Fic: So Many Things To Do And See
Title: So Many Things To Do And See
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Ianto, Jack.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1361
Spoilers: Set in my Ghost of a Chance ‘Verse.
Summary: Even with the whole universe and all of time to play with, Jack and Ianto will never run out of things to see.
Written For: Weekend Challenge Prompt: Bucket List 500, using “Visiting an active volcano, Eating 10 things you never ate before, & Growing old healthily at 1_million_words.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
After Ianto’s death at the hands, or appendages, whatever they had, of the 456, Jack had packed up most of his lover’s life and taken it with him when he’d left earth, there being a lot of things amongst Ianto’s personal effects that he suspected Ianto’s family might be better off not knowing about.
After that, he’d embarked on a decades-long quest to find a way of bringing Ianto back to life. He hadn’t been certain Ianto would want that, but he’d done it anyway, out of guilt, grief, and the unshakeable belief that he owed his lover more than an early death that could have been avoided if he’d only stopped to think things through. Besides, he’d promised more than once that someday he’d show Ianto the wonders of the universe, and he couldn’t keep that promise if his lover was dead.
So here they were, together again, heading out into space. While Jack was otherwise engaged with flying the ship, he’d left Ianto filling in the time by unpacking his life; it was a big job. Jack had more or less shoved everything Ianto owned into boxes, after arranging for a few carefully chosen mementos to be delivered to Ianto’s sister and her family. He’d probably packed a lot of stuff that Ianto wouldn’t have any use for, but there really hadn’t been time to go through everything and sort it out, and anyway, he’d been worried that he might accidentally throw away something that mattered. What looked like a pile of junk to one person might have great sentimental value to the person it belonged to. It should be left to Ianto to decide what he wanted to keep and what should be consigned to the first recycling plant they came across.
With his cargo ship set on course and travelling through the vortex, Jack left the navigation computers handling everything and made his way to the smallest of the cargo holds, where he’d stowed his lover’s belongings.
“How’s it going?” he asked, stepping through the hatch to find Ianto sitting cross-legged on a large cushion from their cabin, the contents of one of the boxes scattered around him.
“Strange,” Ianto replied. “I had no idea there’d be so much stuff. I’m finding things I’d forgotten I even had.”
“Ah, well, I cleared everything out of your storage unit too.” Ianto had bunged a bunch of stuff in storage when he’d returned to Cardiff following the Canary Wharf debacle.
Ianto chuckled. “That would explain some of this.” Ianto waved a slim notebook at Jack. “I shoved a load of bits and pieces from my childhood in there after mum passed away. Can’t believe I kept this!”
“What is it?”
“Sort of a bucket list, I wrote it when I was… I dunno, fifteen or sixteen I suppose. Before I went to London, anyway. First thing on the list is ‘Leave home and start over, go somewhere nobody knows me. London, maybe.’ Guess I can tick that one off.”
Jack grinned, sitting down beside his lover. “What else is on there?”
“See for yourself.”
Ianto handed Jack the notebook, and Jack flipped quickly through the pages.
“It’s a long list.”
“Yeah, well, you know me, I like to be thorough.” Ianto sounded amused. “Plus, I had all sorts of weird ambitions back then.”
“So I can see. Says here you wanted to visit an active volcano?”
“I was a teenager, it sounded like a cool thing to do.” Ianto shrugged. “Pretty sure it’s not the weirdest thing on the list.”
“Maybe not, but it’s one we could do, if you still want to. Earth isn’t the only planet with active volcanos. Some planets even do guided tours of them, tourist safety guaranteed.”
“Seriously?”
“Humans aren’t the only people with a craving for adventure. Y’know, we could start our own list of things we want to do, places we want to see.”
Ianto chuckled. “I suspect that would be an even longer list than mine.”
“Oh, it would be, no doubt of that.” Jack’s grin widened. “It’s a big universe. You have no idea what’s out here, so many places to go, things to see and do, and I want to show you all of them!”
“And I want to see it all, or as much as we can fit in.”
“We can do a few of the things on your list too. How about this one? ‘Eat ten things you never ate before’. That should be easy enough, dining out on an alien planet. You could probably eat ten new things just in one meal. You might think earth food is varied, but that’s nothing compared to what you can get out here.”
“Something to look forward to.”
“A great many things to look forward to,” Jack corrected. “You’re going to see, taste, and experience things you’ve never imagined in your wildest dreams. This will be the greatest adventure of your life!”
