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Chapter 20: Oh, Please, That's The Oldest Trick In The Book
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"What is it with you and rooftops?" Jack complained, as John dragged them both up to the top of the castle. He had let her have the coat back, because it was kinda cold up here, she really looked good in it, and he'd had the chance to search it and get rid of any potential weapons concealed therein.
Neither she nor Damien were putting up any resistance, at the moment, which really did make his job a lot easier. He would be glad if the circumstances were different.
"This is a good view." John said simply, as if that was explanation enough.
"What do you want me to do?" Jack asked, "Whatever it is, please... just leave the others out of it." she pleaded.
John glanced at him, "What do I want you to do?" he repeated, his tone implying that she should know. He wanted Jack to stop him, to recognise that this wasn't like him, that he wouldn't really go this far. He didn't answer the question, though. He knew better than to tell her the true source of her problems, right now.
"Whatever I've done, I'm sorry." Jack begged, "I'll make up for it, just not like this!"
"You don't understand." John said coldly, "You can't ever make up for this." He activated the commlink on his wriststrap, tuning into the frequency Torchwood used on their ear-pieces. It was time to announce the apocalypse to the other little teammates. "Attention... Torchwood employees! Evening all! Now, stop what you're doing."
Gwen Cooper was the first one to answer back, "Jack, what's going on, are you okay?"
Aww, call me Vera, again, lovey. "Jack can't come to the comms right now. But if you leave a message, I'll be sure and pass it along." He flashed an amused smirk at Jack, as she fumed silently, standing back by the wall, as far as she could get from the edge of the roof.
"What've you done to her?" Gwen demanded.
"No, no, wrong question." John chided, "You should be asking, what am I about to do to you?"
"Put Jack on, right now!" Ianto Jones ordered. Or tried to, anyway. There was only one person who had ever been able to make John willingly follow orders, and she was currently in no position to overrule the one who had forced servitude upon him.
"Eye Candy!" he cheered, quite gleeful at the mental picture of the young man's reaction to that nickname the last time he had used it, "That was so masterful, so bossy... so basically powerless." After a brief pause, fully expecting the other two to have something rude to say to him, but hearing nothing more, he continued, "Get up to the roofs of your buildings. Quickly now, spit spot."
"Why?" Owen Harper asked.
"'Cause if you don't, you'll miss all the fun." John cheered. Usually, he'd not go in for this level of mass-destruction. Why blow up a city when it's so much more fun to kill a man with your bare hands? This was so impersonal. "Hold on a minute, do I mean fun or do I mean carnage? I get them confused. Are you running yet? No dawdling now!"
"This isn't like you, John." Jack said softly, stepping away from the security of the wall, so she was now right behind him. He got the feeling if they weren't bound behind her back, she'd put a hand on his shoulder, right now. He hesitated, but had no choice but to continue his mission. "Why are you doing this?"
He looked at her, turning slightly so as not to strain his neck, but couldn't answer her question, or he would know. "I'm sorry." He took out a control device, stepping away from her. He would know if he didn't at least make an effort to stop her from thwarting the plan. "Now... Cardiff!" he announced, over the commlink, "Isn't it pretty? Doesn't it twinkle so?" He glanced at the boy, who was already looking out over Cardiff city, leaning against the battlements, his hands resting in front of him, palms down on the stone.
Wait... how did he get out of those handcuffs?
John blinked, and pretended not to have noticed that. He could hear everything John- or anyone near him- said, but couldn't see what he saw or know what he thought. Instead, he continued the pre-planned spiel, "Take a good look." He pushed Jack over towards the battlements, as well- gently, this time, honestly not wanting a repeat of the last rooftop incident- so she could get the full benefit of the 'view', "Remember this... because it all goes so quick." and with that, he pressed the button.
The explosions were spectacular. Really, they were. If you liked bombing cities.
Damien leaned back, at the first one, startled... but was that a flicker of excitement on his face? Yes it was. Almost gleeful, really, the way his eyes lit up like that. Then he turned around, frighteningly quick, lunging for the control device in John's hands, while Jack stared at the scene before her- the devastation of the city- in utter horror.
John stepped nimbly out of the boy's path, leaving one foot in the way, so as to cause Damien to fall flat on his face. "Serve you right." John muttered, as the kid quickly scrambling to his feet again. He pressed another few buttons, and the explosions continued around them.
Finally, when all of his little explosive devices had been detonated, and the echoes rang out into silence. Jack turned on John, screaming, "You've destroyed the city!"
John just walked over to her, slowly. He felt very tired of all of this... but now it was done. He had no current orders, and he intended to take full advantage of that fact. "Jack, hold me." and he wrapped his arms around her. She didn't react, staring out at the smoke rising from where the bombs had gone off, her face still set in a horrified expression.
