The Coming of the Teraphiles

  at every major subfield. See those funnels of smoke at intervals

  across the field? This is what space would smell like, lady, if

  it wasn't almost wholly airless!'

  Captain N'hn was in great spirits, having repelled pirates

  and completed a successful run. He was already in the process

  of selling his cargo to a broker and would soon transfer it. He

  had a sweet little filly, an administrator in the NNE sector,

  whom he had V'd earlier, and she was more than glad to

  help him enjoy the fleshpots of Desiree as soon as possible.

  But there was one thing he had to do first. He delayed long

  enough to squeeze through the crowd, shake the Doctor's

  hand enthusiastically and thank him again. 'If you shoot

  that well in the last games, Doctor, you're bound to win the

  Arrow. The first thing I'm going to do when I leave is get to

  Ferdii's and put a hefty bet on your team before I blow the

  rest of my tin!'

  'Well try not to let you down.' The Doctor laughed with

  the big centaur. 'And good luck on your next trip, captain.

  I'm sure well do our best to live up to your faith in us.'

  The captain pushed his way back to the gangplank where

  an anti-gee raft floated in readiness and, with a typical bit of

  centaur bravado, threw his knapsack on ahead of him then

  jumped the gap, mane and tail flying.

  Between the parked spaceships were busy V-boards

  advertising all the pleasures the planet had to offer. The

  crew were already watching them, murmuring notes into

  their implanted Vs, reading off numbers and street names

  as they waited impatiently for the cages to be run up beside

  their hull. 'The warm weather's coming,' muttered one, as

  he squeezed past the Doctor and Amy, 'and the buds are on

  the vine!' He uttered a strange, panting noise and gave Mrs

  Banning-Cannon a leer as he went by. 'Night, Missus. Aye

  aye.' A parting wink.

  'Oh, my goodness!' Mrs B-C recoiled in disgust. 'I hope

  I never have to travel with that bunch of ruffians again.

  Promise me, Doctor, that you haven't booked us on another

  ship like this one. Look!' She peered down hopefully. 'Those

  must be the porters I asked for.'

  Disembarking from an open airbus advertising the Djinn

  Inn, and crossing over to the nearest of the tanker's causeways,

  came a group of uniformed giants with numbers stamped on

  their chests, their backs advertising 'the best hotel on Desiree'.

  They were massive. Their heads were shaven of all hair and

  they had distinctly simian faces. Mrs Banning-Cannon waved

  and pointed. 'Here! Here!' she cried until they looked up and

  raised their thumbs to her. The leader spoke to the others

  and their huge mouths split in laughter.

  Suddenly a big, blue, blocky air-car dropped down to

  hover on a level with the observation dome and in a moment

  the Customs and Immigration boys came aboard, asking

  questions, scanning bodies, demanding dockets, feeling

  alien, unfamiliar flesh. The Customs men were mostly

  halbots, half-robots of flesh and steel, their eyes modified to

  make them more efficient, sending information back to the

  central ordinats. When they got to the Doctor and Amy, the

  immigration people were confused.

  'There are some odd discrepancies,' one murmured. 'Your

  passport documentation won't register.' He blinked hard,

  trying to re-scan the psychic paper the Doctor had handed

  him.

  'They're the new kind,' explained Amy. 'Issued through

  OE.'

  'Olde Englande?'

  'Of course not,' snapped the Doctor in apparent ill-temper.

  'Original Earth.'

  'I didn't know it had been finished.'

  'Just,' said Amy.

  'You must have had the codes through by now.' The Doctor

  pretended to be increasingly impatient.

  The official was baffled. Over his shoulder, Mrs Banning-

  Cannon looked at the Doctor's papers. 'Why, what's the

  trouble?' She was at her haughtiest. 'This man is a well-known

  doctor, and I am Mrs Banning-Cannon.'

  The immigration official recognised her name. For all he

  knew her family already owned Desiree. TerraForma™ was

  probably the parent company. 'Doctor, sir? Of course, sir.' He

  scratched the back of his head, looking at Amy. 'And you're

  his nurse, are you? Ah, yes.' His face cleared as he was at last

  able to read the passport properly. He put his palm against

  the documents. 'That should do it.'

  'Thank you.' The Doctor turned to the matriarch. 'You

  saved us some embarrassment.'

  'As you saved me, Doctor.' Her smile was almost charming.

  This holiday seemed to be doing her good.

  The transporter arrived to take them to the West Field on

  the other side of the planet.

  Amy was still finding it difficult to get over the size of

  these vast terminals. She had seen big cities on big planets

  but nothing like this devoted entirely to the shipping of the

  interstellar spaceways.

  The Doctor enjoyed her astonishment. 'And these are often

  only the tenders of the large ships like the Gargantua. All the

  really gigantic ones are out there in space. To say nothing

  of the large patrol ships of the IGP. There are all kinds of

  refuelling stations, including a massive colour pool further in

  towards the sun. I believe that this was the biggest spaceport

  in the entire sector.'

  'What if someone decided to take a shot at it? Sabotage?'

