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

[loveslashangst]

And thus follows the third and final installment, but first...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, OWEN HARPER! And Happy Valentine's Day to those who enjoy it.

I did 4 pitches of my screenplays on Friday, have 5 scheduled for today, and at least another 5 more to go before Tuesday is done. I'm getting lots of good ideas for modifications to the current property. And of the 4 pitches I did on Friday, not a single one was a no and 3/4 wanted to see the scripts.

*happy*

Okay, back to business.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: When I'd begun to plan FAITHFUL with Leda and Ophymirage, I'd always intended to address the Owen/Tosh issue. I feel about them much the same about romance between Owen and Tosh as I do about Janto -- much as I love the idea of the relationship, there are Realities and Issues and Emotional Baggage that need to be addressed before I could be really confident that I could send them off to their Happily Ever After.

Then "Exit Wounds" aired, and my plans fell to tatters. So I wrote a "Fifty Things" as my love letter to Owen and moved on.

But I miss Owen. I wanted to do something with him, but was fumbling for the kind of story I wanted to tell. Then I got nominated for two Forbidden Awards. One of my fellow nominees (in the amusingly-named "Spank my Poodle" = Best Kink Category) is ningengirai, nominated for her "Obsession". It's a beautifully-written and deeply kinky Owen/Ianto, and for me highlighted one of the TW relationships I'd paid least attention to.

So if you owe the Spuffy to ophymirage and emeryboard, you owe this one to ningengirai.

And because I'm still pissed I didn't get to use Owen in FAITHFUL, I hope he'll consider this his own personal Valentine from an author who thought him an acquired taste, but one that's well worth the acquisition.

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.



"Yes." Owen's voice is much steadier than he feels. "Yes, please."

Jack bounds off, as Jack will. Gwen, smiling radiantly, follows him.

He looks at Tosh. "Why?"

She smiles that cute, Japanese, it's-rude-to-show-your-teeth-if-you're-a-girl smile. "You know how I like my tea."

"Two sugar packets, no milk, no artificial sweeteners," he says.

She nods. "And my coffee."

"Dark roast is best." Bugger him if he's not becoming a Teaboy clone. "Black if it's before noon, strong as I can make it. A bit of cream in the afternoon or it's too hard on your stomach."

She nods, smiling more brightly. "See? It's because you've been listening. And not just to that. To everything."

"Well, not to everything," he says.

"What's my favourite color?" she says.

"Pale grey." The reflex surprises even him. "Though you usually say blue because you think liking pale grey makes you difficult." Now he's just showing off, though it's worth being a nerd just to keep her smiling like that. "And your favourite flower's the ladyslipper because they're orchids that grow wild in temperate zones like the northern states in America -- and the prettiest ones are endangered because some twat always has to go digging them up for his garden." He moves a little closer. "You don't have a favourite show on telly because you'd rather be reading. You prefer a good merlot to plum wine, but you'll drink a lager to be polite. You prefer fish and chips to sushi. A walk on the pier to a night at the theater." She's so close he can hear the soft sigh of her breathing. "Though you do like classical music because the patterns help you think when you're working."

She blinks several times, her eyes bright with the right kind of tears. She laces her fingers in his gloved ones. The touch shouldn't thrill him, but it does. And she's still smiling, that perfect look of happiness, thought it's still a little measured, as if she's not used to relaxing around him.

He promises himself he'll get to see her, happy and completely at ease, as often as he can. (The old Owen would be rolling his eyes at the thought, but the old Owen was a twat and a brute, so who really cares what he'd think?)

"Coming, you two?" calls Jack from the Med Bay.

It takes Tosh's voice a minute to work. "Com-coming." She squeezes his fingers with hers.

He follows her down to the odd little Victorian hidey-hole that was his for so many years. It feels like he's never really noticed or appreciated it. It still reeks vaguely of disinfectant with a trace of offal, ichor, and even a hint of pungent slime.

He inhales deeply. "Home stinking home."

The only thing that makes the moment better is having Tosh there to witness it. As he checks the drawers to be sure everything's still where it should be -- and it is -- she's smiling with sweetly repressed joy, like there's so much emotion that if she lets it loose, she might explode.

