trobadora: Precedence (Ten/Jack) [PG]
Title: Precedence
Author: trobadora
Challenge: 2010 Doctor/Jack Fest
Prompt used: Jack doesn't think much of monogamy. How does the Doctor feel about Jack's other lovers? How do they feel about the Doctor?
Rating: PG
Pairings: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness; Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones; Jack Harkness/Gwen Cooper UST
Series: Miracle
Spoilers/Warnings: none
Summary: There is no hierarchy in Jack's heart. (~4,200 words)
A/N: Unlike previous parts of this series, this one is very Torchwood-centric. Many thanks to wojelah for the help!
The "Miracle" Series: 1. Terrible - 2. Intent - 3. Sublimate - 4. Leave - 5. Precedence - 6. Spite Yourself - 7. Support - 8. Quiet Bower
~*~
Part 1
"Aha!" Jack grins at his wrist comp. He's finally out of whatever interfered with the Phyrillian signal - the third one this month - and he's got it now. It's only a street away.
He's about to call his team - they split up to cover more ground since it doesn't seem hostilities are likely - when he picks up a second signal. There's someone else, someone definitely not a Phyrillian.
Two hearts ...
And beneath it on the display, a complicated rounded Gallifreyan sigil indicating temporal synch. Synchronous timelines. The add-on the Doctor installed during his last visit is working: this isn't just the Doctor; this is his Doctor.
Considering the tangle both their timelines have become, that's good to know.
He turns the corner, and there he is. The Doctor's standing there, watching, and a Phyrillian mono-transport capsule is just taking off.
"Problem, Captain?" the Doctor asks pointedly as Jack comes to stand next to him, but his expression is warm.
Jack's lip twitches, wryly. The Doctor will never get past Torchwood's old agenda, will he? "Picked up someone coming through the Rift," he says casually. "The signature was clearly Phyrillian, so I didn't think there was going to be a problem unless they were seriously out of time, which the readings didn't indicate. But this is our city. We keep an eye on who comes and goes."
The Doctor scowls. "Fair enough," he allows. "Got it in hand, though. Gave her the coordinates and told her to get out of here."
Jack sighs. He'd have liked to talk to the Phyrillian, but that's the Doctor for you.
Besides, in the end, he'd have done the same thing: handed her the appropriate space charts and sent her off.
Jack raises his eyebrows. "You here for her or something else?" he asks.
The corner of the Doctor's lips quirks upwards. "I need to be going, actually," he says. "Busy, you know. People to save, corridors to run down ... But we've got a moment."
Jack wastes no time, steps close, closer until they're almost touching. He brushes his hand across the Doctor's cheek, buries his fingers in his hair and pulls him into a kiss. The Doctor meets him half-way: Before their lips are even touching, his hand is at the nape of Jack's neck, pulling him in even as he himself is pulled.
The kiss is brief, just lips meeting and a momentary tease of tongue-against-tongue, but they don't move apart: They stand close, their foreheads touching, breathing each other's breath.
Jack grins. "Hello there."
The Doctor scrunches his nose as his lips curl into a smile. "Stop it."
They stand that way for the longest time, something apart, in a separate space that's only for them. For just this moment, the rest of the world isn't quite there. Even the air between them feels different, warm and charged.
Their lips meet again, a slow, gentle kiss.
Of course, that's the moment when his team burst around the corner and skid to a halt, stunned.
He hears them more than he sees them; they're barely visible out of the corner of Jack's eyes, but they're clear in the Doctor's line of sight. Jack tenses, and he's not even sure why.
It's hardly the first time his team's run into him kissing someone. But this is different.
And of course, there's the Doctor, who's gone very still under his hands.
For a moment neither of them moves, and Jack realises that they're both waiting to see how the other will react. The Doctor twitches, and Jack's fingers are clenched tightly into the Doctor's hair, but they aren't moving, their lips still pressed against each other's.
After a moment, they relax into the kiss again, right here out in the open, for everyone to see.
Something that's been coiled tightly around Jack's heart seems to snap.
When they finally come apart, the Doctor's expression is sardonic. He says nothing, just lifts an eyebrow. Jack nods almost imperceptibly, and in perfect synch they let go of each other.
"See you soon." Jack's voice is soft, kiss-roughened.
"Bet on it."
It isn't until the Doctor has disappeared around the corner that Jack turns to his team. Gwen looks equal parts stunned and furious; Owen slightly bored, and Ianto has closed up. Tosh looks confused, as if she's trying and not quite managing to solve a puzzle. Jack suppresses the urge to roll his eyes.
"Who was that?" Gwen's tone is accusatory.
Jack waggles his eyebrows. "A very old friend."
"You greet all your friends like that?" Owen, sarcastic as ever.
Jack grins and steps right into his space. "Why, have I neglected you? Wait, I'll make it up to you." And reaches out for Owen, who dodges his hands and steps aside, grinning.
~*~
Part 2
They don't talk; they just banter as they make their way back to the SUV, as they drive back to the Hub. Jack would be perfectly content to leave it like this; he just wants to bask in the giddiness that comes from breaking open the separate parts of his life. Everything's spilling out into the open, and he hasn't felt this alive in a long time.
When did his life become this? When did it all break into pieces so completely that such a small thing can be such a great relief?
He's not even sure which is the greater relief: that his team finally know, or will know as soon as he actually gets out the words - or that the Doctor stood there in front of them and kept kissing him and didn't run.
Stayed with him, kept kissing him, and said good-bye in perfect mutual agreement.
