Interviews and interrogations [fic]
Title: Interviews and interrogations
Author: shadowbyrd
Rating(s): PG - 13
Characters: Ianto
Warning(s): Au, just a bit.
Word Count: 2505
Summary: How Ianto came to join Torchwood One. And how far he drifted in the years prior.
A/N: Thanks to laligin for the beta and that fine day out when I first had the idea.
“Ah, Mr Jones. I trust you’re comfortable?”
Ianto favoured the man in the suit with a brief glare and returned to staring at the wall. The whole room was white; white walls, white ceiling, white floor. Ianto had passed the time looking for marks and blemishes to point out to his captors when they attempted to question him. Even if it didn’t bother them, he at least would feel that he was doing something to defy them. Sometimes that was the best way to get through torture, or so Ianto had been told; the longer you felt that you were holding them off the longer it took for them to break you and the more time help had to come to your rescue. So far in his own experience it had held true.
The man in the suit seated himself at the table in the middle of the room, placing a folder and a pen down on the table top and gesturing to the other chair. “Please, take a seat.”
It seemed more of a request than an order. Ianto decided to humour the man for now and took the chair opposite. He seemed human enough, but that didn’t mean he was out of danger.
“What exactly have I been arrested for?” asked Ianto, trying to project a tone of offended authority.
The man in the suit, however, wasn’t interested, too busy reading through one of the files in front of him. “You’re not under arrest,” he said distractedly.
“I was snatched off the street, I presume after being followed for a couple of days at least, handcuffed, thrown into the back of a van and marched into this room with a hood over my head. If I haven’t been arrested this is nothing short of kidnapping -”
“You are being held, and until such time as we see fit to let you go you have no rights whatsoever. So don’t bother asking for a lawyer,” said the man, still not looking up.
Ianto pursed his lips. “Very well. What am I being held for?”
The man continued to flip through his files. “Ianto Jones, born 1983, Cardiff. Bright student, though not exceptional. I have all the necessary paperwork here for the university of Bangor, though it appears you never actually attended. I wonder, is that down to your father’s disappearance when you were eighteen?”
He was so calm. Asking… that, cool as you please, not even looking up at him - Ianto’s hands lay fisted and trembling in his lap, his jaw clenched shut.
The man in the suit nodded as though he had received an answer. “A year on, I can’t seem to find any paper record of you.” Finally he looked up at Ianto, steepling his fingers. “Can you give me an account of your whereabouts for the last two years, Mr Jones?”
Ianto made sure to look exasperated. It wasn’t difficult. “You’ve hauled me in here to find out what I’ve been doing the last two years?” He almost laughed. “I’ve been at home with my Mam, watching daytime TV, alright? I’ve not had a job, never bothered signing on, so there wouldn’t be any record, would there?”
The man in the suit raised an eyebrow, managing to convey such disbelief and scorn with that one small gesture Ianto was sure he had practiced it in a mirror. Now that he was finally looking at Ianto, he could see that the man in the suit was barely a year or two older than him. Amazing, the difference a year or two could make, Ianto thought grimly.
“And no cash withdrawals? You’ve been financially dependent on your mother all this time as well?”
Ianto, hatching an idea, glanced away, trying to look cowed. The man in the suit, apparently sensing a weakness, leant forward. “There’s no sign of you on the CCTV tapes of Cardiff city centre from the last two years. Not even once at Christmas.” The man in the suit cocked his head. “You don’t really expect me to believe that you’ve been locked up in your parents’ house these past two years, do you?”
Ianto swallowed, hunching his shoulders a little for effect. “It’s the truth,” he said, his voice sounding suitably unsteady.
“Really?” asked the suit coolly. Damn, but he was good. Ianto was almost starting to enjoy this.
“Yes,” said Ianto. It caught on his throat as though he really were terrified of being found out. God knew, he had enough experience feeling it to fake it.
The man in the suit picked up the pen that had been lying on the table between them, replacing it to the side as though removing some kind of barrier. “Ianto,” he said kindly. “You’re not very good at lying.”
“I - I’m not lying -” Perhaps he had overdone the stammering.
