by Gary Russell
‘But so funny,’ Jack countered, still unable to get off the ground, he was so amused.
Finally Ruth was able to move and she leapt onto Jack, pummelling his chest with her small hands furiously, not sure if she wanted to break his ribs or move to his face.
Jack eventually stopped laughing and grabbed her wrists. She struggled for a moment as he drew her closer. ‘That was funny,’ he said, grinning from ear to ear.
‘Not to me, it wasn’t,’ Ruth said.
Jack pushed his head forward and kissed her on the lips. ‘Oh, it so was, babe, it really was.’
‘Get a room,’ was Peter’s response.
‘Already got one.’
‘Yeah, I feel welcome,’ laughed Peter. ‘Listen guys, look after that Glamour thing, yeah? I am a bit worried about that Spyro weaponista.’
‘Finally got you to notice her?’ asked Jack, managing to hold Ruth away with a long arm, as her fists flailed pointlessly in the air around his hand.
‘Ha ha, Jack. No, she’s a lethal trained killer, probably locked up in some local prison with a bunch of idiots she could kill before they even breathe at her.’
‘She’s not your problem, Petey,’ Jack said.
‘She is,’ Peter said, as Ruth gave up and slumped on the floor, waving air into her mouth. ‘I got her captured, I ought to get her back to the pyramid ready for Mum and the Doctor to do their magic with that rock thing.’
Ruth took the Glamour from her rucksack. ‘I wonder what this actually is?’
‘Didn’t get a chance to see it in the future.’ Jack nodded. ‘Close up, it just looks like a rock.’
‘It is a rock,’ Ruth said.
‘Maybe it’s a bomb,’ Peter said.
The other two stared at him.
‘Well, if I wanted to create a bomb to blow up the universe, I’d disguise it as a rock. Seeya.’ And with a smile at their newly alarmed expressions, Peter slipped away.
Ruth and Jack were still staring at it, pizza getting cold when, ten minutes later, Bernice and the Doctor entered the room.
The Doctor stuffed some Hawaiian into his mouth. ‘Cold pizza. My favourite. Not.’
Bernice was more concerned as to why Jack and Ruth, who normally couldn’t be trusted with pizza, were sat dead still, staring at a rock with untouched pizza in boxes around them. ‘Guys?’
‘What if it’s a bomb?’ asked Jack.
‘It’s not a bomb,’ said Bernice. ‘Is it a bomb?’
The Doctor got his sonic screwdriver out, ready to scan it, but Jack knocked it away. ‘It’s a bomb.’
The Doctor threw him a tired look. ‘It’s a lodestone, a key. It’s not a bomb.’
‘It might be a bomb,’ Ruth suggested unhelpfully. ‘I mean, we don’t really know, do we? It could be a bomb.’
‘It doesn’t look like a bomb,’ Bernice said.
‘Look,’ the Doctor sighed. ‘Can we all stop using the word “bomb”. This is not a bomb. I mean, how does a lump of rock become a bomb?’
Jack and Ruth stood back, as Bernice stood up. She gave the Doctor a ‘What on earth…’ look, her hands spread out in exasperation. ‘Are you serious?’
The Doctor nodded. ‘Yes, yes I am. Look Benny, I appreciate your concern, but I absolutely know that’s not a bomb.’
‘How?’
‘Because I’m the Doctor, and I know a bomb when I see one. That is a key. It’s probably a pretty intricate and complicated and very definitely useful lodestone that can act as a trigger mechanism for the Pyramid Eternia, or at least the technology that the Pyramid Eternia represents, but it’s not a bomb.’
‘We’re supposed to accept that,’ Jack asked. ‘Just because he’s your precious Doctor?’
Bernice nodded. ‘Yup, for no other reason. He says it’s not a bomb, then it’s not a bomb. He’s always right.’
‘Nearly always,’ said the Doctor, maybe not at the most opportune moment.
‘Nearly always?’ Ruth queried. ‘I mean how often is “nearly always”?’
‘Pretty often,’ Bernice said.
‘Mostly,’ the Doctor added.
Jack stroked his pointy chin. ‘Define mostly.’
‘A lot.’
‘Quite a lot.’
‘Nearly always.’
