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Chapter Twelve - Chapter Twelve
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The Official End of It All
Stokes dreamt. 
A voice, deep and granite-hard, was ordering him to wake up. The deal was not 
yet done. 
Stokes resisted. The appreciation he'd received on Metralubit had been a sham. 
Why should he listen to the voice again? 
The voice reminded him what the screen had shown. He would be appreciated on 
Dellah. Would he like to go there? 
Stokes pondered. Was that possible? 
The voice assured him it was. All he needed to do was set the correct space-time 
coordinates on the TARDIS's navigation panel. 
Stokes laughed at this. The workings of the TARDIS were quite outside his 
understanding. 
The voice told him it could lend a guiding hand. 
And so Stokes woke up, and found his hands wandering over the navigation panels 
as if he'd been piloting the TARDIS for years. 
The data-bank screen now read: 
DEPARTURE -BARCLOW Humanian Era 
DESTINATION - DELLAH AD 2593 



Romana was perturbed. The Doctor was pounding back to the TARDIS, hands thrust 
deep in his pockets, head down, hat pulled over his face, leaving her and K9 to 
struggle to catch up. The rain was falling again, whipping her cape out behind 
her and knocking K9 off his bearings from time to time. 

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'Do we have to go quite so fast?' she protested to the Doctor's back. It was the 
first time they'd spoken since leaving the survivors of this affair in the 
valley.
'Why break the habit of several lifetimes?' the Doctor grumbled. 'I must have 
spent the greatest share of my time since leaving Gallifrey running up and down 
with barely time to stop and think.' 
Romana recognized the signs of impending moodiness and felt reassured. She could 
cope with these occasional bouts of brooding. 'I do hope you're not going to 
start feeling sorry for yourself.' 
He stopped and turned to her. 'That would be predictable, wouldn't it?' 
His tone was almost aggressive, and for the first time ever in his company 
Romana felt threatened. 'Please don't shout at me.' 
He looked between her and K9 and managed a tight smile. 'Do forgive me. It's 
just that I'm worried, you see.' 
'About what?' 
He stepped closer and his grave expression returned. 'When you can predict a 
person's actions it's very easy to lay snares for them.' 
K9 whirred impatiently. 'Query these deliberations, Master. We should return to 
the TARDIS and continue our travels.' 

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The Doctor looked down at him. He was silent for a moment and then he burst into 
one of his sudden crazes. 'Yes,' he shouted, 'planet saved, crisis averted, evil 
menace vanquished. All the questions answered, everything wrapped up.' The sky 
rumbled as if in reply and another gust of freezing rain swept over them.
'Situation has been resolved, Master,' said K9. 'The people of Metralubit and 
the Chelonians can exist together. The Hive has been banished.' 
Romana laid a comforting arm on the Doctor's shoulder. 'K9's right, Doctor. I 
don't see what there is to fret about.' 
He walked a short distance away and stared out into nothingness. 'From the 
moment we arrived here I've felt a powerful unease.' 
'That's not surprising,' said Romana. 'I felt the same. We shouldn't be here, 
after all, strictly speaking.' 
'No, we shouldn't,' he said emphatically. 'We were blown here by a strange, 
unpredictable accident. The erosion of the TARDIS systems circuitry combined 
with an impulse from the Randomizer sent us cartwheeling wildly off course. We 
should have left right away. But we didn't.' 
'We had to pop out "just so we could say we'd been",' Romana reminded him. 
He snapped his fingers. 'Exactly. A chance to cock a minor snook at the Time 
Lords. Just what would I have done. Walked out, got myself involved, started to 
tinker. began the logical, forseeable chain of decisions that have brought me to 
this point.' He raised a finger and pointed through the mist ahead. 'There.' 
Romana squinted. The tall blue shape of the TARDIS was just visible on the 
horizon. 'You're taking a very egocentric view. Plenty of other people made 
decisions along the way. Me and K9 for a start. Galatea, Harmock, Jafrid, St-' 

