Strange Encounter

Chapter Thirty Eight

"Here's the stuff from the Web," said Ianto coming into the office. He handed me another wodge of papers secured with one of those tag thingies with plastic ends. "How are you getting on?"

"All right. There's a lot more here than I realised." I smiled up at him. "We'd never have found it without you."

"Any archivist could have found that." He never accepted compliments, always doing himself down. In my quieter moments I wondered why – something in his childhood maybe? - but I didn't have time to consider it further at that moment. "Lunch'll be here in half an hour."

"Good."

He left and I went back to the folders spread all over my desk. Ianto really had unearthed a lot of information. I had started a profile, listing all the times we had come into contact with our local alien collector, Henry John Parker. The first time had been back in 1962 – ah, the dawn of the Swinging Sixties, good times – and he'd popped up about a dozen times since. He was an avid collector, ranking up there with Hank Van Statten and Connor Blackstaffe, though they had more money than our Henry. Most of the stuff he had accumulated was harmless but now we knew he had got his hands on a Cyberman it put him in a whole different league. Although, as I'd gone through the papers, I couldn't help feeling sorry for the guy. He had made his name back in the forties when he was only thirty and acquired millions from his inventions but he'd not done anything since. His marriage had been childless and when he'd lost his much-loved wife he'd done a Howard Hughes. Flicking through the stuff Ianto had left with me, I saw it was mainly newspaper cuttings about his purchases and speculation about Parker himself. It's strange how cutting oneself off from the world makes the Press more interested. Parker should have stayed in the public eye, no one would have bothered about him then.

Deciding I'd done enough, I went to get some water. I needed to walk about a bit and clear my head. Toshiko was at her desk, tapping away and only looked up to smile before continuing. Owen was in the medical bay whistling tunelessly. Ianto had disappeared so I assumed he'd gone up to the Tourist Office to wait for lunch. Sipping the water, I walked over to the armoury and checked it over. The blasters I'd dumped had been put away in their slots and it all looked very neat; more evidence of Ianto's presence.

"Jack, your mobile's ringing," called Toshiko. Sticking my head out of the armoury I could hear it.

"Thanks." I made it to the office before the ringing stopped and grabbed the mobile. "Harkness."

"Hey, Jack. It was a washout up here. No one showed." It was Suzie and she sounded bored.

"Didn't think they would. You coming back?"

"Yeah. UNIT are clearing the wood store as we speak. I've persuaded Mace to keep the equipment at his local headquarters for now, we don't want it disappearing into their Black Archive. And he's going to delay his reports to give us a bit more breathing space."

"Well done." It was. UNIT standard procedure was for full reports to be submitted to the upper echelons within twenty four hours of any operation. I was getting to like Alan Mace more and more, not many junior colonels would take a chance like that with their career. Of course, he could have been lying to Suzie. We'll have to keep any eye on him.

"I'm off to Paddington. Should be with you mid-afternoon."

"Great. Call when you get close to Cardiff, one of us will come pick you up."

"Will do."

I was asking Toshiko to monitor Mace's communications when Ianto appeared with a big box of food. We took it up to the Boardroom while he went off to make coffee. It was Chinese and we were soon tucking into the various dishes he'd selected for us. I steered the conversation away from Cybermen and all we'd been doing lately. Everyone needed a break from the subject, especially Ianto. The boy was holding up well but I didn't want to put him under any more pressure. Luckily I had an ally in Owen.

"Tosh here says your bird was a nuisance yesterday," he began, pointing a chopstick out towards the Hub where Myfanwy was lazily wheeling around.

"I didn't!" she protested but her blush told me that she was fibbing.

"What happened, Tosh?" I loaded more noodles on my plate and added another pork ball. "Did she attack you?"

"No. Not attacked as such. It's just she .. well, she swooped down and … well, the noise and the downdraft was a bit ..."

"Tosh was frightened." Owen was blunt and to the point. "I know what she means. I've been my own here when that thing has come flying out of the gloom. It's damned scary."

"You feel that way too?" I asked Ianto.

"No."

Owen snorted. "'Cos he doesn't! The thing likes him. He feeds it."

"Okay, what do you want me to do about it?" I really wanted Myfanwy flying free to deter any unwanted guests who may get into the Hub. The sorts of creatures we deal with could manifest themselves anywhere and did not need to use doors. Our shielding was good but nothing is perfect. But, on the other hand, I also wanted my team to feel safe when working on their own.

"Lock it up. Not all the time," Owen continued before Ianto and I could interrupt, "just when we need to."

