'It's al right,' said Chris.

'The extractor,' croaked the Doctor, pointing to the Loom. 'That'll stop it.'

Chris yanked the device out of the open Loom.

The pulse died within the web.

The Doctor tried to stand, and fell against Chris. A tear of blood ran from his eye.

But the House kept shuddering.

From the window, they watched the earth still churning past. The cliff was less than fifty metres away.

'Headless chicken syndrome,' muttered the Doctor and turned unsteadily towards the TARDIS.

213.

The undulating floor ruptured and split under the ship.

'Sepulchasm!' gasped the Doctor, and tensed as the police box keeled into the abyss.

It froze, half into the crack.

The Doctor stared ahead, veins etched out on his forehead, grasping Chris's arm like a vice.

Swaying sickeningly, the TARDIS slowly rose in the air. It hovered, gradually moving away from the crack and settled back on the rubble-strewn floor.

The Doctor, wreathed in sweat, al but collapsed into Chris's arms. The young adjudicator carried him to the ship's door.

'Get ready for a shock,' said the Time Lord as they stumbled inside.

The House was giving out a determined shriek of death.

The survivors of the House of Lungbarrow stood on the cold mountainside, watching in silence.

The whitewood building slowed momentarily in its progress, and then, with a final splintering scream of despair, the entire vast, many-tiered edifice careered with horrible purpose over the edge of the cliff and plunged deep into the valley below.

214.

Chapter Thirty-four.

One Fine Day

The final ember of the sun of Extans Superior sank below the sea. Stars were already sprinkling the lavender-dark sky. The air was scented like pa.s.sion-fruit.

Chris angled an arm out of his hover-hammock and reached for his gla.s.s. He drained the last of his Indigo Moonrise c.o.c.ktail and made gurgling noises through the straw.

The Doctor hadn't touched his drink. The slice of magenta fruit garnishing the gla.s.s was starting to dry and curl.

He sat in a deckchair, staring at the sea, absently turning a set of heavy keys round and round on their thick metal ring.

Chris laid back and tried to relax, to do al the summery holiday things that the lapping waves and rustling palms and beat of distant music told him he should be doing. Along the beach, the locals had started a bonfire. Their laughter and singing echoed along the sand. Chris clunked his gla.s.s back on the antigrav tray hanging in the air beside him and sighed in resignation. 'It doesn't work, does it? I thought it might have helped.'

Little birds ran back and forth at the water's edge. And the Doctor's keys turned over and over. Click... click... click Click... click... click.

'Doctor?'

'It's supposed to be a release.' The Time Lord's voice sounded miles away, fathoms deep.

Oh G.o.ddess, thought Chris, here we go. 'What's that?' he asked aloud.

The Doctor sighed. 'An old lullaby crooned by a skull-faced nurse. Death and the eternal peace of oblivion. That's how it usually ends...'

'Um... I suppose that's one way of putting it.'

'Except for Time Lords, when it just goes on and on.' Click... click... click Click... click... click.

Two of the locals, a girl and a boy, both with scarlet trumpet flowers in their hair, ran past waving. 'Come to the feast. The feast is starting.'

Chris waved back. 'We'll be along later.' He let his arm drop.

'You go if you want to,' said the Doctor. He stood up, folded his deckchair and headed back to the TARDIS. A little figure, still in his hat, silhouetted against the glow seeping from the police box door.

The palm leaves clacked overhead like applause in the warm breeze. A crab scuttled away across the sand, one claw waving its farewel . Chris took one last look at the sea and the rose-coral beach as they slid into the dusk. Then he hurried after the Doctor.

It was cool inside. The Doctor had put up his deckchair again. He sat and watched the new TARDIS console, apparently waiting for it to react. Or was he just admiring the antique rosewood and tortoisesh.e.l.l finish? Or wondering how to make the thing work? 'Shut the door, Chris,' he said and waved a hand. 'Things get in.'

Chris pul ed an ivory lever and the door swung shut. 'Home again,' he said cheerful y. He picked his way through the debris that littered the floor and found a chair to sit on.

The overblown vaults of the reconfigured TARDIS dwarfed them. Wood and stone rose high in panels and b.u.t.tresses, where once there had been the clean functionality of a white honeycomb.

'Home,' murmured the Doctor.

215.

And it was was like the Doctor's home. As if his ship understood the loss of the House and had compensated to fill the emptiness. Shadowy corridors, alcoves and stairways, a secret at every turn. Like being in the Doctor's head. Like his life, for that matter, the details of which were strewn like flotsam across the floor. like the Doctor's home. As if his ship understood the loss of the House and had compensated to fill the emptiness. Shadowy corridors, alcoves and stairways, a secret at every turn. Like being in the Doctor's head. Like his life, for that matter, the details of which were strewn like flotsam across the floor.

