Jack Harkness came stumbling through the open door and punched the button to close. The automatic metal door started to move, but with a screeching sound, it got jammed halfway.

„Dammit," Jack panted, out of breath and activated the override. Then he tried to close the heavy door by hand. He put his whole body weight into it and pushed. The door rails groaned and screeched when he tried to move the metal plate forward. Finally, it began to move. Slowly. Too slowly.

He could hear his pursuers coming closer. The shuffling of bare feet. The rustling of shredded clothes. The grunts and groans of the Undead.

With another push, the door moved a bit further. Jack wished for some old-fashioned doors with a handle.

Just a few more inches.

He thought he would make it, but the first arm squeezed through the narrow opening between the door and the wall. Jack's already fast-beating heart jumped in fear. He inhaled sharply but regretted it immediately. The grey-coloured limb, with its rancid smell of rotting flesh so close to his face, made him gag. Decaying flesh peeledoff its forearm, exposing the white bone beneath.

He pushed even more forcefully when he felt the Undead try to pull in the other direction. The gap began to widen again.

„No," he grunted and employed all his strength and will to push the door closed.

With a clang, it finally slammed shut. And a severed limb fell to the floor. Jack stared at it for a while, noticing the maggots lazily feeding from the pulpy-looking decaying flesh. Lucky buggers, enjoying their feast.

When the adrenaline surge began to settle, Jack felt his shaky knees and sank to the ground next to the door. That was close. He could hear the Undead outside the door, pounding, scratching and pressing their bodies against the barrier.

With the immediate danger gone, Jack looked around. He'd thought he'd fled into the next corridor, but he hadn't. His hiding place was a small storage room.

„Fuck," he felt all his pent-up energy leave with this realisation and slumped back against the wall, exhausted.

He'd already spent two weeks with these creatures and knew they wouldn't stop trying to get in until they succeeded. They would not stop until they got him. Their hunger for fresh meat was too big.

Jack closed his eyes while he listened to the shuffling and scraping outside the door. He couldn't believe what his life had become since the Doctor had left the game station without him.

Initially, it had looked like a simple salvage mission. Taking care of the victims of the Dalek Invasion while waiting for rescue from the earth.

When the ghosts of the deceased started to appear, he knew something was wrong on the station. Jack had seen a lot of weird things in his life. He usually took pride in not getting scared easily. But the long days did wear him down, and eventually, they did get to him with their stoic presence and the nerve-shattering screams that howled through the station every couple of hours.

When the Voice appeared, Jack felt relieved. He thought he could handle that.

With dread, he remembered how his plan to blow up Level 500, where the Control Room was located, had failed in such a spectacular way. He had heard the explosion and saw the ghosts vanish.

And then it all reset.

Not reset. That was the wrong word. It evolved to the next level.

The whole situation felt surreal, like being locked inside a computer game, bestowed with unlimited lives.

Jack squeezed his eyes shut. Why did his thoughts go back to that day? He had to concentrate on the moment. He pulled his legsto him and let his head rest on his knees.

When the ghosts reappeared after the explosion and surrounded him, he could see how their appearance changed.

How the ghosts turned solid.

Jack shuddered when he thought back to that moment.

Their cold and clammy hands had grabbed him. Tearing his shirt, digging deep into his skin. He tried to free himself, but they had too many. Their faces were so close to him, staring at him with their dead eyes. Mouths wide open. Ragged teeth scraping over his bare arms.

Then the first one bit deep into his flesh. The searing pain had been excruciating. He'd screamed in pain and terror and didn't stop when they were all over him. He felt them tearing at his arms and legs, his struggles in vain. The flesh wounds had been deep . He felt his blood running down his chest, arms and legs while the undead had their feast. After what felt like an eternity, one of the creatures bit down into his throat and cut through his main artery. With the already lost blood, it didn't take long until he lost consciousness and was released into a pain-free black void.

An unknown while later , he woke up, gasping for air. His senses were still in panic mode. He immediately assumed a defensive position and looked around. Jack had still been in the hangar bay. Completely alone. None of the strange creatures that had attacked him were in sight.

Hastily he'd looked at his hands and checked his body. His clothes were a mess , and there was blood everywhere, but he was completely uninjured. Had he hallucinated? Was he going mad after all? His clothes spoke a different language, so there had to be more to it than just a vivid imagination.

