FIC: When The World Falls Apart Some Things Stay in Place
Author: shaggydogstail
Title: When The World Falls Apart Some Things Stay in Place (1/2)
Pairing: Ianto/Lisa
Rating: PG-13
Summary: How Ianto pulled Lisa out of the wreckage of Torchwood One, kept her hidden beneath the Hub for months, and why he did it.
Disclaimer: Torchwood is the property of the BBC. No infringement of copyright intended.
Author Notes: Thanks to wildestranger for proof-reading and poking.
Title taken from Levi Stubb's Tears by Billy Bragg.
For 14valentines, Day Twelve: Voting.
Help!
The corridors are filled with smoke and a fine mist of water from the sprinklers, so that Ianto can barely see where he’s going, far less if there’s anyone to hear him call, but he keeps shouting anyway, because he doesn’t know how to stop.
Help me, please!
His throat is sore and his muscles ache from the effort of dragging Lisa through corridor after corridor. The metal casing on her body makes her heavy, and it clunks and grinds against the floor, making horrible screeching noises that remind him of the crushing machines at scrap-metal yards. The image of metal twisting and contorting, with Lisa’s skin, flesh and bones crushed inside floods his mind, and Ianto cries even louder.
Somebody!
Ianto keeps moving and keeps calling for help, but no-one answers. When he does see anyone else-the occasional Torchwood employee, Army troops, fire fighters-they’re either running past him to some other emergency or wandering aimlessly, too dazed and shell-shocked to even register him.
Exhausted, he collapses against a wall outside one of the Head of Division’s offices. He can hear voices through the door, muffled by the splintered wood, but still audible. Somebody’s shouting.
‘We can’t be sure the Cybermen have gone! We have to act quickly.’
There’s another voice, quieter, a woman. Ianto can’t hear what she says - it sounds like she’s crying.
‘It’s the only way to be certain,’ the other voice retorts.
‘These aren’t just anyone, they’re our friends.’ Ianto strains to hear her voice, pressing his ear to the wall. ‘People we worked with. We can’t just…we can’t…’
There’s the click of a gun being loaded and a third voice, cool and determined. ‘We have no choice-it’s us or them.’ Another sob and the calm voice continues, ‘it’s the kindest thing, really. They can’t be expected to live like that.’
Ianto tightens his grip around Lisa’s waist and then, summoning up the last of his strength, hoists her up and backs away down the corridor, through a set of double doors and around the corner. He doesn’t stop moving until he finds an empty room, a stationary cupboard, where he lays Lisa down on reams of photocopy paper and sinks down behind the door.
No-one is going to help him.
~*~
One of the benefits of being surrounded by chaos is that it’s very easy to get away with behaviour that would normally arouse all manner of suspicion. As pandemonium reigns throughout Canary Wharf, Ianto manages to procure a hospital trolley, a considerable supply of drugs, a wireless-enabled laptop, and an impressive collection of keys, swipecards and pass codes to access restricted areas. So long as he keeps his head up and looks like he knows what he’s doing, no-one thinks to question him.
Lisa’s drifting in and out of consciousness when he gets back to her, barely capable of coherent speech as she twitches in agony, the metal rods on her back clinking against the floor. Ianto’s hands shake as he prepares a morphine injection, a hollow, mirthless laugh escaping his lips as he remembers that Lisa’s scared of needles. (They’d argued about it once, when they were planning a holiday. Lisa refused to go anywhere that she’d need a vaccination first. Ianto had given up without much of a fight, because his need to make Lisa happy was far greater than his need to see the pyramids.)
‘Hold still. This’ll make it better.’ Ianto tries to keep his voice even, and comforting, even as he fumbles with the needle. It takes him three goes to find the vein, but Lisa doesn’t seem to notice.
‘There, there,’ he murmurs, stroking Lisa’s forehead in what he hopes is a soothing manner.
‘Ianto.’ Lisa’s voice is rough and croaky, her vocal cords strained by the blood-curdling screams she’d made when Ianto pulled her from the Cyber Conversion Unit.
‘I’m here, Lisa, I’m here,’ Ianto assures her as he presses soft kisses to her cheek.
Lisa gasps, her face contorting with pain. ‘I need…’
‘What is it, what do you need?’ Ianto asks. ‘Tell me and I’ll get it for you.’
‘The unit.’
It takes Ianto a few seconds to realise what she means. ‘No, Lisa. Why?’
Ianto wants nothing but to smash the Cyber Conversion Unit into a thousand pieces. That…that thing had done this to Lisa, torn open her flesh and wrapped it in metal. Ianto had never seen the many blades, saws, and bolts on the Cyber Conversion Unit, whirling and cutting with terrifying precision, but he’d heard it and that was enough.
Lisa opens her eyes and fixes him with a steady stare. ‘I need it. Without it, I’ll die.’
Ianto takes a deep breath and nods. ‘I’ll get it for you.’
He stands up and wipes his face, straightens his tie.
‘Bring it back to me,’ says Lisa.
Ianto forces himself to smile at her. ‘I promise.’
~*~
Lisa had asked for ‘it’ but there’s more than one Unit left in the building, and Ianto decides that one is as good-or as bad-as another.
There’s a group of army officers in the conference room on the third floor, all staring at the hulking great piece of machinery and pretending they’ve got the first idea of what to do about it. Given time, they’ll probably just blow it up, which would probably be for the best.
Ianto casts a glance over the Cyber Conversion Unit. The bloody thing has wheels, like a shopping trolley. Oh, well, that takes care of one problem at least.
He marches up to one of the men, brandishing his Torchwood ID badge. ‘Excuse me, sergeant,’ he says, hoping he sounds calm and assured, not sick with nerves. ‘I’ve been sent to collect this.’
Not bothering to wait for an answer, Ianto pockets his identity badge and moves behind the Cyber Conversion Unit, ready to wheel it away while the troops exchange nervous glances.
‘I’m not sure…’ says the sergeant. ‘Are you authorised to deal with this…equipment?’
‘It’s alien,’ says Ianto as he lines the Unit up with the door. ‘It’s ours.’
~*~
It takes Ianto several trips to collect what Lisa needs, following her instructions diligently and, now, without question. After a couple of hours he moves her to a better location - an old laboratory that he’s fairly certain no-one left alive knows about - but apart from that Lisa tells him everything. Ianto’s grateful for that, because he’s not certain he’s up to thinking for himself. If he had to think about what he’s doing, what’s happened to Lisa, he might go mad.
Lisa tells him what to get and what to do with it. She tells him what drugs she needs and how to administer them, which pieces of the unit are useful to her and what extras he needs to scavenge, and how to put it all together into a makeshift life support system for her.
He doesn’t think about how she knows all this either.
~*~
The clean-up operation at Canary Wharf takes several weeks. There might not be many staff left, but there’s plenty of alien artefacts to be tidied up, catalogued, and stashed away safely.
Two days after the Cybermen attacked the Earth, destroying most of Torchwood, and Ianto and Lisa’s lives the process, Ianto reports to last remaining member of Torchwood management in London and volunteers his services.
Helen Jackson is a slight, well spoken woman who was pot-holing in Yorkshire the day the Cybermen arrived. Ianto remembers her as terrifyingly competent, but now she looks almost constantly confused, like she can’t quite decide if she’s dreaming or the victim of an extremely elaborate and tasteless practical joke. Ianto makes her coffee and makes himself useful, striding through the debris of the most advanced and powerful secret organisation in the world with a clipboard and the veneer of quiet efficiency.
