Ficathon: Every Darkest Sky, 6/6 plus epilogue (teen)
TITLE: Every Darkest Sky
CHARACTERS: Maria, Rani, Mrs Wormwood, Jack Torchwood Three, (name redacted for spoilers)
RATING: Teen (disturbing situations, offscreen death, aliens taking over)
WORD COUNT: 25443 all in. 3917 this chapter.
SPOILERS: Goes AU just before the end of Invasion of the Bane.
SUMMARY: For the End of SJA Ficathon - This is a loose interpretation of two prompts:
"Sarah Jane didn't find Luke - maybe UNIT did, or some other alien, or even the Doctor. What happens and what does Luke become without her guidance and his friends?” and “Luke as a bad guy. How does Team Sarah Jane take him down?” Notice I said loose interpretation. :D
Part one is here, part two is here, part three is here, part four is here and part five is here. Enjoy!
Two days later Owen signed Nathan off medically; his vitals had all returned to normal, his brain was working at his usual speed, and his reflexes had picked back up. Jack wandered into a conversation he was having with Maria, Gwen on his heels.
"Alright, kids. Having fun?"
"Yes," Maria said warily. "What's going on?"
Jack gestured her to wait, pulling out his mobile - phone service was back, though reserved for UNIT and the emergency crews - and dialled.
"You're not supposed to have service yet," his target said disapprovingly.
"Voice of a nightingale. Where are you? I need to see you."
"I'm in Mount Snowdon," Martha said. "I can come to Cardiff."
"We're in London."
"Course you are. Near ground zero, I suppose. What do you need?"
Jack glanced at Nathan, considering. "It's a face to face favour."
"You just want to make sure I can't refuse."
"You never cease to amaze me. Can you come here or should we go to you?"
"Sounds serious." She spoke to someone else for a moment before coming back. "Can you get out of London?"
"Yeah. We'll be with you in a while."
"We?"
"Me and - a guest."
Martha sighed. "You want to bring a guest onto a UNIT base and you won't tell me who? You're using up favours, Jack."
"I know."
There was silence for a moment before she said, "Look, it'll take you hours to drive. Let me...give me five."
"Will do."
"Who's Martha?" Maria asked when he hung up.
"A friend of mine. A doctor." He glanced at Nathan. "She works for UNIT."
"Unified Intelligence Task Force," he told Maria. "They're like Torchwood, but they answer to the United Nations and they have better funding."
"Hey!" Jack protested. Nathan lifted one shoulder in a shrug.
Jack's phone rang and he answered it, listening intently for a few moments before nodding. "You're the best, Martha. I owe you for this." Hanging up, he glanced past the kids at Gwen. "She's rerouting an aid helicopter. Should be here pretty soon."
"Are you sure about this, Jack?"
"No. Gotta talk to her about it, then we'll see."
"Hmm. Maria, can you give me a hand for a while?"
"Yeah." She smiled at Nathan. "I'll see you later. Behave."
"Yes." He watched her leave before looking back at Jack. "Are you sending me away?"
Jack considered him. "Yeah. Maybe. We're going to talk to my friend. Does that upset you?"
"No."
It really didn't, Jack realised. Nathan hadn't reacted to anything much since Mrs Wormwood had died, taking whatever orders he was given without complaint or comment.
"Come on. We need to go meet the copter."
****
Martha was waiting when the helicopter landed at the Mount Snowdon base. "Jack," she said cheerfully, pulling him into a hug.
"Only UNIT would build their secret base under the most-climbed mountain in Britain."
"As opposed to under the biggest tourist attraction in Cardiff?" She let him go, eyeing Nathan. "Jack?"
"Nathan, come and meet Martha." Jack dropped a hand to his shoulder. "Martha Jones, Nathan. Nathan, this is my friend Martha."
"The doctor." Nathan shook her hand politely.
"Martha, we need privacy," Jack said quietly. Martha nodded, eyeing Nathan once more before turning away.
"Need you to sign in, but I've got your badges here." She took them from a soldier, passing them over. Nathan examined his curiously; Jack carefully pinned his on his lapel and Nathan mimicked him. Martha led them onto the base and into her office, firmly closing the door against her escort.
"Now. Talk to me, Jack."
Jack steered Nathan into a chair, standing behind him. "It's a long story, Martha."
"I'm good at long. Start at the start."
Jack took a deep breath before beginning the story. Nathan sat quietly through it, lifting his shirt to provide proof when prompted but otherwise unmoving.
Martha listened intently, scribbling notes as he talked. When he finished she sat back in her chair, taking a deep breath. "I see."
"Owen's sent his notes, I'll give you them before I leave, but..."
"What do you want me to do, Jack?"
Jack glanced down at Nathan, unmoving in his chair. "I want you to take Nathan."
"Jack!"
"He needs someone who understands..."
"That's not me, then, I'm still completely lost."
"...understands his needs," Jack continued doggedly. "Nathan's a good kid, Martha. He could do great things here. Look...we gave him an eReader with no communication equipment. I mean, Tosh actually took out the hardware. No way that thing could talk to other computers. And he used it to reprogram our base without us noticing a thing. But the first time we gave him a banana he tried to eat the skin. He needs someone to look after him. Teach him how to be what he should."
"And if there's still commands buried in there?"
