'It will take you to the time zone you wish to visit,' said Sardon. 'And return you to us here, at a time we decide, to perform as we would wish you to.'
'Anyone would think you didn't trust me!' said the Doctor indignantly.
The old Time Lord smiled thinly. 'Have you decided which time zone you wish to visit?'
'I have,' said the Doctor.
'Hold the time and place in your mind. The temporal transference beam will do the rest.'
He waved to the technician and a beam of light shone down from somewhere in the high ceiling. Slowly the Doctor faded away.
'Well, it is done,' said old Ragnar. 'Mind you, I am not at all sure that it is wise.'
Milvo shrugged. 'What harm? We can indulge him for a time. The Doctor will be far more use if he serves us willingly.'
'Precisely,' said Sardon. 'We hold him on a short leash.'
He turned to the technician. 'Show us.'
The technician adjusted more controls and after a moment a monitor screen glowed into life. It showed a shabby figure standing beside a muddy road a road that led through a desolate, ruined landscape.
'See that the Doctor is observed at all times,' ordered Sardon. 'And keep the temporal retrieval mechanism on constant stand-by. Come, gentlemen. We must plan the next stage of this operation.'
Milvo yawned. 'What further planning is needed? We retrieve the Doctor when we are ready, brief him, and dispatch him to carry out our mission.'
'Yes, but not alone,' said Sardon. 'Whether the Doctor succeeds or fails in his own petty affairs does not greatly concern me. When he departs on our mission he must have a companion one of our choosing. Brilliant as he is, he is erratic. He needs someone to monitor him, and keep him in line.'
'Well who is going to do that?' asked Ragnar peevishly.
'You don't appear to be having much success so far.'
'I hold the Doctor firmly in my grasp,' said Sardon. 'With the Time Ring we can retrieve him at any time, whether he's willing or not.'
'And who is going to control him on our behalf?' asked Milvo.
Sardon smiled. 'I have the very person in mind. I think the Doctor will be pleasantly surprised.'
Chapter Four.
Replay
The Doctor found himself standing at the edge of a road. It wasn't much of a road, mind you. It was muddy and rutted and potholed, barely distinguishable from the surrounding landscape.
It wasn't much of a landscape either. An unending sea of mud, stretching in all directions, broken up only by the occasional glimpse of a shattered farmhouse, or ruined barn.
The land on either side of the road had once held houses and gardens and farms fertile cultivated fields. But it had been fought over so often, churned up again and again by advancing and retreating armies that it had become a wasteland.
The soldiers of this war had a chilling name for the place: No Man's Land No Man's Land.
It was a dull and misty winter afternoon with a hint of rain in the air. From somewhere in the distance came the dull rumble of heavy artillery.
The Doctor waited. Soon he heard the sound of an engine coming towards him. The sound was rasping, spluttering and uneven, suggesting that the vehicle was in a bad way. But somehow it laboured on.
The Doctor peered through the mist in the direction of the sound. He saw a square vehicle, lurching along the road towards him. It was so caked with mud it was impossible to discern what colour it might once have been.
As the vehicle came closer the Doctor jumped up and down waving his arms.
'Hey!' he yelled. 'Hey, huzzay, hullo!'
The vehicle came to a halt. Close up, it was just possible to make out the red cross painted wide and fat on the side.
Through the open window, the Doctor saw a woman in uniform at the wheel of the ambulance. She had the faintly horsey good looks typical of the female English aristocrat.
Beside her was a young man. He wore the uniform of a lieutenant in the British Army.
'Sorry to be a nuisance,' said the Doctor. 'I wonder if you could possibly give me a lift.'
'A lift?' echoed the woman. 'Where to?'
'Oh, to anywhere at all. I seem to have got separated from my delegation.' The Doctor smiled in what he hoped was an appealing manner.
The woman smiled back. 'I don't see why not, sir, always room for a little one.' She had a high, clear, upper-class voice.
'Splendid, splendid!' said the Doctor, rubbing his hands.
'Seems to be my day for picking up stray lambs,' she went on. 'I found the Lieutenant here just back down the road wandering around.' She held out her hand. 'Jennifer Buckingham Lady Jennifer actually, not that it matters a jot.'
The young man beside her said, 'Carstairs, Jeremy Carstairs.'
