Author's Note:

Hey-ho, Christmas Day is over, the Doctor Who Christmas Special is past, now it's time for a bit of a relax and a catch-up! I hope everyone had a very enjoyable festive season :)

Thanks very much to all those who reviewed since the last chapter was posted, you all made my Christmas a very happy place to be - GuesssWho, Aietradaea (x4), TheDoctorsMistress, MayFairy, gallifrey calls now, MountainLord-92, EmmaMarie, Beautifulspace (x 4), silentnight, irishartemis, doctordiva23, SawManiac211, TheWickedHeart, EDZEL2, Geraldine, Celestial Valkyrie, Ahsilaa, sailormajinmoon, KlinicallyInsaneKoschei, mericat (x 2), Lilyrose, Push to Shove, Rosalina, Theta'sWorstNightmare and Lost Moon.

Ok, it's 11:30pm here and I'm dying to fall into bed, so that's all my 'thankyous' for now - just know that I think you're all amazing.

And I apologise, but despite what I said at the end of the last chapter, I didn't quite get to the Otherstide Ball in this one, so please don't hate me - next time, I promise ;)

- CHAPTER TWENTY ONE -

-/-

"Where has the starlight gone?

Dark is the day.

How can I find my way home?

Home is an empty dream,

Lost to the night.

Father, I feel so alone..."

-/-

"You promised you'd be there,

Whenever I needed you.

Whenever I call your name,

You're not anywhere.

I'm trying to hold on,

Just waiting to hear your voice.

One word, just a word will do,

To end this nightmare..."

-/-

- "Endless Night", The Lion King

Theta Sigma leant against the wall in the corridor outside the Infirmary and waited, knowing that Kat would have to emerge sooner or later. He had to admit, given the filthy mood Koschei had been in when he last saw him, he fully expected it to be sooner. However, as the minutes passed by, slowly multiplying into an hour and then carrying on ticking, he began to realise that, surprisingly enough, it was actually going to be later.

What the hell is she doing in there? he asked himself, scuffing his heels against the wall in frustration. And why, out of all the people on Gallifrey, did Koschei even ask for her in the first place?

He was starting to think that the unanswered questions about the tiny Shabogan servant girl were going to drive him crazy. He'd never been able to bear an unsolved puzzle – it was one of the things that constantly got him into trouble. And despite the terrible events of the ill-fated trip to Low Town, this particular mystery was further from being solved than ever. All he seemed to have done was to somehow involve Koschei in the tangled mess.

Every now and then, a detachment of Chancellery Guard would march past, resplendent in their scarlet uniforms, every stylised step perfectly synchronised. Theta assumed they had been detailed to safeguard the Lord President's son, to prevent any further attempts on Anzor's life. However, none of the patrols bothered to look at Theta, let alone question him, even though he was loitering suspiciously outside the Infirmary door. And Kat seemed to have gained instant access to the hospital with no difficulty at all. Theta wondered if the Castellan had actually thought of posting a guard inside the Infirmary. Probably not – that would have made too much sense. Everything on Gallifrey moved so slowly. Nothing had changed for centuries. And the Guard had most likely not had to deal with a real threat in all that time. They were very skilled at parading around and looking impressive, but aside from that, he suspected they wouldn't be able to find their own asses with both hands and a map. Unless someone started jumping up and down in front of them, yelling out, "Hello! Look at me! I'm a threat!", Theta doubted they would ever make an arrest. And whoever this "ghost" was who had attacked Anzor behind his triple-deadlocked door, he was much too clever for that. If he had wanted Anzor dead, the other boy would already be dead, that much was clear. There had to be some other motivation at work.

Theta didn't really care one way or the other about the investigation into what had happened to Anzor. It had nothing to do with him, and Anzor had deserved everything he got. It didn't bother him if the perpetrator ever got caught. However, just to pass the time, he began to imagine all the things he would do differently to track down the attacker if he were Castellan. By the time the small, copper-haired figure he was waiting for finally exited the Infirmary door, the list was quite a long one.