"Why did you do this?" she asked, shaking her head, unable to understand what could possess him to do something so much more destructive than he had ever wanted to before. He tightened his grip, possessively, with a weak smile in spite of what he knew would inevitably happen to her, even if he could manage to postpone it for a while. At least she still understood him.
"It's okay. It's all gonna be okay." he said, as the rift-spike he'd predicted began to appear around them. But just as they were about to disappear through to safety, a hand caught his arm. For one terrifying moment, he thought it was him, somehow knowing of the escape plan and coming to stop it, but then he looked up and realised it was just Damien. The determined look on the kid's face said quite clearly, 'I'm not letting you just disappear without me.'
John really didn't mind this, he rolled his eyes and held on tighter around Jack's waist as the rift pulled them through.
x x x
The landing was a bit rough, but that was to be expected with an uncoordinated rift-jump. John got the worst of it, because the kid had good reflexes. They had appeared a foot in the air, and Damien had somehow managed to twist around in mid-air like a cat, and landed on top of John. Jack had landed beside them both, and rolled a few feet away, without any ill-effects.
Jack picked herself up fairly quickly, but Damien didn't seem inclined to leave too fast. Instead, he shifted his position, so that he was now sitting astride John, pinning him down to the ground, which- it turned out- was covered in grass. "Alright, start talking." Damien demanded.
"About what, exactly?" John asked, choosing to be stubborn. And he really didn't mind the way Damien was holding him down, right now. The kid really was cute... and apparently hadn't been joking about being the dominant type, either.
"There's always a reason." Damien said calmly, meeting John's eyes as he spoke, "You set off fifteen low-grade Entarin explosive charges in the middle of Cardiff. Why?"
How'd he know the bombs were Entarin? Only recognisable difference between them and most other explosives is the trigger mechanism works on a harmless but faintly radioactive trip-switch. So unless he was able to detect the radiation from halfway across the city... which no species John had ever met would have been capable of. Really, that was adding evidence to the possibility that Jack had been telling the truth about the myth.
"Because he told me to." John answered honestly.
"Not like you to be taking orders without a motive of your own." Jack remarked with a cold edge to her voice. She was standing over them, arms folded, glaring at John. Her entire demeanour, so familiar in spite of her being a woman at the moment- all the right curves in all the right places, damn but she was hot- told him that she would not leave him be until she knew what was really going on here.
John pushed Damien's hands away from his shoulders, and held up his right arm. Damien sat back, but didn't leave. Didn't allow him the opportunity to stand up. "Look at that." John snapped. When they both hesitated, he added, "Go on." Jack knelt next to them, looking at the device there.
Damien watched, carefully, as well. "Entarin again." he muttered.
"Ninth generation detonator. It's bonded to my skin, can't get it off." John offered, freely giving them all the information they wanted, if it would help him now, "Add to that a surveillance circuit, to monitor my every word and action, and he has me doing anything I'm told. 'Cause if I don't..." and with the appropriate hand-gestures for an explosion, he finished with a low and overly dramatic tone, "Boom!"
Jack backed away a step, frowning at him, "You're a walking bomb." she said coldly.
Damien, on the other hand, didn't retreat. Instead, he took John's arm in both hands, and examined the detonator, "Aww, it's a shame you left my laser-toy back at the Hub." he looked up and smiled at John, shrugging slightly, "I coulda unlocked this, easy." That's not fair! Ironic, but so unfair.
"Why did you bring us here?" Jack asked, "And where exactly is 'here', anyway?"
"Almost two thousand years ago." John said, propping himself up on his elbows, now, "Trigger signal won't send, this far back."
Damien looked around, now, eyes more on the sky than the surrounding fields and trees, "We're still in Cardiff?" he asked.
"How'd you know that?" John asked, surprised.
Damien looked at him, his lip twitching as if he would have smiled under better circumstances, "Half Time Lord."
"I'm still not sure I believe that, kid." John observed, sitting up properly, now, so he was face-to-face with Damien. When he failed to take the hint, John made a sudden movement towards him, as if to kiss him. Damien didn't flinch, recognising the feint. So John really tried to kiss him... and he leaned back just far enough to avoid it, and no more. John growled, annoyed that he was being beaten at one of his own games by a kid.
"Damien." Jack said in a warning tone.
The boy rolled his eyes, and stood up with all the airs of the sulky teenager he clearly really was. But once he was standing, he offered John a hand to help him up as well, muttering loudly enough for both of them to hear, "Father forbade me from visiting the fifty-first century... it's not often I get to play games like this."
John accepted the offered assistance, but then once he was standing too, he pulled Damien towards him, one arm around his waist and grinning down at him, affecting his best predatory demeanour. Kid wanted to play games, he could play games.
