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: Look at that. This chapter is up in (relatively) short time! Thanks so much for the reviews and the favorites and welcome to the new followers! You guys are awesome.

Finals week is OVER! My classes are finished until January and I've got no other big writing projects going at the moment, which means I've got plenty more time to devote to writing this. Rejoice! Also, I'm feeling much, much better and am feeling a bit more inspired. I'm going to try (TRY) to get new chapters out every Tuesday or every other Tuesday. Hell, I used to manage to write a new chapter every single day when I was in high school. I can do a new one every week or two. I want to keep a more regular schedule with this thing. Hopefully I can stick to it. It may mean chapters are shorter than the 5000+ words they used to be, but I think that's a decent trade off. I want to have this story finished before it reaches its second birthday.

So, thanks once more to everyone who's reading this and extra thanks to those taking the time to favorite and review! You're all awesome!

Armageddon:

Part III: The Year of Hell

Chapter Thirty-Three

The screen fuzzed in and out for a second and Sarah Jane frowned, tapping on the keyboard a few times until the image cleared. Reid looked around the room with curious eyes. Monitors were set up in a mismatched collage – some big and wide, some narrow and flat and a few framed with thick grey panels. They were all flickering to life around him, but mostly they were displaying nothing but whitespace at the moment.

Behind the screens were shelves packed with odds and ends – wires and remotes and cardboard boxes. He'd peeked inside earlier and found weapons that had been torn apart, bullets, tazers, wrenches, pliers and even a few busted up MP3 players. There was an entire shelve, neatly stocked, with machines and gadgets that he'd never heard of, let alone seen. He wondered how much of the stuff was alien technology and if any of it had been given to her by the Doctor.

Sarah Jane caught him looking and smiled faintly, "It's amazing what you'll find when you look for it. Most of this is old junk, but that over there," she nodded her head toward a large table that had been cleared off of everything except a handful of tools and a bulky, cobbled together gun, "is what we've been working on to fight the Toclafane."

"Does it work?" Tish had moved over to the weapon and gingerly reached out to put a finger to the cold metal. Fran and Clive had been standing near the doorway, just staring around the room as Reid had, and cautiously stepped toward the monitors.

Sarah Jane frowned a bit, "Not entirely. It emits an electronic pulse that is, in theory, supposed to kill a Toclafane. So far I've only been able to knock them out for a few minutes. It's helpful, certainly, but not what we need."

Tish frowned, studying the weapon quietly.

Fran had turned her attention to the screens, her eyes cautiously hopeful. "Martha will be on one of these monitors, right? We'll be able to see her?"

Sarah Jane nodded, "Absolutely," she assured her. "People should start connecting any moment now so it won't be long."

The smile on Fran's lips was small, but it was more than she'd managed lately. She, Clive and Tish had been sending Martha short messages over the network ever since Sarah Jane had taught them how, but Fran was anxious to actually see her daughter again.

"Are you sure it's a good idea for me to be here?" Reid asked, suddenly worried. "My team is supposed to be connecting and the other me –"

"It's essential that you're here, Dr. Reid," Sarah Jane cut him off quickly. "There is the problem with the timelines, but your timeline is already out of sync as it is… They want to talk to you and you're our best proof that the Doctor's plan will work. We need you here."

Nodding, Reid turned his attention back to the screens, his brows pinched together. He didn't tell Sarah Jane that he was still worried about whether or not this plan of the Doctor's would work. He didn't tell her that he knew how tricky the laws of time could be and that time could always be rewritten. Just because things had been fine in his 2011 didn't mean that they were definitely going to be alright. One thing could go off-script and then everything could be ruined.

"Hello? Anyone home?" Martha's voice suddenly rang out from the speakers and Tish practically ran around to see them. Fran and Clive looked up, their hands instinctive finding each other and interlocking. Fran's eyes were glistening as she spotted her daughter on a screen to the far left and her smile warbled.

"Martha!" Tish was the first to speak, a huge smile on her face, "You're alright!"

Martha was grinning so wide it looked like her face might split apart and Reid and Sarah Jane stepped back a bit from the monitors to let the Jones family have their moment.

"'Course I'm alright," Martha said. "Practically living my dream, you know. Traveling the world. Meeting new people."

Fran let out a nervous laugh and reached forward, fingers brushing the glass on the screen as she stared at the image there.

"You look tired, Martha."

Martha's smile softened as she stared at her mother. "You're on the talk, Mum. Have you slept at all in the last month?"

