Doctor Who_ Remembrance of the Daleks - Ben Aaronovitch [23]
‘Well, Doctor?’ asked Gilmore.
‘Group Captain,’ said the Doctor, ‘about the evacuation.’
‘I have been in direct contact with High Command and they have agreed to a staged quiet withdrawal under the Peacetime Nuclear Accident Provisions. They felt that given the state of the current government...’
‘Thanks to Miss Keeler,’ said Allison.
‘They felt, Miss Williams,’ Gilmore looked sharply at the young woman, ‘that the initial stages could be carried out under the aegis of the Intrusion Counter Measures Team. The D-notice committee has been informed and a cover story prepared.’
‘What is it?’ asked Rachel.
‘I have no idea.’ said Gilmore with surprise, ‘not my department.’
Ask a stupid question, she thought.
‘Now, Doctor,’ Gilmore said briskly, ‘since you hold my career in your hands, I hope you can justify my faith.’
‘With respect, Group Captain,’ said the Doctor, ‘your career is magnificently irrelevant.’
Rachel saw Gilmore flinch as if he had been slapped.
Emotions rippled across his face – anger and wounded pride. For a moment it was a face of a young lieutenant, lost on a moonlit beach. Then twenty-three years of memory clamped down and it became a warrior’s mask again.
‘Any more transmission sites?’ the Doctor asked Rachel.
Rachel checked the map. ‘Just the one at the school.’
‘Good,’ said the Doctor, ‘I need a direct line to Jodrell Bank and, let me see,’ his brow creased, ‘1963 – the Fylingdales installation.’
He seized a notepad and scribbled figures. ‘Order them to search these localities for high orbital activity.’ He gave Rachel the note: he had written six groups of three digits, meridian and polar co-ordinates.
‘The detector vans should be moved so they can cover this area here and here.’ He marked the maps with red crayon. ‘All air and ground forces must be ordered to avoid engaging the enemy at all costs. We must act with extreme caution.’
‘And if we don’t?’ asked Allison.
‘Goodbye civilization as you know it.’
Ace was bored – really bored. The steam radio on the table was playing music that was all windy strings. Some jazz would be nice, a bit of go-go better, or even house or something by that trio of blonde bimbos whose name escaped her. Anything would be better than Dennis Boredom and his terminally tuneful string quartet. She had already tried the television, but all that showed was some woman with a posh accent thick enough to insulate cavity walls who played a piano while a wooden donkey jerked up and down.
And people get nostalgic about this decade, she thought.
In seven years I’ll be born; in twenty-four years I’ll be sweating gelignite and something will happen – what did the Doctor call it? – an ‘adjustment’. An adjustment will happen and take me out of time. Ace decided she liked that. It could be worse: it could be Perivale.
Ace went to the window and pulled back the chintz curtain. A couple of boys were kicking a football around the street. She watched them, and then she noticed square of cardboard in the window. It was hanging face outward; Ace took it off the hook and flipped it over. It was a hand-lettered sign which read:
NO COLOUREDS.
Ghost smell of disinfectant and charred wood.
Ace snatched up her jacket and rucksack, almost choking on the memories.
‘I’m just going out for some fresh air,’ she called out angrily. Not knowing or caring whether Mrs Smith heard, Ace ran out of the house, slamming the front door behind her.
‘What’s next on the list?’ asked Mike.
Allison ran her finger down the sheet of paper attached to the clipboard. ‘Parabolic reflector, twenty to thirty centimetres.’
‘What’s that in English?’
‘Twelve inches or thereabouts.’
The Doctor had dashed off the list in the map room and handed it to Gilmore. He had handed it to Rachel, who, of course, had handed it to her. Allison and Mike had then scoured Maybury Hall