Fic: When I Come Home (Crossover, Bandom (My Chemical Romance)/Doctor Who, 14A) [2/4]
Back to Masterpost
~~~
Brian was worried.
Bob hadn’t answered his phone the past few days. At first Brian thought it was because Bob was busy getting back to life post tour. But then he received an email from Mikey Way.
Mikey was worried something had happened to Bob when Bob didn’t show online for their weekly chat.
Lines of communication had been opened between the two. It was tentative and still a little painful after everything, but it showed Bob was healing and would remain friends with the guys-or at least with Mikey. The others had been acting weird lately, according to the bassist-weird even for them.
Shaking his head to chase away the thoughts of My Chemical Romance, Brian inserted the spare key Bob had given him in case Bob lost his. Brian turned the lock and entered the house.
The place was quiet, really quiet.
Bits and pieces of appliances were spread out all over the place, gutted and taken apart, like someone was trying to build something using all of these spare parts.
“Bob?” Brian cautiously called out.
Bob didn’t reply back.
Slowly entering the dwelling, Brian took a look around. Other than the scattered appliances, nothing looked too out of place. Brian took a deep breath and made his way to where Bob’s bedroom was. He slowly opened the door.
“Bob?”
Brian’s eyes widened in shock as he noticed the walls were newly covered in black Sharpie marker. Swirls of geometric shapes and smatterings of English words stood out most to Brian.
And then some sort of silver object on Bob’s bed caught Brian’s eye.
It was no bigger than an iPad, but thicker and heavier, and a piece of heavy plastic acted as a screen. It looked like that’s where the cannibalized appliance parts went.
Ignoring it for now, Brian called out again, “Bob now is the time to come out. I’m starting to get a little freaked out here.”
A little freaked out was an understatement. Brian thought as he looked at the drawings on the wall again. He brought up a finger to trace the shapes. What is going on in your head, Bob? This is a little crazy, even for you.
“Brian?”
Letting out a yelp of surprise, Brian spun around and came face to face with Bob, a Bob who was currently in a towel and using another towel to dry his hair and beard.
Brian pulled Bob into a hug. “Fucker, don’t scare me like that.”
Bemused, Bob patted Brian on the shoulder. “You realize you’re hugging me while I’m in a towel, right?”
Quickly pulling away, Brian punched Bob in the shoulder. “You had me worried, you ass! You want to tell me why you felt you had to Sharpie up your walls and gut your appliances?” Brian asked.
“Anything I might say at this point might make me sound crazy, Bri,” Bob said softly.
Brian waved a hand all over. “And this isn’t?”
Bob looked at what was on the walls and his mouth widen slightly in surprise. “Oh that. That stuff doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t matter?” Brian asked incredulously. “You wrote on your walls with black Sharpie and dissected your appliances to make some sort of MacGyver-type tech!”
“Well, it sounds bad when you put it that way.”
“It sounds and looks like you had some sort of breakdown!” Brian yelled at Bob flapping his hands a little.
Bob crossed his arms over his bare chest. “No, I didn’t.”
“Don’t you get stubborn with me, Bob Bryar. You freaked Mikey and me out here,” Brian snarled, worried that something was really wrong with Bob. “I come over here because you hadn’t answered your phone in days and you missed some sort of online chat thing with Mikey. Now, what’s going on? And don’t lie to me; we know each other too well that I’ll be able to tell.”
Bob sighed. “Fine. Let me get some clothes on and then we’ll talk.”
Nodding, Brian left the bedroom to give Bob some privacy to change.
A few minutes later Bob emerged from his bedroom dressed in striped black and grey socks and black shorts that hung above his knees. Some sort of dark blue t-shirt peeked out from behind one of Bob’s customary hoodies, the zipper undone a bit. In his hands Bob was carrying the bit of technology from his bed and some sort of round metal thing.
Sitting on the couch, Brian watched as Bob laid them out in front of him on the table and then sat down on the ground.
“So are you going to tell me what’s going on, Bryar?” Brian asked.
Bob ran a hand through his short hair and then his beard. “Not sure where to start.”
“The beginning is a good place.”
Snorting, Bob sighed. “There are two beginnings; the second one is probably the best one to start from.”
Brian had a ‘what the fuck’ look on his face and opened his mouth to say something, when Bob held up his hand.
“Brian, I promise this will make sense, okay? Just let me get this all out and then you can try and commit me.”
“Fine.”
“Did you know that I was adopted? Found on the steps of an orphanage at the age of five. Didn’t remember anything, just left there with a fob watch.” Bob gestured at the fob watch lying on the table. “Was adopted by my mom when I was six years old, and then my dad died six months later. Drunk driver smashed into him,” Bob smiled sadly. “You know the rest of my life pretty well; I grew up and got into some antics, as well as the Chicago scene. Drummed for a few bands then got a degree in sound, met you while doing sound for The Used, and the rest, as they say, is history.”
“That still doesn’t tell me what all of this is about, Bryar,” Brian demanded.
“I’m getting to it, Schechter,” Bob replied back. “Mom sent me a box of stuff from Chicago just before that teching gig I did for you. But in the box was the fob watch. I forgot about it really. I opened it a few days ago and in it was me, someone who I had forgotten I was.”
To Brian’s credit, he didn’t blink or so much as flinch. Years of dealing with My Chemical Romance had diminished his freak out metre.
“I’m an alien, Brian,” Bob continued on and pointed his finger upwards. “From outer space.”
Brian stared at Bob and then exploded off of the couch, “WHAT THE FUCK, BOB? WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?”
Rolling his eyes, Bob got up and went around the table and grabbed Brian’s hands and placed them on his chest.
“I am not feeling up your man boobs here, Bryar!” Brian stated and tried to pull away from Bob’s strong grip and then paused.
Eyes narrowing, Brian looked up at Bob and then back at Bob’s chest and leaned in, ear pressed against the fabric. Then he switched to the other side of Bob’s chest. Brian’s eyes widened and he found himself scrambling backward until the back of his knees hit the couch and he hit the cushions with a thud.
“You have two heartbeats, Bob,” Brian got out.
Bob nodded. “Yeah, my species has two hearts,” he said running a hand over his beard. “Kinda makes this samba beat if you listen to it through a stethoscope.”