This had happened repeatedly by now, and Jack did knot know what was going on. He had to be on alert 24/7. There could be a zombie attack at any given moment. Since he was the station's sole source of fresh meat, their whole focus lay on him.

Jack had decided to call the creatures zombies because that's what they were. The dead coming back to life. He wasn't sure if it was the real deceased bodies coming down from the freezers or the ghosts turning solid.

It didn't matter.

The Voice had also turned oddly absent. Most of the time, he could hear it laugh or mock him when his situations were most dire. The questions Jack threw at the disembodied voice were mostly ignored. Almost like it was distracted by other more interesting things.

Jack sighed and stretched his legs. Exhausted, he hauled himself up and began to inspect his hiding place. There wasn't much to discover. It was a relatively small storage room for one of the games of the station. Many boxes were stacked against the walls and in rows in the middle of the room, nothing else.

Jack had levelled up his weapon's arsenal for his fights with the zombies. Killing a zombie with bare hands was not a recommended way to go. He'd learned that the hard way.

One of the games of the station had been called „The Last Samurai", and there he'd acquired a large arsenal of stabbing weapons. Aside from the two long swords, the Katana's, he was armed to the teeth with smaller daggers and knives. He still preferred a good old gun, but regarding a zombie apocalypse, you couldn't go wrong with really sharp blades, either.

He pulled out one of the sturdier knives from his belt and pried open one of the boxes. The boxes were filled with stuffed toys. After looking inside, Jack let out a humourless laugh. He had a streak of bad luck lately.

When he heard the strain on the door behind him intensify, he turned around and saw it slowly open again. He knew it was time to confront the enemy. He could fight his way out if he was lucky and the group was not too large. With sweaty hands, he gripped his long sword tighter and positioned himself in a fighting stance.

„Come on boys, come and get me!"

Ianto Jones stood in front of a huge and very old wooden door with heavy iron fittings, typing in his security code. He wondered if any of the others even knew how deep down the Hub descended into the earth beneath the water tower. Most likely, they didn't care much.

Of course, Jack knew about this place, not that he bothered to come down here often. He knew the Restricted Items Archive was in good hands, and Ianto took his assignment very seriously.

Ianto knew every single item that was stored down here. And one of these items had piqued his interest.

He knew his plan was risky, and many unknown variables would be in play, but he had no confidence in Owen's ability to work properly with the singularity scalpel. The result would be similar to them trying to shoot him.

Ianto couldn't lose Jack again, so shortly after coming back from his months travelling with the Doctor. They had finally gone on their first official date not too long ago. The rift had been quiet the whole evening, and they had spent a couple of hours without interruption. Even Jack had been on his best behaviour in the restaurant. He'd been very distracting in the cinema later, but that had been fine. The movie had been crap anyway. It had been a really lovely evening.

Things were going well for Ianto Jones. He was happy for the first time since the early days with Lisa. Genuinely happy.

Ianto knew what he had to do. While he was walking down the long lines of shelves, his determination to make this work solidified. He didn't care which arguments the others would bring up.

He loved being down here. Others would most likely find it weird. The constantly moist climate, his occasional rodent visitors and the ever-so-often flickering lightbulbs made most others feel uncomfortable. He enjoyed the silence. The freedom to let his mind wander without constant interruption by some inept co-workers who couldn't refill the sugar box by themselves. Let alone operate the coffee machine. The archives were his domain. Nobody dared to order him around.

Water was dripping somewhere further down the corridor. He would have to check that out later this week. The boxes were air-tight sealed, but having water damage down here would only lead to extra hours of cleaning. Not worth it. Hopefully, the toolbox upstairs was still fully equipped. Owen tended to borrow pieces and misplace them accidentally by not tidying them up properly after an autopsy.

Finally, he reached the right shelf, which held one of the oldest artefacts in the archive.

He stood in front of the box of Entry 013. Carefully he pulled out the cube-shaped container and carried it to a table close by. He unlocked the lid and opened it. There it was, exactly like he remembered.

The Mind Mesh

Jack had told him the story about how the device had ended up in the hands of Torchwood Three around the turn of the century. About the Moniran heist to kidnap the Queen to bring her to their homeworld to display her in an exhibition about the universe's most influential leaders. The idea of the Moniran's had been to place her in stasis while visitors to the museum could mind meld with her through the mesh to experience her mind's brilliance. Torchwood was able to bust the heist before they could even leave the palace.

