Chapter 5

"Okay time for a major distraction that should help us along nicely." Thalon held up the device he'd cobbled together using the iPod.

"This should stop the guards from being able to communicate with each other." Thalon hit the play button and everything in the area around them with a speaker, including the smoke alarms, played the first two seconds of a song by Britney Spears then faded out as the batteries died on the iPod.

"Yea great distraction for all of two seconds," Rose replied sarcastically.

"I guess I forgot to calculate the power consumption against the capacity of these primitive energy storage devices."

"Any other ideas?"

"Nope, sorry."

"Fine, use some of those power crystals then," Rose replied.

"Good idea." He dug through the pockets of his jackets and then pulled out a few and dropped them back in muttering things like, 'data', 'gemstone', 'cutting tool', 'rock', until he came to an oblong battery-sized bright blue one. "Aha, one of these should keep it running for years." Thalon managed to squeeze it into the battery slot and used the sonic screwdriver on it, he then pressed the play button again and Britney Spears blared out of every speaker in the vicinity.

"Can you move on to the next one?"

"Not a fan I take it?"

"No, not in this universe or the other one," Rose replied meekly as Thalon cycled through the play until he got to some punk stuff that her Doctor liked. This particular one she remembered listening to on the TARDIS before accidentally ending up meeting Queen Victoria and the werewolf. "He liked this one."

"The line 'it's good to be a lunatic' describes him accurately enough too."

"He was going to take me to loads of concerts but we always ended up somewhere else. We only ever ended up at two, one was Live8, and the original Live Aid."

"His TARDIS probably decided she'd rather take you to something more dangerous than a concert. Then there's his driving to factor in as well. Never was as good since that time the Time Lords banished him to Earth and removed his knowledge of TARDIS workings, and that's saying something since he wasn't that great to start with. Sure he got out of it or should I say 'I got him out of it', and that knowledge was returned but I think they, to borrow a phrase, 'botched it up' on him."

"Tell me about it, just after I met him he was supposed to take me home a few hours after we I left. Turned out it was a year later and my mum was shocked to see me. Everyone thought Mickey murdered me, they had him in for questioning and all. Would have had him in jail only they couldn't prove it, which of course they couldn't since I was alive, and the worst of it is it had only been two days for me. Mum slapped him, and I think he's been afraid of her ever since." She laughed at the last part.

"Wish I was there to see that." Thalon laughed. "Actually I could have sold tickets to see that."

Rose laughed harder and had to stop climbing the steps at level seven to catch her breath because of the laughter rather than being unfit. She, being a field agent, was, if anything, fitter than she was when she had been with the Doctor. With the Doctor her main source of exercise had been running, and true that gave her speed now, and her early years of gymnastics gave her flexibility which was good for putting into practice for her hand to hand training, but now she was required to spend at least three hours a week in the gym training on other fitness such as spinning, steps, and weights; she was also required to spend one hour a week swimming in the pool at the Torchwood gym complex. It was no ordinary swimming pool either, it had a currant you had to swim against, and they could simulate swimming in rough tides, as well as a separate diving pool. On top of it all Rose had been trained in firearms: both alien and human, hand to hand, and she had just finished a physics degree through this universe's equivalent of the Open University.

Rose had grown up a lot since she met the Doctor, she was no longer the naive teenager that he met that day in Henricks. She also, although not required, liked to go for a jog around the grounds of Pete's mansion before going to bed as it helped her sleep; she seemed to have so much energy she had no idea what to do with it all, and, now Rose thought about it, that had started back when she became Bad Wolf. Along with her ability to heal quickly from injury she now also had reflexes so good she almost could see when something was coming beforehand. Before she came here she had just thought it was the TARDIS' influence and had kept her so busy, and during the past six years she never stopped long enough to think about that.

"You okay, Rose? Only three more levels to go."

"I'm always okay," Rose replied, channelling that part of her that must have been the Doctor, and started running two steps up at a time again. "Come on, don't get too far behind."

Thalon grinned and ran along behind her at the same pace. "Now you're even beginning to sound like him."

"Someone has to be the Doctor," Rose replied echoing words she said so long ago as they reached level eight.

"Yes, well I suppose. Even my own people came to think it in the end. He was an outcast for challenging the order of things and for doing instead of observing. The Celestial Intervention Agency eventually employed him to intervene on missions that they needed deniability for, and he was allowed to run free and do what he did, and to be honest things only changed for the better. The only thing that could be said that was the wrong choice is that which brought about his guilt. He was sent to stop the Daleks from ever existing, and he refused to do it in the end, he couldn't bring himself to commit genocide then, and he blames himself for the war now."

"Well that's not fair, just because he showed he was better than a Dalek doesn't mean he was responsible."

"Try telling him that. The Daleks where evil and brought with them great destruction, but as the Doctor himself has admitted they also brought people together and made planets forge great alliances from the fear of the name 'Dalek'. I tried to tell him, and I'm sure we both can try when we get back, that without the Daleks there would have been something else to form the power vacuum and the consequences could have been far worse than we ever imagined. It was short sighted of the Time Lords to have even sent him on such a mission, and he was one of the few at the time to have seen it."

"Yeah," Rose agreed as they got to level 10. "Okay remember keep the gun on me, and set to stun."

Thalon checked the gun, and then used the sonic screwdriver he held in his other hand to bypass the key-card lock and open the door. They walked into a vast room that was three stories high, which contained crates, bits of space ships, computers, scanning equipment, and various other things. In one corner there was a very large flat lift that dropped downwards, which was used for bringing the larger objects in. On all but one wall there were doors that lead to offices or other smaller research labs, and the one wall without doors contained windows that used one-way glass to the outside overlooking Canary Wharf. People were too busy bustling maniacally and frantically, doing things with equipment, to even notice their arrival, which gave some understanding as to the utter mayhem that was going on in Torchwood Tower at that moment. "So, where to start?"

