Doctor Who - New Adventures - 50 - Happy Endings by Paul Cornell

Author:Paul Cornell
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science Fiction, General, Fiction
ISBN: 9780426204701
Publisher: London Bridge
Published: 1996-06-14T07:00:00+00:00

‘I know about the modern world,’ repeated James, sitting down.

‘So you don’t know?’ Jason prodded him.

‘I know about the modern world,’ James insisted, pouring out the angostura for the Martians. ‘ Mighty Joe Young is an old movie.’

138

Jason looked deflated. ‘Damn.’

Bernice glanced into one of the other corners, where the UNIT teams were hunched over their piece of paper. Unsurprisingly, being from the same time and planet as the person who set the questions, they were doing quite well.

There were so many soldiers in the pub, even after several of them had wandered off for a quiet drink down the Time In A Bottle with the Brigadier and the other veterans, that they’d had to form several teams, but Bernice had the impression that they were sharing information. Cheats.

Skog, one of the Ice Warriors, stood up. ‘Excuse me,’ he hissed. ‘I shall return in a moment.’ He headed for the gents.

Bernice and Jason looked at each other, with just enough edge to commu-nicate their common thought, but nothing that Savaar would notice. Jason leant closer to Benny’s ear. ‘Shall I go and have a look, and tell you how they do it?’

‘Don’t be vulgar.’

‘But don’t you want to know?’

‘In theory, yes, but it may be too horrid. I’m amazed he can do anything in a moment in that suit.’

Bernice’s gaze followed the Martian as he approached the toilet. He threaded his way through the crowd at the bar, and encountered a UNIT soldier headed in the other direction, carrying a pint. Skog’s shoulder shunted him aside, and the pint went flying.

‘Hey!’ the soldier bellowed. ‘You spilt my pint!’

‘Yes,’ whispered Skog. ‘I did.’

Bernice realized that the Martian was just stating the obvious, that in a moment he would have offered to buy the Private another, but she also realized that it was too late.

The soldier head-charged the bulky alien, pushing him off balance. The Martian, reflexively, struck out with his claw, sending the soldier flying.

As one, the soldiers in the corner jumped to their feet, and ran at the Ice Warrior. Bernice realized that Savaar and his compatriots were getting to their feet also.

‘Savaar,’ she called. ‘Don’t! This is stupid!’

‘Don’t worry, Shsurr Summerfield,’ the Ice Lord assured her. ‘We won’t hurt them.’

Jacquilian and Sanki had been at the bar, chatting in subdued voices with Annie Trelaw while the quiz progressed. Now they were astonished to find chairs and bottles flying as the soldiers and the Ice Warriors laid into each other, and the pub quiz turned into a pub brawl. Annie had started to shout and wave her arms, but she couldn’t make herself heard over the noise.

139

‘Ooh, what a palaver!’ whistled Jacquilian. ‘Do you think we should join in?’‘No, Jacs, no. Think of your digits. Your art must be above such things.’

‘Sanki, you’re so right. Mind you –’ A soldier slammed into the bar beside them, and was about to get to his feet and rejoin the fray. Jacquilian’s third eye glowed red for a second, and his head wobbled with exertion.

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