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The Dying Days - Chapter Twelve
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The No Doctors
Thursday, May 15th 1997 
Benny stretched her arms and yawned. 
When she opened her eyes, the Doctor was standing there, his umbrella in one 
hand, a tray full of breakfast things carefully balanced in the other. She was 
in her room at Allen Road, the one opposite Chris Cwej's on the first floor. 
'Good morning, Benny,' he said, standing in a shaft of warm spring sunlight. 
'I've brought you some strong black coffee and lightly-done toast, just how you 
like it. I'm afraid that Chris has taken the last of the marmalade.' His face 
wrinkled up. 'Are you all right?' 
She shook herself. 'I've just had a dream.' 
'What do you remember?' he asked, clearly curious about such a human little 
thing. The Doctor was the sort of person that had dream sequences instead of 
dreams: his subconscious continued to plot away even while he was trying to get 
some shut-eye. No wonder he rarely slept. 
'I don't think it was anything significant. It was so vivid. You know the sort 
of thing? A dream that goes on for so long that when you wake up you have to 
spend the first few minutes working out what's real.' 
He smiled. 'The sort of dream that haunts you all morning?' 
'Yeah.' She sipped her coffee. 'Where's Jason?' 
The Doctor frowned. 'Who?' 
'My husband.' 
The Doctor grinned a goofy grin. 'Ms Summerfield, you are renowned throughout 
the galaxy for your singular lack of interest in that sphere of human affairs.' 
Benny munched on the toast. 'Lack of success, rather than interest, I assure 
you. I dreamt I got married.' 

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'A white wedding, with guests from across time and space, all getting on 
perfectly well together despite their different creeds and histories?'
'Yes,' she admitted glumly. 'Simple girlie wish-fulfilment, I suppose. There was 
even a unicorn there. The man I married was a bit of a rough diamond with a 
heart of gold and a roving eye, but he loved me and only me and I loved him 
back. We interrupted our honeymoon and found dad. He was running a teashop in 
Berkshire. I got a professorship. A real one that I earned.' 
'It sounds like a nice dream,' the Doctor said wistfully, 'if a little 
far-fetched. I wish I had dreams like that.' 
Benny hesitated, and sipped her tea. 'Well, yes and no. It all went sour after 
that. Roz died. I had an argument with Jason and we split up. Chris left you. 
Then ... wasn't this coffee a minute ago?' 
'Then?' the Doctor prompted. 
'Then you changed.' She looked over at the little man, frowning. 'And the 
government were working with the Martians and we were framed for murder and the 
Martians invaded and they blew up UNIT HQ and dropped a poison gas on Adisham 
and all the animals were dying and the people and the Brigadier was driving me 
away in Bessie and I couldn't stop you and you went running into the cloud and 
then you - ' 



Extract from the memoirs of Professor Bernice Summerfield I woke, screaming. 
I was bolt upright with a rough hand over my mouth, in the darkness. Holding me 
down. 
'Bernice,' a firm voice was saying. 'It's all right.' 
I had stopped screaming, my mouth hoarse. I lay there, my heart pounding, 
pumping all that adrenaline around and around my body. 
The rain was pattering against the corrugated iron roof of the officer's mess. 
It was the middle of the night. 
'Are you all right?' Alistair asked me. 

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I slumped back. 'I've just had a dream.'
'The Doctor?' 
'The Doctor.' 



It was light just before six. 
I was woken by the sound of the radio. The UNIT operators were collating 
information from the resistance cells, making a list of enemy positions and 
activity, just as they had been when I went to sleep. The toothpaste and soap 
were in the provisions box and I made my way outside. I didn't take my gun, and 
knew that would earn me a reprimand from Alistair when I got back. 
I pulled the door open and stepped outside. The privates on guard duty saluted 
me, which I admit gave me a bit of a thrill. The air was chilly and there was a 
haze of mist still hanging around. The ground was still damp from the overnight 
rain. 
As you can imagine, I was at a low ebb. The Doctor had come back as someone 
else, and then just as I was getting used to him, hed been taken from me, and 
this time he wouldnt be coming back. 
This was my second morning here. It had taken us a week to edge this far around 
London, avoiding the main roads. We had arrived in the area yesterday afternoon, 
and the UNIT people had been expecting us, or Alistair at any rate. The Royalist 
encampment had been set up in a natural dip in the earth, a clearing surrounded 
by woodland deep within Windsor Forest, south of Windsor itself. In it sat a 
dozen tanks and as many Harrier jets, not to mention armoured cars, jeeps, 
trucks and motorbikes. The hardware was either tucked underneath the trees or 
covered in camouflaged netting. We had known where it was, but driving along the 
track straining to see it, the camp had been completely invisible until we were 
within twenty yards - by that time, a dozen snipers concealed in or among the 
trees could have picked us off. If that wasnt impressive enough, the base would 
also be virtually invisible from the air - not that anything was flying. The 
Provisional Government were enforcing a strict 'no fly rule, at the insistence 
of the Martians. Bamberas men didn't have to worry about satellites, either: 
the resistance movement's first action was to disable the surveillance network. 
This had been a disconcertingly easy task, they told us, with a little covert 
help from the CIA. 

