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kayura-sanada · 5 years ago

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The Living Lost (Janto, ch. 1/??)

The Living Lost, Ch. 1

Summary: Ianto closes his eyes in Thames House and opens them somewhere else entirely.

Tags: Children of Earth Fix-It, House of the Dead Spoilers, You Absolutely Need to Know What Happened In House of the Dead to Understand This, Post-House of the Dead, Post CoE, not Miracle Day compliant, not Aliens Among Us compliant

Title from “The Living Lost” by William Cullen Bryant

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Ianto Jones opened his eyes.

He was standing. That wasn’t unusual; he’d been standing the last moments of his life he could remember. No. He touched his head. No, he’d been standing, but then he’d fallen. Because of the gas.

He looked around. He was no longer in Thames House. The 456 no longer stood before him, and Jack was nowhere to be found. Instead he seemed to be standing before a doorway leading into an old, crowded office. “Great,” he muttered. “What is it this time?” He rubbed his head and stepped forward.

Several heads turned toward him.

He stopped again. The movements were almost choreographed; several heads turned, saw him, and perked up like they’d sniffed a scent. Eyes widened. Chairs scraped back. Suddenly there was a rush of voices, all of them scrambling together at once. He grabbed his head and winced as people ran toward him. “Stay back!” he shouted, but no one seemed to hear him. They all rushed around him. Several grabbed his arms, poked him.

“Who are you?”

“Where are you from?”

“What are you doing here?”

“How’d you get here?”

He shoved a couple of them away. Only when they fell on their asses did a deathly silence come over them all. Several took quick steps back. “Thank you,” he sighed. His head was pounding. He looked around again. The offices – cubicles, only without the walls – were two steps down from the entrance he stood upon. The two he’d pushed had fallen those two steps. He grimaced as they got up and checked themselves over. “Sorry. I don’t – where am I?”

One of the people around him stepped forward. A young-ish woman with frizzy black hair. “You’re in The Office,” she said, in a way that emphasized the words as if they were capitalized. “I take it you don’t know anything, then.”

He didn’t understand the statement, only the looks of disappointment on the people around him. “Um, no?”

Like that, their interest seemed to wane. Still, they didn’t leave and return to their work. “Well, I guess it’s something to see someone show up of a sudden,” she said, and shrugged, looking toward an older gentleman. “Should we give him a name, then?” she asked.

The older man nodded until his jowls wiggled. “Of course.”

He raised his hand slightly. “Ah, I don’t need one?” Everyone turned back to him. “My name is Ianto. Ianto Jones.”

Everyone gathered around him again, nearly crushing him between them. He got poked again. “You know your name?” one asked. The girl and old man stood, jaws agape. “How?” some man in half a business suit asked.

“Right!” The old man clapped his hands together. “That’s enough of that, everyone. If we want answers, we aren’t likely to get them scaring off the boy, now are we?”

“Where would he go?” the man in business slacks and a t-shirt asked. The question made Ianto look around again.

The doorway behind him opened up into what looked almost like a hotel lobby. A wide, domed ceiling held a golden chandelier, with marble tiles painting the floor beneath it. Beyond that looked like a French door. It had to lead to the outside. He chanced a glance at the windows, only to see them covered by white curtains from the outside. He frowned, then turned back. “So, I’m in ‘The Office,’” he said, giving the words the grave utterance the woman had first given them. “And where is that?”

The old man spread one hand out. “Here.” Ianto frowned. “That’s what we know.” The man gestured around them. “We managed to piece some things together. This is an office building, from what we can tell.” He pointed to the computers, the little desks pressed close together. The computers were those thick monstrosities popular in the nineties. “What else could it be? It’s an odd one, though. The rooms have safe boxes instead of file cabinets. We call them vaults.”

Ianto looked at each person in turn. They were all staring at him with something that looked like hope. “You’re hoping I might know more.”

They each shrugged. “Well, you do know your name.”

He cleared his throat. “Which means none of you know yours.”

“That’s right.” The old man turned to the young, frizzy-haired woman. “We chose our names based on words we remembered. “Crimped can show you around?” The girl nodded. “My chosen name is Elder. If you need anything, just shout for me. The rest of you, give him some space. It’s been a while, but I’m sure we all can remember how we all felt when we found ourselves here. Give him time to adjust.”

Everyone backed away at Elder’s words, though many looked upset at doing so. Still, the space gave him time to breathe, and Crimped sidled up to him only after everyone had left, respecting his boundaries at least a little better than her peers. “Wanna get to know this place?” she asked.

He looked around again. Doors led off to either side. He supposed she would be giving him a basic tour, and since he had no idea where he was or how to get back to Jack – Jack, who must even then think he was dead – he found no better course of action presenting itself at the moment. “Sure.”

She led him to the right first. He passed a couple of desks; a quick headcount gave him over a dozen bodies, including Crimped and Elder. Each sat in front of a computer and turned the things on. They worked, he saw. That was a good sign. Still on planet Earth, then. He’d begun to wonder.

His last moments before arriving here had been of a completely different nature to this. Everything had been harried. The last few days had been a whirlwind of action – the children, the government. Being on the run and still trying to save the world, even from itself. Crimped led him through the doorway and into what looked like an ornate hallway. Several doors stood on either side, but Crimped passed them all. He wondered if he should take a look inside. Even that action seemed like more than this building had seen in months. Unlike the last few days, on the run. Unlike the last day he remembered. He remembered them – himself and Jack – storming into the Thames House. He remembered them walking up to the 456. He remembered them losing.

Before all of that, had things been as slow and stagnant as the air felt around here?

He thought back. The children… the 456. He grabbed his head. Crimped stopped moving and turned to him, mouth open to speak, only to pause. He winced, rubbed at his temple. “I can’t remember,” he said. He looked at her. “I don’t remember.” She didn’t look surprised. He snarled. “What did you do to me?”

The woman shrugged. “We figure it’s this place.” She looked around. For a moment, those full lips of hers pulled down in a frown. She cleared her throat and seemed to force herself to brighten up. “None of us remember anything. You’re the first visitor, and you’re the first to know your name. Pretty impressive.” She leaned down, trying to catch his eyes as he studied his hands. “Wouldn’t happen to remember anything else, would you?”

He looked at her. “I remember… the last four and some change days.” He could clearly see the line mentally demarcating the first thing he remembered. The children. All standing, pointing. He tried to look further back, but it was all gone. He took a deep breath to control his suddenly racing heart. “Four days, and nothing before that.”

“Four days? Well, that’s incredible, isn’t it?” She clapped her hands together. “Exciting, yeah?” He just stared at her. He could remember remembering things. He knew that, in those four days, he had been aware of time he’d spent growing up. He could remember thinking back to life at home, in school; how he’d felt the moment he’d realized he was different than the others around him. He remembered his sister joking about him wanting it in the ass, her husband making homophobic comments right and left, and remembered exactly why he’d never told his family. Why he’d left. Yet he couldn’t remember leaving home, or where he’d gone, or what he’d done.

He took several deep breaths. Where had his memories gone? And why did he remember only the 456? Why were those memories safe when… “Wait.” He held up his hand. “I died.”

The woman’s smile dropped. “What?”

He shook his head. “I… the 456 poisoned me,” he said. He remembered how difficult it had been to breathe in, to tell Jack he loved him. He remembered loving Jack. He didn’t know why, or when it had started, or… anything. But he knew he loved Jack Harkness, and that Jack needed him. He breathed heavily for several seconds. But when he’d told Jack he loved him, Jack had said simply, ‘don’t.’

“So, wait.” The woman held up one hand and scooted in, for once breaking into his personal space. “Are you saying we’re all dead?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know who you are.” There had been others in Thames House, though. He opened his mouth, then laughed. The sound was humorless. “Can’t ask you, though, can I?” He looked around. This wasn’t Thames House. “What are these rooms?”

She shrugged, looking decidedly less all right with the tour than she’d been moments before. “The vaults. We don’t know what’s in them; we’ve tried to get them open, but none of us know the codes. One person tried to open them, but…” Another shrug. “Something happened. They have tripwires or traps or whatever to keep people from breaking in. He died. Or, well. Disappeared. Does… does that mean we’re ghosts? Are we just gonna…” She cleared her throat. “Maybe we died like you did. Maybe that poison got us, and we’re in this fugue state, or…”

“There’s no point in panicking,” he said, as much for himself as for her. “Let’s just try to find out what happened, yeah?”

She opened one of the doors, and he peeked within. She was right to call them vaults; both sides of the room were filled with looked like giant safes, each embedded in the walls. They all had keypads – not the latest technology, but then again, he’d been spoiled by Torchwood. Still. It was a sight better than the computers in the office room. Sophisticated enough that it would still fit in his time period, enough that burglars would have a hard time getting in; the doors into these rooms, however, held no locks. He frowned at them as she led him past the hallway to the next room. He hissed in a short breath as they stepped through. “Right?” she said, agreeing with the wordless sentiment. “Weird. And creepy, considering the other side of this place.” She nodded back behind them, likely indicating whatever lay beyond the office doors and down the hall he had yet to survey.

The room was just as huge as the previous two. Only, this one was filled from top to bottom with the craziest artifacts. Alien artifacts.

In the middle of the room was what looked to be part of an alien spacecraft, including a piece that, since the thing had been cut in half, looked into what could be compared to the Star Trek transporter room, with multiple spaces for a person to stand. Several consoles sat in front of him, buttons and levers both five feet and one foot high, either for one short person to stand beneath the taller one, or for someone with appendages near their feet. He cleared his throat and looked away.

The rest of the room held other, odder additions, ones that couldn’t be so easily named, each kept in glass boxes as if in a museum. He moved away from Crimped for a moment to study them. He’d seen crazy things all up and down Torchwood; some looked like alien fidget spinners, while others had nothing to compare them to. These were just as odd; something that looked like a burnished gold Rubik’s Cube, something else that could have been a TV remote if not for the side split into three. Two more desks sat in this room, though neither were being used at the moment. Beyond those were a simple fridge and stove and countertop, along with several chairs. It was so incongruous with the alien items all around them that he laughed. The woman looked at him.

It was all so very much like Torchwood. Jack would love the place.

Slowly, the laughter died. How did he know Jack would like this place? He recalled so very little about the man. He was ageless; that he could recall, though he didn’t remember how he knew that. Immortal. A vampire? The thought was ridiculous, and yet he couldn’t say it was wrong. As for the man’s personality – angry. He remembered anger more than anything, and of course, he remembered Jack agreeing to let children be taken by the 456 back in 1965. A monstrous thing to do, and yet Jack had done it. To try to keep the 456 from destroying the planet, yes, but still. Why did he love Jack again?

