Thank you again, for all the lovely reviews, fav/alert listings... and for continuing to read. This has gotten a little longer than I'd intended, but I get the sense we're winding down a bit as explanations come out...

Chapter Twenty One: Dafydd Jones

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True to his word, Henry was waiting with the others when Jack and Ianto came into the Hub a few minutes behind Bobby and Mickey. The latter let them know that Wendy had taken Dafydd up to the conference room, although he suspected she would rather have put him in a cell with Janet.

Ianto grimaced, but he supposed he couldn't blame her. Or Jack. He was reasonably sure his Captain wouldn't have told her no if he'd been here and Wendy had suggested it.

Jack insisted Ianto get ice for the swelling before they did anything else, however. While he went to the kitchen, Jack went to find him a clean shirt. Ianto's was covered in his own blood. Jack didn't want to admit it out loud, but he the sight of it made him sick. So did the bruising on his face. It reminded him how fragile human life really was, how one careless mistake was all it took… it reminded him of that year from two thousand years ago, the year that never was, that Ianto would never remember but he was sure he would never forget.

Jack slid up behind the younger man in the kitchen and wrapped his arms around his waist. It was as unprofessional as holding him on his lap in the SUV had been, but he didn't care. Some days he needed let the lines between their working and personal relationships blur.

"One of these days you're going to give somebody a heart attack, sneaking up on them like that," Ianto teased softly, hanging onto Jack's arms as tightly as he could.

The Captain kissed his neck, although he kept it decidedly chaste. There was still work to be done tonight, but for just this brief moment he didn't want to be Captain Jack Harkness, Torchwood's fearless leader, he wanted to be just plain Jack Harkness, husband and lover. "You never seem startled," he replied.

Ianto chuckled, "I'm used to it." He turned in Jack's arms and placed a soft kiss on his lips. Jack returned it carefully, so as not to hurt him. Ianto's lip was swollen, bruised. Just like the rest of his face.

Without further discussion, his Captain helped him out of his soiled shirt and into the clean one, even though he was perfectly all right to do it himself, it was just his face that had taken a beating.

"The world really won't end if you don't wear that," Jack said when he started reaching for his tie. Jack was buttoning up the shirt so Ianto could keep the icepack on his left eye; it was swollen nearly shut.

He smiled. "I suppose you're right. But if it's all the same to you, I can tuck in my own shirt, Cariad," he pulled gently away from Jack's grasp.

The older man chuckled, flashing that famous Jack Harkness smirk, "I could make it worth your while to let me dress you… although undressing you is a lot more fun."

"My point exactly," his partner's tone was dry but Jack knew him well enough to recognize that glint in his eye, a mix of mirth and mischievousness.

It meant that they were all right.

Now all he had to do was figure out some way of keeping his promise, some way of fixing things with Dafydd and whatever it was he'd gotten himself mixed up in.

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They found Dafydd sitting at the table in the conference room; Wendy was standing by the door, leaning up against the wall with her arms crossed over her chest, glowering in the younger Jones' direction. Her presence seemed enough to keep him scared into staying put.

Dafydd knew Wendy. He'd met her years ago, when Ianto had run away from home and taken up residence on her sofa. He'd danced with her at Ianto and Jack's wedding. He'd always liked her.

He was looking at her now like she was some kind of monster and for once, it didn't look to Ianto like she minded.

"We've got it from here," Jack said simply when he and Ianto came in.

She nodded. "I'll get some coffee going." She was the only person allowed anywhere near his coffee machine. Despite the fact that she had taught him the 'coffee magic', as Jack called it, the coffee station was still his exclusive domain – Wendy only got the coffee when Ianto was busy with something else. With a parting glare at Dafydd, she left the room.

Jack pulled out the chair next to Dafydd's and sat down, uncomfortably close to the younger man.

Ianto took up a chair opposite his brother, across the table. Too far away to be any comfort to him.

Dafydd looked from Jack to Ianto and back again; Nerys had remarked a couple of times how Ianto always seemed to follow Jack's lead. She didn't understand why. Dafydd thought he did now. Everyone here seemed to defer to him – and this wasn't a Tourist Office. Whatever it was, he was in way over his head and he knew it. "What… what are you going to do with me?" he stammered at Jack, as it was obvious his brother either couldn't – or wouldn't – help him now.

"I suppose that depends on you," the Captain replied in a cool tone. He stole a glance at Ianto, but if his partner objected to the way he was handling the situation so far, he gave no indication.

