TW Fic: Madrigal (2/10)
Title: Madrigal dei Traditori (2/10)
Author: nancybrown
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto/Lisa (implied past Jack/everyone), Tony Tyler, Mickey/Tosh, Gwen/Rhys, OCs (full New Whoniverse cast cameos)
Warnings: violence, non-explicit sex, dodgy understanding of UNIT hierarchy, angst, fluff, OC overload, chapteritis, alcohol
Words: 50,000 (3,600 this section)
Beta/Britpick: golden_d and temporal_witch audienced this initially, while fide_et_spe and 51stcenturyfox kicked it into shape. Thanks go out to all, and any mistakes still here are mine mine mine. :D
Spoilers: up through CoE, one small spoiler for EoT Pt 2.
Summary: Putting one's thumb on the scale of history is generally considered a bad idea.
A/N: Part of the Rabbit Hole AU. For those who came in late, Jack is the only one who remembers events exactly as they occurred in canon. Since finding himself in this altered universe, he has formed a stable relationship with Ianto and Lisa; together, they chase aliens and raise kids.
Chapter One
***
Chapter 2: Two Conversations Kyle Jones Never Dreamed He'd Have
***
When he was ten years old, Kyle's parents sat him down in the dining room with a chocolate milkshake and asked him to save the world. It was a very good milkshake, he recalled, and he later thought he'd been bribed out of a large chunk of his life by some ice cream and chocolate syrup.
Uncle Jack did most of the talking. "A little over fifteen years from now, there's going to be a first contact incident. The species calls themselves the K'kltic. Local bunch, a few star systems away from here. They go extinct in another six hundred years. Home planet gets wiped out by an asteroid. Bad luck. I met a nice K'kltic girl once, right before the end."
"You are more distractible than a cat," said Mum.
"I am not."
"You are," said Dad. He pointed. "Look! Something shiny!"
Uncle Jack did not let his eyes follow the direction Dad pointed, though Kyle could see him strain from the effort. "Anyway. It's an important first contact because the K'kltic are going to eventually help Earth join the wider community of inhabited planets in this part of the galaxy. They sponsor us. Problem is, the first face to face meeting goes wrong. Instead of greeting the ambassador, the diplomat on hand insults the landing party. Total mistake in translation, happens more often than you'd think, which is why universal translators are in high demand." He tapped his wrist strap. "There may have been some malice involved. See, the other part of the first contact fiasco is that the K'kltic want to have their presence known to the whole world. The sign of a reasonably-developed planetary society is one where the governments of the world in question are in accord and talk to one another. Secrecy puts some at advantage over others."
Kyle drank his milkshake. Uncle Jack could go on like this for hours. Sometimes it was cool, like being inside one of his favourite television programmes, even if the aliens on those were always done wrong and he had to listen to Uncle Jack complain the whole time 'til Dad told him to leave off. He started to tune out Uncle Jack and think about the show that was on last night. The droning continued:
"There's a secret organisation in charge of the first contact mission, and they try to take charge of the operation and tell the K'kltic to only deal with them. So not only do they insult the ambassador's parentage, they also violate the terms of the initial meeting."
That had his attention. "Is it Torchwood? Are you going to mess it up?"
Something flashed across his face and was gone. "Maybe. But I've got my money on UNIT. They're more first contact-oriented than we are. We're more cleanup when things go wrong."
"Like this thing that's going to happen."
"I don't think we're going to be able to clean that up." He folded his arms. "After the mission is botched, the K'kltic briefly declare war on Earth. It only lasts a few months, and Earth fights back, but the real problem starts after that. Countries with grudges against each other, regions that want more oil, more food, more water, they all take the opportunity to grab what they can. A lot of people die."
"How many?"
"Millions. It's a useless series of bitter little wars, and at the end, the lines on the map look just the same. The K'kltic come back fifty years later, once everything is rebuilt and we've started to push out of the solar system, and that's our introduction to space."
"Everything changes."
"Yeah."
Uncle Jack rarely talked about the future. The past, either, really. For him, all of eternity amounted to "Today is the day and the only day, so make the most of it." Kyle played with the condensation on the outside of his glass, collecting cold droplets on the tips of his fingers, writing his initials on the side. "So are we gonna fix it?"
Uncle Jack grinned. Dad looked relieved. Mum looked sad. "We're going to try."
"What about … " Kyle gave his head a little tilt. "You Know Who?" He'd never admit it, but there were days when he felt that naming the Doctor out loud was like saying "Bloody Mary" into a mirror. He wasn't a stupid baby who actually believed anything would happen, but at the same time, who wanted to take the risk? Not Kyle.
"He's not going to know about it, not until we're done. And I'll be the one he's angry with, so don't worry about it." He tousled Kyle's short hair, playing with the curls. Kyle batted his hand away.
