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Chapter 21: I Prayed For Death
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"Who are you?" the woman demanded.
Jack knew these people. He had been 'employed' (enslaved) by them, at one point. Torchwood Three, back in the days when aliens were summarily executed, however benign their intentions, and the organisation existed purely for the betterment of the Great British Empire, to hell with the rest of the planet and galaxy.
Alice Guppy and Charles Gaskell. Out of the two of them, Alice was in charge... although Jack really didn't know where their boss was at this point, it wasn't like they had told her the date. The year had to be 1901, sometime between June 7th, when Charles had been recruited, and October 31st, when he had died.
Considering how long she had been buried, Jack's clothes were in excellent condition... relatively. The coat was a bit mouldy, and she found herself eternally grateful that she had left her WWII coat back on the TARDIS where it wouldn't come to any harm. Still, she had genuinely expected to wake up to find John Hart, and/or her own team, digging her up in rags or completely naked.
"I'm Jack Harkness." she answered, smiling brightly at the infuriating woman. She remembered many arguments with this woman, who could be obscenely cheerful about the most morbid things. Now it was Jack's turn to be unnerving, see how Miss Guppy- used to think of her by her first name, but Jack couldn't stand to do that, now- liked having the tables turned on her.
"I think I would have noticed if Jack Harkness had breasts." she retorted. Yeah, she would... only interested in other women, that one. Jack idly wondered if she could arrange a threesome with Emily Holroyd, while she was here. Couldn't hurt to at least flirt.
"Oh yeah?" Jack asked, grinning, "You like these, then?" she asked, leaning back on her hands, arms out straight so she was still sitting, and pushing her chest out just a little.
The woman blinked several times, then said rather bluntly, "Maybe you are Jack Harkness..." as if that level of flirting was something only Jack was capable of, "It would explain why you were alive when we found you."
"But if you're Jack, how did you turn into a woman?" Charles asked.
"Alien technology." Jack said simply. Besides the fact that it was true, it was always the easiest way to explain anything to anyone who worked for either Torchwood or UNIT.
The two Torchwood operatives shared a look, and they both nodded, "So how are you here, now?"
Jack rolled her eyes. All business, just like last time he had seen this woman, "Time travel."
"But how is that possible?" the woman insisted.
Jack sighed, "Please, can we just stop with the questions?"
"We found you in a twenty-foot grave!" she insisted, "Do you want us to just accept that?"
"Yes, I do." Jack said, nodding, and continuing quickly when Charles opened his mouth to speak, "Look, I've crossed my own timeline. If I meet myself- which I do not remember doing- then there will be a great big paradox and we could all die because of it, so the best thing you can do right now is listen to me very carefully. You'll be protecting the future. That's what you're here for, isn't it?" They both watched her, silently, now. That speech had had the desired effect. "And now I need you to put me in the morgue. Freeze me, set the alarm to defrost in a hundred-seven years time."
x x x
Tosh was just bringing up the schematics for the nuclear power station when Owen called her up on the comms, "Tosh, you're going to have to help me out here, I haven't got a bloody clue what I'm doing."
She called up the current information on top of the basic schematic, and then answered quickly, "Okay, I don't want you to panic, but the reactor's already hit the critical point."
"Okay, you're telling me it's going into meltdown, aren't you? And I'm at the eye of the storm." Owen asked, sounding kind of tired and exasperated, rather than in any way afraid.
"Yes. Sorry." she answered, quickly checking over some more readouts on her screen.
"Right, can you fix it?" he asked, completely unconcerned. Either he had complete faith in her, or he just wasn't afraid of this at all. Or it could be both.
"Of course I can, I'm brilliant!" she announced with a smile.
"Yeah." he agreed.
"I'm gonna try and divert power from the auxiliary source back to Turnmill." she explained, while already setting about the task of doing just that. Which only took all of about five seconds, once she had the correct information in front of her. "If that works, I can talk you through restoring the coolant system." She left her computer and quickly went to pick up her remote data-pad, reading over the information there carefully as she continued to speak, "Right. Now-"
But then she felt a sudden searing pain in her stomach. Half a second later she registered the sound of a gunshot with a silencer... which never really silenced the sound, just made it quieter. She looked down at the wound, stunned to see the dark red seeping through her shirt... and she slowly looked up to see who had shot her, while Owen finally showed emotion- fear- as he called out her name through the comms, "Tosh!"
She didn't recognise this man. One hand moved instinctively to cover the bullet-wound, as she fell to the ground in pain and shock. The datapad landed right next to her, but she didn't take her eyes off this stranger as she gasped, "Help me... please." but she was in too much shock to activate the commlink, to actually let Owen hear her.
