BBC Cult - Printer Friendly Version
Chapter Six - Chapter Six

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Close Encounters

The lift door slid smoothly open and Eve Waugh stepped out into Lord Greyhaven's office. She hadn't known what to expect of it - the headquarters of Greyhaven\x92s company, EG, was an unprepossessing Victorian edifice near the Old Bailey. On the way up she had pictured the office one of two ways. It could have been a room like Sherlock Holmes' with antiques on the mantelpiece, leather-bound chairs and oil paintings on the wall. Either that or a chrome and steel symphony of state-of-the-art technology with a wall of flatpanel TVs. In the event it was a messy compromise of both styles that was rather less than the sum of its parts.

From this building, from this room, EG, a multinational string of electronics companies, component manufacturers and the like all across Europe were all co-ordinated. It wasn't a large company by international standards, but it was influential. The company's main asset was its chairman, who was standing by the window, talking to a couple of men in trench coats. His office gave an impressive view out over St Paul's Cathedral.

'That will be all,' he told the two men. There was a bulky canvas kit bag on the desk, which the taller of the two men took with him as he left. 'Oh, could you ask Adele to bring in a pot of coffee?' Greyhaven called after them.

'Very good, Lord Greyhaven,' the tall man responded gruffly. He glanced at the new arrival appreciatively as he passed her.

'Good afternoon, Eve,' Greyhaven said.

'Hi.' She looked around the office, taking it in. The desk was mahogany, and looked like an antique. 'This room is a lot smaller than I thought it would be.'

'We British are a modest race, Eve: we don't share the American taste for ostentation.'

'You're a billionaire, sir, I think you're allowed to buy yourself a new carpet.'

'I'm only a dollar billionaire,' he noted lightly, removing a couple of tumblers and a decanter from a small cabinet.

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She moved towards the high-backed chair in front of the desk.

Greyhaven chuckled, pointing over her shoulder. There was a closed white door.

'I have a flat... an apartment here. It's a little less formal. You don't mind that?'

'No, not at all,' she said in a giddy-schoolgirl voice that she immediately regretted.

Greyhaven walked over to the door and held it open for Eve.

'Again, not very large, but a useful pied-\xE1-terre. It makes commuting to work easy, if nothing else.'

The room was almost filled by a vast leather sofa and a low glass table, much of the rest of the space was taken up by a little kitchen unit. Two doors led off: bathroom and bedroom, Eve guessed.

They walked over to the sofa together. Greyhaven sat down; Eve hovered for a moment. There was another good view of the Thames from here. Hanging on the wall was a neat row of photographs: Greyhaven with other senior politicians and scientists and various social events and public occasions.

'Is that the Queen? Sorry, that's a really dumb question.'

He watched her as she scrutinised them. 'A touch of ostentation, I'm afraid.'

The same fine middle-aged woman appeared on a couple of the photographs. 'Your wife?'

He smiled. 'Yes. Sit down.' He was pouring a generous double whisky for her. She sat close to him and took a sip of the whisky. As she had expected, it was the best she'd ever tasted.

'Does your wife know?' she asked.

Greyhaven arched his eyebrow. 'Know what?'

She leant over him, kissing his cheek, a little awkwardly.

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'Doctor!'

The Brigadier came jogging across the park. Behind him was a flash of yellow. Yes! - it was Bessie, the sprightly yellow roadster which the Doctor had used as transport while on Earth, a long time ago now. The Brigadier had taken good care of the car over the years.

A tall man the Doctor didn't recognise was sitting in the passenger seat. The Doctor and Bernice hurried towards the Brigadier, both checking the small park for anyone who might have seen the old soldier arrive. They met around a hundred yards from the car. Lethbridge-Stewart was a little out of breath, and far too formal a chap to want a hug. They shook hands instead.

'You recognise me?' the Doctor asked as they set off for the car.

'Of course. You were wearing that face in Hong Kong, remember?'

The Doctor boggled. 'I was?'

'You must remember Hong Kong back in '88, when we discovered the secret of the Embodiment of Gris.'

'I didn't even know that there was an Embodiment of Gris,' Bernice muttered.

The Doctor looked blankly at his old friend. 'I think that must have happened in my future.'

The Brigadier chortled. A couple of decades ago, the Doctor would have needed to explain such a temporal paradox in more detail. Nowadays, Alistair was almost relaxed discussing them. After all he'd been through, he knew as much as anyone how convoluted time travel could become.

The Brigadier reached over to shake Bernice's hand. 'Good afternoon, Miss Summerfield. Now - I've aged twenty years since the last time we met, but you haven't.'

