Hi guys! Sorry it took me so long to update. I've been busy… if you count rewatching all of Doctor Who busy. Which I do, actually. I hope you like it so far. I know its not as great as a lot of other works, and I apologize for the grammar errors, but I'll do my best! I'm trying to portray all the character's personalities as best as I can, but I don't think I'm doing a great job. Please give plenty of critiques in reviews. Thanks!
Chapter 3
"How can you recognize me, Jackie?" the Doctor hissed. He was terrified of this woman, and he hadn't been exactly anxious to see her over the past few years. But, at the same time, he felt a kind of warmth spread through him at the sight of those wide blue eyes of hers, and that stringy blond hair hanging in a ponytail and draping over the forehead. He had really missed those sweat pants and jean jackets. He hadn't realized it, but he really, really had.
"What, no hug? No 'it's been so long, it's great to see you'? Ahh, you ungrateful bastard. And what's up with your chin? Did you choose it to be that way? Bad decision, I'd say. You're regenerations keep getting younger… and so do you're girlfriends. Blimey, it didn't take you too long to get another pretty young thing to start following you, did it? Johnny would be disappointed in you."
"Hey!" Amy complained. "Doctor, who is this?"
"Both of you, shush!" the Doctor bellowed. "Now, Jackie, did you bring me here?"
"Well, why would you think that?" Jackie asked innocently.
"Because you don't seem remotely surprised to see me."
Jackie Tyler scowled. A sharp pang hit one of the Doctor's hearts as he realized the similarities with her expression from Rose. Rose—Rose is near… He snapped himself out of it.
"Alright, we brought you here." Jackie admitted. "But it wasn't me! It was Torchwood! Well, I guess I was a part of it, but it was mostly Pete. But there's something happening, we needed you—"
"Do you realize what you've done?" The Doctor shouted. "You just tore a hole in space and time the size of Russia! Classic Torchwood, I guess. You idiotic apes!"
Amy flinched. She had never seen the Doctor like this. This was bad. Really, really bad, if he was getting so angry. He only got angry when the universe was about to fall apart. But, despite the fact that she was a little scared of this furious, raging Doctor, her curiosity was much, much stronger than her fear.
"Will someone please tell me what's going on?" She screeched, her Scottish accent pronounced.
"Later." The Doctor told her curtly before turning back to the strange blond woman.
"Listen, Doctor, just come to Torchwood! We'll explain everything—why it was necessary!"
He hesitated, unsure whether or not to agree. He would've rather stopped one of his own hearts from beating than step back into that retched Torchwood building again, even if it were in a different universe, but there didn't seem like much choice. He couldn't deny his help when someone needed it. Especially when they were desperate enough to rip apart a universe to reach him.
"Alright." He agreed reluctantly.
"Good. But leave her here." She pointed to Amy, whose was beginning to get her how-dare-you face.
"I trust Amy completely. There's no reason for her to stay." the Doctor insisted before Amy could open her mouth.
Jackie glowered. "Fine. But I'll be keeping an eye on her." She began sauntering off down the unfamiliar road, signaling for the time travelers to follow her.
"Okay, explain. Now!" Amy growled as the two trailed Jackie, making sure to stay far enough behind her as not to be eavesdropped.
"We're in a parallel universe, okay?" The Doctor snapped.
"Parallel universes exist?"
"Of course they do! For every single decision you make, another universe is created. Just by deciding to eat salad for dinner instead of steak would create a completely different world."
"And it tears a hole in the universe by travelling into one?"
"That's right."
"Then how to you know her?" Amy nodded toward the blond speed walking up ahead of them.
"She's just an old friend. I may have… accidentally trapped her in another parallel universe."
Amy's eyes narrowed. She could tell that he was withholding information. There was a new expression on his face… one she had never seen before. "Try not to do that to me, alright?"
"Promise." His dark mood didn't lift at her joke, though he managed a feigned smile.
"So what's Torchwood?" Amy asked.
"Just a secret society that fights alien attack."
"Right. Just. Why didn't you tell me any of this before? You've told me a bunch of other stories."
The Oncoming Storm shrugged. "I guess I have too many stories to tell."
Just looking at the newly-renovated Torchwood gave the Doctor the chills. Even Amy felt it. The glossy skyscraper was forbidding, with its pitch-black surface and deformed reflections. With some elbow grease, the Doctor convinced himself to follow Jackie inside, and of course Amy came in his wake.
The minute they stepped into the marble lobby, all conversations ceased. All eyes rested on the Doctor's grinning face. Amy was glad to see that his smug self was back, but she fidgeted uneasily under the dozens of stares.
"Um, Jackie." A suited man came up to the three of them. He was making an effort to keep his eyes off what might be the legendary Doctor, but it was hard to lock his gaze on every day Jackie. "Pete wants you upstairs." He told her distractedly, "Is that the…"
"Yeah. Meet the Doctor." Jackie sighed. She never liked it when her colleagues discussed the Doctor, as if he were some god. They thought they knew everything there was to know about him. Ridiculous.
"Mr. Doctor, sir, it is an honor." He was about to salute, but the Doctor stopped him with an, "Oh, no, no, no. Don't do that. Jackie, let's keep moving."
Amy nearly laughed at the shocked, offended look on the man's face as they walked away, but first she asked, "You're more of a Mr. Grumpy Face today than with the angels. What's wrong?"
"I'm not a fan of Torchwood." the Doctor replied simply.
The elevator ride was awkwardly silent, until Jackie broke it with, "So what's you're name, sweetheart?"
"Amy." Amy answered uncertainly.
