Remember - Chapter Two
13 September 2008
Kathy Swanson sighed, leaning back in her chair just enough to cause her vertebrae to crack rather loudly.
She was exhausted.
It wasn’t just work. It was her personal life as well. It had been two days ago that her fiancée, Toshiko, had said she’d be back from Geneva, where she’d gone on behalf of Torchwood to investigate something she hadn’t had time to explain before being whisked off to Cardiff International to catch her flight, along with Ianto Jones and Patrick Delaware.
It had been two days since she’d last heard from Toshiko.
Kathy just didn’t sleep well when Toshiko wasn’t with her. But this was worse; it was as if she’d vanished without a trace, not answering her mobile or coming home as she’d promised. To be honest, she was scared out of her wits, but then Toshiko worked a far more dangerous job than Kathy did. That knowledge though did nothing to even prepare her for the silence.
Of course, Toshiko could have spent the last couple of nights at her old flat. Kathy knew about the five-year contract her lover had with Torchwood; about UNIT, and how Harkness and Jones had made a deal with the devil in order to get her Toshiko out of an imprisonment she hadn’t deserved. One of those conditions was that Toshiko had to have bills and such in her name, proving that she was in Cardiff, and her flat had been one of those proofs. When the contract ran out in November, she’d planned on giving up the place and moving in with Kathy, but she still spent most of her nights at Kathy’s place. And, since her flat was closer to the Hub than Kathy’s, it made some sort of sense that, if Torchwood was busy, Toshiko would stay there or even at the Hub.
It was the lack of any sort of contact that was eating her alive. Her fiancée had never once not called or at least emailed if she wasn’t coming home, and there was a tiny, almost silent voice in her head that made her wonder if there was something else going on; something to do with Kathy herself...
Kathy shook her head, dismissing it. She really should just go down to Mermaid Quay and demand to see Toshiko. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have an open invitation to visit anytime she wished. And it beat putting out an all-call for Toshiko’s car or staking out the old flat.
But there was something about doing that…it rubbed her the wrong way, as if she didn’t trust her own fiancée to take care of herself. Kathy knew damned well that Toshiko was one of the toughest women she’d ever met, and that was one of the many things she loved about her. She didn’t want to tread on her toes just because she hadn’t heard from her in a couple of days. Plus, her team would always have her back, especially Jones.
Still, maybe Kathy could take some time off for lunch and see if Toshiko wanted to join her…
“The last time I saw a face that long,” her partner, DC Andy Davidson, said as he leaned against the office door jamb, “my niece’s rabbit just died.”
Kathy gave him her best glare. “I hope you don’t mean that in the proverbial sense.”
Andy chuckled. “No, it was an actual rabbit. She called him ‘Mister Miggles’. Never knew where she’d gotten that name from.” He stopped laughing, his jovial face turning serious. “You really should just go down to the Hub and drag your girlfriend out of there if you’re so worried.” He entered fully, shutting the door behind him and taking up space in the chair across from her desk.
“Yeah, I know,” she sighed. “I’m gonna surprise her for lunch.”
“Good idea, boss. I’m getting heartily tired of your moping. You’re snapping at the PC’s and you know how much I don’t like babysitting the baby bobbies if you make them wet themselves.”
She snorted. “It wasn’t all that long ago you were one of those ‘baby bobbies’, Davidson.”
He rolled his eyes. “That’s what you say.”
It was true; Andy had been her partner and protégé for barely four months, but he’d been an experienced beat copper for three years before that. Nearly acing the detective’s exam had only cemented her determination to take him on, and she hadn’t been disappointed.
“Still,” Andy went on, “it really is weird that she didn’t call, and you can’t get in touch with anyone at the Hub…”
It really was. Kathy had always taken having Ianto Jones on speed dial for granted, and it felt wrong that even he wasn’t answering any of her calls. Whatever it was, it must have been really big to distract all of Torchwood.
She absently rubbed at her wrist. It had been aching since yesterday, but it was easy to ignore in her worry for Toshiko and Jones. And, the rest of the team as well, but if she was honest with herself those were the two she was most concerned about. Of course, Toshiko was her heart, but Jones was her best friend, and had been long before she’d been let into the crazy world of dragons and magic.
“Is it supposed to do that?” Andy asked curiously.
Kathy looked at him, letting her confusion show. “Is what supposed to do what?”
Andy nodded toward her hand. “Your dragon mark. Is it supposed to glow like that?”
Surprised, Kathy glanced down at the wrist that she’d been rubbing. Her eyebrows went up as she noticed that the dragon ‘tattoo’ that marked her as the Dragon Friend of Fire was, indeed, glowing softly. “What the hell?” she muttered, pushing her jacket’s sleeve up higher in order to get a better look at it. It hadn’t been doing that this morning when she’d showered and dressed; this was something new.
“I take it it’s not supposed to do that then?” Andy commented mildly.
He’d really accepted the truth of magic fairly well, she thought vaguely as she stroked the red and gold dragon that everyone else took as a particularly intricate tattoo. It didn’t feel any different, and yet it was obviously reacting to something.
