Doctor Who_ Trading Futures - Lance Parkin [78]
‘Baskerville?’
Oleson was looking over at him, also puzzled. 'What the hell is it doing?’ he asked.
‘Baskerville’s not in his office.
‘If he’s controlling that, he must be. Or someone must be. It’s the only teletroop hub in the complex.’
‘Handy to know,’ another voice chimed in.
An old man in an expensive, fashionable business suit. He looked about eighty, the lines and wrinkles in his face were an inch deep, his hair was neat, but thin. But his eyes were sharp and he seemed unaffected by the cold.
‘Who?’ Relker asked.
‘Cosgrove. Jonah Cosgrove,’ the old man replied, as he broke Oleson’s neck.
Relker brought his gun up, aimed it and fired.
But Cosgrove had gone.
* * *
Chapter Eighteen
Boom and Bust
Mather and Anji had a grandstand seat.
The complex consisted of three areas. The nearest was the runway their Concorde sat on, hangars and what were other support buildings for the airstrip. Beyond that, larger, more industrial‐looking buildings. A factory, or warehouses at the very least. Beyond that, smaller buildings – office space, accommodation blocks. It was a compact site, no more than a dozen buildings in total.
Anji tried to figure the place out. She couldn’t see a road – now she was looking, she couldn’t see any car parks. So, you got here by air. Which fitted in with the isolation of the place. This really was the middle of nowhere. Almost all around was nondescript moorland. Flat, with a couple of lonely‐looking trees in the middle distance. No sign of any other habitation, or even agriculture. Not even planes in the sky. Through the windows on the right side of the plane, they could see the runway had been built a short distance from a cliff edge, although it was difficult to see how high the cliffs were.
Although that side would be easy enough to defend, the complex looked more like a light industrial site than a military one. Now, somewhere there was clearly an anti‐aircraft battery – they had been shot at. But this wasn’t a fortress. The buildings were made from corrugated metal and flimsy‐looking concrete slabs. There wasn’t even a perimeter fence. The men surrounding the plane weren’t in uniform, they looked like mercenaries, or paramilitaries. Its best defence was its isolation.
Anji had watched as the tank – the same type of shiny, egg‐shaped vehicle she’d seen on the news back in that Ibiza restaurant – came out of the hangar building. At first, both she and Mather had assumed it was simply reinforcing the men guarding their plane.
They’d been a little surprised to spot Cosgrove outside. Neither of them had seen him leave, or had any idea how he’d got down from the plane. He’d managed to find cover, and edge towards what looked like the command post, near the hangar door.
Then the tank had started firing at the soldiers on the runway.
It had three guns, which all operated independently, and found their targets. Anji was fascinated by the efficiency of the thing – until she remembered she was watching men die.
Mather didn’t understand what was going on. It was too soon for his air force to arrive, let alone for robots to be deployed.
Anji quickly worked out it must be Baskerville in control, working from a computer on board the Concorde.
Within a minute, Dee and Leo came into the cabin, carrying pistols. ‘We’re moving out once the runway is secured,’ Dee announced.
Mather leant over to Anji. ‘If we get a chance, we have to disable the AAA system here.’
She worked out he meant anti‐aircraft artillery before she opened her mouth to ask. ‘How would we go about that?’
‘There will be a radar post somewhere close by. We should aim to disable that.’
Dee was opening up the front door on the left side of the plane. She had already cocked her pistol. Now she was using the door as cover, waiting for her moment.
‘What is this place?’ Anji asked.
* * *
‘It’s a robot factory,’ the Doctor whispered.
He and Malady were right on the edge of the factory floor. Mechanised production lines were assembling RealWar robots, conveyor belts stretching hundreds of feet. The line