First Time For Everything - WIP
Series: A First Time for Everything
Part: Two of ??
Title: Flirt (Jack)
Spoilers: This part: Fragments but otherwis pre-season 1
Rating: PG-13. Slight hints of m/m sexual attraction and vague innuendo. Couple of bad words.
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Summary: All relationships have their stages and their first moments. This is one of them.
Thanks: to my three wonderful, amazingly-fast betas: madtheo, used songs and travellingone, who again very kindly got rid of the rubbish and told me off for various mistakes! You're all wonderful and one day I'll work out how to make writing your name a link!
Part Two: Flirt - Jack
The first time Jack comes on to Ianto is the morning of the younger man’s first day in the Hub.
This early in the day the Hub is virtually silent; only the quiet hum of the computers left on for various reasons, the flow of the water down the tower and the low, almost inaudible whine of the air conditioning unit can be heard. No voices, no clattering of the keyboards or murmured conversations. Truth be told, he likes these silent hours. Even when the team works late, and last night was a late one, he tries to ensure that they all get away at least between three and seven. It’s partly for their sakes, but also partly for his own. He needs this time alone; this time to stop having to be the leader, to stop having to be in control. To be able to remember the past without having to watch his words.
He wanders out of his office and looks up to the ledge about two-thirds of the way to the roof. He sent them all home while he was on his way back last night, not wanting the Hub to be full of noise and light when the pterodactyl woke up. It’s sleeping there now, still drugged, lying on some old blankets he found in the medical bay. Best go down to the cold-room and get some Weevil rations for when it wakes up, he muses.
Thoughts of the creature bring the memory of last night back sharply and he swears softly to himself. What the hell possessed him to tell the boy he had a job? Laughing quietly, he shakes his head. He knows exactly, what possessed him, if he’s honest. The whole thing was crazy; the heady enjoyment of teaming up with this not-quite-stranger to snag a fucking dinosaur of all things. For the first time in a long time this job was suddenly, briefly, fun again. He knew damn well that at least one reason was the young Welshman who criticised Torchwood Three with one breath before admitting to stealing equipment from Torchwood One with the next, then went alongside him head-to-head with something strong enough to rip them both limb from limb armed with nothing more than a bar of chocolate. And then the boy stood there and caught him as he fell 15 feet and rolled them both out of the way before…
A buzzer sounds suddenly, making him jump. It comes simultaneously from behind him in his office and from over on Tosh’s desk. It’s the alarm for the entrance upstairs - someone has just tried the Tourist Office door.
He moves to the bank of CCTV monitors and there, clear even in the dim illumination reaching from the Plas lights, standing right in front of the door, is Mr. Ianto Jones.
Jack blinks and double-checks his watch, then reaches out and depresses a switch on the comm. station.
“It’s 6 a.m.” Outside, Ianto starts only very slightly and even as he answers, Jack can see him running his gaze over the door and the surrounding wall.
“You said first thing, Captain.” On the final word he spots the camera, much to Jack’s surprise, and looks straight into it.
Jack draws a long breath and lets it out slowly. Suzie is going to bawl him out for this, he knows already. What did she say yesterday about him liking them young and pretty? This one is young, by any standards other than Torchwood’s; he’s three years younger than even Tosh. And pretty doesn’t come close - he’s gorgeous. God only knows what he’s going to tell the others he’s hired the boy for. Tosh will probably believe anything he tells her because whilst she utilises proper scientific caution in her approach to everything else she comes across, she seems to trust him implicitly. The other two though - unless he can actually think of a job description for the new arrival, he knows exactly what they’ll assume he’s been hired for. And they wouldn’t be so far wrong either. Because the job offer wasn’t made from any professional urge at all.
Far from it - he meant what he said the second time they met; he has no job vacancies, or at least not for someone with no specialities. He hadn’t missed anything from their previous two meetings - he’s neither blind nor oblivious. Not to mention the little comment when Jack himself had mentioned pheromones. But he kept telling himself firmly that he wanted no part of anyone from London.
But last night, lying there on the filthy floor with that long body sprawled across almost every inch of his own, feeling and smelling the boy’s arousal and knowing damn well that even without 51st century senses the younger man couldn’t possibly miss Jack’s own opinion, looking up into those eyes and seeing that mouth only centimetres from his own….
And then the soft, breathy whisper, ‘I should go’ and the sudden withdrawal; such an odd contrast from the come-ons the boy had previously given him. It was intriguing and it suddenly caught Jack’s interest in a whole new way. The flirting, the tight jeans and T-shirt, the belt and the open-necked shirt giving way to the neat lines of the suit with its tie and the sudden pulling back… it was fascinating. From ‘fuck me’ to ‘hard-to-get’ and wasn’t that a contrast? Standing there watching him start to walk away Jack had suddenly known that he didn’t want this boy to go; he wanted to know what was going on, wanted to know what made this one tick - wanted him.
That, of course, is exactly what Suzie and Owen will both assume the boy has been hired for the moment they clap eyes on him. And whilst Suzie will keep her carping for Jack’s ears only, he’s fairly sure that Owen’s vicious mouth will make Ianto’s life a misery. There are moments he wonders about his judgement in hiring Owen rather than ret-conning him, but the doctor is damn good at his job so Jack keeps him on.
“Captain?” The tone is polite, but there is a flicker of concern on Ianto’s face as he tilts his head slightly to one side, looking into the camera as though trying to see Jack’s own visage. Jack drums his fingers on his thigh, thinking quickly. He’s seriously tempted to just go up there and bring Ianto down to his office. With the signals the younger man gave off during their first two meetings, he doesn’t think it will take much persuasion on his own part to get the boy into bed. Into his bed and out of his system before this becomes one of what Suzie calls his ‘obsessions.’ And afterwards? Easy. Ret-con himself out of Ianto’s life and, while he’s at it, snuff out the painful memories of Canary Wharf. It would help the younger man, wouldn’t it? To be free of the memories that were clearly too much for him to easily handle.
“Wait a moment.” He heads for the cog-door, stepping over the usual debris and chaos that always litter the Hub. As he enters the Tourist Office, he flicks on the light and then takes the key from its hook before unlocking and opening the door. As he steps aside to let Ianto enter, a gust of wind comes straight in off the water and through the open door, strong enough to bring a damp feel with it and cold enough to make Jack, clad only in slacks and shirt, gasp. He shuts and locks the door, then turns to face Ianto.
It’s only the second time he’s seen the younger man in light bright enough to really look at him - and so he does. Mind, not even the dark of Sophia Gardens or the warehouse could hide the fact that this boy is mouth-watering. He’s just an inch or so shorter than Jack himself, though more lightly built. He’s thin; too thin - but then after surviving something like Canary Wharf, that’s hardly surprising. He’s still the easiest thing on the eye Jack has seen in a long time and the suit, slate grey this morning with a white shirt and light blue tie, just sets it all off. The idea of taking him to bed right now gains even more appeal.
Without thinking, Jack takes a step closer. He can smell an interesting mix of ginger, pine and sandalwood coming from Ianto’s skin - presumably soap or bodywash. There’s another smell too, familiar but too faint to identify. Whatever it is, the over-all combination is tantalising and he wonders if Ianto tastes as good as he smells. The thought makes him realise he can also smell coffee, very faintly, and that reminds him of the sheer heaven of that mug Ianto produced from God-knows-where yesterday morning. A vague idea begins to form in his mind.
“Captain?” Ianto says again, his voice as soft as it was last night and Jack realises he’s standing maybe six inches in front of the younger man, staring. It’s well into Ianto’s personal space, but he doesn’t look like he minds.
“Aren’t you freezing?” he finds himself asking. The cold air that came in with Ianto makes the hairs on Jack’s arms stand on end and that’s from just a brief gust. Ianto’s been standing outside in the pre-dawn on a Welsh winter’s day wearing just a thin suit but he gives a faint shrug and a small, even fainter, smile.
“Cardiff boy - I’m used to it.” Jack nods slightly. He has to admit, when he got back to the Hub after their first meeting and started searching for a ‘Ianto Jones’ in his early twenties, he hadn’t expected to find out the boy was a Torchwood employee. After that, he’d read the main Personal and Employment sections out of curiosity. A Cardiff boy he might regard himself as, but he’d been born up in the valleys, coming to Cardiff at nine. Ten years later, his employment details showed him drifting all over the place for almost three years - Leicester, Manchester, Bradford and a half-dozen other locations before finally landing in London. He’s held various jobs during that time, including a market worker, receptionist, silver-service waiter of all things, art gallery security guard, though you’d not think it to look at him, and finally tour guide. He’s apparently left each job of his own volition, never staying anywhere for more than a few months. Add to that the somewhat unusual circumstances of his recruitment to Torchwood and the brief notes made by his first team leader there, and Jack’s pretty confident that the boy is a bright, quick-thinking learner who is easily bored. Almost a pity that they don’t need a generalist and that no one at the Hub has time to pass on their specialities.
“Not manned very much, sir?” Ianto says suddenly, glancing around the small, unattractive office.
Sir? He hasn’t been called ‘sir’ by anyone from Torchwood since the new recruit back in 1964, a lovely girl who very quickly learned to call him something else entirely; but the word makes him smile.
“We’re not that formal here, Ianto. Jack’s fine. And you’re right - this place was designed to be a front for our day-time comings and goings but.,.” he shrugs. “We just don’t seem to have the time or the hands to man it effectively.” Now that he thinks about it, the others would be relieved if they never had to set foot behind that desk again, even for the few hours a week they normally manage to have someone here. Jack tilts his head to one side, examining Ianto.
