On a Cold Christmas Eve - 1/3
It was midnight on Christmas Eve at the Hub. Midnight on a Christmas Eve where Ianto’d actually had plans. Plans involving Jack, tinsel, and a very large bowl of eggnog.
Normally Ianto would have begun the shut-down procedures long ago, but tonight he needed the lights, the noise, the sense of not being alone. Ianto had always been intuitive, a reader of people. His Tad always laughed and called it The Ianto Spidey Sense. Granted, Ianto could by no means shoot spiderweb from his palms, but the intuition had rarely failed him before. He took smug pride in that.
So now, on Christmas Eve, Ianto sat (well, fidgeted really) on the old Hub sofa, trying desperately to ignore those mental warning bells. His car keys were gone and John had gone after his son. Finding his son would be devastating. Ianto knew that devastation; he’d visited his mother in Providence Park often enough to become well acquainted with it. So, a devastated John, alone, in pain, and out of his time, was out somewhere with Ianto’s car. The car Ianto had finally paid off.
Ianto’s eyes flickered up to Jack’s darkened office. Jack was gone too. Ianto hadn’t been alone in the Hub this late without Jack in a long time; he’d forgotten how much space Jack’s personality took up. The place was remarkably empty without him. And quiet. Lord knows that man never learned how to be quiet.
So, John was out, and Jack was looking for him. Jack and John, two time-lost people, bound by a desperate need to return home, out with Ianto’s fully-paid-off-beloved car. John, who Ianto knew was not doing well. And Jack, for all he wanted to be the hero, had the survival instincts of a lemming. Ianto just knew those survival instincts would be tested. There was no way tonight ended well.
Finally Ianto’d had enough. Simply enough. Good lord, he was not a teenage girl stood up on a date. If he wanted to find Jack, he’d bloody well do it! With a burst of nervous activity, Ianto launched himself to Tosh’s desk, pulling up the readings for the tracker Jack’d placed on his car all those months ago. As soon as Ianto saw the location, he hung his had sighed. John’s old house. Right. And Jack had the bloody SUV. Christmas Eve in Wales meant all the cabs would be full of drunken party-goers. Just bloody fantastic.
All in all, it took about an hour to find a cab and drive to John’s house. Ianto couldn’t help but watch the streets as they passed party-goers. The lights, the music, pretty dresses, not-so-pretty dresses, suits that should never ever had left the store... Closing his eyes, Ianto drifted back to those happy memories of innocent Christmases. Hadn’t had a lot of those recently, but it was always pleasant to remember sitting by the fireplace and ripping open gifts. Oh, that chemistry set when he was seven. Set his Tad’s shed on fire, but damn if he didn’t learn fast which chemicals were flammable.
When the cab finally reached the old, abandoned house, Ianto could clearly see the black SUV haphazardly parked half on the curb. He sighed again. He’d hoped not to be spending Christmas day chipping frozen mud from the wheelbase. He paid the cab driver, giving a large tip considering it was a holiday, and sent the man on his way.
Ianto found the front door open and creaking on the cold breeze. He pulled his coat open and drew his gun. First lesson of the Harkness School of Training - Never go to a scene unarmed. The second lesson, was, of course, how to be jacked off by one’s trainer while still able to hit the target. Jack said it taught concentration. Ianto said it showed how unimpressive Jack’s hand jobs were. Which, of course, led to further demonstrations of Jack’s hand job prowess. That had been a good night.
So, armed and ready, Ianto crept into the house, listening for any signs of life. He called for Jack, once, twice, thrice, before he caught the sound of a car running in the garage. Despite his Spidey Sense, Ianto wasn’t prepared for what he saw through the dark haze - John and Jack, slumped over his dash, skin grey and eyes glassy. Ianto holstered his gun and ran to the car. He pulled John’s door open, turning off the engine and throwing the keys to the ground. He ran to the garage door, throwing it open and pulling in lungfulls of cold, Christmas air. Taking as deep a breath as possible, Ianto ran back to John, feeling desperately for a pulse. Finding none, he laid the seat back, laid John down, and closed the man’s eyes. He broke for air once more before moving to Jack’s side.
After deciding John could wait until later, Ianto carried Jack’s limp body to the SUV. He used Jack’s greatcoat, practically ruined from the fumes anyway, to wipe the blood and foam from the sides of Jack’s mouth. He closed the garage again and drove his dead captain back to the Hub. It was all he could do to keep from swearing at Jack; after all, it wasn’t as if they were in a relationship. If they had been, Jack wouldn’t have gone along and fucking bloody killed himself, now would he? Why would he want to do that, eh? Why would he want Ianto, because it obviously would be Ianto, to find his body in his fucking car on fucking Christmas Eve when they had fucking plans?!
Jack hated coming back to life. It was always painful. There was just no way around the pain. And yet, this time wasn’t half bad. Eyes closed, Jack focused on the feeling of something warm and wet around him. Something smelled nice too, strong but nice. Of all the deaths, this had to be one of the top ways to come back. He opened his eyes and found himself in Ianto’s bath, surrounded by warm, clean water, a mug of milky tea and a sandwich on the floor beside him.