"Across to the other side of the room; beside the big hatch that reaches the ceiling," Rose said and pointed. "The mauve door labelled '3', which incidentally has a Bad Wolf sticker on it. Bad joke from Mickey... Well, so I thought at the time. Anyway they keep a wormhole device in there, and Mickey's current job is to hack into the programming to see if there is a way of having more than one activate on a single planet. He works with seven other people, all of which are not in there as they seem to be running around in here like headless chickens, and that room has the most advanced computer equipment we've worked out how to use."

"So what do we do? Just walk across there?"

"Yup, just act like you own the place. Always works for me," Rose replied and picked up two empty clipboards from a nearby table, then handed one to Thalon.

He put the gun away and walked along behind her carrying the clipboard under his arm. They got about halfway across the room when the iPod started to play the "Mission Impossible" theme tune and Rose burst out laughing. "Strange friend you have."

"Now how cheesy is that?!" Rose exclaimed between laughter. "We better not have to dangle over a computer console trying not to touch the ground."

"Oh come on, you're loving it," Thalon reputed.

"Always," Rose replied still laughing.

"Over there!"

"Looks like we've been spotted," Thalon observed stating the obvious. "Run?"

"Run," Rose agreed and they dropped their clipboards and made a dash for it as twenty security guards, ten special agents, and some of the scientists, chased after them. They made it to the door and Thalon used the sonic screwdriver to open it, and slammed it shut when they where through. He then used the screwdriver to lock it and the other big door. Rose looked to see there were only three occupants in the room all holding up guns, one putting theirs down as they saw who it was. "Thalon meet my family. This is my Dad, Pete Tyler," she gestured to Pete, then Mickey, "Mickey Smith, my ex-boyfriend, who became the best brother I could ask for. And this is his lovely boyfriend Jake, at last took 'em long enough. I also have my Mum and little brother but they're at home."

"Rose, what's going on?" Pete asked confused. "I was told you where taken hostage, but it seems you know this man."

"Dad, I'm sorry, I had to give that impression to help get him out. Split up everyone's attention so everyone was divided. He's the Doctor's brother, and he's going to help me get back to him, and don't ask me how I know he's telling the truth, I just do. I've an instinctive trust in him, a connection that I can't even try to explain; it's like I've known him my entire life even though we only met today."

"So the music was your idea as well?" Pete asked. "Because that was very effective. The radios and phones don't work. We've been reduced to using MSN and text messaging, even paper aeroplanes."

"That was all me," Thalon told him. "Little trick I picked up once. Hi I'm Thalonraxianplatonlationbarrina or Thalon for short. Sorry to be rude, but need to get a wormhole generator before they break through the door."

"Relax Thalon, that's a new type of metal, stronger than thirty feet of concrete, light weight, and with a very high melting point. Will take at least half an hour to get through," Rose told him. "I'm more worried about how to get to your TARDIS."

"Oh don't worry 'bout that. I have it right here," Thalon informed them and reached into one of his many bottomless pockets and pulled out the Rubik's Cube. "Unlike my brother's mine have a functioning chameleon circuit. Means my TARDIS can take on any shape. Just solve the puzzle and turns into a box with a door big enough to fit whatever or whoever needs to get into it."

"What if you lose the cube?" Mickey asked eying the small object.

"What if I lose it! What if I lose it you ask? That is so, so, human! Show an ape something so brilliant, so magnificent, and you ask something like that--"

"Okay now I got to believe he's related to the Doctor," Mickey remarked to the room in general, causing Rose to smile and giggle a little because Mickey was right, Thalon was so much like the Doctor in that moment.

Thalon stooped his belittling of humans and looked at Mickey. "Fine, this is a type one hundred and twenty TARDIS, it has built in remote control. It will come to me as long as I'm in range just by telling it to telepathically." He then looked at what was against one wall on the other side of the room. "Now that is just beautiful. Would be a crime to take it apart, and I mean that quite literally. I take it that's not the only one?"

"No it's the third," Rose replied. "The first was found in Cairo, the second in the Antarctic, and this one was found in a hidden chamber under Stonehenge. You needed the gene to get the door open so it had never been discovered until I got there three years ago; we were on a family outing with my brother, and in this universe you're still allowed to touch the stones if you have enough money. Anyway I was curious about this one stone, it had wolf's head on it, and well I touched it, and then this hatch opened up to reveal a hidden chamber."

"So you have one and a backup as well as this one, yea?"

"Yes," Rose answered.

"Good, 'cause it would be a crime to take apart Earth's Stargate, after all a lot of human history depends on this primitive device."

"And I thought it was just a TV show," Mickey added as he looked at the round rings with nine chevrons and lots of glyphs.

"Well not everything is true that's on the show, the names were changed for a start, and the Goa'uld threat was greatly exaggerated, there is no Ori in this galaxy, and then there was the last episode of SG-1 when--"

"Don't you dare say it! Don't even think it," Jake interrupted speaking for the first time. "I've not seen that one yet, don't you dare spoil it."

"Oh, rambling again, sorry." Thalon scratched the back of his neck and continued, "What you're trying is possible with these old models and some modifications, that's what the ninth chevron's for. I can't tell you how though without changing the whole course of human history so sorry about that too. Anyway this gate isn't supposed to be here, it was placed here by Bad Wolf, look the point of origin is even a wolf head. Rose Tyler I like you, you have style. Probably even programmed the door to encode with your own DNA, now that is clever. My brother sure did pick a smart one, even if she doesn't know how smart she is."

Thalon handed Rose his TARDIS Cube and began using the sonic screwdriver on one of the eighth chevron.