"It's going to be hard on you," said Mum, folding her hands under her chin, her eyes a little bigger and closer to tears than Kyle liked to see. "You're going to have to be very brave."
"I'm not scared."
Dad said, "That's not what she means." He placed a gentle hand on Kyle's arm, and Kyle could just about feel the love spark up his arm and flow into his chest. Dad was like that sometimes. "You're going to have to pretend some things, say things that aren't true, and you're not going to be able to tell anyone, not even your sisters."
Kyle's eyes went wide. "I can't lie to Isabelle. She always finds out." Callie did too, usually five minutes after Isabelle did, but Callie never pounced on him and gave him friction burns on his arms until he pushed her off.
Uncle Jack said, "We'll tell the girls when the time is right. But for now, it's only you."
Then they told him about the narrative.
Of all the phrases and passcodes and secrets that made up their lives after that day, no two words induced quite the number of eyerolls, sighs, and invocations of "Oh God, not this again" as "the narrative." The narrative took the old trope about fathers and sons not getting along, added a dollop of typical adolescent power struggle against a stepparent, a dash of homophobia, and then mixed in a strong love for Kyle's mother. Or as Callie put it when she was finally told, an Oedipal conflict in a blender turned up to frappe and poured out thickly for the benefit of everyone watching.
"I haven't got into a fight in months," Kyle said.
"Good," said Dad.
Uncle Jack said, "We don't want you to start any fights. Just … Take things more personally." There was a lot to take personally. Kyle and his sisters didn't look like the other kids, didn't speak quite like them, and Kyle had yet to meet anyone who responded positively upon discovering their family situation.
Kyle looked at Mum. "You told me not to. That they're just stupid kids who don't understand anything."
"They are, dear." After the first time he'd come home with a black eye and a note from his teacher, they'd had a long talk which boiled down to this: other people's prejudices were their own idiocy, and knocking their teeth out wouldn't help. ("You are not to congratulate him," Mum snapped at his dads when she thought Kyle was out of earshot.)
"You said not to let them bother me." The girls had got a similar talk, though not the same one. Making friends came easily for his sisters but Kyle didn't have the knack. When other kids looked for a target, Kyle didn't have a circle of mates surrounding him. The last time, Eddie and Isabelle had waded into the fray for him, which had earned Isabelle a note home of her own, Eddie a puffed-up chest for his Da, and Kyle yet more teasing that his little sister had to help him in a fight.
"Let them," said Uncle Jack.
***
Anyone who played chess seriously knew it required patience, practice, and the ability to see an infinite number of moves stemming out from the first, and anticipate which were the most likely. One would think that Jack would be good at patience, but the truth was that all eternity had been granted to someone who got antsy when the microwave took too long.
"You're crap at chess," Callie said one day, as they sat in the dining room poring over plans.
"The respect of young people for their elders never goes out of style."
"I'm serious. Even Izzy can beat you half the time."
"Oi!" said Isabelle from where she sat constructing a tiny castle out of wheat crackers. Planning meetings bored her. "Sitting right here."
"She's right," said Mum. "Which is why this isn't a game of chess."
"I am perfectly good at chess. But we're playing poker." Jack pointed to Kyle. "You're the Ace."
Isabelle said, "Chess, poker, you're still the Queen."
"Damn right," said Jack. "Most powerful piece on the chessboard."
"Plans," said Dad, who was trying not to laugh. "We need them."
Isabelle said, "I'm not due to be outed until next year. What's to plan?"
"I have a thought," said Kyle. Isabelle stopped her building. The others looked at him expectantly. "General Ncube has a daughter my age. I think I should ask her out."
Jack grinned. "Okay, as side plans go, this one has potential."
"Is she nice?" asked Mum.
"She's dim," said Isabelle. "Pretty, but that's about it. Are you serious?"
"Do not underestimate the appeal of pretty and dumb," Jack said.
"We don't," Dad said, petting Jack's head and earning a scowl.
"Her name is Christa," said Kyle. "Grapevine says she thinks I'm cute."
"You are cute," said Mum.
Isabelle said, "The word is actually that she thinks you're hot. But she thinks that of all the boys in uniforms."
"If I started asking her out around April or May, I could bring her home for Christmas next December."
Dad said, "Bring her here?"
"We'd have to be on our best behaviour the whole time," said Mum. She glanced around the house, distressed, as if Christa were coming tomorrow.
Jack sat back, hands together. After a long moment, he said, "That could work. If she saw you here, angry with us, everything awkward, it would help your cover."
Kyle nodded. "I thought so. I'm going to need help on that. Fancy teaching me some of your better pickup lines?"
"You dream and dream of this day," Jack started, but Dad waved him down.
Callie said, "But that makes this your last real holiday back home. Once you grass on Izzy, you won't be able to come back."
Mum said, "We still need to work out a contact system for when we lose Isabelle."
"Working on it," said Jack.
