Fandom: Torchwood

Characters: Jack, Ianto, mentions team, Kathy Swanson

Author: m_findlow

Rating: PG

Length: 15,986 words

Content notes: none

Author notes: Written for Challenge 275 - Cloud

Summary: Jack and Ianto team up for an investigation off the books.

'Have I forgotten to tell you to go home again?' Jack asked, reserving a cheeky grin for his young teammate as he stood by the door with a clutch of files in his arms.

'You forget to tell me that every night, sir,' Ianto replied.

Jack's face fell at the unexpectedly honest answer. 'Oh.'

'I'm sure its only because it would be rather hard to articulate the words when you've got your tongue down the back of my throat,' Ianto replied, letting the beginnings of a smile tug at the corner of his mouth.

Jack blushed slightly at the blunt description of their extracurricular activities, even if they were becoming increasingly frequent. It had been a long time since anyone had made Jack blush, but Jack, for all his being accustomed to people finding him attractive, had been thrown for a loop when Ianto had begun to express an interest in him. There was just something so unpredictable about it that made Jack wonder when the other shoe was going to drop. For now though it was fine, and a little bit thrilling, if he was honest.

'What can I do for you, then?' Jack asked. 'Please don't tell me you're wanting me to look over all of those tonight,' he said, nodding worryingly at the files as Ianto came over to his desk and set them down on it.

'These? No,' he replied, lowering himself into the chair. 'But there is something I'd like to discuss.'

Jack leaned back his chair, uncertain what he was about to prepare himself for. Ianto's expression was always so hard to read since he took pretty much everything seriously. 'Go on, then. I'm all ears.'

'Well,' Ianto began, shifting slightly in the chair opposite. 'It's actually about some people that have gone missing.'

Jack's whole body tensed immediately. No. They were not having this discussion again. Flat Holm was the one taboo topic that Jack went cold on every time Ianto tried to bring it up. If Ianto wanted a little extra money for some project he was working on, or a few extra supplies they needed out there, then fine, just take the money. He didn't need Jack's approval. Drain the Torchwood bank account if it would make the headache go away. But if they had to have one more conversation about what to do about the people being taken in the first place, or how to deal with their families and friends left behind then Jack was going to shut him down. Didn't Ianto understand that if he could do something more, he would? If Ianto was going to sit here and provide him with a further list of people taken by the rift then he was going to get up and leave. It was bad enough having to accept that it happened. He didn't need a regular report on them. It would be worse when he got the alarm to say one of them had been returned. The rift was like a feral cat, feeling proud when it dumped its half eaten rat on his doorstep.

'Ianto, we're not having this conversation. I thought I'd made it clear.'

Jack caught the momentary look of annoyed displeasure that flickered in Ianto's eyes before he reverted back to his usual inscrutable self. 'And what conversation would that be, sir?' he replied, challenging Jack to yet another argument.

'I shouldn't have even dragged you into it,' Jack said, knowing it was his own fault. He'd been the one to involve Ianto in this mess, thinking he'd be perfectly suited to the operational side of things - and he had been. Showing him first hand what the place was like however, having brought him along to collect one of the victims of the rift, had really opened his eyes to just how awful it was. Ianto had done well, all things considered. He had that calm, empathetic way about him - someone who'd suffered terrible things themselves and could relate to others who'd been through unspeakable horrors. He also knew how to keep his mouth shut. He was an expert on keeping secrets, which made him the perfect person to help Jack handle things.

'Only if you hadn't, who would have been here to look after things when you were gone?' Ianto countered. 'I very nearly told everyone, only I had to hope you were planning on coming back. It wasn't easy trying to keep it under wraps. Two people came back whilst you were gone. I had to deal with them.'

'And I appreciate that,' Jack said, trying to keep his voice level and quell his rising temper. Just because Ianto kept his secrets didn't mean he had to necessarily agree with them. They'd had more arguments about it than Jack could count.

'I know you hate it and that you don't like to think about it,' Ianto said, his voice soft and sympathetic, 'and I understand why you don't want to tell the others, even if I think it's stupid.'

'But you still want to talk about it anyway,' Jack replied, finishing his sentence for him, and slumping down in his chair.

'Actually, that's not why I came here.'

Jack tilted his head and folded his arms. 'You said you wanted to talk about missing people.'

'And I do.'

Jack frowned. 'So?'

Ianto picked up the top file off his pile on Jack's desk. It was the thinnest by far as he turned it around and handed it to Jack.

'Melanie Rogers?' Jack asked, reading the short dossier before noting the address. 'Neighbour of yours?'

'Next door. Lives there with her two kids and her mum. Her husband walked out on her three years ago and so they've been scraping together what they can to pay the mortgage.'

'Sounds like you know quite a bit about her.'

'We cross paths all the time. She works an extra late shift at Tesco in stock dispatch on top of her regular job so we're often both coming and going at odd hours.'

'And she's gone missing?'

'Four days ago. Left for her night shift but never arrived. It's only about two miles away so she walks there to save on petrol.'

Jack studied the small photo of the not unattractive woman. 'Not exactly wise to be walking the streets late at night.'

'That's what I said, but she said she'd rather spend that money on her kids at Christmas.'

'Dedicated mum.'

Ianto nodded in agreement. 'The family are frantic, knowing she'd never just walk out on them. They asked me to help. Whatever I could. So, this is me helping.'

'You?' Jack narrowed his eyes at Ianto. 'What exactly is it that they think you do?'

Ianto squirmed. 'Well, with all the comings and goings I told them I was a private investigator.'

Jack chuckled at the admission. 'License to kill and all that?'

Ianto bristled, clearly still embarrassed at having been caught out in the armory a few weeks back. Jack had been thoroughly amused by that unrestrained little bit of Ianto's personality manifesting itself when he thought no one was looking. 'Licensed to investigate,' he replied, trying to regain some semblance of dignity.

'Okay. But they reported her missing to the police, right?'

'Of course. But they're not doing anything. They don't even know what to do.'

'Surprise, surprise,' Jack muttered. 'But Ianto,' he said, skimming the rest of the short file and leaning forward. 'I don't know what you want me to do about it. Walking alone late at night, she was probably attacked, or raped, and then murdered. It happens, I'm sorry to say.'

This time it was Ianto who leaned forward. 'No other reports of similar crime in the area, no physical evidence to say there was a struggle anywhere between her apartment and Tesco.'

'They could have dragged her into a car and taken off. Maybe it was her ex husband.'

'No body, Jack. Nothing. She just disappeared.'

Jack reached out a hand and clasped Ianto's. 'Look, I get that this is personal for you, but it sounds like something for the police to handle.'

Ianto's expression turned deadly serious. 'Until you find out that the police have had at least thirty other missing persons reports in the past week.'

Jack's brow furrowed at this new revelation. 'And they're not, you know...'

'No negative rift activity at any of the locations where people went missing,' Ianto confirmed. 'I've already cross referenced all the files.'

Jack let out a relieved breath. He couldn't say for certain why that made him feel better, apart from absolving his conscience from the tiniest by of guilt. 'Serial killer?'

'I don't think so. And the police just don't have the manpower to investigate so many people when there's no root cause and no physical evidence. It's in their too hard basket and that's where it's likely to stay unless we do something about it.'

Jack nodded. 'Okay, you've got my attention. Maybe it's not the rift, but maybe it is something alien.'

'That's what I thought. And... I didn't want to do this on my own.'

'I'm glad,' Jack said, giving Ianto's hand another squeeze. 'It's one thing to go drinking at a pub with a mentally warped barmaid with a slave trading alien hiding in her cellar, but if people are just being made to disappear... Just one thing,' Jack added.

Ianto raised a questioning eyebrow. 'What's that?'

'We keep this investigation off the books for now. Just you and me. If we open this up, get the team involved, they're going to start going through every single missing persons report and then they're going to start checking that against rift activity. I know Tosh. She's good. She'll put two and two together in no time. Flat Holm, the missing people, all of it out in the open.'

There was the slightest tug as Ianto went to pull away his hand. If he hadn't already known that would be a consequence, he wasn't thrilled about them doing something to willfully conceal it.

'It's a Pandora's Box I'm just not ready to open yet,' Jack said, pleading for Ianto to understand. 'But I do want to help you with this. I can see this means a lot to you.'

Ianto raised his eyes to meet Jack's and inclined his head.

'Good. Now, it's late. I mean, really late,' Jack said, casting at glance up at the clock on the wall. 'Let's pick this up tomorrow. I'll make sure everyone is out of here by five.'

'I'll be here by six,' Ianto promised him. 'Perhaps we can go through my files before the others get here? Get you up to speed?'

'Sounds like a plan.'



As promised, Ianto made sure he was at the hub a little before six. Even on a good day, Tosh wouldn't arrive before seven thirty, sometimes eight, and Gwen and Owen were closer to nine. And Tosh wasn't the nosy sort. Even if she came in early, if she saw Jack and Ianto poring over something, she might pop her head in to say good morning and leave it at that. She was always so keen to pick up right where she'd left off the day before. She knew that if they wanted her to know something they'd come right out and tell her.

'Did you even sleep?' Jack asked, trying to be cute as he finished rolling up his shirt sleeve, seemingly only just having gotten out of bed with enough time to shower and get half dressed. His braces still hung loose by his thighs, one side of his collar needed fixing and his hair was still damp as he stood in the middle of his office.

