Chap 1
It is a pleasant, moonlit, windless night in mid-June. We see a long straight stretch of white beach. Behind the low dunes are the dark shapes of large expensive houses. We hear a number of voices singing.
Around a blazing bonfire, a group of young men and women are drunkenly singing. Two young people break away from the others. They are Andy Davison and Mary Andrea. Behind them, there is considerable necking activity; Andy and Mary are more serious.
He fumbles with her knickers, plunging fingers inside her while still full clothed. She cries out and writhes beneath him, pulling at his clothes. With his flies undone, his erection peeks from his jeans and he enters her eagerly. As they fuck in the sand she grips his hair as he snarls through his release. Far too soon but she knows he'll be longer next time. Suddenly she feels the sand and she clambers to her feet, kicking off her knickers into his face.
Andy makes an awkward attempt at catching Mary, grasping her from behind. She squirms playfully out of his grasp.
"Hey! Hey, hey! I'm with you, right?" Andy slurs as he stumbles drunkenly after her.
They are separated from the others, silhouetted against the fire, she pauses and looks at the ocean, he is plodding along in the sand.
She runs down the dune towards the water, leaving Andy gasping at the top of the dune. As she runs, she is moulting her clothes. Andy is trying to follow her by her clothes, like Hansel following bread crumbs through the woods. But Mary is way ahead of him.
"C'mon!" Mary laughs as she runs headlong into the sea, plunges into the water with a light cry as the cold water sweeps over her.
Then we see a gentle swell in the water, a ripple that passes her a dozen feet away. A pressure wave lifts her up, then eases her down again, like a smooth, sudden swell.
"Andy? Don't dunk me ya twat ..." she warns as she looks around for him, finds him still on the beach, his feet twisted in his pants, which have fallen around his ankles. She starts to swim back in to him.
The water-bulge is racing towards her. The first bump jolts her upright, out of the water to her waist. She reaches under water to touch her leg. Whatever she feels makes her open her mouth to scream, but she is knocked again, hard, whipped into an arc of about eight feet, up and down, ducking her down to her open mouth, choking off any scream she might try to make. Another jolt to her body, driving her under so that only her hair swirls on the surface. Then it too is sucked below in a final and terrible jerking motion.
In his undies, laughing to himself, Andy is turning in slow stoned circles, held prisoner by his windbreaker which seems to have him like a straightjacket, as he struggles to free his arm from a tight sleeve. As he turns, we hear the singing in the background, from the fire.
Finally he falling into the sand and lays there laughing at himself as he repeats his promise to come to the breeze.
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A beam of morning sun filters through the crack between the bottom of the curtain and the windowsill, falling across the top of the sleeping couple on the bed. It catches Jack Harkness right across the eyes, bringing him up from sleep. The job is completed by the clock radio, which clicks on with local fisherman's report and weather.
Ianto Jones burrows his head under the deep red covers, avoiding morning for a few precious minutes more. Jack slips under the covers and finds the morning wakeup call has woken at least one part of Ianto, taking his morning woodie into his mouth. As Ianto whines and flails, Jack finger fucks him.
Still wet and slick from last night's coupling, Jack enters Ianto easily. As they wake each other with heady moans and panting breath Jack is overcome with love for this lovely man who not only left his native country to follow him here but also accept two small hellion children from Jack's failed marriage into his life. All from one week in Wales to give a speech to the Heddlu about the Stun Guns he had designed. He came away with a contract and a husband.
Now this dream job came up where he could raise his kids in a real community while Ianto would graciously give up his passion for the sea and try to write that novel he had been chewing over for years.
"How come the sun didn't used to shine in here?" Jack whines to his partner.
"Because when we bought the house it was autumn. This is summer." Ianto mumbles from the pillow as he settles back into the bed.
Jack climbs out of bed, wearing socks, and nothing else, "Right."
"Do you see the kids?" Ianto asks as he yawns and stretches ogling Jack.
"Probably out in the back yard." Jack grins as he scratches himself.
"In Amity, you say 'Yahd.'"Ianto snarks and Jack grins.
"The kids are in the yahd, playing near the cah. How's that sound?" Jack responds, pulling at Ianto's foot.
"Like you're as far from home as me" Ianto sighs as he misses Wales.
"Give me 30 years, I'll get it." Jack climbs back into bed and proceeds to show Ianto how at home he can be.
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Ianto enters the kitchen and goes to make coffee, starts to fill a kettle to boil water, the cold water rushes through and out the burnt-out bottom of the kettle.
"Did you burn another kettle? You know you're a fire hazard? This is the third one!" Ianto yells as Jack emerges, drying his hair from the shower.
"I never hear the whistle." Jack shrugs as he steals a kiss.
Before Ianto can answer, Miller, his oldest boy, enters, holding his hand. There is bright new blood on it, but he is not worried. It's a normal childhood scrape.
"Cut my hand. Bit by a vampire." Miller snarls pretending to wipe the blood on Jack.
"On the swing? I told you not to play near there until I sanded it down." Jack growls then turns to Ianto and points to the blood smear in his trousers, "See what your son did?"
"Go upstairs and bring Taddy a Band-Aid." Ianto rolls his eyes as Miller stomps upstairs.