"Tosh! Can you hear me, are you there?" Owen's voice asked, quiet but concerned, as she tried to reach for the data-pad.
The stranger started ripping out wires from the back of her computers. Sparks flew and the screens powered down. Tosh cringed a little more from that than from her own pain. Those computers were as close as she had ever had to children, the data the programs, all of it... and he was hurting them.
"I've heard people say death is such a waste." he said calmly, ripping out another power-lead as he said it, "I imagine it more as a relief."
"Tosh! Can you hear me? Tosh!" Owen called, again.
She had almost reached the data-pad when the stranger got there first, very quickly picking it up at the same time as asking, "What's it like? How does it feel?" so casually, as if he was talking about nothing of any real consequence.
He threw the data-pad away, towards the autopsy room, and she followed it with her eyes, before turning to glare at him. Whoever he was, she had already decided she hated him... even if he hadn't shot her, he had invaded her sanctuary here, damaged her computers and disrespected her alien technology.
But he didn't seem bothered by her hatred, simply continuing his morbid questions, "Are you afraid?" Yes... but while she was sure it showed on her face, she would never admit it, "Are you sad?" He touched the side of her face, as if trying- and truly failing- to impersonate a comforting gesture, "You can tell me. The battle's done."
But then a banging noise echoed through the Hub, and the stranger looked up, startled. "What's that?"
It repeated, again. Continuing in a slow steady pattern. The stranger showed the distinct air of one who had made long and meticulous plans, which had suddenly been interrupted... and he stood up, stalking out of the main room, heading for the vaults.
Leaving Tosh alone, wounded, bleeding. She wondered if he would have let her die- watched and enjoyed it, even- or kept her alive just to taunt her some more. But then she resolved herself to the task at hand.
Get the data-pad. Contact Owen. Stay alive long enough to talk him through fixing the reactor. That was most important.
She tried to sit up, but groaned in pain as she failed. The bullet was lodged in her stomach, and it burned when she moved. "Tosh, talk to me. I need your help here, babe." Owen's voice called, once more. With a grunt of pain she rolled onto her side... the intention had been to immediately drag herself to the autopsy room, but now she had to pause to catch her breath.
"Shhh." a soft whisper behind her startled her, and she fell back onto her back, looking up to see where that sound had come from.
He was standing over her, watching the doorway that the stranger had left through... and he was holding her datapad! "D-Damien?" she asked, choking slightly.
He set the datapad down in front of her, and produced another bit of tech from seemingly thin air. It could have come from a pocket, or just been in his hand all along, Tosh really couldn't tell. "Hold still." he whispered, pulling her hand away from the wound and then pulling up her shirt just enough to reveal the injury properly.
"What- what's going on?" Tosh asked, confused.
"I was trying to follow him, hoped to catch him off-guard, incapacitate him before he did any serious harm. He's more paranoid than my father." Damien explained hurriedly, scanning her wound with the strange device. She got a good look at it now, and saw that it looked very much like an oversized penlight, with a red glow at the tip.
She nodded, accepting this information, and immediately moved her free hand to her earpiece, "Owen?"
"Tosh! What's going on there? Are you hurt?" he asked immediately.
Damien hesitated, glancing at Tosh's face, and she tried not to look at him as she answered with a complete lie, "Who, me? No! I'm fine, Owen. Just a- a minor distraction. Nothing serious."
"Alright. Okay, what do I do, here?" Owen asked.
"Just give me a minute, I need to redirect the auxiliary power... here." she began working on her datapad, and tried to ignore her injury, as Damien continued to examine it. But then...
"Hold still, a second. This's gonna hurt." he warned, and she gripped the datapad a little tighter, biting her lip and nodding to show her acceptance of this command.
She felt a searing pain where she had guessed the bullet was lodged in her stomach, and she cried out in spite of herself. She was thankful that she had the presence of mind to turn her comms off before he did that. She would have hated Owen to hear her screaming in pain like this.
"Okay, worst part's over. Go back to saving the city, now." Damien said, just a bit too cheerfully.
Tosh looked down at her wound, which was still bleeding quite profusely, "What did you do?"
"Dissolved the bullet. Give me another minute, I'll have the bleeding stopped and the wound healed up." He smiled at her, "I'm taking my time because I don't want to leave a scar, and another minute or so won't kill you."
Tosh returned the smile, making a mental note to ask him exactly what that device was, and then returned her full attention to Owen and her data-pad, working on the controls for the power station. She tried her best to concentrate, and not to wince as Damien healed the bullet-wound in her stomach.
