Being the nearest person to the door, Councillor Erkal was rather surprised to find that he was the last to leave the constabulary. One moment Protector K'thellid was discussing their journey up the mountain, and the next it appeared to slip into unconsciousness as its amorphous body seemed to slump on its large levitating palanquin, the colour draining from its flesh. At the point where its head joined with its tentacles, the skin bulged slightly, and an eerie glow began to spread through its skin. Splaying its ten appendages out like rigid stalks, it appeared to generate a strange vibrating hum, which quickly filled the room. Glancing around, Erkal could see interest in the faces of Gesar and the monks, but no undue concern. Whatever the alien was doing, it wasn't entirely unexpected.
"K9," he whispered to his new travelling companion, "what's going on?"
"Localised temporal manipulation," replied K9, adjusting his speaker volume so only the librarian could hear. "The Protector can reverse local time with pinpoint precision, as you can observe."
The hum faded as the external wall began to deconstruct itself for the second time that cycle. Whitewash gave way to bare plaster, and the plaster thinned to reveal bare bricks, which themselves cascaded out of existence as a large opening appeared. On the other side Erkal could see three monks, returning from their pursuit of Aldus and Tanith, and several mounted k'thellid, their m'n'ch'k steeds waiting patiently.
"Are we heading up the mountain on foot?" Erkal asked, looking around as he stepped outside. Behind him, the wall rebuilt itself.
"We don't have steeds," said Gesar, breaking away from a brief chat with the returning monks. "We weren't expecting to return so quickly. Do you know where we can get some?"
Erkal nodded, indicating a stable door on the other side of the alley.
As Erkal and the monks prepared their steeds, Protector K'thellid's form changed again. Its tentacles relaxed as the bulk returned to its torso. The Protector's body regained its ruddy complexion as it established contact with the collective minds of the k'thellid and the m'n'ch'k, relaying the command to find and stop the Doctor's TARDIS from arriving at its destination.
Time inside the TARDIS passed slowly. To ease the Doctor's restless and, frankly, intolerable mood, Romana had suggested that he and Teyamat get acquainted while she concentrated on the repairs she had to make before they returned to Pengallia's shrine. Surprisingly, the Doctor had taken up her suggestion, asking the old woman to help him 'sort himself out'.
With a final burst from the sonic screwdriver, Romana reattached the modal compensator before leaning back to admire her handiwork. Across the room on the other side of the console, she was startled to see the Doctor casually leaning against the open doorway that led deep into the labyrinthine interior of the TARDIS. With his arms folded and his legs crossed, he was smiling broadly.
In all their time together, Romana had never seen the Doctor dressed in anything other than the greatcoat, long scarf, and floppy hat. Now all that remained was the hat, tilted forward, not over a bloodstained dressing, but instead casting its shadow over a pair of mirrored shades. Their round lenses reflected the white light of the console room. The greatcoat had been replaced by a short light brown tweed jacket with hand-stitched elbow patches, while the absent scarf seemed to have been replaced by a rainbow coloured kaftan, casually slung over the Doctor's shoulder. In place of a makeshift walking stick, he now carried a silver tipped cane, purpose built and completely out of place.
"What do you think?" The Doctor grinned.
"Hideous," said Romana, pleased to see that his mood had stabilized, "which I don't mind, since it will make me look even better. Are those glasses for effect or…"
"Optical bypass," he explained, crossing over to join Romana at the central console. "Late twenty-second century Earth. I think they based the design on dalek technology. I'm still blind, but the lenses relay an optical image into a completely different part of the brain. It'll take time for me to adjust, and my vision will be limited, but at least I won't feel completely useless."
"Where's Teyamat?"
The Doctor turned back to the doorway, from which a hollow squeaking sound could be heard. Moments later, a tall, high-backed chair edged its way into the room, towering over the old woman. On it's seat rested a large open packet of cheese nachos.
"I'm here, Romana," said Teyamat, huffing and puffing as she slowly pushed the chair from behind.
