(no subject)
Title: Work Ethic
Rating: G
Summary: Rose Tyler, her boss, a reporter and an old friend who doesn't know her.
Written for: rheanna27 for The Rose Tyler Gen Ficathon ficathon
A/N: Request was for Setting up the AU Torchwood and/or (2) meeting the alt verse Jack or Sarah Jane and/or (3) Rose getting used to being part of a larger family unit. You sort of get (1) and both Jack and Sarah for (2).
Work Ethic
Rose followed her on the CCTV cameras as she moved from one floor to another, slowly winding her way the corridors of Torchwood’s headquarters before reaching Rose’s office.
The route had been deliberately chosen to be as long and confusing as possible - a simple intimidation tactic.
And Rose wasn’t happy about having the woman in the building at all, but the boss had insisted.
“You do know what an open secret is, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Good. We are going to cultivate good relations with the public, which means good relations with the media. So stop complaining and make the call.
Rose sat down a little stiffly behind her desk. The leather of the chair creaked beneath her and she still wasn’t used to wearing a suit. But while her boss couldn’t care less about what she wore while on assignment, within that building formal dress was required.
There was a knock on the door; the reporter had arrived. “Come in,” called Rose, just a bit proud of the authority she heard in her voice.
Rose stood up, stepped round the desk to greet her visitor. “Miss Smith, good to meet you in person. Please have a seat.”
“Thank you, and call me Sarah, please,” said Sarah, taking the proffered chair and retrieving a dictaphone from her bag. “You don’t mind if I switch this on, do you?”
Rose glanced at the recording device. Cybertech, of course. “Not at all,” she said.
“Cybertech are still everywhere: television, computers, phones... someone should do something about them.”
“I believe the laws on monopoly are being revised to lessen their stranglehold on the electronics market.”
“Yeah, but couldn’t we-“
“Miss Tyler, I suggest that if you are that interested in business you should go and work for your step-father.”
“I do.”
“No. Mr Tyler can do what he likes with his money, and he might contribute significant funding to this operation, but you work for Torchwood. Which means you work for me. Now shut up, get out and do some work.”
Sarah smiled and Rose tried not to think of her Sarah. She had been the one person Rose thought she could depend upon if ever she went home, someone she could talk to, someone who could understand, and now this stranger sat in her place. So similar, but...there were less lines around her eyes, and her smile was guarded. She was brisk, sharp, but without the underlying softness. It’s just because I don’t know her.
“Well,” said Sarah, as she took out her notepad and pen, “where to begin?” She looked up from the notepad and seemed to relax into her chair. “Why don’t you tell me about how you first got into Torchwood?”
Rose folded her hands neatly on her lap. “My step-father,” she said. “It was a fairly standard recruitment. He heard about an opening, put my name forward and...”
“Here.”
Rose found herself looking down at a pad of paper and a pen. “Um...”
A sigh. Rose was getting used to Doctor Shaw sighing. It seemed like she wanted to constantly remind the rest of the world that she was much cleverer than them and that their stupidity was a constant strain on her patience.
“I want you to write down everything you know about aliens, supernatural activity and time travel.”
“Everything?”
“Miss Tyler, if you insist on making me repeat myself, I’m afraid we’re not going to get along at all.”
“Alright.” She picked up the pen. “This might take some time.”
“And be precise. Your information may still be valuable, and goodness knows we need recruits who aren’t green as grass.”
“Oh?”
“Why do you think I agreed to interview you in the first place? It certainly wasn’t for your scintillating wit. And whatever failings I suspect you have, you won’t be thinking that the strange yellow monster is oh-so-very cute, and let your guard down so it can stuff itself down your throat and munch on your internal organs, will you?”
“Um, no.”
“Good. Now get writing. Anything may be useful. We’ll evaluate it against what we already know and assess whether it has any value. There is, after all, a great deal of overlap between our two universes.”
“So the interview went well?” asked Sarah Jane, her pen flying over the page.