He watched her tilt her head back and take in a long, shuddering breath with her eyes closed, as if she was trying to steady herself. Her face was pale and tear-stained and tight with some sort of turbulent, barely-controlled emotion.

"Kat!" he exclaimed.

She must have been deeply lost in her own thoughts, because she jumped at the harsh sound of his voice, her green eyes snapping open, liquid and startled.

"Lord Theta."

He strode towards her and took her by the arm. She didn't try to resist, merely looking up at him, a resigned expression on her face.

"Well? Did you see him?"

"Yes," she said. "I saw him. I stayed with him until he fell asleep."

"How was he?"

She shook her head. "How do you think? He's just found out his whole life has been a lie. It's something he's never going to get over."

Theta stared down at her, his eyes narrowed. Her tone was flat and completely certain. It wasn't as if she was guessing or making an assumption about Koschei's future. It was as if she knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, and it was killing her inside.

It was said on Gallifrey that the Shabogan witch-women, the female line descended from the ancient Pythia, still had the gift of precognition and could see the future as clearly as most other people remembered the past. Theta had always considered that to be a fairytale, like the fantastical stories children told of the Reapers or the Toclafane. The students of the Academy were taught to believe in science and technology, not in witches or mystical mumbo-jumbo. But just then, looking down into the vibrant, elfin face of the girl beside him, and hearing her speak so passionately and definitely about the life of his best friend, a high-born Time Lord she should hardly even know, still less understand so well, he had to wonder if maybe there was some truth in the old tales after all.

Not only that, now that he was paying such close attention to everything about her, the scent of her skin registered with him for the first time. His perception of it had been there all along, every time he had held her, floating like a mist in the back of his mind, but until now he hadn't actually been properly conscious of it. Breathing in, he realised she smelled like a warm summer night. He struggled to put a specific name to the fragrance, and after a few moments it finally came to him. It was honeysuckle – she smelled exactly like honeysuckle on the evening breeze.

Every Time Lord had a unique scent, he was accustomed to that. It was one of the things that helped them identify each other after the physical changes of regeneration. But he had never heard anything before about the Shabogans sharing the same trait. And it was strange, because he was sure he had smelled that particular scent before, only not with her, with someone else.

He thought hard, pushing himself to remember, somehow knowing it was important. The scent he recalled had been similar and yet quite different. More restrained, more ladylike. Not as sweet, not as wild, not as untamed. The subtle but distinct difference between the perfume of a cultivated hothouse flower and the scent of a beautiful bloom found growing freely and naturally in the woods. It wasn't something he had smelt often, he was sure, so it wasn't someone he knew well. Just once or twice, just enough to tease the edges of his memory.

Where had it been? Where had he smelled that fragrance before?

And as he concentrated, a face rose up in his mind, a face which went with the smell, and he stiffened in shock.

Melanakaturadilena of the House of Firestone. The woman he had reluctantly promised to marry, against every one of his own inclinations. A woman he hardly knew well enough to greet in the street. And yet, just from the few times he had met her, he would swear that her skin smelled similar enough to Kat's that they could have been sisters.

His agile brain seized on the thought and processed it rapidly. Was that the secret to Kat's strangeness? Could it be that one of Melana's male relatives had taken a leaf from Lord Oakdown's book and had also taken to wading in the Shabogan gene pool? Was Kat, like the bastard Kelios, nothing more than a half-breed; part witch-woman, part Time Lord?

But that didn't make sense either. Kat had spoken to him of her father several times, indicating that the man was still very much alive. Whereas all of Melana's male relatives, including her father, were supposedly dead, thereby leaving her House without masculine protection or guidance. That was one of the reasons her family, particularly her mother, were so keen for her to marry early, even into a House of such limited political prominence as the House of Lungbarrow. The situation had always reminded him of that old Earth saying he had discovered in his extra-curricular reading – 'beggars can't be choosers'. No, it could only be a coincidence that the scent of Kat's skin reminded him so much of his unwanted wife-to-be. A strange coincidence, to be sure, but a coincidence nonetheless.