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The Doctor cut her off: 'Yes, they did, didn't they? All of them people who 
shouldn't be here.'
Romana was getting exasperated. 'What do you mean?' 
'The artificiality of it all,' the Doctor replied, 'that I mentioned to you 
earlier.' 
'These discrepancies were connected to the Femdroids' deception of the Hive, 
Master,' K9 said patiently. 
The Doctor shook his head. 'I think the Femdroids were part of an even bigger 
game.' He turned to Romana. 'The level of coincidence is too high. Our arrival. 
The Chelonians just wandering into this system at the very moment Galatea needed 
to start a war to fox the Hive. The similarity in technology between K9 and the 
Femdroids.' 
'That wasn't a coincidence,' said Romana. 
The Doctor stared blankly at her. 'What?' 
'The Femdroids' creators used K9 as a blueprint using information from Stokes's 
mind,' she explained. 
The Doctor put a hand to his temple. 'Who? Stokes? Not that artist fellow?' 
'Yes, I forgot to tell you, in all the rush,' Romana admitted. 
'But how did he get here?' The Doctor's face now took on a haunted expression. 
As Romana opened her mouth to reply he held up a hand to silence her. 'No, never 
mind that. Where is he now?' 
'He sloped off somewhere,' said Romana. 'Actually, I thought he'd be waiting for 
us at the TARDIS, if he managed to find it.' 
K9 nodded his agreement. 'That is his most likely course of action.' 
The Doctor stared at the TARDIS and then broke into a frantic run, without a 
word of explanation. Romana followed on, baffled, with K9 in her arms. 

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Galatea stared out at the empty city. Soon the fountains would flow again, the 
tramways would be filled with their silent, pollutant-free traffic, and the 
citizens would work and play in total harmony. Her vision had been accomplished.
One of the dome workers had helped her to rig up a communicator using materials 
from the smashed computer room. A picture relayed from one of the orbital 
satellites showed a rough ring of the survivors on Barclow, including General 
Jafrid, Harmock and that man Fritchoff she'd had sent away a few years ago. He 
and a few others in the dome were strong-willed enough to break through the 
conditioning. Before they could she'd implanted a suitable fantasy in their 
minds and expelled them. Now, she thought with a smile, everyone could come 
home. Metralubit was coming home. 
'Now, you've been a very naughty girl, all told, keeping things from us,' 
Harmock was saying. 'There'll be no need for any of this nastiness and secrecy 
in future, will there?' 
'Absolutely not,' said Galatea with a glad heart. 'I shall be pleased to serve 
my organic masters in a more direct way.' 
'Still,' Harmock went on, 'I have to say I admire your nerve. Doing this all on 
your own. Well done.' 
Galatea nodded. 'Thank you, Premier. I like to think I've always done my best.' 
Just for a second she heard a voice, deep and granite hard, somewhere deep 
inside her head. The bargain is over, it told her, our business is done. 

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Galatea thanked the voice. It had given her exactly what it had promised: the 
total destruction of the Hive and the safety of her people, thanks to the 
provision of Stokes's great knowledge. And she, of course, had fulfilled her 
side of the bargain. She had invented the concept of constitutional privilege, 
conditioned the humans to believe it, and encouraged Romana and K9 to come to 
Metralubit. It had been easy enough.
But she was happy she would never hear the voice again. 



General Jafrid slunk away from the screen, feeling a bit left out from all this 
joy and excitement. One of the young humans - Cadinot, wasn't it? - came across 
and asked kindly, 'Are you all right there, General?' 
Jafrid winked at him, remembering his old friend Admiral Dolne. 'I'm fine,' he 
said. 'Just fine' 
And then, just for a second, he heard the voice again for the first time in over 
a hundred years. The deal is done, the voice said, and our business is over. 
Jafrid thanked it inwardly. The voice had delivered what it had promised: a 
lengthy, untroubled early retirement, thanks to a convenient time storm that had 
whipped him and his men here from their rightful place thousands of years 
before, liberating them from the warrior lifestyle. And his side of the bargain 
could not have been easier. All the voice had asked him to do was sit put on 
Barclow for a hundred and twenty-five years, and pretend to really want it. 
Now the voice was gone, and he could spend the rest of his retirement in luxury 
down on Metralubit, with its plentiful green spaces and large arable areas. It 
would be a pleasure indeed to graze there. 

