The old Doctor's rooms had been left in chaos, strewn with torn papers and books.

'Agency vandals!' he cursed as he sorted through the mess.

'Otherstide felicitations,' said the black-haired old villain behind him. Glospin, old Glospin, leaning heavily on his cane.

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The old Doctor's chin went up in that familiar attitude of defiance. 'What's this, Cousin? A name-day treat? Hmm?'

'I'm no Cousin of yours, remember?'

'How could I forget?'

'So I hope you weren't considering a visit to your former home.'

'Charmed, I'm sure.' The Doctor gathered up a fistful of papers. 'You come all this way, after all this time, when you must be due at the House yourself. What's the matter? Afraid of losing your inheritance!'

'My assumption as new Kithriarch has never been more assured,' said Glospin. 'Quences is senile. But don't entertain the delusion that anyone else wants you back. You have already been replaced.'

The Doctor gave an involuntary gasp of shock. 'Impossible...' He reached to his desk for support. 'And illegal too.'

'A little premature, I felt. But with a few chosen words in suitable places...' He smiled. 'And so I deemed it a courtesy to clarify a few outstanding matters first.' He took a document from his robe. 'Your Loom Certification.'

'What now?'

'I was studying the document recently when I discovered some anomalies in your genetic codings.'

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The Doctor snatched away the document.

'That's all right, Wormhole,' said Glospin smoothly. 'It's just a copy. But if you look, you will see that your codes are entirely out of sympathy with the Lungbarrow Loom's genetic template.'

'Nonsense.' The Doctor's face sharpened with irritation as he studied the document. 'This is some childish attempt to complete my severance from the Family.'

'I undertook this purely out of my interests as a geneticist. But of course, due to the Family circumstances...'

'Insulting.'

'It's not entirely unheard of. People renew their regenerative cycles by jumping Looms, thus being reborn into new Families. Was that your plan, Wormhole? You certainly never belonged to Lungbarrow's Loom. Or do you come from further afield?' He was drawing closer, scrutinising the Doctor like some laboratory specimen. 'In short, exactly who or what are you?'

'Who?' the Doctor exploded. 'I don't know what petty loophole you've dug up, Glospin. But I am your Cousin. And don't think I'm not aware of your nasty Gallifreyan Allegiance proclivities. Or your involvement with the Intervention Agency.'

'Not exactly true,' said the persecutor, smiling. 'But I am ready to fascinate them with my discovery. . . for the correct remuneration.'

'Insanity!' The old Doctor shook his head. 'Haven't you had enough from me already?'

'No,' said Glospin. 'I want everything.'

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'Out! Get out!' shouted the Doctor. He raised his stick and brought it down on Glospin. But his opponent was ready to give as he good as he got. The two old men were soon fighting like mongrels over an old bone.

The box came through the wall with a crash. Glospin screamed as a flare of light scorched his right arm.

He stared at the box, choking with pain. 'I'll see you ruined! Lungbarrow will never take you back again!'

The box slid towards him, but he fell at the door and stumbled out into the Capitol.

'Lies.' The old Doctor was shaking. His cheek was bleeding where Glospin had clawed him. He swept his cane across the litter of damaged books. The strewn wreckage of a life's work. 'Lies.'

From the city outside came a new jangle of alarms. The box hovered by the open door, clicking excitedly.

'What are you?' demanded the Doctor.

In answer, the thing opened its lid. Inside sat a fierce, icy-white furnace. As the Doctor stared into it, his frightened expression turned to astonishment and wonder. His voice trembled. 'Of course, of course. Extraordinary. I understand. But why choose me?'

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The watchers hovered above the rushing procession of time.

'Did Glospin talk to you about this?' The voice of the Doctor's sixth regeneration was drained and flat.

'Yes,' said Innocet.

'It's all lies, you know. Haven't you seen enough?'

'Whose lies?' she asked. 'Glospin's lies? Or yours?'

For the attention of the Cardinal Prime, Prydon Chapterhouse

My Lord Cardinal,

I wish to draw your attention to a most contentious matter concerning the Prydonian House of Lungbarrow. I understand that the aforementioned House is allotted a statute quota of forty-five extant Cousins. I gather, however, that this quota has recently been breached by the birth from that House's Loom of an uncertificated Cousin.

I trust that you will share my concern.

The first Doctor had scrolled the letter tightly. He sealed it with the official Prydonian seal that he kept from his time in the Chapterhouse's Bureau of Possibility. A post he had left after disagreements about his overzealous political involvements.

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Hooded in a black cloak, he pushed the scroll into the open beak of the great stone owl that guarded the Chapterhouse gate.

The alarms were still sounding as he made his way across the Citadel's broad edifice. The rainswept bridges and walkways were deserted. No one steps out on Otherstide night.

He carried one bag with him. A few belongings and keepsakes. The rest he left to the guards and the scavengers.