Jack wasn’t wrong about that. As the months passed, despite everything they crossed off their list, it just got longer and longer. ‘Eat ten things you never ate before’ became ‘Eat a hundred things you never ate before’, and then Ianto had to add another zero, because every world they visited had its own local delicacies, some of which were delicious, and others that proved less appealing to a human palate.
They toured three different volcanoes, on three different planets, one of which was barely two feet tall and erupted like clockwork every five and a half planetary rotations. It was like something built for a school science project, yet it was totally natural. Ianto thought it was cute, like a pet volcano. Given enough time, it would eventually get much bigger, but that would no doubt take millions of years.
Months passed, Ianto died tragically, and then came back to life, just the way Jack always did. Until that moment, he and Jack had been living their life as if they only had a finite time together, and were determined to pack as much into that time as possible, but suddenly it seemed that the last item on his original bucket list, namely growing old healthily, was no longer going to be an issue, since if he did ever grow old in the traditional sense, with grey hair and wrinkles, it wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
That didn’t stop them making the most of their time together though. There was still a whole universe to explore, billions of inhabited planets and almost as many that had yet to be discovered and settled. Even with eternity ahead of them, it wouldn’t be easy to fit everything in; they’d only explored a tiny percentage of their own galaxy so far, and there were countless other galaxies out there.
Ianto ticked another item off their list, having just tried sand-surfing with Jack, an exhilarating sport that involved riding the crests of ever-moving sand dunes using craft very similar to sailboards.
“How many things left on the list now?” Jack asked, leaning over his lover’s shoulder, trying to look at the small computer tablet they’d installed the portable version of their list on.
“Four million seventy-seven thousand nine hundred and thirty-two,” Ianto replied. “Should keep us busy for a few more years.”
“In a few more years, the list will probably be twice as long.”
“Perhaps, but at least we can say with complete honesty that we always have something to do. Where to next?”
“Well, we have cargo to drop off at Betrrandore, so while we’re in the vicinity we could hop over to Trulpha and visit the Whistling Tower.”
“Is that the one that’s supposed to have perfect pitch?”
“Yep. So perfect, nothing made of glass can get within ten miles of it without shattering. Of course, people keep testing that, so the ground around the tower is littered with broken glass.”
“I’d better wear my heavy boots and leave my sunglasses in the ship then.”
Jack settled next to the man he loved, draping one arm around Ianto’s shoulders. “That would probably be wise.”
They had forever, and they were determined not to miss a thing.
The End
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Ianto, Jack.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1361
Spoilers: Set in my Ghost of a Chance ‘Verse.
Summary: Even with the whole universe and all of time to play with, Jack and Ianto will never run out of things to see.
Written For: Weekend Challenge Prompt: Bucket List 500, using “Visiting an active volcano, Eating 10 things you never ate before, & Growing old healthily at 1_million_words.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
After Ianto’s death at the hands, or appendages, whatever they had, of the 456, Jack had packed up most of his lover’s life and taken it with him when he’d left earth, there being a lot of things amongst Ianto’s personal effects that he suspected Ianto’s family might be better off not knowing about.
After that, he’d embarked on a decades-long quest to find a way of bringing Ianto back to life. He hadn’t been certain Ianto would want that, but he’d done it anyway, out of guilt, grief, and the unshakeable belief that he owed his lover more than an early death that could have been avoided if he’d only stopped to think things through. Besides, he’d promised more than once that someday he’d show Ianto the wonders of the universe, and he couldn’t keep that promise if his lover was dead.
So here they were, together again, heading out into space. While Jack was otherwise engaged with flying the ship, he’d left Ianto filling in the time by unpacking his life; it was a big job. Jack had more or less shoved everything Ianto owned into boxes, after arranging for a few carefully chosen mementos to be delivered to Ianto’s sister and her family. He’d probably packed a lot of stuff that Ianto wouldn’t have any use for, but there really hadn’t been time to go through everything and sort it out, and anyway, he’d been worried that he might accidentally throw away something that mattered. What looked like a pile of junk to one person might have great sentimental value to the person it belonged to. It should be left to Ianto to decide what he wanted to keep and what should be consigned to the first recycling plant they came across.
With his cargo ship set on course and travelling through the vortex, Jack left the navigation computers handling everything and made his way to the smallest of the cargo holds, where he’d stowed his lover’s belongings.
“How’s it going?” he asked, stepping through the hatch to find Ianto sitting cross-legged on a large cushion from their cabin, the contents of one of the boxes scattered around him.
“Strange,” Ianto replied. “I had no idea there’d be so much stuff. I’m finding things I’d forgotten I even had.”
“Ah, well, I cleared everything out of your storage unit too.” Ianto had bunged a bunch of stuff in storage when he’d returned to Cardiff following the Canary Wharf debacle.
