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Rachel closed her eyes and jumped into the shaft.

Ace landed on a soft spongy surface. She reached down and touched the floor. It felt like packing foam.

‘This way,’ hissed Rachel from the darkness. Ace followed her voice. There was a glimmer of light from in front. Ace saw that they were in a short hexagonal corridor about twenty metres long. Rectangular archways left and right opened into dark empty spaces. More of the packing material was strewn on the floor.

‘Where’s the Doctor?’ asked Gilmore.

‘Here I am.’

Ace jumped at his voice – she hadn’t heard him come down the shaft.

‘I can’t get the door open,’ said Gilmore.

The Doctor squeezed past Ace, Rachel and Allison to where Gilmore was pushing at the hatch. The Doctor checked the floor and then stamped hard on one particular spot. There was a sharp hiss of hydraulics and the hatch swung open. Daylight poured in. Gilmore drew his service revolver and stepped out. They all bundled out behind him. Ace blinked in the light.

Gilmore holstered his revolver. ‘Playground’s clear.’ He started off towards the school. Rachel and Allison followed.

‘I rigged a communications relay into the shuttle control systems,’ said the Doctor. ‘We can monitor the Daleks with the transmat in the cellar.’

‘You can’t do that,’ said Ace, ‘you mashed up the transmat.’

‘I,’ said the Doctor, ‘can do anything I like.’

Rachel watched the soldiers scatter as Gilmore strode through the school foyer.

He hasn’t changed, thought Rachel.

A soldier lurched into her and she almost fell. The man staggered on a few paces clutching his head. He looked as if he was going to collapse.

‘Allison,’ called Rachel. She caught up with the man and grabbed his shoulders as he collapsed. Allison arrived to help Rachel just in time to stop the soldier falling.

‘It’s Corporal Grant,’ said Allison. She gently prised away the Corporal’s hand and felt his skull.

Rachel spotted Gilmore talking to a couple of men down the hall. ‘Group Captain,’ she called. Still Gilmore did not turn. ‘Ian!’ she shouted. Gilmore’s head snapped round.

‘What happened?’ Allison asked the corporal.

‘Sergeant Smith,’ said the corporal, his words were slurred.

Concussion? wondered Rachel.

Gilmore arrived and put his weight under the man. ‘Is he all right?’ he asked Allison.

‘No idea,’ said Allison, ‘I’m a physicist.’

A cool hand brushed Rachel’s hand aside. It was the Doctor. He checked the corporal’s pupils and then the pulse at his throat. Then he reached out and tweaked one of the corporal’s earlobes.

‘He’ll be fine,’ said the Doctor. ‘Rachel and Allison, I’ll need your help.’

‘Sorry?’ said Rachel.

The corporal shook his head; his legs steadied and this took his own weight.

Rachel stepped back as the man straightened. When she looked for the Doctor he had gone.

‘What did he say?’ she asked Allison.

‘He said he needed our help.’

‘That’s what I thought he said.’

‘He’s got my pistol,’ said the corporal.

‘Allison.’ said Rachel, ‘get your hands off that man’s scalp and come on.’

Now, thought Rachel, the Doctor wants my help.

Mike crept closer to the open gates. Ratcliffe’s warehouse looked quiet, but Mike knew better than that.

The sound of another explosion came from the south east; columns of smoke drifted up above the skyline.

He checked the pistol and tucked it into the waist of his trousers. He had been forced to abandon the Ford Prefect half a mile back because of the light between the Daleks. In the end, he sneaked through a derelict house to get past.

Mike walked through the gates and stopped: the yard was deserted. He started towards the sliding doors at the end of the yard. Then he saw it, tucked away in the far left corner and mounted on trestles. It was the coffin that the Doctor had buried. Mike realized that this was the Hand of Omega.

Mike went cold. They wouldn’t leave that unguarded, he thought.

He spun round and found himself facing two Daleks.

They were in grey and black livery — the Daleks that the Doctor called renegades. Mike quickly put up his hands.