A/N: Hello once again! I am really sorry, I tried to finish this last night, but I didn't get in until gone midnight from a party (I know, geek with a social life, screwing with social heirachy or what?) and I was just so exhausted! But here, finally, as promised is part 2 of the whole reset story line! Hope you all enjoy, as always thank you for readng/subscribing/reviewing and everything! Hannah xxx
Ooh I am so unbelievably happy for Tosh right now! She just ran up to where I was working at my station, pulled me up to my feet and started hugging me manically, and squeaking in excited high pitched tones. Owen and her have got a date planned it seems! About time too, that boy has finally realised that he has the adoration of a wonderful and beautiful girl like Toshiko – let's just hope he treats her well, or Ianto Jones will be on the case. In fact never mind me, Jack would kill him.
Martha set about investigating straight away; we didn't want to waste a second, after all it seemed that The Pharm was far from the safest place to spend a great deal of time. Between Tosh and Martha's efforts we managed to hack into The Pahrm's computer data base and now have access to all patient documentation. Gwen and I are just about to head off and round up the most recent, and still living, member of the clinical trial study: Elin Morgan.
We arrived at Elin's house just as Billy Davies, Dr Coppley's personal hit man, was about to inject her with the ammonium hydroxide to kill her and destroy all evidence of The Pharms involvement. Thankfully we managed to stop him, who would have thought that a hit man could be so scared of a girl with a gun? Then again, Gwen can be pretty intimidating when she wants to be, there are times when you'd never guess that the ruthless and determined woman was the proud owner of a 3 eyed puppy called daisy. We stun gunned him and hauled him into the SUV so that Jack could interrogate him back at the hub.
Whilst we were out, it seemed that Martha had got herself into a spot of bother and we'd now lost contact with her. There had been a security breach, a break out from the centre; one of the mayflies was on the loose. And of course Martha, having worked for UNIT, has become accustomed to following up such events by exploring the situation for herself, and finding out what's gone on no matter what the risks are. It's the same kind of attitude that one acquires through working with Torchwood. You get a thrill for adventure, a need to look wider and not let things rest until you have answers, and any dangers tied up with what you're doing just makes everything seem all the more exciting. I didn't always feel this way it was only really after Jack left and I had to 'man up' and go out into the field, no matter how much I hated it, for the sake of Torchwood that I actually learned to enjoy the feeling of adrenaline and sense of jeopardy. So I understand why Martha did it, why she had to do it, but I can't help wishing that her natural instinct of curiosity hadn't got the better of her just this once. Anything could be happening to her right now…
"Pick a Weevil, any Weevil" Jack just came up to me and asked, placing his arms around my waist as I was fixing his coffee.
"Pardon?" I questioned slightly confused, and his open gesture of… affection (?) causing me to feel a little light headed.
"Just tell me, which of our delightful pests is your favourite" I couldn't see his face, but I could hear the grin in his voice. I was still highly bemused.
"Jack, what are you up to?" I asked turning around to face him now.
"Nothing, nothing, I just really need to know… so pick one!" He commanded. I had been right, he was grinning.
"Janet" I replied, sighing, I knew this was going to come back to bite me ad boy was I right.
"Excellent choice, grab the most heavy duty chain we've got and bring it down with you to the vaults in five – it's question time for Billy." He slapped me on the back and left before I could protest.
Yes, it definitely did come back to bite me, quite literally. Janet seemed reluctant to be chained up and got became surprisingly vicious, thus I now have an impressive Weevil bite on the left side of my waist. What perks this job has.
If Gwen with a gun had frightened Billy, then the way he reacted to Janet must have been out of sheer terror, I only had her out for a minute, maybe even less than that and it was enough to threaten him into giving us the information we needed. To be honest I don't blame him, I mean I wouldn't like to have an angry, alien being with razor sharp teeth thrust in may face either. I'm not sure I want to know how Jack manages to think of such intimidating methods of torture, but at least it got the job done. He confessed that he was working for The Pharm and that the side effect of this 'reset' drug was the mayfly parasite. I mean, we already knew this, but still.