Something of his rapidly-churning thoughts must have shown on his face, for at that moment she shifted uneasily and broke away from him.

"I have to go, Lord Theta. There are Time Lord floors that need scrubbing, Time Lord beds that need making and Time Lord meals that need preparing," she told him sullenly, starting to walk back up the passageway towards the main Academy buildings.

Her delivery of the line was perfect, resentment and discontent at her station in life evident in every nuance of her tone, just as he would have expected from a truculent Shabogan servant. Nonetheless, something about the words coming from her lips struck him as false and contradictory.

"Kat!" he called sharply.

She paused and turned back towards him, her expression wary. "What?"

"When I was in Low Town this morning, I noticed a sculpture in the main square. It was quite large, I couldn't miss it. Why don't you tell me what it was?"

She scowled defensively, her arms crossed. "Why would I need to do that? You were there, my Lord, you saw it. You must know yourself what it was."

He stepped closer to her. "Oh, yes, I know well enough what it was," he said. "But what I'm wondering is whether you do. After all, you're a native of Low Town, right? You grew up there. There's no way you wouldn't know something as prominent as the sculpture in the main square. So why don't you tell me what it is?"

She didn't reply, but she didn't need to. She had no idea what he was talking about. The ignorance was in her eyes, the haughty green depths flaring with barely-restrained temper.

"You can't, can you?" he said. "You can't, because whoever...whatever...you are, you've never set foot in Low Town in your life. Just for future reference, the sculpture is a very realistic representation of a Time Lord standing on a Shabogan worker's back, hands on hips, arrogantly grinding him into the dirt. The message was very clear, one which every Shabogan in Low Town would not only know, but would probably agree with, from what I saw. But you're no more a Shabogan than I am, are you, Kat?"

"I don't have time for this!" she snapped, turning away again. "I told you, I have work to do!"

Anger flared in his veins at her impenetrable stubbornness. Determined to pin her down, he swivelled around, deftly blocking her path so she couldn't get past. "The trip to Low Town was my idea. What happened to Koschei, my best friend, was my fault. Don't you think I deserve some answers? Some sort of explanation?"

She drew herself up to her full, tiny height and glared at him. "Why? I told you about the crack, but I didn't ask you to concern yourself with my personal business! And it wasn't your fault, so you needn't go on thinking it was! It had to happen that way. If it hadn't, Kelios would have made sure Koschei found out some other way, that's just the sort of creep he is. In the long run, the result would always have been the same. Some things you just can't change."

"And what about you? Was any of it real?" he demanded. "That whole sob-story about your father? About your baby? Or was that all a pack of lies to win my trust?"

"It was all real, every last bit of it. Everything I told you!" Her eyes glistened with pain and hostility as she faced him down, not giving an inch. "I never said I was a Shabogan. I never said I came from Low Town. You just assumed that all on your own."

"Then, for the last time, tell me, Kat – who are you?"

She opened her mouth to reply. But right then, a frantic 'dinging' noise began to echo from his pocket, cutting across the moment, and she froze. Cursing, Theta scrabbled around inside his tunic, searching for the rhondium sensor, torn by conflicting emotions. On the one hand, he was furious at the interruption. But on the other, he was intrigued to see what new information the device had to offer. Pulling it out, he realised the red warning light was flashing on and off.

Kat's eyes widened at the sight of the small contraption. "A timey-wimey detector!" she breathed in delight. "You've managed to build one! Oh, Theta, that's brilliant! It's just what we need to detect when the next crack is about to appear!" She stretched her hand out to him. "May I see it, please?"

He held it out of her reach, astonishment surging through him. "You know what a timey-wimey detector is? But Drax only just invented it."