'I slept,' Ianto replied, though not before he'd gone around to Melanie's flat and checked in on the family. Margot, Melanie's mother, had told him to come round any time of day or night if he had news. She was used to being up at all hours herself, fixing eggs at three in the morning for her exhausted daughter or putting on a load of washing at midnight. He'd just wanted to let her know that he was working on it, and he had his investigative partner helping him.

'The kids are hard to put down,' she confessed. 'They won't sleep without knowing she's okay.'

Ianto sympathised. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to be so young and lose you mum. He'd only just lost his own recently and that still hurt more than he could say, even though he was well past needing to be tucked into bed. He supposed it didn't matter how old you were, watching Margot wearily clutching her mug of tea, everyone still needed their mum.

Four more cases had cropped up since he'd left work the night before, and one was still making headlines on early morning breakfast television. 'Chaos on the M4 this morning where a lorry and a sedan have crashed, blocking several lanes right before peak hour,' the newscaster reported from behind her plush desk. 'The driver of the lorry has been taken to St Helen's in a critical condition whilst the driver of the sedan is as yet unaccounted for. Police suggest the driver may have fled the scene however emergency services at the scene have reported the car as being so badly damaged no one could have escaped it. We'll keep you posted throughout the morning as more details come to light.'

What they hadn't seen yet was the CCTV from the overhead traffic cameras. Two miles back there'd been a male in his early thirties at the wheel. At the next camera, just before the collision, the driver's seat appeared empty. It could have been just a trick of the light at that hour of the morning, the windscreen reflecting back the sky or something, but Ianto just knew, deep down, that this was connected to all the others.

'How about some of that amazing coffee before we get started?' Jack suggested. 'Not that I don't love having you stand there watching me get dressed, but well, it's usually more fun getting undressed. Although, as we have time-'

'I'll go get that coffee started,' Ianto quickly interjected, before Jack's mind turned to things non work related

Jack grinned. 'Good man.'



Ianto downed a shot of espresso whilst he was waiting for Jack's cup to brew. He couldn't deny he needed it, and would save his own cup to be enjoyed once they were sat down. Making coffee allowed him to gather up his thoughts, putting him in a calm frame of mind, just as it always did.

Jack's desk was clear of anything unnecessary when he returned, a sure sign that he was prepared to take this case seriously and didn't want anything else cluttering up the space whilst they reviewed the files. Ianto set down the two coffees along with a bag full of pastries. 'I don't know about you but I haven't had breakfast and I'm starving,' he said unapologetically, diving straight in before offering the bag to Jack.

Jack helped himself and took a large bite out of an apple danish. 'So, I was doing a little of my own research last night after you left.'

'You did?'

'I managed to rule out the ex husband. He was on a plane headed to Thailand where he hooked up with a girl he met online. Apparently judging from his Instagram, he really lashed out on her, and most of the bar.'

'He's such a sweetheart, isn't he?' Ianto replied.

'As for other known undesirables...' Jack paused. 'You know you really don't live in a very nice neighbourhood, Ianto. Have you ever thought about moving?'

'There are worse places than Grangetown, trust me. Anything else?'

'Didn't want to step on your toes,' Jack said. 'Just doing some basic background digging so I know who I'm dealing with.'

'Right. Well, here's what I've got so far.' Ianto set his tablet computer on the desk and began going through each of the files one by one. He'd already done the laborious task of trying to filter out his cases from all of the missing persons reports. He'd never fully appreciated just how many people went missing in a city this size. It was quite upsetting, and hardly surprising that the police didn't inject their best efforts. They'd need a whole division dedicated solely to the task.

He'd already discounted anyone who had a history of drug addiction, psychiatric admissions or was connected with a gang or organised crime. Those were most likely death by misadventure or people on the run from those whom they owed money. That left him with the rest - possible suicides, murders, kidnappings or people who'd simply had enough of their lives and had gone on the run. He'd carved out a second wave by using Torchwood's databases to track any activity after they'd been reported missing, finding several who'd used ATM cards or signed leases for new apartments four hundred miles away. A shame the police hadn't managed that much. Three more he'd confirmed had gone missing at locations and times consistent with negative rift activity, though he didn't mention them. Jack would only shut down and become maudlin if he knew. That left the thirty five or so that Ianto couldn't reason out, which fell, into his pile of cases to be investigated.

'How far have you gone with these?' Jack asked, frowning at each file in turn, taking in names, occupations and background checks collected by the police department, now duplicated into files within Torchwood's own databases.

'Just the basics,' Ianto replied. 'I tried tracking a few of them on CCTV based on the locations they were reported missing, but it's just like they fall off the face of the earth. One second they're there, then in the next street there's nothing on camera. Others have gone missing from their homes, or never come home from work.They stay back late but they don't log off, don't swipe their security passes or tap on their oyster cards. Their cars are still in the car park, food left in the microwave. And this morning, that lorry crash? Are my eyes deceiving me or was there no driver in that car when it crashed?' He showed Jack the same photographs he'd pulled from the traffic cameras. 'What do you think happened to them?'

Jack shook his head, staying quiet. 'It could be any one of a dozen things. There are aliens that sit outside our visible spectrum, ones that can shift from one dimension to another, like a magician makes a rabbit appear out of his hat.'

'No such thing as magic,' Ianto interrupted. 'Is it like your Time Agent thing?' He cast his gaze down at Jack's wrist strap and Jack absently touched it.

'This kind of technology is rare and heavily policed. That's not to say it's not capable of being replicated. Even a Time Agent gone rogue could be another possibility, although an unlikely one.'

'What would someone like a John Hart want with random people?'

Jack shrugged. 'Slave traders, people smugglers, individuals who trade in live human body parts,' he replied. 'It's more prevalent than you think. And highly illegal, of course. If you wanna go around stealing people from sentient worlds under Proclamation jurisdiction you'd better be real subtle about it. And we haven't even talked about viruses.'

Ianto set his tablet down. 'Viruses?'

'Ones that can get into your system and literally break you down at the cellular level, like ionizing radiation but much quicker and far more deadly.'

Ianto frowned at the suggestion. 'These seem a little random for a virus.'

'I tend to agree. But there's weapons that can do similar damage, also highly illegal.' Jack leaned back in his seat. 'Back in my Agency days they used to call it decommissioning. It was what you did with agents that ended up so rotten and corrupt they couldn't be rehabilitated. In the old days it was pressure chamber they locked you in. Later they figured out how to weaponise it, turn it into a gun, creating a field around the target that exerted so much pressure you literally imploded until you were nothing but a scattered cloud of atoms, unable to ever be reconstituted.'

'Jesus,' Ianto breathed.

'Yeah. Not a nice way to go.' Jack blew out a breath. 'Of course, things like that always leave a trace, even days afterward. We should check a few of these out, see what physical evidence the blues and twos missed. Then we might get closer to knowing what we're dealing with.'

'Hopefully before anyone else goes missing.'

The cogwheel door alarms squealed, announcing Tosh's arrival just at that moment. She saw them through the window of Jack's office and waved, holding up a bag of donuts in her other hand.

Jack exchanged a glance with him, confirming their arrangement. 'Tonight?'

Ianto nodded. 'Tonight.'



True to his word, Ianto treated the day just like any other, never once intimating that there was any kind of investigation going on. As far as everybody was concerned, today was just another day at Torchwood, and blissfully, it was a quiet once, meaning it didn't take a lot for Jack to convince the team to wrap things up early.

'We should all go for a drink,' Owen suggested.

'It's Monday, Owen,' Tosh said, shouldering her handbag. 'Who goes drinking on a Monday night?'

'Torchwood, that's who.'

'I'm in,' Gwen readily agreed.

'Yeah, alright,' Tosh said. 'Not like I've got plans.'

'What do you say, boss?' Owen called out. 'First round's on you.'

Jack watched as a brief flicker of worry flashed across Ianto's face, stood just behind the three of them. 'It's a school night, Owen, and I've still, got a few things I need to finish up here.'

'Cheapskate,' Owen muttered, turning to look at Ianto behind him. 'You in, Teaboy?'

Ianto cringed. 'Tea with my sister and brother in law.' The response was delivered perfectly, with just the right dash of reluctance and contrition. Jack could almost believe it was true.

'My condolences,' Owen said, pulling a face at the prospect.

'Yeah.'

'Alright then, ladies. Let's go. Just don't think I'm paying if you're planning on having any of those fancy cocktail drinks. Beers and house wine only.'

'Now who's the cheapskate?' Gwen teased. 'See you two tomorrow.'

'Bye,' Jack said, giving them a wave and a smile as they exited, the cog wheel door finally rolling shut behind them.

'And now it's just the two of us,' Jack remarked, wishing it were under different circumstances.

'And now it's just the two of us,' Ianto repeated.

'Ready?'

'Always.'

Jack reached into his pocket and fished out the keys for the SUV, tossing them at Ianto.

Ianto looked down at them, like they were alien.' I get to drive?'

'It's your investigation. Plus, we're starting at your place. Think you can find it?'

Ianto gave him a deadpan expression which was worth it. 'Think I'll manage it somehow.'



Ianto pulled them up just outside the short block of flats. Jack had been here before, but somehow it looked shabbier now, more run down. The kind of place where someone who liked everything neat and tidy and clean might slowly go mad. Someone who got paid enough to be able to afford a nice place in the leafy suburbs where single mums didn't have to work three jobs.