“How did you know?” One of Ianto’s eyebrows lifts slightly before he points at some of the flyers on the desk.
“They’re a year out of date,” he says calmly.
“Ah.” Jack pauses for a second, thinking. The idea tickling at the back of his mind is picking up speed.
“You know anything about tourism in Cardiff?” he asks.
“How much it’s worth to the local economy or what there is for tourists to do?”
“The tourists.” Ianto nods slightly.
“I could answer a few general queries, sir, yes.”
“Speak anything apart from English?”
“Espanol, Deutsche, Francais, Italiano, English, Cymraeg. In increasing order of fluency, which means I can ask for directions and discuss the weather in Spanish. I know a few basic phrases in Urdu and Japanese. I can even understand American.” At the last, his voice stays in exactly the same precise, dry tone but there is another of those faint smiles on his face and Jack snorts with laughter, grinning broadly.
“Impressive list.”
Something flickers in Ianto’s eyes for a second. “My secondary school offered Italian from first year instead of French and then later I had a… friend who had a lot of language CDs. I used to listen to them. The Urdu I picked up in Leicester.”
Jack nods and then something occurs to him.
“More fluent in Welsh than English?”
“My first language, sir. Once you’ve mastered English as a second language, everything else is easy.”
“I thought Welsh was the hard one to learn?”
“With respect, sir, that’s what the English-speakers say.”
Jack grins again, liking the droll humour. It makes a pleasant change from Owen, whose idea of funny can be more than slightly cruel at times. And he hasn’t failed to notice the Welshman is still calling him ‘sir’. Suddenly, the idea of ret-conning him, never actually appealing, is starting to sound downright boring.
He steps behind the desk and hits the control for the Hub door. The sight of half the wall moving away to reveal the tunnel behind usually provokes some sort of reaction but Ianto just nods once.
“I wondered where the entrance was,” is all he says. Jack moves ahead of him through the door and turns to see Ianto glancing up at the CCTV monitor and loudspeaker/microphone on the Hub-side of the entryway. He sees Jack watching him and nods at the set-up.
“Two-way speaker system I presume, sir?”
“Yeah - switch for the other end is by the door control.” The door slides shut again and Jack leads the way toward the Hub proper.
In the lift, he nods briefly at the control panel.
“General supplies are on the first level. We’ve got a full medical bay on the second. The Hub itself starts on the third level.” Ianto nods wordlessly and Jack lets the lift descend. He’s standing just inches from the other man, far closer than is necessary in this space, but as before, the Welshman shows no sign of resenting the proximity. He is however, silent, staring at the lift door. Just as the lift slows, he draws breath as though to say something, but then the doors open and he moves forward, Jack a step or two behind.
“Yes.” The one-syllable response is not quite what Jack is expecting. Most people go with reactions closer to Suzie’s “Dear God” or Owen’s “fuck all!”. He looks at Ianto and realises with a spark of surprise that the younger man is not staring upward or around him in shock or awe. He’s staring across the main part of the Hub.
“Busy week, was it, sir?” Ianto nods out at the Hub. Jack blinks. Then he turns and looks across the Hub again.
“Ummmm” he says after a moment. “Well, we’ve had busier. It is a bit of a mess, isn’t it?” He glances back at Ianto. “Organised chaos?” He can hear a hopeful note in his voice.
Ianto shakes his head. “I’ve seen organised chaos. This isn’t it. I was thinking more of a bomb-site.”
On reflection, Jack is inclined to the idea of a tornado-hit bomb-site. Paperwork is piled haphazardly on almost every horizontal surface - some of it forms and reports, some of it archive material. Artefacts from the archives, dug out in a hurry to help with a case and then never returned, are strewn around all over the place. Items that have come through the Rift which no-one has yet had the time to study or catalogue, are stacked in a couple of cardboard boxes by the sofa. Empty cups, both china and disposable, are scattered around alongside similar plates containing the slowly decaying remains of several hastily-snatched meals, some over a week old. Rubbish and dust complete the picture.
From the look on Ianto’s face, it’s probably a good thing that from here he can’t see the over-flowing box of ripped and dirty clothes in Jack’s office, or the tiny and, now Jack comes to think of it, somewhat grubby kitchen. And down in the basement, the archives are in a scarcely better state. They simply don’t have the time to deal with any of this - keeping their heads above the flood-waters of the Rift takes almost all their time and energy and both he and Tosh are already working themselves to exhaustion just trying to take care of the clean-up needed to maintain Torchwood’s secrecy. Every few days he manages to get round to clearing away some of the accumulated junk but it can take hours to find that one particular bit of research or tech or information. It’s one reason they all keep the essentials of their own work on their desks.
“How do you find anything?” Ianto is looking at him with a bemused expression.
“Generally by moving other things until what you’re looking for turns up. Of course, sometimes you don’t find what you actually need, you find what you were looking for a week earlier, but…” his voice trails off, dimmed by the sheer wattage of Ianto’s glower. Suddenly, he feels like he used to when Alex bawled him out for a particularly fool-hardy approach to solving mission problems - abashed and a little guilty. He tries a broad smile, but Ianto’s expression doesn’t change by a hair.
“C’mon,” he says. “We’ll use my office.” What precisely they are going to use his office for is wavering between two distinct choices right now. The germ of an idea that started ticking over in his mind a few minutes ago is one of them, and it’s gaining strength. It also has the advantage in that it’s not actually incompatible with his first idea.
He leads Ianto across the walkway, passing behind the water tower on the way to his office. The silence is now slightly uncomfortable and he doesn’t like being uncomfortable in his own domain, so he speaks.
“Didn’t expect you in this early. Normally it’s only me here at this time of day.”
“What time do the others normally arrive?” The question has the tone of something being asked for politeness sake only, but he answers nonetheless.
“Between eight and nine usually, but it does vary. Probably be a bit later today: late one last night - I sent them home just before three.” There is a sudden indrawn breath from behind him and he turns to see Ianto standing stock-still, his whole body tense. He gives Jack a long look.
“I didn’t leave the warehouse till 2:45.” There is a second’s pause, and a wary look comes over Ianto’s face. “They don’t know about me, do they?”
“Ummm… No. Haven’t told them yet,” Jack says. Ianto swallows and his hands, which have been loose at his sides, suddenly flex. He looks far more perturbed than Jack expects.
“Was that a genuine job offer last night, Captain?” Jack hesitates, not sure how to answer. Suddenly, Ianto steps forward, reducing the gap between them until he’s so close Jack can smell not only the bodywash, but the wool and cotton of the stylish suit and the scent of mint and cloves coming from the Welshman’s mouth. That mouth is once more close enough to kiss and he can’t tear his eyes from the boy’s lips as Ianto speaks, his voice as soft and quiet as it was in the warehouse. It’s almost hypnotic.
“What am I here for - sir?” Jack reaches out a hand, not sure what he is about to do or say, but knowing he wants to touch that mouth.
The shriek of the pterodactyl shatters the growing tension and both men start back from each other, turning to look up as the creature takes flight.
It swoops up to the roof directly over their heads then dives almost straight down. For a moment, Jack watches in delight, just enjoying the sheer uniqueness of the moment, then he realises that the beast is coming lower and lower.
Ianto grabs his shoulder and pulls him down into a crouch and the creature’s strong claws miss them by inches. It gives a harsh cry that seems to hold a note of disappointment, and then soars back upward to the roof, circling.
“Run for cover?” Jack says, pointing to the boardroom door at the top of the stairway a few feet from them.
“Thought you’d never ask,” Ianto says tersely and they make a dash for the safety of the big room as the dinosaur completes another circuit of the roof-space. It spots them and dives again but they reach the boardroom just ahead of it and Jack slams the door behind them. He glances across to check the far doors, feeling a surge of relief when he sees they’re closed. The two men stand side by side just inside the door, looking back out into the Hub.
“I may be missing my guess, but I think she’s hungry,” Ianto says.
“She?” He’s answered by the same look he was given when he avowed ignorance over the word ‘Weevil’.
“You didn’t notice last night? You got a closer look than I did, Captain.”
Jack lets his gaze wander up and down Ianto’s body and gives the boy a deliberate smirk.
“Kinda had other things on my mind,” he says. He’s been told before that flirting isn’t appropriate in dangerous situations and he couldn’t disagree more. In a potential life-or-death situation, what better way is there to know that you’re alive?
“Point taken,” Ianto says without as much as a blink. He turns his gaze away from Jack to look out of the window, leaving Jack wondering whether he’s just been set back or given a come-on. “Still, I’d say it’s female - and I’m even more sure she’s hungry.”
“There’s a supply of meat in the cold-room down by the holding cells,” Jack says.
“How would you suggest we get there?” Ianto replies.
“Distract her, make a run for it.”
“What distractions do you have to hand, sir?”
“Well….” Jack moves closer, his smile widening. The smile never fails. Ianto’s gaze flickers down and then back up to meet Jack’s eyes, taking in the whole of his body on the journey, a clear echo of Jack’s action of moments earlier. He raises an eyebrow slightly and answers in the same dry tone he used previously.
“I meant for the pterodactyl,, sir.”
“What a shame. Right now I could use a good distraction.” Ianto’s cool, calm, expression doesn’t change.
