FIC: Dancing on the Valentine, Part 2/3
Title: Dancing on the Valentine
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: ~11,000 all parts together
Summary: "Can I escort you to the dance, Mr. Jones?"
Written for: tw_calender's Countdown too Valentine's Day. This is day #14. Actual, you know, Valentine's Day.
Author's Notes: As this is the V-Day story it's pure unabashed fluff. Yeah, a little over 11,000 words of it. This story comes directly after my story Come Undone. I don't think it's completely necessary to read this one first, but it might help set the scene. Both stories have spoilers for "Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang" but nothing further. Invaluable beta advice from kyrdwyn and ladykoori.
Dancing on the Valentine, Part 1
It wasn’t news to Ianto Jones that there were aliens out there. He’d captured dozens; had conversations with several; and on occasion, when he’d had to, even killed a few.
But this was something else.
They’d arrived a few days early, purchased suitable attire and smooth-talked the right people into getting them tickets. Sure, they could have psychic-papered their ways in as the Doctor suggested, but Jack had said that trying to score legitimate tickets was half the fun. The suit Jack had selected for him had been similar enough to the ones Ianto wore to work each day, but he wasn’t quite sure what to make of the wide, bright purple sash worn around the waist. Jack had needed to tie the complicated knot in the ends for him and, in Ianto’s opinion, he’d taken much longer than necessary to get it to settle over his left hip where it belonged.
Jack’s outfit was a little more daring. A black jacket like Ianto’s, but his blue shirt didn’t button, it just tucked into Jack’s tight black pants, leaving most of his chest bare.
As they dressed, Jack explained the customs and etiquette for such an affair. Which dances they’d be required to do together, the words to the opening toast, the response to the blessing they’d receive. He then went on to fill him in on the more pertinent details of how to interact with some of the species most likely to be present. Whom to make eye-contact with, whom to shake hands with and whom, under no circumstances, was Ianto to touch skin-to-skin. One because the slime on their exterior scales was corrosive as hell, the other because skin-to-skin contact was an unequivocal invitation to sex. Wherever they happened to be standing. He’d ended the long list of do’s and don’ts with “But other than that, it’s your basic intergalactic fetish ball.”
The words ‘fetish ball’ had Ianto now picturing the myriad of beings in leather and PVC, half with whips and the other half in collars and on leashes. It must have shown on his face because Jack laughed and said, “Not like that. Just that everyone there’s looking to hook up with someone. Either the being they brought or someone they meet there.”
There was a pause before Jack leaned over and whispered, “Though if you want to investigate the other type when we get home, you know I’m game.”
Ianto blushed and declined to comment.
And now, Ianto Jones and Jack Harkness were the only two humans standing in a room of hundreds. Ianto had stopped counting distinct races at thirty and still wasn’t sure he’d been at all accurate. After all, from the outside, most people would assume the Doctor and he were of the same species.
Jack had led him effortlessly through the formal introductions to the room and the first set of three required dances. Ianto had felt dozens of eyes (at least two dozen just from that bloke over there with the transparent skin and orange hair) on them as they’d danced.
Jack had danced with him once in the Hub. He’d felt silly at first, but then he’d noticed the way Jack had closed his eyes and lost himself in the music and the movement and the closeness. When he’d allowed himself to do the same he understood why Jack had asked him to do it.
But now he felt, oddly, like a politically-correct Cinderella. Someone who’d been swept off his feet by a very charming prince and brought into a world he could only hope to see and experience from a distance and where he seemed to have acquired a number of very frank admirers.
After the three introductory dances, a woman in a long blue cape that neatly hid from Ianto the fact that she had four legs, had tapped Jack on the shoulder and asked to cut in. Jack had raised an eyebrow, silently asking Ianto if he was okay with that. When Ianto nodded, Jack handed him off and wandered over to a group of various aliens having a chat by the refreshment table.
Ianto kept one eye on Jack, not really sanguine about the idea of losing him in the milling throngs of people. When the blue-cloaked woman bowed and thanked him, Ianto found himself on the receiving end of three other requests to dance. He suddenly understood the quaint little tradition of the dance card on Earth.
After a total of four other dances, including one with what would have been termed conjoined twins on Earth - though Ianto had a vague recollection of Jack having mentioned that it was normal for their species - Ianto wove through the crowd, shaking off additional invitations ‘at least for the moment’ as he made his way to the drinks.
“His culture doesn’t,” Ianto heard Jack say as he approached. Jack had a vaguely apologetic grin and Ianto suddenly felt like he had when he’d been six and his thirteen-year-old cousin had to go with him to see a Disney picture while all his friends went to see some horror movie.
When Jack spotted Ianto though, his smiled a huge smile and swept him into a devastating kiss. “You’re making quite the impression,” Jack said keeping one arm around Ianto’s waist, keeping him close while he fussed with the collar of Ianto’s shirt, straightening it and refolding it on the crease.
“This is amazing,” Ianto said for lack of anything more intelligent to add. He’d known there were aliens and given the number of stars in the sky and the number of planets that would be orbiting many of them, the fact that there was such a large variety really shouldn’t have shocked him. But it did. It astounded him. It was more colorful and interesting than any science fiction movie he’d ever seen.
He’d always considered himself quite ordinary, his chosen vocation aside, so he was flattered and a little embarrassed at the number of … beings who seemed interested in him.
The large yellow-feathered alien Jack had been talking to studied Ianto closely. “If he ever bores you, I promise you, there will always be a place in my stable for you.”
Ianto looked to Jack, feeling himself pale. “Stable?”
“Gelzarians aren’t monogamous. Though I’m thinking that we should have a word with the Doctor about the way the TARDIS translates certain terms. But the short version is… he’s making a pass at you. And proposing to you. It’s sort of a combination of the two.”
