Being human

The Torchwood team all have their ways of coping with loss. Jack POV.

Disclaimer: Don't own it, thanks for the lend.

Timeline: Post season two.

There is a part of me that thinks this is all just a game, shoot 'em down score some points, die and just click replay and it's on again. I hate that part, the part the puts the ones I care for in danger, results in their deaths. I love that part, it frees me from the horror – that this will never ever stop.

Gwen's been crying a lot in the hallway and the toilets and whatever place she imagines we won't notice. The vicious bastard in me wonders if it's because she's discovered her own mortality, not because she's just lost two friends.

Ianto's been quieter than ever and if he cleans the autopsy bay floor one more time I might throttle him.

But it's all just human coping mechanisms. I don't need to resort to such things, I'm not actually human. It's only another two souls slipping into the darkness without me. The two remaining ones will go soon too. I'm not sure how, not sure when, but sometime soon it will be them I won't be shedding tears for.

And there are still aliens, the rift hasn't decided to close up because we want to take a couple of bereavement days.

"Come on team, get your coats. We've got twelve hotspots of pinion energy flickering across Cardiff and they're not going to investigate themselves," I say my voice a nice mix of joviality and get your buts into gear or I'll hit you repeatedly with a weevil.

"But.." Ianto says and I hear the sentence he doesn't finish, 'isn't that Tosh's project?' Gwen just grabs her coat and forces a brave smile on her face that isn't fooling anyone.

It's raining and the first site is a stone quarry sticky with mud – always quarries, why quarries? – but it's good to get moving and out of our little hole of misery. Ianto puts a hand out to help Gwen over a rough patch and I wonder if they're sleeping together, or if they aren't, will they be soon. It seems to be an effective Torchwood coping mechanism, so why not?

I don't think Ianto has slept with anyone but me at Torchwood, but I can't be sure. They way he acts, the silent companion at my side, it's like it wasn't him bent over my desk last night, begging me to go harder. Like he's not filthy dirty on the inside just like the rest of us.

"There's nothing here," Gwen says and it breaks me from my thoughts. I regard the site carefully, stones and dirt and mud, and I can't see anything particularly alien or odd about it, but that doesn't mean anything. And the readings, except for the pinion energy, are normal. But way too much experience has taught me not to trust flimsy things like machines and eyes and I get Ianto and Gwen to do a full sweep of the area while I stalk around looking heroic and shagable – we need to stick to the tasks we're good at.

I think our little trip is doing them good. They're complaining about getting mud on their shoes (their fault if they feel the need to look like models out of a Harrods catalogue) and not looking fragile and morose – which I think improves their looks rather than detracts from them. I'm enjoying the rain, wakes you up rain – and you can taste all the million of things the humans have pumped into this planet, DDT and estrogen and just the tiniest hint of radioactive waste. 'Won't hold you for long,' I feel like saying, 'don't fuck up the next one.' But it's already happened so I remain quiet.

"Ok," I say, "Nothing here, next site," just as Ianto says, "Watch out!"

And mud is pouring down on me and I feel weight and pressure and dirt and not again and I'm screaming and screaming as the darkness takes me.

And I'm screaming and screaming as life catches me again and still only darkness darkness and not again and the dark is darker and please please not again.

They dig me out before I can die a third time, Ianto is wearing more mud than suit, his face close to mine, and he's whispering to me in Welsh which means nothing but sounds like a song. Gwen is hovering, her face indistinct in the rain. And me, I'm not talking, or moving, I'm just screaming and crying and my throat is raw and I'm screaming anyway, not again, not again.

Somehow they've got me to the SUV, Ianto in the back with me, still whispering in Welsh. I think I've stopped screaming because I can't hear it anymore, just Ianto's voice like white noise and sunshine. My face is wet and I'm not sure if it's mud or rain or tears or snot, but I have a feeling it may be all four.

Gwen turns to look at me from the drivers seat, "Ah," she says, "So you are human - good to know," and turns back and starts the engine.

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