Doctor Who: Game On.

Author's Note: Thanks to all who followed the first part of the FoT trilogy, Father of Time. When we last left the Doctor and Sandi Jenkinson (former Games Designer), they had discovered the Time Lord sanctuary ship Utopia, which housed the bodies of the last six living Time Lords to make it off Gallifrey alive. On discovering that a vicious alien race known as the Zriekas, who were allies of the Daleks during the last time war, were on board and planned to kill the remaining Time Lords after using the Doctor to reawaken the weaponry they scavenged from Gallifrey, the pair conspired to stop them. But Sandi had discovered something else; that she was hosting the consciousness of the Source of Time, a Time Lord named Shandaiah, with unlimited power over time and space. By allowing Shandaiah to save the Doctor and destroy the ship, Sandi sacrificed her own life as her brain was too unstable to be left alone. She died in the Doctor's arms when Shandaiah teleported them aboard the TARDIS before the Utopia exploded. Shandaiah's body was destroyed in the blast, causing her revert back to a ghost-like form.

With the Doctor's permission, Shandaiah reinhabited the body of Sandi, which caused the regeneration of Sandi's brain. Shandaiah reached into the depths of space and time and pulled Sandi's soul back from the edge of oblivion. With her body regenerated, Sandi awoke, a little worse for wear, but very much alive. The Doctor, relieved at the regeneration of his new companion, offered her a "job" as his assistant.

Now, a strange text message from Earth has made it to Sandi's phone telling her that there is something terribly wrong back home. Its up to the Doctor and his new assistant to discover what it is in this, the new adventure of the Doctor and Sandi!

Disclaimer: I do not own nor have any affiliation with any of the companies mentioned. The Doctor Who characters and rights belong to the BBC. Final Fantasy, Spyro and Ratchet & Clank are property of Sony. I just wanted to take their characters out for a spin.

Chapter One

'What do you mean, there's something wrong? How can there be? Wait... how is you phone even working?' The Doctor asked, puzzlement etched on his face. Sandi tossed him the phone as she dashed past and started fiddling with the TARDIS controls.

'I upgraded, well, when I say I, what I really mean is Shandaiah acted through me and upgraded the phone. We... er, "borrowed" a bit of the TARDIS. Sorry.'

'Sorry? You steal a bit of my ship and all you can say is sorry?!? You could've severely damaged it! You could have taken an important piece of equipment! You could've nicked the temporal destabliser! One of the wormhole refractors! A piece of quasar scanning...'

'Or, just a piece of the air-conditioning,' Sandi said, flicking a switch. The Doctor pulled open the phone, stared at it, then shut his mouth. Grumbling, he strode up next to his new assistant, who pointed didn't look at him and continued to activate the console.

'Explain something to me.'

'Fire away.'

'Why is it that I said "Never EVER touch the controls of the TARDIS" and yet here you are, fiddling with my buttons and flicking my switch?'

Sandi turned slowly and faced the Doctor, who stood bemusedly staring at her. She stifled a laugh and fought to keep her face straight. He frowned at her.

'What?'

'I suggest... you think very hard about what you just said, Doctor,' Sandi giggled as she locked in the co-ordinates for Earth, 2007. The thought sunk in and the Doctor's face twisted in shock.

'Sandi Jenkinson! Of all the rude and underhanded thoughts...'

'D'ya mind not sky-larking about over there? I need another pair of hands.'

'This is my ship, y'know.'

'Good, glad we cleared that up. Now go stand over there like a good little Time Lord and double-check those co-ordinates and settings.'

Unaccustomed to being told what to do inside his own TARDIS, the Doctor stood rigid as Sandi continued to fool about with the controls.

'D'ya mind telling me how you know exactly how to operate this TARDIS?'

'I don't. I'm just sort of... guessing. It's like it's coming naturally now.'

'Great, just great. Wonderful. So, basically, you have absolutely no idea what the hell you're doing with equipment that's far beyond your level of thinking and you think "hey, let's just fiddle about with it and hope that we get home", is that about right?'

'Sounds right, yeah.'

The Doctor shoved her aside and stood hunched at the controls, shaking his head.

'Bloody apes, think you know everything. Right, now where were we?'

Sandi sidled up and leant against the controls, innocence dripping from her grin that she offered up to him.