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There were a dozen resistance bases like this. All of them were well away from 
the population centres, but close to the motorway network. The military were 
keeping their heads down, collecting intelligence, content to stay hidden. 
Despite all the soldiers and their hardware here it was a world away from the 
chaos of the Martian Invasion.
The "officers' mess" was an old garage on the edge of the site, at the end of a 
mud track, off a disused country road. A decade ago someone had used it to fix 
up cars, it had probably been a barn or something of the sort before then. The 
UNIT troops had set up temporary stalls that made the garage look like the 
casualty department of a hospital, but did allow some form of privacy. The other 
troops slept in bivouac tents. The thrusting young archaeologist in me yearned 
for the romance of sleeping under the stars, but secretly I was rather glad to 
have walls and a roof around me. 
There was already a well-trodden path to the "ladies", really nothing more than 
a screened off section of stream with makeshift chemical toilets and shower 
stalls. On arrival, Id been surprised to see how many female soldiers there 
were there. Including Brigadier Bambera the commanding officer, there were about 
twenty. The precautions in place to keep the men and women from, ahem, 
'fraternising, were rather comical. The girlies had their own little area of 
the camp, and the men werent allowed in there. Fascinating from an 
anthropological view. Bambera and I slept in the officers mess, suitably 
screened off from our male colleagues. Thankfully, none of the other women were 
about their ablutions when I got to the stream. What little contact I had had 
with them had convinced me that they werent really my kind of people. 
I was right at the edge of the camp, so I had to check that there was no-one 
hiding beyond the perimeter. That done, I decided to wash in the stream itself. 
When I was sixteen, I had lived out in the woodlands beyond the walls of 
Spacefleet Academy. My exploits there had become legendary among the travellers 
and traders of a dozen galaxies. 'See that woman at the bar?' they'd say, 
interrupting some vital business transaction, 'Don't talk to her, she's forever 
going on and on about how she lived out in the wild and how she became a bit of 
a guru to the other students'. 'Oh yeah,' one of their companions would 
invariably reply, 'Her boyfriend kept tortoises, and he had - ', ' - freckles 
and a wicked laugh!' everyone would shout out in unison. 
Mockery is the sincerest form of jealousy. Besides, the skills I had picked up 
then had come in useful time and time again. I sat on a fallen tree trunk, 
cupped my hands and drank a mouthful of very cold stream water. It was too cold 
to wash properly, so I settled for wiping my face and neck. 

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The echoing, rumbling noise of an aeroplane overhead broke the still of the 
morning. The first repat airliner of the day, taking another five hundred people 
back to their home country. The flights had started yesterday, all from 
Heathrow. It was like the Berlin Airlift in reverse, wave after wave of plane 
flying due south until they were over French airspace, and then off in all 
directions. The radio news said that there were half a million people camped at 
the airport - they'd need a thousand jumbo jets in total. That probably wasn't 
far off Heathrow's normal capacity. The other airports weren't being used to 
simplify the task, apparently. According to all the reports we had received not 
even ProvGov planes were in the air, they'd only flown once, a quick sortie over 
Edinburgh.
A week ago, Id been waiting for the Brigadier on the road out of Adisham. We'd 
been sitting in Bessie, parked in a lay-by that overlooked the village and we 
cheered as the red poison gas dispersed. The Doctor had managed to do that 
within ten minutes of his arrival. All the police cars and army vans that had 
been sent to Adisham to track us down had ended up as disaster relief. The 
Martian ship vanished over the horizon, heading back to London at a speed the 
Brigadier found incredible. On the radio - resistance frequencies, not the BBC - 
we learnt that about a hundred people had died, not the couple of thousand it 
might have been. The village had been completely sealed off. A week later, as I 
washed myself in a cold stream, the village was still surrounded by a police 
cordon. 
So, the Doctor had saved everyone in the nick of time, and any minute now he'd 
appear and cheerfully underplay his achievements. The Brigadier and I bored 
ourselves silly recounting the number of times that had happened. When the 
Doctor didn't emerge straight away, that was fine, too. The Brigadier assured me 
that it often looked like he'd died, but he hadn't really, it had all been a 
misunderstanding. Tell me about it, Id replied. The Doctor had cheated death so 
often that death didn't play anymore. He was alive, and he'd catch up with us 
sooner or later. 
We didn't believe it, even then. 
As I sat in that forest, the Martians and the Provisional Government were in 
London, preparing the second stage of their plan. 



Xznaal moved slowly through the large chambers of the East Wing of the National 
Gallery. After a week he was almost fully acclimatised to England. He could 
almost feel his veins coursing with the blood coolants developed by Vrgnur. The 
first sunlight of the morning was creeping through the skylights. 
Xztaynz was waiting for him in the green-walled Sackler Room, and was baring his 
stumpy human teeth. 'Morning good, Kingman Snal,' he began. 

