The third eye in Davros' forehead flickered into dim life. The slumped figure shivered slightly, and the emaciated head slowly pulled itself erect. The once cold, grey, ancient hand slowly rose up from his lap, and relaxed into its familiar position on the right hand side of the chair. Jaruzel looked up from behind the chair. Most of the panels were open, showing the grotesque melding of man and machine. The stump of Davros' torso was embedded in the soft green glow of his life-support systems. "How do you feel?" Asked Jaruzel. Davros held his hand up. The old leaden grey skin now had a slight pinkish tinge to it. "Stronger." He whispered, turning his hand back and forth; studying it. Within his mind, the chair's computer system informed him that the primary life-support systems were now back online. "What have you been doing?" Jaruzel was picking the crumbled remains of an old power card from the back of the chair. "Oh a couple of repairs. One or two upgrades, stealing a little technology and adding some new stuff. I've spent the last six months rebuilding your primary life-support systems. I've just finished installing the replacements. They should be better than the originals. Things have come along a bit over the last thousand years." System parameters scrolled rapidly through the old scientists mind. The onboard computer was rapidly learning and testing the new systems, integrating them with the old. "Most satisfactory. You have quite a considerable technical skill. You are to be commended." His clawed fingers flicked a switch on the console in front of him. Jaruzel stood up, and flicked it back again. "Your drive systems are still off-line. There's a problem with the magnetic resonance coils. If you try and activate it, your computer won't be able to manage the integrity of the super conducting rollers. They'll go off like a shrapnel grenade." Davros hissed. "Then why isn't this being reported to me?" Jaruzel sighed. "Most of the internal sensor arrays are burnt out, or reporting false data. It, along with a million other things, is on my list of things to do. You can help me by not having a go at me about it. Commander Akona is on my back as it is, I don't need you whinging at me as well." He roughly banged the panel he'd been holding into place. "My apologies. The work that you have done is most exemplary. You have my thanks!" Davros's head turned slightly, and Jaruzel could almost hear the vertebrae grinding. "My vision seems to have improved." The young man stood up, brushing the thousand-year-old Skaro dust from him. Er, yes. I brought you out of cold storage two months ago to install that." Davros looked up. "You, did not wake me?" Jaruzel busied himself with re-attaching a panel on the front of the chair. "Um, no. It wasn't official you see." A slight smile quivered across Davros' lips. The hand reached up to probe the area around the prosthetic. "It is larger. Yet it does not take power from the chair." Jaruzel finished fixing the panel in place. "No, it derives power from your bodies electrolytes. I'm sorry about the size, but I just couldn't make it any smaller. I don't have access to the nano-tech lab they use for maintaining some of the cyborg prisoners. As far as they are concerned, your mechanical and you're going to stay that way. "I assume that you do not agree with that ascertain? That is most admirable." The smile still flickered, much like a flame from a boiler that flicks around the edge of the door. "I've got a lot of work here Davros. Why don't you tell me the rest of that story? You were in your lab?" Davros stiffened, and then slowly relaxed. "Yes. I was working in my laboratory. I was attempting to raise the intelligence of my latest strain of warrior crustacea. I remember the alarms. The entire bunker was drowning in the wailing noise of the sirens. It is strange. I can still hear the sound of the warhead screaming down upon us. The isolation laboratory I worked in saved my life. It was situated on the edge of the blast, and was the only building that remained. I awoke under sixteen tonnes of concrete. My legs were crushed. The remains of my body were burned, lacerated and riddled with radiation. I was trapped in that pit for three days. Three days of nothing but thinking. Three days that set the course for the rest of my life. The Daleks were born in that glowing pit of radiation. When I was rescued they did not think I would survive. I spent years of agony, lying in a bed in a hospital. Years, designing the life-support systems that you now repair. By the time the first experimental Dalek came on-line, I was four hundred years old. I designed a new race, one that had a true purpose. That is what all other races lack. All races look to their world and ask it why they are there. The Daleks do not need to do that. I created them for one purpose, and one purpose only, the total, and utter, annihilation of the Thal race." Jaruzel fixed the last panel in place. You're built-in repair systems will be able to sort out drive train. I can't do that. I don't have the skill." He sat down on the chair opposite the old scientist. "So why did they turn on you? The Daleks." The shaking hand grasped the side of the chair. "They were exceptional creatures. They did in one night, that which the combined effort of the Kaled race had not been able to achieve in over two thousand years of war. The destruction was total. There were no survivors within the Kaled dome. When they returned they discovered that they had fulfilled their one purpose. That, coupled with the ability to better themselves, they decided to make their own purpose. Unfortunately, I was not amongst their immediate plans. I realised my error too late, and was shot when I attempted to shut them down. So you see, it was a mistake. A single glorious mistake that began to conquer the universe." Jaruzel shivered. "I have to start the containment unit again." Davros sighed. In his mind a small red icon turned green. His hand depressed a switch on the console of his chair. "Very well, if you must. I assure you we will speak again. Perhaps much sooner than you realise." Jaruzel was still frowning when he walked out of the containment unit. What had the old buzzard meant by that? Sooner than you think?
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