Doctor Who: Transit (10 page)

The servo motors started up again as Blondie emerged from the ramp, creaked like arthritic dinosaur bones as the cradle lifted back into the ceiling. The sounds ticked off the far walls and the ceramic finish of the old trains. Bay fifteen being where old trains went to die, lined up in dust-covered ranks down its thousand metre length. Blondie was grateful that the bad accident wreck was hidden out of view at the end.

As far as STS's accounts subsystem was concerned
Fat Mama
was also a dead train. A pre-war Chinese tank engine that had been cannibalized years ago, nothing more than a collection of barcoded spare parts, keeping old trains on the branch lines serviceable. The maintenance log knew different, as did the more stupid bits of storage records. Every fifty-two hours the system network would have a brief internal argument about the current status of
Fat Mama
but intelligent baffles put in by Credit Card kept the dispute from being flagged for management intervention.

Fat Mama
was a twelve-metre engine built to pull cargo wagons in the period before friction fields and split-section tunnel integrators. Its field generator was powerful enough to shield ten wagons and then drag them through a gateway. The body shell was built around an MHD turbine that provided the power such an inefficient set-up required.
Fat Mama
had started off ugly and thirty years of Dogface's DIY hadn't improved its looks none.

Lambada leant out of a hatch near the water front end and gestured to Blondie to stop the floater where it was. Instrumentation light flushed her face red as she looked back into the cab and yelled something.

A chunk sound came from the mid section of
Fat Mama
and the loading doors swung open. Blondie noticed that they were at least five centimetres thick with two deep holes for the mechanical locking bolts. Dogface was standing in the doorway, he glanced at the bags piled on the floater.

'Where's the kitchen sink?' he asked.

Old Sam picked up the first bag. It was made of linseed plastic and very heavy. Old Sam handled it easily, transferring it from the floater to
Fat Mama's
deck. Watching him started Blondie shaking all over again.

'I didn't know what we might need,' said Old Sam.

Veterans were strong even without the drugs, made that way for the Thousand-Day War. One thing to know that, another to have Old Sam lift you off your feet with one hand and threaten to rip off your face with the other. Answering the questions, because he couldn't think of a cool reply, because he was scared shitless, and because loss of face meant nothing when Old Sam was willing to turn that into a sick joke. 'What moneypen? I don't know nothing about that. Me and her, we just hit it off, never saw her before. Put me down for Chrissakes?'

There was the distinct sound of gunmetal as the last bag hit
Fat Mama's
deck.

'What's all that?' asked Lambada from inside. 'Tools of the trade,' said Old Sam.

The Stop

Benny stared at the words in the book as if willpower alone would decipher them. Picking a page at random she used Zamina's eyeliner pencil to mark symbol correspondence and pattern repetitions. Strictly speaking it was a code-breaking technique but Benny had used it before to identify patterns in alien scripts. A puterdeck could have processed the whole book instantly; even Roberta's woefully primitive home computer would have handled the task in minutes.

Brain is the best tool, she told herself.

Also, even in this century computers were linked to other computers, and use of them was unsafe and therefore forbidden.

Patterns were emerging in the text. Repeated sequences of symbols in groups of two and three. Assuming this was a human language these could be linking words or identifiers. A dull pain started behind her eyes, the concentration was giving her a headache. She managed to continue for another five minutes before the pain grew too severe. Reluctantly she put the book down and lay back on the bed.

Through the bedroom wall she could hear Roberta and Zamina talking in the kitchen. They'd be cooking up some food for the two Dixie Rebs stationed in the hallway. Benny was sure of Roberta's loyalty now but she was worried about Zamina. The girl wasn't hungry enough for what Benny had to offer, she had doubts and fears that could interfere with the programme.

When she closed her eyes Benny caught glimpses of the programme in the patterns of retinal light against her eyelids. Random patches of luminescence that revealed potentialities, vague because the causal path of human behaviour was vague. Nothing for her to do for the moment but switch to downtime while certain scenarios developed.

