If you told Theodore that at one point, the Cybermen disregard him as nothing more than a mere presence, going far as treating him as an unwanted telemarketer, he would've never believed you, but here he was, treated without care by the pair of Cybermen that didn't seem at all concerned or interested in him being here at the same time, at most, they saw him as an annoyance, like a fly, but nothing of importance.
The nerve!
The pair of Cybermen wanted nothing to do with him and he was standing close to them that they'd have a good shot at him, but instead they just looked at him as nothing, nothing!
Even Daleks would've bothered trying to kill him, a little.
"We have no quarry with you," the Cybermen tells him in its guttural robotic voice, it almost sounded like it told him in a tone of someone who wants to leave and has no interest conversing any longer.
Exhaling sharply as he's brushed off by the pair of Cybermen, Theodore agitatedly asked them, "Could you at least tell me, why are you lot doing here, it's not like I mattered in the grand scheme of things, else you should've zapped me by now?"
He then reminded the Cybermen that there's passengers aboard the train and that he has them to consider, that the Cybermen presence would've rightfully alarmed them, and cause panic, which would risk the Cybermen's operation.
Especially, if they plan on blowing the train up, after obtaining whatever they're after.
The Cybermen grew quiet, probably contacting the Prime, wanting its opinion on the matter, as always, and Theodore waited with his large hands stuffed in his stitched pockets, his icy blue eyes narrowed on the pair, aggravated that his reputation didn't warrant so much as a threat.
It should say something when Theodore's practically begging the Cybermen into reacting at his appearance with something he's more familiar with, but the Cybermen never gave him so much as a shot from their arm canons.
Something must've happened, the Cybermen grew concerned with the silent commands by the Prime, and promptly ignored Theodore, disappearing through the doorway, leaving him alone, an exasperated look on his face and he felt the disregard in his very being.
"At least you could've threatened to delete me!" Theodore called out to them, annoyed.
Well, they're nonviolent, so that's something, and he learnt as little as he did in one of Hammond's meetings, that Theodore had to delve into the mystery as a detective, only instead of a magnifying glass, he had his modified Sonic Screwdriver.
Returning to the table the first Cyberman scanned, Theodore scanned it with his Sonic Screwdriver, and he found there's unusual contact traces, the Sonic Screwdriver couldn't give him specifics, but it's enough.
Reaching out to Al, Theodore tried to tell him what he discovered, but Al wasn't responding, and he's trying to get into contact with Lila, but she wasn't responding, either.
Instantly, Theodore ran through the train, tracking Al with the Sonic Screwdriver.
Following the Sonic Screwdriver, Theodore tracked Al, as he did, he heard the familiar sound of gunfire, and both his hearts went into overdrive as he ran, his mind racing with panicked thoughts.
He's stopped short of where the Sonic Screwdriver whirled, indicating Al's presence's not far from him, by the two Cybermen he met, accompanied by two more, prepared to go into the cargo hold of the train armed, and ready to fire.
"It cannot escape, again," droned one of the Cybermen.
The second Cyberman responded, "It will be deleted!"
"Delete!" the third Cyberman droned.
The fourth Cyberman monotonously let out, "Delete!"
Hearing the gunfire behind the cargo hold door, Theodore's icy blue eyes widened with fear, and panicked.
Yet, he couldn't do anything, the Cybermen refused to acknowledge him as a threat, and he can't even begin to threaten them because of it, it'd be like threatening a toy robot, at this point.
Try as he might, Theodore couldn't do anything, even with his enhanced strength, he couldn't hope to do anything against four Cybermen, and as Theodore helplessly watched them prepared to storm the cargo hold, canons firing at all corners, he felt the sudden jolt of the train slamming its breaks.
It toppled him, but barely the Cybermen, Theodore heard things crashing in the cargo hold, the sound of unsecured crates slamming into each other and the wall of the cargo hold, and glass shattering.
When he finally got his bearings, Theodore sees the Cybermen disappearing into the cargo hold, undeterred by the train suddenly stopping, and Theodore runs through the opened doorway into the chaos of the cargo hold in disarray.
His icy blue eyes darting, Theodore panicked as he searched for signs of Al and the others, but the state of the cargo hold wasn't helping.
The broken wine bottles with red wine staining the fallen racks of clothing certainly didn't help in the matters!
"Lee!" Theodore called out to her as he scoured the cargo hold, looking for her and the others, while looking for the Cybermen.
