by Jacqueline Rayner, Mike Tucker, Paul Magrs, et al (retail) (epub)
‘So,’ Amber said slowly, starting to get frustrated, ‘we stopped them.’
‘Not at all. It was ineffective to the point of embarrassment.’
The twins looked a little hurt.
The Doctor impatiently rummaged in his jacket pocket and pulled out a bunch of small cards. He quickly flicked through them. ‘Nope … Not this time … Save for later … No. Aha!’ He started reading. ‘Good work! You tried your hardest to stop an alien plot, invasion or mystery. Delete as appropriate. But this time you were unsuccessful.’
‘What do you mean, we were unsuccessful?’ Amber demanded. She didn’t make mistakes.
‘There’s an alien called the Nestene Consciousness,’ the Doctor replied. ‘It controls plastic. All plastic. You stopped it building an extra-angry army of Auton dolls, but there’s loads of things it can control already. Toys, dummies, mannequins, already formed in the most fighty of all shapes: the human.’
Before the twins could even begin to process what the Doctor had said, the ground started to shake.
‘And your dumb-dumb species has been dumping plastic and burying it for years. This very factory was shut down because you lot buried so much right here.’
‘We’re on a plastic dumping ground?’ Ross asked.
‘You wish! We’re on a graveyard of dolls,’ the Doctor said with an excited smile.
The soil beneath their feet started to split. Clods of grass turned upside-down. Hundreds and thousands of discarded faulty plastic dolls began breaking through the dirt. The dolls, missing eyes and limbs and with misshapen heads, clawed through the ground like mini plastic zombies, hungry for revenge. And their targets were the Doctor, Amber and Ross. Soon, the churned earth had become a sea of seething plastic body parts. There was no space left to step into. The dirty pink dolls marched in the moonlight, wearing tattered, stripy pyjamas. Their distorted voice boxes sang a chorus, telling the world they were all Baby Sleepy Face.
The Doctor pulled out a pair of sunglasses.
‘It’s night-time!’ Ross exclaimed. ‘There’s no sun.’
‘There’s always a sun!’ the Doctor cried in disbelief. ‘What are they teaching you in school these days? This planet’s really gone downhill …’ He slipped the sunglasses on. ‘Anyway, I don’t need the sun right now. I need my TARDIS!’
Amber and Ross felt a huge rush of air – only, it wasn’t air or like anything they’d ever felt before. A noise, as elegant and as powerful as whale song, hummed in their ears. Something bright and solid was forming around them, and they realised they were inside some sort of hi-tech control room. They looked around in awe, but the Doctor jumped straight to work, heading for a large console in the middle of the space. He began pressing buttons and pulling levers with all the verve and concentration of a concert pianist, then stopped and pointed at Amber. ‘Hey, you! The one who loves hitting big red emergency stop buttons. Don’t do that here.’
Amber nodded. She was so overcome by everything around her that she was speechless.
‘What is this place? Some sort of classroom?’ Ross was staring at all of the blackboards and books.
‘Yes, in many ways.’ The Doctor appeared to like this. ‘Where others come to learn how completely stupid they always are. This is the TARDIS. It’s a spaceship. It’s a time machine. It’s my home.’
He went back to work. He didn’t look up, but he moved his hands over the console at break-neck speed. ‘I’ve materialised it around us, so you won’t get the whole “Wow, it’s bigger on the inside!” experience, but, trust me, it’s incredibly impressive.’
The TARDIS began to shake.
The Doctor looked at a screen on the console. He ran along a walkway to a small door, then flung it open.
‘Oh dear, that’s not good,’ he said, peering outside.
Amber and Ross ran to the door of the TARDIS. There was a lot to take in.
‘We’re in a blue box? How can that be?’ Amber said.
The Doctor slapped his forehead. ‘I would be a bit more concerned about that if I were you,’ he said, pointing up.
Looming high above them was one gigantic mega-doll, made from hundreds of smashed-up dolls, all piled together. The gigantic Auton creature stumbled around like a baby walking for the first time – clumsy but determined. It seemed to fall forward into each powerful step, making the ground shake.
