Title: Back Home
Author: Van Donovan
Characters: Vislor Turlough, Tegan Jovanka, Jack Harkness, Owen Harper and the rest of the Torchwood lackeys.
Pairing(s): Turlough/Owen, Turlough/Tegan, misc. others.
Rating: Hard-R, for sex and swearing.
Word Count This Chapter: 1,987.
Word Count Overall: 14,000.
Notes: Set in the three month glossed-over gap in Torchwood, somewhere probably late 2007, early 2008. Spoilers for all of the Fifth Doctor's run.
Summary: Turlough returns to Earth, but things have changed.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. I made no money from this, but if you want to hire me, I'm cheap. Betaing provided by Starkiller.
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Turlough tore through the streets, following nothing but the scent on the wind and the blood rushing through his veins. His hat was gone, his umbrella abandoned. His hair hung limp and wet in his eyes, and he didn’t care. He couldn’t explain what drew him, or why he was so anxious to run into what must be danger. The smell was Daleks and Cybermen and space-time all rolled into one, and yet none of it. It flooded his veins, quickened his pulse, and spurred him on.
He skidded to a halt once he reached an intersection and backtracked several steps before taking off down another street. Shops gave way to residential homes, and soon he was lost in London suburbs, still following that elusive yet intense sensation.
At last, he arrived. Other than the black SUV haphazardly parked in front of the home, there was nothing spectacular about the residency. It was a modest house with neatly tendered flowers in their pots, gauzy curtains in the window and smoke merrily piping out of the chimney, but it was also the source of whatever it was Turlough was sensing.
He tore up the front steps and found the front door standing wide open.
Inside, he could hear voices, all of them familiar.
“Where did you say it materialized at?” he could hear Gwen ask.
“Look miss, it’s vitally important you give us all the facts, as best as you can remember,” Jack added.
“Hey, come on, lay off her,” Owen said. “The lady has been rattled. Give her some time to adjust.”
“I’ve not be rattled!” the woman replied, her voice harsh and loud. “If I have, it’s by you lot bursting in here unannounced! I know what I saw, and it’s not really any of your business!”
“It can’t be,” Turlough whispered to himself, peeking around the corner. It cost him his lousy hiding place, but afforded him a view of all the occupants in the main room. Jack, Gwen and Owen had their backs to him, but the woman saw him instantly. Her eyes widened immediately.
“Turlough!” she exploded.
The members of Torchwood spun around quickly, and Turlough straightened his damp and dripping self out completely. “Hello, Tegan,” he said coolly.
--
Gwen brought Turlough some tea and sat down beside him, looking from him to Tegan. “You two know each other?” she asked.
Jack and Owen were bickering quietly in the hall, and Turlough wished he were out there with them, where Tegan’s eyes wouldn’t be burning into the top of his head. “Yeah,” he muttered.
“I’ll say,” Tegan snapped. “It’s been a while though, hasn’t it?”
“I’m telling you,” Owen said in the hall, following Jack back into the main room. “It wasn’t me!”
“Okay, I want to know what the hell is going on here,” Jack demanded. “And I want to know now.”
Tegan’s attention was draw by Jack, and Turlough finally stole a proper glance at her. He could only think of one word to describe her: old. She was far from decrepit or ghastly, but she was not the way he’d last seen her. Her hair was touched with grey at the temples, and there were lines at the corners of her mouth and eyes, that hadn’t been there before. Her fingers were long and thin, but lightly laced with lose skin. He supposed after nearly twenty-five years he shouldn’t have been surprised, but it was strange to see the changes, nevertheless.
She looked back at him and he quickly averted his eyes, blowing on his tea to cool it.
“Well?” Jack prompted, sounding irate.
“Tell him I didn’t tip you off,” Owen prompted, staring at Turlough intently.
He took a sip of his tea, raising his eyebrows at the accusation. His gaze traveled to Jack. “He didn’t tip me off.”
“They’re old friends,” Gwen concluded, getting to her feet.
“Oh,” Jack airily said to Tegan. “You’re associating with aliens now, are you?”
Tegan’s surprised expression flirted from Jack to Turlough and back.
“He knows,” Turlough said flatly, studying the carpet. “He didn’t believe me before, but he knows.”
“Turlough had nothing to do with this,” Tegan insisted. “I don’t even know where he came from! And I doubt you have anything to do with this, either,” she added, staring up at Jack. “Just what right do you have, to barge in on someone’s house unannounced like that, anyway?”
“Good old Tegan,” Turlough said, pushing himself to his feet and feeling more confident. “You’ve not changed a bit.”
“And as for you, mister,” she said, glaring. “Just how the hell did you get here?”
Turlough cocked his head, smirking. “How do you think?”
Tegan crossed her arms, glancing about furtively. “Is he with you?”
“No,” he said, not watching Tegan’s face to see how it fell. “I left not long after you. I haven’t seen him since.”
“Hello?” Jack called, waving a hand. “I’m sorry to break up the reunion, but we’ve got questions that need answers. Our instruments picked up an extremely high power level emanating from this house. Not five minutes after we arrived, he shows up,” Jack jabbed a finger at Turlough, “and that’s not even getting to the guy in the naval uniform.”
Turlough’s brow furrowed. “Naval uniform?”
“It’s Marriner,” Tegan confessed to him. “You remember?”
Eternals! Turlough’s mind suddenly supplied, and he instantly knew why the smell reminded him of Daleks and Cybermen and the space-time vortex—because it was the Eternals, and they were all of that, and more. “Marriner!” Turlough said, in honest disbelief. “But that can’t be.”
“I didn’t think it could be, either,” Tegan admitted. “But it was, or another one that looked just like him.”
