Disclaimer: I do not own any characters from Torchwood, no matter how much I wish that I did

Author's Notes: sorry for the delay but here is the next chapter in Two Harts. I finally got it how I like it and now it's here for all to see. Please enjoy.

Extra note: Can't believe that no one picked up on the continuity problem. I said that John hotwired the car, leaving the keys behind and later he uses the key to lock the car. It's right now. Hopefully.

Beta reader: InsanityamI (thanks a lot)

Chapter nine: Memories

He ran through the parvin trees laughing. They were only four feet high but still taller than him even though his mummy always told him he was tall for his age. He was eight years old and he had a dorky little sister who was four. She barely came up to his shoulder but she followed him everywhere and it really annoyed him.

"John!" came her voice through the trees. "John! Wait!"

She couldn't run as fast as him either and it made him laugh to see her struggle to keep up.

He loved playing among the Parvin trees because of their colour and the way it changed with the weather. Best of all the smell they made made him think of space.

"One day," he'd told his father, "I'm going to go out and I'm going to see everything."

This had made his father laugh long and hard but he was too small at the time to take offence and he'd joined in with the laughter.

"John!" he heard his sister calling again. "Wait John!"

John laughed and leant forward to make himself go faster. He would leave her alone and she would cry. He loved it when she cried because her face went all red and swelled up like a balloon.

Before he knew it, he came out of the grove and saw the city which was two miles away. He stopped and watched it; watched all the spaceships come and go carrying people to other places and bringing other people here.

'Why would they want to come here?" he thought. 'There's nothing here.'

"John!" yelled his sister again. "Where are you?"

He had half a mind to call her to see the ships but thought it would be more fun to let her find her way through the parvin trees.

He glanced down at his watch that his mummy had bought for his last birthday. She'd had it imported from the finest watch makers in the galaxy. The dial was pure enamel with a thin layer of wood for each of the hands and a black needle for the second hand.

It was nearly time for him and his sister to be home and if they were late then mummy wouldn't be happy. She very rarely seemed happy nowadays. He blamed his sister.

"Mel!" he yelled. "I'm over here!"

"I'm comin'!" she yelled back.

"We're goin' to be late!"

"I'm comin'! I'm comin'! I'm-oof" she burst through the last of the parvin trees and knocked him over landing on him.

"You stupid idiot." He shouted. "Get off me."

"Sorry." She stammered getting up. "Sorry."

He looked at his watch again.

"Oh no!" he shouted grabbing his sister's hand. "We're gonna be late!" He ran alongside all the parvin trees with his sister trailing by his hand. She struggled to keep up but he barely let her feet touch the ground, he ran that fast and eventually they got home.

Mummy was mad.


John jerked the steering wheel to the left narrowly missing a young kid and their pet dog. He'd already come so close to causing thirteen road accidents within the last ten minutes but he still didn't care.

He'd managed to sneak out after Gwen and Martha had burst in the boardroom talking about his little sister, Melanie, running off with a plan to set a trap for the maniac trying to kill her.

"Why didn't you stop her?" Jack had said.

"You think we didn't try to?" Gwen had retorted angrily.

John didn't know what happened after that as he'd silently snuck out while they were distracted. Thinking about it, the chocolate boy might have seen him go but he hadn't said anything.

Upstairs, John had thought about hotwiring the SUV but he really didn't have time. Luckily he'd found the keys behind the desk in the tourist information point. Now he was driving wildly around the streets of Cardiff.

He wasn't sure what he hoped to achieve. It wasn't as if would just come across her on the street.

Then one of the screens by the steering wheel began flashing and a beeping noise came from it.

John glanced at it but snapped his eyes back onto the road, not that it improved his driving.

He had seen that it said, 'INCOMING CALL' and then two options below it said 'ACCEPT' and 'IGNORE'.

Captain Hart didn't see why he had to press a button to ignore a call and just continued driving. Thing is the noise kept going and began to annoy him so he pressed 'ACCEPT' knowing what was coming.

"What are you doing, John?" came an angry voice. Jack.