A huge hand swooped down and picked up the TARDIS. Amber and Ross toppled forward, but the Doctor grabbed them both by their backpacks and pulled them back into the safety of the TARDIS.
He then peered closely at the doll’s hand. Like the rest of the creature, it was made up of limbs, eyes, heads and torsos. A jigsaw of dolls. Some parts were old and discoloured – buried for years, rotten and forgotten. Some parts were the new dolls that had been made in the refurbished factory – pink and shiny and ferocious. Tiny arms and legs grabbed and kicked viciously at the TARDIS.
A booming robotic voice came from the giant doll. ‘I’m Baby Sleepy Face.’
‘Yeah? Well, I’m Doctor Angry Face,’ said the Doctor, slamming the TARDIS doors shut.
‘Doctor,’ Ross pleaded. ‘Can’t we just get out of here? This is a time machine, right? And a spaceship?’
The Doctor held on to the rail as the TARDIS continued to shake. ‘Not as simple as that, Twin Two. I’m tracking a signal from out there – far away, even by my standards. I need to stop this thing being controlled by the Nestene.’
The TARDIS shook violently, knocking all three of them to the floor.
‘Great. I just redecorated the library.’ The Doctor dusted himself off grumpily.
‘You’ve got a library?’ Amber asked.
‘I’ve got several. I don’t like to boast, but I’ve got a garage, a gallery of oil paintings of cats, an observatory, a –’
The TARDIS shuddered again.
‘Not the right time, Doctor Disco,’ the Time Lord muttered to himself.
Something occurred to Ross. ‘How’s it getting a signal? If something’s being transmitted –’
‘Then something must be receiving it.’ Amber finished for him.
‘Good brain work, twins. Now let’s keep it going. I was trying to look around that factory for some fancy metal stuff. A great big metal receiver. You see anything like that, Twin One?’ The Doctor pointed at Amber.
‘The control room?’ she offered.
‘Nope. Keep thinking …’
‘The machines on the assembly line?’ she tried.
‘Wrong again. Twin Two?’ He turned to Ross.
‘What about the chimneys?’ Ross suggested. ‘Or something from the storage room?’
The twins were back in competition mode, both trying to think of everything, each of them in a race with the other to be first.
The Doctor walked over to them and raised an eyebrow. ‘Do me and yourselves a favour and stop competing. Work together and you might be surprised at the results.’
The twins nodded sheepishly, then started again. ‘How could they communicate?’ Amber pondered.
‘Were there phones?’ Ross asked.
‘Maybe in the offices? But there are no working phone lines …’
‘They could have mobile phones?’
‘Or hands-free kits? Or something like that?’
Then it hit them both.
The Doctor nodded. Had he already worked it out? Did it matter?
‘Doctor!’ Amber shouted. ‘The Foreman had this metal thing on his head, like a hands-free kit with a little satellite dish on it.’
‘It must be capable of receiving a signal,’ Ross said.
The Doctor ran back across to the TARDIS console and beckoned the twins over to look at a small screen. It showed a scan of the giant doll. At the centre of its face, just between the eyes, lay the green outline of a man. A man with a large plastic head full of alien tech.
‘Of course, he’s part of the doll,’ the Doctor said calmly. ‘He’s the brain of the beast.’ He paced back and forth.
‘I need to shut that thing down. I can use my sonic sunglasses to stop the receiver from working and block the signal, but I need to get nearer to it. A teeny little satellite like that needs fixing up close.’
‘You’re using those glasses? Haven’t you got a screwdriver or something?’ Ross asked.
The Doctor grinned. If only they knew.
‘How are you going to get up there? That thing’s huge!’ Amber trailed after the Doctor as he paced around.
The Doctor pulled the TARDIS doors open once more. ‘I’m going to climb up.’
‘But you’re an old man,’ said Ross.
‘You’ve got no idea,’ the Doctor said.
‘I’ll do it!’ Amber took off her backpack and stood proudly.
‘Don’t be stupid. I’m the better climber.’ Ross took off his backpack.
‘That’s not true. I can climb, and I’m better at not being scared,’ Amber retorted.
‘Hardly. You’ve been a right chicken,’ Ross said.
