Notes: I've used the countdown to disaster cliffhanger before, and it might seem like I'm recycling old stories, but I do like a good countdown to build the tension.

Chapter 10

John led them out of the kennels, and along one of the featureless corridors, using his sonic as a guide to where he wanted to go. He had scanned the kennels from orbit three days earlier, when they had followed the animal collectors who had captured Marla, and now that data was being relayed from the TARDIS to his sonic. He stopped and looked at a blank wall, touched it, listened to it, sniffed it and licked it.

Marla gave Rose a look that questioned whether her husband was quite the full ticket, and Rose just shrugged her shoulders and gave an embarrassed smile. John adjusted the sonic and switched it on, causing a hole to open up in the wall, revealing a high tech alien control room. As they followed John inside, Marla saw that Rose's smile had turned from one of embarrassment, to one of pride.

"Wow! - This - is - like - something - out - of - Star - Trek," Marla said in amazement, turning a full circle to take it all in.

"You'll - get - used - to - it," Rose said to Marla with a grin.

The room had control consoles along each wall, and row upon row of video screens showing various parts of the facility, the cages, the reception area, the dining room, a night vision view of the park outside, everything seemed to be covered.

"Right, let's start shutting this place down, shall we?" John said, using his sonic to find the controls. "I think we'll have some light on the subject first." He pressed a button, and the security monitors suddenly brightened, as all the lights came on. "Hah! That's more like it; we can see what we're doing now."

"John, - if - this - place - is - on - automatic, why - is - there - all - this - surveillance - equipment - here?" Rose asked.

"A good question, but I would imagine that it was for the initial set up of the kennels, get the first few legitimate, non sentients through here, make sure it all works as expected, then leave it to do it's thing."

"It's - thing - being - to - take - anyone - and - turn - them - into - a - slave," Marla noted.

"I wonder if this data is being streamed off world to the owner of these kennels." John said. He moved over to a console and inspected a few terminals. He pushed a few buttons, raised a lever, and the security screens went blank. "There we are, that should stop any peeping toms.

Marla just looked on in amazement, as John moved around the control room as though he was born to do this stuff, it was certainly impressive. "Next, we'll get the cages open." He flicked some switches, pressed some buttons, and on an internal camera feed, they saw round holes start to appear in all the cages. "Oh hello, it looks like the orbs want to crash the party..., I don't think so," he said as he deactivated the orbs response protocols.

He started humming a tune, and started to sing his own lyrics. "The lunatics have taken over the asylum - gave me back my right to choose. The lunatics have taken over the asylum - gave me back my point of view. The lunatics have taken over the asylum. The lunatics have taken over the asylum - gave me back my dignity."

"Nice - lyrics," Rose said, giving him a peck on the cheek and a smile, and then she noticed some numbers counting down on a screen. She knew from previous experience that unless it was New Year, numbers counting down were usually bad.

"John, - what - are - these - numbers - counting - down?" John and Marla came and looked over her shoulder.

249…, 248….

"What - numbers?" Marla asked, all she could see were weird alien symbols changing on the screen.

John silently watched the numbers for a few seconds.

247…, 246….

"Oh no, this is bad, this is SO bad..., they're lutens, it's a clock counting down lutens." He started operating various controls on a variety of consoles, running around like a madman.

"John, - I've - heard - of - lutens - before," Rose said with concern.

A few years ago, they had uncovered a plot to turn Earth into a planet of zombie soldiers. When they'd found the alien culprits, they'd activated a self destruct mechanism to destroy their base and any evidence, and the self destruct had counted down in lutens.

"Well, that confirms what I was thinking," he said, mainly to himself. "That three armed web sprayer, its a modified torture device called the 'Manacle of Flesh', where the web strands are sharp and cut into the skin. And the collars are 'Prompters of Confessions', which does what it says on the tin."

Rose looked wide eyed in horror. "Caxtarids? - Are - you - tellin' - me - the - Caxtarids - are - behind - all - this?"

"Yeah, some of the nastiest slave traders in the galaxy, and this set up is pure profit for them."

"Excuse - me," Marla asked. "Can - someone - explain - what - is - going - on?"

"Alien - slave - traders, - they - make - the - Nazi's - look - like - boyscouts. - John, - how - long - have - we - got - before - this - place - blows?" Rose said.

John looked up from the console. "It's not going to blow, there are no excessive energy readings, no explosives. On a remote world like this, an explosion would attract a lot of attention."

"Then - what - is - it - counting - down - to?" Marla asked.

John looked up from the console, that was a Martha Jones question. "Kill all the witnesses, and let the jungle reclaim the building, no one will never know what went on here."

Rose nervously fingered the diamante collar around her neck. "Are - they - going - to - electrocute - us?"

"No, these collars are autonomous, not connected to the network, remember, they have to work halfway across the galaxy." He was pouring over the building schematics. "Aha! The ventilation ducts," he said and then fell silent.

"John, - what - is - it?" Rose asked, looking over his shoulder.

"Gas, there, in the middle of the ventilation shafts. They're going to gas everyone."

"Oh - God, - that's - awful," Marla said. "Can - you - stop - it?"

"Not from here, it locked me out when I tried. I'm going to have to crawl through the shaft and disable it manually." He moved quickly out of the room, turned right, and ran down the corridor, with Rose and Marla running after him. They went up a flight of stairs, and along another corridor. He ran into a room that was full of pipes, conduits, valves and gratings, and was obviously the environmental control centre.

