Moving Forward Prologue
Title: Moving Forward (1/20)
Author: checksandplaid
Pairing: Gwen/Rhys, Gwen/Jack
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1726
Warnings: Spoilers through Children of Earth
Notes: Beta-d by veritas 6.5, in progress
Summary: When you have nothing left, how do you live? Where do you go? What do you do? An alternate turn of events to 'Miracle Day'
It had been an absolutely lovely vacation by any standard: six glorious months of traveling a world basking in the afterglow of escaping the end of days. Rome, Athens, New York, and Hawaii: it didn’t matter where they went; everyone was taking a moment to appreciate how close they had come to losing loved ones. And for all of Rhys’ whining about the impossibility of being able to watch a game, Gwen knew he had enjoyed their travels. For all her time on Earth, this had been her first time to get out of Britain and see a handful of the delights her world could offer. With her husband by her side, or slightly behind her, she had walked through halls in a palace full of the greatest art in the history of man, hiked through the ruins of ancient civilizations under the stars, and snorkeled beside giant multi-colored fish grazing at a coral reef.
But this is their last night abroad, and though they have an early flight back to Cardiff, she can’t pull herself away from the view of their balcony. So she promises her husband she’ll “be right there,” and continues to stare at the moonlight reflecting on the waves. Home. She had doubted she’d ever want to return. Since they had left, all she had wanted was to find a small country house as far from Wales as she could get and rebuild her life. Never go back to that hole in the ground full of blood and memories; never go back to a city that knew she was directly affiliated with the terror they had endured. Jack had probably saved her life by getting her out of Cardiff on sabbatical until the memories of the 456 Incident faded into the realm of bad dreams. She feels a stir in her stomach and the reassurance of her daughter’s presence. It is time to stop fleeing blindly, time to face her losses and her grief, and begin transitioning into her wonderful new life as a full time mother, part time agent.
“Gwen? You coming, love?” Rhys’ voice tugs her back to the present, and this time she goes to him, lulled to sleep by the crashing of waves on the shore and her husband’s comforting warmth at her back.
***
The flight back, though restful, is long. Eleven hours is an uncomfortable amount of time to be still while six months pregnant, and she is relieved to disembark, stretch her legs a little, use a properly sized lavatory, and wait for Rhys to do his husbandly duty and fetch their luggage. Gwen turns her mobile on to call her mother, inform the delighted grandmother to be that they are home safe, but is immediately distracted by a text from Torchwood: ‘Come to the top of Garth Hill’. She shows the message to Rhys as he lumbers up with a trolley full of their bags.
“Garth Hill? There’s bloody nothing out there. Why’s he got to drag us all the way to the middle of nowhere for a chat?” Rhys grumbles about it, but it would take a cruel bastard to refuse his wife this. And just because Jack Harkness was a handsome American wife-seducing arsehole who had started the aliens kidnapping children troubles, still didn’t mean the poor sod didn’t need his last living friend. So he offers his wife his arm, trundles the trolley to their car, installs Gwen in her seat, double checks that she is comfortable, and receives a gentle swat on the arm for being overly concerned. Luggage in its place and the trolley safely out of the car’s way, they leave the airport and drive north.
For all his grousing, it’s a short drive to the wood surrounding Garth Hill. Once the road turns to dirt and ends, they abandon the car and begin to hike. Gwen’s pace is much slower than she prefers, but Rhys is unrelenting in his care; helping her over fallen logs and large stones, checking and double checking and triple checking that she is fine until a testy remark about “not being an invalid just yet” convinces him to back off for the rest of the walk. They leave the tree line, and at the crest of the hill is Captain Jack, grey coat wrapped tight against the cold, waiting. If Gwen wasn’t too pregnant to move faster she might have run to him and thrown her arms around him, husband or no. Instead she swallows the lump of excitement in her throat and squeezes Rhys’ hand as they close the distance. There’s a short pause as she sizes him up under the pretense of trying to stretch her aching back. “Couldn’t have chosen a pub, could you?”
Rhys takes it upon himself to fill the following silence. “It’s bloody freezing. My feet…”
“Oh I missed that, the Welsh complaining.” Jack tries to soften the comment with a half-smile. “You look good.”
