Written
by Chris Chibnall
Directed
by Ashley Way
Music
by Murray Gold/Ben Foster
Additional
music by The Stone Roses – Begging You from the album Second Coming (1994)
It’s morning and Gwen is watching her
boyfriend Rhys as he sleeps.
“You know it’s rude to stare.”
He says, his eyes still shut.
Gwen giggles. She tells him she wants him up in order to make her a cup
of tea. Rolling over he asks her what its
worth and they kiss deeply. Eventually
Rhys rolls back over and gets up, buck naked.
“Nice arse!”
she tells him and laughs as he slaps his bum cheeks on the way out the
door. She giggles again. Her phone rings. From the kitchen Rhys calls
for her not to answer it. She ignores
him and answers it. It’s Jack. He tells her to put the tv on. From the lounge she watches the news channel,
it’s clear from every channel that something is very wrong with the world, when
giant space ships are reported hovering above the Taj Mahal in India, and
scuffles have been reported in the streets where uniformed officers are in a
fierce battle with uniformed soldiers from a few hundred years ago. A few religious nuts are also seen to be
spouting off about ‘end of days.’
In the Hub Ianto reads from a thick bible, Book of Daniel, and
prophesies of end of days, portents of doom, while Owen is concerned that the
hand in the jar is losing power. He is
still in some discomfort after being shot by Ianto in the previous episode.
As Ianto continues with his portents of doom readings, Jack
gets up from his desk and insists Ianto cease with the biblical tales. “You
people love any story that denies the randomness of existence.”
Walking past Ianto and down the few steps he calls attention
to his team. “Ok I’ve been fielding calls all night, the government, UNIT the CIA,
half the western world and good proportion of the eastern and they’re all
asking the same thing. Is this anything
to do with us?”
Jack turns his
attention to Ianto who looks away, all too aware that it is. Toshiko, walks
over to Jack telling him of the readings she’s been taking of the recent
events.
“I’ve run a profile on every reported temporal anomaly and tracked any
temporal or physical pattern...”
Toshiko says as she keys in the data on her PDA transferring the details
to the monitor in front of her. The evidence is frightening.
“The cracks in time trace back here to the rift.” Jack says as the red spider lines spread out
from the central red dot indicating the Hub in Cardiff. “This
city, this hub is the centre. What
you’re seeing around the world is ripples and aftershocks. The rift is splintering because of you.” Jack says turning his attention to Owen.
“What?” Owen is horrified.
“You opened the rift without knowing what you were doing. You’ve caused the temporal cracks to
widen. Time is seeping through.”
“If it wasn’t for me you two would still be in the 1940’s.” Owen says defending his actions. “So
are we going to stand around crying into our latte’s or are we going to do
something about it?” He demands.
“Bring those who’ve fallen through time back here.” Jack decides. “Into the vaults.”
“And do what with them?” Asks Owen.
“We’ll deal with phase one first, then I’ll tell you about phase two.” Jack replies curtly.
“You can’t send them back through time, what are you going to do?”
Owen asks raising his voice.
“We’ll think of something.”
Jack bellows. Glancing around at
his team, Jack calms, and allaying any fears tells them “this is not the end of the world.
I’m certain of that.”
A moment’s pause
and an alarm bleeps on a monitor. Ianto
quickly leaps over to see.
“Apparently our attendance is requested at the hospital.” He announces reading the information on the
screen. “Their mortality rate has gone through the roof, they’re sealing off
the area and designating a hot zone. “
Owen inserts his blue
tooth comms and tells Jack he’ll go.
Jack insists Toshiko go with him.
Owen peeved insists he can do the job on his own. Toshiko wishing to calm the tension suggests
that two will get the job done quicker.
Owen huffs out.
Angered by the way Jack handled the situation with Owen, Gwen
promptly points this out to Jack.
“All our actions have consequences.” He replies angrily.
“And all your team have feelings.
Even Owen.”
“Well you would know.”
Retorts Jack before walking away.
“He brought you back, would you rather have stayed in World War Two?” Gwen calls to him as her mobile rings. It’s
Andy.
Spouting Latin in a
prison cell and dressed in a roman soldier’s uniform is a very loud and very
angry – Roman soldier.
“Double murder, stabbed two blokes in Penarth, brutal it was, no
mercy.” Andy tells them as he comes
around the desk to lead them to the cells.
