Disclaimer: "Nothing is mine. It's not a very fun thing to own..." - this disclaimer belongs to The Chibi's Are Stalking Me. I hereby use and disclaim it.

A/N: Okay, so there's nothing written between the reunion scene and the Hub scene in KKBB... so I improvised. It's what I'm here for. =D
Sorry about the lack in updates; I've been on Guide camp, and revising has gotten in the way. You probably won't get another update until next week, as I have about a gazillion exams this week, but after that it's all a bit more relaxed, and I'll be updating like it's going out of fashion. You can thank rosemariontyler08 for this update.


I Never Did Like Fish

Imagine the scenario.

Captain Jack Harkness. Born in the 51st Century. Once Time Agent, once Con-man, now Defender of Worlds.
Alli Tyler. Half alien, half human. Kind of, sort of the Defender of Worlds' 'sidekick'... or something. I don't know. Anyway...

Invaluable technology at our fingertips, alien machinery waiting to be used. And how do we get across the middle of Wales?

We take the bus.

To be fair, we would have taken the SUV if Toshiko, Ianto, Owen and Gwen didn't have it with them. Then again, if they didn't, we wouldn't have been on the bus in the first place...

But there we were, sat on the bus; I had the tracking device clutched firmly in my hand like a lifeline, and Jack seemed to be having severe trouble keeping his feet still as they tried to tap out a tarantella.

At last, after a journey that seemed to last several lifetimes, we reached the right house, jammed down the emergency stop button and legged it out of the bus without a backwards glance. Jack was pulling his gun out as we ran, and I was still holding the tracker in my hands. We passed the SUV, but displayed on the screen was the little red dot that signified alien life. It was inside the house. A gunshot sounded.

We sprinted to the door - it was ajar. Jack quietly pushed it open, looked at me with a finger held to his lips, and raised his gun. I pulled out my own gun and followed him in.

If I hadn't seen an alien before, I would have screamed. As we entered the living room, unnoticed, I saw what seemed to be a walking, talking, red blowfish (in a suit) at the front of the room, with a gun held to the neck of a young girl. Closest to us was Owen, on the floor with a bleeding, choking man. Gwen was protecting a woman, holding her to one side - the mother, it seemed - while Toshiko and Ianto were stood facing the blowfish with their guns raised, ready to shoot. Toshiko was holding up a small scanner and reading off it, her other hand trained on the blowfish. No one seemed to have realised we were there. My stomach did a strange lurch upon seeing Gwen, and I remembered with a pang of guilt that in the year-that-never-happened, she had died for Martha and I.

To be frank, it wasn't exactly the reunion I'd been hoping for after being parted for a year (though I reminded myself once again that they would believe it to be less than a month), but there was nothing to be done about that. In fact, I should have been paying more attention to the situation at hand. The blowfish was speaking -

"- do it?" he was saying to Ianto, his voice human but oddly cold. (Yeah, that's what was weird. Forget the talking fish, if it's got a cold voice, then we're in trouble...)My grip on the gun tightened, but the fish was moving to fast, the girl struggling too hard, for me to get a good clear shot. "How good are you? How sharp is your aim? What if you kill her? What if I kill her first? Can you shoot, before I do? Can you? Dare you? Would you? Won't you?"

I heard a gunshot and thought I had fired by accident. Checking my gun, I was relieved to see I had not. Was it Ianto? No, since he was now looking at Jack and I. I looked up to Jack, who it now became clear had been the one to shoot. He smirked as the others also turned to stare at us, the woman scrambling past Gwen to reach her daughter, the man still on the floor with Owen's jacket stemming the blood.

"Hey kids." Jack drawled, grinning. "Did you miss us?"

No one answered for a moment. I dropped my gun to my side, and Jack did the same. I looked around, almost laughing from the expressions on the others' faces.

"Jack?" Ianto asked, dumbfounded, and his gun fell to the floor, his arm limp at his side. "Alli?" Owen, still trying to tend to his patient, didn't make any move, his face set. Toshiko just gazed at us, open-mouthed. But Gwen, her face clenched with fury, took one step forward and -

WHAM. Jack staggered backwards, clutching his nose. With raised eyebrows, I took a step back too, just to be on the safe side, but she ignored me. As did the others. Hmph. That's nice.

