1.

"Who are you?"

The man on the other side of the glass watches her with a peculiar sort of intensity that she finds endearing in its way. It's been a lifetime since anyone has looked at her that way, like she holds the secrets of the ages caught up in her eyes.

Once up on a time in another lifetime she actually did but the Lady President is gone now and she's all that's left.

Pity for him, that Romana died falling through time and lost with her world, her face, and her name. She is an orphan now, unrecognizable even to herself and the secrets locked in her breast are of no interest to them.

"You already know that, Captain," she remarks placidly.

He turns away with a curse and the vehement frustration so typical of his species. Such a peculiar little race. "I know who you pretend to be but the real Lauren Reed wasn't born with a dual cardio-pulimonary system." He turns back to press a hand against the glass, leaning in to lock eyes with her imparting, "Human beings don't have two hearts," as though revealing a great and meaningful truth.

"But if one were to judge by the amount of unhealthy foods which you consume, one would assume you had a dozen." She plucks a stray insect from her pants leg and sets it on the floor. "By your behavior, however, one would assume you'd none at all."

He has no answer to that.

2.

When he visits again, he brings her a blanket to ward off the chill.

She takes it, her sole attempt at gratitude the fervent way she wraps it about herself.

"Where is he?" The plaintive note in his voice is almost hidden but the way his timeline loops and tangles with the Doctor's betrays him. She wonders if either of them truly comprehends how tied up together they are. The Doctor has always been maddenly obtuse in these matters and, his absence here does much to suggest that it's continued with this regeneration.

Really, after so many of them one would think he would have learned better by now. But Romana's always expected too much.

"Gone and done it again, has he?" She sighs, sounding like who she'd been than who time has made her. She wraps the blanket tighter and sits on her cot.

He leaves when she says nothing else.

3.

The girl comes to her next. Young and already lost this one. Such a collection the good captain's got for himself. They're always too young, never enough time to see or do anything much less sort out the truth of themselves. She can almost watch the seconds slipping away from young Gwen Cooper's life.

"Who are you?" Gwen asks the question with more bravado than courage. "You're not really Lauren Reed, we know that. Did you kill her?"

"No," she smiles sadly. "Your kind took care of that all on your own...which you already know."

Gwen flinches, the point hitting home. "Then who are you? What are you doing here?" The uncertainty's there in the unspoken What do you want from him? She watches the girl rub nervous palms on the denim covering her hips and knows the uncertainty comes from his deference to her. Torchwood's guests rarely get afforded this much care, particularly not the ones who've proven themselves to be so very troublesome.

"That isn't what you want to know," she points out, not interested in the game anymore. She's not been particularly fond of games since the Daleks introduced her to theirs.

"No?" Gwen lifts her chin as if in challenge.

"No," comes the quiet affirmation, unimpressed by the challenge as she is. So many of the little games humanity insists on playing were (and are) an utter mystery to her and made all the more so by the Doctor's fascination with them.

"Then what is it that I'm wanting to know?" Gwen steps closer to the glass, a hint of anger in her voice. There it is, the slight hint of truth peeking out. Always the anger that brings it through as well, silly little things that they are.

She doesn't answer right away, just runs her hand along the uneven stones of the back wall. The sense of the past rises to her touch, unfolding its story like brail for a blind woman.

"You want to know why it matters to him," she looks over and when she speaks, her apologetic smile is genuine. "I cannot tell you that."

Gwen deflates, nods once. "I know." She's known it from before she came to ask. Funny how humans insist on being told that which they already know.

She settles back down to the cot, leaning her head against the cool brick behind her. "I'm sorry but I can't help you."

4.

"They're quite loyal to you, I trust you know." She doesn't open her eyes when she hears his shoe scrape against stone. "It's quite something that, considering how little they know. Unless, of course, you've told them the truth?"

He hasn't, she knows that.

"You know full well I can't do that," Jack says soft, regretful and maybe just a little bitter. "This is Torchwood."

"And he is their Holy Grail," she smiles. It's not meant to be happy. She was not there for the Doctor's misstep with Victoria but she knows of it just the same. "I can't stay here much longer, you know that. Torchwood still answers to people who would very much like a Time Lord of their very own."

"It seems to me like you don't have much of a choice."

She opens her eyes, meets his gaze and her smile turns a touch wicked. She imagines it looks like the Romana of old. "You know better than that, Jack Harkness, you always have."

He looks down and away, and she smiles.

The Doctor is always a part of their conversations, their very own omnipresent spirit.

5.

The next time he comes, she's just gone and the sound of a TARDIS echoes in his ears.

Her cell is larger than he remembers it being and he nods. "Her chamelon circuit works..." Of course, what the records say of Romana suggest she would allow nothing less of her TARDIS.

Jack picks up the golden key awaiting him, turns it over and smiles at his inscribed name.

Time Lords.

 

Not Mine!

 

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