"What have we got so far?" Will asked. Gwen had set up the remote link to the Torchwood mainframe in Magnus's office. A mainframe with links to every police or government database on Earth, curtsey of Tosh, and most of the people in charge of those databases didn't even know it. At times Torchwood terrified Will far more than any Abnormal did. Even Druitt. The worse Jack the Ripper could do was kill him, Torchwood could make it look like he died in a mob hit after double crossing them, or simply make it as though he had never existed.
"A really depressing number of homicides." Gwen said with a sigh.
"Well there's some we can rule out." Will said, "Although I'm sure there's something that sets him off in every case, to us they are going to look like random acts of violence, so eliminate anything with an obvious motive including robbery. The guy can teleport right into a bank vault if he wants to, he'd have no need to kill for a few buck in someone's wallet."
"I think it's fairly safe to say domestic incidents are out as well." Gwen said as she typed. "What about gender?" Gwen wasn't overly knowledgeable about Jack the Ripper but she did know that he'd killed prostitutes
"Possibly." Will agreed, "His first murders were eight prostitutes in White Chapel."
"I thought it was five?"
"Five the police found and connected to him, the other three lacked the violence of those so they weren't connected." Will explained, Helen had told him that when he'd raised the same point with her just after he'd joined the Sanctuary. "However with the right motivation he will kill men too, he proved that with the Cabal. Can you flag any murders where the victim was a prostitute as high priority?"
"Of course." Gwen said.
"But rule out any with evidence of sexual contact." Will continued, "All evidence shows that although The Ripper targeted prostitutes there was never any sexual overtones to the kills."
"Right." Gwen said, "You seem to know an awful lot about this."
"When I was at college one of my classes was on criminal psychology and we profiled Jack the Ripper. After I found out about his connection to Ashley and Magnus I did some more research." Will explained, "There were quite a few suspects, including Druitt, however most modern experts dismiss him because his personality didn't match that of a man who would commit such crimes, he was a teacher."
"A teacher?" Gwen was surprised.
"Actually some experts think that he was simply gay."
"Are you serious?" Gwen asked looking up, "Is he?"
"I was hardly going to ask him." Will told her, he could just imagine how well that conversation would have gone even when Druitt was at the hight of his sanity. "However I did ask Magnus." He admitted, "She told me his family started the rumour after he told them of his engagement, apparently they didn't like or approve of her and hoped that the gossip would split them up."
"Makes Rhys's mother look nice."
"You're not supposed to like your in-laws." Will pointed out having spotted the ring on her finger and from the affection in her voice assumed that Rhys was her husband. "I'm sure it's an unwritten rule. I pity any man Ashley every brings home."
"So do I." Gwen said and then turned back to the screen, "So what next?"
Will looked over the list of unsolved murders. "Eliminate any that took place in the seven weeks before you found Ashley, we knew where he was during that time." A few more key strokes, the list was starting to look smaller. "We know that he likes to kill up close a personal so eliminate any that were killed from a distance and any gun shot victims. He prefers a blade, I know he still has the one he used in White Chapel and he used a small pocket knife on the Empath so highlight any cases where the weapon was a knife or sharp metal object."
A few more minutes of refining and they had managed to plot a series of locations around the world that was basically a trail of Druitt's movements over the few two months, the trail became more obvious over the last two months indicating an escalation in killings as Druitt lost what little control he'd had remaining from Tesla's shock treatment. They system was also set up to alert them the moment a new report was entered that matched their criteria. "Why do you think it does it?" Gwen wondered, "Why does it want to kill? The first thing it did once it was established was try to kill you so the impulse, the desire to kill must come from the parasite rather than the host."
"I don't think the building has quite that much of a grudge against us." Will agreed, "I don't know way it wants to kill so badly, but you're right, the first thing it did once it had explored its new environment was find a way to kill us."
"Jack has told us that there are creatures out there that want to wipe out all life because it is different." Gwen said. "But maybe this was all an accident." She suggest, "Maybe it accidentally attached itself to Druitt and been in a corporal form drove it insane."
"I don't think we'll ever know." Will admitted, "And even if it is true there is nothing we can do to help it, not as long as it's trying to kill us. The best we can do is humane containment."
"That's only because we can't work out how to kill it."
"Yes." Will admitted, "It would be safer to kill it, even though Magnus only likes to do that as a last resort, I'm certain that Ashley would happily pull the trigger." He looked back at the screen, "Now we wait."
"Yes." Gwen agreed, "I hate this part." With nothing else to do the pair of them relaxed in Magnus's office and talked. Gwen was impressed at Will's accurate profiling of her team and got a good laugh out of his attempt to profile Jack, then advised him to just give up on that front, that it was probably even more difficult than trying to profile Magnus.
They traded what amounted to war stories. Will shared some of the Sanctuary's latest cases. Including the wannabe superhero and Magnus's more than slightly trippy way of exposing a mole in the organisation. The latter Gwen already knew a little about because Helen had sent Ashley to them for the duration, not that any of them, even Ashley herself, at the time knew why Helen was so insistent that she spend a week or two with her godfather.
