Storybrooke, Maine, 2016
'Emma, you have got to see this,' had been David's only explanation when he'd called, in the early hours of the morning. He'd been kind of vague on the details 'You'll understand when you get here.' He'd said, a trifle bemused.
She'd headed to the place David had told her to meet up, Killian riding shotgun in the Bug, as Emma wondered to herself, irritably lamenting her lack of morning coffee, what was so important that he had to wake them both up just as the sun was rising.
'Dave seemed pretty shaken up,' Killian commented suddenly, as if reading her mood.
'Yeah,' Emma breathed an audible sigh. Something about this whole situation was putting her nerves on edge, making her jumpy despite her tiredness, which was odd, because she wasn't prone to sudden feelings of impending doom, but she did have a razor-sharp sense of intuition, and that meant her gut was telling her something was off about the situation, then it was probably justified.
The bug pulled up to the place. It was a small, disused cabin on the fringes of town. Gold had once used it as a second home, and after that, her friend August had been interrogated there. It was a place she knew all too well, but immediately, the sense of something being off was heightened when she saw it.
David was standing close by, arms folded over his chest in a gesture of thinly-disguised concern 'It appeared about an hour ago,' he explained as Emma exited the bug and strode up the cabin, and intent frown creasing her face 'Gold said he sensed something weird in this place, we thought it might be a Dark One thing.'
She didn't reply, she just kept on walking, her expression growing more and more bewildered with each step. Killian shot her father-in-law and inquiring look, but he shrugged and the two began to shadow behind Emma.
Emma saw immediately the thing to which David had been referring. There was a bright, sickly purplish glow pulsating from the windows, interspersed with flickers of white, like an indoor storm, but there was no thunder, only an odd crackle and sizzle and spark of energy. What was it? Since she'd become Saviour, Emma had gotten pretty good at sensing magic, but the vibe that seemed to pulsing off this thing in waves was completely different.
'Wait here for us,' Emma told David, cautiously.
'Uh-huh,' David began sternly.
'Whatever this thing is,' Emma began, her tone severe 'It's dangerous. Don't ask me how I know, I just do, okay? Now you need to stay here, in case anything goes wrong, and Storybrooke needs a backup sheriff.' She gave them both a disarming smile and touched Killian's arm 'Besides, I have my deputy by my side.'
David looked sullen, but began baking away slowly. He lingered on Killian with a knowing, take care of my daughter look, and there was a nod of understanding, which Emma pretended not to notice.
'Let's go,' she said, turning to Killian, before trudging towards the cabin while he followed after.
They entered the cabin silently, closing the door behind them. It was pitch dark, save for the strange light source, which stood in the centre of the empty room, a pillar of white-hot, intense light, its washed-out edged fringed with a bright, pinkish-purple glow, the colour of fork lightning. It wavered, crackled and fizzled unstably, as if barely holding its shape.
Killian and Emma squinted reflexively as they looked into its bright light, straining their eyes. The flickering lights cast an eerie, pallid reflection on their faces.
'What is that?' Killian asked, his voice hushed with disbelief.
'I have no idea…' Emma replied, her own voice barely a whisper. She edged forward, surreptitiously, gazing into the light.
Concern mounted on Killian's face as she drew closer 'Emma, bare careful,' he said. She didn't respond. She was oddly transfixed by the lights of the strange anomaly. The air around it seem to pulsate with a strange pressure.
She edged out a hand, very slowly, the tips of her fingers brushing the edge of the anomaly. Tiny zigzags of pinkish static seemed to jump out from it and stick to her skin, almost magnetically. She winced at a tiny prick of pain, but then gasped as a sudden jolt rushed through her mind and body.
The sudden sensation was accompanied by a rush of images, which flooded through her mind in what felt like a fraction of a second, and yet each image was distinct and clear. Strange creatures. A modern cityscape she didn't recognise. A glossy black SUV, with a single word stencilled on the door: 'TORCHWOOD'.
Somehow, Emma managed to yank her hand free, and she felt herself stumble backwards, gasping in shock more than anything else. She almost doubled over, seized with a sudden dizziness, but Killian was there to catch her, deftly, before she hit the ground. Her body felt limp, but he managed to usher her to one of the cabin's chairs, carefully sidestepping the anomaly setting her down as softly as he could.
'Emma?' Killian asked, putting her face close to hers 'Are you alright?'
'I think it's a portal,' she said, her voice raspy 'But it's different somehow.'
'Focus on getting your strength back, Swan,' he told her, gently.
Killian turned back to the anomaly, perplexed. A portal, she'd said… he edged up to it and carefully, slowly, edged his hook towards it.
There was a strange resistance as he pushed hook experimentally through the layers of violet light on the outer edge, a strange sense that the otherworldly pressure vibrating from it had grown stronger.
Emma was suddenly lucid again, seize with a sudden panic, and she shot upright from her place in the chair 'Hook, wait!' she yelled, causing him to whip his head round.
Before either of them could say anything, there was a sudden inrush of wind as the anomaly imploded inwards, accompanied by a deafening, deep buzzing sound, like a Theremin on loudspeaker, as the air of the cabin vibrated electrically.
The glowing column of light seemed to swallow Killian whole as it collapsed into a blinding point of light like a star, then exploded outward violently in a flash that illuminated the entire room in white for a second, before dissipating into nothingness. There was a faint tingle of power in the air for a few seconds, and then nothing.