The boys had decided Ianto was theirs and Jack could share him if he was good, the love between them instant. Jack was blessed and knew it as his gorgeous husband adored the children as if he had carried them himself. God, just don't ever call him the wife!
Ianto fumbles in his dressing gown pocket and produces Jack's new glasses, which he holds out to him. "Don't forget these."
"Oh, yeah." Jack sighs as he puts them in "How do I look? Older, huh?"
"I think they make you look sexy." Ianto wiggles his eyebrows and Jack laughs, bending to kiss him lightly.
Then more seriously Jack asks, "Sexy, huh? What was I before?"
"Older, sillier." Ianto ponders the question, "Blind!"
Jack looks out the window to the view beyond, CJ, the younger child, is happily cavorting in the summer air, enjoying the very air he breathes.
The phone rings and Jac kanswers one of two phones on the wall.
"Harkness... yeah, what's up... mmm ... Well, what do they usually do, float or wash up? Really? ... okay, I'll at the beach in," Jack checks his watch then speaks again, "...20 minutes, okay? Okay."
"First goddamn weekend of the summer." Jack spits as he slams down the phone.
Miller re-enters in bathing togs, with a towel on his shoulder, his hand washed, holding a Band-Aid ready for Ianto who takes it, and bandages the finger with care and affection.
"There." Ianto declares as he kisses his son's hand then turns to address Jack "What was that?"
"The office." Jack groans as the door slams, announcing Miller's exit.
Ianto brushes his hand over Jack's badge as he flicks of imaginary fluff, "Be careful."
"Here? You gotta be kidding" Jack gives him a soft kiss, starts to go, with his cup. "Love ya Tiger."
"Hey Captain. Bring my cup back." Ianto murmurs as he leans in to steal another kiss.
At the door, Jack takes a windbreaker off a hook and you can see the Amity Police shoulder patch as he goes to an SUV parked outside.
Jack's SUV roars past an enormous billboard depicting a typical summer day in Amity. A beautiful model splashes in the gold surf, languishing in a glowing sun. AMITY WELCOMES YOU is written above her flailing arms.
Three small figures are walking the beach. The sea is rough and there is flotsam and jetsam strewn about from the receding tide.
Deputy Gwen Cooper is searching the shore about one hundred yards down wind. Meanwhile, Jack, in his casual police attire, and Andy, still in the clothes from last night, walk down the beach. Jack carries the missing girl's shoes, purse and clothes. In the daylight, Andy shows his nerves, wavering between maturity and tear-blown adolescence.
"Mary what?" Jack tries to understand the relationship between the two young lovers.
"Andrea. - No one ever died on me before." Andy whines.
"You picked her up on the ferry." Jack reads his notes.
"I didn't know her." Andy shrugs.
"And nobody else saw her in the water?" Jack frowns as he checks the number of people on the beach according to his notes.
"Somebody could've" Andy concedes as he rubs the back of his neck nervously "I was sort of … well, passed out."
"Think she might've run out on you?" Jack stops walking to watch the boy's reaction.
"Oh, no, sir. I've never had a woman do that. I'm sure she drowned." Andy replies with wide eyes that show he never even considered that option.
"You from around here?" Jack starts walking about and Andy tries to keep up.
"No. Cambridge. Harvard. My family's in Tuxedo, New York, though."
"You here for the summer?" Jack looks over the waves.
Andy waves his hand up the beach, towards beach houses, "Some friends and me took a house."
"What do you pay for a place just for the summer?" Jack is interested and turns to face the boy.
"A thousand apiece, something like that. There's five of us. And we each kick in a hundred a week for beer and cleaning, stuff like that." Andy says with a grin.
"Pretty stiff." Jack sniffs as he mentally works out the numbers.
A shrill whistle makes them turn. Gwen is fifty yards away, on her knees. She blows again, a half arsed report this time.
"Maybe that's your girl." Jack shouts as he breaks into the run, followed by Andy with a nervous grimace.
A coil of seaweed lays at the base of this isolated dune. The booming waves and hissing surf make it hard to hear but Gwen is on hands and knees, looking white as a sheet pointing back at the dune.
Jack tells Andy to wait at the foot of the dune, and climbs up. Gwen stops him with a wave-off, saying something at the same time as a mouth full of spew erupts. Jack nods understandingly and steps up carefully, looking down. He adjusts his glasses, trying to make sense of what he is looking at.
Whatever he sees has a marked effect on his entire body.
Kicking out with his foot, Jack sends dozens of angry crabs into an escape frenzy and they boil over the top of the dune and down its slopes.
Andy takes a few nervous steps backwards when Jack waves him over. He shakes his head. Jack glares and waits silently. Then Andy shuffles forward the few remaining feet, his eyes looking everywhere but down. Jack says something else lost in the sound of the pounding surf and Andy shakes his head again, eyes out at sea. Jack puts his arm gently around the trembling man's shoulder.
Nodding, he starts to look down, an inch at a time. He looks. He, too, can't make out what it is at first. Then he recognises what he is looking at.
The jolt that assaults Andy is not unexpected. He falls backward in a sitting position as though shot. Nods yes it's her. Jack turns and slides off the dune, stumbling close. Hears his own breathing in is ears as his blood boils.
He looks around, SHIT!