'Less than an hour.'

The Doctor opened up a panel on the reactor. 'We have to get this running before they arrive. Why hasn't it worked? The Gallifreyan technology I gave you to compress metallic elements should have made those ingots as usable as the element from your own system.

We'll have to try temporal acceleration of the compression field.'

The Doctor started fiddling with the technology inside the reactor and Sarah allowed herself a small wistful smile. Technobabble and tinkering; it was almost like old times.

The only difference was that back then, it was her closest friend who did the fiddling.

Tsang had taken Davis's seat for herself, and the gesture didn't go unnoticed. She didn't particularly like to play these games of one-upmanship, but the situation was sufficiently desperate for her to do what was necessary to fulfil her orders.

She had received her orders on the day she had offered Sarah the use of a UNIT car, in a conference call with her superiors in the Cortez Project.

'Destroy the aliens and their technology by any means necessary,' General Kyle had instructed. 'All project members involved in the operation to be considered expendable.'

Tsang liked to imagine that it had been easy enough for Kyle to issue the order when she was safe in Geneva and didn't have to risk her own neck.

But though she liked to imagine it that way, Tsang knew in her heart that it almost certainly wasn't the case. She had ordered people to their deaths herself, and it was never easy.

'Any means necessary' It could mean wrecking this ship in the process, and that didn't come easy to Tsang. She didn't particularly fear her own death - she'd just be reborn further round the wheel anyway - but it would be unfortunate to condemn the rest of the ship's crew.

Then again, they knew the risk to life and limb when they signed on.

Davis's executive officer rushed in, out of breath. 'Flash traffic from CINCPAC, forwarded from NORAD.' He handed Davis a printout.

"Three objects descending from orbit, on course for our position? Missiles?'

'No, sir. They're on an entry path, not a re-entry curve. Whatever they are, they weren't launched from this Earth.'

Davis glared at him. 'If that's meant to be a joke, Commander, this is what I look like when I'm not laughing.'

'Neither am I, sir. Whatever these things are, they don't come from Earth, and both NORAD and CINCPAC agree on that. And, sir? These These vessels - if that's what they are - are several miles long.' vessels - if that's what they are - are several miles long.'

Chapter Twenty-Three.

Full Conrod

Yue Hwa sat beside Sarah, watching as the Doctor, Chiu and the aliens tried to get the damaged ship up and running. His report remarks that of all the people who had been affected by this latest assignment, she was the one he felt most guilty about. In a way, it was Qi Wang Chuan all over again: doing the wrong thing for what he told himself were the right reasons, as if that somehow made it less wrong.

'For what it's worth,' he said, 'I'm sorry. We did our best to keep you out of it, but but'

'Your best wasn't good enough. Now I suppose it'll be down to killing off the bad guy.'

'I don't want to kill anyone, 'Yue Hwa said plaintively. 'I've seen, and done, some things that made me question the value of taking a life unless it's absolutely a split-second self-defence choice.'

'Tiananmen?' Sarah asked.

He looked at her for a moment, then laughed hollowly. Tiananmen, indeed.

He remembered that day well. It was warm and sunny, the sort of day that should be reserved for picnics and young love by a stream. Some of them had treated it that way at the time: couples with placards, taking a break to share a lunch in the fresh air. Love and causes tended to mix in student days, one leading to the other.

It had been Yue Hwa's last year at university and his first serious relationship. He couldn't remember which of them had decided to join in the protests, just that they were both wildly in favour. No one had expected the tanks to be sent in or smoke and tear-gas to corrupt the summer air.

They had both escaped unharmed, but the experience had filled them with doubts and doubt is poison to love and romance. They parted soon after, amicably.

'No. After that. Qi Wang Chuan.'

'What's that?'

'Qi Wang Chuan was was apak tsz sin for a gang of dai huen jai operating out of Guangzhou. He'd been responsible for kidnapping and extortion, which hurt the gang boss I was pretending to working for. He sent me to kill Wang. It's not as if he didn't deserve it, apak tsz sin for a gang of dai huen jai operating out of Guangzhou. He'd been responsible for kidnapping and extortion, which hurt the gang boss I was pretending to working for. He sent me to kill Wang. It's not as if he didn't deserve it, but but'

'But?'

Yue Hwa had killed a man once before, but that was in the line of duty. It was him or the other man. Qi could have been arrested. He might even have been persuaded to give evidence against the gangster Yue Hwa was spying on, and, thinking of that, Yue Hwa had identified himself as a cop to Qi.

Qi was eager to spare his own skin. Unlike the Mafia's famous code of silence, it wasn't unusual for Triad members to inform on rival gangs. In this respect, the police were just another weapon in the Triad arsenal during turf wars.

It was the pleading face that Yue Hwa saw in his dreams. A man nodding his assent, agreeing to almost anything if it would keep him alive.

If Qi Chuan lived and turned informer, the Triads would know who had turned him. They would know Yue Hwa was a plant and months of investigation would have been wasted. The gang would have continued their work in the long run, and more innocent lives would be tainted or lost.

Yue Hwa had to maintain his cover and no amount of wishful thinking could change that.

As Qi Chuan closed his eyes in thanks that the man facing him would give him a new life, Yue Hwa cocked his pistol and emptied the full clip into his face. He read in the papers the next day that Qi Chuan had to be identified by his tattoos.

He had told himself that it didn't matter too much - the man was a criminal who deserved death. Somehow it didn't feel right. He had killed to support a criminal, and that went against everything he thought he had taken the job on for.

