Jack’s and Ianto’s Private Archives - Season 2 -24/28 part 5 -3/3
Title: Jack’s and Ianto’s Private Archives - Season 2 - 24/28
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Part 5: Wandering and time paradox 3/3
POV: from Jack’s point of view.
Characters/pairings: Jack, Mira, Owen.
Rating: PG-15
Summary: A little flashback in Jack’s life, it’s World War One, and Jack is a lonely father running away with a baby Time Lady.
Disclaimer: The usual, I don’t own what you’ll be able to recognize, the rest is all mine.
Beta: czarina_kitty
..............................
With Ingrid’s death, Jack discovered the joys of being a single father at the beginning of the new century... To start with, making a living was becoming more complicated, especially since he feared abandoning Mira for more than very short periods of time with a babysitter... He couldn’t trust anyone enough.
And then, the war came. The one which was going to be named the Great War or the Last War. Until the next one, of course.
Avoiding the war wasn’t easy and, for the first time in his life, Jack bitterly regretted having selected the Italian Renaissance as his option back at the Time Academy. The war was everywhere and it always ended up catching up with them. His "American" accent helped him for some time to escape a forced conscription. Being a lonely father helped too, but it would not last. Men were becoming scarce and American volunteers...
Jack finally found a compromise: real false documents making him Steven Matthews, an American widower and a nurse, with his eight-year-old daughter Kate. He spent nearly two years working in a battlefield hospital in the north of France. The facility was set in an Ursuline Covent. For Jack, it was very convenient. The nuns somehow insured school was available for the girls from the town, because someone had to take care of them while their mothers were running the factories and their father were most of the time lost on some or another battlefield.
Of course, there were many officers who ranted that a man of his strength and stature should be on the front, but Dr. Astruc was not ready to let his miracle nurse go. No, only nurse Matthews assured him more than his guard and he had a strong stomach. Matthews had a gift for calming patients, and that was very precious. Medicine was spare and not always efficient.
Matt, as they all called him, never counted his time and was fully involved in his work. Always listening to the wounded, he never hesitated to give up his sleep and to take the hand of an unfortunate and accompany him to the end. He had a way of talking to them, or simply staying by their side, murmuring a strange lullaby...
Matt also knew how to boost the morale of the troops--meaning the staff, of course. And this wasn’t to be under estimated, because with so much suffering to deal with and so little means, not just stomachs had to be strong. Matt was always even-tempered.
Everyone liked him in the hospital and if he hadn’t been so naughty, the nuns would have canonized him alive.
Jack spent his little free time with Mira. She had grown up and she was very clever: no wonder! She didn’t sleep much more than he, so they took up the habit of settling on the roof of the barn to watch the stars.
Jack would tell her about the incredible journeys of the Tardis’ strange crew and Mira would listen, dreaming of a world without war, and of extraordinary trips on board a fabulous ship...
The war bogged down. The spring passed and then summer and now winter promised to be in early November. It seemed to Jack that the war was coming to an end, but he wasn’t sure. He shouldn’t have skipped so much of Professor G'tong history courses. At least he would have the basics, now he had to do with just the titles.
He had promised Mira they would resume the road for her birthday, whatever happened, war or no war... But Jack was never going to celebrate the armistice...
It was November 8, 1918, when they burst into the hospital. Jack was upstairs in the large dormitory occupied with re-dressings. Concentrating on his task, he only looked up at the sound of mother Thibaude's protests.
“Who do you think you are? This is a hospital here!” she claimed.
They shot him on sight, without summations. Jack didn’t have time to react, just to register the silhouettes of what might have passed for three gentlemen.
He regained consciousness in the trunk of a car. They had put a bag over his head, and he was tied up like a sausage. Every time they halted, they put a bullet in his head, so he soon lost all sense of time. They moved him, probably for the crossing, into another car. He didn’t see his captors, but it wasn’t necessary, he recognized their methods...
They waited until Cardiff’s Hub to take the bag off his head. There was a new director and he was no fun.
“You gone learn who the boss is. Trust me, that’s the last time you ever try to run away, I’ll make sure of that.”
They locked him up in the incinerator and burned him to ashes. They did it, over and over, opening the door only to let oxygen enter. Jack remained on the ground between the terrible burners for several days, waiting for the next time.
Finally, they took him to his cell where he remained until his next mission. He had lost all sense of time... The war must have ended. Nobody had mentioned Mira. Cardiff’s team didn’t seem to know about her. Jack wasn’t going to put them on her trail by asking about her...
He had told her a lot of things, but she was only 9 years old and Torchwood London was certainly still looking for her. He could do nothing, only endanger her. He could only hope someone would take care of her.
Jack had to wait until World War II to run away from Torchwood. After two of the mother house’s agents had been contaminated by a very strange virus, they sent him to investigate a strange case in London. Torchwood One had to be put under quarantine. As Jack already knew who was responsible for that mess, he took the opportunity to step back into Jack Harkness clothes. As his mortal self fled away with Rose and the Doctor, he took his place.
