With the departure of the Monk during Tribal Council the night before, the Gallifreya campsite is reduced to just four women. Bernice, Leela, Peri and the Rani sit around the camp, eyeing each other warily. Leela shapes a stake out of a branch. Peri adjusts her bra top. The Rani tries to mentally summon her TARDIS to get her away from these weirdos. Bernice drains the last dregs from her last flask.
Without the Monk to capture an irregular meal of half-mutated Death Zone wildlife, the quartet is reduced to munching on the few remaining pouches of Capitol Guard rations. Leela ponders a meal of barbecued American instead, but eventually thinks better of it.
The monotonous day of doing a lot of... well, nothing... is finally broken up by the arrival of our host, the indescribable Jeff Probst. He gets everyone to gather around the campfire, and then reveals the details of the latest Immunity Challenge.
"Over the past few weeks, I've, er, acquired some possessions of a few of the competitors. Whoever identifies the owner of the most items correctly wins immunity."
First he pulls out a small gold star, which everyone correctly identifies as Adric's. Next up is a Battlefield Earth DVD, which all four know is the Monk's. "He's the only one who actually bought one," reflects Bernice. "He was so proud."
"Okay," says Jeff. "I can see I've got to raise the bar a little bit. Give this one a guess." He hands them a pair of dirty white socks.
"Oh God," mutters Peri. "Um, Susan's?"
"Soldeed's," offers the Rani.
"Probably Ben's. Looks Navy-issue," Bernice quips.
Leela seizes the socks and begins sniffing them over. "That is so gross," grunts Peri. Finally, Leela raises her head. "Liz," she says simply.
"Right you are!" cheers Jeff. "Congratulations, Leela, you have Immunity!"
That night, the four remaining WHOvivors make the long trek from the Gallifreya campsite to the Dark Tower for Tribal Council...
After all have voted, Jeff begins to read off the ballots. "Peri," he begins. The young botanist flinches visibly.
"Bernice." The archaeologist looks around in vain for another flask.
"The Rani. That's one vote each for Bernice, Peri and the Rani. It all comes down to this one..."
"The Rani. Rani, bring me your torch."
With a look of furious anger, the Rani walks up to Jeff and thrusts out her torch. She turns to glare at the remaining three contestants, her eyes alive with rage. "Why, you... I'll... I'll..." Suddenly, she bursts into tears. "I'll really miss you guys!"
Sniffling and snorting, the Rani clambers onto the transmat platform and disappears.
"Well," says Jeff. "That was... unexpected. Okay, so, tomorrow there'll be another Tribal Council. Get a good night's sleep, you'll be up early tomorrow!"
Well before dawn, Jeff materialises in the midst of camp and wakes everyone up. "The end is near!" he announces unnecessarily.
Jeff leads the remaining trio to a desolate spot deep in the Death Zone. Two Capitol Guards dressed as ancient Gallifreyans stand to either side of a bed of a burning-hot coals.
"In the Old Time, Gallifreyans used to walk across hot rocks to prove their worth," Jeff explains. "So the first part of this Immunity Challenge is to follow in their footsteps."
Leela shrugs and hoofs it across the coals. "Where was the challenge, exactly?"
Bernice studies the bed for a minute. "Wait, I know!" she says. "It's as easy as pi!" And she hops across the bed in a bizarre looping pattern.
"Oh crap," she says as she reaches the other side and massages her burnt toes, "no it wasn't."
Peri stands in front of the coals for five minutes trying to summon up her courage. Finally, Jeff comes up behind her, smacks her bottom, and she hops right across. "I thought you were a hologram!" she shouts at him, cheeks burning.
"Only when I feel like it," Jeff grins slyly.
"Okay," he continues, "the truth is, we only got you to do that for kicks. I love watching people walk across burning coals. Call it a fetish. The real Immunity Challenge is for you to hang onto that for as long possible." Jeff points at a tall blue police box, erected a few feet distant. "The last person to take their hand off of it wins Immunity and guarantees herself a place in the Final Two."
The contest starts, boringly. Every few minutes, Jeff tries to distract the competitors. First he just chats with them. Then he eats in front of them. Then he rehearses the third act of King Lear. Then he sings his favourite tunes from Leonard Nimoy's latest album. When he threatens to disrobe if one of them doesn't concede, Peri finally gives in and lifts her hand off. "Even a million grotzits isn't worth that sight," she groans.