Something inside him feels full to the bursting.
No, as far as he's concerned there's nothing to debate. Owen seems to share that opinion, from the way he rolls his eyes at Gwen's pinched expression. But there's no chance of that. This is the twenty-first century, after all, and as far as Jack's concerned in some respects it's positively prehistoric.
Nah. Prehistory was a lot more flexible.
~*~
When they arrive in the Hub, Ianto immediately disappears towards the coffee maker. Jack sighs, knowing he has a twenty-first-century style debate ahead of him. But before he can go after the guy, Gwen grabs him by the sleeve and pulls him into his office. She looks as if she'll explode if she can't get things out, and Jack makes a quick executive decision. Gwen first. All right.
As soon as the door is closed she bursts out: "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Her eyes are wide, and there's hurt beneath the anger. Hurt and a deep frustration he doesn't quite understand.
He pouts a little. "I didn't do anything!" Stalling for time.
She scowls at him. "Who is this bloke? I hope he's worth pushing Ianto away. That your choice? Because until this morning I thought you and Ianto actually had something going here. But I guess Ianto was right when he said you were just ... dabbling." She looks dubious and thoroughly disgusted.
Jack throws up his hands. What is it with this era and making everything into either/or? Why should one have to take precedence over the other? "I'm not pushing him away!"
Gwen is very obviously not buying it. "Yeah, right. You can't have it both ways!"
Now he's scowling as well. "The hell I can't."
And Gwen should know. She's made her own choice to have it both ways - and he understands that a lot better now. He gets why she couldn't retcon Rhys again, gets it because oh, this is such a relief, finally not living a double life any more. Having it all.
Besides, Jack is sure Ianto's not one of those people incapable of anything but monogamy.
At the very least, he's sure he can bring Ianto around to his point of view.
Gwen thwaps him on the chest with the back of her hand. "You're an idiot, Jack Harkness, you know that?"
He raises his eyebrows in challenge. "Before you dragged me in here I was going to talk to Ianto. You think Ianto'd break things off over this?"
"No." That didn't take even a moment's thought. "No, and that's all the worse. He'll go along with whatever you want. Why are you doing this to him?"
Jack knows perfectly well that she's not just talking about Ianto. She's taking this a bit personally herself, and well, she's got the right. But seriously, what the hell?
"You think he's that jealous? Come on."
Gwen's eyes go wide, and it's then that Jack realises they've been talking at cross purposes. His frustration with 21st century sexual mores has been getting in the way.
Cold certainty drowns out the last of the giddy joy, and he finally sees things clearly.
For all that this is a step forward for him and the Doctor, now something else is threatening to slip through his fingers.
When Gwen says, "Jealous?", in an incredulous voice, it's only confirmation of what he already knows. She thwaps him again. "Are you really that daft? It's not about who you're sleeping with, you moron!"
Whether or not Ianto'd be bothered that he's sleeping with someone else - he's worried about his own place in Jack's life. Because that kiss couldn't have left any doubts that whatever there is between him and the Doctor, it isn't casual.
"Fuck," he says eloquently. Then he pulls Gwen into a tight hug. "I'm sorry," he whispers into her hair. "We're all ... Damn, cross-cultural affairs are a lot easier with aliens. The more different from us the better. At least then no one expects everyone to be the same."
Gwen returns his hug a bit tentatively. When he lets her go again, her anger seems to have evaporated. But the dubious expression hasn't gone away. "He'll never say anything," she says quietly.
"I'll talk to him," Jack promises.
Gwen smiles a little. "And say what? Because if you're as serious about that other bloke as it looked ..." She shakes her head. "You are, aren't you?"
Jack grins, and the warm feeling in his chest returns. "Since forever, it feels like. He's ..." He shrugs a little helplessly. "Gwen, he's the Doctor."
She gapes at him. "Your Doctor?" And when he nods, "Oh." She looks down for a moment. Then she brushes her hair out of her eyes and faces him, resolution in her expression. "Let him down easy, all right? Ianto, I mean. Don't drag it out."
Jack rolls his eyes at her, good-naturedly. "What, I'm not enough for more than one person?"
She scowls. "Stop it with the joking."
This time, Jack can't suppress his irritation. He slams his palm on the table in frustration. "I'm not! What the hell is so hard to get about this? Your century is really annoying sometimes."
Gwen flinches back a little. And what's on her face now is confusion more than anything else.
Jack wishes he could kiss her and show her how silly that artificial dichotomy is, but that's not how things are between them. And they won't be, no matter that part of Jack - part of her, even - wishes otherwise.
From the way you talk ... Let me guess, Gwen and Ianto, the Doctor had said one day, bouncing like a little kid. Excited and utterly convinced of his own cleverness, utterly sure that he'd got it right.
And he hadn't been wrong. Not entirely.
Still: The latter, he'd replied. And grinned at the Doctor's skeptical expression, definitely flattered by his belief in Jack's ability to seduce anyone and everyone.
Not that the Doctor had been entirely wrong there either. But Jack had never seriously tried with Gwen.
She deserves better than to have that kind of pressure put on her, not when her instincts so clearly are for monogamy. Her brief, ill-fated affair with Owen proved that to Jack quite plainly.
Gwen's with someone else, he'd explained.
The Doctor had smiled a little condescendingly. So? Then he'd slapped his forehead. Oh! Twenty-first century woman, is she?
And that summed it up rather neatly, Jack thinks ruefully. For all that she's an exceptional woman in many respects, Gwen is firmly grounded in her own culture's mainstream.
