Fic, "The New Man," 2/3 (Undead!Owen/Tosh)

[loveslashangst]

Okay, so here's the dealio...

New chapter of FAITHFUL is in the works, but to go the dark and interesting places I have planned for the OT3 ZOMG!, I need to put a few ghosts to rest and stretch a little as an artist and storyteller, hence this 3 chapter diversion...

On with the show...

Story: The New Man
Author: Love! Slash! Angst! loveslashangst
Beta: the patiently supportive ophymirage
Characters: Owen Harper, Undead!Owen, Toshiko Sato, Ianto Jones, Captain Jack Harkness, Gwen Cooper, Captain John Hart (implied)
Rated: Adult for implied slash, canon bisexuality, mature content, language, necrophilia (it IS undead!Owen), and implied sex of various kinds. Softer-core than what I usually write, but still not ready for prime-time
Disclaimer: I don't own 'em, 'cause if I did "Exit Wounds" WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED.
Spoilers: If you haven't seen the first two series of Torchwood, you WILL be spoilered. I like to mess with canon, especially when it pisses me off.
Summary: AU. Platonic Owen/Ianto. Romantic Undead!Owen/Tosh. I rewrite the brief history of Owen's life and death with TW3, starting with Ianto's first day on the job.



"Why?" Owen says at last.

The golden cloud effervesces out of his skin. Flies back toward Ianto and its canister. The lid snaps into place with the indrawn hiss of a very tight seal engaging.

Just when he thinks Teaboy isn't going to answer him, Ianto says simply, "I love Tosh."

And doesn't THAT throw him for a loop? Bad enough that the new man should be such a distraction for Jack -- and vice versa, if he thinks about it hard enough -- but to take away Tosh just when she's getting interesting?

"I don't mean I'm IN love with her," Ianto says, shutting the drawer. "I mean I care what happens to her. And for whatever reason, she's in love with you."

He has to take the gloves off to see the results for himself. Fixed. Even the nicks and bruises and cuts. All fixed. His hands are flawless again. Useful. Flexible. He feels better than he has in what feels like ages.

"It'd be better if you kept the gloves on," says Ianto. "Play the part until we can't hide what we're doing anymore. If you continue to be as useful to the team as you were today, by the time Jack finds out what we're up to, he won't be able to say no to you. Or, at least, not for long." Veiled amusement sparkles in Ianto's eyes. "And if he does, Tosh will re-program every computer in the Hub to play the Spice Girls until he relents."

The worst thing about this new Ianto is his ability to render Owen speechless.

When his voice works again, he manages a lame, "So you're like my Q or something? Outfitting me with gismos and gadgets so I can save the world?"

A quick smile flits across Ianto's face and is gone. "I prefer Alfred myself. Tosh can be Q."

He looks at Ianto with new eyes. "What makes you think Tosh gives a fuck whether I'm whole or in pieces?"

"Wild guess," he says. "Also, I was there when she told you she loved you. She doesn't whisper very well when she's at risk of losing the love of her life."

He raises his chin, trying to resurrect the shreds of his old pride. "What makes you think I give a fuck whether she gives a fuck?"

"I don't," Ianto says. (How can he be so damned calm all the time?) "You asked me why I was doing this. I told you. You're not the same man you were. I thought you deserved a second chance. It's entirely possible you'll waste it and continue to be just as much of a prick to both Tosh and me as you did when you were alive."

He retreats as Ianto comes toward him, but Teaboy just opens the door.

Ianto looks back for a moment. "What you do with this is up to you." He tosses Owen the key.

Owen catches it. Makes for the door. Manages to catch that too before it can close on him. "Ianto!"

Ianto shushes him, but does turn to listen.

"Erm." Moments like this are why he hates people. "You're saying I should ask Tosh out? Like on a date?"

Ianto looks at him for a long time with something annoyingly close to amusement. "Up to you," he repeats.

"Up to me?" he repeats the words like a fucking parrot.

"Up to you," Ianto affirms.

"Up to me." The words taste as wondrous as the possibilities. No more being locked in. No more being left behind. He could resume his duties. He could be part of the team again. And he and Tosh...

With a longsuffering sigh and a roll of his eyes, Ianto turns on his heel and is gone.

"Up to me." It's excruciating, this hope. Flustered like a sodding adolescent who's just discovered his first year pash likes him too, Owen goes back to the drawer. Takes out the canister. Opens it, just for the relief of seeing the little cloud. It flows into him. Through him. Back out again. And he doesn't even mind the "well what the fuck was the point of that?" pause before the nanogenes go back into their little home away from home. He seals the canister. Puts it away. Commits the drawer to memory. Goes back to the door. Commits that to memory.

