Their eyes bulge as the mist threatens to overwhelm them.

Together in this final stranglehold, unable to harm each other further, they sink down until only their heads are left, glaring at each other in absolute hatred.

Hopkins feels the warm stuff rise up over his chin and the pull from below. His last view is of Neville's eyes, glaring.

'VALDEMAR!' shrieks the sorcerer. Then neither man can see anything.

Romana's struggles subside with the final descent of Neville and Hopkins. Perhaps, and the Doctor is not going to be drawn on this, perhaps it really is finished.

Now, how is he going to return his companion to normal?

Pelham topples over. Blood loss, it was only going to be a matter of time. Another one who needs his help.

All of a sudden, he realises he is the last one. He raises his hands from Romana. She has retreated into herself, whether because of his words or not he does not know. The Doctor stands.

Interesting how quiet this cavern can be when it wants to.

He takes a deep breath of the hot salty air, and wonders what happened to Neville and Hopkins. The last he saw of them they were banging heads on the molten slab of that disa.s.sembling gateway.

Whatever process it was going through seems to have stopped.

Of course, with the unfortunate death of Huvan, the power to open the gateway would have ceased as well.

He looks down at the boy's corpse. If there could have been another way, if he had had the opportunity, he is certain he could have resolved all this in a less violent manner. Despite Huvan's age, Neville had ensured he remained a child. He really hadn't been given the opportunity to grow up.

Huvan smiles. The Doctor goes cold.

As he watches, the boy raises his arms over the small wound in his chest. Huvan breathes and the bullet pops out into his waiting fingers. 'Still think you can convince me, Doctor?' he says brightly.

As the boy floats up and rights himself, the Doctor feels intensely weary. This isn't over. It's never over.

'What do you want, Huvan?' he asks, readying himself.

The boy considers for a moment. It is intensely disconcerting to see that his feet are approximately fifteen centimetres from the ground. What has he become?

'I want Romana. That's all I ever wanted.'

The Doctor glances at his supine companion. 'I'm sorry,' he says. 'But I can't allow it.'

'Can't allow it?'

'You will not control the higher dimensions, Huvan. It's not a place; it's the primal stuff of the universe. You will not be able to control it through force of will. Everything that is you will be lost. And Romana too.'

'She wanted to come with me, she wanted me to release the higher dimensions. You know that.'

'Ah, but you could say she wasn't herself. She must give herself willingly. I will not allow you to force her.' Something explodes inside his head. He clutches his temple and sinks to his knees.

'A fraction of the pain I can inflict, Doctor. I don't need your permission.'

The agony leaves him. Its intensity was phenomenal and total. The Doctor knows he won't survive another attack. He's going to have to be good. Very good.

'You still have a chance, Huvan,' he says. 'You possess the power to do it.'

'Do what?' The ghost of a smile still plays over the boy's pale lips. He looks altered; it's not the black shadows of the higher dimensions, but a self-induced improvement in his appearance. It is as if Huvan has given himself a charisma injection. The Doctor muses that it was true he needed one.

Still, it might be enough to work on his vanity.

'To live the life of a normal human being.'

'Why should I want to do that? I, who possess the power of an entire universe.'

'Because you would still be alone. Because there would be no one your equal, and believe me, you will never be happy until you find that. Otherwise, you're just another Paul Neville.'

'Don't mention that name. I made me what I am. Not him, I!' Around the cavern, something like thunder rumbles.

'Anyway, what would be so wrong? I wish only to enter the gateway.'

The Doctor shakes his head. 'No, Huvan. I can't allow you to do this.'

A flare of anger. The boy could kill him any minute.

Instead, however, the Doctor is surprised to see him smile.

'How about this?' Huvan says, a cold, humourless joke. 'I won't release the higher dimensions, I shall just give myself up to them. Your reality will be safe. All I want is Romana to join with me, so we may become one.'

'And if I refuse?'

'No, Doctor. There is no refusal. Do this or I open the gateway and take her with me anyway. Only then, you lose everything. How about that? What do you say?'

The smile is mocking now, insidious.

When the Doctor replies, he is unhesitant. 'I will not make that decision, Huvan,' he says. 'You know it is beyond my power.'

'But the universe depends on your answer, Doctor.'

'I will not answer. I cannot be held responsible for the fate of another.'

'Then you have condemned your whole universe.

Everything you know, s.p.a.ce, even time itself will alter.'

The creaking, the giant, booming, echoing process of release starts up again. Only this time, great sheets of something like thick black rain blast upwards from the gateway. Strands like the black fibres around Romana's eyes.

The higher dimensions revealing themselves. There is nothing emerging, the Doctor knows that. It is the reality around him that is changing; the particle accelerator initiating a process for which there is no reversal.

'Huvan!' he bellows. He must make the boy change his mind. There is no choice. Before the process begins to affect him. 'Huvan, listen.'

The boy is humming to himself, a sound that is eerily similar to the deafening waves of energy spilling out from the gateway. Soon, he will be beyond listening.

'Why can't you allow Romana to make the decision for herself, of her own free will?'

Nothing, no change. 'You're afraid, aren't you? You're afraid that without your influence or the higher dimensions, she'll say no. And then, for all this so-called power of yours, you will still just be... a spoilt teenager who couldn't get his own way. Who failed to mature. Is that what you want? Is that all you want? You would destroy all life for that?'