It did hurt quite a bit, and the odd pinching of her flesh knitting together was uncomfortably akin to a tickling/crawling sensation.
She was distracted from this, however, by the soft humming as he worked. She shot him an odd look, and couldn't help but ask, "Why are you humming?" before hissing slightly at another pinching feeling in her stomach. Damien did seem like he knew what he was doing, but it still stung.
She was quite sure it was a song from South Park, the movie, of all things. She had only seen it once, courtesy of Owen, but that song was pretty much the most memorable and offensive of the lot. And that was saying something, considering the movie had been designed to be offensive.
"Blame Gray." he said vaguely. Tosh blinked in surprise, mouth agape, for all of a second, before turning her eyes back to her datapad... still quite shocked at the disturbing connection he had just made. "Besides, I love that movie. The thought of swearing saving the world. The way Eric Cartman blasted the hell out of that human villain." He grinned, "Totally kicked ass."
She giggled nervously at that, barely remembering the scene he was referring to, and making a mental note to re-watch it if they survived the day.
A final twinge from her stomach, and Damien deactivated the device he had been using to heal her. He nodded efficiently, as he let her bloodstained shirt drop back down to cover the still slightly itchy skin he had healed. She smiled and nodded back to him, sitting up more comfortably, with her back to the wall.
He gave her a gun, set in her free hand, as she worked on the datapad. "In case Gray comes back." he said gently, before quickly standing and running off in the same direction her attacker had gone.
She really hoped he wouldn't get himself hurt... not after all he had done to help her.
"Tosh, come on girl." Owen's voice coaxed in her ear, just as she pressed the button to finish redirecting the power supplies. "Here we go." he cheered, "Right, you've done it Tosh, you've got power! Come on, then-" she could literally hear him clap his hands together, eager to get to saving the city, "Let's do this thing."
Tosh activated her earpiece to answer, "Right... okay..." she said efficiently, pulling up more information on her datapad. But then her heart sank. "Oh god. Owen..." she whispered.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
Tosh was staring in shock at her datapad, as she answered weakly, "There's no way to stop the meltdown. It's too far gone."
In spite of already being dead, panic seemed to make Owen hyperventilate a bit, "Okay, okay." he said, taking a deep breath, "That is not good, is it?" Another deep breath he didn't physically need, but it seemed to calm him... even if he was still speaking a bit too fast, "But come on, Tosh, there's got to be something, there's always something. Come on."
"The only option now would be to vent the flow channels internally." Tosh said, leaning forward over her datapad, and intently working it to bring up the details of how to do this.
"Vent them where?" Owen asked, with the deep suspicion of the answer to this question being bad.
Of course, he was right. "The area you're in is the containment building." she said quickly, reading over the data, "You need to set up a time-delay program, channel the fuel into that bunker, and instigate permanent lockdown. Seal the building, and the meltdown will be contained. And obviously, remember to get out."
"Yeah... I think I can remember that bit." Owen muttered with a shaky laugh.
"I'm opening the system protocol." she said, working on it as she spoke, "You'll just need to enter the timeframe and authorise it. Okay?"
"Okay, Tosh." Owen said, with determination rising to override his earlier panic, "Let's do this thing." he repeated. A second later, he added, "And Tosh... thank you."
"Any time." she answered with a smile.
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The banging sound had stopped, now... whatever had been causing it. Damien remembered following a relatively safe distance behind Gray, when he had locked John, Gwen and Ianto into the Weevil cells... and now he reached these cells, just in time to see that John Hart was up to something that involved an unfamiliar and kind of boxy bit of technology.
That couldn't be good.
Except...
"Got it!" John cheered, and a shrill sound echoed through the hallways for a moment, before resonating out through the whole city on a pitch inaudible to humans. "Sorry." he added unrepentantly, as the others all cringed.
Damien wanted to insult him, one way or another... but he wasn't sure if Gray was nearby or not. Better to go unnoticed.
"What have you done?" Gwen demanded.
"Recall signal." John answered, "Time for all the pets to return home."
Another failed opportunity for insults. Damnit!
"I know you're there, kid." John said idly, and Damien turned to stare at him, "S'alright, Gray's buggered off somewhere downstairs."
"Yes, I was trying to get that song out of my head, Hart!" Damien hissed, breaking off his telepathic link to the Archangel network, and now examining the locking mechanisms on the cells.
"The passcode is two two three, nine six five three." Ianto told him, watching from the far cell. Damien quickly typed that in, and John's cell door opened. John immediately bolted out, staring at the creature he had been locked in with, with evident fear.
