Chapter 3

Ianto sat in the chair opposite Jack's desk as he watched the man pace the room. Toshiko was working on the box, Gwen was studying whatever image was on the box and Owen was going over the medical scans he had done. He was sure that Jack was a bit calmer towards him for his actions now that he knew that he he hadn't intended to do them. He could almost feel the worry that was now flowing from his lover instead.

"This can't be good, there can be nothing good that came out of the Time Lock on the Time War, Davros was proof of that." Jack muttered as he paced. "How did the box even get here? Caan pulled Davros out of the Time Lock and lost his mind. This shouldn't be possible. That's it, I'll call the Doctor, he might know something."

Ianto sighed, knowing that Jack was not going to let this go, and that there would be a Time Lord on their doorstep before they knew it. "Jack, we will figure this out. I'm going to go help Tosh, call Martha she can contact the Doctor for you." Ianto spoke as he started to make his way towards the office door only to be pulled into Jack's arms.

"No!" Jack spoke forcefully, "I don't want you near that thing until we know why it affected you like it did and that it won't do it again."

Ianto groaned, he really had been hoping to avoid Jack in protective mode, the other man turned into a mother hen. It had seemed that the closer they got and the morre serious their relationship became the more protective Jack became in regards to him. It rather reminded Ianto of the behaviour of a wolf in relation to its mate and had wondered if it was maybe some biological imperitive bred into future generetaions. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch of imagination especially with all the interspecies mingling in the future.

Knowing that Jack wouldn't relent he voiced his other want. "Can I at least have a picture of the image to look at then? If the box called to me, maybe it's because there was some sense of familiarity or something, maybe something I came across in London. I may recognise whatever it is."

Jack looked as though he was considering it and was about to reply when the door opened and Owen entered the room. "Come on Teaboy, I've got a few more tests I need to do."

At that Jack whipped his head towards their Doctor, glaring at him. "I thought you said you'd done your tests, that Ianto was fine. What did you find that makes you want to do more tests?"

Owen not one to like admitting his mistakes spoke quickly to get it over with. "Nothing, teaboy is fine. I forgot though to check and make sure that the same can be said of Feathers."

Ianto having realised the same nodded before turning to Jack, "It's fine. Make your phone call; I'll be downstairs with Owen. I'll even stay away from Tosh's desk, promise."

It was obvious to both Ianto and Owen that Jack was conflicted, and that he wanted to follow them, but he in the end just nodded and went to sit at his desk, picking up the phone and began to dial. Taking his actions as permission the two men left the office and made their way back down to the room Ianto had awoke in earlier. Owen gestured for him to sit on the bed before telling him to change shape. It was something that he had been practising quite often, the majority of the time under Owen's supervision. The other man normally took readings of him both as he changed and once he was in his phoenix form, mainly so that he could form baseline readings for him to work with if Ianto was ever hurt.

As usual Owen's scanner was ever present as he changed, but the expression on Owen's face wasn't, the man looked worried about something. Once Ianto was in full phoenix form however the worry seemed to disappear, and he became more relaxed as he carried out the variety of different tests that he needed to do. The worry reappeared however as Ianto was changing back into his human form, something that was justified as a soon as he had shed his feathers so to speak he felt a burning in his hand and the level of pain he was feeling skyrocketed.

Ianto wasn't sure, but he must have screamed or something, because a few minutes after he had transformed Jack had come rushing into the room with Gwen and Toshiko following behind him. Owen was taking readings of him and began to bark orders at Gwen to get him cold water and cloths ready and Toshiko to grab him something from his kit. Jack just ignored Owen completely and made his way straight to Ianto checking him over himself before finding the root of the problem, the hand that had touched the box. His hand was red and angry, like it had only just been burnt, rather than the few hours before. It made him wonder why he hadn't felt the pain before when he had first woken up, only the headache, but he realised that when he had woken earlier there had been nothing wrong with his hand at all, something that confused him.

Owen was quick in treating him as much as he could, using the cold cloths to take some of the heat out of his hand before using a piece of alien technology that he had Toshiko collect for him to remove the pain and heal the burn. They tried not to use the device if possible leaving it only for the most serious of injuries, something that unnerved Ianto that they had used it on him. He knew that there had been a lot of pain, but his mind hadn't processed how serious the burn must have been.

As he felt the pain recede Ianto let out a sigh of relief, he knew that there was no way that he would have been able to cope with that for much longer, especially as he still had a while to go before he could take any more painkillers, especially because of the strength of the alien medication Owen had him on. He wasn't about o become addicted to painkillers, or to overdose himself on them. He knew that he had to be careful with medication; he always had been, mainly because he didn't know if there was anything that would affect him unusually due to his hybrid nature. He had found that aspirin or any other over the counter medication had never worked for him, that he was almost immune to them, and he had always had to have stronger prescribed medication for his pain.

Once the cold cloths had been removed Owen immediately set to test his hand to make sure that everything was in proper working order. He flexed his fingers in many different ways and opened and closed his hand in a fist before Owen was satisfied with his muscle movement. He then turned his hand over so that he could get a good look at his palm where the pain and the burn seemed to have been from his contact with the box. Whatever he was expecting from Owen it wasn't the sucked in breath, and he certainly wasn't expecting to see an image burnt into his palm that the device had been unable to heal. There on the palm of his hand was a set of wings as majestic as his own with what looked like a crown between them.