Disclaimer: I don't own any of the League or any of the characters of 'Underworld'; just the plot.
Feedback: Who doesn't want that?
AN: To clarify, the Doctor portrayed here is the Fifth Doctor, currently travelling with Turlough, between the TV stories 'Resurrection of the Daleks' and 'Planet of Fire'
Sean Malloy-1: Here you are; sorry about the delay
mimifoxlove: Ask and ye shall receive, mimi.
LXG 2004 2: Lazarus
"So, Harry's got visitors who need our help, and he wants us to call the Doctor and have him pick them up?" Gwen asked, looking at Elektra as she sat opposite the former thief. "That's the general gist of it?"
Elektra nodded at the thief, and then glanced over at Angel, who was staring idly at the box in front of him. It was about the size and shape of an old cash register, with an antenna sticking out of the top, and had been given to the League by the Doctor shortly before his departure a few days ago; he'd claimed he had an appointment he needed to keep, although none of them could figure out why he'd need to leave for an appointment if he possessed a time machine…
"You going to call him, or do you want one of us to do the job?" she asked the ex-vampire inquiringly.
"Hmm?" Angel asked, looking up at Elektra's voice, and then shrugging as he looked back at the box. "No, no, I'll do it, I was just wondering if we should wait for Fiona and Eilidh to get back in."
"Eh, they won't mind; we'll tell them when they get back," Gwen said, shrugging. "Look, you know those two; they may have the occasional complaint, but they really do enjoy being able to use their powers to help people. I guess it's only natural they'd want to get out and about when we don't have any League-related activities."
"Right then," Angel said, as he reached over and pulled the box slightly closer to him.
"Doctor?" he said to it, already sounding slightly foolish. "Sorry to bother you so soon, but we've got a bit of a problem already, and we need your-"
The wheezing, groaning sound of the TARDIS materialising filled the room.
"-help," Angel finished, before turning to look at the TARDIS as it solidified in the air before them. The door opened…
And two complete strangers stepped out.
One of them was dressed in what seemed to be a school uniform, with red hair and a slightly sour expression on his face, but it more seemed to be there from habit, as though he'd spent most of his life miserable and still wasn't entirely sure how to be happy.
The other man, however, was a different kettle of fish. He seemed only a few years older than the boy, but there was an edge of experience in his eyes that suggested he was far older than his appearance. He was wearing red-and-white pinstripe trousers, an Edwardian cricket jumper, and a beige frock coat with red lining and a stick of celery pinned to the lapel. He had straight sandy-coloured hair, and was looking at the three League members as though they were all old friends.
"Ah, Angel," he said, smiling at the vampire before glancing over at the two women. "Gwen, Elektra; good to see you two again, by the way. This," he said, indicating the other man, "is my friend and current companion Turlough-"
"And you are?" Gwen asked, as she looked at the man critically.
"Oh, forgive me; I'm the Doctor," the man said, smiling at her and holding out his hand.
Gwen stared at the hand as though it was an offensive weapon, and then looked back at the man offering it.
"If you're really the Doctor, what the hell happened to you?" she asked him, after a moment's deliberation. "You go in for radical plastic surgery or something?"
"Oh, nothing so mundane; I had to regenerate," the 'Doctor' said, smiling at Gwen.
"Regener-what?" Elektra said in confusion.
"He changes his body whenever he's mortally injured and can't survive any other way," the other man- Turlough, Angel recalled his name was- put in. "Trust me; I wasn't with him when it happened, but I met three more of him a while back, followed by a brief run-in with a future model when we were under attack by an indestructible robot." He looked around at the three people in the room, and then raised an inquiring eyebrow. "And while we're at it, who are you three?"
"Old colleagues of mine in my last life, Turlough," the Doctor explained to his companion with a slightly smile; he may have disagreed with their methods at times, but he'd still found the other League members to be good friends and pleasant company in his last incarnation. "They, like me, were members of a group called 'The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen', a team of remarkable individuals dedicated to protecting the world from unorthodox threats and perils."
"Such as…?" Turlough asked, waving a hand inquiringly.
"Well, we tackled an immortal trying to create an army on our first mission, but that's strictly small fry compared to what we could run into, really," the Doctor smiled, before turning back to Angel. "Simply put, Angel, what will convince you that I am the Doctor, and not an impostor?"