The over head television screen shows the soldier still shouting in
Latin, above their heads. “What are we
supposed to do, he doesn’t speak a word of English and he’s dressed as a bloody
Roman soldier?” Andy asks as he
unlocks the door to the cells.
“He’s not dressed as a Roman soldier.” Says Jack.
“He IS a Roman soldier.” He explains, while Gwen stares at the screen.
“He’s shouting in Latin.”
“The only word I could pick out was Gellygaer!”
“Gelligaer!” Corrects Gwen. “There’s a roman fort out in Gelligaer, built around 75AD.”
“So he was on his way there, time splinters and he ends up here.” Jack says trying to piece it all together.
“Excuse me.” Calls Andy,
grabbing their attention. “Hi.
Any time you feel like talking sense...”
“That soldier came through a crack in time.” Jack finally tells Andy. Andy is less than convinced.
“He’s not serious is he?”
Andy looks to Gwen. As the trio
head down towards the cells Andy still doesn’t believe Jack. “This
sort of thing doesn’t happen, not in Cardiff.”
“Just because you can’t understand it doesn’t mean it isn’t true.”
Andy still doesn’t
believe it but setting that to one side wonders how this is going to work with
the CPS. Does a Roman soldier from 2000
years ago have the same rights as everyone else? Jack in the meantime opens a metal tin
containing an unusual syringe with a sedative.
Jack opens the
viewing hatch in time to see the soldier hurl himself at the door and make
threats to each person in Latin. Ready
with the syringe, Jack stands near the door ready to engage with the soldier,
as Andy and Gwen close the door behind him.
“Everyone is saying you know, word on the streets...” says Andy as all goes quiet in the cell. “Do
you think this is the end of the world?”
Gwen laughs. “Oh
Andy don’t be silly, do you think the world is going to end on your shift?”
“I’ve seen you use that smile on a lot of people.” Smiles Andy
“What smile?”
“The smile when you reassure people when deep down inside you know
everything’s all going to shit.”
Suited in biohazard
suits, Toshiko and Owen are brought up to speed on the newly admitted patients.
Many of them without names. The doctor
points out the first patient that died. “No
ID on her, she just appeared in the middle of A&E.” He says handing the clipboard to Owen as he
walks towards the sealed off area of the hospital, where other medical staff
are also suited against infection. “Nobody
saw her come through the doors, she didn’t register at the desk.”
“So what happened?”
Asks Tosh calling over Owen’s shoulder.
“She started coughing up blood so we moved her to isolation
immediately. An hour or so later the staff started to show similar symptoms.” They stop outside the sealed off area where
the first body is. As they enter, Owen
examines the body, the facial features, the clothes, the stark realisation of
who she is and what century she came from.
She’s a carrier of the Black Death – the plague.
Leaving the infected area, Toshiko loses sight of Owen. She removes her protective helmet and scans
up and down the corridor. As two suited
people move away Toshiko sees a vision of her mother several metres away from
her in just the same condition as the last time she saw her.
“It is coming...out of the darkness.” Her mother tells her.
“What is coming?” Toshiko
asks
“If there is no other way...you’ll have to do it.” Her mother informs her, but as Toshiko
enquires after what that would be, the vision disappears, and Owen returns
through a door insisting she hurries up.
Back at the police
station and Jack uses the sonic pen to scan the body of the sleeping soldier.
“If Owen managed to open the rift to get you and Tosh back can’t we do
the same for these people? We’ve still got the rift manipulator!”
Jack laughs. “There’s
a world of difference.” He explains after ending the scan on the body. “We’re
talking of taking control of time not bringing two people back from the past.
Besides, look at the damage Owen caused.”
Jack remarked bitterly. “We mess
with it further we’ll put the whole planet in danger. Have I ever let you down?” He asks her finally. Gwen smiles lightly. She heads back up along the corridor towards
the exit when she hears a voice call her name.
It grows louder with some urgency.
Gwen stops and turns towards the open cell door to see Bilis Manger
sitting staring back at her. He speaks
without moving his mouth and apologises to her profusely. She’s standing there some time before she
hears Jack call to her. She falters a
moment before turning away from the open cell to look at Jack. When she turns back to the cell, Bilis has
gone.
“Are you sure it was the same guy?”
Jack asks when they’re back at the Hub and the soldier is safely
sleeping in the cells.