"One more thing," said Callie. "I have an idea."
"Share," said Jack.
"We've got to prove Kyle's more loyal to UNIT than to Torchwood."
"That's my job," said Isabelle, resuming her cracker castle. "Make him look good."
"But that's not really him."
"He turns me in." Isabelle looked at Jack. "You've got the barrister ready?"
"On retainer," said Dad.
Callie said, "But we need something active. Something to show there's no doubt. He needs to shoot one of us."
"What?!" Kyle had been leaning back in his chair the way Mum hated, balancing on the back two legs. Now the front legs slammed to the floor. "No."
"That's good," said Jack.
"No, it isn't. I'm not shooting anyone." Terror filled his chest, and he held his stomach in an attempt not to lose his dinner.
"This is mad," said Mum.
"No, it'll be perfect," Jack said. "We're always butting heads with UNIT. I'll do something stupid while we're on-site, he can shoot me." He grinned. "It'll work with the narrative."
"No," Kyle said.
Callie said, "That won't work, either. Your well-kept secret isn't kept well enough. People know about you inside UNIT. It'll look suspicious."
"Exactly," said Kyle, as Jack pouted.
She said, "Which is why he should shoot me."
"Out of the question," said Mum. "No one is getting shot."
"Why not me?" asked Isabelle. "It could be during or after the trial. Cement the differences between us."
Callie shook her head. "Too easy, and too neat. You're the traitor, remember? He'll already have broken with you. The narrative says he gets on with Mum, so it's got to be me or Papa."
"Then it's me," said Dad. "We're not risking your life."
"Bloody narrative," said Mum.
Kyle said, "Amen."
"This'll work," Callie said. "It'd be a permanent break with the family." She looked at Dad. "And it's got to be me. You're not healthy enough. I'll recover. You might not."
"Martha says I'm fine. It was nothing." No-one listened to him.
"I'm not shooting you. I'm not shooting Dad, or Isabelle, or even an obnoxious immortal who'd get up from it and do jumping jacks. No."
"You'd have to be very careful," said Mum.
"We're done," Kyle said, and went out of the room.
Callie found him a few minutes later in the backyard, sitting at the edge of the porch. She sat down gracefully beside him, one leg tucked under her, and he felt a twinge of familiar envy. His sisters had inherited Mum's poise and ease, while the best Dad could say to Kyle was that the awkwardness should even itself out in another year or so. Probably.
"I can't do this."
"I trust you. You can."
"Cal, I could kill you." He was hollow inside, like a melon cut to the rind.
"You won't." The quiet confidence in her voice made him turn to her.
"You don't know that. As it is, everyone already hates me."
"Not us. God, Kyle, you're the bravest person I've ever met."
"Don't let them in there hear you say that."
"They think so, too. This will work. Do it, and no-one will doubt you ever again."
"I will," he said, but it was in defeat.
She took his hand, and they walked together back to the dining room as they had when they were kids and she'd been teaching him to walk.
Four sets of eyes waited for him. Isabelle's castle was finished, in all its crackery glory. He sighed.
Jack pointed at him. "You're on the firing range every day, practising. I want you to be able to hit a fly at fifty metres."
"I can do that."
***
Interlude: Intergalactic Manwhore Pickup Lines and Other Things to Learn At Christmastime With Your Family
***
"There's always the old standards," Jack said, and with a grin and a flourish, he took Kyle's hand, gazed into his eyes, and said, "Did it hurt when you fell down from Heaven?"
Kyle blinked at him. "Seriously?"
Callie was less kind, and laughed until she couldn't breathe. "Oh. Oh no. Tell me you never actually tried that one."
"What?" said Jack. "It's a good line."
Isabelle said, "If the target of your affections is drunk and stupid, yes."
"Too much," said Kyle. "I think I need something more subtle."
"Subtle. Subtle. Okay, I think I can do subtle."
"You can't," said Mum, not really part of the conversation but chiming in from her office down the hallway.
After he got The Talk from his parents (a few minutes after accidentally catching the three of them on the settee one night) Kyle had often wondered when he'd be getting the advanced lessons on navigating the waters of interpersonal relationships. He'd assumed Jack would lead the discussion. Dad would be there as well, more sensible about the topic if far less travelled, and between them, Kyle would learn everything he'd ever need to know about picking up girls. He had not banked on his mother and sisters being within earshot and offering commentary.
Jack sighed. He dropped Kyle's hand and placed a strong but gentle hand on his forearm and went for the eye thing again. "Has anyone ever told you that you have the most amazing eyes?" His voice was pitched low, and he threw in a hint of a laugh, that seductive and charming tone that had dropped more pants than Kyle had eaten hot dinners.
"That one's not as bad," said Callie.
"You've got to have a follow-up ready," Isabelle said. "Because if it works, she's gonna ask why, and you don't want to be there flailin', sayin' 'Cos they're blue,' or something. Especially when they're actually green. It's embarrassing."
