There was a ghost in the Hub.

Jack saw it first, and chose not to mention it.  After his time underground he’d occasionally been a little woolly-headed, and he didn’t put it past himself to be hallucinating.  There was no point in upsetting the others if he was seeing things, and he certainly had no wish to draw attention to any weakness on his own part, as he was sure it was a temporary aberration and he’d soon be back to normal.

Most recently, Jack had seen the ghost standing in the middle of the sofa.  It was probably a trick of the light, he told himself, convinced himself because he wanted that to be true.  If the dead he’d left behind began to haunt him, he’d eventually have an enormous entourage of spirits and he didn’t fancy that much at all.  Memories were hard enough, and it was often a relief when he could no longer recall the faces that went with them.

…

Ianto began encountering the ghost when he fed the weevils, a hazy form seen out of the corner of one eye in the darkness of the vaults.  He tried various ways of getting a better look – a sharp turn of the head, a concealed mirror, a snail-paced drift in the direction of the insubstantial visitor – but nothing worked.  He was irritated rather than scared or curious: having had experience with non-ghostly ghosts in the past, and having suffered the consequences of being open-minded, he was quite prepared to put an early end to any outer-worldly shenanigans without dragging Jack or Gwen into it.

He had no wish to cause any ripples in the thick layer of mourning that lay over the Hub like a dank, oppressive blanket.  They needed peace, and to feel safe within these walls.  Therefore the ghost – whatever it was – would be his concern for the time being, and he ensured he was always fully armed when he was at work.  It didn’t feel strange: these days he slept with a gun under his pillow.

…

Gwen was in denial.  There was, she decided, no such thing as ghosts.  Until there was irrefutable proof, she refused to believe that Owen or Toshiko or any other past employee of Torchwood was inhabiting her place of work.  Didn’t matter that she kept jumping at shadows, there was nothing there.  Feeling as if she was being watched?  Understandable to be a bit paranoid after all they’d been through.  That extraordinary moment when her hand was flicked to the very file she needed but didn’t yet know she needed…  Intuition.  She’d always had fabulous intuition.  Paranoia and intuition, not some unwelcome phantom, because there was nothing there.

Nothing.

Absolutely fucking nothing.

There was indisputably nothing there.

And she wished to hell it’d leave her alone.

…

After one particularly difficult day, Rhys took pity on them and, at nine-thirty in the evening, brought them fish and chips and several six-packs, hoping to restore a little of the old spirit.  He wasn’t in the place for more than three minutes before he encountered the new spirit.  Food and booze went flying as he received the (most recent) shock of his life.

“Fucking hell, why didn’t you tell me?” he demanded as Gwen fussed over him, Ianto retrieved their supper, and Jack waited, grimly poised, with Webley in hand.

“Tell you what?” Jack asked as the apparent threat was established as unapparent.

“This place is haunted.”

Jack, Gwen and Ianto exchanged uneasy glances that morphed to surprise.

“You knew?” the three asked each other as one.

“There!” Rhys interrupted the incipient discussion, pointing across the Hub.

Everyone spun in that direction; the ghost was already gone.

“If our security has been breached…” Gwen started.

“We can’t calibrate our systems to locate something that isn’t there,” Ianto told her, taking the scanner from his pocket that he’d been trying to analyse the ghost with.  “Nothing.  Always nothing.”

“It’s some kind of entity we don’t understand yet,” Jack said firmly.  “Now we’ll admit to knowing about it, we can try to make contact.”

“Exactly as Torchwood One did with the last batch of ghosts.”

Jack and Gwen turned apologetic looks on Ianto.

“Nothing like that will happen again,” Jack promised.

“If we don’t understand what it is, how can you make that kind of—”

Alarms brought the impending row to a halt, and Jack rushed to the nearest workstation, Ianto and Gwen in quick pursuit.

“This doesn’t make sense,” Jack shouted over the noise of the siren as he attempted to find a reason for it.  “It seems to be more about drawing our attention than…  What’s that?”