And gets really bugger-all lost trying to find his way back out of the rabbit warren. (Sodding Ianto WOULD leave him behind like this.)

So, since he can't get much more embarrassed than he already is, he calls Tosh. She's already in on the conspiracy, and less likely to be bent over Jack's desk, taking it like a man.

"Yes?"

She's still just Tosh and he's still just dead. The sound of that first syllable shouldn't do anything to him. Shouldn't have him imagining his still heart is pounding beneath his ribs. It takes him a moment to find the words. "Erm, is Jack around?"

"No." A sound, like she's shifting the phone. "He's in his office with Ianto. Should... should I get him for you?"

She's probably wondering why he's being such a prick as to call her when he really wants someone else. (But he doesn't want someone else.) "No. No... Erm. That's okay. I... you can't by any chance locate me, can you?"

"Should be able to do, yeah."

Talking. He has to keep her talking. He'll weasel out of it like the gutless coward he is if he doesn't keep talking. "Thanks. Ianto... Erm... Ianto... he just... he just swanned off."

"Did he?" She sounds distracted, like she's doing more than one thing at a time. But that's his Tosh.

Wait. When did she become HIS Tosh?

"Okay," she says. "Owen? I've got you. Walk straight ahead to the end of the hall, then turn left."

And she guides him out of the fix he's gotten himself into. One turn at a time. One patient corridor after the next. A set of stairs. A familiar hall that he took the wrong turn on before. Familiar and more familiar.

And less and less familiar. Tosh was like Ianto -- a permanent "kick me" sign on her (admittedly lovely) backside. But she too has grown into something else. Something more than the new bird. Something more than the weird tech nerd who solves problems and wears brainy specs and has no one to go home to at the end of the day.

Not that he does either and damn this nervousness. Why is he worried? It's only Tosh. She's only been mad for him since the moment she first laid eyes on him, and it's only bloody dinner after all.

But she'll be able to eat and all he'll be able to do is watch.

"Erm." He shuts the mobile as he approaches her desk. "Thanks, Tosh... I..."

"No problem." Is she not looking at him because she just wasted thirty minutes getting his sorry arse un-lost or is she not looking at him because Ianto was right?

"Say." He sounds so pathetically chipper. "I, erm, was wondering if, erm." Sod this. He's still man enough to ask a bird out, especially someone as easy as Toshiko Sato. (She's mad for him, right?) "You have plans for dinner?"

That pulls her eyes away from her precious computer screens. "Dinner?"

"Yeah." Dear God, he's going to joke with her. "You know, that thing where two people sit down and order food together... and... stuff...?"

She looks as him for a long moment (she's mad for him, he just knows it), then she turns back to her damn computer. "I can't."

He blinks. "You... can't?"

She looks even more uncomfortable than usual. "I'm sorry, Owen. I can't."

The moment stretches into something truly painful. (She can't've just turned him down. She's mad for him. Even Ianto said so!)

"Erm." He fumbles for words.

"Owen," she says, very quietly, then stops. He follows her gaze over his shoulder.

Gwen turns back to her desk, trying to pretend that she wasn't hanging on their every word.

Tosh stands. "C'mon."

He follows her into one of the mouldering hallways that make the whole Hub a biohazard.

"Tosh," he says. "I--"

She holds up a hand, though she still won't look him in the eyes. (Not good. Not good at all.)

"I can't... do this with you," she says.

"Why not?" Yeah, like what bird's not falling all over herself to hook up with the walking corpse? "I thought you--" would've given your left tit to date me? wanted to shag me from the minute you clapped eyes on me? have no life anyway so you -- goddammit he's a self-centred prick -- "liked me."

Tears. God, those are tears in her eyes. "I do," she says. "But that's not really the point, is it?"

He's a self-centred prick. (Who the fuck is so starved for prospects that she'd want someTHING like him?) "It's the whole death thing, isn't it?"

She shakes her head no. "You never liked me."

The words cut him in ways no blade ever could, because they're both true and a complete lie.

"So..." She swallows hard. "Let's not pretend death has changed anything."

And she leaves. Just leaves. Just like that.

And he has to return to work like the woman he's spent years looking down on didn't just tell him what's what. And for once he hates not having tears of his own, because he could really fucking use a good angry, ranting cry. But instead he slinks back to his med bay.

But he doesn't even have a med bay anymore, now does he? Not a doctor. Less than no one. A corpse without the good sense to know when to stay dead.

Ianto finds him several hours later, sitting with his back to the cold cement of one of the passageways. Teaboy offers him a steaming mug of coffee.

He glares. "You know I can't drink that shit anymore."

"Yes." Ianto puts it in his hands anyway. "But I also know you like the heat of it. And the smell."

