They had carried on in silence for about twenty minutes, the air getting thinner. It was a good thing he'd sent Benny back, he decided. She'd have coped admirably but he knew she would have been uncomfortable. His own respiratory system was designed to cope with most atmospheres, although one of those old cream atmospheric density jackets from the TARDIS would have helped. Would have gone quite nicely with his suit as well. And as for Sskeet well, Martian physiology wasn't his strong point but he imagined they could cope quite easily down here.

As the air got staler and staler, the Doctor suddenly recognized where they were. A few odd tools lay scattered around a few more broken wheelbarrows. They were in the heart of the now-defunct mining core of Peladon. The place where the Pel miners had so bravely defended their world against the oppressive Martian traitor, Commander Azaxyr and the devious human engineer Eckersley the last time the Doctor was here. Back then Azaxyr had sabotaged the air ducts, causing the miners to return to the surface points where his Ice Warriors had systematically begun fighting back. And almost winning, until he'd helped the n.o.bles and miners alike to hit back.

Brave Queen Thalira. Poor obstinate Chancellor Ortron. Even a young Lianna. They'd all fought the Ice Warriors alongside him.

Now, here he was trusting them once again.

Funny old universe, really. He spent so much time telling Ace, Tegan, Sarah Jane, Polly and all the others not to judge by appearances. Yet he had done just that with Savaar and Sskeet - tried to make enemies rather than friends.

Oh well, he thought. It proved that it's never too late to teach an old Doc new tricks.

Eventually they had reached the site that the Doctor had guessed they were heading for. The old disused refinery. There, Eckersley had manufactured the ghostly appearances of Aggedor, using a purpose-built Aggedor statue fitted with a high resolution disrupter that literally transmatted around the planet, vaporizing all who got in its way. Such a devious but cunningly crafted plan. He'd never told Sarah, his friend at the time, but he held a grudging respect for both Azaxyr and Eckersley for that.

A magnificent piece of engineering but wholly evil.

The Doctor had stood to one side as Sskeet approached the rusted old door. The Ice Warrior raised his sonic disrupter and an almost imperceptible whine began.

'K9 would have gone mad,' murmured the Doctor as he placed his fingers in his ears.

The door suddenly clunked and bright light shone out of the window. The Doctor could see movement from within and had guessed what they were as the door opened.

Sskeet slammed his arm across his chest in a salute as a taller Ice Warrior walked out.

'Commander Ra.s.sbur,' he rasped.

Ra.s.sbur nodded a greeting. He then turned and looked at the Doctor.

'Greetings, Doctor. My Lord Savaar informed me of your arrival. Please accept my apologies regarding the mysterious way in which you were brought here.'

'Not at all, Commander. A most pleasant journey.' The Doctor doffed his hat before continuing: I must say I am surprised to see you down here. I wasn't aware that any other Federation ships had been in the area since we arrived on the Bruk.'

Ra.s.sbur inhaled noisily. 'That, Doctor, is because there hasn't been one.

My team and I have been on Peladon for six weeks.'

And now the Doctor understood everything. Almost.

He and Sskeet entered the refinery. The Doctor remembered it as a spa.r.s.e and quite small room, just a few banks of equipment for judging Peladon's trisilicate ores, plus of course Eckersley's additions such as the transmat and his neurological anti-theft devices.

However, the Martians had been busy. They had carved out a much larger area which reminded the Doctor of a government war room. In the centre was a three-dimensional hologram of the Citadel. To the left of that were further holograms, larger reconstructions of certain rooms and areas around the throne room. The relic room was represented. as was the shuttle bay where they had first landed. Equally s.p.a.ced around the walls were consoles with banks upon banks of slim computer nets, holograms and even rather archaic electrical equipment. The Doctor was drawn to a small black box with a red light on top.

'How fascinating. What does this do?'