‘We’ve done “nearly always”, guys. Can we define our definitions better, please?’ Jack stopped stroking his chin and put an arm around Ruth’s shoulders. ‘Do either of you actually have a clue what you’re doing?’
Bernice nodded. ‘He does,’ she said, indicating the Doctor. ‘And I do too. So you have a whole 200 per cent of clue-knowing marvellousness.’
The Doctor was suddenly behind Jack and Ruth and went to put his arms round them. He realised that it was pretty much impossible to reach Jack’s shoulders without tiptoeing or to reach Ruth’s without bending down, so he gave that up and just pointed at the rock from behind them. ‘That is a lodestone, a key, known locally as the Glamour. And it contains a great deal of power. If it was mishandled in any way, it could rip apart the entire universe, erase it in a second or rewrite it so that we’re all related to frogs.’ He looked at Jack’s legs. ‘You’re more grasshopper than frog, aren’t you? Great, brilliant, love grasshoppers. OK, so all of us, including Cyrrus Globb and Horace Jaanson, want this to gain entry to the pyramid that’s currently changing the tidal flow around Sydney’s waterways and really needs to be got rid of. But we don’t want them to have it, am I right?’
‘Well…’ Jack started, but Ruth poked him.
‘Yes, Doctor. We don’t.’
‘Thank you.’ The Doctor shot Jack a look of venom. ‘As I was saying, Bernice has a plan to keep this out of their grubby mitts.’ He looked across to Bernice expectantly.
There was a silence.
Quite a long one.
In the grand scheme of pauses that no one wants to go on for quite some time, this was a doozy.
Eventually, Bernice shrugged. ‘Why d’you think I have a plan?’
‘Because, Professor Summerfield, you told me you had one.’
‘No, I told you I had a plan to stop Cyrrus Globb getting his hands on it in the first place and out of the museum. That plan worked: we now have the Glamour. But I haven’t got a clue how to stop them coming to get it back.’ She smiled at him.
The Doctor just stared at her with his big old eyes, mouth slightly agape. ‘You roped me into this.’
‘Because I knew you’d understand how the Glamour would work. And how to stop the universe going up in a big bang. Which you’ve done.’
‘No, I’ve delayed it, apparently. That’s all.’
Ruth and Jack looked at one another. ‘I think maybe we should leave them to it – go find Peter.’
Ruth nodded. ‘Absolutely. Peter. Needs finding. He usually does.’
‘Bound to be in trouble of some sort.’
‘Trouble. Always with the trouble that boy.’
And the two of them snuck out of the hotel room.
11
Last Day on Earth
Barangaroo Police Station was, Peter thought, a pretty dull place. Obviously – it was a police station, boring by definition. But this one really took the biscuit for sheer mind-numbing unimaginativeness. It was a concrete and glass affair that looked more like a library than a headquarters for law enforcement. It even had a small café area for people to wait in.
As Peter took in the reception area, he mentally ticked off the security-shy entrances and exits. A good concerted attack and this place could be under enemy control in less than eighteen seconds. The window to the left wasn’t secure. The door to the cells was unguarded. The main entrance had no worthwhile locks or meshes to speak of.
And, above all, morons populated it. Well, maybe not all morons but Senior Sergeant Rhodes wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box. His greying hair and engorged stomach suggested someone who had probably joined the force as a probationary constable as a teenager and had stayed there ever since. Peter sniffe
d slightly – the policeman smelled of stale sweat, alcohol and cigarettes, as well as thirty years sat on his behind, rather than getting out and catching criminals.
He was looking at Peter with a disdain Peter had got used to. After all, to the humans, he was a teenage thug in a tight hoodie, making sure his face was pretty much hidden by the oversized hood.
What the Senior Sergeant couldn’t see, despite his thirty-odd years on the force and his pretty insignia with its stripes and crest, was that Peter was concealing more weaponry than Rhodes had probably ever seen in his life.
‘So, you’ve come for your friend, have you?’
‘She’s not really my friend, but yeah, I need to get her out of here.’