"We're fairly sure he burned them out. But if we're wrong..." Jack shrugged, eyes dark. "You're in the middle of a military base."
Martha made a face at him, turning to Nathan. "What do you think, Nathan?" Nathan shrugged and she sighed. "Really. If you're unhappy about it..."
"Will Maria be here?"
Jack shook his head. "Not straight away. I want to talk to Martha about that, too. But we'll get her here to visit you. I promise."
Nathan nodded. Martha glanced at Jack, frowning. "Talk to me about...?"
"Maria's father. He's a computer security expert, and he was one of Wormwood's Bane."
"He was Maria's guard," Nathan offered. "My mother liked to hurt the girls, whatever way she could."
"Sounds like a lovely woman," Martha agreed. "Computer security?"
"He's good, from the records we found and what I've seen him do. He works - worked - for big businesses, puts up firewalls, catches viruses." He grinned. "UNIT could use a couple good computer security guys."
Martha nodded. "I'll talk to him. It'd be nice if you weren't traipsing through our databases every time you felt like it." She grinned at the look on his face. "Didn't think of that, did you."
"I may have just outsmarted myself," he muttered.
Martha considered them for a moment before rising to the feet. "Nathan, come with me."
"Where are we going?" he asked, standing to follow her out of the room.
"I want to show you a project the team's been hung up on for a while. There's not much research going on right now, everyone's trying to sort out the mess the Bane left behind, so there shouldn't be many people around."
Jack followed them through the corridors, watching. Nathan was still withdrawn, but he was watching their path at least, paying enough attention to know where they were going and how to get back. It shouldn't have been enough to help him; his Visitor badge would get him detained by any UNIT personnel who saw him on his own, and it wouldn't give him admittance to anything. But Jack was learning not to underestimate Nathan.
Martha opened the door to one of the labs, glancing in. "Dr Aylaia. Got a minute?"
"Dr Jones," the woman answered. "Depends what you need."
"Just wanted to show off your project. Captain Harkness, Nathan, this is Dr Aylaia."
"Pleasure to meet you," she said, glancing curiously at Nathan.
"Tell them what you're working on," Martha told her. "Nathan, go take a look."
"Don't touch anything," Jack added. Nathan nodded, slipping between them and approaching the desk. Dr Aylaia glanced at Martha, who gestured for her to go ahead. Doubtfully, she started explaining the project.
It was completely over Martha's head; it had to do with propulsion systems, but that was as much as she'd ever been able to gather. Nathan was following easily, though, asking questions - and from the sudden look of interest on Dr Aylaia's face, they were intelligent questions.
Jack was nodding as he listened; after a moment he blinked, turning to Martha. "That's where I lose track."
"He's following? Dr Aylaia's our expert..."
"He's definitely following." Jack watched as Nathan leaned over the schematic, pointing something out.
"Jack, I don't know about this," Martha murmured, watching him.
"He needs watching, Martha. If he'd genuinely been on the side of the Bane, they'd have control of the world by now. We're just lucky they didn't leave 'conscience' out of the mix, and that he imprinted on Maria instead of anyone else."
"Yeah, but I don't know what qualifies me to be the person watching him."
"Don't touch," Jack said more sharply. Nathan glanced back at him, taking one careful step back from the - whatever that was he was looking at. Dr Aylaia flicked an annoyed glance at them, but she didn't miss a beat in her discussion.
Turning back to Martha, he said slowly, "Wormwood left him with two girls."
"Maria and Rani. You said that."
"Rani hates him. I mean, not really; intellectually, she understands that none of what happened was really his fault. But every time she visited the house Wormwood made Nathan hurt her in one way or another. And he was effectively their jailor. So she doesn't like him. Doesn't trust him."
"And?"
"He needs someone who will trust him."
"But not too much."
"Not too much," Jack admitted. "You don't have anything to hold against him. Gwen's angry at him, and Tosh is afraid of him. I can't keep him."
"I could make a call," Martha suggested, but Jack shook his head.
"That'd be worse. He has less idea how to be human than the Doctor does. Way too easy for him to slide off the straight and narrow - Nathan, don't touch that!"
"I asked him to," Dr Aylaia said quickly. "Only to steady it while I work on it."
"Sorry. He's not cleared to touch anything." Martha gestured sharply; Nathan carefully laid the piece back down, shook Dr Aylaia's hand and came back to join them.
"Martha?" Dr Aylaia called. "I want him. I'll trade you my tech."
"We'll see." She steered Nathan out of the room.
"I didn't think Earth had technology like that," he said, glancing at Jack.
"Earth as a whole doesn't. UNIT and Torchwood, we're a little ahead of the curve. It'll be disseminated. Do you know where that came from?"
"No. It's not anything I've seen before."
"Then how did you know how it worked?" Martha asked.
Nathan shrugged. "It's all maths. There are only so many ways to lay out a system like that."
Over his head, Jack caught Martha's eye. She rolled hers at him, leading them back to her office. Nathan settled back into his seat, watching as Martha typed quickly.
"Ok," she said finally. "This is what I can do. We can house you here on the base, limited access to particular projects. You'll have a guard, at first. Like - a probation period. I'll contact Alan today. He takes the job, he and Maria will be living on base too." She leaned forward, watching him. "You'll have to answer to me. Do you understand?"
"You'd be my..." Nathan caught Jack's shift and edited himself to "Guardian."
