Chapter Seven
The Mark
Yesterday: Owen walked into Jack' office and put a leaflet down on his desk. Jack looked at it and then looked at Owen,
"What is this?" Jack asked
"It's a combat fitness course, I thought we could run it together, you, me, Morgan and pitch" Owen said
"Rift quiet huh?" Jack asked
"The rift is dead" Owen said
"Make it interesting" Jack said
"How much" Owen asked
"You are my..." Jack stopped himself, "Sure what about 100 for completing the course first, 50 for a place but before anyone else in our group and Jasmine come too"
"I'll beat Jasmine any day of the week, she may have me over a barrle with magic, charm and sarcasm and slice and dice blindfolded with a sword but she's slight, I have the advantage fitness wise" Owen said smugly
"We'll see" Jack grinned
Adrian, Chrissie, Brendan and Lydia dropped their bags in the hallway of their holiday home for the week, where they were greeted by Chrissie' brother Nathan,
"You seem familiar" Adrian said with a point
"It can't be recent, I haven't been anywhere other than Earth since 1992" He replied, "Who're you?"
"Adrian Ray, how did you know it was safe to tell me something like that?" Adrian replied
"Dad wouldn't let Chrissie date anyone unless he was an alien but I'm a bit surprised as to why he chose you, he hates your family"
Adrian raised an eyebrow,
"Past tense, now shut up before you're past tense too" Brendan said to Nathan
"There's only three bedrooms" Nathan said raising his hands
"Then looks like you get the couch" Adrian said, excusing himself and heading upstairs
"So that's your owner" Nathan said to Chrissie, "What changed dad?"
"Don't know what you mean?" Brendan said
"Yeah, right" Nathan replied,
Chrissie went off upstairs to check out her room and Brendan glared,
"Don't push it"
"He has a right to know why your sudden change of heart Brendan" Lydia said fairly
"Mum?" Nathan said in question.
"I have a mark, a Virus activated by troops, the closer they are the more chance Brendan has of finding me a cure, the further apart in heart, mind and proximity the worse I'll become until the virus eats me alive from the inside"
Nathan stepped back in shock,
"No, they can't allow that, it's blackmail, to you and to him, date my charge or she dies, that's not right"
"The deal was done on Gallifrey EY, that court, that banished the Doctor then used him and demanded his return several times, had a deal with the Dark Court Craft so any word casting done on their soil by followers of theirs or a speicies "They" respect can be done so without intervention" Brendan told him, "We were banished from both planets because I fell for a human, it was a human that created it and it'll be a human that takes it down. All we can do is make those two up there inseperable"
To Owen' shock Jasmine left them all at the start line and completed the course in record time. He came second, Jack came third...in their group anyway, and Morgan was last but he was just pleased with himself for finishing the course alive,
"Damn Jasmine, where'd you train?" He asked
"Galafray AY, the training ground, dad picked the courses" Jasmine said, "5am wake up call every saturday"
Jack made a "Screw that" noise before crashing to the ground,
"Pizza anyone?" Jasmine asked
"I'm meeting someone so I'll pass" Morgan said
"Like that?" Owen said looking at the state he was in
"Meh"
Owen let Jasmine and Jack into his apartment, pizza in hand, he put it down on the coffee table and went over to the free standing spare fridge for a beer and to put some music on, as Jack and Jasmine tucked into the pizza,
"Leave some of that for me" Owen called, forgetting the beer and coming back to sit between them, "So going back to my trip with the Doc, he was meant to drop me back here but the TARDIS had other ideas, we ended up on the Bubble Candy Academy, Jas' school"
"How did you like it?" Jasmine asked with a grin
"It was awesome Jas" Owen grinned, "But why doesn't the outer TARDIS blend in?"
"The cloaking device got stuck and Doc fell for the design, besides it has enough perception to make people walk past and ignore it, she'll only show herself to people on the court' list. For instance, Rose wasn't real"
"What do you mean? She was real. Trust me I know, I kissed her" Jack said
"She's a blue rose created by a very powerful Time Lord. He turned her into a human and sent her to Earth so that his father would survive a blast by the Darlek' on Satellite Five" Owen said out of the blue, "Woe, where did that come from?"
