sam_storyteller (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sam_storyteller) wrote2005-07-17 11:40 am
sam_storyteller) wrote2005-07-17 11:40 am
Entry tags:
Edgar Van Scyoc Presents: Doctor Who; Chapter 7
Title: Edgar van Scyoc Presents: Doctor Who
Rating: PG-13 (mainly for language)
Summary: Torchwood is prepared to confront the man who was Professor Arthur Yana, now revealed to be a Time Lord bent on dominating Earth as his first step towards the stars. They have never needed the Doctor's help more than they do now, but the Doctor is in hiding as a human, with only Ross and Rose to protect him from a race of ruthless hunters. Behind the scenes, Edgar and Ellis receive a very surprising visitor, and Edgar makes a decision about his relationship with his head writer.
Chapter Seven
Transcript from the Doctor Who Season One DVD Extras, "Summertime":
John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd are standing in a field in full early-20th-century costume; behind them, various crewmembers move about and Edgar van Scyoc is seen briefly. John leans in close to the camera and grins.
John: Welcome to pollen central, population: us. We've had to stop filming because the clouds of pollen are obscuring the vistas.
Gareth: Back there [waves behind him] you can see our fearless leader, Edgar van Scyoc, mainlining antihistamines.
John: So we thought we'd entertain...you!
John straightens up and both men face the camera. John hums and Gareth matches the note. Both bob their heads in time to the rhythm John sets.
John: Two, three, four.
John and Gareth in unison:
Summertime
And the living is easy.
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high --
John: -- The cotton is high --
John and Gareth:
Well your daddy's rich
And your ma is good lookin'
So hush little baby
Don't you cry...
In the background, quite clearly, Edgar van Scyoc is heard sneezing. John and Gareth burst into laughter.
Edgar van Scyoc: [distantly] IT ISN'T FUNNY.
***
DOCTOR WHO 1x19: HUMAN NATURE
Doctor John Smith, professor of mathematics at the elite Briar Rose Boarding School for Girls outside of Chicago, is continually plagued with supernatural dreams. His only confidantes are Rose, a young and headstrong serving-girl, and Professor Jenkins, the sports instructor and, John assumes, his rival for Rose's affections. In the shadow of the impending world war, Briar Rose Boarding School is a haven for young women of class and sophistication -- and also perhaps a shelter for a gang of bloodthirsty killers. Now Ross and Rose must protect the Doctor not only from those who are hunting him, but from himself -- a suddenly human self, who has little of the Doctor's brilliance but all of his penchant for getting into trouble.
"How is Himself tonight?" Ross asked, sitting on the steps outside the kitchen entrance of the school. Rose dropped down next to him with a sigh and rested her head on his shoulder for a moment before pulling back (it didn't do to show too familiar with the teachers).
"Same as always," she replied, smoothing her skirt out. "Always writing in his little book, talking a lot of crap while he drinks his coffee. You know when I signed on for the TARDIS, kitchen duty wasn't exactly what I had in mind."
"I dunno," Ross said, leaning back. "It's kind of...peaceful."
"You say that because you don't have to scrub floors tomorrow."
"Skive off. I'll give you a note," he grinned. She smiled at him. "It is, though. It's quiet here. It's a nice breather."
"Except for the feeling of impending doom I get every time I look at him."
"He said the hunters would die soon enough. When we got here they were about an inch from our heels. If they could find him they would have done by now. The TARDIS is safe, and so is he; only two more weeks before we can open the Chameleon Arch and get him back. In the meantime, look at where we are, Rose," he said, swinging one hand across the wide Illinois prairie, ending on the smudge in the distance that was Chicago. "It's beautiful here."
"No TV, no internet -- "
" -- no bills, no running for your life -- "
" -- no electric dishwashers, and no pop music." She sighed. "I know. It's nice to stick around in one place for a couple of weeks but I want to go home."
"To our time?"
"To the TARDIS."
Ross nodded. He was silent for a long while, until finally he sat up again.
"My dad's PDA died today. Couldn't hold a charge any longer -- I can't charge it again until we're home. Not that I've been using it, but sometimes it was...nice. What he wrote, about you and the Doctor, it wasn't all bad. I liked reading it." He drew a deep breath. "Will you tell me about him, Rose?"
"Like what?"
"Something. Anything really, I'm not picky. I only knew him for a few days. Tell me about some...time you had an adventure."
Rose thought for a moment and then nodded. "When we started, one of the first places we went was the end of the world. There was this observation platform, perched over the Earth, and we were about to see our own sun go supernova. I think he thought it'd scare us..."
***
John had only come down to the kitchens to try and scare up some cheese and maybe a handful of crackers, but when he heard voices -- Professor Jenkins, it sounded like -- he padded past the stoves and sinks to the scullery at the back, lurking slightly in the shadows.
There was another voice too, higher and younger -- Rose, the serving girl who'd attached herself to his study and wouldn't allow anyone else to bring him his coffee. Apparently he wasn't the only professor she favored, which was...disappointing, and a little saddening. He liked Rose's spirit, and her visits were often the high point of his day.
Rose and Jenkins, sitting companionably outside the scullery, Rose telling him some kind of story. On one level it was not a good sign for Rose; the professors might take advantage of lonely and willing serving-girls, but they rarely made it serious. On another level, something in John was thoroughly envious of Jenkins' easy way with the young woman.
If it had been anyone else he might not have listened in, but he was only human, after all.
"...person who looked exactly like a plant, and she thought your dad and the Doctor were both married to me. They tried to convince her -- "
" -- oh my god! -- " Jenkins said, laughing.
" -- but then she just thought they were married to each other."
"She sounds great."
"She -- was," Rose said, and her voice dipped into sadness. "She died."
"How?"
"The observation platform was sabotaged. Someone had to do a cold-restart of the system to get the shields up before the sun exploded. The Colonel couldn't be there -- he was helping get me out of the solarium -- and she went with the Doctor to the breakers in the base of the ship. She died down there, holding the brake on the ventilation fans so he could step through and shut everything down. That's what he told me later."
"I'm sorry," Jenkins said, but John didn't really hear him; he was back in last night's dream, watching a woman with green skin and a wood-bark shirt trying to hold a giant lever while he ran down a high catwalk towards another lever, one that was important for some reason. Visions of suns exploding and a giant head in a jar flitted across his mind.
His journal hadn't left his pocket all day, and the dream had only come to him the night before. There wouldn't have been time for Rose to read it, let alone study it enough to turn it into the kind of detailed story she was telling Jenkins.
"Tell me how he got you out of the solarium," Jenkins said, somewhere in the background, as John ripped the journal open and flicked through it, pacing up and down in the kitchen. There; there was the account of the Amazing Death Of Our Sun, one of seemingly hundreds of adventures he'd dreamed over the course of his time at the school. There was only one constant, a large blue box that somehow meant safety and home, but as he listened to Rose speak and studied the text and the little ink doodles he realised that yes -- he'd seen Rose in some of his dreams, and Professor Jenkins as well.
"Doctor Smith?"
He looked up sharply to find Jenkins and Rose standing in the scullery -- Rose smiling at him, as she always did, and Jenkins looking faintly wary, as he so often did.
"Can I get you anything, professor?" Rose asked.
"No -- no, no, thank you. I was just going to...get some fresh air," he stammered. Rose glanced at Jenkins; Jenkins gave him a knowing smile and stepped aside.
Once he was outside, well away from the school, John sat down in the long grass and leaned back, staring up at the sky, breathing heavy with relief.
He would find out how Rose had known his dream, and what she was doing in them. All of this was highly improbable, but John firmly believed that magic was only mathematics one didn't understand yet. He would puzzle it out.
The pocketwatch in his vest, heated by the sun, sat close to his heart and warmed his skin through the thin fabric until he closed his eyes and let the dreams take him away again.
***
"You wanted to see me, Doctor Smith?" Rose asked, the next afternoon, putting her head through the door of his study.
"Rose. I did. Come on in," he replied, waiting for her to enter and smile at him before he continued. "Please, sit down."
She frowned, but she sat, and he leaned forward over his desk and steepled his fingers.
"It's not my place to...regulate the staff," he began, searching for the right words. He was terrible with words; that was why numbers were so comforting. "And it's definitely not my job to discipline the junior professors. I'm pretty junior myself. But I'm older than you, and I wanted to pass along a friendly -- a friendly warning."
Her frown deepened.
"I know you've been spending a lot of time with Professor Jenkins," he said, and plowed on before she could say anything. "And I'm glad you've found a friend, and all this old stuff about staff not fraternizing with professors is -- well it's on the way out, and I think that's good. Still, he's young and a little wild."
"Wild," she repeated, with a small smile.
"Yes. I worry he's going to hurt you."
"We're just friends, Doctor Smith."
"I know, I know," he said wretchedly. "But friends can become more -- people can be pushed to become more than friends. I just want you to be aware. He has a lot of power. He could lose you your job if you said no, but if you said yes you could lose your job all the same."
"You have a lot of power over me too."
"But I'm, well, old enough," he said. "To use it wisely -- not to use it, I mean, I'm old enough not to abuse it. Jenkins is very young. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
She watched him for a minute, and then a smile broke over her face. "Are you jealous, Doctor?"
"Jealous! I, no, I'm not jealous, why would I be jealous?" he asked, flustered.
"You are. You're jealous -- you think Ross -- "
"You see? His first name?"
"You think Professor Jenkins is your rival."
John stared at her, open-mouthed. She reached across and boldly put her hand on top of his.
"Doctor, I want you to listen to me," she said. Her voice had a certain note of command in it, even when she was taking orders from the head of staff, that he often thought spoke of a headstrong upbringing. "I like him. He's my friend. But...you know, love is like...totally...you're first in my heart. Of anyone I've ever met. You're first, Doctor," she said, and made his title somehow sound like his name. "You don't have anything to fear from Ross Jenkins."
He stared at her, heart beating in his chest (and the double-time thump felt somehow familiar too).
"Do you mean that?" he asked.
"Yeah. But things are just nuts right now, the world is crazy -- "
"The war."
"That, but -- this isn't the time. Now? It's just not the time."
She must have been thinking of his reputation at the school, how he was a first-year professor as well and didn't need a scandal until he'd at least renewed employment for the next year. That was sensible thinking, not that he'd expect less from Rose.
"I think I understand," he murmured. "But -- summer is coming. Soon."
The look she gave him was knowing -- so knowing it implied she knew something he didn't, which was deeply unsettling.
"The summer," she agreed, an edge in her voice. "Then."
"I'm so glad we spoke, Rose," he said, turning his hand over to thread his fingers through hers.
"Me too," she said. "I should go -- there's cleaning -- "
"Of course. Ah, Rose..." he stood impulsively and took out his pocketwatch. "I want you to keep this."
