Chapter Forty-Seven
"It's 7.28," Bishop said, checking his watch. "Coronation starts in a few hours. If we're going to figure out what's causing this, we need to get a move on."
Zoe bobbed her head in agreement. "I completely agree. But give us a minute first."
"Agent Scully –"
"There's no point in us going into whatever it is that's ahead of us without me and him –" Zoe pointed at Jack who was halfway down the street beneath a streetlamp, hands in his pockets and back of his head rhythmically thumping against the metal poll. "Being in alignment on things. This'll take five minutes tops. In the meantime, practice calling me Zoe since Scully actually isn't my name."
Bishop blinked. "It's not?"
"I'm not about to hand out my real name to people pointing a gun at me now, am I? C'mon, Detective Inspector, use your brain." She shook her head and caught Tommy's eye. "Stay with them, Tommy. I need a second with my mate over there. I'll be back before you know it."
"Yes, ma'am."
"And you can call me Zoe too," she said, backing away from them. "I'm not old enough to be called ma'am."
A small wink from her had Tommy looking down at his feet, a small grin curling across his face even as he blushed. Turning around, she crossed the road and made her way swiftly to Jack who turned his head and watched her approach, an easy smile resting on his face that she didn't buy for a second. Once upon a time when they were new to each other and still finding out how they fit together that smile would have been enough to assure her that everything was all right. But they had been through too much for her to believe it now and she raised her eyebrows in response, watching the smile drip from his face.
"Don't fuss," he said when she reached him. "I'm fine."
"The Doctor says I say I'm fine so often that it's lost all meaning to him now," Zoe told him. "I think I finally understand what he means. What was that about just now?"
"He was taking a swing at you," Jack replied. "I wasn't about to let him hit you."
"And it's much appreciated but you know that's not what I'm talking about." She stepped closer and reached for him, looping her fingers lightly around his wrist, tips of her fingers pressed over the thin flesh of his pulse point. "That wasn't just because some racist twat took a disliking to me. That felt as though it'd been building for a while."
He rested his head against the street lamp and stared at the houses opposite them.
"Didn't you ever get tired?" Jack asked, breath rushing from him in a sigh. "In France with everything so out of date for you, didn't you ever just want to scream?"
"Who says I didn't?" His eyes flicked to her. "I hated the 1700s. When I first arrived, everything was awful. I didn't have a hot bath for the entire time I was there: No matter what the servants tried, it was never the same. And the hygiene – God, Jack, it was so fucking awful. I was lucky because Louis was all about the hygiene and had these Turkish bath things so it wasn't too unusual when I was asking for a bath every other night but, honestly, it was awful. But his personal hygiene didn't change the fact that he kept actual slaves in the palace and couldn't see why I'd be upset about it because it wasn't like I was from Africa. Reinette begged me not to say anything to him. I think she was afraid he'd throw me out and then she'd be forced to choose but how the hell could I keep quiet when there were slaves living under the same roof I was?"
Jack shifted and slid his hand up, taking hers and linking their fingers. "What happened?"
"Louis listened to me yell and rant and threaten him with a patience I'm not sure many monarchs of that time would've tolerated," Zoe replied. "I think I actually told him I'd burn the French monarchy to the ground and France with it if he didn't start acting like a decent human being." Her shoulders lifted in a small shrug, the memory of Louis calmly watching her as she stumbled over her French in her anger sweeping through her. "And once I was done telling him how awful he was, he freed them, retroactively paid them for their services and gave them enough money to help set them up for life. It wasn't enough to make up for them being in chains in the first place but it helped a little, I think. I hope."
"I'm sure it did," he said, looking at her with soft exhaustion behind his eyes. "Sometimes I want to scream or yell or whatever. The 21st century – this time – it's harder than I think it needs to be at times."
"I understand," Zoe said, softly. "It's not easy being out of your own time."
"Just sometimes." He closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. "The TARDIS helps because she's so much more advanced than anything I've seen before and it's comforting but other times with the technology that's so slow – seriously, I don't know how you get anything done with computers that move at a glacial pace – and the backward thinking nonsense. Mickey doesn't want to tell anyone on the estate about us because he thinks it'll be a problem."
She frowned. "Yeah, he might be right about that."
"They know that you're bisexual," he pointed out.
"And I get called a dyke for it behind my back," she said. "Sometimes even to my face but that's less normal because I think people are afraid of Mum and Rose."
He snorted. "That means they've got some common sense."
Zoe shuffled in closer to his body and his head dropped to rest on her shoulder. "I know it's hard, and I'm sorry it is. I'll make sure we spend more time in a more enlightened time for a while. Give you a bit of a break from all this."
Guilt started to press in on him, not used to getting what he asked for and having people make accommodations for him. "It's not so bad."
"Except sometimes it is and you just need to not be here for a while," she said, reaching up to scratch his neck comfortingly. "Like I said, I get it."
"Thank you," Jack said, quietly. "I appreciate you."
Zoe smiled, resting her cheek on the top of his head. "I should be thanking you too. Mr Connolly was going to smack me one and can you imagine what the Doctor would've done to him when everything's fixed and I turn up with a black eye?"
"Jesus." That was something Jack didn't want to see. "He'd go all Oncoming Storm on him and I don't think humans are meant to survive that."
"It is best saved for the Daleks," she agreed, giving his hand a squeeze, aware that time was slipping away from them. "If you're sure you're fine –?"
"It's out of my system now," he told her, straightening up. "I promise I won't slam any more racists into a wall."
"Slam away, that's not the part that bothered me," she said, pausing as her eyes flickered over his face. "You know, sometimes I forget that you're not always all right. You're always in a good mood and nothing ever seems to affect you that I forget you still get frustrated with things. Don't feel that you need to hide it from us, yeah? We're your family, we can handle it. It's okay to not be okay all the time."
Jack studied her hand, her wedding ring glinting in the pale light. "That sounds like Yatta."
"Of course it is," she grinned. "Everything wise and sensible that comes out of my mouth is either her or Reinette."
"Not the Doctor?"
She rolled her eyes. "Please. You know the Doctor, what do you think?"
"Good point." He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed her knuckles. "I really am fine though. It was a momentary loss of temper that I'd appreciate you not telling Mickey about. He worries too much about me."
"Can you blame him given recent events?"
"No, which is why I don't want him to worry about things he doesn't need to," Jack said. "And you don't need to either."
"Easier said than done but all right," Zoe said, trusting that he knew what was best for him and acutely aware of time. "But we do to need to talk about what we're going to do when we catch up with whoever's behind this. I've got some idea about what I'd like to do but none of them are Doctor sanctioned."
He huffed a laugh. "Yeah, mine either."
"I can't –" the words lodged in her throat, a shame she had only shared with the Doctor choking her, and she rubbed her chest through her jacket to ease the pressure. "Something happened in the parallel universe that means I don't trust myself right now to make the right decisions. I hate to ask this, especially because they're your family too, but I need you to keep me in line. Don't let me – don't let me do something I'll regret."
Jack turned his head and stared at her, worry lines creeping into his brow. "You never said anything. What the hell happened back there?"
"It was –" she swallowed, mouth dry and tacky, Lumic's hoarse, weak scream as he fell out of his wheelchair, gasping for breath, pressing into her. "I did something...something bad."
"You don't have a bad bone in your body," he said, wrapping his arms around her and holding her against his chest. She shuddered at the warm, familiar smell of him that helped to keep her trauma at bay: It was bad enough suffering through the nightmares and the Doctor's concern without having it happen during the day as well. "Is this about Ryga?"
"No." Of all the things she had to worry about, Ryga was at the bottom of the list though she was sure he would soon rise as threats were wont to do in her life. Torchwood was her more pressing concern, Bishop's casual mention of them settling a heavy weight in her stomach and reminding her that she still didn't know anything about them. "It's about me and the choices I make. I can't do it again. I can't go through all the aftermath and the doubt and the self-hatred again. So if I start to go wobbly, I need you to stop me."
"Wobbly?" He asked to the top of her head. "What does that mean?"
"You know, wobbly, like on New Earth with the Cat Nuns."
"Oh, wobbly." Bowing his head, he kissed her hair and held her tighter. "And you may not trust yourself right now but that doesn't mean I don't. If you need me to keep an eye on things a little while you sort things out though, I can do that for you."