It’s easy enough for him to do his work, steal any more equipment that Lisa needs and slip away to visit her regularly. Most of the time she’s asleep, or else barely conscious, so Ianto just sits with her in silence. He’s heard that it’s good to talk to coma patients, to stimulate their brains, but Ianto can’t think of much to say and, anyway, it’s not like her brain isn’t working just fine. She continues to give Ianto detailed instructions about how to modify the Cyber Conversion Unit, perfecting her own life-support system, but the effort always exhausts her after a while.
Mostly Ianto just sits and watches her, wishing and hoping that she’ll survive, as though he could keep her alive by sheer force of will. He can see her breathing and feel her pulse he touches her neck, and tells himself to be glad that she’s alive at all, because that puts her ahead of most of the other victims of the Cybermen.
After all, where there’s life, there’s hope, right?
~*~
The clean-up operation is nearly complete, and Torchwood One is being wound-down, with bits of alien technology and useful materials being shipped out to other offices. Ianto has worked for Torchwood for three years, but the first he hears of an office in Cardiff is when Helen asks him if he’d like a day out. He’s reluctant to leave Lisa while he makes the return journey between to Wales, but he’s been starting to panic about what they’ll do when the building’s closed down and, really, he doesn’t have any better ideas.
‘So, I don’t know if they have any vacancies, but it can’t hurt to ask while I’m there,’ he tells Lisa when he visits her that afternoon. ‘That is, if you don’t mind moving to Wales. I know how much you like London.’
Lisa looks at him and smiles without wincing. ‘I’ll go anywhere with you,’ she says, and Ianto thinks that maybe it will be all right after all.
~*~
The Hub, as it’s called, is nothing like the offices in London. Canary Wharf was a vision of modernity, all strip lighting and clean desks. The Hub looks like some sort of weird underground cavern-it is some sort of weird underground cavern. Worse, it seems to run on a skeleton staff, and Ianto doesn’t think he’ll slot in as quietly and unnoticeably as he did at Torchwood One.
He’s greeted by a woman with curly hair and a broad smile, who tells him that her name is Suzie and that they’re all dying to see what goodies he’s brought them from London.
Suzie and another woman, Toshiko, watch intently as he unpacks one of the more interesting boxes of materials he’s brought from Torchwood One, all but cooing with excitement over the array of alien gizmos and curiosities. They’re joined after a while by someone called Owen. A doctor, judging by the stethoscope and the white coat, which is covered in something that might be vomit, except that’s green in colour and appears to be glowing. He looks at the artefacts as though he’s seen it all before, enquiring casually if any of them are really useful, or at least dangerous.
The last arrival is the person Ianto really wants to speak to, the team leader Captain Jack Harkness (Ianto isn’t sure what he’s actually Captain of, but knows better than to create waves by asking.) Jack ignores the alien paraphernalia, turning to Ianto to ask him how things are going at Torchwood One. Ianto falters for barely a moment, then gives him a bland account of the clean-up operation, doing his best to sound accomplished and knowledgeable, in the hope that there might be work in Cardiff for the sort of people who are good at tidying up after alien invasions.
There’s the merest hint of disbelief in Jack’s expression as Ianto paints a picture of unflustered efficiency, and he smiles and nods in a way that implies sympathy and understanding. Ianto hears the fall of Torchwood One in his mind-the clunk of Cybermen marching, the screeching of the Daleks two floors away, and Lisa’s screams of agony.
Fuck you, Captain Jack Harkness, he thinks. You weren’t there, how could you possibly understand? He keeps his expression neutral and excuses himself to unload more boxes from the car.
~*~
No-one asks him to leave, so Ianto lingers for the rest of the day, making himself useful. When he’s finished showing off everything he’s brought with him, he finds sensible places to put it all away, and makes neat lists in paper copy and on the local network. He helps Toshiko make back-up copies of some of her files, tidies the autopsy room, and allows Suzie to use him as a test-subject for a device that seems to make his hair and fingernails invisible.
Jack asks him to hang around and keep an eye on things while they shoot off to investigate some UFO sightings on the outskirts of Cardiff, so Ianto takes the opportunity to explore the Hub. There’s a labyrinth of tunnels and empty rooms on the lower floors, and he’s fairly confident that he’d be able to find somewhere to hide Lisa. She’ll hate it, he thinks sadly, all dank and creepy, with no hint of the open spaces and natural light that she prefers, but at least she’ll be safe until she gets better.
By the time the others get back from what turned out to be a wild-goose chase (a combination of over-sized kites and overactive imaginations) Ianto’s fixed the coffee maker and popped out to the nearest bakers. Judging by the enthusiastic response of the Torchwood Three staff upon their return, he was right not to skimp on the doughnuts.
‘Oh, he’s so lovely,’ gushes Suzie, squeezing Ianto’s shoulders. ‘Can we keep him, Jack?’
Jack laughs as he accepts the mug Ianto offers him. ‘Oh, I’m sure our friend here’s eager to get back to the bright lights in London, right?’
‘Actually, no,’ admits Ianto. ‘Torchwood One’s closing down now, and I haven’t got a job anymore…’
‘And it would make much more sense to redeploy someone who’s already worked for Torchwood than look for someone new,’ Suzie continues.
Jack scrunches his forehead and takes a sip from the mug Ianto gave him. ‘You always make coffee this good?’
‘I never underestimate the importance of good coffee,’ says Ianto, smiling.
Jack pauses, looking Ianto and down. ‘And the suit…?’
‘Standard work attire, sir.’
‘You’re hired,’ Jack tells him. ‘Take some leave to arrange the move, then you can start a week on Monday.’
~*~
Lisa’s pleased when he tells her, her eyes twinkling with pride. ‘I knew you could do it.’
‘It’s not much,’ says Ianto. ‘Just a glorified errand-boy, really. But I should be able to find somewhere for you to keep safe, and if I keep working for Torchwood I’ve got a much better chance of finding a cure.’
Lisa smiles at him, and the smile’s enough to convince Ianto that he’s doing the right thing, that the terrifying prospect of smuggling a Cyber Conversion Unit into the heart of Torchwood will be both possible and worthwhile. ‘I’m glad I’ve got you taking care of me,’ she says.
Ianto returns the smile and leans down to kiss her. ‘I’ll always look after you,’ he says. ‘I promise.’
~*~
It’s three a.m. when Ianto finally staggers home, to a flat that’s starting to gather dust for the first time since he moved in. He’s aching and shivery, but chides himself for the least flicker of self-pity, because he knows that Lisa is suffering so much more than him. His left eye twitches from exhaustion and his stomach emits low growls of protest at his own inability to keep any food down, but he hasn’t even got the energy to chew the couple of crackers he knows he ought to force himself to eat.
Tonight, though, he’ll sleep without medicating himself for the first time in-has it really only been a few days? To Ianto, it feels like several lifetimes at least since the Cybermen invaded. Lisa’s stable now, and Ianto will be able to take care of her in the safest place he can think of until he can find a way to make her better. It’s not enough to make it all right, but the dim light of hope is enough to make the pain a degree less acute.
Head pounding and eyes stinging with tears of exhaustion, and loss, fear, and shame, Ianto falls into a fitful slumber, Lisa’s photograph clutched between his fingers and one shoe still hanging off his foot.
~*~
In the morning Ianto calls the gas board, his electricity suppliers, the council, Thames Water, and British Telecom. He sends e-mails to a couple of Estate Agents in Cardiff and posts a letter with a cheque for two month’s rent to his landlord.
He packs his clothes and Lisa’s in tissue paper, to prevent creasing. Books, CDs and DVDs go into plastic crates. He wraps crockery, glasses, ornaments, and photographs in bubble-wrap, lining the boxes with clean towels and linens. He can’t afford any breakages.