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She smiled weakly.

'Bernice has got married since then, Alistair - you and Doris came to the wedding.'

'Really? That was in my future, I take it, Mrs - ?'

'I'm still a Summerfield.' Bernice was a little uncomfortable discussing her marriage. It was going through a bad patch at the moment, the Doctor remembered. 'And yes, it was in the future: 2010.'

The Brigadier looked a little surprised. 'I'm still around in thirteen years time, then?'

'Not only that,' Bernice assured him, 'you've never looked better.'

The Brigadier grimaced. 'That's what people have started saying to me now. I imagine it means that I'm on the way out. God knows what I'll be like a couple of decades from now.'

'Old soldiers never die, Alistair,' the Doctor said softly.

'Neither do Time Lords, Doctor, eh? Now, you two, about these Ice Warriors...'

The Doctor and Bernice both stopped and stared at him.

The Brigadier looked like the cat that got the cream. 'That is what you were about to tell me, I take it?'

They had reached the car and the Doctor recognised the Brigadier's companion. 'You're full of surprises today, Alistair.'

'You're Alexander Christian,' Bernice announced, betraying some considerable discomfort. 'I've just been reading about you.'

'Nothing bad, I hope?' he asked lightly. The Doctor found himself grinning and shaking his hand.

'It seems that Mr Christian has been misjudged.' The Brigadier clambered in to the back seat. 'You drive, Doctor.'

'I was framed,\x92 Christian explained. \x91I found out things on Mars that I shouldn't have done. I'll tell everyone when we get to UNIT.'

The Brigadier had got comfortable, and was clearing a space for Bernice. 'We're only five minutes away from UNIT's London Office here. After your email message, I phoned Bambera. They're expecting us.'

'Well,' the Doctor said breezily, 'we mustn't keep Winifred waiting.' He located the ignition podule and started the engine.

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The two men dressed as workmen reached the roof of the National Space Museum.

Pigeons scattered as they walked towards the edge of the roof.

'Dish Seven,' the gruff voiced one announced.

His colleague nodded, taking a pair of clippers from the pocket of his overalls.

'I don't understand why we still need to do this.'

'Neither do I. That isn't going to stop me.'

They located the dish, identifying it by the little panel screwed to the back. Together, they unplugged the coaxial cable at the back.

The gruff voiced man opened up his canvas kit bag and removed a brass cylinder the size of a Thermos flask. It was surprisingly light, with a socket at either end and a neat row of switches along its side. He adjusted the settings, then plugged it into the dish. His colleague connected the other end to the cable.

They eased the device into place, tucking it out of sight.

A bright yellow vintage car turned into an anonymous-looking car park underneath an imposing Whitehall office block.

In a third-floor window opposite, one of the watchers took a photograph, the other made a note into a dictaphone.

'Six oh-five. Four entering. Three male, one female. Yellow vintage car, make unknown, registration Whisky Hotel Oscar Eight.'

Alan watched Oswald on the floor of the editing suite, rummaging through Eve's press pack. He'd seen the contents for himself at the Museum, when they'd been handing out the packs. Glossy photographs of the crew, with biographies on the back; maps of Mars; artist's impressions of what a Mars Colony might look like; description of Mars. Alan saw the piece of paper that he wanted, a glossy card bearing a diagram of a space suit.

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Alan and Oswald pulled it out, placing it alongside the screen grab he'd printed off. He ran his finger along the blurred image. Oswald showed Alan the air line. A corrugated white tube, the diameter of a vacuum cleaner hose. A hose that on the picture in front of him had come free from its socket and was flapping about.

It was a single frame of videotape. With the air line disconnected, the next few seconds should have seen the astronaut collapse, gasping for air. His blood vessels would have burst, and his eyes would have started to bulge as though he was being strangled. His colleagues should have bounced over, trying to keep themselves from panicking. They'd be slotting the pipe back into place, pulling him back to the Lander, knowing that it was already too late to prevent permanent brain damage.

That wasn't how it had happened. The astronaut had bounced out of shot like a kid in a playground, live on a billion television screens.

'See?' Oswald said excitedly. 'Whatever that guy is breathing, it didn't come from the tanks on his back.'

'The pictures are fakes,' Alan said incredulously. These pictures of British astronauts that they'd all been watching on TV a few hours ago weren't taken on Mars at all.

