Doctor Who_ Halflife - Mark Michalowski [28]
‘Tell me what has happened.’
The Doctor gave her all the details he could remember about waking up in the forest and making his way into the city. As he spoke, he saw Nessus, sitting on Calamee’s lap, peer over the edge of the table at the dancing lights.
‘And there you have it,’ he said, concluding his tale. Madame Xing said nothing – and then another of the lights separated from the cluster and drifted down, coming to a halt a few inches from the tip of his nose.
‘I’m a viropractor,’ said Madame Xing. ‘I specialise in the use of viroids to alter and enhance cognitive development and memory. I will try to help you.’
‘Thank you. Do I have to do anything?’
Madame Xing said nothing – but the light before his face darted towards him and he felt a sudden warmth spreading through his body. Through the glow, he heard the viropractor speaking, her words smeared out oddly.
‘Are you aware that your memory has been interfered with on thirty-seven separate occasions – eight of them still outstanding?’
‘Outstanding?’
‘Uncorrected.’
‘Really?’
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He suddenly felt awkward, uncomfortable – although he couldn’t work out why. Here he was, possibly on the point of having all the memory deficits that Madame Xing had apparently found set right. And yet something nagged at him, something edgy and grating.
‘Do you wish me to attempt to correct them?’
He wasn’t sure what to say. Of course he wanted them corrected. What a silly thing to say. How could he not want them corrected?
‘My most recent loss,’ he answered cautiously, after a pause. ‘Can you correct that first?’
‘I can try.’
Something tingled in the front of his head, like delicate fingers parting the fabric of his brain. He had the strangest image of Madame Xing physically looming over him, peering into his skull, rooting around like an old lady at a jumble sale, looking for bargains.
Suddenly, the presence he felt in his head was gone, withdrawn with an abruptness that made him feel oddly alone and abandoned. He saw the light dart away from his face and hover again, a few inches in front of his eyes.
‘This is very strange,’ said Madame Xing slowly. ‘Some of your recent memories have been excised, removed. Not repressed. They are not there to restore.’
A huge sense of disappointment washed over him. Madame Xing had been his last – his only – chance to find out what he was doing here.
‘You said “some of my memories”. Does that mean that there are some that you can restore?’
‘Yes. Do you wish me to continue?’
The Doctor glanced up at the other light, the one that Madame Xing had said was ‘recording’ him.
‘Well, seeing as I seem to be paying for my consultation anyway, I suppose so.’ Maybe she was wrong, and that the restoration of those memories that she could bring back would trigger the return of the ones she couldn’t.
‘It will take a few moments to manufacture an appropriate viral agent,’ she said, although she didn’t seem to be actually doing anything. Suddenly, the light in front of his face dropped to the back of his hand, outstretched on the table, and he felt a tiny spot of coldness, like a snowflake falling on his skin –
ushering in a blizzard.
And around him, so sudden and so bright it made him gasp out loud, was a vast, whirling projection. Images blossomed in the air, smeared on to empty space, juddering like old homemade films. The Doctor was stunned, and it took him a few moments before he could start to take it in. It revolved around him, overlapping scenes of countryside and trees, with a disconnected sound-track of voices and howls and deep, thundering roars. He felt sick and dosed 51
his eyes, but the onslaught continued, as if projected straight on to the cortex of his brain. He felt dizzy and gripped the edge of the table, his breath coming in ragged bursts. He could feel his hearts stampeding in his chest like frightened animals and tried to steady them. He ran through the first five hundred prime numbers, calming himself, until, at last, he felt his body relax.
He opened his eyes again, and watched it