Chapter Ten
Ryan Returns
Jack sighed as he came into his lab with a coffee in hand until he saw Jasmine scanning Owen and readying the recall device,
"He's stable, but there's a shift, and energy similar to the TARDIS. We have to do this now" She said
Jack took the recall device from Jasmine and placed it into a slot on the machine above Owen. They then stepped back and watched a light start from Owen' middle then go down to the feet and up to the head. Jack then walked forward and injected the formula to make Owen immortal straight into his only working heart of two. He then took a knife and cut Owen' face. His face healed instantly,
"Welcome to my world Owen"
"It's going to be a long night...he's already dreaming" Jasmine said nodding at the computer
Jack looked at Jasmine nervously,
Owen' dream: Owen was in a throne room of a palace deep underground, he watched two guards drag a poor man up to the feet of the stand-in and then kick him down,
"What're you doing?! Let him go!" He yelled
"Please Mopalsa I did what was asked of me, enough is enough. You're no more a king than I am. His people are crying I can't stop them; I don't want to" The poor man whailed
"Then you have to die too" The stand-in said
Owen winced as he watched the poor man rot before his eyes after being sprayed with a clear formula that came from two points either wall.
Owen woke up with a scream, rolled and fell from the trolly to the floor. It took Jack a few minutes to calm him enough to get what he saw out of him,
"It was like I was there, I saw a man rot in front of me. His friend killed him because he wouldn't stop their people calling out for their King. There were these men in red and purple suits and the friend had this device and a gold sword; it was very distinctive and the place I was in had a very strange smell. Should I be worried?"
"Yes and no" Jack said
"It wasn't a dream was it? It was a real event" Owen realised
"You have a very powerful shield within you. It used to belong to Shyer Folding until my father removed it from him in a fight at a hotel we transferred to via a time slip during The Ninth Doctor' training after the war. He used the blue bolt to reverse the loyalties of this powerful weapon and Phelos used it to aid any true Royal of the T5H fort" Jasmine told him
Owen looked at Jack,
"No wait this should've been you. How did this happen?" He asked
"It sensed an alien presence and a good intent, and a connection to me" Jack told him
"Does this have anything to do with that Weevle bite in 06?" He asked
"I abdicated from my role as king because I was a child and I knew what'd be expected of me so I fled" Jack replied
Owen looked at him sarcastically,
"Well isn't that just wonderful, Pole is after me and I am now expected to stop a war on a planet I've never set a foot on because this shield thinks I'm the only rightful heir to the throne"
"Pole is after you for a very different reason and you are the only rightful heir to the throne" Jack said and he took a nervous breath, "I couldn't tell you before, but I guess I have to now, you're my son"
"I'm you're what?" Owen said
Adrian woke up from a nap on his sofa, alarmed to find that Chrissie was calling him. It was 2am,
"What's wrong?" He asked, "You found what, in your hallway?"
"A corspe! I said there's a rotting corpse in my hallway! It's just me here!" She said freaking out
"Don't touch it, don't move I'm coming over" He said before ringing Jasmine to tell her,
Jasmine was watching Owen and Jack staring at each other,
"Thanks Adrian, we'll be there" She said
"On a scale of 1-10..." Jack began
"You were here...the whole time. Damb our court is screwed up" Owen said
"You're not angry?" Jack asked in surprise
"At you, no. What's going to happen to me now?"
"You learn to use your skills or rather supress the most distructive of them to help me end a War on a planet that used to belong to the Time Lords" Jack said
"How old am I?" Owen asked
"You were there when they wrote the rule book for the Time Lords. I wasn't always your father, I used to revert you to childhood at the end of each era so people wouldn't get suspicious of your role involving humans eveloution but one year you got the plague and died, they brought you back with the glove and you brought death with you. You were born to a human and a piece of soul faded into the background. It'd take a recall device to make you as strong as you were then but it would only work if you died first. I couldn't kill one of my own, I was determined to fix you somehow but then someone had you shot. By taking your life they did me a favour, then I learned you'd need a beating heart, at least one of the two for that device to work. The court kept me from you as long as they could and then realised we needed each other and did what they had to to bring me into your aura again" Jack said, he then looked at Jasmine' concerned expression, "What is it?"
"The first body has turned up in Chrissie' apartment" She said
Owen bit his lip,
Brendan arrived at the hub to observe the autopsy,
He got there just as Owen was washing his hands, side eying the corspe from the sink. Jack and Jasmine were on the steps,
"The look on your face tells me this is exactly what you saw" Brendan said
"Yeah but what does it mean? How did he get here?" Owen asked
"This is how it always starts, they leave bodies for the Royal' to find, a "Hey, maybe now you'll give a crap about us", They know we're powerless against the government. The Royal Standby runs away or commits suicide, the cities grow tired of the abuse and fight back, and then they fight each other because you actually find loyalty towards the government" Brendan told him, "Some out of fear about what'll happen to them; others…well who knows what they're thinking. Soon, word gets out and before you know it you have two wars in one"
Owen shakes his head,
"Why will no one stand up to this man?"
