Disclaimer: Joss owns "Buffy," RTD and the BBC own "Torchwood," I own my snow jacket.
AN: Thank you to RevDorothyL for betaing this for me!
Buffy followed Suit Boy in a daze. She no longer had a home; she no longer had friends or family. She was alone. These thoughts kept playing in her mind on repeat as the man led her to a couch, sat her down, and returned with some leftover pizza.
"Here, eat this," he told her as he placed the reheated food in her hands. She did as he told her do without giving it much thought. He sat down next to her and watched her as if making sure she actually did eat. Surprisingly, the food did make her feel better. Not happy-cheerleader Buffy but it did help ease the empty ache inside her.
"Thank you," she told the man quietly after she finished the last piece of pizza he had given her.
"Don't worry about it," he reassured her as he helped her stand up and led her to another area. Where was she anyways? Buffy had never seen anything like this before. There were computers everywhere, but they were way different from the clunky one Willow used at school. These computers were sleek and shiny and looked like they could eat Willow's computer for breakfast. Lights flashed everywhere and there appeared to be a lake in the middle of the room. The only parts of the complex that looked relatively normal were the desks cluttered with paper and knick-knacks. At the center of the room was a column-like thing that gave Buffy the wiggins. It was sending off some weird sort of vibes, not unlike the Hellmouth.
"What's that?" she asked her guide as he sat her down at one of the empty desks. He looked at where she was pointing and looked back at her.
"That's the Rift. It's a tear through space and time that runs through Cardiff. It likes to drop random alien beings and artifacts that we clean up after."
"Hold up, Suit Boy. Correct me if I'm wrong but did you just say alien? 'Cause that's a little weird," Buffy asked with a confused look on her face. Yeah, so she hunted demons and vamps, but for some reason she couldn't buy the whole alien thing. Of course, that might explain Mr. Ugly before she was tranqued last night.
"Yes, I did just say aliens," he replied with a small smile on his face. "Of course, we may have to correct that explanation, seeing as it dropped you here and you don't appear to be a time-lost person."
"Get a lot of those?" she asked as she swung her legs idly as he nodded. "Look, I don't think I got your name and I don't think I can keep calling you Suit Boy forever."
"Yes, well you wouldn't be the first American to call me a demeaning nickname," he teased gently as he perched himself across from her on the desk. "My name is Ianto Jones."
"Mr. Jones…nice."
"You can call me Ianto. Mr. Jones makes me look around for my father."
"I'll call you Ianto as long as you don't call me Miss Summers. Reminds me too much of that creep Snyder." Buffy fell silent, lost again in the memories of the world she had left behind. Feeling a hand on her shoulder, she jumped and saw Ianto looking at her with a concerned look on his face. She felt the tears pricking at the back of her eyes but she refused to give into them a second time.
"I'm fine," she told him as she shrugged off his hand. He only gave her a look that conveyed his disbelief, but remained blessedly silent.
"So…what exactly is this place?" she asked just to end the awkward silence. "Do you all have a special name or are you just 'We hunt aliens and talk with tweedy accents'?" He cocked an eyebrow at her, but answered her question.
"We're Torchwood. I'll let Jack talk to you about the details, but all you need to know right now is that we'll make sure that you're taken care of." Buffy didn't know how to respond to that, so she gave him a small smile of thanks.
From up above in the glass paneled conference room, Jack watched the two of them talk with Gwen beside him.
"What are we going to do with her, Jack?" she asked as she twirled a strand of hair around her fingers. "I mean, she doesn't have anywhere to go and we can't just let her loose on the city."
"I don't know, Gwen. I honestly don't know," Jack answered her as Ianto said something that made the girl smile sadly. Whoever this Buffy Summers girl was, she was a puzzle and Jack hated puzzles that posed a risk to his team—which was almost every puzzle they came across. Oh sure, there was the thrill in solving it but at the risk of hurting one of his team members.
"She seems to be bonding with Ianto," Gwen commented and Jack could only nod. Ianto hadn't been there for very long and had remained closed off from the rest of the team. Even Jack, who could claim he knew Ianto the best, knew very little about the youngest member of the team.
"I'll talk to her and we'll go from there," Jack finally told the newest member of the team as he left the office. The girl looked up at the sound of the door opening and he wondered how she did that. Most people, OK, lets make that all members of the team barely noticed the soft sound of the door.
"So how do you like the Hub?" he asked her as he gestured to the area around him.
"It's nice," she answered. "Sure beats a high school library. Where did you get those computers? We don't have anything like those at home."
"What year was it when you left?" Jack asked her curiously. It wouldn't be the first time they'd had someone drop in from another time.
"1998. Why?" she asked before realizing the answer for herself. "Ok, so not only am I in a different dimension, but I'm also in the future. Why can't anything normal ever happen to me?"
"What do you mean by that?" Jack seized on the last statement, determined to get something out of this girl.
"Oh you know, accidently burning down a high school gym, living in a town with gang problems, falling into a portal, things like that," she replied flippantly.
"Why do I have a feeling you're not telling me the whole truth?" Jack challenged her as he crossed his arms and stared at her. Jack prided himself on being able to tell when he was being lied to and this girl was setting off all of the alarms.
"I don't know, why don't you tell me?" she replied returning his stare look for look. "I'm just here by accident, honest."
"Then how were you able to beat that Weevil when we first saw you?" This came from Owen, who had come to join Jack and Ianto around the girl. "That not humanly possible."
"Five servings of fruits and veggies?" she answered with a valley girl lilt to her voice that made it sound like a question. "Really," she added when she saw the incredulous looks the three men were giving her. "Look, if we're going to be playing a game of twenty questions, shouldn't we start with the basics, like, oh, what's your age, favorite activities, astrological sign and stuff like that?"
