Author note: to anyone who was curious about the title of chapter one, a 'roflcopter' is quite like a helicopter only much, much more amusing.

Please read and review! I'd like to know what you think about it but, as stated before, the mind powers are still not working properly.

Part Three: Bondage and Bananas

In the main body of the Hub, Jack walked out of his office and paused, staring at the empty room. "Where the hell is my team?"

***

"You cannot possibly know that," Gwen protested.

"Ah, but I do; it was in the extras of series one. I told you, I'm an addict."

"Series one?" Owen interrupted. "Are you telling me we come on box sets?"

"Oh yeah." Tiffany was loving this. No one was drugging her, at least that she was aware of, and she had all the chocolate digestives she could hoard. She was also surrounded by fictional characters and trapped in an underground base that shouldn't exist, but apart from that, life was good.

Ianto's comm. buzzed, he raised his hand to tap it and said, "Ianto Jones, certifiable God of Coffee, how may I be of assistance?"

Behind him, Owen whispered, "Gwen, do you still think Irish coffee was a good idea?"

"No," said Gwen, pouting," 'cause we've ran out now."

Tiffany glanced at Ianto. She could see he was getting an earful.

"Oi-oi," Owen said. "This doesn't sound so good."

"Yes, sir. No, sir. Sir, could I just—"

"How long have we been down here, anyway?" Owen asked.

"No, I understand, sir—"

Tosh looked at her phone and Tiffany did not like the way her eyes widened as she gazed at the tiny screen. "Too long."

"Right away, sir." Ianto tapped his ear. To the rest of them, he said, "Time to go."

When they'd gathered all the coffee-and-biscuits paraphernalia, the Torchwood team turned on Tiffany.

Owen raised his hand in a mock salute. "Nice chattin' to you, Tiff."

"Yeah it was..." Gwen paused. "Interesting."

Tosh waved and then followed after the other two. Ianto and Tiffany were alone again. He relocked her cell with an apologetic expression. "Sorry about all this, you seem a decent girl, but—"

"Appearances can be deceptive, yeah, I know."

"Hang tight, Tiffany."

The door swung shut and Tiffany was once again left to her thoughts. She was thinking she'd kill for her laptop, all of this would make an intriguing fan-fiction...

***

As reprimands went, this had to be one of the worst. Jack wasn't even shouting; he was sulking. (Ianto found it hard to tell if Jack was more annoyed about the fact that all of his trusted team had been casually cavorting with someone who could be a threat to their entire organisation, or the fact that no one had thought to invite him along to join in the fun.)

Either way, when Ianto finally brought Jack's coffee, he also took up a large pile of double chocolate chip cookies (fresh ones, Ianto was pulling out all the stops) balanced precariously on the previously requested tiny plate.

Jack took one look at Ianto trying to struggle through the door with his load and gave in. "Need a hand?"

Ianto raised his head from the tray for long enough to wink and say, "Oh, always, sir."

Jack chuckled. He snagged a cookie from the plate, stuffing it in his mouth before relieving Ianto of the laden tray. "What do you think of her?"

"Tiffany?"

"Yeah. There's something there," Jack said, brushing off the crumbs on his shirt. "I'm just not sure what."

Ianto leaned against Jack's desk and crossed his arms, thinking.

"You've talked to her more. She trusts you."

Ianto nodded slowly. "She isn't a threat Jack, not that I can make out. And she's taking everything quite well for someone who's had reality torn out from under her."

Jack also nodded, then stopped. "What?"

"She isn't from here," Ianto said simply.

"From Earth? You saying she's alien?"

"Does she look alien?" Jack seemed set to answer, so Ianto continued, "Owen tested her blood. She's human, our human, through and through. Not from the past, not from the future. Drink your coffee, it'll go cold."

"So then she's from here," Jack said, reaching for his mug. "She's researched us."

"Yes, because I can just see her researching Torchwood only to call us all by the wrong names and keep tapping at the walls in case they really are plywood. Yep, that's likely."

"Don't get snarky, Yan."

Ianto inspected his nails. "Wouldn't dream of it, sir."

"Tiffany Summers has no records!" Jack protested. "She doesn't exist!"

"Obviously she does."

"Obviously she's lying."

"Then test her," Ianto said. "If she's telling the truth, you buy me dinner."

"Done and done. But if she's lying—"

Ianto sighed, pushing himself away from the desk and Jack's suddenly wandering hands. "Yes, yes. I'm sure I left those other handcuffs around here somewhere..."

***

"Well?" Gwen asked him when he came back downstairs. Owen had disappeared back into the medical bay and Tosh was hunting through the archives for... well, something.

"I think we're forgiven," Ianto replied. "Oh, and he says he wants that bottle of Jameson's either out of your desk and into the trash or upstairs on his desk. He'd prefer the latter."

"Fair enough," said Gwen, secretly planning on hiding it in the vault instead. "Did you mention the fact that our girl Tiffany seems to think we're all fictional?"

"Not yet, no. I was threatened with bondage, I had to back down."

Gwen raised an eyebrow. Ianto avoided meeting her eyes.

***

Tiffany had never watched her own heart rate. It looked more spiky than she would have thought. "Is that necessary?" she asked Owen, who was sticking more electrodes onto her. To Jack, she said, "I thought your lie detector was meant to be the best on the planet."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "How d'you know it's a lie detector?"