"Go with it Owen, that information, how do you know it to be fact?" Jasmine asked as Jack tried to take it in,
"It's like I'm in two places in the same time zone and so all of me becomes privy to information. There's a battle on Galafray with Death Soldiers, grey ghosts that steal the souls of humans to fight Time Lords, and Principle beings, Time Lords, that have lost faith in Adrian out of fear and so have turned to look like their new God, but he's not all he seems either. Honour' rose, it's a glass like orniment that houses the blue print of his own TARDIS and vital information about how to end that very battle. His book is what led him to turning the rose to the Doctor. His book was turned upside down with the righting positioned in such a way as to reveal Rose Tyler' face, beside that was the angry wolf. The Bad Wolf, whatever that means" Jack took a sharp breath in shock, "He realised he was the one who saved Jack. He wrote Rose' story from birth to death. The blue Rose. No matter what happened between the the Doctor would do anything for that rose. Rose told Doc they couldn't let Jack die in World War 2 and then on Satallite Five Honour took over, after she failed to get the TARDIS to open it's heart to her he possessed the ship himself so she'd succeed, fed his own vortex energy into her and took her back so she could bring his dad back to life. If he didn't then Honour would exist no more. What we do in the future affect what happened in our past" Owen finished
"My son loved me so much he made sure I couldn't die again, he's only here because of the Emperor, I live as long as he needs me to live" Jack said
Adrian knocked on Chrissie' door, she was crying on the sofa in the room she'd be staying in,
"Chrissie? What's wrong?" He asked
"Mum' got a virus...I overheard a conversation between dad and Nathan" Chrissie said
"Chrissie, we never get the full story that way...what kind of virus?" Adrian asked
"One that binds us...you and me, and her. If we drift she dies" Chrissie said
Adrian' hearts pounded,
"That's a Black Jack mark, who'd do something like that? We so much as have a fight she ends up in ICU"
"I know"
"I'll bet you this is why they took Liam, no distractions...no cure, but we can't just jump into a relationship" Adrian said
"I know" Chrissie said, Adrian was silent for a minute, "I know what I heard Adrian"
"I'll think of something" Adrian said and he left the room to find Brendan, "OK honest answer, I'm here because there's a mark on Lydia, if there's no future for Chrissie and I then there's not future for her correct?"
"How did you find out about this?" Brendan asked
"Chrissie overheard...so it's true? Is this why the court took Liam?" Adrian asked
"No but i'm not going to lie, it does help" Brendan said
"Right, I want to know everything"
"If you don't feel anything romantically for Chrissie then forget it, we'll accept what comes" Lydia said
"I didn't say...I like her I just don't think a forced relationship is healthy or any help to you in the long run, who put this mark on you, why?" Adrian asked
"An army of alien soldiers called Troops, controlled by Shyer and created by Segmento, she was the Emperor' adopted mother on Corevil. The Time Lords were orginally an experiment with bodies close to the human form, the Norse allowed them to live on T5H until T5H was attacked by Darlek' in the Time War...there was one survivor, Pole. In the time he'd lived there his family had started to bring in more and more humans, the two species began to fight. May Wars and peace calls later a Posture-Mite ship crashed and started leaking fuel Pole could use to control people. Jack, a child at the time, was appointed King by the people, both sides, the court legitimised it and suddenly T5H was under the Time Lord duristiction. Jack abdicated and we ran to Bo, Owen is the rightful heir but if he doesn't recall all of his abilities and learn to control them the War on T5H will never end"
"Owen' Jack'..."
Brendan covered Adrian' mouth,
"Yes"
"Who's been running things all this time?" Adrian asked
"The stand-in, people chosen by Pole and his followers, it starts off simple. They're asked to order the execution or closure of businessess of people, who will think for themselves, go against the players or people they don't trust and then they're ordered to kill their own families and friends" Brendan said
"I'm guessing when they refuse they get shot" Adrian said
"Some try to run, once out at a particular distance they realise what they've been doing and fight back but by then they've no allies and end up dead anyway. Pole then chooses another stand-in" Brendan said
"Why don't these people learn from their pasts?" Chrissie asked, suddenly appearing behind Adrian
"They don't have one" Nathan said
"Don't be stupid everyone has a past" Chrissie said
"The T5H of today are part of a living archive, every ten years the stand-in' build a new City on top of you, the only ones aloud to live in it are comprised of followers or people pretending to be followers, hense a time of peace. The lucky few break free but are talked down, and then when there's enough of them War begins again in earest" Lydia revealed
"So I get why the mark was alloud it's passing but if they can use spells then so can we?" Adrian said
"This isn't Hogwarts, you can't brew a love potion" Chrissie snapped
"No, I can use a binding spell, something that brings us back into each other' aura no matter what comes between us, so we always work together and sort our problems out as and when they arise until I can find a way to reverse it"
"That might work" Brendan said
"I'll have a chat with Vera in the morning" Adrian said
Now: Owen woke up on the floor in Jack and Jasmine' bedroom, Morgan was next to him,
"Huh?" He said with a shake of the head
Jack woke up with a start,
"How did we get from your place here?" Jack asked
"Glad it's not just me and I know I didn't have any beer last night, I don't actually feel like drinking it since I came back to life...no bad thing but"
Liam appeared in a mirror,
"They're all out of shape"
"Who are?" Owen asked, "How're you doing that?"
