'No. They are designed for operation in water; the Qe'shaal is not. The surface vessels must be removed from our path.'

The Doctor retrieved his umbrella. "That's my department.' He moved to the flight deck's transposition arch and started inputting coordinates on the panel. 'All ashore who's going ashore,' he exclaimed. 'That means you two.'

He beckoned to Sarah and Yue Hwa.

'Where are we going?'

'Back to the Westmoreland. We have to move it away.'

'I'll see to it, Doctor,' Yue Hwa assured him. He led Sarah through the arch.

The Doctor turned back to Chiu and bowed slightly. 'I can't exactly say it's been a pleasure, but it has been interesting,' he said, not unkindly.

'likewise, Time Lord. It has been a mostly efficient exercise.'

'I shall take those words to heart and cherish them,' the Doctor said. 'Have a safe trip home.' He tipped his hat, then stepped backwards through the arch and was gone.

Chiu remained looking at the arch for a moment. The Doctor had made a good ally as much as he had once made a worthy opponent. Either way, he was worth admiring.

'Plot an escape trajectory. Prepare for flight as soon as a takeoff path is available.'

How would Sarah have described what happened when the Doctor materialised in the ship's conn? Something like: All the systems were still inoperative and Yue Hwa was lying at the Doctor's feet. The Doctor immediately knelt, feeling for a pulse. There was one, and Yue Hwa came round groggily.

'Sarah,' the Doctor whispered.

'She's fine, for the moment,' Tom said. He was standing on the far side of the main map table, holding a gun. Sarah was sitting in a chair nearby.

'Why are you helping these aliens to get away with with all they've done? all they've done?

Judging by your DIA file, I'd have thought you'd know better.'

'It's called a conscience.'

'Is that what you call it? A dope-dealing, arms-smuggling, alien collaborator with a conscience. That's a new one on me.'

'Tom,' Sarah said. 'It's not what you think. We've had this all wrong. All of us: you, UNIT and me. The Doctor is a -' She bit off the first few words that came to mind. 'Whatever else he's done, he does have Earth's best interests at heart. Those aliens aren't hostile.' So she hoped anyway. She wondered if even the Doctor knew all they really got up to in Cambodia.

Tom looked at her, swinging his pistol in her direction. 'Oh shit.' His face fell. She felt a pang of sympathy for the hurt she saw in his eyes. It was misplaced, but it looked genuine enough to make her wince. "They got to you too,' he said.

'What?' Sarah was puzzled for a moment, then it dawned on her: he thought the aliens had brainwashed her too. 'No, it's not like that. They haven't done anything to us.'

"Then you were playing me for a fool all along. Either way way' Tom pulled her up from the chair,' if if you and the Doctor are working together now, then you mean something to each other. I got good use out of you before, so why not again?' you and the Doctor are working together now, then you mean something to each other. I got good use out of you before, so why not again?'

Sarah felt mentally violated. 'I thought spying by seduction had gone out with Mata Hari.'

'It wasn't like that -'

'You just admitted you approached me because you wanted me to help you get at the Doctor. You're just a rent boy with a civil service pension.'

'That's why I was around here in the first place. What happened& would have happened, whatever I was doing here.' But his eyes said otherwise.

So why was he saying these things?

'Oh,' she grimaced, 'that makes me feel so much better.'

'I just just' He couldn't think fast enough on his feet, not when it came to talking to people. 'I just wondered what you'd be like.'

'I bet you say that to all the girls.' He didn't deny it. Sarah couldn't understand this conversation at all. Unless Tom was trying to make the Doctor think she meant little to him. Little enough to kill her, perhaps?

The Doctor hesitated, looking as anguished as Sarah felt. 'You mustn't prevent the ship from taking off,' he insisted. 'Look outside: those saucers are interplanetary warships. Soon they'll be joined by their big brothers, who're capable of reducing a planet to rubble. Look at them and think what those warships will do if their people are harmed.' He moved to the navigation console. 'If I can give them a flight path 'If I can give them a flight path'

. 'Whatever they do, they'll do it anyway,' Tom retorted. "They're way too advanced to be influenced by us. Destroying them before they can react is our only hope of survival. Now step away from those controls.'

