Doctor Who_ Match of the Day - Chris Boucher [110]
The android was a powerful machine and subtle in its operation but lying and the possibility of being lied to did not seem to be part of its understanding. In its efforts to reason him into following directions to where it said the Lady Hakai was waiting, the thing had been quite prepared to show him the pseudo-grav generator. He had told it that his life‟s ambition was to see one up close and that he would follow whatever instructions he was given as soon as he had. He also told it that, as part of his culture and religion, he was required to take trophies from winning fights and hold them briefly and that was why he was keeping close to him, for a sacred period, the machine he had taken from the dead crewman.
All this nonsense had been accepted without question and when Keefer thrust his trophy into the guts of the generator the android had seemed genuinely surprised by what had happened. He had left it trying to remove the obstruction and repair the damage.
By the time Keefer reached the mock courtroom it was, as he expected, in chaos. What he did not expect was the strange group of people involved in the general mayhem. As well as the Fat Boys flapping around, there was a weirdly dressed, curly-haired man who seemed to be wrestling with a slim woman and an angry fat man. He recognised the figure of Melly Finbar clinging to a light fitting and wondered fleetingly what he was doing there. Most unexpected though was the girl in the animal skin tunic, who was flying at the Lady Hakai. Shots from the woman‟s ceremonial handguns tore into a Fat Boy and the ornamental glass dome. Keefer watched as the girl skilfully dodged the Fat Boys and reached for the Lady Hakai.
And then everything changed once more when the pseudo-grav abruptly came back on.
The Doctor, Sita and Ronick collapsed to the deck in an untidy heap. As the Doctor extricated himself he was relieved to see Leela back on the deck as well. He didn‟t know what she had been planning to do if she had got her hands on Hakai and he was fairly sure she didn‟t know either. It looked as though she might be planning another try, however, and all around in the half-lit confusion he could see hakai-warriors picking themselves up, alert for danger and ready for orders. Hakai had only to give the word, he thought, and Leela would be sliced and diced.
He looked up at the woman, who was still sitting in the high backed chair, still brandishing the two handguns. It occurred to him that if she chose to start firing now the shots would be a lot more accurate. It was definitely time to get themselves back to Finbar‟s ship and leave. Where was Finbar? He glanced around and that was when he noticed the young man armed with a hakai-warrior‟s short sabre. He was moving to thwart Leela‟s pending attack. For a moment the Doctor thought he was a crewman but then he simply put a restraining hand on Leela‟s arm and glared up at Hakai.
„Why did you pay to have me dead?‟ he demanded. „What was the reason?‟
To the Doctor‟s surprise the woman smiled benignly down at him. „I want to see you fight,‟ she said. It was a statement of fact, not a request or an explanation, the Doctor realised.
She did not think of the young man as being the same as her in any way at all. It was like listening to a very young child talking to a toy. „I want to see you fight her.‟
„Why did you send an android to kill me?‟
So that was it, the Doctor thought. This is Keefer and that was what brought him and them here.
„You do not ask me questions.‟
„It‟s Keefer,‟ Sita whispered. That must be Keefer.‟
„Of course it scuffling Keefer,‟ Ronick muttered.
„I don‟t fight for your personal amusement,‟ Keefer declared.
„Why did you want me dead?‟
More to the point, the Doctor thought, why doesn‟t she just give