torchwoodinstitute | Welcome to the Hub

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Welcome to the Hub

Who: Gabriel and Mohinder with appearances by Jack Harkness and JC.
When: July 20, after this thread of doom.
What: Mohinder and Gabriel accept Jack's invitation and join Torchwood.

Mohinder might as well have had his hands and nose pressed to the ass as the SUV descended on the platform from the plaza above. The Hub was darker and less clinical than he had imagined from the way Jack had spoken briefly about Torchwood Institute. The walls were either brick of off white ceramic subway tiles, shaped like a massive tube around a central core. Walkways and stairs connected levels above and below them and rooms seemed to jut off from the main area like the spokes of a wheel.

No wonder Jack called it a Hub.

Wide eyed and half confused, when the car stopped moving, Mohinder jumped out of it to examine the winch system and try to find the opening they had slowly dropped through, though that had disappeared. He gripped the yellow industrial lift control box, which looked like something out of a warehouse or a mine, and frowned at the buttons.

"I was expecting something more... Futuristic, I suppose," Mohinder muttered to himself and set out around the catwalk, trying to look both up and down at the same time.

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"Oh these? Silly, these are Gallifreyan books! Of course they're on time travel. Time Lords write all about time travel! They just love it. They named themselves after it didn't they?"

Time Lords? Mohinder wasn't sure if that was a species of people, a race, or just some sort of high school band. One couldn't tell these things so easy, not when dealing with other life forms, other cultures. Mohinder didn't want to be too rude. "Shanti, we have never heard about Time Lords," Mohinder informed the bear, who first scoffed and then extended a wriggling pink arm towards a book that she (it?) wanted him to take.

"Time Lords control time and space. There use to be many. Now there's just one. See? Read this to me, Gabriel!"

Somehow, Gabriel figured Shanti wasn't including the guy who ran him through with a sword when talking about Time Lords. Whoever this group was, they were very focused. And their language was beautiful.

He picked up the book that Shanti indicated and she reached for the cover, opening it up. "I'm sorry, Shanti," he said, patting the bear on the head. "I can't read Gallifreyan yet. Can you read it to me?"

If there was only one Time Lord left, he wondered if anyone else could read it. Or maybe it ends up being a common language in the future, where more people can time travel. They really knew so little about this, it was making Gabriel more intent than ever on finding out as much as he could.

"I'm not a Time Lord! I'm not a bear that studies other languages either. Do you know what those people are called, Gabriel?"

"A linguist," Mohinder said, answering. So it was an educational toy too? Shanti gripped the book in Gabriel's hand with both stuffed paws and threw it at Mohinder. It fell just short of him.

"Your name isn't Gabriel and I was asking Gabriel!" the toy insisted, making Mohinder blink.

"My apologies," he remarked, not sure if he should laugh or not. He did bend to pick the book up and hand it back to Gabriel.

Shanti at least seemed ready and willing to accept that apology. She even giggled as if to say it was no hard feelings. "Try to read this Gabriel! I know you can do it! You can understand anything!"

Gabriel's eyebrows rose when Shanti threw the book. He took it back, and then Shanti was praising him. It was as if someone had transplanted his mother's personality into a pink stuffed bear. This was fascinating.

"All right, I'll try it, Shanti. But I'm not a Time Lord, either. And I've never seen it before. So it might take me awhile to learn. But if I do learn it, I'll read some of this to you, okay?"

He patted the top of her head, scritching behind the plush ears, and she nodded. "Okay," she said. "But read me the whole thing!"

"We'll see," Gabriel said warmly. He was going to get to the books, but not immediately. He wanted to test something. "And I have something to ask you, Shanti, before I try to read. Can I ask you to do something for me?"

"Yes!" said the bear, who turned her face from the book to him. "I'll do it if I can. What is it?"

Gabriel smiled, glad to have her attention. "I want you to promise me that you won't hurt Mohinder in the future. You are my friend and so is he, and friends shouldn't fight or be mean to each other. We can all play together, can't we?" This sounded rather hypocritical coming from him, but that's why he was asking it, honestly.

The tiny toy bear huffed and puffed far too cutely for words. "I have to protect you, Gabriel!" she pouted (or at least made a pouty sound since her face wasn't made to be expressive. "But I will do my best. No more throwing."

So promised the squishy pink toy. Evidently, she bonded with the person that pulled her tab. Her little disparaging remark of Gabriel's name might shed light on that when the two would think back on it later.

"Oh! Gabriel! Take all the books! But not that one. That one is about cheese I think. Boring!"

"Thank you," Gabriel said, a pleased little smile on his face. He could see why this bear was in the Archives, that it might become dangerous given enough incentive. He wondered if it was mass manufactured, and if so, just how poorly that went. Or perhaps she was a prototype that was a little too smart for her own good.

