Doctor Who_ Christmas on a Rational Planet - Lawrence Miles [4]
‘They don’t see it as a weakness,’ a voice had said. ‘They see it as a threat.’
There had been a moment of shocked silence. It had been Cwej’s voice, but Roz couldn’t believe that it had been Cwej speaking. This was Chris Cwej, for Goddess’ sake, Chris Cwej who’d had a bedroom full of toy anti-grav starfighters, Chris Cwej who’d once spent six hours in the TARDIS wardrobe trying on every single pair of sunglasses in the Doctor’s collection until he’d found the ones he thought were ‘neatest’.
He’d been having these moments of inspiration ever since Yemaya, Roz had noticed, but where the hell had that little pearl of wisdom come from?
The Doctor had looked as if he’d just been dealt a killing blow, as if the comment had been a personal attack on him.
‘Perhaps,’ he’d conceded.
Her back slammed into something, and Roz realized that she’d rolled into a large rock, positioned right at the bottom of the slope. Whichever god or goddess put that there, she thought as the pain crackled up her spine, should be making Tom and Jerry cartoons. But the whispering was getting closer, and she looked up, towards the advancing gynoid, determined to face death head-on.
It was a pathetic gesture, but it was the best she could do at short notice.
"Android",’ the Doctor had repeated. ‘Meaning "manlike".
Not because it looks like a man, but because it’s just like a man. Even if it looked like a woman, or a tiger, or a hairy monotreme, or a shapeless green blob, it would still be a man’s machine. Perfectly ordered artificial life. The ultimate creation of the masculine psyche. Whereas, by contrast...’
... and he’d pointed his cane at the corpse of the gynoid.
The blur was rolling down the slope towards her, new orifices opening in its quicksilver skin every second. The whispers spilled into Roz’s ears until they filled every avenue in her head and turned the world into static.
She and Cwej had both glanced back at the dead thing, still quivering in the sun. ‘Gynoid,’ Cwej had said, apparently back to normal. ‘It’s Greek, right? "Gyno". Like "woman". ‘
‘Yes.’ There’d been a strain in the Doctor’s voice, and he’d just failed to disguise it. And it shouldn’t be here.’
‘Uh-huh. You mean, they don’t build them round this part of the galaxy?’ Yeah, that was Cwej. Chief Inspector Cwej, determined to be on top of the case.
‘You weren’t listening.’ The Doctor had scowled, though not at anyone in particular ‘Gynoids aren’t "built". Only androids are "built". Gynoids just are.’
They just are, Roz thought. Yeah, right. And now one of them just is about to bite my legs off.
Then there was something else, a high-pitched chiming, as the amaranth hit the rock next to her and rang like a bell. Even without looking, she could tell that it was spinning in the dust, making the same sound a glass makes when you run your finger around the rim. Louder, though, loud enough to make her eardrums ache. The gynoid raised its many voices, trying to make itself heard above the screeching, and just for a moment Roz could almost tell what it was trying to say... then the yellow light under the rock crept out into the darkness, folded itself around her, and blotted out the world.
The skeleton within the case was that of a huge, lizard-like creature, a row of dagger-shaped spines punctuating its back.
Catilin wondered if the woman was really looking at it, or just using it as an excuse not to catch his eye again.
‘The bones were discovered in the great deserts of the New World,’ Catilin told her. ‘As you can see, they belonged to some behemoth which no longer walks the Earth. My fellow cardinals insist that its species was destroyed during the great flood, though there is, as always, talk of God releasing unto them a great fire from Heaven.’
Duquesne nodded. ‘And