“Oh.” Ianto found himself moving just a bit closer to Jack now that he understood where Jack’s sudden show of possessiveness came from.
Jack looked back up the large alien. “Like I said, when I was with Erif and Meele, it was different. Not this one.” Jack looked up towards the entranceway. “Oh, I’m sorry, we need to go. There’s someone I want to introduce Ianto to.”
Ianto could barely stammer a good-bye before Jack was pulling him through the throng to the hall.
“You know him?” Ianto asked when they finally came to stop in the quiet hall.
“We met back when I was working for the Time Agency. I forget how long-lived they are.” Jack took hold of Ianto’s shoulder. “I probably don’t need to tell you this, but you don’t have to take up anybody on any offers you aren’t comfortable with.”
Ianto nodded.
“I mean it. Some of the cultures here… they view being difficult as foreplay. I’ve seen a few fights and even a few duels breakout between cultures who read the same action or heard the same words differently. If someone doesn’t get it, explain it however you have to.”
Ianto nodded again; suddenly worried that Jack felt the need to explain this to him so clearly.
“What was that… man? talking to you about back there? My culture doesn’t what?” Ianto asked.
Jack smiled wickedly. “Share.”
Ianto’s eyebrows drew together and then his eyes widened. “Oh. No… If you wanted to… I could find the Doctor and…”
Jack smiled and kissed him softly. “No, Ianto. He didn’t want you to share me. He wanted me to share you. Now, he didn’t strike me as your type for one, and for two I didn’t think you’d really want your first encounter with an alien to include the eight or nine others he’d be picking up tonight. But I told him that your culture believes in monogamy from both partners.”
“You didn’t have to say that for me, Jack. I told you that I wouldn’t -“
Jack put a finger over Ianto’s lips. “I have no desire to go with him. Well, not again. He’s… unimaginative.” Jack glanced around the hall. “I fell asleep half way through. I woke up when he started shouting my name and I was like, ‘oh, are you still…’” Jack made a ‘you know’ face.
Ianto laughed. “How could you not tell?”
Jack held up his little finger in a ‘do the math’ kind of way. Ianto giggled. “And this,” Jack said holding his hand up again, “is being generous.”
Ianto cocked his head. “He had to be at least two meters tall.”
“Their sense of proportion is a little different than ours.”
Ianto shook his head. “Well, I have to say, I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be invited to be part of someone’s stable.”
“And that wasn’t hyperbole. In Verososos culture a household head can have as many spouses as he or she wants. It’s… kind of less repressive form of the old Mormon church on Earth. If you can afford to keep ‘em, you can have ‘em. The more you have the more affluent you must be, so spouses become an indicator of wealth. Of course here, the spouses can leave if they want. That’s the upside.”
“I don’t see an upside to being ‘stabled’ by anyone.” Ianto actually shivered.
Jack pulled him back in and kissed him. “I’m glad you don’t share. I don’t want to leave here with anyone else. And I’m realizing that if you were to want to leave here with someone else… I wouldn’t be as okay with it as I told myself I would be.”
“I’m… oddly touched by that,” Ianto replied as he tried to decipher exactly what Jack meant.
Suddenly the Doctor burst through the door. “Jack! Ianto, there you are. Hurry, the matron is about to give her blessing!” He disappeared back through the door and Jack swore he was being gathered up by a group of Izpedian women. Well, he didn’t need to worry about him coming back to the inn they were booked into until at least sundown tomorrow if that were the case. He’d also be bowlegged as hell for at least a few days.
“We should go be blessed,” Jack said, looping his arm around Ianto’s waist.
Ianto wove his own arm around Jack and smiled. “I think I’ve already been.”
Ianto couldn’t wait to get back to Cardiff and tell the team that he’d actually managed to make Jack blush.
*~*~*~*~*~*
After the blessing, Jack and Ianto danced the next three-song set before Jack kissed Ianto passionately and said, “Ready for part two?”
“Part two?” Ianto asked cautiously.
Jack took him by the hand and led him over to where the Doctor was dancing with a woman who’s face reminded Ianto rather startlingly of a rabbit, but all the rest of her seemed humanoid enough.
“Off for part two, are you?” the Doctor asked as Jack approached.
Jack nodded. “Your Izpedian friends are still watching,” he said with raised eyebrows.
The Doctor took a deep breath. “I know. Don’t wait up for me.”
“Tonight or tomorrow night,” Jack answered. “Have fun.” He gave the Doctor his widest grin. “Don’t do anything that I wouldn’t do.” He laid a noisy kiss on Ianto’s cheek and pulled him to the door.
As they started to walk away Ianto heard the Doctor yell after them, “I’m don’t think I’m imaginative enough to come up with something you wouldn’t do!”
Ianto and Jack both laughed as Jack escorted them out of the large dance hall.
The night was pleasantly cool as they walked the half-mile from the estate the dance was on to the town center.
“Dare I ask what part two is about?”
“You’ll see,” Jack said.
“I had a sinking feeling you’d say that.”
“Did you have fun at the dance?” Jack challenged.
“I did,” Ianto admitted.
“So don’t start doubting me now. Ooh! Wait here a second.” Jack ran off, leaving Ianto standing on the corner of two reasonably busy streets.
Ianto scowled and watched as a Jack ran off to a girl at a street vendor cart. He saw Jack look in the baskets on her cart, but he didn’t select anything. Ianto couldn’t even see what she was selling. After a brief but animated conversation that caused the twelve year old to cover her eyes and laugh as Jack teased her, Jack gave her a large blue coin from his pocket. The girl’s eyes got wide and she nodded eagerly.
Jack sauntered back, not having purchased anything.
“What was that about?” Ianto asked warily.
