In the dining car the mummy suddenly jerked, swinging one arm up into the air, turning its head from side to side, as if trying to locate something. Inside its artificial mind there was nothing but confusion. The command signal had been cut off. It no longer knew what to do, it needed orders. It started sending out a tracing call, and the same pulsing noise that had come from the scarab ring earlier now filled the air again.

Heng-wei had grabbed hold of his gun and jumped to his feet when the mummy started moving, and he looked on in surprise as it began signalling. He stood there for a second, unsure what to do about this new development, but something in the corner of his vision made him turn to face his captives. The Doctor had risen from his seat and was rushing towards him, clearly taking advantage of his momentary lapse of concentration. Heng-wei whipped the gun round, as fast as lightning, and fired at the Doctor.

(The Doctor slowed down time. Everything in the room was now frozen in place, caught between ticks of the clock. It was an easy trick for a Time Lord, they taught it in the first year of the academy on Gallifrey. However, it was only really his perception of time that had changed. His mind was working normally, but his body was suspended just like everything else. He couldn't act, but he could buy himself some thinking time. He could take stock of his circumstances and plan a reaction to them. It took a great deal of effort, and he couldn't sustain it for more than a few subjective moments, but sometimes a little extra room for manoeuvre was all you needed to give you an edge. He could see Heng-wei's bullet coming towards him. He could judge the trajectory along which it was travelling. It was wide, but it would still hit him if he carried on as he was. However, if he shifted his weight and turned…)

The Doctor twisted in mid-run, reacting faster than Heng-wei would have thought possible. The bullet missed his chest, but still hit him in the arm, going through his jacket sleeve, and gouging a bloody channel across his bicep. He fell to the floor and Heng-wei moved to fire at him again. Suddenly, something hard hit Heng-wei in the shoulder. He looked up in surprise and saw Colonel Huntington pointing a gun at him, ready to fire again. Heng-wei brought his gun round and the two of them fired simultaneously, hitting each other in the chest. The pain kicked in now, and his brain was filled with an ecstatic agony of fear and hatred, all directed towards the Colonel. He fired again and hit the Colonel in the side of his ribs, sending a bright red spray of blood over the wall behind him. At the same moment a flash of fire erupted from the muzzle of the Colonel's gun and Heng-wei felt himself knocked backwards into the table. He began to fall and as he fell he fired again, his aim rising. He hit the Colonel in the face this time, the bullet shattering his jaw. The Colonel still did not stop firing his own gun: Heng-wei felt a stab of pain in his leg as he collapsed to the floor, the gun falling from his hand. He tried to lift himself up, but his strength was gone. He could feel the energy in his body, it was trying to repair the damage, but it was too much. No! It could not end like this, he was so close. He refused to…

The Doctor was on his feet, but all he could do now was try to minimise the damage. He kicked Heng-wei's gun away from where he had fallen, then ran over to where the Colonel was slumped against the wall, covered in blood. Litefoot and Jago were still at the table, looking shocked. Jago had one arm over his face, as if to protect himself, and Litefoot had stood up, knocking his chair over behind him. Anton was coming up from behind the bar, where he had ducked down when the shooting started.

"George, go and look at Heng-wei, see if there's anything you can do. I'll look after the Colonel."

Litefoot looked nonplussed for a moment, but quickly came to his senses. "Of course, yes." He said quietly, then went over to check on Heng-wei.

The Colonel was alive, but he looked terrible. The bones of his jaw were visible through the wound in the side of his face. He was sitting in a rapidly expanding pool of blood, which was still oozing out of his chest wound. He was breathing in ragged gasps where the broken ribs on one side had punctured his lung.

"Lionel, listen to me! You must stay with us. Hold on." The Doctor looked into the Colonel's eyes and willed him to hang on to life. "Anton, being some towels, or sheets: anything we can use for bandages."

Anton grabbed an armful of folded linen napkins, and brought them over, stopping on the way to give some to Litefoot, who was examining Heng-wei. The Doctor started fashioning bandages out of them to try and stop the bleeding.

"I shouldn't bother with that, Doctor." It was the Colonel, speaking in a wheezing voice. "I think it's finally time for me to go."

"It's not too late, Lionel. Your body is strong. I can help you."