“You have two heartbeats, Bob,” Brian said again.
Bob snapped his fingers a couple of times in front of Brian’s face. “You freaking out on me here, Schechter?”
Of course I’m fucking freaking out here! Brian thought wildly. One of my best friends tells me he’s an alien, offers proof and and I’m not suppose to freak out? Brian swatted the fingers away and took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m good, just gimmie a minute here.”
After the minute that Brian asked for, Bob placed his hand on Brian’s shoulder and asked softly, “Brian?”
Standing up quickly and knocking Bob’s hand off his shoulder, Brian smiled wide and looked a little manic. “So, alien, huh?”
Bob nodded and took a step back. “Yeah, alien.” Brian still seemed a little wound up.
“And what, you’ve always known you were an alien and only now you decided to share?”
“No, for all of my human life here on Earth, I was human,” Bob explained. “But when I opened that fob watch, it released the stored up energy and DNA of my alien self and restored me to my original self.”
“So it was an accident that released alien you?” Brian laughed.
Bob sheepishly grinned. “Yeah.”
“So, what kind of alien are you anyways? You look human.”
“And you look Time Lord,” Bob snorted. “Time Lords came first.”
Brian’s eyebrows rose in frank disbelief.
Bob grimaced and rubbed a hand through his beard. "Sorry, my species, we're a little arrogant."
"So, Time Lord?"
"It's a title that I earned," Bob said stuffing his hands into his hoodie pockets. "I went to school to get that title. But yeah, Time Lord is just a title that my people used. I come from a planet called Gallifrey, so I'm technically Gallifreyian, but use Time Lord to describe what I do."
"And what does that mean? What you do?"
Bob looked a little sheepish. "Well, in layman terms, I'm a time traveler, Bri."
Brian's eyebrows rose and he quietly freaked the fuck out. "Time travel is real?"
Bob nodded.
"Fuck."
Bob snorted.
"So what happened? Why are you on Earth and not," Brian waved a hand through the air. "Time traveling and whatever your people do."
"We were just about to go to war with a race called Daleks. Really nasty, you don’t want to run into them,” Bob explained as patiently as he could. What he learned was that you didn't share information with lesser species, but Brian was his friend and he'd been living as a human for the past thirty or so odd years. He could not explain it to Brian. It was Brian. “Last thing I remember is a lot of pain, and I think I was de-aged, turned human and left on those orphanage steps.”
"So, someone got the drop on you," Brian pointed out, trying to wrap his head around everything he was being told.
"Nearest I can figure out."
Brian nodded, “Okay, so you lived however long on Earth and then got deaged, so you were a different age before you got dropped here." He eyed Bob. "So, how old are you really and how did someone manage to change your species? Last time I checked that wasn't possible.”
Bob grimaced, not sure on how to answer what Brian was asking. “Listen, Brian. You have to realize my kind is very long lived, but last I checked, I’m about a hundred and forty.”
In hindsight, Brian realized missing the couch when he went to go sit down was a bad idea as he hit the floor hard. “A HUNDRED AND FORTY?” Yelling wasn’t probably good either.
Bob hunched and stuffed his hands into his hoodie pockets-the perfect picture of Bob Bryar being defensive.
Brian sighed and slowly stood up. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to freak out again.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Just a lot you’re throwing at me here.”
Bob scowled at Brian. “Fucker.”
“I know,” Brian nodded, agreeing with Bob. “So, change in species?”
“Best I can figure out is someone used a Chameleon Arch on me,” Bob explained. “It’s a piece of Gallifreyian tech that allows someone to change species, and then they de-aged me somehow and sent me to Earth.”
“How’d the hell did you let someone get the drop on you, Bryar?” Brian asked in a teasing voice.
“I don’t know, and I don’t remember, Schechter,” Bob replied back in a flat tone. “I was just about to go to war.” And then Bob’s eyes looked sad. “I don’t know if anyone survived or if the war is over.”
“Right, right,” Brian nodded to himself and then looked at Bob. “So, how do we find out what happened?”
“We?”
Brian lightly smacked Bob on the shoulder. “Yeah, we, you dumbass. I’m not letting you do this on your own.” Especially after everything you told me.
Bob softly smiled at Brian, and the defensiveness left his posture. “Thanks Brian.” And then Bob looked serious. “As to how we find out what happened next,” He pointed at the manmade iPad, “we use this to find my spaceship.”
“Of course, you have a spaceship,” Brian chuckled.
“Well, time ship technically, but it gets me around,” Bob grinned.
“Right, time ship.” Brian threw up his hands. “What else could it be?”
Snickering, Bob grabbed the manmade iPad and booted it up. The screen lit up as a series of symbols danced on the screen. Bob’s fingers flew over the screen, and a 3D map of North America appeared above it.
“Whoa,” Brian muttered.
The map zoomed in on America and then the state of Illinois, and then it zoomed on the city, Chicago. A dot blinked on the city, but it didn’t elaborate any further.
“Looks like we’re going home, Schechter,” Bob smirked at Brian.
“Great, Windy City, here we come,” Brian deadpanned.
~~~
Slush littered the grounds of Chicago, and Brian cursed coming back home. It was wet and windy, and he was miserable as he watched Bob tinker with the homemade iPad time ship finder.
In the last few hours, Brian had gone from being in L.A., freaking out over Bob maybe having a mental breakdown, to finding out one of his best friends was a freaking alien-from space. It was a little suspicious at how fast they were able to get tickets and get here, but Brian wasn’t going to complain.
Bob needed him. It was as simple as that.
Pulling out his Sidekick, Brian fired off a couple of texts to Mikey, letting him know Bob was fine, just got caught up in a new project and forgot to charge his phone and a power surge had fried the laptop.
It was a piece of crap that Brian was sure Mikey saw right through, but it was all he had at the moment. Huddled in his hoodie slash windbreaker combo, Brian pocketed his phone and blew warm air into his hands. “Any luck yet?”
Brian was ignored as Bob’s fingers flew over the touch screen and little puffs of air escaped from Bob’s lips as he muttered curses that didn’t sound English to Brian.
“Right, now you decide to go alien on me,” Brian muttered as he looked around. The two were in front of the orphanage that Bob had been ‘left’ in front of. It was an imposing building of stone and heavy wooden doors.
