Is this a whole knew chapter to you? Or have you seen this one before?
Chapter thirty-five
I was distantly listening to the coms as I used the cheat sheet that Tosh had programmed into their computers in order to get access to the Valeant's camera's undetected by their security personnel. They'd need to have another Tosh on board, monitoring their key strokes and systems to pick up on the intrusion and even then, they wouldn't be able to back track the hack – that's how good Tosh was, even when she didn't have access to the augmented and advanced alien technology that Jack had been adding to and adapting since he officially joined Torchwood.
"Oh, that thing is rough." Martha complained.
"I've had worse nights. Welcome to the Valiant." Jack brushed off his own discomfort with a quick joke.
"It's dawn?" There was definitely surprise in Martha's voice at whatever she was seeing. "Hold on, I thought this was a ship. Where's the sea?"
"A ship for the twenty first century, protecting the skies of planet Earth." Jack introduced in a grandiose manor.
"Doctor, Jack, I'm in their systems. I can lead you through the corridors without running into guards, and I've got a blue-print of the base so I can direct you wherever you need to go." I interrupted their moment.
"Great. Can you direct us to the main deck? That's where the Master will go when he arrives." The Doctor questioned.
"Alright, you need to head straight, turn when I tell you." I got them moving as I set up a GPS location over the blue-prints, using their comms units to track them. Because of the unique wavelength the comms ran on, they could be used to track a person's location if the comm was active and you had access to the main command – which I did.
They were moving through what seemed to be the storage floor, when the Doctor stopped suddenly.
"We're no time for sightseeing." Jack informed the Doctor.
"No, wait. Shush, shush, shush, shush." The Doctor waved at them. "Can't you hear it?"
"Hear what?" Jack questioned.
"Doctor, my family's on board." Martha reminded him urgently.
"Brilliant," The Doctor said excitedly. "This way."
"Raven, where are we going?" Jack questioned when he didn't get an explanation from the Doctor.
"Hold on, I'm scanning through the rooms." I answered, bringing up the rooms on the same floor that they were on. "It's the…"
"TARDIS." Jack finished as they entered the room with the blue box. "What's it doing on the Valiant?"
"Logs say it was brought on board, 3 days ago." I informed them moments before I lost comms as they entered the TARDIS which had shielding and so prevented the use of external coms unless they were patched through the shields.
While the three of them were in the TARDIS, I kept an eye on the Master who had arrived on board along with the President and his entourage. People were hurrying about, preparing for the broadcasting of the first contact.
"Doctor? Jack, what did you find?" I questioned the moment they stepped outside of the TARDIS.
"The Master has turned the TARDIS into a paradox machine, which is set to activate at 8:02. We need to get the Master, now." Jack brief me quickly.
"Alright, you need to head left and continue past the next two corners, then on your right you'll find the stars. Code is 4631, go up two floors. The master is in the room at the end of that floor." I gave them their final directions. Winter's had already started broadcasting, which meant they were running out of time if they needed to act before the Paradox machine activated. I brought up the broad cast on one of my other screens, but muted it since I was getting sound through the surveillance – a precaution that most UNIT bases had installed.
"…. but that we learn to see ourselves anew." Winters was saying when the three time-travellers slipped into the room. "For as long as man had looked at the stars, he had wondered what mysteries they hold now we know we are not alone."
"This plan, you going to tell us?" Jack breathed to the Doctor.
"No longer unique in the universe." Winters continued.
"If I can get this around the Master's neck," the Doctor explained, lifting the key around his neck, "Cancel out his perception, they'll see him for real. It's just hard to go unnoticed with everyone on red alert. If they stop me you've got a key."
"Yes, sir." Jack accepted his orders, easily able to fall into the role of solider despite the length of time he'd been leading Torchwood.
"I'll get him." Martha promised through gritted teeth.
"And I ask you now, I ask the human race, to join me in welcoming our friends. I give you the Toclafane." Winter's turned to where four spheres appeared. "My name is Arthur Coleman Winters, President Elect of the United States of America, and designated representative of the United Nations. I welcome you to the planet Earth and its associated moon."
"You're not the Master." One of the spheres commented, it's voice appearing to be male.