“Are we on working hours, sir? Because if so, I think that might count as harassment.”
“Might?”
“Yes, sir. Can we return to the issue of the pterodactyl now?” He turns back to look out of the window, leaving Jack wondering hopefully if this means that it doesn’t count as harassment outside of working hours. Just then, the pterodactyl swoops past the door once more with a shriek, making both men instinctively duck. She tries again, clearly trying to work out an angle that will allow her to actually get at them. The glass door is, of course, something of which she has no concept.
Jack looks at his watch.
“Hell, we need to think of something - once she hits that glass, it’s not going to hold for ever. And Tosh will be walking in here in 40 minutes.” He starts searching the room, going through the various boxes that he fills every now and then with the junk that collects here over the course of briefings, meetings and conference calls. He keeps meaning to go through it all and tidy up, but rarely seems to have the time and the energy both together. The number of times they eat in here, there has to be something they can use. From just out of his line of vision, he hears Ianto.
“I thought you said they’d be in late today?”
“Not Tosh. Some sort of scan she’s got running, finishes at half-seven.” He starts on the next box, shoving papers aside so roughly they cascade over the side and onto the floor. “Ah!” He snatches his discovery from the box and crosses the floor to Ianto’s side in seconds. “Think this’ll do it?”
Ianto looks down at the plastic-wrapped item he’s holding and then back up at Jack.
“Oh yes, absolutely. Speaking as the resident expert in all matters pertaining to the Creataceous Period and Pterosauria, jerked beef is definitely her favourite!”
Jack glares at him. “You know what they say about sarcasm being the lowest form of wit, don’t you?”
“Yes sir, they also say it’s the highest form of intelligence.”
There’s pretty much nothing Jack can think of to say to that, so he steps up to the door and looks through, trying to spot the blasted thing.
“We’ll need to make for the stairs there,” he says, pointing. “She shouldn’t be able to follow - not enough room for her to get through.” Ianto nods briefly.
“May I ask why there’s a packet of beef jerky under a pile of paperwork, by the way?” he asks. It takes Jack a moment or so before he remembers.
“We were working late, oh, last month, and it got to 4am and we realised we hadn’t eaten. All the takeaways were shut, it was Sunday by then and all we could get hold of was a few sausage rolls and a few packets of this from a petrol station.”
“You forgot to eat.” It’s a statement, not a question. “That happen often?”
“Well, every now and then.”
“And suddenly, I miss the canteen.” Ianto says. “Despite the truly abysmal catering.”
Jack grins in response. “Last time Hartman insisted on my being at an inter-office meeting, I tried the chili.”
“No-one warned you?”
“Warned me? Hartman’s aide recommended it!”
Ianto looks over at him, and shakes his head slightly. “What did you do to him?”
“I only flirted a little!” Jack smiles suddenly at the memory. “He was kinda hot.” But nowhere near as much as you he thinks. Then he sees the sudden hardness of Ianto’s face. “What?”
“He was converted.”
The room is silent. Ianto is staring straight ahead, his eyes focused beyond the boardroom at something Jack can’t see. Something Jack’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to see. Although it hurts to know that the Doctor (his Doctor, not the earlier versions he tracked for so many years) was in the here-and-now and he didn’t know until it was too late, and although it near as damn-it broke his heart to read Rose’s name in the list of the dead, he’s filled with relief that the Doctor managed to seal the Void and send the Cybermen back. Earth has had, unknown to almost everyone outside UNIT and Torchwood, trouble enough with the Cybermen from Mondas and Talos; and his history lessons tell him his adopted planet will have more trouble in the future - no need to add to that with versions from alternative dimensions.
“I’m sorry” is all Jack can think to say. Ianto, his eyes still focused a long way beyond the room, swallows convulsively.
“His family were one of the lucky ones,” he says, and there is a bitter note in his voice.
“How so?” Jack asks gently.
“They actually got a body to bury, even if its mind was in a metal hulk.” Jack flinches slightly. After their second meeting, he went back and read Lisa Hallett’s file as well. Despite Ianto’s brusque statement, she’s on the “missing” list, which he must know. One of over three dozen whose bodies have never been recovered.
“Lisa,” he starts to say, hesitantly.
“I was left to tell her family. Her sister said ‘missing’ was just a euphemism for ‘we can’t find a fucking body,’” Ianto says, harshly.
“I’m sorry,” Jack says again, horribly aware of how useless the words are. Ianto’s eyes suddenly focus on him, and for an uncomfortable moment, Jack feels as though he is standing on the edge of a precipice, a fall down into something dark just a breath away.
“I’m sorry, too,” Ianto whispers.
Abruptly, he turns partly away, squeezing his eyes closed. His left hand clenches to a fist and his right comes up to his head, tightening into his black hair. The knuckles on both hands turn white with the pressure. He draws in one deep ragged breath and lets it out slowly. For a second, he is quite still. Then his eyes snap open and he turns to face Jack again, hands loose at his sides. His face is entirely calm, nothing in his demeanour telling of the depth of feeling that was there a moment ago. For a second, Jack hesitates. There is something here, something wrong. Some inner voice is telling him to be wary, as though there is danger. Then:-
“Ms Sato,” Ianto says, his voice as calm as his face. “The pterodactyl.” He reaches into one pocket and draws out a small, silvery item. Suddenly Jack is aware of the rapid, smooth tick-tick-tick of seconds flowing past. It distracts him, and he stops listening to that inner voice.
“We have thirty-two minutes and thirty seconds until Ms Sato arrives,” Ianto says. “Twenty-five, twenty-four, twenty-…”
“You carry a stopwatch around?” Jack exclaims. “What the hell do you use it for?”
Ianto looks at him, frowning.
“For timing purposes, sir.” There is a short pause before he speaks again. “What other uses for a stopwatch are you aware of?” Jack opens his mouth to answer and then realises that all the things he can think of pretty much come under the heading of “timing purposes.”
“Well,” he starts to say, only to be interrupted by a loud crash from the main area of the Hub. They both look out in time to see one of the monitors go smashing to the floor as the pterodactyl tries to lift it, only to be defeated by the fact that she can’t get a decent grip.
“Perhaps you should tell me later, Captain,” Ianto says.
“Yeah,” Jack comments, distracted by the angry screech from his new resident. Remembering what he was doing, he rips the rest of the plastic wrap from the dried beef and looks over at Ianto.
“Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be. What, exactly, is the plan?”
Jack holds up the beef strips and nods at the door.
“Open door, throw beef across the Hub, run like hell for the stairs.”
“Succinct, sir,” Ianto says with a short nod. “And actually an improvement on last night’s plan.”
Jack glares at him. “Are you always this insubordinate, or is it just me?”
“Just you.” Ianto moves over to the door before Jack can think of a come back to that. He puts his hand on the door-handle and looks questioningly at Jack, holding up the middle three fingers of his other hand. Jack steps up beside him, draws a deep breath and nods.
“One, two, three,” Ianto counts aloud. On “three,” he yanks the door open, stepping back as he does so. Jack steps through the door and whistles sharply. The pterodactyl, flapping in a slow circle overhead, twists in mid-air toward the sound. As soon as the beady little eyes fix on him, she starts to swoop down. Jack hauls back and throws the half-dozen strips as far as he can and feels a surge of relief as she turns her whole body to glide after them.
“Run!” he yells, suiting action to word as he charges towards the stairs, Ianto close behind. They don’t stop until Jack is a score of steps down the twisting stairway, when he staggers to a halt and turns to grin at the younger man.
“Whoa! That was fun!”
“Yes, sir,” Ianto says in the same droll tone he used earlier. He’s not even breathing hard, Jack notices, despite the headlong dash. “To paraphrase a famous author, that was obviously some strange new definition of the word I was not previously aware of.” But there’s a look in his eyes that matches what Jack saw there last night. Jack snorts with laughter and is rewarded by a small smile.
God he has missed this. He hasn’t had anything like this in the job since Tom died with the rest on Millennium Eve. Tosh will chat to him but refuses to engage in anything resembling banter; Suzie ignores any innuendo he tries to throw her way and the only flirting Owen’s interested in is what he gets up to with each and every woman who crosses his path; you’d think that might be fading off after two years but it seems to be a coping mechanism. Jack hasn’t realised just how much he’s been missing this style of exchange until right now, when it’s suddenly there again.
This - this is not going to be ret-conned away and that’s flat. He’s just going to have to come up with some sort of excuse for keeping Ianto around.
A polite cough brings his attention sharply back to the here-and-now and Ianto holds up the stop-watch.
“Twenty-three minutes, 15 seconds, and counting,” Ianto says. Jack nods and starts off down the stairs, a jerk of his head bringing Ianto with him. Under the circumstances, he doesn’t give Ianto the guided tour on the way, though he does quickly indicate the destinations of the secondary flights of stairs and the tunnels that spilt off the main stairway.
“Storage basements are below the cells - the larger items that come through the Rift are stored down there. Smaller artefacts and papers are in the archives - I’ll show you later.”
“How much room is there down there?” Ianto asks causally.
“Lots. Back in the 1960’s, we - Torchwood - added extra levels for fallout shelters in the event of nuclear war. Wired for electricity, even got water and sewer connections tied into the Hub’s own system. There’re whole levels we don’t use yet, but we’re always getting new stuff through the Rift so we’ll need ‘em one day. But you could put an army down there and still have room to move.”
“An army might just be enough of a power drain to alert someone on the surface.”
