This is for anyone going to the Hub2 Convention this weekend. And also for anyone who isn't!

Crossing the Line

"Jack!" Gwen demands his attention. "You have to stop them. They have been at it for hours now."

"I know", he says, raising his head from his hands and shaking it wearily. "You think I haven't tried? I haven't had a cup of coffee since breakfast and it is now way beyond lunch time."

"Jack!" shouts Tosh, an urgency in her voice that strikes both Jack and Gwen. They race from Jack's office to the main part of the Hub.

"What's wrong, Tosh?" asks Gwen, breathlessly.

"Look!" Tosh gestures down into the autopsy bay towards Ianto and Owen.

Jack takes in the scene and sighs. "Well, at least it will be easy to clean up down there."

Neither of the women finds it funny. Nor, to tell the truth, does Jack. He is fed up with it. He just tries to lighten a situation that has escalated beyond his control.

"DO SOMETHING!" Gwen insists, shoving him towards the steps.

He moves slowly, reluctantly. All earlier efforts have yielded no fruit.

Owen is advancing on Ianto, a scalpel held high as if it were a large butcher's knife. Owen is small, though. The scalpel is small. But both men clearly mean business. Ianto has reached into his jacket and pulled his gun from somewhere. Jack takes a second to marvel that the gun hasn't spoiled the line of the jacket. So much so, he hasn't realized that Ianto was carrying today.

"It was clearly deliberate. You tried to kill me." repeats Ianto, calmly this time. His eyes give him away. They flash dispassionately - a steely, metallic blue.

"It was not!" Owen is heated, knowing that he has right on his side. "It was just an unfortunate combination of circumstances. And if you weren't such an arrogant son of a Welshman, you'd accept that! Any idiot can see it!"

Jack considers his options. First he needs to disarm the men, then bang their heads together, and finally they need to look at the CCTV footage. Together. And come to some sort of conclusion. He advances carefully down the stairs, not wanting to upset what appears to be a bit of a stand off.

Each man is glaring at the other, separated by only a short distance. Owen continues to hold the scalpel aloft. Ianto continues to hold the gun in both hands, leveled at Owen. On the whole, it does not look like it would be a fair fight. Ianto will take out Owen, messily, before Owen can get in a single jab.

The men are totally focused on each other, they do not notice Jack creeping down the stairs towards them. He reaches the bottom and steps between them, his hands up in supplication. He is just about to say something placatory when he realizes that he has made a big mistake and interrupted their concentration. He makes them jump in surprise. This doesn't really matter much to Owen; he only has a scalpel. However, it has a bigger effect on Ianto, who is highly trained in firearms handling and accustomed to reacting in a split second to save the lives of those around him. Ianto snaps the safety off his gun and fires.

Ianto and Owen look at the crumpled body on the floor.

'Oh, Teaboy, you are in trouble now!" comments Owen.

Ianto nods, feeling rather sick inside. He knows that Jack is immortal. He knows that Jack will come back from the dead. He knows that it has happened many times before and will happen many times again. It's just that he has never been the one to kill Jack before.

"Fuck!" he says. "Come on, let's get him on the autopsy table so that at least he is comfortable when he wakes up."

Animosity put aside, totally forgotten, each man grabs an end and they heft the dead Jack onto the table. Owen covers him with a blanket. Ianto tuts, reaches out and pulls it back from Jack's face, so that it no longer completely covers him. He tucks it in under Jack's chin and kisses Jack tenderly on the cheek. He usually prefers the forehead, but it had a neat hole in it at the moment and it doesn't seem right to kiss your lover exactly where you have just shot him dead.

Jack duly resurrects and takes a deep breath. The doctor and the archivist are no longer facing off at each other in the autopsy bay. Jack sighs in relief then wonders where they are. It is much quieter in the Hub now. He swings himself off the table and goes in the main part of the Hub, taking the stairs two at a time in a very sprightly way for someone who was dead only a couple of minutes previously.

He finds the team gathered around a monitor, watching CCTV footage, in complete harmony.

"See! I told you what happened." Ianto was saying.

"It was a mistake!" Owen counters..

This time Ianto holds out a hand. Owen shakes it. "Yes, I can believe it."

Jack can't believe his ears though.

"OK, kids," he says. "Would you care to rerun the footage and talk me through this?"

Tosh reaches out and the grainy black and white footage rewinds a short way. She presses 'play'. The screen springs back into life. It shows two men, clearly Ianto and Owen, together the previous evening in Cardiff coming out of the pub, talking with friendly animation and absorption. Jack hasn't realized that they socialize together. He also wonders what can have happened in the next 50 seconds that caused them to be facing each other with weapons at the ready today. Then it becomes clear.

The screen shows them as they approach a busy road, and walk towards the zebra crossing. There are no lights to control the crossing, just the rules of the road that dictate a driver stops at the black and white markings to allow pedestrians to cross. The crossing is at the top of a steep incline. There is a heavy lorry labouring up the slope. It occurs to Jack that the driver must have been dismayed to realize he was going to have to stop, having finally got up some momentum, in order to allow two slightly inebriated pedestrians to cross.

This clearly occurs to Owen, too. At exactly the moment the lorry grinds almost to a reluctant halt, he makes an expansive gesture to indicate that the driver should continue on his way, that these two pedestrians are aware of his plight and have no wish to add to it. They will wait and cross after he has passed by. The lorry driver waves gratefully and begins to accelerate again taking advantage of what is left of his momentum.

At exactly the moment the lorry grinds almost to a reluctant halt, Ianto gives the lorry driver a cheery wave of thanks and steps off the pavement, onto the crossing in the road.

"See!" Ianto says triumphantly. "Murderer!"

Jack seizes the opportunity and steps forward, putting an arm over each of their shoulders. "Don't you think, my dear Ianto, that is the pot calling the kettle black?"

End