Harry Kersey

VIRTUAL REALITY

Zoe lowered herself gingerly onto the large, soft cushion that she 
had just added to her console chair. Her brand new tartan mini-kilt 
might be trendy, she mused, but it was not exactly the most practical 
wear for being put across an angry highlander's knee. Hence the 
cushion.

It wasn't as though she had done anything so very terrible, either. 
Jamie never wore his spare kilt, after all, and it would have taken 
such a long time for the TARDIS clothes dispenser to weave a plaid. 
She'd tried to tell him she'd replace the kilt in due time, but would 
he listen? No, he'd just snapped that she couldn't wear the kilt even 
if it had been hers to alter. He'd called her a 'naughty wee lassie'. 
And then had come the painful five minutes which had made sitting 
down so difficult now.

She'd told Jamie that she'd get even with him if it was the last 
thing she did, but she knew that really she never would. But she had 
paid for her kilt with a large sum of her pride, not to mention 
discomfort, and she was damn well going to wear it every day just to 
spite him. And moreover, there was somewhere she *could* get her 
revenge, somewhere she was in charge and she programmed every move. 
If she couldn't get back at Jamie in real life (and oh how she wished 
she could!), at least there was the virtual reality she was now 
tapping into the TARDIS computer.

Most of the details she'd scanned in from real life. Jamie, herself, 
the Doctor, the TARDIS, were all reproduced on the other side of her 
screen. All she had to do was make a few little changes, like putting 
her other self back into her usual catsuit, and then devise that 
vital added ingredient. It took shape as she keyed in its details. 
She made it big, but not so big that it couldn't get through the 
passages and doorways of the ship. She gave it the stamina to outrun 
Jamie, but not too soon. She made it scaly and fearsome and hungry. 
Last of all the specifications was its diet. Zoe smirked to herself 
as she typed the words 'tartan plaid'.

***

Jamie strode along the corridor with mixed feelings. The spanking had 
been more than justified, of course. The wee girl had no right to 
take his kilt for herself, and certainly no right to wear the 
distinctive plaid of the McCrimmons. 'But they're all the rage on 
Earth in the year 2000,' she had protested. 'You may come from the 
year 2000, Zoe,' he had replied, 'but what you need is a good deal 
more old-fashioned.' And then he'd turned her over his knee and 
spanked her soundly.

But he couldn't quite shake off a feeling of self-reproach. It wasn't 
that he'd hurt Zoe, for that was the point of it all. And surely it 
was no great matter for James Robert McCrimmon, who had fought 
English Redcoats and silver Cybermen, to hold a squirming lassie 
across his lap for a good larruping? No, what troubled Jamie was 
that, well-earned though the spanking was, he had enjoyed it just a 
little too much.

But then, who wouldn't have enjoyed it? He could not suppress a 
satisfied grin as he remembered the sight of his fellow-traveler 
upended, helplessly kicking her legs at the empty air, the smile of 
her panties under the tartan pelmet growing wider and wider as she 
wagged her shapely bottom, desperately trying to evade the cascade of 
stinging slaps that avenged the honor of the clan. And though she 
struggled hard, Jamie had expertly controlled her bucking body with a 
firm grip around her waist while his powerful right hand did its 
work, leaving her only the minx's retaliation of ear- splitting howls 
and indignant 'how dare yous'.

A more guttural sound broke through Jamie's reverie, like a low moan 
slowly rising until it had become an angry roar. His hand 
instinctively went to the dirk in his stocking, but the tiny weapon 
clattered to the floor as he saw the size of the beastie that had 
invaded the TARDIS. Assessing his options took only a second: he had 
to warn Zoe and the Doctor, and there was no fighting the beastie by 
himself. Jamie turned and ran.

***

Zoe was enjoying herself as she steered the kilt-eater through the 
corridors after the virtual Jamie. The TARDIS computers had done her 
proud: the little highlander on the screen looked so likelike in his 
panic. Wincing a little as she shifted in her seat, she made a mental 
note to compliment the Doctor on the quality of the graphics.

The sound of running footsteps outside made her look up from the 
screen. 'Zoe! Doctor!' It was Jamie's voice. So, she smiled to 
herself, he was on the run in real life too. She lifted herself 
gently from her cushion and went out to see the fun.

She saw - her own monster. It was just as scaly and just as fearsome 
as its counterpart on her screen, and she was very much afraid afraid 
it might be just as hungry.

For the second time that day, Zoe was swept off her feet. Jamie 
barely broke his run as he swung the protesting lassie over his 
shoulder and carried her to safety.

The beastie seemed confused by the sudden disappearance of its quarry 
behind a bulkhead. It came to a halt by the computer room door, 
swiveling its bloodshot eye in search of the tasty feast it had seen 
around Jamie's midriff.

'What did you do that for, Jamie?' said Zoe, angrily yanking down her 
short skirt.

'Och, it's small thanks I get for saving you from being gobbled up by 
yon terrible creature,' said the exasperated Scot.

'Yes, well, thank you very much,' replied Zoe, a trifle too snappily 
for Jamie's taste, 'but now it's between us and the TARDIS computer 
banks.'

'So?'

'So,' said Zoe, speaking very slowly as if to a backward child, 'now 
I can't get back in there to -' She hesitated. '- to activate the 
defense mechanisms.'

'No, Zoe, we must find the Doctor. He might be in danger too.'

