Title: Armageddon

Rating: T

Warnings: Major spoilers for "Utopia", "The Sound of Drums" and "Last of the Time Lords"; violence; mild language; allusions to rape (but I promise nothing explicit or graphic)

A/N: Thanks so much for the reviews! I really appreciate it you guys!

Sorry that this chapter took a tiny bit longer (only a few days though, so I'm still proud of myself!) than I intended. I was busy doing revisions and working on another story. Also semi-research on this chapter as well. Hope you enjoy!

Armageddon:

Part III: The Year of Hell

Chapter Twenty-Five

It was dark on the Valiant when Gabriel arrived. That was probably a good thing considering that he didn't want to be caught by any guards. Anything he did on this ship had the potential to be noticed and anything he said could be overheard. He felt paranoid, but paranoia was precisely how he'd managed to hide himself for so long. His brothers wouldn't recognize him unless they actually saw him face to face. It was only a small comfort. They'd recognize an angel if he did too much.

He scanned the room he was in with a faint frown. There was no one inside except the two prisoners who were huddled together. He'd never met the Doctor, but he knew immediately that the skinny man wearing the dirty brown suit had to be him. It certainly wasn't the human he currently had his arm around, fingers tightly holding onto his shoulder. It took Gabriel a moment to place the human, his brows furrowing.

Spencer Reid. Out of his proper place in time. It had been a long time since Gabriel had seen a human being displaced in time. He approached them cautiously, scanning them and taking note of their injuries. Their stay aboard the Valiant had not been kind to them.

They were sleeping and he was somewhat reluctant to wake them, but he had to get off this ship as quickly as possible so he sat himself down on the floor and reached over, touching the Doctor gently. The Time Lord jerked upright, eyes flying wide. The movement jostled Spencer and he too sat up quickly, sucking in a sharp, surprised breath.

Gabriel didn't say anything, letting them both take in everything before watching them wrap their arms around themselves, shivering. He realized it was, technically, extremely cold in the room. With a faint frown he raised the temperature. Not much, but maybe enough to make them more comfortable.

The Doctor finally spoke, eyeing him with suspicion,

"Who are you?"

"I have a few names," Gabriel said, eyes darting upward. He was doing what he could to make sure that this conversation wasn't overheard and he hoped that they wouldn't get curious about a small pocket of audio coming from here, but he had a feeling they would get curious quickly if something were to happen.

"You can call me Gabriel,"

"How did you get here, Gabriel?" Spencer was staring around him, eyes darting toward the door as if he expected someone else to come bursting in at any moment, "I've never seen you onboard before."

"I wasn't onboard before," Gabriel said, "Just flew in."

"Flew in from where?"

"From talking to a friend of yours," Gabriel said, "Martha Jones. I didn't want to come here, but she insisted and how could I say no to such a pretty face?"

"You spoke to Martha!" The Doctor sat up now, despite the pain the movement clearly caused him. He was weak and injured. Gabriel hesitated, wondering if he could heal him. He'd never tried healing anything other than a human being before.

"Not more than a few minutes ago," Gabriel said, "She's in 'Nam right now. Doing pretty good for herself. I think she's getting tired, but she's struggling through. Seems to be pretty loyal to you."

The Doctor frowned, "If Martha's in Vietnam… how did you possibly speak to her and then get here? Getting on this ship isn't easy."

"Oh, right…" Gabriel frowned, "I'm a…" he hesitated. He started to say 'god', then felt an intense urge to say 'angel' instead. It had been so long since he'd told anyone who and what he really was and now he felt like shouting it, just to get the feeling of something heavy sitting on his chest to go away.

"You're a what?" The Doctor was still eyeing him with suspicion, his jaw tight and his lips pressing together into a thin line.

Gabriel knew this man, of all people, didn't have the same prejudice against supernatural beings that the hunters did, but he wondered which story here would get him the most trust. Either was probably going to get him a raised brow or two.

Before he'd actually made the decision, he answered, "I'm an angel,"

"An angel!?" the Doctor's laugh was disbelieving as he stared at him, "What, a proper angel? With wings and a halo?"

Gabriel frowned, "You know, I'm not even sure where the whole 'halo' things comes from," he said, "We don't actually go around with a floating gold disc over our heads. I mean sure, in our true form there's a lot impossible to describe light, but no halos."