Well. Nothing wrong about that. Nothing at all, except that she still hasn't fully grown out of applying those standards to others.
"Why do you all have to think so small?" he huffs. "Why do you have to whittle away at everything until it fits into a neat little box? And why are the boxes you have all so tiny?"
Gwen blinks, surprised at his uncharacteristic outburst.
"Seriously," he continues. "Not that I haven't seen how far things have come over the last century or so. But ... dammit, at least get a bigger box, all right?" He sighs. "I'm tired of being cut into pieces."
She reaches out as if to touch his shoulder, lets her arm fall away again. "What are you saying?"
"It's not a competition, Gwen. The Doctor ..." He smiles to himself. "It's complicated, between us, but that's just us. It wasn't any less complicated when we weren't shagging. And that takes nothing away from Ianto. All right?"
She looks dubious. "You really mean that."
"Yep."
"And Ianto?"
"Ianto's an idiot." Really, the guy deserves a good spanking for thinking this would make a difference. As if his place in Jack's life depended on Jack having nothing else.
At Gwen's glare, he relents. "I'll sort it." His tone brooks no arguments.
She stares at him for a long moment, but finally nods. "I don't ..." She shrugs, helplessly.
"Stop thinking so small."
Gwen smiles, tentatively. "Get a bigger box?" she suggests, a little self-consciously.
He grins widely, claps her shoulder, then pulls her into a hug. "Get a bigger box," he confirms.
~*~
Part 3
They leave his office, Gwen going over to her desk while Jack scans the room. Ianto's staring intently at a computer screen. It's in the set of his shoulders, the stiffness of his neck, the unmoving, unblinking stare of his eyes - he's very deliberately not looking, pretending to be busy, pretending not to care.
Jack sighs.
On the way over, he leans over Tosh's shoulder and sees just what he expected: She's going through the database, trying to ID the Doctor on a hunch.
Records from Torchwood One. She's close, probably going by a half-remembered surveillance picture. But she clearly can't remember when the picture she's seen before was taken.
"July 2007," he whispers into her ear.
She turns around, stares. For a moment, excitement bubbles up in her eyes, then her face falls. She's realised what that date means.
The Battle of Canary Wharf.
Still, the look she gives him as he moves on is grateful. Didn't expect to be given a hint, clearly.
But the Doctor's not a secret to be hidden from his team. Nor something too painful to talk about. Not any more.
It feels good, having it all out, finally.
But now for the less pleasant part.
After all that he's been through with the Doctor, when did this here with Ianto become the difficult relationship?
But for once, he's not worried about the Doctor at all.
He claps Ianto on the shoulder. "Come along."
"Er." Ianto's cool expression falters a little. But he doesn't argue; he stands immediately. "Right, then."
They leave the Hub via the Invisible Lift, and Jack doesn't miss that Ianto keeps sneaking little glances at him as the slab of concrete slowly rises toward Roald Dahl Plass, but carefully maintains his calm whenever Jack openly looks at him.
Jack suppresses his growing anger. He wraps an arm around Ianto's shoulder, pulls him close, and after a moment Ianto relaxes enough against him to let their bodies move in synch as they walk across the Plass toward the waterfront.
It's late afternoon, and there are a lot of people around, which is just what Jack wanted. This, too, is something that needs to be done out in the open.
They come to stand at the guard rail and look out in silence at the grey water of the bay, side by side. Ianto's face is closed, but now that he's clued in, Jack can see perfectly well what's behind it. Ianto's eyes are wide, and the fear echoed in them isn't just I'm afraid you love him more. This is full-out You've pulled the rug out from under my feet and impending doom.
But he's not saying anything. Won't say anything, Jack is sure. As if Jack would think less of him for caring.
Jack would like to grab him by the shoulders and shake that idiocy out of him. But he merely slaps him lightly on the back of his head.
Ianto makes a small startled noise, and he looks at Jack in confusion.
Good. Confusion's much better than that dreadful sense of certainty he's been seeing.
"I've known him for a long time," Jack says abruptly. "He visits every now and then."
Ianto looks away. "He is ... going to be around, then?" he asks carefully.
"Doesn't live anywhere near around here. Last half-year or so, he's been here a handful of times at the most. Think you can put up with that?" Jack feels Ianto's surprised jerk, and what he sees in his eyes is an almost desperate hope. He baps him on the back of the head again. "Quit that," he says, a little more harshly than he intended.
Gwen was right. Ianto would go along with anything. He expected to be dumped; he'd take anything over that. But that doesn't mean he'll be all right.
Jack pulls Ianto in for a kiss. Ianto is tense only for a moment; he yields almost immediately. And for some reason, that only infuriates Jack further. He clamps down on the anger. Much as he wants to settle this, he knows that if he steps wrong he could do serious damage here.
"Did you really think I couldn't find a regular shag elsewhere? Don't need you for that," he says harshly, and smiles in furious satisfaction as Ianto flinches away. He doesn't let him move away more than a few inches, clamps his hands tightly around the man's shoulders. "You really thought you'd get to me that way?"
Ianto is blinking furiously, struggling for control. "I don't -" He chokes on the protest.
"You were so bent on making yourself indispensable," Jack continues relentlessly. "I didn't know why, back then, just thought you needed direction. Turned out more true than I thought. But then, we didn't know all that much about each other then, did we?" That hits home too.
