Sleeping Dragons 05 - The Old Terror 06
Author's note: The facts about Dr. Arnold's team are taken from the TV-movie trilogy "The Autons", so they are kind of canon. Only that I kept the team members alive.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHAPTER 06 - NESSIE IN NEED
In the next morning the team split up. Adam, Jenny, Trevor and Lloyd took the nondescript UNIT van to visit Loch Ness and try to get a glimpse of the ‘monster’. They took cameras with them and discussed their intention animatedly within the earshot of the villagers. Jenny was particularly bouncy, impatient to get going.
Owen and Jenkins got into Sarah Jane’s battered old car to pick up the other two Privates in Torchwood House and meet Captain Price. Sally remained behind to coordinate things between the two groups; and to report in to Ianto, should either of them find anything of significance.
“Try to keep the Torchwood Four guys out of the loop,” Owen instructed her via their Bluetooth device. “Billy the Fish might trust them but I don’t. That old geezer, the psychic, seems particularly untrustworthy to me.”
“Don’t worry,” Sally’s voice revealed that she was grinning. “I underwent advanced psychic training. He can’t get into my head without me noticing it; and if he tries, I’ll shoot him on the spot. With the stun gun, of course. I won’t rob Jack of the delight of eviscerating the man with his bare hands.”
“Book me a ticket in the first row when that happens,” Owen replied and broke the connection.
As expected, the coordinates given by Captain Price led them to an empty barn, well outside Forgill Castle yet within the Duke’s estate. The captain was already waiting for them, wearing a white lab coat over her tank top and camouflage pants; and she seemed extremely nervous. She relaxed a tiny bit when she spotted Sarah Jane, though.
“Oh, good, you’re here,” she said. “Now I can be sure that the Brigadier learns of this, too.”
“I’m sure Harry… I mean Commodore Sullivan will report him everything we learn here,” Sarah Jane assured her. “So, can you tell us what’s going on here?”
“I don’t know; not exactly,” Captain Price admitted. “My team has been given the task of examining random pieces of alien technology…”
“What kind of alien technology?” Owen interrupted.
The captain shrugged. “Mostly cybernetic components. I’ve never seen anything like that before, and as you know, I was part of the clean-up team after Canary Wharf, so I have seen my fair share of cyber-tech.”
“That rules out the Cybermen at least,” Owen said in relief. “Teaboy will be happy to hear that. Do you have any idea where the parts come from?”
The captain shook her head. “No. But I heard that there’s some kind of wrecked ship on the bottom of the Loch, and diving teams go down regularly with special equipment, trying to get access to whatever might be within.”
“Have they succeeded?”
“Not yet, as far as I know; but I’m sure they will, eventually. Major Blake, the commanding officer of this outpost, seems really obsessed with that ship. I used to serve with him; he used to be an intelligent, careful officer, but now… all he seems to care about is that damned wreck.”
“What about the geneticists?” Owen asked. “What are they doing here?”
Marion Price sighed. “Your guess is as good as mine. All I know that they’re examining DNA samples, retrieved from some mysterious source. And I’m not supposed to know even that much; the head of genetic research, a certain Major Frost, is obsessed with secrecy. Fortunately, I know some people from her team, and they really hate her attitude, so they babble sometimes.”
Sarah Jane and Owen exchanged grim looks.
“That doesn’t sound good,” Sarah Jane finally said.
“No,” Owen agreed. “In fact, it sounds as if they were tinkering with things that are way beyond their competence. That’s what One did, and we all know how it ended.”
Jenkins looked at him doubtfully. “Do you really expect something of the magnitude of Canary Wharf? Cause I cannot really believe that.”
“Perhaps not exactly of the same magnitude,” Owen allowed, “but not a tad less dangerous. We’ll definitely need to take a closer look at those labs.”
“I’m afraid I cannot help you with that,” Captain Price said glumly. “Not even I am allowed to come close to the genetics labs, although my position as the leader of cybernetic research is equal to that of Major Frost. In theory. But she outranks me so my hands are bound. I’m sorry.”
“That’s the disadvantage of a military organization,” Owen said knowingly. “A good thing that we’re more ad hoc, as Jack would put it. Don’t worry, Captain; we’ve got our ways to enter places where we aren’t supposed to sniff around.”
“Good luck with that,” Marion Price glanced at her wrist watch. “Well, I have to go. My lunch break is almost over, and it would draw unwanted attention if I got back late.”
“She has balls,” Owen commented, after the captain had left.
Jenkins nodded. “Oh yes, she does. And she’s got the brains, too… ‘cept for the fact that she fell for Colonel Ironpants. But love is blind, as they say.”
“Not our concern at the moment,” Sarah Jane said dismissively. “Let’s return to the inn and see what the others have learned. Then we can decide how to continue.”
“But you do have a theory, don’t you?” Jenkins asked slyly.
Sarah Jane nodded. “I do, my boy, I do. But I want to hear out the others first.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Jenny, Adam, Lloyd and Trevor, in the meantime, were having the time of their lives - especially Jenny, who’d been eager to visit the location of some of her father’s adventures for quite some time. The view alone was enough to impress somebody who had not seen the place before; and most of those who had seen it already, too.
“It is huge,” Jenny said in awe.
“Twenty-two square miles,” Trevor supported. “The second-largest Scottish loch by surface area after Loch Lomond, but due to its great depth, it is the largest by volume in the British Isles. Its deepest point is seven hundred and fifty-five feet, and it contains more water than all the lakes of England and Wales combined,” at the stunned silence of the others, he frowned. “What? I looked it up in Wikipedia. It’s called research, you know.”
“You sounded just like Ianto,” Lloyd grinned.
Trevor shrugged. “Jonesy does know all about research.”
“The water is really murky, though,” Adam commented. “No wonder that the search teams were unable to find Nessie. One could overlook a whole fleet of submarines by this visibility… or rather the lack of it.”
Trevor nodded. “Yeah, it supposedly comes from the high peat content in the surrounding soil.”
“That sounds plausible,” Lloyd said. “But how are we supposed to find the Skarasen? I doubt that even Torchwood-issue scanners would do us much good here.”
“We’ll use this,” Jenny took a small device that looked like a pepper pot out of her pocket.
Trevor looked at it with professional interest. “And what is this?”
“A signal device used to summon the Skarasen,” Jenny explained. “It’s called a Trilonic activator. My Dad thought that it sends out a mating call, attracting the Skarasen to it, but he might have been wrong about that, of course.”
“And how do you know that?” Adam asked. “I thought you couldn’t access the Doctor’s personal memories.”
“I cannot,” Jenny admitted. “But I talked to Sarah Jane a lot last night, and she told me everything she could remember about the encounter with the Zygons.”
“Did she give you the device, too?”
“Yes. My Dad left it with her, just in case; and a good thing he did, wasn’t it? Now we can summon the Skarasen and see it for real.”
