A/N: I know I promised that this will be the last chapter, but it ran away on me again. Also I didn't want to have been posting chapters with the length of 2000/3000 words and suddenly for a last one to post 10,000/12,000 words chapter. So here it is posted like this. I suppose not the best place to stop, but I don't think there is one in this chapter anyway.

I think I might have found a beta reader, finger crossed, but I'm posting this because I haven't been posting for a while, if I get this edited I will replace it.

They think our heads are in their hands

But violent use brings violent plans

Keep him tied, it makes him well

He's getting better, can't you tell?

No more can they keep us in

Listen, damn it, we will win

They see it right, they see it well

But they think this saves us from our hell

Metallica- 'Welcome Home (sanatorium)'

'I don't think that's Ianto anymore,' the words echoed around the small room filling everyone with dread and anger. A child's room was way too small to hold everyone comfortably. Jack wasn't surprised to see that it was blue. It seemed that in the last two centuries that he lived here on Earth, every boy had to be surrounded by blue. Not surprising on one wall was hanging a poster of some rugby team; the other was shared between Spiderman and some footballer from a Cardiff team. He was obviously quite the Welsh boy, through and through, just like his uncle.

Suddenly the chaos erupted again all over the place. People shouted in confusion, questioning each other, or demanded answers from Jack, but no one dared look at Ianto. It redirected Jack's attention from Ianto and the computer for only a moment but it was long enough for Ianto to open it again and start it. Rhiannon was livid, shouting, demanding and pulling at Jack.

"What do you mean that's not my brother anymore?" Rhiannon demanded to know. "Look at him, that's Ianto over there."

"No, I'm sorry but he is not," Jack said quietly, feeling as if the world under had dropped off under his legs. He felt sick, cold sweat marring in beads his forehead and his neck. He couldn't lose Ianto now, not when it was supposed to be only a nice family dinner.

"So what is it another shape shifter?" Gwen asked." Where is the real Ianto?"

She looked at Jack expectantly with large pleading eyes. Please let it be a shape shifter. Let Ianto be alright. That was the mantra going around her head. She needed Jack to reassure her that she wasn't going to lose another friend, one of her best friends.

"No, Gwen," Jack told her gently. "This isn't a shape shifter. That's Ianto's body, but that's not Ianto right now."

"How do you know that, Jack? You can't know that."

It was just a stubborn denial and she knew it, she, they had seen too much to know that Jack wouldn't just mistake something like this. Still she refused to believe it without any prove, and she could see it in the face of everyone else around her, that they did too. Even if all of them were in denial. Gwen was good in denial. It wasn't the first time for her, denial sometimes made her unable to accept the situation until she fixed it when other people felt defeated. She wasn't going to just stand and accept it now.

But she couldn't keep on contemplating this because Ianto had used their momentary lapse in attention and had started whatever it, the creature that he was now, was telling him to do. Jack took his gun out once again, this time pointing it right at Ianto's forehead.

"Jack?" Gwen gasped in shock. "What are you doing?"

Rhiannon and Johnny's voices could be heard over the general cacophony of angry shouts of, both Ianto's and Jack's names, demanding to know what was going on. Rhiannon looked as if she was barely holding herself not to pounce on Jack. The revolver in his hand, and the hold Johnny had on her sleeve, were the only things keeping her in the place.

"I'm trying to get some answers," Jack told Gwen coldly. "Get away from the computer! NOW!"

Ianto calmly turned around with a small, oh so familiar for his expression, smile and stood up holding his arms up in a gesture of surrender.

"It is going to be too late anyway, even if you shoot," he said calmly, as if shooting him didn't hold too much a value. "I have already sent and set up the data."

"We'll see about that," Jack spat. "Who are you?"

"The Wire."

This small two words answer elicited even more shouts, protests and demands. It was impossible by that moment to distinguish who was shouting what.

"What is that?" Jack snarled.

"What is happening to Ianto?" Gwen asked at the same time.

Ianto just stood there and smiled calmly at them. He stood up from the chair and closed the lid of the laptop. Noting in his posture or mannerism showed that he was at all concerned with Jack's webley pointing at his head or with the general chaos around them. His smile was more of a smirk, and it was making Jack's face twitch with frustration. Gwen could see the tale tales of his frustration in the tight lines of Jack's face. It unnerved her because in moments like this she knew that Jack was unpredictable and could shoot Ianto if he so much as moved wrongly. Even if it was just to wipe the smirk off what was once his lover's face.

