The Eleventh Tiger (31 page)

‘Yes. A good start, but notes and memoranda can be forged, can’t they? You want to be absolutely certain that your orders remain for ever, to be obeyed by those who follow you.

Indeed, perhaps you even want to make them believe you are still there giving them!’

‘I could record my orders on a tape, I suppose.’ The thought took hold, leading Ian to expound further as ideas and thoughts often did. ‘Yes, I could make tapes with my policies and orders. Have them played over intercoms, or even down the phone to subordinates, who might think it was the real me.’

‘Exactly! Now you have it. You could make a recording, which would give out the orders you wanted even if you were no longer there. So long, that is, as there was someone around to play the recording.’

‘But, Doctor, I’m from the 1960s, so it’s easy enough to find a tape recorder. But this is the middle of the nineteenth century.’

‘Yes, and I happen to believe that this particular recording was made for earlier still.’

‘At the time of the First Emperor?’

‘Yes, two thousand years ago.’

‘But, Doctor, you know that’s impossible. They didn’t have tape recorders in those days.’

Before the Doctor could answer, Ian corrected himself. ‘But you mentioned a sort of recording before, to Barbara. A

“stone tape” you called it. Are you trying to suggest that this General Zhao is one?’

‘Yes, my boy, that is exactly what I am suggesting.’ The Doctor nodded towards Brother Yeung. ‘His story is quite clear cut, isn’t it? Qin Shi Huangdi wanted to rule for ever, and somehow he found a way to have his mind and personality recorded as a stone tape, along with those of his two generals.’

‘Then he found his immortality, after a fashion? It doesn’t sound like much of an afterlife to me.’

‘No, he didn’t really. This recording is only a copy of his mind at the time, but it is no more really him than a recording of a man singing a song is that original man.’

‘It sounds like a pretty unstable mind, too.’

‘It most certainly was. Unstable and dangerous. In those days the Chinese believed that eating imperishable materials such as gold and jade would make the body equally imperishable. So Qin liked to snack on powdered jade and gold dust.’

‘But that’s ridiculous. It could only lead to heavy-metal poisoning. And if gold affects the body anything like lead or arsenic...’

‘It does.’

‘Brain damage, eh?’ Ian asked, though he didn’t need the Doctor to answer this for him.

‘I’m afraid I was thinking too narrowly, Chesterton, when I speculated about a stone tape.’

‘Too narrowly? It sounded pretty broad-minded to me.’

‘Yes, but a recording doesn’t respond to you, does it? It just plays.’

‘An AI could respond to what you do,’ Vicki said. ‘An artificial intelligence,’ she added, this time for Ian’s benefit.

‘Artificial intelligence?’

‘AIs are sort of like recordings in computers, but they can think for themselves and hold conversations, fight against you in games... What they do or say depends on what you do or say.’

‘My dear child! You’ve hit the nail precisely on the head.’

The Doctor chuckled. ‘That’s exactly what you’ve done.’

‘You’ve both lost me,’ Ian admitted. ‘The stone tape thing I can understand, but...’

The Doctor tapped his foot for attention. ‘If you could make a stone tape - a recording or imprint, rather, of a person’s mind - then you could play it back. Perhaps you could record over it later, wiping it out. But what if you wanted to keep it but change it a little, hmm? What if you could program it to do some things the way you want them done?’

Vicki frowned. ‘Then it wouldn’t be so much a stone tape as a stone application or a stone executable file. A building full of them could be a stone matrix. But how could you program it or edit it?’

‘That would depend on where you are in relation to your stone application.’

Ian was still trying to understand all this futuristic ter-minology. ‘So what you’re saying is that some intelligence persuaded the First Emperor to imprint his and his men’s consciousness into a stone tape recording, which this controlling force could then reprogram to do its bidding?’

‘Yes, Chesterton, that is precisely what I am stating.’

‘Then who or what is behind this?’

‘Some alien force that has no physical presence, but is capable of making use of the forces inherent in the fabric of the universe to reach out and program local proxies on worlds it wishes to control.’

