Wallis nodded. 'In operation as we speak. Within an hour you'll feel a whole lot better about everything, I promise.'

The Doctor, Ben and Fletcher reached the open space where the crowds were waiting just in time to see a fleet of police cars pulling up, sirens blaring. Ben ran towards the edge of the crowd and looked down the road leading up to the car park. A long chain of police cars was making its way along it, as if every unit in LA had decided to come to see what was going on.

Several cars drove up the paths leading away from the parking area, blocking all escape routes, while the rest surrounded the crowd.

The door of the lead car opened. A cop got out and started to shout through a megaphone. 'OK everyone. Can you leave this area immediately. I repeat, disperse from this area immediately.'

The doors to all the cars flew open, and like front-line soldiers an army of policemen rolled out and began running towards the crowd.

They began manhandling people in the crowd, grabbing them by their arms, trying to pull them away from the queue.

Fletcher turned to the Doctor and Ben. 'Stay here,' he said.

'I'm going to see what the hell my guys are up to.'

He ran into the crowd and Ben was about to follow him but the Doctor put an arm across his friend's chest, telling him not to move. If they stayed on the edge of the car park they'd be safe.

Ben looked up at one of the giant billboards advertising Dying in the Sun Dying in the Sun and realised that the messages were getting stronger getting harder and harder to resist. The crowd's activity seemed to show that they also felt this. and realised that the messages were getting stronger getting harder and harder to resist. The crowd's activity seemed to show that they also felt this.

The police met with strong resistance from the crowd and the situation became more threatening. Several people decided they were being too obstructive and lashed out. At first the cops involved in the scuffles tried making arrests, tried cuffing the troublemakers, but soon too many people were leaping to the defence of those arrested. The arguments rapidly turned into fist fights, and in a short while a chaotic melee had broken out across the car park. A festival of punching kicking and screaming ensued. Police fired guns into the air in a desperate attempt to stop the crowd. The crowd ignored the police, prepared to do anything to stop them blocking the way into the marquee.

Some of the police retreated, while some seemed to revel in the fighting.

Ben looked for Fletcher and saw him pummelling someone's face into the ground, relishing the chance to be involved in a purely physical brawl. Chaos broke out and the fighting developed into a full-scale riot. Bottles and other items of litter were thrown at the police and bodies fell to the ground as the cops fired shots in self-defence. Several people made a run for it, either fleeing down the road away from the hills or pushing through the crowd to see if they could get into the marquee.

Everyone seemed to be fighting everyone else. They didn't care who they attacked, they were just out for themselves.

Everyone was trying to get to the front of the rabble that had moments ago been a queue, everyone was trying to become something greater than anyone else.

The police might have had guns, but the sheer force of numbers in the crowd meant they were being overpowered.

Some of them retreated, some of them were trampled underfoot and kicked half to death.

'Fight them!' a loud voice said over the chaos. Ben looked over to see that a small group of suited people had emerged from the marquee. They were clutching microphones connected to giant amplifiers and speakers that were being hastily erected outside it. 'Don't let them stop you!' the celebrities shouted in unison. 'You deserve better. You are are better.' better.'

As the words of their idols sank in, the crowd appeared to surge, getting more and more violent and aggressive, deepening the blood bath.

'We must stop this!' said the Doctor, panic clear in his voice.

'But what can we do?' cried Ben. 'There's thousands of them!'

'I don't know,' the Doctor said, frustration dominating his voice. 'But we must do something!'

Chapter Twenty-Seven.

Ben and the Doctor watched helplessly as the fighting continued.

A blinding flash of light filled the area, momentarily startling the fighting crowd as remote charges burnt out whatever was holding the illuminated film posters to the movie screens they'd been concealing. The screens lit up as projectors in front of them activated.

There were four screens around the area and Ben noticed a small cluster of De Sande's robed followers standing next to each one, operating the projectors.

At first the screens were filled with a montage of images from Dying in the Sun Dying in the Sun and the crowd made impressed noises. Ben realised that they were no longer screaming. Both the police and the people they were fighting were entranced by what they saw, captivated to the point where they forgot about the fight. This was the largest crowd ever assembled in front of a Selyoid projection, the highest concentration of willing minds ever gathered in one place. Ben just wanted to watch, felt himself being drawn in, felt himself wishing he could be part of the Selyoid experience. and the crowd made impressed noises. Ben realised that they were no longer screaming. Both the police and the people they were fighting were entranced by what they saw, captivated to the point where they forgot about the fight. This was the largest crowd ever assembled in front of a Selyoid projection, the highest concentration of willing minds ever gathered in one place. Ben just wanted to watch, felt himself being drawn in, felt himself wishing he could be part of the Selyoid experience.