“It was straightforward enough. Just like any other job, really. Couple of people asking you questions, reading your CV. Nothing much.”
Sarah nodded. “Mmhmm. So there’s been a lot of confusion about this: what would you say is Torchwood’s main purpose?
“We investigate the unknown.”
“Could you be a little more specific?”
“We investigate the odd, the unexplained.”
“Aliens?”
Rose shrugged. “Yeah. I know you’re going to make a big deal out of that, but it’s a lot less interesting than it sounds. We’re a low-tech planet, out of the way, no-one really bothers with us. We get the odd visitor, maybe a half dozen a year, but they don’t stay long.”
“Can you describe what an alien looks like?”
“They’re usually in some form of environment suit.”
“I see.” Sarah leaned back, let her eyes meet Rose’s. “So what happens when hostile aliens show up?”
“Never happened,” said Rose. “But if it does, we can defend ourselves.”
“So Torchwood sees itself as a planetary defence organisation?”
“More as sifters of information. We pass anything relevant we find onto the government...the United Nations.”
“What about a typical day at Torchwood? What’s your role here?”
Rose smiled easily. “A lot of paperwork usually. It sounds glamorous, ‘Torchwood agent,’ but it’s not. There’s a lot of research, a lot of reading. Lots of running after people, chasing up leads that end up nowhere, cataloguing information.”
Sarah gave her a sceptical look. “You make it sound like a normal office.”
“It is.”
“What about the aliens?”
“Well, apart from them. But that’s a tiny part of the job, and I’m far too unimportant to be let near them anyway.”
“Miss Tyler.”
Shaw was the only one at Torchwood who ever called her that, to everyone else she was Rose. But the head of the Torchwood Institute liked to keep a lot of distance between herself and her agents.
“I’ve got something special for you today,” said Shaw, and Rose felt her stomach plummet. Shaw turned quickly, her sharp heels clicking smartly as she led Rose to the elevator. Shaw unlocked the lift and sent them straight down to sub-basement three.
“Detention?” asked Rose.
Shaw smiled thinly. “Oh, don’t worry, you’re not under arrest.”
The thought hadn’t occurred to Rose. It should have. She knew that it should have. Torchwood was, after all, a very distinctive shade of grey.
Shaw paused outside the cell, shielded the slit-screen viewer in the door. “Try,” she said in her precise and clipped way, “not to look too surprised.”
Rose held her tongue: she knew Shaw liked to do this sort of thing as a test. If it really were that important that she played a particular part then she would have been briefed on the prisoner.
Instead she said: “Yes, Doctor.” The name didn’t come easily, but Shaw had a half dozen doctorates and that was the form of address she insisted upon. A lot of the staff weren’t even told her real name.
Shaw unlocked the door, and as it swung back all Rose could thing of was the Doctor. Her doctor. It had to be him. Or...the Doctor from this universe?
She followed Shaw inside. The room was black, windowless, the ceiling oppressively low. Halfway across the floor was a barrier of steel bars, forming the cell. The small door was sealed with alien technology that Rose didn’t recognise.
The figure in the cell stepped forward.
“So what’s the most exciting thing you’ve done since you started working here?” asked Sarah.
Rose lowered her voice. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
Sarah laughed politely, and Rose let herself smile: it was only funny because it was probably true. “But, really,” said Sarah. “What have you done here that you feel has made a difference?”
“Mostly liasing with the UN,” she said. “We don’t do too badly at international diplomacy and that’s always a good thing, right?”
“Jack!” gasped Rose. Shaw gave her a sharp look, then turned her attention to the prisoner.
“Friend of yours?” she asked.
Jack smiled easily. “Wish she was.” He didn’t take his eyes off Rose. “You stick around, sweetheart. Wait till the old dragon’s gone back upstairs and we’ll get to know each other better.”
Shaw nodded. “Outside, Tyler.”
Rose needed a minute to herself, just a minute, a moment, but Shaw was relentless.
