(**) Torchwood Fic - Had I The Heavens (part 1)
Title: Had I The Heavens - Part 1/6 (**)
Pairing: mostly gen, with a liberal does of Jack/Ianto and more pairings appearing in the later chapters
Rating/Warning: PG-13, some swearing and very minor violence (will become 15 in future parts with themes of abuse and rape)
Spoilers: Set immediately after the events of 2.05 - Adam, so spoilers up until this point in the series
Summary: Adam’s stupid, but he has a talent that Captain John can use. Finally this is a way he can get back into the hub…
Author's Notes: Huge, massive thanks to the wonderful thebirdwoman for her beta services.
Disclaimer: Everything belongs to the BBC and RTD - I’m just borrowing them and I promise I’ll return them (mostly) unharmed.
CHAPTER 1
Embroidered Cloth Enwrought
Adam felt the tablet; he could feel it working its way down his throat. An agonising ghost. His soul was being ripped apart, his body shuddering and disappearing. He wouldn’t go back to the void - couldn’t. He couldn’t be that measly creature, crouching in the darkness again.
He reached out for Jack’s mind, seeking it. The taste and shape of it. But the other man was already on the ground, his mind closed. There was nothing left to cling onto.
He shut his eyes… the memory of his eyes. His last defence against the void.
But the nothingness didn’t come. He could feel wooden floorboards beneath his hands… his knees. He shouldn’t even have a body. Light was beating against his eyelids. He opened them slowly.
The room was flooded with warm artificial light, rich and luxurious, like the furniture around him. He was crouched in front of a desk, just an inch of the other side showing - no feet, but was that a hand dangling down?
Adam climbed slowly to his feet.
A man was slouched in the chair opposite him, his feet on the desk and a sword across his lap.
“Well hello, Memory Boy,” the man drawled. Even his voice was arrogant.
“What am I doing here?” Adam spat, trying to assess the situation and moving sideways. He just needed to be close enough to touch the man; that was all it would take. “Who are you?”
“Captain John Hart.” He raised the sword, pointing it at Adam’s chest. “Stop right there. You should show more respect to a man who has your life in his hands.”
* * * * *
John had just been bored. Or at least that was what he’d been telling himself. He’d already admitted he was lonely to Jack once - he was quite happy wallowing in denial now.
So he’d been bored and watching Jack and the rest of Torchwood had been something to do. It hadn’t taken long to find a nice place to stay. Until recently the house had belonged to a wealthy Welsh widow, and John was good with widows. After that, hooking into the Hub’s CCTV had been ridiculously easy. They really should be embarrassed.
Mostly it was mind numbingly boring, though strangely addictive. Like Big Brother, although at least here they didn’t cover the good bits with bird song. It was worth watching, if only for the unexpected porn.
But the last few days had been surprisingly interesting - a new face and all. Sure the guy was ridiculously incompetent, but that was one hell of a talent - a talent John could use.
“How?” Adam asked.
“Well right now I’m having to keep all my attention on remembering that you exist. I wouldn’t like to forget you, now.”
“You couldn’t - human memory doesn’t work like...”
“Who on earth says I’m human?” John watched the hesitation on Adam’s face. He waved the sword around a little more for emphasis - he’d always wanted a sword. The Time Agency had frowned on them as weapons - for some reason they though they were hard to conceal.
They were silent for a few seconds. He could practically see the cogs spinning away.
“Why am I here?” Adam asked at last.
“Well, Memory Boy, for reasons that are far from apparent to me, I want to get into there,” he used the sword to gesture at the TV screens behind Adam, “And I think you might be the man to help me.”
Adam turned quickly, his eyes glancing across the screens where the team were sleeping, huddled around the board room table and Jack, alone again, in the cells.
“Torchwood? Just tell them you’re an alien…” He sounded bitter. Bitter could be good, John thought. He could use bitter.
“I don’t want to be in a cell. I want to be one of the team.”
“I tried that, it didn’t work.”
“It didn’t work because you’re stupid and despite some rather major lapses in judgement - they aren’t.” John hesitated and then added. “At least not completely.”
“So? What’s changed?”
“This time you’ll have me to do your thinking. With me I can get us both into the team.”
“How?”
“I’m a fucking genius - especially compared to everyone else on this godforsaken rock. All I need is your special skills.”
“And why should I help you?”
“The question you should be asking, Memory Boy, is what possible way could you find of surviving if you don’t help me?”
