THE LOOKS ON YOUR FACES
Characters: Ianto POV
Rating: Mild PG for mention of murder
Spoilers: General, for series, slightly more specific for Cyberwoman
Disclaimer: Not mine; they belong to the BBC.
Summary: Ianto knows that he’s got just as much to worry about from his team-mates as he has from hostile aliens.
I see the looks that come on your faces and they scare me.
I see the focus, the determination, the resolution. I can admire that. They are qualities that I aspire to. When Torchwood mobilises, you do so determined to win, to come out the other side of whatever you face with your lives and sanity intact. Considering some of the things you’ve faced, that is no mean feat. Although I do sometimes wonder about the sanity bit.
But there are other shadows on your faces. Shadows that leach away the humanity, the mercy that sometimes makes all the difference. Your mindset alters. I can see it. I can hear it. You distance yourselves from me and from others outside the team. We’re no longer completely in focus for you. If we get in your way, that’s unfortunate, because the greater good is all that counts and the end justifies the means. The world resolves itself into black and white, good and bad, us and them, with no shades of grey in-between.
I’ve seen where that kind of thinking goes. I was ten years old when I discovered exactly where that kind of thinking went. I cowered in the bedroom with my sister while my uncle, who had discovered that my mother was an alien, murdered her and my father in cold blood. He had accepted her into the family. He had brought her gifts and told my father how lucky he was. But then he had discovered that she wasn’t human and he had come to our home with a gun and shot her. And when my father, his brother, had tried to stop him, he had killed him as well. In my nightmares I still hear their uncomprehending cries, their inability to understand why.
I remember him standing over us, the gun in his hand. Telling us that Torchwood would be coming for us, so that they could take us apart and see if they could discover anything useful. The man who had played with me, laughed with me, teased me and encouraged me. The man who had told me that he loved my sister and me and would always be there for us now looked at me, at us, as if we were things to be disposed of.
And he had that look on his face. The look I see on your faces whenever the alien, the unexplained comes into view. A look that has no mercy, no empathy, but only the need to understand the nuts and bolts of everything because knowledge is power and power is what Torchwood is all about. I know I’m a fool for coming back, for working my way inside Torchwood, but I remember what it was like to be small and afraid and helpless in the face of power. I remember walking into a lab in Torchwood One and seeing a slender, be-furred alien on the vivisection table, screaming for mercy in a language no-one was bothering to learn. Not everything that comes through the Rift is a danger and you never know about half of what happens. There are advantages to being invisible and a computer genius, especially if no-one knows about the latter.
It doesn’t stop the fear, of course. Half the time I’m making things up as I go along and I’m not working with fools. I screwed up with Lisa, although the pain’s faded enough now for me to admit that I was playing with fire and there was always a possibility of failure. But I had to try. Someone has to care. That’s what you’ve lost. The aliens have all become things. And since when did anyone care about what happened to things? I’m not talking about the Weevils or the Marys of the universe. I’m talking about the frightened lost souls that wind up on Earth by accident and aren’t savage or fast enough to get away.
The word’s getting out. The aliens are starting to wake up to just how dangerous Humans can be. A lot of them are beginning to be afraid. And people who are afraid can sometimes be very violent. Now when they come, even if it’s by accident, they don’t bother looking for reason or sympathy. They expect the violence and strike first. And that just reinforces your beliefs about the alien and the look gets harder and deeper on your faces. It’s a vicious cycle and I can’t figure out a way to stop it. Because you have to want to stop before you can. And you don’t want to stop,
And that’s what scares me most of all. Because sooner or later I’m going to make that fatal slip. I nearly did it with Lisa, except you thought I went a bit mental because of love and that saved me. You still don’t really see me and I’m careful to make sure it stays that way. But Jack is watching me. Jack who has more secrets in his little finger than I have in my whole life, but who holds all the trump cards and can’t be dealt out of the game. Sooner or later I’m going to get caught and my secret will be revealed.
And the last thing that I’ll see will be the looks on your faces.