And for a moment, he's pretty sure his heart beats with joy. (Silly, he knows, but there it is.)

Jack and Gwen give him a tandem golf-clap. Laughing and wiping stray tears, Tosh joins them.

His boss gets as thoughtful a look on his face as Jack Harkness is capable of. "Does this make you Officer 565 AND 568?" He winks. "Though I think I'd like 569 even better."

Ianto beats him to the eyeroll. "You would."

Jack grins. "Work to do, doctor."

He grudgingly smiles back. "'Bout time too."

Jack bounds up the stairs. (If the man were a cartoon, he'd be sodding Tigger.) Ianto smiles briefly and follows him. Gwen lingers just a moment longer, her expression curiously melancholy.

"Lose something, P.C. Cooper?" he says.

"Yes, actually." She raps the railing with the heel of her hand. "But I think that's a good thing. In the end."

And on that odd note, she leaves him and Tosh alone.

Tosh trails her fingers along the post-mortem table as if she's waiting for him to notice that this is the moment he's been wooing for.

"Tosh--" Dammit, why can he never find the words when he needs them? "I...?"

"Yes," she says.

He blinks. "Yes?"

Her sweet smile pours warmth into him. "Yes."

It occurs to him that he doesn't have to care where they go anymore. "Where d'you fancy?" It's oddly liberating not to be ruled by the dictates of his stomach.

"Someplace special," she says. "Personal."

So he takes her to the little fish-and-chips place up the road because it's the first place he ate at after relocating from London. Food's not half so nice as his favourite spot in Southwark (never judge a book), but the waitresses are friendly in a provincial, Welsh kind of way and the food's edible. (If his nose still serves, the kitchen's improved, which is a mercy.)

His first day in Cardiff feels like lifetimes ago. He was certainly a different man then. And Tosh was a very different woman.

He shouldn't enjoy watching her eat. Shouldn't savour the mix of smells. Shouldn't enjoy warming his hands on a cup of tea he's not going to drink. Shouldn't like the way the colours seem brighter when Tosh is in the room.

It's all sentimental bullshit anyway, right? The kind of shite that should've vanished when his body stopped producing the chemicals that make most people have these stupid emotions.

Over the past weeks -- god, is it months already? -- he's come to love watching her. And he loves her laugh. Used to annoy the fuck out of him, now he finds himself joking just to get her to stop hiding behind her hand and guffaw. (You know a man's done for when he thinks a bird's guffaw is cute.)

"Tosh," he says. "About that day... when I..." He gestures lamely at his hand. "...at your flat."

She shrugs. "You were upset is all."

"I was an arse."

She shrugs again. "You were upset."

"I'm sorry." Finally, the right words come. "I'm sorry I upset you. Didn't mean to come unhinged."

"Don't worry about it." But he can tell by the subtle shifting of the muscles around her eyes and her mouth that it was the right thing to do. It's so subtle, the shift of her face from one emotion to the next. The shift of her body from one position to the next. And he's glad she turned him down flat the first time he asked her out, otherwise he might never have taken the time to see this.

He's spent too many years not paying attention.

After the pudding arrives, he reaches out to take her hand, then thinks better of it. (Nothing like having some creepy, undead guy grab your hand to put you off your feed and that sticky toffee looks lovely.)

To his horror, she drops her gaze, wounded.

"I'm sorry, Tosh," he says. "I'm just cold is all."

She shrugs. "You're fine."

He watches the spoonful travel to her mouth. Savours the delicate way she cleans it off. The movement of her throat as she swallows.

"I'm really cold," he says. (How can a man who memorized the whole bloody human body part by part and learnt Ianto's convoluted-as-hell filing system be so fucking tongue-tied when it matters?)

She sets down the spoon. "I don't mind."

He tentatively reaches out a hand again. Smiling, she winds her fingers into his. Her hand is hot by comparison. And he feels warm in places that have neither scientific nor medical reason to feel warm.