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'Your Martian improvess, human.'
'Thankie, my liege.' 
Xznaal grunted. It offended him to hear his language desecrated by a lower 
lifeform. The conversation would have to continue in the crude human dialect. 
'The domesstic ssituation remainss volatile. Why?' 
'The rabble are trying to take advantage of the new government. The riots are 
being orchestrated by extremists. We'll capture the ringleaders. With your help, 
we've completely removed the enemy stronghold at Portsmouth. If you would 
authorise the use of the warship again - ' 
'That attack wass in retribution for the incident at Gatwick.' He paused to suck 
in more air. 'Our operation there wass dissrupted. One of our sshuttlecraft was 
desstroyed.' 
Xztaynz faltered. 'Yes, I heard reports. But your crew?' 
'My crew wass unharmed.' Xznaal barked. 'But all the livesstock esscaped.' 
'How did it happen?' 
Xznaal didn't reply. The Terran weapons were primitive, but they had penetrated 
the war rocket's armour. Xznaal had always known that his ship would be unable 
to withstand a nuclear blast, but last night human conventional rocketry and 
artillery had proved a great deal more effective than Martian military 
intelligence had suggested. It was a worrying development, but one that only 
confirmed the urgency of his endeavours. 
'That iss of no importance. I will not authorisse the usse of the warsship 
except where Martian interesstss are directly threatened.' 
'But Adisham - ' 
'The Time Lord wass a threat to Martian operationss. Enough of thiss: what of 
the other human clanss?' 
'The foreign situation has stabilised, as we knew it would,' Xztaynz continued. 
'Very few embassies have closed, and now that the foreign nationals are 
beginning to return home, and it's clear that it's business as usual - ' 
'Enough. Lord Gerayhayvun informss me that you are an expert on human art.' 

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The human shifted from one foot to the other, as it was wont to. 'I know a 
little. The curators here will be happy to help us if my knowledge proves 
imperfect. This place is so much more impressive without the mob surging around 
it in their backpacks and T-shirts.'
Xznaal looked around at the high ceilings and long galleries. Normally this 
place was open to humans of all ranks. He understood that as the British state 
owned the exhibits, all taxpayers had free access to view the finest Earth art 
acquired in a millennium of conquest and commission. A noble arrangement for 
such a savage race. When he returned to Argyre, Xznaal vowed to throw open his 
own galleries to his subjects. The first exhibition would be one of human 
painting, weapons, flowers and sculpture. 
He turned to the canvas on his right. 'What iss thiss one?' 
'The Hay Wain. By Constable.' 
'I like it. It sshowss the bounty of your human flora and fauna. Have it removed 
and taken to my chamberss in the Tower. Thiss one iss by the ssame artisst?' 
'Correct, your majesty.' 
'That one too. And that big horsse.' 
'The Stubbs? Yes, King Xznaal.' The Home Secretary motioned to the curator and 
repeated the order. 
When the curator had gone, Xztaynz turned back to Xznaal. 'Your majesty, I was 
at Television Centre yesterday. The documentary on Martian history is proceeding 
very well. The photographs you provided of the last Marshall's funeral were very 
powerful.' 
'Yess.' They showed the funeral barge moving up the Araxes Canal into the Fields 
of the Dead. Every Lord was there, their armour bedecked in gold. Xznaal had 
stood shell to shell with even his bitterest rivals, the leaders of the clans of 
Thaumasia and Erythraeum, united in grief for the ruler of all their people and 
in support of the new Marshall, the boy-king Paxaphyr. The funeral of a Marshall 
was such a contrast to the normal austerity of Martian life. 
'I had no idea that your civilisation was so old. Hundreds of thousands of 
years. It makes human history seem so insignificant.' 

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'Indeed,' Xznaal whispered. 'Report on the consstruction of the sspace 
freighterss.'
'Er, yes, that is ahead of schedule. The first shipments to Mars will begin at 
the end of the month.' 
'Good,' Xznaal said. 
'If I might return to the subject of Martian culture. I couldn't help noting an 
Egyptian influence. That fascinates me. It seems that your people and ours have 
encountered one another before.' 
Xznaal shuffled around to face the Home Secretary. 'Egyptian?' 
'An ancient Earth clan. But Egypt is a hot country, too hot for Martians, I 
would have thought. Luckily, we've got a lot of Egyptian pieces at the British 
Museum. I brought a catalogue.' 
Xznaal took the document, tried to manipulate it in his claws. It slipped 
between his pincers and dropped to the floor. Xztaynz bent down to pick it up, 
holding open and in front of his eyes. Xznaal studied the pictures. Ancient 
human artefacts, all bearing crude, but recognisable images. 
'You worsship thesse godss?' Xznaal hissed curiously. 
'Heavens no, I'm Church of England,' Xztaynz gurgled. 'No-one has worshipped 
this lot for thousands of years.' 
Xznaal glared down at him. 'They will,' he ordered. 'You will insstruct your 
teacher casste to include religiouss insstruction in the curriculum.' 
'Martian religion?' 
'Reformed Martian, yess.' 

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Xztaynz gurgled again. 'I'm not sure the Archbishop of Canterbury would like 
that.' His face was contorted into a rictus.
Xznaal angled his head and exhaled. 'Then behead him and replace him with one 
loyal to uss. I thought you were a politician.' 