“Just tell me the truth. Just do that and you’ll be able to walk out of that door of your own free will.”
Ianto swallowed again and made a point of evading eye contact. “I -” He stopped and cleared his throat, folding his arms. “After my dad disappeared, it just got really hard to leave the house, y’know? Before I knew it, months had gone by without me leaving the house. I tried - I really tried to, but I just - I couldn’t do it. Agoraphobic, the psychiatrist said. Today, if it’s still the same day, was my fifth successful trip out on my own. Before you lot grabbed me.” These last words came out bitter and Ianto glared at the man for good measure, allowing himself to think for a moment about his Mum, and what was going through her mind right now, especially after Dad -
The man in the suit blinked, then sighed, sitting back in his chair, looking strangely disappointed. “That’s the best you can do?”
Ianto couldn’t help but feel offended. “It was a rather good idea, I thought.”
“Well executed,” the suit admitted. “Though the initial discomfort you displayed when forced to wear the hood, and when you were first brought in here, suggested to me claustrophobia rather than agoraphobia. If I hadn’t seen the footage I probably would have been taken in,” he added, as though worried he were offending Ianto. “Though you’ve completely given yourself away, now.”
Ianto nodded wearily. “True.” That had been a stupid move to make. He relaxed, easing the tension in his shoulders. “So, what happens now?”
The man in the suit pinched the bridge of his nose, before pulling a blown-up CCTV still from the back of the file and slapping it down on the table in front of Ianto. It was a high-angle shot of a London street, early one winter evening. Ianto remembered it well. He saw himself, bundled up in gloves and a muffler that flapped around his knees, turned to talk to a tall, broad man dressed in nothing more than his usual dark jeans, jumper and a battered leather jacket.
Shit.
“This,” said the suit, tapping the print-out, “is you. And this man, what name do you know him by?”
Ianto tried to shrug. “He never told me his name.”
“Than what did you call him?”
“I didn’t call him anything.”
“How did you manage that?”
“The same way I’m managing not calling you anything.”
“But we’ve barely been together in this room half an hour,” the man in the suit pointed out. “After two years, surely he would at least give you some kind of alias?”
“What about you?” asked Ianto, aware his stalling was becoming far too obvious. “What are you called? Who’s kidnapped me, exactly?”
“You won’t have heard of us,” said the man in the suit, waving a hand.
“You don’t know that.” said Ianto. “If I’ve been travelling with him and he’s who you think he is, might be I’ve heard of you.”
The suit looked vaguely amused, corners of the mouth quirking up. “We’re called “Torchwood”.”
The silence stretched out before them as Ianto pretended to think. “No,” he said. “You’re right, never heard of you.”
“Let me tell you how this day is going to end,” the man in the suit began, an impatient edge to his voice. “You are going to tell me everything you know about the TARDIS and about the Doctor, and you are not going to leave a single detail out, because if you do - if you do, things could take a turn for the worse for you. And your mother -”
Ianto was on his feet so fast his chair toppled over. “Don’t you dare,” he snarled. “You lay so much as a finger on her and I’ll -”
“Yes?” The man was barely a year or two older than him, sitting while Ianto was standing. “What will you do?” Why the hell did he make Ianto feel so powerless?
Ianto knelt down and righted his chair and then seated himself. He wouldn’t tell them everything. Just enough. Vague descriptions and knots of memories that couldn’t be untangled, even by him. The Doctor would forgive him if ever they met again.
The man in the suit didn’t take any notes - Ianto didn’t really expect him to, though nonetheless found himself curiously disappointed that he didn’t - though several times he asked Ianto to repeat certain facts, or elaborate on a term, give places, dates. Ianto talked himself hoarse and eventually the words dried up and he shook his head.
“That’s not all of it,” the man in the suit said.
Ianto nodded. “That’s it. Everything you could possibly want to know, anyway. Can I go now?”
The man in the suit shook his head, rising. “I’ll get you some water, then perhaps you’ll -” He stopped, frowning. He then sat back down, looking Ianto up and down as though considering something.
Finally he said, “We’d like to offer you a job in our archives. New personnel are always needed, and with your… obvious experience, you are more than qualified for the job.”