“Nah, we’ve got our own generator. Very green, combination of geo-thermal and wave. We could triple the power demands of this place and not even notice.” Ianto nods silently.
Rounding one last curve, they reach the upper cell level and leave the stairway. Jack leads the way down the tunnel to the cold-room and unlocks the door. The walls of the room are covered with shelves, several of which are filled with the cloth-wrapped bags of meat, each bundle weighing in excess of 10kg. He sees Ianto glance around.
“One bag feeds a Weevil for a coupla days,” he says. He grabs two bags and hands them to Ianto, then grabs two more for himself. Moments later, they are back out of the room and he locks the door as Ianto heads back along the tunnel. He lengthens his stride to catch up before the younger man has reached the stairs.
“You don’t have the meat delivered, do you?” Ianto asks.
“Nope. Get it wholesale from an abattoir out Newport way. They think we’re a pet-food firm. We order it, go out and pick it up.” He jerks his head back toward the cold-room. “The back corridors link this level with the Waterside Carpark. Get the SUV or a van into the carpark and unload everything straight through the secured doors into the Hub. No-one ever notices anything.”
They don’t talk any further as they climb the stairs, silently concentrating on ascending as fast as they can. It’s only then that Jack realises that Ianto makes hardly any noise as he walks; even on the metal stairs, he is almost silent. And despite climbing over 100 steep steps carrying 20 kilograms over his shoulders, he isn’t any more out of breath than Jack is by the time the top of the stairs comes into sight. They stop then, and Jack looks at Ianto.
“We need a tranquilizer gun, just in case.” He shrugs his shoulders, dropping the two meat-bags down into his hands. “Same kind of plan as before, only you stay here. I’ll throw these for her and make for the armoury while she’s distracted. I’ll get a gun and ammunition - should be able to get a shot from the armoury door if need be.”
“And my role, sir?” Jack wouldn’t normally let an opening like that go by without a come-on, but right now, he’s more concerned about Tosh walking in. Above their heads, he hears the pterodactyl shriek again. The meat scraps he threw earlier have probably done nothing other than whet her appetite.
“Stay here - if I need you to get your bags to her, I’ll yell.” Ianto nods once and Jack turns and runs up the last few steps before he can think about whether this is a good idea or not.
He hits the top of the stairs and drops one bag at his feet to take hold of the other in both hands. As before, he throws it as hard as he can and when it hits the ground with a thunk, the bag splits open. The smell of raw meat, faint until now, suddenly becomes strong. Perhaps two seconds pass before there is a rush of wind above his head and the dinosaur drops from above, her wings folded back, to land on the open bag with a clear note of triumph in her voice. As she lowers her head to tear at the meat, Jack throws the other bag to land near her and then bolts for the Armoury before she can even react.
He slams the glass doors closed behind him and strides down the room, snatching up gun and ammunition in seconds. Before she’s finished even the first bundle, he’s back at the door, watching her through the glass as he loads the gun.
It takes her only minutes to devour the contents of both bags. Then, just as he is opening the door, intending to take his shot whilst she is on the ground, she launches herself back into the air. He bites back a curse and opens his mouth to call out for Ianto to ground her again with more meat, when she swoops up to the ledge from which she woke and descends back onto the piled-up blankets. From this angle, he can see clearly and he watches in relieved amazement as she settles down and falls asleep in seconds.
“Huh!” He raises his voice. “C’mon up - all clear.” He looks toward the stairs as Ianto appears and again he notes how quietly Ianto moves - from just a few feet away, Jack can’t hear his footsteps.
One quick glance at the tattered bags on the floor is apparently all it takes for Ianto to realise where the dinosaur is, because his gaze lifts straight up to the ledge. He nods once, then looks at Jack, inclining his head to the bag on his left shoulder.
“Where shall I put these, sir?”
“Stick ‘em down in the autopsy room for now,” Jack says, indicating the general direction. “We’ll have to work out what to do about her later.”
Ianto nods briefly. “And what will you be doing about me, sir?” His voice is so smooth and calm it takes Jack a second to actually register the meaning of the words. He hesitates, unsure what to answer.
The low, repetitive buzz of his mobile saves him. He taps his ever-present earpiece and hears Tosh.
“Morning, Jack.”
“Tosh! What’s up?”
“Going to be late - there’s been an accident on Fitzalan Place. Probably going to delay me by about twenty, twenty-five minutes. That artefact scan is due to finish at half-seven - could you disconnect the system when it’s done? I should be in shortly after.”
“OK. See you later.” She rings off and he looks over at Ianto.
“Tosh. She’ll be late.” He moves forward, meaning to take one of the meat bags from Ianto and lead the way down into the autopsy room. His foot catches on something on the floor, and he lurches forward, staggering a step before he catches his balance. He turns and sees one of Owen’s boots, the ones they wear when they have some warning of a visit to Cardiff’s sewer system, lying in the middle of the floor. He swears under his breath - is Owen trying to break someone’s neck? And then he smiles, because suddenly it’s all come together: the idea ticking in the back of his mind since he first thought of that coffee; Ianto’s own words from last night; the look on the boy’s face when he saw the state of the hub - even Owen’s goddamn boot.
He turns to Ianto.
“Shove the bags into the autopsy room, then I’ll give you a tour of the Hub.”
The tour doesn’t take in the deeper levels of the Hub (no time) and he doesn’t tell him about Mainframe (Tosh’s area of expertise) but he shows the Welshman the medical bay and the supply rooms that lie between the surface and the Hub proper, as well as the central Hub, the upper exits that lead to the carparks for easy access when they have new artefacts or corpses and lastly, the Archive Room.
Why they call it a ‘room’ he’s not really sure, as it’s not. It’s the entire upper two levels of the basement system and soon they’re going to have to start using the third level. Filing cabinets and boxes and shelves, all of them filled with papers and those artefacts small enough to fit into the palm of a hand. Once, it was all ordered and organised, with the files cross-referenced by name and origin and date, and anything that could or might be connected to anything else flagged as such. Enough remains of that system that you can normally find what you need if it was already here on Millennium Eve. If it’s been recovered since, you have a chance of finding it if you spend long enough looking but he knows damn well that it’s getting harder and harder. Every couple of months one of them tries to do something about the chaos, only to give up after a few days when another crisis or disaster takes priority.
Ianto stands in the middle of an open area on the edge of the lower Archive level and looks at the stack of files that one or another of them dumped on the desk about three weeks ago.
“I see,” is all he says. He looks over at Jack. “Tell me sir, do you have any pleasant surprises for me?”
Jack opens his mouth with every intention of offering something he hopes Ianto will find very pleasant indeed when he remembers something completely different - something that’s been sat in the same place since it arrived three days before Christmas 1999.
“I might have,” he says. “Come on.” He leads the way back up to the main Hub and down the side of the Armoury into the minute kitchen. Fridge, microwave and kettle are the only additions to the sink and cupboards and nothing’s been cleaned properly in a week; mugs and plates just rinsed off quickly when no-one can find anything clean.
“Oh dear God,” Ianto says. “Why would anyone…”
“Ah-ha!” Jack shakes a finger and Ianto falls silent, giving him a bemused look, which is a damn sight better than the gesture Owen would be giving him in these circumstances. Jack crouches down and reaches into the narrow space under the worktop next to the fridge. He pulls out a large, dust-covered box and Ianto moves forward, seemingly automatically, to help him lift it. When it’s on the worktop, Jack brushes the worst of the dust off with his shirt sleeve, revealing the writing on the top.
“Ah!” Ianto actually gives a real, full-on smile and looks across at him. “Why isn’t this in use?” As he draws breath to answer, Jack is struck by the fact that the smile makes Ianto look even younger than he normally does. Not to mention even more attractive. He makes a mental note to see what else it will take to get that expression on the boy’s face. Ianto doesn’t look like he smiles enough.
“We’ve all read the instructions,” Jack says ruefully. “None of us has ever been able to make head nor tail of them.”
Ianto’s mouth twitches upward, a flash of humour on his face. “I’m sorry?” There is just the faintest tremor in his voice, as though he’s trying not to laugh. Jack mock-glares at him and Ianto’s mouth twitches again. Before he can get distracted, Jack wrenches his eyes from Ianto’s mouth and turns to start rummaging through the hanging cupboards.
“Hey!” he says as he does. “That operating manual reads like it was translated from Swahili to Latin by a Weevil and then handed to an Ancient Breton for translation into English!”
“Hmmm,” Ianto says. “And it didn’t occur to anyone to read or translate directly from the Italian?”
“Italian?”
“It is an Italian model, sir.” Ianto looks up from the manual he’s perusing and sees what Jack is holding. “Ah!” He reaches out and takes the packet. “Thank you, sir.” His eyes meet Jack’s. “Shall I bring something up to your office in half an hour or so?” The eyebrow lifts again. Oh yeah, thinks Jack.
Just then, the alarm sounds and the rumbling of the cog-door reaches the kitchen. Jack looks up at the CCTV monitor in the corner, which automatically cuts to whichever door is being used when the sensors trigger. He can’t help but feel a wave of disappointment when he sees not just one, but all three of his team walk in, deep in conversation together.
“Attractive as that sounds, Ianto, better make it a round of coffees in the boardroom. I’ll introduce you to the team and let them all know why you’re here.”
“Yes, sir.” Jack nods once, receiving a calm nod in return. As he walks out of the kitchen, he hears Ianto lift the never-used coffee maker from the box.