Gwen told Will some of the more interesting, and creepy, aliens that they had encountered. At the lighter end of the spectrum there was the poacher who had been stealing sheep because they were a delicacy on his homeworld, they now had quite a good trading relationship established with him. At the opposite end of the scale were the Night Travellers, who Gwen would be perfectly happy to never see again.
"How'd it going?" Jack asked when he walked into the office an hour later, he left Ashley with Kate so the two of them could go over the containment of some or other Abnormal.
"Pretty good Jack." Gwen told him. "We managed to narrow down a very long list to just a few possibilities." She pointed to the screen, "We think Druitt has been responsible for these over the past few months."
"We used a combination of the circumstances of the death, the killer's MO and the victims life." Will explained, "We also have the system set to alert us if there's another kill that fits the profile. If we can get to the site of the murder fast enough then Ashley can track his teleport. They found out while he was teaching her. Of course he can do the same."
"And if he knows about it he might be taking pains to hide himself." Jack finished. "Well the group in the lab have come up with a working containment plan. And a way to get it out of Druitt, though Helen is really not happy about it."
"Why?"
"She didn't like killing him last time when her life was in danger, she's even less happy about it this time." Jack explained.
"Isn't there another way?" Will asked.
"Not according to Helen or Owen." Jack told them, "As Helen explained it, Druitt is such a perfect host that nothing short of death would cause the parasite to abandon him." Jack waved his hand as if to say 'they're the experts not me.' "Anyway Helen and Owen are working on the details of that. I'm sending Ianto with Ashley to Cardiff for some supplies."
"Please tell me that includes his coffee." Gwen pleaded, it had been several hours since she'd had her last fix and she was starting to feel it, she was sure the others were as well, they were all addicted to Ianto's coffee. The only downside to her honeymoon, unlike the many issues with her wedding, had been that she suffered from withdrawal symptoms.
"It will." Jack assured her, "They're collecting technology that maybe useful in containing the parasite. Anything you need picking up?"
"No I have everything, but get him to call Rhys while he's there. Let him know I'm likely to be gone a while."
Ianto and Ashley arrived just outside the tourist office. Since they had left the EM shield up, as a precaution, it was impossible to teleport inside the base itself. Ianto unlocked the door and then led her though the secret entrance. "So what are we looking for?" Ashley asked as they took the lift down to the main level of the Hub.
"Tosh sent a list." Ianto told her folding up a piece of paper, "Most of it will be in our Archives but a few items we'll need to get from London." He pulled out a map and photo. "I have the location for you."
"Thanks."
"How are you with filing and archiving systems?"
"Well I mastered mom's version of the Dewey Decimal system." Ashley admitted.
"Good, I use a modified system here." They walked through the main part of the Hub and into the Archive, "Be careful down here." Ianto warned, "We do regular scans but sometimes things slip through so you never know exactly what might be down here."
"Thanks for the warning." Ashley muttered. For the next hour she and Ianto hunted through the Archives for the items that Tosh and Owen had requested. Most were easy to find but some seemed to have disappeared and others were found in sections that had nothing to do with them. Like the scanner that was found in the section for alien music items.
Once they had everything assembled into two large cardboard boxes they headed back up to the surface and Ashley used the photo and map Ianto showed her to teleport them to the London Archives. "This was an off-site storage facility used by Torchwood One." Ianto explained as he entered his pass-code. "They put anything deemed non-dangerous or useless here, the more interesting stuff was kept in the Tower."
"Which burnt." Ashley said, "We watched it on the news, mom was worried that uncle Jack had been caught up in it."
"No he wasn't the one caught up." Ianto told her, "He was in Cardiff and kept his team safe." After Ianto had passed the fingerprint recognition the door swung open. "UNIT took control of the Tower and the off site Archives, we're just lucky no one thought to change the locks."
"I thought everyone died." Ashley said, suddenly realising that Ianto must have been at the Tower.
"Twenty-seven of us survived the assault on the Tower." Ianto told her as he closed the door behind them and flipped the lights on, illuminating the large warehouse. "Only a handful recovered to the point where they can be considered physically and mentally well. Several are suffering from long term breathing problems after their lungs were damaged in the fire. More have physical disabilities from their injuries and a few have been confined to mental institutions for their own well being."
"Only twenty-seven survived?" Ashley asked again, and she thought the death toll from the attacks she'd lead was bad. "From how many?"
"Over eight hundred. One has since died of complications from her injuries and six have committed suicide."
"Mom said that Torchwood would be its own downfall."
"She was right." Ianto said, as they talked they moved amongst the massive stacks of material looking for the few items they needed, "It's better now, under Jack I don't think it could happen again."
They worked in silence for a few minutes until Ashley suddenly called, "Hey Ianto, is this it?"
Ianto took a closer look and compared the label to his sheet of paper. "Excellent Ashley, that officially makes you better at this than Owen." He checked his list again. "And that is also the last item we need." He folded the paper and put it back in his pocket then headed towards the entrance where they had left the boxes from Cardiff. Adding their finds to the top, Ashley called Henry to deactivate the EM shield.