Kathy closed her eyes. This had never happened before, and she had to know why, and what was going on. It had to be the Fire Dragon trying to tell her something, but Kathy was well aware that, with magic fading from the world, that the Dragons weren’t simply as strong as they had once been and that it took a lot of energy for them to completely come into being this far from Ddraig Llyn, and she was far enough away from the Hub that her Dragon Friend couldn’t simply use the energy of the Rift to help. She had to try to figure that out, and to do that she needed to reach out to the one person she knew who had all that sort of information at her beck and call.
“Close the blinds,” she ordered quietly.
Kathy heard Andy do as she bid, the rattle of the blinds loud within the silence of her office as he twisted them shut so no one out in the outer area could see inside her office. Beyond the door she could make out the sounds of the working CID, but she ignored it. “Can you keep a lookout? Make sure I’m not disturbed?”
“You got it, boss.” Andy’s voice was hushed, but she could tell he was intrigued by what was happening.
She was grateful for that, and yet one more time she was very glad that she’d taken him as her partner. He’d proved himself over and over again, by accepting the strangeness of her life and of that of her fiancée and friend. But then, the Davidson family was old Cardiff, and he’d probably suspected more about Torchwood than Kathy had even known after her transfer from Newport.
Kathy took out her mobile, scanning through the contacts until she found the one she wanted. It rang four times before it was answered. “Kathy!” the bubbly voice of Rhiannon Jones-Davies exclaimed happily. “It’s been too long!”
She put her phone on speaker, setting it down on her desk. She didn’t care if Andy overheard; he’d keep whatever he learned a secret. “Yeah, I know,” she admitted, “and I hate to call when I need something…”
“What’s going on?” her fellow Dragon Friend asked, her voice turning completely serious.
Rhiannon had grown up knowing Ianto Jones, and had been the Friend of Water for as long as she could remember. It made her the perfect person for Kathy to turn to.
And so, she explained everything.
Kathy didn’t leave anything out; about Toshiko and Ianto - and the entire Torchwood team - going incommunicado for the last couple of days, her worry about them, and finally about her dragon mark glowing. “And I don’t know what that means,” she finished, sounding plaintive…but then, what made Kathy one of the best detectives at Cardiff CID was the fact that she hated being in the dark about anything, and would go after answers like a terrier after a rodent.
There was silence on the other end, and then she heard Rhiannon shout for her husband. “I can’t see my mark that easily,” she replied. “I wanna see if I have the same problem as you do…”
Kathy knew that Rhiannon’s mark was on her hip, just out of sight. Only she and Alice had visible marks, the Friend of Air’s being on her ankle. Toshiko’s was on her shoulder, and Kathy knew for a fact that her lover’s was extremely sensitive…
No, she needed to concentrate.
She could make out Rhiannon and Johnny Davies talking; she must have also put her phone on speaker. Johnny was complaining about being interrupted, and Rhiannon was scoffing about him being busy. It put a smile on Kathy’s face; those two were always bickering, Rhiannon teasing Johnny about being a lazy git and Johnny harping on Rhiannon’s bossy nature.
“Bloody hell, Rhi,” she heard Johnny shout.
“I think that means mine’s glowing as well,” Rhiannon growled. “Let me see if I can get the Dragons out of the lake and talking, and I’ll call you back.”
Kathy acknowledged her, and then rang off. Her eyes met Andy’s, and she could tell her partner was as bothered as she was. “I don’t pretend to know much about magic and shit like that, but boss…that can’t be good.”
She had to agree. Kathy chewed her lip for a second, and then reached for her mobile once more, knowing that Rhiannon would be at least a few minutes before calling back. She had to check in with Alice, even though she was certain she’d discover the same thing…
“Is something wrong?” was Alice’s first question as she answered.
“I think so.” Kathy flinched slightly. It was telling that Alice’s first thought when she phoned was that there was a problem. She’d have to keep in closer contact with her fellow Dragon Friends. “I have to ask first: is your dragon mark glowing?”
Alice didn’t say anything, but Kathy could hear her rustling around, and the detective knew she had to have been checking. “What’s going on?” Alice demanded.
Kathy sighed; she took that as confirmation. “When was the last time you talked to either Harkness or Jones?”
She could practically feel the irritation over the open line, and it was at times such as this Kathy wondered why Alice wasn’t the Dragon Friend of Fire, because of her sometimes fiery temper, especially where her family was concerned. Still, she answered, “Dad was over for dinner the night Ianto left for Geneva. I could tell he was bothered by Ianto leaving…Kathy, if you don’t tell me what the hell is going on, I’m coming down there and it won’t be pretty.”
Past the anger, Kathy could hear the stirrings of worry. “I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “But I can’t get a hold of anyone at Torchwood, and Toshiko hasn’t called me since she, Jones, and Delaware got back from Geneva.”
There was silence, and then Alice said, “I’m going to the Hub.”
Kathy was well aware of just how much Alice disliked Torchwood. So, for her to say she was willing to go there, she had to have been scared. “No, not yet. We don’t know what’s going on, and you could walk into something you wouldn’t be prepared for. Both of your dads would kill me if I let you do that. Besides, I would’ve done that anyway if I thought it would do any good.”
