Doctor Who

POLARITY

By R A Henderson

Episode I

"Firebird Orbiter to remote, you have fourteen minutes to atmospheric insertion. Lock thrusters and prepare to break orbit on my mark."

Commander Velon checked the thruster lock and set it into phase, charging the fuel tanks for the final burst. "What is our current position, Firebird Orbiter?" he asked into the communicator feed.

"Just inside the inner northern polar region of the planet, remote," replied the captain of the orbiter.

"We are considerably off course," Velon observed. "Lunar gravitational disruption must have increased. What is the nearest land mass?"

"There is a northern polar land mass," said the orbiter captain. "It will be suitable for landfall, but not colonisation. The weather conditions are Scale Fifteen."

Velon logged the information in the ship's computer. "Advised course of action, orbiter?"

"Land and take necessary survival measures, and then await further orders, remote," answered the orbiter captain. "Orbiter will return to base. Disengaging connections now. Good luck, Commander. Over and out."

Commander Velon waited for the computerised signal, the mark, the very last signal that he would ever hear from his own people. The signal came, a loud chime over the communicator wave, and Velon fired the thrusters. The ship started to move out of planetary orbit and move into the stratosphere, aiming for a landfall.

Then an alarm went off.

Velon checked the computer. An immense object, almost the size of his own ship, had just materialised in space, just outside orbit, and was on a collision course with the planet below. It had appeared out of nowhere. It was impossible, but it had happened. Velon switched to internal communications. "Commander Velon to Sub-Commander Liong," he announced. "There is an emergency. Report to the command deck immediately."

Less than a minute later, the door behind the cockpit chairs slid open and Liong marched in. "What is the emergency?" he asked as he sat in the empty chair beside Velon's.

"Another craft is about to enter orbit behind us," said Velon.

"That is not possible," said Liong. "There are no other craft in the vicinity."

"The craft materialised one thousand five hundred and thirty-nine point four kilometres above us eighteen seconds before I called you to the command deck."

"Materialised from where?"

"Unknown. There is no explanation."

Liong checked the computer. Velon was, of course, quite correct. "Are evasive manoeuvres possible at our current position and in our current fuel situation?"

Velon checked the computer. "They are unnecessary," he replied. "The craft's trajectory indicates that it will pass us at an interval of one thousand three hundred and seven point two kilometres in six minutes. If we remain on present course we should avoid collision with the craft and also remain outside the impact radius."

Liong strapped himself down. "Prepared for impact, Commander," he reported.

For the next five minutes, everything was smooth. The ship was shaken almost apart as the other object slipped safely by at six minutes, its unusual gravitational presence starting to pull the remote planetary module in its wake at seven. With a struggle the module broke free at eleven minutes.

At fifteen, the antimatter explosion engulfed the entire planet.

The Doctor sat on the steps of the cathedral and looked down into Senate Square. The square was, of course, empty; no one would be stupid enough to be out at three in the morning on a winter day in Helsinki. Thick snow lay everywhere, piled high on rooftops and pavements, and despite the best efforts of those who came out regularly to clear the way, even encroaching into the roads. This snow was a fresh fall and it was still falling, and the Doctor sat on the steps with it falling on him, alone and silent, waiting. The thick fur coat he'd dredged up from the depths of the TARDIS wardrobe kept in a little of his ambient body temperature in a place where it might be of help, but in the current atmosphere he could really have made good use of an electric heater. The TARDIS was nearby, but he couldn't wait inside. They might not know where to look for it, given that he had landed it rather awkwardly and didn't know Helsinki all that well. He made a mental note to pop back one nice warm summer and thoroughly explore the city so that he would know his way around in future. Maybe he'd come in 1918, the first midsummer celebrated by a nation of independent Finns. He smiled at that thought despite the chattering of his teeth.

There was a rumble in the distance, like the sound of an engine, growing louder – growing nearer – and a moment later a massive lorry pulled into the Square. It was an eighteen-wheeler, entirely black with blinkered lights and no markings. It crushed ice and snow under its mighty wheels as it slowed to a halt. The hydraulic brakes hissed loudly and the back doors were flung open. A dozen black-clad figures with torchlights mounted on their shoulders charged across the snow in heavy army boots toward the Doctor and surrounded him, rifles pointed intrusively into his personal space. A few seconds passed without event.