The twins’ bickering was interrupted by a soft grunt. They turned to see the Doctor launch himself out of the TARDIS doors and on to the wrist of the huge Auton doll.
They gaped in awe, as they watched the Doctor scramble up the forearm of the plastic monster. He grabbed on to jutting limbs and fuzzy yellow wigs for grip. Loose hands scratched and pinched him, and the dolls’ heads tried to bite him. Patches of the devilish giant doll were beginning to smooth out and form one solid creation. The Doctor had to move fast or it would soon be too slippery to climb. The Doctor gave it everything. The TARDIS swung around in the grip of the creature’s hand, but the twins held on tight. They didn’t want to miss a thing.
The Doctor made it to the giant doll’s shoulder, balancing carefully on a row of heads with furious faces. Suddenly he slipped – first his legs, and then his body. He held on at the shoulder, but something was wrong. His sunglasses fell off. They bounced down the doll’s torso as tiny hands tried to grab at them, and then landed on the churned-up grass.
‘He needs those sunglasses.’ Amber turned to Ross. ‘I can climb down and climb back up to get them to him.’
‘No!’ Ross shouted, grabbing Amber’s arm.
They shared a look. The Doctor was right: they had to work together to achieve their goal.
‘You climb up and I’ll climb down,’ Ross said. ‘I’ll grab the glasses and throw them up to you. You’re a better climber.’
‘And you can throw further,’ Amber said. ‘Chuck them to me and I’ll pass them to the Doctor.’
Ross nodded and jumped out of the TARDIS doors. He allowed himself to fall from the doll’s pudgy hand, timing it so he landed on its chubby knee.
Amber followed after the Doctor. He turned and gave her a look of both fury and respect.
‘I told you two to stay put,’ the Doctor shouted, beginning to scramble up the doll’s neck.
‘No, you didn’t!’ Amber yelled, edging her way up the doll-beast’s arm.
‘Well, I should have,’ the Doctor said. ‘But I’d never tell anyone to do something I wouldn’t do myself.’
Ross tried to slide down the plastic leg, avoiding spiteful pokes from blunt fingers. He made it down to the ground. Just as he was about to jump clear, the doll flicked its ankle, sending him across the dirty ground in a rough roll. Amber watched, panicked, as her brother lay there motionless on the ground. Then, a second later, he climbed to his feet and gave her a thumbs-up.
As Ross ran towards the sonic sunglasses, which lay in a heap of ripped-up grass, the doll’s foot lifted ominously above them, then started to descend. Ross skidded across the ground to the sunglasses, grabbed them and dived out of the way just moments before the big plastic foot smashed down.
Amber gripped the doll with her knees and held out her hands. ‘I’m ready!’ she called to her brother. ‘Throw them to me now!’
Ross hurled the sunglasses into the air and Amber caught them easily. She gave Ross a thumbs-up, but then the giant doll started moving violently. It threw down the TARDIS and used its hand to swat at her, as if she was an insect. An unearthly roar came from the plastic beast’s delicate baby-pink lips. Amber moved quickly, heading towards the Doctor, who had now made it up to the face. He reached backwards and Amber stretched upward to pass him the sonic shades.
The Doctor nodded. ‘Now, you two, move away as fast as you can!’
He scaled the giant’s face. When it opened its mouth to roar again, he took advantage of the open lips and used them as stepping stones. Then he grabbed the big button nose and pulled himself up between the doll’s huge eyes.
Ross helped Amber down the last section of the doll’s ankle and they watched together from the ground. They nervously paced, ready to move away from the doll giant’s lumbering footsteps at the same time as being ready to move towards the action so they could see everything.
The Doctor found what he needed. There, submerged in the broken doll parts of the face, was the Foreman. He slotted in perfectly, with his gigantic doll’s head lying in the middle of the creature’s forehead. His eyes were wide open and he watched the Doctor with loathing. The small satellite dish on the side of his head buzzed.
‘You are an enemy of the Nestene,’ the Foreman declared.
‘I’m an enemy of anything that invades, bullies and controls. So you know what I must do.’ The Doctor sighed, sliding on his shades.
