Resonating Through Time -- It's So Nice To See That Insanity Translates
Title: It's So Nice To See That Insanity Translates
dwtwprompts prompt: "The More Things Change, the more they remain... insane." -- Michael Fry and T. Lewis
Date Written: 4/23/08
Rating: PG/K+
Word Count: 1,935
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto, Team
Spoilers: Torchwood seasons 1 & 2, particularly past Something Borrowed.
Warnings: Crack-ish ending
Author's Notes: This was requested by reviewers. I love you people! Honestly, I thought these were pure crap, and I was gonna abandon the table... major thanks in particular to talcat for the plot bunny, this is all your fault!
1/9: Salt and Pepper
2/9: That's the Thing About Gloves, Sir
3/9: Leading Back To Rome
There were many, many, many things at Torchwood Three that were different from the way Torchwood One was run. Yvonne Hartman had often complained (loudly, to a great many people) about Jack Harkness and his backwards team at Three.
Ianto loved it. This, this was the way Torchwood was supposed to be run. Protecting humanity, serving Crown and country, yes, but not the way it used to be. Before it had been smash-and-grab, humans exhibiting the same scum that they were trying to protect themselves from.
Under Yvonne's regime, he'd never be having a conversation with an alien visitor, and he wouldn't be asking the very awkward question, "Can I get you something to eat, or to drink?" to a being he wasn't quite sure was male or female -- or both, or neither.
Jack's way was oh-so-much better.
"First contact night!" Jack said with a smile, clapping his hands together in excitement as the team fought with the canvas tent. "Sometimes I love this job, I really do."
Ianto wiped the back of his hand over his forehead, looking up at Jack and smiling a little. Jack's excitement was contagious, and his team had been infected. Ianto himself had been grinning from ear to ear all day. Tosh had been a bundle of energy and frazzled nerves as she made sure all the translation technology was going to work. Owen was looking forward to new alien DNA to profile. And poor Gwen had been banned from caffeine since she couldn't sit still from the gut-turning, exciting dread of her first face-to-face.
Jack put his hands in his coat pockets. "And the best place to land, too, the Welsh countryside!" He smiled and turned, looking over the fields of emerald green. "Fresh air, quiet serenity... he may not want to leave!"
"So it's definately a he then?" Gwen asked, looping the rope around the stake at her feet. Her nerves were showing.
"No idea." Jack grinned. "Could get a blob of goo that'll just burble at us. That's the fun of it!"
Ianto rolled his eyes, but couldn't stop grinning.
The alien's name was Odari, and was a member of the race known as the Blatumni, from a planet called Ouidophont. They were mentioned in passing in the archive notes, actually speaking to him had been Ianto's inner researcher's dream -- wet as he was.
Ouidophont, as it turned out, was similar to Earth in the fact that it was mostly composed of water (95.8%, to be precise). Odari -- who was male, as they'd found out when Gwen had asked in her point-blank way -- looked humanoid. He could walk upright and had, but he was used to the weightlessness of swimming and quickly sat as soon as he could. He had very long webbed fingers and toes and huge black eyes with just a hint of purple iris around the gigantic pupils. His skin was very similar to a squid or an octopus, changing pigments from the light blue he had been when he'd exited his craft to the green and gray of the tent walls and grass floor, and shimmering softly.
After about ten minutes of talking, he'd managed to gasp out -- oh so politely -- that he was dreadfully sorry, but would it be capable for them to spare some water? His skin needed to be kept moist, and he was afraid he was starting to dry out. Ianto had fished out a handkerchief and carefully patted bottled water over Odari's face and neck while Tosh rigged a makeshift water sprayer out of the miscellaneous stuff they kept in the kit in the back. When they'd started the sprayer up (with a mixture of 20% salt and 80% water), Odari had smiled at them, revealing two perfect rows of blue-tinted teeth.
Toshiko and Owen were currently checking out the Blatumni spacecraft, while Gwen, Jack and Ianto picked the poor alien's brain about its culture and himself.
Long, clammy fingers wrapped around Ianto's wrist as he turned to move and the Welshman smiled down at him politely. "Yes? Is there something more?"