'That's not true. The Mars 97 is real enough, in fact those pictures prove it. The Apollo missions were faked by Disney, sure, everyone knows that, but - '

Alan rounded on him, almost yelling the information on the press sheet he had just found.' "The Martian atmosphere is chiefly carbon dioxide, with virtually no oxygen or hydrogen. Some scientists believe that it might, in the long term, be possible to make the Martian atmosphere like that of Earth. This process is called 'terraforming', and a number of experiments will be carried out on the Mars 97 mission." Explain that.'

Oswald snorted. 'You believe that propaganda?'

Alan turned on him. 'As a matter of fact, yes I do believe a wealth of scientific evidence over some fruitcake who thinks that the world's flat and that Elvis had crash-landed at Roswell.'

'I love you too, Alan.'

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'How do you explain the fact that that man is breathing nitrogen and he isn't dead?'

'The Martian atmosphere is breathable. Thin but breathable. Why do you think the British government would invest billions of pounds trying to set up a colony on a planet without a breathable atmosphere?'

'It says that here that they will terraform it.'

'Alan, listen to what you are saying. Even heard of the ozone hole? Mars' atmosphere is one big ozone hole. If British scientists could fix an ozone hole and turn the main greenhouse gas into lovely fresh oxygen, they'd fix the atmosphere we've got down here first.'

Alan ignored him. 'The Mars 97's a fake, like that Di video last year. The whole Mars Project is just another crummy British sci-fi drama. This is the story of the decade.'

A billion people had seen those pictures; he couldn't be the only one to spot that the astronaut hadn't done his suit up properly. He couldn't be the only cameraman who'd spent the last few hours staring at the picture.

He couldn't wait for Eve.

They were in the briefing room deep in the heart of the UNIT Offices in London. Bambera had ushered them all down here, where her senior officers - two captains, two sergeants - were waiting.

Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart looked around the room. It was a far cry from his day when budgets were tight and he, Benton and Yates could solve the world's problems with a mug of cocoa each and a telephone between them. This was just the Whitehall Office - heaven knew what UNIT HQ looked like now.

A long, black conference table ran the length of the room. The far wall was a bank of video screens of various sizes. Scrolling readouts, video pictures and computer graphics were constantly flashing up and renewing themselves. The Doctor and Mrs Summerfield had supplied some of the information: computer disks with Mars data, given to them by some chap at the Space Centre. Two sets of near-identical data were flashing all over the place. It was all terribly confusing.

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A prim young corporal was sitting at the far end of the desk, tapping instructions into a keyboard that controlled the displays.

Alistair looked around at the three people he'd brought along. Bernice sat to his left, looking a little uncomfortable. The Doctor paced the room for a moment, before realising that he was also meant to be seated. Both seemed out of place in such a spotless, disciplined place. Alexander Christian sat at Lethbridge-Stewart's right side, much more at ease. The Captain to his right was more nervous.

Bambera stood in front of the multimedia display. 'OK. Here's how I see the situation. There was some flap at the Space Centre. The astronauts discovered a doorway made by extraterrestrials. Since then, there's been a clampdown at Mission Control. I've been trying to get them to return my calls for five hours now, and they won't. A couple of press contacts say they've had no luck, either.'

'If they've encountered evidence of alien life, they're doing the right thing to keep it secret,' one of the Captains noted.

Bambera nodded. 'I agree - and it wouldn't be the first time that the British government had covered up ETs and kept UNIT out of the loop. So I phoned NUIT HQ, Paris and got them to listen in on the Mars transmissions. Corporal - '

The Corporal controlling the display pressed a control on the desk and the loudspeakers began burbling with standard comms traffic between the Lander and Orbiter. The voices of the astronauts would pipe up every so often. Everything sounded perfectly normal.

'This is a live feed. They haven't even mentioned the archway, so it didn't lead anywhere interesting. End of story. Right?'

'Wrong,' the Doctor declared. Now he was sitting draped over a chair, his feet on the desk. 'When did the astronauts enter the tomb?' he asked the room.

'About ten fifteen,' Bambera supplied.

The Doctor peered at the clock - it was twenty past six.

He leapt to his feet. 'We have a little under forty hours before the invasion.'

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'Invasion?!' Lethbridge-Stewart was not the only person to express his surprise at the Doctor's pronouncement.

He knelt down by Summerfield, grabbing her shoulders, staring straight into her eyes. 'You know your Martian culture, Bernice. What's the punishment for tomb robbery?'

'Disturbing the tomb of a Marshal is just about the worst sacrilege under Martian ecclesiastical law,' she said. Lethbridge-Stewart found himself picturing little green men in dog collars.

The Doctor was nodding his head. 'It's the human equivalent of bursting into Westminster Abbey and digging the place up with a bulldozer.'