"How are we going to do that? I'm not going up there to lock her in every time you get scared, Owen." Ianto was standing up for himself which was good to see.

"Quite right, even if I would get a great view of your arse!" As I hoped this released some tension and sent a lot of dirty looks in my direction. "Seriously, I'm sure we can replicate the signal to call her back to her nest. But to keep her there we'll need a cage of some sort, one we can lock remotely." I looked at Owen and Ianto who were studiously ignoring one another. "I'll leave you two to come up with something."

Giving them a joint project would keep Ianto's mind off Cybermen and Owen out of my hair. I also wanted to see if they could work together. So far they were only sniping at one another. I didn't want it to get more serious and have to lose one of them from the team. They accepted my decision with various mutterings but they didn't refuse. We got on with our meal after that.

"Do you have time to show me some of the artefacts downstairs?" asked Ianto as he cleared the table. "I want to get an idea of how much is down there."

"Ah, yeah, think I could find a hour or so. Tosh, Suzie'll be calling to organise a lift from the station. Gives me a heads up and I'll go."

"Okay. I'll have all the stuff on Whyte by then."

I went off with Ianto, happily expecting a romp in the archives. That was why he'd asked to go down there, right? Wrong! He really did want me to give him a tour of the basements. I was cruelly disappointed but no amount of sulking made him relent. So we went round the rooms and I think he grasped the scale of the problem. We've always taken some care of the artefacts; they were sorted by type and properly labelled. Anything we knew to be dangerous was secured but the rest of the horde was a mess. Previous teams had started putting stuff on shelving but when that had got full boxes had been filled and dumped on any surface, including the floor. In one room, full of domestic implements, we could barely get the door open for the boxes wedged against it.

Ianto sighed as we entered the fifth room full of this detritus of nearly a hundred and fifty years of Torchwood in Cardiff. "How many more rooms like this, Jack?" he asked.

"Not sure. Ten maybe."

He sighed again, pushing through the boxes along a narrow path. I stayed where I was, watching him but also wondering how we'd let it get this bad. It had been better once but lack of staff and lack of interest had resulted in the present chaos.

"What's in this room?"

"Not totally sure. Mainly small stuff, jewellery stuff like that." I noticed a yellow statue, idol I suppose, with just one eye. That had come from Torchwood India back in 1924, one of the few pieces I'd not handed over to London.

"Are they all alien? This looks ordinary enough." He held out his palm on which lay a signet ring with a large tag attached. "Says it was dug up in 1901, in Bute Park."

"Let me see." I turned it over in my hand and wiped off the dust. "This emits an etheric particle signal. Kind of a homing signal, useful if you have to leave something behind and want to find it again." They had been standard issue in the Time Agency and I wondered how this had come to be in Cardiff.

"So it is alien." Ianto put it back where he had found it. "At least most of this stuff has a description and a date, that's something."

"I told you before, Ianto, there's no need to get it all done straightaway. And you should talk to Suzie. She's in charge of artefacts and knows what she put down here most recently. Start with that."

"Okay."

We left the room and started walking back along the corridor. Ianto seemed a bit disheartened so I pulled him into a corner and kissed him long and slow. He responded but his heart wasn't in it, I could tell.

"I think you need a change. Have you been out today?" I was still pressed against him and looking into those baby blue eyes of his.

"No. Maybe I should."

"I'll be going to get Suzie, come with me."

"Wow, a trip to the station. Can't contain my excitement." He smiled. "You're treating me like a poodle again, sir."

"All right, just get out for a while. Go to your flat, go shopping, go -"

"Shit!" He rarely swore and he shocked me now. "I had some library books in the flat. They're still there."

"That's settled then. I'll drop you off and you can take the books back. Got enough for the fines?" I was joking but I'd got stung once. Took a book out in 1946 and didn't take it back until 1989. "Want to go and see your sister tonight?" I ventured.

"I don't think so." He frowned and looked at me like a little puppy dog. "Johnny'll probably be around. Do you mind if I put it off a bit longer?"

"It's your call, Ianto." I gave him a hug and we started back up the corridor, walking slowly. "Gonna have a day off this week?"

"I'll see. We're pretty busy and if Tosh is in Scotland on Friday we'll be short again."

"Doesn't mean you shouldn't have a break. Take an afternoon at least."

"I'll think about it." I didn't push him. We were busy and anything could come out of the Parker/Cyberman investigation. I needed the full team around – just in case.

