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crowd.
    ‘I cannot order the deaths of three innocent people,’
    protested Malkon.
    ‘You call those heretics innocent!’ spluttered Timanov.
    ‘The Fire Lord requires sacrifice,’ chanted the Elders in unison.
    ‘Burn them! Burn them! Burn them!’ roared the crowd.
    Malkon was on the verge of tears. ‘Remember what I taught you.’ Timanov whispered in his ear. ‘Resolution is everything. The laws of our people must be seen to be obeyed.’
    The boy looked at the citizens, all now excited at the prospect of a burning; then back to the three frightened victims; and beyond them to the flickering fire. If only the judgement could be spared hint...’
    ‘Malkon!’ A man came running into the Hall. ‘He is here!’
    The crowd turned to the newcomer.
    ‘With the sound of the great wind and a shining light,’
    cried the excited messenger. ‘The Outsider has come!’
    The TARDIS had materialised in a dark and dangerous land.
    ‘A lot of volcanic activity,’ observed the Doctor as he read off the inboard seismic scanner.
    ‘Am I dreaming?’ said Peri. ‘Or will someone explain what sort of crazy ship this is?’
    ‘How are you feeling, honey?’ said the man in the dark suit who everyone believed to be Professor Foster.
    ‘Sick!’ answered the girl, unaware that she was conversing with a robot. ‘Can I go back to the hotel?’
    ‘Haven’t you heard a word the Doctor said?’ continued Kamelion in the guise of the American archaeologist.
    ‘We’re not on the island.’
    ‘Then where are we?’
    ‘I’m not sure,’ said the Doctor, still examining the instruments on the console. ‘But I’ll get you back to Earth just as soon as I can.’
    ‘Earth?!’ screeched Peri, convinced that this Doctor needed urgent treatment himself, and wondering why Howard could take such raving lunacy so calmly.
    ‘You’re not going out?’ said Turlough as the Doctor opened the doors.
    ‘Why not?’ said the Doctor, putting on his coat. ‘The TARDIS decided to bring us here. I want to know why.’
    The police box had landed in the centre of a large ruin.
    Only one wall remained standing, but a line of tapered columns marked the perimeter of what must once have been a very impressive edifice. Beyond the derelict building lay a desert of solidified lava.
    ‘Reminds me of Pompei,’ said the Doctor as he surveyed the scene from the door of the TARDIS. There was an ominous rumble and both looked towards the distant volcano.
    ‘Pompei,’ observed Turlough, rather pertinently, ‘was utterly destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius.’
    But as usual the Doctor wasn’t listening. He had wandered over to the corner of the ruin and was poking about the fallen columns and carved stones. Turlough ran across to join him. ‘We shouldn’t have left Kamelion.’ He glanced nervously over to the TARDIS.
    ‘Poor old Kamelion’s virtually lobotomised.’ grunted the Doctor as he pottered happily amongst the rubble.
    Turlough said nothing. He had his own reasons for being afraid of the automaton, which he had no intention of discussing with the Doctor. The volcano grumbled like a sleeping giant with a touch of indigestion. ‘That thing could erupt at any moment,’ shouted Turlough, by way of encouraging a return to the TARDIS.
    ‘Not according to the seismic scan,’ replied the Doctor confidently and dropped to his knees. He fished the two halves of the casing from the beacon out of his pocket and peered at the carving on the side of one of the fallen pillars.
    He pointed to the symbol on the metal sheath and then at the engraved stone.
    Turlough leaned forward. ‘The Misos Triangle!’ he whispered.
    ‘Someone or some thing must have computed the co-ordinates from the data core,’ said the Doctor.
     
    Turlough looked out across the miles of sterile black tufa, a nightmare landscape that had haunted his sleep every night in the cold dormitory at Brendon. So this was Sarn. He had tried so often to imagine what it might be