3.03: The Middle Men

## Episode

Continuing on from last episode, several masked figures appear to be walking through the multiverse portal and can be seen pointing at Shane through the portal, their voices echo around the strange place "We saw everything, it's over for you now!" as Shane looks on with an expression of panic and confusion.

These masked men seem to be different from the ones at Live Control, these are dressed in all black suits compared to the casual business suits Live Control recruits wear, they surround Shane and Tirnel.

"Travelling masked men from the multiverse, very ominous...if a little weird" Shane says jokingly, the masked men seem to show no emotion, one of them pulls out a device and scans him - the masked man seemingly nods and the others go to grab Shane, some suddenly get tangled and choked by vines summoned by Tirnel - the masked man with the scanner looks around only for Shane to say "Your taking me nowhere" before using his lightning powers to electrocute the masked man in front of him.

The other masked men go limp as their final breath leaves their bodies thanks to the vines and they drop to the floor dead.

Tirnel says to Shane "I guess we will never know their true intentions now" Shane just shrugs "They've tortured me enough" Tirnel interrupts "They came from the portal you moron, whose to say they weren't different" Shane again just shrugs, Tirnel grows impatient "SHANE" she growls subtly as she gets mad, Shane just sits down on the floor "I need a holiday" he says before continuing "Tirnel, thank you for the help but I need to continue on my journey" Tirnel just looks at him "Your leaving now..." she says unimpressed.
"I have no business here, I dont want you to drag my shit into your life" he says before walking away, the garden seemingly disappearing as he goes through the perception filter.

Elsewhere, The Director can be seen in the suited man's office - the two sit opposite each other with a white table in the middle of them, the suited man has paperwork next to him with various people on them "I feel like the recruitment test with those subjects went rather well" the suited man begins, he is refering to the homeless people they tested on.

The Director nods "Yes sir, it is clear that our machines do what the bosses say they do" the suited man smiles "Of course they work and I can see the look in your eyes, your nervous" The Director looks on from behind his mask and shakes his head "Nervous? what do you mean?" the suited man assures him "It's ok, the recruitment is nearly ready for Phase 2, patience my friend" The Director seems confused "Phase 2?" The suited man nods and pulls a diagram of the Live Control recruitment machine up "So we can change people's appearance and brain patterns to make them work for us...unknowing slaves in a way but Phase 2 is bigger than that...we just need test subjects."

The Director nods "Right" he is interrupted by the suited man "However not homeless people, bring me the corpses of those Torchwood members from the compound." the suited man orders in a menacing tone, The Director quickly stands up and leaves the room seemingly very uncomfortable with the talk he just had.

Back in Portugal, Shane can be seen walking along the mountain tracks talking to himself "Live Control, that's all I know about them - they want Torchwood gone, they know seemingly everyone and their seems to be another force controlling the whole operation...this isn't confusing at all" he says sarcastically as he continues to head back into town.

Elsewhere, The Director soon returns with a small bag and three dead bodies, He lays them on the table and The suited man stares at them "They look like the ones from the other night." "Its because they are" The Director says, the suited man tells The Director to put them in the machine "Each machine should have a test run dont you think?" the suited man asks The Director. The Director simply nods in agreement and puts the three corpses in the machines, this time a panel on the back opens up and the three bodies begin to change.
"What will they become?" The Director asks - The suited man replies "Guards if you like, a way of recruiting more people...naturally the general public wont like normal people in riot gear showing up and taking people away so lets make it more...strange" the suited man says as the machines fall quiet.

The Director opens the doors to the machines revealing an extremely grotesque sight, a guards uniform has been sewn onto the body of the first corpse, the skin has been peeled back to reveal the organs beneath.

The suited man inspects them with The Director commenting "This one didn't seem to work" The suited man agrees so they open the second machine revealing another horribly mutated guard "This one looks like it had working parts at least" The suited man says with a smirk. He turns to The Director and asks "So who do you think it will work best for?"

