by Stephen Cole
‘We don’t know what this stuff does,’ Roba grumbled. ‘What if we disconnect life support or something?’
Creben smiled wanly. ‘We put it back together. Quickly.’
‘You’re funny,’ Haunt told him. ‘Now get on with it. This is going to be our base, and we’re going to make it as secure as it can be. Tovel - see to Shade. Sounds like his face needs stitches.’
‘He’s asleep,’ Polly called over.
Tovel smiled ruefully, tapped the medical kit. ‘Not for much longer.’
The soldiers moved to obey, without further question. Polly and Ben nervously joined the Doctor and Haunt.
‘I wonder,’ the Doctor mused aloud. ‘What intelligence is coordinating this affair, and to what end?’ He nodded, pursed his lips. ‘Yes. Yes, that is what we must ask ourselves.’
‘It’s madness,’ Haunt muttered. ‘A madman’s scheme.’
‘I can’t believe Shel was a...’ Ben trailed off. ‘What was he?’
‘A cyborg.’ Haunt’s voice was hollow. ‘They’re only used for intelligence work. Programmed never to give themselves away.’ She looked pained, pale. ‘I never knew what he was.
My last adjutant was reassigned six months ago, and in all that time I never knew...’
‘No one could have guessed his true nature,’ said the Doctor. ‘But now that we do know, we must decide how it affects our judgement of the situation.’
Polly remembered now what the Doctor had been talking about earlier. ‘Until both DeCaster and Pallemar vanished,’
she pointed out, ‘there was one Schirr missing for each
person missing.’
The Doctor steepled his fingers together. ‘Quite so. And the Morphiean sciences - as practised by these Schirr also, let us not forget - place the emphasis on the body.’
‘What’re you saying, Doctor?’ Ben asked uncertainly.
Haunt seemed to think she knew. ‘That Shel used Lindey and Denni’s bodies to somehow reanimate the corpses of DeCaster and his disciples?’
Ben shrugged. ‘Figures. Ten of them for ten of you.’
‘Before we came along,’ Polly pointed out. ‘But in any case, there’s eleven of us now - if you can even count Shel since he’s a robot – and six of them. How does that work?’
‘And even with the stasis field jammed in place thanks to Shel’s handiwork,’ said the Doctor, ‘the corpses seem able to come and go as they please.’ He considered the problem, his eyes darting from side to side. ‘Then there’s the sickness.
Again, affecting the body. Severely so in the cases of Shel and Shade. I imagine the interface between Shel’s flesh and circuitry has begun to break down as the effect increases.’
‘Making him crazy?’ Polly asked.
‘Presumably, having brought you all here and set events in motion, his task is complete...’ The Doctor swung round to Polly. ‘My dear, do you still itch all over?’
‘Well, yes,’ Polly said worriedly. ‘But I feel fine in myself.’
She considered. ‘I feel better than fine.’
‘Me too.’ Ben chipped in, scratching his arms. ‘I feel like I could go on forever.’
Haunt’s eyes were red-rimmed, her face shiny with sweat.
‘You think our own bodies are being affected by something on board?’
The Doctor agreed with her genially, as he might if someone had offered him a sweet sherry. ‘Yes, I’m afraid it’s possible.’
Polly jumped as Roba leaned in over her shoulder. He looked furious, sweating profusely.
‘Who gave you all the answers, old man?’
‘No one gives me answers, sir,’ the Doctor retorted. ‘I seek them out for myself, as anyone can.’
‘Great, OK - so what’s gonna happen to us?’ Roba was fidgeting, uncomfortable. ‘Seeing as our bodies are being
affected’.
‘I don’t know yet.’ He half-smiled at Roba. ‘But the truth will come in time, I have no doubt.’
‘Think you’re so smart,’ Roba hissed. ‘But we still don’t know a thing about you.’
‘No, indeed, you do not.’ The Doctor seemed almost amused by this comment.
There was a long tear in the sleeve of Roba’s combat suit, and Polly could see a bandage beneath it. He’d been hurt.
Maybe that was why he was acting like a bear with a sore head.
Ben scowled at the huge man. ‘Ain’t you got a barricade to build, Roba?’
