Secrets and Hope (3/9)
Title: Secrets and Hope - (3/9)
Characters/pairings: Ianto, Jack, Gwen, Rhys, Andy, various other characters introduced in CoE. Jack/Ianto and Gwen/Rhys
Rating: PG, maybe pg13ish in places.
Genre: Happy ended angst, hurt/comfort.
Summary: As Torchwood rebuilds following the events of CoE the government are still keeping secrets and it's up to Ianto to reveal the truth.
Spoilers: Children of Earth days 4 and 5.
Authors note: A CoE fix-it fic. Compound B67 as a name for Retcon appears in They Keep Killing Suzie. Also dodgy science is dodgy, but no more so than it already is in a lot of Torchwood episodes. I will try to update once a week, but a new baby means my posting schedule could be a bit erratic.
part one
part two
The cranes on the Plas have just started lifting the first sections of twisted metal from the ruins of the Hub when Andy arrives, walking over to Gwen who is watching the ongoing work from outside the Pierhead Building.
Gwen smiles and waves at Andy, before looking at his jeans and jumper, asking him, "You got a day off then?"
“Not exactly, I'm still on suspension, aren't I?” Andy leans back against the railing, next to Gwen. “All the disciplinary hearings got put back another month."
"It'll be all right." Gwen tries to reassure him. "They'll realise that you were only trying to do the right thing."
"I took off my uniform and joined in with a riot, I'm not sure it's going to be okay, not this time." He looks down. "Anyway, what about you? How are things going?"
“Me and Rhys?” She thinks for a moment. “Good, all things considered. I feel a bit guilty about it really, everybody else lost so much, and here’s me about to start a family.”
“That’s life, I suppose. Can’t always be bad for everybody, wouldn’t be fair.”
“I think I’ve given up believing in right or fair.” Gwen looks away. “Right now I’d settle for not bloody awful.”
There's an awkward silence for a moment, then Andy says, “You want to go get a cup of tea or something?”
Gwen looks at the very slowly progressing work. “All right, twenty minutes, then I'll have to be back, make sure they don’t see anything they shouldn’t.”
The small cafe just off the Plas provides a reasonably good view of the work, and Gwen watches as another piece of twisted metal is lifted free of the wreckage while Andy gets the teas.
“You definitely going to rebuild then?” Andy nods towards the remains of the Hub as he puts two mugs down on the table.
“We have to.” Gwen smiles sadly, looking at the ruin of what had almost become like a second home to her in the past couple of years. “The aliens aren't just going to go away.”
“Bit like the hoodies hanging around Queen Street and Bute Park on a Friday night then.”
“You love it really.” Gwen laughs, glad to have something amusing like comparing weevils to chavs to distract her, even if it’s only for a moment. “You’ll be back out on the beat in no time.”
“I don't know if I want to.” Andy sighs, and drinks some of his tea. “The DI said things would go better if I apologised, just say I’m sorry and that I won't do it again.” He shakes his head. “I can’t though, I’d be lying, because I’d do it again if I had too. All those kids, it just wasn’t right.”
“You know Andy,” Gwen says thoughtfully. “If you don’t go back, there's a job for you with Torchwood, if you want it.”
“What me chasing round after aliens?” Andy laughs. “You must be joking.”
“Just think about it.” Gwen leans forward across the table. “It’d be like old times, you and me working together again.”
“You really mean it, don’t you?”
“There’s just me and Jack left now, we can’t run Torchwood by ourselves.” Gwen says sadly. “But I’m not giving up. I can’t. Owen and Tosh and Ianto died keeping this planet safe, and I’m not letting their deaths have been in vain.” She gives Andy a determined look, “Torchwood will be something again. No more secrets, no more being pushed around and lied to. It starts here, Andy, here in Cardiff, then London, then Glasgow, all the old offices open again, I’m going to make sure of it.”
Andy thinks for a moment before saying, “I wouldn’t have to go to London or Glasgow would I? I’d just be working in Cardiff.”