Her gaze met his and, all at once, it was as though a mask had fallen away, and he could see her clearly at last. The gentle, vulnerable, bewildered servant girl he had tried so hard to protect had disappeared. In her place was a woman with hard, alert eyes who knew exactly what she was doing and could look after herself.

"Yes, I know about it. My father taught me to make one when I was five years old. Listen to me, Theta. There's no point me pretending any more. You're right, I don't belong here. But I can't tell you any more about who or what I am, not without irretrievably damaging the casual nexus. All that you need to know is that I'm a traveller and that, right now, I'm very, very lost. And all I want to do is to find my way back where I came from. I'm asking you for your help."

"A traveller?" he echoed, staring at her as if he had never seen her before, trying to wrap his mind around the implications of what she was telling him. She came from somewhere else...somewhere out there, in the vast realms of time and space, somewhere far beyond the stifling confines of Gallifrey.

A traveller... He caught his breath, both his hearts leaping in excitement and longing at the thought. The one thing he had always dreamed of becoming, to fulfil his greatest desire, to see the stars. Where had she come from, this tiny alien girl? What worlds had she visited? What incredible wonders had those bright green eyes seen? His brain teemed with eager questions he knew she couldn't – or wouldn't – answer. And at the same time, there came the stark realisation of the appalling danger she was in. "Outsiders aren't allowed on Gallifrey. If the Time Lords find out you're here..."

"I know."

"How did you even get here? The transduction barrier..."

"I fell through the crack – the same crack I told you about, in the servant's passageway," she said. "It's not easy to explain, but I think there's been some sort of terrible temporal explosion in the future and now a network of interconnected cracks are reaching backwards through time. If they get big enough, there's a real possibility they may erase the entire space-time continuum. I need to get back there, to try to stop it happening."

Theta frowned. "And how are you planning to do that?"

Her expression was bleak. "By jumping back into another crack."

"Are you insane?" he exclaimed incredulously, unable to believe his ears. "Even if all the cracks are connected, like you say, you have no idea where you'll end up. And that's only if you don't get wiped out of existence by the Time-fire first!"

"I have a...friend. He has the ability to negotiate his way through the cracks, once he's inside. I'm hoping to persuade him to come with me, to guide me safely back home."

"And if he won't? If he won't take the risk?"

"If he won't..." She hesitated, sadness filling her face. There was loss there, Theta could see it, terrible, haunting loss. She looked so young, but in that moment, he knew she wasn't at all, and he wondered how he hadn't seen it before. "If he won't, then whatever happens will happen. But, either way, I can't stay here. I've already caused too much damage and nothing good can ever come of it. Seeing Koschei just now proved that to me. So, for better or for worse, jumping into that crack is the only thing left for me to do." She held her hand out to him once again. "So, please, Theta, I'm begging you...let me have the rhondium sensor."

Slowly, reluctantly, he placed Drax's invention in the centre of her palm. She closed her fingers gratefully around it. "Thank you."

Immediately, she began to disassemble the device, deftly disconnecting and tweaking some of the wiring.

"Hang on a minute! What are you doing?" Theta protested. "Drax and I spent hours building that!"

"You forgot to align the quantum sensors," she responded in a curt, preoccupied voice as she continued to work. "This way, we can use the contrasting data streams to triangulate the exact position and timing of the next crack."

As soon as she said it, he realised how logical her solution was. "That's brilliant! Why didn't we think of that?"

"I learned from the best." She glanced up and gave him a faint smile. "I hope I'll never stop learning from him."

"Your father?"

"Yes, my father. Who, for all his faults, will always be the most wonderful, amazing man in the the entire Universe...at least to me."

Despite everything he had discovered about her, the inexplicable tenderness he had felt towards her from the beginning swept over him again. The emotion in her face was so strong, he couldn't stop himself from reaching out to her and brushing his fingers across her cheek. "I wish I could meet him. Then maybe I could tell him that he has a wonderful, amazing, and very brave daughter."

