The Trouble with Nessie - Chapter Eleven (Complete)

Author: Milady Dragon

Author's Note: And so, this is the end of this story. I'm going to keep on posting "The Wizard and the Void" (Yes, I know my posting schedule on that hasn't been what I'd said, but I'm just not used to posting every day. Sorry about that!) and then, when I catch up with that, I'll start posting its sequel, "The Hunters and the Prey", and when I catch up with that I'll go back to my regular posting schedule. A warning - "Hunters" has 76 chapters. It's a monster.

After that, I'll get back to the Dragon-Verse, with some more SHIELD stories. I have several I've already written, but I wanted to get more done before I post those since they're all sort of sequels to each other. Also, I hope to have a Thirteen Future Story ready as well.

10 June 2012

Torchwood House

Aberdeenshire, Scotland

"– and I haven't come up with anything more on the Blue Angels front."

Penelope was apologetic, but Josh didn't think she needed to be. "It was a longshot. Did you send word to the coven yet?"

"Yeah, I contacted Ceridwen about it, and she's gonna have their own Archivist go through their records to see if they're some sort of spiritual or magical creature. But, since they're all handwritten, it's gonna take a while." She leaned back in her desk chair, sighing, regarding him over the rims of her cat-eye glasses, rhinestones on the arms twinkling in the light coming from the many computer monitors that made up Penelope's workstation. "I even spoke to Jemma – when she wasn't busy helping out with Nessie – but there's nothing in the SHIELD files about them, either."

Josh couldn't help it, he was disappointed, but it wasn't Penelope's fault. "We might need to broaden the search a little."

His friend looked intrigued. "You have any ideas?"

Josh leaned forward in his own chair, resting his elbows on his knees. "Maybe we're taking 'Blue Angels' a little too literally. Maybe it's time to look into myths and legends that are only peripherally to do with either the colour blue or angels."

Penelope whistled. "There's a lot out there. Just the Judeo-Christian stuff alone…"

"I think we can discount that. I've done enough reading on that to know those angels could never be mistaken for being blue, nor have they ever messed with human evolution." He'd taken several Religion courses while studying for his degree, and he was pretty certain of his facts on that score.

"You have a point." Her expression turned pensive. "There are also enough religions and cults out there that have angels involved in some way. But I'm sure you knew that."

He did, and said so.

"Let me expand the parameters a little, and see what I come up with." She grinned. "There's nothing I like more than a bit of research. Especially when I'm doing it for one of my new favourite people."

No, Josh wasn't about to blush.

He hadn't meant to fall into the habit of calling Penelope every night while he'd been in Tulloch. The first night, it had been curiosity to see if she could find out anything about Mr MacRanald's little bout of the second sight he'd had on Josh's behalf. But, then he'd called her the next night to let her know about Nessie, and it had become nearly every night after that, during Nessie's recovery time, while they all waited to see if her body would accept the new power node. It had, and Josh couldn't help himself in calling Penelope with progress reports. It had turned into them talking about personal things, like Josh's need to be discovering new things, and how Penelope had been a hacker before being recruited by the FBI. They'd even talked about starting up an online RPG, which was something Josh had never done but had become interested in, just from her explanation.

If Josh was being honest with himself, he thought he might be falling a little for her.

She wasn't really his usual type. Before meeting her, he'd been more into dating sporty types, women who would go hiking or mountain climbing or diving; more like tomboys, really. Penelope was pretty much opposite that. She did share his need to understand things, though, and she was brightly intelligent and eager to help everyone around her, which were all certainly attractive traits in a person. She also had such an upbeat personality, it was impossible not to be in a better mood just by talking to her. Her disposition on life was refreshing and it raised his own spirits just to see her smile. It was hard to believe that she'd once worked for the FBI doing research on serial killers. That just didn't seem like something she'd do.

Oh yeah, he was screwed.

"So," she said, "you got any idea how long before you and Tosh are heading back to Cardiff?"

He shook his head. "I'm guessing I'll find out whenever she and Archie get out of the meeting with Ianto. Probably tomorrow or the next day."

"Then, you and I are going seize the moment and head into Aberdeen tonight. There's this great pub that serves the best food, and you need to decompress after that mission."

That sounded like a fantastic idea. "I do like haggis."

She made a face. "You are kidding me."

"Nope. Tried it at The Fox, and it was really good." He'd been surprised that he'd enjoyed it so much. Mrs MacRanald had been surprised, too, but very pleased. He thought she might have even wanted to adopt him as one of her sons, or something. It had been really amazing. And he kinda wanted to tell his real Mom about it. He had the feeling that they'd get along famously.

Penelope flapped a hand at him. "That's Maddie's cooking, which is a step above anything else you could get. You'll only be disappointed after that."

"I think you just want to keep me from eating haggis in front of you."

"Maybe. Or maybe I don't want to kiss you while you have haggis breath."

Josh's heart swooped at that. "So, this is a date?"

Penelope's dark eyes were serious. "If you want it to be."

"Yeah. I think I do."

She smiled at him, bright and beautiful and very happy. "Good."

Yes, this was very good indeed.

Fin