* * * * *
“What are you talking about?” Ianto heard Gwen ask as she wandered past him her ear pressed to her phone. The computers were a mess - two days had just been ripped out of them. Even his recently returned diary was useless, although, he noticed, slightly scuffed. What had Jack been doing with it?
“No, no - it’s alright, I’ll come home early, there’s not much to do here anyway. We could go out for a meal - or get a takeaway… relive Paris.” Gwen laughed delightedly and Ianto looked up just in time to see her almost skipping up the stairs to Jack’s office.
“Hey Jack, I was wondering if I could go home early? Rhys is sounding a bit odd.”
Ianto already had her coat ready and waiting by the time she was back down the stairs, Jack watching them with parent-like amusement from the gangway. She grinned at him.
“At least there’s one gentleman left around here,” she laughed loudly as he helped her slip her arms into the coat. He reached to straighten her collar and for a moment his fingers touched her neck, almost an embrace but too hard. Like they had a life… no, a memory of their own.
Gwen squirmed out of his grip giggling and he started, surprised at himself.
“So much for gentlemen - I’ve got a fiancée, remember,” she wiggled her engagement ring at him and laughed again and he laughed with her. Above her head he saw Jack frown slightly.
“Ianto, can you come here a sec?” The Captain called down. Gwen smiled at him, winked and said goodbye.
Jack was perched, leaning on his desk, when Ianto walked in, waiting.
“What was that about?” He asked.
“I honestly don’t know,” Ianto replied, as he sank down into Jack’s chair and decided to ignore the fact that this was clearly meant to be an interrogation. “Nothing to be worried about.”
“How are you feeling, Ianto?” Jack always said his name softly when they were alone, like it was a treat.
“Embarrassed,” Ianto admitted and watched Jack smile slowly, “and a little confused - shouldn’t we be trying to work out what happened in the last two days?”
“You know what Owen’s tests said, we’ve all got retcon in our systems, there was obviously something that I thought it better for us to forget,” Jack told him.
“I know… but…” Ianto started, looking for a way to explain, someone else could have given them the retcon.
“Does it really bother you?” Jack interrupted.
“A bit. I’m just…” he sought for the word. “Curious.”
“Normally I’d love you to go all Scooby Gang on me, but…” Jack looked away for a moment, trying to find the right words and then looked back, his expression intent. “When I try to remember what happened, the only thing I can think is to leave well alone. I usually find it’s better to follow my instincts.”
“What if that’s what someone else wants you to think?”
“It’s not,” Jack said simply. “We don’t need to know this. Come on Ianto, when have I ever been wrong before?”
He leant forward and kissed him on the forehead. He’d never done it before. It was a soft, gentle feeling and oddly familiar.
* * * * *
Adam was curled up in a chair, chewing his thumb. Captain John had left him alone at last, retired to his room.
His eyes flickered back to the CCTV screens. Jack and Ianto were talking in Jack’s office, but his eyes were drawn to where Toshiko was sat alone, staring at her flowers. She was still wearing the top he had chosen for her that morning.
She looked miserable and confused and lonely. It was her loneliness that had attracted Adam in the first place. He’d recognised the void in it - and himself. He had made them better. All of them.
He wanted to go back - try again. But he couldn’t, not until he had escaped from here. From John and his rules and his research. He rose untidily from the chair, determined as he left the room.
John was flung across his bed, dead to the world. All it would take was one little touch. Adam crept closer and knelt near the bed, but as he reached out to take the dangling arm and a sword tip grazed his nose, appearing from nowhere and hovered between his eyes. Behind it, John sat up.
“Now, Memory Boy - why would you try something as stupid as that?”
Adam scrambled to his feet moving backwards quickly as John rose slowly and surely from his bed, keeping the sword level.
“You couldn’t have had that in the bed with you,” he tried to control his panic.
“I’m a man of many talents, Memory Boy,” John moved forwards until Adam was pinned by the sword against a wall. “I don’t think you’ve understood your position here, you don’t get out of this, and you don’t get away from me. You do what I say, when I say and you’re happy about it.”
“What if I don’t want to be your lapdog?”
“When did you get a choice in this?”
“Your plan won’t work without me.”
“And you don’t get to be alive without me,” John suddenly smiled viciously and stepped backwards. “I don’t even need this,” he threw the sword aside but held up a hand as Adam took a step forward. “I’ve been looking forward to trying this. Although I expected to have to wait longer - a cleverer man would have been patient, would have waited to see what would happen. Because I do remember you - you died didn’t you?”
Adam paused in confusion and John laughed.
“You were shot, I remember now,” his voice was low. “I watched you bleed to death.”
