Exhibit, Part Five
Part Four
They all just stared at her. It was Gwen. It was Gwen.
She was older. Her hair was different, wavier, longer, no more fringe in her eyes, and the sort of unnatural uniformity to the color that implied she probably dyed it to cover up grays. Her face was lined; her eyes crinkled at the edges and there was a worry line through her forehead. She looked so much older, with a hardness to her that had just started to come out when they last seen her, when they had died and left her all alone on Earth.
But it was Gwen, she carried herself the same, she still wore the tight jeans and dark leather jacket and the same color lipstick, and behind the superficial changes it was the same face, with the same pale freckles. They were the same bright green eyes that always looked too big for her face, darkened by mascara, looking like they were just on the verge of tears, even with that familiar gap-toothed smile.
She lowered her weapon and dropped it on the ground, stepping out of the archway and down onto the laboratory floor.
"Gwen," Ianto choked. He pulled himself out from under Owen and stumbled to his feet, unable to take his eyes off of her, afraid she'd disappear like so many dreams if he looked away for even a moment.
Gwen smiled that strange, uncertain, not-quite-crying smile at him. "Hey handsome," she said, and her voice was almost as choked up as his.
"We thought you were dead," he said, because it was 2000 years in the future and she had vanished from the records and -
"Look who's talking!" Gwen said with a short laugh, and the tears finally appeared in her eyes.
Ianto crossed the room in three strides and pulled her into his arms. She hugged him back, her arms around his neck, kissing his cheek and getting his hair thoroughly wet with tears. But then, hers wasn't exactly staying dry either.
"God I missed you so much," Gwen said, squeezing him tighter before stepping away to look at him. "I missed all of you, so much, I can hardly believe this is happening."
"Gwen, you…" Owen said, starting towards the two of them and utterly clueless as to how he planned to finish that sentence. It didn't really matter though, because she had him tugged into a hug and was planting a chaste kiss on his dry lips before he could finish the word.
Then she whirled around and met Tosh on the step to the control and grabbed her too, lifting her straight off her feet and spinning her around.
"Oh god," Gwen said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. She let go of Tosh, who stumbled backwards until Ianto caught her.
"God," Gwen repeated, sniffling one last time before standing up straight. "Right. We don't have time for this!" She grinned somewhat lopsidedly at them before walking right past them, stepping easily over the piled robots over to the door. "We've got to get going before any more of these things show up, yeah?"
"What," Rory said, staring after her, "What just happened?"
"Who are you?!" Amy put in.
"Come on then," Gwen said to them, rolling her eyes and waving the questions off. "I'll explain while we walk."
"But," Ned said, gesturing helplessly as the rest of the Torchwood team hurried after her, "What about your gun? And the Time Gate?"
"Both useless now," Gwen said. "The gun only has one shot at full power, then it takes a full day to recharge. No time for that, so just leave it. And your little arch is useless now too. Sorry. Probably burnt it out when we redirected it and forced our way through."
"Wh-what do you mean?!" Ned shouted, scurrying over the destroyed robots and following the humans out into the hall. "How are you even here? All of the records indicate - "
"You just disappear," Owen finished, slightly accusing. "Vanish, without a trace, from all of the Torchwood records."
"And the rest of the world," Tosh added, "You literally dropped off the face of the Earth!"
"Yes," Gwen said. "I did. I came here."
"…What?"
"I came here!" she repeated. "I disappeared to here. To the future. To this… space station, or whatever it is."
"Timey-wimey," Amy muttered.
"Precisely," Gwen said, pointing at her with a smile.
"But why?" Ianto asked. "Why come here?"
"Well I couldn't exactly leave you, now could I?"
"But Gwen," Toshiko said, grabbing her arm and slowing her down. "How did you manage all this? You literally hijacked the Time Gate's coordinates and forced your way through. How did you do that?"
Gwen shrugged, smiling at her. "Torchwood," she said. "Alien technology. Time travel. All in a day's work, right?"
"How long has it even been for you?" Ianto asked.
"About twenty years," Gwen said with a sigh. "That's… twenty years since we lost you, Ianto. My little girl's at university now, you didn't even get to see her born."
He squeezed her hand.
"In any case," Gwen said, "I think it's most important for us to get out of here, yeah? I can explain everything later, when we're all back together."
"That's right, we still have to meet back up with the Doctor," Amy said. "How are we supposed to find him?"
~~
The Doctor barely managed to get the passageway door open, putting all his weight against the side of it. It didn't help that the 'door' was actually just another part of the wall, designed to be opened by creatures with much more muscle mass than he had. How the hell had Moshe passed through this passage on her own?
"You could help, you know," he said with a scowl at Jack.
Jack smirked and adjusted Moshe's position in his arms. "Hands are a little full, Doc."
Moshe giggled and green flashed across her fur in a quick blush.
The Doctor rolled his eyes and slipped through the small opening into the hall. "Air vents and ancient secret passages," he complained, "I don't normally have to do both in one trip. I'll be stuck in a winding cave next, just you watch."
Jack laughed and followed him out. "So, where are we now?"
"Not sure," the Doctor said. "Not in the main museum. Backstage area, I'd guess, where all the labs and offices and things are. Moshe?"
Moshe nodded. "I'm not supposed to go back here," she said, with an expression that indicated she went there rather frequently. "It's off-limits to the public."
"And you think our friends will be here?"
"Tha'ss where they keep my friends," she said. "They're not supposed to leave either."
"So who are these people, Doctor?" Jack interrupted. "Your companions?"
"Some of them," the Doctor said. "Two of them. Amy and Rory. Only Amy's found people being kept here - Moshe's doctor-friend and two others, if I'm not mistaken - and we thought we'd get them out."
"Being kept for what?"
"As bait," the Doctor said. "You really didn't come here because you heard about the 21st Century Earth exhibit?"
Jack shook his head. "I told you, my ship ran out of fuel. I mean completely out of fuel, I had to turn life support off and float my way here using nothing but momentum. Why would I come for some Earth exhibit, anyway?"
"I like the Earth exhibit!" Moshe interjected. "I get hot chocolates and then they tell stories and we go look at stuff!"
"Their tagline is 'First Contact before First Contact,' Jack, it's about extraterrestrial contact with Earth and time slips and things and the humans who had to cover it up. Sound familiar?"
Jack frowned. "Sounds a bit like Torchwood," he muttered.
The Doctor threw his hands up. "Now he gets it!"
"Someone built an exhibit about Torchwood, just to attract my attention so they could kidnap me and study my immortality?"
"That's about it, yes."
Jack glanced back into the dark passageway. "I kinda want to see it now," he said, "Since they went to that much trouble."
The Doctor rolled his eyes again. "Yes, well, maybe once we're done escaping from the killer robots and mad scientist and rescue the others we can all come back and make a nice day trip of it. Now come on, we have to keep going - "
"Stop!" Moshe said suddenly, turning a pale yellow nervously. "Somebody's coming!"
Jack and the Doctor looked around in either direction - the halls were empty.
"You sure?" Jack asked, backing into the Doctor as he kept a lookout.
Moshe nodded. "I can hear voices!" she whispered, "And footsteps. There's a whole bunch of people over that way."
She pointed over the Doctor's shoulder, where the corridor took a turn to the right.
The Doctor frowned. "I think we'd better take her word for it. Much better ears than either of us have. Quick, back in the passage."
Moshe's large pointed ears flattened against her head at their mention. The three of them hurried back into the hidden passage. Jack put her down so he could help the Doctor shut it, leaving only a crack so they could look out.
The three of them pressed up against the crack, listening with their breaths held. Soon, Jack and the Doctor could hear the sounds as well, voices from down the hall, indistinct but clearly present.
"Doesn't sound like robots," Jack whispered.
"Could be staff," the Doctor whispered back.
Moshe's ears perked up and she flushed green with pleasure. "It's okay!" she said loudly, "It's Doctor Harper!" and she slipped through the crack and out into the hall.
Jack turned to the Doctor with a wide-eyed stare. "Doctor Harper?" he repeated incredulously.
The Doctor just smiled.
~~
Moshe scurried on all fours down the hall and stopped at the corner. "Doctor Harper!" she called, grinning.
The group of would-be escapees paused, turning around to look. Gwen already had a hand on the holster at her hip, but Ianto caught her wrist. Owen just sighed and jogged over to the little girl.
"Moshe, what are you doing here? I thought the museum was evacuated."
"I hid in the wall!" she said brightly, already clambering up into his arms. "There were a bunch of robots but I wasn't scared and then I helped us get here because I know how to get everywhere on the station and it was really fun!"
Owen frowned, trying to make sense of her babbling. "Look, just calm down, speak slowly. You're not hurt or anything are you? You really should have just stayed with your mum this time, it's dangerous in here - "
"Owen?" called a shaky voice.
Owen stopped and stared down the hall, where Jack was clambering out of the hidden passageway.
"Jack?"
There was a moment where they just stared at each other. Then all at once Jack was running down the hall and Owen was enveloped in arms and a WWII air force coat and there was a hand running through his hair.
Moshe stepped back from where she'd slipped out of Owen's arms when they'd gone slack with shock and bit her thumb.
The cry of "Jack!" was echoed down the hall by a more feminine voice, and he stepped away from Owen just enough to catch Tosh as she hurdled into him, grabbing her around the waist and pulling her in to the impromptu group hug.
Amy and Rory watched curiously from further down the hall.
"Are you guys always like this?" Amy asked.
"Nah," Gwen said. "Only when it's important. The rest of it's all arguing and guns and things."
She nudged Ianto with her elbow. "Go on then, what are you standing about for?"
Ianto stumbled forwards at her push. He glanced back at her with a look somewhere between shock and fear, then back at the still locked-together trio.
"…Jack!" he finally shouted, and Jack looked up, smiling wider than ever.
"Ianto!" Jack shouted back, and he ran forwards without letting the others go, dragging them behind him.
Ianto met him halfway, crashing into his chest and yanking his head down into a deep kiss. Jack wrapped his arm around him, somehow, without letting go of Tosh's hand, and his other one still buried in Owen's hair as if losing physical contact with any of them would make them disappear.