And just like the rest of Chicago, it screamed it had history.
A beeping noise brought Brian out of his musings, and Bob seemed a bit more animated.
Approaching Bob, Brian leaned against him and looked at the mcguyvered iPad. “Did Lassie find Timmy down the well?”
Snorting, Bob hit the screen a few more times with his fingers. “Something like that.” Bob reached out and grabbed Brian by his jacket and pulled him along. “C’mon, Schechter, we’re close.”
Stumbling a bit at the sudden tug, Brian quickly found his feet and followed the quickened pace that Bob had set. “Fucker, some of us are shorter than others.”
“Should’ve drank your milk when you were younger,” Bob shot back.
They had only gone a couple of blocks from the orphanage building when they stopped in front of a high stone fence covered in ivy with pointed finials on top. It almost looked like a gate, but it didn’t have any type of door.
“I used to come here all the time when I lived at the orphanage,” Bob whispered. Bob hesitated and placed a hand on the stone wall and pushed.
A startled yelp escaped from his lips as he fell forward and through the wall.
“Bob!” Brian called out and ran after his friend through the stone wall without a second thought.
Branches and brush battered at Brian’s body as he brought his hands up to protect his face. As he continued forward the growth became less dense; soon, he hit Bob’s back and fell backward.
An undignified noise escaped from Brian’s lips as he stared upwards and glared at the back of Bob’s hoodie. “Any reason why we stopped our little journey here, Bryar?”
But Bob kept quiet.
“Bob?”
There was still no response. Concerned for his friend, Brian quickly got to his feet and stepped in front of Bob. “Bob?”
Bob gestured behind Brian. “She’s still here.”
Glancing behind him, Brian only saw a very large white oak tree. It was indigenous to Chicago. It was actually the state tree of Illinois, but that didn’t really concern Brian. What concerned him was that Bob seemed to have gone crazier.
“It’s just a white oak, Bob,” Brian stated gently as he rubbed Bob’s arm in a comforting manner. “They’re all over the place here in Chicago.”
Bob growled at Brian. “It has a cameoflage filter on it. It’s made to look like something in the area so people don’t steal it.” Side stepping Brian, Bob grabbed the sleeve of Brian’s jacket and manhandled him toward the tree. “C’mon.”
Protesting, Brian tried to dig his heels in. “I am not getting in the tree, Bob!”
Bob smirked and propelled Brian forward.
Losing his balance, Brian found himself going head first into the white oak. He closed his eyes and waited for the impact that would most likely give him a broken nose and a concussion. When it didn’t come, he cautiously opened his eyes and gaped in wonder.
The room was circular and lights were slowly turning on for the occupants in the ship. The walls were covered in heavy cords of grey, black, blue, with the odd red one threaded through. Glancing down, Brian could see that the floor was see-through, almost like glass, and that the cords snaked down. In the middle of the room was some sort of hexagonal consol board. Each side that protruded out looked like a different mixing board to Brian, and it oddly fit with the theme of the ship. In the centre of the hexagon was a large clear tube that glowed blue, and inside the tube was some sort of rotor that moved up and down. Off to the side of the room there were two doorways that Brian guessed went into the interior of the ship. There was also a couple of puffy black leather couches with a couple of blankets thrown on them on the other side as well.
“It’s-it’s-” Brian stammered.
Bob came up from behind Brian and squeezed his shoulder. “Freaking out on me again, Brian?”
Brian felt his eye twitch. “Just a little. It’s certainly bigger on the inside than the outside.”
“That’s what she said,” Bob joked.
It broke the tension, and Brian laughed hard.
Wiping away the tears of mirth, Brian walked over to the console and lightly let his fingers dance over the buttons and various nodes. “So, we found your ship. Now what?”
“Now, I take you home and then I go find out what happened to my planet and people.”
“Excuse me?” Brian asked incredulously.
“I’m taking you home, Brian,” Bob said patiently. “My species, they’re not tolerant of humans. If I took you with me, they’d most likely erase your memories and then send you home. This way, you at least still remember.”
Brian glared at Bob as he stalked over and jabbed a finger into Bob’s chest. “I think that’s my decision and risk to make, Bryar.”
Frustrated, Bob ran a hand through his hair. “Fine, you stubborn asshole, but don’t come crying to me when they mess you up so bad you can’t remember to tie your own shoelaces.”
Brian just smirked.
Bob pointed a finger at Brain. “When we land on my planet, you don’t get out of the ship for anything, okay?”
“Okay.”
“No matter what, Schechter.”
Brian held up his hand and crossed his heart with the other. “I promise.”
“Good, that’s good,” Bob stated.
“So, how do we get this bird in the air?” Brian asked.
“You don’t; I do. And we’re going into the Time Vortex, not the air.”
Brian made some sort of mocking sound and then headed over to the leather couches and flopped down. “And it’s a jump to the left.”
Ignoring Brian, Bob went to work on the mixing boards that were acting like control panels. Buttons and switches were pressed and flipped and the rotor in the blue-lighted tube started to make some sort of grinding sound. Finally, the ground moved.
“WHOA!” Brian yelled out in surprise as the force rolled him off the couch. Getting to his feet, Brian glared at Bob, who was smirking in his direction. “Fucker. You did that on purpose.”
“I will neither confirm nor deny that.”
Stomping loudly over to where Bob was manning the controls, Brian punched Bob in the arm, hard, and glanced at the screen that started to lower down. “So how long is it going to take to get us there?”
“Not long.”
And that was the end of that conversation as Bob re-familiarized himself with the controls. Eyes occasionally glanced at the screen that was covered in the same strange geometric shapes that covered Bob’s walls back home. Reaching over, Brian tapped the screen. “Do these mean something? They were covered all over the walls of your LA home.”
Looking at what Brian was pointing at, Bob gave a smile. “It’s the written word of my original language.”
“So what? They were huge math geeks?” Brian joked.
Bob snorted. “Something like that, Schechter. Only it went beyond the math you know.”
“Huh.” Brian shrugged. “Well, it’s always-”
The rest of Brian’s sentence was cut off as the TARDIS encountered turbulence. Grabbing the mixing board in front of him, Brian tried to find his balance. “What’s going on, Bryar?”
