Title: Torchwood's Remnant
Author:
dancingbarefoot
BETA: none at this point
Rating: PG to NC-17 in later chapters
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Martha, Tom, Rhys and OC
Pairings: Jack/Ianto, Gwen/Rhys
Spoilers: TW - all seasons to be safe plus a little tweaking by me.
Warnings: None but will duly note if things are needed.
Summary: A year after the Children's Riots ... something returns and the remainder of Torchwood has to solve a mystery.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of them the BBC does, wish I did though ... could have played nicer with Janto.
The greatest and most important problems of life cannot be solved. They can only be outgrown. — Dune: House Harkonnen
“It’s 9:45 and you’re listening to the Remnant here on radio free Cardiff.”
With a jolt, Gwen looked up from the laptop at the sound of that voice.
It had been a year since the fall of Torchwood three, a year since the Children’s Riots and the death of the 456 and life as she had now come to know it was finally settling down. She had been in talks with the government and the Crown regarding Torchwood’s rebuilding, a task for which she had taken time away to give birth to her and Rhys’s first child, a little man of 2 months who went by the name of Ianto James Rhys Williams, for three of the men she loved most but the first being for the man she had never truly known.
It was as she sat on the couch, baby monitor on the table beside the rift monitor late one evening that she felt like hearing some music and as she flitted about the radio dial, that she came across this station and thought nothing of it.
“It’s been a year since the world as we knew it came to an end, an end of innocence shall we say. For the world learnt that not all government decisions are for the good of the people. In fact, they’re selfish and cruel and don’t care for the good of the people at all. They destroy and they ignore the cries of the people. They take away the supports and then look lost when everything crumbles. The more they rebuild, the less obvious is that nothing good comes from things that were lost. It’s 9:50 and you’re listening to radio free Cardiff .”
It had been a year and he was dead but yet that voice was too familiar, too many memories coming over her as Gwen scrambled for the phone and dialled her second. “Tell me you heard that!!!”
*~*~*~*~*
Dr. Martha Jones-Milligan had been enjoying a rare night away from the rift when the telephone rang, earning a look of not again and a laugh from Tom who upon seeing the caller ID merely handed the phone over and kissed the top of her head. “You need to tell your work wife love to stop calling you at home. It makes me jealous.”
She waited for his laughter to fade out before answering. “Gwen?”
As Gwen started to explain what exactly she had heard, Martha’s brow furrowed and she felt that familiar itch that always came over the back of her neck when it seemed that something weird was about to happen. It started after the incident at the Pharm and continued to this day. Not that she could help it really. One would have twitches and weird moments when one has friends like the Doctor and Jack.
“HAD” she corrected herself as she confessed that she hadn’t heard the radio broadcast. “We were at dinner and had just gotten in Gwen.”
It was as Gwen re-went over for a second time what she had heard that Martha reached for a notepad and scrambled down notes. “It can’t be him Gwen. You know that.”
“I do but that voice is too familiar.”
*~*~*~*~*
He was seated in his chair surrounded happily by his equipment as he thought about how he had gotten to this point, his fingers pressed together under his chin as he tried to remember those first few days. The pain and confusion thanks to the virus that had gone through him and the subsequent antivirus that had nearly crippled him with pain that the doctor treated him had stated was a result from a lifetime that was spent near the rift.
As the instrumental music was replaced by something that was more a bastard love child of Leonard Cohen and the Corrs and then finally back to blessed silence, he then slipped the headset back on and began to speak.
“The hero isn’t one who tries to make himself look good all of the time, that is the role for the faceless drones who feed on ego and greed. The hero is one who knows what has to be done and faces down the currents that swirl around them. Who can gird himself against the enslaught and swallows the bile thrown at him. The hero is one who knows what he is and what he could be and yet still manages to get things done.”
His blue eyes drifted around the little motley collection of trinkets *HIS* trinkets and he took a breath.
“It doesn’t matter how you begin the journey, it matters how you carry the knowledge of what you have done with you each step of the way. To know that while you have done terrible things or matters of great importance .. you’re not alone.”
