Part 31 (1/2)

'It's like Jack's beanstalk, isn't it? Only a different colour.'

Drawing his gun, Bishop turned in surprise.

The Doctor did not move. 'h.e.l.lo, Ace.'

Ace hovered nervously. 'Hi.' She paused.

The Doctor remained facing into the valley. 'It's out there,' he said. 'The secret thread that binds together Lucifer and the Angels. If only I could touch it, run my hands over it, unknot it.'

Bishop lowered his gun, but did not holster it. 'Trau Bannen had the answer, judging by the files on his workstations.'

'If only the irritating man hadn't insisted on deleting the most important information and keeping it with him on paper all the time so that n.o.body else could read it, and then having the criminal negligence to lose that hard copy.' Now the Doctor turned to look directly at Ace. 'You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you, Ace?'

Silently, she held out a plastic folder stuffed full of paper. 'Thought you might need these, Professor.'

'Indeed.' The Doctor's voice was hard. Bishop's eyes narrowed, and he tightened his grip on his gun, although he wasn't entirely sure why.

'Yeah. Got a problem with that, have you?'

The Doctor took the folder and flipped casually through the pages of closely written notes. 'The man could have done with a few calligraphy lessons.' He closed the file and looked up at Ace. 'Problem? Why should I have a problem?'

Ace's grin slipped a little. 'I don't know. 'Cos I was working for IMC, perhaps? 'Cos I thought I was better off with someone who couldn't move backwards and forwards in time quite as much as you can?'

The Doctor frowned. 'Why should I think that? Our relations.h.i.+p's been fine until now, hasn't it?'

'Yeah. So like I said, got a problem?'

The Doctor smiled. 'No, Ace. No problem. Not now. I'm just very glad you're alive.'

Ace laughed. 'You're glad!' She sat down, cross*legged, and stared out across the valley. She brushed a hand across her face, continuing the gesture to take in the surrounding landscape. 'So what's this all about, then?' glad!' She sat down, cross*legged, and stared out across the valley. She brushed a hand across her face, continuing the gesture to take in the surrounding landscape. 'So what's this all about, then?'

'I'm not really sure yet. Some of these notes are encrypted. Who did he think he was, Leonardo da Vinci? I'll need a code word to work out some of the more important pa.s.sages.' He thought for a moment. 'I don't suppose Trau Bannen will volunteer the information, but '

Ace interrupted, 'I bet it'll be on file somewhere at his workstation. I bet it's something really easy like his logging*on codeword, or his son's name. Do you want me to go and suss it out?'

The Doctor beamed. 'I'd be very grateful.'

'Colour me gone.' Ace jumped to her feet and ran off into the landscape behind them.

As soon as she was gone, the Doctor sat heavily on the ground. His smile vanished, to be replaced with a look as black as thunder.

Bishop holstered his gun. 'What's the matter?'

'Everything.'

'I don't understand. Krau Ace seems to be back on our side again '

'Is she?' The Doctor drew his knees up to his chest and hugged them. 'Or is she still on Legion's side? Or on her own side? How many sides are there? How long is a piece of string? How many beans make five?' His face reflected an increasing panic. 'Sometimes I think that I am a Doctor of no brain at all.'

He sighed theatrically. 'In almost a millennium,' he said glumly, 'I don't think I've ever had a companion who has been this much trouble.'

Piper O'Rourke gripped the arms of her acceleration couch as the starpod sank through the b.l.o.o.d.y glare of Lucifer's atmospheric corona. Her knuckles were white, her jaw clenched in fear. The virtual interaction module she wore showed her the outside view as a great ocean of boiling cloud through which she fell at faster and ever faster speeds. She blinked sweat out of her eyes. Had this view of h.e.l.l been the last thing Paula had seen before being crushed to pulp? Perhaps it was ironic that she, Piper, should now feel the same fear as the girl whose death she had been responsible for.

'I have come to see how your house is,' Miles Engado's soft voice intruded into the roiling cloudscape. 'Is it prepared for large crowds?'

With an effort, Piper unclenched one fist from the arm of the couch and paused the simularity software. Muscles trembling, she slotted the device back into its receptacle. She blinked as her eyes momentarily lost focus, before the starpod interior swam back into view.

The interior s.p.a.ce was curved and dimly lit, bulked out with navigational equipment. Additional equipment was fastened to the curving walls. Across from her, in the copilot's couch, Miles's face was lit from one side by blinking coloured lights from the main instrument spread. His face was as blank as it had been back in the Lift.

A wave of guilt crashed into Piper's mind. Another life destroyed. The life of a man whose love she did not deserve. Guilt and regret welled inside her until she wanted to scream. Her shoulders began to heave and her eyes filled with tears. Shaking, she buried her face in her hands, too ashamed to face the man she loved for any longer. After a moment, Miles reached out and hesitantly touched the side of her face, wiping away the tears.

Without thinking, she slipped the catch on her safety harness; then she was in his arms, and she couldn't tell whose tears were the hottest, and he was whispering her name over and over again: a litany against the darkness.

'Teal! This way!' Cheryl dodged sideways down an access corridor.

Seconds behind her, Teal gasped as molten metal from a near miss splattered across his arm.

The sound of running feet followed. Ardamal turned the corner behind them, new gun primed. Both walls of the pa.s.sageway blistered. No warnings this time, then. It was fight or flight. Flight or death.

'Cheryl, the gun. Use the... b.l.o.o.d.y gun!'

Ardamal's gun! She'd forgotten she still held it. It must be the shock 'Cheryl!'

She skidded to a halt, spun, dropped to one knee and sprayed hard radiation back down the corridor. Teal ran past her as the trooper dived for the side of the corridor. Without waiting to see the results of her action, Cheryl turned and began to run again. Thirty metres away, the wide double doors which opened on to the Mushroom Farm beckoned invitingly. The doors began to open as Teal hammered on the outside lock. Cheryl increased her speed with an effort.

'Come on, Cheryl! You're nearly there!'

Another energy pulse sizzled past her head and blew chunks from the wall, but Teal was through the portal, head down and running for the lock controls.

She dived in through the doors as they began to close. Panting, she scrambled across the glimmering chrome floor.

Teal moved away from the doors, bent double, sucking in great lungfuls of air. He straightened with a sigh. 'Christ on a stick, that was '

An energy pulse flashed between the closing doors, skimmed the top of Cheryl's head and punched a hole the size of a fist in Teal's chest.

He gazed down stupidly at the smoking wound. There was no blood: the perfectly circular wound had cauterized instantly.

Cheryl didn't scream until he actually fell, as the doors clanged shut and the smell of burnt flesh and melted clothing seeped into the air.

'He shouldn't have hit me.'

Cheryl whirled with a gasp.

Ardamal stood in front of the doors, a field dressing on his head, a new gun clenched in his hands, the same blank desire in his eyes.