Moving On

Drama / Sci-Fi / Romance

Rated M for mature themes, sexual situations (mostly Jack/Ianto because I enjoy writing them), and language.

And a great big huge thank you to my beta reader for making this a better story!

Who is Liz? (edit added 22 May, 2008) For anyone who hasn't read my previous work or been watching Doctor Who as long as I have, Liz Shaw is a former companion of the Doctor's. I brought her in for my previous fic A New Day; but it isn't necessary to read that before this. I just wanted to clear that up because it has confused a few people.

Synopsis:

After the Atmos incident, Jack realizes that Liz is right and he needs to hire someone young enough to keep up Torchwood... he arrives just in time to help them solve a case that looks suspiciously like spontaneous human combustion.

House/Torchwood Crossover (with Doctor Who references galore, although truthfully, I think of them as practically the same show, with so much crossover between cast and crew.)

A/N:

Prior knowledge of House isn't strictly necessary, although some has been included in the notes, mostly for anyone who wants to put faces to names (google images is a great resource.)

Crossovers are far and away my favourite kind of fanfiction. We can do things here that are impractical or even impossible to do on screen, so why not take advantage of that and have as much extra fun as possible? ;-) This idea started with the question "Who could Jack hire to fill the vacancies in the wake of Exit Wounds…?"

Setting:

Doctor Who: Poison in the Sky (contains only minor spoilers), Torchwood: post Exit Wounds (and post my own stories Short Stories and A New Day.) House: post Wilson's Heart (by a couple of months, time to give everyone a chance to recover. May contain spoilers in later chapters, but none here.)

House: Very briefly, for anyone interested, House is an American medical drama starring Hugh Laurie in the title role. The cast also includes Australian actor Jesse Spencer as Robert Chase, Jennifer Morrison as Allison Chase, Omar Epps as Eric Foreman, Lisa Edelstein as Lisa Cuddy, Robert Sean Leonard as James Wilson and Anne Dudek as Amber Volakis (aka "Cutthroat Bitch"). In supporting roles are Peter Jacobson as Dr. Chris Taub, Kal Penn as Dr. Lawrence Kutner and Olivia Wilde as "13," (aka Dr. Remy Hadley) who along with Foreman make up House's current team of diagnostic ducklings. The majority of these characters are background figures in this piece.

The usual disclaimers apply. I don't own any of it, just borrowing some of the characters for my own amusement (and possibly the amusement of others.) I promise to put them back where I found them and they won't be any the worse for wear… well… Jack may have a few teeth marks, but they'll heal…

Prologue: The Day the Earth Stood Still

Princeton, New Jersey (USA):

"Everyone, please, don't panic! Just get down to the ER and help. I'm sure we'll have some news soon…House!" Lisa Cuddy's voice became loud enough for the whole floor to hear when she spotted House trying to duck around a corner. Since she had everyone's attention anyway, she stopped trying to be subtle in the hopes of avoiding further panic, and raised her voice. "Unless you're treating a critical injury, I need all medical staff to report to the ER immediately. Thank you."

Outside the hospital windows, white gas continued to drift up from the street below. It had become so thick one could hardly see the sky any more. Whispered words like 'terrorist attack' and '9/11 all over again' floated through the hallway, growing louder by the moment.

"Come on people, staring at it won't make it go away and it won't give us any answers either. As soon as I hear something, I'll let you know." Cuddy pulled a group of staff and patients away from the windows. Telling the former to get back to work and asking the latter to please return to their rooms, trying to assure them that they were safe; they just needed to clear the halls. "We're all scared," she added. "But we just have to stay calm and everything will be all right."

She'd called in every off-duty security guard they had, but no one could get in so she had clerical staff, orderlies and janitors escorting patients back to rooms and trying to keep them there without creating any more alarm than the conditions outside were already causing. So far no one from the FEMA or the CDC had returned her calls, but according to the last news report she'd seen, the situation was world-wide.

Cuddy spotted House's team filing out of his office. She snagged Eric Foreman's arm as he passed, "Where is he?"

"Staring out the window."

"I don't have time for this… HOUSE!"

"What the Hell is going on out there?" His voice was calm, too calm.

"I don't know, but would you please get down to the ER? I need every pair of hands I've got down there." Much to her surprise, he complied with the request without further comment. Shit. House was doing what he was told; it really must be the end of the world.

She walked over and looked out the window herself. Someone on the news had said it was like a plague of Biblical proportions and looking at it, it was easy to believe…Cuddy shook herself and continued making her way through the hospital, getting the ER the help they needed, getting patients back to bed and trying to convince herself that it would be all right.