The flat’s tiny and Ianto works quickly, so the packing operation is nearly complete by mid-afternoon. Ianto shaves and takes a shower, and pleases himself by managing to eat almost an entire Weetabix. He swallows a couple of ibuprofen too, before straightening his tie, flicking a speck of lint off his shoulder and setting off for Canary Wharf.
~*~
Ianto’s nearly finished clearing his desk when Helen arrives, looking uncomfortable as she hands him a leaving card. It occurs to him that in the time he’s worked for Torchwood, he’s never actually known anyone to leave before, and it’s only now that this strikes him as odd.
Helen’s half-way through a speech she’s obviously rehearsed beforehand when she breaks down, her sobs echoing through the now empty and antiseptically clean office-space.
‘I’m sorry,’ she gasps, staring down at her shoes. ‘I’m so sorry about…oh, god, what have we done?’
Ianto doesn’t know what to do. Part of him wants to hug the terrified, broken woman before him and tell her that he understands. Another part wants to shake the self-pitying member of Torchwood management and shout at her, you have no idea what you’ve done.
Eventually he retrieves a packet of Kleenex from the box on his desk and hands it to Helen, pats her arm and mumbles some vague words of comfort, all the while hoping she’ll hurry up and pull herself together, because it’s getting late and he needs to get to Lisa.
~*~
‘Where have you been?’
Ianto hadn’t expected Lisa to be awake, so he’s startled to hear her voice the moment he closes the door behind him. Except…it doesn’t sound much like her voice, not what he’s used to. She sounds distant, cold, and-though Ianto can scarcely bring himself to admit it-mechanical.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, rushing to her side. ‘I was busy packing up, I must have lost track of time. I’m sorry.’ He isn’t late, really, but he feels ashamed and regretful all the same. ‘So sorry.’
Lisa doesn’t answer him, just stares up at the ceiling. Her expression is hostile, burning with tightly-controlled rage. Ianto glances around frantically to see if there’s anything wrong. Is she in pain? Has the life-support system malfunctioned? But the morphine drip appears to be working and the collection of machines and monitors whir and bleep regularly.
‘Lisa, love, what’s wrong?’ Ianto struggles to keep the alarm out of his voice as he strokes her cheek with his thumb and slips his other hand into hers.
Still Lisa doesn’t answer, but she clutches Ianto’s hand, fingers and metal plates encasing it in a vice-like grip. He tells himself not to panic, because he knows that Lisa would never hurt him-she doesn’t even like killing spiders-but she’s grasping his hand so tightly that he’s starting to get scared.
‘Lisa, please.’ Ianto winces and bites his cheek to stop himself from calling out as he feels something crack in his hand. ‘Lisa!’
He leans over her, looking into her eyes. There’s no sign of emotion there, and that troubles him more than the agony of having his hand crushed by her extraordinary strength. The pain makes him woozy, and he collapses on her shoulder, taking deep breaths of air in a bid to stop himself from being sick. The metal breastplates feel cold and hard, alien, beneath his skin.
‘Ianto?’
Ianto lifts his head slowly to see Lisa blinking down at him, looking confused and alarmed. He sniffs unattractively and wipes his face with his free hand.
‘Ianto, are you all right? What’s wrong?’
Despite the pain, Ianto manages to smile; Lisa sounds like herself again.
‘Nothing, nothing’s wrong,’ he assures her. ‘Um…would you mind letting go of my hand?’
His fingers are still trapped in that mechanical grip. Lisa glances down, still looking disorientated, and then opens her hand at once. Strangely, it hurts Ianto even more when his hand is released, and he has to bite back a cry of pain.
‘Did I…?’ Lisa’s eyes flicker between Ianto’s hand and his face. ‘Did I hurt you?’
‘Of course not,’ Ianto lies without hesitation. ‘Just scratched the skin a bit.’
‘You’ve been crying,’ Lisa replies, and it’s obvious she doesn’t believe him.
‘Just got a bit upset.’ Ianto looks away and pulls up a chair to sit beside her. ‘Silly, really. Nothing for you to worry about.’
‘Are you sure-’ Lisa starts to protest but Ianto cuts her off with a kiss.
‘I told you, it’s nothing,’ he says firmly. ‘Now, let’s talk about how we’re going to organise this move, shall we?’
Lisa looks unconvinced, but she allows him to change the subject anyway. Ianto sits and discusses cybernetics and the desirability of various Cardiff suburbs with her until she falls asleep, all the while keeping his bruised and aching hand out of sight.
~*~
The doctor at A & E is far too busy to question Ianto’s story about dropping a crate at work as she examines his hand before sending him off for an X-ray to determine exactly how many bones are broken and how many just fractured. It’s morning by the time a nurse finishes wrapping a seemingly endless length of bandage over the splints that hold three of his fingers in place, and part of Ianto is perversely relieved that he hasn’t had to go home all night.
He thanks everyone politely and takes the information leaflet provided, promising to make an appointment with his GP the following day. He doesn’t actually have a GP-no-one at Torchwood does-but he doubts that anyone at the hospital will have time to check up. He gave them a false name anyway.
~*~
Four days after his first trip to the Hub Ianto supervises a team from a removal firm contracted to Torchwood remove a number of large, and one very large, crates, load them onto a van, and set off for a little-used industrial estate on the outskirts of Cardiff.
Hindered by his injured hand, it takes Ianto far longer than he had planned to load a car with his and Lisa’s worldly goods, and driving without the option of using the hand break makes him nervous. He can just about manage the gear stick with his palm, but it hurts every time he uses it. The pain gets so bad that he pulls into a service station somewhere between Reading and Swindon to buy aspirin (he gave the codeine they’d provided at the hospital to Lisa) and almost smiles when he imagines Lisa’s irritation at the mark-up these places charge.
It takes him half-an-hour to find the car when he gets back out and then he sits at the wheel, staring blankly at the sunlight streaming in through the windscreen, the spattered remains of a fly beneath the wipers. He blinks and takes several deep breaths to focus himself and swallows four paracetamol, washed down with a carton of warm Ribena. The taste of blackcurrant and sugar lingers at the back of his throat all the way to the Severn Bridge and into Wales.
~*~
It’s dark when Lisa awakes in a rundown warehouse. She’d been sedated for the journey-they’d both agreed it was for the best-and the extra drugs in her system make it even harder than usual for her to wake up.
‘Hey,’ says Ianto softly when Lisa finally opens her eyes. She’s groggy with sleep, blinking as Ianto washes her face with damp cotton wool, always gentle and meticulous.
‘Are we here?’ she asks. ‘Is this Cardiff?’
Her voice is rough and croaky, so Ianto lets her drink, dribbling lukewarm tea from a flask into her mouth. ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘we’re here.’
Lisa’s eyes flicker around the dirty-white walls of the warehouse storage room. ‘Home, sweet home,’ she says sadly.
The room isn’t up to much-there’s junk on the floor and cobwebs on the ceiling, and the faint odour of tar permeating the air. But there’s a large metal door a few feet to their left and Ianto’s a long way from giving up.
‘Got something to show you,’ he whispers in Lisa’s ear, before removing the brakes from the wheels on the Cyber Conversion Unit and angling it around. It isn’t easy to push Lisa to the door-there’s still the remains of packing cases here and there and Ianto has to steer with one hand and his shoulder pushed the back of the Unit.
There’s a triumphant grin on his face as he opens the door, then runs back to push Lisa a little closer towards the world outside. Her eyes are wide with shock as the moonlight hits her face, and she gasps at the rush of cool night air.
