Grace and Brian sprinted down an alley-way, trying to stay a few steps ahead of 
the Isconian mob that was howling after them.
   Well, all right; it wasn't exactly howling, more like occasionally calling out directions 
and explanations to new recruits in high, fluting voices as it pursued the two fugitives 
through an increasingly confusing maze of town streets.
   At least confusing to him, Brian reflected breathlessly, as he and Grace skidded to a 
halt.  A door down the street had just swung open, disgorging two excited residents.  
Grace threw herself down another alley-way, dragging Brian with her.
   "They seem to be enjoying themselves," he gasped, as they ran.
   Grace shook her head, but didn't disagree.  "Can't let them catch us!"
   "Got to get back to the TARDIS!" Brian rasped.
   Grace glanced back at him. "Where is it?"
   "In the woods above the town!  Oh, God -- I think I'm lost!"
   "I know I am!" she shot back.  "We've got to lose this bunch!" she gasped, 
glancing back at the streets behind down which blue bodies were hurtling.  Glancing 
around desperately, she motioned to what looked like a shed.
   Brian wanted to point out that they might well end up getting trapped, but in as dire 
need of a breather as she was, decided not to protest.  They slipped in, eased the door 
closed, crouched back, and hoped for the best.
   Grace closed her eyes and leaned back against the wall, trying to breathe quietly 
when what she wanted to do was to suck in great lungfuls of air.  It was dim within 
the shed; next to her, she heard Brian similarly gasping.
   In the street outside, running feet were heard, and the two fugitives flinched.  The 
patter of footfalls passed by and was gone.
   They slumped in relief.
   "You okay?  They didn't do anything to you, did they?"
   Grace shook her head.  "They just all looked at me.  How about you?" she asked in 
return.
   "I'm fine, except for getting dragged around by this Doctor guy and thrown in a 
swimming pool.  And locked up by these blue things.  Why?"
   She broke eye contact.  "Well...I remember how it was when *I* first met the 
Doctor.  Pretty crazy."
   Brian leaned back, rubbing his face with his hands and smoothing back his hair.  
"I keep thinking it's some kind of nightmare, but then something happens to make me 
feel it's real.  Right now, it feels really real."
   "Brian?" Grace said quietly, glancing over at him.
   "Hmm?" he prompted.
   "Thanks for helping."
   He stirred a little.  "Well, at least that's what I meant to do," he said somewhat 
ruefully.
   "Oh, come on, Brian - you know what I mean.  You were the last person I 
expected to see."
   He looked at her frankly, even a little irritatedly.  "Grace, we drove each other 
crazy, but it's not as if I hate you, you know.  If you'd asked for the sofa back, 
I'd have told you where to stick it.  But how could I pass up the chance to help 
rescue a damsel in distress?"
   "Oh, for heaven's sake," Grace muttered, rolling her eyes.
   "And I've got to say, Grace," he told her, smiling and shaking his head," you 
make a great damsel in distress..."
   "Ha-ha, Brian," she retorted, turning to glare at him.  "Very funnmmmppphhh..."
   She should have, Grace reflected as Brian finally broke off the kiss and 
leaned back again, seen that one coming.  Damn him anyway, for reminding her...
   For his part, Brian was starting to feel pretty smug.  This crazy adventure/dream/whatever 
was definitely starting to improve.  He'd muffed 
the rescue bit, but it was very fitting that Grace rescue him, after all the 
times she'd thrown him over.  And not even for another guy - as far as he 
knew - but for work.
   He leaned forward again, reaching for her with a smile-
   Her reprimand was like a slap across the face.  "Brian, what the hell do you 
think you're doing?"
   He froze, a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.  Too good to be true, too 
good to be true - the dream was twisting away, out of his control, sending him 
a smidgin of hope, just to snatch it away again.
   He leaned back against the wall, closing his eyes in disappointment.  "Okay; 
I give up.  You wanna be a bad dream, fine.  I have to wake up sometime..."
   Grace stared at Brian.  "What are you talking about?"
   He shook his head without opening his eyes.  "Whatever bad's going to happen, 
just get it over with."
   Grace gawped.  "You - are you saying you think this is all a dream?" she asked 
incredulously.
   He didn't even bother answering.
   The next instant, though, he twitched in surprise, his eyes flying open to stare 
at her as she suddenly grabbed hold of his hands.
   "Brian!" she said, "Look, I'm real.  She squeezed his hands.  "I'm here; I'm 
real.  All this is real.  It isn't a dream!"
   He merely stared at her, again trapped in denial.  "Look, don't waste your time," 
he told her.  A hopeful look came over his face.  "Maybe this means that I'll be 
waking up soon.  For a while I thought it was real, but then I saw how strange 
it was; I saw through it again.  The dream must be almost over."  He smiled.
   Grace stared at him, then reached forward and grabbed his head with both her 
hands, wrenched it forward, and glared sternly at him.
   "Dammit, Brian, this is real!"
   He stared back at her, astonished.  Then he twitched his head back, irritated.  
"Don't talk to me that way!" he snapped.
   "Well, if you listened to me, then I wouldn't have to!"
   He glared at her.  "Oh, I listen to you, all right - always telling me you've 
got something more important to do than be with me!"
   "Dammit, I'm a Doctor!  You knew that when you first started going out with 
me!"
   "Yeah, well, if I'd known then what I know now, I wouldn't have!  What was 
I, just a warm body to come home to, an arm to hang on when it was convenient 
for you?"