"Never happened to me," said Jack.
Dad said, "Aren't they usually naked by that point?"
"Yes."
Kyle said, "Barring surprise nudity, then, can we please work on more of these?"
Dad said, "You could just introduce yourself."
"That only works for him. And if I start introducing myself as 'Captain Jack Harkness' … "
Isabelle finished for him, " … you'll probably score more often. I don't think I've seen you on a date since we were assigned together."
Several sharp comments came to mind, and Kyle ignored them all. Isabelle liked dating, and did it as frequently and enthusiastically as possible, and he couldn't blame her, and he certainly couldn't snipe at her for it, considering.
"Okay, here's a good one," said Jack. "You just say 'Gorgeous,' or possibly 'Lovely.' When she asks what you're talking about, point to the view or the moon or whatever, but make eye contact with her when you said that it's beautiful."
Callie made a loud honking noise.
"What?"
"That's awful. No self-respecting woman would buy into that line."
"I'll have you know Alice was conceived because of that line."
Callie made her "Ew. Parent sex." face.
Isabelle said, "These are all terrible lines. You don't go comparing women to the stars or the moon. 'Hi, you look like a rock in outer space. Fancy a shag?'"
Dad watched them for a moment. "All your lines really are terrible, you know."
"Excuse me?"
"It's all in your delivery. And that chemical factory you call a body."
"You like my chemical factory."
"Staying on topic," said Callie, loudly. "I think Papa's right. You do a lot of body language, lots of touching. You've been touching Kyle each time, emphasising the eye contact, that sort of thing. And you've got that pheromone thing."
"Everyone's got the pheromone thing," said Jack. "People smell good when they want to have sex. It's human."
Isabelle said, "Kyle, don't shower."
Kyle asked, "At some point, will there be any good advice?"
"No," said Mum from the office.
"This is all good advice," said Jack. He rubbed his head. "Some of what I do is pretty unique. You tell someone you've won prizes for your oral skills, they're going to want to see a trophy or a demonstration."
"Oh God," said Callie.
Isabelle said, "You've been actively having sex for nearly two hundred years, and this is the best you've got?"
"I haven't had to pull in over twenty years, and before that, about two thousand years. Forgive me for being rusty."
Mum came down the hallway. "You're all talking at cross-purposes. Jack, when you use a line, what's the purpose?"
"What do you mean?"
Mum did something to her voice and carriage and then did a very passable: "Captain Jack Harkness. And you are?" Dad whistled. Mum asked, "Why do you use a line?"
"To get sex."
"Exactly. Kyle, why do you want to use a line?"
"To get Christa to go out with me."
"Are you going to have sex with her?"
And there was the blush he'd been hoping would pass him by for this conversation. "It wasn't on the agenda. I'd like not to add 'whore' to my list of accomplishments."
"Perfectly respectable profession," said Jack.
"No," said Kyle, and meant it.
Callie said, "So, what do your parents do for a living?"
Kyle and Isabelle chorused: "Something with computers."
Mum said, "You're trying to meet a girl, play nice, and not have sex with her. Don't act like a man on the pull. Act like a gentleman." She turned to Dad. "Show him."
Dad took Mum's hand, kissed it softly. In a posh accent, he said, "My dear, you look radiant."
In an equally posh accent, she replied, "Thank you, darling."
Isabelle snickered.
Jack sighed. Then he stood, took Mum's other hand and coaxed her towards him. He kissed it, grinned, and said, "Nice tits. Wanna fuck?"
Callie covered her eyes with her hand as Mum flushed. "That really does only work for you, you know."
"Is it working now?"
"Oh, for fuck's sake," said Dad, and he grabbed each of them by a hand and dragged them towards the stairs. "Back later." And then they were gone.
For a moment, all three of them shared the "Ew. Parent sex." face, and then Kyle slumped.
"This isn't going to work."
"Just be nice," said Callie. "You can do nice."
"Tell her you think she's beautiful," said Isabelle. "No beating around the bush with stupid comparisons to summer's days or interstellar objects."
"Stars are not technically interstellar," said Kyle. "They are stellar."
"And don't go correcting her all the time," said Callie. "No-one likes someone coming behind them saying, 'You did that wrong.' Laugh at her dumb jokes, be nice to her dumb friends, and pay attention to her."
"Definitely pay attention to her," said Isabelle. "The last woman I dated broke up with me because I kept fallin' asleep when she talked. It was her fault. She was that boring."
"That's terrible," said Callie, and Isabelle mimicking snoring until Callie punched her in the arm.
Kyle said, "Anything else I should know?"
"Don't be a phoney," said Callie, and immediately said, "Sorry," when she saw his face fall. "Fuck the narrative and the mission. Just don't lie to her except on the things you really have to."
"I can handle that. But how do I get her to go out with me to begin with?"