"Ianto Jones," Jack whispered, pulling away just long enough so they could catch their breaths, "You are so beautiful," and he kissed him again.
The Doctor rolled his eyes as he sidled past them to the others, holding Moshe's furry hand.
"You see what I have to put up with?" He said to her. "And these two are just as bad, always all excited just because we nearly died, at least Jack has 2000 years of no contact as an excuse."
"Hey, we had 2000," Rory protested.
Gwen just laughed. "Hey, break it up you guys!" she shouted. "We've still got to find a way out of here, remember?"
Tosh and Owen managed to disengage themselves from Jack's grasp, though Tosh was smiling and half-sobbing and leaning into Owen for support. Jack and Ianto took a moment longer before separating and turning to join the others.
Getting closer, Jack stared at Gwen. She smiled brightly back.
"What are you doing here?"
"Here to help get everyone out," she said.
"You disappeared. I went back to Torchwood and nobody would tell me where you'd gone. They told me to drop it and not to worry and that was all."
"Yup," Gwen agreed. "That was the plan."
"What plan?"
"I disappeared to here," she explained again. "At least temporarily, and we all agreed to cut off my records and not tell anybody where I'd gone, because if you knew where I was it would mess up the timeline."
"What timeline?"
Gwen shrugged. "We got a contact," she said, "From the future. Told us about everyone being held here and helped us activate our Time Gate. And because it had already all happened for the contact, it was a fixed point in our timeline, and we couldn't change any details. One of which was that nobody knew what happened to me."
"Sorry," she added, smiling sadly at Jack. "I know it must have been hard on you, but we didn't have a choice."
"I had no word from you for 2000 years!"
"Well sorry, I only saw you a month ago though."
"Okay, wait," the Doctor said. "What do you mean you had a Time Gate?"
"How can you have a Time Gate?" Ned asked, bewildered. "We were told there was only the one in existence! And it's back in that room, broken beyond repair!"
The Doctor turned on him. "What do you mean you have a Time Gate?" he accused. "Professor Uquiccax, if I'm not mistaken, I hope you're happy that your little trap worked."
Ned's ears flattened against his skull in shame. "It - it was donated," he said, dodging the second statement. "It was donated to the museum."
The Doctor frowned thoughtfully. "Donated? By whom?"
"Er," Ned said, trying to think of the archaeologist's name. "A woman, human, somewhat famous I think. Doctor Song, I think?"
"Doctor Song," the Doctor repeated flatly. "Doctor River Song. Donated to you the Time Gate, which brought all these people here."
"Er," Ned said again. "Yes?"
The Doctor turned away with a sigh. "Of course she did. I'm probably the one who tells her to donate it. Figures."
He turned back to Gwen. "Now how did you get a Time Gate?"
Gwen smirked. "We built it."
"You built it?!"
"Sort of. We didn't need to build a whole Time Gate, just something that could access this one and send me through. We didn't have any time or the resources to make anything fancier than that."
"Even though," the Doctor said. "Even it wasn't a complete time portal, it takes a ridiculous amount of energy to power anything that travels through time. Even a dinky thing like a vortex manipulator has to power itself by absorbing time energy from rifts and stars and whatnot."
Jack put a hand on his wrist strap, slightly offended.
Gwen reached into her shirt and pulled something off from around her neck. "We used this," she said. From her hand dangled a gold chain with a glass marble. Inside the glass, a tiny twist of golden energy swirled around, reaching out towards her hand.
The Doctor took it from her and stared at it.
"What is it?" Toshiko asked.
"Time energy," the Doctor said, squinting at it in the light. "Just a tiny bit. Same stuff that's in the heart of the TARDIS."
"There used to be more," Gwen said. "Powering the Time Gate used up most of it."
"I should think so. This little marble can't hold very much, just enough for a one-way trip. Just this amount is still immensely powerful, though; if it weren't contained it could make all kinds of trouble." He lowered his hand. "Where did you get it?"
Gwen shrugged. The Doctor passed it to Jack to look at, and it went its way through the group.
"Hey!" Moshe said, pulling lightly on Owen's trouser leg as he peered curiously at the gold swirl in the marble. It bounced off the edges of the glass, splintering into tiny threads that reached out as if trying to get to the palm of his hand.
"Hey!" she said again, tugging him. "I wanna see! It looks like what Mr. Face - "
The wall opened up, startling the group. One of the security robots stepped out.
"Run!" Jack and the Doctor said at the same time. Owen shoved the necklace into his pocket, the chain still dangling out the side, and grabbed Tosh's hand to hurry away. The Doctor scooped Moshe up from the floor and led the way, followed by Jack and Ianto still gripping each other's hand, Amy and Rory behind them, Tosh and Owen, and Gwen shoving Ned ahead of her as she turned around and drew her gun.
Three gunshots rang out behind them, but when the robot fell it unleashed the same death wail as the one Rory had decommissioned, calling the others to the area. More soon blocked the way, and they were trapped.
~~
"I suggest you all surrender," Xarchac said, but his voice didn't come from any of the robots. He stepped out from the behind the sea of red metal, smirking at them. "How helpful of you all to gather together. It did make you easier to find, Doctor, with you gravitating to Nerranderot's pets and their helpful tracking chips."
Owen had to grab Toshiko's hand to stop her from ripping her own wrist open to get at the chip.
"I knew it," she snarled, her fists clenched. "You stupid fucking bastards."
Ned flinched at her words.
"And I've finally caught my immortal," Xarchac continued, either not noticing or not caring about the interruption. He leered at Jack. "How kind of you to bring him to me."
Ianto made a sort of lunge towards Xarchac, only held back by Jack's embrace. His fingers dug into Ianto's arm, but he pulled him backwards, unwilling to let him run off into danger to be lost again.
"Eskar," Ned whispered hoarsely. "Eskar, calm down, we can… we can work this out."
"Work what out, Nerranderot? Everything went according to plan. Better than we expected, in fact. You got your little exhibit, I got all the subjects I could need for my studies. We'll be famous, Nerranderot."
"Eskar, this has gone much too far!" Ned shouted. "This is… kidnapping and hostages and endangering the museum! I never meant to take anyone against their will or to hurt anybody."
"I did," Xarchac said simply. "Now, I suggest you all drop your weapons and surrender before I give the order to open fire."
"Just you try it," Jack snarled.
Xarchac looked at him calmly. "I don't see why I shouldn't. After all, the only ones of you I need alive… wouldn't die." He sneered in the general direction of the other humans. "Your little friends, on the other hand…"
"Eskar, you must stop this!"
Ned took a sudden step forwards, reaching out towards Xarchac, pleading.
Xarchac sneered and flicked his hand over the opposite wrist. His implant flashed blue. The nearest robot raised its weapon and fired.
"NED!"
Ned slumped to the floor as Owen, Tosh, and Ianto all cried out. Gwen pulled her pistol and fired wildly at the robots, sending Xarchac ducking for cover. Jack pushed Ianto behind him, propelling him colliding into Tosh as she rushed forwards, and drew his own weapon. The Doctor held his arms out, stopping Amy and Rory, staring down at Ned with a melancholy expression.
"Go," he shouted at them, "There's nothing we can do, hurry, cut a path, we need to get out of here. Rory, your sword!"
Rory paused, just long enough to watch Owen kneel at Ned's side, a pool of blood coagulating around the historian's fallen body. Then he turned away, and with a yell charged at the surrounding army.
"Professor, professor!" Moshe sobbed, and her fur was all colors, green and blue and orange as tears streamed down her face. "Professor, no! Professor Uquiccax!"
Gwen turned as she fired, scooping the little girl up in her free arm and running after Rory and Amy.
"Run!" she shouted, shooting one of the robots ahead of them. Moshe screamed and covered her ears.
"Come on, Owen!" Jack yelled, grabbing hold of his shirt. Owen was staring down at Ned, his hands bloody from examining the wound. He let himself be dragged away, and the two of them hurried after the others, dodging under and around the sluggish robots.
"Security!" Xarchac shouted behind them. "Kill them! Bring me the immortal and the Time Lord and the dead one, destroy the others! Go!"
They all ran, charging through the empty hallways with the constant clang of metal footsteps right behind them.
"Amy!" the Doctor shouted, leading the way, "Screwdriver!"
Amy looked over her shoulder. "Toshiko!"
Tosh pulled out the sonic silently, tears drying quickly on her face, and tossed it to Amy. Amy handed it to the Doctor.
He swung around a corner and stopped, leaning against the wall and fiddling with the screwdriver's buttons. The others piled around him; Jack and Gwen peering around the corner with their weapons at the ready, Rory facing the opposite way with his sword, eyes open for another ambush. The clanging footsteps grew louder.
"Doctor, what are you doing?" Jack asked.
"Screwdriver is linked to the TARDIS. I can use it to find it. Then we can get out. A-ha, there we go, you beauty!"
The screwdriver's tip glowed green and it buzzed, like it always did. The Doctor seemed extremely satisfied with this.
"All right, we have to hurry and get out of here."
"They'll catch up to us," Tosh said. "They're not that fast but they can get around the station faster than we can, using the security passages."
"Is that what those are?" the Doctor said. "What do you know. We're lucky they weren't using that one earlier, eh, Captain?"
Jack just scowled, still staring around the corner at the approaching danger.
"You all go ahead," he said, "I'll catch up with you."
"What?" Tosh exclaimed in horror at the same time Ianto grabbed Jack's arm and said, "We're not leaving you behind!"
"I'm not going to lose any of you again!" Jack said, frustrated. "I can hold them off a bit, buy you some time. They can't kill me anyway. If you can all get to the TARDIS, you can lock onto my wrist strap and come pick me up, whether I'm caught or not."
"Jack," Ianto protested, but Jack cut him off with another kiss.
"I'm not going to lose you all again."
The Doctor was frowning, but he nodded. "Alright," he said, "But don't die if you don't have to. Come after us if you get overwhelmed, don't wait more than ten minutes. Got that?"
