So Vile a Sin (24 page)

The Doctor woke up on board a shuttle. ‘You were dreaming,’

said Genevieve.

‘Was I?’ he sat up.

‘Your eyes were moving, and you kept muttering things. I couldn’t understand them.’

The Doctor sat up. He could see clouds out of the window.

‘The Duke,’ he said. He shut his eyes. ‘Am I remembering rightly? Were we attacked in this timeline?’

‘The Duke is well. He had some minor injuries. Are you sure you’re all right?’ Genevieve shrugged uncomfortably. There was an inflatable cast on her arm.

‘It doesn’t go with what you’re wearing,’ said the Doctor.

‘It’ll come off tomorrow,’ she said. ‘We were a lot luckier than the people who… changed. How’s your head?’

The Doctor put his hands on top of his head. ‘Round,’ he said.

‘Where are we going?’

‘The Duke’s offices. A few thousand miles from the Imperial Palace. We’ll be there in an hour. Try to get some sleep. There’ll be a lot to do.’

The Doctor looked out of the window. ‘Have you ever noticed,’ he said, ‘that the clouds on terraformed worlds have a slightly geometric look?’

Genevieve knocked on the door. She waited patiently, then knocked again.

‘I’m in the bath!’ called the Doctor.

‘I know,’ said Genevieve. ‘You weren’t answering the terminal. I thought you’d drowned.’

‘You could have checked this very embarrassing security camera… oh,’ he said.

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‘Bubble bath’s wonderful, isn’t it?’ she called. ‘Very popular throughout the Empire.’

‘Madam,’ said the Doctor, his voice distorted by echoing around the tiles, ‘can I assist you in some way?’

‘The Duke is anxious to speak with you,’ said Genevieve. She sat down, leaning against the door, unable to keep a mischievous grin off her face. ‘There’s a great deal to discuss.’

‘I’m not coming out there,’ said the Doctor. ‘Someone will execute me.’

‘Actually, that’s pretty unlikely. For the moment, at least. The Duke has demanded that the Council – what’s left of it, anyway –

hold a full investigation into both the Empress’s death and whatever happened in the courtroom.’

She waited, but all she could hear was splashing. ‘Doctor?

What
did
happen in the courtroom?’

‘I’m not completely sure,’ he said. ‘Tell me – the people who changed. Were they all registered psis?’

‘Yes, they were,’ said Genevieve, impressed. She’d just sneaked a look at that report half an hour ago, while the Duke was sleeping. ‘Though few of them had measurable powers. The Psi Registry tracks recessive genes as well as actual powers. If there was a conspiracy, it was a very serious one. The Imperial surgeons say that none of them could have survived the changes to their bodies.’

‘I thought you needed Quoth to do that,’ mused the Doctor.

‘Quoth?’

‘A subatomic life form with the power to alter matter. They can be enslaved to produce all sorts of unlikely results. But I don’t think the Quoth have anything to do with this.’

‘You’ve seen something like that before, then,’ said Genevieve.

‘That’s true of an alarmingly large number of things,’ said the Doctor. ‘Sometimes my life is like a series of repeats.’

‘We’re very lucky to have you, Doctor,’ she called. 'Now of all times, the Empire needs expert advice.’

‘Flattery will get you everywhere,’ said the Doctor. ‘Except perhaps into this bathroom. Just remember not to let anyone cut off my head, please.’

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‘I wouldn’t worry. A full Council investigation ought to give you five years at least.’

‘You ought to get anyone with psi powers away from the Duke,’ he said.

‘That’s being arranged now. Most of them will be keen to go once they realize the danger they’re in.’

‘It’s obvious that whoever’s behind this was after Duke Walid.

They were quick to move once the Empress was dead.’

Genevieve frowned. ‘The House Armand?’

‘Possibly. I doubt it.’

‘Duke Armand is the other surviving contender for the throne.

There are a few others, but no one with a really strong case. If the vote goes against Walid, Armand will be the next Emperor.’

‘Hmm…’ Genevieve had a mental image of the Doctor sinking further into the tub, the water coming up over his ears as he thought deeply.

She glanced up at Walid, who was standing against the opposite wall, his arms folded. The Duke smiled, his mismatched eyes twinkling with amusement.

Genevieve got up. ‘Enjoy your bath, Doctor,’ she called. ‘I’ll leave you in peace.’

