Author's Note: I've been in labour three times. The first time I used pain killers. I love Demerol. The other two times, I had natural childbirth - not my choice. The babies came too fast. So I know a bit about labour pains. Btw, I still don't own Torchwood.
xxxx
"Jack, now that Mickey is out of the room, what happened?" asked Martha.
Jack sat up then another contraction hit. Weren't they suppose to be further apart? He didn't scream this time. They weren't as bad as the pain of being blown across the Hub in tiny bits. Then he didn't have the apparatus necessary to scream, so he screamed mentally in what was left of his head. Therefore, there was pain worse than labour. Labour was a bit worse than being shot repeatedly for amusement, horror or both. Jack had been in that situation far too often. Martha only knew of the last time when the Master killed him over and over during the year that never was.
The pain was over for now. "I was trying to get rid of all the information on Torchwood since some hacker announced our presence over all the Earth's communication systems. I was locating a copy in FBI records under 456 when a suicide bomber tried to kill me."
"That doesn't explain the cut on your leg," said Martha.
"I got it jumping out a window," said Jack. "Everything was fine until I landed. Then my water broke."
"A friend of mine called me from a hospital," said Martha. "The morgues are empty. She asked me if I knew something since I used to work for UNIT."
"What did you tell her?" asked Jack.
"I told her I knew less than her," said Martha.
"Morph fields." Jack looked at the cut on his leg. Still there. He wasn't healing. He had assumed he was now mortal, but that cut on his leg was proof. "Everyone in the whole world stopped dying the same time that hacker posted the word Torchwood everywhere."
"I would normally suggest we arrest labour since the longer we can keep the baby in-utero the better. But if the baby is immortal and you're not then the best bet would be C-section. Mickey is calling Ianto then Rhiannon."
So that was the list of names Mickey needed to call.
Martha explained. "We made arrangements with Rhiannon and Johnny if we needed to hide the baby from your enemies."
Jack nodded then another contraction hit.
"Breath through them," said Martha. "You've been through much worse pain. Rhiannon can pass the baby off as hers. She had two children and, with this immortality being a new thing, no one will question if she had a third child. Whoever is sending suicide bombers after you won't get Jeremy."
"Jeremiah," corrected Jack.
"Let's get you to Torchwood then I'll prep you for surgery," explained Martha. "Since the contractions are irregular, we should have time to fetch Owen and Uneek to assist. Do you want to go by van or wrist strap?"
"Van," said Jack in a soft voice.
"Can you walk or do you need a wheelchair?"
"Walk," said Jack. "My leg is only cut."
"You get another contraction; you lend on me and breath through. Didn't you and Lucia have Lamaze training or something with Alice?"
"No, she wanted pain killers."
"She must have been hurt in the line of duty many times," said Martha. "And she copped out of natural childbirth."
"Natural childbirth was part of the back to nature movement. And Lucia associated all that with the crazy PETA people. Lucia said she wanted to go to sleep and wake up with a baby in her arms. Her mother, a good Catholic woman, did that five times. Lucia wanted drugs."
"Ah," said Martha. "Let's start walking to the van."
xxxx
Owen decided to stay overnight at Flat Holm since Diane was away on business. In one of the patients' rooms, CNN International had been playing in the background. Some Danes bloke made the news for not dying. Claude Danes, no, that was the actor who played The Invisible Man. An "O" name, Olsen or Orson or something. Not Owen. Owen would have remembered hearing his own name on the telly. A slow news day. A girl in Devonshire was found buried alive - coughed up the dirt in her lungs; badly bruised but none the worse for wear. She walked off, refusing to go to hospital. Two people in the news for not dying. Odd. After looking at his paperwork and playing a few games on Facebook, he curled up on his sofa.
Finally, he went to sleep to be woken by someone grabbing him.
Still wiping the sleep from his eyes, Owen felt as it he was being pulled through a singularity through his navel. His stomach hurt too much for it to get left behind. A slender black man was holding him against him - Mickey. Was he using Jack's wrist strap time machine? If so where were they going? No arrived? Owen didn't want to open his eyes and hoped he was still dreaming.
When he felt solid ground under his feet, he opened his eyes then got on his hands and knees and vomited. Owen kept on vomiting until he was only bringing up dry heaves. As he stood up, he realized he was in the backroom of the pawn shop they were using as a surgery. This was one of the few moments that he wished he was still dead. Dead people don't spew. Jack was on the table and Martha and Uneek were staring at him.
Martha, finally, spoke. "Clean yourself up. Owen, I need you to monitor the anaesthesia. Do you think you can handle that?"
"Anaesthesia," repeated Owen.
"Scrub up," said Martha. "You need to be sterile. Jack is the mortal one and we are immortal. The rules of the universe or, at least, planet Earth have been reversed."
Owen was also probably mortal because he was connected to Jack's life force. Then Martha was the one who told him that Jack's life force had been animating him after Duroc left. She must want him to keep it secret because people could be listening in. Owen just nodded and used the hand sink to wash up.
"By the way, someone is trying to kill Jack," said Martha. "They're probably hoping at the moment that we will do the job for them. They could be watching our every move."
Owen thought as much. Sometimes, it pays to be paranoid.
