Part 7 (1/2)

It was in hexadecimal notation, using Arabic digits up to nine followed by the first six letters of what was called the Roman alphabet, so that the first fifteen numbers could be represented by a single character. In some ways it was a complicated way of counting, instead of the more usual Earth notation which used only as many symbols as there are fingers and thumbs on the human hand. But ten is a very awkward number, the Doctor had explained, only divisible by two and five. The hexadecimal notation was based on the number sixteen, which can be halved four times, and then produces perfect unity.

The Monitor signalled to Adric to follow him. 'I must check the External Registers. Read it to me as we go.'

Tegan had been kneeling beside Nyssa, watching the TARDIS closely for the past few minutes. It was still shrinking visibly, though the rate seemed to have slowed. She saw Adric and the Monitor leaving the room, and scrambled to her feet to follow them. But in the doorway she stopped and looked down the length of the hall they had entered. One long wall that stretched away into the distance as far as she could see was lined with dark-robed figures, each seated before a console that was a scaled-down version of the Monitor's in the Central Register. They spoke earnestly into the apertures in front of them, filling the room with the rhythmic incantation of 'the Numbers'. As Adric and the Monitor moved slowly away down the hall, Tegan hung back in the doorway, appalled by the sight of al those earnest, joyless faces.

The Monitor moved from work-station to work-station, looking over each shoulder and listening in. Behind him trailed Adric, reading aloud from the print-out. 'Zero-A, Zero-four, Zero-Zero, nine-two, two-C, eight-seven . . .'

They had turned a corner and pa.s.sed through a doorway to enter a second similar room. Adric was barely conscious of his surroundings; it took all his concentration to read accurately from the paper in his hand. The Monitor's progress was slow and deliberate; only once did he hold up his hand to interrupt Adric's flow as he leaned over a fellow Logopolitan to exchange a few whispered words.

He returned to Adric shaking his head. 'I'm sorry, I thought we had found something. It's somewhere in this sub-routine . . . somewhere.' He paused to look up and down the room, and Adric took the opportunity to survey the perspective of hundreds of whispering workers hunched before their consoles.

'But Monitor, why do you need so many people? I still don't understand why all this can't be done with machinery?'

'For many uses machinery is unsurpa.s.sed. But Logopolis is not interested in those uses. Block transfer computations cannot be run on computers.'

'Why not?' the boy asked.

'Our manipulations of numbers directly change the physical world. There is no other maths like ours.'

Adric was surprised by the weight of sorrow in the man's voice. If he hadn't wanted so eagerly to know more, Adric might have had the tact to stop pressing his questions.

'You mean the computations themselves would affect a computer?'

'Change its nature and cause it to malfunction,' the Monitor confirmed. 'Only the living brain is immune.'

'But you have a computer out there. You were using it.'

'To record the code, and prepare new algorithms, yes. But we must never run our programs on it.'

Adric scanned the print-out in his hand with new respect, and the Monitor, seeming to take this as an indication that they had rested enough, said 'Perhaps we can continue . .

Adric felt a surge of panic. In the process of resting his eyes from the hard black print he had completely lost his place among all those figures that, he had to confess, meant nothing to him.

The Monitor must have realised Adric's predicament. Gently, without having to consult the print-out, he said, 'We had reached zero-seven, zero-four, A-zero, three-zero, three-eight. We should be somewhere towards the end of the third block.'

The silver-haired Logopolitan was smiling at him. Adric's pulse slowed, and he found his place again. Together they moved on down the long row of seated workers.

The Doctor stirred and tried to lift his head. Even in his coma, immobile within the black winding-sheet of unconsciousness, the persistent sound, screwed up now to the pitch of pain, had somehow penetrated his awareness. Some fierce red luminosity swam in the darkness behind his eyes; it sapped the strength from his neck, and his head sank once more onto the TARDIS floor.

If he had been able to open his eyes he might have seen, imaged on the viewer screen, the Logopolitan devices Nyssa had identified as loudspeakers. From the distorted perspective they seemed like giant steel-gauze hands cupped protectively around the tiny time machine. The gauze vibrated slightly as the energy pulsed through it.