Jack was surveying the two skeptically. “Marriner? That’s the name of the guy who vanished into thin air when we arrived?”
“He’s an Eternal,” Tegan supplied haughtily. “Not as though I expect you to have any idea what that means.”
Jack and Owen exchanged slow glances. “That’s not possible,” Owen said.
“What’s not?” Gwen ventured.
“The Eternals were destroyed,” Jack explained, still staring at Tegan. “It would be impossible for them to be here.”
“Where’ve I heard that before?” Tegan retorted, sarcastically. “Well, I suppose you’d better tell that to Marriner.”
“What does he want?” Turlough asked, ignoring Torchwood. He set his tea down, crossing to her. “Did he try to hurt you?”
He couldn’t place the face she gave him, but she shook her head. “No. He just tried to get me to go with him, again.”
“The Eternals were destroyed!” Jack shouted.
Turlough turned a dark eye to him. “And since when have you been time sensitive? Last I heard, humans didn’t have that extra sense.” He stepped closer to Jack and took a whiff, confirming what he already knew: Jack was human, 100% pure Earthling. “The Eternals fled the Time War. They weren’t destroyed. Every child on my homeworld knows that.”
The look of shock and disbelief that stole across Jack’s face almost made being bagged twice and interrogated in the Torchwood underground worth it. “How could you possibly know about that?” he demanded.
Turlough had had enough of this. “Because I’m alien, remember?” He turned to Tegan. “What did Marriner say?”
For once, Tegan seemed flustered to suddenly have all eyes on her. “Nothing, really,” she sputtered. “I was cooking dinner and he just appeared in my kitchen. He asked me how I was, and I tried to hit him with a frying pan.”
Turlough grinned. “Striker? Wrack?”
“No, just Marriner,” Tegan said. Her eyes shifted back to Jack, and her tone grew harsh again. “And then these three burst in, guns drawn, and he vanished.”
“They consider themselves alien hunters,” Turlough supplied. “They interrogated me twice when I arrived.”
“Well, you can have Marriner,” Tegan said. “He’s the last thing I need.”
“And to do that, miss, we need you to help us out here,” Owen prompted.
“What’re you doing here?” Tegan asked Turlough, ignoring Owen completely. “I didn’t expect to ever see you, of all people, again. At least not on Earth.”
Turlough laughed, despite himself. When she smiled, she looked like the same Tegan he had always known. “It’s a long story,” he said. “I’ve got a job here, now.”
“Not banished again, I assume?”
“Bit old for public school now, wouldn’t you say?” Turlough countered. Off Tegan’s flat stare, he added, “Well, it is a form of punishment, I suppose.”
“And just why do you still look so young?” she said. “That’s hardly fair.”
Turlough tried not to study his feet. “Time travel, you know. It’s complicated.”
“Jack,” Gwen called, putting a hand to her ear. “Tosh’s got that info you wanted.”
“Put it through to the car,” Jack said, dismissively. He thumbed at Turlough, looking at Tegan. “He’s really a time traveling alien?”
“Don’t act so surprised,” Tegan said, bitingly. “There’re a lot more of them out there than you might think.”
Gwen had moved to the front of the house, to carry on her conversation, but now she called out, “Jack! You’d better come see this!”
Jack and Owen followed her into the front room, and Turlough trailed behind. Tegan slipped away for a moment, and when she returned, she pressed a towel into Turlough’s hands. “You look a mess,” she said with a smile, and then followed after the Torchwood team.
Turlough dried his hair with the towel and stood in the doorway, trying to make out what Gwen was bleating about. He could vaguely see something sparkling on a low table in Tegan’s front room, but Jack, Gwen, Owen and Tegan created a wall that nearly blocked it.
“What the hell is that, Jack?” Owen demanded.
“Intergalactic bouquet of flowers?” Jack ventured.
Tegan wedged her way past them, and went to pick up the sparkling vase. “It’s beautiful,” she said, admiring it.
It reminded Turlough of Enlightenment, and as such, he wanted to hurl it across the room until it shattered into a million shards. “Don’t touch it,” he said warningly, pushing through to her. It was, of course, too late for that. Tegan had already picked it up. “You remember what happened last time we dealt with the Eternals,” he said.
Tegan set the crystal vase back on the table. “Well, I can’t just leave it there.”
“Take it, won’t you?” Turlough asked, turning to Jack. “Go on, take it, do your experiments. Leave her alone.”
Jack’s eyes darted from the vase to Tegan, but at last he nodded. Owen pulled on a pair of gloves and grabbed the glittering object. “We’re just trying to protect you,” Jack said to Tegan. “Talking with aliens is dangerous,” he added, his eyes fixing on Turlough. “You don’t know what they want from you.”
“I can take care of my own self, thank you very much!” Tegan snapped. She crossed her arms defiantly. “Now get out of my house, all of you, before I call the police.”
She ushered them out the door, and Turlough followed, resigned to shuffle out right along with them. But as soon as he stepped through the threshold, her hand gripped his shoulder and pulled him back. “And where do you think you’re going?” she said.
Turlough looked at the Torchwood team as they filed through the rain, back into their SUV. He shrugged, looking back at her. It was getting easier to take in her face each time he looked; she almost seemed to be getting younger, though he knew it was probably just his memory getting hazier. “I figured ‘all of you’ included me.” He wanted to stay, deep down, but some part of him knew he shouldn’t.
“I don’t see you for twenty-some-odd years and you think I’m going to put you back out in the rain?” she said. “Don’t be ridiculous.” Pulling the front door shut behind her, she ushered him back into the sitting room.
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