a/n: Things heat up in Cardiff, London and Glasgow.
Chapter Twenty-Three
"Have you been able to find them yet?"
"No," he said into his mobile. "We've searched and searched San Francisco, and John Smith and Rose Tyler don't appear to be there."
"Did it occur to you that they may be traveling under assumed names?"
He rolled his eyes. "They undoubtedly are, but we haven't been able to discover the names they might be using. Nor have we been able to find anyone matching their descriptions on any zeppelin flights in or out of San Francisco, nor have we been able to find anyone who remembers seeing them at any of the hotels."
The other groaned. "It's a city, dammit. There are a million people there. You couldn't possibly have spoken to everyone."
"I know my job," he said sharply. "And they probably aren't even there. We have no proof that they've even left Great Britain."
"If they are still here, they have to be living somewhere, and spending money. And I'm guessing the money that they are spending is Pete Tyler's."
"You're talking about hiring a forensic accountant?"
"Not hiring. We have one in our organization already. She should be able to determine where every penny Tyler is spending is going."
"If you want to find them," he said, "all we really need to do is to ask the one person who knows for certain where they are. And has a big mouth."
He heard a loud groan come over the speaker of his mobile.
"Alright. We'll do both. But we'll have to find her somewhere out in the open. Make it look like a natural encounter. I don't want Jackie Tyler to suspect anything."
~oOo~
The next morning the Doctor and Rose were sitting with the other Torchwood employees in a makeshift sitting area in the atrium of the Hub. There were a couple of armchairs, a beat up coffee table, and an ancient sofa that someone had dragged into the room at least a decade earlier. The chairs looked stained and worn, but the brown floral fabric of the sofa had the advantage of hiding the many spills it had received over the years. All of the furniture looked like it belonged in the landfill, and rumors were that that's where it had all come from originally.
The Doctor and Rose had swung by the local bakery on the way to work and now, while they were waiting for Owen's mobile to ring, they were all sharing a breakfast of scones and the coffee Ianto had made. Still they were all surprised when, instead of the normal telephone ring they expected, the strains of Baby Got Back began to play loudly. As he reached into his pocket for his phone, he snickered at the eye rolls he received.
"Hello," he said into his mobile. "Oh, Simon. What can I do for you? You're ill, did you say? Well, that's too bad." He looked pointedly at the Doctor and Rose while he spoke. "Yeah, I can help you out. I'll be right there." He rang off and shoved the phone back into his pocket.
"Seems Tosh here actually did what she was supposed to last night," he told them. "Our friend Simon has come down with what he thinks is a case of influenza and he can't do the DNA sampling today. He tried to get someone to cover for him, but for some reason he wasn't able to reach anyone but me." He smirked.
"Knock it off, Owen," Toshiko said, her irritation with him obvious in her voice. "I'm the one who did all the work. I had to flirt with him for almost two hours, I had to drug him without him noticing, and I had to block all calls out on his mobile except to you."
"Yeah, but it was my idea," Owen countered. "And yours was the easy part. I've got the difficult bit. If they catch me playing with the DNA sampling, I could be sent to prison. Or worse."
~oOo~
Later that morning in the local police department, in a room set aside for the purpose, Dr. Owen Harper was taking mouth swabs of Cardiff residents. Nearby, a police officer was doing fingerprint scans. Immediately outside the door, a police officer sat at a small table checking the current IDs of those waiting to be registered. Other officers were standing around, attempting to keep things orderly.
The hallway was filled with people; teenagers, elderly, parents with children, people of all ages and from all walks of life were crowded into the small space. It almost appeared as if everyone in southern Wales was in the queue that morning. It stretched down the hall, down a flight of stairs, out the door and along the pavement into the car park.
Ianto Jones stood near the entrance to the testing room, with the Doctor standing immediately behind him. Meanwhile the other members of Torchwood Three were randomly scattered along the queue. Rose stood several people behind the Doctor. Further down was Gwen, and even further down than that, near the top of the stairwell, was Toshiko.