Perhaps because, when the world had gone mad, Jack had stood before it, and the 456, and said no.

Ianto had stood with him. He’d refused to let Jack stand alone. And for that, he had died. Died, and the man he’d loved had demanded he not tell him he loved him. And then had sworn to never forget him, even after 1000 years.

A lie. People couldn’t remember the names of high school classmates once they hit their thirties. A thousand years was too long to remember a single man, no matter how ‘good’ it had been.

“So this isn’t as odd as we’ve thought it should be?” Crimped asked.

“Oh, no. It’s odd.” He nodded. “Very odd. Em, I take it this is the reason the windows are covered.”

“Covered?” She looked over to the windows, then back at him, eyes wide. “Oh. I guess you haven’t really seen that yet. Well, there aren’t any windows on the other side, so this is your best chance. Get the panic out of your system before going back to the others, you know?”

That sounded promising.

She waved him over to the nearest window. Slowly, he made his way to its edge. The curtain spanned the entire window, even below it and to its sides. He craned his neck back and forth for a moment, only to stop and stare again, brows furrowing. He didn’t see any edges to it. No billowing folds, no fluttering in some wind. Curtains always folded in on themselves. They were made to do it. These didn’t.

As he got closer, he understood why. There were no curtains. That endless expanse of white was all there was beyond the panes of glass. He stumbled back again, as if to be too close was to fall into it.

It was like space. Only white. Endless, endless white. “What is this?” he asked, going for calm and sounding more panicked. So much for his words of wisdom earlier.

“Dunno. It’s how it’s always been. Well, for us. As far as we know.” He looked over to her. “It hasn’t always been like this, has it? I mean, the computers show pictures of buildings, right? And they’re all surrounded by other buildings or trees or whatnot. So we’re supposed to have all that, too, right?” She hugged herself. “Or is this what the universe is really like, and people just imagined all those other things?”

“No, this isn’t normal,” he said. He dared go near the glass again, even touched it. It was cool against his fingertips. “The trees and buildings is the normal stuff.” He pulled away again. He only had a few days of memories, but he had gone in and out of several buildings, even then. Just the effort of getting peoples’ credit cards had seen him in and out of restaurants, shops, diners. Each of them had been part of the world. This looked more like it sat in the middle of nowhere. As if it had been rendered as a graphic on a computer, but never given any background graphics. A building trapped in a world of white space. “Anyone ever opened one?”

“Once. All the air got sucked out. Not noisily, or anything. Just – there, then gone. And it felt like we were fading away, too. We haven’t opened one since.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “All right.” He thought. For the life of him, he couldn’t think of what it might be. He knew he should know – he remembered being the one Gwen and Jack and just expected to find the answers, but he didn’t know why. He… he couldn’t remember. He remembered standing in the Hub, and knowing it was called the Hub, but he couldn’t recall what he did down there. He’d made coffee a couple of times, and tea, and he’d cooked. He’d also gotten the most cards back. Jack had said it was because he had ‘the face of a salesman.’ He’d argued it had been because of his suit.

Despite all of that, he was certain he’d once have been able to find such information. Still. “We can try to find out what this is. We might be able to find a way out of here.”

Crimped tilted her head at him. “You think there’s a way out?”

“Don’t you?” He turned to her. “Haven’t you all tried?”

She shrugged. “Sure. Doesn’t mean we got anywhere. And it’s not like we really knew for sure there was anything else, did we? The computers gave us information, but who knows if it’s true? I mean, from what the Internet shows us, you need things to make the computers run that we don’t have.” She gestured outside, toward the white, and he had to concede the point. Without any memories, who could say what knowledge was true and what wasn’t?

“So what do you people remember? No personal memories, but information, clearly.” He started back the way they came.

“Yeah. Language. Elder was the first to point out we knew how to talk and read. Sharp pointed out that we could write it, and that we recognized which words linked to certain objects and ideas. Hence his name, you know.” She shrugged, following after him at a short clip. He barely glanced at the doors to either side of him. “And, well, we know how to type on the computers and all. Notion says we’re probably just some game system. Like we’re characters. Pieces on a board.”

“Until I came along,” Ianto said.

“Well, yeah, I suppose.” They entered the main room. People had moved from the chairs; someone was running his fingers along the doorway Ianto had arrived in. The man had to rearrange himself on the floor; he wasn’t the skinniest person, but he maneuvered himself into a sitting position and continued checking the wall. Another man followed after a woman, both of them glaring at each other as they moved toward the back of the room. The woman yelped and tripped, only for the man to grab her. She glared at him. “Nice catch, Med!”

The man let the woman go and waved.

“That’s Med,” she said, pointing to him. “Short for Medical. First time Injury fell, he knew how to patch her up. We’re running low on supplies now, though, so he hovers over her a lot. She hates it.” She grinned at him. “Funny, that, eh? If we’re ghosts, I guess ghosts can get injured.”

And die, if there’d really been another of them who had gotten hurt by the vaults’ security measures. “I don’t think we’re ghosts,” he said. Their conversation was getting some attention. He made to pass through the room and found himself stopped by a lean man with spiky hair.

“Ghosts?” he asked, looking back and forth between them. “Why are we ghosts?”

“Notion,” Crimped said by way of introduction. “Ianto says he remembers dying.”

Inwardly, he sighed. That got everyone’s attention, even the two ready to fight in the back. “Let’s not discuss it,” he said.

“Died?” The spiky-haired man followed after him. “So we’re all dead? That actually explains a lot. Maybe we’re in limbo.”

“Or hell,” someone else called out.

“It explains why we’re never hungry,” the man continued. “Or thirsty, or tired.”

“Not like that stops Lounge,” someone said. A few people laughed.

Ianto gritted his teeth. If he was dead, then that meant he wouldn’t be seeing Jack again. He wouldn’t allow it. For whatever reason, he loved that man. He wouldn’t let himself be pushed to the side. “We’re not dead,” he said again, growling. “What would be the point of feeling pain? Of having a spaceship in your side room? Of needing to keep the windows closed?” He waved his hands around. “Of me showing up here? If this is death, or ghosts, or whatever, it doesn’t explain my being here.”

“Maybe you died here,” the chubby man spoke up.

“No,” he said, voice short. “It wasn’t here.”

Crimped hummed. “You really remember it? Dying?” He nodded. “Sounds awful,” she said, voice going low. “You’re too young for it to have been an easy death. Right?”

He looked away. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Right.” He’d taken only a single step further before she’d run up to him, coming up on the opposite side of Notion, who followed by his right. “Only, you’re the only one who can remember anything. The first clue we’ve had in forever. So anything you remember, anything at all. It helps.”

“Right. Only I don’t remember this place, or arriving here. So I don’t think it does.”

“But we don’t remember anything. Imagine that. Not knowing anything. Not even knowing for sure what the world should look like.” He paused at that. “We don’t remember ever seeing trees before. I mean, we must have done, surely. But we don’t remember it. Don’t know what they feel like, or smell like. Simple stuff, probably. For people out in that world the computers show us.” He turned to her. “We remember things, sure. Words and shapes and colors. We know how to use the computers, but not the vaults. We know the word for keypad, but not how to make them open. We’ve been here for who knows how long, with nothing to tell us about anything.”

“You’re the first thing that’s ever changed around here,” he said. “The first person to show up since all of us. If you died – or almost died – then whatever happened to you might be similar to what happened to us. Maybe it could give us a way out of here.”

He thought about the computers. “Have long have you all been here?”

“Who knows?” the man shrugged.

“The computers should have dates on them. You should have been able to catalog time through that, if nothing else.” He motioned toward the desks behind them.

“Those things don’t make any sense. Here. Look.” Notion held out his wrist. On it was a simple watch, a black leather band with a silver face. He looked at the thing, only to see the hands of the clock steadily moving forward. The hour hand slipped from four to five to six as he stared. “Sometimes they’ll go backward. Oftentimes, they’ll stop, or just swing wildly. I have a theory.”

“He has a lot of theories,” Crimped said, leaning up to whisper in his ear. She grinned widely over at Notion. Notion harrumphed.

“Anyway. I think we’re in a sort of time stasis, or time bubble. Outside of normal time, you know?”

“He reads the weird stuff online,” Crimped said in explanation.

“Ah,” Ianto said. He wondered, however, if Notion wasn’t on to something.

Did the 456 have some sort of way to keep people outside of time? Could that have something to do with how they’d managed to keep the children from 1965 from aging? But how could that possibly explain how he’d gotten to this strange place, or why he couldn’t remember anything before the aliens’ arrival?

What had happened to him? What had been in that poison, to put him in this state? Or had something happened afterward? Had he been saved from the poison, only to be taken from Jack’s side and holed up here? He looked at Crimped as he headed down the second hallway. Unlike the first, no doors broke up the white of the walls. Crimped looked at him, likely feeling his gaze on her, and smiled. “Soon you’ll find out the biggest mystery of this place.”

“Other than the ‘trapped in the middle of nowhere in a time bubble?’” Ianto asked.

Crimped’s smile turned a little rueful. “Yeah. Other than that.”

He opened his mouth to ask how that was possible, only to stop dead, the answer before his very eyes.

Before him, the hall opened up into yet another large room. This one did have a door leading into it, one that clearly had been locked at one point, and locked well. On every side, vaulted cells lines the walls, floor to ceiling. Each was open now, with cots that looked to have been primped up. Someone even lay on one, hands behind his head as he shifted on the cot.

But most important was what was emblazoned on the top of every cell.

He paled.

“Can’t find anything on the team,” Crimped said, her voice oddly excited. “Dunno if we were experiments, or spies, or something. But it’s gotta be some sort of government secret, yeah? I mean, what else could it be, with these weird cells? Looks like an experiment gone wrong. That’s what most of us think.”

He sucked in a deep breath. “I think I found the connection between us.”

Above every cell, in big brick letters, hung one word: Torchwood.

#the living lost #torchwood #janto #ianto jones #jack harkness #fanfiction #my fanfiction #fix-it fic

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anneh91-us · 5 years ago

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Unwanted and Loved

Ianto Jones, Janto, Gwen, Tosh and Owen.

Torchwood AU, Pain, Rape, Sex, Comfort and Selfharm, Gwen and Ianto pregnancy/Mpreg, Happy endings.

Ch 1 of 3

Hub on a Monday

Ianto was making coffes and took a tray of mugs and puts one of each on Jack, Gwen, Tosh and Owen desk and so that nobody thank him for it like they was angry at him for somthing. He walked down down to basement and feel to floor and started too cry hard.