'Here we are,' Ianto declared, slamming the door shut as he exited the car, rounding on the boot to remove the equipment they might need. He tossed a scanner at Jack and pocketed one for himself, sliding his gun into the back of his belt, just as a matter of precaution. Jack's own was already in its holster. He was glad he didn't have to tell Ianto to be prepared.

Jack began wandering down the street, holding his scanner out in front of him as he scoured the area. He wasn't sure what they were looking for, nor just how far away it might be, given that they had two miles to search and that didn't account for any deviation from the planned route Melanie had taken on her way to work. The area had very few street traffic cameras, meaning they only narrowed their search by about half a mile, picking up a camera four blocks from the Tesco. Ianto had already reviewed the footage from the night she'd gone missing and determined that at no time had she passed within range of the camera, but had done so on any given number of nights before that.

Jack let his eyes wander as his scanner tried to pick up the things that he couldn't. He was on the lookout for any signs of a physical altercation, anything that didn't look pedestrian and normal for a area of plain and otherwise ordinary suburbia. In his long years of experience he'd come to understand that everything left a trace.

Out of the corner of his eye he watched as Ianto crossed the street, widening their search. If something spooked her she might have crossed the street to avoid it, but that didn't mean it wouldn't follow her.

Jack paused to study the readings on the small device in his hand. No Nelson seepage, no ionizing radiation signatures, no temporal particles, no changes in ambient temperature or other indications of a ripple effect from something alien. In short, nothing to suggest anything had occurred.

Jack picked up his pace, taking long sweeping strides along the nighttime streets. Only a handful of cars passed them, but Jack clocked each and every one of them, looking for anything suspicious about either the car or its occupants. Only as they neared the main roundabout, taking the right hand exit towards the shopping precinct did the volume of cars finally pick up. Around here, someone was bound to notice if a car pulled over and grabbed someone, or if anything else strange happened. Whilst most Cardiff residents were accustomed to the unexplainable things that seemed to gravitate around their city, most turned an equally blind eye to it, as if pretending it wasn't there meant it wouldn't impact their lives. It must be nice to live in such ignorant bliss, Jack decided.

When they reached the traffic camera, perched out of reach on the sodium lit lamppost, Ianto stopped and stared up at it.

'Anything?' Jack asked.

Ianto set a hand on his hip, a sure sign of perplexment. 'Nothing. You?'

He shook his head. 'Maybe we missed it,' Jack said, though knowing in his heart, and by the return expression on Ianto's face, that they hadn't. They'd been as thorough as they could be, perhaps more so. 'Were you able to find anything at all that connects our victims? Background checks? Online history? GPS tracking from their phones?'

'Not really. They all came from different parts of the city, worked different places, haven't been anywhere where they would have crossed paths. The only thing, well... I mean, I'm not even sure if it's a thing but...'

'What?'

'No old people. In fact, no one above the age of about thirty five. And no kids. The youngest to go missing so far is sixteen, and that could just be a runaway.'

It wasn't much, but it was something. What it meant Jack couldn't say. Then again, it might also be nothing.

'Perhaps we should start looking somewhere a little more recent,' Ianto suggested. 'One that's been gone missing less than twenty four hours. Like that guy on the M4.'

'You wanna go wandering along the M4 at night, trying to scan a busy six lane highway for traces of alien intervention?'

'Probably not.' Ianto consulted his PDA, reviewing the case files again. 'Look, there's one not too far from here. Last seen at home supposedly babysitting two very expensive purebred samoyds.'

'Sounds like a plan to me. Just so long as they don't shed hair all over my coat.'



Ianto lead the way to the row of streets just behind the shopping centre. Long rows of two up houses pressed in together along a road that barely looked wide enough for one car to pass, let alone two. Halfway down the long narrow street, Ianto came to a stop. Not all the houses had numbers on them, but he'd been keeping a mental count in his head from the last one that had, until he reached the one listed as the address of their missing man. Light emanated from the windows on both levels. Jack was quick to lead him up the short path to the door, leaning on the doorbell button long and hard.

'Yes hello, ma'am,' Jack said as the door opened a few inches. 'Detective Inspector Jack Harkness.' Ianto noticed he didn't even bother flashing fake ID. Peope just seemed to immediately take Jack's words on face value. 'Sorry to trouble you so late but I'm here about a missing persons report you filed two days ago in relation to your husband?'

The young woman pulled her long blonde hair back over the shoulder of her knitted jumper. 'Oh? Have you found him?'

'No, ma'am. Not yet. But I was wondering if we might come in and ask you a few questions.'

She paused, not undoing the chain latch on the door just yet. 'You're not the same detectives I spoke with at the station,' she stated.

'No, ma'am,' Jack said, keeping everything polite. 'We're a different division. More specialised. In fact, I should be upfront. Mr Jones here is not strictly police.'

The comment caught Ianto off guard. If he wasn't police then who was he?

'He's not?' The woman said, asking the question rolling around in his head. She frowned at Jack, casting a curious glance towards Ianto which made him lose his confidence for a moment.

'More of a liaison,' Jack explained. 'He's a psychic medium.'

The woman's hand flew up to her mouth. 'Oh God. Are you saying my husband is dead?'

'Not at all,' Jack said, quick to dispel her anxiety. 'Mr Jones' speciality is in psychic energy resonance. Have you ever heard of morphic fields?'

'No. Should I have?'

'Well, they exist around and between people. They're persistent. We can tell things from these traces of energy. Well, I mean, I can't, but Mr Jones can.'

'Oh, you mean like those fellas on TV that find celebrities dead relatives?' Ianto resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

'We're hoping that it might give us some insight into your husband's disappearance.'

'Oh. Well, if you think it will help.'

'It can't hurt, right? Mr Jones has assisted me on several cases and been invaluable. We just need to spend a little time moving around the house, see if we can pick up anything. Would that be okay? If you're not comfortable, you can always say no.'

'Yes, of course.' There it is, that old Jack Harkness charm, Ianto thought. Give a person the chance to tell Jack no and they'd fall over themselves to say yes.

Jack beamed at her. 'Good. Why don't we pop into the kitchen whilst Ianto takes a look around the living room. It's delicate work you understand. It's not good to have other energies and auras in the room at the same time. It requires a lot of focus.'

What an utter load of bollocks, Ianto thought. How could this poor woman believe any of it? He could imagine some batty old woman believing in nonsense like that, but this girl looked like the intelligent sort. Mostly. Except for the charlatan television evangelists.

'Do you mind if I have a quick word with the Detective before I begin?' Ianto asked.

'Go right ahead. I'll pop the kettle on. Then maybe I can show you my two prizewinning dogs, Mr Harkness? They'll only get under your feet if you don't say hello anyway. We're thinking of taking them to Crufts next year.'

Jack put on his best smile. 'I would love that.'

Ianto grabbed Jack by the elbow just as soon as she was out of earshot. 'A psychic? Are you totally out of your mind?'

'Hey,' Jack said, brushing him off. 'You wanted a way to search the place, I gave you one. Now, you go check everywhere. Scan for everything. I'll keep Mrs Doglover out of your hair.'



Ianto wasn't able to find anything out of place in his search of the house, thorough as he'd been. It wasn't just scanning for traces left by all things alien. It was poking through drawers, thumbing through diaries and address books, inspecting medications stowed away in bathroom cupboards. All done extremely quietly so as not to arouse suspicion that he was doing anything for more than chanelling spirits. It gave him the time he needed to invent his own story at the end of it, suggesting that there were traces of paranormal disturbance in the house that were interfering with his ability to get a proper read on the place. It sounded like utter rubbish, even as he said it, though it had sounded far more plausible in his head at the time. Given how long he'd spent trying to come up with the story whilst he scanned every inch of every room, it should have been brilliant. He'd always been good at keeping his lies in order. Perhaps if he'd been given license to come up with his own back story, it might have been better. It was typical of Jack to throw him an absolute curve ball.

The woman perched on the edge of her leather sofa, hugging a big white dog's head to her lap. 'Is there anything we can do to fix it?'

'I'm no exorcist,' Ianto replied, thinking it was the first honest thing he's said to her all night.

'We're still going to continue our more traditional investigations,' Jack assured her.

'It was worth a shot,' she conceded.

'Thank you for you time,' Ianto said, feeling every inch the fraud he was.



'Well, that was a bust,' Jack said, beginning the long walk back to Ianto's flat. He brushed down his trousers with his hand, growling in frustration. 'And now I've got dog hair all over me.'

'Can't help being popular, huh?' Ianto teased.

Jack scowled. 'Fluffy hairy dogs are not my thing. And don't even get me started on cats. Last time we had a stray cat living in the hub I was sneezing for a week.'

'Such a sensitive soul,' Ianto replied, unable to resist poking fun at Jack's expense, before turning serious again. 'So, where does this leave us?'

Jack ran a hand through his hair, and Ianto could tell he was pondering the situation. It was highly unusual that their poking around resulted in absolutely no results whatsoever. The team were good at what they did, never leaving a stone unturned, dogged in their determination to solve the mystery or fix the problem. 'Do we bring the rest of the team in now?' Ianto asked.

'To do what?' Jack asked. 'What are they going to do that we haven't?' He heaved out a sigh. 'Besides...'