"You used it in the episode with—" Tiffany stopped herself. If that episode had already happened, then telling them about it would be bad. She could trip the ret-con; make them remember. If it hadn't happened, and the alien known as Adam had not yet invaded their minds, Tiffany wasn't going to be the one to tell them. She could still see Ianto sobbing as he admitted to murders he hadn't committed. "Err," she said. "Lucky guess?"

She could tell Jack didn't believe her, but then the green light on top of the lie detector flickered into red and she hastily added, "I can't tell you. It could be damaging if I did."

The light turned back green at her words and Tiffany grinned.

"Ready," Owen said, moving away from Tiffany to hover and watch her vitals on the screens behind. Gwen and Ianto stood on the balcony above, watching the scene in the interrogation room unfold. Tosh was at her desk, going through all the readouts on Rift activity to see if Tiffany could have fallen through from some parallel world.

Tiffany doubted that, though. She was still willing to attribute this entire thing to sleepless nights and cheese before bedtime. More gravy than of grave, she added wryly.

"What's your name?" Jack asked.

"Tiffany Summers."

Tiffany was ever so slightly hurt by the way Jack looked hopefully at the green light, willing it to change.

It did not.

From above, Gwen said, "Owen, you owe me a fiver."

Jack tried again. "When and where were you born?"

"London. London Bridge Hospital in nineteen eighty-nine. My birthday is August twelfth. Me and my mum and dad lived— Look. What I said before was true. What I told Gwen was true. I am telling the truth."

The light stayed green.

"Still don't believe me, Jack?"

Jack made a 'harrumph' noise. "How do you know about Torchwood?"

"Where I live, which quite obviously isn't here, Torchwood is a television series."

This time the entire team stared at the lie detector. It didn't change.

"Well, blow me," said Owen.

"No thanks," Ianto replied.

Jack cleared his throat. "Can we please keep on track here? For just a few minutes, would it kill you?"

"It wouldn't kill you," Tiffany said meaningfully. To her delight, the light stayed green.

"Know about that too, huh?"

"I don't know everything about the base, Jack," Tiffany said with patience. "I don't know all the ins and outs, the protocol, the fine print. I just know plot."

"Plot?" Jack repeated, his tone one of doubt. "Like what?"

Tiffany decided to try a different tack. Children of Earth hadn't happened here, not yet, but there was still the story behind it. "What happened in nineteen sixty-five, Jack?"

Jack's eyes narrowed. "Nineteen sixty-five. Sound of Music got released. Not a bad year, I guess."

"Didn't you ever wonder what you were doing?"

He stared at her.

***

Up above, Gwen turned to Ianto and asked, "What's she talking about?"

"I have no idea."

***

"Didn't you wonder what those things wanted with them when you handed them over?"

"You can't know about this," he protested. "You weren't even born."

"No one ever saw them again, did they, Jack? You always wondered, and you were left wondering."

The light kept its green corona and Jack said, "Stop it."

"I'm sorry. I can't; this is stuff I know."

"The year after? Do you know what happened to me then?"

"No idea. Not a sausage." On some bizarre whim, Tiffany added, "Not even a banana! Ha!"

"What did you say?"

"Villengard, wasn't it? Sonic blaster factory, all plantations now."

"You can't know this."

"Nanogenes, Glen Miller, gas mask zombies. Can't I?" All in all, Tiffany felt quite wonderfully smug. Then Jack's fist slammed down hard on the table and she jumped, good feelings fleeing.

"How?" Jack demanded, towering over her. "Tell me how!"

Owen's voice drifted across the room. "Easy, Jack." On screen, Tiffany's heart raced in jagged lines and blips. Seeing Jack's anger in person was...

She drew in a shuddering breath and Jack seemed to finally notice how hard she was gripping at the arms of her chair; how wide and fearful her eyes were.

"You can't know," he whispered. "You cannot know about him."

Tiffany managed to force herself to breathe and say, "But I do."

Jack regarded her. He became aware of the others listening and decided that a break was needed. He could find out just how much Tiffany Summers knew about him later and away from the team's prying ears. This was personal.

***

Hours passed and when everyone had been sent home – including one protesting Ianto, demanding free food as he was ejected from the tourist office – Jack descended to the cells. There he sat and talked to Tiffany. Just talked.

After a time, Jack decided Ianto was right. Tiffany Summers wasn't a threat. Here was someone who understood, albeit in a completely bizarre manner. She thought he was fictional; he knew he was not. He thought she was mad and she knew she was not, or at least she was pretty certain.

Somehow it worked.

The topic of conversation moved onto the Doctor and what he was up to, as Tiffany would of course know. It was hard trying to work out where in time the Doctor would be; she wasn't even sure where she was on Torchwood's own timeline. Jack didn't know anyone called Donna, but he clammed up over the name Martha and Tiffany got all she needed to know from that.

"How about Adipose? Have you heard of them?" she'd asked.

"'Them'?" Jack had replied. "Adipose is body fat. It's not a 'them'."

So the Doctor was alone, Tiffany thought. It was sadder to think that the Doctor could really being flying out there companionless instead of flying alone on-screen. It made everything seem more real to her.

Jack continued to probe and ask questions, but over one item of information he would not budge:

"We're seriously the spin-off?"

Secondary author note: If you don't get the significance of bananas, I shall despair at you. :D