Doctor Who_ Interference_ Book One - Lawrence Miles [26]
For a while, Badar didn’t speak. There was nothing outside the cell, outside the courtyard. There hadn’t been anything outside in some time. And suddenly, the pale man was building whole worlds, putting entire universes together as he spoke.
Suppose you could turn things pink, just by thinking about it.
There was a pain in Badar’s chest, where one of the guards had once run several thousand volts through his ribcage, and very nearly stopped his heart. There were red slashes across his vision, where his eyes had been damaged. There was a prickling in his legs, where the batons had been run all the way from his crotch to his ankles.
But supposing you could turn things pink. At will.
The idea was too big to even consider properly.
‘Think of the havoc you could cause,’ the prisoner went on. ‘Colours can have profound effects on the humanoid subconscious. On the humanoid neurosystem. You could cause huge shifts in the psyche of the human race. Or any other visually orientated species, come to think of it. You could change the way your people perceive the universe around them. Affect, even manipulate, the thoughts of everyone else in your society. And they wouldn’t be able to resist, because you’d be the only one who could do it. It doesn’t sound like much of an ability, does it? But it is. If you knew what you were doing, you could take over the whole world that way.’
The world is pink, thought Badar. Not the cell, not the courtyard, but this world. This new world the prisoner was building. Everything was pink.
Then it occurred to him. The flaw in the logic of this infinitely wonderful pink universe.
‘We can’t turn things pink,’ he said. His voice was slurred, his lips still numb where the batons had been used on his facial muscles, and he ended up screaming. ‘We‐can’t‐turn‐things‐pink!’
The pale man put a finger to his own lips. ‘No. But it was just an example. We do have other skills we can use.’
Badar stared at him for a moment or two. Eventually, he remembered what the man had said. ‘Technical expertise?’ he asked, although the word ‘expertise’ came out as nothing but a mumble.
‘Yes. More than anyone else on this planet, I should imagine. Not that I want to show off.’
‘Then you could… take over the world?’
‘Good grief, no!’ The man practically shouted it, and Badar jumped. Actually jumped. He’d thought nothing could shock him now, not after so many surprise torture sessions with the guards, but somehow the other prisoner had managed to hit exactly the right nerve.
They stared at each other for a while. The man looked uncomfortable again.
‘Well, all right,’ he said. ‘Yes. Yes, I could. But I wouldn’t.’
‘Why?’
He didn’t seem to have an answer ready. ‘Because… it’d be incredibly irresponsible, for a start.’
‘Could I take over the world?’
The man spent a few moments thinking about that. Maybe he was just working out the logic of the question.
‘We’ll see,’ he said, in the end.
* * *
Dusk
The guards came into the cell only once that day. They didn’t bring food, and they didn’t empty out the bucket by the door, but they didn’t hurt Badar much, either. They hovered over him, screaming that he was an animal, that he’d broken all the most sacred laws of his people, that he was the son of a whore, and so on and so on. They even kicked him, once or twice. But they didn’t use the batons.
The other prisoner was fair game, though. Badar couldn’t see him, not with so many of the guards squeezing into what little space there was in the cell, but he could hear the crackling noises. He wondered which parts of the prisoner they were using the batons on. Not the eyes, he hoped.
The man didn’t scream, although he made a few grunting sounds.