Ianto knew where the conversation was headed next. They'd end up down the same rabbit hole Jack had already dragged him into. Flat Holm. Ianto was sure they could come up with ideas and suggestions that he hadn't. That was always the argument. Jack wanted them to stay focused on the things they could fix, dismissing the idea that there was anything about Flat Holm that could be fixed. Instead Ianto spent the journey back to the car trying to figure out a way they could involve the team in this case without leading them to widen their field of missing people and connecting the dots with the negative rift activity. Knowing how thorough Gwen and Tosh were, he couldn't see any way it wouldn't come to light. Worse was how he thought they might react to the knowledge that he knew about it and had kept it a secret from them. Jack was allowed secrets, but Ianto wasn't. He was meant to be one of them. He just never imagined that having to be one of them might mean having to be disloyal to Jack. This wasn't a small case by any stretch of the imagination. It wasn't like it was just one missing person. It was dozens. If only Jack had just told them about the rift in the first place they might be here now helping him to find Melanie and all the other people who'd disappeared.

The SUV came into view before he knew it. If he'd been silent and sullen, mulling over his thoughts, Jack hadn't bothered to call him out on it, letting them walk in companionable silence. Now that they were back, he didn't want to go inside just yet. There had to be more they could do, even though it was getting late.

'Would you like a coffee before you go?' Ianto blurted out without thinking.

'I'm invited in?' Jack sounded surprised.

'Well, I just assumed you'd be heading back to the hub for the night. We usually have one last coffee for the day. Debrief and all that.'

Jack gave him a small smile. 'Well, I won't say no if you're offering.'



Ianto lead him inside, pressing the button for the lift to the fourth floor, feeling the clunky old lift struggle up the short distance. Sodding body corporate, he thought. Never fix anything around here. He almost always took the stairs, uncertain he might not end up stuck in a broken lift with no way out.

As the doors slid open, he nearly bumped straight into the person standing on the other side.

'Careful there, Ianto! You want to watch where you're going,' came the friendly voice.

'Oh, sorry Margot,' he apologised.

'No need. Just putting the rubbish out. And who's this with you?'

'Oh,' Ianto said, forgetting for a moment that he wasn't alone. 'This is Jack. Jack, this is Margot Rogers,' he said, doing a quick introduction. 'Margot is Melanie's mother, who I told you about.'

'Oh, is this your partner, Ianto?' Margot asked.

'Jack Harkness,' he greeted, putting out a hand to shake. 'I'm sorry we're meeting under these circumstances.'

'Yes, Well, I'm just glad that we've got you two looking into things for us. Ianto's ever so kind to do this.'

Jack grabbed Ianto's hand and squeezed it, giving him a smile. 'He's one in a million. You couldn't ask for a better man.'

'It's no trouble,' Ianto insisted, feeling his cheeks grow red.

'Well, I won't keep you up. You both look dead on your feet.' She pressed the button for the lift again, slipping inside and leaving them alone in the hallway.

Ianto marched down the short corridor and slipped his key in the lock, twisting it sharply and entering with Jack right behind him, before he slammed the door shut and twirled on Jack. 'I meant that we were investigative partners! Not...'

'Not, what?' Jack asked.

'You and me, and...' He sighed, rubbing a hand down his face. 'Bollocks. Maybe you should just go. I'm tired and I could do with a proper night's sleep.'

Jack suddenly grabbed him and pulled him into a fierce kiss. It caught Ianto off guard. His feet nearly went out from under him but Jack's arms were wrapped so tightly around his middle he didn't think he could fall even if he tried. Instead he gave into the kiss, snaking his own arms around Jack's neck. They didn't get to be alone very often. Even at the hub once the others had gone home for the night, they still weren't really alone. There was Myfanwy and a dozen other things that occupied the hub. Then there was the thorough network of CCTV cameras that watched and recorded their every move. There was almost never a time when someone wasn't able to see them. In here, in Ianto's flat though, it was different. No CCTV, not another soul within these walls that could see them. They truly were alone and able to have a moment to do whatever they wanted.

When Jack finally let go of him, leaving him breathless, he grinned. 'Still tired?'

'Not that tired,' Ianto replied. There'd be time for figuring out how to backtrack Jack's remarks to Margot later.



Jack felt like he was on cloud nine all the next day. It didn't matter that Owen was being an obnoxious shit and that Tosh had accidentally fried one of their servers during a test of some alien tech. It didn't even matter that Gwen had gone down to city hall without him to discuss the not so small matter of who was going to pay for the restoration works after two gronklyns had torn up the mayor's office and several other public staterooms. It also didn't matter that he had a case they couldn't puzzle out and three more missing persons reports that matched their criteria since yesterday. All that mattered was that last night Ianto had let him stay over and that waking up curled in his arms was bliss.

Of course they'd slept together a hundred times, but always here at the hub, squashed into the tiny space that was usually occupied solely by Jack. It definitely wasn't designed for two but they made it work as best they could. He'd never presumed to suggest they might kip elsewhere, somewhere with more room. Even the medical suites downstairs had bigger beds, but Ianto had never once complained and Jack liked having him pressed that close, using the excuse that he might fall out of the cot if he tried to put too much space between them. They were usually so tired and sated that it hardly mattered. A few more late nights like last night and maybe he might get to stay over again. Perhaps he might even get asked to stay over even if they weren't. A whole new raft of possibilities seemed to have suddenly opened up. As it wasn't like the neighbours didn't know who he was now, he thought, smirking to himself.

Ianto wandered past with a clipboard in hand, busily working away at something, Jack wasn't sure what. He barely registered Jack as he went by but Jack couldn't help that stupid smile that crept across his face. How did Ianto do that? Stay so cool and collected? Jack felt giddy just seeing him there. Trying to hide it was impossible, and luckily he didn't have to. The others knew they were together so they just put it down to Jack being Jack, infatuated with Ianto and his suits. If only they knew, he thought. What a pity they couldn't.



Despite his high mood, the rest of Jack's day didn't go nearly as smoothly as he'd hoped. When a rift alert came through a little bit before five o'clock, he saw the slightly distressed look on Ianto's face. How long might it take? Did it really require the whole team? What about their missing people investigation?

Jack took charge of the situation. 'Tosh? Any ideas what we've got?'

She pulled a face at the monitor, trying to pinpoint the rift energy signature against anything from theit databases that was similar. 'No idea. Sorry, Jack.'

'Doesn't matter. Whatever it is, we'll deal with it. Ianto, you stay here in case we need backup.'

Ianto nodded. 'I'll just go fetch your coat.'

Jack was strapping his webley into its holster on his belt when Ianto returned, letting Jack slip his arms into the grey wool. It was as good an opportunity as they were going to get to exchange a few quiet words.

'Do what you can without me,' Jack whispered. 'I'll meet up with you as soon as we're done.'

Ianto ran a hand across the shoulders, making sure they sat perfectly on Jack's frame. 'What if you really do need backup?'

'I know you'll manage to work some magic. Keep your comms open and your gear in the car just in case we need you to hustle.'

'Okay.'

'And be careful.' Jack didn't know why he felt the need to remind Ianto of that. So far they'd turned up nothing.

'I will,' Ianto promised.



With the hub empty of people, Ianto stared around. What was he supposed to do now? He'd rather been hoping Jack would have some brilliant idea for what they could do next. Instead, he was out with the rest of the team, averting their latest possible crisis.

Ianto reviewed his list of people again. He didn't think he could pass himself off as a psychic medium again. He was good at lies, but not that good. There were still so many that they hadn't even begun to scratch the surface of.

He checked the latest reports from the last two days. There was a guy called Darryl Murphy in marketing who was a fifty-fifty on Ianto's list. A bit of a loner by all accounts, who didn't go to lunch at the pub on a Friday with the rest of them. It was therfore hardly surprising that his colleagues didn't particularly notice he wasn't there when they came back from lunch, slightly tipsy and more interested in how to kill the last three hours of the working week before they could clock off and begin round two of drinking. It was only when he didn't turn up Monday that his boss went bananas, leaving abusive messages on his answering machine until his girlfriend called back and told him he hadn't been seen since he went to work on Friday.

One way or another, it was worth having a poke around. He'd check through computer logs, do a little digging around his desk and confirm if Darryl Murphy was someone connected to their investigations, or if he'd just really gotten sick of the nine to five office grind and his ungrateful boss.



Ianto swiped his access card on the building's security panel, admitting him entrance. One of the perks of being Jack's right hand man had been the card that granted him access to just about any building in the city. Jack kept them for those times when he wanted to go and stand on one of the city's man rooftops, but couldn't be bothered with the hassle of sweet talking security into letting him in. Only Jack was forever misplacing his card and so Ianto kept a bundle of spares on hand, and one for himself, lest he need to go after Jack and tear him away from his brooding rooftop vigil.

He let the lift take him to the tenth floor where Mancuso and Associates Advertising Agency was located. Given it was just after six, there were only a handful of people still working, and Ianto in his suit had no trouble fitting in, looking like just another low level associate. He found Darryl's desk without too much trouble. Someone had already started packing things into a box on the floor. It was a sad indictment that he was missed so little they'd already begun preparing to replace him. At the top of the box was a framed photograph, presumably of Darryl and his girlfriend. The guy was punching well above his weight in that department, taking in the buxom blonde wrapped around his acne pock marked face.