"I know it's not fair," she said, hands flat against his chest as she looked up at him. "The Doctor, Rose, and Mickey are yours too. I just – right now it's too hard to think straight when all I want to do is find the person or thing who did this and hurt them."
"Hey." Jack's hand smoothed over her back, the other cupping the back of her head. "I've got your back, you know that."
Her eyes softened. "I do, thank you."
"And as for whatever or whoever's causing this, I say we get them to reverse what they've done and then hold them for the Doctor to deal with," he said, thumb pressing into the pressure point behind her ear, slowing her heart rate and helping her breathe easier. "We can always take them back to their planet for punishment like we did with Margaret because I'm assuming alien."
"I'd be surprised if it's not," Zoe said. "And I like that idea. That's actually a good idea."
"Don't sound so surprised," he grinned. "I've been known to have one or two good ideas every now and then. Just ask Mickey."
"No, thank you," she said, quickly, stepping back from him and tugging her jacket down. "Right then. Back to work?"
Jack nodded. "Sooner we do the sooner we get them back."
Taking her hand again, they walked side-by-side back to Bishop, who was checking his watch obsessively, and Crabtree and Tommy, who were awkwardly attempting to make conversation and failing miserable: All three straightened at Jack and Zoe's appearance.
"Sorry about that," Jack apologised. "Needed a quick confab."
"Looked more like hugging to me," Bishop noted.
"Confab, hugging, we can do both," he said. "What time is it now?"
"7.37," Bishop answered. "Coronation starts at 11.15. Whatever your plan is, we need to do it now or else everything will be ruined."
Zoe turned in her heels. "I get that you're under a lot of pressure but the dramatics really don't help. We need clear minds, Detective, and local information. Fortunately, we've got the latter. Tommy."
"Yes, ma'am." A sigh filtered from her throat. "Sorry. Zoe."
"That's better," she said. "How are you doing? Any questions, comments, or concerns you'd like to raise right now?"
"Er –" his eyes flicked to Jack who smiled at him. "No?"
"Are you asking me or telling me?"
"Telling you?" Colour bloomed through his skin at the sight of her raised eyebrows, uncertain how someone was able communicate so pointedly through them. "I mean, I'm telling you. I'm good. I'm fine. I'm okay."
Zoe and Jack exchanged a look.
"You're not but you will be," Zoe said, resting her hand on his shoulder and giving it a reassuring pat. "Now, please tell us about what happened the night your grandmother changed. What was she doing? Did she eat anything, drink anything? Did she seem out of sorts? Even the smallest thing you can remember could be helpful."
Tommy put his trembling hands in his pockets, removing them when he realised a beat too late that it was rude to do such a thing in front of a lady – even if Zoe was like no lady he had ever seen before. Instead, he crossed his arms over his chest and awkwardly hunched in on himself, not sure what he was doing with them but positive he didn't want to go back home. He was aware of his father behind him, still standing outside the house in a state of shock, not even flinching when the paper boy threw the morning newspaper at his feet.
"It was the same as always," he said, finding his voice. "Dinner at five – we had ham, egg, and chips – and then she was just watching the telly for the evening. She loves it because she says it feels as though she's got her friends all in the house with her. They're all dead now her friends. She's the only one left and I know she gets lonely sometimes."
"My mum does that too," Zoe said. "She just puts the TV on so the flat isn't always quiet."
Jack glanced at her. "Really?"
"She's slowly getting used to not having me and Rose underfoot any more," she said with a small shrug.
"Oh." His heart ached for Jackie even as his mind though of his mother sat alone in her kitchen with the sun spilling through the window, alone even though she still had one son left who had needed her. Dragging himself from his memories and guilt, he focused on Tommy. "Did you get the TV from Magpie's Electricals?"
"Yeah, we did, from the back of his van," Tommy answered. "How did you know that?"
"Because that's what everything is being linked back to so far," Jack said. "Whatever's happening seems to have its epicentre at that shop. Did you go in or get it from his van?"
"His van," Tommy said. "Which was weird, y'know? Sometimes we have shops come through in vans but from the bakery and stuff like that. But he was knocking on doors and bringing people out to look at the sets in his van. I remember it was weird because Dad –" he stumbled, risking a glance over his shoulder to see that Mr Connolly was slumped on the front porch, head in his hands. "He said it was a strange way to go about selling TVs and next thing we know, we won't have to leave the house to do our shopping."
"You're right, that is weird," Zoe lied. "But, with your gran, when did you notice that something was wrong with her –?" She gestured at her face. "Did it happen straight away, or was it more like a gradual fade?"
"I don't know, I think it was instant but I don't know," he said, fiddling nervously with the open cuffs of his sleeves, rolling them up his forearms. "We found her in the morning. Mum did, I mean. She screamed and that's what woke me up. I came downstairs and saw Gran just – just sitting there in her chair with the TV still going."
"How could a TV do this?" Bishop asked. "It doesn't make sense."
"Not right now it doesn't. Give it time though," Jack said, casting his eyes around the street. "Rose was right. Everyone and their mother seems to have a TV aerial attached to their houses. If Magpie was going around selling them off cheap, my bet is they're a conduit of some kind."
"Have you ever come across face sucking?" Zoe asked him. "You've been about the block a bit more than me."
"Polite way to say I'm older than you."
"By what, like three years?"
"Hush now, your elder is speaking, show a little respect." Jack rubbed his jaw, mind turning over the information they had. "And no, by the way, I haven't seen anything resembling face sucking. The closest I can think of that we've encountered is what – Momo? The Zygons?"
"The Zygons don't really suck your face off they more cover a person in slime and cocoon you," she said, still bitter about her first encounter with the Zygons shortly after meeting Jack. The slime had taken hours to scrub off and every meeting with a Zygon since then had reinforced her first negative impression of them. "And Momo – I don't know. Maybe? She was an artificial intelligence gone wrong though. These TVs...maybe there's something living in them but I don't know if that makes any sense. God, this is so much easier when the Doctor's here to be all actually, they're a blah-blah-blah from the planet blah-blah-blah."
"That does sound like him," Jack said, dryly. "Whichever way we look at it, I keep coming back to alien."
"I agree."
"And what's the betting our idiots walked straight into the middle of it all at Magpie's shop?"
"Fairly high knowing them," she said, rubbing the bridge of her nose where a headache was settling in. "Remind me to have a word with the TARDIS when we get back. It's all well and good her having fun but she could at least give us a warning when she throws us into these situations. Like a flashing light or something. She was much better behaved when it was just the two of us. You know, sometimes I think she's jealous."
Jack's eyebrows lifted. "Of what, you?"
"God no," she scoffed. "Just that she's not the centre of the Doctor's attention any more. More people on board, the less one-on-one time she gets with him. I swear she flooded the kitchen the other day just so he'd go crawling about to fix her. It's perverse."
"Ah." Amusement settled in him and he couldn't wait to tell Mickey about this. "You're jealous."
"Piss off."
"What's the matter, did she interrupt some one-on-one time of your own?"
Her eyes narrowed. "Yes, actually, but I'm not jealous."
"If you say so," he said, cheerily.
"I do."
"Okay then."
Zoe opened her mouth to retort before she snapped it shut with a click, aware that he was teasing her.
"Are you two done?" Bishop asked, pointedly. "Because everything's linking back to this shop. We looked at it earlier because the proprietor seemed nervous and a little sketchy – who sells TVs out the back of a van? – but we didn't find anything out of the ordinary."
"You wouldn't," Jack said before pausing. "You had a look around without a warrant?"
"A discreet one."
Zoe nudged him. "Like we're any better."
"We're not police officers," he said. "Just concerned citizens."
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes, turning instead to Tommy to ask him to lead them to the shop. With Jack at her side, their shoulders brushing together as they walked, she felt confident that they would be able to fix what had been done to their friends and to all the other innocent people who had had the misfortune of crossing Mr Magpie's path. The worry she held over her lack of clear judgement was abated in Jack's presence, trusting in him not to let her doing anything she would live to regret, conscious that she still had some ways to go before she was able to trust herself again.
Jek.
Lumic.
Ryga.
Three men who had been affected by her lack of judgement and lack of control, her emotions getting the better of her when she was in a more vulnerable state. She knew that being tired and stretched thin wasn't an excuse for what she had done to Jek, nor was her fear an excuse for what she had done to Lumic, and she dreaded to think what it was that she would do to make Ryga hate her so much.