The sigh of frustration made Kathy aware that Alice was listening to her. “I have a call out to Rhiannon,” Kathy went on. “I can’t help but feel the marks and what’s going on at Torchwood are connected, though.” It only made sense; the team goes out of contact, and the marks start glowing.
“Call me as soon as you know anything,” Alice demanded. “I mean it, Kathy…I want to know what’s going on at the Hub. I can’t…” her voice lost all of its sharpness. “I need to know about my dads.”
“I understand, believe me,” she sighed. She could totally get behind Alice’s worry. “Let me hang up so I can be available for Rhiannon. She’s going to see about talking to the Great Dragons.”
“Alright. Call me.”
Kathy assured her she would, and then disconnected. She lay the phone down on her blotter, rubbing her forehead tiredly. “This is not going to be good,” she commented, looking her silent partner in the eye. She could see in them that Andy knew the same thing.
“We’re gonna have to beard Torchwood in its lair at some point,” Andy said bluntly.
“Yeah, I know. But I want as much information as I can get before we do. The Hub is gonna be well defended…and that just takes Delaware into consideration. The others are tough to beat, but he’ll have the firepower to stop anyone coming in uninvited. Plus, we don’t even know what we’re dealing with -“
Her phone rang, interrupting that thought. Kathy punched the connect button just a bit harder than was necessary when she saw it was from Rhiannon. “What did you find out?”
“It’s not good,” Rhiannon answered. “I managed to call up the Water Dragon, and he said that the Earth Dragon…he’s gone.”
Kathy stopped breathing. For something to have happened to the Earth Dragon…it was impossible. “Did he have any idea…?”
“You need to find Ianto,” Rhiannon said. “He’s the keystone.”
“So I need to get into the Hub.” It wasn’t what she wanted; to go in blind, because whatever was cutting the team off from the rest of the world had to be dangerous to have gotten past Harkness, Jones, and Delaware.
This wasn’t something Kathy was prepared for. It was one thing to be Torchwood’s police liaison and understand what they went through; it was another to walk into a situation that she certainly didn’t have a clue about and had no training for. She was beginning to wish she’d taken Harkness up on his offer for more training than just in weapons.
“No,” Rhiannon denied. “The Water Dragon says to follow your dragon mark, that Ianto…there’s something wrong with him.”
“Did he say what?”
“No, he didn’t know. But whatever it was, it’s done something to the Earth Dragon as well, which means Tosh doesn’t have access to him either.”
That made sense. Jones and Earth Dragon had always had a very close connection; from what she’d understood, it had gone back at least 1600 years. “Follow my dragon mark?” Kathy snarked. “Could he be any more cryptic?”
Rhiannon barked a laugh. “You have no real idea.”
“And just how am I supposed to do that? Stand on the roof and turn in a circle to see if it glows brighter in a certain direction?”
This time Rhiannon’s laugh was lighter. “Nope. It’s more like meditation. Find the place where the Fire Dragon’s power connects to your mark, and the magic will do the rest. The Fire Dragon might help as well, but with the Earth Dragon missing the other three Dragons are unbalanced, and that’s throwing their power off even more.”
Kathy was uncertain that would work, but she’d give it her best. “Stay on the line while I try this?” she requested, unable to stop herself from not sounding her usual, sure self.
“You know I will.”
She glanced up at Andy; her partner was standing quietly by the door, and he nodded once to show his support. Kathy took a deep breath, closing her eyes in order to attempt to relax.
It wasn’t as if she was completely unfamiliar with meditation. One of the department-approved psychologists had suggested it after an arrest had gone bad several years ago, and Kathy hadn’t been handling it well. It had worked in a way, letting her relax instead of suffering from some of the more horrible nightmares that had come from that shitstorm. It had made accepting a gun from Harkness all that much easier.
Kathy had no idea how this was supposed to work, but she took several more deep breaths to clear her mind, and then relaxed as much as she could while sitting in her desk chair. The thing was she just wasn’t the mystic kind. Toshiko was; she’d often say things like being able to feel the living Earth under her feet, and it amazed her that someone so grounded in science and technology could embrace magic so easily.
But Kathy…she was, of course, the Friend of Fire, but she’d never completely been that comfortable with all the mumbo-jumbo that went with it. She’d mainly accepted the mark because of her friendship with Ianto Jones, and she hadn’t looked back once she’d learned of his true nature. Still, there was something slightly detached about the whole situation, and Kathy always believed it had more to do with her training than any sort of personal preference.
Still, she had to try.
The only sound in the office was the inhalations she was taken; even the noises outside the office seemed diminished. Kathy slumped down into the chair, her hands resting loosely on her blotter, and eventually even those sensations ceased to have any meaning.
She felt herself falling into the darkness.
Before she could react to that swooping sensation, there was a sudden flickering light behind her eyelids. It was tiny, like a will-o’-the-wisp in the moonless black of the night, and it darted and weaved, faded and grew, drawing Kathy’s undivided attention as if she was a moth and it was the flame she desperately needed to reach.
