Title: Alternate Memories

Author: Thomas

Subject: Torchwood – Jack & Ianto – After 'Children of Earth'

I do not own any of these characters. I just own my spin on them.

Author's note: Thank you for all your positive feedback. This is my first attempt at fanfiction…so don't chastise me if you see a mistake. I'm having a lot of fun with this.

Chapter Two – Jack

Jack was relieved after finally hacking away at the last bit of overgrowth covering the entrance to the very large ancient building. All these months and he was finally about to find what he had been searching for. The thought of being in this South American jungle any longer was not a fun idea. He pulled out the small yet powerful explosive from his pack and strategically attached it to the large stone covering the entry, then ran back and slid behind several boulders before hitting the trigger switch.

'No time for subtleties now', he thought.

Besides he always loved a chance to blow something up.

The trees swayed wildly sending birds squawking for safety from the explosion, with rocks and other debris falling erratically all around. With a satisfied grin he peered around to see his handy work. It worked. The stone covering was cracked in half and leaned at an angle against the side pillar. He walked up and pushed the heavy stone away to give himself more room. He jumped back as the top half slammed to the ground with a thud. He stared into the darkness of the opening, wiping the sweat from his brow.

"Won't be long now", Jack said looking down at his scan of the interior. Turning on his torch and with a deep determined breath he squeezed through the opening and set out to find the main central chamber.

What seemed like hours passed before he finally maneuvered his way through the maze like passageways and found the room he was looking for. He scanned the room again, pinpointing the area where the low energy signal was emitting from.

'Let this be the right one', he thought.

Out of the several likely signals that Tosh's program had picked up, this one was the most accessible option. Before she died, Tosh had been in the process of locating energy emissions from alien tech or other objects that managed to find there way to various parts of the world after coming through the rift. The rift had long been depositing alien objects since far before Torchwood was around to round them up and she had been set on the task of finding them. These signals were the only ones that matched the energy signal of a certain type of rare crystal that he needed in order to get the teleport function of his vortex manipulator working. Then he could finally get away from this planet and the bad memories it held.

Turning towards the far wall he flashed his torch in the area of the energy emission. There were circular sets of holes all around a central stone carving that protruded several inches out from the wall. He set about shining his light in each hole only to reveal that most of them only contained dust…others had pottery or bones as well as other similar things. Then he caught a glimpse of a reflective object within the hole directly above the carving. Inside he found what he was looking for…a small purplish colored crystal. After a quick scan to confirm it was indeed the rare Xaonian crystal used as a power source for his vortex manipulator, he sat down against the wall with a sad sigh.

'I should be happy', he thought.

With his task accomplished, his energy drained. He began sobbing lightly with the thoughts of all that he had lost. Especially Stephen and Ianto. Two people he cared more about than anything and he was directly responsible for their deaths. There was nothing he could do about it now…so with a shake of his head and a quick wipe of his face he reached for his pack and pulled out his tool kit. He just needed a piece of the crystal and once inserted into his wrist strap, he could teleport out of this jungle and then off this planet for good.

Once finished with the crystal and a quick programming of a few coordinates, Jack went about repacking his supplies. Glancing at his scanner, he noticed another energy signal…but very faint.

"That's interesting", he said aloud.

He stood up and scanned the wall again. It was too faint to pinpoint, so he went about checking each hole again...finding nothing of interest. With a frustrated sigh he realized the signal must have been coming from the central carving itself. He propped his torch on his pack and angled it towards the wall and began examining the carving. It looked as though the carving itself was set inside a hole and with some twisting and pulling, and a lot of grunting, he managed to pull the carving from the wall. He shown the light in the exposure and inside found a small golden hand size metallic box with a large turquoise jewel set in the top.

Grabbing it…he stood staring at it. With a shrug, he opened it…and the room was suddenly filled with a blue light that faded to daylight and Jack was no longer in the dark chamber he was in before. He was standing in the open jungle. Stunned, Jack looked around and instead found himself standing in front of what looked like a vine covered alter and all around him were enormous stone pillars similar to Stonehenge that were covered in jungle overgrowth. Not sure what to do…he closed the box and everything went dark.

After a moment he realized he was back inside the chamber he was in before. With a deep breath he opened the box again, but this time nothing happened. Only a dim blue glow emitted from within the box. Looking inside he found something that looked similar to his vortex manipulator, but much sleeker. There was a gold mechanism that was set inside an encasing, that looked to be made of some kind of bluish crystal, with a flexible bluish gray metal band instead of a leather strap.

"A Jumper?", he said out loud with a laugh of recognition. He quickly looked around the empty room and carefully secured the box in his pack.

'Looks like a whole new set of options just opened up', Jack thought with a wonder of excitement….and with a press of a button he teleported out of the chamber.

Back in his hotel room in Cardiff he sat examining the Jumper. He had never actually seen one in person, only pictures, but it worked similar to his vortex manipulator. Only instead of time traveling within the same universe, the Jumper jumped to parallel universes. It was alien tech found in the far future and became a side project of the Time Agency. From his understanding there were only about a couple of the devices ever found and they could never be replicated since part of the basic elemental structure of the device was never found in our universe or any other that he was aware of. The Agency eventually abandoned the project, since it was determined that the Jumpers had minds of their own. Some even thought said they had to be sentient, for all the trouble they caused.

The gold box it was in must have acted as an insulator, trapping the energy and letting it build up. Then when Jack opened it, it propelled him to a parallel world. He was just glad it had brought him back. Some of the agents assigned to the Jumper Program never returned…only the devices came back. Nobody was sure why…only that they seemed to only work correctly for certain operators.

Now that he was ready, he had to say his goodbyes to Gwen…the only person on this planet that he cared about that would still speak to him. He wasn't going to tell her what he had planned…he didn't want her to talk him out of it, like he knew she would. All he knew was this was his only chance to see Ianto again and he wasn't going to pass it up.

'Not my Ianto though', he thought.

But it would be Ianto and just seeing him alive will make everything better. Not a very rational thought, but he didn't care.

'What else is there to do?', he thought again.

He picked up his phone and dialed.

"Gwen. It's jack. I need to see you".

Several days later he was ready.