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This level of secrecy means that historians were never able to reach a consensus over when what they cal 'The Real First Contact' was made. Some stil preferred to count the Arcturan Treaty of 2085. That had been an official, peaceful contact. The first time that human and alien sat down and talked, rather than attempted to commit genocide.

The Martian Invasion was yet another demonstration of the shortcomings of the First Contact Protocols, not least because the designated Contact Group, the local UNIT contingent had just been suspended. With the Prime Minister in the United States, there was some confusion among the British authorities about who exactly was meant to initiate contact with the aliens.

The result was chaos for the first hour. A million people descended on Trafalgar Square, desperate to see the alien vessel. A million more attempted to flee the city, convinced that the world was about to come to an end. The authorities were caught in the middle as two million of their citizens stampeded.

The scheduled editions of Wildlife at One and The Cook Report had been postponed. BBC1 and ITV were both showing the same image from different angles: the prow of the UFO hanging over Nelson's Column, pointing down the Mall straight at Buckingham Palace. The main body of the vessel was hanging directly over the Strand.

Learned commentators and experts tried to find the words to match the image. They failed.

***

'What are our options, General?'

'We can do little to contain the information, Mr President. Every station has been broadcasting pictures of the object for the last half hour. The FCC are pul ing as much as it as we can, but the word is out.'

'I'm not worried about the damn coverage, General, I'm worried by the alien spaceship. A nuclear strike is out the question, I know, but - '

'With respect, sir, I don't think we should be ruling out the nuclear option at this stage.'

'It's a hundred metres above London, General.'

'Sir, a pre-emptive nuclear strike might prove to be the only effective method of destroying the Hostile. I am not recommending that at this stage, but we can't rule it out.'

54

'Understood. What do you recommend?'

'Firstly, sir, we need to mobilise the National Guard. We need troops in al the cities, and additional forces in the air, ready to deploy them wherever there is trouble.'

'You think that the aliens are going to attack us?'

'That I don't know, sir. So far, there's no evidence either way and the situation seems contained in London. What I know is that at any moment riots are going to break out from here to Los Angeles.'

'I think you're underestimating the American people. There was a study done under the Carter administration which concluded that when confronted with indisputable evidence of alien life, most people's reaction would be one of awe and quiet contemplation.'

'That report was wrong. Mr President, our system of government operates on a very simple principle: the people trust the authorities to keep them safe. They can wake up every morning, believe what they read in their newspapers, take the kids to school, drive to work, earn some money that they can spend how they want, go to the park without being bombed, eat their lunch without being poisoned. They pay us taxes, we keep them safe. Now, what we have there on CNN, in glorious colour and NICAM stereo sound, is proof that we can't protect them. We don't know what it is, what it can or wil do, who's in there, where they even came from. Mr President, our people aren't safe anymore. When they realise that, a lot of them will get angry, a lot of them wil get frustrated. Some of them wil take to the streets.'

The President rubbed his chin. 'Mobilise the guard.'

***

They'd been forced to abandon Bessie halfway up Whitehall, the streets were full of people and it would be quicker to get to Trafalgar Square on foot.

'This is madness!' the Doctor shouted back to Benny over the noise of the crowd. 'All these people, heading towards the Martian