The next few minutes are a loud blur, calling in the quarantine suddenly much harder to do since Ianto is calling in UNIT and the sounds coming from the coms not helping your worry AT ALL. Ianto practically has to drag you out the door, telling you to drive and call Sarah Jane while he helps the team navigate out. They haven't been caught yet - god, those buggers are slow - but UNIT can't get there fast enough and Jack refuses to leave until he absolutely has to.
"Just call The Doctor! That's an order!" Jack finally shouts. The figurative kick in the pants what you need to clear your head a bit. Normally you'd be okay, but this is your /dad/ in danger... And he's all you've got.
By that time, you're sprinting through the base, outpacing your boyfriend, even, just to get to the computer and and find you don't know what the protocol for that is.
"Emergency Program Two!" you hear him call - speak of the devil - from the entryway.
Every computer in the hub lights up, a dial-tone and then ringing heard over the speaker system as the same set of numbers light every screen.
"Jack, me ol' mate! I haven't seen you in forever!" you hear, the screens switching to show a young man with poofy brown hair in a suit. The man on the screen just beams until he sees your faces.
"I'm not Jack, J-A-C-K. I'm his kid, Jacque with a Q-U-E. My dad's in trouble. He told me to call you and tell you that they're outnumbered. By Cybermen. They're back."
The Doctor's face sets, a curt not and, "Tell me your coordinates," all he needs before he's on the way and you both rush back outside, Ianto driving this time to go join the fray.
Of course, just as you're about to leave, Dad chimes in with a list of things to bring from the hub. And to tell you that one of you needs to stay there to man the base, something he actually needs since whoever stays can patch into the computers and control bits of the city.
Ianto wants that to be you.
Fighting ensues.
"No way," you say simply, "You know the computers inside and out. My place is out there, fighting."
"I just want you safe!" he finally shouts, "I /can't/ lose you! I lost Lisa to the Cybermen, I can't lose you, too!"
You just stop, finally getting it. This is why you were left home, why you were /both/ left home. If Ianto was there, there would be no stopping you from being at his side... But if you were there, he'd be next to useless, too busy having flashbacks to the last time he lost someone he loved.
"Look at me," you say softly, gently tugging his hands from his face to let him look at you. "I'm not going to die. I can't die. Worst case scenario is you find the biggest bit of me you can and leave me in a med bay for a couple weeks or something."
He's crying, anyway, and you just pull him into a hug. "I need to be there. I have to help my dad. But I promise you, I'm going to come back for you, okay?"
You feel him nod, but he doesn't let go. It's like if he holds you close enough, maybe he can protect you. But it doesn't last, there isn't time.
"You can work that out later, love! Ianto, we need help /now/. One of you get to the computer and the other get to the car. Whoever comes with me, I promise I will do everything I can to make sure that they get out of here alive," Jack says, the laptop still tuned into the com system.
"I love you," you says softly, touching your forehead to his.
He takes the moment for a kiss, saying, "Good luck. You'd better come back, cause if you die I just might kill you."
You each have a hint of a smile before having to leave, both of you worried for the other. If you fail... No, you stop yourself from going down that road. You won't let that happen.
By the time you get back out to the car, you're ready to fight. "Hang in there dad," you think aloud, "I'm coming."
When you get there, everything is surprisingly quiet.
They somehow managed to get an emergency warning for everyone to stay in their homes, shutting the roads for miles around. The only reason you managed to get through the three blockades is because you have Torchwood ID.
Then you get to the sandbag wall that UNIT built around the school (geez, that was fast) and end up running to your dad's side. The entire team is there, as is The Doctor and a couple of people you don't know in different uniforms.
"Jacque, this is The Doctor. He's an old friend," he says, running through introductions quickly, "These are The Brigadier and Lieutenant-General Sanchez, both with UNIT. The Brigadier was just passing through when this happened, so we just got lucky."
"You got lucky. Meanwhile I'm probably not holidaying in Wales again for quite some time," he comments, getting a nudge and witty response from The Doctor, "Oh, come on. I know you, always ready for a fight. Probably wouldn't miss this for the world."
Jack just smirks, continuing, "Everyone, this is Jacque, my kid. And no, I wasn't the one to pick the name."
You shake everyone's hands. You knew you that Torchwood wasn't the only one who fought aliens - and heard whispers of The Doctor - but actually having them show up... Any other time, you would be thrilled. Now it just makes everything that much more terrifying.