'You were yelling at me because I nicked a bit of the air conditioning unit to upgrade my phone and we were heading back to Earth because I got a text from Nicola saying that there was something terrible going on.'

'Ah, yes. Well. That was very naughty of you. Right. Back to Earth, then,' the Doctor said cheerfully, throwing a lever. The TARDIS bucked wildly, sending Sandi and the Doctor flying. Sandi crashed into a pillar and clung on for dear life, while the Doctor, who was laughing manically, slammed into the couch near the control and began hammering on the panels with a rubber mallet.

'Prepare for LANDING!!!' The Time Lord roared over the noise. Sandi laughed heartily with her travelling companion as the TARDIS crashed to the ground and skidded to a halt. The Doctor leapt to his feet.

'Right, I'd say we're here. About six o'clock in the morning, I shouldn't wonder.'

'That's insane. We've been gone longer than nine hours.'

'Go outside if you don't believe me, then,' he said, folding his arms and leaning against the controls. Sandi gave him an odd look, before striding down the ramp and opening the doors of the TARDIS and peering outside. The morning fog had settled on Eversleigh Street Park and the only people around were two joggers and a very surprised looking, middle-aged man walking a St. Bernard. Sandi poked her head back inside the TARDIS.

'You know, I think it is about six AM. What day is it?'

'It should be the day after we left. The front door should still be in the television if we're lucky.'

'Oh God. Nicola is not going to be happy.'

The Doctor laughed, jogged down to join Sandi and grabbed her hand, gently squeezing it.

'C'mon. We better go check on your friend, see if she's alright.'

---------

Nicola Catriona Mills stood staring at the chaotic mess that had once been her living room. It looked like a herd of wild bulls had come charging through the front door and window of her second storey apartment only to follow it up by square dancing on the remains. Her front door was currently lodged in the screen of her television and her flatmate was nowhere to be seen. The police had come and gone late the night before, but they had drawn a complete blank as to how the front wall had exploded and the whereabouts of her flatmate.

She had sent a frantic message to Sandi two hours previously, hoping that she was just out on a big night on the town. Unlikely as it was, though. Sandi hardly ever left the flat unless it was to go to work. Nicola shook back her waist-length, blonde hair and trudged sleepily into the kitchen.

'Helloooo!? Nicola? Don't worry, its just me!'

Sandi scrambled over the rubble in the lounge room, closely followed by the Doctor, who slipped on a piece of broken wood and tumbled over. As Sandi helped pull him to his feet, Nicola wandered back in, rubbing her eyes with one hand, cup of coffee in the other. She raised an eyebrow.

'I won't ask where you found him, but I have to say, you've got great taste,' Nicola said approvingly as the Doctor leant on Sandi to steady himself. Sandi frowned.

'What's that supposed to mean? Wait! You don't think...?'

'Well, he's tall, dark and handsome. Why not?'

'Oh, for heaven's sake! Look, he saved my life last night...' Sandi trailed off, elbowing the Doctor as he waggled his eyebrows suggestively and laughed at her. Nicola was looking at her with dubious eyes. Sandi figured that it was time to shut up and make the introductions.

'Whatever. Look, Nicola, this is the Doctor. He's a friend of mine. Doctor, this is my flatmate Nicola.'

'Doctor? Doctor who?'

'Just "The Doctor". Sorry about the mess.'

'You mean, you did this?!?'

'No he did not! Nicola, apart from the catastrophic mess in the living room, are you alright?'

'Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. The police were at a total loss to explain as to how the wall collapsed. No signs of explosives, no possibility of a car wreck, nothing.'

'Not surprising. Ion cannons don't leave a residue,' the Doctor muttered, picking his way through the debris, past Nicola and into the kitchen. Nicola stared at the newcomer bemusedly.

'And... where exactly did you pick this one up? I gotta say, he's a lot weirder than the last one you brought home,' she said, watching the Doctor open the fridge and search for something to eat. Sandi scratched her head.

'I doubt you'd believe me if I told you.'

'You're right, I don't think I would,' Nicola replied distractedly, watching the Doctor chuck out a lump of cheese over his shoulder. He peered over the top of the fridge.

'Tell me you've got better food than this in your cupboards,' he said, feigning desperation and holding up half a loaf of bread. Sandi laughed and looked over at her flatmate.

