Fandomweekly Challenge 65 - Far away

[m_findlow]

Title: Far away
Fandom: Torchwood
Author: m_findlow
Rating: M (language)
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 65 - Long distance at fandomweekly
Summary: Gwen isn't the only one feeling the pangs of solitude.

Gwen tapped angrily at the keys on the laptop. God, but it never used to be this hard to get a secure connection between Torchwood infrastructure and her home computer. Then again, she hadn't had a home computer for nearly two years, and before that, no one had been trying to track her down and have her wiped from the face of the earth.

She rubbed the damp from the back of her neck and searched around for something to tie up her hair. Nearly one am and it was still stinking hot. 'Who the hell lives in a place like this?' she muttered, hating the Los Angeles summer more and more.

She went back to tapping keys. If she could just bounce that signal through this Chinese server... All she needed was a few seconds to make the connection.

The door to the room flung inwards, startling her as Jack flew through it. If this was him turning up drunk or hungover again, she was going to have him strapped to the bed, and not in a good way. She was fed up with him just taking off whenever he pleased, and never saying where he was going. She couldn't tell if he was investigating or just off on the lash, not that either was bearing fruit from her perspective.

'Gwen, you won't believe what I just found out about PhiCorp.' He snatched the laptop from her before she got even a glimpse of her husband.

Gwen fumed as she glared at Jack. Just like always, he came swanning in like a cyclone, disrupting everything in her life. She was going to bloody kill him.

He paused just long enough to notice her expression. 'Something wrong?'

'I finally get a secure line to speak to Rhys and you bungle in and take over. Do you know how hard it is to keep things on an even keel being stuck here a million miles away? This has become like some mental long distance relationship. I don't even get to hold my baby girl because I'm stuck here with you.'

'I know, but this thing I found out...'

She gripped the edge of the table, feeling her knuckles go white. 'Jack Harkness, just for five minutes can the whole of bloody existence not be about you!'

Jack's eyes narrowed at her and went immediately cold. 'Just remind me,' he said, 'whose idea was this again? I didn't exactly see you hesitating back there in lovely sunny Wales, all guns and rocket launchers blazing on the beach.'

Jack was pushing all her buttons now and he knew it. 'Oh, sure, blame this all on me. I didn't choose to get arrested with you and shipped off to this anarchic bloody county! Yes, I hated Wales. And yes, I hated living in shitty caravans and being on the run for the better part of a year. And of course, I hated that awful windy cottage by the sea with the nearest store forty miles drive away. I hated being stuck there with the roses and the herb garden and the loving husband and beautiful daughter who at least would never leave me. Oh God, how I hated being a mum, and having that precious little thing be my legacy in this totally bonkers world. I miss her and I can't even see her to tell her mummy loves her. Unlike you. Not a word, Jack. Not one word.' She reached for yesterday's newspaper, the only thing within reach that wasn't expensive or breakable. 'Not even so much as a single...' Thwack! She hit him. '...bloody...' Thwack! '...postcard...' Thwack! Thwack! '...to tell us you were okay!'

'I wasn't okay!' Jack yelled. 'Okay?'

Esther bungled through the doorway, holding several plastic carry bags of takeaway Chinese. Their raised voices caused her to freeze to the spot. 'Um, I'll just... Go outside for a bit.' She dropped the bags on the floor and disappeared quickly.

Jack returned his gaze to her. He looked like a shadow of his former self, thinner and bent, with lines on his face that hadn't been there before. At the centre of it all were those blue eyes that spoke of sadness and loss and deep-seated loneliness. 'I wasn't okay. I couldn't face you. I tried everything to get away from it. Traveled all over Earth and couldn't find a single place that didn't hurt just as much as being back there in Cardiff. I though maybe I just had to go further, away from everyone and everything.'

'And did you?'

Jack stared up at the roof, taking in a deep breath as he tried to calm himself. 'Cast myself as far and wide as I could. All that dirt under my boots and I couldn't shake it off no matter what I tried. Everywhere I went, it went with me - Alice, Stephen, Owen, Suzie, Tosh, Ianto... I just wanted to bury it all and forget about it, including you. It wasn't that I didn't care. It was that I cared too much.'

Gwen's expression softened. She felt lonely and isolated out here, away from her family, but it couldn't even begin to compare with how Jack must feel. She was literally all he had left in this world and he was clinging to her like a life raft in a storm.

Jack bowed his head, looking genuinely contrite. 'I'm sorry for messing up your chance to see Rhys and Anwen. I know how much you must miss them.'

She shrugged him off. 'There's always tomorrow.'

'Thank you, by the way.'

She frowned. 'What for?'

'For saving my life back there on that plane. I don't think I got a chance to say it.'

'Yeah, well, I couldn't just let anyone kill you. We're a team. After all the shit you've put us through, the only one who's allowed to kill you is me.'

A little light came back into his eyes. 'When that day comes, I'll be glad it's you.'