Exhibit, Part Two
Part One
Their rooms were a floor below the medical area. They weren't that much; a desk with a panel for computer access, some chairs, a bed in the back, a cupboard and a toilet. To Ned's credit, the cupboards were all filled with clothes that pandered to their tastes, and the beds were very comfortable.
"They're all connected by the side doors, as well," Ned pointed out, opening one of Tosh's to show that it led straight into Ianto's room. "I know it's a little bare, but if you want anything to make it more homey, please, just let me know and I'll do my best."
They all made vague noises of confirmation. Ianto and Tosh were obviously exhausted, even though they'd only been awake an hour or so, and Owen just wanted Ned to leave so he could get his thoughts together.
"Thanks, Ned," Owen said, since nobody else spoke up. "I think we've got it for now."
Ned nodded proudly, but didn't move. Tosh glared at him again, and sat down on her bed quite deliberately.
"Er, yes," Ned said, finally getting the hint. He slowly backed out the front door, nodding to them each. "Good night then. I'll come by tomorrow morning with your breakfasts. Do sleep well!"
Owen shut the door on him.
Ianto sighed and sat down next to Tosh, his head in his hands.
"How are we going to get out of here?" Toshiko murmured, curling up against the wall.
Ianto just shrugged. "Doesn't sound too good, does it?"
Owen sat down on Tosh's chair. "Well you two aren't going anywhere until you're fully back to health," he said. "We might as well get settled for a long stay."
"He said we'd be fine within a week," Tosh pointed out.
Owen shrugged. "Sure, but we don't have any means of escape, unless you're planning on building a space ship out of bedclothes tied together. Face it, we're stuck."
Tosh banged her head against the wall and stared at the ceiling.
"Better than being dead, though, right?"
Neither of them answered.
"I wonder what became of Jack and Gwen," Ianto mused.
Toshiko's head snapped forwards. "Jack," she said. "He's got to still be alive somewhere."
Owen leaned on the desk, staring idly at his mangled fingers. He hadn't thought of that. Jack was, in all likelihood, still out there somewhere, with a ship maybe.
"It's been 2000 years for him," Ianto said, still staring at the floor. "He probably doesn't even remember us."
Owen and Tosh both looked up at that. He sounded utterly miserable at the thought, but at the same time completely sure of himself.
"Jack was always bringing up things from 2000 years ago," Owen said after a pause. "He probably tells all kinds of embellished stories about us. Probably all kinky too. Bet he brags to all his friends about shagging the tea-boy."
Tosh glared at him. Ianto just shrugged again.
"They were just stories though," he said. "Never mentioned names. Details get lost in time, that's just how it works."
He finally raised his head, sitting back to stare beyond Owen's shoulder at the opposite wall. "And it's not like we have any way to contact him, anyway."
Owen stood up when Ianto started coughing again, putting an end to their cheerful conversation. He tugged the larger man off Tosh's bed and shoved him into his own room. After setting it up so he could have a glass of water right next to his bed and forcing him to sleep sitting mostly upright, he crossed back through Toshiko's room to get to his own.
She had already fallen asleep, twisted at an odd angle with her legs dangling off the side of the bed. Owen pushed her into a more comfortable position, and took the opportunity to pull up her shirt and look again at the bullet wound. It was already looking better than it had, with no sign of infection or oozing of the usual fluids.
He turned off her light and wandered back into his own quarters. He leaned on the closed door, staring at the unfamiliar room. No gorgeous view of the city, no giant TV, nothing at all that resembled his flat back home. On Earth. 2000 years ago.
He lay in bed with the lights still on, his mind filled with death and vague homesickness and Tosh and Ianto and Jack and Cardiff and space and -
He stared at the blank ceiling, wishing for sleep.
~~
The days passed in a long blur of redundancy. Ianto's chest and throat were far better after the first day, and by the end of the week, both he and Tosh were walking around like nothing had ever happened, as Ned had predicted. They had breakfast with Ned, and he explained more about the station and the museum. By the second day, they each had one of the same wrist implants he wore.
"This will grant you permission to various areas on the station, as well as access to the computers. If you need additional access, just let me know, and I can alter your permissions as needed," Ned explained. "They're really very useful, even off the station. Has a built in short range translator."
"And probably a tracking device," Tosh had muttered crossly, but she seemed content to fiddle with it all day, like a new toy.
After breakfast, they all had time on their own, which they mostly spent in Tosh's room. They spent their time talking. Owen told them about his first day on the station, though he glossed over the details of his 'examination;’ if Tosh clenched her fists any tighter, she was liable to cut her palms with her nails. In the days following, Ianto related stories that Owen and Tosh had missed, starting with the aftermath of their own deaths, and then the story of his own.
In the evenings, they met with Ned again, and endured his academic interviews as best they could. It came down to more story telling, often repeats of what they'd already told each other, though they didn't quite tell it the same way.
"I shouldn't have gone with him," Ianto confessed to Tosh and Owen in the afternoon. "He didn't even need me there, we both just got caught up in saving the world. As usual." He stared up at the ceiling, blinking back tears. "All I remember after that is telling him… and he kissed me. And then nothing."
"Then the 456 released the gas and killed everyone in the building, including me and Jack," he said calmly to Ned.
"But what did it feel like?" Ned insisted. "What was it really like?"
Ianto shrugged. "It hurt," he said, "A lot. It felt like something was squeezing my chest really hard, and I could barely breathe. It felt like I should have been able to breathe, but I couldn’t. And then my limbs stopped working. That’s about it."
Ned nodded and marked something down in his notes.
"What happened after that?" Ianto asked. "I assume Jack and Gwen figured out how to beat them."
"Oh, yes, of course," said Ned. "Though it wasn't… easy, to say the least. The records are a bit vague in these matters - they were all written a long time after the fact, you see, and their accuracy is questionable. I can give you access to them, if you like. You might as well look into these things during your free time."
He smiled apologetically at them, obviously knowing they pretty much had nothing but free time.
"Did Gwen have the baby?"
Ned nodded furiously at Tosh's question. "Oh yes, she certainly did. Lovely girl, Anwen Cooper-Williams. She's really the reason we even have these records, you know. Grew up hearing stories from her mother, insisted they be written down properly. Rather a shame she didn't do the same with her own experiences… then we might know a little more about what happened…"
"What happened with what?"
"Well, the thing is, Mr. Jones, even after your death, Torchwood didn't exactly come to an end. Oh, it went off the map for a good year, but inevitably things started up again. It's your Ms. Cooper who fixed up the whole thing, got it all started again, with off-and-on-again help from your Captain, who was mostly living offworld at that point. But it cuts off," Ned said with an excited flourish. "Not Torchwood itself, that kept going with its new staff and location, nothing strange there, but Ms. Cooper simply disappears from the records after a certain point, as does her spouse."
Owen frowned. "What do you mean 'disappears'?"
"I mean there's simply no mention of her beyond a certain point. There's no mention of death or even disappearance, no vacation or mission on record, they just stop mentioning her altogether. It's one of the great mysteries of my studies."
Owen used his wrist implant that night to look at the records himself. Gwen's records did end rather abruptly, as did Rhys', though he still remained separate from the official staff roster. He got bored with the family after that, as it was mostly just Anwen's grades from Oxford. Jack's records were spotty to begin with (well, after Ianto's death, anyway), but he seemed to have left Torchwood permanently some time within five years from Gwen's disappearance. He moved on to the much older files, from before any of them had been recruited, just reading.
He spent a lot of his nights like that, staring at the panel on his desk and reading old Torchwood records while he waited for morning. Tosh and Ianto usually stayed up as late as they could, but it always ended with Owen alone in the dark, trying not to wake them.
Besides that, his days were peppered with interruptions from Doctor Eskar Xarchac, who did not seem to keep any kind of regular schedule and demanded Owen drop everything to be studied with no warning whatsoever. He was short and entirely disagreeable, irritated by absolutely everything, Ned’s polar opposite. Owen hated him.
But it was something to do besides just sit in the rooms, so he welcomed the distraction. Xarchac rarely spoke to him, except to give terse instructions, but Owen honestly didn't care. The study was downright interesting. It wasn't just talking about things he already knew, it was a real, medical study, and he had first hand access to the experiments. Even if there wasn't much of a chance that Owen's condition could be reversed, he liked the idea of the findings being used to save lives, the way Xarchac's other research had saved Ianto and Tosh.
Toshiko also spent a lot of her days at the computer. Unlike Owen, she wasn't looking for time wasters: she researched. The computer told her all about the station, the museum, the universe she had been thrust into, 2000 years beyond everything she knew. It was a fascinating present, with interplanetary politics and alien celebrity gossip, and all kinds of technology with instructions. Nothing that came through the Rift had ever had instructions.
But her purpose was clear, even if she went off topic a little at times. Tosh was looking for a way off the station, for all three of them, permanently.
It wasn't just that Toshiko had sworn, after being freed from UNIT prison, that she would never let herself be imprisoned again. She was worried. Ianto didn't really occupy his time the way she and Owen did. He seemed to spend his time alone just sitting around, and really only humored her and Owen when they tried to get him to open up. He was obviously still thinking about Jack and the life he'd left behind on Earth, and simply didn't care about anything happening right now.
And Owen wasn't much better. He seemed alright most of the time, but he was far too quiet and even polite for her not to worry. His acceptance of being studied and even dissected was terrifying her. How could anybody just go with that, whether he could feel the pain or not?
So she kept looking, scrolling through pages and pages of information, trying to find anything useful for their escape, doing her best not to fall into the same black hole of resignation the others were in.
~~
A few weeks after their arrival, Ned led them all into an area of the station they hadn't had access to before.