"It's all right," a female voice said. "It's him. This is one of his known avatars." One of the figures, the owner of the voice, pushed through the others, shoving them aside and forcing rifles to point to the ground. "Perkele," she exclaimed. "You look close to hypothermia. Get in the truck. We've got heaters."

"Thank you, Commander..." the Doctor wheezed as politely as he could, observing the military insignia while the woman and another soldier grabbed an arm each and hauled him to his feet, supporting him as they headed back to the truck.

"Makkinen," the woman replied. "And you're welcome, Doctor. Tell me something: have you any idea how highly recommended you come?"

The Doctor managed a wry smile. "I couldn't give a precise estimate."

"MI6, C19, UNIT Emergency Defence Committee, CIA, some of the biggest noises in the United Nations, the US and UK armies and navies... The list is long. You must make one hell of an impression when you get involved."

"I do my best," the Doctor answered the inference modestly. He allowed Makkinen and the other UNIT trooper to pull him up into the truck, and was almost knocked in the face by the blast of warm air. The other troopers climbed into the vehicle and the doors were closed and bolted, and then sealed with a coded electronic locking unit. The Doctor hurried to pull off his fur coat. It was making him sweat. "The inside of this lorry reminds me of a sauna," he hooted. "Or a Turkish bath."

Makkinen grinned wolfishly. "The way Finns like it in the winter, Doctor. By the way, how do you like our mobile operations centre?" She gestured around the interior of the lorry with both hands.

The carriage was packed with the most sophisticated technology that the Earth military powers of 1996 could offer. Computers and scanners were bolted to the metal framework and the floor was carpeted. Strip lighting on the ceiling illuminated the workspace, and swivel-chairs and electric heaters littered the office-like environment. Troopers were getting into seats and operating controls as the engine roared into life. "It's impressive," said the Doctor. "But to be honest you and I both know I'm not here to discuss the decor. The space-time telegraph isn't ever used unless the circumstances are not only deeply unusual, but also potentially a serious threat to human survival."

"We're acquainted with procedure, Doctor," Makkinen answered flatly. "C19 seemed to think that you were the right man for the job. One particular top-ranker gave his personal recommendation."

The Doctor knew instantly who that would have been. How typical of Alistair to take a Ministry job as a means to keeping his hand in. What was that expression about Old Soldiers? The Doctor smiled at the thought of his old friend sitting behind a mahogany desk, barking orders at his secretary as if she were dear old Corporal Bell or someone. He found two empty chairs and positioned them facing one another. "Well," he said to Commander Makkinen as he sat down. "I'll do my utmost to justify his faith." He gestured to the chair facing him.

Makkinen sat down with a sigh. "Okay, first: our destination. This truck is going to make a rendezvous in two hours with a UNIT train heading for Lapland. At Lapland we camp for one night at our temporary HQ and from their go on north in the morning."

"The Pole?" the Doctor asked.

"The Pole, Doctor," Makkinen confirmed. She swivelled in her chair toward a trooper sitting at one of the consoles. "Get me the file, will you?" She watched the soldier march up the truck to the end and open a small bolted-down filing cabinet. A moment later she was handed the small buff folder, which she thrust into the Doctor's hands. "Take a look," she said. "Eight months ago a team of geologists were working just outside Rovaniemi. Some guy had the idea that analysing the ice would turn up ways to reduce Arctic shrinkage, cut back the dangers of tidal waves by cutting down the size of ice masses that sink into the ocean."

The Doctor opened the folder and examined a couple of photos of the North Pole that were pretty but other than that showed nothing of any real interest. "Nice to see someone taking the world's ecological changes seriously," he observed. "And a shame that didn't start happening decades ago."

"Maybe," Makkinen shrugged back. "Take a look at the third photo on the second page."

The Doctor turned the page. The third picture showed two men in protective winter clothing and masks kneeling in the snow, holding up a gleaming black object. It was like a giant lump of coal, much shinier but equally shapeless. "Black ice," he observed.

"That's what they've called it," said Makkinen. "They ran every analysis on it that their equipment allowed for, but they came up with jack. Spectrograph, chemical makeup, everything. That chunk of ice there is not made of anything we've ever heard of."

"I might be able to identify it with equipment in the TARDIS," the Doctor suggested. "By the way, I was hoping that someone might move it for me, put it somewhere for safekeeping." He pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and unravelled it. "This is a rough map of its location from where you found me outside the cathedral."