All Gwen can do is shake her head at such flattery. “I look huge.”
“She’s bloody gorgeous.”
Gwen squeezes Rhys’ fingers as the two men share a chuckle she doesn’t quite understand, and then slips her hand free to cross the distance between the two men. She studies his face a moment, “you ok?”
He pauses, considering what answer to give. “Yeah.”
Her fingers hover above his lapel before retreating to her pockets at his lie. “Did it work?”
“Traveled all sorts of places.” Jack isn’t answering her question as much as musing out loud for her benefit. “This planet is too small. The whole world is… like a graveyard.”
There’s a sadness in her eyes that conveys more comprehension than he wants to see. “Come back with us.”
“Haven’t traveled far enough yet.” There is no place sufficiently far from Cardiff in Jack’s opinion. “Got a lot of dirt to shake off my shoes.” A lot of memories to drown until they stop smothering him. He stares into the sky, “And right now there’s a cold fusion cruiser surfing the ion reefs just at the end of the solar system. Just waiting to open its transport dock. I just need to send a signal.”
Gwen holds up a finger, bringing his eyes back to Earth, and pulls his vortex manipulator out of her pocket. “We found it in the wreckage. Indestructible. Like its owner.” She passes it over with a silent prayer that he use it to come back soon. “I put on a new strap for you.” It had been foolish to carry it during her travels, but her hope of accidentally running into Jack during their travels had never wavered.
“Cost me 50 quid, that.”
“So bill me.” There’s an aching familiarity to this quip and retort pattern as he secures the straps around his wrist. It isn’t fair that after even he has let down and abandoned everyone around him he can still coast by on witticisms and charisma. He deserves to be left standing here alone in disgrace, not bantering with a man as good as Rhys Williams.
Gwen brings the topic back on track, braving the heart of the matter head on. “Are you ever coming back, Jack?”
“What for?”
The two words slam into her gut, forcing “for me” out before the thought registers fully in her mind. However Rhys might hassle her about this later doesn’t matter now. Very little does. “It wasn’t your fault!” Nothing can stop tears from brimming over now.
“I think it was.” He knows it was.
“No.” Whatever horror she had felt when he first admitted to surrendering the 1968 twelve crumbles before her belief in the chains of causality ending absolutely and forever with the terrifying creatures in their bulletproof tank full of smoke.
“Stephen and Ianto and Owen and Tosh and Suzy and… and all of them. Because of me.” There is no joy in knowing she still believes in him. Only another dull ache in a long line stretching as far as he can see in all directions.
“You saved us…”
“I began to like it. And look what I became.” Oh, Estel, forgive me. “I have lived so many lives. It is time to find another one.” He carefully steps away from Gwen and keys a code into his newly received vortex manipulator, fixing his gaze on her tear-streaked face. It’s kinder to let her down now, when she has so much else to live for. He hates the irony of these young, beautiful, short lived people who are so eager to throw their lives away for him, the old immortal con.
She can’t believe this is happening. This careful cold abandonment is foreign and terrifying. “They died, Jack. And I am so sorry. But you cannot just run away.” She’s begging now, but her pride has no value in a world without Torchwood. Without Jack.
The cruiser transporter begins to take effect, that weird vertigo and curious emission of light as he is turned from matter to energy. “Oh yes I can. Just watch me.” The process completes and he turns into a flash of white light, streaking into the sky towards infinity.
She tilts her head back, tears dribbling down her neck, dampening her coat collar as she strains her eyes to track the light that is Jack Harkness on his final journey away from her. She doesn’t know how much time has passed before Rhys comes up behind her, resting a gentle hand on her shoulder. The contact is too much and Gwen Cooper-Williams buries her face in her hands and sobs as though her world is ending.
“Let’s go home, yeah?” His injured pride can wait. Gwen needs him now, less the world fall out from under her feet. Besides, his feet are numb, his legs ache, and he will be damned if he lets his wife compromise her health by catching a cold grieving over a man who never loved her quite enough.
“Yeah.” She doesn’t move for a long moment, then slowly uncovers her face and wipes her nose. “Yeah.” But she can’t stop the tears until they are back in their flat, and even after a hot shower and a nice cup of tea she sits in the window seat all night, stroking a photo of her Torchwood family, staring out at the ever-changing lights of Cardiff.