‘What forces inherent in the fabric of the universe?’

‘Alignments in gravitational fields, perhaps. Much as you might wait for the wind to drop before shouting from one roof top to another, the alignments and conjunctions of stars and planets allow some beings to make their influence felt at certain times.’

‘And that’s why they waited two thousand years before starting up their reprogrammed army? Because they needed the conditions to be right in order for them to be heard?’

‘Yes,’ the Doctor said darkly. ‘The stars must be right.’

Ian stood in the store room where Vicki had said she and Barbara were held prisoner. He told himself he was looking for signs of what had happened to Barbara - blood, if the worst had come to the worst. In reality he was doing his best not to look at all. He didn’t want to see blood, or a body, or anything other than her smiling when she saw him.

The fact that the abbot, whether possessed or otherwise, had taken her with him suggested there was still a window in which Ian was expected to kill Major Chesterton.

He had never thought he could do something like that. Not in cold blood. He had killed during his time travelling with the Doctor and Barbara, but he had never set out with that intention, and never done so when losing his own life wasn’t the only alternative. Cold-blooded killing was a different matter entirely.

Taking a life for selfish reasons was possibly the worst thing Ian could imagine. At Sunday School he had been taught the Ten Commandments and, although he wasn’t particularly religious as an adult, he still tried to hold on to those core values which seemed common to almost all races and cultures.

He had also been taught that suicide was a sin as bad as murder, because you were murdering yourself. He doubted that Father Michael ever could have imagined a situation in which this could be so literally the case.

Was it murder to kill an older version of yourself when you would still be alive? Was it suicide? Or was it some weird mixture of both and neither? Ian didn’t know, but he was sure Father Michael would have disapproved.

Father Michael by definition wouldn’t have had a wife to live for, kill for and die for. Barbara might not share his name or wear his ring, but he knew their hearts had wed long ago and were just waiting for their minds to catch up.

Would he kill for Barbara? Yes, to protect her life. He would die for her too, he knew that. Major Chesterton was himself, which meant that he, too, would die for Barbara. Ian just wished he didn’t have to be the one to make the choice for him. Not that anyone else could. They were one person, and only one person could make such a choice.

Ian backed out of the store room and found his way out of the monastery. The moon was setting in the west. Not on the British Empire - the sun would set on that in the coming century - but the ancient Greek huntress was setting on one man who was two.

Sticking to the shadows, as if in a dream, Ian set off for the docks.

Vicki woke early and went to look for breakfast. A boat from Xamian had been promised, bearing supplies. She hoped it had arrived. She passed the room Ian had been given at the monastery and saw that it was empty, the door open.

Vicki wasn’t surprised at this. With Barbara in the hands of a madman - or worse - it would be a wonder if Ian could get a wink of sleep. He was probably already at breakfast, swapping stories with the soldiers who were delivering the supplies.

He wasn’t. In fact, he wasn’t anywhere in the monastery.

Vicki was beginning to worry that some of their enemies had remained behind as guerrillas or terrorists. She half expected a sword-wielding assassin with glowing eyes to jump out at her at any moment. The only person she did bump into, however, was Fei-Hung. He was going through his morning

jiao shi
next to a scorched and blackened tree as the sun rose.

‘Have you seen Ian?’ she asked.

‘No, but I am worried about him.’

‘He seems fine to me,’ Vicki said. ‘All his injuries have healed.’

Fei-Hung shook his head. ‘He has a mix of practicality, compassion and courage that is enviable and dangerous. He reminds me of myself, in many ways.’

‘You mean he won’t leave anyone behind? He doesn’t want to fight, but he won’t back down if he’s forced...?’

Fei-Hung nodded.

‘Also... if I were him I would do anything to rescue the woman I love. Even if it meant dying or killing. And, I think that if he were me he would do the same thing.’

A terrible suspicion began to dawn on Vicki. ‘You mean...?’