Within the darkness Kathy knew this was the Fire Dragon, urging her on. The flame was weak, but it was there, and despite having gotten herself into a trance of some sort she could feel the sensation of warmth against her fingertips and eyelids and deep within her heart as if a flame had taken up residence there.
Kathy had no idea how long her mind followed the Dragon, but suddenly the friendly flicker was gone, leaving her deep within the shadowless dark. She could feel herself panicking and tried to pull back, but with a near-physical jerk she felt her mind slam into something hard, and even blacker than death.
The scent of decay and dirt clogged her nostrils, and Kathy floundered against the invisible barrier that had stopped her in her metaphysical tracks.
But then, the light returned, not as strong as before but enough to illuminate what was keeping her from moving forward: a wall, made of dirt and roots and crawling things that should have been disgusting but really weren’t, being of nature and belonging within the Earth.
She noticed that the wall was moving.
No…it was breathing.
Kathy was before the Dragon of Earth.
Something was wrong, however.
The soil of the Dragon’s body should have smelled clean, but there was something off about it that she couldn’t place. The roots of those unknown plants were dry, like skeletal, grasping fingers that clutched at the dirt in spasms of horror. And the creatures that lived within were desiccated husks of insects that should not have been alive, rustling like mummified hands rubbing together in the depths of their tomb.
Kathy’s thoughts jerked away from what she was being shown. The Earth Dragon’s body shivered, twisted in a way it shouldn’t, and she could suddenly feel agonising pain; it was outside herself and within herself and she shied away from it…
…and came back to her body, staring up at Andy’s concerned face as he stood over her, his hands on her shoulders, shaking her lightly. She whooped in a huge breath, sitting up slightly and nodding her head, letting her partner know that she was alright.
Andy released her, taking position back at the closed door, his eyes darting anywhere but her. “You had me worried there for a sec, boss.”
“Sorry,” she gasped, getting her breath under control.
“What did you see?” Rhiannon asked. She sounded somewhat panicked, and she hadn’t even seen what Kathy had. It made her wonder if she’d said something while she’d been under, or if Andy had been reporting to Rhiannon as Kathy had travelled.
Frowning, Kathy answered, “I saw the Earth Dragon. There’s something wrong with him…I don’t know what, but if I had to guess I’d say he was sick or something.”
There was a sort of horrified silence for a moment, and then Rhiannon added, “And Ianto?”
She paused for a few seconds, gathering her thoughts about her. Kathy hadn’t actually felt or seen Jones, but there was something… “I…don’t know. But I think he’s with the Earth Dragon. There was pain…but I don’t think the Earth Dragon was the one feeling it.” She shook her head, not paying attention to the fact that Rhiannon wouldn’t be able to see the gesture, and slumped back in her seat, rubbing the bridge of her nose as she considered what she’d witnessed. “There was…this smell. I know it, I’ve smelled it before…like something’d gone off. Trash, or sewage…it wasn’t what I’d equate with the Earth Dragon.”
“Maybe this is a leap,” Andy said slowly, “but maybe Jones was in the sewers? Torchwood says those Weevil things live down there. Could he have gotten hurt down in the sewer chasing one of them?”
Kathy chewed her lip as she considered that notion. It did make sense; she’d met the one Weevil that Torchwood was taking care of, and she could very easily imagine a creature like that taking a chunk out of anyone. But Ianto Jones?
“I think that’s close,” she conceded. “But I don’t believe Jones wasn’t injured by one. It would take a hell of a lot of bite force to penetrate his tough hide, and I’m pretty certain a Weevil wouldn’t be able to do it.”
“Then what?” Rhiannon demanded. “What could have happened?”
“We need to find Jones,” Kathy deflected, mainly because she didn’t know.
“You got any ideas on that score?” Andy inquired.
“I think your sewer idea is our best bet -“
Her office line rang.
Cursing, she picked up the handset. She couldn’t not answer; she was still on duty. “Swanson,” she snapped, letting her frustration with the situation show in her voice.
“We got a funny report of some guy popping up out of the sewers down off Bute Street by the Post Office,” it was the voice of the desk sergeant, not sounding at all put out over Kathy’s tone.
Kathy stilled, her heart suddenly thumping hard, her instinct telling her that this was the clue she’d been needing. “Anything else?” she asked, dialling back the irritation.
“Nothing much,” the sergeant answered. “But we don’t get a lot people just jumping out into traffic from the manhole there. The caller reported that whoever it was had escaped back into an alley, and no one goes into the sewers voluntarily.”
That was the honest to God truth. Anyone who’d lived in Cardiff for any length of time was well aware of the dangers underground, even if they’d never heard of Weevils. The sewer workers themselves received hazard pay. Only Torchwood went willingly. “Davidson and I will head out there,” she said. “It might not be anything…”
“But it sure sounds weird. Like something up Torchwood’s jurisdiction.”
“That it does.” She thanked the desk sergeant then hung up. “I think we might have just found Jones.”