She stared down at the watch, looking more shocked than he'd expect.
"As a reminder. Time. You know. Sort of," he said. He held it out to her. "Please, I want you to."
She nodded and took it out of his hand; to his shock, instead of leaving immediately, she tucked it in her pocket and touched his shoulders, tipping his head down so she could kiss his forehead. Like a mother, or a sister.
"Summer is coming soon," she said, the words echoing strangely in his mind, and then she was gone.
Two days later, when he saw her handle a gun for the first time against a gang of invaders who were seemingly invincible and for some reason wanted his blood, he wondered who she really was and how deep he'd gotten himself embroiled in something far beyond his human understanding.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 1x19: Human Nature
Story by: Ellis Graveworthy
Teleplay by: Derek Smith and Richard Allen
Directed by: Edgar van Scyoc
INT - DANCE HALL - NIGHT
THE HUNTERS enter the hall disguised as BAINES, CLARKE, and JENNY. Shrieks and muttering are heard when the crowd in the dance hall sees the guns in their hands.
CLARKE
Silence! All of you!
MAN #1
Mr. Clarke! What's the meaning of this?
CLARKE executes MAN #1 ruthlessly. More shrieks.
BAINES
HE ASKED FOR SILENCE!
All fall silent. The DOCTOR wraps a protective arm around ROSE.
ROSE
[whispering]
Let go, Doctor. If they see you with me --
JENNY
That's the one. Professor Jenkins. He's one of the Doctor's companions. I heard him talking.
In the background, ROSE has managed to get free of the DOCTOR and is standing in front of him.
BAINES
Better than that.
[he sniffs]
There...is...the Doctor. That's what Professor Jenkins calls you, isn't it, "Professor Smith"? You took human form. How charming.
DOCTOR
Took human -- I AM human! I was BORN human! Like you!
BAINES
And a human brain, too! Simple, thick and dull.
JENNY
But we need a Time Lord!
BAINES
That can be arranged.
[aims his gun at the DOCTOR, who recoils]
Change back.
DOCTOR
I don't know what you're talking about.
BAINES grabs ROSS, who tries to fight him off; if BAINES were human they would be equally matched, but BAINES holds him easily.
ROSS
Let me go, you son of a --
BAINES
He's your friend, isn't he, Doctor? Your companion? Scared yet?
DOCTOR
Stop this, just stop! I don't understand!
JENNY
Or maybe...
[grabs ROSE and puts the gun to her head]
Everyone's been talking, haven't they? About how Professor Smith's in love with one of the serving girls.
DOCTOR
Let her go, please. Let them both go. I'll do whatever you want, just let them go.
BAINES
All you have to do is change back.
DOCTOR
[anguished]
I don't know what you're talking about!
BAINES
Then it's your choice. Answer this. Which one should we kill first? Your best friend -- or your lover? Your choice.
TO BE CONTINUED
***
Edgar was going over financial reports for the end-of-fiscal-year accounting, and Ellis was "helping" by sitting on the office sofa and writing, because Ellis couldn't add two and three to make five, when there was a sudden knock on the door. Whoever was on the other side didn't wait for an invitation before opening it, either.
Both men looked up; Edgar laid his highlighter down, and Ellis tilted his head.
"Sorry to intrude," said the rangy, auburn-haired man in the doorway. "Edgar van Scyoc?"
"That's me," Edgar said warily. Visions of crazed fans with guns flitted briefly through his head. The door swung wider and a young woman in a leather jacket put her head under the man's arm, peering around curiously. "And you are...?"
"...here to ask a favour," the man said. Edgar glanced at Ellis, who frowned. "Aaaah. This is Ace."
"Hi!" Ace waved cheerfully.
"Something that...belongs to me got tossed in with ah..." the man looked around again. "Props? I think?"
"You think?"
"I need a rummage in your drawers," the man announced.
There was an amused snort from Ellis. Edgar narrowed his eyes at the man.
"I'm sorry, I still don't know who you are or how you got past security," he said.
"Was there security?" the man asked Ace.
"Not that I saw," she answered. Edgar knew that mock-innocent look. He'd used it often enough himself.
Slowly, he pushed his chair away from the desk.
"Have a go...Doctor," he said.
The man's face broke into an enormous grin. "I told you he wouldn't fuss," he said to Ace. "She said, you never can tell with parallel universes, and I said..." he began pulling drawers out, combing through them with long, clever fingers, "I said, he'll know who I am. Hi," he added, glancing at Ellis. "Huge fan, Mr. Graveworthy."
Ellis looked smug.
"Yes, all right, round here somewhere...a-HA!" the Doctor burst out, holding up what looked like one of the dozens of prop Sonic Screwdrivers that the show went through in a season. Edgar had eight or nine in his drawer, to hand out to people as toys. He flicked it and it lit up; all of the prop ones were green, but this one, oddly, glowed blue. "Thanks so much. Brilliant. We'll be out of your hair now. G'bye!"
They disappeared out the door before either man could move. There was half a minute of silence.
"We never, ever talk about this to anyone," Edgar said.
"Agreed," Ellis replied.
There was another knock on the door, and both men jumped. It turned out to be Mia, toting a handful of drawings.
"What, did Hamu-chan get free?" she asked, taking in their pale faces and nervous expressions.
"No -- why do you ask?" Edgar said, going for casual and missing by a mile.
"No reason. Hey, did you guys have a meeting without me this morning? I just saw some guy who looked like an ad executive walking out with one of your prop Screwdrivers," she said.
Edgar placed a hand on each shoulder and looked her directly in the eye.
"Some things are better left a mystery," he said.
"O...kay," she drawled. "Anyway -- drawings?"
***
FROM: E van Scyoc
TO: El
SUBJECT: Security Footage
El,
This is the best we'll get, I think. The security cameras outside the office only caught him on a handful of frames, didn't get the girl at all. I ran it up to our design people -- trust me, they're the best we can get with digital imagery without going to the police -- and they cleaned it up. I'm attaching both images.
I want to believe that this was some guy who pranked us for a laugh, but honestly, El, it feels dishonest to think that. And there are more things in heaven and earth, et cetera. So.
That's the face of our Doctor. I like to think we're doing him a credit, don't you?
EvS
--
Edgar van Scyoc
Executive Producer, Torchwood
NBC Studios
I'm an absolute beginner and I'm absolutely sane. -- David Bowie
***
DOCTOR WHO 1x20: THE FAMILY OF BLOOD
A gang of alien hunters have come for the Doctor, laying siege to the Briar Rose School where Doctor John Smith has been unwittingly in hiding. It's up to him, aided by Professor Ross Jenkins and serving-girl Rose Tyler, to draw the menace away from the school and to defeat them -- but defeating the Family of Blood means giving up his humanity, and losing the precious thing growing between him and Rose. Ross and Rose, meanwhile, are desperate to find the Doctor's missing Chameleon Arch -- a pocketwatch that holds his essence inside it.
The field was as warm as it had been, the day he'd lain among the grass and fallen asleep, but John couldn't seem to warm up. He was frightened; people kept trying to kill him, or his friends, or his students, and a tiny little hysterical corner of his mind also wanted to know when the girls of the Briar Rose school had become quite so adept with handguns. Probably Professor Jenkins' doing; he had all sorts of insane ideas about womens' lib.
But Rose was with him, which was something; Rose was safe, and he could see Jenkins' progress through the long grass, the stalks waving this way and that as he crawled forward.
"Got it," Jenkins gasped, when he reached them, rolling over onto his back and opening his left hand. The pocketwatch -- the silly old thing he'd given Rose on a whim, and which had been stolen from her -- tumbled to the ground. Rose snatched it up and pressed it into his palm.
"You have to open it," she said. "That's its purpose. The real you is inside and you need to free it."
"I am the real me," he protested, his voice hushed. "I don't want to be someone else, Rose."
"It's too late -- you already were someone else. Please, just open it!"
"You knew," he murmured. "You knew all the time that I was someone else, but you said -- "
"I wasn't lying," Rose said desperately. Jenkins pushed himself up on his elbows to watch them argue. "But when you left instructions you didn't tell me what to do if -- if you fell in love!"
"It never occurred to me?" John asked, shocked and hurt. "And you want me to become that man again?"
"You have to. You're the only one who can stop them," Ross said, his voice level and even. "John Smith can't stop the Family of Blood any more than I can. But the Doctor..."
"You have a lot of faith in the Doctor," John said bitterly.
"What, you think I only hung about you because you used to be the Doctor?" Jenkins asked. Rose looked impatiently back and forth between them. "You're him. You're inside him. But you're not all of him. The Doctor is like...fire, and ice, and gravity. He's the storm in the heart of the sun. He's called the Rage of Kings."
"Stop it," John ordered, panicking, because the rhythm of Jenkins's voice was soothing, and he found himself wanting to open the watch.
"He's ancient and forever. He can see the turn of the universe," Jenkins declared.
"Stop!"
"He's the reason I exist," Jenkins continued inexorably. "Father, brother, hero -- he walks as a god on a thousand planets."
"I can give them the watch," John said desperately. "That's all they want. They can leave, I can stay like this."
"You'll make them immortal," Jenkins said. "Do you want that?"
"I just want them to leave me alone. Rose -- if I give them the watch we can stay here, together."
Rose lifted her head and the sunlight caught her eyes, turning her skin to gold.
"No," she said. "We can't. If you stay, you're not the man I'd stay for."
John glanced at Jenkins, who had adopted a casual attitude, as if none of this mattered in the slightest. And yet his eyes never left John's face.
Jenkins is a soldier, he thought to himself, surprised at the insight.
"Who are you to me?" he asked them, clutching the watch tightly.
"We travel with you."
"Why?"
Jenkins glanced at Rose. "Because we chose to."
Doctor John Smith, Professor of Mathematics, made a decision.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 1x20: The Family Of Blood
Story by: Ellis Graveworthy
Teleplay by: Anna Jackson
Directed by: Edgar van Scyoc
INT - TARDIS
ROSE, ROSS, and the DOCTOR walk into the TARDIS; the DOCTOR inhales deeply and smiles.
DOCTOR
Good old TARDIS. Smells a little musty.
ROSE
It doesn't, I aired it out every few days.
ROSS
I aired it out, she sat there and complained about the poor quality of undergarments in the early twentieth century.
ROSE
[studying her button-up boots]
Great shoes, though.
ROSS gives the DOCTOR a long-suffering look.
DOCTOR
You both deserve some kind of vacation, I think. Especially for putting up with that idiot I turned into.
ROSE
You weren't an idiot. You were sort of sweet. A little pathetic, but...nice.
DOCTOR
Nice.
ROSS
Damnation by faint praise.
