Torchwood

Characters/show owned by BBC

12 February 2012

This is just the beginning of a potentially quite long fic. This is my first Torchwood story and I only sort of know where I'm going with it, so any suggestions are greatly welcomed. Also: My grasp of British slang is based completely on Doctor Who, Harry Potter, a bit of Lord of the Flies, and of course Torchwood. I've tried to capture the vernacular but any corrections to my American-ness would be gratefully accepted.

Please enjoy.

A Wrinkle in the Sheets of Time

How- How could this happen? This wasn't supposed to happen. This is- This is out of the realm of possibility. How… How?

Toshiko Sato is no fool. She knew, intellectually, what had happened. How it happened. She simply had trouble wrapping her mind around it.

As she sat there, staring at that life-changing little piece of plastic, she tried to grasp what was going on. She'd seen the signs. The nausea, the cravings, the bloating, the missed period. But it hadn't really, truly registered until a moment ago.

Bloody hell. I'm pregnant. I'm… I'm with child. The father of my child died in 1918.

What would her mother say?

Tosh stuck her head into Jack's office.

"May I speak to you a moment?"

Gwen looked up, a bit startled. "How'd you find me in here?"

"You play with Jack's desk ornament when you've had a row with him." Toshiko replied, matter-of-factly.

"Oh." Gwen seemed to consider it a moment, as if she hadn't noticed, and abruptly caught the little swinging metal ball. "What did you come find me for?" she asked, rising from her place in one of the chairs in front of the cluttered desk.

"I- I need to talk to you about something. Privately."

The two women sat across from each other in a booth at a diner a few blocks away from the hub, nursing milkshakes. Gwen had vanilla. Tosh couldn't decide between peanut butter-chocolate, peanut butter-banana, strawberry-banana, or chocolate-strawberry and so got chocolate-strawberry-peanut butter-banana. Gwen had raised an eyebrow at the choice.

There was a slightly uncomfortable silence as Tosh tried to work up the courage to confide in the person she felt most comfortable talking to, about this subject anyway. Gwen sat back and, observing that her colleague must be having some internal dialogue, tried to give her due space and not rush her. Nothing passed between the two but the occasional surreptitious glance for several moments as Gwen took intermittent pulls on her straw and Tosh stirred methodically, her hand seemingly acting of its own accord as the brain was away.

"If this is you coming out to me I'll have you know I'd figured everyone in Torchwood was pretty much pansexual. Part of the job description or something."

Tosh could've laughed, but instead let past an almost ironic chuckle. "No, it's not that."

They lapsed back into a silence that Gwen could tell Toshiko had no idea how to break. Gwen watched the evening light play across her colleague's downturned face for a moment, deciding she was actually very pretty in a quiet sort of way, with wisps of hair falling in her eyes, the warm brown eyes hidden behind those glasses. She sat hunched over her milkshake, looking as if the glossy red booth behind her could swallow her up at any moment. Folded in upon herself, functional ponytail, lavender blouse draped over her shoulders like a camouflaged security blanket, Gwen had never seen her colleague so… Childlike. Vulnerable. She took it upon herself to break the silence yet again.

"So. You said you needed to talk but you haven't done much talking."

"Yeah, sorry. I um…" she trailed off, then seemed to find her footing "Have you ever been pregnant?"

The question caught Gwen completely off guard. "I- What? I um…" She took a breath. "I thought I was, once. I was so scared." Her hands left her milkshake and she looked down at them, playing with her cuticles. "Was convinced it was going to get me kicked out of the Academy, ruin my dreams of becoming an officer." Gwen seemed a million miles off as she gazed unseeing at her hands. She snapped out of it abruptly. "Turned out I wasn't though," she said, pulling at her red tee and adjusting her black blazer. A thought struck her.

She instinctively grabbed Toshiko's hand. "Why?"

Tosh didn't shrink from the touch. She spoke to her milkshake. "I am. Pregnant, I mean. I haven't gone to the doctor or anything but…" She met Gwen's caring, imploring gaze for a moment before continuing to address the ice cream. "I took a test from a corner shop. And… And I just am. I know I am. I can feel it." Tears hovered threateningly in the corners of her eyes.

Gwen processed the information for a moment. She rubbed Toshiko's hand with her thumb, wishing she could hug her. Wondering if she'd let her. She knew the answer to her question before she asked it in a low, even voice. "That night, with Tommy, did you…"

"Yes."

"Did you use…"

"No. It wasn't… It didn't cross my mind, actually. Our first and last night together… I suppose I thought sperm from 1918 was different or something."

They both chuckled at that. The smiles didn't last long.

"How far along, do you reckon?"

"It'd have to be a little over a month. Unless the whole cryogenics thing changes anything."

"Don't see why it would."

They sat in silence for a moment. Gwen held both of Toshiko's hands in her own, soothing her with gentle rubs with her thumbs. The milkshakes were forgotten.

"What are you going to do?"

"I don't know. I don't know."

The two women sat on the couch in Tosh's apartment. Gwen sipped a glass of wine as the hostess swilled grape juice. The silence was comfortable this time as streetlight spilled in from the panoramic window. Stars twinkled in the background, providing the real scenery over a breathtaking view of Cardiff. The night was serene, the only disturbance the steady hum of traffic on the street below. The night sky was a brilliant canvas of color, the white glow of the moon highlighting the orange, yellow, blue glowing orbs floating in a sea of colorful brilliance disguised as a black sky. The nearly-full moon seemed to spotlight every moment of pure humanity. Toshiko couldn't help but think that utterly peaceful moments such as this made life worth living, even after everything she witnessed at Torchwood.

She wondered if, nearly a century ago, Tommy had seen this same moon before he was executed for cowardice.

Suddenly, and to Tosh's utter bemusement, Gwen began giggling. She almost spilled her Merlot.

"What? What's so funny?" Toshiko was confused and a bit hurt, suspecting Gwen was laughing at her.

"I- I just…" Gwen collapsed in another bout if giggles. "I imagined Jack babysitting!"

They laughed their arses of for a good ten minutes.