When Suzie finally called at three forty I was sitting with Toshiko going through the stuff she'd found on Whyte. I was happy to put the discussion on hold and get some air so grabbed my coat and Ianto and we headed out. Suzie's train had been held up and she was expected into Cardiff Central at four five leaving enough time to swing round to drop off Ianto. Suzie was waiting when I drew up outside the station.

"What's been happening?" She was doing up her seatbelt as I extricated the SUV from the vehicles coming in and out of the ridiculously small parking area. "Find the Cyberman yet?"

"Nope. We've found a lot of info about Parker and Whyte that I'd like you to look over. No obvious signs about where they'd be keeping it."

"Okay. But I need to be gone by six."

"I know, it's Tuesday." I grinned, still intrigued by her weekly assignation.

"It's the only time I get to myself, Jack," she retorted defensively. "I don't think it's too much to ask."

"You're right. And thanks again for staying in London. You did wonders with Mace." A bit of flattery never did any harm.

"He's okay. Was really peeved when no one showed to collect the gear."

"As if they could have missed UNIT trampling all over the place."

She filled me in with a bit more detail about her day which had been spent hanging around waiting for something to happen which never did. I brought her up to speed on the rest of the team's activities and we were all caught up when we walked into the Hub. She joined Owen and Toshiko in the work area while I went on to the office. The papers on Whyte were on my desk but I had had enough of paperwork for a while. That was all I'd done for most of the day. I needed something to get me out and about and hoped for a Weevil to appear. Of course, when you want they want one they're never to be found.

"How you feeling, Owen?" I asked, stopping at his desk.

"All right. Might get off early though, if that's okay."

"Sure." He looked paler than normal and I'd seen him wince as he moved about. A bullet wound hurts and he'd need a couple more days to recover fully. "If you need a lift, maybe Suzie'll take you when she goes."

"Oh yeah, it's Tuesday. She's off to her S&M club," he smirked. Twisting round in his chair he grinned at her where she was standing by Toshiko's desk.

"Is that where you go?" I was delighted with this new piece of information.

"No it is not! Honestly, can't I have any private life!?" She flounced off to her desk to the sound of our laughter. Toshiko looked disgusted with us and disappeared in the direction of the kitchen. She'd already agreed to stick around for a while to cover; there were no predicted alerts but anything could happen.

"Those tests I was doing haven't come up with anything conclusive," said Owen. "UNIT are still working on it but they'll not find anything either." I concentrated on what he was saying. He had been running tests on the samples we'd taken off the Cyber-conversion units and equipment.

"Not sure whether to be pleased or not."

"Know what you mean. As for Tanizaki, he's safely back at his clinic. I've got markers checking for his movements and Tosh is monitoring his phone and e-mails. I printed off a list of recent visitors and his staff." He held up a sheaf of papers. "I'll run a background check on them all. Other than that, I was planning to wade through his published papers."

"Good. If he moves we need to be ready."

The door alarm sounded and Ianto strode through the cog door. He looked furious and made directly for me. "You had me sectioned!" he shouted, poking me in the chest with a finger. "You," poke, "told," poke, "my," poke, "neighbours," poke, "I was crazy!"

"What are you talking about!?" I took a step backwards to escape his angry words and his poking finger. If I could bruise, I'd have a large one on my chest.

"When you kidnapped me and brought me here, you told Sadie Matthews that I was crazy. That I was in a mental hospital!" His voice was still loud and Suzie had come over to see what the fuss was about. Owen was looking on in amusement and Toshiko, returning from the kitchen, stood by her desk open mouthed. "She is the biggest gossip in the building. She told everybody!"

I looked round helplessly. It may have been only three weeks ago but I couldn't remember what cover story we'd concocted when we'd taken Ianto into custody. "Did we?"

"Ah, yeah," confirmed Suzie. "I told your next door neighbour. Large woman in a flowery dress - "

"Sadie!" Ianto was not calming down.

" – and Tosh altered the records to show you were in the Tillman Clinic," she continued. She was unperturbed but then she hadn't been poked with that accusing finger.

"Good place that," commented Owen, not helping one little bit. "The best for miles and they charge a fortune."

"Missing the point here, Owen," stormed Ianto. "I am not crazy. I have never been crazy. I do not want records showing I am crazy!" The latter was shouted.

"Well you're acting crazy right now."

I pulled Ianto off Owen eventually. I don't think he would have hurt him, not permanently. Suzie got Owen out of the Hub as I held onto Ianto and Toshiko started making things right. He was only truly satisfied when she had deleted all the Clinic's records in front of him. Then he stormed off to his room.

I thought of asking for a coffee but even my bravery has its limits.