Five-Minute "The Long Game"
by Youth of Australia

Doctor: Right, Adric...
Adam: Adam.
Doctor: As you're new aboard the good ship TARDIS, I think we should treat you with kid gloves and try not to scar you emotionally for the rest of your stunted life.
Adam: Great.
Doctor: So, set course for the day the sun expands and the planet Earth boils away into space...
Rose: Aw, I saw that already!
Doctor: Oh. Okay. I shall take us to the far future then. To the year 2000!
Rose: I'm from 2005, Doctor.
Adam: And I'm from 2012.
Doctor: It always used to impress the 1960s chicks. Okay, I shall take us to the far future -- the year two thousand... hundred!
Rose: Isn't that the year two hundred thousand?
Doctor: It's more exotic the other way.

Adam: Hey, this is just a fast-food retailer!
Doctor: A fast-food retailer... of the future, Adric!
Rose: Are we on Earth, then?
Doctor: No, for a change, I've taken us off Earth.
Rose: How far off Earth?
Doctor: Well, we're closer to it than the moon is. We're on a space station overlooking Earth in the far future.
Rose: This sounds suspiciously familiar.

Doctor: Hey, how much is a kronkburger, mate?
Cook: 2 credits 20.
Doctor: My god! That's far too expensive for Happy Hour! History must have changed! Humanity's vision is scuppered! Oh well, I'll just loot the local ATM and try to relax.
Adam: If this is the far future, where are all the aliens?
Doctor: Good question. Excuse me? Hi, can you look at this blank piece of paper?
Suki: Sure.
Doctor: Now, I am your superior. You worship and respect me and will not be at all suspicious that I have absolutely no idea what's happening and am asking painfully obvious.
Suki: Hmm. That's what it says.
Cathica: Okay. You are on Satellite 5, floor 139. You might have noticed it from the whacking great sign over there.
Doctor: I knew that.

Editor: Hmmmm. What shall I do today. Oh, look! That lady looks hot! Have her brought up to me at once, brainwashed into a slave to do my bidding and put her with the others.
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAG.
Editor: What, sir? Oh, er, she's a terrorist. In disguise. Very good disguise. She looks like a badly-dressed airhead, but I know beneath that massive chest is the heart of a true anarchist.
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAG!
Editor: Oh, please, sir! Two more and I'll have the whole set!

Computer: Hello, Suki. Your application to be promoted to Floor 500 has been accepted. Kiss your ass goodbye -- sorry, I mean, congratulations!
Suki: Whoopee!
Cathica: Fine. Get your promotion. I get to stay here, with all the fast food and your boyfriend and these weirdoes from that blue box. On second thought, Suki, take me with you!
Doctor: Too late. So, to summarize, this entire space station controls all the media on Earth and comprises of you and four other yuppies plugged into a computer?
Cathica: Yup.
Doctor: And despite the fact that it only needs the five of you, there are at least a thousand people on this station, and everyone who gets promoted vanishes, never to be seen again? And, according to my highly-tuned powers of observation, flares are back in?
Cathica: Are you trying to say that Satellite 5's media bias is preventing mankind from developing past the year 199,009?
Doctor: No, but now you come to mention it, that's a damn good idea.

Adam: No sex with Rose, no exciting adventures in time and space, and this slurpie tastes of re-fried beans. That does it, I'm turning to the Dark Side. Hey Rose, can I use your phone?
Rose: Sure. What do you want it for?
Adam: I'm gonna find out the results of the horse races for the next 100,000 years, telephone them back to my house and make a fortune.
Rose: Really?
Adam: ...uh, no.
Rose: Okay, then! I'm off to nag the Doctor and reassure total strangers that we aren't a couple.
Adam: A natural blonde. What a pity. Okay, computer, let's change civilization as we know it... Damn it! The computer's not working. I could try and fix it, being a genius and all, but to do so would prevent IT support from flourishing. Man, I am such a nice guy.

Suki: Wow! Floor 500 looks just like Floor 139. Only, snowing. Ooh, snowmen! And they have holes in their foreheads! But why not carrots for noses? Something's wrong.
Editor: Hello. I'm the Editor, but you can call me Simon.
Suki: Are you an albino? Or just really cold?
Editor: How dare you! I shall let my master rip your mind apart.
Suki: Who's your master?
Editor: Up there.
Suki: Your master is the ceiling?
Editor: No, not there -- there!
Suki: Oh. Your master is a giant tapeworm?
Editor: Oh dear. He hates getting called that.
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAG!
Suki: GAK!
Editor: Damn. There goes another one.

Adam: Wow. IT support is full of ladies in nurse uniforms. As a geek, this is several orders of heaven for me!
Nurse: Hello. What's your problem?
Adam: Yeah, I can't hijack all the information of the future for my own personal gain ten thousand centuries ago.
Nurse: I'm afraid we don't let people do that without a sheet of psychic paper.
Adam: Botheration!
Nurse: We can give you a free vomit-o-matic implant that turns bodily waste into attractive ice cubes that can be sold at a profit to small and gullible children?
Adam: Hah! I need a vomit-o-matic like I need a hole in the head.
Nurse: Whatever turns you on.

Doctor: Wow. The TARDIS has landed just next to a junction box full of cables that keep the space station from exploding and killing every single person aboard. Hey Rose, help me rip this stuff up, will you?
Cathica: That's not a good idea.
Doctor: At least I'm not stupid enough to get a hole drilled into my head on the pretext of getting richer!

Nurse: There you go, sir. A hole has been drilled in your head. I'm sure you can get richer now.
Adam: Okay, obviously sarcasm does not survive into this time. I'm definitely going to distort the pattern of history now. And after that... I'm taking my dog for a walk!

