Title: Evolution (Prologue)

Author: Emma

Characters: Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones, Rhys Williams, others

Rating: Starts PG, but hey, it’s got Jack and Ianto in it!

Disclaimer: Oh, please. If I owned them, would I let some of those idiots write the scripts? And if I were making any money off them, would I be where they could find me?

Summary: Rhys Williams has his own monsters to fight...

Author’s Note: This story takes place in a totally different AU from Homecoming. In this one, Gwen and Owen died at the end of TW2. I hadn't planned to start posting it so soon, since some of the plot isn't ironed out yet, but this is what happens when you spend the night awake with back pain. I decided to post this for some concrit.

           The dream is the same every night.

            I am standing by the fountain, waiting for Gwen. Christmas lights are twinkling, and in one of the cafes a band is playing a really crappy version of Jingle Bells Rock. I'm wearing gloves; I notice them because I almost never do, and Gwen always complains about my cold hands. Not that she minds too much when I run them up her thighs. Randy girl, my Gwen.

            Suddenly, she's there, stepping off a kerb I'd swear was empty before. The thing is, it doesn't surprise me; somehow I've been expecting it. She's arm in arm with a handsome young bloke in a dark blue suit. They're leaning towards each other, laughing. I smile too, so proud that this gorgeous woman chose me to be her husband and someday father of her children.

            Behind them are the spare, weasel-faced doctor and the stunning Asian woman, bickering amiably as they usually do. And behind them, the man in the long coat, looming over them like a guardian or a stalker. He notices me first and taps Gwen on the shoulder, pointing me out. She looks in my direction and smiles the soft, sexy smile that's just for me. The young bloke laughs and gives her a gentle shove between the shoulder blades. Gwen starts running towards me...

            And the whole world blows up.

            The psychiatrist told me later that I hadn't been there when Gwen was killed. The dream was just my way of managing my grief. That never made any sense to me; why would reliving my wife's death every night help me? And who were those people with her? The shrink explained that they weren't real. They represented aspects of my own psyche, to which I said bollocks, I don’t have an Asian computer geek and a guy with a superhero complex in my psyche.  After a couple of go 'rounds, though, I realized he had already made up his mind, facts be damned, and since he had the power to keep me in hospital for as long as he wanted, I kept my mouth shut and nodded a lot. After he cut me loose I tracked down Gwen's partner and asked him.

            Andy Davidson could never lie worth a damn.

            So I figured those people were friends of Gwen's from the Special Ops counter-terrorist branch. God knows, plenty of coppers and firefighters died that day. 

            Two months after the attacks I decided to leave Cardiff. I couldn't stand the feeling that Gwen was going to be there every time I turned the corner or opened a door. I was drinking myself to sleep every day and screwing up at work and worst of all I was losing my temper and using my fists a little too readily. After the second time of waking up with bloody fists and a black hole where my memory should have been, I had had enough. I needed peace, time, and hard work.

            Three days later I drove my Tad's old Vauxhall into Woodstall Grange's stable yard. Eddie Dingell was waiting for me, looking much as he had done twenty years before, when he had caught a punk from the village sneaking in to look at the foals. Instead of calling the constabulary he had given me an after-school job mucking out the stables and rubbing down the horses after their training sessions. I spent every day for three years – until the day my Tad moved us all to Cardiff – learning everything I could from Eddie Dingell.

            When I called him all he had said was get your arse down here, there's stalls as need mucking out.

            Woodstall Grange was more than a successful stud and training operation, though that was the show piece. There was a big organic produce farm that supplied fancy restaurants all over Wales, and a small distillery that sold all its products by subscription to very rich folk from New York to Dubai. When Thomas Woodstall found out about my experience in the lorry business I traded my shovel for scheduling software. Soon after, he put me to work on the breeding and training records. Four years later, when Eddie decided to retire and go back to Ireland, Thomas offered me the farm manager job.

            It was a good life. I worked hard from sunrise to long past sunset. Four or five times a year I travelled to the continent or to America, usually accompanying a plane full of horses, but I did have some time for sightseeing. I learned to play chess well enough to give Thomas and father Goodwin, our local Catholic priest, a good run for their money. I drank water, although on special occasions I allowed myself a small glass of Woodstall single malt. Most nights I slept the sleep of the just or the exhausted, and I would go on for months without waking up in a cold sweat, watching Gwen die as she walked towards me with a smile on her face. Once a year, on the anniversary of her birthday, I would go to Cardiff and put flowers on her grave.

            And then the monsters came to Woodstall Grange, and I found that everything I thought was real and true was a complete lie.