But Damien just stared up at him, not intimidated in the slightest. As if he could read John's mind and knew he wouldn't really try anything... certainly not to Jack's son, most especially not right in front of Jack, however handsome the young man may be. No, the entire point of this particular game was intimidation, a fight for dominance in a sexual context without actual contact.
"John..." Jack warned, her tone exactly matching that which she had used to tell off her son a moment ago.
John turned an exasperated glare on her, but before he could speak he saw movement behind her. It was him. "Oh no. Run... just run." he said, letting go of Damien, pushing the boy behind him, almost protectively, and staring fearfully as he approached.
Damien turned to look as well, and his reaction- which John didn't see- clearly made Jack believe in the danger. She turned to see what they were looking at, but then her sense of fear evaporated. "Gray?"
"I said run..." John hissed through gritted teeth.
Gray was walking towards them with a purposeful stride that really shouldn't be mistaken for enthusiasm. His voice was even when he spoke, showing no emotion either way, "I never stopped believing. I always knew we'd find each other again."
Like the sentimental fool Jack had always been, she stepped forward to meet him, and they hugged. A truly heart-warming scene... if John didn't already know better. "I'm sorry." Jack said, her voice choked by emotions John couldn't place. Obviously regret was in there somewhere, but it wasn't like John understood that one very well.
An instant later, Gray growled, "Sorry's not good enough." and the blade protruding from Jack's back showed just how right John's guess had been. He heard Damien gasp in shock, and glanced at the younger man, to see him stagger backwards, as if physically struck.
"Hey, kid?" he asked. Would be stupid to ask 'you okay?'... 'course the kid wasn't okay. Bloody hell, but this paradox would be spectacular, in a minute.
"Didn't see that one coming..." Damien hissed, answering the unspoken question anyway, clearly in shock. He glancing up to actually watch as Jack fell to the ground, then straightened quickly as Gray's attention turned to the two of them.
"Who's this?" Gray asked, indicating Damien with the bloodied blade.
"Your nephew." John answered bluntly, glancing at Jack's currently dead body without any further need of words.
Gray looked at the kid, now, "Seems to be taking this well."
"I take after my... other parent." Damien answered, his eyes turning to Jack's body without a flicker of pain or remorse.
Gray frowned slightly, then nodded, "I might let you live, then." John snorted loudly at that, and Gray turned on him, "What?"
"Too late for that, mate."
"Can't kill a ghost." Damien agreed, scowling at Jack's dead body, "But as I'm still here for now..." he bowed his head to Gray, in a show of deference. John didn't allow himself to show it, but this did confuse him. Damien had claimed to be the dominant type, after all. Why would he suddenly defer to the man who had just murdered his mother?
It was at this moment that Jack resurrected.
John watched with morbid interest, as she inhaled sharply- it sounded painful- and her hand flew to where her fatal wound had been a moment ago. The only sign that she had been stabbed at all was the damage that the blade had done to her shirt, and a bit of blood staining around the edges. She sat up, staring at Gray, confusion and fear written on her face, plain as day. Wore her heart on her sleeve for all to see, no wonder this one had always been such a terrible liar.
"I wonder, though." Gray said, now circling Damien like a predator, "Can you give me a reason not to kill you? It had better be good. I have no doubt that my brother values your life."
Damien glanced at Jack, then back to Gray, "Sorry to disappoint you, but I grew up with my father. First fourteen years of my life, I never saw her." Stated as fact, simple truth. John was by nature terminally dishonest, and because he had so much practice, he could all-but smell a lie a mile away.
Gray turned to Jack, now, watching her carefully, "Is this true?"
"How should I know?" she demanded, defensively, "It hasn't happened, has it?" Not 'it hasn't happened yet'... 'it hasn't happened'. At all? John was beginning to wonder why the paradox hadn't consumed them by now.
Still facing Jack, Gray held the still-bloodied blade up towards Damien, who watched it without any sign of fear, "So you don't care about him?"
"He was an accident." Jack said coldly, holding Gray's gaze. Though there were tears in her eyes, it was obviously from her brother's betrayal, more than anything else. "His father is a psychopathic megalomaniac who spent three months torturing me to death. Repeatedly, and very creatively." she closed her eyes and turned away, "He never asked my consent. You really think I want to be reminded of that monster?"
John's eyes narrowed as he watched Jack. He took it all back. She was good. Damned good. He wouldn't be surprised at all if every word was truth- that was Jack's preferred form of lying, always had been- but he knew how protective she had been of her unborn child, the last time they had met.
Gray turned on Damien, "You see? He only cares about himself!"
