Just a little note to start with- I'm really very sorry for the long wait in between the last chapter and this one, I feel really bad about it, I made a goal to finish it last week... but failed. So without further ado-

Chapter 7

Converging

St. Aquinas' Gardens

12:34

Michael sprinted hard, dodging around corners in the hedge maze, nearly running over four other boys in the process.

He had to get away.

Not just from the investigators, but from the image of Malcolm being killed.

He sprinted until he could barely breathe in the crisp air of Northern Maine, his feet pounding against the gravel. He flew around a corner, but as the fountain that signified the center of the gardens came into view, his foot slipped and he went flying, landing awkwardly on his back . Crawling to his feet, Michael barely took note of the scrapes and bruises he had acquired from his run through the grounds.

Sitting on the edge of the fountain, catching his breath, Michael let a few tears slide down his cheek. This was too much- Derik returning when he couldn't possibly- Him- Malcolm dying, why Malcolm?

Taking in a shaky breath, Michael looked around him, noticing for the first time exactly where he was. Running a hand through the cold water of the fountain, Michael stood.

Looking around as he decided what exactly to do, Michael spotted someone walking purposefully across the grounds, away from the school.

Mr. Smith.

The Doctor.

Michael made up his mind and, curious, followed the 'teacher' out of the school grounds.

St. Aquinas'

1:02

Gwen wandered through the halls, staring at her phone's screen, every now and then hitting a button to keep it lit up. Taking care to not run into anyone, she turned a corner and sighed once more as the bars on her mobile stayed dejectedly at zero. She had been doing this for almost twenty minutes- wandering the halls(starting at the science wing and heading towards the dorms)- but to no avail.

"Excuse me," A woman dodged around her as Gwen moved down the hall.

"Sorry," She said, looking around and stopping. She had been positive it had just been Miss Trails, but now the hallway was deserted but for a couple boys walking in her direction. There was a door to the right. Maybe she had gone in there.

Gwen turned to continue her search, but froze as she noticed her mobile.

It had a signal.

A very good signal, in fact.

She moved a little to the left.

Nothing.

She moved back to where she had just been, guessing it had just been a spike in the signal at the time, but stopped as the signal returned.

She moved to the right.

Again nothing.

Back in her original position, facing the wall, she walked forward. The signal remained strong. She walked backwards until she hit the other wall. The signal stayed strong across the hallway in one concentrated beam.

Strange.

Frowning, Gwen glanced around for anything that could be causing this, but the hallway was empty.

Curious to see if it was just her phone acting strangely, she pulled up her contacts and called the first one on the list.

Calling Rhys

"Gwen!" Came the sound of her husband's voice. He seemed pretty happy. The quality of the call was amazing, no static or slight cutting out of the voice.

"Hey Rhys," Gwen said quickly.

"What? Just 'Hey Rhys', no 'Hello love, I'm sorry I left the country on half an hour's notice',"

Gwen sighed. Rhys was a bit tipsy. "Sorry love, it was for work. Look I'm sorry, but I've got to go," She knew she would get reprimanded later for the extremely short call in which nothing was said, but she really needed to find one of the others.

She took note of where she was- a long hallway that ended in a wooden door, and instead of a turn in the hall to the right, there was a glass door that lead out onto a small porch at the back of the school that overlooked the gardens. She turned to leave, but as she was heading back the way she had come, she bumped into her teammate.

"Tosh, I was just looking for you," Gwen said.

Martha, who was with Tosh and Owen, spoke up, "We were looking for you. Jack called, said to meet him at the hotel. We're going into town. He didn't explain. But Tosh found something."

"I'll explain on the way," Tosh said. The four headed off quickly.

"I have something to tell you… it's about the mobiles," Gwen said.

"Right, but Tosh found our alien," Owen said, interrupting, "We know who it is."

"Who?" Gwen asked, eager to catch the culprit.

"That new teacher, Mr. Smith," Tosh said, "The history teacher. This thing," She held up the scanner, "Well, I've been playing around with it and I found this," She showed Gwen the screen.

On the screen was the same hallway they were walking down at the moment. On the left of the screen, it showed Owen's back on the right, Martha's. The image had a strange quality, however. While it showed the picture clearly, it also seemed to have a layer that could be seen simultaneously with the original picture. This layer, at the moment, seemed to show body heat(Gwen figured this as Martha's image was a bright red, while Owen's showed nothing). It also seemed to show something else- around Martha, there was a slight golden glow.

"What's that?" Gwen pointed at the glow.

"Radiation Martha picked up when she was travelling with the Doctor," Tosh said, "Alien radiation. I was able to figure this out, this shows all lifeforms, and it can identify which are terrestrial and which are not. For example," She tapped at the screen a few times, now it showed a table, "It shows Martha as fully human- fully terrestrial, with background radiation that's non-terrestrial in origin. It also shows remnants of things. Like," The image of the hall was up once more, "All these slight colorings to the walls and floors, it's where people have come into contact with them. So we looked around for traces like these, except extra-terrestrial, and found loads in the history classroom."