"Welcome to the Adris One Science and History Museum!" he announced.
It sure looked like a museum. Unlike back in their quarters and the medical/research floor, it was full of things to look at. Brightly colored signs pointed to various displays and exhibit halls, which contained objects from all across the galaxy and time.
"It has twelve floors," Ned explained, leading them down a hallway lined with clothes in picture frames. "And multiple exhibits on every floor, plus the theater for presentations, and the cafés on the third basement, and the gift shop on the first floor by the entrance. If you go past the exit, that's where the public living areas are, and the hotel. Below all of that is docking. But you'll all have plenty of time to see that later."
He led them around a corner, to a curtain with a sign reading 'Exhibit Under Construction.' Pulling the curtain open, he waved them all inside.
"Welcome," he said excitedly, "to Torchwood."
Tosh stopped in her tracks, staring. Ianto just avoided colliding with her, but neither of them noticed, too occupied with the sudden immersion back home.
"It's the Hub," Toshiko whispered. "You've rebuilt the entire Hub in your museum."
It wasn't, exactly. The floors were still the grey-green tile of the museum, and the walls were mostly the same beige. But the main area of the Hub was replicated, all of their desks in the correct places, trinkets from 21st century and rift debris lain out atop them, and even the fountain in the back. The biggest difference was that everything had been condensed to one floor, with the Tourist Office off to the left, and the autopsy bay in the back next to Jack's office. It was all labeled, with little plaques saying who worked where and what did what. Against the walls were clear display cases showing off alien weaponry and other things that had fallen through the Rift. Just above eye level was the familiar sign, graffiti and all, reading TORCHWOOD, supplemented by a smaller plaque reading '21st Century Earth - Contact before First Contact.'
"It isn't open to the public yet," Ned continued, obviously pleased by the humans' reaction. "But we've started getting ready for the opening, and we even have your testimonials and background on the Institute available to read. I do hope you'll take part in the exhibit, we've worked very hard to make it accurate."
Ianto had already wandered off, drawn to the familiar sights. He ran his hands over his desk in amazement. "It's all here," he murmured. "How did you get all of this?"
Ned fluffed up again, all too pleased to explain. "We used the Time Gate again," he said. "Much of this isn't just a replica, it actually is the object that was in your Hub. We pulled it out just before the explosion, you see. As it would have been destroyed anyway, nobody missed it. The objects too large for the Gate we had commissions of, replicas by only the finest professionals."
"So you got it working again, then," Owen commented from the corner, all-too-pleased to see his Singularity Scalpel again, even if it was behind a case.
"Pardon?"
"When you pulled me out, you were all panicking, said there was something going wrong with the Gate."
"Oh," Ned said, though none of the humans were really listening with more than half an ear, too preoccupied with the exhibit. "Well, yes, it's quite old, you see. We don't even really know where it came from, we just got it donated. Sometimes it acts up, musses up the coordinates or starts sparking or something. Haven't quite worked out the kinks yet. It's, er, actually out of order again right now, but since the exhibit's nearly done and we don't have any others planned, it's not a big problem."
Aliens don't understand it, coordinates are unpredictable, possibly dangerous, Toshiko noted on auto, sitting down at her desk and picking up her Rubik’s Cube. Probably too dangerous for an escape, but might work in a pinch. Of course, even if we managed to get home, we're all already dead. Can't screw up the timeline.
"So what exactly do you mean by take part in the exhibit?" she asked aloud. "You don't mean you want us to sit around out here and act like we're back in the past, do you?"
"Oh, no, certainly not," Ned said. "Not unless you want to, that is. You could! That would actually be quite interesting. But no, you don't have to do anything if you don't want to, really just all your cooperation with my research has been extraordinarily helpful. If you did want to come out in the exhibit itself, you could, I don't know, talk to the patrons? Explain about what you did, answer questions. But really," he said defensively, noticing Tosh's frown at the idea of being on display, "Absolutely nothing is required of you. I just thought you might like to see what it is we've been working for, why we brought you all here in the first place. To see what has been accomplished!"
"When does the exhibit open?" asked Ianto.
"Three weeks," Ned stated.
"We'll think about it," Owen said, slinging on his lab coat. He frowned, and paused to unpin one of his badges and relocate it to the other side. "It's pretty obvious you've got some of the details wrong."
~~
Despite Ned's excitement over the opening exhibit, life didn’t really change for the three humans. It was all still long hours of doing nothing with only the occasional interruption in the form of talking to Ned. After three days, none of them could deny the appeal of getting a change of scenery.
"What happened to, 'It's so demeaning, being put on display like animals in the zoo, what a horrible thing to do?'" Owen mocked from his usual seat on Toshiko's chair.
Tosh glared at him sideways from where she lay on her bed. About five seconds ago, she had collapsed into it, bemoaning the fact that the exhibit still had 19 days to opening.
"It still is demeaning," she said. "But being out there with the public means interacting with people who don't work here; we might be able to find someone to help us escape."
Owen just leaned farther back in the chair and didn't answer.
"What do you think of the exhibit?" he asked later, watching as Eskar Xarchac examined yet more readings from his hundredth scan of Owen's non-functioning vascular system.
Xarchac snorted. "Waste of money," he said frankly. "Nerranderot gets too wrapped up in his pet projects. This little obsession of his isn't going to earn anything for the museum, it's not even going to further his research."
Right, because you don't have a problem with obsession, Owen thought, watching him review the scan from last week and compare it to the new one. He'd read Xarchac's papers by now, all studies on species with unusually long lifespans or recovery systems. The man was obviously infatuated with the idea of cheating death, maybe even immortality.
"Why are you helping fund it then?" he asked.
Xarchac glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. "Nerranderot and I always find a mutually beneficial way of working. He can study his history all he likes. I do not come away completely empty handed."
He motioned to the full body scanner. Owen sighed, something he knew Xarchac found particularly annoying due to the lack of necessity, and pulled his clothes off for the fourth time that day, shoving them in the corner and dropping his hand brace on top.
"Well, glad to know I'm still good for something, I guess."
Xarchac just snorted again and began the scan.
He wasn't the only person on the station skeptical of Ned's project. Ianto, aware that Owen and Tosh were both rather concerned about his emotional health (making mountains out of molehills, he was sure), had volunteered to help the historian work on the exhibit itself. It wasn't much, but he could stay out in the museum for a couple hours at a time, and the familiarity of the Hub made him feel a bit better. He gave suggestions on how they could better organize the exhibit, which Ned usually took to heart, even if the rest of the museum staff grumbled about it.
The other members of staff were all nonhuman, though they varied greatly in size and shape. None of them was particularly interested in talking to Ianto, which didn't really bother him. He was good at going unnoticed, and they paid him no mind during lunch break, when Ned ran off to take care of an emergency in the Headless Monk exhibit.
"This thing's gonna be a flop," one of the lizardy girls declared, biting vindictively into her sandwich. It oozed yellow all over the floor where she was sitting. "Who the hell wants to look at this crap?"
The greenish bear-crab she was talking to shrugged. "You never know. Uquiccax doesn't usually do anything bad for the museum. It's his whole life. Maybe there's an audience for this we aren't aware of."
"He is putting an awful lot of effort into advertising," pointed out the squiddy-thing, reaching an arm out of his (her?) mechanized water suit to grab a biscuit. Crumbs fell to the floor as she (he?) leaned out of the top hatch to chat. "Audio and video and print, bragging all about the real-life artifacts and first-hand testimonies and all that."
"Nothin' 'bout the Gate though," Lizardy said.
Bearcrab shuddered. "Good thing, it'd scare everyone off. That thing gives me the heebie-jeebies."
"Is it still making noises?" asked Squiddy.
"All the damn time. I swear I can hear it from my quarters. And there's that weird thumping coming from the walls in the passages. They should just unplug it and throw it in storage forever, if you ask me."
"Or dismantle it," Lizardy agreed. "Get rid of it forever."
"With our luck we'd be cursed if that happened. Sure looks like something that'd curse ya."
It was then that Ned came running back in, a Cheshire grin wide across his furry face.
"Our replica's arrived at last!" he announced. "How wonderful, this is all coming together so well!"
Two more lizardy fellows in jumpsuits grunted as they wheeled in the enormous pternodon replica. The three having lunch stared in wide eyed dismay, all too aware they would have to hoist it and hang it from the ceiling.
Ned beamed. "What do you think?" he asked excitedly.
Ianto smiled, impressed. "It's gorgeous, Ned. Great job." Never mind that it was half as big again as Myfanwy had been, nor that the replica was painted a startling green.
Ned fluffed up with pride.
~~
Lizardy and her friends were proven wrong at about ten days prior to opening. The entire museum seemed to have lost its head, all at once. A message alert bleeped out, all across the station, and all the staff stopped to glance at their wrists at the same time.
Xarchac dropped his scanner, which clattered on the floor and snapped in two. He didn't notice. He just made a strange, strangled sound.
"You all right?" Owen asked, interested. His wrist-thingy hadn't made any noise.
Xarchac started, as though he'd entirely forgotten Owen was there.
"Go…. go back to your quarters," he ordered. He began frantically gathering his equipment from the counters, suddenly in a huge hurry. "I will inform you if I need you again. Go! Hurry!"
Owen found himself shoved into the hallway, half dressed, clutching his clothes awkwardly. He turned around to shout back at Xarchac, but the doctor was already sprinting down the hall away from the laboratory.
Owen huffed and put the rest of his clothes back on before wandering back to his room.
He was met on the way by Ned, who looked quite as flustered as Xarchac had been, pulling Ianto along by the arm without looking.