Extract from the memoirs of Professor Bernice Summerfield: 
I finished my ablutions and began to trudge back up to the officer's mess. My 
thoughts at the time were preoccupied with how I could escape. Id decided that 
my best bet was to build myself an interstellar distress beacon and signal for 
help. That was the current plan, the only real flaw with it being I hadn't even 
the slightest idea how to build an interstellar distress beacon. I knew that I 
wanted to try and contact my father, but wasnt sure where to start. Hed be 
lying low, too low for me to find on my own. Failing that, I told myself, I 
could stay in Windsor Forest. Why would anyone want to leave such a peaceful 
wood, with deer and squirrels, for motorways and town centres with a roadblock 
at every junction? 
I slid the door of the mess open and stepped inside. Most of the soldiers were 
up now. One of them had made us all a mug of tea. I took mine gratefully. The 
two Brigadiers were checking their maps. Lethbridge-Stewart doing so while he 
shaved. The radio transceiver was still on, but now it was playing the Radio 
Four Breakfast Programme. The presenters' voices were unfamiliar. There had been 
purges at all the broadcasters and newspapers. For the most part, UNIT had used 
the radio only to listen to messages, they'd maintained their own radio silence 
for almost the whole week. We couldn't afford to draw attention to ourselves. 
'Portsmouth has fallen,' Alistair announced grimly. 'In the last hour or so. The 
Martian ship attacked the docks, they sank every ship there. All the Royal Navy 
buildings were demolished with that ray thing of theirs.' 
I sat down, unable to think of anything to say. There were many tiny resistance 
cells, but only a handful of real strongholds still stood in England: Bristol, 
York, Aldershot, Manchester and here in Windsor. Perhaps a couple of others. The 
one at Portsmouth was the best-defended. The coup leaders included senior 
officers of the Army and RAF, but the Royal Navy had been almost untainted. The 
ships around the British coast had moved in to defend Portsmouth, to maintain a 
foothold on British soil and to keep the supply lines open. Now Portsmouth had 
fallen. 

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'Scotland's our best hope now,' Captain Ford noted. The Provisional Government's 
tacticians had been most anxious to secure the capital and the further north you 
went, the less their grip on power. Unfortunately, that didn't rule out 
airstrikes and rapid deployment of men parachuting in. Or the ever-present 
threat that the Martian ship could up sticks and attack any city in the country 
within minutes.
'It's the first time they've used the Martian ship since Adisham,' I noted. 
'It's been over London for the whole week, hasn't it?' I moved over to the 
Brigadier. He'd unfolded a big map of the South of England over Bessie's bonnet 
and had marked off intelligence reports in red felt-tip. He'd been careful not 
to note down the location of the resistance groups they knew about - a basic 
security measure, but not necessarily one that would have occurred to me. The 
resistance cells were doing a good job in tracking ProvGov troop movements, and 
they had an almost complete record of where the Martians were. So far, the 
resistance had agreed not to attack any military targets, simply to observe 
them. 
Bambera consulted a notepad. 'Not quite, Professor. The Martian ship headed this 
way on Saturday - we thought it was coming for us, but it went straight past 
before returning to London. It was sighted over Bradford during the rioting 
there on Monday night. Yesterday it was tracked over Surrey. But it's never been 
used in combat before.' 
I rubbed my forehead, already tired again only half an hour after waking up. 
'The Martians probably see the riots as a spectator sport. Up there they had the 
best seats in the house.' 
The Brigadier slammed his fist down on Bessie's bonnet. 'Damn this!' he shouted. 

We stood in silence for a couple of seconds, glaring at each other. 
Tactlessly, the radio continued to reel off its propaganda. ' ... Staines 
reiterated that the Provisional Government is offering a full amnesty for anyone 
leaving the rebel encampments. In the north, York is under siege. Our 
correspondent on the ground there observes that medieval walls won't hold back 
the tanks for long. Another walled city, Chester, surrendered unconditionally on 
Tuesday evening when an outbreak of cholera ... ' 
'It must be a good sign that they haven't bombed York to oblivion,' 
Lethbridge-Stewart said hesitantly. 

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'Yes,' I said, recognising that the old man was trying to stay friends with me. 
Tempers had become frayed quite a few times over the last couple of days. We 
both knew that the Provisional Government was capable of winning without firing 
a shot - all they had to do was cut off the water and electricity supplies, 
prevent any food from getting in and wait. Parts of the country that weren't 
resisting were finding that life was going on pretty much as normal. That was 
enough of an incentive to co-operate with the new government for most people. 
Even the foreign travel ban wasn't being badly-received: the government had 
fully compensated holidaymakers, and businesses had received various assurances. 
It was frustrating just sitting here, hoping that the woods around us weren't 
full of Government snipers.
'What are we going to do?' I asked, trying to sound constructive. 
'Professor Summerfield, you will need to brief us about the Martians and their 
technology. We'll need to know how long we can expect to stay hidden.' Bambera 
said all that without even looking in my direction. 
'Fine. Look, they are a civilised race. We can talk to them.' 
A couple of the officers laughed, but Lethbridge-Stewart was nodding. 'You're 
right. But I think we should negotiate from a position of strength. Show them 
what we're made of.' 
Any other time, I would have cracked a dark joke about spilt blood and guts, but 
it wasn't appropriate. 
'Brigadier,' Bambera said darkly, 'we are in no position to take back London. 
Especially not with that Martian ship there. We should wait here until we know 
more. Professor Summerfield is the expert on the Martians. Let's hear what she 
has to say.' 
I scratched my collarbone. 'Now? OK.' 
The officers pulled their chairs around to face me. I smiled nervously - this 
wasn't quite how I had pictured my inaugural lecture as a real professor. For 
one thing, I'd planned to down a stiff brandy beforehand. 
I began by sketching in a brief history of the Martians. Nothing too detailed, 
just a rough explanation of the feudal system that had kept Martian civilisation 
carefully balanced for the last million years. 
'So the Martians have been around for more than a million years?' one of the 
senior RAF men interrupted. 'Surely by now they'd have evolved into superbeings 
or conquered the galaxy? If they had ships like that a million years ago, why 
didn't they conquer the Earth then, back when we were only monkeys?' 

