Title: A Little More Time
Author: halfspokenwords
Pairings: Suzie, Ianto, briefly Owen
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,615
Prompt: (for skidmo_fic's lyric challenge) She'll find strength in her anger, and the truth in his lies / When the last scar finally fades, she'll have a new life (SR-17, "Alive")
Summary: All she's asking is for a little more time. Missing scene from 1x08.
Note: This is something of a tentative foray into Suzie-territory, so if it doesn't seem to get inside her head, it's because I'm still figuring her out.

***

The room persisted in swimming for several minutes after she came to. She was alone except for Owen, and he seemed to be preparing to leave her as well. Look at Suzie, his eyes seemed to say: she can't even kill herself right.

She swallowed twice before she realized that she shouldn't have been able to at all. She couldn't feel the hole the bullet had cut through her throat, but she knew it was there. "I should be dead." It was a groan, the words nearly unintelligible, but he seemed to understand despite that.

"No argument here," said Owen, shoving some folded-up scrubs in her direction. "Put these on." He stopped, looked at her, and wiped both of hands on his lab coat, as if touching her flesh, checking her pulse, had contaminated him. After a pause in which it looked as if he was attempting to think of something appropriate to say, he turned on his heels and left in silence.

She was alone. It figured--they brought her back to life just to leave her cold and alone, undressed and spread out on a morgue table. It wasn't long before she willed herself to try getting dressed, and attempted to pull herself into a sitting position. Quickly, she found that everything felt wrong. Cold. Heavy. Her fingers didn't quite work correctly; every sensation was dulled.

She managed to turn herself sideways, but that was all. She couldn't hold back a curse as she fell back onto the cold table, her shoulder hitting it with a solid, fleshy thud. It was beginning to seem like a lost cause-- she'd have to swallow her pride, wait for one of them to come back and take pity on her, and who knew how long that would be-- when she became aware of movement at the corner of her eye. "Who's there?" she managed to ask, the venom seeping into her voice despite the slur. "Are you enjoying this?"

"I'll help you," he said, quietly, instead of answering. It was Ianto, one hand gripping his gun, although as he descended the autopsy bay stairs it became obvious that his finger wasn't anywhere near the trigger.

Dryly, she laughed-- then coughed, as something unfamiliar caught in her throat. She wondered briefly about shrapnel.

"Here." And he must have come the rest of the way with his usual stealth and swiftness, because suddenly there was Ianto, easing her into a sitting position, one arm supporting her dead shoulders. "You probably shouldn't be trying to do this just yet," he added, but she noticed he made no move to lay her down again. Instead, he straightened her, then reached for the scrubs with one hand as he held her steady with the other.

She almost snapped "You try being the one dressed for the morgue," but in the end that asked too much of the energy she didn't have.

One-handedly, Ianto began to unfold the dark blue trousers. Once he had them ready, he a spared her a rather thoughtful look. "Here," he said again, meaninglessly, as he stayed against her for support. "Can you hold yourself there a moment?"

When she tried to nod, her head lolled forward; the nod become a grimace became a sneer. But despite that, she did succeed in propping herself up with her left arm. Her right remained almost dead weight, hanging slack by her side, wrist against the edge of the table.

Ianto moved quickly, and soon he was tugging the scrubs up past her ankles, past her knees. He stopped at her thighs, not quite awkwardly. "Care to help?"

Between the two of them, Ianto supporting her weight first on one side and then the other, soon he was very conscientiously tying the drawstring loosely around her hips. "Fully dressed," she said finally. "The Captain won't be happy."

Ianto smiled. It was pale and fleeting, but it was a smile. "I'll have to--" He motioned widely to her upper body, then stopped and waited for permission to get nearer. Always the gentleman, Ianto.

"Go on, then," she muttered tiredly. "I have no shame. I'm sure you've seen it all already."

It was almost-- almost-- worrying, the way he didn't answer.

When he began to unfasten her gown, there was something purely clinical about it. No surprise there. "Why are you doing this?" she asked, though she knew full well already-- he was doing this because no one else would. That was Ianto's job, or that's what it had become.