Ianto sat down in front of the desktop computer and easily hacked into Darryl 's account, There were half written marketing proposals, meetings for next week accepted in his calendar, and nothing in his filing system or trash can that resembled an attempt at a letter of resignation or other indications he was readying to leave his job behind. In fact, when Ianto ran a keystroke analysis program on his PC, it showed that he'd been halfway through an email when his keystrokes had come to an end. He opened up the draft email, skimming the contents and rushing towards the point where the words came to an abrupt halt. Not just halfway, but halfway through a word. You might get sick of your job halfway through a tedious email but nobody stopped halfway through a word. That was just weird. There could be no question that Darryl hadn't just upped and left. Besides which, his bike was still parked in the hallway, the matching helmet in the box of personal effects on the floor, and someone having tied a fake parking fine notice to the handlebars, thinking it funny.

He extracted his scanner from his pocket, beginning to run it over the desk and the cubicle, looking for traces of anything unnatural. The sound of two chatty women approaching him made him freeze, keeping his head low. Like Darryl they didn't even take any notice of him, still gossiping loudly as they drifted past and around the corner towards the toilets. He popped his head back up over the cubicle wall and found the office now empty. He did a quick circuit of the other cubicles, checking them as well in case someone had come through a rift in space somewhere else and grabbed Darryl as he sat at his desk. He'd learned not to discount anything.

He was almost done when there was a scream.

'Somebody help! Anyone?'

The woman's voice was coming from the bathrooms and Ianto was quick to arrive, finding one of the two women who had passed him earlier as the source of the commotion.

'What's wrong?'

'It's Shandra. She's gone.'

'What do you mean she's gone?'

'In the loos!' She grabbed a fistful of his shirt and dragged him inside.

There were four neat cubicles inside the black tiled bathroom with smoky mirrors and washbasins on the opposite wall. The third cubicle along had the door shut. The woman marched over and slammed hard on the door. 'This isn't bloody funny, Shand!'

Ianto gave her a curious look. 'She's in there?'

'No, you daft sod! Weren't you listening?' She rolled her eyes at him like he was an idiot. 'We came in here to freshen up before going out for dinner. She was in the loo and we were bitching about that slime bag Russell that heads up HR. You know the one.'

'Oh yes,' Ianto said, trying to sound convincing. 'Complete twat,' he added.

'Anyways, there we were chatting away and then she just stopped talking. I thought she'd done fainted or something like that.'

'She's definitely not in there?'

'See for yourself.'

There was no one in here, Ianto was certain. He'd gotten down on hands and knees to peer under the stall door, half expecting this was a setup - the kind where a guy gets lured into the ladies and then accused of being a pervert or worse. Only they didn't know him and had no reason to want him fired from a company he didn't even work for. The cubicle was completely empty, yet still locked from the inside. You'd have to be Houdini to get out.

What were the chances of two people going missing in the same building, on the same floor? Actually, pretty damn good, he realised. 'And you never left? You were here the whole time she was in there?'

The woman snorted. 'Course not. Not til I was screaming for someone and you showed up. But if you mean, could she have snuck out when I had my back turned, then no, I don't reckon.'

'Look, I'm sure it's fine. She probably just played a practical joke on us. Seriously, what are the chances that two people from the office go missing in as many days, eh?'

Her expression turned sour. 'A bloody good joke if you ask me.'

'Quite,' he agreed.

'Besides, Darryl was a complete tosser. One of those nerdy freaks that probably still lives with his mum. What guy over twenty rides a bike to work?' She shuddered. 'God, I've come over all shaky. Do you really think Shandra is just having us on?'

'What's say I go grab you a drink?'

The young woman gave him a look as they exited the bathroom. 'We've never even met and your asking me out for a drink?'

'I was thinking more something from the kitchen,' he said, pointing towards the small kitchenette.

'Oh, right. But I would if you offered. I mean, that drink. You're actually quite cute.'

'Maybe some other time,' Ianto said, already pulling a mug from the cupboard and dunking a teabag into it. Whilst the kettle was boiling and she was still prattling on about God only knew what, he surreptitiously snuck in a tiny dose of retcon as well. He simply couldn't bring himself to make instant coffee for the poor girl, even if she wouldn't remember it.

'Bloody hag, that Shandra,' she muttered, taking the mug from him. 'She'll be sorry tomorrow if this was all some setup. If she didn't want to go to dinner she should have just said so.'



Whilst Carly, the girl who was now napping over a pile of old magazines at a table in the kitchenette, dozed, Ianto returned to the scene of Shandra's disappearance. Even in here, not quarter of an hour ago since it had happened, was there any trace of something alien going on. She'd literally been there one minute and gone the next. He hadn't imagined it. He'd seen both of them pass him by, the tall black woman, Shandra, and the shorter mouse blonde Carly. In order for her to have left the building, she would have had to have gone past him again to get out.

He watched his face scrunch up in anger in the mirror's reflection. 'Shit,' he cursed, before turning back around to the empty bathroom stalls, leaning back against the counter.

The rest of his evening was a waste. He hadn't heard a word from the team, which must have meant they had things well in hand, but neither had he heard from Jack to say he was on his way. Instead, here he was, dragging an unconscious Carly down to the basement carpark, shoving her in the back seat of his car and driving her home to her flat in Barry.

'Not quite what you had in mind for a first date,' he said as he finally hefted her small frame into the bed, covering her with the lurid pink duvet. 'We had a drink, I drugged it, took you home and had my way with you. Guess it just proves we're all scumbags and cowards. At least you won't remember how shitty it was.'



Jack beat Ianto back to his flat by minutes only. When he'd checked the GPS chip in Ianto's phone and seen him just a few blocks away he was certain he was on his way and not headed out elsewhere. Rather than let himself in - even though he had a set of keys - he waited by the door, hearing the heavy footfalls of the young man coming up the stairs.

'How long have you been here?' Ianto asked, surprised to find Jack hovering at his door.

'Not long. Sorry, by the way. Thing looked like a bomb so we had to evacuate the entire street, then when Tosh and I started trying to take it apart it looked like it was a fake, and then once we dug under all of that cabling, it turned out it really was a bomb, and...' He sighed, leaning against the wall. 'Doesn't matter.'

'Everyone's okay, though?'

'Oh yeah. Tosh is somewhere right now doing a little victory dance at how amazing she was defusing that thing.' When Ianto raised an eyebrow at him Jack held up his hands. 'It was fiddly. She's got smaller hands than me.'

'Good.' Ianto dropped his car keys in a bowl on the sideboard and rubbed a hand across his face. Jack watched his body language with curiosity.

'What about you? How did you get on?'

Ianto flopped onto the edge of the sofa and Jack took up a spot next to him, listening intently to Ianto's explanation of the bizarre events. He wished he'd been there to see it for himself, but by all accounts it didn't sound like there was any way of knowing it was going to happen, or anything Ianto could have done to prevent it.

Ianto heaved a sigh and slumped back on the sofa. 'Have you eaten?' he asked.

'No. Have you?'

'Rather lost my appetite after tonight. I was this close, Jack,' he said, holding his fingers barely an inch apart. 'This close. How could I have missed it?'

Jack reached out an arm and placed his hand on Ianto's shoulder. 'Hey, don't beat yourself up. Might have happened no matter what. I'm just glad you're okay.'

'She said there was no sounds of a struggle, no indications the woman had been feeling unwell. She just went in and never came out. I didn't hear or see anything weird. Everything felt completely normal until...'

'So, we're saying maybe we can rule out a virus,' Jack said, trying to follow Ianto's train of thought.

'It's a very selective, very painless one if it is.' Ianto frowned. 'Maybe you should have me checked out just in case. Two people in one building? And I was there more than an hour. I could have been exposed.'

'I'm not even sure I'd know what I was looking for. I know of these kinds of viruses. What they look like under a microscope is another matter.'

Ianto turned sideways on the sofa to look at Jack. 'Would the full body scanner know? I'd sleep a lot better knowing I wasn't about to just suddenly evaporate into nothing.'

Jack nodded. 'I'd never let that happen. Let me put in a call or two to some people I know within the Shadow Proclamation's medical research program. What we don't know about them we can probably get data for and upload it into the scanner's data banks.'

'How long will that take?'

'Give me an hour to wake up the right people. You wanna head to the hub now?'

'If you think it won't take long.'

'You drive and I'll start making calls.'



Ianto was eternally fascinated at how many people Jack knew, not just here on Earth but all over the universe. It seemed that everyone happened to owe him a favour and were happy to have their chips called in, no matter what time of day or night.

A little while after Jack had put down the phone, he had something downloaded to his wrist strap, and from there he transferred it into their databases, connecting it up to the body scanner. 'We now know everything they do on this,' Jack declared. 'I wish it were that easy to get our hands on all of their other proprietary info. Our databases could do with a bit of enhancement.'

'I hope you didn't have to call in too big a favour.'

'Nothing is too big if it gives you peace of mind. It's ready when you are.'

Ianto gave him his best brave, unconcerned smile before setting his palm face down on the glass plate. It lit up blue as it ran up and down, scanning his hand and the rest of him from top to toe for several minutes before shutting off.

'Well?'

Jack studied the results. 'You're clear. A little vitamin D deficient, but apart from that.' Jack noted that there was a tiny tracer mark that the scanner picked up, but he dismissed it. There were a million alien things that left a small trace once they'd gotten near you. It could have been there months, or years. With all the things in the archives, it was a wonder Ianto didn't light up like a Christmas tree with alien tracer marks.