"They have moments of peace. Pole runs a government of ex guards from the Orphisvile prison on Galaxy 10. At first the Royal Standby or King is required to execute and destroy the businesses of anyone or anything they take a dislike to and then it's their friends, their own family. All executions are done within the palace" Jack revealed, "It's buried deep beneath the beach. Anyone who tries to run, if caught are murdered and buried beneath the palace"
"Pole was one of the good guys once until the War of the Empires of Light and Dark when T5H was fired into the barrier of The Dark Empire, killing all but Emperor, in a matter of seconds" Brendan said, "The War corrupted Pole. Shyer brought him back from the dead, practically made him indestructible and dad was evacuated here, to the 1950's, where he went to Marvel Boarders for Boys, it's a hotel now"
"You honestly believe we can stop this for good" Owen said
"Now I do but we have to be smart" Jack said
While a jet carrying a pilot crashed into the canal under the watchful eye of Uncle Ryan a policeman was backing his car up into a corpse that was pinned to the wall. A corpse that hadn't been there until now.
"What the...!?"
Jack and Brendan were putting Owen through a series of tests when Jasmine came in and distracted him, a cup flew at her, she ducked and it smashed the window,
"Sorry Jas" Owen said
"You forgot to mention something Owen, before the palace" She said
"Don't tell me there's another body" Owen said
"Two actually, Adrian is bringing in the one found in the multi storey car park, he had holes in his legs,
A copper said he was pinned to the wall" Jasmine told him, "The other is pilot, crashed into the canal"
"The pilot I don't know about but the man pinned to a wall..." Owen began
Owen' dream: Owen was in a city, there was a riot between civilians. He watched one cop fire another across the road, pinning him to a spiked wall
"I'm sorry" Owen sighed
"It's not your fault" Jack said
It was at that momen that Adrian arrived,
"I'll do the autopsy on the officer" Owen said
"Body' in my trunk" Adrian said
"You have to be so blasé?" Jack fumed
"Have you met his father?" Jasmine said
Jack laughed.
As Jasmine and Adrian arrived at the canal the body of the pilot was only now being removed from the jet. He was placed on the walkway beside it and Jasmine let Adrian do a proliminary exam on it,
"No idea how he got here. ID says his name is Captain William Carter though of what I don't know,
I don't recognise the uniform" Andy said
"You won't, this man is from World War 5" Jasmine said
"I beg your pardon?" Andy said in question
Back at the hub Owen, Jack, Adrian and Brendan stared at Jasmine as they stood around the body Owen had just removed a number of bullets from,
"You were in World War 5...as in Earth World War 5" Owen said
"Planet Earth World War Five. Adrian was two at the time. After we left World War Three the TARDIS kept landing in warzones and after a sneezing fit from Adrian we realised the TARDIS had a cold" Jasmine told everyone, "It can be treated with A.N.R serum, only it was administered on the wrong side of the boarder and The Doctor was held for two days. Either way, this body has no time slip device and the only thing strong enough to have possibly gotten him here is the TARDIS"
"You think one of the Doctor' brought a dead body here?" Jack asked in disbelief
"I don't know what to think anymore. It's possible though"
"The 7th did some work…without knowing it, for the court. If he saw what is happening on the T5H then he might have used this as a way of warning us without warning us, without realising he was warning us" Adrian put in
"That bullet is from this era" Owen told her
"Bag it; I'll do some research tomorrow, for now I say we all get some sleep" Jasmine said
Less than an two hours later as Owen and Brendan slept top to toe on the sofa in the lower central hub, the pilot got up and walked. Ryan appeared from a black cloud and shot the man dead again before tying him up and burning letters into the screens of the computers.
"Do not get up again" He said before vanishing
Jasmine grabbed her gun, loaded it and went downstairs to the hub. She looked at the body and then at Owen and Brendan, who she nudged awake,
"What's going on?" He asked and then he saw it, "Oh shit!"
Owen woke up and then Jack joined everyone in the room,
"Do not remove the bullet next time…" He read, "Why the hell didn't the alarms go off? He didn't just get up a walk!"
"Why didn't you wake up?" Jack asked
Ten minutes later Jack, Jasmine, Adrian, Owen and Brendan were stood around the boardroom computers, watching CCTV, they saw the body get up and then being shot by nothing and no one, him being tied up too was too much for Adrian,
"What the hell is going on around here tonight? How can this hub be haunted?"
"It's a scare tactic on the part of the murderer I know that much. Owen, take out the bullet and compare the two" Jasmine said
Owen nodded but before he could leave the boardroom the phone rang,
"No...no don't" He shuddered
"Captain Jack Har...oh God" Jack stammered, "200 bodies...how many of them are children?"
