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Chapter One A rasping wind swept the hair away from Alf's head and she fumbled in one of the voluminous pockets of her khaki trousers for a scrunchie to keep her locks in check. She'd only awoken a few minutes ago and had not gained her bearings properly at all. The TARDIS had crash materialised at the entrance to a cave, a vast overhang of rock casting a welcome shadow over its entrance. The first Alf had noticed on waking was the heat. It went way beyond stifling. Every movement was an effort and the strong gusts of sandy wind did little to cool her. The sky was a fierce shade of cobalt, with no hint of cloud or bird life. What made matters worse was the feeling that she was being gradually squashed; something the Doctor had attributed to a higher than normal gravity. The Doctor was sitting on a boulder, cross-legged with his checked trousers rolled up to the knee and his shirtsleeves to the elbow. He looked as incongruous as the Police Box nestling in the shade behind him. Nick was still comatose, resting against a rock with his honey blond hair spread out behind him like a mane. Alf plodded over to him and smoothed a stray wisp of hair away from his forehead. She gazed down at the face of the man she loved and a smile played on her lips. What was it she'd thought on Voga? Something about marriage? Bog off. Marriage? Her? The smile broadened for just a second and then faded as Nick let out a groan and opened his eyes. 'Alf? You Okay?' he asked, pushing himself up on his forearms. 'Fine,' said Alf, containing a strange urge to cry. 'It's you I'm worried about.' 'I'm all right,' said Nick with one of his infectious grins. 'Once you've crashed on one alien planet, you've crashed on 'em all!' Alf sighed; concern turning to eyeball-rolling familiarity with his antics. 'You're injured,' she said simply. Nick looked at her blankly and then cast an eye down his body to his legs. One ankle looked like it had been wrapped in cling film. 'The Doctor said it's sprained and gave me that walking stick.' Alf pointed at the ebony cane. Nick coughed and Alf plucked a water bottle from where it had been sitting next to her partner and raised it to Nick's lips. He drank down several large gulps and then exhaled noisily. 'Kosher,' he said. 'So apart from my repetitive leg injury disorder, what's the latest?' Alf explained that the Doctor had said the TARDIS was 'injured' too, and that they could not remain inside, so he'd dragged the unconscious bodies of his companions out into the desert. She had not been allowed back in and now the clone was meditating or something, gazing into infinity, his face an unreadable mask. Nick shot a look of concern at the ample figure of his renewed friend. Alf smiled. Before they had buried the previous - real - Doctor on the Eye of Orion, things had been strained between the two men she cared for most in the universe. Thankfully they'd become friends again. She knew it hadn't been easy for Nick. Hell, it hadn't been a barrel of laughs for her, but then 'easy' didn't seem to be a word contained in the time travellers' dictionary. Nick rose to his feet and clasped the ebony cane for support, but then started fiddling with the handle. 'Hey,' he moaned. 'This is broken.' Alf watched as Nick examined the seemingly faulty walking stick. Suddenly, the handle came away from the its housing, revealing a two-foot blade. 'Ahhh,' he continued. 'Nice one. A swordstick!' Before Alf could say anything, the silence of the desert was broken by the whine of an engine somewhere nearby. Alf glanced at the Doctor, but he did not seem to have heard it. Nick sheathed the blade. 'Doctor!' he shouted. 'Visitors!' The Time Lord clone slowly turned his head. 'N…' he said hesitantly. 'Nathan?' Alf and Nick exchanged a grimace of uncertainty. 'It's Nick,' Alf prompted, rushing over. 'Nick. Of course it is,' he said. 'Sorry, Alf, just a bit hazy there for a moment. Must be the heat.' He raised his face to the sky, hearing the engine for the first time. 'Well, it's about time the welcoming committee got here.' 'What?' asked Alf. 'I sent a distress signal when we, ah, landed. With the TARDIS out of action, we need to get to a conurbation and start poking around.' He gave a gruff laugh at Alf's expression and stood up. 'But I don't really want them to find the TARDIS, so shall we mountains make our way to Mohammed?' 'We'd better shake a leg, then,' said Nick. 'Which is about all I can manage at the moment.' With Alf supporting Nick and the Doctor leading the way the trio of travellers left the oasis of shade and started moving away from the TARDIS. Within a minute of walking, the rock had given way to sand and the blazing red giant of the sun had intensified; both conspiring to slow their progress. 'This sure isn't Cromer,' muttered Alf, looking over her shoulder to check on how far from the TARDIS they were. The ever-shifting Sief dunes had already blocked her view of the time ship. The sound of the engine was now almost on top of them and yet there was nothing in the sky. Then a strange craft appeared, flying just yards from the ground. To Alf it looked a bit like a flying boat, but it was more streamlined and, well, alien. 'Not exactly the original ship of the desert, but necessity, mothers and invention, you know,' said the Doctor waving a chubby hand at the craft as it veered towards them, slowing and losing height. The keel bumped gently on the sand dunes and gradually the small vessel came to a standstill about a hundred feet away. A hatch opened in the craft's side and a squat figure clambered out. It was wearing light olive robes and a scarf of similar material had been wound round its thick neck and over the top of its bald, chocolate-brown head. 'Arabic aliens?' asked Alf. 'I'll try anything once,' said Nick. The Yahanan made his way towards them with a lumbering gait and stopped a few feet away. 'What are you?' he asked with a sneer. 'We might ask the same of you,' the Doctor said. 'But seeing as this is - presumably - your planet…' He inclined his head as if in pain. 'I... I... I am Hakim and this is ah, Nathan and, um, Alice.' The Doctor frowned as if that wasn't quite right. 'Names are for tombstones,' the creature said. 'You must be Cufic.' It spat on the ground. The Doctor was about to speak when the creature produced a wand-like weapon and levelled it at the threesome. 'Whatever your genetic condition you are vagrants and must be processed.'
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