'Oi! Cut that out!'

'For G.o.d's sake, Ace!' he sighed. 'From a distance, we'll look more like we have the Doctor with us if we do this.' She gave him a look. He shrugged. 'Fine, do it your way. Just remember that I'm the one that's been in the army, not you.'

'Yeah well maybe you should go back there, soldier boy.'

Michael didn't reply, and Ace felt a bit cheap for throwing that one back at him. She took his arm and laid it over her shoulder and the two of them set off in silence.

It was mid-afternoon and, through the thin canopy of spring leaves, the sun shone brightly if none too warmly. Michael kept checking behind them, altering their course or speed when they felt that their pursuers were losing the scent. At least, thought Ace with some relief, they've not stopped to look for the Doctor.

She was getting used to Michael's arm around her shoulder, and although she'd never have admitted it, it was rather comforting but she wished she'd had the sense to do it the other way round, with him taking some of her weight. Her knee was still throbbing.

Neither of them spoke very much, other than to urge each other left or right, or to point out obstacles or landmarks they could use later to retrace their steps back to the Doctor. On the couple of occasions the Doctor's name was mentioned, Ace felt Michael tense up, but she really didn't want to start a counselling session. She glanced at her watch: they'd been running for over half an hour. Ahead, Ace could see the main road. A red car flashed past, flickering behind the trees. She wasn't sure what they were going to do when they got there. Behind them, the sounds of snapping twigs and crunching footsteps told them that they were still being chased. It seemed odd, she thought, that she'd be more worried if they weren't weren't being followed. being followed.

'Nearly there,' Michael said.

'And then what?'

'I reckon we should cross the road and head into the wood on the other side and then hide. With a bit of luck, they'll think we've managed to get farther down the road than they expected or that we've hitched a lift. Hopefully they'll call the chase off and head back to Graystairs.'

Ace nodded, and the two of them resumed their three-legged-race-style lumber through the wood until they climbed the shallow bank up onto the road. In seconds they were across to the other side, scrambling back down into the shelter of the trees, Ace's rucksack bouncing around on her back. Michael spotted a dip in the ground under a fallen tree, and the two of them slipped into it.

'Now we play the waiting game,' Michael said.

After a few moments' silence, Ace turned to him. 'I'm bored with the waiting game can't we play Battling Tops instead?'

From where they were hidden, the slope of the bank not only hid them from the road, but prevented them from seeing their pursuers. They heard them crash through the last bit of the wood on the other side of the road and then there was silence. A muttered, indecipherable exchange of voices. And then more silence.

'Sounds like they're checking out the road,' Michael whispered, his body pressed up against hers in the loamy confines of the hollow. He brushed a bit of earth from her face and then looked away, suddenly embarra.s.sed.

'Don't get any ideas,' she warned in a low voice.

They fell back into their awkward truce-silence for ten minutes. Michael broke it. 'Who was that ugly little bloke back at Graystairs? The one who said that you should be dead. What did he mean?'

'That,' Ace said, 'was Sooal the bloke that runs the place.

He tried to kill me earlier. Then he sent his henchwoman after me to finish the job.'

'And what happened to her?'

Ace grinned. 'Sorry can't tell you. If I did, I'd have to kill you.' She grinned again at Michael's expression and lowered her voice to a whisper. 'This is between you and me, right? But I've just spent about 24 hours in the Orkneys, getting cold, wet and dodging bullets well, energy beams, anyway.'

'So who was it that I was talking to last night? Your evil twin?'

'You don't get it, do you?' she said, revelling rather cruelly in his confusion. 'The Doctor's not the only one who can time travel, you know. Anyway,' she said hastily, realising that the thawing atmosphere between the two of them was also thawing her tongue. 'Let's drop it the Doctor'd have my head on a stick if I told you any more.'

Michael grunted, clearly unsure whether to take her seriously, and they resumed their silence. Finally and about half an hour after they'd burrowed under the tree he took a deep breath and began to slide out. 'Come on. They'll have gone by now probably into the village.'

Extricating themselves from the rotting tree, they brushed themselves down, all the time keeping their eyes open for any sign of their attackers. The road above the bank seemed deserted. Michael told Ace to stay where she was whilst he checked out the road. A couple of hours ago, Ace would have argued with him; but she was getting tired and just a bit fed up with all of this. She wanted to get back to the Doctor as soon as possible, get him somewhere safe, and get this whole b.l.o.o.d.y thing over with.

Michael poked his head through the bushes at the side of the road and beckoned her, giving her a hand up the bank.

Cautiously, they stepped out into the road. They were alone.

Ace turned to Michael with a grin which, to her great surprise, was returned. He wasn't developing a crush on her, was he?

Despite the growing suspicion that Ace was developing a crush on him, Michael couldn't bring himself to dump her. Not yet.