'Look, how about I take you and Mr. Critical over there out to breakfast, huh? Maybe I can explain better then.'

---------

Sandi straightened her khaki army-style dress and fluffed her hair as she stared appraisingly into the mirror. The three had agreed that going out for breakfast while two of them were wearing tattered, blood-stained clothes would not have been a good look. So the Doctor had gone back to the TARDIS to grab a fresh shirt and a clean suit while Sandi had hogged the shower for a good half hour, washing the dried blood out of her hair. Now she stood in front of the mirror, fresh-faced, looking like it was her first day at university.

'You ready? Your flatmate's driving me...' came a voice from the door. Sandi whipped around. The Doctor stood in the doorway, his hair still visibly damp from a recent shower, dressed in a clean brown pinstripe suit with a white shirt and black tie. He smiled gently at her.

'You really scrub up nicely, don'tcha?'

Sandi blushed slightly and gave a quick spin.

'You think so?'

'All things considered, sure, why not?'

'What do you mean, "all things considered"?' Sandi asked indignantly as the Doctor nudged her aside, hogging the mirror. He borrowed a comb, raked it through his hair and grinned mischievously.

'I mean, considering you're human,' he chuckled, only to have his arm slapped hard. Nicola poked her head around the door.

'Are you two done chatting? I'd like to get going, since I'm starving and all,' she complained. The Doctor grinned boyishly, rubbing his arm where Sandi had hit him.

'Yup, all done. Lets eat!'

---------

'So you expect me to believe that last night, you went travelling in time, met an alien...'

'Several aliens, Nic. Including the one sitting next to me.'

'Okay, okay, several aliens including the one sitting next to you, got yourself killed, came back from the dead, hosted the source of all time and space inside your head and blew up a spaceship?'

'Sanctuary ship. There's a difference.'

'And he's an alien? The Doctor, he's an alien.'

'Time Lord, actually. Nice bloke when you strip the sarcasm away.'

Nicola breathed out a long sigh. She stared at the Doctor, who was picking his way through a plate of fast-cooling chips. He looked up and grinned winningly at her. She screwed her face up at him.

'Is she telling me the truth? Are you really an alien?'

'Well, to you I'm an alien, I s'pose. To me, you're the alien.'

'That's very reassuring. What makes you think that I actually believe any of this?'

'We can show you the TAR...' Sandi trailed off, taking the hint from the Doctor's pointed glare. She closed her mouth. Obviously, the Doctor was uncomfortable with the idea of too many people knowing about the TARDIS. Nicola gave her a questioning look.

'What?'

Sandi smiled and shrugged.

'Nothing. Look, what was that text all about? I mean, you look fine. Why did you think that I was in trouble? Come to think of it, why on earth did you think it had anything to do with me?'

'Well, when I got home from work, the front wall was gone and so were you. I thought something terrible must've happened to you.'

'I appreciate the sentiment. I assume you called the cops after I got home.'

'Yeah, while you were in the shower. I told them that you were out all night, clubbing.'

'Smooth. Listen, d'you think you can look after him until I get home from work? It's just that I don't think that he'd fit in around there.'

The Doctor looked up, a chip hanging from his mouth like a cigarette.

'Waif a minnit, I fawt at oo err comin wiff ee? Woff oo neef oo gof oo wurf or?'

Nicola started laughing hard as Sandi pulled the offending chip from the Doctor's mouth. He grinned sheepishly.

'I'll try that again. I thought that you were coming with me? Why do you need to go to work?'

Nicola stared at Sandi.

'You going somewhere? And you weren't gonna tell me? Some friend you are!'

Sandi sighed and threw up her hands. She turned to Nicola.

'Look, the Doctor has offered me a job. There's a lot of travelling involved, so I won't be home much. You can sublet my room if you want. I'll crash on the couch when I get home.'

'But, what about your job at Torchlink Games? They're gonna want to know where you're going. You know what they're like.'

Something about the name caused the Doctor's ears to perk up and his mind to spin as his new assistant nodded, rolling her eyes.

'Sorry, but did you just say Torchlink Games?'

Sandi nodded.

'Yeah, it's the games company that I work for. Why, is there something wrong?'

The Doctor sunk back into the plush bench, his long fingers pressed against his temples. His dark brown eyes flashed in Sandi's direction. She could almost see what he was thinking.

