Chapter 13: Bad Wolf
Screen plays again and starts by showing the Doctor lying down in a small, spinning cupboard. He wakes up and asks what's happening before falling out.
"What the hell?" Jack's eyebrows fly up.
"Where are we?" Rose asks, pointing to herself and Jack. Everyone except Ten looks mystified. He just looks angry.
A blonde woman runs over asking why they put him in there and that they never said he was coming.
"They? Who's they?" Donna frowns.
"Don't bother, he won't answer." Mickey shrugs, gesturing to Ten.
"No point when you're about to find out anyway." He replies.
She helps him up as he asks what happened and she tells him to be careful as he falls over again. She tells him it's the transmat that has scrambled his head.
"Transmat? No wonder I'm all over the place."
"What's a transmat?" Rose asks.
"It's a way of travelling through time and space, sorta like the watch Jack used when we first met him except far more uncomfortable." Nine tries to explain.
She admits she was sick for days and then asks his name. He is still very unsteady but replies his name is the Doctor he thinks and asks again what happened and she tells him he go chosen.
"Chosen for what?" Rose frowns.
He asks chosen for what and she tells he he is a housemate. He is in the house and isn't that brilliant.
"Oh of all the ironies. The Doctor is chosen to be a housemate." Rose laughs.
"Not funny and very, very bad." He grumbles.
Over by a pink screen with a stylised eye on it, a young man in a t-shirt is not amused. He states it's not fair as they have an eviction in five minutes. He continues that he has been there all nine week and followed the rules.
"Sounds like Big Brother." Donna notes.
The dark-skinned young lady in the pink shirt joins in. She says that if they keep changing the rules she will protest. A voice asks the Doctor to go to the diary room. The Doctor goes through a door with the stylised eye on it and sits in a comfy chair. The remote voice tells him he is live on channel forty four thousand and not to swear. He simply says 'you've got to be kidding'.
"You're on live TV? It really is like Big Brother. Some future version of it?" Martha smothers a laugh.
"At least they caught him, if it had been that one," Donna points at Ten. "They wouldn't have to worry about swearing, just him talking the ear off everyone listening till they fall asleep."
"Oi!"
Rose wakes up on a studio floor. A dark-skinned man is bending over her.
"Rose! Brilliant, somehow we've all been separated. Very not good." Nine is scowling at the screen.
Rose asks what happened and the man tells her it's the transmat and asks her name. She tells him it's Rose.
"So we all got caught by transmat to different places?" Nine recoils in surprise.
"Well, you're on some kind of game show, maybe Rose and I are too." Jack suggests.
She then asks where the Doctor is and he just tells her to do what the Anne-droid says as it's word is law. Rose asks what he means by Anne-droid but someone calls out for everyone to get in position. He helps her up and she is wobbly but tells him she was travelling with the Doctor and Captain Jack, noting the Doctor wouldn't just leave her.
"No, I wouldn't." Ten smiles a little.
"But if we were all together, how did we end up in different places?" Jack asks, confused.
Rose says she isn't supposed to be there but the man points out her name is on the podium. She takes her place next to him and Rose says she must be going mad saying it look like, before being cut off as it is announced the Anne-droid has been activated. The droid says welcome to the Weakest Link.
"So that's Big Brother and the Weakest Link. Definitely Earth TV shows but who knows how far in the future." Donna notes.
"Wonder what Jack is going to get stuck on." Rose gives a half laugh.
The screen goes white and then some droids appear but they are very blurry. One says they have their work cut out for them and the other replies that he is sort of handsome with a good lantern jaw.
"Only sort of handsome?" Jack looks insulted.
"Even droids think they have their work cut out for them to make you look good." Donna sniggers.
The first droid says that lantern jaws are so last year.
"Hey! I don't like this episode." Jack pouts.
A pair of droids - one tall and thin, one short and curvy - have Jack lying on an examination couch. There is a rack of clothes nearby. Jack asks where he is and they tell him they are giving him a brand new image. Jack says he was with the Doctor before getting distracted and asking what's wrong with what he is wearing.
"Not the time." Mickey rolls his eyes.
"There is nothing wrong with my clothes." Jack replies with a frown.
"You look fine, what do droid know?" Rose assures him. He winks at her.
One droid tells him it's all very twentieth century and asks where he got the denim. He replies it was from the Top Shop in Cardiff. She calls it a classic design. The other one says they will need to find him some new colours and get rid of the Oklahoma farm boy thing he has going on. They both stand by a machine and one tells him to stand still and let the defabricator do it's work.
"Defabricator?" Jack asks a little nervously. Nine and Ten both snigger.
"Does exactly what you think it does." Nine answers.
Jack asks what a defabricator does and a beam shoots out disintegrating all his clothes. He asks if he is naked in front of millions of viewers and both droids answer an affirmative.
"Well at least Jack is happy where he landed." Martha laughs.
"Now you know what you ladies are missing." Jack winks at them.
"Ah, if only I'd known before I picked this one up." Rose snickers as she nods her head at Nine. He mock scowls at her but simply tightens his grip around her and then glares at Jack.
Jack smirks and tells them their viewing figures just went up. Back in the Big Brother house, the Doctor is checking his surroundings with the sonic screwdriver. He says he can't open it and the blonde woman who helped him up explains it's a deadlock seal and has been ever since Big Brother five hundred and four when the contestants all walked out.
"Damn deadlock seals." Nine moans.
"Five hundred and four? People aren't bored of it yet?" Donna scoffs.
"Really annoying that screwdriver can't do deadlock seals." Mickey sighs.
The Doctor walks over to a mirror and asks about that. She explains it's exoglass and you would need a nuclear bomb to get through. He tells her not to tempt him.
"Where exactly were you planning on getting this nuclear bomb?" Sarah Jane asks him in amusement.
"No idea, I'm sure I'd come up with something." Nine shrugs.
The woman then says she knows you aren't supposed to talk about the outside world but asks if people like her and introduces herself and Lynda with a Y. The other Linda got evicted because she damaged a camera.