And he -- waste of space that he is -- actually does. He inhales gratefully over the mug. Feels better as the rich scent of liquid consciousness seeps into him.

"Sorry," he says. "I know I'm a prick sometimes."

"Yup." Ianto sips his own mug.

He glares. "Don't do me any favours, Teaboy."

Ianto smiles faintly. They sit in the silent companionship of men until Ianto's mug is empty. But even once it is, he makes no move to leave.

"What do I do now?" Owen says at last.

"Wooing works," says Ianto.

"Wooing?" he repeats.

"Wooing," says Ianto. "As in to gracefully seduce--"

"I KNOW what wooing is," he snaps.

Ianto gives him the Eyebrow of Doom.

Owen Harper, undead arse. "Sorry," he says. "Sorry. You're just trying to help." He inhales the coffee again, a conscious effort to make his lungs expand. Both that and the warm scent relax him. "So wooing?"

"Wooing," Ianto says.

"Wouldn't even know where to start," he admits. "I don't really even know her that well."

"Maybe that's the problem," says Ianto softly.

He fucking HATES it when Teaboy is right.

Ianto gives him an awkward pat on the shoulder. "I... should really get back to it."

He inhales his coffee until long after it's gone stone cold. Brings it and Ianto's mug down to the galley kitchen. Then, because he's in a mood for penance, he washes every dish and mug that's been piling up. (And how good it is to have whole hands again.) Hot water and suds are relaxing too, in their mundane simplicity, and by the time the washing up's finished, he has a plan.

He sucks up what's left of his pride and goes to see Tosh.

She looks uncomfortable, shoulders tensing as he approaches her workstation. "Owen..."

"I'm sorry," he says, and is surprised to find how much he means it. "Erm..." He fumbles a rolling chair over. "Mind if I sit here?"

A smile flits over Tosh's face and is gone. (And he hates how wary she looks -- it's him who put that guard on her emotions.)

"I suppose," she says.

"Thanks." He sits. And watches.

Day after day, he watches. He pays attention. Asks questions, though he tries not to interfere or pester her. And though Tosh's answers are guarded and monosyllabic at first, when she starts to see he's serious in his interest, she tells him more. Elaborates. And even though he'll be buggered if he understands the half of what she does, what the woman can IMAGINE absolutely gob-smacking floors him.

He's pants at most things mechanical. (Used to joke with Jack that if it didn't bleed, he wasn't interested.) But he does get to the point where he's not completely useless when she does repairs. He even helps with the overhaul of the database -- after all, filing used to be his forte -- and is pleased when even Ianto approves.

As the days pass, Tosh shows him how to coordinate the team from the Hub. Do quick-searches of both the interweb and the database. A week or two more and he's starting to master the cushy job of bossing them around from a distance. (Being able to tease Gwen when she can't reach him? Now THAT is fun. And it amuses the fuck out of Jack.)

Though if his heart still beat, it'd pound every time Tosh leaves; no one knows better than him how easy it is to fall victim to Death By Torchwood.

When the team return, often a little banged up and covered in mysterious substances whose origins are best left to the imagination, their smiles are genuine.

Unfortunately Owen's coffee still tastes like it was brewed by a zombie. Irritating to admit that there are some things Teaboy will always be better at.

Then one day Jack comes over to where he and Tosh are working and hands her some kind of new alien tech. Whatever it is, she's in on this conspiracy, because she knows how to use the little hand-held scanner that turns out to be more than just a scanner. It's sort of a travel-sized sterilizer with a beam like a miniature autoclave.

"With any luck," Jack says, "this should kill off any viruses or bacteria you're unwittingly carrying."

He manages not to smile. "And here I was so hoping to be Torchwood's Typhoid Mary." But the glint in Tosh's eye clues him in. "This isn't a routine sterilization, is it?"

Jack shakes his head no, grinning. He nods to Tosh, who hands him the device. "Consider it a gift, for Torchwood's new doctor."

He can't have heard him right. Takes him a minute to accept the thing. He stares at it, half wishing he had tears -- silence isn't enough for a gift this big.

"You've earned your place on the team," says Jack. "We took a vote and decided being dead already gives you a unique perspective on autopsies."

Owen stares at him.

And sod him if Ianto doesn't appear out of nowhere (HATE it when he does that) with Owen's gun on a silver platter.

He glances at Jack, who nods. Smiling faintly, Owen takes it and checks the clip. Empty.

"Baby steps," says Ianto.

"Don't do me any favours." But he is privately pleased at the gesture, he knows where Jack keeps the ammo, and working with Tosh means he even knows the codes to get in.

Jack winks. "So, d'you want to re-acquaint yourself with the med bay?"

"Yes." His voice is much steadier than he feels. "Yes, please."

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Crossposted to torchwoodslash