The book was important, she knew that. She just didn't know why.

Lunarversity

When they got there Yeltsin Plaza was crawling with cops.

Campus Policemen in light blue shirt sleeves were coming and going through the repeating holograph at the entrance of Max's den. Max was sitting crosslegged on the floor outside, head bowed, arms wired behind his back. A detective stood in front of him, making notes on a clipboard.

A mostly student crowd formed a semicircle around the scene, talking quietly amongst themselves. Just about everyone on campus had done some kind of deal with Max at some time, even if it was just for bootlegged software.

Kadiatu put her hand on the Doctor's arm in warning. The detective was wearing a dogskin shirt and red and yellow Mogadishu pumps. She didn't look like local heat at all.

The Doctor didn't even slow down, he walked straight through the crowd towards the detective. Kadiatu paused for a moment and then went after him. She had to push her way through the line of people and duck quickly under the police tape to catch him. The detective looked up as they approached An ID badge pinned to her chest gave her name as
Whiteriver
The hologram on the badge showed a younger woman with glossy black hair and copper skin. The picture's eyes seemed to follow Kadiatu as she moved closer.

The detective opened her mouth to say something.

'What's going on, Whiteriver?' The Doctor's voice had changed, taken on a rougher, world-weary tone. His posture had changed too into something that hinted of tired authority Whiteriver took an involuntary step backwards and the Doctor plucked the clipboard from her hands. He glanced quickly at the arrest form displayed on the impact resistant screen.

Kadiatu straightened her shoulders and tried to look like back-up. Whiteriver's left hand had automatically slipped down to the weapon tucked into the waistband of her skirt. The detective opened her mouth to speak again but the Doctor held up his hand for silence. Kadiatu could see a tiny LED blinking on the comer of the clipboard, indicating that the machine was accessing outside data. Text files went streaming up the screen too quickly for her to read.

Some of the campus cops had stopped piling Max's belongings on the floor and were watching the scene with interest. Any moment Detective Whiteriver was going to recover her balance and start trying to reassert her authority. The watching eyes of the cops and the crowd demanded it.

'Did you get clearance for this arrest?' asked the Doctor without looking up.

'We went through normal channels,' said Whiteriver. There was a hint of belligerence but her hand was drifting away from her gun.

'But not from me,' said the Doctor. The text on the screen was practically a blur, he couldn't possibly be reading it.

'I wasn't aware of any flag on the suspect's name.'

The Doctor looked up from the clipboard and gave her a thin smile. 'Of course not,' he said. 'Our mistake.' He handed back the clipboard, the arrest form back on its screen. The smile became confidential. 'These jurisdictional things are always a problem, aren't they?'

'Yes, sir,' said Whiteriver. 'What should we do with the suspect?'

'Turn him loose,' said the Doctor, 'but not here. Mustn't lose face in the eyes of the public, must we?'

Whiteriver looked grateful. 'No, sir.'

'Oh and by the way, Whiteriver, this conversation never took place.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Carry on.'

Kadiatu's stomach complained all the way back to the throughway.

'I love dealing with hierarchies,' said the Doctor as they left the plaza. 'They're so easy.'

South of the plaza was the student centre and the permanent flea market. Kadiatu followed the Doctor as he slipped through the stalls. He had a way of turning comers as if inertia didn't apply to him that made it difficult to keep up. When he stopped Kadiatu almost ran into his back.

The stall sold second-hand archaeological equipment. The Doctor was staring at the mud-covered soil-acidity probes and ground sonar receivers as if he'd just remembered something.

'We have to go to Pluto,' he said.

4: The Stupid Dead

The Stop

Mariko's
razvedka krewe
ran in silence through the dripping dark, feet slapping on the puff concrete floor. One of them scampered on all fours, weaving between their legs, streaking ahead with sudden bursts of speed until Mariko shooed him back into line. It was too narrow to run in more than single file and every so often the
krewe
had to jump the vertical shafts that yawned unexpectedly in the floor. That's why Mariko let the Reverend Cyclops run ahead. The halogen lamp jammed into his left eyesocket lit the way for the rest of them.

