2.01: The Empty Planet

"The Empty Planet" marks the start of the second season of Torchwood: Lincoln City.

### Location (s)

Lincoln City, UK
 Amicus spaceship
 Tamriel

## Episode

The wind can be heard rushing around as we see a panning shot of a jungle, birds can be heard and an emu like creature can be seen running around but stops and looks as a group of bandits run through the jungle they are mostly wearing all black armour, they discuss what to do with the goods they've stolen as one of them looks into a bag where a chest of jewels can be seen, the bandit then he winces he looks down to see a lightning bolt in his abdomen he falls to the floor as the other two bandits look behind them to see where it came from, "Oh gods, there's someone here" says one of the bandits who is visibly panicked as the other one is knocked out seemingly from nowhere. The lone bandit grabs the bag and runs for his life through the dense jungle, we then see someone holding and aiming a bow and arrow which fires and hits the bandit right in the leg, the bandit screams for his life as a figure in silver-red armour approaches him, "Who....who...ARE YOU?" the bandit is clearly shaken he even has tears in his eyes, the man rips off the bandit's mask revealing a middle aged altmer "Look, if you....you...want this....then take it" the bandit says as he offers the figure the bag but the figure refuses, the bandit replies "O..ok....can you....erm...please let me...go...or at least get the arrow...out of me" he gulps "We...took the jewels...because...we had no choice...our village...is starving...we need them...so we can trade...for food" The bandit then screams as a right hook knocks out the bandit, the man walks off, following this the emu looking creature returns and starts feasting on the bandit as the camera pans out and we see what looks like a town in Tamriel with the jungle in the foreground, we then hear the bandit scream as a crow flies at the camera which leads into the title sequence.

The portal back at the Torchwood base opens which looks run down and almost on the brink of disrepair due to the events of the series 1 finale with the team falling apart and Shane walks out in that silver red armour he would take it off and replace it with more casual attire however it would look like he doesn't remember how he ended up wearing the armour. He looks a lot more depressed, he sighs and walks over to one of the screens which is static, he bangs on it with his hand and the screen comes back on, he seems to not mind the run down Torchwood base, he also can be seen going through and deleting the profiles of Lewis and Zach "I don't know if I can do this anymore" he says finally before heading out into the street. On street level, the city itself seems busy and a very positive vibe can be felt all around as people get on with their days, Shane seems a bit happier now however it would seem somethings bothering him, he would then go for a walk around the city "They say walking is good for the body." he says before heading off.

Elsewhere at an unknown location, a room can be seen with several hibernation chambers it is unclear what's in them however they seem to be important as they are being monitored by a figure on a chair, they seem to be scanning the city and there system picks up Shane on his walk and the system seems to be reading and discovering how he feels and what his emotions are, "Scan further" a strange voice says as the system seems to scan his brain waves "Well looks like someone could use a friend" the voice says before what looks like a glass hand can be seen activating a hibernation chamber.

Back in Lincoln, Shane continues his walk ranting at himself "Hmm maybe I should never have took Torchwood's contract because look at me, im a massive wreck right now. Kasuti's inactive to do her own thing, Zach got killed by Cybermen and Lewis left the team...this has fallen apart in so many ways and to make matters worse my memory of my Tamriel adventures is getting thinner....not easy being me."

Exiting the hibernation chamber at the unknown location is a glass person, it meets another glass person which was the source of the hand "This is Shane, last name unknown, of the human race, our system tells us that depression has taken over his life this is unacceptable" the glass person then brings up a database on a massive screen running down all his friends "choose a few" says the glass person "but be discreet." says the glass person, the other glass person nods and proceeds to teleport away, upon arriving in Lincoln the glass person has become Lewis.

Shane turns a corner and rather conveniently finds "Lewis" on his phone he looks up and says "Shane? What are you doing this far away from the base?" Shane seems confused "Is that any of your business?" he asks rather bluntly "No, it isn't...anyway I wanted to find you to say I want to come back to the team" Lewis says with a rather weird smile on his face, Shane continues to be sceptical of Lewis "We aren't taking vacancies right now" Shane then quickly leaves obviously not caring about Lewis ever since he abandoned the Torchwood team. The glass person's form returns to normal and tells the presumed leader of the glass people "Unsuccessful" the leader replies "You were too artificial, try something else" without any response the glass person follows the same path as Shane whilst remaining in its form but it would quickly turn back to Lewis.