There was a pause as the translator processed Ianto's words into the sharp sonar that made up Blatumni speech and the alien replied, his other hand coming up to touch Ianto's silk tie.
"This," the translator supplied. "It is beautiful. What is it?"
"It's called a tie, it's made of a fabric called silk." He grinned as Odari fingered the silk carefully. "Do you like it?"
The alien nodded and spoke again. "It feels like water," the translator explained after a moment.
Ianto loosened the tie and slipped it off, handing it over. "Here. I have many more."
A tie-tying lesson had followed the exchange. Odari was a quick study.
The night slowly dragged on, and finally, just as the sun rose, both parties had exhausted every curiosity they had. The six of them, five humans and one Blatumni, threw the tent flaps open and watched the sun come up over the Welsh hills.
Ianto suspected that Odari had been moved to tears by the scene but it was hard to tell, what with the water still spraying over him.
Everyone looked tired, but a cheerful tired. And they were all damp from the spray, but no one seemed to mind. They all had slowly shed layers as their clothing got wet and clingy and were down to what was considered just barely modest: Gwen was pulling at her soaked tank top (all were glad she hadn't gone with white tonight. flashing a visiting representative would have been in bad taste, even if he might not have noticed) and squirming in her wet jeans. Toshiko's hair had fallen out of the clip she'd had it in and it now hung loosely around her pretty smiling face, and Owen was frowning a little at his leather jacket, which was surely ruined by now -- both of them were wearing what could be considered the most, and were drier since they'd spent half the night outside the tent. Jack had lost his button-up somewhere around two in the morning, his braces hanging loosely at his hips and his white undershirt soaked through, revealing a little glimmering bulge of gold trapped between the clinging white and his skin.
Ianto ran his fingers through his wet hair, slicking it back away from his face. It was going to be fun peeling Jack out of that wet clothing, and he was sure it was going to be a mutual joy.
His shirt tugged uncomfortably as he moved and Ianto sighed a little, unbuttoning his shirt sleeves and undoing the top two buttons of his shirt. Finally, he felt like he could breathe again, without wet weight clinging to him. He settled back against the chair, smiling a little and watching the scenery light up.
After about five minutes, he got the very distinct feeling he was being analysed and looked over. Odari was studying him, those big eyes narrowed in concentration. The alien gaze flicked over to Jack and then back, then to Jack again before realizing something. His mouth made a little 'o' of surprise and he clapped his hands together.
Sometimes things tended to be the same for different alien cultures. It was a lovely surprise when it did.
The entire team turned to look as Odari said something to him, then looked at Jack and pointed. "I didn't realize you were married!"
Ianto's face must have looked priceless, because Owen burst out laughing. "Married? Him? No way!"
"Tosh, are you sure that thing's working right?" Gwen asked, pointing to the translator.
Toshiko frowned. "It's been working properly all night!"
Odari pointed to Jack again, then reached out to touch Ianto's necklace. "They wear matching necklaces." He looked at Ianto. "You are married then, yes?"
Ianto smiled politely but shook his head. "No, not married," he said, trying to keep the note of disappointment out of his voice. "On Earth, a married couple wears rings."
"Like this," Gwen said, holding up her left hand to show her wedding band and engagement ring.
Odari shook his head again, touching the necklace. "No, married. The necklaces are special."
He suddenly stood and stumbled out to his ship, the others following him. Ianto looked at Jack, reflexively touching his necklace. "Jack?"
Jack shrugged in response. "Maybe a necklace is the Blatumni equivalent of a wedding ring," Jack theorized. "It's not like they can wear rings with their hand webbed like that."
Gwen let out a little 'hmn' at Ianto's other side, twisting her rings as they watched Odari come back out of his ship. He was holding what looked like a ray gun from an old science fiction b-movie. Toshiko, Owen and Gwen instinctively reached for where their weapons normally were, but Jack and Ianto didn't move -- none of them were armed anyway.
Odari pressed the little gun into Ianto's hand, smiling and patting his face (and leaving a wet spot on his cheek). "For you." He smiled and touched the tie around his neck first, then touched Jack's shirt. "For you both."