Ianto finally rips himself out of Jack's grip, and Jack lets him. Jack watches as Ianto stands at the guard rail, gripping the metal tightly, his knuckles white, his face turned out to the sea but his eyes unseeing. Finally he takes a deep, shuddering breath. He turns around, looks Jack in the face, terrified and brave. "Why don't you just say it."
Jack steps closer, smiles warmly. He lifts a hand and cups Ianto's face gently, watches confusion creep into the mix of emotions in Ianto's expression. "I don't need you because of what you do for me," he says quietly. "Not that I don't appreciate that part." His eyes rake over Ianto's body for a moment.
Ianto makes a choked noise.
"That why you're with me?" Jack demands. "Because I gave you a place? For Lisa, for yourself. Because it's something to do? Because I get you off?" A saucy wink.
Ianto makes an abrupt gesture. "It's not -" He swallows visibly. His mouth opens, then closes again. "I've never met anyone like you," he says helplessly.
He doesn't need to add, I don't have any idea why you'd want me - Jack hears it perfectly clearly.
Which is good, because Ianto would probably rather shoot himself in the head than admit to that.
The idiot. Something inside him clenches.
He has no idea why the hell Ianto thinks he's so amazing, and he knows he'll never be able to live up to the hero worship, not in the long run. But then, he knows that it's possible to love someone even when they fall off the pedestal you've built for them. So he supposes there's hope.
Besides, Ianto's already called him a monster once. If he could get past that ...
Jack pulls Ianto into a tight hug. Ianto clings to him, and he clings right back. He has to close his eyes for a moment, takes a deep, shuddering breath.
When they come apart, Ianto smiles at him a littly shyly. Jack can see him rearranging his mental landscape, adjusting. Then, abruptly, "Gwen's mad at you, isn't she?"
Jack smiles, a little self-deprecatingly. "Not any more, I hope."
Ianto merely nods. He opens his mouth; closes it again. "I'm not," he says eventually. There's almost a challenge in his eyes now.
"Are we good, then?"
A nod. Jack breathes a sigh of relief, answering Ianto's small smile with one of his own.
Ianto throws him a hesitant look then, turns away again.
So many things unsaid.
"You can ask," Jack offers.
Ianto twitches uncomfortably, moves away from him a bit. "I've seen you kiss people. But never like that."
Jack grins. "You haven't seen me kissing you." Anything else Ianto has seen was casual; this between them matters. Jack's thoughts turn speculative. "We should set up proper cameras - the surveillance ones really don't do much for aesthetics. What do you think?" He winks.
Ianto blushes. Then he looks away again. His lips are pressed together. Jack can almost see his mind working furiously. "You said he visits. I expect you will be ... unavailable ... at those times? I would appreciate a warning, in that case."
Jack presses his lips against Ianto's, a gentle kiss. Ianto's lips soften against his almost immediately. "I'm not going to sideline you whenever he turns up. You're not playing second fiddle, idiot."
For a moment, Ianto looks confused and very young. Then his expression closes up into a mask of formality. "I'm not objecting to your ... priorities," he says a little stiffly. "But if it's all the same to you, I'd really rather prefer to be aware of the rules."
Jack stares at him for a moment, stunned. Then he lets go of Ianto, leans back against the guard rail, turns his face to the sky and laughs, convulsively, helplessly and possibly a little hysterically. Several passers-by give him strange looks. Deservedly so.
Oh dear, he's turned into the Doctor.
When he looks at Ianto again, the boy seems a little hurt. Jack sighs and pulls him in again. Ianto is tense, but he comes without resistance. "I'm sorry. I just ... I know how that feels, all right? I never meant to turn around and do it to you."
Ianto jerks away, blinks at him. "You mean ..."
"I mean there's people even worse at sharing than I am." Jack winks at him. "All right, you want rules? Here's how it works: This, right here, is my life. I'm not walking out on it; it doesn't come second to anything; I wouldn't want to lose it for the world. That enough?"
Ianto nods, tentatively.
"And as for the rest - you're wrong about the priorities. You can't put relationships in a hierarchy." He sighs. What takes precedence? Each of them, all of them. Everything for its own sake, and each moment in its time. There is no hierarchy in his heart. "The people that really matter? You can't rank them. All right?"
Ianto seems to be looking right into him. Finally he nods. "Right."
"See? We're getting there." He winks at Ianto, pouts a little. "Even with all the annoying attitudes so common in this century."
Ianto looks at him with obvious surprise. "I never thought ..." he says eventually, slowly. "It can't be easy, living in a time and a culture not your own. We must all seem terribly backwards to you." He looks to the side, blushes a little.
"Nah." Jack smirks. "Torchwood is good for that, you know. Once people wrap their minds around the weekly alien incursions, more ... human ... transgressions just aren't the same any more." He shrugs. "Still tiresome, though. Cramping my style." He leers playfully.
Ianto purses his lips, almost hiding a small smile. "Can take people out of their century; can't change the way they were socialised."
Smart boy.
"Sadly." He offers a wicked grin. "Though I'm doing my best."
"I'll bet you are."
They smile at each other. Jack holds out his arm, and Ianto steps right into it. Jack reels him in closer with a hand on the nape of his neck, rests his forehead against Ianto's. They stand quietly, breathing each other in for the longest time, close and intimate, letting the tension bleed away, oblivious to any passers-by.
Eventually they'll have to move again. But not now.