‘I mean he isn’t in his room, no-one has seen him since before sunrise and the boat that delivered the supplies from Xamian has already left. I don’t know whether he was on it, but if I were him I would be oh my way to kill the major.’

‘Oh no!’ Vicki ran back into the monastery. She had to tell the Doctor about this, and she was sure he would come to the same conclusion as Fei-Hung. It was a conclusion Vicki didn’t want to believe, but did.

The Doctor was examining scorch marks on the wall of the main hall, while Logan, who had arrived with the food supplies and bedding, looked on.

‘Gunshots?’ Logan asked.

‘No, I think some kind of projected electrical plasma.’

‘I’ve never heard of such a weapon.’

‘If young Wong is to be believed, there was no weapon. And, as it happens, I do believe him.’

‘But then how - ?’

Before the Doctor could answer, Vicki called out to him.

‘Doctor!’

‘What is it, child? Can’t you see I’m busy?’

It’s about Ian. He’s gone. I think he’s gone to kill the other Ian. I mean, Major Chesterton.’

The Doctor gasped. ‘He mustn’t. If the two Ians should meet, there would be the most terrible explo-’

‘Ian?’ Logan shook his head. ‘The major’s name isn’t Ian.’

The Doctor and Vicki both froze. ‘What did you say?’ the Doctor asked hoarsely.

‘The major’s name isn’t Ian. It’s William. Major William Chesterton, of the First Light Hussars.’

‘Are you certain of that?’

‘As certain as I can be, and I’ve known him since he was twenty and under my father’s command.’

‘Captain, we must get to Xamian Island at once.’

‘The boat will have gone back already.’

‘Then we must use the junk. Or Ian Chesterton will make a terrible, terrible mistake!’

Ian walked on to the parade ground in the heart of the fortress at Xamian. He didn’t feel his footsteps hit the ground, and felt as if he was floating. All a product of adrenaline or something, he supposed.

A couple of soldiers in grey shirts, sans uniform tunics, were whitewashing the perimeter of small stones around the parade ground. Ian suppressed a smile. In... what?... ninety years? ...he’d be doing the exact same thing in Wales. What was it the French said? The more things changed, the more they stayed the same. Technologies, policies and attitudes may change, he thought, but the British army would for ever run on the motto, ‘If it moves, shoot it; if it doesn’t move, paint it white.’

He wondered if these men were conscripts, as he had been in his National Service days, or volunteers. For all Ian knew they still press-ganged people in 1865. He reflected that his knowledge of army history wasn’t up to much. He should ask Barbara, he thought, and then shivered.

‘Major Chesterton,’ a voice called. Ian froze, struck with the fear that his other self was about to stumble upon him. True, he wanted to meet the major, but on his own terms. He wanted to see him coming.

The call came again and Ian looked around for the source.

A soldier was coming across the parade ground holding a bundle. ‘Excuse me, sir,’ the man said with a salute. ‘Sorry, sir! Didn’t recognise you without your moustache, sir.’

‘That’s all right,’ Ian told the man. ‘Life is all about change, isn’t it?’ He forced a smile he didn’t feel. ‘What can I do for you, Private?’

‘Oh, sorry again, sir. For the delay, I mean.’

He held out the bundle he was carrying. Ian took it, and found that it was heavy. It was a leather belt, wrapped around a leather holster that contained a pistol that weighed almost as much as Ian’s heart.

‘Quartermaster says it’s as good as new, sir.’

Ian forced something he hoped resembled a smile. ‘Of course he does. Thank you, Private. Dismissed.’

The soldier left just in time, as Major Chesterton emerged from a door twenty yards behind him.

The pistol felt heavy in Ian’s hands as he walked towards his other self. He registered that people were looking at him, and speaking or shouting. They were like reflections in a fairground hall of mirrors - distorted and silent, fading out of his peripheral vision as he came closer to the major.

There was sound - voices, in the main - but it floated past him like the breeze. His older self, turning, surprised, as Ian raised the gun.