"Ah, blowing things up gets you out of there. Just your sort of style." Rose laughs.
"Oi! I don't blow that much stuff up." Nine protests.
"It's still rule breaking and you love that." Sarah Jane grins.
"Well yes, but who doesn't love rule breaking?" Ten grins back widely.
The Doctor tells her he doesn't remember. She asks if that means she's nothing and says that people sometimes get that far by being insignificant. He amends his previous statement to people think she is sweet. She seems flustered and asks if she is really sweet. He tells her she is dead sweet.
"That's very nice of you." Rose smiles approvingly.
"I can be nice." Nine reminds her.
"You're just usually not." Mickey smirks.
She thanks him and he wanders over to another wall asking if there should be a garden outside. Lynda tells him nobody has a garden anymore, then asking if he has one. He says he only has the TARDIS.
"You're remembering." Martha grins.
Lynda tells him it's the amnesia and asks where they got him. He says they had just left Raxacoricofallapatorius and gone to Kyoto in 1336 then only just escaped.
"Japan? Can't wait for that." Rose says enthusiastically.
"So this isn't long after the last one then?" Jack notes. "There seems to be no pattern in the time skips between each one."
There is a flashback to the TARDIS where Rose and Jack are laughing. The Doctor says they were together and laughing then there was a white light coming through the walls. Rose is shown getting sucked through the wall. The Doctor ends with him waking up in the house.
"That should be impossible. No ordinary game show transmat could get through the TARDIS." Nine frowns.
"So something else is going on behind the scenes? Well that sounds about right." Donna rolls her eyes.
"Something very big. It would take ridiculous amounts of power to transmat three people from the TARDIS." Nine explains. Ten remains silent but his grip tightens on Rose's hand. She squeezes back trying to offer comfort but not sure what for.
Lynda says that is the transmat beam and how they pick the housemates. The Doctor explains that he isn't just a passing traveller and the beam was fifteen million times more powerful so something else is going on. The Doctor speaks into one of the Eyes on the walls and says the latest update from the Big Brother house is he is getting out, then finding his friends and finding them.
"Aww, I've moved from stray pretty boy to friend. I'm honoured Doc." Jack grins.
"Don't push your luck." Nine retorts but he grins too. "I'm still waiting for that drink you know."
A man goes over to a woman who is using the same console bank as on Satellite five.
"That looks like Satellite five?" Rose asks in astonishment.
"Well with five hundred floors I guess it is the perfect place to run games shows." Martha shrugs. Rose looks over at Ten and remembers what he said about visiting more than once. Maybe this big power behind the transmat is what caused him to regenerate. He glances at her but doesn't give anything of his feelings away.
He asks to have a word and she says when she's finished what she's doing. He has the Weakest Link on her screen. In the game, Rose leans over to Rodrick saying she needs to find the Doc but he cuts her off and tells her to shut up and play the game. Rose decides she is going to play to win.
"Not that I doubt your intelligence, but this far in the future, a lot of the questions may not be anything you know or have even heard of." Nine reminds her gently.
"Well, my only other option is going out quickly and who knows where I would end up then." She shrugs. "I guess I should pay attention in case this ends up happening in our future."
The Anne-droid starts asking questions. Rose gets her easy maths question right and Rodrick banks £20. As it goes round, Rose starts laughing. When it gets to her next question the screen cuts back up to floor 500 and on the monitor she is shown saying she has no idea. The woman asks why Rose is laughing and then says she thinks she knows. The man says he has a housemate who appeared out of nowhere and notes it is as if the games are running themselves.
"Oh great. That means somebody brought us in particular there for a reason." Rose groans. "And that reason is not going to be good."
Back with Jack he is posing and one of the droids says it is the buccaneer look.
"Very dashing if I do say so myself." Jack grins happily. "Needs a little colour though."
He says he isn't sure about the vest and asks about a little colour to lift it. The droid tells him to never wear black with colour and moves on to jackets. He says he likes the first one and it tells him it's a bit too much Hell's Angel.
"Sounds perfect." Jack winks.
"Angel? Definitely not you." Rose grins.
It hands him a shorter jacket saying it's slimming and shows off the bum.
"Well then. That's even better."
Jack says that works for him. The droid says that once they have the outfit they can move on to the face, asking if he has ever thought of cosmetic surgery. He says he has considered it to lift around the eyes and tighten the jaw.
"Really? You'd go through plastic surgery? What if it went wrong and you ended up with three eyes or something? No head maybe. It'd be an improvement." Rose laughs.
"Oi!" Jack whines. "So many would weep if I lost my head."
The droid tells him to have a little more ambition. It takes the covering off its arm and has a chainsaw attached underneath, as it says to do something a little more cutting edge.
"Well, these games just got a lot more dangerous." Mickey notes.
"They wouldn't kill contestants on live TV." Donna scoffs but without much actual belief.
The contestants are choosing the weakest link of the round. The Anne-droid asks Rose what she does and she says she is a traveller. It asks if that is another way of saying unemployed which Rose denies but when pressed for a job she says she doesn't really have one.
"That's not my fault though. I did have a job and it got blown up." Rose protests.
It asks why she chose Fitch and Rose says she got a few of the questions wrong to which the droid retorts she would know all about that.
"Well they certainly got her personality correct." Rose mutters mutinously. Nine smothers a laugh.
Rose points out she can't vote for herself. Fitch is in tears, begging to try again. The Anne-droid says that Broff was the Weakest Link but votes out. She opens her mouth and a beam comes out vaporising Fitch.
"Oh my god!" Rose cries. Everyone else looks horrified.
"You guys need to hurry up and get out of there." Martha states worriedly. Obviously they knew the Doctor and Rose managed to get out but that didn't mean Jack did.
The floor manager says they've gone to adverts and Rose is asking what just happened. Rodrick explains she was the weakest link so she gets disintegrated.
"How can he say that so calmly?" Sarah Jane asks.
"It's part of their everyday life now." Nine sighs sadly.
"But when this first began, they can't have accepted being disintegrated just for losing a game?" Donna looks confused.
