Doctor Who_ Cat's Cradle_ Warhead - Andrew Cartmel [26]
‘Could it just be because they’re different?’
Bobby Prescott was tired of listening to the man. He began to look around for something suitably long and heavy. Or maybe he’d just use his hands. He didn’t hurry as he followed the little man around the circular balcony, the man concentrating on his sketch.
‘You want to know who’s different?’ said Bobby Prescott. ‘I’m different. Out on the steps with those kids? They were fixing to kill me.’
‘I know. I’m sorry about that. They got a little carried away.’
‘They had the knife already going into my throat. I should have lost it right about then. You ever seen anybody die?’
The small man frowned. ‘Yes.’
‘I don’t mean die in bed when they’re sixty. I mean die in the street when they’re young and think they’re going to live forever. Kids always think they’re going to live forever.’ Bobby Prescott smiled. ‘I’ve seen quite a few like that. And they always beg or scream or just go out of their minds. They all totally lose it in some way. But not me. Not on those steps. I felt it coming. Fear. And I stopped it. You’re damned right I’m different. I’m strong. I am the iron that has been strengthened in the fire. That was my childhood, man.’
Now the little man looked up from his sketching. He looked into Bobby Prescott’s face.
‘My childhood,’ said Bobby Prescott softly. ‘That was the fire, all right. You wouldn’t want to know about my childhood.’
‘No,’ agreed the little man. It was too dark to see any expression on his face.
‘But that was the fire. And I was forged in the fire. It only made me stronger. I am privileged because I am strong. I am special because I am strong. You are damned right I’m different.’ He was close to the little man now. Right on top of him. ‘I can control my fear. It’s just an enemy and I overcome it.’ The little man seemed to have stopped sketching. He was still concentrating on the pad of paper, the drawing he’d just made. He wasn’t looking up, but Bobby Prescott didn’t mind. He’d do it to him anyway. ‘I am not afraid,’ said Bobby Prescott, closing in. ‘If you’re afraid you’re an animal. And it’s okay to kill animals.’
‘Bobby Prescott, do I look afraid?’ said the Doctor. He looked up. And then he showed Bobby Prescott his drawing.
And then the fear hit Bobby Prescott like a freight train.
* * *
‘That’s all.’
Bobby Prescott wasn’t sure that the Doctor had Heard him. He cleared his throat and said it again. ‘That’s all.’
The moon was gone now, only the streetlight and the mall neon coming through the library windows. They were by the front desk of the library again, near the main entrance. Bobby Prescott was sitting cross‐legged on the floor, keeping some distance away from the Doctor. As far away as he could, and still make himself heard. ‘Is that all you wanted to know? Can I go now, man?’
The little man was silhouetted in the window light, sitting perched on the ruined Xerox machine in the centre of the big foyer. The librarians had tried to drag it across the floor of the entrance hall and barricade the main doorway with it. They’d got about halfway.
Bobby Prescott stood up and moved around stretching his legs. He had almost stopped shaking now. Talking to the little man had allowed Bobby Prescott to calm down a bit, get himself back together a bit. He walked to ease the cramp in his legs and to feel some sense of control over himself again. He didn’t walk towards the small man, though. He looked out the front window, up at the sky. He was trying to see the moon, trying to work out what the time was.
How long had they been talking? His voice was hoarse. He cleared his throat and stared through the window, looking down from the clouds. Then he saw McCray’s drugstore across the street and the sight of it started him shaking again.
He had trouble walking back to the long library desk and trouble sitting down in front of it again. He looked away from the windows.
The little man was still sitting on the Xerox machine, still saying nothing, but making notes.
‘Come on, let me go, man,’ said Bobby Prescott, and now his voice was shaking, too.