by Doctor Who
On the balcony, he slid soundlessly beside her, slipped an arm around her waist. 'All right, babe?'
She smiled up at him, leaned up for a kiss. 'Yeah. Great.'
'You were smiling. Thinking about something nice?'
'Just the old days. How I can't believe this kind of stuff is really happening.'
Paul smiled again. 'Yeah. Tell me about it.'
'I'm looking for that girl,' she said. The one who helped me earlier. Katy, I think she was called. I want to give her something. Dunno what - some tickets or something.'
Paul nodded absently. Tell the guys. They'll sort it out.'
'I will.' Shaneeqi peered over the edge of the balcony, looking at the milling hordes of the party below. She leaned up and kissed her husband again. 'Shall we go and circulate?'
Paul winced. 'I ain't really any good at that sort of thing.
You go. I'll come down in a bit.'
'All right. And tell me if you see that girl,' she said. 'Katy, she's called. Or Kate, I think. Oh, and...' Shaneeqi waggled her HyperCard at him. 'Can you order us some more champagne?'
'I will, babe.'
He watched her go, and smiled as he plugged the HyperCard into the slot in his phone.
125
DOCTOR WHO
The Doctor was busy.
He hadn't come to Hyperville by accident, although he hadn't exactly told Kate about this in great detail yet. He thought he could trust her, but he'd known her less than a day - and, sometimes, humans reacted badly to information overload. Kate seemed good, though. Sharp.
He walked through the vast, colourful ground floor of Fashionista, which was becoming quieter for the evening shift. He was holding his liminal sub-wave energy detector, careful to keep the compass-like object close to his chest whenever he passed the rotating eye of a camera.
Hyperville never closed, but there was always a lull between the dedicated daytime shoppers and the midnight rush. This was the time when the staff managed to snatch quick breaks, and take a breather, a time when the pace and rhythm of the place slowed a little, with the evening murmur only occasionally punctuated by the beeping of cash-tills.
The Doctor turned in a full circle, watching the needle of the detector wobbling. 'Hmm,' he said. 'Inconclusive.'
He narrowed his eyes at the nearest display, consisting of three female dummies in artful dance pose, shiny black plastic limbs draped with diaphanous white material. He flipped his glasses on, peered at them, trying to get as close as possible.
A young store assistant, blonde and burnished, sidled up to him.
'Are you interested in the Muses range, sir?'
'What?' The Doctor turned to face her for a second, looked her up and down. 'Er, no, no. Just looking.'
'For a lady-friend, perhaps? We have some excellent deals on at the moment. Ten per cent off with a phone-linked HyperCard. Muses clothing is eco-centric, ergonomic,
126
AUTONOMY
intimately shaped to fit whatever form. It's the clothing of the future.'
The Doctor grinned. 'No, no, I've seen the clothing of the future. It's not that great. Really. Not much different from today, to be honest. You know. Shirts, trousers, skirts, blouses... the odd tie. Sometimes a very odd tie.'
The girl smiled nervously. 'Right...'
'Oh, yeah. Well, OK, in about sixty years, PVC comes back with a vengeance. And it gets a bit rubbish in the mid-twenty-second century when the 1970s are in again.
Actually, in the twenty-third as well, to be fair.' The Doctor took his glasses off and looked thoughtful. 'But no, mostly you can't go wrong with a classic look.' He peered at the mannequins again. 'I'm interested in these dummies. What are they made of?'
'Sorry?' The girl looked taken aback. She was obviously not asked this question very much.
'It's important. Really, very important. Do you think I could get a sample from one of them? Just a scrape off the hand, or a bit of hair, or...' The Doctor saw the girl looking nervously from side to side. 'No? Oh, all right. I suppose not.'
'It's Plastinol,' said the girl nervously.
'I'm sorry?'
'Well, everything's Plastinol, isn't it? These days.
Practically everything, anyway. It's the latest stuff. You can make just about anything out of it.'
The Doctor smiled. Thank you. That's very useful.'
He shoved his hands into his pockets, and remembered the specimen jar with the Doomcastle vampire's tooth in it.