She wanted to be better.
The Doctor's sweet words about forgiving herself were easier said than done; though, she supposed he was better aware of that than most.
Never cruel nor cowardly, she thought to herself as they approached Magpie's shop, holding onto the words of the Doctor's promise tightly. Never give up, never give in.
Repeating it on a mantra in her mind, she took in the shop that had seen better days. She found herself sweeping the area with her eyes, looking for anything out of the ordinary and finding nothing. Turning her gaze to the ground, she searched for the Doctor's screwdriver, hoping to catch a glimpse of the sunlight bouncing off its metallic surface but there was nothing. No matter what happened, they wouldn't be able to leave 1953 without it, particularly since she knew that Torchwood was sure to be on their way when they heard about what had happened.
It was bad enough they had a weapon potentially capable of taking out a Sycorax ship in 2007 without adding the Doctor's altered Time Lord technology into the mix.
"Here it is," Tommy said, the five of them stopped on the street outside Magpie's Electricals that did not look as though it could afford to practically give TVs away. "It's been here for ages. I think he set it up before the war started."
"Bad time to start a business," Crabtree said.
Zoe turned to him, startled. "Honestly, I forgot you were even here. You're extremely quiet."
"Don't say much," he replied. "Bothers the wife when I talk."
"Happy wife, happy life," Zoe said. "I know that feeling."
Bishop rattled his knuckles against the glass door and peered inside. "It's locked. No one's home."
"Perfect." Zoe stepped up onto the pavement and looked in through the main window, using the sleeve of her jacket to wipe away some of the dirt. "Jack, could you boot the door open for us?"
"Not like you to pass up a chance to kick a door in," Jack observed, reaching into his pocket and removing his small lock picking kit that, along with his emergency first aid kit, went everywhere with him. "Sometimes you and Rose actually fight about who gets to kick a door open."
"It's these damned shoes," she complained. "Next time I try to wear something impractical like this, stop me."
Jack settled on his knees and began to pick the lock, ear placed against the door to hear the gentle click of the locking mechanism.
"Not a chance. You look smashing –" she snorted at the slang he was testing out, always enjoying his forays into 21st century colloquialisms. "And it made the Doctor's eyes go like that cartoon wolf , all – awooga!"
She laughed. "He's always very enthusiastic about my fancies."
"Is he now?" The lock gave way beneath his tools and the door opened an inch. "You'll have to tell me more about that later."
She pinched his ear as she passed him, pushing the door open. "Nope."
The dense, musty smell inside the shop reminded Zoe of the taverns she used to frequent in Paris that she would never have dared to take Reinette to: The places they visited were more upscale even if she let her wife believe they were slumming it. Her nose twitched at the smell of faintly burnt metal, something having recently been soldered together, and she cast a critical eye over the dark polished wood. Dust drifted through the air, caught in the sunbeams of the early morning, drawing a sneeze from Bishop who groaned and muttered something about allergies as he dug his handkerchief out.
All was still and quiet.
There was no sign that there had been a disturbance the night before. If the others had put up a fight, if what had happened to them had even happened there, Zoe wasn't able to tell. Behind her, Tommy quietly shut the door, edging into the room with a nervousness she recognised from people like herself, Jula, and Lorna: People thrown into an adventure they weren't ready for, trying desperately to get their footing underneath.
She wasn't worried about Tommy though.
He seemed like the sort who was able to roll with the strange and unusual.
"You can let go of that," Jack said, breaking the silence and nodding at the gun Crabtree held in front of him, slender barrel pointed towards the ground. "We're not here to shoot anyone, we're here to question them."
Crabtree's fingers flexed. "We also believe they're responsible for removing the faces of people all over this part of London. If they're capable of that, what else are they capable of?"
"That's a good point," he agreed. "But having a gun out means you're more likely to shoot first and ask questions later. And how are we supposed to ask this man questions if he's dying? Holster it, officer. If we have need of it, I trust you'll be quick on the draw."
Crabtree hesitated, eyes sliding to Bishop to receive his orders.
"Do as he says," Bishop said after a moment's though. "We need answers and we can't get them from a dead man." Slowly, Crabtree relaxed his grip and slid the weapon back into the holster clipped to his belt as Bishop moved further into the ship. "Mr Magpie, are you here?"
Silence was their only response.
"Maybe he's out," Tommy said, clearing his throat nervously. "Or at home. It's still early. He could be in bed."
"Could be," Zoe replied, watching Jack hop the counter to begin his search through the drawers and cupboards. He pulled them open one-by-one and rifled through the contents with a careless disregard for organisation, not worried about Magpie knowing he had been through them. "What are you looking for? He's not going to keep anything incriminating out in the open like this."
"Maybe, maybe not. People are weird when they're caught up in something. They get complacent, lazy." He held out his hand without looking up, fingers waggling. "Phone please."
She pressed it into his hand and turned to look at the TVs lining the wall. Out of date by her time – historical relics almost – but shiny and new in 1953 where everything appeared normal and nothing seemed to be out of place. Yet she had spent her formative adult years learning through experience that even the most normal, humdrum, boring things were able to hide the weird, the wonderful, and the dangerous. She reached out to touch one of the screens, ready to tap her knuckles against it when Tommy kicked something across the floor, the skittering clatter turning her away.
"Sorry." Red stained his cheeks as he dropped to a crouch, picking the Doctor's sonic screwdriver up between his thumb and forefinger. "What's this? Do you think it's important?"
"Yes." Zoe snatched it from his hands, curling her fingers around it and breathing easier at proof they were on the right track. The others had been in the shop as the Doctor would never drop his sonic screwdriver, not unless he had to. "Thank you. This is – it belongs to our friend."
Bishop stared at it, attempting to make sense of what it was only to give up in confusion. "What is it?"
"It's – um – it's –" she glanced to Jack who shrugged helplessly before disappearing beneath the counter to drag something heavy out. "A family heirloom. Not that interesting really. It holds sentimental value to my boyfriend, that's all."
"Good job we got it back," Jack said, voice muffled from behind the counter. "He can be a right pain in the – got it!" Standing up with dust in his hair, Jack set a rectangular box down on the counter. "That was tucked away right at the back but look at this beauty."
Crabtree frowned. "What is that?"
"No idea," he said, running Zoe's phone over it to scan the interior workings. Checking the results, he hummed lightly and met Zoe's eyes through the motes of dust suspended in the sunbeams. "It's like we thought. The design isn't human. Built by a human, no doubt about that, but there's no way someone of this time could've come up with this because this baby's advanced. And not regular advanced but advanced advanced."
"Time Lords?"
"Less advanced than them," Jack conceded. "Think Grifari with a splash of Omni thrown in for good measure."
"Huh." Zoe slipped her glasses onto her face and bent at the waist to examine it closer, realising her mistake at the last moment when the sounds of two men and a teenage boy choking behind her reminded her that she wasn't wearing clothes suitable for bending over in. Mildly embarrassed, she straightened up and ignored the small, unfurling grin on Jack's face. "What does it do?"
"Are we skipping over the bit when you said it isn't human?" Bishop asked. "And that's the second time you've said this time. Who are you people? Really though. No lies. Who are you?"
Jack caught his sigh in his chest. "Who we are doesn't matter as much as what we can do. It'd take far too long to tell you the truth, longer still for you to believe it. All you need to know is that we're people who can help. If it helps, just ignore the talk of aliens and time and chalk it up to us being eccentric."
Aware that there was more to what was happening than could easily be explained away, Bishop wanted to know yet, at the same time, he shied from the truth. He was overworked and underpaid as it was and with a household of nearly a dozen people to take care of on his salary, the thought of adding more to his plate sent exhaustion pulsing through him. Except, faces were being stolen, Torchwood was whatever Torchwood was – everyone in the police and military had heard the rumours about them, knew to call them in when something strange happened and the only reason he hadn't was because his superior officers didn't trust them not to make the situation worse – and he had two strangers talking about aliens and time.
"I –"
"Detective Inspector." Zoe looked up from her examination of the machine and fixed him with a look over her glasses that reminded him of his grammar school teacher. "Once you know, you can't ever unknow."
He held her eyes, wondering if it was worth knowing the truth, curious if she had been a normal woman before whatever it was dragged her into a life where she spoke about aliens and time freely. He thought about his wife at home – Angela with her round face and bright laugh and German-accented English when she was tired at the end of the day and how she made everything better – and he wondered if knowing would mean that he was still the same man she married twenty-six years ago.