"Doctor, how could you?" Romana was appalled, dashing across the room to help bring the chair into the room.
"Ah. I'm still slightly blind, you see," said the Doctor, tapping his new mirror-shades before glancing around the room and pointing. "Over there should do it."
"I thought you were still blind," Romana retorted, setting the chair down on the opposite side of the room.
"Slightly," corrected the Doctor as he crossed the room, "but it is very bright in here, and I have excellent spatial awareness."
Teyamat snatched up the nachos and retreated as the Doctor headed towards the chair. En route, his leg brushed against one of the dvora, which responded with a gentle but insistent growl.
"What's this?" He asked, reaching down to feel the creature.
"Don't!" Romana warned, as the Doctor's hand passed through its cold, ethereal form. "It's a dvora… a devouring hound."
"Ah," the Doctor cautiously withdrew his frost-covered hand. "I wondered why K9 didn't follow me. They must really have put his nose out of joint. Where are you keeping the dragon? I'm not sure the swimming pool will be big enough."
"There isn't any dragon, Doctor," Romana sighed, "just the dvora and Pengallia's TARDIS, when we get there."
"That's the trouble with relics," said the Doctor as he settled into his chair, "you can never complete the set. Still, it's nice to see you've been busy while I was out for my constitutional."
"Well, while you've been slave-driving poor Teyamat, I've managed to retrieve and reinstall the modal compensator. It won't work properly until we refit the isochronic regulator, but at least we won't end up in any parallel timelines by mistake."
"Always a bonus," smiled the Doctor, "so are we all ready?"
"I am if you are," smiled Romana, as she reached forwards to resume the materialisation process.
Nothing happened.
Already in the middle of the yellow shift, the Oculus blazed brightly over the city as, for the first time in their long history, the Honour Guard gathered under in daylight.
Hooded riders came from every direction, their long lilac robes and glittering armour filled up the city's small memorial quad as they gathered in the shadow of the old memorial tower. Even when the cycles were regular, the time reckoned by old clock bore no relation to the time shifts they experienced on Rendulix. It was a weathered old anachronism that told Demosian rather than local time, and was revered by the fallen as the last symbol of their life before the war. Passing through their loosely packed ranks, the Lord Commander of the Honor Guard made his way through the murmuring crowd. For most of those assembled, their purpose was a complete mystery. The great nautilus horn had not been blown, and it was unlikely that any menks would be up and about while the Oculus was so bright in the sky.
Climbing the few steps that led to the plinth that formed the base of the old tower, Commander Aldus turned to face his brothers. Raising his gloved hands high, he settled the Guard, calling for their silence.
"Brothers…" he said, his voice softening, "lads… today is the most momentous day in the Guard's history. Not since we first came to this godsforsaken world have the Honour Guard assembled in the open," he reached up, gripping his hood firmly, and yanked it away, to collective gasps of shock and surprise from his fellow vigilantes, "and never with our faces exposed, so that all can look upon us, and know who, and what, we are."
Commander Aldus smoothed down the white hair that had been messed up by his hood, and unconsciously stroked his thick silver beard. His good eye glared defiantly over the heads of his men, picking out the handful of onlookers that had begun to gather in a rough circle at the edge of the quad.
"Ours," he spat, "should have been a noble history. We were meant for a triumphant return to the home world, the victors of a war in which we fought to preserve our way of life. Instead, we were exiled and forced to celebrate our successes in darkness, reliving the war we thought we'd won, against an enemy that grows forever stronger, while our numbers dwindle."
"Well, brothers, the time for secrecy is past. I need you to cast off these masks and face me like the Honour Guard of old. Fierce, proud, and with your faces naked to your enemies."
The crowd stirred, with many of the guard following their Commander's example, while others hesitated, uncertain of why things should suddenly be different. Raising his battle club, stained with the blood of a hundred menks, Aldus continued his address.