The Foreman’s face flashed with fear and anger, and he screamed. The doll giant’s mouth stretched open once more and let out another tremendous roar. Every head that made up the creature also let out a scream.
The Doctor pressed the side of his sonic sunglasses. ‘It’s time to go to sleep.’
The signal was cut and the doll suddenly became still.
Amber turned to Ross, concerned. ‘Did he do it?’
A low rumbling sound confirmed that the Doctor’s plan had worked. Heads and limbs started to fall off the imposing figure, as it crumbled to a pink mountain of lifeless doll parts. The twins yelled out for the Doctor, as the creature collapsed in front of them, then they raced forward to search through the pile of plastic rubbish, frantically trying to reach the strange man who had saved their lives.
Amber suddenly felt something warm among all the hard plastic limbs – a real flesh hand. Ross ran over to help her and they pulled out the Doctor. He rose from the pile of body parts coughing, spluttering and shaking his head.
‘That was ridiculous!’ he said, brushing off his jacket. He began to head back to the TARDIS, which had fortunately landed upright, but at a slight angle. ‘Even by my standards!’
‘Where are you going?’ Amber said.
The Doctor turned to look at her. ‘It’s the middle of the night. I’m getting you two home to bed.’
They didn’t move, so he gestured impatiently. ‘Come on then, twins. Hurry up!’
The twins ran into the TARDIS, this time entering into the surprisingly enormous interior through the small wooden doors.
‘Wow! It really is much better this way!’ Ross said in awe.
‘Finally!’ the Doctor said, grateful for the acknowledgement. He smiled, then remembered to look cross too.
‘So, what about the Autons?’ Amber asked.
‘Just inanimate plastic now. Just dolls. I’m going to come back and tidy that lot up. There’s a species I know that love that stuff. The Chekadarians. Gobble it up and poop out diamonds. Sounds amazing, but it’s pretty gross. Actually, it doesn’t sound that amazing. It just sounds gross.’
Amber and Ross stared at each other. Who was this man?
‘But the Nestene thing, will it be back?’ Ross asked cautiously.
‘Almost definitely. They always come back,’ the Doctor replied with a sigh.
‘So, what do we do?’ Amber found her backpack and started putting it over her shoulders.
‘You do nothing. I’ll do the worrying. You just get on with your lives. Dream your dreams. Eat your chips. Be kind and curious and the right sort of
careful.’ The Doctor’s face darkened. ‘And, for pity’s sake, grow up and stop bickering. When you worked together, you helped to save the planet.’
Amber and Ross nodded.
The TARDIS started to make the same singing noise it had made earlier, humming and then wheezing. When it stopped, the Doctor headed to the doors and opened them to reveal they were in Amber and Ross’s small back garden. They all stepped out.
‘What happens now?’ Amber said.
‘You go to bed, fall asleep, dream your dreams, eat your chips, et cetera. Haven’t I covered all of this already? Do pay attention.’
The Doctor walked back into the TARDIS and shut the doors. A second passed before they opened again and he popped his grey-haired head out.
‘Check out that factory tomorrow. Take your dad. A few tweaks and it will be a fully functioning, eco-friendly, futuristic factory. Give everyone jobs. Make something fun and amazing that will save this town and change the world. But no plastic. Or dolls.’
The twins agreed. The TARDIS faded into the night, making that noise they had come to love, then Amber and Ross snuck into their house and went upstairs.
‘Good work tonight,’ Ross said, smiling at his sister.
‘You too!’ Amber nodded.
Back in her room, Amber put her backpack down and sat on her bed. She was still trying to get her head around everything. The Doctor. The TARDIS. Dolls. Aliens.
Suddenly she remembered something. She pulled a battered cardboard box from the top of her wardrobe and placed it on the floor. She crouched down and pulled out a knitted blanket and some comic annuals, and there it was: her old Baby Sleepy Face doll.
She picked it up and looked at it. She turned it upside-down and shook it, but it was limp and lifeless. She was taking no chances. Amber headed downstairs and opened the back door into the small garden. She threw the doll into the wheelie bin, then smiled and headed back into her room. Now it really was time to go to sleep and dream of more adventures with the Doctor.
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