'I suppose,' she conceded, aware that everyone in the room was staring at her. Lethbridge-Stewart smiled encouragement at her. The spark of recognition passed between them - here the Doctor goes again.

'So what's the penalty?' the Brigadier prompted her gently.

'Anyone caught in there would face summary execution.' Summerfield realised what she was saying. 'Those astronauts are dead.'

Something pulsed at the very back of Lethbridge-Stewart's brain, primal sorrow for the astronauts, their families, the whole human race.

'Yes,' the Doctor was insisting, 'But it's worse than that. The Martians don't just punish the criminals, do they?'

Summerfield blanched. 'The robbers' entire clan would also face retribution: massive reparations, the loss of territory and industrial facilities.'

The Doctor addressed the room like a prosecuting counsel. 'Those astronauts have stirred up a hornet's nest. Without knowing it, they have just condemned the entire human race to death. Warships will already be on their way.'

One of the Captains laughed, the same that had spoken before. He was a young lad, with blond hair. 'And you've got evidence for that, I suppose?' He'd probably only just been seconded to UNIT, he still had that swaggering scepticism that all the new recruits had for the first couple of months.

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'He has, Captain Ford,' Bambera nodded. 'Eye witness evidence. I saw them entering a cave myself. Space Centre denied that ever happened, they threw me out when I tried to watch the video link. In the absence of any other explanation, and in the light of his experience, I am prepared to entertain the Doctor's assertion that the astronauts found a Martian tomb.'

'What about the radio transmissions?'

'Faked.'

Everyone turned to face Alexander Christian.

The Brigadier leant forward to explain. 'We have had the ability to fake space-to-surface transmissions since my day. A military satellite, designation Haw-Haw, was put up by the Black Star rocket in 1971. It was capable of jamming extraterrestrial signals and broadcasting messages that looked like they came from deep space.'

'Who controls this satellite?'

'It always used to be the Space Security boys.' Alexander Christian informed the room. Bambera nodded, jotting down a note.

The young UNIT Captain straightened. 'With respect, sir, can we prove these transmissions are faked?'

Bambera scowled. 'We can try. It should be straightforward enough to match voice patterns and so on. See to it when we've finished here, Captain Ford.'

The Doctor was holding his hand up, like a schoolboy in a classroom. 'Brigadier,' he interrupted, 'there must be a genuine signal, too. Try retuning to find the real telemetry from the Orbiter - it shouldn't be too difficult to find.'

Bambera nodded.

Captain Ford was objecting again. 'Ma'am, even if the transmissions are fakes, it doesn't prove we're dealing with aliens. There aren't any records of Martians in the UNIT archive.'

'We've never faced them before,' Lethbridge-Stewart informed him.

'The Doctor and I certainly have,' Summerfield interrupted. It was the first time she had spoken unless she had been answering a question put to her, and she was aware of the sceptical looks around the room, unsure whether to continue.

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The Doctor had his feet on the desk, his hands were folded behind his head. 'Bernice is from the twenty-sixth century,' he explained, delighting in the astonished expressions this revelation earned him. 'By then, the human race has colonised Mars and displaced the native Martian population. Bernice is an expert on Martian civilisation and culture. With the greatest respect, time is pressing.'

A couple of people at the table looked bemused by the revelations, but they'd seen enough in their time with UNIT to at least keep an open mind. They took their lead from Bambera, who was taking all the information in her stride.

'Doctor, I'll need some sort of proof of Martian involvement before I can even think of asking to deploy UNIT forces. And I need some evidence - anything - that points to a wider conspiracy. I'm afraid the MoD will not believe the words of an escaped psycho. No offence, Colonel Christian.'

'None taken, Brig,' Alexander said lightly.

The Doctor was staring at the television screens, and knowing him, Lethbridge-Stewart imagined that he was taking in every piece of information, trying to find a clue in there. 'At the moment,' the Doctor blurted, 'because of the manned mission, almost every telescope in the country is pointing at Mars. Get them to check their records - at some point today there will have been a disturbance on the Martian surface. Check the photographs, and you'll see it bears an uncanny resemblance to an ICBM launch or a Moon rocket.'

'Do it, Corporal,' Bambera ordered. The prim Corporal could do that from her box of tricks, too, it seemed.

Bambera stiffened. 'OK, here's the score: if the Doctor is wrong, and there aren't any Martians, no-one will ever know. Space Centre has everything pretty well covered up, and there's no problem. But, if there are Martians, UNIT need to know about it. From this point, we'll assume for the sake of argument that the Martians are out there and that they are mad with us. So, Doctor, Professor Summerfield, what are these Martians going to do?'