Gwen didn't want to hurt Ianto, she only wanted to help him and protect him. But as her old Sergeant in the police force used to say when they really needed to use some unconventional methods, desperate time called for desperate measures. So she took the matter in her hands. She crept behind Ianto and knocked him out cold.

"I am really, really sorry," she said lowering Ianto to the ground gently. Jack quirked a questioning eyebrow, but then just nodded at her mouthing a 'thank you', and started tying Ianto to one of the chairs.

That was the moment when Rhiannon broke away from Johnny's grip and pushed Gwen away to reach Jack and Ianto. She tried to pull Jack away from her brother, all the while shouting incomprehensible in between desperate demands of information and pleading with Jack to release her brother or help him.

"For goodness sake woman, pull yourself together!" aunt Aldyth's voice suddenly broke through the chaos. "This is a disgrace! Keep some decorum! I knew that your mother should not have married in this barbaric Welsh place."

If Gwen had ever wondered where Ianto had his uptight manner from despite his valley boy upbringing, she had her answer now after meeting this lady. She left the two men in the family, Johnny and Andy, to take care of the ladies and hopefully manage to calm them down, and went to help Jack with tying up Ianto. She didn't like it, but she still trusted Jack's judgment and she knew Ianto enough to see the difference for herself now.

"How did you know it wasn't him?" She whispered to Jack.

"Did you notice how rude he was to Miranda in the bathroom?" Jack asked her back. "He is sarcastic sometimes, but he is never openly and consciously rude. I think that whatever this Wire is it looked in his mind and tried to copy him."

"It mistook his sarcasm for rudeness," Gwen stated nodding. It was formed as a statement but she looked at Jack questioningly for confirmation, wanting to see if she got it right.

Jack nodded.

"But it could have been just the stress," Gwen suggested.

"Yes, but there is more. When we were working on the scanner in the kitchen he allowed me to practically press into him in front of all the family," Jack said. "Does that sound as Ianto?"

Gwen just shook her head. And then she thought there was this moment in the corridor, before they had ascended the stairs, when Ianto had tried to stop Jack and warn him that using the computer wasn't really a good idea. She didn't think it was too important moment at the time, but now she thought that they should have paid more attention to it. It could have been the last moment the real Ianto had to warn them.

"But if it was since then, why help us with the shape- shifter then?" Gwen asked. "Why save me?"

"Maybe it needed us to trust him." Jack shrugged.

"Or Ianto isn't completely gone," Gwen suggested and looked at Jack daring him to contradict her.

He didn't, not this time. He just nodded and went to take some water from the bathroom to wake up Ianto. They would have to wait for Ianto to tell them what was going on and see how it will go from there. Jack splashed the water on Ianto's head and he woke up spluttering. He pulled on his bonds trying to get out of the desk chair.

"Jack, for God's sake," Gwen protested.

"We need answers, Gwen." Jack turned to Ianto. "Don't struggle, is not going to help!"

Ianto snarled something inaudible but did heed Jack's comment and stopped struggling for the moment. He gave all of the room's occupants a reproachful gaze and a disdainful smile. He clearly thought they were not up to his standards. The look he gave Gwen, however was slightly pleading.

"What is the Wire?" Jack started his merciless questions without leaving him any time to recover.

Ianto laughed again, "Even if I tell you what I am human you will not understand."

"Try me," Jack hissed. "I'm not your mere human."

Before Ianto, no not Ianto, the Wire, could answer, Gwen butted in unable to just stand around quiet any longer.

"What do you want?" She pleaded. "Why did you take over Ianto?"

It gave her an appraising look and smiled almost fondly at her, " Aren't you so sweet, always needing to understand, to care."

It tugged one last time and then seemed to get resigned to its fate and sagged in the restraints making as comfortable as possible into the small chair. It wasn't much to offer really, Ianto was a full grown, six feet odd man, and not with of very light build either. But it just had to do, there was no choice really.