Polly looked to Haunt to break this up before it got any nastier. But the marshal’s eyes were shut, her lips pressed together. She looked fit to drop.
A second later, she did, clutching her side. Her head smacked into the solid stone floor. Her eyes snapped open, unseeing, and a trickle of blood stained her lip as she bit her tongue. It wasn’t enough to stifle her low moan of pain.
Polly turned to Roba, expecting him to lift his fallen marshal. But he just stood there and stared at Haunt in hurt disbelief. Like a child learning there’s no Father Christmas, no such person as Superman.
‘Dear, dear,’ fussed the Doctor. ‘We must help her, quickly.’
‘There’s an airbed over there,’ Polly said, struggling to keep calm. She gestured to the translucent rectangle of Shel’s abandoned force mattress. ‘Ben, help me carry her.’
Tovel rushed over from Shade’s side with the medical kit.
Creben came over to join Roba, staring on in astonished silence as Polly and Ben lifted Haunt over to the force mattress. Polly felt the considerable muscles in the woman’s arms and shoulders twitch and clench.
‘Take more than instant sutures to fix this,’ Tovel breathed.
‘What do you think’s wrong with her?’ she heard Creben ask behind her.
‘A physical malaise of the most extraordinary kind, ‘was the Doctor’s utterly unhelpful diagnosis.
As Ben tried to straighten out Haunt’s sweaty form on the mattress, she gave a rattling gasp of pain. He snatched his hand away.
‘What is it?’ Polly asked.
‘Not sure,’ Ben said. ‘A big lump or something, above her hip.’
‘She was holding her side before,’ Polly remembered.
Tovel took a scalpel from the kit and cut with difficulty through the damp fabric of Haunt’s combat suit. The pale skin beneath was dominated by a huge red swelling, like a mosquito bite gone septic.
‘What we gonna do?’ Roba whispered hoarsely to himself over and over. He stared down at Haunt, fearfully. ‘What we gonna do?’
‘Is something inside that thing?’ Ben wondered.
The Doctor had by now arrived to investigate, shooing them out of his way as he peered closely at the swelling through Victorian-looking pince-nez. ‘I don’t think so. It is more likely to be an abnormal growth of some kind.’
‘A tumour?’ Creben didn’t sound convinced. ‘She’d never be on active service with -’
The Doctor interrupted him, removing the pince-nez. ‘I imagine it has never been detected before. This effect I’ve been speaking of, it must drive out impurities in the flesh.’
‘Like poor Shade’s face,’ whispered Polly. She glanced at Tovel. ‘How is he?’
‘Better than he should be,’ Tovel muttered. ‘Those sutures sting like nothing else, but he didn’t even stir.’
Ben, predictably, seemed less interested in Shade’s welfare, still grappling with the Doctor’s explanation. ‘You mean this tumour or whatever is just being...’ Ben groped for the right words. ‘Pushed out of her?’
The Doctor nodded. ‘It’s remarkable, quite remarkable.’
‘I’ll do what I can for her,’ said Tovel, rummaging in the medical kit. ‘Jesus, what the hell is happening to us?’
Roba turned, pushed roughly past him. He got back to building his barriers.
V
‘I don’t see no angels out here,’ Frog said, playing her torch beam along the amorphous features of the giant stone figures that flanked the end of the narrow passageway to the control room.
‘That’s good.’
‘It’s not good. There were a bunch of them out here. That means they can move too .’Joiks shuddered.
‘We’re alone out here,’ Frog promised him.
Joiks nodded, nervously. ‘I guess we’d hear them anyway.
They got wings... Make a sound like no bird you ever seen...’
‘Weren’t no birds where I grew up.’
‘Weren’t nothing where you grew up.’ Joiks swept his torch beam around again, wanting to be sure.
‘Listen,’ Frog said, and lightly took his arm. ‘Stay cool. Ain’t no angels here.’ She paused, took a step closer. ‘And I can prove that if you want.’ The words buzzed quickly out of her, as if before she could change her mind.
Joiks turned to face her, lowered the torch until it lit them both from beneath. ‘What you talking about?’