“It was definitely him.”
Says Gwen as she stares through the glass at the sleeping beauty inside.
“Bilis the caretaker at the dance hall.”
“That’s all he said, sorry? What’s he got to be sorry for?” Jack shrugged, curiously.
Before either can
think up a reason for Bilis, Ianto enters the cells yelling ‘Coming Through’ while escorting an
angry weevil towards a cell. As it’s
growling persists, Ianto threatens it with weevil spray.
“Thirty more reports of weevils on the loose.” He says after
pushing the weevil into the open cell. “we’re not going to keep up on this one.”
“Everything’s on the increase.”
“Can’t we stop them from making that noise?” Asks Gwen as she notices the howling from the
creature.
“If you’ve got any ideas how?”
“Maybe it’s time sensitive, this disturbance maybe is too much for them.” Suggests Jack watching the weevil moan at
them from the other side of the Perspex glass.
“We’re now full in all vaults across all nine levels. Do you want me to evacuate the levels below,
just we’ve never used them in all the time I’ve been here?”
“Do it.”
Jack agrees. “Gwen maybe you’re right. Let’s
run a search on your dance hall buddy, we need to find him.”
As Jack and Gwen leave the cells, the fresh weevil begins to
moan loudly. Lights flicker for a few
moments, Ianto turns to see Lisa standing at the far side of the cells.
“Hello Ianto.” She says, clearly without any sound of Cyber
control. Ianto is visibly startled by
her. His last memories of her had been
heart wrenchingly disturbing, he couldn’t believe she was in the cells, now
walking towards him, clear as day, not an illusion, not a ghost.
“This can’t be real. This can’t be happening.”
“There’s only one way to stop this,
before it gets worse.”
She says appearing to take hold of his hand. “People will die Ianto, thousands of people, unless you open the
Rift.”
Ianto closes his eyes a moment, but a moment too long, when he
opens them, Lisa is gone, the weevil is growling and the lights have settled.
In the main Hub the alarms signal Tosh and Owen’s return from
the hospital. Jack caught up with them
as they entered. Enquiring after their
visit, Owen informs him it was laugh a minute, then drops the bombshell.
“They have an outbreak of the Black Death.”
Toshiko is still in shock after seeing a vision of her mother
and is exceptionally quiet. As Jack asks
about how the hospital is coping, slapping a hand on the desk to get her
attention, she fills him in but is still clearly shaken.
Owen tells Jack that the plague is easily treatable nowadays
but wonders how they’re going to cope when the next disease drops in their
laps. When Jack tells him it would do
nobody any good standing around and speculating, Owen presses the urgency of
knowing what to do.
“We need to be prepared. We’re
helpless. All we’re doing is putting
sticking plasters over gaping wounds.”
“What do you suggest?”
Jack asks.
“I suggest you lead us and tell us what the instructions are.”
Gwen steps in
sensing danger between the two men. But
Owen drags them all into the argument, knowing they all feel it too.
“You’re the big man here, you keep all the secrets, well now it’s time
to tell us a few and tell us how we’re going to get out of this.”
Jack strides away from Owen before turning back to face him.
“You want to know a secret, there is no solution. I can’t fix this,
because this was never meant to happen.
The first thing you learnt when you joined Torchwood was ‘Don’t mess
with the Rift’ but you disobeyed those orders and now everything that is
happening is down to you.”
“I only disobeyed instructions to get you back!”
“And now people are dying.”
“What, so I shouldn’t have bothered?
Who the fuck are you then anyway, Jack Harkness? You don’t even exist,
we’ve looked. So if you’re not even a real person why should I follow your
orders?”
“Get out!”
“What?”
“Get out! I’m relieving you of
your duty.”
Shocked by Jack’s decision Toshiko speaks up.
“Bollocks you are!” Replies
Owen.
As Gwen also tries to diffuse the situation Jack strides
towards Owen, raising a finger, growls his authority
“You’re done here!”
As Owen stares after him as he walks to his office. “So
that’s it, the whole world is going to shit and you’re going to fire me?”
Jack returns his glare at Owen while Gwen tries to restore
calm but to no avail. Jack’s mind is
set, and Owen has to face the consequences, that within 24 hours, Jack will
find him, and retcon him. Tearfully,
Owen leaves, knowing the rest won’t follow after him. He has 24 hours to savour the good times!