"Wrong question, check outside" Liam said before vanishing
Owen, Jack, Jasmine and Morgan opened the door and found everything and everyone bend out of shape but even stranger, no one seemed to know it was happening. They were all going about their business as normal.
"Is it the same beyond the Bay Walk boarder?" Jack asked
"This isn't on CCTV" Owen said taking pictures,
"Maybe someone should call Andy" Morgan suggested
"He'll say everything' fine, look at all these people, does it look like any of them know they look like this?" Jack said
"Jasmine, have you ever seen anything like this before?" Owen asked
"Thats a perception ship with a currupt engine doing that" Jasmine said, "If we check the CCTV for the glitch I should be able to find out which one it is"
Jack, Owen and Morgan followed Jasmine inside and down to the lower central hub, the computers were down but Jasmine still had a USB with the footage on it,
"We have no computer" Owen said
"I'm calling Adrian" Jasmine said, taking her mobile out, "Adrian, how does everything look to you?" She asked as he picked up
"What kind of question is that?" Adrian asked, Jasmine sent him a photo, "What the...? This a new app?"
"Really Adrian? Send me a pic of the view outside the house" Jasmine replied, so he did, "OK it's just here then. If I give you the code on the back of the USB I'm holding can you override a computer to view footage and tell me when it starts to glitch and anything out of place you can pick up on?"
"Uh send me the code...I may need a bit of time though" Adrian replied
"That's fair"
"What're we looking at here?" Jack asked while they waited
"OK so a Time Lord framed a T5H for a crime he didn't commit and as a result he ended up on a space prision, if there's Blue Mercury in the air then he's got control of the prision ship and has zoned in on the Time Lord, that framed him. He wants revenge and absolution...on Earth' soil, only T5H' King can auhtorise that"
"Uh oh!" Jack said
Adrian was able to go one better. With Brendan' help he was able to view the ship and locate a body, the body of the Time Lord. He was also able to get a tracker on the prisoner,
"OK mum, we have a dusted Time Lord and an abductee" Adrian said
"What?!" Jasmine exclaimed
"A human...he's heading in my direction" Adrian added nervously
"He knows" Jasmine said in shock, looking at Jack, "Taking a human changes everything, it's up to you what happens to him now Adrian"
"No pressure there then" Adrian said
With Brendan by his side they went out, followed the signal and met the prisoner and his human abductee,
"You know what they did to me up there?" He spat
"I was torchured with a Thunder Chip device for 14 years, I know a little about torcher" Adrian said
"I didn't do it!"
"I don't know what you're talking about" Adrian said, arms out
"Murder, I didn't do it"
"What can I do?" Adrian asked, this was the wrong question, the T5H killed the woman he'd held, "What do you need?"
"A life!" He screamed, "My life!"
"OK" Adrian said and he took out his cane, "Man to cradle, remove this lable, erase his memories and distrust, let his old life become the dust, let him see our right side and with loving Time Lords reside"
The prisoner became a baby, with a tag on his wrist,
Brendan went over to him,
"Carter" He said, "We'll raise him in the 50' Bay"
"I'm just sorry we lost a human" Adrian sighed
"It doesn't have to be perminant, she was killed by an alien" Brendan said
"What're you saying?" Adrian asked
Chrissie appeared and revived the woman without Adrian even seeing it. He just rushed to the woman in shock and phoned for an ambulance,
"What do we do with the prision ship?" Chrissie whispered, "This is an Astral Port"
"Merge it with Prison 10" Brendan said
"Merge what?" Adrian asked
Brendan tapped his ear piece and Adrian nodded
One week later: Vera was surprised to see Adrian at the front door on her way to work,
"Adrian...this is a surprise, I was actually on my way out" She said
"I need to ask you something, more I need to know if such a thing exists" Adrian said
"Right, go ahead"
"There's a mark on Chrissie' mother, that reacts to romantic distance and emotional ties between myself and Chrissie. I need to know if there's such a thing as a binding spell and the conciquences of breaking it at any point are" Adrian said
"Oh Jesus, Adrian, you are in trouble"
"Does it exist?"
"Yes but only Owen can perform it...he hasn't a clue, who, he is" Vera replied