Big thanks to: doctorwho29, starwefter, and Isis the Sphinx for leaving reviews :)
Chapter Thirty-seven
The bright white light gradually cleared from Seto's vision. He felt the pain of discomfort in the back of his neck and was relieved to hear Kisara's voice as she complained about her own discomfort. Thank god it transported us both! But the relief was short lived as he found himself staring down the barrel of the machine gun pointed directly in his face.
A pair of narrowed eyes peered over the top of the automatic firearm and would have seemed intimidating had they been filled with anger and not fear. They began to widen as realisation of the identity of their target hit home and the weapon was lowered. "Cariad?!"
Seto caught Gwen in his arms as she flung herself at him; narrowly avoiding hitting Kisara with the machine gun that she continued to hold as she wrapped her arms around her friend. His view caught sight of Ianto who also lowered the weapon which he held. "It's great to see you both again." He smiled before asking. "Where's Jack?"
"Not here, as you can plainly see." The Welshman replied in his usual deadpan tone.
"This isn't the time for joking around." Seto stated as he gently eased back his female friend from him. "I've got a serious situation back home…."
"Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"
The muffled sound of the invaders that came over the intercoms caused all of them to feel nervous though the younger man seemed to remain remarkably calm throughout it all. "I don't suppose it involves Daleks by any chance?"
"It's a worldwide problem and Jack's onto it." Gwen assured the two travellers, knowing that the dry humour of her colleague wasn't appreciated right at this very moment in time. "He used his vortex manipulator-thingy to go team up with the Doctor. I think you should go after him too, using the one that you have." She glanced at the makeshift device and then started to move away towards the terminal across the other side of the hub. "Follow me; I'll get you the coordinate information that you'll need."
"Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"
Kisara stayed rooted where she stood listening to the intercoms' transmissions and watched Seto trail after the Welshwoman across the huge vast area of the secret underground base. She felt a twinge of jealousy at the sight of them both together, knowing that nothing could possibly be going on between them and that the feeling she had was pure paranoia as he had intended to ask her to marry him. And she knew what her answer to his question would have been, the reality of which she feared they would not live to carry out.
"It's okay Kisara." Ianto smiled as he lingered with her. "You're safe, there's no way that those Daleks can penetrate their way in here." He had assumed that was the issue troubling her.
"How do you know my name?" She asked the stranger curiously.
"Because that boyfriend of yours never stops mentioning you in his e-mails to me." He smirked back in reply and received a faint smile from her. Feeling the awkwardness of unfamiliarity between them he extended his hand to introduce himself. "Ianto Jones."
She smiled politely and shook the Welshman's hand. His reassuring lie about their safety may have sounded convincing, but she wasn't buying it for a second.
"Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"
"And just what am I suppose to do then?"
"I don't know." Gwen heaved a sigh. "Unlike me and Ianto, you know the Doctor, so I'm sure he'll find someway in which you can be useful to him." She typed away on the control panel to bring up the Doctor's cell phone number which all the lines in the UK had been dialling simultaneously just a short while ago.
Seto entered the digits into his makeshift space hopper to transport him into the vicinity of the TARDIS' location before he then began to tamper with the electronics once again. Now that he wasn't in too much of a rush, he could focus on the time travelling aspect of it so that he arrived at the same point Jack had travelled to as he was sure that the captain and the timelord would have covered a lot of ground over the minutes that had since passed. Just how did he get his contraption to work again? I'm pretty sure that quack said that it would revert back to its useless state after the final jump.
Now satisfied that his adjustments were complete he took a moment to make sure that he really had made amends with his 'short-lived' colleague. "I'm really sorry about my behaviour back then."
"Back when?" Gwen laughed mockingly, pretending that she didn't have a clue about the incident he was referring to.
"Exactly." Seto smiled back, getting the feeling that she too was one of very little words when it came to apologies, whether it was making or accepting them. Thinking back to just a moment ago, he should have known that things between them were okay by the way she had used the affectionate name towards him which had once been abandoned after their fallout.
"So is she the one?" Gwen asked gesturing over her shoulder to where Kisara and Ianto stood shaking hands.
"Definitely." The CEO nodded in reply. He was extremely glad that the knocked up device had brought them both to the hub but couldn't be sure that it would work a second time. "Which is why I wanted to ask if you'd both take care of her while…?"
"Don't leave her here!" His words were interrupted by the low volume controlled exclamation from his friend. "Take her with you Seto, it's not safe here. The Daleks are about to break through our defences any moment now and they'll annihilate the whole place."
"Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"
"Jack left you both here knowing this?!" Seto was appalled that the captain would do such a thing. At least now he knew why they had been scared senseless and armed with the two machine guns when he and Kisara had first arrived.
"No." Gwen shook her head sadly and tried to control the frown on her face. "We were using a subwave network to contact the Doctor when the Daleks managed to trace us through it just before Jack left. Instead of notifying him of the situation which would have delayed, - or possibly even stopped him from going, - we kept that tiny bit of information to ourselves. The fate of the world is at stake here, to tell him would have jeopardised everything…"
"So you willingly condemned yourselves to death by staying here?" He didn't want to even think about losing more people in his life that he felt a connection with.
"Our deaths will be worth it." She tried to remain strong but could no longer look her friend in the eye, "It's his belief of coming back to us which keeps him fighting…"
"And when he returns to find you both dead it will destroy him!"
Gwen shook her head. "He'll see the wider scale of things and understand why we did what we did." The disapproving look she received didn't agree with her. "These Dalek things are virtually unstoppable; the only fate that you can expect when being attacked by them is to die…"
"Who told you that?"
"Jack."
"And how would he know?"
"Because he's been up against them himself in the past…"
"Exactly, and he's still alive to tell the tale."
She wasn't going to get anywhere disagreeing with Seto who clearly still wasn't aware of the captain's immortality. Telling him about it herself would be the only way that she could be sure he would stop taking such an optimistic outlook which had the potential to lead the CEO into an earlier grave than what possibly awaited him if the invaders could not be stopped. "There's something that I need to tell you……"
The whole hub seemed to shake, with several bits of debris falling down from above and the Dalek cry now coming directly from behind the huge circular door instead of over the intercoms. "Torchwood will be exterminated!"
"You have to go now!" Gwen ordered loudly as she and Seto raced back over towards the other two. The secret that she had just been about to unveil about her boss left her mind as she focused on making sure that their friend and his true love made it out of the hub before it was too late.
Kisara held on tightly to Seto as he prepared to make the jump that would take them both ever-so-slightly back in time to join up with the captain and timelord. "Come with us." He pleaded both of his friends, not sure if all four of them would make it through the time lapse, but still it had to be worth a try rather than just leaving them here to die a moment later.
"We'll man this place to the very end." Ianto stated confidently. The offer to leave with them was extremely tempting, - after all, who wanted to die before their time? - but his loyalties were anchored to the duties of Torchwood and his captain.
"Go." Gwen instructed as she leant up to kiss her friend one last farewell, lips brushing gently on his cheek. "And remember that to save the world you mustn't tell Jack about what is happening here."
Sadly nodding in agreement to her words and trying not to think about his friends' approaching fate, Seto activated the Dueldisk encased vortex manipulator. The white light enveloped both him and Kisara, and transported them far away, leaving the two Welsh friends on their own.
"Well I don't know about you, but I could certainly do with an Irish coffee to calm the nerves right about now." Gwen had to say something otherwise she would have broken down into tears.
"Sod the coffee; I'd rather just have the whisky on its own." Ianto attempted to smirk but couldn't shift the frown from his face.
The hub shook some more and the Dalek cried out on the other side of the door. "Exterminate! Exterminate!"
"Goodbye Ianto sweetheart." Gwen raised her machine gun and aimed it directly at the huge entrance way, her colleague mimicking the action as the circular door rolled to one side and the firing commenced all round.
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Smoke emitted from the fried circuitry of the Dueldisk as the light faded to leave the two travellers out in the dark street. Seto coughed and spluttered several times as he listened to more hissing complaints of discomfort from his girlfriend before the sight that met his eyes made him turn and drag her down to the ground.
Emerging from their jump had positioned the couple directly behind a Dalek, with a lorry truck and string of parked vehicles to their left, and house fronts to their right. Running was not an option as there just simply wasn't anywhere to go other than down the narrow sidewalk leading in the opposite direction that allowed them no room to manoeuvre if, - make that when, - the invader chose to launch an attack.
He held a hand tightly over Kisara's mouth to stop anymore sounds from leaving her throat as they slumped down on the pavement, out of sight from the dome head that slowly turned to investigate the source of the nose disturbance that it had just heard. Don't look down, don't look down!