ROSE
[laughing]
Now I know you're back to normal, when "nice" isn't good enough for you.
[she kisses his cheek]
Good to have you back.
DOCTOR
Yeah. All back the way it was.
ROSE
I'm starving, I'm gonna go find something to eat.
DOCTOR
[calling after her]
Be thinking about where you want your vacation!
ROSE exits; ROSS fixes the DOCTOR with a knowing look.
ROSS
Why don't you just tell her you're in love with her? She loves you enough to stay with you.
DOCTOR
I can't be that obvious.
ROSS
No. You're very careful around her. That's how I know.
DOCTOR
It doesn't matter.
ROSS
It does if she makes you happy.
DOCTOR
Not even then. You're very young, Ross Jenkins. So is she. Your lives are so short. You shouldn't waste them on me; you'll travel with me for a while, but one day you'll go home again. Maybe even the same day you left home. You need meaning in your lives. You can't spend your whole short lives on this.
ROSS
You think you have no meaning for us?
DOCTOR
I think I'll live long after Rose is dust and bones. So I can't afford any more love for her than I already feel.
ROSS
What if I told her?
DOCTOR
You won't.
ROSS
Why wouldn't I?
DOCTOR
Because you know that what I say is the truth.
ROSE wanders back in, eating a granola bar.
ROSE
We're out of everything. Or it's moldy. This is a time machine, how come things get mold on them?
DOCTOR
Narrative veracity.
ROSE
Whatever.
DOCTOR
[smiling]
Grocery run? How does the universal marketplace of the bazaar planet Nefi sound?
ROSE
Sounds great.
DOCTOR
Then we're off!
EXT - SPACE
Closing shot of the TARDIS, spinning through the Time Vortex.
BLACKOUT
***
***
TORCHWOOD 2x20: LORDS AND LADIES
Professor Arthur Yana has been revealed as a Time Lord, the only other survivor of the great Time War. With superior intelligence and the ability to manipulate time from inside the Rift, Yana has gone about remaking the history of Earth to suit his own purposes. Only Torchwood, who witnessed his descent into the Rift, are immune; when he brings forces to bear on the team they must find a way to defeat him -- even if it means sending Jack into the Rift itself to fight him. Jack is willing to go, but only one person in Torchwood has been into the Rift rather than through it, and Jack may not be the best man for the job.
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 2x20: Lords And Ladies
Story & Teleplay: Ellis Graveworthy
Directed by: Ellis Graveworthy
INT - HUB - DAY
JACK
Oh, my god.
TOMMY
[joining him at the computer screen]
What? Oh.
GWEN
You want to tell us what's freaking you out?
JACK
Pull up the Rift activity archives.
IAN
What's going on?
JACK
Look. Look there. These are archives of Rift activity going back to the founding of Torchwood. Every spike, every time the Rift opens, Torchwood has records. Now watch.
JACK pulls up a very old hand-drawn graph.
JACK
This is a jpeg file, a scan of hand-kept records.
The TEAM crowds around him. Focus on the graph. After a few seconds, a new spike appears.
TOSH
That's not possible. It's a digital image file.
JACK
He's rewriting history.
IAN
Oh whoa. Heads up.
JACK
What is it?
IAN
Who led the Union in the Civil War?
GWEN
President Lincoln.
IAN
Not so much anymore.
He tilts his screen towards them. An image of THE PROFESSOR in a stovepipe hat is onscreen.
JACK
He's putting himself into history. Building a dynasty.
OWEN
How do you know?
JACK
It was done once before. A Time Agent went rogue. He put himself into a planet's history as the founder of civilisation, created a line of descendants -- all him -- to replace their dynasties, made himself supreme ruler of an entire species. It took us three weeks to catch him. We wouldn't have, but he tore open a rift.
IAN
Is that what's going to happen to ours?
JACK
Our Rift is old...
TOSH
If he keeps up he'll overload it. Blowback.
JACK
Unless he's not using the Rift for transport.
Silence as JACK looks at the dark, silent Rift Manipulator.
JACK
He's inside the Rift.
IAN
So how come we aren't affected?
JACK
We're as close to the epicenter as we can be. A few hundred feet in any direction -- people on the surface of the Plaza are probably affected. He's in the Rift.
TOSH
A Rift we can't close.
OWEN
No. But we can open it. If he's in there, we open it, reach in, get him out...
JACK
Now you're talking. Tommy, fire up the supercomputer. Tosh, set up the stabilizers.
TOSH
On it!
JACK
Owen, you'll ride the Rift.
OWEN
[elbowing Tommy over to work one of the strange machines on the table]
Move over, Tommy.
JACK
Gwen, go to the Armory, open cabinet 112, get the green metal guns you see there. They're timelocked, they'll work inside the Rift. Theroetically. Ian --
There is a clank and a clatter as IAN secures one ring of a handcuff around Jack's wrist, the other to a railing.
JACK
Ian.
IAN
You're not going into the Rift.
JACK
Let me go.
IAN
No.
OWEN
Ian --
IAN
Don't make me shoot you, Owen.
JACK
It's the only way, Ian.
IAN
I know.
[he turns to GWEN]
Get the guns.
JACK
Ian, I can't die. You can.
IAN
But I've been in the Rift before. I know how to survive. You don't. I'm the logical choice, Jack.
JACK
You'll die.
IAN
No. I'll go in, I'll get him, I'll go to ground. I know how. When the Rift stops flaring you can come after me.
GWEN runs for the guns as JACK tugs, violently and fruitlessly, on the handcuffs.
JACK
LET ME GO!
IAN
No.
JACK
Do you know what happens to people who go into the Rift without a manipulator?
IAN
Yes.
JACK stops for a moment, shocked by IAN's expression.
TOMMY
Manipulator's online.
[uncertain look]
Someone's got to go soon.
IAN
Tosh?
TOSH
Stabilizers are in place.
[she looks at Jack]
It makes sense, Jack.
[she pushes a button]
Initialising stability field.
GWEN returns with the guns. IAN holds out his hands. She hesitates before passing them over.
GWEN
I'm sorry, Jack. He's right.
IAN holsters the guns and pulls his jacket off.
IAN
Don't let him come after me. Tosh, are you ready?
TOSH
Go, Tommy.
TOMMY pushes a button on the side of his keyboard. A glowing golden hole opens in the middle of the HUB. Side shot, IAN in profile. He takes a deep breath and steps through; the Rift is paper-thin, but he doesn't step out the other side.
TOSH
Rift stability is holding.
JACK screams in rage. OWEN, from behind him, jabs a syringe into his neck. The others stare at him.
OWEN
That was gonna get really old, really fast.
***
Ian had been in the Rift once before, but that time he hadn't been expecting it, had hardly been aware of where he was. It was easier, this time; he went in with a single memory held tightly in his mind, and the falling-floating sensation faded to blackness. It was like the caves in Missouri where he'd gone camping as a kid; pitch-black and oppressive.
The guns helped too; they were cool and real in his hands. This was a new kind of hunting, but not so different from Weevils, really. Look for the shadow (in your mind, in time, the shadow in time) and follow it. Listen for the low growl (rumble in your bones, a chill up your ribcage) and triangulate the origin. Find places (times) to hide and watch.
Jack had taught him well.
Jack's never going to forgive me, he thought, as light and mass and time all scrolled past him, devoid (for now) of the Professor. But on the bright side, I'll probably die in here, so it's not like I'll notice.
He had two green-metal guns, though. He had Yana's pocketwatch from their world in his waistcoat, stolen from their world's Yana's grave by Jack earlier that morning. He had his wits. He wasn't sure if any of them would do any good; he had no idea what firing a timelocked gun or opening Yana's pocketwatch would do inside the Rift. But he knew he could track the Professor.
There. A flicker of noise in an Italian court in the 16th century. Just a hint, but enough to pull him up short.
Inside the Rift, without a body, Ian began the chase.
This was the easy part.
***
"Rift is destabilising," Gwen called, working frantically in tandem with Tommy at the computers. Tosh was tapping out commands on her handheld almost too fast to see.
"It's no good -- we have to get to the epicenter," she said. "We can't hold the Rift open from outside."
"Tosh, don't you dare," Tommy shouted.
"If it closes now we'll lose Ian and there's no guarantee he'll be able to stop him," she shouted back, vaulting over the rail and running towards the bright glowing gap in reality in the center of the Hub. "I have to go in. I can stabilise it from inside, leave the transmitter there, and come back."
"Toshiko -- "
"No, Tommy! There's no time!"
"Gwen, grab him!" Owen yelled, as Tommy broke to follow. "She needs you out here, Tommy! Stay at your post, that's an order!"
Tosh pressed two buttons in quick succession on one of the transmitters, ejecting a small glass rod that glowed faintly. She turned, gave them a desperate, frantic look, and grabbed Owen's arm.
He didn't move as she leaned in and kissed him briefly, then hugged him with one arm around his neck and stepped back.
"Yes," she said, and ran after Ian into the Rift.
"Yes?" Gwen asked, turning to Owen. He was touching his lips, confused.
"Answer to an old question," he said.
The destabilization alarms cut off abruptly. There was silence in the Hub, suddenly, except for the low, almost inaudible squeal of the Rift itself. Owen and Tommy stood staring; Gwen gave a sobbing noise as she inhaled.
A clanking noise began, soft at first but growing louder; they began to look around them as it increased until it was almost unbearable. Gwen drew her gun as it passed directly overhead --
And then Tosh's face appeared over the rail, looking down on them.
"Hi," she said. "Have I been gone long?"
Owen gave a hysterical bark of laughter and ran up the steps, meeting her halfway.
"I -- I went in and I left it and it was like -- this ball of -- and then it -- oh my god -- but I managed to -- it put me -- Hub, up there," she blurted, as he half-carried her down the steps to Tommy, who hugged her tightly.
Gwen put a hand on her arm. "Did you see Ian?"
Tosh turned to look at the Rift.
"Yeah," she said. "He's in there. He's hunting."
***
There were no actual bodies in the Rift, and so he couldn't technically come face to face with the Professor; though he'd chased him in and out of time and his legs (that didn't exist) were sore and his heart (that didn't beat) was pumping furiously, when he finally caught up to the madman it was...oddly anticlimactic.
Here was a room of stone, with no doors, but somehow Ian was there; here was a table and here were two chairs, the Professor in one of them. Ian raised the gun.
"It won't hurt me," the Professor said, with a look of infinite tolerance.
"It's timelocked. It'll fire in the Rift," Ian said.
"If you fully believed that you would have fired, young son. Have a seat," the Professor said, and kicked out the chair across the table from him. Ian pulled the trigger.
Nothing happened.
"Timelocked firearms are crude things," the Professor said. "Easily circumvented. This place..." he waved his hand, "Is a pocket of time inside the Rift, where time goes to die. Those guns don't work in real time. Only in the imaginary realms...your Jack must have paid a handsome price for them. Too bad."