The place was like a surreal drive-in theatre, with no cars and four screens. The moonlight shone down, rippling off people's faces, and the bright colours emanating from the screens appeared to dance around the crowd like tormenting spirits.

'May I have your attention please,' a deep voice boomed over the speakers a voice amplified so strongly that it seemed that the hills themselves were talking. The voice didn't need the crowd's attention, of course. It already had it. 'Everyone, prepare to witness the true power of your new friends.'

With that the screens flickered, and in the moonlight the robed figures began busily adjusting the projectors.

For a second the screens went dark. Then, before anyone's concentration could be broken, they filled with bright white light.

Images of light and fire played across them, images that swirled and danced, black-and-white images that suddenly burst into colour, like in The Wizard of Oz The Wizard of Oz. And then the bright mass of light advanced through another technological revolution. The fire and the light and the moonbeams on the screen seemed to take on a three-dimensional appearance.

A giant roar filled the skies like thunder from heaven.

Suddenly the fire burst out of the screens, surging above the crowd.

The thousands of people gathered by the screens gasped as they craned their necks to see the battle going on above them, the heavens ablaze as the trails of fire from all four screens met above their heads cinema projections made real.

'My word,' Ben heard the Doctor mutter. 'What have they done?'

The crowd watched with awe, captivated as the flames expanded, fireballs swirling in the sky like living objects, dancing around each other in a celestial ballet. Some people began to run away, screaming with panic at the amazing spectacle in the heavens above them.

Choral singing erupted from the speakers and soon half the crowd began to sing as well, the Selyoid spectacle pushing them to give their souls to the situation.

Those who weren't singing gasped as if watching an expensive fireworks display.

The fire in the sky began to spark, started to grow brighter, then separated out into beams of a thousand different colours.

They became one giant entity, a lightball the size of several football pitches, which flew up into the night sky then came crashing down to earth, splitting off into several giant pieces.

Part of the crowd ducked, worried about being hit by the fire, while the rest stood motionless, rooted to the ground by terror.

As the pieces of the lightball reached the ground they seemed to solidify, gaining mass and losing their inconsistency.

Gradually each of them formed a solid object like a huge block of burning magnesium.

One of the pieces landed between the point where the Doctor and Ben were standing and the rest of the crowd. The enormous mass of people began moving away from the light in unison, clearing a path in front of it. They could see it changing, forming a shape that consisted of two large pillars of light supporting a bulky weight. It seemed to be turning into a giant person.

No, Ben realised, as the light began to scream with a terrifying animalistic roar that shook the hills. It wasn't turning into a person.

'Oh, my God!' Ben heard one of the crowd scream. 'It's a monster!'

The light spread out forming a wide mass above the pillars, a mass that became chest-shaped, forming the upper body of a creature with hunched shoulders and giant drooping arms. At the top of the creature a lightball took on the shape of disproportionately large facial features.

The crowd's screaming grew even louder when they realised what they were seeing. The light had turned into a fifteen-storey-high gorilla. It began pummelling its chest and waving its arms around as if swatting at imaginary aeroplanes.

'What is that?' Ben asked.

'I'm not sure,' the Doctor said, putting his hands to his ears and shouting over the din. 'It's just a projection, but it's appearing as if it has a physical form, altering our perceptions so that we see it as more than just light.'

The gorilla took several steps, seemingly shaking the ground with its weight, and Ben instinctively ducked out of the way to avoid being trampled under its feet.

'So it can't hurt us then?'

The Doctor shook his head. 'I don't know for certain.' Then he pointed to the police, and to the crowd. Terror was clear on all their faces. 'But I know they they can hurt us!' He gestured towards the bank of hills that surrounded the car park. 'Come on!' he shouted, grabbing Ben's arm. can hurt us!' He gestured towards the bank of hills that surrounded the car park. 'Come on!' he shouted, grabbing Ben's arm.

They raced round the crowd and, as the gorilla's massive bulk moved out of his field of vision, Ben began to see the cinematic forms the other projections were taking on.