'Oh no, you are so not...'

Sandi sighed and looked over at Nicola, who shrugged. She looked back at the Doctor, who waited expectantly, his face awash with hopefulness.

'Oh... alright then.'

---------

The central headquarters of Torchlink Games, Inc, was a relatively new contruction, just down the road from Canary Wharf. The steel structure rose fifteen storeys up and had the company's name in burnished bronze lettering above the entrance. The Doctor stood in the front of building, looked up and gave a low whistle.

'Well, they certainly didn't go for the understated look, did they? Nope, just a big ol' building smack-bang in the middle of town,' he quipped. Sandi shifted her black duffle bag higher on her shoulder.

'It's not much, but it's a job,' she said, taking his hand and dragging him inside. The lobby of the building was just as impressive as the outside. It was a large, dark room, the lack of light due mainly to the tinted windows. A mahogany desk marked where reception stood, directly in front of the doors. Behind the desk, the room narrowed into a short hall, at the other end of which opened into another large, dark room full of blinking computer screens. The Doctor nodded, impressed.

'Nice, very nice. So... where exactly do you work?'

'Third floor. Design and Development. Loads of fun, really. It just sounds boring as all hell.'

'So you... think up the games, then programme them. Very interesting.'

'Oh, you know. Pays the rent, wastes the day. Keeps the imagination afloat. Oh, here we go.'

Sandi had arrived at the double-doors of a concealed lift. She punched in her third floor code and waited for the elevator to arrive at the ground floor. The Doctor looked around.

'So... who owns Torchlink, exactly?'

Sandi looked at him incredulously.

'You mean, you don't know? Nine hundred years of wandering in time and space and you have no idea who owns the biggest gaming company in the UK?'

'Well, if I knew, I wouldn't be asking, would I?'

Sandi shook her head sadly.

'Sheesh, I dunno. Torchlink is an off-shoot of Torchwood.'

The Doctor's blood ran cold. His face darkened, then drained of colour.

'Did you just say Torchwood? As in, alien-artifact-salvaging-attempting-to-wipe-me-off-the-planet-and-cause-of-the-rift-collapsing Torchwood? That Torchwood?'

Sandi looked at him as if he was going slightly mad.

'Err... yes to the alien artifact salvaging, but I don't know to the rift -collapsing bit. All I know is that when the Daleks and Cybermen invaded Earth, Torchwood was exposed to the world. In order to show the public that there was nothing to be afraid of, they developed Torchlink Games; a marriage of modern alien equipment and human gaming technology to provide to the most realistic gaming experience available, which opened about a month after the invasion. They hired the best in the business, which is why I'm here. Top marks at college, amazing imagination... got the job as soon as I applied. Honestly, I still don't see how its possible that you haven't heard of the biggest video game company in Northern Europe. Even the Americans are getting on the Torchlink bandwagon.'

The lift doors pinged quietly open. The Doctor's mouth dropped open. Sandi stepped inside, as if nothing had happened.

'Come on. You'll be wanting to see the rest of the building.'

He stepped inside the lift. The doors slid smoothly shut and the lift rocketed upwards. The Doctor turned to Sandi.

'So... you know that the equipment that you're working with is alien technology. Right. So, how come when I showed you my alien technology, you reacted as if you'd never seen anything like it before?'

'Torchlink limits the amount of access that the designers and developers have to the alien technology. Console Development is a different department. We're given the parameters we can work within and the rest is up to us. But there is something that I want to show you, something you might be interested in,' Sandi replied, as the lift slid to a halt. The doors reopened into a more brightly-lit room full of computers and cubicles. She stepped out and swept across the floor towards the far end of the room, where a lone laptop and cubicle stood. The Doctor followed, nervous but intrigued by the sudden turn of events.

Sandi stopped by the laptop. It was just a normal computer with a screensaver that declared it PROPERTY OF TORCHLINK GAMES: DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT. Next to it was what looked like a pair of wraparound sunglasses. She handed these to the Doctor. He eyed them suspiciously. Sandi sighed heavily.

'Look, they don't bite. This is just a virtual reality console, designed to completely immerse you into the game. Trust me, I made them and tested them myself.'

The Doctor gingerly put them on. He could still see through the tinted lenses. He frowned at Sandi.