Author:
dancingbarefootBETA: none at this point
Rating: PG to NC-17 in later chapters
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Martha, Tom, Rhys and OC
Pairings: Jack/Ianto, Gwen/Rhys
Spoilers: TW - all seasons to be safe plus a little tweaking by me.
Warnings: None but will duly note if things are needed.
Summary: A year after the Children's Riots ... something returns and the remainder of Torchwood has to solve a mystery.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of them the BBC does, wish I did though ... could have played nicer with Janto.
The greatest and most important problems of life cannot be solved. They can only be outgrown. — Dune: House Harkonnen
“It’s 9:45 and you’re listening to the Remnant here on radio free Cardiff.”
With a jolt, Gwen looked up from the laptop at the sound of that voice.
It had been a year since the fall of Torchwood three, a year since the Children’s Riots and the death of the 456 and life as she had now come to know it was finally settling down. She had been in talks with the government and the Crown regarding Torchwood’s rebuilding, a task for which she had taken time away to give birth to her and Rhys’s first child, a little man of 2 months who went by the name of Ianto James Rhys Williams, for three of the men she loved most but the first being for the man she had never truly known.
It was as she sat on the couch, baby monitor on the table beside the rift monitor late one evening that she felt like hearing some music and as she flitted about the radio dial, that she came across this station and thought nothing of it.
“It’s been a year since the world as we knew it came to an end, an end of innocence shall we say. For the world learnt that not all government decisions are for the good of the people. In fact, they’re selfish and cruel and don’t care for the good of the people at all. They destroy and they ignore the cries of the people. They take away the supports and then look lost when everything crumbles. The more they rebuild, the less obvious is that nothing good comes from things that were lost. It’s 9:50 and you’re listening to radio free Cardiff .”
It had been a year and he was dead but yet that voice was too familiar, too many memories coming over her as Gwen scrambled for the phone and dialled her second. “Tell me you heard that!!!”
*~*~*~*~*
Dr. Martha Jones-Milligan had been enjoying a rare night away from the rift when the telephone rang, earning a look of not again and a laugh from Tom who upon seeing the caller ID merely handed the phone over and kissed the top of her head. “You need to tell your work wife love to stop calling you at home. It makes me jealous.”
She waited for his laughter to fade out before answering. “Gwen?”
As Gwen started to explain what exactly she had heard, Martha’s brow furrowed and she felt that familiar itch that always came over the back of her neck when it seemed that something weird was about to happen. It started after the incident at the Pharm and continued to this day. Not that she could help it really. One would have twitches and weird moments when one has friends like the Doctor and Jack.
“HAD” she corrected herself as she confessed that she hadn’t heard the radio broadcast. “We were at dinner and had just gotten in Gwen.”
It was as Gwen re-went over for a second time what she had heard that Martha reached for a notepad and scrambled down notes. “It can’t be him Gwen. You know that.”
“I do but that voice is too familiar.”
*~*~*~*~*
He was seated in his chair surrounded happily by his equipment as he thought about how he had gotten to this point, his fingers pressed together under his chin as he tried to remember those first few days. The pain and confusion thanks to the virus that had gone through him and the subsequent antivirus that had nearly crippled him with pain that the doctor treated him had stated was a result from a lifetime that was spent near the rift.
As the instrumental music was replaced by something that was more a bastard love child of Leonard Cohen and the Corrs and then finally back to blessed silence, he then slipped the headset back on and began to speak.
“The hero isn’t one who tries to make himself look good all of the time, that is the role for the faceless drones who feed on ego and greed. The hero is one who knows what has to be done and faces down the currents that swirl around them. Who can gird himself against the enslaught and swallows the bile thrown at him. The hero is one who knows what he is and what he could be and yet still manages to get things done.”
His blue eyes drifted around the little motley collection of trinkets *HIS* trinkets and he took a breath.
“It doesn’t matter how you begin the journey, it matters how you carry the knowledge of what you have done with you each step of the way. To know that while you have done terrible things or matters of great importance .. you’re not alone.”