Doctor Who_ Lungbarrow - Marc Platt [69]
'I have to ask you to pour,' Romana said. 'I'm afraid I can't join you.'
'I wondered why it was only set for two,' said Leela. 'You said you were away from Gallifrey.'
'I am away. The Romanadvoratrelundar you can see is a projection of the real me. I'm speaking to you from. . .
well, from somewhere else. And I hope the K9s haven't blurted out where.'
'No,' Leela assured her. 'But many are speculating on your whereabouts.'
Romana groaned wearily. 'If only they'd give me more time. I suppose it's my fault for bul ying them. I shouldn't expect to change the habits of a thousand millennia overnight. Most of the Council have been in their jobs for a thousand years at least. It's like trying to stampede a herd of tortoises.'
'You have problems,' said Dorothée, pouring the tea.
Leela lifted the lid of a silver dish and exclaimed, 'These are muffins!'
'Freshly toasted,' said Romana.
'Thank you. The Doctor bought us muffins in London.'
Dorothée grinned. 'He knows how to party, doesn't he? He once bought us both baked Alaska, but I landed up paying.'
The three of them laughed.
Dorothée sipped at her tea. It was Earl Grey and far better than the French could ever manage. The cups were the best porcelain. She noticed that Leela didn't quite have the knack of social etiquette. She was holding the cup by the bowl rather than the handle and had her muffin in the other hand. Not much of a ladylike bearing at all.
She turned to Romana, but the President's expression had suddenly turned very grave.
101
'Go on then,' said Dorothée with a sigh. 'You didn't haul me halfway across the Galaxy just in time for tea for nothing.'
'That's true,' admitted Romana. 'Are you prepared to tell me what the Agency asked you?'
Dorothée felt herself freeze up. She looked at the two other women. If they'd both travelled with the Doctor, then they'd both seen hell too. So how come they were so nice about it?
'I didn't like it,' she said. 'They tried ...' She felt her blood suddenly starting to burn with angry confusion. 'I don't know what they were trying. They wanted me. No, not me. My identity!' She wanted to hit something. Or shoot the hell out of something. 'They had all my memories, but they wanted more!'
She looked up and met Romana's blue eyes. They pierced her the way the Doctor's eyes could. A concern for her that cut deep through the bewilderment and bloody rage, but did not diminish her right to her anger.
That's cruel, said Romana's eyes. And Dorothée knew that the eyes could read and understand her fears and experiences.
'She shot me,' said Dorothée. 'Ace shot Me. And when I came back she said I'd been dead for twenty minutes.'
That's all the time they'd need. You died so they could copy and upload your memories into the Matrix.
'That wasn't enough though, was it? She kept on at me. She was me and I was nothing. And she was me too. A right vicious little bitch. All the worst bits slung together. She had all the facts, but she didn't understand them. I could see right through her. She'd got all the lurid details, but she didn't know how I felt or what I imagined and that's what I hung on to. But she went on and on, always coming back to the Doctor. Who was he? And why and what was he? And that's what I hung on to. 'Cos I believe in him and she didn't know why!'
The teacup cracked into a dozen pieces in her grip.
Romana's face slid to one side.
There was another woman there. She wore robes the colour of embers and her face was painted silver. Her fingers reached out and touched Dorothée's face.
'It is passed,' she said gently.
'You see, Gallifrey is a temporal anomaly,' Romana said as the others tucked into their tea. 'It exists not only in the Universe of N-Space, but also within its own exclusive time stream. Long before the Time Lords came to power, the ancient Gal ifreyans had a sensitivity towards time and