Author's Notes: And the officially first chapter is here! I've tried to plant the roots of just how skewered Ianto's idea of life as a whole now is and I hope that shows. Had a bit of trouble with portraying Gwen as a mother, though, and I'm not really sure that it worked at all, but from what I've seen from the few Miracle Day episodes I've watched, she missed Anwen but she wasn't too troubled by leaving her somewhere safe. Anyway, I hope you enjoy the chapter and, of course, feel free to let me know what you think!
Gwen hovered near the kitchen table, uncertain, as Ianto sat down in one of the chairs. The water dripping down from him was already forming a puddle on the floor and she knew that if Rhys was there, he'd freak out over the stains on the wood. As it was, though, the storm outside kept raging on and the only thing breaking the silence was the occasional thunder.
"So–" Gwen cleaned her throat. "How come you're here?"
Ianto looked up, surprise painted over his features. "What, no 'how are you alive'?"
"Well," Gwen cleared her throat, "I've always had my suspicions. People have been– seeing things."
"Things?" Ianto's eyes narrowed in suspicion and Gwen felt a shot of anxiety run through her. There was something wrong, something incomplete about him that she couldn't quite place.
"Six months after your death," she started, pulling out a chair and sitting down as well, "Jack left Earth. He said he couldn't cope with everything that had happened and he just– ran away. On the day after that, I heard about that place we had been meaning to investigate since forever – the House of the Dead, I think it was called – and I realised that the Rift had been closed. I interrogated some of the people that had been there and they all confirmed that someone by the name Jack Harkness had interfered in the séance, and that he'd had a companion with him. The description fit perfectly and I thought he'd found a way to bring you back and, given how angry he looked when I last saw him, that he'd lost you again. Never got the idea out of my head, to be honest. Never really stopped hoping."
"Well, I'm just glad you didn't shoot me when you saw me at the door." Ianto seemed to think about that for a second and then gave a mirthless laugh to a joke Gwen didn't understand. "I closed the Rift and it threw me out somewhere else. I didn't realise it at first, but it was a different dimension – also Earth, but in the 35th century and with some major historical differences. They all have got these," he lifted his arm to show her a wrist strap very similar to Jack's, "and they can travel through time and space, easy as anything. I had to work on mine for quite a while to get it to take me to another dimension."
"Why didn't you come in when you saw the house?" Gwen asked, thinking about the time she'd watched him outside. "You could have said something instead of standing there in the storm!"
"I wasn't sure how you'd take it," he admitted. "I arrived this morning, actually; went to where the Hub used to be and when I found nothing, I tried to find you. Took a few hours, but here I am now."
Definitely different, Gwen thought to herself. He was smiling, but there was something dark in it, as if he was thinking through every word for an ulterior motive, and it suddenly occurred to her that she'd trusted him all too easily. She'd desperately wished it to be true, and yet...
"How's the baby?" He asked and distracted Gwen from her descent into doubt. "How old is it now?"
"Oh, she's not a baby anymore," Gwen smiled. "She turned five last week."
"Six years," Ianto said quietly, tone somewhere between fascinated and incredibly sad. "It was two for me. Funny how many things can change for so little time." Before he could say anything else, he yawned and Gwen cut in.
"Would you like the guest room? And maybe some dry clothes?"
"I've got my own," Ianto said, nodding to the case he'd brought with himself. "But I could use a bed, yeah. Travelling in time is tiring enough without it being trans-dimensional as well."
"I'll show you the way."
Once Ianto was asleep, Gwen took out one of the scanners she'd salvaged from the wreckage of the Hub and ran it over him. Just in case.
The screen lightened up. 100% human, with residual traces of chronon energy.
That was enough for her. She left the room and snuck up into her own bed.
o.O.o
Gwen woke up later than she usually did – most likely because of last night's happenings – and came down to the kitchen where she heard the unmistakable sounds of someone making breakfast.
"Good morning!" She greeted from the door and Rhys gave her a cheery wave as he kept working on the eggs. "I– I have some news." He threw her an inquisitive glance over his shoulder. "We've got a guest."
"We do? Who's coming?"
"He's, ah," Gwen faltered, not sure how the news would be accepted. "He's already here. It's our guy from last night."
At that Rhys abandoned the eggs and turned around sharply. "What?"
"He's not a burglar," she hurried to say. "He's– He's Ianto." Just as she said it, she realised that it didn't offer much comfort. Oh, he wasn't trying to rob us; he's just my dead colleague!
Rhys's expression shifted from disbelief to something like compassion and he brought her in for a hug. "I know you miss your old life sometimes," he said, "bur Ianto is dead." His voice was gentle and comforting, as if talking to a child, and Gwen shoved him off.
"No," she snapped, irritated, once she realised that he thought she'd had a rather vivid hallucination. "Jack brought him back somehow, and now he's here. Actually, I think he's already–"
"Hello, Gwen!" She swirled around when the door opened and Ianto flashed her a quick smile. He was dressed in clothes similar to last night's – tight black jeans, a black dress shirt and the leather coat he'd arrived in, paired with heavy combat boots. "I think we should go see if–"
"Wait a minute," Rhys cut him off. "You're here. You're actually here."
Ianto's eyes focused on him with just the sort of condescending amusement that he'd always displayed for her husband. "Yes?"