'Oh, Jamie, there's hardly likely to be more than one of those things 
wandering about the TARDIS, now is there?' Jamie looked unconvinced, 
but Zoe pressed on. 'No, I can deal with this myself if I can only 
get back into the computer room.'

Jamie risked a look round the side of their hiding place. 'It's not 
going to move. What we need is a diversion. I'll have to try to lead 
it off somewhere.'

'No, Jamie, I've got a better idea. Do you know about the bullfights 
in old Spain? They used a red cloak to attract the bull's attention.'

'But we don't have a red cloak,' said Jamie firmly. Zoe looked 
pointedly down from his kilt to hers. His eyes widened in alarm as 
she fumbled with her buckle. 'No, Zoe, you mustn't!'

'Unlike you, Jamie, as you must already have noticed, I am not a 
Scotsman,' retorted Zoe sharply. The pleated material fanned out into 
the air as she drew the mini-kilt from around her waist and passed it 
to the gawping Jamie. 'Now pay attention,' she said, tugging down her 
tank top in a vain effort to cover up her panties. 'When I give the 
word, you throw my kilt as far as you can past the creature. Then 
I'll sprint back to the computer room and shut down the program - I 
mean, deal with the creature. And whatever you do, don't come out 
until I tell you it's safe. We don't want it going for your kilt too!'

Jamie shuddered at the dishonor of it: first she had stolen his clan 
tartan to make a lassie's frippery for herself, and now she wanted to 
use it as beastie bait. But pinned down here with no weapons there 
was little choice that he could see. With the force of a highland 
shot-putter, he slung the kilt long down the corridor, and watched it 
unfurl as it went, a bright red streak against the TARDIS' clinical 
white walls. The monster turned, as if scenting its prey, and Zoe 
sprung from cover. Jamie could not resist peering round the bulkhead 
at her departing bottom, the tight fabric of her panties crimping in 
the center as the two beautifully curved cheeks flexed alternately in 
her run for the door. He was almost sorry when she made it and 
disappeared from view.

***

Adrenalin was in control now. Zoe felt nothing as she sat heavily 
down at her console, sending her cushion skidding from the chair. Her 
hands played over the controls, undoing one by one her instructions 
that had defined the kilt-eater and made it such a deadly reality. 
Outside she could hear the munching, belching sound of her hard-
bought kilt disappearing down the monster's gullet. Then a cry of 
mixed relief and anxiety from Jamie. 'Zoe! It's moving off! We must 
warn the Doctor!'

Zoe pressed the final key and crossed to the door. She glanced at the 
screen, checking to see that the computer had started to execute the 
shutdown program, and returned to Jamie. 'It's alright,' she 
reassured him, 'I've done it. The creature is getting weaker all the 
time, and it'll disappear altogether in a minute or two.'

'Let's hope it's soon enough to save the Doctor,' said Jamie grimly. 
As if in response, a familiar cry of panic echoed down the corridor. 
Jamie and Zoe looked at one another with horror, then gaped with a 
mixture of relief and amusement as the Doctor waddled into view, a 
towel wrapped loosely around his nether regions.

'Oh my giddy aunt, what a narrow escape!'

'Did ye meet up with yon fearsome beastie too, Doctor?' asked Jamie.

'Yes, and look what it did to me before it vanished! No, don't look. 
My best pair of check trousers!'

'I don't understand,' said Zoe, 'it was only supposed to eat ...' She 
stopped herself short as she felt the two men's eyes swing in her 
direction, but there was no going back. 'It was only supposed to eat 
tartan plaid,' she finished sheepishly, and fixed her eyes intently 
on the toes of her boots.

'You created that terrible monster?' asked the Doctor.

'To eat my kilt!' added a furious Jamie.

'It was only supposed to be a virtual reality game, not real.'

'How often have I told you, Zoe, never to play with virtual reality 
in the TARDIS? The telepathic circuits must have picked up your 
program and configured it here, in real life.'

Zoe bit her lip as she remembered wishing her revenge could be real. 
'At least none of us was really harmed before I managed to close it 
down. Well, apart from your trousers and my kilt, that is.'

She looked from the frowning Doctor to Jamie, still glowering over 
the insult to his highland heritage. She forced a smile. 'Yes, well, 
I really must put a catsuit on before I catch cold.'

'Before you do that, Zoe, there's one last thing to be done. And I 
don't think there's any danger of you catching cold the while.' She 
gulped as the Doctor turned to his other companion and said, 'Jamie, 
you have a strong right arm. Perhaps I could leave you to give this 
naughty girl a well-deserved spanking.'

'Aye, Doctor,' said Jamie as the older man left the room. He rolled 
up his sleeve as he strode meaningfully towards her. A flick of the 
wrist turned Zoe helplessly over his lap as he sat down.

He looked down at the pneumatic swell of her unprotected bottom, her 
bright white panties snug as a second skin. 'I canna have done the 
job properly before,' he told her. Zoe drew in breath. This was going 
to be worse than the last time.

***

Setting the controls of the TARDIS, the Doctor smiled as the air was 
punctured by the distinctive explosive sound of a hard hand impacting 
on firm, soft flesh, followed by a half-stifled squeal. For once, 
justice was being done within the TARDIS as it always was outside. 
How often he had itched to give Zoe exactly what she was getting 
today! And he'd have done it if it wasn't beneath his dignity. Maybe 
now there'd be no more of that 'nearly as clever as I am' nonsense.

Another slap, another wail. The time machine drifted on through the 
turnpike of infinity.