"Oh!" Ned exclaimed. "Good, you're here. I mean, you're on your way back, aren't you? Would you mind, er, just…. just stay in your quarters for the time being. Something's come up, the staff has to take care of it, we'll all be terribly busy…"
"What's come up?" Owen asked, at the same time Ianto said, "Do you need any help?"
Ned floundered, bouncing from foot to foot and glancing down the hall as if he desperately wanted to be somewhere else. "Oh no, no, thank you, I'll let you know if there's anything… hrm. Yes. It's just that there's a very important guest coming to visit, we don't know why, it's all terribly exciting, we have to get everything ready for him. You understand, don't you? It's a rather important time for us, it's really quite amazing he's coming."
Ned took off down the hall, still muttering to himself.
Owen and Ianto looked at each other, confused. The rest of the staff was in a similar state of excited panic, passing through the halls at high speed and chatting breathlessly at one another.
Tosh was leaning out her door, watching them go by.
"What's going on?" she asked as the other two arrived.
"No idea," Owen said. "Some big shot’s visiting or something. Got everyone all freaked out."
"Maybe it's the police," Tosh murmured, letting them in and shutting her door to cut off the noise.
"Except it isn't illegal for them to keep us here," Ianto pointed out. It was one of the first things Tosh had looked up; having been legally deceased for longer than the allotted time limit, they were property, not people, resurrection notwithstanding.
"Doesn't mean they haven't done something else illegal," Owen pointed out. "I bet ol' Xarchac's gotten in trouble for something before, morals aren't exactly high on his priorities."
"Did you hear who it was?" Tosh asked, all ready at her panel to look up names. "If it's really someone famous, they'll probably be easy to find."
"Don't remember anything," Owen said, and Ianto shrugged his agreement.
Toshiko sighed and moved to open the door. "I'll just ask someone outside, then."
She raised her wrist to the scanner and waited. Her wrist flashed red, and the door remained firmly shut. She frowned, and hit the manual open.
"They've locked us in!" she said in disbelief. "I can't believe this."
"They must really want us out of the way," Ianto said, and settled back on Tosh's bed.
Owen flopped into his usual seat as well. He raised an eyebrow at Tosh, who was still fiddling madly with the door controls. "Forget it, Tosh. Ned'll let us out when this is over. We might as well just kill time."
Ianto tugged something out of his waistcoat pocket and tossed it to Owen.
"Playing cards?"
"Nicked them from the exhibit," Ianto explained. "Jack's desk."
Tosh leaned her head against the door, fighting back frustrated tears. How could the boys take all this kind of shit so calmly?
With one last angry bang on the door, she turned and stalked back to her place in the corner of the bed. Owen dealt her in.
They played for what must have been hours, every game they could think of until they were horribly bored again. It had deteriorated to the three of them sticking cards to their foreheads (though Owen had some difficulty with that, due to his lack of sweat) and Ianto trying to do magic tricks he hadn't practiced since high school, when the door chimed.
They all looked up, and Ned appeared in the doorway, looking frantic.
"Oh good!" he said, breathlessly. "You're all in here! I checked the other room first and it was empty and I didn't know what - " he coughed, as he tended to do on the rare occasions he noticed he was rambling.
"Anyway, um," he continued. "Would you all mind coming with me? The… the Face wants to meet you."
~~
They were ushered into a sort of observation area, filled with windows that looked down on a large, empty room, that in turn had a window that filled the entire wall, looking out into the stars. Ned scurried downstairs with just a quick explanation, leaving the three of them with some museum staff and Eskar Xarchac.
All of them were staring with one mind down at the room.
"Who's the Face?" Ianto whispered, as they took up an area in the corner.
"The Face of Boe," Tosh elaborated, staring down into the large room below them. "I've read about him, he's some sort of celebrity. Very ancient, very mysterious. Always in the front of celebrity gossip."
"Why, what does he do?" Owen asked, peering over her shoulder. "Which one is he?"
She pointed. "He does a bit of everything, I think. I've come across the name in politics and economics and even entertainment. Supposedly he can also predict the future with amazing accuracy. Nobody knows where he came from, there's no knowledge of any other Boes except his own descendants."
"It's a giant head in a jar," Owen said, staring down.
"Yes, Owen, he's a giant head in a jar."
"The jar is supplemental," Xarchac said suddenly. He had one claw pressed to the window tensely. "They say it keeps him alive, but it's all just show. He's lived longer than anything known in the universe, it's like he's always existed. There's no way he needs that technology to live, he just uses it."
Owen had a feeling he knew why Xarchac was up here instead of down there with Ned, talking to the Face.
"He can't touch him," he muttered as quietly as he could. "He's obsessed with studying everlasting life, and he's got a perfect specimen down there, and he can't do anything to such a public figure."
Down below, Ned nodded frantically at something the Face said, and waved up towards the observation room. The three of them shrunk back as the giant eyes turned to look at them. The Face said something else that made Ned frown, but he nodded reluctantly. He and the rest of the museum staff attending turned and left the room, nodding or bowing politely as they went, until the Face was left alone with his cat-faced attendant.
Ned was back up the stairs within a minute. He gestured to the humans, panting, and they followed him out.
"That down there is the Face of Boe," he explained tersely. "He's an extremely important figure, just his being here will bring all sorts of attention to the museum. He came for my exhibit!"
His fur fluffed up again before he made a conscious effort to flatten it. "He heard about my 21st Century Earth exhibit, and he made a special trip just to see it."
"But it isn't open yet," Ianto pointed out.
"When the Face of Boe wants to see your unfinished exhibit, you show it to him," Ned replied. "We closed down the whole museum to the public, just so he can have a look in peace. And he asked to see you," he said. "I have no idea how he even knew, your names are nowhere to be found on the available materials, but then, he is the Face of Boe, he's famed for knowing absolutely everything, past and future."
He led them into a large entryway, shutting the door behind him. The doors on the other side were enormous, obviously leading into the big windowed room they'd been looking down on.
"What kind of place is this?" Tosh asked, putting out of her mind for the moment that she'd apparently been asked for by name by a big giant head.
"It's the grand ballroom," Ned said, flustered. "It's used for conferences and important guests and sometimes weddings."
"People get married here?"
Ned flapped his hands impatiently. "Is that really important right now? Listen, the Face asked to speak to each of you, in private. One at a time. I've actually closed all the observation windows for him. It doesn't matter what order you go in, but… please, be very respectful and polite when talking to him, this is a very important man, we have to maintain a good impression."
The Torchwood crew looked at each other. It was bad enough having to go talk to a giant alien head, but now they had to go alone.
Tosh bit her lip, unwilling to speak up. Ianto looked from her to Owen; much as he liked to show up the older man, he wasn't really a take-the-lead kind of person, and he was rather hoping one of the others would take that position. Owen glanced at the two of them.
I'd be sweating like a pig right now if I could, he thought. No sweat, no adrenaline, no hormones. It's like I'm not nervous at all.
He took a deep breath out of habit, wishing it actually accomplished something. "Right then," he said. "Guess I'll go first."
~~
The giant door creaked open, and Owen stepped through tentatively. He felt very small, standing in front of a giant door in a giant room with giant window, about to go talk to a giant head about… god knows. 21st Century Earth. First Contact before First Contact. Same old stuff he'd been talking about for weeks now. Right. No problem.
The door shut behind him, and Owen flinched at the sound. The cat-person standing next to the Face looked up at him and smiled gently. He stepped back politely as the giant head rolled upwards in its jar to stare at him.
"Doctor Owen Harper," the Face said, smiling. "It's nice to see you."
"…Charmed," Owen said, and he was unable to stop staring. Come on, this is nothing, he told himself. So he knows my name, so he's a giant fucking head in a jar, who cares, you've seen weirder, no big deal.
"Is something wrong?"
Owen flinched. The voice… it wasn't exactly sound, it was almost as if the Face was talking directly into his mind. Which was dumb, he could hear it in his ears, but then he didn't really see the mouth move, did he? But not all aliens had to talk with their mouths, he supposed, Oh god I've lost it, I can't think, it's a giant fucking head in a jar.
"Yeah, sorry," Owen forced out. Be polite be polite be polite. Fuck. "It's just that you're a giant fucking head in a jar, it's a bit distracting." Fuck!
The Face stared at him for a moment. Then he chuckled. The sound reverberated through Owen's head like someone had smacked a gong inside it. Owen couldn't help it. He laughed too.
"I was wondering when you would say it out loud," said the Face, still smiling and obviously not offended in the least. "Your thoughts were practically screaming at me."
Oh fuck, he's psychic too?
"Only a bit," the Face answered. "It's easy when you're directing thoughts right at me. I try not to pry."
"Sure," Owen said. "Giant fucking head in a jar, psychic powers. Not a big stretch there. And they say you can see the future, too."
The Face made a motion somewhat like a nod. "They say that," he agreed. "Please, Owen, speak freely. I will not take offense. There is no need for you to be uncomfortable."
Owen smirked back. "Yeah, thanks for that. Ned had us all freaked out in the back, there."
The Face just kept smiling, and seemed content to gaze at Owen from his jar. Owen fidgeted uncomfortably.
"Look," he said. "Ned said you wanted to talk to us, that you asked for us. What… what exactly did you want?"
"I did not ask to talk," the Face said. "In fact, I asked to see the three of you, that is all. If you wish to talk, by all means, go ahead. I shall answer."
Owen frowned, a bit disconcerted by the fact that he'd evidently been called in to be looked at. He grasped for something to say.
"Tosh read about you, online, or whatever it is you call it here in the future. Said you're as old as anything in the universe and can predict the future."
The Face peered at him. "I am very old," he agreed, "Old enough to have seen many events in the universe, sometimes more than once. I have never claimed to know everything, but through experience, I have learned a lot. As for the future, I do know some. Time is not linear, Owen Harper, and what one person considers the future is another's past."