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'Can't we tell them it was an accident?' Ford objected. 'We didn't even know that there were any Martians, let alone what their laws are.'

Bambera fixed the Doctor with a stare. 'I take it that ignorance of the law is no defence?'

'No,' the Doctor intoned gravely.

'What's all this about forty hours?' the Brigadier asked. 'It takes four months to travel to Mars, yes?'

The Doctor shook his head sadly. 'Martian science is far in advance of that of the human race.' Lethbridge-Stewart expected the Doctor to say something of the sort.

His old friend stood up, abruptly, and began pacing the room again. He ended up at the head of the table. All eyes were on him. 'From launch on Mars to arrival here, it will take just under forty eight hours.'

The Doctor flashed a smile, and stabbed down at the corporal's keyboard. All the pictures on the video wall snapped off. 'That was very distracting. Now, by my calculations, the Martians will be in Earth orbit by Thursday lunch time. They will declare their intentions, presumably via radio. If they are not given what they ask for, they will take it by force.'

Bambera straightened. 'And that is it?'

'Isn't it enough?' Benny asked.

'Word coming in from Skywatch Control, Brigadier. They've retuned to the new frequency.'

'Now we'll have some evidence for you, Winifred,' the Doctor shouted triumphantly.

The signal from the Orbiter was piped through the loudspeakers again. This time there weren't any voices, just the steady bleeping of the computers on Earth and Mars talking to each other.

'There's no sign of the telemetry from the Lander, ma'am.'

'The Lander has been destroyed along with its crew,' the Doctor declared, almost casually. 'And the war rocket has shown up on the photographs, hasn't it?'

The Corporal tapped a control and the video wall filled with astronomical pictures, images of Mars.

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The prim young woman checked her own screen. 'Our watchers report that the Orbiter is still there, and there's been no sign of a spaceship launch from the Martian surface. We have triple confirmation of that.'

The Doctor's face fell. 'Well,' he said, a note of uncertainty in his voice, 'keep looking, won't you?'

Eve was surrounded by her silk dress, the leather sofa, his wool suit. The smell of the whisky and the leather and his aftershave. Lord Greyhaven - Edward - had none of a young man's urgency, and was content to hold her and kiss her face and mouth, if that was all that she wanted. She straightened a leg, and together he half-pushed, she half-pulled down until she was laid the full length of the sofa, her head on the armrest. Her hand on the back of his neck, his skin rougher than anyone's she had known before. His weight on her, pushing her further down into the cushions. The smell of coffee.

She opened her eyes and there was a tray full of coffee pots and cups on the glass table. His secretary had come in with them and left without making a sound. Eve shifted up onto one elbow, about to say something.

Greyhaven eased himself back, until he was upright. He placed a hand on her side, just beneath her ribcage.

'I have something for you,' he said very seriously. He leant over her to get to the tray.

'Coffee?' she asked, laughing.

'That too. If you'll excuse me, I just have one little thing to do.'

She moved her legs, allowing him to stand. He crossed the room, closing the door behind him. After a moment, she could hear his voice drifting across from his office. One side of a conversation.

Eve looked around guiltily, as though she was being watched. Then she made a decision to listen in. She tiptoed across the room. 'We have crossed the Rubicon.' Edward informed someone that she couldn't see.

Eve eased the door open and peeked through the crack. Edward was alone.

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'Understood. But how?' It was a man's voice, and she recognised it. Edward was addressing a hands free telephone, or intercom. There was a speaker on the desk that hadn't been there before. It came as a relief that Greyhaven wasn't talking to himself.

'I pride myself on my resourcefulness. You will see.' Eve edged back behind the door, aware that this was a private conversation.

'If you are sure, then I am sure, Teddy.' The line clicked, dead.

Edward had picked up a small brass box from his desk, squeezing its side. A faint warbling sound started up. Greyhaven slipped the box into his jacket pocket and pressed something on his desk. A panel slid back into place, concealing the intercom he'd been talking to. Greyhaven gathered up another little box from the desk and then straightened, heading back her way.

Eve dashed back to the sofa, and had arranged herself on it as he opened the door. Edward was carrying a long, thin box, which he passed over to her as he sat down. The sort of box jewellery came in. Eve pulled herself up, a little clumsily. Inside was a gold necklace.

'Not too ostentatious, I hope.' He passed it over.

'It's beautiful.' It was understated, elegant and worth a small fortune. 'When-?'

'Adelle, my secretary chose it for me this afternoon. She has more taste in that area. Try it on.'