Shanti singled out one book to not take, and he chuckled. "How do you know it's about cheese? You're right, though, cheese is boring." He raised his hand palm up, and all the books except for that one rose in the air. Having settled them there for the moment, he let his hand fall. "We'll see if we're allowed to cart them around. If not, I'll just have to read them here."

Shanti yawned over the end of that sentence- or at least, it sounded like she was yawning. "Tired?" Gabriel asked.

"Yes, I am," Shanti replied. "I need a nap. Gabriel, you'll wake me again, won't you?"

Gabriel leaned his head on the bear, the best way he could think of to give it a hug while already holding it. "I will," he promised. "Sleep well, Shanti."

He watched as the bear closed its eyes. "Doesn't last long, does she?" he asked, looking up to Mohinder.

"Probably lucky for the parents of the child," Mohinder said, taking the bear from Gabriel. He wasn't going to pull the string again, he just wanted to look her over, closely. There was nothing mechanical about her. She was soft through and through. Mohinder found that pretty amazing, really, and tucked her under an arm. "Imagine if your son or daughter was through playing with her and the bear was still off running around at all hours of the day and night!"

Mohinder plucked the supposed book about cheese off of the shelf because at least it clued them in that some part of the design on the spine had to do with cheese and it might help Gabriel learn to translate the rest.

He was about to say something else when JC popped up out of no where. In the darkness, he almost seemed to shine...or reflect the light from the nearest fixture. It was very odd.

Mohinder blinked but still smiled. "I see you've found the time travel section," JC said. "The Captain will be back in seven minutes or so. We probably ought to leave."

"All right," Gabriel replied, with a smile. He'd figured JC might suddenly appear again, and that was how it went. It seemed to be how the man traveled. He hadn't expected JC to shine in the darkness, but maybe he should've. "Thank you for showing us this place."

He floated the books on top of each other, into a stack, and then floated them over to carry them properly. "Can anyone here read these? The bear said this was Gallifreyan. I was going to try and decipher them, but if someone knows the language, then I can-" Don't say 'pick their brains', his mind warned him at the last moment. "-pester them about it."

He started walking back the way they came with his stack of books, figuring JC would tell them if they weren't allowed to take them out. He wasn't planning on leaving the Hub with them, anyway.

JC wasn't in the business of telling anyone what to do...which sort of was his whole problem. All the more reason to work with Torchwood. His job was done otherwise. And it was all very complicated. He didn't quite think about it much any more.

"I can not read them. You can ask the Captain. I do not believe we are in possession of a universal translator. Pity, those are quite useful." Mohinder reached up to grab some of the books from Gabriel's stack but his back thought better of it and he winced in apology. It wasn't as if his boyfriend wasn't capable. "But even if I could, the concepts might be a little too much for me anyway and that would make translation difficult. Right and then a left, there you are."

Gabriel would not have let Mohinder take any more books, anyway. Besides, he was cheating with the telekinesis, just a little bit.

It didn't take them long to get back to the entrance of the Archive, and they walked back to the Hub proper. "I saw a number of desks around here- is there one that no one's using?" he asked JC. "I'd like to look through these until Jack gets back."

It was less difficult to treat JC normally than he'd expected. But that was probably just due to compartmentalization. He'd let himself think about all that later. For now, he was happy to leave it. They had enough to think about right now. Like- should he have mentioned more to Jack about Peter's predicament? He hoped that was going okay.

JC was accomodating and though it took them four minutes to clear the Archive and he was rather certain the Captain would be waiting for them by the time Gabriel cracked his first book, JC offered him the use of one of the research rooms and left him alone with Mohinder and their toy.

As he knew already, Jack had returned to the Hub, looking a little worse for wear. He'd gotten into it with Peter, who had lost his temper, pulled a little Sylar trick on him, and then blinked out of Cardiff. Jack hadn't seen that coming but something like that always happened to Peter.

He was a sponge, as Mohinder had once called him, and therefore unstable when he absorbed too much. There was little he could do for his nephew. He spoke briefly with JC before he went to see how the other two were fairing.

He was surprised that they had already cracked to the Gallifreyan.

A research room was even better. Gabriel had thanked JC for the help, had the books open, and was trying to find patterns between the different symbols before they'd even been there five minutes. He was fairly certain that each circle was its own word, and the symbols inside of it represented sounds or letters. Of course, this was somewhat wishful thinking- each circle with each set of symbols could have its own meaning entirely, and one just had to memorize it. But who would do that with clockwork, really? It was all about parts fitting into one whole mechanism that worked together with precision.

