Open Sesame [attn: Torchwood]

The sky over the Millenium Centre was just beginning to darken, the horizon holding onto the last hint of sunlight. People milled here and there, paying attention to nothing really besides themselves, save for the occaisonal one or two who glanced up at the few dim stars just becoming visible between the clouds.

No one noticed the blonde who appeared off to one side, against a wall. Rose glanced over her shoulder at it, inhaling sharply. She still wasn't entirely sure if it was possible to end up appearing in a wall or something but... If it was, that had been rather close. She took a moment to toss her hair over her shoulder and double check that she still had her bag before moving away from the wall.

It had been just under a week since her reunion with Jack, and she was planning to make good on her promise to visit. She'd been in the universe two other times already, but had opted for searching London along the lines of how she had been. Both visits had proved useless though, and she'd gotten nothing from them but a bruised shoulder, the second time.

For now though, she had just planned to visit. It was, she hoped, late enough to be considered 'after-hours'. She didn't want to make him deal with the questions she'd left last time so he could avoid. However, she wasn't aware of just how long the 'fauna' of Torchwood Three tended to stay at work.

Rose made her way over to the tile that concealed the lift. It was the only way she knew of to get into the base underneath. She waited for a few moments for something to happen, but nothing did. Glancing to see if any passerby were paying attention to her she tapped a foot, faking a smile, and still going nowhere.

Satisfied that no one was paying her any mind she crouched down, setting her bag on the slab by her knees. Feeling more than a little stupid, she knocked on the tile impatiently and waited some more. Furrowing her brows she glared at the concrete as it remained stationary. She racked her brain for a few moments, but came up empty-handed as to what to do to move it. After some more time passed and she refused to give up, she gave the lift an almost pleading look. "Open Sesame?"

The team was working late again. Gwen was busy filling out some over-due reports and tidying around her desk.
Her eyes scanned the computers infront of her, seeing nothing out of order on the CCTV of the hub she went back to work.
Halfway through a form on Health and Safety procedures a movement out of the corner of her eye dragged her attention.
It seemed a blond girl was on the lift.

The lift didn't budge, and Rose glared at it in frustration. In hindsight it might have been an idea to get Jack's number. Or at least the information of how exactly to get in. It was too late for that now though, and she was left to figure something out on her own. More pleading with the concrete seemed to be an idea.

"C'mon, just go down."

Gwen stared closely at the girl, she didn't seem drunk, in fact she seemed quite steady on her feet.
Sometimes she wished they had installed a microphone's around the hub, it did seem to be a centre of otherworld-y activity it would make sense.
She saw Ianto emerge from the basement and motioned for him to come over.

Ianto passed by Gwen's station, he'd been fiddling with some CCTV reports he needed to show Tosh. However, he stopped, and took a few steps back, looking at Gwen with a frown. She was frowning at the screen herself.

"What's wrong, Gwen?" He asked.

"What's wrong, Gwen?" He asked.
Gwen glanced back at Ianto and shook her head slightly.

"I don't know, but look." Gwen pointed to the screen, "she's been there a minute or two, do we know her? She looks pretty normal, not drunk anyway."

Ianto brought his head closer to the screen, looking at the grainy female form standing on top of the "lift". He opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out right away.

"I don't know who she is, why do you think she's just...standing there?" He asked Gwen, looking from her to the screen and back. "Do you think it's possible that she knows about the lift?"

"Do you think it's possible that she knows about the lift?"
Gwen shrugged and took a sip of her coffee.
"I don't know, I mean it's possible. Maybe the perception filter was on the blink at some point and she saw one of us."

Owen walked out of the autopsy bay and saw Gwen and Ianto looking inquisitively at a computer screen. He walked over to see what they were looking at. "Oi," he said, "what's going on?"

"There's a...woman, standing on the lift. Just, there, standing." Ianto told Owen, without looking at him. The woman on the CCTV kept looking down, and ahead, but she wouldn't move from that particular square.

Tosh scurried over to see what all the commotion was about. Following the story of the "mysterious girl" she watched with the others as they stared at the screen watching the blonde try to work the lift.