“I wonder what use it could be for us, except being able to say that we’ve actually seen the Loch Ness monster,” Trevor muttered pessimistically.
“Well, it will show us if we can control the Skarasen via the Trilonic activator, at least,” Jenny replied. “That might be crucial, should the Zygons have returned without having been noticed.”
Adam, who didn’t know a thing about the Zygons, frowned. “How that?”
“Skarasens are large, dinosaur-like creatures that have been cybernetically enhanced by the Zygons, so that they could be used as weapons,” Jenny explained. “They can smash a human to death with a single swipe of a foot. Also, their spine is infused with some sort of alloy that makes them resistant to blunt trauma, and their skin is extremely tough. The one supposedly still dwelling in the Loch destroyed three oil rigs the last time my Dad encountered it.”
“But if it is so huge, how did it fit into a spaceship and how did the Zygons manage to feed it?” Lloyd wondered. “Unless, of course, they transported it in its embryonic form, or as a very small baby.”
“The latter,” Jenny said. “In fact, all Zygon ships carry baby Skarasens with them, since they are dependant on the lactic fluid of the creatures as a food source. That’s the only thing their freshly hatched youths can eat; and the adults need it periodically as well.”
“So, does that actually mean that if the Skarasen is lactating, there might be Zygons nearby?” Lloyd asked.
Jenny nodded. “Yes, Skarasens cannot breed without artificial inseminations; the species has been already too specified to serve the needs of the Zygons for spontaneous spawning. The cybernetic parts regulate their bodily functions and also keep them alive much longer than they would naturally live.”
“And Ms Smith has told you all that?” Trevor asked doubtfully.
Jenny shrugged. “Of course not. But I inherited almost all of my Dad’s knowledge during the progenation process; and he met the Zygons long before I was created.”
“Personal knowledge yet no personal memories?”
“Certainly. Knowledge can always prove useful for a soldier. Memories, on the other hand, can be distracting, which one cannot afford,” Jenny wrapped her fingers around the device and squeezed. “I hope this is the right way to activate it. My Dad was really taking a shot into the dark.”
For a while nothing happened. Then, when they were about to give up, the device began to beep. It was a shrill, high-pitched tone that felt like many hot needles rammed into one’s head. Adam in particular was hit hard, as it caused a feedback in his infospike; he fell to the floor, clutching his temples and moaning in pain.
“I hope it won’t take long,” Lloyd said on concern, “or else it might fry the boy’s brain.”
“This is the proximity alert,” Jenny replied. “The Skarasen is coming. As soon as it arrives, the alert will stop.”
And indeed, mere moments later the beeping stopped. Instead, the water of the Loch started boiling, and the head of an extraordinary creature rose from the middle of the widening rings of water. It looked like the head of a particularly large plesiosaur, mounted on a long, sinuous neck that was followed by a large body - about four feet high and twenty-five feet long. Unlike regular plesiosaurs, however, it had four short, powerful, clawed legs that propelled it forward in the water with unexpected speed. Its skin gleamed, as if it had been infused with some kind of metallic alloy.
“It looks like an armoured dragon,” Lloyd commented.
“It is armoured,” Trevor replied, consulting his scanner. “Its entire skin is laced with cybernetic implants. In theory, it should be invulnerable; only that it clearly isn’t!”
“What do you mean?” Lloyd asked.
Trevor handed her the scanner. “Look at this. It seems as if entire chunks of implants have been removed from its skin; and rather forcibly at that.”
Lloyd checked the readings. “You’re right. This creature has been damaged.”
“Which is bad news,” Trevor said. “Firstly, anything that can damage an armoured cyborg can cause a great deal of harm in the wrong hands. Secondly, a damaged cyborg - especially a non-sentient one - can be malfunctioning and unpredictable. I don’t think we should get close to this… thing.”
“It’s easier said than done,” Lloyd looked at Jenny. “Or do you know how to send it away again?”
“I have no idea,” Jenny admitted. “I can deactivate the device, of course, but if that will be enough…?”
“Give it to me,” Adam took from her the deactivated device and snapped his fingers.
The infospike dutifully emerged, offering everyone unhindered sight into his brain. Adam scanned the Trilonic activator with the bundle of light that the infospike emitted and frowned for a moment. Then he selected a few of the unmarked bumps on the surface of the device, which then produced a low, vibrating sound.
“That should do the trick,” Adam declared, closing the infospike with another snap of his fingers and grimaced in pain, caused by the vibration directly in his head. “I’ve reversed the summoning signal; in theory, this other transmission should send Nessie back where she came from.”
“It’s not a she,” Jenny corrected. “Skarasens have no specified gender.”
Adam shrugged. “Whatever. Let’s hope it will go away.”
It seemed that the infospike had done what it was supposed to do indeed, because after a few moments of hesitation the Skarasen, that had already been towering over them, plunged back into the murky water and disappeared in a boiling mass of foam. Only an odd patch of greenish fluid on the water surface showed that only moments earlier there had been anything at all.
Trevor let out a deep, relieved breath. “Saved by the bell in the last minute. Good job, Adam. But what is the green stuff?”
“That would be Skarasen lactic fluid, although collecting some for further analysis might be useful,” Jenny replied. “If only to make sure whether its lactation glands have been activated.”
The others exchanged reluctant looks; then Lloyd sighed.
“All right, I’ll do it. Once SOCO always SOCO, I guess. But Torchwood will so owe me a new pair of jeans after this!”
She opened her field kit, took out some test tubes and waded into the murky water to collect a sample.
“Actually, a new pair of shoes, too,” she called back over her shoulder. “And I’ll insist on proper hazmat coveralls on the next staff meeting.”
“I’m sure Jonesy will listen to reasonable arguments,” Trevor replied, happy that it wasn’t him who had to wade into the Loch.
“He better will,” Lloyd muttered, expertly using the test tubes to take a sample; then she looked at the oozing green liquid and pulled a face. “Gah, this is disgusting. If I had to depend on it to survive, I’d seriously consider suicide. OK, we’ve got our sample; what next?”
“Back to the Fox Inn,” Trevor suggested. “Owen and the others will be back, soon, and then we can put together what we’ve learned.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
But when they got back to the inn, all they found was a note from Owen that they’ve gone to meet Private Harris outside Torchwood House.
“Why would they do that?” Adam wondered. “They could have simply called him.”
“Mobile phones don’t work in Torchwood House,” Lloyd reminded him. “And I don’t think Owen would use the landline; not with Torchwood Four in the House.”
“But why?” Adam frowned. “They’re Torchwood, too, aren’t they?”
“By name perhaps,” Trevor said grimly. “But they used to be UNIT, every single one of them.”
“So was Sally,” Lloyd pointed out.