"I don't want you to help me. I want to die, Doctor." He stopped for a moment to cough up some blood. "This makes sense to me. I should have died in battle all those years ago, this time I can do things properly." He started to laugh, but it turned into another blood-filled coughing fit. The Doctor held a napkin to the Colonel's mouth, whilst supporting his head. Then the coughing stopped, and he felt the neck muscles relax and go limp. He took the napkin away and leant the Colonel's head gently against the wall. His eyes were focussed on some point far away, and there was a smile on his lips. He no longer moved or breathed. The Doctor reached forward slowly and closed the Colonel's eyes.

- - -

Ace felt the blackness recede, and the pain drained slowly away from her. Her vision returned and she found herself staring at the Contessa. She had knelt down again and placed the globe on the floor in front of her. In her hand she held a small mirror, and she was looking at herself in it, whilst gently touching her face. She caught sight of a small movement from Ace, and realised she was awake.

"Look at me, I am young again! I am beautiful!"

Ace could see that the Contessa had indeed been rejuvenated. She looked at least ten years younger, and she seemed to almost glow with an inner radiance.

"Thank you for your gift. I can feel your life flowing within me."

Ace felt as though she had never slept in her life. All the energy had gone from her body. She wondered if she looked as old as she felt.

"But it won't last you know." The Contessa was reaching for the globe. "The life I've taken from you will ebb away, and I will grow old again." She smiled benevolently at Ace. "And we can't have that now can we?"

"Please, don't do this. Not again." Ace felt despair overwhelm her, and she started to cry.

"Hush now, child. It will be over soon."

Ace sobbed as the green light stabbed out, and then the blackness swallowed her world again.

- - -

"He's not breathing, and there's no pulse. As far as I can tell, he really is dead this time."

Litefoot was standing next to Heng-wei's body, wiping his hands on a bloodied napkin.

"The Colonel is dead as well." The Doctor said grimly. "We need to leave here now and find Ace." The wound to his arm didn't seem to be slowing him down, and it had stopped bleeding already.

"What about the mummy?" Asked Litefoot.

"I think we can risk trying to go round it. It's still signalling, I think something must have broken the link between it and the control ring."

The mummy hadn't moved at all since the gun fight, and it was still emitting the same pulsing tone.

"I'll go first. The rest of you follow if I get past safely."

The Doctor moved slowly towards the mummy. It didn't react, even when he sidled past it into the corridor.

"George, I want you to come with me. Henry, Anton: stay here and keep an eye on this thing. If it starts to move, I want you to distract it."

"How do we do that?" Asked Jago, looking aghast.

"Shout at it. Throw things at it. Dance around singing 'Oh! Mr Porter!' Do what you like, just keep it from following us. But don't let it touch you."

The Doctor started off down the corridor, followed by Litefoot, who gingerly squeezed past the mummy, holding his breath as he did so.

Jago and Anton were left alone, staring at the carriage around them. The dining car was a mess of wrecked chairs and overturned tables. There was blood and broken glass everywhere, and a cold wind whistled in through the shattered windows. Three dead bodies were laying in various positions around the room, and the eerie pulsing call of the mummy filled the air.

"Can I get you another brandy, monsieur?"

"Good idea, Anton. And have one yourself while you're at it."

- - -

The Doctor began moving quietly as he approached the door to the luggage car. He looked round at Litefoot and put a finger to his lips. Litefoot nodded his understanding, and the Doctor carefully opened the door and looked in.

A green glow lit up the car. The Doctor couldn't see the Contessa, but he could see Ace: she was laying on the floor, handcuffed to a trunk. Even from here he could tell she looked awful. She seemed haggard and exhausted. Her hair was matted with sweat, and loose strands of it hung limply down the sides of her face. And she was crying, great wracking sobs forced out from her heaving lungs. He felt a burning, dark anger rise up inside him. His eyes seemed to blaze and the air around him darken. He turned to Litefoot, and Litefoot involuntarily took a step backwards, shocked by the Doctor's fearful aspect.

"Wait here." Hissed the Doctor.

Litefoot nodded again, his eyes wide. The Doctor walked into the luggage car and went straight over to Ace. She looked up as she heard him coming over. Relief flooded across her face, only to be quickly replaced by fear.