"It doesn't sound like they have much choice. Lynda said they get chosen not that they chose to do this. The transmat seems to just pick up random people whether they want this or not." Sarah Jane realises.
Rose is horrified that she voted for Fitch and calls them all sick, not wanting to play anymore.
"Rose, don't. I don't think that will end well for you." Nine warns her, frustrated he can only comment in here where it's useless.
Broff says he can't play anymore. He runs across the studio. The Anne-droid calls out you are the weakest link and he is disintegrated as well. Rodrick warns Rose that it's play or die.
"It's also play and die for all but one." Jack says in disgust.
"So, whoever gets evicted from the house is probably also disintegrated." Marth realises.
"If that is satellite five there are five hundred floors on that. How many games could they run at once? How many people are dying each day?" Rose's eyes go even wider.
Back in the Big Brother house, Lynda tells the Doctor they have to all gather on the sofa. He replies he is busy trying to get out and she tells him that if he doesn't then they all get punished. He stops what he is doing and reluctantly flops down on the sofa saying he might get voted out. The man calls him stupid saying he isn't eligible as he has only just arrived.
"Well if someone pulled me there for a reason, I assume they wouldn't let me be disintegrated." Nine ponders out loud.
"Assumptions can be dangerous." Sarah Jane smile slightly.
"Don't say you know you're fine. You don't know that then." Rose warns him.
Everyone holds hands while the Doctor pulls various faces of boredom. It's announced that Crosbie is evicted and the Doctor leans right back looking even more bored. Lynda and the other man are apologising to Crosbie. The voice announces she has ten seconds to make her farewells. Lynda promises not to forget her and the bloke thanks her for cooking. A door to a short white corridor opens, with another door at the far end.
"Well, there's your way out." Donna notes.
"Just gotta get there without being disintegrated." Mickey adds darkly.
Crosbie and Lynda make an arch, and Crosbie walks through. The Doctor comments that it's only a game show and that she will probably make a fortune in the outside world. Lynda asks what he means on the outside and then she and Strood run back to the sofa to watch Crosbie.
"They actually watch them being disintegrated?" Martha says in disgust. "Spend weeks making friends and then run to watch them disintegrated?"
"It's probably in the rules." Ten spits. Everyone looked over at him in mild surprise given his silence so far.
The Doctor is genuinely confused when he asks what they are waiting for and why they don't let her go. Lynda tells him that isn't funny. There is a countdown and then a beam comes down from the ceiling and hits Crosbie. After a few moments, she vanishes in a puff of smoke. The Doctor is now interested and asks what that was. Lynda says she has been evicted from life.
"What the hell? There is no way people would sign up for this, it has to be involuntary but why haven't people tried to do something?" Donna asks.
"History has gone wrong again. Obviously when we fixed it last time it didn't go on as it should have done which means this has been planned for a very long time." Nine says darkly.
On floor 500 , the man is saying nobody programmed the transmat or selected new contestants and that it is exactly like the stories. She tells him he needs a session off. He tells her he would if she'd take one with him. She tells him not to start that again either.
"Poor bloke." Jack laughs.
He goes on to say the rumours go back decades that something is hidden underneath the transmissions. She says the controller would know and he points out that maybe she can't see it, allow for human error. The woman says she doesn't think the controller has been human for years.
"The controller? So someone or something is overseeing this and is on the Satellite." Rose states.
"Well, we'd better get up there quick." Jack says, eager to get out of that game.
Screen shows a human woman has fibre optic filaments coming out of her head and torso. She is counting up to twenty and then says transmit.
"That's worse than last time." Rose wrinkles her nose.
Back in the Big Brother house, the Doctor asks if they are insane for stepping right into the disintegrator. He wonders if being on telly is worth dying for. She stands up saying he is acting like they have a choice. He says he thought you had to apply and Strood tells him that's how they played in centuries back.
"Well that's not stupid. Not dying in a game is rather sensible." Martha rolls her eyes.
"Yeah, I'd much rather play our 'primitive' games than their versions." Rose agrees.
Lynda adds on that you get chosen whether you like it or not. Everyone on Earth is a potential target. She says there are sixty Big Brother houses running. The Doctor is stunned repeating sixty. Strood shakes his head and says they've had to cut back. The Doctor is now outraged as he asks what the winners get. Lynda says they get to live, he asks if that is it and she asks if that isn't enough.
"No. Everyone lives in fear that they could get chosen for these games and then have a very small chance of winning. They should at least get something more than just winning." Donna rants.
"I'm guessing whoever is running this doesn't care that much." Nine scowls.
The Doctor says that Rose is out there as a contestant and it's time he got out. He asks what Linda got evicted for and Lynda reminds him it was damage to property. He asks like this as he points his screwdriver at a camera causing it to blow up.
"There's the Doctor we all know and love." Rose laughs.
"I'd say I hope you know what you're doing but I'm very sure you don't. This is just guesswork." Sarah Jane smirks at him.
"Sometimes, guesswork is all we have." Ten shrugs.
Back with Jack, he is in tennis whites saying they are too safe and decent. One droid says stage two ready and waiting. He tells them to bring it on. His clothes are disintegrated and the second droid says it's time for the face off. He asks if they mean competing with someone else.
"Given that chainsaw and what we've seen so far, I'm going with literal face off." Nine tells Jack.
"That's what I was afraid of." He mutters. "I'm definitely reconsidering that plastic surgery now."
"You don't need it anyway." Rose assures him.
She corrects she means face off and starts up her chainsaw. The other droid says he would look good with a dog's head as a large pair of scissors start up. They suggest no head at all then stitching his legs to his chest. They says nothing is too extreme and it's to die for at which Jack raises an eyebrow.
"Wish they didn't mean that quite so literally." Jack grumbles nervously. Ten hasn't mentioned actually seeing him in the future so he has no idea if he even survives this. If it's bad enough to cause the Doctor to regenerate it could well end up killing him but then he considers that Rose survived.
Jack says he doesn't want to have to want to shoot anyone.