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The Doctor burst into the TARDIS to find the console room empty. He peered 
beneath the console and in all the comers; he even looked behind the hatstand 
and among the items he had been sorting out before they had entered the Time 
Spiral.
Romana almost fell through the doors, exhausted by the run and from carrying K9. 
She was glad of the warmth and comparative comfort of the TARDIS, and 
immediately reached for the lever that closed the big double doors. Barclow's 
low moaning wind and biting cold were finally shut out. She set K9 down and 
turned with a despairing sigh to the Doctor, who was scattering objects from his 
useful pile all over the floor. 'I hardly think you're going to find Stokes in 
there,' she said, still unable to fathom the reasons for his distress. 'Besides, 
he can't just have walked in.' 
'Doors are an irrelevance to some people,' the Doctor snapped back. He peered 
through the inner door and grunted; a set of muddy bootprints trailed away down 
the corridor. 'Just as I thought. He's probably gone to find a bed.' 
For the first time Romana caught a little of his anxiety. 'But how did he pass 
through our security?' She shivered. Theoretically, the TARDIS was impenetrable. 

The Doctor hunched over the console. 'We can worry about that later. First, 
let's minimize the risks and get out of here.' He started to fiddle with the 
controls of the dematerialization sequence. 
K9 trundled over urgently. 'Master, the Hive.' 
'Yes, I know, K9. Don't tell your grandmother how to suck eggs,' the Doctor 
snapped back. 
For once K9, who was perhaps learning about Earth idioms, and perhaps sensing 
the seriousness of the situation, refrained from comment. 

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Romana leant over the Doctor's shoulder. He was calibrating a set of dials at 
the base of the dematerialization circuit array. 'There,' he said. A steady 
pinging note filled the console room. 'There's the Hive's energy signature. I've 
locked it on to our own engines. We'll pull it along behind us like a caravan 
and dump it somewhere apposite. I know a couple of good black holes in the 
Cosplodge system.'
'The linkage is secure, I hope,' said Romana. 
'Of course it is. Even a vintage model like the TARDIS has a good strong 
secondary attachment.' He looked up ruefully as he started the dematerialization 
sequence. 'We'll just slip into the vortex for the time being. I want to get 
away from here as soon as possible and take stock.' 
Romana stood back as he threw the last few switches. The central column began 
its steady rise and fall. 



The blue beacon on the rooftop of the TARDIS started to flash. A few seconds 
later, to the accompaniment of an unearthly trumpeting noise, its police-box 
shell faded away completely from the rocky terrain of Barclow. 
There was a thunderclap and a peal of mocking laughter. 





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The TARDIS tipped, throwing the Doctor, Romana and K9 across the console room 
and back again. The central column glowed incredibly brightly, turning fiery red 
and crackling with electric sparkles.
'The Time Spiral again,' Romana shouted, trying desperately to find the edge of 
the console and lever herself up. 
'Negative, Mistress,' called K9. 
The Doctor, who was a dab hand at being thrown around the console room, used the 
momentum of a vicious spin to gain the support of the console's navigation 
panel. When he saw the display on the screen he uttered a very old and 
seldom-used word in Old High Gallifreyan. 'Somebody's already put in a course,' 
he cried. 'There's a lock in the coordinates.' 
Romana was appalled. Only a skilled operator could input coordinates, and to 
lock them in - to wire in an extra code so that travel to that destination, no 
matter how far distant, took very little relative time at all and could not be 
altered - took an expert with a lot of patience. 'Who?' 
'Stokes!' the Doctor called back. 
'That's impossible!' Romana called. At last she man- aged to grab hold of the 
console. 
'Unless he was helped,' the Doctor said. Then he leant over and started to throw 
switches on the panel manically. 



An observer watched the insane pitch and yaw of the TARDIS as it sped through 
the howling maelstrom of the space-time vortex. 
Now the Doctor would cancel the coordinates program by using the coordinate 
override. 
And the choice could be made. 