~end~
The "Miracle" Series: 1. Terrible - 2. Intent - 3. Sublimate - 4. Leave - 5. Precedence - 6. Spite Yourself - 7. Support - 8. Quiet Bower
Author: trobadora
Challenge: 2010 Doctor/Jack Fest
Prompt used: Jack doesn't think much of monogamy. How does the Doctor feel about Jack's other lovers? How do they feel about the Doctor?
Rating: PG
Pairings: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness; Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones; Jack Harkness/Gwen Cooper UST
Series: Miracle
Spoilers/Warnings: none
Summary: There is no hierarchy in Jack's heart. (~4,200 words)
A/N: Unlike previous parts of this series, this one is very Torchwood-centric. Many thanks to wojelah for the help!
The "Miracle" Series: 1. Terrible - 2. Intent - 3. Sublimate - 4. Leave - 5. Precedence - 6. Spite Yourself - 7. Support - 8. Quiet Bower
~*~
Part 1
"Aha!" Jack grins at his wrist comp. He's finally out of whatever interfered with the Phyrillian signal - the third one this month - and he's got it now. It's only a street away.
He's about to call his team - they split up to cover more ground since it doesn't seem hostilities are likely - when he picks up a second signal. There's someone else, someone definitely not a Phyrillian.
Two hearts ...
And beneath it on the display, a complicated rounded Gallifreyan sigil indicating temporal synch. Synchronous timelines. The add-on the Doctor installed during his last visit is working: this isn't just the Doctor; this is his Doctor.
Considering the tangle both their timelines have become, that's good to know.
He turns the corner, and there he is. The Doctor's standing there, watching, and a Phyrillian mono-transport capsule is just taking off.
"Problem, Captain?" the Doctor asks pointedly as Jack comes to stand next to him, but his expression is warm.
Jack's lip twitches, wryly. The Doctor will never get past Torchwood's old agenda, will he? "Picked up someone coming through the Rift," he says casually. "The signature was clearly Phyrillian, so I didn't think there was going to be a problem unless they were seriously out of time, which the readings didn't indicate. But this is our city. We keep an eye on who comes and goes."
The Doctor scowls. "Fair enough," he allows. "Got it in hand, though. Gave her the coordinates and told her to get out of here."
Jack sighs. He'd have liked to talk to the Phyrillian, but that's the Doctor for you.
Besides, in the end, he'd have done the same thing: handed her the appropriate space charts and sent her off.
Jack raises his eyebrows. "You here for her or something else?" he asks.
The corner of the Doctor's lips quirks upwards. "I need to be going, actually," he says. "Busy, you know. People to save, corridors to run down ... But we've got a moment."
Jack wastes no time, steps close, closer until they're almost touching. He brushes his hand across the Doctor's cheek, buries his fingers in his hair and pulls him into a kiss. The Doctor meets him half-way: Before their lips are even touching, his hand is at the nape of Jack's neck, pulling him in even as he himself is pulled.
The kiss is brief, just lips meeting and a momentary tease of tongue-against-tongue, but they don't move apart: They stand close, their foreheads touching, breathing each other's breath.
Jack grins. "Hello there."
The Doctor scrunches his nose as his lips curl into a smile. "Stop it."
They stand that way for the longest time, something apart, in a separate space that's only for them. For just this moment, the rest of the world isn't quite there. Even the air between them feels different, warm and charged.
Their lips meet again, a slow, gentle kiss.
Of course, that's the moment when his team burst around the corner and skid to a halt, stunned.
He hears them more than he sees them; they're barely visible out of the corner of Jack's eyes, but they're clear in the Doctor's line of sight. Jack tenses, and he's not even sure why.
It's hardly the first time his team's run into him kissing someone. But this is different.
And of course, there's the Doctor, who's gone very still under his hands.
For a moment neither of them moves, and Jack realises that they're both waiting to see how the other will react. The Doctor twitches, and Jack's fingers are clenched tightly into the Doctor's hair, but they aren't moving, their lips still pressed against each other's.
After a moment, they relax into the kiss again, right here out in the open, for everyone to see.
Something that's been coiled tightly around Jack's heart seems to snap.
When they finally come apart, the Doctor's expression is sardonic. He says nothing, just lifts an eyebrow. Jack nods almost imperceptibly, and in perfect synch they let go of each other.
"See you soon." Jack's voice is soft, kiss-roughened.
"Bet on it."
It isn't until the Doctor has disappeared around the corner that Jack turns to his team. Gwen looks equal parts stunned and furious; Owen slightly bored, and Ianto has closed up. Tosh looks confused, as if she's trying and not quite managing to solve a puzzle. Jack suppresses the urge to roll his eyes.
"Who was that?" Gwen's tone is accusatory.
Jack waggles his eyebrows. "A very old friend."
"You greet all your friends like that?" Owen, sarcastic as ever.
Jack grins and steps right into his space. "Why, have I neglected you? Wait, I'll make it up to you." And reaches out for Owen, who dodges his hands and steps aside, grinning.
~*~
Part 2
They don't talk; they just banter as they make their way back to the SUV, as they drive back to the Hub. Jack would be perfectly content to leave it like this; he just wants to bask in the giddiness that comes from breaking open the separate parts of his life. Everything's spilling out into the open, and he hasn't felt this alive in a long time.
When did his life become this? When did it all break into pieces so completely that such a small thing can be such a great relief?
He's not even sure which is the greater relief: that his team finally know, or will know as soon as he actually gets out the words - or that the Doctor stood there in front of them and kept kissing him and didn't run.
Stayed with him, kept kissing him, and said good-bye in perfect mutual agreement.
