He wasn't coming back at least, not immediately, that much was apparent. Ace was tempted to try every control on the machine, but she somehow doubted that would help. She was still trying to decide what would help when Fortalexa's voice almost made her jump.

'What are you doing here?' His voice was angry, his eyes sharp.

'Sorry,' said Ace despite herself. She was annoyed she had let him get so close without hearing his approach. She must have been very deep in thought, although she had to admit he did move very quietly. She watched as he crossed the room towards her, his feet barely seeming to touch the floor.

'You haven't been fiddling, have you?'

'I haven't touched anything,' Ace snapped back. 'I just came to see how you were getting on. In case you needed any help.'

'Thank you, but I have everything I need.' Fortalexa began to tap out a complicated sequence on the machine's keypad. He seemed to have forgotten Ace.

'And how's it going?'

'Fine.' He continued without looking up.

'So we'll actually get a performance of this play tomorrow, will we?'

Fortalexa's head snapped up and he fixed Ace in a steady stare: The performance will take place as planned. Everything is going according to plan. Exactly according to plan.'

'Okay, okay keep your hair on.' Ace backed away worried by the intensity of his response. 'I'll leave you to it, all right?'

Fortalexa watched her to the door, then his attention flicked back to the machine, almost as if a switch had been thrown in his mind.

Ace frowned and bit lightly at the inside of her cheek. 'I say,' she called over experimentally, 'my dog has no nose.'

'I am sorry to hear that,' Fortalexa replied without shifting his attention. 'If you will excuse me, I am rather busy.'

'Sure,' said Ace. 'Sure you are.' And she left him to it.

The honour was about the highest he could ever had wished for, and Klasvik hated every second of it. If he could have left, he would have done. As it was he tried to keep his face from betraying his feelings and his mouth from doing anything other than eat the food. Fortunately they each had a set of dishes, so he need not ask for anything to be pa.s.sed.

Although its corners were hidden, receding into the gloom, the room was large, rectangular and featureless. So was the table where the main light was focused. It was obviously intended to seat far more than four people. There were more than four people in the room, of course the unending stream of waiters, Marlock's bodyguards and the alert men standing behind the Exec's chair, hands permanently on the b.u.t.ts of their disruptors, eyes forever glancing round the room.

Klasvik sat at the middle of one of the long sides of the table, so he would have had to shout to make himself heard by the Exec or Marlock, who sat at opposite ends. Marlock had no trouble making his comments heard throughout the room effortless shouting was an art that Marlock seemed to have perfected long ago.

Lannic had been sitting opposite Klasvik, but she had slowly shuffled her chair closer and closer to the Exec during the meal, until now she sat almost at his right hand. Klasvik had tried not to show his disgust at these manoeuvrings, while Marlock had all but leered down the table at Lannic.

Klasvik had to admit to himself that Lannic was an attractive woman. Especially since she had changed out of her coverall. Klasvik was more than conscious that he was still wearing his. He wondered where Lannic had found her new clothes n.o.body had offered him any. He thought he was lucky to have found a shower.

Lannic was radiant. She was wearing a simple knee*length dress, sleeveless and with no flourishes or other adornment. The dress was a colour which seemed to alternate between black and silver depending on where the light caught it. The effect was to create artificial shadows at every contour and so emphasize the shape of the curves in Lannic's body. Klasvik might have been quite smitten, had he not been feeling so nauseated.

The effect on the others was easy to read. Marlock was amused by the whole thing, but at the same time could hardly keep from s...o...b..ring; the male guards and waiters were having trouble keeping a straight face when Lannic stretched or crossed her legs (both of which she did frequently). The Exec was head over heels in l.u.s.t..

Klasvik was not sure what made him feel most sick, the way the Exec ate with his mouth open, dripping food and drink in equal quant.i.ties back on to the table, or Lannic obvious fawning and flirting. He concentrated on his piksya.s.si, trying to tease strands of it from the uvinza sauce.