"Something like that, yeah." She glanced at Jack, who looked blandly back at her. "How does that sound?"
"It sounds fine."
"Right. Let's get you settled in, then."
****
Jack hung around while Martha forced Nathan's paperwork through - being a known Companion gave her extra pull, but it still took both of them on occasion. The fact that Nathan kept telling anyone who asked just what his role in the invasion was didn't help; several UNIT officers thought he should be dissected rather than hired on, and they weren't shy about expressing it. Eventually Martha shrugged and pulled out her phone, tossing it to Jack while she faced off against the latest scientist.
"Martha Jones!" the Doctor crowed.
"Doctor, it's Jack. Are you busy?"
He pretended not to notice the sudden silence in the room.
"No. What's wrong? Where's Martha?"
"She's fine, here with me. I might need a favour. We've got a bit of a situation down here at UNIT, Mount Snowdon."
"Oh?"
"I've come into guardianship of a pretty amazing kid. I was planning on leaving him with Martha under UNIT care, but they seem to think cutting him open is their best option."
"When are you, Jack?" the Doctor asked, voice sharp.
"Bubble shock."
"Bubble Shock," he said quietly. "So Sarah Jane..."
"I think so. I'm sorry."
"Mmm." There was a long pause before he said, voice deliberately cheerful, "You found the Bane boy."
"Mm hmm." Jack carefully didn't react outwardly.
"Put me on speaker."
Jack obeyed, glancing at Martha, who grinned cheerfully. "Hi, Doctor!"
"Hi, Martha," he said fondly. Voice sharpening, he added, "Are the idiots who want to dissect your guest listening?"
"Yes."
"Good. Listen carefully, then. You might have to repeat this to them a few times before they catch on."
It was the Oncoming Storm who said very clearly, "Do Not Hurt That Boy."
****
No one tried to touch Nathan after that. The quarters next to Martha's were miraculously cleared, and Nathan was given a security badge that would grant him access to two or three of the labs.
"You don't go anywhere without me knowing about it," Martha told him. "Not unless it's a genuine emergency. Don't ever go with anyone who says they're from me; I'll have told you they're coming. Understand?"
"No. I mean..." he frowned, studying the radio she'd given him. "I understand the orders. I don't understand the reason. Captain Harkness said I would be safe here."
"You are. More or less. Especially now the Doctor's weighed in to protect you. But there are people who'll think what they might learn from you would be worth his wrath - people who've never met him - and they could do a lot of harm to you very quickly. Besides, if this is going to work I'll need to know where you are all the time."
"In case I start following my mother's orders again."
"Yes," she agreed honestly. Nathan knew exactly what the conditions on his life were.
"I would tell them if they asked me."
"I'm sorry?"
He gestured vaguely. "You said they wanted to learn from me. I know what I am. I could tell them anything they wanted to know."
She smiled softly. "Don't tell them that. In fact, don't tell anyone anything about yourself without checking with me first."
"Careful," Jack said from where he was holding up the wall. "You'll create a mute."
"What?"
He shoved off the wall, coming closer. "You can tell them anything except how you were created, and your role in the invasion."
"That doesn't leave much," Nathan pointed out.
"It leaves your name. It leaves what you like and don't like. It leaves everything you know, everything you've learned."
Nathan nodded in understanding, and Jack grinned at him. "I'm going to go back to London. I'm leaving you with Martha, but if you need me, Nathan, or you want to talk to me, call me, alright?"
He glanced at Martha, who nodded. "We'll put you in touch any time you like, Nathan."
"Thank you."
Jack caught Martha's hand, drawing her to the doorway. "One last thing." He glanced briefly at Nathan, occupied with examining his new bed and apparently completely ignoring them. "He's not a soldier. Don't try to make him one. Don't put him on weapons research."
Martha nodded. "He's in the system as a tech. He'll need basic hand to hand, but he won't need weapons training."
"I can shoot," Nathan offered. "Hand eye co ordination and reflexes well above human norms. I can fight."
"No," Jack said firmly. "You're thirteen."
"I'm less than three months."
"You're thirteen now. You're not joining the UNIT field teams. You're not going to be fighting."
"If I need to..."
"You're in the middle of a mountain, Nathan," Martha pointed out, not unkindly. "If you need to fight, we're in deep trouble." Turning back to Jack, she added, "Make sure and put me in touch with Alan as soon as you can."
"Captain Harkness, what about Rani? Is she coming here with Maria and Mr Jackson?"
"I don't know yet. Hopefully her parents..."
Nathan shook his head. "Her mother wasn't affected at first, but her father was. She held him off long enough for Rani to run. But there was a fire, two days later. The day before you rescued us. The whole street burned down, and a lot of the human Bane died."
"Why didn't they run?" Martha protested.
"They had no orders," Jack said quietly. "You didn't tell Rani, Nathan?"
"No. I only learned it shortly before you rescued us. There wasn't really time after that."
"I suppose not. Why are you telling me?"
"You're her guardian. And I don't...she should know, yes? People want to know?"
"Yeah. When they're missing, the families want to know."
"I can mock up a report," Martha offered. "Tell her UNIT found them."
"I didn't know if I should tell her," Nathan said quietly. "From me, then, she'd have thought it was a lie, an attempt to hurt her. She wouldn't have believed me. I was going to ask Maria what I should do, but it didn't seem right for Maria to know before Rani."
