The card dissolved between her fingers.
There was a hissing sound above her.
A hatstand floated horizontally above her and to the right. A cat was perched precariously at its middle. It was a large animal, half a metre long with glistening silver fur as if it had been dipped in mercury. Its eyes were slanted shards of refracted light.
The cat hissed at Kadiatu again, showing sharp white canines. Bands of green formed around its shoulders and rippled down its body until they formed a ring at the end of the cat's tail.
Kadiatu bared her teeth and hissed back.
The cat recoiled, it had obviously not been expecting that response. Its ears flattened and the tail twitched from side to side.
'Such a small cat,' said Kadiatu. 'Where I come from the cats are as large as men and as fierce as tigers. They assume the form of women and walk the paths of the forest in search of prey.'
The cat yawned, feigning indifference.
'Well, little sister,' said Kadiatu, 'do you belong to the Doctor?'
The cat stiffened, its eyes blazing with green light. I am my own cat, the eyes seemed to say. I belong to no man.
'Well then, little sister. Shall we hunt him anyway?' Kadiatu asked the cat.
The cat wiped its face with a paw. Considering.
'Perhaps not,' said Kadiatu. 'Perhaps you should leave this to me.'
The cat stopped its wash and stared at her, green and silver chased themselves over its fur. With a light confident movement it jumped on to Kadiatu's shoulder, twisted around and made itself comfortable. Its purr was loud and comforting in Kadiatu's ear.
There were many red roundels, fewer blue and only one black.
'Well, little sister,' said Kadiatu, 'shall we dance?'
Node Twenty - Twenty-One
The attack came from nowhere. The Doctor got the impression of animal fur, lithe speed and ferocity. Like a greyhound crossed with a yeti, thought the Doctor, and of course that's what it was. Ragged brown fur pulled tight over starvation ribs, lean elongated limbs tipped with three-fingered claws. Red eyes blazed over a sharpened dog's snout, a pink tongue lolled out between yellow teeth.
The Doctor made a mental note to keep his imagination under restraint. The mental note popped into the air between the greyhound yeti and him. An Alexandrian scroll fluttering down in the imaginary gravity, blue tie ribbons streaming behind. The greyhound yeti snapped at it and the Doctor used the distraction to leap through the closest roundel.
Once in the next node he imagined a huge vault door slamming shut on the pathway. He locked it tight with memories of Fort Knox, the Bank of England during the nineteenth century and the Great Seal of Rassilon in the Panopticon.
A random predator, decided the Doctor. That's why it appeared in my frame of reference as an animal.
He was going to need some kind of advanced guard to prevent another ambush, and something to guard his back. The Doctor thought long, hard and carefully about it.
The result was a group of yard-high figures in black bomber jackets and pony tails. They carried little silver deodorant cans and careened around the node with irritating exuberance. They also made a lot of noise, yelling nonsense in high pitched voices.
He wondered what he should call them in the multiple. A brace of Aces, a confusion? One hurtled past his head and ricocheted off the side of the node. An explosion, he decided, an explosion of Aces.
He decided to move on before things could get out of hand.
Node Twenty
She stretched, enjoying the rich luxury of the movement, the pull of her muscles against anchoring bone, the silk feeling of being wrapped in her own skin.
The silver cat had returned to its place on her shoulder and was now batting idly at a scrap of fur as it drifted past. Other pieces of the monster floated in the node, a severed limb twisted close by Kadiatu's face. She watched it rapidly decompose, the structure breaking down particle by particle, like a slow derez on a hologram.
The monster had been trying to break through a locked roundel when Kadiatu entered the node. She'd jumped on its back and torn it to bits with her bare hands and teeth.
She felt enormously better now.
The trail of the Doctor led through the locked roundel.
'What shall we do now, little sister?' she asked the cat.
If one pathway was blocked then she would just have to try another.
As she considered her options she licked her lips, running her tongue over sharp white canines.
The cat's purr was loud in her ears.