Ianto blinked. Trap, he thought. I don’t know how, or to what end, but this is definitely a trap.
“The pay is very generous,” the man in the suit went on. “You’d be able to re-pay your mother for all that money you’ve borrowed from her. With interest.”
“Do I have any choice in the matter?” asked Ianto, genuinely interested. Sometimes they tried to trick you into making the decision they wanted you to make by making it seem like you had other options.
Torchwood, it seemed, weren’t into that kind of back-to-front psychology. “Certainly. If you wish to remain in our custody like this, you can decline.”
Ianto bit his tongue, trying to decide whether or not to ask. He gave in. “Why are you offering me this exactly?”
“Because we believe that you could help us in our fight against the Doctor,” said the man in the suit. “With your insider’s knowledge -”
““Fight against the Doctor”? That’s what your “Torchwood” is doing? Fighting the Doctor?” Ianto almost laughed.
“The Torchwood Institute was founded to provide the British Empire with defence from the Doctor and other alien threats.”
“The Doctor isn’t a threat. He’s saved planet Earth from numerous invasions -”
“When it suits him,” said the suit. “What about when he’s not here? What about those times he doesn’t take our side? What are we to do then?”
Ianto bit his lip and said nothing.
“You would be helping us defend the peoples of the old empire from the alien threat.”
“Not the world?” asked Ianto. “Just the British empire?”
“The Americans can more than look after themselves, and in any case probably wouldn’t accept our help,” said the suit dismissively.
Mad, Ianto thought. Completely mad. On the other hand -
“If I have no other choice,” said Ianto, slowly sitting up straight. “I accept your offer.”
The suit smiled and extended his hand. Ianto took it. “Welcome to Torchwood, Mr Jones.”
As it was, keeping Torchwood off the Doctor’s trail was difficult. That Ianto had been put to work in the archives, not intelligence or tracking, and that someone in the IT department seemed to have been ordered to monitor his activities whilst logged into the system didn’t help things. He tried to work around this by logging on as other people, browsing on other people’s computers while they were away at the toilet or in a stationery cupboard cheating on their girlfriend/boyfriend/significant other.
There was a lot to hate about working there, but the thing Ianto hated the most was having to wear a suit. They were all very bland and unoffending and it reminded him of things he’d rather have forgotten for at least a couple more years.
The most recent sighting of the Doctor had been in Cardiff, with a blonde girl, a black boy a couple of years older and an American in his thirties. Ianto remembered the Doctor mentioning the boy and the girl - more particularly the girl. He’d gone back and found her after all. When he zoomed in on the picture to get a better look at the American, another window popped up on Mark’s computer, flipping through personnel files. As Ianto tried desperately to close the thing down the window informed him that the man was one Captain Jack Harkness, formerly a free-lancer attached to Torchwood Three, now in charge of the place.
Ianto spent the next few days worrying over whether the Captain was travelling with him as some kind of mole or double agent - it had happened before, so the Doctor told him. But if he were, surely the Doctor would figure it out? Especially as it had happened before.
Or maybe that was Jack before he came to work for Torchwood. Maybe that’s what Torchwood did as they chased after the Doctor; picked up the scraps he left behind, anything that could be used against him. Including his travelling companions. The thought made Ianto sick and hopeful at the same time. Maybe somewhere in this labyrinthine maddeningly white building there was someone else like him, who was threatened into joining up and forced to work against an old friend.
But then maybe some of them joined up willingly. He thought of the picture in Harkness’ file, the painfully neutral expression that the man on the CCTV tape didn’t look capable of. Had he been left somewhere? Had he resented it? Had he joined Torchwood willingly to get revenge?
Ianto yanked his tie, slowly strangling him, loose and sighed. Whatever his reasons for joining, it would be interesting to meet him, someone else who had met the Doctor, someone else who had travelled with him. Was the Doctor any different now? Had Harkness - Jack - ever encountered the Cybermen?
Then again, there wasn’t much point in thinking about it - if they had someone tracking Ianto’s movements on the computer, they’d probably try to prevent him and Captain Jack from crossing paths, just to be on the safe side. Shame, though. He would have liked to have met him.
