I screwed up! This is the right version! No big changes, just to the kinds of tickets they can buy, so if you've already read this, just whizz down to that bit.
Rose had been on the wrong end of men with guns many a time on her travels with the Doctor. There'd been that time in London, the first time they went home. In Van Statten's museum. In Scotland, with Queen Victoria. Even so, no matter how often it happened, she was never going to get used to it. Looking down the barrel of a gun would never become easier.
"Hands up!" The commander of the guards directed them, waving his gun at them. "Get your hands above your heads!"
Rose didn't quibble. Neither did the Doctor, but, unlike her, he was unable to keep his mouth shut. Until she met him, Rose had thought no one could possibly talk as much as her mum, and she'd often been called a gobby cow herself at school. But he was something else.
"Hi!" He beamed round at them. "Nice to meet you, I'm the Doctor and this is Rose."
Rose shot him a look. "Should we really be introducing ourselves?" she hissed.
The Doctor raised his eyebrows at her and then winked quickly. Rose supposed he meant it to comfort her; it didn't.
"Where have you come from?" The commander demanded now, as armed guards surrounded them on all sides. "Check them for teleportation devices."
Rose glared as a guard approached her, a spotty faced teenager. "You lay a finger on me and I'll shove that gun somewhere you wouldn't want it."
"Rose," the Doctor said in a warning tone. "Let them check you over."
Rose reluctantly allowed the guard to pat her down and check all her pockets.
"Nothing, chief," the guard reported back.
"I could have told you that," Rose muttered, readjusting her top. "And you didn't have to be quite so thorough."
"Chief. He's got this." One of the other guards pulled the sonic screwdriver out of the Doctor's pocket and tossed it to the commander.
The commander turned it over in his hand. "Some sort of sonic probe?"
"That's screwdriver," the Doctor corrected, sounding hurt. "And can you not hold it like that?"
The commander pressed a few buttons. "What's it for?"
"Flat-packs," the Doctor lied smoothly. "Murder to put up."
"He's not wrong, chief," a guard spoke up. "It took me all week-end when my Sheila bought a new bed. Where did you get it from, I could use one."
"Guard!" The commander snapped. "If we could save the pleasantries." The guard looked subdued, and Rose shot him a sympathetic smile. "As I was saying. Where have you come from?"
The Doctor rubbed his ear, stalling for time. Rose recognized that method, he'd used it many a time, not least in arguments with her. "Well, it's a funny story actually, actually, isn't it, Rose?"
"Hilarious!" Rose faked a laugh.
"You see, what happened was-"
"They must have got trapped after hours, chief." The guard who'd been so interested in the sonic screwdriver cut in.
"Here?" The commander looked doubtful. "Not possible."
"Maybe the doors weren't shut properly, they just sort of drifted through."
The chief looked them up and down. "Is that what happened?"
"Yes, just what he said." The Doctor nodded. "We… drifted, we do that a lot. Sorry." He looked round at everyone. "Anyway, no harm done."
The chief sighed and gestured to all the guards to put their guns down. "Alright, they're legit. Sorry about that sir, madam. Can't be too careful these days though." He waved to two of the guards. "Go and get maintenance to take a look at the doors. Do I have to do everything myself?" he muttered as the two men left. He turned his attention back onto the Doctor and Rose. "Can I just check your tickets? It's just a formality thing, for the records."
"Erm, sure." The Doctor glanced at Rose as he pulled the psychic paper out of his pocket. "How's that?"
The chief took it off of him and frowned. "This is a single. Where's yours?" He nodded at Rose.
"Um, isn't that a double?" Rose asked, trying to sound casual. "Doctor, I told you to get a double. I'm sure we were charged for a double." She rolled her eyes jovially. "Seems it's more than maintenance who aren't doing their job right!"
The commander looked at the ticket again. "No, this is only a single." He handed it back to the Doctor. "You'll have to go back down to the ticket office, I'm afraid, and start again."
"What?" The Doctor suddenly leapt into life. "No, this is a double."