TBC
Part: Two of ??
Title: Flirt (Jack)
Spoilers: This part: Fragments but otherwis pre-season 1
Rating: PG-13. Slight hints of m/m sexual attraction and vague innuendo. Couple of bad words.
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Summary: All relationships have their stages and their first moments. This is one of them.
Thanks: to my three wonderful, amazingly-fast betas: madtheo, used songs and travellingone, who again very kindly got rid of the rubbish and told me off for various mistakes! You're all wonderful and one day I'll work out how to make writing your name a link!
Part Two: Flirt - Jack
The first time Jack comes on to Ianto is the morning of the younger man’s first day in the Hub.
This early in the day the Hub is virtually silent; only the quiet hum of the computers left on for various reasons, the flow of the water down the tower and the low, almost inaudible whine of the air conditioning unit can be heard. No voices, no clattering of the keyboards or murmured conversations. Truth be told, he likes these silent hours. Even when the team works late, and last night was a late one, he tries to ensure that they all get away at least between three and seven. It’s partly for their sakes, but also partly for his own. He needs this time alone; this time to stop having to be the leader, to stop having to be in control. To be able to remember the past without having to watch his words.
He wanders out of his office and looks up to the ledge about two-thirds of the way to the roof. He sent them all home while he was on his way back last night, not wanting the Hub to be full of noise and light when the pterodactyl woke up. It’s sleeping there now, still drugged, lying on some old blankets he found in the medical bay. Best go down to the cold-room and get some Weevil rations for when it wakes up, he muses.
Thoughts of the creature bring the memory of last night back sharply and he swears softly to himself. What the hell possessed him to tell the boy he had a job? Laughing quietly, he shakes his head. He knows exactly, what possessed him, if he’s honest. The whole thing was crazy; the heady enjoyment of teaming up with this not-quite-stranger to snag a fucking dinosaur of all things. For the first time in a long time this job was suddenly, briefly, fun again. He knew damn well that at least one reason was the young Welshman who criticised Torchwood Three with one breath before admitting to stealing equipment from Torchwood One with the next, then went alongside him head-to-head with something strong enough to rip them both limb from limb armed with nothing more than a bar of chocolate. And then the boy stood there and caught him as he fell 15 feet and rolled them both out of the way before…
A buzzer sounds suddenly, making him jump. It comes simultaneously from behind him in his office and from over on Tosh’s desk. It’s the alarm for the entrance upstairs - someone has just tried the Tourist Office door.
He moves to the bank of CCTV monitors and there, clear even in the dim illumination reaching from the Plas lights, standing right in front of the door, is Mr. Ianto Jones.
Jack blinks and double-checks his watch, then reaches out and depresses a switch on the comm. station.
“It’s 6 a.m.” Outside, Ianto starts only very slightly and even as he answers, Jack can see him running his gaze over the door and the surrounding wall.
“You said first thing, Captain.” On the final word he spots the camera, much to Jack’s surprise, and looks straight into it.
Jack draws a long breath and lets it out slowly. Suzie is going to bawl him out for this, he knows already. What did she say yesterday about him liking them young and pretty? This one is young, by any standards other than Torchwood’s; he’s three years younger than even Tosh. And pretty doesn’t come close - he’s gorgeous. God only knows what he’s going to tell the others he’s hired the boy for. Tosh will probably believe anything he tells her because whilst she utilises proper scientific caution in her approach to everything else she comes across, she seems to trust him implicitly. The other two though - unless he can actually think of a job description for the new arrival, he knows exactly what they’ll assume he’s been hired for. And they wouldn’t be so far wrong either. Because the job offer wasn’t made from any professional urge at all.
Far from it - he meant what he said the second time they met; he has no job vacancies, or at least not for someone with no specialities. He hadn’t missed anything from their previous two meetings - he’s neither blind nor oblivious. Not to mention the little comment when Jack himself had mentioned pheromones. But he kept telling himself firmly that he wanted no part of anyone from London.
But last night, lying there on the filthy floor with that long body sprawled across almost every inch of his own, feeling and smelling the boy’s arousal and knowing damn well that even without 51st century senses the younger man couldn’t possibly miss Jack’s own opinion, looking up into those eyes and seeing that mouth only centimetres from his own….
And then the soft, breathy whisper, ‘I should go’ and the sudden withdrawal; such an odd contrast from the come-ons the boy had previously given him. It was intriguing and it suddenly caught Jack’s interest in a whole new way. The flirting, the tight jeans and T-shirt, the belt and the open-necked shirt giving way to the neat lines of the suit with its tie and the sudden pulling back… it was fascinating. From ‘fuck me’ to ‘hard-to-get’ and wasn’t that a contrast? Standing there watching him start to walk away Jack had suddenly known that he didn’t want this boy to go; he wanted to know what was going on, wanted to know what made this one tick - wanted him.
That, of course, is exactly what Suzie and Owen will both assume the boy has been hired for the moment they clap eyes on him. And whilst Suzie will keep her carping for Jack’s ears only, he’s fairly sure that Owen’s vicious mouth will make Ianto’s life a misery. There are moments he wonders about his judgement in hiring Owen rather than ret-conning him, but the doctor is damn good at his job so Jack keeps him on.
“Captain?” The tone is polite, but there is a flicker of concern on Ianto’s face as he tilts his head slightly to one side, looking into the camera as though trying to see Jack’s own visage. Jack drums his fingers on his thigh, thinking quickly. He’s seriously tempted to just go up there and bring Ianto down to his office. With the signals the younger man gave off during their first two meetings, he doesn’t think it will take much persuasion on his own part to get the boy into bed. Into his bed and out of his system before this becomes one of what Suzie calls his ‘obsessions.’ And afterwards? Easy. Ret-con himself out of Ianto’s life and, while he’s at it, snuff out the painful memories of Canary Wharf. It would help the younger man, wouldn’t it? To be free of the memories that were clearly too much for him to easily handle.
“Wait a moment.” He heads for the cog-door, stepping over the usual debris and chaos that always litter the Hub. As he enters the Tourist Office, he flicks on the light and then takes the key from its hook before unlocking and opening the door. As he steps aside to let Ianto enter, a gust of wind comes straight in off the water and through the open door, strong enough to bring a damp feel with it and cold enough to make Jack, clad only in slacks and shirt, gasp. He shuts and locks the door, then turns to face Ianto.
It’s only the second time he’s seen the younger man in light bright enough to really look at him - and so he does. Mind, not even the dark of Sophia Gardens or the warehouse could hide the fact that this boy is mouth-watering. He’s just an inch or so shorter than Jack himself, though more lightly built. He’s thin; too thin - but then after surviving something like Canary Wharf, that’s hardly surprising. He’s still the easiest thing on the eye Jack has seen in a long time and the suit, slate grey this morning with a white shirt and light blue tie, just sets it all off. The idea of taking him to bed right now gains even more appeal.
Without thinking, Jack takes a step closer. He can smell an interesting mix of ginger, pine and sandalwood coming from Ianto’s skin - presumably soap or bodywash. There’s another smell too, familiar but too faint to identify. Whatever it is, the over-all combination is tantalising and he wonders if Ianto tastes as good as he smells. The thought makes him realise he can also smell coffee, very faintly, and that reminds him of the sheer heaven of that mug Ianto produced from God-knows-where yesterday morning. A vague idea begins to form in his mind.
“Captain?” Ianto says again, his voice as soft as it was last night and Jack realises he’s standing maybe six inches in front of the younger man, staring. It’s well into Ianto’s personal space, but he doesn’t look like he minds.
“Aren’t you freezing?” he finds himself asking. The cold air that came in with Ianto makes the hairs on Jack’s arms stand on end and that’s from just a brief gust. Ianto’s been standing outside in the pre-dawn on a Welsh winter’s day wearing just a thin suit but he gives a faint shrug and a small, even fainter, smile.
“Cardiff boy - I’m used to it.” Jack nods slightly. He has to admit, when he got back to the Hub after their first meeting and started searching for a ‘Ianto Jones’ in his early twenties, he hadn’t expected to find out the boy was a Torchwood employee. After that, he’d read the main Personal and Employment sections out of curiosity. A Cardiff boy he might regard himself as, but he’d been born up in the valleys, coming to Cardiff at nine. Ten years later, his employment details showed him drifting all over the place for almost three years - Leicester, Manchester, Bradford and a half-dozen other locations before finally landing in London. He’s held various jobs during that time, including a market worker, receptionist, silver-service waiter of all things, art gallery security guard, though you’d not think it to look at him, and finally tour guide. He’s apparently left each job of his own volition, never staying anywhere for more than a few months. Add to that the somewhat unusual circumstances of his recruitment to Torchwood and the brief notes made by his first team leader there, and Jack’s pretty confident that the boy is a bright, quick-thinking learner who is easily bored. Almost a pity that they don’t need a generalist and that no one at the Hub has time to pass on their specialities.
“Not manned very much, sir?” Ianto says suddenly, glancing around the small, unattractive office.
Sir? He hasn’t been called ‘sir’ by anyone from Torchwood since the new recruit back in 1964, a lovely girl who very quickly learned to call him something else entirely; but the word makes him smile.
“We’re not that formal here, Ianto. Jack’s fine. And you’re right - this place was designed to be a front for our day-time comings and goings but.,.” he shrugs. “We just don’t seem to have the time or the hands to man it effectively.” Now that he thinks about it, the others would be relieved if they never had to set foot behind that desk again, even for the few hours a week they normally manage to have someone here. Jack tilts his head to one side, examining Ianto.