"Fine then Buffy, how old are you?" Jack asked through clenched teeth. How could someone this young throw him off his game so much. Normally he had people eating out of the palm of his hand with a smile and a flirty look, but this girl seemed immune to him.
"OK, I'm seventeen, I'm a Capricorn and I like long walks during the evening. Oh, wait, no fair with me only knowing Ianto's name here. You know my name but I don't know yours," she pouted. Jack only sighed.
"This here is Owen Harper, our resident doctor. Over there by the computers is Toshiko Sato our tech wizard. Next to me is Gwen Cooper our newest addition. Ianto you already know, he keeps everything running smoothly around here. And I," he added with a flourish, "am Captain Jack Harkness, head of Torchwood."
"Buffy Summers, high school junior and displaced person," she replied giving Jack a bright grin. "Now that we have the meet and greet out of the way, care to tell me what this Torchwood business is besides dealing with aliens?"
Jack gritted his teeth. "I think it's time that we got some answers out of you Buffy," he answered her. "How exactly did you end up falling through that portal?" A guarded look flitted over Buffy's face.
"I was fighting with my ex when it opened up behind him and he fell through. I tried to get out of the way but the backlash caught me before I could get clear of the energy," she told them in a suddenly dead voice. "I was transported to this place that was like…like hell. I couldn't see my ex anywhere and these things kept attacking me. I kept fighting and fighting until I saw this light which I guess lead me here." There, it was the truth, or at least part of it. No reason they needed to know about the Slayer now, or ever for that matter.
Jack eyed the blonde in front of him, not sure how much of the truth she was actually telling him. "You aren't going to tell us how you took out that Weevil are you?" he asked her after she had been silent for a few moments, apparently lost in her memories.
"Adrenaline rush," she replied in a monotone. "I'd been fighting so long, it was just second nature to me I guess." There again, the truth but not all of it. In all her time lying to her mom she'd learned that was the best way to go. Oh God…she was never going to see her again. Involuntary tears started to trickle down her face again and she buried it in her hands.
"I think that's enough questioning for now, sir," Ianto broke in as he put his arm around Buffy's shoulders. Jack nodded and Ianto lead Buffy to the couch at the entrance of the Hub. Buffy sat down and rubbed her arms in a vain attempt to warm herself up after suddenly feeling cold.
"Where am I going to go?" she asked him in a quiet voice while looking down at her hands. "It's not like I can just stay here. I have no money, no family, nothing." She felt a panic start to hit her and began breathing faster and faster. "What am I going to do? I'm not even eighteen yet, I'm still a minor…" Ianto interrupted her mid-rant with an upraised hand.
"Don't worry about that right now, Buffy," he reassured her. "Try to get some rest and I'll let you know what we decide when you wake up. There's no use in working yourself up into a panic." Buffy nodded. Ianto reminded her of her mother in her infamous "take charge" mode, where she could turn any situation around in a matter of moments. Lying down, Buffy closed her eyes and tried to get her breathing into the relaxation pattern Giles had taught her. Funny how her thoughts always seemed to turn back to them.
Ianto watched Buffy as her breathing evened out and she appeared to fall asleep. He then quietly walked away towards Jack's office, where his boss had overseen the entire sequence of events.
"What are we going to do with her, sir?" Ianto asked as soon as he entered the room. "I doubt we can do what we would normally do with time-displaced peoples."
"Why not, Ianto?" Jack challenged "She's time-displaced, she said so herself." Ianto just gave his boss one of his patented "I disapprove" looks and stayed silent. Jack rolled his eyes. "As much as I hate to say this, I agree. There's too much we don't know about her to let her go. Even if we Retconned her, I still would feel nervous letting her loose on Cardiff. Look at what she did to that Weevil!"
"And there's the fact that she's obviously broken in spirit and I doubt any amount of Retcon can fix that," Ianto added as he stuck his hands in his pockets and continued to stare at Jack. "Jack, this girl needs more than what we would normally do."
"What exactly do you suggest we do, Ianto?" Jack asked as he leaned on his overflowing desk.
"We keep her here," Ianto told him simply. "Owen will surely want to study her some more and I'm sure there are ways he can do so discreetly; you want to keep her off the streets until we discover what exactly she is and this way we can monitor her at all times."
"Do we really want her around the Hub if we can't be certain we trust her? What if she turns out to be a plant by some species that wants to weaken our defenses in order to invade?"
"What if she's a magical being designed to murder philandering husbands and create a safe world for puppies and kittens?" Ianto countered. Jack looked at him appraisingly. He had never seen Ianto defend anyone or anything like he defended Buffy. "There's a risk with anything involved with the Rift, but it doesn't mean we should automatically assume the worst. Jack, this girl is going through post-traumatic stress, how can you not see it?" That was it then. Although Ianto never talked about the aftermath of the Battle of Canary Warf, he knew that the following weeks had been hard on the young man. He wondered if Ianto had been in the same state that Buffy Summers was now in.
"Very well, we'll keep her here," Jack finally conceded. Ianto did have a point after all about keeping a better eye on her here than if she was roaming the streets of Cardiff. "But you're responsible for her. That means if she does something that endangers this team, I'm holding you responsible."
"Very wel,l sir," Ianto replied. "I'll take her to my flat after she wakes up and help get her settled. I am going to need Tosh's help in order to enroll her in school. I'm going to need to get credible transcripts from her 'former' high school."
"Do whatever you need to do within limits in order to get her settled. Let her know what the plan is as soon as she wakes up," Jack told Ianto. Ianto nodded and left the room and headed to the Archives. Jack wearily ran a hand over his face and walked to the window to study the sleeping girl. She was a mystery, one he was determined to crack.