“Yeah, but Jonesy chose Sally,” Trevor replied. “After checking her credentials and after Commodore Sullivan vouched for her. This so-called Torchwood Four is Doctor Arnold’s old team; a team Jonesy didn’t get the chance to check first. A team he still doesn’t even know of.”
“I seriously doubt that Prince William would have chosen them if they weren’t loyal,” Lloyd said.
“Oh, I’m sure that they are loyal?” Trevor returned grimly. “The question is, though: to whom are they loyal?”
“Do you believe that they might be in league with Colonel Oduya?” Lloyd asked doubtfully. “I can’t imagine it. Prince William would have them thoroughly vetted before drafting them for Torchwood. He takes his responsibility as liaison seriously.”
“I’m sure he does, but he’s just human like the rest of us and not infallible,” Trevor said. “He’s been wrong before; he believed that Harold Saxon’s wife would be trustworthy, too, just because they grew up in the same social circles and went to the same school. I’d be willing to give their archivist the benefit of doubt - Jonesy worked with him when he last checked on the archives here and would have noticed if the man weren’t kosher, he’s very good at that - but I wouldn’t lay my hand into fire for Doctor Arnold. And that old psychic of theirs gives me the creeps.”
“I thought you guys had psychic training at One,” Lloyd said.
Trevor nodded. “We had; especially the ones working on special projects like me. So you couldn’t fool me with psychic paper or a perception filter, assuming I know what I’m looking for. I can also recognize telepathic probing and shield my mind against it… to a certain extent. But we don’t know just how strong the old man is - or if he truly follows Doctor Arnold’s orders. Assuming that she is willing to cooperate, that is.”
“I can check him if you want me to,” Jenny offered. “Gallifreyans are telepathic, you know.”
Trevor shook his head. “Jonesy doesn’t want anyone to know who - or what - you are. Especially UNIT. They’d find a way to have you extracted to them, seeing that your Dad used to work for them, and then you’d vanish in one of their secret labs - as a lab specimen.”
“But why would they do that?”
“Because they’ve become power-hungry and paranoid, ever since Oduya took over. And Oduya was Saxon’s puppet. Unfortunately, no-one remembers that, since the resetting of time; only the few of us who spent The Year That Never Was in the temporally shielded Vaults of the Hub - so we have no proof.”
“But Doctor Arnold and the others aren’t with UNIT anymore,” Adam, who was still very new to the power struggle between Torchwood and UNIT, pointed out.
Trevor snorted. “That’s what they say. We still don’t know for sure if it’s true.”
“Isn’t there any way to find out?” Lloyd asked. “Somebody mentioned an alien lie detector once…”
“Which is very efficient, or so Jack says,” Trevor agreed. “Unfortunately, it sometimes causes the head of the subject explode, so Jonesy would hesitate to use it on people who might be just fellow Torchwood agents.”
“So what are we gonna do then?”
“I haven’t got a clue,” Trevor admitted. “Let’s hope that Owen manages to contact Jonesy and get new instructions. In the meantime we should eat something and rest a bit. Especially you,” he looked at Adam. “You know that you are risking brain damage every time you use that thing in your head.”
“Not to mention the headache,” Adam muttered. “God, what an idiot I was, having it installed in the first place! How I wish it could e removed!”
“No chance for that; not at this time, not on this planet,” Jenny said with compassion. “But if we manage to fix my ship, you should come with me. It’s dangerous to cross your own timeline, even if the two yous are on the opposite sides of the planet. And out there we might find a place technically advanced enough to remove the implant.”
“Ianto would never let me go,” Adam replied glumly. “I’m unofficially imprisoned by Torchwood; and that’s still the lesser evil. I could have ended up in a UNIT lab, too.”
“Jonesy doesn’t want you to run free on Earth while there still is another you present,” Trevor corrected. “He might let you leave the planet with Jenny, though. He’s a reasonable man.”
“And that way he’d be rid of us both,” Jenny added; then, at Lloyd’s surprised look, she shrugged. “He doesn’t like me. He doesn’t want me here: on Earth, with Torchwood. He hides it well, but he’ll be relieved once I’m gone. He just tolerates me because that way he can always know where I am and what I’m up to. And I’m useful. But he still doesn’t like me.”
“Actually, it’s your Dad he doesn’t like,” Trevor said.
Jenny shrugged. “Same difference. Quite frankly, I’ll be glad to be gone, too. There’s so much to see out there, so much to learn… people to help, bad creatures to defeat… I wouldn’t want to be restricted to just one planet. And a travelling companion would be welcome,” she grinned at Adam.
“Jack would be sad to see you go,” Lloyd said quietly. “And the rest of us would miss you, too.”
“I could always come back for short visits,” Jenny replied, still grinning. “But for that I’d need a functioning ship first.”
“We’re working on it,” Trevor promised. “That is, Toshiko is working on the fine tuning between your ship’s systems and the Chimaeran scouting device. There are still a few glitches that need to be ironed out, but it will work, I’m sure of that.”
“I hope so,” Jenny said seriously. “The baby TARDIS - the coral Jack gave me - will need years yet to grow out fully, and I’ll still have to get hold of the technology that operates it as a vessel. I can’t do that while grounded on Earth.”
“And yet Earth would be your best chance to catch your Dad,” Trevor reminded her.
“Perhaps,” she allowed. “But I can still travel at least in space in the meantime.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Unbeknownst to them, the leading triumvirate of Torchwood Three was discussing the same topics back in Cardiff. Both Jack and Ianto were moderately pissed out by Owen’s news that he had managed to deliver from out of nowhere between the Fox Inn and Torchwood House, thanks to the technically savvy Private Harris.
“I find it disturbing that the Crown saw it necessary to re-establish an independent branch,” Ianto said. “We’re still understaffed and Sir Archibald has no-one but Maggie who needs to be taught the ropes before she could be of any help. “And I find it even more disturbing that Prince William did it without consulting me first.”
“What I find worrisome is that they would draft a group of disgraced UNIT scientists for the job,” Jack said grimly.
“Actually, Mr. Winslet is quite competent,” Ianto replied. “He also seemed an honest person to me. Tosh, have you ever heard of this Doctor Arnold?”
Tosh nodded. “She is - well, was - a name-worthy scientist with UNIT. Her field is mechanical engineering and alternate energy sources. She used to lead a secret lab known as The Warehouse, with the help of her personal assistant. Mr. Winslet was their senior archivist. They accidentally reactivated a dormant Nestene energy unit and nearly unleashed a full-blown Nestene invasion on Earth.”
“How that?”
“Apparently, there were dormant Nestenes lying underground around the world, put in place before the development of the human race. Their locations have later become known to humanity as holy sites and were connected by ley lines. One of them was revived on Sentinel Island by an Auton posing as your Mr. Winslet, and tried to revive the others. UNIT sent a psychic operative by the codename of Lockwood to contain the situation, as he could apparently access all information from any computer mainframe in the world, thanks to an alien implant in his head.”
