Torchwood: Fanfic: Fighting fit

[m_findlow]

Title: Fighting fit
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Rex Matheson, Esther Drummond, Jack, Gwen
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 641 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for m_findlow's prompt "Any, any, pushing the body to its limits" at fic_promptly
Summary: Rex is determined not to let the Miracle get in the way if him doing his job.

Rex watched as Esther gave him another of those worried looks. He wished she'd she'd stop doing that. He wasn't dead and he wasn't dying. None of them were, and that was the whole goddamn problem. Still, having a metal pole shoved through your clavicle was gonna hurt like hell, and that fact that the enormous hole in his chest was never going to heal had its own problems. Pain for one.

He'd been popping painkillers like they were candy, and Esther was worried he wasn't okay. He was fine; just fine. He should have been on another planet with the amount of painkillers in his system but he could take it. This new world of chronic drug abuse suited him just fine.

Besides, he wasn't about to show weakness in front of any of them, not Esther, not that crazy Gwen Cooper, and definitely, most definitely, not Captain World War Two. The guy had the biggest ego he'd ever met, which was saying something. Everything had to be a goddamn competition with him. If there was one thing Rex was certain of, it was that Torchwood weren't in charge anymore, and he'd be damned if anyone thought otherwise. What the hell was Torchwood anyway? Two misfits from England trying to save the world from aliens. Who the hell cared about aliens? They had bigger fish to fry. The whole planet had gone to hell in a hand basket.

He caught Gwen looking at him oddly.

'What?' he snarked.

'You're bleeding again. Just thought you should know,' she replied, calm as ever.

Damn it, he thought, looking down and seeing the large red stain seeping through his pale blue shirt, the dressing underneath soaked through. He caught the little smirk on Jack's face.

'Shut it, Fred Astaire.'

Jack threw up his hands in defense. 'Hey, I didn't say anything. I'm the one who can supposedly die, and you're the one bleeding all over the place.'

'He's right, Rex,' Esther said. 'Maybe you should lie down for a bit, or at least restrict your movement.'

Oh, that was the last straw.

'I. Am. Fine,' he repeated, glaring at each of them in turn. 'I don't need a nanny, and I don't need you to tell me to take it easy. This body is in the best shape it's ever been in.'

Jack scoffed again.

'Hey, at least I'm not pretending I'm twenty years younger than I am.'

'Worst part is that he's older than you think,' Gwen said, not even bothering to look up from her laptop. 'Twenty years is nothing for him. You'd have to go back over a century if you thought that was immature.'

'There's nothing wrong with being young at heart,' Jack countered.

'And God help us if the rest of us are stuck like you forever,' Rex said.

Jack leant back, resting his hands behind his head.

'You're not the only one who's ever been impaled, ya know.'

'Yeah, but I am the only one who's survived it.'

Esther was standing over him, offering him a clean dressing. He snatched it out of her hand and began unbuttoning his shirt to re-dress the wound, turning away so that Jack couldn't watch him. The man was too gay for his liking, and took too much of an interest. Vera was the only one he wanted checking him out, and she was going to do her nut at him for tearing open the stitching again. Then again, he could always use another excuse to go see her. He might have a hole in his chest, but the rest of his body worked just fine, and he was prepared to push the limits to show her just how capable his body really was. The Miracle might not have killed him, but at least something good had come out of it.