'It's pointless anyway. We downloaded your notes, that's the essential bit. We can replicate the experiment any time we like.'
Kadiatu had to laugh, she couldn't help it. 'What you've got, Ming, is the complete works of William Shakespeare, two Kafka novels and a bootleg copy of Thatcher: The wilderness years.'
Ming closed her eyes and said something long and complicated in Cantonese. When she opened her eyes again they were filled with a strange recognition.
'Bugger,' she said and terminated the communications link.
The countdown read sixty seconds.
Inside the suit it was terribly quiet. Kadiatu thought it strange that she couldn't hear her own breathing.
The prototype didn't have a name. It was fashioned out of a modified cargo shuttle, its guts ripped out and replaced by the baffle field managers that would soak up the energy. It hung suspended in a spherical chamber two hundred metres across close to the heart of the station.
Thirty seconds.
There were four fission-fusion devices stored in the hold, courtesy of the Angel Francine. God knows where she got them from, probably army surplus. Four more jumps after this one and then she'd be out looking for more fuel.
Twenty seconds.
She remembered a black rose and a cool hand. The taste of gunpowder on a boy's lips. A river under a blue African sky, water over her head and the shrill distorted screams of her playmates.
Ten seconds.
A beach on the ocean with a storm sweeping in. Picking up the stick as the smooth-skinned mother of the world. A voice echoing down the fractal corridors of time saying - 'Please.'
'Here I come, Doctor,' shouted Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart, 'ready or not!'
Glossary
akti
(Greek) street
bajan pumps
(slang) rope soled running shoes
bangjack
(warspeak) explosives expert
beatbox
see noisebox
billy-lamp
(trademark) heavy torch that can double as a club
bioraid
(warspeak) attack with biological weapons
blitzed
(slang/warspeak) stoned, intoxicated
brain-naked
(slang) operating within a computer matrix without a hardware interface
broederbund
(Afrikaans) 'brotherhood' name of street gang
catfood monster
(slang) homeless person, from the practice of eating petfood as a cheap source of protein.
derez(zed)
to turn off a hologram
doberman
(slang/warspeak) standard combat drug
drone
(generic) independently mobile machine
dustkart
Martian surface vehicle
EMP
(acronym) Electro-Magnetic Pulse
ENG
(acronym) Electronic News Gathering, remote camera drone used by the media
freesurfing
(slang) riding a tunnel independent of a train
fufu
West African staple made from cassava
gangbanger
(slang) member of a gang
GIS
(acronym) Geographic Information System
granny bashers
(slang) mugger, usually retired soldier
Greenies
(slang) indigenous Martian [Ice Warrior]
heinkel
(slang/warspeak) standard combat drug for pilots
IFF
(acronym) Identification Friend or Foe
joyboy
male prostitute/young man of lax morals
kabuki
traditional Japanese drama form
KGB
Sol's largest private security firm
klicks
(slang) kilometres
krewe
(slang) New Orleans' carnival society or razvedka unit
LZ
(warspeak) Landing Zone
makeni
small town in Sierra Leone, West Africa
medevac
(warspeak) medical evacuation
mzungu
(Swahili) white person
NAFAL
(acronym) Not As Fast As Light, drive used in Sol's principal colonization effort
prior to development of the warp drive.
newsfax
printed newspaper
NGO
(acronym) Non Governmental Organization
noisebox
(slang) portable multimedia unit
oporto
(Themne) white person, European
opsit
(warspeak) operational situation report
opstat
(STS) operational status report
ouzo
Greek alcoholic beverage
personspace
area of the galaxy explored by human beings
pix
any still image transmitted digitally
razvedka
(Russian) intelligence-gathering assets
secateurs
garden shears used for pruning
shango
Yoruba god of thunder
shinjinrui
(Japanese) new young breed
shoji
(Japanese) sliding door made of paper on a wooden frame
Silurian
aboriginal terran
STS
Sol Transit System
Stunnel
Stella Tunnel
Themne
West African language
tsunami
(Japanese) tidal wave
ubersoldaten
(German) lit. over-soldier, augmented human soldiers who fought in the Thousand Day War
vrik
(slang) very rich kids
Xssixss
(Martian) path of easy virtue
Yoruba
West African language
zap
(trademark) semi-legal stimulant
Table of Contents
Transit
Prologue
PART ONE
1: Oncoming Trains
2: Crazy Paving Man
3: Bad Acid Macho
4: The Stupid Dead
5: Hereditary Diseases
PART TWO
6: Red Queen
7: Doorstep Blues
8: Improvisations
9: Chain Gang Song
10: Broken Swords
Epilogue
Glossary
Ben Aaronovitch, Doctor Who: Transit
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