Chapter Three
.
Kathy Swanson sighed, leaning back in her chair just enough to cause her vertebrae to crack rather loudly.
She was exhausted.
It wasn’t just work. It was her personal life as well. It had been two days ago that her fiancée, Toshiko, had said she’d be back from Geneva, where she’d gone on behalf of Torchwood to investigate something she hadn’t had time to explain before being whisked off to Cardiff International to catch her flight, along with Ianto Jones and Patrick Delaware.
It had been two days since she’d last heard from Toshiko.
Kathy just didn’t sleep well when Toshiko wasn’t with her. But this was worse; it was as if she’d vanished without a trace, not answering her mobile or coming home as she’d promised. To be honest, she was scared out of her wits, but then Toshiko worked a far more dangerous job than Kathy did. That knowledge though did nothing to even prepare her for the silence.
Of course, Toshiko could have spent the last couple of nights at her old flat. Kathy knew about the five-year contract her lover had with Torchwood; about UNIT, and how Harkness and Jones had made a deal with the devil in order to get her Toshiko out of an imprisonment she hadn’t deserved. One of those conditions was that Toshiko had to have bills and such in her name, proving that she was in Cardiff, and her flat had been one of those proofs. When the contract ran out in November, she’d planned on giving up the place and moving in with Kathy, but she still spent most of her nights at Kathy’s place. And, since her flat was closer to the Hub than Kathy’s, it made some sort of sense that, if Torchwood was busy, Toshiko would stay there or even at the Hub.
It was the lack of any sort of contact that was eating her alive. Her fiancée had never once not called or at least emailed if she wasn’t coming home, and there was a tiny, almost silent voice in her head that made her wonder if there was something else going on; something to do with Kathy herself...
Kathy shook her head, dismissing it. She really should just go down to Mermaid Quay and demand to see Toshiko. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have an open invitation to visit anytime she wished. And it beat putting out an all-call for Toshiko’s car or staking out the old flat.
But there was something about doing that…it rubbed her the wrong way, as if she didn’t trust her own fiancée to take care of herself. Kathy knew damned well that Toshiko was one of the toughest women she’d ever met, and that was one of the many things she loved about her. She didn’t want to tread on her toes just because she hadn’t heard from her in a couple of days. Plus, her team would always have her back, especially Jones.
Still, maybe Kathy could take some time off for lunch and see if Toshiko wanted to join her…
“The last time I saw a face that long,” her partner, DC Andy Davidson, said as he leaned against the office door jamb, “my niece’s rabbit just died.”
Kathy gave him her best glare. “I hope you don’t mean that in the proverbial sense.”
Andy chuckled. “No, it was an actual rabbit. She called him ‘Mister Miggles’. Never knew where she’d gotten that name from.” He stopped laughing, his jovial face turning serious. “You really should just go down to the Hub and drag your girlfriend out of there if you’re so worried.” He entered fully, shutting the door behind him and taking up space in the chair across from her desk.
“Yeah, I know,” she sighed. “I’m gonna surprise her for lunch.”
“Good idea, boss. I’m getting heartily tired of your moping. You’re snapping at the PC’s and you know how much I don’t like babysitting the baby bobbies if you make them wet themselves.”
She snorted. “It wasn’t all that long ago you were one of those ‘baby bobbies’, Davidson.”
He rolled his eyes. “That’s what you say.”
It was true; Andy had been her partner and protégé for barely four months, but he’d been an experienced beat copper for three years before that. Nearly acing the detective’s exam had only cemented her determination to take him on, and she hadn’t been disappointed.
“Still,” Andy went on, “it really is weird that she didn’t call, and you can’t get in touch with anyone at the Hub…”
It really was. Kathy had always taken having Ianto Jones on speed dial for granted, and it felt wrong that even he wasn’t answering any of her calls. Whatever it was, it must have been really big to distract all of Torchwood.
She absently rubbed at her wrist. It had been aching since yesterday, but it was easy to ignore in her worry for Toshiko and Jones. And, the rest of the team as well, but if she was honest with herself those were the two she was most concerned about. Of course, Toshiko was her heart, but Jones was her best friend, and had been long before she’d been let into the crazy world of dragons and magic.
“Is it supposed to do that?” Andy asked curiously.
Kathy looked at him, letting her confusion show. “Is what supposed to do what?”
Andy nodded toward her hand. “Your dragon mark. Is it supposed to glow like that?”
Surprised, Kathy glanced down at the wrist that she’d been rubbing. Her eyebrows went up as she noticed that the dragon ‘tattoo’ that marked her as the Dragon Friend of Fire was, indeed, glowing softly. “What the hell?” she muttered, pushing her jacket’s sleeve up higher in order to get a better look at it. It hadn’t been doing that this morning when she’d showered and dressed; this was something new.
“I take it it’s not supposed to do that then?” Andy commented mildly.
He’d really accepted the truth of magic fairly well, she thought vaguely as she stroked the red and gold dragon that everyone else took as a particularly intricate tattoo. It didn’t feel any different, and yet it was obviously reacting to something.