Node Thirty-Six - The Border
The Minister for Primary Colours was waiting for the Doctor at the boundary. The Minister appeared as an iridescent shimmer at the north end of the node. The Doctor's frame of reference should have translated the Minister into something more recognizable: compatibility problems deduced the Doctor. He made a brief attempt to resolve the Minister into a human figure but gave up when he encountered escalating resistance.
The Minister was flanked by a personal guard of fearsome Reds. The Doctor's explosion of Aces bounced about the node but generally behaved themselves by staying behind him. The Reds hung in the air as sheets of solid colour, dangerous in their stillness. When the Minister spoke it was with a sound like wind chimes.
'I am the Minister for Primary Colours,' said the Minister.
'I am the Doctor,' said the Doctor, 'and these are my Aces.'
'What is your function in coming here?' asked the Minister.
'I am searching for a utility called Fred.'
'This utility is registered with me,' said the Minister. 'It is held in the directory of the Monarch. Why do you seek it?'
'The utility called Fred has bootlegged a program that belongs to me. I wish it returned.'
'This is a matter that is out of my purvue. You must take this matter before the Monarch,' said the Minister. 'But be warned that the utility Fred is held in high esteem by his Majesty who ranks him above all other programs in his directory.'
'None the less,' said the Doctor, 'I will take my suit to the Monarch.'
'Attend,' said the Minister of Primary Colours. 'These are the access protocols, you must divest yourself of all offensive programs and the colours Red, Blue and Ultramarine. Are these protocols acceptable?'
'No,' said the Doctor. 'But I shall abide by them. A moment as I prepare.'
The Doctor thought jazz, and back beyond jazz, stripping away the European influence, the instruments of varnished wood and cunning artifice. Back across the cramped and recking ocean to where the forest met the sea. Back to the drums, the human voice and the dance. Dance for joy, for sadness, for funeral, harvest, wedding and childbirth. Lover's dance, young feet stamping down the dust, children's dance, old men's dance, mother's dance.
Women's dance, secret in the forest or the society huts. Leopard agile: the feet barely touch the ground. The body becomes the instrument: infused with the spirits of the gods. The dance of which no woman will ever speak, that no male shall ever know. Save one.
There! thought the Doctor.
Spear-sharp and arrow-fast the thought sped away down the alien pathways.
He checked quickly. The Minister for Primary Colours hadn't noticed, nor had his Reds.
'Stay here,' he told the Aces, who pouted collectively but did what they were told.
'If I may make an observation,' said the Minister as he led the Doctor through the pathway, 'the number one is not an efficient base for a good attack program. I hope you do not rely only on that.'
Spear-sharp, arrow-fast.
'No,' said the Doctor. 'Of course not.'
Node Fifteen
Spear-sharp, arrow-fast.
The knowledge of Blondie's death hit her in the chest, just under the heart. The mind is the seat of consciousness and therefore the site of human emotion, but we feel it in our guts.
The knowledge seemed to wrench open a hole beneath her ribs.
The cat leapt from her shoulder, s
pitting in fear. It split apart as it flew across the node, becoming two cats, one silver, one green.
Kadiatu floated with her limbs outstretched as the hammer blows piled in. She saw the family dead come dancing up the beach again and the sky was filled with lightning.
'We came out of the sea,' chanted the dead, 'we came down from the trees. We walked upright across the plains and talked to the old gods. We picked up sticks and stones and fashioned them into tools. The spirit ran through us, mother to daughter.'
'What do you want with me?'
'A sacrifice,' said the dead. 'Your soul for the lives of the children.'
Kadiatu folded over the pain, rolling up tight and fetal. She saw an old woman suspended in a basket above an abyss from which clouds of incense rose. As she watched, the old woman spoke a terrible death-curse and cut the single rope that held the basket aloft. Woman and basket tumbled into the abyss.
The curse came out of the abyss, roaring and invisible as it streamed into the sky. Kadiatu heard thousands of mothers screaming as the curse sucked the creation spirit from the world.