181

2

Tethys

13 June 2982

Chris spent thirty minutes in the fresher, a real hot-water shower, using up two bars of guest soap. After weeks of travel on cargo freighters and pirate ships, economy class in a standard passenger transport was luxury.

He emerged from the cubicle into the steamy bathroom, scrubbed pink and humming ‘I Heard a Rumour’. He filled so much of the tiny room that he kept knocking his elbows against the walls and the sink when he tried to dry himself.

He put his head around the door. ‘Um, Roz?’

She was sitting at the terminal with her back to him. ‘Was that banging noise you?’

‘Yeah. Do you mind if I finish drying off out here? I won’t take a minute. It’s just that there’s not much room –’

‘Get out here. I’ve busted scarier things than you in a towel,’

she said, still without turning around.

He stepped out and frantically dried himself off, tugging on his boxers and the nondescript blue suit he’d bought from the on-board duty-free. Roz didn’t turn around. He lay down on the bed, his feet dangling over the edge.

‘Anything interesting?’ he said.

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‘Here and there,’ said Roz, turning in her seat. ‘I’m just reading the news. While you were in the shower, someone killed the Empress.’

‘What?’ Chris stared at her.

‘There are a lot of garbled reports coming out of Janus. Some of the Council were killed, too.’

‘Is it a coup?’

‘Not quite,’ said Roz. ‘The Council are still in charge. They’re debating who the successor will be.’

‘Heck. The Empress. Do they know who did it?’

‘One report said they’d caught the assassin, but that his or her identity was being kept tightly under wraps. That might be another way of saying they have no idea who did it.’

‘Mom’s going to hate this. She was always keen on the royals.

Jeez, the
Empress
. What are we going to do?’

‘Nothing. Nothing to do with us. We keep looking for Zatopek.’

‘I wonder what the Doctor’s doing.’

Roz’s mouth twitched. ‘He’s probably on Janus, taking tea with the Council and offering to solve their murder mystery for them.’

A chime sounded softly. Roz’s terminal said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we will shortly be passing over Odysseus Crater on our way to Ithaca City. For an excellent view of the Crater and the Temple of the Goddess, please take a seat in the port-side viewing chamber. Thank you.’

‘Do you want to see?’ asked Roz.

‘Sure. I’ve never been to the Temple.’ Chris sat up and started tugging on his shoes. It was then that he realized he could see the whole room reflected in the terminal screen.

There were a dozen passengers in the viewing chamber. It was a thick bubble protruding from the ship’s hull, giving them a wide view of the landscape moving below. Sharp lines and shadows, details emerging from the pattern of light.

There was a strange feeling in the small crowd, a kind of camaraderie. They were all thinking the same thing, all thinking about the Empress, wondering how life was going to change.

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The ship had already passed the lip of the crater when Roz and Chris came in. There were two rows of seats. They sat at the back. Chris found he had a vague urge for popcorn.

‘It’s huge,’ said Roz. They were looking out over the vast, worn plain of the Odysseus Crater, four hundred klicks across.

The Temple of the Goddess was a glittering collection of lights, precisely in the centre of the crater, easily visible in the airless night sky.

‘You know what it reminds me of?’

‘Aulis Crater,’ said Roz.

They both shifted in their seats, uncomfortable.

It took fifteen minutes for the transport to get close enough to the Temple for a good look. A circular building with four spokes, a tall, sharp cone rising from the centre.

All the holograms and sims didn’t compare to the building itself, real and stark against the starry sky. The largest religious building in the solar system. The home of the Goddess, the heart of the Adjudicators. Chris felt a chill down his spine as they passed almost overhead, the tip of the cone pointing up at them like a finger.

‘Blasphemous,’ murmured Roz.

‘What?’

‘I was just thinking,’ she said. ‘If there was… another Nexus.

Under the Temple. If this was another fake crater.’

‘I didn’t think you were a believer,’ said Chris.

Roz tilted her head to one side, watching the landscape. ‘There are some things that shouldn’t be messed with.’

‘Yeah,’ said Chris. ‘Let’s hope there was only the one.’

The Ithaca Chasma was a massive gash in the moon’s icy surface, a hundred klicks wide, five deep. It wrapped around three-quarters of Tethys. Chris and Roz were still in the viewing chamber when the passenger ship passed over its edge. In the distance they could see Ithaca City.