***
Chapter Three
Author: nancybrown
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Ianto/Lisa (implied past Jack/everyone), Tony Tyler, Mickey/Tosh, Gwen/Rhys, OCs (full New Whoniverse cast cameos)
Warnings: violence, non-explicit sex, dodgy understanding of UNIT hierarchy, angst, fluff, OC overload, chapteritis, alcohol
Words: 50,000 (3,600 this section)
Beta/Britpick: golden_d and temporal_witch audienced this initially, while fide_et_spe and 51stcenturyfox kicked it into shape. Thanks go out to all, and any mistakes still here are mine mine mine. :D
Spoilers: up through CoE, one small spoiler for EoT Pt 2.
Summary: Putting one's thumb on the scale of history is generally considered a bad idea.
A/N: Part of the Rabbit Hole AU. For those who came in late, Jack is the only one who remembers events exactly as they occurred in canon. Since finding himself in this altered universe, he has formed a stable relationship with Ianto and Lisa; together, they chase aliens and raise kids.
Chapter One
***
Chapter 2: Two Conversations Kyle Jones Never Dreamed He'd Have
***
When he was ten years old, Kyle's parents sat him down in the dining room with a chocolate milkshake and asked him to save the world. It was a very good milkshake, he recalled, and he later thought he'd been bribed out of a large chunk of his life by some ice cream and chocolate syrup.
Uncle Jack did most of the talking. "A little over fifteen years from now, there's going to be a first contact incident. The species calls themselves the K'kltic. Local bunch, a few star systems away from here. They go extinct in another six hundred years. Home planet gets wiped out by an asteroid. Bad luck. I met a nice K'kltic girl once, right before the end."
"You are more distractible than a cat," said Mum.
"I am not."
"You are," said Dad. He pointed. "Look! Something shiny!"
Uncle Jack did not let his eyes follow the direction Dad pointed, though Kyle could see him strain from the effort. "Anyway. It's an important first contact because the K'kltic are going to eventually help Earth join the wider community of inhabited planets in this part of the galaxy. They sponsor us. Problem is, the first face to face meeting goes wrong. Instead of greeting the ambassador, the diplomat on hand insults the landing party. Total mistake in translation, happens more often than you'd think, which is why universal translators are in high demand." He tapped his wrist strap. "There may have been some malice involved. See, the other part of the first contact fiasco is that the K'kltic want to have their presence known to the whole world. The sign of a reasonably-developed planetary society is one where the governments of the world in question are in accord and talk to one another. Secrecy puts some at advantage over others."
Kyle drank his milkshake. Uncle Jack could go on like this for hours. Sometimes it was cool, like being inside one of his favourite television programmes, even if the aliens on those were always done wrong and he had to listen to Uncle Jack complain the whole time 'til Dad told him to leave off. He started to tune out Uncle Jack and think about the show that was on last night. The droning continued:
"There's a secret organisation in charge of the first contact mission, and they try to take charge of the operation and tell the K'kltic to only deal with them. So not only do they insult the ambassador's parentage, they also violate the terms of the initial meeting."
That had his attention. "Is it Torchwood? Are you going to mess it up?"
Something flashed across his face and was gone. "Maybe. But I've got my money on UNIT. They're more first contact-oriented than we are. We're more cleanup when things go wrong."
"Like this thing that's going to happen."
"I don't think we're going to be able to clean that up." He folded his arms. "After the mission is botched, the K'kltic briefly declare war on Earth. It only lasts a few months, and Earth fights back, but the real problem starts after that. Countries with grudges against each other, regions that want more oil, more food, more water, they all take the opportunity to grab what they can. A lot of people die."
"How many?"
"Millions. It's a useless series of bitter little wars, and at the end, the lines on the map look just the same. The K'kltic come back fifty years later, once everything is rebuilt and we've started to push out of the solar system, and that's our introduction to space."
"Everything changes."
"Yeah."
Uncle Jack rarely talked about the future. The past, either, really. For him, all of eternity amounted to "Today is the day and the only day, so make the most of it." Kyle played with the condensation on the outside of his glass, collecting cold droplets on the tips of his fingers, writing his initials on the side. "So are we gonna fix it?"
Uncle Jack grinned. Dad looked relieved. Mum looked sad. "We're going to try."
"What about … " Kyle gave his head a little tilt. "You Know Who?" He'd never admit it, but there were days when he felt that naming the Doctor out loud was like saying "Bloody Mary" into a mirror. He wasn't a stupid baby who actually believed anything would happen, but at the same time, who wanted to take the risk? Not Kyle.
"He's not going to know about it, not until we're done. And I'll be the one he's angry with, so don't worry about it." He tousled Kyle's short hair, playing with the curls. Kyle batted his hand away.
"It's going to be hard on you," said Mum, folding her hands under her chin, her eyes a little bigger and closer to tears than Kyle liked to see. "You're going to have to be very brave."