"Someone has to." Well, that confirmed all of her suspicions. "And besides," he went on after a pause, softly and to her surprise, "I don't mind."

In an unexpected surge of curiosity and something not unlike surprise, she probed: "Why?"

Ianto hesitated, his eyes momentarily distant. It passed quickly, with that disconcerting habit he had of hiding himself away-- and to that she could relate; once he pulled his gaze back to hers, he gave a little, jerky shrug. "I've looked after the ill before."

"I'm not ill." She leaned heavily against Ianto's trunk as he maneuvered one of her arms into a sleeve. He was so warm-- so warm, because that's what it meant to be alive. "I'm dead."

"You're not," he answered quickly, definitively, pausing to look down at her as though it mattered that she knew she wasn't, and to hold her before moving on to the second sleeve. He looked thoughtful, almost-- haunted. "You're not really, are you? You're here talking to me, and that's as good a criteria as any."

As he helped her into the rest of her shirt, she felt the displacement of air-- against her throat, where it tickled the ragged edges of flesh in a thoroughly unpleasant way. She shuddered and, immediately, Ianto went still. "Did I hurt you?"

"No," she snorted. "No. Not a lot you could do, is there?"

"Suzie," he said softly, a soft reproach. The single word was followed by a silence in which Ianto hitched up his trousers and knelt down with a pair of thick woolen socks.

Finally, she couldn't hold it back any longer. Looking around, at the reception she'd had, it was obvious she didn't have to ask. "Did any of you even miss me? You have Gwen Cooper, Torchwood agent extraordinaire, now."

She didn't expect a reply, and so almost wasn't paying attention when one came. He kept his eyes on her feet even once he was done, and finally said, "I did."

She bit back the denial, because of all of them Ianto was the one she doubted deserved it, and went instead for a too-sharp "Oh, I'm honored."

He either didn't mind the slight or didn't notice it. She suspected the former; very few things escaped his notice, though as she remembered with something like bitterness and something like relish, she'd been one of those in the past. "There. Now, I've brought you a wheelchair," he said, shifting the topic again to something more palatable, as he stood and wiped some nonexistent dust from his trousers. "Took it out of storage since it seemed you could use it. Won't do you much good down here, sadly. Shall I offer to carry you?"

"What, over the threshold?" She didn't move, just let her body hang still as she spoke. She tried to imagine that; but it was all too romance-heroine and she just couldn't manage. "Why, Ianto," she remarked when he raised an eyebrow in lieu of a proper answer, "I didn't know you cared."

"Up the stairs." He knew the clarification was unnecessary, as was the fact that he turned to again consider the stairs that led to the main area of the Hub. In the end, he didn't wait for an answer and put one arm around her waist, slid one beneath her knees. "Just lean against me."

When she did, Ianto took it as assent. He seemed to know, at any rate, that it was all he was going to get.

At the top was a wheelchair, just as he'd promised. It was metal, looked uncomfortable, but of course that was fine by her. Comfort wasn't exactly on her mind. He deposited her in it as carefully as he could, then took some time to fuss, to re-arrange her in the seat, to straighten the shirt which had twisted around with all the movement. That done, he stepped back to her side.

"I'm lucky, aren't I," she mused, reaching up to probe ungently at the wound, "that suicides don't need to be autopsied. Don't think I'd want to live forever with a Y-incision."

When her fingers came away gummy but not bloody, she looked between them and Ianto. To his credit, he hadn't turned green yet-- though he was very pointedly keeping his gaze anywhere but on the back of her head. "Jack will be over in a few moments," he offered, his tone one of forced calm, reassuring as always. "While you're doing that, I'll see if I can't find you a headscarf."

It took a moment, but she finally forced her lips into a smile. "Thank you."

He nodded. "And a sweater?" For a moment, a tiny, almost imperceptible moment, his hand came down to rest at the curve of her neck. His fingers twitched, as if they didn't know what they were supposed to do once there. It wasn't usual--Ianto wasn't particularly tactile-- and for those few seconds she had the distinct impression that he was convincing himself once again that she was real.

Then the hand was gone, safely confined in a trouser pocket.

"Yes," she said, and let her head fall to rest against her shoulder.

***