Chapter Text
“Excuse me, I heard there was an army base around here. Do you know how I could go about joining?”
“Aye, you could ask those two soldiers over there.” The Bartender said as he pointed over to the corner of the pub, where two men were sitting.
“Thank you.” Kate had just turned sixteen when her mother had kicked her out. Fiona had never liked her daughter but kept her on so other people wouldn’t say she was a bad mother, but on Kate’s birthday, she had told her to get out and never come back. She’d known it was coming, but she didn’t expect it the moment she was old enough. Kate had spent the last six months exploring the country to try and find somewhere to settle, but nowhere seemed right. She had knocked on people’s doors, asking them if she could do something in the garden for them and then spent the night in a room wherever she could, but all of that jumping from one place to another had brought her here. A small town just outside London.
She went over to the table. “Excuse me sirs, do you know how I can join up at the army base here?”
The two men looked at each other.
“How old are you?” One of them asked.
Kate didn’t like to lie, but she had to if she wanted to get in. “Eighteen sir.”
Thankfully, they looked convinced. “My name’s Captain Yates and that’s Sergeant Benton.” Captain Yates told her.
“Kate Lethbridge Stewart.” She said.
Once again, Benton and Yates gave each other a look, but this time with a slight shock. “Nice to meet you. I shall speak to the recruitment officer tomorrow morning and we’ll sort something out so you can start your training. Will you be here at fourteen hundred hours tomorrow?”
“Yes, sir.”
Yates gave her a nod. “I’ll give you all the information, then.”
Kate smiled. “Thank you. Have a good evening.” She told them as she talked back to the table she was sat at earlier.
A few seconds later, a girl her age with long brunette hair and glasses sat down opposite. “Are you really eighteen?”
“I am now.” Kate said, not trusting this person wouldn’t just go up to the soldiers and tell them.
The girl shrugged. “Do your parents know that you’re joining the army?”
“Dad’s dead and mother wouldn’t care if I was dying in a ditch.” She said.
“I’m sorry.” She told her. “My Uncle is a Scientist for Unit…you know, the place you just signed up for, and it sounds a fascinating place. I can’t tell you what they do exactly because that’s classified, but it’s a brilliant place. I’m Osgood, by the way. Well, technically, Petronella’s my first name but I hate it. My middle name’s not much better. Eustacia.” Osgood screwed her face up.
Kate had only just met her, but she could tell they would get along. “I think it’s a pretty name personally. My name’s Katherine, but Kate or Katie would be better. Don’t mind which.”
Osgood smiled at her. “Nice to meet you, Kate.”
“Nice to meet you too, Osgood.” Kate said. “Do you live around here?”
“Sort of.” She told Kate. “I live here during the holidays, but I go back to my parents for the term. Summer’s only just started thank goodness.”
Kate felt a wave of relief. Finding a friend at long last was the best feeling she had experienced in a while. “I’m glad it’s only just started.”
-
The sun streamed through the curtains of Kate’s room the next morning. She woke up to the smell of freshly cooked bacon and the sound of someone humming a lively tune from the room next door.
Today could be the day that changed everything for her.
She got dressed and went straight outside, not feeling in the mood for tons of bacon and eggs, so instead she went to the bakery next door to pick up a few pastries, including a straight out of the oven, Pan au Chocolat. Kate passed the Library and walked over to the town square, where there were a group of small children running over the grass. She sat herself down on a bench next to a bus shelter and ate her breakfast.
“Morning Kate.” Osgood said as she sat down next to the other girl.
Kate offered her a pastry. “Morning.”
“Your meeting isn’t until two is it? Did you want me to give you the grand tour?” She asked.
She finished eating her pastry. “I’d be honoured.”
So that’s what they did for the next two and a half hours. First, they went along the railway, up towards the primary school and came back via the fields so they wouldn’t get too close to the Unit base. They brought some ice-cream and came down past the church and over the bridge to the other side of the River so Osgood could show Kate where she lived and where the small Theatre/Cinema was.
“There is more.” Osgood told her. “But if we want to get lunch and be back in time for your meeting, then there wouldn’t be any point.”
