The Summer Spirit (Jack/Ianto; PG-13)
Dear Readers,
Thank you so much for sticking with me in this. I'll be catching up on replying to comments this week, so a few of you may be getting a bunch of reply notifications in your emails. I LOVE YOU ALL ♥
Regards,
Rei
Title: The Summer Spirit
Author: etharei
Rating: PG-13
Timeline: S2, ambiguous
Spoilers: none
Summary: It was a few days after the Rooftop And Handcuffs Incident, and Ianto was in the middle of double-checking the contents of the ‘In’ and ‘Out’ piles on opposite ends of Jack’s desk...
Author's Notes: ONE MORE TO GO. Shamelessly influenced by Terry Pratchett's Discworld writing.
Disclaimer: Torchwood and all the characters and situations featured therein are the property of Russell T. Davies, the BBC and their affiliates. I’m only borrowing them for purely non-profit, recreational purposes.
Written for: horizonssing, Day #31.
And summer isn't a time. It's a place as well. Summer is a moving creature and likes to go south for the winter.
- Terry Pratchett,
Feet of Clay
The Summer Spirit
by Etharei
It was nearly midnight by the time Jack appeared on the roof of the Millennium Center. He grinned at seeing Ianto, causing the younger man to blush in the dark; he nearly shrugged the coat off his shoulders and returned it to Jack, but it was comfortable and warm and there was a strong gust coming in from the sea. Besides, Jack didn’t seem to get cold easily; the arms winding around Ianto’s waist from behind felt warm through the thick fabric.
“Bad day,” murmured Jack, resting his head on Ianto’s shoulder.
Ianto nodded in agreement and leaned back a little.
Jack knew better than to ask if he was okay. “Feel better?”
“Just tired,” sighed Ianto. Of shooting at things, of being shot at, of watching other people get shot. It’d be nice, once in a while, to meet an alien who’d be content with a firm handshake (or limbic equivalent thereof).
“You look good in my coat.” Jack’s lips were warm and dry against the skin of Ianto’s neck. “You should wear it sometimes.”
The tone of voice left no doubt that Jack didn’t mean during work hours. “How do you know I don’t try it on when you give it to me to take to the dry-cleaner’s? We’re nearly the same height, people probably won’t be able to tell from a distance, in the dark.”
Jack gave him an incredulous look. “Tell me you haven’t?” At Ianto’s non-committal shrug, Jack chuckled. “Ianto Jones: Tourist Information Center employee by day, Captain Jack Harkness at night.”
“Imagine my memoirs,” said Ianto mildly, his mouth twitching into a smile. All things considered, Jack wasn’t bad at the keeping-up-the-morale aspect of his job. “I could create a television show.”
“We-ell,” said Jack, his hands slipping under the loose cloak and expertly working up a different flavor of heat in Ianto’s body. “Since a time-traveler such as myself clearly falls under Torchwood jurisdiction, the Captain should take me to his base and make sure I’m not a threat.”
Ianto laughed, and turned around to kiss Jack. Jack responded with characteristic enthusiasm, so much so that he did not realize what Ianto was doing until cool metal slipped over his wrists and there was a very distinct click.
“Hey, Ianto,” called Jack, from the depths of his bunk.
It was a few days after the Rooftop And Handcuffs Incident, and Ianto was in the middle of double-checking the contents of the ‘In’ and ‘Out’ piles on opposite ends of Jack’s desk; he’d been patiently training Jack on basic organizational concepts, on the basis that old dogs could learn new tricks if they wanted the special, industrial-strength coffee that only Ianto knew how to brew. He paused in the act of gathering up most of the ‘Out’ pile - definitely some improvement there, though rate of progress could be described as speedy only in relation to, say, the movement of glaciers - and bent his head over the entrance. “Yes?”
At first he could only see the sheets of Jack’s bed, then Jack’s face was beaming up at him. “How do you feel about doing a bit of sight-seeing tomorrow? Just the two of us.”
Ianto pondered this. “Would that be in the sense of: I have it in my sights, Jack, should I fire?”
“Nope.”
“Fresh air and open countryside, then, flashing speedily by while we incidentally chase down a carnivorous lizard?”
“No, no running involved.”
“If this is a roundabout way of inviting me to the bathhouse again, I’m not sure I’ve recovered from what happened last time. Naked is not the best costume in which to face down alien invaders.” Though the aliens had been naked, too, and occupied. In every sense of the word.
“We’ll be going in broad daylight.”
“Can’t see that stopping you,” grumbled Ianto. “With all due respect, sir.”
“Come on, it’s going to be interesting!”
Ianto, who knew very well why some older and wiser cultures used the phrase May you live an interesting life as a curse, leveled a doubtful eyebrow at Jack. “Where are we going?”
“Can’t tell you. In fact,” Jack’s mouth twisted. “I’m not entirely sure it will work. That you’ll see it, I mean. But I’m sure you will.”
