sam_storyteller (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sam_storyteller) wrote2005-07-17 02:15 pm
sam_storyteller) wrote2005-07-17 02:15 pm
Entry tags:
The Theory of Two Centres 4/8
Title: The Theory of Two Centres
Pairings: Canon. Set post-S2.
Rating: R
Summary: A week ago in realtime he'd been wearing business suits. Now he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Notes: Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
la_rainette, adina_atl, and spiderine for advice on fighting, firearms, italics, titles, eggs, and grammar. All are important!
Chapter Four
Ianto had been expecting the same reaction from UNIT that they'd had from the Cardiff police -- forced deference with an undercurrent of anger. The police might be happy to hand off nasty unsolvable cases to Torchwood, but in the end they didn't like the organisation. Torchwood, in their eyes, went where it wanted and did as it pleased and caused all the really spectacular civic disturbances.
UNIT, on the other hand, apparently understood and appreciated the need for a thing like Torchwood Three, a shadow agency that could do what UNIT couldn't. When they saw the black SUV pull up, the soldiers nearest the road snapped to attention.
"What do I do if they salute me?" Ianto asked Gwen.
"Smile and nod," she said. "Think Royal Family, visiting the troops."
Jack left the car parked in front of a no-parking sign and jumped out, grinning.
"I love a man in uniform," he said, as they walked towards the pair of soldiers. "Or a woman in uniform. Or out of a uniform. Good morning," he said to the taller of the two. "Captain Jack Harkness."
"Yessir," the man said. "Colonel was expecting you at ten, sir."
"Good traffic," Jack answered. "Don't spoil the surprise. The colonel loves to be surprised."
Both men looked uneasy, but Jack clapped one of them on the shoulder and gestured for Ianto and Gwen to follow.
The Egg that had come through in London wasn't hard to locate. It was sitting on a strange plinth of bricks and concrete rubbish in the middle of a flower patch, covered in a sheet of khaki oilcloth. Jack tossed a scanner to Gwen and walked up to a man in the centre of a knot of red-beret'd soldiers.
"So," he said, crossing his arms. The man turned. "Think you could make that thing a little more visible, Colonel? If you really put in some effort, I mean."
"Harkness," the man answered, looking not a whit put out. "Thank god."
"If I had a penny for every time I heard that," Jack said with a slight grin. "Where's your reconnaissance?"
"We're just assembling it -- "
"Well, lead the way. You know how much I love raw data."
The colonel looked uncertain, but Jack just kept smiling away until finally he turned on his heel and led them towards a military jeep on the far side of the Egg. Ianto felt deeply unnerved as a trio of soldiers fell in behind him in lockstep.
"They like to put on a show for us," Jack said in an undertone, as they walked. "Torchwood -- our Torchwood -- used to tap agents from UNIT. They all say it's a good gig if you can get it."
"You must have amazing powers of propaganda," Ianto replied.
"Have we met? I'm Captain Jack Harkness."
"Point."
There were three UNIT jeeps parked together in one corner of the paved walkway, and spread out across the bonnet of one of them were a series of printouts, a pair of laptops, and a handful of paper coffee cups filled with stones, weighing down the paper against the breeze. Jack picked up the nearest paper and turned it sideways, studying it.
"Mass-spec," he said. "How'd you get a sample?"
"We didn't," the colonel replied. "We ran the dirt through on the off-chance."
"Yeah, I see, dirt," Jack stabbed a finger at part of the chart. He set it down, re-weighted it, and glanced at Ianto. "This is gonna take a while. See if Gwen needs help."
Ianto was about to answer when Jack leaned close.
"Listen to everything," he whispered. "Be my ears."
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied.
"You, go with him," Jack pointed at random to a UNIT soldier. She jumped to obey. "Whatever he needs, you give him, got it?"
She saluted. Ianto tried not to laugh. He was turning to walk back to the Egg when Jack caught his arm.
"Not that way," he said. "Go around."
Ianto looked down. What he'd taken for textured metal plating, a few feet ahead, was actually a plaque -- an enormous plaque, filled with columns of writing, a narrow aisle next to each column. There were flowers scattered here and there.
Names.
Oh. Right. This was the memorial park for the victims of Canary Wharf.
They'd said in the report Jack gave him that it was listed publicly as a terrorist bombing, with some nonexistent cult taking credit for it. The nonexistent cult had been captured by nonexistent troops and nonexistently executed after a trial with no cameras, classified under Official Secrets.
Ianto turned carefully and walked around the broad, flat plaque, trailed by the UNIT soldier.
"What's your name?" he asked, as they walked.
"Corporal Ganton, sir."
"You don't have to call me sir. I'm not in your chain of command."
"With all due respect, that's because you're above it. Sir. You're Torchwood."
Ianto glanced sidelong at her.
"You're Ianto Jones," she added.
"Yes."
"I've seen your name on reports from Cardiff. Your team does good work."
"Thanks."
"Reckon you'll take the UPO with you back to Cardiff?"
"UPO?" he asked, and she coughed, trying to hide a smile.
"Sorry, sir. Term the others came up with. Unidentified Plummeting Object."
Ianto bit his lip, hiding his own laugh. "No, that's good. We call it the Egg. I don't know about taking it yet. Up to Captain Harkness. Gwen," he called, as they reached the little cleared area where the Egg was standing. "Jack sent me. Anything interesting?"
She offered him the scanner. "Residual Riftlike traces -- doesn't quite read the same. Tosh would have known more," she added wistfully. "Definitely came through something like the Rift, anyway. Everyone I talked to says it fell out of the sky. They're getting footage from the CCTV."
The ghost shift had been caused by a weakness over Torchwood Tower, a weakness in space-time that put out a tremendous amount of energy. That much was in the reports. Supposedly it had been sealed up, but you could paint over rotting wood and it'd still rot.
"Do we know how far it fell?" he asked. She shrugged.
"How tall was Torchwood Tower? We should find out where the -- "
"Breach was measured at six hundred and four feet above sea level," Ianto said promptly. "Five hundred and two feet aboveground spanning to five hundred and twenty feet aboveground at highest recorded point, locally."
Then he closed his mouth.
Gwen was staring at him. So was Corporal Ganton.
"How do I know that?" he asked.
Gwen gave him a reassuring smile that did not in fact reassure him in the slightest. "Perfect recall, I expect."
"But it wasn't in the -- "
"Ianto," Gwen said firmly, cutting her eyes to the corporal, who stiffened and looked away. "Here, take this," she added, and pressed a second scanner into his hand. "We'll try bouncing it around a little, see if it's permeable."
They worked that way for a while, Ianto keeping one eye on the scanner and one on Jack, who was still studying readouts and talking to the soldiers nearby. He was smiling a lot. Eventually Ianto handed the scanner to Corporal Ganton, who looked like he'd just given her a chunk of gold.
"Help Gwen out," he said. "And point me to the coffee."
There were three young -- very young -- men standing around a folding table with a coffee carafe and a large box on it, filled with odd packets. They fell silent when he approached and poured himself a cup.
"Have you lot been out here since three?" he asked, and they nodded. "Boring, eh?"
"Not really," the boldest of the three said.