"What do you think I'm doing?" he yelled at the screen, not sure where he had to speak to be heard.

"Something that isn't like you."

"Jack," John heard Gwen's voice say in the background, "we're getting reports of a black SUV nearly running down people around every twenty metres."

"John!" yelled Jack. "At least drive better."

"My first car Jack." He said back. John swerved to avoid an oncoming car. "I'm used to something a bit more complicated."

"What do you plan to do?" Jack said a bit more calmly. "If it were anyone else you'd leave them for dead. Why is it different for Melanie?"

"She's my sister."

"How is that different?"

"It just is, Jack!" John shouted taking a sharp right turn. "It just is!" The voice over the phone went silent.

John slowed down and began breathing a bit easier.

"Come on, Jack! We both know that if it was you and Gray that you would do exactly the same thing!"

Jack still didn't say anything but John knew that he'd won. Jack had felt so guilty about letting go of Gray's hand and if there was any way that he could have saved Gray he would do it.

John could almost see Jack's sorrowful face as he was reminded of Gray and it made him hate himself. He hated bringing up Gray because it always made Jack sad and a sad Jack wasn't as pretty as a happy one. Also the love he felt for Jack made him feel even more angry at himself for bringing it up. John wouldn't have brought up Gray but it was the only way he could make Jack understand.

"Now you can sit there and lecture me about how I was doing so well with kicking the habit of stealing or you can help me out and give me Mel's address." He said clearly across the phone as he narrowly missed another pedestrian.


He sat on his small thin camp bed hugging his knees to his chest. His sister was missing and mum was out looking for her. If mum found her then she'd make Mel pay.

She'd recently turned ten years old which left only three years between them until his birthday in four months. He'd always blamed her for everything because it was easy. Like when the parvin tree grove was burnt down a year and a half ago leaving nothing but the smell of space behind, he said it was all her fault for not playing properly in there.

There was a knock on the door but he stayed where he was, rooted by guilt, listening to the low buzz that rode the air. Slowly the door creaked open and Dad's face appeared round the door.

He was tall, with a thin face and black hair. His most striking feature was the two blue eyes that were set equal distances from either side of his nose. Mum wasn't beautiful at all, she had thick matted browny-black hair that she never washed and a big swelled up face that pushed the hair out the way making her look like a big hairy blowfish.

Dad always said he could have any thing he wanted in the universe. So how, he wondered did Dad end up with mum?

He remained on the bed as Dad came in and sat on it. Dad was dressed simply, just a shirt and trousers. Not like he normally dressed at all but it didn't matter.

Neither of them said anything for a while, just sat there listening to the buzzing which had now become no more than a hypnotic hum.

"It's alright." Dad said smiling. "Your mother will find her." Dad lost his smile because he also knew what Mum would do if she found Mel.

"It's my fault." He sobbed to Dad. Dad moved closer to him and stroked his hair.

"No it's not."

"Yes it is." His eyes stung with tears that tried to fall but he forced them back. "I told her that you didn't love her." He gulped. "I said you and mum hated her and she should just leave and we could be happy."

He buried his face in his arm and let the tears flow but he didn't cry out. He heard Dad sigh.

"Look, John." Dad said. Dad didn't sound angry so he looked over his arm, his vision blurred by the tears. "I understand that it wasn't easy for you getting a little sister. Someone coming out of nowhere and taking all the attention of your parents, hanging off you like a dead body but you shouldn't say things like that to Melanie."

"I know." He choked as Dad stroked his hair. "I didn't think she'd actually run away."

"John." Dad said again. "You need to be nice to your sister."

"But why?"

"One day she's gonna need help and I'm not gonna be there. And neither's your mother. Hopefully." he added under his breath. "One day, you're going to be all she has in the universe." Dad paused to ensure his words were sinking in. "She'll need you. And you need to be there."

"But what if I'm not?"

Dad laughed.

"Trust me, John. When close family need you, you're always there."


John shut the SUV door behind him and pressed the keys. The car locked itself. He waited but after a few seconds he turned.

"They need a beeper." He said under his breath.