Damn, his curiosity will be the death of him one day. But then, he wouldn’t be working in Torchwood otherwise. Ianto sighed. “All right. I’ll start stocking up on supplies for the poor creatures imprisoned in this house of concrete and glass. And maybe something for the Weevils, too.”
“Great!” Jack’s face threatened to have more grin than face on it. “And no need to worry about the others, we’ll only be gone a day.”
“Clearly you have not seen the Hub after Gwen’s been hunting for HobNobs.”
The following morning, to Ianto’s surprise, Jack did not even wait for him to arrive at the Hub. Ianto exited his building to find Jack outside, car running, beckoning him to get inside. The fact that it was Ianto’s car, and Ianto’s car keys were still inside his pocket, caused Ianto to pause and throw a glare at Jack. But the man appeared genuinely eager and excited to be off, and really Ianto had long ago surrendered the battle over the concept of personal possessions and personal space.
Jack’s ignorance of personal space extended to traffic and other cars, and a tendency to treat the lines on the road as mere suggestions, meant that they quickly left Cardiff behind and plunged into rolling sun-bathed Welsh country. At first, Ianto attempted to keep track of where they were, but the light conversation that Jack struck up, in addition to the monotonous view and surprising number of turns, distracted him enough that he lost track of names and gave it up for futile.
“If I didn’t know any better,” said Ianto, an hour into the drive. “I’d suspect you’re randomly picking directions as you go.”
Since he was at liberty to give Jack his full, unwavering attention, and Jack concentration was on driving, Ianto caught the flash of a sheepish look.
“You are, aren’t you?”
Jack sighed. “You know when people say: it’s not where you’re going that matters, it’s how you get there?”
“I’m familiar with it.”
“Sometimes it’s the other way around. All that matters is the destination, not the journey. As long as you know where you’re going, the route will be whatever you end up taking to get there.”
“I’m... not entirely sure how that’s supposed to work.” Ianto frowned.
“It’s closer to say that we’re standing still, while time and space move,” Jack drew a squiggly shape in the air with one hand, “around us and bring the... destination to us.”
Ianto could picture that. “It’s not really true, though, is it?”
“Not entirely,” admitted Jack. “But it’s a good way of thinking about it.”
“This thing you want me to see - is it a place?”
No. And yes. Um.” Jack turned and looked at Ianto. Normally Ianto would object to Jack taking his eyes off the road, but there was nothing around for miles. “Trust me?”
“Of course.”
He must have fallen asleep after that, because the next thing Ianto knew was Jack’s hand on his shoulder, gently shaking him awake. “Wlngh?”
“We’re here,” said Jack in a low whisper, face shining.
Ianto shook his head, blinking. No aches in his neck, must only have dozed for a bit. He shifted his head, to get the sun out of his eyes - and realized that the light wasn’t coming from the sun. Unless the sun was hovering right in front of his car.
(Not as unlikely as one might think, in Torchwood.)
“Jack,” he whispered, sitting up. “What is it?”
“It’s all right.” Jack, smiling, undid his seatbelt and turned off the engine. “Come on, it won’t hurt you.”
The words ‘alien possession’ crossed Ianto’s mind, but Jack was already getting out of the car. The light was so bright, it bleached the colour out of everything, but the accompanying warmth was mild, almost pleasant. Since Ianto’s windscreen wasn’t tinted, he figured it was too late to worry about possible damage from the unknown radiation, so he followed Jack out of the car.
They were on a... field. But the bright light made it hard to see anything beyond the fiery ball, and behind them was… grass, a long flat plain stretching out to a distant horizon. Ianto returned his gaze to the light source, and found that his eyes had adjusted. Or maybe it had toned the light down a bit. He could see a shape, somewhere in there, movement. And… a sense of awareness.
Jack walked around the car to stand at his side. “Beautiful, isn’t she?”
Ianto drew in a deep breath and nodded. “What is she?”
“I don’t know if there’s really a name for her kind. She’s the only one on Earth, and she’s lived here since time out of mind. If she ever knew the name, she’s forgotten it, but I suspect she was born here. Hatched.”
“So she didn’t come by the Rift?” It was hard to take your eyes off her, Ianto realized, even though so much light must be wreaking havoc on his retinas.
“Don’t know. Maybe her egg did. Or maybe it was deposited here. Maybe the ship carrying it blew up as it passed the Earth, and it was the heat from entering the atmosphere that caused the egg to hatch.”
He could pick out more details now. Hints of a body, a faint avian outline in the yellow-white, a long graceful neck. A head, a beak, and tiny eyes. But the most spectacular features were the wings. Many times her size, or so they appeared, but it was difficult to tell where the wings ended and the fire-light began. Or maybe they were the light. “Here the anthem doth commence: Love and constancy is dead; Phoenix and the turtle fled, in a mutual flame from hence.”
A wry smile appeared on Jack’s lips. “Thought you’d figure it out. Though that poem wouldn’t have been my first choice.”