Jack grinned at him. "Yes sir."
They had all just started to move when Owen spoke up.
"I'm staying with you."
"Like hell you are," Jack said in an angry growl. "You're getting out of here, safe and sound, with all the rest of them. I mean it, I don't want to lose any of you after I've got you again."
"You may have 'got' us, Jack, but you don't own us. I'm staying here with you. You heard Xarchac, he wants me in one piece for more study. They can't kill me either. I can help you."
Jack looked almost ready to snap, unable to think of any argument besides fuck no, it's way too dangerous!
Gwen handed Moshe off to a surprised Amy and walked back to the two of them.
"Owen," she said, reaching into the other holster on the back of her belt. She handed him one of her guns and gave him a quick kiss. "Don't you dare die again."
Jack growled again, swinging around to shoot at the first of the oncoming robots. "Fine," he said, "But you stay behind me at all times, and when I tell you to run, you run, got it?"
"Got it," Owen said, and ducked down behind him, cocking the gun.
"The rest of you, get the hell out of here."
Gwen nodded at Jack's order, pulling the reluctant Ianto away from the arising fray. Tosh hesitated, flashing Owen a quick, uncertain smile.
"You come back to me, you hear?"
He smiled back at her. "Don't you worry, Tosh. We'll be there."
~~
With the sound of footsteps fading behind them, Jack and Owen opened fire on the approaching horde of security bots. Bullets pinged off the walls as the robots fired back, hardly phased by the humans' attack.
"They still use bullets," Owen laughed harshly. "Ned was killed by a fucking bullet, even this far in the fucking future, billions of miles from home."
"They could disintegrate us if they wanted to," Jack said solemnly.
"Yeah, well then I guess it's a good thing they want us alive, more or less."
Jack laughed. "I guess so."
"Thanks for coming to get us, Jack," Owen said, shooting a robot in its eye. "I mean, there wasn't all that much we could do on our own, and we all thought… well, that maybe you'd forgotten us, after all this time."
"It was a fluke," Jack said harshly. "A coincidence. I didn't really mean to come here, except that it was somewhere to refuel."
Owen laughed over the gunfire. "Seriously? You didn't see any of those ridiculous advertisements and shit? Ned went crazy with the advertising, just to set a trap for you."
"Didn't see a damn thing," Jack laughed back. He smiled to himself as he shot down another robot. "But I never forgot any of you, not for a moment."
Owen smirked. "Good to know."
He flinched as a bullet ricocheted right next to his face. "Whaddya say, retreat?"
Jack nodded. "Retreat. Down to the next corner."
Owen backed into the corridor the others had run down, gun still drawn. Jack only backed up as far as around the corner, keeping up a steady fire at the enemy line. The robots kept up their steady march, barely hindered by their fallen brothers.
Owen paused halfway down the hall, taking careful aim at any of the bots Jack missed. He hugged the wall with his right side, his leg pressed right up against it.
Jack spared a glance over his shoulder. "Keep moving!" he shouted. "I'll follow!"
Owen took another step back obediently, and he thought he heard a soft ping! nearby, like something falling to the floor.
One of the robots made it past Jack's fire and took aim. Owen snarled like a hungry weevil and lined up his own sight. The gun clicked as he pulled the trigger.
Empty, he thought. You couldn't have given me some spare ammo, could you, Gwen?
The robot opened fire, and bullets whizzed past Owen's head, through his hair, rustling his shirt. One of them hit his shoulder.
No functioning nerves and no pain, but the impact put Owen off-balance, and he stepped back with one foot to catch himself.
The marble went crunch under his foot.
~~
Jack roared and fired at whatever was in range. The nearest robot fell to the ground, blocking the others' path just long enough for Jack to put a little distance between them.
Behind him, Owen suddenly gasped, deep and harsh, like a man saved from drowning.
"You alright, Owen?" Jack called, unable to look behind him for more than a second. Something golden sparkled in the corner of his eye. Owen didn't answer.
"Owen!"
"Jack, I've been shot," Owen said.
Jack swore and brought down another robot as it climbed over another's broken body. He turned and ran to Owen's side. The younger man was leaning against the wall, clutching his left arm in astonishment.
"I've been shot," Owen repeated.
"I can see that," Jack said, glancing at the wound. "Doesn't look too bad though. It was worse when Ianto shot you."
"Jack, I'm bleeding."
"I know, Owen, it's okay, you're gonna be fine."
"I've been shot, and I'm bleeding."
"You're just in shock," Jack said, and fired again. The robots were getting closer. "I think it's time we went and caught up with the others, huh?"
"No," Owen said, frustrated. "No, Jack, look. Look at me. I'm bleeding," and he let go of his shoulder, lifting his hand for Jack to see.
His hand and arm were covered with warm, sticky blood, dripping down his wrist and elbow to the floor. He stared at the bold red liquid in fascination, watching it ooze down his arm and seep into his clothing.
"I'm bleeding," Owen repeated, and Jack realized he was hyperventilating, sucking oxygen into disused lungs and just barely forcing out words between breaths. "I'm bleeding. Jack, I'm alive!"
Jack just stared at him, his weapon forgotten even as he pointed it forwards, mesmerized by the flush in Owen's face, the gasping breaths, the vein that was pulsing in his forehead. Owen still stared at his own blood, suddenly overwhelmed with feelings of hot and cold and pressure and -
He suddenly lurched forwards, grasping his shoulder and crashing into Jack.
"Aw, fuck, it hurts!"
Jack caught him with both arms, stopping him from falling to the ground in pain. He barked a short laugh, grinning madly as he hoisted Owen up and slung him over one shoulder, pointing his gun back at the oncoming security bot and firing.
"Life hurts, Owen!" he shouted gleefully, and began to back up with a quick hop-step the way the Doctor and the others had gone. "Don'tcha just love it?"
~~
The door slid open and the Doctor swung through, brandishing his screwdriver threateningly. The large, froglike security guard was not impressed. He stood up and bared his sharp teeth, thick tail lashing, reaching for a weapon at his belt.
"So you're the trespassers," he snarled. "You're all under arrest. Surrender now or I'll have to use force."
Gwen fired a shot right past the side of his head. He squeaked.
"Security Chief Roc Ingersol, I presume?" the Doctor asked with a raised eyebrow.
The alien nodded frantically, dropping his gun as he flung his hands in the air.
"Right," said the Doctor. He jerked his head towards the open door. "Get the hell out of here."
The frog scurried out. Gwen took up position in the doorway, pointing her pistol down the hall after him, just as a reminder.
The Doctor grinned, bounding up to the TARDIS, which was standing in the corner. "Oh, there you are, gorgeous thing," he cooed, and reached into his inside pocket for the key.
Ianto joined Gwen at the door, armed with the frog's abandoned weapon. She grinned at him, he smirked back, and they both turned to face opposite ends of the hall, ready for the pursuing mass of robots should they appear.
"What about Jack and Owen?" Toshiko asked, walking quickly past Rory and Amy with the still whimpering Moshe to the Doctor's side. "Are we going to pick them up?"
The Doctor peered at his watch, troubled. "I told them ten minutes," he said. "We'll wait ten minutes for them to show up. Amy, Rory, take Moshe inside, will you, cheer her up a bit. Give her a banana. Children like bananas, right?"
Amy just rolled her eyes at him and carried Moshe into the box. There was a short pause before the little girl's voice rang out; "Wow! It's so big!"
The Doctor grinned, but Tosh ignored him, walking quickly over to the security guard's desk. Her implant flashed as she accessed the computer.
"What are you doing?" Ianto asked her.
"Hopefully, clearing a path for them. I think I can get into security's main system and order the robots to stand down." She fiddled at the keyboard some more.
Her eyes narrowed and she paused, finding something interesting on the screen. "Never mind, I just had a better idea."
The Doctor hopped over to her. "Why, what have you found?"
Toshiko didn't answer, too busy typing.
"I see Jack!" Ianto shouted. "It looks like he's carrying Owen, though."
"Right," the Doctor said, pushing away from the desk. "Everyone into the TARDIS. Hurry!"
"Just a minute," Tosh muttered, still working.
Ianto and Gwen also ignored him, running to meet Jack midway. The Doctor threw his arms up in exasperation, then ran into the blue box himself, tugging and smashing at the controls so they could take off as quickly as possible.
Tosh, finished with the security system, ducked in after him.
"Everyone, brace yourselves for takeoff, we're leaving as soon as everyone's in," the Doctor ordered.
Gunshots rang out from the corridor, supplemented by the whine of the energy weapon Ianto had picked up as he and Gwen brought down Jack's pursuers. The fallen robots were simply replaced by more each time, urged on by the mad shouting of Doctor Xarchac, behind them.
"Can't I just shoot the bastard?" Gwen muttered through gritted teeth.
"Best not," Jack called back to her, "The Doctor'd have our hides. Come on, let's just get out of here!"
"'s not bloody fair," Owen muttered, inaudible to anyone but Jack as he hung upside down over the Captain's shoulder. "Face told me I'd live again, said I'd breathe, didn't say how long. Somehow I thought it would have been for longer than fifteen minutes."
"Shut up, Owen, you're not dying," Jack snapped. "You're just in shock."
"S'ppose," Owen muttered, staring down at the ground as it flashed by. "Lots of people go into shock when they get shot. I'm usually better about it. Bit out of practice. Haven't felt anything like pain for the past year or so. Probably makes a difference."
"Probably," Jack agreed, dodging through the door. "Gwen, Ianto, hurry up!"
He ran into the TARDIS, closely followed by the others. Ianto slammed the door behind him, and the Doctor shouted, "Taking off everyone, hold onto something! Geronimo!"
The TARDIS ground and screeched as it took off, sending the inhabitants lurching to the side and grabbing for support.
"Oh my god! Owen!" Tosh shouted, staring as Jack laid Owen on the ground. The blood had soaked through the medic's shirt and all over Jack's coat, now leaking onto the TARDIS floor. Jack ripped the ruined garment off to get at the wound.
The others looked up as she ran to his side and dropped to her knees.
