He wakes up and swears inwardly. There wasn’t supposed to be a thirteenth time. A tenth okay, nice little rounded off number, nice little final dot. Full stop.

There wasn’t supposed to be an eleventh. Or a twelfth (blowing Owen in his truly bachelor pad styled flat because really, purple sheets?) He remembers swallowing hysterical laughter that time, gut still hurting from where Owen kicked him just as he came, silent scream.

Maybe that’s a nice allegory, nice definition, nice perfunctory label for what they do. They fuck and fight.

Maybe the hysteria hasn’t completely disappeared yet.

Thirteen. The number was never supposed to come. It just wasn’t, he was supposed to stop at three or five or seven or nine. Evens or odds. Something was supposed to wake him up, something was supposed to stop him. One of Jack’s too-wide, too-real (unreal) smiles maybe. One of Tosh’s schoolgirl crush, quiet looks. Or Gwen, with her seeming goodness, yearning to screw (already screwing?) Owen where everyone could hear them.

He feels sick. He feels afraid.

Owen stirs and he climbs out of the bed without thinking, mind like clockwork (out, out, before) and he’s moving out of the room crumpled shirt in hands and he winces (that won’t come out) bare feet on unclean carpet and Christ, but he hates Owen’s Penthouse flat. It’s a mockery.

He shuts his eyes when he notices that his pants are on the couch, hating himself (impressed still) for how quickly Owen got his pants off, belt (clang!) falling to the not-so-clean ground.

Owen needs a maid. He resists the urge to clean up and looks around for his socks. He hunts for ten minutes before noticing that the sun is moments away from gliding across the sky and pulls his shoes on, wasting exactly thirty seconds to mourn Marks and Spencer wool socks. Gift from Tosh. Ages ago.

Owen never gives anything back. As if once something (someone) crosses his mockery of a threshold they’re his to keep, destroy, make….make. Cause to be. Filthy.

He pulls on his jacket, putting his tie in his pocket. He has to change this suit anyway, it’s a lost cause, a trip to the dry cleaners waiting to happen.

                                          *                 *                       *

He reaches the hub three hours later, hair still wet (mouth still tasting like cheap beer, Owen never had good taste).

Makes Jack’s coffee, leaves the paper on his desk. He doesn’t think Jack ever reads it. He doesn’t think Jack really needs to.

Owen staggers in three hours late, approaching the boundaries of what even he can get away with but all Jack does is raise his eyebrow and continue talking to Tosh.

He places a mug besides Owen’s elbow. Owen doesn’t look up.

Gwen is humming a tune and it isn’t long before Owen snaps at her, not long at all and sometimes he wonders at how utterly predictable Owen can be, is.

The only unpredictable thing he’s done this entire year is fuck Ianto. Even the stunt with the weevils wasn’t that astonishing, that strange.

Owen doesn’t hover on the precipice. He lives on it.

So maybe the fucking isn’t that predictable either.

He isn’t predictable. Cyberwoman in basement (Lisa, sweet Lisa, where did you go), bullet in arm, Jack.

He’s a constant surprise. If only you knew where to look.

Jack calls him to his office, shouting of course, as if the device stuck to their ears was there just for show. He doesn’t comment. Not a time for comm sex jokes. Really not, when his hair is still wet and his knee still hurts from the first time on the floor.

                                        *                     *                         *

The seventeenth time happens at the hub. Like the first. He’s ashamed even as Owen bites his necks and gropes him, panting, fire-engine in his ears and he’s faintly annoyed because sometimes Owen’s bitch-in-heat act is damned inconvenient and if he doesn’t get Jack his coffee soon he’s going to come looking down here for them.

It’s not as if at this point he particularly cares what Jack thinks. Owen’s fingers (mouth, tongue, cock, thumbs, teeth) are taking him apart splinter by splinter and Owen’s a quick learner, almost as good as Ianto, really and he has to grit his teeth to stop himself from making a sound.

Owen’s smirking of course. Prick.

He comes on the back end of a wail, unable to keep quiet. When he opens his eyes Owen’s licking his fingers. His knees tremble. Owen’s still hard.

Jack yells his name and Owen scowls, still hard in his too-old, too out of style jeans. He cleans himself up, thank God for the autopsy room and runs up the stairs, fingers light on the railing, ignoring Owen’s sputtering. He can’t help smirking.

Sometimes, this thing between them (self destructive, non-apologetic, crushing, bruising thing) is fun. Just a bit.

He makes Jack’s coffee and goes to his office, quick on the steps.

Jack is holding a hand out, frowning fiercely at report (white, bare with no emblem, never a good thing). He takes the cup and freezes, looking up.

“Everything all right, sir?”

Jack just stares for a moment, unseeing almost, frown gone now. He doesn’t speak and he’s about to repeat the question, when he nods his head, almost abrupt, almost angry. And goes back to his report.

He goes back down to the main floor, confused. Jack doesn’t know. And if he did, he wouldn’t care. He knows that, he’s sure of that.

Owen’s leaning against his desk at reception, swinging his car keys on one, long, white index finger.

They don’t speak. He uses his comm to tell Jack he’s leaving. Escaping. Gets a grunt in reply.

                                           *               *                     *

This is rare. Usually he fucks Owen. That’s their dynamic, that’s the way they like it. He takes Owen apart.

This is different though because he’s on top but it’s Owen’s cock inside him. Owen’s expression is the same, want marred by anger (loathing, he’s not the only one who hates what they’re doing). His hands clench on Owen’s shoulders and he really, really gets why Lisa enjoyed this so much. It’s good to have a man’s cock in your control, watch his mouth fall open and hands twist in sheets and know you can make it all stop. Now.