'Not a lot,' replied Ra.s.sbur. Occasionally it receives messages from a group of human mercenaries employed by whoever is stealing Peladon's treasures. That is what we are here to observe and eventually stop. We guessed that events would climax around the restatement vows. With so much traffic in and around the planet, it would be the ideal opportunity for the criminal to escape.'

The Doctor dropped into a hard seat. Wincing slightly - and remembering that Martians were not renowned for their love of comfort - he removed his hat and began folding it. And the mercenaries?'

'We believe they are bringing something else for our mystery criminal.'

Oh, they are.' The Doctor paused and then frowned. 'Commander Ra.s.sbur, are you telling me that with all this equipment, with six weeks of illegal hiding down here, you haven't actually ascertained firstly why the mercenaries are coming is?'

'They thought it was me,' said a plaintive voice.

The Doctor didn't bother to turn: he recognized the tone. 'Mister Corry, I think a lot of people up top are - and secondly who the villain of the piece going to be - very pleased to see you alive. Your Ker'a'nol is especially upset.'

Corry wandered into his field of vision. 'That's nice to know. What's going on up top?'

The Doctor sat back. Oh. Lots. King Tarrol had me executed. High Priestess Atissa had High Lord Savaar executed. Both failed. Did Savaar know you were here?'

Ra.s.sbur answered: 'Lord Savaar and the Lady Lianna knew everything from the moment we landed here.'

'Good. Then by now Savaar should have sussed who our mystery man is.'

The Doctor stood up. 'Commander Ra.s.sbur, those human mercenaries are bringing with them the Ancient Pakhar Diadem. I'm sure I don't need to lecture you regarding its legendary power or its fiscal value. I suspect that our mystery man isn't going to take the Peladon relics himself at all - I think he's trading them for the Diadem because that's what he was after when he murdered the Federation Chair's daughter on Pakha. You and your men are likely to have a war on your hands. I hope you are prepared.'

Ra.s.sbur saluted. Always.'

'Good. I think you should stay hidden until the time is right. I take it you are monitoring the presence of the mercenaries.'

'They are less than an hour from here.'

'Good, good. Now, it is imperative we let them get quite some way in. I abhor violence but the most important thing is the destruction of the Diadem. I hope no lives will be lost but it is a possibility. Nevertheless, I shall be the one to retrieve the Diadem at my own risk. None of your men are to try, is that understood?'

Ra.s.sbur nodded. The Doctor scooped up his umbrella and pointed to Sskeet.

'Come on Sskeet - time to take me back. Mister Corry and I have a resurrection to stage.'

Geban gently shook Alpha Centauri awake.

With a slight cry of pain, Centauri began to stir, colour seeping back into his arms and head. He looked up at Geban. 'Chancellor? Someone pretending to be you attacked me!' As Geban pulled Centauri upright he asked who it was, but Centauri miserably confirmed that he hadn't seen.

The chancellor reached down and picked up the bloodsoaked ball of cloth.

'Someone really wanted it to look like me. Who?'

'We should go and tell someone about this.'

Again, who? The king will not be interested. Savaar is dead. The Doctor is dead. I cannot find Nic Reece or Professor Summerfield and the holocrew are all packed and waiting by the Martian shuttle.'

Suddenly there was a crash and scamper of feet from outside the door.

Geban flung it open to see Keri and Kort, breathless.

'He's dead, yeah. The pilot is dead.'

Geban looked at Centauri who merely said, I wondered why he wasn't replying to my call.'

I suspect he's been dead only a short while,' said a Scottish accent behind them all.

The unanimous shouts of 'Doctor!' nearly deafened the Time Lord but eventually he waved their questions away. 'Keri here can explain how it was done, we have work to do. We must find Savaar.'

'Doctor, he has been executed,' wailed Centauri.

'Nonsense, Amba.s.sador. He's as dead as I am. With any luck he and Bernice have your art thief in chains by now. The clues were obvious enough.'

'What clues?' asked Kort.

