She looked at the Doctor, his elbows tied tightly to the chair arms so he had enough freedom to manipulate the control pad, but not enough to untie himself. "Wish I had a camera," she said. "That"d be one for the alb.u.m. Not to mention I could probably make a fortune from any alien bondage websites there are out there."
"Does your mother know about your obsession with these "alien bondage websites"?" he replied.
"Why do you think she"s so suspicious of you?" Rose said. "I told her you were the mastermind behind them."
"Are there really alien bondage websites?" asked Mickey.
Rose and the Doctor burst out laughing. "Yeah. I"ll give you the address when we get back," said the Doctor.
"Don"t be silly, I didn"t really think there was..." Mickey continued hurriedly. Then, as the Doctor didn"t stop laughing, he added, "Although aliens being gagged, I can see the appeal of that."
Rose finished untying Mickey, and turned her attention to the Doctor. Soon his ropes lay on the floor, and Rose waited for him to stand up so they could make their getaway. But he stayed sitting down, still holding the control pad.
"Hadn"t we better be getting out of here?" she said urgently.
"Hang on a minute," the Doctor said. "I wanna try something. Sit down, Mickey."
Mickey had stood up, eager to be getting going, but sat down at the Doctor"s words, seemingly to his own surprise. "But those things could be back any minute," he said.
The Doctor shook his head, as if such things really didn"t concern him. He gestured at the image on screen in front of him. "Does any of this look familiar to you?"
Mickey looked at it. "Nope."
"Thought not. Can"t have everyone doing the same thing at the same time." The Doctor leaned across to look at Mickey"s screen. "And yours doesn"t ring any bells with me. Except... look up there."
Mickey obediently pressed the relevant b.u.t.tons. There was a tunnel entrance visible in the top corner of the screen.
"I think I"ve seen that," said the Doctor. "Right back at the beginning. So if I can just reverse to that point..."
"You can remember every turn you made for an hour or so?" said Rose. "Blimey. I get lost in Hampton Court maze."
"Nah, that"s easy," said the Doctor dismissively. "It"s hardly even up to your shoulders." He thought for a second. "Mind you, it might"ve grown a bit since I was last there."
"Yeah, well, I went in 1998 on a school trip," said Rose. "Every turn there were snogging couples taking advantage of being out of sight of the teachers. You"re going to tell me you went in the 1700s or something, aren"t you?"
He grinned. "Not if you don"t want me to. I"ll tell you this, though, there were snogging couples using it even then. Had to be careful that their powdered wigs didn"t get caught on twigs. Last thing you want, you lean in for a snog and suddenly this impressionable young lady"s seeing your hairdo as nature intended. Puts you right off."
"Don"t tell me you know that from personal experience," she said, glancing at the Doctor"s closely cropped head and battered leather jacket and trying to imagine him in full Restoration get*up, velvet, brocade and periwig. "I really don"t want to know. Ewwww!"
The Doctor laughed, his eyes never leaving the screen. "Not my scene," he said.
As the minutes pa.s.sed, Rose got increasingly nervous. "I really reckon it"d be a good idea to get out of here," she said. "Those aliens are gonna be back here soon, and we don"t have any weapons or nothing..."
"Just a bit longer..." said the Doctor, eyes fixed on the screen.
But Rose was feeling really agitated. "Can"t you do whatever you"re doing back home, if we just got hold of a couple of consoles?"
He shook his head, although he said, "Maybe. But if what I think is true, there"s no time to lose..."
Rose suddenly remembered something. "There"s a sort of diagram out there," she said, pointing through the door. "Maybe that"d help you do it quicker."
The Doctor darted through the door, and she heard him call, "Yes!" He popped his head round the doorframe and gave her a thumbs*up. "This"ll do it!" he said. "Rose, pick up the control pad, and do exactly what I tell you."
"But I don"t do computer games!" she cried.
"You do now," he replied.
So she sat there, and did her best to keep up with the rapid and complicated instructions the Doctor was calling through from the next room.
"Why"s he doing this?" she asked Mickey.
"Dunno," he said, shrugging. "But it"s been bugging him. He"s been desperate to try this out. Trouble is, those Spiny Normans got a bit unhappy if you didn"t stick with their plan, so he"s not been able to do what he wanted."
The Doctor"s voice floated through again, sounding excited: "This is it, any minute now... Keep an eye on your screens!"