'Now what?'

'Go stand in that cubicle over there,' she replied, punching in a few keystrokes on the laptop. The Doctor stepped inside the cubicle. Suddenly, the glasses tightened around his head. The room went inexplicably black. The Doctor grabbed the side of his head only to find that he was wearing a helmet, not glasses.

'I understand that you might be panicking around now,' came Sandi's voice. The Doctor whirled around, but he could still see nothing. Suddenly, the floor lit up in a grid of light that stretched out to some distant event horizon. He stared, sagging slightly.

'You are now inside a new gaming experience; the Game Prism. This console immerses the player totally into whatever game he or she chooses to play from any maunfacturer. But that's not the only feature of the Prism. In here, you choose your antagonist, your own form as the protagonist and the platform on which you want to play. For example, you could use the Arbiter from Ratchet: Gladiator to take on Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII in the Dojo from Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly. Allow me to demonstrate.'

The room suddenly changed. The Doctor found himself holding a massive rocket launcher in a quiet Dojo, complete with softly splashing waterfall and tinkling stream. But standing dead ahead was a tall, thin, mean-looking character with a very long, sharp sword, three large indigo wings, red and black armour and silver hair. He stared piercingly at the Doctor with icy blue eyes.

'You would challenge me?'

'That's Sephiroth! Fire the Arbiter! Quick!' Sandi's voice echoed as the samurai drew his sword and rushed towards the Doctor. The Time Lord hefted the launcher onto his shoulder and squeezed the trigger. The missile exploded from the gun and rocketed towards the antagonist, impacted squarely in his stomach and left a burning residue of napalm. Sephiroth staggered backwards and looked up blearily. A large green bar appeared above his head.

'What you see is your opponent's heath allocation. When all the green is gone, the enemy is too weak to continue and the fight is yours,' Sandi said, watching the battle from the laptop's screen. The green in Sephiroth's bar disappeared and he sunk to the ground, beaten. Suddenly, he began to dissolve into tiny squares. The Doctor gave a shout as his opponent looked up sadly as he broke into millions of pixelated pieces. A breeze blew the bits away. The Doctor spun wildly, searching for Sephiroth.

'He's gone, Doctor,' Sandi said softly as her friend dropped the launcher on the ground.

'Do you want me to bring you back?'

'Yes,' the Doctor whispered, staring around the Dojo. Barely a moment passed before he was blinking in the harsh light of the cubicle. Sandi leapt up and supported him as he slumped to one side, clawing desperately at the glasses.

'Oops, careful there, sunshine. We better get you a seat,' she said gently as the Doctor sagged on her shoulder. She half-dragged him over to her comfy chair by the laptop and sat him down. Unhooking the glasses and placing them carefully beside the laptop, Sandi checked the Doctor's eyes. They weren't focussing properly, so she gave him a glass of water and pushed him back in the chair, so that he was lying flat.

'Easy, tiger. That happens to most people on their first run inside the Prism. Just breathe deeply and rest a bit.'

'What was that?'

'It's Torchlink's brand-new linked gaming console. You can play anywhere, anytime, in a group or on your own. All you need is a set of glasses and a spotter.'

'Spotter?'

'Someone on the outside who can see what's going on. Your link to the outside world who can shut the game down if your mind gets linked in too far.'

'You what?'

Sandi sighed and rocked back on her heels.

'The technology isn't perfect. The console locks into the visual and audio receptors in the brain. But we're having trouble. It locks into the pain centres, too. Whenever your protagonist registers damage, you feel it, too. Trust me, this isn't the kind of pain you want to be feeling.'

'What do you mean?'

'You remember Sephiroth... the guy I set you up against?'

'That samurai bloke who had a big sword to match his big mouth?'

'That would be him, yeah. Well, imagine, if you will, if that sword had cleaved into your side. A razor-sharp cutting weapon designed to inflict the biggest amount of damage it can deliver in the hands of an enemy who really knows how to wield it. Try, if you can, to imagine the type of pain that would cause you. Now imagine that it's all real, at least, it is to your mind.'

The Doctor shuddered and gripped his stomach.

'Then I suppose I should be thanking you for the rocket launcher, yeah? One wrong move and it would have been filet-o-Doctor for dinner tonight.'