Something inside him feels full to the bursting.
No, as far as he's concerned there's nothing to debate. Owen seems to share that opinion, from the way he rolls his eyes at Gwen's pinched expression. But there's no chance of that. This is the twenty-first century, after all, and as far as Jack's concerned in some respects it's positively prehistoric.
Nah. Prehistory was a lot more flexible.
~*~
When they arrive in the Hub, Ianto immediately disappears towards the coffee maker. Jack sighs, knowing he has a twenty-first-century style debate ahead of him. But before he can go after the guy, Gwen grabs him by the sleeve and pulls him into his office. She looks as if she'll explode if she can't get things out, and Jack makes a quick executive decision. Gwen first. All right.
As soon as the door is closed she bursts out: "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Her eyes are wide, and there's hurt beneath the anger. Hurt and a deep frustration he doesn't quite understand.
He pouts a little. "I didn't do anything!" Stalling for time.
She scowls at him. "Who is this bloke? I hope he's worth pushing Ianto away. That your choice? Because until this morning I thought you and Ianto actually had something going here. But I guess Ianto was right when he said you were just ... dabbling." She looks dubious and thoroughly disgusted.
Jack throws up his hands. What is it with this era and making everything into either/or? Why should one have to take precedence over the other? "I'm not pushing him away!"
Gwen is very obviously not buying it. "Yeah, right. You can't have it both ways!"
Now he's scowling as well. "The hell I can't."
And Gwen should know. She's made her own choice to have it both ways - and he understands that a lot better now. He gets why she couldn't retcon Rhys again, gets it because oh, this is such a relief, finally not living a double life any more. Having it all.
Besides, Jack is sure Ianto's not one of those people incapable of anything but monogamy.
At the very least, he's sure he can bring Ianto around to his point of view.
Gwen thwaps him on the chest with the back of her hand. "You're an idiot, Jack Harkness, you know that?"
He raises his eyebrows in challenge. "Before you dragged me in here I was going to talk to Ianto. You think Ianto'd break things off over this?"
"No." That didn't take even a moment's thought. "No, and that's all the worse. He'll go along with whatever you want. Why are you doing this to him?"
Jack knows perfectly well that she's not just talking about Ianto. She's taking this a bit personally herself, and well, she's got the right. But seriously, what the hell?
"You think he's that jealous? Come on."
Gwen's eyes go wide, and it's then that Jack realises they've been talking at cross purposes. His frustration with 21st century sexual mores has been getting in the way.
Cold certainty drowns out the last of the giddy joy, and he finally sees things clearly.
For all that this is a step forward for him and the Doctor, now something else is threatening to slip through his fingers.
When Gwen says, "Jealous?", in an incredulous voice, it's only confirmation of what he already knows. She thwaps him again. "Are you really that daft? It's not about who you're sleeping with, you moron!"
Whether or not Ianto'd be bothered that he's sleeping with someone else - he's worried about his own place in Jack's life. Because that kiss couldn't have left any doubts that whatever there is between him and the Doctor, it isn't casual.
"Fuck," he says eloquently. Then he pulls Gwen into a tight hug. "I'm sorry," he whispers into her hair. "We're all ... Damn, cross-cultural affairs are a lot easier with aliens. The more different from us the better. At least then no one expects everyone to be the same."
Gwen returns his hug a bit tentatively. When he lets her go again, her anger seems to have evaporated. But the dubious expression hasn't gone away. "He'll never say anything," she says quietly.
"I'll talk to him," Jack promises.
Gwen smiles a little. "And say what? Because if you're as serious about that other bloke as it looked ..." She shakes her head. "You are, aren't you?"
Jack grins, and the warm feeling in his chest returns. "Since forever, it feels like. He's ..." He shrugs a little helplessly. "Gwen, he's the Doctor."
She gapes at him. "Your Doctor?" And when he nods, "Oh." She looks down for a moment. Then she brushes her hair out of her eyes and faces him, resolution in her expression. "Let him down easy, all right? Ianto, I mean. Don't drag it out."
Jack rolls his eyes at her, good-naturedly. "What, I'm not enough for more than one person?"
She scowls. "Stop it with the joking."
This time, Jack can't suppress his irritation. He slams his palm on the table in frustration. "I'm not! What the hell is so hard to get about this? Your century is really annoying sometimes."
Gwen flinches back a little. And what's on her face now is confusion more than anything else.
Jack wishes he could kiss her and show her how silly that artificial dichotomy is, but that's not how things are between them. And they won't be, no matter that part of Jack - part of her, even - wishes otherwise.
From the way you talk ... Let me guess, Gwen and Ianto, the Doctor had said one day, bouncing like a little kid. Excited and utterly convinced of his own cleverness, utterly sure that he'd got it right.
And he hadn't been wrong. Not entirely.
Still: The latter, he'd replied. And grinned at the Doctor's skeptical expression, definitely flattered by his belief in Jack's ability to seduce anyone and everyone.
Not that the Doctor had been entirely wrong there either. But Jack had never seriously tried with Gwen.
She deserves better than to have that kind of pressure put on her, not when her instincts so clearly are for monogamy. Her brief, ill-fated affair with Owen proved that to Jack quite plainly.
Gwen's with someone else, he'd explained.
The Doctor had smiled a little condescendingly. So? Then he'd slapped his forehead. Oh! Twenty-first century woman, is she?
And that summed it up rather neatly, Jack thinks ruefully. For all that she's an exceptional woman in many respects, Gwen is firmly grounded in her own culture's mainstream.