Sarah squirmed. She didn't think it could be possible to be more afraid than she already was, but when the cold muzzle moved down her cheek to her jaw, she managed it. She tried to pull away from Tom, testing his strength.

He reeled her back in immediately and shoved the gun into her armpit.

To Sarah's surprise, the Doctor started to lean back, away from the console. She wouldn't have been surprised at either of her other Doctors doing so, but this man had worried her. Unfortunately, leaning back was the worst thing he could have done.

There was only one thing she could do. Nobody, later, could have said whether she had simply reached her limit with Tom and become angry, or whether she was taking the only rational course of action she could, for the best result. Not even her.

Either way, she turned onto the pistol and looked into Tom's eyes. 'Let the Doctor do what must be done. Can't you see that we're all dead otherwise?'

'I can see that you're dead if you don't shut up and the Doctor doesn't do what he's told.' Tom pushed Sarah in front of him again, and called out louder. 'I mean it, Doctor; step away from that console or this bitch is dead.'

'I thought you'd say that,' Sarah said in a small, childlike voice. She looked back over her shoulder to where the Doctor was already lifting his foot to accede to Tom's demand. 'I'm sorry I can't forgive you,' she whispered.' Her hands were slipping down, grabbing for the pistol.

'I don't need your forgiveness,' Tom snapped pulling at her shoulder, trying to turn her so that she faced the Doctor.

'I wasn't talking to you.' Sarah's hand closed over his. She could feel the Doctor's horror an instant before he shouted a wordless protestation. She could see Tom realise, too late, that she wasn't trying to twist the gun away or get it off him.

Her hands closed over his, pulling inwards, her thumb pushing on his index finger. Tom's mask of toughness slipped, just for an instant, and she could see a man who'd fallen in love with her start to form the word 'No'.

In the narrow metal confines of the room, the shot was like a cannon blast.

Chapter Twenty-Four.

AII Bad Things Things

In those noisy Wanchai bars, you'd have to strain even harder if you wanted to hear Tom tell the end of the story. His voice would drop to a whisper, and you'd think you could see a tear form. But in those smoky places, it's hard to tell.

Tom had tried to pull his hand back, but too late - Sarah was already doubling over.

Then his arms had gone numb from shock and he had no hostage to use for leverage. The Doctor was free to do whatever the hell he wanted, but that didn't matter as much as watching his hopes and dreams die at point-blank range.

He was a Hero, capitalised. He was supposed to win the girl's heart and make love with her at sunset, not shoot her in that heart at touching distance. He would never have pulled the trigger on her. Not on Sarah. But he had to make the Doctor believe he would. The bluff had to be convincing, and that meant Sarah had to believe it too, but only for a little while. He would have explained later.

The gun had fallen from his grip and he had stared at his hand as if it was something supremely alien to him. 'I didn't mean mean'

The Doctor had hooked Tom's hand with his umbrella and pulled him over.

'Don't waste your breath.' He squeezed the nerve points at the back of Tom's skull, and the man slumped into unconsciousness.

The statement filed by Yue Hwa at the PSB headquarters in Beijing doesn't mention Tom shooting Sarah. His report skips to afterwards, when he himself recovered consciousness.

'What's happening?' he asked, rising unsteadily to his feet.

'Blood and thunder,' the Doctor told him, though Yue Hwa could see no blood in the room, just Sarah curled on the floor. The Doctor pointed to Tom. 'Handcuff him before someone gets hurt.'

While Yue Hwa handcuffed Tom, the Doctor turned back to the navigation computers, and fiddled with them. He made a little 'argh' sound which drew Yue Hwa back. 'Something wrong?'

'I can't take control of the ship from here. We'll need the bridge.'

Yue Hwa grimaced. 'I was under the impression that UNIT were in control there.'

'What about the ship's own crew?'

'Locked in their cabins by the same people who freed them, I should expect.'

'Good.'

'It is?'Yue Hwa couldn't see how.

'Yes. Because it means they'll be all the more keen to help us take their ship back.'