"What…who are you people?"

"Torchwood," Jack told him. "Outside the government, beyond the police."

Dafydd swallowed hard and glanced to his brother.

"That means no lawyers, Dafydd," Ianto stuck to pointing out the obvious. "No judge, no trial. If you want to get through this you have to work with us. We aren't the bad guys," he told him again.

"He's not the bad guy," the Captain countered. "You can feel free to think of me as judge, jury and executioner."

Dafydd paled; watching Jack's expression, he didn't get the impression he was lying. Or exaggerating. "What do you want?"

Jack leant towards him. "Tell me everything. Don't leave anything out and do not lie to me."

"I'll know if you do," said Henry from the doorway. They hadn't heard him come up the steps.

He turned to Jack, both his tone and expression congenial. "I hope you'll forgive the intrusion, Captain," he said, "but Vickie tells me the best lie detector she's ever met." He flashed a wicked smile at Dafydd before continuing. "I thought I would offer up my services," he favoured Jack with a very different sort of smile.

Ianto only barely remembered that if he rolled his eyes, it would hurt. The only thing missing from the room – or any room that Henry and Jack occupied for that matter – was that song from Right Said Fred. Ianto could all too easily see the two of them trying to 'out-sexy' one another, probably while they were supposed to be on a date together, he thought a little acerbically.

To Henry's offer, however, the Captain merely nodded, his expression never wavering.

With another cocky little grin, Henry slipped into the chair next to Ianto, presumably so he could look Dafydd in the eye while they talked.

The younger Jones licked his lips nervously, looking from Henry to Ianto and then briefly at Jack before finally settling his gaze on his hands, which were folded on the table in front of him. "It started a couple of months ago," he said quietly. Then he cleared his throat, "Maybe… maybe it really started before that," he cast a frightened glance up at Henry. Even without understanding what he'd seen, he'd seen something truly terrifying earlier. Henry was something truly terrifying.

The Captain leant back in his chair, nodding for Dafydd to continue.

"Tom came to me last year with this idea. He said we could be like those guys on the telly. He said it would be cool. He knew this girl – Anne. She was a psychic, a medium or something, like on that show. She could talk to ghosts, you know…"

Ianto gave him a look. "Don't tell me. She said she saw dead people," he said, deadpan.

"It's true! I saw her, Yan. She would go into this trance and she could tell us things that nobody else would know. She showed us stuff. She… she taught us stuff."

"Like the tarot cards we found in your apartment?" Ianto questioned.

"You were in my flat?"

"I was worried sick about you, Dafydd, of course I was in your bloody flat," despite the harshness of his words, the elder Jones' tone remained steady. Calm. "Is that what she taught you, tarot?"

"No," Dafydd broke eye contact with his brother. "Those are Marisol's," he said softly. "I haven't seen her in over a month.

"About a month ago was when Anne's parents reported her missing," Jack interjected.

"She wasn't really missing. She didn't want anybody else getting hurt, so she dropped out of sight for a while, you know. She was hiding out with Tom and Quinn and me at the church where you found us. Tom used to go there, as a kid. Father Andrew was looking out for us…"

"I just saw you a week ago…!" Ianto began.

"Mam would have killed me if I hadn't shown up," he glanced at Jack again, as if trying to reconcile the Jack he knew with the man sitting there now.

"Hiding from what?" Jack asked.

"I… I know you won't believe me when I say we were hiding from the Devil, but that's what it felt like."

"You might be surprised what I'd believe, Dafydd," Jack told him.

"What were you doing the night your brother saw you?" asked Henry.

"We hadn't seen Anne in a couple of days… I got worried."

"How did you know where to go?"

"I don't know. I just did."

Henry's eyes narrowed. He turned his attention to Jack. "He's lying." His eyes glazed black, "I can force it out of him if you want me to."

"NO! Wait," Dafydd looked desperately in Ianto's direction, but it was obvious his brother wasn't going to come to his rescue, even now. He turned to Jack and wondered if Ianto had been telling the truth when he said that Tom was dead or would be soon, if Jack would really have killed him if he'd had the chance. It was hard to imagine that the man Ianto had married was really capable of murder, but looking into those stone cold blue eyes… looking at Ianto now… nothing was what the way he thought it had been. "Please… just… give me a chance. Jack… please!"

The Captain nodded, once. "I'm listening."