‘Ianto, is this safe, won’t someone-’
He shushes away her concerns. ‘Relax, I’ve checked it all out. No-one can see, or they’re not likely to look, especially if I…’ He leans back and flicks the light off, eliminating the possibility of any mysterious silhouettes attracting attention.
‘Look.’ Ianto gestures towards the heavens. It’s a clear night, picturesque even, the last glowing embers of the setting sun purple-blue on the horizon, the India-ink sky above shot through with a thousand stars. The blinking red eye of an aeroplane makes its lazy way overheard, and the thin patches of cloud cover look like scattered soot against the sky.
Ianto sees none of it, though, his gaze fixated on Lisa’s face. Her eyes sparkle in the faint glow of a nearby security light and her mouth dances in the first true smile she’s managed since…the accident. He raises his arm and points to the distance.
‘Over there, that’s Newport and this way,’ he points again, ‘to the sea. The centre of Cardiff is over here, and if you take…that road far enough, you’ll see where I was born.’
Lisa laughs softly, breathy gasps of delight and Ianto points out landmarks to her, her eyes darting this way and that after his directions. ‘Will you take me there? When I’m better?’
‘It’s not very exciting, I’m afraid,’ Ianto tells her.
‘Then we’ll just have to make our own excitement.’
She winks broadly and Ianto can’t help but laugh, drawn in by her infectious optimism and joyous laughter. He leans over and presses a kiss to the side of her mouth.
Lisa suddenly becomes very still. ‘Kiss me, Ianto,’ she says quietly.
‘I just did,’ he replies, still smiling broadly.
‘Not just a peck,’ she tells him. ‘You could kiss your auntie like that. Kiss me properly, like you used to.’
A beat, and Ianto starts to feel the cold of the evening air. There are goose-bumps rising between the metal plates Lisa’s stomach.
‘Kiss me.’
He does, deep and open-mouthed, with one hand placed cautiously on the exposed skin of Lisa’s hip. He can still taste the tea in her mouth, and the strawberry lip-balm he applied for her. The angle’s awkward and Ianto can’t quite forget about the metal and machinery between them, but Lisa’s mouth is warm and familiar; the curve of her lip, the touch of her tongue and the hitch in her breathing at the back of her throat conspire to remind him that this the woman he loves, the one who makes everything possible.
Lisa’s eyes are drooping, tired, when she looks at him with unfocused adoration. She can’t stay awake for long and Ianto knows he’ll have to take her back inside in a moment.
‘I love you.’
That night, Ianto sleeps in the back seat of his car. It’s cold and draughty, and there’s not nearly enough room. His clothes get creased and he awakens with a dead leg and a crick in his neck.
It doesn’t matter.
~*~
Ianto’s plans to slip quietly and unobtrusively into his new role at Torchwood Three are slightly undermined by the attention his battered and bandaged hand receives upon his arrival at the Hub. Truth be told, he can sort of see Suzie’s point when she holds it up, a frown that conveys sympathy and disgust in equal measure on her face. The bandages are coming unravelled and there’s dirt everywhere. It’s such a stark contrast to the neatness of his suit and the polish on his shoes that he wonders vaguely why he didn’t notice it before.
She drags him over to Owen, who looks at the tattered mess with a frown and a quirk of his eyebrow.
‘Wanking injury, was it?’
Suzie glares at him, muttering something about not judging everyone by his own standards, holding onto Ianto protectively. Owen just scoffs and shots them both filthy looks in return. Ianto isn’t sure what he’s caught in the middle of, but he’s glad it detracts attention from him so he doesn’t have to explain himself.
Owen replaces the splints and bandages, and seems vaguely disappointed that it isn’t gangrenous. He coats Ianto’s fingers with a thick, gelatinous substance that Ianto is fairly certain isn’t available on the NHS. It tingles, right the way down to the bone, but Ianto can see that the bruises are fading even before Owen’s finished bandaging his hand.
Messing with alien technology isn’t all bad, he tells himself grimly.
~*~
The Hub isn’t a pleasant place to work. There’s no natural light and the water tower running through the heart of the building makes the air permanently damp. One corner of the main room contains a stinking pile of organic matter, which Ianto first assumes to be of alien origin, but closer inspection reveals it to be a graveyard for the rotting remains of pot plants that Tosh or Suzie had brought in at one point or another, in vain attempt to make the place seem habitable. It’s filthy too, with discarded pizza crusts, mouldering apple cores, and piles of Weevil shit in all manner of unexpected places.
The generator clanks and groans ominously, and Ianto readily accepts responsibility of taking care of it. It earns him the gratitude of the rest of the team-none of them much enjoyed descending into the bowels of the Hub to do battle with a wrench and oil, but it suits Ianto’s purpose nicely.
Ianto finds it easy enough to carve out a niche for himself, even if it is as little more than a glorified errand boy. He’s good at making himself useful, always has been. That was how he’d met Lisa-she’d broken the heel on her shoe running up a flight of stairs on her way to an important interview. Ianto had a tube of superglue in his desk for a passable repair job and hacked into the interviewing officer’s on-line diary so that Lisa had time for a coffee while the glue set and still managed to show up for her interview ten minutes early. She got the promotion and ran straight back to Ianto’s office to tell him, kissing him on the cheek and calling him her hero before insisting on taking him out for fish and chips to celebrate. He’d never looked back.
Now, he bides his time until he can sneak Lisa into on of the storage chambers beneath the Hub. It isn’t difficult to find somewhere to hide her-there’s any number of bleak and gloomy rooms down there that no-one would think of visiting unless they absolutely had to-but Ianto knows he has to be careful, eliminate even the slightest risk.
He earns the trust of Torchwood Three by making himself quietly indispensable, performing a million and one unseen and unheard tasks to make the team run smoothly. He organises, tidies, catalogues, and monitors, hands out tourist information leaflets and brews coffee, all the while maintaining an air of cool, calm innocence. The unflappable exterior provides an excellent cover for his gnawing terror about Lisa’s fate and the mild bitterness he feels about going from respected Senior Archivist to general dogsbody.
Ianto’s searching the Torchwood archives for information about cybernetics for the nth time when the CCTV camera by his desk shows him the SUV pulling up outside. By the time the team make into Hub, bickering amongst themselves and shivering from the cool evening rain, Ianto has already cleared his cache and started warming up the milk. He moves between them dispensing hot chocolate and warm, fluffy towels like a cross between an old-fashioned butler and their mother.
‘Ianto!’ Jack beams, water dripping down his face as he accepts the proffered mug. ‘What would we do without you?’
Ianto offers a slight deferential nod and a tiny smile. ‘I’m sure you’d struggle through somehow, sir,’ he says.
‘You’ve never tasted Owen’s coffee, have you?’ says Jack. ‘I’d be poisoned before the week was out.’
‘Oi,’ says Owen, mock-offended. ‘I’ve not killed anyone yet.’
‘No.’ Tosh giggles over the rim of her mug. ‘You can’t poison someone if your coffee’s too disgusting to drink.’
‘Which means if anyone’s going to poison you,’ continues Suzy, nudging Jack in the ribs. ‘It’ll be Ianto.’
Jack pouts. ‘You wouldn’t poison me, would you, Ianto?’
‘Of course not, sir,’ Ianto tells him. ‘Although I do keep a supply of particularly unpleasant Camomile tea for anyone who annoys me too much.’
‘Is that was that was?’ asks Owen. ‘I thought you’d left me a urine sample in a mug.’ He pauses and grins. ‘Still, you’ll be glad to know you’re not pregnant after all. Didn’t know how I was going to break that one.’
They all laugh, and Ianto decides it’s time. He’ll move Lisa into the Hub tomorrow.