"You're alright, sir, but I'm afraid you," he looked at Rose, "will have to come with me and buy a ticket. The office will be opening soon." He glanced at his watch. "You'll have to queue up again."
"No, she's not going anywhere!" The Doctor grabbed her arm. "I'm not going anywhere without her!"
The commander shrugged. "Sir, it's up to you. If you want to go on, you can, but she's got to come with me."
"She's got a name!" Rose spat.
"I'm sorry, madam, but they're the rules. I don't make them, I just follow them." The commander gestured towards the door. "So? What are you doing, sir?"
The Doctor slipped his hand into Rose's. "Like I said, I'm not going anywhere without her. But don't think I won't be making a formal complaint about this."
As they were marched out of the zoo-room, Rose moved closer to the Doctor, nuzzling her cheek against his shoulder. "Thank you," she said in a small voice.
"What for?"
"Coming with me."
The Doctor looked at her, amazed. "What did you expect me to do? I wasn't going to lose you again."
Rose smiled. "Aww. And I thought you loved that screwdriver more than me," she teased.
"That, Ms. Tyler, is not possible." The Doctor landed a feather-light kiss on her head. "Come on. We better see what it is we're buying a ticket for."
"He wasn't kidding when he said we'd have to queue up again!" Rose exclaimed as they surveyed the snake of people in a large warehouse-like room. "How long do you think that'll take to go down?"
"That isn't the end of it." The Doctor pointed at a small doorway in the room. "There're stairs there. This line could go on forever." He looked around. "Where are we though?" he asked, frowning.
"Somewhere grim. As usual." Rose sighed. "You know, once, just once, I'd like to be abducted somewhere nice. Or even just pleasant. Somewhere with sun and sky and maybe a few trees. Is that asking for too much?"
The Doctor clearly wasn't listening as he continued looking around. "This is like the basement of something. Or somewhere. I don't know… Why do I feel like we've been here before?"
Rose looked at him and then looked back around. "Now that you mention it…" She scoured her thoughts, trying to pinpoint the strange basement corridor to a particular memory. The trouble was, seen one basement, seen them all. There wasn't a huge difference between a basement in a castle in nineteenth century Scotland and a basement in a space-age hospital in the year five billion. They were both horrible places. At least this one was lit, she thought, with bright artificial lights that tried their best to be sunlight, but fell far short.
She looked at the queue against one of the long walls of the room. It reminded her of the queue outside Madame Tussauds on a weekend, long and seemingly never-ending. They'd been three times before the line had been short enough for them to consider joining it, and they'd really only stuck with it then because Tala had been so desperate to go and look in. Rose had kicked herself for not booking beforehand, then they could have joined the VIP queue…
"Doctor!" She grabbed his sleeve suddenly, so hard it made him jump.
"What is it?" He searched her face for some kind of trouble. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing! Not really!" She shook her head. "But look, there's a shorter queue." She pointed to the opposite wall to the first queue, where a much shorter line of people was moving in at the double doors both queues ended up at. "VIP queue."
The Doctor looked. "So there is." He looked back at Rose. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"For once, I'm almost certain, yes!" Rose nodded eagerly as he took his psychic paper out again. "And this time, pay attention! Else you'll have me thrown out as some sort of scrubber."
They reached the front of the queue quickly, before the other queue had shifted even slightly. The Doctor produced the psychic paper and then leaned back on his heels, hands in pockets whilst the man on the door, dressed in a smart red uniform, like a bell-boy at a fancy hotel.
His eyes flickered over the psychic paper and then at both the Doctor and Rose. He glanced down at Rose's clothes, and she shifted uncomfortably. The jeans and black strap top she'd put on when she woke up back at home weren't exactly the attire of a VIP guest, but then, the most she'd expected to do that day was some grocery shopping and maybe taking Tala to the park after school. Then the Doctor had announced that he needed to check something in the TARDIS, and from there they'd found themselves here.