The Senior Sergeant tapped a computer and brought up a CCTV-style image of the cells (more a comfortable room with a couch and coffee table). Clear as day was Kik the Assassin, sitting there, still as a statue, and Peter guessed she was probably trying to work out the stress on the door locks, or whether if she hit the wall with the side of her hand in the right place, she could cause a chain reaction that would bring the entire building down. For a pretty slight person, Kik the Assassin was pretty powerful, he thought.
He smiled. ‘Look, Sergeant, you might as well let me take her away. Keep her here much longer and she’ll probably tear this place down around your ears.’
The Senior Sergeant sighed and led Peter towards the cell area. He pointed to a door with a small gap cut into it and now Peter could see Kik the Assassin properly. And she could see him.
She didn’t move an inch.
‘I’ve come to take you away from all this,’ he said through the gap.
Nothing.
‘There’s paperwork to fill in,’ the Senior Sergeant was saying. ‘She needs to come back next week to sort out a hearing. And there’s bail to be paid.’
Peter dug into a pocket and tossed a roll of plastic-coated bills at the police officer. ‘That cover it?’ And Peter realised that was a mistake.
‘I hope that’s not a bribe of some sort, mate,’ Rhodes said, frowning at the money.
‘Too much?’
The Senior Sergeant passed it back to Peter. ‘Doesn’t work that way in New South Wales.’
‘You have a massive great pyramid in the water by the bridge, and you’re worried about rules and regulations?’
‘Yes. Yes, I am. Just because the world has gone to hell doesn’t mean that law and order breaks down. If nothing else, it makes us stronger.’
Peter looked at the human with a fragment more respect. ‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘I can get that. Security is always important.’
‘There are thousands of lives depending on the police, mate. Remember that.’
Peter nodded. ‘I face the same quandary at home,’ he said. ‘I’m the Head of Security there. That’s a lot of people to control.’
‘Oh, and where’s that?’
‘Legion. You won’t know it.’
‘Nightclub, is it? Use you as a bouncer or something? Coat check?’
Oh, and that was the momentary respect gone.
‘Legion is a vile place,’ Peter said quietly. ‘Populated by thieves, murderers, fighters and smugglers. Just one of them could bring this city to a halt in an hour. You wouldn’t stand a chance facing what I keep control over every day.’ He pointed towards Kik the Assassin. ‘People like her.’
Kik the Assassin looked up finally and smiled. ‘I’m glad you recognise the threat I pose to you, and to this pathetic planet,’ she said.
‘You don’t pose anything to me,’ Peter said emotionlessly. ‘And unlike my mum, I don’t care about this planet, so you’re no threat to me at all.’
Kik the Assassin stood up. The policeman took an involuntary step back, as if he saw something that told him she wasn’t the docile, slightly weird emo-girl in weird blue make-up that he’d thought she was.
‘Now hang on, you two, I thought you were friends…’
‘Us?’
‘Friends?’
‘This pathetic mongrel has no friends,’ Kik the Assassin said. ‘Least of all me. I have broken out of stormcages that make this place look like a paper house. I need no aid from the likes of him.’
The policeman placed a hand out, and rested the other on his sidearm. ‘Now, I’m not having any trouble from you two, right?’
‘Wrong,’ said Peter, a little sadly.
‘Wrong,’ said Kik the Assassin, a little too gleefully for Peter’s liking.
Kik the Assassin jumped towards the door from a completely still, sitting position. The speed impressed Peter. The utter disintegration of the door impressed him less. With a sigh, he felt like chastising the senior sergeant on the ridiculousness of his supposed security. Then he remembered this was Earth – the average human would have been unlikely to be able to damage the door. But, like him, Kik the Assassin had been trained to spot weak spots, unseen fractures, the tiniest flaws in something, and use them to her advantage.
The shattering door had two advantages. Firstly, it provided her with a means of escape. Secondly, as it flew outwards, it took Senior Sergeant Rhodes out of action with it.
As he hit the floor unconscious, Peter heard the yelps of other officers back in the main precinct area. With a sigh of annoyance, he flicked his wrists down past his waist then back up, and now he had a blaster in each hand. The one in the left was a standard Deindum maser, capable of drilling holes in its target at anything from pencil-lead thickness to the size of a dinner plate. In his right hand was a gun of his own design that he’d spent a few weeks perfecting back on Legion.