END OF PART ONE
Feedback is cherished.
Title: When The World Falls Apart Some Things Stay in Place (1/2)
Pairing: Ianto/Lisa
Rating: PG-13
Summary: How Ianto pulled Lisa out of the wreckage of Torchwood One, kept her hidden beneath the Hub for months, and why he did it.
Disclaimer: Torchwood is the property of the BBC. No infringement of copyright intended.
Author Notes: Thanks to wildestranger for proof-reading and poking.
Title taken from Levi Stubb's Tears by Billy Bragg.
For 14valentines, Day Twelve: Voting.
Help!
The corridors are filled with smoke and a fine mist of water from the sprinklers, so that Ianto can barely see where he’s going, far less if there’s anyone to hear him call, but he keeps shouting anyway, because he doesn’t know how to stop.
Help me, please!
His throat is sore and his muscles ache from the effort of dragging Lisa through corridor after corridor. The metal casing on her body makes her heavy, and it clunks and grinds against the floor, making horrible screeching noises that remind him of the crushing machines at scrap-metal yards. The image of metal twisting and contorting, with Lisa’s skin, flesh and bones crushed inside floods his mind, and Ianto cries even louder.
Somebody!
Ianto keeps moving and keeps calling for help, but no-one answers. When he does see anyone else-the occasional Torchwood employee, Army troops, fire fighters-they’re either running past him to some other emergency or wandering aimlessly, too dazed and shell-shocked to even register him.
Exhausted, he collapses against a wall outside one of the Head of Division’s offices. He can hear voices through the door, muffled by the splintered wood, but still audible. Somebody’s shouting.
‘We can’t be sure the Cybermen have gone! We have to act quickly.’
There’s another voice, quieter, a woman. Ianto can’t hear what she says - it sounds like she’s crying.
‘It’s the only way to be certain,’ the other voice retorts.
‘These aren’t just anyone, they’re our friends.’ Ianto strains to hear her voice, pressing his ear to the wall. ‘People we worked with. We can’t just…we can’t…’
There’s the click of a gun being loaded and a third voice, cool and determined. ‘We have no choice-it’s us or them.’ Another sob and the calm voice continues, ‘it’s the kindest thing, really. They can’t be expected to live like that.’
Ianto tightens his grip around Lisa’s waist and then, summoning up the last of his strength, hoists her up and backs away down the corridor, through a set of double doors and around the corner. He doesn’t stop moving until he finds an empty room, a stationary cupboard, where he lays Lisa down on reams of photocopy paper and sinks down behind the door.
No-one is going to help him.
~*~
One of the benefits of being surrounded by chaos is that it’s very easy to get away with behaviour that would normally arouse all manner of suspicion. As pandemonium reigns throughout Canary Wharf, Ianto manages to procure a hospital trolley, a considerable supply of drugs, a wireless-enabled laptop, and an impressive collection of keys, swipecards and pass codes to access restricted areas. So long as he keeps his head up and looks like he knows what he’s doing, no-one thinks to question him.
Lisa’s drifting in and out of consciousness when he gets back to her, barely capable of coherent speech as she twitches in agony, the metal rods on her back clinking against the floor. Ianto’s hands shake as he prepares a morphine injection, a hollow, mirthless laugh escaping his lips as he remembers that Lisa’s scared of needles. (They’d argued about it once, when they were planning a holiday. Lisa refused to go anywhere that she’d need a vaccination first. Ianto had given up without much of a fight, because his need to make Lisa happy was far greater than his need to see the pyramids.)
‘Hold still. This’ll make it better.’ Ianto tries to keep his voice even, and comforting, even as he fumbles with the needle. It takes him three goes to find the vein, but Lisa doesn’t seem to notice.
‘There, there,’ he murmurs, stroking Lisa’s forehead in what he hopes is a soothing manner.
‘Ianto.’ Lisa’s voice is rough and croaky, her vocal cords strained by the blood-curdling screams she’d made when Ianto pulled her from the Cyber Conversion Unit.
‘I’m here, Lisa, I’m here,’ Ianto assures her as he presses soft kisses to her cheek.
Lisa gasps, her face contorting with pain. ‘I need…’
‘What is it, what do you need?’ Ianto asks. ‘Tell me and I’ll get it for you.’
‘The unit.’
It takes Ianto a few seconds to realise what she means. ‘No, Lisa. Why?’
Ianto wants nothing but to smash the Cyber Conversion Unit into a thousand pieces. That…that thing had done this to Lisa, torn open her flesh and wrapped it in metal. Ianto had never seen the many blades, saws, and bolts on the Cyber Conversion Unit, whirling and cutting with terrifying precision, but he’d heard it and that was enough.
Lisa opens her eyes and fixes him with a steady stare. ‘I need it. Without it, I’ll die.’
Ianto takes a deep breath and nods. ‘I’ll get it for you.’
He stands up and wipes his face, straightens his tie.
‘Bring it back to me,’ says Lisa.
Ianto forces himself to smile at her. ‘I promise.’
~*~
Lisa had asked for ‘it’ but there’s more than one Unit left in the building, and Ianto decides that one is as good-or as bad-as another.
There’s a group of army officers in the conference room on the third floor, all staring at the hulking great piece of machinery and pretending they’ve got the first idea of what to do about it. Given time, they’ll probably just blow it up, which would probably be for the best.
Ianto casts a glance over the Cyber Conversion Unit. The bloody thing has wheels, like a shopping trolley. Oh, well, that takes care of one problem at least.
He marches up to one of the men, brandishing his Torchwood ID badge. ‘Excuse me, sergeant,’ he says, hoping he sounds calm and assured, not sick with nerves. ‘I’ve been sent to collect this.’
Not bothering to wait for an answer, Ianto pockets his identity badge and moves behind the Cyber Conversion Unit, ready to wheel it away while the troops exchange nervous glances.
‘I’m not sure…’ says the sergeant. ‘Are you authorised to deal with this…equipment?’
‘It’s alien,’ says Ianto as he lines the Unit up with the door. ‘It’s ours.’
~*~
It takes Ianto several trips to collect what Lisa needs, following her instructions diligently and, now, without question. After a couple of hours he moves her to a better location - an old laboratory that he’s fairly certain no-one left alive knows about - but apart from that Lisa tells him everything. Ianto’s grateful for that, because he’s not certain he’s up to thinking for himself. If he had to think about what he’s doing, what’s happened to Lisa, he might go mad.
Lisa tells him what to get and what to do with it. She tells him what drugs she needs and how to administer them, which pieces of the unit are useful to her and what extras he needs to scavenge, and how to put it all together into a makeshift life support system for her.
He doesn’t think about how she knows all this either.
~*~
The clean-up operation at Canary Wharf takes several weeks. There might not be many staff left, but there’s plenty of alien artefacts to be tidied up, catalogued, and stashed away safely.
Two days after the Cybermen attacked the Earth, destroying most of Torchwood, and Ianto and Lisa’s lives the process, Ianto reports to last remaining member of Torchwood management in London and volunteers his services.
Helen Jackson is a slight, well spoken woman who was pot-holing in Yorkshire the day the Cybermen arrived. Ianto remembers her as terrifyingly competent, but now she looks almost constantly confused, like she can’t quite decide if she’s dreaming or the victim of an extremely elaborate and tasteless practical joke. Ianto makes her coffee and makes himself useful, striding through the debris of the most advanced and powerful secret organisation in the world with a clipboard and the veneer of quiet efficiency.
