Part 34 (2/2)

'Stay out of sight until I'm back,' said Sarah.

'But...'

But Sarah had already gone.

Kate felt nauseous. She didn't want to be involved and she didn't want to be left out. She wanted Gordy now. Her hands had clamped into fists clammy with the frustration of inactivity.

Her fingers were still stinging. She had been possessed by something something that she thought was in her head. But that thing had also been in her home. She had seen it for the monster it was.

She always took care of herself. No one gave her orders.

But she had lost control. She never lost control.

The gun was heavy inside her jacket. She stared up at the play of light on the inside of the sky canopy. The world was being closed in. The air had an acrid, burnt taste. Strands of web were catching in her hair. It was no good. She had to do something. Her dad was around her somewhere.

She slid from her hiding-place and started to dodge across the concrete, out along the walkway overlooking the university's central square.

She reached the stairs and glanced down. She was face to face with several Chillys on the way up.

32.

Access Denied he generator plant was built under the maintenance road.

T The air inside hummed.

Victoria clattered down three flights of metal steps to reach the control centre. She counted three security cameras on the way. Each of them had swivelled in its housing to follow her progress.

The cavernous generator chamber was like a small cathedral in size. It was deserted. A row of huge grey cylindrical turbines crouched along one side of the chamber.

Like everything else at New World, the turbines had been designed by the Chancellor, or what Victoria had believed was the Chancellor. She had tried to persuade him to invest in solar-powered generators. Now she had seen the canopy blotting out the sky, she knew why he had resisted so vehemently.

She had one chance. She was certain that her own pa.s.sword into the computer system would be deleted by now, but she still knew the Chancellor's personal access codes. She had secretly made a mental note of them long ago an act of kindness in case the old man, who never seemed to write anything down, ever forgot them. If the system still accepted the codes, she would override and shut down every function on the mainframe and see the bulldozers in on the following morning.

There was an access terminal set up beside an output guidance console at the far side of the chamber. She set to work at the keyboard, concentrating, using the disciplines she had learned from him him to stay calm and think clearly. to stay calm and think clearly.

The log-in code took a full minute to be accepted. Victoria proceeded through a maze of menus that led her eventually to select the Generator Output System.

As she waited she heard the clatter of feet on the metal stairs. The screen flickered and scrolled with checks for viruses and trojan variants.

It finally cleared and displayed its text: ACCESS DENIED

She began to try other codes. Any codes.

ACCESS DENIED.

ACCESS DENIED.

'Access denied, Victoria... my dear.'

She spun round and saw Christopher Rice watching her from the centre of the chamber. His usual cold smile had an odd warmth to it. He was levelling a gun at her. Behind him, a Yeti loomed, rocking slowly on its hind claws.

'I have to stop it,' Victoria protested.

Christopher began to advance. 'Way, way out of time.'

Plainly he was back to his normal self, turning on his oily charm at the most inappropriate moment. 'Let's see what the New World has to offer.'

Victoria knew that her ruin was the objective he had set himself. He didn't seem to have noticed that something else was now setting the agenda.

'The Intelligence doesn't care about you,' she insisted.

'I look after myself.'

The Yeti was growling softly behind him. Victoria caught a look in its eye that pierced her. She saw through the cold vice of alien hatred that gripped and drove the huge creature, glimpsed something that struggled deep inside. Another tormented will that strove just to comprehend its own existence. The Yeti seemed to have a soul.

Christopher was moving closer.

'Get away from her!'

A woman was running towards them. It was Sarah Jane Smith, unarmed and apparently unconcerned by the danger to her herself.

Christopher stepped backwards with a grin, swinging the gun back and forth to cover both women. 'Well, the press never miss a trick, do they?'

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