Ianto blushed. “It was the only one I could think of, off the top of my head.”
Jack’s hand closed around Ianto’s. “Come on, let’s go say hello.”
They stepped towards the creature. Ianto braced his body for… he didn’t know what, exactly, but whatever it was, it didn’t happen. The light swallowed up the world, until he was walking on it, but there was no change in the heat, or the overall brightness. He’d thought the creature had been right in front of his car, but they traveled quite a way into the light without the core appearing any closer, until the last shimmering image of field and car winked out behind them.
“Don’t touch her directly,” warned Jack. “I don’t know what will happen, but I bet it won’t be good. She’s not really meant to make contact with humans.”
“From all the myths surrounding her,” phoenix, benu, firebird, fenghuang, “I’d have thought lots of people have met her.”
The look was back on Jack’s face - the one he’d had in the car, that suggested he was trying to work out how to fit a square peg into a round hole. “There are certain conditions, usually involving great stress, where a human could get a glimpse of her, but... wait, you’ll understand better in a moment.”
Ianto gazed ahead, and saw a shape that, for flickering moments, was just slightly more solid than the light emanating from it. She regarded them curiously, and made a dry clicking, spitting sound. Like fire crackling on wood.
He saw Jack reaching out his free, unprotected hand to her. He tightened his grip on Jack, but the man only threw a reassuring smile over his shoulder, and made contact.
Hot. Light. Fire, but without the destroying heat.
THE SOUL OF FIRE. WHAT FIRE OUGHT TO BE.
Ianto could see nothing else, only bright, living white. Distantly, he could sense Jack’s grip, not as touch or pressure but as an anchor, keeping him from being borne away by the roaring brilliance. Jack’s voice, distant but inside his own head, Don’t let go.
“As if I ever would,” he replied, mouth speaking before the brain could do its customary inspection.
The anchor grew heavier, more solid. Ianto found that he was holding his breath, and forced his lungs to exchange old air for new. It smelled... dry, scorching, like something out of the bowels of an ancient wasteland. He wondered if he was breathing in the light, the almost-fire, but the possibility of dying didn’t concern him as much as it should have.
He saw… a desert, of sorts. But floating in the air, with light for sand and heat for wind, lying over woods and beaches and cities. Even the ice caps felt the brush of her wings, and her tail lashed unexpectedly at places after the body of her had passed through. Her eyes shimmered like twin mirages, shaped like those of a reptile. And at the heart of it all was her heart, like a living sun, beating out life.
“Summer,” whispered Ianto.
YES.
Feeling returned to his body, slow at first then all at once, various parts of his body sparking protests at being vacated and reoccupied so brusquely. He stumbled backwards, into strong, steadying arms, and he realized that he was still clutching onto Jack with a death-grip.
“You all right?” asked Jack.
Ianto drew in a deep breath. “Yeah. Just took me by surprise.”
“Sorry, I should have warned you,” said Jack, not sounding nearly sorry enough. In fact, he looked positively ecstatic. “But do you understand, now?”
“I think so.” Ianto looked around. They were still enveloped by the yellow-white light, but it no longer seemed as intimidating as before. She was still there, a few paces away, regarding them calmly. “She’s... a being of higher dimensions.”
I AM.
Ianto blinked. “And humans can’t see you properly because we’re three-dimensional. But Jack can?”
“More like she shows herself to me,” explained Jack. “I think she noticed that I’m… different from the other life-forms on this planet. One summer, she caught me napping in the afternoon, outside this sweet little cottage in the south of France. Since then, I’ve made a point of coming out to see her every summer.”
“Oh,” said Ianto, and could not think of anything else to say. He began to pry his aching fingers off Jack’s hand, but Jack shook his head, and held on tighter. Jack and the creature gazed at each other, and Ianto felt quite sure that there was some communication going on between them that he couldn’t hear. He was content to watch in silence, though, even when Jack’s thumb started rubbing over his skin.
After an interminable length of time, Jack announced, “We should head back.”
Ianto nodded. Hr smiled at the creature. “It was nice meeting you.” One must be polite, after all, even to beings of another dimension. Perhaps especially to beings of another dimension.
He received an amused look from Jack, but it seemed to Ianto that the creature executed a dainty little bob of its head in acknowledgment.
Jack followed no path that Ianto could see, but the field and car reappeared in the distance. If only, thought Ianto, the man could manifest a similar sort of skill when returning files back into the Hub archives. The all-encompassing light greatly confused Ianto’s depth perception - the only indication of the field’s distance was its small size in Ianto’s field of vision. It was disconcerting, and the back of Ianto’s eyes began to ache.
Additionally, he was feeling a great deal warmer. He knew, rationally, that he was moving away from the source of the light and heat, but it was as if his body was becoming aware of the flame-like energies it hitherto had ignored, or perhaps he was losing some protection he’d previously had.
“Jack,” he alerted the other man, tugging on his hand.