“How did you know?” One of Ianto’s eyebrows lifts slightly before he points at some of the flyers on the desk.
“They’re a year out of date,” he says calmly.
“Ah.” Jack pauses for a second, thinking. The idea tickling at the back of his mind is picking up speed.
“You know anything about tourism in Cardiff?” he asks.
“How much it’s worth to the local economy or what there is for tourists to do?”
“The tourists.” Ianto nods slightly.
“I could answer a few general queries, sir, yes.”
“Speak anything apart from English?”
“Espanol, Deutsche, Francais, Italiano, English, Cymraeg. In increasing order of fluency, which means I can ask for directions and discuss the weather in Spanish. I know a few basic phrases in Urdu and Japanese. I can even understand American.” At the last, his voice stays in exactly the same precise, dry tone but there is another of those faint smiles on his face and Jack snorts with laughter, grinning broadly.
“Impressive list.”
Something flickers in Ianto’s eyes for a second. “My secondary school offered Italian from first year instead of French and then later I had a… friend who had a lot of language CDs. I used to listen to them. The Urdu I picked up in Leicester.”
Jack nods and then something occurs to him.
“More fluent in Welsh than English?”
“My first language, sir. Once you’ve mastered English as a second language, everything else is easy.”
“I thought Welsh was the hard one to learn?”
“With respect, sir, that’s what the English-speakers say.”
Jack grins again, liking the droll humour. It makes a pleasant change from Owen, whose idea of funny can be more than slightly cruel at times. And he hasn’t failed to notice the Welshman is still calling him ‘sir’. Suddenly, the idea of ret-conning him, never actually appealing, is starting to sound downright boring.
He steps behind the desk and hits the control for the Hub door. The sight of half the wall moving away to reveal the tunnel behind usually provokes some sort of reaction but Ianto just nods once.
“I wondered where the entrance was,” is all he says. Jack moves ahead of him through the door and turns to see Ianto glancing up at the CCTV monitor and loudspeaker/microphone on the Hub-side of the entryway. He sees Jack watching him and nods at the set-up.
“Two-way speaker system I presume, sir?”
“Yeah - switch for the other end is by the door control.” The door slides shut again and Jack leads the way toward the Hub proper.
In the lift, he nods briefly at the control panel.
“General supplies are on the first level. We’ve got a full medical bay on the second. The Hub itself starts on the third level.” Ianto nods wordlessly and Jack lets the lift descend. He’s standing just inches from the other man, far closer than is necessary in this space, but as before, the Welshman shows no sign of resenting the proximity. He is however, silent, staring at the lift door. Just as the lift slows, he draws breath as though to say something, but then the doors open and he moves forward, Jack a step or two behind.
“Yes.” The one-syllable response is not quite what Jack is expecting. Most people go with reactions closer to Suzie’s “Dear God” or Owen’s “fuck all!”. He looks at Ianto and realises with a spark of surprise that the younger man is not staring upward or around him in shock or awe. He’s staring across the main part of the Hub.
“Busy week, was it, sir?” Ianto nods out at the Hub. Jack blinks. Then he turns and looks across the Hub again.
“Ummmm” he says after a moment. “Well, we’ve had busier. It is a bit of a mess, isn’t it?” He glances back at Ianto. “Organised chaos?” He can hear a hopeful note in his voice.
Ianto shakes his head. “I’ve seen organised chaos. This isn’t it. I was thinking more of a bomb-site.”
On reflection, Jack is inclined to the idea of a tornado-hit bomb-site. Paperwork is piled haphazardly on almost every horizontal surface - some of it forms and reports, some of it archive material. Artefacts from the archives, dug out in a hurry to help with a case and then never returned, are strewn around all over the place. Items that have come through the Rift which no-one has yet had the time to study or catalogue, are stacked in a couple of cardboard boxes by the sofa. Empty cups, both china and disposable, are scattered around alongside similar plates containing the slowly decaying remains of several hastily-snatched meals, some over a week old. Rubbish and dust complete the picture.
From the look on Ianto’s face, it’s probably a good thing that from here he can’t see the over-flowing box of ripped and dirty clothes in Jack’s office, or the tiny and, now Jack comes to think of it, somewhat grubby kitchen. And down in the basement, the archives are in a scarcely better state. They simply don’t have the time to deal with any of this - keeping their heads above the flood-waters of the Rift takes almost all their time and energy and both he and Tosh are already working themselves to exhaustion just trying to take care of the clean-up needed to maintain Torchwood’s secrecy. Every few days he manages to get round to clearing away some of the accumulated junk but it can take hours to find that one particular bit of research or tech or information. It’s one reason they all keep the essentials of their own work on their desks.
“How do you find anything?” Ianto is looking at him with a bemused expression.
“Generally by moving other things until what you’re looking for turns up. Of course, sometimes you don’t find what you actually need, you find what you were looking for a week earlier, but…” his voice trails off, dimmed by the sheer wattage of Ianto’s glower. Suddenly, he feels like he used to when Alex bawled him out for a particularly fool-hardy approach to solving mission problems - abashed and a little guilty. He tries a broad smile, but Ianto’s expression doesn’t change by a hair.
“C’mon,” he says. “We’ll use my office.” What precisely they are going to use his office for is wavering between two distinct choices right now. The germ of an idea that started ticking over in his mind a few minutes ago is one of them, and it’s gaining strength. It also has the advantage in that it’s not actually incompatible with his first idea.
He leads Ianto across the walkway, passing behind the water tower on the way to his office. The silence is now slightly uncomfortable and he doesn’t like being uncomfortable in his own domain, so he speaks.
“Didn’t expect you in this early. Normally it’s only me here at this time of day.”
“What time do the others normally arrive?” The question has the tone of something being asked for politeness sake only, but he answers nonetheless.
“Between eight and nine usually, but it does vary. Probably be a bit later today: late one last night - I sent them home just before three.” There is a sudden indrawn breath from behind him and he turns to see Ianto standing stock-still, his whole body tense. He gives Jack a long look.
“I didn’t leave the warehouse till 2:45.” There is a second’s pause, and a wary look comes over Ianto’s face. “They don’t know about me, do they?”
“Ummm… No. Haven’t told them yet,” Jack says. Ianto swallows and his hands, which have been loose at his sides, suddenly flex. He looks far more perturbed than Jack expects.
“Was that a genuine job offer last night, Captain?” Jack hesitates, not sure how to answer. Suddenly, Ianto steps forward, reducing the gap between them until he’s so close Jack can smell not only the bodywash, but the wool and cotton of the stylish suit and the scent of mint and cloves coming from the Welshman’s mouth. That mouth is once more close enough to kiss and he can’t tear his eyes from the boy’s lips as Ianto speaks, his voice as soft and quiet as it was in the warehouse. It’s almost hypnotic.
“What am I here for - sir?” Jack reaches out a hand, not sure what he is about to do or say, but knowing he wants to touch that mouth.
The shriek of the pterodactyl shatters the growing tension and both men start back from each other, turning to look up as the creature takes flight.
It swoops up to the roof directly over their heads then dives almost straight down. For a moment, Jack watches in delight, just enjoying the sheer uniqueness of the moment, then he realises that the beast is coming lower and lower.
Ianto grabs his shoulder and pulls him down into a crouch and the creature’s strong claws miss them by inches. It gives a harsh cry that seems to hold a note of disappointment, and then soars back upward to the roof, circling.
“Run for cover?” Jack says, pointing to the boardroom door at the top of the stairway a few feet from them.
“Thought you’d never ask,” Ianto says tersely and they make a dash for the safety of the big room as the dinosaur completes another circuit of the roof-space. It spots them and dives again but they reach the boardroom just ahead of it and Jack slams the door behind them. He glances across to check the far doors, feeling a surge of relief when he sees they’re closed. The two men stand side by side just inside the door, looking back out into the Hub.
“I may be missing my guess, but I think she’s hungry,” Ianto says.
“She?” He’s answered by the same look he was given when he avowed ignorance over the word ‘Weevil’.
“You didn’t notice last night? You got a closer look than I did, Captain.”
Jack lets his gaze wander up and down Ianto’s body and gives the boy a deliberate smirk.
“Kinda had other things on my mind,” he says. He’s been told before that flirting isn’t appropriate in dangerous situations and he couldn’t disagree more. In a potential life-or-death situation, what better way is there to know that you’re alive?
“Point taken,” Ianto says without as much as a blink. He turns his gaze away from Jack to look out of the window, leaving Jack wondering whether he’s just been set back or given a come-on. “Still, I’d say it’s female - and I’m even more sure she’s hungry.”
“There’s a supply of meat in the cold-room down by the holding cells,” Jack says.
“How would you suggest we get there?” Ianto replies.
“Distract her, make a run for it.”
“What distractions do you have to hand, sir?”
“Well….” Jack moves closer, his smile widening. The smile never fails. Ianto’s gaze flickers down and then back up to meet Jack’s eyes, taking in the whole of his body on the journey, a clear echo of Jack’s action of moments earlier. He raises an eyebrow slightly and answers in the same dry tone he used previously.
“I meant for the pterodactyl,, sir.”
“What a shame. Right now I could use a good distraction.” Ianto’s cool, calm, expression doesn’t change.
“Are we on working hours, sir? Because if so, I think that might count as harassment.”