Gwen and Jack walk towards the shop Bilis owns in the Arcade –
A Stitch in Time. Ianto gives them
directions over the Comms and remains in contact during their time in the
shop. Inside the shop are time pieces
from all over the world from all different eras of time.
“He scavenges pieces from the past brings them here sell them for a
profit
Not a bad business plan.” Jack says admiring Bilis in some way. Gwen agrees.
“We all have to earn a living.”
Bilis replies coming down the spiral staircase carrying a box in his
hand. Jack and Gwen turn around to see a familiar face.
“You’re from 1941.”
“As you were. Hello again.” Replies Bilis entering the back of the shop
where time pieces sit on a table behind the partition wall.
“How can you be in two time zones at once?” Gwen asks.
“I can step across eras like you can walk into another room. At first it was a most incredible gift, now I
know the reality...it’s a curse!”
“Why?” Gwen asks stepping closer.
“I can see the whole of history but I don’t belong anywhere within it.” Bilis pauses a moment drawing both the
Torchwood team closer. “So your return to this time came at a
price, time is splintering. This city
exists on a rift in time, the only way to make it right is to free open the
rift and let it suck back what fell through.”
Jack doesn’t like
the plan. “No way it’s too dangerous.”
“Can we even do that?” Gwen asks directing the question back
at Bilis.
“Of course you can, isn’t that right Captain?”
Gwen turns to face
Jack for some answers, getting none she prompts him.
“You’ve seen what happens. If we open the rift fully, millions of lives
will be at risk.”
“And yet if you don’t, more will fall through, lives will be lost.”
Jack grows tired of Bilis aware that his words are affecting
Gwen’s thoughts of the Rift and draws his gun on the old man, laughing. Bilis
raises his hands in surrender.
“You know so much, you’re coming back with us.”
“I’m sorry.”
Bilis vanishes instantly. As Gwen
walks towards the empty space a whirr of clockwork devices ring around the back
room.
“Dammit!” Jack curses
holstering his weapon. “Trace the temporal activity around this
location.” He instructs Ianto in the
ear piece. Touching Gwen’s arm. “We need to find where he is, come on.” Jack says before leaving the shop at a
run. Gwen is still curious as to where
Bilis vanished to. Backing slowly from
the room, the time pieces on the walls begin to chime. Gwen hears Bilis whisper to her and stops
moving for a moment, turning towards the door Bilis is in her way. She runs to the door but Bilis reaches it
before her and stops her leaving.
“I am not your enemy.”
He tells her softly
“In the cells why did you tell me you were sorry?”
“Sometimes it’s better to live in ignorance.” Bilis tells her walking back into the
shop. He pauses. “Unless...do
you really want to know?”
“Know what?”
Gwen asks wary of him.
“Hold my hands, I’ll show you.”
“Ok.”
Gwen goes to take his hands but Bilis pulls back.
“But only if you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.”
Gwen takes hold of
Bilis’ hands. The man tightens his
grip. He stares hard at her, and images
begin to filter into her head of her flat, of Rhys, of dead, bloodied boyfriend. She pulls away from him.
“What did you just show me?”
“The future!”
Gwen runs from the
shop, high speed, away from Jack who can only run after her, wondering where
the ‘fire is’. He loses sight of her as
she turns left from the Arcade. Gwen
runs home to the flat to find Rhys cleaning the oven. Insisting Rhys came with her to the Hub, Gwen
resorts to using the Stun Gun when Rhys would rather finish the oven clean
first. As her boyfriend lies ‘stunned’
on the ground, she can only apologise.
Across town somewhere in a bar, Owen drinks to his ‘happy
times’ when he hears a voice above the loud thumping music. He turns to see Diane, as clear as day.
Shocked by her appearance in the bar, dressed in her flying
jacket, he reaches a hand to touch her, she’s physically there. She wants him to bring her back and open the
rift, but Owen isn’t sure he can do that, telling her everything is out of
sync. As the bar man walks through her
as if she were a ghost her vision disappears and Owen is back in the bar, alone
in the loud thumping music.
Rhys wakes up to find himself in the cells. He stares back at
the Perspex glass to find Gwen staring back at him. Gwen explains that he’s in the cells at the
place where she works. Gwen tells him
that she’s brought him to her work to be safe, but Rhys insists he was safer at
home, with his oven cleaning and the telly.