He hurried along the windy colonnades known as Gesyevva's Fingers and paused on the wide square where the ancient memorial to Omega stood. For a moment, he saw a shape flit across the burnt orange sky above the monument.

The TT embarkation port was on Under-level 15 of the Citadel. A group of watchful citizens was seated in the waiting zone. Several were busy trying far too hard not to be conspicuous.

'Agency guards,' mused the Doctor to himself.

He ducked into the dry dimension dockyard on the next level up. On a neural construction palette stood a gleaming new TARDIS ready for service installation. A technician's chart listed its immaculate specifications and latest safety precedent - a remote recall override system. 'A type fifty-three?' complained the Doctor. 'You're not getting me out in one of those new-fangled soulless slip-abouts.'

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In a far corner, surrounded by junk, was a dull grey, battered old TT booth with an obsolete Type 40 marker on the door.

The key was in the lock.

As the Doctor stepped inside the doomed TARDIS, he heard a fresh clamour of alarms from close by.

Beyond its tight dimensional gate, the ship's interior opened out impossibly. Its spacious console room was gloomy and neglected. A cobweb lifted and rippled on the central console. Several panels had been lifted off to expose the complex inner circuitry.

The Doctor tore away the cobweb and blew off the dust. Instantly, the sluggish hum of power edged up a tone. A gold light began to glimmer weakly behind the honeycomb of roundels that covered the walls.

The place felt welcoming.

The Doctor put down his bag.

There were banks of instruments around the room and a couple of overturned chairs. Beyond a door, there was the glimpse of a shadowy passage leading deeper.

He pondered the control panels with a degree of glee and selected the brass button marked DOOR.

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There was no response. The power was all but drained. The light guttered and the ship's hum died.

The Doctor drummed his fingers in frustration.

Something whooshed. The black box was suddenly hovering beside him.

'Yes, I wondered when you'd catch up with me,' he said. 'So you think you can come along too, do you? Well, that's all very well, my friend. But since we have neither the luxury of a pilot nor of any power, perhaps you can suggest a way to fly this thing.'

The box whirred. Its lid opened a crack. The white furnace inside winked at him. He could feel its energy softly saturating the air.

The ship gradually began to hum again. A more confident, assertive hum. The light in the room began to rise. A screen attached to the ceiling flickered into life, showing a group of Agency guards moving methodically across the dock area outside. One of them carried a gun.

The Doctor pressed the DOOR button again. This time, the heavy double doors buzzed and swung shut. The central glass column of the console juddered. The complex instruments inside turned back and forth. Lights twinkled among the circuits.

By now, the ship was throbbing with energy. 'Remarkable, remarkable!' enthused the Doctor. 'All this power, from an ancient antiquity!'

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There was a loud clang. On the screen, he could see the guards gathering around the ship.

'Well, it appears that my future is in your hands ... or should I say Hand, eh? Hmm?' His shoulders heaved with little gusts of mirth.

A light showed beside an unmarked dial. The Doctor glanced at the box. It gleeped at him. He reached out and gave the dial a twist.

The air grated with the roar of engines. An undulating grinding like something tearing open the fabric of reality. The glass column rose and fell, its inner carousel of instruments turning. Switches and levers adjusted by themselves. The ship jolted and the screen picture vanished.

The Doctor turned pale and fell against one of the chairs.

Then the commotion stopped. The column sank and fell silent. The light dimmed and a voice spoke out of the air.

'This ship is on an unauthorized vector. Transportation into the Backtime of the Gallifreyan continuum is forbidden. You are being tractored back to Time Traffic Control for further questioning.'

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The Doctor, already on hands and knees, turned to the box. 'Where were you taking me? Hmm?'

The ship shook and the light turned red.

'Well? This is a fine pickle,' he complained. 'So what do you intend to do about it?'

The box rose steadily in the air. It whirred across the console room and hovered its bulk above the glass column.

The air started to thrum. The Doctor covered his ears as red light flickered around him.

'Warning!' He could still hear the voice. 'The resistance of a recall summons is an offence. You cannot breach the Backtime Field Buffers. Abandon this vector immediately!'

A trembling seized the ship. Forces wrenched at its structure. The box opened its lid wide.

'Warning! Contact with the Backtime Field Buffers will disengage the dimensions of this ship. Retur-'

The box gave a shriek. The Doctor hit the floor as an icy sunburst engulfed the room.

The flower of white flame hung for a moment. Then space and other dimensions outside time folded around it and tucked it neatly out of harm's way.

The Doctor lay on his back staring at the ceiling. The steady hum of the TARDIS was gently soothing.

He sat up. The glass column rose and fell with the pulse of flight. Lozenges of vortical light streaked across the scanner.

'Well,' he said, feeling for broken bones, 'and where exactly are you taking me?'

The box edged in beside him. It clucked and chirruped with something resembling a contented familiarity.

He looked startled. 'Home? What do you mean "home"? I don't want to go home. I can never go home again.'