"We like the Mister Master." Another sphere confirmed, this one with a female voice.
"We don't like you," a second, male, sphere informed Winters.
"I can be master, if you so wish. I will accept mastery over you, if that is God's will." Winters spoke unsurely.
"Man is stupid." The second male sphere giggled.
"Master is our friend." The first male sphere re-affirmed.
"Where's my Master, pretty please?" the female sphere asked.
"Oh, alright then." The Master jumped up so he was stood before Winters and on camera. "It's me. Ta Da!" he smiled brightly. "Sorry, sorry, I have this effect. People just get obsessed. Is it the smile? Is it the aftershave? Is it the capacity to laugh at myself? I don't know. It's crazy."
"Saxon, what are you talking about?" Winters demanded to know.
"I'm talking about control, Uncle Sam, starting with you." the Master's voice changed from the upbeat and happy voice he had been using to something colder and darker. "Kill him"
Before anybody could react, one of the sphere's opened a panel in their body which revealed a gun. The President was incinerated a second later, causing his guards and several other personnel to move forward, but they were unarmed and unable to do anything. The Master simple laughed and applauded at the consternation he'd caused.
"Guards." He ordered his own men who were stationed around the room and clearly outnumbered those who didn't support him.
"Nobody move! Nobody move!" the lead guard ordered, as they swiftly had the resistance at gun point and then disarmed.
"Now then, peoples of the earth. Please attend carefully." The Master directly addressed the camera that was broadcasting live. Being in their surveillance cameras meant that I saw the Doctor take off his key and make a run for the Master.
"Stop him!" one of the guards called as the Doctor was grabbed and subdued by two men.
"We meet at last, Doctor. Oh, ho. I love saying that." The Master laughed, and just how unhinged he was started bleeding through.
"Stop it! Stop it now!" the Doctor pleaded, pulling against the arms holding him back.
"As if a perception filter's going to work on me. And look, it's the girlie and the freak." The Master raised some kind of weapon in the direction of Martha and Jack, waving it between the two. "Although, I'm not sure which one's which."
Not wanting to risk the Master shooting Martha, Jack ran forward, key in hand. He barely made it four paces before he was hit in the chest by what appeared to be a green laser from the Maser's device. I couldn't stop my hand from going to my mouth in horror – Jack had said the Doctor hadn't fixed him, but this was only the fourth time I was seeing him die and there was nothing I could for him.
"Laser Screwdriver." The Master smirked at the Doctor. "Who'd have sonic? And the good thing is, he's not dead for long. I get to kill him again!"
"Jack," I whispered, knowing that their earpieces would pick me up. Those words were not very promising – he'd only just come back from having his life drained by Abaddon and he could still feel pain just like everyone else… Martha ran to Jack's side in order to check on him.
"Master, just calm down. Just look at what you're doing. Just stop. If you could see yourself…" the Doctor pleaded, but the Master was energised by the pain he was causing and the control he had.
"Oh, do excuse me. Little bit of personal business. Back in a minute." He addressed the camera which was still recording even though all new stations had cut the feed and I was only still getting the feed on one of my monitors because I was in the Valliant's systems. "Let him go." He ordered the guards darkly.
"It's that sound. The sound in your head. What if I could help?" The Doctor pleaded, struggling against the guards holding him back.
"Oh, how to shut him up?" The Master asked the skies. "I know. Memory Lane."
With all his repressed energy, the Master jumped and sat down on the steps leading up the control panels. Keeping him in the camera line at that point was difficult, but a little bit of minor adjustments and I had eyes on the whole room – including the floor as there was cameras in the ceiling.
"Professor Lazarus. Remember him and his genetic manipulation device. What, did you think that little Tish got that job merely by coincidence? I've been laying traps for you all this time. And if I can concentrate all that Lazarus technology into one little screwdriver? But, ooo, if I only had the Doctor's biological code."
He moved over to a case which he unlatched and slammed open to reveal the hand that Jack had been looking after for the last year.
"Oh, wait a minute, I do. I've got his hand. Lazarus made himself younger, but what if I reverse it? Another hundred years?"