"Your naked? Where the hell could you be hiding a gun?" Donna looks at him, eyebrows raised. He simply smirks at her.
One cries that he is unarmed and the other says he is naked. He produces a small handgun from somewhere behind him.
"Sorry I even asked." Donna mumbles.
One notes that it is a Compact Laser Deluxe as the other asks where he was hiding that. He tells it that it really doesn't want to know. It tells him to give it to her and he shoots each of their heads off in turn.
"Ok, so that's me and Jack with a way out. Just Rose. That's going to be harder as you'll get shot if you move." Nine looks at her in concern.
"Well, we know I live through it so I'm sure you get there in time." Rose smiles up at him and he wonders in he will ever cease to be amazed at the level of faith she has in him.
On the Weakest Link, Colleen is disintegrated. The floor manager says they are going to the break with a reminder for a solar flare and Rose asks Rodrick why he voted for Colleen as she banked all the money. He says he wants to keep Rose in because she is stupid.
"Oi!" Nine and Ten both cry out.
"Rose is not stupid." Sarah Jane protests. Rose gives her a grateful smile, which is returned, making a note to spend some more time with her at the next break.
"However, I'm grateful he is helping keep you in and therefore alive, despite his reasoning." Nine admits.
He continues saying that he wants her to be in the final where she can be disintegrated and he gets a stack load of credit courtesy of the Bad Wolf corporation.
Everyone sucks in a breath. "Is that a warning or what?" Donna asks.
"No idea." Rose frowns. "But I'm sure we will find out."
Rose asks who Bad Wolf are and he tells her they run the Game Station. She asks why they are called Bad Wolf and he says he doesn't know but it's like an old Earth nursery rhyme and asking if it matters. Rose says she keeps hearing those words. It shows the flashbacks of all the times they have heard or seen the words.
"It is following you around. No other explanation. But are they leading you there or telling you not to go there?" Jack looks at Rose and Nine. Both shrug at him.
Rose realises that if Bad Wolf is in charge then maybe she isn't there by accident. That someone has been planning it.
"Doesn't mean you are completely safe." Nine warns.
In the Big Brother house the voice calls out that the Doctor has broken house rules and they have no choice but to evict him. He raises his fists in celebration. They give him ten seconds to say his goodbyes. He cheerily run to the door and waits, telling it to open up. Lynda tells him he is mad, like he wants to die. Strood reckons the Doctor was a plant to stir things up.
"It is rather bizarre. Without knowing what we do you look very excited to die." Martha shakes her head in amusement.
"There isn't exactly time to explain to them." Nine shrugs.
The door opens and he bounds in. Strood runs over to the tv but Lynda keeps watching until the door closes. On the monitor the Doctor is yelling at them to disintegrate him. Lynda calls him bonkers.
"She's not wrong." Mickey laughs. Ten rolls his eyes at him.
On the floor 500 monitor the Doctor is still shouting at them to disintegrate him. The woman says she told him to keep an eye on the Doctor not kill him. He says that the Doctor damaged property and it's an automatic process. Back in the room the machine shuts down and the Doctor says he knew someone brought him into the game for a reason. If they wanted him dead they would have transmatted him into a volcano.
"Please don't give people ideas when they could actually do it." Rose rolls her eyes.
"They obviously don't want me dead." Nine grins.
"Yet. Maybe they haven't met you yet." Donna smirks.
"Oi!"
On floor 500 the woman asks what he did and he insists he did nothing. As the Doctor says they want him alive, he says it must be some sort of override. The Doctor says security may be less tight at that end an that he is getting out.
"So that's you most likely out and Jack has a weapon now so he can get out." Martha smiles.
"Now you just have to find Rose, who could be anywhere." Mickey says.
The Doctor opens the white door. Lynda opens the other door. He asks Lynda to come with him and she says they aren't allowed. He points out that if she stays she has a fifty fifty chance of disintegration and he promises to get her out alive if she goes with him.
Ten flinches at this statement. Rose looks over at him sadly, taking that to mean Lynda didn't make it. She squeezes his hand softly and he turns to smile at her sadly.
The Doctor says she is sweet and that from what he has seen of the world nobody votes for sweet. He holds out his hand and she takes it after a small pause. They run out of the game. The Doctor pauses and says he has been here before and states it is Satellite Five.
"Finally making use of more than three floors." Donna notes.
"Lynda might have a better idea of what floors the games are on." Martha suggests hopefully.
He notes there are no guards and that makes a change. He opens another door and they go through. Lynda tells him nobody has called it Satellite Five in about one hundred years. He recalls that it was exactly one hundred years ago and that there was a bit of trouble upstairs he gave them a hand with.
"Well that's one way of putting it." Rose laughs. "More than a little bit of trouble."
"We've had worse." Nine shrugs with a small smile.
"True enough."
Lynda is surprised he was here one hundred years ago and tells him he is looking good on it. He says he moisturises.
"So did Cassandra, look what happened to her." Mickey laughs.
"You comparing me to Cassandra?" Nine raises his eyebrows at him. Mickey just laughs harder but doesn't respond.
The Doctor continues that there are funny readings. He wonders what they would need all the power for and Lynda says they are probably the first contestants to get out. He asks where his two friends could be and she says there are a hundred different games. He asks like what and she tells him there are ten floors of Big Brother alone. She lists off some games all of which have horrible endings.
"They actually want to watch this stuff? It just gets worse the more she talks about it." Rose winces.
"Being blinded for not singing?" Donna looks horrified.
"Being turned into compost is actually relatively nice compared to the rest of this stuff." Sarah Jane looks equally horrified.
The Doctor looks disgusted while asking if she watches this stuff. Lynda says everyone does and asks why he doesn't. He says he never paid for his licence and she gasps, stating people get executed for that. He seems very unconcerned as he holds up his screwdriver and says to let them try. Lynda tells him he keeps saying things that don't make sense.
"Well that's a given." Rose laughs.
"It's if you can understand him, I'd worry." Sarah Jane agrees.
"I'm not that bad." Nine protests.