"I'm not scared."
Dad said, "That's not what she means." He placed a gentle hand on Kyle's arm, and Kyle could just about feel the love spark up his arm and flow into his chest. Dad was like that sometimes. "You're going to have to pretend some things, say things that aren't true, and you're not going to be able to tell anyone, not even your sisters."
Kyle's eyes went wide. "I can't lie to Isabelle. She always finds out." Callie did too, usually five minutes after Isabelle did, but Callie never pounced on him and gave him friction burns on his arms until he pushed her off.
Uncle Jack said, "We'll tell the girls when the time is right. But for now, it's only you."
Then they told him about the narrative.
Of all the phrases and passcodes and secrets that made up their lives after that day, no two words induced quite the number of eyerolls, sighs, and invocations of "Oh God, not this again" as "the narrative." The narrative took the old trope about fathers and sons not getting along, added a dollop of typical adolescent power struggle against a stepparent, a dash of homophobia, and then mixed in a strong love for Kyle's mother. Or as Callie put it when she was finally told, an Oedipal conflict in a blender turned up to frappe and poured out thickly for the benefit of everyone watching.
"I haven't got into a fight in months," Kyle said.
"Good," said Dad.
Uncle Jack said, "We don't want you to start any fights. Just … Take things more personally." There was a lot to take personally. Kyle and his sisters didn't look like the other kids, didn't speak quite like them, and Kyle had yet to meet anyone who responded positively upon discovering their family situation.
Kyle looked at Mum. "You told me not to. That they're just stupid kids who don't understand anything."
"They are, dear." After the first time he'd come home with a black eye and a note from his teacher, they'd had a long talk which boiled down to this: other people's prejudices were their own idiocy, and knocking their teeth out wouldn't help. ("You are not to congratulate him," Mum snapped at his dads when she thought Kyle was out of earshot.)
"You said not to let them bother me." The girls had got a similar talk, though not the same one. Making friends came easily for his sisters but Kyle didn't have the knack. When other kids looked for a target, Kyle didn't have a circle of mates surrounding him. The last time, Eddie and Isabelle had waded into the fray for him, which had earned Isabelle a note home of her own, Eddie a puffed-up chest for his Da, and Kyle yet more teasing that his little sister had to help him in a fight.
"Let them," said Uncle Jack.
***
Anyone who played chess seriously knew it required patience, practice, and the ability to see an infinite number of moves stemming out from the first, and anticipate which were the most likely. One would think that Jack would be good at patience, but the truth was that all eternity had been granted to someone who got antsy when the microwave took too long.
"You're crap at chess," Callie said one day, as they sat in the dining room poring over plans.
"The respect of young people for their elders never goes out of style."
"I'm serious. Even Izzy can beat you half the time."
"Oi!" said Isabelle from where she sat constructing a tiny castle out of wheat crackers. Planning meetings bored her. "Sitting right here."
"She's right," said Mum. "Which is why this isn't a game of chess."
"I am perfectly good at chess. But we're playing poker." Jack pointed to Kyle. "You're the Ace."
Isabelle said, "Chess, poker, you're still the Queen."
"Damn right," said Jack. "Most powerful piece on the chessboard."
"Plans," said Dad, who was trying not to laugh. "We need them."
Isabelle said, "I'm not due to be outed until next year. What's to plan?"
"I have a thought," said Kyle. Isabelle stopped her building. The others looked at him expectantly. "General Ncube has a daughter my age. I think I should ask her out."
Jack grinned. "Okay, as side plans go, this one has potential."
"Is she nice?" asked Mum.
"She's dim," said Isabelle. "Pretty, but that's about it. Are you serious?"
"Do not underestimate the appeal of pretty and dumb," Jack said.
"We don't," Dad said, petting Jack's head and earning a scowl.
"Her name is Christa," said Kyle. "Grapevine says she thinks I'm cute."
"You are cute," said Mum.
Isabelle said, "The word is actually that she thinks you're hot. But she thinks that of all the boys in uniforms."
"If I started asking her out around April or May, I could bring her home for Christmas next December."
Dad said, "Bring her here?"
"We'd have to be on our best behaviour the whole time," said Mum. She glanced around the house, distressed, as if Christa were coming tomorrow.
Jack sat back, hands together. After a long moment, he said, "That could work. If she saw you here, angry with us, everything awkward, it would help your cover."
Kyle nodded. "I thought so. I'm going to need help on that. Fancy teaching me some of your better pickup lines?"
"You dream and dream of this day," Jack started, but Dad waved him down.
Callie said, "But that makes this your last real holiday back home. Once you grass on Izzy, you won't be able to come back."
Mum said, "We still need to work out a contact system for when we lose Isabelle."
"Working on it," said Jack.
"One more thing," said Callie. "I have an idea."