“You’ll see after dinner.” Jack wrapped his arm around Ianto’s waist again and led him half way down the block. He stopped them at storefront restaurant with large picture windows and a bright green door. “Here.”
Ianto let himself be escorted into the establishment where they were greeted by the local equivalent of the Maitre’d. The man was mostly human looking, if Ianto could ignore the second set of eyes that rested just above the ones Ianto expected to see. He showed that he clearly knew who Jack was as he bustled about escorting them to a table in the corner near the windows. Somewhat private, but with a great view of the city. Ianto swore he heard him whisper something to Jack about ‘everything being just as he’d asked’.
Ianto tried to control his smile. Jack had set this all up for him? Wining, dining and dancing someone after he’d already gotten him into bed didn’t really seem Jack’s style. Ianto wavered between touched and worried.
As they sat Jack reached over and took Ianto’s hand. “I had the Doctor bring us here, to this place for this particular dance.”
“Why? What’s so special about this one?”
“Do you know what the date is today?” Jack wove his fingers through Ianto’s.
Ianto thought for a second. “It’s, what? January twenty-fifth, isn’t it?”
“At home,” Jack agreed. “But here, today is the middle of the second lunar cycle.”
“And that’s significant?”
“What’s the middle of the second lunar cycle on Earth?”
Ianto sighed and thought; playing along with Jack’s little game. “The second lunar cycle would be February and the middle of it would be the fifteenth. No, wait, February’s short. It would be the four-“ the lightbulb went on. “Fourteenth. It would be February fourteenth at home.”
“I didn’t want to wait three weeks.” Jack shrugged and smiled.
Ianto reached across the table and took Jack’s hand in his own. “This is lovely, thank you.”
Jack met his eyes and they just looked at - looked into - each other for a long moment. Jack finally ended the moment by kissing Ianto’s hand and handing a menu from the two near his elbow. “Ask about anything you don’t recognize. I’ll do my damnedest to come up with analogies you’ll understand.”
“I’m on a Valentine’s Day date on another planet, thousands of years after my own time and I was proposed to by a two-foot, yellow-feathered alien at a fetish ball. I think I can take my chances with a new kind of bread or stew. So as long as none of it will poison me, I think I can sort out something manageable.”
Jack laughed again, loving the new, confident, snarky Ianto he’d come home to.
Ianto managed to find himself a harmless salad and soup and Jack ordered something Ianto was sure he’d never be able to pronounce again if he’d tried. He kept waiting for the moment when he’d make some massive social faux pas for this culture or say just the wrong thing, but amazingly, they made it through to coffee - or the local equivalent - with no major problems.
“Did you like your salad?” Jack asked as they both leaned back, cradling their drinks in their hands and lingering, in no hurry to leave.
“It was very good. How was your… uh…?”
“Good. But then again, I wouldn’t expect anything less from the chefs here.” Jack set his cup down and leaned in towards Ianto, making eye contact and holding it for a long second. Ianto got the impression that Jack was about to make some kind of declaration or ask something intensely serious. He met Jack’s eyes and waited, holding his breath.
“I know you didn’t have to take me back. I do know that. And I wouldn’t expect you to give me a third chance. I won’t give you a reason to need to. When I was gone I realized that we expected different things from… this. And the more I thought about what you wanted, what I think you wanted anyway, I realized that you had it right. Maybe I should be a little less proud of how many people I’ve slept with. Or at the very least it might help to stop throwing it in your face.”
Ianto set his cup down and took Jack’s hand again. “I don’t want you to change for me. I’ve had relationships where we both tried being the person the other wanted and we were miserable inside of six months. More and more I find that I’m comfortable being me around you. And I think you’ve become more honest with me. Especially since you’ve been home. In a lot of ways I understand now why you had to go. I don’t know if I could easily give… all of this up. You’ve been on Earth, my Earth, for what? A hundred and fifty years? After seeing things like this I can see why you’d be ready for… something else. That’s who you are.”
Ianto’s tone was soft, accepting and it made Jack’s heart sink. He reached into his pocket and pulled out several green and yellow coins and stacked them on the table. “Let’s go take a walk. I’ll tell you why I had to go. It had nothing to do with being… bored on Earth. Or with you.”
Ianto made a face, clearly concerned that he’d said the wrong thing and ruined the night. Jack pulled him in and kissed him. “I couldn’t even begin to tell you the whole story in one night, but I’ll tell you why I had to find the Doctor again. And why after I did, I knew I belonged back in Cardiff. Back at Torchwood Three. With you.” He kissed him again. “Come on.” He led Ianto out of the restaurant by the hand.
As they came out of the restaurant the girl from the cart ran up to Jack and handed him a small bag. Jack peeked in it, making sure Ianto couldn’t see in and gave the girl a grin and another blue coin. “Brilliant,” he told her. “You got it exactly right.”
She pocketed the coin and bowed to Jack, not saying anything she ran back to her cart looking thrilled.
Jack rummaged in the sack for a second before pulling out six miniature paper flowers. A small bouquet of origami roses. “They have very strict laws here about killing plants that aren’t for eating. She’s an apprentice paper-folder. It’s quite the traditional art here - kind of like origami on Earth - only you only get to practice it if you study under a master tradesman.”
“By the look on her face, you gave her enough money to buy a paper factory,” Ianto said studying the intricately folded three-dimensional roses.
“Nah, but let’s just say that she won’t have any problems paying her tuition for the next few months.” Jack offered Ianto his elbow and Ianto took it with a smile.
“That’s a lot of money for some paper flowers.”
“You’re worth it,” Jack said without pause. “Besides, part of the way she’ll work towards her master-ship is by proving that her work is worth the kind of money a master-folder earns. Her instructor will be very happy with her tomorrow.”
“He gets some of the money then?”