He turned back and looked at his destination. It was a series of small flats in a very poor area of Cardiff. It was Kracknell Street and Melanie's 'house' was number 32 on the eastern side of the street.

As John walked up to the front door a McDonalds BigMac carton was blown past his feet. Looking at the door of number 32, he noticed it wasn't shut properly. Using one finger he pushed it and it swung open letting him see through into the hallway.

It was quite clean, no dirt, no muck, no random clothes tossed any which way, he noted as he stepped inside.

'Mel mustn't like it here.' He thought. 'It's too clean.'

There were two doors leading off the hallway. One at the far end that went into the kitchen, which he knew because he could see through into it as the door was open, and one on the left-hand side.

He grabbed the handle of the door and carefully opened it. He was slow because he didn't want to startle Mel, especially since his jaw still hurt a bit.

John stepped into it warily looking round the room as he came in. There were several luxuriously shiny furnishings: large screen television hanging off the wall; fancy computer tucked away in the corner; cordless phones scattered around the place with the hub they were supposed to rest on, on a table by his shins.

A gun was cocked behind him. Mel had hidden behind the door as he opened it and turning around he saw that she was pointing an eighteenth-century pistol at his face.

"Hey… Mel." He said nervously.

"I did say that I'd shoot anyone who followed me." She said glaring at him. He didn't see her glare as he was busy keeping an eye on the trigger finger. John had bounced back from some bad things in his time but never a direct bullet to the face.

"I think I missed that bit."

"You ran out?" John nodded.

"Yeah kinda." Mel nodded slightly.

"Nice to know you care." John wasn't sure if she was being sarcastic or not so kept a straight face.

"Do you mind putting the gun down?" John suggested after a while.

"Wuss." Mel said lowering it. "Doesn't matter though." She threw it at him and he caught it. "Isn't even loaded."

"What?" John looked it over and found that Mel was right. There wasn't a ball-bearing bullet in the barrel as he thought there was when she'd had it at his face. "Why?

"That's the thing with being a Hart." Mel said pushing past him to sit on the worn-out armchair behind him. "You get so busy pissing off one half of the universe and trying to get the other half in bed that you rarely get the chance to stop off anywhere for bullets." She leant back. "How do you do it?"

She folded her arms but John didn't reply. He was assuming that the question was meant to be an insulting rhetorical question.

"I'm still angry with you." Mel stated.

"I understand." John said putting his hands up. "And that's part of the reason that I'm here. To say sorry."

"Part of?" Mel sat forward, intrigued. "Why else would you be here?"

"Well…to…I came to…you know." Even in the future, brothers and sisters checking if each other are alright is still embarrassing and difficult to admit to.

"I see." She saved John from having to explain any further. "Well I am fine as you can see. I'm not a baby, John. I don't need your help."

"Why do you always have to be like this?" John said sternly trying desperately to not groan aloud.

"Like what?"

"Like a child."

Mel laughed once. "Newsflash." She said holding up her hands. "We, unlike some people, travel through time. Hence, we age differently to your average human being. Meaning, although I am, technically speaking, twenty, what with all aforementioned travel I still have the mentality of a fifteen year-old girl."

Melanie sat back and folded her arms again.

"Conclusion?" she added, "It's more fun that way."


He strolled down the bustling street and took in the mesmerizing mix of aromas, sights and smells that surrounded him. All of them sent his mind abuzz which merged with the hubbub around him.

Stalls left, right and centre offered him everything from pet Krallblahs to a 'good time'. He declined everything, happy just to revel in the wonders that surrounded him.

He was twenty-one now or thereabouts. The thing with time travelling is that there's no real concept as to how the traveller ages. He was older but he'd been to so many different times that it was impossible to determine his actual age.

Market traders were all tugging at his coat, desperate to show this new stranger their wares but he shooed them all away and leaned against a pillar towards the North of the street.

He watched the hustle and bustle, comings and goings of the street and grinned broadly. This was what he'd always dreamt of; getting out there and doing what he wanted.