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I chuckled. This was traditionally the first question a human asked in any 
lecture about Martian history. Id done the same fifteenish years before. 
'You're judging their civilisation in terms of your own. There's a lot to be 
said for a stable society rather than a progressive one. The Ancient Egyptian 
civilisation thrived for thousands of years without a single new invention, they 
hardly even improved on their existing stuff. The only thing that changed in 
four thousand years under the Pharaohs was the introduction of the chariot, when 
the Phoenicians attacked. Or was it the Assyrians? I forget.' A number of the 
officers were shuffling impatiently, so I shunted off that particular train of 
thought. 'Anyway, the Martians are exactly the same, only their stability has 
been forced on them by a lack of resources. Mars is in what we archaeologists 
call a "state of decay": they've lost advanced technological knowledge - or it 
sits in libraries gathering dust - because they have no use for it. What's the 
point of knowing how to build an atom bomb if there isn't any plutonium? Or a 
silicon chip if there isn't any silicon? Or a log fire if there aren't any 
logs?'
There was a murmuring around the room. They seemed excited by this. I'd stolen 
the last bit from a textbook that wouldn't be written for four hundred years. I 
enjoyed appearing all-knowing, having a roomful of military men hanging on my 
every word. They were lucky I didnt get my spoons out and start playing them. 
'So in many ways, we are at an advantage?' Bambera asked. 
I nodded sagely. 'Oh yes. Humanity is in the middle of a rapid stage of 
technological progress. Within a hundred years, we'll have overtaken the 
Martians in a number of key areas.' 
Another round of murmuring. 
'Don't get carried away,' I warned. 'Just think how easy it would be to conquer 
Victorian England using Harrier jump jets and nuclear submarines.' 
The officers were apprehensive again. 
'The Doctor built a sonic jammer,' the Brigadier said, trying to keep the spirit 
of optimism stoked up. 'That reflected the Martian's energy ray back at them. I 
take it that we can't do that yet?' 
I shrugged. 
'If we had the right frequency we probably could,' one of the technicians said. 
'Problem is we don't have the frequency.' 

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'We need to strike before they consolidate their position,' Lethbridge-Stewart 
said. 'They could be preparing a giant occupation fleet on Mars.'
I shook my head. 'They have the technology, but not the raw materials. That one 
warship represents a massive investment of time and energy - think of all that 
metal and fuel. There's probably a year's entire clan defence budget tied up in 
it. Britain found it a lot easier to build the Mars 97 than Xznaal did to build 
his warship.' 
Lethbridge-Stewart frowned. 'So that's not the spearhead, that's the entire 
invasion?' 
Captain Ford was nodding. 'Our intelligence suggests that the Martians are 
staying put. The Provisional Government is preparing consignments of raw 
materials for export to Mars: steel, timber, fertiliser.' He swept his hand over 
the map in front of him that had all of the production sites marked off. 
Lethbridge-Stewart was trying to concentrate. 'Surely they'll use Earth's 
resources to build more warships? I would have thought that would be logical. 
Only then would they send for reinforcements. So we have to strike now, before 
more of those things are operational.' 
Bambera frowned. 'Strike where? Look, they aren't building anything at the 
moment. If they started, they can't build any of those things overnight, or in 
one place. You are right to be concerned: we'll pass this on to the other cells, 
get them to watch out for unusual activity at aerospace factories, shipyards, 
that sort of thing.' 
'I want to go into Windsor, Lethbridge-Stewart announced, 'We need more 
detailed maps.' 
Bambera chuckled, presumably by the thought that an elite military force needed 
to pop to the shops for supplies. 
'I'll try and phone Doris, too,' he whispered across to me. 
'No,' I said firmly. 
He frowned. 'Why not? Do you think the Martians will be monitoring phone calls?' 

'Not the Martians. They are a noble warrior race, and such tricks are beneath 
them. I'm worried by the humans.' 
The soldier considered what I was saying, then nodded. I took Lethbridge-Stewart 
to one side. 'Take Bessie,' I offered. 

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'I wasn't sure whether - '
'Take the car. If you need to make a getaway, you'll need it.' 
A smile flickered across his face. 'Thank you, Benny. If I'm not back by 
nine-thirty, then I won't be coming back.' He lifted the map off the bonnet, and 
handed it over to her. 
'Er, do you mind if you fold this up, Alistair?' I asked, 'I never really got 
the knack.' 
When the Brigadier looked at me, there was a twinkle in his eye. 'Truth to tell, 
Mrs Summerfield, neither did I. When I joined the army I made it my business to 
get promoted quick smart so that someone else could do all the folding for me.' 
We turned back to the main group, and the Brigadier passed the map back over to 
Bambera, who began to fold it without being asked. 
'Look after yourself,' I chuckled as Lethbridge-Stewart climbed stiffly into the 
driver's seat. 
'Of course I will.' 
A couple of corporals were pulling open the door for him. Bessie shot silently 
out and off onto the dirt track. 
Bambera was shaking his head. 'Shame.' 
'That's why they call them "The Blunder Days", ma'am,' Captain Ford said. 'He 
thinks we can go in, all guns blazing.' 
The sniggering continued for a couple of seconds until I rounded on them. 'At 
least he's doing something. At least he isn't sitting in a wood, waiting for the 
Martians to find us.' They looked blankly at me. 
'Professor Summerfield, Bambera said sharply. 'Ive read the files: back in the 
seventies, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart repulsed a couple of small-scale 
incursions. Ive read his reports, and he relied on two things: luck and the 
Doctor. Since weve not had any luck, and your friend turned out to be 
half-lemming on his mothers side - ' her voice trailed away. 
'I'm going for a walk.' I announced levelly. A witticism had just occurred to 
me, one of those peculiar expressions Ace would come up with. 'Sod this for a 
game of soldiers, I called back as I headed for the door. 