It’s easy enough for him to do his work, steal any more equipment that Lisa needs and slip away to visit her regularly. Most of the time she’s asleep, or else barely conscious, so Ianto just sits with her in silence. He’s heard that it’s good to talk to coma patients, to stimulate their brains, but Ianto can’t think of much to say and, anyway, it’s not like her brain isn’t working just fine. She continues to give Ianto detailed instructions about how to modify the Cyber Conversion Unit, perfecting her own life-support system, but the effort always exhausts her after a while.
Mostly Ianto just sits and watches her, wishing and hoping that she’ll survive, as though he could keep her alive by sheer force of will. He can see her breathing and feel her pulse he touches her neck, and tells himself to be glad that she’s alive at all, because that puts her ahead of most of the other victims of the Cybermen.
After all, where there’s life, there’s hope, right?
~*~
The clean-up operation is nearly complete, and Torchwood One is being wound-down, with bits of alien technology and useful materials being shipped out to other offices. Ianto has worked for Torchwood for three years, but the first he hears of an office in Cardiff is when Helen asks him if he’d like a day out. He’s reluctant to leave Lisa while he makes the return journey between to Wales, but he’s been starting to panic about what they’ll do when the building’s closed down and, really, he doesn’t have any better ideas.
‘So, I don’t know if they have any vacancies, but it can’t hurt to ask while I’m there,’ he tells Lisa when he visits her that afternoon. ‘That is, if you don’t mind moving to Wales. I know how much you like London.’
Lisa looks at him and smiles without wincing. ‘I’ll go anywhere with you,’ she says, and Ianto thinks that maybe it will be all right after all.
~*~
The Hub, as it’s called, is nothing like the offices in London. Canary Wharf was a vision of modernity, all strip lighting and clean desks. The Hub looks like some sort of weird underground cavern-it is some sort of weird underground cavern. Worse, it seems to run on a skeleton staff, and Ianto doesn’t think he’ll slot in as quietly and unnoticeably as he did at Torchwood One.
He’s greeted by a woman with curly hair and a broad smile, who tells him that her name is Suzie and that they’re all dying to see what goodies he’s brought them from London.
Suzie and another woman, Toshiko, watch intently as he unpacks one of the more interesting boxes of materials he’s brought from Torchwood One, all but cooing with excitement over the array of alien gizmos and curiosities. They’re joined after a while by someone called Owen. A doctor, judging by the stethoscope and the white coat, which is covered in something that might be vomit, except that’s green in colour and appears to be glowing. He looks at the artefacts as though he’s seen it all before, enquiring casually if any of them are really useful, or at least dangerous.
The last arrival is the person Ianto really wants to speak to, the team leader Captain Jack Harkness (Ianto isn’t sure what he’s actually Captain of, but knows better than to create waves by asking.) Jack ignores the alien paraphernalia, turning to Ianto to ask him how things are going at Torchwood One. Ianto falters for barely a moment, then gives him a bland account of the clean-up operation, doing his best to sound accomplished and knowledgeable, in the hope that there might be work in Cardiff for the sort of people who are good at tidying up after alien invasions.
There’s the merest hint of disbelief in Jack’s expression as Ianto paints a picture of unflustered efficiency, and he smiles and nods in a way that implies sympathy and understanding. Ianto hears the fall of Torchwood One in his mind-the clunk of Cybermen marching, the screeching of the Daleks two floors away, and Lisa’s screams of agony.
Fuck you, Captain Jack Harkness, he thinks. You weren’t there, how could you possibly understand? He keeps his expression neutral and excuses himself to unload more boxes from the car.
~*~
No-one asks him to leave, so Ianto lingers for the rest of the day, making himself useful. When he’s finished showing off everything he’s brought with him, he finds sensible places to put it all away, and makes neat lists in paper copy and on the local network. He helps Toshiko make back-up copies of some of her files, tidies the autopsy room, and allows Suzie to use him as a test-subject for a device that seems to make his hair and fingernails invisible.
Jack asks him to hang around and keep an eye on things while they shoot off to investigate some UFO sightings on the outskirts of Cardiff, so Ianto takes the opportunity to explore the Hub. There’s a labyrinth of tunnels and empty rooms on the lower floors, and he’s fairly confident that he’d be able to find somewhere to hide Lisa. She’ll hate it, he thinks sadly, all dank and creepy, with no hint of the open spaces and natural light that she prefers, but at least she’ll be safe until she gets better.
By the time the others get back from what turned out to be a wild-goose chase (a combination of over-sized kites and overactive imaginations) Ianto’s fixed the coffee maker and popped out to the nearest bakers. Judging by the enthusiastic response of the Torchwood Three staff upon their return, he was right not to skimp on the doughnuts.
‘Oh, he’s so lovely,’ gushes Suzie, squeezing Ianto’s shoulders. ‘Can we keep him, Jack?’
Jack laughs as he accepts the mug Ianto offers him. ‘Oh, I’m sure our friend here’s eager to get back to the bright lights in London, right?’
‘Actually, no,’ admits Ianto. ‘Torchwood One’s closing down now, and I haven’t got a job anymore…’
‘And it would make much more sense to redeploy someone who’s already worked for Torchwood than look for someone new,’ Suzie continues.
Jack scrunches his forehead and takes a sip from the mug Ianto gave him. ‘You always make coffee this good?’
‘I never underestimate the importance of good coffee,’ says Ianto, smiling.
Jack pauses, looking Ianto and down. ‘And the suit…?’
‘Standard work attire, sir.’
‘You’re hired,’ Jack tells him. ‘Take some leave to arrange the move, then you can start a week on Monday.’
~*~
Lisa’s pleased when he tells her, her eyes twinkling with pride. ‘I knew you could do it.’
‘It’s not much,’ says Ianto. ‘Just a glorified errand-boy, really. But I should be able to find somewhere for you to keep safe, and if I keep working for Torchwood I’ve got a much better chance of finding a cure.’
Lisa smiles at him, and the smile’s enough to convince Ianto that he’s doing the right thing, that the terrifying prospect of smuggling a Cyber Conversion Unit into the heart of Torchwood will be both possible and worthwhile. ‘I’m glad I’ve got you taking care of me,’ she says.
Ianto returns the smile and leans down to kiss her. ‘I’ll always look after you,’ he says. ‘I promise.’
~*~
It’s three a.m. when Ianto finally staggers home, to a flat that’s starting to gather dust for the first time since he moved in. He’s aching and shivery, but chides himself for the least flicker of self-pity, because he knows that Lisa is suffering so much more than him. His left eye twitches from exhaustion and his stomach emits low growls of protest at his own inability to keep any food down, but he hasn’t even got the energy to chew the couple of crackers he knows he ought to force himself to eat.
Tonight, though, he’ll sleep without medicating himself for the first time in-has it really only been a few days? To Ianto, it feels like several lifetimes at least since the Cybermen invaded. Lisa’s stable now, and Ianto will be able to take care of her in the safest place he can think of until he can find a way to make her better. It’s not enough to make it all right, but the dim light of hope is enough to make the pain a degree less acute.
Head pounding and eyes stinging with tears of exhaustion, and loss, fear, and shame, Ianto falls into a fitful slumber, Lisa’s photograph clutched between his fingers and one shoe still hanging off his foot.
~*~
In the morning Ianto calls the gas board, his electricity suppliers, the council, Thames Water, and British Telecom. He sends e-mails to a couple of Estate Agents in Cardiff and posts a letter with a cheque for two month’s rent to his landlord.
He packs his clothes and Lisa’s in tissue paper, to prevent creasing. Books, CDs and DVDs go into plastic crates. He wraps crockery, glasses, ornaments, and photographs in bubble-wrap, lining the boxes with clean towels and linens. He can’t afford any breakages.
