Doctor Who_ Last Man Running - Chris Boucher [76]
All of them were Leela.
Feerlenator was tired. That was not a good sign, he knew.
There was a time when he had enjoyed the politicking. There had been real satisfaction in the climb up the corporate ladder of the OIG; move and countermove had felt like a contest for grown-ups played for pride and other worthwhile prizes. Recently, though, the game had taken on a new edge.
It was as if the rules had changed, the prizes had changed, and everything had got more dangerous suddenly and nobody had told him why. He gestured the willowy young man to the chair on the other side of the desk and said,
‘You’ve double checked?’ He was mostly tired of trying to keep ahead of the Director. On more than one occasion he had suspected that the man was clinically insane, and that to stay in the job of deputy director he had to be crazy too.
‘Every possible connection from every possible angle?’
‘Yes sir,’ Frith said, sitting down. ‘I’ve checked everything.’
‘And Skinny-dick is not related to, bedding, or in business with any member of that team? We’re quite sure?’
‘There are no links of any kind between Director Drew and any member of the Serian Kley patrol.’ His confidential assistant, Sol Frith, was a smart young firster of impeccable breeding. He was probably a bit too fastidious for crap-scuffling and snooping, Feerlenator knew, but he was the only person on his staff that Feerlenator trusted.
‘He’s up to something, Sol,’ he said. ‘And we’re missing it.
Let’s hope it’s not too important.’
‘Too important?’
‘Life-threatening?’
Frith looked dubious. ‘Perhaps he means what he says about our people deserving our best endeavours.’
Feerlenator snorted. ‘Dikero Drew has never meant anything he has ever said and that includes hello and goodbye.’
‘Goes with the job, surely, doesn’t it? The higher up the ladder you get the more hypocritical you have to become.’ He grimaced, realising what he had just said to the second-ranking officer in the OIG. ‘Did I say that?’
‘Relax, Sol. We both know how the game is played. My point is that as far as he’s concerned the definition of our people extends as far as Dikero Drew and no further.’
‘You don’t like him much, do you?’
‘No,’ Feerlenator said. Oddly, it had not occurred to him until he said it how much he actually hated the Director. ‘I suppose I don’t. He smiled and rubbed his eyes. ‘Maybe it’s a toody reaction.’
‘I doubt that.’
‘I hope I’m not prejudiced.’
‘For what it’s worth I feel the same way about him,’ Frith said. ‘Do you want me to go on digging?’
For some obscure reason, Feerlenator felt that he had let Frith go too far. He was slightly offended by the young man’s familiarity. No, it was by the young firster’s familiarity. He would never be free of this feeling of resentment, he thought.
It was prejudice. He hated Drew for being a firster as much as for being a selfish, arrogant, lying, craphead firster. ‘No, leave it, Sol,’ he said. ‘Sooner or later he’ll show his hand and we’ll find out what’s going on.’
Frith smiled. He was relieved. He had a genuine affection for his boss. One day he hoped to be able to take him into his confidence. In the meantime, he didn’t want to arrest him unless he had absolutely no choice.
Leela had seen the copy of the Doctor and he had explained it to her, so why should she find these copies of herself so frightening? She kept her head high and her back straight as she walked. She was determined not to let them see how frightened she was, though since they were her perhaps they already knew. She was angry with herself that she had let one of them take her knife. She was angry with the Doctor for not letting her fight them. But most of all she was frightened.
‘Do you know how the door