"It's all right, Doctor," Makkinen smirked. "Your... apparatus has been picked up already. Its arrival disturbed the, um, illicit pursuits of a married woman and her lover in a car a few metres away and they called it in. It's being taken to the train."

The Doctor exhaled loudly. "Bit of a cold night for it. Now, perhaps you could show me this chunk of black ice."

Makkinen shook her head. "We don't have it, Doctor. That's why we're investigating. Less than two hours after these images were transmitted to their administrators' office from their camp, the geologists vanished. Every one of them. A team of forty-two guys, all just disappeared."

The Doctor closed the folder. "And next you're going to tell me that you sent people out to look for them, but the search party didn't come back either."

"Not exactly," Makkinen replied cautiously. "The matter was reported to the army, but no one was sent out. Well, not officially."

"I have a feeling I'm not going to like this, but go on."

"The army generals, in their infinite wisdom, decided that a handful of geologists probably getting accidentally buried under an avalanche or something wasn't worth sending out a team of their best guys for, and also they felt that if it were something more sinister than it would be pretty stupid getting their own people killed investigating it."

"Nothing like a little military paranoia and government costcutting to put a few innocent lives in danger. So these geologists are just being abandoned, are they?"

"Not exactly. There was a small team of... freelancers... from Britain who took an interest in the area just after the photos were made public. We did try to stop them becoming public knowledge, but we weren't quick enough. These British guys are archaeologists and historians, and the presence of the black ice interested them. They offered their services to the army, suggesting that they would look for the geologists on the condition that they also be allowed to conduct their own research. The army basically offered these people a bounty of a million UK pounds to share between them on the condition that they bring back any information regarding the disappearances. The army also contacted a group of oil riggers in Alaska and offered them a million US dollars between them if they give the British team a hand. Even loaned them some military scanning equipment. They're still out there, and recently they sent back some thermal images."

The Doctor scowled. "They sent a handful of trowel-scrapers and roughnecks to do their dirty work for them," he observed cynically. "I was right. I don't like it. They get a share in a million pounds, or dollars, and all they have to do is survive whatever got hold of those geologists and bring back some evidence of its existence?"

Makkinen nodded. "Yeah."

"Then I'd say they're getting ripped off," said the Doctor.

"That's as may be," said Makkinen, taking back the file. "But it wasn't my decision to send them out there. Please don't criticise me for the actions of others. Personally I think the decision was crazy for a lot of reasons, including the question of putting civilian lives in jeopardy when we have people who are trained for this kind of work." She opened the file and took out a picture. "Look at this. Thermal imaging equipment that is... on loan... to these guys was used to transmit these pictures. It's the best imaging equipment that money can buy and it got something. It got something three thousand feet under the ice."

The Doctor took the picture and examined it. It was a blur of vivid colours, like a poor digital reproduction of a Picasso, but the shape it made out was clear. "Well, you don't need a doctorate in geometry – or archaeology – to tell what this is," he said.

"The archaeologists are calling it a ziggurat," said Makkinen. "Basically an ancient pyramid of a design that..."

"Thank you," the Doctor interrupted her. "I know what a ziggurat is. But this is no ordinary ziggurat, even in my experience. For one thing it's clearly over sixty-five million years old."

Makkinen gawked. "But that's Cretaceous!" she spluttered. "There's no way there were any human beings around back then, even the humblest troglodytes didn't come along till way after that period, let alone anyone sophisticated enough to build a ziggurat!"

The Doctor nodded gravely. "I completely agree. And that leaves only one logical possibility."

Suddenly Makkinen got the point. "It was built by a civilisation that existed before Man." She thought for a moment. "The reptiles? Silurians?"

"Unlikely," the Doctor replied. "It's not their style. Normally they didn't bother with external architecture. They just built everything inside the natural caves and potholes in whatever rock formations were littered around the planet. Whoever built this ziggurat either had no intention of hiding it from anyone, or..."

"Or..?" Makkinen prompted impatiently.

"Or knew that winter was coming and they'd be snowed under before anyone realised they were there," the Doctor concluded. "During the Cretaceous period the Arctic didn't quite have the amount of ice and snow that it has now, though it did get the occasional dusting of snow. Plants even grew there, and creatures like the Chasmosaurus, Hypacrosaurus and Edmontosaurus even migrated north in the summers to take advantage of the good growing season. There's a chance that the people who built the pyramid arrived when the Arctic was more-or-less an ice-free zone, or perhaps when it was actually freezing over. Have you any idea what the ziggurat's made of?"