“You mean an infospike like Adam’s?” Ianto asked.
Tosh shrugged. “I don’t think it was exactly the same; but perhaps something similar. UNIT did take away a great deal of unsorted alien technology from Canary Wharf before we could have secured them. In any case, the Nestene Consciousness clearly used this implant - and Lockwood’s psychic abilities - to their own end. The energy creature Doctor Arnold had accidentally released merged with his mind, and in the end he was forced to commit suicide to destroy the Nestene plan.”
“How did you learn all this?” Jack asked in awe.
“When Ianto last went to Torchwood House and found this Mr. Winslet there, I made a background check on the man,” Tosh explained. “I found some… anomalies in his CV, so I let Mainframe run a very detailed search. She managed to tap into some top secret UNIT files and I saved he data, just in case. I was surprised to learn that Doctor Arnold’s entire team has actually survived, although the official records reported them being killed during various phases of the incident.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Ianto said in concern. “That was very risky. If they’d caught you snooping around in their secret files…”
“I know, Ianto, but we needed the information. And the computer Mainframe couldn’t outsmart on any day will have to be built yet.”
“Perhaps,” Ianto allowed. “Still, try not to hack into UNIT’s files again, unless it is absolutely necessary. We need you a lot more than any piece of information.”
“What about the other team members?” Jack asked.
“Well, Doctor Matthews is a containment specialist who, together with this Lockwood character and Sergeant Ramsay, was called to The Warehouse by Doctor Arnold when she activated the Nestene pod,” Tosh replied. “He was injured by the Autons but continued to work with Lockwood and Doctor Arnold for some time. He did try to rack down the escaped alien… without results. About six months before the discovery of the creature on Sentinel Island he left the team to carry out archaeological research in Africa, where he supposedly died in some unspecified accident.”
“Just like Sergeant Ramsay, who fought the Autons on Sentinel Island and was reported to have sacrificed himself,” Ianto committed. “Or Miss Chard, Doctor Arnold’s assistant who was also reportedly killed by the Nestene creature. It seems that UNIT has sent us a great deal of false memos in the recent years. I wonder, though, why was somebody trying to keep all these people under the radar.”
“They all seem to have worked with Doctor Arnold, one way or another,” Tosh said thoughtfully. “With the exception of this Mr. Palmer they all went on swimmingly, too.”
“Owen does have his doubts about Mr. Palmer,” Ianto said. “I wonder who his supporters might be, since he obviously wasn’t reported dead.”
“I can’t tell,” Tosh admitted. “It appears that Doctor Arnold used to be Colonel Smythe’s pet scientist, which means she might have fallen from grace when Colonel Oduya took command of the British division. Mr. Palmer, however, seems to have kept his position as a special UNIT operative… until recently, when he suddenly decided to retire.”
“I can’t understand why Prince William chose him, of all people,” Jack shook his head. “He seems to be the least trustworthy of the entire team.”
“Perhaps he wanted to put his psychic abilities to good use, while enabling the rest of the team to keep an eye on him,” Ianto offered. “This whole thing with Torchwood Four is more than just a little fishy. Jack, I think you need to go to London and speak with the Brigadier in person. And with Commodore Sullivan.”
“Oh, I intend to do more than just that,” Jack said grimly. “I’m gonna pay Lizzie a visit.”
“Yeah, because you can just walk into Buckingham Palace and demand to have a chat with the Queen,” Ianto returned sarcastically.
“Actually, the royal family is in Balmoral Castle right now,” Tosh pointed out. “Not that that would make things any easier.”
Jack grinned like a shark. “Don’t worry; I have my ways, for exactly such cases.”
Ianto gave the idea some thought.
“Perhaps you should do it,” he finally agreed. “I don’t doubt that Prince William means well, but he lacks the vast experience of Her Royal Majesty. He might need some… guidance from his grandmother. But talk to the Brigadier and the commodore first.”
“I could go to London right now,” Jack offered, but Ianto shook his head.
“Not before I’m back from Torchwood House. We can’t leave Tosh alone with the newbies.”
“And you absolutely insist on going yourself?” Jack asked.
Ianto nodded. “Needs must, Jack. I need to lay down the law for Torchwood Four while I still can; and I need to meet them in person to decide whether they can be trusted or not. Besides, I’m planning to have words with Sir Archibald as well.”
Jack snorted, having known the Torchwood Two leader for decades. “Good luck with that!”
“I don’t need luck for that,” Ianto answered coldly. “Sir Archibald enthusiastically supported Her Royal Majesty’s decision to make me the Torchwood Director; I presume he was afraid to get stuck with the job in my stead. But since I am his boss now, he’ll have to learn to run everything through me - or I’ll find someone who will.”
“You’d remove Archie from Torchwood Two?” Jack asked in shock.
Ianto nodded grimly. “If I had to then yes, I would. I cannot run Torchwood efficiently when everyone acts as they please. That’s something our royal liaison needs to understand, too.”
“And you intend to tell him exactly that?” Jack grinned.
It wasn’t exactly a question but Ianto nodded anyway. “I do. Which is why you need to get support from his grandmother. He’s but the liaison; she is our ultimate boss,” he stood. “I’ll try to call Owen now. Then I’ll have a few hours’ rest before I attempt to teleport right into Torchwood House.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
About halfway between Torchwood House and the Fox Inn, out in nowhere, Owen disengaged his phone at looked at Sarah Jane, Jenkins and Harris in grim satisfaction.
“All right,” he said. “Teaboy’s coming over. He’ll teleport directly to Torchwood House and walk in using a perception filter,” he turned to Harris. “He asks to be picked up at the Celtic cross in front of the House.”
Harris nodded. “I’ll pretend to have a smoke outside the building then.”
“You don’t even smoke,” Jenkins commented. “Stevie does.”
“Yeah, but Stevie would shit his pants out of sheer anxiety,” Harris reminded him. “I’ll just have to fake it.”
“Here,” Jenkins pulled a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket and threw it at him. Harris caught it and frowned.
“Why do you carry cigarettes on you? You don’t smoke, either.”
“They’re Stevie’s,” Jenkins revealed. “I’ve been practicing my fine motor skills by picking his pockets.”
Harris shook his head in exasperation. “You’ll never grow up!”
“Not when I can help it,” Jenkins agreed. “Now, go back to that Tudor monstrosity and keep an eye on the others.”
“And we should go back to the inn and see if the others have found Nessie,” Owen said. “God, I hate the countryside! Can’t wait to be in Cardiff again.”
“Urban civilization does have its advantages,” Jenkins nodded. “I for my part would prefer London, though.”
“Wouldn’t we all?” Owen muttered, climbing into the passenger seat of Sarah Jane’s geriatric car. “Let’s go then so that we can at least have a roof over our heads.”
