Fic: In A Whirl
Title: In A Whirl
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Tosh, OC.
Rating: G
Spoilers: Nada
Summary: Sometimes Ianto despairs of the way Jack keeps trying to make a pet out of everything he comes across.
Word Count: 2007
Written For: My genprompt_bingo square ‘Tornados’.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
“No, Jack, you can’t keep it!” Ianto sighed, shaking his head in exasperation. He was having a strong feeling of déjà vu, which was hardly surprising when he thought about it. Every week or two it was the same thing; Jack would find some creature that had come through the Rift, or even something of earthly origin, take a shine to it, and decide he wanted to keep it as a pet, and every time it was something totally unsuited to domestication. This time, though, he’d really managed to outdo himself. Sometimes Ianto feared for his immortal lover’s sanity.
“But look at it, Ianto! How can you not love it? It’s just a baby, and it’s so cute!”
There he went with the pleading puppy-dog eyes. Ianto stifled a groan. Did Jack honestly think that would sway him the slightest bit? It never had before, so why would it now?
Ianto stared at the tiny, whirling mass spinning about on Jack’s desk, sucking in the odd crumb or paperclip, and despaired. How could he get it through Jack’s thick skull that keeping a semi-sentient tornado in the Hub would be a bad idea? It had been hard enough trying to convince him that owning the only living Stegosaurus on the planet was out of the question, they didn’t have the facilities, or the budget, needed to care for something that size, but this… this was beyond ridiculous. Nevertheless, for the sake of the Hub, the team, and his own sanity, he knew he had to make his lover see sense.
“You can’t keep weather as a pet, Jack, think of the damage it could do! Sure, it looks cute right now, but it’s only four inches across. What d’you think is going to happen as it grows? It’s already almost twice the size it was when we found it.”
The Rift alert had come in at mid morning and Tosh’s readings on what had come through had been vague at best. When they’d reached the coordinates of the Rift spike, they’d at first dismissed the tiny spinning funnel of air as nothing more than a random dust devil, until they’d realised there wasn’t the slightest breath of wind to create it.
Once Ianto succeeded in running a scan, which hadn’t been easy because it had kept moving, making him have to run after it, he’d been forced to accept that they’d found what the Rift had brought them, and hadn’t capturing a mini tornado been fun? Well, not really. It had led them a merry chase through the side streets and alleys of Cardiff for over an hour, but in the end they’d cornered it in the angle of two walls and Ianto had managed to drop a containment unit over it, sliding the lid underneath to trap it.
The little whirlwind hadn’t been happy, battering itself against the sides of its box and shedding bits of dust and leaves in its effort to escape, all to no avail. When they’d arrived back at the Hub, Jack, big softie that he was, had taken pity on their tiny captive, letting it out on his desk when Ianto wasn’t looking, worried that confinement might harm or even kill it. So now here they were, watching it spin about, gradually growing as it drew more air and random bits of stuff into its vortex.
“But it wouldn’t harm us! It likes me! Here, watch this!” Jack sprinkled some glitter on his desk, smiling delightedly as the tornado eagerly sucked it up, turning all twinkly as it spun back and forth, round and round… Ianto was starting to get a bit dizzy watching it.
“You can’t keep it, Jack, and that’s final.” Ianto steeled himself against the power of the inevitable pout; Jack’s pouting was a force to be reckoned with, but Ianto was made of sterner stuff than most people and he stared stonily back at Torchwood’s leader until the other man drooped, for the moment defeated. “Good, glad we’ve got that settled.”
Of course, that still left them with the problem of what to do with the small, semi-sentient weather system. They couldn’t keep it, but neither could they let it go to wreak havoc around the planet; unlike earth tornados, it was unlikely that it would eventually blow itself out, and if it kept growing, it could cause disaster on a global scale. On the other hand, they couldn’t kill it even if they knew how. It wasn’t to blame for getting stuck on earth, and Torchwood Three, unlike Torchwood One, wasn’t in the habit of killing innocent alien beings, whatever form they came in, for no good reason. It would amount to murder,
Ianto was still frowning, watching the tiny twister making another circuit of Jack’s desk and trying to come up with a workable solution for the problem it presented, when the alarms started going off again.