'Later. Too many questions, I'll tell you later. Let's go.'

As the entourage moved away from Centauri's quarters, it was Neal Corry who noticed the bulge in a nearby drape-covered alcove. Calling them back, he moved the drape side.

Geban gasped as Torg's body flopped forward, the huge man's throat severed from ear to ear.

'He must have died instantly,' said the Doctor quietly. 'The poor man.'

'Who did this?' said Geban.

Our art thief. The same person who killed Lady Lianna, old Fabon and anyone else who is missing.'

'Jav,' said Keri.

'Jav? My cameraman?' asked Corry.

If he is a Pakhar, then yes,' replied Sskeet. 'We found a badly mutilated Pakhar on Mount Megeshra's slopes some time ago. He had fallen or been pushed from a great height.'

I wonder what scam he got caught up in this time,' Corry muttered. I knew he was trouble. Knew that after the Galactic Storm stuff. Poor fool.'

I suspect,' said the Doctor, laying the drape over Torg's body and straightening up, I suspect he found out who our man was and tried to blackmail him. Very silly idea.'

He led the way forward.

High Lord Savaar decided it was time to risk attention. Shsurr Summerfield and Nic Reece were obviously engaged in deep, meaningful conversation somewhere but it was time he reported in to Commander Ra.s.sbur.

He was just leaving Bernice's room when the door was flung open and the Doctor stood there. Savaar saw the Pakhar, the Cantryan, Sskeet, and Geban the Chancellor and even Neal Corry pile in behind him.

'Greetings, Doctor. Shsurr Summerfield carried out her mission with great delicacy and style. She will be honoured when we return to the Federation.'

'Good, Savaar, good. Now where is she?'

'She and Nic Reece are in the tunnels, discussing private matters.'

There was a pause and then the Doctor almost seemed to erupt in anger.

He began pacing around like a clockwork toy in overdrive.

And you let her? You let her go off with Nic Reece? How could you be so stupid?'

'Doctor! I don't understand-'

'No, obviously. I thought I'd laid all the clues out for you. I couldn't tell Benny because I needed her to get close to him. Don't you understand, the man you know as Nic Reece isn't. He's some kind of psychotic mercenary who's trying to rule the Federation.' The Doctor stared at them. 'He killed Lianna, Torg, Jav, Jina, everyone. Nic Reece is the man we've ail been hunting and you've let him take Bernice into the caverns!'

Interlude Three 'Professor? Professor Rhukk? Where are you?' In his portable cabin, the object of the calling looked up from his comm-net.

Open,' he commanded and a portion of the wall melted away to let in the searing heat of Phaester Osiris's close atmosphere. He adjusted the controls on the collar of is translucent exo-suit. Cool air and liquid oxygen were pumped against his body and he sighed contentedly.

Feeling able to face the outside, Rhukk pushed himself out of his chair and gingerly stepped on to the sand. Despite the exo-suit, the heat hit him like a pile-driver and he actually staggered, grasping out with his clamplike hands to the side of the cabin.

'Close,' he hissed and the wall rematerialized, to keep the interior atmosphere as cool as possible.

He saw the young Lurman, Krissi, running towards him. How he envied the Lurman's ability to run and generally enjoy the heat of the planet. Martians, he long ago decided, were actually totally ill-equipped for the life of archaeology. Inevitably, digs took place in arid wastelands, years after a civilization had disintegrated into dust. Dust that cluttered up sophisticated equipment and, more importantly, Martian bodies. He'd been so grateful when the Federation research teams had created the exo-suit for him: it had given him back the manoeuvrability that age had slowly withered away.

Of course, being a Martian archaeologist was in itself somewhat unusual, but Rhukk delighted in eccentricity. He saw himself as a bit of a cultural throw-back, an oddity who was forever invited to lush dinner parties and soirees and gave appreciated after-meal speeches. His fellow Martians would pa.s.s the time of day but shared very little intellectual similarities with him. But the other humanoid species within the Federation had quickly given him recognition and, wholly deservedly, a reputation as one of the finest explorers in the galaxy.