Of course, in retrospect, an irate Weevil invading your personal space seems like a summer holiday compared to what happened to poor Billy in the end. He had one of the mayflies using him as a host; Owen reckoned he must have breathed it in after the death of one of his victims. Jack had wanted to try and keep him alive, he wanted to use him to get us into The Pharm, but there was nothing we could do. Even if Owen had got the calibrations of the 'singularity scalpel' correct then there was no guarantee he would have survived, and if he hadn't attempted to use it all then his death would have been certain. There was nothing else we could have done. I shouldn't be complaining about something as trivial as this seeing as a man has just died a most graphic, and horror film esque death, but I really am quite irritated. I've got his blood splattered all down my tie. I feel bad even for just writing that, but it could have been a lot worse, I could have voiced my distaste immediately after his death like Jack did. It's not as if that man hasn't got a million other pale blue shirts anyway…
Although we had thought we no longer had a way into The Pharm, Tosh seemed to have other ideas; apparently we could still use Billy Davies to help get us in. That girl is brilliant and amazing and completely and utterly warped on the inside. I've got absolutely no idea how she managed to think of using Billy's body to 'drive' the car like that. Pure genius.
We split up; Gwen, Tosh and heading in at Zone A, whilst Jack and Owen went of searching frantically for Martha before things became too late. We headed down to the labs and it was shocking what they were doing there, to that poor Weevil and to goodness knows what other aliens, and of course to all the human beings they were testing their drugs on. I immediately told Jack, and he told Tosh to get this place shut down, fast. Whilst this was going on downstairs in the laboratories, Martha was upstairs dying at the hands of Dr Coppley. They had injected her with reset and the mayfly was growing stronger inside of her with every second. Owen did the only thing he could, he used the singularity scalpel, and thank god he had figured out how to use it properly this time.
We stood outside the facility glad to see Martha alive and well, if a little shaken, as we watched Tosh shut this horror down for good. But Dr Coppley wasn't having it, he was not happy in the slightest, and revenge was evidently at the forefront of his mind because that's when it happened. That's when he shot Owen.
I still can't believe it happened. That feeling of the blood completely draining from your body, your stomach dissolving away from your insides, of your lungs incapable of taking in enough oxygen; the way you feel upon looking at the lifeless body of someone you loved. And I did love Owen, do love Owen, despite the banter and insults and disagreements; I love that man like a brother. And in that moment he was gone. I hadn't expected to ever feel as awful and pain stricken as I had on that day that Jack left and tore my world apart, but I did. I just wanted him to wake up and tell is it was some stupid practical joke, that he was finally getting Jack back for Halloween or something, that it had just been one of those times where he'd tried to inject humour at an inappropriate moment. But he didn't wake up… not then at least.
We drove back to the hub in silence. Only moments ago Gwen and I had been discussing how we were going to work out the seating arrangements, given that we had an extra passenger. How we all wished that we still had that problem.
Back in the hub now, we all stood over his body lying on the table in the autopsy bay, his table. We swallowed back tears as we listened to Martha document the autopsy she was about to begin. I looked over to Tosh but she couldn't bear to make eye contact, she looked as if she was about to shatter into a thousand pieces, and all I wanted to do was to run over to her and hold her, make everything better. But in that moment, for Tosh, no amount of hugs in the world could have made her feel better.
Martha was just about to make the first incision when Jack burst in and commanded her to stop, and boy am I glad that he did.
He arrived, running back into the hub about half an hour later, armed with a box that contained the article which could make Tosh feel better, that could make everything ok again, the risen mitten (mark 2). Gwen was sceptical about using it and she had quite a right to be after what happened to her after what happened to her through its last use, but I am so very glad that Jack ignored her. We thought we would get a couple of minutes, max, to tell him what we needed to, to say goodbye. Nobody quite knew what to say to him, not even Jack, all he could think of was to ask for the code to the alien morgue; nobody, except from Tosh that is. Tosh stood there and confessed her love for him, something she would have been far too embarrassed to do unless she knew it was her only chance.
But in the end, it wasn't her only chance, she can tell him those 3 words as many times as she likes, because somehow, by some pure sweet miracle Owen is back with us. Sort of. The two minutes were up, and Owen slipped back into the darkness, or so we thought, but two minutes twenty rolled on and he was still here. Jack wasn't even using the glove anymore, it was such a strange and confusing situation but nobody dared to question it because we had what we all wanted, we had Owen back.
There were no vital signs for him showing up through use of our equipment so he began carrying out an investigation on himself, confirming the lack of pulse and heartbeat, confirming that somehow he was a dead man walking. Gwen feared that Owen may, accidentally, be doing the same to Jack as Suzie did to her but Toshiko used the Philemon filter to scan Jack and everything seemed A ok with him at least.
With Owen however, Martha ran some tests and has found that Owen's cells are mutating. For now, he's under quarantine so is spending the night at the hub along with Martha, meaning that there is now a severe shortage in sleeping equipment. Well, potentially a shortage in sleeping equipment, we haven't actually worked out if Owen can still sleep or not.