"Rory!" the Doctor shouted.
"On it!" Rory yelled back, running to grab the medical supplies.
Moshe started wailing again, shaking as Amy did her best to calm her down. "Doctor Harper, Doctor Harper!"
"What the hell happened?" Gwen said, pale as she ran to join Tosh and Jack on the floor.
"I was shot," Owen said, still rather delirious. "I'm bleeding all over and it hurts like hell. And I think I broke your necklace. Sorry."
Rory pushed Jack to the side and knelt down to examine the wound.
"What, 're you some kind of doctor too?" Owen asked.
"Nurse," Rory corrected, cleaning away the blood from his shoulder.
"I always wanted a nurse," Owen said, staring up at the ceiling. "Jack always refused to hire one for me. Tosh or someone had to fill in all the time." He winced as Rory carefully reached into the wound with a pair of tweezers.
Tosh was crying as she gripped his hand. He squeezed back, hard, privately elated at being able to feel the pressure and the heat of her hands on his skin.
"It doesn't look too bad," Rory said reassuringly. He dropped the bullet onto the floor and began to clean and dress the wound. "Definitely nothing fatal. You should probably get to a real hospital as soon as possible though."
"I've had worse," Owen said. He released a breath he'd been holding back with the pain and grinned at how good it felt to breathe. He laughed suddenly, adjusting his grip on Tosh's hand. "Tosh, look, I'm fine, never been better. I'm bleeding and breathing and hurting and so fucking alive!" and he pulled her down and kissed her until his lungs burned.
"We should go on that date sometime," he added when they pulled away. Tosh nodded silently.
"How, though?" Ianto asked, staring down at them from where he was still bracing himself against the TARDIS wall. "How are you alive again? The nanites couldn't bring you back, why are you suddenly… better?"
"Gwen's necklace," the Doctor provided without looking up. "You said you broke it."
Owen winced and sat up, supported by Tosh and Gwen on either side. "Yeah, stepped on it. There was a sort of gold light, I guess, and then suddenly I was breathing again."
The Doctor nodded, finally turning around to look at them.
"Time Energy," he said. Owen was the only one not staring back at him for the explanation, busy removing the cast from his fingers and marveling at how they moved.
"Your necklace was full of Time Energy, the same stuff that's in the heart of the TARDIS, which is, incidentally, the same stuff that got into Rose that one time, which means it's the same stuff that keeps Jack immortal. Only your necklace had a much smaller amount, much much smaller after you used it to travel to the future, just enough to bring somebody back to life once."
He paused.
"Maybe twice," he amended. "But I wouldn't test it."
"But what I want to know," he continued, frowning harshly at Gwen, "Is where exactly you got a marble full of Time Energy."
"I know!" Moshe said, sniffling and wiping her eyes on her arm. "I have one too! Mister Face gave it to me! It was a present!"
The Doctor stared at her. The little girl proudly pulled something out from under her dress; a glass marble with a swirl of golden energy inside, suspended by a gold chain, identical in every way to the one Gwen had worn.
The Doctor took it from her and goggled at it. "Where did you say you got this?"
"Mister Face gave it to me!"
The Doctor gaped silently at the necklace for another moment. Then he snorted, holding back laughter unsuccessfully. "Of course he did. Why wouldn't he? Good ol' Mister Face. Pfff."
"What's so funny?" Amy asked, frowning. "Who's Mister Face?"
"The Face of Boe," Ianto provided, though he was likewise baffled by the Doctor's private joke.
Gwen stood up, leaving Owen to be cared for by Tosh, and took the necklace from the Doctor's hand. She held it back out to Moshe with a soft smile.
"I think you'd better hold onto this, Moshe," she said. "And you take very good care of it for me, all right? Someday you're going to have to pass it on to someone else, and you need to look after it as best you can until then."
"Tha'ss what Mister Face said!" said Moshe, and she slipped the chain back around her neck.
~~
They landed the TARDIS back in the living quarter of Adris One. Ianto and Gwen accompanied Moshe back to her flat, passing her on to her extremely grateful mother. Moshe waved goodbye with her usual enthusiasm, fur a bright purple, and they left.
The museum entrance was cordoned off and filled with stout soldiers in black armor. The Doctor and Tosh watched them from behind the barrier with mild amusement.
"What exactly were you doing at that control panel?" he asked her.
Toshiko smiled. "It had access to all of the flats and guest rooms in case of emergency. I just sent a message to that Judoon squadron that there had been a murder and attempted theft of museum property by Eskar Xarchac, as well as an unauthorized lockdown of the station preventing all ships from entering or leaving."
The Doctor smiled, watching the Judoon captain vaporize a dark red robot. "That sort of thing's almost as bad as littering to them," he agreed.
He sighed and turned away from the scene. "It's really something of a pity, though. They'll destroy all of Xarchac's work, set medical science back for another century at least. Nobody will want to use things like nanites any more, with the stigma of being invented by a murderer."
"You knew this was going to happen."
"I knew Xarchac was arrested for murdering his partner," the Doctor said with a shrug. "Didn't know the details. Records never said anything about Torchwood or a museum or anything."
They walked back to the TARDIS.
"No luck getting back to your ship?" the Doctor asked.
Jack shrugged. "No big deal. Didn't have anything too important in there anyway."
"Right," the Doctor said, frowning. "Only I was thinking you would take your ship and refuel and… go do things. I can't exactly take you all with me."
Jack glared back. "There's no room in that hunk of junk for five people, anyway, Doc, and I'm not leaving anyone behind."
"I never said you should!"
"Actually, Doctor," Gwen interrupted, "Do you think you could drop us off back in my time?"
"I can," he answered, "Only I thought you said that you 'disappeared' to here. Won't it count as messing up your timeline to go back now?"
"Only if there are records of it," Gwen said with a smile. "I've got it under control."
The Doctor shrugged and went to put the TARDIS in gear.
~~
"What do you think?"
"It's very… different," Ianto said, gazing upwards at the distant ceiling. "And large."
"Well it has been twenty years," Tosh pointed out. She ran her fingers over a nearby computer, gazing longingly at the familiar Torchwood software running.
"Yup," Gwen confirmed, smiling proudly with her hands on her hips. "Also, we're in New York."
"I thought you were sticking with the Hub 2.0 back in Cardiff," Jack said. "Familiar surroundings, closer to Anwen, all that jazz."
"Yeah, well, that was then, Jack, times change."
"Thought you said it'd only been a month."
"It was a busy month!"
"How many Torchwoods are there nowadays, anyway?" Owen asked.
"Well, Two was shut down and started up again, we rebuilt the one in Cardiff, it's now the central office, London's got some small establishments but for that area we mostly liaison with the Smiths if something happens. And then there's the Drummond Clinic out in L.A., which is a sort of hospital, and a few small bases scattered about and this one here in New York."
"Why move to America, though?" Ianto asked.
Gwen sighed. "Because Rex thinks all of Great Britain and especially Wales is out to get him, personally."
"That's because it is," a harsh voice interrupted from above. Rex Matheson glowered down at them from the entrance, his shirt covered in blood, dragging a struggling alien behind him with the help of two others; one human woman and one blue furry one.
"You might have called first," Rex chastised.
"Sorry, not much reception 2000 years from now and in space," Gwen said, and they grinned at each other.
Rex hopped down the ladder to join them, smacking Jack on the back. "Hey old man, lookin' good. Love what you've done with the hair."
Jack glared back. "You come find me in 2000 years, we'll see how you look."
"Yeah, whatever, World War Two. You gonna introduce me or what?"
There were introductions all around, with the rest of Rex's team joining in shortly. The conversation turned to story swapping, then a quick tour through the facility, and a fair amount of hero-worship from some of the rookies that reminded Ianto of what the Face had said about Gwen and her stories, and he thought perhaps she had embellished the truth a bit. Everyone seemed somewhat in awe to meet them.
"You keep aliens on your team, now?" Ianto asked.
"First contact might not have officially happened yet," Rex said, "But with all these guys runnin' around it seemed like a good idea to put some of them to use. Mind you, that one isn't one of ours, she's just a student, stickin' around to see her project through."
He gestured back at the blue furry woman who had helped bring in the captive earlier. She looked up at his glance and flushed purple.
"I was actually just about to leave," she said quietly. She fiddled with the vortex manipulator around her wrist. "I should really return to my own time, get this back to Professor Song."
"Hey, wait a sec," Owen called, catching up to her as she turned to go.
Her fur flickered through a number of colors before settling on the same dark grey as the wall behind her.
Owen looked awkwardly at her. "You're…. a student, then," he said.
She smiled. "Lunar University," she confirmed. "Archaeology."
Owen smirked. "Just like you always wanted, then. Great." He paused, unsure of what to say. "Sorry I broke your necklace."
Moshe laughed. "Oh, I knew I wouldn't be getting that old thing back. I'm just glad there was finally a use for it."
She took a step back and flipped open her wrist strap. "Thank you for everything, Doctor Harper," she said, and disappeared.
~~
"Really though," Jack said, slipping back out of the crowd to stand next to Gwen. "Why'd you have the Doctor take drop us in New York? You said you'd got it under control, what did you mean?"
Gwen smiled and gestured for him to follow her. "This is the only facility large enough to hold this," she said, leading him downstairs to one of the larger storage areas.
Jack stared up at it.
"This is that ship that crashed back in 2028," he said. "You've repaired it."
Gwen nodded. "We've been working at restoring it since the crash, but we put all our effort into it once we found out about my records cutting off in the future. I didn't want to leave everything completely behind, so we put a jump on our space program. Contact with Earth, but no records of it. Our first truly secret operation since I joined up, I think. We'll be the first Torchwood emissaries to the rest of the universe, just the six of us, together again."
Jack raised an eyebrow. "Six?"
She glared impassively back. "Rhys' records cut off without a trace, too."
For a moment Jack thought about challenging her, just to get that look on her face he loved so much, before slinging his arm around her shoulders and smiling up at their ship. "Sure, why not. I always wanted someone on my ship to cook for me."
She elbowed him in the side, and they went back upstairs to join the others.