Kate did a slow 360 turn. “This place is amazing.”
Osgood smiled. “It is isn’t it. You wouldn’t expect London to only be twenty miles away.”
“It’s only twenty miles away!” She exclaimed. “Oh, wow.”
“Most of the alien invasions happen in London, although apparently we get a few here every now and again.” Osgood said without thinking.
Kate stopped in her tracks. “Aliens!?”
She really didn’t want to be the one to tell Kate this. It was so hard to explain and she really wasn’t supposed to say anything about it in case Kate didn’t get in. “Yes aliens. That’s what Unit’s all about. The United Intelligence Task Force is basically here to save the world from alien threats and to help those who get lost. From what I’ve heard, there’s another organisation called Torchwood, but they’re a little more brutal.”
“I wasn’t expecting that.” Kate told her.
Osgood shrugged. “I’m not supposed to say anything about it otherwise the Brigadier will get mad.”
“It definitely makes me more eager for this interview.” She said. “Does the Brigadier run it?”
The two of them walked towards the pub.
“Pretty much. He seems a very nice person.” She said. “He likes to shout and blow things up when he’s in a mood, so what my Uncle told me. You said yesterday that your dad was dead.”
The change of subject was slightly confusing, but Kate understood that Osgood couldn’t say much more about Unit. “Yeah. He was in the army and got shot in India according to what mum told me. I think he was a Brigadier too. I remember the last time I ever spoke to him. It was on the phone about six years ago, and he said he’d just got a promotion. He sounded so proud and I was too but mum spent the night complaining how he could’ve spent all that time at home with us.” She sighed. “I didn’t understand at first why he never came back.”
“I’m sorry.” Osgood told her.
“No, it’s alright. I should probably talk about him more, anyway.” Kate said as they walked back over the bridge. A few ducks swam, underneath them, quacking away and occasionally bobbing their heads under the warm, clear water. “I’d do anything to get one more day with him.”
Osgood gave her a sad smile. “What was he like?”
So Kate spent the next twenty minutes telling Osgood everything she could remember about her dad, from the very first memory of him, all the way to the last time she saw him, which was on her tenth birthday. She hadn’t expected him to be there, but when she came downstairs on that Christmas Day, he was sat on the Sofa, still in his uniform and looking exhausted, but he was there with a giant smile on his face. He had stood up and Kate had ran into his arms for the biggest hug she’d ever had in her life. Kate hadn’t seen him for months, but all he could tell her was that he had been on a secret mission to Antarctica.
Of course, Fiona ruined the moment, getting Alistair to make the breakfast now he had bothered to turn up, but Kate said she’d help him because he didn’t look himself. He looked almost ill, but Fiona didn’t seem to care. Kate had told him to take a nap on the sofa, after they had dealt with the presents, but he told her he couldn’t sleep on this special day.
Kate knew now that he was being brave for her.
-
They got back to the pub and Osgood told Kate that she’d wait outside for her.
She felt slightly nervous as she walked into the building. Kate saw Captain Yates sitting in the same place he was last night, so she went over and sat opposite.
“Oh, good afternoon.”
“Good afternoon Captain.” She said back.
Captain Yates handed her over a small file which was titled ‘Confidential’ in big, bold letters. “I spoke to the recruitment officer this morning like I said I would, and he would like to offer you a place at the training grounds which are about three miles away. You’ll be placed there for about twenty-two weeks and then it’s your choice if you want to go to the regular Army or join Unit.”
Kate took the file but didn’t open it just yet. “Thank you, sir.”
“Of course it’ll be challenging and many don’t get through the first month, but that’s mostly because they’re not serious enough about it.” He explained. “Everything you need to know is in there, but if you have any other questions or if you decide not to go with it, then I’m in here most nights.”
She nodded. “Thank you.”
Captain Yates hesitated for a second and opened his mouth to say something but thought against it. He stood up. “Well, I wish you the very best. I must get back to HQ. ”
“Goodbye, sir.”
And he left without another word.
Kate wondered what it was he was going to say, but it couldn’t have been that important if he hadn’t said it. She took the file and went outside where her friend was waiting.