"These have been our weapons for as long as we can remember. Crude and simple, but not likely to run out of power nor lose their edge. These," he threw the club to the ground, "are the weapons of a skulking mob. We deserve better. I asked you to come in full regalia today, because the time has come for us to draw our swords and shoulder our rifles once more. Today, the eternal war ends."
On cue, Aldus unsheathed the keen blade strapped to his waist, and unholstered the ancient blaster that had hung, unused for many years, at his side. Most of the men had now shed their hoods, and many of them were changing weapons. Some, however, needed more than simple orders to make them follow his example.
"The Time Lords," he explained, "have returned to Rendulix. There is a carnifex among us, and he has within him the power to destroy all k'thellid who stand in his way. Even now he is being held against his will by the treacherous Abbot of Madronal who, as we speak, is returning to the mountain with the king of all menks, the K'thellid Protector."
This caused cheers and curses to be uttered in equal measure, as the last of the hoods were removed as a mixture of swords, scythes, blasters, and rifles were shaken defiantly across the quad.
"For millennia we've been waiting for the Protector to show his ugly pink face, while he's been hiding, quivering in fear while his menks have grown and grown in numbers. Well, the carnifex has drawn him out into the open where we failed, and now it's time for us to make good our most ancient oaths. The Great Accordance has to end, and with it the so-called peace between the fallen and the k'thellid."
As Aldus paused for breath, a cheer rose among the Guard. Buoyed by their support, and by the growing crowd of onlookers who also seemed to be rallying to his speech, he pressed on.
"Men," he continued, "I want you to mount up, bear arms, and join me in an attack. Not upon a handful of menks, but on the Abbot of Madronal and the K'thellid Protector himself. We outnumber them, and without their leader, the menks will be helpless, just as they were when Our Lady defeated their Great Archon. They'll be vulnerable on the mountain, and if we succeed, we can press on to the top of Mount Madronal itself, and deal with every one of the bastard man-menks we've seen there."
The Guard were well and truly spurred into action, heading for their steeds and readying themselves to ride out of the city, in the wake of their Lord Commander.
Amid the cheers and support, Aldus' pink eye shed a single tear, as a strong sense of pride swelled within him. This was his moment, and the fallen would rise up and take control on his command.
"So what was that exactly?" The Doctor asked, as Romana checked and rechecked the instrumentation. "I didn't hear the time rotor move."
"It didn't," said an exasperated Romana, "it's… frozen."
"Frozen?" Abstractly swishing his kaftan over one of his shoulders, the Doctor rose from his chair before joining Romana at the console. Behind him, like a wizened little girl, Teyamat settled into the chair, checking it for comfort before she tucked greedily into her nachos.
"Look, there's nothing you can do, Doctor. It looks like an external force has been exerted on us, in much the same way that Teyamat and the abbot diverted the TARDIS to Mount Madronal."
Romana stressed her last words, deliberately seeking the old crone's attention. Teyamat looked up from her nachos, her smile fading. "Not even we could affect a TARDIS while it's in transit," she said. "That would take the power of…"
"A god," the Doctor completed for her. "K'thannid must be doing this."
"No," said Romana. "This force isn't keeping us in temporal orbit, it's stopping us from materialising back on the planet."
"And we can't alter our coordinates mid-flight," added the Doctor. "This is the work of someone who knows how a TARDIS operates."
"It must be the Protector," said Teyamat. "He can call on the minds of every k'thellid on the planet. If it's not K'thannid, only they could generate such force."
"That covers the who," said Romana. "What about the why?"
"A delaying tactic," suggested the Doctor. "They can't keep us here indefinitely, and they know what we hope to achieve. With Gesar I'd put it down to a lack of trust, but something about the Protector bothers me…"
"Perhaps we would be better staying where we are and waiting," suggested Teyamat. "Romana's plan did seem quite risky"
"Risk and Romana don't usually sit well together," said the Doctor, pausing. "What was the plan, by the way?"
"We materialise next to Pengallia's sarcophagus, force our way inside her TARDIS interior…"
"Time-ram our way inside, you mean?"