Master Post
They all just stared at her. It was Gwen. It was Gwen.
She was older. Her hair was different, wavier, longer, no more fringe in her eyes, and the sort of unnatural uniformity to the color that implied she probably dyed it to cover up grays. Her face was lined; her eyes crinkled at the edges and there was a worry line through her forehead. She looked so much older, with a hardness to her that had just started to come out when they last seen her, when they had died and left her all alone on Earth.
But it was Gwen, she carried herself the same, she still wore the tight jeans and dark leather jacket and the same color lipstick, and behind the superficial changes it was the same face, with the same pale freckles. They were the same bright green eyes that always looked too big for her face, darkened by mascara, looking like they were just on the verge of tears, even with that familiar gap-toothed smile.
She lowered her weapon and dropped it on the ground, stepping out of the archway and down onto the laboratory floor.
"Gwen," Ianto choked. He pulled himself out from under Owen and stumbled to his feet, unable to take his eyes off of her, afraid she'd disappear like so many dreams if he looked away for even a moment.
Gwen smiled that strange, uncertain, not-quite-crying smile at him. "Hey handsome," she said, and her voice was almost as choked up as his.
"We thought you were dead," he said, because it was 2000 years in the future and she had vanished from the records and -
"Look who's talking!" Gwen said with a short laugh, and the tears finally appeared in her eyes.
Ianto crossed the room in three strides and pulled her into his arms. She hugged him back, her arms around his neck, kissing his cheek and getting his hair thoroughly wet with tears. But then, hers wasn't exactly staying dry either.
"God I missed you so much," Gwen said, squeezing him tighter before stepping away to look at him. "I missed all of you, so much, I can hardly believe this is happening."
"Gwen, you…" Owen said, starting towards the two of them and utterly clueless as to how he planned to finish that sentence. It didn't really matter though, because she had him tugged into a hug and was planting a chaste kiss on his dry lips before he could finish the word.
Then she whirled around and met Tosh on the step to the control and grabbed her too, lifting her straight off her feet and spinning her around.
"Oh god," Gwen said, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. She let go of Tosh, who stumbled backwards until Ianto caught her.
"God," Gwen repeated, sniffling one last time before standing up straight. "Right. We don't have time for this!" She grinned somewhat lopsidedly at them before walking right past them, stepping easily over the piled robots over to the door. "We've got to get going before any more of these things show up, yeah?"
"What," Rory said, staring after her, "What just happened?"
"Who are you?!" Amy put in.
"Come on then," Gwen said to them, rolling her eyes and waving the questions off. "I'll explain while we walk."
"But," Ned said, gesturing helplessly as the rest of the Torchwood team hurried after her, "What about your gun? And the Time Gate?"
"Both useless now," Gwen said. "The gun only has one shot at full power, then it takes a full day to recharge. No time for that, so just leave it. And your little arch is useless now too. Sorry. Probably burnt it out when we redirected it and forced our way through."
"Wh-what do you mean?!" Ned shouted, scurrying over the destroyed robots and following the humans out into the hall. "How are you even here? All of the records indicate - "
"You just disappear," Owen finished, slightly accusing. "Vanish, without a trace, from all of the Torchwood records."
"And the rest of the world," Tosh added, "You literally dropped off the face of the Earth!"
"Yes," Gwen said. "I did. I came here."
"…What?"
"I came here!" she repeated. "I disappeared to here. To the future. To this… space station, or whatever it is."
"Timey-wimey," Amy muttered.
"Precisely," Gwen said, pointing at her with a smile.
"But why?" Ianto asked. "Why come here?"
"Well I couldn't exactly leave you, now could I?"
"But Gwen," Toshiko said, grabbing her arm and slowing her down. "How did you manage all this? You literally hijacked the Time Gate's coordinates and forced your way through. How did you do that?"
Gwen shrugged, smiling at her. "Torchwood," she said. "Alien technology. Time travel. All in a day's work, right?"
"How long has it even been for you?" Ianto asked.
"About twenty years," Gwen said with a sigh. "That's… twenty years since we lost you, Ianto. My little girl's at university now, you didn't even get to see her born."
He squeezed her hand.
"In any case," Gwen said, "I think it's most important for us to get out of here, yeah? I can explain everything later, when we're all back together."
"That's right, we still have to meet back up with the Doctor," Amy said. "How are we supposed to find him?"
~~
The Doctor barely managed to get the passageway door open, putting all his weight against the side of it. It didn't help that the 'door' was actually just another part of the wall, designed to be opened by creatures with much more muscle mass than he had. How the hell had Moshe passed through this passage on her own?
"You could help, you know," he said with a scowl at Jack.
Jack smirked and adjusted Moshe's position in his arms. "Hands are a little full, Doc."
Moshe giggled and green flashed across her fur in a quick blush.
The Doctor rolled his eyes and slipped through the small opening into the hall. "Air vents and ancient secret passages," he complained, "I don't normally have to do both in one trip. I'll be stuck in a winding cave next, just you watch."
Jack laughed and followed him out. "So, where are we now?"
"Not sure," the Doctor said. "Not in the main museum. Backstage area, I'd guess, where all the labs and offices and things are. Moshe?"
Moshe nodded. "I'm not supposed to go back here," she said, with an expression that indicated she went there rather frequently. "It's off-limits to the public."
"And you think our friends will be here?"
"Tha'ss where they keep my friends," she said. "They're not supposed to leave either."
"So who are these people, Doctor?" Jack interrupted. "Your companions?"
"Some of them," the Doctor said. "Two of them. Amy and Rory. Only Amy's found people being kept here - Moshe's doctor-friend and two others, if I'm not mistaken - and we thought we'd get them out."
"Being kept for what?"
"As bait," the Doctor said. "You really didn't come here because you heard about the 21st Century Earth exhibit?"
Jack shook his head. "I told you, my ship ran out of fuel. I mean completely out of fuel, I had to turn life support off and float my way here using nothing but momentum. Why would I come for some Earth exhibit, anyway?"
"I like the Earth exhibit!" Moshe interjected. "I get hot chocolates and then they tell stories and we go look at stuff!"
"Their tagline is 'First Contact before First Contact,' Jack, it's about extraterrestrial contact with Earth and time slips and things and the humans who had to cover it up. Sound familiar?"
Jack frowned. "Sounds a bit like Torchwood," he muttered.
The Doctor threw his hands up. "Now he gets it!"
"Someone built an exhibit about Torchwood, just to attract my attention so they could kidnap me and study my immortality?"
"That's about it, yes."
Jack glanced back into the dark passageway. "I kinda want to see it now," he said, "Since they went to that much trouble."
The Doctor rolled his eyes again. "Yes, well, maybe once we're done escaping from the killer robots and mad scientist and rescue the others we can all come back and make a nice day trip of it. Now come on, we have to keep going - "
"Stop!" Moshe said suddenly, turning a pale yellow nervously. "Somebody's coming!"
Jack and the Doctor looked around in either direction - the halls were empty.
"You sure?" Jack asked, backing into the Doctor as he kept a lookout.
Moshe nodded. "I can hear voices!" she whispered, "And footsteps. There's a whole bunch of people over that way."
She pointed over the Doctor's shoulder, where the corridor took a turn to the right.
The Doctor frowned. "I think we'd better take her word for it. Much better ears than either of us have. Quick, back in the passage."
Moshe's large pointed ears flattened against her head at their mention. The three of them hurried back into the hidden passage. Jack put her down so he could help the Doctor shut it, leaving only a crack so they could look out.
The three of them pressed up against the crack, listening with their breaths held. Soon, Jack and the Doctor could hear the sounds as well, voices from down the hall, indistinct but clearly present.
"Doesn't sound like robots," Jack whispered.
"Could be staff," the Doctor whispered back.
Moshe's ears perked up and she flushed green with pleasure. "It's okay!" she said loudly, "It's Doctor Harper!" and she slipped through the crack and out into the hall.
Jack turned to the Doctor with a wide-eyed stare. "Doctor Harper?" he repeated incredulously.
The Doctor just smiled.
~~
Moshe scurried on all fours down the hall and stopped at the corner. "Doctor Harper!" she called, grinning.
The group of would-be escapees paused, turning around to look. Gwen already had a hand on the holster at her hip, but Ianto caught her wrist. Owen just sighed and jogged over to the little girl.
"Moshe, what are you doing here? I thought the museum was evacuated."
"I hid in the wall!" she said brightly, already clambering up into his arms. "There were a bunch of robots but I wasn't scared and then I helped us get here because I know how to get everywhere on the station and it was really fun!"
Owen frowned, trying to make sense of her babbling. "Look, just calm down, speak slowly. You're not hurt or anything are you? You really should have just stayed with your mum this time, it's dangerous in here - "
"Owen?" called a shaky voice.
Owen stopped and stared down the hall, where Jack was clambering out of the hidden passageway.
"Jack?"
There was a moment where they just stared at each other. Then all at once Jack was running down the hall and Owen was enveloped in arms and a WWII air force coat and there was a hand running through his hair.
Moshe stepped back from where she'd slipped out of Owen's arms when they'd gone slack with shock and bit her thumb.
The cry of "Jack!" was echoed down the hall by a more feminine voice, and he stepped away from Owen just enough to catch Tosh as she hurdled into him, grabbing her around the waist and pulling her in to the impromptu group hug.
Amy and Rory watched curiously from further down the hall.
"Are you guys always like this?" Amy asked.
"Nah," Gwen said. "Only when it's important. The rest of it's all arguing and guns and things."
She nudged Ianto with her elbow. "Go on then, what are you standing about for?"
Ianto stumbled forwards at her push. He glanced back at her with a look somewhere between shock and fear, then back at the still locked-together trio.
"…Jack!" he finally shouted, and Jack looked up, smiling wider than ever.
"Ianto!" Jack shouted back, and he ran forwards without letting the others go, dragging them behind him.
Ianto met him halfway, crashing into his chest and yanking his head down into a deep kiss. Jack wrapped his arm around him, somehow, without letting go of Tosh's hand, and his other one still buried in Owen's hair as if losing physical contact with any of them would make them disappear.