Well. Nothing wrong about that. Nothing at all, except that she still hasn't fully grown out of applying those standards to others.
"Why do you all have to think so small?" he huffs. "Why do you have to whittle away at everything until it fits into a neat little box? And why are the boxes you have all so tiny?"
Gwen blinks, surprised at his uncharacteristic outburst.
"Seriously," he continues. "Not that I haven't seen how far things have come over the last century or so. But ... dammit, at least get a bigger box, all right?" He sighs. "I'm tired of being cut into pieces."
She reaches out as if to touch his shoulder, lets her arm fall away again. "What are you saying?"
"It's not a competition, Gwen. The Doctor ..." He smiles to himself. "It's complicated, between us, but that's just us. It wasn't any less complicated when we weren't shagging. And that takes nothing away from Ianto. All right?"
She looks dubious. "You really mean that."
"Yep."
"And Ianto?"
"Ianto's an idiot." Really, the guy deserves a good spanking for thinking this would make a difference. As if his place in Jack's life depended on Jack having nothing else.
At Gwen's glare, he relents. "I'll sort it." His tone brooks no arguments.
She stares at him for a long moment, but finally nods. "I don't ..." She shrugs, helplessly.
"Stop thinking so small."
Gwen smiles, tentatively. "Get a bigger box?" she suggests, a little self-consciously.
He grins widely, claps her shoulder, then pulls her into a hug. "Get a bigger box," he confirms.
~*~
Part 3
They leave his office, Gwen going over to her desk while Jack scans the room. Ianto's staring intently at a computer screen. It's in the set of his shoulders, the stiffness of his neck, the unmoving, unblinking stare of his eyes - he's very deliberately not looking, pretending to be busy, pretending not to care.
Jack sighs.
On the way over, he leans over Tosh's shoulder and sees just what he expected: She's going through the database, trying to ID the Doctor on a hunch.
Records from Torchwood One. She's close, probably going by a half-remembered surveillance picture. But she clearly can't remember when the picture she's seen before was taken.
"July 2007," he whispers into her ear.
She turns around, stares. For a moment, excitement bubbles up in her eyes, then her face falls. She's realised what that date means.
The Battle of Canary Wharf.
Still, the look she gives him as he moves on is grateful. Didn't expect to be given a hint, clearly.
But the Doctor's not a secret to be hidden from his team. Nor something too painful to talk about. Not any more.
It feels good, having it all out, finally.
But now for the less pleasant part.
After all that he's been through with the Doctor, when did this here with Ianto become the difficult relationship?
But for once, he's not worried about the Doctor at all.
He claps Ianto on the shoulder. "Come along."
"Er." Ianto's cool expression falters a little. But he doesn't argue; he stands immediately. "Right, then."
They leave the Hub via the Invisible Lift, and Jack doesn't miss that Ianto keeps sneaking little glances at him as the slab of concrete slowly rises toward Roald Dahl Plass, but carefully maintains his calm whenever Jack openly looks at him.
Jack suppresses his growing anger. He wraps an arm around Ianto's shoulder, pulls him close, and after a moment Ianto relaxes enough against him to let their bodies move in synch as they walk across the Plass toward the waterfront.
It's late afternoon, and there are a lot of people around, which is just what Jack wanted. This, too, is something that needs to be done out in the open.
They come to stand at the guard rail and look out in silence at the grey water of the bay, side by side. Ianto's face is closed, but now that he's clued in, Jack can see perfectly well what's behind it. Ianto's eyes are wide, and the fear echoed in them isn't just I'm afraid you love him more. This is full-out You've pulled the rug out from under my feet and impending doom.
But he's not saying anything. Won't say anything, Jack is sure. As if Jack would think less of him for caring.
Jack would like to grab him by the shoulders and shake that idiocy out of him. But he merely slaps him lightly on the back of his head.
Ianto makes a small startled noise, and he looks at Jack in confusion.
Good. Confusion's much better than that dreadful sense of certainty he's been seeing.
"I've known him for a long time," Jack says abruptly. "He visits every now and then."
Ianto looks away. "He is ... going to be around, then?" he asks carefully.
"Doesn't live anywhere near around here. Last half-year or so, he's been here a handful of times at the most. Think you can put up with that?" Jack feels Ianto's surprised jerk, and what he sees in his eyes is an almost desperate hope. He baps him on the back of the head again. "Quit that," he says, a little more harshly than he intended.
Gwen was right. Ianto would go along with anything. He expected to be dumped; he'd take anything over that. But that doesn't mean he'll be all right.
Jack pulls Ianto in for a kiss. Ianto is tense only for a moment; he yields almost immediately. And for some reason, that only infuriates Jack further. He clamps down on the anger. Much as he wants to settle this, he knows that if he steps wrong he could do serious damage here.
"Did you really think I couldn't find a regular shag elsewhere? Don't need you for that," he says harshly, and smiles in furious satisfaction as Ianto flinches away. He doesn't let him move away more than a few inches, clamps his hands tightly around the man's shoulders. "You really thought you'd get to me that way?"
Ianto is blinking furiously, struggling for control. "I don't -" He chokes on the protest.
"You were so bent on making yourself indispensable," Jack continues relentlessly. "I didn't know why, back then, just thought you needed direction. Turned out more true than I thought. But then, we didn't know all that much about each other then, did we?" That hits home too.