The Director responds "Well that Shane guy for a start, if he gets back to his Torchwood base he could essentially take down this whole operation" The suited man nods in agreement and The Director continues "Then we have the other homeless people here, I'd say that if you sew this onto one of them they will become an unstoppable killing machine."
They gather the recently recruited homeless people and they mindlessly step into the machines, mechanical whirring can be heard as the machines begin to work "Perfect" The suited man says happily. The Director just watches in amazement "What is it?."
He simply replies "Nothing, the machines do what they're supposed to and thats impressive in itself" he claps and bounces around, a moment of insanity showing itself. The machine goes quiet after a few minutes and The Director opens the door expecting to find a mutated guard "Well.?" - The suited man simply replies "It's done, let's pack up what we've got and move on" Inside the machine, the three people have been oblivious to the procedure "We're nearly done" one of the men says To the other two who nod in response, they seem to have had some kind of brain procedure done to them as their eyes are now a silvery colour and various stitchings can be seen in the head of the people.

The converted men seem to talk with somewhat robotic voices as the suited man and Director pack up the equipment.

Back in Portugal, Shane returns to Lisbon and spends the night there, he decides to have some fun in the city - going in arcades and just taking in the sights like he's put the Live Control agency case on hold for the night, he says to himself as he sleeps in a hotel room he brought with money on the bank card he had with him "Best case scenario they send another team overnight, if they don't, then I'll deal with it in the morning" he thinks as he falls asleep.

Shane walks up the next morning to a beautiful Lisbon sunrise, that morning he researches Live Control on one of the hotel's computers and see if there are any clues as to who these people are or where they are, search results are almost non existent its like this agency doesn't exist at all, after some solid hours of researching to no avail he returns to his room to chill out when there's a knock on the door of his room, Shane cautiously approaches the door "Hello?" he asks seriously.

"Hello" a voice says back this one is female and speaks with a Nordic accent "You're Danish aren't you?

"No British" Shane responds in a confused way "Bit of a strange question."

The voice laughs "My boyfriend is, he's always talking about Danish beer and stuff, he's on a trip of Scandinavia for work and...

"I think you've got the wrong room" Shane says cutting her off.

The voice seems annoyed at his abruptness "Oh...okay then" she says and takes her leave.

"Fucking tourists" Shane says in a tense way knowing Live Control could literally be anywhere.

Realizing he has another night in this Lisbon hotel, Shane decides to once again chill out in his room, he finds himself undisturbed all night and once again put the case of Live Control on hold "Can't find out too much in one go" he tells himself as he then gets some much needed sleep.

During this sleep, he dreams - the dream finds himself on the estate of a former friend who can be seen standing alone in the middle of a park field, she beckons Shane over in the dream only to reveal a strange beetle creature attached to her back, its legs visible to him over her shoulders, she tells him menacingly "This is Spikey, he'll keep you safe tonight." - "Trickster's Brigade" Shane says in the dream in shock as he suddenly wakes up from the dream, he quickly grabs a notepad from reception and quickly start writing down what he knows about The Trickster's Brigade thinking that the dream he had meant something, after hours of writing he has written the following: "The Trickster's Brigade were a group of beings led by the Trickster, a creature from beyond the universe" he also writes "Like their leader, the Brigade look to change the course of history by altering details in individuals' lives, this change can be tiny or huge, their main aim is to create chaos and disorder...exactly like Live Control" Shane starts to think if Live Control and The Trickster's Brigade are connected thinking the dream he just had was a sign "Maybe the two are the same" you think to yourself as you head down for breakfast.

When he gets down to the restaurant for breakfast, the hotel seems quiet, a few other people are there having breakfast until the man at the reception desk notices Shane and waves him over "There's a man here to see you."

Shane seems cautious but tells the receptionist to take him to this man.

The receptionist leads Shane to a meeting room where to his surprise Shane sees three men sitting at a table "Please, take a seat" one of them says politely. Shane sits opposite of them, hands on the table clenched, staring at them "I take it you are Live Control?" - The middle man of the three men shakes his head "No, we haven't been contacted by Live Control, we are a rival group looking to take control of what they are trying to get, trying to stop disease from spreading, and the other things they want to do."

