Doctor Who_ Corpse Marker - Chris Boucher [87]
‘I’ve been trying not to.’
‘I think it wants you alive.’
‘So do I.’ Tel moved out from behind the TARDIS and took a couple of tentative steps towards the robot. ‘Any chance you could stop smiling and chewing like that?’ he said. ‘You’ve no idea how unappealing it is. Especially when you’re covered in blood.’ He took a few more steps. The robot ignored him. ‘It’s ignoring me,’ he said.
‘Go for the alarm,’ Ging suggested.
‘If it kills me I’m never going to forgive you,’ Tel said, walking towards the alarm.
The robot turned and moved to cut him off. Ging snatched up the drill and rushed forward. As the robot turned to meet her she activated the drill and drove the lucanol-tipped bit hard into the centre of its forehead. Ducking away from the flailing killer, Ging barely heard the alarms going off.
The boundary was switching on and off here too.
This time the Doctor set about checking the electronic barrier on either side of the road Toos had used to enter the Sewerpits. He was not entirely surprised to find that where there was no open access road the boundary itself was not switching on and off.
It appeared that electronic gateways were rapidly opening and closing and that either the physical routes developed as a result of them or they were put in to control already existing routes. Which came first, the road or the gate? he wondered. He would need some rather more sophisticated equipment if he was going to find out anything more about the boundary. ‘There’s only so much you can do with a sonic screwdriver,’ he said to no one in particular.
‘Does he talk to himself a lot?’ Toos was standing with Leela and watching the Doctor pacing about with the small rod held out in front of him, waving it around, reaching into inaccessible places with it.
‘It is hard to be sure sometimes,’ Leela said.
‘What is he doing?’ Toos was becoming impatient.
Leela shrugged. ‘Searching?’ He looked like the tribal water-finder. ‘Understanding the boundary has become important to him. He can stop being reasonable when something like that takes his attention.’
Toos shivered. ‘It feels like the Emptiness might stir,’ she said. ‘The Emptiness?’
‘Cold wind,’ Toos said. ‘You never heard it called that?’
The strangeness of travelling with the Doctor was wearing off for Leela but she remained uncertain of how to react when challenged over her lack of local knowledge. The Doctor had never been clear about how much of what and who they were she was supposed to reveal to other people. ‘No,’ she said.
‘Doctor?’ Toos called.
The Doctor did not look up from what he was doing. ‘
Almost finished.’
‘Is there anything else you want from me?’
‘Very well,’ he said absently and clambered up on to a nearby wall and from there on to the low roof of a ramshackle building.
‘I see what you mean,’ Toos said to Leela. ‘Look, if it does blow Ore-dream to Emptiness I’m not exactly dressed for the change. And even if it doesn’t I’m tired of rags and rodents. I want to go back to my life. I want to go back to my life now.’ She smiled wearily. ‘So that’s what I’m going to do.’
‘Do you not fear the robots?’
‘Only the ones I can see,’ she said. ‘At the moment I can’t see any, can you?’
Leela scanned the area and shook her head. ‘At the moment I cannot but there is too much cover. Too much is hidden.’
Toos took her by surprise then when she embraced her briefly and wordlessly set off down the road. It did not seem to Leela like a well-thought-out decision, or a decision that had been thought out at all, and she watched carefully either side and ahead of Toos as the woman walked with brisk confidence towards the derelict outskirts of the city.
Leela saw the movement and shouted the warning before the robot showed itself fully. Toos did not hesitate but turned on her heel and was already running back when the robot reacted and started to sprint after her.
On the low roof the Doctor heard Leela’s shout and looked up to see Toos running back towards him with a robot chasing her. He moved to the edge of the roof and as