'I'm going to ask a favour of you. Make arrangements to have Glitz and the others released. None of them did any of this willingly.'

'Why should I?'

'Because without them you'd never have got your property back, and there would have been a war. And because a friend of your people asks you. I know that there is a history of passing down exploits in your Packs to new generations of cubs, and I suspect that you know how I helped Pack Zanchyth bring justice to those who destroyed Pack Huthakh.'

'Very well. You have earned that much.'

'One other thing?'

'Do not presume on your luck.'

'I'd like to have some assistance in separating my TARDIS from what's left of the gunship.'

Brokhal nodded, and the use of the human gesture wasn't lost on the observers. 'It will be seen to.'

'You're letting them go,' Kala echoed disbelievingly. She considered the thieves just as responsible for her heartbreak as Mandell. It was guilt by association if nothing else. In truth, though, Kala wasn't too interested either way. Her life had just... stopped, with the revelation of Nic's complicity.

He'd betrayed not only the population of their planet, and the Veltrochni, but her and their unborn child too.

'Yes,' Brokhal said simply. 'As Ambassador to the Delphinus group, I must insist that these people are released without charge. They were, after all, merely following the instructions of your government to return our property.'

'But there were no such instructions,' Jemson put in. 'The government didn't know we even had it.'

Brokhal made a strange snorting sound that passed for laughter among Veltrochni. 'You are young, and new to politics. By tonight there will have been instructions to that effect, believe me - unless your President wishes the people to know how he has been duped, he will issue post-dated orders to appear as if he was defusing the crisis all along. As I was saying, this can in no way be considered a crime. However, I do understand your concerns. Family is the thing most important to us, and yours has been damaged by this crisis.

Punishing those who were... innocent will not lessen that damage.' Kala said nothing, and Brokhal continued. 'You may tell your President, as we will, that the Doctor and his associates were just returning our property to us as your government will have agreed.'

'And given how much Niccolo's collusion will embarrass them, they won't complain,' said Kala bitterly. 'Nor should they. Those thieves just saved your planet.'

'Where will you go?' Chat asked Glitz. They were standing on the balcony of a hotel in the City of Great Houses, and he was trying very much to ignore the smell of the jungle. 'Back to Elchur,' he answered after a little think. 'Elchur?'

'My ship's still there, isn't it? How am I going to make a living without it?'

'Does that mean you're going to go straight?'

'Well... I'm an entrepreneur after all. There's always a tidy little earner in some trade, isn't there?' He didn't add that there were more earnings in evading import and export duties. She might take that the wrong way, and he didn't really want her to do that. Nobody else had ever looked at him in quite the way she did, and for some reason he didn't want to spoil that. 'But I can stay for a little while longer, if you want.'

She smiled, and he prided himself on his skills at seduction.

Jack Chance and Monty Kast clinked glasses in the hotel bar. Everything was going on the government's bill, so they were taking the trouble to experiment with as many cocktail combinations as possible - all in the name of philanthropic research, of course.

'Well, I guess we shook things up a bit at home,' Jack commented proudly. He liked the idea that he had that much clout. Already they were hearing rumours that the President might call an early election.

'That we did. Profitable too.'

Jack examined his smoking drink closely, wondering if something in it was making him hear things. It was a Morestran concoction, so there was no telling what was in it.

'Profitable? But we didn't get anything.'

The older man grinned. 'That's because you're young and foolish. And didn't put a bet on with Korled the Terileptil that we'd pull this off.'

Jack put his drink down. 'You did what?' He couldn't believe Monty had done that. More accurately, he couldn't believe Monty had done it without letting him try as well.

'My whole life's savings at odds of four hundred and eighty three to one. Very profitable.'

'You bet your life's savings? That doesn't sound old and wise to me.'

'If we'd lost, I'd be dead anyway, so what difference did it make? So, are you coming back to VP?'

Jack shook his head. 'Who's gonna come to the Cafe with the reputation it'll have after being trashed twice? The insurance is pretty hefty, so I'll buy myself a ship, maybe go home to Earth...'

There was a message waiting for Karthakh at reception. 'An escaped serial killer in the Xotac system,' he told Sha'ol. 'Half a million, dead or alive.'

'Signal them that we will take it.'

After all, what else did they know how to do?

Frobisher took a last look at the skyline of Veltroch. Leaving any planet was always hard, but he managed because he knew there was always another to visit.

Some visits were more pleasant than others, but Frobisher doubted he would get tired of any of them for a long time. He turned and went into the TARDIS. Rather than remove it from the wrecked ship, the Veltrochni had cleared the ship away from it.

The Doctor was waiting for him. 'Where to, Frobisher?' Now that they didn't have to worry about Sha'ol and Karthakh, there was no need for a random jump.

'Nowhere special, Doc.'

'Nowhere special?' The Doctor smiled slyly. 'I think I recall the coordinates-for there.'

Watch out for Doctor Who on Video!

The following exciting adventures are currently available from BBC Worldwide:

THE LEISURE HIVE starring Tom Baker THE AWAKENING/FRONTIOS starring Peter Davison THE WAR MACHINES starring William Hartnell THE HAPPINESS PATROL starring Sylvester McCoy THE E-SPACE TRILOGY starring Tom Baker TIMELASH starring Colin Baker BATTLEFIELD starring Sylvester McCoy THE MIND OF EVIL starring Jon Pertwee

Coming soon...

Horror of Fang Rock starring Tom Baker Planet of Fire starring Peter Davison The Ark starring William Hartnell The IceWarriors starring Patrick Troughton