Owen frowned. He knew that sort of thing from Torchwood, it was in the archives and was one of the first things Jack had explained to him about working there, rule 1, don't mess up the timelines.
"Why do you ask?" the Face said, curiously. "Just making conversation? Or would you like to know the future for yourself?"
"I've been getting a bit too much of the future as it is, if you know what I mean," Owen said, glancing out the window at the stars. The docking bay was visible from here, and he watched as a ship landed in the asteroid.
"But this is only one future," the Face said. "It's the universe, it's the museum. It isn't necessarily your personal future."
Owen looked back over at him. "What, you know my personal future? Even if you've seen everything in the universe twice, why would you know about me?"
"I know many things," the Face answered calmly. "You may ask me any one question about your future, if you like. If I am able to answer, I will do so to the best of my knowledge."
Owen raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Oh yeah? Great and powerful oracle, you're going to tell my future?"
"What is your question?"
Owen meant to say something scathing, something about how you shouldn't know your own future anyway or that all fortunetellers were full of crap, but his mouth opened before he could think.
"Will I ever be fixed?"
The Face looked at him curiously, waiting for elaboration.
Owen hesitated. That wasn't what he had meant to say at all, but… "Fuck it, you know what I mean," he said, stepping back and raising his arms. "My heart doesn't beat, my lungs don't take in air, I don't bleed, I don't breathe, I can't feel! You tell me to ask a question, well that's it. One way or the other, I don't care. Am I going to be stuck like this, between dead and alive, for…. forever, I guess?"
The Face stared at him, long and hard. Owen stared back, challenging him.
"Everything comes to an end," the Face said finally, and Owen's heart sank. "Nothing lasts forever, death finds everybody in the end. Even I shall die some day. And for you too, death will come, eventually. There will be a day when you die, permanently."
Owen stared at him, feeling sort blank and empty.
"But before that day," the Face of Boe continued, "Before you die, Owen Harper, I can promise you, you will breathe, and you will live again."
~~
Owen stumbled back into the waiting room and leaned against the door to shut it. He shut his eyes and faced the ceiling for a long moment.
"Well, what happened?" Ianto said.
"Are you all right?" Tosh asked, walking up and grabbing his hand.
Owen looked down at her with a strange look on his face. Then he grinned. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I'm fine. Nice guy, Face of Boe. Easy to talk to."
"But what did he say?" Ned asked, twiddling his fingers nervously. "What did he want to see you for?"
"Oh, this and that," Owen said. "Hard to explain. Anyway, one of you should go soon, shouldn't keep him waiting."
Tosh frowned, unwilling to leave Owen after such a strange reaction. She looked over at Ianto and jerked her head towards the door. He nodded nervously, and stepped forward to go through.
"Any advice?" he asked.
Owen stepped back, led by Tosh, to let him through the door. "Not really. Be yourself. Say what you want to, he doesn't give a shit about being polite, whatever Ned said."
Ned made a noise as if to protest, but Owen continued.
"Oh, and pick a good question."
"Question?"
"Yeah, he said I could ask a question about the future or whatever. You guys get one too. Make it good."
Ned made a strangled sound as Ianto passed through the doors.
"He prophesied for you?' he gasped. "The Face of Boe never says anything about the future to anybody!"
Owen shrugged. "Yeah, well, he offered. I asked."
"What did he tell you?!"
Owen smirked and leaned against the wall with Tosh. "None of your business. Nothing important for you anyway. He makes it all very personal."
~~
Ianto straightened his suit self consciously as he stepped through the gigantic doors. They closed behind him with a noise a bit louder than he should have liked.
The Face looked up at him as he walked up to the jar. He smiled, and the effect on the enormous, gray, wrinkled face was astounding. Ianto felt like some great weight was lifted from him, relieving him.
"Ianto Jones," said the Face of Boe, "You are beautiful."
Ianto stopped and blinked at him, not knowing what to say. What did you say when a giant betentecled head in a jar called you beautiful? Was he being hit on? It didn't really feel like it, it was more like… he wasn't sure. But the Face was staring at him, admiring him like a work of art, and it didn't really make Ianto feel uncomfortable so much as confused.
"Thank you," he eventually settled on. Then he added, "Sir," because if he's one of the most important people in the galaxy and can bring a whole space station to a grinding halt just because he wants to look at something, he probably deserves to be called Sir.
The Face kept gazing at him, a soft smile on his enormous lips. "It's wonderful to see you," he said.
"Thank you," Ianto said again. "It's very nice to meet you, too, Sir." He resisted the urge to fiddle with his tie again. Maybe it was okay for Owen to be rude, but Ianto was more or less against giving a bad impression to anybody if he could avoid it.
"Have you got a question for me?" the Face asked.
"Pardon, Sir?"
"I'm certain Owen must have told you," he said. "If you like, you can ask a question, any question, about the past or present or future, and if I am able to answer it, I will."
Ianto tugged on his sleeve. "Yes, he did mention that," he said. "I didn't have much time to think about it though."
"You may think now," said the Face, and he seemed content to lapse into silence, simply admiring Ianto from afar.
Ianto thought about it. The truth was, he had an awful lot of questions, all over the map. He wished Owen had told them what he had asked, just so he could have some idea of where to start. All he could think was that he should ask something for all of them, something that the others wanted to know as well, something that could be useful to them. Ask about escape, maybe, for Tosh. He thought of asking whatever became of Gwen - that would settle his and Owen's and Tosh's and even Ned's concerns on the topic, solve the mystery, finish the story of the woman who'd become his closest friend.
But instead he was selfish. He always was, in the end.
"Was I remembered?" he asked. "After I died, I mean."
The Face peered at him for a moment, considering the question. "You were," he said, "Remembered. For years beyond your death, you were remembered."
"Your funeral was very small, but the people who attended loved you. Your sister and her family, in particular. Her children grew up knowing you as a hero, and she thought of you many, many times throughout her life. Gwen Cooper also attended, and made sure everything was taken care of, out of care for you. She kept some of your possessions, a constant reminder, and her daughter, who grew up with Torchwood, took you as a role model, from her mother's stories. You were remembered through the years, as the Institute was rebuilt and grown, until its eventual dissolution and reform when Earth finally reached out to the stars."
Ianto choked, filled with all kinds of mixed up feelings. He wished now he had asked about Gwen, and he suddenly and violently missed her, and Rhi and the kids and…. But he wished he'd been more specific. This was all good to hear, but it wasn't what he was really asking.
The Face stared at him, waiting for Ianto to compose himself before continuing.
"You were mourned, Ianto Jones. For a long time. In the year following your death, Jack Harkness wandered the Earth, searching for some way to say good-bye to you properly. He wanted nothing more than to tell you what he hadn't been able to say back, that he loved you."
Ianto stared up at the Face of Boe in shock, doing his best to control his breathing.
"In time, he recovered. He found other outlets, other friends, other lovers, eventually. But he always remembered you fondly, throughout the long years, after his closest friends and lovers passed through his life. You were never, ever, forgotten."
~~
Toshiko shut the door behind her with a snap, unphased by the sound.
Ianto had come back into the entryway, smiling brighter than she'd seen in a long time and with tears all over his face. He grabbed her shoulder as they passed, flashing her a reassuring smile before he sank against the wall and sat on the ground next to Owen, his head in his arms.
She didn't wait for him to say anything. She just walked through the door. She knew more or less what to expect, she thought, and she was ready with her question, and she wasn't going to let him get to her.
The Face of Boe smiled as she approached. "Toshiko Sato," he welcomed. "The brilliant Toshiko Sato."
Tosh crossed her arms in front of her, unimpressed. She wondered what he had said to the others, to make them trust him. They had both become too trusting nowadays, too easily won by flattery. Tosh was all too aware that the people here were captors, not friends, and she wasn't going to fall for the Face until she was certain of him.
The Face chuckled at her. "You can trust me, Toshiko Sato, but I won't be offended if you choose not to."
"Owen told me you were psychic," she informed him, determined not to appear startled.
"Of course he did. And I know you want to get this all over with."
"You're the one who called us here," she said. "Why are you so concerned with seeing us, if you don't have anything to say?"
"Is that your question?"
"No."
The Face smiled at her. "Then I am not obliged to answer. My motivations are not important. Just know that I am very glad to see you, even if you do not understand why, and that I am here to help you."
"Then tell me how we're going to get out of here."
The Face sighed, sending bubbles floating to the top of his jar. "That is a difficult question, Toshiko."
"You said we could ask anything," she said quietly. "You said you would tell us the future."
"I said that I would answer your questions as best as I could. I cannot tell you what I do not know."
Tosh faltered, her arms falling to her side in hopelessness. "Wh - what do you mean you don't know?"
"I do not know how you will escape from this place," he repeated. "Not exactly. The variables are too many, strange and convoluted. All I can tell you is that you are brilliant."
Tosh felt like she was going to break down. "Flattery isn't exactly going to help," she said.
The Face of Boe looked up at her and smiled. "No, Toshiko Sato, I am not flattering you. You are a woman from the 21st Century on a little planet in the middle of nowhere, and yet you've spent your life using technology from distant worlds and different times. You are brilliant, you can use, repair, and even create devices far beyond what should be within your scope of abilities. You have bent time and saved the world, because your mind is amazing."
"And it is that, Toshiko Sato, that will be your key from this prison. When the other variables are in place, you are the one who will make everything work, and it is your perseverance and brilliance that will lead you and your friends to freedom."
Tosh stared at him, tears gathered in her eyes. She wiped them away with the back of her hand.
"You bastard," she said. "You did that on purpose."