“Our Jack Harkness then, good,” she said. “Pull yourself together, for goodness sake, he’s hardly a planetary threat. Especially not while he’s in there.”
“He’s...was my friend,” said Rose, more quietly than she intended.
“Don’t be a fool. That’s not the same man in there.” Her tone changed, became a little softer. “But you have demonstrated an ability to establish a connection with the counterparts of the people you knew in your world.”
“Why’s he locked up? Where did you find him?”
Shaw drew in a long breath, a little like a sigh. “He’s locked up because he’s a con-artist. And we found him attempting to con one of our agents out of a very valuable piece of alien tech.”
“Same old Jack,” said Rose.
“Oh.” Shaw raised her eyebrows. “I do hope you’re not going to be difficult. I want you to interrogate him.”
“Me?”
“I believe we’ve already discussed repetition. And you have the most information about him, even though it may not be wholly accurate. You’ve told us how much overlap there generally is in personality and circumstances, so you are best suited to deal with him.”
“I don’t...I mean I’ve never...”
“Just talk to him, Tyler,” said Shaw. “Be his friend. That’s all. You can do that, can’t you?”
“I...yes, course I can.”
Shaw nodded. “Good. We’ll take care of the rest.”
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away,” Jack half-drawled from the bed he was sprawled across. “Saw it in your eyes...what did she call you? Tyler?”
“That’s right.” Rose took a seat at the other side of the cell, watched as Jack stood up, walked to the bars.
“You’ve got to have a first name.”
“Rose.”
“Cute.”
“Is there anything I can get you?”
“The keys?” Jack grinned. When Rose said nothing, he sighed, said: “Alright, you want to tell me why the dragon sent you down here? Or, better yet, how did you know who I was?”
“I’ve met you before.”
His expression changed, just for an instant, but he caught himself. “Oh?”
“Travelled with you for a while too.”
“You wish.”
Rose shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll know, with that perfect memory of yours.”
He stared at her, harsh and unwavering. “Who the hell are you?”
“Told you, I’m Rose. And you’ve lost two years of your memory, haven’t you?”
“I...there’s no way...” He backed away a little, shaking his head.
Rose approached the bars. “I know how scared you are. I don’t know if I can help, but I’m here, and you can talk.”
He sat on the bed, head in his hands and looked up at her. “Rose Tyler,” he said, and then smiled, a real smile.
“Ever done anything you regret?” asked Sarah.
“Every night out that ended with my head down a toilet?”
“Come on, the public know Torchwood is involved in...shall we call it shady business?”
“You can if you want to be dramatic.” Rose shrugged. “We’re a security organisation. We, obviously, can’t be transparent for reasons of national security. But what we do, we do for the good of the planet.”
“Where the hell is he?”
Shaw looked up for her desk, face impassive. “Knock before entering my office, Tyler.”
Rose took three short steps forward and slammed her hands down on the desk. “Where is he, Doctor?”
“If you don’t calm down right now,” she said mildly, “I’m going to have security eject you from the building.”
Rose took a deep breath. “Where is Captain Harkness, please?”
Shaw sat back. “He’s been dealt with.”
“And what does that mean?”
“That he’s no longer your concern.”
“Wrong. Damn wrong. That’s Jack. Jack. He’s...he’s practically the same Jack I know, and he was my assignment and you are going to tell me what’s happened to him.”
Shaw tapped her pen against the desk, stood up and walked past Rose to shut the door. “Take a seat,” she said, returning to her side of the desk.
Rose sat, her anger in no way lessened.
“You did a good job, Tyler, You got a lot of useful information.”
“I don’t care.”
“Not even if it helps us? Not even if it helps protect the planet?”
“Right now the only thing I care about is what happened to Jack.”
Shaw stared at her for a long moment, her expression unreadable. “He was handed over to the appropriate authorities.”
“Who?”
“The Time Agency,” she said.
“He was on the run from them!”
