Time After

[madimpossibledreamer]

LTW is Localized Temporary Wormhole.  the beginning is titled Chapter 1: Not in Kansas, but there are no further chapters, so it's being left as is.

Main Points:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Torchwood AU
Summary: This one's from 2012, so it's a little more current than the others.  It's maybe a spinoff of Torchwood: Aftershock, only Captain Jack also exists.  I like this vulnerable version of Xander; he's more what he'd actually be if he was a Time Agent.
Word Count: 3591
Rating: Teen
Pairing: Xander/Spike
Warning: very vague, but there is a mild reference to abuse.  also very mild dirty talk for above pairing

 

Some sort of typical Torchwood opening (it’s been a while since I’ve seen it).

         “That’s not good!  No, that’s the rift-slow down-” Gwen yelped, looking forward.
         “No time, sweetheart,” Owen stated grimly, gritting his teeth.
         Jack leaned over, pulling on the steering wheel.  “Maybe if we-”
         And then the world stopped.
         Space kept moving, so they felt themselves being elongated, part pulling forward, part staying in place.  They could feel, but they couldn’t move.  And then there was a burst of colour, as if a rainbow had exploded within the vehicle, and suddenly time was passing again, and they snapped back into position, lurching forward onto a grassy area.
         “Woah,” Gwen commented, trying to calm her jittery heart and nerves.
         “I think I agree,” Ianto voiced quietly.
         Jack was pressing buttons on his Vortex Manipulator, but unfortunately it didn’t seem to feel like giving any useful answers...about location, for instance.  “We need to figure out where the rift dropped us off.  Tosh?”
         “The instruments seem to be malfunctioning.  We’ll probably need to triangulate readings to get anything useful out of them,” she replied.
         “Okay.  Fine.”  Before Jack could say anything else, Gwen interrupted.
         “Do our mobiles work?”  A question that made a lot of sense, especially right before they split up.  A little checking confirmed that they did indeed function, without the static that was interfering with everything else.  Tosh suggested that the mobiles were a lower form of technology and therefore less affected.
         “Owen, find a good place for us to camp.  Defensible.  Ianto, Tosh, try to figure out where we are.  Gwen and I will explore a little, try to figure out if there are any towns nearby, or anything useful or dangerous.”  They nodded and split up.

