Place the usual disclaimer here.

Author's note: One month after the events of "The Thing About Love." I'm probably being too self-indulgent with my OC, but this idea just popped into my head, and I couldn't shake it loose.

So Many Shades of Wrong

Chapter 1: The Mating Habits of…

"Rory?…Rory?" Jack calls as he and Ianto look around her living room with their guns drawn.

Ianto checks the house security system and compares them to the readings from the rift activity monitor. He whispers, "Two life forms in the bedroom along with traces of rift activity."

Jack taps his Comm, "Owen, are you okay? Are you still in the house? Answer me!" He glances over to Ianto who shakes his head.

As they move upstairs and closer to the bedroom, they detect a bright light coming from behind the door. They hear someone moan, which immediately sends up the red flags.

"Alien life form detected," Ianto says quietly. "But the signal is breaking up like it's being scrambled."

Jack gestures for Ianto to stay flat against the wall and wait for his signal as he kicks the door open and aims his gun.

"Oh, God!" the Captain yells, filling the younger man's head with the worst imaginable thought that something has happened to the doctor or his friend.

Ianto hears Rory scream and rushes into the room. The action is fast, but he still gets a good idea of what has been going on. Owen is knocked off the bed. Rory scrambles to cover herself up. Bursts of light flow sporadically through her body, traveling from her hips and through the rest of her body. Jack has his back turned on the pair of them and tries to recover from the shock.

Rory wraps a bed sheet around her body and rushes to the bathroom to retrieve a washcloth for the blood trickling from her lover's nose. "I am so sorry! I just…"

"It's okay. Not your fault," Owen reassures her. He turns his attention to Jack and Ianto, "What the fuck are you doing here?"

Gwen shouts from the first floor, "Jack? Ianto? Hello?"

"Great!" Owen says, grabbing a pillow with his free hand and placing over his lap while Rory flits around the room, looking for their clothes.

"Up here," Ianto calls out.

Gwen enters the room with Tosh right at her heels. The former police woman takes one look at the scene and bursts out into laughter, "This was the alien activity that you called me about?"

The Welshman scans the room with the rift monitor, "We got an alert that something was coming through the rift at this location."

Jack wordlessly takes a blue and pink kimono from the hook on the closet door and tosses it to Rory. Then, he begins to rummage through her closet.

"What happened to you?" Gwen asks the doctor.

"I got a knee in the nose," Owen mutters as he tries to pull on his pants with one hand.

"How did that happen?" Tosh asks.

"He stuck it right into the center of things, I believe" Ianto says in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Oh," Tosh says, realizing what Owen had been doing. She looks over at Rory who smiles like the cat who swallowed the canary.

Jack pulls out an alien device from Rory's closet and hands it to Tosh.

"My closet is a rift dumping ground? The estate agent failed to mention that," Rory comments.

"She did say it was spacious," Ianto quips.

"You didn't notice any rift activity?" Gwen asks.

Rory begins to fidget a little. "We were sort of busy, and I had my eyes closed."

"And she…glows," Owen adds. "Brightly."

Ianto sniggers. "I'm surprised that you didn't go blind with your eyes so close to the light."

Tosh and Gwen giggle.

"I think we got what we were looking for," Ianto says politely as Jack exits the room. "Tosh, if you'll come back with us to the hub to take a look at that. Gwen, sorry to interrupt your evening, but I think we've got it covered. Owen, you should probably have someone take a look at your nose. And Rory, sorry we came before you did."

"Shut up, Ianto," Owen growls.

"Couldn't resist. And if you'll excuse us, we're off."

xxxx

"You can at least laugh about it," Ianto insists. "It is pretty funny."

Jack drives the SUV back to the hub a little too fast. "I am going to have that image burned into my brain for a long time."

"It's not as if she's actually your daughter. She's not even a blood relative."

"It's just that I missed so much of her life. One day I'm sitting at the edge of her bed telling her bedtime stories…"

"And the next Dr. Harper is giving her a very intimate pelvic exam?" Tosh jokes from the back seat.

Jack screeches to a halt at a red light.

"You did say that you approved of them dating," Ianto reminds him. "And sometimes if a man really likes a woman, he's willing to make it all about her."

"Personally, I'm never sure how to bring the subject up with my boyfriend," Tosh quips absent-mindedly.

Jack turns his head around and looks at his computer expert. "You have a boyfriend?"

"Green," Tosh says meekly as she points at the light.

"So what's his name?" Jack asks.

"He's not really my boyfriend. I mean, we are sort of dating…"

"Does he know what you do?" Jack insists.

"It's Andy… Davidson…"

"PC Andy? Gwen's Andy?" Jack asks.

"It's not as if he's Gwen's Andy anymore," Tosh replies.

"When did this happen?" Ianto asks happily.

"About a month ago," she says. "We met, at least formally, at a dance class. We just hit it off."

"You can't tell him anything about what we do," Jack warns.

"I know."

"And he's already curious about all of it," Jack says, rubbing his temple.

Ianto gently rubs the Captain's knee. "I'm sure Tosh has it under control."

"If I didn't have you…" Jack says.

"And now we can be happy for Tosh for finding someone," Ianto replies.

"He's your responsibility," Jack says to Tosh.

"Thank you," she replies.

Ianto turns around and winks at her.

xxxx

The next day, Tosh sits inside the boardroom and examines the device that Jack found in the closet.

Ianto hands her a cup of coffee, "Anything yet?"

"Nothing. This is really unlike anything I've ever seen. It's alien tech all right, but, beyond that I don't even know what it does or what its power source is."

"What does Jack say?"

"He's leaving it to me. Right now, he's busy working on a way to close the rift portal in Rory's closet before anything else gets through."