Nothing was worth losing her and so he shook his head.
"We're running out of time," he said, turning his watch to face him. "It's 8.12 now."
The smile Zoe gave him was soft and full of understanding, a hint of respect in her eyes for making the choice that he had, and she turned back to the machine, poking it with the screwdriver.
"This is where their faces were taken. I don't know how but this is definitely involved." Looking down at the screwdriver, she noticed the light blinking and swiped her thumb up the side to check the readings. "This is interesting. It looks like there's a pretty big power source in this room that's not coming from our new toy there. Here, take a lo–"
Jack caught the screwdriver as it dropped from Zoe's startled fingers, the television screens lining the wall crackling to life. The sharp, artificial light of the screens cast the room in an eerie glow broken only by the sunlight stretching in long beams across it. On each TV set there was, a different face, and Zoe's eyes flicked across them in turn, mouth parted in surprise.
Their mouths moved silent, some of the crying for help, others merely talking, already used to the loneliness and using conversation with themselves to stop from going mad wherever they were.
A brush against her shoulder and Tommy stepped past her, crouching down in front of the face of his grandmother, fingertips lightly touching the screen. Behind the counter, a tight sound throttled Jack, his eyes focused up high. Following his gaze, she found Mickey's trapped within the TV set too much for her to bear, and her eyes shifted, searching, until she found her sister.
The syllables of her name formed on Rose's mouth, Zoe's fingers reaching out to touch the screen as an empty grief throbbed inside of her: She was alive but trapped and Zoe didn't know how she was going to get her out of there. Lightly tracing the shape of Rose's face with the tip of her index finger, she continued her search until she found the Doctor. Swallowing hard, she knelt in front of him and met his eyes. There was no panic on his face, nothing at all that implied he was anything less than comfortable where he was, and when his eyes met hers, he smiled.
"Hello," Zoe murmured, wanting to feel his arms around her and the double beats of his hearts against her back. "What've you gone and done to yourself now?"
He had no shoulders to shrug and settled instead for dropping his left eye in a small wink that eased the knot of tension in her chest. Somehow, against the odds, he was still alive inside the TV, which meant that whatever had done this to him wasn't killing them for a reason. Their bodies remained alive and unharmed and what appeared to be their consciousness hadn't been swept away into energy. It felt as though they were being saved for something but she didn't know what.
His mouth opened and, briefly, she thought he was trying to tell her something before she realised he was simply popping his mouth, something that usually drove her mad when he did it around her.
Touching her fingers to his lips, he stopped. "We'll save you, I promise."
Behind you, he mouthed, the screens turning off as one.
Dropping her hand from the screen, she turned on the balls of her feet and rose as Mr Magpie stepped into the room, face flashing with annoyance and panic. He opened his mouth to demand to know what they were doing when Jack stepped forwards, grabbed him by the front of his knitted jumper and slammed him against the wall.
"Who do you work for?" Jack demanded, voice low and threatening. "Speak quickly."
"Jesus, what is this, slam people against the wall day?" Zoe asked, making no move to drag him off Magpie who had turned white with fear. "As far as interrogation techniques go, it leaves a lot to be desired."
"I don't know," he mused. "A small dose of fear tends to shake secrets loose. Lets people know that there are other players on the field. Isn't that right, Mr Magpie?"
"I – I – I –" Zoe brushed lint off Tommy's shoulder and smiled at him when he looked up at her, eyes wide with alarm. "There's not – I don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't lie to me," Jack snapped.
"Really, don't," Zoe said. "Just take a moment and look at his face, Mr Magpie." Frightened eyes darted to Jack's face that looked as though it had been carved from stone, anger harshening the lines around his eyes and the set of his jaw. "Does he look like the sort of man you want to be lying to right now?"
Magpie latched onto Bishop and Crabtree. "You're the police, get him off me."
"I don't start until nine," Bishop said, checking his watch. "It's only 8.17 now."
Crabtree yawned. "And I'm not all that bothered about it. Just don't leave any bruises, yeah, mate?"
"Honestly." Zoe clucked her tongue, partly amused but mainly concerned that this was the level of policing in the 1950s. "There'll be no violence, right, Jack?"
"Absolutely," Jack said. "There are so many more ways to hurt a person than physically. But we'll only have to get into that if you don't answer our questions. Because – and I want you to pay close attention to me now – whatever you've done, whoever you're working for, has taken three of the most important people in the universe from me. You've taken their faces and put them in the TVs. I want to how, I want to why, and I want you to reverse it."
"It wasn't me," Magpie whispered, body shaking so hard Jack had difficulty keeping hold of him. "I didn't do it."
"But you know who did it," Jack said, voice soft and gentle and all the more terrifying for it, a whimper falling from Magpie's throat. "I know you're just the middle man. There's no way you built that device without a lot of help. What happened? You get in over your head? There's no shame in that. Happens to the best of us. But now you have a choice: Tell us everything you know and we'll help, or don't tell us and find out about my other methods."
Magpie's breath shuddered from him, face creasing in anguish, and he opened his mouth to –
"This one's thrilling," a voice said from behind them. Zoe and Tommy turned as one, Crabtree raising his gun only for Bishop to force it down: Jack turned slower, one hand kept on Magpie, eyes narrowing at the woman on the screen. Her dark eyes roved over him, painted lips parting lightly, fingers touching the string of pearls around her neck. "And so handsome too. My, my, my. I want to just gobble you up."
"Oh my god," Bishop breathed. "It's the woman off the telly."
"I doubt that, more like whatever it is is using her image," Zoe said, releasing Tommy and stepping in front of him, screwdriver extended as she scanned the woman. "That's interesting. Same results as before but definitely more powerful. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you're the thing responsible for what's happening here."
"That's hardly a reach, darling."
"Who are you?" She asked. "What are you?"
"I'm the Wire," it said.
"Is that supposed to mean something to us?" Jack asked, palm flat against Magpie's chest to hold him in place. "Because it doesn't."
"Not a damn thing," Zoe agreed. "But it doesn't matter who you are, not really. What matters is why you're doing this. What possible reason could you have for sucking people's off but not killing them? What are you using them for?"
"How else am I supposed to gain the corporeal body by fellow kind denied me?" Understanding clicked into place for Zoe and Jack, eyes flicking to the TV screens where the consciousness of its victims lay, waiting to be consumed at the right moment. "And while I would so dearly love to stay and chat, I'm afraid I have an appointment I must keep. No rest for the wicked, isn't that what you lovely people say?"
"You realise that the origin of that proverb means that evil-doers will face eternal punishment, yeah?" Zoe asked. "Which actually fits with what we're going to do to you if you don't let our people go. But, since I'm trying to be a new and improved version of myself, I'm going to make you an offer but I'm going to make it once: Let everyone go, return them to their bodies, and we'll help you with whatever it is you need. Refuse my offer and live with the consequences."
"Do you think you scare me, little girl?" The Wire demanded. "When I'm through eating up every last pretty little morsel of your being, you'll be nothing. Your threats will be words on a breeze."
Jack shook his head slowly. "You're an idiot for not taking her up on that. I've seen her destroy fleets of Daleks and they were actually dangerous. You, stuck in your TV, you'll be ten minutes of work at best."
"We'll see about that."
Having barely moved from her perfect seated position, colour started to seep into the screen and fill in the dark blue of her dress and the red of her lipstick. Behind her, Bishop appeared to be caught in fascination at colour television while Tommy reached for her, curling his fingers into the back of her jacket, the ragged, frightened breathing making her stretch her hand behind her, offering his palm to her. His fingers were clammy but strong when they latched around hers, his warmth at her back as he stared at the Wire from around her shoulder.
"That's a nice little trick," Jack said, boredom dripping from his words. "But double back a second, your own people tried to stop you?"
Pain flashed across her face, quickly hidden behind its human mask. "They executed me. But I escaped in this form and fled across the stars."
"How?" Tommy whispered, breath disturbing the thin hairs on the side of Zoe's neck. "How is this even happening?"
Zoe squeezed his hand in response.
"And got yourself trapped in the television?" Jack noted. "That's a bit of bad luck."
"Ma'am – Zoe." She tilted her head a millimetre to one side, showing that she was listening without taking her eyes off the screen. "Is this what took my gran?"
Slowly, she dipped her head in a nod, his breath shuddering across her neck.