Jack seemed to accept it. "Want another one?" he asked jokingly, and for a second, I thought Gwen wasgoing to punch him again. But instead, she turned to face Ianto, Toshiko and Owen.

"Let's get that thing back to the Hub." she instructed, indicating the blowfish that now lay crumpled on the floor but looking at Ianto, who nodded, his own eyes still on Jack. "I want to make sure nothing else came through with it. Owen, get an ambulance here to take him to hospital -" she pointed at the wounded man "- you can invent a scenario, whatever you like."

"Gotcha." said Owen.

"Tosh, you got any further with the readings? If there are any more of these around, I want them dealt with."

Toshiko shook her head. "I need the system back at the Hub. But I'd like to get a DNA sample from this one, then I can trace it back to species - it's incredible technology."

"Be my guest." said Gwen, and she and the others moved across the room quietly. I wanted to say something but couldn't find the words. Owen made a quick call to 999 by the man's side and informed Gwen that an ambulance was on its way, Toshiko and Ianto were sorting out the blowfish's body, and Gwen was comforting the mother and daughter and explaining what would happen next.

Jack seemed speechless too. After a few moments, Gwen stood up and shrugged her way past Jack and me. Following Gwen's example, the others walked out after her. Owen had his phone to his ear, but cast a quick glance at my disfigured face and frowned; Toshiko walked past wordlessly with her head bent low, pulling the blowfish behind her on a stretcher; and Ianto, holding the other end of the stretcher, hesitated between Jack and me, looked up at Jack and seemed about to speak, but then hurried along after Toshiko when Gwen yelled their names from outside.

We exchanged a glance and followed them out. We jumped into the back of the SUV with the dead blowfish, where the back door had been left open, and Owen drove us back to the Hub in silence, while Jack and I exchanged numerous looks of nervousness (on my part) and reassurance (on Jack's).

On arriving back at the Hub, we hung behind, trailing in after the others in an act of politeness (and fear of Gwen). As soon as we got into the main Hub area, the team trailed about and wandered over to the computers.

Toshiko made immediately for hers, cast one glance at the tracking program I had forgotten to shut down, closed it wordlessly, and started frantically typing things into the screen. Gwen was watching her, waiting for results, and Ianto was at her side. Owen went down to the post-mortem bay with the blowfish.

"So?" Gwen asked Toshiko when she hesitated at one point.

"I have no idea..." she muttered, then turned to Gwen, her eyes accidentally landing on me and widening in alarm. I looked away instantly. "The - uh, the DNA I gathered can't be traced. We don't have anything like it on record. No idea what it is, or where it's from. But that's not always the best method, Owen'll know what to do better."

"What about other incidents?"

"On it now." She turned back to her computer. I thought of going to ask if I could help, but decided against it, watching the interchange curiously.

"What about you, Ianto? Where's the body?" asked Gwen.

"Owen's got it." answered Ianto. "He's just conducting the post-mortem."

"And how're the family?" ventured Gwen.

"All fine; Owen sorted it all out with the hospital, the dad's going to make a full recovery, and the girl's just suffering from a bit of shock." reported Ianto.

"Yeah, being held captive by a talking fish can do that to some people." Gwen replied with a slight smile.

Toshiko turned back around. "Nope, nothing." she reported to Gwen. "No Rift activity around the same time, nothing on the same scale..."

"Are you sure no more like him came through?" Gwen asked her nervously.

"Cross-referencing with the rift activity monitor, doesn't look like it." Toshiko said confidently.

"That car's been impounded." Ianto continued to Gwen. "I'll get it back to the owner in the morning."

Gwen gave a curt nod and turned her attention to Owen, who had just emerged from the autopsy room. "How you doing, all right?"

He walked across and handed Gwen a file. "Bio-profile's onscreen now. Nothing in his genetic make-up likely to contaminate the city."