Part Three
Master Post
Their rooms were a floor below the medical area. They weren't that much; a desk with a panel for computer access, some chairs, a bed in the back, a cupboard and a toilet. To Ned's credit, the cupboards were all filled with clothes that pandered to their tastes, and the beds were very comfortable.
"They're all connected by the side doors, as well," Ned pointed out, opening one of Tosh's to show that it led straight into Ianto's room. "I know it's a little bare, but if you want anything to make it more homey, please, just let me know and I'll do my best."
They all made vague noises of confirmation. Ianto and Tosh were obviously exhausted, even though they'd only been awake an hour or so, and Owen just wanted Ned to leave so he could get his thoughts together.
"Thanks, Ned," Owen said, since nobody else spoke up. "I think we've got it for now."
Ned nodded proudly, but didn't move. Tosh glared at him again, and sat down on her bed quite deliberately.
"Er, yes," Ned said, finally getting the hint. He slowly backed out the front door, nodding to them each. "Good night then. I'll come by tomorrow morning with your breakfasts. Do sleep well!"
Owen shut the door on him.
Ianto sighed and sat down next to Tosh, his head in his hands.
"How are we going to get out of here?" Toshiko murmured, curling up against the wall.
Ianto just shrugged. "Doesn't sound too good, does it?"
Owen sat down on Tosh's chair. "Well you two aren't going anywhere until you're fully back to health," he said. "We might as well get settled for a long stay."
"He said we'd be fine within a week," Tosh pointed out.
Owen shrugged. "Sure, but we don't have any means of escape, unless you're planning on building a space ship out of bedclothes tied together. Face it, we're stuck."
Tosh banged her head against the wall and stared at the ceiling.
"Better than being dead, though, right?"
Neither of them answered.
"I wonder what became of Jack and Gwen," Ianto mused.
Toshiko's head snapped forwards. "Jack," she said. "He's got to still be alive somewhere."
Owen leaned on the desk, staring idly at his mangled fingers. He hadn't thought of that. Jack was, in all likelihood, still out there somewhere, with a ship maybe.
"It's been 2000 years for him," Ianto said, still staring at the floor. "He probably doesn't even remember us."
Owen and Tosh both looked up at that. He sounded utterly miserable at the thought, but at the same time completely sure of himself.
"Jack was always bringing up things from 2000 years ago," Owen said after a pause. "He probably tells all kinds of embellished stories about us. Probably all kinky too. Bet he brags to all his friends about shagging the tea-boy."
Tosh glared at him. Ianto just shrugged again.
"They were just stories though," he said. "Never mentioned names. Details get lost in time, that's just how it works."
He finally raised his head, sitting back to stare beyond Owen's shoulder at the opposite wall. "And it's not like we have any way to contact him, anyway."
Owen stood up when Ianto started coughing again, putting an end to their cheerful conversation. He tugged the larger man off Tosh's bed and shoved him into his own room. After setting it up so he could have a glass of water right next to his bed and forcing him to sleep sitting mostly upright, he crossed back through Toshiko's room to get to his own.
She had already fallen asleep, twisted at an odd angle with her legs dangling off the side of the bed. Owen pushed her into a more comfortable position, and took the opportunity to pull up her shirt and look again at the bullet wound. It was already looking better than it had, with no sign of infection or oozing of the usual fluids.
He turned off her light and wandered back into his own quarters. He leaned on the closed door, staring at the unfamiliar room. No gorgeous view of the city, no giant TV, nothing at all that resembled his flat back home. On Earth. 2000 years ago.
He lay in bed with the lights still on, his mind filled with death and vague homesickness and Tosh and Ianto and Jack and Cardiff and space and -
He stared at the blank ceiling, wishing for sleep.
~~
The days passed in a long blur of redundancy. Ianto's chest and throat were far better after the first day, and by the end of the week, both he and Tosh were walking around like nothing had ever happened, as Ned had predicted. They had breakfast with Ned, and he explained more about the station and the museum. By the second day, they each had one of the same wrist implants he wore.
"This will grant you permission to various areas on the station, as well as access to the computers. If you need additional access, just let me know, and I can alter your permissions as needed," Ned explained. "They're really very useful, even off the station. Has a built in short range translator."
"And probably a tracking device," Tosh had muttered crossly, but she seemed content to fiddle with it all day, like a new toy.
After breakfast, they all had time on their own, which they mostly spent in Tosh's room. They spent their time talking. Owen told them about his first day on the station, though he glossed over the details of his 'examination;’ if Tosh clenched her fists any tighter, she was liable to cut her palms with her nails. In the days following, Ianto related stories that Owen and Tosh had missed, starting with the aftermath of their own deaths, and then the story of his own.
In the evenings, they met with Ned again, and endured his academic interviews as best they could. It came down to more story telling, often repeats of what they'd already told each other, though they didn't quite tell it the same way.
"I shouldn't have gone with him," Ianto confessed to Tosh and Owen in the afternoon. "He didn't even need me there, we both just got caught up in saving the world. As usual." He stared up at the ceiling, blinking back tears. "All I remember after that is telling him… and he kissed me. And then nothing."
"Then the 456 released the gas and killed everyone in the building, including me and Jack," he said calmly to Ned.
"But what did it feel like?" Ned insisted. "What was it really like?"
Ianto shrugged. "It hurt," he said, "A lot. It felt like something was squeezing my chest really hard, and I could barely breathe. It felt like I should have been able to breathe, but I couldn’t. And then my limbs stopped working. That’s about it."
Ned nodded and marked something down in his notes.
"What happened after that?" Ianto asked. "I assume Jack and Gwen figured out how to beat them."
"Oh, yes, of course," said Ned. "Though it wasn't… easy, to say the least. The records are a bit vague in these matters - they were all written a long time after the fact, you see, and their accuracy is questionable. I can give you access to them, if you like. You might as well look into these things during your free time."
He smiled apologetically at them, obviously knowing they pretty much had nothing but free time.
"Did Gwen have the baby?"
Ned nodded furiously at Tosh's question. "Oh yes, she certainly did. Lovely girl, Anwen Cooper-Williams. She's really the reason we even have these records, you know. Grew up hearing stories from her mother, insisted they be written down properly. Rather a shame she didn't do the same with her own experiences… then we might know a little more about what happened…"
"What happened with what?"
"Well, the thing is, Mr. Jones, even after your death, Torchwood didn't exactly come to an end. Oh, it went off the map for a good year, but inevitably things started up again. It's your Ms. Cooper who fixed up the whole thing, got it all started again, with off-and-on-again help from your Captain, who was mostly living offworld at that point. But it cuts off," Ned said with an excited flourish. "Not Torchwood itself, that kept going with its new staff and location, nothing strange there, but Ms. Cooper simply disappears from the records after a certain point, as does her spouse."
Owen frowned. "What do you mean 'disappears'?"
"I mean there's simply no mention of her beyond a certain point. There's no mention of death or even disappearance, no vacation or mission on record, they just stop mentioning her altogether. It's one of the great mysteries of my studies."
Owen used his wrist implant that night to look at the records himself. Gwen's records did end rather abruptly, as did Rhys', though he still remained separate from the official staff roster. He got bored with the family after that, as it was mostly just Anwen's grades from Oxford. Jack's records were spotty to begin with (well, after Ianto's death, anyway), but he seemed to have left Torchwood permanently some time within five years from Gwen's disappearance. He moved on to the much older files, from before any of them had been recruited, just reading.
He spent a lot of his nights like that, staring at the panel on his desk and reading old Torchwood records while he waited for morning. Tosh and Ianto usually stayed up as late as they could, but it always ended with Owen alone in the dark, trying not to wake them.
Besides that, his days were peppered with interruptions from Doctor Eskar Xarchac, who did not seem to keep any kind of regular schedule and demanded Owen drop everything to be studied with no warning whatsoever. He was short and entirely disagreeable, irritated by absolutely everything, Ned’s polar opposite. Owen hated him.
But it was something to do besides just sit in the rooms, so he welcomed the distraction. Xarchac rarely spoke to him, except to give terse instructions, but Owen honestly didn't care. The study was downright interesting. It wasn't just talking about things he already knew, it was a real, medical study, and he had first hand access to the experiments. Even if there wasn't much of a chance that Owen's condition could be reversed, he liked the idea of the findings being used to save lives, the way Xarchac's other research had saved Ianto and Tosh.
Toshiko also spent a lot of her days at the computer. Unlike Owen, she wasn't looking for time wasters: she researched. The computer told her all about the station, the museum, the universe she had been thrust into, 2000 years beyond everything she knew. It was a fascinating present, with interplanetary politics and alien celebrity gossip, and all kinds of technology with instructions. Nothing that came through the Rift had ever had instructions.
But her purpose was clear, even if she went off topic a little at times. Tosh was looking for a way off the station, for all three of them, permanently.
It wasn't just that Toshiko had sworn, after being freed from UNIT prison, that she would never let herself be imprisoned again. She was worried. Ianto didn't really occupy his time the way she and Owen did. He seemed to spend his time alone just sitting around, and really only humored her and Owen when they tried to get him to open up. He was obviously still thinking about Jack and the life he'd left behind on Earth, and simply didn't care about anything happening right now.
And Owen wasn't much better. He seemed alright most of the time, but he was far too quiet and even polite for her not to worry. His acceptance of being studied and even dissected was terrifying her. How could anybody just go with that, whether he could feel the pain or not?
So she kept looking, scrolling through pages and pages of information, trying to find anything useful for their escape, doing her best not to fall into the same black hole of resignation the others were in.
~~
A few weeks after their arrival, Ned led them all into an area of the station they hadn't had access to before.
"Welcome to the Adris One Science and History Museum!" he announced.
