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The Age of Paradox 2.5: Miracle Day

The actual trip to Shanghai was one of those cases where the Doctor was frankly left disappointed at what the human race did with the marvels they had encountered over the centuries. It was always frustrating when humans found something remarkable like this particular natural miniature wormhole and decided to use it just to smuggle weapons, as though there weren't so many more interesting ways to use such a system…

Still, when they were potentially this close to getting true answers about this particular threat, the Doctor supposed that there were bigger concerns than the unimaginative nature of some humans. He had even stopped himself from wondering about how exactly the wormholes had come into existence, even if he had noticed a few similarities to the Dragon Paths created by Greel's Time Cabinet, although the transition had been smooth enough that he was satisfied that this wasn't some side-effect of that particular mess…

Turning his attention back to the current situation, the Doctor hoped that they were at least on the right path to finding a true solution. There was no way to know if the extra precautions he'd discussed with Jack and Esther would be necessary, but they at least had Esther's assurance that she'd work with Rex, Natalie and Amy to do what had to be done at her end. If everything worked out, he would be ready for what was to come, and if it wasn't needed… well, he would never complain about things being easier than he'd anticipated.

He was also grateful that he'd been able to keep Amy and Natalie away from Danes. He appreciated that they could both handle themselves, but there was something about dealing with the likes of Oswald Danes that made him feel more uncomfortable than any of his past alliances with old enemies. At least when he had been forced to work with the Master in situations like the destruction of Logopolis or the coming of the Quantum Archangel, he could be sure that his adversary-turned-temporary-ally had useful skills and he understood how to keep the man focused. In this situation, there was no guarantee that Oswald Danes was going to play along with them any longer than he absolutely had to, and as for what he wanted…

It's better than risking the life of someone I actually like.

The Doctor hated it when circumstances put him in a position where he had to choose who wouldn't survive his latest crisis, but in a situation like this there was something to be said for the merits of having someone along that nobody liked. Taking Danes' death wish into account, if things became as bad as the Doctor speculated they would become, at least he wouldn't have to feel too guilty about that particular decision…

As they settled into the Shanghai hovel Jack had identified as their current temporary residence, apparently claimed from the gangs that had taken over the original smuggling operation after Torchwood stopped their alien pipeline, the Doctor made sure to keep himself in a position where he would always have an eye on Danes. For the moment, they needed to rely on Jack and Gwen's field training and superior situational experience to work out what they were up to, and K9 was running a scan of a few databases; the Doctor would 'take over' once they actually had something for him to analyse in depth. Gwen didn't take long to set up a new video call with the Buenos Aires team, allowing the Doctor the relief of knowing that he would see that his daughter and his companion were safe.

"Hey," Esther said at the other end of the connection. "Guess what. Same old glamour here. We're in some kind of warehouse."

"Yeah, well, we're crashing in a hovel owned by former gun runners with Oswald Danes as a roommate," Gwen replied, as Danes idly examined a bank note as he lay on one of the bunk beds. "Not the best day in my life, I'll tell you."

"Still, it's a good phone line," Amy put in, leaning over Esther's shoulder to grin at the screen.

"Considering the distance," Gwen nodded. "Where's Natalie?"

"She's checking around for any physical clues about the Blessing," Amy explained. "We're going to look into some local sources as well, but she's like her dad; she can't sit still."

"She comes by it honestly," the Doctor put in with a smile of his own.

"Never said I didn't like it," Amy replied before she adopted a more serious tone. "You're sure we need all that blood?"

"Blood is the key to this, Pond; the Families had nothing but Jack's blood and they managed to do all this in the first place," the Doctor observed. "You've got everything else?"

"Ready to go when we have a target," Amy nodded.

"It better be worth it," Matheson put in, evidently deciding now was the time to join Esther's call. "Had to get that stuff through in a diplomatic bag; if anyone checks the Embassy notifications, we're in trouble."

"We'll worry about that when it happens," Gwen affirmed. "The important thing is that it's safe; we'll get in touch if we find anything."

As Gwen signed out of the call, she turned to look at Jack as he rubbed at his chest, wincing in a manner that she didn't like the look of. "Are you all right?"

"Just… took a knock or two getting this set up," Jack said with a shrug.

"You did?" the Doctor looked at Jack in surprise.

"There were people here?" Gwen asked.

"Nothing serious; turns out the prospect of living forever with brain damage is just as good as a death threat these days," Jack explained, taking off his coat to reveal a faint bloodstain on his shirt. "Damn, I thought I'd fixed that…"

"Jack," the Doctor looked warningly at his old friend.

"Hey, I wouldn't have actually done it; I just needed to make them think I would-"

"I know that, Captain Harkness; I'm more concerned with the state you're in at the moment," the Doctor said, as Jack moved to lie down on a nearby bed.

"It's OK," Gwen said, moving over to help Jack. "We've got you; let's do this."

"I… I'm sorry," Jack said, wincing as he held a hand against his side, his shirt already stained with blood.

"It's all right," Gwen said, pulling up Jack's shirt. "Don't be sorry; we've got you. OK, let's take a look… oh, honestly."

"Gwen, it's just a graze-" Jack began, even as the bandage at his side revealed a stain about the size of the Doctor's palm.

"Jack, you're lucky this just passed through you," Gwen glared at him. "And it doesn't seem to be doing well-"

"It got worse when we arrived-" Jack began.

"It did?" the Doctor looked at Jack.