I gritted my teeth as the Master aimed his screwdriver at the Doctor, making him convulse. Even with the Doctor writhing on the ground, I didn't miss Jack waking up and whispering to Martha since I was still patched into their comms which were turned on.
"Teleport." Jack ordered Martha.
"I can't." Martha whispered with tears in her eyes.
"We can't stop him. Get out of here. Get out." Jack ordered again even as the Master stopped zapping the Doctor, who looked very old indeed. Martha left the recovering Jack to run to Martha instead.
"Doctor?" Martha whispered. "I've got you."
"Ah, she's a would-be Doctor. But tonight, Martha Jones, we've flown them in all the way from prison." The Master pointed theatrically to the doors which opened to reveal Martha's parents and sister.
"Mum," Martha whispered.
"Martha, just get out, I'll watch over them." I ordered, knowing that one of them needing the be free to move around. The Doctor, would be able to handle this situation better if his companion got out, according to his classified UNIT file.
"The Toclafane." The Doctor tried to get up, and Martha crouched down to help him up. "What are they? Who are they?"
"Doctor, if I told you the truth, your hearts would break." The Master placed his hands over his heart.
"Is it time?" A sphere with a male voice appeared. "Is it ready?"
"Is the machine singing?" a female sounding sphere asked.
"Two minutes past." The Master jumped to his feet. "So, Earthings. Basically, er, end of the world. Here come the drums!"
As he announced this, a sound started playing loudly over the whole Valiant, and even outside of it using the loud speakers used to communicate on the bridge.
Immediately, the rift alert started going off and I pulled up screens to see what was going on. It took a second, but I soon discovered a great rift had opened in the skies above planet earth and millions of the spheres were descending.
Rapidly typing record on the Valients' systems as well as all CCTV networks so that I could go back and discover what exactly happened later. Once that was set up, I ran to Jack's special weapon's storage. If the Master had been involved in the creation of these Spheres, a Time Lord, then I had a feeling that regular guns wasn't going to cut it. Once fully stocked with as many electrical based weapons as I could find (even the classified weapons Jack didn't want the team using), I headed down the tunnels, entering emergency closed doors as I went until I found the large bunker which could be used to shelter a population. From this bunker, many escape tunnels led, and I was going to need all of them – never before have I been more thankful for the paranoia of Torchwood and the Crown.
I took the tunnel which led just outside the school closest to Torchwood base. Stepping out into the streets was chaos, there was people running and screaming, trying to get away from the spheres which were shooting people and cutting them down with their knifes as they flied by. There was a group of five police officers trying to evacuate the children, with the adult civilians taking the killing shot aimed for the kids while also trying to get them into cover and out of sight.
Whistling sharply, I drew the officer's attention. "Here, get them over here!"
As the children, officers, teachers and civilians in the area converged on the entrance to the bunker, I covered them with the 'electro-gun' as I'd decided to call it until I could find the time to look at Jack's files with its actuals name. The electrical charge wasn't enough to kill the spheres, as they took to the air again, but it did stun them for a minute.
"Come on, get in!" I shouted as more and more spheres started converging on the street. Finally, I couldn't hold it anymore and I was forced to throw out an electrical grid bomb before closing and securing the door.
"Follow the red line, it will take you somewhere safe while I try and get more people!" I ordered sharply, looking mostly to the teachers and officers – trusting them to take charge.
"Ma'am," the officers agreed having either recognised my person or my description.
With one small section of Cardiff protected, I moved onto the next and then the next. A GP's office and the surrounding homes, another primary school, a secondary school, a police station and a Cul De Sac. Each time I left the safety of the tunnels, it was harder and harder to stay out long enough to save any significant number of people.
Finally, I came to what would be the last passage – the door that led to the army base. I'd known at the previous door that whichever passage I chose next would be the last one I'd be able to do that night – this would be the last group of people I'd be able to save in this ten percent purge. The army base, being so far away from the centre of Cardiff was always going to be one of the last places I reached, but they also had the greatest chance of holding out against the Spheres as they had weapons but they were not a large base and so not a great threat like other bases that I knew the Master would have targeted in order to prevent resistance.