Was he growing soft? Considering how he felt about the Doctor, why the h.e.l.l was he putting himself on the line trying to rescue him? He suddenly wished that it was Claire there with him, instead of Ace, and immediately felt bad about it.

'Which way?' asked Ace in a whisper.

He looked around. His years in UNIT hadn't been completely wasted, he thought wryly as he recognised the snapped branches, the odd little dumps of bushes and the dips and rises in the ground that he'd made a mental note of on their way out of the wood. The journey back to the hut took only half the time it had taken them to get away, and there was no sign of their followers, which was a relief. They saw the hut and Ace raced on ahead.

'He's gone!' Ace shouted, as she reached the hut and opened the door. Michael instinctively glanced round to see if anyone had heard. He jogged the last few paces.

Ace was right the hut was empty.

Chapter Thirteen.

They searched the area in widening circles for over half an hour before Ace, red-faced and fuming, finally conceded the Doctor's disappearance. Michael said nothing, not sure whether she was closer to tears or to a shouting fit.

'I knew we shouldn't have left him,' she glowered. Michael didn't point out that it was her idea. 'They must have found him.

He wouldn't have gone wandering off like this on his own.'

She looked at him, as if expecting an answer. All he could do was shrug. 'Maybe he's gone into the village.'

'Or back to Graystairs,' said Ace.

'Tell you what you check out the village, and I'll check Graystairs.'

There was a pause.

'What about the bloodhounds back there?'

'I don't reckon they'll try anything, as long as they don't catch me before I get back there not with all those witnesses around. Besides, I need to find Mum and Gran. Even if I am just a soldier boy, I reckon I can take care of myself.'

Ace nodded, a slightly guilty look on her face: Michael reckoned that she'd only just realised that she wasn't the only one with friends and family to think about. She looked at her watch. 'It's about quarter to four. Meet up at the pub around five and compare notes.'

Michael nodded. 'Will you be OK?' he asked, gesturing at her knee, as Ace gave one last look at the hut and set off. She hitched up her rucksack. 'Yeah,' she said, unconvincingly.

'Course I will. I'm Ace, aren't I?'

Joyce woke with a start in Norma's room. She'd been dreaming that her mother had been chasing her, screaming, accusing her of desertion in the line of duty. The elderly woman had been dressed in UNIT combat gear, a machine gun in her hand, her hair glowing a harsh white, like burning magnesium. Joyce shook her head and rubbed her eyes, feeling sweaty and grimy.

Rea.s.suringly, Norma was still there, sleeping soundly. She could hear footsteps outside in the hallway and then the door opened. Michael's head appeared around it, cautiously. She gave him a bleary, relieved smile. He slipped inside and closed the door behind him.

'Still here?' he asked. He looked anxious, edgy. She saw him glance around the room, noticing the broken gla.s.s on the dressing table and the stains on the floor where Mum's toiletries had spilled when she'd swept them aside. 'What happened?'

Where did she begin? 'Mum had a funny turn again no, she's fine now. Honest.'

Michael stood over his gran, shaking his head slowly. 'She can't stay here,' he said simply. 'You know that. I told you back at the hotel. I thought we'd agreed...'

'If we take her away now, what chance does she stand?' Her own voice had taken on a wheedling tone that she hated. She took a breath. 'She's getting better, Michael.'

He didn't answer.

'What's happened to you, anyway? I thought you were just going round to the back door. You've been gone ' she glanced at the silver fobwatch on the bedside table, ' hours.'

Michael gave a little laugh. 'Oh, not much really. Ace and me have been shot at, the Doctor's gone missing, and I had to climb on the kitchen roof and in through a window to avoid getting caught.'

'Caught? And what do you mean, the Doctor's gone missing?'

'Ace rescued him from that s.p.a.ceship you told me about, but his head's all screwed up never mind that Ace swears he's changed his appearance. Someone followed us into the woods when we tried to get him away and took a few potshots at us. So we hid him, intending to go back and when we did, he'd gone.'

Norma stirred in her sleep, pulling the covers up around her.

'How is she?' asked Michael.

'She seems fine. Doctor Menzies stuck his head in earlier to say that her results were looking good.'

'Well, that's something. Did you ask him about what's going on around here?'

Joyce looked over at her mother. She couldn't hold Michael's gaze. 'No.'

'What? Gran's in this madhouse and you didn't even think to ' 'Ssh!' Joyce stood up and took Michael out into the corridor, dosing the door behind her gently. 'Your gran's in this madhouse, as you call it, because she's ill. And this might be her only chance to get better. D'you want to ruin all that?'

'I don't believe this!' Michael stared at her disbelievingly.

'Ace and me are getting shot at, Ace says there's a s.p.a.ceship where people get their brains wired up to a computer, and you want Gran to stay stay here?' here?'