Fran shook her head, "I'm fine," she insisted. Turning toward Clive and Tish she smiled again, "We're all fine."

"Good," Martha nodded, her voice cracking. Tears started to slip down her face and she cleared her throat loudly, wiping at her eyes. "That good, Mum… Oh god…" The tears were falling earnestly and she covered her face with her hands, trying to force sobs back down.

"Martha, don't," Fran's tears were starting to fall as well and Clive looked like he was going to start crying too. "Don't cry, sweetheart, please."

Moving her hands away, Martha shook her head, "Sorry, sorry, I just – I'm so glad you're alright. I've been so worried, I didn't –"

"We're fine," Clive spoke finally, his voice wobbly, but clear. "We've got each other, Baby. We're taking care of each other. Don't you start worrying about us."

"You just worry about you," Fran nodded seriously, "We'll be alright until you can come home."

Martha smiled a watery smile and nodded, taking a breath to compose herself before turning her gaze toward the others in the room.

"Sarah Jane," she greeted her, "Spencer… You look better."

Reid smiled and nodded, "I certainly feel better," he said quietly.

She nodded in return, her smile turning down slightly, "Where is everyone else?" she asked, "Shouldn't they be connecting already?" She slid back a bit in her seat and her eyes swept around the space she was in.

"Give them time," Sarah Jane said, "We're all in different time zones and the Americans just pulled off a huge move across most of the country. They're probably just trying to get everything set up properly."

Almost as soon as the words had left her mouth another screen lit up and Kate Stewart was sitting with a handful of UNIT agents flocked around her. Somehow, in spite of the situation, Kate managed to look clean and respectable. She smiled when she saw Martha and Sarah Jane.

"I thought you said you were in Cairo?" Sarah Jane said, "There are hardly any computers left there!"

"I am," Kate said, "I got lucky. Our last raid got us three laptops. They're busted up, but they work."

"Lucky," Martha smiled, "It's so good to see your face, Kate. I was beginning to worry you weren't going to join us again."

Kate shook her head, "UNIT isn't out of this fight yet, Martha. Just because we haven't been able to check in doesn't mean we're gone."

Another of the screens suddenly started sending electronic feedback through the speakers for several seconds before a picture popped to life and Sherlock, Tosh, Ianto and John were seated close together around their monitor.

"Oh good! Martha, you did make it!" Tosh smiled at her and nodded to Sarah Jane.

"I wasn't going to miss this one," Martha said. "Any word from anyone else?"

"We just spoke to Charlie – the uh, one of the hackers in the US – they're having some sort of issue with all the computers being together, but they're working it out. They'll be connected." Ianto answered, glancing around Tosh to see the screen more clearly.

Suddenly several of the monitors began to crackle to life.

"Speak of the Devil," John said as faces began showing up. There were several people smashed in close proximity in the monitors and the feedback was a bit grating, but there wasn't much they could do. From what Sarah Jane had told them, the Americans were all in one spot at the moment.

Reid's eyes scanned the screens, looking eagerly for his team. His eyes lit on Jack first and he smiled.

"Jack!" He and Ianto both cried his name at the same time and Tosh's eyes followed Ianto's to a monitor in the center where Jack was standing with Gibbs, Tony and Prentiss.

Jack's grin could've shattered the glass as he spotted his old team – what was left of it at least. For a moment, his eyes sparkled and then he realized that Gwen wasn't there and his heart sank.

"Ianto! Tosh!" he kept his smile in place, but he looked over the others with them and seemed to deflate a bit. "…Gwen?"

Tosh looked away and Ianto shook his head solemnly. Jack sucked in a breath and nodded. "Well, at least your both okay. Been a while."

Tosh's lips quirked and she shook her head, "You owe us an explanation, Jack."

"Don't worry, you'll get one. Later," he promised. He looked toward Reid and smiled bright again, "And Dr. Reid. Good to see you again… well, that you anyway. You look good. Almost as good as your double here. Of course, he is younger." He glanced to his left and then his eyes twinkled a bit, "Just as pretty though."

Reid smiled faintly, "You look good too, Jack," he said, but his attention was elsewhere, eyes searching the screens until he found the rest of his team – Hotch, Garcia. And sitting there, sandwiched tightly between Garcia and Hotch was a younger, slightly less battered version of him.

