It was a dummy.

For an instant Ian's eyes met the Doctor's, which reflected his own utter astonishment.

Before they could speak there was a booming explosion from high above.

They spun about to see that the top of the tower where the TARDIS rested was surrounded by a spreading cloud of blast fragments. The roof deck seemed to fold in upon itself and then dropped down through the hollow sh.e.l.l of the building into which Susan and Barbara had run only seconds earlier.

'No!' Ian cried out in fear and despair.

He had managed just three futile strides when the road tunnel, crushed flat by the avalanche of falling debris, vomited a plume of dust into his face.

Chapter Two.

The Mayor of Arkhaven.

Brantus Draad's skycar circled the remains of the tower twice before receiving clearance from the reconstruction squad ground team. The pilot set the car down gently on the elevated road, on the far side of the tower from the damaged section, and Draad climbed stiffly out. Supervisor Curton greeted him and they walked clear of the wash from the car's idling fans.

'How does it look?' Draad asked.

'The sh.e.l.l's going to need a rebuild, Mayor. The foundations may have been damaged as well, but we can't tell until we excavate the wreckage down there.' Curton looked at Draad uncertainly. 'This close to Zero Day, I was wondering if we couldn't just make it safe and leave it be.'

Draad sighed. 'Yes, that would be the sensible thing to do, wouldn't it, Mr Curton? But you know it's not as simple as that.' He suddenly felt very tired. 'However, I'll see what I can do. Meanwhile, what was this you said about finding some NC2s up here?'

'That's right, Mayor. They're over here.'

Curton led him across to the small cl.u.s.ter of emergency vehicles.

Beside an ambulance a couple of city guards were watching over two strangers, both men, one with flowing grey hair, whose odd clothes showed they were not citizens. A young woman, hardly more than a girl, was being loaded into the ambulance on a life-support stretcher.

'The men had just pulled the girl from the remains of the tunnel as we arrived,' Curton explained. 'Apparently there's another NC2 woman still missing. They think she may have been in the service lift when everything collapsed.'

'How did they get out of the camp and find their way up here?' Draad asked. 'I wasn't notified of any recent escapes.'

Curton hesitated. 'In the circ.u.mstances I haven't pressed them about it yet. They seem pretty confused by what's happened and too worried about the condition of the girl and the other woman. Sorry, Mayor.'

'Even NC2s deserve our compa.s.sion,' said Draad. 'But we have security to think of, especially at times like this. What about their registration cards?'

'I asked for them, but they didn't seem to understand what I meant.'

'Thrown them away and thought they could pa.s.s themselves off as citizens, I expect. They must have been hiding out here since the last break-out, waiting for a chance to get closer to the Ship.'

The medics were trying to close the ambulance doors, but the old man seemed to be protesting, even as the younger man seemed to be trying to reason with him. The guards held him back as the doors closed and the ambulance lifted into the air, warning lights flashing urgently.

The two strangers watched it recede into the distance until it was lost in the city haze. Then they turned back to the wrecked tower, and Draad saw the bleak despair on their dirt-streaked faces. Well, they had certainly paid the price for trying to escape. He'd prefer to simply have them shipped back to the camp immediately, but there were questions that had to be answered first. He gestured to the guards to bring the men over to him.

'You realise this is a restricted zone, and you could be punished for being caught here,' he told them when they stood before him. 'However, if you cooperate, I may decide to be lenient. First, tell me when you escaped from the camp.'

They looked at him blankly, as though he was talking complete gibberish.

'Do you understand me?' he said slowly. Perhaps they were island-dialect speakers. 'Are you from the Ferren Islands?'

'We understand you perfectly,' the old man said, his voice dulled by exhaustion. 'I wanted to travel in the ambulance with my granddaughter, but they wouldn't let me. Where have they taken her? I must be with her!'

His fear and concern were so palpable that Draad found himself saying rea.s.suringly. 'She'll be taken to City Central Hospital. Don't worry, she'll get the same care as any citizen.

When she has recovered she will be brought back to you.

Meanwhile, you will answer my question. When did you escape from the camp? Who aided you?'

The old man rubbed a shaky hand across his forehead.

'Camp! I don't know what you mean about any camp. We have just arrived here, my granddaughter is seriously injured, my friend is missing. I have no time to answer your foolish questions.'