"Ianto Jones," Jack whispered, pulling away just long enough so they could catch their breaths, "You are so beautiful," and he kissed him again.
The Doctor rolled his eyes as he sidled past them to the others, holding Moshe's furry hand.
"You see what I have to put up with?" He said to her. "And these two are just as bad, always all excited just because we nearly died, at least Jack has 2000 years of no contact as an excuse."
"Hey, we had 2000," Rory protested.
Gwen just laughed. "Hey, break it up you guys!" she shouted. "We've still got to find a way out of here, remember?"
Tosh and Owen managed to disengage themselves from Jack's grasp, though Tosh was smiling and half-sobbing and leaning into Owen for support. Jack and Ianto took a moment longer before separating and turning to join the others.
Getting closer, Jack stared at Gwen. She smiled brightly back.
"What are you doing here?"
"Here to help get everyone out," she said.
"You disappeared. I went back to Torchwood and nobody would tell me where you'd gone. They told me to drop it and not to worry and that was all."
"Yup," Gwen agreed. "That was the plan."
"What plan?"
"I disappeared to here," she explained again. "At least temporarily, and we all agreed to cut off my records and not tell anybody where I'd gone, because if you knew where I was it would mess up the timeline."
"What timeline?"
Gwen shrugged. "We got a contact," she said, "From the future. Told us about everyone being held here and helped us activate our Time Gate. And because it had already all happened for the contact, it was a fixed point in our timeline, and we couldn't change any details. One of which was that nobody knew what happened to me."
"Sorry," she added, smiling sadly at Jack. "I know it must have been hard on you, but we didn't have a choice."
"I had no word from you for 2000 years!"
"Well sorry, I only saw you a month ago though."
"Okay, wait," the Doctor said. "What do you mean you had a Time Gate?"
"How can you have a Time Gate?" Ned asked, bewildered. "We were told there was only the one in existence! And it's back in that room, broken beyond repair!"
The Doctor turned on him. "What do you mean you have a Time Gate?" he accused. "Professor Uquiccax, if I'm not mistaken, I hope you're happy that your little trap worked."
Ned's ears flattened against his skull in shame. "It - it was donated," he said, dodging the second statement. "It was donated to the museum."
The Doctor frowned thoughtfully. "Donated? By whom?"
"Er," Ned said, trying to think of the archaeologist's name. "A woman, human, somewhat famous I think. Doctor Song, I think?"
"Doctor Song," the Doctor repeated flatly. "Doctor River Song. Donated to you the Time Gate, which brought all these people here."
"Er," Ned said again. "Yes?"
The Doctor turned away with a sigh. "Of course she did. I'm probably the one who tells her to donate it. Figures."
He turned back to Gwen. "Now how did you get a Time Gate?"
Gwen smirked. "We built it."
"You built it?!"
"Sort of. We didn't need to build a whole Time Gate, just something that could access this one and send me through. We didn't have any time or the resources to make anything fancier than that."
"Even though," the Doctor said. "Even it wasn't a complete time portal, it takes a ridiculous amount of energy to power anything that travels through time. Even a dinky thing like a vortex manipulator has to power itself by absorbing time energy from rifts and stars and whatnot."
Jack put a hand on his wrist strap, slightly offended.
Gwen reached into her shirt and pulled something off from around her neck. "We used this," she said. From her hand dangled a gold chain with a glass marble. Inside the glass, a tiny twist of golden energy swirled around, reaching out towards her hand.
The Doctor took it from her and stared at it.
"What is it?" Toshiko asked.
"Time energy," the Doctor said, squinting at it in the light. "Just a tiny bit. Same stuff that's in the heart of the TARDIS."
"There used to be more," Gwen said. "Powering the Time Gate used up most of it."
"I should think so. This little marble can't hold very much, just enough for a one-way trip. Just this amount is still immensely powerful, though; if it weren't contained it could make all kinds of trouble." He lowered his hand. "Where did you get it?"
Gwen shrugged. The Doctor passed it to Jack to look at, and it went its way through the group.
"Hey!" Moshe said, pulling lightly on Owen's trouser leg as he peered curiously at the gold swirl in the marble. It bounced off the edges of the glass, splintering into tiny threads that reached out as if trying to get to the palm of his hand.
"Hey!" she said again, tugging him. "I wanna see! It looks like what Mr. Face - "
The wall opened up, startling the group. One of the security robots stepped out.
"Run!" Jack and the Doctor said at the same time. Owen shoved the necklace into his pocket, the chain still dangling out the side, and grabbed Tosh's hand to hurry away. The Doctor scooped Moshe up from the floor and led the way, followed by Jack and Ianto still gripping each other's hand, Amy and Rory behind them, Tosh and Owen, and Gwen shoving Ned ahead of her as she turned around and drew her gun.
Three gunshots rang out behind them, but when the robot fell it unleashed the same death wail as the one Rory had decommissioned, calling the others to the area. More soon blocked the way, and they were trapped.
~~
"I suggest you all surrender," Xarchac said, but his voice didn't come from any of the robots. He stepped out from the behind the sea of red metal, smirking at them. "How helpful of you all to gather together. It did make you easier to find, Doctor, with you gravitating to Nerranderot's pets and their helpful tracking chips."
Owen had to grab Toshiko's hand to stop her from ripping her own wrist open to get at the chip.
"I knew it," she snarled, her fists clenched. "You stupid fucking bastards."
Ned flinched at her words.
"And I've finally caught my immortal," Xarchac continued, either not noticing or not caring about the interruption. He leered at Jack. "How kind of you to bring him to me."
Ianto made a sort of lunge towards Xarchac, only held back by Jack's embrace. His fingers dug into Ianto's arm, but he pulled him backwards, unwilling to let him run off into danger to be lost again.
"Eskar," Ned whispered hoarsely. "Eskar, calm down, we can… we can work this out."
"Work what out, Nerranderot? Everything went according to plan. Better than we expected, in fact. You got your little exhibit, I got all the subjects I could need for my studies. We'll be famous, Nerranderot."
"Eskar, this has gone much too far!" Ned shouted. "This is… kidnapping and hostages and endangering the museum! I never meant to take anyone against their will or to hurt anybody."
"I did," Xarchac said simply. "Now, I suggest you all drop your weapons and surrender before I give the order to open fire."
"Just you try it," Jack snarled.
Xarchac looked at him calmly. "I don't see why I shouldn't. After all, the only ones of you I need alive… wouldn't die." He sneered in the general direction of the other humans. "Your little friends, on the other hand…"
"Eskar, you must stop this!"
Ned took a sudden step forwards, reaching out towards Xarchac, pleading.
Xarchac sneered and flicked his hand over the opposite wrist. His implant flashed blue. The nearest robot raised its weapon and fired.
"NED!"
Ned slumped to the floor as Owen, Tosh, and Ianto all cried out. Gwen pulled her pistol and fired wildly at the robots, sending Xarchac ducking for cover. Jack pushed Ianto behind him, propelling him colliding into Tosh as she rushed forwards, and drew his own weapon. The Doctor held his arms out, stopping Amy and Rory, staring down at Ned with a melancholy expression.
"Go," he shouted at them, "There's nothing we can do, hurry, cut a path, we need to get out of here. Rory, your sword!"
Rory paused, just long enough to watch Owen kneel at Ned's side, a pool of blood coagulating around the historian's fallen body. Then he turned away, and with a yell charged at the surrounding army.
"Professor, professor!" Moshe sobbed, and her fur was all colors, green and blue and orange as tears streamed down her face. "Professor, no! Professor Uquiccax!"
Gwen turned as she fired, scooping the little girl up in her free arm and running after Rory and Amy.
"Run!" she shouted, shooting one of the robots ahead of them. Moshe screamed and covered her ears.
"Come on, Owen!" Jack yelled, grabbing hold of his shirt. Owen was staring down at Ned, his hands bloody from examining the wound. He let himself be dragged away, and the two of them hurried after the others, dodging under and around the sluggish robots.
"Security!" Xarchac shouted behind them. "Kill them! Bring me the immortal and the Time Lord and the dead one, destroy the others! Go!"
They all ran, charging through the empty hallways with the constant clang of metal footsteps right behind them.
"Amy!" the Doctor shouted, leading the way, "Screwdriver!"
Amy looked over her shoulder. "Toshiko!"
Tosh pulled out the sonic silently, tears drying quickly on her face, and tossed it to Amy. Amy handed it to the Doctor.
He swung around a corner and stopped, leaning against the wall and fiddling with the screwdriver's buttons. The others piled around him; Jack and Gwen peering around the corner with their weapons at the ready, Rory facing the opposite way with his sword, eyes open for another ambush. The clanging footsteps grew louder.
"Doctor, what are you doing?" Jack asked.
"Screwdriver is linked to the TARDIS. I can use it to find it. Then we can get out. A-ha, there we go, you beauty!"
The screwdriver's tip glowed green and it buzzed, like it always did. The Doctor seemed extremely satisfied with this.
"All right, we have to hurry and get out of here."
"They'll catch up to us," Tosh said. "They're not that fast but they can get around the station faster than we can, using the security passages."
"Is that what those are?" the Doctor said. "What do you know. We're lucky they weren't using that one earlier, eh, Captain?"
Jack just scowled, still staring around the corner at the approaching danger.
"You all go ahead," he said, "I'll catch up with you."
"What?" Tosh exclaimed in horror at the same time Ianto grabbed Jack's arm and said, "We're not leaving you behind!"
"I'm not going to lose any of you again!" Jack said, frustrated. "I can hold them off a bit, buy you some time. They can't kill me anyway. If you can all get to the TARDIS, you can lock onto my wrist strap and come pick me up, whether I'm caught or not."
"Jack," Ianto protested, but Jack cut him off with another kiss.
"I'm not going to lose you all again."
The Doctor was frowning, but he nodded. "Alright," he said, "But don't die if you don't have to. Come after us if you get overwhelmed, don't wait more than ten minutes. Got that?"
Jack grinned at him. "Yes sir."
