Fic: The Spaces In Between - Part six.

[silver_sun]

Part five.

Part six.


Travelling between parallel worlds is, Jack has to admit, not as bad as travelling from the end of the universe back to the 21st century in one jump, but not by much.

Disorientated for a moment, Jack leans against one of the towering iron columns that support the roof of the Hub, until it has passed.

The Hub in this world is different. Instead of sleek, flat panel monitors and a few cables running to the mainframe, there are huge banks of antiquated looking CRT monitors and reel-to-reel tape recorders, giving it the look of an old sci-fi film's idea of what the future would look like.

The lift still rises up through the centre, although it's a more substantial structure now, which suggests it opens into something larger than a paving slab in the city above.

The Victorian tiles on the wall, and the sense that whoever designed the place was probably normally employed in designing underground stations is the same though. It makes it seem familiar and strange at the same time, and Jack can't work out if it's the differences or the similarities that are more unsettling, given that he'll never see his own Hub whole like this again.

He doesn't have any more time to think about it though as Tosh calls out, “Owen! There was an energy spike, I think Ianto's back.”

Jack turns round, looking for Tosh, but finds himself facing Owen instead.

Owen stares at him, too surprised to move.

Tosh arrives a moment later, leaning on a cane, her left leg obviously giving her some trouble. “Owen, what is...Jack?”

“The one and only.” He smiles disarmingly. “Well sort of.”

"You're from the parallel world, aren't you? It worked.” She turns to Owen, smiling. “Owen, it worked.”

Looking around, Tosh's smile fades, and she asks, “Where's Ianto?"

“He's all right,” Jack reassures her. Pointing to the vortex manipulator, he adds, “We had a couple of problems with this, so I came instead.”

“He handed all of it over to you?” Tosh says sceptically. “I don't think so.”

“He wasn't exactly in favour of the idea.” Jack takes off the power cells carefully, buying himself a little time to think, knowing that it's probably not the best idea to tell them the whole truth about him getting there. “He said it would be a close thing, you having enough power to leave. So I went while he was asleep.”

“Now that I can believe,” Owen says, somewhere between amused and irritated. “It's just the same sort of bloody stupid thing our Jack would have done.”

“They say great minds think alike,” Jack says with a cocky smile, hoping that this will help reassure them that he's there to help. “So, are you two ready to go?”

“The power cells need to be recharged first, and I need to calculate the energy consumption levels, to make sure we've got enough for the three of us,” Tosh says, walking slowly back to her workstation.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Jack asks, needing something to do. Sitting around has never been something that he's good at, not when there might be something that he could be doing.

“Yes.” Tosh gets a device that looks like a tuning fork with a small LCD display on the handle out of the desk drawer. “You can test the cells, find out the power drain. I need to know how much power was used to bring you here. They were all fully charged when you left, weren't they?”

“Yes.”

“Good. That makes things easier.” Tosh hands him the device. “You tell me the current level, and I'll make a start on the calculations.”

“Okay. Forty nine percent,” Jack says, reading out the first of the readings for the power cells. Then pointing to the cane, he asks, “What happened?”

“Gray.” Tosh turns round, the movement obviously causing her some discomfort. “I was lucky really, a little further to the left and I might not have been able to walk at all.”

Or you could have been dead, Jack thinks. Losing Tosh had been hard. She'd been with him longer than anybody else on the team, and it had felt like it was his fault. He'd brought her into Torchwood and he'd failed to keep her safe.

“I guess I wasn't so lucky in your world,” Tosh says, seeing Jack's expression.

“No,” Jack says wearily, all the losses weighing heavily on him. “None of us were.”

“That's Torchwood though, isn't it?” Tosh says with a sad smile. “It's what it does.”

Jack sighs and nods, then takes the reading on the next power cell.


Once the readings are all taken, Tosh turns her attention to calculations.

“You mind if I take a look around?” Jack asks, suspecting that Tosh won't want him bothering her while she works.

“There's not much to see,” Tosh answers a little distractedly. “And don't use the lift, there's no shielding outside of the Hub.”

Limited to the main area of the Hub, Jack looks around wondering where he should start, and what he hopes to gain from this.

Jack's office is similar to his own. An old safe in the corner, a large desk, and a hatchway down to a cramped sleeping area.

It's more lived-in though, photos and mementos of Jack's life on Earth displayed on shelves and his desk rather than hidden away. Photos of men and women, friends and lovers from the hundred and forty years he'd spent on Earth. Jack in India in the 1920's. Jack and Estelle on their wedding day. Wearing a diving suit and standing next to Alex Hopkins, the steam ships in Cardiff Docks behind them.