Makkinen shook her head. "Scans can't penetrate that deep. We've ordered the expedition to start drilling."

The Doctor didn't like the sound of that word. "Drilling?"

"We need to get a better look at it, Doctor," Makkinen explained. "We need to know what it is in case it's dangerous."

"And you don't think that going down there and poking at it with a drill will make it dangerous?" demanded the Doctor. "When will human beings ever learn that the safest thing to do with something you don't understand is to leave it alone?"

Makkinen sighed. "Doctor, if it wasn't us, it would eventually be someone else, and they might not be trained to handle it."

"How do you know you're trained to handle it? You don't even know what it is."

"We'll find out."

"And if you can't deal with it?"

"That's what you were called in for."

The Doctor dropped back into the chair. "I don't suppose anyone in this lorry has the facilities to make a cup of tea, do they?" he sighed heavily.

Makkinen nodded. "I'll see you get one. Afterwards, get some rest. We have a long journey ahead of us, and we don't know what we will find at its end."

As the Commander walked away, the Doctor closed his eyes and became lost in his thoughts. Something from space had come to Earth a very long time ago, and it had built a pyramid; a pyramid that has since been buried under thousands of tonnes of ice and yet has suffered no structural damage. Whatever that intelligence was that had built the thing, it was clearly extremely technologically advanced, and undoubtedly self-obsessed and ruthlessly determined. After all, anyone who would build a structure that could survive sixty-five million years under tonnes of ice and snow obviously had a thing about immortality.

Chris Styles slid down to the foot of the slippery ice ridge to join his crewmates at the camp, keeping his back pressed to the ice to avoid been flipped over in the event that he slipped. The others were gathered around the generator-powered heating unit, swathed in their parkas, struggling to keep warm. Chris wasn't sure whether the rattling he could hear was the generator or the chorus of chattering teeth. "Kev," he shouted as he landed on his feet. "Nielsen's planted the charges."

Kevin Farrant shook his head disdainfully. "Why the hell do we need bombs for an archaeology job, for crying out loud?" he complained for about the thousandth time since he and the two teams had arrived at the Pole. "Bloody military, telling us what to do. We're civilians. We shouldn't be taking orders from them."

"The million would be pretty useful, Kev," Chris placated him. "Funding for our future projects to last at least another couple of years."

"But we have to blow up potentially valuable archaeological finds so that we can collect it?" Kevin grunted. "I don't know if the money justifies what we might be sacrificing."

Chris sighed. "There are lives at stake too, mate."

"Whose lives?" Kevin retorted. "We've been here two weeks, and have you seen anyone else around here? Even when the snowing stops you can't see much more movement than you'd get from your average polar bear."

"We should at least try and look for them," said Chris. "If only for the sake of our contract." He trudged over to the heating unit and looked around it. One of the girls was pulling out the hotplate carefully. "Got a cup of tea for me, Bex?"

Rebecca Staden took a steaming tin mug from the hotplate and carefully passed it from her gloved hands to Chris's. "I'd sit it in the snow for about five minutes before you try drinking it," she told him with a smirk. "Otherwise you might weld your lip to the rim of the mug."

"Gotcha," Chris chuckled. He sat down on one of the mats and carefully nestled his tin mug in the snow, causing a cloud of vapour to swell around it.

An explosion sounded in the distance.

"That's the first lot gone," Kevin said glumly.

Two more explosions.

"And there go the others," said the other of the two women on the crew. "They'll fire up the drill in about ten minutes, I'd think."

"Shut up, Bryce," Kevin humphed.

Hannah Bryce looked at him sadly. Kevin was an archaeologist before all things, and it was causing him depression. He had been an archaeologist before a father and lost his children; he had been an archaeologist before a husband and lost his wife. All he ever did was obsess about history, and Hannah felt sorry for him because he was becoming more buried in the past than the artefacts to whose recovery he devoted his every waking hour. She strode over to Chris and dropped down on the mat next to him. "He's getting worse," she said quietly.

Chris picked up his tea and took a tentative sip. It was fine. "Well, I've done my best and you've done your best," he said pessimistically. "Shall we pass it around, see if Bex or Eddie or Jukebox can do anything about it? Somehow I think they'll do was well as we've been doing."

Hannah nodded in agreement. "I was thinking actually we should stand him down from the project," she whispered. "Let him have his share of the million, but get him out of the way so that we can all get on with finding and surveying the ziggurat."