         It looked like the future to Captain Jack.  Of course, he couldn’t be certain, but the area was more desolate.  Fewer plants, a higher abundance of red and yellow in nature’s colour palette.
         Both of them jumped when his VM started beeping.  The last time that had happened, a certain rogue Time Agent had left a message shortly before playing his game and trying to kill them all.  Cautiously, Jack answered it, but to his surprise, the message had no audio.  Letters flashed up in front-general SOS, with a specific location listed.  Despite tinkering, the message’s author would not list.
         “Be ready,” he told her, and then set it to tracking it.  Luckily it was close by, but several times they had to backtrack as the terrain became impassible or the device suddenly decided they were going the wrong way.
         Eventually, they reached a more rocky area, and the device settled to a specific location.  They had to travel up the streambed, the water barely trickling past them, carefully stepping to avoid a fall.
         “Stop where you are!” a commanding voice called out.  Didn’t sound like ‘Captain John Hart’, but one never knew.  Then again, he probably would have shot at them by now.  “Turn around, so I can see you.  Don’t make any sudden moves.”
         Quietly, they did as the voice asked.  Male, strong, probably authority figure.  Young.  Probably handsome, too.  Jack signaled to Gwen that if anything went wrong, he should be the one to die.  It wasn’t permanent for him, after all.
         There was a gasp, and then a figure in a trenchcoat was running at him, full speed.  He barely had time to react to catch the bloke, who buried his head in Jack’s shoulder.  Nice scent.
         “You’re alive,” the man gasped, and then Jack Harkness put it all together.  That particular smell.  The shape of the warm body in his arms.  The somewhat familiar voice.
         “So are you,” he stated warmly, hugging the man back.  So close-like a friend, a lover, and a brother all rolled up into one.
         At that, the man pulled back, laughing and wiping a few tears from his eyes, grinning weakly.  “Oh, I believed I was dead, same as you.”
         Jack took the moment to examine the familiar face.  Dark hair fell slightly past the chin, wavy in a flattering way.  A strand of hair lingered over the forehead, caressing the side of the nose.  Captain Jack took a moment to push it aside, tucking it behind one of the slightly large ears, and the eyes closed, enjoying the sensation and feeling of touch again.  They opened after a few moments, staring back at Jack with such trust.  Dark, rich chocolate brown eyes still glimmered with a hint of the hope, innocence, and good nature he’d known.  Yet a darkness lurked on the edges, a fear and sadness that had aged him.  A crust of blood marred the right cheek.  Jack ran an appraising eye over it-although there was a lot of scattered blood, it didn’t seem deep.  He just hadn’t had time or the resources to take care of it properly.  The coral pink lips quirked upward slightly in the beginnings of a smile.  A slight stubble that didn’t quite match the young, mostly carefree man he’d known had begun to collect on the chin.  Jack let his hand trail down the cheek to where a long scar traced most of the left jaw.
         “Ahem,” Gwen cleared her throat.  “Are you going to introduce me?”
(Mostly a ploy to get them to actually think about their current situation, instead of making out or anything in front of her.)
         They broke apart, the newcomer grinning sheepishly.  “Captain Alexander Holmes,” he stated quietly, walking up to her and shaking her hand firmly.  Friendly and somewhat flirty, but overall professional.
         Gwen was charmed, and smiled back.  “Gwen Cooper.  Nice to meet you.”  Alexander had a charisma about him, true, but it was different than Jack or John.  He wasn’t the sort that you wanted, really badly.  True, there was that boyish charm, but he was just...trustworthy.  The sort that you’d meet in a bar that would flirt with you, listen to you, tell you stories, make you feel a thousand times better about yourself, but you wouldn’t go home with.  Not that you didn’t love him, but you didn’t automatically want him as your lover, just a best friend.
         “Likewise,” he answered, dropping his hand to his side.  “Most people just call me Xan, or Xander.”  He turned back to Captain Jack.  “How’d you get here?”
         “Rift.  You?”
         A sigh, and slump of the shoulders.  “No idea, actually.  Probably an LTW.  Last thing I remember, I was in the middle of Kjiou and that mess, and then suddenly I was here.  Saw what looked like a sabertooth cat, which chased me up here.  Wasn’t watching where I was going, and ran over a cliff.  Went tumbling, and I remember a bit of the rocks and dirt flying by and then all of a sudden it was all ‘Hey, Xan-man, meet Swallowing Darkness of Oblivion’.  When I wake up, I’m a bit woozy and can’t remember everything.  Luckily, I don’t seem to have broken anything major, so that’s of the good.  Like my head-my head’s especially important.  Been here a couple of days, fixed up something so that I could deal with the water situation.  Had to take apart my gun to do it, though, so all I’ve got is swords.  I mean, I’m good with that, I like hand weapons better, but it narrows my defense options.”
         Captain Jack Harkness laughed.  “You mean, when you were acting as if you were going to shoot us if we didn’t cooperate, it was an empty threat?”
         The bottom lip twitched in a pout.  “Still had my knives.  And I’ve still got a good pair of arms.  Besides, I would never have killed you.”
         “No.  You wouldn’t have.”
         A pause, then Xander asked carefully, “Does this mean you...you saw him?” he asked in a small whisper.
         Another moment, then Jack answered, “Yes.  He hasn’t changed.  Calling himself Captain John Hart now.”
         “Shot me, the last time I saw him.  Couple of weeks ago-relatively, anyway.  On Kjiou.”  He fingered a two-inch hole in his coat and shirt beneath, still a bit crusty with blood.  “Of course, you know me-healed it right up, but...”
         “Tried to kill our whole team,” Gwen stated conversationally, and he winced. 
         “Ouch.”
         “We’ll have the resident medic-Owen-look at it, okay?”