'Find me a person who lives in Wales that isn't short on sunshine,' Ianto quipped, but quietly relieved he wasn't harboring anything likely to kill him. 'You next?'

'Ianto, I can't die.'

'Even so.' He gave Jack a look that said he'd feel equally better knowing Jack wasn't about to implode either.

'Fine.' Jack slapped his hand down, looking bored as the machine went about its business, before delivering him a clean bill of health. As if there were any doubt. 'Happy now?'

'Can't you tell I'm smiling on the inside?'

Ianto jogged up the steps from Owen's medical bay, Jack following him. 'I should try and go through some more of these case files,' Ianto suggested. 'There's got to be something we're missing, some link that connects our missing people. Maybe there is something in the rift data we haven't looked at and maybe-'

Jack cut him off. 'Ianto, it's late.'

'But-'

'Sit down.' He virtually had to yank Ianto down onto the sofa with him. 'We'll get to the bottom of this, but not tonight.'

'And how many more people have to die first?' Ianto snapped at him. 'How many more people have to lose their mothers?' There was an edginess to Ianto's words that said this was about more than just a few people going missing. He had a tone that Jack had gotten used to picking out from his usual acerbic dry sense of irony. Then it dawned on him what it was.

'How are you doing since your mum passed away?'

Instead of tensing next to Jack, ready to throw up those defensive walls he loved so much, Ianto seemed to go all loose, like he was finally conceding some kind of defeat. Jack took the opportunity to reach around him and pull him closer until he was resting back against Jack, with his head nestled in between his chin and shoulder. He didn't fight Jack for even a single moment.

'It's just...' he sighed. 'I thought it would be easier to get over. It wasn't like we didn't know it was coming. We had time to say goodbye. Time to get used to the idea.'

'She was still your mum. There's always going to be gap where she was that can't ever be filled.'

'I know.' He paused, mulling it over for a long while. 'Where's your mum, Jack?'

He slipped an arm around Ianto's waist, resting it on the flat of his stomach. 'The last time I saw her was when I was sixteen, leaving Boeshane for the first time in my entire life, ready to go to the Time Agency's academy. I felt so torn, excited to go and terrified all at the same time.'

'You never went back? Not even just to visit?'

'I wanted to. There just never seemed to be a right time. I wrote letters for a while, and then... The Time Agency became my family, dysfunctional as it was.'

'Do you miss her?'

'I like to think she's always with me. She's out there somewhere, three thousand years in my future. When I think about it like that, it's like she's never dead.'

Ianto rested a hand on Jack's arm across his stomach. 'I like that.'

Jack buried his lips in Ianto's hair. 'Me too.'



'Stupid thing's playing up again,' Owen griped.

'Are you sure?' Tosh's voice replied.

'Course I'm sure.'

'I'll take a look.'

'Fine. Til then I'm gonna go grab one of those custard scrolls from the café round the corner. You want one?'

The voices broke through an invisible barrier of Ianto's subconscious, forcing him to realise he'd been asleep and now wasn't. He pushed himself partly upright just as Owen was walking past.

'Don't tell me you waited up for him all night,' Owen muttered, looking down at him in his rumpled state, Jack's coat forming a twisted mess around him. 'That's desperate, even for you.'

Ianto rubbed his eyes. What time was it? Hadn't Jack been here when he'd fallen asleep, curled up against him? Somehow he'd not only slept through Jack wriggling out from under him, but also through all of his teammates turning up to work and getting on with their day. It startled him to discover when he checked his watch that it was nearly ten thirty. 'I was working on... stuff,' he replied vaguely.

'Well, maybe now you can work on getting us all a coffee. Boss is always foul until you've fixed him up.'

Sure, why not, he thought. It wasn't like he had anything else to do. Nothing important anyway. Not until tonight after the rest of them went home.



Ianto groaned and let his pen drop on the desk with a tired resignation. The list of files on his computer was growing longer and longer. The others had left him alone, seemingly busy with their own projects which left him with nothing to do but to keep persevering with whatever he could drum up using the hub's sophisticated systems to try and find similarities between each of the reports filed. Not only that but he now had every CCTV camera in the city being searched by Torchwood's facial recognition software, trying to trace people's movements in the hours before they went missing, and also to be on the lookout for them right now on live feeds all across the city.

Even with every piece of Torchwood technology at his disposal, the lack of progress was getting to him, wearing him down. Even on their toughest cases they would have had some kind of a breakthrough by now. It was lucky he hadn't made it home since the day before yesterday. He didn't think he could face running into Margot in the halls again, knowing he had absolutely no news for her, nor any progress. He couldn't even tell her if her daughter was still alive or not. Not being able to give them closure one way or another ate away at him, making him feel angry and hopeless. He could only imagine what it must be like for the families who had only the police to hound with their phone calls. And then of course there were those who had been confirmed as taken by the rift. What was he suppose to do about those families? Small wonder Jack refused to talk about it. Just thinking about it was enough to destroy your soul. If they ever got to the bottom of this case, he was going to have stern words with Jack, whether he wanted to hear them or not. They couldn't just sit here and do nothing.

The phone on his desk rang, breaking him out of his anxious state. He was almost tempted to let it go to the answering machine, letting whoever was calling think they'd dialed the wrong number, trying to get a hold of Torchwood and instead being asked to place an order for a pizza delivery from Jubilee. It was one of Owen's little jokes that had been going for years now. The PM had famously once called and left an order for an Americana, no cheese, and a side order of please explain. A pity all their leaders since then didn't have her sense of humor.

Begrudgingly he picked it up. 'Good afternoon. Ianto Jones speaking.'

'Put me through to Jack right now,' barked an irate sounding Detective Swanson. As one of the few people who had their number, her accent was as distinctive as it was dreaded. 'I know he's ignoring my calls on purpose, and I know you lot have something to do with this.'

'Something to do with what?' Ianto asked, keeping his tone calm and placid, hoping he could either fob her off or otherwise placate her, avoiding the need to involve Jack. In any case, he picked up his pen and flipped over his notepad to a fresh page.

'Half a hour ago my officers brought in a guy who's beaten up at least four women. Not only that, but he physically assaulted one of the arresting officers who is now in A and E getting patched up.'

'Sounds like a good day's work.'

'Only ten minutes ago, the perp who was in one of our lock-ups just vanished. His lawyer is pissed as hell thinking we're stuffing him around, but the guy is gone. You don't just escape from a locked cell so I know this is one of your weird Torchwood things.'

'When you say disappeared?' Ianto asked, his pen halted just millimeters from the paper.

'Poof! Like just gone. Now, are you going to put him on or do I have to issue an arrest warrant for obstruction of justice? Not that I don't think he'd enjoy being put in handcuffs.'

'Please hold.' He placed the handset down on the desk and walked across the hub towards Jack's office, rapping gently but urgently on the door. 'I've got Detective Swanson on the phone.'

Jack groaned. 'Can you tell her I'll call her back? Like, sometime next year?'

Ianto gave him a firm look. 'You're going to want to take this call. Trust me.'

Jack sighed. 'Okay,' he said grabbing his own phone reluctantly and pressing the hold button off. 'Detective, what a pleasant surprise. Must've left my other phone in my coat pocket.' Ianto closed the door behind him, lest anyone else overhear Jack's end of the conversation. As much as he'd wanted to stay and eavesdrop, he knew Jack would fill him in.



Ten minutes later Jack's office doorway flew open and he was shrugging into his coat. 'Gotta pay a visit to the Cardiff Met,' he said, explaining away the three sets of questioning glances.

'Need some company?' Gwen offered.

'Actually I do,' Jack said. 'Ianto! Fancy tagging along?'

'Me?' He tried to act surprised. It was tricky when he was so anxious to get this charade out of the way and just go.

Jack, ever the consummate liar, just smiled. 'Sure. Why not? When was the last time you were out and about?'

'I'll come too, Gwen insisted, already reaching over the back of her chair for her jacket.

'Stand down, PC Cooper,' Jack replied. 'It's probably nothing. We can handle it.'

'Oh, okay then. If you're sure.' To say she looked put out to be left behind was an understatement. It didn't seem to matter that the rest of them hadn't been asked to tag along either. Gwen was the sort who might take it personally.

'I'm sure.'

'Just call me if you need me, though.'

'We will,' Jack promised.

'Probably just an excuse to nick off for a quick shag,' Ianto heard Owen mutter as they left. 'You really want in on that?' Ianto couldn't suppress his grin at Owen's comment. If that didn't put Gwen in her place, nothing would.



The Cardiff Metropolitan police station hummed and buzzed with the usual Tuesday afternoon crowd of minor assaults, petty theft and lost dog reports. Jack wasn't worried about the missing dogs, but he was curious about Detective Swanson's missing prisoner. Like Ianto's missing office worker, there could be absolutely no doubt that this was connected to their case, but why and how a criminal lowlife had gotten connected to a bunch of single mums, uni students, dog sitters and jaded office workers was anyone's guess. As Ianto had observed in the car on the way over, the only consistent thing was that he was under thirty five.

Kathy Swanson was there waiting for them by the door that lead in one direction to the CID offices, and in the other, to the public intake and lockup facilities.

'I'm all for you taking criminals off our hands but we've got protocols and paperwork. And no one from the brass is going to accept that we weren't at fault in this,' the Detective seethed as she lead them through and down to the lockup.

