Doctor Who_ Remembrance of the Daleks - Ben Aaronovitch [55]
another death in a chain of blood that stretched from the future to the past.
I shall be well rid of the Daleks, thought the Doctor.
Something warm was butting him in the back of the knee. It was the Alsatian, snuffling for the Doctor’s affection. He stroked the dog’s head. ‘I wonder who you remind me of?’ The Doctor straightened, sighed and started back towards the van.
He had work to do.
19
Saturday, 16:45
The special weapons Dalek returned to the shuttle in triumph. Behind it floated the Hand of Omega. After the death of the shuttle commander the Abomination had assumed command. Pride filled the mutant as it boarded, the Emperor’s benediction was a clear undercurrent within the encrypted command-net.
The Omega device was placed in the prepared storage module at the rear of the shuttle. The dead pilot was replaced by a warrior from section four. Even now the chosen Dalek’s mind was filled with the relevant database, downloaded from the shuttle’s computer.
The shuttle started to vibrate as the engines warmed up.
The last of the Daleks filed aboard and started lock-down procedures. There were many empty spaces.
‘What are you going to do when all this is over?’ asked Allison.
Rachel thought for a moment. ‘Retire to Cambridge and write my memoirs.’
‘Professor?’ Gilmore appeared at the top of the cellar stairs.
‘Subject to security vetting of course,’ said Rachel.
Gilmore came halfway down the stairs and called down to the two women. ‘The shuttle appears to be leaving.’
Allison leapt to her feet. ‘Good riddance to bad rubbish.’
She’s as bad as Ace, thought Rachel. Was I like that when I was young? Did I just walk away from horror like that?
Suddenly she remembered a beach in August 1940
where the sun was going down in smoke. She could clearly see the stark angular shape of the radar towers against the sky. The sea was like a sheet of silver. She held him close, just to prove that they were both still alive. Yes we did – we spat death in the eye when we fought our war, she decided.
The four thrusters at the base of the shuttle roared. The concrete of the playground became white hot and burst into flame. The shuttle lifted on four pillars of smoke and fire, fighting to be free of the world. It rose slowly at first, then gathering speed it leaped for the sky.
The Doctor stood by the TARDIS and watched the shuttle accelerate into the upper atmosphere. He raised his hat as it departed.
Enjoy this moment, monsters, thought the Doctor.
Enjoy the brief moment of flight as you soar high above this pathetic little world. Except, of course, you can’t. You eradicated such worthless little pleasures centuries ago.
The Doctor held on to that thought. It would make what he had to do easier.
Ace heard the rumble and looked up. A shadow passed over her face. The shuttle shot away high over the houses, the noise of its engines dopplered into the distance. Ace stopped and watched it vanish.
‘Wicked,’ she breathed.
Ace looked around to get her bearings. She was pretty certain that Mike was heading east, out of the evacuation zone, but where?
She jammed her hands into her coat pockets. Inside her left pocket she felt something small and metallic. Her thumb ran down a serrated edge. It was a door key. She took it out and looked at it. Then, putting her hands back in her pockets, Ace set off deeper into Shoreditch.
The girl was skipping. The road slipped away under her feet. The houses drifted past like smoke. The girl tracked the female target as she turned a corner. Probability assessment indicated that the female target would lead the girl to the male target. They were both marked for extermination.
A star burned deep in the heart of the Eret-mensaiki Ska contained in a bottle of gravito-magnetic force. The interface stripped raw power from the plasma core and transformed it into electricity: one hundred and twenty-three