E-Kobalt regained control of its sensory systems, and began to a.n.a.lyse the data the growth was feeding it. The dynatropes were trapped inside a box. The box was approximately two hundred metres along each side; the growth claimed that the surfaces were made out of an unidentified, and unidentifiable, material. E-Kobalt shifted its sensory apparatus a little, demanding a visual scan of the nearest wall.

It was decorated with humanoid remains. Skulls, they were called. There were thousands upon thousands of them, set into the wall at regular intervals, their faces painted with black dust and rotting bioma.s.s.

'Commander?'

E-Kobalt spun its head. A shape had materialised by its side, a blue smudge, hovering above the floor of the control section. It was the face of one of the bipeds, the one with the blue visual apparatus and the excessive cranial fur. E-Kobalt vaguely remembered that it had discovered the unit's ident.i.ty, before it had left the ziggurat, but something seemed to be blotting the information out of its mind. The face was a hologram, according to the control growth, though the growth had no idea where it was being projected from.

'I-den-ti-fy-yourself,' E-Kobalt demanded, somewhat weakly.

The man in the hologram shook his head. 'There's no time, commander. You have to listen to me. I don't want to have to hurt you.'

E-Kobalt wasn't sure how to respond to that. 'You-have-no-pow-er-to-harm-the-Kro-ton-Ab-so-lute.'

'E-Kobalt, please. You're not thinking. It's the Shift. It's in your head, it's urging you to do things you shouldn't be doing. Try to concentrate. You know I'm telling the truth.'

The Shift? Suddenly, there was a brand-new thought in E-Kobalt's head. A realisation...

The central idea the concept of absolute destruction, absolute aggression rolled forward, thoroughly squashing the new notion. 'You-are-ly-ing,' E-Kobalt announced. 'You-will-explain-what-has-happ-ened-to-the-War-spear. You-will-tell-me-where-we-are.'

The man's eyes were tight shut, E-Kobalt saw, and small bubbles of salt-water were trickling down his upper cranial unit. It recognised these symptoms. The humanoid was under stress, possibly in a state of exhaustion. 'You're in the Faction's shrine. I've materialised it around you. E-Kobalt, I don't have time to argue. I can't hold on to the control systems much longer. You have to listen to me.'

'I-do-not-un-derstand.'

'I told you. This is the shrine's cargo hold. It's like being inside a TAR... well, never mind.' A hand appeared, and wiped the hologram's brow. 'You can't attack the ziggurat as long as you're here. You might as well listen. The Shift wants you to destroy us. It's using you, commander.'

More new ideas popped up in the Kroton's forebrain, but the aggressive instinct flattened all of them. 'The-Kro-ton-Ab-solute-will-not-be-de-fea-ted!' E-Kobalt roared. 'You-will-release-the-dy-natropes!'

The man on the hologram let out a deep, sorrowful breath. 'Very well. You leave me no choice.'

'You-will-release-us!'

'No I won't, E-Kobalt. There's no way out for you. You're trapped.'

'We-will-pre-vail!'

'How? How are you going to get out? How are you going to destroy the ziggurat when you're stuck in here?'

'We-will-succeed!'

'How, E-Kobalt? How?'

How?

E-Kobalt searched for an answer, but there was so little in its mind. In fact, it only had two ideas left to work with. One of them, the smaller of the two, was "get the Relic", but that was hardly appropriate now.

The other, the thought that occupied almost every part of whatever E-Kobalt had for a soul, was "destroy".

'Destroy!' E-Kobalt shrieked.

The vibration rippled through the nervous systems of every Kroton in the Warspear. One idea, one simple command, more powerful than any other. From dynatrope to dynatrope, E-Kobalt felt the pilots reaching deep into their control cores, activating their weapons. The solution was simple, after all. They would blast their way out of the box. The prison would break open. The City would, ultimately, be destroyed.

The thought was a pure one, more satisfying than any other E-Kobalt could remember having. Strange, then, that even as it gave the firing order, a new idea began to blossom at the back of its mind. An idea that said, in a voice the commander didn't quite recognise: "stop".

But the weapons systems had already been engaged. E-Kobalt saw a look of relief cross the biped's face. Then the hologram faded into nothingness.

Of course, E-Kobalt was dead before it realised anything was wrong.

In less than a second, the Warspear's hyperbolic resonators cycled through their entire repertoire, slamming signals ranging from the ultrasonic to the infra-normal against the walls of the shrine, searching for the frequency that would tear the prison open. Of course, any known form of matter would have been susceptible to the vibrations. The loomkeepers of Quartzel-88 had been quite thorough when the weapons had been designed.

Unfortunately for the Krotons, the shrine wasn't made of matter. At least, not in the conventional sense. Like the ziggurat, it had been built out of sheer mathematics, the complex architectures of block transfer computation. Unlike the ziggurat, the people who'd made the shrine had got their sums right.

