First off, a H*U*G*E thank you to Kitsa for letting me bounce some ideas off her and for helping me sort though some of the details.

Also, many H*U*G*E thank yous to everybody who has reviewed, fave'd/story alerted, or just keeps on reading without commenting! Reviews, of course, always go an extra long way towards making my day all the better… ;-)


Chapter Ten:

Day One, Part Three

"Never despair; but if you do,
work on in despair."

Edmund Burke


Sleeping in Gibbs' spare room, Tim realized, well after it was too late to easily make alternative arrangements, was even more difficult for him than if he and Abby had gone to stay with his parents (who were next on the list of people he wanted to visit while they were in the States.) His folks, while the picture of perfect conservative Irish Catholicism, easily accepted the fact that he and his girlfriend lived together in what was essentially a one bedroom apartment. Gibbs accepted the facts as they were… but he had this way of looking at him that made McGee feel like he was doing something wrong just by curling up next to Abby in a bed at Gibbs' place. He doubted the feeling would go away even after they were married. Which was probably why, at six o'clock in the morning, he was up drinking coffee, quietly listening to the little transistor radio in the Gibbs' kitchen...

"Bed not comfortable, McGee?"

The younger man jumped, yelping and spilling his coffee all over the table. It dribbled down onto the linoleum, pooling up under his bare feet, much to his irritation.

His host shook his head, chuckling softly; he tossed over a towel from the sink.

McGee caught it deftly, one handed. "Thanks, Boss," he didn't think before saying it. He went about sopping up the spilt coffee. There had been a time, years in the past, when he would have hesitated, embarrassed, apologizing all over himself, a time when Gibbs would have had to tell him what to do next even though it was painfully obvious what needed doing.

The retired NCIS officer regarded his former colleague a moment; the ease of that catch hadn't gone unnoticed, either. "I'm not your boss any more," he said, rather than commenting.

The other stopped, realized what he'd just said. "Guess not," he replied in a casual tone as he went back to cleaning up the mess. "But you're not a probationary field officer any more. Mike Franks still calls you 'Probie', doesn't he?" he glanced up, just briefly.

"He always will," Gibbs agreed, flashing a wry half-grin; he'd used that exact same argument to convince McGee that having Tony calling him Probie wasn't (necessarily) an insult. He grabbed a second towel from the drawer and tossed it on the floor to get the puddle at McGee's feet.

They both stopped working when a new story came over the morning news. Reports were coming in from around the globe. For the second time that morning, every child in the world had stopped—just stopped. This time, however, they let out a collective ear piercing scream before uttering an ominous pronouncement.

We are coming.

………………………………………………………………

"Are you all right?" Ianto asked when Jack hung up his mobile, flipping it shut, hard. They'd just turned into the car park by the quay.

Ianto had finished his conversation with Bobby and was about to phone Tim… but Jack's ire was palpable. He'd been on the line with the Home Office, so little wonder, but it seemed worse than usual. Apparently whomever he'd been speaking with didn't know what Torchwood was. Under better circumstance, he would have teased him about that delicate ego of his… But not today.

"Yeah, I'm fine," the older man lied. He pulled the black SUV into its usual spot. He put it into park, but didn't cut the engine. "You go on in without me," he said, brusquely changing the subject.

"What? Where're you going?"

"I…" he hesitated, "I have something I need to take care of."

Ianto gave him a speculative look, but he knew that expression, Jack's face was like cold stone. Whatever it was, he wasn't going to talk about it until he was ready—if he was ever ready. There were times, even now, when the Welshman wondered how much his husband still kept from him, wondered why. "Will you be long, do you think?" he asked, instead of pressing the issue directly.

"I don't know. I shouldn't be." His expression, his tone, softened. He hesitated another moment, then reached over and took the other's hand in his. He rubbed his thumb over the band on his ring finger wondering just how guilty he looked, wondering why Ianto put up with so much from him. How could anybody love somebody so much… how could one person make another so happy, just by being themselves? But you do… he thought in the younger man's direction. "I'll be back as soon as I can. Meantime, you four keep working on this," he instructed, his tone brisk again. "Nothing else matters but figuring out what's going on, finding a way to stop it if that's what we have to do."