Jack turned around, and frowned. A blessedly cool palm came up to rest against Ianto’s cheek. Jack took a step toward him, standing close, finding Ianto’s other hand.
Ianto expected Jack to say something, but the man was uncharacteristically silent, wordlessly gazing at Ianto from mere inches away. Ianto met his eyes, the deep cool blue startling after so much yellow and light. Around the edges of his vision, he thought he could see the not-fire licking over his arms, wisps and tendrils of light, but he kept his eyes on Jack. The light seemed to grow brighter, more animated, denser. He pulled his arms back a little, and Jack obediently stepped closer, so that their bodies were touching in a long light line.
Close, but Ianto had the strange sensation of not breathing. The heat kept growing, but at a distance. Until Jack kissed him.
A spike of want, the desire instinctive with the feel and smell and taste of Jack, and the resulting familiar heat felt more immediate, tangible, real.
He focused on it, held it with something that wasn’t hands or arms or mouth, but nevertheless gripped with strength, from a point to the left of the center of his chest.
The world fell away.
His body did what bodies tend do to in such situations, and went flop.
When Ianto opened his eyes, he saw the ceiling of his car.
Normally, in such cases the immediate thought would be that some rather inventive dreaming had been going on previously. But Ianto found it very easy to believe that what he thought happened had happened; likely the product of months on active field duty, where questions such as did I really see a giant wallaby coming towards me? were often overtaken, if not trampled outright, by more vital questions like how the hell do I get out of this giant furry pouch, and is the big hairless dog next to my leg going to eat me?
Happily, in this case, Ianto’s lacking curiosity had a clear cause: Jack was still kissing him. Quite enthusiastically. Technically this supported Ianto’s recollection of events, but this was Jack, who took the opportunity to perform mouth-to-mouth on the merest excuse of respiratory difficulty, including ‘slight breathlessness from moving file cabinets’.
And - Ianto felt around with a hand - no, that which was poking into his back was definitely not the gear stick.
“Welcome back,” whispered Jack, drawing back a little and smiling.
“Mmhmm.” Ianto licked his lips, suppressing a faint disappointment. He looked around and realized he was sprawled over the front two seats, his upper half resting against Jack and the rest of him in the passenger’s side. He grabbed the edges of the seats and struggled to sit up, wincing when his shoulder banged on the steering wheel and his head grazed the rearview mirror.
They were parked on a field. An ordinary Welsh field, not the flat plain he’d seen earlier, and it was late in the afternoon. Ianto got out, inspected the grass in front of the car. Not a mark, nor any trace of warmth, and the air was calm and still. Like there’d never been anything out of the ordinary. Jack didn’t say anything when he returned to the passenger’s seat and buckled in. The engine came to life with a muted roar and healthy thrumming, and Jack made a wide U-turn to head back the way they’d come.
A comfortable silence filled the car; Ianto stared out of his window in thought, while Jack followed a dirt path over a hill and back to a main road. Contrary to his usual behavior in public, Jack didn’t really indulge in superfluous conversation when it was just the two of them,
“Is she really summer?” asked Ianto, after a long while. “I mean, if she were to leave...”
“Or die?” Jack said. “The Earth will continue to turn, and the axial tilt will cause seasonal changes, just like it always has. In that sense, she’s not summer. It’s not that she creates summer, herself...”
...but rather humans have evolved with a, a space in their world that she fills, or so Ianto understood it. She’s the promising breeze through an open window, the light sparkling off fluffy clouds, the scent of wine, the sweet lethargy in children out of school, the rich heat on the skin after the days indoors. She’s death in the unprotected sands, radiation on skin, the blinding stroke, decay and decomposition. She brings life to the green world, and takes it away.
It gave a man something to think about.
"And she's lonely," said Jack simply, at the end of his narrative. "So I go and see her, every year."
After thirty minutes of driving, they entered Cardiff proper. Turned out they weren’t all that far away after all. Ianto remembered, “You said you weren’t sure if I would be able to see her.”
An unfamiliar smile appeared on Jack’s face. Shy, or as close as Captain Jack could get. “I’ve never taken anybody with me to see her, before.”
“Oh.” Ianto looked down, flexed the fingers of his hands. There was still a faint ache from Jack’s tight grip; Jack had never let go, the entire time they’d been in the light. “Thank you. For taking me with you.”
Jack glanced at him, opened his mouth as if to say something, but closed it again and returned his attention to the road.
They were in sight of the Plas when Jack spoke up. “I also wasn’t sure because… let’s just say there’s only one way for you to have been able to see her.”
“And this was?”
“Me.” Jack smile was warm, in the early evening sun. “You could see her because you trusted me completely.”
The two of them were silent again. Jack parked Ianto’s car and turned off the engine. The hourly text messages from the Hub had told of no emergencies, brushes with doom, or food hunts.
Ianto reached over, finding Jack’s hand without looking and closing his fingers around it. “Of course I do. About bloody time you realize.”