Owen screamed and squatted to the floor,
"I'm gona kill that man! I swear to fucking God!" He yelled
"Who?" Jack asked
"The stand-in! The one with the gold sword!" Owen snapped, "Who found them? Where"
"Daisy, at the hotel" Jack said
"No, that doesn't make sense, I saw a school sprayed not a hotel" Owen said
Adrian did some quick work on the computer in front of him and then looked at everyone,
"Using the geographical points of both planets and assuming they're both equal in size that this hotel is where the school stands on T5H?"
Jack took a shocked breath,
"We need to help move those bodies" He said
"Yeah, yeah you're right and then we can put a stratedgy together, this bulshit needs to stop, Brendan can retcon everyone while we're gone" Owen said
"Done" Brendan said with nod
Owen took out the bullet, locked the body in the morgue and left with the others but while they were gone the pilot got up, got out and walked across the hub and up the stairs. He got as far as the slanted corridors when Ryan appeared from a black cloud and shot the man dead,
"Why're you making things so difficult for yourself?" He asked before hanging the man up on the ceiling of the slanted corridors and leaving again.
Owen was the first to arrive, his scream had everyone on edge,
"I don't think I can take much more of this!" They're eyes widened as they too saw the pilot, "How did he get there!?"
Adrian pushed past everyone to examine him,
"He was shot first"
"What?" Owen said
Down in the mortuary Owen removed the bullet,
"They came from the same gun, I hate to say this but I think Jasmine hit the nail on the head earlier,
The only way that body could get here was in the TARDIS and it's the only way anyone can get in here without setting off the alarms"
"Look it can't be him, even if it was, why would he do this? Kill you to help me sure I can go along with that, this doesn't make any sense" Jack said
"Bring in the 7th, have Michael search his TARDIS for the gun, if there isn't one we're back to the drawing board, minds eased, but if there is...well I don't know, he's got some explaining to do but up to 9 that's nothing out of the ordinary" Adrian said
Unfortunately for the 7th Doctor Ryan had been exact and he soon found himself under arrest and locked in a cell at the court, being watched by Adrian, Jack, Owen and Jasmine,
"What exactly am I being held for?" He asked
"Shooting a human from World War Five, harbouring the body and transporting it here to present day,
Shooting him again on the bullet being removed within a Torchwood base in Cardiff by King Owen the Immortal. Shooting him a third time and then hanging him from the ceiling" Michael said
The Doctor' genuine confusion alarmed Michael,
"Why would I do that? I had Owen killed sure but you told me to" The 7th Doctor said
"Huh!" Jack and Owen exclaimed at the same time from the court,
"Hold on" Adrian said as a rep came over to him with the gun, "This is Marther' gun" And with that he joined Michael and the 7th Doctor. Jack, Owen and Jasmine followed with intrigue, "Not too long ago Jack' uncle Ryan came back from the dead. He had no recollection of the rebuilding of his body,
Would you know anything about that? It could be the difference between you living a little longer in this form or this form being your last because the offence you're being accused of could see you losing your right to regenerate meaning your now form would cease to exist too, so would I because my father is the 9th"
The 7th Doctor looked at Adrian,
"Hello again" He said taking Adrian by surprised, "I was trying to help Owen you see, Pole knows how to kill an immortal, so I had to create someone as strong as the TARDIS to help him. Owen can still die, Pole has means and so dose Shyer, Ryan can't. I separated his DNA from the ash of the Darlek and used the TARDIS technology to piece him back together. Now, I don't know where he is now but I know what he's capable of"
"Can you help us track his signal Doctor?" Owen asked him
"Yes...providing I have Jasmine' permission to continute to live aboard a while longer" He said with a slight bow,
"You may" Jasmine smiled
"Oh my God this is before..." Jack began but he stopped when Jasmine jolted him in the ribs, "Captain Jack Harkness"
"Here we go" Michael said
"I was only saying hello!" Jack said
Ryan appeared in the basement of the abandoned hotel from Torchwood' first case since returning from the War and dumped the body of the stand-in on the floor. All around the walls were plastered with articles about the Wars on T5H from different stations and papers around the universe.
He send out a signal by licking his finger and holding it up in the air,
The 7th Doctor showed them the footage of the pilot' crash and the signals that arose from it's arrival. How no one batted an eyelid,
Owen was stunned,
"He can make objects disintegrate" The Doctor said, "He lay on top of the pilot's plane and took him to the present. The trip vaporised the engines and he crashed, the pilot was then shot dead and the plane exploded; it then disintegrated but not until after you'd left with the pilot. No one heard it or saw it because the body had an alien ID, meaning humans wouldn't be able to see him unless they had contact with Owen" At that moment the signal reached the TARDIS, "Uncle Ryan will see you now"
As Owen, Jack, Jasmine and Adrian met Uncle Ryan in the ruins of the hotel he had four words for them,
"You took your time"
"I can't leave Earth...but I will try and save them"
"You are their King" Ryan said
"In name only"