Before You Die

“United Nations Intelligence Taskforce Headquarters. Passcode?”

“10735,” I answered, watching the Doctor thinking across from me. “I need a direct connection to Jessica Ming in Australia.”

“This access has been terminated.”

Crossing the room quickly, I held the phone to his mouth.

“Your passcode?”

“18046,” he said spitefully, maintaining eye contact with me. My gaze became even more forceful, and beyond the Doctor’s vision I pulled aside my coat, once again revealing my mistilec. Ben was still very bad at carrying out successful lies.

“I know they changed the format. I do still have some contacts.”

“Well I don’t.”

I pulled his hair back, and by force, his head, making him whimper.

“Erica,” the Doctor warned without looking up.

“Aura968P12,” he spat.

“Thank you,” I smiled, relenting my grasp on his hair and stepping backward. The line spent a while connecting before I was given to HR.

“I asked for a direct contact to Jessica Ming,” I said impatiently.

“This is Jessica Ming,” the woman answered. “And this is stated as field agent Benjamin Brown’s passcode. Who are you?”

Ouch. I kind of felt bad. Jessica was fantastic at her job and the only reason she would have lost it would be because I managed to undermine her authority and infiltrate UNIT under her nose. It would suck to be demoted to Human Resources. I knew; that’s where I'd started.

“I'm sorry, I need to speak to the Head of International Defence.”

“You need level five clearance to speak to him. I'm not authorised to give that to you considering you still refuse to tell me who you are.”

“Blenicon542,” I said, giving her my clearance. She stuttered her astonishment at me before I impatiently continued, “That’s level seven clearance. I can talk to the Queen with that clearance. So pass it on.”

“I'm really glad this is a secure line,” Jessica murmured, pressing a few buttons. “And thank you Erica, for losing me my job.”

“Bu…what?”

“I had to check your clearance didn’t I? No one wiped it from the records but they did suspend your passcode. I'm assuming that’s because all your details have a D next to them meaning that your disappearance was accredited to the Doctor. True?”

“Yep,” I answered. “We’ve got an alien invasion. So if you could pass me on it would be great.”

“You’re going through to Major Partrael now.”

“Partrael got your job?”

“Tell me about it,” she sighed. I was glad she wasn’t holding it against me by the tone of her voice but I was sad for her as well. It would be a long way back to where she wanted to be.

“When this is over, I'll come back and plead your case,” I promised her.

“That would be much appreciated. See you,” Jessica said, the line beeping as it transferred.

“An outsider with level seven clearance is rarely heard of,” a man’s voice picked up on the other side. “But so is using Benjamin Brown’s passcode. Tell me, how did you manage to withdraw such information from one of our top operatives.”

“He’s one of your top operatives?” I scoffed. “I hate to see your worst ones.”

“Thank you for that,” the man said, disgruntled. “This is Major Partrael.”

“This is Erica Scott.”

“Erica Scott?” the man pondered. “Weren’t you the one who went by the name of Emily Summers?”

“Yes that would be me,” I replied.

“You work for Torchwood?”

“Not anymore,” I replied. “But the real reason I called up is to warn you of an invasion that I can’t stop with the limited resources I have.”

I pretty much had unlimited resources, what with a Timelord mind, a Tardis and the Doctor, but I had to talk him up.

“What kind would this be? I'm assuming Benjamin is with you there?”

I held out the phone to him mouth and Ben said, “Right here, alive and tied up sir.”

Major Partrael’s facepalm was almost visible by the sound it made coming through my mobile, but leaning back against the controller I continued, “Going after the Deknera was a bad idea. We’ve got the Gangores, maybe half taken care of? But they are quite small and once they realise the riots on Ferion are fake they’re going to come running back and try to take over the world again, or destroy it. They haven’t given us a definite answer yet. Have they Doctor?” I called over the controls.

“Three ships just flew off for Ferion,” he called back, “that only leaves ten thousand Gangores left on Earth. And they still aren’t answering my texts.”

“We can do ten thousand easy,” I called back, covering the mouthpiece.

“Not when they have mindrays,” he responded, without looking up at me. We’d had a mindray in the vault at Torchwood. Pretty much technology built on the brainwaves of the Silence, except a mindray had the capability to do a lot more damage with its hundred kilometre radius.

“Would’ve been nice to know before,” I hissed, turning back to face Ben who was watching us quizzically. “Either way, Benjamin Brown is in our custody for the meantime since your people simply let Gangores and Deknera walk onto this Earth using him as bait. We’re hoping this will buy us time but who knows. After all, the Faurai family aren’t thinking exactly like Deknera since they’re partially human and that makes them unstable.”

“You wish for UNIT to intervene?”

“I want UNIT to do something about the mess you’ve made. I was quite content to blame it all on Ben but it’s obvious he can’t have done this all on his own. Probably not even a little on his own.”

Ben was giving me a weird expression. His face had been changing a lot in these past twenty minutes. One minute he’d be apologetic, the next he’d turn into an arrogant look-a-like of Flynn Rider. There was something else going on here.

“We’ll have our experts look into it. I'll get in touch with the American front.”

“Tell them to contact me before running in,” I answered.

“You don’t work for UNIT anymore,” Partrael responded sharply.

“I work for a higher authority,” I responded with a strong voice.

“We are the highest authority.”

“Then you would do well to listen to me,” I answered. “Because I stand for the planet. Alongside the Doctor.”

“This comes from the Doctor?”

“Yes it does,” I conceded, realising the importance of his name. “And don’t forget it. Over and out major.”

I hung up on him with a single click, frustrated by the fruitless conversation only to find myself looking back at Ben curiously.

“I can’t figure out if you’re Ben or just someone impersonating him. Maybe possessing him?”

“You’re going to have to figure that out yourself,” Ben smiled. And I sat back to study him, the cogs turning in my Timelord brain as the Doctor stared at the screen trying to find us a way out of this mess.