Soledad's Journal

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 14+, just to be on the safe side.
Genre: Romance/Angst, for this part. Plus some dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Greeks Bearing Gifts". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 07 – GIFT HORSES, Part 5

Author’s notes: Continued from Part 2. Obviously.
This story will be posted in several short parts rather than in one big chunk, as it serves better the development of the relationship(s).

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
It took the doctor about twenty minutes to clean up the autopsy bay and join Andy at his own computer. He didn’t look any less efficient without the white lab coat, wearing a leather jacket. He sat down, flashing on the skeleton’s digital image, and started a search of his own, having the compute: checks Cardiff A&E for cases between 2000 and 2002... presumably from the time when he worked there, or so Andy guessed. Lots of names scrolled by in alphabetical order with numbers after them.

By that time, Andy was well into his own research program, trying to pick out all unsolved murder cases with unexplained chest traumata, as far back as there were any police records available.

“Jesus,” Owen breathed, seeing the amount of records scroll by on both screens. “You better call in, mate; we’re gonna be here for days!”

“I already have,” Andy replied; thanks to Toshiko’s bravery earlier on that day, Inspector Henderson was still in a magnanimous mode and allowed him to help out the Torchwood team. “I’m glad the records are digitally stored, at least. Imagine leafing through this amount of paper folders in some dusty archive.”

“That would be a job for Teaboy,” Owen commented.

“Actually,” Ianto said dryly, placing a mug of coffee in front of each one,” my archives are digitalized, too. At least the case files are. It’s the bloody artefacts that need to be dug out manually every time.”

Owen gave the coffee mugs a suspicious look, noticing that the liquid in them hadn’t the same colour or texture.

“Since when do you know how PC Andy drinks his coffee?” he asked, almost accusingly.

Ianto shrugged. “Since Gwen started dragging him in whenever she needs something from the police. It’s called eidetic memory; I’m sure they mentioned it to you at medical school.”

He gave them a bland smile and glided out of the room elegantly, as if he’d been wearing skates. Owen glared at his retreating back with a scowl.
( Read more... )
~TBC~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 14+, just to be on the safe side.
Genre: Romance/Angst, for this part. Plus some dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Greeks Bearing Gifts". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 07 – GIFT HORSES, Part 3

Author’s notes: Continued from Part 2. Obviously.
This story will be posted in several short parts rather than in one big chunk, as it serves better the development of the relationship(s).
The Mermaid’s Dream is not a really existing pub.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
On the next two evenings Andy didn’t go to his favourite pub. Somehow he knew Toshiko wouldn’t be there; she’d gone all deer-in-the-headlights when that Mary character walked in and seemed to forget everything else. Perhaps she’d been serious, saying that she’d try her luck with girls for a change. Or perhaps that Mary person was doing some hypnotic mumbo-jumbo on her. Perhaps that pendant he’d seen her wearing for a short while had something to do with it.

Andy had Yvonne run a search on a Mary; age: late twenties or early thirties, slim, blonde, smoking a lot. He had Yvonne look for frauds matching that description cos he was certain that she had to be some sort of swindler. The search brought up forty-seven possible matches. He read their files after work, every single one of them; studied the pictures that came with the files. Toshiko’s Mary wasn’t among them.

On the second day he asked Yvonne to extend the search to all known blonde female frauds of the approximately same age, regardless of the name. The extended search brought up a hundred and thirty-eight other possible suspects. Andy got their files, too, read them and checked their photos. Again, Toshiko’s Mary wasn’t among them.

“What are you looking for anyway?” Desk Sergeant Bronowski asked, seeing him buried in old files. “Who’s this chick you try to find?”

“I’m not sure,” Andy replied slowly. “She’s been cruising around someone I happen to know, and I’m a tad worried.”
( Read more... )
~TBC~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 14+, just to be on the safe side.
Genre: Romance/Angst, for this part. Plus some dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Greeks Bearing Gifts". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 07 – GIFT HORSES, Part 1

Author’s notes:
Again, this one turned out very differently from my original intention, but I’m quite pleased with it.
The title comes from the saying we have in Hungarian. “Never look a gift horse into the mouth”. I don’t know if it exists in English or not; it means one shouldn’t criticize that which one gets for free.
This story will be posted in several short parts rather than in one big chunk, as it serves better the development of the relationship(s).