“No, she’ll let the girl keep the money, but it helps her move through her training if she can prove that she’s earning her own keep through her trade.” Jack steered them to a long boardwalk out over the bay.
As they turned the corner from the street to the walk, Ianto froze. “I suppose that shouldn’t have shocked me but… there are three full moons and a half-moon over there.”
“Yeah. After seeing things like this, I’ve always had the ridiculous notion that Earth’s moon has to be so lonely.” Jack pulled him in and kissed him. “Sometimes I know how it felt.”
Ianto put everything he had into the kiss, trying to tell Jack that he never had to be lonely again for as long as Ianto had breath. They were making great progress towards moving past the ‘part-time shag’ situation they’d had before Jack had left, but Ianto knew neither of them were up to making or hearing those kinds of commitments yet. But he couldn’t let the comment go unnoticed at all.
Jack led them to the end of a pier that had benches spaced far enough apart that there would be privacy for whomever used them. Jack found an empty one near the end of the pier and pulled Ianto down next to him, hip to hip. “Tomorrow we should get a camera and come back out here.”
Ianto shrugged. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget this.”
Jack pulled him in and gave him a lingering kiss.
Ianto gently traced Jack’s lips with his fingers. “You were going to tell me why you needed to go with the Doctor.”
Jack sat up, putting just enough distance between himself and Ianto to let him clear his head and speak coherently. “I’m jumping into the middle of the story, but like I said it’ll take far too long to start at the beginning.”
Ianto nodded, but didn’t press.
“I met the Doctor in 1941. Only it was the first time I went to 1941. I’ve been there twice, long story. I was… not a very nice guy at the time. I’d been hurt by people I’d spent most of my life trusting and I was… looking out for number one for a while.”
Ianto threaded his fingers between Jacks. “The Time Agency John spoke of?”
“Yeah. It’s so complicated that I don’t even know the whole story, but the end result was… I was a pretty major Jack-ass. The Doctor decided there was something in me worth saving. Even though I nearly got him and all of London killed, he decided to take me under his wing for a while. He let me travel with him and his companion, Rose.” Jack took a deep breath. “We got involved in a war that… I guess it was his war, but it sure as hell wasn’t mine. But he convinced me that it was worth fighting in and dying for. So I did.”
“Died?” Ianto asked. He’d always wondered if Jack had been born immortal or … well, he wasn’t sure exactly what ‘or’ could entail. “You can’t die.”
“I can die, I just can’t stay dead,” Jack remarked quickly. And back then I could. I did.”
Ianto looked him up and down. “What changed?”
“Rose. She… I don’t know the whole of it, but apparently she sucked up part of the life-force of the TARDIS. And she brought me back to life. Only she did a little too good a job of it.”
“She brought you back forever,” Ianto said as he realized what Jack was implying.
“Yeah. She willed me back to life and something in that ‘command’ never specified a regular human life span. So I’m stuck.” Jack shrugged.
“Well, better stuck alive than stuck dead, yeah?” He squeezed Jack’s hand.
“Most of the time I agree with you. But it’s hard knowing that… everyone, everyone I let myself love, I will lose.”
Ianto turned to see Jack better in the bright light of all the moons. “Not today. Not today and not for a very long time, okay?”
Jack leaned in and kissed him thoroughly.
When they broke for air, Ianto leaned his forehead on Jack’s. “So after all that, why did you leave him?”
“He left me,” Jack said simply. “He left me on a place where if I had been able to stay dead, I probably would have several times over. But I finally escaped and made it to Earth’s past with my wristband and I waited. I wanted to know what had happened to me and what could be done to let me live a normal life and die at the end of it.”
“What did he tell you?”
Jack shifted to lean his head on Ianto’s shoulder. He wasn’t sure he wanted to repeat what the Doctor had told him. Had called him. He wasn’t sure he was ready to admit to another person how much it had hurt. How much it still hurt. He took a deep breath and sat up and met Ianto’s eyes. “He told me I was ‘wrong’. That… it hurt him to look at me.”
“Jack!” Ianto reached up and caressed his cheek, surprised that he didn’t find tears. “That’s a horrible thing to say to someone who’s already said they aren’t completely comfortable with the situation.”
Jack shrugged.
“So why stay with him? I mean, a year…” Ianto tried not to sound like a jilted lover, but he wasn’t sure he was managing.
“I didn’t mean to. But things got out of our control and we couldn’t get back to Cardiff for… a very long time. Don’t ask me about that tonight, all right? Not tonight.”
Ianto leaned and kissed him. “Not tonight. When you’re ready to talk, you’ll let me know.”
Jack nodded. “Anyway, that’s when I realized that the Doctor and I were never meant to be. And when I started to realize that just maybe we are.” Jack turned and in a swift moment pulled Ianto into a bone cracking hug and devastating kiss.
Even in their awkward position, Ianto could feel Jack’s the start of Jack’s erection against his leg. He knew if they continued to sit out under the moons snogging and touching, he’d be harder than he’d be comfortable being as they walked back to the inn. “We might want to make our way back to the inn. I don’t know what these people think of public displays of affection.”
“We’d be arrested in Cardiff long before we would be here,” Jack bounced his eyebrows, trying adamantly to change the tone of the conversation. Ianto wilted back a little. “But the inn might be more comfortable,” Jack suggested when it became clear that Ianto was starting to think Jack was suggesting that they shag right there on the pier.
They stood and Jack pulled Ianto into a tight hug. He may have intended it to be a platonic, thank you of a hug for someone who listened without judging, but it quickly turned into less of a hug and more of a grope when Jack’s hand brushed across Ianto’s arse. An arse that had no right to look as good, let alone feel as good, as Ianto’s did in those specially tailored pants. “Though if you wanted to-“
“Inn. Now,” Ianto said sharply and they both laughed.