He grins in the dark, cruelly almost, Jack-like almost. Owen’s squeezing his name past his lips, still angry even though it’s eighteenth now, even number again and he should stop tonight.

He knows he won’t.

Owen doesn’t touch him because this is a game they play, exercise in patience (or revenge, glass empty, glass full.)

Sometimes he thinks that he and Owen were born in the half empty part of the world. It would explain a lot.

On the other hand it’s not really wise to get overly introspective about Doctor Owen Harper.

Owen’s cursing him now, he must be close and he can’t help but grin. Again.

Tonight he wins.

                                  *                     *                    *

The next day, when he returns with lunch, thai today, from a place that doesn’t deliver because of course Owen must have his revenge somewhere. Gwen doesn’t yell at him for being an ass so he figures they may actually be screwing again.

Owen knows where to find him if he needs him. He doesn’t give it too much thought.

When he returns Tosh won’t look at him and scurries off, something about not being hungry.

He goes up to Jack’s office, a trifle concerned. He can’t see Owen or Gwen anywhere.

He sees Owen sitting in Jack’s office, fingers tight on his knees. He tries not to think about what Owen did after he came (he does anyway, and there’s something almost transcendental about getting fucked with three fingers while being blown, something rather indescribably filthy about it taking place after being fucked with cock) and just raises an eyebrow at Jack, about to bow out if he isn’t needed.

Instead Jack waves him in.

It’s then that he notices the bottle of retcon on the table. Owen’s eyes are fixed there as well, feet drumming against the floor.

He always rather thought this would come after Lisa. He doesn’t get why it’s coming now, why he gets oblivion now. He bites his cheek to stop himself from speaking. If he comes off even a little desperate, Jack won’t listen to him.

He sits in the one empty chair left in the room.

Jack just stares at him for a moment. Before barking out a laugh and he can’t help but wince, cringe, shiver.  Jack didn’t kill him when he should have (could have, would have) but that doesn’t mean he isn’t terrified of him. Not after Mary. Not after the Camping Incident (He is hysterical often now. Without letting anyone see it of course. Quiet hysteria. Wonderful for the Torchwood agent. He should bottle and sell it.)

Jack’s moving around the office now, hands in pockets. Owen glares at him, as if this is somehow his fault, his error, his fall from grace.

He gives Owen a blank stare. Best way to piss the bastard off.

“You know Ianto, a month ago you came to me and asked me to allow you to retcon Owen.”

You both go still. So still.

“Can you imagine why?”

Stare at him. Stare. He can’t breathe for a minute. A month ago he woke up with time missing. Days, hours, holes in his recollections. Holes in his  life.

So did Owen. Migraines too.

He suspected retcon then. He knows it now.

Owen’s getting angry, he can feel it. He’s just waiting for him to connect the dots and decide who he’ll punch first and he doesn’t think he’ll fight back, he doesn’t because there’s the taste of strong, viscous bile.

And he’s done this. He knows it. Even before Jack starts talking.

                                   *               *                 *

He sits in the office even after Owen barges out, Jack doing nothing to stop him. Sits still. Jack is angry. And amused. And oddly sympathetic. He feels his stomach clench and knows he’ll have to move soon or else he’ll spew all over the floor and who is there to clean it up but him?

Jack would make him do it before the retcon. He knows he would.

“It’s a choice.” He looks up, not understanding, not seeing, not feeling. It was Ianto’s idea. This at least explains why Gwen keeps giving him strange looks when she thinks he isn’t paying attention.

They’re the ones who don’t pay attention. Not him.

He always knows. Except when he doesn’t.

“You can choose to take it. Try and forget. And maybe this time you won’t end up screwing him on the autopsy table.” He winces despite himself.

“Or you can not take it. Maybe it’ll go right this time.” The sympathy is bright in Jack’s eyes.

He doesn’t believe that anymore than Jack does. This, this isn’t healthy, it isn’t close to normal. It isn’t even, it’s not that one cares more and can strike a balance, it is what it is and he doesn’t think he wants it to continue, he’s sure it can’t.

“We can end it.”

Jack smiles. Sad almost. “You tried that already. It didn’t work.”

“But last time the team was involved. That’s already happened now, it can’t get worse. It’s not like he’s going to sleep with Gwen again and sleep with…” He stops, laughing almost hysterically because of course Owen has, of course he has and of course Gwen fell for it again, knowing, knowing.

People are just stupid sometimes.

Jack watches him, same smile, hands still in pockets. He thinks of his bed, which still smells like Owen. He thinks of the glass Owen broke a week ago. He thinks of the picture frame he threw against the wall (drunk, angry, helpless), he thinks of Lisa smiling up at him. He thinks, he thinks of wanting to kill Owen, strangle him, just hold him against the wall until he stops breathing.

And that was just last Friday.

He picks up the bottle and puts it in his pocket.

When he leaves the hub, walking to the car in the cool night air, he knows Jack will have a cup of coffee ready for him in the morning. And if that doesn’t work (and it won’t, he’s insane, but not stupid) there will be a glass of water, a beer, a glass left unattended at a restaurant. He’ll get Gwen to do it, he’ll get Tosh to do it.

He won’t remember any of it.

The fact is, a fact Jack knows, a fact Jack has considered and filed and written in blue ink, that nothing will change.

He wonders how long it’ll be before Jack realizes he has to let one of them go. Jack’s always been bad at that, even when it came to those he hates. He can’t let go once he’s made them his.

He wonders which one of them Jack will choose in the end.

In the end, it’s not really a choice. Just what has to be done. Owen doesn’t fight it that hard.

The drive back is very long and very quiet.