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I took my mug, leaving them to compile their reports and sit around on their 
assimilations. I felt an overwhelming urge to get out of the camp, to be on my 
own. Without thinking, I wandered out beyond the perimeter and found myself a 
sheltered spot facing away from the camp. I sat with my back to a tree trunk, my 
eyes closed. A hundred yards away, a line of black-clad Provisional Government 
troops with raised rifles marched forwards as if they were directed by 
Eistenstein himself, gunning down everything in their path. At least they could 
have been doing for all I cared. This wasnt my timezone, it wasnt even my own 
home planet.
There was a dull shape in my chest, something that a week ago had been a sense 
of loss. I had spent the week crying, not for one lost Doctor but two. I found 
it difficult to mourn for the young man who had run off into the red cloud, 
frock coat flailing. Although Alistair recognised his old friend, I only saw a 
stranger - irritating new habits and mannerisms, virtually nothing of the old 
body language. Carefree instead of careful. A little brother or first boyfriend, 
not a father. It wasnt just him - his death had robbed the universe of all 
future Doctors, young and old, fat and thin, bald and hairy. Now the Doctor had 
gone, we would have to sort all this out on our own. 
It was a daunting prospect. Where did one begin? What would the Doctor have 
done? He'd have tried to talk to the Martians, he'd have made them see reason. 
If they couldn't do that, then he'd use their own weapons against them. He'd 
find out what the Martians were really planning and he'd stop it, once and for 
all. He wouldn't use guns, he'd talk to them. And he'd have sorted it all out in 
about an hour and a half, two hours tops. 
And he'd make it all look so easy. 
A twig snapped behind me, but before I had time to turn, I was pushed down onto 
the floor. 
'Don't move.' It was a lanky man in a tattered business suit. He was holding me 
down, and he had a knife. 'Stay still or I kill you. Keep quiet.' 
I nodded. The man waved the knife a little closer, betraying his nervousness, 
rather than his resolve. 
'Good morning,' I replied. 
'I said shut - ' 
I grabbed his wrist, slammed it against a tree trunk and kicked his feet from 
under him. He toppled over, and I stuck my knee in the back of his neck. It had 
been a while since I'd had cause to use my Aikido, and so I was rather gratified 
that I could still lift my leg so high. 

Page 17 
   

'Let me go,' he screamed. 'Civilisation.'
'What?' I scowled. 
'Civilisation. It's the end of the world. The end of everything. Ten days ago I 
was a civil engineer. Now look at me.' 
I considered my options, then stood. 'You're talking about being civilised. So 
let's cut out all this knife and kung-fu crap and talk.' 
The man scrambled to his feet. I held out my hand and we introduced ourselves. 
The stranger said his name was Raymond Heath. 
'OK, Ray. You were a civil engineer. Where?' 
The sound of boots crunching through undergrowth. Soldiers from the base were 
hurrying to my aid, taking up positions behind me. 
'Are you OK, Professor Summerfield?' one of the lads asked. 
'Yes thank you, private.' 
The soldiers stayed alert, scanning the wood to make sure my assailant was on 
his own. 
'Carry on,' I told Ray quietly. 
'I worked at the EG refinery, just outside Reading.' 
'The what?' I asked. 
'EG. You know: one of the Greyhaven companies.' 
So I listened. 



Lethbridge-Stewart was slotting coins into the pay-and-display machine. While 
the mechanism whirred, he checked the car park. No-one was watching him, except 
a three-year old with a balloon. 

Page 18 
   

As far as he knew, neither he nor Benny's photograph had appeared in the press 
or on television in the last week. Perhaps the authorities thought that they had 
died in Adisham. More likely, with the Doctor dead, they weren't considered a 
threat any longer. The Brigadier had reached that conclusion himself, but he'd 
rather hoped that UNIT would pose more of a threat.
Lethbridge-Stewart quickened his pace a little, passing through a row of trees 
to the main street. He used to live in Gerrard's Cross, so he'd been to Windsor 
his fair share of times over the years. The streets were as busy as he 
remembered, there was even a school party making its way over to the Castle. 
London was less than an hour away, just along the M4. The population of that 
city was living in fear, under curfew, with a kilometre long warship hovering 
over them. Here, people were going about their daily business. A quartet of 
Etonians passed him, moaning that the BBC had cancelled last night's X Files 
'due to recent events'. 
Lethbridge-Stewart could see the WH Smiths sign now. He continued towards it, 
pausing every so often to look into other shop windows. This was a simple 
technique. If anyone was following you, they'd have to stop as well, or walk 
straight past you. You could also check the reflected image of the other side of 
the street, without having to look directly at a potential tail. As part of his 
basic espionage training, he'd walked down Oxford Street, from one end to the 
other. Half a dozen MI5 man were trailing him. His primary goal was to shake 
them off, the second was to identify as many of them as he could at the debrief 
afterwards. 
The point was, of course, that he couldn't do either. If you walk down a street, 
people look at you. If you are going to Smiths, chances are a dozen others are 
too, so they'll be walking down the same pavements. At the debrief, he'd been 
honest enough to admit that he couldn't spot anyone who was definitely following 
him. He described a couple of the people he thought might have been MI5 agents, 
all of whom had been innocent passers-by. He got points for honesty, and 
realism. Despite all his weaving in and out of shops, he doubted that he'd 
shaken off the men following him. He had managed to drop out of sight for almost 
a full minute, more than enough to pass over or drop off any documents he might 
have been carrying. He'd passed that part of his training. 
He walked into Smiths, checking the dozen or so shoppers. He paused at an empty 
newspaper rack. 
'Excuse me,' he asked the nearest assistant, 'but - ' 
'Oh there aren't any,' she said in a sing-song voice. 