"You are but he's worse." Donna snorts, pointing at Ten. "Talking at a mile a blinkin' minute." Ten pouts at her.
Lynda asks who he really is and he tells her it doesn't matter. She replies that it does when she's just put her life in his hands.
"She makes a fair point." Jack nods.
He tells her he is just a traveller and believe it or not he is after a quiet life.
"You'd get bored with a quiet life." Donna scoffs.
"Not necessarily." He looks over at Rose.
"You would." Rose affirms. "Besides, I love all of it, it'd just be nice to have a few off days. Not completely quiet though, you'd go even more bonkers."
"I more meant just travel, I could do without all the trouble." Nine defends.
"Not for long. Given how excited you get every time you guys run into trouble, you couldn't go for long without it." Sarah Jane smiles.
She asks if he is going to wander off again as soon as they get out of there and he agrees. She asks if she could go with him. He smiles slightly and says maybe she could. She quickly says she wouldn't get in the way and he replies he wouldn't mind if she did with a big grin.
"Seriously? Do I need to lay down the same rules as I did for Jack? No flirting while I could die at any moment." Rose grumbles.
"I believe the rule was no oogling your backside while you could die." Jack puts in with a smirk.
"Yeah, well, no flirting or oogling while I could die." She amends.
"So you don't mind me flirting then?" Nine asks her.
"Well yeah, course I mind, but right then I don't have any claim on you." She shrugs. He had put up with her agreeing to stay in a hotel with Mickey, and bringing Adam on board, she had no right to argue about him bringing Lynda with them. He senses more to her statement but doesn't press further.
He agrees it's not a bad idea her coming with them but says that first they need to get out. He asks who's controlling the Satellite and Lynda turns on a light breaker. A sign lights up Bad Wolf Corporation as she says your lords and masters. He stares at it.
"So whoever controls Bad Wolf has been setting this up? That's one hell of a lot of power to make those words follow you through time and space." Martha looks confused.
"Maybe that's who brought us here." Rose suggests.
On floor 500 Pavale and his lady colleague are watching the Doctor and Lynda on a monitor. He says she wins and the Controller needs to handle this. He asks her to find out how they got on board and turns to tell the Controller they have a problem. She tells them to keep working. He explains they have a security problem and again she tells him to keep working.
"Not much of a controller then." Mickey frowns. "If she can't control the games."
"Maybe she can. Don't know how far this Bad Wolf stretches." Nine shrugs.
Pavale says he can't continue working with contestants outside the games and alarms not having gone off. She says no security, the games continue. He keeps trying by saying they can't just them the duo wander around and the Controller replies they are no one. The woman puts her hand on a door lock and the Controller stiffens in pain. She starts to apologise and the Controller says archive Six is out of bounds. The woman says she needs to check the transmat log and the Controller again replies it is out of bounds and no one may enter.
"Well then, she's definitely covering something up. Something to do with our arrival." Jack grins.
"That's probably not a good thing." Sarah Jane tells him.
The Controller tells them to return to work and inform all staff a solar will flare soon. Jack is taking apart the Defabricator. He fashions himself a gun and then says the pleasure was all his which is the only thing that matters in the end.
Donna hits him. "Ow!" He complains.
Jack runs out and calls the lift. He checks his wrist computer saying two hearts must be the Doctor. He asks which floor and gets in the lift.
"Look at him scanning and getting to places quickly." Rose teases.
"He had the tech for it." Nine defends.
"Originally he was naked. He got the tech himself." Donna grins.
On an observation deck Lynda says she has never seen Earth from orbit before. It is covered in grey. The Doctor asks what happened to it and she says it's been like that ever since she was born.
"In only a hundred years? Less than that if it's been like that since she was born." Rose frowns.
"Something went very wrong when we tried to fix it last time." Nine sighs. "Clearly humans never moved on as they should have done."
Lynda points out the Great Atlantic Smog Storm that's been going on for twenty years. They get news flashes when it's safe to breath outside. The Doctor asks if the population just sit there watching television. Lynda says ten thousand channels beam down from the Game Station.
"So other than no longer having chips in their brains, it's not actually any better than a hundred years ago?" Martha realises.
"Apparently not." Jack raises an eyebrow.
The Doctor calls the human race brainless sheep being fed on a diet of, then cuts himself off to ask if they still have the programme where three people live with a bear.
"Really not the time." Mickey scolds him. "Rose is still in those games and you're talking about tv shows."
"Not like she could die any second or anything." Sarah Jane rolls her eyes. Nine and Ten look down guiltily, Ten knowing that if he had been quicker, Rose wouldn't have been stuck with the Daleks.
Lynda realises he means Bear With Me and says she loves that one. The Doctor talks about a celebrity edition and then states that history has gone wrong again when he put it right last time. Lynda corrects that one hundred years ago is when it all went wrong. The station suddenly stopped broadcasting. The Doctor says he did that and she continues that nothing was left in its place. The whole planet froze, the economy collapsed and that was the start of a hundred years of hell.
Nine looks even guiltier. "That's all my fault?"
"Our fault. I helped." Rose offers.
"I should have made sure everything moved on the way it should instead of just running again." He moans.
He looks out at Earth in horror as he states that he made this world. Back with Rose, Agorax is disintegrated, leaving Rose and Rodrick going head to head. He tells her that is the end of tactical voting and she is now on her own.
"So if he hadn't been helping her she would be dead already." Mickey scowls at Nine. "While you're busy talking the day away."
On the observation deck Jack comes in and asks if there is any sign of Rose.
"Thanks Jack." Rose smiles gratefully over at him that that was his first question.
"I always got your back Rosie." He winks.
"You don't trust me?" Nine looks down at her, hurt.
"Course I do. But you've spent most of the time jabbering away, even while scanning stuff. Jack's first question was where I am." Rose shrugs.
The Doctor asks if Jack can't track her down. He says she must still be inside the games which are shielded. The Doctor says if he can get the computer to work, she has to be somewhere. Jack tells him to hurry up as the games don't have a happy ending. The Doctor snaps back that he knows that. Jack hands over his wrist computer and says it's programmed to find her.