Flashbacks 2 weeks ago

Ianto was on his way home when he felt a hand grab him over the mouth and was held down and he was trying fight but guy was too strong and he pushed Teaboy pants down and puched his cock inside his anus hole and Ianto screamed out in pain and started cry. After 5 minuts guy pulled out and kissed Ianto on forhead, laugh and ran off. Ianto stood up and took his pants on and was in a lot of pain and walked slowing home. And by morning nowbody ask him how his weekend was or if he had fun. He never told team about him being raped becomes they never care anyway.

(Flashback end)

Ianto whent into hub bathroom and washed his face and took out a knife and started cut himself on arm and took down his shirt sleeves and jacket sleeves and walked into the archives.

Upstairs in Jack office

Jack sat in his chair at his desk and ask himself do he like or forgive Ianto of what he did too team and him. He did flirt and teased Teaboy and liked it and so that something was not right at all and stood up and whent down into archives and so Ianto was sleeping at his desk. He kissed him on forhead.

Ch 2 of 3

Day after in Ianto flat

Druken Jack knocked on Ianto door 1pm and he let him in. Jack kissed Teaboy and they kissed and undressed themself naket into bedroom into bed and had sex. After sex Ianto took robe on and looket at Jack naket on bed awake.

-Why are you her sir. Ianto asket and was inrested in answard. Jack stood up and took his pants, shirt and his coat on.

-I wanted know what you was in bed Teaboy. -Now i know you are just a shag and nobody will ever love you. -Plus you are just butler and whore. Jack laugh and walked out the door and tears feel down Ianto face and whent into bathroom and found a raiser blade and started cut himself three on his other arm one for having sex with his boss and two and three for beliving Jack might love him. He promised himself never fall for Jack again.

Next day at Hub

Jack had sobber up and so that Ianto was acting weired around him. He upon the door and called out Ianto come too his office. Minut later Ianto stood in his office when he passed out and Jack ran over see if he was alive and he was. He carried Teaboy down too med bay where Owen was and he took a look at him and took off his vest, jacket and shirt. Both Owen and Jack was shocket see cuts on both of Ianto arms.

When Ianto wake up he so Jack and Owen standing over him. He sat up and was half naket and so pity in there faces.

-Ianto, what is going on. -Please tell me i want too know. -No, you dont i am just whore and butler am i not you said yourself yesterday after we had sex. Ianto said cold and got of table and took his jacket and shirt and ran out of hub with a shocket Jack behind.

Later at hub in boardroom he and Owen sat talking about work and drinking whisky.

-So what did you do too Teaboy. Owen said looking at Jack who looket sad.

-I dont know but i think i hurt his feelings.

-I See then you need make it right too him then.

-You ate right Owen i do it tomorrow.

Next morning at Ianto flat

Ianto sat at couch when door bell rang and he whent up from couch and upon door so Jack standing there and let him in and turned around in living room and looket at him.

-What do you want Jack.

-Ianto, why are you hurting yourself and are you angry at me.

-Yes, i am becomes two weeks ago i got raped and nobody cared ask after weekend if i was okey. -That made me angry, sad and in pain and then we had sex and you was mean and dint care and i was falling in love with you. -Now i dont like you anymore sir.

Jack started cry and wiped his tears from his face and huged Ianto who pushed him away.

-I am sorry for what i said too you and i promised i will make it right for you. He walked out of Ianto flat.

Day after in Hub in boardroom team and Jack talket and told them about Ianto got rapet and nobody cared see that he was not okey. Owen was in shocked, Gwen was herself not so caring too Ianto and Tosh was crying. They promised help Ianto feel like team again.

Ch 3 of 3

Ianto walked into hub when Tosh came running into his arms and hugged him and he know she had find out about raped and selfharm and pushed her away and walked up stairs into Jack office and slammed door. Jack got up so that Ianto was angry. He never seen him that angry.

-What got you right tell team that i got raped it was noon off there bussines and stay away from me. He upon door and walked angry down stairs down too his desk and after he calmed down Tosh talked to him and told him she loved him and so him as brother and both hugged each other. Then it was Owen turned he said he was sorry for not see that he was hurt both hugged and then it was Gwen and she just hugged him and said she was sorry he got raped. Ianto so her walked away from him and know that she dint like him much becomes she liked Jack and know that he liked him too. But he was done with Jack and might forgive him in future.

In Jack office

Jack was mad at himself for betraying Ianto trust and knew that be lot of time get his trust back. Becomes he does care and love Ianto.

Three weeks later

Ianto has gotten over the rape and found out guy that raped him got busted trying rape other guy and got arrested and 20 years in prison. He was happy but has not forgiven Jack. He was still hurt over what he said too him the night they had sex. He walked up stairs to Jack office when he so Jack and Gwen had sex and walked down to hub doors and walked out and know he never have him.

At Ianto flat at night

Ianto was making dinner and was on plat when door bell rang and he walked over and upon the door and so Gwen standing there in tears and told her come in. They sat down in couch and took some glass of wine. When Ianto felt dissy and passet out. When he wake up he so that Gwen was gone and he was in his bed naked.

He told himself that she took of his clothes becomes he was drunk. He smiled and feel too sleep.

4 weeks later

Gwen told Jack she was pregnant and it was his or Rhys. But in truth it was Ianto she never get pregnant by her husband or Jack so she drugged Ianto 4 weeks ago and raped him and got pregnant. She was happy it what she wanted a baby and mabey Jack in end. Ianto felt dissy and whent to hospital and was told he was pregnant. He got Owen take blood test and was same as other doctor told him he was pregnant. He told team and Gwen was in shock that mabey she was going lose Jack too Ianto. But Ianto told team he was going give baby up becomes it might be guy that raped him. Gwen was more happy.

6 weeks later Ianto was told by Owen that father might be Jacks. He change his mind of keeping the baby. He was getting bigger.

9 weeks later

Gwen whent into labor and gave birth to baby girl she called Lisa and Owen did a DNA test becomes he dint trust her and it was showed that Ianto was father and she came cleaned too her husband who wanted a divorce and Jack gave her a reckon so she ended up in whore house used as sex toy for life.

2 days later

Ianto gave birth to a baby boy called Micheal by help of Owen and was happy he had a son and daugther.

1 year later

Ianto was married to Jack and had two kids. He was happy. Owen and Tosh was best of friends and was good parents too Micheal and Lisa. They was all happy family.

Ending.....

#story

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music-is-love-90 · 2 years ago

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Chapters: 2/? Fandom: Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who & Related Fandoms Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: The Doctor (Doctor Who)/Original Female Character(s), The Doctor/Rose Tyler | Bad Wolf, Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones, Martha Jones/Mickey Smith Characters: The Doctor (Doctor Who), Rose Tyler, Ninth Doctor (Doctor Who), Tenth Doctor (Doctor Who), Eleventh Doctor, Original Female Character(s), Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones, Martha Jones, Donna Noble, Amy Pond (Doctor Who), Rory Williams, River Song Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, This is a rewrite of an old story, condensed into one story instead of like 5 Summary:

The tale of the Doctor and the Phoenix, last survivors of Gallifrey.

Previously published on Fanfiction.net as Never Gonna Be Alone, Savin' Me, Someday, I'd Come For You, and If Today Was Your Last Day. Edited and reworked.

Ch. 2:

Everything was set.

The flowers were perfect, the band was ready, everyone was dressed in their very best, she looked fantastic, and, best of all, at the end of the aisle waited the most perfect man in the world, ready to marry her, Donna Noble.

Life was just about as perfect as it could get.

The organ began its famous call and Donna gave her father a nervous smile as the butterflies in her stomach doubled, tripled. She began her march down the aisle towards her perfect future and they grew even more. Kind of painfully. Really painful. Donna came to a stop as the pain grew ten times, a hundred times more painful. The only thing she could do was scream as the world went black.

The next thing she knew, she was in an odd, dome shaped room. She heard something behind her and spun on her heel to find a very skinny man in a pinstriped suit, next to the oddest contraption she had ever seen.

“Who are you?” she demanded. He started sputtering, but she cut him off. “Where am I?”

“What?”

“What the hell is this place?” Her voice started to rise.

“What?”

She was fairly certain the man was an idiot, given how he was just staring at her.

“You can’t do that, I wasn’t even – But we’re in flight!” he exclaimed, tripping over his words. “That is – that is physically impossible. How did you – “

“Tell me where I am!” she demanded, cutting him off again. “I demanded you tell me right now: where am I?”

“You’re inside the TARDIS,” he told her, looking more and more confused.

“The what?”

“The TARDIS.” He began moving around the console, taking readings.

“The what?”

“It’s called the TARDIS.”

“That’s not even a proper word!” she spat. “You’re just saying things!”

“How did you get in here?” he demanded.

“Well, obviously when you kidnapped me! Who was it that put you up to this, huh? Was it Nyeris? Is this her? She finally getting me back?”

“Who the hell is Nyeris?” he demanded, completely mystified.

“Your best friend,” she replied, sneering at him.

He looked her up and down.

“Hold on, wait a minute. Why are you dressed like that?”

“I’m going ten pin bowling,” she said snarkily, motioning to her white gown and veil. “What do you think, dumbo?! I’m getting married! I was half-way up the aisle! I’m gonna have the police on you! Me and my husband, as soon as he is my husband, are going to sue the pants off you!”

As she was ranting, she spotted doors to the side of the room and took off, ignoring his shout to wait. She flung them open, only to be brought short by the sight of a nebula in deep space.

The Doctor calmly walked up behind her, silently asking the TARDIS if she would get Lily to the control room somehow.

“You’re in space,” he told the other woman calmly. “Outer space. This is my…spaceship. It’s called the TARDIS.”

“How am I breathing?” she asked.

“The TARDIS is protecting us.”

“Who are you?” she asked finally.

“I’m the Doctor,” he replied simply.

“Donna.”

“Human?” he asked, looking at her.

“Yeah. Is that optional?”

“Well, it is for me.” He turned back to the open doors.

“You’re an alien.”

It wasn’t a question, but he answered anyway.

“Yeah.”

They stood in silence, observing the turn of the universe.

“It’s freezing with these doors open,” Donna said finally, rubbing her arms.

The Doctor gave her a look and quickly closed them before running back to the console.

“I don’t understand this,” he said, quickly moving around the console, “and I understand everything. This, this can’t be happening. There is no way a human being can lock itself on and beam itself into the TARDIS.” He grabbed an ophthalmoscope and started looking at her. “Impossible. Some sort of subatomic connection? Something in the temporal field? Maybe something pulling you into alignment with the Chronon shell. Maybe something macro mining your DNA within the interior matrix. Maybe a genetic – “

Donna slapped him.