Cyclops had been riding an empty southbound train on the new route that linked the suburbs of Crepe Town with the centre of South Polar. The lamp had been perched on a shoulder rig, all the better to sniff out sinners in the dark comers of the godless. After his conversion Mariko knew that he was nothing more than a maintenance worker going off shift. She didn't know why she had taken him for a priest. But that was reality. Fantasy was more fun.

And the lamp, installing the lamp had been fun too.

She heard the band before she saw the lights. The music rolling down the arrow-straight passage, bass notes shaking the walls, rim shots cracking off the ceiling. They picked up speed. Naran started to hoot, a fluting sound that emerged from around his tongue. The rhythm was picked up by the rest of the
krewe
as they charged the last twenty metres.

The passage terminated in a large natural cavern with a levelled floor covered in arctic moss. A couple of projectors were strung up on the ceiling. They were showing
The Best of the Bad News Show part IV,
vivid atrocity footage and natural disasters tangling around the granite spikes that hung down from the roof.

Most of the music came from the President who led a choir of
speakers
near the back wall supplemented by a couple of free standing stacks. The backbeat came on solid like a heartbeat but the melody was freeform brainwave stuff. Some of the
speakers
were clicking their fingers but the sound was lost over their own output. Food was stacked on linen-covered trestle tables around the other walls and the centre was cleared for dancing.

There were whoops and catcalls as Mariko's
krewe
entered. One
speaker
feeding at a table turned and blew a fanfare, splattering everyone nearby with chocolate cake. Mariko grinned and did a deliberate strut on to the dancefloor; Naran of course went straight for the food. Most of the dancers were
razvedka
with spiky carapaces and killing spurs on their wrists.
Subcontractors
didn't dance, they stood around in tight little groups talking about machinery while the manipulators imbedded in their chests twitched reflexively to the music. There were even a couple of
reps
mixing with the crowd around the food tables. They were easy to spot since they kept their original appearance. The rest of the
reps
would be out on jobs.

All three
razvedka krewes
were in attendance. Mariko waited in the centre of the dancefloor until the other two
krewebosses
had gathered around her.

'This party is symbolic,' said 2Boss, a male that seemed to have been stitched together from leftover body bits.

'Good to kick back after work,' said 3Boss, a diminutive female with a fetching crest of spines running over her scalp and down her back.

'Like the spines,' said Mariko.

3Boss grinned, showing sharpened teeth.

'We've all done sweeps of the Pluto environs,' said Mariko. 'Anything moving?'

'Just normal traffic,' said 3Boss.

'We're dealing with a reactive network here. It's big but slow and it's bound to have defensive systems closer to the core. Now we've got a
rep
stirring the pot at this end.'

'Doing what?' asked 2Boss.

'We don't need to know, but remember the whole system is more complex than previous ones. There's bound to be proactive elements on other reality levels that we're not aware of, so look sharp.'

'What's next?' asked 2Boss.

'Don't know,' said Mariko. 'We party till we get told different.' Naran wandered up to them, tongue buried in a catering-size tub of vanilla icecream. The pink flesh of the proboscis rippled as he sucked.

'I didn't know you could do that,' said Mariko.

3Boss was gazing speculatively at Naran. 'Can I borrow him sometime?'

A door opened in Mariko's mind and abruptly it was full of information. She looked at the others. 2Boss and 3Boss were staring at her intently. They knew. Naran was oblivious, happily finishing off the dregs in the bottom of the tub.

Boss-level data then.

'Prediction,' said Mariko. 'Probe coming up the Central Line - minimum response.' She looked over the crowd of dancers
,
and caught the President's eye. He nodded.

3Boss started hopping up and down. 'I want to go.'