Author: shadowbyrd
Rating(s): PG - 13
Characters: Ianto
Warning(s): Au, just a bit.
Word Count: 2505
Summary: How Ianto came to join Torchwood One. And how far he drifted in the years prior.
A/N: Thanks to laligin for the beta and that fine day out when I first had the idea.
“Ah, Mr Jones. I trust you’re comfortable?”
Ianto favoured the man in the suit with a brief glare and returned to staring at the wall. The whole room was white; white walls, white ceiling, white floor. Ianto had passed the time looking for marks and blemishes to point out to his captors when they attempted to question him. Even if it didn’t bother them, he at least would feel that he was doing something to defy them. Sometimes that was the best way to get through torture, or so Ianto had been told; the longer you felt that you were holding them off the longer it took for them to break you and the more time help had to come to your rescue. So far in his own experience it had held true.
The man in the suit seated himself at the table in the middle of the room, placing a folder and a pen down on the table top and gesturing to the other chair. “Please, take a seat.”
It seemed more of a request than an order. Ianto decided to humour the man for now and took the chair opposite. He seemed human enough, but that didn’t mean he was out of danger.
“What exactly have I been arrested for?” asked Ianto, trying to project a tone of offended authority.
The man in the suit, however, wasn’t interested, too busy reading through one of the files in front of him. “You’re not under arrest,” he said distractedly.
“I was snatched off the street, I presume after being followed for a couple of days at least, handcuffed, thrown into the back of a van and marched into this room with a hood over my head. If I haven’t been arrested this is nothing short of kidnapping -”
“You are being held, and until such time as we see fit to let you go you have no rights whatsoever. So don’t bother asking for a lawyer,” said the man, still not looking up.
Ianto pursed his lips. “Very well. What am I being held for?”
The man continued to flip through his files. “Ianto Jones, born 1983, Cardiff. Bright student, though not exceptional. I have all the necessary paperwork here for the university of Bangor, though it appears you never actually attended. I wonder, is that down to your father’s disappearance when you were eighteen?”
He was so calm. Asking… that, cool as you please, not even looking up at him - Ianto’s hands lay fisted and trembling in his lap, his jaw clenched shut.
The man in the suit nodded as though he had received an answer. “A year on, I can’t seem to find any paper record of you.” Finally he looked up at Ianto, steepling his fingers. “Can you give me an account of your whereabouts for the last two years, Mr Jones?”
Ianto made sure to look exasperated. It wasn’t difficult. “You’ve hauled me in here to find out what I’ve been doing the last two years?” He almost laughed. “I’ve been at home with my Mam, watching daytime TV, alright? I’ve not had a job, never bothered signing on, so there wouldn’t be any record, would there?”
The man in the suit raised an eyebrow, managing to convey such disbelief and scorn with that one small gesture Ianto was sure he had practiced it in a mirror. Now that he was finally looking at Ianto, he could see that the man in the suit was barely a year or two older than him. Amazing, the difference a year or two could make, Ianto thought grimly.
“And no cash withdrawals? You’ve been financially dependent on your mother all this time as well?”
Ianto, hatching an idea, glanced away, trying to look cowed. The man in the suit, apparently sensing a weakness, leant forward. “There’s no sign of you on the CCTV tapes of Cardiff city centre from the last two years. Not even once at Christmas.” The man in the suit cocked his head. “You don’t really expect me to believe that you’ve been locked up in your parents’ house these past two years, do you?”
Ianto swallowed, hunching his shoulders a little for effect. “It’s the truth,” he said, his voice sounding suitably unsteady.
“Really?” asked the suit coolly. Damn, but he was good. Ianto was almost starting to enjoy this.
“Yes,” said Ianto. It caught on his throat as though he really were terrified of being found out. God knew, he had enough experience feeling it to fake it.
The man in the suit picked up the pen that had been lying on the table between them, replacing it to the side as though removing some kind of barrier. “Ianto,” he said kindly. “You’re not very good at lying.”
“I - I’m not lying -” Perhaps he had overdone the stammering.
“Just tell me the truth. Just do that and you’ll be able to walk out of that door of your own free will.”