“What was that for?” he demanded, recoiling in shock.

“GET ME TO THE CHURCH!”

“Right!” he yelled back, dropping the device and moving back the console. “Fine! I don’t want you here anyway. Where is this church?”

“Saint Mary’s, Paytor Road, Cheswick, London, England, Earth, The Solar System!”

Donna spotted a woman’s jacket hanging over one of the corrals and grabbed it, brandishing it at him.

“I knew it!” she sneered. “Acting all innocent. I’m not the first! How many women have you abducted?”

It took a moment for the Doctor to figure out what she was waving in his face, but his eyes grew cold when he realized it was Rose’s jacket. It had been an unspoken agreement between him and Lily. She didn’t mention the jacket that still lay where Rose had thrown it that last day and he didn’t mention the leather jacket that had gone missing from the wardrobe.

After all, they were both grieving in their own way.

“That’s my friend’s.” he told the newcomer, struggling to keep his emotions in check.

“Well, where is she?” Donna demanded mockingly. “Popped out for a spacewalk?”

“She’s gone.”

“Gone where?”

The Doctor tried to look away from the jacket, but he couldn’t seem to make himself actually do it.

“I lost her.”

Donna opened her mouth to respond, but they were both distracted by the sound of breaking china. The Doctor turned to see Lily in the doorway, growing paler by the second as she stared at the other woman.

“Donna?”

The three of them stared at each other.

“What?” the Doctor demanded, looking between them.

~.~

Ten minutes earlier

Lily had wandered away from the music room in search of a cup of coffee. She was fairly certain the Doctor had snuck back to Earth while she was sleeping one night to get her some, given he only drank tea. He never mentioned it, it just appeared one morning, and she couldn’t help but think it was very sweet of him. She was almost done when she felt the TARDIS nudge her. She was used to her TARDIS in her Universe doing the same thing when the Doctor needed her, so she sighed.

“So, what did he do this time?” she asked the ship, leaning against the counter as she stirred her coffee. “Cross two wires and set himself on fire again?”

The time ship nudged harder and Lily sighed again.

“Alright, I’m coming.” she said, heading out the door. “But he better be dying.”

She made her way towards the control room, noting that the TARDIS had rearranged to make it a straight shot.

“Must actually be serious,” she muttered.

She entered the room and froze, the cup slipping from her hand. What she was seeing couldn’t be true.

“Donna?” she whispered.

She vaguely heard the Doctor say something before she felt her legs give out, but she never felt herself hit the ground as the memories overtook her. Flashes of one of the worst days of her life, flowing through her mind, unrelenting. She couldn’t make it stop, even as she felt her power slipping through her grasp.

She was losing control.

~.~

Now the Doctor was even more confused. Lily had been slowly telling him of her life before she joined him, and Donna Noble had featured heavily in many of those stories. Lily Carter’s best friend, a firebrand and braver than anyone she knew. He knew she had died and that it had been awful for Lily, but he didn’t know much beyond that. But it wasn’t the fact that she was alive in this universe that confused him. No, it was trying to reconcile the kind, funny, empathetic woman Lily had told him about with the woman who had just slapped him!

None of that mattered, though, when he saw Lily fall. He managed to get to her fast enough to keep her from hitting her head and he saw that, while her eyes were open, she was not seeing him.

“Lily?” he called, shaking her slightly, but she didn’t respond.

“See, I was right!” Donna crowed. “Where did you pick her up? Disney World? Probably doing all sorts of freaky alien things to her! She definitely looks like she’s on – “

“Donna shut up!” the Doctor yelled, surprising the woman into silence. Content that she would stay quiet, the Doctor turned his attention back to the woman in his arms. “Lily, can you hear me?”

There was no response. She didn’t seem aware of anything that was happening around her, too deep in her own mind to notice him. What was even more troubling was the gold flooding her eyes.

He knew she had power, that the Vortex still lived inside her, and it looked like she was losing control. Who knew what a release of that kind of power would do to the TARDIS, much less him and Donna? There was no other option.

The Doctor laid Lily on the grating, taking her face between his hands as he entered her mind.

Every where he looked, there was chaos. Lily’s memories were a jumbled mess, trapping her inside her mind. As he moved through them, it became easier to distinguish what was from before she had met his counterpart and what came after. He saw familiar places and familiar faces that he tried to not look too hard at, trying to find the path to the memory that she was trapped inside. As he moved deeper, he saw more and more death as her memories turned darker and darker, giving him an idea of exactly why his counterpart had been willing to risk everything to send her to him.

No one should have had to endure this much darkness, much less someone as bright and kind as Lily Carter.

Finally, he located the memory Lily couldn’t escape and he entered it.

The room was clearly of Dalek design, sparce and unfeeling, and in the center was a table with a young woman strapped to it. Her red hair was matted, and she had clearly been tortured, as blood still flowed from many of her wounds. Some of the wounds seem half healed, while others were very fresh.

She had obviously been here for a while.

The door opened and Lily ran in. She took a moment to assess her situation before running to the table and starting to undo the straps.

“Lily.”

The younger woman paused what she was doing at the whisper, grabbing her friend’s hand and holding it tightly.

“Hey, girlie,” she said gently. “How you doing?”

Donna chuckled weakly and blood dribbled from the side of her mouth.

“I…I’ve been better.”

Lily laughed softly.

“Well, don’t you worry. We’re gonna get you out of here and get you back to the Doctor. He’s gonna fix you up, good as new.”

The forced cheerfulness sounded so brittle in the air.

“You shouldn’t have come,” Donna protested. “The baby – “

“Would never forgive me if I didn’t come after their Aunt Donna,” Lily interrupted. “So, stop distracting me so I can save your sorry ass.”

She squeezed her friend’s hand and let go, returning to the straps. Finally, they were done, and Lily wrapped her arm around Donna’s waist to help her up. They only made it about halfway to the door before Donna collapsed to her knees, vomiting blood all over the floor. Lily tried to get her up, but they just slipped in the blood. Lily pulled her into her arms as more of her wounds reopened and the blood surrounding them grew even more.

“Lily…”

“Shh. You’re gonna be fine,” Lily comforted her, stroking her hair. “You’ll see. Everything’s going to be fine.”

“Lily, I’m sorry.”

Lily started to cry as Donna weakly took her hand and pulled it up to her chest.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” she told her friend fiercely.

“I didn’t tell them anything,” Donna whispered. “I kept you safe. I kept the baby safe.”

“I know you did.” Lily was sobbing now. “I never doubted it for a moment.”

“Don’t…don’t blame yourself,” Donna said, growing weaker by the moment. “I wouldn’t…have traded it for the world. Tell…the Doctor…tell him…he better keep you two safe…”

“I will,” Lily assured her. “And I will make sure my little girl knows she had the best aunt in the universe.”

Donna smiled softly.

“You’re…you’re my best friend, Lils,” she said, her voice barely more than a whisper. “Love…yo…”

And she was gone.

Lily stared at her, her face slack in shock. She pulled Donna’s body to her, rocking her slowly as the body slowly began to cool. A little while after that, the air began to change. Where there had been stillness, electricity now crackled.

And Lily’s eyes turned pure gold.

The scene faded for a moment before resetting and the Doctor realized Lily was stuck in a loop, reliving the death of her best friend. A woman who now stood in their ship with no idea of who Lily was.

He pulled back slightly and saw that Lily’s eyes in the real world will also gold.

She was losing control, reacting to the memory of one of the worst days of her life. He could tell she was fighting, trying to push the memory back, but she couldn’t do that and keep control of her power. So, he dove back in, fighting through her trauma to help her lock the memory away. It wasn’t perfect, and she would need to deal with it eventually, but it was the best option for the moment. As his mind joined with hers, he felt something he hadn’t felt in centuries: the comfort of another mind. He had been so alone for so long that he couldn’t help but bask in the comfort of someone else to reach out to, settling into the hole the Time Lords had left.

He helped her push the memory back and reluctantly pulled away to find her eyes finally seeing him.

Thank you.

He could have wept at the sound of another voice in his head.

I know I should have asked, he told her sheepishly, but there didn’t seem to be any time.

He felt her smile more than he saw it.

I prefer to be alive, rather than all of us dead, so it’s probably best you didn’t wait for permission.

Still.

He started to pull away, but she grabbed his chin, forcing him to look at her.

For the future, you have permission to enter my mind any time you think it necessary, she told him. I trust you.

He felt a feeling rush through him that he hadn’t felt in so long.

Belonging.

She might be in a human body, but Lily Carter was a Time Lord at heart, which meant he wasn’t alone anymore.

He smiled softly and nodded.

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?”

Lily stifled a sob and the Doctor pulled her into his arms, ignoring the other woman completely.

“Will you be alright?” he asked softly, and Lily hesitated for a moment before nodding. “She isn’t your Donna,” he warned.

“I know,” she whispered. “I’ll manage.”

He nodded, getting to his feet and holding his hand out to help her up. When she was on her feet, he squeezed her hand before letting go and heading to the console.

“Did he kidnap you too?” Donna demanded, walking towards Lily.

The other woman swallowed thickly, looking anywhere other than the red head.

“No,” she told her softly, resisting the urge to either run away or throw her arms around the other woman. “He’s…protecting me. He’s my friend.” She glanced at him and saw him smile warmly, giving her strength. “I had something happen to me and he gave me a soft place to land. He’s one of the good guys.”

“Well, I don’t need protection,” Donna said with a sniff. “Get me to the church!”

“Right,” the Doctor said grumpily. “Chiswick.”

He threw the TARDIS into flight and Lily grabbed the railing, hanging on for dear life.

“Doctor, I take it back!” she yelled. “I’m pretty sure you’re trying to kill me!”

“It’s not me!” he yelled back.

“You always say that!” she shouted without thinking and winced. “I imagine, I mean. I think she’s starting to take offense!”

“What do you want from me?!”

“I want to make it to London without throwing up!”

“Well, talk to her!”

“She’s your ship!” Lily shot back. “You talk to her!”

“WILL YOU TWO STOP TALKING LIKE THE SHIP’S ALIVE!” Donna screamed at them from where she was holding on for dear life.

They both turned to stare at her.

“But – but she is!” the Doctor sputtered, looking a bit like a child who had just been told that Santa wasn’t real.

“It’s a ship.” She told him slowly, as if speaking to a simpleton.

“Yes, but she’s grown, not made.” The Doctor explained excitedly. “TARDISs are sentient.”

The TARDIS chose that moment to touch down, throwing them all to the ground. Faster than anyone could have thought possible in a floor length gown, Donna was up and through the doors. As she looked around, she realized they were nowhere near a church.