"Oh yeah?"
"Well," the man said, faltering.
"Listen, I'm not your boss," Ianto told him. "I'm the office boy. Nobody's going to report you. Just trying to make conversation. I'm bored."
This did the trick, and two of them were now smiling at him.
"Well, we got to secure the area and watch the brass drop a brick," the bold one said. His namebadge said Karls. "Then the looky-loos came around and we ran them off. Then we got word you lot were coming up and the officers went off their heads again."
"Nice to know we have cred," Ianto said, sipping his coffee.
"Loads," Karls assured him. "Then you actually did come up and we drew lots to see who got to guard the car."
"It's a brilliant car," the second soldier said. "All the bells and whistles."
"And bits and bobs, too," Ianto answered. They grinned.
"You taking it back with you, then?" Karls asked.
"The UPO? Might do. Up to the captain."
"Don't suppose you need armed escort?"
"Are you asking for a trip to Cardiff?" Ianto raised his eyebrows.
"Just putting my name in the hat, sir."
"I'll let the captain know. Who got it covered up once it was off the ground?"
"Me, sir," said the second one. "Well, me and three of the others."
"Anybody touch it?"
"Not bloody likely. First rule of training: don't touch it."
"Second rule, don't lick it," Karls said, and they laughed. Some kind of UNIT in-joke, apparently.
"Words to live by." Ianto glanced past them. Jack was watching him. "Boss looks hungry."
He poured out two more cups of coffee and lifted a packet out of the box, studying it. Hamburger and beans.
"Dare I ask?" he said, offering it to them.
"ORP, sir," Karls said. "Breakfast of champions."
"Is there a breakfast of hungry bastards who don't like military rations?" Ianto inquired.
"What you see is what we got."
"All right." Ianto studied the packet as he carried a coffee to Gwen (who declined the rations) and then took the other up to Jack at the jeep. He ripped the ORP open, put the sack of food inside the chemical heating bag, and set it on the car hood.
"Rations," Jack remarked. "God, I hated rations. You know in an American ration pack they used to include cigarettes?"
"I wouldn't have high hopes for the coffee," Ianto said, offering it to him.
"Hear anything interesting?" Jack asked, leaning against the jeep.
"Nobody's touched it. Everyone thinks we're taking it with us. Volunteers have stepped forward for armed military escort."
Jack's lips twitched.
"Oh, and I know the precise height and location of the dimensional breach that used to exist over London," Ianto added. "Which was a surprise to me."
"Muscle memory?"
"The brain is not a muscle."
Jack looked troubled. "Are you having flashbacks?"
"No, just random moments of information."
"Martha's back on Monday, we can have her run some more scans. Actually, she's in London somewhere if you want us to go bother her now."
"Somehow I don't think Saturday morning is a very appropriate time to demand an alien brain scan."
"It's not an appropriate time to be digging an alien egg beacon out of the Canary Wharf memorial, either. Or eating..." Jack tore open the bag of food as it began to inflate with steam. "Hamburger and beans. Can I tempt you?"
"Anytime, sir," Ianto replied.
"Mmh. I like that in an employee," Jack replied, taking the plastic fork Ianto offered and sampling the food. "Not bad. Gotten better," he said. Around a mouthful of food. Ianto gave up.
"I have Torchwood's purchase card. We're not in the back of beyond. I can get real food," Ianto offered. Jack washed the concoction down with a sip of coffee and a grimace.
"What's Gwen say?"
"She'd rather eat Weevil."
"Weevil chow?"
"No, actual Weevil."
"Okay. Provide succor," Jack said, with a slow grin.
"Anything for you?"
"Get me some drinkable coffee. I think we're almost done here."
Ianto found a chain coffee-shop not far from the memorial park, crammed with people. He waited patiently, asked for a muffin for Gwen and a danish for himself, got Jack's hopefully-drinkable coffee, and passed over his card.
"Doing good business today," he said idly, as the barista ran the card.
"Lots of tourists," she said. "Guess something happened down by the wharf."
"Vandalism, I heard, at the memorial," said the man in line behind Ianto. "Crying shame, that. Nothing's sacred anymore."
"Have a nice day, sir," the barista said, handing him his card back. He nodded and left the cafe, hurrying back towards the park.
Jack wasn't at the jeep when he returned. Ianto stopped and swept the grounds, finally locating the blue greatcoat in a crowd of black-clad soldiers. At Jack's word they dispersed, and Jack seemed to look around him to see if anyone was watching before he reached into his pocket and took something out. It looked like a pair of small rocks, but then again this was Jack. They could be anything.
Ianto watched, unseen behind the jeep's chassis, as Jack walked to the edge of the memorial plaque and paced along it until he came to an aisle between names, apparently the one he wanted. He stepped onto the plaque and idled along it, head down, turning the stones-or-maybe-not-stones over and over in his hand.
He stopped two thirds of the way down the aisle and crouched, the edges of his coat pooling around his feet. He touched a finger to his lips and then to a name on the plaque, then placed a stone next to it with his other hand. After a brief contemplation he walked to the edge of the plaque and found another aisle, far off from the first, and repeated the gesture with a second name.
Jack must have known people who worked in London, Ianto realised. Even if he broke with London he would have known people and lost people too.
He waited until Jack had disappeared in the direction of the car before hurrying over, up the first aisle Jack had taken, the name easy to locate with the little stone to mark it.
Rose Tyler.
Meant nothing to him, hadn't been in any of the reports. He moved back and tried to locate the other one -- there, that was the stone he'd placed on the other na --
Lisa Hallett.
Oh god.
"It's an old tradition, leaving stones for the beloved dead," someone said, and he whirled in surprise. Jack was standing there -- how did he do that? -- hands in his pockets, looking grave. "Jewish, originally. After humanity gets to the stars, flowers are in short supply for a while, but every colony planet has rocks, every spaceship has spare chunks of metal or plastic. Stones are best, though, I think."
"Who was Rose Tyler?" Ianto asked, not really expecting an answer.
"She was a friend. We traveled together for a while. She saved my life a couple of times. For years I thought she'd died here. Turns out she just got sucked into another dimension. Torchwood, huh? Never a dull moment," Jack said, with a fake smile. "She'd have liked you a lot."
"I'm sorry, Jack."
"Well, she's alive, and hopefully happy. Lisa's dead, but we're not. So, we go on." Jack jerked his head back the way they'd come. "Come on, they're loading the Egg into the SUV. We have work to do."
***
Things changed quickly at Torchwood. Ianto was grasping this. Yesterday their boss had been Harkness, now he was Jack. Two days ago the most important thing in the world was to know why four years of his life had been taken from him -- why he'd given them up -- and now it was to know what the Eggs were. Four days ago in his personal timeline he'd been packing to move to London, and today he was chasing alien artefacts around Cardiff at three in the morning.
A week ago in realtime he'd been wearing business suits. Now he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Two years ago in realtime he'd had a dying girlfriend. Now...he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Four hours ago he'd been standing in London staring at the Egg that had dropped out of the sky from a breach in time-and-space that was supposed to be closed tight and now he was standing in a containment cell in the Hub, staring at two gigantic Eggs. The heat coming off them was evident in the small room, and he and Gwen were both sweating. Jack was merely...glowing. It really wasn't fair.