Taking a deep breath, I shouldered open the door and swiftly scanned the area. The previous times I'd stepped out onto the streets, it had been to see the occasional car on fire and the chaos of panicked civilians. The army base was more contained, but the explosion and fire more prevelant.
"Full Back!" I bellowed as loud as I could, throwing the last of two electrical gride grenades to give the soldiers a brief pause.
"Go!" what looked like the commander called, waving his men back. "Go! Go!"
"Come on, Men!" I hurried them along, shouldering my gun and firing as the grid came down just as the first of the soldiers passed through the door.
"You got any more of those, ma'am? We've still got men out there." a stern-faced soldier kicked one of the sphere's I'd taken out with my gun so that it rolled away from them.
"I'm running short, I'm sorry. I got as many civilians safe as I could before I came here." I answered, motioning the cut I'd taken to the cheek from a sphere that had gotten a tad too close.
Finally, all thirty-two soldiers were through the door and I threw out the last of my electrical-grenades in order to buy time to secure the door and activate the defence.
"I'll see about saving more people tomorrow, once I've got the lay of the land." I turned to the men. "Come on, we've got a lot of scared and nervous people waiting for us at the bunker."
"Ma'am, are you okay?" the solider who had asked about additional weapons asked, reaching out a hand to steady me when I stumbled with a brief moment of light headedness.
"It's been a long day," I shook him off and got moving. "We're following the red line."
"Not the yellow?" one of the soldier's tried to joke even as he supported his injured comrade.
"The red leads to the bunker at the heart of the retreat, it's where I've been sending everyone." I moved to the front and took the lead.
"Everyone? How many did you save? It was a slaughter out there." One of the injured asked.
"I didn't stop to count." I brought my phone forward and started looking through the security count. One of the system protocols had everyone passing through the bunker door counted. "Well, if everyone went where I direct them, 3,209."
"That's a lot of people to feed, bed and water." the commander warned.
"There are rooms leading off from the bunker where I can set people up, and also stock rooms with military rations. That will hold everyone over for two weeks while we plan and come up with something better. I'm pretty sure there is an underground farm or greenhouse somewhere around here… I just need to remember where and what the code to the door is." I finished with a mutter.
"And all this is just under Cardiff?" was a disbelieving question asked from several of the men.
"Torchwood has been over prepared for an attack on the city for a long time." I frowned sadly. "I just which I could do the same for the rest of Whales. He ordered the destruction of one tenth of the population."
"He?"
"Weren't you watching the news?" I asked surprised.
"We were on guard, not near a radio or TV." The solider admitted.
"Our glorious Prime Minister is actually an alien who wishes to take over the world. The Sphere's, he brought them here by opening a rift and they answer completely to him. I've got cameras on him and will be able to pull more intel, but I've not been paying attention to that while I'd been trying to rescue as many as I could. I've already got a team working on stopping him." I briefed.
"A team?"
"Hmmm." I hummed in agreement, not speaking about it as I closed the door to the passage we'd just come down. I'd closed off all the passages leading to the outside as a secondary defence encase the spheres broke through the doors that they knew about having seen me make use of them.
"These are some pretty serious doors, not even one of my explosives could get through here without bringing the city streets down on us." the solider with primer cord on his belt observed.
"Good to know, since the outer doors are even worse." I smirked briefly at him. "We're about twenty minutes from the bunker now, and I know I saved some doctors who'll be able to patch you up."
"And you started at the bunker when the attacks started? How many paths did you take before coming to us? How long have you been fighting the spheres?" the commander asked, surprised.
"Well, the attacks started at 8:02. I was at the first exit at 8:41. I went out thirteen exits before reaching you lot at 18:13. It took between five and fifteen minutes at each exit, and the rest of the time was spent travelling between the exits." I hummed thoughtfully as I thought over my day.
"Damn," was whistled, but I didn't see which of the men did it.
"Not like you lot didn't have a better day then me. You've been fighting the entire day." I pointed out.
"No, we haven't. The spheres didn't come to our base until 14:20. We were one of five groups left to defend the base while everyone else mobilised to protect the city." The commander corrected.
"Still, that's six hours of fighting and defending your lives." I pointed out. "We're here."