Damien calmly sealed the door again, and repeated the process for Gwen's cell, next... because she seemed afraid of her cellmate, as well. He left Ianto to the last, as he didn't seem bothered at all. In fact, one of his cellmates was awake and sitting quite sedately next to him.
Damien couldn't help but feel like she was familiar, but had no idea why.
"Thought you were supposed to be dead, kid?" John asked, not sounding like he had really believed it for a second.
"No. We just misrepresented the truth to make it look like killing my mother might cause a great big paradox." Damien said brightly, "I have the Master of deception and the best damn trans-temporal con-artist in the human race as parents. Didn't think I was that good, did you?"
"That evil, you mean." John said appreciatively, taking a slightly predatory step closer to Damien, smirking and eyeing him up, "And did I mention, puppy-kickingly cute?"
"That's quite enough of that." Jack's voice snapped, as she stalked down the hallway towards them, "Both of you. Damien, no gloating." Damien pouted sulkily, at this command. "John, flirt with my son one more time, I will maim you. It will not be pretty." She glanced at the holding cells, "Janet will help."
The creature in the still-open cell that Ianto had been locked in stepped forward with a slight purring growl, to stand next to Jack, before snarling at John and showing her teeth.
"Whoa." John backed up immediately, "Sorry, love." he said defensively.
"Yeah, you better be." Jack warned, leaning against Ianto slightly. Damien could tell that she was exhausted, but trying to hide it. "Nice use of the ring."
"Thank you." he said with a smile of his own, and a curt nod, "Least I could do. Listen, Gray's in the Hub."
"I know. It's done."
x x x
Jack led the rest of the team back up to the main Hub floor.
"Space pig." she heard Tosh say quietly. Tearfully.
Damien ran across the floor, following the voice easily to its source, and by the time Jack followed him, he was already holding Tosh's hand as tears ran down her face.
"Me too." Tosh whispered, practically oblivious to the rest of them. Instead listening to her commlink. "Owen..."
Jack saw the datapad lying at Tosh's feet, and realised what was happening.
Owen was still in the nuclear power station... and it was about to vent a radiation spike in about five seconds.
Jack spun around to John, "Give me that." she snapped, tearing the Vortex manipulator from his left wrist. The second it was in her hands, she was typing commands into it without even bothering to put it on.
She didn't care that everyone was staring at her. If she could teleport in and out of there, she could still save him. There was still time.
But it wouldn't work. The final button just beeped up an error tone, again and again.
"Owen..." Tosh whimpered, with that sense of finality that told Jack it was too late now. She looked to see Tosh lean into Damien's shoulder, sobbing quietly.
Damien hugged her, looking up at Jack as she rather violently threw the useless Vortex manipulator back at John. Worthless junk! At least she could blame the Doctor for sabotaging her own, but what was John's excuse? Found a 'better' use for the batteries, had he?!
There was still one option, though.
"Damien." she turned on him, now.
He was still watching her. Tosh slowly raised her head, to look at her as well. In fact, the whole team was staring at her.
"Where's your father when I actually need him, hmm?" She took a step closer, taking on an air of command, "Call him, now. We can still go back to that instant, and save Owen before-"
"No." Damien said bluntly. Tosh sniffed, but while she was upset she wasn't the one to argue with his refusal.
Jack stared at Damien in surprise, "What?" she asked, her tone dangerous.
"I said no." he repeated, voice wavering slightly. "Not that I don't want to, but he won't do it... and you should know better. Besides, I'm in enough trouble for even being here, right now."
"Trouble?" Jack growled, taking a step towards him, "I'll show you trouble."
"Jack!" Ianto snapped, grabbing her arm. She froze and turned to face him, slowly. "He's right. Listen to yourself, you're reacting exactly the same as last time." He took both her hands in his, gently turning her to face him, "Please, don't do this again."
Tosh sniffed loudly, drawing attention to herself before speaking, "They're right, Jack. Let him go."
Jack turned to look at her, unsure. She was still leaning against Damien's shoulder, and still crying... but the determination in her eyes was strong.
"He's been through enough. We had our goodbyes this time. It's over. Please."
Jack glanced at the others. John was wisely staying out of it.
"Owen wouldn't want to be brought back again, would he?" Gwen asked, gazing back at Jack, looking just as hurt as she felt.
Jack's resolve finally broke, and she turned back to Ianto, leaning on him for support. She knew how it felt, not to want to be dragged back into something that felt like hell. They were right, Owen wouldn't want it.
"I'm sorry." she whispered, to them all.
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