'You'll speak politely to the mayor,' one of the guards said sharply.

'You're the mayor?' the younger man said, as though waking from a daze. 'Look, you must get more men here.

We've got to try to find Barbara!'

He looked as though he wanted to go back into the ruined tower and start moving the rubble with his bare hands.

'I a.s.sure you everything will be done to find your friend,'

Draad said. 'Heavy excavating equipment will be here very soon. We don't leave anybody unaccounted for after a meteor strike, even NC2s. Now, for the last time, when and how did you get out of the camp?'

'We have been in no camp,' the old man snapped back.

'We are travellers, wanderers in time and s.p.a.ce. We arrived on this world no more than an hour ago. Our craft landed on top of this tower... I suppose it is now buried somewhere amongst the rubble. It appears externally to be a large blue box. If your men come across it 'Doctor!' the younger man interrupted angrily. 'Forget about the TARDIS!'

The old man looked contrite. 'Of course... I'm sorry, Chesterton. The shock. Naturally we must think of Barbara first.'

'Your, ah, s.p.a.cecraft, landed on top of the tower?' Draad said slowly.

'Only in a simplistic sense,' the old man said irritably.

'But my friend is right you must concentrate all your efforts on finding our companion. If she remained inside the lift cage there is a chance, a good chance, that she has survived.' The younger man hung his head, looking sick with worry. 'No, never despair, Chesterton. I'm sure they'll find her.' He turned back to Draad, his eyes burning fiercely. 'You promise every effort will be made, sir?'

'Yes, every effort will be made to find your friend.' Draad replied simply. 'I promise.'

'Good, good. The TARDIS can wait. It is very robust. I'm sure it has survived the fall.'

Draad's heart sank in exasperation and not a little pity.

There was little point in questioning them any further. The two men were obviously delusional. Mental disorders were not uncommon amongst the last refugees they had taken in. Many of them had been convinced the world was going to be saved by divine intervention or superhuman aliens though these were the first he had encountered who actually thought that they themselves came from outer s.p.a.ce.

'I'm sure it has,' Draad said lightly. 'Meanwhile, let the guards take you back to the camp. That's where all newcomers to Arkhaven go. You belong there. They'll see you get new registration cards and then you can draw your rations and have a rest.'

'But I must stay here,' the younger man said.

'No, you can't do anything more here,' Draad said firmly.

'We have plenty of experience in this sort of work.' He heard the hum of powerful engines, and a large transporter rolled up.

'Look, the heavy equipment has arrived.'

The side of the truck split open and unfolded to form a ramp. From within came the whine and hiss of machinery powering up. Fluorescent orange and yellow metal limbs unfolded and wheels turned as the robot squad disembarked and marched and rolled purposefully towards the tower. Claw hands flexed and cutting beams flared as they awaited their a.s.signed tasks.

The two men stared after the excavators in surprise, almost as though they had never seen anything like them before. They are far gone, Draad thought. The drone of a skycrane pa.s.sing overhead made them look up. A bucket grab was already being lowered from its main body, supported by six multibladed fan units.

'You see, we've got every tool we need,' Draad said. 'I promise that as soon as we find anything, you'll be informed.

And also about your granddaughter's condition,' he a.s.sured the older man.

The two men didn't protest further. Their evident shock and exhaustion made them tractable.

'Treat them gently,' he murmured to the guard sergeant as they were escorted away.

'Poor devils,' Curton said as he watched the guards' car depart. 'They behaved as though they really believed that nonsense.'

'I think many more of us may go that way before the end,'

Draad said bitterly. 'And I don't mean just NC2s. So you'd better get this mess tidied up as soon as possible. We'll maintain the illusion a little while longer.'

Almost two hours later Draad's skycar landed him on the roof pad of the city hall. A short descent by lift took him down to his private office in the residence, which occupied most of the tenth floor.

'You have calls waiting for you, Mayor,' said Monitor as he entered. 'I judge the two most urgent are from Lord Vendam and Bishop Fostel. Shall I inform them you are now available to interface with them?'

'No. Hold all calls for a minute, Monitor.'

Draad poured himself a drink from his cabinet, swallowed a pill with it and then stood for a moment staring out of the window.