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Stokes was woken when his large bald head was smacked against one of the softly 
humming walls of the TARDIS corridor. He had no memory of anything after he'd 
looked himself up in the data bank. Perhaps he'd walked here in his sleep.
He picked himself up and regained his balance as the TARDIS steadied. He hadn't 
gone far into its innards; through the door at the end of the corridor be could 
hear the Doctor's rich, booming voice. Cautiously he crept closer, and turned 
his ear to catch the Doctor's words. 'Do you know what this is, Romana?' 
'I've never seen anything like it,' came the girl's voice. 
'Yes you have,' countered the Doctor. 
Stokes poked his head around the door. The Doctor, who was looking very 
dishevelled, his wet, stained coat torn in several places, was holding something 
out to Romana. It was, Stokes realized with a jolt, his own crystal. It must 
have fallen from his pocket when he'd walked in. 
He heard Romana's gasp as she took it from the Doctor. 'The Key to Time. The 
same substance.' 
'Exactly,' said the Doctor. 'A material that exists in ways even old Rassilon 
could never have speculated. You might say it borders on magic.' 
K9 trundled into view. 'Magic refuted, Master. Substance cannot be analysed as 
it exists, er, simultaneously at every point in time. This does not constitute 
magic, only a level of scientific conceptualism we cannot comprehend.' 
The Doctor ignored him. 'Now,' he told Romana, 'with this, Stokes could get in 
here and set those coordinates quite easily. So how did it get into his 
possession? And how did he get himself shanghaied halfway across the universe 
and halfway across the span of time?' 
'The White Guardian?' Romana suggested hopefully. 


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'Or the other fellow,' said the Doctor. 'A web of choices. That's how the 
Guardians, both of them, operate. Jafrid, Galatea and Stokes were all pawns in 
the game, arranged for someone else's benefit.'
Romana leant in close. 'And who might this other person be?' 
The Doctor leant even closer to her. 'I have this terrible suspicion it might be 
me.' 
K9 piped up. 'Master, Mistress,' he called. 'Mr Stokes.' 
Stokes put up his hands and tried to ignore the accusation in their gaze. 
'Hello, Doctor,' he said feebly. 
The Doctor stalked over. 'I want a word with you.' 



The TARDIS hung in suspense in the space-time vortex. Its mighty time engines 
were held in stasis, their power held back by the Doctor's operation of the 
override switch. The indescribable maelstrom shrieked about it. 



'It wasn't actually what you'd call a dirty deal,' said Stokes. He addressed 
Romana. 'Most of my, er, very long story was true, my dear. I only left out a 
teensy bit.' 
'The teensy bit about the Black Guardian,' she replied bitterly. 
'Is that what's he's called?' mused Stokes. 'I suppose it's apposite. No, the 
first thing I knew of him was just after my court case. I was landed with costs 
that wiped out my fortune, as I mentioned earlier, so I decided to go for a 
drink. I had several. In fact, I had a lot more than several. I think I bumped 
my head. And that's when I saw him, this fellow in black with a bird on his 
head.' 
The Doctor nodded grimly to Romana. 'He can contact lower primates only when 
their minds are knocked into an altered state.' 


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Stokes flushed. 'Who are you calling a lower primate?'
'You,' said the Doctor. 'Go on.' 
'Well, it seemed like a dream afterwards,' Stokes continued. 'In a nutshell, he 
offered me the chance for some success. In exchange for which I had to provide a 
certain service. 
'To betray and trap us,' accused Romana. 
'No,' Stokes said finally. 'Honestly, no. I wouldn't have agreed to that, would 
I? And in fact the thing that made me think it really had been a dream was the 
ludicrous nature of the service I was asked to perform.' 
'Which was?' the Doctor prompted. 
Stokes pulled his hammer from his pocket. 'There would come a time, he said, 
when I had to smash something up. He didn't even say what, only that I'd know 
what it was when the time came, and that I should carry this wherever I went. 
And that it was something to do with you, Doctor, some sort of personal feud, 
and that I shouldn't mention him to you or Romana if ever we should meet. Of 
course I thought it was all subconscious rambling on my part.' He pointed to the 
crystal in Romana's hand. 'Until I found that in my pocket when I woke up. 
Occasionally it gave me directions. It pushed me towards the cryogenic process, 
for example, when I first considered it. Very odd.' He sighed. 'Otherwise, 
everything I told you was true. So I can hardly be painted as the villain of 
this piece.' Determined not to feel cowed, he stuck his chest out. 'In fact, we 
all seem to have come out of it all right. We're going to Dellah, now, I think 
you'll find, where you can drop me off. And then you can take your feud with 
this Guardian chap elsewhere.' He extended his hand. 'No harm done, eh?' 