"I feel all paternal," Jack said. "I hope whatever hatches from them is fluffy and needy."
"They're not actually eggs, Jack," Gwen said. "No life signs inside."
"They'd make one hell of an omelette." He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. "It'd be a lot easier to figure out if they were eggs."
"So...what do we know?" Gwen asked, as Jack walked out of the cell. Ianto locked it behind them.
"No visible surface interfaces. Mass spectrometer readings can't identify it, at least not from the little that came off the one in London. Survives a drop from six hundred feet without significant damage. Unknown power conversion mechanism. Advanced light and heat management. Some method of communication."
"And we have two of them," Ianto said.
"Did I award you the gold star for counting already?" Jack asked, leading them up to the conference room.
"Point being," Ianto continued, "When was the last time two identical things fell through the Rift? At separate times?"
"We have ninety-two mismatched alien socks," Jack pointed out. "They're in a box in the archives. Filed under 'socks, probably'."
"Mismatched, and that's over the course of a hundred and thirty years," Ianto replied. "And ten of them arrived together in a sack. Filed in the archives under 'sack, socks, for the containment of'."
Jack and Gwen both looked at him.
"Perfect recall," he reminded them. "I've been reading the database. Funny stuff. Archivists have a sense of humour."
"Could be more of them coming," Gwen said. "If we could get a precise time of arrival next time, we might start to get a pattern."
"The Rift is random," Jack said. "And the breach over London's been sealed for two years."
"Then it might be intentional. Some kind of message. Maybe even for us," Gwen replied.
"They couldn't phone?" Jack sighed. "We have recorders on the heat fluctuations. I'll try to run Tosh's translation program on them, but it was set up for text."
"We could try to get another sample," Ianto suggested.
"I don't want to hit it with hammers. The amount of power they draw, it might level Cardiff. I hate it when we level Cardiff," Jack added. He put his hands flat on the table. "Okay. If they're coming through in a pattern then we'll probably have another one at three tomorrow morning, because aliens aren't really up on the whole 'Sabbath day' concept. Gwen, talk to UNIT, tell them to keep a lookout. Ianto, stock the SUV and set up monitors on the Royal Observatory email network, let's see what they're saying. Then go home, both of you."
"It's hardly afternoon," Ianto said.
"We've been up at three a couple days running. Go home, drink something herbal, get some sleep."
"Fine by me," Gwen said, and Ianto could see she was envisioning a long night at home with Rhys. He waited until she'd left the conference room and tilted his head at Jack.
"Coming home too?" he asked quietly. Jack glanced up at him.
"Might be better if I didn't."
"For who?"
"There's slow, and there's slow, Ianto. Take the night. Think about what you're doing. I've got all of time. I can wait a day." Jack stood and kissed him, which seemed a contradiction, but Ianto wasn't going to argue against Jack's lips.
"You said you missed me," Ianto answered when they were done. It sounded petulant even to him.
"But now I know," Jack murmured, fingers stroking his cheekbone, like brushing away dust that wasn't there. "I know you're here. Maybe not the same place as me, but the same general area. And you need rest."
"Don't you?"
"Ever heard the expression, I'll sleep when I'm dead?" Jack asked. He laughed and tapped him on the cheek and pulled back. "Go home and get some sleep. Don't forget to stock the SUV first."
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied, twisting the sir just a little to make it something private, intimate. He wondered where he'd even learned how to do that.
"And send Martha an e-mail about Monday," Jack yelled down the hall after him.
"Yes, sir," Ianto yelled back, rolling his eyes.
Ianto set his alarm for two-forty-five, though when it woke him the next morning there was no call from Jack or from UNIT. He made himself a cup of coffee -- god, why? Lisa Hallett must have been pretty goddamn amazing to make him drink this for her -- and sat up until four. When his eyelids began to droop and there was still no call, he went back to bed.
There was nothing when he woke at seven or when he arrived at the Hub at seven-fifty. There was nothing at eight, when Jack caught the smell of coffee and emerged half-naked from his office, pulling a shirt on and calling, "Ianto?"
There was nothing at eight-fifteen when Myfanwy demanded a game of keep-away with the basketball, or at eight-thirty when Gwen arrived.
By ten, all of them were rechecking the figures on the Eggs and scanning and re-scanning the Observatory's computers for any sign of disturbances in Great Britain's night skies. By eleven, Jack was restless, his fidgeting making them both insane, and Gwen made Ianto take him out of the Hub.
Use any excuse, I don't care.
Ianto got to ride on the invisible lift for the first time, which was fun.
At eleven-fifteen, as they were walking along Mermaid Quay, Ianto's phone rang.
"Ianto Jones," he answered. Jack looked like he wanted to eavesdrop.
"Aw, Jesus, who is it this time?" said an American voice on the other end of the line. "I'm trying to reach Harkness. Captain Jack Harkness. Do you know the guy? Do you know someone who knows the guy?"
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied, catching Jack's eye. "I'm his assistant. How can I help you?"
"Well, thank fuck for small favours. Put him on."
"I'll see if he's in. Can I give him your name?"
"For the love of -- Statten. Henry van Statten."
"One moment, sir." Ianto muted the phone. "An American named Henry van Statten wants to talk to you."
Jack tapped his comm. "Gwen?"
"Yes Jack?" Gwen's voice came over both their comms.
"Look up a guy named Henry van Statten. American. See what UNIT has on him."
"On it..." a brief pause. "Henry van Statten, American, millionaire -- some kind of pharmaceuticals tycoon. Lives in Utah. There's a flag on his file from Area 51, they've got their eye on him."
"Huh. Could be interesting," Jack said. "Pass him over."
Ianto took the mute off and handed him the phone. Jack winked at him and held it to his ear.
"Captain Jack Harkness," he said. "Yeah, my assistant -- really. Well I'm flattered. Who'd you call? No, they wouldn't. What can I do for you?" A long pause. "I see. When did it -- I see. And you -- okay. So it's out. Yeah, I'm familiar." He chuckled. "Mr. van Statten -- can I call you Henry? Henry, I'm in Cardiff." A pause. Jack looked annoyed. "It's in Wales. Great Britain. You're going to have to give us...you do. Sure. How long? Wow. No, this number. We can talk about payment later. All right. See you in Utah." He hung up the phone. "What an asshole."
"What'd he want?" Ianto asked.
"At around three o'clock this morning, local time, an Egg appeared in the middle of the desert outside Salt Lake City. Apparently this guy van Statten beat Area 51 to it. He called around, someone gave him my name as a consultant. He's sending a jet for us."
"He's sending a jet?" Ianto asked.
"Yup. We're going to the States. Gwen!"
"Here, Jack," Gwen's voice came over the comm.
"Get on the phone to Area 51, see why they have him flagged."
"There's an Egg in Utah," Ianto said.
"The crow flies at midnight," Gwen replied. Ianto snorted.
"Can you hold down the Hub while I'm gone? I'm taking Ianto, because he can't," Jack said.
"Oh thanks," Ianto said.
"Well, you can't."