"You have it programmed to find us?" Rose asks in surprise.
"Yeah, I guess so. Makes sense." Jack smiles up at her. A genuine smile with no flirting behind it. "Can't go leaving my friends behind." Ten flinches at this too. Despite his reasoning he regretted leaving Jack on that station.
The Doctor thanks him and Jack introduces himself to Lynda. The Doctor tells him to take the flirting outside.
"You're not telling him off for flirting while you're in danger." Nine grumbles playfully.
"Well there isn't anything he can do at the moment." Rose grins. "He's given you all the help he has on him."
"You just enjoy picking on me."
"That too." She grins up at him and he kisses her softly.
Jack protests that he was just saying hello and the Doctor points out that for him that is flirting.
"He makes a fair point." Martha laughs.
"True enough." Jack shrugs, looking amused.
Lynda says she isn't complaining. The Doctor says it's not compatible and the stupid system doesn't make sense. He thrusts the wrist computer at Lynda and tries to pull the front plate of the console off. Jack steps in to help. They get it off and the Doctor notes that it should be a basic broadcast and the systems are twice as complicated as they should be. Something else is going on and Jack asks what. The Doctor says he doesn't know but Bad Wolf is tied up with him as some sort of trap with Rose stuck inside it.
"Ah, there's that concern I was looking for." Rose teases quietly. She knew he always worried about her really even if he hid it well.
"You know I…" He begins but she nods, looking at him fondly.
With Rose they start the head to head and Rose gets the first question wrong. The Doctor says he has found her and when he states the floor, Lynda tells him she is with the Anne-droid and they really need to get out of there.
"I swear by you will be the first human to give me a heart attack." Nine mutters playfully.
"This one isn't my fault." She protests. He smirks.
"But given how jeopardy friendly you are, no wonder you appeared in the game that has Lynda really worried. The worst game you could have picked as you could have been dead in two minutes flat. You're lucky someone wanted to help you even for selfish reasons."
"I might be jeopardy friendly but I make up for it with extraordinarily good luck." She grins.
Rodrick gets his second question wrong but Rose gets her second one correct leaving them at one each. The Doctor urges on the lift and then Rodrick gets the third question right and Rose gets hers wrong.
"Come on Rose." Sarah Jane smiles at her.
Rodrick gets the fourth one wrong as does Rose. The Doctor, Lynda and Jack burst out onto the correct floor as the Anne-droid can be heard asking Rodrick his last question. Screen switches to him and then back to the trio as he gets the answer wrong. Jack tells the Doctor to stand back so he can blast it but the Doctor says he can't as it's made of Hydra combination. In the game the Anne-droid asks Rose the last question and she gets it wrong. Rodrick celebrates as the Doctor works on the lock.
"Leaving that the tiniest bit close." Martha winces.
"Just remember those answers for if this really happens when you guys get back." Jack smiles encouragingly. Rose nods at him, having already committed the answers to memory.
Rose calls out that she isn't meant to be there and she needs to find the Doctor. She keeps calling out he wouldn't just leave her as the Anne-droid announces Rodrick as the strongest link. He will be transported home with a bunch of credits and he thanks it. Rose cries that the game is illegal as the Doctor bursts in calling to Rose and then to stop the game. The Anne-droid continues saying Rose leaves with nothing and Jack calls to stop the game.
"Careful or it will shoot you." Rose calls to Jack looking worried.
"I've got a bigger gun." He smiles.
The Doctor says he orders them to stop the game. Rose slips around the podium yelling for them to watch out as it's armed. She runs for the Doctor but just before she reaches him the Anne-droid shoots her leaving a pile of dust.
"What?" Jack looks from the screen to Rose in horror. "What the hell just happened?" He demands, now looking at Ten.
"She travelled with you so she can't be dead." Points out Sarah Jane, whose hands were covering her mouth.
"Rose isn't dead." Ten confirms, although his grip on her hand has definitely increased.
"I was too slow." Nine whispers.
"I'm fine." Rose tells him, hugging him so he knows she is right there next to him.
"I was too slow." Rose thinks he doesn't seem to have registered that she was with him in the future. "It doesn't matter what that thing was, we thought it would kill you and I was too slow to stop it." His arms reflexively loosen and tighten around her as if he can't make up his mind whether to hold her tight or push her away from him.
"Lets just keep watching. He says I'm not dead so let's get to the part where you guys discover this." Rose suggests.
Jack yells what did they do to her as the Doctor falls to his knees beside the dust and just stares at it. Rodrick uses the floor manager as a shield as Jack aims his gun at them. She calls for security. Jack keeps yelling for them to back off. The Doctor picks up a pinch of the dust. A guard grabs the Doctor's arm and Jack aims his gun at the guard telling him to leave the Doctor alone. The guard aims a gun at the Doctor's head, who still hasn't even attempted to get himself free. Two guard then grab Jack by the arms and arresting him while he yells at the floor manager that they killed her with their stupid freaking game show.
Rose slips from the Doctor's grip and nods to Sarah Jane who quickly takes her place beside Nine. Rose goes over to Jack and pulls him into a bear hug. Still stunned it takes him a few seconds to respond but then he lifts her up and spins her around.
"God Rosie, you could have died." He mumbles in her hair.
"I'm fine Jack." She smiles slightly at how much it is affecting them even now, when she is fine and they know she lives through this. Not that she is pleased they're in pain, but it's nice to see how much Jack cares for her. Once he sets her down again she kisses his cheek and goes back to sit next to Nine. He hasn't really moved and she snuggles into his side where his arm automatically fits around her shoulders. Once everyone is settled back down they turn back to the screen.
The Doctor is thrust up against a cell fence and a guard pats him down, taking the screwdriver. He asks him the purpose of the device but the Doctor doesn't answer. The three of them are sat in a line and a guard then asks how they got on board. Lynda tells him to leave them alone.
"Go Lynda." Martha cheers, trying to lighten the mood.