They had all just started to move when Owen spoke up.
"I'm staying with you."
"Like hell you are," Jack said in an angry growl. "You're getting out of here, safe and sound, with all the rest of them. I mean it, I don't want to lose any of you after I've got you again."
"You may have 'got' us, Jack, but you don't own us. I'm staying here with you. You heard Xarchac, he wants me in one piece for more study. They can't kill me either. I can help you."
Jack looked almost ready to snap, unable to think of any argument besides fuck no, it's way too dangerous!
Gwen handed Moshe off to a surprised Amy and walked back to the two of them.
"Owen," she said, reaching into the other holster on the back of her belt. She handed him one of her guns and gave him a quick kiss. "Don't you dare die again."
Jack growled again, swinging around to shoot at the first of the oncoming robots. "Fine," he said, "But you stay behind me at all times, and when I tell you to run, you run, got it?"
"Got it," Owen said, and ducked down behind him, cocking the gun.
"The rest of you, get the hell out of here."
Gwen nodded at Jack's order, pulling the reluctant Ianto away from the arising fray. Tosh hesitated, flashing Owen a quick, uncertain smile.
"You come back to me, you hear?"
He smiled back at her. "Don't you worry, Tosh. We'll be there."
~~
With the sound of footsteps fading behind them, Jack and Owen opened fire on the approaching horde of security bots. Bullets pinged off the walls as the robots fired back, hardly phased by the humans' attack.
"They still use bullets," Owen laughed harshly. "Ned was killed by a fucking bullet, even this far in the fucking future, billions of miles from home."
"They could disintegrate us if they wanted to," Jack said solemnly.
"Yeah, well then I guess it's a good thing they want us alive, more or less."
Jack laughed. "I guess so."
"Thanks for coming to get us, Jack," Owen said, shooting a robot in its eye. "I mean, there wasn't all that much we could do on our own, and we all thought… well, that maybe you'd forgotten us, after all this time."
"It was a fluke," Jack said harshly. "A coincidence. I didn't really mean to come here, except that it was somewhere to refuel."
Owen laughed over the gunfire. "Seriously? You didn't see any of those ridiculous advertisements and shit? Ned went crazy with the advertising, just to set a trap for you."
"Didn't see a damn thing," Jack laughed back. He smiled to himself as he shot down another robot. "But I never forgot any of you, not for a moment."
Owen smirked. "Good to know."
He flinched as a bullet ricocheted right next to his face. "Whaddya say, retreat?"
Jack nodded. "Retreat. Down to the next corner."
Owen backed into the corridor the others had run down, gun still drawn. Jack only backed up as far as around the corner, keeping up a steady fire at the enemy line. The robots kept up their steady march, barely hindered by their fallen brothers.
Owen paused halfway down the hall, taking careful aim at any of the bots Jack missed. He hugged the wall with his right side, his leg pressed right up against it.
Jack spared a glance over his shoulder. "Keep moving!" he shouted. "I'll follow!"
Owen took another step back obediently, and he thought he heard a soft ping! nearby, like something falling to the floor.
One of the robots made it past Jack's fire and took aim. Owen snarled like a hungry weevil and lined up his own sight. The gun clicked as he pulled the trigger.
Empty, he thought. You couldn't have given me some spare ammo, could you, Gwen?
The robot opened fire, and bullets whizzed past Owen's head, through his hair, rustling his shirt. One of them hit his shoulder.
No functioning nerves and no pain, but the impact put Owen off-balance, and he stepped back with one foot to catch himself.
The marble went crunch under his foot.
~~
Jack roared and fired at whatever was in range. The nearest robot fell to the ground, blocking the others' path just long enough for Jack to put a little distance between them.
Behind him, Owen suddenly gasped, deep and harsh, like a man saved from drowning.
"You alright, Owen?" Jack called, unable to look behind him for more than a second. Something golden sparkled in the corner of his eye. Owen didn't answer.
"Owen!"
"Jack, I've been shot," Owen said.
Jack swore and brought down another robot as it climbed over another's broken body. He turned and ran to Owen's side. The younger man was leaning against the wall, clutching his left arm in astonishment.
"I've been shot," Owen repeated.
"I can see that," Jack said, glancing at the wound. "Doesn't look too bad though. It was worse when Ianto shot you."
"Jack, I'm bleeding."
"I know, Owen, it's okay, you're gonna be fine."
"I've been shot, and I'm bleeding."
"You're just in shock," Jack said, and fired again. The robots were getting closer. "I think it's time we went and caught up with the others, huh?"
"No," Owen said, frustrated. "No, Jack, look. Look at me. I'm bleeding," and he let go of his shoulder, lifting his hand for Jack to see.
His hand and arm were covered with warm, sticky blood, dripping down his wrist and elbow to the floor. He stared at the bold red liquid in fascination, watching it ooze down his arm and seep into his clothing.
"I'm bleeding," Owen repeated, and Jack realized he was hyperventilating, sucking oxygen into disused lungs and just barely forcing out words between breaths. "I'm bleeding. Jack, I'm alive!"
Jack just stared at him, his weapon forgotten even as he pointed it forwards, mesmerized by the flush in Owen's face, the gasping breaths, the vein that was pulsing in his forehead. Owen still stared at his own blood, suddenly overwhelmed with feelings of hot and cold and pressure and -
He suddenly lurched forwards, grasping his shoulder and crashing into Jack.
"Aw, fuck, it hurts!"
Jack caught him with both arms, stopping him from falling to the ground in pain. He barked a short laugh, grinning madly as he hoisted Owen up and slung him over one shoulder, pointing his gun back at the oncoming security bot and firing.
"Life hurts, Owen!" he shouted gleefully, and began to back up with a quick hop-step the way the Doctor and the others had gone. "Don'tcha just love it?"
~~
The door slid open and the Doctor swung through, brandishing his screwdriver threateningly. The large, froglike security guard was not impressed. He stood up and bared his sharp teeth, thick tail lashing, reaching for a weapon at his belt.
"So you're the trespassers," he snarled. "You're all under arrest. Surrender now or I'll have to use force."
Gwen fired a shot right past the side of his head. He squeaked.
"Security Chief Roc Ingersol, I presume?" the Doctor asked with a raised eyebrow.
The alien nodded frantically, dropping his gun as he flung his hands in the air.
"Right," said the Doctor. He jerked his head towards the open door. "Get the hell out of here."
The frog scurried out. Gwen took up position in the doorway, pointing her pistol down the hall after him, just as a reminder.
The Doctor grinned, bounding up to the TARDIS, which was standing in the corner. "Oh, there you are, gorgeous thing," he cooed, and reached into his inside pocket for the key.
Ianto joined Gwen at the door, armed with the frog's abandoned weapon. She grinned at him, he smirked back, and they both turned to face opposite ends of the hall, ready for the pursuing mass of robots should they appear.
"What about Jack and Owen?" Toshiko asked, walking quickly past Rory and Amy with the still whimpering Moshe to the Doctor's side. "Are we going to pick them up?"
The Doctor peered at his watch, troubled. "I told them ten minutes," he said. "We'll wait ten minutes for them to show up. Amy, Rory, take Moshe inside, will you, cheer her up a bit. Give her a banana. Children like bananas, right?"
Amy just rolled her eyes at him and carried Moshe into the box. There was a short pause before the little girl's voice rang out; "Wow! It's so big!"
The Doctor grinned, but Tosh ignored him, walking quickly over to the security guard's desk. Her implant flashed as she accessed the computer.
"What are you doing?" Ianto asked her.
"Hopefully, clearing a path for them. I think I can get into security's main system and order the robots to stand down." She fiddled at the keyboard some more.
Her eyes narrowed and she paused, finding something interesting on the screen. "Never mind, I just had a better idea."
The Doctor hopped over to her. "Why, what have you found?"
Toshiko didn't answer, too busy typing.
"I see Jack!" Ianto shouted. "It looks like he's carrying Owen, though."
"Right," the Doctor said, pushing away from the desk. "Everyone into the TARDIS. Hurry!"
"Just a minute," Tosh muttered, still working.
Ianto and Gwen also ignored him, running to meet Jack midway. The Doctor threw his arms up in exasperation, then ran into the blue box himself, tugging and smashing at the controls so they could take off as quickly as possible.
Tosh, finished with the security system, ducked in after him.
"Everyone, brace yourselves for takeoff, we're leaving as soon as everyone's in," the Doctor ordered.
Gunshots rang out from the corridor, supplemented by the whine of the energy weapon Ianto had picked up as he and Gwen brought down Jack's pursuers. The fallen robots were simply replaced by more each time, urged on by the mad shouting of Doctor Xarchac, behind them.
"Can't I just shoot the bastard?" Gwen muttered through gritted teeth.
"Best not," Jack called back to her, "The Doctor'd have our hides. Come on, let's just get out of here!"
"'s not bloody fair," Owen muttered, inaudible to anyone but Jack as he hung upside down over the Captain's shoulder. "Face told me I'd live again, said I'd breathe, didn't say how long. Somehow I thought it would have been for longer than fifteen minutes."
"Shut up, Owen, you're not dying," Jack snapped. "You're just in shock."
"S'ppose," Owen muttered, staring down at the ground as it flashed by. "Lots of people go into shock when they get shot. I'm usually better about it. Bit out of practice. Haven't felt anything like pain for the past year or so. Probably makes a difference."
"Probably," Jack agreed, dodging through the door. "Gwen, Ianto, hurry up!"
He ran into the TARDIS, closely followed by the others. Ianto slammed the door behind him, and the Doctor shouted, "Taking off everyone, hold onto something! Geronimo!"
The TARDIS ground and screeched as it took off, sending the inhabitants lurching to the side and grabbing for support.
"Oh my god! Owen!" Tosh shouted, staring as Jack laid Owen on the ground. The blood had soaked through the medic's shirt and all over Jack's coat, now leaking onto the TARDIS floor. Jack ripped the ruined garment off to get at the wound.
The others looked up as she ran to his side and dropped to her knees.
"Rory!" the Doctor shouted.