Joyce glared at him and grabbed his arms. 'Family might not count much for you, Michael; but she's the only grandma you've got. You remember what she was like. D'you want to see her go back to that? Do you?'

Michael couldn't answer. Joyce let go of him.

'I know this whole place is screwed up,' she added, more gently this time, 'but what can we do? Just let them treat Gran, please, and then... then we can sort out what to do.'

The Doctor. That's what he called himself. Just the Doctor.

Eddie remembered the teashop, remembered the way he'd run, scared of what this Doctor was making him think, making him feel.

Just the name brought up the hairs of the back of his neck: doctors had done things to him; doctors were the ones who messed about with your head, put bad thoughts in there, evil thoughts. He remembered the treatment room, being given pills, injections. He remembered something small and metallic being placed on his skin, just in front of his ear. And then it all went dark, fuzzy.

Eddie needed to know more about this man. Something in their curtailed conversation had made him wonder if this doctor could help him.

So now the two of them sat in the shady chill of the boathouse down by the loch, well away from both the woods and from Graystairs. The Doctor just stared blankly ahead, out over the still water, whilst Eddie pulled his cardigan around himself and shivered. He'd lost track of how long he'd been away from the house: at least two days, he guessed. He'd heard the staff blundering through the bushes on a couple of occasions, calling out his name, but he'd stayed low and still. Did they really expect him to reply? To hold his hands up and be taken back to that place? He'd left not knowing where he was going or what he was going to do, and the cold nights in the forest hadn't supplied him with any new ideas. He'd gone into the teashop, looking for something to eat. But the Doctor's arrival had spoiled that. Maybe the Doctor would know what to do now.

'They put things in my head,' Eddie said, trying to keep his voice from cracking.

'Things? What things?' The Doctor's voice was still wobbly, his gaze unfocussed and inclined to slide sideways.

'Bad things.' Eddie tried not to think about the bad things.

'Tell me... more.'

Eddie shook his head. 'I don't want to talk about them.' His voice came out whining and pathetic, and he felt ashamed, inadequate. 'When we met at the teashop,' he said after a pause, 'you talked about being human.'

'Did I?' The Doctor seemed genuinely surprised. No wonder, Eddie thought, not if they'd done to the Doctor even half of what they'd done to him. 'And why did I do that, I wonder?' He winced as if even his own voice was too loud.

Eddie didn't know the answer and said so. The Doctor nodded sagely, although Eddie got the impression that he was just playing for time, giving him chance to root around in his own memories, put things in some sort of order. Eventually, when he wondered if the Doctor had drifted out of the conversation altogether, Eddie grabbed his hand.

'These thoughts,' he said. 'These things, here ' he tapped the side of his head with his other hand, ' they're not, you know, not right right, are they?'

'Not human? Is that what you mean?'

It sounded silly put into words like that. Not human Not human. Is that what they were doing? Turning him into something not human not human?

The Doctor's gaze had drifted away again, his eyes glazing over before closing. Slowly, his chin dipped towards his chest. Eddie sat back. Let him sleep, he thought. He needed it.

Whereas before the pub had possessed a certain charm and warmth, now it was just miserable and dead. Ace sat in a corner and nursed a half of bitter. With the Doctor's disappearance, the act of ordering a pint seemed to have lost the little rebellious thrill that it had held earlier. Claire kept throwing her solicitous glances from the other side of the bar; all Ace could do was to smile back, tight lipped. She checked her watch again. Michael should be here any moment. She tried to work out where the Doctor could have wandered off to, but in his half-baked state he could be almost anywhere. Even, she realised coldly, back at Graystairs. Being subjected to more of Sooal's experiments.

A wintry draught heralded the arrival of two blokes, both of whom she'd seen around the village and the pub: a fair-haired, ruddy-cheeked rural type who gave her a nod as he came in called Douglas, she seemed to recall; and a swarthy, dark-haired chap with a fine, livid scar along his right jaw. He rubbed his hands vigorously as he and his friend went to the bar.

Sipping halfheartedly at her drink, she wondered whether Michael, too, had fallen into Sooal's clutches. Maybe he was down in the s.p.a.ceship as well, wired up to the machine alongside the Doctor, having his mind turned inside out. She shook her head; she was growing maudlin. After what she'd seen over the past couple of days, maybe she had good reason to. With a sigh, she heaved herself out of her seat and crossed to the bar.

'No sign?' asked Claire as Douglas and Scar-face installed themselves in a far corner and began a game of dominoes. Ace shook her head. 'Maybe he's gone looking for this Joyce woman.'

'Maybe.' Ace wondered whether she should tell Claire about what was going on up at the house.

'Maybe he's actually found her.'

'Could be.'

Claire leaned across the bar. 'They're very good, you know,'

she said. 'Up at Graystairs. They've worked miracles with some people.'

Ace realised that Claire had a.s.sumed that Ace's 'grandfather'