She took them straight to the main lab and then left immediately, she'd been banned by her mother since she kept getting under their feet. Tosh was on top of Ianto almost as soon as he appeared. She took one of the boxes from Ianto and placed it on the table before she stared unpacking it, explaining to Henry what each item was as she went.
"Did you get the medical stuff I asked for?" Owen asked.
"It's all in here." Ianto told him as he handed the second box to the medic. They spent half an hour sorting through everything that Ianto had brought from Cardiff, while he'd been looking for the specific items needed he'd spotted a couple of others that could be useful and added them to the box as well.
"I think this is yours Ianto." Owen said as he finished unpacking the second box box and found a carrier bag with bag of coffee and all the extras Ianto added to the team's coffee when he thought they deserved it.
Tosh leaned over to read the label on one of the coffee bags, "Ooh you brought the good stuff."
"I'll just put a pot on then shall I?"
"Yes." Answered Tosh and Henry.
"Tea for me please Ianto." Helen requested.
"Of course." Ianto told them as he exited the main lab and headed towards the kitchen. After having to asked for directions from a bipedal lizard, Ianto finally found the very well appointed kitchen. He wasn't surprised to find that there was a coffee machine but he was a lot less than impressed to find that it wasn't been well taken care of. Muttering a few choice words in Welsh about the IQ of people that couldn't even be trusted with a coffee machine, he cleaned it, which took over half an hour, and then set a pot brewing.
He continued to curse as he also set the water boiling for Helen's tea and arranged mugs for everyone else's coffee. "Ooh Welsh, someone's in trouble." Ianto turned around to see Jack and Ashley standing in the doorway of the kitchen, "He only curses in Welsh when he's really mad." Jack muttered in an aside to Ashley then continued to Ianto, "What is it this time?"
"Idiot yanks that don't know how to take proper care of a coffee machine despite been famous the world over for drinking it." Ianto complained as he used the proper tea leaves that he'd found to make Helen's tea.
"Here." Ashley said having walked over and handed him a container, "The Big Guy drinks this."
"Thank you." Ianto told her, inside was a herbal tea though he wasn't sure of the exact blend. "Would you like the same as when you were in Cardiff?"
"If you can find enough in here for a caramel cappuccino." Ashley said, then grinned when Ianto pointed to the stuff he had set next to the mugs. "Ianto I'm holding you prisoner here."
Ianto smiled, "I thought you deserved it. Now if you have finished beating up my boyfriend." Ianto knew the Jack had been trying to keep Ashley distracted with weapon and hand-to-hand training. "You can tell me how Kate Freelander takes her coffee and then help me deliver them. And." He held up his hand before she could object, "Since we will be taking some to the main lab, you can ask if they've made any progress."
"Thanks Ianto," Ashley said with a soft smiled, "And Kate takes her coffee however it's put in front her her."
"Good to know." Ianto told her as he started to make the coffees. Ashley found a tray, and then a second one for her mother's tea service.
While they were assembling everything Kate and the Big Guy appeared, "So is this the famous Welsh coffee?" Kate asked. Of all the Sanctuary staff she was the only one who hadn't gone to Cardiff when Ashley was found and so she only had the stories of Ianto's coffee to go by. However considering that even Druitt, usually as much of a tea drinker as Magnus, had complimented it, she knew she would be in for something more than Starbucks.
"You bet." Ashley told her handing a cup to her friend. "Enjoy." She added as she handed the Big Guy his mug of herbal tea.
"Thank you." He said.
Kate took a sip of the coffee, "You're staying." She told Ianto.
Jack laughed, "Why does this happen every single time?"
"Seriously." Kate said, "Whatever he's offering I'm sure Magnus will double it."
"Salary wise perhaps," Ianto said as he handed Jack his coffee, industrial strength of course, "However there are additional perks to the job that I doubt Magnus would be prepared to offer even if she was my type. And I suspect Druitt would also object."
"And me." Ashley muttered as she enjoyed her caramel cappuccino
"Oh God." Kate complained, "Why are all the good ones taken or gay?"
"Or both." Ashley laughed, "Oh come on I know you have a thing for Will."
"You promised." Kate hissed at her.
Ashley grinned, "Come on Ianto, I don't know about your people but Henry gets cranky without his coffee, especially when he's trying to make something." Ashley picked up her mother's tea service and left the tray full of coffee for Ianto to carry.
"At least she's laughing." Jack commented after Ianto and Ashley had left.
"How's Helen doing?" The Big Guy asked.
Jack thought for a moment, "She seems alright, as long as she has something to focus on, some hope."
"But if she looses that." The Big Guy said thoughtfully
"Yes, if she looses that I don't know how she'll be. I think it might almost have been easier if he'd died, if she'd never known about the parasite." Jack said, "At least then she'd still have her anger at his betrayal to off set the pain of his loss."
"Hey guys, seriously lighten up." Both of the men looked over, slightly surprised to see that Kate was still there. "This is Helen Magnus we're talking about, she created the Sanctuary network and brought down the Cabal, she's not going to let some parasite stop her." She swept past them and out into the corridor, still cradling her coffee.
Jack and the Big Guy looked at each other and shrugged, they had to admit she had a point.
AN: Hope you all enjoyed, please review