"I'm the Wire!" It announced proudly in Ianto's voice. "I'm a single entity existing on an electrical wave lent. But not anymore! Now I'm going to spread through this planet's networks. Mobile phones, internet connections… This planet is full with them, it's perfect."

"But… why? Why did you take Ianto?" Gwen insisted to know.

Ianto opened his mouth to answer but Rhiannon interjected this time.

"Please don't use my brother's voice!"

"Is that better?" The question came from Ianto's mouth but it sounded as a standard pure recording of a train announcement through an electronic speaker. Rhiannon nodded numbly, it wasn't better, not really. It was still using her brother and it was strange but it was much better than listening to this...thing, using her brother's voice.

"I needed a body to make the connection to your Torchwood server, there are too many firewalls on it and the normal civic one is not enough to sustain me on its own." It paused and turned to Gwen looking her in the eyes. "He was the best choice as he was the one who tried to a make a connection in the first place. Unfortunately the computer blew out when I was passing through."

"So Ianto wasn't around ever since the incident in the kitchen?" Jack asked. "It has been you all along." Jack stopped for a moment, thinking, he suddenly remembered something. "But why did you stop me in the corridor and insisted that we shouldn't use the laptop if you needed the connection?"

"Because Ianto isn't really gone?" Gwen insisted again.

"He is almost. There might be some of him left, but he is fading faster than I thought. I need to hurry."

"You are not going anywhere!" Jack snarled. "If you need to hurry, then you are fading. Aren't you, you need more hosts."

"Not to worry", the Wire said placidly. "I have already established the connection with most of the servers. And soon we will be more and ready to reach mainframe at your Hub. My fellows are already taking bodies and spreading."

"How?" Gwen sounded shocked.

"Through the internet and then phone calls, people will think they've just got a little electric shock. Just like dear Ianto."

"I'm going to stop you!" Jack spat in venom. "Because, Ianto Jones is the one person you shouldn't have touched if you did not want me as an enemy."

"Oh, but Jack, I have seen inside his mind. Doubts about you, about you caring enough, are all over his head, it's full of them." The Wire taunted. "Do you think he will hang on long enough to hope that you will save him?"

Jack strode with determined, despite the only few steps that separated him from Ianto. His face was now blank and calm, not betraying the anger that was boiling inside him. Gwen knew what it meant when Jack became like this. When she saw him twitch, she knew that he was angry and ready to shoot, but now when he suddenly became that calm, he was way beyond angry and into furious. He wasn't read to shoot he was ready to kill and annihilate.

He leaned close to Ianto and put his hands on the desk behind the chair to which he was tied. His nose almost touched Ianto's, their lips were just a breath away, however, when the words came out, his voice was not a whisper, it came out strong and full of promise.

"I don't believe that. And do you know why?" Jack asked. "Because I know the humans of this century, and do you want to know what I know about them. They are resilient, and just brilliant, and stubborn, and most of all down right argumentative. They don't just give up without a fight and damn well so. Take this lady for example." Jack said and pointed at Gwen. "She is one right stubborn, fight prone and determinate woman, and she is Welsh to boot!"

"Oi!" Gwen shouted frowning.

Jack ignored her and righted himself from his intimidating position. Not that that Wire, whatever it was had looked very intimidated anyway. He put his hands in his pockets hoping that this familiar gesture will help to calm him down and he won't be tempted to hit Ianto anymore.

"And do you know what?' Jack asked, tilting his head up and lifting his chin. They had to give him that, he did look kind of heroic even if it was in the middle of a kind's bedroom surrounded by football and rugby posters. "Ianto is Welsh too. And the Welsh are stubborn as a mule. So I won't be so sure that Ianto has faded away already."

He turned his gaze towards Gwen and looked her straight in the eyes. She could see in his eyes the fact that he had decided what to do and was not going to back away even if this meant heartache or killing him for Ianto's sake. All of a sudden, Jack was once again full with energy and on a motion. He turned towards Rhiannon and locked gaze with her, his face was set and serious. It bore no argument.

"You stay here and make sure he doesn't come off his bonds." Jack instructed Rhiannon.

She was ready to argue, to tell him that he couldn't order her around like this because she wasn't part of his mad, Scooby Doo team. But Gwen interjected once again settling up the situation.

