Doctor Who_ Blue Box - Kate Orman [11]
Peri wondered if they could have left out a step and just arrived with a cardboard box full of bricks. But then, they wouldn’t have had the paperwork or the official company logo on the carton.
And then he and Peri were alone in the ‘compute centre’.
It was quiet and noisy at the same time, full of the hum of air conditioning, and cold enough to make the tiny hairs on Peri’s arms prickle. The room was white, spotless, filled with neat rows of big grey boxes.
‘I’d better get working,’ said Bob. They wheeled the wobbling trolley down a row of machines, until he found one he liked.
‘What’s gonna happen when someone comes along and discovers this brand-new machine they didn’t order?’ said Peri.
‘We’re doing them a favour,’ said Bob, extracting an artist’s knife from the pocket of his overalls. ‘This baby is top of the range. Hi-res graphics display. Stereo sound. A mouse!
Who’s gonna complain?’
Peri sighed. It was all annoyingly familiar being dragged into unlikely and hazardous situations by someone with too much confidence and not enough interest in explanations. It must be some Freudian thing she had. Or maybe all the Doctor’s friends were like this.
While Bob worked, Peri paced the perimeter of the computer centre, hoping to find a locked door, a NO ENTRY
sign, something suggesting secrecy. There was a closet full of big computer tapes in metal canisters, but it wasn’t even locked. As she walked along the rows of boxes, Bob appeared and disappeared from her line of sight. From time to time she heard him banging and thumping, or muttering to himself.
The constant noise of the room whited out most sounds: Peri saw, but she didn’t hear the sliding doors swish open. She ducked behind one of the computers.
‘What are you doing here?’ said the woman’s voice crisply. It wasn’t the receptionist. Peri had a sinking feeling she knew exactly who it was. She heard a bang and crash as though Bob had dropped something.
‘I understood this was an urgent order, ma’am.’
Peri peeked out from her hiding place for a moment. Swan was examining the invoice on the clipboard. This is it, Peri thought, there was never any way we could have got away with this, I’m wearing a fake moustache, for God’s sake. She was tempted to rip the thing off right away so at least she wouldn’t be arrested in drag.
But Swan didn’t seem to find anything wrong with the invoice: She put the clipboard back down on top of the box where Bob had perched it.
And then she watched him set up the Lisp Machine. For the next forty minutes.
Peri thought of hiding behind the nearest door – a closet filled with huge plastic bottles that reeked of noxious chemicals. She decided to stay where she was, crouched behind the tall grey box.
Her mind flashed forward to the consequences: kicked out of college, shot by the security guard, having to tell her parents. Having to keep running forever, never being able to go home. Somehow it was more frightening than ravening carnivores or rivers of lava. It was more real.
She could make a break for it. After so long in the Doctor’s company, she was an expert at the mad sprint to safety. She could be out that sliding door and out of the building before anyone could stop het But that would leave Bob to be the fall guy.
‘All done, ma’am,’ she heard Bob say at last, rather too loudly Swan replied, but Peri couldn’t make out what she was saying. , They spoke for a few moments; she got the impression Bob was stalling, not sure where the hell Peri was or what she was going to do. She had no choice but to stay hidden until she saw Bob wheel the empty carton out of the compute centre, a stony-faced Swan at his heels.
She waited five minutes and then sauntered out of the compute centre. She took the stairwell by the lifts down to the basement, and walked out a side door into the parking lot. Bob was waiting in the van across the street, craning his neck, looking for her. She forced herself to stroll across the road instead of bolting.
What she didn’t know was:
Sarah Swan