:15 IST. Initial mission objectives taken at H+1 hour. Initial resistance was stiff and 10mH took 6% casualties during the course of the a.s.sault. Despite heavy fighting secondary mission objectives were achieved at H+6 hours and the operation moved ahead on schedule. In the face of extremely heavy enemy resistance the leading elements of 10mH a.s.saulted the citadel and took final mission objectives at H+11. Casualties were extremely heavy (35%).

NOTE: Regret to inform you Colonel Roslyn Forrester was killed in action while leading the final a.s.sault.

1 September 2982

It should have been raining the day they put Roz into the ground, not bright and sunny under a blue sky.

The sky should have wept tears on to the bare shoulders of the women who carried her body, darkening the bright patterns of their blankets. Should have soaked the ground and turned it muddy. Should have fallen on the armour of the honour guard and turned it all to rust and ashes.

Rain would have stilled the voices of the praise singers, stopped up the bugles and the idiot mouths of speakers. There should have been pain and confusion and darkness.

But it was not raining the day they buried Roslyn Forrester.

The sun was high and bright in a wide African sky and the air was scented with cut gra.s.s and freshly turned earth.

The Doctor and Chris were just two of the hundreds in the funeral procession, winding their way through the Umtata Reclamation Zone. The sun beat down on the Doctor. He thought of taking off his hat and fanning his face.

In the hazy distance he could make out the shapes of the overcities. There would be rubble from fallen buildings scattered throughout the Zone, chunks of polyconcrete and pieces of furniture. High-tech versions of the kopje kopje, great stones piled on stones.

Leabie had been busy in her garden. The rolling, gra.s.sy hills of the eighteenth century had been carefully restored. Terraforming Earth itself. They'd flown over one of the work crews in the shuttle. The Doctor had rested his head on the window, watching the bright-yellow machines moving the earth, workers with trolleys carrying out the rubbish. In the distance, a herd of antelope were kicking up a long plume of dust.

Normally, Chris would have been ooh-ing and ah-ing over the machinery, toy-box-sized from this height. He had sat perfectly still, staring at the seat in front of him.

Chris was right at the front of the procession. From time to time, as the dirt path wound through the Zone, the Doctor caught glimpses of his companion. His surviving companion.

9.

Chris wore his full Adjudicator uniform, deep-blue armour with gold tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, full cape hanging from his broad shoulders. He stood painfully straight, his upper lip rigid. He must be cooking in that armour.

The Doctor was near the back of the procession. Behind him, a group of Ogrons moved, not exactly marching, but silent and organized. Behind them, a group of Earth Reptiles.

In front of him, soldiers, human soldiers. There were ten of them, each with a bad-tempered buffalo snarling on their armour, Colour Sergeant Muller leading the way. Dwarfed by the standard she was carrying. The flag tinkled in the gentle breeze, a row of metal chimes sewn to the bottom of the cloth. Beside her, a second flag: the ancient UN standard, light-blue and white.

Then nine more of the buffalo soldiers. Side by side with another eight figures in DPM fatigues and blue berets.

In front of the soldiers, the n.o.bility. Mostly members of the Inyathi clan, scores of men, women and children in traditional dress. The women walked at the front, wailing. Sometimes it was a wordless sound, rising and falling Sometimes there were words, too distant to understand.

The viewers at home would be listening to murmured commentary on the traditional! Xhosa dress, especially what the clan leader, Leabie Forrester, was wearing: a red blanket thrown around her body, a weight of blue and white jewellery around throat, forearms, ankles. Pointing out the different Zulu costumes, kilts and furs, and the Knights of Io in their traditional Indian clothes. Putting names to the Baronial Allies who had been invited, from Hungary and Mexico and Australia.

Men and women wandered purposefully up and down the edge of the procession, hands clasped in front of respectful black kaftans. The POVs. Each wore a media badge, but it was only a legal requirement. You wouldn't fail to realize you were being watched by one. Men and women with green eyes, transmitters slid softly into place over their pupils. Whoever decided they were less intrusive than cameras had never spent an hour being stared at.

Green eyes, watching.

10.The rain should come down, ruining their view, forcing them to peer through sheets of freezing water. Unable to focus in on the little man slos.h.i.+ng through the red mud.

It should have rained hard, pouring down from a sky as angry as he was, to wash the gra.s.s into mud, the stream into a torrent that would sweep away this field, this hilltop, the gaggle of the still living.

Still living. The dead on holiday. The sparrows still flying.

He realized that the chimes on the buffalo soldiers' flag were dog tags.

The procession slowed and halted, forming a semicircle of mourners around a wide, bare circle of naked earth. The POVs shuffled, looking for the best positions.

Now he had a clear view of the very front of the procession.

The wooden bier, held by Chris and three young Inyathi men. He saw Thandiwe standing beside her mother, her shoulders bare, her little face imitating the grim expressions of the grown women around her.

Chris saw him in the crowd, but didn't look at him. Perhaps the Doctor's need to be invisible, to not be here, was starting to affect the people around him. He wasn't here, standing in the African sun while someone dug a hole in the ground so they could hide his friend in it. He was in the rainstorm, and on a battlefield on Callisto, where he should have been but wasn't. Having left it just a little bit too late this time.

Chris was speaking. He'd been up half the night trying to get the eulogy to sound right. It had started as a four-thousand-word essay. Standing in front of a mirror in one of the TARDIS's libraries, he'd recited it over and over, scribbling out bits, until he'd got it down to just the right length.

Had Chris finished speaking? The Doctor couldn't hear him for the sunlight, battering down. He closed his eyes for a moment.

When he opened them again, Chris was lifting Roz's body from the bier.

He didn't feel the impact itself, just the after-effects, every cell in his body ringing with the shock. Whatever had hit him had knocked the air out of his lungs. His whole chest was alight with crus.h.i.+ng pain.

11.He looked around, trying to work out what had hit him, realizing he was on his knees. One hand was pressed to his chest.

Had he been shot? Where was the blood?

Something inside him clenched clenched, and clenched clenched again. Sparkles erupted across his field of vision. His fingers were tingling, suddenly cold. He still couldn't work out what had hit him. again. Sparkles erupted across his field of vision. His fingers were tingling, suddenly cold. He still couldn't work out what had hit him.

His other hand was clutching his hat, trying to keep it on, keep his face hidden from the staring POVs. They would just love this.