Doctor Who_ So Vile a Sin - Ben Aaronovitch [11]
‘Was he a simularity projection like me?’
‘Maybe real isn’t the word. Maybe I should have said alien. He sat there, in your chair, but I could tell he was restless – after a couple of minutes he started to pace up and down, up and down.
He asked me about my nightmares. He was very interested in my nightmares.’
‘Did you have an episode while he was there?’
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‘I can’t remember. I may have done. You know I can never remember afterwards.’
‘Did you tell him about your nightmares?’
‘Yes. I told him about the one where I’m married with children.
Have I told you about that one?’
‘No.’
‘I’m on a colony world somewhere. I’ve left the navy and I’m married and we are expecting our first child. I am in bed and…
my wife brings me breakfast because I’m the one carrying the child. Nothing much happens. We just chat about things that need doing to the house, how work is going. I’m a surveyor – I remember that. I’m pretty sure that the landing on Iphigenia never happened. That’s it really, very domestic.’
‘Who were you married to?’
Mei Feng.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the doctor. ‘I’m afraid I upset you again.’
‘How long was it this time?’
‘You were restrained for three minutes and twenty-two seconds
– the episodes are becoming much shorter. Do you remember anything about it?’
‘No. Was I telling you about my dream?’
‘Yes.’
‘What do you think?’
‘I am not here to interpret your dreams – only you can do that.
What do you think your dreams represent?’
‘I think they are alternative lives.’
‘Alternatives to what?’
‘Being locked up here. Some of the lives are better than others, but they’re all things that might have happened.’
‘Is that what the other doctor said?’
‘Yes. He also said that having the dreams and the episodes were a good thing.’
‘Why?’
‘Because otherwise my head would explode.’
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Kibero Patera, Io: 31 December 2981
The dress was unique: a one-off exclusive from the House of Scheherazade. A simple strapless sheath of burgundy silk that clung to Genevieve’s body from armpit to ankle. Panels cut in the fabric exposed precisely delineated strips of her skin, at waist, thigh and the underside of her breasts.
She wore matching slingbacks with eight-centimetre force-field spikes. Her shoulders were dusted with sparkle, her lips and nails painted gold and silver. A single glittering circle held her yellow hair in its elaborate style – an ancient compact-compact disc made into a clasp, an inch across and five centuries old.
The fashion thread of the TopTenPercent media feed later described it as a statement, daringly high-tech in a scene given over to ethnic bad. ‘Retro dela retro,’ said the pundits. ‘What the well-dressed concubine wears to the ball and of course, darling, it eliminates any chance that she’ll wear the same dress as the Duchess.’ (That would have been impossible. Genevieve had already cleared the dress with the event fashion coordinator.) She spent the flight to Kibero sitting carefully upright so as not to crease the dress. A solitary splash of colour among the tasteful grey upholstery of the Ducal shuttle.
There was colour outside the shuttle as well: the ochre, yellow and chrome green of Io herself. The only Galilean moon never to be terraformed and the only planetoid of any size to fall within the fiefdom of baronetcy.
The pilot interrupted her thoughts to point out an active volcano visible to starboard. Genevieve turned her perfect face to the window and watched the plume of sulphur dioxide rise over the limb of the moon as the shuttle began its final descent.
There had been a castle built of grey stone by the sea, and around the castle a town of narrow streets and steep slate roofs. Every tenday Genevieve and her father had ridden out, horses’ hooves sparking on the cobbled streets, to sit in judgement in the villages and farms. There had been banquets and games and falconry.
There had been laughter and music.
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