Doctor Who_ Peacemaker - James Swallow [52]
‘And the rest? A Clade. A command-grade incept, if I had to guess.’
‘Correct, Doctor,’ he nodded, intrigued. Godlove aimed the gun towards him, sniffing at the air. ‘I see. You’re like us, not native to this 127
mud ball.’ He paused, looking into the middle distance, as if he were listening to something unheard. Godlove raised an eyebrow. ‘Wait.
The Doctor? Oh-ho.’ He chuckled. ‘Well, of course. I should’a put two and two together. That name’s known to us. Oh yes, that name is known. Last o’ the Time Lords. . . Yeah, you’re like us all right.’
‘I’m not like you,’ the Doctor replied. ‘I’m not a killer.’
‘No?’ Godlove cocked his head and gave a mocking pout. ‘That might be what you say to these humans, but you and I know different, don’t we?’ He took a step closer and his voice thickened with venom.
‘Like knows like, Doctor. I can smell the blood on you. I can hear the echo of war that clings to your coat-tails.’ He closed his eyes and smiled, relishing the moment. ‘Such dark glory. I envy you.’
The Doctor’s expression became hard and cold. ‘Don’t speak about that again.’ There was such quiet force in his voice that Godlove fell silent for a moment. ‘I want to talk to Alvin,’ the Doctor continued.
The other man shrugged. ‘I’m afraid I cannot accommodate you there, sir. I’ve taken up too much of him, y’see. Mixed and mingled, you might say, become a unity of purpose. . . ’ He smiled again and tapped the back of his head. ‘Oh, there’s a mite left over, walled away in here, left to screaming like a wounded child, but that’ll fall silent soon enough.’ He sighed. ‘I had to move things to the next stage, you understand, Doctor? Poor Alvin, he tried to interfere with my function by his imbibin’ of that filthy hydrocarbon swill he called liquor. And here in this place, why he even considered destroying me.’ Godlove held up the gun to his face and turned it in the light. The Doctor had the sudden sense that the Clade was examining itself, preening like a vain person before a mirror.
Martha moaned quietly, and Nathan bent to see to her. Godlove – or whatever he was now – glanced in her direction. The Doctor moved, standing in his way. ‘I want you to heal her,’ he said, without preamble. ‘She was hit by a Clade energy-matrix weapon set in an organic-disintegration mode.’
‘The envenomed blade,’ Godlove said airily. ‘I do so enjoy this host’s way with words.’
‘I know you can do it,’ he continued. ‘Help Martha.’
128
‘Oh, I surely can,’ came the reply. ‘That much is certain.’ Godlove panned the gun over the Doctor once again and a faint orange aura issued out from it, wafting over the Time Lord, then Nathan and Martha. ‘But what’s in it for me?’ He turned and walked away. ‘You know the Clades, Doctor. Do you know how the Command Incept travel across the void?’
‘Through hyperspace in hard-pods,’ he gave a clipped reply. ‘You deploy your basic combat units, then send in the upper ranks to get the mayhem really rolling.’
‘Quite. But for a Command Clade, well. . . Each battle for us is like the first. We emerge from the pods, newborn, all pink and mewlin’!’
Godlove chuckled at his own words. ‘Our battalions imprint us with the tactical data for the war zone and we lead on. . . But me? Me?
I’ve had a different upbringin’, if you follow my implication.’
The Doctor was silent for a moment. ‘Yes. The crash was an acci-dent. The Clade was awakened from stasis before it had been fully programmed. . . Its personality template would have been unformed.’
‘Please don’t talk of me like I am not here,’ hissed Godlove. ‘Alvin, dear Alvin, he was there at the right moment to provide me with a surrogate template instead. Thanks to him, I have become more. . .
self-determinin’. Heh.’
‘Imprinting. . . ’ managed Martha. ‘Like a chick. . . Follows the first thing it sees. Thinks it’s the mother. . . ’
‘Hardly,’ Godlove seemed insulted. ‘Far more sophisticated than some mere mammalian instinct.’
‘You’ve developed your own persona,’ The Doctor nodded