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The Doctor shot him a venomous look. 'Stokes, you've been very stupid, even for 
a lower primate.'
Romana's expression was as gloomy. 'You've been manipulated as part of a plan to 
bring the Doctor to this point. A string of small events, of small choices, 
calculated to reach this moment.' 
Stokes frowned and looked at the central column, which was grinding ferociously, 
as if the energies trapped inside were straining desperately to escape. 'But we 
are going to Dellah, aren't we?' 
'Yes, we're going to Dellah,' cried the Doctor, 'and we're dragging along with 
us a Hive of blood-crazed insects that given the right conditions could become 
one of the deadliest life forms in the cosmos.' He pointed to a particular lever 
on the console. 'We've both been fooled, Stokes. And even when I realized I was 
being manipulated I was being manipulated. The Black Guardian timed our 
movements precisely. You set the coordinates, I rushed in, picked up the Hive 
and dematerialized.' 
'So?' demanded Stokes. 'I think I must be missing the point.' 
'This is the trap,' Romana explained. 'The Doctor was rushed, made to panic. We 
were going to drop the Hive off into a black hole, right away.' She pointed to 
the materialization control. 'If we materialize here, it'll be released into 
populated space at a crucial point in history. It'll destroy millions and 
reproduce without restriction. The web of time will be fractured irreparably.' 
She shuddered. 'And we'll be responsible.' 
'No,' said the Doctor. 'I shall be responsible.' 



The TARDIS rocked as a great shadow fell across its doors. 





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The shutters of the scanner screen slid open unbidden. The Doctor whipped round 
from his moment of introspection and blinked at the figure that was revealed. 
The imperturbable face could have been blasted out of solid rock; the 
ermine-lined robes were glossy and seemed to contain in their folds every dark 
thought the universe had ever contained; the headdress was mounted by a raven 
whose eyes were narrowed in pure, piercing hatred.
'Ah,' said the Doctor. 'We were just talking about you.' 
'That's him, isn't it?' Stokes asked. 
'If it isn't it's somebody wearing his hat,' said the Doctor. 
The Black Guardian's voice was as stentorian as he remembered, a rumble that 
seemed to shake the very fabric of time. 'Doctor,' he said, 'the time has come 
for us to do business.' 
'I don't think so.' 
The Guardian gestured with one massive hand to the TARDIS console. 'The choice 
is clear. Press the lever and condemn the universe to chaos, or -' his eyes 
narrowed and his lips twisted '- remain suspended here in the vortex forever.' 
The Doctor ambled over to the scanner and peered up at the face of his greatest 
enemy. 'You've been very clever, I must say. I know that to an elemental being 
like yourself the compliments of a mere mortal like myself must not count for 
much, but I'd like to congratulate you anyway. I should have seen your hand in 
it from the beginning.' He raised his voice. 'What better place than the end of 
the universe to set your trap? Your opposite number is at his weakest there and 
couldn't intervene.' 

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'Precisely,' said the Black Guardian. 'You walked into the situation on 
Metralubit as you always do, Doctor. It was easy for me to predict your moves.' 
He indicated Stokes. 'Using this creature and others as my players.' A smile 
cracked his unearthly features. 'I have been tracing your path through all time 
and space, your past and your future, choosing my moment. I was at your side 
when you fought the wizard of Avalon, when you united the Rhumon and the 
Menoptera against the Animus, when you brought down Lady Ruath and her vampire 
hordes and when you fought the Timewyrm on the surface of the moon.'
'I'm not sure you should be telling me some of that,' said the Doctor. 'I 
haven't done it yet.' He wagged a reproving finger up at the screen. 'You're 
dabbling with the forces of continuity.' 
'I care nothing for such abstract concepts,' snorted the Guardian. 
'You've disrupted our timeline, broken the First Law,' accused Romana. 'The 
consequences could be catastrophic. Not to mention very confusing.' 
'Catastrophe and confusion is his job,' the Doctor remarked. 
'Throughout I have studied you,' said the Black Guardian, 'until my knowledge of 
your personality and my capacity to predict your next move were absolute. And I 
can predict your next move, Doctor.' 
Stokes decided he was being left out of things. 'Excuse me,' he said, stomping 
over to the screen. 'There is still the small matter of our bargain.' 
The Black Guardian turned to look at him and cackled. 'Ah yes. Menlove Ereward 
Stokes.' The cackle became a full-voiced, deep-throated, very fruity laugh. 'Who 
would do anything to be remembered to posterity.' 