She gave a small, choked, ironic laugh, which sounded a bit like an amused hiccup. "Who knows, Theta Sigma? Maybe one day, you will."

The rhondium sensor gave another quiet 'ding' and they both looked down at the readings.

"Well?" Theta asked.

"According to this, the crack will manifest in the Adytum."

"The Adytum?"

She grimaced in distaste. "It's an ancient crypt, dating back to the Old Times, located directly below the Records Room. Not the nicest of places."

"You sound like you've been there before."

"I have," she answered briefly, with no further explanation. Theta sighed inwardly, doing his best to contain his curiosity. It was apparent she intended to maintain her veil of secrecy, no matter how hard he pressed her.

"Have you been able to determine when it's due?"

She nodded, her eyes fixed on the scrolling data. "Tomorrow, in the evening."

"Tomorrow? But that's Otherstide."

Unexpectedly, she started to laugh - a musical, silvery sound. "And the crack is due at midnight. Oh, that's funny! I'll have to make sure I leave the Ball by the time the clock strikes twelve, before everything turns back into a pumpkin. How very appropriate!"

Theta wrinkled his brow in confusion, not getting the joke. "A pumpkin? What's a pumpkin?" He'd never even heard the word before.

"Never mind, it doesn't matter," she responded, the laughter draining from her face, to be replaced by extreme weariness. "The point is, I need to be in the Adytum when that crack opens. It's my only chance."

"You will be, I promise," he assured her. "And I'll be there with you. It'll be all right, Kat, I know it will."

"You know, when you say it like that, I almost believe you," she said wistfully.

"Trust me!" he winked. "I'm Theta Sigma!"

To his surprise, she began to laugh again. "That catch phrase needs a bit of work!" she giggled. "But never mind, I know you'll get there eventually!"

She closed her hand around the gently-vibrating rhondium sensor, before slipping it deep into the pocket of her dress. "And now, I really do have to go, because if Fionnula catches me being late, I won't live long enough to see Otherstide. But, if you don't mind, I'll hang on to the timey-wimey detector for now." She rose up on tiptoe and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you, Theta...for more than you'll ever know. I'll see you later."

Moving away from him, she began to hurry up the corridor, leaving him staring after her.

"Kat!" he said urgently, unable to resist calling her back one last time.

She glanced over her shoulder at him. "Yes?"

"Don't use the timey-wimey detector anywhere near chickens."

Her face lit up in a mischievous grin. "'Cos it's not pretty when they blow!" she responded. "Yeah, I know."

And, with that, she disappeared up the corridor and was gone.

The polar bear growled savagely as it towered over the small group of people, its eyes fixed hungrily on them, drool slavering from its mouth.

Little Amelia screamed in terror. Amy grabbed her by the shoulders and stood protectively in front of her. "Doctor!" she yelled. "That thing thinks we're lunch!"

The Doctor looked around frantically, trying to see a way out. But there wasn't one. They were trapped. Even if there was somewhere to run, the bear was too fast – it would catch them before they'd even gone five steps.

Hart didn't hesitate, training his sonic blaster on the rearing monster. A blaze of blue light cut through the dim air, striking the bear squarely on the chest. The creature roared in agony, before falling back down on to all fours. Enraged by the pain, it still kept coming, loping towards them, its massive head thrashing back and forth as it gnashed its teeth, determined to reach them. Again, Hart fired, and again, until at last, too injured to stand, the bear crashed heavily into the floor.

For a few moments, there was nothing but silence. The bear's paws twitched helplessly and then it lay still.

"Is it dead?" Amy asked in a low voice, still holding Amelia behind her.

Cautiously, the Doctor approached the fallen animal, one slow step at a time, while Hart kept his gun aimed at it, in case it tried to attack again. However, it remained completely motionless, its wide open eyes already glazing over.

"Yes, it's dead," the Doctor replied bitterly, stroking his hand across the soft, white fur on the bear's head. He had seen too many things die in his time to ever enjoy seeing it happen, especially to a poor, dumb animal that never stood a chance. "That tends to happen when you shoot something often enough."

