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Shonnzi tried to scramble away across the floor, but Vael kicked him back again.

"Process. It's me. Vael Phazel. Look, I brought you something."

The Process made a gurgling sound somewhere in its throat, a throat that extended from one footmouth to the other. Its clawed fins scrabbled at the girders and struts to find a hold. Once its free foot had found a grip on a jutting plate, the other foot released its hold and arched over to stare at them. The plate lowered its whirring way to the ledge.

Vael stood his ground as the Process completed a graceful cartwheel towards them. The ledge shuddered with the extra weight. The creature's body had a sheen of slime on it, green against the ruddy brown of its hide. For its size, it exuded a sickening vigour in its movements.

"It's Shonnzi Phazel," said Vael. "I swore to you I'd find him."

The Process swung its head in close towards Shonnzi. He choked in terror. This was the nightmare he had woken from regularly since the Beginning. It had found a way out of his head back into reality. The ring of beady black eyes and the circle of serrated teeth around its cratered mouth. But the dream had no rotting stench.

Its mouth contorted grotesquely as it struggled to form words unnatural to its shape. The sound was a dry strangulated croak like scraping iron. "The Doctor, the Process destroys him in the Beginning. The stolen Future, where is it now?"

Shonnzi's voice dried. The words cracked in his throat. Even his scream was locked inside, echoing around his thought-emptied head.

"Now disrupts!" spluttered the Process. Its head swung towards Vael and back to Shonnzi again. "The stolen Future, find it now!"

"He can help me," said Vael. "We'll both find the Future for you.

"Shonnzi Phazel stays. The disruption, it finishes."

Shonnzi shot a glance at Vael. "You can't leave me here! Not with that thing!"

But Vael was already bowing low to the monster. "You're right, of course. With Shonnzi here, there'll be no more disturbance to Time's patterns in the City. Now do you believe that I can serve you?" He bent towards Shonnzi and gave his head the slightest shake.

It meant: "Don't mention the girl. It doesn't know." Shonnzi didn't have to read thoughts to know that.

"Disturbance in City's First Phase! The source, find it!" the Process instructed.

"Thank you," Vael said. He turned to leave, some of his swagger coming back. Shonnzi watched him freeze on the edge, framed against the clacking mechanisms of the Tower walls. The platform that had raised them to this level was gone. From below, other metal platforms were rising around the ledge. Guards were positioned on them, waiting as his escort.

He turned back with a frozen smile. His head ticked. "I work better on my own. And quicker too."

"Guards ensure no delay," was the croaked response.

Vael was going to argue, but the insect-heads began to chitter angrily.

"Time, it is disturbed from Beginning," the Process continued. "The City's first Phase. Search it now!"

"There is only Now," retorted Vael, but the Guard Captain stepped in close beside him. Its movements jerked like a reluctant puppet.

Shonnzi caught the anger on Vael's face as he stepped out on to the Captain's platform. The new search party sank below the ledge and were gone.

The Process hissed hungrily as it turned its attention back to its other prisoner.

He knew what it wanted. Terrified as he was, all Shonnzi would stutter was, "I won't tell you. I won't tell you."

Pekkary leant forward in the striped deckchair. "You were with the Doctor, weren't you?" he accused.

Ace was clinging desperately to the arm of the sofa. They kept telling her that the Doctor was dead. But she knew otherwise, didn't she?

"All right, so I was with him. What does it matter now, if he's dead like you say?"

"He trapped us here," Amnoni added from the other half of the sofa.

"No," said Ace. "It's not true. The TARDIS was attacked as well." She didn't like the way Reogus was standing behind her. And Chesperl,