"All right," the other agreed. He pulled his hand away from Jack's warmth, missed it immediately, and undid his seatbelt. He got out…hesitated…then turned back towards the SUV, just as the other was putting it into reverse. "Jack..." he shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. "I love you, you know."

He smiled—it melted the younger man's heart, lifted it. "I know. I love you too, Ianto Jones-Harkness. I will always love you."

Ianto's smile was a reflection of Jack's "Be careful out there, will you?"

"There's nothing to worry about." His smile turned into a cocky grin. "I can't die, remember?"

"But you can get hurt," he answerd him, unwilling to give into the other's banter.

Jack leaned across the seat and Ianto met his kiss at the window. "You be careful too," he said. "You're not even supposed to be here, you're on family leave, remember?" he added in an intentionally light tone that (finally) brought a smile to that beautiful Welsh face.

"I'll just ring up the aliens, then, and see if I can persuade them to delay their invasion plans for another couple of months. Do you think they'll go for it?" he teased. The lightness of his tone belied the tightness in his chest, the fear. That… sound… the scream had come out of Remy's mouth… the words…

We are coming…

They'd tried to convince Nerys to let them bring her back to the Hub, but Ner refused to let her daughter out of her sight. All things considered, Ianto didn't blame her. There was no guarantee they could keep her safe. They didn't know what was causing it or why, they were only guessing it was alien in nature because at the moment that made more sense than anything else they could think of.

Ianto pressed another soft kiss to his husband's lips before straightening so Jack could pull out. He stood there and watched him drive away. "I'll always love you too, Captain Jack Harkness," he said to the departing vehicle.

Softly under his breath he whispered another name, Jack's real name, so very quietly that no one would have heard it, even if they were standing right next to him.

"I will love you until the last star burns out of the sky and even then…even then I won't stop. I won't ever stop loving you." He wiped the moisture from his corners eyes…it wasn't even noon and already his guts were in knots…fear… helplessness.

"Right, enough of that," he scolded himself. There was always hope.

He dialled Tim's mobile as he headed towards the tourist office, where the new clerk was manning the information desk, trying very hard to maintain his own façade of calm in the wake of this morning's events.

Ianto gave him a friendly wave as he walked in…the young man behind the desk hit the switch under it to open the secret door in the wall. Despite everything, the Welshman found himself smiling, just a little. If his mam had thought it odd having an American working for the Tourist Bureau, he wondered what would have made of Sam, who hadn't even been born on their planet. Thankfully, I don't think anybody will ever tell her, he mused.

Thousands of miles away, five hours earlier, Tim McGee answered his mobile phone with the customary greeting: "McGee."

"Tim, it's Ianto. We have a situation. Have you heard a news broadcast yet this morning…?"

…………………………………………………………….

"Where's Jack?" Mickey asked when their fearless leader's partner stepped through the cog door alone. Ianto wasn't dressed for work, not in his usual attire, anyway. Jeans. T-shirt…hoodie. Denim jacket over that. Christ. The world really must be coming to an end.

"Dunno," Ianto answered, entirely too casually. He flipped his mobile shut and pocketed it.

"What do you mean, you don't know?" Mickey pressed him. "He was with you, wasn't he? And what're you doing in, anyway, you're supposed to be on leave."

Ianto rolled his eyes. It was one thing to get that from Jack, but he would not have the whole team having a go at him over where he should be in the middle of a global emergency. "Given the current circumstances," he began, his tone betraying his irritation.

"Oi," Gwen snapped, cutting their argument short before it even got started. "We're looking at footage," she told Ianto in a calmer tone; she and Sara had been going over newscasts, videos of children chanting, all at the same time. It was the same thing all over the world:

We…

We are…

We are coming…

The same thing over and over… and then… then it just stopped. It stopped and the children carried on as they had been, as if nothing was wrong.

"We were up in the Plass when it happened the second time," Sara added, giving over an inquisitive look, wondering if Ianto had seen it too—or if Ianto and Jack had seen it, presuming they'd been together like everyone thought.

"Jack and I were with my sister and…and my niece," he answered her unspoken question, his voice straining with the emotions he was trying desperately to keep under control.

"Is she all right?" the American queried.

