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'I'm sure he'll be perfectly fine in a moment,' Emmeline said determinedly, holding her father's left arm and leading him along.

'I'm Sam,' said Sam.Tve sort of met you before.That is, I've met your Zygon double. She seemed all right until she changed: Emmeline paled. 'Do you mean these hellish creatures created a facsimile of me? I dread to contemplate what fiendish acts it committed in my name.'

'Nothing too bad,' said Sam.'Don't worry. They made a double of me too.

She's quite nice as Zygons go, actually. It's really weird, though, meeting yourself.'

Between the two of them they managed to keep the tail-end of the Doctor's entourage in sight, and so guided Emmeline's father back towards the main control room. During the journey, Nathaniel Seers became gradually more aware of his surroundings, until finally, his voice stronger than before, he asked, 'What precisely is this place?'

'It's an alien spaceship,' said Sam airily, 'but it's probably best not to think about it.'

'A spaceship?' Seers looked momentarily bemused again, then his face cleared.'I recall... creatures.Hideous creatures.'

'Zygons,' confirmed Sam. 'Don't worry, they're all dead. If you don't believe me, just breathe in.'

Sure enough, the stench of decay was getting stronger the closer they got to the main control room. Some of the men were evidently agitated by it.

Before entering the room, the Doctor turned and held up his hands.

'Behind me is the centre of operations,' he said.'My aim is to try to guide the ship on to dry land. Unfortunately, the drive systems are ailing even as we speak, but with a bit of luck we might just be able to do it before the ship blows up.

'Now, inside this room are many dead Zygons, all of which are in a rather unpleasant physical state. Try not to let the sight of them upset you. Once inside the room, I'm going to set each of you a task. Most of these tasks will be simple, but absolutely vital to the well-being of us all, and your utmost concentration will therefore be required. Do you all understand what I'm telling you?'

The men nodded. Even Sam, at the back of the group with Emmeline and her father, couldn't help but respond.The Doctor spent so much of his time being vague, unassuming, accommodating, and sometimes downright infuriating, that it became all too easy to forget how mesmerisingly impressive he could be when he put his mind to it. So much of the time his genius seemed intuitive, but how much of an act was that? Could a man really muddle absent-mindedly through the most appallingly dangerous situations and come up smelling of roses almost every time?

'Right then, ladies and gentlemen,' he said, and grinned as though he was genuinely enjoying himself,'let's go to work.'

He turned and strode towards the crystalline door as if he intended to smash his way through it. However, the door slid up into the ceiling, releasing the stench of decaying Zygons which rolled over them like fog.

The Doctor, seemingly unaffected, marched right into it. As if reacting to his presence, the burbling shriek of the self-destructor unit began to rise in pitch once more. 'There's not much time!' the Doctor shouted. 'Come along, gentlemen.'

He spent the next few minutes organising his troops, positioning them at consoles around the main control room and shouting out instructions:

'Apply pressure here'; 'Hold this steady'; 'Tell me if these readings fluctuate

.'Then he scampered between those consoles that weren't manned, tugging and twisting and squeezing the Zygon controls, his hands at times moving so fast they were almost a blur.

From her post in front of an orange-tinged screen across which a seemingly random succession of symbols tumbled (she was to call out if a particular symbol, shaped like a denuded Christmas tree, began to proliferate), Sam kept an anxious eye on the Doctor. He reminded her of a plate-spinner at the circus who was trying to keep more plates going than he could comfortably handle. His hair hung down over his