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'Where are you going to put them?' she asked the Ethiopian.

'Poland, Brazil, the Noctis Labyrinthus. Anywhere that's got facilities, army-training bases mainly.' He looked over at the Doctor. 'Who are you with?'

'Bomb disposal,' said the Doctor.

The man shot Kadiatu a very worried look. 'Really?'

'If you've got a bomb,' said Kadiatu, 'we dispose of it.'

His voice cracked. 'Here?' he asked.

'We're looking for a box,' said the Doctor, 'about two and half metres tall, one and a half wide, with a blue light mounted on top.'

The man looked relieved. 'No,' he said, 'nothing like that.'

'Do you mind if we look around?'

'Be my guest.'

They walked up towards the blank end of the station.

'He couldn't wait to get rid of us,' said Kadiatu.

'Kings Cross station,' said the Doctor. 'I asked what was at the end of the tunnel and you said Pluto, yes?'

'Yes.'

'So it should be here.'

'What should be here?' asked Kadiatu and then she remembered. A blue box, two and a half metres tall, blue light on top. Right in the middle of the platform - she'd run right into it.

The wind had been filled with knives and the stink of ozone.

'Next time I'm going to find a better place to park.'

'Well,' she said, 'it could have been diverted but the default signalling position would take it straight through to here.'

'Then it should be here.'

'How fragile is it?' Whatever came through Kings Cross had eaten through armour, muscle and bone.

'It's indestructible.'

Since the Central Line terminated at Lowell Depot the friction field stopped three metres before the end wall. A concrete apron extended the platform into an L-shape. A physical buffer constructed from layers of collapsible steel and permafoam stood at the end of the track. Last chance of a stop before the wall. The Doctor bent over to examine it.

'I wonder,' said the Doctor, 'does this buffer look brand new to you?'

Kadiatu looked. The paintwork did look suspiciously fresh. She didn't know though, maybe they were routinely replaced.

The Doctor straightened up and looked at the end wall. A rectangular sheet of plywood three metres high had been fixed to the wall opposite the buffers and then painted over to match the wall. The Doctor walked over and rapped his knuckles on the wood. It was hollow.

He handed Kadiatu a French fisherman's knife. A wickedly sharp blade hinged out of the wooden handle and locked in place with a metal ring. She jammed the blade under the plywood, ripping down until there was enough room for them both to get a handhold. The sheet came away easily, probably held to the wall only by the adhesiveness of the paint.

'I bet you always wondered,' said the Doctor, 'what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object.'

There was a hole in the wall with razor-sharp sides. It started about ten centimetres above platform level, creating a step. It was about one and a half metres wide and two and half metres tall. The ceiling had a stepped cross-section like a ziggurat.

The hole continued straight ahead into darkness.

'Well,' said the Doctor, peering inside, 'shall we dance?'

5: Hereditary Diseases

The Ice Maiden

The rumours about Francine's eyes were wrong; she did not see in the far ultraviolet or deep infrared. She did not see at all. Instead, darkness rushed behind her eyes, non-glimpses of ridges or canyon walk in the random silver imagination of her damaged nerves. 'So sorry,' said the Doctors and their machines, 'an interaction between your brain and the devices that were put inside.'

So Francine took her disability pension and forged a cocoon for herself under the sea. A flesh place, a sex-driven life-support machine to suck in the capital to finance her real interests. Expanding her influence among the artificial ganglia of humanity's brand-new nervous system, m the hectic years after the war even the military had no idea how to protect itself. They had numerous theories and academic studies but nobody knew - until Francine