m_findlow

Title: A rose for the departed
Fandom: Torchwood
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 39 - Premonition at fandomweekly
Summary: Jack is paid a visit by an ancient enemy.

Jack shuts his eyes and lets the sound of the train rattling along the tracks fill his mind. He'll miss Lahore and its eclectic mix of Indian and British architecture, all trying to merge into one. He's spent much of his time off duty exploring the Walled City. The buildings are such ramshackle places, and each level jutting out at least two feet from the one below it, such that by the time they've risen three or four storeys into the air they're almost touching from one side of the street to the next. It's probably the only thing holding them up, he surmises, given how impossibly top heavy they seem to be. Yet it all adds to the quaint chaos of the place. No amount of British rule seems to impinge on the daily lives of the people who live there. It has such a gritty sense of life that Jack almost wishes they could have stayed a while longer. But orders are orders, and his are to move on.

He casts his gaze around as the carriage rocks and sways along the tracks. His squad are good men, a combination of British, Sikh and Punjab, yet you wouldn't know it by the way they were laughing and playing cards. To a man they were one unit - his unit. Maybe this whole colonisation thing could've worked out, Jack thinks, though knowing it never will. Partition is years away yet. For now, there's peace between the locals and the Empire. Only local religious scuffles gave them anything to do.

Jack slips the folded piece of paper back into his top pocket, having read it again and knowing their orders by heart. Not that he's expecting much trouble. As soon as they arrive, things always calm down, as if reminding them they're part of something bigger and grander now. The children will want to know how their faces got so white, and the men will want to know how they can get a job with a British regiment, where the pay is far better than what they earn now. No one resents them, no one despises them, no one sees them as invaders or outsiders. A bubble of peace held together by some unseen forces is all Jack can put it down to.

'Can we deal you in a round, Captain?' one of the men asks.

Jack chuckles. 'And have you rob me again? How much do you think the army pays me?'

They laugh and carry on without him. Ever since the other night when lady luck had spat on his cards, they'd been trying to get him to remake his luck anew. He'd let them win, of course, because it was good for morale. After a few of them had gotten drunk and accidentally run over a child one night, their recreation time had been curbed. Orders from above. Jack wasn't angry with them. It was dark. Even sober it might have happened anyway. It was tragic but they couldn't undo it. They needed to refocus and carry on. A new posting is just what they need. He'll keep a more careful eye on them. They're good men, blighted by a little bad luck.

Jack folds his arms and leans back against the carriage wall. This is better than working for Torchwood, he thinks, basking in the glorious Indian summer heat that fills the space. It wraps them up in a blanket of dusty, spice-laden warmth, tinged with the scent of coal smoke from the train's engines. Maybe if he stays here long enough, Torchwood will forget all about him and his debt. The century has only just turned once. It'll have to turn again before he needs to go back there.

The carriage lurches left as it turns on the mountainous rail before passing into a tunnel. The carriage falls black as it enters. There's a sound of angry flapping inside the darkness. Jack assumes that they've disturbed a nest of birds and that they've flown through the open windows in a panic. He waits for the cries from his men, swatting them away, but instead the carriage falls eerily silent. It's unnatural and makes Jack's breath catch in his throat, unable to breathe.

He squints as the train finally pulls out of the tunnel, blinding him with an onslaught of sunshine. When he draws his arm away from his face, what he sees makes his heart stop. All about the carriage, his men are slumped on the floor or up against the walls. Red petals spill from their mouths like blood. A cloying perfume of roses fills the air. Jack presses back against the wall in shock, knowing already that they're dead. An evil presence waited for them in that tunnel, killing all fifteen silently in seconds. All except him.

Jack starts again and his eyes fly open to find himself back in the darkness again, but this time he recognises it not as a train carriage, but the underside of his bunker at the hub. He isn't in 1909 anymore, but back in 2006. Just a dream, he realises. A nightmare of years long past. He didn't know what they were then - those creatures that killed his men - but he knows them now. Revenge for the child they killed. Their chosen one. Few things scare him more than what they are and what they can do.

He resolves to give up on sleep. He doesn't want to go back there. He pulls on his clothes, only half dressed in his t-shirt and trousers, braces hanging loose at his sides.

He clambers up the ladder and approaches his desk before noticing there are still lights on, but they distract him for only a moment before something else catches his eye. He reaches down and there, on top of his reports, is a single red rose petal. His stomach lurches. It can't be. It's just a coincidence. Not here. Not in this place right now, he tells himself.