Sandi helped him to sit upright. The Doctor's eyes were focussing and he was smiling weakly. She stood up.

'No problem. I've found that the Arbiter is useful for long-range battles. Equipped with the napalm mod, it explodes on impact, which drains the HP of the antagonist quickly. The only thing better would have been a canyon setting with a fusion rifle.'

The Doctor looked at her blankly.

'I have no idea what you just said, which is saying something. When's the release date for this?'

Sandi shrugged, helping him to his feet.

'I reckon it'll take a month or two to work out how to stop the link-up, so, maybe... two months? Three? Not sure. There's something else. Sort of... odd, about the programme that I'm using to recreate the antagonist in the game.'

She sat in the chair that the Doctor had just vacated and pulled it up to the desk where the laptop sat. She lifted up a headset that the Doctor hadn't previously noticed.

'This is what the spotter wears. They use it to communicate with their protagonist and direct their movements. If the spotter notices the enemy or enemies closing in where their friend inside the game can't see, they can alert them through the PA inside the console. The message is delivered right to the audio receptors, improving instant reflex ability. But like I was saying... this programme. It's reacting strangely to the console. I've had to modify it several times to stop a brainstorm in the test subjects at the localisation houses.'

Sandi opened a new window and showed the Doctor the programme's coding. He popped on his glasses, scrolled through the code and frowned.

'I can't see anything wrong, per se. It looks just like a standard programme. Nothing out of the ordinary.'

'That's what I thought, until I watched this.'

Sandi clicked on a link on her desktop. It opened a short video clip of a player inside the prism, facing off against what looked like a giant spaceship while they took on the form of a tiny dragon.

'Spyro versus Ansem. Difficult but supposedly lots of fun,' Sandi explained. The Doctor watched carefully. The dragon circled the figurehead of the ship and prepared to launch a fire attack when suddenly, the figurehead twisted, grabbed the dragon by the throat and began throttling it. The clip came to an end just as the figurehead released the dazed reptillian, who flew slightly wobbly off. The Doctor looked seriously up at Sandi.

'What happened? Tell me everything.'

She rubbed her temples.

'It's like the game is adapting to player's attack styles. One of the team at our Cardiff localisation house was testing that level for the third time when Ansem just grabbed him. It's never done that before and never happened in the original game.'

'But you're interfering with the original game's coding, aren't you?'

'To a lesser extent. I have the authorisation from the companies who developed the games originally, but I've tried to stay true to the characters. But they seem to be taking on parameters beyond those I've given them. Like the game has a memory and has been developing new retaliation styles to suit different players. It's the same across the world. I was lucky to stop a mass brainstorm in Madrid during a multi-player testing run.'

'What about me? Did you think that just maybe it could've shorted me out?'

Sandi shook her head.

'Not possible. I modified that version of Sephiroth for my own game. Had I put you up against the real thing, he would have cleaned you out.'

The Doctor raised an eyebrow.

'You know, for some strange reason, that doesn't make me feel any better.'

'Good. It wasn't supposed to. I would've binned the project, but the general manager wanted to continue with it.'

'Who's the general manager?'

'Rebecca Granger. Right royal bi...'

'That's enough,' the Doctor cut in. Sandi closed her mouth, while her face darkened. Her companion grinned and tipped her chin up with a deft flick of his hand.

'Come on now, grumpy face. Cheer up. Just think, twelve hours from now, you and I are gonna be zooming around time in a little blue box.'

'Three and a half years studying and I end up chucking it in for a bloke. Sounds about right. Sheesh.'

The Doctor laughed and helped her up. As he did so, a young interdepartmental aide came crashing into the room, clearly out of breath.

'Miss Jenk... Jenkin... Jenkinson... I have... very important... news,' he gasped, struggling for breath. Sandi rushed to his side and helped him into and empty chair. The aide sat gulping for few moments, before staring at her.

'You... you're wanted upstairs. Level fifteen. Becky wants to see you.'

Sandi's face twisted in confusion.

'What? Why? What does she need me for?'

'It's the console, the Game Prism. They've decided to bring the release date forward.'

'What?!?' The Doctor and Sandi responded in unison, the panic clearly present in both voices. The Doctor frowned at the assistant in the chair.

'When? When do they plan to release the console?'

'T... tomorrow.'

---------