"You have a strange sense of morals," Jack noted. "You're sure about this?"
"The reports were very clear, sir. There were pictures."
"I like your mother less and less the more I hear about her," Martha muttered. "You want the report, Jack?"
"Please."
"Right. One fake report, coming up." She slipped into her own quarters, leaving the door open so they could hear her moving around.
"Should I have told her?" Nathan asked quietly.
"I don't know. It's not something that has a right or wrong answer. Sometimes you just have to go with your gut - instincts," he corrected himself quickly.
"I don't think I have instincts."
"You'll learn."
"I was going to tell Maria. But we were interrupted, and then we had to leave."
"Right." Martha reappeared in the corridor. "Report will be in Ianto's hands by the time you get back to base."
"Martha Jones, voice of a nightingale, you are a miracle worker."
Martha grinned. "Wait until you taste my cooking."
"Is that an invitation?"
"Go home, Jack."
He nodded, turning to Nathan. "I'll be putting Alan on the phone to Martha later. I'll make sure you get to talk to Maria."
"Thank you."
"If you're not happy here I want you to call me. You have choices, remember."
"I'll remember."
"Good man." He tipped a salute to Martha, striding down the corridor.
Martha glanced down the corridor, gesturing to a soldier there. "Nathan, this is Private Jenkins. He's going to be your guard, alright?"
"Alright," Nathan agreed. "Hello, Private Jenkins."
"Nice to meet you," Jenkins said cheerfully.
"You can stay here in your room, or go to the canteen. Those are your options right now, I don't have time to get you set up in a lab. Private Jenkins can get you onto the computer and you can read through the rules and regs, get to know the layout, that kind of thing. Got it?"
"I can get myself onto the computer."
"No hacking! Stick to your security level. Keep an eye on him, Ross, he's not too sure of the rules yet."
"Will do."
"I'll be back later to check on you, alright? And Ross will call me if you need anything."
"Yes," Nathan agreed.
Martha turned to Jenkins. "Don't interfere with him unless he's trying to leave or hack. Let him do whatever he wants within those limits."
"Yes'm."
She nodded, heading to her office to face down the first in what would probably be a long line of complaints.
***
Jenkins came by six hours later to tell her he was going off duty, leaving Nathan with another private. "He's just been sitting at the computer, reading the history and whatever reports he can get at on his security level. I've been watching him, and Private Little knows what to watch out for. I told her to make sure he eats something, as well."
"That's fine. Thanks, Ross."
"Dr Jones? Can I ask who he is?"
"He's a kid who was used by the Bane. Had his intelligence heightened. The Doctor thinks he's important, so we're keeping him here. You might be on babysitting duty for a while."
Jenkins shrugged. "He's a nice kid."
"Yeah. He is. Go get some rest, Ross."
Ross saluted and headed out, and Martha turned back to her work. She was halfway through the next report when her phone rang.
"Took your time, Jack. Getting slow in your old age?"
"Very funny," Jack said dryly. "You want to talk to Alan?"
"Yeah. Hang on a second." Flicking her radio on, she called Corporal Little and asked her to escort Nathan to her office. "Ok, Jack. Put him on."
Alan Jackson, it turned out, was very receptive to the idea of a new job that would house both him and his daughter. Neither was eager to return to the house across the road from Maria's prison, and theirs was the only house on the road that was even still standing. Alan offered it to Martha as refugee housing without the slightest twinge of regret; the only thing he asked was her promise that anyone who stayed there would be told to keep an eye out for Chrisse, just in case she made it back there. Martha had to interrupt the interview halfway through - Nathan was refusing to leave his quarters, since Martha hadn't told him to herself - and when she came back to Alan he hesitantly broached the subject of Rani.
"She got your report, when Captain Harkness came back. And - she doesn't have anywhere else to go, she doesn't know anyone..."
"Bring her along," Martha agreed easily. "UNIT can have her legally in your custody by this time tomorrow. We'll have to figure something out once we get off emergency status, the base isn't built for families, but right now as long as you can do the work and they don't get in the way no one will care."
"I can do the work. Thank you, Dr Jones."
"Mr Jackson, you know that Nathan is here, under my care."
"Yes, Captain Harkness told me. Maria will be happy. She's pretty mad she didn't get to say goodbye."
Martha glanced up at a knock on her door. "I can help you there, I think. Is she with you?"
"Yes..."
"Put her on the line?" She flipped the phone onto speaker, gesturing Nathan forward.
"Hello?" Maria said uncertainly.
"Maria!" Nathan dropped into the seat, leaning forward. "Are you coming here?"
"Nathan. I don't know, where are you? Captain Harkness wouldn't tell me anything."
"A UNIT base." He didn't say where, Martha noted approvingly. "I'm going to work for them. I can do good here."
"You can do good anywhere you want," she said firmly. Alan murmured something the phone didn't pick up, and she said "Really? Brilliant! Nathan, my dad says he took a job on the base. We're coming there, Rani and us."
"That's happy." Nathan smiled. "I recognise happy."
"That is happy," Maria agreed, smile in her voice. "Nathan, my dad needs to talk to Dr Jones. I'll see you soon, alright? Be good."
"Yes." He stood. "Thank you, Dr Jones."