Tearing himself away from his would-be pet, Jack strode out the door of his office and leaned over the catwalk railing. “What’ve we got, Tosh?”
“Not sure, I can’t get a clear reading, but whatever it is it’s right above us on the Plas,” Tosh called back. “I’m trying to pick up an image from the CCTV cameras, but I can’t seem to get them to focus; no matter what I try everything still looks blurry.”
“Keep trying, and let me know if you get anything.” Jack returned to his office, grabbing his coat off the coat rack and pausing by his desk while he pulled it on. He looked sternly at the tornado. “Stay,” he told it firmly. “Ianto, with me. We’ll go out through the Tourist Office.”
Snatching up his own coat, Ianto followed Jack, briefly glancing back at the whirlwind on Jack’s desk before leaving the office. It looked like it was doing as it had been told; he just hoped it wouldn’t get bored and go wandering off. He didn’t want to have to search the Hub for it when they got back.
The wind hit them the moment they stepped out onto Mermaid Quay, making them stagger, and they didn’t even have to go up to the Plas to see the cause of both the sudden gale and the new alert. It towered above them, a whirling vortex taller than the Millennium Centre, sucking in litter and other small items to swirl them around in a dizzying spiral. The oddest thing about it was that instead of sweeping past and continuing on its way, it was spinning on the spot.
Ianto didn’t believe in coincidences these days. They had a mini tornado in the Hub, and now they had a massive one on the Plas; the two had to be connected.
“I’m guessing that’s mum come to find her baby,” he shouted at Jack over the roar of the wind. “See what your cute little ‘pet’ could grow into given half a chance?”
Jack gaped up at the tornado, eyes wide with awe. “Wow, that’s big!”
“Imagine something that size in the Hub,” Ianto yelled into Jack’s ear, tugging at his sleeve, dragging him back into the shelter of the Tourist Office and shutting the door firmly behind them. Both he and Jack were breathless and looking more than a little windswept. “Now do you get why we can’t keep your little friend?”
Jack’s shoulders slumped. “I suppose you’re right, the Hub’s not really big enough.”
“Of course I’m right; aren’t I always? Come on, I think it’s time for you to take baby back to mama.”
Down in Jack’s office, they sprinkled glitter onto an old tray, coaxed the baby tornado onto it, and Jack carried it through the Hub to the invisible lift, a wistful expression on his face.
“Just put the tray down and send the lift up,” Ianto said, but Jack shook his head.
“There’s no way of knowing if the perception filter works on non-biological sentient entities. I’d better go up too, then I can carry Twirly off the slab.”
Ianto’s eyebrows shot up. “You named it?”
“Of course I did!” Jack said indignantly.
“Of course you did,” Ianto agreed. “For a moment I forgot who I was talking to.” He put one hand out to stop Jack before he could step up onto the slab. “Be careful up there, you’ll be walking right into the middle of a tornado so there’s no telling what might happen. If it picks you up, you could wind up anywhere.”
“I’ll be fine, the lift should take me straight up into the eye of the storm.”
“We can only hope.” Ianto spared one more look at the glittering little whirlwind spinning around the tray. It really was quite pretty. “Okay then, no point in waiting any longer; good luck!”
As soon as Jack was standing on the slab, Tosh set the lift rising slowly and steadily towards street level. Ianto stood below, watching his lover grow smaller with distance until he disappeared through the small opening far above.
The paving slab came to a halt and Jack just stood there for a moment, taking everything in. Around him was an area of completely calm, still air, about fifteen feet across, but beyond that was the madly whirling vortex of the huge tornado, full of litter and other detritus, people’s hats and scarves, menus from the tables in front of a nearby café, and posters from notice boards. Despite the swiftness of the swirling wind, no people, animals, birds, or large objects had been pulled into it. He took that as a good sign and stepped off the slab, holding the tray up in front of him, Twirly spinning gaily in the middle of it.