~TBC~
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
CHAPTER 06 - NESSIE IN NEED
In the next morning the team split up. Adam, Jenny, Trevor and Lloyd took the nondescript UNIT van to visit Loch Ness and try to get a glimpse of the ‘monster’. They took cameras with them and discussed their intention animatedly within the earshot of the villagers. Jenny was particularly bouncy, impatient to get going.
Owen and Jenkins got into Sarah Jane’s battered old car to pick up the other two Privates in Torchwood House and meet Captain Price. Sally remained behind to coordinate things between the two groups; and to report in to Ianto, should either of them find anything of significance.
“Try to keep the Torchwood Four guys out of the loop,” Owen instructed her via their Bluetooth device. “Billy the Fish might trust them but I don’t. That old geezer, the psychic, seems particularly untrustworthy to me.”
“Don’t worry,” Sally’s voice revealed that she was grinning. “I underwent advanced psychic training. He can’t get into my head without me noticing it; and if he tries, I’ll shoot him on the spot. With the stun gun, of course. I won’t rob Jack of the delight of eviscerating the man with his bare hands.”
“Book me a ticket in the first row when that happens,” Owen replied and broke the connection.
As expected, the coordinates given by Captain Price led them to an empty barn, well outside Forgill Castle yet within the Duke’s estate. The captain was already waiting for them, wearing a white lab coat over her tank top and camouflage pants; and she seemed extremely nervous. She relaxed a tiny bit when she spotted Sarah Jane, though.
“Oh, good, you’re here,” she said. “Now I can be sure that the Brigadier learns of this, too.”
“I’m sure Harry… I mean Commodore Sullivan will report him everything we learn here,” Sarah Jane assured her. “So, can you tell us what’s going on here?”
“I don’t know; not exactly,” Captain Price admitted. “My team has been given the task of examining random pieces of alien technology…”
“What kind of alien technology?” Owen interrupted.
The captain shrugged. “Mostly cybernetic components. I’ve never seen anything like that before, and as you know, I was part of the clean-up team after Canary Wharf, so I have seen my fair share of cyber-tech.”
“That rules out the Cybermen at least,” Owen said in relief. “Teaboy will be happy to hear that. Do you have any idea where the parts come from?”
The captain shook her head. “No. But I heard that there’s some kind of wrecked ship on the bottom of the Loch, and diving teams go down regularly with special equipment, trying to get access to whatever might be within.”
“Have they succeeded?”
“Not yet, as far as I know; but I’m sure they will, eventually. Major Blake, the commanding officer of this outpost, seems really obsessed with that ship. I used to serve with him; he used to be an intelligent, careful officer, but now… all he seems to care about is that damned wreck.”
“What about the geneticists?” Owen asked. “What are they doing here?”
Marion Price sighed. “Your guess is as good as mine. All I know that they’re examining DNA samples, retrieved from some mysterious source. And I’m not supposed to know even that much; the head of genetic research, a certain Major Frost, is obsessed with secrecy. Fortunately, I know some people from her team, and they really hate her attitude, so they babble sometimes.”
Sarah Jane and Owen exchanged grim looks.
“That doesn’t sound good,” Sarah Jane finally said.
“No,” Owen agreed. “In fact, it sounds as if they were tinkering with things that are way beyond their competence. That’s what One did, and we all know how it ended.”
Jenkins looked at him doubtfully. “Do you really expect something of the magnitude of Canary Wharf? Cause I cannot really believe that.”
“Perhaps not exactly of the same magnitude,” Owen allowed, “but not a tad less dangerous. We’ll definitely need to take a closer look at those labs.”
“I’m afraid I cannot help you with that,” Captain Price said glumly. “Not even I am allowed to come close to the genetics labs, although my position as the leader of cybernetic research is equal to that of Major Frost. In theory. But she outranks me so my hands are bound. I’m sorry.”
“That’s the disadvantage of a military organization,” Owen said knowingly. “A good thing that we’re more ad hoc, as Jack would put it. Don’t worry, Captain; we’ve got our ways to enter places where we aren’t supposed to sniff around.”
“Good luck with that,” Marion Price glanced at her wrist watch. “Well, I have to go. My lunch break is almost over, and it would draw unwanted attention if I got back late.”
“She has balls,” Owen commented, after the captain had left.
Jenkins nodded. “Oh yes, she does. And she’s got the brains, too… ‘cept for the fact that she fell for Colonel Ironpants. But love is blind, as they say.”
“Not our concern at the moment,” Sarah Jane said dismissively. “Let’s return to the inn and see what the others have learned. Then we can decide how to continue.”
“But you do have a theory, don’t you?” Jenkins asked slyly.
Sarah Jane nodded. “I do, my boy, I do. But I want to hear out the others first.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Jenny, Adam, Lloyd and Trevor, in the meantime, were having the time of their lives - especially Jenny, who’d been eager to visit the location of some of her father’s adventures for quite some time. The view alone was enough to impress somebody who had not seen the place before; and most of those who had seen it already, too.
“It is huge,” Jenny said in awe.
“Twenty-two square miles,” Trevor supported. “The second-largest Scottish loch by surface area after Loch Lomond, but due to its great depth, it is the largest by volume in the British Isles. Its deepest point is seven hundred and fifty-five feet, and it contains more water than all the lakes of England and Wales combined,” at the stunned silence of the others, he frowned. “What? I looked it up in Wikipedia. It’s called research, you know.”
“You sounded just like Ianto,” Lloyd grinned.
Trevor shrugged. “Jonesy does know all about research.”
“The water is really murky, though,” Adam commented. “No wonder that the search teams were unable to find Nessie. One could overlook a whole fleet of submarines by this visibility… or rather the lack of it.”
Trevor nodded. “Yeah, it supposedly comes from the high peat content in the surrounding soil.”
“That sounds plausible,” Lloyd said. “But how are we supposed to find the Skarasen? I doubt that even Torchwood-issue scanners would do us much good here.”
“We’ll use this,” Jenny took a small device that looked like a pepper pot out of her pocket.
Trevor looked at it with professional interest. “And what is this?”
“A signal device used to summon the Skarasen,” Jenny explained. “It’s called a Trilonic activator. My Dad thought that it sends out a mating call, attracting the Skarasen to it, but he might have been wrong about that, of course.”
“And how do you know that?” Adam asked. “I thought you couldn’t access the Doctor’s personal memories.”
“I cannot,” Jenny admitted. “But I talked to Sarah Jane a lot last night, and she told me everything she could remember about the encounter with the Zygons.”
“Did she give you the device, too?”
“Yes. My Dad left it with her, just in case; and a good thing he did, wasn’t it? Now we can summon the Skarasen and see it for real.”
