Doctor Who_ Prime Time - Mike Tucker [76]
‘Good evening gentlemen. I’m afraid that you’ve lost this round, and that the girls have played their joker.’
Ace and Gatti clung to the wall of the Channel 400 building, grimacing as the wind threatened to pluck them off and hurl them to the ground.
Ace shifted her grip, her fingers digging into the tiny gaps between the concrete blocks. She struggled with the rope.
Without climbing boots and without proper shackles it was almost impossible to secure themselves properly. She and Gatti had the rope tied around their waists, but it was hampering their mobility.
They were about five metres above the balcony. Ace twisted her head to look down. Below her was the car park, the thousands of vehicles little more than kids’ toys from this height. As she watched one of Gurney’s men stepped out on to the balcony.
Her heart jumped. If Breame had told the commissionaires how she and Gatti had escaped then this would all be over very quickly. The man did a quick inspection of the balcony, then peered over the edge. Gurney came out to join him.
‘They couldn’t have got out that way, sir.’ Ace struggled to listen over the biting wind. ‘Mr Breame was telling the truth. They must have got past us on the stairs.’
‘How, damn it? How?’
The two men stamped back inside the bar. Ace let out her breath and shot a look at Gatti.
‘I think we’d better get some distance between us and them.’
Gatti nodded and began to haul herself up the sheer wall.
The two girls made painfully slow progress, Ace using the piton gun wherever possible, aware that every shot threatened to alert the commissionaires to their presence.
Eventually the two of them clung beneath the lip of the roof. Gatti was shivering, her hands almost white.
‘I’m not sure how much more of this I can cope with, Ace.’
Ace craned her neck. ‘This has got to be it, Gatti. Top of the building. We’ve just got to get over this overhang and we’re home and dry.’
Gatti cast a practised eye over the jutting concrete. ‘It’s not a simple climb Ace. You’re not going to be able to use the gun. One of us is going to have to get over first and then let the rope down for the other.’
‘It’ll be me then.’ Ace’s face was grim. Gatti tried to argue but Ace shook her head. ‘Look at you. It’s as much as you can do just to hang on.’ She shuffled over, letting the rope take her weight. ‘Tie yourself on, and give me as much slack as you can.’
Gatti hooked the rope through the end of the piton, pulling herself tight to the wall. Ace took a deep breath. ‘Wish me luck.’
Roderik Saarl stepped out on to the stage in Studio Two. The last crash of drums faded away, the spotlights lit him like a beacon.
He held his arms wide. A hush descended across the audience. Saarl smiled. This was his moment, this was what he lived for, this was what he was.
The world faded into nothingness, nothing existed beyond the walls of the studio. Every eye was on him. Hundreds of billions of people all waiting to hear him speak, all watching Roderik Saarl.
He felt a huge surge of pleasure. To think that he had made it. To think that from his humble beginnings, the son of a shuttle loader, a nobody from a backwater planet, he could command any fee he wanted and people hung on his every word. He remembered the bullies back home, the critics, the tormentors. No one would dare now. In the temple of television he was a god!
He crossed the stage, flicking his eyes over his expectant audience, then turned to the camera. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, good evening.’ He kept his voice low and mysterious.
‘Tonight will see the final round in a contest that has kept you gripped and astounded. A mysterious traveller in time and space pitted against almost insurmountable odds. The Doctor triumphant, or the Doctor defeated? Here, live, you will see its resolution.’
The audience started to cheer. Saarl held up a hand, calming them.
‘But that is later, for the moment we have another first.’
Across the stage a curtain was rising, the police-box shape of the TARDIS sliding out on to the stage once again.
‘Tonight, we at Channel