The Lover After You

Time For A Get Away

"How do you know my name?" The young former mid-shipman asked, laying his hat down on the bar.

"I'll explain over another drink?" Jack offered, looking more thoroughly at Alonso.

"Thanks." Alonso smiled widely, taking a moment to sweep an appreciative eye over the stranger.

That smile, it reminded him too much of Ianto so Jack looked back at his drink, taking a deep gulp.

“Captain Jack Harkness.” Jack introduced with a false smile, answering the young man's unspoken question.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, fine. So what brings you here?"

"Sightseeing. What about you?"

"Sightseeing? Well interesting place to sight-see, I guess." Jack smirked, looking around at the numerous types of aliens.

"What about you? What's brought you here?" Alonso repeated, curiosity seeping into his voice.

Jack's smile faltered before replying. "I needed an escape. I mean, my partner ... he was killed back on Earth. I couldn't cope, so I ran."

"I'm sorry. Wow, Earth, huh? I've heard it's amazing. So what was he like, your partner?"

"He was wonderful, bluest eyes I've ever seen, wicked sense of humour, brilliant smile. Oh, but the way I could just be myself around him in a way I couldn't with my team, that was something."

"Your team?"

"Yeah, Torchwood. We protected the Earth from alien threats and sometimes we adopted the harmless ones. There was a pterodactyl that Ianto found in an abandoned warehouse and a weevil; a strange humanish creature, like figure of a man but a warped and twisted face. They looked like us but different, if that makes sense." Jack smiled.

"They? How many where there?"

"Honestly, I don't know, I have a feeling we only found a handful of them. But this one we had we called her Janet, well we thought it was a her. And the pterodactyl was called Myfanwy, Welsh, I think. It was Ianto who named them both. The alien, the dinosaur and that small group of people where as close to a family that I have ever had."

"So you left it all behind?"

"Not really by choice, there was an alien. It had been to Earth before, back in the sixties and back then it came for a percentage of children. I gave them to it, I thought it just wanted to use them to evolve or something. It was stupid, I know, trusting an alien that hid in a huge spaceship behind a bright light but sometimes you just don't think. And it took advantage, it came back a couple of months ago, came back like a farmer getting a harvest. This time I made sure I made the right decision, but again the government thought about it. I mean, it was only ten percent, children were practically being born every other day. But it didn't matter, those ten percent where people's children, the ones I gave it in the sixties were orphans, nobody wanted them. But as years went by more and more children were being adopted or fostered from children's homes, they became people's children. And it makes you sick to know that your government, well your adopted government, would actually consider giving up innocent children, even after seeing what that thing did to them. It wired them into the container, it was feeding off them. It was just like a harvest …" Jack broke off, feeling tears welling in his eyes.

"Oh sorry, don't carry on if you don't want to. I can see what it's doing to you." Alonso replied, resting a reassuring hand on Jack's shoulder.

He could feel the man's pain; the pain of betrayal and loss.

He'd been on the ill fated Titanic ready to hit Earth.

He'd had to disobey orders in order to save lives and he'd seen colleagues die.

If anyone could sympathise with this stranger, it was him.

"No, it's good to talk about it. Get's it off my chest, I guess."

"Well, maybe somewhere more private then. I know a hotel."

"Sure." Jack smiled, gulping down the rest of his drink.

Alonso copied the action and picked up his hat, grinning at Jack.

"This way." Alonso replied, leading the Captain out of the bar.

"Wow, nice breeze." Jack replied as he stepped out the door.