Mariko tested the idea in her mind, it felt right. 'Go,' she told 3Boss.

2Boss watched sourly as 3Boss collected her
krewe
and headed out of the cavern. 'Some people have all the fun,' he said, so Naran sprayed him with icecream.

Central Line

The turbines at the back made a subsonic rumble that vibrated in Blondie's chest cavity. There were no sockets for human interface in the cab; everything was manual. Dogface had plastered masking tape with handwritten labels over the original pictograms. Some of them were jokes - a big central lever was marked
go faster knob.
Sensor terminals bolted on to the bulkhead, whistled and clicked every time they hit a tunnel The stations were confused patches of white light as they howled through them. A noisebox under Lambada's seat was putting out two hundred watts of a Rio-based salsa thrash band called Mea Culpa. The lead singer gave damnation a good name in Portuguese.

Fat Mama
was cranked up to the limit.

Blondie was riding in the right-hand engineer's seat, wedged between the bulkhead and a bank of archaic-looking LCDs and touch pads. Dogface was in the centre seat, big hands wrapped around the manual-drive controls. Lambada and Credit Card were stationed on the left-hand side, each monitoring the systems that were too old for automation. A big red LED over the windscreen showed them shaving seconds off the normal transit time.

But as fast as they ran the priority override ran faster, picked up by sensors in the stations and channelled into tunnel gateways. In the older stations the signal was transmitted as coded patterns of light in spun glass; in the newer stations they ran as a stream of free electrons in room temperature superconductors. At the gateways the signal became theoretical ripples in the redundant marginal zone of the tunnel itself, the probability of an idea of a signal that instantaneously became real at the other end. Real photons and electrons, real information.

Ahead, in the local station nodes, logic gates snapped open and shut. Freight trains switched to sidings, even to the main passenger track, hooting their way past astonished commuters. Making space on the freight line so that
Fat Mama
had a clear line all the way to Pluto.

'I've got a trace,' called Lambada over the music. 'Triton Station. Moving fast.'

'That's fifteen stations ahead,' said Dogface. 'Plenty of leeway.'

'It's coming towards us.'

'Credit Card,' said Dogface, 'get some pixs.'

Credit Card leaned over his terminal and punched in a search protocol. 'I wish you had a plug in.'

'Ganymede coming up,' said Dogface.

'Ready.'

Fat Mama
thundered through Ganymede Station, sucking in data from the traffic net.

'I've never been to Ganymede,' said Blondie.

'You haven't missed much,' Lambada told him.

The surveillance pix came up on the main monitor just as they slammed back into the tunnel. 'That's them at Oberon,' said Credit Card.

'Thirteen stations,' said Lambada.

'Looks like some free surfers,' said Credit Card.

'How many?' asked Dogface.

'Six people, three boards.'

'They must be out of their skulls,' said Lambada. 'Coming down a freight line the wrong way.'

'Whoever heard of free surfers in armour?' said Credit Card.

'Callisto coming up,' said Dogface. 'See if you can get an enhanced image.'

'I never would have thought of that.'

'They just hit Titania,' said Lambada. 'These boys are shifting it you know.'

There was a wash of white light through the cab windows as they went through the station.

'Maybe they're military,' said Credit Card. He touched his throat mike. 'Hey Sam?'

Old Sam was in the back looking after the turbines. Credit Card shunted the pictures on to his repeater screen. 'You ever seen armour like this?'

'Nope.'

'But you guys used to customize yours though, right?'

'We never used to put fucking spines on them.'

'Nine stations,' said Lambada. 'Maybe it's some kind of new gang.' She looked over at Blondie.

'What?'

'You know anything about this?'

'Hey, I'm from the Stop,' said Blondie. 'Free surfing's a rich kids' game.'

'They're going to be expensive paint soon,' said Dogface, 'if they don't get off the line.'

'I'll put up a station warning,' said Credit Card.