The boy's smile disappears. The Doctor has got through.

Although, judging by the gaze Huvan now turns on him, whether that particular achievement could be called a success is debatable.

'You dare?' Huvan snarls.

'Yes, I dare,' the Doctor replies angrily. Might as well, nothing left to lose. 'Of course I dare! You're nothing but a frustrated little brat who didn't get his own way. Too scared to even try. A coward. Ask Romana. Go on. Ask!'

Huvan's mouth opens and closes and for a moment the Doctor thinks he has won. Certainly, and let's not get overconfident, he has knocked Huvan back on his heels, given himself some time to think.

'No, Doctor. Nice try.'

'Wait...'

'Too late, Doctor. You had your chance.'

Still unconscious, Romana rises from the ground. 'We will be one,' Huvan cries. 'If I need maturity, she can give it to me. My bride. As it was meant to be.'

'No!'

The Doctor makes a move but a force harder than a brick wall pushes him over, sending him sliding along the shifting ground.

Huvan and the insensible Romana float towards the solid rain. The noise is tremendous. The Doctor looks up. He cannot believe he has failed. It can't be true. 'Romana!' he yells, 'You can fight him! Romana!'

'Goodbye, Doctor,' laughs Huvan as the two of them disappear into the wall of solid energy.

Chapter Fifteen.

And so it came to pa.s.s that, after all, Valdemar was released to destroy the universe. OK, he doesn't have horns and a tail, and the universe will be altered rather than destroyed, but who's going to split hairs?

And the really nice thing, the real dandy thing, is that you, Miranda Pelham, are the cause of it. How's about, if you can concentrate with all that blood spilling out and your arm being on fire, how's about going back in time, back to Proxima 2, and instead of following that black procession you just toddle off to some bar and get pleasantly drunk. Yeah, that's a good idea. Let's do that instead.

Which would mean that this... this slow, painful death on the edge of the gateway is nothing but a bad dream, too much cheese before bedtime.

The noise and the expanding cloud of whatever it is issuing up from the ground, remind her that if this is a dream, it's time to wake up.

She is going to die. Nothing can stop that now. As the universe around her changes, as the huge walls, the air itself, become somehow thinner, transparent, she understands that she too will change. Something is emerging from reality, or rather through reality. Miranda Pelham is left to face the raw stuff of life. I don't want to die; I never want to die. Please Doctor, stop it.

She forces her eyes to open, to get one last look at the man she wants to save her. He is kneeling by her side, staring at the hole in the floor, perhaps grinding one final possible solution, some last brilliant idea, through his mind. He has to come up with it; he's going to live forever.

But the Doctor looks old now, very old. The lines on his face have deepened, that funny scar on his lip puckered with weariness. 'Romana,' he says.

Hope dies inside Miranda Pelham. 'Doctor,' she croaks. 'It's all over, isn't it?'

He snaps his head round to her. 'Never,' he says softly.

She lies back and realises her mind is feeding her images of the past, of her life. The old cliche about the flashing-before-your-eyes thing? Or the unravelling effects of the higher dimensions?

She sees the dullness of childhood, the discovery of the myths, writing the book, her time with Neville. The legacy of the Old Ones, the discovery of the palace that had been lying around for some idiot, her, to find it again. Perhaps there is a clue in this, something to help them. Right, unfortunately this blacking out and pain and dizziness don't exactly help matters.

A million years ago, the Old Ones broke a hole in the higher dimensions and flooded the universe. They stopped it, they staunched the flow, why can't she?

'How did they do it?' she asks.

'Do what?' he replies, distracted.

'How did the Old Ones stop Valdemar?'

'How am I supposed to know?' he barks, then immediately cuts himself off. In all this turmoil, this change, he still finds time to smile his smile. 'Yes, you're right. They did find a way, and so must I.'

How? How? Now Huvan and Romana have gone through the gateway, what could she and the Doctor possibly do?

A thought, perhaps the the thought, enters her mind. 'Doctor?' thought, enters her mind. 'Doctor?'

she asks.

'Yes?'

'Why did Huvan have to go through the gateway? I mean, I'm probably being stupid...' She feels something liquid well up in her throat. Christ, not yet, not yet. The Doctor places soothing hands on her head, lifting it up. She coughs out the blood.

'Keep going, Miranda,' he says gently. 'What are you saying?'

If only the noise and the lights and everything would just let her concentrate. It's not dark in here now, it's light, blinding light.

'Miranda!' comes a voice from miles away. She keeps this thread, this final thought going.

'Why didn't he just wait?' she manages. 'If the whole thing is going to change anyway, why didn't he just stay here and wait for it to wash over him? These higher dimensions?'

The gentle grip suddenly tightens. 'Yes,' says the Doctor.

'Why didn't he wait?'

She hacks out a coughing laugh. 'I was asking you.'

'There must be something he needs. Something in there. I don't see... how could there be anything in there? Unless... a point of stability, something artificial.'

The voice is soothing, containing an energy that keeps her going. His words haul her back to the land of the living. Don't let me go, Doctor, she prays. Save me.

'Of course!' He is laughing, and it sounds like silver bells to her damaged mind. 'The Old Ones. Oh, that's cunning, that's ever so cunning.'