Into the void went the curse, leaving the world only half alive behind it. As it streamed across the gaps between stars it left a bow wave in the metareality of time and space. In its wake even the stars began to dream.
Kadiatu saw the beach again but the dead were not yet born. She saw the curse as it fell from the sky and into the primeval ocean. The waters suddenly boiled with life.
The two cats warily circled each other, each an identical copy of the other save for its colour. Each with flattened ears and claws extended, slant eyes probing for any weakness.
A noise stopped them. The cats turned curious eyes on the woman curled in the centre of the node.
The changes were sudden and impressive.
The King's Buffer
His Majesty the Emperor of Subsystems was watching the logic problems play around his feet. The Doctor was particularly pleased with the King's feet, it demonstrated that his frame of reference was again working properly. Within it the King appeared as a large man with a prominent stomach and a florid face. He was wearing a brocade jacket of deep burgundy silk with gold lace trimming, and sat on a throne of quartz.
The logic problems resolved as a trio of miniature poodles that chased their tails and yapped incessantly. The Minister for Primary Colours had become a tall sparse man with aesthetic features. The fearsome Reds became halberd-carrying foot soldiers with faces the same colour as their scarlet tunics. The lack of differentiation between skin and livery in the Reds implied a certain simplicity of function.
The Doctor was concerned by the possibility that his anthropomorphism of King and Court could have all the validity of a Disney cartoon.
Who knew what he looked like to them?
The King had bleary eyes that hinted at overindulgence. What did that signify? Some form of internal degeneration? What did a software program overindulge in? Dangerous thinking, decided the Doctor. These were not just programs, they were intelligences in their own right. Better to accept the frame of reference and deal with them as people.
After all, he was supposed to be good at that.
The Minister for Primary Colours motioned for the Doctor to stay back and approached the throne. He leant over and whispered in the King's ear. The Monarch's bleary eyes fixed briefly on the Doctor. When the Minister finished the King waved a hand and the logic problems evaporated.
'You are the virus killer labelled the Doctor?' asked the King
'That is how I am labelled,' said the Doctor. 'But I have many other functions.'
'There is much redundant code there,' said the Minister.
'A wise program devises architectural sub-structures for all eventualities,' said the King.
'Indubitably, Your Majesty,' said the Doctor, wishing he could do something about the language. 'Be prepared, that's my motto.'
'Proceeding to the matter of your visit,' said the King.
'Your Majesty is too kind,' said the Doctor.
'Yes,' said the Minister for Primary Colours, 'he is.'
'I believe you are in dispute with the utility labelled Fred,' said the King, 'that he is in possession of another utility that you claim as a vital operating subset of yours.'
'Captured in the southern expedition. Your Majesty,' said the Minister.
'Not a subset of mine. Your Majesty,' said the Doctor. 'A subset of the operating system itself.'
'Have you no redundancy?' asked the King.
'Billions,' said the Doctor. 'But this subsystem is of special importance to me.'
The Minister glanced suspiciously at the Doctor. 'Billions?' he asked. 'The new kingdoms are that powerful?'
'They are different, vast and complex,' said the Doctor.
'The utility Fred reported nothing of this,' said the King.
'The utility Fred is frequently obtuse,' said the Minister.
'This is an issue that must be decided in open court,' said the King. 'Download the Ministers for Strange Logic and for Rare Data, and the Minister for Probabilities.'
'At once. Your Majesty,' said the Minister for Primary Colours.
'What of the Minister for Irritating Oxymorons?' asked the Doctor with a reasonably straight face.
'The Minister for Irritating Oxymorons,' said the Minister for Primary Colours, 'does not attend open sessions of the court.'
'Of course he doesn't,' said the Doctor. 'Silly me.'
'With Your Majesty's permission,' said the Minister for Primary Colours, 'I will withdraw and see to the southern defences.'