"Get something to eat," she told him, watching him leave. "Mr Jackson. When can you get here?"
CHARACTERS: Maria, Rani, Mrs Wormwood, Jack Torchwood Three, (name redacted for spoilers)
RATING: Teen (disturbing situations, offscreen death, aliens taking over)
WORD COUNT: 25443 all in. 3917 this chapter.
SPOILERS: Goes AU just before the end of Invasion of the Bane.
SUMMARY: For the End of SJA Ficathon - This is a loose interpretation of two prompts:
"Sarah Jane didn't find Luke - maybe UNIT did, or some other alien, or even the Doctor. What happens and what does Luke become without her guidance and his friends?” and “Luke as a bad guy. How does Team Sarah Jane take him down?” Notice I said loose interpretation. :D
Part one is here, part two is here, part three is here, part four is here and part five is here. Enjoy!
Two days later Owen signed Nathan off medically; his vitals had all returned to normal, his brain was working at his usual speed, and his reflexes had picked back up. Jack wandered into a conversation he was having with Maria, Gwen on his heels.
"Alright, kids. Having fun?"
"Yes," Maria said warily. "What's going on?"
Jack gestured her to wait, pulling out his mobile - phone service was back, though reserved for UNIT and the emergency crews - and dialled.
"You're not supposed to have service yet," his target said disapprovingly.
"Voice of a nightingale. Where are you? I need to see you."
"I'm in Mount Snowdon," Martha said. "I can come to Cardiff."
"We're in London."
"Course you are. Near ground zero, I suppose. What do you need?"
Jack glanced at Nathan, considering. "It's a face to face favour."
"You just want to make sure I can't refuse."
"You never cease to amaze me. Can you come here or should we go to you?"
"Sounds serious." She spoke to someone else for a moment before coming back. "Can you get out of London?"
"Yeah. We'll be with you in a while."
"We?"
"Me and - a guest."
Martha sighed. "You want to bring a guest onto a UNIT base and you won't tell me who? You're using up favours, Jack."
"I know."
There was silence for a moment before she said, "Look, it'll take you hours to drive. Let me...give me five."
"Will do."
"Who's Martha?" Maria asked when he hung up.
"A friend of mine. A doctor." He glanced at Nathan. "She works for UNIT."
"Unified Intelligence Task Force," he told Maria. "They're like Torchwood, but they answer to the United Nations and they have better funding."
"Hey!" Jack protested. Nathan lifted one shoulder in a shrug.
Jack's phone rang and he answered it, listening intently for a few moments before nodding. "You're the best, Martha. I owe you for this." Hanging up, he glanced past the kids at Gwen. "She's rerouting an aid helicopter. Should be here pretty soon."
"Are you sure about this, Jack?"
"No. Gotta talk to her about it, then we'll see."
"Hmm. Maria, can you give me a hand for a while?"
"Yeah." She smiled at Nathan. "I'll see you later. Behave."
"Yes." He watched her leave before looking back at Jack. "Are you sending me away?"
Jack considered him. "Yeah. Maybe. We're going to talk to my friend. Does that upset you?"
"No."
It really didn't, Jack realised. Nathan hadn't reacted to anything much since Mrs Wormwood had died, taking whatever orders he was given without complaint or comment.
"Come on. We need to go meet the copter."
****
Martha was waiting when the helicopter landed at the Mount Snowdon base. "Jack," she said cheerfully, pulling him into a hug.
"Only UNIT would build their secret base under the most-climbed mountain in Britain."
"As opposed to under the biggest tourist attraction in Cardiff?" She let him go, eyeing Nathan. "Jack?"
"Nathan, come and meet Martha." Jack dropped a hand to his shoulder. "Martha Jones, Nathan. Nathan, this is my friend Martha."
"The doctor." Nathan shook her hand politely.
"Martha, we need privacy," Jack said quietly. Martha nodded, eyeing Nathan once more before turning away.
"Need you to sign in, but I've got your badges here." She took them from a soldier, passing them over. Nathan examined his curiously; Jack carefully pinned his on his lapel and Nathan mimicked him. Martha led them onto the base and into her office, firmly closing the door against her escort.
"Now. Talk to me, Jack."
Jack steered Nathan into a chair, standing behind him. "It's a long story, Martha."
"I'm good at long. Start at the start."
Jack took a deep breath before beginning the story. Nathan sat quietly through it, lifting his shirt to provide proof when prompted but otherwise unmoving.
Martha listened intently, scribbling notes as he talked. When he finished she sat back in her chair, taking a deep breath. "I see."
"Owen's sent his notes, I'll give you them before I leave, but..."
"What do you want me to do, Jack?"
Jack glanced down at Nathan, unmoving in his chair. "I want you to take Nathan."
"Jack!"
"He needs someone who understands..."
"That's not me, then, I'm still completely lost."
"...understands his needs," Jack continued doggedly. "Nathan's a good kid, Martha. He could do great things here. Look...we gave him an eReader with no communication equipment. I mean, Tosh actually took out the hardware. No way that thing could talk to other computers. And he used it to reprogram our base without us noticing a thing. But the first time we gave him a banana he tried to eat the skin. He needs someone to look after him. Teach him how to be what he should."
"And if there's still commands buried in there?"
"We're fairly sure he burned them out. But if we're wrong..." Jack shrugged, eyes dark. "You're in the middle of a military base."