"Seriously, do you forget I wasn't always immortal?" the captain glared at the Time Lord. "It's not like one little scratch-"

"Jack, we're tracking something attuned to your blood that's meant to have some kind of presence here, and you didn't think that it was important for us to be aware that your body is… doing something while we're here?"

"…OK, put it like that, I get your point," Jack nodded at the Doctor before he reached down and pulled off the bandage with a swift motion. Taking the bandage from Jack, the Doctor tilted it slightly until a drop of blood fell from the bandage and landed on the floor. Even the Time Lord wasn't sure what he had expected to happen, but even he was surprised when the drop began to move along the floor of their room.

"That's… interesting," Danes said, for once saying something that everyone present could agree with. "Can't say I've been to China before, so I'm not well-versed in their customs, but I've got to say I never knew about that."

"None of us were," the Doctor mused as he studied the travelling blood.

"It's your blood," Gwen looked at Jack in new understanding. "No wonder it's killing you… I think it's showing us the way."

Following the direction of the droplet, Gwen looked out of their hovel's small window at a range of rooftops beyond them, leading to the larger, more modern construction beyond.

"It's the Blessing," she said, looking back at Jack as the former Time Agent got to his feet. "It's somewhere over there. And I think whatever it is, it's calling you, Jack."

"Right," the Doctor nodded, turning back to Gwen. "Get the others back on the line; I need to let them know this so that they can follow the same clues at their end."

"Will it work for them?" Danes asked. "Fairly sure they just have a couple of bags of his blood…"

"And bags were all that the Families had when they put their plan into action," the Doctor observed.

He just had to hope that the properties of Jack's blood were transferrable that way…


Amy wondered what it said about her life with the Doctor that it was often the small things that surprised her more than the bigger ones. She could face all kinds of twisted alien monsters or learn some of the secrets of time travel (as much as the Doctor was willing to share with her), but the sight of a drop of what should be ordinary blood moving along the ground like it was metal being pulled by a magnet was somehow stranger than any of that.

"OK, that's it; I'm done," Rex said, as the rest of the group looked at the drop. "I thought I'd seen some crazy shit with Torchwood-"

"And if this is your limit, this is why you're not qualified to criticize us for not doing things your way," Amy cut in with a smile. "You're not adaptable enough to deal with our kind of crap."

"Hey-!" Rex began.

"Let's just focus," Natalie cut in, looking thoughtfully at the drop of blood before looking back at the now-active screen. "OK, so from what I can tell, the blood drop here is moving southeast, twenty three degrees six minutes four seconds south; how about you?"

"Northwest, fifteen degrees thirty-eight minutes thirty-nine seconds north at last check," the Doctor replied.

"Like- family trait, I take it?" Amy asked.

"We always know what we're doing in that regard," the Doctor observed, before he glanced over at the sound of a groan off to one side.

"Is that World War Two?" Rex asked. "What's wrong?"

"It feels like all the blood inside me is trying to get out," Jack observed, grunting as he rubbed at his wound.

"That doesn't sound pleasant…" Rex muttered, rubbing his chest wound.

"Rex still isn't doing well," Esther said, looking anxiously at the Doctor. "What's even doing to happen to him if we stop this thing? Maybe death catches up with him-?"

"We can't worry about that right now," the Doctor cut her off.

"…He's right," Rex nodded; whatever her other problems with Rex, Amy at least couldn't call him a coward. "We have a mission, people; let's not worry about superstition like that."

"If both cities are connected underground, it's almost like a pole," Gwen observed.

"A secondary pole," Jack and the Doctor said simultaneously.

"You mean like the North and South poles?" Natalie asked.

"Except that this one links Buenos Aires and Shanghai," the Doctor said thoughtfully.

"You didn't know about this?" Amy asked.

"It's a big world and if I knew all the secrets from the beginning it would be a dull existence indeed, Pond," the Doctor smiled at her before he became more serious. "Our priority now is to find where the blood is actually going…"

"Just follow the route and see what we find?" Gwen suggested. "I can use a compass to keep me on target."

"I'll do the same," Natalie nodded. "Everyone just take care and update the other when we know what we're tracking; maybe we'll meet in the middle?"

"First time for everything," Rex observed. "Maybe if we're professional about this-"

"Professional doesn't always work in these situations," the Doctor said. "Do what's right and we'll make it work."

"See you soon, yeah?" Esther put in. "When all this is over."

"Speaking as a man who's walked to his death," Danes put in from off to the side, "can I say I did it with a lot less sentiment?"

"Just you wait," Gwen said, clearly glaring at Danes. "If this goes right, murder's coming back."

"Just, listen to me," Rex put in, taking over the call. "I've got no choice now; I need to bring in the CIA for backup. If we find this place, we're gonna have to move in and take it fast and hard."

Amy had a feeling that the Doctor and Jack would be exchanging glances at the other end of the line, but she chose to keep quiet; if she was right, it was better that not many people knew about the Doctor's long-term plan too early. Even as Jack got Rex's assurance that he wouldn't tell anyone in the CIA where Jack and the Doctor were, Amy wished that she could actually see the Doctor's reaction to their latest plan.

The Doctor had assured her that their own plan wasn't breaking the Laws of Time, but if they had to rely on bending the rules to save the day this time…

The more Amy witnessed the Faction's own efforts to manipulate time, the more she wanted them stopped so the Doctor wouldn't have to compromise his own methods any more than he had to. He enjoyed tricking his enemies into ruining their own plans as much as the next hero, but when he had to go this far…