"How long?" Gwen asked.
"Wednesday at earliest, I should think," Ianto said, doing timezone maths in his head. "Nine hours to get here and another nine to get us there -- "
"Uh," Jack said.
"What?"
"He's sending a Concorde."
"The Concorde isn't even -- "
"Apparently he owns one."
"He owns a Concorde?" Gwen asked.
"I don't even know how to calculate for that," Ianto said.
"Give it five hours. Ten and we'll be in Utah. Depending on how fast we can get him to give us the Egg, say a day. Five hours back," Jack said. "Accounting for time zones, we should be back just in time for Tuesday's Egg-drop, if this keeps up. What?" he asked, as Ianto stared at him. "You think you're the only person in this burg who does math? Okay -- Gwen, make the call on Martha if you think you want her there for Monday's drop, wherever the hell it's going to be. If not, let her know to come down on Tuesday instead, give her another day with her boy. Call UNIT if you need backup."
"Ask for Ganton and Karls and anyone Ganton thinks is good," Ianto added.
"It's a shame I'm so competent and well-trained, I could be taking a Concorde to Utah," Gwen replied.
"All in good time, gorgeous," Jack said, and flicked off his comm. "Let's go see what we can find out about van Statten."
As it turned out, what they could find on van Statten wasn't much. Area 51 knew he was a crackpot alien-chaser, always poking around where he wasn't wanted. He was rumoured to have some artefacts but, the few times they'd sent someone in to investigate, van Statten had laughed their agents out of his house. He had museum experts and astrophysicists on his personal staff. Considering how many new drugs he put out on a yearly basis, the research division at his biotech firm was really tiny.
"Sloppy," was Jack's verdict, when they presented their findings. "The way he's parading around, they should be coming down on this guy like a load of bricks. Instead he's stealing their march. Area 51 isn't coping. Remind me when this is over to go to DC and knock a few heads together."
"Do you have that kind of power?" Ianto asked.
"No, but he'll have fun trying," Gwen sighed. "You should get going, the plane'll be here soon."
"I'd take you, but it's going to be boring and someone has to sit on the Rift," Jack said, looking contrite. "As soon as we re-staff, schedule yourself a vacation."
"That always works out so well," she said, but she looked pleased.
Ianto went home to pack and change, and took a call that the jet was arriving at the airport while he was still en route. He called Jack, who was already there, and got directions to the private side. When he stepped out of the cab, Jack wolf-whistled.
"Didn't I say you look good in a suit?" Jack asked. Ianto fidgeted with the hem of his waistcoat. "Trying to impress the millionaire?"
"Never know, he might offer me a job at higher pay."
"We did say you could get a job anywhere by looking ornamental and being willing to shoot things. Come on. Ever been on a Concorde?"
"Never been on an airplane," Ianto replied. Jack glanced at him, a shadow flitting through his eyes.
"You have, actually," he said quietly. Ianto thought for a minute.
"Ah. We went to CERN," he said. "Read about that."
"You'd seriously never been on an airplane before?"
"Dad didn't like them. We did train holidays."
"You're gonna enjoy this, then," Jack said, as a young man in a sober blue uniform took their bags and led them up a rolling stairway to the airplane.
Inside there were benches along the windows and two tables near the back. Behind one table was a well-secured bar, done in mahogany and brass. There was a stereo system too; Jack immediately went to it and began fiddling until he found the rack of CDs nearby.
"Swing," he said, a profound expression of glee on his face. He popped the CD into the changer and turned the volume up.
Fats Waller, Ianto thought absently. Very Jack. If I go to church on Sunday and a cabaret on Monday, tain't nobody's business if I do...
"Swanky place," Jack said, sitting down opposite him on another bench. Ianto felt strange and awkward wearing a suit jacket, compared to Jack in his worn blue Oxford. "Teaches us a thing or two about van Statten, too."
"Such as?" Ianto asked.
"He doesn't go to people. They come to him. Otherwise he'd have flown out here to meet us. And he's a show-off, because if he doesn't use this himself then it's purely for other people's comfort...I used to be a pilot," he added randomly. "Nothing like this. Recon, fighters, bombers." He looked distant for a second, then sat back, relaxing. "Strap in. They won't stay on the ground long. And remember, when you start to panic, we're not actually in trouble unless I'm panicking too."
"Who says I'm going to panic? Did I panic last time?"
"There was a certain tension," Jack replied.
Ianto very carefully did not tighten his hands on the bench or watch Jack incessantly during takeoff, because Jesus Christ machines like this were never meant to get airborne, they couldn't be...
"Good job," Jack said, when they were finally levelled off again and Ianto relaxed. "Brought you something, by the way." He passed across a cheap bound book, stuffed here and there with paperclipped receipts and bits of card.
"What's this?" Ianto asked, opening it. His own handwriting on the front page: a date, a sketch, a few sentences.
"Your diary. Until we...talked, I couldn't give it back to you."
"I keep a diary," Ianto said.
"Diligently, until a few weeks ago."
"I am judging myself so much right now," Ianto said, paging through it.
"It's interesting reading."
"You read it?"
"You left it out. Months ago, don't look at me like that. I put sticky-notes on the interesting parts," Jack added helpfully. Ianto looked down. There were narrow yellow post-it edges sprouting like weeds from the later pages. Ianto turned to one of them, read the writing, tried to hide the horrified look on his face, and glanced at Jack.
"You really need to learn how to convert inches to centimetres," Jack was trying not to laugh. He undid the seatbelt he'd worn for takeoff and slipped across to Ianto's bench, touching the book. "This is your record. There's not much you in it, but it's what you thought was important to remember."
Ianto flipped a few pages along. "Cinema tickets?" he asked, studying the torn stubs stapled to a page.
"We went to the movies."
"Why are there three tickets to one film on three separate nights?"
"You missed the ending the first two times."
Ianto frowned.
"I was distracting you," Jack said in his ear. Ianto closed the book gently.
"I did go home and think last night," he said. He could feel Jack tense, though he didn't move much.
"And?"
"I think I'd like to go to the cinema with you again," Ianto said, giving him a small smile. Jack beamed. "Besides, clearly I'm going to have to take new measurements..."
That got him a laugh. "Read your book."
"And you will be...?"
"Brooding on Eggs and admiring the way you wear a waistcoat."
Ianto looked down at the waistcoat in question. "I honestly wore one of these every day? Did people not stare at me as if I were an arse?"
"They stared at your arse instead. Trust me." Jack patted him on the leg and darted across again, digging in his bag. He took out his laptop, flicked it on, and (presumably) dove into the latest readings off the Eggs.
Ianto didn't mean to get engrossed in reading his own diary, because that was just narcissism on top of self-indulgence and he would have liked to talk with Jack some more once Jack was finished with his work. After a few pages, however, the hum of the airplane and the clack of Jack's fingers across the keyboard and the jazzy horn music all faded out.