Yue Hwa nodded and followed the Doctor to the infirmary, which was being used as a brig, dragging a mumbling Tom. It took only a few seconds to open the door and explain the situation. Lieutenant Cunningham was the most senior officer present, and the Doctor conferred with him. 'How heavily guarded is the bridge?'

'Two men with MP5s on each door.'

'Trying to rush them would be a slaughter slaughter and we can't outflank and we can't outflank them them' The Doctor paced around the small infirmary. 'If the weapons systems are still down, is the CinC guarded?'

'No.'

The Doctor brightened. "Then the game's afoot.' He hurried down the companionway, following Cunningham's lead to the CinC. Yue Hwa followed, still dragging Tom. The CinC was perilously close to the bridge, but one deck down so Yue Hwa hoped they wouldn't be seen.

'What are you going to do?' Cunningham asked.

'Programme a nuclear missile.'

Cunningham and Yue Hwa exchanged looks. Neither of them could quite believe what they just heard. 'Why -?'Yue Hwa broke off as another sound became audible as they passed a door to the outer deck. The air was not just thickening, but shaking and humming.

'What's that noise?'

'The sound of our failure,' the Doctor said sourly. He moved to the door and pointed upwards, directing everyone to raise their eyes to the heavens.

There were a lot of indrawn breaths.

On the bridge everyone also looked up. The glass in the windows was rattling as the sky darkened. Barry suddenly knew what that crazy guide had been talking about.

Impossibly descending through the clouds was an expanse of grey metal that stretched almost from horizon to horizon. A couple of miles along it, a large engine pod of some kind hung down on a boom, and the sea had pulled itself into a bowl to keep away from it. To either side, more vessels were descending.

Yue Hwa had never seen anything like it. No one on Earth had.

The Doctor's expression darkened even further, impossible though that seemed. 'We're too late.' He pursed his lips. 'But never say die.' He followed Cunningham as the young officer led him to the CinC.

The room was filled with radar and weapons systems. Yue Hwa shoved Tom into a darkened corner of the room so that he could both keep an eye on him and watch the Doctor. 'We had an EMP effect,' Cunningham explained. 'It shut everything down. We've got power back, but the weapons systems are all linked through the Aegis radar system. While it's still down, we've no weapons.'

'Congratulations,' the Doctor said absently. He fished in his pockets and eventually brought forth a Swiss Army knife that included a screwdriver. He started attacking the consoles, ripping out circuits boards and cross-wiring things. Yue Hwa didn't understand anything of what he saw, but after a few minutes the Doctor had a console operational.

Yue Hwa leant closer to Cunningham. 'What is that console for?'

"The Tomahawks.' The lieutenant raised his voice so the Doctor could hear. 'You still need two firing keys -'

'No, I don't.'

Cunningham gulped as the Doctor continued. "This technology is like a slingshot to some of the people I know, and I'm a fast learner' He turned.

'You two go and get some men to watch the bridge. You'll need to take the UNIT people into custody if they surrender, and also stop them trying to storm us here.'

'Right,' the two men agreed. As soon as they were out of the CinC, they heard the door lock behind them.

On the bridge, a monitor suddenly sprang into life, displaying a three-minute countdown.

Tsang and Barry exchanged puzzled looks. 'What the hell is that?' Tsang wondered aloud.

'It's a weapons system display' Davis told her. 'That's a Tomahawk cruise missile countdown.'

Tsang was pleased. 'Someone got it operational. Good. As soon as the aliens take off, we let them have it.'

'And those big ships?'

'The nukes will take care of them too.' Tsang wished she felt as confident as she hoped she sounded.

'Hello.' The Doctor's voice suddenly came over the intercom. 'Colonel Tsang?'

Tsang recovered quickly from the surprise. 'I'm here, Doctor. Perhaps you'd care to give up now that I'm about save us from these aliens. We have weapons systems operational.'

'Ah, a most worrisome threat, with only two minor errata. One: those ships would look at a nuclear strike as we look at a fleabite. Two: actually, I'm the one with the finger on the button.'

'What?' Tsang had an awful feeling that she knew exactly what he meant.