"And you want me to have a word with the others to that effect, I take it?"

"You're a nice guy, Chris. We all like and respect you, the others will listen if it's you doing the talking. The only person who won't listen is the very person who's at the centre of the trouble, and he isn't listening to anyone right now."

"I don't like it. It feels like mutiny."

"What's he gonna do, Christian? Make you walk the plank?"

Chris sighed heavily and swigged the last of his tea down. "Why do I let you get me into these situations?" he asked with a wry smile.

Hannah grinned back at him. "Because you adore me, of course," she laughed as she got up and went back to the heater.

The drill roared into life. Kevin could feel the ground vibrating under his feet. It was making his face itch. "Shut that bloody noise off!" he hollered up the ridge. "Can't hear myself think down here."

"No can do, Kevin," an American voice shouted back from the top of the ridge. "Drilling's in the mission statement, and we gotta get down there."

"Piss off, Nielsen!" Kevin shouted.

"Can't do that either," Nielsen laughed. "There's a cool million in it for us guys. Anyway, I just came to tell you we got a real good fracture from the bombs. If my boys hit that crack with everything they got, we can expect to hit the target in forty-eight hours."

Kevin's attitude brightened a little at the thought of the spectacular find being so close. "That's not bad," he crowed excitedly. "Can we really get down there that quickly?"

"Sure," Nielsen told him. "Oh yeah, and we just got a call on the radio. There's a military investigation team coming out to look at the pyramid."

"It's a ziggurat," Kevin corrected him.

"Trust me, dude," Nielsen replied flippantly. "It's a pyramid. I know what a goddamn cigarette looks like and this ain't it. Those investigators should be here about an hour before breakthrough."

Kevin didn't like that at all. It had been agreed that there would be no actual military presence in the area until all the archaeology had been done, the finds collected, labelled, recorded and taken for examination. A bunch of clodhopping military buffoons were sure to damage or misplace something extremely valuable and mess up the project. But as soon as they'd sent back a thermal image of the ziggurat the army had changed its collective mind and decided to come in and take a look. Worse, they weren't even going to come and help with the dig. They'd just be popping up at the last minute to see all the work done for them. "Why aren't you supervising the drilling?" he called to Nielsen.

"Why aren't you sticking your trowel in the ice and trying to find something historical?" the gruff American retorted. "I came to give you the message, and now I gotta get back." And in an instant he was gone.

Kevin turned to face his own small crew, who by now were all huddled around the heater, chatting animatedly about the exciting prospect of finally seeing the amazing historical anomaly beneath the ice. "Well, everyone," he announced verbosely. "Looks like by tomorrow night we'll be in possession of the greatest archaeological find in history."

The black BMW crunched gravel under its tyres as it slinked through the gates and rolled up to the house. It drew to a halt alongside the green Jaguar that belonged to the house's owner and the door was opened. Armani shoes pressed onto the drive and the door of the BMW was closed. Leather-gloved hands held out the key fob and the car gave the usual beep to signify that its alarm system had been activated. The driver checked the handcuffs that held the briefcase to his left wrist and, satisfied that they were still secure, strode up to the large, heavy wooden front door of the small mansion. The door opened after precisely fourteen seconds and a stout, shaven-headed man, awkwardly squeezed into a black suit, white shirt and black bowtie, allowed the man inside without speaking a word but closing the door behind him. The visitor allowed the butler to lead him across the hall to the parlour. The parlour door was, like the front door had been, closed, and the butler knocked on it. A woman's voice called him to enter. "If you'd just like to wait here for a moment please, sir," the butler said with eloquence that seemed as unbefitting him as that suit.

"The lady is expecting me," the visitor insisted, struggling to be polite. He was a less than patient man at the best of times.

"I dare say, sir," the butler smiled patronisingly. "Still, there are the correct protocols to be observed, and so you'll excuse me if I announce you properly." Without waiting for the visitor's gruff reply, the butler opened the door and stepped into the parlour. "Mr Azikiwe to see you, Madam," he announced smoothly.

The woman carefully closed the book that she had been reading and placed it on the small table beside her chair before looking up and directly at the butler. "Thank you, Forrester," she said coolly and casually. "Show him in."

Forrester gave a slight nod. "Very good, Madam," he said and extended a hand toward the door in an inviting gesture. "If you'd care to enter, sir."

Chimela Azikiwe stepped into the room and waited for Forrester to leave and close the door behind him before speaking. "A tissue," he asked slowly.