"He's your Jack too," Ian said.
"Yes, more mine than yours, in fact. He bores me now, though. He's a human; you're not very interesting, as creatures."
Ian sat down. He didn't know what else he could do. "And that's why you're bothering to enslave us, right?"
"I need a ship. I need weapons. This planet is a stepping-stone, at best. You're not a soldier, are you, son?"
"Don't call me that."
"I didn't think so. I was," the Professor said, leaning back comfortably. "I was the general of a great war."
"The Time War."
"Oh, you've heard of it? Did we win?"
Ian stared at him.
"I decided I didn't like our odds. I...left," the man smiled. "I don't even know if we won or not. I assume so, or else this world would have fallen to the Daleks long ago."
"That depends on how you define winning," Ian said. "Both races were destroyed."
"Except for me."
Ian smiled. "Believe that if you want. You won't leave the Rift alive anyway."
"Neither will you. Sooner or later this place drives the greatest men mad."
"Been there," Ian said. "And I'm bored now. Can't you think of anything better to do?"
The Professor smiled. "Do you play cards, Mr. Leone? I'll play you for those guns of yours."
"How about something better?" Ian asked, lifting his right hand, the one still holding the green-metal gun. With his left hand he flicked the pocketwatch out of his waistcoat.
He saw the Professor's eyes widen and his mouth open to shout a denial even as he moved; the pocketwatch clattered across the smooth table, the Professor dove for it, and Ian brought down the butt of the gun square on the crystal in one swift second.
And then he knew nothing more.
***
When the Rift went up, it went up in a big way; the edges started to turn a dangerous shade of red and somehow seemed to peel back away from reality for just a second before a concussion-wave burst out of it, blowing the stabilizers flat and knocking everyone off their feet.
It killed Jack, which was in some ways fortunate; he would have been out for another hour if it hadn't. As it was he woke up to Gwen removing the handcuff from his wrist, rubbing the circulation back into it. He looked up at her, and for a moment he knew that she saw right through him to the terrified three-year-old he felt like.
"Where's the Rift?" he asked hoarsely.
"It closed," Gwen said. She rubbed his fingers with her hand. "I'm sorry, Jack."
"Oh. My. Sweet. JESUS," Owen swore, picking himself up and brushing dust out of his hair.
"Rift spikes are resetting," Tosh called. She was bleeding from a cut over one eyebrow, and she kept brushing blood away as she worked, as if it were a minor annoyance. Owen found a wad of reasonably clean tissue in his pocket and pressed it over the wound, gazing at the monitors over her shoulder. "History's reknitting itself. Little echoes -- nothing significant."
"Uh, guys," Tommy said, standing under the clear, glass area of the ceiling where they could look up, even if no-one could look in. "You better see this."
Jack limped over tiredly and looked up. At first it was hard to make sense of the shapes; slowly, as he studied them, they coalesced into two bodies. One of them was wearing the Professor's tweed jacket; the other was in a white shirt, with a black waistcoat snug around his body. Neither were moving.
"Ian," he breathed, and bolted for the elevator to the Plaza.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 2x20: Lords And Ladies
Story & Teleplay: Ellis Graveworthy
Directed by: Ellis Graveworthy
FINAL SCENE:
INT - HUB - AFTERNOON
JACK and GWEN are standing in front of the filing cabinets, GWEN placing a file inside. When she closes the drawer, JACK locks it and pockets the key.
IAN V.O.
We don't know much about the race of aliens that call themselves Time Lords. We know they're powerful; we know there was a war where they were destroyed completely. We thought only one of them remained -- the Doctor, who seemed to have taken it upon himself to be some kind of guardian for Earth.
INT - MEDICAL GROTTO
OWEN and TOMMY are hoisting the body of THE PROFESSOR onto a table, fitting him into a body bag.
IAN V.O.
Except the Doctor didn't come to help us this time.
INT - SUV - IN TRAFFIC
TOSH is driving, JACK in the shotgun seat. OWEN, TOMMY, and GWEN are in the back. All of them look solemn.
IAN V.O.
Another Time Lord, the Professor, tried to rewrite history in one sweeping arc, as if the complexities of life were so easily altered. We had to stop him; without the Doctor, without anything other than our wits.
EXT - ILLINOIS FIELD
JACK watches as OWEN and GWEN spread some kind of flammable liquid around the base of a rough stick-and-log pyre with the body bag on top. TOSH holds a torch for TOMMY to light. She offers it to JACK, who takes it and begins lighting the base.
IAN V.O.
And we did. We won.
JACK and the TEAM, minus IAN, watch the PROFESSOR burn.
OWEN
We could have learned a lot from him.
JACK
[bitter]
Nothing I wanted to know.
TOMMY
Why did we burn him? Why not keep him in cryo?
JACK
Too dangerous.
GWEN
And Professor Yana deserved a funeral.
GWEN takes JACK's hand.
JACK
Yeah. That too.
INT - IAN'S HOSPITAL ROOM
IAN is sitting in bed, knees drawn up, journal propped on his thighs as he writes.
IAN V.O.
So now we know we don't need the Doctor. We're strong. We can defend ourselves. Jack's always told us that the twenty-first century is when everything changes. We're finally ready.
IAN's door open and JACK enters, carrying two large paper bags. The rest of the TEAM enter behind him, and IAN closes his book, setting it aside and smiling at the others in greeting. JACK begins to unpack several cartons of Chinese food as the others settle in chairs around IAN's bed, talking and laughing. OWEN and TOSH are sitting very close together.
BLACKOUT.
In green ink, in the margins: Very clever, Ellis. Ian "bookends" the season with his journal. You spent an entire year of writing for one cinematic pun.
In red ink, below it: Genius has its quirks, love.
***
They'd been on location for about five hours, watching the Chicago sky turn from black to blue to yellow and filming the all-important Many Scenes Of Running that the actors always joked about. Running around the Hub, running across the Plaza, running down streets ravaged by this or that alien race.
The actors and crew were taking ten for coffee and cigarettes, which to Ellis meant ten minutes where he didn't have to be thinking and talking. He enjoyed the cerebral side of directing and he'd been told that he was rather good at it, but he always found it exhausting. A writer could sit in on shooting and tune out for reasonable periods of time, working on their own projects; a director couldn't call his soul his own, especially in the chilly predawn streets of Wrigleyville.
He was fortunate enough to open his eyes and sit up in time to see Edgar edging past the barriers, Edgar who should have been taking two well-deserved days off after filming in rural Illinois had played merry hell with his allergies. Ellis frowned, but he also waved, and Edgar caught sight of him and bolted over like his life depended on it, clearing a low pile of camera equipment easily.
"Good morning," Ellis said calmly, as Edgar nearly fell over in an effort to stop in time. "Did someone put methamphetamines in your cornflakes?"
"You need to come with me," Edgar said, grabbing his sleeve and tugging.
"Come with -- we're in the middle of shooting, Edgar!"
"Yeah, I know, but they can do without you for like an hour," Edgar said, still tugging.
"They cannot, I'm the director."
"Get your AD to do it, it'll be her big break, we can laugh about this when she gets her Oscar in twenty years."
"Not until you tell me what's going on."
Edgar stopped tugging, but the frenetic light in his eyes didn't dim.
"State Supreme Court just passed a ruling on the Gay Marriage Act," he said. "They're upholding same-sex marriage in Illinois. Come on, come on, there's a cab waiting, we're going to the court house."
Ellis stared at him.
"Ellis!"
"Edgar Nicholas van Scyoc, this is how you propose to me?" he demanded, pulling out of Edgar's grasp and crossing his arms. People all around them were starting to take an interest. "You're making a scene. Behave like an adult."
"I didn't know it was even on the books until today. Who has time to read the papers?" Edgar asked. "It was just on the news, I saw it, I came over, now come on!"
Ellis would, in fact, have gotten up and gone willingly except for the assumption that he would and the fact that he hadn't yet had proper breakfast, which always made him contrary. Even then he might have stood up in another two seconds, except Edgar threw his hands up and rolled his eyes.
"You want a proposal?" he asked, which was when alarm bells began to ring.
"Edgar, I didn't -- "
"Okay! Proposal!" Edgar said, extremely loudly. Ellis glanced around. The interested bystanders, including John, Gareth, and Hayden, had given up any pretense of not being an audience.
Then Edgar dropped to his knees and spread his arms, and everything went all to hell.
"Ellis Graveworthy, considering that the state has been kind enough to allow us to wed, cohabitate, share a bank account and claim each other on our taxes, and considering that we have spent the last two years in each others' pockets and managed not to kill one another, and further considering that I feel a very strong need to stake my claim forever, will you please, for god's sake, put your pen down and get out of your goddamn chair and come marry me?"
Ellis gazed down at him. He cut his eyes briefly to the crowd; John, curse the man, was looking on with unadulterated glee. Hayden had a camera out. John made a little shoo-ing motion.
"Well," he drawled, "when you put it so charmingly, Edgar, and so very very publically -- "
"You told me to!" Edgar protested, without moving.
"I did not, but that's beside the point. How can I possibly say no now?"
Then Edgar was on his feet; he pulled him bodily out of the chair and kissed him, and then John kissed them both (with tongue; well, it was John) and then Edgar kissed him again and Ellis couldn't help but notice that his assistant director did have a somewhat ambitious gleam in her eye.
"You lot," he said sternly. "I'll be back in an hour. Misbehave and you'll feel my wrath."
"Promise?" Edgar whispered in his ear, as he pulled him towards the cab.
***
Ellis Graveworthy knows the power of happy endings and unhappy ones. Happy endings are rarely perfect; well, they are too perfect, and a storyteller never wants too much perfection. Still, there's no reason to kill your characters unless it's absolutely necessary.
He made Edgar promise one thing when he agreed to come on-board Torchwood, charmed by Edgar's enthusiasm and intrigued by the characters and mythology of it all. He made him swear, and Edgar swore, that Ellis could write whatever ending to the series he chose, when the time came.
"Out of curiosity," Edgar had said, back when they were still Mr. Graveworthy and Mr. van Scyoc to each other, "What exactly did you have in mind for an ending? Because we've, you know, we haven't actually written a beginning yet."
Ellis pulled a napkin towards him and uncapped his pen.
"How far do you trust me?" he asked.
"Trust you to what?"
"Trust me to make this ending true and still make it good?"
Edgar had frowned at him. "I wouldn't have chosen you if I didn't think you were the man for the job."
Ellis scribbled seven words on the napkin and passed it across to him. The thing itself is taped up over Edgar's desk, in a corner of the cabinetry where very few can see it.
Edgar grinned.
"Make this true and good," he said, "and you can write for me forever."
"I'll hold you to that," Ellis said.
AND THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER.
Rating: PG-13 (mainly for language)
Summary: Torchwood is prepared to confront the man who was Professor Arthur Yana, now revealed to be a Time Lord bent on dominating Earth as his first step towards the stars. They have never needed the Doctor's help more than they do now, but the Doctor is in hiding as a human, with only Ross and Rose to protect him from a race of ruthless hunters. Behind the scenes, Edgar and Ellis receive a very surprising visitor, and Edgar makes a decision about his relationship with his head writer.
Chapter Seven
Transcript from the Doctor Who Season One DVD Extras, "Summertime":
John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd are standing in a field in full early-20th-century costume; behind them, various crewmembers move about and Edgar van Scyoc is seen briefly. John leans in close to the camera and grins.
John: Welcome to pollen central, population: us. We've had to stop filming because the clouds of pollen are obscuring the vistas.
Gareth: Back there [waves behind him] you can see our fearless leader, Edgar van Scyoc, mainlining antihistamines.
John: So we thought we'd entertain...you!
John straightens up and both men face the camera. John hums and Gareth matches the note. Both bob their heads in time to the rhythm John sets.
John: Two, three, four.
John and Gareth in unison:
Summertime
And the living is easy.
Fish are jumpin'
And the cotton is high --
John: -- The cotton is high --
John and Gareth:
Well your daddy's rich
And your ma is good lookin'
So hush little baby
Don't you cry...
In the background, quite clearly, Edgar van Scyoc is heard sneezing. John and Gareth burst into laughter.
Edgar van Scyoc: [distantly] IT ISN'T FUNNY.
***
DOCTOR WHO 1x19: HUMAN NATURE
Doctor John Smith, professor of mathematics at the elite Briar Rose Boarding School for Girls outside of Chicago, is continually plagued with supernatural dreams. His only confidantes are Rose, a young and headstrong serving-girl, and Professor Jenkins, the sports instructor and, John assumes, his rival for Rose's affections. In the shadow of the impending world war, Briar Rose Boarding School is a haven for young women of class and sophistication -- and also perhaps a shelter for a gang of bloodthirsty killers. Now Ross and Rose must protect the Doctor not only from those who are hunting him, but from himself -- a suddenly human self, who has little of the Doctor's brilliance but all of his penchant for getting into trouble.
"How is Himself tonight?" Ross asked, sitting on the steps outside the kitchen entrance of the school. Rose dropped down next to him with a sigh and rested her head on his shoulder for a moment before pulling back (it didn't do to show too familiar with the teachers).
"Same as always," she replied, smoothing her skirt out. "Always writing in his little book, talking a lot of crap while he drinks his coffee. You know when I signed on for the TARDIS, kitchen duty wasn't exactly what I had in mind."
"I dunno," Ross said, leaning back. "It's kind of...peaceful."
"You say that because you don't have to scrub floors tomorrow."
"Skive off. I'll give you a note," he grinned. She smiled at him. "It is, though. It's quiet here. It's a nice breather."
"Except for the feeling of impending doom I get every time I look at him."
"He said the hunters would die soon enough. When we got here they were about an inch from our heels. If they could find him they would have done by now. The TARDIS is safe, and so is he; only two more weeks before we can open the Chameleon Arch and get him back. In the meantime, look at where we are, Rose," he said, swinging one hand across the wide Illinois prairie, ending on the smudge in the distance that was Chicago. "It's beautiful here."
"No TV, no internet -- "
" -- no bills, no running for your life -- "
" -- no electric dishwashers, and no pop music." She sighed. "I know. It's nice to stick around in one place for a couple of weeks but I want to go home."
"To our time?"
"To the TARDIS."
Ross nodded. He was silent for a long while, until finally he sat up again.
"My dad's PDA died today. Couldn't hold a charge any longer -- I can't charge it again until we're home. Not that I've been using it, but sometimes it was...nice. What he wrote, about you and the Doctor, it wasn't all bad. I liked reading it." He drew a deep breath. "Will you tell me about him, Rose?"
"Like what?"
"Something. Anything really, I'm not picky. I only knew him for a few days. Tell me about some...time you had an adventure."
Rose thought for a moment and then nodded. "When we started, one of the first places we went was the end of the world. There was this observation platform, perched over the Earth, and we were about to see our own sun go supernova. I think he thought it'd scare us..."
***
John had only come down to the kitchens to try and scare up some cheese and maybe a handful of crackers, but when he heard voices -- Professor Jenkins, it sounded like -- he padded past the stoves and sinks to the scullery at the back, lurking slightly in the shadows.
There was another voice too, higher and younger -- Rose, the serving girl who'd attached herself to his study and wouldn't allow anyone else to bring him his coffee. Apparently he wasn't the only professor she favored, which was...disappointing, and a little saddening. He liked Rose's spirit, and her visits were often the high point of his day.
Rose and Jenkins, sitting companionably outside the scullery, Rose telling him some kind of story. On one level it was not a good sign for Rose; the professors might take advantage of lonely and willing serving-girls, but they rarely made it serious. On another level, something in John was thoroughly envious of Jenkins' easy way with the young woman.
If it had been anyone else he might not have listened in, but he was only human, after all.
"...person who looked exactly like a plant, and she thought your dad and the Doctor were both married to me. They tried to convince her -- "
" -- oh my god! -- " Jenkins said, laughing.
" -- but then she just thought they were married to each other."
"She sounds great."
"She -- was," Rose said, and her voice dipped into sadness. "She died."
"How?"
"The observation platform was sabotaged. Someone had to do a cold-restart of the system to get the shields up before the sun exploded. The Colonel couldn't be there -- he was helping get me out of the solarium -- and she went with the Doctor to the breakers in the base of the ship. She died down there, holding the brake on the ventilation fans so he could step through and shut everything down. That's what he told me later."
"I'm sorry," Jenkins said, but John didn't really hear him; he was back in last night's dream, watching a woman with green skin and a wood-bark shirt trying to hold a giant lever while he ran down a high catwalk towards another lever, one that was important for some reason. Visions of suns exploding and a giant head in a jar flitted across his mind.
His journal hadn't left his pocket all day, and the dream had only come to him the night before. There wouldn't have been time for Rose to read it, let alone study it enough to turn it into the kind of detailed story she was telling Jenkins.
"Tell me how he got you out of the solarium," Jenkins said, somewhere in the background, as John ripped the journal open and flicked through it, pacing up and down in the kitchen. There; there was the account of the Amazing Death Of Our Sun, one of seemingly hundreds of adventures he'd dreamed over the course of his time at the school. There was only one constant, a large blue box that somehow meant safety and home, but as he listened to Rose speak and studied the text and the little ink doodles he realised that yes -- he'd seen Rose in some of his dreams, and Professor Jenkins as well.
"Doctor Smith?"
He looked up sharply to find Jenkins and Rose standing in the scullery -- Rose smiling at him, as she always did, and Jenkins looking faintly wary, as he so often did.
"Can I get you anything, professor?" Rose asked.
"No -- no, no, thank you. I was just going to...get some fresh air," he stammered. Rose glanced at Jenkins; Jenkins gave him a knowing smile and stepped aside.
Once he was outside, well away from the school, John sat down in the long grass and leaned back, staring up at the sky, breathing heavy with relief.
He would find out how Rose had known his dream, and what she was doing in them. All of this was highly improbable, but John firmly believed that magic was only mathematics one didn't understand yet. He would puzzle it out.
The pocketwatch in his vest, heated by the sun, sat close to his heart and warmed his skin through the thin fabric until he closed his eyes and let the dreams take him away again.
***
"You wanted to see me, Doctor Smith?" Rose asked, the next afternoon, putting her head through the door of his study.
"Rose. I did. Come on in," he replied, waiting for her to enter and smile at him before he continued. "Please, sit down."
She frowned, but she sat, and he leaned forward over his desk and steepled his fingers.
"It's not my place to...regulate the staff," he began, searching for the right words. He was terrible with words; that was why numbers were so comforting. "And it's definitely not my job to discipline the junior professors. I'm pretty junior myself. But I'm older than you, and I wanted to pass along a friendly -- a friendly warning."
Her frown deepened.
"I know you've been spending a lot of time with Professor Jenkins," he said, and plowed on before she could say anything. "And I'm glad you've found a friend, and all this old stuff about staff not fraternizing with professors is -- well it's on the way out, and I think that's good. Still, he's young and a little wild."
"Wild," she repeated, with a small smile.
"Yes. I worry he's going to hurt you."
"We're just friends, Doctor Smith."
"I know, I know," he said wretchedly. "But friends can become more -- people can be pushed to become more than friends. I just want you to be aware. He has a lot of power. He could lose you your job if you said no, but if you said yes you could lose your job all the same."
"You have a lot of power over me too."
"But I'm, well, old enough," he said. "To use it wisely -- not to use it, I mean, I'm old enough not to abuse it. Jenkins is very young. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
She watched him for a minute, and then a smile broke over her face. "Are you jealous, Doctor?"
"Jealous! I, no, I'm not jealous, why would I be jealous?" he asked, flustered.
"You are. You're jealous -- you think Ross -- "
"You see? His first name?"
"You think Professor Jenkins is your rival."
John stared at her, open-mouthed. She reached across and boldly put her hand on top of his.
"Doctor, I want you to listen to me," she said. Her voice had a certain note of command in it, even when she was taking orders from the head of staff, that he often thought spoke of a headstrong upbringing. "I like him. He's my friend. But...you know, love is like...totally...you're first in my heart. Of anyone I've ever met. You're first, Doctor," she said, and made his title somehow sound like his name. "You don't have anything to fear from Ross Jenkins."
He stared at her, heart beating in his chest (and the double-time thump felt somehow familiar too).
"Do you mean that?" he asked.
"Yeah. But things are just nuts right now, the world is crazy -- "
"The war."
"That, but -- this isn't the time. Now? It's just not the time."
She must have been thinking of his reputation at the school, how he was a first-year professor as well and didn't need a scandal until he'd at least renewed employment for the next year. That was sensible thinking, not that he'd expect less from Rose.
"I think I understand," he murmured. "But -- summer is coming. Soon."
The look she gave him was knowing -- so knowing it implied she knew something he didn't, which was deeply unsettling.
"The summer," she agreed, an edge in her voice. "Then."
"I'm so glad we spoke, Rose," he said, turning his hand over to thread his fingers through hers.
"Me too," she said. "I should go -- there's cleaning -- "
"Of course. Ah, Rose..." he stood impulsively and took out his pocketwatch. "I want you to keep this."
She stared down at the watch, looking more shocked than he'd expect.
"As a reminder. Time. You know. Sort of," he said. He held it out to her. "Please, I want you to."
She nodded and took it out of his hand; to his shock, instead of leaving immediately, she tucked it in her pocket and touched his shoulders, tipping his head down so she could kiss his forehead. Like a mother, or a sister.
"Summer is coming soon," she said, the words echoing strangely in his mind, and then she was gone.
Two days later, when he saw her handle a gun for the first time against a gang of invaders who were seemingly invincible and for some reason wanted his blood, he wondered who she really was and how deep he'd gotten himself embroiled in something far beyond his human understanding.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 1x19: Human Nature
Story by: Ellis Graveworthy
Teleplay by: Derek Smith and Richard Allen
Directed by: Edgar van Scyoc
INT - DANCE HALL - NIGHT
THE HUNTERS enter the hall disguised as BAINES, CLARKE, and JENNY. Shrieks and muttering are heard when the crowd in the dance hall sees the guns in their hands.
CLARKE
Silence! All of you!
MAN #1
Mr. Clarke! What's the meaning of this?
CLARKE executes MAN #1 ruthlessly. More shrieks.
BAINES
HE ASKED FOR SILENCE!
All fall silent. The DOCTOR wraps a protective arm around ROSE.
ROSE
[whispering]
Let go, Doctor. If they see you with me --
JENNY
That's the one. Professor Jenkins. He's one of the Doctor's companions. I heard him talking.
In the background, ROSE has managed to get free of the DOCTOR and is standing in front of him.
BAINES
Better than that.
[he sniffs]
There...is...the Doctor. That's what Professor Jenkins calls you, isn't it, "Professor Smith"? You took human form. How charming.
DOCTOR
Took human -- I AM human! I was BORN human! Like you!
BAINES
And a human brain, too! Simple, thick and dull.
JENNY
But we need a Time Lord!
BAINES
That can be arranged.
[aims his gun at the DOCTOR, who recoils]
Change back.
DOCTOR
I don't know what you're talking about.
BAINES grabs ROSS, who tries to fight him off; if BAINES were human they would be equally matched, but BAINES holds him easily.
ROSS
Let me go, you son of a --
BAINES
He's your friend, isn't he, Doctor? Your companion? Scared yet?
DOCTOR
Stop this, just stop! I don't understand!
JENNY
Or maybe...
[grabs ROSE and puts the gun to her head]
Everyone's been talking, haven't they? About how Professor Smith's in love with one of the serving girls.
DOCTOR
Let her go, please. Let them both go. I'll do whatever you want, just let them go.
BAINES
All you have to do is change back.
DOCTOR
[anguished]
I don't know what you're talking about!
BAINES
Then it's your choice. Answer this. Which one should we kill first? Your best friend -- or your lover? Your choice.
TO BE CONTINUED
***
Edgar was going over financial reports for the end-of-fiscal-year accounting, and Ellis was "helping" by sitting on the office sofa and writing, because Ellis couldn't add two and three to make five, when there was a sudden knock on the door. Whoever was on the other side didn't wait for an invitation before opening it, either.
Both men looked up; Edgar laid his highlighter down, and Ellis tilted his head.
"Sorry to intrude," said the rangy, auburn-haired man in the doorway. "Edgar van Scyoc?"
"That's me," Edgar said warily. Visions of crazed fans with guns flitted briefly through his head. The door swung wider and a young woman in a leather jacket put her head under the man's arm, peering around curiously. "And you are...?"
"...here to ask a favour," the man said. Edgar glanced at Ellis, who frowned. "Aaaah. This is Ace."
"Hi!" Ace waved cheerfully.
"Something that...belongs to me got tossed in with ah..." the man looked around again. "Props? I think?"
"You think?"
"I need a rummage in your drawers," the man announced.
There was an amused snort from Ellis. Edgar narrowed his eyes at the man.
"I'm sorry, I still don't know who you are or how you got past security," he said.
"Was there security?" the man asked Ace.
"Not that I saw," she answered. Edgar knew that mock-innocent look. He'd used it often enough himself.
Slowly, he pushed his chair away from the desk.
"Have a go...Doctor," he said.
The man's face broke into an enormous grin. "I told you he wouldn't fuss," he said to Ace. "She said, you never can tell with parallel universes, and I said..." he began pulling drawers out, combing through them with long, clever fingers, "I said, he'll know who I am. Hi," he added, glancing at Ellis. "Huge fan, Mr. Graveworthy."
Ellis looked smug.
"Yes, all right, round here somewhere...a-HA!" the Doctor burst out, holding up what looked like one of the dozens of prop Sonic Screwdrivers that the show went through in a season. Edgar had eight or nine in his drawer, to hand out to people as toys. He flicked it and it lit up; all of the prop ones were green, but this one, oddly, glowed blue. "Thanks so much. Brilliant. We'll be out of your hair now. G'bye!"
They disappeared out the door before either man could move. There was half a minute of silence.
"We never, ever talk about this to anyone," Edgar said.
"Agreed," Ellis replied.
There was another knock on the door, and both men jumped. It turned out to be Mia, toting a handful of drawings.
"What, did Hamu-chan get free?" she asked, taking in their pale faces and nervous expressions.
"No -- why do you ask?" Edgar said, going for casual and missing by a mile.
"No reason. Hey, did you guys have a meeting without me this morning? I just saw some guy who looked like an ad executive walking out with one of your prop Screwdrivers," she said.
Edgar placed a hand on each shoulder and looked her directly in the eye.
"Some things are better left a mystery," he said.
"O...kay," she drawled. "Anyway -- drawings?"
***
FROM: E van Scyoc
TO: El
SUBJECT: Security Footage
El,
This is the best we'll get, I think. The security cameras outside the office only caught him on a handful of frames, didn't get the girl at all. I ran it up to our design people -- trust me, they're the best we can get with digital imagery without going to the police -- and they cleaned it up. I'm attaching both images.
I want to believe that this was some guy who pranked us for a laugh, but honestly, El, it feels dishonest to think that. And there are more things in heaven and earth, et cetera. So.
That's the face of our Doctor. I like to think we're doing him a credit, don't you?
EvS
--
Edgar van Scyoc
Executive Producer, Torchwood
NBC Studios
I'm an absolute beginner and I'm absolutely sane. -- David Bowie
***
DOCTOR WHO 1x20: THE FAMILY OF BLOOD
A gang of alien hunters have come for the Doctor, laying siege to the Briar Rose School where Doctor John Smith has been unwittingly in hiding. It's up to him, aided by Professor Ross Jenkins and serving-girl Rose Tyler, to draw the menace away from the school and to defeat them -- but defeating the Family of Blood means giving up his humanity, and losing the precious thing growing between him and Rose. Ross and Rose, meanwhile, are desperate to find the Doctor's missing Chameleon Arch -- a pocketwatch that holds his essence inside it.
The field was as warm as it had been, the day he'd lain among the grass and fallen asleep, but John couldn't seem to warm up. He was frightened; people kept trying to kill him, or his friends, or his students, and a tiny little hysterical corner of his mind also wanted to know when the girls of the Briar Rose school had become quite so adept with handguns. Probably Professor Jenkins' doing; he had all sorts of insane ideas about womens' lib.
But Rose was with him, which was something; Rose was safe, and he could see Jenkins' progress through the long grass, the stalks waving this way and that as he crawled forward.
"Got it," Jenkins gasped, when he reached them, rolling over onto his back and opening his left hand. The pocketwatch -- the silly old thing he'd given Rose on a whim, and which had been stolen from her -- tumbled to the ground. Rose snatched it up and pressed it into his palm.
"You have to open it," she said. "That's its purpose. The real you is inside and you need to free it."
"I am the real me," he protested, his voice hushed. "I don't want to be someone else, Rose."
"It's too late -- you already were someone else. Please, just open it!"
"You knew," he murmured. "You knew all the time that I was someone else, but you said -- "
"I wasn't lying," Rose said desperately. Jenkins pushed himself up on his elbows to watch them argue. "But when you left instructions you didn't tell me what to do if -- if you fell in love!"
"It never occurred to me?" John asked, shocked and hurt. "And you want me to become that man again?"
"You have to. You're the only one who can stop them," Ross said, his voice level and even. "John Smith can't stop the Family of Blood any more than I can. But the Doctor..."
"You have a lot of faith in the Doctor," John said bitterly.
"What, you think I only hung about you because you used to be the Doctor?" Jenkins asked. Rose looked impatiently back and forth between them. "You're him. You're inside him. But you're not all of him. The Doctor is like...fire, and ice, and gravity. He's the storm in the heart of the sun. He's called the Rage of Kings."
"Stop it," John ordered, panicking, because the rhythm of Jenkins's voice was soothing, and he found himself wanting to open the watch.
"He's ancient and forever. He can see the turn of the universe," Jenkins declared.
"Stop!"
"He's the reason I exist," Jenkins continued inexorably. "Father, brother, hero -- he walks as a god on a thousand planets."
"I can give them the watch," John said desperately. "That's all they want. They can leave, I can stay like this."
"You'll make them immortal," Jenkins said. "Do you want that?"
"I just want them to leave me alone. Rose -- if I give them the watch we can stay here, together."
Rose lifted her head and the sunlight caught her eyes, turning her skin to gold.
"No," she said. "We can't. If you stay, you're not the man I'd stay for."
John glanced at Jenkins, who had adopted a casual attitude, as if none of this mattered in the slightest. And yet his eyes never left John's face.
Jenkins is a soldier, he thought to himself, surprised at the insight.
"Who are you to me?" he asked them, clutching the watch tightly.
"We travel with you."
"Why?"
Jenkins glanced at Rose. "Because we chose to."
Doctor John Smith, Professor of Mathematics, made a decision.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 1x20: The Family Of Blood
Story by: Ellis Graveworthy
Teleplay by: Anna Jackson
Directed by: Edgar van Scyoc
INT - TARDIS
ROSE, ROSS, and the DOCTOR walk into the TARDIS; the DOCTOR inhales deeply and smiles.
DOCTOR
Good old TARDIS. Smells a little musty.
ROSE
It doesn't, I aired it out every few days.
ROSS
I aired it out, she sat there and complained about the poor quality of undergarments in the early twentieth century.
ROSE
[studying her button-up boots]
Great shoes, though.
ROSS gives the DOCTOR a long-suffering look.
DOCTOR
You both deserve some kind of vacation, I think. Especially for putting up with that idiot I turned into.
ROSE
You weren't an idiot. You were sort of sweet. A little pathetic, but...nice.
DOCTOR
Nice.
ROSS
Damnation by faint praise.
ROSE
[laughing]
Now I know you're back to normal, when "nice" isn't good enough for you.
[she kisses his cheek]
Good to have you back.
DOCTOR
Yeah. All back the way it was.
ROSE
I'm starving, I'm gonna go find something to eat.
DOCTOR
[calling after her]
Be thinking about where you want your vacation!
ROSE exits; ROSS fixes the DOCTOR with a knowing look.
ROSS
Why don't you just tell her you're in love with her? She loves you enough to stay with you.
DOCTOR
I can't be that obvious.
ROSS
No. You're very careful around her. That's how I know.
DOCTOR
It doesn't matter.
ROSS
It does if she makes you happy.
DOCTOR
Not even then. You're very young, Ross Jenkins. So is she. Your lives are so short. You shouldn't waste them on me; you'll travel with me for a while, but one day you'll go home again. Maybe even the same day you left home. You need meaning in your lives. You can't spend your whole short lives on this.
ROSS
You think you have no meaning for us?
DOCTOR
I think I'll live long after Rose is dust and bones. So I can't afford any more love for her than I already feel.
ROSS
What if I told her?
DOCTOR
You won't.
ROSS
Why wouldn't I?
DOCTOR
Because you know that what I say is the truth.
ROSE wanders back in, eating a granola bar.
ROSE
We're out of everything. Or it's moldy. This is a time machine, how come things get mold on them?
DOCTOR
Narrative veracity.
ROSE
Whatever.
DOCTOR
[smiling]
Grocery run? How does the universal marketplace of the bazaar planet Nefi sound?
ROSE
Sounds great.
DOCTOR
Then we're off!
EXT - SPACE
Closing shot of the TARDIS, spinning through the Time Vortex.
BLACKOUT
***
***
TORCHWOOD 2x20: LORDS AND LADIES
Professor Arthur Yana has been revealed as a Time Lord, the only other survivor of the great Time War. With superior intelligence and the ability to manipulate time from inside the Rift, Yana has gone about remaking the history of Earth to suit his own purposes. Only Torchwood, who witnessed his descent into the Rift, are immune; when he brings forces to bear on the team they must find a way to defeat him -- even if it means sending Jack into the Rift itself to fight him. Jack is willing to go, but only one person in Torchwood has been into the Rift rather than through it, and Jack may not be the best man for the job.
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 2x20: Lords And Ladies
Story & Teleplay: Ellis Graveworthy
Directed by: Ellis Graveworthy
INT - HUB - DAY
JACK
Oh, my god.
TOMMY
[joining him at the computer screen]
What? Oh.
GWEN
You want to tell us what's freaking you out?
JACK
Pull up the Rift activity archives.
IAN
What's going on?
JACK
Look. Look there. These are archives of Rift activity going back to the founding of Torchwood. Every spike, every time the Rift opens, Torchwood has records. Now watch.
JACK pulls up a very old hand-drawn graph.
JACK
This is a jpeg file, a scan of hand-kept records.
The TEAM crowds around him. Focus on the graph. After a few seconds, a new spike appears.
TOSH
That's not possible. It's a digital image file.
JACK
He's rewriting history.
IAN
Oh whoa. Heads up.
JACK
What is it?
IAN
Who led the Union in the Civil War?
GWEN
President Lincoln.
IAN
Not so much anymore.
He tilts his screen towards them. An image of THE PROFESSOR in a stovepipe hat is onscreen.
JACK
He's putting himself into history. Building a dynasty.
OWEN
How do you know?
JACK
It was done once before. A Time Agent went rogue. He put himself into a planet's history as the founder of civilisation, created a line of descendants -- all him -- to replace their dynasties, made himself supreme ruler of an entire species. It took us three weeks to catch him. We wouldn't have, but he tore open a rift.
IAN
Is that what's going to happen to ours?
JACK
Our Rift is old...
TOSH
If he keeps up he'll overload it. Blowback.
JACK
Unless he's not using the Rift for transport.
Silence as JACK looks at the dark, silent Rift Manipulator.
JACK
He's inside the Rift.
IAN
So how come we aren't affected?
JACK
We're as close to the epicenter as we can be. A few hundred feet in any direction -- people on the surface of the Plaza are probably affected. He's in the Rift.
TOSH
A Rift we can't close.
OWEN
No. But we can open it. If he's in there, we open it, reach in, get him out...
JACK
Now you're talking. Tommy, fire up the supercomputer. Tosh, set up the stabilizers.
TOSH
On it!
JACK
Owen, you'll ride the Rift.
OWEN
[elbowing Tommy over to work one of the strange machines on the table]
Move over, Tommy.
JACK
Gwen, go to the Armory, open cabinet 112, get the green metal guns you see there. They're timelocked, they'll work inside the Rift. Theroetically. Ian --
There is a clank and a clatter as IAN secures one ring of a handcuff around Jack's wrist, the other to a railing.
JACK
Ian.
IAN
You're not going into the Rift.
JACK
Let me go.
IAN
No.
OWEN
Ian --
IAN
Don't make me shoot you, Owen.
JACK
It's the only way, Ian.
IAN
I know.
[he turns to GWEN]
Get the guns.
JACK
Ian, I can't die. You can.
IAN
But I've been in the Rift before. I know how to survive. You don't. I'm the logical choice, Jack.
JACK
You'll die.
IAN
No. I'll go in, I'll get him, I'll go to ground. I know how. When the Rift stops flaring you can come after me.
GWEN runs for the guns as JACK tugs, violently and fruitlessly, on the handcuffs.
JACK
LET ME GO!
IAN
No.
JACK
Do you know what happens to people who go into the Rift without a manipulator?
IAN
Yes.
JACK stops for a moment, shocked by IAN's expression.
TOMMY
Manipulator's online.
[uncertain look]
Someone's got to go soon.
IAN
Tosh?
TOSH
Stabilizers are in place.
[she looks at Jack]
It makes sense, Jack.
[she pushes a button]
Initialising stability field.
GWEN returns with the guns. IAN holds out his hands. She hesitates before passing them over.
GWEN
I'm sorry, Jack. He's right.
IAN holsters the guns and pulls his jacket off.
IAN
Don't let him come after me. Tosh, are you ready?
TOSH
Go, Tommy.
TOMMY pushes a button on the side of his keyboard. A glowing golden hole opens in the middle of the HUB. Side shot, IAN in profile. He takes a deep breath and steps through; the Rift is paper-thin, but he doesn't step out the other side.
TOSH
Rift stability is holding.
JACK screams in rage. OWEN, from behind him, jabs a syringe into his neck. The others stare at him.
OWEN
That was gonna get really old, really fast.
***
Ian had been in the Rift once before, but that time he hadn't been expecting it, had hardly been aware of where he was. It was easier, this time; he went in with a single memory held tightly in his mind, and the falling-floating sensation faded to blackness. It was like the caves in Missouri where he'd gone camping as a kid; pitch-black and oppressive.
The guns helped too; they were cool and real in his hands. This was a new kind of hunting, but not so different from Weevils, really. Look for the shadow (in your mind, in time, the shadow in time) and follow it. Listen for the low growl (rumble in your bones, a chill up your ribcage) and triangulate the origin. Find places (times) to hide and watch.
Jack had taught him well.
Jack's never going to forgive me, he thought, as light and mass and time all scrolled past him, devoid (for now) of the Professor. But on the bright side, I'll probably die in here, so it's not like I'll notice.
He had two green-metal guns, though. He had Yana's pocketwatch from their world in his waistcoat, stolen from their world's Yana's grave by Jack earlier that morning. He had his wits. He wasn't sure if any of them would do any good; he had no idea what firing a timelocked gun or opening Yana's pocketwatch would do inside the Rift. But he knew he could track the Professor.
There. A flicker of noise in an Italian court in the 16th century. Just a hint, but enough to pull him up short.
Inside the Rift, without a body, Ian began the chase.
This was the easy part.
***
"Rift is destabilising," Gwen called, working frantically in tandem with Tommy at the computers. Tosh was tapping out commands on her handheld almost too fast to see.
"It's no good -- we have to get to the epicenter," she said. "We can't hold the Rift open from outside."
"Tosh, don't you dare," Tommy shouted.
"If it closes now we'll lose Ian and there's no guarantee he'll be able to stop him," she shouted back, vaulting over the rail and running towards the bright glowing gap in reality in the center of the Hub. "I have to go in. I can stabilise it from inside, leave the transmitter there, and come back."
"Toshiko -- "
"No, Tommy! There's no time!"
"Gwen, grab him!" Owen yelled, as Tommy broke to follow. "She needs you out here, Tommy! Stay at your post, that's an order!"
Tosh pressed two buttons in quick succession on one of the transmitters, ejecting a small glass rod that glowed faintly. She turned, gave them a desperate, frantic look, and grabbed Owen's arm.
He didn't move as she leaned in and kissed him briefly, then hugged him with one arm around his neck and stepped back.
"Yes," she said, and ran after Ian into the Rift.
"Yes?" Gwen asked, turning to Owen. He was touching his lips, confused.
"Answer to an old question," he said.
The destabilization alarms cut off abruptly. There was silence in the Hub, suddenly, except for the low, almost inaudible squeal of the Rift itself. Owen and Tommy stood staring; Gwen gave a sobbing noise as she inhaled.
A clanking noise began, soft at first but growing louder; they began to look around them as it increased until it was almost unbearable. Gwen drew her gun as it passed directly overhead --
And then Tosh's face appeared over the rail, looking down on them.
"Hi," she said. "Have I been gone long?"
Owen gave a hysterical bark of laughter and ran up the steps, meeting her halfway.
"I -- I went in and I left it and it was like -- this ball of -- and then it -- oh my god -- but I managed to -- it put me -- Hub, up there," she blurted, as he half-carried her down the steps to Tommy, who hugged her tightly.
Gwen put a hand on her arm. "Did you see Ian?"
Tosh turned to look at the Rift.
"Yeah," she said. "He's in there. He's hunting."
***
There were no actual bodies in the Rift, and so he couldn't technically come face to face with the Professor; though he'd chased him in and out of time and his legs (that didn't exist) were sore and his heart (that didn't beat) was pumping furiously, when he finally caught up to the madman it was...oddly anticlimactic.
Here was a room of stone, with no doors, but somehow Ian was there; here was a table and here were two chairs, the Professor in one of them. Ian raised the gun.
"It won't hurt me," the Professor said, with a look of infinite tolerance.
"It's timelocked. It'll fire in the Rift," Ian said.
"If you fully believed that you would have fired, young son. Have a seat," the Professor said, and kicked out the chair across the table from him. Ian pulled the trigger.
Nothing happened.
"Timelocked firearms are crude things," the Professor said. "Easily circumvented. This place..." he waved his hand, "Is a pocket of time inside the Rift, where time goes to die. Those guns don't work in real time. Only in the imaginary realms...your Jack must have paid a handsome price for them. Too bad."
"He's your Jack too," Ian said.
"Yes, more mine than yours, in fact. He bores me now, though. He's a human; you're not very interesting, as creatures."
Ian sat down. He didn't know what else he could do. "And that's why you're bothering to enslave us, right?"
"I need a ship. I need weapons. This planet is a stepping-stone, at best. You're not a soldier, are you, son?"
"Don't call me that."
"I didn't think so. I was," the Professor said, leaning back comfortably. "I was the general of a great war."
"The Time War."
"Oh, you've heard of it? Did we win?"
Ian stared at him.
"I decided I didn't like our odds. I...left," the man smiled. "I don't even know if we won or not. I assume so, or else this world would have fallen to the Daleks long ago."
"That depends on how you define winning," Ian said. "Both races were destroyed."
"Except for me."
Ian smiled. "Believe that if you want. You won't leave the Rift alive anyway."
"Neither will you. Sooner or later this place drives the greatest men mad."
"Been there," Ian said. "And I'm bored now. Can't you think of anything better to do?"
The Professor smiled. "Do you play cards, Mr. Leone? I'll play you for those guns of yours."
"How about something better?" Ian asked, lifting his right hand, the one still holding the green-metal gun. With his left hand he flicked the pocketwatch out of his waistcoat.
He saw the Professor's eyes widen and his mouth open to shout a denial even as he moved; the pocketwatch clattered across the smooth table, the Professor dove for it, and Ian brought down the butt of the gun square on the crystal in one swift second.
And then he knew nothing more.
***
When the Rift went up, it went up in a big way; the edges started to turn a dangerous shade of red and somehow seemed to peel back away from reality for just a second before a concussion-wave burst out of it, blowing the stabilizers flat and knocking everyone off their feet.
It killed Jack, which was in some ways fortunate; he would have been out for another hour if it hadn't. As it was he woke up to Gwen removing the handcuff from his wrist, rubbing the circulation back into it. He looked up at her, and for a moment he knew that she saw right through him to the terrified three-year-old he felt like.
"Where's the Rift?" he asked hoarsely.
"It closed," Gwen said. She rubbed his fingers with her hand. "I'm sorry, Jack."
"Oh. My. Sweet. JESUS," Owen swore, picking himself up and brushing dust out of his hair.
"Rift spikes are resetting," Tosh called. She was bleeding from a cut over one eyebrow, and she kept brushing blood away as she worked, as if it were a minor annoyance. Owen found a wad of reasonably clean tissue in his pocket and pressed it over the wound, gazing at the monitors over her shoulder. "History's reknitting itself. Little echoes -- nothing significant."
"Uh, guys," Tommy said, standing under the clear, glass area of the ceiling where they could look up, even if no-one could look in. "You better see this."
Jack limped over tiredly and looked up. At first it was hard to make sense of the shapes; slowly, as he studied them, they coalesced into two bodies. One of them was wearing the Professor's tweed jacket; the other was in a white shirt, with a black waistcoat snug around his body. Neither were moving.
"Ian," he breathed, and bolted for the elevator to the Plaza.
***
Excerpt from the shooting script for Episode 2x20: Lords And Ladies
Story & Teleplay: Ellis Graveworthy
Directed by: Ellis Graveworthy
FINAL SCENE:
INT - HUB - AFTERNOON
JACK and GWEN are standing in front of the filing cabinets, GWEN placing a file inside. When she closes the drawer, JACK locks it and pockets the key.
IAN V.O.
We don't know much about the race of aliens that call themselves Time Lords. We know they're powerful; we know there was a war where they were destroyed completely. We thought only one of them remained -- the Doctor, who seemed to have taken it upon himself to be some kind of guardian for Earth.
INT - MEDICAL GROTTO
OWEN and TOMMY are hoisting the body of THE PROFESSOR onto a table, fitting him into a body bag.
IAN V.O.
Except the Doctor didn't come to help us this time.
INT - SUV - IN TRAFFIC
TOSH is driving, JACK in the shotgun seat. OWEN, TOMMY, and GWEN are in the back. All of them look solemn.
IAN V.O.
Another Time Lord, the Professor, tried to rewrite history in one sweeping arc, as if the complexities of life were so easily altered. We had to stop him; without the Doctor, without anything other than our wits.
EXT - ILLINOIS FIELD
JACK watches as OWEN and GWEN spread some kind of flammable liquid around the base of a rough stick-and-log pyre with the body bag on top. TOSH holds a torch for TOMMY to light. She offers it to JACK, who takes it and begins lighting the base.
IAN V.O.
And we did. We won.
JACK and the TEAM, minus IAN, watch the PROFESSOR burn.
OWEN
We could have learned a lot from him.
JACK
[bitter]
Nothing I wanted to know.
TOMMY
Why did we burn him? Why not keep him in cryo?
JACK
Too dangerous.
GWEN
And Professor Yana deserved a funeral.
GWEN takes JACK's hand.
JACK
Yeah. That too.
INT - IAN'S HOSPITAL ROOM
IAN is sitting in bed, knees drawn up, journal propped on his thighs as he writes.
IAN V.O.
So now we know we don't need the Doctor. We're strong. We can defend ourselves. Jack's always told us that the twenty-first century is when everything changes. We're finally ready.
IAN's door open and JACK enters, carrying two large paper bags. The rest of the TEAM enter behind him, and IAN closes his book, setting it aside and smiling at the others in greeting. JACK begins to unpack several cartons of Chinese food as the others settle in chairs around IAN's bed, talking and laughing. OWEN and TOSH are sitting very close together.
BLACKOUT.
In green ink, in the margins: Very clever, Ellis. Ian "bookends" the season with his journal. You spent an entire year of writing for one cinematic pun.
In red ink, below it: Genius has its quirks, love.
***
They'd been on location for about five hours, watching the Chicago sky turn from black to blue to yellow and filming the all-important Many Scenes Of Running that the actors always joked about. Running around the Hub, running across the Plaza, running down streets ravaged by this or that alien race.
The actors and crew were taking ten for coffee and cigarettes, which to Ellis meant ten minutes where he didn't have to be thinking and talking. He enjoyed the cerebral side of directing and he'd been told that he was rather good at it, but he always found it exhausting. A writer could sit in on shooting and tune out for reasonable periods of time, working on their own projects; a director couldn't call his soul his own, especially in the chilly predawn streets of Wrigleyville.
He was fortunate enough to open his eyes and sit up in time to see Edgar edging past the barriers, Edgar who should have been taking two well-deserved days off after filming in rural Illinois had played merry hell with his allergies. Ellis frowned, but he also waved, and Edgar caught sight of him and bolted over like his life depended on it, clearing a low pile of camera equipment easily.
"Good morning," Ellis said calmly, as Edgar nearly fell over in an effort to stop in time. "Did someone put methamphetamines in your cornflakes?"
"You need to come with me," Edgar said, grabbing his sleeve and tugging.
"Come with -- we're in the middle of shooting, Edgar!"
"Yeah, I know, but they can do without you for like an hour," Edgar said, still tugging.
"They cannot, I'm the director."
"Get your AD to do it, it'll be her big break, we can laugh about this when she gets her Oscar in twenty years."
"Not until you tell me what's going on."
Edgar stopped tugging, but the frenetic light in his eyes didn't dim.
"State Supreme Court just passed a ruling on the Gay Marriage Act," he said. "They're upholding same-sex marriage in Illinois. Come on, come on, there's a cab waiting, we're going to the court house."
Ellis stared at him.
"Ellis!"
"Edgar Nicholas van Scyoc, this is how you propose to me?" he demanded, pulling out of Edgar's grasp and crossing his arms. People all around them were starting to take an interest. "You're making a scene. Behave like an adult."
"I didn't know it was even on the books until today. Who has time to read the papers?" Edgar asked. "It was just on the news, I saw it, I came over, now come on!"
Ellis would, in fact, have gotten up and gone willingly except for the assumption that he would and the fact that he hadn't yet had proper breakfast, which always made him contrary. Even then he might have stood up in another two seconds, except Edgar threw his hands up and rolled his eyes.
"You want a proposal?" he asked, which was when alarm bells began to ring.
"Edgar, I didn't -- "
"Okay! Proposal!" Edgar said, extremely loudly. Ellis glanced around. The interested bystanders, including John, Gareth, and Hayden, had given up any pretense of not being an audience.
Then Edgar dropped to his knees and spread his arms, and everything went all to hell.
"Ellis Graveworthy, considering that the state has been kind enough to allow us to wed, cohabitate, share a bank account and claim each other on our taxes, and considering that we have spent the last two years in each others' pockets and managed not to kill one another, and further considering that I feel a very strong need to stake my claim forever, will you please, for god's sake, put your pen down and get out of your goddamn chair and come marry me?"
Ellis gazed down at him. He cut his eyes briefly to the crowd; John, curse the man, was looking on with unadulterated glee. Hayden had a camera out. John made a little shoo-ing motion.
"Well," he drawled, "when you put it so charmingly, Edgar, and so very very publically -- "
"You told me to!" Edgar protested, without moving.
"I did not, but that's beside the point. How can I possibly say no now?"
Then Edgar was on his feet; he pulled him bodily out of the chair and kissed him, and then John kissed them both (with tongue; well, it was John) and then Edgar kissed him again and Ellis couldn't help but notice that his assistant director did have a somewhat ambitious gleam in her eye.
"You lot," he said sternly. "I'll be back in an hour. Misbehave and you'll feel my wrath."
"Promise?" Edgar whispered in his ear, as he pulled him towards the cab.
***
Ellis Graveworthy knows the power of happy endings and unhappy ones. Happy endings are rarely perfect; well, they are too perfect, and a storyteller never wants too much perfection. Still, there's no reason to kill your characters unless it's absolutely necessary.
He made Edgar promise one thing when he agreed to come on-board Torchwood, charmed by Edgar's enthusiasm and intrigued by the characters and mythology of it all. He made him swear, and Edgar swore, that Ellis could write whatever ending to the series he chose, when the time came.
"Out of curiosity," Edgar had said, back when they were still Mr. Graveworthy and Mr. van Scyoc to each other, "What exactly did you have in mind for an ending? Because we've, you know, we haven't actually written a beginning yet."
Ellis pulled a napkin towards him and uncapped his pen.
"How far do you trust me?" he asked.
"Trust you to what?"
"Trust me to make this ending true and still make it good?"
Edgar had frowned at him. "I wouldn't have chosen you if I didn't think you were the man for the job."
Ellis scribbled seven words on the napkin and passed it across to him. The thing itself is taped up over Edgar's desk, in a corner of the cabinetry where very few can see it.
Edgar grinned.
"Make this true and good," he said, "and you can write for me forever."
"I'll hold you to that," Ellis said.
AND THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER.
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