whoniverse fic: first day
More of me playing around with the Pete's World!versions of characters. First attempt at mixing it up with Torchwood and SJA characters. (Yeah, posting these out of order...bit of a fic dump this morning. I need to start actually posting these to comms, but getting them on my journal at all is this first step.)
first day; owen and rani (friendship); pg
Owen hadn’t expected to see a light on down the hall after turning off his own; he’d been working late, and he thought everyone had already gone. He made to turn it off, but stopped when he noticed the girl sitting on the long conference room table, feet on a swivel chair. She didn’t look up even as he walked into the room and took the spot beside her.
“You okay?” he asked her.
She continued to stare at her feet. “Today was...crazy.”
Owen laughed. “That’s every day here.” She almost cracked a smile, then seemed to remember whatever had been on her mind. “So how’d you wind up here, then?”
“This room, or Torchwood?”
“Both.”
Rani finally looked up at Owen. “I’m interning at a newspaper office,” she said. “Been trying to work my way up for a year already. I’ve been looking for a story. And this time, I thought I’d finally found it, the one story that would get me noticed. I just didn’t think it’d be by...you guys.
“Rose told me to go home, but I wanted to help her. I knew more than she did, I’d been watching them for longer. And I don’t regret it, I just...” She trailed off.
Owen moved a little closer to Rani, which she didn’t seem to mind. “It’s rough, out there,” he said after a moment. “They don’t send me out often, normally I’m just here in my lab coat. But when you see them out there, all violent, and it’s kill or be killed...it’s heavy. It never really stops being heavy.”
“So why do you do it?” Rani looked him in the eye. She wasn’t crying, like he’d half expected when he’d found her alone. But her eyes revealed the mess of emotions raging on inside her, and Owen felt a sudden rush of fondness for Rose’s newest recruit.
“Same reason I became a doctor. To save people.”
Something shifted in Rani’s expression, just slightly. Owen put an arm around her and squeezed her shoulder.
They left the building together, Owen walking her to her car. She unlocked the car door and paused.
“I’ve always wanted to be a journalist because I want to find the truth. So I can set things right, and help people.”
Owen smiled, and turned to leave. “Welcome to Torchwood.”
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