Doctor Who_ Alien Bodies - Lawrence Miles [53]
Sanjira crawled out of the bed, reached for his dayrobe, and folded it around his body, trying to ignore the sense of revulsion he felt when he saw his own bloodless, withered limbs slipping into the sleeves. Fifty years old, looking eighty, at least. The other members of the family at the Mission talked about that, behind his back. They said he’d made a pact with bad Spirits, and this was the price he’d paid.
He would have laughed, if he’d had the strength. The others were different. They were young, they’d been brought to Dronid from worlds as far apart as Lurma and Salostopus, but Sanjira had been born and raised here, and he knew the truth of it. There were things in the air on Dronid, things the locals never talked about. They took you apart, hour by hour, year by year. They bit chunks out of your life, ate away your skin and bones.
The legacy of the Time Lords, thought Sanjira. They’d done so much to this planet. So much damage.
‘Cousin?’
Sanjira didn’t bother to turn. He knew what he’d see. Little Sister Justine, wearing the same outfit, day in and day out. The black velvet dress she’d brought from Earth, when the family had recruited her. She’d be hovering in the doorway of Sanjira’s room, her head bowed respectfully. He wondered if she’d spend the rest of her life like this. He imagined her as an old woman, worn to nothing by Dronid, her red hair turned grey, performing the same old duties decade after decade.
Sanjira mumbled the Earliest Prayer; Justine gave all the correct responses. She was only seventeen, Sanjira remembered. Still young enough to take the Spirits at face value.
‘There’s news, Cousin,’ Justine said, once the formalities were over. ‘Little Brother Kolman is back from the city. He’s been watching the Corporation for us.’
Sanjira moved across to one of the windows, as he did every morning. It was a hole in the wall, nothing more; no weather on Dronid these days, no wind or rain, no need for glass. Outside, on the street behind the Mission, there was nothing but red dust and crumbling stonework. A handful of young men lurked among the ruins on the other side of the street, doing their best to look macho and dangerous whenever anybody wandered past. ‘And?’ Sanjira prompted.
‘Kolman believes the Corporation has found a relic,’ Justine went on. There was a touch of excitement in her voice, which she wasn’t hiding quite well enough. ‘Under the wreckage of the city centre. Hidden in an underground bunker, he says.’
Sanjira turned to her, at last. The Little Sister’s head was still bowed. ‘A relic? What sort of relic?’
‘The Little Brother wasn’t certain, Cousin. He described it as a coffin, though he couldn’t examine it closely. Not without the Corporation noticing him. They say the bunker’s been there since the Cataclysm.’
Sanjira coughed a chuckle out of his throat. “Cataclysm”. So dramatic, the newbloods. The Time Lords had fought the first battle of their war on Dronid almost half a century ago. The natives never spoke of it, but the off-worlders liked to think of it as a War in Heaven, all hellfire and thunder.
Of course, Sanjira knew better. It wasn’t the battle that had destroyed the cities, it wasn’t the battle that had sucked the life out of the planet. The Time Lords had done that after the battle had ended, in a desperate attempt to cover their tracks. Gallifrey liked to keep its secrets.
‘It’s a Time Lord artefact?’ Sanjira queried.
Little Sister Justine wrinkled her nose. ‘The Little Brother wasn’t sure. He... acted rather rashly.’
‘Explain.’
‘He contacted some of the family’s allies in the city. They agreed to attack the Corporation’s stronghouse there.’ Justine sniffed the air as she spoke. ‘Kolman