Doctor Who_ Halflife - Mark Michalowski [38]
‘Calamee! Calamee!’
She opened the toilet door to find him there, eyes bright, bobbing up and down with excitement. The other diners were staring at him in a way that made her want to shut the door on him. And lock it.
‘What? What’s happened?’
‘It’s starting to make sense!’ he yelled, unaware of the looks he was getting.
‘What is? Just calm down.’
He grabbed her hand and dragged her back to the table where Nessus had woken up and was eyeing the manic Doctor from his seat.
‘I was puzzling it all over,’ said the Doctor, rooting around amid the cutlery, serviettes, plates and dishes on the table, ‘and then it all came together.’ He snatched at something. ‘It was a setup. All of it. Don’t you see?’
‘Um.’
He opened out his palm in front of her. Nestled in the centre was the robot fly that she’d almost forgotten about.
‘I was supposed to escape from the Palace – the Imperator wanted me followed for some reason, so they took me inside and kept me there just long enough for them to get this thing set up. And then they released me, with this flying along behind me.’
‘But why?’
He gave a cheery shrug.
‘Maybe they think I know something.’
‘And do you?’
He gave another shrug, this one even more unconcerned than the last one.
‘Who knows? Maybe it’s something to do with why I came to Espero in the first place.’
‘Which is. . . ? Oh yes,’ Calamee cut him short. ‘You don’t know that either.’
She glanced down at the dead fly, still in the palm of his hand. ‘But at least we’re getting somewhere. I expect that the Imperator’s now a bit confused and annoyed that he’s lost contact with his tracking device. It is dead, isn’t it?’
68
‘Well, it’s not working any more, if that’s what you mean.’ He sat back down and asked the waiter for the bill. Calamee rooted in her pocket for her credit card, fairly sure that the Doctor would have no money of his own. He was drumming his fingers on the table in an incredibly fast and complicated paradiddle.
‘Considering how little we’ve got to go on,’ Calamee said, ‘it all fits, I’ll give you tha–’
‘It fits,’ interrupted the Doctor, fixing her with his eyes. ‘Yes – that’s it. Fits.’
‘Eh?’
He gripped the edge of the table with both hands and sprang to his feet.
Nessus squealed and raced under the table to clamber up Calamee’s leg on to her lap. ‘Fits,’ he said again. ‘With a zed. Fitz.’
‘Fits is spelled with an ess – or is it different where you’re from?’
He shook his head vigorously.
‘No, Fitz. My friend Fitz – Fitz erm, erm. . . Fitz Kreiner.’ Calamee just stared.
‘I came to Espero with a friend. A man called Fitz.’ The Doctor gripped the edge of the table and bowed his head, shaking it slowly. ‘I really need to get a grip on this. Madame Xing brought back memories of my friends, Fitz and. . .
and Trix. And I’ve only gone and forgotten them again.’ He looked up at her as he shook his head, and Calamee realised how tired and drained he looked.
‘This isn’t going to be easy. I need to find them – make sure that they’re all right. Before I forget them again.’
‘Well,’ said Calamee, suddenly realising how much hard work being with the Doctor involved, ‘if he’s stuck around you for more than a fortnight, he must be a very good friend. And at this rate, it’ll have taken us that long just to work out your name. Now come on – we’re getting some very strange looks.’
‘I think this is an Earth colony,’ Fitz said as they paused in front of a brightly lit shop window displaying assortments of crucifixes and statues and figurines of Jesus and Mary – and, Trix presumed, God. Without exception, their faces were brown or black, which – despite the probable historical accuracy (although she wasn’t so sure about God) – was quite surprising. It had never really occurred to her before that black people might be happier with black Jesuses and Marys and what-have-you.
‘Really?’ said Trix. ‘Because they look like us?’
‘Mainly. I know it’s a rather humanocentric view to