'Believe me, Detective,' Jack said, keeping pace behind her, greatcoat flapping from his long strides and forcing constables walking in the opposite direction to press themselves against the wall to let him pass through the narrow hall. Apart from the reinforced steel doors that had been fitted to the cells and a fresh coat of paint, the rest of the facility was just as it had been forty years ago, with its dark green tiling and the persistent smell of human decay. 'This isn't the first one to go missing.'

Kathy Swanson stopped dead for a second, her dark eyes boring into him. 'You've nicked others?'

Ianto coughed politely. 'What Jack means is that we're investigating a raft of disappearances around the city, and the cause of them is as yet unknown.'

Kathy's demeanor immediately softened. Jack always wondered how Ianto did that, putting everyone immediately at ease with just a few words. Even on a good day, being polite and jovial would get under Kathy's skin and earn him a tongue lashing. He hated to think what she'd be like if he did something to really upset her. He seemed to bring out the impatient bulldog in her.

'Can we please go down there and take a look?' Jack asked, hoping to ride on the coattails of Ianto's diplomacy.

'Before you do, I want to show you the CCTV,' the detective qualified. 'Then I want you to explain how this is even possible.'



Kathy steered them right, away from the lockup and into an office that adjoined the intake processing room, where several computers were lined up. She logged herself in and then brought up the CCTV feeds of the cells not far away, scrolling through the feeds for each cell until she found the one she was after, rewinding the playback to an hour ago.

Jack watched the short section of video intensely. Remarkably, this was the first and only instance where the disappearance had actually been captured on film in the moment it happened. One second the man was sitting hunched over on the hard steel bench that lined one side of the wall, and the next the cell was just empty, liked he'd blinked and missed something.

'Play that back again,' Jack said.

Kathy did so and he stared at the screen again, determined not to blink. Just as before, the man popped out of existence without warning.

Kathy stopped the video feed. 'Tell me what the hell I just saw. People don't just disappear. '

'You still think so?' Jack asked, pointing at the video monitor.

'Has anyone been inside since?' Ianto asked, a frown forming on his face as he considered all the possibilities. 'Has the door been opened at all?'

'What, you think he's still in there but we just can't see him?'

'Just working through possibilities.'

Kathy shook her head vehemently. 'No. Unless he can now slip through the guard flap.'

'We'll take a look for you,' Jack promised. Admittedly, shrinking was one alternative he hadn't considered up until now.

Kathy lead them down to the cell and took the keys that were offered by the constable keeping guard outside the door. She slipped them in the lock and Jack reaching out, stayed her hand. 'What?'

'Just wanna a check something first.' He gave Ianto a look and with perfect understanding, he handed over his PDA. Jack pointed it just inside the small flap in the center of the door, taking readings of the air inside the cell. 'Nothing discernable,' he said, pocketing the device and pulling out his gun, watching as Ianto mirrored the movement.

'Just a precaution,' Jack tried to assure Kathy, as he noted both she and the constable tensing at the sudden production of weapons. He supposed inside a police station, anyone who didn't work there was probably frowned upon for entering with a concealed weapon, and quickly ejected if they dared to brandish one. Those rules however didn't apply to him.

Jack held his gun pointed at the opening as Kathy pushed it slowly in, Jack slipping inside with Ianto right behind him, covering him. If he'd expected to be attacked by some invisible source, he was disappointed. The cell was just as empty as it appeared. He holstered the gun and let out a vexed sigh. His frustration was as palpable as Ianto's must have been last night.

'You weren't seriously expecting something in there, were you?' Kathy asked, her comment bordering on insulting.

'We've got further investigations to conduct,' Jack snapped. 'Don't you have some paperwork to file somewhere? Parking tickets to chase?'

The detective folded her arms across her chest and stood her ground. 'I'm not going anywhere until you give me a really good story to spin to my DCI about where the bloody hell our arrestee got to.'

Jack was about to give her a mouthful before a gentle hand on his elbow stopped him momentarily. It wasn't going to be enough to stop him but just when he opened his mouth to give her a piece of his mind, everything went immediately black.



Jack blinked once, then twice more, trying to figure out why the world had gone pitch dark. His elbow was strangely sore as something gripped it painfully until he turned and saw it was Ianto holding it tightly. He could see him perfectly, just as he realised he could see himself standing there, bathed in an impossible light that couldn't exist because everything else around them was totally black.

'Oh God,' he heard Ianto utter. 'Are we dead?'

Jack shook his head. He didn't think that was the case. He'd been dead more times than anyone had a right to be. He knew what it was to be dead. It was a nothingness, just black and empty and nothing, but not like this. There was always this feeling he got when he was dead, like there was something else there with him, just out of the corner of his eye, watching him, or perhaps waiting for him. It was like death was there to claim him but knew it couldn't. He didn't feel that same creepy presence here.

He took a tentative step forward and was surprised to find that underneath his foot the floor, if it could be called that, glowed with tiny blue ones and zeroes. He pulled his foot up and the blue light disappeared, and then reappeared when he set his foot back down. He reached out his arm, trying to see if there was a vertical wall. He found it off to his right, and the same flurry of blue ones and zeroes zipped past in the spot where his hand briefly brushed the surface. He drew a finger across the smooth surface, watching as the lit numbers chased after his fingertip.

Ianto stepped forward, cautiously touching the wall to see it for himself. 'What is this place?'

'I don't know,' Jack replied, 'but I'm guessing it's where all our other missing people must have been at some point.'

He heard Ianto swallow hard. 'But where are they now?' That was a very good question.

A voice trilled overhead, making them both jump at the sound, Jack reaching out to grab at Ianto at the same time he did to Jack. Somehow their hands found each other and gripped tightly. 'Upload failure. Please review and confirm or purge from cache.'

'Purge? I don't like the sound of that,' Ianto said, looking up for the source of the voice.

'Hello!' Jack called out. 'Is there somebody there we can speak to?'

'The specimens will please remove themselves to opposite sides of the cache for further analysis,' the voice instructed.

'Oh, no we won't,' Jack said, gripping Ianto's hand ever more tightly. 'Who are you? What do you want?'

A second voice joined the first. 'You have made an error.'

'The error was not mine,' the first voice argued. 'I thought he met the criteria. He is very fertile.'

'He is too old.'

'I thought he was the younger one.'

'The younger one had already been assessed and rejected.'

There was a tiny huff of annoyance. 'The transmat could not be more precise. We can purge the one we don't need and code the one we do.'

'Whoa, whoa, whoa,' Jack said, holding up a hand. 'Nobody is being purged.'

The voices seemed to ignore Jack's command, continuing on with their own conversation. 'He was too close when the trace was run. I assumed the reading must have been coming from the young one.'

'Hey, what I lack in youth I make up for in stamina,' Jack replied, unable to resist getting in on their conversation. 'Ask anyone.'

'We should purge them both.'

'Why not run more diagnostics? If these readings are true then-'

Jack pulled his gun and pointed it skyward, loosing two bullets. The sound was deafening but it had the desired effect, silencing any talk of purging them. There was only so much Jack could take of people ignoring his efforts to be civil and communicative, and he suddenly had a hunch that needed testing out.

'Jesus, Jack!' Ianto hissed, grabbing for his wrist and forcing his gun hand down. 'You could have killed one of us with the ricochet!'

Jack leaned his head closer to Ianto's. 'Only I didn't. Where are the bullets Ianto? Did you hear them hit anything? Did you even hear them echo?'

Ianto's grip on him relaxed as he considered the question. 'No, but...'

'The specimens will not disturb the cache!' came the irate instruction.

'None of this is real, Ianto,' Jack said, ignoring the voices overhead. 'I don't know why it took me so long to figure it out. All the ones and zeroes everywhere you touch. We're inside some giant computer.'

Confusion turned to concern in his eyes. 'But... we're still real, right?'

'Insofar as we've been reduced to binary code. Isn't that right?' he yelled loudly, scowling at the room with distrust. 'You've been stealing people all across the city and storing them in your computer data banks, haven't you?'

'Your genetic code has been been uploaded to our cache, before being verified and transmitted to the cloud.'

'The cloud?'

'For reconstruction in the future,' the voice explained.

'What future? Where?' Ianto asked.

'We have selected those that are most fertile, of good health and longevity, within acceptable breeding age and capable of furthering your species. That is the purpose and function of this vessel.'

Fertile? Breeding? The implications of what was being said infuriated Jack. 'You can't just take people and upload them to some cloud somewhere,' he said, incensed by the proposition. 'And how did you manage to fool our deep space sensors?' he added. 'We should have known about you guys before you got within twenty light years of Earth.'

'We utilised the rift located within this star system as the most expedient method of arrival.'

Jack gritted his teeth. 'Fine. And do you know that this is a Level Five protected world? The Proclamation Treaty of 1057 is very specific.'

'That document is outmoded and no longer of relevance.'

Jack's brow knitted together at the response. 'Uh huh. And exactly which year do think this is?'

'It is the year five point three slash apple slash seventy eight,' the voice replied, as if this were obvious.

Jack shook his head. 'Only it's not.'

There was an awkward pause. 'Please explain.'

'The rift you traveled in on is highly unstable,' Jack explained. 'It spans both space and time. You've come here in the year 2007. Not that I particularly care what year it is. You have no right to take sentient beings from their home world.'

'This planet is in danger of extinction,' the voice informed him. 'We are merely here to preserve human life. It is our mandate. Do you not wish for your species to be preserved?'