"No one else knows about the hub," she murmured. "Owen... who is she and how drunk were you?"

"Owen... who is she and how drunk were you?"

Gwen giggled, "to be honest, I was thinking you or Jack.....Anyway she's been there a few minutes now, should we do something?"

"There's a...woman, standing on the lift. Just, there, standing."

"Issat it?" Owen rolled his eyes and started to walk away when he saw Toshiko.

"Owen... who is she and how drunk were you?"

"Oi! Who said I had anything to do with this?"

Still looking at the lift in a rather annoyed manner, Rose sat down crosslegged, moving her bag to her lap. It could be awhile before she got any sort of response, but she was determined to wait it out. She knocked idly on the concrete once more, glancing around her once more to see if anyone was looking.

Gwen was shocked to see the young girl sit on the step and wait, maybe she was just resting her feet.
Well until she knocked.
"Ok, she knows we're here."

Owen turned back. "Okay, well, that is a bit weird..."

Ianto cocked his head to the left.

"It's like she's knocking on our door. Sort of. It's clear she knows one of us, how else could she have gotten the location of the lift?" He looked around, and everyone present looked as weirded out as he was. It either wasn't one of them, or one of them was a great actor.

Owen looked around.

"Where's Jack run off to?"

Tosh took a seat in front of the monitors. A few clicks of the mouse the girl on the screen was enlarged. She looked young and determined to find a way into the hub.

"Where's Jack run off to?"

It dawned on Tosh. The other day while Jack was napping she heard him mumble something about a blonde girl. "I think it's... Rose?" she said aloud to herself, unintentionally.

Jack kept his computer on while he was doing paperwork, keeping an eye on what the others were up to. The paperwork was basic and familiar, forms he'd been filling out quite literally since they came into being in the '50s. Mostly he was just looking through them for something, but he took the time to make a few marks on some where new information had come to light. Of course, the forms he was going through were actually from the 1950s, which was primarily why he was the one dealing with them.

The last thing he needed was for his staff to catch his signature on a fifty year old piece of paper.

Catching a glimpse of the screen from the corner of his eye, Jack looked up to see all of the team clustered round one of the computers, looking puzzled. That piqued his interest, and he prodded the system to bring up another window or two - checking out what they were looking at.

The lift. Rose was sitting on the lift. Well, no wonder they were curious.

Realizing - probably much later than he ought to have - that Rose had no way of getting down the lift, he looked at the Vortex Manipulator, or what had once been a Vortex Manipulator before it had broken and gotten reused for other purposes, on his wrist, pressing the button that would lower the lift.

Well, she had to meet the staff sooner or later. Besides, the looks on their faces would be just a little priceless, and he could stop anything too bad from happening before it got out of hand.

Rose had been half-ready to start humming a song while she waited when she felt the lift move under her. She couldn't help grinning, glancing around one last time to discover that there was still no one paying her any mind. She might have to ask about that yet.

As the lift made its way lower still she glanced around the inside of the hub instead. It would, she assumed, make sense to stay seated rather than try to stand on it, so she just used her arms to support herself. "'Bout time." She muttered.

Gwen suddenly noticed the girl was disappearing. She seemed to be slowly sinking into the ground.
She then remembered that the particular brick she was sitting on was a lift and that a whirring noise was coming from the side of the hub.
It slowly descended, with someone hanging on for dear life.

Ianto looked from the screen to the lift, as the girl was lowered down...On both. He quirked one eyebrow, mumbling something even he couldn't understand.

Rose noticed the group of people huddled around the screen when she was nearly down and cursed silently. Apparently this particular Torchwood kept later hours than she thought. Under the assumption that she had to have been noticed, and that they didn't seem to be doing anything, Rose decided to ignore them unless they approached her first. Once the lift had descended fully she stood, picked up her bag and started in the direction she remembered Jack's office to be in.

Jack was still in his office, but when he saw on the CCTV that Rose had gotten off the lift, he went to the door, leaning back against the frame and giving her a grin and a small wave. "Welcome back," he told her.

As if by pretending this was all very normal, he could avoid the inevitable questions. Not even remotely true, but that was Jack for you.