| Date: 16 December 2007
Characters: Gwen Cooper, Owen Harper Location: hotel lobby, hotel hallways Link to IJ: thread #10696 |
 It wasn't often that Gwen had traveled far enough afield that she stayed in a hotel room. Still, if she'd had any sense, she'd have asked Jack for a double shot of Retcon and gone on about her life after nearly ending up dead.
So she showered, dressed, and tried not to think about how certain she was that she'd slept in her own bed last night as she went to the lobby for coffee. |
 Owen was still reeling from his meeting with himself, well not himself, but something close. What the fuck was going on? Susie was alive, Gwen was marrying Rhys? He wasn't even paying that much attention until he saw Gwen. He walked over to her and stopped right in front of her. "Oi, tell me you know who I am." |
| She didn't flinch. She wasn't awake enough for that yet. Oi yourself," she said, stepping sideways to reach for a cup. "And good morning." |
| "Gwen," he started again, reaching for her arm and gently pulling her back to face him. "M'serious. There's something weird going on here." |
| Gwen looked down at his hand and up at him. "Have you hit your head?" |
| "No. No I haven't." Frustrated, Owen leaned in and kissed her, partly because he wanted to, but also because it was the fastest way he could think of to figure out if this was the Gwen he knew. |
| She didn't slap him. That was probably a good sign. She didn't bite him either. Her eyebrows did knit, though. "All right, then. What's gone off?" Because public displays of affection were not exactly their thing. |
| Owen relaxed, okay, this was his Gwen. "I was in my office, watching a movie and I walked in. I mean another Owen, but from Glasgow and a different Torchwood. I was going to shoot him, but then thought maybe he was a time traveler or something. He showed me this place. Where he is, Ianto and he are in charge and Susie's alive and your getting married to Rhys in April." |
| Her frown deepened. "There's a Torchwood in Glasgow?" |
| "Yeah, there is, not that we ever work with them or anything, but it's there." " He stroked her hair rather absently then stepped aside so Gwen could get to the coffee. |
| She gave him another little frown, then moved on indeed. She poured two cups and pressed the extra into his hand. "Drink that, you need it." |
| He frowned at the cup then drank it down, burning his tongue in the process then swearing. "You don't believe me do you?" |
| "It is a bit hard to swallow," she confessed. "I mean, you and Ianto?" She grinned a bit. |
| Owen was not amused. "Fine then. Come on." He took he arm and started down one of the hallways. |
| "Wait, wait!" She managed one mouthful of coffee before she put it down. If she couldn't drink it, she certainly didn't want to wear it. "Where are we going?" |
| "You can bring the coffee, I know how you get without it, just come with m. We're going to go see a room." |
| Gwen didn't double back. She jogged a step to catch up. "What room?" |
| " You'll see." He walked about twenty more feet then stopped and looked at the door. "This one." He opened it and it was the right office. It looked out onto the Hub, but it wasn't their Hub. He picked up the picture off the desk, the one of another version of him, this one with it's arm slung around a Weevil and wearing a Hawaiian shirt. "Does this look like something I would do? Does that look like our Hub? And for that matter, why can we walk into an office in the Hub from a Hotel hallway?" |
| She took the picture, studied it, then looked up at him again. "This is a joke, right?" She put it down and pushed past him to look out the window at the wrong hub. "It has to be a joke." |
| "I bloody well wish it was, but it's not. I have no clue what's going on. I've got to find Jack though and hope he's got some answer that makes some fucking sense." |
| "Jack." She turned back to face him. "He'd know. He always knows what's going on, doesn't he?" |
| "A lot more often than he lets us know, that's for sure.' Owen shuddered at the picture then stepped back out of the office and into the hotel hall. "So...how'd you get here?" |
| "I don't know," she confessed, a little distantly. "I thought I'd just forgotten we checked into a hotel..." |
| Owen pressed his hand to the small of her back, "What's the last thing you remember before that?" |
| "Going to sleep, at home, I think." And he was still very hands on. "Are you all right?" |
| "No. I'm not all right. I'm not fond of having my world turned upside down without so much as a by your leave." Owen was scowling as he walked down the hall, "Do you remember which door you came out of?" |
| "I was half asleep." She was wide awake now. "It might have been this hall..." She turned back the way they came. "Or not." |
| "Fuck, well...let's go back to the door I came through and maybe it will get us back. We should go to your flat and see if you have a door there as well." He grinned, "Hate for Rhys to walk through one of these and get lost." |
| "Oh God, Rhys. He'd go mad." She started moving. |