"Bless you," the woman replied with the most cordial sarcasm.

"I will not ask again," Azikiwe said impatiently.

The woman sighed and stood up, her black stiletto heels making up for her lack of height as she walked – almost danced – to a small sideboard and opened a draw. She took out a pack of handy tissues and threw them in his direction. There was a crystal decanter and a couple of whisky glasses on that sideboard too. "Care for a drink?"

"Saltwater," said Azikiwe.

Raising an eyebrow, the woman returned to the table beside her chair and pressed the button on the intercom set that sat there. "A glass of saltwater, please," she said, and took her finger away from the button without waiting for a reply. Fifty-six seconds passed and a maid came in with a tall glass on a tray. "For our guest, Moira," the woman said.

The little maid offered the tray to Azikiwe. When he took the glass she curtseyed and scurried away back to her duties, closing the door behind them. "Pretty little thing," Azikiwe observed, his thick Nigerian accent making the observation sound sinister.

"My footman thinks so too," smiled the woman. "He's marrying her in three weeks. They've both decided to stay in my service, and they'll know how grateful I am for that when I hand over their wedding present."

Azikiwe snorted. "Let's not make small talk," he said dismissively and he drank the saltwater in a single violent gulp. A moment later he started retching and hastily opened the pack of tissues, ripping one out and letting the pack fall onto the rich Axminster carpet as he covered his mouth. A moment later he was taking deep recovering breaths as he rubbed at something that he had regurgitated into the tissue. Satisfied that it was clean, he produced a tiny, shining key and offered it to the lady of the house.

"Please," she said, eyeing it distastefully. "Do be my guest."

Shrugging, Azikiwe opened the handcuffs and carried the briefcase to the sideboard, resting it beside the decanter and carefully entering the combination to release its locks. The case was opened and Azikiwe took out the brown folder, revealing the small collection of handguns carefully secured beneath. He passed the folder to the woman, eyeing her carefully as she took it, glad that he had another gun in his shoulder holster under his suit jacket. "You can see, Miss Lomax," Azikiwe told her as she examined the files. "The thermal imager shows that there is a pyramid under the ice that is at least sixty-five million years old. Evidence of Man in the times of the dinosaurs."

"I can read, Mr Azikiwe," Lomax replied curtly, flicking through the files. "And you want me to reimburse you the costs of your acquisition of this information, I take it?"

Azikiwe grinned. "I was thinking of something a little more enterprising, Miss Lomax," he said, and this time it wasn't his accent making his words seem sinister.

Lomax sat down in her chair again, file still in her hand. "I'm listening."

"Ten million," said Azikiwe, "for the ziggurat."

The train was more sophisticated even than the lorry, with whole carriages absolutely packed with the most advanced equipment available to the United Nations and any of its appended military forces, and also toilets, sleeping compartments and a dining car. The Doctor had been grateful for the warm bunk in his sleeping compartment and had slept for almost an hour. It had been all he had needed before waking up refreshed and ready to get started on his investigation. Naturally the lack of information didn't really help that investigation much, but he would know plenty about the ziggurat once he'd managed to get a good look at it. On the whole he didn't like the idea of going down into it at all, tomb-robbing not really being his style, but deep down he had to agree with Commander Makkinen that if they didn't open the pyramid then eventually someone would, and if there was something nasty inside then he might not be around to help that party. He splashed a little water on his face from the small basin, dressed and left his compartment, heading for the dining car. He ordered a cup of tea and a cheese and pickle sandwich and found himself a seat. Someone had left a newspaper on the table and he leafed idly through it, looking at some of the more obscure articles. It didn't bother him that the whole newspaper was written in Finnish; the TARDIS saw to little complications like that, and he was amused by some of the recent film reviews and bits of local trivia. Someone put his tea and sandwich on the table and he muttered his thanks as the man returned to his job before putting the paper down and picking up his sandwich.

"You have impeccable timing," a voice said from behind him. "It's seven minutes past noon."

"Perfect for lunch," the Doctor agreed. "But then I always did have a good sense of timing. Will you join me, Commander?"

"Kati," Commander Makkinen said as she sat down opposite him. "Please. I want us to be friends."

The Doctor smiled and raised his hand. "A cup of coffee over here, please," he called. "White, one sugar."

Makkinen gave him a puzzled look. "How did you know how I take it?"

