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The Doctor removed the bomb from his mouth. 'You could have said that sooner,' he said,

'instead of letting me look like a fool.'

'Shall we cut out the crap and get down to business.'

'It occurred to me,' said the Doctor, 'that this negotiation could be very protracted if we proceed at normal biological speeds. In the interest of getting this over and done with I suggest I link my mind directly to your comms system and we can chat that way.'

'You can't possibly think at machine speeds,' said the !C-Mel.

'No,' said the Doctor, 'but I think faster than I talk and I can talk pretty fast.'

'Very well,' said the !C-Mel, 'we'll do it your way.'

The Doctor smiled, hugely.

Whatever the Doctor's plan was it happened very fast. Roz was still making for the nearest hangar that she'd spotted on the way in, when the internal gravity flipped over ninety degrees. She bounced off the new floor and somehow managed to keep going. There were deep vibrations in the floor which would have probably been terrifyingly loud explosions if she could hear them. The next shift in gravity turned the corridor into a chute and she slid helplessly down it towards the open space of the hangar.

It was, she noticed, one of those swish open-lock hangars that used forcefields to keep the air in and allow material objects out. Material objects such as Roz Forrester. Beyond was nothing but the inverted vista of the sphere's interior. She wondered whether she would suffocate first or burn up on re-entry. They said it was better to burn out than fade away, but Roz felt that she would have liked a free choice.

She realized that her hearing was coming back because she could hear her screams echoing off the walls.

The inner doors of the hangar shot past, far out of reach. The rectangular main exit grew to fill her vision and for the first time in thirty-two years Roslyn Inyathi Forrester started praying to her ancestors.

Dear Mama, I'm sorry I couldn't dance and that I was a total disappointment as a daughter in all respects but I'm still your flesh and blood and if you've got any influence at all with the creator now would be a good time to –

She was caught by a dinky two-person shuttle that swooped in, opened its canopy and caught her face-down in one of its bucket seats. 'Hey,' it said as Roz struggled to get herself the right way up. 'You're that Roz Forrester, aren't you? I'm your greatest fan.'

!C-Mel was coming apart at the seams when the Doctor made his getaway. He could feel contrary sets of vibrations through his feet as God tried to hold the ship together long enough for him to get off. It wasn't easy: the TSH was essentially held together by interlaced forcefields and without the controlling mind it had all the intrinsic cohesion of a child's building blocks.

Part of him, that small part that would rather be juggling, wondered if it wouldn't be better if he just died, considering what he had just done. It helped if he told himself he didn't have any choice but not much.

Poor !C-Mel; not so different from anybody else, wanted a quiet life with no problems.

Shouldn't have threatened to kill everyone in the sphere though, made that old 'good-of-the-majority' equation far too easy to solve.

A great fissure opened in front of him as a whole pyramid split away from the bulk of the ship.

He looked down into the abyss and saw the night time splendour of the sphere spread out beneath him.

Time to put my faith in God, he thought.

And jumped.

The Doctor wasn't worried about burning up; with no orbital velocity he wasn't travelling nearly fast enough for that. No, instead, he was going to suffocate before the atmosphere got thick enough to breathe.

He was in sunlight and blue sky. The air was cold and thin but breathable.

Respiratory bypass system, he thought, as recommended by the Doctor, accept no imitations.

Now all he had to worry about was the ground but that was still a long way off. It was a pity he hadn't brought along his umbrella; he could have shaved,