Kathy closed her eyes. This had never happened before, and she had to know why, and what was going on. It had to be the Fire Dragon trying to tell her something, but Kathy was well aware that, with magic fading from the world, that the Dragons weren’t simply as strong as they had once been and that it took a lot of energy for them to completely come into being this far from Ddraig Llyn, and she was far enough away from the Hub that her Dragon Friend couldn’t simply use the energy of the Rift to help. She had to try to figure that out, and to do that she needed to reach out to the one person she knew who had all that sort of information at her beck and call.
“Close the blinds,” she ordered quietly.
Kathy heard Andy do as she bid, the rattle of the blinds loud within the silence of her office as he twisted them shut so no one out in the outer area could see inside her office. Beyond the door she could make out the sounds of the working CID, but she ignored it. “Can you keep a lookout? Make sure I’m not disturbed?”
“You got it, boss.” Andy’s voice was hushed, but she could tell he was intrigued by what was happening.
She was grateful for that, and yet one more time she was very glad that she’d taken him as her partner. He’d proved himself over and over again, by accepting the strangeness of her life and of that of her fiancée and friend. But then, the Davidson family was old Cardiff, and he’d probably suspected more about Torchwood than Kathy had even known after her transfer from Newport.
Kathy took out her mobile, scanning through the contacts until she found the one she wanted. It rang four times before it was answered. “Kathy!” the bubbly voice of Rhiannon Jones-Davies exclaimed happily. “It’s been too long!”
She put her phone on speaker, setting it down on her desk. She didn’t care if Andy overheard; he’d keep whatever he learned a secret. “Yeah, I know,” she admitted, “and I hate to call when I need something…”
“What’s going on?” her fellow Dragon Friend asked, her voice turning completely serious.
Rhiannon had grown up knowing Ianto Jones, and had been the Friend of Water for as long as she could remember. It made her the perfect person for Kathy to turn to.
And so, she explained everything.
Kathy didn’t leave anything out; about Toshiko and Ianto - and the entire Torchwood team - going incommunicado for the last couple of days, her worry about them, and finally about her dragon mark glowing. “And I don’t know what that means,” she finished, sounding plaintive…but then, what made Kathy one of the best detectives at Cardiff CID was the fact that she hated being in the dark about anything, and would go after answers like a terrier after a rodent.
There was silence on the other end, and then she heard Rhiannon shout for her husband. “I can’t see my mark that easily,” she replied. “I wanna see if I have the same problem as you do…”
Kathy knew that Rhiannon’s mark was on her hip, just out of sight. Only she and Alice had visible marks, the Friend of Air’s being on her ankle. Toshiko’s was on her shoulder, and Kathy knew for a fact that her lover’s was extremely sensitive…
No, she needed to concentrate.
She could make out Rhiannon and Johnny Davies talking; she must have also put her phone on speaker. Johnny was complaining about being interrupted, and Rhiannon was scoffing about him being busy. It put a smile on Kathy’s face; those two were always bickering, Rhiannon teasing Johnny about being a lazy git and Johnny harping on Rhiannon’s bossy nature.
“Bloody hell, Rhi,” she heard Johnny shout.
“I think that means mine’s glowing as well,” Rhiannon growled. “Let me see if I can get the Dragons out of the lake and talking, and I’ll call you back.”
Kathy acknowledged her, and then rang off. Her eyes met Andy’s, and she could tell her partner was as bothered as she was. “I don’t pretend to know much about magic and shit like that, but boss…that can’t be good.”
She had to agree. Kathy chewed her lip for a second, and then reached for her mobile once more, knowing that Rhiannon would be at least a few minutes before calling back. She had to check in with Alice, even though she was certain she’d discover the same thing…
“Is something wrong?” was Alice’s first question as she answered.
“I think so.” Kathy flinched slightly. It was telling that Alice’s first thought when she phoned was that there was a problem. She’d have to keep in closer contact with her fellow Dragon Friends. “I have to ask first: is your dragon mark glowing?”
Alice didn’t say anything, but Kathy could hear her rustling around, and the detective knew she had to have been checking. “What’s going on?” Alice demanded.
Kathy sighed; she took that as confirmation. “When was the last time you talked to either Harkness or Jones?”
She could practically feel the irritation over the open line, and it was at times such as this Kathy wondered why Alice wasn’t the Dragon Friend of Fire, because of her sometimes fiery temper, especially where her family was concerned. Still, she answered, “Dad was over for dinner the night Ianto left for Geneva. I could tell he was bothered by Ianto leaving…Kathy, if you don’t tell me what the hell is going on, I’m coming down there and it won’t be pretty.”
Past the anger, Kathy could hear the stirrings of worry. “I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “But I can’t get a hold of anyone at Torchwood, and Toshiko hasn’t called me since she, Jones, and Delaware got back from Geneva.”
There was silence, and then Alice said, “I’m going to the Hub.”
Kathy was well aware of just how much Alice disliked Torchwood. So, for her to say she was willing to go there, she had to have been scared. “No, not yet. We don’t know what’s going on, and you could walk into something you wouldn’t be prepared for. Both of your dads would kill me if I let you do that. Besides, I would’ve done that anyway if I thought it would do any good.”