"They all seem to be all right, don't they?" he countered, sliding out of the denim jacket, suddenly realizing what he was wearing. Jack was always saying that the world wouldn't end if he didn't wear a suit into work… perhaps he was wrong about that.

He headed for the coffee station, hoping that by going through his usual routine he could somehow restore order some to the world—or at least that he could restore some order to his world. "Apart from that, they all seem fine, though," he said to the others over his shoulder. He started the coffee.

Only instead of feeling better, the knot in his chest only tightened as he worked. He'd never seen Nerys so frightened… his mam… Trea had called… even Cade phoned, just to see if it was really all the children, if Remy, if Gavin and Trea's children… if they'd all stopped, too.

Just then, he felt the familiar touch of Gwen's hand on his shoulder. "Ianto?" her concern was audible.

"They don't even remember doing it," he whispered. "They don't remember stopping…speaking. Screaming. They don't remember."

She gave over a tight lipped smile, "I know. Look, Ianto, why don't you…"

"Don't you dare suggest I go home, Gwen!" he snapped at her angrily.

She nodded, giving his shoulder a gentle squeeze, recognizing anger. Fear. "All right. Why don't you let me get that, then, you go see if you can sort out the footage…?"

He rolled his eyes. "I get the coffee, Gwen. That's what I do for Torchwood."

"Ianto, you're more than just a… I mean…" she floundered as the words 'tea boy' died on her lips.

"I know what you mean," he cut her off. "But this is what I need to do." He turned to face her fully, his expression softening. "Go on. I'll get this. We'll all be the better for it and you know it."

"I am rubbish at making coffee, aren't I?" she managed a meagre little smile.

"A bit, yeah," he teased back. "Go on. I'll just be a tick."

"All right then. But better make mine a tea, yeah?"

"Absolutely."

A few moments later he rejoined the others carrying a tray of mugs, one tea and three coffees. Each was done perfectly, to his each of his colleagues' exact specifications—not that he'd ever had to ask them how they took it. It was one of the many things Ianto Jones simply seemed to know.

"…look, it's got to be a transmission of some sort," Sara was saying, her frustration evident. She flashed a smile a pure gratitude, however, when Ianto pressed a mug of coffee into her hands. "It has to be something only children can hear. That's the only thing that makes any sense!"

"I'm telling you, I'm not picking up anything!" Mickey insisted. "Pulse, broadcast, whatever, there's nothing there!"

"Well there has to be something," said Gwen. She pulled up more footage on her screen, hoping to find something, some clue…anything. She frowned. "Sara…" she motioned for the other woman to come over to her station. "Have a look…what do you see?"

"Ey?" Mickey asked, craning his neck around to see what they were doing.

"Maybe it's like those mosquito alarms," Ianto was saying; he leant back against the nearest table. "Like Sara said, something only kids can hear. Maybe tied to… I don't know…testosterone…oestrogen, maybe? Only pre-adolescents are being affected, so—"

"Why didn't our instruments pick it up, then?" the other man wanted to know. "They don't have testosterone or oestrogen!"

"Look, I'm only throwing out suggestions, if you've got a better theory—"

"Hey, guys, you might want to look at this," Sara called over; she could see that the 'debate' was about to escalate into an argument. Between Ianto's emotional state and Mickey's lack of sleep… "This is coming in from Taiwan," she added, drawing their attention away from each other and towards Gwen's computer screen.

"It's just more of the same," Mickey waved it off, still irriated.

"Wait a minute…" Ianto pushed off the desk and moved closer to the screen.

"They're speaking in English," said Gwen, at the same time as he was coming to the same realization. "Every single child in the whole wide world is speaking…English," she gave the others a perplexed look as they gathered around. "Why English?"

"I suppose if someone out there were looking down here, English must be the dominant language, right?" Mickey suggested. "That makes sense."

Ianto and Sara both shook their heads, exchanging looks. Mickey was brilliant at some things, but…

"Actually, Chinese is the dominant language on the planet," the Welshman corrected his colleague. "Well…Mandarin, to be precise. Three times more people speak Mandarin than English."