Ianto swallowed again and made a point of evading eye contact. “I -” He stopped and cleared his throat, folding his arms. “After my dad disappeared, it just got really hard to leave the house, y’know? Before I knew it, months had gone by without me leaving the house. I tried - I really tried to, but I just - I couldn’t do it. Agoraphobic, the psychiatrist said. Today, if it’s still the same day, was my fifth successful trip out on my own. Before you lot grabbed me.” These last words came out bitter and Ianto glared at the man for good measure, allowing himself to think for a moment about his Mum, and what was going through her mind right now, especially after Dad -
The man in the suit blinked, then sighed, sitting back in his chair, looking strangely disappointed. “That’s the best you can do?”
Ianto couldn’t help but feel offended. “It was a rather good idea, I thought.”
“Well executed,” the suit admitted. “Though the initial discomfort you displayed when forced to wear the hood, and when you were first brought in here, suggested to me claustrophobia rather than agoraphobia. If I hadn’t seen the footage I probably would have been taken in,” he added, as though worried he were offending Ianto. “Though you’ve completely given yourself away, now.”
Ianto nodded wearily. “True.” That had been a stupid move to make. He relaxed, easing the tension in his shoulders. “So, what happens now?”
The man in the suit pinched the bridge of his nose, before pulling a blown-up CCTV still from the back of the file and slapping it down on the table in front of Ianto. It was a high-angle shot of a London street, early one winter evening. Ianto remembered it well. He saw himself, bundled up in gloves and a muffler that flapped around his knees, turned to talk to a tall, broad man dressed in nothing more than his usual dark jeans, jumper and a battered leather jacket.
Shit.
“This,” said the suit, tapping the print-out, “is you. And this man, what name do you know him by?”
Ianto tried to shrug. “He never told me his name.”
“Than what did you call him?”
“I didn’t call him anything.”
“How did you manage that?”
“The same way I’m managing not calling you anything.”
“But we’ve barely been together in this room half an hour,” the man in the suit pointed out. “After two years, surely he would at least give you some kind of alias?”
“What about you?” asked Ianto, aware his stalling was becoming far too obvious. “What are you called? Who’s kidnapped me, exactly?”
“You won’t have heard of us,” said the man in the suit, waving a hand.
“You don’t know that.” said Ianto. “If I’ve been travelling with him and he’s who you think he is, might be I’ve heard of you.”
The suit looked vaguely amused, corners of the mouth quirking up. “We’re called “Torchwood”.”
The silence stretched out before them as Ianto pretended to think. “No,” he said. “You’re right, never heard of you.”
“Let me tell you how this day is going to end,” the man in the suit began, an impatient edge to his voice. “You are going to tell me everything you know about the TARDIS and about the Doctor, and you are not going to leave a single detail out, because if you do - if you do, things could take a turn for the worse for you. And your mother -”
Ianto was on his feet so fast his chair toppled over. “Don’t you dare,” he snarled. “You lay so much as a finger on her and I’ll -”
“Yes?” The man was barely a year or two older than him, sitting while Ianto was standing. “What will you do?” Why the hell did he make Ianto feel so powerless?
Ianto knelt down and righted his chair and then seated himself. He wouldn’t tell them everything. Just enough. Vague descriptions and knots of memories that couldn’t be untangled, even by him. The Doctor would forgive him if ever they met again.
The man in the suit didn’t take any notes - Ianto didn’t really expect him to, though nonetheless found himself curiously disappointed that he didn’t - though several times he asked Ianto to repeat certain facts, or elaborate on a term, give places, dates. Ianto talked himself hoarse and eventually the words dried up and he shook his head.
“That’s not all of it,” the man in the suit said.
Ianto nodded. “That’s it. Everything you could possibly want to know, anyway. Can I go now?”
The man in the suit shook his head, rising. “I’ll get you some water, then perhaps you’ll -” He stopped, frowning. He then sat back down, looking Ianto up and down as though considering something.
Finally he said, “We’d like to offer you a job in our archives. New personnel are always needed, and with your… obvious experience, you are more than qualified for the job.”
