Creator's Note: Various authors have tried (and some succeeded) to put their own spin on Exit Wounds and what happens after. This, this is my attempt. But first, I heard this song from Trisha Yearwood's album and thought the chorus was perfect. You'll probably still recognize it after my fiddling, so as such the concept is hers. I'll let you know if I've written any of the songs I'm using. I'm not sure I will, but it's not yet out of the realm of possibilities. After this chapter, Tosh and Owen aren't mentioned again (except in possible passing) and I thought the best place to start from was the ending. Because, after all, aren't all endings just new beginnings?
Italics signify the songs. Oh yes, and I'm not the BBC, RTD, JB, etc. You know the drill. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to go listen to "No Good Deed" from the Wicked soundtrack.
--On With the Show!--
Her sight was vacating her mind, slowly. The last thing she focused on was his smile and his eyes, the last great barrier from his tears. She smiled because she knew. Tosh had been impressive. Ianto would probably have his own way of moving Jack with the fireman's carry, she noted that he might have to. It looked as though he'd have no plans to leave her. It was that same carry that had released Lisa from the clutches of Canary Wharf. Only, Tosh assumed, Ianto probably wouldn't have used a syringe filled with sedative to move Lisa away.
Ianto's willpower in these situations was always, well, impressive. No one understood and loved Torchwood as much as Ianto and Tosh had. Thinking of Lisa made Tosh want to beckon Ianto closer, but he always stayed a bit farther from death, knowing it rather personally more so than most of the Torchwood crew. Oddly enough, the words and the hope clung to her throat, kidnapped by the pain emanating from her wound. She did want to say sorry to Ianto. She knew blood would be murder to clean up.
She regretted not being more proactive like Gwen or being more faithful like Ianto, but she could never realize how much of a perfect blending of the two she had been. She would never realize how loved she had been, even in her loneliness. She smiled at Jack, allowing her eyelids to flutter away finally and meeting Owen in the darkness.
The quiet that consumed her mind as she thought back onto those first few days with Torchwood and getting settled in, that time with the space pig, posing and saving Owen's backside, Suzie's death and Gwen's entrance, being trapped with Ianto and the cannibals, the first time she had met John Hart, and then working with Gwen on the "Island Project", as they had dubbed it for necessity.
She didn't want the memories to bombard her. She watched blood flow slowly from her wound and let the pulse of the alarm set the pace for her memories. She heard the intercom beep, taking her from her trance.
Toshiko Sato gripped onto the nothingness of the floor and dragged herself down the stairs, even setting a projection up for herself and moving the cart with the adrenaline needle around. All to help Owen. Owen, who was forcing her to concentrate and do what she did best.
"Tosh, I need some help here!"
"I'm here."
"Are you alright?"
"Just a machine malfunction."
"Are you hurt?"
"Just my arm." I really don't enjoy lying.
"Okay." I did hope she wasn't lying.
A few minutes pass and things become severely more complicated. This time, I'm feverish and manic with my skill. Not just to save Cardiff, but to save Owen. I don't even have enough composure left, but somehow manage, with my back freezing from the cart and my head numb from the shot of adrenaline, to get him lighting and a way out. "Now, seal the building and the containment will be set in. Just remember to get out."
"Thanks, Tosh. I usually have trouble remembering that part."
"That's what I'm here for."
He screams into my ear while I fight to breathe and feel. I grit my teeth and the beginning of my eyesight glazing over is setting in. My fingertips graze the floor in an attempt to feel as I helplessly watch the toxic levels all around him rise after the door seals itself.
"Owen, just stay calm!"
"Where's the fun in that? I'm going to wage my way into oblivion! Give me one good reason why I shouldn't keep screaming?"
"Because you're breaking my heart!"
Wasn't this bound to happen?
Wasn't this just a matter of time?
This world is just too small for us to really say goodbye"
You smile that smile that you get when being nervous
Like you don't know what to do
But this is me you're talking to
I've heard that you admit it
But that the feelings didn't take too long
I'll submit it isn't easy
Knowing we can never move on
But I can see in all those movements
How anyone could easily fall for you
This is me you're talking to
Me, the one who really knows you
Me, the one who's heart you've broken
Me, the one who continues hoping
The one who'll be missing you
"Tosh, it's not your fault. Listen. You've saved my backside so many times, from the second I joined."
I laugh weakly, remembering. Maybe he can tell we're both closer to death than we've ever truly been before. "Your second week. Pretend I was a medic-space pig."
We don't have to put on this show
We can just pretend to be only friends
As much as I would love to
I don't really think I can
"We never really did get that date, did we, you and me? We kind of missed each other. It's my fault."
You don't have to tell me that you really love me
After all that we've been through
This is me you're talking to
"I didn't notice it until it was too late. I'm sorry."
Me, the one who really knows you
Me, the one who's heart you've broken
Me, the one who continues hoping
The one who'll be missing you
"Owen. It's alright."
You don't have to say you do
This is me you're talking to
This is me you're talking to
"I like to think of the world as an interconnected database program, full of human likes and dislikes. One of those dislikes under fear might be death, worse is loneliness. But death without loneliness? I don't have that. Because now we both know. Because now we've both lived. I think a late night news anchor could say it best for the rest of the team, for the things I see in Torch wood's eyes. But it's alright, it really is.
Sources say it's too early to account for the extent of damages.
Maybe the end is where we start from. This is Toshiko Sato, in her last private Torchwood transmission, logging off."