“Yes, a rogue Time Agent. And the Agency wanted him back very badly. They were extremely grateful for our help.”
“Help?” said Rose, rising to her feet. “You betrayed-“
“Oh, don’t be such a naive little idiot,” snapped Shaw, her temper finally showing. “What do you think we’re doing here? What do you think is at stake? We have planet to protect, Tyler. I know you went swanning off around the universe with your Time Lord friend, but you never saw what happened after the monster went away. Shall I tell you what happens? It has a nasty tendency to come back. This is a resource rich world with a massive population, and we have been invaded dozens of times by hostile alien life forms. I was saving this planet before you were born, Tyler, so don’t dare try and pull any of that morality crap on me. Now get out of my office and get back to work.”
Sarah sat back in her chair, flipped onto the next page of her notepad. “So you believe Torchwood should continue in its current position, independent and unaccountable to anyone in government?”
“I don’t think we should allow politics to interfere in our work.”
“But you haven’t always been independent?”
“Technically, no. Torchwood was originally a research organisation and a lot of the work we do now was carried out by UNIT.”
“United Nations Intelligence Taskforce?”
Rose nodded. “But increasing bureaucracy and political pressure left them unable to operate effectively. So we stepped in.” She stood. “I think that’s all we’ve got time for,” she said curtly.
Sarah switched off her dictaphone and stood up. “Thank you very much for your time, Miss Tyler.”
“Rose,” she said.
Sarah nodded. “Rose.”
She dialled for someone to escort Sarah back to the ground floor. “I knew your counterpart, you know,” she said causally.
“Oh?”
“She was a good reporter.”
“I’d like to think I am too.”
“I hope so.”
The door opened, Rose nodded at the junior agent. “Take Miss Smith back downstairs, please.”
Sarah stood. “I’d love to do a follow up. Perhaps go out with you on one of your investigations?”
Rose let her amusement show. “One thing at a time.”
As the door closed, she turned to the stack of papers she had to read through, and got back to work.
Rating: G
Summary: Rose Tyler, her boss, a reporter and an old friend who doesn't know her.
Written for: rheanna27 for The Rose Tyler Gen Ficathon ficathon
A/N: Request was for Setting up the AU Torchwood and/or (2) meeting the alt verse Jack or Sarah Jane and/or (3) Rose getting used to being part of a larger family unit. You sort of get (1) and both Jack and Sarah for (2).
Work Ethic
Rose followed her on the CCTV cameras as she moved from one floor to another, slowly winding her way the corridors of Torchwood’s headquarters before reaching Rose’s office.
The route had been deliberately chosen to be as long and confusing as possible - a simple intimidation tactic.
And Rose wasn’t happy about having the woman in the building at all, but the boss had insisted.
“You do know what an open secret is, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Good. We are going to cultivate good relations with the public, which means good relations with the media. So stop complaining and make the call.
Rose sat down a little stiffly behind her desk. The leather of the chair creaked beneath her and she still wasn’t used to wearing a suit. But while her boss couldn’t care less about what she wore while on assignment, within that building formal dress was required.
There was a knock on the door; the reporter had arrived. “Come in,” called Rose, just a bit proud of the authority she heard in her voice.
Rose stood up, stepped round the desk to greet her visitor. “Miss Smith, good to meet you in person. Please have a seat.”
“Thank you, and call me Sarah, please,” said Sarah, taking the proffered chair and retrieving a dictaphone from her bag. “You don’t mind if I switch this on, do you?”
Rose glanced at the recording device. Cybertech, of course. “Not at all,” she said.
“Cybertech are still everywhere: television, computers, phones... someone should do something about them.”
“I believe the laws on monopoly are being revised to lessen their stranglehold on the electronics market.”
“Yeah, but couldn’t we-“
“Miss Tyler, I suggest that if you are that interested in business you should go and work for your step-father.”
“I do.”