The sigh of frustration made Kathy aware that Alice was listening to her. “I have a call out to Rhiannon,” Kathy went on. “I can’t help but feel the marks and what’s going on at Torchwood are connected, though.” It only made sense; the team goes out of contact, and the marks start glowing.
“Call me as soon as you know anything,” Alice demanded. “I mean it, Kathy…I want to know what’s going on at the Hub. I can’t…” her voice lost all of its sharpness. “I need to know about my dads.”
“I understand, believe me,” she sighed. She could totally get behind Alice’s worry. “Let me hang up so I can be available for Rhiannon. She’s going to see about talking to the Great Dragons.”
“Alright. Call me.”
Kathy assured her she would, and then disconnected. She lay the phone down on her blotter, rubbing her forehead tiredly. “This is not going to be good,” she commented, looking her silent partner in the eye. She could see in them that Andy knew the same thing.
“We’re gonna have to beard Torchwood in its lair at some point,” Andy said bluntly.
“Yeah, I know. But I want as much information as I can get before we do. The Hub is gonna be well defended…and that just takes Delaware into consideration. The others are tough to beat, but he’ll have the firepower to stop anyone coming in uninvited. Plus, we don’t even know what we’re dealing with -“
Her phone rang, interrupting that thought. Kathy punched the connect button just a bit harder than was necessary when she saw it was from Rhiannon. “What did you find out?”
“It’s not good,” Rhiannon answered. “I managed to call up the Water Dragon, and he said that the Earth Dragon…he’s gone.”
Kathy stopped breathing. For something to have happened to the Earth Dragon…it was impossible. “Did he have any idea…?”
“You need to find Ianto,” Rhiannon said. “He’s the keystone.”
“So I need to get into the Hub.” It wasn’t what she wanted; to go in blind, because whatever was cutting the team off from the rest of the world had to be dangerous to have gotten past Harkness, Jones, and Delaware.
This wasn’t something Kathy was prepared for. It was one thing to be Torchwood’s police liaison and understand what they went through; it was another to walk into a situation that she certainly didn’t have a clue about and had no training for. She was beginning to wish she’d taken Harkness up on his offer for more training than just in weapons.
“No,” Rhiannon denied. “The Water Dragon says to follow your dragon mark, that Ianto…there’s something wrong with him.”
“Did he say what?”
“No, he didn’t know. But whatever it was, it’s done something to the Earth Dragon as well, which means Tosh doesn’t have access to him either.”
That made sense. Jones and Earth Dragon had always had a very close connection; from what she’d understood, it had gone back at least 1600 years. “Follow my dragon mark?” Kathy snarked. “Could he be any more cryptic?”
Rhiannon barked a laugh. “You have no real idea.”
“And just how am I supposed to do that? Stand on the roof and turn in a circle to see if it glows brighter in a certain direction?”
This time Rhiannon’s laugh was lighter. “Nope. It’s more like meditation. Find the place where the Fire Dragon’s power connects to your mark, and the magic will do the rest. The Fire Dragon might help as well, but with the Earth Dragon missing the other three Dragons are unbalanced, and that’s throwing their power off even more.”
Kathy was uncertain that would work, but she’d give it her best. “Stay on the line while I try this?” she requested, unable to stop herself from not sounding her usual, sure self.
“You know I will.”
She glanced up at Andy; her partner was standing quietly by the door, and he nodded once to show his support. Kathy took a deep breath, closing her eyes in order to attempt to relax.
It wasn’t as if she was completely unfamiliar with meditation. One of the department-approved psychologists had suggested it after an arrest had gone bad several years ago, and Kathy hadn’t been handling it well. It had worked in a way, letting her relax instead of suffering from some of the more horrible nightmares that had come from that shitstorm. It had made accepting a gun from Harkness all that much easier.
Kathy had no idea how this was supposed to work, but she took several more deep breaths to clear her mind, and then relaxed as much as she could while sitting in her desk chair. The thing was she just wasn’t the mystic kind. Toshiko was; she’d often say things like being able to feel the living Earth under her feet, and it amazed her that someone so grounded in science and technology could embrace magic so easily.
But Kathy…she was, of course, the Friend of Fire, but she’d never completely been that comfortable with all the mumbo-jumbo that went with it. She’d mainly accepted the mark because of her friendship with Ianto Jones, and she hadn’t looked back once she’d learned of his true nature. Still, there was something slightly detached about the whole situation, and Kathy always believed it had more to do with her training than any sort of personal preference.
Still, she had to try.
The only sound in the office was the inhalations she was taken; even the noises outside the office seemed diminished. Kathy slumped down into the chair, her hands resting loosely on her blotter, and eventually even those sensations ceased to have any meaning.
She felt herself falling into the darkness.
Before she could react to that swooping sensation, there was a sudden flickering light behind her eyelids. It was tiny, like a will-o’-the-wisp in the moonless black of the night, and it darted and weaved, faded and grew, drawing Kathy’s undivided attention as if she was a moth and it was the flame she desperately needed to reach.