“Oh. You’re awake,” he heard Ianto mutter, “Lucky me.”
Jack looked over to see Ianto sat on the toilet, fully clothed and definitely damp from the waist up. He tried to speak, but his throat only croaked.
“Don’t!” Ianto said harshly, coming to stand by Jack’s head. From where Jack was sat in the tub, Ianto’s head was surrounded by the vanity’s light. He was a veritable angel, albeit a very angry one if the clenched fists were anything to go by.
“Don’t,” he said again. “Just fucking sit there till the smell comes off. I used enough bath salts and body wash to make the fucking Dark Ages smell like a bed of roses. Just sit there.”
“Ok,” Jack croaked, reaching for the tea. He winced as the liquid trickled down his throat. “John-“ he began.
“Yeah, I know. Now that you’re back I can go deal with him. Happy bloody Christmas, Jack,” Ianto muttered as he left, throwing a towel and pair of pyjamas to the floor by the tub. Jack winced again as he heard the front door slam, and the SUV tires screech. He lay back and closed his eyes; it was going to be a long day. A long, lonely Christmas day. He opened his eyes a bit and watched as the blood rushing to his toes turned them from grey to pink. They’d start burning in a minute. It was always the same.
Ianto’d adamantly refused to fumigate John’s old house, settling instead for moving some budget monies around to pay a company. He’d retcon ‘em if he had to, but it was Christmas, after all, and Ianto decided to give himself that as a gift. He mad a mental note to call a company after Boxing Day. Until then, the police tape around the house would keep people away, as would the false report of a gas leak.
It took a while to get John’s body laid out on the autopsy slab at the Hub. John’s corpse hadn’t been the issue; it was instead Ianto’s car. Absolutely no way was Ianto keeping that car. He’d loved the car, and loved the fact that it had been his first grown-up purchase, but he just couldn’t get John and Jack’s grey faces out of his mind. Instead, Ianto laid John’s body in the SUV and hitched the car to the SUV. He drove the car to a worksite on the outskirts of town, making sure that there were no homeless witnesses around. A few liberal dashes of chemicals (thank you, chemistry set. His Tad’d certainly got his monies worth from that gift) and the car (and any evidence of suicide) was nothing but a flaming ball of, well, flames.
Finally laying John’s body on the Hub’s autopsy slab, Ianto took great care in cleaning the man as carefully as possible, just as he did with all the corpses. He washed him, even perfumed him, and changed him into the white Torchwood mortuary clothes. The entire time, his face was impassive, but his mind couldn’t shut out the swearing and berating. He understood suicide, had contemplated it quite a few times recently, but he couldn’t understand involving Jack. He couldn’t understand sitting there, on Christmas bloody Eve, and killing someone else as well. If John’d wanted to kill himself, there were plenty of guns, pills, or rooftops he could have used. But oh no, the man had to go and use Ianto’s bloody car to kill himself and Jack. Merry Christmas indeed.
As Ianto zipped the body bag closed, he stopped just before it reached John’s face. He watched the body for a few moments, the dropped his head and sighed. Rubbing his own face with his hand, he chuckled darkly.
“Guess I’ll be getting a new car out of this, eh? Thanks for the present, John. Nadolig Llawen,” he said, closing the bag and sliding the table into the box. He slowly closed the door, making sure it clicked and locked. Resting one hand on the front face, he punched in the locking code.
“I’m sorry, John. I hope you find your peace. The rest of us are still looking,” he whispered against the cold metal.
The walk to the main Hub had never seemed so draining. His legs were as heavy as lead, and he just couldn’t seem the get warm. Cold Welsh nights and freezing mortuaries don’t mix well.
He dropped the death certificate and paperwork on Owen’s desk, ready for final inspection and signatures when the medic eventually made it back in. Ianto sighed again as he looked at his watch. 10am on Christmas Day. He was supposed to be sleeping off eggnog and an orgasm. But no, he was at the Hub, smelling like an oil refinery. Lovely.
He was definitely not looking forward to going back home to Jack. Which, however, did not mean he was looking forward to the call his mobile received a moment later.
“Yeah?” he said tiredly into the mobile. He was too spent for niceties, and anyone who deserved such verbal coddling was programmed with a special ring. This was an unknown number.
“Are you Ianto Jones?” came an equally tired, yet suspiciously angry, female voice.
“Depends. How’d you get this number?”
“This is Detective Swanson with the Cardiff Police. We have an Owen Harper in custody. He tried to destroy a pub last night, almost killed someone in a brawl. He’s been arraigned and needs to be bailed out. He gave us your number.”
“Fuck,” Ianto muttered. “How much does he need?”
“Right now, about 2,500 pounds.”
“Yeah, fine. I’ll be there with the money,” Ianto hung up, punching the buttons and throwing the phone into the Rift Pool.
He looked around the Hub darkly. “And guess who gets to foot that bill, eh? Merry Christmas, Cardiff.”