John went to a console and brought up the countdown sequence on the screen. One hundred and eighty four lutens and counting. He searched around the room and stopped at a grating at knee height. "This is the one," he said, as he knelt down and pulled the grating off, revealing a horizontal ventilation shaft. He crouched down and tried to force his shoulders into the narrow shaft.

174…, 173…, 172….

"John, - don't - be - daft, - you'll - never - fit - in - there," Rose told him. "Shift - over, - let - me - have - try." She crouched down and tried to force her way in. "I - can't - quite - make - it, - maybe - if - I took - my - uniform - off."

Once again, Marla showed them that she was this universe's version of Martha. She took her bathrobe off and stepped forward. "What - do - I - have - to - do?"

"What?" John and Rose looked at her, looked at each other, and then looked back at her. "Martha, it's too dangerous, you're a civilian, you're not trained for this kind of work."

"And - you - two - don't - fit, - which - means - we - can - all - wait - here - and - get - gassed, - or - I - could - crawl - down - there - and - try - and - stop - it."

"She's - got - you - there - John."

John rubbed the back of his neck. "Okay, straight down to the junction, turn left and keep going until you see a canister with pipes and wires attached to it." He held up the sonic screwdriver. "I've set this to disable the actuator on the valve, just hold it against the cannister and press this button…, and good luck." He pulled her into a hug, and kissed her on the cheek.

157…, 156…, 155….

Rose gave her a hug and a kiss, before Marla crouched down and squeezed herself into the shaft. They watched as her naked bum and then her legs slowly disappeared into the shaft. They both crouched down and looked in to see how she was doing.

"You're - not - looking - at - my - fanny - are - you?" she said, trying to lift her spirits. "And - did - I - mention - I'm - claustrophobic?"

"Try not to think about that Martha and keep going," John shouted encouragingly.

"How - long - have - I - got?"

"You really don't want to know, just don't stop to admire the view."

134…, 133…, 132….

After a lot of shuffling noises and naked flesh squeaking against polished metal, they heard her stop. "Okay - I'm - at - a - four way - junction, - you - said - left - didn't - you?" the voice emulator echoed down the shaft towards them.

"YES, LEFT," John shouted. they heard more shuffling and banging.

"I'm - stuck!" Marla's emulator said. "I - can't - get - into - the - side - shaft, - it's - too - tight."

"Don't panic Martha, take a deep breath in, and then as you breath out, try to make the turn."

"It's - no - good, - I - can't - get - enough - leverage - there's - too - much - friction - on - my - skin."

"Friction!" Rose's emulator said, and she ran out of the room.

110…, 109…, 108….

["Rose, where are you going?"] John thought to her.

["The TARDIS, my moisturiser, she needs a lubricant."]

["Brilliant…, run!"]

["Hah! Just like old times."]

Marla had turned onto her right side to try and negotiate the ninety degree turn to her left, and was stuck in the shape of a question mark at the junction. Her right arm was out in front of her, and she had managed to squeeze her left arm down by her side to adjust her boobs so that they were lifted past the sharp corner. Her bum was against the opposite corner of the junction; she was limited for options and was starting to panic.

'Oh God, I don't want to die in here like this', she thought. 'Why the hell did I volunteer in the first place?' But she knew really, it was why she became a doctor, she wanted to help people, to make a difference. 'Little chance of that now', she thought.

Rose jumped down the stairs and sprinted down the corridor into the kennels, where she dodged around people who were just milling about. "Go - to - the - dining - hall - and - try - to - get - outside," she told them, not sure if they would be able to open the external doors and get out in time. She ran to the Induction Room, and ran into the TARDIS, making her way to the en suite in their bedroom.

71…, 70…, 69….

["Yes, got it!"]

["Rose, you're going to have to run like you've never run before."]

She was already sprinting back along the corridor, her hair flapping behind her. ["What, y'mean like my life depended on it?"] She took the steps, three at a time and skidded into the room, throwing the plastic squeezy bottle to him.

28…, 27…, 26….

"Martha, incoming lubricant," he called down the shaft, as he threw it as hard as he could.

"What? - Ow, - you - don't - want - to - know - where - that - hit - me. - Hang - on, - I've - got - it." They heard a squelching, squirting noise, followed by the squeak of lubricated skin on polished metal. "I - made - it, - I - made - it!"

"Brilliant, hurry up…, please..., just hurry."

Marla put the sonic between her teeth, and slithered along on her belly, pulling with her hands, and pushing with her toes. A few yards ahead, she could see a cylinder indented into the shaft.

10…, 9…, 8….

"I - can - see - it - up - ahead, - please - let - me - be - in - time." She reached her arm out as far as she could and just managed to touch the canister. She pressed the button on the sonic, and the shaft was filled with a blue glow, as it whistled and warbled, echoing like an organ pipe in the shaft. "Oh - God - no," she said, thinking that the blue glow and the noise was the gas being released.

John and Rose heard the sonic, and saw the faint blue glow and knew she had done it, but heard 'oh - God - no', echoing down the shaft. They glanced over at the countdown timer and it had stopped with three seconds left.

"Martha, are you alright...? You did it..., you did it..., and by our standards, you had plenty of time left."