Fic: Hidden In Plain Sight
Title: Hidden In Plain Sight
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: OCs Greg and Michael, Ianto.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Greg and his older brother Michael have been headhunted by a man who claims to belong to Torchwood, but can this really be the entrance to the organisation’s base or is someone having them on?
Word Count: 1394
Written For: Prompt 094 - Secret Lair at fandomweekly.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
“Are you sure this is the way in?” A dubious expression on his face, Greg studied the unassuming wooden door in front of him; it was weathered with age, hardly the sort of door you’d expect to lead into a semi-secret organisation’s base of operations.
“This is where Mr Jones said he’d meet us,” Michael replied. “Mermaid Quay, Cardiff Bay, just off the Roald Dahl Plas. I don’t see any other doors around here, d’you?”
“No, it’s just… Well, I always thought this place was, like, a tourist information office.” Greg pointed to a faded sign above the door. “That’s what the sign says.”
“Maybe it used to be, but how much business could a tourist kiosk get tucked away out of sight down here? Nobody would ever find it. Place probably went bust and then Torchwood took it over, maybe after whatever it was blew that big crater in the Plas last year.”
Greg frowned. “Thought the papers said that was caused by a ruptured gas main.”
Michael snorted. “You seriously believed that? How dumb are you? It was probably a cover story for a terrorist attack or something, meant to keep the public from panicking. Not that it would’ve helped much, what with everything else that was going on back then, the kids chanting and all that stuff. C’mon, I guess we should go inside. Torchwood wouldn’t want us hanging around out here drawing attention to ourselves.”
“I don’t know. I mean, Mr Jones didn’t say anything about going in.”
“He didn’t say we shouldn’t either. ‘Sides, if we dither about, they might think we’ve changed our minds. How often d’you think ordinary blokes like us get offered a chance to work for Torchwood? They most likely prefer to recruit from the police or the army, and here we are, just a couple of computer nerds. Y’know, they’re probably watching us right now, wanting to see what we’ll do, whether we’ll stand around like a couple of idiots or use our initiative.”
“Watching us how?” Greg glanced around. “I don’t see any cameras.”
“Are you kidding me? They’re bound to have a ton of high-tech stuff; you’ve seen that modified Range Rover they drive. I bet they’ve got security cameras that don’t even look like cameras, not to mention a bunch of other sensors. They wouldn’t want just anyone getting inside their secret base, would they?”
Greg sighed. “That’s true, I guess. Okay, lead the way. You always do.” There was hardly more than a year separating them, but Greg was well used to trailing after his older brother. He’d been doing it all his life.
Glancing back over his shoulder with an excited grin, Michael turned the handle and pushed the shabby door open…
There was a light on inside, just a single bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, and as Greg closed the door behind him and turned to examine his surroundings, he couldn’t help but laugh.
“It IS a tourist office!”
There was a counter across the back of the room with racks of leaflets on it, a couple of free-standing carousels packed with postcards, and shelves around the walls bearing touristy souvenirs, from plush Welsh dragons, to mugs, keyrings, button badges, and collectable teaspoons. There was even a selection of buckets and spades, beachballs, and sunhats.
Michael’s face fell; it wasn’t what he’d been expecting. “Maybe that Jones character wasn’t serious about recruiting us, sent us on a wild goose chase to get rid of us. Hell, maybe he wasn’t even Torchwood, we only have his word for that. We should probably just leave.”
Despite his earlier doubts, Greg disagreed. “Not yet. This could be some kind of test to see if we’re serious about joining Torchwood. Mr Jones said to meet him here at two-thirty, and according to my watch, we’re five minutes early, so we should wait. He might still show up.”
“Yeah, okay, I guess that makes a kind of sense. We’ll give him until… Oh, say two-forty, just in case he’s got held up somewhere, but if he doesn’t show by then, we leave. Agreed?”
Greg nodded. “That’s fair.”
“Good thing I didn’t hand in my notice at work yet.” Michael worked at a computer company out at one of Cardiff’s industrial estates, while Greg was barely a month away from graduating from the University of Cardiff with a degree in computer science.
To pass the time, the brothers browsed the goods on sale, lost in their own thoughts, so they were startled by the sudden rattle of the outdated bead curtain behind the counter, spinning around to find Mr Jones standing there smiling at them.
“Right on time, excellent! Punctuality is important.”
Greg glanced down at his watch; two-thirty on the dot. “Actually, we got here a bit early,” he admitted. “Figured it’d be better to be early than late.”
“I know; we’ve been watching you.”
“See?” Confidence regained, Michael smirked at his brother. “Told you they’d have hidden cameras!”