Almost immediately, the funnel started to close in around him, the wall of
wind drawing steadily nearer, and he held his breath, waiting for the worst to happen, to be torn bodily from the ground and hurled around by the powerful air currents encircling him, but when it was almost touching him, it halted. He let his breath out in a sigh of relief and dropped his gaze to the tray, watching the miniature tornado as it spun in place like a child’s spinning top.
“So, I guess this is goodbye then.”
Twirly spun to the edge of the tray closest to him, lightly brushing against his coat and leaving a small smear of glitter behind.
Jack smiled. “You’re welcome. Be good. I wish you didn’t have to go, but Ianto’s right; you’ll be better off with your own kind,” Acting on instinct, he stretched out his arms, pushing the edge of the tray into the wall of the vortex. He felt a slight resistance, but the tray wasn’t torn from his hands as he’d expected; instead, it was as though it had been taken in a gentle grasp and held steady. Twirly whizzed away from Jack across the surface and a small pocket seemed to open in the wall of air, which the tiny twister slipped into. Then it closed again, and Jack was left holding an empty tray; Twirly was gone.
Slowly, the massive tornado lifted from the ground, spinning upwards, higher and higher, until it abruptly vanished in a burst of golden light. The litter and other items that had been swept up by its air currents rained down around Jack for a few minutes, then all was silent and he was alone on the deserted Plas, everyone else having long since taken shelter in the nearby buildings.
Sighing, he stepped back onto the invisible lift, tucked the tray under one arm, pressed a button on his wrist strap, and allowed himself to be carried back down into the Hub. He was going to miss the little whirlwind, but it wouldn’t have been a very good pet for long, not if it was going to grow that big. Surely one day he’d find his ideal pet, one that even Ianto would be willing to accept, but until then, he’d just have to keep looking.
The End
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Tosh, OC.
Rating: G
Spoilers: Nada
Summary: Sometimes Ianto despairs of the way Jack keeps trying to make a pet out of everything he comes across.
Word Count: 2007
Written For: My genprompt_bingo square ‘Tornados’.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
“No, Jack, you can’t keep it!” Ianto sighed, shaking his head in exasperation. He was having a strong feeling of déjà vu, which was hardly surprising when he thought about it. Every week or two it was the same thing; Jack would find some creature that had come through the Rift, or even something of earthly origin, take a shine to it, and decide he wanted to keep it as a pet, and every time it was something totally unsuited to domestication. This time, though, he’d really managed to outdo himself. Sometimes Ianto feared for his immortal lover’s sanity.
“But look at it, Ianto! How can you not love it? It’s just a baby, and it’s so cute!”
There he went with the pleading puppy-dog eyes. Ianto stifled a groan. Did Jack honestly think that would sway him the slightest bit? It never had before, so why would it now?
Ianto stared at the tiny, whirling mass spinning about on Jack’s desk, sucking in the odd crumb or paperclip, and despaired. How could he get it through Jack’s thick skull that keeping a semi-sentient tornado in the Hub would be a bad idea? It had been hard enough trying to convince him that owning the only living Stegosaurus on the planet was out of the question, they didn’t have the facilities, or the budget, needed to care for something that size, but this… this was beyond ridiculous. Nevertheless, for the sake of the Hub, the team, and his own sanity, he knew he had to make his lover see sense.
“You can’t keep weather as a pet, Jack, think of the damage it could do! Sure, it looks cute right now, but it’s only four inches across. What d’you think is going to happen as it grows? It’s already almost twice the size it was when we found it.”
The Rift alert had come in at mid morning and Tosh’s readings on what had come through had been vague at best. When they’d reached the coordinates of the Rift spike, they’d at first dismissed the tiny spinning funnel of air as nothing more than a random dust devil, until they’d realised there wasn’t the slightest breath of wind to create it.