Editor: Suki? Oh, poor, Suki. I knew her well, Mr. Jagrafess.
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAG.
Editor: Okay, I didn't, but I could have! Oh, well, never mind. Plenty more fish in the sea. Any other brainless blondes on the station that I can use for my wicked ways and not have anyone notice? Hey! Her! Next to the big-eared dork in the leather jacket. Who's she?
Computer: No idea.
Editor: But this station contains every last drop of data in the entire cosmos! How could she avoid our omnipotent glare?
Computer: Maybe she didn't fill in her census.

Doctor: Right. This lift takes us straight to Floor 500, a place where no one has managed to return from, the source of a lethal amount of heat, and doubtless the force preventing mankind from developing, so... anyone for a ride?
Cathica: I may have half my brain missing, but I know a stupid offer when I hear it. No thanks.
Rose: I wish I understood that. I'll come!

Adam: Right. Just snap open my head, begin downloading the whole Internet and convert it into Morse code I can record on the answering machine and translate later... Hey, that might take a while. Still, it IS Rose's phone. She gets the bill. Damn it, I'm evil!

Doctor: Oh, my god! It's the Master!
Editor: No, I'm the Editor.
Doctor: Oh, sorry, my mistake.
Editor: Please, we're all friends here, aren't we? Now, my frozen zombie chicks, chain them to the wall! I feel particularly cool today, and after one hundred years of continual success I'm certain our evil plans can survive me explaining them all to a complete stranger.
Doctor: You're SURE you're not the Master?
Editor: The Master did not have frozen zombie chicks.

Cathica: Oh, well. Nothing else to do to day but head up to Floor 500 and face my destiny. Plus Suki still owes me a fiver.

Editor: So, you see, by repeating a phrase over and over again you can get whole hordes of people worked up and speculating and having no idea that they're just being distracted. Well, that's what I think RTD is doing with this "Bad Wolf" thing.
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAG.
Rose: Hey, you said that without moving your lips!
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAGGRAAGAGAGAGAG!
Doctor: Good gravy! There's a giant booger on the ceiling and it's gurgling in an evil fashion!
Rose: Why doesn't the TARDIS translate its evil gurgles?
Doctor: He must have Tourette's syndrome -- the TARDIS refuses to translate swear words. Why do you think I never tell your mother that she's a GRAAGAGAGAGAG?
Editor: Language!
Doctor: Just why are you and this thing trying to control humanity?
Editor: That "thing" is the Mighty Jagrafess of the Holy... oh, forget it. Call him Max. And why are we interfering with mankind's development? Well, like we need a reason?
Doctor: This badly-thought out plot has all the hallmarks of my old enemies the Cybermen!
Rose: But the walls are made of gold?
Doctor: Oh. So they are. But all this ice... It must be the Ice Warriors then!

Adam: What does this button do? ARGH!

Editor: I downloaded Adam Mitchell's entire brain! Quicker than normal, actually, come to think of it.
Doctor: Adam who?
Rose: He means Adric.
Doctor: Oh, right. Still, what harm could he do?
Editor: I now know that you are the Doctor, the last of the Time Lords, I now have your TARDIS and the key you were stupid enough to give him.
Doctor: Well, apart from that. I hope someone just happens to be listening in the background to reverse the polarity of the neutron flow.
Cathica: Oh, okay.
Editor: Reverse the polarity of the neutron flow? That couldn't harm us in the slightest. Now, if she reversed the flow of the air conditioning and pumped it up here, then, I admit, we'd be stuffed...
Jagrafess: GRAAGAGAGAGAGGRAAGAGAGAGAGGRAAGAGAGAGAG!
Editor: Oops. Sorry, sir.

Adam: Argh! It's the end of the world as we know it. And I'm getting the hell out of here!

Doctor: Rose! Use your escapology skills and untie me.
Rose: I don't have any escapology skills, Doctor. You're thinking of Jo.
Doctor: Damn! We'll just have to escape with the restraints still on.
Rose: Kinky!

Editor: I think it's time for a career change - Whoa! Suki! You've come back to life! You really must love me. Either that or the Jagrafess is possessing you to make me share his death!
Suki: GRAAGAGAGAGAG.
Editor: So... it's not option one then?
Suki/Jagrafess/Editor: GAKKK!

Doctor: Okay, so your heating system is stuffed and the satellite's on the brink of collapse, the media itself has ended and humanity's guiding light is now three liters of pond scum...
Cathica: But?
Doctor: I was hoping YOU would be able to say something positive. I'm just off to discipline Adric. Rose, stay here and for god's sake don't screw up the course of established history.
Rose: You betcha, Doctor. So, Cathica, instead of news, how about... oh, I don't know... reality TV game shows?
Cathica: Hey, that might just work!

Adam: Wow! You've taken me back to my living room! How kind!
Doctor: Not really, I landed the TARDIS on your dog.
Adam: Nooo!
Doctor: And now I will steal your answering machine.
Adam: Can't you just steal the tape?
Doctor: Shut up or I'll click my fingers. Just like that!
Adam: Gurk!
Rose: Eew! His third eye has opened!
Doctor: Come on, let's get out of here before he sees his reflection and starts vomiting ice cubes.
Adam: You can't leave me here! How do I explain this hole in my head?
Rose: You're the genius!
Adam: Yeah, I am. I'll just tell people it's a piercing. That got out of hand. Oh, no! What if they think I'm gay? Doctor, come back!
(The Doctor flees his ex-companion at Ludicrous Speed)

THE END


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This fiver was originally published on July 12, 2006.

DISCLAIMER: A lot of stuff in here is copyrighted by the company that makes Doctor Who. We, the administration of Five-Minute Voyager, could not possibly have less of a clue who that is. Well, actually we do since SCMoll told us, but it's funnier this way.

All material © 2006, Ewen Campion-Clarke.