"I'll stay here with her. You do what you need to do." Gwen told Jack putting a reassuring hand on Rhiannon's shoulder.

"Gwen, I need you as a backup!" Jack told her sternly.

"No, Jack, Ianto and his family need me as a support much more." When she said this, her stance was one she would take every time they argued a posture that Jack had dubbed the stubborn ready to fight Gwen. "What are you planning to do anyway?"

Jack shook his head. There was no point of arguing with her when she was convinced that she was doing the right thing. It would just lose them more precious time and she would win in the end anyway.

"Take a good care of him!" Jack instructed her pointing a finger at her. She mock saluted him and then nodded determined. "I'm going up on the roofs and cutting the communication connections of the area. I doubt it that, it had managed to spread too far yet. Despite having Ianto's hacking abilities, Tosh had put too many wards on mainframe. It will have trouble getting pass them."

Ianto snarled at him, barring his teeth, and looking anything but human even in a human's body. When Jack and Gwen looked carefully at their friend, Ianto's eyes had lost their cloudy blue colour and had become all black pits of darkness. Jack was even more determined to do what needed to be done, because they had to hurry, there wasn't time for explanations and emotions. Ianto was losing his grip.

"If you cut the connection and kill me, you will kill this body too," it snarled with a voice that was nothing like Ianto's deep soft Welsh accent. "I am after all the only thing keeping it alive. It is mine now."

Gwen looked shocked at Jack, "Jack, you can't," she pleaded, but it fell on deaf ears.

Jack ignored her and checked that his gun was secure and loaded in its holster. He turned swiftly around, ignoring every pleading gaze and all the words softly spoken to him, or in Gwen's and Rhiannon's case, shouted at him. He sent one last, intent gaze at Ianto. The look was full of promise and care.

"I still need a backup," Jack said and turned to Andy. "You come with me."

Miranda hastily pushed baby Nick in Brenda's arms and jumped up to confront Jack. She strode to him and almost pushed right into his face, looking furious and emphasising her words with wild gestures.

"You can't ask my husband to do this," she shouted at Jack. "We have nothing to do with this madness, don't you get my family involved!"

Andy jumped after Miranda before Jack had had the chance to answer and drag them in the next argument, which could be easily avoided. After all, as it had been already pointed neither Ianto, nor the world had time to be wasted. He took his wife's hands and gave her a light, calming kiss on her head.

"I need to go, love," he said quietly. "It isn't much safer here than out there. Beside if we don't do something it wouldn't matter where we are staying. Other people would get hurt too."

Miranda shook her head in denial, "But, you don't know what to do. This Captain and his girlfriend..."

"Not his girlfriend, I am married. Thank you very much!" Gwen interrupted her.

"Never mind that," Miranda continued, "They are trained, they are used to risk their lives, they know what to do. You don't!"

"That's exactly it, Miranda, they risk their lives constantly so we can keep going on undisturbed and oblivious. It is time we do something ourselves!"

Miranda wanted to argue further, she was even ready to use Nick for her argument, but after opening and closing her mouth a couple of times, she decided that it wasn't worth it. He looked determined, Jack nodded curtly and turned around to the door. In the tiny space of the bedroom the effect of his coat was lost, not having the space for Jack to swirl enough for it to fawn and below. Andy followed him close behind on his heels.

The room fell silent for a few minutes, no one feeling comfortable enough to say a word or daring to look the others in the eyes, even less at Ianto's. With each passing moment the air started to feel more and more oppressed, the silence lay heavy between the occupants. Through the bedroom window came a soft Christmas carol and cheerful voices, which seemed to mock the occupants of the room.

"Mum, are uncle Ianto and Andy, going to die?" David asked innocently.

Rhiannon sat by her son and hugged him tight to her, on her other side Mica snuggled close holding out to her waist. Rhiannon kissed first the top of her son's head, and then her daughter. She didn't understand any of this any more than the rest occupants of the room, but she had to keep calm for the sake of her brother and her children.

"Of course no," she said firmly. "You know your uncle Ianto, he isn't going to just give up."

Gwen sprang to action again at that. This would have been the perfect situation to find something more about her secretive colleague, meeting his family hearing some anecdotes from childhood or school, but it wasn't really, not now.