Eve lifted her hair, letting him wrap it around her. It was heavier than she had expected. When he had finished, he withdrew, looking a little uncomfortable.

'It's so expensive.'

'I'd much rather spend my money on my friends than on my carpet.'

She leant over him, kissing him on the forehead, then the bridge of his nose. He shifted, allowing her closer.

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Half a world away, the Prime Minister checked his tie in the mirror.

This was going to be a big speech. There had been a lot of uncertainty for the last couple of years. But with the British and American elections out of the way, things were going to settle down for a while. This speech would set the tone for Anglo-American relations, and he wanted to grab the imagination with it, not just say the same old things about 'special relationships'.

The Prime Minister always got nervous before a speech, whether he was addressing the United Nations or the Women's Institute, and it had become a habit to come to the washroom, splash his face with water and check his appearance. The wash basins in the White House were relatively lavish affairs: large and spotlessly clean.

The washroom door swung noisily open. It was his bodyguard.

'Is everything all right?' the Prime Minister asked, reaching for the hand towel.

The bodyguard shot him twice, once in the chest and once in the back of the head.

Alarms were sounding around the UNIT Offices. Bambera's phone rang. The Doctor watched silently as she picked it up and listened for a couple of seconds before replacing the receiver.

'Corporal, patch through the datafeed from Skywatch One.'

That was the radar station in Essex that kept its dish pointing upwards. Twenty years ago it had been able to detect an artificial object a million miles away. Who knows what its range was now?

A roughly cylindrical object was in plain view, and no more than 200,000 miles away. It was moving fast across the screen.

The Doctor leapt to his feet. 'We're too late!' he gasped.

'It is now on a direct heading for Earth,' the Corporal announced.

The Doctor stared straight at Bambera, pointing at the screen. 'Your people want proof? That is pretty compelling evidence, I would say.'

Lethbridge-Stewart turned to face his old friend. 'Doctor, you said that we had two days.'

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The Doctor grabbed a handful of his hair and stared at the screen. 'Martian spacedrives are notoriously slow. I don't understand how they have got here so quickly.'

Alexander Christian rubbed his chin. 'It's simple old chap. The radar signal was jammed. It's been on its way here all this time and no-one down here was any the wiser.'

The Doctor pressed his face up to the video wall, calculating trajectories and velocities. 'Yes, of course. Don't you see, Brigadier? It means that this has been planned: the Martians launched their revenge ship a day and a half before the astronauts even set foot on Mars.'

'Skywatch confirms UFO on heading for Northern hemisphere.'

'But how did the Martians know that the Lander was heading their way?'

'They must have picked up the transmissions from Mars 97,' Bernice suggested.

The Doctor whirled to face the video screens, a little concerned. They were all missing something obvious. A cylindrical object on radar; faked radio signals; no telemetry from the Lander. He turned back to the group.

Captain Ford's former scepticism had evaporated. He was also staring at the screen, unable to take his eyes from it. 'So how long have we got?'

The Doctor glanced up at the screen. 'Fifteen minutes, maybe twenty.'

Bambera snatched up the phone. 'We'll need a global state of emergency. Captain Ford, contact the Secretary-General and the Prime Minister. Tell them "Cromwell". Tell them "Ultimate".'

Back in the Second World War, 'Cromwell' had been the codeword for the German invasion of Britain. An invasion that had never come. 'Ultimate' must be some sort of codeword stressing the urgency of the situation.

'The PM's in Washington. We'll need the Home Secretary.'

'Whatever,' she snapped.

'Skywatch confirms UFO on heading for Western Europe.'

'Brigadier - it's New York for you.'

'That was quick.'

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The Secretary-General appeared on the screen. 'Winifred. I've just received word from Downing Street. Now you're declaring a Cromwell Ultimate. What on Earth is going on there?' She had a pleasant Irish accent.

Bambera scowled at the screen. 'Secretary-General, we have reason to believe - '

'Ten minutes ago, I had the Home Secretary on the line. He says that you've got Alexander Christian in there.'

Brigadier Bambera was a little taken aback. 'Yes we have, he - '

'They have formally requested the suspension of UNIT operations in the United Kingdom pending an investigation. You are not above the law, Brigadier.'

Bambera pulled herself up to her full height. 'Madam, we have a global security alert.'

'Well that's just it. There's nothing on the radar, no anomalous radio transmissions. The sky is clear, Brigadier. In future, before you tell everyone the world's about to end, kindly check your sources. Provide me with concrete evidence and hand over Colonel Christian to the British police. Do that, and I'll reconsider. End.'