"Anne saw stuff. She knew stuff. She said she kept seeing this place in her head – she was going to die there. She called it fate, a fixed point in time, something no one could prevent."

Only Ianto noticed Jack's almost unperceivable reaction to the words 'fixed point in time.'

"Anne said not to tell Tom."

"Why?" asked Henry, his eyes their normal brown once more.

"I don't know," Dafydd answered miserably. "I swear, I don't. I think… I'm not sure she trusted him any more. She kept a diary. I have it. In my bag. She gave it to me just before she went missing for real."

Jack nodded; he put his ear piece back in and tapped it, asking Gwen if she and Vickie would go through Dafydd's bag and find it.

"What were you doing?" Ianto asked his brother, his tone breaking just a little for the first time.

"What do you mean?"

"You were kneeling over a pool of your friend's blood, Dafydd. What were you doing?"

Dafydd pulled the pendant out from under his shirt; it was a simply wrapped quartz crystal. "I was using this as a pendulum. I wanted to figure out who had killed her, but this was all I had on me. I thought… maybe her blood… maybe it could tell me something."

Jack scoffed. "Pendulums are side-show gimmicks. You always have a fifty-fifty chance of getting the answer you want."

"More things on Heaven and Earth, my friend," Henry reminded him in an even tone.

"Believe me, I've seen Heaven and Earth. And Hell," he cast a glance over at Ianto; they both had.

Jack reminded himself to tread lightly, however. Henry hadn't been kidding when he'd told Tom he was a religious man. He might not believe in God and the Devil and all that, but Henry did. Ianto did. Apparently so did his brother. "What did Anne see?" he asked, trying to remain open minded. Maybe some psychics could tap into the patterns of time, if this Anne had really perceived her death as a fixed point… there was no telling what the limit of the human potential was. "What did you get yourselves mixed up in?"

"About two months ago we were investigating this old haunted house. Anne started freaking out… she just… she flipped. She said we had to get out of there. We'd barely set up our stuff… Tom pushed her to stay. We all did. It's our fault she's dead."

Jack sighed; apparently guilt ran in the family.

"We've been going over the footage on your website," Ianto told him. "I don't remember anything that looked like an old 'haunted house.'"

Dafydd shook his head. "We never aired it. After Cameron died… Cameron Harris. He was the first to bail on us. He got too freaked out by what happened that night, said he wanted out. Four weeks ago he walked out in front of a bus, drunk, the cops said. After that, Marisol took off…" he buried his face in his hands. "She left everything… she just… vanished… we thought… I thought… after I found Anne like that… I'm the one who phoned it into the police. Anonymous tip, you know, from a pay phone. I couldn't just leave her like that but I didn't know what else to do… Then you guys showed up… I thought… I don't know what I thought."

Ianto looked to Jack; he nodded. The Welshman got up and poured his brother a glass of water from a pitcher behind them. "Here," he said gently, laying his hand on his brother's shoulder.

Dafydd looked up at him with blood-shot eyes.

"It's just water," Ianto gave him half a small smile.

Dafydd almost laughed. Almost. "I'm sorry, Yan. I just wanted to talk to you… to find out what you knew, what you were doing there. I never thought Tom would…" he looked away, a fresh torrent of emotion overtaking him.

Ianto tightened his grip on his brother's shoulder. "I forgive you," he said simply.

"Where's the video footage?" Jack asked, his tone less hard-edged. He didn't forgive Dafydd, but Ianto had allowed him to forgive Grey, who had done far worse, he had to allow the younger to forgive his brother as well.

"On Quinn's computer," Dafydd met his eyes again. He took a shaky sip of water and glanced back up at his brother, accepting the tight lipped smile as encouragement. "Tom said it was our fault, we woke the thing up, we had to put it back down again. But I don't think we woke it up, I think somebody else did. It wasn't a… a demon… or whatever… that killed Anne. It was people. I think they've killed before. I started looking through old news paper stories, at the library," he explained.

Jack nodded. "Ianto, take him down to Gwen…"

Dafydd's eyes widened. "I've told you everything… you have to believe me!"

Ianto gave his brother's shoulder another gentle squeeze, "It's all right. Come on. Trust us, Dafydd. Trust me. It's going to be all right." Because Jack had said so. He gave his partner a quick glance as he got Dafydd to his feet.

Jack nodded. His face was still impassive, but his eyes told Ianto everything he needed to know. It was really going to be all right.