Jack scoffed. 'This planet will survive for billions of years yet. You're way too early if you think you're here to preserve human life.'

'Exactly how far back in time have they traveled?' Ianto asked, keeping his voice low. 'I've never heard of a chronological reference to time in slashes and apples, whatever that means.'

'It's about five billion years in your future,' Jack replied.

'Yes, well, I'd say that's a bit early, then,' he agreed.

'Nevertheless,' the voice interjected, 'we have been charged with ensuring the future of all species.'

'You can't take humans from this point in time,' Jack insisted. 'There's a whole lot of future that could very well depend on their contribution to this timeline. You could alter the entire future of the human race.'

'Our task is not to concern ourselves with the future of this planet, only to preserve the species from extinction and for future scientific study. These humans have fit our criteria.'

'Oh yeah? Well, let me tell you something,' Jack said, poking the wall with his finger as if he were poking someone in the chest, 'that last guy you uploaded before you snatched us? Not such a nice guy. I don't care how straight he shoots in the fertility department, he is not the kinda guy you want furthering the human race.'

'Explain.'

'He's violent and physically assaulted several women and a police officer. You think he's going to win awards for father of the year? If you're planning on ensuring the future of the human race, you need to select people who are kind and nurturing, not cold-blooded criminals. If he's the future, then I pray to all the goddesses that I'm not around when that day comes.'

'We must preserve. All analytical models predict this world is facing extinction.'

Jack's frustration as this pointless argument was reaching breaking point. 'Then let me tell you,' he began, 'because I've been all the way to the year one hundred trillion and back. They survive. The human race survives. And not because someone plucked them out of existence, but through their own brilliant ingenuity. Maybe in five billion years you might come along and take a few as a contingency, but here and now, the human race is flourishing and will continue to do so for billions of years to come.'

'Our models-' the voice began to say.

Jack cut it off. 'And what if by coming here now, taking these people, it's you who sets in motion that whole chain of events that leads to their extinction? For all we know that is exactly what happens.'

There was along silent pause. 'We do not have sufficient data to model from the year two zero zero seven to present the outcome of such actions.'

'Just as I thought,' Jack said, feeling smug. 'You came through a rift in space and time that brought you somewhere you shouldn't be. The only way to fulfill your mandate is to go back to your own timeline.'

'And return everybody you're uploaded back to Earth,' Ianto added. 'Us included.'

'That is... not unacceptable or contradictory to our directive.'

'Then I'm very glad to hear it,' Jack said. 'Protecting human life in this timeline is our directive. One that we take very seriously.'

There were a few minutes of silence as they were left standing there whilst the aliens were presumably going about the business of returning all of the people they'd stolen. 'It is done,' they reported. 'The human specimens have been returned to your planet.'

'Good,' Jack said. 'And where have you returned them to?'

'The place from whence they were originally sourced.'

Ianto tugged on Jack's sleeve. 'Do you think perhaps they might be convinced to send us back somewhere else? Only I don't fancy being downloaded back into a prison cell with a psychopath.'

'Good point. About five yards to the left of where you picked us up, if you could,' Jack requested. 'And triple check your chronometers when you pass back through the rift. You just never know where you might end up, or when.'

'We shall.'

'Oh, and next time you're in town and fancy going shopping for sentient life, you might want to check in with Torchwood first. That's a capital T, by the way. Ask for Captain Jack Harkness.'



There was hardly a heartbeat between being trapped in the blackness before Ianto's eyes were assaulted by bright light. He raised a hand to his eyes, sheltering them from the worst of it. When he finally adjusted to the light, he saw that they were out on the street standing in the bright winter sunshine. Cars and people drifted by them as if nothing at all had happened and their sudden appearance had gone completely unnoticed.

'Where,' he began, before getting his bearings, realising that they were in the street that ran around the corner from the police station.

'I said left, didn't I?' Jack mused. 'I thought we'd end up on the right side of the cell.'

'Perhaps that was the confusion,' Ianto replied, realising that the wall they were stood next to was the outer wall of the cell which incidentally was also the outer wall for the entire police station.

'Suppose we'd better get back inside,' Jack suggested. 'I don't think anyone warned the Detective we were bringing back her perp. I only hope she locked the door.'

Ianto suppressed a smirk. 'With us on the inside, I think she'd have been sorely tempted to do so and throw away the keys for good measure.'

'She just wishes she could lock me up and have her way with me,' Jack said, grinning like a Cheshire cat.



They rounded the corner and jogged up the front steps of the station, breezing through the people milling about in reception and heading back down the corridor they'd followed previously.

Kathy twirled at the sound of their footsteps and her face scrunched up in bafflement. 'But... You were in there... And then, not there... And now...' She twirled again, watching the constable peer through the prison cell flap at the prisoner who was once again hunched on the bench, as if he'd never left. 'And he's...'

'It's best if you don't try to think about it too much,' Jack assured her. 'But hey, you got your guy back so I guess your DCI won't be firing you today. And as a bonus, I think you'll find that a whole bunch of missing persons reports filed here in the last week or so will suddenly have resolved themselves.'

'But...' she stuttered. 'You still haven't explained how...'

Jack chanced putting a hand on her shoulder. 'Go home, have a stiff drink, and pretend you imagined the whole thing.'

'Works for me,' Ianto agreed. 'Now, if you'll excuse us, we have a few loose ends to tidy up.'

This time is was Jack's turn to look confused .'We do?'

'Yes. We do.'



With Jack behind the wheel it didn't take long at all to drive the short distance between the police station and the Grangetown Tesco, then slowly trawling a route back to Ianto's flat. Halfway there Ianto spotted the familiar figure of Melanie, leant against a short brick fence in her uniform, looking slightly dazed and confused. He was out of the car in an instant, walking over to her. 'Melanie? You okay?'

She looked up, her face contorted with a bleary sense of awareness. 'Ianto? What am I doing here?'

He perched on the brick fence next to her. 'What do you remember?'

She frowned into the middle distance, trying to gather her recollections. 'I was... on my way to work. Night shift. But now it's light. Ianto, I don't...'

'It's okay,' he said, putting a reassuring hand on her arm. 'There's been a speight of people being picked up off the street by guys in vans, and drugged with the intention of being held for ransom. Margot had me looking into it. We were about to get close when they shut up shop. They must have known it was too risky to keep you in case they got caught and so they dropped you back off here. I was starting to worry we'd never find you.'

Melanie rubbed her forehead in slow circles. 'I don't remember any of it.'

'It's okay. You're safe now. My friend and I can drive you home. I know the kids will be over the moon to see you.'



Ianto repeated the same story when they got back to the block of flats, settling Melanie on the sofa with a cup of tea and some aspirin. Considering they'd all been reduced to electronic strings of one's and zeroes and uploaded to some computer system a billion light years away, a slight headache was getting off lightly. The kids were beyond ecstatic and Margot was practically in tears, taking turns to hug him and Jack repeatedly as thanks.

'You say you almost got to the bottom of this gang?' Margot asked, having finally convinced them to stay for tea.

'Almost,' Ianto replied, keeping the details brief.

'We think the police bungled it,' Jack said, enjoying playing along with the story. 'These kinds of operations are sensitive. Someone gets too enthusiastic, poking around, and the bad guys get twitchy. They can go to ground just like that,' Jack said, snapping his fingers. 'It could take months to track them down to a new base of operations. We don't know just how many people they might have taken and then been forced to dump back out on the street before they turned tail.'

'Well, I'm glad they did,' Margot said. 'Who knows what might have happened if they hadn't. There's no way we could have come up with ransom money.'

'We'd have helped you out,' Jack said. 'It's the least we could have done if we couldn't track them down.'

Margot beamed at him. 'That's very sweet of you. You two make such a sweet couple. Did you know Ianto had this lovely man hidden away, Mel?'

'I think I'd have noticed if you came sneaking home at three am with him latched on your arm, Ianto,' Melanie teased. 'You kept that well under wraps. I assumed all you private investigators were life long bachelors.'

'Ianto likes to keep his work and private lives separate,' Jack explained. 'We've been working together for years, but this is all a bit new still. We're taking it slow.'

'Well, you're welcome round for tea any time. You know this house never sleeps.'

'Neither does ours,' Ianto agreed, rolling his eyes.

'So, that's case closed for you now?'

'For now,' Jack agreed. 'But tomorrow there's guaranteed to be something new waiting for us. There always is.'



Once the kids got tired, the pair of them politely made their leave. Considering how often they left people unconscious and retconned in their line of work it was nice to be able to be properly thanked for a job well done and to see what impact it had on the lives of those who got caught up in Torchwood affairs.

'This was fun,' Jack said, hovering in Ianto's doorway. 'We should do it more often.'

'What, lie to the team and go out on crazy missions, getting abducted by aliens?'

Jack chuckled. 'You know what I mean. It's good having you more involved with the team but this, just us, fighting the good fight. It'll be kinda sad to go back to normal tomorrow. We made quite a duo.'

'It doesn't have to be like that,' Ianto replied. 'I mean, if you had something that didn't require the whole team...' He left the suggestion open for Jack to fill in the blanks.

'We could partner up?' Jack asked hopefully.

'Maybe.' He didn't want to give Jack too much leverage. It was nice, feeling needed, and now that his neighbours knew about Jack, maybe it wouldn't be so bad if they went out on their own every now and then, crashing at his place once their adventures were done. That would be something worth coming home to.