It didn't help there's silence, the shooting stopped the moment the train did, and silence from Lila and Al.
His two hearts racing, Theodore struggled as he stumbled over the broken objects, the shattered crates, the piles of clothes on the floor, broken glass everywhere, and the foul smell of every bottled cologne and perfume converging in a poorly ventilated room on top of broken bottles of alcohol.
"Al!" Theodore called out to the TARDIS, but once more, he didn't respond, either, and it's sending Theodore into full-blown panic, as he's using his enhanced strength to power through debris, searching for any signs.
"Lizzy!" Theodore tried calling out to her through her mind, figuring it's better than nothing, "Bumble!"
Almost tore through the entire cargo hold himself hadn't Theodore stumbled over one of the Cybermen that stormed it, standing silent in the middle of the ground with its arm outright, prepared to shoot the arm canon.
Rushing towards it, Theodore's prepared to give the Cyberman an earful, but to his amazement, the Cyberman's… dead.
Yes, dead, Theodore checked, it's practically oozing black liquid from the blackened eyeholes, the internals turned to mush.
It's amazing, but Theodore couldn't study the sight more, he was more focused find Lila and the others, he passed by the Cyberman in haste.
His loafers slamming against the scuffed wooden flooring, Theodore's scarf danced in the generated breeze as he ran around, finding another stationary Cyberman, same as the first, pointing towards an area.
"Lee! Al! Lizzy! Bumble!" Theodore couldn't hide his panic, calling them out externally, wanting to hear someone, and he came across the last two Cybermen, the fifth one's on the ground with more bullet holes in its chassis, that it would've been considered Swiss adjacent to the two stationary Cybermen.
His hand running through his mess of a hair, Theodore rushed past the Cybermen, ripping apart everything in his vicinity, until he found a familiar face among the chaos.
The TARDIS.
Al must've turned back the moment things gotten hairy and had the women hide inside.
Grabbing the handle, Theodore opened, and inside, he sees Lizzy tending to Bumble, resting on the grated floor, the blackness on her hands expanded to her forearms, pieces of her skin tattered just shy from her shoulders.
Al appeared beside Theodore as he stumbled inside, his icy blue eyes scanned the console room, landing on Lila who stepped out of the hallway with a kit for Lizzy to use on Bumble.
Couldn't help but yank her away from the women the moment she handed off the kit to Lizzy, hugging her tightly as he exhaled sharply with a happy, "Lee!"
Surprised her, but her mind caught up and she assured him that she and the others got out of the chaos by the skin of their teeth… er… arms.
Releasing her from his bear grip, Theodore breathlessly tells her that he's just glad they're alright, before looking towards Bumble while Lizzy worked to encourage the torn skin to regrow with the kit that Lila brought her.
"Are you sure you don't want the upgrades?" Lizzy inquires if Bumble changed her mind about accepting the upgrades that she initially offered, but Bumble remained adamant, saying that she liked her current upgrades just fine.
Sighing, Lizzy muttered that Bumble's difficult, as she lightly touched areas of the torn skin with a pipet of clear liquid. The moment the droplets of the clear liquid touched the torn skin, it began regrowing, becoming taut as it went over the exposed black metallic arms, Lizzy careful not having the skin cover the hands, as Bumble reminded her it wasn't worth it.
It would've torn again the moment she uses the guns stowed in her hands; it be a waste.
"What the hell happened?" Al asks Theodore what happened outside the cargo hold and as he turned towards him, Theodore says that he doesn't know, the Cybermen weren't telling him anything, even if he antagonized them with every known thing he could think of, and they went to the cargo hold, prepared to Rambo it, if need be.
Nodding, Al says that it sounded about right, before Theodore asked if he and the others found anything, but Al says that nothing came up, not that it mattered, the cargo hold's a mess, and seeing the Cybermen, well, good luck, there.
Confused, Theodore gestured as he wanted answers, "That wasn't you?"
Nodding, Al says that the Cyberman that came into the cargo hold started acting unusual, understatement of the decade, Al knows, anyhow, the Cyberman acted like something got into its coding, and everything fell apart, then.
The only thing Al was able to do's stop the train, figuring the sudden stop would've thrown spurs into the Cybermen's plans the moment they stepped through the doorway.
"They blocked me, kid, me, I was only able to get somewhere with the Cyberman that Bumble turned Swiss, but the others, that wasn't me!" Al informed him that he couldn't do anything except the opportunity given.