I feel guilty for not having found the time to arrange alternative accommodation for Martha but it's all been so hectic over the last couple of days; I doubt she would have wanted to leave Owen anyway, as I did offer her the spare bedroom at my apartment, but she declined. Owen made a joke about sleeping on the autopsy table, but he seemed to wince at the thought of it, as if he immediately regretted saying it. The only solution I could see was that Martha should continue to sleep in Jack's bed, Owen would take the sofa and for Jack it would just have to be one of those nights where he didn't sleep at all. To be honest, it probably would have been one of those nights anyway. As for me, I was determined to stand my ground this time and just go home.
Last night, Jack called me up to the conference room just before I was about to leave, I'd already put my coat on.
He was smiling as I entered the room, but his face fell when he saw the coat. "And just why are you wearing that?" He asked, almost frowning.
"I don't want to catch my death outside, it is December you know" I replied, smiling.
"Well, I had no intention of you needing to go outside this evening." His voice had an odd tone to it, uncertainty perhaps, as if he doubted whether I wanted to stay. Or maybe he was just shaken up about Owen; after all I still haven't got my head around any of it.
"With all due respect, Sir, I don't really think that having 4 grown adults trying to find sleeping provisions in the hub is ever going to work" I countered. I called him Sir, as I was trying to show him that whilst I would very much like not to venture outside the hub this evening too, but that I had to. It had been a while since I had addressed him as Sir; at one time I used it a) because he's my superior and b) because in his mind it seemed to qualify as some strange form of fore play. After his return, he asked me not to use it again, because it made everything feel to distant. I hoped that he would interpret the sentiment as in its original meaning.
He seemed to understand my use of the word. "Aaah I've missed that" He replied, grinning and moving closer towards me.
"As have I Sir" I said again, "But I still can't really stay here tonight" I replied.
"There's always room for you here Ianto Jones" He said, taking my waist in his hands as he did so. I winced at the touch; I'd forgotten all about my Weevil bite after such a chaotic day.
He noticed, removed his hands and raised an eyebrow "What's up" He said softly, but also slightly critically.
"It's nothing, just a Weevil bite"
"Ianto, you should have said, what if it had got infected?" He chastised.
"It's fine, it's nothing really. I'm fine" I replied, hoping he would just drop it.
No, it was Jack; of course he wasn't going to drop it. "Let me have a look" He commanded.
I, reluctantly, removed my coat and made to lift up my shirt on the left side, where the offending wound lay. But he wasn't having that. He removed my hands and began unbuttoning my shirt, determined to remove the whole thing instead, I suppose it was only to be expected of Jack. I had anticipated that after he had finished with the shirt that he would take a brief look at the bite mark, and proceed to remove the rest of my clothing – trying to convince me into staying. What actually happened was something much more unexpected; he knelt down so that his head was in line with the injury on my waist and 'kissed it better' as he put it. I didn't mention that actually it had hurt like hell when he did that, I was just so happy that he had made a gesture like this at all. It was little moments like this that confirmed in my mind that we since Jack's return we were something different, something better. The pair of us had long since given up on shielding our... relationship… from the others and I'm not sure how they see us, but the fact that Jack doesn't care who knows what is reassurance of what, I think, we have in itself.
And it's just as well that we'd given up seeing as Martha walked in to the conference room just a few seconds later. She opened the door and her eyes grew wider as she saw us still poised there in that same position, I stood up straight, shirtless and Jack crouched below with his head at my waist. I dread to think of what she must have thought was going on after walking in to see that. After a second she just began to laugh and said she had some of Owen's test results to go over with Jack, but that it could easily wait until the morning.
"So you boys have fun" She said, winking as she retreated out of the room, no doubt to go off and tell Owen what she had just seen. It would probably make him chuckle, which I suppose I should have been glad of, but the thought of it just intensified my embarrassment.
I was mortified. Flushing a deep shade of magenta, I began putting my shirt back on.
"No no Jones, tonight you are staying right here" He stated, pulling me into a passionate kiss and taking my shirt back off again, being careful to watch my bite.
"But Martha's out there thinking… that we're… in here…" I said, flustered and embarrassed.
"Exactly, so we'd better live up to whatever she's thinking" He winked.
I had something prepared to say back but he was already unbuttoning his own shirt, and had found that spot on my neck… the combination of which was making it highly difficult to think coherently, let alone quip back a witty response. In the end I caved in and ended up staying in the hub last night after all, a course of action for which I'm sure I'll suffer for today a) through Martha and Owen's teasing and b) because the conference room floor is bloody uncomfortable!