The flat’s tiny and Ianto works quickly, so the packing operation is nearly complete by mid-afternoon. Ianto shaves and takes a shower, and pleases himself by managing to eat almost an entire Weetabix. He swallows a couple of ibuprofen too, before straightening his tie, flicking a speck of lint off his shoulder and setting off for Canary Wharf.
~*~
Ianto’s nearly finished clearing his desk when Helen arrives, looking uncomfortable as she hands him a leaving card. It occurs to him that in the time he’s worked for Torchwood, he’s never actually known anyone to leave before, and it’s only now that this strikes him as odd.
Helen’s half-way through a speech she’s obviously rehearsed beforehand when she breaks down, her sobs echoing through the now empty and antiseptically clean office-space.
‘I’m sorry,’ she gasps, staring down at her shoes. ‘I’m so sorry about…oh, god, what have we done?’
Ianto doesn’t know what to do. Part of him wants to hug the terrified, broken woman before him and tell her that he understands. Another part wants to shake the self-pitying member of Torchwood management and shout at her, you have no idea what you’ve done.
Eventually he retrieves a packet of Kleenex from the box on his desk and hands it to Helen, pats her arm and mumbles some vague words of comfort, all the while hoping she’ll hurry up and pull herself together, because it’s getting late and he needs to get to Lisa.
~*~
‘Where have you been?’
Ianto hadn’t expected Lisa to be awake, so he’s startled to hear her voice the moment he closes the door behind him. Except…it doesn’t sound much like her voice, not what he’s used to. She sounds distant, cold, and-though Ianto can scarcely bring himself to admit it-mechanical.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, rushing to her side. ‘I was busy packing up, I must have lost track of time. I’m sorry.’ He isn’t late, really, but he feels ashamed and regretful all the same. ‘So sorry.’
Lisa doesn’t answer him, just stares up at the ceiling. Her expression is hostile, burning with tightly-controlled rage. Ianto glances around frantically to see if there’s anything wrong. Is she in pain? Has the life-support system malfunctioned? But the morphine drip appears to be working and the collection of machines and monitors whir and bleep regularly.
‘Lisa, love, what’s wrong?’ Ianto struggles to keep the alarm out of his voice as he strokes her cheek with his thumb and slips his other hand into hers.
Still Lisa doesn’t answer, but she clutches Ianto’s hand, fingers and metal plates encasing it in a vice-like grip. He tells himself not to panic, because he knows that Lisa would never hurt him-she doesn’t even like killing spiders-but she’s grasping his hand so tightly that he’s starting to get scared.
‘Lisa, please.’ Ianto winces and bites his cheek to stop himself from calling out as he feels something crack in his hand. ‘Lisa!’
He leans over her, looking into her eyes. There’s no sign of emotion there, and that troubles him more than the agony of having his hand crushed by her extraordinary strength. The pain makes him woozy, and he collapses on her shoulder, taking deep breaths of air in a bid to stop himself from being sick. The metal breastplates feel cold and hard, alien, beneath his skin.
‘Ianto?’
Ianto lifts his head slowly to see Lisa blinking down at him, looking confused and alarmed. He sniffs unattractively and wipes his face with his free hand.
‘Ianto, are you all right? What’s wrong?’
Despite the pain, Ianto manages to smile; Lisa sounds like herself again.
‘Nothing, nothing’s wrong,’ he assures her. ‘Um…would you mind letting go of my hand?’
His fingers are still trapped in that mechanical grip. Lisa glances down, still looking disorientated, and then opens her hand at once. Strangely, it hurts Ianto even more when his hand is released, and he has to bite back a cry of pain.
‘Did I…?’ Lisa’s eyes flicker between Ianto’s hand and his face. ‘Did I hurt you?’
‘Of course not,’ Ianto lies without hesitation. ‘Just scratched the skin a bit.’
‘You’ve been crying,’ Lisa replies, and it’s obvious she doesn’t believe him.
‘Just got a bit upset.’ Ianto looks away and pulls up a chair to sit beside her. ‘Silly, really. Nothing for you to worry about.’
‘Are you sure-’ Lisa starts to protest but Ianto cuts her off with a kiss.
‘I told you, it’s nothing,’ he says firmly. ‘Now, let’s talk about how we’re going to organise this move, shall we?’
Lisa looks unconvinced, but she allows him to change the subject anyway. Ianto sits and discusses cybernetics and the desirability of various Cardiff suburbs with her until she falls asleep, all the while keeping his bruised and aching hand out of sight.
~*~
The doctor at A & E is far too busy to question Ianto’s story about dropping a crate at work as she examines his hand before sending him off for an X-ray to determine exactly how many bones are broken and how many just fractured. It’s morning by the time a nurse finishes wrapping a seemingly endless length of bandage over the splints that hold three of his fingers in place, and part of Ianto is perversely relieved that he hasn’t had to go home all night.
He thanks everyone politely and takes the information leaflet provided, promising to make an appointment with his GP the following day. He doesn’t actually have a GP-no-one at Torchwood does-but he doubts that anyone at the hospital will have time to check up. He gave them a false name anyway.
~*~
Four days after his first trip to the Hub Ianto supervises a team from a removal firm contracted to Torchwood remove a number of large, and one very large, crates, load them onto a van, and set off for a little-used industrial estate on the outskirts of Cardiff.
Hindered by his injured hand, it takes Ianto far longer than he had planned to load a car with his and Lisa’s worldly goods, and driving without the option of using the hand break makes him nervous. He can just about manage the gear stick with his palm, but it hurts every time he uses it. The pain gets so bad that he pulls into a service station somewhere between Reading and Swindon to buy aspirin (he gave the codeine they’d provided at the hospital to Lisa) and almost smiles when he imagines Lisa’s irritation at the mark-up these places charge.
It takes him half-an-hour to find the car when he gets back out and then he sits at the wheel, staring blankly at the sunlight streaming in through the windscreen, the spattered remains of a fly beneath the wipers. He blinks and takes several deep breaths to focus himself and swallows four paracetamol, washed down with a carton of warm Ribena. The taste of blackcurrant and sugar lingers at the back of his throat all the way to the Severn Bridge and into Wales.
~*~
It’s dark when Lisa awakes in a rundown warehouse. She’d been sedated for the journey-they’d both agreed it was for the best-and the extra drugs in her system make it even harder than usual for her to wake up.
‘Hey,’ says Ianto softly when Lisa finally opens her eyes. She’s groggy with sleep, blinking as Ianto washes her face with damp cotton wool, always gentle and meticulous.
‘Are we here?’ she asks. ‘Is this Cardiff?’
Her voice is rough and croaky, so Ianto lets her drink, dribbling lukewarm tea from a flask into her mouth. ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘we’re here.’
Lisa’s eyes flicker around the dirty-white walls of the warehouse storage room. ‘Home, sweet home,’ she says sadly.
The room isn’t up to much-there’s junk on the floor and cobwebs on the ceiling, and the faint odour of tar permeating the air. But there’s a large metal door a few feet to their left and Ianto’s a long way from giving up.
‘Got something to show you,’ he whispers in Lisa’s ear, before removing the brakes from the wheels on the Cyber Conversion Unit and angling it around. It isn’t easy to push Lisa to the door-there’s still the remains of packing cases here and there and Ianto has to steer with one hand and his shoulder pushed the back of the Unit.
There’s a triumphant grin on his face as he opens the door, then runs back to push Lisa a little closer towards the world outside. Her eyes are wide with shock as the moonlight hits her face, and she gasps at the rush of cool night air.