"Soon – soon I shall be free," the Wire claimed. "And I will make them pay for what they've done to me. Them and everyone else."
"How?" Zoe asked. "You're trapped in the TV. You can't –" she cut herself off and checked the sonic screwdriver again. "Delta, theta, beta, gamma, alpha: You've got the whole alphabet jammed into you, haven't you? All of them are coming together but for what?"
"Do you taste that?" Bishop said, suddenly. "It's like – I don't know – something earthy and fresh, like how the air tastes after there hasn't been rain for a while."
"Petrichor," Jack said. "Sixteen points in Scrabble."
"You know, this is reminding me of a situation I lived through once," Zoe said, ignoring the chatter behind her, looking over her shoulder to Tommy and smiling. "Children were going missing and it took me a while before I figured out what was going wrong. These aliens were stealing them off the street and converting them into energy because humans have a distinctive energy feature. We're built with the stuff that others use to power their ships and fuel their agriculture and, in some cases, rebuild corporeal form."
The Wire looked down at her from the screen, the air growing dry and warm, static crackling between Zoe and Tommy's joined hands.
"Aren't you a clever little thing?"
"What about the faces though? Why would it suck people's faces off?" Jack asked, the answer already with him before he finished his questions. "Except we don't eat everything, do we? We'll peel the skins off potatoes and leave bones after eating ribs because that's just the done thing but there's nothing stopping us from eating the skins or sucking the marrow out."
"Exactly," Zoe said, theorising quickly. "But if we're hungry, we're not going to waste time peeling the potatoes. We're just going to boil them as is. That's what it's doing, it's feasting. It's so hungry that it's not stopping to eat politely."
"Like you at theme parks."
"Hey but yeah," she said. "It's been feeding off people, using the television sets all around this area to get energy." Her eyes rolled, annoyed. "God, the Doctor's going to be insufferable when this is over. Talk about idiot boxes."
Bishop turned on Magpie with a fury that had him reaching for his gun. "And you let her do it. You coward, Magpie!"
"I had to!" Red in the face, sweat beading his brow and staining his underarms, he squirmed in Jack's grip. "She allowed me my face. She's promised to release me at the time of manifestation. What was I supposed to do?"
"Not this," Jack snapped. "You could've done anything else and it probably would've been better in the long run."
Tommy tugged on Zoe's hand. "What does that mean?"
"What does what mean?"
"The manifestation?"
"Good point, excellent job for catching that, Tommy, thank you." Zoe twisted back to face the Wire. "What's the manifestation?"
"The appointed time," the Wire said, simply. "My crowning glory."
Jack's eyes slid shut. "Son of a bitch."
"Fuck," Zoe sighed.
Elizabeth Windsor – Lilibet to close friends, family, and David Moyo of 13 St Lawrence's Lane, Bodmin for reasons no one fully understand – was set to be crowed Queen of England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, and other assorted realms at 11.15am that morning. From history, Zoe knew the ceremony went without a hitch and was everything Detective Inspector Bishop hoped it would be for a population suffering from the aftereffects of a war eight years over. It revitalised a handful of industries, helped pump money back into the economy, brought investors back from abroad, and repositioned Britain as a bright and shining beacon after decades spent in stagnation and war.
With a young and beautiful queen at the helm, Britain reshaped itself for the future.
The damage that would be done to the timelines if Elizabeth wasn't crowned, if she or if any others died that day, sent ice washing through Zoe. She wasn't able to see the timelines or feel changes to them the way the Doctor was but she had a vivid imagination, and her mouth turned dry at the prospect of a Britain without Elizabeth II becoming queen. For all that she maintained the status quo – more so the older she got – she was an icon of Britain and the lodestar for many British people who had known nothing else except a queen on the throne.
"Well..." she said into the silence that crackled with energy, her hair tingling against her scalp as it built around them. "This is a problem."
"Does she mean the coronation?" Tommy asked. "Is she going to kill the queen?"
"Not the queen," she said. "At least not yet."
"This is the first time in human history that people have been able to watch something like this on a large scale," Jack said, frowning. "How many millions are going to be sitting in front of their TVs watching it?"
"Millions," Zoe said. "Like the moon landing but not as big yet. Except, the only people who have had their faces taken are those who have a Magpie TV. Detective Inspector, are you sure there are no other cases around London? Is it just here?"
"Positive, ma'am," he said, wiping his sweaty face with a handkerchief. "Crabtree here broke into sealed records back at headquarters to double check when we were told to sweep it under the rug."
"Good man, Crabtree," she replied, giving him a thumb's up. "But that means that the damage would be limited only to people who bought a TV from Magpie. Unless –" she and Jack turned to look at the portable TV. "You don't think that's a –"
"Portable adaptor," Jack finished for her. "I do now. Hook this up to a big enough transmitter and it becomes a big receiver, you could tap into homes all across London. All across Britain. There's your million and more people to absorb. It's smart technology. I'm almost impressed."
"Clever," Zoe said, looking back to the Wire. "So what's your plan at the end of this? You kill a whole lot of people and then what? You're still stuck on Earth."
"You're absolutely right," the Wire said, dryly. "Let me tell you what my plan is so that you can stop me. Dear, I'm not an idiot." Her eyes flicked to Jack "You're clever as well as handsome, I like that. But why fret about it? Why not just relax? Kick off your shoes and enjoy the coronation. Believe me, you'll be glued to the screen."
Zoe knocked Tommy to the ground and hissed in pain as the energy singeing the air reached its pressure point and burst out of the Wire's screen and slammed into her face. It felt like she was sitting too close to a fire, the heat of it warming her skin until it became too uncomfortable to bear it any more but bear it she must. Twisting from side to side, she felt herself weaken, knees buckling beneath her. Distantly, she heard the sounds of the others struggling to fight the effects and worried for Jack and Tommy, the latter of whom had his hand locked around her ankle in a tight grip. Unable to breathe without pain stabbing at her lungs, she fought against the failure that rushed her like a tide.
Doctor, she thought, desperately. I'm sorry.
A stronger surge of energy pulsed into her, her muscles contracting, fingers clamping down around the sonic screwdriver that buzzed in her hand.
"You're armed." A hint of panic broke through the Wire's facade, reaching out to the technology that it recoiled from upon discovering how advanced it was. "She's armed. Withdraw, withdraw!"
Pulling the beam away from the five of them, it pressed itself into the portable adaptor on the counter. Zoe collapsed to the floor, limbs trembling, and she tried to push herself up only to fall back down, vision blurred and teeth vibrating. Magpie's scuffed leather shoes passed across her eyeline, the door opening and closing, before a silence broken only by the ragged breaths of the group and Tommy's small, whining groans of pain descended.
Darkness crept in around the edges of Zoe's eyes and she tried to fight against it.
"Oh no," she murmured, passing out.
Jack woke with a start.
Sitting upright, he sucked in deep lungfuls of air and pressed his molars together in an attempt to stop the small bursts of electricity that ran through them. Light spooled through the room, higher in the sky than it had been, and he fumbled awkwardly for Zoe's phone that lay face down on the ground. Awkwardly thumbing at the screen, his limbs taking a while to receive instructions from his brain, the time flashed at him: 10.24am.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," he swore, scrambling to his knees, the world tilting precariously to one side before he crawled past Bishop and Crabtree to Zoe's still form, Tommy curled around her legs. He paused quickly to check Tommy's pulse and give him a little shake before he turned Zoe onto her side, hand beneath her head as he tapped her cheek. "Zoe. Zoe, wake up. Zo. Zoe. Zoe. Zoe. Zoe. Zo. Zoe."
Her eyes moved beneath her eyelids, mouth parting as she groaned. Relief flooded him at the sound, smoothing her hair back and gently coaxing her back to consciousness. It came to her slowly, piece by piece, before her eyes opened and squinted at him, mouth moving as she tried to get rid of the static that ran over her teeth, muscles sore from clamping down on them. Sliding an arm beneath her back, he helped her sit upright, her forehead falling to rest on his shoulder as she caught her breath.
"All right," she muttered. "Now I'm pissed off."
His quick, surprised laugh warmed her ear. "Yeah, me too. We're running out of time. It's nearly half-ten."
"Fucking fuck," she swore, pulling back from him to touch his face, eyes sweeping over him with obvious concern. "You okay?"