Reid was giving him a funny look, "You said you're name was Gabriel," he said.

"I did," Gabriel nodded and the Doctor was watching the two of them with a frown.

"…Did you… Do you like candy?"

Gabriel snapped his fingers and there was a Butterfinger in his hands. He tore the paper off and smiled a bit, "Candy, pretty girls and screwing with douche bags."

"Spencer, what –" the Doctor looked completely confused, but Spencer was still staring at Gabriel with wide, half-terrified, half-hopeful eyes.

"What about Sam and Dean Winchester?"

Gabriel blinked at him, but answered anyway, "Couple of clueless jackasses," he said, "Kinda sad really. They remind me of my brothers."

Spencer nodded curtly and turned to look at the Doctor, "He's telling the truth," he said, "He's an angel. The archangel, Gabriel."

"How do you know that?" the Doctor's voice rose in pitch a bit, staring at Reid with wide, demanding eyes. Gabriel was uncharacteristically silent, his eyes on the young man with a pensive frown. He knew who Spencer Reid was and he knew he was out of his own time, but Spencer Reid wasn't supposed to be part of anything big. Not by cosmic standards at least. He was certainly not supposed to be the kind of person to meet an angel in the flesh.

"That's complicated, Doctor," Spencer said, only half looking at the Time Lord. "It's… about before. What happened before."

"Oh," the Doctor's face fell a bit, "Of course. Spoilers."

For some reason, that made Spencer grin widely and he nodded, "Exactly," he said.

"Anyway," Gabriel cut in, "I don't have much time here, Doc, so I'm gonna get to the point. I'm here to help."

"Help?"

"Why does everyone give me that look?" Gabriel muttered, "None of you even know me and you think I'm lying."

"It is a bit difficult to know who to trust these days," the Doctor said.

"Well I'm here to help you anyway," Gabriel said, "Martha Jones sent me here. I can't kill the Master or –"

"I don't want you to do that anyway," the Doctor was quick to cut in, "Assassination isn't part of the plan."

"Might want to talk to some of the people down below about that," Gabriel said, "I don't think they got the 'DO NOT KILL' memo."

The Doctor frowned. He had heard about the assassination attempt. It was the first one in a quite a while and he was certain that it was going to be a failure. He hoped that Martha and some of his old friends would be able to convince them to put the attempt off, but they seemed determined.

"What is your plan? Exactly?" Gabriel asked, "Because these timelines… Not quite sure how you plan to deal with that."

"You can sense that the timelines are off?" the Doctor raised a brow.

"Of course," Gabriel said, "My father exists outside of time. Angels can bend time to a certain degree. We can tell when time is being tampered with. Your ship gives off its own temporal energy from being sucked between time so often. You know, your species was the first to develop time travel outside of any supernatural being."

The Doctor frowned, "You can sense the TARDIS?"

Gabriel tilted his head, "She doesn't seem happy,"

"She isn't," the Doctor said, his voice hollow, "The Master cannibalized her. It's why the Toclafane are able to be here and why the timelines are so screwed together."

"Then you would need to fix her," Gabriel said, "Priority number one, right?"

"I'm trying," the Doctor said, "It's not exactly easy. I can still reach her, psychically, but the pain she's in from what the Master's done to her and holding together the paradox… She can barely hear me."

"What about Archangel and this plan for the countdown?"

The Doctor let out a breath and anxiously glanced toward the doors.

"We're alone," Gabriel assured him, "I'll know if anyone decides to come this way, trust me. I'm on high alert here."

The Doctor met his eyes and frowned, nodding slowly, "The network is tuned into psychic wavelengths. If everyone, or even just a large portion of everyone, follows the plan and focuses their thoughts on me at one specific time it will give me enough power to heal the TARDIS and that should snap the timelines back in place."

"So you're integrating yourself into the network," Gabriel said.

"I can't do it too quickly," he nodded, "otherwise the Master would notice something is wrong."

"Right," Gabriel said, "I think I can work with this. I can definitely help with the Toclafane problem since they were human once and give me enough time I can probably convince the people not to get themselves killed for something that isn't going to happen…"

"Just you?" the Doctor asked, frowning, "I would think there would be other angels."

"Oh, there are plenty of other angels," Gabriel said, "They're all in Heaven doing whatever they're doing these days. I haven't exactly checked in lately. Missed the last few thousand family reunions."