"I make a point of knowing all about my friends," the Doctor answered coolly. "Now, tell me, Katariina Mirja Makkinen, what makes a seventeen year-old girl get some strings pulled to get onto a military fast-track course that will give her the field rank of Commander in a specialist defence force by the age of twenty-six?"

"You've been doing your research," Makkinen sighed. "How the hell did you get access to my entire file?"

"I called C19, of course," the Doctor explained simply. "You said yourself I have a lot of influence. Now come on, Kati," he grinned. "Spill the beans. You know you want to."

Makkinen looked sadly at the Doctor. "I was sixteen when my father died," she said sadly. "He was a technician for a military installation on the other side of the world, in Antarctica. It was a rocket base, sending survey teams into space. One day, the day after there had been reports of a new planet in space close to Earth we just got a letter, my mother, sisters and I, telling us that my father had died and they were very sorry. They never told us how he had died or why. We called them, wrote to them and got nothing. A week later it was in the news that the 'new planet' had been a reflection of Earth caused by a unique phenomenon of 'reflective cosmic dust' but nothing had been said about the loss of that base. The thing just vanished and the military and world governments denied all knowledge of it. It was like it had never existed."

Suddenly the Doctor realised what Makkinen was saying. "You joined UNIT so that you could uncover the cover-up and find out what happened to your father," he said.

Makkinen nodded, sipping the coffee that had been delivered while she'd been talking. "And suddenly I find that the Earth has been invaded by aliens more times that it's had World Cup football matches," she exclaimed. "In 1986 my father was working at the Snowcap Zeus rocket base when the 'reflection' appeared, and it was no reflection: it was an identical copy of Earth, well, identical except that it was upside-down. Ships crossed from that planet to Earth and a group of superhuman cyborgs broke into the Snowcap base and lay siege to it. Something went wrong in their plans and their planet somehow disintegrated. They all died, but they killed a lot of people, or got a lot of people killed while that was going on. Then UNIT arrived and covered it up, collected up all the alien tech, silenced survivors and came up with a cover story for the papers. A week later everyone's forgotten about it – I mean totally forgotten. You mention something that was on TV a week ago and they remember, but ask about the new planet and they think you're crazy. And how does the UN manage that? To make us all forget? They drug the water. They drug all the drinking water in the world with something that makes us all forget the whole week, and then they set the calendar dates back a week so we have those same dates again and don't realise we lost seven days. And now I work for the people who do that, and I actually want to help. Perkele!"

The Doctor gently patted her hand. "It's a learning curve," he said, "viewing the bigger picture from inside it. You realise that, although you didn't want your father to be swept under the carpet, humanity has to be protected from maddening information like this."

"Maybe," Makkinen said with a shrug. "Or maybe I just don't think that knowing aliens did it helps a bereaved family to recover." She was swigging her coffee now, as it had cooled a little. "Or maybe I'm just a hypocrite, the girl who changed her mind."

"I don't think that," the Doctor smiled warmly. "I think you just do what you feel is best, and that's what you've always done."

"Thank you," Makkinen said, managing a smile.

"I wonder why the drugs didn't work on you," the Doctor mused. "If they were designed to induce amnesia on a global scale, they should've affected everyone on Earth. We all drink."

"Everyone on Earth who has access to a technologically-supported clean water supply that doesn't have to be purified after dispensation, Doctor," Makkinen enlightened him. "I was always a bit of a crusader. I got involved in one of those foreign aid programmes and was in North Africa that week. Nobody there forgot the new planet, but who the hell ever listened to them?"

The Doctor nodded slowly and sipped his tea. He finished his sandwich in silence and folded the newspaper up, leaving it on the table where he had found it for the next person just as the last person had left it for him. Makkinen shared his silence as she drank her coffee, and then the two of them walked down the train to the operations room.

"Commander," a Lieutenant called as Makkinen entered the Ops car.

"What do you have for me, Kivilahti?" Makkinen asked.

Heikki Kivilahti handed Makkinen a piece of paper. "A communiqué from the drilling party, sir."

Makkinen unfolded the paper and examined it. She glanced at the Doctor. "The drilling is almost complete," she announced. "They'll break through to the ziggurat in four hours."

"And we'll be there in..?"

"Two hours, forty-seven minutes and counting, Doctor."

The Doctor marched past her and started inspecting some of the computer banks around the operations car. He took a small notebook and pencil from one of his pockets and started taking notes from the extreme-range scanners. The information displayed wasn't conclusive, but it was helping him to form a picture. Finally he reached the main radio communications bank. "May I use this?" he asked Makkinen.

