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Felbaac carried on.'It's ridiculous. You couldn't have come from the control centre. No one can steer through the time fields without the authorised coordinate codes.'

Sam's head hurt. She was fed up with this bloke's attitude. 'Well, you got here, didn't you? Maybe I got them from the same place you did.'

'Vost? You mean you -'

'Shut up, Tanhith!' snapped Felbaac.'You idiot! We could've found out if she was telling the truth if she'd told us herself!'

'Well, actually I didn't.' Both men stared at her. 'He was long gone by the time I arrived. Missing, believed dead. I think.'

Felbaac and Tanhith looked at each other.

Sam continued.'I was sent down here through some kind of matter-transmission device, I think. Judging by its size, it's not meant for people.

Didn't stop some psycho having a pop, though.'

'She's gibbering,'said Felbaac.'It's the heat.'

'It's the truth,' snapped Sam.

Felbaac continued to stare at Tanhith. 'Come outside,' he ordered, moving to the door. Tanhith shrugged at Sam, and followed him out into the oppressive heat of the day.

Sam looked at the door as it closed. She rubbed her burning eyes, wincing as the dizziness returned with a wave of nausea. Then the clanking of a chain being wrapped around the handle filled the air.'Surprise, surprise,'

she muttered.

***

'She's not going anywhere. Where can she go?' protested Tanhith as Felbaac finished coiling the heavy chain round the door handle.'Everyone's a prisoner here, remember?'

'So Yost's gone. He'd have wanted to get away, I imagine.'

'What are you talking about?' asked Tanhith.

Felbaac looked at him. 'Do you really think she came down via a matter transmitter? What was she doing there on Vest's base anyway?'

'Well, perhaps we should try asking her. If you don't believe her story, why do you believe Vost isn't there any more?' Tanhith followed his leader's example and ploughed on without waiting for an answer. 'We know aliens made Hirath the way it is. Maybe she's one of them.'

Felbaac said nothing. 'I wonder if she knows how to get back from here?

The safe path?'

"That wasn't much of a safe path,' retorted Tanhith. "Those coordinates were constantly fluctuating.'

'Vost warned us it was a hazardous route without the very latest updates.

He did his best for us.' Felbaac smiled, grimly. 'Maybe your piloting just wasn't up to following them.'

The memories sat heavily in Tanhith's mind once again, distracting him. He tried to concentrate.'I... I got us down alive, didn't I? When half the thrusters aged to dust, I still gave us a landing.'

'And I'm grateful, Tanhith,' smiled Felbaac, smoothly, looking over the other man's shoulder.'Now here comes Yast. Perhaps he'll have news for us on the repairs' progress.'

The diminutive man bustled over, wringing his hands. 'The latest batch of circuits don't patch in either,' he whined, apologetically. 'Even the brightest here are employing methodology we outgrew twenty years ago.' He looked down at the red dust swirling round his boots. 'That ship's not taking off again.'

Tanhith smiled grimly to himself and glanced at Felbaac, whose face was impassive. Then Yast began twittering again.

'And the men here, Felbaac. They seem to be working themselves up about the sun. They think it's all down to the alien in there.' He gestured with distaste at the chained-up outhouse.

'What do they think is down to her?' demanded Tanhith.

'I told you, the sun.'Yast blinked at them. 'They say it's stopped moving.'

***

'It's no use,' said the Doctor, wiping his hands on his trousers. "This machine has lost the will to live.' He looked over at Vasid, who had connected the black box from Vest's quarters to a small monitor screen and a data disk loader borrowed from Anstaar's quarters.'How are you getting on?'

Vasid shrugged. 'Hard to say.Vost kept his dealings brief. But I think he was selling the coordinates of how to get through the time barriers to somewhere on Hirath.'

'Where