Author: checksandplaid
Pairing: Gwen/Rhys, Gwen/Jack
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1726
Warnings: Spoilers through Children of Earth
Notes: Beta-d by veritas 6.5, in progress
Summary: When you have nothing left, how do you live? Where do you go? What do you do? An alternate turn of events to 'Miracle Day'
It had been an absolutely lovely vacation by any standard: six glorious months of traveling a world basking in the afterglow of escaping the end of days. Rome, Athens, New York, and Hawaii: it didn’t matter where they went; everyone was taking a moment to appreciate how close they had come to losing loved ones. And for all of Rhys’ whining about the impossibility of being able to watch a game, Gwen knew he had enjoyed their travels. For all her time on Earth, this had been her first time to get out of Britain and see a handful of the delights her world could offer. With her husband by her side, or slightly behind her, she had walked through halls in a palace full of the greatest art in the history of man, hiked through the ruins of ancient civilizations under the stars, and snorkeled beside giant multi-colored fish grazing at a coral reef.
But this is their last night abroad, and though they have an early flight back to Cardiff, she can’t pull herself away from the view of their balcony. So she promises her husband she’ll “be right there,” and continues to stare at the moonlight reflecting on the waves. Home. She had doubted she’d ever want to return. Since they had left, all she had wanted was to find a small country house as far from Wales as she could get and rebuild her life. Never go back to that hole in the ground full of blood and memories; never go back to a city that knew she was directly affiliated with the terror they had endured. Jack had probably saved her life by getting her out of Cardiff on sabbatical until the memories of the 456 Incident faded into the realm of bad dreams. She feels a stir in her stomach and the reassurance of her daughter’s presence. It is time to stop fleeing blindly, time to face her losses and her grief, and begin transitioning into her wonderful new life as a full time mother, part time agent.
“Gwen? You coming, love?” Rhys’ voice tugs her back to the present, and this time she goes to him, lulled to sleep by the crashing of waves on the shore and her husband’s comforting warmth at her back.
***
The flight back, though restful, is long. Eleven hours is an uncomfortable amount of time to be still while six months pregnant, and she is relieved to disembark, stretch her legs a little, use a properly sized lavatory, and wait for Rhys to do his husbandly duty and fetch their luggage. Gwen turns her mobile on to call her mother, inform the delighted grandmother to be that they are home safe, but is immediately distracted by a text from Torchwood: ‘Come to the top of Garth Hill’. She shows the message to Rhys as he lumbers up with a trolley full of their bags.
“Garth Hill? There’s bloody nothing out there. Why’s he got to drag us all the way to the middle of nowhere for a chat?” Rhys grumbles about it, but it would take a cruel bastard to refuse his wife this. And just because Jack Harkness was a handsome American wife-seducing arsehole who had started the aliens kidnapping children troubles, still didn’t mean the poor sod didn’t need his last living friend. So he offers his wife his arm, trundles the trolley to their car, installs Gwen in her seat, double checks that she is comfortable, and receives a gentle swat on the arm for being overly concerned. Luggage in its place and the trolley safely out of the car’s way, they leave the airport and drive north.
For all his grousing, it’s a short drive to the wood surrounding Garth Hill. Once the road turns to dirt and ends, they abandon the car and begin to hike. Gwen’s pace is much slower than she prefers, but Rhys is unrelenting in his care; helping her over fallen logs and large stones, checking and double checking and triple checking that she is fine until a testy remark about “not being an invalid just yet” convinces him to back off for the rest of the walk. They leave the tree line, and at the crest of the hill is Captain Jack, grey coat wrapped tight against the cold, waiting. If Gwen wasn’t too pregnant to move faster she might have run to him and thrown her arms around him, husband or no. Instead she swallows the lump of excitement in her throat and squeezes Rhys’ hand as they close the distance. There’s a short pause as she sizes him up under the pretense of trying to stretch her aching back. “Couldn’t have chosen a pub, could you?”
Rhys takes it upon himself to fill the following silence. “It’s bloody freezing. My feet…”
“Oh I missed that, the Welsh complaining.” Jack tries to soften the comment with a half-smile. “You look good.”
All Gwen can do is shake her head at such flattery. “I look huge.”