“Might?”
“Yes, sir. Can we return to the issue of the pterodactyl now?” He turns back to look out of the window, leaving Jack wondering hopefully if this means that it doesn’t count as harassment outside of working hours. Just then, the pterodactyl swoops past the door once more with a shriek, making both men instinctively duck. She tries again, clearly trying to work out an angle that will allow her to actually get at them. The glass door is, of course, something of which she has no concept.
Jack looks at his watch.
“Hell, we need to think of something - once she hits that glass, it’s not going to hold for ever. And Tosh will be walking in here in 40 minutes.” He starts searching the room, going through the various boxes that he fills every now and then with the junk that collects here over the course of briefings, meetings and conference calls. He keeps meaning to go through it all and tidy up, but rarely seems to have the time and the energy both together. The number of times they eat in here, there has to be something they can use. From just out of his line of vision, he hears Ianto.
“I thought you said they’d be in late today?”
“Not Tosh. Some sort of scan she’s got running, finishes at half-seven.” He starts on the next box, shoving papers aside so roughly they cascade over the side and onto the floor. “Ah!” He snatches his discovery from the box and crosses the floor to Ianto’s side in seconds. “Think this’ll do it?”
Ianto looks down at the plastic-wrapped item he’s holding and then back up at Jack.
“Oh yes, absolutely. Speaking as the resident expert in all matters pertaining to the Creataceous Period and Pterosauria, jerked beef is definitely her favourite!”
Jack glares at him. “You know what they say about sarcasm being the lowest form of wit, don’t you?”
“Yes sir, they also say it’s the highest form of intelligence.”
There’s pretty much nothing Jack can think of to say to that, so he steps up to the door and looks through, trying to spot the blasted thing.
“We’ll need to make for the stairs there,” he says, pointing. “She shouldn’t be able to follow - not enough room for her to get through.” Ianto nods briefly.
“May I ask why there’s a packet of beef jerky under a pile of paperwork, by the way?” he asks. It takes Jack a moment or so before he remembers.
“We were working late, oh, last month, and it got to 4am and we realised we hadn’t eaten. All the takeaways were shut, it was Sunday by then and all we could get hold of was a few sausage rolls and a few packets of this from a petrol station.”
“You forgot to eat.” It’s a statement, not a question. “That happen often?”
“Well, every now and then.”
“And suddenly, I miss the canteen.” Ianto says. “Despite the truly abysmal catering.”
Jack grins in response. “Last time Hartman insisted on my being at an inter-office meeting, I tried the chili.”
“No-one warned you?”
“Warned me? Hartman’s aide recommended it!”
Ianto looks over at him, and shakes his head slightly. “What did you do to him?”
“I only flirted a little!” Jack smiles suddenly at the memory. “He was kinda hot.” But nowhere near as much as you he thinks. Then he sees the sudden hardness of Ianto’s face. “What?”
“He was converted.”
The room is silent. Ianto is staring straight ahead, his eyes focused beyond the boardroom at something Jack can’t see. Something Jack’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to see. Although it hurts to know that the Doctor (his Doctor, not the earlier versions he tracked for so many years) was in the here-and-now and he didn’t know until it was too late, and although it near as damn-it broke his heart to read Rose’s name in the list of the dead, he’s filled with relief that the Doctor managed to seal the Void and send the Cybermen back. Earth has had, unknown to almost everyone outside UNIT and Torchwood, trouble enough with the Cybermen from Mondas and Talos; and his history lessons tell him his adopted planet will have more trouble in the future - no need to add to that with versions from alternative dimensions.
“I’m sorry” is all Jack can think to say. Ianto, his eyes still focused a long way beyond the room, swallows convulsively.
“His family were one of the lucky ones,” he says, and there is a bitter note in his voice.
“How so?” Jack asks gently.
“They actually got a body to bury, even if its mind was in a metal hulk.” Jack flinches slightly. After their second meeting, he went back and read Lisa Hallett’s file as well. Despite Ianto’s brusque statement, she’s on the “missing” list, which he must know. One of over three dozen whose bodies have never been recovered.
“Lisa,” he starts to say, hesitantly.
“I was left to tell her family. Her sister said ‘missing’ was just a euphemism for ‘we can’t find a fucking body,’” Ianto says, harshly.
“I’m sorry,” Jack says again, horribly aware of how useless the words are. Ianto’s eyes suddenly focus on him, and for an uncomfortable moment, Jack feels as though he is standing on the edge of a precipice, a fall down into something dark just a breath away.
“I’m sorry, too,” Ianto whispers.
Abruptly, he turns partly away, squeezing his eyes closed. His left hand clenches to a fist and his right comes up to his head, tightening into his black hair. The knuckles on both hands turn white with the pressure. He draws in one deep ragged breath and lets it out slowly. For a second, he is quite still. Then his eyes snap open and he turns to face Jack again, hands loose at his sides. His face is entirely calm, nothing in his demeanour telling of the depth of feeling that was there a moment ago. For a second, Jack hesitates. There is something here, something wrong. Some inner voice is telling him to be wary, as though there is danger. Then:-
“Ms Sato,” Ianto says, his voice as calm as his face. “The pterodactyl.” He reaches into one pocket and draws out a small, silvery item. Suddenly Jack is aware of the rapid, smooth tick-tick-tick of seconds flowing past. It distracts him, and he stops listening to that inner voice.
“We have thirty-two minutes and thirty seconds until Ms Sato arrives,” Ianto says. “Twenty-five, twenty-four, twenty-…”
“You carry a stopwatch around?” Jack exclaims. “What the hell do you use it for?”
Ianto looks at him, frowning.
“For timing purposes, sir.” There is a short pause before he speaks again. “What other uses for a stopwatch are you aware of?” Jack opens his mouth to answer and then realises that all the things he can think of pretty much come under the heading of “timing purposes.”
“Well,” he starts to say, only to be interrupted by a loud crash from the main area of the Hub. They both look out in time to see one of the monitors go smashing to the floor as the pterodactyl tries to lift it, only to be defeated by the fact that she can’t get a decent grip.
“Perhaps you should tell me later, Captain,” Ianto says.
“Yeah,” Jack comments, distracted by the angry screech from his new resident. Remembering what he was doing, he rips the rest of the plastic wrap from the dried beef and looks over at Ianto.
“Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be. What, exactly, is the plan?”
Jack holds up the beef strips and nods at the door.
“Open door, throw beef across the Hub, run like hell for the stairs.”
“Succinct, sir,” Ianto says with a short nod. “And actually an improvement on last night’s plan.”
Jack glares at him. “Are you always this insubordinate, or is it just me?”
“Just you.” Ianto moves over to the door before Jack can think of a come back to that. He puts his hand on the door-handle and looks questioningly at Jack, holding up the middle three fingers of his other hand. Jack steps up beside him, draws a deep breath and nods.
“One, two, three,” Ianto counts aloud. On “three,” he yanks the door open, stepping back as he does so. Jack steps through the door and whistles sharply. The pterodactyl, flapping in a slow circle overhead, twists in mid-air toward the sound. As soon as the beady little eyes fix on him, she starts to swoop down. Jack hauls back and throws the half-dozen strips as far as he can and feels a surge of relief as she turns her whole body to glide after them.
“Run!” he yells, suiting action to word as he charges towards the stairs, Ianto close behind. They don’t stop until Jack is a score of steps down the twisting stairway, when he staggers to a halt and turns to grin at the younger man.
“Whoa! That was fun!”
“Yes, sir,” Ianto says in the same droll tone he used earlier. He’s not even breathing hard, Jack notices, despite the headlong dash. “To paraphrase a famous author, that was obviously some strange new definition of the word I was not previously aware of.” But there’s a look in his eyes that matches what Jack saw there last night. Jack snorts with laughter and is rewarded by a small smile.
God he has missed this. He hasn’t had anything like this in the job since Tom died with the rest on Millennium Eve. Tosh will chat to him but refuses to engage in anything resembling banter; Suzie ignores any innuendo he tries to throw her way and the only flirting Owen’s interested in is what he gets up to with each and every woman who crosses his path; you’d think that might be fading off after two years but it seems to be a coping mechanism. Jack hasn’t realised just how much he’s been missing this style of exchange until right now, when it’s suddenly there again.
This - this is not going to be ret-conned away and that’s flat. He’s just going to have to come up with some sort of excuse for keeping Ianto around.
A polite cough brings his attention sharply back to the here-and-now and Ianto holds up the stop-watch.
“Twenty-three minutes, 15 seconds, and counting,” Ianto says. Jack nods and starts off down the stairs, a jerk of his head bringing Ianto with him. Under the circumstances, he doesn’t give Ianto the guided tour on the way, though he does quickly indicate the destinations of the secondary flights of stairs and the tunnels that spilt off the main stairway.
“Storage basements are below the cells - the larger items that come through the Rift are stored down there. Smaller artefacts and papers are in the archives - I’ll show you later.”
“How much room is there down there?” Ianto asks causally.
“Lots. Back in the 1960’s, we - Torchwood - added extra levels for fallout shelters in the event of nuclear war. Wired for electricity, even got water and sewer connections tied into the Hub’s own system. There’re whole levels we don’t use yet, but we’re always getting new stuff through the Rift so we’ll need ‘em one day. But you could put an army down there and still have room to move.”
“An army might just be enough of a power drain to alert someone on the surface.”