It was interesting stuff: accounts of their finds, hastily scrawled supply-lists, notes, sketches. Jack was right, there wasn't much about him in it, and thank god for that to be honest. It was mostly cases they'd worked. The generalities didn't vary that much from the official reports he'd read, but there were anecdotes that weren't in the reports, copied-down remarks that Jack or the others had made, sly observations about the people he'd worked with. On one page there was a chart mapping out the time and location of Owen Harper's coffee demands from day to day, apparently as an attempt to establish a pattern. Finally, at the bottom, he'd written "Ask Tosh to hook Owen up to the computer and see if he can be used as a true random-number generator."
All of them were mentioned in some respect, Tosh more than the others at first -- well, if you didn't count Jack, who was on every page. Jack says, Jack told us, Jack found, Jack thought, Jack did, Jack went, Jack asked. Then lots of Tosh, offhanded remarks about getting coffee together or having her show him some computer tricks. Gradually there were more mentions of Gwen and Owen, and other names -- Rhys, Andy, Martha.
One page gave him pause. It was blank, except for a date and a single sentence: Leave well alone.
"Do you know what this is about?" he asked, holding it out to Jack. Jack looked up, studied it, shook his head.
"You remember the date?" Jack asked.
"It's one of the two days you say we lost."
"Ah," Jack said noncommittally.
"We don't know anything about that loss? Nothing at all?"
"Only that all the deletions were digitally signed by me, and that's hard to forge considering my digital signature requires a retinal scan. And that's the way I feel when I think about it." Jack pointed at the page. "Leave well alone."
"Captain Harkness," the young man from earlier said -- to Jack, because Ianto was, as far as Henry van Statten knew, just the PA. "We'll be serving lunch in a moment, if you'd like to move to the table."
Jack pressed his tongue between his teeth, thinking. "We're running on Utah time?" he asked finally.
"We've found it's easiest to acclimate to the jet lag that way," the man said apologetically.
"Works for me. We'll touchdown at what, two or so?"
"Yes, Captain."
"Remind me to call my girlfriend around eight-thirty tonight, Ianto," Jack said. Ianto tilted an eyebrow but didn't say anything. Eight-thirty in Utah was three-thirty in the morning for Cardiff. Gwen would have Egg News by then.
They really had to start calling them something else. Also, he couldn't have said 'sister'?
Jack spoke about nothing in particular as he ate, messy and unself-conscious as ever. Mostly he talked about Cardiff, dancing around Torchwood on the whole. He mentioned the rebuilding efforts in the city, speculated about the politics of the grant for a new hospital, theorised about water-current patterns in the bay and where they were likely to wash up debris. Ianto couldn't puzzle it out, but he didn't have to. He was learning that he would be told when the time was right. All he had to do until then was cope and try not to make too many assumptions. It felt passive, but then there was only so much activity you could get up to, sometimes. And once he had just a little more information he could stop waiting so much and --
Well, Jack had answered some questions. He'd told Ianto more than he'd been asked, about Rose Tyler. Maybe he'd answer more, if Ianto knew the right questions to ask.
They touched down in Utah a little ahead of schedule, at a private airstrip. Two people were waiting for them -- a middle-aged woman carrying a folder and a youngish man who practically screamed Private Assistant, in the way Ianto probably currently was as well.
"Captain Harkness, Mr. Jones," the woman said, shaking hands. "My name is Bonnie Smith, I'm head of research for Mr. van Statten's private collection. This is Richard, his assistant. Welcome to Utah."
"Nice landscape," Jack replied, but he was looking at the pair of them as he said it. Ianto suppressed the urge to roll his eyes so hard he'd sprain something. "Always thought Utah'd be pretty."
"If you've never been, I can see that you're given some sightseeing brochures," Richard said, as Bonnie handed Jack the folder in her hands.
"I don't think we'll be here long enough for that, but you never know your luck," Jack said with a wink. Richard coloured; Bonnie smiled.
"Mr. van Statten's very eager for you to examine his new acquisition, but he understands you've just jumped seven time zones in five hours. If you'd like to be shown to your suite, we can arrange for you to meet Mr. van Statten later tonight."
Jack cut an almost imperceptible glance at Ianto, who nodded slightly.
"We're good, I think," he said. "If you can get us some coffee we'll push through. Shame to make Henry send a Concorde and then waste all that time sleeping. Keep up, Ianto," he added, apparently for show, since Ianto wasn't trailing more than a step behind.
They were led into a small building at one end of the airstrip, down three flights of stairs, into a lift that seemed to hum and descend forever, and out into --
A museum.
High ceilings, decorative support beams, the works. Objects in glass cases all around them. Ianto felt his jaw drop. Jack whistled low.
"Impressive, isn't it?" said a voice, and a well-dressed man -- built on large lines, radiating smugness -- appeared at the far end of the room. "You must be Captain Jack Harkness," he said, walking forward.
"Either that or you paid a lot of money for an impostor," Jack answered, meeting him halfway. Van Statten grabbed his hand, clapped him on the arm, and ignored Ianto completely.
"I'm Henry van Statten. Good to meet you. Flight all right? She's something, isn't she, my jet?"
"Beautiful piece of work, Henry," Jack answered, flashing his perfect white teeth.
"Yeah, and I got her for a steal. Come on, let's get to business, then you can get some shuteye," van Statten was already steering Jack away. "I hate jet lag. Captain Harkness, huh? What are you captain of, by the way? All I know is, everyone I talked to said you were the one to ask about this -- thing."
"Former pilot," Jack said. "Kept the title."
They passed a glass case with a hairy stuffed arm in it. Just an arm. Ianto swallowed.
"Suits you! Like that coat, too. Retro style. Bonnie, did you give him -- "
"Yes, Mr. van Statten," Bonnie replied, as they followed Jack and van Statten like ducklings. Another case, this one with a set of small metal discs mounted on felt -- Ianto recognised them from the Torchwood database. Alien earrings. Made for alien ears.
"Great. This is everything we've got on the object," van Statten said, tapping the folder in Jack's hands. "We're calling it the Dragon's Egg."
"Catchy name," Jack remarked. He was oozing charm out of every pore, matching van Statten point for point in sheer...American-ness. "This should be interesting. I've never seen one in person."
They passed a plinth with a vase on it. It didn't look alien, but it did have teeth in the top.
"You've seen records, though, right? Pilot, huh? That code for military intelligence or something?"
"I got around, in the service," Jack replied. "Guess you figured out how to switch it off."
"Get it out of the ground? Yeah. Haven't been able to crack it open though."
Another case, a strange lacquered helmet shaped like a bird's head -- either that or it was some alien bird on display...
"Try a diamond saw?"
"Yep, no dice. Lasers too. Here we go..." van Statten stopped in front of a heavy door, keying a code into the lock on the wall. "And listen, if you've got the time and you do good work on this, I've got like two dozen other things you could have a look at."
"Sounds great," Jack said. The door slid aside and van Statten waved Jack in. Bonnie put a hand on Ianto's arm to stop him from following. Jack noticed the movement and leaned back out. "It's okay," he said, upping the wattage on the grin. "He's with me."
"Your eyes only, Captain Harkness," van Statten said.
"Call me Jack. Sorry, but some of my stuff's a two-man operation. He's gonna have to see it sooner or later if you want accurate readings."
Van Statten looked torn. He obviously didn't like not calling the shots.