He pointed most of this out to Mohinder, speaking most of his thoughts on the matter immediately. He was so engrossed in it that he didn't hear Jack's approach, and continued to babble on with his boyfriend in a manner he never would with anyone else. "So I'm looking for a number system, because it will help us move on from there and I'd bet that numbers are going to be heavily used in most of these books. It might be the notches here, these parts that jut outside the circles? ...that has to be part of it, at least. Eugh, I'm not sure. I need to find more examples."

Mohinder noticed him first, his bruised-purple face still somehow lovely despite the cuts and lumps he suffered. Jack smiled at him, but it was not Mohinder he was interested in. Mohinder was linked now inextricably with Gabriel, and Gabriel was the true gem here. Jack was not and would never say such a thing, he wasn't an idiot.

"How do you like the place?" No, Gabriel, carry on with your reading. Gallifreyan was a dead language, or nearly dead with only one Time Lord left sailing around the universe being utterly selfish in his old age. If anyone could figure out the texts, Gabriel could. "It's not much, I know. It works, though. What have you seen so I don't duplicate it on the tour?"

Jack pulled up a chair and drew up across from the pair.

When Gabriel looked up, the relaxed, pleased expression on his face dropped to one of concern. Jack's state of appearance meant that something had gone wrong with Peter. "What happened?" he asked. Then he added a question, even though he had a strong feeling about the answer. "Where's Peter? I should've stayed with you, I told him I'd help him..."

The texts are forgotten for the moment.

It was a good thing his head had gone back together. And a better thing that Jack had nothing Peter could have anyway. The Captain sighed a bit sadly. "He needs to learn to control himself. And he should be headed there." Lie? Partial lie? Could Jack even know that?

It was difficult to know, really, but he'd not steered them wrong yet, right?

Mohinder did look concerned. "Gabriel's successfully overcome it. Peter likely needs his brother--"

But Jack interrupted him. "He does. But Gabriel has only just become his brother. He needs the one he's known his whole life. Nathan makes very difficult decisions sometimes and I keep hoping that one day, they won't be so selfish."

Gabriel frowned, thinking. Jack was very good at being vague. And he wasn't entirely sure about Mohinder's assessment, either, that he'd 'successfully overcome it.' It wasn't like any of these urges had gone away, and it was still a despairingly short time since he'd last cut someone's head open. But at the very least, he had more experience than Peter did in dealing with it.

"Maybe I should try to get in touch with Nathan. I know Peter's close with him, but that might not keep him safe..." And Peter would hate himself if he hurt Nathan.

But he'd probably have to contact Angela to find out how to reach Nathan. By the time he got ahold of Nathan, Peter would probably be long gone. Besides, he wasn't exactly raring to talk to Angela right now. He rubbed at his face with a sigh. "Do you think he'll come back here?"

"I don't know," Jack said, which was a lot better than the I hope he doesn't reply he wanted to give Gabriel. "I know you're feeling a familial tie to the Petrellis, and I won't stop you if you feel the need to help them, but I need you here too."

And he glanced at Mohinder, who had been more or less ignored despite his little outbursts of encouragement. "Both of you."

"It might seem counter productive to think this way, but we really don't have all the time in the world to fix the things that come up. Pocket dimensions make it necessary for us to move when they are formed."

Mohinder blinked. "Pocket dimensions?"

"Difficult to explain the science behind, easy to explain the necessity to act quickly. They have the ability to overwrite the current timeline.We can't let that happen."

The way Jack put that was somewhat strange. 'feeling a familial tie'. That, combined with the fact that Jack was purposefully being vague, just reminded Gabriel that he and Mohinder had been wandering around in the dark for far too long. If people were keeping information from him, then they couldn't be too mad if he got it through other means, right? He took note of what Jack was wearing- if he got a chance later, maybe he could use clairsentience to find out what had really happened with Peter.

For now, though, there wasn't much to be done. He'd let Peter try to work it out, and if he couldn't, Gabriel would hear about it somehow- either through the news or from Peter himself. Jack was right, the whole family barely knew him as anything other than a monster. His presence probably wouldn't be wanted.

Jack's insistance that he their help took some of the sting out of that realization. It also didn't hurt that he launched immediately into talking about pocket dimensions, which took Gabriel's focus immediately. "So how do these pocket dimensions pop up? Are they like alternate timelines? Different ways a future could've gone?"

Edited 2015-07-26 16:52 (UTC)

Dealing with Gabriel was a specialized sort of operation and Jack had had practice. Mohinder didn't notice anything odd going on between the two and instead leaned gingerly on the table as he looked up at Jack with bright, if bruised eyes.