The deadly buzzing began to fade. Quite suddenly it stopped altogether. In the silence that fell like soft snow, the Doctor opened his eyes.

There had been nothing out of place in the Registers, the Monitor was sure of that. The secret was out here in the deep and winding streets, alive with whispers and the click of abacus beads. But there were far too many of them. They could never check them all in time.

Still reading from the print-out, though noticeably flagging now, Adric walked close beside the Monitor. He had become almost hypnotised by his own incantations. 'Eight-three, zero-three, A-three, three-seven, two-B, two-B, three-F, zero-D...' The paragraph of figures came to a conclusion in one more restful island of white s.p.a.ce on the page before his eyes. 'That's the end of the third block', he told the Monitor.

The Monitor was turning from side to side as they walked, glancing at the bowed, seated figures and the abacuses in the entrances that lined the street. He dipped his head to Adric in acknowledgement and said 'The work is wearying to those unused to it, but we must continue.'

Adric took a deep breath and began again. 'Fourth block begins... Zero-three, zero-two, zero-zero, F-eight...'

'Zero-zero, E-eight, I think,' the Monitor corrected, without interrupting his surveillance.

The Monitor was right; Adric had misread the figure. 'Sorry, E-eight,' said Adric, wondering at the precision of detail held in that smooth grey head. 'It is difficult, I know,'

said the Monitor, putting his hand on Adric's shoulder. 'But accuracy is of vital importance...'

Meanwhile in the Central Register a small group of the Logopolitans that Tegan had noticed conferring with the Monitor earlier were setting up a pair of large flat devices on either side of the TARDIS. They looked a little like portable screens.

'Some sort of sonic projectors,' Nyssa suggested, raising her soft, clear voice a little over the sea-sh.e.l.l sound of myriad whispers that washed into the room from the Registers beyond the doors.

Tegan was puzzled. 'What's the good of that?'

'They must be creating a temporary zone of stasis around the TARDIS. But I'm afraid I don't understand their science.'

'That goes double for me,' said Tegan. The Logopolitans had waved them politely back from the TARDIS while they set up their screens. Now Tegan was steering Nyssa towards one of the doors. 'But one thing's clear as daylight. Come and take a peek in this room here...'

She pointed through the doorway to the External Register, and for the first time Nyssa saw the source of the echoing whispers. 'They all seem very dedicated,' she said, watching them.

'Dedicated! That's one way of looking at it. You know what I think? I think it's sheer exploitation. Just look at their faces.'

'They certainly all seem very serious,' Nyssa agreed. 'But I've seen that look on my father's face - intense dedication. These people are scientists. They're trying to help the Doctor.'

'If you ask me they must be under some huge threat to keep them so hard at work,'

Tegan said. 'Not that it seems to be doing the Doctor any good.' The two girls were walking back to where a knot of Logopolitans were gathering around the TARDIS. Some of the group stepped politely aside as the girls approached.

Nyssa stopped in front of the TARDIS, measuring it with her eye.

Tegan had noticed the same thing. There was no doubt about it: the TARDIS had stopped shrinking.

Adric's throat was very dry now, and he spoke with obvious effort. '...eight-nine, nine-A, zero-A, one-one, E-seven...'

Once again the Monitor stopped him. It was the fourth time in the past three streets.

Adric was becoming an unreliable reader. 'E-nine,' the Monitor corrected, a little testily.

Adric stared at the paper in front of him. The little black figures were starting to dance in front of his eyes. 'Sorry,' the boy said. 'E-nine, three-three...' But he broke off almost immediately. 'Did you say ”E-nine”? It says E-seven here.'

The Monitor seized the paper. 'You're right, E-seven. And the next three numbers are wrong...' He looked rapidly up and down the street, calculating the shortest route. 'Come on, this way.'

Tegan's elation at finding that the shrinking process had come to a halt was quickly replaced by a renewed sense of despair. 'The TARDIS isn't much use to anybody that size, stable or not,' she said to Nyssa who was kneeling beside her. If only one could see in through those small black windows.

'Perhaps it gives us some time,' said Nyssa, after a moment.

'Time to do what? We don't even know if he's alive in there.'