The Doctor and Lily followed her out and she rounded on them.

“I said St. Mary’s!” she shouted at them. “What sort of Martian are you?”

The Doctor had already turned his attention away from her and towards the TARDIS.

“It’s like something’s wrong with her,” he said to no one in particular as he stroked the side of the shell. “It’s almost like she’s…RECALIBRATING!” He ran back inside and straight to the console. “She’s digesting!”

Lily knew he was talking to her, but she was more interested in watching Donna’s reaction to the outside of the TARDIS. It was almost physically painful to watch this woman have the same reaction as dead woman she had loved more than almost anyone while having her face and not being her. Lily was caught between wanting to rage at her for the sin of not being her Donna, while wanting to gather her in her arms and never let go.

“Who’s this man you’re marrying?” the Doctor called as Donna took off down the alley. “Are you sure he’s human? Hasn’t got a zipper on his forehead, does he?” He poked his head out and saw only Lily. “Where is she?”

She just pointed at Donna’s retreating figure.

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

Lily met his eyes and he saw the pure grief there and he nodded.

“Come on,” he said, exiting the TARDIS and holding out his hand. “We can’t let her get too far before we figure out what’s going on.”

Lily nodded and took his hand, letting him pull her after Donna.

“Donna…” he called as they caught up.

“Leave me alone! I just want to get married!”

“Donna, just come back to the TARDIS,” he insisted.

“No way,” she said, shaking her head. “That box is too weird.”

Lily smiled at that and the Doctor squeezed her hand.

“It’s bigger on the inside, that’s all,” he told the other woman, as if this explained everything.

“Oh!” she rounded on him, staring at him. “That’s all?” She glanced at her watch and groaned. “Ten past three! I’m gonna miss it!”

“Can’t you phone them?” Lily asked. “Tell them where you are?”

“How do I do that?” Donna sneered at her, motioning to her dress.

“Oh, right.” Lily agreed sheepishly. “Mobile phone’s probably not a big consideration with a wedding dress.”

“Why not?” the Doctor asked, confused.

“I don’t have pockets!” Donna screeched at him. “Have you ever seen a bride with pockets? You know what the one thing I forgot at my fitting at Chez Allison? You know what I forgot to say? I forgot to say GIVE ME POCKETS!”

“This man you’re marrying, what’s his name?” the Doctor asked.

Donna’s whole personality changed.

“Lance,” she told him dreamily.

“Good luck, Lance.”

Lily elbowed him in the side.

“Oi! No stupid Martian is going to stop me from getting married,” she yelled at him, walking away again. “The hell with you!”

“I’m – I’m not from Mars,” he called after her.

“Well,” Lily said, linking her arm with the Doctor’s, “she may not be my Donna, but I can tell you that you might as well give up now. She’s never going to care.”

The Doctor just shook his head, leading her down the road after the other woman.

They caught up with Donna as she tried to hail a cab and had no luck. Lily stood back and watched as the Doctor tried to help and had no better luck.

“Why aren’t they stopping?” he demanded, confused.

“They think I’m in fancy dress,” Donna replied, annoyed. Another driver drove by, yelling for her to lay off the sauce. “They think I’m drunk!” And yet another told her she wasn’t fooling anyone. “They think I’m in drag!”

For a moment, Lily thought Donna might give chase to that one.

“Both of you, stop,” she ordered, stepping out to the curb.

She put her fingers to her lips and let out an ear-piercing whistle. A moment later, three cabs had stopped.

“Et voila,” she said as they approached the nearest. “Perks of growing up in New York.”

“You couldn’t have done that earlier?” the Doctor groused as they got in.

“I was enjoying watching you try.” She shot back with a cheeky grin.

He shook his head, a slight smile passing over his face. Donna was giving the driver the directions when he informed them that it would be double, due to it being Christmas and all.

“Oh my god. Have you got any money?”

“Um, no. Haven’t you?”

“Pockets, Doctor,” Lily said, rubbing her temples.

They quickly found themselves back on the street. The Doctor got Donna situated with a nearby payphone before taking Lily’s hand and leading her over to stand in line for a cash point. Lily smiled as the Doctor shifted his weight, clearly impatient.

“Would you like me to distract him?” she asked with a smirk.

The Doctor took in her loose sweatshirt and jeans with an arched eyebrow and she smacked his arm playfully.

“Rude.”

The Doctor’s expression fell, and he swallowed, turning away from her. A moment later, he felt her hand slip into his, squeezing it tightly. He squeezed back, taking comfort from the fact that he wasn’t alone.

Finally, the man left, and Lily angled her body to block The Doctor as he used the sonic screwdriver to get some cash out of the machine.

“You know, stealing is a crime.” She teased as they walked away.

“What are you going to do, turn me in?” he shot back, swinging her arm. “Oh, officer! My Time Lord friend here just stole money from the cash machine using his amazing sonic screwdriver. Yeah, that’s going to work.”

Lily wrinkled at his attempt at mimicking her accent.

“I do not sound like that.” The Doctor just smirked at her. “I do not!”

They arrived back at the road to see Donna getting in a taxi.

“Thanks for nothing!” she shouted, slamming the door shut.

Lily sighed, shaking her head, but the Doctor was distracted by a band of Santas playing nearby. He looked back at Donna and Lily caught his look.

“What is it?” she asked.

“The band…”

The taxi carrying Donna drove past them and they saw one of the Santas driving.

“DONNA!”

He grabbed her hand and started pulling her back.

“What’s happening?”

“I’ve seen those Santas before,” he told her, looking for an escape. “Last Christmas, when I regenerated.”

“I think I remember that story,” she said, backing away. “Pilot fist to the Sicorax’s shark, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Just to confirm, this isn’t the same Christmas, right?”

“Just how bad a driver was your Doctor?”

Lily just smirked as the band started to head their way. The Doctor quickly began looking for an escape route and spotted the cash machine they had just used. He pointed his screwdriver at it and cash spewed out of it, driving the crowd into a frenzy, and allowing them to slip away in the confusion.

They ran back to the TARDIS and the Doctor quickly put them into flight.

“So, why do they want Donna?” Lily asked, holding on for dear life.

“No idea,” the Doctor replied, flipping a switch. “This didn’t happen in your universe?”

Lily shook her head.

“We met her when her temp job was attacked by Cybermen.”

Spark flew as the TARDIS tried to shake herself apart.

“Behave!” the Doctor shouted, hitting the console.

“She doesn’t seem to like it when you do that!” Lily called.

“Yes, well, she can complain later. Right now, she can do as I say!”

They flew down the motorway, tracking Donna and only hitting a few cars as they went. The Doctor motioned for Lily to take over and she quickly took his place at the console.

“When I say, pull the lever!”

She nodded and he ran to the doors, flinging them open to find them next to the cap carrying Donna.

“Open the door!” he screamed at her.

“Do what?” she screamed back.

“Open the DOOR!”

Donna tried the handle, but it wouldn’t budge.

“I can’t! It’s locked!”

The Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver and the window opened.

“Santa’s a robot,” she told him dryly.

“Donna, opened the door!” The Doctor ordered.

“What for?”

“You’re going to have to jump!”

“I’m not jumping, I’m supposed to be getting married!”

The RoboSanta sped up at that moment, leaving the TARDIS behind.

“Now!” the Doctor shouted.

Lily pulled the lever and they pulled level with the car again. The Doctor stumbled at the TARDIS jerked forward but he managed to use the sonic screwdriver to disable RoboSanta.

“You’ve got to jump!” he told the red head.

“I’m not jumping on a motor way!”

The Doctor sighed.

“Look, whatever that thing is, it needs you. And whatever it needs you for, it’s not good. Now, come on!”

“I’m in my wedding dress!”

“Yes, you look lovely. Come on!”

Donna opened the door with a groan. Looking down at the road flying by beneath them and back up to the Doctor, she shook her head.

“I can’t do it!”

The Doctor went still.

“Trust me,” he said, just loud enough for her to hear.

“Is that what you said to her?” she demanded. “Your friend, the one you lost. Did she trust you?”

“Yes, she did,” the Doctor replied, his face hard. “And she is not dead, she is so alive, now, JUMP!”

Donna hesitated for a moment longer and then threw herself out of the car. She landed in the TARDIS on top of the Doctor as the doors slammed shut.

“Time to go!” Lily called, pressing the necessary buttons to take them away from there.

#Doctor Who #TV: DW #Fanfiction #The Doctor #The Tenth Doctor #OC #The Doctor x OC #The Tenth Doctor x OC #Donna Nobel

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chocolatequeennk · 7 years ago

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Forever and Never Apart, 36/42

Summary: After taking a year to recover from the Master, the Doctor and Rose are ready to travel again. But Time keeps pushing them forward, and instead of going back to their old life, they slowly realise that they’re stepping into a new life. Friends new and old are meeting on the TARDIS, and when the stars start going out, the Doctor and Rose face the biggest change of all: the return of Bad Wolf.

Series 4 with Rose, part 7 of Being to Timelessness; sequel to Taking Time (AO3 | FF.NET | TSP)

Betaed by @lastbluetardis, @rudennotgingr, @jabber-who-key, and @pellaaearien. Thank you so much!

This fills the general Doctor/Rose prompt on @doctorroseprompts

AO3 | FF.NET | TSP

Ch 1 | Ch 2 | Ch 3 | Ch 4 | Ch 5 | Ch 6 | Ch 7 | Ch 8 | Ch 9 | Ch 10 | Ch 11 | Ch 12 | Ch 13 | Ch 14 | Ch 15 | Ch 16 | Ch 17 | Ch 18 | Ch 19 | Ch 20 | Ch 21 | Ch 22 | Ch 23 | Ch 24 | Ch 25 | Ch 26 | Ch 27 | Ch 28 | Ch 29 | Ch 30 | Ch 31 Ch 32 | Ch 33 | Ch 34 | Ch 35

Chapter Thirty-six: Just a Phone Call Away

There was one very important call Mickey had to make before he could ask control for the shift he wanted. He switched the radio to the private frequency designated for use between himself and Pete.

“Tin Dog to Gemini,” he whispered. “Gemini, come in.”

“This is Gemini,” Pete answered only seconds later. “Have you located the target, Tin Dog?”

“Negative, Gemini. I’m going to T3 to get help from Captain Jack, but I wanted to give you an update first.”

“Understood. Sitrep?”

Mickey looked up at the sky, filled with planets and Dalek ships. He heard a Dalek rolling down the street and ducked behind a trash bin, waiting for it to pass before he answered.

