Mr Gabriel smiled warmly. The smile didn't look entirely natural, but that was understandable, as the humanoid body he wore was obviously artificial. To give the Gabrielideans credit, at least they were trying to blend in on Dronid. 'Don't worry yourself, Mr Keyhoe. n.o.body's bugging us, except maybe the staff, and they're pretty discreet. No need to get edgy just yet, OK?'

'Qixotl.'

'I'm sorry?'

'Qixotl. Not Keyhoe. Q-i-x-o-t-l. Kee-hot-l.'

'Qixotl. Right.' Mr Gabriel smiled again, and the smile was exactly the same as it had been before, so the software in his face clearly wasn't very versatile. The Gabrielidean appeared to be middle-aged, and he was kind of cuddly, despite the suit and the lump in the pocket where he kept his staser. He was a lot like someone's uncle, thought Qixotl, all bright eyes and shallow wrinkles. 'The Time Lords aren't going to be sniffing around here, if that's what's you're thinking,' Gabriel went on. 'I've been dealing in time-tech ever since I got to this planet, and the High Council hasn't caught on yet. Can I ask you something, Mr Qixotl?'

'Er, yeah. Sure.'

'Where'd you get a TARDIS from, anyway?'

Qixotl bit his lip. 'Who said I had a TARDIS?'

'C'mon. You need a demat circuit, that means you've got a TARDIS. Let me guess. You got friends on Gallifrey, am I right? And they managed to sneak you out an old type 60, but the demat circuit's messed up. Listen, I've heard it all before. You don't have to start squirming.'

Qixotl squirmed anyway. He didn't like to think of his ship as a TARDIS any more. He'd changed its whole structure, its whole operating system, just to make sure the High Council couldn't track it. The demat circuit had popped as soon as he'd got to Dronid, and he'd been stuck here ever since. For a while, he'd been happy to stick around, but things had changed in the last couple of days.

To be honest, Qixotl was lucky to have got himself stranded here, on a planet where it was at least possible to get hold of spare TARDIS parts. A couple of generations ago, one of the Time Lord Cardinals had tried building a powerbase on Dronid, putting together an army in the vain hope of overthrowing the High Council. He'd been dragged back to Gallifrey in the end, natch, but there were still bits and pieces of time-tech lying around the cities, leftovers from his time in residence. The organised crime networks had recovered most of them, which was why they more or less ran Dronid, these days. The planet was pretty primitive they still used combustion engines around here, for pity's sake, and the people had only just invented TV but Qixotl had heard you could pick up the blueprints for a demat gun in the underworld, if you knew where to look.

'You want to get some more drinks in?' asked Mr Gabriel.

23:23; three cans down, starting to feel "relaxed".

Qixotl had spent the last few minutes small-talking with Mr Gabriel, skirting around the big question, "How much is a demat circuit going to cost?". Qixotl knew full well he wouldn't be able to afford the hardware, not right away. He didn't have enough local currency to hire an atmosphere vessel, let alone buy a chunk of solid-state Time Lord technology. Once he got an estimate from Gabriel, he'd be spending the next week or three doing little jobs around the capital city, saving up the denaris. That is, if he didn't get knifed in the back first.

'Don XaPristi?' Mr Gabriel repeated, as if not believing his ears.

Qixotl shrugged. 'What can I say? I sold the Don some faulty merchandise. Couple of items that didn't go "bang" as loudly as they should've done, right? I mean, y'know, it's not like I didn't offer him a refund or anything.'

Mr Gabriel's face went into "grim" mode. 'Yeah, but the Don's one of the old school. Hereditary gangster. Someone crosses him, it's a question of honour. Like an insult to his family name.' Mr Gabriel drew his finger across his throat, just to press the point home.

Mr Qixotl didn't need telling. He'd only met XaPristi once, but the Don had come across as a Grade-A psychopath. XaPristi had been wearing a fur wrap during the meeting, genetically augmented, with a mouth full of teeth snapping away at either end. The sign of an unbalanced mind, that.

'Right,' said Qixotl. 'The point is, he says he'll overlook this little problem if I pay him back with interest, yeah?'

'How much interest are we talking about?'

'About 400 per cent.'

Mr Gabriel reached for the Blue Dog. 'So, you want to get yourself off Drornid while you've still got all your legs?'