The Doctor frowned curiously, "What?"

"I'm a runaway," Gabriel said, hopping to his feet, "Think you might know something about that, huh, Doctor?"

Before the Doctor could ask anything more, Gabriel was gone.

~/.\~

"Jen?"

Jenny lowered her gun and gave Gibbs a smile that was more of a smirk, her eyes sparkling a bit. "Well you didn't think I'd let you have all the fun, did you, Jethro?" Gibbs didn't say anything, but there was a smile on his face that none of them had seen in months.

She motioned to her companions, "And look who I found poking around in Detroit two weeks ago," said. It was only then that Gibbs actually looked at the two people behind her. His eyes lit on the man she was pointing at and his grin somehow got wider. He moved toward him without a word and McGee and Tony stared with wide eyes when their boss hugged the man.

"Mike! For God's sake I thought you were dead. You couldn't come up here to help us any sooner?"

Mike Franks gave him a sort of sneer that was riddled with affection and playfully smacked him on the head, "You know I was south of the border, Probie," he said, "You expect me to teleport? It ain't exactly easy to get past the Master's friends."

"I feel like we're missing something," Tony whispered to McGee, glancing over at him.

"Mike was Gibbs' boss when he became an agent," Jenny explained, "And I'm sure you remember Agent Cassidy, Tony."

Tony's eyes got even wider, if it were possible, when Paula smiled at him. He hardly recognized her; her hair was longer and darker and she was too thin, but her eyes were shining brightly and he knew that smile well. He grinned at her.

"Been a long time," she said, sounding somber.

"Kinda wish we didn't have meet again like this…" Tony said.

Gibbs was already leading Jenny and Mike further into the church, introducing them to everyone else who was entirely lost on exactly what had just happened. Tony slid to Paula's side and looked over with a grimace.

"You look like you've been through the wringer," he said.

"Hard to find good food and shelter when you're on the run," she told him, "Now I know how fugitives feel."

Prentiss cleared her throat and smiled a painful sort of smile at them, "They're getting the computer connected now," she said, nodding toward Sam, McGee and Grace. "I think they've almost got the cables fixed." Her eyes were on Paula the entire time and Tony shifted a bit, leading them toward the computers.

"Right, let's see if McGeek and friends were able to accomplish something worthwhile…"

"How did you even get here, Jen?" Gibbs asked, "We haven't heard any word from you in months."

"That's a long story, Jethro. I spent a while in a safe house outside Quantico after the Decimation. They were raided about a month later and I ran into Paula when the few of us who survived ran. We were on the move for a while. Crossed a few stateliness and three weeks ago I was in Detroit when heard about this attempt."

"She ran into me on her way here," Mike said, "I wasn't gonna come until she told me you were here. Couldn't miss an opportunity to fight this sonuvabitch along you, Probie. Figured you'd need all the help you can get."

McGee looked up from the computer, frowning, "Gibbs has been an agent for over a decade and you still call him Probie?"

Mike grinned a bit, "He'll always be a Probie compared to me."

Tony clapped McGee on the back, "Take a good look at that, Probie, that's your future."

McGee grimaced and turned back to the computer, hitting a few keys, "We're connecting. It'll take a second to… There we are!"

Abby's face was suddenly there in one of the boxes in the screen, giving them an accusing stare, "Took you guys long enough!" she snapped, shaking her head at McGee.

"Sorry," Sam apologized, "We had a few setbacks."

"Setbacks?" Sarah Jane asked, "No one's hurt are they?"

"Nothing like that," Lassiter assured her, "We had a… visitor… I think we'll have to save that for another time though considering we're already almost ten minutes behind." He wasn't sure how to say they'd been visited by a god who'd offered his help. It was definitely something they'd have to discuss with everyone, but they had more pressing things to talk about at the moment.

"And then some new people showed up," Lisbon added, motioning to Jenny and Mike and Paula.

Abby's eyes got wide, "Director Shepard! You're alive! I knew you were! I knew it!" She was grinning and Jenny smiled at her, "And Agent Cassidy! You're there too! This is wonderful! Ducky look!"

Ducky smiled next to her, "I see, Abigail," he said, nodding, "It's wonderful to see you again, Director."