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Sometimes Police Constable Andy Davidson thought he was cursed to run into Gwen Cooper every other week – and that related to work, too. When she’d left the police to join Torchwood, he’d been so relieved he nearly burst out in tears. Getting a new, reliable and sane partner meant that he’d be able to try for Desk Sergeant, soon, perhaps even fro Detective, one day. That was his long-term goal for which he’d been working in all his duty years. Without all the team reprimands earned due to Gwen’s stupidity and her blatant disregard of every rule that was ever written, now he might get the chance to make that long-nursed dream reality.

Admittedly, he’d been quite surprised that she got accepted. Andy knew more about Torchwood than most people in Cardiff. Not nearly enough to get more than a very vague idea about what exactly they were doing, but enough to know that it was a high-risk job that required skills, competence and discretion. Things that Gwen Cooper never had and would never develop, even if she lived a thousand years.

If anyone, he knew that. He’d suffered from her incompetence and clumsiness for years. Thankfully, though, that wasn’t his burden to bear any longer. Or it wouldn’t be, hadn’t he run into her and her new team-mates with alarming regularity.
( Read more... )
~TBC~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 18+, for really disturbing images.
Genre: Horror/Angst, for this part. No humour in this one.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Countrycide". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 06 – BIG BARBECUE ON THE COUNTRYSIDE, Part 2

Author’s note: Continued from Part 01. Obviously.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
He was halfway out of the building when he heard the shot. Putting the samples in his kit, he grabbed his gun and ran out of the house. Across the small alley between the two buildings, he could see Jack waving at him frantically from a half-opened door. Gwen was lying in the dirt, clutching her side, her eyes glassy with pain.

“What happened?” Owen asked, grabbing his kit and running over to them.

“Some kid hit her with a shotgun,” Jack replied grimly. “I told her to stay behind, but there was no way holding her back.”

Of course there wasn’t – she was Gwen-bloody-Cooper, after all.
( Read more... )
~TBC~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 14+, just to be on the safe side.
Genre: Angst/Romance, for this part. Plus some dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Small Worlds". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 05 – SMALL BRAINS, Part 2

Author’s notes:
Directly continued from Part 1. Obviously. Ianto and Lisa’s past is entirely my invention.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
It was near midnight when they finally reached Estelle’s home. Jack pulled up the SUV in the front with screeching tyres and slammed down on the brake. Leaving it to Gwen to park the car properly, he got out and ran up the front walk, pounding on the front door with both fists.

“Estelle! Estelle!” There was no answer from within, and the door was locked. He gave up and ran around the side of the house. “Estelle!”

He found her in the garden, lying on her face on the ground, dead. He didn’t dare to get any closer, out of fear that he’d break down spectacularly in front of the entire team. He made a vague gesture in Owen’s direction, who seemed to understand its meaning because he came forth to check on Estelle.

“Looks like she died from drowning,” he murmured, clearly stunned. “The rest of the garden's dry as a bone.”

Jack nodded, the numbness that had been spreading in his heart with every loss of a loved one in his unnaturally long life growing another inch. Sometimes he wondered how long it would take till his heart turned to stone entirely.
( Read more... )
~The End – for now~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: This chapter is rated 18+, for bloody violence. You know my opinion about it by now, right?
Genre: Drama, Horror. No humour in this one.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Cyberwoman". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 04 – CYBERWOMAN RELOADED

Author’s note:
Again, this is a very different approach than the previous ones. I don’t know why these parts write themselves so differently, but here you are.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
TAKE ONE – UPGRADED

Down in the storeroom Gwen was facing off the Cyberwoman who walked around her and to the side with the regal posture of the funeral statues of an Egyptian pharaoh. She – it was beautiful and frightening and absolutely repulsive at the same time something beyond human weakness… beyond understanding, compassion, need, love… beyond everything that would make a once human being at least humane.

Gwen pointed her gun at the slowly moving figure with a trembling hand.
( Read more... )
TAKE TWO – CONNECTED

Gwen and Owen were kissing passionately in the morgue cabinet. Deadly peril usually made Owen horny; so horny that he didn’t even care who the woman was he snogged – it might be the last time, after all, and when she was willing, which she very obviously was, why should he miss the opportunity?
( Read more... )
~The End – for now~

Note: I originally planned this as a three-parter, but I run out of ideas for the time being. I might add the third part later.