Within the darkness Kathy knew this was the Fire Dragon, urging her on. The flame was weak, but it was there, and despite having gotten herself into a trance of some sort she could feel the sensation of warmth against her fingertips and eyelids and deep within her heart as if a flame had taken up residence there.
Kathy had no idea how long her mind followed the Dragon, but suddenly the friendly flicker was gone, leaving her deep within the shadowless dark. She could feel herself panicking and tried to pull back, but with a near-physical jerk she felt her mind slam into something hard, and even blacker than death.
The scent of decay and dirt clogged her nostrils, and Kathy floundered against the invisible barrier that had stopped her in her metaphysical tracks.
But then, the light returned, not as strong as before but enough to illuminate what was keeping her from moving forward: a wall, made of dirt and roots and crawling things that should have been disgusting but really weren’t, being of nature and belonging within the Earth.
She noticed that the wall was moving.
No…it was breathing.
Kathy was before the Dragon of Earth.
Something was wrong, however.
The soil of the Dragon’s body should have smelled clean, but there was something off about it that she couldn’t place. The roots of those unknown plants were dry, like skeletal, grasping fingers that clutched at the dirt in spasms of horror. And the creatures that lived within were desiccated husks of insects that should not have been alive, rustling like mummified hands rubbing together in the depths of their tomb.
Kathy’s thoughts jerked away from what she was being shown. The Earth Dragon’s body shivered, twisted in a way it shouldn’t, and she could suddenly feel agonising pain; it was outside herself and within herself and she shied away from it…
…and came back to her body, staring up at Andy’s concerned face as he stood over her, his hands on her shoulders, shaking her lightly. She whooped in a huge breath, sitting up slightly and nodding her head, letting her partner know that she was alright.
Andy released her, taking position back at the closed door, his eyes darting anywhere but her. “You had me worried there for a sec, boss.”
“Sorry,” she gasped, getting her breath under control.
“What did you see?” Rhiannon asked. She sounded somewhat panicked, and she hadn’t even seen what Kathy had. It made her wonder if she’d said something while she’d been under, or if Andy had been reporting to Rhiannon as Kathy had travelled.
Frowning, Kathy answered, “I saw the Earth Dragon. There’s something wrong with him…I don’t know what, but if I had to guess I’d say he was sick or something.”
There was a sort of horrified silence for a moment, and then Rhiannon added, “And Ianto?”
She paused for a few seconds, gathering her thoughts about her. Kathy hadn’t actually felt or seen Jones, but there was something… “I…don’t know. But I think he’s with the Earth Dragon. There was pain…but I don’t think the Earth Dragon was the one feeling it.” She shook her head, not paying attention to the fact that Rhiannon wouldn’t be able to see the gesture, and slumped back in her seat, rubbing the bridge of her nose as she considered what she’d witnessed. “There was…this smell. I know it, I’ve smelled it before…like something’d gone off. Trash, or sewage…it wasn’t what I’d equate with the Earth Dragon.”
“Maybe this is a leap,” Andy said slowly, “but maybe Jones was in the sewers? Torchwood says those Weevil things live down there. Could he have gotten hurt down in the sewer chasing one of them?”
Kathy chewed her lip as she considered that notion. It did make sense; she’d met the one Weevil that Torchwood was taking care of, and she could very easily imagine a creature like that taking a chunk out of anyone. But Ianto Jones?
“I think that’s close,” she conceded. “But I don’t believe Jones wasn’t injured by one. It would take a hell of a lot of bite force to penetrate his tough hide, and I’m pretty certain a Weevil wouldn’t be able to do it.”
“Then what?” Rhiannon demanded. “What could have happened?”
“We need to find Jones,” Kathy deflected, mainly because she didn’t know.
“You got any ideas on that score?” Andy inquired.
“I think your sewer idea is our best bet -“
Her office line rang.
Cursing, she picked up the handset. She couldn’t not answer; she was still on duty. “Swanson,” she snapped, letting her frustration with the situation show in her voice.
“We got a funny report of some guy popping up out of the sewers down off Bute Street by the Post Office,” it was the voice of the desk sergeant, not sounding at all put out over Kathy’s tone.
Kathy stilled, her heart suddenly thumping hard, her instinct telling her that this was the clue she’d been needing. “Anything else?” she asked, dialling back the irritation.
“Nothing much,” the sergeant answered. “But we don’t get a lot people just jumping out into traffic from the manhole there. The caller reported that whoever it was had escaped back into an alley, and no one goes into the sewers voluntarily.”
That was the honest to God truth. Anyone who’d lived in Cardiff for any length of time was well aware of the dangers underground, even if they’d never heard of Weevils. The sewer workers themselves received hazard pay. Only Torchwood went willingly. “Davidson and I will head out there,” she said. “It might not be anything…”
“But it sure sounds weird. Like something up Torchwood’s jurisdiction.”
“That it does.” She thanked the desk sergeant then hung up. “I think we might have just found Jones.”
Chapter Three
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