         Xander looked around the encampment, then smiled broadly.  “Your team’s full of hotties.  Is that on purpose?”
         “You better believe it!” Jack called back, winking at Ianto as he came around the bend.  “You’ve already met Gwen.  Ianto, Owen, Tosh.  Xander.  He’s from my past, but don’t worry, he’s not going to try to kill us all.”
         “That’s a relief,” Owen stated dryly.
         Xander grinned.  “Well, maybe not him.  Cute, but the attitude would kill me.”

         Spike woke up to a headache and an unpleasant warm situation all over his skin.  Too much to drink last night-or not enough this morning.  He yelped as his skin caught fire, and he ran.  This happened far too often to him in his own opinion.  How exactly he’d gotten into a meadow next to some woods wasn’t exactly a question he wanted to examine at the moment.  First order of business was finding a rock to crawl under until that baleful sun got out of the sky, and then he could think about getting out and finding something to eat.

         “Stay where you are!”  A lot of people were yelling at him at once, and the panicked humans around him had guns.  For a second, he thought about changing and showing them exactly how little those bullets of theirs scared him, but instead he acquiesced.  He could think about eating them later (ha!  the chip laughed at the idea, just giving the slightest twinge as a reminder of exactly how pathetic and useless he was), but for the moment he needed answers.  He wasn’t about to get any if he scared them all off.  Or if the chip spontaneously deactivated itself, and he dug into their flesh, biting through to get the warm, savory, numminess within...
         “Bloody ‘ell!” he swore, dropping to his knees, and heard a few bullets whistle by.  He gritted his teeth against the pain and clutched at his head, concentrating on the comforting smell of fear around him.
         “Search him,” a somewhat familiar voice ordered, and a second, with a beautiful coat, almost as good as his duster, came and patted him down, very thoroughly.
         “Like what you’ve done with the hair,” an American voice whispered in his ear (what?  What was that supposed to mean?).  Eventually, the other human was gone, and telling the rest, puzzled, “Only the knives.  Doesn’t even have his VM.”
         “Not...not armed?  No guns?  And...”  The familiar voice sounded even more panicked on that news.  
         “Scanner confirms that,” a female voice.  English.  Japanese ancestry, probably.
         His head was starting to clear up, and he looked up to see...Xander.  And a bunch of other humans he didn’t recognize.  Slayer’s boy was in a pretty trenchcoat, like the bloke that had searched him’s coat and his own duster.  Boots, button up shirt, trousers...he was dressed like an Englishman, maybe even an English highwayman minus the hat, in an outfit that Spike would be caught undead in.  Much more nummy than Xander’s usual painfully loud shirts.
         “Don’t need weapons ta ‘urt you, whelp,” he stated quietly, trying to put as much menace as he could possibly.  Just because he was fangless doesn’t mean he wasn’t still the Big Bad.
         Xander gulped, and Spike found his eyes fixed on the bobbing Adam’s apple in that luscious neck.  He hadn’t eaten in long enough.  And the boy wasn’t terrible, to look at, anyway.  Once he opened his mouth, that was the problem, there.
         “Is anyone as concerned as I am about this?” he asked, and a few hands raised in reply.
         Spike snorted.  “You’re actin’ as if you’ve got no idea I’m a vampire,” he pointed out.  Silence.  He looked up to see the boy blink a few times, rapidly, eyes slightly wider than normal (and for the Slayer’s boy, that was saying something).  
         “Let me guess, Buffy, Willow, and Rupert don’t ring bells either,” he stated sarcastically.  Again, no reply.  At least not from the whelp.
         The other man in a long coat-good looking, grey eyes, and intriguing scent (how would the blood taste-OW-) stepped in front, the gun still trained on him.  “I don’t know what game you’re playing this time, John, but I told you to leave and not come back.  We’re not willing to play this time.”  There was attraction there, in the scent, but overwhelming anger, too.
