Doctor Who_ Original Sin - Andy Lane [111]
‘The flickerships?’ Powerless Friendless said. ‘Our frontline fighters? I trained on one of those.’
‘They were brilliant! They looked like they could run rings around anything.’
‘That’s what we thought,’ Powerless Friendless said bitterly, and slid off along the catwalk towards the ship.
Cwej watched him go, wondering what he had said to depress the Hith.
‘Ever considered a career in the diplomatic service?’ Forrester asked as she walked past Cwej, clapping him on the shoulder.
Cwej felt a flicker of anger, and bit down on it before he said something he might regret. Shaking his head, he followed Forrester along the catwalk. He didn’t usually get annoyed at her banter. He must have been more tired than he had thought, despite his subjectively long rest in the time tank.
Bernice’s long stride brought her up to his side as he walked. She was looking around at their surroundings. Cwej, after his initial wide-eyed reaction to hyperspace, had been trying to ignore it. There was something about it that reminded him of a large blind spot; he felt that if he looked at it for too long, he would want to throw himself off the catwalk.
He looked backwards, but that was worse. The entrance doorway hung unsupported in hyperspace at the end of the catwalk. What would happen if it closed? Would it vanish? Leave them stranded?
He shuddered, and gazed resolutely back at the approaching ship, trying not to wonder how he was managing to breathe in hyperspace.
‘I wonder how they keep this tunnel from drifting off,’ Bernice said. ‘I mean, anchoring something to one spot in hyperspace must be quite an engineering feat. There are tides, whirlpools and all sorts of things. Presumably the air just hangs around here on the basis that it hasn’t got anywhere else to go.’
‘Haven’t got a clue,’ he said, gulping.
‘I prefer you without the fur and the pointy ears, by the way.’
He smiled at her. ‘Thanks,’ he said, touched. He could feel a blush spreading up from his neck, and walked faster, hoping that Bernice would mistake it for signs of his exertion. Joining Forrester and Powerless Friendless by the 189
knobbly hull of the ship, he gazed up in wonder at the brightly coloured spikes and spines and the smooth curves of its hull.
‘It’s incredible,’ he murmured.
Powerless Friendless extruded a pseudo-limb and caressed the ship’s skin.
It seemed to bend slightly under the pressure of his tentacular fingers.
‘No sign of any power,’ he said. ‘I was half afraid that they might have found a way to turn the engines on, but without the nexus –’
‘The nexus?’ Bernice asked, but Powerless Friendless turned away.
Cwej ran his hand over the hull as well. Turning to Powerless Friendless, he asked, ‘What was it armed with?’
‘Klypstromic warheads,’ the Hith said softly, ‘quark projectors, high-power masers and long-range transdyne impellers. All the energy we saved by using the new power source was diverted to weapon systems. It was our last, best hope.’
Cwej’s breath hissed out in a long impressed exhalation.
‘Incredible,’ he murmured. ‘This ship could’ve won the war.’
‘Tell me about it,’ the Hith murmured.
‘Powerless Friendless,’ Bernice said, ‘you mentioned that this ship had a new power source. What was it?’
‘Something called an icaron ring,’ he said. ‘That’s what the engineers called it. Apparently these icarons are particles that prefer to be in hyperspace.
That’s their natural habitat. The icaron ring kept them circulating inside a magnetic Klein bottle. The theory was that if enough energy was pumped in, they started to slip into the real universe.’
Icarons. That word was familiar. Cwej scratched his head, trying to recall what it meant. He could see from the puzzled expression on Forrester’s face that it was familiar to her as well.
‘Icarons,’ Bernice mused. ‘The Doctor mentioned them.’ Her face suddenly brightened at the same time that Cwej remembered where he had heard the word before.
‘Purgatory!’ they exclaimed together.
‘The things that drive people mad,