“No. Mr Tyler can do what he likes with his money, and he might contribute significant funding to this operation, but you work for Torchwood. Which means you work for me. Now shut up, get out and do some work.”
Sarah smiled and Rose tried not to think of her Sarah. She had been the one person Rose thought she could depend upon if ever she went home, someone she could talk to, someone who could understand, and now this stranger sat in her place. So similar, but...there were less lines around her eyes, and her smile was guarded. She was brisk, sharp, but without the underlying softness. It’s just because I don’t know her.
“Well,” said Sarah, as she took out her notepad and pen, “where to begin?” She looked up from the notepad and seemed to relax into her chair. “Why don’t you tell me about how you first got into Torchwood?”
Rose folded her hands neatly on her lap. “My step-father,” she said. “It was a fairly standard recruitment. He heard about an opening, put my name forward and...”
“Here.”
Rose found herself looking down at a pad of paper and a pen. “Um...”
A sigh. Rose was getting used to Doctor Shaw sighing. It seemed like she wanted to constantly remind the rest of the world that she was much cleverer than them and that their stupidity was a constant strain on her patience.
“I want you to write down everything you know about aliens, supernatural activity and time travel.”
“Everything?”
“Miss Tyler, if you insist on making me repeat myself, I’m afraid we’re not going to get along at all.”
“Alright.” She picked up the pen. “This might take some time.”
“And be precise. Your information may still be valuable, and goodness knows we need recruits who aren’t green as grass.”
“Oh?”
“Why do you think I agreed to interview you in the first place? It certainly wasn’t for your scintillating wit. And whatever failings I suspect you have, you won’t be thinking that the strange yellow monster is oh-so-very cute, and let your guard down so it can stuff itself down your throat and munch on your internal organs, will you?”
“Um, no.”
“Good. Now get writing. Anything may be useful. We’ll evaluate it against what we already know and assess whether it has any value. There is, after all, a great deal of overlap between our two universes.”
“So the interview went well?” asked Sarah Jane, her pen flying over the page.
“It was straightforward enough. Just like any other job, really. Couple of people asking you questions, reading your CV. Nothing much.”
Sarah nodded. “Mmhmm. So there’s been a lot of confusion about this: what would you say is Torchwood’s main purpose?
“We investigate the unknown.”
“Could you be a little more specific?”
“We investigate the odd, the unexplained.”
“Aliens?”
Rose shrugged. “Yeah. I know you’re going to make a big deal out of that, but it’s a lot less interesting than it sounds. We’re a low-tech planet, out of the way, no-one really bothers with us. We get the odd visitor, maybe a half dozen a year, but they don’t stay long.”
“Can you describe what an alien looks like?”
“They’re usually in some form of environment suit.”
“I see.” Sarah leaned back, let her eyes meet Rose’s. “So what happens when hostile aliens show up?”
“Never happened,” said Rose. “But if it does, we can defend ourselves.”
“So Torchwood sees itself as a planetary defence organisation?”
“More as sifters of information. We pass anything relevant we find onto the government...the United Nations.”
“What about a typical day at Torchwood? What’s your role here?”
Rose smiled easily. “A lot of paperwork usually. It sounds glamorous, ‘Torchwood agent,’ but it’s not. There’s a lot of research, a lot of reading. Lots of running after people, chasing up leads that end up nowhere, cataloguing information.”
Sarah gave her a sceptical look. “You make it sound like a normal office.”
“It is.”
“What about the aliens?”
“Well, apart from them. But that’s a tiny part of the job, and I’m far too unimportant to be let near them anyway.”
“Miss Tyler.”
Shaw was the only one at Torchwood who ever called her that, to everyone else she was Rose. But the head of the Torchwood Institute liked to keep a lot of distance between herself and her agents.
“I’ve got something special for you today,” said Shaw, and Rose felt her stomach plummet. Shaw turned quickly, her sharp heels clicking smartly as she led Rose to the elevator. Shaw unlocked the lift and sent them straight down to sub-basement three.