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: ~11,000 all parts together
Summary: "Can I escort you to the dance, Mr. Jones?"
Written for: tw_calender's Countdown too Valentine's Day. This is day #14. Actual, you know, Valentine's Day.
Author's Notes: As this is the V-Day story it's pure unabashed fluff. Yeah, a little over 11,000 words of it. This story comes directly after my story Come Undone. I don't think it's completely necessary to read this one first, but it might help set the scene. Both stories have spoilers for "Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang" but nothing further. Invaluable beta advice from kyrdwyn and ladykoori.
Dancing on the Valentine, Part 1
It wasn’t news to Ianto Jones that there were aliens out there. He’d captured dozens; had conversations with several; and on occasion, when he’d had to, even killed a few.
But this was something else.
They’d arrived a few days early, purchased suitable attire and smooth-talked the right people into getting them tickets. Sure, they could have psychic-papered their ways in as the Doctor suggested, but Jack had said that trying to score legitimate tickets was half the fun. The suit Jack had selected for him had been similar enough to the ones Ianto wore to work each day, but he wasn’t quite sure what to make of the wide, bright purple sash worn around the waist. Jack had needed to tie the complicated knot in the ends for him and, in Ianto’s opinion, he’d taken much longer than necessary to get it to settle over his left hip where it belonged.
Jack’s outfit was a little more daring. A black jacket like Ianto’s, but his blue shirt didn’t button, it just tucked into Jack’s tight black pants, leaving most of his chest bare.
As they dressed, Jack explained the customs and etiquette for such an affair. Which dances they’d be required to do together, the words to the opening toast, the response to the blessing they’d receive. He then went on to fill him in on the more pertinent details of how to interact with some of the species most likely to be present. Whom to make eye-contact with, whom to shake hands with and whom, under no circumstances, was Ianto to touch skin-to-skin. One because the slime on their exterior scales was corrosive as hell, the other because skin-to-skin contact was an unequivocal invitation to sex. Wherever they happened to be standing. He’d ended the long list of do’s and don’ts with “But other than that, it’s your basic intergalactic fetish ball.”
The words ‘fetish ball’ had Ianto now picturing the myriad of beings in leather and PVC, half with whips and the other half in collars and on leashes. It must have shown on his face because Jack laughed and said, “Not like that. Just that everyone there’s looking to hook up with someone. Either the being they brought or someone they meet there.”
There was a pause before Jack leaned over and whispered, “Though if you want to investigate the other type when we get home, you know I’m game.”
Ianto blushed and declined to comment.
And now, Ianto Jones and Jack Harkness were the only two humans standing in a room of hundreds. Ianto had stopped counting distinct races at thirty and still wasn’t sure he’d been at all accurate. After all, from the outside, most people would assume the Doctor and he were of the same species.
Jack had led him effortlessly through the formal introductions to the room and the first set of three required dances. Ianto had felt dozens of eyes (at least two dozen just from that bloke over there with the transparent skin and orange hair) on them as they’d danced.
Jack had danced with him once in the Hub. He’d felt silly at first, but then he’d noticed the way Jack had closed his eyes and lost himself in the music and the movement and the closeness. When he’d allowed himself to do the same he understood why Jack had asked him to do it.
But now he felt, oddly, like a politically-correct Cinderella. Someone who’d been swept off his feet by a very charming prince and brought into a world he could only hope to see and experience from a distance and where he seemed to have acquired a number of very frank admirers.
After the three introductory dances, a woman in a long blue cape that neatly hid from Ianto the fact that she had four legs, had tapped Jack on the shoulder and asked to cut in. Jack had raised an eyebrow, silently asking Ianto if he was okay with that. When Ianto nodded, Jack handed him off and wandered over to a group of various aliens having a chat by the refreshment table.
Ianto kept one eye on Jack, not really sanguine about the idea of losing him in the milling throngs of people. When the blue-cloaked woman bowed and thanked him, Ianto found himself on the receiving end of three other requests to dance. He suddenly understood the quaint little tradition of the dance card on Earth.
After a total of four other dances, including one with what would have been termed conjoined twins on Earth - though Ianto had a vague recollection of Jack having mentioned that it was normal for their species - Ianto wove through the crowd, shaking off additional invitations ‘at least for the moment’ as he made his way to the drinks.
“His culture doesn’t,” Ianto heard Jack say as he approached. Jack had a vaguely apologetic grin and Ianto suddenly felt like he had when he’d been six and his thirteen-year-old cousin had to go with him to see a Disney picture while all his friends went to see some horror movie.
When Jack spotted Ianto though, his smiled a huge smile and swept him into a devastating kiss. “You’re making quite the impression,” Jack said keeping one arm around Ianto’s waist, keeping him close while he fussed with the collar of Ianto’s shirt, straightening it and refolding it on the crease.
“This is amazing,” Ianto said for lack of anything more intelligent to add. He’d known there were aliens and given the number of stars in the sky and the number of planets that would be orbiting many of them, the fact that there was such a large variety really shouldn’t have shocked him. But it did. It astounded him. It was more colorful and interesting than any science fiction movie he’d ever seen.
He’d always considered himself quite ordinary, his chosen vocation aside, so he was flattered and a little embarrassed at the number of … beings who seemed interested in him.
The large yellow-feathered alien Jack had been talking to studied Ianto closely. “If he ever bores you, I promise you, there will always be a place in my stable for you.”
Ianto looked to Jack, feeling himself pale. “Stable?”
“Gelzarians aren’t monogamous. Though I’m thinking that we should have a word with the Doctor about the way the TARDIS translates certain terms. But the short version is… he’s making a pass at you. And proposing to you. It’s sort of a combination of the two.”