Later the team tried to test the Mind Mesh on one of the Weevils, which was a disaster. They'd wanted to learn more about the grotesque creatures from the sewers, just to find out that the device worked both ways. The participating Torchwood agent got his mind fried, and later that day, they had a weevil on the loose since it had been able to get his hands on all their passwords and security protocols. Torchwood ended up with one agent recovering in a nursing home and a weevil being disposed of in the furnace.

However, the Moniran's usually used the device. There obviously was additional equipment needed that the Torchwood didn't own.

The Mind Mesh was secured and sealed away in the Restricted Items Archive, deemed too dangerous to be used by anyone, including Torchwood.

Exactly what Ianto was looking for.

„No way, Ianto. No, it's too risky!" Gwen had raised her voice. She sat behind Jack's desk, and Ianto stood in front of it, The Mind Mesh resting in his hands while he presented his idea to her.

„You told us to come up with other solutions and this is one. One that actually works," Ianto responded calmly. He was trying to sell her the artefact as a safe way to bring Jack back, but so far, she wasn't buying it.

„How? How should this possibly work? A mind melt like in Star Trek? In the end, the parasite has two sets of minds to feed from. It's too risky!" Gwen crossed her arms and stood her ground.

They both stared at each other.

„If there is no way from the outside to disconnect them, I want to try to find a way from the inside. I don't ask any of you to do this. Let me safe Jack!" Ianto pleaded with her.

Gwen sighed when she realised Ianto wouldn't back down. „I might be in charge right now, but I'm neither the med nor the tech expert. Maybe I shouldn't dismiss your ideas too quickly when we don't have other solutions on the table. Let's talk to Owen and Tosh."

A while later, Gwen, Owen and Ianto stood around Tosh's desk while she inspected the device Ianto had retrieved from the archives.

„I have run a few tests on the object, but I have no idea how this thing works," Tosh admitted with a frustrated tone.

„I'm not gonna risk losing you too, Ianto," Gwen's voice was full of concern.

„Do you think it's dangerous to use?" Ianto asked Tosh while he stared at her hard.

„Mmmh," Tosh looked down at the Mesh again and turned it around in her hands. „I don't know how it works, but from the tests I ran I can't say I found anything dangerous about it."

„See?" Ianto stared at Gwen with a victorious look in his eyes.

„I don't know..."

„This was used by the Moniran's for tourist purposes. How dangerous can it be? They would neither want to endanger the paying customers nor the exhibit," Ianto insisted. He had no intention of telling the others about the Restricted Items Archives report regarding the Weevil incident.

„Let me do this."

„Owen?" Gwen wanted to hear the medics' opinions before making her decision.

„If the tea boy wants to risk his sanity for the boss, let him," Owen answered dismissively. „No really, we can monitor his vital signs as we do with Jack. If something looks off, we bring him back."

Gwen still looked doubtful but nodded eventually.

„Okay, let's try it."

They had placed a second table next to Jack's, and Ianto lay already on top. Gwen and Tosh stood on the upper level and nervously watched how the medic below prepared the Mind Mesh.

Owen had the core part of the device, a sphere the size of a cricket ball, positioned between Jack and Ianto. On each side, he pulled out the little connection devices that would be attached to the foreheads of the participating parties. They looked like little spider webs with five little suction cups. First Jack, then Ianto. After the meshes were tightly attached, Owen pressed a little button on each one, and yellow lights began to blink. After pressing similar buttons on the primary device, the sphere started syncing itself with its satellites. The lights turned red.

„Well, I guess that's it," Owen said, trying to make it sound light, but the nervous tone in his voice betrayed him. „Ready, Ianto?"

He received a determined nod from the table.

„Here we go," Owen said and pressed the bigger round button in the middle of the sphere.

Ianto's body suddenly jerked and spasmed, and his eyes rolled back. Then his muscles relaxed, and he lay motionless on the exam table.

„Is he okay?" Gwen breathed.

Owen checked the screen, which showed Ianto's bio signs. „Looks like."

„Why have the lights turned from red to green?" Tosh asked from above, recalling how Ianto had described the device to work.

Owen looked down and started to look a bit pale. „Green means the safety measures are off...," the medic tried to adjust the settings by pressing the buttons again. „Dammit, I can't disconnect the device!"

„Oh, Ianto, what did you do?" Tosh whispered.

The medic stared at Gwen and Tosh. „I guess Ianto has to find the exit by himself."