"So, here's the million dollar question," Jack asked once they were all dry and back at the Hub, "what's this thing do?"
"Don't know," Tosh replied, already at her computer station. "We could scan it, then try to reverse engineer it."
"I don't think it's dangerous," Ianto said. "Odari said the Blatumni hate conflict, and he just didn't seem to be the type."
"And it's possible we had a faulty translator," Owen argued back, ignoring Toshiko's scoff of protest.
Gwen picked it up, turning it this way and that. She ended up with what could be considered the barrel-end facing Jack, making him duck.
"Jesus Christ, woman, do I have to take you off weapons clearance?!"
"Good morning, sir."
Jack laughed a little and sat back in his chair. "Ianto!"
Ianto smiled and crossed the floor, a cup of coffee in one hand and a plate in the other. He leaned in to give Jack a (far too) brief kiss. "Good morning, Jack."
"Much better."
"Your coffee." Ianto set the cup down, still holding the plate at an angle where Jack couldn't see it. "And we figured out what the device was that Odari gave us last week was, sir."
"Oh?" Jack asked with a smile. Ianto was always all business when the others were in the Hub. Jack thought that Ianto liked winding him up with the 'sirs' and 'Captains'. "And what was it?"
Ianto set the plate down in front of Jack, showing him two slices of perfectly-browned bread.
They were in his kitchen.
That in and of itself was bad enough. While Tosh at least tried to clean up after herself, Owen and Gwen tended to leave messes that Ianto's young nieces and nephews couldn't outdo.
There was the suspicious zapping sound of alien tech, followed by an outburst of laughter and a "Let me do it this time, Tosh!" from Owen.
Ianto stepped into the kitchen just in time to see Owen point the little gun at a poor slice of white bread lying on a plate on the counter. He pulled the trigger and the bread smoked slightly, turning a light brown without damaging the plate.
"It's a toaster. An alien toaster. He thought we were married, and he gave us a bloody toaster."
Jack laughed so hard he fell out of his chair. Ianto rolled his eyes and picked up a piece of bread and biting into it.
It did make pretty damn good toast.
ETA: Chapter five here
dwtwprompts prompt: "The More Things Change, the more they remain... insane." -- Michael Fry and T. Lewis
Date Written: 4/23/08
Rating: PG/K+
Word Count: 1,935
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto, Team
Spoilers: Torchwood seasons 1 & 2, particularly past Something Borrowed.
Warnings: Crack-ish ending
Author's Notes: This was requested by reviewers. I love you people! Honestly, I thought these were pure crap, and I was gonna abandon the table... major thanks in particular to talcat for the plot bunny, this is all your fault!
1/9: Salt and Pepper
2/9: That's the Thing About Gloves, Sir
3/9: Leading Back To Rome
There were many, many, many things at Torchwood Three that were different from the way Torchwood One was run. Yvonne Hartman had often complained (loudly, to a great many people) about Jack Harkness and his backwards team at Three.
Ianto loved it. This, this was the way Torchwood was supposed to be run. Protecting humanity, serving Crown and country, yes, but not the way it used to be. Before it had been smash-and-grab, humans exhibiting the same scum that they were trying to protect themselves from.
Under Yvonne's regime, he'd never be having a conversation with an alien visitor, and he wouldn't be asking the very awkward question, "Can I get you something to eat, or to drink?" to a being he wasn't quite sure was male or female -- or both, or neither.
Jack's way was oh-so-much better.
"First contact night!" Jack said with a smile, clapping his hands together in excitement as the team fought with the canvas tent. "Sometimes I love this job, I really do."
Ianto wiped the back of his hand over his forehead, looking up at Jack and smiling a little. Jack's excitement was contagious, and his team had been infected. Ianto himself had been grinning from ear to ear all day. Tosh had been a bundle of energy and frazzled nerves as she made sure all the translation technology was going to work. Owen was looking forward to new alien DNA to profile. And poor Gwen had been banned from caffeine since she couldn't sit still from the gut-turning, exciting dread of her first face-to-face.