“Oh.” Ianto found himself moving just a bit closer to Jack now that he understood where Jack’s sudden show of possessiveness came from.
Jack looked back up the large alien. “Like I said, when I was with Erif and Meele, it was different. Not this one.” Jack looked up towards the entranceway. “Oh, I’m sorry, we need to go. There’s someone I want to introduce Ianto to.”
Ianto could barely stammer a good-bye before Jack was pulling him through the throng to the hall.
“You know him?” Ianto asked when they finally came to stop in the quiet hall.
“We met back when I was working for the Time Agency. I forget how long-lived they are.” Jack took hold of Ianto’s shoulder. “I probably don’t need to tell you this, but you don’t have to take up anybody on any offers you aren’t comfortable with.”
Ianto nodded.
“I mean it. Some of the cultures here… they view being difficult as foreplay. I’ve seen a few fights and even a few duels breakout between cultures who read the same action or heard the same words differently. If someone doesn’t get it, explain it however you have to.”
Ianto nodded again; suddenly worried that Jack felt the need to explain this to him so clearly.
“What was that… man? talking to you about back there? My culture doesn’t what?” Ianto asked.
Jack smiled wickedly. “Share.”
Ianto’s eyebrows drew together and then his eyes widened. “Oh. No… If you wanted to… I could find the Doctor and…”
Jack smiled and kissed him softly. “No, Ianto. He didn’t want you to share me. He wanted me to share you. Now, he didn’t strike me as your type for one, and for two I didn’t think you’d really want your first encounter with an alien to include the eight or nine others he’d be picking up tonight. But I told him that your culture believes in monogamy from both partners.”
“You didn’t have to say that for me, Jack. I told you that I wouldn’t -“
Jack put a finger over Ianto’s lips. “I have no desire to go with him. Well, not again. He’s… unimaginative.” Jack glanced around the hall. “I fell asleep half way through. I woke up when he started shouting my name and I was like, ‘oh, are you still…’” Jack made a ‘you know’ face.
Ianto laughed. “How could you not tell?”
Jack held up his little finger in a ‘do the math’ kind of way. Ianto giggled. “And this,” Jack said holding his hand up again, “is being generous.”
Ianto cocked his head. “He had to be at least two meters tall.”
“Their sense of proportion is a little different than ours.”
Ianto shook his head. “Well, I have to say, I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be invited to be part of someone’s stable.”
“And that wasn’t hyperbole. In Verososos culture a household head can have as many spouses as he or she wants. It’s… kind of less repressive form of the old Mormon church on Earth. If you can afford to keep ‘em, you can have ‘em. The more you have the more affluent you must be, so spouses become an indicator of wealth. Of course here, the spouses can leave if they want. That’s the upside.”
“I don’t see an upside to being ‘stabled’ by anyone.” Ianto actually shivered.
Jack pulled him back in and kissed him. “I’m glad you don’t share. I don’t want to leave here with anyone else. And I’m realizing that if you were to want to leave here with someone else… I wouldn’t be as okay with it as I told myself I would be.”
“I’m… oddly touched by that,” Ianto replied as he tried to decipher exactly what Jack meant.
Suddenly the Doctor burst through the door. “Jack! Ianto, there you are. Hurry, the matron is about to give her blessing!” He disappeared back through the door and Jack swore he was being gathered up by a group of Izpedian women. Well, he didn’t need to worry about him coming back to the inn they were booked into until at least sundown tomorrow if that were the case. He’d also be bowlegged as hell for at least a few days.
“We should go be blessed,” Jack said, looping his arm around Ianto’s waist.
Ianto wove his own arm around Jack and smiled. “I think I’ve already been.”
Ianto couldn’t wait to get back to Cardiff and tell the team that he’d actually managed to make Jack blush.
*~*~*~*~*~*
After the blessing, Jack and Ianto danced the next three-song set before Jack kissed Ianto passionately and said, “Ready for part two?”
“Part two?” Ianto asked cautiously.
Jack took him by the hand and led him over to where the Doctor was dancing with a woman who’s face reminded Ianto rather startlingly of a rabbit, but all the rest of her seemed humanoid enough.
“Off for part two, are you?” the Doctor asked as Jack approached.
Jack nodded. “Your Izpedian friends are still watching,” he said with raised eyebrows.
The Doctor took a deep breath. “I know. Don’t wait up for me.”
“Tonight or tomorrow night,” Jack answered. “Have fun.” He gave the Doctor his widest grin. “Don’t do anything that I wouldn’t do.” He laid a noisy kiss on Ianto’s cheek and pulled him to the door.
As they started to walk away Ianto heard the Doctor yell after them, “I’m don’t think I’m imaginative enough to come up with something you wouldn’t do!”
Ianto and Jack both laughed as Jack escorted them out of the large dance hall.
The night was pleasantly cool as they walked the half-mile from the estate the dance was on to the town center.
“Dare I ask what part two is about?”
“You’ll see,” Jack said.
“I had a sinking feeling you’d say that.”
“Did you have fun at the dance?” Jack challenged.
“I did,” Ianto admitted.
“So don’t start doubting me now. Ooh! Wait here a second.” Jack ran off, leaving Ianto standing on the corner of two reasonably busy streets.
Ianto scowled and watched as a Jack ran off to a girl at a street vendor cart. He saw Jack look in the baskets on her cart, but he didn’t select anything. Ianto couldn’t even see what she was selling. After a brief but animated conversation that caused the twelve year old to cover her eyes and laugh as Jack teased her, Jack gave her a large blue coin from his pocket. The girl’s eyes got wide and she nodded eagerly.
Jack sauntered back, not having purchased anything.
“What was that about?” Ianto asked warily.
“You’ll see after dinner.” Jack wrapped his arm around Ianto’s waist again and led him half way down the block. He stopped them at storefront restaurant with large picture windows and a bright green door. “Here.”
