A/N: I know that I said that this was going to be the last chapter, but as I have this very nice end to the chapter, not to mention how bad I'm with updating so I decided to post this short chapter and try to work of the second part of it later as a separate chapter. So next one should be the last one. Once again this is not beta read.

Jack wished it would really have been that easy. A bit of a run in with some robot Santas and some shape shifter, and then back home for tea. There was the matter with the ruined living room, of course that one was a shame, but Torchwood was going to take care of the maintenance expenses. Next working day a builder's company was going to show at Davies's font door and tell them they had been send by the council to repair the damage caused by the wild animal. They would have been none the wiser and would have had a newly refurbished ground floor. Of course that would have been too easy for Torchwood, not life threatening at all and not world ending. The problem was that he couldn't even began to guess what the big threat would be, and when would it come?

Would it be just threat to the immediate vicinity lives, or one to be an apocalypse, end of the world as we know it? That was exactly what scared Jack the most, the unknown enemy, the one you can't see coming or don't know how to defeat.

"Jack…" Gwen tried to get her boss' attention but it didn't seem to work. He appeared to be so deep into his thoughts that he couldn't hear her calling.

"Jack…" Gwen tried again, but got no better result than the first time. She took his shoulder and shook it. "Jack…"

Jack finally snapped out of it and turned towards her. He looked her in the eyes and frowned.

"Is everyone alright?" he asked.

"Yes, well apart of the shape shifter and Miranda obviously," Ianto said.

"Well, yes, obviously," Jack agreed with Ianto while still managed to sound sardonic when answering to him.

"What was that thing, Jack?" asked Gwen. "If it wanted world domination it just gave up way too fast."

"No, Gwen, it didn't want world domination." Jack went to the body on the kitchen floor and pocked it lightly with the toe end of his boot. "It's from a race of shape shifter assassins and it was probably sent here as a decoy to get our attention occupied, while whatever is planning world domination put their plan to work. These assassins would do any job for the right amount of money. Only this one probably didn't realise that it won't be enjoying the money."

"So I have the dead body of an alien assassin on my kitchen floor?" Rhiannon shrieked. She would have liked to sound calm and reasonable asking this question but she couldn't. It was too much, it was utterly bonkers, and her brother and his friends were responsible for it. At least everyone else was too stunned to even speak and the room was finally reasonably quiet.

"Rhiannon, please, not now," Ianto said.

Rhiannon sat back affronted feeling a bit hurt, it wasn't usual for her to just accept when someone tell her to stay quiet without protest, but then again it wasn't every day that you are chased around your house by aliens. So she sat and let the experts do their work. And wasn't that just so strange thinking of her baby brother as one of the secret agent experts.

Slowly people around the room had started to come out of the silent shock and started to move around the room in a bit of a daze. Aunt Aldyth was still complaining about the chaos clearly not grasping the full severity of the situation. Grandma Brenda was trying to pour some more tea with hands shaking, spilling it around the cups and in small puddles on the kitchen counter, electing further grumblings from Aldyth. Johnny was trying to calm down Rhiannon and keep Mica quiet, while David was trying to get one more glimpse of the alien corps feeling something between the curiosity of a child and being totally terrified.

On the other side of the kitchen, despite her sore throat, Gwen was trying to calm Andy down and help him feed and change Nick. It was strangely calm, people drinking their tea, changing a nappy proceeding with their lives as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Jack couldn't help but think that it seemed too much like the calm before the storm.

"We need to find Miranda," Andy said snapping out of his haze. "You said that she could still be alive, we need to find her."

"We will, I promise you we will, but we also need to find out what is coming here," Gwen assured him. "Ianto, can you see anything on the PDA?"

Ianto shook his head lifting up the PDA for Gwen to see. Jack approached him behind and to Ianto's discomfort stood right behind him almost plastered to his back. Ianto kept quiet not wanting to draw any more attention to their position that it already might have, the only sight for his discomfort of being so close around people was the slight stiffening of his back. Jack took the PDA from him and studied it carefully, checked a few more settings, then tossed it back on the counter with disappointment.

"Rhiannon," Jack turned to her, "you said that you have another computer in one of the kids' rooms?"

"Yeah, in David's room."

"Well then, let's go upstairs and have a look at it," Jack commanded. Not waiting any response he turned sharply around with a swish of coat tails. Ianto's hand stopped him. He got a hold of Jack's arm and pulled on it insistently.