Thank you so much for sticking with me in this. I'll be catching up on replying to comments this week, so a few of you may be getting a bunch of reply notifications in your emails. I LOVE YOU ALL ♥
Regards,
Rei
Title: The Summer Spirit
Author: etharei
Rating: PG-13
Timeline: S2, ambiguous
Spoilers: none
Summary: It was a few days after the Rooftop And Handcuffs Incident, and Ianto was in the middle of double-checking the contents of the ‘In’ and ‘Out’ piles on opposite ends of Jack’s desk...
Author's Notes: ONE MORE TO GO. Shamelessly influenced by Terry Pratchett's Discworld writing.
Disclaimer: Torchwood and all the characters and situations featured therein are the property of Russell T. Davies, the BBC and their affiliates. I’m only borrowing them for purely non-profit, recreational purposes.
Written for: horizonssing, Day #31.
And summer isn't a time. It's a place as well. Summer is a moving creature and likes to go south for the winter.
- Terry Pratchett,
Feet of Clay
The Summer Spirit
by Etharei
It was nearly midnight by the time Jack appeared on the roof of the Millennium Center. He grinned at seeing Ianto, causing the younger man to blush in the dark; he nearly shrugged the coat off his shoulders and returned it to Jack, but it was comfortable and warm and there was a strong gust coming in from the sea. Besides, Jack didn’t seem to get cold easily; the arms winding around Ianto’s waist from behind felt warm through the thick fabric.
“Bad day,” murmured Jack, resting his head on Ianto’s shoulder.
Ianto nodded in agreement and leaned back a little.
Jack knew better than to ask if he was okay. “Feel better?”
“Just tired,” sighed Ianto. Of shooting at things, of being shot at, of watching other people get shot. It’d be nice, once in a while, to meet an alien who’d be content with a firm handshake (or limbic equivalent thereof).
“You look good in my coat.” Jack’s lips were warm and dry against the skin of Ianto’s neck. “You should wear it sometimes.”
The tone of voice left no doubt that Jack didn’t mean during work hours. “How do you know I don’t try it on when you give it to me to take to the dry-cleaner’s? We’re nearly the same height, people probably won’t be able to tell from a distance, in the dark.”
Jack gave him an incredulous look. “Tell me you haven’t?” At Ianto’s non-committal shrug, Jack chuckled. “Ianto Jones: Tourist Information Center employee by day, Captain Jack Harkness at night.”
“Imagine my memoirs,” said Ianto mildly, his mouth twitching into a smile. All things considered, Jack wasn’t bad at the keeping-up-the-morale aspect of his job. “I could create a television show.”
“We-ell,” said Jack, his hands slipping under the loose cloak and expertly working up a different flavor of heat in Ianto’s body. “Since a time-traveler such as myself clearly falls under Torchwood jurisdiction, the Captain should take me to his base and make sure I’m not a threat.”
Ianto laughed, and turned around to kiss Jack. Jack responded with characteristic enthusiasm, so much so that he did not realize what Ianto was doing until cool metal slipped over his wrists and there was a very distinct click.
“Hey, Ianto,” called Jack, from the depths of his bunk.
It was a few days after the Rooftop And Handcuffs Incident, and Ianto was in the middle of double-checking the contents of the ‘In’ and ‘Out’ piles on opposite ends of Jack’s desk; he’d been patiently training Jack on basic organizational concepts, on the basis that old dogs could learn new tricks if they wanted the special, industrial-strength coffee that only Ianto knew how to brew. He paused in the act of gathering up most of the ‘Out’ pile - definitely some improvement there, though rate of progress could be described as speedy only in relation to, say, the movement of glaciers - and bent his head over the entrance. “Yes?”
At first he could only see the sheets of Jack’s bed, then Jack’s face was beaming up at him. “How do you feel about doing a bit of sight-seeing tomorrow? Just the two of us.”
Ianto pondered this. “Would that be in the sense of: I have it in my sights, Jack, should I fire?”
“Nope.”
“Fresh air and open countryside, then, flashing speedily by while we incidentally chase down a carnivorous lizard?”
“No, no running involved.”
“If this is a roundabout way of inviting me to the bathhouse again, I’m not sure I’ve recovered from what happened last time. Naked is not the best costume in which to face down alien invaders.” Though the aliens had been naked, too, and occupied. In every sense of the word.
“We’ll be going in broad daylight.”
“Can’t see that stopping you,” grumbled Ianto. “With all due respect, sir.”
“Come on, it’s going to be interesting!”
Ianto, who knew very well why some older and wiser cultures used the phrase May you live an interesting life as a curse, leveled a doubtful eyebrow at Jack. “Where are we going?”
“Can’t tell you. In fact,” Jack’s mouth twisted. “I’m not entirely sure it will work. That you’ll see it, I mean. But I’m sure you will.”