He smiles wistfully at them, fingers lingering on the edges of the frames. It makes him wonder if the old tin box of photos he'd kept in his desk has survived the destruction of the Hub. He's sure that if Gwen has found it in the course of having the Hub rebuilt in she'll keep it safe for him.

On the desk is a small silver frame. The Jack in the photo looks a little older than himself, his hair worn more as he'd done back in the '40's. He looks happy though, Ianto as well, as they with stand arms about each other's shoulders.

Picking it up, Jack sits down in the chair, the photo held in his hands. They look so happy and in love, he wishes he had at least one photo like that of Ianto, something for when he starts to doubt his own memories of the happy times they had together.

Jack looks at the photo one more time, then puts it into his coat pocket, intending to give it to Ianto. Having deprived Ianto of the chance of returning to this world, and collecting any mementos, he thinks that this is the least he can do.

Standing at the door to the office, Jack watches as Tosh takes off her glasses and rubs her eyes.

“What is it?” Jack hears Owen ask.

“There’s not enough power left in the system to recharge the power cells, not enough for all of us anyway.”

“We’re going to be leaving soon, aren't we? Can’t we just take a bit from life support?” Owen asks hopefully.

“I’ve already done that. Even then there isn’t enough power, the shielding around the Hub is going to fail before the cells have recharged.” She sighs.

“There’s something else though, right?” Owen still sounding hopeful. “I mean, you’ve thought of something?”

Tosh nods. “I’ve reduced the shielding to just the main area of the Hub, there’s enough air space here that I can switch off the oxygen filters as well to try and get energy we need.” She looks down. “But even with that I’m not sure that there will be enough.”

The Hub is almost silent once the wheezing groan of the oxygen pumps have stopped. While the dim blue light provided by low energy lamps it give the place an eerie quality. One that makes Jack think of tombs. It’s really not the kind of thought he wants to have, given that if they can’t recharge all the cells, that’s exactly what this place will be for them.

Looking at Tosh and Owen who are sitting on the battered green leather couch next to the only functioning workstation, Jack knows what he needs to do.

Not that the idea of using the piece of tech that killed his counterpart here on this world is appealing, but the situation is such that he doesn’t feel like he’s got much of a choice any more.

“Ianto told me that your Jack used a piece of alien tech to transfer some of his energy to the main power supply.” He looks first at Tosh and then at Owen. “I want give it a try.”

“No,” Tosh says, shaking her head. “We'll find another way, it too dangerous.”

“Believe me, if there’s another way, I want to know about it.” Jack smiles tightly. “But I don't think there is, or you'd have found it by now.”

Still looking less than happy, Tosh says, “Owen, could you fetch the gauntlet from the safe?”

“Don’t say you weren’t warned,” Owen says, before walking over to Jack’s office, muttering under his breath about hero complexes.

“Gauntlet?” Jack asks, his apprehension growing.

“Yes. It came through the Rift years ago. Suzie theorised that it was made by a species which produced large quantities of bio-electrical energy and who had low level psychic abilities.” Opening a drawer in her desk, Tosh takes out a folder containing the information.

“There was a knife of the same material, that was probably used in conjunction with the gauntlet, either to focus the energy, or more likely as a conduit for it so that it could be used in combat.”

“She never used it on people then?”

“No.” Tosh sounds horrified. “Why would anybody do that?”

“To bring them back to life.”

“But all you'd do is electrocute them.” Tosh gives him a puzzled look. “It really doesn't work like that.”

“That's probably a good thing,” Jack says, relieved that the temptation to keep the gauntlet for use in the future isn't there.

“Here you go.” Arriving back, Owen hands Jack the gauntlet. “Are you sure about this?”

“Yeah,” Jack lies easily. The metal feels cold against his hand, although not as cold and forbidding as the gauntlet from his own world. He hopes that it's a good sign.

Wires lead from the fingers of the gauntlet to a plug so that it can be connected to whatever needs charging.

“How does this work?” Jack asks, hoping that on this world they’ve worked out a better method of using it than just putting it on and hoping it’ll do something you want it to.

“It’s thought-activated as far as we can tell,” Tosh says, picking up the folder of notes. “It's seems to sense the intention of the wearer, the more the wearer wants it to work the better it does. Previous psychic training seems to help as well. I think that's why it was only Jack who could ever get it to work properly.”

Slipping the gauntlet onto his hand, Jack asks, “So how fast can I get these charged?”

“Safely?” Tosh frowns, thinking for a moment. “I think you should try it for a few minutes just to get used to-” She is interrupted by the whine of a warning siren.

“I'm guessing that's not good?” Jack asks. In his experience there are very few good sirens.

“No.” Tosh sits down, looking tired. “It means that the force field around the Hub is failing. In a few minutes we'll start losing atmosphere, and there's nothing I can do.”