The cargo hold rang with a sound that was like all the other sounds in creation added together and amplified. The air was shaken apart by echoes on every conceivable frequency, including the ones to which the Warspear was susceptible, and the ones to which E-Kobalt's s.p.a.cecraft was susceptible, and the ones to which the Krotons themselves were susceptible.

Moments later, the floor of the hold was carpeted with a layer of fine white frost. The skulls weren't even scratched.

The Doctor piloted the shrine back to the ziggurat before he let go of the control systems. Then he relaxed, remembering slightly too late that the intense concentration had been the only thing keeping him upright. His knees buckled, and he fell to the ground, although he liked to think he did it with some degree of style and elegance.

He lay there a while, staring up at the ceiling. Eventually, Sam's face appeared overhead.

'What happened?' she said.

'We won,' the Doctor told her. He squinted, as if that would make it easier to concentrate. There was something he was forgetting... oh yes. 'How's the Kroton? The one in the doorway?'

Sam glanced towards the corridor. 'You know what coleslaw looks like?'

'Yes.'

'That's how the Kroton is.'

'Good. The units in the ziggurat were in resonance with E-Kobalt, then. I thought as much. When the commander got shaken apart, all its friends got shaken apart, too.'

'You mean, like Bagpuss?'

The Doctor frowned. 'Obscure post-modern youth-culture reference. Ace would have been proud of you.'

Sam moved her lips to say something else, but the voice that came out of her mouth wasn't quite her own. 'YOU'RE BECOMING AN IRRITATION,' she seemed to say.

Ah. The Shift. It wasn't a physical ent.i.ty, so it had survived the demise of the Warspear. Kroton weapons don't cycle through conceptual frequencies, the Doctor concluded. Now, there was a piece of information that would almost certainly never come in useful ever again. 'Ready to admit defeat yet?' he asked, pleasantly.

'NOT AT ALL. HOWEVER, I SUPPOSE I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER THAN TO USE KROTONS AS CAT'S-PAWS. THEY'RE NOT VERY INTELLIGENT, ARE THEY?'

'It's your fault. If you hadn't spent so much time pumping up E-Kobalt's aggressive side, he wouldn't have opened fire.'

Sam looked puzzled by what the Doctor had said. Clearly, she had no idea the Shift was using her as a mouthpiece. Well, of course she hadn't, the Doctor reminded himself. The Shift was in his head, not hers. It wasn't changing her words, it was changing the way he heard heard her words. 'NEVERTHELESS, I'M AFRAID IT'S NOT OVER YET,' the Shift went on. 'THERE ARE OTHERS I CAN USE. EVERYBODY CAN BE MANIPULATED.' her words. 'NEVERTHELESS, I'M AFRAID IT'S NOT OVER YET,' the Shift went on. 'THERE ARE OTHERS I CAN USE. EVERYBODY CAN BE MANIPULATED.'

'But right now, you're inside my personal head s.p.a.ce. I'm right about that, aren't I?'

'YES. OH, DON'T TELL ME YOU'RE GOING TO GO INTO SENSORY WITHDRAWAL AGAIN. WE'VE BEEN THROUGH ALL THAT.'

'I wasn't going to.' Sam was shaking her head. The Doctor wondered what she was really saying, behind the Shift's words. 'You're forgetting something, "Mr" Shift. It wasn't just biodata sensitivity I picked up while I held the Presidency. We've got all sorts of secrets, where I come from.'

The Doctor could have sworn he saw Sam's eyes open wide in alarm. 'WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?'

'I'm saying I left a little something for you inside my mind, after the last time we met there. Ready?'

'Ready for what?' asked Sam. The Doctor felt the Shift moving around inside his consciousness. It was on the threshold, trying to escape through his senses, ready to pop out and into someone else's perceptions.

He flexed a neural muscle. He could have sworn he heard the sound of a cage door being swung shut on the inside of his head.

'Gotcha,' he said.

'Sorry, have you gone mad or something?' asked Sam, who'd completely missed the fact that anything had happened at all.

'I'll explain later,' the Doctor a.s.sured her. 'Now all we have to do is deal with the Relic. Ah. I seem to be lying on the floor. Could you help me up, do you think? Thank you.'

Mr Qixotl listened. Everything was quiet; the hall had even run out of muzak to spew at him. For once, nothing was shouting at him, swearing at him, or threatening him. He was the only one there, if you could ignore the remains of the Raston lap-dancers. Well, so much for "the most perfect dancing machines ever devised".

He sat on his chair, in front of the remains of the conference table, running his hand across the skin under his shirt. The hole was gone. Completely healed over. The shirt was a mess, but there was no sign of injury. Even his legs had been fixed up.

What kind of deal had he made, for pity's sake? What had he let himself in for? He knew all about the Celestis, about the way they'd "mark" corporeal life-forms, so their souls would be under Celestine control even after death. But Trask had promised him, a.s.sured him, he hadn't been marked. He'd simply been "recorporated". The Celestis had the power to do that, apparently, to bind someone to their mortal form and patch them up a bit. Qixotl didn't know how the process worked. Too much like voodoo for his liking, really.