It was like looking through a distorted mirror. This version of Dr. Spencer Reid had longer hair – though it didn't matter much seeing as neither of them had had a proper haircut in nearly six months. And in spite of everything, this version still had more hope in his eyes than Reid felt he would ever be capable of again. It was quiet for a moment, the silence deafening even over the crackle of electronics and the feedback through the microphones. And then the strange not-quite-him spoke, his voice oddly high and reverent at the same time.

"You're real…"

Reid didn't know why, but those words made him smile and he nodded, "I'm real,"

"And you're really from the future?" Garcia whispered quietly, staring at him with wide eyes. "You aren't some clone or anything?"

"I'm definitely from the future," he promised, "The year 2011. I'm not a clone or a cyborg or anything like that."

"This is so weird," Prentiss said, her eyes fixed on him. "I can't even… I mean, we saw you, in the broadcasts, but still, it's just…" she trailed off, shaking her head.

"Is it true?" Charlie spoke suddenly, drawing Reid's eyes toward a different screen where she sat with Juliet, Gus and Grace Holloway. "What Jack said about the Doctor's plan? Resetting time?"

Reid hesitated, "I – I don't know. But I do know that in my timeline, none of this happened. None of it. The Master never took over, the Decimation… it didn't happen."

His eyes scanned the monitors, still looking for the rest of his team on some subconscious level. He knew, intellectually, that they had been killed in the Decimation. The Master had been more than clear on that point. But it didn't quite dawn on him that they were gone until he'd scanned them all twice. It only took a few seconds, but it felt like a lot longer and they were all still staring at him when he turned his eyes back to his team.

"JJ and Gideon," he whispered their names, some part of him feeling shattered at their absence on the monitors, "they're not dead. They're alive. Before I left with the Doctor I still saw JJ every day."

"Then there is a chance," Hotch didn't sound like the Hotch Reid knew when he spoke. He sounded so empty. It was worse than even when Haley had been murdered by the Reaper and Reid couldn't quite bring himself to meet his boss's eyes. "There's a chance that they'll come back. They'll all come back."

"There's a very big chance," Reid nodded, swallowing. "We just have to trust the Doctor."

"And you do?" the not-quite-him leaned forward. "You trust him?"

His eyes were earnest and demanding and Reid could feel the burning need for hope there. He nodded seriously.

"I'd trust him with my life. I've done it before."

Not-Quite-Him nodded once, curtly, and sat back, looking at Hotch for a moment and then toward the screen one more time.

Jack watched them talking with a thoughtful expression on his face before clearly his throat and drawing their attention toward him. "You know," he said, "I'd say there's more than a chance. Spencer's timeline is out of sync with everything, but there's no record of the Decimation in my timeline either. I'm sure something like that would've made the history books."

"Your timeline?" Gibbs asked, "Ducky said he met you in the past..."

Ducky nodded quickly, "It was some years ago," he said.

Jack smiled and glanced toward Ducky for a moment, his eyes twinkling brightly. Reid thought he saw the man wink, but the screens were fuzzy and it could've been his imagination. He continued talking a second later.

"Well, I've lived a long time," he admitted, "And most of it's been in the past, but that's not where I'm from originally. I was a Time Agent before I went rogue and met the Doctor back in World War II."

"A Time Agent?" McGee frowned curiously.

"World War what?" Gus was staring at him with his mouth slightly open.

"I was born in the 51st century," Jack said. "I went to school there, grew up there, worked there. Trust me, if the Decimation had happened in my timeline, we'd have noticed. You've got to do a lot of studying history to get to be a Time Agent. It's never mentioned, not once. It doesn't happen."

There was another long bout of silence where nothing but the feedback and the crackling of the electronics could be heard. After what felt like several minutes, but was likely only a few seconds, Hotch cleared his throat loudly and spoke.

"Alright then," he said, his voice sounding forced and stiff, "There's more than a chance. The odds are in our favor if we listen to the Doctor. I think we need to start talking about the Toclafane then."

Sherlock smiled, "And finally you're talking sense. We've been working on developing a weapon to kill them."

"So have we," Sarah Jane said, "It's not perfect yet, but it will help."

"We have too," Ash leaned back from where he was sitting with Rufus and Shawn and Adam – who hadn't been present at any of the video conferences thus far – and hefted up a makeshift weapon that vaguely resembled a potato gun.

"It'll kill Toclafane," Gibbs said, "Our only problem is that it's good for maybe three shots and it dies. It's too heavy for one person to have more than two and even that's a stretch."