'Smith,' said the Doctor. 'Doctor John Smith.'
He studied the two young people thoughtfully. They were old friends, comrades-in-arms. The three of them had shared life-and-death adventures on the planet of the War Games.
But Lady Jennifer and Lieutenant Carstairs didn't know it. Not any more. The Time Lords had wiped it from their memories.
So they didn't recognise him. Which, thought the Doctor, was just as it should be.
Carstairs got out of the ambulance and held open the passenger door. 'Perhaps you'd care to sit in the middle, Doctor?'
The Doctor climbed onto the long front seat, and Carstairs got back in beside him and closed the door. Lady Jennifer put the engine into gear and with a spluttering and coughing the ambulance lurched on its way.
Just a few more checks, thought the Doctor. 'Have you been out here long?' he asked.
'Only about six months,' said Lady Jennifer. 'Though I must say it seems like forever.'
'I've been here for over a year,' said Carstairs. 'I came out near the beginning in '14. Had a couple of leaves, though.'
So far, so good, thought the Doctor. On the War Games planet, their memories blurred by their kidnappers, they would have been quite unable to answer such questions.
One final test...
'I should imagine you lose track of time out here,' he said casually. 'I certainly do. What's the date exactly?'
Carstairs frowned. 'It's the 18th, I think, November the 18th.'
'Year?'
'1915 of course!' Carstairs smiled a little uncertainly. 'You can't be that confused already, Doctor!'
'November the 18th, 1915,' confirmed Lady Jennifer. 'How long have you been out here?'
The Doctor shrugged apologetically. 'Just long enough to get myself lost and confused.'
Everything checked out, thought the Doctor. The Time Lords had kept their part of the bargain. Soon he would have to keep his. At the first opportunity he would slip away and wait for the Time Lords to retrieve him.
Little did he know that events were to take a very different course before that happened.
They continued chatting as the ambulance trundled on.
The technician watched the ambulance for a while. He yawned. Surely there was no need for continuous surveillance? He would check on the Doctor from time to time when he remembered.
He switched off the monitor and turned away.
Chapter Five.
Serena
The Lady Serenadellatrovella known to her peers as Serena was at work in the Capitol Library when the summons came. Seated at an ornately decorated terminal, one of the hundreds ranked in the vast, high-ceilinged hall, she was studying the records of the most recent Presidential Election, trying to work out the truth of what had actually happened, where it lay buried between the lines of the official accounts.
Serena was studying past politics for a reason. She was ambitious politically ambitious. There had had been female members of the High Council, of course. Time Lord society was far too evolved to countenance discrimination at least, not openly. There had even been occasional female Presidents, but not many. Serena felt that there should be more herself amongst them. been female members of the High Council, of course. Time Lord society was far too evolved to countenance discrimination at least, not openly. There had even been occasional female Presidents, but not many. Serena felt that there should be more herself amongst them.
To achieve her aims, she had first to distinguish herself.
Not burdened with undue modesty, she knew she had many advantages. Her family, for instance, one of the oldest and most powerful on Gallifrey. In theory all Time Lords were equal but some were considerably more equal than others.
Unfortunately, her family had achieved all its ambitions long ago, and was now content to rest upon its distinguished history and its aristocratic laurels, regarding any participation in actual politics as rather vulgar.
Then there was her appearance. Tall and slender with green eyes and elegantly patrician features, her golden hair piled above a high forehead, Serena was startlingly beautiful.
She even looked looked like a President. like a President.
The handsome and aristocratic young officers of the Capitol Guard regarded her with ambitions that were anything but political. None of them had enjoyed the slightest success.
She was known as the Ice Maiden.
She was studying the events in the life of a certain Councillor Taskor, who had risen with meteoric speed and then suddenly vanished from public life, when her screen went blank and a message appeared. It was brutally short:
The Lady Serenadellatrovella will report immediately to Room 30007 in the Administrative Complex. 30007 in the Administrative Complex.
BY ORDER OF THE HIGH COUNCIL.
Unaccustomed to arbitrary commands, Serena was tempted to ignore the message, however such a summons was unusual enough to be intriguing. And it wouldn't do to offend a body one was bent upon joining some day.
She closed the file she was working on, accessed the Capitol directory, and put up a map and detailed directions to her destination and memorised them.