You know, you could just let them deal with it themselves this time, the man thought to himself, watching a fight between another person and a tall, beastlike creature from afar. But you know you won't, he contradicted himself, and walked casually across the park towards the struggle. The beast seemed to be winning. Picking up a branch from the ground, the man increased his speed slightly. Then, the creature knocked the other person over, biting at their neck, and he burst into a sprint, clubbing it across the back a couple of times.

It sprang up, and leapt at him. Taken slightly by surprise, he struggled for a moment and felt it slash at the side of his head before it was knocked away from him. His eyes were unfocused, but he did see the other person jab something into the creature's neck. It went limp.

The other person stood up. He was a man, fairly tall, who wore a long grey coat. Military. World War Two? What's a man in the 21st century doing wearing a 1940s era military coat? As the man with the coat stared at him for a second, he realized he should say something.

Tossing the branch away, he remarked, "Thanks."

"No, thank you." There was a slight pause, and a strange look came into the anachronistically dressed man's eyes. Recognition, maybe, though why, he couldn't say. Expectation, too. What did he expect him to do? After a second, the man said "And...you are?"

Name, name, name. Where am I? Wales, that's right. Need a Welsh name. Last name, too, though- "Jones," he answered, thinking fast. That's a common one. Now first. Welsh. "Ianto Jones." That was Welsh enough, right?

A little smirk came up on the other man's face. A knowing smirk. "Nice to meet you, Jones, Ianto Jones. Captain Jack Harkness." He reached out to shake hands.

"Lucky escape," said the now-called Ianto Jones (I rather like that, I think I'll keep it for now), looking down at the creature. Oh. Now he recognized it. But what had Captain Jack Harkness injected it with?

"I had it under control."

"You think so?" Now he was really curious. "Looked pretty vicious." Then he remembered that it had bitten Harkness's neck. There was blood on the coat collar. "You're…" Ianto reached out to inspect the wound, but the Captain leaned back just as he saw that there were no bite marks at all. Strange. "You were bleeding."

"Had worse from shaving," Jack Harkness said.

Okay, he couldn't be that casual unless he knew something about the creature. Let's test that theory. "Looked like a Weevil to me."

"I've no idea what you're talking about." The Captain stared at him for another few seconds. What was that look in his eyes? "I'll take it from here," he added, hoisting the Weevil (for that was what the beast was called) onto his shoulders easily. He paused. "Thanks for the assistance." He started walking away.

Even more intrigued now, Ianto replied, "Anytime." This man doesn't quite belong here any more than I do. His accent isn't Welsh, or any sort of British, it's American. And he has a World War Two coat and calls himself Captain? Something's strange. "By the way," he called. "Love the coat." He heard a quiet snort of laughter from the man, but no verbal response.

How strange. Ianto felt sure that Jack had recognized him, but he had never met the man before. Not that he could remember, at least. Perhaps it hadn't happened for him, yet. He'd just push it out of mind, forget about it for now. It would eventually make sense. It wasn't the first time he'd met people out of order.

After all, when one is a Time Lord, what can one expect?

Also on my tumblrs demisexual-ianto-jones and clarehope128, this is going to be a very long story. Updates Tuesdays with occasional hiatuses. Hope you enjoy it!