OOOO
Next story in chronological order is Amateur at http://tanarian5.livejournal.com/5658.html
Rating: Mild PG for mention of murder
Spoilers: General, for series, slightly more specific for Cyberwoman
Disclaimer: Not mine; they belong to the BBC.
Summary: Ianto knows that he’s got just as much to worry about from his team-mates as he has from hostile aliens.
I see the looks that come on your faces and they scare me.
I see the focus, the determination, the resolution. I can admire that. They are qualities that I aspire to. When Torchwood mobilises, you do so determined to win, to come out the other side of whatever you face with your lives and sanity intact. Considering some of the things you’ve faced, that is no mean feat. Although I do sometimes wonder about the sanity bit.
But there are other shadows on your faces. Shadows that leach away the humanity, the mercy that sometimes makes all the difference. Your mindset alters. I can see it. I can hear it. You distance yourselves from me and from others outside the team. We’re no longer completely in focus for you. If we get in your way, that’s unfortunate, because the greater good is all that counts and the end justifies the means. The world resolves itself into black and white, good and bad, us and them, with no shades of grey in-between.
I’ve seen where that kind of thinking goes. I was ten years old when I discovered exactly where that kind of thinking went. I cowered in the bedroom with my sister while my uncle, who had discovered that my mother was an alien, murdered her and my father in cold blood. He had accepted her into the family. He had brought her gifts and told my father how lucky he was. But then he had discovered that she wasn’t human and he had come to our home with a gun and shot her. And when my father, his brother, had tried to stop him, he had killed him as well. In my nightmares I still hear their uncomprehending cries, their inability to understand why.
I remember him standing over us, the gun in his hand. Telling us that Torchwood would be coming for us, so that they could take us apart and see if they could discover anything useful. The man who had played with me, laughed with me, teased me and encouraged me. The man who had told me that he loved my sister and me and would always be there for us now looked at me, at us, as if we were things to be disposed of.
And he had that look on his face. The look I see on your faces whenever the alien, the unexplained comes into view. A look that has no mercy, no empathy, but only the need to understand the nuts and bolts of everything because knowledge is power and power is what Torchwood is all about. I know I’m a fool for coming back, for working my way inside Torchwood, but I remember what it was like to be small and afraid and helpless in the face of power. I remember walking into a lab in Torchwood One and seeing a slender, be-furred alien on the vivisection table, screaming for mercy in a language no-one was bothering to learn. Not everything that comes through the Rift is a danger and you never know about half of what happens. There are advantages to being invisible and a computer genius, especially if no-one knows about the latter.
It doesn’t stop the fear, of course. Half the time I’m making things up as I go along and I’m not working with fools. I screwed up with Lisa, although the pain’s faded enough now for me to admit that I was playing with fire and there was always a possibility of failure. But I had to try. Someone has to care. That’s what you’ve lost. The aliens have all become things. And since when did anyone care about what happened to things? I’m not talking about the Weevils or the Marys of the universe. I’m talking about the frightened lost souls that wind up on Earth by accident and aren’t savage or fast enough to get away.
The word’s getting out. The aliens are starting to wake up to just how dangerous Humans can be. A lot of them are beginning to be afraid. And people who are afraid can sometimes be very violent. Now when they come, even if it’s by accident, they don’t bother looking for reason or sympathy. They expect the violence and strike first. And that just reinforces your beliefs about the alien and the look gets harder and deeper on your faces. It’s a vicious cycle and I can’t figure out a way to stop it. Because you have to want to stop before you can. And you don’t want to stop,
And that’s what scares me most of all. Because sooner or later I’m going to make that fatal slip. I nearly did it with Lisa, except you thought I went a bit mental because of love and that saved me. You still don’t really see me and I’m careful to make sure it stays that way. But Jack is watching me. Jack who has more secrets in his little finger than I have in my whole life, but who holds all the trump cards and can’t be dealt out of the game. Sooner or later I’m going to get caught and my secret will be revealed.
And the last thing that I’ll see will be the looks on your faces.
OOOO
Next story in chronological order is Amateur at http://tanarian5.livejournal.com/5658.html