'She's gotta point,' said Archie. 'I 'ave more room to myself on my ship!'

'Well, it's part of the experience,' said the Doctor. 'Bit of discomfort to sharpen the senses. I'm sorry, it's Mrs Wingsworth isn't it? I didn't know the Balumin had regenerative powers like that.'

'No?' asked Mrs Wingsworth. 'Well, they do say schools are dumbing down, don't they?'

'S'a bit of a swizz, you ask me,' said Archie. 'You kill someone, they should stay killed.'

'Yeah,' agreed Dash, from over by the door.

'That's more a reason why you shouldn't kill anyone,' chided the Doctor. 'Isn't it?'

'I'd like to know what my Uncle Cecil would have made of it,' said Mrs Wingsworth airily. 'He was a famous consultant, you know. Treated the Yemayan Ambassador, Mr Sutton. Was quite something at the time. And he was very interested in this sort of thing. I think he even wrote about it.'

'I'll have to look that up,' said the Doctor. 'When I've a spare moment. Though I can probably guess what he concluded.' He looked Mrs Wingsworth up and down quickly, and again she batted him away with a tentacle. 'Speed of recovery like that, you've probably got a nifty gift for remyelinating nerve fibres at a rate of knots. Obvious really, isn't it?'

'If you say so, dear,' said Mrs Wingsworth.

'You disintegrate them,' said Archibald slowly. 'And they get better.'

The Doctor grinned. 'That's the gist of it, yeah. Glad you're keeping up. Must be a characteristic of the Balumin. But I hadn't heard of it before.'

'Is there ways to kill them?' asked Joss. 'So they don't come back?'

'No idea,' said the Doctor. 'And I'm not sure I want to find out.'

'You're boring,' said Archie.

'Well maybe I am. But at least I don't go round killing people for no very good reason.'

'They're quite indescribably brutish,' agreed Mrs Wingsworth. 'No manners whatsoever!'

'I'm warning you,' began Dash, angrily.

'Oh, what are you possibly going to threaten me with next, dear?' asked Mrs Wingsworth lightly. 'You stand there with your great big gun and yet we both know you're completely impotent.'

'Hang on, hang on,' said the Doctor, quickly putting himself between Dash and Mrs Wingsworth before things turned ugly again. 'Mrs Wingsworth, with all due respect, that's not really helping. And Dash, you know it does no good to kill her, so let's not waste everyone's time.'

Dash and the other two badgers glowered at him, but since they did not say anything it looked like they took his point. Mrs Wingsworth clearly wasn't used to being talked to like that either, but she too yielded with wounded grace.

'Good,' said the Doctor. 'Now, we're in a bit of a pickle, aren't we?'

He would have elaborated further, got the pirates and the prisoners working together to work out what had happened to the Brilliant. But Archie interrupted, muttering something gruffly under his breath.

The Doctor turned to him wearily. 'What is it?' he asked.

'Nothing,' said Archie.

'No, it was definitely something,' said the Doctor. 'Spit it out so everyone can hear.'

Archie glanced at his badger comrades, but they weren't going to help him with this. 'Well,' he told the Doctor, in an embarrassed tone. 'It was jus' different with that girl.'

'That girl?' said Doctor. He beamed. 'Archie, you've met my friend Martha!'

'Yeah,' said Archie proudly. 'She was good.'

'Oh,' said the Doctor. 'She's better than good.'

'Yeah,' said Archie. 'When we killed her she knew to stay dead.'

More than three hours earlier, Martha had stood in the same cocktail lounge watching the space where until a moment before Mrs Wingsworth had stood. The air was rich with a stink of roasted lemons, and wisps of ash floated from the ceiling. Martha felt sick to her stomach.

'That was murder!' she said coldly.

'Yeah!' said Archibald. But he saw the horror in her eyes and looked quickly away.

'She 'ad it coming,' said Dashiel, gruffly. 'Anyone else wanna be difficult?'

The alien prisoners quavered with fright, none daring to respond. Dashiel seemed delighted. He growled at them, he jabbed his gun at them, each time getting them to scream.

'Ha!' he said. This is good!'

'Let me kill one, Dash,' said Jocelyn, coming to his side. 'Go on! Archie got to kill one.'

'You can't!' said Martha.

'I didn't mean to kill one,' said Archibald quietly, still looking guilty.

'Yeah you did!' said Jocelyn. 'That was good!'

'Yeah,' agreed Archibald, though he still didn't seem convinced. Martha saw how he kept glancing at her, keen for her approval.

'All right,' said Dashiel. 'Which one you wanna kill?'

The aliens shrieked with terror as Jocelyn looked them over. She decided on a pale blue male, who wore several watches on his left tentacle.

'Please,' said Martha. 'We'll cooperate.'

'There's nothing to operate,' said Dashiel, seeming pleased with himself at using such a long word. 'Get on with it, Joss.'

Jocelyn grinned as she pulled the trigger and the pale blue alien vanished in brilliant pink light. Martha didn't think – she just ran forward and grabbed the gun from Jocelyn's paws. Startled, Jocelyn let go, fell back, and then quickly took cover behind Dashiel. Martha covered them both with Jocelyn's gun.

'What you gonna do?' snarled Dashiel without any fear. 'There's a hundred of us coming.'

'They're not coming,' said Martha. 'You know you're on your own.' She tried to wield the gun like she knew what she was doing with it, though she really didn't.

'They are!' said Dashiel, but she could see the fear in his eyes. He took a step towards her.

'Don't do it, Dash,' said Archie. He stood to Martha's left, his gun aimed at her. He didn't look any more confident about using it than she felt about using hers.

'I don't want to hurt anybody,' she said, backing away from them. Maybe she could get behind the bar, use it as cover. Or, back to the wall, she could circle round, get over to the door in the far corner of the cocktail lounge.

'No you don't,' Dashiel told her as he took another cautious step nearer. 'Cos you hurt us an' we 'ave to hurt you more.'

'Keep back!' she told him, her voice more shrill than she'd have liked it. 'I mean it!'

Dashiel did as he was told, his gun still on her, Jocelyn still cowering on the far side of him. Archibald kept looking over at them and back at Martha, and he couldn't keep his feet still. They were children, thought Martha. Badger-faced children dressed up as pirates. But their game had gone too far.

'We can talk about this,' she told them. 'Like grownups.'

Dashiel considered. 'Yeah,' he said, and slowly lowered his gun.

And behind him Mrs Wingsworth sauntered into the cocktail lounge, waving a cheery tentacle. 'Hello, dears!' she cooed. Her flesh was dark and patchy, showing long-healed scars. But Martha had seen her completely consumed by the disintegrating pink light.

The badgers turned round to stare at her, just as amazed as Martha.

'It's impolite to gawp at someone,' said Mrs Wingsworth uncomfortably. 'I expected better from you at least, Martha.'

'Sorry,' said Martha. She took a step back, bumped her bum into the bar and stumbled forward. Before she could do anything Archibald had rushed forward and snatched Jocelyn's gun from her hands. Martha tried to snatch it back but Archibald moved quickly out of reach. She looked round, but the only thing to hand was the tray of cheese and pineapple sticks.

'Well,' grinned Dashiel, raising his gun at her.

'Wait!' said Martha, desperate.

'Yeah, wait,' said Archibald loyally.

'Oh, I wouldn't worry about it, dear,' said Mrs Wingsworth. 'It's over very quickly.'

'Shut up!' said Dashiel. 'I'm gonna do this.'

'But I surrender!' said Martha.