"Finally some more good guys" Shane seems relieved "I'm Shane...leader of Torchwood: Lincoln City" he says introducing himself.

The man in the middle nods "Yes, we know who you are, though your group is a bit obscure, I assume you work better as a team" he says, the youngest man (the man on the right) seems to speak again "Where is your team?" he asks, Shane doesn't respond only sighs, the youngest man responds "Oh...I'm sorry" he responds as the other two men look at him disapprovingly.

"So, what do I call you?" Shane asks.

The middle man responds, all 3 of them revealing Torchwood ID's "Your backup" he says "I'm Dan, this is Alexa and this is Colin" the middle man introduces himself and his teammates. They all seem to go into some sort of code for a few minutes, then Shane notices the man at the desk has been watching him while chewing on a pencil "So, what's your plan?" he asks. "Someone deal with him" Dan says unimpressed at the receptionist, Colin walks over to the receptionist and drags him out the room before comically putting up a Do Not Disturb sign on the door.

Shane seemingly examines the three new people he just met, first theres Dan - a middle aged man, who seems nice but has a very firm personality, Shane imagines he would be good at giving orders but not so good at following them.

Then theres Alexa - she seems nice and has colourful hair that would probably look good in a pony tail. he imagines she would be the one handling the cases for the group and finally theres Colin - a big man who has a funny side to him but when he works for Torchwood he seems all business.

Dan sees that Shane have zoned out and brings him back round, he asks "So...Live Control, what do we know?" to little response as no one really knows anything other than they take Torchwood members off the streets and seemingly kill them like they did with some of Torchwood: London's crew.

Elsewhere, a black car with the suited man and The Director in it can be seen driving down a motorway, the converted people sit in the back idlily.

The Director asks "Are we sure we want to do this test in public, that surely will bring us into public view which we dont want."

The suited man doesnt respond, he just pulls the headrests back and asks The Director "You ready?"

The car pulls up into the middle of London, the police quickly approach the vehicle saying where they parked is illegal only for the suited man to open the back doors and the three converted men maul the policeman.

The Director looks at his phone and then to the London Eye, he gets out of the car and walks off, leaving the suited man in charge of the other two.

The three converted men have now mauled the nearby policeman to death causing people to run and freak out, the suited man notices The Director has walked off and radios him "I hope you know what your doing" The Director nods and just says "Yes" and forces his way onto the London Eye with a strange device, he reaches the top and presses a button where a strange high pitched noise is heard from the device causing the people down below and around where the suited man is to cover their ears however this isnt enough as its clear something is happening to them.

Suddenly the crowd of people below seem to change and leap on unexpected passers by near them, they attack with incredible speed and ferocity, the Director stays on the London Eye ferris wheel as the savage attacks continue, the suited man declaring to The Director by radio that "We are in a new age, Phase 2 of recruitment...kill all the people who just don't make the cut and what better way to cover our tracks then make it look like a massacre."

Back in Portugal - Shane, Dan, Alexa and Colin are watching the news seeing all this unfold live The news reporter even gets attacked and mauled live on TV as the news reader is clearly freaked out as they urge people to stay in their homes if they live in Central London The suited man notices a downed camera and picks it up and says to everyone watching the news at that point "Does Live Control have your attention now" before pulling off his own face revealing a "real" one to the audience, his real face has grey skin and silver eyes (like the converted men) "Maybe i should finally introduce myself" the suited man says now he has revealed his "true" face.

The suited man then laughs "But thats no fun, I will let you figure that out....and Torchwood if your watching, you have 48 hours left to try and stop us...before Live Control consumes the world, plunging it into eternal chaos!" he announces before he knocks the camera over causing it to go static.

## Characters

* Shane
* Dan
* Alexa
* Colin
* Tirnel Gilorndes
* The Director
* "The Suited Man"