He needed to check that out. With the TARDIS impounded
- and he wasn't going to waste time trying to track it down right now — he needed somewhere else.
127
DOCTOR WHO
'So I can't interest you, then?' said the girl hopefully.
The Doctor tilted his head to one side. Tell you what,' he said. 'I'll come back tomorrow. See if it's still in fashion. See you!' He hurried out into the mall, dodging the late-night shoppers and keeping a close eye on the Oculator bouncing high above the crowd.
The Doctor was looking for an internet cafe - and it didn't take him long to find one, up on Level Seven, among the fake trees and fountains of Hilton Boulevard. The computers, sleek and silver, had a HyperCard slot on the side of the monitor, but a quick, discreet burst with the sonic screwdriver got one up and running.
The Doctor tapped enthusiastically at the keyboard for a bit, keeping an eye on the staff. When it became apparent that nobody was really interested in what he was doing, he rummaged in his pockets and unloaded a pile of electronic equipment onto the desk in front of him.
'Now then,' he muttered. 'Bit of jiggery... and maybe some pokery...'
'Intruder
detected,'
Tess
called
into
her
wrist-communicator, as she flipped the hatch open and heaved herself up into the WinterZone. 'In pursuit.'
'Do not damage it, Miss Tilbrook,' snapped Max Carson's voice in her ear. The rogue unit needs to be preserved and reprogrammed. Do you understand?'
'Yes, sir.' Standing amid the fake snow, Tess nodded to her team of two men and two women. 'Ready? Let's go.'
They ascended a steep bank of snow, boots holding the slippery ground firmly, and emerged beyond the treeline.
The white expanse below the glittering starlit dome was empty
128
AUTONOMY
- Tess had already used her authority to close it off to the public. On the ridge, she put infra-red binoculars to her eyes and scanned the landscape.
Down in the hollow, Santa's Grotto stood quiet and empty, a small wooden cottage festooned with flashing lights and shiny tinsel. The guardian snowmen, which would normally have welcoming arms out and eyes shining brightly - in a way Tess had to admit she found slightly sinister - were now dull and silent, standing like plump white statues.
And then she saw a flash of movement - pink in the darkness.
There!' she said, pointing. 'Fan out. You two, across the ridge that way and intercept. You and you - with me.'
Tess pounded down the slope, followed by the two guards she had designated.
The Shaneeqi party was in full swing.
The Doctor and Kate descended the illuminated staircase towards the black-and-white chequered floor-Kate nervously, the Doctor with his usual insouciance.
Kate had a good look at the crowd as they came down into the hall. Beneath the sparkling chandeliers, guests circulated in a whirl of genres, styles and epochs. Women in eighteenth-century silk dresses and ornate masks laughed with men in sharp, twenty-first-century designer suits. A couple in matching white-leather outfits and thin ties, looking very 1980s, were chatting happily to a group of Goths in elegant lace and full white make-up. On the far side, near the bar, she saw a crowd of girls in little red-and-black catsuits and matching devil-horns, as if dressed for a hen-night, laughing uproariously at some joke.
129
DOCTOR WHO
A smattering of guests had dressed formally, like the Doctor and Kate, in dinner jackets and modern designer ball gowns - most of these were trying their luck at the gamingtables
staffed
by
smartly
red-waistcoated
croupiers. Pounding synth-pop music bounced around the room, hammered out through invisible speakers above the babble of voices and laughter, and the air was scented with vanilla and cinnamon.
'Quite some party,' said Kate.
'Mmm.' The Doctor was unenthusiastic. 'I've seen better.'
'Hello, darling,' said a tipsy red-haired woman in a red dress and red high heels. 'Don't I know you?'
'Urn, I don't think so,' said the Doctor nervously, looking her up and down. The fingernails were red, too.
Kate was amused. 'Girl in every port, Doctor?'
The woman shrugged. 'It doesn't matter,' she said, quaffing a large gulp of wine. That's not a designer jacket.'
She prodded the Doctor. 'You're cheap,' she added disgustedly, and staggered off.