Finally, the bell-boy handed the psychic paper back to the Doctor. A smile, completely fake, spread across his face. "Sir Doctor, Dame Rose, welcome to The Pleasure Dome, the experience of a lifetime. We hope you'll enjoy your visit. If you just step inside, someone will help you with the purchase of your tickets."
The Doctor pushed through the doors, Rose holding firmly onto his hand.
"Well, it's taken you a while, but I think you've finally got the hang of that." Rose grinned. Then something barreled into her legs and she almost overbalanced as she lost hold of the Doctor. She looked down to see a small boy, probably only about two, sitting on the floor, a dazed expression on his face. Rose recognized that look; it was the look Tala used to give her when she was still a little unsteady on her feet and had fallen over after bumping into something, a look that said "I know I'm on the floor but I don't quite know how I got here."
"Dante!" A heavily pregnant woman suddenly rushed across, dragging another two children by the hands. "Dante, I told you not to wander off!" She picked the little boy up and turned to Rose. "I'm so sorry!"
"It's alright," Rose insisted, not taking her eyes off of the little boy, who had started to wail half-heartedly now his mother had picked him up. "You look like you've got your work cut out there."
The woman smiled. "I know, it's a bit silly really, what with this little one on the way, but I mean, once she's born, I won't be able to afford to bring the kids here. At least this way, they won't charge me for her."
"I should think not!" Rose exclaimed.
The woman gave her a funny look. "Anyway, we better get back in line. Sorry again." She wrenched the hands of the other two children and headed back to a different counter. Rose watched them go.
"Rose?" The Doctor pulled on her hand. "Come on."
"I know, I just…" Rose wished she could shake this feeling off. It was like she had an ache somewhere, but she didn't know where it was exactly and she knew nothing in the world would stop it from hurting until she had Tala back with her again.
The Doctor suddenly leaned in close to her ear, so close that his breath tickled the hairs on her neck. "She'll be fine."
Rose nodded. "Yeah, I know. It's just…"
"She's fine." The Doctor nodded firmly. "Now come on. We need to get our tickets."
Rose joined him in a queue. "So where are we? And, you know, when?" She looked around. With its maroon carpet, glass-walled ticket booths and lines of harassed adults and children wound up on sugar, the room they were in had a lot in common with a cinema on a Saturday afternoon. It all seemed very normal.
The Doctor picked up a leaflet. "I'm not sure. Ah, here we go. The Pleasure Dome." He opened the leaflet up. Inside, instead of the static text Rose had been expecting, it was like a small television screen, paper-thin and showing an advert on a loop. The Doctor barely gave the white-toothed smarmy presenter a chance to welcome him to the Pleasure Dome, before he shut it and put it back onto the counter. He looked up at the high wall, where writing was inscribed in three foot letters and a fancy font.
"'In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree'," he read. "Nice to know they still appreciate the classics."
"Is that… Wordsworth?" Rose made a guess, a stab in the dark really.
The Doctor looked at her fondly. "Close. Coleridge. Obviously a big selling point of this place, wherever we are." He put his hands into his pockets. "Let me have a think. The Pleasure Dome… I've never even heard of this place! Experience of a lifetime… you'd think I'd have at least heard of it, wouldn't you?"
"Maybe you don't know everything," Rose suggested.
"Oh, I know I don't know everything, but this… this I should know about." The Doctor shook his head. "Something doesn't feel right about this place."
The queue moved and they found themselves in front of a pretty young blonde girl, all swishing hair and sparkly-eyed. She gave them the required smile dictated by management, then widened it as she registered the Doctor.
"Hi, how can I help you?" She was speaking only to the Doctor, her light Californian accent perfectly complimenting her honey-gold skin. Rose took an instant dislike.
"Hi, we're after tickets." The Doctor returned the smile, much to Rose's chagrin. "Two of them."
"Bronze, silver or gold?"
The Doctor leaned on the desk. "Erm, I'm not sure. Rose, what do you think?"