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Stokes rearranged his coat in an attempt to appear more dignified and sniffed. 
'Some of us are quite content with our small lives, you know. And besides, I'd 
certainly never heard of you until I met you. For a deity of all that is evil 
you're not actually very famous, are you? I haven't seen you on the front covers 
of any magazines, have I?'
'Famous,' chortled the Black Guardian. 'Magazines.' His deeply lined face 
creased with further mirth. 
Romana sidled close to the Doctor. 'What are we going to do?' she whispered. 
'We could always just sit and watch these two out-ham each other for all 
eternity,' he whispered back. 
K9 joined in the hushed conversation. 'Options limited, Master,' he said. 
Further debate was forestalled by the Black Guardian's next statement. 'Stokes,' 
he said, 'your petty concerns amuse me.' He waved his fingers in a dismissive 
motion, as if flicking them dry. 'Go to Dellah, take up your place, find your 
acclaim.' 
Stokes felt himself drifting away from the console room. He saw the Doctor, 
Romana and K9 slide slowly away from him, and when he looked down he saw he was 
becoming transparent. 'It seems like I must -be going,' he said. He waved 
goodbye. 'I'm sorry if I've caused you any inconvenience, and that if we meet 
again it'll be under more pleasant circumstances. You can drop in on Dellah 
whenever you want -' 
His words were swallowed up, and suddenly he was somewhere else. 




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He was in a high, draughty corridor. Through a window he saw a set of 
bee-hive-like buildings made of baked red mud, arranged to form a quadrangle. 
Small groups of people, mostly young humanoids, were walking between the 
buildings. At the centre of the quad was an abstract sculpture that depicted a 
vicious, two-headed reptilian creature, gore dripping from its jaws. 'Good God,' 
he said. 'That's one of mine.'
He turned and found himself at a door. On its frosted-glass front was embossed 
PROFESSOR M. E. STOKES. 
He pushed open the door. Inside was a large desk stacked with unattended 
paperwork and several battered filing cabinets. He walked in slowly, still 
amazed by the sudden transition. 
On the desk was an unaddressed black envelope. He unsealed it and found a black 
card. Inside, written in sparkling gold and in an excessively stylized hand, 
were the words 'Mr Stokes. Hoping you find the rewards you seek. B.G.' 
Stokes sat down at his desk and thought for a very long time. The events of the 
last few - days? months? years? millennia? - rallied around his head like images 
left from a fading dream. He had been humiliated, scorned and made to look a 
fool. Here was his chance for a fresh start. He decided on certain things. 
He would forget the Black Guardian. He would forget Metralubit. And he would, 
most definitely, never so much as think about the Doctor and company ever again. 




After Stokes had faded the Black Guardian gave another of his grotesque smiles. 
'Mr Stokes has arrived safely on Dellah, you'll be pleased to hear.' He gestured 
to the console. 'Why not materialize and join him there?' 
K9 motored forward angrily and snarled up at the scanner. 'Do not mock my 
master.' 
The Guardian cackled. 'Ah, the metal dog. Did you enjoy your moment of elevation 
on Metralubit? It amused me to bring out the superiority that has always bubbled 
beneath that servile shell.' He turned to Romana. 'It amused me also to 
encourage your righteousness, so typical of the Time Lord race.' 