It sure looked like a museum. Unlike back in their quarters and the medical/research floor, it was full of things to look at. Brightly colored signs pointed to various displays and exhibit halls, which contained objects from all across the galaxy and time.
"It has twelve floors," Ned explained, leading them down a hallway lined with clothes in picture frames. "And multiple exhibits on every floor, plus the theater for presentations, and the cafés on the third basement, and the gift shop on the first floor by the entrance. If you go past the exit, that's where the public living areas are, and the hotel. Below all of that is docking. But you'll all have plenty of time to see that later."
He led them around a corner, to a curtain with a sign reading 'Exhibit Under Construction.' Pulling the curtain open, he waved them all inside.
"Welcome," he said excitedly, "to Torchwood."
Tosh stopped in her tracks, staring. Ianto just avoided colliding with her, but neither of them noticed, too occupied with the sudden immersion back home.
"It's the Hub," Toshiko whispered. "You've rebuilt the entire Hub in your museum."
It wasn't, exactly. The floors were still the grey-green tile of the museum, and the walls were mostly the same beige. But the main area of the Hub was replicated, all of their desks in the correct places, trinkets from 21st century and rift debris lain out atop them, and even the fountain in the back. The biggest difference was that everything had been condensed to one floor, with the Tourist Office off to the left, and the autopsy bay in the back next to Jack's office. It was all labeled, with little plaques saying who worked where and what did what. Against the walls were clear display cases showing off alien weaponry and other things that had fallen through the Rift. Just above eye level was the familiar sign, graffiti and all, reading TORCHWOOD, supplemented by a smaller plaque reading '21st Century Earth - Contact before First Contact.'
"It isn't open to the public yet," Ned continued, obviously pleased by the humans' reaction. "But we've started getting ready for the opening, and we even have your testimonials and background on the Institute available to read. I do hope you'll take part in the exhibit, we've worked very hard to make it accurate."
Ianto had already wandered off, drawn to the familiar sights. He ran his hands over his desk in amazement. "It's all here," he murmured. "How did you get all of this?"
Ned fluffed up again, all too pleased to explain. "We used the Time Gate again," he said. "Much of this isn't just a replica, it actually is the object that was in your Hub. We pulled it out just before the explosion, you see. As it would have been destroyed anyway, nobody missed it. The objects too large for the Gate we had commissions of, replicas by only the finest professionals."
"So you got it working again, then," Owen commented from the corner, all-too-pleased to see his Singularity Scalpel again, even if it was behind a case.
"Pardon?"
"When you pulled me out, you were all panicking, said there was something going wrong with the Gate."
"Oh," Ned said, though none of the humans were really listening with more than half an ear, too preoccupied with the exhibit. "Well, yes, it's quite old, you see. We don't even really know where it came from, we just got it donated. Sometimes it acts up, musses up the coordinates or starts sparking or something. Haven't quite worked out the kinks yet. It's, er, actually out of order again right now, but since the exhibit's nearly done and we don't have any others planned, it's not a big problem."
Aliens don't understand it, coordinates are unpredictable, possibly dangerous, Toshiko noted on auto, sitting down at her desk and picking up her Rubik’s Cube. Probably too dangerous for an escape, but might work in a pinch. Of course, even if we managed to get home, we're all already dead. Can't screw up the timeline.
"So what exactly do you mean by take part in the exhibit?" she asked aloud. "You don't mean you want us to sit around out here and act like we're back in the past, do you?"
"Oh, no, certainly not," Ned said. "Not unless you want to, that is. You could! That would actually be quite interesting. But no, you don't have to do anything if you don't want to, really just all your cooperation with my research has been extraordinarily helpful. If you did want to come out in the exhibit itself, you could, I don't know, talk to the patrons? Explain about what you did, answer questions. But really," he said defensively, noticing Tosh's frown at the idea of being on display, "Absolutely nothing is required of you. I just thought you might like to see what it is we've been working for, why we brought you all here in the first place. To see what has been accomplished!"
"When does the exhibit open?" asked Ianto.
"Three weeks," Ned stated.
"We'll think about it," Owen said, slinging on his lab coat. He frowned, and paused to unpin one of his badges and relocate it to the other side. "It's pretty obvious you've got some of the details wrong."
~~
Despite Ned's excitement over the opening exhibit, life didn’t really change for the three humans. It was all still long hours of doing nothing with only the occasional interruption in the form of talking to Ned. After three days, none of them could deny the appeal of getting a change of scenery.
"What happened to, 'It's so demeaning, being put on display like animals in the zoo, what a horrible thing to do?'" Owen mocked from his usual seat on Toshiko's chair.
Tosh glared at him sideways from where she lay on her bed. About five seconds ago, she had collapsed into it, bemoaning the fact that the exhibit still had 19 days to opening.
"It still is demeaning," she said. "But being out there with the public means interacting with people who don't work here; we might be able to find someone to help us escape."
Owen just leaned farther back in the chair and didn't answer.
"What do you think of the exhibit?" he asked later, watching as Eskar Xarchac examined yet more readings from his hundredth scan of Owen's non-functioning vascular system.
Xarchac snorted. "Waste of money," he said frankly. "Nerranderot gets too wrapped up in his pet projects. This little obsession of his isn't going to earn anything for the museum, it's not even going to further his research."
Right, because you don't have a problem with obsession, Owen thought, watching him review the scan from last week and compare it to the new one. He'd read Xarchac's papers by now, all studies on species with unusually long lifespans or recovery systems. The man was obviously infatuated with the idea of cheating death, maybe even immortality.
"Why are you helping fund it then?" he asked.
Xarchac glanced at him out of the corner of his eye. "Nerranderot and I always find a mutually beneficial way of working. He can study his history all he likes. I do not come away completely empty handed."
He motioned to the full body scanner. Owen sighed, something he knew Xarchac found particularly annoying due to the lack of necessity, and pulled his clothes off for the fourth time that day, shoving them in the corner and dropping his hand brace on top.
"Well, glad to know I'm still good for something, I guess."
Xarchac just snorted again and began the scan.
He wasn't the only person on the station skeptical of Ned's project. Ianto, aware that Owen and Tosh were both rather concerned about his emotional health (making mountains out of molehills, he was sure), had volunteered to help the historian work on the exhibit itself. It wasn't much, but he could stay out in the museum for a couple hours at a time, and the familiarity of the Hub made him feel a bit better. He gave suggestions on how they could better organize the exhibit, which Ned usually took to heart, even if the rest of the museum staff grumbled about it.
The other members of staff were all nonhuman, though they varied greatly in size and shape. None of them was particularly interested in talking to Ianto, which didn't really bother him. He was good at going unnoticed, and they paid him no mind during lunch break, when Ned ran off to take care of an emergency in the Headless Monk exhibit.
"This thing's gonna be a flop," one of the lizardy girls declared, biting vindictively into her sandwich. It oozed yellow all over the floor where she was sitting. "Who the hell wants to look at this crap?"
The greenish bear-crab she was talking to shrugged. "You never know. Uquiccax doesn't usually do anything bad for the museum. It's his whole life. Maybe there's an audience for this we aren't aware of."
"He is putting an awful lot of effort into advertising," pointed out the squiddy-thing, reaching an arm out of his (her?) mechanized water suit to grab a biscuit. Crumbs fell to the floor as she (he?) leaned out of the top hatch to chat. "Audio and video and print, bragging all about the real-life artifacts and first-hand testimonies and all that."
"Nothin' 'bout the Gate though," Lizardy said.
Bearcrab shuddered. "Good thing, it'd scare everyone off. That thing gives me the heebie-jeebies."
"Is it still making noises?" asked Squiddy.
"All the damn time. I swear I can hear it from my quarters. And there's that weird thumping coming from the walls in the passages. They should just unplug it and throw it in storage forever, if you ask me."
"Or dismantle it," Lizardy agreed. "Get rid of it forever."
"With our luck we'd be cursed if that happened. Sure looks like something that'd curse ya."
It was then that Ned came running back in, a Cheshire grin wide across his furry face.
"Our replica's arrived at last!" he announced. "How wonderful, this is all coming together so well!"
Two more lizardy fellows in jumpsuits grunted as they wheeled in the enormous pternodon replica. The three having lunch stared in wide eyed dismay, all too aware they would have to hoist it and hang it from the ceiling.
Ned beamed. "What do you think?" he asked excitedly.
Ianto smiled, impressed. "It's gorgeous, Ned. Great job." Never mind that it was half as big again as Myfanwy had been, nor that the replica was painted a startling green.
Ned fluffed up with pride.
~~
Lizardy and her friends were proven wrong at about ten days prior to opening. The entire museum seemed to have lost its head, all at once. A message alert bleeped out, all across the station, and all the staff stopped to glance at their wrists at the same time.
Xarchac dropped his scanner, which clattered on the floor and snapped in two. He didn't notice. He just made a strange, strangled sound.
"You all right?" Owen asked, interested. His wrist-thingy hadn't made any noise.
Xarchac started, as though he'd entirely forgotten Owen was there.
"Go…. go back to your quarters," he ordered. He began frantically gathering his equipment from the counters, suddenly in a huge hurry. "I will inform you if I need you again. Go! Hurry!"
Owen found himself shoved into the hallway, half dressed, clutching his clothes awkwardly. He turned around to shout back at Xarchac, but the doctor was already sprinting down the hall away from the laboratory.
Owen huffed and put the rest of his clothes back on before wandering back to his room.
He was met on the way by Ned, who looked quite as flustered as Xarchac had been, pulling Ianto along by the arm without looking.