Page 19 
   

'The government have banned them?'
'S'pose.' 
'You don't seem terribly interested,' he informed her. 
'Don't take much interest in it. Politics,' she explained. 'You know "beef's 
safe to eat", '"no it isn't". It's all made up. Everyone eats beef again now, 
don't they?' 
'I never stopped,' Lethbridge-Stewart informed her. 
'Even though it might turn your brain into a sponge? A load of people stopped 
eating it for a couple of weeks, but only when it was in the news. It'll be the 
same with the Martians. Already is. I'm used to them now, and they ain't that 
bad.' 
Lethbridge-Stewart continued on to the 'local interest' section. There was a 
shelf there full of Ordnance Survey maps. He picked up a couple for north of 
here. If they wanted to prevent being captured, they needed the best knowledge 
of the terrain available. With the right intelligence, they could evade the 
Martians and the Provisional Government forces for months. The resistance would 
be able to collect intelligence data and keep one step ahead of the enemy. 
Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart frowned. And then what would they do? Wait for the 
Americans or the United Nations to bail them out? It wasn't going to happen. 
With every passing day, the international situation was more stable - the 
governments of the world were finding it easy to accommodate the Martian 
presence. The resistance needed to strike, to hit right at the centre of the 
Provisional Government. But with London under martial law, how could they? And 
how could they do that without provoking Martian retaliation? Britain wasn't 
just at war with itself, it was at war with another planet. No wonder no other 
countries were going to get involved. 
The Doctor had been right: the Martians wouldn't stop at Britain. They had to be 
beaten back. But he was just one old man, standing in a newsagents worrying that 
someone would recognise him. He didn't even have enough money to buy all the 
maps he wanted to. What could he do on his own? 

Page 20 
   

He could fight.
The Brigadier realised that he wasn't on his own. He had UNIT, he had half the 
British army and, despite what that girl had just said, he was sure he had 
virtually all the British people. 
He could lead. 



Oswald and Dave had been staring at the packet for almost the whole hour since 
the postman had delivered it. There was a rather odd instruction on the back: DO 
NOT OPEN - WAIT ONE HOUR. The mystery had intrigued Oswald, and fifty nine 
minutes later the padded envelope was still sealed. Early on, theyd established 
that it contained a videotape. 
'Its probably from a charity for menks traumatised by having their entire video 
collection wiped by a giant Martian UFO. 
Oswald was weighing the packet in his hands. 'The ship clearly generates an 
intense magnetic field. 
'Clearly. 
They turned. A tall man in a neat blue suit had just come through the doorway. 
He looked like a pilot or a soldier, but he was old - fifty-five at least. He 
had a peculiar angular face. Dave was sure that he recognised the man from 
somewhere. 
The man took his pipe from his mouth. 'Good morning, lads. I believe that you 
have a package for me. 



Extract from the memoirs of Professor Bernice Summerfield 'We have to stop 
them.' 
Lethbridge-Stewart was shouting so loud we could hear him from outside the mess. 
The soldiers on the door were a little more hesitant with their salutes, and 
they were clearly embarrassed by the noise. 
We stepped into the old barn. Bambera and Ford were glaring at Alistair. 

Page 21 
   

'There's nothing I would like more than to "stop them",' Bambera said curtly. 
'But I will not send my men on a suicide mission. If you've assembled the 
command staff simply to - '
'The Martians won't stop at Dover, you know. The world is at stake here.' 
Captain Ford pointed to his charts. 'Brigadier, as soon as we know the full 
extent of the Martian plan, we can begin to sabotage it. Guerrilla tactics: 
block their convoys, blow up their factories. Ferment civil unrest ... ' 
'Until?' Lethbridge-Stewart asked. 
'What do you mean?' 
'Why are we playing at being the French Resistance? Who are our allies, who will 
help us?' 
'No-one is happy with the Martian presence,' Bambera reminded him. 'The EU 
imposed trade sanctions to prevent the export of Martian technology. The UN 
would have passed that Alien Non-Proliferation Resolution if it wasn't for the 
Chinese veto.' With only six weeks to go before the British were due to leave 
Hong Kong, the Chinese were going out of their way to stay on good terms with 
the Martians. The United Kingdom's membership of the UN was officially 'under 
review', but in reality little had changed. They hadnt even lost their seat on 
the Security Council. 
'The government-in-exile are rallying support for us. The Queen is in Washington 
at - ' 
'The US Congress has already agreed not to interfere in Britain's "internal 
affairs". They want the Martian technology. The EU members haven't withdrawn 
their embassy staff. Bambera, we are on our own. We have to take the lead.' 
'How?' she said scornfully. 
Lethbridge-Stewart began to explain the plan that he had formulated on the way 
back from town. 'The Provisional Government is based in London, but we know that 
their military forces are all in the north, or heading up there. They are going 
to secure the northern cities - Manchester, Leeds and York are all Royalist 
strongholds. At the moment, the Provisionals can't even think of moving north of 
there, and so Scotland's almost untouched, apart from the air-raid on 
Edinburgh.' 