"Jack, I don't think using the computer and accessing Mainframe is a very good idea!" Ianto persisted holding on to Jack's arm.

"Ianto what are you talking about?" Jack asked. "We already discussed this. We need the information on mainframe."

"No, Jack, trust me on this," Ianto said. Then he looked as if he was thinking this over. He looked lost for a moment after that, then shook his head and released Jack's arm. "I'm sorry, you are right we need it."

Jack lifted an eyebrow at Ianto's sudden change of mind but couldn't give him more attention that this because at that moment they could hear thumps on the bathroom door and muffled cries.

"Miranda…" both Gwen and Andy shouted and started running up the stairs followed by Jack and Ianto. Everyone else trailed behind.

Gwen stood by the bathroom door holding a hand up to stop Andy from opening the door and running in without knowing what they might find in there. He was desperate to make sure that his wife was ok, and she understood this, but it could be another trap, something else to divert them from the real chase. Very slowly and cautiously Gwen approached the door and put a hand on the handle. Her other hand was on the waistband of her jeans, ready to grab her gun at any moment if needed. She looked over at Jack and Ianto and received nods indicating that they were ready to cover her back. She turned the handle very slowly. Everyone near the door could hear the urgency of the muffled cries increase when the door handle started moving. Gwen tried to stop herself from simply shoving the door open and running to help the distraught woman, because it might very well not have been a distraught woman. In the end she couldn't stand the slow progression and pushed the door, still peaking cautiously, she could see a young woman being tied clumsily, and gagged with a towel, on the floor near the toilet with her bond feet lifted in preparation to kick the door again. Andy pushed by past Gwen before anyone could react and stop him with a cry of, "Miranda!"

Abandoning all caution Gwen helped him to untie Miranda and lift her up from the floor. However, Rhiannon was more cautious of handing her Nick still holding him in her hands and trying to find any sight that this was not Nick's mother.

"Andy," Miranda shrieked the moment her mouth was free of the hand towel. "It was bloody awful! That creature…what was it? It was so ugly, oh God, it was from hell…"

"No, it wasn't," Jack said tersely.

"It's you!" Miranda exclaimed pointing a still shaking, accusing finger at Jack. "You show up and a perfectly normal and enjoyable dinner turns into a horror story."

"Miranda, calm down, it's not his fault, and it's not like a horror movie. And frankly, the dinner was far from enjoyable, unless you have been eating on another table," Ianto muttered, and ushered everyone out of the bathroom and down the short corridor towards the children's rooms. He pushed the door to David's room opened and turned a deaf ear to the protests of the owner of the room. Ianto grabbed the lap top and opened it to start it up. A moment later a hand pushed the lead of the laptop back down, slamming it closed.

"In the hallway you said that it wasn't a good idea to use the mainframe. Why was that?" Jack Harkness asked.

"No, reason sir? Might've been just a bit nervous," Ianto answered. He tried to appear calm and push the lead up again to open the lap top.

"Oh, no, you are not giving me that," Jack said. He kept his hand on top of the computer effectively preventing Ianto from opening it until he give him a satisfying answer in order to be allowed to continue with doing his work.

"Jack, I think this can wait until later, we need to find what is happening and the real threat to Earth," Gwen said placidly, putting her hand on Jack's shoulder.

"Oh, I think we already found the threat," Jack said darkly, then turned his cold gaze to Ianto. "Don't we Ianto?"

Ianto didn't answer immediately. He just stood there calmly waiting for Jack to lift his hand from the computer so he could keep working. He didn't smirk or comment, but his posture and face were so calm almost as if he was saying, 'took you long enough, sir.'

"Indeed sir," Ianto said calmly. "Now if you excuse me?"

Everyone around the room was staring at Jack and Ianto as if expecting a bomb to go off at any moment. The tension was almost palpable in the air. Gwen could almost taste it on her tongue, as if it was something bitter and acid at the same time. Rhiannon was gaping at Jack, her mouth working open and then closing again. She clearly wanted to say something to Jack for accusing her brother, but either could not find the words, or didn't know if she should say something. After all they all thought that the shape shifter was Miranda as well.

"Jack, what do you mean," Gwen asked after a few tension ridden moments. "What has Ianto to do with it?"

"Oh, Gwen I don't think that's Ianto anymore," Jack said still keeping his dark tone of voice and the clod look on his face.