   Grace stared back at him, then twitched her head aside.  "Brian, that's not fair!"  
She closed her own eyes and grimaced.  "It wasn't like that - it was just-"  She 
paused, and opened her eyes to look at him.  "Brian, this is who I am.  I'm a 
doctor."
   "For a while there I thought maybe you were seeing someone else.  That was 
easier to think than that your work was always more fascinating than coming 
home...to me."
   They glared each other.
   "Well, if that's really the way you felt, then why did it work for as long as it 
did?" she snapped raggedly, looking away again.
   He didn't answer immediately, but let out a long sigh.  When he finally spoke, 
he sounded incredibly weary.
   "Because I kept telling myself it was just a temporary situation, that next week, 
next month, things would calm down, you wouldn't be so busy.  That you'd 
been exaggerating."
   She nodded smasmodically.  "Yeah, well, you can see now I wasn't kidding."
   They looked at each other again in silence.  "Grace," Brian sighed finally, "I just 
wanted to be with you.  To be with you."
   Grace looked back at him helplessly.  She opened her mouth to speak-
   The next moment, their heads jerked around at the hesitant noise from the 
Isconian peering in through the slightly-ajar doorway.
   "Greetings," it said uncertainly.  "You are the Offerings, yes?"
   They merely gaped at it.
   Taking this as assent, the native came several steps forward into the shed.  
"Why do you talk so mad?" it asked curiously, peering at their stricken expressions, 
half-lit in the slanting beam of the light thrown inside by a nearby street-globe.
   Grace closed her eyes in chagrin.  "I don't believe it," she groaned.  "We could 
have been getting away, and we get caught because we're too busy arguing..."
   "It's only one of them!" Brian exclaimed, scrambling to his feet.  "We can take 
him!"  He paused.  "It."
   Grace quickly got to her feet to stand warily beside Brian.  "Brian, don't you hurt 
him!"
   "It*.  It's a hemaphrodite."
   Grace blinked.  "Whatever.  And anyway, I thought you'd decided this was all 
a dream."
   He looked at her, then turned his wary attention back to the Isconian.  "Well..." 
he hedged.
   She poked him in a arm with a finger.  "See?  You're trying to convince yourself 
it's a dream, but inside you know it's real!"
   He stared, perturbed.  "How can it be?  It's too strange!"
   "Strange?  Of course it's strange!  It's crazy, weird - you name it!  But this is 
what we have to deal with!"
   He stared.
   "Look, Brian - it's just a planet of blue people.  Just think 'Star Trek' or 
something."
   No response.
   "Didn't you like Star Wars when they re-released it in ninety-seven?"
   "But none of that was real!"
   "Yeah, well now it is!"
   He glared at her, then flung an arm spasmodically to point at the native.  
"Okay - fine, Ms. Know-it-all!"  he shouted heatedly.  "If you say it's real, 
then it's real!  We're stuck on a freepin' alien planet with blue hemaphrodite 
people who want to sacrifice us to some dead god!  You happy now?!"
   "Is not dead."
   "What?!" Brian exclaimed, his head swinging around to stare at the Isconian.
   "Shamileth sleeps.  It is not 'dead'."
   "Oh, yeah?  Well, I don't care if it's dead, sleeping, or doing...whatever 
it is you guys do to yourselves!  I'm getting out of here, and you're not going 
to stop me!  Come on, Grace!"  He grabbed her hand and took a belligerent 
step forward.
   Grace closed her eyes momentarily, caught between embarrassment and an 
odd sense of elation.  Trust Brian to go from near hysteria to alpha male in the 
space of a few moments.  She wasn't sure whether to give him a hard rap on the 
head or burst out laughing.
   To their surprise, the Isconian stepped politely aside.  "Of course," he told them.  
"As you wish."
   Brian looked at the native suspiciously.  Grace tugged on his arm.  "Come on!" 
she urged him.
   They moved warily around the native, who smiled pleasantly at them as they 
edged past.  Stepping out the door, they peered carefully about, but saw no waiting 
posse.
   Grace turned to look behind at the native, as it came to the doorway and stood 
watching them.  She shook her head, perturbed.  "Why are you just letting us go?  
Everyone else wants to sacrifice us to that Shamileth."
   The Isconian smiled.  "I am not believing."
   Grace stared.  "What?"
   The blue humanoid pointed at her and Brian.  "That you are part of Shamelith."
   Brian glared at the native.  "Grace, can you make head or tails of what it's 
saying?  Because I sure can't."
   "You are not of here.  Not part of Shamileth."
   Grace blinked.  "I don't believe it - I think we managed to run into a native with 
some common sense."  She looked gingerly at Brian.  "I guess we got lucky..."
   "Oh.  Great.  Well, we'll be going, now."
   The Isconian stepped forward.  "I will come with you."
   "No way-"
   "Am coming with you."
   "How do we know you're not just going to turn us in?"
   The Isconian stared hard at them.  "Told you - not part of Shamelith."
   "Look, why don't we just find the Doctor, and get out of here," Grace suggested 
through gritted teeth.  "Maybe this guy here can help us..."
   She twitched suddenly and Brian leaned forward.  They both could hear a dull 
roar, as if of a crowd cheering, away across the town.
   They looked at each other uneasily.
   "Something's happened," Grace said, unnecessarily.





To be continued...








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