The King nodded his permission. The Minister seemed to elongate across the node to become a stream of colours pouring out through one of the roundels. The Doctor thought he heard a voice say 'Billions'.
The other ministers flowed similarly into the node. Rare Data resolved into an empty Armani suit complete with mobile phone, Porsche sunglasses hovering over the collar where the eyes should have been. Strange Logic was a man in a pinstripe suit and bowler hat with a large green apple stuck to his face.
The Minister for Probabilities didn't resolve at all but remained a curtain of shimmering light.
Since the frame of reference was generating images from his own imagination the Doctor felt that his brain was long overdue a good spring-cleaning.
The Doctor was glad that he wasn't going to meet the Minister for Gratuitous Nightmares.
'Court in open session,' said Probabilities. 'His Majesty presiding.' The voice was neutral and genderless.
'Download the utility Fred,' said the King.
Node Thirty-Six - The Border
The fearsome Reds on the border were reinforced by a platoon of cautious Yellows and a squadron of long-range Blues.
Left on their own the explosion of Aces had begun to impose their own frame of reference on reality. To their eyes the fearsome Reds were slowly transforming into Daleks and the Yellows into Cybermen. When the squadron of Blues arrived they took the form of clowns with sinister smiles.
The Aces stopped their agitated bouncing around the node and gathered in a knot at the opposite end of the node. The fearsome Reds were too simplistic to react but the more sophisticated Blues felt a trace of unease.
The Aces broke from their huddle and spread out into a ragged line facing the Primary Colours. They hefted their silver deodorant cans from hand to hand and smiled in a disconcerting manner.
Something bad was coming.
The King's Buffer
The node suddenly expanded, elongating in the horizontal until the walls were shrouded in darkness. The ceiling flattened out into an expanse of oak panelling and the Doctor feit his heels click on cold marble. Columns thrust suddenly out of the floor, growing upwards until they merged with the ceiling. They were smooth sided in the Tuscan style with inset diffusion strips in spiralling candy stripes. The floor had the unmistakable shot neon pattern of cultured marble. The Doctor recognized the style of whole ensemble: late Terran Empire. The dominant arc
hitectural style of the twenty-sixth century.
Benny's epoch.
The King was staring at the Doctor. The brilliant quartz throne darkened and became carved teak. His eyes went from bloodshot to burning red.
There was a booming sound from the shadowy far end of the audience hall, like huge double doors being thrown open. A rectangle of white light lit the darkness. A human figure threw a long shadow down the aisle of light that ran from doors to throne. Jackboots clicked on the marble as the figure walked towards the Doctor.
This is all getting needlessly theatrical, thought the Doctor.
'Behold the utility Fred,' said Probabilities.
The figure walked from the darkness and into the light of the candystripe diffusion strips.
'Hello Benny,' said the Doctor.
She was dressed in a uniform of electric blue and a peaked military cap. Gold epaulettes widened her shoulders, gold and scarlet frogging crisscrossed a chest heavy with medals. She wore jackboots polished to a mirror finish. The cap badge caught the Doctor's attention. It didn't gel with the rest of the comic opera outfit. The wrought-silver design was of a sword crossed with winged Venus, the badge of the Terran Space Navy.
The silver was tarnished and blackened as if by fire. Absurd because death in space came in expanding globes of superheated plasma. Only a child would think otherwise.
Remember your father, Benny, thought the Doctor. The ties of kith and kin, your stupid, irrational, human hope. Fred's weakness.
'I'm not Benny,' said Benny/Fred. 'At least not in any significant sense.'
'You kept her form though,' said the Doctor.
'Once I'd tried her on,' said Benny/Fred, 'I liked her so much I kept the body.'
'It wasn't the body that attracted you.'
'No,' said Benny/Fred. 'It's her mind. The complexity of her motivations, the interlacing of intellect, emotions, instinct, learned behaviour. It's quite ...'
'Bracing?'
'That's the word,' said Benny/Fred. 'Trivia is very important here, you might say this whole civilization is based on it.'