"Headache but I'm fine." Jack pressed a kiss to her forehead, closing his eyes, comforted by the fact he had her even when the others were gone. "Try and get your feet under you, I'm going to check on the others."
Her face opened with sudden concern. "Tommy!"
Scrambling out of Jack's arms, she knelt by Tommy and turned him onto his back, cupping his face with her hands. He felt hot to the touch and there was a pulse fluttering beneath her fingers when she checked. Digging into her pocket, she removed the small pack of wet wipes she kept on her person in the event the Doctor stuck his fingers into things that made him sticky, aware that the difference between him and a toddler often came down to his higher speech, and wiped it over Tommy's face, cooling him down. Eyelashes fluttering against his pale skin, he moaned and struggled to open his eyes.
"Easy does it," Zoe said, gently. "You're okay."
"Ow," he moaned. "My head."
"I've got something for that." Pulling out a strip of pain relief tabs from her pocket – the depths helpfully expanded by the TARDIS for her wearing pleasure – she peeled one off and rubbed it onto his temple. "There we go. You'll start to feel it soon."
"Whoa," Tommy said, blinking his eyes open, colour returning to his cheeks. "What is that?"
"Good, aren't they?" Shifting until she was seated, she helped him sit up, supporting him as he swayed, lightheaded and confused. "Sorry about that. I tried to get you out of the way but no such luck. You'll be fine though. I don't think there's any lasting damage."
"My teeth feel funny."
She pulled his hands away from his mouth. "Don't poke at them. It's just the energy discharge. Give it a few minutes."
"Crabtree can't speak and Bishop's been taken," Jack said, appearing above them to offer them hands up. Zoe grabbed hold of his forearm and managed to get to her feet even as Tommy used her as support, his gangly teenage form heavier than it looked. "Magpie's not here too, neither's the portable TV."
"There's some bad news," Zoe said, swaying on the spot and fixing her gaze on Crabtree who was rubbing at his throat, trying to speak. "Crabtree, you all right?"
"I –" garbled, muffled sounds left his mouth. "Can't –"
Tommy's shoulders tensed beneath the hand she had on them. "Why? What happened just now?"
"That must've been how the Wire feeds," Zoe said. "But the process was interrupted and so it wasn't able to finish, at least not with all of us. It must have taken some of him but not all, the poor bastard." Pushing herself away from Jack and Tommy, she staggered to Crabtree and seized his shoulders. "Do you understand me?" He nodded, pupils blown with panic. "We're going to fix this, I promise. I don't know how yet, but we are." She looked back to Jack and Tommy. "We need to hurry. The coronation is in –" her mind blank. "Shit. How long do we have?"
Jack checked her phone. "Forty-two minutes. It's 10.33 now. Hell, I swear it was dawn not too long ago."
"Time flies when you're trying to prevent mass murder," Zoe replied. "Right, we need to stop the Wire. That is like job numero uno. Rescuing everyone else has to come after that."
"But my Gran," Tommy protested. "Your friends."
"Zoe's right," Jack said, resting a hand on Tommy's shoulders. "We'll save everyone but, right now, we've got to stop the Wire from piggybacking off the coronation. The timelines won't hold if that's affected –"
"And I don't know how to deal with the Reapers," Zoe told them, running her hands over her face. "Okay. Stop the Wire. Save everyone. Have a cup of tea."
"Agreed," Jack said. "First problem, how do we stop the Wire?"
"Was kind of hoping you had an idea or two," she admitted. "Because I'm drawing a bit of a blank unless shutting down the National Grid would work."
"I wouldn't put it past her to have a backup power system and wouldn't shutting down the Grid affect history as well?" He replied. "Millions of people not being able to see it would definitely have a negative effect."
"I hate that you're right about that."
"We don't even know what it is. Normally the Doctor has all of this right up here." Jack tapped his temple with his fingers. "But the two of us can make one Time Lord, no problem. We just have to work the problem." Pacing, he clapped his hands together and pointed at them. "What do we know so far?"
"It sucks people's faces off," Tommy said.
"That's true, it does," he agreed. "And it also leaves their bodies alive, which makes me think that it needs a link between their energy and their bodies. Maybe the bodies are like slow-release carbohydrates? It keeps getting energy in low doses throughout the day to keep a base level of energy."
"Makes sense," Zoe replied. "It also had Magpie build that portable adaptor because it's not strong enough yet to jump out of the TV and into a big transmitter. It needs the help and that buys us some time."
"So how does it get stronger?" Jack asked. "More food."
"And how does it get more food?"
"By using the adaptor to turn a transmitter into a receiver."
"And in 1953 what's used a big transmitter?" Zoe asked. "What's the one place that it would go to make sure that every TV set in Britain could be reached by the time that crown's sitting on Lizzie's head?"
Jack frowned and Zoe stared out the window, their minds churning when –
"Alexandra Palace," Tommy said, their eyes snapping to him. "It'd be Alexandra Palace, wouldn't it?"
"Of course, I'm so stupid," Zoe groaned, remembering a school trip there when she was twelve or thirteen. The only reason had gone was because it was free and she remembered a boring afternoon listening to a dry old woman talking about the history of the building. "Tommy, you're doing fantastic, keep it up!"
"Thank you," he said, uncertainly. "May I ask a question quickly?"
"As long as it's quick."
"You're not – er – you're not on drugs, are you?" He asked, nervousness making him twist his fingers in front of him. Jack stared down at him, surprise and amusement lancing across his face, while Zoe blinked. "It's just your showing a lot of the tells that my school told us to look out for. Stimulants and stuff. It's okay if you are, I just – I only want to know if you're going to crash before we rescue my gran."
"This is brilliant," Jack whispered, closing his eyes to treasure the moment. "Don't say anything, I want to savour this."
"No I'm not on drugs, this is just who I am." Zoe hovered between offence and laughter. "Why would drugs be your first idea and not simply a cheerful personality?"
Jack pressed a hand to his mouth, trying to stuff his laughter back into his mouth.
"Sorry," Tommy apologised, embarrassed. "It was stupid. I was – gran – if you needed more whatever, I'd have got it for you. That's all. I wanted to plan ahead but it's stupid. You're not – you're not like anyone I've met before and I –"
"It's fine," she interrupted, settling on finding the humour in the situation. "You're worried about your gran and don't want some junkie ruining that when the drugs run out. I get it. However, fortunately for all of us, I'm not on drugs. This is just a good education and my boyfriend's tendency to ramble rubbing off me. Although, since we're here, take this as a life lesson for you: Don't do drugs, stay in school."
Jack turned his eyes to the ceiling, rubbing the bridge on his nose. "Jesus. Can we please focus on what's happening? What's Alexandra Palace?"
"The BBC's first regular transmission centre," Zoe explained. "Biggest TV transmitter in North London."
"That sounds like where it'd go," he said. "Can we get there in time?"
"Probably, if you faff around with a car outside," she replied. "Take Crabtree, I need Tommy for something else."
Jack looked at her closely. "You've got a plan."
"I've got an idea of a plan," Zoe said, managing his hopes. "We'll see if it works."
"All right then," he said. "I'll take care of transport. You take care of what you need to. Just...hurry."
"Actually, I thought I'd have a cup of tea and a sit down first," she said, sarcasm falling from her lips. His eyes rolled as he ducked out the door with a silent Crabtree in his wake, Bishop standing faceless and silent in the middle of the room. "Tommy, I need your help to get me some things. You in?"
"Yes, ma'am." Her eyes sliced towards him and colour pricked his cheeks. "Zoe. Sorry. Zoe."
Quickly rattling off a list of items and material she needed, trusting in Tommy to keep it in his head, she dragged a chair out from beneath the counter and sat down on it as she searched for pencil and paper. Flipping open a dog eared notebook, her hand flew across the page as she sketched a design for the idea forming in her mind. If she was able to reverse the energy and create a feedback loop when the Wire attempted to convert the transmitter then she was roughly 63% sure that it would prevent the Wire from executing its plan. Checking the readings from the screwdriver, she swiftly etched out designs for a containment facility within the radio that Tommy set down on the counter in by her along with an armful of copper wiring, rubber tubes, nails, and tape.
"What are you going to do?" Tommy asked, breathless, jumping when the engine of the car outside backfired and Jack leapt back from the bonnet with black soot covering his face. Crabtree ducked beneath the raised bonnet and kept working as Jack spluttered. "What's this for?"