Mr Qixotl felt like hissing. He hated people who did that. Technically, this planet was supposed to be called "Drornid"; that was the name the locals had always used, anyway. But there'd been a typo in the first edition of Bartholomew's Planetary Gazeteer Bartholomew's Planetary Gazeteer, so the rest of the universe called it "Dronid", including the off-worlders who came to make a living/killing here. And, as the off-worlders were at the heart of the planet's economy, most of the natives went along with them. Some people always had to be picky, though.

'There's a lot of demand for time technology right now,' Mr Gabriel continued, between mouthfuls of Blue Dog. 'You know how it is. Everyone's trying to get away from Drornid before the Time Lords come back. A lot of Professionals are talking about building their own armed-up TARDIS units, maybe tapping into the Eye of Harmony behind the High Council's back.'

'I get the idea. What you're saying is, the circuit's going to cost me an arm and a... wait a minute. What d'you mean, "before the Time Lords come back"?'

'You haven't heard? There's a lot of unhappy rumbling, down in the underground. They say the High Council's making plans for some kind of war. Somebody's upset them, and badly.'

Mr Qixotl felt like sulking. Typical. He was always the last to know these things. 'So surprise me. Who are they supposed to be fighting?'

'Who knows? Like I said, it's only a rumour. D'you know there's a whole fleet of Gabrielidean warships on its way to Drornid? Heard it on the TV this afternoon.' Mr Gabriel chuckled an artificial chuckle. 'That's my government, bless 'em. The word is, the Time Lords have set it all up. The warships are acting for the High Council. Don't ask me what the Gabrielideans are getting out of the deal.'

'I'm missing something here,' Qixotl said. 'OK, so the Time Lords are going to war. Then why are they sending the warships to Dronid?'

'Wish I knew. It's going to be where they have their first face-off with the enemy, that's all I've heard. Maybe they're hoping all us Professionals are going to get wiped in the crossfire. I mean, it's embarra.s.sing for them, knowing a planet like this has got people trying to build TARDISes on it.'

'I have to use the little bipeds' room,' said Mr Qixotl.

23:42; four cans down, going beyond "relaxed" and into the realms of "introspective".

Qixotl had picked up another couple of cans on the way back from the toilets, and he'd already downed one, even though he hadn't gone back to the cubicle yet. He stopped off in one of the club's relaxation lounges, where Professionals huddled together in suspicious little cl.u.s.ters, discussing the latest developments in narcotics science. The lounge was designed to make the Professionals feel at home, with a black-and-white Bakelite TV mounted on the wall in one corner, and the skinned corpses of undercover policemen dangling artistically from the ceiling on meat hooks. All very tasteful, really.

Qixotl made his way across to the TV. Someone else was already standing in front of the screen, drink in hand. The Professional was young, dressed in the obligatory black suit, with an unconvincing frown on his face. Another Gabrielidean, Qixotl judged.

The TV station Dronid only had the one was running a news bulletin. Qixotl watched a piece of footage that had presumably been taken by one of the surveillance satellites the off-worlders had put into orbit. Half a dozen s.p.a.ceships were moving through the vacuum in close formation. The craft were plain black cuboids, utterly smooth and featureless, but you knew, you just knew, that at a moment's notice they could open up their gunports and reveal a whole host of nasty weapons systems.

'Gabrielidean warships,' Qixotl murmured.

The Professional turned to face him. The man would have looked worried, if his facial software had been subtle enough.

'The Time Lords,' he said. 'They're coming for us, aren't they?'

'Yeah, right,' said Qixotl. He tried his best to sound cynical about the whole thing.

23:49; five cans down, wobbly enough to knock over furniture without noticing it, but sober enough to deny being drunk in any way, shape, or form.

'And that's not all,' Mr Gabriel said, on the other side of the table.

Qixotl picked up a couple of the empty cans in front of him. All of a sudden, he had the irresistible urge to balance them on top of one other. 'Go on.'

'You want to know what else the rumours say? The rumours say the Doctor's involved.'

Qixotl had made a three-can tower in record time, but the word "Doctor" made his hand shake, so it all came tumbling down. 'Doctor? Like, the the Doctor Doctor?' Qixotl threw his hands up in despair, and very nearly poked himself in the eye. 'OK, that's it, show's over. The Doctor's involved. Whoever the Time Lords are fighting, they don't stand a chance.' Doctor Doctor?' Qixotl threw his hands up in despair, and very nearly poked himself in the eye. 'OK, that's it, show's over. The Doctor's involved. Whoever the Time Lords are fighting, they don't stand a chance.'