‘Nothing.’ Don’t make a joke out of this, Joiks. ‘Nothing much.’ Just for once. ‘It’s...’ Frog stopped. She hated her voice. There was some stuff she could never ever say out loud, even to herself, because of how it would sound. She turned off her torch, took the deepest of deep breaths, and concentrated on modulating the words. ‘Been a long time, is all. Since anyone…’
Joiks looked at her, realisation slowly dawning. She waited for him to smirk, to burst out laughing that she could even think that kind of thing, let alone have the nerve to act on it, looking the way she did.
He didn’t smirk. Just stared at her with a funny expression.
‘You wanna get with me, Frog?’
No, she thought. She didn’t really. Joiks was an idiot, a bully, she didn’t even like him. But people said he really wouldn’t say no to anyone, and right now...
She tuned her voice down to a husky whisper, one she could hardly hear herself. ‘We could turn the torches off if you didn’t want to look.’
He dropped the torch, which fell with a clatter and rolled against the wall. He became a silhouette to her. Too scared to move, she let him come to her. His fingers moved to the zip at the top of her suit, hesitated, then yanked it down. She felt herself start to shake as he slipped his hand under the cold fabric. His palm was rough as it brushed over her skin. That was all she could feel, the roughness. She wanted to open up to him, but it was like her body was dead.
Joiks suddenly pulled his hand away. ‘Jesus, Frog.’
‘What is it?’ Her voice rapped out in fear, a high buzzing gurgle. There was something in his tone, something that went beyond simple disappointment. She pushed her own hand inside her jumpsuit, but still couldn’t feel a thing.
Joiks had grabbed his torch. He shone it at her torso.
Frog looked down automatically and saw her pale hand was white against shiny pink flesh beneath. There was a huge patch of it on her right side. Sticky, coarsened skin, like some graft which wasn’t taking.
Or which was taking over the rest of her.
She stared up at Joiks, her eyes wide with shock.
He pulled out his gun, grabbed hold of her arm and forced her ahead of him back down the passageway, moaning in terror.
Chapter Eleven
The Road of Dreams
I
Polly heard the sobs ahead of the stumbling footsteps.
Creben and Roba both stood up, drew their guns, barely sheltered behind the flimsy barricade they had erected.
She gasped as Frog was marched into view by Joiks. One hand was twisted behind her, tight in the big man’s grip, and the other clutched at her gaping suit.
Joiks shouted over the alarmed babble that started up at their entrance. ‘She’s changing!’
Everyone fell quiet. Polly turned to the Doctor. He was watching closely, his beady eyes narrowed. Ben rose to his feet, glanced uncertainly at Polly.
‘Changing?’ Creben questioned.
‘Her skin. Big patch of it ain’t even human.’ Joiks looked wildly into Creben’s eyes, into Roba’s. ‘Looks like Schirr skin.’
‘Schirr?’ Roba’s eyes widened.
Frog shook her head mutely, fiercely. Then she hung it.
Joiks tried to force Frog through a gap in the barricade ahead of them. Her thigh caught against a sheet of metal from the back of a console. The clanging it made as it fell woke Haunt from her feverish sleep. She stared round, bewildered. Tovel rested a hand on her shoulder to try to calm her.
‘What’s your game, Joiks?’ Ben shouted. ‘You’re hurting her!’
‘Am I?’ Joiks sneered. ‘She’s changing. How long before she tries to hurt us?’
Get off me,’ Frog shrieked as she struggled, teeth gritted, eyes screwed up. She looked like she wanted to hurt Joiks right enough, and Polly couldn’t blame her.
‘Show us what you mean, Joiks,’ said Creben.
Joiks twisted harder on Frog’s arm. She threw her head back and hissed like a cat. He slipped his other arm under her shoulder and brought his hand back round behind her neck, until he held her quite helpless. Frog’s suit was flapping open to the waist. Beneath it she wore a cropped grey top, and below the hem Polly glimpsed something sticky and sore-looking.
‘What are you all playing at?’ Ben shouted. ‘Frog’s your mate!’ The men ignored him. ‘She’s not well! You can’t treat her like that!’
‘Hold her still, Joiks,’ Creben snapped.
Frog kicked at him as he came closer, so Roba seized hold of her ankles. If his bandaged arm was hurting him he gave no sign. He just stared at Frog, who went on struggling as Creben advanced.