Chris wasn't sure how long he sat, feeling the purr of the TARDIS engines as they tried to ease his own aching heart. His head had cleared of other people's thoughts, guilt and stresses. In comparison, his own were easy to put in order.

He thought of Roz, of how angry she used to get, her dark eyes flashing, her expression dour for days on end, and laughed at how much he missed her. He'd already fetched her towel from the bathroom and put it in his bag.

Click... click... click... The Doctor was turning his keys again, staring at a fixed point on the console... waiting. The Doctor was turning his keys again, staring at a fixed point on the console... waiting.

'Where would you like to go?' Chris asked quietly.

The little man edged a sad smile across his face. 'Even more places than you, Chris.' He hefted himself out of the deckchair, took a few steps circling the console and sank backwards into an ancient armchair that creaked as it received him. 'Isn't it time you struck out on your own? Did your own thing? You'll have had enough of me by now.'

'No,' protested Chris.

'But...,' said the Doctor and waited.

'Well, I mean, yes. There are are places I'd like to see.' places I'd like to see.'

'I know there are.'

'Before I'm so old, they al laugh when I walk in the door.'

'Would they?' The Doctor sounded shocked. 'They never laugh at me.'

'Um...' Chris looked across and saw the Doctor's eyes twinkle with laughter in the depths of the armchair. He gave up. 'You're just trying to make it easy for me.'

'I do try,' the Doctor agreed.

Chris suddenly brimmed with love for this strange, all-powerful, irritating, little whoever, whatever he was person.

'What about you? It's even less easy for you. I should be there.'

The Doctor shook his head. 'Talk to Romana. She'l sort out the transport for you.'

'Yes, but...' Chris was fl.u.s.tered. 'Romana? You mean we're going back?'

'Three days here in paradise is quite enough, thank you. Besides...' His mouth twitched nervily. '...running away again? It won't do, will it?'

'Suppose not...'

'No. It never does.' He rose again, walked up to the newly antique console and briskly adjusted the ebony dials.

'Straight back to where we left them, I think.' But his eyes were full of tears.

'Doctor,' said Chris gently. 'You're crukking wonderful, you know.'

'I know, I know,' he said with a watery smile. 'And if I didn't exist, you'd have to invent me.'

The sun broke through the clouds, and the wind had softened. Birds were feeding on the fish.

216.

Innocet, walking on the springy turf of Mount Lung with Leela and Dorothee, suddenly stopped and took her shoes off.

'Of course, they got out,' Dorothee said for the umpteenth time. 'They always get out.'

They heard a call and saw Romana running up the slope towards them. Beyond her, the homeless Cousins resembled an animated jumble sale. People and guards were moving among them.

'Help has arrived from the Capitol,' she said. 'We've got provisions and medical aid. We'll soon get the Cousins moved to safety.'

Innocet nodded graciously and fumbled with her shoes.

'And I've been talking to Captain Redred. He seems resigned, but I doubt the poor man understands what happened.'

'His Family wil look after him,' said Leela.

'They're your Family too,' Romana reminded her.

'Andred's Family.' Leela looked in earnest at the President. 'What about you?'

Romana tossed her hair and smiled mischievously. 'Quite a lot's been going on,' she said. 'You'l see.'

Mum's the word, thought Dorothee. But she kept her mouth shut on that count. 'Still no sign of the Doctor,' she said.

'He'll turn up,' Romana said. 'Always when you least expect it. As things stand, I don't mind if he takes years...'

The others threw her puzzled glances.

There was a shout and someone came galumphing down the slope to meet them.

Chris looked surprisingly clean and rested. Somehow he'd found time to shave and have a bath. And change his clothes too.

'How did you get out?' they asked. 'Is the Doctor safe? Where's the TARDIS?'

'The Doctor's fine,' he said after he'd hugged them all, including Innocet, much to her surprise. 'But he's had a h.e.l.l of a shock.'

'So have we all,' said Romana.

Chris nodded up the mountain. 'Go up and see him. The company will do him good. And you won't believe what the inside of the TARDIS looks like!'

Chris watched the others tramping up the slope. Romana waited, suddenly looking serious, which made him feel awkward.

'Actually, I have to ask a favour, if that's OK.'

'Of course,' she said.

'Well, he and I have talked it through. I mean, it's not that I don't get on with the Doctor. I'll miss him terribly...'

'But he has been very much in your thoughts lately.'

217.