Martha made a face at him, turning to Nathan. "What do you think, Nathan?" Nathan shrugged and she sighed. "Really. If you're unhappy about it..."
"Will Maria be here?"
Jack shook his head. "Not straight away. I want to talk to Martha about that, too. But we'll get her here to visit you. I promise."
Nathan nodded. Martha glanced at Jack, frowning. "Talk to me about...?"
"Maria's father. He's a computer security expert, and he was one of Wormwood's Bane."
"He was Maria's guard," Nathan offered. "My mother liked to hurt the girls, whatever way she could."
"Sounds like a lovely woman," Martha agreed. "Computer security?"
"He's good, from the records we found and what I've seen him do. He works - worked - for big businesses, puts up firewalls, catches viruses." He grinned. "UNIT could use a couple good computer security guys."
Martha nodded. "I'll talk to him. It'd be nice if you weren't traipsing through our databases every time you felt like it." She grinned at the look on his face. "Didn't think of that, did you."
"I may have just outsmarted myself," he muttered.
Martha considered them for a moment before rising to the feet. "Nathan, come with me."
"Where are we going?" he asked, standing to follow her out of the room.
"I want to show you a project the team's been hung up on for a while. There's not much research going on right now, everyone's trying to sort out the mess the Bane left behind, so there shouldn't be many people around."
Jack followed them through the corridors, watching. Nathan was still withdrawn, but he was watching their path at least, paying enough attention to know where they were going and how to get back. It shouldn't have been enough to help him; his Visitor badge would get him detained by any UNIT personnel who saw him on his own, and it wouldn't give him admittance to anything. But Jack was learning not to underestimate Nathan.
Martha opened the door to one of the labs, glancing in. "Dr Aylaia. Got a minute?"
"Dr Jones," the woman answered. "Depends what you need."
"Just wanted to show off your project. Captain Harkness, Nathan, this is Dr Aylaia."
"Pleasure to meet you," she said, glancing curiously at Nathan.
"Tell them what you're working on," Martha told her. "Nathan, go take a look."
"Don't touch anything," Jack added. Nathan nodded, slipping between them and approaching the desk. Dr Aylaia glanced at Martha, who gestured for her to go ahead. Doubtfully, she started explaining the project.
It was completely over Martha's head; it had to do with propulsion systems, but that was as much as she'd ever been able to gather. Nathan was following easily, though, asking questions - and from the sudden look of interest on Dr Aylaia's face, they were intelligent questions.
Jack was nodding as he listened; after a moment he blinked, turning to Martha. "That's where I lose track."
"He's following? Dr Aylaia's our expert..."
"He's definitely following." Jack watched as Nathan leaned over the schematic, pointing something out.
"Jack, I don't know about this," Martha murmured, watching him.
"He needs watching, Martha. If he'd genuinely been on the side of the Bane, they'd have control of the world by now. We're just lucky they didn't leave 'conscience' out of the mix, and that he imprinted on Maria instead of anyone else."
"Yeah, but I don't know what qualifies me to be the person watching him."
"Don't touch," Jack said more sharply. Nathan glanced back at him, taking one careful step back from the - whatever that was he was looking at. Dr Aylaia flicked an annoyed glance at them, but she didn't miss a beat in her discussion.
Turning back to Martha, he said slowly, "Wormwood left him with two girls."
"Maria and Rani. You said that."
"Rani hates him. I mean, not really; intellectually, she understands that none of what happened was really his fault. But every time she visited the house Wormwood made Nathan hurt her in one way or another. And he was effectively their jailor. So she doesn't like him. Doesn't trust him."
"And?"
"He needs someone who will trust him."
"But not too much."
"Not too much," Jack admitted. "You don't have anything to hold against him. Gwen's angry at him, and Tosh is afraid of him. I can't keep him."
"I could make a call," Martha suggested, but Jack shook his head.
"That'd be worse. He has less idea how to be human than the Doctor does. Way too easy for him to slide off the straight and narrow - Nathan, don't touch that!"
"I asked him to," Dr Aylaia said quickly. "Only to steady it while I work on it."
"Sorry. He's not cleared to touch anything." Martha gestured sharply; Nathan carefully laid the piece back down, shook Dr Aylaia's hand and came back to join them.
"Martha?" Dr Aylaia called. "I want him. I'll trade you my tech."
"We'll see." She steered Nathan out of the room.
"I didn't think Earth had technology like that," he said, glancing at Jack.
"Earth as a whole doesn't. UNIT and Torchwood, we're a little ahead of the curve. It'll be disseminated. Do you know where that came from?"
"No. It's not anything I've seen before."
"Then how did you know how it worked?" Martha asked.
Nathan shrugged. "It's all maths. There are only so many ways to lay out a system like that."
Over his head, Jack caught Martha's eye. She rolled hers at him, leading them back to her office. Nathan settled back into his seat, watching as Martha typed quickly.
"Ok," she said finally. "This is what I can do. We can house you here on the base, limited access to particular projects. You'll have a guard, at first. Like - a probation period. I'll contact Alan today. He takes the job, he and Maria will be living on base too." She leaned forward, watching him. "You'll have to answer to me. Do you understand?"
"You'd be my..." Nathan caught Jack's shift and edited himself to "Guardian."