  'If someone thought it worth blowing up Desiree, they'd

  either destroy half the galaxy or wake up the day before in

  a police cell. Desiree's on a time fault, and they've managed

  to harness some of its power. They've invented all sorts of

  temporal alarm systems. They can actually go back and deal

  with a problem before it happens, and they've got a constant

  forward time-loop working for them. No way that I know of

  fooling those. To my knowledge, there have been fifty-two

  thwarted attempts since the port was founded.'

  'You've been here before?'

  'As a youngster, yes. In my gap century. I had a job once as

  a courier, taking bills of lading out to the ships. I got lost too

  many times. Ships were delayed. They fired me.'

  Amy laughed at this, not believing a word of it. 'You're

  having me on again, aren't you?' She shook an admonishing

  finger.

  She was relieved when a special car came for the Banning-

  Cannons and took them away to their hotel. She would

  be glad of the relative peace. Since the Doctor had saved

  them from Frank/Freddie Force, Mrs Banning-Cannon had

  cultivated his and Amy's company.

  Most of the other passengers had not bothered to book

  accommodation, since the hotels were extraordinarily

  expensive. They were heading straight for their connection,

  to board early and be ready for take-off in about twelve

  hours.

  'I hope nobody tries to steal that again.' The Doctor

  nodded towards the huge hatbox being carried aboard the

  hotel's tende
r. 'I wish we could get her to give the thing up

  and leave it here. I'm sure Mr Banning-Cannon would love

  to see the back of it.'

  'So are we sure he paid young Bingo to pinch it?'

  'Oh, I think so. Paid him in planets! Well, in a planet.

  'Yeah, Bingo's already decided to give Hari a knighthood,

  quickly followed by an earldom, so that Hari will be able

  to reassure Mrs B-C that he's the stuff that sons-in-law are

  made of...'

  'And meanwhile Bingo's trying to land you and take you

  up the aisle, Amy Pond.' The Doctor grinned.

  Amy kept a straight face. 'Well, I am rather fond of him,

  Doctor. Don't you like the sound of Amelia, Countess of

  Sherwood. Or is it Earl-ess? Can you have an Earl-ess?

  Anyway, he's sweet. And very enthusiastic.'

  'Oh, yes. I saw he was enthusiastic. Here's our taxi.'

  A battered air-car drew up at the gangplank and the

  Doctor helped Amy into it. She tried to avoid sitting on the

  split maroon fake zylorian myatt covering of the bench seat.

  The driver was a huge Unshim-Anlinite sucking a three-foot

  long chirpy. Apart from her face, which looked more like

  a human skull, she had most of the features of an earthly

  praying mantis, which told them she was from one of the

  colonised planets of Anlin. An albino with several sets of

  ruby-red eyes, she greeted them cheerfully, commenting on

  the improvement they had seen in the weather. 'Had a hot

  oil storm a week ago. The stuff was everywhere. It would

  have been funny if there hadn't been so many accidents. Big

  Brunk went over a walkway. Fell almost a mile. Wasn't much

  to clean up after that.'

  The air-car started up with a lurch, throwing them forward.

  The Anlinite used one of her sets of arms to stop Amy falling

  while the Doctor helped her get settled in her seat. 'Wow!'

  she exclaimed. 'It's enormous!'

  The mantis made hissing and clacking sounds which were

  probably laughter. 'You should have been here last month.

  We had almost double this volume. Time storms! Unusual

  number of crashes, apparently. People having hallucinations

  and so on. Piggo went totally crazy and pinched an ippy

  cruiser. You know what the cops have become. Everyone

  jittery. Something to do with the dark tide's sudden speed.

  Pulling them in. Gravity increase? I doubt it's as big a deal as

  they're making it out to be. Fuel crisis? There's more colour

  pools, not fewer! I don't really understand these things. I

  mean, what's gravity? Does anyone know? Causing some

  serious turbulence, though, they say.'

  'We noticed a bit of that,' said the Doctor. 'We arrived

  ahead of schedule. Had to settle back and use our thrusters.'

  The car made its way through mile after mile of battered,

  oil-streaked commercial ships, many of them undergoing

  minor repairs, others being refinished or refitted, with the

  sky belching and cackling and sending streaks of lightning

  in all directions, while the combined stinks of thousands

  upon thousands of ships from any number of distant worlds

  formed a heavy blanket below, hiding the hulls from view.

  Every so often a blob of rainbow-streaked colour wallowed by,

  floating like a giant, irregularly shaped, grimy, soap bubble.

  Dangerous. The stuff was the best fuel ever discovered but to

  drop into it meant you passed through into dimensions not

  always compatible with any known life.

  The smog eventually grew so thick that the Doctor pulled

  over the car's canopy to protect them from a sudden isolated

  shower of what was only partly water. The smells seemed

  to get stronger the further they went. He wrinkled his nose.

  'Maybe we should have taken the Gentlemen's bus,' he said.

  'I just wasn't sure if we'd get any time alone on the Dafryd

  boat.'

  'Will it be as cramped as the tanker?'

