TW Ficlet: Hand(s)
“You never learnt how to shoot a gun?” Jack asks incredulously.
“No sir, not really,” Ianto answers with a smooth, insincere quirk of his lips, “I was mostly an archivist at Torchwood One, and the most grievous injuries any of us got were paper cuts. None of us were ever in danger until the, the…”
“The Cybermen invasion.”
“Yes sir.”
Jack let the silence hang for a moment, because, Jesus Christ, the kid looks like he’s about to cry, which is a sharp contrast to the refined, stoic young man that had walked into his office earlier. He could see the long, pale fingers pressing tightly against the dark dress pants that clenched into a fist once, then relaxed to their prior position.
“So,” Jack asks after a pause, “how do you expect to work here without any type of weapons training?”
Ianto looks up and draws himself up as much as he could in his chair, and Jack is sure that the kid is readying himself for a recitation of his impressive resume that he’d memorized before the interview. “I may not have much experience in the field, but I assure you, sir, that I am very competent at providing general support to the team, as well as taking on administrative duties that-”
“I can’t be bothered with, yes.” Jack cuts the other man off, noting with slight interest the way Ianto doesn’t react at all to the interruption, with his expression still schooled into a professional veneer. “But to work here, basic knowledge with guns is critical for both your safety and that of the team, and I can’t hire you until you’ve had that kind of training.”
And that’s what gets a reaction out of him, Jack thinks to himself, seeing the quick, panicked look in Ianto’s eyes and the way his relaxed hands leap off his thighs before pressing themselves back down again to the dark fabric.
“But sir, I-” Jack admits to himself that he kind of likes to see the Welshman squirm in front of him, for general amusement if nothing else, and so he smirks through a few more earnest protests before interrupting again.
“That’s why I’m teaching you how to handle a gun now.” Jack says glibly, drawing himself out of the chair and out of the office before throwing back a “Well, what are you waiting for? Follow me.” to the astonished youth behind him.
--
“So,” Jack starts what would surely be a stilted conversation with awkward pauses, “Why did you apply to Torchwood Three?”
“Because my mum and my father were both in Torchwood in their days, sir, I suppose it runs in the family.”
“That only explains why you applied for Torchwood One. It doesn’t tell me a thing about why you want to work for the agency again after what happened at Canary Wharf.”
For a long moment, Ianto doesn’t answer, and judging by the silence, he probably isn’t going to. Jack is just about to open his mouth to change the subject, when, in a low, demure tone, Ianto says, haltingly, “I think, it’s because…I have never known anything else.”
Jack frowns. That’s definitely up there on the list of bad reasons to work for Torchwood. “So, what, it’s a last resort?”
“Oh no, sir, not at all. I did not mean any disrespect. It is just that my parents were always away on business for Torchwood, and it was a romantic idea for a young boy: going on secret missions for the government. James Bond was also popular back then, so I suppose that explains it to some extent.”
Jack agrees, thinking back to his childish make-believe games so long ago, and returns Ianto’s wry smile with his own bright grin. They make it to the shooting range without further conversation, something even Jack is grateful for. At least he wouldn’t have to pretend to believe any more of Ianto’s lies.
--
One look at the other man’s hands and Jack knows that Ianto probably has never even held a gun before in his life. Jack watches they way Ianto curls his right hand awkwardly around the grip of the gun, too tight for any kind of mobility, and the way his finger curls hesitantly over the trigger. He eyes take in the sight of Ianto’s long fingers and trail over the smooth, pale back of his hand, and Jack imagines that it would be soft to the touch with phantom hairs ghosting over his palm if Jack just reached out and...
But Jack doesn’t. Instead, when Ianto is still trying to get used to the unfamiliar weight of a Beretta nine mil, he imagines those long fingers flitting over file folders and gathering sheaves of paper, holding pens and writing memos until the fingertips stained blue with ink.
In an uncharacteristic leap of thought, Jack finds himself also picturing those hands wrapped around stems of flowers Ianto would bring to his girlfriends; of the way those fingers would shyly intertwine with more feminine ones in a perfect icon of youthful love…
And all of a sudden, Jack finds the way Ianto’s unmarred, unscarred, untouched hand clutching the gun to be somehow obscene and wrong and he wants to rip it out of that rigid grip. But even more so, Jack wants to shove the young man out of the hub, push a retcon pill through those pink, soft looking lips, and tell him to go elsewhere, anywhere, just nowhere near Torchwood because hasn’t he had enough of this already?
But everything changes in the twenty-first century and Torchwood can’t afford to let anyone go, not with their forces so depleted already and especially not someone with Ianto’s experiences. So Jack takes that hand around that gun and gently coaxes it to relax, coaxes Ianto to relax, and he presses Ianto’s finger firmly in contact with the trigger and whispers, “This is how you do it.”
The shot goes off with Jack pressed against Ianto’s back, their arms parallel. Ianto almost drops the gun afterwards from the recoil, but Jack’s hand was there over his, finger over his over the trigger, so that Ianto would get used to the feel of that heavy, lethal weight in his hand.
--
Feedback is much appreciated. Also, I would like to note that, uh, it started with the urge to write hand!gun!porn. Really. Except that "and then they had sex." is the extent of my pr0n writing skills.