“We do indeed,” Mister Jones confirmed. “And we can tap into the various CCTV systems around the city, as well as satellite feeds. If you decide to join Torchwood, you’ll have a lot of very advanced tech to play with, but first, let’s begin with a tour of our base. We call it the Hub, although it’s not the original one. That got blown up last year. You no doubt saw the gigantic hole in the Plas. Thankfully only the upper level got destroyed; I managed to lock down the lower levels before the explosion, so we didn’t lose anything irreplaceable.” As he spoke, Jones must have triggered some kind of mechanism, because behind the brothers the entrance door locked, and in front of their eyes a section of the wall swung away to reveal a hidden passageway.
Greg’s jaw dropped “Whoa, a secret entrance! That is so cool, like right out of a superhero movie!”
“Jones inclined his head. “I suppose you could say that, but I’ve always considered it more like something from a spy movie. If you’d follow me?”
The brothers didn’t need telling twice, trailing behind their guide along the passageway and around a corner to a lift, which took them deep into the ground, although it was impossible for the brothers to gauge how far. When the lift door opened, it let them out into a small antechamber, then with a swipe of a security card, Mister Jones led them into the base itself.
It was immense. Tiled floors stretched out before them, staircases leading to offices and other rooms on several levels, what looked like some kind of indoor greenhouse, an open-plan area containing a dozen computer stations, and even what appeared to be a small pool at the far end, lush with greenery.
“Welcome to Torchwood. We’ve done some extensive modernisation on this level during the rebuild, but I like to think we’ve managed to maintain a degree of charm.”
Michael stared in awe. “It’s amazing! Way nicer than where I’m working at the moment.”
Greg didn’t say anything, lost for words.
Murals brightened the walls, and indirect lighting imparted an air of cosiness despite the main area seeming as vast as a rugby field, although it was probably only half that size.
“Offices, research labs, hothouse, medical bay, treatment areas, dorms, break room, complete with a full kitchen, which is more than we used to have.” Mr Jones indicated various areas as they passed. “I imagine this is what you’re most interested in though.” He led the way to the computer stations where just a glance told the brothers the technology was beyond state-of-the-art.
“Man, look at all this!” Greg was itching to get his hands on a keyboard and see exactly what the capabilities of the computers were.
“I’m looking!” Michael turned to Mister Jones. “I don’t even care what else you’ve got here, or what the pay is. This is more than enough to convince us; you can count us in!” No way were they turning this job down!
“What my brother said,” Greg agreed.
“Glad to hear it.” Mr Jones smiled his approval. “There’s some paperwork you’ll need to fill in, and you,”
he turned to Greg, “still need to graduate, but I’m confidant you’ll both be valuable additions to the team.” He offered his hand to Greg, then Michael. “Welcome aboard.”
The End
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: OCs Greg and Michael, Ianto.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Greg and his older brother Michael have been headhunted by a man who claims to belong to Torchwood, but can this really be the entrance to the organisation’s base or is someone having them on?
Word Count: 1394
Written For: Prompt 094 - Secret Lair at fandomweekly.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
“Are you sure this is the way in?” A dubious expression on his face, Greg studied the unassuming wooden door in front of him; it was weathered with age, hardly the sort of door you’d expect to lead into a semi-secret organisation’s base of operations.
“This is where Mr Jones said he’d meet us,” Michael replied. “Mermaid Quay, Cardiff Bay, just off the Roald Dahl Plas. I don’t see any other doors around here, d’you?”
“No, it’s just… Well, I always thought this place was, like, a tourist information office.” Greg pointed to a faded sign above the door. “That’s what the sign says.”
“Maybe it used to be, but how much business could a tourist kiosk get tucked away out of sight down here? Nobody would ever find it. Place probably went bust and then Torchwood took it over, maybe after whatever it was blew that big crater in the Plas last year.”
Greg frowned. “Thought the papers said that was caused by a ruptured gas main.”
Michael snorted. “You seriously believed that? How dumb are you? It was probably a cover story for a terrorist attack or something, meant to keep the public from panicking. Not that it would’ve helped much, what with everything else that was going on back then, the kids chanting and all that stuff. C’mon, I guess we should go inside. Torchwood wouldn’t want us hanging around out here drawing attention to ourselves.”
“I don’t know. I mean, Mr Jones didn’t say anything about going in.”
“He didn’t say we shouldn’t either. ‘Sides, if we dither about, they might think we’ve changed our minds. How often d’you think ordinary blokes like us get offered a chance to work for Torchwood? They most likely prefer to recruit from the police or the army, and here we are, just a couple of computer nerds. Y’know, they’re probably watching us right now, wanting to see what we’ll do, whether we’ll stand around like a couple of idiots or use our initiative.”
“Watching us how?” Greg glanced around. “I don’t see any cameras.”
“Are you kidding me? They’re bound to have a ton of high-tech stuff; you’ve seen that modified Range Rover they drive. I bet they’ve got security cameras that don’t even look like cameras, not to mention a bunch of other sensors. They wouldn’t want just anyone getting inside their secret base, would they?”
Greg sighed. “That’s true, I guess. Okay, lead the way. You always do.” There was hardly more than a year separating them, but Greg was well used to trailing after his older brother. He’d been doing it all his life.
