Doctor Who_ The Paradise of Death - Barry Letts [58]
Greckle moved close to Waldo. ‘Thank you, Waldo Rudley,’ she said huskily. ‘A moon-brothel just suits my mood. It makes my skin feel all sliggly-hoo.’ She moved even closer. ‘All over,’ she said.
Well, really! thought Sarah Jane. In front of everybody, too!
Waldo took a step to the side and walked round her.
‘Take a few deep breaths,’ he said in a hearty voice. ‘It’ll soon go away.’
Greckle was unabashed. ‘Brrrr!’ she said, pretending to shiver. ‘You’re as c-c-c-cold as an ice-lizard, you are. Never mind. We’re going to watch the semi-finals of the Games later. I’ve had the pluralizer hooked up to the stadium transmission. That’ll heat you up.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? Because it’s exciting, that’s why.’
Jeremy looked up as he took his third glass of blip.
‘Wha’ games are those?’ he said in a slightly out-of-focus voice.
‘The games I told you about.’
‘The killing games?’
‘Yes,’ said Waldo, grimly. ‘The killing games.’
Oh Lor’, thought Sarah. Did they have to stay? The prospect of watching people hacking each other to death quite took away whatever party spirit she had managed to conjure up.
‘And what’s wrong with killing games?’ said a voice, a deep voice – an impossibly deep voice.
Waldo turned. ‘Oh, I might have known you’d want to join in,’ he said. ‘Sarah, Jeremy, this is an old sparring partner of mine: Rasco Heldal.’
Before either of them could say ‘Hi’ – or perhaps ‘How do you do’ – the heavy porcine face frowned and spoke again. ‘I said, what’s wrong with killing games?’
Sub-Controller Dogar took his pleasures quietly. He was a watcher by nature; an observer, he would have called himself, even if an uglier, out-of-fashion word sometimes brushed across his thoughts.
He certainly would never have chosen to go to a blip party, though he sometimes had a sneaking envy of the young; nobody seemed to take any notice of the Twelve Commandments these days; they just did what they felt like – but if he’d found himself at one, the last thing he would have done would have been to join in the drigdrig.
True, he experienced a faint sense of physical release as he felt the rhythmic spasms of Rasco Heldal’s muscular body, but even at the reduced level used for surveillance, the volume of the music – if that’s what they called it – and the relentlessness of the jolting soon made him feel quite nauseated.
Vice-Chairman Tragan had removed his own headset as soon as Greckle hauled Heldal onto the dance floor. He sat watching with his pale mauve eyes, waiting for a signal from Dogar.
Thankfully, the dancing stopped at last. Dogar, listening hard for Rudley’s voice, heard him say, ‘Killing games...’ in a disapproving way; and as he found himself speaking in turn, in a heavy booming voice, directly to the Captain. He waved frantically at the Vice-Chairman, who at once donned his helmet. By this time, Heldal was saying for a second time, ‘What’s wrong with killing games?’
Dogar waited tensely for Rudley’s answer.
‘I don’t like them, that’s all,’ he said.
Dogar spoke with the nervous urgency of the inefficient.
‘Is that enough? Shall I send in the patrol?’
‘No, no,’ Tragan answered impatiently. ‘That’s just an expression of feeling. That’s not nearly enough. Yet. Ssh!’
Rudley’s remark had occasioned a chorus of protest, not least from his hostess. ‘But the Games are a flameout!’ she said. ‘Everybody hots at the Games!’
‘That’s one of the things I detest about them,’ answered Rudley, ‘what they do to us – filling us with hate and lust.’
The Vice-Chairman’s face erupted in a surge of bumps.
‘His father. A Temple Guardian, didn’t you say?’
Dogar nodded. ‘Dead now.’
‘Typical Temple cant,’ said Tragan.
‘I certainly hate that Jenhegger,’ said Greckle. ‘I hope the champion rips his liver out.’
Sarah could hardly believe the tide of viciousness that all in a moment rose from the company. With the music stopped, the raised voices had attracted the attention of a large number of the partygoers,