…………………………………………

Chase spotted Foreman and flagged him over to the elderly patient he'd just gotten into a chair; he would have liked to have her lying down, but there wasn't so much as stretcher available, and people were still wandering in. "Foreman!" he called when the other doctor didn't immediately come over.

"Yeah? What d'you have?"

"She needs oxygen and a bed – a stretcher – a desk – it doesn't matter, just something. Then get anyone who isn't keeling over to move into the cafeteria. I'll be back in a minute."

"What're you doing?"

Chase fished his pager back out of his pocket; it had gone off five minutes ago, its screen flashing with a number he'd hoped he'd never see again.

"Chase?"

"I have to make a call."

"We're in the middle of a…" But Chase was already on his way over to the nurse's station, helping himself to the phone despite the objection of several other staff members. Cuddy had issued a 'do not use the phone' order over an hour ago; everyone had someone they wanted to call, but the hospital was already in a state of pandemonium as it was without everyone jockeying for a few minutes on the phone.

"Are you out of your mind?" Foreman hissed in an angry tone at Chase's elbow, having gotten a nurse to find a cot for the patient Chase handed off.

"No more so than the next guy. Why?" Chase punched in the last number displayed on his pager and then erased it.

"If Cuddy catches you on the phone…"

Chase held up his hand to silence the man next to him and began speaking into the receiver, "Chase, Robert, Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital…that's in New Jersey… yes, the United States. Yes… hang on…" He grabbed a pen out of a nurse's hand and turned over a form to write on. "Yeah, all right. Got it. Copy that…whatever. Thank you, Sergeant."

Sergeant? Foreman scowled. "What's going on?"

Chase ignored him, literally pushing the same nurse he'd taken the pen from away from the computer, completely ignoring her objections.

"What the Hell is going on here?" Cuddy wasn't even a foot out of the elevator, her pager in one hand; one of the nurses had clearly paged her to report Chase's behavior.

"Dr. Cuddy, good, glad you're here," Chase didn't even look up from the computer screen where he was typing a lengthy web address.

"This isn't the best time to be surfing the internet for porn," came a familiar snarky voice; House leaned over the desk to peer at the screen.

"You'd know all about that, wouldn't you?" Chase shot right back without missing a keystroke. He pocketed the web address before typing in his name and password, neither of which showed up as anything but asterisks on the screen.

"I'm assuming you've got an explanation?" Cuddy maneuvered to stand behind him, not looking like she was going to accept anything he had to say for himself.

"Yup… Here. This is the best chemical breakdown we have of that gas out there."

Suddenly the room got very quiet. Everyone was staring at the television, which had been tuned to WBZN News all day. "The United Nations has issued a worldwide directive…" announced the anchor woman.

"They call this a bloody heads up?" Chase muttered, bringing Cuddy's attention back to the screen. "Here. Mostly Co2, some hydrocarbons, some No2. And you need to get people to stop saying it's a terrorist attack."

"So what is it?" asked Foreman.

"Industrial accident," Chase repeated the line he'd been given over the phone. He wasn't sure anyone was going to actually believe it, but if enough doctors told enough patients that it was an industrial fuck-up…

"Who were you just on the phone with?" Cuddy wanted to know.

"Never mind that," Chase told her. He supposed she had the right to be upset, seeing as she was supposed to be in charge here and probably couldn't get any answers herself. But it's not like FEMA is going to have any answers, he realized.

"Ten percent unidentified heavy metal compound?" Foreman came around to look over Chase's shoulder too. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Don't worry about it, just deal with what we do know. Treat it like Co2 poisoning…"

"First I want you to tell me where you're getting this from," Cuddy insisted, nodding towards the computer screen. There was nothing on it to identify the source; even the web address was obscured. "And who the Hell were you on the phone with?"

"I'm on a list," Chase answered, intentionally ducking the actual question.

"What sort of list?" Foreman and House both asked (although the latter didn't sound more than casually curious, which was typical.)

"Look, we can stand around arguing about it while people start dying or we can do our jobs. This stuff becomes lethal when saturation reaches eighty percent and since it seems to be coming from cars equipped with that Atmos thing, metropolitan areas are being hit the hardest," he added, letting Cuddy skim the file for herself.

"Evacuation?" she read the word in red letters.

"Only on the coast; we're too far inland. The situation is being handled. Right now our job is to help these people here, to get everyone inside, away from the doors. You there," he stood up and called to the nearest security guard. "Get everybody back away from the exits. Every exit. No one goes outside. Period. And for the last time – anyone who doesn't need immediate medical attention, please to get to the cafeteria now!" He walked over to a nurse, "I need a couple of you to go down with them. Keep an eye out for symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning, and for God's sake try to keep people calm," he gave the woman a sharp look. "This isn't a terrorist attack, people; it's an industrial malfunction. It's being worked on, so just please just stay calm. The gas isn't lethal."

