Previously...
Suddenly, there was a sudden rush from outside and the team dashed out to take a look. The sleek silver pod was hurtling towards the centre, with the burnt remnants of a Primord clinging to the side of it.
"That's the pod!" Alan exclaimed in amazement, "Meaning that the Doctor's inside it..."
"Should I blast it?" Laura asked Tara, glancing at the rocket launcher she had brought.
"No. We need to find the Doctor and see what's happened." Tara instructed, "For now, hide in the jeep."
The pod crashed into the nearby meadow, rolling towards a small stream. Thankfully it stopped a few metres away, the remnants of the Primord rolling into the river. Tara, Laura and Alan arrived five minutes later, with a laser scalpel. Alan used the scalpel to slice open the pod, to reveal the Doctor: he looked exactly like a Primord, with black hair and emerald green eyes. The Doctor stumbled out, collapsing to the floor. The team stared at their leader in shock.
"What do we do now?" Alan asked Tara, gazing at the body.
"I don't know." she replied.
Redgrove
Episode Two: Only the Dead
Featuring the Redgrove Doctor, Tara Watson, Professor Alan Ryder and Laura Neasden
Two days later...
Tara stared at the unconscious body of the Doctor, which had been laid down on a table in the morgue. But this wasn't what she was expecting him to look like: he looked like some sort of primordial monster, with long black hair and forest green eyes. He had sharp fangs and claw-like hands.
"Doctor, I really want you to come back as your old self." she said, hoping that nobody would notice, "I'm the second in command and so now I'm in charge of Redgrove. I don't know what to do though. I can't cope with bearing responsibility for Alan and Laura. And if you don't come back, then I have no idea what the hell's gonna happen next."
After a few more moments, Tara re-entered the main lab, where Laura and Alan were sat, looking up at her.
"How is he?" Alan asked, hoping for a good answer.
"Not good. He hasn't made any recovery since two days ago so now I'm in charge." Tara explained, "Any calls yet?"
"Only one." Alan explained, "There's been a missing persons case at Abbey Marston. Apparently the owner of the nearby caravan site has uncovered something and went missing."
"I see. Alan, with me. Laura, stay here and contain the Doctor." Tara instructed, heading to the green Redgrove jeep with Alan.
At Abbey Marsden, Jack Crawford had taken two pistols and had headed towards the stone circle. He noticed a dead body that had been placed on the altar within the circle and headed towards it curiously. But, as soon as he entered the circle, a ring of green light linked the stones together, preventing him from escaping.
"THE STATIC IS ALIVE!" the dead body cried, standing up with glowing green eyes, "AND IT LIVES THROUGH ME!"
The body stood up and lunged towards Jack. He fired several times at the body yet it did not fall down.
"What is the Static?" he demanded, "What do you want?"
"DOMINATION!"
Alan and Tara arrived and headed towards the stone circle, where Jack was wrestling with the dead body. They couldn't penetrate the circle but immediately noticed the fight that was going on.
"Hey, what do you think you're doing?!" Tara yelled, "And who the hell are you?!"
"Jack Crawford!" he cried back, shoving the body away, "Are you Redgrove?"
"What's left of it. Do you know how we can get in the circle?"
"No idea. Maybe duck under the green beams?"
The two of them shared a look and then ducked under the beams, before Tara took out two pistols and fired them at the body continuously, until it collapsed to the ground. Alan, meanwhile, set up a station on the altar and activated a sonic tracer, which detected anomalous energy by bleeping in a high tone. The tracer exploded.
"There's an unprecedented amount of energy in this stone circle," he said to Tara, before asking Jack, "Do you know what exactly is going on here?"
"No, I don't. That's why you got called in though, isn't it? You find out what happens when other people have no clue." he answered, "But I've seen far more than you want me to so now you've got a choice."
"And what choice would that be?" Tara wondered, questioning why Jack seemed so authoritative despite having no power.
"You can either recruit me or leave me in the outside world. Which one would you rather pick?"
Alan, Tara and Jack were now examining the altar very carefully and had discovered a control console underneath the altar, which was littered with levers and buttons that could control the strange machine they had found.
"Do you want to do the button mashing or shall I?" Tara asked the other two.
"May I?" Alan wondered, stepping forward.
"Please, be my guest."
He studied the instruments for a few moments and then pulled a large red lever towards him, which clearly started to operate the machine. The altar began to glow a bright green and Tara gestured to Jack to place the corpse onto the altar. The eyes of the corpse glowed a bright green and the body sat up, gasping for air.
"Why do you keep bringing me back?" it demanded, "I want this torture to end!"
"Who are you?" Tara wondered, aiming a pistol at it.
"My name is Michael Stephenson and I own a lovely little caravan site just a few miles away."
"So you're why we're here then?" Alan asked, "Because we came after you went missing. Also, who are the Static?"
"THE STATIC IS HUNGRY AND WE SHALL DOMINATE THIS PUNY LITTLE WORLD!" Michael cried, his voice sounding crackly and muffled, before returning to normal and wondering, "What did I just say?"
"The Static just spoke through you." Jack deduced, "The stone circle must introduce the Static into the dead person's brain."
"So tell me how I get it out of me." Michael demanded, before screaming in the crackled voice, "THE STATIC SHALL NEVER DIE! THE STATIC SHALL NEVER DIE!"
Tara then decided what to do. She fired two bullets at Michael, making his dead body fall to the ground. The green mist that held the Static drifted back into the altar and Tara, Jack and Alan walked off, preparing to seal off the area.
Once they had sealed off the area and returned to Redgrove HQ, Tara, Jack and Alan noticed that Laura was stood next to the Doctor, who looked exactly like he did prior to his transformation into a Primord.
"Err, who's this?" the Doctor wondered, pointing at Jack.
"This is Jack Crawford. I've recruited him as my second in command. Can he stay? And how did you become normal again?" Tara asked, asking the question everyone else, apart from Laura, was wondering.
"I can explain." Laura said.
And so she did.
THE END
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