"He's confidential, don't worry. Ianto, tell Henry about the Slitheen."
"What's a Slitheen?" Ianto asked.
"See?" Jack turned to van Statten. "Silent as the grave. Scout's honour. He's Welsh, they don't talk at all unless you make them. Don't make me pout, Henry."
That seemed to amuse van Statten. He cocked his head and waved Ianto through with an aw-shucks smile.
The room was low-ceilinged and plain, lit with fluorescents, quite a difference from the elegance of the museum. The Egg sat on a cup-shaped stand in the middle of it. There were what looked like electrode patches attached to it at various intervals. Ianto drifted over to the computer monitors on one side, working to get a handle on the readouts van Statten was taking.
Van Statten's PA, Richard, had disappeared without them noticing, and now reappeared with coffee that Ianto had to admit was a fair substitute for his own. It gave him the necessary edge of wakefulness; it was good to be alert when Jack was playing a dangerous game and depending on Ianto to play along without knowing all the rules.
Jack immediately spread out along a workbench to one side of the Egg, sorting the papers van Statten had given him and setting out a handful of tools -- a metal pick, a switched-off scanner, his mobile phone, a ballpoint pen, a small torch, a tuning fork. This was a performance, Ianto realised, a sleight-of-hand where only Jack knew what he was palming.
"Oh, x-rays, nice," Jack said, holding them up to the light. They showed nothing. "Uh huh. Did you do a spectral analysis while it was still going?"
"Second from the bottom," Bonnie leaned forward slightly. Jack raised his head and smiled at her.
"You're thorough," he said.
"We aim to please, Captain Harkness."
"You have very good aim. Okay. Henry, how'd you like to help with a little experiment?"
"My hands are yours," van Statten said proudly. Ianto fought to keep the resigned annoyance off his face, only to find that Richard was looking every inch the way he felt. Jack caught their exchanged glance as he was giving van Statten the tuning fork.
"Ianto, why don't you run along and play with Henry's kid for now? I'll get your help when we get to the scanners."
"Yes, sir," Ianto murmured. Richard waved him through the door and then followed him. Once outside, Ianto loosened his tie and exhaled in relief.
"Pretty impressive, eh?" Richard said. "Your boss have any idea what it is?"
"Dunno yet. Might do, soon."
"Where's he work?"
"Not usually under an airstrip in Utah."
They looked at each other, but Richard broke first; he laughed and cocked his head at a doorway across the wide display room. "Come on. Have a seat, take a load off."
"Your boss wants you to pump me about my boss," Ianto said, as they walked into a small office kitchen, complete with cheap plastic chairs and a vending machine. And there was a display-case here, too, a small taxidermied lizard, labeled "TARKASIAN - 1849".
"Like yours doesn't want the same thing from me?" Richard asked.
"He just wanted a look at the museum, I reckon. And the Egg."
Richard nodded. "You likely to actually tell me anything else?"
"Are you?"
The other man leaned back in one of the chairs, tipping it on two legs. "I don't know a lot. He buys this stuff up from whoever's selling, doesn't care if it's real or not. Bonnie authenticates it if she can. I mean that Egg is alien, right?"
"I think so. It's certainly not someone's idea of a joke."
"Well, so..." Richard waved a hand. "He's got tons of crap like that."
"Must be interesting work."
"Yeah, if you like constantly dancing on the edge of termination. Plus..." Richard leaned forward. "Between you and me and the Tarkasian, I think he's losing it."
"Losing it?" Ianto asked in a hushed voice.
"He's stepping up his security, inch by inch, not because he needs it -- he's just paranoid he's going to. He heard a rumour that there's a machine that can wipe memories, he's gonna find it so he can wipe anyone he's fired. Which means firing a lot more people, lemme tell you. He's expanding the bunker downwards, way further than it needs to go, for no real reason I can see except 'we could be safer'. Seriously, the minute that mindwipe thing shows up, I'm outta here. The benefits aren't that good."
Ianto nodded. "I know what you mean. Better than you think."
"So, come on, quid pro quo me a little here, Ianto Jones."
Ianto laughed. "Fair enough. Captain Harkness freelance consults. I think he saw a lot of things he isn't talking about when he flew. Keeps his lips sealed, y'know? MI-5 might be after him."
"No way."
"Mm." Ianto sipped his coffee and set it down. He was...enjoying this, in a peculiarly perverse way. "He keeps a low profile. I guess he probably likes your boss's style. They seemed..."
"Friendly. Though it looks like Captain Harkness gets friendly with pretty much everyone."
"Lonely childhood, I expect," Ianto said. Richard laughed.
There was a rap on the door and Jack put his head in. Richard was instantly on his feet. Ianto gave him a dry look and stood.
"Need you," Jack said. "Hop hop."
"If Captain Harkness wants you, Mr. van Statten will want me," Richard said, following him through the door and back out into the museum. It really was amazing, a beautiful cavern tucked away from prying eyes, much nicer than the Hub, but at the same time...well, Torchwood didn't lock something away if it was useful, only if it was dangerous. And if they found a dead body they at least locked it in the morgue away from view, instead of chopping it up for a display.
"Set this up over here," Jack said, handing him a scanner as he stepped inside. "Power source," he added to van Statten. He plugged a USB cable into a port Tosh had modified for it (Ianto had read the specs -- fascinating stuff) and ran the cord around the other side of the Egg, fitting it into a digital camera mounted onto a pole. Strapped between camera and pole was a small ratchet device.
"We need to calibrate the scanner and let it run for a few hours," Jack was saying, poking the camera as if it was going to do something supernatural. Ianto fiddled with the "power source".
"Can I watch?" van Statten asked.
"Yeah, but it's going to be really boring," Jack said, offhanded. "Listen, this is a good thing. Give me some time to get online, talk to some contacts, get my head down for the night."
"Okay then. Richard?" van Statten prompted.
"Driver waiting for you, Captain Harkness, he'll take you into town. We've set up a suite for you and a room for Mr. Jones. I have dinner recommendations as well," Richard said promptly.
"Watch out, Ianto, I might trade you in," Jack remarked. He turned the camera on and pushed a button on the ratcheting device. It began to twitch and move, ever so slowly. "That's that. See what we have for you in the morning, okay?"
Van Statten looked delighted -- and not a little avaricious, his eyes glittering in the fluorescent light.
"These contacts -- "
"Eh," Jack held up a hand. "Gotta keep some secrets or I'd be out of a job. Your kid said something about a hotel?"
Richard escorted them back into the lift and took them up. True to his word, there was a large sedan with a driver, waiting for them at the top. Jack's gentle pressure on Ianto's arm as he climbed into the car told him they weren't quite out of the woods yet.
"What'd you think of van Statten?" he asked, as they sped along towards Salt Lake City.
"He seems very efficient," Ianto replied.
"He's a good guy. Always thinking. Inquisitive. Wants to know how things work," Jack agreed. This was a show -- probably for the driver. "American spirit, Ianto. It's why we've still got our empire."
Ianto smirked. "An example to us all."
"Don't get smart with me, I pay your salary."
Jack drifted off into an easy monologue about America, which lasted them until they reached the hotel and there were bags and bellhops to be dealt with.