However, at the end of the war, Torchwood claimed him back, and the Air Force turned him down. Jack had to wait until General Johnson was made Torchwood Three new director to obtain permission of few days off, enabling him to travel back to France. Johnson was his superior officer during World War II. When during the Blitz civilians of a mysterious organization came to claim one of his best pilots on the pretext he was an alien, he sent them to hell.
However, after the victory, while others continued to party, he was taken as a bandit. Johnson could no more oppose the interests of their country.
When in 1951, Johnson found himself at the head of Torchwood Three, he’d kept a minimum of respect for Jack. Jack had fought, and fought well.
But he knew now that Jack had never risked his life, not really, not permanently. Nevertheless he had saved more than one...
In short, from ‘51 to ‘63, Jack saw his conditions considerably improved. Not to the point he could use the staff’s showers and toilets, but he was allowed to use the tap on his cell’s floor, and he was allowed to spend some free time out, as long as he respected the curfew.
He had to wait until May of ‘53 to set foot in France. He took a ferry as a stowaway. , in order to save the little money he earned in the game.
Not to upset Johnson, nor attract the suspicion of his 'colleagues', Jack just played and won little...
He reached Charleville by hitchhiking and from there he walked in search for the Ursuline Convent. There, he presented himself as a nephew of Matthews, who had recently learned he had a cousin...
Mother Thibaude long reposed at the bottom of the small cemetery and no one could tell him what had become of Kate Matthews... Jack spent some days in the area, then he left and came back empty-handed.
............................
After all this time, Jack still had no idea of what had become of his daughter. Because Mira was still at heart his daughter. The only thing he still had was the bracelet she’d made for him with some of her hair. One day he’d found it while moping the floor of the third basement. Perhaps it at been pulled off before he’d been put into the incinerator. Jack had hid it in his cell where no one ever went.
“Jack, are you all right?” Owen asked.
Jack was sitting at Tosh workstation lost in his thoughts.
“I didn’t expect you to come back so soon. Something wrong in wonderland?”
“No, just something bothering me... Something I need to check,” Jack said looking at Mainframe without bringing himself to send the search.
“If it’s about your half Time Lord, or should I say Time Lady, you won’t find her in there,” Owen replied heading back to his lab.
“You’ve checked? You’re sure?”
“If your boyfriend really has downloaded the whole of Torchwood One’s memory in there, I can assure you London never managed to put their hand on her or any other Time Lord.”
Mira had managed to escape from Torchwood. That was good news, even if he still didn’t know what had happen of her.
End of the episode
To be continued with Ianto’s secret memories
First chapter of the Archives season one here on LJ and Master list of both seasons here
Fandom: Torchwood/Doctor Who
Part 5: Wandering and time paradox 3/3
POV: from Jack’s point of view.
Characters/pairings: Jack, Mira, Owen.
Rating: PG-15
Summary: A little flashback in Jack’s life, it’s World War One, and Jack is a lonely father running away with a baby Time Lady.
Disclaimer: The usual, I don’t own what you’ll be able to recognize, the rest is all mine.
Beta: czarina_kitty
..............................
With Ingrid’s death, Jack discovered the joys of being a single father at the beginning of the new century... To start with, making a living was becoming more complicated, especially since he feared abandoning Mira for more than very short periods of time with a babysitter... He couldn’t trust anyone enough.
And then, the war came. The one which was going to be named the Great War or the Last War. Until the next one, of course.
Avoiding the war wasn’t easy and, for the first time in his life, Jack bitterly regretted having selected the Italian Renaissance as his option back at the Time Academy. The war was everywhere and it always ended up catching up with them. His "American" accent helped him for some time to escape a forced conscription. Being a lonely father helped too, but it would not last. Men were becoming scarce and American volunteers...
Jack finally found a compromise: real false documents making him Steven Matthews, an American widower and a nurse, with his eight-year-old daughter Kate. He spent nearly two years working in a battlefield hospital in the north of France. The facility was set in an Ursuline Covent. For Jack, it was very convenient. The nuns somehow insured school was available for the girls from the town, because someone had to take care of them while their mothers were running the factories and their father were most of the time lost on some or another battlefield.
Of course, there were many officers who ranted that a man of his strength and stature should be on the front, but Dr. Astruc was not ready to let his miracle nurse go. No, only nurse Matthews assured him more than his guard and he had a strong stomach. Matthews had a gift for calming patients, and that was very precious. Medicine was spare and not always efficient.
Matt, as they all called him, never counted his time and was fully involved in his work. Always listening to the wounded, he never hesitated to give up his sleep and to take the hand of an unfortunate and accompany him to the end. He had a way of talking to them, or simply staying by their side, murmuring a strange lullaby...
Matt also knew how to boost the morale of the troops--meaning the staff, of course. And this wasn’t to be under estimated, because with so much suffering to deal with and so little means, not just stomachs had to be strong. Matt was always even-tempered.
Everyone liked him in the hospital and if he hadn’t been so naughty, the nuns would have canonized him alive.