He tried not to look up as Lannic laughed loudly at yet another inane comment from the Exec as he questioned her about the expedition and Menaxus. He could imagine her leaning back, letting her hair hang to one side as she c.o.c.ked her head and brought up a stockinged knee clasped between her folded hands. He could see the Exec from the corner of his eye as the greasy young idiot leaned obviously forward for a better glimpse of leg.

Klasvik looked away in disgust, and found Marlock watching him. The Manact had a wide grin across his face. He nodded down the table towards the Exec and Lannic raising an eyebrow as he tried to draw Klasvik into scene. Klasvik looked down at his food, embarra.s.sed and heard Marlock's laughter join with Lannic's and Exec's.

The delta dart was certainly nippy. But even so, it would be another few hours before Bernice had to worry about the defence shields and sat*strikers positioned round Heletia. For the moment she had only to worry about avoiding units which might have strayed from a war which was being prosecuted pa.r.s.ecs away, but closing ever nearer. The Heletians would make their consolidation stand at Nichoria by all accounts. And by those same accounts, It would be a b.l.o.o.d.y affair drawn out over years.

She checked the charts again, looking for a more direct route which did not involve too much risk. But she knew there wasn't one.

All the corridors and all the rooms in the place looked much the same. Grey, drab, concrete, boring. Only the variety of posters framed in silver on the walls broke the monotony. Ace was just about to give up finding anything of interest and return to her quarters to wait for the Doctor to reappear when a short fat man bustled down the corridor towards her. He seemed familiar. Ace stepped aside to allow him plenty of room, but the man still managed to brush against her.

'Second door on the left ahead of you,' he whisper as his face pa.s.sed close to Ace's shoulder. 'I'll be there soon.'

Ace tried to give no indication that she had heard. The man obviously did not wish anyone to know he had spoken to her. Equally, Ace was not at all sure she wanted anyone knowing that she was being offered a.s.signations with a short, fat, bald man who she hoped was too old to be her father.

Nevertheless when she reached the second door on the left, she opened it and went through. She hoped it looked natural as if she had been wandering aimlessly down the corridor with the single intention of entering this room.

Except that it seemed to be the Heletian equivalent of a broom cupboard. The light had come on automatically as she entered, and she wondered how the fat man would find room to fit in with her. She soon found out.

'Thank you,' the fat man breathed heavily as he squeezed himself into the small room beside Ace.

'I haven't done anything yet,' Ace told him, wishing she had not included the 'yet'.

'You are here. That is enough.' Even within the confines of the room, he was glancing nervously around.

'Wait a minute.' Ace realized where she had seen him before. 'You're the commissionaire of wherever it is, aren't you?'

'Arbela, yes.' He glanced round again, licking his dry lips and swallowing. 'I really wanted to talk to your friend the Doctor he intervened with the Exec to help my people.'

'Yeah, he does that sort of thing. But I'm afraid he's, er, unavailable right now.'

The commissionaire nodded as if he quite understood, though Ace was certain he didn't. 'Never mind. You can take a message to him.'

'Now wait a minute, I'm not his secretary or anything.'

'Please please, we want him, both of you in fact, to join us.'

'Doing what?' asked Ace, but she thought she could guess.

'Not all of us are in favour of prolonging the war. Or even of having a war at all. If only we can speak to the Exec, make him see reason, we can sue for peace.' His eyes were large and watery as he looked up at Ace.

'He didn't look the peaceful type.'

'He's only a boy. He was seven when this war started. Marlock is the real power.'

Ace laughed. 'That much should be obvious even to a seven*year*old.'

'But not to the Exec. If we can get to him, talk him, without Marlock being there better still if we can have Marlock sent away somewhere on a fool's errand then maybe we can reason with the boy.'

'And you want the Doctor to help?'

The commissionaire nodded.

'Sorry,' said Ace. 'We're strictly neutral. Non*intervention is the Doctor's middle name.' She considered for a moment. 'Might be his only name,' she added.

The commissionaire shook his head sadly. 'I am sorry I had hoped that the Doctor was a man who understood what was happening here knew something of the evil and how to fight it.'