"If whoever is doing this just wanted to communicate, they wouldn't be doing it in English," Sara agreed. "They'd be doing it in Chinese. Mandarin," she corrected herself for his benefit, taking another sip of coffee. "So…why are they speaking English?" she asked the question they were all thinking.

"I don't know," Ianto settled his hands on his hips. "But maybe if we can figure that out, we'll finally know what the Hell's going on out there."

Agreeing, the others went back to work, each exploring a different theory, a different angle, hoping that one of them would latch onto the right answer.

"Oh my God," Gwen was the first to break the silence.

"What is it?" Ianto asked her.

She glanced over her shoulder at him...the others. "Ok, so every single child in the world is talking in unison, yeah? Well look at this…" she stepped aside so they could see the footage of the fifty-one year old man on her screen. "Every single child. And one man."

"We are coming…"

"Where did you get this?" Ianto wanted to know…

……………………………………………………….

Frustration and anger pooled in Jack's chest as he exited the well kept suburban home. Things hadn't gone as planned inside. They never went as planned, not here, but just once… shoving his ire aside, trying to concentrate on new options, he pulled his phone from his coat pocket.

Without thinking about what he was doing, he dialled Ianto's mobile instead of the main line for the Hub.

"Hello?" the younger man answered on the first ring; he sounded harried, but less emotionally drained than he had earlier.

Working must have done him some good. Little wonder, really. He smiled. He couldn't help it. There was just something about hearing his partner's voice that made him feel better. "It's me," he identified himself. "Anything?"

There was a pause on the other end of the line; his good mood evaporated.

"Ianto? Talk to me…" please don't tell me something else has gone wrong, not today. Around him, everything seemed peaceful. Quiet. If it weren't for the events of the morning, it would be a beautiful day. A perfect day.

On the other end of the phone, the younger man cleared his throat. "Gwen is on her way to Springstead," he stated simply.

"What?"

"I know she's supposed to be on light duty, Sir," he remained unflustered despite his outburst. "But it was her lead. She insisted."

Jack felt his jaw clench. "And you let her?" he demanded.

"She's gone to interview a psychiatric patient, Jack, not take on a pack of angry Weevils."

"Psychiatric patient?"

"A Timothy White," he read the name off his screen. "Mr White is being affected by the same…the same whatever it is, that's affecting the children. According to his records, he's fifty one years old and has been in and out of care for nearly forty years."

Jack leant against the fender of his car, closing his eyes, absorbing the details. "All right. Fine. But would you mind telling me why you didn't at least send Sara or Mickey Mouse with her?" his tone was scathing.

"I sent Mickey to my sister's. Jack, he got less than two hours of sleep last night. He's not going to be of any use to anyone if he doesn't get some rest," he informed the other in a curt tone. "He was falling over."

He didn't need to tell Jack that would be good for Nerys to have Mickey there—or that he knew it meant he was playing favourites, putting Nerys above the rest of the citizenry of Cardiff. At the moment he didn't care about the rest of the citizenry of Cardiff. She was his sister. If they couldn't tell her what was causing her daughter to speak in a weird alien voice, the very least he could do was send Mickey over to be with her while they figured out what was really happening.

"Sara's working on a program to locate the source of the signal," he went on. "And I've been on the phone to Martha. She's stuck in New York and doesn't know anything. Neither does Elizabeth Shaw."

Jack rubbed the back of his neck. Ianto's tone was cool bordering on cold. Angry. He supposed the younger man had the right to be angry and yelling at him because he would have done things differently—because never would have sent Gwen off to Springstead alone—wasn't helping matters any. In fact, the Captain was quite completely certain it was only hurting things. "All right," he said. "Good work. Earlier somebody said something about some doctor at St Helen's?"

"A doctor…" Ianto paused while he brought the half completed report up on his screen. "Patanjali. Rupesh Patanjali. Why?"

"Get me his number."

There was an extended silence on the other end of the line, far longer than it should have taken anyone, least of all Torchwood's senior archivist, to get a simple phone number.

"I need to speak to a doctor," Jack told him, hoping it would be was explanation enough.

"We have a medical officer, Jack."

"Yeah. I know. He's stuck in New Jersey, remember?"

"Point taken. Hang on."

"Thanks…hey, Ianto…"

"I'm fine, Sir," he said, before the other could ask.