Ianto finally rips himself out of Jack's grip, and Jack lets him. Jack watches as Ianto stands at the guard rail, gripping the metal tightly, his knuckles white, his face turned out to the sea but his eyes unseeing. Finally he takes a deep, shuddering breath. He turns around, looks Jack in the face, terrified and brave. "Why don't you just say it."
Jack steps closer, smiles warmly. He lifts a hand and cups Ianto's face gently, watches confusion creep into the mix of emotions in Ianto's expression. "I don't need you because of what you do for me," he says quietly. "Not that I don't appreciate that part." His eyes rake over Ianto's body for a moment.
Ianto makes a choked noise.
"That why you're with me?" Jack demands. "Because I gave you a place? For Lisa, for yourself. Because it's something to do? Because I get you off?" A saucy wink.
Ianto makes an abrupt gesture. "It's not -" He swallows visibly. His mouth opens, then closes again. "I've never met anyone like you," he says helplessly.
He doesn't need to add, I don't have any idea why you'd want me - Jack hears it perfectly clearly.
Which is good, because Ianto would probably rather shoot himself in the head than admit to that.
The idiot. Something inside him clenches.
He has no idea why the hell Ianto thinks he's so amazing, and he knows he'll never be able to live up to the hero worship, not in the long run. But then, he knows that it's possible to love someone even when they fall off the pedestal you've built for them. So he supposes there's hope.
Besides, Ianto's already called him a monster once. If he could get past that ...
Jack pulls Ianto into a tight hug. Ianto clings to him, and he clings right back. He has to close his eyes for a moment, takes a deep, shuddering breath.
When they come apart, Ianto smiles at him a littly shyly. Jack can see him rearranging his mental landscape, adjusting. Then, abruptly, "Gwen's mad at you, isn't she?"
Jack smiles, a little self-deprecatingly. "Not any more, I hope."
Ianto merely nods. He opens his mouth; closes it again. "I'm not," he says eventually. There's almost a challenge in his eyes now.
"Are we good, then?"
A nod. Jack breathes a sigh of relief, answering Ianto's small smile with one of his own.
Ianto throws him a hesitant look then, turns away again.
So many things unsaid.
"You can ask," Jack offers.
Ianto twitches uncomfortably, moves away from him a bit. "I've seen you kiss people. But never like that."
Jack grins. "You haven't seen me kissing you." Anything else Ianto has seen was casual; this between them matters. Jack's thoughts turn speculative. "We should set up proper cameras - the surveillance ones really don't do much for aesthetics. What do you think?" He winks.
Ianto blushes. Then he looks away again. His lips are pressed together. Jack can almost see his mind working furiously. "You said he visits. I expect you will be ... unavailable ... at those times? I would appreciate a warning, in that case."
Jack presses his lips against Ianto's, a gentle kiss. Ianto's lips soften against his almost immediately. "I'm not going to sideline you whenever he turns up. You're not playing second fiddle, idiot."
For a moment, Ianto looks confused and very young. Then his expression closes up into a mask of formality. "I'm not objecting to your ... priorities," he says a little stiffly. "But if it's all the same to you, I'd really rather prefer to be aware of the rules."
Jack stares at him for a moment, stunned. Then he lets go of Ianto, leans back against the guard rail, turns his face to the sky and laughs, convulsively, helplessly and possibly a little hysterically. Several passers-by give him strange looks. Deservedly so.
Oh dear, he's turned into the Doctor.
When he looks at Ianto again, the boy seems a little hurt. Jack sighs and pulls him in again. Ianto is tense, but he comes without resistance. "I'm sorry. I just ... I know how that feels, all right? I never meant to turn around and do it to you."
Ianto jerks away, blinks at him. "You mean ..."
"I mean there's people even worse at sharing than I am." Jack winks at him. "All right, you want rules? Here's how it works: This, right here, is my life. I'm not walking out on it; it doesn't come second to anything; I wouldn't want to lose it for the world. That enough?"
Ianto nods, tentatively.
"And as for the rest - you're wrong about the priorities. You can't put relationships in a hierarchy." He sighs. What takes precedence? Each of them, all of them. Everything for its own sake, and each moment in its time. There is no hierarchy in his heart. "The people that really matter? You can't rank them. All right?"
Ianto seems to be looking right into him. Finally he nods. "Right."
"See? We're getting there." He winks at Ianto, pouts a little. "Even with all the annoying attitudes so common in this century."
Ianto looks at him with obvious surprise. "I never thought ..." he says eventually, slowly. "It can't be easy, living in a time and a culture not your own. We must all seem terribly backwards to you." He looks to the side, blushes a little.
"Nah." Jack smirks. "Torchwood is good for that, you know. Once people wrap their minds around the weekly alien incursions, more ... human ... transgressions just aren't the same any more." He shrugs. "Still tiresome, though. Cramping my style." He leers playfully.
Ianto purses his lips, almost hiding a small smile. "Can take people out of their century; can't change the way they were socialised."
Smart boy.
"Sadly." He offers a wicked grin. "Though I'm doing my best."
"I'll bet you are."
They smile at each other. Jack holds out his arm, and Ianto steps right into it. Jack reels him in closer with a hand on the nape of his neck, rests his forehead against Ianto's. They stand quietly, breathing each other in for the longest time, close and intimate, letting the tension bleed away, oblivious to any passers-by.
Eventually they'll have to move again. But not now.
~end~
The "Miracle" Series: 1. Terrible - 2. Intent - 3. Sublimate - 4. Leave - 5. Precedence - 6. Spite Yourself - 7. Support - 8. Quiet Bower