'You were right,' he told Sarah. 'We should have asked you directly. Or not involved you at all.'

'Why did you?'

'You're one of the few people the Doctor trusts to do the right thing.'

Sarah felt terrible. She had betrayed the Doctor's trust in her judgement just as much as he had crossed her. She wondered how life had come to be like this.

Suddenly the lights came on brighter than before, with a distinct blue tinge, and a soft rumbling hum filled the air. 'Main power established,' one of the small alien pilots reported. 'Reactor is functioning normally, gravitational waveguide is stable.'

The Doctor leapt to his feet, closed the hatch on the reactor and patted it.

'As good as new. Better, actually.'

'Thank you, Time Lord,' Chiu said. 'We owe you a debt for your assistance.'

'Really?' The Doctor looked askance at him."The only thing as bad as owing something, is being owed it.' He left Chiu to monitor the power build-up, and joined Sarah and Yue Hwa. 'Almost time to go.'

'Go?'

'Unless you fancy a very long flight to a very strange place, yes. All of Chiu's people are accounted for, both the half-humans like himself and his genetically engineered pilots, and so is the technology we all want to keep out of human hands.'

'Genetically engineered?'

'Yes. The pilots are modified to withstand tremendous pressures and forces. Why?'

'I was thinking about Major Barry and UNIT,' Sarah said quietly.

'What about Major Barry's UNIT team?'

'According to them, not only were their own memories altered but their guide was working against them. They described him as being brainwashed. And what about the hikers who disappeared locally?'

"They all turned up again. I doubt that their cases were connected -'

'Doubt? You admit these aliens have been brainwashing people. You admit they're experts at genetic engineering. Isn't it just possible they've been doing other things?'

The Doctor had been growing steadily angrier through this, if Sarah was any judge. He turned on Chiu. 'You were altering the DNA of people?'

'All we have done was for our own security only,' Chiu said. 'It was necessary to have a number of loyal Ph'Sor who would guard against any interference from the planetary authorities or other organisations.'

"That's not a denial.'

"The information is classified on a need-to-know basis,' Chiu snapped, cutting him off.

'If I find any sign of your interference in human culture culture'

'Earth is no longer a target, Doctor, and hasn't been for many years. Our own expedition was merely a salvage mission to recover technology left behind previously. You need not fear us.'

Sarah could almost see the Doctor's reply written on his face -he might not need to fear them, but he couldn't trust them either. "Then what happens to those people?'

"They live normal human lives,' Chiu told him. 'Until and unless another incident like this occurs. Then we have a spread of contacts across the globe, who can assist with repairs and keep us out of the authorities'

hands.'

Somehow, either through woman's intuition - not that she believed in such a gender-specific thing - or journalistic hunch, Sarah knew he was lying.

The Westmoreland's engines started slowly but steadily. Davis looked as relieved as Tom felt. 'What do we do now?'

Tsang had come over to a sonar station. "That alien ship has to surface before it can take off, right?'

Tom nodded.

'So,' Tsang told him, 'we ram it, as soon as it comes up.'

"That'll wreck the whole thing!'

'It'll stop them, in a pretty damn permanent way,' Barry corrected him.

'And what about their technology?' Tom asked. 'If it all gets trashed trashed'

'I'm sure there'll be wreckage,' Barry pointed out. 'If nothing else, the stuff the ship is made of is something new.' Tom didn't like that at all.

'Look,' Barry told him, 'it's that or they fly off in it and do whatever they want. That way we all lose.'

Tom nodded slowly. It wasn't what he'd been sent here for, but it was better than nothing. 'All right, I'm still in.'

Back aboard the Zhukov, Kutzov looked up as soon as the American ship's sonar sound changed. 'Aspect change,' the sonar officer called out unnecessarily.

'I hear.' Kutzov returned to the periscope.

'Aspect change below us also. It's the the whatever it is. It's moving up.' whatever it is. It's moving up.'

Kutzov nodded. 'I think the Americans know as well. They're coming around, building up speed speed'

'Captain,' Morozich suggested, 'they're not going to try ramming the thing?'

Kutzov hesitated. It did look that way. What the hell was he supposed to do now? 'Blow tanks two and four, and surface,' he ordered.

'But we'll be right in the path of the American ship,' Morozich protested.

Kutzov nodded. 'I doubt they'll be willing to risk an international incident, not in these waters.' 'You're not supposed to play chicken 'with cruisers.'

'Fortune favours the foolish, Gennady. Blow tanks two and four, and surface.'

On the Westmoreland's bridge someone called, 'Captain, it's that Victor ID, she's putting herself between us and the UFO.' 'Dammit. Bear starboard.

Reverse port screws.'

'They're too late!'

'Shit! Right full rudder, flank speed and sound collision!' Kutzov's order was too late. Even as the collision-warning siren hooted, the Westmoreland's bow cut into the Zhukov just forward of the propeller screws. The cruiser's bow crumpled under the impact, but held. The submarine, however, was batted sideways as if it weighed nothing, and rolled over.

It was like being inside a washing machine: water was scything into the engine room through a huge gash in the pressure hull, while men and anything that wasn't nailed down were bounced around the interior.

Screams and floods of water muted the sounds of bones breaking and flesh being crushed.

The central column that filled the heart of the alien ship began to throb and pulse. 'We have achieved flight power,' one of the aliens told Chiu. 'Shields are non-operational.'

'We will require a clear flight path, but have no manoeuvrability below the surface.'

'Can't you outrun the surface vessels?' the Doctor asked.