"That's cold, Jack." John said, putting one arm around Damien's shoulders. Unlike the hostage situation earlier, this time the gesture was relatively gentle, and could almost be called a hug... not to John's face, though, or he'd beat the hell out of whoever suggested it. He was trying to comfort the kid. Damien leaned against John's shoulder, accepting this offer, and not looking at Jack.
To John, it was obvious what she was doing. If Gray wanted to destroy everything she cared about, then she had to convince him that she didn't care about Damien. Perfectly reasonable strategy... assuming the kid recognised that that was all it was.
Although it could still be pretty damned hurtful, even if it was a complete lie. Still, she hadn't actually said she was unwilling, just that the alien- still not entirely buying the Time Lord thing- hadn't asked her consent. Knowing Jack, she had most likely been the one to start it, and therefore not needed to be asked, but that was beside the point.
He wondered how the kid would respond to this... if he knew that it was a trick to protect him, he still had two very different cards to play. He could be completely indifferent and cold, never knew her so why should he care, sort of thing. Or he could act seriously hurt by it. John honestly wasn't sure which one would appeal more to the madman... would he prefer his nephew to be another cold-hearted monster, or another lost and betrayed child?
A slight grimace crossed Gray's face- a glitter in his eyes- for an instant. John had learned over time that this was the closest that Gray got to a smile. If he had smiled, it would have been cold and heartless, but somehow this expression seemed even more disturbing, "How does it feel to know that he effectively wants you dead?"
Damien slowly turned to look in Jack's direction, "Her words are strongly reminiscent of an ogre." he hissed, his voice cracking slightly to show pain. And a slight waver in his accent, too, almost sounding a little bit Scottish in the emphasis he put on the word 'ogre'.
John noticed- though Gray was facing Damien and couldn't have seen it- that while Jack's eyes showed surprise at her son's words, the tension across her face- fear that he wouldn't understand it was a trick- faded away now. Was that a code of some sort? John really didn't get it.
"An ogre?" Gray asked, confused. He never did get most Earth cultural references, having spent more time in hell than around humans.
"Mythological creature, commonly depicted as willing to kill their own young." John answered. Another truth, but somehow he doubted that was the correct context for what Damien had just said.
By this point Jack was now kneeling on the ground, instead of sitting... and her lip twitched, coming close to a smile, as she met John's eyes. 'Thank you for playing along.' He blinked once, slightly slower than is entirely normal, not daring to show his acknowledgement of her thanks any more than that.
Gray now spoke to Damien, pointing to Jack with the blade he still held, "Would you kill him?"
"What's the point?" Damien asked, looking up at Gray, "It never lasts."
Gray snorted, a sound somewhere between impatience and poorly veiled anger. He shifted his grip on the blade, and held it out to Damien, hilt first. An offer and an order to take it and use it to kill Jack. To kill his own mother.
Damien stared at it for a few seconds, before wrinkling his nose in distaste, and stating bluntly, "I prefer lasers."
Gray stared at him coldly, not moving. Waiting for Damien to either accept or refuse the offer, rather than stalling. Jack closed her eyes, bowing her head and while she looked upset, she also appeared resigned to the fact that there really was only one way this could go.
"You know the kid's as good as dead already, right?" John asked, "You killed him before he was born." And John was still waiting for the paradox to catch up to them.
Jack's face remained resigned and calm, blank and emotionless, her eyes still closed as Gray turned to look at her with surprise. Clearly he hadn't figured out the details of the paradox too well, yet. Not unexpected, since he had no training in temporal dynamics.
"What I don't get is why we're still here." John added, honestly confused by it. Gray almost looked interested now.
"Theoretically, that sort of paradox would exponentially expand, the further back you travel to avoid it." Damien said rather quickly, "The focal point would be her due date... and we're almost two thousand years before that. Meaning instead of potentially just erasing me, for instigating the paradox in two-thousand-nine, at this point you could be destroying half the galaxy when I catch up to that time. Even dust, remains of my decayed died-of-old-age corpse reaching that time would do it. In this situation, the only way to prevent that would be if I went forward now, sacrificed myself to the paradox, so that it wouldn't harm anyone else."
'Theoretically'. 'Potentially'. 'Would', not 'will'. Oh, now John picked up on it. Economy with the truth, misrepresentation of facts, just like his mother. There was no paradox! Eight months, he could have already been born by now. He and Jack could have been playing John from the very beginning.
It was entirely likely that every word the kid said was true, too. He hadn't actually said there was any such paradox, just what it could do if it did exist.
John was still dubious of Jack's claim that the boy's father was a Time Lord, but he did talk the talk better than most Agents could. And was that last part there for a reason? He wanted to get back to 2009? To help undo the damage in Cardiff, no doubt. The kid was smart. Very, very smart.