“I wonder what use it could be for us, except being able to say that we’ve actually seen the Loch Ness monster,” Trevor muttered pessimistically.
“Well, it will show us if we can control the Skarasen via the Trilonic activator, at least,” Jenny replied. “That might be crucial, should the Zygons have returned without having been noticed.”
Adam, who didn’t know a thing about the Zygons, frowned. “How that?”
“Skarasens are large, dinosaur-like creatures that have been cybernetically enhanced by the Zygons, so that they could be used as weapons,” Jenny explained. “They can smash a human to death with a single swipe of a foot. Also, their spine is infused with some sort of alloy that makes them resistant to blunt trauma, and their skin is extremely tough. The one supposedly still dwelling in the Loch destroyed three oil rigs the last time my Dad encountered it.”
“But if it is so huge, how did it fit into a spaceship and how did the Zygons manage to feed it?” Lloyd wondered. “Unless, of course, they transported it in its embryonic form, or as a very small baby.”
“The latter,” Jenny said. “In fact, all Zygon ships carry baby Skarasens with them, since they are dependant on the lactic fluid of the creatures as a food source. That’s the only thing their freshly hatched youths can eat; and the adults need it periodically as well.”
“So, does that actually mean that if the Skarasen is lactating, there might be Zygons nearby?” Lloyd asked.
Jenny nodded. “Yes, Skarasens cannot breed without artificial inseminations; the species has been already too specified to serve the needs of the Zygons for spontaneous spawning. The cybernetic parts regulate their bodily functions and also keep them alive much longer than they would naturally live.”
“And Ms Smith has told you all that?” Trevor asked doubtfully.
Jenny shrugged. “Of course not. But I inherited almost all of my Dad’s knowledge during the progenation process; and he met the Zygons long before I was created.”
“Personal knowledge yet no personal memories?”
“Certainly. Knowledge can always prove useful for a soldier. Memories, on the other hand, can be distracting, which one cannot afford,” Jenny wrapped her fingers around the device and squeezed. “I hope this is the right way to activate it. My Dad was really taking a shot into the dark.”
For a while nothing happened. Then, when they were about to give up, the device began to beep. It was a shrill, high-pitched tone that felt like many hot needles rammed into one’s head. Adam in particular was hit hard, as it caused a feedback in his infospike; he fell to the floor, clutching his temples and moaning in pain.
“I hope it won’t take long,” Lloyd said on concern, “or else it might fry the boy’s brain.”
“This is the proximity alert,” Jenny replied. “The Skarasen is coming. As soon as it arrives, the alert will stop.”
And indeed, mere moments later the beeping stopped. Instead, the water of the Loch started boiling, and the head of an extraordinary creature rose from the middle of the widening rings of water. It looked like the head of a particularly large plesiosaur, mounted on a long, sinuous neck that was followed by a large body - about four feet high and twenty-five feet long. Unlike regular plesiosaurs, however, it had four short, powerful, clawed legs that propelled it forward in the water with unexpected speed. Its skin gleamed, as if it had been infused with some kind of metallic alloy.
“It looks like an armoured dragon,” Lloyd commented.
“It is armoured,” Trevor replied, consulting his scanner. “Its entire skin is laced with cybernetic implants. In theory, it should be invulnerable; only that it clearly isn’t!”
“What do you mean?” Lloyd asked.
Trevor handed her the scanner. “Look at this. It seems as if entire chunks of implants have been removed from its skin; and rather forcibly at that.”
Lloyd checked the readings. “You’re right. This creature has been damaged.”
“Which is bad news,” Trevor said. “Firstly, anything that can damage an armoured cyborg can cause a great deal of harm in the wrong hands. Secondly, a damaged cyborg - especially a non-sentient one - can be malfunctioning and unpredictable. I don’t think we should get close to this… thing.”
“It’s easier said than done,” Lloyd looked at Jenny. “Or do you know how to send it away again?”
“I have no idea,” Jenny admitted. “I can deactivate the device, of course, but if that will be enough…?”
“Give it to me,” Adam took from her the deactivated device and snapped his fingers.
The infospike dutifully emerged, offering everyone unhindered sight into his brain. Adam scanned the Trilonic activator with the bundle of light that the infospike emitted and frowned for a moment. Then he selected a few of the unmarked bumps on the surface of the device, which then produced a low, vibrating sound.
“That should do the trick,” Adam declared, closing the infospike with another snap of his fingers and grimaced in pain, caused by the vibration directly in his head. “I’ve reversed the summoning signal; in theory, this other transmission should send Nessie back where she came from.”
“It’s not a she,” Jenny corrected. “Skarasens have no specified gender.”
Adam shrugged. “Whatever. Let’s hope it will go away.”
It seemed that the infospike had done what it was supposed to do indeed, because after a few moments of hesitation the Skarasen, that had already been towering over them, plunged back into the murky water and disappeared in a boiling mass of foam. Only an odd patch of greenish fluid on the water surface showed that only moments earlier there had been anything at all.
Trevor let out a deep, relieved breath. “Saved by the bell in the last minute. Good job, Adam. But what is the green stuff?”
“That would be Skarasen lactic fluid, although collecting some for further analysis might be useful,” Jenny replied. “If only to make sure whether its lactation glands have been activated.”
The others exchanged reluctant looks; then Lloyd sighed.
“All right, I’ll do it. Once SOCO always SOCO, I guess. But Torchwood will so owe me a new pair of jeans after this!”
She opened her field kit, took out some test tubes and waded into the murky water to collect a sample.
“Actually, a new pair of shoes, too,” she called back over her shoulder. “And I’ll insist on proper hazmat coveralls on the next staff meeting.”
“I’m sure Jonesy will listen to reasonable arguments,” Trevor replied, happy that it wasn’t him who had to wade into the Loch.
“He better will,” Lloyd muttered, expertly using the test tubes to take a sample; then she looked at the oozing green liquid and pulled a face. “Gah, this is disgusting. If I had to depend on it to survive, I’d seriously consider suicide. OK, we’ve got our sample; what next?”
“Back to the Fox Inn,” Trevor suggested. “Owen and the others will be back, soon, and then we can put together what we’ve learned.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
But when they got back to the inn, all they found was a note from Owen that they’ve gone to meet Private Harris outside Torchwood House.
“Why would they do that?” Adam wondered. “They could have simply called him.”
“Mobile phones don’t work in Torchwood House,” Lloyd reminded him. “And I don’t think Owen would use the landline; not with Torchwood Four in the House.”
“But why?” Adam frowned. “They’re Torchwood, too, aren’t they?”
“By name perhaps,” Trevor said grimly. “But they used to be UNIT, every single one of them.”
“So was Sally,” Lloyd pointed out.
