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The Doctor raised an eyebrow. 'Listening to me? That would make a change . . . '

`That's not fair,' said Cat through a mouthful of crumbs. 'I always listen! I don't always do what you say, but I always listen:

`And what did I say this time?'

`Let's see . . . That the W ierdarbi were a warlike and vicious breed of giant insects, adapted with artificial parts by an unknown alien intelligence; that they were probably not going to be very happy about us stealing some of their precious horde of mercury; and that we should be very careful.'

`Exactly! So which bit of that did you fail you understand?'

`Hey! I took precautions!'

`Yes . . . ' The Doctor frowned. 'Small, cybernetic precautions. I suppose it would be too much to ask where you got them from?'

Cat looked sheepish. 'Your workshop . . . '

`Ah, you stole . . . '

`Borrowed!'

`They were prototypes!'

`So I field tested them for you!' Cat grinned. 'I thought they worked pretty well.'

The Doctor gave a deep sigh. 'You're incorrigible.'

`And beautiful and intelligent and witty . . . ' Cat stretched out on the chaise longue, rummaging in her jacket pocket. 'And in recognition of the help I've given you in repairing the fluid link, you can let me have a cigarette.'

`I thought you agreed not to smoke in the TARDIS . . . '

`And I thought you said that I could if I'd been good!'

`W ell, Catherine, you haven't been good,' the Doctor snapped. 'You seem to have forgotten something.'

`W hat?' Cat was crestfallen.

`My Gladstone bag!' wailed the Doctor. 'Have you any idea how hard they are to come by?'

`It was old and tatty . . . '

`It had character!'

`It had moths!'

`I'd had it for centuries. It was given to me by . . . well, Gladstone actually.'

`Then you were long overdue for a new one!' Cat slid off the chaise longue and hopped up onto the control dais next to the Doctor. 'Is this thing working properly now?'

`Of course it is said the Doctor defensively.

`Good,' said Cat. 'It's time we went shopping!'

The market square of Braak was a riot of colour and noise. Street traders meandered through the crowds, waving their goods under the noses of anyone and everyone; children raced through the tangle of stalls, pushing close to the hastily erected pens and corrals to pat the muzzles of the pa-arteks and young kreekgs destined for the auctions.

Philippo tutted angrily at the chattering crowd of youngsters that clustered in front of his stall. He didn't like children at the market. They cluttered the streets, they brought no money and they stopped people getting easy access to his goods.

He waved angrily at them, cursing in his native tongue. The children scattered, shouting playground insults. Philippo sighed. He didn't like being out in the middle of the market. It was too close to the pa-artek pens, the smell of the animals masking the delicate aroma of his freshly roasted plegan beans. He preferred his old spot, over by the city wall, next to the cathedral, but until the repairs were finished, he had to make do.

He craned his neck back, staring up at the spire of the cathedral. Through the tangle of scaffolding and bracing, the scar through the stone was still visible. The noise from the chisels of the stonemasons rang out across the square. It had been sixteen months since the shuttlecraft of the off-worlders had all but demolished the west wing of the cathedral. Sixteen months since the Devil-box .. .

Philippo felt goose bumps run down his spine. Like all the people of Braak, he still had nightmares about the day that the Devil-box had arrived, could still feel the pain tearing through his mind, could still hear the screams . . . He felt a wave of anger. This had been a good place before the off-worlders had come with their machines and their technology; now it was a world haunted by memories of howling winds and flaring lightning, a place where the victims of that terrible day still shambled through the streets, their minds wiped clean, their bodies changed.

Philippo crossed himself.