John really hoped he had read that right... 'cause he did kinda like the kid, and it would be a shame for Damien to have to be erased from existence.
"It seems to me that he could live long enough to want to fight for that life." Gray pointed out to John. He frowned, wondering if Gray really had lost it, even more than previously assumed. All self-preservation instincts should tell him to throw Damien to the metaphorical wolves, to save his own neck from this imaginary paradox.
Damien stepped forward and took the sword from Gray, weighing it in his hand and frowning at it. John did agree with his distaste, whenever he needed a bladed weapon, he preferred his own- much lighter and more elegant- sword. Stepping forward, so he was now facing Jack, with his back to Gray, Damien held the blade loosely in his hand, hesitating.
Jack was watching him now, as he shifted his grip, tilting the weapon ever-so-slightly backwards, so that it almost touched the ground. John saw the question in that slight movement; 'Should I use this on him instead of you?'
Jack shook her head, and to cover her action she asked, "Why are you doing this, Gray?"
"Because everything that they did to me is entirely your fault." Gray answered coldly.
"And you'd turn a child into a murderer, just to prove a point?" John spat.
"Why not?" Gray asked, glancing at John, "He did that to me."
Damien shook his head, turning to face Gray, now, "She never did anything to harm me. I have no reason to kill her." he said, now holding the weapon defensively between himself and Gray. The speed of his movement was quite frankly terrifying, as he stepped forward and struck Gray across the face with his free hand.
Gray actually laughed- a sharp and humourless bark- catching Damien's arm after the blow, as if it hadn't affected him at all. Twisting the boy's arm up behind his back and grabbing his other wrist as well. A sharp flick of his own wrist, and the sword fell from Damien's hand.
The boy yelped at the pain, but he stopped struggling after only a second, still cringing as Gray pulled his other arm behind him as well, "Are you going to kill me, now?"
"Why would I?" Gray asked, now holding Damien in place with one hand holding both the boy's wrists, arms twisted a bit too far up behind his back. The grimace of pain on Damien's face showed just how uncomfortable that must be, and his breath caught as he fought not to voice this pain. "He doesn't care about you. And you are... family." Gray explained.
He bent down to pick up his sword, pulling Damien with him as he did so, causing the boy to stumble and cry out as his already strained arms were jolted by the movement. Gray ignored his nephew's obvious pain, calmly replacing his sword in its sheath at his waist, and turning to John.
"Get a shovel."
x x x
The boy was young, and had much to learn. It was more than obvious that he had no understanding of real pain. A slight strain on the arms, this was nothing, but the child nearly cried. Gray would teach him. But first, he had to deal with his brother.
It never occurred to Gray to use the feminine description for his brother. The slave and the boy did, and they were technically correct so he saw no reason to argue with it... but women were weaker, and his brother was not weak. The only one who could have stopped those creatures from taking him... who let him go instead. Not weak, but as great a monster as any of them.
With the limited number of restraints, and the boy's proven affinity for handcuffs, Gray chose to continue to hold him. The boy had struggled, when the slave was ordered to dig a grave. He understood Gray's plans better, knew it wasn't some twisted game as the slave seemed to think. He was now leaning against Gray, arms still held securely behind his back, no longer fighting, weakened and exhausted from the last half hour of trying to free himself, and gasping for air against the pain.
"I looked for you." his brother said, as the slave now applied the handcuffs, "I searched for you for years. You were my first thought, every day."
"What are you expecting, hm?" Gray hissed, still holding the boy tightly, "A loving reunion?" I hate you. "Absolution?" You deserve this fate. "Me to say, 'It's OK, brother, I forgive you'." I never will. "Those creatures, they lived to torture." Such fantastic pain, you cannot imagine. "They kept us just on the verge of life. I'd lie there, hemmed in by corpses, praying to become one. Because you..." you bastard, "...let go..." left me to die, "...of my hand. Remember?"
"If I could swap with you, I would." Lies. No one would choose that fate, least of all the one who had abandoned him to it. Not someone so selfish as to leave his little brother to those monsters.
Life before the pain hurt what was left of his soul to even think of, and his voice almost wavered as he spoke now, "I believed you'd come." he said, stepping closer to his brother, pulling the boy with him. He regained his self-control- show of emotion is weakness- as he continued, "But you never did. How long before you gave up, hm? Months? Years? Decades?" Seconds?
"What do you want from me?" his brother demanded, hurt and angry.
