Klonk

"I thought... wait... that's only four..." Monty began, looking back and forth from the cards to me.

I absentmindedly dropped a card.

"Oops..." I mumbled, as Monty immediately stooped to pick up the card, leaving his neck completely exposed, and as such I was able to rapidly drop the rest of the cards, get my arm around his neck, stick my thumb in his collar and press my wrist into his neck in a nice little hold that I really didn't like using, but ensured somebody wasn't going to be screaming if I did it right. The completely surprised host didn't even seem to recognize what I had done for a moment, but by the time he did react, he was already slumping in my arms... ok... aaaaand... he's out.

"Uh... I thought you were going to set something on fire..." Joan commented, looking at my bag.

"Opportunity presented itself," I shrugged. "Besides, nobody pays attention to somebody slumping, but everybody pays attention to fire. I'd rather set something on fire that I want them paying attention to."

"Hah... Ok, somebody DOES learn from their mistakes," Helen laughed. "So your plan is to run and then set fire to the place while doing so?"

"Hey, I mean, unless he's got something valuable like the complete records of the Library of Alexandria back here, he ain't got anything I want." I shrugged. "Or is that an Option? I mean, I could always wake him up and ask him."

"There's being forgiving, and then there's just being an idiot, Brent." Kaila sighed, her expression hardening as she stared at Imogene, who hadn't moved from her seat, and was now happily tapping away at her phone.

"Hey, Imogene!" I spoke to her.

She didn't respond, merely continuing to look into her phone. I waved my hand at her, and she looked up, bemused. Her expression was blank, and she cocked her head at me with a questioning gaze. Her hand went to her ear, and she removed a small black earpiece with a flashing blue light, which I hadn't noticed under her hairdo.

"Huh? Was totally not paying attention, sorry. What did you say?" Imogene smiled broadly, before immediately placing the earpiece back into her ear. "It's on mute, it's cool, I can hear you."

"What... what are you even listening to?" I asked, trying to remember what I wanted to ask her.

"Oh, this totally awesome girl who's doing this podcast from her quarantine. It's all about..."

"Never mind, I don't want to know. Imogene, I really don't know how to say this..." I began, before I realized that she wasn't even listening to me.

"...and how you can totally get lots of cash doing these private web shows, well, I had this idea that we could do a tease show from Dad's house where..." She continued, and I realized that she hadn't even been listening to me. Her eyes were back on her phone and she was happily chatting away to... someone on her phone as well as me?

"Imogene!" I said, a bit louder, and noted that she still wasn't paying any attention to me.

"Brent, we... probably should go." Helen said softly, her hand on my arm. "She can't really hear you. She won't really hear you. She thinks she's won. She's getting everything she wants. You're... a prize to her. She won you, and now... she's on to the next one. The next great triumph."

"I can't just abandon her..." I watched as Imogene continued to type, holding the phone up once again and snapping a quick picture of herself, before rapidly tapping away once again. "I... she's my..."

"She was a conquest to you too, Brent. You both wanted the idea of each other," Charlotte explained quickly, her arms coming around Helen for a hug. "I could have made it happen again, but it never ends happy between you two. "

Imogene continued to type away at her phone, and looked over at us with a smile.

"You're NOT going to believe this! I think we're going Viral!" Imogene cheered, "Just.. yeah, hang on, I have totally got to say a thank you to my followers."

"Before I change my mind..." I nodded, pulling the improvised incendiary device from my bag as well as the zippo lighter. "Wish I'd had some duct tape, because it's so much cooler when you duct tape the... OH hey, there's some duct tape right here... Oh right... that's how this works..."

A quick cough of annoyance from Kaila silenced my rant, and I looked back at the police box.

"Ok, so... does anybody know how to drive this thing?" I asked, as I pushed open the door, revealing a large bronze circular room, with a large glowing console in the center. A large metal grate led from the door towards the central console, and the entire place looked polished and shiny, as if it had just come from the showroom. It smelled faintly of new car. Around the central consoles sat several smaller raised surfaces, all set into a circular bronzish looking frame.

"Ooooh, Ninth Doctor. Nice choice..." Kaila grinned. "Even fits continuity, since the show was Cancelled at this point!"

"Really? I uh... it was just the one I liked the most... just a little surprised to have that one show up." I shrugged. "But it kinda makes sense... I guess."

Joan skipped past me into the box, her feet gliding up the metal ramp effortlessly, and her fingers caressing the various controls.

"I'd be a total liar if I said I knew how to work this." She shouted down. "But hell with it, you wanna live forever?"

"One second..." I nodded, snapping the zippo several times and watching as the flame began to burn a nice bright flicker. The rest of the women had filed into the box, and I was the last one standing on a stage with an **** host and a young woman snapping selfies and tweeting about how she just won Lets Make A Deal.

I touched the lighter to the rag, letting the flame burn for only a second before I hurled the device against a divider and was delighted to see a cascade of gelled liquid that poured across the facade wall as well as the nice solid sound of shattering glass. The whoosh of flame was brief, and the slight crackle of burning was everything I could have hoped for.

Monty still lay **** on the stage, the flames a good distance from him. Should be fine until the fire alarm goes off any second now, I surmised, as I removed the apple from the case that It had been concealed in. I looked at Imogene sadly, as she moved her chair to directly in front of the flames, and picked up an official "Let's Make a Deal" coffee mug from where someone had dropped it.

She sat in the chair and snapped a selfie of herself calmly drinking coffee in front of the burning displays.

"Check it out! I'm gonna title this one "This is Fine!" " Imogene laughed over at me, as her fingers immediately began dancing on the phone once again.

I sighed, and placed the apple on the floor.

"For you Imogene. You want to win... And this seems... fairest."

I closed the door of the machine and heard a sound of banging, whanging and general mayhem behind me as Joan pressed various buttons and spun various dials.

"So... where are we going?" I mumbled, trying not to think about my sister, sitting on that stage. What she would do with... and I realized it didn't really matter. I couldn't control what she chose to do. "Scratch that... If you can, I want to go back home. I want to go back to my vacation. Hell with it, maybe actually get a chance to meet Joan... and... I mean, Nikki, where WERE you? I think I must have missed you a few days back."

"No... I think I missed you, " Nikki smiled, leaning back against the railing, and her lovely little hawk girl costume now missing its wings completely, which made things a bit easier for me to keep straight in my head. "But don't worry, we'll figure it out."