"Why not," she smiled humourlessly. "You did before."

"I mean to contact the drilling team," the Doctor said.

"You want to talk to them?"

"Ask a couple of questions about the ground. It might give me some ideas."

Makkinen nodded. "Of course, Doctor. I'll call first, tell them to give you all the information you need."

The Doctor stepped aside. "Thank you."

Makkinen picked up the handset and made the call.

"Hey Cody!" Nielsen shouted over the roar of the drill. "Get over here, will ya!"

Cody Prince was seated at the monitor, watching the drill's gauges and progress reports, but he got up and let one of the other guys take his seat while he ran across the drilling platform to talk to Nielsen. "What's up, Joe?"

Nielsen shoved the radio handset into Cody's hand. "Some egghead with the investigators wants to know about the ice. You're the brains; I only know that it's thick and white and fuckin' cold."

Cody pulled up the receiver. "Cody Prince," he announced himself. "Geologist and senior drill technician."

A voice crackled through the receiver. "How d'you do, Mr Prince. I'm the Doctor."

"What's up, Doc?" Cody asked.

"Sorry," said the Doctor. "Am I speaking to Bugs Bunny?"

Cody groaned. "Wiseass. Look, I got work to do and it's at kind of a critical point, so before I get back to it, what can I do ya for?"

"What sort of drill are you using?" the Doctor asked.

"It's a customised Atlas Copco RD20," Cody told him. "Customised for speed and stability by your guys, as well as adjusted for use on the ice. These are normally used to drill for gas. It's got some pretty high-level advancements. The carriage feed system can handle 110,000 pounds of pullback, so you get a high feed speed as well as precise weight and speed control. The derrick's rigged to take out compressive loads on the upper, even at full pullback."

"That's quite impressive," the Doctor mused. "I take it you have a computer monitoring system."

"Yeah, we know what's goin' on," said Cody. "There's been almost no resistance from the ice during the whole drill programme, and we're on the final layer right now. I hear you guys are gonna be here for the breakthrough."

"That's our intention, yes."

"You better bring some champagne, Doc. Not on ice though. I think we got enough of that."

An alarm sounded from the computer console.

"What was that?" the Doctor demanded.

"Shit," snapped Cody. "We've come up against something hard on the bottom layer, way harder than the ice we've been drilling." He raised his voice. "Hey Fellows!" he hollered. "Get Gleason and Ramirez down here and get the pressure under control. Come on, move your goddamn ass! You want us all to get smeared all over the Arctic?" He returned to his call. "Sorry, Doc. I gotta get back to work. Don't worry about the emergency. We'll make that breakthrough right on time."

"Right," said the Doctor. "Thank you."

The line went dead.

Cody passed the receiver back to Nielsen. "I gotta get to the computer," he said. "Call the guys together and get everyone working on this. We gotta get the drill back under control before those assholes get here. We don't want them thinking we're making a mess of things if we plan on getting our hands on that million."

Nielsen nodded. "I got it," he said, slamming the receiver back onto its cradle in the radio set. He ran off, shouting at the others of his crew while Cody went back to the computer.

The system came online.

The pilot checked the data feed and noted the input, and then referred the details to the main computer. The computer assimilated and analysed the information it had been given and projected the most logical conclusion. Then it informed the pilot.

"Leader," the pilot said, its voice a mechanical vibration of syllables without inflection or character to draw anything away from the purity of simple truth. "Our scans have detected Mondasian technology on Earth in the northern polar region."

"What does the computer advise?" asked the Leader, its voice as hollow and free of quality as that of the pilot.

"Investigation, Leader," said the pilot.

"Attempt to establish communication with the scanner's target," the Leader ordered.

"Yes, Leader," replied the pilot. It activated the communications array and uploaded the coordinates from the scanner. The communications array fixed a bearing on the source and the pilot engaged the main transceiver. It checked for a response; there was none. "No response from the target area, Leader," it announced. "Transceiver systems register no operational modules. If communications technology has survived, it has not yet been activated."

"Lock coordinates on the scanner's target and prepare to breach orbit," the Leader instructed its subordinate. "We will investigate the anomaly on the surface."

"There may also be processing opportunities, Leader," reported the pilot. "If the location is populated with human specimens."

"That," said the Cyber Leader, "has already been considered."

To be continued...