Page 22 
   

'One snag here, Brigadier,' Bambera reminded him. 'The Martian ship is hanging 
over London. It would make short work of anyone that tried to attack the 
capital. That's why we've not moved before now.'
'We're not just at war with one ship, Brigadier, we're at war against an entire 
planet,' Captain Ford reminded everyone. 
'Not the whole of Mars,' I corrected. 'Just one clan: the Argyre.' They noticed 
me for the first time. 
Lethbridge-Stewart hadn't finished with Bambera. 'The lads in Portsmouth damaged 
the Martian ship. It can be done, with surface-to-air missiles and heavy 
artillery. They are not invincible.' 
Bambera straightened and faced me. 'You know your Martians, Professor. Did we 
really manage to sting them?' 
I thought about the question for a moment, realising that the lives of all the 
men in the camp depended on my answer. 'Yes,' I said finally, 'They don't have 
forcefields or anything like that.' 
'So an air strike could knock the Martian ship out of the sky?' Ford asked. 
'In theory, if they could get close enough. The Martian gunners will know the 
planes are in the air before your own radar operators and they'll be able to 
keep better track of them once they are flying. If you could get around that 
somehow, the big problem would be the magnetic engines: they don't emit heat, so 
heatseekers wouldn't work, they do generate magnetic flux, which would play 
merry hell with your guidance systems.' 
'What about a nuclear strike?' the Brigadier asked. 
I grimaced. 'Thinking of calling your old friends on the Revenge? Hobson, wasn't 
it?' 
He narrowed his eyes. 'How the devil did you know about that?' 
I smiled. 'It's a long story. Yes, a nuclear strike would work, and I doubt the 
Martians would have any more of a defence against an ICBM than you have. It 
would also kill about a million Londoners straight away and another two or three 
million over the next ten years.' 

Page 23 
   

'I was only speaking hypothetically,' Lethbridge-Stewart told me.
'Glad to hear it.' 
'We won't have to fight the Martian ship,' Lethbridge-Stewart announced. 'Not 
until we've re-taken London.' 
Bambera was rubbing her forehead. 'How are we going to do that?' she asked 
wearily. 'No. Cancel that. Alistair, I appreciate that you're trying to help, 
but throwing ourselves at the Martians like the Charge of the Light Brigade 
won't help anyone. We sit tight.' 
'No we won't,' I said firmly. 
The officers were all glaring at me. I motioned for my companion to come 
forwards. It looked like he had been crying. 
'This is Raymond Heath. He's got a story for us.' 
'H-hello. I was a civil engineer at the EG Plant just outside Reading. We were 
making a fertiliser, all very hush-hush. Lord Greyhaven was in personal charge 
of the project, and he told us that what we were doing would eventually be used 
on Mars. We assumed he meant when the humans colonised it.' he paused. 'Really 
it was for the Martians themselves. On that first Friday morning, a Martian 
shuttlecraft arrived at the plant. A Martian scientist, Vrgnur took over, and 
anyone who objected was killed. Vrgnur stays in his shuttle, but the whole 
refinery is patrolled by Government troops with machine guns. No-one's allowed 
to leave - we had to sleep in the canteen.' 
The assembled officers were all staring at him, making him even more nervous 
than he naturally was. 
I smiled at him, trying to put him at his ease. 'But if all you were doing was 
making fertiliser ... ' 
Ray became more animated. 'But we weren't. The project changed when the Martian 
arrived. Now we were growing some bacteriological weapon. A red gas.' 
I stepped forwards again. 'This is the poison gas that the Martians used on 
Adisham - it's what killed the Doctor.' The members of the audience that had 
known the Doctor shifted in their chairs, Lethbridge-Stewart included. I 
continued: 'Adisham was just a test. I think the gas is the weapon that the 
Martians will use to destroy humanity.' 

Page 24 
   

Ray nodded. 'They were testing the gas on prisoners. They would turn up in 
Prison Service vans and be led into the - ' he broke off. 'This was happening in 
Berkshire. It still is. They forced us to do it, at gunpoint. I - ' he was 
having difficulty speaking now. I put her arm over his shoulder.
'They were gassing prisoners?' Captain Ford asked quietly. 
I nodded. 'Fifteen miles away from here, and then burying the bodies in mass 
graves. Ray managed to escape, he's been wandering the countryside ever since.' 
'But how did the Martians manage to set all this up without anyone knowing?' 
'The Home Office must have helped set it up,' Bambera said. 'They must 
co-operating with this. People knew.' 
'And now we know,' I said quietly. 'So do we stay here and let it carry on?' 
There was fire in Lethbridge-Stewart's eyes. 'No. We fight it,' he said. 'We 
fight it and we stop it. In twenty four hours, the last Martian will have left 
British soil.' 
'How, exactly? Bambera asked. 
The Brigadier broke into a broad smile. 'Im glad you asked me that question ... 
'
NEXT WEEK: Earth attacks. 