“Yeah, but Jonesy chose Sally,” Trevor replied. “After checking her credentials and after Commodore Sullivan vouched for her. This so-called Torchwood Four is Doctor Arnold’s old team; a team Jonesy didn’t get the chance to check first. A team he still doesn’t even know of.”
“I seriously doubt that Prince William would have chosen them if they weren’t loyal,” Lloyd said.
“Oh, I’m sure that they are loyal?” Trevor returned grimly. “The question is, though: to whom are they loyal?”
“Do you believe that they might be in league with Colonel Oduya?” Lloyd asked doubtfully. “I can’t imagine it. Prince William would have them thoroughly vetted before drafting them for Torchwood. He takes his responsibility as liaison seriously.”
“I’m sure he does, but he’s just human like the rest of us and not infallible,” Trevor said. “He’s been wrong before; he believed that Harold Saxon’s wife would be trustworthy, too, just because they grew up in the same social circles and went to the same school. I’d be willing to give their archivist the benefit of doubt - Jonesy worked with him when he last checked on the archives here and would have noticed if the man weren’t kosher, he’s very good at that - but I wouldn’t lay my hand into fire for Doctor Arnold. And that old psychic of theirs gives me the creeps.”
“I thought you guys had psychic training at One,” Lloyd said.
Trevor nodded. “We had; especially the ones working on special projects like me. So you couldn’t fool me with psychic paper or a perception filter, assuming I know what I’m looking for. I can also recognize telepathic probing and shield my mind against it… to a certain extent. But we don’t know just how strong the old man is - or if he truly follows Doctor Arnold’s orders. Assuming that she is willing to cooperate, that is.”
“I can check him if you want me to,” Jenny offered. “Gallifreyans are telepathic, you know.”
Trevor shook his head. “Jonesy doesn’t want anyone to know who - or what - you are. Especially UNIT. They’d find a way to have you extracted to them, seeing that your Dad used to work for them, and then you’d vanish in one of their secret labs - as a lab specimen.”
“But why would they do that?”
“Because they’ve become power-hungry and paranoid, ever since Oduya took over. And Oduya was Saxon’s puppet. Unfortunately, no-one remembers that, since the resetting of time; only the few of us who spent The Year That Never Was in the temporally shielded Vaults of the Hub - so we have no proof.”
“But Doctor Arnold and the others aren’t with UNIT anymore,” Adam, who was still very new to the power struggle between Torchwood and UNIT, pointed out.
Trevor snorted. “That’s what they say. We still don’t know for sure if it’s true.”
“Isn’t there any way to find out?” Lloyd asked. “Somebody mentioned an alien lie detector once…”
“Which is very efficient, or so Jack says,” Trevor agreed. “Unfortunately, it sometimes causes the head of the subject explode, so Jonesy would hesitate to use it on people who might be just fellow Torchwood agents.”
“So what are we gonna do then?”
“I haven’t got a clue,” Trevor admitted. “Let’s hope that Owen manages to contact Jonesy and get new instructions. In the meantime we should eat something and rest a bit. Especially you,” he looked at Adam. “You know that you are risking brain damage every time you use that thing in your head.”
“Not to mention the headache,” Adam muttered. “God, what an idiot I was, having it installed in the first place! How I wish it could e removed!”
“No chance for that; not at this time, not on this planet,” Jenny said with compassion. “But if we manage to fix my ship, you should come with me. It’s dangerous to cross your own timeline, even if the two yous are on the opposite sides of the planet. And out there we might find a place technically advanced enough to remove the implant.”
“Ianto would never let me go,” Adam replied glumly. “I’m unofficially imprisoned by Torchwood; and that’s still the lesser evil. I could have ended up in a UNIT lab, too.”
“Jonesy doesn’t want you to run free on Earth while there still is another you present,” Trevor corrected. “He might let you leave the planet with Jenny, though. He’s a reasonable man.”
“And that way he’d be rid of us both,” Jenny added; then, at Lloyd’s surprised look, she shrugged. “He doesn’t like me. He doesn’t want me here: on Earth, with Torchwood. He hides it well, but he’ll be relieved once I’m gone. He just tolerates me because that way he can always know where I am and what I’m up to. And I’m useful. But he still doesn’t like me.”
“Actually, it’s your Dad he doesn’t like,” Trevor said.
Jenny shrugged. “Same difference. Quite frankly, I’ll be glad to be gone, too. There’s so much to see out there, so much to learn… people to help, bad creatures to defeat… I wouldn’t want to be restricted to just one planet. And a travelling companion would be welcome,” she grinned at Adam.
“Jack would be sad to see you go,” Lloyd said quietly. “And the rest of us would miss you, too.”
“I could always come back for short visits,” Jenny replied, still grinning. “But for that I’d need a functioning ship first.”
“We’re working on it,” Trevor promised. “That is, Toshiko is working on the fine tuning between your ship’s systems and the Chimaeran scouting device. There are still a few glitches that need to be ironed out, but it will work, I’m sure of that.”
“I hope so,” Jenny said seriously. “The baby TARDIS - the coral Jack gave me - will need years yet to grow out fully, and I’ll still have to get hold of the technology that operates it as a vessel. I can’t do that while grounded on Earth.”
“And yet Earth would be your best chance to catch your Dad,” Trevor reminded her.
“Perhaps,” she allowed. “But I can still travel at least in space in the meantime.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Unbeknownst to them, the leading triumvirate of Torchwood Three was discussing the same topics back in Cardiff. Both Jack and Ianto were moderately pissed out by Owen’s news that he had managed to deliver from out of nowhere between the Fox Inn and Torchwood House, thanks to the technically savvy Private Harris.
“I find it disturbing that the Crown saw it necessary to re-establish an independent branch,” Ianto said. “We’re still understaffed and Sir Archibald has no-one but Maggie who needs to be taught the ropes before she could be of any help. “And I find it even more disturbing that Prince William did it without consulting me first.”
“What I find worrisome is that they would draft a group of disgraced UNIT scientists for the job,” Jack said grimly.
“Actually, Mr. Winslet is quite competent,” Ianto replied. “He also seemed an honest person to me. Tosh, have you ever heard of this Doctor Arnold?”
Tosh nodded. “She is - well, was - a name-worthy scientist with UNIT. Her field is mechanical engineering and alternate energy sources. She used to lead a secret lab known as The Warehouse, with the help of her personal assistant. Mr. Winslet was their senior archivist. They accidentally reactivated a dormant Nestene energy unit and nearly unleashed a full-blown Nestene invasion on Earth.”
“How that?”
“Apparently, there were dormant Nestenes lying underground around the world, put in place before the development of the human race. Their locations have later become known to humanity as holy sites and were connected by ley lines. One of them was revived on Sentinel Island by an Auton posing as your Mr. Winslet, and tried to revive the others. UNIT sent a psychic operative by the codename of Lockwood to contain the situation, as he could apparently access all information from any computer mainframe in the world, thanks to an alien implant in his head.”