Glancing back over his shoulder with an excited grin, Michael turned the handle and pushed the shabby door open…
There was a light on inside, just a single bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, and as Greg closed the door behind him and turned to examine his surroundings, he couldn’t help but laugh.
“It IS a tourist office!”
There was a counter across the back of the room with racks of leaflets on it, a couple of free-standing carousels packed with postcards, and shelves around the walls bearing touristy souvenirs, from plush Welsh dragons, to mugs, keyrings, button badges, and collectable teaspoons. There was even a selection of buckets and spades, beachballs, and sunhats.
Michael’s face fell; it wasn’t what he’d been expecting. “Maybe that Jones character wasn’t serious about recruiting us, sent us on a wild goose chase to get rid of us. Hell, maybe he wasn’t even Torchwood, we only have his word for that. We should probably just leave.”
Despite his earlier doubts, Greg disagreed. “Not yet. This could be some kind of test to see if we’re serious about joining Torchwood. Mr Jones said to meet him here at two-thirty, and according to my watch, we’re five minutes early, so we should wait. He might still show up.”
“Yeah, okay, I guess that makes a kind of sense. We’ll give him until… Oh, say two-forty, just in case he’s got held up somewhere, but if he doesn’t show by then, we leave. Agreed?”
Greg nodded. “That’s fair.”
“Good thing I didn’t hand in my notice at work yet.” Michael worked at a computer company out at one of Cardiff’s industrial estates, while Greg was barely a month away from graduating from the University of Cardiff with a degree in computer science.
To pass the time, the brothers browsed the goods on sale, lost in their own thoughts, so they were startled by the sudden rattle of the outdated bead curtain behind the counter, spinning around to find Mr Jones standing there smiling at them.
“Right on time, excellent! Punctuality is important.”
Greg glanced down at his watch; two-thirty on the dot. “Actually, we got here a bit early,” he admitted. “Figured it’d be better to be early than late.”
“I know; we’ve been watching you.”
“See?” Confidence regained, Michael smirked at his brother. “Told you they’d have hidden cameras!”
“We do indeed,” Mister Jones confirmed. “And we can tap into the various CCTV systems around the city, as well as satellite feeds. If you decide to join Torchwood, you’ll have a lot of very advanced tech to play with, but first, let’s begin with a tour of our base. We call it the Hub, although it’s not the original one. That got blown up last year. You no doubt saw the gigantic hole in the Plas. Thankfully only the upper level got destroyed; I managed to lock down the lower levels before the explosion, so we didn’t lose anything irreplaceable.” As he spoke, Jones must have triggered some kind of mechanism, because behind the brothers the entrance door locked, and in front of their eyes a section of the wall swung away to reveal a hidden passageway.
Greg’s jaw dropped “Whoa, a secret entrance! That is so cool, like right out of a superhero movie!”
“Jones inclined his head. “I suppose you could say that, but I’ve always considered it more like something from a spy movie. If you’d follow me?”
The brothers didn’t need telling twice, trailing behind their guide along the passageway and around a corner to a lift, which took them deep into the ground, although it was impossible for the brothers to gauge how far. When the lift door opened, it let them out into a small antechamber, then with a swipe of a security card, Mister Jones led them into the base itself.
It was immense. Tiled floors stretched out before them, staircases leading to offices and other rooms on several levels, what looked like some kind of indoor greenhouse, an open-plan area containing a dozen computer stations, and even what appeared to be a small pool at the far end, lush with greenery.
“Welcome to Torchwood. We’ve done some extensive modernisation on this level during the rebuild, but I like to think we’ve managed to maintain a degree of charm.”
Michael stared in awe. “It’s amazing! Way nicer than where I’m working at the moment.”
Greg didn’t say anything, lost for words.
Murals brightened the walls, and indirect lighting imparted an air of cosiness despite the main area seeming as vast as a rugby field, although it was probably only half that size.
“Offices, research labs, hothouse, medical bay, treatment areas, dorms, break room, complete with a full kitchen, which is more than we used to have.” Mr Jones indicated various areas as they passed. “I imagine this is what you’re most interested in though.” He led the way to the computer stations where just a glance told the brothers the technology was beyond state-of-the-art.
“Man, look at all this!” Greg was itching to get his hands on a keyboard and see exactly what the capabilities of the computers were.
“I’m looking!” Michael turned to Mister Jones. “I don’t even care what else you’ve got here, or what the pay is. This is more than enough to convince us; you can count us in!” No way were they turning this job down!
“What my brother said,” Greg agreed.
“Glad to hear it.” Mr Jones smiled his approval. “There’s some paperwork you’ll need to fill in, and you,”
he turned to Greg, “still need to graduate, but I’m confidant you’ll both be valuable additions to the team.” He offered his hand to Greg, then Michael. “Welcome aboard.”
The End