‘I must insist you let me examine this woman in a proper manner,’ the Doctor thundered, tapping Creben repeatedly on the shoulder.
‘Show him,’ said Tovel. ‘Maybe he can help her.’
Roba looked angry. ‘Whose side you on, man?’
Tovel shrugged. ‘Frog’s, maybe.’ Now he looked at her.
‘Frog, sweetheart, give it up, OK?’
Polly realised guiltily that Tovel was the only one of them who’d actually talked to Frog like she was still a person, and not some wild dog that needed putting down. ‘We want to help you.’
‘Help her?’ Joiks echoed. His face was pearled with sweat as he clung grimly on to her. ‘Look at her! Look!’
Creben stepped aside, and now Polly caught a vivid glimpse of Frog’s bare midriff. There was an enormous sticky patch of raw, shiny flesh, a deep pink like new skin growing back round a wound. It was puckered with the ridges of strange, powerful muscles, and pulsating like a new heart beat beneath it.
She turned away, feeling revulsed. Joiks was right. The patch of skin was identical to that of the Schirr on bloody display on the platform.
‘What do you make of it, Doctor?’ she heard Ben ask quietly.
‘Well, my boy, well...’ The Doctor cleared his throat. ‘I would say massive cellular disruption resulting in spontaneous tissue generation. Her genome is being aggressively altered by some alien influence.’
‘Come again?’
Creben acted as interpreter. ‘She’s becoming a monster.’
Polly span round at this. ‘No!’ she said helplessly.
‘What did I tell you,’ Joiks spat. Frog finally let herself go limp in his grip. She looked exhausted. Now she was just fighting against the tears that still forced their way out of her.
Ben turned to Tovel. ‘Ain’t there something in your box of tricks you can give to her?’
‘Yeah, Tovel?’ Roba joined in. He seemed to have changed his tune. ‘We can stop this thing, right?’
‘It is a sickness,’ the Doctor said, nodding. ‘Whereas your leader and Shade have had impurities driven from their bodies, Frog is becoming contaminated in some way.’ His voice wavered: ‘I am sure we can reverse the process.’
‘You don’t sound so sure to me,’ Roba said, letting go of Frog’s ankles.
Joiks sagged under Frog’s full weight, almost lost his balance. He shook his head. ‘Reckon the only cure for her’s right there in Creben’s hand.’
For a long, long second, Creben looked down at his gun.
Before he could do another thing, Tovel swiped it from his grip. It skittered across the floor.
‘You can forget about using that,’ he said flatly.
‘What gives, Tovel?’ Joiks hissed. ‘You marshal now, stretcher-bearer?’
Tovel gave a cheerless smile. ‘Well, I don’t know, Joiks, are
you?’
Roba nodded back at Haunt’s prone form on the force mattress. ‘Someone better be.’
‘I should take command,’ said Creben stepping forward.
‘How’d you figure that, brain boy?’ snapped Joiks.
‘I graduated to Elite training faster than any of you,’ Creben said simply.
‘So you got less field experience than any of us,’ Roba pointed out.
‘What else you got?’
‘Gentlemen, please,’ the Doctor said heavily. ‘Listen to yourselves. Divisive forces are at work here. They seek to spread terror... will you fight amongst yourselves, or will you pit your wits against these forces and defeat them?’
‘Do I have to kill you, old man?’ Joiks asked like it was a serious question. ‘Is that what it’s gonna take to keep your mouth shut?’
Tovel stepped in quickly. ‘If he opened it to yawn he’d be speaking more sense than you, Joiks. You’re not in the Incendiaries now, you got witnesses, OK? So let Frog go.’
Ben stood beside Tovel. ‘You heard him.’
‘Hey, good for you, Tovel.’ Joiks laughed mockingly. ‘You got shorty’s vote. I bet the little girl will be in your gang too!’
‘That’s enough.’
It was a long way from Haunt’s usual bellow, but it arrested everyone like a gunshot. She was facing them on her knees. She looked like death, pale and clammy, both hands were clamped against her side. She swayed slightly, but her gaze was defiantly steadfast. The looks on the soldiers’ faces were all identical - like rowdy children caught red-faced and red-handed up to no good.