Not in Cardiff [Open]
It had only been a few weeks since Ianto had moved into Tosh's place on the team, putting his computer and technological knowledge from Canary Warf to use. While he knew he wasn't nearly as brilliant as Tosh had been, he was doing everything that he could to bring some semblance of normalcy back to the Hub after her and Owen's deaths.
It didn't take too long before he had thrown himself into spending most of his time pushing himself harder, working to the brink of exhaustion, doing all those little essential tasks that did, in the end, help them, but nothing that he felt anyone else in Torchwood had the inclination nor need to attend to.
Keeping busy. That had always been his way of soothing himself to the point where he wouldn't have the chance to refine thoughts abandoned for lack of time to examine them. Every thought in his head, every emotion in his heart, shoved far enough aside so they would all seem to fade away, or be placed in the cushioned box of distant memory, where they could lose their bite.
It was further evidence of his unhealthy manner of dealing with grief, which had soon resulted in a predictable firming of the unemotional walls around him. But it kept him from dwelling; the Rift was still discharging all manner of weird and wonderful backwash, so most days he barely had time to breathe, let alone talk.
This night was no different, when a call he'd intercepted on the local constabulary's radio wavelength detailed all the traits of a man attacked by a Weevil. He didn't tell Jack and Gwen about it; he didn't want them worrying more than they had to, and certainly not about him and what looked to be an everyday cover-up operation. After slinging on his overcoat, grabbing up a can of Weevil spray - just in case - and tucking his handgun into his belt, it wasn't long before he was running down Bute Street in pursuit of the vicious scavenger.
He moved swiftly, comfortable in the darkness. Night was when he did most of his work, and there were some things that just couldn't be dealt with by the light of day. It was when he was approaching a corner that, in a moment, the change was instantaneous, a case of blink-and-he'd-missed-it.
Stepping aside sharply to avoid a wall that suddenly seemed to be there, Ianto fell back hard and cursed under his breath, curling onto his side to let the pain in his tail-bone subside. Only then to realise that his handgun was digging into his hip something terrible. This was the Jones luck surely; from surprise to in pain, to the strange comfort of it potentially only getting worse, but at least he wasn't-
... What was going on?
Ianto ignored the ache in his bones and hauled himself up from the pavement, dusting off his suit trousers while looking around in low lighting. A faint breeze stirred the strands across his forehead, and he was very, very sure those cars hadn't been there only moments earlier. Instinctual apprehension gripped at him when he stared down the narrow street flanked on both sides by unfamiliar tall buildings, and realised his surroundings were completely new. The feeling lodged something fist-sized in his throat.
His hand reflexively went to his earpiece, "Jack?", but not even static answered him.
There was a strange taste in the air that Ianto noticed when his fingers rapidly moved to the dial at the back of the comm piece, hoping to increase the frequency enough to get a message out while he looked around the skyline to try to get a sense of his new bearings.
Haste made his hands quick as it took him three tries to realise the signal wasn't going to work. He moved to settle with his back against the wall, pulling his earpiece off with a snap, and began to pull the casing open to prod at the inner workings of the standard issue communicator in order for him to suss out the problem. After all, it was a far better thought to consider it was just a technical malfunction than the more terrifying aspect that he was seriously lost in time and space due to the ever-changing whims of the Rift.