"I want you to suffer." As I did. "I want your life." Ruined like mine. "This is Cardiff. Twenty-seven A.D. The city will be built here, over the next two thousand years. Your grave will be the city's foundations. Your blessing of life becomes a curse." Life always is. You will understand that, as I do. He grabbed the collar of his brother's shirt with his free hand, and actually smiled- he had forgotten what that facial expression felt like- as he continued, cold anger and vengeance rising up beyond his self-control, "Each time you revive, with a throatful of earth, each time it chokes you afresh, and you thrash on the edge of death, you think of me." Of what you did.
The slave dared interrupt, walking towards them, sounding like he thought he was just breaking up a playful duel that had gotten out of hand. This wasn't a game! "Alright, calling a halt now, I can't let you do this." Like he had a choice.
Gray shoved his brother back into the grave, but then boy began to resist again as well. A strong kick at Gray's leg- but Gray knew pain, and he didn't react to it- as the boy tried to turn around to face him, in spite of the way his hands were still held behind him.
He grabbed the boy's right arm with his free hand, and pulled hard, dislocating the shoulder. The boy screamed at that, but it did put an end to any illusion of resistance.
"Fill the grave." he ordered.
"No way." the slave snapped, defensive and angry. Then he looked at the boy, showing concern for the child. Fear of what Gray might do to him?
"Then the detonator on your arm gets activated." Gray said. It wasn't a threat, it was a promise. He had no reason to harm this man, if he obeyed. No qualms about killing him if he refused.
The slave stared down into the grave, at Gray's brother. Hesitation was weakness, it was the reason this man was now in servitude. That, and compassion. After a moment, he removed the ring he wore, kissed it and threw it into the grave.
"What's that?" Gray demanded, suspicious of the innocuous object. He had no idea what it might really be, but there had to be a reason for it.
"It's, er, sentimental value." the slave answered. More weakness. Gray dismissed the subject, pulling the boy back from the edge of the grave as the slave began to shovel earth onto his brother.
He wasn't struggling now, only whimpering in pain, as each step jolted his injured arm. When they reached the tree-line- still with a good view of the slave as he worked- Gray chose to show the mercy of realigning the boy's shoulder. Which, again, caused him to cry out at the pain. Releasing his grip on the boy's wrists, Gray guided him to sit down at the foot of a tree... the boy didn't resist, pulling his legs up in front of him defensively, and rubbing his right shoulder, still wincing at the residual pain. Gray sat next to him, cross-legged, watching him carefully.
Slowly, showing fear in his eyes, the boy looked up at him. "What will you do with me?"
"You're mine, now." Gray answered, simply. His only remaining family... his brother didn't count. "I can teach you. Make you better."
The boy's lip twitched at some unknown and morbid joke, and the darkness in his eyes showed experience of something Gray didn't understand, "How?" he asked, turning to stare at the grave as it was filled, a frown- a flicker of emotion- crossing his face for a moment, but gone again in the next.
"You care about him?" Gray asked.
"Rejection hurts." he answered shortly.
Gray snorted, "Emotions are weakness."
There was that darkness in his eyes again, "So I've been told."
"Then why do you not learn?" Gray asked. The boy flinched when he reached a hand out to rest it on that injured shoulder, but Gray didn't do anything more to hurt him, yet.
"Because they're wrong." the boy said bluntly, staring warily at Gray's hand, out of the corner of his eye. How would he know? A weak child, never left to fend for himself, there was no way he could understand this. But he could learn.
Gray watched him carefully, then after a minute he asked, "You fear me?"
"You hurt me." was the answer. Gray interpreted it as a 'yes'.
"Life is pain." he said calmly, gripping the boy's injured shoulder tightly, making him hiss at the pain. "Fear is death."
"You're blind." the boy answered coldly, through gritted teeth, "There is so much more than this. All you have to do is look for it."
"What are you referring to?" Gray asked, with scorn, "Happiness? Love? Hope? Peace?" he snorted derisively, "They are illusions. The only constants in this universe are pain and death."
The boy considered this for a moment, concentrating in spite of his pain, "If that were true, then the illusion would be far preferable to the reality." Another hiss of pain as Gray tightened his grip, and he begged, "Please, stop."
"You're weak." Gray said calmly, digging his fingers into the boy's shoulder... any more and his nails would draw blood, but he knew how to avoid leaving scars. After so many years, with so few of his own to show... he had learned that from them.
The boy yelled in pain, and turned a hateful glare on him, "You have no idea what I am!" he snarled. The sudden anger impressed and surprised Gray, and he released the boy, allowing him to turn to properly face him, "I have seen eternity! Stars crying and planets dying! You think you know pain, but human bodies are so fragile, they can't endure real pain! The entire universe is scarred by war and plague. Deliberate malice and genocide, but you, blind fool, you persecute the only one who would want to help the monster you chose to become, for an accident!"