“So that’s a yes?” Gwen asks enthusiastically.
“I must be mad, but yes, I’m in.”
* * *
Depriving a person of coffee, Ianto decides, should be added to the Geneva Convention as something that's not allowed to happen to prisoners. Although given that his legal status is dead, Ianto isn’t sure that it would apply him anyway.
It's been over a week since Ianto woke up, and he's seen almost nobody since. His only real contact with the world being the uncommunicative doctor Alistair Munro, who'd been in the room when he'd woke. Since then Doctor Munro has been back three times to run tests, take more samples, and ignore all of Ianto's questions about what is going on and were he is.
The only other person that he’s seen has been a cleaner who’d arrived with an armed guard. She’d cleaned the room, changed the sheets on the bed and left, all without speaking a word.
The food, provided three time a day, continues to be healthy but bland, while the boredom is barely relieved by the few trashy novels he's been provided with after telling doctor Munro that he needed something more to do that look at blank walls all day.
Ianto knows that he's still tiring easily, his attempts at exercise leave him feeling breathless and exhausted after just few minutes. Getting over something that should have been fatal, Ianto supposes, takes time. Knowing that though doesn't stop the slow progress - because there is progress, Ianto knows he can manage more activity now than he could a few days ago - from being frustrating and demoralising.
Yet if the days are boring, then the nights are the worse. Long hours of either lying sleepless in the dark, loneliness and fear preventing him from getting any rest, or it's disturbed sleep, punctuated with vivid, horrendous nightmares about being pinned helpless under piles of rubble while his friends die around him. Images of the destruction of Torchwood one blurring with the abandoned building that had been destroyed by Captain John Hart with them inside, and the most resent explosion that had destroyed Hub.
Nightmares are nothing new, but waking and having to deal with them alone hasn’t been something Ianto’s had to do for months; since Owen and Tosh died there had been very few nights that he and Jack hadn't spent together.
Ianto is lying in bed, on what is, as far as he can tell, is his tenth night since woke up there, when there’s a commotion in the corridor outside the room.
Getting out of bed, Ianto listens at the door to the sound of indistinct shouting and running footsteps. As the disturbance gets closer Ianto is able to make out what is being said, although he doesn’t recognise any of the people speaking.
“…can’t do this. I work for UNIT.”
“It doesn’t matter who you worked for, you’re not leaving. Now, if you’ll just return to your room there’ll be no more trouble.”
“No! You can’t keep just me here.”
“I think you’ll find we can.”
“Who the hell are you people?”
“You really don’t need to know that.”
“I’ve got a family, a wife, two kids, please just let talk to them, tell them that I’m okay.”
The desperation in the man’s voice mirrors what Ianto is feeling, and Ianto finds it hard not to call out, to tell the man he’s not alone, and that they’re going to get out.
“That’s not going to be possible, there were no survivors from Thames House. It was a tragedy, and one that they families are trying to put behind them.”
“You bastards.”
There is the sound of a scuffle, and a few heavy blows being landed, before someone says, “Shit. What did you let him get your gun for?”
“I didn’t let him, he just-”
The sound of the gunshot in the narrow confines of the corridor is almost deafeningly loud and Ianto stumbles back from the door, a hand across his mouth.
A second shot sounds almost immediately afterwards, and is followed by the echoing of shoes on the tiled floor of the corridor.
“Waste of a promising subject.” Doctor Munro’s distinctive Scottish accent seems loud in the silence that follows the gunshot. “They’re not an unlimited resource you know, see this doesn’t happen again.”
Ianto is shivering as he gets back under the covers, a reaction as much to the chill room as to the callousness of the death that has happened just outside his door.
The realisation that he’s not the only survivor of the alien virus is both comforting and confusing. Until now Ianto had thought, maybe now he realises naively, that his survival had been due to Jack, that Jack had somehow saved him.