“Not good, Boss. We’ve got Daleks on the ground.”

He heard his boss suck in a breath. Pete had the same nightmares of Daleks and their grating voices as he did. “Understood. Do you need backup before you find the TARDIS?”

“No. Hold your position until you get the all clear from me. As soon as I find the TARDIS, I’ll turn the beacon on so your hopper will lock onto me.”

“Roger that. Gemini out.”

After ending the radio conversation with Pete, Mickey changed it back to the all-comms channel. “Agent Smith calling control. Come in, control.”

He winced when a buzz of static came over the radio first, followed by a voice. “This is control. Go ahead, Agent Smith.”

“Can you lock me onto Torchwood Three in this universe?” he asked. “Straight into their Hub.”

He waited, hearing the faint sound of keys clicking. “Locked and ready for transport.”

Mickey shifted his weapon so it was at his back, hopefully making himself look non-threatening enough that Jack and his team wouldn’t shoot him on sight. “Go.”

Using the dimension cannon as a teleport was a hell of a lot more comfortable than flying through the Void—and a lot faster, too. He held up his hands as he felt himself appear in the Hub.

“Don’t shoot!” he called out.

“What the…” Jack was sitting on the floor ten feet away from where Mickey had materialised, but he jumped to his feet when he heard the new voice. His eyes widened when he saw who had joined them. “Well, if it isn’t Mickey Mouse!”

Mickey grinned at his friend, relieved that he’d made it and avoided being shot. “You can talk, Captain Cheesecake!”

Jack laughed and swept him into a hug. “It’s good to see you—and that’s Beefcake.”

Mickey groaned and pushed away from Jack just as another man cleared his throat. He looked over Jack’s shoulder to find a surprisingly familiar face. “Well, the parallel version of Ianto Jones,” he said, feeling a little off-balance. Even after five years, meeting a parallel version of someone he knew in a different universe threw him.

A perplexed look crossed the Welshman’s face. “You seem to be implying that you’re from a parallel universe, but multiversal theory suggests that if other universes exist, they are completely separate from each other.”

Mickey snorted. “Definitely parallel Ianto. Yeah, that’s the way it’s supposed to be, but when reality starts to fall apart, well, apparently the walls between the universes are the first things to go.”

Jack stepped back and gestured between the two men. “Ianto Jones, meet Mickey Smith. Mickey and I go way back, to my days before Torchwood.”

A string of beeps interrupted the conversation, and then they all heard another voice echo through the Hub, this time coming from the computer monitor.

“This message is of the utmost importance. We haven’t much time... Can anyone hear me?”

A woman Mickey didn’t recognise came out of a dimly-lit alcove and walked to a computer terminal. “Someone’s trying to get in touch.”

“Yeah, and I know that voice,” Mickey said as they all moved closer to the computer.

Harriet Jones held up her ID. “Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister.”

“Yeah, I know who you are,” Mickey and Jack said in unison.

Behind them, Ianto and the woman were whispering to each other, asking how this was even possible. Mickey didn’t have a clue, honestly, but this was the first bit of hope he’d had since he’d heard the Daleks.

The screen went back to static for a moment, then it focused again, only this time it was split into four quarters—one for Harriet, one for Torchwood, one for Sarah Jane Smith, and a fourth that was still static.

“The fourth contact seems to be having some trouble getting through,” Harriet said. “I’ll just boost the signal.”

They waited anxiously, and Mickey blinked a moment later when a gorgeous woman appeared in the fourth quadrant.

“Hello?”

Jack laughed and rocked back on his heels. “Martha Jones. Martha, where are you?”

Martha shifted in her chair. “I guess Project Indigo was more clever than we thought. One second I was in Manhattan, next second…” She gestured at her surroundings. “Maybe Indigo tapped into my mind, because I ended up in the one place that I wanted to be.”

An older woman entered the frame and wrapped her arm around Martha’s neck. “You came home. At the end of the world, you came back to me.”

Martha smiled at the woman Mickey assumed must be her mum, then turned back to the screen. “But then all of a sudden, it’s like the laptop turned itself on.”

“It did,” Harriet confirmed. “That was me. Harriet Jones, former Prime Minister.”

Mickey covered his mouth to hide his laughter. Harriet never had quite gotten used to the idea that people knew who she was.

Humour lit up Martha’s dark eyes, and the shared amusement drew Mickey to her. “Yes, I know who you are,” she said.

“I thought it was about time we all met, given the current crisis. Torchwood, this is Sarah Jane Smith.”

Mickey grinned. “Oh, me and Sarah Jane go way back.”

Sarah Jane smiled. “Not just a tin dog any more, Mickey Smith.” She raised an eyebrow. “But Rose and the Doctor told me you were in a parallel universe.”

Mickey nodded. “Past tense. I came back to find them when the stars started going out.”

“That’s what we are all here for,” Harriet interrupted. “Though I admit I didn’t expect to find you, Mickey.” She redirected the conversation back to the introductions. “Mickey Smith, friend of Rose Tyler and defender of the Earth at the Battle of Canary Wharf.”

“Rose told me a little about you,” Martha said. “I’m Martha Jones. I travelled with them for about a year.” Her gaze shifted away from him. “But how did you find me?” she asked Harriet.

Harriet smiled. “This, ladies and gentlemen, this is the Subwave Network. A sentient piece of software programmed to seek out anyone and everyone who can help to contact the Doctor and Rose Tyler.”

Fear sliced through Martha. There were Daleks everywhere, certainly monitoring Earth’s communications. Harriet had put a target on all their backs by drawing them together.

Her mum stood up, and Martha leaned forward to whisper into the mic. “What if the Daleks can hear us?”

Harriet shook her head, an eager smile on her face. “No, that’s the beauty of the Subwave. It’s undetectable.”

“And you invented it?” Sarah Jane asked.

“I developed it,” Harriet corrected. “It was created by the Mr. Copper Foundation.”

“Mr. Copper, huh?”

Martha looked at Jack, who was rubbing his jaw.

“I’ll have to tell the Doctor that he kept his word.” Then his expression turned serious. “But what we need right now is a weapon. Martha, back there at UNIT, what, what did they give you? What was that key thing?”

Martha swallowed and held the disk up. She knew at least Harriet would know what the Osterhagen key was; she didn’t know what her opinion of it would be. “The Osterhagen key.”

She found out Harriet’s opinion quickly enough. “That key is not to be used, Dr. Jones. Not under any circumstances.”

“But what is an Osterhagen key?” Jack pressed.

Martha started to answer, but Harriet interrupted. “Forget about the key, and that’s an order. All we need is the Doctor.”

Mickey raised an eyebrow. “Bit backwards, innit, you tracking down the Doctor? After all, he was the one to depose you. I was there, remember?”

Martha gladly accepted the cup of tea her mum brought out and studied Rose’s Mickey. The easy confidence in the way he talked to Harriet didn’t match the stories Rose had told of their growing up years, but she guessed time had changed them both.

Harriet pressed her lips together and nodded once. “Yes you were, Mr. Smith. And I’ve wondered about that for a long time, whether I was wrong. But I stand by my actions to this day, because I knew, I knew that one day, the Earth would be in danger, and the Doctor would fail to appear. I told him so myself, and he didn’t listen.”

The way Harriet framed the Doctor’s actions sounded so unfair to Martha. She didn’t know what the former Prime Minister had done that had led the Doctor to depose her, but she knew he wasn’t staying away today because he just didn’t care.

“But I’ve been trying to find him,” she countered. “I’ve been calling Rose, but I keep getting sent straight to voicemail. And her phone is never outside of range, so there’s definitely something blocking the call.”

Mickey held up a phone of his own. “Yeah, I’m not getting through either,” he agreed. He looked like he wanted to say more, maybe about what Harriet had done before, but after a second of hesitation, he clamped his jaw together and shook his head.

“That’s why we need the Subwave,” Harriet said. “To bring us all together. Combine forces. The Doctor’s secret army.”

And then Martha understood. Because if Harriet didn’t understand the Doctor well enough to know he would never want an army, their falling-out made perfect sense.

Jack’s voice pulled her back to the present. “Wait a minute.” Jack turned and looked at Gwen. “We boost the signal. That’s it. We transmit that telephone number through Torchwood itself, using all the power of the rift…”

“And we’ve got Mr. Smith,” chimed in the teenager standing with Sarah Jane. “He can link up with every telephone exchange on the Earth. He can get the whole world to call the same number, all at the same time. Billions of phones, calling out all at once.”

Jack cackled. “Brilliant. Who’s the kid?”

“That’s my son,” Sarah Jane said proudly.

“Excuse me. Sorry. Sorry. Hello.” Ianto pushed his way past the other Torchwood employees to address Harriet directly. “Ianto Jones. Er, if we start transmitting, then this Subwave Network is going to become visible. I mean, to the Daleks.”

“Yes.” Harriet nodded. “And they’ll trace it back to me. But my life doesn’t matter. Not if it saves the Earth.”

Jack straightened to attention and snapped a salute. “Ma’am.”

“Thank you, Captain.” Martha marvelled as not even a smile cracked Harriet’s stoic demeanour. “But there are people out there dying on the streets. Now, enough of words. Let’s begin.”

Mickey watched Jack and his team jump to action, getting Torchwood ready to transmit a billion phone calls all at once. Jack typed a command into a computer terminal, then leapt back and spun around. “Rift power activated,” he called out.

“All terminals coordinated,” Gwen replied from another computer.

Then she jogged over to a storage bin Ianto had opened. Together, they pulled out a thick cable, which Ianto carried over to the tall column that gave them access to the national grid.

The cable sparked when he plugged it into an open port, and the familiar ‘whoosh’ of electricity slowing down echoed around the hub. “National grid online,” Ianto said. “Giving you everything we’ve got.”

Mickey turned back to the computer screen connecting them with the rest of the Doctor and Rose’s friends. “Sarah Jane, I’ve got Rose’s number when you’re ready.”

She smiled and shook her head. “Thank you, Mickey, but I’ve got her number myself and I’ve already given it to Mr. Smith.”

Mickey blinked. He’d imagined Rose and the Doctor flying around in the TARDIS without any real connection to Earth, but looking around at the group of people all working to help them, that didn’t seem to be the case. He shrugged and stepped back to watch the action. Sarah Jane and her son were talking to Mr. Smith, which was apparently some kind of computer.

“Opening Subwave Network to maximum,” Harriet said.

Sarah Jane stepped back from her computer and pressed her hands together, palm to palm. “Mr. Smith, make that call.”

“Calling Rose Tyler,” a computer voice replied.