Bob’s fingers flew over the boards. “I don’t know, we should be at Gallifrey right now.”
“Can’t your screen bring up a visual or something?”
Bob pounded on a big blue button at the top of the board, and Brian could see the tension in Bob’s fist from where it rested as a bigger flat screen was lowered.
Swirling fields of orange and red dust and scattered space rocks littered the area.
But there was no Gallifrey in sight.
A strangled moan and some sort of whine escaped from Bob’s throat as he collapsed to his knees. Brian caught him on the way down as Bob’s hand gripped the board, fingers pushing a couple of buttons, and they were off once again into what Brian assumed was the Time Vortex.
“It’s gone,” Bob whispered. “It’s all gone.”
Brian pulled Bob close and held him as the Time Lord poured out his rage and grief. Mumblings of ‘that’s why I couldn’t hear them?’ and ‘why?’ and ‘was it the Daleks?’ came from Bob’s mouth. Brian rubbed Bob’s back in circular motions as his jacket absorbed the moisture from Bob’s tears.
A shuddery breath escaped from Bob’s lips. “I’m the last one left, Brian.”
“I know, I know,” Brian said softly and continued rubbing Bob’s back. “I gotcha.” Moving so Bob was in a more comfortable position, he started to pet Bob’s hair. “We’re going to have to move, Bob. This position can’t be good for your wrists.”
Snuffling, Bob rubbed his nose against Brian’s t-shirt. “Wrists are fine. When I changed species it healed any damage I suffered as a human. So perfect wrists once again.”
Brian pulled in Bob closer as Bob clung to him, slowly falling to sleep.
“Perfect,” Brian sighed as Bob’s weight became more apparent. Grunting, Brian got to his feet and hauled Bob up. “Let’s get you over to the couches, you dead weight.”
As he started to carry Bob toward the couches, a series of whistles and lights caught his attention. Looking at the flat screen, Brian saw there was an arrow pointing toward the doorway and lights were lighting up on the floor, directing him toward the opening and into the ship.
“Guess we’re heading in.”
Grunting, Brian propped Bob up more and followed the lights on the floor into the ship. It was a series of two lefts, a right, past a garbage bin and another left before they stopped in front of the door. “I hope this is it, because he is a heavy Time Lord.” Brian called out to the ship.
The door whooshed open, and Brian found himself inside a large room with nothing but wood flooring and a raised bed in the middle. It looked half decorated.
Brian prepared himself for the final stretch and brought Bob over to the bed. Turning them around, he let them fall backward so their backs hit the comforter.
“Holy crap, I am never moving from this bed again,” Brian declared as he stretched out the kinks in his shoulders and back. After a few minutes of bliss, Brian got up and started to work Bob’s shoes off and then pulled the covers back and tucked Bob in. A hand caught his and Brian looked down to see Bob cuddling it close to his chest. Sighing, Brian climbed over Bob and lay over the covers and became the big spoon for the time being.
“What I do for you kid,” Brian murmured as he slowly fell asleep.
~~~
When Brian awoke, it was to an empty bed. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, he got out and followed the lights on the floor back to the control room of the TARDIS.
Smiling at the sight of Bob’s legs sticking out from underneath the console, he walked up and banged the board. “You alive down there, Bryar?”
There was a banging sound so loud you could hear Bob’s head bang up against the inside of the board and then muttered swearing. Inching his way out, Bob trained a pair of icy blue eyes on Brian, promising death as he rubbed his forehead. “Death, there is death in your future, Schechter.”
Brian just grinned and helped Bob up. “Promises, promises.”
Bob looked a bit hesitant and then pulled Brian into a quick hug. “Thanks for last night.”
“No problem,” Brian said patting Bob on the back awkwardly. “Although if I knew all it took was for you to turn into a giant girl was to change species-”
Blue eyes narrowed, and Bob punched Brian in the arm hard.
“So what were you doing down there?” Brian asked, smirking as he ignored the sting in his arm.
“A tune up, it’s been a while for her,” Bob explained as he gestured at the ship.
“Her?”
Bob patted the mixing board. “Yeah, her. She’s an organic ship and can understand us, Brian.”
Hazel eyes widened in surprise as Brian looked around.
“TARDISes are grown, not built,” Bob smirked at his friend.
“Wow,” Brian said in awe and also patted the mixing board. Then Brian looked at Bob, even though his friend got some sleep last night, Bob still looked tired. “Are those the clothes you slept in last night?”
Bob looked down at himself and then looked back up. “No. I changed my hoodie.”
“Well, la-dee-da,” Brian sing-songed. “What are we going to do now?”
Looking at Brian, Bob contemplated what he wanted to do next, and he knew what he had to do. “I have to find out what happened to my planet and my people.”
“Of course,” Brian agreed and then levelled Bob with a glare. “You do realize I’m coming with you, right?”
“Yeah,” Bob chuckled. “I know better than to argue.”
“Damn right.” And then Brian looked contemplative. “Can’t you use your ‘I see everything that was, is and will be’ thingy?”
“It’s called a Time Sense, Bri,” Bob said and then he frowned. “And no, I can’t. It’s like it’s blocked from seeing what happened to Gallifrey.”
“Well, crap.”
“Yeah.” Bob shook his head. “We’re going to have to do some investigating.”
“All right and how are we going to do that?”
Bob gestured at the TARDIS. “She picked up some readings at where Gallifrey was, and I’ll analyze them and go from there. Hopefully, I’ll be able to build something to follow the trail of whatever destroyed Gallifrey.”
“Well at least this type of traveling will be more comfortable than a tour bus,” Brian grumbled.
Chuckling, Bob agreed. “You can say that again. We are traveling in style.”
“We’re going to have to head back to Earth, though, to let my boss know I’m going to be gone for a bit,” Brian explained.
Bob raised an eyebrow. “Brian, we’re in a time ship. I can get us back to the minute we left Chicago.”
Brian looked taken back. “Oh right.” A sheepish look spread across Brian’s face. “I forgot there for a minute.”
“Idiot,” Bob said fondly.
“Drummer boy,” Brian snarked back.
Bob just grinned and went back to fine tuning the TARDIS.