Ianto was shown briefly to a pretty standard hotel-room: king bed, dresser, telly, bathroom. He stayed long enough to set down his bag and then followed the voices down the corridor to Jack's suite, which was about as far from standard as it was possible to be. There was a tastelessly enormous atrium filled with plants and furniture, with stairs on one side leading up to a loft bedroom overlooking it all. There was a kitchen involved somehow. Ianto didn't dare look in the bathroom.
"I could get used to this," Jack said, sprawling on a sofa and narrowly avoiding knocking over an enormous vase of ivy. "Unpack me, huh?"
Ianto raised an eyebrow, but Jack put a finger to his lips and opened the catch on his wrist-strap, tapping a sequence into it with his right hand. The television blared on and off again quickly; something hissed in the kitchen. Then, to Ianto's concern, there was a fizzling noise in the ceiling and a brief puff of smoke.
"Van Statten's been bugging us," Jack said. "He's been listening in on us since we left Cardiff."
"That's why you put the music on in the jet," Ianto said, realisation striking.
"Yep. He wants to hear what we're saying, and now he doesn't get to. There's probably some in your room too. We should leave those on, he'll think it's a short in the wiring around here. Not to malign the guy who's keeping me in splendour, but I stand by my previous assessment of asshole."
"You seemed to do well, though."
"I was great," Jack said. "Sometimes I miss the con game."
"Con game?"
"Long time ago. Different life. Still, good to know I haven't lost it. Stop unpacking," Jack said, lifting his eyebrows, "and come here and unpack."
"That was beneath you," Ianto said firmly.
"You'll find there's almost nothing beneath me."
"Food first."
Jack moaned. "You're right. What time is it really?"
"Five-thirty."
"In Cardiff."
"Just past midnight."
"Okay," Jack said. "Restaurant around here somewhere. Steak. Gravy. French fries," he said, his American accent deepening and thickening.
"Heart attack."
"Immortal."
"Rub it in," Ianto rolled his eyes.
"I'd like to, but you're insisting I buy you dinner first."
"Well, if you buy me a drink you might find I put out."
Jack pushed himself off the couch and -- there was no other word for it, he stalked forward.
"Are you suggesting I get you drunk and debauch you?" he asked.
"I'm suggesting that after tolerating your act for van Statten, I need a drink," Ianto said. He pulled his tie off and shed his jacket, rolling his sleeves, breathing with relief as he unbuttoned the collar of his shirt.
"You're not helping," Jack said quietly.
"Food," Ianto insisted.
***
"So," Jack said, when they were settled at a table in the hotel's reasonably classy restaurant, waiting for their food, "what'd you learn from princely Richard?"
"Van Statten's indiscriminate. Doesn't know much. I imagine he gets fooled a great deal. The woman, Bonnie, she's the brains when it comes to the artefacts, but van Statten runs the show. Richard thinks he's going mad."
"Really," Jack drew the word out, interested.
"Paranoia, unpredictability -- he's manipulative, likes power. Apparently," Ianto said, "he's also looking for a machine that wipes memories. So he can fire with impunity."
Jack paused, a water glass halfway to his mouth. Ianto knew what he was thinking, what they both were. He pressed on.
"He's not an idiot, Richard. Says when that comes along he'll bugger off. Nice bloke."
"And what did he learn from you?"
"That you're a freelance consultant, possibly a criminal, probably on the run from MI-5." Ianto sipped his pint and gave him a smug look.
"Dangerous to know."
"Something like that."
Jack smiled on him -- pleased, but also affectionate. "Great work."
"I do my best."
He leaned forward. "I promise, when this is over, I'll explain the Retcon."
"I'm sure you will. Torchwood isn't a museum run by a small-minded man who never gets to show off his toys," Ianto replied. "The similarities are superficial at best."
"I like the way you say superficial."
"I'll make sure to call you that frequently," Ianto replied, as their food arrived. He was silent for a few minutes, giving Jack a chance to eat, enjoying the food. When Jack had finally slowed down enough to chew, Ianto took another sip of beer and put his fork down.
"Van Statten's not going to give us the Egg, is he," he said.
"No," Jack replied. "I don't think we could buy it from him even if we tried."
"What do we do, steal it?"
"We could. I don't think we should. I'm not scared of van Statten, but he could cause us more trouble than he's worth. He struck me as vengeful."
"And clever."
"Ignorant but not stupid, I got that from him," Jack replied.
"So what do we do, Jack?"
"Check in with Gwen. See what she's got. Stall for time. If these things just keep falling, sooner or later we're gonna have to do something."
"Why did it show up in Utah, of all places?"
Jack shrugged. "There's no Rift here. On the other hand, there's a huge concentration of alien devices in that museum. Temporal resonance, maybe. In that one part alone there were at least five things that shouldn't exist yet. Might be creating a hot spot."
"By that logic, the Hub should be a likely target."
"Bite your tongue," Jack said, but he smiled as he said it. "We'll see in a few hours. There's something...weird about the museum."
"Aside from the underground bunker full of alien devices?"
"Yeah, like...a memory I can't quite catch. Like I've heard of van Statten before. It'll come, I guess," Jack said thoughtfully.
They lingered once the food was done, speculating about the Eggs and about van Statten's collection. Ianto didn't see why they couldn't send the Army in; Jack was more reluctant. He brought up Mr. Parker, the strange old collector in Cardiff, who had essentially held the longest running cold war with Torchwood in the organisation's history but was effectively harmless, so long as someone kept an eye on him.
It was evident that it hurt Jack to talk about Dr. Harper, who had been lead agent when they finally had to confront Parker. Ianto wasn't certain he ought to ask, but he got the sense that Jack had been more father than boss to Owen. He wasn't best at identifying what Jack was to each of them, but every ounce of information he managed to wrench out of the captain helped in one way or another. Father-figure for Owen, Toshiko's...friend, perhaps even confidante, a challenge for Gwen, a brother-in-arms for Martha...
Which left him. And the thing they'd never put a label on.
Maybe Jack was a challenge for him, too. That would explain a lot -- the flustered tension between Jack and Gwen, the reason Gwen seemed to hold tight to Ianto. Some incredibly dysfunctional connection all three of them shared. But Gwen was married and he was the one in Jack's bed -- in Jack's bed a lot, apparently.
"Ianto," Jack said, waving a hand in front of his face. "Come back."
Ianto smiled and nodded. "Sorry. Jet lag, maybe."
"Then we should go to bed," Jack suggested, his voice dropping low. Ianto wondered idly if that trick had ever fooled him. Maybe he'd wanted to be fooled, a little.
In the elevator, Jack rested his hand in the small of Ianto's back, guiding him past an elderly couple and a young tourist. He kept it there for about two seconds, then slid it down to his arse. Ianto thought about hip-checking him, but suspected that would only make him grab. As it was, the slide of his palm along the light wool trousers was tantalising. The message was clear: work time's over.
They were barely through the door into the suite's atrium before Jack got an arm around his waist and pulled him backwards until their bodies were flush, kicking the door shut with his foot. His other arm came around and opened the strap on his wrist again to scan for repairs to the bugs. The telephone on the side-table near the door shorted out.