“That was quick.” Osgood said.
“It was rather.” She handed the file over to Osgood. “It wasn’t really an interview, it was more of a ‘here’s what you need to know, goodbye and good luck’ sort of thing.”
Osgood inspected it. “This is a proper Unit issued file. Look at the logo.”
She did.
They both agreed that the Logo was pretty cool.
“I suspect they have the official secrets act in here as well as all the bus times, open days, training hours and a medical form.” Osgood gave the file back to Kate and took her hand. “You’ll need to be somewhere hidden to read this. Don’t want it in the wrong hands.”
“Do you know a place?” She asked.
Osgood smiled. “Of course I do.”
-
Osgood lead her back down to the River again, but this time, they went down the embankment and under the bridge.
Kate opened the file and the two of them read every single word there was to make sure they wouldn’t miss anything. Apparently, there was a bus to the training grounds every two hours which was helpful and the uniform would be issued there. She was to arrive at eleven o’clock on the 27th of June, which was in three days’ time and she would be taken on a tour and shown to the barracks. Her training started on the 28th. She had to get up at five on weekdays and six on a Saturday (Seven on a Sunday) and was allowed to finish before dinner. Every other Sunday, she had the whole day off. During this time, she would be an Officer Cadet.
At the end of the 22 weeks, there would be a test and if she passed, she would be allowed to go on and work for Unit, where she would finally get the title ‘Private Lethbridge-Stewart’
The file was full of everything she ever needed.
“Kate, we can still write letters to each other can’t we?” Osgood asked uncertainly.
“Of course we can! And I’ll only be a few miles away, so once I get used to waking up at that time, we can see each other a lot…that is until you go home.” Kate told her.
Osgood smiled. “That’s good. Oh, let me give you both of the addresses.”
Kate wrote them down on a blank page at the back of the file.
“I think I remember the address to the training grounds.” Osgood said. “You never told me your last name.”
“Didn’t I?” Kate said, surprised. “It’s Lethbridge-Stewart.”
It was Osgood’s turn to look surprised. “But you said your dad was dead!?”
“He is.”
Osgood looked at her. “But Kate!…unless it’s a coincidence…”
“Osgood, what is it?” She asked desperately.
She turned away. “The Brigadier who runs Unit is called Lethbridge-Stewart. I mean it’s not a very common name, so there’s a big possibility that someone lied to you.”
Kate blinked and sighed. “Mum always liked lying. But surely dad would’ve still come over or at least sent a card.”
“Or maybe she told him the same thing.” Osgood said. “We can go up the the head quarters now and…”
“No!” Kate exclaimed. “I can’t…I just…”
Osgood took her hand again. “I understand, but if it is him, then you can’t ignore it forever. Especially if you’re living in the same town and working in the same building.
Kate knew Osgood had a point, but she just couldn’t deal with the fact that her dad could be alive. Although there was always a slight possibility of him not being her dad. If that were the case, it would just hurt more.
-
In the short time that Kate and Osgood had known each other, both of them could say that they were pretty close friends. They spent the next three days going about the Town, exploring the little walks in the forest and just having a great time by themselves. It was like they had known each other for ages, so it was a little hard when Kate had to leave Osgood at the bus station on the 27th to go to the training grounds.
It would be an adventure.
-
Kate arrived at the grounds and got off the bus, where there was someone waiting for her. They took her to the reception room first where she gave them the forms she had signed in before she got taken down to the Barracks. It was like what she had expected. A long room with bunk beds lining the sides. They were all empty.
“The other new recruits will arrive from London in half an hour. Choose a bed, get unpacked and go straight to the dining hall.” They said before leaving Kate alone in the room.
This was the first test. She had to be efficient but tidy, so she went straight to the bed closest to the door and neatly folded and put away the things she had brought. Kate had a photo of her dad in the frame, but the last thing she wanted was for someone to recognise him, so she put the photo neatly in a draw a hurried to the dining hall.
And so it began
-
Week 1
The first week was slow. No one really knew what they were doing, but each one of them knew that Colonel Johnson was being lenient with them, but it would change next week.