"Share," said Jack.
"We've got to prove Kyle's more loyal to UNIT than to Torchwood."
"That's my job," said Isabelle, resuming her cracker castle. "Make him look good."
"But that's not really him."
"He turns me in." Isabelle looked at Jack. "You've got the barrister ready?"
"On retainer," said Dad.
Callie said, "But we need something active. Something to show there's no doubt. He needs to shoot one of us."
"What?!" Kyle had been leaning back in his chair the way Mum hated, balancing on the back two legs. Now the front legs slammed to the floor. "No."
"That's good," said Jack.
"No, it isn't. I'm not shooting anyone." Terror filled his chest, and he held his stomach in an attempt not to lose his dinner.
"This is mad," said Mum.
"No, it'll be perfect," Jack said. "We're always butting heads with UNIT. I'll do something stupid while we're on-site, he can shoot me." He grinned. "It'll work with the narrative."
"No," Kyle said.
Callie said, "That won't work, either. Your well-kept secret isn't kept well enough. People know about you inside UNIT. It'll look suspicious."
"Exactly," said Kyle, as Jack pouted.
She said, "Which is why he should shoot me."
"Out of the question," said Mum. "No one is getting shot."
"Why not me?" asked Isabelle. "It could be during or after the trial. Cement the differences between us."
Callie shook her head. "Too easy, and too neat. You're the traitor, remember? He'll already have broken with you. The narrative says he gets on with Mum, so it's got to be me or Papa."
"Then it's me," said Dad. "We're not risking your life."
"Bloody narrative," said Mum.
Kyle said, "Amen."
"This'll work," Callie said. "It'd be a permanent break with the family." She looked at Dad. "And it's got to be me. You're not healthy enough. I'll recover. You might not."
"Martha says I'm fine. It was nothing." No-one listened to him.
"I'm not shooting you. I'm not shooting Dad, or Isabelle, or even an obnoxious immortal who'd get up from it and do jumping jacks. No."
"You'd have to be very careful," said Mum.
"We're done," Kyle said, and went out of the room.
Callie found him a few minutes later in the backyard, sitting at the edge of the porch. She sat down gracefully beside him, one leg tucked under her, and he felt a twinge of familiar envy. His sisters had inherited Mum's poise and ease, while the best Dad could say to Kyle was that the awkwardness should even itself out in another year or so. Probably.
"I can't do this."
"I trust you. You can."
"Cal, I could kill you." He was hollow inside, like a melon cut to the rind.
"You won't." The quiet confidence in her voice made him turn to her.
"You don't know that. As it is, everyone already hates me."
"Not us. God, Kyle, you're the bravest person I've ever met."
"Don't let them in there hear you say that."
"They think so, too. This will work. Do it, and no-one will doubt you ever again."
"I will," he said, but it was in defeat.
She took his hand, and they walked together back to the dining room as they had when they were kids and she'd been teaching him to walk.
Four sets of eyes waited for him. Isabelle's castle was finished, in all its crackery glory. He sighed.
Jack pointed at him. "You're on the firing range every day, practising. I want you to be able to hit a fly at fifty metres."
"I can do that."
***
Interlude: Intergalactic Manwhore Pickup Lines and Other Things to Learn At Christmastime With Your Family
***
"There's always the old standards," Jack said, and with a grin and a flourish, he took Kyle's hand, gazed into his eyes, and said, "Did it hurt when you fell down from Heaven?"
Kyle blinked at him. "Seriously?"
Callie was less kind, and laughed until she couldn't breathe. "Oh. Oh no. Tell me you never actually tried that one."
"What?" said Jack. "It's a good line."
Isabelle said, "If the target of your affections is drunk and stupid, yes."
"Too much," said Kyle. "I think I need something more subtle."
"Subtle. Subtle. Okay, I think I can do subtle."
"You can't," said Mum, not really part of the conversation but chiming in from her office down the hallway.
After he got The Talk from his parents (a few minutes after accidentally catching the three of them on the settee one night) Kyle had often wondered when he'd be getting the advanced lessons on navigating the waters of interpersonal relationships. He'd assumed Jack would lead the discussion. Dad would be there as well, more sensible about the topic if far less travelled, and between them, Kyle would learn everything he'd ever need to know about picking up girls. He had not banked on his mother and sisters being within earshot and offering commentary.
Jack sighed. He dropped Kyle's hand and placed a strong but gentle hand on his forearm and went for the eye thing again. "Has anyone ever told you that you have the most amazing eyes?" His voice was pitched low, and he threw in a hint of a laugh, that seductive and charming tone that had dropped more pants than Kyle had eaten hot dinners.
"That one's not as bad," said Callie.
"You've got to have a follow-up ready," Isabelle said. "Because if it works, she's gonna ask why, and you don't want to be there flailin', sayin' 'Cos they're blue,' or something. Especially when they're actually green. It's embarrassing."