"What's going on?" Allison Cameron slid up to Foreman and House.

"Looks like your boyfriend has a backbone after all," House gave her a snide little smile. "Who knew?"

"I thought it was having a backbone that got him fired in the first place," Foreman returned before Cameron could speak.

"That's just because he stood up to the wrong person," House countered. "Me."

"And we all know no one does that," said Cameron; her tone was dry.

"Good thing Cuddy outranks you," Foreman added.

"She just has a soft spot for rejects," House told him, although clearly he was aware that he was insulting himself as much as anyone else. The whole reason Foreman had been forced back to Princeton-Plainsboro was that no one would hire him after having worked for House for so long. He was tainted by House's reputation, just like Cameron and Chase. This was the only place any of them would be working for a very long time.

Cuddy stepped in next to Chase, "Come on, people! Let's go! Anyone who hasn't been exposed to the gas please move to the cafeteria…" she gave Chase a look, and under her breath told him he was going to explain himself later.

"With all due respect, no I'm not."

"I beg your pardon?"

"I said 'with all due respect, no I'm not'."

"Dr. Chase…"

"I'll be happy to give you the number of who can take it up with if you'd like, but I'm afraid my hands are tied." As some semblance of order was being restored to the ER, Chase headed towards the nurses' station to try and get a handle on which patients were in for gas exposure and which were here for other injuries. Just because there's an invasion going on out there doesn't mean people aren't injuring themselves in perfectly normal, every day acts of non-alien-related stupidity, he thought. In fact, he expected to see more acts of perfectly normal human stupidity before the day was over because when people were scared they did stupid things. And people don't need to know about aliens to be scared.

He realized Lisa Cuddy was less than half a step behind him. It didn't look as if she was interested in the charts he'd picked up. "I'm sorry," Chase told her without making eye contact. "I've said as much as I can."

"Can you at least tell me what kind of 'list' you're on?"

"Auxiliary civilian medical personnel attached to the Unified Intelligence Taskforce."

"The what?"

"UNIT. I'm one of a couple of hundred civilian doctors around the globe who gets contacted in case of certain types of emergencies."

"Like industrial accidents?" It was obvious she didn't believe him.

"Something like that."

"And you've never mentioned this before because…?"

"It was never relevant to my job here."

……………………………………………………….

Three hours later a wave of fire swept over the sky, clearing all traces of gas. Ten minutes after that, Chase's pager went off again. He sank to the floor, exhaustion and relief overtaking him until he saw Allison peering anxiously down at him. "It's all right," he told her. "It's safe to go back outside again." Industrial accident, he repeated to himself, have to just keep saying that line… news people will be fed a story… Allison was speaking:

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. I'm sure."

"What was that?"

"Doesn't matter."

"Robert… "

"Honestly, Allison, I don't even know. But it doesn't matter. It's over. It was just an industrial accident." Even he didn't believe the words coming out of his mouth.

………………………………………..………

Chase waited until he was home to get back onto the UNIT site to read the full report, at least what was being released to civilians. He was well aware that there were plenty of details UNIT wouldn't make available to mere auxiliary personnel such as himself. Just the same, there was plenty that was being made available and it had been a long time since he'd logged in.

He was prowling through the archives' article on Sontarans when someone knocked on his door. There was really only one person who would show up at his apartment at one o'clock in the morning and the last thing he wanted Allison to see was a detailed work up on the alien species that had very nearly destroyed the earth… again.

"Did I wake you?" she asked when he finally opened his door.

"Nah, come on in. Sorry, place is a bit of a mess," he apologized as he admitted her into his living room.

"After today I really don't think I care about dirty socks."

"You all right?"

"What do you think?" Allison leaned up against the wall and folded her arms across her chest. "I want to know what really happened today, Robert. Please."

"I can't tell you."

"Can't or won't?"

"A little bit of both. Can I get you a beer or something…?"

"No. I don't want a beer," she pushed off the wall and wandered further into the room without sitting down. "I want some answers. Almost half of the cars on the planet went haywire today and started spewing poison gas…"

"It's over. Don't worry about it."

She stopped and stared at him. "How exactly am I supposed to not worry about it?"

"By not thinking about it."

"I had an Atmos system, Robert – Sally – Jen – either of them could have been killed. I could have been killed… "

"Shhhh," he drew her into his arms and held onto her as anger melted into tears. "Are they all right?"

"Yeah. They're fine. I just want to know what happened. I need to know."

"Even if I could tell you, you wouldn't believe me."

"Foreman said you got a page today, some kind of emergency list… "

"Let it go, Allison. We survived. That's all that matters."

"So I'm just supposed to keep saying 'industrial accident' like everybody else?"