“And sending.” Jack turned a dial, and a pulse of energy went up the column, through the ceiling of the Hub where Mickey knew it would continue resonating through the Water Tower, transmitting through the rift itself.

“And now we wait,” he muttered.

oOoOoOoOo

Twenty minutes had passed since Rose had declared that they only had to wait for someone to call them. For the first few minutes, they’d all stared at the phone, sitting on the console, and willed it to ring. Finally, Donna had slumped in dejection and gone around to sit on the stairs. Jenny had joined her, and the Doctor and Rose were on the jump seat.

Rose’s head ached, and she couldn’t tell if it was the constant awareness of time swirling around them, or if her ponytail was a bit too tight. She let her hair down and sighed when the pressure on the back of her scalp disappeared.

The Doctor combed his fingers through her hair, massaging away the sore spots. Are you sure they’re going to call us? he asked as he worked.

Martha called us for the Sontarans, she reminded him as she leaned into his touch. Do you really think she won’t call us for Daleks?

I didn’t think of that.

That’s why you have me. Rose winked at him, then took the strands of hair that liked to fall in her face and clipped them back with a barrette. Her head didn’t ache anymore, but the timelines were still distracting. It was almost…

Her phone rang, the cheerful ringtone bouncing around the cavernous console room while the vibrations had it dancing perilously close to the edge of the console.

“Phone!” the Doctor shouted, scrambling for it and pressing the accept call button. “Martha, is that you?” But instead of a voice, he just heard three beeps, over and over. He recognised it right away—a homing beacon. “It’s a signal.”

Donna looked from the phone to his face. “Can we follow it?”

The Doctor pulled out his stethoscope and pressed the bell to the phone, listening for the signal. “Oh, just watch me.”

Come on come on come on, he begged, not knowing if he was talking to the TARDIS or the universe at large. Timelines were tightening around them, making him itch with the need to do something. And Rose seemed to be sensing something he couldn’t see, which made him even more nervous than usual.

For once, the universe seemed to be listening, because it was only a minute later that he got a solid fix on the signal and was able to punch the coordinates the signal originated from into the TARDIS.

“Got it. Locking on.”

oOoOoOoOo

Jack couldn’t be sure, but the plan seemed to be working. At least, Torchwood’s part was. The power was going out along the rift, just like they’d discussed, and carried in the transmission were millions of phone calls, all trying to find the TARDIS.

He didn’t say it out loud, but the universe must have known he’d mentally broken the rule to avoid any thoughts like, “What could possibly go wrong?” Because just when he dared to feel optimistic about their success, Gwen spoke up.

“Harriet, a saucer’s locked on to your location. They’ve found you.”

“I know. I’m using the Network to mask your transmission. Keep going.”

“Exterminate.”

Everyone winced when they heard the sound of an explosion and shattering glass come over the network. Then they swallowed and worked harder.

“Captain, I’m transferring the Subwave Network to Torchwood,” Harriet said, her voice still absolutely calm. “You’re in charge now. And tell the Doctor from me—he chose his companions well. It’s been an honour.” Jack swallowed hard and offered another salute.

Harriet nodded, then stood up and moved out of range of the camera. In the background, Jack could hear the electric hum of Daleks moving into the house. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mickey reach automatically for the powerful weapon he had strapped to his chest, even though it wouldn’t do Harriet any good.

“Harriet Jones. Former Prime Minister.”

“Yes, we know who you are,” a Dalek replied.

“Oh, you know nothing of any human, and that will be your downfall.”

“Exterminate.”

Jack flinched and tried to ignore the way the top left quadrant of the screen went dark. “All right people, look lively,” he ordered. “Let’s make her proud.”

She was Harriet Jones, former prime minister. He knew who she was, and he would make sure everyone knew what she’d done.

oOoOoOoOo

The TARDIS shuddered and rocked as she followed the signal through the Vortex. When a bit of electrical wiring came loose and sparked a fire, Rose frowned—seeing the console room on fire seemed familiar, somehow. She shook her head and grabbed a fire extinguisher, putting it out and soothing the ship as she went.

The Doctor was watching their progress on the monitor by the navigation panel, and once the flames were under control, Rose joined him. “Where is she taking us?”

“We’re travelling through time,” he hollered over bangs and crashes as more wiring came loose. “One second in the future. The phone call’s pulling us through. Three, two, one.”

Rose watched the external monitor as they followed the signal forward through time. As they got closer, the planets appeared, one by one, until they were in the centre of the arrangement they’d seen at the Shadow Proclamation.

Everyone took a deep breath when the ship stopped rattling, then Jenny jogged over to look over her shoulder. “Twenty-seven planets. We did it!”

Donna was the last to join them. She brightened when she spotted the familiar blue-and-green sphere on the monitor. “And there’s the Earth. But why couldn’t we see them?”

“The entire Medusa Cascade has been put a second out of sync with the rest of the universe,” the Doctor explained. “Perfect hiding place. Tiny little pocket of time. But we found them.”

Feedback squealed and crackled over the monitor, and they all turned around to look at the computer terminal again. “Ooo, ooo, ooo, what’s that?” The Doctor turned a dial slowly. “Hold on, hold on. Some sort of subwave network.”

A moment later, the screen split into four quadrants. They were in the top left corner, with Jack and Mickey in the top right next to them. As soon as the picture resolved, Jack started yelling. “Where the hell have you been? Doctor, it’s the Daleks.”

Rose pointed at the screen. “Look, Doctor. It’s Mickey, just like I told you.”

He waved. “Hey, babe. Long time no see. I’ll explain everything properly when we’re actually together.”

“Right,” the Doctor agreed. “So tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s the Daleks,” Sarah Jane said, echoing Jack. “They’re taking people to their spaceship.”

“It’s not just Dalek Caan,” Martha added.

The Doctor looked at his friends proudly. “Sarah Jane… Who’s that boy?” he muttered, pointing at the teenager standing with Sarah. He moved onto the next group, Jack and his friends. “That must be Torchwood. Oh, they’re brilliant. Look at you all, you clever people.”

“That’s Martha,” Donna said, pointing to the bottom right corner. “And who’s he?” she asked, pointing to the Torchwood frame.

Rose laughed. “That’s Jack.”

Jack leaned towards the monitor, a welcoming grin on his face. “Captain Jack Harkness. I look forward to meeting you face to face, Ginger.”

The Doctor groaned and scrubbed his hands over his face. “Don’t. Just don’t.”

Jack opened his mouth, but before he could protest, like always, that he was just saying hello, the screen went blank. The Doctor reached automatically for the dial, trying to bring it back. A second later, he realised what was happening. “Oh.”

“What happened?” Jenny asked.

He frowned and pounded on the top of the monitor. “There’s another signal coming through. There’s someone else out there. Hello? Can you hear me?”

He was expecting another old friend, the Brig maybe. But the voice that came over the Subwave Network was a gravelly one the Doctor hadn’t heard in centuries. The Doctor stumbled back in shock and reached blindly for Rose’s hand.

“Your voice is different, and yet its arrogance is unchanged.”

Rose took his hand as the static faded into a dark screen. A blue light slowly moved closer to them, and finally, they saw a withered man, sitting in a wheelchair that looked like the bottom half of a Dalek.

“Welcome to my new Empire, Doctor. It is only fitting that you should bear witness to the resurrection and the triumph of Davros, lord and creator of the Dalek race.”

“Oh, my God,” Rose mumbled. She’d seen Davros in the Doctor’s memories, but he was supposed to be dead. How could he be here? The Doctor squeezed her hand painfully, but she didn’t flinch.

“Dad?” Jenny whispered.

Rose looked up at their daughter and quickly shook her head, urging her to stay off screen. She didn’t know if it would be possible to conceal her existence from the Daleks, but she was bloody well going to try.

“Have you nothing to say?” Davros taunted.

Rose moved to stand directly behind the Doctor, putting one hand on his shoulder and looking at the nightmare face on the screen as she tried to reassure her bond mate.

We’re all safe right now, in the TARDIS, she reminded him. I know how horrible it is to see him again, but this is just a message.

That seemed to shake the Doctor out of his stupor. “But you were destroyed. In the very first year of the Time War, at the Gates of Elysium. I saw your command ship fly into the jaws of the Nightmare Child. I tried to save you.”

“But it took one stronger than you,” Davros gloated. “Dalek Caan himself.”

The camera panned over to reveal an open Dalek casing chained to the floor. Tentacles waved as Dalek Caan sang his story to them. “I flew into the wild and fire. I danced and died a thousand times.”

The camera focused back on Davros. “Emergency Temporal Shift took him back into the Time War itself.”

“But that’s impossible,” the Doctor argued. “The entire War is timelocked.”

“And yet he succeeded.” Davros cackled. “Oh, it cost him his mind, but imagine. A single, simple Dalek succeeded where Emperors and Time Lords have failed. A testament, don’t you think, to my remarkable creations?”

“And you made a new race of Daleks,” the Doctor spat out.

“I gave myself to them, quite literally. Each one grown from a cell of my own body.” Davros pulled back his tunic to reveal his bare skeleton, free of flesh.

Rose shuddered when she realised what he meant, but at the same time, she felt a timeline slip into place. This was important, somehow—the fact that the Daleks were identical genetically. She filed the information away and listened to the rest of Davros’ speech.

“New Daleks. True Daleks. I have my children, Doctor. What do you have, now?”

The Doctor’s anger and pain burned brightly, and Rose didn’t try to stop him. Not yet.

“After all this time, everything we saw, everything we lost, I have only one thing to say to you.”

He slowly reached for something on his right, and when Rose realised what he was doing, she grabbed onto the console.

“Bye!” the Doctor shouted as he threw the dematerialisation lever.

The TARDIS spun through the Medusa Cascade, dancing around the planets until she came to the Earth. And on Earth, there was one place she liked to land best, one city that felt the most like home.

“Doctor, Dalek Caan,” Rose whispered as the TARDIS locked onto London. “The last time we saw him, I said… I said he was falling through time. And that it would cost him his mind.”

“I know,” the Doctor bit out. He sighed and pinched his nose. “I know, Rose.”

“But how did I know?”

The Doctor pulled her close. “Does it really matter? You were right. You… you saw this, somehow. And you were right.”

oOoOoOoOo

They say you never hear anything good when you eavesdrop, and listening in on the conversation between the Doctor and the creator of the Daleks certainly didn’t make Jack happy. He’d overheard Sarah Jane’s whispered pleas too—whoever this guy was, his presence was clearly not good news.

The audio cut out when the Doctor shouted his final goodbye at his old adversary, but Jack knew the signal was still transmitting, putting a target on Torchwood’s back. If he was going to get to the Doctor and be any help at all, he had to get out of there before the Daleks found them.