"You know how the Wire has a portable TV thing?" She asked, slipping off her shoes and standing barefoot on the dirty floor, popping open the tool case Magpie helpfully kept beneath the counter. "I'm going to try and build the opposite version of that."
"I don't understand."
"Everything has a positive and negative, right?" Prying open the front of the radio, she slipped her fingers into the inner workings and moved as fast as she was able while maintaining the quality of her work: It was no good making something that would break the first moment the Wire's energy touched it. "Yin and yang, up and down, it's the nature of things. The Wire's created something that will allow it to drag massive amounts of energy through TV screens and into it in order to feed it. I plan to reverse it and then take a small step to the side by creating a feedback loop that will – hopefully – cause it to revert in on itself."
Tommy worried his bottom lip. "Will that kill it?"
"No," she said, eyes on her work. "I plan to imprison it, not kill it."
"Why?" He asked. "It's hurting people. It's hurt my gran. It's going to kill us. Why aren't you going to kill it?"
"Because killing something isn't as easy as it sounds," Zoe said, mouth dry. "There's a cost you need to pay when you take a life. Even if it's someone horrible, even if it's the right thing to do, there's a price that needs to be paid." Looking up, she met his eyes and wondered if she looked the same to the Doctor when they first met: Young, innocent, unknowing. "Don't be so quick to take a life when you can't give one in return."
Tommy swallowed and looked down at his feet.
"Keep an eye on the time for me, would you?" She asked, looking back down at her work. "Let me know every five minutes that pass."
Building things under pressure was more the Doctor's area of expertise than hers. She preferred to take her time when constructing something – the Delta Wave machine had been the culmination of two years of work and multiple iterations – but she tried to ignore the pressure weighing on her. At some point, Jack and Crabtree re-entered the shop smelling like engine oil and exhaust, the car's engine turning over in a low, consistent rumble outside; Jack's added presence and knowledge sped things along at a faster pace when he glanced over her sketched designs and understood what she was doing.
"Tommy, I need your hands," Zoe said, glancing at the smaller set of his hands compared to hers. "Get in here and pinch these two wires together. Don't let them slip."
His hand worked its way inside, thumb and forefinger holding the twisted wires in place, as she wielded the screwdriver like a soldering iron.
"Careful," Jack murmured in her ear. "You're going to –"
"I know," she said. "D'you have –?"
"Here." He tore a small piece of rubber off from the discarded wiring and worked it into place as a protective shield. "Okay, go."
Zoe lowered the screwdriver to Tommy's fingers and began to solder the final pieces together, taking care not to burn his skin.
"How do you know how to do this?" Tommy asked, eyes fixed on her and the radio in fascination.
"I studied really hard," she said, Jack leaning in to blow the curling grey smoke away to clear her view of the wires. "Went to university for four years and studied computer science but I took a few engineering classes as well. It was mainly computer science I studied but I took a few engineering classes as well."
"I didn't know girls were allowed to study that," he said, and Jack snorted while Crabtree looked away with a smile. She looked up over the rim of her glasses and he flushed. "I mean, Dad says –"
"You might not want to put too much weight on what your dad's told you," Zoe recommended. "Okay, remove your hand." His fingers left the radio and she pocked at it with a bobby pin. "And women have been instrumental in computers since the beginning. Ada Lovelace for one. She was the first to recognise the potential of computers beyond that of calculation and she came up with the first algorithm. She's considered one of the world's first computer programmers, so women are definitely allowed to study that considering one of us founded the discipline."
"Katherine Johnson," Jack added. "Although I think she's a little after your time."
"Nicole Reine-Lepaute," she continued, carefully reattaching the front of the radio, using the screwdriver to solder it into place. "She was one of the world's first human computers way back when in the 1700s and successfully calculated the return of Halley's Comet."
Jack hummed, impatience fizzing in his gut. "Sounds French."
"She was," she said. "Met her once at one of Reinette's salons. Fascinating woman. Had a bit of a crush on her."
"That doesn't surprise me," he said, checking his watch. "You are attracted to intelligence."
"It's a wonder I'm dating the Doctor then." Lifting the radio, she crouched until she was eye level with it and ran a final scan. "Point is, Tommy. Women are all over computer science, engineering, mathematics, astronomy – everything you see and read has been touched by women but the problem is they're often not credited for their work."
Tommy risked a glance at her. "I didn't know."
"Why would you?" She asked. "It's not like these things are talked about, not properly."
"10.52," Jack said.
"I'm done." Zoe stepped back from the radio and put her shoes back on. "The car's ready?"
"And raring to go."
"Tommy, you stay here with Crabtree and –"
Garbled sounds of protest from Crabtree were drowned out by Tommy's loud exclamation of "no, I'm coming with you."
"It's dangerous," she argued, passing the radio into Jack's safe hands. "And you're a child."
"I'm fifteen!"
"That's not making the argument you think it is," she told him. "You've helped us incredibly up to now but I'm not going to back to your mother and tell her that you died because you wanted to see this through to the end. You're staying here."
"I'm coming with you," Tommy argued. "You might need an extra set of hands."
"Then I will co-opt them at Alexandra Palace," Zoe said, sternly. "Do as you're told."
"No!"
Jack looked back and forth between the two of them. "We don't have time for this. Tommy, do as Zoe says and stay here."
"You need me!" Hot red spilled into his cheeks, blotching the pale skin in his frustration and anger at the injustice of it all. "And it's my gran. I've got the right to come with you."
Zoe took hold of his shoulders and gave him a small shake. "Listen to me. This isn't an adventure story, it's real life. There are dangers you can't even begin to comprehend. I thought I knew what I was getting into when I walked into this life but I was so incredibly wrong and there's no going back from it once you're involved. You're a good boy, Tommy, and you've got a smart head on your shoulders and you deserve better than looking down every dark alley for the things that go bump in the night."
"But –"
"Please." Her hands cupped his face, holding him still under her gaze. "If you want to help, go with Crabtree back to the warehouse where Bishop is keeping the bodies of everyone who's been taken. Be there when your gran wakes up so she's not afraid. People are going to need a kind face when they get back from this, and you've got a kind face. That's how you help."
"I –" Tommy hesitated, chin wobbling with tears that he wanted to shed as he wanted to go with them. "Zoe, please let me come with you. I can help."
"I can't concentrate if I have to worry about you," Zoe said. "That's the truth of it. And I need every ounce of my concentration today if we want to win this. Now enough. Do as you're told and go with Crabtree."
Incoherent gargling emerged from Crabtree's throat, forcing Zoe to tear her eyes from Tommy. He tapped at his watch insistently, reaching out to take hold of Tommy's arm, pulling him back from her light grip.
"When we solve this and fix everything there are going to be some really confused and possibly scared people locked in a cage," Jack told Crabtree. "Go, be a police officer. And for God's sake keep Tommy safe."
"I'll see you when this is over," Zoe told Tommy. "I promise."
Tommy dragged in a deep breath, accepting his defeat. "Be careful."
"Always am."
Zoe left the shop and slid into the passenger's seat, the radio playing to keep them updated with the queen's progress, and Jack pulled away from the side of the pavement before her foot had left the ground. Dragging the seatbelt across her torso, she grabbed her phone from the dashboard and checked the time: 10.58.
"We're really cutting saving the world fine today," she complained, knee bouncing. "Do you know where you're going?"
"Not a clue."
"Take a left at the end of the road." Zoe accessed the TARDIS computer and pulled a map onto the screen of her phone. "We're apparently only four minutes away but if you can make it two –"
"Consider it done," he said, taking the phone from her and propping it in the hand that was attached to the steering wheel, the other dropping to the gearstick. "Tommy was right. We could use an extra pair of hands."
"He's a child," she told him. "We can't put children in danger no matter how useful or brave they are."
"You're right," Jack said with a sigh, shaking his head. "God, of course you are. Having Mickey and the others taken, it's scrambling my brain." He took a corner sharply and Zoe pressed her hand to the roof to stop from sliding into the door. "Shouldn't have been worried about you handling things, your head's on straight."
"It's not." Zoe felt the pull she had felt when building the Delta Wave, the urge to say fuck it and let humanity burn as long as the people she loved were safe. At least she had had time then to force herself to be patient, to let Yatta talk sense into her; now, with time pressing in on them from all angles, she felt herself slipping. "Because I'm starting to think that letting the Wire shred the timeline as long as they're safe is a good idea."
