Doctor Who_ Longest Day - Michael Collier [46]
The Kusk in the black skirt hissed its appreciation. "Then we are so close.'
***
The salmon-pink sky stretched over the Doctor and Anstaar like a watery tarpaulin. Ruffled red clouds of wetness draped themselves dreamily around towering spires of sand and rock. Strands of vegetation wormed up from patches of soil, and the Doctor breathed deeply, his eyes gleaming.'
"'Twixt sea and shore",' he muttered. 'Come on. If I've read that indicator display correctly, this is somewhere in the area of temporal leakage I was telling you about.'
'Wonderful,' sighed Anstaar.
'Do you have any idea what this chunk of Hirath is used for?'
'No. There's so many discrete parts. It could be - oh, I don't know. You know I'm finding it hard believing anything you've told me.'
'It was a long story,' chided the Doctor, lightly,'not a tall one. Why would I lie?'
'How should I know?'
The Doctor realised Anstaar wanted to believe him, but the ramifications of what he was saying left her terrified. He placed a sympathetic hand on her shoulder.
'You can stay here if you like, and pretend I never came. But believe me -
help isn't going to come from any other quarter. And it won't take the Kusks long to find out where I went or how to operate the matter transmitter.'
'But they'll never fit in it if they're as big as you say.'
The Doctor looked sheepish. 'I had to make one or two minor alterations to get in it myself.'
'Of course. Great. Well, if it comes to a choice between monstrous killer bipeds and a jaunt with you...' She set off up a wide path, her figure soon made indistinct by the fine mist in the air.
'I'm overwhelmed,' commented the Doctor, to no one in particular. 'You haven't asked me what we're looking for yet.'
Anstaar's voice floated back to him.'Trouble?'
The Doctor set off after her. 'Are you sure we've never met before?'
***
Fettal led her team of five in one desultory land assault transporter. Her face was impassive, but resentment twisted her guts. As usual, Sangton had detailed the best equipment to Traxes. He did it because he knew it annoyed her. Made her aggressive, and thus more prone to making mistakes. He knew her ambition, and she knew that he scorned it.
She knew also how he looked at her. Not that the old idiot could surely do much with the little he had these days, but if it pleased him to abuse his power over her she'd go along with it. He wouldn't be around much longer.
He was an embarrassment.
Still, he and all the old ones in his House, all of them, would die out in the next few years, or be pensioned off to villa worlds. It was a good thing: with their corruption, endless manipulations, diverting of funds and commandeering of craft for secret missions like this one, they had brought disrepute on the sacred Houses and long outlived their time. The old idiot had tried to make it sound exciting to her, but she knew exactly what was going on.
The hunting down of the Outers, and the policing of that rabble of cultures awaiting dispersal around the ever-expanding Thannos system, would be better handled by the young, those who had lived with the issues of rebellion and dissension all their lives. Until then, she had to be grateful for the scraps of information, advice, and command that Sangton gave her.
The resentment twisted at her insides again.
She'd been told she had to internalise her anger and her frustrations until a battle situation. Then, as long as her judgement remained clear at all times, she could release it. The pleasure of that release had sustained her for some time. Weeks, a few years back. Not so long now.
Still, the moment was coming, and a tingle of exhilaration was running through her. The camp would be in sight soon, full of pitiful half-dead men.
How many of them would she slaughter today to get to the target?
She smiled, the sun catching on tiny beads of moisture on the gossamer covering her eyes. She felt she could be a giant.
***
'So what's