Once Ianto succeeded in running a scan, which hadn’t been easy because it had kept moving, making him have to run after it, he’d been forced to accept that they’d found what the Rift had brought them, and hadn’t capturing a mini tornado been fun? Well, not really. It had led them a merry chase through the side streets and alleys of Cardiff for over an hour, but in the end they’d cornered it in the angle of two walls and Ianto had managed to drop a containment unit over it, sliding the lid underneath to trap it.
The little whirlwind hadn’t been happy, battering itself against the sides of its box and shedding bits of dust and leaves in its effort to escape, all to no avail. When they’d arrived back at the Hub, Jack, big softie that he was, had taken pity on their tiny captive, letting it out on his desk when Ianto wasn’t looking, worried that confinement might harm or even kill it. So now here they were, watching it spin about, gradually growing as it drew more air and random bits of stuff into its vortex.
“But it wouldn’t harm us! It likes me! Here, watch this!” Jack sprinkled some glitter on his desk, smiling delightedly as the tornado eagerly sucked it up, turning all twinkly as it spun back and forth, round and round… Ianto was starting to get a bit dizzy watching it.
“You can’t keep it, Jack, and that’s final.” Ianto steeled himself against the power of the inevitable pout; Jack’s pouting was a force to be reckoned with, but Ianto was made of sterner stuff than most people and he stared stonily back at Torchwood’s leader until the other man drooped, for the moment defeated. “Good, glad we’ve got that settled.”
Of course, that still left them with the problem of what to do with the small, semi-sentient weather system. They couldn’t keep it, but neither could they let it go to wreak havoc around the planet; unlike earth tornados, it was unlikely that it would eventually blow itself out, and if it kept growing, it could cause disaster on a global scale. On the other hand, they couldn’t kill it even if they knew how. It wasn’t to blame for getting stuck on earth, and Torchwood Three, unlike Torchwood One, wasn’t in the habit of killing innocent alien beings, whatever form they came in, for no good reason. It would amount to murder,
Ianto was still frowning, watching the tiny twister making another circuit of Jack’s desk and trying to come up with a workable solution for the problem it presented, when the alarms started going off again.
Tearing himself away from his would-be pet, Jack strode out the door of his office and leaned over the catwalk railing. “What’ve we got, Tosh?”
“Not sure, I can’t get a clear reading, but whatever it is it’s right above us on the Plas,” Tosh called back. “I’m trying to pick up an image from the CCTV cameras, but I can’t seem to get them to focus; no matter what I try everything still looks blurry.”
“Keep trying, and let me know if you get anything.” Jack returned to his office, grabbing his coat off the coat rack and pausing by his desk while he pulled it on. He looked sternly at the tornado. “Stay,” he told it firmly. “Ianto, with me. We’ll go out through the Tourist Office.”
Snatching up his own coat, Ianto followed Jack, briefly glancing back at the whirlwind on Jack’s desk before leaving the office. It looked like it was doing as it had been told; he just hoped it wouldn’t get bored and go wandering off. He didn’t want to have to search the Hub for it when they got back.
The wind hit them the moment they stepped out onto Mermaid Quay, making them stagger, and they didn’t even have to go up to the Plas to see the cause of both the sudden gale and the new alert. It towered above them, a whirling vortex taller than the Millennium Centre, sucking in litter and other small items to swirl them around in a dizzying spiral. The oddest thing about it was that instead of sweeping past and continuing on its way, it was spinning on the spot.
Ianto didn’t believe in coincidences these days. They had a mini tornado in the Hub, and now they had a massive one on the Plas; the two had to be connected.
“I’m guessing that’s mum come to find her baby,” he shouted at Jack over the roar of the wind. “See what your cute little ‘pet’ could grow into given half a chance?”
Jack gaped up at the tornado, eyes wide with awe. “Wow, that’s big!”