They stand in silence for a moment. Then ,looking scared but determined, Owen turns to Jack and says, “There should be enough power for two of you to go. You take Tosh.”

“No,” Tosh says, giving Owen a furious look. “Don’t you start getting all noble with me now.”

“Oi, I’ve been noble loads of times before,” Owen says indignantly. “Anyway, if you go you’ll have time to get the time-travel bit of that thing working and then you can come back and get me.”

“We're all going. I'm not leaving anyone behind,” Jack says, the bickering reminding him of the Tosh and Owen he’s lost. He's not losing them again, not now, not when they are so close to being safe.

“What if we connect it directly to the cells? Would that work, could I transfer the energy faster?”

“Yes, but it could kill you,” Tosh says, obviously not pleased with the direction that the conversation is going.

Given everything that has happened to him, both recently in and the long years since becoming immortal, Jack really can't find anything frightening in that possibility. And he says recklessly, “Certain death versus possible, I know which odds I like better.”

“I guess when you put it like that it does make sense,” Tosh says with a tight smile.

“How are we going to do this then?” Jack asks, looking at the glove, hoping that the changes that need to be done it can be made quickly.

“I need to take the wires out, so you can make a direct connection,” Tosh replies.

Once the last of the wires is removed Jack places his gloved hand directly onto one of the power cells.

Tosh puts her hand on Jack's arm. "If it's getting too much just lift your hand to break the connection.”

“Don't worry, I be fine.” Jack flexes the fingers on the glove. “Let's see what you've got.”

He can feel the glove straight away, the pull of it. It's different from how either Suzie's glove was and the one he'd used to bring Owen back. It's still not entirely pleasant though.

The cold metal of the glove warms quickly, and the feeling of energy being dragged from him is increasingly unpleasant, but it's nothing he can't deal with. Starting to feel a little dizzy, Jack sits down on the floor, the glove still held against the power cell.

“They're not charging fast enough, the shield isn't going to hold that long,” Tosh says, checking the cells' energy levels.

“Can't you make it smaller or something?” Owen asks, sounding scared now, his earlier bravado having deserted him. “Give Jack a bit more time?”

“I'd need a defined area, I don't have time to...” Tosh looks at the lift, then smiles, saying enthusiastically. “Of course, I can use the energy signature generated by the lift's perception filter, refocus the shield on it.”

Tosh goes back to her workstation. “Owen, get Jack to the lift. I need to switch the field from here.”

“But you'll be on the wrong side,” Owen protests.

“There's a time delay.” Tosh starts making a final check of the settings. “I'll have a few seconds to join you. Now get Jack into the lift, we're only going to get one chance at this.”

“I can manage.” Still holding on tightly to the power cells, Jack tries to stand, his legs feeling like rubber, his head spinning.

“Sure you can,” Owen says sarcastically, grabs Jack around the waist, stopping him from falling down.

Jack can feel a cold sweat break out on his forehead as he stumbles across the Hub, leaning on Owen for support.

As soon as they are in the lift Tosh begins the transfer of the shield. It only takes a couple of minutes to complete it, and she pauses for a moment, taking one last look at the Hub, before she finalises the transfer.

Tosh has barely got inside the lift, pulling the metal lattice door closed behind her, when the shield switches on.

Glancing at Jack and Owen to check that they are okay, Tosh opens the control panel on the lift.

“The shield will be strongest where the perception filter is the strongest: the surface,” Tosh explains as she works on re-routing the controls. “There should be just enough residual power left in the system to get us there.”

Still shaking from the effort of moving, Jack leans weakly against the wall of the lift. He knows he can't rest though, that the air in the lift won't last them long.

Releasing the power cells, Jack enjoys a moments relief before he touches two of the fingers to the edge of his vortex manipulator.

“Powering it directly.” He sways on his feet, the effect of the gauntlet seeming more pronounced this time, the pull of energy from him “Only way.”

There's no argument from Owen or Tosh. They all know that if this fails they'll be lost, scattered as atoms through the void between the worlds.

As the lift starts to move there's a rushing noise around it as the air starts to escape from the Hub into the void of space.

The surface of the planet has been scoured bare by the stellar winds now that there is no magnetic or atmospheric protection. They have just a few moments to look at the brilliance of the stars around them, their view uninterrupted by the atmosphere, before the shield starts to shimmer.

“Put you hands on the vortex manipulator. Both of you.” Jack grits his teeth, fighting against the pain and exhaustion that's consuming him. “And hold on.”

With Owen and Tosh holding on to him, they disappear as the last of the shield fails and the remains of the lift are swept from the ground, removing the last traces of life on Earth.


Part seven.