With his unspoken pleading chant not having any affect on the Dalek, its eye-stalk began to lower. Almost pushed right up against its knobbly curved metallic body, Seto outstretched one of his already uncomfortably positioned legs and wrapped it around Kisara's to pull them closer inwards. If he could keep them both out of sight of the Dalek's eye, - which he doubted would be able to view the lower area around itself, - then they might just stand a chance of making it out of the situation alive.
Tiny droplets of perspiration began to form on Seto's brow as he fought to remain calm and hide his fear. A task which was made even more difficult when he felt a hot teardrop sliver its way down over several of his fingers and teeth dig into the palm of his hand, making him aware of just how frightened his girlfriend was as she shed the silent tears. I'm so sorry that I dragged you into this.
Just when Seto thought that his heart rate could not increase any faster, he was proven incorrect. The Dalek began to inch backwards from them, presumably to get a better angel to view where they crouched and blast them into eternal darkness. But then the sensation eased a little as he heard footsteps, - running footsteps, - and realised that the Dalek had instead been drawn away as it now focused on the unlucky person to have caught its attention. Unlucky for whoever would soon find themselves stone cold in death, but for him and Kisara this was the chance to bolt for their lives. All they had to do was wait until the merciless killing machine was far enough away for them to get back onto their feet and…
"Exterminate!" The cry rang out through the air.
Seto tilted his head ever so slightly and saw the blue blast shoot out of the Dalek's firing arm, a faint yelp as the unseen target was hit, closely followed by an explosion as the dome was blown away. He used his body to shield Kisara from the flying shrapnel, several pieces hitting his back, though not badly enough to seriously injure him more than a few scratches which added to the scars that where already present. "You okay?" He asked the shaken looking woman who could do nothing but nod frantically at that moment in time.
A kiss was planted on her forehead before the CEO used the side of the lorry truck to pull himself up and glance over to see a brown suited body sprawled on the ground. By the victim's side a blonde haired woman knelt, a huge gun on the ground next to her as she obscured the man's identity from his view. Drawing his attention up the road directly opposite, Seto then saw a man sprinting towards them, carrying an even bigger weapon than that which laid on the ground, his greatcoat flapping in the wind. "Jack!" He gasped in relief.
Now that she was on her feet he turned to grab Kisara's hand, dragging her out to meet up with his friend at the point where the fallen civilian lay. It was only as they approached that he then noticed the red haired assistant, - Donna, he remembered the annoying woman's name to be, - also running over and registered the body on the ground as that of the timelord.
"Get him into the TARDIS, quick." The captain ordered them, looking surprised to see all of the faces of those gathered around the Doctor. "Move!" He added sternly as they just seemed to gawk at one another.
Reaching down Seto began to haul the timelord, who had somehow managed to survive the deadly blast, onto his back. Both Donna and the woman whose name he didn't know helped to keep the injured man in place as they headed over towards the blue call box from the direction which he had seen the red-head running from a moment earlier.
With one hand holding his own weapon, Jack reached down to pick up the other from the ground. "Here, hold this!" He told Kisara, trusting the huge gun that he had just picked up into her grasp, watching as she struggled to hold for a moment before she found a firm hold. Together they stepped backwards following the others whilst staying alert for more Daleks that might be close by.
No! Jack told himself as erotic thoughts about the woman beside him began to enter his mind. If Ianto found out about them then you'll spend the next month or so on decaf. With no sex. Again. And although they hadn't been introduced yet he was fairly certain that the silvery haired young woman was none other than his closest friend's love interest. And if Seto ever found out?....Well, he'd probably team up with Ianto to make sure that you died many slow and painful deaths!
They'd made it into the TARDIS and Seto carefully placed the Doctor down onto the floor. It was no secret that he didn't think too highly of the timelord, especially after the refusal of help when he had pleaded for it, but even he wouldn't have wished for this to watched the wide brown eyes glancing around struggling to stay open, alive and conscious.
"What do we do now?!" Donna's scared voice cried in dismay, hoping that one of them had the answer. "There must be some medicine, or something."
"Just step back." Jack replied as he took the weapon back from Kisara, - who was staring around the gigantic space that she now found herself in, - and then placed them both safely on the three seated chair at the time machine's controls. He turned to make his way over to the blonde who had refused to leave the Doctor's side. "Rose, do as I say and get back."
Rose. So that's her name. Seto listened in on the conversation as he drew his girlfriend closer to himself. Embracing Kisara tightly, his wordless actions spoke out to her that everything was going to be okay; he wouldn't allow anything bad to happen to her. Glancing down over her shoulder he saw a severed hand in a jar which he hadn't noticed the last time he had been in the TARDIS. What the hell?
