Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy, Doctor Who, or Torchwood.
A/N: This is set somewhere after Donna and before Martha and quite obviously after the whole shenanigans of season one torchwood. A new, short chapter for the new year, hope everything is shiny for all.

It wasn't unusual for Ianto Jones to stay late at work. It wasn't unusual for him to not go home.

Of course 'usual' had changed since Harkness disappeared a week ago.

Gwen was dealing the best of the four left behind. She had a life outside of Torchwood, she had friends and she had Rhys.

Owen was dealing the way he dealt with everything: A heavy dose of hard liquor and an even larger dose of sarcasm.

Tosh was dealing quietly in the background. She had tinkered and fixed every faulty appliance and device she could get her hands on and then she had repeatedly reorganized her books.

Ianto wasn't dealing. Ianto was acting. Jack was gone. That was it.

It wasn't unusual for Ianto Jones to stay late at work, but it was unusual for him to lay out one of the standard issue Torchwood sleeping bags on the autopsy table and settle down for the night.

It was unusual, but no one said anything. They knew why he was doing it. Someone had to monitor the rift. Jack lived at Torchwood, in a room below his office. Now there was no Jack to take the night shift. So Ianto started to sleep at Torchwood. He stopped going home after a week and half. He started to live out of a pair of suitcases.

Tosh, Owen, and Gwen didn't say anything. Ianto was always the second in command informally. He made Torchwood work like a clock, even without Jack.

It was almost business as usual when Ianto rolled off his makeshift bed and to his feet as one of the computers beeped to life.

His tired eyes skimmed the screen as he hit the small remote Tosh had fashioned to start the coffee maker. The log showed a flood of panicked calls to the police departments informing them that the dead were walking the earth again.

Sending out the obligatory text to call in the agents of Torchwood Three Ianto retreated to redress in his suit instead of his cowboy jammies. By the time he was half way through his first cup of coffee, Owen was wincing at his desk and Gwen and Tosh were speaking quietly about their evenings.

Finally seeing Ianto Gwen smiled almost shyly, "So, what's up Ianto?"

He paused. This was their first actual call, excepting weevils, since Jack had left. The rift had been unusually quiet—not that anyone minded.

"There was an influx of calls to the police about ghosts. There have been no incident reports, and the rift monitor didn't go off."

Tosh spoke quickly, "Well just because the monitor didn't go off doesn't mean there wasn't any rift activity. Sometimes the spikes are within normal parameters but it carries small things through—non corporeal aliens might have slipped past."

"Okay," Gwen nodded, "Tosh, can you check on the monitor see if that might have happened, I'll start a new file for this. Better safe than sorry, eh?"

Owen rolled his eyes, "Righty-oh, I'll just…what should I do?"

Gwen snapped her fingers, a half smile settling into place at her idea, "Why don't you see if there's a pattern of where these sightings happened. That way we can canvas the area later."

Ianto nodded, "Coffee's in the pot. I will be down in the records room, see if I can't find anything."

The team scattered to do their individual tasks while Ianto make the trek into the bowels of the hub. While he was almost certain there would be no information in the records room, he had an ulterior motive for this trip. It had occurred to him late last night that if he couldn't find Jack's personnel file, he might find a clue to the man's life in old employee files.

He sat in the cold, uncomfortable metal folding chair with the rather thick stack of employee logs. It went back to the very beginning of Torchwood Three, which was quite a bit of data to go through. The only blessing Ianto had was that the previous archivist had been more than meticulous. Everything was in chronological order with numbered pages.

Actually judging by the style, Ianto guessed that whoever had redone this file had done nearly every other file in the room as well. That left one of two possibilities as explanation. Either Jack had done it—which Ianto doubted—Jack hated paperwork. Or someone else before him had been an even bigger workaholic.

It took three quarters of an hour before Jack reached the page he had been looking for. Or at least what was left of the page he was looking for. There was a name that had been blacked out with two three digit numbers below it. It was something.

Owen growled at the map of Cardiff before he narrowed his eyes and whipped a dart at it. It stuck firmly into the map which he had pinned to the corkboard on the wall.

"Its curtains for you Mr. 9th Street Deli," Owen spoke harshly.

"Having fun there," Gwen asked from behind him.

"Ah!" He nearly jumped out of his skin, "Jesus Gwen, I nearly pissed myself, thank you."

Gwen snorted, "Anything besides you practicing for your MI-5 interview?"

"No, and no. There aren't any patterns it's scattered. There are clumps and outliers. I even ran them through Tosh's program—nothing in common. In short," Owen smiled, "A dead end. No pun intended."

"Tosh's the same. I just hope Ianto has something useful," Gwen sighed.

"'fraid to say I don't have anything either," the man in question supplied.

Owen snorted a dry laugh, "Fair excellent time for Jack to take a vacation huh."

Gwen and Ianto both stiffened at the mention of their boss.

Tosh walked over to join them, a sad smile on her lips, "Nothing. What would—what should we do?"

Gwen shrugged. This was out of her experience.

Ianto straightened his back, "We don't do anything. We just continue monitoring the situation. If anything changes we follow up, if necessary we call Archie."

"Archie," Gwen asked as if it was the most ridiculous idea ever.

"Torchwood Two," Owen supplied.

Tosh sighed the reality of the situation setting in, "We're flying blind."

Please review, I'm always eager to here what readers think. Thanks and sorry for the wait..hehe, I got distracted in 2009…maybe 2010 will be better for my muse and I.