Melanie and The Doctor

The Doctor’s travelling companion Melanie Bush wants to go swimming so he decides to take her to a huge tower block called Paradise Towers where there is reputed to be a fantastic swimming pool. But when they arrive, in the TARDIS, they discover that Paradise Towers is far from the superb leisure resort they had expected - the building is instead run down and defaced with graffiti.

The hallways are also roamed by gangs of young girls, known as Kangs, who are grouped together in colour themes (Yellow, Red and Blue). But, just before The Doctor and Melanie arrive, the last surviving member of the Yellow Kangs is killed in the corridors.

As they explore The Doctor and Melanie are captured by the Red Kangs and The Doctor makes friends with their leaders, Bin Liner and Fire Escape. The Red Kangs decide to take the two travellers to their ‘hide-in’, but they are attacked by a group of dictatorial Caretakers and The Doctor is arrested. Melanie though manages to escape and she meets two old ladies, Tilda and Tabby, known as ‘Rezzies. The old ladies invite Melanie into their apartment and they seem to be friendly, offering her tea and cakes. But her stay at their apartment is soon interrupted by a young man named Pex who breaks down the door in order to ‘save’ her. She leaves, and Pex insists on accompanying her so that he can protect and guide her. Reluctantly Melanie allows Pex to accompany her and she discovers that he is the only young man left in Paradise Towers when all the others left to fight a war. However, soon after leaving Tilda and Tabby’s apartment Melanie and Pex are captured by the Blue Kangs.

The Doctor and the Red Kangs

The Doctor has been taken to meet the Chief Caretaker, who believes him to be the Great Architect responsible for creating Paradise Towers and orders a ‘327 Appendix 3 Subsection 9 death’ for him. The Doctor though escapes by tricking his guards into following non-existent rules. The Doctor then finds his way back to the Red Kang ‘brain-quarters’, where he is recaptured by the Caretakers and in turn is rescued by Bin Liner and Fire Escape.

Meanwhile the Chief Caretaker visits a mist-shrouded area in the basement of the building and speaks with something that proclaims it is hungry. The Chief Caretaker calls it his ‘pet’ and refers to himself as its ‘daddy’.

Captured by the Caretakers

Melanie manages to talk her way out of the clutches of the Blue Kangs. She then encounters Tabby and Tilda again, but their friendly façade quickly vanishes as they wrap her in a shawl and threaten her with a toasting fork, apparently intent on eating her. She escapes when first Tabby and then Tilda are dragged into their apartment’s waste disposal outlet by a robot arm that emerges from within it. A large robot cleaner then transports the bodies of the two old ladies to the ‘thing’ in the basement.

Reunited with Pex, Melanie makes her way to a lift and, after many failed attempts, they finally arrive at floor 304 where the swimming pool is situated. Melanie intends to go swimming but she fails to notice that there is a bright yellow cleaning robot in the water which attacks her. Pex though is too scared to help her, but she grabs his gun and is able to destroy the cleaning robot.

The Doctor postulates that the Kangs’ parents trapped the Great Architect, Kroagnon, in the building to stop him from completing it. The Kangs reveal that there is a ‘door with smoke’ in the basement. The Doctor, Fire Escape, Bin Liner and Air Duct prepare to go and investigate but before they can do so the Blue Kangs attack, their Leader, claiming that they have won the game. The Doctor intercedes and gets the two groups of Kangs to work together.

The Chief Caretaker

Meanwhile the Chief Caretaker is escorted to the basement by a robot cleaner and again talks with the mysterious creature. The Doctor, Fire Escape, Bin Liner, Air Duct and the Blue Kang Leader arrive. They watch as the Chief Caretaker is forced to stand under a tube and is processed by Kroagnon. They are then attacked by the robot cleaners and one of them grabs The Doctor by his throat and starts to throttle him. Luckily The Doctor manages to escape. But when they have gone, the tube retracts to reveal that the Chief Caretaker has now been taken over by Kroagnon.

Kroagnon then systematically ‘cleanses’ each floor of Paradise Towers in turn by having the cleaning robots kill all the inhabitants as he considers that they are spoiling his creation by living there. The Doctor gathers all the Kangs together and takes them up to the swimming pool, where he is reunited with Melanie. The remaining Rezzies, including Maddy, the caretakers, including the Deputy Chief Caretaker, also arrive.

The Doctor attempts to get everyone to work together to try to defeat Kroagnon. The Deputy Chief Caretaker explains that on floor 245, Sodium Street, corridor 75, there is a store of explosives that they can use to destroy the robot cleaners. The Doctor plans to set a trap for Kroagnon and Pex volunteers to lure him there. When they arrive, The Doctor tries to topple Kroagnon into the mined store but is unable to do so. Pex plucks up courage and sacrifices himself and drags Kroagnon into the trap. As the store explodes they are both killed, but the terror is over.

The Kangs hold a ceremony to celebrate Pex’s life and The Doctor is made an honorary Kang - Red and Blue. The Doctor and Melanie then say their goodbyes and leave in the TARDIS - trusting that the remaining Kangs, Rezzies, and Caretakers will build a better society. As the TARDIS dematerialises, a new piece of Kang graffiti is revealed on a nearby wall with the slogan ‘Pex Lives’.