Jack’s and Ianto’s Private Archives - Season 2 - 11/28 - part two 6/7
Title: Jack’s and Ianto’s Private Archives - Season 2 -11/28
Fandom: Torchwood
Part 2: Jack’s Travel Diaries - 06/07
POV: from Ianto’s point of view.
Characters/pairings: Jack/Ianto, Amy and Thomas Prescott, and Lord Henry Lothian.
Rating: PG-13
Summary: After “Adam” Ianto is unbalanced by the effects of retcon and by the fact that Jack had retconned them all.
Disclaimer: The usual, I don’t own what you’ll be able to recognize, the rest is all mine.
Beta: czarina_kitty
“You’re leaving?” Jack asked trying hard to hide his disappointment.
“Yes,” Ianto replied still a bit uncomfortable. He wasn’t really upset, just disoriented, like the others were.
Jack was leaning against the doorjamb of his office, hands in his pockets, waiting sadly, but not daring say or try anything to keep Ianto from leaving.
“How can the retcon possibly still work on you?” Ianto finally asked.
“A massive dose will work for a while, at least until my next death,” Jack explained.
“You left a note saying we’re not to try to find out what had happened no matter what happens in the future,” Ianto pointed out.
“Let’s hope any danger will be gone for good by then,” Jack replied. He looked as much at loss as anyone of them.
“Yes, I guess that the only thing we can do,” Ianto stated. “I’ll go now.”
“You’re doing something this weekend?” Jack asked as Ianto was about to walk out. “I mean with your girlfriend?”
“I don’t know Jack, but right now I need some space. Sorry.”
“It’s okay, have some fun.”
“Same to you. Bye.”
..............................................................
“What was wrong with you yesterday?” Amy asked.
“Yesterday?” Ianto asked suddenly feeling really uncomfortable.
“Yes, yesterday,” Amy insisted. “You nearly frightened me, you know?”
“Frightened? Did I hurt you, in any way?” Ianto asked. He was now really upset, as he had sometime earlier woken up among his colleague in the conference room. Jack had been, for his part, down in the cells of the Hub, all of them retconned, two days missing and a very cryptic message left by Jack before he’d retconned them all, included himself. The retcon didn’t seem to have worked completely on Ianto, he was having blurry flashback. It was too faint for him to understand what it was about, but he didn’t like the taste of it.
“No, of course not, what a funny idea,” she replied, to Ianto’s relief. “Don’t tell me you don’t remember--”
“I can’t remember the last 48 hours. Something happened at work, it was an accident,” he tried to explain.
“What kind of accident? Didn’t you say you weren’t going into the field?”
“I have to go more and more often. Not enough staff,” he said. “And anyway, it’s the kind of job where sometimes the field is bound to invite itself to the office, you know.”
“I guess you don’t want--”
“Amy, didn’t we already have this conversation? I won’t quit my job,” Ianto said frowning to make his point. This wasn’t really an argument; just a recurrent wish she would make every time she remembered he could be in danger.
“I just... I love you Ianto, really, and I don’t want you to get hurt, or worse,” she sighed. “At least not before we get married,” she bantered.
“Right, I should have known better,” he replied stopping the car in front of the manor’s large gates.
It was the first time a very long-time that Ianto was allowed to pass through these gates. Behind them was the playground of his childhood, the barn of his first romp with the four girls of the household, the amazing private library of Lord Henry Lothian... He was just a street kid granted the luxury of charity holidays...
Contrary to what Henry might believe, Ianto would always be thankful to him, even if things had become complicated between them with time. In fact, Henry had fully foreseen that if the very solitary and studious Ianto had suddenly gained interest in girls’ activities when turning thirteen, it wasn’t because he’d turned out to be gay, far from it, but because he was interested in discovering more about her. But, as Ianto never got caught, and no one else wanted to know about it, it stayed an argument between Margaret and Henry until Ianto left for London after a fight with Tom.
Once allowed inside, Ianto drove the car to the front door. Fred, the guard, came to help Amy out of the car before Ianto could. Ianto gave him the key to his little blue coupé and, taking Amy’s arm, he followed Oscar, Henry’s butler, into the blue chamber where Lady Margaret had tea served.
“Milord, Tom, Esther, Lady Margaret, I beg your pardon,” Ianto said moving to take Lady Margaret’s hand in both of his hands. The old lady, even if she wouldn’t move from her armchair, welcomed him with a benevolent smile.
“Stop it, Ianto,” Lord Henry warned him sternly, making clear he wasn’t happy with Ianto being there and wasn’t going to make things easy for him.
“Henry,” the old woman protested. She, like all the women of the household had always been sweet on him. “You were at the funeral, I saw you. It pleased me, but why didn’t you come and join us?”