As he watched the movements of the people, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He spun round, his hand reaching instinctively for his pistol that his sister had bought him as a leaving present but saw that he was face-to-face with a beautiful young girl. Her skin was flawless with the healthy glow of the golden champagne he tasted on the third moon of Norkas while her shoulder-length white hair delicately framed her face.

He moved his hand from his pistol.

"Hello." She said.

"Hi." He was in shock; he'd never seen anyone so…was beautiful the right word?

"Care to hear your fortune?"

"No thanks." He shook his head. "I don't believe in magic."

She tossed her hair slightly to her right. "I do not use magic, boy." She leant in to his ear; her breath hot on his neck. "I use science." She pulled back.

"I don't know…" he began to back off.

"I can tell you of your sister."

"What makes you think I have a sister?"

"You both come from Jarcus."

"Clever. Pick a planet and just by chance the sucker might be from there." He turned his back on her and began to walk away. "Bye."

"Leaving her behind was the most difficult thing you've done." He froze where he was.

"What do you want to say?" he asked turning.

"What you fear the most is that one day she won't need you."

"What do you want to say!" he shouted.

The girl's mysterious smile slipped. He saw she was wearing a long white dress which was odd as everyone else in the street was wearing oranges or reds.

"Jarcus has fallen to the reformed Kulkan Empire. All who live are captured aboard their prison vessel 98741-DT1. Your sister needs you now, John Hart."

"How do you know this?" John said. He didn't want to believe her and needed all the facts straight. "We're in the 95th century now and she's in the 51st."

The girl paused before speaking again. Her voice wasn't rushed but there was an urgency to her voice.

"It is written that she will be raped and then killed within twenty-four hours unless you can reach her first."

"I thought we weren't allowed to mess with time."

"Not everything is written in stone."

"I think I've heard that before. Didn't I see that in The Library before it shut down?" John smiled. "That tv programme. The one made up by that guy. Oh what was his name? You know the one, Tim Kring or something; the one that later went on to start the campaign for peace in the Milky Way. Oh well."

He laughed and shrugged his shoulders. "This is a joke isn't it?" He stopped smiling. "It's not funny!"

"You can believe I am lying and then find her dead body yourself." The girl said turning to go. "Then the tears you shed shall truly burn."


Melanie was leant against the broken ten-year-old cooker in her kitchen with her body facing slightly towards the open back door. It only led out onto a small alley-way that ran behind all the houses from number twenty-six down to number forty. The breeze that blew in was refreshing and cooled her face as she stood with her eyes closed.

"I'm not going back." She said for the seventieth time in six minutes. She'd kept repeating herself because John who was sat at the small square dining table was ignoring her argument.

"Give me one reason why not?" he said, trying to reason with her.

"I can give you several. One." She held up one finger "I hate that team and everything they've done to me since I first came across them. Two." She held up another finger. "Hiding in the bunker beneath the fountain while someone is after my blood is not the way I roll and you know it. Three. I prefer it here. It's my home and contains my things. Four. I know for a fact that you are desperate to ask me who out of those lot I would be willing to have a threesome with you with. Five-"

"Alright." John interrupted hastily. "Stop there." He breathed in and out in frustration. "Did you have an answer?" he asked trying to seem innocent.

"Homicidal maniac probably on his way here right now. Try to focus, John." Mel snapped.

"Oh." John said shaking his head. Mel looked at him and waited for the silence to begin to set in before she spoke again.

"I've told you and I can go on forever sayin' this. I'm not going back." Mel said again.

"Then what are you gonna do?" he said.

"Catch him."

"And do you have a plan?"

"As a matter of fact, I do." Mel retorted. "And I think we could pull it off."

"We?"

"Ah, come on." She leant forward so she was leaning on the chair opposite John. "You didn't think I'd leave you out did you?"

"I dunno." John looked unsure.

"Come on. It'll be really dangerous." She said trying to tempt him. "With unbelievably high chances of certain death." She paused. "Like when we used took the piss out of mum."

A grin tugged at the corners of John's mouth but he still looked unsure.

"Come on." Mel grinned straightening up. "I'll tell you who I'd be willing to have a threesome with."

John smiled.

"What's the plan?"

Next: Being Live Bait Hurts