Jack put his hands in his coat pockets. "And the best place to land, too, the Welsh countryside!" He smiled and turned, looking over the fields of emerald green. "Fresh air, quiet serenity... he may not want to leave!"
"So it's definately a he then?" Gwen asked, looping the rope around the stake at her feet. Her nerves were showing.
"No idea." Jack grinned. "Could get a blob of goo that'll just burble at us. That's the fun of it!"
Ianto rolled his eyes, but couldn't stop grinning.
The alien's name was Odari, and was a member of the race known as the Blatumni, from a planet called Ouidophont. They were mentioned in passing in the archive notes, actually speaking to him had been Ianto's inner researcher's dream -- wet as he was.
Ouidophont, as it turned out, was similar to Earth in the fact that it was mostly composed of water (95.8%, to be precise). Odari -- who was male, as they'd found out when Gwen had asked in her point-blank way -- looked humanoid. He could walk upright and had, but he was used to the weightlessness of swimming and quickly sat as soon as he could. He had very long webbed fingers and toes and huge black eyes with just a hint of purple iris around the gigantic pupils. His skin was very similar to a squid or an octopus, changing pigments from the light blue he had been when he'd exited his craft to the green and gray of the tent walls and grass floor, and shimmering softly.
After about ten minutes of talking, he'd managed to gasp out -- oh so politely -- that he was dreadfully sorry, but would it be capable for them to spare some water? His skin needed to be kept moist, and he was afraid he was starting to dry out. Ianto had fished out a handkerchief and carefully patted bottled water over Odari's face and neck while Tosh rigged a makeshift water sprayer out of the miscellaneous stuff they kept in the kit in the back. When they'd started the sprayer up (with a mixture of 20% salt and 80% water), Odari had smiled at them, revealing two perfect rows of blue-tinted teeth.
Toshiko and Owen were currently checking out the Blatumni spacecraft, while Gwen, Jack and Ianto picked the poor alien's brain about its culture and himself.
Long, clammy fingers wrapped around Ianto's wrist as he turned to move and the Welshman smiled down at him politely. "Yes? Is there something more?"
There was a pause as the translator processed Ianto's words into the sharp sonar that made up Blatumni speech and the alien replied, his other hand coming up to touch Ianto's silk tie.
"This," the translator supplied. "It is beautiful. What is it?"
"It's called a tie, it's made of a fabric called silk." He grinned as Odari fingered the silk carefully. "Do you like it?"
The alien nodded and spoke again. "It feels like water," the translator explained after a moment.
Ianto loosened the tie and slipped it off, handing it over. "Here. I have many more."
A tie-tying lesson had followed the exchange. Odari was a quick study.
The night slowly dragged on, and finally, just as the sun rose, both parties had exhausted every curiosity they had. The six of them, five humans and one Blatumni, threw the tent flaps open and watched the sun come up over the Welsh hills.
Ianto suspected that Odari had been moved to tears by the scene but it was hard to tell, what with the water still spraying over him.
Everyone looked tired, but a cheerful tired. And they were all damp from the spray, but no one seemed to mind. They all had slowly shed layers as their clothing got wet and clingy and were down to what was considered just barely modest: Gwen was pulling at her soaked tank top (all were glad she hadn't gone with white tonight. flashing a visiting representative would have been in bad taste, even if he might not have noticed) and squirming in her wet jeans. Toshiko's hair had fallen out of the clip she'd had it in and it now hung loosely around her pretty smiling face, and Owen was frowning a little at his leather jacket, which was surely ruined by now -- both of them were wearing what could be considered the most, and were drier since they'd spent half the night outside the tent. Jack had lost his button-up somewhere around two in the morning, his braces hanging loosely at his hips and his white undershirt soaked through, revealing a little glimmering bulge of gold trapped between the clinging white and his skin.
Ianto ran his fingers through his wet hair, slicking it back away from his face. It was going to be fun peeling Jack out of that wet clothing, and he was sure it was going to be a mutual joy.
His shirt tugged uncomfortably as he moved and Ianto sighed a little, unbuttoning his shirt sleeves and undoing the top two buttons of his shirt. Finally, he felt like he could breathe again, without wet weight clinging to him. He settled back against the chair, smiling a little and watching the scenery light up.
