The Doctor puts together some of the pieces of the puzzle and a shocking (or perhaps not so shocking? Ha!) discovery is made at Torchwood.
*Sorry for the short chapter, holidays and work have kept me busy! I will try to get the next one up in a few days because I'm having surgery in a week and won't be able to do much computer work for a while. Eeek!*
"Doctor! Wake up, please! Wake UP!"
His eyes snapped open. Although the bulbous onyx orbits that had just stood over him were now replaced by Rose's warm brown eyes it took him a few seconds to stop thrashing around, his body's reaction time lagging behind his racing mind. Gentle hands cupped his face and finally stilled him, though his single heart felt as if it were throwing itself against his ribs, his chest heaving as he attempted to drag in air that had all of a sudden turned thick and impossibly solid. It was a few moments before he was able to speak.
"Rose… I think I know what happened in the warehouse!"
Her hands brushed part of his messy fringe from over his eyes, forehead slick with perspiration. She sat back and waited patiently as he eased himself into an upright position, resting his head against the headboard. The Doctor closed his eyes again momentarily, trying to hang on to every bit of information he had gleaned before his memories faded. Already much of the dream was beginning to take on a foggy quality and he struggled to keep hold of what he had begun to piece together. Rose watched silently as his brows furrowed, the rapid movements of his eyes clearly visible beneath his lids. They sat there for a few more seconds before he took a deep breath and finally spoke.
"It was a thalamocortical switch!"
"I'm sorry, a- a what?"
Frantically running a hand through his hair, he looked at Rose as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"A hyperpolarization block of the thalamocortical neurons, Rose! The hippocampus is critical to memory formation and the thalamic sensory relay nuclei, well don't even get me started on that! Don't you see?"
Rose sighed. "Yeah… still not getting it Doctor, English please?"
"An amnesiac! They were secreting an amnesiac into the air, that's why we couldn't remember anything. It's their natural defense mechanism… weeeell, one of them, anyway."
"So you breathed it in? Like a general anesthetic?"
"Similar, yes, though it did not render us unconscious. Seems it's designed to leave its victim unable to recall the encounter. So not so much of an immediate self-defense… No, more like long-term insurance."
"But it wears off, yeah? I mean, it seems to be at least… though I haven't heard anything from Lars. He promised he would inform me of the slightest detail, should he remember anything."
"I'd expect it to take longer for him, Rose. The poor bloke doesn't have superior Time Lord genes like myself!"
Rose couldn't help but roll her eyes, but smiled endearingly at this ridiculous man, preening in his pinstriped jimjams. Not missing the eye roll, the Doctor raised an eyebrow and scoffed.
"Well, he doesn't!"
"Right, of course, Doctor… and this matters because…?"
"Because Rose, his nervous system is obviously more vulnerable than mine. I expect it may take Lars months to recuperate his memories, if he can at all. Thankfully, my nervous system is mostly Gallifreyan in physiology so the amnesiac effects of whatever it was we inhaled will be quite transient."
"I see… but that still doesn't explain how they were able to stay off our biosignature scanners. Did you see any tech that could have scrambled our receivers? No one at Torchwood has found anything yet."
"No, I didn't… then again I didn't exactly get much time to explore that day but I did notice a spectrum force field as well as a massive perception filter. It wouldn't surprise me if there was such technology onboard. I may need to do some poking around now that I can remember a bit more."
"Sure, we can do that tomorrow. Pete mentioned they had finally gotten the last of the craft back to the vault so everything will be at your disposal… can you remember anything else?"
The Doctor reached up to rub the back of his neck and hesitated a moment. When his eyes met Rose's, she saw trepidation.
"Yeah, I do… Bypassing Torchwood's bioscanners would have been possible with the right type of technology, and certainly within the realm of possibility for a race that possessed that type of spacecraft. However… all Torchwood agents field agents have been trained in basic psychic detection tactics, am I correct?"
"Yes, we are. Some are better than others, obviously… natural ability and all that, as you've pointed out."
"Exactly, and your team Rose, it's got some of the best?"
"Yes, we do. They should have sensed the life forms even though our scanners failed, yeah? That's been one of the most frustrating parts of this whole ordeal. We've never come against a situation in which at least one of us couldn't. Lars especially, he's always been exceptional. Now he's been blaming himself for that…"
"Well, it would have had to be a particularly powerful dampening field to do what it did, I myself was affected quite extraordinarily! It was like going in completely blind."
Rose shook her head, baffled.
"What could possibly do that?"
"Oh, I can think of a few things that could, but one in particular comes to mind… we have it at Torchwood. Quite a bit of it actually."
The next day Rose and the Doctor headed off to work earlier than normal, hoping to beat most of the R&D staff down to the labs. Once they arrived they headed straight to the vault housing smaller recently acquired materials, most of which were either still being catalogued or currently worked on in some project or other.
Opening the safe in question, the Doctor pulled out a long rectangular container. Rose immediately recognized the blue crystals that had piqued the Doctor's interest so much that very first day she had brought him to Torchwood, hoping that its labs would prove to be too much of a temptation to pass up on.
"I remember those! You said they killed you once right? Well, back in our old universe."
"That's correct, Rose. The Metebelis crystal back home was known to increase one's psychic abilities but in large enough quantities, gave off fatal amounts of radiation. That's what forced me to regenerate. In this universe however, they seem to do quite the opposite."
Picking up a small crystal, the Doctor closed his eyes and made a fist, his fingers obscuring the soft glow emitted from the blue rock.
"I can't sense you. You're less than a foot away from me, I can smell your shampoo and hear you breathe but I cannot sense you Rose."
He opened his eyes again and saw the look of shock on her face slowly turn to anger.
"You think this was an inside job?"
"There's only one way to find out… let's go visit Tim, shall we?"
When Tim Oldham walked into the lab thirty minutes later, he was pleased to see The Doctor waiting for him at his lab station. He was not alone, and while it was a common sight to his Rose. Tyler by his side, it was odd to see her wearing such a pronounced scowl. She was usually quite cheerful these days, if not cordial at least.
"Doctor, Commander Tyler… good morning! I wasn't expecting to find you here this early, is there something I can help you with?"
"Yes Tim, there is. Do you mind telling us what ever became of the Metebelis crystals we acquired a few months ago in that trade with the Andelogormian diplomats?"
Tim was taken aback by the hostility in Rose's voice. Glancing between her and the Doctor he noticed the stiffness in their postures and the uncharacteristic hard glint in his mentor's eyes. Not knowing what had brought on this sudden change in their demeanor, he simply shook his head and answered quickly.
"Well, initially I was working on studying their psychic dampening abilities. As we discussed, Doctor, Torchwood's main interest in the crystal was developing a protective amulet of sort for our agents to ward off unwanted telepathic probing."
He paused when the couple in front of him exchanged a dark look and then turned their piercing eyes back to him.
"Go on Tim. Did you have success in creating such an amulet?"
"W-well… I almost did. I feel like I was on the verge of a breakthrough but then my project got red-lighted. I never got a chance to finish."
"And why was that?" inquired Rose.
"UNIT, m'um. They requested we send all research and most of the crystals over to them for further development. There are only a few left in our vault if you would like to see them."
"We've already done that Tim, but tell me… who exactly authorized the transfer of the crystals and your research notes? UNIT does not have jurisdiction over Torchwood employees or the authority to issue direct orders to transfer property without prior approval. That process involves mounds of paperwork and red tape, I would have heard about it."
Tim sighed in relief. He was worried there for a second that he was about to be disciplined for acting without orders.
"Oh not to worry Commander, strict Torchwood protocol was followed, I assure you! Director Evans authorized the transfer herself."