"Yeah," he brushed a stray bit of hair out of her face, tucking it securely behind her left ear, "That's exactly what you're supposed to do."

"How many other things have you lied to me about?"

"I'm not lying to you," he insisted. "You're right. It wasn't an accident, industrial or otherwise. But that's what we're supposed to say, so that's what we're goingto say. It's what I'm going to say, even to you."

She gave him another long measured look, clearly not happy with his answer but when he leaned in she didn't resist.

"You planning on staying the night?" Robert asked quietly.

"I don't think I want to be alone right now."

"Let's get some sleep then," he eased her towards the bedroom.

……………………………………………………………..

Cardiff, Wales (UK)

Jack tucked a blanket around Liz's sleeping form. She was out cold on the sofa behind what used to be Tosh's station. They both knew what had happened… who had made it happen. There was only one person mad enough to light the whole planet on fire and brilliant enough to know it would work. Jack found himself chuckling at the thought of his Doctor.

"Sorry you missed him?"

"Ianto. I didn't hear you..."

The younger man smiled and handed Jack a cup of coffee. "So are you?" His tone was deceptively light and he didn't step in quite as close as Jack might have liked.

"I'm sure I'll see him again. Some day."

Ianto nodded and turned to leave Jack to his thoughts.

"Thanks for the coffee," Jack said before he'd completely gotten away.

"Any time," Ianto favoured him with one of those sweet smiles. "I ah – I'm going to take a shower and lie down. You coming to bed soon?"

"No."

Ianto just nodded; sometimes it was easier not to ask too many questions. When Jack wanted to share what he was thinking he would. "I'll just leave the coffee pot on then, shall I?"

"Thanks. For everything, Ianto. You were great today."

"Just doing my job, Sir."

Jack smiled and pulled Ianto closer; Ianto met the kiss half way with an eagerness that surprised Jack. They were both exhausted from the long day, but tongues tangled and bodies pressed up against one another making Jack wish he didn't have work yet to do. I'm glad you're here, though, he thought in the younger man's direction. Glad you'll be waiting for me when I do drag myself into bed. "Go get some sleep, Ianto. I'll be down later," he promised.

"Try not to stay up all night."

"Wouldn't be the first time," Jack offered up a grin that left Ianto chuckling.

"Yes, but as I recall we were up to something a whole lot more fun than whatever it is you're going to be up to, all alone tonight."

Jack suspected that Ianto knew just what he was going to be 'up to'… "You know what they say, no rest for the wicked."

"If that were really the case, neither of us would ever get any sleep," Ianto leaned in and kissed him again, lightly this time, and left him to get some work done.

Jack watched him go, not making any attempt to pretend he wasn't enjoying the view. Definitely love the suit, he smiled and drank some more coffee.

It was late, Gwen had gone home an hour ago and by tomorrow the rest of the world would have begun putting itself back together again. But Liz is right, she nearly died today because she's…he couldn't bring himself to use the worlds 'too old.' He didn't think of her in terms of years, but that didn't change the fact that she couldn't keep up with them in the field and he knew it. He would miss having her here…but I'll hate myself if she dies because I'm having a hard time replacing…

He glanced at Tosh's station – the station that used to be Tosh's. "No one can replace you, Toshiko. No one can replace Owen." He still felt the pang of loss whenever he thought about them, saw their faces staring at him from the darkness… Damn, I miss you, both of you… "But we can't carry on the way we have, either." Somebody was going to end up getting killed if they tried.

Jack tried Martha's mobile again to see if he couldn't talk her into coming to work for him. Still no answer. She'd phoned him to say she was bringing the Doctor to London, did he want to drive up and surprise him, but since then there had been nothing. Jack sighed knowing he could worry about her or he could do something useful. He opted for the latter, because one thing the Doctor wouldn't do was to ever let anything happen to Martha Jones.

Jack drained his cup and refilled it on the way back to his office and the stack of files Ianto had left for him a week ago. He sat down in his chair and began perusing the fruits of Ianto's labour; a flicker of a smile playing across his lips as that phrase drifted through his mind, too. But at the end of it, every file that Ianto had put together for him ended up in the 'no' pile.

It wasn't that Ianto hadn't given him fifteen very strong candidates; fifteen people with skill sets that would meet their needs, with life experiences that would help them fit in. It was just that none of them was Owen Harper or Toshiko Sato. And maybe that was unfair, but it was the way it was.

Frustrated, Jack shoved the entire pile into the trash and went out to Ianto's station to search the UNIT data base for himself. Auxiliary civilian medical personnel…

"Well that sounds promising," Jack mused as he began scanning through the files. It became even more promising when he came across a name he knew. I wonder if he still wants that job he asked me for a few years ago…