Doctor Who_ So Vile a Sin - Ben Aaronovitch [10]
After lunch she would arrange the bagchairs so that they faced each other in readiness for the afternoon consultation.
They said that the routine was a good sign. They said that it was her instinctive reaction to personality fragmentation. That once she demonstrated an ability to retain a sense of linear time they could start to work on her other problems.
They liked the routine, so it was puzzling that they decided to change it two days in a row.
On the second day she had hardly finished breakfast when her doctor appeared. ‘I hope I am not intruding,’ he said.
‘Not at all,’ she said. She was a bit annoyed. She’d been meaning to punch up Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know after breakfast. Still, the doctor’s early arrival could herald good news.
‘Shouldn’t I clear breakfast first?’
‘I think we can risk it this once,’ said the doctor and sat down on a bagchair.
Dutifully she took her place opposite.
‘Firstly, I’d liked to apologize for breaking into your routine,’
said the doctor. ‘I know how important it is to you.’
‘I thought we might be starting a new routine,’ she said. ‘With the other doctor.’
‘The other doctor?’
‘The one who visited yesterday.’
30
‘Oh,’ the doctor hesitated. ‘That doctor. Of course.’ Another hesitation. ‘How are you feeling today?’
‘I’m not sure. Much the same as always but possibly different.
I’m sorry, that’s terribly ambiguous.’
‘Not at all, not at all,’ said the doctor. ‘I thought you might tell me your impressions of yesterday.’
‘Like what exactly?’
‘Well, for example, what did you talk about?’
‘He asked me how long I had been here and I said I didn’t know. He asked where I was before I came here and I told him –’
There was a stain just above the simcord screen. Sauce from the meatstrips she had eaten for breakfast. She checked around the room. The breakfast tray was lodged in the corner of the room; her bendy spoon was in her hand.
‘Perhaps I should have let you clear away first!’ said her doctor.
‘How long?’ she asked.
‘Twenty-three minutes. You know, I believe your episodes are shortening.’
‘Is that a good sign?’
‘A very good sign,’ said the doctor. ‘Your last recorded episode lasted just over three hours.’
She spent a few minutes picking up the tray and the soft bowls and placing them with the bendy spoon in the right place for the micro-transmat to whisk them away. The doctor said nothing until she was back in her bagchair. ‘What else did you talk about?’ asked the doctor.
‘He asked me about… well you know.’
‘The landing on Iphigenia?’
‘Yes.’
‘You still find it difficult to talk about?’
‘Yes. But it’s easier now, since yesterday.’
‘That’s good. I’m glad we’re making progress.’
‘He asked me why I thought I was here. I told him I’d gone psychotic.’
‘Psychotic,’ said the doctor, ‘is not a word we use in modem psychology.’
31
‘Of course I’m psychotic. I did things to Mbuya and Alexis and… the others. Terrible things. What else would you call it?’
‘A dysfunctional delusional episode.’
A bright rush of blood across the main screen. The ripping silk linen sound the knife made. Mbuya screaming. Mei Feng singing a song about toy dogs.
‘Would you like to talk about something else?’ asked the doctor.
‘I’d rather. What would a functional delusional episode be like?’
‘One that didn’t interfere with your life or those of anybody else.’
‘Would you treat them?’
‘Only if they wanted me to.’
‘How many people are like that? In the Empire I mean.’
‘Human or alien?’
‘I said people.’
‘Six million, seven hundred and six thousand, nine hundred and ninety-six – less than zero point zero one per cent of the population.’
‘Goddess,’ she said. ‘How do they survive?’
‘Many of them use their episodes as the basis of a career in the arts and sciences. Certain forms of delusional episode are associated with the more esoteric branches of physics, the ones dealing with time for example.’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘The other doctor?’
She nodded. ‘He said that there were possibilities that the human mind couldn’t cope with. That probing