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Chris knelt down by the side of the mouth. ‘Do you know what’s causing it?’

The lips let out another cough. Longer, this time, more rasping. Chris had seen simcords of human soldiers dying of metacarcinogens that ate away the lungs, and their death–

rattles weren’t nearly as bad. ‘Someone. Listen. Please.

Someone on Earth. Using the. The chaos. To remake the world.’

Interface’s voice had changed, Chris noted. Despite the fractured sentences, there was a pleading quality to it that seemed almost human. ‘Someone on Earth? You mean a human being’s doing all this?’

‘Hu. Human. But. Somebody. Somebody else controlling.

Controlling him Very old. Very old. Mani. Mani. Manip.’

‘Manipulating him?’ Chris was nodding like a mad thing, trying to remember all the details. ‘Like some evil meta-dimensional force or something? Like an old enemy of the Doctor’s?’

Marielle was looking at him strangely again.

‘Nnnn. No. Old. Older. Than Doctor.’

‘Who? Who’s responsible?’ demanded Chris.

‘Ca,’ said Interface.

‘Ca,’ it tried again.

‘ Ca,’ it screeched.

Then the corner turned to dust, the mouth’s lips disintegrating, white marble flecks cascading down the wall.

‘Damn,’ said Chris.

Marielle looked irritated. She was almost cute like that.

‘Did that mean anything to you?’ she asked.

‘Not a lot. We’ve got some clues, but we still don’t know what’s happening to the ship.’ Chris shrugged, and stood.

‘Still, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.’

Marielle looked blank.

‘It’s an expression,’ Chris explained.

‘Oh,’ said Marielle.

‘Of course, this is all my fault,’ the man in the white suit said cheerily.

Beth-Ann Wolcott hardly knew what to say. ‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes. Of course, blame is as relative as time itself. You could say that the creator of the universe was at fault for starting off the whole process. However, the creator of the universe never really understood the concept of responsibility, and seldom acknowledges complaints.’ He twiddled his walking-cane thoughtfully.

‘I see.’

‘Consequences. You never know what you’ve started.’ He looked out of the alleyway, watched the masked men run past on Paris Street. ‘It’s the bloodlines that worry me the most. I may have affected my companions more deeply than I like to admit. Genetically. Bernice’s children will be born with a little piece of Time Lord in them.’

He smiled sheepishly. ‘Not that you should take that too literally, of course.’

‘Well, no. Of course not.’

‘Timothy Dean would have introduced almost unthinkable quantities of Time Lord DNA to the human species.

Christopher must have planted several family trees by now.

Ancelyn may have spread innate abilities throughout mankind that aren’t even supposed to be possible in this universe. And then there was Jo. Poor Jo. I sometimes wonder if her dynasty ever... well, too late to worry now. Eleven-thirty already. Half an hour until Christmas Day, and we can all open our presents.’ He straightened his jacket, slung the cane over his shoulder, and stepped out into the rain. ‘Things to do.

Amaranths to locate. People to see about dogs.’

‘Wait!’ Beth-Ann Wolcott called.

The man stopped, turned, and gave her a quizzical look.

‘You just saved my life,’ she said.

‘Yes. They were going to burn you as a witch, you know.

That’s rationalism for you. Sometimes, even I don’t feel ready for life on this planet.’ He licked a finger, held it up, thought for a moment.

‘This way, I think,’ he said. And then he was gone.

The basement could almost have been alive. Stepping into it, there was an unaccountable feeling of familiarity, as if Catcher had been in a place like this before; a room where the walls seemed to expand and contract as if they were breathing, where the passages were filled with strange and hateful organic sounds. Even the dais looked more like a growth than a construction, something sick and fungal and cankerous.

And the Watchmakers were there, lurking in the labyrinth, waiting