"I suppose it is your turn to pick up a stray." Rose tries to tease but Ten simply doesn't respond, trying to stop himself wincing, and Nine doesn't seem to hear her.
The guard grabs her face and says he is asking the Doctor. There is no response and then the Doctor's mug shots are taken, front and both profiles. A guard tells them they will be taken to a Colony and held without trial and they can't appeal. A second guard unlocks the door and the Doctor says let's do it. Jack leads the fight out. Jack reclaims the defabricator and the Doctor gets his screwdriver. Lyndra picks up the guard's weapons.
"Should I be concerned that you two seem to have a breakout routine preplanned?" Rose asks in amusement. Nine finally cracks a small smile.
"Given how frequently it happens you should probably be more concerned if we didn't have one planned." He smirks.
"Good point." Donna laughs.
On floor 500 Pavale states they are now in trouble as the trio get in the lift and head to floor 500. The Doctor also has a gun in hand. Pavale set an alarm off and tells them to clear the floor as he is on his way up. Nobody moves until he adds that he has a gun. The woman addresses the Controller and tells her to close the lift. She keeps on about the solar flare and Pavale shouts that he will kill her. The lift arrives and Jack tells everyone to move away from the desk and not to try anything clever.
"Well that's one hell of an entrance. Since when do you hold guns?" Martha turns to Ten in puzzlement, his hatred of guns well known.
"When I think somebody killed Rose. But I didn't plan on actually using it, it's more for show." He shrugs. "Easier to get quick answers when people are scared."
The Doctor demands to know who is in charge but the Controller just keeps counting. He states the Satellite is more than a Game Station and when she doesn't reply demands to know who killed Rose. She still doesn't reply and Pavale informs him of this. As he begins to speak the Doctor turns the gun on him and he pleads with him not to shoot. The Doctor throws his gun at Pavale and tells him not to be thick, he was never going to shoot.
"Well, in their defence, they don't know that and you looked rather terrifying." Mickey points out.
"All they've seen is a very, very upset pair of men with guns storm their office, not exactly the regular passifict look." Donna adds.
"I'm not exactly in the mood for their rubbish. Even if I were in a killing mood, I'm not going to kill people who have answers." Nine rolls his eyes.
He calls to Jack that they have more guards coming and to secure the exit. Then he turns back to Pavale and asks what he was saying. Pavale points out nervously that he has the gun and the Doctor impatiently tells him to shoot him and then demands to know why she can't answer. Pavale asks if he can put the gun down and the Doctor, even more impatiently, says he can if he wants but to hurry up.
"Seriously, can he stop asking stupid questions?" Nine growls.
He thanks him and puts it down before saying the Controller is linked to the transmissions and as the Doctor isn't a member of staff she doesn't recognise his existence.
"It's not like she answered him either and he is a member of staff." Rose points out.
"But it seems like she's not in control, so either it's just a programme that is stopping her responding or something doesn't want to talk to you." Jack looks at Nine.
"Well, I've obviously been brought for a reason so I doubt it's that she doesn't want to talk to me." Nine reasons.
The Doctor asks her name and Pavale doesn't know it saying she was installed at five years old.
"They ruined a child's life! She can't have chosen this, not at five years old." Rose cries, looking outraged.
Jack says the door is sealed so they should be safe for ten minutes or so. The Doctor tells him to keep an eye on them and Pavale says he agrees something is going on and tells him he has kept a log of unauthorised transmats and encrypted signals. The Doctor tells him to show him as Jack tries to get into Archive Six. The woman tells him it is out of bounds and Jack holds up his guns asking if he looks like an out of bounds kinda guy.
"Well, you look like you love getting into out of bounds places." Mickey laughs.
"Definitely." Jack grins wickedly.
The door opens. Jack goes in and walks up to the Tardis.
"Oh good." Nine breathes. Now he can go and get Rose wherever she's gone.
"Oh yeah, in all the panic I almost forgot about the TARDIS." Donna confesses.
"At least it was brought to the Satellite as well." Sarah Jane smiles. Things were finally looking up a little.
Jack closes the door behind him and spots Rose's jacket hung over the side. He stares at it for a second and then operates the console. After a few second he does a double take and says what the hell. Outside, the woman tells the Doctor to let them out if he isn't holding them hostage as the staff are terrified. He retorts that these are the same staff who murder hundreds of people every day. She replies that they are just doing their jobs.
Everyone makes disgusted sounds at that sentence.
"So murder is a job now but you get killed for not paying a TV licence." Nine spits.
The Doctor tells her she has just lost the right to even talk to him. The power drops. Pavale explains it's the solar flare and the Controller calls for the Doctor. The woman calls the Doctor and he tells her it can wait until she tells him the Controller wants him. The Controller keeps calling out as she clearly can't see. The Doctor announces he is hear and she tells him the solar flare is hiding her. Her master's always listen but the flare hides her.
"So she has to act like a computer anytime except for a solar flare?" Martha covers her mouth.
He asks who her masters are and she says they wired her head and the name is forbidden. They control her thought but she could hide the Doctor in the games as they don't watch the programmes. He says his friend died in the games and she says it doesn't matter.
Nine and Ten both let out explosive noises of contempt. Ten's eyes flash and everybody attributes it to the comment, not what is coming.
"Of course it bloody matters. It's the most important thing going on right now." Nine growls out.
He tells her not to dare say that. She continues that they have been hiding in the dark space and growing stronger, shaping humanity for hundreds of years. He demands to know who they are and she says they fear the Doctor. The power comes back on before he gets an answer to his last demand to know who her masters are. The Doctor turns to Pavale and asks when the next solar flare is and he tells him not for another two years. Jack comes out and announces he has found the TARDIS.
"Which in turn has worked something out if Jack's reaction is anything to go by." Rose smiles.
"As long as he doesn't think we are leaving." Nine scoffs.
"Never." Jack grins. "Not when we still don't know who we think killed Rosie."