There was a sudden pain in Adam’s gut - both searing and dull. He reached down to touch it gently and his fingers came away sticky with blood. His legs buckled and he collapsed again onto knees.
“Memory doesn’t work like that,” he managed to squeeze the words past the pain.
“Mine does. Many talents remember. I can make you small or fat or tall. If I want you to be an Adonis or a woman you will be - or if I decide you’re better as a toad then I can make you that too.”
John knelt down beside him, the closest they’d ever been and whispered in his ear.
“If I’m clever enough to work that out, don’t you think I’m clever enough to make sure that you die a very painful death if you ever… and I mean ever, change my memory. We do this my way.”
He stood and left, leaving Adam gasping on the floor. His fingers stroked his stomach - the shirt was still sodden with his blood but the wound was gone.
* * * * *
“Torchwood. Is that Torchwood?” The women on the other end of the phone sounded slightly manic. Jack frowned slightly.
“That’s us, although we don’t usually…”
“The police said I should call you,” she interrupted him, her voice suddenly becoming brisk and very Welsh.
“Really? That was unusual of them. All right, how can we help you?”
“I’m from the Sunny Side Animal Sanctuary and we’ve found a… well it’s a… Look it’s probably better if you see him yourself.”
Jack was about to respond when he heard a high pitched squeal from the other end of the phone. The women began to talk again, although by the sound of it she wasn’t talking to Jack - probably.
“What have you got there. Oh god, not the gas canister. Bad boy!” There was a sudden bang and the phone line went dead. Jack walked quickly to his office door, slamming it open, the others looked up at him sharply.
“Owen? Gwen? I’ve got a job for you at the Sunny Side Animal Sanctuary - do you know it?”
Gwen nodded.
“Good. I think it’d be better if you got there quickly.”
* * * * *
The remains of the building were still smouldering slightly. Although it only looked like the reception had been affected. The rest of the animal shelter sprawled out behind it - a ramshackle mess of overgrown buildings. A thin, strict looking woman was standing outside watching the firemen.
As Gwen and Owen approached, she turned, greeting them with short, firm handshakes.
“You must be Torchwood,” she said. Owen opened his mouth to answer but Gwen jumped in before he could say anything. Things tended to run smoother the less she let Owen talk. Tosh would probably draw a chart illustrating the fact if she asked her.
“We were told you were having trouble with an animal.”
“Yes, yes - come on, we’ve had to put him in the kennels, we were keeping him in the reception with us - he seemed to like the company and I have to admit the dogs don’t like him much, but as you can see,” she gestured to where the firemen were working.
“Err… did he do that,” Gwen asked as they followed the lady into the maze of buildings.
“Yes, yes. He was just over excited, bless him.” Gwen exchanged a look with Owen, what on earth did they have here. “He’s had a terrible life already,” the women continued, “somebody dumped him in a sack in the river. Can you imagine? He burnt through the sack of course but he got very wet…”
“Sorry, you haven’t told us your name,” Owen interrupted, rolling his eyes at Gwen.
“Mrs Cadwallader.”
“There’s a Mr…” Owen began with barely concealed surprise but Gwen interrupted him, with a quick shake of her head.
“Does the animal have a name?” She asked. Mrs Cadwallader bent to unlock a door.
“Oh no, we don’t name the animals here, it makes you too attached and then affects the rehoming.”
“You were going to rehome it?” Owen burst out and Mrs Cadwallader turned to look at him, a small frown on her face.
“Of course - that’s what we are here for.” She turned around and led them into the kennels. “He’d only have gone to a good home of course…”
“With fireproofing,” Owen muttered out of the corner of his mouth. The kennels were strangely silent, the dogs cowering in corners - looks of terror on their faces.
“… but well we just don’t have the expertise to care for him, which is why the police suggested we call you. Here we are.”
They stared down at the creature in the cage.
“Seriously?” Owen breathed in disbelief.
“Who’s a pretty boy then,” Mrs Cadwallader said warmly.
* * * * * *
It had been quiet since the temporal shift, or whatever that had been, but Ianto felt exhausted. He hadn’t slept well in days. When he did fall asleep, he woke up sweaty, tired and uncomfortable with vague memories of dark alleyways and rain.
He peered, blearily at the computer and rubbed his eyes. He didn’t know why he was still digging for things from the missing 48 hours, but it was a compulsion. He’d always liked things to be complete and organised.
