Ianto pulled into the underground carpark like he always did, but no longer alone.
Gwen had insisted on joining him down into the 'tradesmen entrance', sneaking exposed into the car park underneath the Millenium Centre.
When they passed Roald Dahl Pass they dropped Jack off, but Gwen had already been fast asleep by then.
Ianto watched her from the corner of his eye as he sat in the passenger seat, wishing he could've done the same thing, but like always the pounding of his heart against the van's leather seats made him feel more at rest than anything.
He carefully glimpsed at the overhead barrier as he entered, turning off his wipers and turning on his lights as he entered the gloom.
Beams of light fell across Gwen's face, stirring her in her light sleep.
He should've known it would have been impossible to fall asleep listening to the van's roaring engine.
She lifted her head from the glass and looked up to watch Ianto park the van into the registered bay.
The car park was silent and empty, but for a few cars that had been left standing there over night.
Ianto nodded at the security guard and checked to see if they were all alone but for him.
Gwen and he watched his yellow uniform vanish around the corner before they finally opened the trunk and got him out.
The metal trolley folded outwards, spawning legs and wheels as they pulled it out of the back of the van, and Owen lay on top of it inside a black, leather bag.
They quickly wheeled it over to a door marked 'Private' and looked up to let the security camera analyze their retinas, to determine whether or not they were granted access or not.

As they emerged from the damp tunnel they heard rash footfalls, stomping down a flight of metal stairs. Jack read out loud from a file, welcoming them back into the Hub.
"Abigail Williams, 28 years old," he said. "Not special, not too bright, middle-class family worked hard to put her through medical school, and she works as a nurse at Saint Mary's hospital for the past three years."
He slapped the file shut between his hand.
"What are we missing?"
He helped them wheel Owen's body to the Autopsy Room, giving Gwen the chance to pick up her phone and call Rhys.
They attached the slab to a chain winch bolted into the ceiling, lifted it up and lowered it into the Autopsy Room, so that it was sat on the examination table.
They dusted off their hands and sighed when they were done and when their eyes crossed Jack smiled approvingly.
"Did you find it?" Gwen spoke into her phone, biting off a chip of her nail. She cursed when she noticed.

Ianto returned to his desk, half expecting it to be covered in a layer of dust, and he scanned his monitor for any changes in Rift activity.
"Chronon activity," he spoke and Jack turned his head.
"What?"
"There's been a surge in chronon activity some three days ago…"
Jack lunged himself at Ianto's desk to read his monitor.
Ianto didn't mind him sitting that close.

"I'm just glad you're all right," Gwen said to Rhys.
"Did you find her?" Rhys asked. "That girl you were looking for?"
Gwen's eyes turned and found Jack looking right back at her, and she stammered, knowing she shouldn't be discussing Torchwood business with civilians.
She took it upon herself to end it right then and there.
She didn't mean to sound so cross, but it just happened.
"I can't tell you, okay? There's just too many things going on right now and it's best that you let us handle this on our own. Don't think about it, Rhys. Please."
"Can't I worry about my wife?" Rhys said.
"Get some sleep, Rhys." Gwen said, retreating into kindness again. "…I love you."
The silence itself on the other end as Rhys ended the conversation hurt her more than enough, less than it should, but she knew she had to take it and leave it. There were better things to do, more important things to tackle.
Owen was lying on the autopsy table for the second time in his undead life and there was no way of telling if he was ever coming back again.

"The energy's still there," Ianto said, waving the whistling scanner across Owen's chest. "Fluctuating, but dormant."
Jack put his hands in his pockets. "We'll have to wait till he wakes up. Now I know how you guys must feel."
They could barely smile.
Ianto had already started doing his rounds, preparing his chores and making his magical coffee.
Gwen had watched Jack run through the CCTV footage of last night, watching the kidnappers without as much of a clue to where they might have taken Abigail.
"If only Toshiko were here," Gwen said, rubbing her eye. "We could've used her magic fingers."
She didn't expect a response from Jack, but she did watch him closely.
"They need her for something," Jack said. "But what do the shapeshifters have to do with it?"
"You mean the disciples?"Ianto said as he joined them, carrying a plate with three mugs filled with coffee in his hands.
"I'm still looking for the right name for them," Jack replied with a teasing wink.
"Heavenly," he added when he took a zip from his coffee and wiped his mouth. "Chronon, why chronon?"
"What do you mean?" Gwen asked.
"If there was a surge in Void particles, I'd understand, but chronon? Wait..."
His eyes lit up and he jumped from his seat to turn to his team.
He put down his mug to free his hands to talk.
They loved it when he did this.