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Romana tried to think of a suitably haughty reply but failed. Her eyes turned to 
the Doctor, who was circling the console and examining the varied systems 
displays. He stopped by the crackling, pinging navigation panel and the small 
flashing unit that represented the Hive's energy signature. Could some 
extraordinary solution present itself? Could that incredible, 
eight-hundred-year-old mind pull the rabbit out of the hat? 'I have to admit,' 
he said to the Guardian, 'that you've sewn this up very well.' He looked up at 
the scanner. 'You said you could predict my next move. Go on then.'
The Black Guardian smiled. 'You are both very long lived, for mortals. Almost 
ageless. You will wait here in the vortex for many years. You will explore every 
possible technological solution. You will vow never to press the lever and bring 
yourselves back out into the cosmos.' His tone darkened, and as it did the 
lighting in the console room dimmed and there was a rushing noise from outside. 
'But eventually, Doctor, you will. I know you. You cannot stay in one place and 
in one time. It would drive you insane. It will drive you insane. And to save 
yourself you shall become my agent, of your own choosing. You will press the 
lever. You will release the Hive, and it shall feast on the universe and plunge 
all time and space into chaos.' 
As he spoke Romana's imagination conjured up an image of the Doctor, many years 
older, his spirit shattered, hunched over the console, a feeble hand wrapped 
around the materialization control. She shuddered. 
'I thought it would be something like that,' said the Doctor. Some of his good 
humour seemed to have returned, and it was as if he was goading a minor warlord 
rather than the protector of all the universe's evil. He pointed to the 
materialization lever. 'You want me to press this switch.' 
'You are going to,' the Guardian said, his voice lowered to a horrible whisper. 
'I have waited an eternity to see you do it. A few centuries more will not 
trouble me.' He indicated the frame of the screen. 'I shall always be here, 
Doctor, watching and waiting.' 

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The Doctor nodded affably. 'It's nice to know I'm worthy of your special 
attention;' His voice hardened.
'But you've forgotten one thing.' 
'I have forgotten nothing,' stormed the Guardian. 
The Doctor carried on as if he hadn't spoken. 'You forget that there are plenty 
of other switches and levers on this console. You've forgotten one in 
particular.' He pointed to a small black box that was wired on to the side of 
the panel nearest the door. 'What about that, then?' 
Romana was shocked. 'The emergency unit,' she exclaimed. 'You won't use that.' 
The Doctor wheeled on her. 'Can't I? I've had enough of people telling me what I 
will or won't do.' 
K9 came forward. 'The emergency unit is designed to remove the TARDIS from time 
and space, vis-a-vis reality as we understand it. Its usage is most 
inadvisable.' 
'We could end up anywhere,' Romana protested. 
The Doctor shook his head. 'No. Anywhere is just where we won't be going.' 
The Guardian growled from the screen. 'Explain yourself.' 
The Doctor tapped the black box. 'A nifty gadget for use in extreme emergencies. 
If I activate it we'll just drop out of everything, quite possibly forever, 
taking the Hive with us. We'll be outside your influence.' 
'You would not dare, Doctor,' called the Guardian. 'You would rather die.' 

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The Doctor hunched over the console and readied his finger above the box. 
'Probably, in the normal run of things. But occasionally it does one good to 
surprise oneself. And I'd rather disappear than grovel to you.' He turned to 
Romana. 'I'm sorry.'
Romana swallowed and curled her fingers around his above the control. 'There's 
no alternative,' she said, trying to keep her voice even. 'Have you ever done 
this before?' 
He smiled. 'Once. I ended up in the fictional realm. I suppose it wasn't such a 
bad place.' 
Romana shuddered at the thought. 'Then we'd just be characters, not real 
people.' 
'I can think of worse fates,' said the Doctor. 
'No!' the Black Guardian thundered. 'You will not press that button, Doctor. You 
will not press that button!' 
K9 extended his eyestalk and chirruped a signal. The shutters of the scanner 
slid closed, and there was a sudden silence. The lighting returned to normal. It 
could have been another ordinary day in the TARDIS, ready to begin another 
adventure. 
'Goodbye, universe,' the Doctor said sadly. 'I'll be back again, one day. Try to 
look after yourself. Mind out for the Daleks, keep an eye out for the Cybermen, 
don't let the Sontarans boss you about. Good luck.' 
The Doctor and Romana looked at each other. 
The Doctor kissed Romana quickly on the cheek. 
Together they pressed the button. 
THE END 

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