He glared at Hart, who merely shrugged. "It was him or us, Doc. What did you want me to do?"

"You could have stunned it!"

"The stun function takes twice as much energy," Hart said practically. "The batteries are already low. I couldn't afford to waste the juice."

"Will it stay dead now?" little Amelia asked, staring at the animal's bulky corpse. "Because it didn't before."

The Doctor frowned in puzzlement. Turning around to her, he knelt down, so that his head was on her level and he could look into her face. "What do you mean, before, Amelia?"

"It was in there," she said, pointing towards the doors to the long gallery, the direction the bear had come from. "So were the penguins. But they were all dead. I even knocked one over and it didn't move."

"Are you trying to tell me these animals were exhibits in the museum?"

She nodded emphatically. "Aunt Sharon always said there was nothing to be scared of in a museum, because everything was already dead. But now they're all coming alive again. How can that happen?"

"That, Amelia Pond, is a very good question!" the Doctor said, just as a low, rabid snarl vibrated from the shadows and something dark leapt out at him.

A heavy weight smashed violently into him and he tumbled backwards, his hands automatically coming up to hold the thing away from his throat. He could hear Hart shouting "Doc!", followed by a confused impression of pale amber animal eyes; brownish-grey fur; strong, snapping jaws and foul, fetid breath. Again, the sonic blaster whined, and he felt his hairy assailant collapse limply on top of him, almost crushing his ribcage.

Then Hart's face appeared above him and the huge, hairy body that was pinning him down was pulled away and tossed unceremoniously aside. Reaching down, Hart seized him by the shirt-front and hauled him upright.

"Wolf," he gasped, wheezing as he tried to drag some air into his lungs. "Canis lupus. North American timber wolf."

Yellow eyes blinked at them through the gloom, accompanied by a chorus of low, vicious snarling. In the distance, there was a spine-chilling howl. Automatically, the Doctor and Hart began to back away, retreating towards the spot where Amy and Amelia stood together.

"There are more of them," Hart said. "They're all around us. We need to use the vortex manipulators to get out of here!"

"And go where?" the Doctor snapped. "Isn't anyone listening to me today? The Universe is collapsing and we're running out of time!"

"So, what then? We just sit here and get eaten by a bunch of mangy dogs? I can pick them off one at a time, but if they rush us, we're done for!"

"Just keep moving," the Doctor said, taking Amy and Amelia each by the hand and pulling them rapidly backwards towards a display alcove behind the Pandorica. "Come along, Ponds!"

Swearing under his breath, Hart covered their retreat, periodically firing searing blasts of blue light into the darkness. In the dim light, it was difficult to see what, if anything, he hit. However, going by the subsequent howls behind them, the Doctor assumed that he was making each shot count.

"What exactly are we doing?" Amy demanded, as the three of them ended up huddled together in the middle of a tableau representing North Africa. The Doctor's elbow jostled a mannequin wearing a flowing djellaba and a red, tasselled fez, accidentally knocking the fez to the ground. Leaning down, he picked it up, wondering if there had been any animals in the North African display and, if so, what they were and, more importantly, where they were now.

"Running into a dead end," he replied shortly. "Where I'll have a brilliant plan that basically involves not being in one."

Plonking the fez on to his own head, he searched through his pockets and pulled out his sonic screwdriver.

"What good's that going to do?" Amy asked. "It's not a weapon."

"Not in the traditional sense, no. But if I can adjust the frequency to the right setting..."

As he spoke, a shrill, ululating noise screamed through the air, radiating in increasing volume from the screwdriver. Amy and Amelia clapped their hands over their ears in pain and, at the entrance to the alcove, Hart yelled in protest.

"Oops, sorry, that wasn't it!" the Doctor muttered, rapidly changing the combination of controls.