"Oh!" Ned exclaimed. "Good, you're here. I mean, you're on your way back, aren't you? Would you mind, er, just…. just stay in your quarters for the time being. Something's come up, the staff has to take care of it, we'll all be terribly busy…"
"What's come up?" Owen asked, at the same time Ianto said, "Do you need any help?"
Ned floundered, bouncing from foot to foot and glancing down the hall as if he desperately wanted to be somewhere else. "Oh no, no, thank you, I'll let you know if there's anything… hrm. Yes. It's just that there's a very important guest coming to visit, we don't know why, it's all terribly exciting, we have to get everything ready for him. You understand, don't you? It's a rather important time for us, it's really quite amazing he's coming."
Ned took off down the hall, still muttering to himself.
Owen and Ianto looked at each other, confused. The rest of the staff was in a similar state of excited panic, passing through the halls at high speed and chatting breathlessly at one another.
Tosh was leaning out her door, watching them go by.
"What's going on?" she asked as the other two arrived.
"No idea," Owen said. "Some big shot’s visiting or something. Got everyone all freaked out."
"Maybe it's the police," Tosh murmured, letting them in and shutting her door to cut off the noise.
"Except it isn't illegal for them to keep us here," Ianto pointed out. It was one of the first things Tosh had looked up; having been legally deceased for longer than the allotted time limit, they were property, not people, resurrection notwithstanding.
"Doesn't mean they haven't done something else illegal," Owen pointed out. "I bet ol' Xarchac's gotten in trouble for something before, morals aren't exactly high on his priorities."
"Did you hear who it was?" Tosh asked, all ready at her panel to look up names. "If it's really someone famous, they'll probably be easy to find."
"Don't remember anything," Owen said, and Ianto shrugged his agreement.
Toshiko sighed and moved to open the door. "I'll just ask someone outside, then."
She raised her wrist to the scanner and waited. Her wrist flashed red, and the door remained firmly shut. She frowned, and hit the manual open.
"They've locked us in!" she said in disbelief. "I can't believe this."
"They must really want us out of the way," Ianto said, and settled back on Tosh's bed.
Owen flopped into his usual seat as well. He raised an eyebrow at Tosh, who was still fiddling madly with the door controls. "Forget it, Tosh. Ned'll let us out when this is over. We might as well just kill time."
Ianto tugged something out of his waistcoat pocket and tossed it to Owen.
"Playing cards?"
"Nicked them from the exhibit," Ianto explained. "Jack's desk."
Tosh leaned her head against the door, fighting back frustrated tears. How could the boys take all this kind of shit so calmly?
With one last angry bang on the door, she turned and stalked back to her place in the corner of the bed. Owen dealt her in.
They played for what must have been hours, every game they could think of until they were horribly bored again. It had deteriorated to the three of them sticking cards to their foreheads (though Owen had some difficulty with that, due to his lack of sweat) and Ianto trying to do magic tricks he hadn't practiced since high school, when the door chimed.
They all looked up, and Ned appeared in the doorway, looking frantic.
"Oh good!" he said, breathlessly. "You're all in here! I checked the other room first and it was empty and I didn't know what - " he coughed, as he tended to do on the rare occasions he noticed he was rambling.
"Anyway, um," he continued. "Would you all mind coming with me? The… the Face wants to meet you."
~~
They were ushered into a sort of observation area, filled with windows that looked down on a large, empty room, that in turn had a window that filled the entire wall, looking out into the stars. Ned scurried downstairs with just a quick explanation, leaving the three of them with some museum staff and Eskar Xarchac.
All of them were staring with one mind down at the room.
"Who's the Face?" Ianto whispered, as they took up an area in the corner.
"The Face of Boe," Tosh elaborated, staring down into the large room below them. "I've read about him, he's some sort of celebrity. Very ancient, very mysterious. Always in the front of celebrity gossip."
"Why, what does he do?" Owen asked, peering over her shoulder. "Which one is he?"
She pointed. "He does a bit of everything, I think. I've come across the name in politics and economics and even entertainment. Supposedly he can also predict the future with amazing accuracy. Nobody knows where he came from, there's no knowledge of any other Boes except his own descendants."
"It's a giant head in a jar," Owen said, staring down.
"Yes, Owen, he's a giant head in a jar."
"The jar is supplemental," Xarchac said suddenly. He had one claw pressed to the window tensely. "They say it keeps him alive, but it's all just show. He's lived longer than anything known in the universe, it's like he's always existed. There's no way he needs that technology to live, he just uses it."
Owen had a feeling he knew why Xarchac was up here instead of down there with Ned, talking to the Face.
"He can't touch him," he muttered as quietly as he could. "He's obsessed with studying everlasting life, and he's got a perfect specimen down there, and he can't do anything to such a public figure."
Down below, Ned nodded frantically at something the Face said, and waved up towards the observation room. The three of them shrunk back as the giant eyes turned to look at them. The Face said something else that made Ned frown, but he nodded reluctantly. He and the rest of the museum staff attending turned and left the room, nodding or bowing politely as they went, until the Face was left alone with his cat-faced attendant.
Ned was back up the stairs within a minute. He gestured to the humans, panting, and they followed him out.
"That down there is the Face of Boe," he explained tersely. "He's an extremely important figure, just his being here will bring all sorts of attention to the museum. He came for my exhibit!"
His fur fluffed up again before he made a conscious effort to flatten it. "He heard about my 21st Century Earth exhibit, and he made a special trip just to see it."
"But it isn't open yet," Ianto pointed out.
"When the Face of Boe wants to see your unfinished exhibit, you show it to him," Ned replied. "We closed down the whole museum to the public, just so he can have a look in peace. And he asked to see you," he said. "I have no idea how he even knew, your names are nowhere to be found on the available materials, but then, he is the Face of Boe, he's famed for knowing absolutely everything, past and future."
He led them into a large entryway, shutting the door behind him. The doors on the other side were enormous, obviously leading into the big windowed room they'd been looking down on.
"What kind of place is this?" Tosh asked, putting out of her mind for the moment that she'd apparently been asked for by name by a big giant head.
"It's the grand ballroom," Ned said, flustered. "It's used for conferences and important guests and sometimes weddings."
"People get married here?"
Ned flapped his hands impatiently. "Is that really important right now? Listen, the Face asked to speak to each of you, in private. One at a time. I've actually closed all the observation windows for him. It doesn't matter what order you go in, but… please, be very respectful and polite when talking to him, this is a very important man, we have to maintain a good impression."
The Torchwood crew looked at each other. It was bad enough having to go talk to a giant alien head, but now they had to go alone.
Tosh bit her lip, unwilling to speak up. Ianto looked from her to Owen; much as he liked to show up the older man, he wasn't really a take-the-lead kind of person, and he was rather hoping one of the others would take that position. Owen glanced at the two of them.
I'd be sweating like a pig right now if I could, he thought. No sweat, no adrenaline, no hormones. It's like I'm not nervous at all.
He took a deep breath out of habit, wishing it actually accomplished something. "Right then," he said. "Guess I'll go first."
~~
The giant door creaked open, and Owen stepped through tentatively. He felt very small, standing in front of a giant door in a giant room with giant window, about to go talk to a giant head about… god knows. 21st Century Earth. First Contact before First Contact. Same old stuff he'd been talking about for weeks now. Right. No problem.
The door shut behind him, and Owen flinched at the sound. The cat-person standing next to the Face looked up at him and smiled gently. He stepped back politely as the giant head rolled upwards in its jar to stare at him.
"Doctor Owen Harper," the Face said, smiling. "It's nice to see you."
"…Charmed," Owen said, and he was unable to stop staring. Come on, this is nothing, he told himself. So he knows my name, so he's a giant fucking head in a jar, who cares, you've seen weirder, no big deal.
"Is something wrong?"
Owen flinched. The voice… it wasn't exactly sound, it was almost as if the Face was talking directly into his mind. Which was dumb, he could hear it in his ears, but then he didn't really see the mouth move, did he? But not all aliens had to talk with their mouths, he supposed, Oh god I've lost it, I can't think, it's a giant fucking head in a jar.
"Yeah, sorry," Owen forced out. Be polite be polite be polite. Fuck. "It's just that you're a giant fucking head in a jar, it's a bit distracting." Fuck!
The Face stared at him for a moment. Then he chuckled. The sound reverberated through Owen's head like someone had smacked a gong inside it. Owen couldn't help it. He laughed too.
"I was wondering when you would say it out loud," said the Face, still smiling and obviously not offended in the least. "Your thoughts were practically screaming at me."
Oh fuck, he's psychic too?
"Only a bit," the Face answered. "It's easy when you're directing thoughts right at me. I try not to pry."
"Sure," Owen said. "Giant fucking head in a jar, psychic powers. Not a big stretch there. And they say you can see the future, too."
The Face made a motion somewhat like a nod. "They say that," he agreed. "Please, Owen, speak freely. I will not take offense. There is no need for you to be uncomfortable."
Owen smirked back. "Yeah, thanks for that. Ned had us all freaked out in the back, there."
The Face just kept smiling, and seemed content to gaze at Owen from his jar. Owen fidgeted uncomfortably.
"Look," he said. "Ned said you wanted to talk to us, that you asked for us. What… what exactly did you want?"
"I did not ask to talk," the Face said. "In fact, I asked to see the three of you, that is all. If you wish to talk, by all means, go ahead. I shall answer."
Owen frowned, a bit disconcerted by the fact that he'd evidently been called in to be looked at. He grasped for something to say.
"Tosh read about you, online, or whatever it is you call it here in the future. Said you're as old as anything in the universe and can predict the future."
The Face peered at him. "I am very old," he agreed, "Old enough to have seen many events in the universe, sometimes more than once. I have never claimed to know everything, but through experience, I have learned a lot. As for the future, I do know some. Time is not linear, Owen Harper, and what one person considers the future is another's past."
