Doctor Who_ Corpse Marker - Chris Boucher [6]
She was mildly irritated but she waited patiently enough for the overrides to kick in and the systems to come back up so she could open the door and get on with her life.
She had never much liked the dark but she was not afraid of it. She would have preferred to be locked inside her quarters rather than locked out of them but there was no need to panic.
She was not pressed for time. And the darkness did not really bother her.
The overrides seemed to be taking longer than they should, though. Simbion better wake up and pay attention, she didn’t have to overlook the drinking. It was probably her imagination, it was probably only a few seconds, and the dark didn’t really bother her.
It might have been more worrying if the mine had been full of functioning robots - they could switch to different wavelengths and move through the darkness, find you in the darkness. A robot could find you in the darkness simply by homing in on the infrared...
She shivered and peered unseeingly into the total darkness.
...But there were no robots on this level, and the dark didn’t bother her. There were very few functioning robots left on board. What was it: three? No, it was more than three. How many then? How many? Five, say. Six? Six at most. Six, yes, it was six. And they were all in the dark. But not in this dark. Not in this dark here because none of them were allowed on this level. They were down in the gross-function levels, held there by her order. Robots did what they were ordered - that’s what robots were for. Except...except when they didn’t do what they were ordered but that was only once and that was not possible now. That could never happen now. Once but never again. It could never happen again.
The dark did not bother her but it was taking longer than it should. The back-ups ought to have kicked in by now. The darkness was so total that she had begun to see lights in it. She knew her eyes were unreliable in these conditions. She knew there were no lights. But there should be. It was definitely taking too long.
What was Simbion playing at? She would break that lazy, unreliable drunk if she didn’t do what she was being paid to do and do it now. ‘Simbion!’ she yelled. ‘Simbion!’
Even as she raged Toos knew it was a mistake. It didn’t make her feel better - it was a loss of control, it brought her closer to panic, but she couldn’t stop herself. ‘Simbion,’ she screamed at the top of her lungs, ‘get off your fat rear end and get the systems back on-line!’
Now she was shaking and tiny star shells were exploding soundlessly in the back of her eyes. She was panting: the shallow gasps of a dying animal. The dark was too dark and it was lasting too long and the robots were all around her. She struggled for control of her breathing.
She had to be quiet. She could hear them coming and she could feel them reaching and she could feel them closing round and she wanted to die immediately, now before it could happen, now before it would happen.
The light came back on with a sudden blinding flare and for a moment Toos could still see nothing. But then as her eyes adjusted she thought she saw a movement down the passageway by a bulkhead stanchion. Panicking, she slapped at the door control of her quarters and missed the activator button. When the door failed to open she kicked and punched at it hysterically.
Pain brought her back from mindless fear to furious anger. She was Lish Toos. She was Captain of Storm Mine Seven. She turned to face whatever it was that was lurking in the shadows.
Nothing and no one was going to push her around any more.
Ever.
She stalked down the passageway to the place where she had seen it. There was nothing there. Feeling relieved and more than a little foolish, she went back to her quarters, opened the door and stepped inside. She went to the comm unit, punched up the mover suite and snapped, ‘What’s t happening, Simbion?