In the eerie silence that filled the Hub, Jack swung his coat around his shoulders and pulled his Vortex Manipulator out of the drawer he’d stashed it in. It had been hard to keep his promise to the Doctor over the last year and not use it to fix every little thing. But right now? Having a teleport? This was why the Doctor had left it operational.

“Jack!”

He spun around and looked at Ianto as he strapped the wristband on.

“Dalek saucer heading for the bay. They’ve found us.”

Jack swallowed hard, but before he could answer, his phone rang. He flipped it open after a quick glance at the caller ID. “What do you need, Martha?”

Martha exhaled loudly in his ear. “Jack. You’ve got a teleport. Can you tell me anything about how it works? I need to use Project Indigo, and I can’t keep hoping it’ll just read my mind.”

Jack nodded. “Open it up. Lift the central panel; there’s a string of numbers that keep changing, right?”

“Yes. And we could work out some of them, but the fourth one over…”

“It keeps oscillating between two numbers.” He looked at his device as he set the coordinates for London. “Should be a four and a nine.”

“Yes!”

“That’s the teleport base code.” He heard her take a sharp breath. “You know how to work it now, don’t you?”

“Yeah, thank you Jack. And good luck.”

“Good luck, Martha Jones.” Jack snapped his phone shut and slid it back into his pocket.

Jack looked at Mickey as he locked his coordinates, making sure nothing could pull him off course. “I’d offer you a ride, Mickey, but something tells me you’ve got your own transportation.”

Mickey nodded. He was already pulling a radio from his belt. “Control, this is Agent Smith. Can you lock onto the TARDIS?”

“Locking onto the TARDIS now, Agent Smith. Good luck.”

“Thanks. And tell Pete I’m turning the beacon on.” Mickey saluted to Jack, then pressed a small button on his waist and disappeared.

Jack took a deep breath and looked back at his team. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was abandoning them, even though he didn’t really have a choice.

“Look, I know the Daleks will be here any minute, but I swear I’m not running away,” he told them. “I’ve got to find the Doctor, but I’m coming back.”

Gwen handed him the most powerful hand-held weapon they had. “Don’t worry about us. Just go.”

“We’ll be fine,” Ianto promised.

Jack winked at him. “You’d better be.” He pressed the button on his teleport, then slung the gun around so he was ready to use it as soon as he landed. A moment later, the Hub disappeared and he was on a London street.

oOoOoOoOo

“Jackie!”

Jackie froze for a moment, then took a deep breath and turned around slowly. She could hear Pete running up the steps, and she kissed the top of Tony’s head while they waited for him to reach them.

The door to the nursery burst open, and he peered inside. “I just got the call. Mickey’s found the TARDIS, and I’m going through to help him.”

He held out his hands, and Jackie set Tony down and let Pete pull her in for a hug. “It’s almost time, love,” he whispered in her ear. “Keep the radio nearby so you hear me call when it’s safe to come through.”

She was glad he couldn’t see her face, because she couldn’t help but roll her eyes at the ridiculous notion that she was just going to sit around and wait. She turned her face into his shoulder and nodded.

“I will,” she lied.

Pete kissed her temple, then let her go and scooped Tony up in his arms. Jackie pressed her lips together to hold back tears as he said goodbye to their son. Whatever was happening on the other side of the Void, they both knew Pete might not come back. It was possible he might never see Tony again—no, that they might never see Tony again.

Which is why I have to go, she reminded herself as Pete reluctantly set Tony down. I’ve got two children whose lives are at stake. I can’t just sit here and wait for someone else to save us.

Pete kissed her quickly, then jogged away from the room as if he were afraid he would lose the will to leave if he didn’t move fast.

Jackie picked Tony up as soon as Pete was gone and cuddled him while she paged the nanny. He squirmed in her arms, not appreciating being held when he’d been playing with his trains.

“Wanna play, Mummy!” he finally insisted, kicking his legs slightly.

Jackie pressed a kiss to the top of his head, then put him down just as the nanny entered the room. “Ah, good. You’re here,” she said, walking towards the door. “I have some shopping to do in town. I don’t know how long it will take; I might eat dinner out, depending on how late it gets.”

Ella nodded. “Will I need to feed Tony and put him down tonight?”

“You might. Pete has an important meeting with a few Torchwood officers, so who knows when he’ll be home.”

Ella got down on the floor and started playing with Tony. “Not a problem, Jackie,” she said easily. “Me and Tony will have plenty of fun, won’t we kiddo?” She set up an extra length of track, and Tony cheered and sent his train over it. “Say goodbye to Mummy.”

Tony shot her a bright smile and waved with his free hand. “Bye, Mummy!”

Jackie spun around and left the room before she could burst into tears or change her mind. Her and Pete’s room was next door, and she grabbed a denim jacket before going to Pete’s office.

She trod cautiously, uncertain if he’d left already. If he caught her, he would definitely try to talk her out of her plan.

But the room was empty. Jackie reached into the still-open desk drawer and pulled out the second hopper. For the second time in her life, the yellow button was draped around her neck. She took a deep breath and pressed the button, and the mansion disappeared around her.

Pete landed in the prime universe, poised in a crouch. He hadn’t done much travelling with the hoppers before the Cybermen and the Daleks, but he knew a lower centre of gravity lessened the chances of toppling over.

He blinked into the darkness and adjusted the hold on his weapon. Mickey hadn’t mentioned it was night when they’d talked on the phone. He glanced up at the sky and swore softly; it wasn’t night. There was just no sun to shine its light onto the planet.

The beacon on his hopper flashed, and he knew he was less than a mile away from the TARDIS. He nodded once and started jogging, but he’d only gone a few steps when he heard the whoosh and pop of another hopper.

Pete knew who it was without turning around. “You couldn’t just wait, could you?” he said, resignation his first reaction. “No, of course you couldn’t. You couldn’t trust us to take care of this for you.”

“Well if you’re going to lecture me, at least do me the courtesy of looking at me.”

He turned around slowly and looked at his wife. She was wearing a denim jacket over her shirt, and he realised she must have been ready and waiting to follow after him.

That sent a rush of anger through him, and his hands tightened around his weapon. “You just left Tony behind to come through and do what? Annoy the Daleks to death? Well, you’ll do a bang-up job of that.”

Jackie’s face went pale. “Daleks?”

“Yes. That’s who’s been messing around with reality, making the stars go out. This is dangerous, Jacks.” Pete pulled out his hopper and swore when he saw the red flashing light. “As soon as these recharge, you’re going home.”

Her spine stiffened. “Oi, you listen to me, Peter Alan Tyler. I’ve been married to you twice and I’ve never let you tell me what to do. I know this is dangerous. Why do you think I’m here?”

Pete ground his teeth together. “And what if we both die? Tony will be an orphan. Have you thought of that?”

Jackie planted her hands on her hips. “If we both die, then I reckon it means we failed. And if that happens, Tony is gonna die too, isn’t he?” She glared at him. “I might not have caught everything in that lecture the other night, but I know the stars going out means everything is going to end.”

Pete opened his mouth to argue, but the sound of tires squealing interrupted him. He turned and gestured for Jackie to follow him as he jogged silently towards the noise.

“All human transport is forbidden.”

Pete shuddered at the distinctive voice of a Dalek. A moment later, he heard a woman, clearly frightened.

“I surrender. I’m sorry!”

“Daleks do not accept apologies. You will be exterminated.”

Pete growled softly. He wanted to lie low and get to the TARDIS, but he couldn’t let this woman die. Without looking at his wife, he hefted his weapon and crept carefully out of his hiding place.

oOoOoOoOo

Sarah Jane stared at the map Mr. Smith was displaying. Harriet Jones had been targeted, and now there were Daleks flying directly for Torchwood. They were being picked off, one by one.

Davros’ voice had been straight out of her nightmares. If he was behind this—the stolen planets, everything—then everyone would die if they couldn’t find the Doctor. Martha, Jack, and Mickey were all trying, and maybe one of them would succeed. But she was a companion of the Doctor, too, and she wouldn’t cower at home and hope someone else did the hard work.

“Mr. Smith!” she said, her voice tremulous. “Where is the TARDIS landing?”

The map shifted to focus on a part of London, instead of Cardiff. “TARDIS heading for vector seven,” the computer said. “Grid reference six six five.” She scanned the map and memorised the location, then spun around and ran to the door.

“But there are Daleks out there,” Luke protested as she grabbed her leather coat from where it hung on the wall.

“I know.” She scooped her keys up from the desk. “I’m sorry, but I have got to find the Doctor.” At the door, she turned around and pointed at her son. “Don’t move. Don’t leave the house. Don’t do anything.”

“I will protect the boy, Sarah Jane,” Mr. Smith promised.

Angry desperation welled up in Sarah Jane. If she left, she couldn’t protect Luke, but finding the Doctor was the best way to save him in the long run. Still, she felt her bottom lip wobble as she looked at him. “I love you. Remember that.”

Luke nodded, and she took off down the stairs before she could convince herself to stay. The TARDIS wasn’t far away; she could get there in her car in less than ten minutes.

The tiny car peeled out as she tore around a corner, and then she caught a glint of light off metal, and a shape that she would never forget. She slammed down on the brakes, not wanting to know what kind of special punishment she’d receive if she actually ran over a pair of Daleks.

The Daleks turned slowly until their eyestalks were pointed at her. “All human transport is forbidden.”

Sarah Jane held up her hands. “I surrender. I’m sorry!”

“Daleks do not accept apologies. You will be exterminated.”

“Exterminate. Exterminate.”

Sarah Jane hid her face behind her arms, knowing full well it would do nothing to shield her from the Dalek’s death rays. She thought of Luke, sitting back in their house with Mr. Smith. I’m sorry.

“Exterminate! Exterminate!”

She heard two separate shots from a laser weapon, one right after the other, and flinched instinctively. But instead of feeling searing pain, she heard two explosions. Maybe… She blinked and carefully lowered her arms, and when she saw two smoking Dalek casings, she looked around for her rescuers as she climbed out of the car.

A slight man with thinning strawberry blonde hair holding an enormous gun stood on the right side of her car. Sarah Jane had never seen him before, but she did think she recognised the blonde woman standing a few feet behind him.

She blinked, trying to place the face. “You’re… I know you.”

The woman nodded once, and the fire in her eyes was familiar enough for Sarah Jane to make the connection. But before she could say anything, Jackie introduced herself.

“Jackie Tyler, Rose’s mum. This is my husband Pete.” She stepped forward and put her hands on her hips. “Now where the hell is my daughter?”

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