The Doctor was restless, but unlike normal, he was trying to maintain a low profile by not chatting with the other people around him. He had even tried to dress more conservatively than usual, wearing his brown pinstriped suit with a collared shirt and a tie. It surprised him how uncomfortable his old look now was to him. He much preferred non-collared shirts, tees or even jumpers with his blue pinstripes. Differences due to a partial regeneration, he told himself.
There was a commotion at the entrance to the building and he, along with everyone else, turned to look. He raised an eyebrow when he saw what was causing it. UNIT soldiers had entered the building.
Oh, he despised all this business. The registrations were something he should be fighting, not taking part in. But there was nothing to be done… yet. They were still waiting on more information from Pete and Jake, and he knew they needed to bide their time. But biding his time wasn't ever something he had done comfortably, not in any regeneration, not even on Gallifrey.
Thoughts of Gallifrey were painful, so he shoved them out of his mind and focused on the here and now. The registrations were not all that different than getting a falsified birth certificate and driver's license from Pete, he tried to tell himself. And he had done that. For a moment he bemoaned the loss of his psychic paper, which would have made it unnecessary for Owen to risk his neck with this plan to get him registered. But there was nothing to be done about that now; he didn't have it and that's that. He hadn't even mentioned it to Rose. She had enough on her mind without listening to him whinging.
While the Doctor was struggling with feelings of anger and powerlessness, Rose was feeling a sense of resignation. She had been through tough times in Pete's World ever since she had been trapped here, but it had never been like this, being herded like cattle to be branded. And although the Doctor had once called her Defender of the Earth, she didn't feel much like a defender of anything today.
Before they had left the Hub, she had received several phone calls from aliens who were long term residents of Cardiff. In the wake of everything happening, they were trying to get off-planet. Rats deserting a sinking ship, she thought. But she didn't blame them; like the Doctor, they couldn't give a DNA sample. And unless they managed to sort this soon, things threatened to get much worse before it got better.
Soon, she told herself. Soon she and the Doctor would figure what all this was about and sort it.
Further down the queue, Gwen spotted PC Andy Davidson. He was standing near the doorway to the testing center, only a couple of yards away from Ianto and the Doctor. "Shit," she muttered under her breath. She and Andy had attended school with the younger brother of the man the Doctor was impersonating, and she didn't want to risk Andy overhearing the name the Doctor was using. Not to mention the fact that Andy knew Rose from her days working at the Hub before. She realized she really needed to do something to head off potential problems. So Gwen left the queue to go talk to her former partner.
"Hey," she said, walking up to him.
At the sound of her voice, Andy turned. And gaped. "Jesus, Gwen, I never would have believed it, but you're bigger than the last time I saw you. You're enormous."
"Gee, thanks, Andy," she said sarcastically. "Whatever would I do without you to point that out to me?"
As she spoke, she casually walked around him so that if he wanted to talk continue to talk to her, he'd be forced to face the other direction.
"So, what do you think about all this?" she said in a low voice. She took a few steps backwards, as if she was just trying to find a comfortable place to lean against the wall. After a couple of furtive glances around him, he followed her. Good, she thought. The further away he was from the initial ID check, the better.
"It's ridiculous," he answered quietly. "What's the point? What are they trying to accomplish by doing all this? We've already got identification cards on everyone. And why are they registering all the children? And I really don't like the military involved in what should be purely civilian stuff. But don't tell anyone I said that; I heard they're arresting people for less."
As he spoke, Gwen noticed the queue had moved. Both the Doctor and Rose had moved far enough away that Andy probably wouldn't notice them.
"I know what you mean," she responded. "Listen, I've got to queue up again. I'll talk to you later." She moved to leave and he stopped her.
"Gwen, just stay safe, okay?" he said seriously. "Specially with that little one you're gonna have soon."
"Yeah," she said, rubbing her stomach protectively. "I'll try. Thanks. And you be careful, too."
He nodded.
~oOo~
"Next."
The Doctor walked up to the table. A middle-aged policewoman sat behind a laptop computer taking everyone's information in preparation for registration.
