Doctor Who_ The Also People - Ben Aaronovitch [85]
'Don't get smug, Doctor. It's your least attractive attribute.'
'Don't worry, God. I've stopped more wars than you've had hot dinners.'
'Yeah, I believe you,' said God. 'And how many have you started?'
FeLixi came out to join him on the breakwater and Chris was glad to see him. The oddly nondescript man was wearing a transparent rain cape over a neat black suit, a small round hat with a forcefield brim which kept his face dry. FeLixi asked if Roz was in town, accepting Chris's rather bland explanation of the events at the Spaceport. Chris was careful not to tell him about the locked door to her room or the drunken screaming that went on during lunchtime.
FeLixi sat down on the Doctor's camp stool. 'I called up the whole sequence,' he said. 'It was very funny. Especially the bit where she fell over backwards.'
'I wouldn't tell Roz that if I were you.'
'You don't think that would be a good idea,' said feLixi.
'That depends,' said Chris, 'on how much time you'd like to spend in a regeneration tank.'
FeLixi made a sour face. 'I'm a martyr to aggressive women,' he said. 'If they can't beat me in a fair fight I don't want to know.' He looked over at Chris, who was surprised to see a whisper of real pain in feLixi's eyes. The pain was gone then almost instantly replaced by a sardonic expression of self-deprecation. 'It must be the romance of danger,' he said.
'I wouldn't tell Roz that either,' said Chris.
'She wouldn't be flattered?'
'No,' said Chris carefully. 'I'm not sure she'd understand.'
'Probably not,' said feLixi and turned his eyes to the grey swell as it attempted the long slow erosion of the breakwater.
Silence. There was something about fishing that promoted silence and the quiet half-whispered conversations that Chris associated with places of worship. The same sense of reverence and isolation, as if his thoughts were loud enough to be heard at a distance. He'd once found a handwritten monograph in the TARDIS broom cupboard: its thesis was that concentrating on a series of exacting tasks elevated the mind to a higher plane of consciousness. It had been titled, Zen and the Art of Machine Gun Maintenance and initialled with a single letter A. He thought he vaguely understood the concept but it was nothing like flying and the wild elation of the skies.
They started talking. Chris found it difficult to keep up his end of the conversation because of the Doctor's proscription of certain subjects. Since it was a safe topic they soon moved on to the progress of the investigation.
'I'm not so sure that God is right,' said feLixi, 'about it having to be a ship or a drone. I mean, it would be easier for a machine but I think God underestimates what an organic person could do with the right equipment. They'd have to know what they're doing though.'
'Why?' asked Chris. 'Couldn't they just get a non-sentient machine to help them?'
'But that would be a risk,' said feLixi. 'How could you be sure that the machines were non-sentient? You would have to use the most basic no-brain stuff and to do that you'd have to have at least a working knowledge of energy field dynamics.'
'That should narrow it down to a couple of billion suspects,' said Chris. 'Any idea how I could check who has that kind of expertise?'
'No,' said feLixi, 'sorry. What would you do back home?'
'I'd run an occupation search through centcomp,' said Chris. 'That's what our central information net is called. That wouldn't work here, would it?'
'No occupations,' said feLixi. 'And the science-based interest groups would regard an association list as privileged data. Especially if they knew why you were asking, which they would since the bar fight last night. I suppose you could ask saRa!qava. I think she used to be involved in field dynamics or something like that. Gave it up to bake bread.'
'Why don't we do that now?' said Chris.
'What's that red thing in the water called again?' asked feLixi.
'Er, the float I think.'
'In that case,' said feLixi, 'shouldn't it be floating?'
The Doctor waited precisely