It's a stupid thing to enjoy. When he was alive, holding hands would've been down at the bottom of his list of turn-ons. Hell, he usually didn't start paying attention to most birds until the bra was off. But Tosh's fingers are strong and slender and hot and ALIVE in his gloved ones. No hesitation. She's not just being nice. As he watches, Tosh's fingers flex a little more, a suggestive embrace of the digits.

He looks up in time to see her slip the last bit of pudding into that lovely mouth of hers. Should annoy the hell out of him to have her rubbing it in that she can enjoy such things and he can't, but...

Oh sod it. He's enjoying this. He's enjoying her. And he's enjoying the fuck out of whatever physical contact she's willing to give him.

She sets down the spoon again. "Where do you want to go, after this?"

"Could go back to yours." He means it as a joke -- what the hell would someone like him do at hers? -- but...

She looks at him slowly, and even beneath the flawless coffee of her skin, he can see a slight flush. If he still breathed, it'd take his breath away.

"Could do," she says.

If he were alive, he'd have the hard-on to end all hard-ons. As it is, he's in the unfamiliar territory of being mentally aroused to almost painful levels.

He doesn't wait for the waitress to bring the check, but heads her off at the register. Leaves too much money. Returns just in time to hold Tosh's coat for her.

And if Ianto could see what a gentleman he's being, Teaboy would laugh his poofy arse off.

The little details stick in Owen's head as they head back to hers. The leather seat beneath his back. The solidity of the shifter beneath his fingers. The sultry smell that can only be coming from Tosh herself.

She invites him up to the familiar flat. Turns on the light he doesn't need. Offers him a drink he can't accept. Fidgets at the entrance to the little kitchen they're not going to use. She's vulnerable in that moment. Raw. Ready to retreat should he be an arse again, like he's been so many times before.

He touches her shoulder. A brush of gloved fingers at first, testing. She doesn't flinch. No. To his relief and delight, she strips off his gloves. Slowly. One at a time. And being without them, setting them aside makes him feel naked. Exposed. The old Owen would roll his eyes, laugh, and shuck his jeans. But he's a new man now, and the rules have changed.

She runs her thumbs over his bare palms. "Your hands?"

"Your doing," he says. "Well, I mean in the sense that you helped Ianto get me into the room where the..." Now would be a good time to stop talking. "... Anyway." He can't stop looking at the slight curve of her mouth. "Thank you, Tosh."

She glances down and then up, like bowing with the eyes. "You'll have to show me sometime."

"Sure." He really wants her. Now there's no doubting God has a sick sense of humour. "We'll just throw Ianto at Jack and he'll be distracted for hours."

She chuckles. Smiles at him. And in that moment he could just sweep her up and snog her senseless.

(Nothing is more annoying in an intimate moment like this than hearing "Baby steps," in Ianto's voice.)

But Teaboy is right, even in absentia. Owen gently withdraws his hands from Tosh's. Runs them over her shoulders, testing. The woollen jumper is prickly and comfortingly real under his naked fingers.

Tosh smiles a little.

He moves closer.

She leans in.

Her hands come up to press his chest. Even through his shirt, he can feel them. It's not a "back off" motion, but a need to touch him as he's touching her. And he can feel everything more strongly than he would've thought possible.

Tosh is warm verging on hot. Pulsing with life. Breathing quickly and holding her breath in turns.

And all he can do is stands here with the painful knowledge that no power on earth will allow him to have her like he wants to. Like he's been imagining all night. (The joke's on him and it's not funny.)

"Are you all right?" she murmurs.

"I'm sorry," is all he can think to say. "I'm... cold."

"You're perfect," she says. "Just as you are."

"Cold and all?" He can't quite bring himself to ask about the rest.

"Just as you are." She leans in for the kiss. Pauses.

And he's kind of glad his heart stopped beating months ago, because he's sure the resulting rushing of blood would've deafened him to every hitch of her breath. Every faint rustle of movement. Even the damn ticking of the clock. And he wants to memorize this. All of this. All of her. He'll want to savour every detail later -- that's certain.

He kisses her, gently at first. Steels himself for her to freak out. (Not that he'd blame her if she did.) But she doesn't. Instead, her mouth is so hot on his. Her lips part for his. She draws him in, leaning in. And when he pulls her tight to him and tastes her deeply, her eyes roll closed in pleasure. Pleasure. At him. At his touch. At his kiss.

