Doctor Who_ Lungbarrow - Marc Platt [54]
Affirmative. Gate open. Standing by.
K9 Mark I's tail started to wag.
His line of crashed memory wafers went into domino-reversal mode. He retrieved everything> everybody> everywhere> in every respect. And he learnt that he had more capacity than before. And his new extra capacity started to fill with new information that he had never known.
'Memory capacity increased by seventy-one point one per cent,' he announced aloud.
He already recognized the designation of the analyst. As his optic circuits restored vision, he saw the analyst itself.
It was the unit he had been in occasional conference with over the past five days. The sensor from the analyst's angular metal head was extended to engage the extended sensor from his own.
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They wagged their tails and ears at each other and retracted sensors.
'All systems reactivated and reprogrammed,' said K9 Mark I. 'You are K9 Mark II.'
'Affirmative. Program complete,' said K9 Mark II. 'You are K9 Mark I.'
The two robotic dogs circled each other, 'sniffing' at each other's credentials.
Eventually they pulled apart. 'All data assimilated,' they chorused unnecessarily.
'Next objective: to find and retrieve the Lady Leela,' declared K9 Mark II.
'Affirmative,' agreed K9 Mark I, and he led the way as the junior version rolled back to let him through.
***
Leela lay on the bed, feeling sick. It was not just the effects of her questioning by the cold Time Lord. It was a feeling she recognized, that was returning with increased frequency. The unnatural world here only made it worse.
All the hard angles and single colours. Nothing new or soft, nothing growing, just old, stifling traditions in the clothes and the ceremonies. In the Capitol, the only living things were narrow-minded keepers of lists. No matter what titles they found for themselves, they were all still keepers of lists.
Until Romana had come home, everything had pointed into the past and never faced towards the future.
Leela had grown up in a wild forest, where new life was always burgeoning and fighting for existence. That was why she brought in al the plants, but they only half hid the angles and pushed against the windows in an effort to reach the sky.
Andred's Family House of RedLooms away from the city was better, but even there no one went out. They just stayed inside reading more books and watching the Public Register transcasts from the Capitol.
Romana was fighting to change it all, but it was like chipping at a mountain with a dry straw.
Andred treated Leela with a proud devotion, while other Time Lords smirked behind his back. In return, she tried hard to behave in the way that he said was proper and she thought was stupid. But in the secret dark, when they lay together, they giggled at the affectations and manners of the Time Lord gentry and had secrets and made plans that were theirs alone and could not be accessed on a catalogue port or consulted in an authority list.
'I'm so lucky,' he'd said amid their frequent bouts of giggles. 'They never taught us this at the Academy. I'd like to see their faces. I don't think anyone's done this for... it must be thousands and thousands of years. All the others do is watch the aliens at it and précis their notes afterwards.'
And then the giggling would stop.
These were things she must not forget. If she was frightened of anything at all, she was frightened of losing Andred.
She could stil remember her interrogation, so she guessed that they had not finished with her yet.
When they had heard the boom of the explosion, the cold serpent Time Lord did not seem surprised. He went to the window to watch. From her forcefield prison, Leela had seen the sky momentarily darken as if all the light was sucked out of it.
Then the Time Lord turned back and studied her. He was smiling. She felt like an animal in a trap.
Instantly she was in this bare room - all white with six walls and no doors. All hard angles. She had fallen asleep on the bed and woken up feeling sick.
The