'War is h.e.l.l.' She tried to keep a straight face as she said it.

'No.' He shook his head again. His eyes were firmly fixed on Ace now, no longer darting furtively in search of hidden cameras and microphones. 'No, not just the war. The occupations, the terror, the oppression, the camps.' He struggled to turn back to face the door. 'I am sorry you will not help. But I had to ask. Any hope for us has to be explored.'

'Heh, look if it's serious ' Ace was starting to think maybe they should consider the situation. She was not sure quite what he was talking about, but he was certainly sincere. 'I'll talk to the Doctor, tell him what you said.'

The commissionaire's face broke into a smile and he grabbed her hand and shook it as violently as the s.p.a.ce allowed. 'Thank you.' He calmed down at last and let go of her hand. 'Thank you,' he said again.

'Yeah, right. But no promises. We'll just see what's going on, okay?'

'Then go to Marlock's office in the war room. If your stomach is up to it.' He described briefly where it was located, then opened the door and stepped nervously into the corridor. 'Good luck, and thank you,' he called back to Ace, then set off down the corridor, head swaying slightly as he bustled about his business.

'Okay, doctor,' said Ace to the empty room. What the h.e.l.l have you got us into now?'

The Doctor had completely lost track of the route he had taken. He had no idea how to get back to Hamlet Hamlet, or even if he needed to in order to escape from this world. He was more concerned at the moment with finding the mysterious character who had been watching him on the croquet lawn. He had seen the man a couple of times amidst the confusion of the ending of A Splash of Red A Splash of Red, and ducking out of The Dumb Waiter The Dumb Waiter.

As he chased through the seemingly never*ending series of stages, each ab.u.t.ted to the next, the Doctor reflected that Pinter was an interesting playwright to find under these circ.u.mstances: how could he tell if the characters were frozen by the machine or by a scripted pause? But compared to some of the other thoughts whirling round in the Doctor's head, this puzzle was not a priority.

A rather more worrying thought occurred to the Doctor as he caught a glimpse of the man hurrying past Faustus. He could have eluded the Doctor several times in the drawing room right at the start of the chase, the Doctor had completely lost him until he stuck his head round the door, saw the Doctor, and ran off. Maybe, considered the Doctor as he waved cheerily to Sergeant Musgrave, he was himself being led a dance.

He skidded to a halt. The room next to the northern mining town was more familiar than most. It was the great hall of a castle. The rough stone sprayed with heat*resistant sealant, the plastic flooring and the blast*proof doors all suggested a variation on Scott Bailey's designs. Bailey had started with hydrogen plants and moved on to fortresses, and the Doctor was sure that this was a representation one of those fortresses the fortress of Limlough. He knew of only one play set in such a room, and the positions of the six characters, seated round the banqueting table confirmed this. He was on the main set for The Good Soldiers The Good Soldiers.

Judging from the fact that the characters were still at the table, and that the makeshift stage required for the play within a play had not yet been constructed, he was at the very beginning. The performance had not yet started.

The Doctor took a tour round the table, tapping each of the motionless men on the shoulder as he pa.s.sed. 'Remek, Spidler.'

He murmured their names as if they were old friends and in a way they were.

'Prator, Freppon, Teel.'

They looked almost exactly as he had imagined. He had Osterling's detailed stage direction to thank for that they left no room for interpretation. The Doctor smiled: they ad been extremely boring to transcribe from Osterling's dictation. But the creeping restioparothis had taken the playwright's ability to hold a stylus or tap on a keypad. And they neither of them trusted a computer to get the transcription correct. Besides, it was Art Art, and they had both considered that that the province of the sentient rather than the machine. the province of the sentient rather than the machine.

The Doctor reached the head of the table and clapped the final figure on the shoulder. 'Jorvik,' he whispered to the cloaked man. 'The only one who held true to his beliefs. The only "good soldier" here. Philosopher, traitor and murderer.'

He turned away at last. There were two doors out of the room, excluding the one he had just come through. He went immediately for the door stage left, the door through which the players would later arrive to enact Jorvik's cruel play within a play.