“I wasn’t welcomed,” Ianto replied. “And I didn’t want to provoke a fuss at such a moment. My thoughts were with you, though.”
“Stop it Ianto,” Thomas Prescott said in his turn. “You didn’t know that child. Of course, she will remain the only girl of this household you won’t have laid.”
“Thomas,” both the old Lord and his wife exclaimed, horrified.
“Same old Tom, as tactful as ever,” Ianto commented displaying a large grin. To everyone else, even Amy, the two old friends had grown apart long ago, and it had to stay that way.
“Aren’t we here to discuss my sister’s latest whim?” Tom replied with a very convincing distasteful grin. To be truthful, even if Ianto and Tom were like brothers, Tom really was unhappy with Amy wanting to marry Ianto.
“I forbid you to call our wedding a whim,” Amy protested, faking outrage and glancing at Esther for friendly support.
“Gentlemen, it’s tea time,” Lady Margaret calmed everyone down.
So they had tea. Ianto was happy, happy to be here among these people he loved, despite their flaws. Not out of self-interest as many thought, but because he knew what he owed them; for the holidays away from home, away from the gray suburbs and especially away from his father.
They talked about contracts or pre-nuptial agreement. He was asked who his lawyer was and replied that he didn’t have one but he would sign whatever they wanted. He’d been warned, in every way, and of course the dreaded question finally came out.
“Amy said you worked for the Home Office department?” Henry asked conversationally.
“Amy told you that?” Ianto asked cautiously.
“Yes, she did, but no one knows you in the Home office,” Henry stated.
“Did you ask for the coffee boy?” Tom bantered.
“I asked about any job, even as they now call them surface technicians,” Henry replied looking straight at Ianto.
“We’re working with the Home Office, but are not under their control,” Ianto explained without further information. His work was classified, that was what he had told Amy, and that was the only thing he was going to admit, and that only because both Henry and Thomas also worked for classified departments. The fact was Ianto knew a lot of thing they didn’t know, just as Henry didn’t know his nephew real assignment.
“Oh, stop it Henry,” Lady Margaret ended the discussion. “You, more than anyone else, must remember how difficult that kind of job can be regarding family business. Ianto give me your arm, my boy, and take me for a walk under the patio, please.”
Ianto did was he was asked, he went for a long walk with the old Lady, enjoying every minutes of it. When time to leave came around, Henry couldn’t prevent himself from taking Ianto slightly apart for a last warning.
“I don’t know what you’re up to--” he started.
“6284fmp45873o55,” Ianto whispered in his ear, to cut him short. “Even if you can’t access my file, as you can see, I can access yours,” he added before leaving behind a consternated old Lord.
............................
Ianto drove back to Cardiff and took Amy home, telling her he had something to go and check at work. He would call her later on.
The fact was Ianto had spent the day with a flash back constantly hacking in his head. He couldn’t make out what it was about and it was beginning to upset him. He went home first, to change and have a look at the diary he used to leave at the Hub. That diary was just a decoy, he usually wrote insignificant things in it, mostly for the benefit of the inevitable curious eyes. Nothing that should be useful, unless you were missing two days. Problem was, the last two pages were missing. They had been carefully cut, not pulled out. It might mean that he’d agreed to be retconned, but what Ianto couldn’t understand was why he hadn’t write himself a note.
He dialled Tom.
“Can you tell me if we met or talked during the last couple of days?” he asked the young Lord.
“What’s going on? What do you mean?”
“Answer.”
“No, but Esther got a disturbing phone call,” Tom replied.
“How disturbing?”
“Enough for me to want to trace the caller. Especially since she didn’t want to tell me who it was.”
“And you managed to trace it to me?”
“You called from a public box, but I know you were the caller from the voicemail on her mobile.”
“Does your fiancé know you’re hacking her mobile?” Ianto bantered. “Did I say anything... interesting?”
“You sounded pissed,” Tom replied. “Don’t tell me you can’t remember.”
“I can’t.”
“Did he drug you? Ianto?”
“No, no, nothing like that,” Ianto replied. “Something happened and he retconned us all, even himself.”
“Is that what he said? Do you have proof? And moreover, how can retcon still work on him?”
“Some drugs are more effective than others on him,” Ianto explained. “His healing process is a bit fuzzy. He can keep marks from a beating for hours, but a deadly wound will heal within minutes.”
“But you only have his word, right?”
“Right,” Ianto admitted, but he trusted Jack with his life, he realised. No, that wasn’t the point. Something was nagging at him and he needed to find out what. “Could you send me a copy of that call?”
“No problem old mate, but can I knock you out when this is over?”
“Is it that bad?”
“Pretty much.”
First chapter of the Archives season one here on LJ and Master list of both seasons here
To be continued.