Rose focused her gaze in front of her. But suddenly the control pad in her hand juddered. She tried pushing the b.u.t.ton to carry on ahead, but it resisted her touch. It looked as if the same thing was happening to Mickey.
"Doctor!" she called out. "It"s going all funny!"
He hurried back in. "Aha!" he said. "That means we"re getting close, I reckon. Got to maintain the fiction of the game, see. Thought there might be some sort of safeguards." He took Rose"s control pad and prised off the cover, then began poking around inside it with his sonic screwdriver. Having put the cover back on, he handed it to her. "There," he said. "See what that"s like. Few adjustments and that plan out there, we should be able to get round this."
She tried again, following the Doctor"s continuing instructions. There was still a bit of resistance, but she could push through it now.
On the screen, the viewpoint was jogging forward, jiggling up and down as if created by a camera held by a running man.
"Here we go!" called the Doctor.
And as Rose watched, something appeared on the screen, something she"d not seen in the game before. She glanced over at Mickey"s screen. Something similar was coming into focus there too, coming closer and closer.
Both screens swam into focus at almost the same moment. Each screen showed... a figure. A human figure. A familiar human figure.
Mickey"s screen showed a lad in his twenties. He had shoulder*length hair and was wearing gla.s.ses and a black T-shirt with a picture of screaming skulls on it.
Rose"s screen showed a woman in her sixties, wearing a tea*cosy hat and a b.u.t.toned*up coat. Both had flashing discs sticking to their foreheads. Both had metal cubes the disruptor of the game"s introduction strapped round their necks.
"I"ve seen him down the pub," said Mickey, sounding confused.
"That"s Mrs Hall," said Rose, feeling a bit sh.e.l.l*shocked. "Mum said she"d gone on holiday."
The Doctor had come back into the room. He crouched down next to Rose. "Your mum said she"d won a holiday. On the scratchcards." He waited for that to sink in.
Rose turned to stare at him. "There are real people playing the games?" she said, making sure it was a question, giving him the opportunity to tell her, no, don"t be stupid, Rose, what a ridiculous idea...
"Yes," he said, his jaw set in anger. "Here you go, humans, have something for nothing. Oh, wait, actually we want something in return after all. You think you"re getting a holiday, well, let"s make it an action*packed one. Come to our planet and die for us."
Rose felt sick. "All those people all those people who"ve won holidays..." She looked at the screens again. Mrs Hall was staring, her eyes trying to say something to the lad from the pub. The lad from the pub was looking the same, desperate and scared.
Mickey dropped his control pad, his eyes wide with horror. "What happens when you lose the game?" he yelled. "What happens? What happens when you see those insects coming towards you and they open their jaws? What happens when it says "game over"?"
Rose turned back to the Doctor, hoping for... She didn"t really know what she was hoping for. For him to put it right, she guessed. To wave a magic wand and make it OK again, or better yet, to make it never have happened at all. "Did you know?" she said, trying not to sound as if she was accusing him. "Did you know what was happening?"
He shook his head. "I didn"t, no. I just thought there was something going on. Once we knew it was happening for real, I wanted to see what they were using to play the games."
Mickey suddenly pointed a trembling finger at the screen in front of him. "Oh no, oh no, oh no," he muttered. As Rose looked, the green forelimb of a Mantodean appeared, waving at the side of the screen.
"Don"t just sit there!" shouted the Doctor. "Get them out of there!"
Rose pressed a b.u.t.ton. On Mickey"s screen, she saw the black T-shirt bloke turn to his right. Her hands were shaking. "I can"t do this!" she said. "I can"t control a person like they"re a toy!"
The Doctor grabbed the controller from her. He started manipulating the controls, and in seconds the lad had disappeared from Mickey"s screen, but the Mantodean was still there. Mickey had dived for the controller that he"d dropped on the floor, but he wasn"t quick enough. He began to stab frantically, desperately, at the b.u.t.tons, trying to move Mrs Hall to reach for the gun anything...
The mandibles of the Mantodean filled the screen.
And then there was just the simple phrase: "Game over".
"Sorry, you"ve not won this time," whispered Rose, numbly. "Please try again."
Mickey leaned over the side of his chair and began to heave. Rose put out a hand to touch his arm, to comfort him, but he shrugged it off. "I killed her," he said. "I just killed someone."
