Cold Fusion - Lance Parkin [58]
‘You were lucky you didn’t break both our backs,’ Nyssa replied. They had fallen twenty metres through the air, Nyssa screaming the whole way down. They’d hit a pile of ploughed snow, rolled over one another onto the icy pavement. Bruce had pulled her into cover behind some waste bins. When she had heard the shooting from her room, seen the flashes of laser energy, she’d realized that he’d saved both their lives. Now Nyssa stood, brushing the snow from herself He also pulled himself up, clearly in pain.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked her.
‘It knocked the wind out of me, and I’m cold, nothing more.
Her blouse was long-sleeved, but low-cut. She had pulled it on as tightly as she could, but her shoulders and collarbones were still exposed.
‘We’ll take this.’ He hobbled over to an antigravity vehicle, a hovercar. It was painted a dark metallic green and was streamlined. Jovanka unlocked the door, apparently without using a key, and ushered her inside.
Nyssa sat in the passenger seat, trying to ignore the voice in her head which was asking who the car really belonged to. Panels inlaid into the doors and dashboard were made from a dark wood the seats were hand-stitched, leather. It was the first piece of human technology that Nyssa had seen that displayed one of the fundamental creative virtues: elegance in functionality.
Jovanka was sitting alongside her, starting the engine.
The car began lifting gently into the air. The dashboard lit holographic dials and warning lights rezzing up.
Jovanka was clearly happy. ‘Fantastic. This is the latest model Austin Martin. Good old British craftsmanship.’
‘You’ve lost your Australian accent,’ Nyssa observed.
‘Yes,’ Jovanka admitted, ‘I’ll explain all about that on the way.’ He pressed a switch by the gearstick and his window slid smoothly open. He took the blaster from its shoulder holster and dropped it out of the window. The window slid closed and the car moved off on a cushion of depolarized gravitrons.
Why did you do that?’
‘You’ll see.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘My apartment.’
The car sped into the night.
‘So what’s the escape route?’ Adric asked Forrester.
Her voice came back over the helmet radio. ‘We get into the ventilation ducts and climb down to the cellars.’
‘I take it that this has all been arranged by the Doctor?’
‘Uh-huh.’
They passed an Adjudicator. ‘Justice by your side.’
‘And fairness be your friend,’ they replied automatically.
Forrester had already coached him in basic Adjudicator behaviour: how to walk and stand, who and who not to salute a few of the ritual responses.
They left the Adjudicator behind, turned the comer and walked past a statue of Galileo.
‘You’re a natural,’ Forrester told him, and Adric thought that he detected the hint of a genuine compliment behind the sarcastic tone.
‘Is it much further?’
‘No. Here we are.’
It was the door to a prison cell..
For a fleeting moment, Adric half-suspected that this had all been an elaborate ruse to get him into gaol. That thought had already dispersed by the time the door had slid open.
Together, they stepped inside. The room was small, with a retractable bed and latrine.
‘There’s a loosened panel on the back wall. Press it at a certain point and it opens up.’ Forrester pushed her hand against the wall. It remained in place. She tried another of the panels. And another. She tried the last panel.
‘They’re sealed. Stand back.’
She clenched her fist and raised it. She flexed her fingers and the guntlet fired once. A devastating bolt of energy spat out, splashing against the wall.
The cell wall was barely scratched.
‘Not one security camera registered the ghosts? We don’t have a single image?’ Medford knew the answer already.
The banks of monitors that filled the room were only displaying corridors, empty rooms and workrooms. It was the familiar frustration that always followed this sort of action. After thirty years, Medford should have been used to it.
‘We have a great deal of information about them,’ a young Adjudicator-Lieutenant told him. ‘So much that we will need several hours to