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could have affected your thought processes adversely?
Hanging onto Morbius s mind-bending equipment while his past lives were
dragged from him, one by one . . . Letting the Zygons bistronic radiation short-
circuit through his body . . . Lying, squirming, while Davros s mind probe ripped
his memories to shreds . . . Screaming soundlessly as Abaddon s tiny thought
parasites worked their way through his neuronic pathways, burning as they
went . . .
Point taken, he admitted. Nobody can argue from a privileged position.
Thank you. I repeat my question: why do you think that murder is wrong?
The Doctor hesitated. This was a potential moral minefield. The state of
being alive is intrinsically valuable, he said eventually. And nobody has the
right to take that away.
You disappoint me. Pryce leaned back in his seat. He wasn t even sweating
in the heat. That isn t an argument at all. You are merely saying that there
is some value in what is being taken away. That fails to explain why taking it
away is wrong.
His hairless brows drew together, creating furrows in his broad forehead.
He was holding something in his hand: something that had not been there
before. The Doctor gazed down at it in surprise and dawning horror. Some-
how, Pryce had managed to twist the metal of the beaker into a sharp-edged
weapon.
If you can t do better than that, he said, I m going to have to remove your
eyes.
The blast spread fire across the plasticrete where Bernice had been standing.
She had instinctively dived to one side, feeling the hairs on the back of her
neck shrivel in the heat. Gravel gouged at her skin as she hit the ground rolling
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sideways. The energy beam followed her, searing the plasticrete, spraying
small splinters in all directions. Bernice felt them cut her face and neck as she
kept rolling, trying to stay ahead of the ray.
Cwej dropped to a crouching position and fired. The beam from his blaster
splashed harmlessly against the robot s burnished skin and reflected off in a
distorted fountain of energy, blistering a nearby pillar. The bot didn t even
seem to notice.
It s armoured, he yelled. That s unfair. He shifted fire to the bot s body,
concentrating on its joints, but that strategy was equally useless.
No good, Forrester shouted, scuttling into the cover of a pillar. Must be
one of those assassin models the big corporations are supposed to use.
I thought they were outlawed? Cwej exclaimed, holding fire for a moment.
They are. Do you want to tell it or shall I?
Bernice had rolled over and over until she was underneath a flitter. Her
heart was pumping so fast she thought it would burst and there was blood
in her eyes from multiple cuts on her forehead. The exposed flesh of her
forearms and legs stung. Panic was a dead, cold weight in her chest. She
knew that if that beam touched the flitter and ignited the atomic batteries,
she d be cooked like a lobster.
She scrambled to the other side of the flitter, preparing to make a dash for
it but knowing that she would be cut down before she had taken three steps.
Concentrate fire on the head! Forrester cried, pumping off shots that
missed the silver figure completely but blasted chunks of plasticrete loose
from the ceiling. Bernice wondered for a brief, hysterical moment how For-
rester had ever made it through Adjudicator training with an aim like that.
Several chunks dropped on the bot s arm, knocking its aim off. The beam shot
into the darkness and the bot s head swung around, its multi-sensored muzzle
seeking out the source of the annoyance.
How tiresome. The strangely mellow, sardonic voice of the bot echoed
around the flitterpark. It raised both of its lower arms and aimed them at
Forrester. The Doctor s friends always were notoriously difficult to kill.
The Doctor s friends. Bernice filed that one away for later consideration.
More metallic footsteps, like a metronome off in the shadows. Glinting
highlights as the dim, scattered lights reflected off smooth metal.
Two more bots walked out of the darkness to flank the first.
Fortunately, said the one on the left in the same, relaxed voice, I ve always
preferred my own company . . .
. . . to that of anybody else, the one on the right finished.
All three raised their gun arms simultaneously, each aiming at a different
target. Two of them acquired Forrester and Bernice instantly. The third hes-
itated, trying to locate Cwej and failing. Bernice glanced around, but she
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couldn t find him. He d obviously made a run for it sensible man.
Well, Bernice sighed, it s been fun.
No it hasn t, Forrester snarled, it s been a bitch.
A gravimetric motor roared into life in the depths of the flitterpark. For-
rester and Bernice peered into the darkness, trying to locate the source, but
failed.
Cwej? Forrester yelled. Is that you?
The only answer was the sudden overload of the motor as the mag-brakes
were abruptly taken off line.
Cwej! What the hell are you doing?
Something flashed out of the darkness towards the robots, something large
and blunt: a flitter, cranked up to well over the recommended speed. Two of
the bots tried to leap out of the way while the third attempted to fire, but the
flitter struck all three before they could move, scattering them like ninepins.
Metallic arms and legs flew off in all directions, trailing fibre-optic strands
behind them. Lubricant splashed like black blood across the plasticrete.
Way to go! Forrester crowed, jumping up and punching the air with her
fist. Score one to the kid.
The wall! Bernice shouted, but it was too late. The pilot, a dark shadow
through the flitter s canopy, tried to spin the vehicle around before it hit the
approaching far wall of the flitterpark, but he was still travelling too fast. The
flitter overturned and rolled. Bernice could just make out Cwej s silhouette
fighting the controls, but he didn t have time.
The flitter hit the wall and exploded.
A wall of flame washed across the ground towards them. Bernice threw
herself behind a pillar, but Forrester just covered her eyes and ran into the
pall of greasy black smoke that erupted behind the fire. Cursing, Bernice
followed.
The flitter was a blackened skeleton with a blazing heart when they got
to it, and the heat was so fierce that Bernice could feel her skin blistering.
Nobody could have survived the inferno. Nobody.
She had to drag Forrester away. Her face was contorted into a snarl of rage,
and she struggled with Bernice, trying to get back to the burning vehicle.
Don t be a fool! Bernice yelled. You can t help him now!
I m not losing another partner, Forrester spat, I m not losing another part-
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