The screen went blank.

'We need to warn the public,' Bernice said quietly.

'That is the last thing we will do,' Bambera snorted. 'Can you imagine the panic when we announce that not only do aliens exist, but they're about to attack?'

Bernice was scathing: 'Don't you think they'll be panicking anyway in a quarter of an hour when the war rocket lands and Martian battle tanks pour out?'

'Can't we at least set off air-raid sirens?' Lethbridge-Stewart suggested. 'Get as many people as we can into shelters.' The Doctor looked around. For all their brisk efficiency, for all their expertise, there was little that the people in this room could do to protect their citizens.

'The Martians won't get that far,' Bambera announced, dialling a short number. 'Missile Control?'

'Missile Control here.' The reply was relayed around the conference room.

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The Doctor opened his mouth to object, but Bambera was already barking instructions into her microphone. 'We need a surface-to-space ICBM strike. Those are your co-ordinates now. Authorisation: Seabird One. Dayword: Electron.'

'Denied, UNIT HQ.'

'Denied?' Bambera snarled.

'Skywatch confirms UFO heading for the United Kingdom,' the Corporal called out.

'Direct orders, United Nations, ma'am.' The line went dead.

The Doctor sighed with relief. 'Any attempt at violence will be met by the Martians with superior firepower.'

Captain Ford was still staring at the radar screen. 'Couldn't we contact another country? Another branch of UNIT would have the authority. Call NUIT in Paris.'

'Sir, we can't ask the French to start firing nuclear missiles over British airspace. What if one fell short?'

'Won't other countries start taking things into their own hands and arrange their own nuclear strike?'

'They won't,' Lethbridge-Stewart said, more in hope than certain knowledge.

'Can't we try talking to them?' Bernice asked.

'Do you speak Martian. Mrs Summerfield?'

'As a matter of fact - '

'UFO is now in the atmosphere. Trajectory confirmed.' A string of numbers ran across the computer screen.

'Calculating course,' the Corporal said.

'It's heading for Trafalgar Square,' the Doctor announced. 'Brigadier, you have to get us down there.'

'UNIT engagement protocols - '

' - the Doctor knows all about them, Captain,' Lethbridge-Stewart interrupted, 'in fact he helped me to draft them. We need a containment team down there to evacuate the public, we need military units to keep them out.'

'I am aware of what we need, Brigadier,' Bambera bawled at him, 'but I have just been given a direct order from the Secretary-General to stay put.'

'This is far more important than the petty concerns of your planet,' the Doctor yelled.

'I agree, but - '

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'Tracking computer confirms the landing area as Central London.'

The Doctor looked up at the ceiling. Far, far above him, the Martian spacecraft would be visible from the ground now.

'We're too late,' he whispered. He darted for the door. 'Come on, Bernice!'

Night was falling over London.

It never got dark in the city. The street lighting became diffused with the air pollution, and the sky glowed a muddy orange. On most nights you could see the Moon, and some of the brighter stars, but nothing much else. So few people ever looked up.

A black shape appeared among the clouds, parting them like a plough. It was vast, larger than any of the buildings it passed over.

Warning buzzers had already sounded at Air Traffic Control stations around the city. Airspace had been cleared, as best it could. Police stations were beginning to get the first of their phone calls from worried citizens.

Alan dialled the number of the Newsdesk.

'Gloria, it's Alan in London. I know I'm too late for the evening news, but I've got a story for you. Yeah - you'll want to flash it. Check the pictures of the - '

The line was beginning to crackle. Alan scowled at the phone, unable to believe that the story of the century would slip through his fingers because of a dodgy telephone.

'The line's terrible,' he told Oswald.

'It's the government listening in. They're on to us. We'd better get moving!'

The young man was swinging his head from side to side, checking to see if anyone was watching the phone box. Alan ignored him.

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'Check the pictures of the Mars Landing,' he shouted into the phone. 'Look at the air lines. One's disconnected. It's the story of the century: the Mars Missions are a fake. The Brits haven't been to Mars at all. Tell the world!' He slammed the handset down, knowing that he'd just made history. Oswald was waving at him.

'Alan, look up there, for Christ's sake.'

Alan did as Oswald said, and saw a vast, dark shape coming down through the clouds over the Thames.

For the first couple of seconds, those that looked up and saw it thought it was an aircraft in trouble. But after a moment of panic, they realised it couldn't be. It was perfectly silent. It wasn't a zeppelin, either: the hull was clearly made from thick metal plates, riveted together, and it must have weighed many hundreds of tonnes. It was drifting down, apparently effortlessly. In reality the underside of the object was lined with tiny rocket vents which were pulsing with bursts of magnetic force.