“Detention?” asked Rose.
Shaw smiled thinly. “Oh, don’t worry, you’re not under arrest.”
The thought hadn’t occurred to Rose. It should have. She knew that it should have. Torchwood was, after all, a very distinctive shade of grey.
Shaw paused outside the cell, shielded the slit-screen viewer in the door. “Try,” she said in her precise and clipped way, “not to look too surprised.”
Rose held her tongue: she knew Shaw liked to do this sort of thing as a test. If it really were that important that she played a particular part then she would have been briefed on the prisoner.
Instead she said: “Yes, Doctor.” The name didn’t come easily, but Shaw had a half dozen doctorates and that was the form of address she insisted upon. A lot of the staff weren’t even told her real name.
Shaw unlocked the door, and as it swung back all Rose could thing of was the Doctor. Her doctor. It had to be him. Or...the Doctor from this universe?
She followed Shaw inside. The room was black, windowless, the ceiling oppressively low. Halfway across the floor was a barrier of steel bars, forming the cell. The small door was sealed with alien technology that Rose didn’t recognise.
The figure in the cell stepped forward.
“So what’s the most exciting thing you’ve done since you started working here?” asked Sarah.
Rose lowered her voice. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
Sarah laughed politely, and Rose let herself smile: it was only funny because it was probably true. “But, really,” said Sarah. “What have you done here that you feel has made a difference?”
“Mostly liasing with the UN,” she said. “We don’t do too badly at international diplomacy and that’s always a good thing, right?”
“Jack!” gasped Rose. Shaw gave her a sharp look, then turned her attention to the prisoner.
“Friend of yours?” she asked.
Jack smiled easily. “Wish she was.” He didn’t take his eyes off Rose. “You stick around, sweetheart. Wait till the old dragon’s gone back upstairs and we’ll get to know each other better.”
Shaw nodded. “Outside, Tyler.”
Rose needed a minute to herself, just a minute, a moment, but Shaw was relentless.
“Our Jack Harkness then, good,” she said. “Pull yourself together, for goodness sake, he’s hardly a planetary threat. Especially not while he’s in there.”
“He’s...was my friend,” said Rose, more quietly than she intended.
“Don’t be a fool. That’s not the same man in there.” Her tone changed, became a little softer. “But you have demonstrated an ability to establish a connection with the counterparts of the people you knew in your world.”
“Why’s he locked up? Where did you find him?”
Shaw drew in a long breath, a little like a sigh. “He’s locked up because he’s a con-artist. And we found him attempting to con one of our agents out of a very valuable piece of alien tech.”
“Same old Jack,” said Rose.
“Oh.” Shaw raised her eyebrows. “I do hope you’re not going to be difficult. I want you to interrogate him.”
“Me?”
“I believe we’ve already discussed repetition. And you have the most information about him, even though it may not be wholly accurate. You’ve told us how much overlap there generally is in personality and circumstances, so you are best suited to deal with him.”
“I don’t...I mean I’ve never...”
“Just talk to him, Tyler,” said Shaw. “Be his friend. That’s all. You can do that, can’t you?”
“I...yes, course I can.”
Shaw nodded. “Good. We’ll take care of the rest.”
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to stay away,” Jack half-drawled from the bed he was sprawled across. “Saw it in your eyes...what did she call you? Tyler?”
“That’s right.” Rose took a seat at the other side of the cell, watched as Jack stood up, walked to the bars.
“You’ve got to have a first name.”
“Rose.”
“Cute.”
“Is there anything I can get you?”
“The keys?” Jack grinned. When Rose said nothing, he sighed, said: “Alright, you want to tell me why the dragon sent you down here? Or, better yet, how did you know who I was?”
“I’ve met you before.”
His expression changed, just for an instant, but he caught himself. “Oh?”
“Travelled with you for a while too.”
“You wish.”
Rose shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll know, with that perfect memory of yours.”