"Doctor," she croaked "behind you!"

The Doctor whirled round to see the Contessa emerging from her hiding place behind a large crate. She held the glowing globe in one hand, and her gun in the other. He saw that she looked young again, perhaps in her early twenties. She was stunningly beautiful, making her older self look plain by comparison.

"What a pleasant surprise it is to see you again, Doctor. Although, I am curious as to how you managed to get past my little friend."

The Doctor ignored her and knelt down next to Ace. She had stopped crying and was making a brave attempt at a smile. He brushed the hair out of her face and said "Don't worry, I'm here now. Everything will be alright."

"How touching! I hate to break up your little reunion, but I'm going to have to ask you to step away from your young lady friend. There is still some life left in her, I think."

"You don't need to take all her life force. She will regain her energy if you leave her alone. But if you take any more now, you might kill her."

"That would be… regrettable, but even now I can feel the youth slowly leaving my body. I need every drop of life I can get. I have grown old once, Doctor, and I have no intention of doing it again."

"I won't let you do this." The Doctor stood up, putting himself between the Contessa and Ace. "Stop this insanity. Even now it's not too late."

"I'll kill you too, if you force me, Doctor. I can't let anything stand in the way of the plans Tommy and I have made."

"Tommy's dead, Contessa."

The Contessa's face twisted in anger and grief, just for a moment. "No, I don't believe you! You're lying!"

"I'm not lying. There was a gun fight, and Tommy was hit, several times. Even his body could only take so much damage. He's gone, Contessa. Do you really want to spend eternity without him? It's a very long time to be alone."

"No! I won't believe it! You are lying, and for that I will take your life as well, Doctor." She thrust the globe towards them. "Now, die as the Mouth of Setesh feeds upon your soul!"

The ray of light shot out towards the Doctor and Ace, but suddenly there was movement and Litefoot was rushing into the car. The Contessa turned, and the ray sprang towards him instead.

"Litefoot, no!" Shouted the Doctor, taking a step towards him. But it was too late, the light had hit him, he was transfixed, and the darkness was moving out towards him.

"Contessa, turn it off! His body is too old, you'll kill him."

Lightfoot cried out in pain as the green glow swelled to cover him like a gangrenous halo. The blackness snaked along the beam of green light, and attached itself to his forehead. The Mouth of Setesh began its dreadful feeding. But something was different. Flashes of blue and red were appearing in the green aura, and began running back along the beam from Litefoot's form, flickering over the globe in the Contessa's hand.

The Contessa suddenly convulsed, dropping to her knees and letting her gun fall to the floor. The Doctor darted over to her and tried to take the globe from her hand, but a flash of green lightning arced out at him and knocked his arm away.

"I can't stop it! It hurts!" The Contessa cried out. The green light from the globe was now marbled with the red and blue coming from Litefoot. It was also spreading over the Contessa's body, so that she and Litefoot were now joined by a swirling corona of illumination. They were both screaming in agony. As the Doctor and Ace watched they saw Litefoot and the Contessa begin to rise up into the air and draw closer together, until they were floating barely a foot apart, surrounded by a bubble of multi-coloured energy.

"What's happening?" Ace called out to the Doctor.

"No time to explain! We must get out of here." He started yanking at the handle of the trunk, trying to pull it loose in order to free Ace.

"Doctor, leave me! Get into the TARDIS."

"No! I won't go! It's coming free. I think I've…"

Suddenly the glow around Litefoot and the Contessa contracted and almost vanished, plunging the Doctor and Ace into darkness. Before they could react, the light erupted outwards in a wave of force which knocked the Doctor off his feet and sent him flying back into Ace. Litefoot and the Contessa were thrown apart and fell to the floor. The wave passed through the walls and continued onwards, leaving the luggage car in darkness again.

The car was still and quiet, the never-ending sound of the engine and the wheels on the track providing a background noise which only served to emphasise the silence. The train turned a bend and a beam of moonlight shone through the high window slits and moved across the car, casting its pale glow on boxes, parcels and trunks. Four bodies lay on the floor of the carriage. The moonlight passed over them and moved on, leaving them still and lifeless as the train drove on through the night.