Ianto blinked. Trap, he thought. I don’t know how, or to what end, but this is definitely a trap.
“The pay is very generous,” the man in the suit went on. “You’d be able to re-pay your mother for all that money you’ve borrowed from her. With interest.”
“Do I have any choice in the matter?” asked Ianto, genuinely interested. Sometimes they tried to trick you into making the decision they wanted you to make by making it seem like you had other options.
Torchwood, it seemed, weren’t into that kind of back-to-front psychology. “Certainly. If you wish to remain in our custody like this, you can decline.”
Ianto bit his tongue, trying to decide whether or not to ask. He gave in. “Why are you offering me this exactly?”
“Because we believe that you could help us in our fight against the Doctor,” said the man in the suit. “With your insider’s knowledge -”
““Fight against the Doctor”? That’s what your “Torchwood” is doing? Fighting the Doctor?” Ianto almost laughed.
“The Torchwood Institute was founded to provide the British Empire with defence from the Doctor and other alien threats.”
“The Doctor isn’t a threat. He’s saved planet Earth from numerous invasions -”
“When it suits him,” said the suit. “What about when he’s not here? What about those times he doesn’t take our side? What are we to do then?”
Ianto bit his lip and said nothing.
“You would be helping us defend the peoples of the old empire from the alien threat.”
“Not the world?” asked Ianto. “Just the British empire?”
“The Americans can more than look after themselves, and in any case probably wouldn’t accept our help,” said the suit dismissively.
Mad, Ianto thought. Completely mad. On the other hand -
“If I have no other choice,” said Ianto, slowly sitting up straight. “I accept your offer.”
The suit smiled and extended his hand. Ianto took it. “Welcome to Torchwood, Mr Jones.”
As it was, keeping Torchwood off the Doctor’s trail was difficult. That Ianto had been put to work in the archives, not intelligence or tracking, and that someone in the IT department seemed to have been ordered to monitor his activities whilst logged into the system didn’t help things. He tried to work around this by logging on as other people, browsing on other people’s computers while they were away at the toilet or in a stationery cupboard cheating on their girlfriend/boyfriend/significant other.
There was a lot to hate about working there, but the thing Ianto hated the most was having to wear a suit. They were all very bland and unoffending and it reminded him of things he’d rather have forgotten for at least a couple more years.
The most recent sighting of the Doctor had been in Cardiff, with a blonde girl, a black boy a couple of years older and an American in his thirties. Ianto remembered the Doctor mentioning the boy and the girl - more particularly the girl. He’d gone back and found her after all. When he zoomed in on the picture to get a better look at the American, another window popped up on Mark’s computer, flipping through personnel files. As Ianto tried desperately to close the thing down the window informed him that the man was one Captain Jack Harkness, formerly a free-lancer attached to Torchwood Three, now in charge of the place.
Ianto spent the next few days worrying over whether the Captain was travelling with him as some kind of mole or double agent - it had happened before, so the Doctor told him. But if he were, surely the Doctor would figure it out? Especially as it had happened before.
Or maybe that was Jack before he came to work for Torchwood. Maybe that’s what Torchwood did as they chased after the Doctor; picked up the scraps he left behind, anything that could be used against him. Including his travelling companions. The thought made Ianto sick and hopeful at the same time. Maybe somewhere in this labyrinthine maddeningly white building there was someone else like him, who was threatened into joining up and forced to work against an old friend.
But then maybe some of them joined up willingly. He thought of the picture in Harkness’ file, the painfully neutral expression that the man on the CCTV tape didn’t look capable of. Had he been left somewhere? Had he resented it? Had he joined Torchwood willingly to get revenge?
Ianto yanked his tie, slowly strangling him, loose and sighed. Whatever his reasons for joining, it would be interesting to meet him, someone else who had met the Doctor, someone else who had travelled with him. Was the Doctor any different now? Had Harkness - Jack - ever encountered the Cybermen?
Then again, there wasn’t much point in thinking about it - if they had someone tracking Ianto’s movements on the computer, they’d probably try to prevent him and Captain Jack from crossing paths, just to be on the safe side. Shame, though. He would have liked to have met him.