"Okay, Tosh, can you add that to the species database?" Gwen asked Toshiko, who nodded and turned back to the computer. "Ianto?"

"Hello." said Ianto, waiting for an order.

"Sorry, um, can you deal with the body when it's cold?"

"My pleasure... unless you mean making sushi." joked Ianto.

"No, the morgue'll do fine." smiled Gwen. "Thank you."

Jack, it seemed, had been watching the scene with as much interest as me. "Got pretty organized without me." he commented in the brief lull.

Gwen, working at a computer and typing furiously, didn't turn. "Yeah, well we had to." she answered sharply.

He appeared to sense Gwen was not as forgiving as he'd thought. He glanced around for a change of subject. "Hey, did you decorate in here?"

Gwen turned suddenly and I flinched, but she reached for Jack and pushed him up against a wall.

"You left us, Jack!" she yelled, and stepped away agitatedly. Toshiko, Owen and Ianto turned to watch the scene, apparently too eager for answers to interrupt Gwen. I was just glad that their attention seemed to be focused on Jack.

Jack sighed, defeated. I knew he wasn't going to argue. "I know." he said sincerely. "I'm sorry."

"I'm - I'm sorry too." I added, my face reddening with shame and guilt. While Gwen's attention seemed trained on Jack, the others seemed merely surprised that I was sorry - clearly they thought Jack had abducted me, or something.

"We knew nothing, Jack!" persisted Gwen furiously. Jesus, that girl is obsessed with him...

Toshiko looked from Jack to me. "Where were you?"

"We..." I began, when Jack didn't answer, but I found that as much as I wanted to tell them the truth, the words seemed glued to the roof of my mouth. I suddenly understood why Jack never told them about him. It would mean losing who he was. I looked to Jack, shooting him a look that plainly said 'No lying'. He seemed to understand.

"I found my doctor." he said simply.

Ianto gaped and looked directly at me. "You mean -"

I nodded wordlessly.

"Wow." gasped Toshiko.

"Did he fix you?" asked Owen.

"What's to fix?" Jack forced out. "You don't mess with this level of perfection."

Gwen gave a small smile.

"Are you going back to him?" asked Ianto, looking rapidly from me to Jack then back again.

"No." I answered softly.

"I came back for you." Jack told Ianto, seeming to forget about the others. I felt my heart drop with a thud to my stomach. Jack looked around at the others, and added hastily, "All of you. We both came back - for all of you."

"What happened to you?" breathed Toshiko, directing the question at me. I swallowed and looked down, unable to fathom the words, attempting to shield my face from view and pulling my sleeves down over my forearms.

"There's was a fight." Jack covered for me. "Nothing major, don't worry."

"How can you say that?!" asked Toshiko incredulously, gaping at him. He shrugged.

"Okay, so it was a bigfight." he said nonchalantly, and I was thankful that he had chosen not to make a big deal of it. "But it's all sorted; everything's fine."

"Well, she's clearly not." said Owen, and made his way towards me. I was taken aback by his sudden... niceness. But still, I shook my head and moved away.

"It's okay. I'm okay." I insisted.

"What d'you -"

Owen's question was interrupted as Toshiko's computer gave a loud beep. She turned around swiftly and read the information displayed on the screen.

"Rift activity!" she reported, and everyone pulled away from the group. I headed over to Toshiko's workstation with her, but glanced at Jack, who was edging towards the others. He caught my eye and shot me a supportive smile. I didn't return it.

"There's been a surge of Rift activity in the city." Toshiko informed us. "And a reported 'accident' at the same time, in pretty much the same place."

"Could be another fish-thing?" Ianto suggested.

"No, the readings are completely different." said Toshiko.

"Okay, well I reckon we should head over there." suggested Gwen, and the others agreed. Jack and I followed them out of the building cautiously, Jack obviously not wanting to try to take charge again just yet.


A/N: Crummy ending, yes, but never mind. =D And no, I'm not going to re-write the whole of series 2 Torchwood. Don't worry. I have plans. And a maths exam tomorrow. -groan-