Another wash of light - another station. From the back Blondie heard the turbines cycle up a notch. Dogface was pushing the
go faster knob
forward.
Fat Mama
was accelerating.

'Are you sure that's a good idea?' asked Credit Card.

'Seven stations,' said Lambada.

'Where are we going to meet them?' asked Dogface.

'Stazione Centrale de Rhea.'

'Better warn Rhea Traffic Control,' said Credit Card.

'We could just stop at the next station and wait,' said Lambada.

Blondie was thinking about bay fifteen and the Bad Accident. He didn't want to but his mind kept vulturing round to pick at the memory.

'Five stations,' said Lambada.

Dogface had taken Blondie down there on his first day. All the old trains gathering dust under the xenon strips. Dogface walked him down the aisles recounting each engine's name and service history - he knew them all.

'They're at Hyperion and they're not slowing down.'

'Tethys station coming up.'

Dogface had shown him the gutted interior of
India,
President Achebe's wartime command train. It still had its blonde wood floor and strips of oak panelling where equipment had been ripped out.

'Three stations.'

'Everybody strap in.'

Dogface gave Blondie no warning at all, just let him walk round an old Canadian pushme-pullyou and find the Bad Accident waiting for him at the end of the line.

It had happened just after the war. A Honda Pullman exited the Beverly Hills-Hawaii commuter line at Hollywood Boulevard, carrying forty-nine passengers. A fraction of a second later a General Electric Go-Faster Caboose carrying thirty passengers exited the same gateway. The Honda was only halfway out at the time.

The gateway compensator did its job and prevented matter-annihilation from taking place, saving Los Angeles from appearing on that short list of cities that started with Hiroshima. Instead the physical substance of the two trains was smoothly integrated as they emerged from the tunnel gateway. The lucky passengers died immediately.

'Goddamit Dogface,' screamed Lambada, 'stop the train.'

'Too late,' said Credit Card.

Somebody had turned the noisebox off and Blondie had stopped hearing the turbines.
'What's the matter,'
Dogface had said,
'you never seen two trains fucking before?'
It seemed very quiet in the last stretch of tunnel.

'Hey, Lambada,' said Dogface, 'turn the cameras on. We might be able to sell this to Yak Harris.'

Fat Mama
hit something.

Silence banged at Blondie's eardrums.

He felt his body smash into the restraint harness, head snapping forward before slamming back on to the headrest. There was a metallic ripping sound to his left and Dogface started shouting. The cab was shaking, turning the instrumentation into streaks of light. Dogface's voice choked off. Blondie watched as a spike drilled its way out the back of the driver's seat. He thought he saw movement on the outside of the windscreen just before it exploded inwards. Shafts of psychedelic light penetrated the bulkheads to flood the cab as
Fat Mama
lost her shield integrity.

Blondie heard the turbines whine into over-rev as Dogface slumped back off the dead man's switch. Blood was dripping from the point of the spike and Blondie realized that Dogface had been transfixed to the chair through his stomach.

Wind struck his face as they exploded into the station.

The reality transition tore strips of metal from
Fat Mama's
nose. The train yawed violently to the right and rode up on to the platform. Sparks flew up from underneath it as it scraped along the edge of the platform. There was another tremendous lurch as the train settled back on to the friction field.

Somebody was clinging to the nose. Blondie saw a face leaning in through the shattered windscreen. It had human eyes but the mouth was a circular maw lined with concentric rows of teeth. Dogface batted feebly at the creature with his fists, blood was bubbling out of his mouth. The creature put its hands on either side of the windscreen frame and started to pull itself inside. With a sound of grating bone the rows of teeth started to rotate as the mouth inched closer to Dogface's head.

On the other side of the cab Lambada was fighting with her harness to get free. Credit Card was slumped in his seat with a line of blood across his forehead. The creature had its shoulders through the windscreen. Its jaw line was distorting, its mouth growing wider to envelop Dogface's head.

'Hey,' shouted Blondie.