"What about his friends?" Gwen asked.

"Can't find them," Martha said, "We looked for a bit, but then Jack called. We asked around, turns out Mr. Smith left about half an hour ago, heading into town. We're going there to talk to him."

"So we have him," Gwen said, both happy and sad for the same reason. They would catch the person who had killed an innocent boy.

"Yup, we've got him," Martha said with a sad smile as they headed out of the school.

Alice Trails stared at the retreating backs of the Torchwood team, her heart beating loudly against her chest. She felt as though she might not be able to breathe.

She had to find him.

They had said he had gone into the town.

Without a second thought she ran to her office, grabbed a pen and pad of paper, scribbling out-

Amy-

Gone into Marksborough, back in a bit- sorry.

Alice

She ran out the front doors, jumping down the front steps, not caring who saw her.

Grabbing her bicycle from where it was chained underneath her office window(who needed a car when she lived at the school and the nearest town was a few minutes bike ride?), she hopped on and sped away, aiming for a little-known path through the woods that led straight to the hotel.

That's where he would be, right?

She sped down the path, her bike jumping over loose pebbles and almost slipping into the deep ditches caused by runoff on either side of the path. She steered dangerously, cutting the few corners, and not taking care to slow down as she headed down a steep hill.

She had to warn him.

The TARDIS

12:49

The Doctor slipped through the trees, ignoring the strangely colored bushes that surround the pine trees that hid his TARDIS.

He pulled the key out a pushed it into the lock, glancing behind him as he slipped inside. He had had a feeling that he had been followed all the way from the school.

Running up to the console, he pressed a few buttons while pulling the screen towards him.

"You've been scanning?" he stared at the readings, "Ever since…Oh. Thank dear," He whispered. The TARDIS had been acting even more sentient ever since it had inhabited the body of Idris a few hundred years before. It seemed as though she had noticed the strange things he had seen(shown as spikes of alien energy) and commenced a scan of the surrounding area.

"It's part psychic," He said aloud, not caring that he was alone, "Well that would explain how he… it knew so much about what… I knew about… him." The Doctor muttered, setting up a couple more scans.

Now that he was here, in the TARDIS, thinking back on his… vision, hallucination? He didn't understand why he had been so hesitant to let the Torchwood team know he was there. Well, if his suspicion was correct, it would explain it pretty well.

On the topic of his suspicion-

The Doctor typed furiously away at the type writer, pulling up a search through the TARDIS' databanks.

"Here we are," he said with a smile, frowning slightly when he saw the size of the file of information.

He tapped on a few keys, and soon the type writer was printing out the page.

The Doctor impatiently pulled the slip of paper out of the makeshift printer and ran out of the door.

As he shut the door, folding up the paper hastily and shoving it into one of his bigger-on-the-inside pockets, the Doctor continued his train of thought from earlier. It seemed as though whatever was causing this did not want him and Torchwood working together, hence his strange desire to keep his identity a secret. This brought up the problem that if whatever was causing this could control his thought patterns, it would have to be very, very strong.

Looking at the pluses, however, it seemed the radius of whatever was causing this was relatively small. If he managed to stay outside of it while the Torchwood team was outside also, they might be able to figure something out together.

With that in mind, the Doctor set out to find some way to communicate with the Cardiff team, after he had explained just who he was.

Jack walked as fast as he could without breaking into a run. He wasn't sure where he was going, he just needed to get his thoughts in order.

The TARDIS was here.

In Maine.

Which would mean the Doctor was here.

In Maine.

Maybe.

Jack had noticed the difference. They were the reason he wasn't trying to burst through the doors this very second, but coming close to running in the opposite direction.

For starters, it was too blue. The blue was just a shade brighter and more vibrant than he remembered. Second- there was a small circular crest on one of the doors that hadn't been there before.

Jack wasn't sure what it meant, maybe it wasn't the Doctor. Maybe it was.

Maybe he had regenerated.

Jack wasn't sure which was worse. It not being the Doctor, or having to (once again) get used to a completely new man.

"Jack!" Ianto was shouting, trying to keep up, jogging every now and then to stay with the immortal, "What's going on? Is that the ship?"

"It's the ship," Jack said. They were now at the parking, but he didn't care. Why would the Doctor not tell them… unless he had just arrived. Maybe that's what Toshiko had picked up on her scanner.

No, it was a more steady signal, so it wouldn't have been the landing she picked up.

What should they do?

He had called her seconds after he had seen the TARDIS, not explaining just telling her to get the others and Martha and come to Marksborough before hanging up and running away from the clearing, but other than that he had no idea.

