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By Root 342 0

the space was devoid of furniture, save for a single workbench. The guard threw Ace to the floor at the foot of this bench. It was about eight feet in length, and very heavy. On its surface, at each corner, was a leather strap and buckle. Another leather strap, along the side of the bench, helda series of viciouslooking wooden canes in a row. The top and sides of the bench were flecked with crusty, reddishbrown stains. The room smelled of raw meat. 'When this complex was in civilian hands it was a scientific and industrial research facility,' said Hartmann. 'This area was used to test the resilience of materials and chemical compounds. I understand they used to conduct some quite extreme experiments here. We use it to test the resilience of human flesh. Our experiments are no less extreme. Ace felt her breathing quicken. She was shaking.

Her mouth was dry, her mind empty.

'Suddenly you have nothing to say,' Hartmann smirked.

He ran his forefinger lightly across Ace's cheek. She flinched.

'That will change.'

He nodded in the direction of the far wall. The guard dragged Ace towards three doors in a row, all metal, all green. She didn't struggle. She was numb with fear. The anonymity of the concrete expanse, of the officiallooking doors, somehow exacerbated her fear. The central door was pushed open and she was thrown through it.

***

The room Ace found herself in was small, empty, and dim.

She huddled herself into an uncomfortable corner, knees drawn up to her chin, rocking slightly, struggling to fight back tears.

Where was the Doctor?

She thought of all they had been through together. She thought of the Cybermen. Daleks. Dangerous enemies: dangerous times. Somehow it had all been a game compared with this. Hitler. Real Nazis this time.

They mustn't win. The Earth would become a hell. She would tell them nothing. She would give them no clue to the future. Why hadn't she listened to the Doctor? Why had she brought her Walkman with her, in spite of his many lectures?

They would take her out, strap her to the bench and beat her until she told them everything she knew.

She would tell them nothing. They would flay her back with their birches. They would probably kill her.

Her thoughts bounced and echoed around the tiny room.

She had to stop this. She would drive herself mad this way.

This was what they wanted. This was why Hartmann had placed her here to wait.

Her eyes were becoming accustomed to the weak light filtering through the glass in the door. She began looking around her, minutely scrutinising the walls, anything to take her mind off the area outside the door. The bench.

There was some writing on the wall, low down, close to her head. Indelible pencil. 'This used to be my office,' it said.

'Now it is my cell. Tomorrow they will come for me. Jacques Millais. Engineer. Remember me. Pray for me.'

There were other messages. Different hands. Different tones of voice: some defiant, some pitiful, some merely names, written, it seemed, with the last reserves of their owners' strength. All desperate not to be forgotten. A memorial wall. It reminded Ace of the memorials that would go up after this most hideous of wars was over. Walls commemorating the millions who would die in battle, the millions who would be murdered in the death factories.

She was going to be one of them. One of the millions to die in a holocaust that happened thirtyodd years before she was born. And she wouldn't be forgotten either. She scrabbled around in the pockets of her jacket for a pen, a pencil, anything. If only she had managed to hang on to her rucksack.

No pen. She fished out a bunch of keys. The keys to her mother's flat in Perivale. She laughed bitterly to herself. The flat hadn't even been built yet.

They would have to do. The surface of the wall was only plaster. She would scratch her last words into it. What to write? Somehow 'Ace woz 'ere' didn't seem appropriate.

What was it the Doctor used to say to her? She struggled to recompose the words in her head. 'There is always evil to be fought. Evil thrives on neglect.