“She’s bloody gorgeous.”
Gwen squeezes Rhys’ fingers as the two men share a chuckle she doesn’t quite understand, and then slips her hand free to cross the distance between the two men. She studies his face a moment, “you ok?”
He pauses, considering what answer to give. “Yeah.”
Her fingers hover above his lapel before retreating to her pockets at his lie. “Did it work?”
“Traveled all sorts of places.” Jack isn’t answering her question as much as musing out loud for her benefit. “This planet is too small. The whole world is… like a graveyard.”
There’s a sadness in her eyes that conveys more comprehension than he wants to see. “Come back with us.”
“Haven’t traveled far enough yet.” There is no place sufficiently far from Cardiff in Jack’s opinion. “Got a lot of dirt to shake off my shoes.” A lot of memories to drown until they stop smothering him. He stares into the sky, “And right now there’s a cold fusion cruiser surfing the ion reefs just at the end of the solar system. Just waiting to open its transport dock. I just need to send a signal.”
Gwen holds up a finger, bringing his eyes back to Earth, and pulls his vortex manipulator out of her pocket. “We found it in the wreckage. Indestructible. Like its owner.” She passes it over with a silent prayer that he use it to come back soon. “I put on a new strap for you.” It had been foolish to carry it during her travels, but her hope of accidentally running into Jack during their travels had never wavered.
“Cost me 50 quid, that.”
“So bill me.” There’s an aching familiarity to this quip and retort pattern as he secures the straps around his wrist. It isn’t fair that after even he has let down and abandoned everyone around him he can still coast by on witticisms and charisma. He deserves to be left standing here alone in disgrace, not bantering with a man as good as Rhys Williams.
Gwen brings the topic back on track, braving the heart of the matter head on. “Are you ever coming back, Jack?”
“What for?”
The two words slam into her gut, forcing “for me” out before the thought registers fully in her mind. However Rhys might hassle her about this later doesn’t matter now. Very little does. “It wasn’t your fault!” Nothing can stop tears from brimming over now.
“I think it was.” He knows it was.
“No.” Whatever horror she had felt when he first admitted to surrendering the 1968 twelve crumbles before her belief in the chains of causality ending absolutely and forever with the terrifying creatures in their bulletproof tank full of smoke.
“Stephen and Ianto and Owen and Tosh and Suzy and… and all of them. Because of me.” There is no joy in knowing she still believes in him. Only another dull ache in a long line stretching as far as he can see in all directions.
“You saved us…”
“I began to like it. And look what I became.” Oh, Estel, forgive me. “I have lived so many lives. It is time to find another one.” He carefully steps away from Gwen and keys a code into his newly received vortex manipulator, fixing his gaze on her tear-streaked face. It’s kinder to let her down now, when she has so much else to live for. He hates the irony of these young, beautiful, short lived people who are so eager to throw their lives away for him, the old immortal con.
She can’t believe this is happening. This careful cold abandonment is foreign and terrifying. “They died, Jack. And I am so sorry. But you cannot just run away.” She’s begging now, but her pride has no value in a world without Torchwood. Without Jack.
The cruiser transporter begins to take effect, that weird vertigo and curious emission of light as he is turned from matter to energy. “Oh yes I can. Just watch me.” The process completes and he turns into a flash of white light, streaking into the sky towards infinity.
She tilts her head back, tears dribbling down her neck, dampening her coat collar as she strains her eyes to track the light that is Jack Harkness on his final journey away from her. She doesn’t know how much time has passed before Rhys comes up behind her, resting a gentle hand on her shoulder. The contact is too much and Gwen Cooper-Williams buries her face in her hands and sobs as though her world is ending.
“Let’s go home, yeah?” His injured pride can wait. Gwen needs him now, less the world fall out from under her feet. Besides, his feet are numb, his legs ache, and he will be damned if he lets his wife compromise her health by catching a cold grieving over a man who never loved her quite enough.
“Yeah.” She doesn’t move for a long moment, then slowly uncovers her face and wipes her nose. “Yeah.” But she can’t stop the tears until they are back in their flat, and even after a hot shower and a nice cup of tea she sits in the window seat all night, stroking a photo of her Torchwood family, staring out at the ever-changing lights of Cardiff.