The Closing of Doors

Part Nine

As evil and despicable the mind of a Dalek could be, the amount of processing power constituted in their mushy little brains was constantly underestimated. For a Dalek who could properly accumulate the wisdom gained by his own experiences, this was doubly true. In the time it took for Camille to fall to the floor, Cai had already severely chastised himself for his failure to predict that Ayl would lash out against her--predicting the unpredictable had always been his proudest ability, being a top-rating Strategist, the most genius genius in a race of mad geniuses. Likewise, in a second it took Camille to realize that she had fallen, Cai was already lurching forward and thrusting his manipulator arm downward towards her, offering her the equivalent of a hand to help her off the floor.

Looking up at him with something of admiration, she gripped the metallic rod above the sucker-like appendage and he tugged her absently to her feet. He was distracted, his eyestalk facing somewhere else, his dome swiveling and his gaze finding its way to each corner. Camille, assuring herself that he was busy scheming, suddenly noticed the absence of any resistance from Ayl. The black Dalek was sitting motionless, his eyestalk staring straight ahead.

"Cai?" Camille inquired with an urgency, her sights not leaving Ayl's dark outline, "What's his problem?"

"I may not consider the Commander to be particularly clever in a Dalek sense," Cai's response was quiet and distant in his distraction, and his tone was oddly human-like, "but he had to earn his Commanding position somehow. He is clever enough to understand that the magnetic fluctuation I have set into the Stratagem Computer will cause him to lose control if he tries to move."

"I see," Camille replied, her fingers brushing the trigger to her gun, "And why isn't it affecting you?"

"It is localized," Cai answered with only a part of his concentration. He was busy trying to narrow down the most strategic way to escape. Internally, he had long ago reached a conclusion; it was bringing himself to act that was taking his time.

The link between the Dalek and the woman was a bridge for the emotions. Camille could feel some tingling of dread--was it her own, or was it his? This was the problem she often encountered.

"I assume you've got a plan," she breathed, weary of the fear. The entrance to the Stratagem Quarters was now glowing a bright red as though it was melting; they had sent for a specialty torch-fitted Dalek to burn down the door. She looked at Cai; a pang of frustration rushed over her. Why was he failing to communicate? Why did he always fail to communicate?

Why did he hide things from her? Her thoughts starkly transitioned from the situation around her to what she had learned in her encounter with the Stratagem Computer. Suddenly, she felt her trust in Cai melt away as the numbers that had been implanted into her by the Stratagem Computer lined themselves up in her mind. There was remarkably large number floating around that she hadn't understood before--now she did. It was a death count.

All at once, the mask that had identified Cai as anything other than a Dalek crumbled, and her partner in front of her was just as menacing to her as any other Dalek would be. Sparks of emotion lit into fire inside her; she backed away from the Dalek.

The telepathic connection always went two ways.

Cai was startled out of his lazy strategizing as he felt unfamiliar emotions wash over him. Quickly, he evaluated his own thoughts as to analyze why he would experiencing such an awful hurt feeling--there was no correlation, meaning that these feelings had to be radiating off of Camille.

This launched him into an entirely different trail of thought. Why was she feeling such intense emotions? Fear was understandable--there was a near-dead idiotic killing machine in front of them, and more bumbling little killing machines outside, who could have gotten into the room 40.02% quicker if they had sent for two specialty Daleks instead of one, which were both certainly available, if they weren't so clouded with thick-headedness and pride....

Cai regained his concentration, halting himself from being the chief Strategist of the 116th Dalek Brigade and instead focusing on being a good partner to the human behind him. What exactly was she feeling? This was a difficult answer to place for an organism not meant to feel anything besides hatred, but Cai could tell that she was certainly feeling hurt in some way.

Cai's incredible mind refused to be stumped. Within the second of first noticing Camille's shift of emotions, he came to a conclusion in a subject he knew very little about.

His sensors reported that she had backed away from him, and it suddenly made sense.
She was feeling mistrust. Even deeper, she was feeling betrayed.

With a terrible new wave of guilt and sorrow, Cai came to the realization that Camille was feeling betrayed by him.

It must have been what Ayl had said. You killed them. This was exactly why he hadn't wished her to know; he had hid the entire truth of his past so she would continue to trust him. Cai never wanted Camille to know that he himself had ordered planets to be ripped out of the sky, that he had ordered millions of lives to be ended, all for the strategic advancement of the Daleks.

That's all Cai felt like he could do: strategize. As mentioned previously, he was the top genius in a race of geniuses. However, as he was stricken with the panic that his worst fears were becoming realized, the very mind that had advanced the Dalek Empire so immensely could no longer bring itself to think. As he tried desperately to decide what to say, he realized that his mind was wired for war, not for the strange, unplaceable, emotional affection he felt for the one individual human he couldn't bear to be without. His dire need to preserve her life was unfamiliar to the creature who had previously spent his time ordering the end of lives. In this one situation, the terribly underestimated mind of the wisest strategist alive didn't have a strategy to rid himself of his past and allow her to trust him again.