"We've got the same problem," Tosh said, "Too much weight and not enough power. We need to find a way to streamline it and get enough power in them to sustain a lethal burst of power."

"You know what we could do," Charlie sounded eager, "We could make it bigger!"

"Wouldn't that just make the weight issue worse?" Shawn frowned and she shook her head quickly.

"No, no, because we wouldn't be making a gun to carry. We could try building a canon. Like – like an energy canon. Think about it. Big enough canon to have a huge electric pulse and that'd wipe out ten or fifteen of 'em with one blast!"

"That's a great idea!" Kate said, "In fact, I think we can do one better. The Toclafane are fairly routine in their patrols. We can set up traps in areas they frequent. They may not be good for very long once the Master and his men realize what's happening, but it'd definitely set their numbers back. If we can build something that would send out a powerful enough current to kill them…"

Tosh's eyes were bright. "That could work. We already have what it takes to get enough electricity. It wouldn't take much to rework the designs to make them bigger so we can have standing weapons and the traps… We could set them up around London."

"Oooh, wait!" Abby suddenly spoke, "The airport!"

"What?" Tony frowned, glancing toward her curiously.

"The airport!" Abby was waving her hands excitedly, "It's not that far from here. The metal detectors for weapons? I bet those still work!"

McGee suddenly lit up, nodding eagerly, "Abby that's perfect! We could sneak in, take them apart. I bet we can fix them to shoot enough current through with some tweaking. It would be easy! The Master shut down most of the airstrips. There are probably dozens of places to get them."

"That is perfect!" Sarah Jane said, "We could turn them into weapons and set them up in heavily patrolled areas. Any time a Toclafane passed through them they would be killed! They usually fly in groups of seven or eight… We could take out at least that many in just one go!"

Everyone was suddenly chattering excitedly. There was a lighter weight to air around them all, something like hope starting to settle in, stronger than ever.

Kate spoke over them all, "Okay, okay, okay!" she said, "This is perfect. This is just what we need! We need to start working on this immediately. Tosh?"

"Yes?"

"How safe do you think it is to send the blueprints of the weapons we already have over the network?"

Tosh frowned, "Relatively safe," she said, "We haven't had much trouble so far. And even if the Master did somehow intercept them… There wouldn't be much he could do with just blueprints."

"Perfect," Kate nodded, "We can share our weapon schematics with each other. More people working together to fix our existing guns and to build the new weapons. I want you all to start sending schematics immediately. We can get started on fixing and building our arsenal. The Toclafane won't know what hit them."

~/.\~

Martha leaned back and closed her eyes as the monitor faded to black. She was smiling faintly and it felt so good to smile that she didn't want to stop. That strange feeling of floating hope hadn't vanished and she wanted to hold on to it for as long as she could.

She could still see the image of her family in her mind. Tish looked so tired and so small. She was older than Martha, but she looked so tiny and vulnerable and Martha had never really noticed that before then. Her mum and dad were both so weary and the lines on her mum's face seemed to have deepened into thick crevices over the last several months. But they were together and they were alive and they were still able to smile and that meant something. That meant the world was still going to be okay and there was still something to fight for.

Not only that, but the video conference had gone so much better than any of the ones they had before. They were all agreeing, they were all working together. They were planning and strategizing and for once Martha didn't feel like everything was going to smother her under the weight of the pressure.

Happy probably wasn't the word she would use to describe how they were, but they were hopeful, certainly. None of them were particularly eager – and the Americans were still shakily committed to the idea because they wanted more than anything to see the Master dead – but she could work with this. She could convince them that the Doctor's plan was the right one and that the Master didn't need to die for them to win. She knew she could win them over and with just a little over six months left to do it, she was starting to think it was even possible.

"You look happy," Gabriel's voice made her jump and she nearly fell from her chair. "Someone give you a lollypop?"

Spinning around, Martha frowned at him, "Would you please stop doing that to me?"

Gabriel was grinning from ear to ear and her smile widened in response.

"Good news then?" she asked eagerly, standing up.

Gabriel nodded and then a second later there were two new people standing on either side of him. Martha blinked at their sudden appearance and shook her head to clear it as the questions started buzzing around.

"It's not as much as I wanted, but it's something. Martha Jones, meet my brothers. Castiel and Uriel."