‘Looks like a kid’s toy box,’ said Chris. The city was a knot of buildings and lights, one huge dome covering the city centre, dozens of small domes and shapes clustered around it like 184

building blocks. And around those, hundreds and hundreds of spacecraft.

Chris grinned and got up, walking right down the front, almost pressing his nose against the insulated hyperglass. Roz followed him down, taking a front-row seat.

‘Look,’ he said. ‘There’s an old Indigenous Class carrier, in for repairs. And there’s a whole flock of those brand-new Vipers.

Looks like they’re having their weapons fitted. And look! Holy cow! The
Gulf of Tonkin
! Look at the
size
of that baby!’

As they drew closer to the city, the transport slowly cruising down, they could see the flags. Stiff plates of metal at half-mast.

Some of the domes were painted with alien symbols.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, please return to your quarters. We’ll be arriving in Ithaca City in ten minutes. Please be ready to disembark. Thank you for flying Solar Transport.’

Neither of them was carrying much. Roz had brought a small bag of essentials; she stopped in the spaceport to buy a few more bits and pieces, while Chris thumbed through the spaceship magazines in the newsagent’s.

‘Do you want to grab a hotel room first, or have –’ she looked at her chronometer ‘– lunch?’

‘Let’s have lunch,’ said Chris. ‘Get the feel of the place.’ He held up the book he’d bought, the
Lonely Galaxy Guide to
Tethys
.

They took the slidewalk to the city centre. The most expensive hotels and shops were right in the centre; the price got lower the closer you got to the edge of the dome. ‘You pay for sky,’ said Roz.

And it was sky. During the day, a constant simulation of Earth weather was projected on the surface of the dome. It was surprisingly convincing – though the liquid-crystal clouds would always threaten, never rain.

The Ithacans were a mix of human and alien – lumbering Martians, Skags in overalls, bulky Hith – jostling elbows and appendages in apparent unconcern. On Earth, the aliens would have been in little groups by themselves, or alone, keeping to one side, eyes fixed on the ground. Or they’d have shuffled or slid up 185

to you, asking for spare change. Here they were literally just part of the crowd.

Chris was reading the guidebook, miraculously avoiding collisions. ‘Here’s a good place,’ he announced. ‘A Jeopard bagel bar.’

They got off the slidewalk and went in. It was a small place done up in simulated wood, with a small crowd at the counter, selecting ingredients from the display.

The Jeopard serving them was a skinny, muscular cat-man, wearing white shorts and sleeveless top, slicing bagels with a knife gripped in thick fingers. As Chris watched, the alien skewered an olive on a slender claw and used it to garnish someone’s salmon sandwich.

The Jeopard gave him a small, round smile, careful not to show his fangs. He had very short, fine grey fur, subtly patterned.

‘What can I get for you?’ he said.

‘Two bagels, one plain and one with peanut butter and mashed banana, and two incredibly strong coffees, please,’ said Chris.

‘Yes, sir!’ said the Jeopard. ‘Eat here or take away?’

Chris looked around. Roz had already taken a seat, and was reading the guidebook. ‘To eat here.’

‘OK. Have a seat and I’ll bring it to you.’

Chris sat down. Roz didn’t look up. ‘Any help?’ he said.

‘I think we should try the Martian Quarter,’ said Roz.

‘Do you think Zatopek is likely to have gone to ground there?’

‘He could be anywhere,’ said Roz. ‘But remember, we’re looking for someone who looks just like the Doctor.’

‘Hey, that’s right,’ said Chris. ‘He’s got some serious history with those folks.’ He glanced over at the Jeopard, who was filling a jug with frothy milk. ‘Didn’t he once mention –’

‘He stopped the Jeopards from invading their neighbouring planet,’ said Roz. ‘A year later the Empire swept in and conquered both worlds.’

Chris tried to read the guide’s screen. ‘Is that all in there?’

‘Not quite.’ Roz lowered her voice. ‘There’s an entry on the conquest of Jeopardy.’ She handed him the guide.

‘It was only ten years ago,’ said Chris. ‘After we left. It says there are only a few hundred thousand Jeopards.’

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‘Small planet.’

‘They mustn’t have bothered to indenture them.’

Roz jerked her head, and Chris saw that the Jeopard was heading for them with a tray.

‘Let’s split up,’ said Chris.

‘After lunch,’ said Roz.

The Martian Quarter was a separate dome. The slidewalk passed through a series of force fields, each one an airlock, allowing you to acclimatize. The air was cold and thin, the ‘sky’