Kate had made a few friends. Caroline Harris in the bunk above her and Holly Smith in the bed next to her. Of course, neither of them could compare to the friendship she had with Osgood, but Kate understood that she had found maybe a lifelong friend.
In the first letter she wrote to Osgood, she explained everything that had happened in fine detail. Not that much had happened, but she said that she would go into town on Sunday and explain more later.
It had only been a short letter, but she expected they would eventually get longer with time.
-
Week 2
Every morning, they woke up and someone came in to make sure nothing was out of place. Their bed sheets had to be folded neatly at the end of the bed and the pillows were centrally placed at the top of the bed.
The cleaning and the organisation wasn’t hard to do since her mother had been just as strict with it.
After the inspection, they always did a mile of running in the large field behind the forest before breakfast. This was because there wasn’t always time to eat before an emergency struck, so by the time they headed for the dining hall, everyone was ready to get stuck in.
They were pushed their limits, physically and mentally. Sometimes someone even woke them up in the middle of the night where they had to get dressed and be on the field within five minutes before they had to run for another two miles.
Kate put in her letter to Osgood just how much she wanted to sleep in a comfy bed for twelve hours straight but if there was one bit of useful advise her mother had given her, it was to never be a quitter.
By the time it was Sunday, she was exhausted, but she still went into town to see Osgood.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come around mine for a bit and sleep?” She asked her friend.
Kate sighed. “But I promised I’d buy you food.”
“We can do both.” Osgood told her. “You need sleep, and I’ll wake you up so we can walk down to the town centre.”
She finally gave in. “Ok then.”
Osgood took her hand and helped her down the road. “I know it’s only week two, but I have every faith you’ll get to the end.” She said. “Just you wait when they teach you how to shoot and blow things up.”
Kate’s face lit up at ‘blow things up’ which Osgood found extremely funny.
“What?”
Osgood grinned. “Just something my uncle said. I think it was something to do with the Brig having a thing for blowing things up and your face just then…” She laughed.
Kate couldn’t help but laugh with her.
Like father like daughter.
-
Week 3
The week had started with a drill. It was just after dinner and the new recruits were out in the dark, crawling through the mud and trying not to get caught by each other. It was basically a game of hide and seek.
The first person to get caught had to do thirty push-ups.
The Second twenty-nine and so on.
Since there were only twenty of them there, the last ten didn’t have to do pushups. Kate was in the last seven.
The entire point of the exercise was not to get caught because you might die.
-
Week 4
A month in and Kate had finally grown use to the early mornings, so when she got to see Osgood that Sunday, she managed to stay up the entire time. They borrowed some bikes and rode down to the pond, with a picnic basket. It was doubly hot that day, so they had in the shade of a tree while they talked and laughed and ate their freshly made picnic which Osgood had prepared for them that morning.
“When do you go back to school?” Kate asked once they had finished eating.
Osgood sat back against the tree and closed her eyes. “7th of September.”
“Nine weeks is a long holiday.” Kate said.
Normally, schools either stuck to six or eight weeks.
“I know, but it wasn’t like we were getting taught anything important.” She answered. “It’s nicer here anyway, and I probably wouldn’t have met you otherwise.”
Kate smiled and leant back too, so her head was resting on Osgood’s shoulder. “And that would be a tragedy.”
They sat like that for a few minutes, feeling content with each other’s company.
-
Week 5
It started off with the usual drills, inspections and surprise midnight runs. Their morning one mile run had turned into a timed morning three mile run. The last five had to finish with pushups.
The week finished with a race in the woods at one in the morning.
-
Week 6
This week, they learnt how to dismantle and build five different guns safely. This was added to their daily practise.
-
Week 7
It was only a Wednesday, but with permission from her commanding officer, Kate rushed out of the grounds and took a bus to the Hospital. She’d got a call that morning to say Osgood had to be rushed there by ambulance and Kate could hardly think about it.
Turned out she had had a pretty nasty Asthma attack and Kate didn’t want to spend a single second that wasn’t by Osgood’s side. She had to make sure her friend was ok.