  'Well, she's designed for passengers, but she's not a luxury

  liner. A bit basic. I'm afraid Mrs B-C will be upset with me all

  over again when she sees the vessel.'

  'Oh, God, I can't imagine!' Amy began to laugh.

  'Get some sleep,' said the Doctor. 'It's at least a couple of

  hours until we pick up the 11-28 to Placamine.'

  Resigned, she settled back in her cushions while the Doctor

  continued to look around him at the great port, identifying

  ships which had been built sometimes two or three hundred

  years before.

  The Doctor sighed, suddenly remembering a day, so long

  ago, when everything in time and space had been new to

  him. He'd been so excited then, and the universe was so

  mysterious. There had been so much for him to explore, and

  he'd had a long, long lifetime ahead to enjoy it all in. Now,

  he thought with some sadness, he had seen far too much of

  it to retain the same early sense of wonder. But then - how

  different had he really been in those early days of wonder?

  He might never know. There were not many people left to

  ask.

  He looked out at all the odd designs of ships and thought

  about the thousands of cultures they represented. Rank upon

  rank, mile upon mile the car flew on, past an enormous liner,

  its dull metal giving it an oddly organic sense of sickness,

  dwarfing the very planet itself, as it came down for serious

  repairs which couldn't be made in free space. When the

  Doctor asked the driver why the ship was in dry dock, the

  praying mantis answered that she understood it had been

  attacked by something down near the Inner Suns.

  'Know what it was?' the Doctor asked casually.

  'I heard they hit a colour pool,' said the driver. 'Though

  with all her sophisticated instruments, I'm surprised they

  didn't spot it.'

  Colour lakes were found everywhere throughout the

  galaxy. They were patches of pure energy which could be

  parsecs across or, if found on a planet, only a few feet wide

  and a few inches deep. They supplied almost all the post-

  nukers, since the famous inventor O'Bean the Younger had

  developed engines capable of using the raw stuff. It was

  extremely difficult to refine. Almost singlehandedly O'Bean

  had drawn the human race from its last long Dark Age.

  Their driver drove her car between two identical ships,

  whose noses disappeared in a blood-red cloud of roiling gas.

  'The captain had to do some snappy steering to get her out of

  the pool,' she told them.

  The Doctor craned his long neck to look back at the big

  ship. 'What was her name?'

  'I forget, cit. One of that class of supers. Super-luxury.

  Super-speed. All of that. I saw a V about her. Didn't you? I

  know they made a lot of fuss. She was a C-class. Belonged to

  the Aristophanes family, I know. I bet she was insured for a

  bundle!'

  'I bet,' agreed the Doctor. 'But I'm surprised her captain

  let her get into a colour pool and so close to the Inner Suns.'

  'You must have heard, cit. There's a lot of stuff going on

  down there. Funny stuff you never hear about on the V. Just


  rumours. But they add up. Sightings of ghost-planets, weird

  distortions in the charts, whole planets changing position or

  else vanishing altogether. Conflicting currents bad enough to

  pull an ordinary ship apart. Dark flow forming pictures as if

  it was intelligent, trying to communicate. I'm surprised you

  don't know about any of that stuff. Where have you been?'

  'You saw the old tanker you picked us up from. We

  started speeding up for a while, too. Something sent her

  communications all over the place. Time winds blowing

  every which way. She had no high-speed, no real contact

  with anyone or anything. How long have you been hearing

  stories like that out here?'

  'Quite a while. But that's real time. Our time. Months ago

  for you.'

  'It's all relative.' With a sigh, the Doctor sat back and

  closed his eyes.

  'Don't talk to me about relatives,' said the driver feelingly.

  'Did I tell you about my husbands? Ex-husbands, I should

  say.' She leaned forward to tap a control irritably. And began

  to wheeze, then to cough. There is no stranger sight than a

  mantis cabbie in full exoskeleton shake. But she kept steering

  steady, to Amy's amazement.

  That was all the Doctor needed to help him keep his eyes

  closed and get the forty winks he had been promising himself

  for ages. What was going wrong with the colour pools? If they

  disappeared or became contaminated it could mean vast

  changes in the economics of the entire galaxy.

  He was awakened by the driver yelling: 'Here we are, cit!

  Forty-seven red ones, if you please, thank you!'

  Leaning forward the Doctor handed her a yellow. 'Keep the

  change,' he said, as the driver started to punch the numbers

  into her wrist bank.

  He looked with some relief at the relatively modem

  spacebus which was going to take them to Placamine in

  Poseidon.

  They were not the first passengers. The Doctor cocked his

  head when he heard something half-familiar.

  'What was that?' he asked the neatly uniformed steward

  who checked their tickets and directed them to their cabins.

  'Voices?'

  'Oh, just the miners singing, cit. The Desiree All Male

  National Eisteddfod Deputation. They're lovely to listen

  to, aren't they? Representing Desiree in the Interstellar

  Eisteddfod. Great lads, sir. There's a strong chance they'll

  bring back the ab Ithil cardigan if not the Yellow Leek itself.