He’d found stuff as well - an appraisal and some emails from someone called Adam - none of which made any sense. Now he’d found what looked like a staff profile in some deleted files, but the computer was refusing to show it properly. He grunted in annoyance as another error screen flashed up and leaned back in his chair.
“Is everything ok?” Tosh asked him from across the room. Jack was busy in his office and Gwen and Owen were still at the animal sanctuary.
“I’m trying to access a deleted file, but the computer keeps coming up with error messages,” Ianto told her - there was no point lying, she’d just check what he was doing from her own computer anyway.
“That sounds like something I can help with,” she said with a smile heading over.
“Super Tosh,” Ianto laughed, willingly relinquishing his chair and pointing out the file. Up close he realised that she looked exhausted, dark shadows making her eyes look sunken.
“Are you all right?” He asked. She started to shake her head, clearly about to deny any problems, so he added: “You look tired.”
“I suppose I’ve not been sleeping too well.”
“How come?” The best time to get Tosh to talk was usually when they were alone.
“Oh it’s nothing… it’s just my bed feels empty. Somebody really didn’t want you to get to this file, did they?” She continued tapping away at the computer in silence for a few seconds. “It’s silly, it’s not like there’s been anyone… I mean not since Tommy,” her voice was quiet, “but it just started feeling like there was something missing. I’ve had to sleep on the couch… I’m just being stupid,” she finished.
She wouldn’t look up at him, her eyes fixed on the screen. There wasn’t much he could say so instead Ianto squeezed her shoulder.
“There you go,” Tosh’s voice was falsely bright as the staff profile flashed up on the screen. “I’m afraid the picture’s still jumbled. Adam Smith. Who’s that? An old team member…” she paused for a second, “wait, is this from the days we lost?”
“Yes, I’d be grateful if you didn’t tell Jack - he didn’t want me looking into it.”
“Naughty,” she teased him, her voice back to normal.
“Ianto!” Jack called from his office, making them both jump. Tosh’ at least had the common sense to minimize the profile. “Could you make me one of your wonderful coffees?”
“Right away,” Ianto replied, winking at Tosh as he headed for the kitchen.
He took his time making the coffee, making sure it was exactly how Jack liked it. He was hoping he was in a good mood. He had something to ask him.
The wedding invitation had arrived two weeks ago and was still nestled carefully in the inner pocket of his jacket where he’d put it the day it came. Paul and Sabrina. Friends of his from London, his and Lisa’s - he hadn’t seen them since Canary Wharf. They knew she had died of course, they’d tried to call him more than once, but he’d been busy with Lisa and moving and Torchwood 3 and after a while they’d stopped trying.
And now the invitation had turned up - “Ianto Jones plus one”.
It had taken a while to admit to himself that he wanted Jack to come with him. He knew the people who didn’t know him that well would be surprised, probably scandalised knowing Jack, but it was better than facing the pitying smiles alone.
Ianto still wasn’t actually sure what he and Jack had. It wasn’t a normal relationship and romantic weekends away and going to weddings might not be a step Jack was expecting to take. He wasn’t sure that was the sort of relationship that Jack wanted - he wasn’t even sure, when it came down to it, that that was the sort of relationship he wanted.
He carried the coffee carefully into the office where Jack was absorbed in paperwork.
“Thanks,” Jack grinned up at him briefly and then turned back to his paperwork.
“Anything to be of service, we can’t have you getting tired on the job,” Jack didn’t look up from the work but Ianto saw the smile flicker across his face. He hesitated for a moment and Jack looked up again.
“Anything wrong?”
“Ummm… some of my friends are getting married, next weekend… in London,” that wasn’t how he had meant to start.
“That’s a bit sudden isn’t it? Well I guess we’ll just have to cope without you. How long do you need off?” Jack asked and Ianto faltered for a second, trying to think of a way to get the conversation back on course.
“Well I was thinking of making a weekend of it, thought I could rent a nice hotel room…” he left the sentence hanging, hoping that Jack would notice the invitation.
“Good idea, you could do with some time off,” Jack was staring back at the paperwork again, his brow slightly furrowed, utterly distracted. After a few seconds he looked up at Ianto. “Don’t worry, really, we’ll cope without you - I’ll keep everyone in check.”
A strange high pitched roar interrupted them before Ianto could respond and then Owen’s voice called out.
“Jack, I really think you should see this!”
* * * * * *
They stared up at the creature perched on the gangway above them. There was just no denying it - it was a dragon. A small one. At least for the moment. But still a dragon. It was red.
Ianto appeared at the top of the gangway with a book in his hand, he hesitated, looking sideways at the dragon and then hurried down the stairs, flipping the book open.