"Name and identification cards," she said in a bored tone. She was looking at the computer screen in front of her and didn't bother to look up at him.
"Roger Carter," the Doctor said. He placed in front of her the birth certificate and driver's license Toshiko had given him. The driver's license had been forged by Tosh, but the birth certificate, since it didn't have a current photo, was genuine. She barely glanced at them, only looking at them closely enough to type the information into the computer system.
"Parents?" she asked.
"Richard and Susan Carter."
"Place of birth?"
"Swansea," he answered.
She switched to Welsh. "It says here you speak Welsh fluently. Is that true?"
"Yes," he answered flawlessly in the same language. "It was my grandparents' first language and we often spoke it in the home."
She handed him back the driver's license and birth certificate and switched back to English. "Your paperwork seems to be in order. Next is the DNA test."
While the Doctor was speaking to the policewoman, Ianto Jones had entered the testing room. He crossed over to Owen Harper.
"Identification, please," Harper said, and Ianto handed him his driver's license. He pretended to examine it and then handed it back.
"Open, please," he said and Ianto obediently opened his mouth.
Owen glanced at the police officers monitoring the room. Neither was paying any attention to him, so he pulled out two swabs and used both to thoroughly swipe the insides of Ianto's cheeks at the same time. He closed them into separate sterile containers and surreptitiously labeled both, one with Ianto's name, the other with the name the Doctor was using. He placed them into the tray holding the used swabs that were waiting for DNA testing.
"Please continue to the next station for fingerprinting," Owen said to Ianto. The other man moved on. "Next."
The Doctor crossed the room to Owen.
"Identification please," Harper said. The Doctor handed over his false ID from Toshiko. "Open your mouth." He placed a swab in the Doctor's mouth but didn't swipe it.
"Okay, you're done," he said, handing back the ID and pretending to process the swab. "Please continue to the next station for fingerprinting. Next."
~oOo~
The instant Pete walked in the door of the mansion, Jackie waylaid him.
"Peter Alan Tyler, what the heck is going on?" she demanded. "It was one thing to hear on the telly last week that Rose and the Doctor are in Asia when I know full well that they are in Cardiff. But now when the nanny and I took him to the zoo this morning, some woman was asking all sorts of questions about them. She seemed to think they were in San Francisco."
"San Francisco? Are you sure she said San Francisco?"
Jackie gave him a look that said she thought he was an idiot. "Yes, I'm sure she said San Francisco."
"Who was she?" Pete asked sharply. "What did she look like?"
"I dunno. Just a woman. Bit younger than me, had a kid with her. Dark hair, sunglasses, too skinny…."
It didn't sound like anyone in particular he knew, but the description could have been any one of a thousand people he had had contact with. And it might have been someone he had never met.
"You didn't tell her anything about them, did you?"
"A course not," she said. "I'm not stupid. 'S not the first time someone has tried to get close to me to try to get to the Doctor. I know the signs. Learned them the hard way."
"What do you mean?" Pete asked curiously.
"Never you mind," Jackie said, not wanting to discuss with Pete the embarrassing situation she had gone through with Elton Pope. "I just know, okay? And as I said then, I'd do anything to protect either one of them."
Pete pursed his lips and then sighed heavily. He couldn't keep this from her any longer.
"Jacks," he said, "you know things are getting nastier and nastier in London. I might have to send you away for a bit."
"Pete, the break-in, the riots… they're nothin' compared to what I've been through with the Doctor. Whatever is going on, I can handle it. I belong here with you."
He looked at her seriously. "Yeah, I know you can handle anything life throws at you. But we have a responsibility to Tony to keep him out of harm's way. If there ever comes a time when I tell you to go, you two need to go and no arguments."
Jackie met his eyes somberly. After a moment, she nodded.
~oOo~
That night, Jake sat in front of his laptop again in Torchwood Two getting more and more frustrated. He just couldn't find anyone who worked for Torchwood with a motive for helping Lisa Hallett escape from Torchwood Four. In fact, other than those who worked with her directly, and Ianto Jones, her former fiancé, he couldn't find anyone who really knew her well enough to want to help her. And of those, Richard Bradford, the only one who truly had a motive to help her, was dead. And she had broken off her engagement with Ianto years earlier, so he would have been unlikely to want to help her, even if he hadn't been in Cardiff the first time she escaped.