END PART 2.
PART 1 // PART 3 // PART 4
~~~
Brian was worried.
Bob hadn’t answered his phone the past few days. At first Brian thought it was because Bob was busy getting back to life post tour. But then he received an email from Mikey Way.
Mikey was worried something had happened to Bob when Bob didn’t show online for their weekly chat.
Lines of communication had been opened between the two. It was tentative and still a little painful after everything, but it showed Bob was healing and would remain friends with the guys-or at least with Mikey. The others had been acting weird lately, according to the bassist-weird even for them.
Shaking his head to chase away the thoughts of My Chemical Romance, Brian inserted the spare key Bob had given him in case Bob lost his. Brian turned the lock and entered the house.
The place was quiet, really quiet.
Bits and pieces of appliances were spread out all over the place, gutted and taken apart, like someone was trying to build something using all of these spare parts.
“Bob?” Brian cautiously called out.
Bob didn’t reply back.
Slowly entering the dwelling, Brian took a look around. Other than the scattered appliances, nothing looked too out of place. Brian took a deep breath and made his way to where Bob’s bedroom was. He slowly opened the door.
“Bob?”
Brian’s eyes widened in shock as he noticed the walls were newly covered in black Sharpie marker. Swirls of geometric shapes and smatterings of English words stood out most to Brian.
And then some sort of silver object on Bob’s bed caught Brian’s eye.
It was no bigger than an iPad, but thicker and heavier, and a piece of heavy plastic acted as a screen. It looked like that’s where the cannibalized appliance parts went.
Ignoring it for now, Brian called out again, “Bob now is the time to come out. I’m starting to get a little freaked out here.”
A little freaked out was an understatement. Brian thought as he looked at the drawings on the wall again. He brought up a finger to trace the shapes. What is going on in your head, Bob? This is a little crazy, even for you.
“Brian?”
Letting out a yelp of surprise, Brian spun around and came face to face with Bob, a Bob who was currently in a towel and using another towel to dry his hair and beard.
Brian pulled Bob into a hug. “Fucker, don’t scare me like that.”
Bemused, Bob patted Brian on the shoulder. “You realize you’re hugging me while I’m in a towel, right?”
Quickly pulling away, Brian punched Bob in the shoulder. “You had me worried, you ass! You want to tell me why you felt you had to Sharpie up your walls and gut your appliances?” Brian asked.
“Anything I might say at this point might make me sound crazy, Bri,” Bob said softly.
Brian waved a hand all over. “And this isn’t?”
Bob looked at what was on the walls and his mouth widen slightly in surprise. “Oh that. That stuff doesn’t matter.”
“It doesn’t matter?” Brian asked incredulously. “You wrote on your walls with black Sharpie and dissected your appliances to make some sort of MacGyver-type tech!”
“Well, it sounds bad when you put it that way.”
“It sounds and looks like you had some sort of breakdown!” Brian yelled at Bob flapping his hands a little.
Bob crossed his arms over his bare chest. “No, I didn’t.”
“Don’t you get stubborn with me, Bob Bryar. You freaked Mikey and me out here,” Brian snarled, worried that something was really wrong with Bob. “I come over here because you hadn’t answered your phone in days and you missed some sort of online chat thing with Mikey. Now, what’s going on? And don’t lie to me; we know each other too well that I’ll be able to tell.”
Bob sighed. “Fine. Let me get some clothes on and then we’ll talk.”
Nodding, Brian left the bedroom to give Bob some privacy to change.
A few minutes later Bob emerged from his bedroom dressed in striped black and grey socks and black shorts that hung above his knees. Some sort of dark blue t-shirt peeked out from behind one of Bob’s customary hoodies, the zipper undone a bit. In his hands Bob was carrying the bit of technology from his bed and some sort of round metal thing.
Sitting on the couch, Brian watched as Bob laid them out in front of him on the table and then sat down on the ground.
“So are you going to tell me what’s going on, Bryar?” Brian asked.
Bob ran a hand through his short hair and then his beard. “Not sure where to start.”
“The beginning is a good place.”
Snorting, Bob sighed. “There are two beginnings; the second one is probably the best one to start from.”
Brian had a ‘what the fuck’ look on his face and opened his mouth to say something, when Bob held up his hand.
“Brian, I promise this will make sense, okay? Just let me get this all out and then you can try and commit me.”
“Fine.”
“Did you know that I was adopted? Found on the steps of an orphanage at the age of five. Didn’t remember anything, just left there with a fob watch.” Bob gestured at the fob watch lying on the table. “Was adopted by my mom when I was six years old, and then my dad died six months later. Drunk driver smashed into him,” Bob smiled sadly. “You know the rest of my life pretty well; I grew up and got into some antics, as well as the Chicago scene. Drummed for a few bands then got a degree in sound, met you while doing sound for The Used, and the rest, as they say, is history.”
“That still doesn’t tell me what all of this is about, Bryar,” Brian demanded.
“I’m getting to it, Schechter,” Bob replied back. “Mom sent me a box of stuff from Chicago just before that teching gig I did for you. But in the box was the fob watch. I forgot about it really. I opened it a few days ago and in it was me, someone who I had forgotten I was.”
To Brian’s credit, he didn’t blink or so much as flinch. Years of dealing with My Chemical Romance had diminished his freak out metre.
“I’m an alien, Brian,” Bob continued on and pointed his finger upwards. “From outer space.”
Brian stared at Bob and then exploded off of the couch, “WHAT THE FUCK, BOB? WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?”
Rolling his eyes, Bob got up and went around the table and grabbed Brian’s hands and placed them on his chest.
“I am not feeling up your man boobs here, Bryar!” Brian stated and tried to pull away from Bob’s strong grip and then paused.
Eyes narrowing, Brian looked up at Bob and then back at Bob’s chest and leaned in, ear pressed against the fabric. Then he switched to the other side of Bob’s chest. Brian’s eyes widened and he found himself scrambling backward until the back of his knees hit the couch and he hit the cushions with a thud.
“You have two heartbeats, Bob,” Brian got out.
Bob nodded. “Yeah, my species has two hearts,” he said running a hand over his beard. “Kinda makes this samba beat if you listen to it through a stethoscope.”