"Lumic's Cybermen were made in a parallel world, not too different from our own. In their reality they almost took over the world if the Doctor hadn't stopped them in time. In that reality, Lumic died, but in our reality he lives."
"He's creating Cybermen," Ianto said, but Jack hadn't finished.
"Their world was a few years ahead of ours. They had technology way more advanced than us, but also different. What happened there doesn't have to happen here. It's a different world, different people, different technology. History doesn't have to repeat itself. Lumic's Cybermen could possibly never return at all. He lost his company, remember? History is changed, yet lucky for us, history has its way of restructuring itself when people and events coincide like before."
Ianto nodded: "Everything happens in a time and a place."
Gwen was shaking her head. "Wait, what?"
"The option for that reality is still there, only it could've been mutated, altered, by different people, events, technology. There's no Cybus Industries here, there's Shelby Industries. Instead of cats, there'll be dogs, but in the end they'll still scratch you. You'll still be bleeding."
"But why would you think that?" Gwen asked. "Why would it still happen? Is it because of Abigail? Is it because of Joe Milton?"
"Mickey said he was the first Cyberman." Jack explained. "In his world, Abigail Williams died. Heartbroken, he volunteered for the experimental procedure, to rid himself of all emotion. He was the first to die. Here, he pushed her out of the bullet's way and died saving her. But it didn't end there."
"Owen." Gwen said.
"He came back from the dead, by possessing Joe's body. The body of Joseph Milton, out of hundreds of bodies at that cemetery. Why? I don't know."
"Divine comedy." Ianto quipped, without as much interrupting Jack.
"It set this in motion. It probably gave John Lumic the inspiration he needed to restart his cybernetic work."
"But didn't we erase his memories?" Gwen asked.
Jack picked up a disc from Gwen's desk.
"Film never forgets." Jack said, implying that Lumic probably had secret cameras installed in his sister's house, a security system that had recorded their every move, more importantly the moment they slipped two small retcon pills in their coffees.

"But then how does that explain the chronon surge?" Ianto asked. "Is John Lumic travelling through time?"
"I seriously doubt that," Jack said. "But there's more than one way to travel from one parallel world to another. One is to rip holes in the fabric of dimension and jump from one universe to the next. Another is to travel all the way back in time to the moment the realities separated, and then making sure that you're in the right one."
"And how do you do that?" Ianto asked.
"Changing the timeline is easy," Jack said with a smile, and Ianto knew he was talking from experience. "It's what happens afterwards that's the hardest part. According to that scan, something arrived through time three days ago, giving off a massive wave of chronon particles, but it could've been anything. The real question is...why didn't we know of it sooner?"

Gwen was overwhelmed with answers, parallel worlds and altered timelines, but all she could see was that girl down in the vaults, screaming to see her Joe again.
He was willing to give up everything for her, she was willing to endure torture for him.
"We're missing the point of it all," Gwen said after a while. "This is not about Cybermen, or Lumic, this is about a boy and a girl…whose love almost destroyed the world. They're the key to it all, and I just know it."
Jack put his hands in his pockets and shrugged.
"What do you want us to do?" he said. "We don't have the boy, and we don't have the girl."
Gwen's head was spinning.
"But we have Joseph Milton, don't we?" she suddenly realized.
"What do you want to do? Interrogate him? He's dead!"
"We still have the Life Knife…" Ianto said without thinking, and he still didn't get what his words had started when he looked up at Jack, but Gwen had already ran into Jack's office.
"You know we can't use that, Gwen," Jack said as he stood in her way. "You know why."
"The blade is connected to the gloves, yes?" Gwen said, deducing logically how the events of last time's resurrection had taught her how these gadgets worked.
"Without the gloves the blade's useless." Jack insisted, but Gwen wouldn't give in.
She demanded access to his supernatural safe.
"There's a chance we could tap into Owen's energy, use that to power the blade! We could resurrect him! Sixy seconds tops!"
Jack was outraged. "We are not going to resurrect another soul! Not after what happened last time! Who knows what's going to happen next! You know the risks!"
Gwen knew he was right.
She started pacing, clutching her throbbing head.
She could still taste the coffee in her mouth that had burned her lips and tongue.
" Jack," she spoke intentionally slowly and calmly, emphasizing her words with her hands to build up her logical argument. "Lumic knows we're after him. He knows if he knows we drugged him. He knows, and we're not going to find him or find Abigail. He's going to kill her Jack!"
"You don't know that." Jack replied.
"Exactly," Gwen said, "we don't know anything. But HE KNOWS."
Jack was thinking.
Ianto stood in the doorway, ready to jump in if he had to.
"He was his nephew, Jack." Gwen said. "I don't think his death was an accident. That wasn't any bar fight he got in. They had guns, Jack. They shot him for a reason, and I bet because he knew too much. You're saying he was involved in making the Cybermen, down in that other reality of sorts? We've got to wake him up, Jack. We've got to ask him."
"Who? Joe, or Owen?" Jack asked.
Gwen would've replied straight away, but chose not to.
She chose to remain perfectly still and quiet, whilst awaiting Jack's verdict.
His blue eyes gazed intently into hers, before they faded into a proud smile.
"You're good, you know that?" he said.
Gwen was amused, but she couldn't smile.
"So, are we doing it?" she asked, becoming ever more frightened now the prospect of raising the dead actually was an option.
She hadn't expected Jack to give in.
"Oh, we're doing it."