"Your mum is right." Gwen addressed the children. "We are Torchwood, and I'm not letting anything happen to your uncle."

"Then what is that thing?" Miranda asked. "What does it want to do?"

Gwen threw a quick glance in Ianto's direction, but he seemed preoccupied with something else entirely and no answer was going to come from him, or from the creature that was inside of him. She wasn't sure that he had registered their conversation at all. Whatever it was he was doing she could't see him moving, he was just looking very concentrated.

"It's an alien creature," Gwen answered and waited for the snorts to stop before continuing. She wasn't sure if their reaction was in disbelief or because after Jack's talk with it she was stating the obvious. She suspected it was the latter. "It wants to take over people. So far it had survived only as an electric impulse, with no body and touch, or taste. Now it got Ianto and probably liked the feel of being corporeal." Despite not posing this as a question, she looked at Ianto for confirmation. He did not give any indication that he had heard her. He just kept on staring at nothing, blankly.

Everything seemed to have calmed down comparatively for a moment, with Ianto restrained and away from any internet connection, and Jack who reported to Gwen that he and Andy were already up on the roof. It was a bit concerning that he had managed to access mainframe, but Jack had assured her that Tosh had put sufficient firewalls to hold a sentient virus for a time, even if it wasn't possible to neutralise it without their intervention. She just hoped that it didn't spread around the public networks and that Jack could stop it before it does. It was strange to be so frightened by an enemy they couldn't even see. She was used to the big brutes, metal paper pots and bity things with pointy teeth, but this was so much scarier in some ways.

Before Gwen could notice it, Ianto had moved. She turned around alarmed by the scraping of the chair and saw him standing up. Ianto had freed himself, and no one had noticed, because they got lolled into false security. Brendan and Aldyth had even gone to make more tea and get some cake. She scrambled for the first thing that she could use as a weapon but before she could do anything Ianto had taken by her throat and flung her across the room. Her head connected with the wall, a bad crunch noise came out and she was left lying where she had fallen senseless.

Rhiannon started to shout and demand from her brother to explain what he was doing, but Johnny's hand came across her mouth muffling her words.

"Rhi, please keep quiet," he whispered in her ear. "Didn't you see how he just threw her like a rag doll? What do you think you can do?"

Rhiannon had to concede with his point, because it wasn't as if she would be able to fight him off, and she had to think of her children. But if she didn't…Jack was out there trying to save them all and thinking that he and Andy weren't in danger. She had to at least warn him if not stop her brother.

Ianto was opening the door now, his face still a blank, impassive mask. She had to stop him, Rhiannon knew that she had to act, but before she could do, David crept behind his uncle lifted the lap top up and smashed it down against his back. He wasn't tall enough to hit him on the head, but it was enough to make him shout in surprise and paint and stumble. David just put his foot and caught Ianto in his momentum making him fall down. They knew it wouldn't last long, he wasn't out cold like Gwen, and he was just surprised and a bit pained. Rhiannon jumped and threw the bed sheet over his head, it wasn't a weapon, or some heroic action move, but that was all she could think of at the moment, and it did keep him disorientated for a while.

"Now what?" Johnny asked around the room.

No one answered because Ianto had freed himself from the sheet and was lifting himself up growling with anger. They all backed as far away, as the tiny room would allow them. It was over. They had tried but were not a match for an alien creature or a trained special agent. He stood up on his legs already steady and reached for his gun. The kids whimpered, and Mica hid her face in her mother's skirt, a moment of anticipation and fear passed, nothing happened. Ianto made a low growling noise again; Jack had taken his gun away. They still didn't dare move, because he was advancing on them, and looked quite ready to harm even without the gun. Rhiannon threw an anxious look at Gwen hoping that she would wake up soon, but she was still old cold. Ianto took the chair that he have been tied to and lifted it up. Everyone averted their faces away from Ianto and towards the wall.

Aldyth crashed through the door and brought the full tea tray down on Ianto's head knocking him stone cold.

"I'm afraid we shall not have tea," she said calmly. "I've wanted to do this the whole night."

She looked at him in disdain and took the duct tape out of her pocket. She wasn't going to bother with ropes this time.