"You too, Ducky,"

"I hate to cut this reunion short," Kate suddenly cut in, "but we're already behind and we have a bit of important information to cover."

"We think the Doctor is infiltrating Archangel," Sarah Jane said, not wanting to beat around the bush, "He's trying to communicate with us. We can't quite get through to him yet, but I'm sure that it's him."

"You think he wants to talk to us?" Charlie asked.

"I'm sure he does," Sarah Jane said, "Especially because he doesn't want the Master killed,"

"How can he not want that?" Dean demanded, "The Master's sitting up there on that ship, just torturing and killing people and enjoying it. He can't seriously think there's some way to save him."

"The Doctor would," Kate insisted, "It's who he is. Never give up hope on anyone."

"And the Master is the last of his kind," Sarah Jane reminded him, "Wouldn't you be a bit reluctant to kill the only other living human being if your places were reversed?"

"Not if he was a psychotic dickbag," Dean said.

"There is not convincing you to back out of this is there?" Tosh asked. She looked a bit sad, "I really think you should reconsider. There are things that you can do that don't have to end in bloodshed like this will."

"We have to try," Lassiter said.

"Anything that we do is going to be dangerous anyway," Morgan said, "This is just taking things a little farther than we have been lately."

"It's idiotically reckless," Sherlock said, "You're going to do yourselves more harm than good and it will only make the Master angry."

"But if they do manage to kill him –" Reid started to say but Sherlock cut him off.

"They won't,"

"I think we should at least wait," Grace Holloway said, "but I can understand why they're all eager to do something. We've all lost someone, haven't we? It feels like we're just waiting for someone else to come save us right now."

"Exactly," Gibbs said, "And I don't much like the idea of putting all my bets on one guy. We've got a shot at this and we're going to try it. Anything that could take the Master out is worth the risk right now."

"It's extremely risky though," Ianto said, "You're better off focusing on something smaller. Taking out the Toclafane should be our top priority right now, not the Master."

"We're not going back on this plan," Gordon said, "We're going through with this."

Kate sighed, "If there's no reasoning with then I suppose we don't have any real way to stop you,"

"None," Prentiss said.

She leaned forward and tapped a few keys, "This is a layout of the Valiant," she said, "It should be on your screen now. I don't know what the Master has designated anything for or where he keeps the prisoners. We can probably assume the cells in the lower levels are going to at least partially occupied. Your best bet to get onboard quickly is to go in through the loading bay."

"Seems really exposed," Grace said, frowning, "If he gets suspicious, he could blast us right off the ship before we ever get inside the actual ship itself…"

"We can pull it off if we keep our heads down and move fast," Henry said, "As long as we get the uniforms and move fast we'll be okay I think. We can't hesitate though."

"Alright, well," Sarah Jane sounded disappointed, "I really do hope you can get at least get on and off the Valiant quickly. I wish Martha were here. She's getting ready to move to Australia soon I believe and as soon as I can get in contact with her again I want to have another video conference… We should probably disconnect and I hate to go when you've only just been able to connect with us, but the feed has been running for several minutes and I don't want to draw too much attention."

They signed off quickly, the screen going black in front of them before Grace shut the laptop.

"So, Probie," Mike turned to Gibbs, "Why don't you all fill us in on the rest of this plan of yours…"

~/.\~

A/N: I hate this chapter. I just… I don't know. I wrote it. Rewrote it. Changed several things and it still feels so off. I really hope it isn't terrible.

I was already debating about using either Paula Cassidy or Michelle Lee for one of Jenny's companions and eventually decided to use Mike Franks as the other because I've been riding the fence about bringing him in or not for a while. (Thanks to KMW1968 for convincing me too; and I'm sorry Laura! I am still trying to find a way to bring Chang in though 'cos I want him to be in here somewhere)

Of course, once I decided to use Mike I had to go look up the proper timeline for NCIS and Mike comes into the show in 2006 during the season 3 finale so Jenny's already met him and he already came up from Mexico to help Gibbs once. Then I couldn't remember if McGee and Tony met him then so I rewatched Hiatus part 1 and 2 to get that right and to make sure I wrote his character right. Then I just sobbed for like two hours. I forgot how sad those episodes made me.

I hope Mike is in character. I really don't want to screw his character up, but I'm not sure… Anyway. Hope you enjoyed! Please don't forget to review!