“Nah, we’ve got our own generator. Very green, combination of geo-thermal and wave. We could triple the power demands of this place and not even notice.” Ianto nods silently.
Rounding one last curve, they reach the upper cell level and leave the stairway. Jack leads the way down the tunnel to the cold-room and unlocks the door. The walls of the room are covered with shelves, several of which are filled with the cloth-wrapped bags of meat, each bundle weighing in excess of 10kg. He sees Ianto glance around.
“One bag feeds a Weevil for a coupla days,” he says. He grabs two bags and hands them to Ianto, then grabs two more for himself. Moments later, they are back out of the room and he locks the door as Ianto heads back along the tunnel. He lengthens his stride to catch up before the younger man has reached the stairs.
“You don’t have the meat delivered, do you?” Ianto asks.
“Nope. Get it wholesale from an abattoir out Newport way. They think we’re a pet-food firm. We order it, go out and pick it up.” He jerks his head back toward the cold-room. “The back corridors link this level with the Waterside Carpark. Get the SUV or a van into the carpark and unload everything straight through the secured doors into the Hub. No-one ever notices anything.”
They don’t talk any further as they climb the stairs, silently concentrating on ascending as fast as they can. It’s only then that Jack realises that Ianto makes hardly any noise as he walks; even on the metal stairs, he is almost silent. And despite climbing over 100 steep steps carrying 20 kilograms over his shoulders, he isn’t any more out of breath than Jack is by the time the top of the stairs comes into sight. They stop then, and Jack looks at Ianto.
“We need a tranquilizer gun, just in case.” He shrugs his shoulders, dropping the two meat-bags down into his hands. “Same kind of plan as before, only you stay here. I’ll throw these for her and make for the armoury while she’s distracted. I’ll get a gun and ammunition - should be able to get a shot from the armoury door if need be.”
“And my role, sir?” Jack wouldn’t normally let an opening like that go by without a come-on, but right now, he’s more concerned about Tosh walking in. Above their heads, he hears the pterodactyl shriek again. The meat scraps he threw earlier have probably done nothing other than whet her appetite.
“Stay here - if I need you to get your bags to her, I’ll yell.” Ianto nods once and Jack turns and runs up the last few steps before he can think about whether this is a good idea or not.
He hits the top of the stairs and drops one bag at his feet to take hold of the other in both hands. As before, he throws it as hard as he can and when it hits the ground with a thunk, the bag splits open. The smell of raw meat, faint until now, suddenly becomes strong. Perhaps two seconds pass before there is a rush of wind above his head and the dinosaur drops from above, her wings folded back, to land on the open bag with a clear note of triumph in her voice. As she lowers her head to tear at the meat, Jack throws the other bag to land near her and then bolts for the Armoury before she can even react.
He slams the glass doors closed behind him and strides down the room, snatching up gun and ammunition in seconds. Before she’s finished even the first bundle, he’s back at the door, watching her through the glass as he loads the gun.
It takes her only minutes to devour the contents of both bags. Then, just as he is opening the door, intending to take his shot whilst she is on the ground, she launches herself back into the air. He bites back a curse and opens his mouth to call out for Ianto to ground her again with more meat, when she swoops up to the ledge from which she woke and descends back onto the piled-up blankets. From this angle, he can see clearly and he watches in relieved amazement as she settles down and falls asleep in seconds.
“Huh!” He raises his voice. “C’mon up - all clear.” He looks toward the stairs as Ianto appears and again he notes how quietly Ianto moves - from just a few feet away, Jack can’t hear his footsteps.
One quick glance at the tattered bags on the floor is apparently all it takes for Ianto to realise where the dinosaur is, because his gaze lifts straight up to the ledge. He nods once, then looks at Jack, inclining his head to the bag on his left shoulder.
“Where shall I put these, sir?”
“Stick ‘em down in the autopsy room for now,” Jack says, indicating the general direction. “We’ll have to work out what to do about her later.”
Ianto nods briefly. “And what will you be doing about me, sir?” His voice is so smooth and calm it takes Jack a second to actually register the meaning of the words. He hesitates, unsure what to answer.
The low, repetitive buzz of his mobile saves him. He taps his ever-present earpiece and hears Tosh.
“Morning, Jack.”
“Tosh! What’s up?”
“Going to be late - there’s been an accident on Fitzalan Place. Probably going to delay me by about twenty, twenty-five minutes. That artefact scan is due to finish at half-seven - could you disconnect the system when it’s done? I should be in shortly after.”
“OK. See you later.” She rings off and he looks over at Ianto.
“Tosh. She’ll be late.” He moves forward, meaning to take one of the meat bags from Ianto and lead the way down into the autopsy room. His foot catches on something on the floor, and he lurches forward, staggering a step before he catches his balance. He turns and sees one of Owen’s boots, the ones they wear when they have some warning of a visit to Cardiff’s sewer system, lying in the middle of the floor. He swears under his breath - is Owen trying to break someone’s neck? And then he smiles, because suddenly it’s all come together: the idea ticking in the back of his mind since he first thought of that coffee; Ianto’s own words from last night; the look on the boy’s face when he saw the state of the hub - even Owen’s goddamn boot.
He turns to Ianto.
“Shove the bags into the autopsy room, then I’ll give you a tour of the Hub.”
The tour doesn’t take in the deeper levels of the Hub (no time) and he doesn’t tell him about Mainframe (Tosh’s area of expertise) but he shows the Welshman the medical bay and the supply rooms that lie between the surface and the Hub proper, as well as the central Hub, the upper exits that lead to the carparks for easy access when they have new artefacts or corpses and lastly, the Archive Room.
Why they call it a ‘room’ he’s not really sure, as it’s not. It’s the entire upper two levels of the basement system and soon they’re going to have to start using the third level. Filing cabinets and boxes and shelves, all of them filled with papers and those artefacts small enough to fit into the palm of a hand. Once, it was all ordered and organised, with the files cross-referenced by name and origin and date, and anything that could or might be connected to anything else flagged as such. Enough remains of that system that you can normally find what you need if it was already here on Millennium Eve. If it’s been recovered since, you have a chance of finding it if you spend long enough looking but he knows damn well that it’s getting harder and harder. Every couple of months one of them tries to do something about the chaos, only to give up after a few days when another crisis or disaster takes priority.
Ianto stands in the middle of an open area on the edge of the lower Archive level and looks at the stack of files that one or another of them dumped on the desk about three weeks ago.
“I see,” is all he says. He looks over at Jack. “Tell me sir, do you have any pleasant surprises for me?”
Jack opens his mouth with every intention of offering something he hopes Ianto will find very pleasant indeed when he remembers something completely different - something that’s been sat in the same place since it arrived three days before Christmas 1999.
“I might have,” he says. “Come on.” He leads the way back up to the main Hub and down the side of the Armoury into the minute kitchen. Fridge, microwave and kettle are the only additions to the sink and cupboards and nothing’s been cleaned properly in a week; mugs and plates just rinsed off quickly when no-one can find anything clean.
“Oh dear God,” Ianto says. “Why would anyone…”
“Ah-ha!” Jack shakes a finger and Ianto falls silent, giving him a bemused look, which is a damn sight better than the gesture Owen would be giving him in these circumstances. Jack crouches down and reaches into the narrow space under the worktop next to the fridge. He pulls out a large, dust-covered box and Ianto moves forward, seemingly automatically, to help him lift it. When it’s on the worktop, Jack brushes the worst of the dust off with his shirt sleeve, revealing the writing on the top.
“Ah!” Ianto actually gives a real, full-on smile and looks across at him. “Why isn’t this in use?” As he draws breath to answer, Jack is struck by the fact that the smile makes Ianto look even younger than he normally does. Not to mention even more attractive. He makes a mental note to see what else it will take to get that expression on the boy’s face. Ianto doesn’t look like he smiles enough.
“We’ve all read the instructions,” Jack says ruefully. “None of us has ever been able to make head nor tail of them.”
Ianto’s mouth twitches upward, a flash of humour on his face. “I’m sorry?” There is just the faintest tremor in his voice, as though he’s trying not to laugh. Jack mock-glares at him and Ianto’s mouth twitches again. Before he can get distracted, Jack wrenches his eyes from Ianto’s mouth and turns to start rummaging through the hanging cupboards.
“Hey!” he says as he does. “That operating manual reads like it was translated from Swahili to Latin by a Weevil and then handed to an Ancient Breton for translation into English!”
“Hmmm,” Ianto says. “And it didn’t occur to anyone to read or translate directly from the Italian?”
“Italian?”
“It is an Italian model, sir.” Ianto looks up from the manual he’s perusing and sees what Jack is holding. “Ah!” He reaches out and takes the packet. “Thank you, sir.” His eyes meet Jack’s. “Shall I bring something up to your office in half an hour or so?” The eyebrow lifts again. Oh yeah, thinks Jack.
Just then, the alarm sounds and the rumbling of the cog-door reaches the kitchen. Jack looks up at the CCTV monitor in the corner, which automatically cuts to whichever door is being used when the sensors trigger. He can’t help but feel a wave of disappointment when he sees not just one, but all three of his team walk in, deep in conversation together.
“Attractive as that sounds, Ianto, better make it a round of coffees in the boardroom. I’ll introduce you to the team and let them all know why you’re here.”
“Yes, sir.” Jack nods once, receiving a calm nod in return. As he walks out of the kitchen, he hears Ianto lift the never-used coffee maker from the box.
TBC