'Urn... how... did it go with Sir Gerry?' the Doctor asked, wrinkling his nose and trying to pretend that encounter had not just happened.
'Rhiannon's out,' Kate told him, nervously adjusting her elegant silk dress.
I’m sorry?'
'Well, you know, he fired her. It's his little thing. He sort of points his finger at you and says You're out! I think he didn't like her attitude. He told us all to give our initial impressions of Hyperville's strengths and weaknesses in thirty seconds, and I think Rhiannon was just a little too spot-on. Then he went off in one of his helicopters to a meeting in London. Seriously, Doctor, did you know that woman?'
130
AUTONOMY
'No! Oh, look!' The Doctor nodded in relief to the white-jacketed, white-gloved waiter who had arrived, soundlessly, at their shoulder with a tray of wine glasses.
'Hello.' He took a glass and sniffed it. 'What year is it?' he asked.
The waiter remained impassive. '2013, sir.'
'Ah. No, no, I don't mean literally what year. Although, to be fair,' he added for Kate's benefit, I do often ask that. I mean what year is the wine?'
The waiter sighed and raised his eyebrows. '2013, sir,'
he repeated, with just a hint of condescension.
'No, I... oh. Oh, I see. Thank you.' The Doctor took two glasses and handed one to Kate. 'So what about you?' the Doctor murmured, as they stepped forward and blended into the crowd. 'Presumably you didn't tell Sir Gerry what you really thought?'
'Give me some credit, Doctor.'
'And he's not rumbled you yet?'
'Not as far as I know.'
'Good - ooh, look! It's the Little Eye again.' The Doctor nodded upwards, and they saw an Oculator bouncing above the party guests on its little blue jet of gas. It spun round in a full circle, scanning the entire room.
'Won't Mr Carson be watching you on that?' Kate asked.
She still wasn't sure if associating with the Doctor was going to get her into trouble, but she knew it was the only way she was going to find out the truth about Hyperville.
'I hope so. As long as he can see where I am, he won't get suspicious.' The Doctor smiled, raised his glass at the Oculator.
'Suspicious?' said Kate.
'Mmm. Yeah. I was a little bit naughty earlier on. I accessed
131
DOCTOR WHO
Hyperville's new Central Program and did a little poking around. They intend to bring it online at midnight.'
'How did you do that?' she asked, amazed.
The Doctor scratched his ear. 'Well, I cross-matched the resonance codes with the initiation software, and introduced an induction loop into the—' Kate was glaring at him, her arms folded and her eyebrows raised. 'OK, OK.
I... waved a magic wand.'
She grinned. 'See? Keep it simple and everyone's happy.'
She nodded to the stage at the front of the casino hall.
'Look out! Madam's going to address her people.'
Shaneeqi was at the microphone. The room fell expectantly silent. Behind her stood the entourage which Kate had seen earlier, hands on hips in their classic pose: the two pale, besuited young men, the two muscular men and
the
woman
in
mirror-shades
with
flowing,
silvery-white hair to her waist.
Kate glanced up at the Doctor. He was staring intently at the entourage, his glasses on, leaning slightly forward. She narrowed her eyes at the stage. There was something very stiff and formal about the way the entourage was standing, she thought. Maybe that was what they were paid to do.
'... great moment in my career,' Shaneeqi was saying.
'I'm really, really grateful to you all for coming and supporting me like this.'
The Doctor had his energy detector out again.
'Something's wrong,' he muttered.
Kate saw that the needle on it was still oscillating wildly from left to right. At her shoulder, an immaculate, gloved waitress topped up her champagne glass, but Kate hardly spared her a glance.
132
AUTONOMY
'What does it mean?' the Doctor murmured.
'And now,' Shaneeqi said, giggling, 'I want to let someone very special have a few words. He's my rock, my partner, my other half... Ladies and gentlemen, please give a very big hand for Mr Paul Kendrick!'
The room erupted into loud cheers, with many of the guests actually jumping up and down. A woman on Kate's right, one of the crowd in eighteenth-century dress, waved her pince-nez in the air like a football rattle.