But Gwen, after the vision couldn’t take the risk.
He calls after her as she leaves him in the cells, amongst the
strange creature growls from above and below.
Upstairs in the Hub Gwen asks for Toshiko to bring up the CCTV
of the vaults so she could monitor him from the Hub. Toshiko can’t understand how Bilis had been
able to show Gwen the image of Rhys in the flat.
“It was so real Tosh. I was in
my flat. It smelt of my flat. It had all the sounds of my flat.” Gwen replies becoming upset at the mere
thought of it. Jack walks over to her,
convinced that Rhys will be safe and that nothing will happen. Perhaps a little too cock sure of himself!
“Come on there’s still work to be done!” He tells the team as he advances towards the
water tower on the way to his office.
Suddenly a massive electrical charge crackles above them and the lights
dim throwing the Hub into semi darkness setting off the alarms and locking the
secure doors.
Jack enquires as to what it could be. Toshiko tells him “We have a security breach.”
Gwen is only too
aware of what this could mean and screaming his name she runs down to the
vaults to save her beloved Rhys.
Downstairs in the Vaults, the doors unlock, the lights flicker
to red, and the alarms scream. Rhys
steps out of the cell and into the main hallway, and spies a man at the far end
of the cells with his back to him and crouching facing a door. The man gets up, hand behind his back. As Rhys introduces himself and enquires after
the man, if he were an employee of the place, Bilis walks straight towards Rhys
and plunges the dagger into his stomach.
Blood spurts from the wound.
Bilis plunges in the knife again, this time in an upwards motion into
the heart and lungs, Rhys has no chance of survival.
Bilis wipes clean his dagger and returns to the box the other
side of the room. Once he vanishes, the
alarms stop and the lights return to normal, and Rhys is dead.
Gwen bursts through the door to see Rhys’ body bleeding out on
the concrete floor and screams in horror.
She pulls the man towards her as she screams and begs Jack to save
him. But Jack after checking for a pulse
knows there’s nothing that will bring the man back.
Ianto and Toshiko watch from the steps to the morgue while
Jack wipes the blood from Gwen’s hand as she sits beside the mortuary table
where her dead boyfriend lies.
“I’ll have to tell his family.”
Gwen realises.
“We’ll deal with it.”
Ianto offers
“The way you dealt with that porter the first time I met you? No, you won’t deal with him Ianto.”
“Gwen...I’m so sorry.”
Toshiko offers her condolences
Gwen laughs bitterly before looking towards Toshiko. “You
never even met him.” She pulls her
hand from Jack, who puts down the cloth he’d been using to clean her hand with. “This
is what happens here.” Gwen says and
smiles bitterly back at Tosh. “We all end up alone.” Her smile fades. “Not
me.” She turns her gaze to
Jack. “No way. You bring him back.”
“No.”
Jack replies walking towards the light in the alcove.
“The resurrection gauntlet...”
“It was destroyed.”
Ianto replies
“You’ve got to have something else.”
“I said, no!”
Jack restates, hands on hips.
“No there’s something wrong with time so...we can go back and to the
moment...to the very moment and...”
“Gwen!”
Jack says, more directly.
Impressing upon Gwen to take his word as truth.
“Well there’s got to be something otherwise what’s the fucking point of
you?” Screams Gwen, charging towards
Jack, lashing out at him, demanding he bring back her boyfriend. As Gwen’s rage turns to grief and she cries
more against him, Jack holds her close.
Owen returns to the Hub to discover Rhys dead on the table and
the team looking on. Toshiko smiles as
she sees him. He comes down the steps to
console Gwen but she wants none of it.
“How many more people have got to suffer?” Owen asks as Gwen sits beside her dead
boyfriend. Jack shoots Owen a look. “I’m
going to fix this.” Owen tells him. “I’m
opening the Rift.” He runs up the
steps. Ianto looks to Jack before
following Owen up. Jack calls up to him.
“Make sure you stop him.”
But Ianto isn’t going to stop him, he’s going to help him, and
so is Toshiko. Moments later Gwen
follows, convinced that Bilis was right, opening the rift will put everything
back, she’ll have Rhys once more.
“Enter Emergency Protocol One!”
Ianto instructs Owen as he taps away on the keyboard.
“Out the way I’ll do this.”