During this tirade, the boy stood, looming over Gray with an air of power that he had never seen before. If he believed in such things, he might have considered himself to be in the presence of a god... a very angry god, at that. But he refused to fear a child, and stood quickly himself. He was taller than the boy, and physically stronger. He struck this infuriated demi-god across the face, as hard as he could, and the boy's head snapped to the side from the force of the blow.
Gray frowned as the fire and anger faded from the boy's eyes. A hateful glare remained, but none of that power or passion. Another illusion, that was all it had been. A trick to give hope or fear to those who would show such weakness. Although he did, now, feel an unfamiliar emotion... he had assaulted a power he did not understand, and wounded it. It wasn't fear, but the desire to undo his actions against the boy.
Was this regret?
"I can hear her..." the boy said quietly, "Every time she wakes up." His eyes didn't show any sign of horror or fear, "Hatred should make no difference to family. Blood and life, love is unconditional. You hurt her, you hurt me. Can you even understand that?" The boy seemed almost tired now.
Gray shook his head slowly. Both answering the question and expressing his own resentment to the boy. He would never learn, and Gray couldn't let him live, after all. What had he said, before, about a paradox? Take him back to 2009, let him cease to be. Or have ever been. "No. And I don't want to."
He seized the boy's injured arm, and dragged him back out into the field, now. The grave had been filled, and the slave was watching them both now with undisguised and morbid fascination.
"Have you finished?" he asked the slave.
"Yes." was the sulky response.
"Then you're free." Gray produced a control device from a pocket, and pressed the appropriate buttons to disarm and detach the bomb from his arm.
The man stared at his arm, as the trigger was disarmed, and then up at Gray with confusion, "Just like that?"
"Just like that." Gray answered.
He glanced at the boy, "What about the kid?"
"I'm taking him with me." The boy struggled, now, but only succeeded in causing himself more pain as he twisted his injured arm against Gray's grip.
"Where?"
"Twenty-oh-nine, Cardiff." Gray said calmly.
"You mean to kill him?" Something in the way that was worded didn't fit what he knew of this man. Should it not have been 'You're going to kill him?'? But Gray didn't know or care to know more than was necessary of this man's behaviour, and quickly dismissed that thought.
"As you said before, he's already dead."
The man glared at him, but then quickly activated his vortex manipulator, before Gray could change his mind. The instant he was gone, Gray activated his own wriststrap, his left hand still holding on to the boy's arm as he pressed the button.
With one last glance at the grave, Gray stepped into the rift and pulled the boy through with him.
He released the boy, the moment they arrived in 2009. The boy cringed away from him, holding his arm defensively, and glaring spitefully at him. "You can go, now." Gray said calmly.
He watched the boy slump against the wall, looking incredibly tired, "I'll see you in hell." he said, smiling darkly, as he began to fade. Gray found himself unable to focus on him, as reality itself seemed to blur around him... and when he blinked, the boy was gone.
Gray then turned to the holding cells next to him, and pressed more buttons. A signal that would override the locking mechanisms, and the call that would enrage the creatures held within.
He showed no fear or concern as the creatures left their cages, snarling and growling viciously. To him, they may as well be pets, so tame compared to the things he had seen and experienced before now.
And now he would wait.
x x x
Ianto and Tosh were on their way to the nuclear power station. With the IT servers down, the power station was going to go into meltdown if someone didn't get there and fix it. Tosh was the technical expert, but Ianto- hell, any idiot- knew that this was a bad thing.
But now they had to duck out of sight, as a large pack of Weevils charged past, running along the main road like they owned the city.
He tapped his commlink, and whispered, "Owen, Gwen, can you hear me? The streets are flooded with weevils, they came out of nowhere. There's no chance we'll get to the nuclear power station in time."
"Ianto, leave it to me. I can get there." Owen answered.
"How?" he asked.
"I'm the Weevil Bogeyman, remember?" Owen answered. Not entirely reassuring, but hopefully it would be enough. Tosh and Ianto turned and ran down the side-street, away from the Weevils, and towards the plaza.
They had just returned to the Hub, when they heard the sound of yet more Weevils snarling. Ianto drew his gun, and led the way inside, followed closely by Tosh. As soon as he saw the four Weevils, and their two potential victims- John Hart, and Gwen- he opened fire on the Weevils. One shot in the chest to each of the three main attackers, incapacitated them easily enough.
The fourth- and he only noticed it an instant before he would have shot her as well- was Janet, and she hadn't been moving to attack. Growling at Hart- an intruder in her pack's territory- but nothing more than that. She whined mournfully, and crouched next to one of the other three, making no hostile moves at all, now. He didn't want to shoot her if he didn't have to.