He doesn't know how, of course, he can't find anything, but the Swiss Cyberman had a wrench thrown at its robotic fleshy brain, it's mush, that's how Al managed to stop it, and Al can't get anything from the others, as there wasn't time.
When asked, Al said that no one on the train matched any descriptions that'd warrant Cybermen appearance, then as Theodore showed him what he found at the table one of the Cyberman scanned, Al responded that there's contact traces of something, wood varnish, nothing special, but without an intact Cyberman brain to bounce off, Al's miffed as him.
"Um, you better check the passengers, I think I might've shaken them," Al suggested Theodore check the passengers after Al caused the emergency breaks to kick in abruptly, and Theodore nods, agreeing with his point, before checking on Lila and the women one more time.
Relieved, Theodore goes and sees the passengers tumbling out of their train cabins, ghostly white, muttering amongst themselves, and Theodore having to become a conductor, corralling them as he expressed his concern for them.
Al stopped them short of their destination, he'll turn the train on in a moment, just wanted to stop the Cybermen in a last ditch effort, once they arrive, the passengers's going to receive compensation from having to endure their time with Cybermen.
It's the least he can do, he jostled them terribly pulling his stunt.
Once everyone calmed down and settled, Theodore having to carefully deal with Rufus's body until they arrived at Europa station, there authorities can properly remove the body, go from there, which Al says there won't be issues, as he informed them of the Cybermen.
As for the Cybermen, too dangerous to leave their stationary corpses, the Prime might send more to collect, so Al destroyed them in the only fashion he saw fit, and used their remains for his own uses, once he made sure that they can't worm their way into his internals.
"What could've they have wanted?" Lizzy's baffled as the others, wanting to know what the Cybermen wanted, and without a living one to interrogate, they don't know any more than they did when this situation unfolded.
Shrugging her stout shoulders, Lila says that the Cybermen could want anything, usually get it, but this time, they weren't lucky, though it baffled her how they eluded the scans the first time.
"I think they upgraded their blockers, again," Al's certain the Cybermen upgraded them after the last time he broke their blockers and caused trouble, they're getting craftier, and much more secretive about their missions, when those missions weren't conquering and destroy, as they're known to do on a given day.
Without an intact brain, he won't know, he doesn't even know what happened to the one that targeted them, by the time he got into the Cyberman's liquifying brain, something did a good job destroying it from the inside out.
"I never met something I couldn't put down in a hundred bullets," Bumble noted that anyone or anything that was a threat to Lizzy, she didn't have difficulty stopping them within a hundred well-placed bullets, but the Cyberman's a different story, which Al then informed her that after countless exploits and destruction, the Cybermen wisened up, and upgraded that flaw away.
Like gold, used to blow gold dust in their faces, watched them shutdown for good due to the allergic reaction that had, gone within an upgrade following their defeat at the hand of the Doctor.
"What do you think they were after?" Bumble asked Al what he thinks as she ran her black hands over her newly regenerated skin while he smoked a cigarette.
As phantom smoke rose from his cigarette, Al pondered her question, before responding that usually, Cyberman wanted something tangible, but the Cybermen they encountered weren't interested in something tangible, they were afraid, chasing after something.
More afraid Cybermen, of all things they haven't upgraded, they haven't upgraded that part out, yet, and it perturbed Al, that when he got the chance, he broke off to speak with Theodore and Lila.
"Just like the others," Al commented as he privately spoke with the two about the previous Cybermen they encountered.
Squirrelly than squirrels about something, wouldn't tell them nothing, it's curious.
Theodore wondered about the wood varnish and Al said from his scans, it looked like ordinary wood varnish that anyone found on furniture.
"No one on the list looked like an enemy of the Cybermen, either," Al's perturbed as Theodore while they stood around.
Upon arrival at Europa station, the authorities immediately boarded the train, going through it, taking accounts from witnesses, going through the motions investigating the scene.
Rufus's death was caused by the Cyberman shooting him with its arm canon, the electrical shock's enough to cause a fatal heart attack.
Having Al destroy the Cybermen, they didn't find a trace of them, workers began cleaning up the mess in the cargo hold, a tally man working with them, as they proceeded to dig through the destroyed items inside.
By the time they got half of it cleared out, the tally's a cool quarter million pounds and counting.
Watching them, Lila sees workers taking out several objects at a time, some intact, some not, and when they gotten to the other half of the cargo hold, Lila had to ask one of the workers if they found the strange man in the cargo hold, what remained of him at least, due to the cargo hold becoming a sordid mess from the emergency braking.