Damn, his curiosity will be the death of him one day. But then, he wouldn’t be working in Torchwood otherwise. Ianto sighed. “All right. I’ll start stocking up on supplies for the poor creatures imprisoned in this house of concrete and glass. And maybe something for the Weevils, too.”
“Great!” Jack’s face threatened to have more grin than face on it. “And no need to worry about the others, we’ll only be gone a day.”
“Clearly you have not seen the Hub after Gwen’s been hunting for HobNobs.”
The following morning, to Ianto’s surprise, Jack did not even wait for him to arrive at the Hub. Ianto exited his building to find Jack outside, car running, beckoning him to get inside. The fact that it was Ianto’s car, and Ianto’s car keys were still inside his pocket, caused Ianto to pause and throw a glare at Jack. But the man appeared genuinely eager and excited to be off, and really Ianto had long ago surrendered the battle over the concept of personal possessions and personal space.
Jack’s ignorance of personal space extended to traffic and other cars, and a tendency to treat the lines on the road as mere suggestions, meant that they quickly left Cardiff behind and plunged into rolling sun-bathed Welsh country. At first, Ianto attempted to keep track of where they were, but the light conversation that Jack struck up, in addition to the monotonous view and surprising number of turns, distracted him enough that he lost track of names and gave it up for futile.
“If I didn’t know any better,” said Ianto, an hour into the drive. “I’d suspect you’re randomly picking directions as you go.”
Since he was at liberty to give Jack his full, unwavering attention, and Jack concentration was on driving, Ianto caught the flash of a sheepish look.
“You are, aren’t you?”
Jack sighed. “You know when people say: it’s not where you’re going that matters, it’s how you get there?”
“I’m familiar with it.”
“Sometimes it’s the other way around. All that matters is the destination, not the journey. As long as you know where you’re going, the route will be whatever you end up taking to get there.”
“I’m... not entirely sure how that’s supposed to work.” Ianto frowned.
“It’s closer to say that we’re standing still, while time and space move,” Jack drew a squiggly shape in the air with one hand, “around us and bring the... destination to us.”
Ianto could picture that. “It’s not really true, though, is it?”
“Not entirely,” admitted Jack. “But it’s a good way of thinking about it.”
“This thing you want me to see - is it a place?”
No. And yes. Um.” Jack turned and looked at Ianto. Normally Ianto would object to Jack taking his eyes off the road, but there was nothing around for miles. “Trust me?”
“Of course.”
He must have fallen asleep after that, because the next thing Ianto knew was Jack’s hand on his shoulder, gently shaking him awake. “Wlngh?”
“We’re here,” said Jack in a low whisper, face shining.
Ianto shook his head, blinking. No aches in his neck, must only have dozed for a bit. He shifted his head, to get the sun out of his eyes - and realized that the light wasn’t coming from the sun. Unless the sun was hovering right in front of his car.
(Not as unlikely as one might think, in Torchwood.)
“Jack,” he whispered, sitting up. “What is it?”
“It’s all right.” Jack, smiling, undid his seatbelt and turned off the engine. “Come on, it won’t hurt you.”
The words ‘alien possession’ crossed Ianto’s mind, but Jack was already getting out of the car. The light was so bright, it bleached the colour out of everything, but the accompanying warmth was mild, almost pleasant. Since Ianto’s windscreen wasn’t tinted, he figured it was too late to worry about possible damage from the unknown radiation, so he followed Jack out of the car.
They were on a... field. But the bright light made it hard to see anything beyond the fiery ball, and behind them was… grass, a long flat plain stretching out to a distant horizon. Ianto returned his gaze to the light source, and found that his eyes had adjusted. Or maybe it had toned the light down a bit. He could see a shape, somewhere in there, movement. And… a sense of awareness.
Jack walked around the car to stand at his side. “Beautiful, isn’t she?”
Ianto drew in a deep breath and nodded. “What is she?”
“I don’t know if there’s really a name for her kind. She’s the only one on Earth, and she’s lived here since time out of mind. If she ever knew the name, she’s forgotten it, but I suspect she was born here. Hatched.”
“So she didn’t come by the Rift?” It was hard to take your eyes off her, Ianto realized, even though so much light must be wreaking havoc on his retinas.
“Don’t know. Maybe her egg did. Or maybe it was deposited here. Maybe the ship carrying it blew up as it passed the Earth, and it was the heat from entering the atmosphere that caused the egg to hatch.”
He could pick out more details now. Hints of a body, a faint avian outline in the yellow-white, a long graceful neck. A head, a beak, and tiny eyes. But the most spectacular features were the wings. Many times her size, or so they appeared, but it was difficult to tell where the wings ended and the fire-light began. Or maybe they were the light. “Here the anthem doth commence: Love and constancy is dead; Phoenix and the turtle fled, in a mutual flame from hence.”
A wry smile appeared on Jack’s lips. “Thought you’d figure it out. Though that poem wouldn’t have been my first choice.”