“As man came, the dragons went,” he began to read out loud, and Jack had to suppress a smile. He always seemed much calmer and confident while buried in research and he had to admit he always enjoyed hearing Ianto reading - his voice soft and measured. "Brief though the contact was, compared to the enormous spans of time in which species mature and flourish and die out, they have left their mark on us. Though their metabolic…”
“Why does our reference library have books on dragons?” Owen interrupted him.
“Book,” Ianto corrected calmly. “I thought it might be useful.”
“Useful - a useful reference book on dragons - which, unless I’ve missed something, are big, fire-breathing mythological creatures.”
“Probably mythological.”
“What?”
“Well they’re only probably mythological,” Ianto explained.
“I think if dragons had existed then we’d have learnt about it by now - there would have at least been bones or something.”
“Not necessarily - it has been suggested that dragons would have needed lightweight hollow bones to enable them to fly, like birds, which wouldn’t have survived well once they died. After all, absence of evidence is never acceptable evidence for absence. There’s been quite…”
Owen and Ianto looked ready to settle in for a debate when Jack decided it would be a good time to interrupt.
“I’d like to point out that right now we have some rather excellent evidence for dragons right here,” he gestured to the dragon which emitted a perfectly timed, very fiery belch. Ianto frowned slightly; apparently on the way into the hub it had eaten the collection tin.
“Well,” Owen said defiantly, “that one definitely doesn’t have lightweight bones, it weighed a bloody tonne.”
“You picked it up?” Tosh asked, genuine surprise in her voice.
“I didn’t have a choice - that madwoman just dumped it in my arms.”
“She wasn’t mad,” Gwen corrected him.
“She wanted to rehome it - she was like a crazy old cat lady on speed.”
“She was just well meaning,” Gwen replied diplomatically.
“Yes, well you could say that about Harold Shipman but…”
“Anyway,” Ianto interrupted giving Jack a pointed look, “Do you know of any planets that happen to have dragons? It might have come through the rift.”
“Nope, it’s a new one for me,” Jack interrupted.
“It’s strange though,” said Owen, “because Ianto’s right. To fly it would need to be lightweight - like Myfanwy - but it certainly isn’t.”
“Well we all saw it fly,” Tosh pointed out. Owen’s short lived attempt to do tests on the dragon, had ended with it biting the machine, squealing in pain and suddenly taking off. It had hovered about them for a few seconds, before settling on the railing.
“It shouldn’t be able to breathe fire either,” Owen continued, “the brief scan I managed shows there’s nothing in there that could possibly produce fire. It’s like a kid drew what they thought a dragon should be and somehow it just all works.”
“Well, the real question is what we’re going to do with it,” Gwen pointed out.
“We’d need to work out what planet it came from, before we could send it back through the rift - and that’s going to be difficult, because we have no idea when it arrived.” Tosh turned back to her computer. “Plus, even if we did, it might be ages before a portal to the right planet opens again. It’d be a shame to get rid of it though. We could learn a lot from it…”
“We’ll just have to keep it here,” Jack said firmly. Ianto rolled his eyes and muttered something in Welsh. Gwen laughed. “Got a problem?” Jack asked him with a grin.
“I was just wondering what we were going to do once it has eaten the rest of the Hub?”
“Well, we’ll just have to train it not to. We managed with Myfanwy, didn’t we?”
“Suzie was in charge of that.”
“You’ll just have to check her notes. Anyway, maybe Myfanwy will help.”
“Yes,” Owen interrupted. “She might eat the little sod.”
“I suppose if we’re going to keep it,” Tosh said, “we should give it a name.”
“Errol,” Ianto said slightly quicker than was necessary and Jack noticed that he flushed slightly, obviously realising his mistake.
“Errol?” Owen said.
“It’s a good name for a dragon,” he offered weakly.
“All right - Errol,” Jack agreed with a wink.
“Can we stop letting Ianto name everything?” Owen asked as the dragon yawned disconcertingly.
* * * * * *
CHAPTER 2
A/N 1 - Both the main title and the chapter title are from this W.B.Yeats poem (which I think is lovely):
HAD I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet,
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams
A/N 2 - Just because Ianto is Welsh doesn’t mean he is interested in dragons, however, because Ianto is Ianto he is definitely interested in dragons (*winks*). The book Ianto reads from is ‘Flight of Dragons’ by Peter Dickinson, Ianto highly recommends it and after all he does know everything. Ianto is also (clearly) a fan of Terry Pratchett. Just so you know. ;)