“You have two heartbeats, Bob,” Brian said again.
Bob snapped his fingers a couple of times in front of Brian’s face. “You freaking out on me here, Schechter?”
Of course I’m fucking freaking out here! Brian thought wildly. One of my best friends tells me he’s an alien, offers proof and and I’m not suppose to freak out? Brian swatted the fingers away and took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m good, just gimmie a minute here.”
After the minute that Brian asked for, Bob placed his hand on Brian’s shoulder and asked softly, “Brian?”
Standing up quickly and knocking Bob’s hand off his shoulder, Brian smiled wide and looked a little manic. “So, alien, huh?”
Bob nodded and took a step back. “Yeah, alien.” Brian still seemed a little wound up.
“And what, you’ve always known you were an alien and only now you decided to share?”
“No, for all of my human life here on Earth, I was human,” Bob explained. “But when I opened that fob watch, it released the stored up energy and DNA of my alien self and restored me to my original self.”
“So it was an accident that released alien you?” Brian laughed.
Bob sheepishly grinned. “Yeah.”
“So, what kind of alien are you anyways? You look human.”
“And you look Time Lord,” Bob snorted. “Time Lords came first.”
Brian’s eyebrows rose in frank disbelief.
Bob grimaced and rubbed a hand through his beard. "Sorry, my species, we're a little arrogant."
"So, Time Lord?"
"It's a title that I earned," Bob said stuffing his hands into his hoodie pockets. "I went to school to get that title. But yeah, Time Lord is just a title that my people used. I come from a planet called Gallifrey, so I'm technically Gallifreyian, but use Time Lord to describe what I do."
"And what does that mean? What you do?"
Bob looked a little sheepish. "Well, in layman terms, I'm a time traveler, Bri."
Brian's eyebrows rose and he quietly freaked the fuck out. "Time travel is real?"
Bob nodded.
"Fuck."
Bob snorted.
"So what happened? Why are you on Earth and not," Brian waved a hand through the air. "Time traveling and whatever your people do."
"We were just about to go to war with a race called Daleks. Really nasty, you don’t want to run into them,” Bob explained as patiently as he could. What he learned was that you didn't share information with lesser species, but Brian was his friend and he'd been living as a human for the past thirty or so odd years. He could not explain it to Brian. It was Brian. “Last thing I remember is a lot of pain, and I think I was de-aged, turned human and left on those orphanage steps.”
"So, someone got the drop on you," Brian pointed out, trying to wrap his head around everything he was being told.
"Nearest I can figure out."
Brian nodded, “Okay, so you lived however long on Earth and then got deaged, so you were a different age before you got dropped here." He eyed Bob. "So, how old are you really and how did someone manage to change your species? Last time I checked that wasn't possible.”
Bob grimaced, not sure on how to answer what Brian was asking. “Listen, Brian. You have to realize my kind is very long lived, but last I checked, I’m about a hundred and forty.”
In hindsight, Brian realized missing the couch when he went to go sit down was a bad idea as he hit the floor hard. “A HUNDRED AND FORTY?” Yelling wasn’t probably good either.
Bob hunched and stuffed his hands into his hoodie pockets-the perfect picture of Bob Bryar being defensive.
Brian sighed and slowly stood up. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to freak out again.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Just a lot you’re throwing at me here.”
Bob scowled at Brian. “Fucker.”
“I know,” Brian nodded, agreeing with Bob. “So, change in species?”
“Best I can figure out is someone used a Chameleon Arch on me,” Bob explained. “It’s a piece of Gallifreyian tech that allows someone to change species, and then they de-aged me somehow and sent me to Earth.”
“How’d the hell did you let someone get the drop on you, Bryar?” Brian asked in a teasing voice.
“I don’t know, and I don’t remember, Schechter,” Bob replied back in a flat tone. “I was just about to go to war.” And then Bob’s eyes looked sad. “I don’t know if anyone survived or if the war is over.”
“Right, right,” Brian nodded to himself and then looked at Bob. “So, how do we find out what happened?”
“We?”
Brian lightly smacked Bob on the shoulder. “Yeah, we, you dumbass. I’m not letting you do this on your own.” Especially after everything you told me.
Bob softly smiled at Brian, and the defensiveness left his posture. “Thanks Brian.” And then Bob looked serious. “As to how we find out what happened next,” He pointed at the manmade iPad, “we use this to find my spaceship.”
“Of course, you have a spaceship,” Brian chuckled.
“Well, time ship technically, but it gets me around,” Bob grinned.
“Right, time ship.” Brian threw up his hands. “What else could it be?”
Snickering, Bob grabbed the manmade iPad and booted it up. The screen lit up as a series of symbols danced on the screen. Bob’s fingers flew over the screen, and a 3D map of North America appeared above it.
“Whoa,” Brian muttered.
The map zoomed in on America and then the state of Illinois, and then it zoomed on the city, Chicago. A dot blinked on the city, but it didn’t elaborate any further.
“Looks like we’re going home, Schechter,” Bob smirked at Brian.
“Great, Windy City, here we come,” Brian deadpanned.
~~~
Slush littered the grounds of Chicago, and Brian cursed coming back home. It was wet and windy, and he was miserable as he watched Bob tinker with the homemade iPad time ship finder.
In the last few hours, Brian had gone from being in L.A., freaking out over Bob maybe having a mental breakdown, to finding out one of his best friends was a freaking alien-from space. It was a little suspicious at how fast they were able to get tickets and get here, but Brian wasn’t going to complain.
Bob needed him. It was as simple as that.
Pulling out his Sidekick, Brian fired off a couple of texts to Mikey, letting him know Bob was fine, just got caught up in a new project and forgot to charge his phone and a power surge had fried the laptop.
It was a piece of crap that Brian was sure Mikey saw right through, but it was all he had at the moment. Huddled in his hoodie slash windbreaker combo, Brian pocketed his phone and blew warm air into his hands. “Any luck yet?”
Brian was ignored as Bob’s fingers flew over the touch screen and little puffs of air escaped from Bob’s lips as he muttered curses that didn’t sound English to Brian.
“Right, now you decide to go alien on me,” Brian muttered as he looked around. The two were in front of the orphanage that Bob had been ‘left’ in front of. It was an imposing building of stone and heavy wooden doors.
