Episode Four

Throughout, the population of Britain, indeed the whole UN, remained blissfully unaware of the existence of these organizations. The few ministers aware of, or responsible for, C19 were sufficiently well briefed to remain silent. For most of them, all it took was a reminder of wartime slogans about careless talk costing lives to ensure their loyalty and discretion. That, and their signature on the Official Secrets Act, any breach of which was tantamount to treason.

What no one in the British Government, the United Nations or even Lethbridge-Stewart's UK branch of UNIT knew was that there was more to C19. Far more.

Like any organism, natural or social, it possessed a dark side: a cancerous, repressed side that made the light seem all the brighter. Only those who directly worked for C19's darker half knew of it. They were ensconced deep within those Cheviot Hills, reporting directly to someone who, on the rare occasions the matter was discussed, did not appear to possess a name. He was a pale young man with a vicious scar disfiguring his face. His eyes were forever hidden behind a pair of expensive silver-rimmed dark glasses and he always wore the same pale grey suit. Or perhaps he had a wardrobe full of identical ones.

On the whole, the people there turned a blind eye to the implications of their work. Most had been selected, signed up body and soul, and brought to the base because, apart from lacking family ties and loyalties, they also lacked two other things considered essential by the more public side of Cl9: morals and integrity.

Grant Traynor had once been such a person, and as the pale young man viewed Traynor's record of employment on the screen of a so-state-of-the-art computer that no one outside the Vault even knew it existed, he smiled broadly.

'Employment terminated. Benefits rescinded. Private pension payments reinserted into our funds, I think.'

'Don't get too complacent,' said a voice that seemed to come from just behind him.

'Complacency is the beginning of the end.'

The pale young man switched off his computer. 'Of course, sir.'

'And is the Doctor dead?'