"Never happened to me," said Jack.
Dad said, "Aren't they usually naked by that point?"
"Yes."
Kyle said, "Barring surprise nudity, then, can we please work on more of these?"
Dad said, "You could just introduce yourself."
"That only works for him. And if I start introducing myself as 'Captain Jack Harkness' … "
Isabelle finished for him, " … you'll probably score more often. I don't think I've seen you on a date since we were assigned together."
Several sharp comments came to mind, and Kyle ignored them all. Isabelle liked dating, and did it as frequently and enthusiastically as possible, and he couldn't blame her, and he certainly couldn't snipe at her for it, considering.
"Okay, here's a good one," said Jack. "You just say 'Gorgeous,' or possibly 'Lovely.' When she asks what you're talking about, point to the view or the moon or whatever, but make eye contact with her when you said that it's beautiful."
Callie made a loud honking noise.
"What?"
"That's awful. No self-respecting woman would buy into that line."
"I'll have you know Alice was conceived because of that line."
Callie made her "Ew. Parent sex." face.
Isabelle said, "These are all terrible lines. You don't go comparing women to the stars or the moon. 'Hi, you look like a rock in outer space. Fancy a shag?'"
Dad watched them for a moment. "All your lines really are terrible, you know."
"Excuse me?"
"It's all in your delivery. And that chemical factory you call a body."
"You like my chemical factory."
"Staying on topic," said Callie, loudly. "I think Papa's right. You do a lot of body language, lots of touching. You've been touching Kyle each time, emphasising the eye contact, that sort of thing. And you've got that pheromone thing."
"Everyone's got the pheromone thing," said Jack. "People smell good when they want to have sex. It's human."
Isabelle said, "Kyle, don't shower."
Kyle asked, "At some point, will there be any good advice?"
"No," said Mum from the office.
"This is all good advice," said Jack. He rubbed his head. "Some of what I do is pretty unique. You tell someone you've won prizes for your oral skills, they're going to want to see a trophy or a demonstration."
"Oh God," said Callie.
Isabelle said, "You've been actively having sex for nearly two hundred years, and this is the best you've got?"
"I haven't had to pull in over twenty years, and before that, about two thousand years. Forgive me for being rusty."
Mum came down the hallway. "You're all talking at cross-purposes. Jack, when you use a line, what's the purpose?"
"What do you mean?"
Mum did something to her voice and carriage and then did a very passable: "Captain Jack Harkness. And you are?" Dad whistled. Mum asked, "Why do you use a line?"
"To get sex."
"Exactly. Kyle, why do you want to use a line?"
"To get Christa to go out with me."
"Are you going to have sex with her?"
And there was the blush he'd been hoping would pass him by for this conversation. "It wasn't on the agenda. I'd like not to add 'whore' to my list of accomplishments."
"Perfectly respectable profession," said Jack.
"No," said Kyle, and meant it.
Callie said, "So, what do your parents do for a living?"
Kyle and Isabelle chorused: "Something with computers."
Mum said, "You're trying to meet a girl, play nice, and not have sex with her. Don't act like a man on the pull. Act like a gentleman." She turned to Dad. "Show him."
Dad took Mum's hand, kissed it softly. In a posh accent, he said, "My dear, you look radiant."
In an equally posh accent, she replied, "Thank you, darling."
Isabelle snickered.
Jack sighed. Then he stood, took Mum's other hand and coaxed her towards him. He kissed it, grinned, and said, "Nice tits. Wanna fuck?"
Callie covered her eyes with her hand as Mum flushed. "That really does only work for you, you know."
"Is it working now?"
"Oh, for fuck's sake," said Dad, and he grabbed each of them by a hand and dragged them towards the stairs. "Back later." And then they were gone.
For a moment, all three of them shared the "Ew. Parent sex." face, and then Kyle slumped.
"This isn't going to work."
"Just be nice," said Callie. "You can do nice."
"Tell her you think she's beautiful," said Isabelle. "No beating around the bush with stupid comparisons to summer's days or interstellar objects."
"Stars are not technically interstellar," said Kyle. "They are stellar."
"And don't go correcting her all the time," said Callie. "No-one likes someone coming behind them saying, 'You did that wrong.' Laugh at her dumb jokes, be nice to her dumb friends, and pay attention to her."
"Definitely pay attention to her," said Isabelle. "The last woman I dated broke up with me because I kept fallin' asleep when she talked. It was her fault. She was that boring."
"That's terrible," said Callie, and Isabelle mimicking snoring until Callie punched her in the arm.
Kyle said, "Anything else I should know?"
"Don't be a phoney," said Callie, and immediately said, "Sorry," when she saw his face fall. "Fuck the narrative and the mission. Just don't lie to her except on the things you really have to."
"I can handle that. But how do I get her to go out with me to begin with?"
***
Chapter Three