Outside the door was a void. Blackness, like the Doctor and Ace had seen beyond the limits of Hamlet Hamlet. And as far as the Doctor could see, away into the darkness, stretched the line of players waiting to come on stage.

They were all cloaked in purple, their faces partly obscured by heavy hoods. From beneath the hoods glowed the red of their electronic eyes, throwing shadows down the reflective metal of their skull*like faces and the exposed sections of exoskeleton which showed from beneath the cloaks.

That the players were robots did not surprise the Doctor. That was totally in keeping with the play. But while Osterling had been uncharacteristically remiss in not explicitly stating how many robots there were, it was generally a.s.sumed that there were at most a dozen. Five players would fit with Jorvik's description of the mime play they were to perform. Five players would mirror the characters whose deaths they would portray. Add to that another six or seven to burst in at the climax of the play, and twelve was more than ample.

But here there were hundreds. And the Doctor could think of only one reason to swell their ranks.

There was a movement in the shadows beside the Doctor. An area of the dark void shimmered within the overall ma.s.s. The old man he had been chasing through the worlds of the machine stepped from the shadows and stood beside the Doctor. And as they surveyed the ranks of mechanical troops, the Doctor at last believed he knew what had happened on Menaxus.

The look of disdain on Klasvik's face was almost completely undisguised. Marlock smiled to himself at the old man's envious disgust as Lannic curtsied to the Exec, her hand outstretched. The Exec took it and wiped a greasy kiss over her knuckles. Klasvik turned away.

'Until tomorrow, then.' The Exec barely acknowledged either Klasvik or Marlock when he spoke.

'Until tomorrow,' echoed Lannic in a voice more husky than usual.

The Exec's bodyguards followed him from the room, close on his heel. Lannic followed them. Marlock inclined his head slightly as she pa.s.sed him, but she seemed not to notice.

Klasvik made to follow, but Marlock held up a hand. 'Wait. A word, if I may, Leontium Klasvik.'

'Marlock.'

'My t.i.tle is Manact.' Marlock's voice was like a thunderclap.

Klasvik took a step backwards. 'Er, yes Manact. My apologies. I did not intend any, er, any disrespect.'

'And none is taken.' Manact opened his arms to show how forgiving he was. Then he made a point of turning to look at the door through which the others have just left. You know,' he said without looking back. 'I think we shall be seeing a great deal more of Camarina Lannic.' Suddenly he spun round, his finger pointing at Klasvik's head. 'What do you say to that?' he demanded.

Klasvik bl.u.s.tered for a moment. 'The Exec chooses his friendly wisely,' he eventually managed to say.

Marlock threw his head back and let out a single snort of laughter. 'He does not.'

Klasvik looked puzzled. Marlock explained. 'The Exec is an adolescent idiot who couldn't choose where to sit down if we didn't give him a special chair. You saw how that Doctor made a fool of him earlier today. It is a constant struggle for all of us who serve him so loyally to how shall I put it? to emphasize the better parts of his character and abilities.'

Klasvik gulped. 'Yours must be a very special talent,' he hazarded.

Marlock glared at him. 'It is. Now Lannic.' He strode up to Klasvik and stood in front of him. Marlock's guards kept close behind. 'You were as revolted as I was by the display this evening. But you show too much of your feelings. Suppress tem.'

'Yes, Manact.'

'I do not know what your colleague is doing, any more than I see you do. I doubt very much if she is as taken with our Exec as she would like us, and him, to believe. But whatever power*play she thinks she is making. I wish her to continue.'

'To continue?'

Madock snorted again. 'Yes, to continue. She will not gain any real power through a liaison with the Exec, but while he is occupied, shall we say? Yes, while he is occupied, I can concentrate more of my energy and time on matters more important than acting as nursemaid.'

Klasvik nodded nervously, and Madock went to the door. Without turning back he said to Klasvik, 'You will ensure that the relationship between the Exec and Camarina Lannic is not... interrupted.'

'Of course, Manact.'