The Doctor was still at the controls, eyes glued to the screen, face tense with concentration. "Come on, come on," he was murmuring. "Not far now, nearly out..."
Rose was still feeling nauseous, but then something happened to make her stomach churn even more. She heard a noise. It sounded as if the trapdoor was being opened. "Quick! Quick!" she yelled, panic hitting her.
"Nearly out!" called the Doctor. "Here we go... There"s the exit..."
The three of them stared at the Doctor"s screen, adrenalin pumping.
"You"re gonna make it!" said Mickey. "Come on, come on..."
The exit was getting closer and closer. Rose imagined the lad, sweat running off his forehead, legs pumping as the Doctor propelled him towards freedom. Five more steps... four more steps, three, two...
"You"re there!" said Mickey. "Come on!"
Sand filled the screen, the landscape outside the pyramid, one more step and he"d be out...
With a press of a b.u.t.ton, the Doctor helped the black T-shirted lad, the bloke Mickey had seen down the pub, take the final step to freedom.
And the screen went white, blinding white.
They gazed in disbelief as the light faded and the legend appeared: "Game over".
The Doctor threw the control pad on the floor. "No!" he yelled. "No, no, no!"
"What happened?" asked Mickey, still looking at the screen.
"They must"ve b.o.o.by*trapped him or something. Something to stop people leaving once they"re in there. Try to escape, and you get blown up."
Rose hadn"t quite taken this in when she heard the noise again. "The Quevvils are coming!" she said. "We"ve gotta get away from here!"
They raced out into the first room. The door to the corridor was still locked. Rose put an ear to it. "I don"t think they"re down yet," she said. "Shall we make a run for it?"
But the Doctor had found something, some sort of receptor built into the wall. "I think I can reverse the teleportation field," he said. "Send you back to Mickey"s flat." He waved his sonic screwdriver at her.
"Think you can, or know you can?" said Rose. "I"d rather take my chances with an angry porcupine than end up with my atoms scattered to the four winds." And then she took in the rest of what he"d said. "What do you mean, send us back? What about you?"
He frowned, but didn"t stop what he was doing. "One, I"ll probably have to stay here to operate this. Two, I need to find out stuff. Like, where their planet is."
"So we can go there and rescue everyone?" said Rose.
"Something like that," said the Doctor, twisting the end of his sonic screwdriver so it emitted a high*pitched hum. "Just need a few more minutes here... D"you reckon those Quevvils are down yet?"
There was a loud thud from outside the door. "Sounds like one just fell off the ladder," said Mickey.
Rose smiled for the first time in quite a few minutes. "I lip*balmed the rungs," she said, producing from her pocket a pot that now contained only faint traces of cherry*scented gunk. "Thought it might slow them down."
The Doctor was now tapping on a keypad. "Here we go," he said. "You two, come here."
Rose and Mickey walked over to where he indicated. They were standing right in the middle of the room. The Doctor put his hands on Rose"s shoulders, and looked deep into her eyes, that look that made her know she"d do whatever he was going to ask of her, however dangerous it was. "I want you to collect up the games," he said. "As many as you can. We"ve got to stop people playing it. At the moment it"s the only way we might be able to prevent more deaths."
"All right," she said. "But people aren"t going to just hand them over they"ll think I"m trying to steal them or something."
There was a sound from outside the door.
"You"ll think of something," said the Doctor, hurriedly. "Right, off you go. I"ll see you later. Meet you at your mum"s."
Rose smiled an acknowledgement.
The Doctor raised his hand to operate the controls.
The door burst open.
The Quevvil raised its gun.
The Doctor"s hand came down.
Everything went fuzzy again.
Rose wanted to throw up. It was just as bad the second time. But her vision slowly cleared. She found she was face*down on carpet, but it was familiar carpet. The Doctor had done it! They were back in Mickey"s living room, right on the very spot from which she"d vanished earlier. "We made it!" she groaned, climbing to her knees.
There was no answer. "Mickey?" she said. Feebly, she shuffled round to the front of the chair. Mickey had also materialised face*down on the floor, but he"d made no effort to move. "Come on, you lazy lump," said Rose, trying to jolly him along. "If I can get up, you can." But Mickey still didn"t move. "Mickey?" she said again, suddenly scared. She reached out with a hand. He didn"t stir. She used both hands, managed to roll him over.
Then she realised. The Quevvil had managed to fire its gun before they had been zapped away. And it had hit Mickey.