         Spike had had enough.  “I am a bloody vampire, ya wanker!” he yelled, putting on his demon face and surging up at them.  Couldn’t hurt them, but a little intimidation couldn’t hurt.
         He was wrong there.  A couple bullets went through him, and he fell to the ground, bellowing in agony.  Luckily they missed the heart-most likely not accounting for vampire speed-but still were painful as ‘ell.
         “Jack-that face wasn’t...human,” Xander’s voice shook.  So prettyboy’s name was Jack.
         “‘Course it’s not.  Demon ‘ere.  Accusin’ me ‘o playin’ games, but that’s you, ‘arris.  Spike ‘ere.  William the Bloody, Scourge o’ Europe, remember?”  He groaned, trying to sit up.  Bleeding was already slowing down.
         He was surprised when prettyboy slapped him hard enough to knock him to the ground again.  “It’s not ‘Harris’,” Jack bit out.  Spike, pissing off people he’d not even met before.  He had a talent for it, that was sure.  And of course, it usually led to decent, beautiful violence, so usually he didn’t care about that so much.  He looked up to see the whelp about to...cry?  Tears of pain and rage, looked like.  He wasn’t really a vampire to apologize, but he’d been around long enough to realize that there were some times when he just had to swallow his pride and take it like a man.
         “All right, not ‘arris.  What’s ‘e like ta be called, then?” he asked reasonably, pulling out a bullet close to the skin with a wince.
         “...It’s like he’s pushing all your buttons on purpose.  Except he seems completely sincere.  And clueless,” Prettyboy commented, moving back again toward the Slayer’s whelp.  And Xander didn’t complain about the intrusion into his personal space.  Was the boy bent?
         “Never trust ‘Captain John Hart’,” Xander stated bitterly, still pointing the gun toward the vampire’s heart, though his hands were shaking.  By the looks of it, wouldn’t complain much if the trigger got accidentally pulled.
         Jack eased the gun out of the boy’s hands, talking softly and calmly as one would to a frightened animal.  “I know.  I don’t trust him either.  But look at him.  He looks like John, but he’s not.  Skin was cold when I was frisking him.  Cold as in corpse.  And that face thing.  I’m pretty sure he’s telling the truth-about this, at least.  Unarmed, marooned?  Wouldn’t react like this.”
         Xander pulled himself up, breathing deep, and faced Spike, steadying his stance and eyes.  The master vampire never thought there was a time he’d think that the Slayer’s whelp was dangerous, but the promise of violence in his eyes took even Spike a few steps back-mentally, anyway.  “You seem to be under the impression that you know me.  If you’re telling the truth, and you’re not ‘John’, then you don’t.  If I’m mistaken about your identity, you’re equally mistaken about mine.  It’s Captain Alexander Holmes.  Call me Captain, or Captain Holmes, or Holmes.  I might give you permission to call me Xander at some point, if you ever earn even a part of my trust.  But if you ever call me ‘Harris’ again, I will tear your throat out and make you eat it.”
         Spike blinked and shivered.  “That wouldn’t kill me.”
         The smile he got in return was wolfish.  “I’m counting on it.”
         All right, so this new Xander hated his guts.  Even so, Spike liked this version better.  Got some fire, this one.

         Xander and Spike are dancing at the Bronze when vampires attack.  Xander plunges into it whole-heartedly.
         Spike glanced over as Xan grabbed a pool cue and smashed it down into two vampires.  He glanced over at a vampire, running away, and grinned roguishly.  “Where d’you think you’re going?  Party’s just getting started!”  He threw a knife, sticking the vamp in the leg, and it went down howling, only to be dusted by Spike.  He looked back at his Time Agent, only to see the man wink at him.  “The main band hasn’t even played yet!”
         “Are all Time Agents this barmy?” he asked, loving this man, this insane, impossible man.
         A shrug, a shrieking vampire turning into dust.  “Think so.”
         “Good.”  He let his gaze roam, and there was just a hint of pink dusting his luv’s cheeks now.