'Yeah? When did I say the Doctor's working for the Time Lords? Sure, the story says he's coming here to fight for Gallifrey, but a couple of the pundits are saying he's gone over to the enemy. They're saying he's had it with the way the High Council's treated him over the years.'

Qixotl belched. 'Good luck to whoever he's going up against, that's all I'm I'm saying.' saying.'

'Yeah. I've heard the stories. You know Mr Abel, works for the InCorporate? He says he winged the Doctor with a microwave knife one time, and the guy just walked away from it. I mean, a microwave knife. We're talking serious tissue damage here.'

'Tell me about it. Last time I saw the Doctor, there was a whole flotilla of Antiridean organ-eaters on his tail, and he got off without a scratch. Jammy sod.'

Mr Gabriel's face software went into surprise overdrive. 'You've met the Doctor?'

'Couple of times. We didn't get on, y'know?' One by one, Qixotl picked up and shook the cans on the table, but they all seemed to be empty, for some reason. 'And I'm telling you, he's a force of nature. You can't fight a force of nature, right?'

Mr Gabriel's face settled down a bit. 'Maybe it's different this time. If the Time Lords are at war, the enemy's got to be someone big. I mean, forget the Daleks, I'm talking big big. If the Doctor's ever going to get stiffed, it's going to be now. Everyone wants a piece of the action. You know the Celestis? Word is, the Celestis have got agents on both sides of the fight. And in a couple of the organisations here on Drornid, you get the idea? And the Paradox people are hanging around waiting to see how much damage gets done. You know what they're like. Vultures.'

'The Faction's going down,' Qixotl said, with the voice of slightly inebriated authority. 'They've been outcla.s.sed ever since the InCorporate turned up on this planet. Hey! This can hasn't been opened yet. Isn't that great?'

24:12; six cans down, getting to that stage in the evening when it becomes impossible to be bored by any topic of conversation, however stupid or pointless it may be.

At the end of the meeting, Qixotl shook hands with Mr Gabriel, but missed. As expected, the price Gabriel set for the demat circuit was extortionate. When my ship's working again, Qixotl told himself, I'm going to track him down as an embryo and inject something really nasty into his alb.u.men. That'll show him.

He stopped by the bar again on his way out, wondering if he should maybe take another couple of cans with him. Right now, he needed something to take his mind off his problems. Or to take his mind off this level of reality. Whichever came first.

When he started elbowing his way towards the bar, however, everything changed.

In front of him, making their way through the crowd of black-clad Professionals, were two figures Qixotl recognised. They had their backs turned, thankfully, but their slicked-back hair and cheap designer suits gave them away in an instant. So, for that matter, did the way they were hissing at the girl behind the bar.

Don XaPristi's men. Old style thugs, probably recruited from the ghetto gangs. Qixotl had seen a lot of them since he'd arrived on Dronid. Neanderthals, mostly, all sharpened teeth and gold medallions. They were slimy, they were ugly, and they tended to be quite extraordinarily violent.

Mr Qixotl turned, and ran. Which was stupid, bearing in mind how crowded the bar area was. He scattered the Professionals around him, and stumbled towards the exit, knocking aside the various chairs, gla.s.ses, and customers in his path.

Behind him, there was a shout, then the sound of scurrying feet. Qixotl swore. All in all, his exit from Shockley's Den of Almost Limitless Iniquity wasn't what you could have called subtle.

24:22; still six cans down, but a lot more sober than a few minutes previously.

Qixotl bolted along the backways of Traducersville, tactically knocking over any garbage cans he happened to come across. There probably wasn't much point in doing that, but it couldn't hurt. He'd looked over his shoulder once or twice, and he hadn't seen any sign of the thugs, so he guessed he'd shaken them off back in the slums. But then, it was too dark to see very far, and his vision wasn't exactly perfect, what with the curse of the Blue Dog upon him and all. So he kept moving, just to be on the safe side.

Don XaPristi would have sent the men to give him a warning. The kind of warning that made you go "ouch" in lots of unusual places. Qixotl was running out of time, and running out of options. One way or another, he had to get hold of the cash for a demat circuit.

