My brain wouldn't let me sleep until I wrote this.  It's the first non-school thing I've written in a couple years, so I figured I could use some unbiased feedback.

You probably won't understand it if you haven't seen at least through Season 2 of Doctor Who and some of Torchood, and SPOILERS for the same.




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Two hours later, Jack and Ianto were standing beside the SUV in an inauspicious car park in the rain. The kind of spitting rain you could hardly see, that didn't wet you so much as leave a sticky sheen on your skin. Waiting for Rift activity was never pleasant, especially with a power surge as big as Tosh predicted this one to be, but the rain made it unbearable.

Jack was about to turn and ask Ianto if there happened to be an umbrella in with all the tech in the car (screw his image, this was getting ridiculous) when a sudden shift in the atmosphere warned him that it (whatever 'it' was) was happening.

A hundred yards away, the air split with a sound close to thunder into a virulent orange and red scar. Jack felt his breath catch as an image of a much larger wound in the fabric of reality filled his mind's eye. "Not the whole sky,' he reminded him self, as he had to every time since, "This is natural, this is controlled... as much as these things can be." Clearing his throat, he rested his hand on his gun, and waited to see what the Rift had for them today.

As quickly as it had appeared, the gaping hole in reality closed itself and was gone, leaving a small, huddled figure on the wet pavement. Drawing his gun, and signaling for Ianto to cover him, Jack approached the prone form with utmost caution.

Human, female, young, and very dead. Jack kept his defensive stance even knowing this. No ordinary human could survive a trip through the Vortex, but you never knew what could have hitched a ride.

Ianto knew this, and was therefore stunned when his boss, only halfway to the pile of sodden clothes which had once been a person, dropped all pretense and ran, not away, but right to the lifeless form.

When Ianto, gun still drawn, reached the pair, he took in the sight with an utterly confused, yet analytical mind. Human, female, young. Contemporary clothes and accessories, dyed blond hair. She was pretty, very pretty, but this didn't explain why Jack, his amazing, stoic, commanding, in charge, never-flustered-by-the-most-outrageous, always-with-a-quip-or-joke Jack, was clutching this girl's shoulders and sobbing into her chest.

"Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose. What did you DO? You should have stayed there, you should have stayed SAFE. You stupid, amazing, beautiful, stubborn girl. What will I do? What will I tell him? What will this do to him? What will he do to me?" these thoughts and more flit in and out of Jack's mind in the few seconds it took for Ianto to take charge and push him away from Rose's body, saying "She's still warm, Jack." Quickly, Ianto searched for a pulse and any breath. None.

As Ianto started chest compressions, Jack fell back, for once at a complete loss for what to do. He matched his breath to Ianto's counting, calming slightly, and began to feel that something was not quite right. Yes, one of the loves of his life was lying dead at his feet as another tried in vain to resuscitate her, that was very not quite right, but no, there was something else. Something Wrong.

He realized what it was when he heard an all-too-familiar gasp from the dead girl. Ianto, who had had just started rescue breathing, flashed a huge, dopey grin at Jack, assuming it was his actions which had jump started life. Jack, however, knew all too well the assumption was wrong. He pushed, the again confused, Ianto aside just as Rose opened her eyes.

"Was someone been kissing me?" she asked, licking her lips. "Oh, Jack!" She grinned and Jack couldn't help but grin back. "Oh, he's not gonna like this." He whispered, before helping Rose to her feet.



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