m_findlow

Title: Overtime
Fandom: Torchwood
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG.
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 54 - Time travel at fandomweekly
Summary: Andy's quiet night on patrol ends up being anything but.

What a night to be stuck out on patrol in a dead end part of Tiger Bay, Sergeant Andy Davidson thought. Next time Carroll asked him to pull an extra shift he was going to tell him to get knotted. Never offered a spare shift at the football or crowd control during the Six Nations, did he? Tosser.

Andy pulled up the collar on his high-vis jacket, and pulled down low his cap, trying to cover as much of his face from the bitter weather as possible. He cast a look down the curving road. Half a mile back was a greasy spoon and a cup of tea with his name on it, patrol be buggered.

A sudden gust of wind nearly knocked Andy off his feet. Worse was the way it turned him about, twice at least, leaving him disoriented and rather nauseous. It was comparable to that night he'd gotten drunk after the police Christmas party at Barry Island, agreeing to kick on with the lads. The memory made him realise there were still photos of it lurking about on Terry's Facebook page, showing them doing a bit more than just riding the carousel horses.

He bent over, resting his hands on his knees and sucking in a few deep breaths to ease his nausea. The wind subsided and the rain picked up again.

'Oi! Blues and twos!'

'Me?' Andy called out to the man striding towards him, still too distant to make out a face in the dark, wearing dark clothing on top of everything else.

'Yeah, you. This area is restricted. Didn't you get the memo?'

Andy turned around. The voice sounded so familiar and yet...

The lanky blond man stopped dead in his tracks, frowned and muttered as he drank in the sight of Andy standing there in the drizzle. The torchlight pointed at him reflected off his jacket and droplets of rain slid off the edge of his police cap, glistening as they fell. 'Oh, bollocks...'

Oh, bollocks indeed! Andy's jaw nearly hit the pavement as he found himself staring back at... Himself!

'Bloody Torchwood,' Andy's mirror image complained.

'But... How... I mean... What?' Andy couldn't decide which question was most pertinent.

'What year is it?'

Andy frowned at the question. '2007?'

Plainclothes Andy groaned. 'Thank you, rift,' he grumbled, his comment laced with sarcasm.

'Wait, have I traveled through the rift somehow?' He looked around at the same grubby street he'd been patrolling not five minutes ago. 'Are you me from the future? Oh my God! I'm actually meeting myself from the future!'

'You're not meant to meet yourself!' Andy scolded. 'Don't you know anythingabout time travel? The whole universe could implode.'

Andy gripped his utility belt. 'Oh, and since when are you the expert on time travel, hmm?'

Andy rolled his eyes. 'Since I work for Torchwood, obviously.'

Andy did a double take. 'What? Hang on, you work for Torchwood? I mean, Iwork for Torchwood?' A grin broke out on his face unable to quell his rising excitement. Finally! He'd only been begging Gwen for ages! 'When? How?'

'Bollocks,' Andy swore, realising his own mistake. 'I can't tell you that! That's like time travel rule number one.'

'I thought not meeting yourself was rule number one?'

'Okay, so maybe it's number two. Jack's never been good at explaining it but I'm sure Ianto's got it all written down...' He rolled his eyes '...somewhere. Anyway, shouldn't you have bigger worries?'

'Like?'

'Like how you got here? Why this time and place? And most importantly, how the hell you're going to get yourself back.'

Blimey. He hadn't thought about that. God, what if he was stuck here? I mean, all well and good that he was part of the inner circle of Torchwood now, but that was other him, not him, er... him. Would they let two of him work there? Maybe not. Jack would probably be livid as it was that he'd already bungled into himself here. 'You're really working for Torchwood?'

'Well, yeah. I mean, you get Gwen up the duff and someone has to step in and help out.'

'You mean, Gwen and you, I mean, Gwen and I...'

'Oh, God no! I mean, yeah she's had a baby and all but it's Rhys', I promise.'

'Oh.'

'Yeah.' He patted Andy disconsolately on the shoulder. 'Trust me. One day you will get over her. Even if she did marry a bit of a tosser.'

'So... what now?'

'Alpha Delta to Tango Hotel,' Andy chirped into his earpiece. 'That's code for Torchwood Hub, by the way,' Andy said, sounding pleased with himself.

'Andy, quit pretending you're special ops,' came the sarcastic tones of Jack Harkness, clearly audible on the other end of the line. 'And if you refer to me as Juliette one more time... What's up? Did you find it?'

'Ah... Sort of. It's me. Me from 2007.'

'And you don't remember this happening in your past?'

'I think I'd remember being tossed into the future and meeting the much cooler version of myself.'

'Hey! No need to be a prat about it!' Andy snapped at himself.

He heard Jack groan. He could almost picture the bowing of head and pinching the bridge of his nose. 'Okay. Bring him in until we can figure out how to send him back.'

'Roger that Juliette Hotel. On our way in.'

'What did I say about calling me Juliette!' he heard Jack shout, before Andy quickly turned his headset off, cutting off Jack's tirade.

'Come on then, you. Can't just leave you standing out here in the rain all night. You always end up with a sniffle in the morning and then moan for days.'

'I don't-' he was halfway through defending himself when reality dawned on him. 'I get to see the hub? Really?'

'Jack seems to think it won't break the future,' he replied, sounding bored.

Andy skipped after his doppelganger, grinning madly and fist-pumping the air. 'For the win!'