"How long have you been with the Doctor? Because trust me when I say that the longer you stay with him, the more likely you are to get abandoned."
Amy glowered. "The Doctor wouldn't do that."
"I wouldn't put it past him."
"I didn't abandon her." The Doctor snarled. "I would've gone to the end of the universe to save her, and you know that. I would've torn apart reality for her, even, but I don't think that the rest of the universe would've been too happy about that. If I could've, I would've."
Jackie rolled her eyes. "Oh, please. Don't give me that! You abandoned her the second time! You had a chance to be with her for Pete's sake! And you just threw it away! The only thing that kept her from going mental with the grief was Johnny. He's a better man than you'll ever be!"
"Jackie, he is me! And he needed her."
"Lousy excuse."
The three of them lapsed back into what was for Amy a very bemused silence, but what was for the Doctor and Jackie a very enraged one. Amy cast the Doctor a 'tell me later' look.
They got off at the twelfth floor, which was bustling with more suited men and woman. Instead of a room falling silent in the Doctor's presence, the noise simply amplified with whispers tossed around. "Is that him?" People would say, or "Oh my gosh, I can't believe it!" or even "Jackie wasn't lying then!" Most tried pretend that they weren't all staring. Jackie proceeded without a moment's hesitation.
The hallways, like the lobby, were made of fancy marble, and the air was consumed by the sound of pricey shoes clattering against it. Jackie seemed under dressed in the sea of Italian silk, but she didn't seem to mind. With a tight jaw, she knocked on a large wooden door. "Pete!" She called inside. "I've got him!"
There was a sound of a scuffle, like books being dropped, before a gruff, familiar voice answered, "Well, bring him in, bring hi in!"
The room was some kind of lab, filled to the brim with high-tech computers and fancy little gadgets. It was a large, airy room, but only a single man stood in the corner, behind a large wooden desk. It seemed to take Pete a minute of searching for another man before he realized who the Doctor was.
"Doctor? Is that you?" He said as he evaluated the new man. "You regenerated." His eyes lingered on the bowtie. "Bowties?" He asked. "Are you sure that's the right look?"
"Bowties are cool." the Doctor insisted, straightening his own. This time, his expression was smug, not quite as nervous. "Now I've heard that you tore apart time and space to get my help. Not a very wise thing to do."
Pete sighed. "I knew you would say that. John was trying to stop me, but we need you're help. Badly."
"Well, so does everyone. More cybermen trouble?" The Doctor was stalling. His throat burned as a singular question floated within his skull: how is Rose? Was she married? Did she have kids? Was it all working out well with the metacrisis Doctor—this John? Okay, maybe the question wasn't as singular as he thought.
"No, actually. There's something else, something big and bad, and—"
His voice was interrupted as the heavy wooden door slammed. The group of four all turned their heads to find a rather out of breath man storm into the room. His wild brown hair and rumpled brown suit made him look like he had just stepped out of a wind tunnel. He and the Doctor exchanged one brief glance before the newcomer burned his fiery gaze into Pete.
"Pete, I told you not to! Have you realized what kind of damage you've done?" He yelled. Amy drew back unnerved by this stranger's presence, while Jackie merely roller her eyes and Pete pursed his lips in a disappointed kind of way.
The next thing that happened could only be described as completely extraordinary—that is, if you were like Amy and had absolutely no idea who this tall, breathless man was.
At the very same moment, both the Doctor and the newcomer spoke the exact came words: "Classic Torchwood, tearing the universe apart to keep their business in check."
A gelid silence fell.
Amy, who at this point was already quite possibly more bewildered than ever before in her life—even more than at that moment in the diner when they were grieving the Doctor's death, only to see him bound in wearing his ear-to-ear grin—somehow managed to get even more confused. It wasn't just misunderstanding. She was missing something. Something big. And she was the only one, by the looks of the unsurprised grimaces cast by Jackie and Pete. She, being Mrs. Amy Pond, the one and only, was not very happy about this.
Meanwhile, the alien and the strange new man shared another look. A longer one. It almost seemed, at least to someone on the outside, that they were sharing come kind of secret, telepathic conversation. Both of the men shared the same frowning, worried kind of look, as if they were both thinking the exact same thing.
"Can I speak with you for a moment, Doctor?" Amy hissed, becoming the first to shatter the icy silence. She couldn't stand not understanding for one more second.
"Not now, Amy." He said a bit curtly. He seemed to regret being to brusque once he glanced at Amy's red-hot glare. "Sorry. But as I said, it's a long story. Not to be told now, I'm afraid." Then he made the mistake of saying the one thing that could only make her angrier. "Why don't you go back to the TARDIS while we sort this out, okay?"
"I'm not a child!" she nearly screeched the words before hissing more quietly to him, so that these wide-eyed strangers would not hear quite as well, "So don't patronize me, son in law."
"Amy, please." He whispered back, his voice pleading. He held out the extra TARDIS key he always kept in his pocket, well aware that on most occasions Amy forgot her own. "I promise I'll explain everything when I get back. I just need you to do this for me."
She scowled, debating. "Fine." She snarled at last, only because of that strangely desperate look in the Doctor's eyes. Her plot to come back and eavesdrop may have been a part of her decision too. "But you have to call me the second anything exciting happens. Then explain everything to me in clear detail once we escape from some fatal alien attack. Alright, Mr.?"
"Promise."
With a reluctant glower, Amy snatched the TARDIS key from the Doctor's fingers and made her way to the door. She made sure to take slow steps, just to see if she could hear any snippet of conversation. Only silence. The Doctor knew her only too well. Amy Pond speed walked into the hallway, grumbling about in-laws the whole way.