for hofficoffi The (Journey's) End is where we start from.

[quitehomoerotic]

When the Doctor dropped off Jack, Martha and Mickey it wasn't anywhere convenient. They may have just managed to tow the Earth through time and space but it seemed the Doctor still had trouble landing anywhere even remotely near where people needed to get

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[hofficoffi]

For a long time, all Ianto could do was wait. Later, much later, the Dalek exploded, and, later still, the world righted itself. They'd helped with that, he and Gwen. And Jack, of course--somewhere.

At the time, Gwen had brought up, on every monitor in the Hub, real-time coverage of the celebrations on the streets of Cardiff. The impromptu fireworks over the Bay, useless in broad daylight but symbolic. The laughing-crying people on the Plas.

Then, she had gone home to Rhys.

Ianto would never have let her stay. He, of course, had nowhere to go. And, though he diligently did not think this, someone to wait for.

When Jack arrived, Ianto was in the middle of clean-up. He'd held off as long as he could, did other things, but eventually he could no longer stand having a Dalek, even a half-detonated one, in the Hub.

The bullets had been swept into a large pile off to one side. The broom laid beside them, abandoned.

Ianto stood, his hands on his hips, staring at the Dalek.

[quitehomoerotic]

When he reached the bottom of the stairs, Jack appeared from the side of the lift, with a wide grin on his face. Barely a step forward though and he stopped. He hadn't expected to see a Dalek sitting in the Hub.

His grin, for a moment, faltered on his face. But it was all very quick. All very fast that he could see this Dalek was nothing but a shell. Any danger that was here (and if a Dalek got in, there was danger), was gone now.

After a beat his grin returned.

It had all taken nothing but seconds to register it all, and Jack stepped forward, and rested his forearms against the shell of the Dalek.

"You know I know you said you wanted to spruce the place up a little," he said with a smile over to Ianto, "but really, if this is your choice of decoration then we might have to have words."

His smile grew a little.

"Hey."

[hofficoffi]

When the door opened and Jack appeared, Ianto started. For a moment his expression was unguarded. The last thing he needed was a(nother) surprise visitor, after all.

But it was just Jack, and an apparently cheerful Jack at that.

Ianto recovered quickly. "It went with the drapes," he replied, dryly, but with the tiniest falter as he spoke. He'd thought, really thought, that he had been seconds away from death.

He turned his attention back to Dalek disposal. Pursed his lips for a moment, a thoughtful expression.

Incineration, he supposed.

"Hi," he said finally, not unkindly. Softer, perhaps, than he'd intended.

[quitehomoerotic]

"Oh did you get the velvet ones? You know I thought the colour would really offset nicely against my eyes," Jack continued with a teasing sarcasm. A pleasant mood and an attempt to make Ianto's the same.

And to make him smile.

With a pointed movement, he pushed up from the Dalek and took a step around it, glancing down towards where it had sat within the casing, still residue and bits of flesh left visible.

He ignored it, and as he reached the other side, he pushed it with the heel of his foot against the skirting, knocking it out of the way, A silent way of hitting home that it couldn't hurt them now. It was dead and it was broken and Jack would stand between it and Ianto, always.

Again, he turned his attention up to Ianto and he nodded, "Said I was coming back, didn't I?"