‘Ianto, is this safe, won’t someone-’
He shushes away her concerns. ‘Relax, I’ve checked it all out. No-one can see, or they’re not likely to look, especially if I…’ He leans back and flicks the light off, eliminating the possibility of any mysterious silhouettes attracting attention.
‘Look.’ Ianto gestures towards the heavens. It’s a clear night, picturesque even, the last glowing embers of the setting sun purple-blue on the horizon, the India-ink sky above shot through with a thousand stars. The blinking red eye of an aeroplane makes its lazy way overheard, and the thin patches of cloud cover look like scattered soot against the sky.
Ianto sees none of it, though, his gaze fixated on Lisa’s face. Her eyes sparkle in the faint glow of a nearby security light and her mouth dances in the first true smile she’s managed since…the accident. He raises his arm and points to the distance.
‘Over there, that’s Newport and this way,’ he points again, ‘to the sea. The centre of Cardiff is over here, and if you take…that road far enough, you’ll see where I was born.’
Lisa laughs softly, breathy gasps of delight and Ianto points out landmarks to her, her eyes darting this way and that after his directions. ‘Will you take me there? When I’m better?’
‘It’s not very exciting, I’m afraid,’ Ianto tells her.
‘Then we’ll just have to make our own excitement.’
She winks broadly and Ianto can’t help but laugh, drawn in by her infectious optimism and joyous laughter. He leans over and presses a kiss to the side of her mouth.
Lisa suddenly becomes very still. ‘Kiss me, Ianto,’ she says quietly.
‘I just did,’ he replies, still smiling broadly.
‘Not just a peck,’ she tells him. ‘You could kiss your auntie like that. Kiss me properly, like you used to.’
A beat, and Ianto starts to feel the cold of the evening air. There are goose-bumps rising between the metal plates Lisa’s stomach.
‘Kiss me.’
He does, deep and open-mouthed, with one hand placed cautiously on the exposed skin of Lisa’s hip. He can still taste the tea in her mouth, and the strawberry lip-balm he applied for her. The angle’s awkward and Ianto can’t quite forget about the metal and machinery between them, but Lisa’s mouth is warm and familiar; the curve of her lip, the touch of her tongue and the hitch in her breathing at the back of her throat conspire to remind him that this the woman he loves, the one who makes everything possible.
Lisa’s eyes are drooping, tired, when she looks at him with unfocused adoration. She can’t stay awake for long and Ianto knows he’ll have to take her back inside in a moment.
‘I love you.’
That night, Ianto sleeps in the back seat of his car. It’s cold and draughty, and there’s not nearly enough room. His clothes get creased and he awakens with a dead leg and a crick in his neck.
It doesn’t matter.
~*~
Ianto’s plans to slip quietly and unobtrusively into his new role at Torchwood Three are slightly undermined by the attention his battered and bandaged hand receives upon his arrival at the Hub. Truth be told, he can sort of see Suzie’s point when she holds it up, a frown that conveys sympathy and disgust in equal measure on her face. The bandages are coming unravelled and there’s dirt everywhere. It’s such a stark contrast to the neatness of his suit and the polish on his shoes that he wonders vaguely why he didn’t notice it before.
She drags him over to Owen, who looks at the tattered mess with a frown and a quirk of his eyebrow.
‘Wanking injury, was it?’
Suzie glares at him, muttering something about not judging everyone by his own standards, holding onto Ianto protectively. Owen just scoffs and shots them both filthy looks in return. Ianto isn’t sure what he’s caught in the middle of, but he’s glad it detracts attention from him so he doesn’t have to explain himself.
Owen replaces the splints and bandages, and seems vaguely disappointed that it isn’t gangrenous. He coats Ianto’s fingers with a thick, gelatinous substance that Ianto is fairly certain isn’t available on the NHS. It tingles, right the way down to the bone, but Ianto can see that the bruises are fading even before Owen’s finished bandaging his hand.
Messing with alien technology isn’t all bad, he tells himself grimly.
~*~
The Hub isn’t a pleasant place to work. There’s no natural light and the water tower running through the heart of the building makes the air permanently damp. One corner of the main room contains a stinking pile of organic matter, which Ianto first assumes to be of alien origin, but closer inspection reveals it to be a graveyard for the rotting remains of pot plants that Tosh or Suzie had brought in at one point or another, in vain attempt to make the place seem habitable. It’s filthy too, with discarded pizza crusts, mouldering apple cores, and piles of Weevil shit in all manner of unexpected places.
The generator clanks and groans ominously, and Ianto readily accepts responsibility of taking care of it. It earns him the gratitude of the rest of the team-none of them much enjoyed descending into the bowels of the Hub to do battle with a wrench and oil, but it suits Ianto’s purpose nicely.
Ianto finds it easy enough to carve out a niche for himself, even if it is as little more than a glorified errand boy. He’s good at making himself useful, always has been. That was how he’d met Lisa-she’d broken the heel on her shoe running up a flight of stairs on her way to an important interview. Ianto had a tube of superglue in his desk for a passable repair job and hacked into the interviewing officer’s on-line diary so that Lisa had time for a coffee while the glue set and still managed to show up for her interview ten minutes early. She got the promotion and ran straight back to Ianto’s office to tell him, kissing him on the cheek and calling him her hero before insisting on taking him out for fish and chips to celebrate. He’d never looked back.
Now, he bides his time until he can sneak Lisa into on of the storage chambers beneath the Hub. It isn’t difficult to find somewhere to hide her-there’s any number of bleak and gloomy rooms down there that no-one would think of visiting unless they absolutely had to-but Ianto knows he has to be careful, eliminate even the slightest risk.
He earns the trust of Torchwood Three by making himself quietly indispensable, performing a million and one unseen and unheard tasks to make the team run smoothly. He organises, tidies, catalogues, and monitors, hands out tourist information leaflets and brews coffee, all the while maintaining an air of cool, calm innocence. The unflappable exterior provides an excellent cover for his gnawing terror about Lisa’s fate and the mild bitterness he feels about going from respected Senior Archivist to general dogsbody.
Ianto’s searching the Torchwood archives for information about cybernetics for the nth time when the CCTV camera by his desk shows him the SUV pulling up outside. By the time the team make into Hub, bickering amongst themselves and shivering from the cool evening rain, Ianto has already cleared his cache and started warming up the milk. He moves between them dispensing hot chocolate and warm, fluffy towels like a cross between an old-fashioned butler and their mother.
‘Ianto!’ Jack beams, water dripping down his face as he accepts the proffered mug. ‘What would we do without you?’
Ianto offers a slight deferential nod and a tiny smile. ‘I’m sure you’d struggle through somehow, sir,’ he says.
‘You’ve never tasted Owen’s coffee, have you?’ says Jack. ‘I’d be poisoned before the week was out.’
‘Oi,’ says Owen, mock-offended. ‘I’ve not killed anyone yet.’
‘No.’ Tosh giggles over the rim of her mug. ‘You can’t poison someone if your coffee’s too disgusting to drink.’
‘Which means if anyone’s going to poison you,’ continues Suzy, nudging Jack in the ribs. ‘It’ll be Ianto.’
Jack pouts. ‘You wouldn’t poison me, would you, Ianto?’
‘Of course not, sir,’ Ianto tells him. ‘Although I do keep a supply of particularly unpleasant Camomile tea for anyone who annoys me too much.’
‘Is that was that was?’ asks Owen. ‘I thought you’d left me a urine sample in a mug.’ He pauses and grins. ‘Still, you’ll be glad to know you’re not pregnant after all. Didn’t know how I was going to break that one.’
They all laugh, and Ianto decides it’s time. He’ll move Lisa into the Hub tomorrow.
END OF PART ONE
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