Far below, television pictures and computer monitors began to shimmer. Car radios and phone lines began to crackle. Every audio and video tape in Central London was wiped. Cutlery drawers were rattling, every loose piece of metal across the city began jiggling up and down.

People were beginning to look up. Cars stopped, the crowds on the streets began to point up into the sky. Every burglar alarm and car alarm went off.

The Sumerian MechInfs had wiped out the Mongol Militia, and now they were advancing relentlessly towards the Mongol capital, Doug City. The three hundred year campaign was reaching its inevitable conclusion and only an act of God would save him now. Still Emperor Doug fought on.

The VDU rippled, then the computer tried to reset itself. Every other machine in the Caf\xE9 was bleeping as they rebooted. Doug looked around at the denizens of his Internet Caf\xE9, all of whom were glaring at him as though the freak electrical surge was his fault.

\x91The end of Civilisation,\x92 he chuckled.

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Eve Waugh often woke in an unfamiliar bed.

This was the first time she had found herself in a married man's room wearing nothing but a ten-thousand-dollar necklace. It was the first time she'd slept with a member of the House of Lords. It was the first time for a long time that she'd shared a bed with anyone. What would her mother think?

Although the curtains were drawn, she could see that it was still only the early evening outside.

Edward had risen and dressed while she dozed. She was dimly aware of him getting out of the bed, kissing her shoulder as he left. Ten minutes ago? She could hear him outside in the living room, boiling a kettle.

Eve sat up, brushing her chest where the segments of the necklace had dug little marks into her skin. She checked her watch as she scooped it up from the bedside table. It was seven in the evening. She'd been asleep for a couple of hours. The night was still young.

Edward's bathrobe was hanging up by the bed. Eve stepped over to it. The carpet felt as worn as it looked. She toyed with the idea of putting the robe on. It smelt of his aftershave. She decided not to wear it. If it was seven, his staff had gone home, and besides they'd proved very discreet. So she walked through to where he was, wearing nothing but her new necklace and her watch.

Edward was standing at the window, looking out over the Thames. He was immaculate in his wool suit, he'd even brushed his hair and fitted the handkerchief to his jacket pocket. As she walked in, he turned to face her. She hardly saw his reaction to her.

There was a UFO coming up the Thames. She ran over to the window, pressing her palms to the glass. Five storeys up, she got a better view of the alien machine than most. It looked like... it didn't look like anything from Earth.

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Eve stared up into the twilight sky and tried to fit the object into her own frame of reference. There was a resemblance to a Civil War ironclad, its prow reminded her of the head of a swordfish. It was built from a dark metal, like cast iron, but it glittered. The portholes looked like a fly's compound eyes, and it was possible to see through the smoky glass that the interior was lit in languid red, like emergency lighting. Something was shifting around in there: dark, diffracted shapes that were impossible to interpret. It was vast.

It was following the course of the river, heading upstream. It barely cleared Tower Bridge and passed over HMS Belfast on the river. It was possible to guess its size now it was coming alongside the Greyhaven Building. It eclipsed Guys Hospital and London Bridge station, so it was larger than the two combined. That made it a kilometre long, perhaps two hundred metres broad. A dozen times bigger than a Jumbo Jet.

Edward placed a hand on her bare shoulder. 'It's heading across the city. Get dressed. We have to get to Mission Control,' he said softly.

Police cars were racing through London.

It was so large that it was visible right across the city. The pavements, the parks and the rooftops were full of people staring up at it, trying to work out what it was. Loudmouths were proclaiming it to be a publicity stunt for a movie, a hot air balloon, a Jeremy Beadle wind-up. No-one was listening to them.

EastEnders vanished from ten million television screens, replaced by a live feed from the roof of the BBC. The picture jumped around a bit at first: there was no commentary. There were dozens of people up there, all looking upwards at an object in the sky. Some were pointing, others were talking. There was an urgency about the image that every viewer found compelling. They edged closer to the screen, trying to ignore their children who were asking what was going on. The object passed overhead, drifting over the Strand. They heard Nicholas Witchell's voice telling them that this was a genuine news programme, and the object on their television screen was an alien spacecraft.

But everyone could see that for themselves. This wasn't a model, a computer graphic or any other kind of special effect. It wasn't a hoax, a mass hallucination, a scare story, a dream, a practical joke, a fossilised polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon or a science fiction drama.

It was an alien spacecraft, coming to rest ten feet above Nelson's Column.