Ianto let himself be escorted into the establishment where they were greeted by the local equivalent of the Maitre’d. The man was mostly human looking, if Ianto could ignore the second set of eyes that rested just above the ones Ianto expected to see. He showed that he clearly knew who Jack was as he bustled about escorting them to a table in the corner near the windows. Somewhat private, but with a great view of the city. Ianto swore he heard him whisper something to Jack about ‘everything being just as he’d asked’.
Ianto tried to control his smile. Jack had set this all up for him? Wining, dining and dancing someone after he’d already gotten him into bed didn’t really seem Jack’s style. Ianto wavered between touched and worried.
As they sat Jack reached over and took Ianto’s hand. “I had the Doctor bring us here, to this place for this particular dance.”
“Why? What’s so special about this one?”
“Do you know what the date is today?” Jack wove his fingers through Ianto’s.
Ianto thought for a second. “It’s, what? January twenty-fifth, isn’t it?”
“At home,” Jack agreed. “But here, today is the middle of the second lunar cycle.”
“And that’s significant?”
“What’s the middle of the second lunar cycle on Earth?”
Ianto sighed and thought; playing along with Jack’s little game. “The second lunar cycle would be February and the middle of it would be the fifteenth. No, wait, February’s short. It would be the four-“ the lightbulb went on. “Fourteenth. It would be February fourteenth at home.”
“I didn’t want to wait three weeks.” Jack shrugged and smiled.
Ianto reached across the table and took Jack’s hand in his own. “This is lovely, thank you.”
Jack met his eyes and they just looked at - looked into - each other for a long moment. Jack finally ended the moment by kissing Ianto’s hand and handing a menu from the two near his elbow. “Ask about anything you don’t recognize. I’ll do my damnedest to come up with analogies you’ll understand.”
“I’m on a Valentine’s Day date on another planet, thousands of years after my own time and I was proposed to by a two-foot, yellow-feathered alien at a fetish ball. I think I can take my chances with a new kind of bread or stew. So as long as none of it will poison me, I think I can sort out something manageable.”
Jack laughed again, loving the new, confident, snarky Ianto he’d come home to.
Ianto managed to find himself a harmless salad and soup and Jack ordered something Ianto was sure he’d never be able to pronounce again if he’d tried. He kept waiting for the moment when he’d make some massive social faux pas for this culture or say just the wrong thing, but amazingly, they made it through to coffee - or the local equivalent - with no major problems.
“Did you like your salad?” Jack asked as they both leaned back, cradling their drinks in their hands and lingering, in no hurry to leave.
“It was very good. How was your… uh…?”
“Good. But then again, I wouldn’t expect anything less from the chefs here.” Jack set his cup down and leaned in towards Ianto, making eye contact and holding it for a long second. Ianto got the impression that Jack was about to make some kind of declaration or ask something intensely serious. He met Jack’s eyes and waited, holding his breath.
“I know you didn’t have to take me back. I do know that. And I wouldn’t expect you to give me a third chance. I won’t give you a reason to need to. When I was gone I realized that we expected different things from… this. And the more I thought about what you wanted, what I think you wanted anyway, I realized that you had it right. Maybe I should be a little less proud of how many people I’ve slept with. Or at the very least it might help to stop throwing it in your face.”
Ianto set his cup down and took Jack’s hand again. “I don’t want you to change for me. I’ve had relationships where we both tried being the person the other wanted and we were miserable inside of six months. More and more I find that I’m comfortable being me around you. And I think you’ve become more honest with me. Especially since you’ve been home. In a lot of ways I understand now why you had to go. I don’t know if I could easily give… all of this up. You’ve been on Earth, my Earth, for what? A hundred and fifty years? After seeing things like this I can see why you’d be ready for… something else. That’s who you are.”
Ianto’s tone was soft, accepting and it made Jack’s heart sink. He reached into his pocket and pulled out several green and yellow coins and stacked them on the table. “Let’s go take a walk. I’ll tell you why I had to go. It had nothing to do with being… bored on Earth. Or with you.”
Ianto made a face, clearly concerned that he’d said the wrong thing and ruined the night. Jack pulled him in and kissed him. “I couldn’t even begin to tell you the whole story in one night, but I’ll tell you why I had to find the Doctor again. And why after I did, I knew I belonged back in Cardiff. Back at Torchwood Three. With you.” He kissed him again. “Come on.” He led Ianto out of the restaurant by the hand.
As they came out of the restaurant the girl from the cart ran up to Jack and handed him a small bag. Jack peeked in it, making sure Ianto couldn’t see in and gave the girl a grin and another blue coin. “Brilliant,” he told her. “You got it exactly right.”
She pocketed the coin and bowed to Jack, not saying anything she ran back to her cart looking thrilled.
Jack rummaged in the sack for a second before pulling out six miniature paper flowers. A small bouquet of origami roses. “They have very strict laws here about killing plants that aren’t for eating. She’s an apprentice paper-folder. It’s quite the traditional art here - kind of like origami on Earth - only you only get to practice it if you study under a master tradesman.”
“By the look on her face, you gave her enough money to buy a paper factory,” Ianto said studying the intricately folded three-dimensional roses.
“Nah, but let’s just say that she won’t have any problems paying her tuition for the next few months.” Jack offered Ianto his elbow and Ianto took it with a smile.
“That’s a lot of money for some paper flowers.”
“You’re worth it,” Jack said without pause. “Besides, part of the way she’ll work towards her master-ship is by proving that her work is worth the kind of money a master-folder earns. Her instructor will be very happy with her tomorrow.”
“He gets some of the money then?”