“You mean an infospike like Adam’s?” Ianto asked.
Tosh shrugged. “I don’t think it was exactly the same; but perhaps something similar. UNIT did take away a great deal of unsorted alien technology from Canary Wharf before we could have secured them. In any case, the Nestene Consciousness clearly used this implant - and Lockwood’s psychic abilities - to their own end. The energy creature Doctor Arnold had accidentally released merged with his mind, and in the end he was forced to commit suicide to destroy the Nestene plan.”
“How did you learn all this?” Jack asked in awe.
“When Ianto last went to Torchwood House and found this Mr. Winslet there, I made a background check on the man,” Tosh explained. “I found some… anomalies in his CV, so I let Mainframe run a very detailed search. She managed to tap into some top secret UNIT files and I saved he data, just in case. I was surprised to learn that Doctor Arnold’s entire team has actually survived, although the official records reported them being killed during various phases of the incident.”
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Ianto said in concern. “That was very risky. If they’d caught you snooping around in their secret files…”
“I know, Ianto, but we needed the information. And the computer Mainframe couldn’t outsmart on any day will have to be built yet.”
“Perhaps,” Ianto allowed. “Still, try not to hack into UNIT’s files again, unless it is absolutely necessary. We need you a lot more than any piece of information.”
“What about the other team members?” Jack asked.
“Well, Doctor Matthews is a containment specialist who, together with this Lockwood character and Sergeant Ramsay, was called to The Warehouse by Doctor Arnold when she activated the Nestene pod,” Tosh replied. “He was injured by the Autons but continued to work with Lockwood and Doctor Arnold for some time. He did try to rack down the escaped alien… without results. About six months before the discovery of the creature on Sentinel Island he left the team to carry out archaeological research in Africa, where he supposedly died in some unspecified accident.”
“Just like Sergeant Ramsay, who fought the Autons on Sentinel Island and was reported to have sacrificed himself,” Ianto committed. “Or Miss Chard, Doctor Arnold’s assistant who was also reportedly killed by the Nestene creature. It seems that UNIT has sent us a great deal of false memos in the recent years. I wonder, though, why was somebody trying to keep all these people under the radar.”
“They all seem to have worked with Doctor Arnold, one way or another,” Tosh said thoughtfully. “With the exception of this Mr. Palmer they all went on swimmingly, too.”
“Owen does have his doubts about Mr. Palmer,” Ianto said. “I wonder who his supporters might be, since he obviously wasn’t reported dead.”
“I can’t tell,” Tosh admitted. “It appears that Doctor Arnold used to be Colonel Smythe’s pet scientist, which means she might have fallen from grace when Colonel Oduya took command of the British division. Mr. Palmer, however, seems to have kept his position as a special UNIT operative… until recently, when he suddenly decided to retire.”
“I can’t understand why Prince William chose him, of all people,” Jack shook his head. “He seems to be the least trustworthy of the entire team.”
“Perhaps he wanted to put his psychic abilities to good use, while enabling the rest of the team to keep an eye on him,” Ianto offered. “This whole thing with Torchwood Four is more than just a little fishy. Jack, I think you need to go to London and speak with the Brigadier in person. And with Commodore Sullivan.”
“Oh, I intend to do more than just that,” Jack said grimly. “I’m gonna pay Lizzie a visit.”
“Yeah, because you can just walk into Buckingham Palace and demand to have a chat with the Queen,” Ianto returned sarcastically.
“Actually, the royal family is in Balmoral Castle right now,” Tosh pointed out. “Not that that would make things any easier.”
Jack grinned like a shark. “Don’t worry; I have my ways, for exactly such cases.”
Ianto gave the idea some thought.
“Perhaps you should do it,” he finally agreed. “I don’t doubt that Prince William means well, but he lacks the vast experience of Her Royal Majesty. He might need some… guidance from his grandmother. But talk to the Brigadier and the commodore first.”
“I could go to London right now,” Jack offered, but Ianto shook his head.
“Not before I’m back from Torchwood House. We can’t leave Tosh alone with the newbies.”
“And you absolutely insist on going yourself?” Jack asked.
Ianto nodded. “Needs must, Jack. I need to lay down the law for Torchwood Four while I still can; and I need to meet them in person to decide whether they can be trusted or not. Besides, I’m planning to have words with Sir Archibald as well.”
Jack snorted, having known the Torchwood Two leader for decades. “Good luck with that!”
“I don’t need luck for that,” Ianto answered coldly. “Sir Archibald enthusiastically supported Her Royal Majesty’s decision to make me the Torchwood Director; I presume he was afraid to get stuck with the job in my stead. But since I am his boss now, he’ll have to learn to run everything through me - or I’ll find someone who will.”
“You’d remove Archie from Torchwood Two?” Jack asked in shock.
Ianto nodded grimly. “If I had to then yes, I would. I cannot run Torchwood efficiently when everyone acts as they please. That’s something our royal liaison needs to understand, too.”
“And you intend to tell him exactly that?” Jack grinned.
It wasn’t exactly a question but Ianto nodded anyway. “I do. Which is why you need to get support from his grandmother. He’s but the liaison; she is our ultimate boss,” he stood. “I’ll try to call Owen now. Then I’ll have a few hours’ rest before I attempt to teleport right into Torchwood House.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
About halfway between Torchwood House and the Fox Inn, out in nowhere, Owen disengaged his phone at looked at Sarah Jane, Jenkins and Harris in grim satisfaction.
“All right,” he said. “Teaboy’s coming over. He’ll teleport directly to Torchwood House and walk in using a perception filter,” he turned to Harris. “He asks to be picked up at the Celtic cross in front of the House.”
Harris nodded. “I’ll pretend to have a smoke outside the building then.”
“You don’t even smoke,” Jenkins commented. “Stevie does.”
“Yeah, but Stevie would shit his pants out of sheer anxiety,” Harris reminded him. “I’ll just have to fake it.”
“Here,” Jenkins pulled a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket and threw it at him. Harris caught it and frowned.
“Why do you carry cigarettes on you? You don’t smoke, either.”
“They’re Stevie’s,” Jenkins revealed. “I’ve been practicing my fine motor skills by picking his pockets.”
Harris shook his head in exasperation. “You’ll never grow up!”
“Not when I can help it,” Jenkins agreed. “Now, go back to that Tudor monstrosity and keep an eye on the others.”
“And we should go back to the inn and see if the others have found Nessie,” Owen said. “God, I hate the countryside! Can’t wait to be in Cardiff again.”
“Urban civilization does have its advantages,” Jenkins nodded. “I for my part would prefer London, though.”
“Wouldn’t we all?” Owen muttered, climbing into the passenger seat of Sarah Jane’s geriatric car. “Let’s go then so that we can at least have a roof over our heads.”
~TBC~