And she gives him back another of the things he thought he'd lost.

"You don't mind?" Like a moron, he can't leave well enough alone.

She avoids his eyes. "It's... a turn-on."

His brain won't quite allow him to accept it. "You have a thing for dead guys?" Though, come to think of it, that WOULD explain Tommy.

"Not dead," she says. "Cold."

"Cold?" he say, not even daring to hope.

"Some people like velvet. Some handcuffs. Some whipped cream." She shrugs, eyes lowered. "I like... cold."

Maybe the gods are laughing at him, but this kind of joke, he can take. He holds her firmly when she threatens to slip out of his arms. "Lucky thing."

She dares a look up. "Lucky?"

He tips her chin up. Smiles reassurance. (Oh, darling, you have no idea how much you do it for me.) "Lucky for you, I'm cold."

"Yeah." She relaxes into his arms. "You are."

And that's when he snogs her like he REALLY means it.

It's the textures he treasures as the evening becomes the night. The silk of the cami she has under her work clothes. The flannel of the very un-sexy but very comfortable linens. The smoothness of her naked skin beneath his bare palm. The silk of her hair, sifting through his fingers. The soft warmth of her breath. The beads of sweat that rise between them as he slowly gets her good and worked up.

He doesn't rush her. Doesn't waste a moment of it. Savours everything as if he's never been alone with a woman before. As if she's his first. (And in a weird sort of way, he supposes she is.)

However, the whole thing does put his past liaisons in a poor light, doesn't it? He'd always fancied himself a sterling lover, but -- if he's honest -- the truth is he mostly spent his time impatiently trying to have it off. And the few women he really did try "lovemaking" with (God, it still hurts to think about Diane)... well, even in her case "lovemaking" was a polite way of saying he slowed the having it off down on the off chance his partner might somehow meet him halfway.

Not having a functioning cock does make a man rethink his methodology a bit. Lucky for him, Tosh shows him how to touch. Where to kiss. Cues him on when to slide his fingers into a heat he'll never get tired of. Encourages him with every shuddering sigh. And she tastes amazing, every inch of her.

He'd been afraid they wouldn't be able to do anything, but Tosh seems to have thought of everything.

And his name in her breathless voice is absolutely fucking gorgeous.

He used to label his insomnia another curse. Now it merely means he doesn't have to let exhaustion rob him of any time. He can wear Tosh out with impunity and still be fresh enough to hold her afterward, murmuring the kind of syruppy endearments that make her snuggle closer. (And how weird is it that he really means them?) Insomnia also means he can watch her, dishevelled and satiated, as she succumbs to sleep, head pillowed on his chest. He can drink in every minute of it and still be there, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, when she wakes, hungry for him again.

Owen fucking HATES romantics, but is in dire jeopardy of becoming one in a way he hasn't been since Katie. The night with Tosh softens him. Warms him, even as his body remains at best room-temperature. And though he doesn't have any hope of sleep, he's loath to leave the bed for fear of losing some moment with this new woman he loves.

Later (much later) that morning, she wakes slowly. "You're still here."

"Did you want me to leave?" He's kidding, mostly, but there's that uncertainty in the back of his head.

She looks up at him as if she's trying to memorize the moment. "I just thought..."

He tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear. "No."

Wary. Even after all this time, she's still wary. "No?"

He strokes her cheek with his thumb. She shivers in a good way.

"No," he says. "Not anymore. Not so long as there's this."

Still wary, her eyes ask him for reassurance.

He smiles, feeling warm in ways that have nothing to do with body heat and everything to do with being a slug-a-bed with the woman he adores.

She surges up. Kisses him. Fiercely. Bruisingly. Deeply enough that he'll need to make use of those nanogene-things later. And he gives as good as he gets. Her hair is sleek in his hands -- she's even more gorgeous for being bed-headed and slightly muzzy.

She pulls away, smiling. "Fancy a shower?"

He runs his hands up her naked back. "Why, Miss Sato -- I do believe that was a pass."