And then what?

Hmm. Funny. He didn't normally bother with long-term plans. For the last half-hour, though, there'd been something nagging at him. Ever since Mr Gabriel had told him about the Doctor, and the great battle that was supposed to be coming to Dronid.

'Maybe it's different this time...'

Yeah. He needed his ship in working order, but there was a profit to be made here, right? He'd stumbled into the middle of something big, maybe big enough to shake up the whole timeline. And if somebody knew how to exploit the situation properly, say, somebody with a stolen TARDIS and not too many scruples...

Oh. Oh, yes. That was it. That was lovely.

Mr Qixotl had just had a very, very interesting idea.

8.

THE BODY POLITIC.

The vault had, in a very real sense, come to life. And it wasn't happy.

The walls were screaming. Earlier, Bregman had heard the toucans shrieking their heads off in the rainforest, and now the same kind of sound was filling up the vault, a squawking, screeching, cackling noise that seemed to come from every direction at once. The voice from inside the casket fell silent. Bregman turned, searching the vault for the source of the screaming, but all she saw was Sam, standing in the doorway behind her. Frozen. Like a rabbit caught in headlights. Bregman guessed she probably looked the same way herself.

Then the walls began to blossom. Shoots forced their way out of the cracks in the stone, their stems shot through with deep red arteries, and buds the colour of dead flesh broke open before Bregman's eyes. The blooms had petals like flowers, but they were scarred and wrinkled like old skin. Something moved under Bregman's feet, and she stumbled backwards, until her spine was pressed against the side of the casket. In front of her, the floor rippled, as organic tendrils pushed the slabs aside and reached up towards the torchlight.

Bregman started stomping on the growths, trying to mash them back into the ground. It wasn't really a rational response to the situation, but what the h.e.l.l? Now the voice had abandoned her, she didn't have anything to do except panic. She looked up as she stamped, hoping to make eye contact with Sam again, but Sam wasn't there. The vault had changed shape around her. New walls had grown out of the stonework, curtains of pink fleshy material that stretched between the floor and the ceiling, held in place by columns of living muscle.

She'd obeyed the voice without question. She'd been weak. In shock, maybe, after what had happened in the shrine. The voice had latched onto that weakness, had used it to pull her here through the corridors of the ziggurat. Now she was waking up, at last, only to find that she had no way of getting out again.

Come to think of it, why had she gone to the Faction's shrine in the first place? Had the voice led her there, too? Had she ever ever been in control of her own body? been in control of her own body?

At her feet, a cl.u.s.ter of saplings reared up out of the floor, their buds swelling in front of Bregman's face until each one was the size of her head. The buds were the colour of scar tissue. They weren't plants, Bregman realised. Back at the gate of the Unthinkable City, Kortez had told her there was a bio-induction system in place on this island, pumping new genetic material into the ecosystem. The same kind of device was at work here in the vault. Something was seeding the area with living matter, squeezing blood out of the stone. No human-made machine could have done the job this fast, though. It took months, years, for a bio-induction system to have a visible effect on an environment. Not seconds.

The first of the head-sized buds opened up in front of Bregman. There was a potato-shaped lump of bioma.s.s at the centre of the flower, covered in b.u.mps and indentations, a sticky layer of skin stretched across the surface.

A face. A half-formed human face, too flawed to be anything but ugly. Even if the features had been given time to develop, the nose wouldn't have been streamlined enough, the eyes wouldn't have been quite the right shape. And the hair, stuck to the head in slippery wet clumps, was a complete mess. The other buds began to unfold, and one after another, the head-flowers opened their eyes.

All the faces were identical, crude copies of Bregman's own. She wondered if this might be a good time to start screaming like a b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

The sky was as grey as ever, but after the interior of the s.p.a.ceship it looked positively sunny. The Doctor noticed, with more than a little satisfaction, the look of shock on Qixotl's face as the man shuffled out of the ship after him.

'Told you so,' said the Doctor, out of the side of his mouth.

Qixotl blinked at him. 'Told you so what?'

'Told you it wouldn't go according to plan.' The Doctor nodded towards the Kroton, which was even now striding down the ship's gangway, its spindly legs shaking under the weight of its body. Its feelers were wobbling excitedly, and the Doctor got the impression it was trying to decide whether to start shooting at the plants floating around the roof garden.