Title: We Stand Alone
Author: A Lanart
Character(s)/pairings: Torchwood 4 team (OCs), Dorothée Gale McShane
Fandom and/or Prompt: Torchwood/Doctor Who; no prompt
Rating: PG
Spoilers/Warnings: none
Disclaimer: Anything you recognise probably belongs to he BBC
Title from the song of the same name by Covenant
word count: 1,240
Written for
consci_fan_mo Day 4
A/N This is the Torchwood 4 team as seen in
Blue Monday, in fact this fic is kind of a sequel to that one.
~*~
We Stand Alone
*
Flick. Flick. Flick. Flick. The same reading from every sensor, the same picture on every camera in the base; nothing had changed. Mitch sighed, and closed the surveillance program, scrubbing his unshaven face with his hands. Every morning he woke up hopeful that they would somehow be back where they belonged and every morning his hopes were dashed before breakfast. Morning -hah! There was no daylight in this place, no sense of real time, they just continued running on the same clock as they had been when they’d ended up here; there was no reason to do otherwise. He contemplated going back to bed and not getting out of it for the rest of the day; it was the best way to ignore Rosa’s endless bickering with just about everyone but he wouldn’t be any sort of leader if he did that. They remained isolated, apart from space and time and with no-one but each other. He sighed again, and dragged himself back to his quarters to get freshened up for another day of futility. One of the few things he was thankful for was that Torchwood 4 had been self contained with its own generators, sewage and water recycling systems and enough emergency rations to last for years. He was also thankful he was still alive, though if he had to get through another 6 months of Rosa being the way she was he wasn’t certain he would remain that way.
He was emerging from his quarters when he heard Rosa shriek; his heart sunk, if she was starting this early they were in for a bad day. Then he realised she was shouting, rather than shrieking, and shouting for him at that. He broke into a run, intent on getting to the main area as quickly as possible; if Rosa was using *that* tone of voice, then something *big* was happening.
The something big turned out to be a weird sort of disturbance showing up on one of the monitors. There was an elliptical area mid screen that looked as much like a giant soap bubble as anything else. It was also in an area that was completely deserted.
“What the hell is *that*?” Mitch asked.
“No idea, but I can tell you it’s *not* the monitors or the sensors. Whatever it is, it’s really there,” said Jase. Of course, Jase’s first priority would be to make sure it wasn’t anything that was *his* responsibility that was acting up. Mitch didn’t blame him.
“Not only that, have you noticed *where* it is?” At Rosa’s words, Mitch took a closer look.
“Oh fuck. That can’t be good,” he said. It was in the middle of the corridor that used to lead to the perception field generator and the last time Mitch had been down there he’d been running for his life from a time travelling space slug intent on dissolving its way into their base and an explosion he’d set up to destroy said slug. That the explosion was what had sent them spiralling out of their reality was something that he tried not to think about too hard. It was true they didn’t really want anything else happening there, not outside the temporal shielding that kept them relatively safe, as they had no idea what might happen.
“Now you know why I yelled for you,” Rosa commented.
“Yeah. Thanks - I think.” Mitch felt the rest of the team join them at the monitor, no doubt alerted by Rosa the same as he had been.
“You know, that looks like it could be due to some sort of artificial space-time manipulation. It’s similar to some of what is documented in the archive,” Lorna said and moved to another terminal where she started calling up files.
“If it *is* being artificially manipulated, I only hope whatever it is ends up being friendly,” Rosa said.
“Well, we’ll find out soon, the disturbance is becoming stronger.”
“You sure, Jase?” Asked Mitch
“Completely.”
“Then I’d best be getting down there, hadn’t I?” Mitch strode out of the main area without a backward glance; he would either be back in one piece or he wouldn’t and there wasn’t a hell of a lot he could do about it. He grabbed a gun from one of the storage lockers on his way, there was no way he was meeting anything unknown without being armed even if they were outside of space and time. It didn’t take long before he was standing in front of one of the sealed doors; he hit the button on the control panel that released the seal and the temporal shielding but he didn’t open the door immediately. Rosa’s voice sounded in his ear.
“The disturbance is getting worse; Jase thinks that we’re going to get breakthrough very…” Her words were drowned out by the sound of a very loud, very powerful engine on the other side of the doors, then a screech of brakes, then nothing. If he listened hard he could just about hear whatever-it-was quietly rumbling as it idled; it sounded like a motorbike.
“Rosa, what the hell is on the other side of the door?”
“No idea. Visuals went down when it came through. So did sound. You’ll have to do an eyeball.”
“Eyeball it is.” Mitch hit the door release and waited for the panels to retract, gun at the ready, wondering what the hell would be down there *this* time.
Whatever he’d been expecting, it wasn’t the sight that met his eyes. It *was* a motorbike, but it didn’t look like any bike he’d seen before and it was accompanied by a gun-toting, leather-clad woman in mirror-shades. It was all very ‘Terminator’ in Mitch’s opinion, so he carefully raised his hands, and let his gun hang to one side on its strap.
“Hi,” he said weakly. “I’m Mitchell Anderson. Welcome to Torchwood 4.” To his relief she holstered her gun and pulled off the shades; her eyes were brown, warm and vital.
“And I’m your ticket out of this place,” she said with a smile, stepping forward with her hand outstretched to shake; Mitch took it without thinking.
“Do you have a name?” He asked, still somewhat nervous of the woman.
“Dorothée Gale McShane.” Mitch felt himself gaping at her. After they’d found themselves stuck in this place away from reality he’d decided to do a little digging, a little research into just *what* had been in the explosive he’d used. Right there, along with the description of nitro-nine and its derivatives was the name of Dorothy ‘Ace’ McShane. He’d kind of fallen in love with her from what he’d read and now she was standing there right in front of him; living, breathing and far more beautiful than he’d ever imagined.
“Oh fuck,” he muttered. She grinned up at him.
“I see you’ve heard of me.”
“I’ll say. Umm. Well. I suppose you’d best meet the rest of the team, then. It will be good to have a new person around.” He indicated the door and she leaned across the bike to switch off the engine. Side by side, while she pushed the bike, they made their way deeper into the base. Mitch wondered just what the hell would happen when Ace - Dorothée - met the others. No matter; he was certain she could hold her own - and then some. He glanced across at her, and hid a smile. Things were about to get very interesting…