The ear-splitting alarm ceased as a stream of calculations poured across the bottom of the screen, so fast that the individual figures became a blur.

Ianto ran to the next computer, bringing up activity logs for the entire Hub.  Everything seemed to be normal.  Everything, except for…

“Jack!  Something’s overriding the controls for cryogenics.”

As Jack momentarily froze with the implications, Gwen drew her gun and clicked off the safety, moving swiftly to the doorway to the autopsy room.

“The capsules are being targeted,” Ianto reported.  “No, hang on, it seems to be passing them over and—  Wait,” Ianto interrupted himself, “one of them is being brought online.  It’s…  Oh god, it’s Gray’s.”

Jerking himself back into action, Jack called up the control panel for the cryogenic facility, inputting codes that should have overridden all others in a fruitless attempt to cancel the unauthorised commands.

“I can’t stop this!” he shouted in sheer frustration, before rushing down into the autopsy bay to try the controls there.

“What’s happening?” Gwen asked Ianto, tinge of fear in her voice.  “Is Gray being released?  Who in their right mind would want that?”

Ianto began to answer, stalled, then said warily,

“It’s stopped.”

“Stopped?”

“Whoever is doing this has access, but…  Jack,” Ianto called, “it’s reading as a malfunction.”

“It’s just a glitch?” Gwen asked hopefully.

“Seems to be.”

There was a strange stillness, a feeling of anticipation in the air; Jack came up from the bay and checked the readouts.

“Why that capsule?” he said to himself.  “Why Gray?”

“Coincidence?” Ianto suggested.  “Because it was the last one used?”

The readings fluctuated; Jack spent a moment taking in the implications before releasing a strangled cry and launching into a frenzied attempt to regain control of the system.  Ianto and Gwen watched anxiously as he fought and ultimately lost the battle.

Then…it was over.  Jack walked stiltedly away from the station and sank onto the sofa beside Rhys, who automatically put a can of beer in his hand.  In a daze, Jack took a sip.  And another.

“What?” Gwen mouthed to Ianto, who stepped in to check exactly what had occurred.

The expression on his face wavered between shock and relief.

“The programme for Gray’s capsule was damaged by the malfunction.  The system instigated safe mode and…terminated the capsule’s contents.”

“Terminated?  You mean…”  Gwen looked to Jack and back to Ianto.  “No.”

“Yes.”

“But how is that safe?”

“Safe mode applies to the Hub.  This is to prevent a threat emerging from a faulty cryogenic system.”  Ianto chose his words carefully, attempting to keep the description as impersonal as possible while Jack was within earshot.  “Temperature control, integrated defibrillation, and life support are all disabled, and whatever is in storage is corrupted to ensure it’s non-viable, and the capsule…becomes a coffin.”

“So fast?”

“So fast,” Ianto confirmed, businesslike veneer concealing a tumult of emotions.  “Designed and honed to be brutally efficient.”

The moment of realisation stretched into a painful silence.  Putting away her gun, Gwen charily approached Jack, crouching beside him and gently rubbing his forearm.

“Jack?” she said softly.

After a moment, Jack gave her a gentle smile, reaching up to run his fingers affectionately over her cheek.  He gave her his beer, stood, and headed for his office.  He paused by Ianto, briefly clasping his hand.

“Can we stay at yours tonight?”

“Of course.”

With a nod, Jack left them.

Still not quite able to believe what had happened, Ianto turned back to the computer and began searching for answers.

“Come and have something to eat,” Gwen told him, picking at her own lukewarm fish and chips.

“In a second,” Ianto told her, and carried on with his task.

“This is better, isn’t it?” Rhys asked quietly.  “After everything?”

Gwen shushed him, and leaned in for a cuddle, ashamed at agreeing with him quite so heartily while Jack was in such obvious pain.

…

Gwen was pulling on her coat, more than ready to go home and get this day over with, when she paused by Ianto’s work station.

“Figure it out?”