"He's dying, and you know what happens next." The captain continued trying to urge the woman away.
"What do you mean?" The red-head demanded as she spoke out exactly what the CEO was thinking.
"He can't." Rose continued to refuse to move from the timelord's side as tears weld up in her eyes. "Not now. I came all this way."
All what way? Seto thought as he watched the blonde break down into tears.
"What do you mean? What happens next?" Donna was becoming hysterical now as she fought back her own sorrow whilst trying to get further information out of the greatcoated man.
Not a word was spoken as the timelord raised his hand and glanced at it, turning it over in the air as it started to glow. "It's starting." He gasped painfully and saw tears roll down Rose's cheeks as she too stared at the golden light beginning to protrude from the hand.
"He we go!" Jack exclaimed a little too excitedly. He leapt in to pull the blonde away to join the rest of them as they stood gathered to one side of the time machine. "Good luck Doctor!"
"Will someone please explain what is going on?!" Both Donna and Seto found themselves yelling in unison as they remained clueless to the situation at hand.
"When he's dying, his body, it repairs itself. It changes." Rose explained as she fought more sobs back, the captain's arm wrapped around her shoulder providing comfort to the friend whom he hadn't seen since before his original death on the Game Station.
Changes? Seto hated not knowing and understand what was happening around him. It made him uneasy and resentful at not being in control like he was normally on a day to day basis. And yet he should have known by now to expect such things when being around the Doctor or Jack. Or even Kisara for that matter.
"I'm sorry, it's too late." The timelord apologised pulling himself back to his feet as he grabbed tightly to the control panels. "I'm regenerating." With that he let go and his whole body seemed to burst into a golden light.
The sight made Kisara bury her face into Seto's chest, and he too turned away not wanting to witness what he assumed would soon be an unpleasant scene. To his side he saw Jack with the other two women, both of whom were also shielding their view as they huddled together with the captain. He watched his friend also looking away from the bright explosion of light, eyes scrunched shut but curiously opened to peek back several times.
Not wanted to glance back himself for fear of seeing the timelord in unimaginable pain and agony from whatever was happening at that very moment, Seto watched as he saw the light reflect on his friend's face until it stopped. He then watched as the captain's eyes opened extremely wide as they stared over to where the timelord had been. The reaction was shortly mimicked by the two women in his arms.
Still unsure of what to expect and letting his curiosity get the better of him, Seto also turned his view back to see what had become of the Doctor.
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Ianto: KG can not take full credit for plot events and dialogue used from here on as Russell T. Davies did most of the hard work when he wrote the episodes of season four of Doctor Who were this fanfic is now overlapping.
Seto: Why are you typing up her author's notes and responses?
Ianto: To make sure that she doesn't forget to add them again like she did last chapter and a previous one before that.
Seto: It's not your responsibility to keep tabs on her fics, she's the one who should drag her head back down out of the clouds since attending that stupid convention…
Ianto: Are you going to continue to stand there and complain her?
Seto: Pretty much. (evil grin) Call it payback for all the crap she puts me through in her ridiculous stories.
Ianto: Well it's going to irritate me, so why don't you go and play Duel Monsters with Janet? Just make sure that she doesn't eat the cards.
Seto: No thanks.
Ianto: Well in that case you could always go and brush the hair of KG's My Little Pony collection, or play a round of naked hide and seek with Jack.
Seto: (looks horrified at both suggestions) Card games with the Weevil it is then. (hurries off)
Ianto: doctorwho29 – In response to the planets in the sky, the answer is simply that KG forgot about this fact as she did not bother to re-watch the entire episode before choosing to overlap the two fandoms. I'll make sure that it's added to her 'list of irks' as she calls it, and thank you for pointing it out.
starwefter – Is Kisara going to say 'yes' ? Well KG definitely likes to make things difficult/unpleasant/complicated, - pick your choice of word, - for Seto in her fics. However I have been nagging at her to give him a break, so we'll just have to wait and see what happens. And thanks for the heads up about the Japanese Yu-Gi-Oh! episodes. It is very much appreciated but YouTube will not allow her to play them as they are 'not available' to our country. (sigh) Just another disadvantage of living in Wales, though I suspect it is more likely a whole of the UK thing.
Isis the Sphinx – It would be rude to leave you out, so I'll thank you on KG's behalf for sticking with this story and reviewing, even when there were times when you felt it slow going.