"So. What was in there, exactly, and what are we planning to do about it?" you ask.
"Well, currently there's a theory that they aren't the same ones we met, or that maybe they've evolved. Both of which - while valid - will make taking them out twice as hard," Jack says.
"Soo, going from what we know," The Doctor picks up, "The basic plans are to try and send some sort of electric or electromagnetic pulse through the whole building. Preferably," he says, adding a bit of a wary look to the major, "One that won't hurt any of the humans still inside?"
The Brigadier nods, saying, "Don't worry, Doctor. I wouldn't want any more casualties than will be caused by the Cybermen. And hopefully we won't even get those."
"You're getting old," The Doctor says with a grin.
"Either way," Jack interrupts, pulling them back on track, "It'll take some time to get the right equipment built and moved. In the meantime, we've set up a perimeter and need to know exactly where to shoot and with what. The papers and boxes I had you bring have the basic build of a Cyberman as we know them and bullets that can tear one wide open."
"Only," The Doctor says, "To destroy the emotional inhibitor. Hopefully it'll just slow them down until we can figure out a way to fix this. There's got to be a way to save them, we just haven't found it, yet."
You bring everything over, looking at the plans with the others.
That's when you get an idea.
"Why don't you just build better bodies?" you ask, "You know, ones that look sort of like they did? If they have names, we've got to have pictures. The ones that make it past finding out what they are can get put into machines that look like themselves."
Everyone just stares at you.
"That's brilliant! Why didn't I think of that?" The Doctor says, grinning.
"And you can take them to another planet where they can live out the rest of their lives," adds Jack.
"Everyone can be happy," Gwen says, "Everybody wins."
"And," adds Owen, "As long as people don't find out, you're safe."
"You've got a great kid, there, Jack," The Doctor says, "Who's the mum, anyway?"
"Who says there is one?" Jack quips, quickly changing the subject, "The only problem is that we don't know enough about this technology to be able to design better bodies."
"If you get me in there, I can figure it out in an hour, tops," Tosh says.
"No," Jack says, "It's too dangerous."
"But if she doesn't it'll take months just to reconstruct the boards. And they don't exactly come with a manual," Owen replies, prompting Tosh to ask, "Can Cybermen even be cryogenically frozen?"
"Even if this all works," the Major speaks up, "What's to keep them from fighting back even without the inhibitor chip?"
"Picture this;" The Doctor says, the whole group falling still to listen, "You're off to work or class, or even just cleaning up something. You black out for a bit and, when you come to, suddenly everything's cold. You have jumbled memories of people dying by your hand... But it can't be yours, you're not a robot. Then you look in a mirror, and oh, yes you are. But it's worse than that," he says, "Because they've even stolen your identity. You didn't have a name, all your identifying marks, even your gender or gender identity is gone. Chucked in the bin. And it's all so cold, cause if it wasn't, you'd die.
"Does that sound like a life you'd want, Major? Or would you turn to the first person who promised to help you?"
The Major just nods, the point proven, and says, "Right. So, once the inhibitor chip is knocked out, what do we do with them?"
"Last time, most of them died," The Doctor says darkly, "The machinery couldn't process their emotions at finding out what they had become."
"Any chance UNIT has psychologists trained in this sort of thing?" Jack asks, a slight bitter edge to his voice.
"Even if we did," The Major says blandly, "What would they say to these... Things?"
"People, Major," The Brigadier reminds him, having seen the look on The Doctor's face, "Behind that chip and the mechanical suit are human minds. And not ones that volunteered, from what I've heard."
The major seemed to almost sulk, but pulled back with a nod, saying, "Alright. That still doesn't solve my question about what do do with the survivors, /if/ there are survivors."
"I can take them," says The Doctor, "If Jack can freeze them - or if UNIT can, either way - then I can keep them there and wait in the vortex for your signal. It'll only be, oh..." He scratches the back of his head, estimating, "Five minutes? Tops? And that's only assuming that you can't figure it out until 2050, and I know you lot can do better than that."
The two groups of humans sort of grinned; it's not often you get such high praise.
"Alright," Gwen says, "But how are we going to take down the hub inside? What are we going to do? Just camp here until the computer bomb is ready?"
"I think I have a solution that'll be faster than that," your dad says.
"Oh? What's that?"
"Tosh," he says with a smirk, "If I give you Ianto for help... How long should it take to make a computer virus?"