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: This particular chapter is rated 16+, for violence. Personally, I find it a lot more harmful for young readers than moderate sex scenes..
Genre: Drama, I'd say. Plus a lot of dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: "Day One". Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 02 – DAY ONE? NO, DAY ZERO! - Part 3

Author’s note: Continued from Part 2.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Whatever Ianto might have slipped their boss, it worked. In the middle of dinner, Jack suddenly left for the bathroom. As soon as he was out of hearing range, the others all turned their attention to Gwen.

“So what's he told you?” Owen asked.

Gwen blinked in confusion. “What about?”

“Himself!” Toshiko said. “Come on, the two of you are together all the time, talking, sharing… Surely he’s told you something?”

Gwen frowned. “You've been here longer than I have.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t talk to us the way he talks to you,” Toshiko said. +We were banking on you! You’re his new prize pupil, his confidante.” She bit the inside of her face to suppress a hysterical giggle, seeing that Gwen actually believed it.

“You're a copper, trained to ask questions,” Owen added, and Toshiko almost fell off her seat, because they’d all seen just half an hour earlier how good Gwen was at interrogating a suspect. Well, all but Ianto, that is, but Owen had recorded it for him.
( Read more... )
~The End – for now~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: 14+, for this chapter. Just to be on the safe side.
Genre: Drama, I'd say. Plus a lot of dark humour.
Series: Wishverse.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: All along both Series One and Two. Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 02 – DAY ONE? NO, DAY ZERO! - Part 1

Author’s note: This episode turned out too long, so I broke it into parts. LJ does have its limits.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Toshiko Sato had been one unhappy woman since the day Gwen Cooper had joined Torchwood Three. And it wasn’t simply because she missed Suzie – although she did. When she’d come to Torchwood, Suzie had been a funny, brilliant, sharp-witted woman with whom to work had been a delight a well as a great adventure.

And it hadn’t been all work and no fun, either. Often, the two of them had gone out together, late after work, and even though it had always been Suzie who got picked up in pubs or bars or discos, Toshiko had enjoyed very much that there was something else than Torchwood and its often terrifying secrets nonetheless.

Until the job had finally broken Suzie. Until she’d developed an obsession for “getting inside” the alien tech, as she’d called it, shortly before taking her own life. Until she’d surrendered to it completely, became part of it, so much that not even the perception filter would work on her.

Until she’d started murdering people, just so that she could test the resurrection glove, trying to extend the limits of its working. Until she’d become completely mad. Broken by Torchwood, for good.
( Read more... )
~Part 2~

Title: The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper
Author: Soledad

Fandom: Torchwood
Category: Heavy-duty Gwen bashing.
Rating: Teens, mostly. If not, additionally given.
Genre: Take your pick. It’s different with each part.
Series: If Wishes Were Horses aka The Many Departures of Gwen Cooper, called the Wishverse, just to make it short.
Warning: repeated character death(s) in each chapter.
Timeframe: All along both Series One and Two. Major spoilers. This is an AU, though.
Summary: Many different ways to get rid of Gwen Cooper, while keeping the episodes as canonical as possible.

Disclaimer: the usual: don’t own, don’t sue! Everything belongs to RTD and BBC. I used a great deal of rewritten original dialogue, though. The additional dialogue in the bar between Jack and Andy uses lines from the deleted scenes, my thanks to beccaelizabeth.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
EPISODE 01 – NOTHING CHANGES, TAKE ONE

Author’s notes:
To certain episodes, there are two or more different versions. The pilot is one of those.
This particular chapter is rated 16+, for bloody violence. Personally, I find it a lot more harmful for young readers than moderate sex scenes.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Police Constable Andy Davidson was not a religious man. At least, he didn’t go to church, unless him mother came to visit and dragged him there. However, he firmly believed in karma. He believed that one’s deeds had consequences, and one had to live with those consequences, whether one liked it or not.

And so he accepted the fact that having walk the beat with Gwen Cooper, of all people, was the well-earned punishment for that moment of weakness (or insanity) two years ago. For the fact that – after a particularly stressful day – he’d kept comforting Gwen Cooper till they’d ended up shagging like bunnies in the police station’s broom closet. Speak about horrible clichés.
( Read more... )
~The End – for now~