"Whatever." Rose shrugged, glaring at the sales assistant.
"What do you think… Courtney?" The Doctor read the name off the girl's badge, much to her delight, as the pony-like head tossing increased. "What do you suggest?"
"Well." Courtney looked around. "I'm not really supposed to say." She lowered her eyelashes in a way that made Rose roll her eyes.
"Aw, come on. Just for us." The Doctor turned those puppy-dog eyes on him. Rose felt a bit sick.
"Well." Courtney looked up through her lashes. "The gold is really just the silver with heated towels and dinner thrown in. I mean, it's a good deal, if that's what you want, plenty of our VIP customers enjoy that package…"
The Doctor nodded. "Silver it is then. Two."
Courtney beamed, delighted to have been of service. "Right. That's fourteen hundred dollars then."
"How much?" Rose almost yelled. "That's daylight robbery! Without the daylight!" she added as she threw a glare up at the solid ceiling and overhead strip lights.
"It's really a reasonable price," Courtney insisted. "It's our promotion week, you see, that's sixty percent off the usual selling price." She glanced at the Doctor. "I can downgrade you if you'd like, the bronze is only-"
"It's fine." The Doctor slid the psychic paper towards her. "See, Rose, it's fine. We've got that gift certificate your great-aunt Mildred sent you. It's fine."
Courtney typed in the details she was reading on the psychic paper. "You're not from round here, are you?" It sounded like a reasonable enough question, friendly even, but it was all directed at the Doctor.
"Not exactly," he agreed, not committing himself to an answer. "That's a nice accent you've got there, whereabouts are you from?"
"New Santa Monica." Courtney flashed her teeth at him again. "I was the first baby to be registered in the second Santa Monica."
"The second Santa Monica!" The Doctor sounded suitably impressed. "So that would make you…?"
"Twenty." Courtney produced two tickets. "Here you go. Is there anything else I can help you with?"
"No, thanks, we're good!" Rose took the tickets out of the girl's perfectly manicured hand and firmly linked her arm through the Doctor's. "Come on."
"Uh, thanks for all your help, Courtney, you have a lovely day!" The Doctor gave her a final big grin before being dragged away by Rose.
"What was that for?" he demanded. "I was being nice!"
"You were flirting!"
"You always tell me I'm being rude!"
"You don't have to bat your eyelashes at someone to be nice!" Rose snapped.
The Doctor sighed. "Look, okay, maybe I was a bit-"
"Dancey?" Rose coined a new term.
The Doctor smiled and slipped an arm around her waist. "But I found out what I needed to know. It's the year two hundred thousand, two hundred and twenty. Give or take a few years."
"And you worked that out how?" Rose folded her arms sulkily as they joined yet another queue, this time for a lift.
"Oh, because I'm a genius." The Doctor glanced at Rose.
A smile involuntarily spread across Rose's face. "So where are we, genius?"
"I'm still working on that, give me some time." The Doctor took the tickets out of Rose's hand. "Let's have a look then. 'The Pleasure Dome, experience of a lifetime', etcetera, etcetera. 'Admits one adult'. 'Brought to you by…'" His brow furrowed.
"What?" Rose leaned over his shoulder. "What is it?" She looked from the ticket back to the Doctor. "What's wrong?"
The Doctor stabbed a finger at a line of the text on the ticket. "'Brought to you by Van Statten Ltd.'"
Next time: Sweet Thoughts
Toshiko +Bill Gates is the anti-christ+: So where did she come from? Why is she here?
Gwen chewed on her lip, and then noticed Owen watching her keenly from his desk. She hastily typed out a reply.
Gwen: She's just the daughter of a friend. He's looking after her for a while.
Owen +the doctor will see you now+: Jacky-No-Mates has a friend?!
Toshiko +Bill Gates is the Anti-Christ+: That is a horrid nickname, Owen.
Owen +the doctor will see you now+: I bet he calls me worse. Is she his?
Gwen: No.
Owen +the doctor will see you now+: Ah! So you asked him?