And just like the rest of Chicago, it screamed it had history.
A beeping noise brought Brian out of his musings, and Bob seemed a bit more animated.
Approaching Bob, Brian leaned against him and looked at the mcguyvered iPad. “Did Lassie find Timmy down the well?”
Snorting, Bob hit the screen a few more times with his fingers. “Something like that.” Bob reached out and grabbed Brian by his jacket and pulled him along. “C’mon, Schechter, we’re close.”
Stumbling a bit at the sudden tug, Brian quickly found his feet and followed the quickened pace that Bob had set. “Fucker, some of us are shorter than others.”
“Should’ve drank your milk when you were younger,” Bob shot back.
They had only gone a couple of blocks from the orphanage building when they stopped in front of a high stone fence covered in ivy with pointed finials on top. It almost looked like a gate, but it didn’t have any type of door.
“I used to come here all the time when I lived at the orphanage,” Bob whispered. Bob hesitated and placed a hand on the stone wall and pushed.
A startled yelp escaped from his lips as he fell forward and through the wall.
“Bob!” Brian called out and ran after his friend through the stone wall without a second thought.
Branches and brush battered at Brian’s body as he brought his hands up to protect his face. As he continued forward the growth became less dense; soon, he hit Bob’s back and fell backward.
An undignified noise escaped from Brian’s lips as he stared upwards and glared at the back of Bob’s hoodie. “Any reason why we stopped our little journey here, Bryar?”
But Bob kept quiet.
“Bob?”
There was still no response. Concerned for his friend, Brian quickly got to his feet and stepped in front of Bob. “Bob?”
Bob gestured behind Brian. “She’s still here.”
Glancing behind him, Brian only saw a very large white oak tree. It was indigenous to Chicago. It was actually the state tree of Illinois, but that didn’t really concern Brian. What concerned him was that Bob seemed to have gone crazier.
“It’s just a white oak, Bob,” Brian stated gently as he rubbed Bob’s arm in a comforting manner. “They’re all over the place here in Chicago.”
Bob growled at Brian. “It has a cameoflage filter on it. It’s made to look like something in the area so people don’t steal it.” Side stepping Brian, Bob grabbed the sleeve of Brian’s jacket and manhandled him toward the tree. “C’mon.”
Protesting, Brian tried to dig his heels in. “I am not getting in the tree, Bob!”
Bob smirked and propelled Brian forward.
Losing his balance, Brian found himself going head first into the white oak. He closed his eyes and waited for the impact that would most likely give him a broken nose and a concussion. When it didn’t come, he cautiously opened his eyes and gaped in wonder.
The room was circular and lights were slowly turning on for the occupants in the ship. The walls were covered in heavy cords of grey, black, blue, with the odd red one threaded through. Glancing down, Brian could see that the floor was see-through, almost like glass, and that the cords snaked down. In the middle of the room was some sort of hexagonal consol board. Each side that protruded out looked like a different mixing board to Brian, and it oddly fit with the theme of the ship. In the centre of the hexagon was a large clear tube that glowed blue, and inside the tube was some sort of rotor that moved up and down. Off to the side of the room there were two doorways that Brian guessed went into the interior of the ship. There was also a couple of puffy black leather couches with a couple of blankets thrown on them on the other side as well.
“It’s-it’s-” Brian stammered.
Bob came up from behind Brian and squeezed his shoulder. “Freaking out on me again, Brian?”
Brian felt his eye twitch. “Just a little. It’s certainly bigger on the inside than the outside.”
“That’s what she said,” Bob joked.
It broke the tension, and Brian laughed hard.
Wiping away the tears of mirth, Brian walked over to the console and lightly let his fingers dance over the buttons and various nodes. “So, we found your ship. Now what?”
“Now, I take you home and then I go find out what happened to my planet and people.”
“Excuse me?” Brian asked incredulously.
“I’m taking you home, Brian,” Bob said patiently. “My species, they’re not tolerant of humans. If I took you with me, they’d most likely erase your memories and then send you home. This way, you at least still remember.”
Brian glared at Bob as he stalked over and jabbed a finger into Bob’s chest. “I think that’s my decision and risk to make, Bryar.”
Frustrated, Bob ran a hand through his hair. “Fine, you stubborn asshole, but don’t come crying to me when they mess you up so bad you can’t remember to tie your own shoelaces.”
Brian just smirked.
Bob pointed a finger at Brain. “When we land on my planet, you don’t get out of the ship for anything, okay?”
“Okay.”
“No matter what, Schechter.”
Brian held up his hand and crossed his heart with the other. “I promise.”
“Good, that’s good,” Bob stated.
“So, how do we get this bird in the air?” Brian asked.
“You don’t; I do. And we’re going into the Time Vortex, not the air.”
Brian made some sort of mocking sound and then headed over to the leather couches and flopped down. “And it’s a jump to the left.”
Ignoring Brian, Bob went to work on the mixing boards that were acting like control panels. Buttons and switches were pressed and flipped and the rotor in the blue-lighted tube started to make some sort of grinding sound. Finally, the ground moved.
“WHOA!” Brian yelled out in surprise as the force rolled him off the couch. Getting to his feet, Brian glared at Bob, who was smirking in his direction. “Fucker. You did that on purpose.”
“I will neither confirm nor deny that.”
Stomping loudly over to where Bob was manning the controls, Brian punched Bob in the arm, hard, and glanced at the screen that started to lower down. “So how long is it going to take to get us there?”
“Not long.”
And that was the end of that conversation as Bob re-familiarized himself with the controls. Eyes occasionally glanced at the screen that was covered in the same strange geometric shapes that covered Bob’s walls back home. Reaching over, Brian tapped the screen. “Do these mean something? They were covered all over the walls of your LA home.”
Looking at what Brian was pointing at, Bob gave a smile. “It’s the written word of my original language.”
“So what? They were huge math geeks?” Brian joked.
Bob snorted. “Something like that, Schechter. Only it went beyond the math you know.”
“Huh.” Brian shrugged. “Well, it’s always-”
The rest of Brian’s sentence was cut off as the TARDIS encountered turbulence. Grabbing the mixing board in front of him, Brian tried to find his balance. “What’s going on, Bryar?”