He slammed one fist on the table. "Dammit, what am I missing?"
Sitting at a table across the room, Audrey looked up from the book she was reading. "What's wrong?" she asked.
"A puzzle," he told her. "A puzzle with about a million missing pieces. And I don't even know what the picture looks like."
"Anything I can help with?"
He sighed. "Not really. I'm looking for someone who did something, and I can't figure out who would have a reason to do it."
She raised one eyebrow. "Someone who did something?"
He laughed ruefully. "Yeah. Sorry I can't be more specific than that."
The young woman put one elbow on the table in front of her and rested her chin in her hand. "Y'know, I read a lot of mysteries, and in them they always say that the killer is the one who has means, motive and opportunity. You're looking at the motive. Have you tried looking at people who had the means or the opportunity to do whatever it is?"
Jake gaped at her for a moment and then quickly turned back to the computer. His fingers flew across the keyboard. "I can't believe I am so thick. Audrey, if this works, I'm putting you in for a promotion. And a rise in salary."
She grinned. "And can I have the night off?" she asked hopefully.
"Yeah, yeah, anything," he said absently, staring at the monitor.
She quickly grabbed her book and her purse before he could change his mind. "See ya tomorrow," she called on her way out the door. He didn't respond, not noticing that she had left.
A half an hour later Jake sat back and stared at the screen. He exhaled loudly and ran his hand through his short, blond hair. He had cross-referenced Lisa's escapes from Torchwood Four with a list of the staff who had been in the building at the time according to their Torchwood employee IDs. Surprisingly, there were only eight staff members who had been in the building both times Lisa had disappeared. All of them would have known of the Vitex party, but only two of them would have known that the mansion was typically empty of staff on nights like that. Neither had an obvious connection to Hallett, and he couldn't figure out why either one of them would want to break into the mansion let alone bug it, but it was clear that one was the traitor. The question was, which one?
He swore and pulled out his mobile. When the phone on the other end didn't ring, he took another look at his phone's display screen.
"Huh. No signal," he said aloud. That made absolutely no sense. He had always had a strong mobile signal whenever he had visited the Pub and he hadn't had a problem with signal since he had begun working here either.
Jake shut down his computer and walked outside. One bar. He swore again.
He wandered down the street randomly, staring at his phone. Finally, several blocks away, he managed to get barely enough signal to place a call out. To his frustration, Pete didn't answer. Instead, it went straight to Pete's message service.
"Boss," he said. "Call me as soon as you get this."
As he turned around to head back to the Pub, he almost bumped into someone. A woman. She was wearing an extremely revealing top, a very short, too-tight skirt, high heels, and what Jake estimated was about a pound of makeup.
"Sorry," he said. "Didn't see you there."
"Not a problem." She smiled and winked at him. "Lookin' for some company tonight?"
"Uh, no," he said, a false smile plastered on his face. "Thanks just the same but I've got to get going."
He moved to walk around her and she stepped in front of him. "Oh, don't go. I think you and me could have a really good time."
"Lady, you've really got the wrong guy," he told her, a bit amused. He tried to walk around her again, and again she stepped in front of him.
"I don't think so," she said in an entirely different tone of voice.
Jake turned around to walk away, and there was a very large man standing behind him, pointing a gun at him. Somewhere in the back of his mind he registered it as some sort of sub-compact Glock. He wasn't certain of the accuracy of that particular model, but at this distance it didn't have to be accurate.
Dammit, I'm losing my touch, he thought. I should have realized it was a set up.
"Listen," he said to them, "I don't have my wallet on me, but my stud is a real diamond. It was a gift and it's worth a hell of a lot. Let me just give you that, let me walk away and I won't report this to anyone." He reached up to remove his earring.
The man shook his head. "Mr. Simmonds, you need to come with us."