         A tough blonde cheerleader entered, three vampires being dusted in quick succession, and Captain Holmes guessed that this had to be Buffy.  “That,” he panted, still unable to stop the smile of exhilaration on his face, “...would be the main band.”
         “Xander!” the redhead beside the girl shrieked with joy, and ran into a smothering hug.
         “You know, when I had daydreams about girls throwing themselves at me, they were never like this,” he joked.
(he’s dead)

         “I’m exhausted after that.  The good kind, but I think I want to grab a quick nap if you don’t mind.”  Xander smiled and stretched languidly, and caught Spike staring at his muscles as he moved.  The smile grew, and he shook his head, mouthing ‘naughty boy’ at the vampire.  A little bit of eyebrow waggling had them both giggling like mischievous schoolboys.
         There were more than a few clueless glances in their direction, but Rupert had taken off his glasses and was now polishing them determinedly, muttering some sort of plea under his breath.

         They’d gone upstairs, and there was actually a cot squashed in among the bookshelves and assorted knick-knacks scattered about in the room.  
         The vampire clambered onto the bed first, causing a gasp from behind them.
         “Don’t worry, we’re very good.  We won’t make a mess.  Just...in the mood for a bit of snuggling, ‘s all.”
         “I’ll let you in on a little secret, Red,” Spike stated contentedly.  “...’e’s always in th’ mood for a bit o’ snugglin’.”  She blushed a little, but surprisingly not as much as he’d been expecting.
         Captain Xander clambered up, settling himself somewhere above the vampire and giving his boyfriend a sweet kiss.  He laid his head down gently above where Spike would have a heartbeat, one hand bunched up in the shirt above the shoulder, the other making a kind of pillow.
         Quietly, she gave them a thumb’s up, smiling and giggling a little, and closed the door.  She stayed for a moment, listening in on the quiet conversation inside, and was surprised at how okay she was with this.  Okay, yes, so Spike was an evil demon.  And this Xander was...completely like himself, and yet so different.  But he seemed like he could take care of himself, and the two of them were so obviously in love.  Cute couple.  She giggled again and went downstairs to give them their privacy.

         Xan fidgeted a little more.  Such like a cat, sometimes.  One leg was thrown out, almost protectively, and Spike couldn’t help but smile, running a hand over the leg.
         “You seem quite fixated on my thighs,” Xan remarked sleepily.
         “In my defense, they are quite nice thighs,” Spike replied.  He realized he sounded like the ponce William, but he didn’t particularly care as long as this warm, willing, beautiful body with equally beautiful mind kept laying on top of him.
         “I think you’re trying to talk dirty to me, or something, but it just isn’t working.  It is, however, very nice...whatever it is.”
         “Point of talkin’ dirty isn’t for it to be just nice, so yeah, you’re right, isn’t workin’.”  A kiss on the top of the head.  “Sleep well, luv.  And I better ‘ave a starrin’ role in your dreams.”
         He could feel the sleepy smile, as Xan drifted further toward sleep.  “If you don’t, I’ll have a talk with the director, whoever...he might be.  Prom-”  And with that, the boy relaxed completely into his arms.  He spared an adoring smile for the Time Agent in his arms, absently running one hand through the soft hair.  Contented, that’s what he was.  Completely happy with life.  He’d been in love before, but never this content.  Course, he didn’t know the future, and it wasn’t exactly stable, dating or loving or being with a Time Agent for the rest of one’s unlife, but that wasn’t the point.  Every day was an adventure; every day promised love and battles to come.  Vampire who spit at fate, he was.  Didn’t give a rat’s arse about the fact that he was supposed to be fighting on the side of evil.  Sure, he was evil, the Big Bad through and through, but he was fighting on the side of good because...well, he laughed at anything that tried to tell him what to do, even if it was his own nature.  Plus, it had some nice perks, didn’t it?  Got his fighting, and his shagging...well, fairly regular.  His demon wasn’t altogether happy that it wasn’t more, but what he had...made him not feel so lonely and empty, and anyway all Time Agents seemed to be able to make anything-holding hands, a kiss, even just a look-intimate enough even to keep it fairly quiet.