Burning Cosmos {A Torchwood Story Three} [COMPLETED]

17. Owen And Jack's Marvellous Adventure

Owen's POV

Being dead is shit.

The girl whose hand is stuck down my pants makes a face and pulls it out. "What, don't you like me?" she asks, pouting. What answer do I go with: that I'm dead, or in love; or dead and in love?

"Get off me," is my angered response, and I shove her out the way as I down another shot from the bar and make my way out of the club. I don't want to be here anymore: it reminds me of my life, what I lost, in just a matter of hours where I've gone to pieces and am still being hauled over them. Evelina? Lost her. Jack? Prick. Who resurrects me to a state of living death for a fucking code?

It's unfair. This whole bloody thing. It's more than unfair, it's God fucking awful. I finally understand what Evy means when she talks about being a Time Lord around humans - knowing in your soul that you are different, broken in a straight line right through you, knowing you will never belong. I don't wish this on anyone.

Except maybe the fucking Captain that just appeared in front of me. You know, Ianto once taught me a word that I can recall looking at my boss right now - twmffat.

"How did you find me?" I demand, furious. Wordlessly, he holds up the wrist with the monitor on it, and his know-all expression makes it even worse.
"Get off me, Jack," I snarl, "do you know what you've done? You don't care about me. You brought me back for an alarm code!"
"That is not why I brought you back."
"Shut the fuck up!" I yell at him, wrestling the urge to find out if I still have tears. "Have you any idea what it means to know that your life is over? That that was it! Owen Harper's contribution to the world!" My face contorts as I fight to keep my voice as angry as I feel, instead of wavering and falling to the floor. "You idiot!"

I lunge at him and we topple into the crowd, me pounding away at his face. He's not even defending himself. Just letting it happen.
I keep punching until security drag us outside and hands us to the police, who instantly cuff me. What are they gonna do, kill me? Fuck off!
"Get off me, I'm Torchwood, get off me!" I protest, but he's not taking any of it. Jack isn't even helping, the bastard!

We get driven off and thrown in a cell together. All the while I hammer on the door, angry at the men, angry at the world. Haven't I fucking been through enough?!
"You call that number! You speak to Police Constable Gwen Cooper. I want to make a complaint!"
"Enough!" Jack eventually calls, sharp and short but contained in his derision. "You're dead," he continues as I sit down on the stone bench; "you break your ankle, what are the chances it'll knit back together? You want to add a wheelchair to your prob..."

We both dial down our tantrums as we look down at my stomach, and hear something that doesn't sound good.

~∆~

"I forgot," I tell him as I lean upside down on the wall of the cell, Jack watching me unnervingly, "my digestive system's shut down. That alcohol I drank is, ah, just going to sit in my stomach; it won't go anywhere."
As I shift myself this way and that, he asks, "Can't you just stick your fingers down your throat?" and I fix him with a dead-eyed stare. How can I be working under someone so stupid?
"I'm dead. It's just another one of those things - the gag reflex, lost in the process. Hang on, hang on, if I can just line up my oesophagus-"

My stomach gurgles like the plug in our bath. I prepare myself for the utterly enormous amount of disgusting that's about to unravel. And then I puke out a stream of alcohol that scores higher than any tacky chunder behind the bins of The Old Monk. It's gross even to me, and Jack agrees as he shouts over it, "That is the single most disgusting thing I have ever seen!" Jesus, when does it stop?