This time there was no discernible sound. But almost immediately, there was a deafening chorus of yelps, followed by a burst of agonised howling, which gradually faded into the depths of the silent museum.

"They're running away!" Hart reported triumphantly, turning back towards them.

"Canine ears are very susceptible to high-pitched noises, well beyond human – or even Time Lord – hearing," the Doctor said. "It was just a matter of finding a ultrasonic sound level on the screwdriver that was painful enough to make them run."

Hart nodded. "Nice trick, Doc. Just in time, too – the blaster energy is down to residual levels. Maybe you're not such a waste of space after all. But it won't keep them away for long. If they're hungry enough, they'll be back."

"But how can this even be happening?" Amy asked. "Stuffed animals don't just come back to life, it's impossible!"

The Doctor moved up to the alcove entrance beside Hart and stared out at the enormous grey cube, his brain racing.

"It's the Pandorica," he said. "That's got to be it. The light inside is actually a restoration field, intended to prevent the prisoners held inside it ever dying. It causes localised temporal reversal, restoring both people and objects to their natural state. Somehow, when the Pandorica was opened, the light must have fallen on all these animals and brought them back to life."

"Yeah, 'somehow' is about right," Hart replied sceptically. "If the kid's telling the truth, they were all part of displays in the next room. So unless your restoration field can peep around corners, how the hell did it reach them?"

The Doctor didn't appear to be listening. His attention was riveted firmly on something leaning against the side of the Pandorica. A big, square, flat something. Walking over to it, he picked it up, grunting a little at the weight, and turned it over. A silvered surface glimmered back at him in the dim light, revealing the indistinct outline of his own face. "A mirror."

Hart gave him an irritated look. "So?"

"So, if you look carefully, you'll notice there's another one over by the doorway," the Doctor said, pointing out a second square shape, leaning against the far wall. "Somebody used them to reflect the light from the open doors of the Pandorica, to channel it where they wanted it to go. Somebody who knew exactly what it would do."

Sudden horrified understanding dawned in Hart's face. "Which means..."

Together, the two men swung around to stare at Amy and Amelia, both of whom gazed back at them calmly and blankly, their eyes empty and unconcerned, as if they had no comprehension of what was going on.

"Oh shit!" Hart exclaimed.

Then they were both running, side by side, around to the front of the Pandorica. Hart was already activating the controls on his wrist-strap, sending the circular locks spinning, whirring and clanking as they disengaged. Once again, a sliver of bright light spilled into the room. Immediately, the Doctor used his screwdriver to stop the doors sliding completely open, preventing the restoration field enveloping the corpses of any of the creatures Hart had shot. On top of everything else, the last thing they needed were the dead wolves coming back to life again.

Blinking against the glaring illumination, they peered through the gap inside the box. Two empty chairs sat there, their restraints dangling uselessly.

"Just as I thought. He's gone!" the Doctor said grimly.

At that moment, there was a wave of static and the PA system stuttered into life. A burst of very familiar laughter echoed manically around the room. "Are you having fun yet, Doctor? Because I am. Oh, but don't worry, I won't let you get bored. The best is yet to come."

More taunting laughter poured forth and then the speakers clicked off.

The Doctor spun around to the two girls. "Amelia, what else was in that room?"

"I..." the child stammered. "I don't know. I can't remember."

"This is very important, Amelia. I need you to think hard!"

She scowled, her little face a picture of concentration. "Well...there were those robot things. I didn't like them. They scared me."

The Doctor froze. "What robot things?"

She raised a trembling hand and pointed behind him. "Those ones."

Slowly, deliberately, he turned, knowing from the cold feeling in the pit of his stomach precisely what he was going to see.

Three Daleks glided effortlessly through the doorway, their eyestalks swivelling back and forth, their weapons rising aggressively.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE! EX-TER-MIN-ATE!"

Another Author's Note: If anyone is wondering about Tejana's earlier visit to the Adytum on Gallifrey, it's a reference to Chapter 9 of "A Deadly Assassin".