"Something like that, yeah." She glanced at Jack, who looked blandly back at her. "How does that sound?"
"It sounds fine."
"Right. Let's get you settled in, then."
****
Jack hung around while Martha forced Nathan's paperwork through - being a known Companion gave her extra pull, but it still took both of them on occasion. The fact that Nathan kept telling anyone who asked just what his role in the invasion was didn't help; several UNIT officers thought he should be dissected rather than hired on, and they weren't shy about expressing it. Eventually Martha shrugged and pulled out her phone, tossing it to Jack while she faced off against the latest scientist.
"Martha Jones!" the Doctor crowed.
"Doctor, it's Jack. Are you busy?"
He pretended not to notice the sudden silence in the room.
"No. What's wrong? Where's Martha?"
"She's fine, here with me. I might need a favour. We've got a bit of a situation down here at UNIT, Mount Snowdon."
"Oh?"
"I've come into guardianship of a pretty amazing kid. I was planning on leaving him with Martha under UNIT care, but they seem to think cutting him open is their best option."
"When are you, Jack?" the Doctor asked, voice sharp.
"Bubble shock."
"Bubble Shock," he said quietly. "So Sarah Jane..."
"I think so. I'm sorry."
"Mmm." There was a long pause before he said, voice deliberately cheerful, "You found the Bane boy."
"Mm hmm." Jack carefully didn't react outwardly.
"Put me on speaker."
Jack obeyed, glancing at Martha, who grinned cheerfully. "Hi, Doctor!"
"Hi, Martha," he said fondly. Voice sharpening, he added, "Are the idiots who want to dissect your guest listening?"
"Yes."
"Good. Listen carefully, then. You might have to repeat this to them a few times before they catch on."
It was the Oncoming Storm who said very clearly, "Do Not Hurt That Boy."
****
No one tried to touch Nathan after that. The quarters next to Martha's were miraculously cleared, and Nathan was given a security badge that would grant him access to two or three of the labs.
"You don't go anywhere without me knowing about it," Martha told him. "Not unless it's a genuine emergency. Don't ever go with anyone who says they're from me; I'll have told you they're coming. Understand?"
"No. I mean..." he frowned, studying the radio she'd given him. "I understand the orders. I don't understand the reason. Captain Harkness said I would be safe here."
"You are. More or less. Especially now the Doctor's weighed in to protect you. But there are people who'll think what they might learn from you would be worth his wrath - people who've never met him - and they could do a lot of harm to you very quickly. Besides, if this is going to work I'll need to know where you are all the time."
"In case I start following my mother's orders again."
"Yes," she agreed honestly. Nathan knew exactly what the conditions on his life were.
"I would tell them if they asked me."
"I'm sorry?"
He gestured vaguely. "You said they wanted to learn from me. I know what I am. I could tell them anything they wanted to know."
She smiled softly. "Don't tell them that. In fact, don't tell anyone anything about yourself without checking with me first."
"Careful," Jack said from where he was holding up the wall. "You'll create a mute."
"What?"
He shoved off the wall, coming closer. "You can tell them anything except how you were created, and your role in the invasion."
"That doesn't leave much," Nathan pointed out.
"It leaves your name. It leaves what you like and don't like. It leaves everything you know, everything you've learned."
Nathan nodded in understanding, and Jack grinned at him. "I'm going to go back to London. I'm leaving you with Martha, but if you need me, Nathan, or you want to talk to me, call me, alright?"
He glanced at Martha, who nodded. "We'll put you in touch any time you like, Nathan."
"Thank you."
Jack caught Martha's hand, drawing her to the doorway. "One last thing." He glanced briefly at Nathan, occupied with examining his new bed and apparently completely ignoring them. "He's not a soldier. Don't try to make him one. Don't put him on weapons research."
Martha nodded. "He's in the system as a tech. He'll need basic hand to hand, but he won't need weapons training."
"I can shoot," Nathan offered. "Hand eye co ordination and reflexes well above human norms. I can fight."
"No," Jack said firmly. "You're thirteen."
"I'm less than three months."
"You're thirteen now. You're not joining the UNIT field teams. You're not going to be fighting."
"If I need to..."
"You're in the middle of a mountain, Nathan," Martha pointed out, not unkindly. "If you need to fight, we're in deep trouble." Turning back to Jack, she added, "Make sure and put me in touch with Alan as soon as you can."
"Captain Harkness, what about Rani? Is she coming here with Maria and Mr Jackson?"
"I don't know yet. Hopefully her parents..."
Nathan shook his head. "Her mother wasn't affected at first, but her father was. She held him off long enough for Rani to run. But there was a fire, two days later. The day before you rescued us. The whole street burned down, and a lot of the human Bane died."
"Why didn't they run?" Martha protested.
"They had no orders," Jack said quietly. "You didn't tell Rani, Nathan?"
"No. I only learned it shortly before you rescued us. There wasn't really time after that."
"I suppose not. Why are you telling me?"
"You're her guardian. And I don't...she should know, yes? People want to know?"
"Yeah. When they're missing, the families want to know."
"I can mock up a report," Martha offered. "Tell her UNIT found them."
"I didn't know if I should tell her," Nathan said quietly. "From me, then, she'd have thought it was a lie, an attempt to hurt her. She wouldn't have believed me. I was going to ask Maria what I should do, but it didn't seem right for Maria to know before Rani."