Jack spent his little free time with Mira. She had grown up and she was very clever: no wonder! She didn’t sleep much more than he, so they took up the habit of settling on the roof of the barn to watch the stars.
Jack would tell her about the incredible journeys of the Tardis’ strange crew and Mira would listen, dreaming of a world without war, and of extraordinary trips on board a fabulous ship...
The war bogged down. The spring passed and then summer and now winter promised to be in early November. It seemed to Jack that the war was coming to an end, but he wasn’t sure. He shouldn’t have skipped so much of Professor G'tong history courses. At least he would have the basics, now he had to do with just the titles.
He had promised Mira they would resume the road for her birthday, whatever happened, war or no war... But Jack was never going to celebrate the armistice...
It was November 8, 1918, when they burst into the hospital. Jack was upstairs in the large dormitory occupied with re-dressings. Concentrating on his task, he only looked up at the sound of mother Thibaude's protests.
“Who do you think you are? This is a hospital here!” she claimed.
They shot him on sight, without summations. Jack didn’t have time to react, just to register the silhouettes of what might have passed for three gentlemen.
He regained consciousness in the trunk of a car. They had put a bag over his head, and he was tied up like a sausage. Every time they halted, they put a bullet in his head, so he soon lost all sense of time. They moved him, probably for the crossing, into another car. He didn’t see his captors, but it wasn’t necessary, he recognized their methods...
They waited until Cardiff’s Hub to take the bag off his head. There was a new director and he was no fun.
“You gone learn who the boss is. Trust me, that’s the last time you ever try to run away, I’ll make sure of that.”
They locked him up in the incinerator and burned him to ashes. They did it, over and over, opening the door only to let oxygen enter. Jack remained on the ground between the terrible burners for several days, waiting for the next time.
Finally, they took him to his cell where he remained until his next mission. He had lost all sense of time... The war must have ended. Nobody had mentioned Mira. Cardiff’s team didn’t seem to know about her. Jack wasn’t going to put them on her trail by asking about her...
He had told her a lot of things, but she was only 9 years old and Torchwood London was certainly still looking for her. He could do nothing, only endanger her. He could only hope someone would take care of her.
Jack had to wait until World War II to run away from Torchwood. After two of the mother house’s agents had been contaminated by a very strange virus, they sent him to investigate a strange case in London. Torchwood One had to be put under quarantine. As Jack already knew who was responsible for that mess, he took the opportunity to step back into Jack Harkness clothes. As his mortal self fled away with Rose and the Doctor, he took his place.
However, at the end of the war, Torchwood claimed him back, and the Air Force turned him down. Jack had to wait until General Johnson was made Torchwood Three new director to obtain permission of few days off, enabling him to travel back to France. Johnson was his superior officer during World War II. When during the Blitz civilians of a mysterious organization came to claim one of his best pilots on the pretext he was an alien, he sent them to hell.
However, after the victory, while others continued to party, he was taken as a bandit. Johnson could no more oppose the interests of their country.
When in 1951, Johnson found himself at the head of Torchwood Three, he’d kept a minimum of respect for Jack. Jack had fought, and fought well.
But he knew now that Jack had never risked his life, not really, not permanently. Nevertheless he had saved more than one...
In short, from ‘51 to ‘63, Jack saw his conditions considerably improved. Not to the point he could use the staff’s showers and toilets, but he was allowed to use the tap on his cell’s floor, and he was allowed to spend some free time out, as long as he respected the curfew.
He had to wait until May of ‘53 to set foot in France. He took a ferry as a stowaway. , in order to save the little money he earned in the game.
Not to upset Johnson, nor attract the suspicion of his 'colleagues', Jack just played and won little...
He reached Charleville by hitchhiking and from there he walked in search for the Ursuline Convent. There, he presented himself as a nephew of Matthews, who had recently learned he had a cousin...
Mother Thibaude long reposed at the bottom of the small cemetery and no one could tell him what had become of Kate Matthews... Jack spent some days in the area, then he left and came back empty-handed.
............................
After all this time, Jack still had no idea of what had become of his daughter. Because Mira was still at heart his daughter. The only thing he still had was the bracelet she’d made for him with some of her hair. One day he’d found it while moping the floor of the third basement. Perhaps it at been pulled off before he’d been put into the incinerator. Jack had hid it in his cell where no one ever went.
“Jack, are you all right?” Owen asked.
Jack was sitting at Tosh workstation lost in his thoughts.
“I didn’t expect you to come back so soon. Something wrong in wonderland?”
“No, just something bothering me... Something I need to check,” Jack said looking at Mainframe without bringing himself to send the search.
“If it’s about your half Time Lord, or should I say Time Lady, you won’t find her in there,” Owen replied heading back to his lab.
“You’ve checked? You’re sure?”
“If your boyfriend really has downloaded the whole of Torchwood One’s memory in there, I can assure you London never managed to put their hand on her or any other Time Lord.”
Mira had managed to escape from Torchwood. That was good news, even if he still didn’t know what had happen of her.
End of the episode
To be continued with Ianto’s secret memories
First chapter of the Archives season one here on LJ and Master list of both seasons here