“I think so,” Ianto answered, so softly that she had to move very close to hear.

“What then?” she whispered, understanding that this was confidential.

“It wasn’t a malfunction, it was only made to read as one.  There was a code used to close down Gray’s capsule, a Torchwood authorisation code.”

“One of us?  It wasn’t me, was it you?”

“No, but…”

“D’you think Jack would stage this for some reason?”

“It wasn’t us,” Ianto stressed.

“Then…”

“It’s Owen’s.  It’s Owen’s code.”

Gwen stared at him in renewed shock.

“Who else would know that?  Jack?”

“No-one, not even Jack.  I was only able to find out because Owen’s no longer classed as active.”

“But if you found out, then maybe Jack…”

“I’ve checked the access records, no-one’s been near Owen’s information since I officially logged him out.  Besides, Jack wouldn’t, he just wouldn’t.  This was Gray.”

“Then…it doesn’t make sense.  Besides, even if—  No.  I don’t believe in ghosts, Ianto.  Not even when I want to more than anything.”

“I know it doesn’t make sense, but…”

“Even if he’d survived somehow, if he’d found a way back in, Owen wouldn’t have known how to do this.”

“Maybe not.  But Tosh would have.”

They exchanged a long, teary look.

“No,” Gwen eventually said, her voice shaking.  “Tosh would never…”

“She’d do anything for Owen.  For us.  To keep us safe.”

Another word wasn’t possible, not without succumbing to fresh bouts of weeping at the reminder of what they’d so tragically lost.  Gwen gave Ianto a fast hug and left the Hub on Rhys’ arm.

…

“Ready to go?”

Red-eyed and exhausted, Jack glanced to where an equally red-eyed, exhausted, but also very awkward Ianto was standing in the office doorway.

“I’m all right,” Jack assured him.

“Really?”

“It’s easier this way.  To mourn him, rather than be his warder.  I feel like I can love him now with a clear conscience.”

“Good.”

“Just…tonight…”  Jack paused, obviously embarrassed.  “I may need a little TLC.”

Ianto gave a sharp nod and took Jack’s coat from the stand, holding it up for him.  Rising slowly from the desk, Jack crossed to him, slipped into the greatcoat and gratefully accepted the hug as Ianto ran his arms around his waist and squeezed.

“I’m sorry, Jack.”

“You can’t mean that, and…it’s okay.”

“I do mean it.  I’m sorry that you keep on suffering because of him.”

“Well, it’s over now.”  Jack turned in Ianto’s arms and hugged him back.  “It would have been a peaceful death.  He deserves peace.”

That Ianto could agree with.

“I’ll deal with the body tomorrow.”

“No, let me.”

“We could have a funeral,” Ianto suggested.  “Somewhere out of the way, private.  Make sure he remains at peace.”

Ianto felt Jack shudder in his arms, and he held on a little tighter.

“Okay,” Jack hoarsely agreed.  “You’ll find the right place?”

“Leave it with me.”

A warm, comforting kiss later, Ianto ushered Jack through the Hub, as eager to leave as Gwen had been.

“Our ghost,” Jack murmured thoughtfully as they went.  “You think…”

“I’m not sure what to think.”

Jack came to a gradual halt, drawing Ianto back to him.

“If it’s what we’re both considering but refusing to say then…  You know what this means?”  Jack paused, frowning and smiling and teetering on hope.  “That, beyond the darkness…”

Ianto understood perfectly what Jack was inferring, and they stood together in deep thought, remembering those they’d loved and grieved for, those who were perhaps not quite as lost as they’d feared.

It was an extraordinary moment shared between the two men, and Ianto felt a thaw, in them, between them, around them.  As if a ray of healing light had broken through the dense gloom of mourning, illuminating a way forward.

With a soft smile, Ianto took Jack’s hand and led him to the cog door; once there they couldn’t resist turning back to curiously study their surroundings.

The Hub was familiar and still and quiet.  The same, but different.

And then, as one, they knew.

The ghost was gone.