"On it!" Rory yelled back, running to grab the medical supplies.
Moshe started wailing again, shaking as Amy did her best to calm her down. "Doctor Harper, Doctor Harper!"
"What the hell happened?" Gwen said, pale as she ran to join Tosh and Jack on the floor.
"I was shot," Owen said, still rather delirious. "I'm bleeding all over and it hurts like hell. And I think I broke your necklace. Sorry."
Rory pushed Jack to the side and knelt down to examine the wound.
"What, 're you some kind of doctor too?" Owen asked.
"Nurse," Rory corrected, cleaning away the blood from his shoulder.
"I always wanted a nurse," Owen said, staring up at the ceiling. "Jack always refused to hire one for me. Tosh or someone had to fill in all the time." He winced as Rory carefully reached into the wound with a pair of tweezers.
Tosh was crying as she gripped his hand. He squeezed back, hard, privately elated at being able to feel the pressure and the heat of her hands on his skin.
"It doesn't look too bad," Rory said reassuringly. He dropped the bullet onto the floor and began to clean and dress the wound. "Definitely nothing fatal. You should probably get to a real hospital as soon as possible though."
"I've had worse," Owen said. He released a breath he'd been holding back with the pain and grinned at how good it felt to breathe. He laughed suddenly, adjusting his grip on Tosh's hand. "Tosh, look, I'm fine, never been better. I'm bleeding and breathing and hurting and so fucking alive!" and he pulled her down and kissed her until his lungs burned.
"We should go on that date sometime," he added when they pulled away. Tosh nodded silently.
"How, though?" Ianto asked, staring down at them from where he was still bracing himself against the TARDIS wall. "How are you alive again? The nanites couldn't bring you back, why are you suddenly… better?"
"Gwen's necklace," the Doctor provided without looking up. "You said you broke it."
Owen winced and sat up, supported by Tosh and Gwen on either side. "Yeah, stepped on it. There was a sort of gold light, I guess, and then suddenly I was breathing again."
The Doctor nodded, finally turning around to look at them.
"Time Energy," he said. Owen was the only one not staring back at him for the explanation, busy removing the cast from his fingers and marveling at how they moved.
"Your necklace was full of Time Energy, the same stuff that's in the heart of the TARDIS, which is, incidentally, the same stuff that got into Rose that one time, which means it's the same stuff that keeps Jack immortal. Only your necklace had a much smaller amount, much much smaller after you used it to travel to the future, just enough to bring somebody back to life once."
He paused.
"Maybe twice," he amended. "But I wouldn't test it."
"But what I want to know," he continued, frowning harshly at Gwen, "Is where exactly you got a marble full of Time Energy."
"I know!" Moshe said, sniffling and wiping her eyes on her arm. "I have one too! Mister Face gave it to me! It was a present!"
The Doctor stared at her. The little girl proudly pulled something out from under her dress; a glass marble with a swirl of golden energy inside, suspended by a gold chain, identical in every way to the one Gwen had worn.
The Doctor took it from her and goggled at it. "Where did you say you got this?"
"Mister Face gave it to me!"
The Doctor gaped silently at the necklace for another moment. Then he snorted, holding back laughter unsuccessfully. "Of course he did. Why wouldn't he? Good ol' Mister Face. Pfff."
"What's so funny?" Amy asked, frowning. "Who's Mister Face?"
"The Face of Boe," Ianto provided, though he was likewise baffled by the Doctor's private joke.
Gwen stood up, leaving Owen to be cared for by Tosh, and took the necklace from the Doctor's hand. She held it back out to Moshe with a soft smile.
"I think you'd better hold onto this, Moshe," she said. "And you take very good care of it for me, all right? Someday you're going to have to pass it on to someone else, and you need to look after it as best you can until then."
"Tha'ss what Mister Face said!" said Moshe, and she slipped the chain back around her neck.
~~
They landed the TARDIS back in the living quarter of Adris One. Ianto and Gwen accompanied Moshe back to her flat, passing her on to her extremely grateful mother. Moshe waved goodbye with her usual enthusiasm, fur a bright purple, and they left.
The museum entrance was cordoned off and filled with stout soldiers in black armor. The Doctor and Tosh watched them from behind the barrier with mild amusement.
"What exactly were you doing at that control panel?" he asked her.
Toshiko smiled. "It had access to all of the flats and guest rooms in case of emergency. I just sent a message to that Judoon squadron that there had been a murder and attempted theft of museum property by Eskar Xarchac, as well as an unauthorized lockdown of the station preventing all ships from entering or leaving."
The Doctor smiled, watching the Judoon captain vaporize a dark red robot. "That sort of thing's almost as bad as littering to them," he agreed.
He sighed and turned away from the scene. "It's really something of a pity, though. They'll destroy all of Xarchac's work, set medical science back for another century at least. Nobody will want to use things like nanites any more, with the stigma of being invented by a murderer."
"You knew this was going to happen."
"I knew Xarchac was arrested for murdering his partner," the Doctor said with a shrug. "Didn't know the details. Records never said anything about Torchwood or a museum or anything."
They walked back to the TARDIS.
"No luck getting back to your ship?" the Doctor asked.
Jack shrugged. "No big deal. Didn't have anything too important in there anyway."
"Right," the Doctor said, frowning. "Only I was thinking you would take your ship and refuel and… go do things. I can't exactly take you all with me."
Jack glared back. "There's no room in that hunk of junk for five people, anyway, Doc, and I'm not leaving anyone behind."
"I never said you should!"
"Actually, Doctor," Gwen interrupted, "Do you think you could drop us off back in my time?"
"I can," he answered, "Only I thought you said that you 'disappeared' to here. Won't it count as messing up your timeline to go back now?"
"Only if there are records of it," Gwen said with a smile. "I've got it under control."
The Doctor shrugged and went to put the TARDIS in gear.
~~
"What do you think?"
"It's very… different," Ianto said, gazing upwards at the distant ceiling. "And large."
"Well it has been twenty years," Tosh pointed out. She ran her fingers over a nearby computer, gazing longingly at the familiar Torchwood software running.
"Yup," Gwen confirmed, smiling proudly with her hands on her hips. "Also, we're in New York."
"I thought you were sticking with the Hub 2.0 back in Cardiff," Jack said. "Familiar surroundings, closer to Anwen, all that jazz."
"Yeah, well, that was then, Jack, times change."
"Thought you said it'd only been a month."
"It was a busy month!"
"How many Torchwoods are there nowadays, anyway?" Owen asked.
"Well, Two was shut down and started up again, we rebuilt the one in Cardiff, it's now the central office, London's got some small establishments but for that area we mostly liaison with the Smiths if something happens. And then there's the Drummond Clinic out in L.A., which is a sort of hospital, and a few small bases scattered about and this one here in New York."
"Why move to America, though?" Ianto asked.
Gwen sighed. "Because Rex thinks all of Great Britain and especially Wales is out to get him, personally."
"That's because it is," a harsh voice interrupted from above. Rex Matheson glowered down at them from the entrance, his shirt covered in blood, dragging a struggling alien behind him with the help of two others; one human woman and one blue furry one.
"You might have called first," Rex chastised.
"Sorry, not much reception 2000 years from now and in space," Gwen said, and they grinned at each other.
Rex hopped down the ladder to join them, smacking Jack on the back. "Hey old man, lookin' good. Love what you've done with the hair."
Jack glared back. "You come find me in 2000 years, we'll see how you look."
"Yeah, whatever, World War Two. You gonna introduce me or what?"
There were introductions all around, with the rest of Rex's team joining in shortly. The conversation turned to story swapping, then a quick tour through the facility, and a fair amount of hero-worship from some of the rookies that reminded Ianto of what the Face had said about Gwen and her stories, and he thought perhaps she had embellished the truth a bit. Everyone seemed somewhat in awe to meet them.
"You keep aliens on your team, now?" Ianto asked.
"First contact might not have officially happened yet," Rex said, "But with all these guys runnin' around it seemed like a good idea to put some of them to use. Mind you, that one isn't one of ours, she's just a student, stickin' around to see her project through."
He gestured back at the blue furry woman who had helped bring in the captive earlier. She looked up at his glance and flushed purple.
"I was actually just about to leave," she said quietly. She fiddled with the vortex manipulator around her wrist. "I should really return to my own time, get this back to Professor Song."
"Hey, wait a sec," Owen called, catching up to her as she turned to go.
Her fur flickered through a number of colors before settling on the same dark grey as the wall behind her.
Owen looked awkwardly at her. "You're…. a student, then," he said.
She smiled. "Lunar University," she confirmed. "Archaeology."
Owen smirked. "Just like you always wanted, then. Great." He paused, unsure of what to say. "Sorry I broke your necklace."
Moshe laughed. "Oh, I knew I wouldn't be getting that old thing back. I'm just glad there was finally a use for it."
She took a step back and flipped open her wrist strap. "Thank you for everything, Doctor Harper," she said, and disappeared.
~~
"Really though," Jack said, slipping back out of the crowd to stand next to Gwen. "Why'd you have the Doctor take drop us in New York? You said you'd got it under control, what did you mean?"
Gwen smiled and gestured for him to follow her. "This is the only facility large enough to hold this," she said, leading him downstairs to one of the larger storage areas.
Jack stared up at it.
"This is that ship that crashed back in 2028," he said. "You've repaired it."
Gwen nodded. "We've been working at restoring it since the crash, but we put all our effort into it once we found out about my records cutting off in the future. I didn't want to leave everything completely behind, so we put a jump on our space program. Contact with Earth, but no records of it. Our first truly secret operation since I joined up, I think. We'll be the first Torchwood emissaries to the rest of the universe, just the six of us, together again."
Jack raised an eyebrow. "Six?"
She glared impassively back. "Rhys' records cut off without a trace, too."
For a moment Jack thought about challenging her, just to get that look on her face he loved so much, before slinging his arm around her shoulders and smiling up at their ship. "Sure, why not. I always wanted someone on my ship to cook for me."
She elbowed him in the side, and they went back upstairs to join the others.
Master Post