The worker looked at her like she grew a second head, before informing her that they haven't found anyone in the cargo hold, or remains, and didn't recognize the description of the strange man, either.
Lila then asked if they found the old grandfather clock, what remained of it, at least.
Initially, the worker didn't know, so Lila asked the foreman who worked to separate the cargo based on key indicators, and with the list issued by the company, the foreman read off everything that was in the cargo hold at the time of the Cybermen boarding it, and came to the end without mentioning a grandfather clock.
He said the list is exact, there's stiff penalties, so it wasn't like someone tried to have a grandfather clock loaded under a different name.
Everything gets screened, tagged, named, nothing gets on that cargo hold without clearance, due to the local laws.
"So, no grandfather clock?" Lila blinks before the foreman affirmed that there's no indication of one aboard the train.
That goes especially for any unauthorized personnel in the cargo hold, too.
Thanking him for his time, allowing him to return to his work, it left Lila confused as she walked through the crowded train station, trying to locate the others as they're nearby, with Lizzy and Bumble conversing with Lizzy's disheveled father who panicked the moment word came in what happened aboard the train.
"I'm not crazy!" Lila couldn't believe it, no one saw the strange man, or what remained of him in the cargo hold or the old grandfather clock with the stuck hands and the key still in the keyhole.
None of the other passengers knew anything about the strange man, either, and when Lila found Al, he said that no one matched the strange man's description in his inquiries.
Hearing this, Lila held a confused look on her face.
Theodore caught up to her after dealing with the authorities believed her unquestionably, but he couldn't help her alleviate her desire for answers.
Exhaling sharply as she's dismayed, Lila shakes her head, her chestnut hair stiffly moved behind the wrapped scarf, before Theodore led her towards Lizzy and Bumble, having finished their conversation with Lizzy's father.
He's pushing them to leave the station and head onward, but Lizzy stubbornly wanted to speak with Theodore before they went, thanking him, Lila, and Al.
"Well, it was a peculiar adventure," Theodore responded that it wasn't like he did anything of note, he just argued with the Cybermen and that's about it, but Lizzy thanked him nonetheless.
Theodore turned towards the approaching Bumble, thanking her for keeping Lila and Al safe, but Bumble modestly said that it's her job since inception.
"Wouldn't be here if I wasn't good at it," Bumble modestly tells him.
Lizzy groaned as she prodded her friend, reminding her that even then, she wouldn't let her father scrap Bumble, it'd be foolish of him to try!
Conversing more, it seems that Bumble took a shine to Al, after all, musing that she didn't know he was "bigger on the inside" only for him to put on the widest grin known to man.
Lila wasn't amused, Theodore shook his head disapprovingly, but in all, it seems that Lila's cooking for the week, and Theodore fiendishly mentioned that he's been craving more army base stew, lately.
"You're really lucky you're bossman's brother," Lila eyed him with disapproval as Theodore reigned in their deal.
He giggled, but he gently poked her nose, before poking at her thinly veiled threat, "Come now, dear Watson, you don't mean it."
Exhaling, Lila responded, "You're really lucky, you're also cute."
Mischievous grin on his face, Theodore giggled, "You know you love it!"
Oh, this spaceman.
Once everything settled, Bumble and Lizzy moving on with Lizzy's father, Theodore and Lila prepared to vacate the station, while trying to piece together what kind of adventure this was, only for Theodore to say that there isn't much they can do, they're fortunate the Cybermen weren't in a shooting mood, but still something bothered them.
With Cybermen remaining firm not wanting to tell them anything, the Prime keeping information scare, they have nothing to go by, and Theodore didn't want to go looking for the Prime, unless he had to, which case, only in extreme circumstances.
Those extreme circumstances, Theodore doesn't want to have to deal with, either, that said, he's happy the adventure didn't turn out a nightmare, bruised ego aside, but at least he still has his head.
"What about the strange man I saw and the old grandfather clock?" Lila wondered about what she seen, if she saw them at all, and Theodore comforted her, saying that he believed her.
Shaking her head, Lila commented, "Sometimes I don't think I believe myself!"
Prodding her, Theodore led her inside the TARDIS and it disappeared from the corner of the busy Europa station.
Movement along the columns, a man stepped to the side, his piercing black eyes laid squarely on the spot he saw the TARDIS disappearing.
"Identity confirmed," he said in a deep resonating voice.
THE END