Says Gwen pulling Owen away to type faster. The three watch on, as Jack picks up his gun
and holster and reattaches it to his belt.
Alarm bells sound across the Hub as the codes flash up on the screen.
“Get away from the computer Gwen.”
Jack instructs. Owen steps in his
way. “This is a trap. All these
cracks around the world, they’re diversions, it’s what Bilis wants.”
“What are you afraid of Jack?”
Owen asks.
The computer asks for the Protocol password. Ianto gives it.
“Rhea Silver.”
Jack draws his weapon and aims it at Gwen’s head. “I
said move.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Toshiko asks staring at the gun
“Final warning.”
Jack says. Sensing mutiny in the
ranks.
“Come on Jack.”
Gwen pleads
“You’re a united front now?”
Jack says, gun still raised. “Toshiko, the poor girl who will screw any
passing alien for a pendant? Owen, so
strong he gets into the cage with a weevil, desperate to be mauled. Ianto, hiding his cyber girlfriend in the
basement, his three comrades pumped bullets into her, remember?”
“I’ve got to get Rhys back”
Gwen begs
“Yeah coz you’re so in love with Rhys you spend half your time in
Owen’s bed.”
Gwen lands Jack
with a right hook causing him to drop his weapon that is retrieved by
Owen.
“We’re relieving you of your command Captain.” Owen says aiming the gun at Jack. “We’re
opening the rift and getting back what we lost.”
Jack sits up his
hand against his face, staring at the gun in Owen’s hand. Gwen returns to the computer. She curses as she sees what is required next
before they can open the rift. Retina
Prints.
“STAY DOWN!” Owen insists as
Jack makes attempts to get up.
“Are you in charge Owen? You’ve
got to have significant bigger balls!”
Jack growls getting to his feet, only to be floored by gun-toting Owen, who
is sick of people doubting him.
Shocked by the
death of Jack, lying with three bullets pumped into him, two in the chest and
one in the head, Toshiko and Ianto are totally stunned by their leader’s murder
at the hands of Owen Harper. Gwen who has
knowledge of Jack’s inability to die, places her hand over Owen’s and removes
the gun from him. Despite the knowledge
of Jack that she carried with her, they still have a job to do, she still wants
Rhys back. Ianto squats beside Jack’s head, staring closer at his dead body,
shocked.
“What have you done?”
The team take retina shots using the hand held device, but
someone has to take one of Jack’s eyes.
With the retina scans complete and uploaded to the computer, the
authorisation is complete for the Emergency Protocol One.
Hitting OK a warning sign flashes up on the screen informing
the user of the danger it would put the infrastructure in. Gwen looks back at the team who know how big
this decision is and as Toshiko looks back at Jack lying on the ground
dead...Gwen looks back at Rhys on the table and turns back to the keyboard and
hits OK.
Alarms signal around the Hub, electricity arcs up the
building. Creatures and people from other worlds begin yelling and growling in
the cells, the team stand around listening to the alarms unsure what to do
next. As Jack gasps back to life,
grabbing hold of Gwen’s leg. The team
are horrified to see him alive.
“What have you done?” He
demands to know.
Electricity arcs up the water tower and a rush of white light
escapes up through the tower and out into the atmosphere, straight out into
space. The Hub begins to shake, trays on
tables begin to rattle, and Rhys is shaken on the mortuary table. Weevils go crazy in the cells then vanish,
the Roman soldier vanishes, Rhys vanishes.
In the Hub the structure begins to collapse, beams fall from
the roof and crash to the ground around the team, rubble bounces off the work
surfaces, the glass blows out of the boardroom.
The team make a mass exodus and leave the building as fast as they
can.
Convinced that what they’ve done was the right thing, Gwen can
only think that everything now will go back to normal as Bilis had
suggested. But as Gwen and Ianto
struggle with Jack, Owen and Toshiko see Bilis standing before them.
“From out of the darkness, he has come.”
“What is he talking about?”
Gwen calls back to the team, who watch cautiously.
“Son of the great beast, cast out before time, chained in rock and
imprisoned beneath the rift.”
“WHAT?” Gwen asks again, tired of the riddles.
Glancing up towards
the skies Bilis honours the creature as it stomps towards them.
“All hail Abadon, the Great Devourer, come to feast on life.”