"Damn straight."

Heaven would be spending the whole morning here. Her arms around him. Her body twining around his. Her hand encouraging his, just one more time. Her cries, muffled under his merciless kisses. Her sweet shivers as he brings her again.

And heaven is definitely the taste of her on his fingers.

"Never get tired of that," he says.

She gives him a somewhat goofy and completely adorable grin. "That makes two of us."

Eventually, he follows Tosh into the shower. And funny thing if she isn't just as voracious vertical and soaking as she was horizontal and sweat-drenched.

They are going to be hours late and he really doesn't give a fuck. (Well, technically he does give a fuck, which is why they're going to be late.)

Tosh makes coffee. And juice. And eggs. And toast. And even though her coffee cannot compare in terms of aroma to Ianto's (whose can?), even though he can only take a mouthful of juice and then has to quietly spit it out in the sink for fear of its getting into his stomach, even though she only cooks for one... it's enough. More than enough.

And how sad is it that he enjoys watching her eat breakfast even more than he did watching her eat dinner? If he still had hormones, he might think he was in the first madness of the kind of love that lasts.

She reaches out to him halfway through the meal. Winds their fingers together. He can't help the smile, especially when she smiles back so sweetly.

And everything is just as it should be.

[EPILOGUE]

A new man walks into the Hub at quarter to noon precisely. At least three hours after Gwen usually shows up, by Owen's estimation, and God only knows how long after Ianto hauled his prissy carcass in -- if Jack let him go home at all. (Never could figure out the rotation for who goes where and when Ianto stayed over. If there was a pattern -- Jack always did get off on keeping them all guessing. Made for a few uncomfortable wakeup calls in the past, though Owen's in such an amazing mood that he wouldn't care even if he found Jack and Ianto swapping handcuffs and bodily fluids in the med bay, so long as they cleaned and used his new present to sterilize after.)

He has Tosh on his arm, like any half-decent gentleman should. After the door rolls closed and the twin gates swing shut, she hugs his arm a little tighter to catch his attention.

He kisses her. Or she kisses him -- doesn't even matter to him who starts it so long as he gets to savour every movement of her mouth on his.

Only after Tosh pulls back, self-conscious, does he realize Gwen is whistling and cheering like the plonk she is.

And if he were a more observant man, he'd notice Ianto and Jack watching from Jack's office. And the unheard conference that ensues. As it is, he's just trying to work up a decent glare to shut Gwen up, while being privately pleased that she's publicly pleased.

Tosh gives him a chaste peck on the cheek and heads for her work station.

"Good on you," is all Gwen says before she too goes off to find better things to do.

He tries to resurrect his usual resentful glare, but can't seem to stop lapsing into what is doubtless the world's stupidest grin as he heads for his med bay to scrub up and get elbows-deep in alien guts.

Before Owen can finish his scrub and sterilization, Ianto announces himself with his usual clearing of throat.

"What?" he says with what he thinks is a reasonably surly tone. Surly. Have to remember to be surly. Shouldn't enjoy the day half so much as he is.

"Morning," Ianto says. Not a trace of smugness in Teaboy's tone, but he wouldn't bet on what he'd see if he met Ianto's gaze.

He doesn't return the greeting, though he probably should since Ianto was right about Tosh. But that would mean admitting Ianto was right about Tosh, which is almost worse than him being right about Tosh in the first place.

"What?" he snaps.

"Nothing," says Ianto. "I just..." He turns on his heel.

Now he's gone and done it. "Ianto?"

The younger man turns, wary.

"Sorry," he says. "I'm sorry."

"It's all right." A flicker of a smile. "I take it the wooing went well?"

He nods. It takes a sheer force of will to repress the goofy, happy grin.

Ianto nods too, then turns to go.

"Ianto?"

"Hmm?" He pauses, his hand on the rail, exactly in the spot where he stood the day Jack first introduced them.

Owen smiles, the first genuine smile he's ever given Ianto. "Thank you."

The new man, his friend and Tosh's, smiles back. "You're welcome."

THE END

Previous | Next



Crossposted to torchwoodslash