Once the view would have been of the lake and gardens of Hub Park. He remembered one hot summer night in his student days when he and a group of friends had swum in the lake and looked up at the stars. And they had laughed and joked and talked of their hopes and plans for the future, not realising that the future would turn their dreams to dust.

How could he have wasted such golden moments of peace so idly? Yet what else were such times for?

Now his friends were gone and the lake had been buried under concrete, ringed about by machine shops and site offices. Within this ring, supported by its skeletal gantry and squatting over its cavernous blast pit like some silver monster, was the Ship.

It had been known as the 'Ship' from the start. It had never needed a proper name because it was unique. The tiny probe rockets that had preceded it simply did not compare. Nothing like the Ship had ever been built in Arkhaven, or anywhere else on Sarath, as far as anybody knew. Perhaps the Taklarians had tried to construct something similar in their homeland during their last days, but by then it had been too late. No other country on the planet would have had the necessary technology even to begin such a project. The Ship would be the first and last of its kind.

To view it, Draad had to lean into the window bay and tilt his head back to see its nose cone. Each of its four outflung landing-leg nacelles rose twenty storeys high. Draad often privately likened the monstrous fins that connected them to the main hull to the flying b.u.t.tresses that flanked the city cathedral. But you could have rolled the nave of the cathedral through the arch of the fins with room to spare. In other circ.u.mstances the Ship's location, in a city centre, might have been oppressive but not in Arkhaven. Here everybody lived as close to it as possible, not only because this was the most heavily defended area of the city, but against the time when they would be called upon to board it for the first and last time.

Draad thought once again of that carefree night in the park. There had been a girl in the party who had been more than just a friend to him. Halfway through the night they had slipped away together. What had been her name? Surely he didn't need to check the records... But it would not come.

Perhaps he should ask Monitor to call up past college registers. No. That belonged to another life he dare not let himself think about now. Either there would be time for nostalgia later or there would be nothing.

He finished his drink, sat at his desk, and faced Monitor.

Screens and displays filled the rest of the wall around the computer's audio-visual receptor and vocaliser. The mobile camera eye set within the softly glowing green ring on the wall unit regarded him impa.s.sively. That was perhaps Monitor's highest virtue he had infinite patience. Of course, that was the way he had been programmed. He served the mayor and city of Arkhaven with unswerving mechanical loyalty.

'The bishop and Lord Vendam are calling again, Mayor,'

Monitor said, the green ring about its camera eye pulsing in time with its words.

'All right. Put them on together.'

Two screens lit up to reveal Fostel and Vendam.

'Gentlemen, my apologies,' Draad said quickly. 'I was out personally inspecting the latest damage. I understand you wish to speak to me.'

Fostel and Vendam both tried to speak at once before realising they were on a three-way link. Draad kept his face carefully expressionless as they apologised stiffly both men heartily disliked and distrusted each other.

'Mayor Draad,' said Fostel quickly, holding out three pebble-sized blackened stones towards the camera, 'meteorite fragments actually struck the cathedral during the last shower.

The transept window was badly damaged. This is not to be permitted to happen again. The people must not see that the last great house of G.o.d on Sarath is vulnerable.'

'The cathedral area has been a.s.signed the next highest priority on the defence grid after the hospital,' Draad said.

'Only the Ship and the central zone have greater protection.'

'It is easier to heal wounds of the flesh than the spirit,'

said Fostel. 'I suggest you revise your priorities.'

'Bishop, this was an unusually large and intense shower that struck us with little warning,' Draad protested. 'I'm sure it will not happen again.'

'Well, if it does, I shall hold you personally responsible,'

Fostel warned him.

'When you've quite finished worrying about that archaic monstrosity of a building,' Lord Vendam said impatiently, a scowl contorting his long face, 'I've had news that this strike came very close to hurting real people in Feldor Avenue and Rinthian Prospect. Now, what are you going to do about that, Draad?'

Feldor Avenue and Rinthian Prospect were almost exclusively populated by families of the Elite cla.s.s; descendants of the ancient royal lines of the North. Lord Vendam's family was first amongst them.

'I can only repeat what I have told the bishop,' said Draad.

'Of course, if more resources were freed from other tasks, we might be able to improve matters. As we are now getting so close to Zero Day, we might allow damaged buildings in the Outer Zone to remain unrepaired. Then we could build another turret on the wall to improve the siting of the interceptor units.'