It’s no longer just a case of him escaping, he got to get the truth out, get the other people being held here out, before any more of them lose their lives.
part four
Characters/pairings: Ianto, Jack, Gwen, Rhys, Andy, various other characters introduced in CoE. Jack/Ianto and Gwen/Rhys
Rating: PG, maybe pg13ish in places.
Genre: Happy ended angst, hurt/comfort.
Summary: As Torchwood rebuilds following the events of CoE the government are still keeping secrets and it's up to Ianto to reveal the truth.
Spoilers: Children of Earth days 4 and 5.
Authors note: A CoE fix-it fic. Compound B67 as a name for Retcon appears in They Keep Killing Suzie. Also dodgy science is dodgy, but no more so than it already is in a lot of Torchwood episodes. I will try to update once a week, but a new baby means my posting schedule could be a bit erratic.
part one
part two
The cranes on the Plas have just started lifting the first sections of twisted metal from the ruins of the Hub when Andy arrives, walking over to Gwen who is watching the ongoing work from outside the Pierhead Building.
Gwen smiles and waves at Andy, before looking at his jeans and jumper, asking him, "You got a day off then?"
“Not exactly, I'm still on suspension, aren't I?” Andy leans back against the railing, next to Gwen. “All the disciplinary hearings got put back another month."
"It'll be all right." Gwen tries to reassure him. "They'll realise that you were only trying to do the right thing."
"I took off my uniform and joined in with a riot, I'm not sure it's going to be okay, not this time." He looks down. "Anyway, what about you? How are things going?"
“Me and Rhys?” She thinks for a moment. “Good, all things considered. I feel a bit guilty about it really, everybody else lost so much, and here’s me about to start a family.”
“That’s life, I suppose. Can’t always be bad for everybody, wouldn’t be fair.”
“I think I’ve given up believing in right or fair.” Gwen looks away. “Right now I’d settle for not bloody awful.”
There's an awkward silence for a moment, then Andy says, “You want to go get a cup of tea or something?”
Gwen looks at the very slowly progressing work. “All right, twenty minutes, then I'll have to be back, make sure they don’t see anything they shouldn’t.”
The small cafe just off the Plas provides a reasonably good view of the work, and Gwen watches as another piece of twisted metal is lifted free of the wreckage while Andy gets the teas.
“You definitely going to rebuild then?” Andy nods towards the remains of the Hub as he puts two mugs down on the table.
“We have to.” Gwen smiles sadly, looking at the ruin of what had almost become like a second home to her in the past couple of years. “The aliens aren't just going to go away.”
“Bit like the hoodies hanging around Queen Street and Bute Park on a Friday night then.”
“You love it really.” Gwen laughs, glad to have something amusing like comparing weevils to chavs to distract her, even if it’s only for a moment. “You’ll be back out on the beat in no time.”
“I don't know if I want to.” Andy sighs, and drinks some of his tea. “The DI said things would go better if I apologised, just say I’m sorry and that I won't do it again.” He shakes his head. “I can’t though, I’d be lying, because I’d do it again if I had too. All those kids, it just wasn’t right.”
“You know Andy,” Gwen says thoughtfully. “If you don’t go back, there's a job for you with Torchwood, if you want it.”
“What me chasing round after aliens?” Andy laughs. “You must be joking.”
“Just think about it.” Gwen leans forward across the table. “It’d be like old times, you and me working together again.”
“You really mean it, don’t you?”
“There’s just me and Jack left now, we can’t run Torchwood by ourselves.” Gwen says sadly. “But I’m not giving up. I can’t. Owen and Tosh and Ianto died keeping this planet safe, and I’m not letting their deaths have been in vain.” She gives Andy a determined look, “Torchwood will be something again. No more secrets, no more being pushed around and lied to. It starts here, Andy, here in Cardiff, then London, then Glasgow, all the old offices open again, I’m going to make sure of it.”
Andy thinks for a moment before saying, “I wouldn’t have to go to London or Glasgow would I? I’d just be working in Cardiff.”