“Imagine something that size in the Hub,” Ianto yelled into Jack’s ear, tugging at his sleeve, dragging him back into the shelter of the Tourist Office and shutting the door firmly behind them. Both he and Jack were breathless and looking more than a little windswept. “Now do you get why we can’t keep your little friend?”
Jack’s shoulders slumped. “I suppose you’re right, the Hub’s not really big enough.”
“Of course I’m right; aren’t I always? Come on, I think it’s time for you to take baby back to mama.”
Down in Jack’s office, they sprinkled glitter onto an old tray, coaxed the baby tornado onto it, and Jack carried it through the Hub to the invisible lift, a wistful expression on his face.
“Just put the tray down and send the lift up,” Ianto said, but Jack shook his head.
“There’s no way of knowing if the perception filter works on non-biological sentient entities. I’d better go up too, then I can carry Twirly off the slab.”
Ianto’s eyebrows shot up. “You named it?”
“Of course I did!” Jack said indignantly.
“Of course you did,” Ianto agreed. “For a moment I forgot who I was talking to.” He put one hand out to stop Jack before he could step up onto the slab. “Be careful up there, you’ll be walking right into the middle of a tornado so there’s no telling what might happen. If it picks you up, you could wind up anywhere.”
“I’ll be fine, the lift should take me straight up into the eye of the storm.”
“We can only hope.” Ianto spared one more look at the glittering little whirlwind spinning around the tray. It really was quite pretty. “Okay then, no point in waiting any longer; good luck!”
As soon as Jack was standing on the slab, Tosh set the lift rising slowly and steadily towards street level. Ianto stood below, watching his lover grow smaller with distance until he disappeared through the small opening far above.
The paving slab came to a halt and Jack just stood there for a moment, taking everything in. Around him was an area of completely calm, still air, about fifteen feet across, but beyond that was the madly whirling vortex of the huge tornado, full of litter and other detritus, people’s hats and scarves, menus from the tables in front of a nearby café, and posters from notice boards. Despite the swiftness of the swirling wind, no people, animals, birds, or large objects had been pulled into it. He took that as a good sign and stepped off the slab, holding the tray up in front of him, Twirly spinning gaily in the middle of it.
Almost immediately, the funnel started to close in around him, the wall of
wind drawing steadily nearer, and he held his breath, waiting for the worst to happen, to be torn bodily from the ground and hurled around by the powerful air currents encircling him, but when it was almost touching him, it halted. He let his breath out in a sigh of relief and dropped his gaze to the tray, watching the miniature tornado as it spun in place like a child’s spinning top.
“So, I guess this is goodbye then.”
Twirly spun to the edge of the tray closest to him, lightly brushing against his coat and leaving a small smear of glitter behind.
Jack smiled. “You’re welcome. Be good. I wish you didn’t have to go, but Ianto’s right; you’ll be better off with your own kind,” Acting on instinct, he stretched out his arms, pushing the edge of the tray into the wall of the vortex. He felt a slight resistance, but the tray wasn’t torn from his hands as he’d expected; instead, it was as though it had been taken in a gentle grasp and held steady. Twirly whizzed away from Jack across the surface and a small pocket seemed to open in the wall of air, which the tiny twister slipped into. Then it closed again, and Jack was left holding an empty tray; Twirly was gone.
Slowly, the massive tornado lifted from the ground, spinning upwards, higher and higher, until it abruptly vanished in a burst of golden light. The litter and other items that had been swept up by its air currents rained down around Jack for a few minutes, then all was silent and he was alone on the deserted Plas, everyone else having long since taken shelter in the nearby buildings.
Sighing, he stepped back onto the invisible lift, tucked the tray under one arm, pressed a button on his wrist strap, and allowed himself to be carried back down into the Hub. He was going to miss the little whirlwind, but it wouldn’t have been a very good pet for long, not if it was going to grow that big. Surely one day he’d find his ideal pet, one that even Ianto would be willing to accept, but until then, he’d just have to keep looking.
The End