Ianto blushed. “It was the only one I could think of, off the top of my head.”
Jack’s hand closed around Ianto’s. “Come on, let’s go say hello.”
They stepped towards the creature. Ianto braced his body for… he didn’t know what, exactly, but whatever it was, it didn’t happen. The light swallowed up the world, until he was walking on it, but there was no change in the heat, or the overall brightness. He’d thought the creature had been right in front of his car, but they traveled quite a way into the light without the core appearing any closer, until the last shimmering image of field and car winked out behind them.
“Don’t touch her directly,” warned Jack. “I don’t know what will happen, but I bet it won’t be good. She’s not really meant to make contact with humans.”
“From all the myths surrounding her,” phoenix, benu, firebird, fenghuang, “I’d have thought lots of people have met her.”
The look was back on Jack’s face - the one he’d had in the car, that suggested he was trying to work out how to fit a square peg into a round hole. “There are certain conditions, usually involving great stress, where a human could get a glimpse of her, but... wait, you’ll understand better in a moment.”
Ianto gazed ahead, and saw a shape that, for flickering moments, was just slightly more solid than the light emanating from it. She regarded them curiously, and made a dry clicking, spitting sound. Like fire crackling on wood.
He saw Jack reaching out his free, unprotected hand to her. He tightened his grip on Jack, but the man only threw a reassuring smile over his shoulder, and made contact.
Hot. Light. Fire, but without the destroying heat.
THE SOUL OF FIRE. WHAT FIRE OUGHT TO BE.
Ianto could see nothing else, only bright, living white. Distantly, he could sense Jack’s grip, not as touch or pressure but as an anchor, keeping him from being borne away by the roaring brilliance. Jack’s voice, distant but inside his own head, Don’t let go.
“As if I ever would,” he replied, mouth speaking before the brain could do its customary inspection.
The anchor grew heavier, more solid. Ianto found that he was holding his breath, and forced his lungs to exchange old air for new. It smelled... dry, scorching, like something out of the bowels of an ancient wasteland. He wondered if he was breathing in the light, the almost-fire, but the possibility of dying didn’t concern him as much as it should have.
He saw… a desert, of sorts. But floating in the air, with light for sand and heat for wind, lying over woods and beaches and cities. Even the ice caps felt the brush of her wings, and her tail lashed unexpectedly at places after the body of her had passed through. Her eyes shimmered like twin mirages, shaped like those of a reptile. And at the heart of it all was her heart, like a living sun, beating out life.
“Summer,” whispered Ianto.
YES.
Feeling returned to his body, slow at first then all at once, various parts of his body sparking protests at being vacated and reoccupied so brusquely. He stumbled backwards, into strong, steadying arms, and he realized that he was still clutching onto Jack with a death-grip.
“You all right?” asked Jack.
Ianto drew in a deep breath. “Yeah. Just took me by surprise.”
“Sorry, I should have warned you,” said Jack, not sounding nearly sorry enough. In fact, he looked positively ecstatic. “But do you understand, now?”
“I think so.” Ianto looked around. They were still enveloped by the yellow-white light, but it no longer seemed as intimidating as before. She was still there, a few paces away, regarding them calmly. “She’s... a being of higher dimensions.”
I AM.
Ianto blinked. “And humans can’t see you properly because we’re three-dimensional. But Jack can?”
“More like she shows herself to me,” explained Jack. “I think she noticed that I’m… different from the other life-forms on this planet. One summer, she caught me napping in the afternoon, outside this sweet little cottage in the south of France. Since then, I’ve made a point of coming out to see her every summer.”
“Oh,” said Ianto, and could not think of anything else to say. He began to pry his aching fingers off Jack’s hand, but Jack shook his head, and held on tighter. Jack and the creature gazed at each other, and Ianto felt quite sure that there was some communication going on between them that he couldn’t hear. He was content to watch in silence, though, even when Jack’s thumb started rubbing over his skin.
After an interminable length of time, Jack announced, “We should head back.”
Ianto nodded. Hr smiled at the creature. “It was nice meeting you.” One must be polite, after all, even to beings of another dimension. Perhaps especially to beings of another dimension.
He received an amused look from Jack, but it seemed to Ianto that the creature executed a dainty little bob of its head in acknowledgment.
Jack followed no path that Ianto could see, but the field and car reappeared in the distance. If only, thought Ianto, the man could manifest a similar sort of skill when returning files back into the Hub archives. The all-encompassing light greatly confused Ianto’s depth perception - the only indication of the field’s distance was its small size in Ianto’s field of vision. It was disconcerting, and the back of Ianto’s eyes began to ache.
Additionally, he was feeling a great deal warmer. He knew, rationally, that he was moving away from the source of the light and heat, but it was as if his body was becoming aware of the flame-like energies it hitherto had ignored, or perhaps he was losing some protection he’d previously had.
“Jack,” he alerted the other man, tugging on his hand.