Ianto chuckled. “That would explain some of this.” Ianto waved a slim notebook at Jack. “I shoved a load of bits and pieces from my childhood in there after mum passed away. Can’t believe I kept this!”
“What is it?”
“Sort of a bucket list, I wrote it when I was… I dunno, fifteen or sixteen I suppose. Before I went to London, anyway. First thing on the list is ‘Leave home and start over, go somewhere nobody knows me. London, maybe.’ Guess I can tick that one off.”
Jack grinned, sitting down beside his lover. “What else is on there?”
“See for yourself.”
Ianto handed Jack the notebook, and Jack flipped quickly through the pages.
“It’s a long list.”
“Yeah, well, you know me, I like to be thorough.” Ianto sounded amused. “Plus, I had all sorts of weird ambitions back then.”
“So I can see. Says here you wanted to visit an active volcano?”
“I was a teenager, it sounded like a cool thing to do.” Ianto shrugged. “Pretty sure it’s not the weirdest thing on the list.”
“Maybe not, but it’s one we could do, if you still want to. Earth isn’t the only planet with active volcanos. Some planets even do guided tours of them, tourist safety guaranteed.”
“Seriously?”
“Humans aren’t the only people with a craving for adventure. Y’know, we could start our own list of things we want to do, places we want to see.”
Ianto chuckled. “I suspect that would be an even longer list than mine.”
“Oh, it would be, no doubt of that.” Jack’s grin widened. “It’s a big universe. You have no idea what’s out here, so many places to go, things to see and do, and I want to show you all of them!”
“And I want to see it all, or as much as we can fit in.”
“We can do a few of the things on your list too. How about this one? ‘Eat ten things you never ate before’. That should be easy enough, dining out on an alien planet. You could probably eat ten new things just in one meal. You might think earth food is varied, but that’s nothing compared to what you can get out here.”
“Something to look forward to.”
“A great many things to look forward to,” Jack corrected. “You’re going to see, taste, and experience things you’ve never imagined in your wildest dreams. This will be the greatest adventure of your life!”
Jack wasn’t wrong about that. As the months passed, despite everything they crossed off their list, it just got longer and longer. ‘Eat ten things you never ate before’ became ‘Eat a hundred things you never ate before’, and then Ianto had to add another zero, because every world they visited had its own local delicacies, some of which were delicious, and others that proved less appealing to a human palate.
They toured three different volcanoes, on three different planets, one of which was barely two feet tall and erupted like clockwork every five and a half planetary rotations. It was like something built for a school science project, yet it was totally natural. Ianto thought it was cute, like a pet volcano. Given enough time, it would eventually get much bigger, but that would no doubt take millions of years.
Months passed, Ianto died tragically, and then came back to life, just the way Jack always did. Until that moment, he and Jack had been living their life as if they only had a finite time together, and were determined to pack as much into that time as possible, but suddenly it seemed that the last item on his original bucket list, namely growing old healthily, was no longer going to be an issue, since if he did ever grow old in the traditional sense, with grey hair and wrinkles, it wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
That didn’t stop them making the most of their time together though. There was still a whole universe to explore, billions of inhabited planets and almost as many that had yet to be discovered and settled. Even with eternity ahead of them, it wouldn’t be easy to fit everything in; they’d only explored a tiny percentage of their own galaxy so far, and there were countless other galaxies out there.
Ianto ticked another item off their list, having just tried sand-surfing with Jack, an exhilarating sport that involved riding the crests of ever-moving sand dunes using craft very similar to sailboards.
“How many things left on the list now?” Jack asked, leaning over his lover’s shoulder, trying to look at the small computer tablet they’d installed the portable version of their list on.
“Four million seventy-seven thousand nine hundred and thirty-two,” Ianto replied. “Should keep us busy for a few more years.”
“In a few more years, the list will probably be twice as long.”
“Perhaps, but at least we can say with complete honesty that we always have something to do. Where to next?”
“Well, we have cargo to drop off at Betrrandore, so while we’re in the vicinity we could hop over to Trulpha and visit the Whistling Tower.”
“Is that the one that’s supposed to have perfect pitch?”
“Yep. So perfect, nothing made of glass can get within ten miles of it without shattering. Of course, people keep testing that, so the ground around the tower is littered with broken glass.”
“I’d better wear my heavy boots and leave my sunglasses in the ship then.”
Jack settled next to the man he loved, draping one arm around Ianto’s shoulders. “That would probably be wise.”
They had forever, and they were determined not to miss a thing.
The End