'Who's he again?' the Doctor whispered to Kate, as Kendrick, eyes covered with shades, strode on to the stage with a big wave.
Kate tutted. 'Goldenball Paul! The England captain!'
'Right.' The Doctor sounded none the wiser. 'Hang on a minute...'
Kendrick was at the mike, his rather thin voice with its South London twang at odds with his tanned, burnished physique. 'I just wanna say, it's great to see my wife's talent being
recognised
by
somewhere
like
Hyperville.
Somewhere that'll be a place for future generations to come and see what, y'know, the biggest and best of the twenty-first century really looked like.'
'He's deluded!' muttered Kate.
The Doctor was staring at his energy detector. The dial had stopped spinning. It was pointing forwards, at the stage.
Kate glanced down at it. She looked back up at the Doctor.
'Does that mean... ?'
The Doctor tried to shove his way through the crowds of revellers in front of him. 'Everybody!' he shouted. 'Get down! Quickly!'
For a second, Kate was unsure what to do.
133
DOCTOR WHO
Then she saw Shaneeqi, standing at the edge of the stage, looking bemused. She grabbed the girl's hand and pulled her down behind a table by the fire exit. All around them, other revellers were dropping uncertainly to the floor behind the roulette tables and the bars.
She saw Paul Kendrick looking accusingly at the Doctor.
'You, mate.’ he said. 'I want a word with you.'
The crowd suddenly parted, leaving the Doctor isolated in an expanse of dance floor.
'Urn,' he said. 'Right.'
Paul Kendrick smiled.
'Mr Carson told me you might be trouble, Doctor,' he said. 'Seems he was right.'
Miss Devonshire smiled. In the dimness of the control centre, it seemed as if her eyes were glowing a dull green.
'Activate it,' she said. 'Activate it now.'
Max Carson's hand hovered over the main console. For a moment, he looked up at her.
'I want the entire, exclusive world rights to Plastinol,' he said. 'With no room in the contract for wiggle room.'
She rounded on him, eyes harsh and angry behind her glasses.
&nbs
p; 'You have Barbados, Max. Now just do it.'
Max's finger stabbed down on the button.
A blaring, staccato siren began to echo repeatedly through the whole of Hyperville.
Deep, deep below the lowest official level of Hyperville, in the
darkness
of
Level
Zero,
the
pulsing
green
Consciousness thrashed and glowed, as if it had received a burst of new life.
134
AUTONOMY
A sound echoed through the great space - it could have been a howl of triumph, or even a screech of pain.
Out in space, the cluster of rough spheres moved ever closer.
They pulsed with a greater intensity, now, as they skirted the gravitational pull of the great planet Jupiter.
They knew where they were heading.
Kendrick extended his hand towards the Doctor. He pointed straight at him.
His eyes glowed pinkish-red.
The crowd had fallen back, leaving a space around the Doctor. He backed away, though his natural curiosity was, as ever, fighting his fear.
There was a clunking sound from somewhere within Kendrick's arm. A dark line began to form across his fingers, along the joints.
'Oh, dear," the Doctor said softly. 'Should have seen this coming.'
With a fleshy, slurping, unzipping sound, the front half of Kendrick's fingers fell away as if on a hinge, revealing the dark tube of an alien gun barrel buried inside his wrist.
Shaneeqi put her hands to her face and screamed.
135
EIGHT
'This is Hyperville. This is a security announcement.
Please make your way to the nearest exit. Please note, this is an official security announcement. Please make your way quickly and quietly to the nearest emergency exit. Do not stop to collect shopping or other items. Thank you.'
Reece thumped the wall of the hospitality suite for the fifteenth time in as many minutes. Despite the Doctor's request, they had still somehow ended up here.
'Did you hear that alarm? What are we doing in here?
We need to get out and find Mum and Derek!'
Chantelle, feet up on the coffee table, was painting her nails. Unlike her restlessly pacing brother, she looked calm and collected. 'Just calm down, bruv. I'm thinking.'