After his first paper was published on the Telosian Cyber-tombs, starting that ridiculous nostalgia wave thirty years ago, he had been on all the holo-nets. More recently he'd had the charming pleasure of being interviewed on GFTV-3 - his favourite channel due to their intelligent and precise coverage of events rather than cheap entertainment. The delightful Pakhar, Ker'a'nol, had come to his home and gone through his life with him. Together they had discussed his highly exciting career and, false modesty aside, discussed just how much of that career was now considered essential reading by the Federation educational establishments purely because of his and his teams' research.

His favourite moment had been when she'd asked him which ten pieces of music and which written texts he would like to be stranded on a frontier asteroid with. His music stretched from Old Mars cla.s.sics from centuries back right up to the present with some of the nouveau-techno-skiffle that his Lurman and Human students were so fond of. But the text was even easier to decide upon Gustaff Heinrich Urnst's seminal 'Being an Account of my Discoveries of the Unnameable Secrets of Sakkrat'.

This co-existence of serious scientific explorer and witty raconteur made Rhukk a highly popular guest on other chat shows and an interviewee in comnet programs. As a result, he had been able to go to Irving Braxiatel and convince him to fund his sojourn to explore the Horun ruins, on the proviso that the Braxiatel Collection had full access to the findings. With the amount of credit Braxiatel placed in Rhukk's accounts, that was certainly no problem. It also ensured that these monumental discoveries would be accessible to the public for eons to come rather than locked away with some private and disinterested collector of alien ephemera.

Krissi caught up with him, running a hand across her silver hair and so removing handfuls of Osirian dust and sand.

She pa.s.sed him a data-pad and ran her Neysc.r.a.pe across it for him.

Immediately the holographic image of Irving Braxiatel blurred into view.

'Professor Rhukk. I have some news for you and little of it good, I'm afraid.

I'll get straight to the point. As you know I, along with the University of Pakhar, have been funding research into the location of the legendary Ancient Diadem.

'You may remember Sym Sharrod, the professor of archaeology at the university. He and a group of his students, working with Federation librarians, believed they had located the Diadem. Sharrod took a party to retrieve it. It is my sad duty to report two things -firstly Sharrod's entire group are dead, apparently murdered. I know you will take this very hard as I remember how well you knew most of the students involved after your Deanship there.

'Secondly, it would appear that they did in fact locate the Diadem. Any minor victory that would signify to the archaeological world is not only tarnished by their deaths but also by the fact that the Diadem was stolen.

At present, its location is unknown but I understand via a few . . . let's say unconfirmed sources, that the Federation are tracking it. The Martian High Commission on to have informed me that High Lord Savaar was leading the recovery mission. It transpires - and this is the bit that I am loathe to report so impersonally - that Savaar is also dead and his entire resource mission was destroyed.

I am sorry to be the bearer of such tragic news. A formal message has been dispatched to the others within your hatchery but as Savaar's second brother, I thought it best if you heard it from me.

'Rhukk, I am so sorry. I leave it up to you if you choose to return for the Death Honour Ceremony - I fully understand and, of course, provisions have been introduced to our schemes to ensure that the dig on Phaester Osiris will continue without you, albeit temporarily.

'Let me know your decision, old friend. Braxiatel out.'

Krissi stepped back, her eyes to the ground. Rhukk rested a hand on her shoulder.

'You knew them didn't you, Krissi?' She slowly nodded, her lip trembling.

'Julian and Nezz Larroq were in my study group before I left. I didn't know Fehler or Gris that well, but Professor Sharrod was exceptionally popular. It all seems so horrible.'

'Death is, my dear. It always is.' Rhukk breathed out slowly. 'Thank you for bringing this to me so promptly.'