"Hey you!" Rory says cheerfully.

"Hey yourself," Ianto replies as he gives her a small kiss on the cheek. He twirls her around and looks at her cocktail dress, "You didn't do this for us, did you?"

"I figure I owe Owen a nice meal after last night," the alien says looking at the device.

"You don't mind if I hang out here with you lot?" Gwen asks as she enters the room. "Jack is being really weird around Owen."

"He just had too many surprises last night," Ianto laughs.

"He knows," Tosh tells Rory.

"Does he?"

"You knew?" Ianto asks in disbelief. "And you didn't tell me?"

"She told me not to tell, and I'm good at keeping secrets," she replies.

"Knows what?" Gwen inquires.

"Tosh and Andy sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G," Rory sings.

"Andy who?"

"PC Andy," Ianto replies.

"Andy? My Andy?"

Rory wraps her arm around Toshiko. "He belongs to her, now."

"And how's that going?" Gwen asks with a big smile on her face.

"He's very sweet, thoughtful, romantic…"

"But?" Ianto asks.

"The sex…" Rory says. "I keep telling you, sometimes you have to give a little direction."

"I don't want to seem critical," Tosh says.

"Sometimes being told what to do is actually sexy," Ianto points out. "Maybe he's into the strict school marm types."

"The kissing is good, right?" Gwen inquires.

"Yes."

"And you're happy with him?" Gwen asks.

"Yes."

"Please don't say that the sex doesn't matter," Rory begs. "They are both young, healthy adults who should be enjoying themselves."

"It's not that big of a deal," Gwen insists.

Ianto and Rory turn to each other and laugh. "Yeah, it is," Ianto says.

"Easy for you to say," Gwen says defensively. "You're with someone with all sorts of experience."

A small smile forms on his lips. "Ah, but for me, it was all new. There were all sorts of tricks I had to learn, and I have to admit that Jack had to ease me into some of them."

"And sometimes people figure out those tricks together," Rory adds. "The first time I had sex with Owen was really weird for both of us, not bad, but definitely weird. With practice, things got better. Just last week, Owen experienced multiple orgasms for the first time."

"How?" Gwen asks.

With an impish grin, Rory replies, "Sharing certain nerve responses and sensations is one of the perks of being an alien."

"You've had multiple orgasms?" Tosh asks.

"That's another perk about being an alien. I can make it so he doesn't finish until I do."

"He is your bitch, isn't he?" Ianto comments.

"Hey! He's good," she replies. After some thought she adds with a perverse grin, "He's oh so very good."

"Er, Tosh, you have had at least one?" Gwen asks.

"Not with a man."

"But you at least know how to get there," Rory says encouragingly. "And for most women that's half the battle."

"Get him to talk about fantasies," Ianto suggests. "You try one of his. He tries one of yours."

"And try not to over think it," Rory adds.

"Who needs Cosmo when we've got the pair of you?" Gwen quips.

Ianto places his hand on Rory's arm. "We could write our own magazine."

She places her hand over his. "Maybe have our own television show or go on talk radio. Our ratings would be through the roof."

Toshiko answers her ringing cell phone and mouths, "Andy." She steps out of the room and sneaks off to the empty hothouse.

"I seriously can't imagine what sort of fantasies Andy has," Gwen comments.

"Oh, everyone has their inner freak," Rory responds.

"You don't know he the way I know him," Gwen says. "He's just not that type. He takes his grandmother to church every Sunday for crying out loud."

"It's not like he's going to ask Tosh to have sex with him in a carnival funhouse." Ianto replies. "For one thing, he lacks the authority to shut it down for a couple of hours."

Gwen eyes widen so much, they look as if they are about to pop out. "Not everyone else's sex lives are as… creative as yours. I can't even begin to imagine the craziest thing that you've ever done."

"I wouldn't know how to choose," Ianto muses out loud.

Rory chuckles as she looks over the device.

"You're not going to do anything with it?" Gwen asks her.

"Of course not. Just a small scan to take a look at the circuits." The alien runs her fingers along the alien tech. "This is really weird. It's like it's trying to read me as well." She stops quietly and stands with her hand still on the device as if in a catatonic state.

Ianto begins to panic just a bit. "Rory? Say something please!"

Rory gasps loudly and returns to consciousness. "Hey you?" she replies with a shaky voice.

"You okay?" Ianto says, offering her a chair.

"I was in the machine. I left my body, and I went into the machine. I had to fight it to get back into myself."

"What are you talking about?" Gwen asks.

"It's malfunctioning, and it's bad news."

The machine starts to beep erratically until it flashes for one second, emitting a loud tone that momentarily deafens the three.

Jack and Owen rush into the room. The doctor kneels beside Rory and examines her while Jack attends to Gwen and Ianto. Seeing that she's all right, Owen kisses his girlfriend and holds her tightly.

"Owen," Rory says. "I don't think that's me. I think I'm over here."

"Ianto, what are you talking about?" Jack asks.

Ianto looks around the room. "I'm Gwen!"

Gwen realizes that the body she's inside isn't hers. She's in the alien's body. "Jack, this is bad. Very bad!" She anxiously paces around the room, but soon collapses to the floor as if she's been drained of energy.

Owen cradles her in his arms and tries to revive her. "Babe? Talk to me, gorgeous."

Rory, who is inside of Ianto, kneels next to Owen and says, "I'm Rory, and I think that's Gwen."

"I'm a woman," Ianto says calmly.

When she says this, Jack realizes that Gwen wouldn't react this way. She's being too quiet. He looks into her eyes and says, "Ianto?"

Rather than leap into his arms, she presses herself against his body, and Jack knows that somehow, she is his boyfriend.

Tosh enters the room and takes a look around. "What happened here?"