The maser was kicked out of his hand and away into the corner as Kik the Assassin came past him, in a blur of somersaults and backflips. He had to admire the athleticism of it all.
He immediately put his left hand to the rear of his belt and brought out a Fifth Axis standard pulse gun, and fired to Kik the Assassin’s right, spoiling her latest back flip, so she crashed to the floor.
‘Two hands, three guns. Seems greedy,’ she spat.
‘Or just well prepared,’ Peter grinned at her. ‘You’re hardly my first Spyro. Don’t worry – it’s only set on stun.’
And he ducked behind a filing cabinet and started crawling to a better position.
Kik the Assassin lay still, her reptilian head twitching from side to side, the scales around her nose expanding as she sniffed the air. Her yellow nictitating eyes widened and blinked as she hunted her prey. ‘Mongrel,’ she called, and lashed out with a foot, trying to upend the filing cabinet.
He saw it coming a mile off and did his own perfectly performed back flip, parkouring off the wall and back to a taut, ready-for-anything pose, but out of her physical reach, all in the time it took the cabinet to hit the ground.
Kik the Assassin reached down and scooped up his dropped Deindum maser and went to fire it.
Behind her, three police officers ran into the area, drawing their side arms.
Kik the Assassin was on one of them in a second, slamming his body against the wall, and she looked up at his wheezing face as it went purple, her head again jerking spasmodically side to side. ‘On my world, we eat your kind as you snack on candy,’ she said. She opened her jaws, wider and wider, until it looked entirely possibly that very soon she might indeed be able to swallow the policeman in one go.
Before Kik the Assassin could react, Peter almost lazily raised his homemade gun and fired.
Phut. Phut. Phut.
All three officers dropped unconscious where they stood.
To Peter’s right, Senior Sergeant Rhodes stirred, saw his friends shot and immediately went to pull out his own gun.
Peter gunned him down casually and he flopped back to the floor.
Kik the Assassin swung away from Peter and instead shot at the wall to the outer precinct area, where more yells and screams were starting up. A segment of plaster and besser-blocked wall disintegrated, making the now visible police officers flinch and hide. She fired more roun
ds, shattering phones, laptops and TV screens, leaving sheets of paper floating sadly down to the floor, as the humans scattered, trying to find safety where this mad woman couldn’t find them.
One of them didn’t flinch and instead slowly and deliberately drew her pistol, holding it in both hands and aimed at Kik the Assassin and Peter, just moving the muzzle as she stared at each of them. ‘This stops right now,’ she barked.
Peter shot her expertly in the chest and she was flung back onto a desk and then the floor.
As the others recovered, Peter stunned them all one by one.
He realised a civilian was standing by the glass doorway in utter shock, his bags of shopping dropping to his feet.
With a sigh, Peter took him out as well.
Kik the Assassin was on all fours, spread-eagled like a cat or a spider, ready to bounce, every muscle locked in place, perfectly poised for action. As the noise and dust settled, she looked back at Peter and smiled. ‘Hey, sexy.’
Peter raised his eyes to heaven. ‘You what?’
‘That was cool. Never knew you had it in you, mongrel.’
‘Leave the “mongrel” thing out, yeah. Beyond the fact it’s racist and offensive, I simply don’t like it.’ Peter shrugged. ‘Don’t like you much, either.’
‘You are magnificent,’ Kik the Assassin said, bounding over to him, making no attempt to disarm him, but instead throwing her arms around his waist and kissing him. On the lips. Quite passionately.
Peter extracted himself, bringing his gun up to her head height.
‘Well, that’s not quite the response I was expecting,’ she said with a grin. ‘I do like my men manly and powerful.’
‘No, you like your men any way they are, provided you can get something out of them.’
Kik the Assassin shrugged. ‘Oh don’t be such a spoilsport. Besides, other than a kiss, what am I trying to get out of you?’
‘Access to the pyramid, I imagine,’ Peter replied. ‘Especially as you just took what you probably think is some sort of keycoder from my back pocket.’
Kik the Assassin looked coy. ‘This little thing?’ she said holding up what she had half-inched from him.
‘That little thing,’ Peter confirmed. ‘It’s not a keycoder, by the way.’