He glanced at her, a small look from the corner of his eyes before he refocused on the road, the speedometer climbing.
"You don't mean that."
"That's the problem," she said. "I think I do."
The radio presenter interrupted them, faint traces of excitement filling the cut-glass tones of the BBC service, announcing Queen Elizabeth as she arrived at Westminster Abbey in her golden, horse-drawn carriage. Jack pressed his foot harder against the ground and skidded around a final corner before barrelling through the opened iron gates and into the small car park, a security guard dropping his Thermos in surprise. As tea glugged out over the ground and he rushed forward, they leapt out of the car: Zoe snatched hold of the radio and looped the heavy coil of wire on the backseat over her shoulder as Jack shoved his hand into her pocket, grabbing the psychic paper.
"Shit," Zoe swore, eyes on the transmitter tower that soared above them. "He's already here. Actually, considering he's got hours on us, he's moving slowly, wouldn't you say?"
"He's making good time when you take into account the work he had to do to finagle the systems to the Wire's specs," Jack replied, flashing the psychic paper at the security guard who pulled back, eyes wide. "Don't mind us. Important coronation business."
"Oh! I'm very sorry, sir," the guard apologised immediately, stumbling back. "Shouldn't you be at the coronation though? It's starting in a few minutes."
"They're saving us a seat," he said over his shoulder as he and Zoe took off at a run, quickly glancing down at the paper. "Hey, would you look at that? I'm the King of Switzerland, now."
"They don't even have a king."
"That's your problem with my sudden ascent to royalty?" He slammed his shoulder into the closed entrance, lock breaking beneath his strength, and stumbled inside, righting himself quickly. "See if I invite you to my coronation. Which way?"
Zoe spun on her heels, taking a 360-view of their surroundings, before taking off into the poorly lit corridor. "This way!"
Running down the corridor that echoed with their rapid footsteps, they searched for the control room. Door after door was pushed open, startling technicians inside only for Jack to flash the psychic paper and take off again. Impatience began to grow in her, wrapping itself around the fear she had of losing the Doctor, Mickey, and Rose, and she was starting to lose hope when she shoved open a door and found what she was looking for. A heavyset technician looked up in surprise only to yelp when Zoe grabbed him by the back of his shirt and forced him out of the room, nearly knocking Jack over who thrust the psychic paper into his face, snapped out a quick explanation, before darting in after her and shutting the door behind them.
"11.07," Jack told her. "Eight minutes to go."
"Right, good, love having only eight minutes to save the world," Zoe said, wiping the sweat from her forehead with her sleeve. "Time to plug everything in. Grab the end of the wire and plug it into the thing."
Jack eyed the console as he grabbed a heavy wire and found an empty socket lined with yellow rubber. "This thing?"
"That's the one." She ducked beneath the console, the buzz of the screwdriver filling the agitated silence. "Now I just need to –" she tapped the bottom of the radio against the console and the entire thing lit up. "Aha! Good, it's working. That's step one done."
"What's step two?"
"Taking this wire –" she patted the round circle over her shirt, the end plugged into the console. "To the base of the tower and then step three is attaching the radio to the Wire's portable TV. It needs to be touching or else nothing's going to work."
"You couldn't have made it contactless?"
"I had like twenty minutes to do it," she complained, pushing it into his arms and shaking the wire out. "Next time, do it yourself if you think you can do better."
"Right, sorry, no complaints," Jack said, quickly. "I'll do steps two and three. And, before you argue, you need to keep an eye on things here and, more importantly, you're dressed for decoration than actual work." She opened her mouth to protest but he barrelled over her before she could, grabbing the coil of wire from her and hooking it over his shoulder. "And if I get hit with the electrical charge, I'm less breakable than you."
Zoe hesitated. "Don't get hit with the charge. And don't you dare die."
"I wasn't planning on it today," he promised, taking the screwdriver from her. "If we stop the Wire and imprison it, do you think it'll automatically release the people its consumed?"
"Maybe, I don't know," she said. "Either way though I'm betting we can make it vomit them up if we have to. Its energy. We'll just need to find the right frequency to make it react negatively and that should work. But we're running out of time. We've got –" she checked her phone. "Six minutes."
"Tell me what do with this then," he said, nodding at the radio. "I press what?"
"This button and then this button." She pointed, taking the time they didn't have to be as clear as possible. "Not the other around."
Jack looked up. "What happens if I do it the other way around?"
"Then you'll be sucked into the prison instead and many millions of people will die," Zoe replied. "So don't do it."
"Why would you design it like that?"
"There – was – a – time – constraint."
"I'm just saying –"
Grabbing him by the shoulders and pushing him towards the door, she pointed with her entire arm flung out. "Go!"
Zoe watched him sprint away, worry clawing at her gut. There was little she was able to do from the control room except for monitor the energy fluctuation, ready to shut the system down if she had to, certain that repairing the timelines from people not being able to watch the broadcast would be significantly easier than trying to fix the damage done from millions of people left as faceless, empty husks. Glancing at the TV screen that was showing rolling footage of the ceremony, the grainy image of Winston Churchill flashed in front of her: He looked old and tired, so much more so than he had last time she had seen him, and she knew that he was nearing the end of his life.
"Come on, Jack," she muttered, gripping the edge of the console tightly, the feeling of uselessness coursing through her. "Come on."
Outside the building in the alley beneath the tower, Jack emerged from a side door. A quick assessing glance at his surroundings had him racing towards the base of the tower where he looped the cable around it and attached the large crocodile grips to the power box that he burst open with the screwdriver. Looking up, he squinted against the sunlight and was able to make out the form of Magpie at the top, not having made as much progress as Jack thought he would have. Where Jack's body was lean muscle used to strenuous exercise of varying shapes and forms, Magpie was portly and didn't spend two hours in the gym every day to ensure that he was in the peak of physical fitness for whatever awaited him out in the universe.
Seizing his advantage, Jack began to climb the side of the tower, pulling himself up with a steady and thorough methodicalness that soon closed the distance between him and Magpie. As he climbed higher and higher the wind became more insistent, buffeting him and whipping through his hair, chilling his hands on the metal structure at the same time that the air crackled around him, ozone bursting across his tongue. He leaned back, pausing briefly, and caught sight of the red energy that was converging at the top of the tower, static leaping out from the metal and sparking against his skin.
"Hey," Jack shouted, annoyed. "Stop that!"
"Help me, please," Magpie begged, tears streaming down his cheeks as he wept. "It burns. It took my life, my soul...help me!"
"Drop the TV," he yelled up to him, heaving himself up another level and climbing his way around, missing Magpie's foot by an inch. "Give it to me and I can end this. You can walk away and go home. Just drop it into my hands!"
"You cannot stop the Wire," the voice from the portable TV cried, the energy increasing, singeing the fine hairs on the back of Jack's neck, skin turning scratchy and uncomfortable. "Soon I shall become manifest and return myself to my corporeal form!"
"Please," Magpie called out, desperation cracking his words in two as Jack ducked beneath the horizontal arm and approached from inside the tower. "You promised me peace. I've done what you asked, please, let me go!"
The energy crawled out of the portable TV and wrapped bright, electric tendrils around Magpie's arms and legs, slicing through the clothes on his chest as it touched his skin.
"And peace you shall have," the Wire said.
Magpie's body vibrated, mouth stretching in a scream, as he convulsed and burst into atoms that folded in on themselves. Jack flinched back, the smell of wet blood no longer in existence tingeing the air, and he lunged forwards, foot slipping as he crashed into the metal bar. Reaching up, he grabbed hold of Magpie's portable TV and yanked it towards him only to jar his elbow when he discovered it was soldered on. Grunting in annoyance, he swung himself onto the outside of the tower and lifted himself up the last inch.
"This stops now," Jack snapped, pressing Zoe's radio against the TV and pressing the buttons in the correct order. "Let my friends go!"
The second his finger lifted from the second button, energy exploded outwards from the TV and radio held in his hands, hitting him like a truck slamming into his chest. Distantly aware of his body leaving the tower, Jack soared through the air, body singing with energy. There was a small, brief moment of peace before the pain hit him: His feet throbbed and his teeth vibrated, hair crackling all over him as the connection between the Wire and all those television sets broke.
Its furious scream at its defeat filled his ears as he plummeted towards the ground, the blue sky of London above him before everything went dark.