The team turn back
to stare at the giant creature towering above the office blocks, setting off the
alarm on the SUV parked in the back street.
“The whole world shall die beneath his shadow.” Bilis exclaims.
Abadon towers above them and roars but turns away more
interested in the rest of the city and stomps across Cardiff in search of
food.
Pedestrians, shoppers, people in cars can’t get away quick
enough and lie in the streets, dead.
“I look upon my god and I know my work is done!”
Gwen looks on Jack for help.
He considers a moment and insists that only Gwen drive him.
Out on the waste ground outside of the city, across the water,
Jack climbs from the SUV and struggles to walk across the rough ground, having
only just come back to life. The
creature is in his sights. Gwen wants to
know what he plans.
“If Abadon is the bringer of death then let’s see how he does with
me. If he feeds on life then I’m an all
you can eat buffet!”
Gwen tries to talk
him out of it, tells him he’s too weak but Jack’s mind is set. He tells her to get in the car and get as far
away as possible, then calls across the water at Abadon, who curiously comes
across interested in Jack.
Fear etches across
Jack’s face as he stares up at the creature towering over him. As he stands in the creature’s shadow he
feels the life energy being taken from him, every death, every revival, every
painful resurrection, he screams across the waste ground as Abadon takes his
fill, but Abadon himself begins to struggle against Jack and soon is consumed
by life itself.
Jack collapses back
against the stones as Abadon falls. He
lies still. Gwen comes to his aid but
he’s cold. She cries holding him, this
day has been quite an ordeal.
With the world
reset, Gwen returns home to find Rhys standing puzzled in the kitchenette,
certain that Gwen had already just arrived a minute ago. She plants a lingering kiss upon his lips,
pleased that he is back and alive. But
she isn’t stopping. Gwen insists he goes
to bed and gets some rest and she’ll be there just as soon as possible. She has to return to the Hub.
The team are waiting in the morgue for her, beside the open
drawer where Jack lies inside the white body bag. His face is ashen white and Owen confirms
that he’s ice cold with no vital signs.
“He survived when you shot him.
When I first joined he said he couldn’t die.”
“He was wrong.” Owen replies.
“I want to sit with him.”
Gwen says as she strokes her fingers gently against Jack’s hair. The team file out, leaving Gwen alone with
Jack.
Gwen waits patiently for Jack to wake up, believing in him
when all others had given up. She
straightens the body bag, smoothes out the creases in his gown, leans against
him telling him to ‘wake up’.
“How long is she going to do this?” Owen asks as the remaining trio watch the
CCTV from the Hub.
A while later, Ianto tidies up Jack’s office, spying the coat
hanging on the coat stand, lifts it down and sobs into it.
“It’s been days.” Toshiko
says as she joins Gwen in the morgue. “You have to face up to it, he’s not coming
back.”
“I believe in him.”
Gwen replies
“Let him go Gwen.” Toshiko
advises. As Tosh walks away Gwen finally accepts that perhaps Jack really can
die. She leans down and kisses him
goodbye on the lips. Walking away from
the body she hears a faint voice reply: “Thank
you!” Running back to the body she
sees Jack awake, smiling, and blinks back her own tears of joy.
A while later Jack
walks back up to the Hub with Gwen by his side, still with the dark rings
around his eyes he looks far healthier than earlier. As Toshiko lifts down the object she was
dismantling, she spies Jack and runs over to hug him. Ianto also follows suit and is kissed by
Jack. Owen hesitantly comes over. When Jack forgives him, Owen breaks down and
Jack pulls him close.
The team are all back together.
“What’s happened to the Rift?”
“It closed up after Abadon was destroyed. But it’s going to be more volatile than
ever.”
“The visions we had, we all saw people we loved. What did you see?”
“Nothing.” Shakes his head. “There was nothing.”
“Jack, what would have tempted you?
What visions would have convinced you to open the rift?”
“The right sort of Doctor.”
Jack leaves the office wondering where Ianto is with the coffees as he
hears the water in the hand jar bubbling, a rush of air and the sound of a
distant time travellers craft engine screaming ever closer, brings a smile to
Jack’s face. A whoosh of air scatters
the paperwork across the floor, and as the team come back with coffees, Gwen
realises Jack has disappeared, that something has taken Jack.
End of Season One
Next month –
Doctor Who: Utopia
©BBC Torchwood 2006
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