"And how did that happen?" Rhys continued, stepping in front of Gwen who rolled her eyes. She was tired of the overprotectiveness he adopted every single time when Torchwood was involved in any way.
"Short version? I was taken out of my own timeline and brought back to life, then I closed the Rift and ended up in another universe, and now I need help."
It was the first time since last night that he'd admitted what he'd come here for, and also the first time ever she'd seen his looking so vulnerable under the cocky expression. Gwen raised an eyebrow and Ianto returned it with a look usually reserved for cases when a civilian started asking inconvenient questions. We'll talk later.
Rhys turned to her. "How can you be sure he's not a clone or something like that? It's not like it hasn't happened before, is it?"
"I scanned him last night," Gwen admitted and Ianto gave a short but sincere laugh. There was a hint of approval in his eyes that she understood once he spoke again.
"I thought you'd left it all behind," he commented and Gwen shrugged.
"I did. Sort of."
Rhys glared at her – she knew how much he hated the fact that she still kept some of the old tech in the house – and then sighed. "I've got to go to work." Gwen could tell that he didn't understand why she'd accepted the return of someone long dead with such ease, but the truth was, she'd been craving this. The inexplicable, dangerous situations that Torchwood and all its children brought with themselves; the same thing she'd reluctantly tried to cleanse herself from for six years now. She could feel the blood rushing in her veins, waking her up once again.
Gwen smiled and gave Rhys a kiss goodbye. "See you tonight, love."
o.O.o
"What do you need help with?" Gwen said once Rhys was out of the door. She'd checked on Anwen earlier and she was still asleep, so they'd moved to living room as not to wake her up.
A small, tired smile was playing on Ianto's lips. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"Try me," Gwen challenged and then raised an eyebrow when he reached for his case and took out a knife.
She watched in quiet fascination as Ianto pressed the blade against the pale skin of his wrist and pulled the sleeve of his coat back, allowing the weapon to slide up and leave a deep, bloody trail in its wake.
"What–" Gwen started and then gasped as she saw the wound close in seconds. When Ianto raised the knife, she saw that it was absolutely clean. "How?"
"Wish I could tell you," Ianto said; the same defeated look still on his face. "But I have no idea. Maybe it's got something to do with falling into the Rift without any protection whatsoever – you know, like Jonah? Most of the people come back with some sort of mutation. Maybe this is mine. And I don't grow older either," he added. "I've been in the other world for two years, and I haven't aged a day."
"You're like Jack, then." It was a statement, not a question, but Ianto shook his head.
"No." His smile turned sardonic. "I'm better. Look." He showed her the knife again. "Jack gets hurt and dies before coming back again, but this? I'm frozen."
"Frozen how?"
"Frozen in time. No matter what I do, I can't change a thing about me; not if it damages my body. And believe me, where I come from, there were a lot of opportunities to test that."
A shiver passed through Gwen at the thought of Ianto – the ever-curious Ianto – inflicting all sorts of damage to himself just to test something like that. It was clear that he'd turned himself into his latest project and she wasn't sure how to react to it.
"I don't think anyone can help you," she said gently. "Remember what happened to Jack? No one could fix it."
"I don't need a cure, I need an explanation," Ianto said and then stood up, taking her hands in his. "I'm going to contact UNIT and get them to find the Doctor. And once I find the Doctor, I can use his machine to track Jack down. We've learnt about it in One," he explained when Gwen made to ask. "It has a sort of GPS, I think, and it can follow anyone you'd like it to. What I wanted to ask was... Come with me?"
"I can't," Gwen said, shaking her head. It was tempting, but too many things could go wrong, and there was still something worrying about Ianto. It wasn't 'find Jack', but 'track Jack down' and that was suspicious enough by itself. "I've got responsibilities here. There's Rhys, and I can't just leave Anwen behind, no matter for how short a time it is."
"If things go according to plan, we're going to find a time machine and the Doctor can get us back whenever you like him to. It'll be like you've never left."
"You know what I really didn't miss about you and Jack?" Gwen asked and didn't give him a chance to answer. "This. Both of you always think that you can just come in and the world stops, and nothing but Torchwood matters anymore. But it doesn't work like that. I have an actual life now, I have a family, and I'm not going to let Torchwood ruin this because you came at my front door with a key to the Universe."
"You miss it." Ianto's voice was quieter now, but he was still staring her dead in the eye and there was something frantic about him; something scaring and inviting at the same time. "I can see it, you're bored. It can be just like it was before."
"There really is no quitting Torchwood, is there?" Gwen asked with a small laugh and Ianto beamed at her.
"I'm sure Jack told you that when he offered you the job," he said, "but you still said yes."
"I did, yes." There was no denying it. What he was offering was too good, too much like the old days, and she knew that there was no way she'd say no. "Well, what's the plan?"
Ianto let go of her hands, clearly content with himself. "We'll call Martha, and then we can call the Doctor."
"And then what?" Gwen found that she couldn't hide her smile and also that it took the last shreds of sensibility to not say 'let me get my bag' and get going.
"And then everything," Ianto offered and her smile widened as she reached for her phone.
"Yes, Mum, it's me," she said once her mother picked up. "Can you come look after Anwen for a few hours? I'll be back as soon as possible. I'm going on a business trip."