"You promised me a swim, not a sprint!" Sarah Jane rebutted, as breathless as he. Judge Jacobsen's two purple-armored stormtroopers were still right behind them, firing across the deck as steadily as their energy pistols' recharge rate allowed. "When do I get my bloody swim?" Busy complaining, instead of watching where they were going, Sarah Jane failed to notice when she and the Doctor reached the stern of the ship.
"As you wish," said the Doctor, jumping in after her.
--
Jordan extended the wishbone. "Make a wish."
Jason took the other end and the two rebels pulled. Jason took the greater portion of the bone, but got no joy from it, compulsively wiping his fingers clean of anything the wishbone might have had on it.
"Something odd on the ship today," Jordan said. He hadn't been certain till now he'd say anything to Jason about this. But, being determinedly unsuperstitious, he regarded losing at the wishbone to be a good sign. "There were two people locked up for having no ID tatoos."
Jason understood immediately, looking up from waxing his placemat. "Where were they from?"
"Some wacky story about time travel," Jordan dismissed, idly spilling the salt. "Doesn't matter. The point is, they're not from here."
Jason wiped up the salt and started clearing the dishes into the disposal. "They'd be perfect for our plan."
"I wish you'd put only disposable dishes in the disposal."
"They're dirty!!"
--
The Doctor pulled a gold watch from the pocket of his smoking jacket, opened it, and deftly maneuvered it into both the stormtroopers' ray beams in turn, bouncing the beams off the mirror in the watch's inside cover back toward the ship and setting the rear cabin and a portion of the hull on fire. "Sorry, chaps," said the Doctor, "no reflection on you."
"Which part of 'swim' don't you understand?" Sarah Jane groaned.
"I told you about the density of the water," the Doctor reminded her as they ran along the moonlit surface toward the shore. "This is just an unusually thick patch even for Florana..."
"Now that we've escaped, where can we go?" Sarah Jane groused. "I mean, if everyone's supposed to be numbered here, and it's past curfew, where won't they turn us in?"
"I'd say," said the Doctor as they walked up on the beach, "that nightclub over there. The one with the large playing card painted on the door and the neon sign saying King of Clubs."
"The one with the two guys in the doorway," Sarah Jane grinned, "one hissing 'psst' at us and the other spraying disinfectant on the knob?"
"That's the one."
The Doctor and Sarah Jane scooted themselves into the nightclub. The two men introduced themselves as Jordan and Jason; when shaking their hands the time-travelers discovered Jason was wearing rubber gloves. Jordan invited them into the club's back room. You could only pass through the door to the back room by passing under a ladder.
"Didn't we see you on Judge Jacobsen's ship earlier?" the Doctor asked Jordan.
"Yes," said Jordan. "This is the Judge's favorite club and we're hosting his thirty-ninth biannual inaugural ball tomorrow night."
"We're also in the secret rebellion against him," Jason said. "He doesn't know that," he added.
"Knock on wood," said Jordan. His hands didn't move.
"We need your help," Jason said.
"Does this often happen to you?" Sarah Jane asked the Doctor.
Jordan had moved to a visiphone console, over the screen of which was fastened a three-leaf clover. "Our leader will explain," he said as a woman appeared on the screen. "This is Justine."
"Pleased to meet you two," said Justine charmingly. "So you've met our odd couple? Hope you wiped your feet!"
"I can't help it," Jason whimpered. "I get it from my mother's side of the family."
"I gather you want to ask something of me?" the Doctor said to Justine.
"Yes. As the boys'll have explained to you, we're engaged in a plot against the Judge."
"I'm always pleased to take a hand against megalomania wherever I find it. But I should warn you, I have minimal tolerance for violence."
"Didn't the boys say?" Justine grimaced. "This is an assassination plot."
"Assassination?" the Doctor exclaimed. "You'd have to chloroform me first."
The Doctor saw Justine smile. He heard her say, "Not a problem." He smelled chloroform. He felt clamp a cloth clamped over his mouth, and his arms to his sides. He tasted frustration. Then his senses shut down for a bit.
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