One of them had split up into an army of Roman soldiers, who filled the air with their battle cries as they bore down on the people below with swords held high and shields held tight.

As the Doctor and Ben ran they witnessed one marvel after another. They saw the police shooting at the monsters and bullets passing straight through the projections. They went through a pass and came face to face with a hundred giant horses, each five times as large as it should be, each mounted by a rider wearing the white hood and robes of a member of the Ku Klux Klan. The horses stampeded and Ben and the Doctor scrambled on to the undergrowth around the edges of the car park, desperately trying to escape the carnage.

Horrified, Ben watched as a giant dinosaur, moving in jerky stop-frame animation, crushed three police cars underfoot, while the Klansmen and the Roman legions fought it out with each other and with the LAPD. The dinosaur roared and the hills were filled with war cries from the battling factions. The cops were joining in the chaos, having clearly given up on trying to bring any logic to the situation. They fired wildly into the sky at the projections, which seemed to be targeting them directly and deliberately ignoring the general public. The Romans sliced down on them with their swords, the Klansmen tried to trample them with their horses. The police fired back in retaliation but their weapons were useless.

The scene was a nightmare, but Ben found he couldn't take his eyes off the spectacle. It was fascinating, enticing and absorbing. It was a scene greater than any that could ever be shown in a motion picture epic. It was the greatest movie of all time, taking place live in Los Angeles.

The crowds were screaming as they fought, panicked and confused by what was going on. Peoples' faces said it all. They wanted to run, wanted to get away, but while the Selyoids were projecting their messages to them they knew they had to stay, knew they had to be a part of the new era that was coming. Ben moved away from the undergrowth at the edge of the car park, wanting to get closer to the action.

'Where are you going?' the Doctor asked.

'I've got to be there,' Ben said. 'I've got to be a part of it.'

The Doctor grabbed him, pulled him back and looked him in the eye. 'No,' he said sternly. 'Ben, don't listen to them. Fight it. Stay with me!'

'But it's everywhere, Doctor. I can't think about anything else!' 'You must!' the Doctor urged. 'You must fight it!'

Ben nodded, then rubbed his eyes. He took a deep breath and tried to clear all thoughts of Selyoids from his mind. 'I'll try, Doctor.'

'Now,' the Doctor explained, 'we need to get to those projectors.'

He scuttled over to the nearest one and Ben followed him.

'Will you be able to switch it off?' Ben asked.

The Doctor shook his head and pointed to the small electricity generators at the side of the projector. 'There's no way we can get close enough to find the "off" switch.'

Ben waved his thumb in the direction of the robed figures guarding the projector. 'Not unless we get rid of that lot, eh?'

'There's too many of them,' the Doctor said. 'Besides, we don't know how strong they are.'

They ran towards the projector and Ben felt revulsion as he saw the decaying features of a rotting corpse beneath the robes of one of the figures.

The Doctor walked all round the projector, going as close to it as he could without getting a reaction from the corpses. 'Look at this,' he called from the other side of the mammoth object.

Ben ran round to its front to see what the Doctor was talking about and found he had to shield his eyes. The glow from the projector was so bright, sparkling... no, sparking. Tiny bits of light darted around its edges, as if the entire thing was live electrically.

'Careful, Doctor,' he said. 'It looks dangerous.'

The Doctor stared at the projector and reached up with his arm. He jumped and, for a fraction of a second, stopped part of the light beam hitting the screen. The projections rippled slightly, but the Selyoid influence was too strong, too powerful, for a simple light disruption to have any effect.

The corpses growled at him and he took several steps back to stop them coming any closer. 'Now this is interesting,' he said, pointing to the lens. 'Look at the front of the projector.'

Ben craned his neck to try to see what he was referring to.

On a small ledge sticking out in front of the projector lens was a large crystal-like object. An object that looked very similar to the device the Doctor had stolen at the FOCAL meeting.

'That's it!' the Doctor said with excitement. 'They've managed to create more industrial versions of the filter that made the monster that attacked us come to life. They are what's causing those apparitions. If we remove them, then the apparitions should disappear.'

'We'll never be able to do that,' Ben said. He gestured to the corpses. 'There's too many of them. And they're only the ones guarding the projector.'

The expression on the Doctor's face became one of defeated resignation.

'Maybe we can convince everyone that the projections aren't real?' Ben suggested. He pointed towards the crowd. 'Fletcher's in there somewhere, maybe he can help to calm them?'