Episode Two

The Timeless Corridor

They pass through a disorientating, timeless void. Each of the Travellers briefly changes appearance, taking on the look of their favourite point in life.

Then they step into an endless stone corridor, part of an ancient castle. The lion-creature is there ahead of them, walking slowly and gesturing for them to follow.

They pass doorway after doorway. Through the windows they glimpse the raging Time Winds outside.

The lion-creature leads them to a particular door. Beyond it lies a room. They step through — and find themselves back in the banquet hall they first saw on Tara, but transformed. This version is full of life. Lion-creatures dressed in exotic clothing feast at the table, while human servants attend them. There are no armoured robots.

Banquet of the Tharils

Their guide, who now introduces himself as Biroc, sits down at the table. He behaves as if the Time Travellers are invisible, laughing and talking with the other Tharils.

The mirror is here too, and they watch the Tharils pass through it, returning with riches and slaves from across time and space. They overhear the Tharils boasting that they can walk the Time Winds unharmed, but that no other living beings can follow — for the Winds would age them to dust.

The King of the Tharils lashes out at a serving woman who spills his wine, beating her cruelly. Karl steps forward to challenge him. The King raises a hand, and suddenly Karl is hurled back into a terrible memory: zombies clawing at him from every side.

The King sneers that unless Karl submits, he will be left to die in that moment forever. Karl refuses to answer, and after a tense pause, the King lets him go.

Robots Attack

Without warning, the armoured Gundan Robots burst through the mirror, shouting their electronic war-cry: “Kill the Masters!”

The Tharils’ powers are useless against them, and the Time Winds offer no protection. The Gundan overwhelm the lion-creatures, chaining them with heavy collars and dragging them away one by one through the mirror.

When they seize Biroc, he struggles, pleading with the Time Travellers to help him.

Through the Mirror

Romana explains they cannot pass through the mirror unaided — the Time Winds would kill them. After a hurried discussion, they decide to use the shrunken Time Capsule. If they place it on Biroc’s body and enter it with their wrist devices, they will be carried safely wherever he is taken.

The Gundan ignore the Travellers, so they attach the Capsule to Biroc and shrink down to enter. From inside, they watch on the scanner as the robots drag him through the mirror. The Capsule lurches violently, spinning out of control. The Travellers black out.

A No-Where Place

They awaken to find the Capsule stabilised. The scanner shows a confusing white expanse of nothing. The co-ordinates register zero — a true no-where place. Neither the tracer nor Maria’s anomaly device responds.

Yet there is breathable atmosphere. They step outside. Frederick senses something beyond the horizon, and they head towards it.

Space Ship

They discover a vast, cube-shaped vessel — stark, advanced, and alien. As they circle it, a doorway opens and two human crew members emerge. One introduces himself as Lazlo and demands to know who they are and how they arrived.

Karl challenges them over the guns they carry, but Lazlo insists he will only fire if threatened.

Time Sensitives

Lazlo presses them for answers. He asks about their “Time Sensitive,” explaining that hyper-warp temporal jumps are impossible without one — only a Time Sensitive can predict what lies at the destination. He declares they cannot have reached this place without using such a jump.

Romana counters that their ship has a device to achieve it, but Lazlo scoffs in disbelief.

He leads them aboard the ship to the Bridge, where Captain Rorvik greets them stiffly. The crew eye the strangers with open suspicion.

Awkward Confrontation

At the far end of the room, hooked to a machine with wires running into his skull, sits Biroc. He is their Time Sensitive and is expected to project their destination on the Time Visualizer screen. Captain Rorvik, visibly frustrated, complains that Biroc led them here but now refuses to visualise, leaving the ship trapped.

The Travellers worry that Biroc appears to be dead. To prove Biroc is still alive, Rorvik shocks him with an electric current.

Thaddius attempts to use psychic powers, reaching out telepathically to his companions. Rorvik recognises this and immediately activates an anti-telepathic field, cutting him off.

Dwarf Star Alloy

Karl freezes time across the Bridge. Rorvik and his crew lock motionless. In that stillness, Biroc’s astral form appears, begging the Travellers for help. He reveals that the Gateway they first found on Tara exists here too, a way for his people to escape from slavery on this ship. But they are bound in shackles of Dwarf Star Alloy, unbreakable and inescapable. He shows them the Gateway’s location using the ship’s Time Visualiser screen.

Before time restarts, Thaddius disables the anti-telepathic field. When time resumes, the image of the Gateway still glows on the screen. The Travellers admit to Rorvik they have seen it before. Suspicious, the Captain orders Lazlo and another crewman to escort them to investigate.

Back to the Gate

They leave the ship with Lazlo and his silent companion, heading across the whiteness. They step through the Gateway into the same derelict banquet hall they once saw on Tara, complete with mirror and dormant Gundan.

Lazlo signals Rorvik, who soon arrives. The Captain insists on passing through the mirror himself — but it repels him. In anger, he fires his hand-laser at it. The beam ricochets and strikes a Gundan, waking it.

The machine advances. Rorvik recognises the robot is made from Dwarf Star Alloy. It cannot be stopped. They all retreat hastily through the Gateway, back into the white void.

Releasing Biroc

Karl bargains with Captain Rorvik: hand over Biroc in return for their help. Since Biroc refuses to work as a Time Sensitive, Rorvik reluctantly agrees. He plans to cut his losses and focus on using the M5 laser, a weapon capable of piercing Dwarf Star Alloy, to force a way through the Gateway.

While the Captain fetches the weapon, Lazlo grudgingly releases Biroc into the Travellers’ custody. He even provides the molecular code to unlock the shackles, though he warns them not to.

The Travellers take Biroc back to the Time Capsule and free him, while Rorvik prepares his desperate assault on the Gateway.

End of Episode Two