"Well… you could tell us what you said to Terry before he died, for a start," Angel asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Ah, the tricky one…" the Doctor said, tapping his finger on his chin as he thought. Then he looked back at Angel, smiling brightly. "Wasn't it 'I would never think of you as young, Mr Nator'?" he asked. "That might not be word-perfect, but it has been a good few decades since that adventure for me."
Angel nodded thoughtfully, but then Elektra interrupted.
"You taught me a couple of fighting tricks while you were with us," she added. "Who, according to you, was the person who taught you them originally?"
"Well," the Doctor began, "the sword tricks were from one of Cleopatra's bodyguards, the unarmed combat was learned on Venus, and the-"
"You're real," Elektra said, sighing slightly as she looked over at Angel. "Trust me, the Doctor has picked up quite a few tricks for a man who doesn't like violence."
She looked back at the Doctor curiously. "What happened to you, anyway?"
The Doctor shrugged dismissively. "I had to save the universe from an old adversary of mine," he said, trying to sound casual. "It went well enough- I stopped him blackmailing creation by threatening to end existence- but I ended up falling off a radio tower in the process, and sustained severe injuries.
"Anyway," he continued, looking over at Angel inquiringly, "now that we've got that out of the way, what seems to be the trouble?"
"Oh, yeah… that," Angel said; in all the confusion over the change in the Doctor, he'd forgotten why the Time Lord was here in the first place. "Harry's received some visitors who need our help, and we need you to head along and pick them up- and maybe see about contacting James and Clark while you're at it; we'll probably be needing all the help we can get for this one."
The Doctor nodded. "Right-o," he said, smiling at the former vampire as he turned around and headed back into the TARDIS. "Wait here, Turlough," he added, looking over at his companion just as he shut the door. "I shan't be long!" he called out through the door, just before the TARDIS dematerialised, leaving Turlough and the three League members in various degrees of confusion.
Eventually, Turlough broke the silence.
"So, what 'talents' do you three have?" he asked, raising a curious eyebrow as he looked at them. "I mean, I can guess that the Doctor was your technology expert, but what did you three bring to the… 'League', wasn't it?"
Elektra shrugged. "For me, it's simple enough; I'm an expert martial artist," she said, indicating the sai daggers on her belt. "Gwen's a professional thief who can control electricity, and Angel used to be a vampire before a spell was cast to restore his humanity."
"Partly," Angel put in from where he was still sitting at the head of the table. "I still possess most of the perks of being a vampire- enhanced strength and so on- but I don't need to drink blood or anything like that."
"Ah," Turlough said, nodding briefly.
Gwen looked at him in surprise.
"'Ah'?" she said, a slightly incredulous tone in her voice. "That's all you have to say? 'Ah'?"
Turlough shrugged. "It's nothing against anyone here, but when you've met the embodiment of all that is evil in the universe, dined in a time-travelling restaurant, confronted lizard-like beings that ruled Earth before humanity even evolved, and fought monsters on the moon with the aid of Victorian spacemen, the word 'impossible' tends to not really mean very much to you," he said, by way of explanation.
(AN: The adventures Turlough mentions here are 'Enlightment', 'The Crystal Bucephalaus', 'Warriors of the Deep', and 'Imperial Moon'; summaries of all these can be found on the website 'www dot drwhoguide dot com slash who dot htm' if you're interested)
Then he looked over at Angel. "Who else do you have on the team?"
"A spy, a wizard- that's who the Doctor's gone to collect-, an invisible woman, a superhuman alien, and a telepath," Angel said. "Harry- the wizard- and I have a couple of our friends down as reserve members, but otherwise that's it for the League."
Turlough seemed about to say something, but then the TARDIS began to rematerialize in its original position.
Elektra blinked in surprise.
"Well… that was fast," she said, as the TARDIS solidified.
"Hey, it's a time machine, remember?" Gwen asked, smiling over at her friend. "It shouldn't be a surprise that it can get here so fast, when you take that little detail into account!"
As the TARDIS solidified in the air, Angel couldn't help but smile slightly. As soon as Fiona and Eilidh were back, they could find out exactly who had contacted Harry, why they'd done it, and what the situation was that the League could help them with.
And then, in the words of Tom Sawyer…
"The League is set… and the game is on".
Angel only hoped that this mission didn't end in the death of another League member; losing Terry had been more than enough for all of them, as far as he was concerned.