Jack turned around, and frowned. A blessedly cool palm came up to rest against Ianto’s cheek. Jack took a step toward him, standing close, finding Ianto’s other hand.
Ianto expected Jack to say something, but the man was uncharacteristically silent, wordlessly gazing at Ianto from mere inches away. Ianto met his eyes, the deep cool blue startling after so much yellow and light. Around the edges of his vision, he thought he could see the not-fire licking over his arms, wisps and tendrils of light, but he kept his eyes on Jack. The light seemed to grow brighter, more animated, denser. He pulled his arms back a little, and Jack obediently stepped closer, so that their bodies were touching in a long light line.
Close, but Ianto had the strange sensation of not breathing. The heat kept growing, but at a distance. Until Jack kissed him.
A spike of want, the desire instinctive with the feel and smell and taste of Jack, and the resulting familiar heat felt more immediate, tangible, real.
He focused on it, held it with something that wasn’t hands or arms or mouth, but nevertheless gripped with strength, from a point to the left of the center of his chest.
The world fell away.
His body did what bodies tend do to in such situations, and went flop.
When Ianto opened his eyes, he saw the ceiling of his car.
Normally, in such cases the immediate thought would be that some rather inventive dreaming had been going on previously. But Ianto found it very easy to believe that what he thought happened had happened; likely the product of months on active field duty, where questions such as did I really see a giant wallaby coming towards me? were often overtaken, if not trampled outright, by more vital questions like how the hell do I get out of this giant furry pouch, and is the big hairless dog next to my leg going to eat me?
Happily, in this case, Ianto’s lacking curiosity had a clear cause: Jack was still kissing him. Quite enthusiastically. Technically this supported Ianto’s recollection of events, but this was Jack, who took the opportunity to perform mouth-to-mouth on the merest excuse of respiratory difficulty, including ‘slight breathlessness from moving file cabinets’.
And - Ianto felt around with a hand - no, that which was poking into his back was definitely not the gear stick.
“Welcome back,” whispered Jack, drawing back a little and smiling.
“Mmhmm.” Ianto licked his lips, suppressing a faint disappointment. He looked around and realized he was sprawled over the front two seats, his upper half resting against Jack and the rest of him in the passenger’s side. He grabbed the edges of the seats and struggled to sit up, wincing when his shoulder banged on the steering wheel and his head grazed the rearview mirror.
They were parked on a field. An ordinary Welsh field, not the flat plain he’d seen earlier, and it was late in the afternoon. Ianto got out, inspected the grass in front of the car. Not a mark, nor any trace of warmth, and the air was calm and still. Like there’d never been anything out of the ordinary. Jack didn’t say anything when he returned to the passenger’s seat and buckled in. The engine came to life with a muted roar and healthy thrumming, and Jack made a wide U-turn to head back the way they’d come.
A comfortable silence filled the car; Ianto stared out of his window in thought, while Jack followed a dirt path over a hill and back to a main road. Contrary to his usual behavior in public, Jack didn’t really indulge in superfluous conversation when it was just the two of them,
“Is she really summer?” asked Ianto, after a long while. “I mean, if she were to leave...”
“Or die?” Jack said. “The Earth will continue to turn, and the axial tilt will cause seasonal changes, just like it always has. In that sense, she’s not summer. It’s not that she creates summer, herself...”
...but rather humans have evolved with a, a space in their world that she fills, or so Ianto understood it. She’s the promising breeze through an open window, the light sparkling off fluffy clouds, the scent of wine, the sweet lethargy in children out of school, the rich heat on the skin after the days indoors. She’s death in the unprotected sands, radiation on skin, the blinding stroke, decay and decomposition. She brings life to the green world, and takes it away.
It gave a man something to think about.
"And she's lonely," said Jack simply, at the end of his narrative. "So I go and see her, every year."
After thirty minutes of driving, they entered Cardiff proper. Turned out they weren’t all that far away after all. Ianto remembered, “You said you weren’t sure if I would be able to see her.”
An unfamiliar smile appeared on Jack’s face. Shy, or as close as Captain Jack could get. “I’ve never taken anybody with me to see her, before.”
“Oh.” Ianto looked down, flexed the fingers of his hands. There was still a faint ache from Jack’s tight grip; Jack had never let go, the entire time they’d been in the light. “Thank you. For taking me with you.”
Jack glanced at him, opened his mouth as if to say something, but closed it again and returned his attention to the road.
They were in sight of the Plas when Jack spoke up. “I also wasn’t sure because… let’s just say there’s only one way for you to have been able to see her.”
“And this was?”
“Me.” Jack smile was warm, in the early evening sun. “You could see her because you trusted me completely.”
The two of them were silent again. Jack parked Ianto’s car and turned off the engine. The hourly text messages from the Hub had told of no emergencies, brushes with doom, or food hunts.
Ianto reached over, finding Jack’s hand without looking and closing his fingers around it. “Of course I do. About bloody time you realize.”