After about five minutes, he got the very distinct feeling he was being analysed and looked over. Odari was studying him, those big eyes narrowed in concentration. The alien gaze flicked over to Jack and then back, then to Jack again before realizing something. His mouth made a little 'o' of surprise and he clapped his hands together.
Sometimes things tended to be the same for different alien cultures. It was a lovely surprise when it did.
The entire team turned to look as Odari said something to him, then looked at Jack and pointed. "I didn't realize you were married!"
Ianto's face must have looked priceless, because Owen burst out laughing. "Married? Him? No way!"
"Tosh, are you sure that thing's working right?" Gwen asked, pointing to the translator.
Toshiko frowned. "It's been working properly all night!"
Odari pointed to Jack again, then reached out to touch Ianto's necklace. "They wear matching necklaces." He looked at Ianto. "You are married then, yes?"
Ianto smiled politely but shook his head. "No, not married," he said, trying to keep the note of disappointment out of his voice. "On Earth, a married couple wears rings."
"Like this," Gwen said, holding up her left hand to show her wedding band and engagement ring.
Odari shook his head again, touching the necklace. "No, married. The necklaces are special."
He suddenly stood and stumbled out to his ship, the others following him. Ianto looked at Jack, reflexively touching his necklace. "Jack?"
Jack shrugged in response. "Maybe a necklace is the Blatumni equivalent of a wedding ring," Jack theorized. "It's not like they can wear rings with their hand webbed like that."
Gwen let out a little 'hmn' at Ianto's other side, twisting her rings as they watched Odari come back out of his ship. He was holding what looked like a ray gun from an old science fiction b-movie. Toshiko, Owen and Gwen instinctively reached for where their weapons normally were, but Jack and Ianto didn't move -- none of them were armed anyway.
Odari pressed the little gun into Ianto's hand, smiling and patting his face (and leaving a wet spot on his cheek). "For you." He smiled and touched the tie around his neck first, then touched Jack's shirt. "For you both."
"So, here's the million dollar question," Jack asked once they were all dry and back at the Hub, "what's this thing do?"
"Don't know," Tosh replied, already at her computer station. "We could scan it, then try to reverse engineer it."
"I don't think it's dangerous," Ianto said. "Odari said the Blatumni hate conflict, and he just didn't seem to be the type."
"And it's possible we had a faulty translator," Owen argued back, ignoring Toshiko's scoff of protest.
Gwen picked it up, turning it this way and that. She ended up with what could be considered the barrel-end facing Jack, making him duck.
"Jesus Christ, woman, do I have to take you off weapons clearance?!"
"Good morning, sir."
Jack laughed a little and sat back in his chair. "Ianto!"
Ianto smiled and crossed the floor, a cup of coffee in one hand and a plate in the other. He leaned in to give Jack a (far too) brief kiss. "Good morning, Jack."
"Much better."
"Your coffee." Ianto set the cup down, still holding the plate at an angle where Jack couldn't see it. "And we figured out what the device was that Odari gave us last week was, sir."
"Oh?" Jack asked with a smile. Ianto was always all business when the others were in the Hub. Jack thought that Ianto liked winding him up with the 'sirs' and 'Captains'. "And what was it?"
Ianto set the plate down in front of Jack, showing him two slices of perfectly-browned bread.
They were in his kitchen.
That in and of itself was bad enough. While Tosh at least tried to clean up after herself, Owen and Gwen tended to leave messes that Ianto's young nieces and nephews couldn't outdo.
There was the suspicious zapping sound of alien tech, followed by an outburst of laughter and a "Let me do it this time, Tosh!" from Owen.
Ianto stepped into the kitchen just in time to see Owen point the little gun at a poor slice of white bread lying on a plate on the counter. He pulled the trigger and the bread smoked slightly, turning a light brown without damaging the plate.
"It's a toaster. An alien toaster. He thought we were married, and he gave us a bloody toaster."
Jack laughed so hard he fell out of his chair. Ianto rolled his eyes and picked up a piece of bread and biting into it.
It did make pretty damn good toast.
ETA: Chapter five here