Bob’s fingers flew over the boards. “I don’t know, we should be at Gallifrey right now.”
“Can’t your screen bring up a visual or something?”
Bob pounded on a big blue button at the top of the board, and Brian could see the tension in Bob’s fist from where it rested as a bigger flat screen was lowered.
Swirling fields of orange and red dust and scattered space rocks littered the area.
But there was no Gallifrey in sight.
A strangled moan and some sort of whine escaped from Bob’s throat as he collapsed to his knees. Brian caught him on the way down as Bob’s hand gripped the board, fingers pushing a couple of buttons, and they were off once again into what Brian assumed was the Time Vortex.
“It’s gone,” Bob whispered. “It’s all gone.”
Brian pulled Bob close and held him as the Time Lord poured out his rage and grief. Mumblings of ‘that’s why I couldn’t hear them?’ and ‘why?’ and ‘was it the Daleks?’ came from Bob’s mouth. Brian rubbed Bob’s back in circular motions as his jacket absorbed the moisture from Bob’s tears.
A shuddery breath escaped from Bob’s lips. “I’m the last one left, Brian.”
“I know, I know,” Brian said softly and continued rubbing Bob’s back. “I gotcha.” Moving so Bob was in a more comfortable position, he started to pet Bob’s hair. “We’re going to have to move, Bob. This position can’t be good for your wrists.”
Snuffling, Bob rubbed his nose against Brian’s t-shirt. “Wrists are fine. When I changed species it healed any damage I suffered as a human. So perfect wrists once again.”
Brian pulled in Bob closer as Bob clung to him, slowly falling to sleep.
“Perfect,” Brian sighed as Bob’s weight became more apparent. Grunting, Brian got to his feet and hauled Bob up. “Let’s get you over to the couches, you dead weight.”
As he started to carry Bob toward the couches, a series of whistles and lights caught his attention. Looking at the flat screen, Brian saw there was an arrow pointing toward the doorway and lights were lighting up on the floor, directing him toward the opening and into the ship.
“Guess we’re heading in.”
Grunting, Brian propped Bob up more and followed the lights on the floor into the ship. It was a series of two lefts, a right, past a garbage bin and another left before they stopped in front of the door. “I hope this is it, because he is a heavy Time Lord.” Brian called out to the ship.
The door whooshed open, and Brian found himself inside a large room with nothing but wood flooring and a raised bed in the middle. It looked half decorated.
Brian prepared himself for the final stretch and brought Bob over to the bed. Turning them around, he let them fall backward so their backs hit the comforter.
“Holy crap, I am never moving from this bed again,” Brian declared as he stretched out the kinks in his shoulders and back. After a few minutes of bliss, Brian got up and started to work Bob’s shoes off and then pulled the covers back and tucked Bob in. A hand caught his and Brian looked down to see Bob cuddling it close to his chest. Sighing, Brian climbed over Bob and lay over the covers and became the big spoon for the time being.
“What I do for you kid,” Brian murmured as he slowly fell asleep.
~~~
When Brian awoke, it was to an empty bed. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, he got out and followed the lights on the floor back to the control room of the TARDIS.
Smiling at the sight of Bob’s legs sticking out from underneath the console, he walked up and banged the board. “You alive down there, Bryar?”
There was a banging sound so loud you could hear Bob’s head bang up against the inside of the board and then muttered swearing. Inching his way out, Bob trained a pair of icy blue eyes on Brian, promising death as he rubbed his forehead. “Death, there is death in your future, Schechter.”
Brian just grinned and helped Bob up. “Promises, promises.”
Bob looked a bit hesitant and then pulled Brian into a quick hug. “Thanks for last night.”
“No problem,” Brian said patting Bob on the back awkwardly. “Although if I knew all it took was for you to turn into a giant girl was to change species-”
Blue eyes narrowed, and Bob punched Brian in the arm hard.
“So what were you doing down there?” Brian asked, smirking as he ignored the sting in his arm.
“A tune up, it’s been a while for her,” Bob explained as he gestured at the ship.
“Her?”
Bob patted the mixing board. “Yeah, her. She’s an organic ship and can understand us, Brian.”
Hazel eyes widened in surprise as Brian looked around.
“TARDISes are grown, not built,” Bob smirked at his friend.
“Wow,” Brian said in awe and also patted the mixing board. Then Brian looked at Bob, even though his friend got some sleep last night, Bob still looked tired. “Are those the clothes you slept in last night?”
Bob looked down at himself and then looked back up. “No. I changed my hoodie.”
“Well, la-dee-da,” Brian sing-songed. “What are we going to do now?”
Looking at Brian, Bob contemplated what he wanted to do next, and he knew what he had to do. “I have to find out what happened to my planet and my people.”
“Of course,” Brian agreed and then levelled Bob with a glare. “You do realize I’m coming with you, right?”
“Yeah,” Bob chuckled. “I know better than to argue.”
“Damn right.” And then Brian looked contemplative. “Can’t you use your ‘I see everything that was, is and will be’ thingy?”
“It’s called a Time Sense, Bri,” Bob said and then he frowned. “And no, I can’t. It’s like it’s blocked from seeing what happened to Gallifrey.”
“Well, crap.”
“Yeah.” Bob shook his head. “We’re going to have to do some investigating.”
“All right and how are we going to do that?”
Bob gestured at the TARDIS. “She picked up some readings at where Gallifrey was, and I’ll analyze them and go from there. Hopefully, I’ll be able to build something to follow the trail of whatever destroyed Gallifrey.”
“Well at least this type of traveling will be more comfortable than a tour bus,” Brian grumbled.
Chuckling, Bob agreed. “You can say that again. We are traveling in style.”
“We’re going to have to head back to Earth, though, to let my boss know I’m going to be gone for a bit,” Brian explained.
Bob raised an eyebrow. “Brian, we’re in a time ship. I can get us back to the minute we left Chicago.”
Brian looked taken back. “Oh right.” A sheepish look spread across Brian’s face. “I forgot there for a minute.”
“Idiot,” Bob said fondly.
“Drummer boy,” Brian snarked back.
Bob just grinned and went back to fine tuning the TARDIS.
END PART 2.
PART 1 // PART 3 // PART 4