Owen frowned. He knew that sort of thing from Torchwood, it was in the archives and was one of the first things Jack had explained to him about working there, rule 1, don't mess up the timelines.
"Why do you ask?" the Face said, curiously. "Just making conversation? Or would you like to know the future for yourself?"
"I've been getting a bit too much of the future as it is, if you know what I mean," Owen said, glancing out the window at the stars. The docking bay was visible from here, and he watched as a ship landed in the asteroid.
"But this is only one future," the Face said. "It's the universe, it's the museum. It isn't necessarily your personal future."
Owen looked back over at him. "What, you know my personal future? Even if you've seen everything in the universe twice, why would you know about me?"
"I know many things," the Face answered calmly. "You may ask me any one question about your future, if you like. If I am able to answer, I will do so to the best of my knowledge."
Owen raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Oh yeah? Great and powerful oracle, you're going to tell my future?"
"What is your question?"
Owen meant to say something scathing, something about how you shouldn't know your own future anyway or that all fortunetellers were full of crap, but his mouth opened before he could think.
"Will I ever be fixed?"
The Face looked at him curiously, waiting for elaboration.
Owen hesitated. That wasn't what he had meant to say at all, but… "Fuck it, you know what I mean," he said, stepping back and raising his arms. "My heart doesn't beat, my lungs don't take in air, I don't bleed, I don't breathe, I can't feel! You tell me to ask a question, well that's it. One way or the other, I don't care. Am I going to be stuck like this, between dead and alive, for…. forever, I guess?"
The Face stared at him, long and hard. Owen stared back, challenging him.
"Everything comes to an end," the Face said finally, and Owen's heart sank. "Nothing lasts forever, death finds everybody in the end. Even I shall die some day. And for you too, death will come, eventually. There will be a day when you die, permanently."
Owen stared at him, feeling sort blank and empty.
"But before that day," the Face of Boe continued, "Before you die, Owen Harper, I can promise you, you will breathe, and you will live again."
~~
Owen stumbled back into the waiting room and leaned against the door to shut it. He shut his eyes and faced the ceiling for a long moment.
"Well, what happened?" Ianto said.
"Are you all right?" Tosh asked, walking up and grabbing his hand.
Owen looked down at her with a strange look on his face. Then he grinned. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, I'm fine. Nice guy, Face of Boe. Easy to talk to."
"But what did he say?" Ned asked, twiddling his fingers nervously. "What did he want to see you for?"
"Oh, this and that," Owen said. "Hard to explain. Anyway, one of you should go soon, shouldn't keep him waiting."
Tosh frowned, unwilling to leave Owen after such a strange reaction. She looked over at Ianto and jerked her head towards the door. He nodded nervously, and stepped forward to go through.
"Any advice?" he asked.
Owen stepped back, led by Tosh, to let him through the door. "Not really. Be yourself. Say what you want to, he doesn't give a shit about being polite, whatever Ned said."
Ned made a noise as if to protest, but Owen continued.
"Oh, and pick a good question."
"Question?"
"Yeah, he said I could ask a question about the future or whatever. You guys get one too. Make it good."
Ned made a strangled sound as Ianto passed through the doors.
"He prophesied for you?' he gasped. "The Face of Boe never says anything about the future to anybody!"
Owen shrugged. "Yeah, well, he offered. I asked."
"What did he tell you?!"
Owen smirked and leaned against the wall with Tosh. "None of your business. Nothing important for you anyway. He makes it all very personal."
~~
Ianto straightened his suit self consciously as he stepped through the gigantic doors. They closed behind him with a noise a bit louder than he should have liked.
The Face looked up at him as he walked up to the jar. He smiled, and the effect on the enormous, gray, wrinkled face was astounding. Ianto felt like some great weight was lifted from him, relieving him.
"Ianto Jones," said the Face of Boe, "You are beautiful."
Ianto stopped and blinked at him, not knowing what to say. What did you say when a giant betentecled head in a jar called you beautiful? Was he being hit on? It didn't really feel like it, it was more like… he wasn't sure. But the Face was staring at him, admiring him like a work of art, and it didn't really make Ianto feel uncomfortable so much as confused.
"Thank you," he eventually settled on. Then he added, "Sir," because if he's one of the most important people in the galaxy and can bring a whole space station to a grinding halt just because he wants to look at something, he probably deserves to be called Sir.
The Face kept gazing at him, a soft smile on his enormous lips. "It's wonderful to see you," he said.
"Thank you," Ianto said again. "It's very nice to meet you, too, Sir." He resisted the urge to fiddle with his tie again. Maybe it was okay for Owen to be rude, but Ianto was more or less against giving a bad impression to anybody if he could avoid it.
"Have you got a question for me?" the Face asked.
"Pardon, Sir?"
"I'm certain Owen must have told you," he said. "If you like, you can ask a question, any question, about the past or present or future, and if I am able to answer it, I will."
Ianto tugged on his sleeve. "Yes, he did mention that," he said. "I didn't have much time to think about it though."
"You may think now," said the Face, and he seemed content to lapse into silence, simply admiring Ianto from afar.
Ianto thought about it. The truth was, he had an awful lot of questions, all over the map. He wished Owen had told them what he had asked, just so he could have some idea of where to start. All he could think was that he should ask something for all of them, something that the others wanted to know as well, something that could be useful to them. Ask about escape, maybe, for Tosh. He thought of asking whatever became of Gwen - that would settle his and Owen's and Tosh's and even Ned's concerns on the topic, solve the mystery, finish the story of the woman who'd become his closest friend.
But instead he was selfish. He always was, in the end.
"Was I remembered?" he asked. "After I died, I mean."
The Face peered at him for a moment, considering the question. "You were," he said, "Remembered. For years beyond your death, you were remembered."
"Your funeral was very small, but the people who attended loved you. Your sister and her family, in particular. Her children grew up knowing you as a hero, and she thought of you many, many times throughout her life. Gwen Cooper also attended, and made sure everything was taken care of, out of care for you. She kept some of your possessions, a constant reminder, and her daughter, who grew up with Torchwood, took you as a role model, from her mother's stories. You were remembered through the years, as the Institute was rebuilt and grown, until its eventual dissolution and reform when Earth finally reached out to the stars."
Ianto choked, filled with all kinds of mixed up feelings. He wished now he had asked about Gwen, and he suddenly and violently missed her, and Rhi and the kids and…. But he wished he'd been more specific. This was all good to hear, but it wasn't what he was really asking.
The Face stared at him, waiting for Ianto to compose himself before continuing.
"You were mourned, Ianto Jones. For a long time. In the year following your death, Jack Harkness wandered the Earth, searching for some way to say good-bye to you properly. He wanted nothing more than to tell you what he hadn't been able to say back, that he loved you."
Ianto stared up at the Face of Boe in shock, doing his best to control his breathing.
"In time, he recovered. He found other outlets, other friends, other lovers, eventually. But he always remembered you fondly, throughout the long years, after his closest friends and lovers passed through his life. You were never, ever, forgotten."
~~
Toshiko shut the door behind her with a snap, unphased by the sound.
Ianto had come back into the entryway, smiling brighter than she'd seen in a long time and with tears all over his face. He grabbed her shoulder as they passed, flashing her a reassuring smile before he sank against the wall and sat on the ground next to Owen, his head in his arms.
She didn't wait for him to say anything. She just walked through the door. She knew more or less what to expect, she thought, and she was ready with her question, and she wasn't going to let him get to her.
The Face of Boe smiled as she approached. "Toshiko Sato," he welcomed. "The brilliant Toshiko Sato."
Tosh crossed her arms in front of her, unimpressed. She wondered what he had said to the others, to make them trust him. They had both become too trusting nowadays, too easily won by flattery. Tosh was all too aware that the people here were captors, not friends, and she wasn't going to fall for the Face until she was certain of him.
The Face chuckled at her. "You can trust me, Toshiko Sato, but I won't be offended if you choose not to."
"Owen told me you were psychic," she informed him, determined not to appear startled.
"Of course he did. And I know you want to get this all over with."
"You're the one who called us here," she said. "Why are you so concerned with seeing us, if you don't have anything to say?"
"Is that your question?"
"No."
The Face smiled at her. "Then I am not obliged to answer. My motivations are not important. Just know that I am very glad to see you, even if you do not understand why, and that I am here to help you."
"Then tell me how we're going to get out of here."
The Face sighed, sending bubbles floating to the top of his jar. "That is a difficult question, Toshiko."
"You said we could ask anything," she said quietly. "You said you would tell us the future."
"I said that I would answer your questions as best as I could. I cannot tell you what I do not know."
Tosh faltered, her arms falling to her side in hopelessness. "Wh - what do you mean you don't know?"
"I do not know how you will escape from this place," he repeated. "Not exactly. The variables are too many, strange and convoluted. All I can tell you is that you are brilliant."
Tosh felt like she was going to break down. "Flattery isn't exactly going to help," she said.
The Face of Boe looked up at her and smiled. "No, Toshiko Sato, I am not flattering you. You are a woman from the 21st Century on a little planet in the middle of nowhere, and yet you've spent your life using technology from distant worlds and different times. You are brilliant, you can use, repair, and even create devices far beyond what should be within your scope of abilities. You have bent time and saved the world, because your mind is amazing."
"And it is that, Toshiko Sato, that will be your key from this prison. When the other variables are in place, you are the one who will make everything work, and it is your perseverance and brilliance that will lead you and your friends to freedom."
Tosh stared at him, tears gathered in her eyes. She wiped them away with the back of her hand.
"You bastard," she said. "You did that on purpose."
Part Three
Master Post