Martin’s wife had evidently needed help because of Martin’s demands, so she had hired a personal servant--No. 999. The Servitor had killed her. Then, without regret or remorse, it had taken over completely the job of fulfilling Martin’s needs. And it had managed the task far more effectively than Mrs. Martin could have done. Martin probably didn’t even bother feeding himself any more--just sat day after day in his wheelchair growing fatter and fatter. Being completely taken care of the way he had always wanted and stripped of all of his worries. No more headaches, no more terrible responsibilities. No more decisions involving cobalt bombs or sprays of germs, or something even more hideous to contemplate. No. 999 would take care of everything. And Donna? No. 999 had promised Donna love. She hadn’t been conscious of it, but the promise itself was what she had _really_ been afraid of when she had called Hall earlier, with such terror in her voice. Of being taken over, of being given what she wanted until she wouldn’t want anything else again, wouldn’t even want to live again.... Hall dropped flat on his stomach and crawled toward the porch, his senses scanning the area. He waited for long minutes, but could detect nothing. He was almost certain that No. 999 wouldn’t be ready. How could the Servitor have any way of knowing that a lucky chain of circumstances had enabled him to act almost immediately. Hall lay tight against the base of the porch, with its rocks and ice-crusted mortar. Every danger-charged minute seemed only a kind of re-living, for the hunt was no longer anything new. Slowly he raised himself on his elbows and looked through the French windows. Donna was lying on a couch before the burning fireplace. She might have been dead. Her arms were hanging down on both sides of the couch, and she was staring at the ceiling. In her eyes there was an expectant joy too great to describe or understand. Like a wraith stretched out in a coffin she seemed, waiting for the joys of Heaven. He remembered again the night when she had offered him everything--far more than she was offering him now. Then at least there had been something full and genuine in her feelings about him. He felt sad, tragically sad, and somehow responsible for her defeat. He desensitized himself so he would feel no disconcerting pain, and then he resolutely heaved himself over the porch railing, and without pausing to draw breath hurled himself through the glass of the French windows. But the element of shocking surprise wasn’t enough. For an instant Hall saw the lean deadly form through a glittering spray of splintering wood and slivers of glass, and rolled desperately to seek cover behind a chair. The three explosions rang deafeningly in his ears, and the impact of the slugs seemed to drive him into the gray rug of the floor. If No. 999 had been clasping a circuit gun Hall would no longer be alive.