He stared at her, harsh and unwavering. “Who the hell are you?”
“Told you, I’m Rose. And you’ve lost two years of your memory, haven’t you?”
“I...there’s no way...” He backed away a little, shaking his head.
Rose approached the bars. “I know how scared you are. I don’t know if I can help, but I’m here, and you can talk.”
He sat on the bed, head in his hands and looked up at her. “Rose Tyler,” he said, and then smiled, a real smile.
“Ever done anything you regret?” asked Sarah.
“Every night out that ended with my head down a toilet?”
“Come on, the public know Torchwood is involved in...shall we call it shady business?”
“You can if you want to be dramatic.” Rose shrugged. “We’re a security organisation. We, obviously, can’t be transparent for reasons of national security. But what we do, we do for the good of the planet.”
“Where the hell is he?”
Shaw looked up for her desk, face impassive. “Knock before entering my office, Tyler.”
Rose took three short steps forward and slammed her hands down on the desk. “Where is he, Doctor?”
“If you don’t calm down right now,” she said mildly, “I’m going to have security eject you from the building.”
Rose took a deep breath. “Where is Captain Harkness, please?”
Shaw sat back. “He’s been dealt with.”
“And what does that mean?”
“That he’s no longer your concern.”
“Wrong. Damn wrong. That’s Jack. Jack. He’s...he’s practically the same Jack I know, and he was my assignment and you are going to tell me what’s happened to him.”
Shaw tapped her pen against the desk, stood up and walked past Rose to shut the door. “Take a seat,” she said, returning to her side of the desk.
Rose sat, her anger in no way lessened.
“You did a good job, Tyler, You got a lot of useful information.”
“I don’t care.”
“Not even if it helps us? Not even if it helps protect the planet?”
“Right now the only thing I care about is what happened to Jack.”
Shaw stared at her for a long moment, her expression unreadable. “He was handed over to the appropriate authorities.”
“Who?”
“The Time Agency,” she said.
“He was on the run from them!”
“Yes, a rogue Time Agent. And the Agency wanted him back very badly. They were extremely grateful for our help.”
“Help?” said Rose, rising to her feet. “You betrayed-“
“Oh, don’t be such a naive little idiot,” snapped Shaw, her temper finally showing. “What do you think we’re doing here? What do you think is at stake? We have planet to protect, Tyler. I know you went swanning off around the universe with your Time Lord friend, but you never saw what happened after the monster went away. Shall I tell you what happens? It has a nasty tendency to come back. This is a resource rich world with a massive population, and we have been invaded dozens of times by hostile alien life forms. I was saving this planet before you were born, Tyler, so don’t dare try and pull any of that morality crap on me. Now get out of my office and get back to work.”
Sarah sat back in her chair, flipped onto the next page of her notepad. “So you believe Torchwood should continue in its current position, independent and unaccountable to anyone in government?”
“I don’t think we should allow politics to interfere in our work.”
“But you haven’t always been independent?”
“Technically, no. Torchwood was originally a research organisation and a lot of the work we do now was carried out by UNIT.”
“United Nations Intelligence Taskforce?”
Rose nodded. “But increasing bureaucracy and political pressure left them unable to operate effectively. So we stepped in.” She stood. “I think that’s all we’ve got time for,” she said curtly.
Sarah switched off her dictaphone and stood up. “Thank you very much for your time, Miss Tyler.”
“Rose,” she said.
Sarah nodded. “Rose.”
She dialled for someone to escort Sarah back to the ground floor. “I knew your counterpart, you know,” she said causally.
“Oh?”
“She was a good reporter.”
“I’d like to think I am too.”
“I hope so.”
The door opened, Rose nodded at the junior agent. “Take Miss Smith back downstairs, please.”
Sarah stood. “I’d love to do a follow up. Perhaps go out with you on one of your investigations?”
Rose let her amusement show. “One thing at a time.”
As the door closed, she turned to the stack of papers she had to read through, and got back to work.