"Not quite," said Teyamat. "Romana shares Pengallia's biodata."
"She does?"
The old woman nodded. "She can use the telepathic link to bypass its defences."
"She can?" The Doctor frowned. "It looks like you were busier than I thought, Romana. I think we need to huddle in a corner and play catch-up before we leave the TARDIS, don't you?"
"We will, Doctor," Romana assured him, "but we need to get aboard the Oculus first."
"Ah yes, the Oculus. Well, if it lies at the centre of vortex, and if we're stuck in temporal orbit, then it should be," he flicked a switch, opening the view screen and pointing, "over there."
"Filters!" Shouted Romana as a brilliant burst of golden light washed over the console room, causing her to shield her eyes as they adjusted to its intensity. With a silent oops, the Doctor adjusted the image.
"We're already inside the Well of Deep Time?" asked Teyamat, joining them in front of the view screen.
"We must be," said the Doctor. "When the Time Lords trapped the planet in a time loop, they had to close off that part of the vortex which allows a temporal orbit to be established."
"And on the periphery of the vortex, it's relatively stable," Romana added. "No violent time winds; just a gentle bit of backwash."
The Doctor grinned. "Which saves us the effort of trying to get outside just to get inside."
Romana shook her head. "It still doesn't help us get inside the Oculus."
"Oh?" Teyamat scrunched up her eyes and leaned forwards, pointing. "So what's that?"
She was indicating a tiny shadow, barely visible against a giant swirl of golden light. "Pengallia's TARDIS," said Romana excitedly, using the controls to zoom in on the object. It was large, round, and highly reflective. "The Oculus."
"As I predicted," muttered the Doctor. "What we have here is an abstract concept, quite brilliantly executed, but not without its flaws. On the outside, we have a TARDIS exterior, which has been disconnected from the TARDIS interior, and used to seal off the vortex periphery around K'thellid. At the heart of the periphery we have the TARDIS interior; the Oculus."
"And yet, elsewhere on the outside," added Romana, "we have a TARDIS interior, which also surrounds the vortex periphery, but as a means of venting excess energy from the planet. So they're both inside, and outside, the vortex."
"Exactly! I think we should call it and 'escheract', don't you?"
"I don't care what we call it, Doctor." Romana wasn't in the mood for one of the Doctor's eureka moments, especially when it had overshadowed one of her own. "I just want to know how we can get inside the Oculus."
"It's a pity that it's so far away," he muttered.
"Why," she asked dryly, "would you have tried to cross the vortex manually?"
"The vortex periphery," the Doctor corrected.
"Yes, and what about the wrath of K'thannid?"
"Ah," the Doctor paused, staring closer into the view screen. If this was the Well of Deep Time, then the shimmering golden light must be K'thannid. "Not how I remember him. We got on famously the last time we met, but you're probably right, all things considered."
"So, what do you suggest?"
"The interstat."
"The what?" Teyamat was slowly beginning to realise that both the Doctor and Romana were complete technophiles. Two and a half million years of relative simplicity was being scoured away by a few minutes of exposure to their banter.
Romana looked shocked. "The TARDIS has an interstat?"
The Doctor paused to bring the old crone up to speed. "An interstat, my dear Teyamat, is a dimensional doorway which opens onto the vortex. It's a very crude dimensional interface point, similar to a TARDIS door, but much less sophisticated. They were used as observational windows when travelling in the vortex was little more than a Prydonian pipe-dream."
"I didn't think TARDISes carried them," said Romana.
"Just a few of the early models," said the Doctor, patting the navigational console.
"Where is it?"
"In the Observatory," said the Doctor.
"You have one of those too?"
"Oh yes. I don't use very often. Scared the willies out of Sarah-Jane. Would you like to see it?"
Romana nodded. "After you, Doctor."
"That's it," smiled the Doctor as he left the control room, "follow the blind man. Did I mention it's a fair old jog? It should take just about as long as it takes you both to tell me what you've been up to while I was away."