“No, she’ll let the girl keep the money, but it helps her move through her training if she can prove that she’s earning her own keep through her trade.” Jack steered them to a long boardwalk out over the bay.
As they turned the corner from the street to the walk, Ianto froze. “I suppose that shouldn’t have shocked me but… there are three full moons and a half-moon over there.”
“Yeah. After seeing things like this, I’ve always had the ridiculous notion that Earth’s moon has to be so lonely.” Jack pulled him in and kissed him. “Sometimes I know how it felt.”
Ianto put everything he had into the kiss, trying to tell Jack that he never had to be lonely again for as long as Ianto had breath. They were making great progress towards moving past the ‘part-time shag’ situation they’d had before Jack had left, but Ianto knew neither of them were up to making or hearing those kinds of commitments yet. But he couldn’t let the comment go unnoticed at all.
Jack led them to the end of a pier that had benches spaced far enough apart that there would be privacy for whomever used them. Jack found an empty one near the end of the pier and pulled Ianto down next to him, hip to hip. “Tomorrow we should get a camera and come back out here.”
Ianto shrugged. “I don’t think I’ll ever forget this.”
Jack pulled him in and gave him a lingering kiss.
Ianto gently traced Jack’s lips with his fingers. “You were going to tell me why you needed to go with the Doctor.”
Jack sat up, putting just enough distance between himself and Ianto to let him clear his head and speak coherently. “I’m jumping into the middle of the story, but like I said it’ll take far too long to start at the beginning.”
Ianto nodded, but didn’t press.
“I met the Doctor in 1941. Only it was the first time I went to 1941. I’ve been there twice, long story. I was… not a very nice guy at the time. I’d been hurt by people I’d spent most of my life trusting and I was… looking out for number one for a while.”
Ianto threaded his fingers between Jacks. “The Time Agency John spoke of?”
“Yeah. It’s so complicated that I don’t even know the whole story, but the end result was… I was a pretty major Jack-ass. The Doctor decided there was something in me worth saving. Even though I nearly got him and all of London killed, he decided to take me under his wing for a while. He let me travel with him and his companion, Rose.” Jack took a deep breath. “We got involved in a war that… I guess it was his war, but it sure as hell wasn’t mine. But he convinced me that it was worth fighting in and dying for. So I did.”
“Died?” Ianto asked. He’d always wondered if Jack had been born immortal or … well, he wasn’t sure exactly what ‘or’ could entail. “You can’t die.”
“I can die, I just can’t stay dead,” Jack remarked quickly. And back then I could. I did.”
Ianto looked him up and down. “What changed?”
“Rose. She… I don’t know the whole of it, but apparently she sucked up part of the life-force of the TARDIS. And she brought me back to life. Only she did a little too good a job of it.”
“She brought you back forever,” Ianto said as he realized what Jack was implying.
“Yeah. She willed me back to life and something in that ‘command’ never specified a regular human life span. So I’m stuck.” Jack shrugged.
“Well, better stuck alive than stuck dead, yeah?” He squeezed Jack’s hand.
“Most of the time I agree with you. But it’s hard knowing that… everyone, everyone I let myself love, I will lose.”
Ianto turned to see Jack better in the bright light of all the moons. “Not today. Not today and not for a very long time, okay?”
Jack leaned in and kissed him thoroughly.
When they broke for air, Ianto leaned his forehead on Jack’s. “So after all that, why did you leave him?”
“He left me,” Jack said simply. “He left me on a place where if I had been able to stay dead, I probably would have several times over. But I finally escaped and made it to Earth’s past with my wristband and I waited. I wanted to know what had happened to me and what could be done to let me live a normal life and die at the end of it.”
“What did he tell you?”
Jack shifted to lean his head on Ianto’s shoulder. He wasn’t sure he wanted to repeat what the Doctor had told him. Had called him. He wasn’t sure he was ready to admit to another person how much it had hurt. How much it still hurt. He took a deep breath and sat up and met Ianto’s eyes. “He told me I was ‘wrong’. That… it hurt him to look at me.”
“Jack!” Ianto reached up and caressed his cheek, surprised that he didn’t find tears. “That’s a horrible thing to say to someone who’s already said they aren’t completely comfortable with the situation.”
Jack shrugged.
“So why stay with him? I mean, a year…” Ianto tried not to sound like a jilted lover, but he wasn’t sure he was managing.
“I didn’t mean to. But things got out of our control and we couldn’t get back to Cardiff for… a very long time. Don’t ask me about that tonight, all right? Not tonight.”
Ianto leaned and kissed him. “Not tonight. When you’re ready to talk, you’ll let me know.”
Jack nodded. “Anyway, that’s when I realized that the Doctor and I were never meant to be. And when I started to realize that just maybe we are.” Jack turned and in a swift moment pulled Ianto into a bone cracking hug and devastating kiss.
Even in their awkward position, Ianto could feel Jack’s the start of Jack’s erection against his leg. He knew if they continued to sit out under the moons snogging and touching, he’d be harder than he’d be comfortable being as they walked back to the inn. “We might want to make our way back to the inn. I don’t know what these people think of public displays of affection.”
“We’d be arrested in Cardiff long before we would be here,” Jack bounced his eyebrows, trying adamantly to change the tone of the conversation. Ianto wilted back a little. “But the inn might be more comfortable,” Jack suggested when it became clear that Ianto was starting to think Jack was suggesting that they shag right there on the pier.
They stood and Jack pulled Ianto into a tight hug. He may have intended it to be a platonic, thank you of a hug for someone who listened without judging, but it quickly turned into less of a hug and more of a grope when Jack’s hand brushed across Ianto’s arse. An arse that had no right to look as good, let alone feel as good, as Ianto’s did in those specially tailored pants. “Though if you wanted to-“
“Inn. Now,” Ianto said sharply and they both laughed.