DISCLAIMER: The character of Vince Hawkins belongs to Terrence Dicks. The characters of Elton Pope and Ursula Blake belong to Russell T. Davies. The character of Sally Sparrow belongs to Steven Moffat. The character of Anne Travers belongs to Mervyn Haisman and Henry Lincoln.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story touches on events from the Lethbridge-Stewart novel, Beast Of Fang Rock, which was written by Andy Frankham-Allen.
DEDICATION: This story is dedicated to Emily Carter, the greatest Doctor Who fan ever to walk the planet Earth.
BENEATH SOUTHAMPTON, PRESENT TIME...
Shouldn't be far now, Elton Pope thought as he led the small group through the disused sewer tunnel. With him were the people that made up the current roster of LINDA (London Investigation 'N'Detective Agency).
The first LINDA, had been formed in early 2007. It had been a society composed of five people: Elton, Ursula Blake, Colin Skinner, Bridget Sinclair and Bliss. Although the group had originally created and dedicated to finding out about the mysterious traveller in time and space known as the Doctor, the members of the group soon bonded and LINDA became as much a social club as a Doctor-investigating club, much to the annoyance of their future "leader", the mysterious Victor Kennedy. Kennedy had been, in reality, an alien being called an Abzorbaloff.
With the help of the Doctor himself, the Abzorbaloff had been destroyed, however, all but Elton were absorbed by the creature and died with it. However, Ursula was later partially returned from the dead by the Doctor's sonic screwdriver in the form of a face embedded in a slab of concrete, which Elton now carried in his hands.
That incident had caused LINDA to be dissolved. However, recent mysterious events on Earth, allegedly involving the Doctor, had convinced Elton and Ursula to revive LINDA in 2015. Soon they had a few new members join them. Ross Greene, was a conspiracy nut who was convinced that the Government lied all the time to the people, Joseph Chandler, Joey to his friends, was a computer geek extraordinaire, and Sally Sparrow, a young women who had recently joined the group after the tragic death of her fiancé, Larry. Like Elton, Sally had her own experience with the Doctor, which involved some terrifying creatures called the Weeping Angels. This incident had occurred not long after Elton's own encounter with the Doctor, so they had much in common. This new LINDA investigated strange mysteries, such as this current one.
"We should be there soon," Joey said. It was because of him that LINDA was here to begin with. Not too long ago, Joey had hacked into a classified website which referred to a mysterious group called Torchwood. Apparently, this Torchwood had been formed to fight alien invaders (and had limited success, it seemed). The website referred to the branch of Torchwood that was based here, in these tunnels, under Southampton. This branch, called Torchwood Southampton, had all been wiped out in something called the "Scaroth Incident Of 1903". No further information could be turned up, so Elton decided that an on-site investigation was warranted.
"I hope so, it stinks down here," Ross said.
"Well, Ross, we are in the sewers, after all," Sally said.
"Yeah, but I still don't like it."
"Don't worry, it shouldn't be too far now," Elton said in a reassuring voice.
"Are you sure about this?" Ursula whispered.
Elton looked down at Ursula's face in the concrete slab, and replied. "No, not really. Perhaps this Torchwood can help, but I'm not sure." This was one of the reasons that Elton wanted to find this Torchwood base. From what Joey had been able to download from the classified site was that Torchwood apparently had access to alien technology. Technology that could, perhaps, restore Ursula to human form.
"This is not the first false lead you've followed, Elton," Ursula pointed out.
"I know, but I'll keep looking, Ursula. I promise you that."
"Hey, I found something!" Ross's voice called out. He'd gone slightly ahead of the group and was now standing by the wall on the left side of the sewer tunnel. "The colour of this section of the wall is slightly different. I think there's something here."
"Ross is right," Sally said after she'd examined the wall herself. "This could be what we're looking for."
"Only one way to find out," Elton said and began to push on the section of wall. The others helped and soon the section began to swing back. It's a hidden door. This must be it, Elton thought. Before long, the door had been opened and Elton led the group into the darkened room beyond. Switching on their flashlights, the group saw that they were now standing in what looked like central meeting area of some kind. All around them were old furniture (chairs, tables, desks, and even a couple of couches) and filing cabinets, all covered with dust.
We may be the first humans to visit this place in over a hundred years, Sally thought.
"What was this Torchwood anyway?" Ross asked. "Some kind of Government Black Ops thing?"
"No one really knows," Joey said. "Much of what is known of Torchwood comes from second hand accounts. Legend has it that Queen Victoria herself first set it up, back in 1879, or thereabouts."
"You're kidding."
"No, Ross, that's what the stories say," Joey said. He had scoured the Internet for mentions of Torchwood, but information was few and far between. "If their true or not, your guess is as good as mine."
"That's the Government for you," Ross said. "Always lying. Is this where our tax dollars go?"
"It's more than that, Ross," Joey began. "For example..."
"Guys, not now, please," Elton said, before Ross and Joey got into another debate. And when those two really got going, the debate could last for hours, possibly days. "We need to get the equipment set up and get some serious research done. Save the debate for later, okay?"
"Right you are, boss," Ross said and Joey grunted in agreement.
The group quickly got busy, breakout their batter powered lanterns and setting up their laptop computers. Sally pulled out a digital camera and began taking pictures of the room around them. It was then that she spotted a door nearby and headed towards it.
"Right, I think that's everything," Ross said. "We're ready, Elton."
"Good, now I want us to go over everything here," Elton said. "Catalogue it all. Who knows what we might find."
"Guys, in here!" Sally's voice called out from the door that she had gone through, seconds before. In no time, the rest of the group had joined her. Sally was standing in front of what appeared to be a series of drawers that one might find in a mortuary. Of the drawers, only one of them had a label on it which read:
V. HAWKINS
FANG ROCK LIGHTHOUSE
AUGUST 26th, 1902
"What does that mean?" Joey asked.
"I don't know, but the same Fang Rock sounds familiar, but I can't place it right now," Ross said.
"What should we do, Elton?" Sally asked.
"Let's open it up and see what's in there," Elton replied.
"You sure about that, boss?" Joey asked. "What if it's dangerous."
"It's highly unlikely that anything is going to be dangerous after one hundred and fifteen years," Elton said. "Come on, everyone, give me a hand." The group grabbed the drawer and, after a few moments of grunting and pulling, were able to open it. As they did so, some vapour, that was ice cold, flowed out of the drawer and into the room, temporarily chilling it.
"What the hell was that?" Sally asked, wrapping her arms around herself.
"I don't know, but look at this," Elton said and shined his flashlight into the drawer. Lying on the slab was a young man, who looked to be in his early twenties, and was dressed like someone from 1902 would be dressed. Prominent was the heavy white sweater and wooly black hat the young man had on. "V. Hawkins I presume," Elton said.
"This chap has been here since 1902?" Ross asked.
"So it seems," Sally said. He's kind of cute, reminds me a bit of Larry... Sally squelched the thought, before the emotions associated with could overwhelm her.
"Who is he? Why is he here?" Ross wondered.
"There are some filing cabinets in the other room. Perhaps we'll find our answers there," Joey suggested.
"I agree. They must have some documents about who this chap is and how he ended up here." Elton said. The group turned and headed back into the main room.
It was Sally that found what they were looking for. "Come have a look at this," she said, holding up a file that she had extracted from one of the filing cabinets. She put the file down on one of the tables and opened it. The group read the report contained within: