Chapter Forty Two: Army Of Ghosts

Planet Earth. This is where I was born. And this is where I died. For the first nineteen years of my life, nothing happened. Nothing at all. Not ever. And then I met a man called the Doctor. A man who could change his face. And he took me and my little sister away from home in his magical blue box. He showed us the whole of time and space. I thought it would never end. That's what I thought. But then came the army of ghosts. Then came Torchwood and the war. And that's when it all ended.

My name is Rose Marion Tyler, and this is the story of how I died.

~~~

When Alex woke the next morning, she was entirely at peace with herself. Things were good. She was travelling through all of time and space with her sister and her boyfriend. None of them had gotten seriously hurt in a long while. The apocalypse hadn't come to pass. Yes, things were definitely good.

With these thoughts in mind, Alex still had a Cheshire cat smile on her face when the Doctor woke up, blinking blearily.

"Hey," he whispered, his voice barely audible as he kissed Alex's shoulder, alerting her to his consciousness. She turned in his arms so she could look at him, greeting the Time Lord with a short kiss.

"Hey," she replied, mimicking him.

"You look happy," the Doctor noted, his hand absently drawing patterns on her bare back.

"I am happy. Good thoughts. Today is a good day, Kas."

"Good," he smiled. "I was thinking we could go see your mum today. I know Rose wanted to give her that bazoolium thing."

Alex smirked. "Mmm. Here we are naked in bed together and you want to see my mother." She sighed mockingly. "I knew you were too good to be true." The Doctor poked his tongue out at her, and she giggled. "Seriously, though, sounds good. Mum'll be delighted."

"Yeah." He rested his forehead against hers. "It wouldn't be completely inacceptable to go back to sleep right now."

"Now that does sound good."

***

Back on a bright sunny day in 2006, the TARDIS materialised in a corner of the playground by the Powell Estate. Rose came out first, toting her large rucksack that looked very heavy. Alex was next, and hand-in-hand with her came the Doctor, who paused to lock the TARDIS before allowing the excitable girls to drag him off to their mother's flat.

"Mum, it's us!" Rose yelled as they entered the living room. "We're back!"

"Oh, I don't know why you bother with those phones," Jackie remarked as she came in from the kitchen. "You never use them."

"Shut up, come here!" Alex pulled her mother into a heartfelt hug, standing on her tiptoes.

"Oh, I love you!"

"I love you!"

"I love you so much!" Jackie exclaimed as she next hugged Rose.

The Doctor tried to scoot past, but Jackie dropped Rose to envelope him in a bear hug too, peppering him with kisses, much to the girls' amusement. "Oh no you don't! Come here! Oh, you lovely big fella! Oh, you're all mine. Yes, you are."

"Just, just, just put me down!" the Doctor managed, screwing up his face as he squirmed.

Rose dumped her rucksack on the sofa. "I've got loads of washing for you. And, I got you this." She produced the bazoolium. "It's from the market on this asteroid bazaar. It's made of, er, what's it called?"

"Bazoolium," the Doctor supplied, as he intertwined his hand with Alex's.

"Bazoolium," Rose nodded. "When it gets cold, yeah, it means it's going to rain. When it's hot, it's going to be sunny. You can use it to tell the weather."

"I've got a surprise for you and all," Jackie smiled.

"Oh, I get her bazoolium, she doesn't even say thanks," Rose muttered, rolling her eyes.

"Guess who's coming to visit? You're just in time. He'll be here at ten past. Who do you think it is?"

"I don't know," Alex shrugged.

"Oh, go on, guess."

"Nah, come on, I hate guessing. Just tell us," Alex pleaded.

"It's your granddad. Granddad Prentice. He's on his way any minute. Right, cup of tea!" Jackie bustled off into the kitchen

"She's gone mad," Rose realised.

"Tell me something new," the Doctor snorted.

"Granddad Prentice, that's her dad," Alex informed him, frowning. "But he died, like, ten years ago."

"Oh my God," Rose continued, still staring after her mum. "She's lost it."

Alex sighed, going around her to find her mum, both Rose and the Doctor peering in through the kitchen doorway. "Mum? What you just said about Granddad?"

"Any second now," Jackie replied, nodding happily.

"But he passed away. His heart gave out. Do you remember that? When I was nine, yeah?"

"Of course I do."

"Then how can he come back?"

Jackie shrugged. "Why don't you ask him yourself? Ten past. Here he comes."

An ethereal humanoid shape walked through the outside wall to stand next to Jackie.

"Here we are, then. Dad, say hello to Rose and Alex. Ain't they grown?"

Alex froze, tears filling her eyes, while the Doctor ran from the flat, going to see if everywhere else was like this too. After a minute or so, Alex shook herself, snapping out of it, and she ran after the Doctor, grabbing Rose's hand as she went.

***

"They're everywhere!" the Doctor exclaimed, looking around in horror.

"Doctor, look out!" Alex cried, right before one of the ghosts walked right through him. Judging by his face, and the way he squirmed, it was even less pleasant than Jackie attacking him with kisses.

"They haven't got long," Jackie said, panting as she followed the girls. "Midday shift only lasts a couple of minutes. They're about to fade."

"What do you mean, shift? Since when did ghosts have shifts? Since when did shifts have ghosts? What's going on?" the Doctor questioned, his eyes wide in confusion.

"Oh, he's not happy when I know more than him, is he?" Jackie smirked.

"But no one's running of screaming or freaking out," Rose realised.

"Why should we?" Jackie looked at her watch. "Here we go. Twelve minutes past."

Exactly on time, all the ghosts vanished.

***

Back at the flat, the Doctor was sitting forwards on the sofa, flicking through the channels as he tried to figure out what was happening.

"What the hell's going on?" he murmured, frowning intently. After seeing news reports from India and China, he realised, "It's all over the world." Once he'd gotten to Peggy Mitchell yelling at a ghost on Eastenders, he turned the TV off, rolling his eyes. "When did it start?"

"Well, first of all, Peggy heard this noise in the cellar, so she goes down—" The Doctor's eyebrows creased in confusion at Jackie's words.

"He means worldwide, Mum," Alex pointed out, sitting on the arm of the sofa.

"Oh." Jackie blinked. "That was about two months ago. Just happened. Woke up one morning and there they all were. Ghosts, everywhere. We all ran round screaming and that. Whole planet was panicking. No sign of you lot, thank you very much. Then it sort of sank in. It took us time to realise that we're lucky."

"What makes you think it's Granddad?" Rose asked her mother.

"It just feels like him. There's that smell, those old cigarettes. Can't you smell it?"

"I wish I could, Mum, but I can't," Rose replied, shrugging.

Alex sighed. "I thought it smelled more like Jack. You know, that weird lemon-y aftershave he always had?" She smiled fondly. "I always used to say he smelt like washing up liquid."

"You've got to make an effort. You've got to want it, sweetheart."

"The more you want it, the stronger it gets?" the Doctor checked.

"Sort of, yeah," Jackie nodded.

"Like a psychic link. Of course you want your old dad to be alive, but you're wishing him into existence. The ghosts are using that to pull themselves in," the Doctor explained.

"You're spoiling it." Jackie pouted.

The Doctor sighed. "I'm sorry, Jackie, but there's no smell, there's no cigarettes. Just a memory."

"But if they're not ghosts, what are they then?" Rose asked, frowning.

"Yeah, but they're human! You can see them. They look human," Jackie pointed out.

"She's got a point," Alex admitted. "I mean, they're all sort of blurred, but they're definitely humanoid."

"Maybe," the Doctor conceded. "They're pressing themselves into the surface of the world. But a footprint doesn't look like a boot."

***

Rose frowned, peering at the monitor. "According to the paper, they've elected a ghost as MP for Leeds. Now don't tell me you're going to sit back and do nothing."

The Doctor stepped up and out of the grating wearing a backpack and holding a hosepipe-like device. "Who you gonna call?"

"Ghostbusters!" Alex cheered, grinning.

"I ain't afraid of no ghosts!" the Doctor quipped, before leading the way out of the TARDIS, where Jackie was waiting. "When's the next shift?" he asked as he put three metal cones linked by wires on the grass in a triangle.

"Quarter to," Jackie replied. "But don't go causing trouble. What's that lot?"

"Triangulates their point of origin," Alex stated proudly.

"I don't suppose it's the Gelth?" Rose asked.

"Nah." The Doctor shook his head. "They were just coming through one little rift. This lot are transposing themselves over the whole planet. Like tracing paper."

"You're always doing this. Reducing it to science. Why can't it be real?" Jackie whined. "Just think of it, though. All the people we've lost. Our families coming back home. Don't you think it's beautiful?"

Alex thought of Chloe Webber's dad coming back to her and shuddered.

"I think it's horrific," the Doctor frowned, thinking along the same lines. "Rose, give us a hand."

They took the power cable and plugged it into the TARDIS console. Jackie and Alex followed them in.

"As soon as the cones activate, if that line goes into the red, press that button there. If it doesn't stop—" The Doctor handed Rose the sonic screwdriver. "Setting fifteen B. Hold it against the port, eight seconds and stop."

"Fifteen B, eight seconds," Rose repeated.

"If it goes into the blue, activate the deep scan on the left," the Time Lord instructed.

Rose smirked. "Hang on a minute, I know. Push that one."

"Close," Alex smiled.

"That one?"

"Now you've just killed us," the Doctor teased.

"Er, that one."

"Yeah!" He turned "Now, what've we got? Two minutes to go?"

***

Outside, the Doctor activated the cones, Alex standing ready in case anything went wrong. "What's the line doing?"

"It's all right. It's holding!" Rose's voice floated out of the TARDIS.

"You ready?" the Doctor asked Alex quietly.

"Oh, I got you," she replied, rubbing her palms together as a golden light faded into existence.

"Here we go!" the Doctor yelled over his shoulder, grinning with anticipation and childish excitement.

"The scanner's working," Rose stated. "It says delta one six."

"Come on then, you beauty!" the Doctor called, looking at the triangle as a ghost appeared. He put on a pair of red and blue cardboard 3D glasses and made an adjustment to his control box. Alex rolled her eyes fondly.

The ghost began to writhe inside the field, causing the Doctor to grin, and Alex to construct a shimmering forcefield, just in case. "Don't like that much, do you?" the Doctor taunted. "Who are you? Where are you coming from?" The ghost lunged at him, trying to break out, but it couldn't. The Doctor didn't even flinch, confident in his science and his Alex's powers. "That's more like it! Not so friendly now, are you?"

Suddenly, the ghost faded away, and Alex relaxed the forcefield, while the Doctor gathered up the equipment. They both ran into the TARDIS, grinning.

"I said so!" the Doctor announced cheerfully. "Those ghosts have been forced into existence from one specific point, and I can track down the source. Allons-y!" He stopped in his tracks. "I like that. Allons-y. I should say allons-y more often. Allons-y. Watch out, girls. Allons-y. And then, it would be really brilliant if I met someone called Alonso, because then I could say allons-y, Alonso, every time." He stopped, frowning at Alex's amused expression. "You're staring at me."

She pointed over her shoulder. "Mum's still on board."

"If we end up on Mars, I'm going to kill you," Jackie stated matter-of-factly. The Doctor looked vaguely terrified.

***

A while later, the TARDIS materialised in some sort of Loading Bay, and was immediately surrounded by armed soldiers. The Doctor frowned at them on the monitor. "Oh well, there goes the advantage of surprise. Still, cuts to the chase. Stay in here, look after Jackie," he instructed, looking between Rose and Alex.

"I'm not looking after my mum," Rose exclaimed indignantly.

"Well, you brought her."

"I was kidnapped!" Jackie piped up.

Alex rolled her eyes. "Doctor, they've got guns."

"And I haven't. Which makes me the better person, don't you think? They can shoot me dead, but the moral high ground is mine," the Doctor replied smartly, gently moving her aside so he could go outside to face the soldiers, his arms up in surrender. A blonde woman tottered in, smiling widely.

"Oh! Oh, how marvellous. Oh, very good. Superb. Happy day!" she exclaimed and started to clap. The soldiers joined in, lowering their weapons, and the Doctor lowered his arms, confused.

"Er, thanks? Nice to meet you. I'm the Doctor."

"Oh, I should say. Hurray!"

He frowned. "You... You've heard of me then?"

"Well of course we have," the blonde woman stated. "And I have to say, if it wasn't for you, none of us would be here. The Doctor and the TARDIS."

"And... you... are?" the Doctor asked, absolutely bewildered.

"Oh, plenty of time for that," the blonde brushed off. "But according to the records, you're not one for travelling alone. The Doctor and his companions. That's a pattern, isn't it, right? There's no point hiding anything. Not from us. So where are they?"

The Doctor winced. "Yes. Sorry. Good point. She's just a bit shy, that's all." He reached in through the half open door and grabbed Jackie and Rose, knowing Alex would be better equipped to handle soldiers on her own than they. "But here they are, Rose and Alex Tyler. They're not the best I've ever had. Bit too blonde. Not too steady on their pins. A lot of that." He mimed talking with his hand. "And just last week, Alex stared into the heart of the Time Vortex and aged fifty seven years. But they'll do."

"I'm forty," Jackie protested.

"Deluded. Bless. I'll have to trade them in. Do you need anyone? They're very good at tea. Well, I say very good, I mean not bad. Well, I say not bad. Anyway, lead on. Allons-y. But not too fast. Her ankle's going," the Doctor continued, quite clearly enjoying himself if his smirk was anything to go by.

"I'll show you where my ankle's going," Jackie muttered threateningly as the blonde woman led them into a huge warehouse.

"It was only a matter of time until you found us, and at last you've made it. I'd like to welcome you, Doctor. Welcome to Torchwood."

"That's a Jathar Sunglider," the Time Lord recognised, pointing at a spacecraft suspended from the ceiling with hydraulic cable.

"Came down to Earth off the Shetland Islands ten years ago," the blonde replied.

"What, did it crash?"

"No, we shot it down." As the Doctor, Rose, Jackie all looked at her with wide eyes, the woman elaborated. "It violated our airspace. Then we stripped it bare. The weapon that destroyed the Sycorax on Christmas Day? That was us. Now, if you'd like to come with me. The Torchwood Institute has a motto. If it's alien, it's ours. Anything that comes from the sky, we strip it down and we use it for the good of the British Empire."

Rose and Jackie gaped. "For the good of the what?"

"The British Empire."

"There isn't a British Empire," Jackie pointed out.

The blonde woman smiled. "Not yet. Ah, excuse me. Now, if you wouldn't mind." A soldier handed her a very big gun. "Do you recognise this, Doctor?"

"That's a particle gun," the Time Lord noted, frowning.

"Good, isn't it? Took us eight years to get it to work."

"It's the twenty first century," the Doctor stressed. "You can't have particle guns."

"We must defend our border against the alien." The woman handed the gun back to the soldier. "Thank you, Sebastian, isn't it?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Thank you, Sebastian." She turned to the trio as Sebastian walked off, presumably to return the particle gun to its usual position. "I think it's very important to know everyone by name. Torchwood is a very modern organisation. People skills. That's what it's all about these days. I'm a people person."

"Have you got anyone called Alonso?" the Doctor asked absently; Rose rolled her eyes.

"No, I don't think so. Is that important?"

"No, I suppose not," the Doctor replied, sounding vaguely disappointed.

"What was your name?" Rose inquired.

"Yvonne. Yvonne Hartman." Yvonne smiled as the Doctor picked up what looked like a black plastic step-stool with a handle attached on top. "Ah, yes. Now, we're rather fond of these. The Magnaclamp. Found in a spaceship buried at the base of Mount Snowdon. Attach this to an object and it cancels the mass. I could use it to lift two tonnes of weight with a single hand. That's an imperial ton, by the way. Torchwood refuses to go metric."

"I could do with that to carry the shopping," Jackie remarked.

"All these devices are for Torchwood's benefit, not the general public's," Yvonne clarified hastily.

"So, what about these ghosts?" the Doctor questioned.

"Ah, yes, the ghosts. They're, er, what you might call a side effect," Yvonne replied evasively.

The Doctor narrowed his eyes. "Of what?"

"All in good time, Doctor," Yvonne assured. "There is an itinerary, trust me."

Rose gasped as the TARDIS was driven past on the back of a truck. "Oi! Where are you taking that?"

Yvonne smirked, and Rose decided she really didn't like her. "If it's alien, it's ours."

"You'll never get inside her," the Doctor told the woman smugly.

"Hmm. Et cetera," Yvonne mocked and began to walk off. Alex peeked her head out of the TARDIS, and the Doctor winked at her.

***

Inside the TARDIS, Alex began to rummage through the Doctor's trenchcoat pockets. "Psychic paper," she muttered repeatedly, making a face when she found a clockwork mouse in one pocket. She then grinned in success when she found the small wallet, before sneaking out of the TARDIS, grabbing a white lab coat from a bench, and making her way out into the Torchwood Institute.

Once in the corridor, she ducked her head to avoid being seen properly and followed another scientist along to a door. After he went in, she kissed the psychic paper, then held it against the entry reader to get in. When she entered, she was transfixed by a sphere that was hovering in mid air towards the back of the room. She barely registered the scientist coming over to her, wearing a nametag that read Rajesh.

"Can I help you?" he asked.

"I was just..." Alex trailed off, her attention ensnared by the sphere again.

"Try not to look," Rajesh advised, snapping his fingers to bring her back to him. "It does that to everyone. What do you want?"

"Sorry," she muttered sheepishly, before making something up on the spot. "They sent me from personnel. They said some man had been taken prisoner. Some sort of Doctor? I'm just checking the lines of communication. Did they tell you anything?"

"Can I see your authorisation?" Rajesh inquired.

"Sure." Alex handed over the psychic paper.

"That's lucky. You see, everyone at Torchwood has at least a basic level of psychic training. This paper is blank and you're a fake." Rajesh handed the psychic paper back and turned to look at the guard standing by the door with a gun. "Seal the room. Call security. Samuel, can you check the door locks? She just walked right in."

Samuel looked up, and Alex nearly had another heart attack when she saw it was Mickey Smith. He smiled at her. "Doing it now, sir."

"Well, if you'd like to take a seat," Rajesh offered, showing Alex to an office chair in front of a laptop, where there was a video link open with a blonde in a posh glass-walled office. "Yvonne? I think you should see this." Rajesh pointed to Alex, who grinned and held up the peace sign. "We've got a visitor. We don't know who she is, but funnily enough, she arrived at the same time as the Doctor."

Yvonne must have turned her laptop, because now, Alex could see the Doctor, Rose, and Jackie. "She one of yours?" Yvonne asked.

"Never seen her before in my life," the Doctor lied smoothly.

"Good. Then we can have her shot," Yvonne stated easily. Alex just rolled her eyes, in time with her boyfriend, while throwing a ball of energy up and catching it repeatedly, clearly bored.

"Oh, all right then. It was worth a try," he shrugged. "That's, that's Alex Tyler."

"Hi," Alex grinned again, waving, as Yvonne came into view.

"Well, if that's Alex Tyler, who's she?" Yvonne inquired, frowning as she pointed to Jackie.

"I'm her mother," Jackie smiled.

"Oh, you travel with her mother?" Yvonne looked surprised.

"He kidnapped me!" Jackie exclaimed, not for the first time.

"Please—Alex, stop laughing—Please, when Torchwood comes to write my complete history, don't tell people I travelled through time and space with her mother," the Doctor begged over the sound of his girlfriend finding the situation hilarious through the video feed.

"Charming!" Rose reminded him, smacking his arm.

"I've got a reputation to uphold!" the Doctor protested, grinning.

Yvonne cut in. "Excuse me? Everyone? I thought I said stop the ghost shift. Who started the programme? But I ordered you to stop! Who's doing that?" Alex frowned as everyone on the other end got up and moved away, looking at something she couldn't see. "Right, step away from the monitors, everyone. Gareth, Addy, stop what you're doing, right now. Matt, step away from your desk. That's an order! Stop the levers! Andrew! Stop the levers!"

"What's she doing?" Alex asked telepathically.

"We're going into ghost shift," was all the Doctor had to offer.

"Ghost shift," Alex muttered aloud, sighing.

"Yvonne, I thought you said the next Ghost Shift was cancelled. What's going on? Yvonne?" Rajesh asked. There was a loud bang and a rumbling from behind them, like thunder, and the pair stood up, turning around to stare at the sphere. "It can't be. It's active!" He turned back to the screen. "We've got a problem down here. Yvonne, can you hear me? Yvonne, for God's sake. The sphere is active! The readings are going wild! It's got weight, it's got mass, an electromagnetic field. It exists!"

Clunk! Thump! Alex jumped, even as Mickey moved to stand with her and Rajesh.

"The door's sealed. Automatic quarantine. We can't get out!" Rajesh cried.

"It's all right, Alex," Mickey said, putting his hand on her shoulder as he hefted his gun with the other hand. "We've beaten them before, we can beat them again. That's why I'm here. The fight goes on."

"The fight against what?" Alex asked, confused.

"What do you think?" Mickey snorted, standing ready as the sphere began shuddering violently. "We had them beaten, but then they escaped. The Cybermen just vanished. They found a way through to this world, but so did we."

"The Doctor said that was impossible," Alex frowned, rubbing her hands together to ready some energy.

"Yeah, it's not the first time he's been wrong. He never thought he'd get together with you."

Alex snorted. "What's inside that sphere thing?"

Mickey shrugged. "No one knows. Cyber Leader, Cyber King, Emperor of the Cybermen? Whatever it is, against you and me, he's dead meat."

"It's good to see you," Alex grinned.

"Yeah. It's good to see you too."

"Can anyone hear me? Come on, I need help down here! I need—" Rajesh was cut off by a creak and a loud thunk.

Mickey discarded his white coat and ear piece. "Here we go."

The sphere cracked open, and a black hole appeared.

"I know what's in there, and I'm ready for them. I've got just the thing. This is going to blast them to Hell," Mickey grinned, patting his gun, which Rajesh only just seemed to notice wasn't regulation.

"Samuel, what are you doing?" Rajesh demanded.

Mickey smirked. "The name's Mickey. Mickey Smith. Defending the Earth."

Alex smiled. "Lock and load," she quipped, as he did just that, her holding up her palms and flexing out her wings.

The sphere slowly disappeared in a blaze of white light, making them shield their eyes. Four oversized pepperpots glided out afterwards, one inanimate pepperpot between them.

"That's not Cybermen," Mickey realised slowly.

"Oh God," Alex managed, her eyes widening as she took in the four Daleks.

"Location: Earth. Life forms detected. Exterminate!" the black one ordered.

"EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"