Shane continues to walk down the high street, he stops to look at his phone where the notification "No new messages" can be seen on it, Shane sighs and literally throws his phone in rage "IM SO ALONE IN THE WORLD" he screams which causes a lot of weird looks from passers by, he then realises what he has done and rushes over and grabs his phone, however before he can pick it up 'Lewis' picks it up and hands it to him "What are you doing throwing things Shane?" Shane looks at him "Look, after the team fell apart and you left and all that, my life hasn't been the same I've been struggling to find 'a purpose' lets say, you see with Torchwood I felt like I was doing something right for a change, I had friends, my world was perfect but then it all blew up in my face and THEN YOU LEFT ME IN THAT FIELD, YOU ABANDONED TORCHWOOD" Shane starts to rant at him trying to hold back tears when he starts full on shouting at him to show that he is passionate about Torchwood. Lewis seems taken back "Well why didn't you tell anyone how you truly feel?" Shane replies more calm yet still monotone "I can't...I don't let myself as I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings" Lewis seems even more taken back by this. Back at the unknown location the leader of the glass people opens up another screen which is a point of view camera so they can see their figures in the field, the camera begins to shake "Return to the ship, you must return to hibernation. His words have cracked you" Lewis pauses for a moment "Come with me" he says all of a sudden, Shane looks on "Im sorry what?" "Come on, I need to show you something" Lewis says whilst Shane's scepticism returns and before he knows, Lewis starts to crack he grabs Shane and teleports him up to the unknown location.

Shane seems dizzy as he tries to regain his surroundings "Not trying to be captain obvious here, but this seems to be some kind of colony spaceship." Lewis nods as the subtle cracks keep appearing on him "How long have you known about this?" he asks Lewis curiously "Not for long" Lewis shrugs "Its like it appeared from nowhere" Shane looks over and sees the hibernation chambers as the lights come on in the ship "Definitely a colony spaceship, these are status chambers" he says looking at the control panel he seems to want to push the buttons on it, Lewis then warns him "Don't push that, you may disturb them" "Them?" Shane says, Lewis turns on the light to see a cracked glass person, "Ok..." Shane says examining the glass person, he all of a sudden feels a rush of energy and he feels like his former self a bit more "So, what do we have?" he asks himself "Teleported to a ship above the Earth, strange glass people and...weird big screens" he says looking up and Lewis tries to enter the hibernation chamber, "What are you doing?" Shane asks as he sees Lewis getting into the chamber before cracking to the floor revealing tiny glass shards "Oh....I've just been scammed....BY GLASS" Shane jokes "Listen to me cracking jokes" he says seemingly not knowing what to do with himself.

A chair then turns revealing the leader who looks the same as the glass people in the chambers "Hello Shane" the leader says "I am the control node of this civilisation" "This is NOT a civilisation though, this is a run down colony ship, how you even found it I don't know" the control node ignores this and says with a strange voice "We are what the universe calls Amicus, the balance of happiness in the universe" Shane interrupts "Soooooo....why bring me here, your obviously monitoring the city from here so what's the deal with you?" The control node blankly looks at Shane it is obvious at this point that the glass people show no emotion due to them just being glass figures, "We monitor the races of the universe, balance is necessary in the universe, happiness is essential" Shane looks with somewhat intrigue yet he looks at the node "You do know using your "troops" here to do your work wont help...i mean look at them" he says pointing to the cracked glass people "humans are obviously to complex for you to register into your system, even now your screens desert you" he says pulling out his iPad "Where did you get that?" the node asks "Well.....you don't wanna know" he says as he logs into the Torchwood network and uses the map of the Earth and its orbit to find the ship and would then press a few buttons on the iPad screen, during this the control node says "You know, we have some of the most advanced technology on this ship, we can copy anyone anywhere as long as we know what the person were after likes...but we don't intend to kill or anything, we just..." Shane smiles for a change and then cheekily says "Stop talking, brain thinking, hush" he seems to be back to himself.

"What are you doing?" asks the control node with no emotion what so ever "What you should have done...restored my happiness" he laughs clearly joking "Really?" asks the control node "No....now get away from my planet" the node looks confused as Shane shows them the iPad he has revealing he has uploaded a virus to the Amicus system causing the ship to shake "That's the thing about glass copies" says Shane "There easily cracked" he says with a really smug look before disappearing back to Earth, the virus does more than just disable the Amicus systems the node looks around to see all there glass people crack, sparks start to fly everywhere, the node simply says "Clever boy" before it to cracks which causes the ship just to float aimlessly away from Earth and out of sight.

Back in Lincoln, Shane decides its time to get his life back on track and cleans out the base giving it a more cleaner look "Torchwood is back in business" he then realises he has 1 new message on his phone its from a friend of his and it says "Nice work but a real job would be nice wouldn't it?" Shane replies with a few laughing emojis he seems to now be in a mentally good place as the end credits roll.

## Characters

* Shane
* "Lewis"

## "The Empty Planet Controversy"

The episode, "The Empty Planet", was released during a period of poor mental health for Shane (the writer and creator of this universe) and when he first showed the episode off to his online friends, one of them called it out for "taking the mick of out depression" however this was never the case and whilst, looking back on it, it isn't a story that Shane is proud of writing but it, to him, acts as a "time capsule" to a much more different time in his life.