Martha smiled at the two new angels, marveling at them. They looked so normal. It was hard to believe that they really were Heavenly beings. One of them was wearing a business suit and a tan trench coat, his dark hair mussed and his eyes an electric shade of blue. The other was a dark skinned man in a deep blue suit. They looked like they belonged behind large desks at some corporation, not flying around Heaven or working on earth as champions for humanity.

"Castiel?" she asked curiously, eyeing the one in the trench coat. "You're the angel who saved Tosh and Ianto?"

At her words, Uriel's lips tightened and he scowled. She remembered that Tosh had told her Castiel had gotten into some sort of trouble for helping them.

Castiel nodded and glanced at Gabriel, "Yes, I saved them from the metal monster. I only regret that I was not able to do more to assist them."

"You're making up for that now, Castiel," Gabriel told him before turning back to Martha. "I know it's not the Heavenly Host, but three angels are better than no angels, trust me. How'd your little chat with the others go? I'm assuming well."

She nodded, smiling again, "Very well. They're all ready to start working to kill the Toclafane and the Doctor's still integrating into the network. Sarah Jane thinks he might be able to contribute to our discussions soon. That would be helpful."

Uriel stepped forward, "And these Toclafane are the Master's army, correct?"

"He's got human soldiers too," Martha said, "but they're not the problem. The Toclafane are his big defense. It's what we've been trying to stop."

He nodded, but the frown never left his face and Martha found herself wondering if angels knew what smiling was. Gabriel was the only one who was smiling. Both Uriel and Castiel were somber and monotone. Was this what all angels were like?

"We'll need to talk to your military strategists,"

"Of course, but…" her eyes flickered to Gabriel, "I thought you wanted to keep off the radar of Heaven? What if the other angels hear? I mean… you can't tell them you're all gods. Tosh and Ianto know Castiel."

Gabriel looked somewhat unhappy, nodding, "Well, Castiel tells me Michael's been too busy worrying about something else upstairs to bother with listening to the garrisons. If any of the others hear anything… I've just got to hope it doesn't reach the top."

"So you're going to tell them you're an angel?"

Castiel frowned at her, "You sound skeptical,"

"Well," Martha thought for a moment before continuing, "I'm not skeptical, really, but… I mean it's hard enough to swallow the idea that one god might exist and want to be involved. The hunters didn't seem too surprised about that, but even they didn't buy Tosh and Ianto's story about angels."

Castiel's eyes narrowed just slightly. "But we are angels,"

"And humans are ignorant apes," Uriel said, "They don't want to believe in us, Castiel."

Gabriel rolled his eyes, "That's not why they think we're myths," he said, "You wanna know why they don't believe in angels, Uriel? Because the angels aren't doing their jobs."

Uriel scowled, "What would you know about that, Gabriel? You ran away from your responsibilities. At least the rest of us weren't coward enough to run from Lucifer."

Martha held her breath and stared at them. She could feel power crackling around her from this three seemingly ordinary men and it made her stomach hurt. For the first time since she'd met Gabriel the angel looked angry. He looked like he was a powerful archangel capable of terrific devastation as his golden eyes seemed to glow white.

"Enough," he said, and even his voice sounded different. "We are here to do one thing, Uriel. That's to help the humans."

"To fix the timelines," Uriel corrected. Martha decided she didn't like Uriel at all as he swept his eyes coldly over her with an air of contempt so blatant that she wanted to slap him.

Gabriel looked annoyed, but didn't comment on his remark. "Thanks for the update, Martha," he said, "See you later. Good luck."

He snapped his fingers and then there was the sound of fluttering wings and they were all gone. She sighed, running a hand over her face tiredly, and slumped back down into her seat. When she turned her chair toward the computer again she grinned so hard it hurt.

Sitting there on the desk was a box jam packed with skittles. She stared at it for a second and then burst out laughing hysterically.

~/.\~

A/N: Yay! I gotta say, this chapter was fun to write – and easy. I can just feel things brewing in the air, can't you? That scene with Martha and her family made me cry when I was writing it – and I really hope I got across that emotion to you guys as well.

And as some of you may know, Supernatural is now on Hellatus. And I am going insane. And after what they did… Well. I was tempted to seriously just murder everyone. I really wanted to kill things. And now I want so badly to bring Kevin into this story. He'd be like, 13 though and so he'd only be a really nerdy, genius kid. I can't do that to sweet, innocent Kevin after all he went through on SPN.

But anyway, hope you guys enjoyed! Please, please review! I'll love you forever and send you internet hugs!