"Oh, God, I'm so pleased to see you!" Gwen said, rushing towards Ianto, ready to hug him... but he stepped forward, turning his gun on Hart. She caught his arm just in time to stop him from firing, and held him there. Gwen must have a good reason to stall him, but that didn't stop him from glaring at Hart... if looks could kill he wouldn't even need the gun.
"Don't start!" Hart said defensively, his eyes darting every half-second to Janet, as if expecting her to attack in spite of her obviously non-aggressive stance, "I'll make things right, Eye Candy."
I'll shoot you if you call me that again.
"Then start by getting those Weevils down the vaults before they recover." Tosh interrupted their standoff very quickly and efficiently, as she moved over to examine the computer screens, "It takes more than a bullet to stop them."
Reluctant as he was to have to cooperate with Hart, Ianto knew that Tosh was right and the Weevils needed to be secured. He quickly moved to Janet's side, meeting her eyes when she looked up at him, and recognising that she didn't mean them any harm. She made a sound in the back of her throat that could only be interpreted as mournful, but other than that she didn't seem to react to him.
"It's okay, girl." he said softly, as he leaned down to pick up- well, more like drag, these things were heavy- the fallen Weevil she stood by. Only now that he was close enough to see the number on the boiler-suit this one wore, did he realise that this was Brad, and he immediately added, "I'm sorry."
The sound she made might be interpreted as acceptance of this apology, and then it seemed like she was trying to say something else... but Ianto was not a telepath, and he didn't know what.
Ianto led the way, dragging an unconscious Brad, while Janet loped along next to him. As they reached the vault level, Ianto demanded, "What happened to Jack?"
"According to Vera, here, he's buried somewhere beneath the city." Gwen said, shooting a glare at Hart as she struggled a bit in her attempt to drag her own Weevil down the corridor.
"How did that happen?" Ianto asked, also glaring at Hart.
Hart sighed over-dramatically, before explaining, "Jackie's evil little brother enlisted me- against my will, I might add- to wreak vengeance on her... which, it turned out, included burying her alive in the foundations of Cardiff about two thousand years ago."
One thousand nine hundred and eighty two years, three months, six days, eleven hours and twenty-three minutes ago.
Ianto shook his head, to dispel that strange thought, wondering where it had come from, and yelled at Hart, "You did what?!" utterly horrified.
"Ianto!" Gwen snapped irritably, trying to interrupt this entirely out-of-place interrogation.
"I didn't have a choice!" Hart snapped back.
"There's always a choice." Ianto retorted, angrily.
"Okay, can we just get these Weevils into the cells please!" Gwen yelled, this time succeeding in her attempt to interrupt their argument.
Ianto finally put Brad down in the cell, carefully. Janet immediately settled herself next to Brad, and began crooning softly to him. It was rather sweet, and he couldn't help repeating, "I'm sorry, girl."
She only acknowledged his words with the briefest glance and a sharp but not angry sound that was out of place with the softer tone she used for her mate. He hoped she accepted his apology... although he did get the feeling that if she hadn't, she'd probably have mauled him by now.
Ianto turned around to lean against the glass door at the far side of the cell, so he could be heard more clearly by Hart, "If we don't find her, I'll kill you." he warned, in perfect honesty, pausing for a second before adding for effect, "Very slowly."
But then he heard the door behind him close, solidly and ominously. Ianto looked behind him, at the now sealed door, and rolled his eyes. Figures, as soon as you think things can't get any worse.
"Whoa! What's happening?" Gwen asked, and he heard the beep as she tapped her comm, "Tosh? Tosh! Ianto, my comms are dead."
"Gwen." Hart's voice called, warning and authoritative all of a sudden. He wasn't playing games now. Ianto leaned against the glass, to try to see what was happening, and he heard an angry growl from Janet, the sort of sound that's usually made low in the back of the throat.
"I let you go." The voice was unfamiliar and almost soft. Calm in a very ominous sort of way, "I gave you your freedom, you could have gone anywhere."
"Question of honour." Hart retorted bluntly.
"Gray?" Gwen asked, as Ianto heard footsteps moving his way, stopping outside Gwen's cell, "You're Gray, right? There's no need for this, we can help you. Just tell us where Jack is."
"His life's mine now." the unfamiliar voice- Gray- said coldly.
And he walked past Ianto's cell now, completely ignoring as Ianto demanded, "Where's Jack? What've you done with her?" Janet roared at Gray, as Ianto repeated the question at the top of his voice, "What've you done with her?!"
Gray ignored them, and just walked out, through the door that led up to the Hub. Leaving the three of them alone with their respective Weevils.
Ianto figured he was safe, here... Brad and Janet both acknowledged the fact that he outranked them. He really wasn't sure what would happen when those other two woke up, though. He didn't want to find out.
x x x