Thankfully, Osgood only had to spend the night for observation.
-
Week 8
This week was mostly based on theory and the reasonings why the Army was so important.
-
Week 9
“I know you have to, but I really don’t want you to go.” Kate told her best friend on the last Sunday before Osgood had to go home. They were sat in the pub, drinking freshly made lemonade and eating carrot cake.
Osgood sighed. “I don’t want to go either, but I’ll be back at Christmas and we’ll throw the biggest party ever because by then, you’ll have officially become a ranking soldier.”
Kate smiled at that, but it only lasted a second. “I’ll still miss you, Os.”
“I’ll miss you more.” She said back.
-
Week 10
This one had been the hardest yet, and not because the Colonel decided to push them all harder than ever before. It was because she wouldn’t get to see Osgood at the end of it. The others had noticed the change in her mood, but she ignored it and decided to try even harder than she had before.
Kate had gone back to the town of Sunday, but it wasn’t the same.
-
Week 11
Half way through.
They were now getting taught how to shoot properly and to her surprise, Kate was a natural at it. This made everyone want to joke by how much she was like the Brig.
-
Week 12
They saw the other weaponry, like Bazookers and different kinds of explosives.
Kate sent off Osgood’s birthday card and present with plenty of time to spare in case it got lost.
-
Week 13
The air had started to get colder and the nights were drawing in, so even though she’d had 13 weeks with practicing getting up early in the morning, it had begun to get a little harder.
-
Week 14
Kate still missed her friend terribly. She hadn’t ventured into the town since the last time.
-
Week 15
The Brigadier payed a visit to the training grounds, but Kate was both disappointed and glad he didn’t see her group. She didn’t want to have to deal with him recognising her in the middle of training, but all she wanted was to see him again.
-
Week 16
The pleasant weather had dissipated now, so it was constantly cold, windy and rainy. There had been a test on one particularly gruelling day. They weren’t to stop running until they couldn’t go a step further, which in itself sounded horrible, but it was worse to actually experience it. Kate managed to keep doing it for an hour, but she only stopped because she tripped over a rabbit hole and sprained her ankle.
-
Week 17
Osgood had sent her a lovely long letter about anything and everything she could, and it made Kate smile. No one had seen her smile for a bit, so when they were in the Barracks and saw the rare smile, they knew the person who wrote the letter must be very special.
-
Week 18
Only a month left
There wasn’t much more to learn, so it was mostly routine apart from the occasional surprise drill to keep them on their toes.
-
Week 19
Over the past nineteen weeks, the amount of new recruits had lessened. Once there were twenty and now, only eleven, but it made the remaining more eager not to give up.
-
Week 20
Only two more weeks and she could see her dad. Maybe. How would he even react?
On a more promising note, only three weeks until Osgood came back. Kate had the date crossed on her calendar.
-
Week 21
This was the last week of real training. Next week, they would perform everything they had been taught in a highly watched test. They would be graded up for everything they did right and graded down for everything they did wrong.
-
Week 22
Osgood’s letter this week had been just a really colourful bit of paper with, ‘Good luck, I have every bit of faith in you. From Osgood’ on it.
If nothing else, Kate would pass this just for Osgood.
It had started, as always, with an inspection of the barracks and the cleanliness of the uniforms. Then, they timed them in the field, and they took turns showing them how to use the weapons.
There were no room for mistakes.
Sunday came and Kate packed her bags before she waited outside the front of the building with the others. Apparently, she was the only one who wanted to work for Unit. The others wanted to travel to the many places in the world they could go to, which was fair enough. Only two didn’t pass. They had the choice to restart or go home.
Colonel Johnson came up to Kate and she saluted.
“You are to take the bus straight up to the Unit Headquarters. Captain Yates will be waiting for you and you will be taken to the Brigadier. I wish you luck Private.” He told her.
“Thank you, sir.” She said.
Kate took a deep breath. Maybe the entire thing had been a mistake. Not the training. She didn’t regret that, but it probably would’ve been a good idea to go and see him before now. She left the training grounds and climbed onto the bus.