An eerie stillness settled over the room.
Then Emma saw him.
A man, curled into a ball in the centre of the room, exactly where the anomaly had been only moments before. He was hugging his knees to his chest, his body steaming faintly. He lifted his downturned face from his knees, and regarded Emma blearily. She gaped at him.
After a while, he grinned winningly at her 'Captain Jack Harkness,' he said suavely 'Now who might you be?'
'Emma Swan,' she returned 'Now, where the hell is my husband?'
Cardiff, Wales, 2009.
Gwen Cooper was having 'one of those days'. She'd known it was going to be hectic when they'd gotten an alarm first thing in the morning. She hadn't even had time to check her e-mails before they were bundling into the SUV and off to god knew where to face god knew what.
The reading was…weird.
'It's not a standard rift flare-up,' she informed them, checking the SUV's internal displays. The offending anomaly was represented as a purple splotch on the map, rhythmically pouring out faint pinkish waves. 'Whatever it is, it's an energy signature we've never seen before.'
'I know, I sensed it.' Jack stated. He sounded on edge, wound tight.
Gwen didn't know what that meant, but something in his tone told her not to ask.
'It's coming from a packing factory, downtown,' Ianto informed him before she could.
'Got it.' Jack nodded, and slammed down on the accelerator.
Within minutes they were there, and I befuddled foreman was ushering them through the plastic curtain into a back room, where they immediately saw what they were looking for. It was a column of white incandescent light, fringed with deep violet, that crackled and wavered with a constant outpouring of energy.
'Jack, what is that?' Ianto was asking. Gwen just found herself staring at its flickering light.
Jack's eyes were wide, his voice a thrilled whisper 'It looks like a temporal cross-gate,' he said, edging forward to put his face inches from the anomaly 'Theoretically, you place two gates at two independent points in spacetime, and you could create a bridge between,' he held two fingers a few inches apart, then made a two-finger walking motion, to demonstrate.
Gwen quirked an eyebrow 'Could? Theoretically?'
'Yeah,' Jack nodded slowly, his brow furrowing intently 'Trouble was, there were terribly unstable. The machinery used to generate them exploded more often than not. Obsolete, my by time.' He exhaled thoughtfully 'But this one's holding…naturally.'
Before either of them could say anything to the effect of "Jack, wait!" Jack stuck a hand inside, as though testing the temperature for a bath.
He winced, as a jolt of energy coursed through his body, and a series of images played through his mind with impossible speed and clarity. A forest, reforming itself in a haze of purple mist into a small American town. A yellow Volkswagen trundling up that same town's main road. And a woman, blonde in a red leather jacket, holding a sword at one side.
Jack was thrown backwards out of the anomaly, as if spat out, staggering and swaying. Gwen and Ianto each instinctively shoulder an arm to steady him.
'Bloody hell, Jack!' Ianto scolded, frantic 'Don't ever do something that impulsive ever again.'
Jack managed a queasy smile 'Fat chance.'
It didn't take him long to support himself again, and by that time, he was already eyeing the cross-gate again 'I saw the other side,' Jack explained 'Something, some force, or entity or power, linked our time to another, creating natural cross-gates in the process,' he expression clouded with thought 'But…why?'
He turned to Ianto and Gwen 'I'm going through; whatever this is, whatever's causing it, it has to be deliberate, and that kind of meddling with time could destroy everything, especially if it interferes with the rift.'
'Jack—' Gwen started.
'Not buts,' he declared with a smile 'I'll be two minutes.'
He gave them one last dazzling grin and threw himself into the gate…and it collapsed inward with a rush of air, and a deafening buzz of energy, falling into a white point of light, which flared briefly, and then popped into non-existence.
'Ah,' said Ianto, crestfallen 'So much for two minutes…'
Gwen blinked. In non-existent the time since the gate had vanished, a man had appeared on the floor in its place. He was sprawled, moaning, eyes fluttering groggily. Gwen stopped over and examined him warily. He was wearing a leather jacket and tight black jeans, pretty normal clothes. Pinned to his lapel was sheriff's deputy badge, cut into a star shape. She squinted to make out the lettering 'Storybrooke Sherriff's Department,' she read aloud, completely nonplussed.
Strangest of all, there was a steel hook on the end of his arm, where his left hand should've been.
His eyes opened and he blinked up at them in a daze 'What…? Where…?' he muttered.
'Who're you?' Gwen demanded, reflexively reaching for her sidearm.
The man heaved himself into a sitting position, a little indignant 'I'm Captain Killian Jones,' he announced 'Who the bloody hell are you?'
'We're Torchwood, mate,' Gwen told him curtly.
The man pulled a face 'Who…?'
Author's Note: Hey, folks! So typically, authorial notes like this will go at the beginning of chapters, but in this case, I decided to put it at the end, to let the first chapter speak for itself. So yeah, from that, you have the setup for our story: Jack and Killian switching places, which means switching locations, switching 'teams', and…well, lots of other, plot-related things! Characters from the Whoniverse may also pop up in this story, including a certain doctor *wink wink*. Anyway, hope you enjoy this first chapter. Be sure to leave a review so I actually know that, too. See you guys for the next one!