Jack frowned, stopping suddenly and almost causing Ianto to smash into his back. He shoved his hands into his pockets and was about to say something when his right hand clenched something hard, metallic and surprisingly warm.

He pulled it out. It was a normal key to a normal, everyday Yale Lock. Except this one was glowing a light gold and warmed his hand considerably because of the heat radiating from the metal due to its proximity to the time machine.

Staring at the glowing key that he always had with him, Jack made up his mind.

He spun around, ignoring Ianto's questions, and headed back the way they had come.

He would figure this out, the school, the strange teachers, the plants… But first, he would figure this new twist out. If it was the Doctor, whether the one he remembered or a completely new regeneration, then the more the merrier. He would be able to help Torchwood stop this… after they had figured out what… this… was in the first place. If it wasn't, then… well, they would improvise. It was Torchwood's specialty, after all.

He was almost back into the forest when he heard someone shouting his name.

"Jack!" It was a man.

Jack turned around, looking around the parking lot. Soon he saw the young history teacher coming towards them at a brisk jog.

"I was looking for you!" He said as he met up with them halfway across the parking lot, "Well, I actually only decided to look for you a second before I actually saw you… but I should have been looking for you for hours. Which would not have been the case as I would have probably seen you minutes later."

"What are you talking about?" Jack looked at the man with mistrust.

"Oh yes, sorry about that," The man said, pausing as he caught sight of the key in Jack's hand. The grin slipped off his face, "Oh." He started backing away, "I was positive it didn't extended this far."

"What extended this far?" Ianto asked. If Jack hadn't been so focused on the fact that the TARDIS was mere meters away from them, he would have felt bad for Ianto. Nothing would be making sense to the Welshman at the moment. To tell the truth, most of it didn't make any sense to the immortal anyways.

"The projection field… but you'd know all about that, wouldn't you," The man seemed nervous.

"What do you mean, projection field?" Jack cut in, "Listen, Mr. Smith-"

"Mr. Smith?" Mr. Smith froze, "Not… You think I'm Mr. Smith?"

"Think?" Ianto frowned, "What do you mean, think? It isn't your real name?"

"No, no, of course it isn't," Then the man froze, glancing over his shoulder. He leaned forward and whispered. "It'd be best if you come with me. I think I've been followed."

"So, if you aren't Mr. Smith… then who are you?" Jack asked, having no intentions of following this strange man.

"I can't explain that right now, but if we go somewhere more… private, I can explain," he said, eyeing the key once more, "Maybe over there," He nodded over to the woods where the TARDIS was hidden.

Jack frowned. It was probably just a coincidence.

"Fine, I have a good place," He wanted to know what this man had to say, but he wanted to make sure he wouldn't run for it.

It was worth the risk. Besides, both he and Ianto had a couple Retcon pills in their pockets. Just in case.

"Right. Lead on," Mr. Smith said, looking over his shoulder.

"Come on then," Jack lead the way, followed by Mr. Smith with Ianto bringing up the rear.

Soon the TARDIS came into sight. Jack walked up to it, intending to use the key, but as reached out, Mr. Smith moved in front of him.

"Let me," He glanced at Jack. Pulling out a key, he fit it into the lock, turned it, and pushed the door open.

Jack paused a moment, before following 'Mr. Smith' into the larger on the inside time machine, having realized who he was following.

"Is he our alien?" Ianto asked.

"The one we were picking up, yeah," Jack said quietly, still staring. No wonder 'Mr. Smith' had been acting strangely around them. But this brought up the question- Why didn't he just tell them who he was. Unless there was someone else at the school who would know him… Jack frowned, then decided to tell the young Welshman what he had figured out, "But not the one who's behind it… Ianto. Welcome to the TARDIS."

"The TARDIS?" Ianto stopped in his tracks and said, "As in… the Doctor's TARDIS?"

Jack nodded.

"So, does that mean he's…" He motioned towards the Doctor.

"Yeah," Jack said, walking forward once more.

Ianto followed, walking in right behind Jack, "Oookay."

"Alright?" 'Mr. Smith', better known as The Doctor, asked, spinning on the spot where he was standing next to the console..

"Um yeah," Ianto said, frowning, "It just seems as though your box is a little bit bigger on the inside."

"A little?" Jack laughed, watching the Doctor, "You should see the swimming pool."

Ianto raised his eyebrow as Jack turned to the Doctor.

"So, Doctor," Jack said, "Long time, no see."

"Jack," The Doctor said seriously, getting straight to the point, "We've got a problem."

Right- so- They met *hopeful smile* the real meeting's next chapter... but still... So! Please review! They make me happy, especially this time of year- no Christmas doesn't make me depressed and stressed- the other thing... that's right! Mid-terms! Already taken one*grumbling* so that's one down, four to go, then FREEEEDOOOOOM! fortwoweeks. But anyways, once again, I'm really really really sorry about the long wait, no excuses, I'm just a procastinator with no time, so please review.