The Doctor says they are not leaving and Jack agrees but says the TARDIS worked it out, telling him he will want to watch this. The Doctor turns to watch and Jack asks Lynda to stand in a spot. She says she just wants to go home and he assures her it will only take a second. She does and he asks if everyone is watching and then a beam comes down and Lynda vanished. The Doctor cries out that he killed her and Jack disagrees. Another beam brings her back in a different spot and he explains it's actually a transmat beam. Then pointing out this means Rose is still alive. Jack and the Doctor hug.
Nine finally relaxes properly upon hearing the news. Knowing it and seeing it are very different things he realises with more clarity than ever before.
"So none of those people died in the games? Then what happens to them? They obviously aren't beamed back to Earth as everyone thinks they die." Martha points out. "Why would they need to transport that many people across space?" Everyone looks at her, slowly realising that just living through the beam may not necessarily be a good thing.
"Way to ruin the mood with that wonderful brain of yours." MIckey teases.
Screen cuts to Rose unconscious. She wakes up and looks around. She looks in surprise at something and mutters that it can't be. The view changes to a blue lens.
"But...that's impossible." Nine stutters out. He rounds on his future self. "How can this be possible?!" He half shouts. Ten looks at him in sorrow.
"One survived. Fell through space and then built the Daleks again with the humans." He says quietly though everyone can hear him. Gasps run around the room as they realise it is definitely not good for those who get beamed over. Rather than dying they get turned into Daleks. Death would be better, Rose thinks.
"It was all for nothing then." Nine slumps back in his seat, his face devoid of any emotion.
"Not nothing." Ten tells his younger self. "We saved the universe."
"They came back." Nine bites out. "We lost everything yet they come crawling back." Rose hugs him tightly and he clings to her like a lifeline.
Rose stumbles up and backs away, into a wall. She says she saw it die and tries to go sideways but a plunger blocks the path. On the Satellite, the Doctor is saying Rose is out there somewhere and the Controller calls out some coordinates. He starts typing them into the computer while telling her to stop because her masters will hear her. She keeps going and then disappears into a puff of smoke. She appears on a ship and says the Daleks can kill her as she has brought their destruction. She is exterminated.
"She sacrificed herself to give us the coordinates, but you didn't get them all." Jack groans.
"It narrows it down a lot though." Nine points out. "Besides, that bloke said he kept a log of all unauthorised transmissions. Maybe that has the coordinates in."
"I'm grateful and all, but why haven't these Daleks killed me yet?" Rose asks.
"Not sure, maybe they know you're linked to me." Nine shrugs, grateful for the same thing.
Pavale hands Jack a disk and says the final coordinates may be on there. Jack thanks him and introduces himself. The Doctor tells him there is a time and a place for that.
"He really has a point." Rose rolls her eyes at Jack.
"I was just introducing myself." He defends, hands in the air but a grin on his face.
"I thought we covered that earlier, for you, that is flirting." Donna raises her eyebrows at him.
"Well, yeah, maybe, but it's rude not to introduce yourself." Jack smirks.
The woman asks if the whole thing has been a disguise and the Doctor confirms someone has been playing a very long game, even installing the Jagrafess a hundred years ago. Jack hands the Doctor something and tells him to click on it. The Doctor points it at a holographic screen and does, a picture of the solar system comes up and Jack says that is where the transmissions have been going. The woman says there is nothing there but the Doctor corrects that it only looks like nothing as the Satellite is hiding another signal underneath the transmissions.
"Very clever, a lot of power and they have Rose. Not a good combo." Jack frowns.
"We have the TARDIS, we can be there in seconds." Nine shrugs.
Pavale asks what the signal is doing and the Doctor says hiding something sat right on top of Earth. He cancels the signal and a large ship appears and then zooms out to reveal a whole lot more. Jack says he knows those ships but they were destroyed. The Doctor seems not to know how to react and states that they obviously survived. Lynda asks who they are but he just lists numbers totalling that there is almost half a million of them. Pavale asks again what they are and he says Daleks.
"Half a million?" Jack breathes.
"They've had hundreds of years to rebuild." Ten says quietly.
"How the hell do you make it out of this one?" Martha asks.
"A miracle." He replies, half a smile on his face, a big contrast to his counterpart who is still staring stonily at the screen while clinging to Rose.
On the Dalek ship one announces they have been detected and another one says to open communications channel. The first one orders Rose to stand. A holo screen pops up showing floor 500. The Doctor pulls a disgusted face before getting control of himself. One of the Daleks says it will speak to the Doctor who replies sarcastically that's nice and waves hello.
"Oh dear. When that sarcasm comes out even the Daleks should be running." Donna mutters.
The Dalek on screen says the Dalek stratagem nears completion and that the Doctor will not intervene. The Doctor's voice goes cold as he asks why that is. The Dalek answers that they have his associate. He swallows and his face lowers slightly without taking his eyes off the screen. The Dalek says he will obey or Rose will die. The Doctor stares for a second before saying no. Everyone of floor 500 whips around to look at him.
"No?" Jack looks at him eyebrows raised.
"No. I'm not obeying. They aren't killing Rose and they aren't going to win." Nine states coldly. Rose grins up at him.
The Dalek tells him to explain himself. He simply says no again. The Dalek asks what is the meaning of the negative and he says it means no. It says Rose will be destroyed and he says no again, more forcefully and standing up this time. Then explains he is going to rescue her. He is going to save Rose from the middle of a Dalek fleet and then save Earth before finishing off by wiping every Dalek out of the sky.
"Nothing too difficult then." Donna remarks sarcastically.
"Just another day at the office." Nine agrees, his eyes not moving from the screen.
The Dalek states he has no weapons, defences or plan and the Doctor agrees before saying it scares them to death. He addresses Rose who says yes Doctor. He tells her he is coming to get her before pointing the screwdriver at the screen and it disappears. The Dalek states the Doctor is initiating hostile action. The second one orders the invasion of Earth and the third says the Doctor will be exterminated. All the Daleks start saying exterminate and then the screen goes black.
"Put the next one on Jack!" Rose tells him urgently. He obeys quickly and they all settle down to watch the second part.
"I really hate these two part ones. No good for my nerves." Sarah Jane laughs lightly.
