Doctor Who_ Combat Rock - Mick Lewis [68]
Needless to say the party wasted no time crossing the rest of the swamp. They were all very relieved upon reaching the muddy shore to find nobody else had been plucked beneath the water by the invisible predator.
‘Now you can only charge small money for men,’ Wina resumed as they emerged from the jungle onto a grassy plateau that hung above the broad sweep of the Sclachtenmoord,
‘Because you look more like animal than woman.’
Santi looked down in dismay at her torn top, muddied skirt and scratched legs. Her hair hung in itchy clumps, and she knew her face must be a mask of mud and smeared make-up.
She looked at Wina and then smiled, because her Indoni companion was actually trying to act superior while looking every bit as dishevelled as herself. So, instead of replying, she simply nodded and gave a dazzling ironic smile. Wina snorted and turned away.
‘The Schlactenmoord,’ Tigus said, pointing at the wide but slow-moving river.
‘Interesting name,’ the Doctor puffed, brushing parasites from his bare legs below the rolled-up baggy trousers. ‘Of Earth origin I should imagine. Possibly Dutch. Has there been a substantial missionary presence in the area?’
‘The speakers for a meaningless God?’ Tigus said with some bitterness. ‘Of course they come here, make bad our culture, kill our traditions. But many perished at the hands of the Kirowai.’
‘The Kirowai? And what might they be?’ The Doctor took off his frock coat and hung it over one arm, sweat rolling down his forehead under the hot, exposed sun.
‘Cannibal.’ Tigus pronounced the last syllable to rhyme with ‘pal. He looked proud.
‘Oh. And are these cannibals prevalent in the area?’
‘South of the Schlactenmoord is Kirowai country. They live in tree-house and have constant war with neighbour village. From here we must be careful.’ He seemed to be almost relishing the idea.
‘And you have no control over them, being Papul yourself?’ the Doctor asked hopefully.
Tigus laughed. ‘They kill and eat each other. Why should they spare someone from other tribe like me? Someone from other end of island? I am stranger to them just like you. We all become bones in tree shrine if we meet them.’
‘Then let’s, er... let’s just hope we don’t meet them, shall we?’ the Doctor said nervously.
Clown was on the stilted walkway and he was looking at the blood. It was everywhere. No longer dripping but drying under the Papul sun. Bodies and bits of bodies were everywhere, in grisly displays outside stalls, hanging over the plankways, floating in the water beneath.
The bodies were all Indoni. And they were all headless.
Clown powered up his rifle and made his way along the planks towards the missionary house. He could hear his own breathing, the faint jingle of bells from his hat and the screech of distant birds. Nothing else.
Agat was empty of life.
He did not feel fear, because he was too deeply immersed in causing it. He was a Dog, a killer, a man of blood money. A bounty hunter, a mercenary – there were many names for what he did. He had seen death in all its faces, and he was too old and scarred to be frightened by it. It was just an end to things; he himself was an end to things. Death wearing a clown face and jester cap. Yes, he had seen many disturbing and horrific things in his time.
But this...
There was the missionary’s house, a simple two-storey clap-board colonial-style cottage, painted white and shining in the midday sun. Nice.
It looked like his job had been done for him, then.
But where were all the Papul locals, and why had they killed the Indoni inhabitants?
He entered the house anyway, because he was paid to be thorough.
Father Pieter was sitting in an armchair facing the shattered window. He held a severed head in his hands, and his eyes were staring across Flamingo Bay, his mouth wide open and smeared