"You have a strange sense of morals," Jack noted. "You're sure about this?"
"The reports were very clear, sir. There were pictures."
"I like your mother less and less the more I hear about her," Martha muttered. "You want the report, Jack?"
"Please."
"Right. One fake report, coming up." She slipped into her own quarters, leaving the door open so they could hear her moving around.
"Should I have told her?" Nathan asked quietly.
"I don't know. It's not something that has a right or wrong answer. Sometimes you just have to go with your gut - instincts," he corrected himself quickly.
"I don't think I have instincts."
"You'll learn."
"I was going to tell Maria. But we were interrupted, and then we had to leave."
"Right." Martha reappeared in the corridor. "Report will be in Ianto's hands by the time you get back to base."
"Martha Jones, voice of a nightingale, you are a miracle worker."
Martha grinned. "Wait until you taste my cooking."
"Is that an invitation?"
"Go home, Jack."
He nodded, turning to Nathan. "I'll be putting Alan on the phone to Martha later. I'll make sure you get to talk to Maria."
"Thank you."
"If you're not happy here I want you to call me. You have choices, remember."
"I'll remember."
"Good man." He tipped a salute to Martha, striding down the corridor.
Martha glanced down the corridor, gesturing to a soldier there. "Nathan, this is Private Jenkins. He's going to be your guard, alright?"
"Alright," Nathan agreed. "Hello, Private Jenkins."
"Nice to meet you," Jenkins said cheerfully.
"You can stay here in your room, or go to the canteen. Those are your options right now, I don't have time to get you set up in a lab. Private Jenkins can get you onto the computer and you can read through the rules and regs, get to know the layout, that kind of thing. Got it?"
"I can get myself onto the computer."
"No hacking! Stick to your security level. Keep an eye on him, Ross, he's not too sure of the rules yet."
"Will do."
"I'll be back later to check on you, alright? And Ross will call me if you need anything."
"Yes," Nathan agreed.
Martha turned to Jenkins. "Don't interfere with him unless he's trying to leave or hack. Let him do whatever he wants within those limits."
"Yes'm."
She nodded, heading to her office to face down the first in what would probably be a long line of complaints.
***
Jenkins came by six hours later to tell her he was going off duty, leaving Nathan with another private. "He's just been sitting at the computer, reading the history and whatever reports he can get at on his security level. I've been watching him, and Private Little knows what to watch out for. I told her to make sure he eats something, as well."
"That's fine. Thanks, Ross."
"Dr Jones? Can I ask who he is?"
"He's a kid who was used by the Bane. Had his intelligence heightened. The Doctor thinks he's important, so we're keeping him here. You might be on babysitting duty for a while."
Jenkins shrugged. "He's a nice kid."
"Yeah. He is. Go get some rest, Ross."
Ross saluted and headed out, and Martha turned back to her work. She was halfway through the next report when her phone rang.
"Took your time, Jack. Getting slow in your old age?"
"Very funny," Jack said dryly. "You want to talk to Alan?"
"Yeah. Hang on a second." Flicking her radio on, she called Corporal Little and asked her to escort Nathan to her office. "Ok, Jack. Put him on."
Alan Jackson, it turned out, was very receptive to the idea of a new job that would house both him and his daughter. Neither was eager to return to the house across the road from Maria's prison, and theirs was the only house on the road that was even still standing. Alan offered it to Martha as refugee housing without the slightest twinge of regret; the only thing he asked was her promise that anyone who stayed there would be told to keep an eye out for Chrisse, just in case she made it back there. Martha had to interrupt the interview halfway through - Nathan was refusing to leave his quarters, since Martha hadn't told him to herself - and when she came back to Alan he hesitantly broached the subject of Rani.
"She got your report, when Captain Harkness came back. And - she doesn't have anywhere else to go, she doesn't know anyone..."
"Bring her along," Martha agreed easily. "UNIT can have her legally in your custody by this time tomorrow. We'll have to figure something out once we get off emergency status, the base isn't built for families, but right now as long as you can do the work and they don't get in the way no one will care."
"I can do the work. Thank you, Dr Jones."
"Mr Jackson, you know that Nathan is here, under my care."
"Yes, Captain Harkness told me. Maria will be happy. She's pretty mad she didn't get to say goodbye."
Martha glanced up at a knock on her door. "I can help you there, I think. Is she with you?"
"Yes..."
"Put her on the line?" She flipped the phone onto speaker, gesturing Nathan forward.
"Hello?" Maria said uncertainly.
"Maria!" Nathan dropped into the seat, leaning forward. "Are you coming here?"
"Nathan. I don't know, where are you? Captain Harkness wouldn't tell me anything."
"A UNIT base." He didn't say where, Martha noted approvingly. "I'm going to work for them. I can do good here."
"You can do good anywhere you want," she said firmly. Alan murmured something the phone didn't pick up, and she said "Really? Brilliant! Nathan, my dad says he took a job on the base. We're coming there, Rani and us."
"That's happy." Nathan smiled. "I recognise happy."
"That is happy," Maria agreed, smile in her voice. "Nathan, my dad needs to talk to Dr Jones. I'll see you soon, alright? Be good."
"Yes." He stood. "Thank you, Dr Jones."
"Get something to eat," she told him, watching him leave. "Mr Jackson. When can you get here?"