Two sets of footsteps came clumping down the corridor towards the conference hall, breaking the silence. Qixotl didn't bother looking up. He knew who it'd be.

'Quite a successful conclusion, all things considered,' said the Doctor.

There was a long pause, so Qixotl a.s.sumed the Doctor had been talking to him. 'Uh,' he said.

'The Krotons are gone, and the Shift's out of the way, at least for the time being. All we have to do is deal with the Relic, and we can all go home.'

Qixotl finally looked up. The Doctor was staring at him expectantly. His companion hovered at his side, looking as awkward as ever.

'The Relic,' the Doctor prompted him. 'Where is it?'

Qixotl shrugged. 'Look, what can I say? I was dying. I got shot up by the Krotons. I would've bitten the dust if it hadn't been for Trask.'

The Doctor looked confused. 'Trask? Why, what did Trask do?'

'He made the arrangements. With the Celestis. I didn't have a choice, right? He made me this offer, before the auction got going. He said he'd give me the ability of, what do they call it, "perpetual recorporation". I mean, when it came down to it, he kind of backed out. He said he'd only recorporate me the once, I could take it or leave it. I know, I know, I could have asked for more, but I was dying there, y'know?'

The human girl's jaw dropped. 'You mean...?'

'Yeah. Trask saved my life. In exchange for the Relic. He took it back to Mictlan five minutes ago. Don't look look at me like that.' at me like that.'

THE DEAD MAN'S STORY

The Light

I have to tell my story. I have to give myself more time. I'm trying to stay in one piece... I mean, I'm trying to keep everything together, but...

Wait. Let me start again. I have to tell my story. Not because I think anybody's going to be interested, not because I think anybody's listening. I have to tell my story, because if I don't, then I'll forget it, and if I forget it, there won't be anything of me left.

Firstly. My name is Kristopher Patrick Englund, and I'm dead. That's the most important thing there is to know about me. My life isn't an important part of the story, but I'll say one thing, about the days when I walked and talked and thought for myself. I'll say that I remember being in a hospital, having something sick and twisted taken out of my body. I remember being on the operating table, with my eyes tight shut, feeling the doctors slicing me open. Hearing them talk about my insides while they went to work. Mumbles and scalpels.

I was supposed to have been unconscious. Some kind of slip-up with the anaesthetic, I think. I couldn't move, or speak, or open my eyes, but I could feel the edge of the knife cutting into me, slipping under the skin. That kind of thing's supposed to drive you mad, and I thought I was was mad, back then, because that's when I started seeing things. mad, back then, because that's when I started seeing things.

Yes. I remember. I could see everything opening up in front of me, like someone was cutting a hole in my head, the same way the doctors were cutting holes in my body. I remember watching the hole getting wider, and wider, until I could see the people living in the shadows on the other side.

That was the first time I met the Celestis. They said they'd opened up an "aperture in the s.p.a.ce-time continuum" I'm quoting them word for word, here just so they could talk to me from their castle in the land of the dead. They told me they wanted me to serve them. I don't know if I should have been flattered or insulted, knowing they wanted me as a slave, but I was scared, and I was in pain, so I listened to what they had to say, and I believed every word.

All I had to do, the Celestis said, was let them give me their mark. They'd make sure I didn't die on the operating table, but in return, my ident.i.ty would belong to them for the rest of eternity, however long that turned out to be. That's how they put it. "Ident.i.ty" . I remember wondering whether that meant I was giving them my soul.

So I said yes. I know, I know. I shouldn't have done it. Of course I shouldn't have done it, I don't think I was even in danger of dying in the hospital. But I said yes. I made the deal. I signed the contract. I got the mark.

When I recovered from the anaesthetic, so I could move and speak and open my eyes again, one of the doctors was standing over me with a big grin on her face. She had no idea I'd been conscious through the operation. As far as she was concerned, everything had gone smoothly. I didn't tell her the truth. I would have had to tell her about the Celestis, as well.

Anyway. I'm talking about my life too much. I didn't want to do that. I wanted to talk about what happened after I died.

I won't bother describing what it feels like to die. I'd have to start talking about out-of-body experiences, about floating down long dark corridors, etcetera etcetera etcetera. I died, that's all I've got to say about it, and the Celestis took my ident.i.ty away, just like they'd said they would. I ended up in Mictlan, as promised.

Mictlan. The land of the dead. And I know it's not really the afterlife, I know it's only a place the Celestis built to keep themselves happy, but maybe I should say a few words about how things are there, because it's not like any afterlife you ever read about in the land of the living.

In the middle of Mictlan, there's a castle, and on the top floor of the castle there's the Grand Hall of the Celestis. I don't think I saw any of them step outside that Hall, not in all the time I was there. Then again, I never really saw the Celestis do anything, even though I had to take orders from them every day of my non-life.