Hours pass.
More hours pass.
A couple of hours fail, but the rest pass.
Finally, while Jeff's back is turned, Leela whispers to Bernice, "Hey isn't that a bottle of brandy in Jeff's pocket?"
When Bernice turns her head to look, Leela kicks her off the police box, right into Jeff.
"Hmmm," says Jeff as he extracts himself from under Bernice. "I guess this means you give up."
"I guess so too," mutters Bernice, shooting daggers at Leela.
"Okay," says Jeff. "That means you win Immunity, Leela. And since that means yours is the only vote that counts, you'll be the only voter at the Tribal Council that was supposed to start three hours ago."
"Hmmm," says Leela. "The alcoholic or the American. What a choice."
The remaining trio, exhausted and hungry, then make the long trek from the to the Dark Tower for Tribal Council...
After Leela has voted, Jeff retrieves her ballot from the Voting Booth of Rassilon and reads it aloud. "The last person kicked out of the Death Zone is... Peri. Peri, bring me your torch."
Jeff puts out Peri's torch and, without another look back, she walks over to the transmat and vanishes. As her form disappears from view, she can be heard shouting, "Christ, get me a razor!"
The bulk of the day is spent by Leela and Bernice cleaning up the campsite area. It's not clear whether this is an effort by the WHOvivor producers to give them one last nostalgic moment, or just negate the need to hire some schlub to do it.
After one last crappy meal of rations, the duo makes their way to the Dark Tower...
Once Bernice and Leela have taken their seat, Jeff materialises. "To decide the winner, we're bringing back the last seven people kicked off the island, to form a jury. They'll vote to choose the winner. We were going to let them each ask you a question, but then we were afraid someone would get really bitchy and make for incredibly nauseating television, so we'll skip that. Ready?"
Behind Jeff, the noticeably cleaner, less-hairy and less-emaciated forms of Peri, the Rani, the Monk, Susan, Ben, Liz and Davros materialise.
"You guys can each make one statement to the jury," Jeff tells the Final Two. "You have thirty seconds. Leela, you start."
"Statement? Ummm... er... I... hmm...."
"Okay, time's up, thanks a lot, Leela. Bernice, it's your turn."
"Sorry, Jeff, I never lecture without a couple of good stiff drinks."
"What, not even for a million grotzits?"
"Nope. I could never live with myself."
"Okay, well, I guess your time is up anyway. Thanks for really doing such a great job of persuasion there, candidates. Moving right along, I guess it's time to vote. Remember, jury, you're voting for who you want to win the competition. And no, 'none of the above' is not an acceptable choice."
One by one, the jury makes their way into the Voting Booth of Rassilon. Once all seven have cast their vote, Jeff retrieves the ballots.
"Okay, here we go. The Rani's vote... Leela.
"Susan's vote... Bernice.
"The Monk's vote... Leela.
"Davros's vote... Leela.
"Peri's vote... Bernice.
"Liz's vote... Bernice.
"Ben's vote..."
"Don't hurt me, it's just because you kept making fun of the reverse-alphabet strategy!"
"... Bernice. Congratulations, Bernice! You win the million grotzits!"
Once Leela and the jury members have dematerialised, Bernice is left alone with Jeff.
"So what do you think you'll do with your million grotzits, Bernice?"
"Oh, I don't know. Probably fund the first-ever archaeological expedition with a permanent open bar."
"Do you think you'll stay in intergalactic spotlight? Maybe write a book like Richard Hatch? Or do you think you'll quickly fade into obscurity like Eddie Gee?"
Bernice shrugs. "Couldn't care less. I just can't wait to get out of here. I'm so sick of Gallifrey, I don't care if it blows up or something tomorrow."
"Yes, well," says Jeff, "before you go, there's one more thing I wanted to ask you."
"What's that?"
"Would you mind terribly if I took the million grotzits?"
Bernice laughs nervously. "Yeah, right. Whatever, Jeff. Why would I do that?"
Jeff reaches up and suddenly peels off the very flesh from his face, revealing a bearded, saturnine countenance beneath. "Because I am the Master... and you will obey me..."
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