“So that’s a yes?” Gwen asks enthusiastically.
“I must be mad, but yes, I’m in.”
* * *
Depriving a person of coffee, Ianto decides, should be added to the Geneva Convention as something that's not allowed to happen to prisoners. Although given that his legal status is dead, Ianto isn’t sure that it would apply him anyway.
It's been over a week since Ianto woke up, and he's seen almost nobody since. His only real contact with the world being the uncommunicative doctor Alistair Munro, who'd been in the room when he'd woke. Since then Doctor Munro has been back three times to run tests, take more samples, and ignore all of Ianto's questions about what is going on and were he is.
The only other person that he’s seen has been a cleaner who’d arrived with an armed guard. She’d cleaned the room, changed the sheets on the bed and left, all without speaking a word.
The food, provided three time a day, continues to be healthy but bland, while the boredom is barely relieved by the few trashy novels he's been provided with after telling doctor Munro that he needed something more to do that look at blank walls all day.
Ianto knows that he's still tiring easily, his attempts at exercise leave him feeling breathless and exhausted after just few minutes. Getting over something that should have been fatal, Ianto supposes, takes time. Knowing that though doesn't stop the slow progress - because there is progress, Ianto knows he can manage more activity now than he could a few days ago - from being frustrating and demoralising.
Yet if the days are boring, then the nights are the worse. Long hours of either lying sleepless in the dark, loneliness and fear preventing him from getting any rest, or it's disturbed sleep, punctuated with vivid, horrendous nightmares about being pinned helpless under piles of rubble while his friends die around him. Images of the destruction of Torchwood one blurring with the abandoned building that had been destroyed by Captain John Hart with them inside, and the most resent explosion that had destroyed Hub.
Nightmares are nothing new, but waking and having to deal with them alone hasn’t been something Ianto’s had to do for months; since Owen and Tosh died there had been very few nights that he and Jack hadn't spent together.
Ianto is lying in bed, on what is, as far as he can tell, is his tenth night since woke up there, when there’s a commotion in the corridor outside the room.
Getting out of bed, Ianto listens at the door to the sound of indistinct shouting and running footsteps. As the disturbance gets closer Ianto is able to make out what is being said, although he doesn’t recognise any of the people speaking.
“…can’t do this. I work for UNIT.”
“It doesn’t matter who you worked for, you’re not leaving. Now, if you’ll just return to your room there’ll be no more trouble.”
“No! You can’t keep just me here.”
“I think you’ll find we can.”
“Who the hell are you people?”
“You really don’t need to know that.”
“I’ve got a family, a wife, two kids, please just let talk to them, tell them that I’m okay.”
The desperation in the man’s voice mirrors what Ianto is feeling, and Ianto finds it hard not to call out, to tell the man he’s not alone, and that they’re going to get out.
“That’s not going to be possible, there were no survivors from Thames House. It was a tragedy, and one that they families are trying to put behind them.”
“You bastards.”
There is the sound of a scuffle, and a few heavy blows being landed, before someone says, “Shit. What did you let him get your gun for?”
“I didn’t let him, he just-”
The sound of the gunshot in the narrow confines of the corridor is almost deafeningly loud and Ianto stumbles back from the door, a hand across his mouth.
A second shot sounds almost immediately afterwards, and is followed by the echoing of shoes on the tiled floor of the corridor.
“Waste of a promising subject.” Doctor Munro’s distinctive Scottish accent seems loud in the silence that follows the gunshot. “They’re not an unlimited resource you know, see this doesn’t happen again.”
Ianto is shivering as he gets back under the covers, a reaction as much to the chill room as to the callousness of the death that has happened just outside his door.
The realisation that he’s not the only survivor of the alien virus is both comforting and confusing. Until now Ianto had thought, maybe now he realises naively, that his survival had been due to Jack, that Jack had somehow saved him.
It’s no longer just a case of him escaping, he got to get the truth out, get the other people being held here out, before any more of them lose their lives.
part four