"The rift causes them," Jack launched into explanation immediately. "It's a phenomena that happens extremely rarely in the universe but these rifts, even with regulators built on top of them, just so happen to cause time and dimension distortions. They start small but the sensors don't always catch them. That's where we come in."

"We? How many agents are there?" Mohinder asked.

Jack grinned. "Difficult to say. Presently? Fifteen. I'm hoping for sixteen in a day or two. But to answer your question, Gabriel-- It's not like what I was telling you before...with the facets of time and every conceivable direction of a future being part of the same jewel. Rift pocket dimensions can change things radically. They could snuff you out of existence. Add ten more of you... Do you see what I'm saying? These will change the world in ways they should never have been and only those of us affected by rift energy will know it's changed."

Edited 2015-07-26 16:56 (UTC)

"The really strange stuff, in other words," Gabriel said, nodding. That made sense, even if it was completely different from his guess. "I see. So these pocket dimensions are caused by the rift, and need immediate attention- at least, as soon as they're noticed." He figured there must be nothing major going on right now, since Jack seemed to be in the process of recruiting.

Speaking of- "I am glad to hear we won't be the only newbies," Gabriel added, with a slight smile. "The only one other agent we've met so far is JC." That did remind him. "He's a very interesting fellow. Almost familiar, even." He rose an eyebrow at Jack, as if to say 'did you really pull Jesus out of his dimension?' The amused smile still on his face gave away that he was more impressed than anything else. "He showed us the Archives and we were kinda distracted in there-" He tapped the book directly in front of him, because right now there were a number of possible distractions. "So we haven't seen much other than that and the central area, where we came in."

"Does he? I didn't think his counterpart was still around in this dimension anymore. Let's hope I got that right!" Jack said, laughing it all away. It wasn't a lie but he loved and protected the people that worked with him. Even the dicks. JC had been hurt enough. He didn't want the man to be outed unless he did it himself.

Jack turned one of the books around to gaze at the language.

"The Doctor and I use to be close. Change your face, change your friends," he said to himself before he smiled. "Well most of your fellow agents are closing a pocket as we speak so I'm sure you'll meet them soon enough. In the mean time, how about we figure out where you want to live. We have a few vacant flats open. Are you city folk or water folk?"

Jack's sidestepping of the whole JC issue was actually oddly relieving. He didn't even lie. Gabriel smiled. "That's what I thought, too," he said quietly, with a nod of acknowledgment. Gabriel wasn't used to leaving things alone, but he wouldn't press Jack for details when he could talk to JC himself. And if the guy was intent to keep his identity quiet, well...Gabriel would have to think on whether to even bring it up.

The books clearly held some sort of importance for Jack. Oh, and the agents were busy. He was very curious to meet these other people. He doubted he'd work too closely with most of them- it was just how things went in any sort of office environment and was certainly true of Primatech. But it would be interesting to find out what sort of people they were.

Oh, and now they were on to more fun things. Like living someplace that almost certainly didn't have cameras situated all over it. He looked at Mohinder and shrugged. "Chennai and New York- I'd say we're both city folk. Unless you wanted something calmer to come home to?" He was pleased as punch about having choices, but he wanted Mohinder to have the final say here.

A choice? Honestly, he had no idea what to choose. "Can we see the options...?"

It made Jack laugh and he dug into his RAF coat, one Gabriel might eventually find hanging on an old fashioned coatrack by the door of his office, until he came up with three keys. "High rise, beautiful city views. Second floor walk up. Cozy and close to good dining. And.." Yes. He hesitated. "A one bedroom by the sea, close to the underground but with a nice garden."

He handed the keys specifically to Mohinder.

"The addresses are on the fobs."

"Thank you," Gabriel replied sincerely, smiling down at the keys. He'd noticed the hesitation and wondered, a little, about that. And he wondered whether either of these apartments had been recently vacated.

Well, he appreciated it, regardless. It had been a long time since he'd looked at moving in anywhere. It was nice to have the opportunity to be excited. "Can we go take a look now?" He was sure there was plenty more to go over, and he'd be fine if Jack had more pressing issues to talk about. But the idea of going home someplace was extremely satisfying.

"We can talk about salary and do the paperwork tomorrow," Nack said with a grin. Yes. Paperwork. He ran a reputable company!

With permission to do as they liked, Mohinder pocketed the keys and offered his hand to Gabriel. "Then shall we?" Mohinder was as excited to explore their new city as he was to explore the Hub and their new employment. He wanted to know and see everything and he wanted to do it with Gabriel.

"Oh and books stay here. Torchwood material stays in the Hub but you can look at it whenever you want... And that goes for the bear, Mohinder."

That made the Indian blink. He hadn't even realised that he was still cuddling it!

Thank you for being patient anyhow!!

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