"Shame," Jack said. "Could have given them a show."
"Next time, maybe," Ianto replied. Jack bit his earlobe.
"If you want to," he whispered, fingers working at the buttons on Ianto's waistcoat. "I won't object."
Ianto tilted his head, smoothing a palm over Jack's busy hands.
"Though, what I'd really like is to have you on every horizontal surface we can find," Jack continued in the same filthy voice. "I don't think you get what the suits do to me."
Ianto leaned back against him as he got the waistcoat undone. The shirt underneath was tugged free and Jack's other hand worked his belt-buckle slowly.
"Sometime I'll tell you what we did with two of your neckties and a waistcoat," Jack continued.
"A waistcoat?" Ianto asked, alarmed.
"You'll have fun. Right now, I'll settle for something a little less complicated. Fine by you?" Jack asked.
"Fi -- " Ianto stifled a moan with an indrawn breath. "Fine."
Jack was about to say something else when Ianto felt something buzz against his hip; they both started, and then Jack tightened his arm, trapping him there as he pulled the mobile out of his pocket.
"Gwen," he said, looking at the caller ID.
"Oh god," Ianto replied.
Jack answered it anyway. He'd managed to get the belt buckle undone and apparently decided to prove he could multitask. His fingers were drawing small circles on Ianto's stomach, warm against his skin.
"News?" Jack asked, holding the phone to his ear. Ianto could hear Gwen's voice, but not what she was saying. "Uh huh. Okay, tell me..."
He went very still; his hand stopped, halfway down Ianto's trousers, and Ianto swallowed a whine of frustration.
"It did," he said. Ianto turned his head, nosing along Jack's cheek. Jack's arm tightened. "No, I think that's good. It'll help us out here. Really. I remember that thing. Box, right?"
His hand began to inch lower again. Ianto pressed silent, dry kisses against his jaw, hips jerking against Jack's arm.
"Go ahead and find it. That's what I thought. And did we get a new Egg? The -- oh, Gwen," and Jack's voice was rich with amusement. "I'm sorry. No, I'm not laughing."
Ianto twisted his fingers in the material of Jack's trousers. Jack bumped his knee against Ianto's in warning.
"Go for it. Unless you think it's dangerous, get some sleep and call me tomorrow. I'm tied up at the moment. Well. Hope to be soon."
Ianto huffed air against his skin.
"Absolute torment. Yep. Okay."
Jack hung up the phone and tucked it back in his pocket. "Gwen says," he said, cupping Ianto's cock lightly, "that the Egg hatched."
"What?" Ianto asked stupidly.
"The outer shell dissolved. It was cycling down energy. It's wood underneath," Jack murmured. He twisted his wrist slightly. Ianto moaned. "Good boy," he added.
"What -- what's she going to -- "
"She remembers something that came through a while ago. She's going to find it. And more importantly," Jack added, "it leaves us the rest of the evening free, barring disaster. Enjoying that?"
"Yes, but the..." Ianto couldn't think, could hardly breathe, but this was work and probably important.
"Gwen's on it. Another Egg came down in the bay. She got it out, it's contained. They work in water, too. Briefing over," he announced, and turned Ianto to kiss him thoroughly -- messy, dirty, intense. Ianto spared a quick sympathetic thought for Gwen, hauling one of those things out of Cardiff bay, but he couldn't hold onto it. Not with Jack undressing them both now, deft and sure.
"Gentleman's choice," Jack added. "Couch? Bed? Kitchen counter?"
"Cold," Ianto said. "Bed?"
"Bed."
They kissed their way up the staircase, Jack's shirt catching on the banister as he discarded it, Ianto losing track of his trousers somewhere near the top. Jack pushed him down on the bed and propped himself over him on his elbows, beaming.
"Hi," he said. "Wanna fuck me?"
Ianto gaped.
"Do we do that?" he blurted.
"Do you really think there's much we don't do?" Jack asked. He twisted his hips enticingly.
"I just assumed..."
"As I think we've established, I'm easy," Jack said. "Whatever you want. But it's good, that way." He bent his head, sucked on Ianto's throat. "I want to show you everything," he said against his skin.
"I, yes," Ianto babbled, as Jack straddled him. "Yes, please, show me, I can, yes, how -- "
There was a clatter from the floor nearby as Jack's phone buzzed again. Both of them looked up. Jack dropped his head, thudding it against Ianto's chest.
"Gwen," he mumbled.
"Probably," Ianto gasped.
"I can -- "
"No, answer it -- might be important."
Jack groaned and rolled off him, catching the phone on the fourth ring.
"Please go to bed," he said, in greeting. He was silent for a while. "Okay. But it was classified harmless, right? Yeah, well, someone found it and catalogued it. No...not tonight. Go to bed, Gwen. Call me..." he ran a hand through his hair.
"Noon," Ianto offered.
"Call me at noon Cardiff time. Goodbye, Gwen. Goodbye."
He set the phone on the nightstand next to the bed and ran his hands through his hair, obviously thinking.
"What was it?" Ianto asked.
"Unimportant. Tell you tomorrow," Jack replied, crawling across the bed and kissing him.
"But -- "
"Tomorrow," Jack insisted.
Perhaps it made him a bad person, or at least a bad employee, but he found as Jack took his hand, kissed him, showed him how to open him up (gently, so gently, as if Jack might break), that he didn't care what Gwen had uncovered. He didn't want to think about it, not when Jack was making soft, sharp cries in his ear, not when Jack was straddling him again and easing down. Not when Jack was tipping his head back and undulating his hips, sheened with sweat, moaning filthy encouragements and chanting Ianto's name.
His last rational thought before it all got swept away was that there were worse jobs than being Jack Harkness's very personal assistant -- than being Jack's 'unlabeled'.
***
Then
"What the hell can I say to you that's not going to freak you out?" Jack asked, turning sideways from the camera to look at Ianto, leaning in the doorway.
Ianto shrugged. "Tell me the truth."
"Would you have been okay with the truth when you were twenty?"
Ianto smiled. "Twenty-one. I was...a lot less intense when I was twenty-one."
"Oh, I can't wait to see that," Jack muttered. Ianto turned to leave -- Gwen was waiting for him outside, with handcuffs, ready to take him back to the cell -- but then he paused.
"I was an arsehole sometimes. Maybe a lot of the time. Go easy on me," he said over his shoulder.
"Come back to me," Jack replied. "I'll figure you out as I go."
***
Chapter Five
Pairings: Canon. Set post-S2.
Rating: R
Summary: A week ago in realtime he'd been wearing business suits. Now he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Notes: Thanks to
la_rainette, adina_atl, and spiderine for advice on fighting, firearms, italics, titles, eggs, and grammar. All are important! Chapter Four
Ianto had been expecting the same reaction from UNIT that they'd had from the Cardiff police -- forced deference with an undercurrent of anger. The police might be happy to hand off nasty unsolvable cases to Torchwood, but in the end they didn't like the organisation. Torchwood, in their eyes, went where it wanted and did as it pleased and caused all the really spectacular civic disturbances.
UNIT, on the other hand, apparently understood and appreciated the need for a thing like Torchwood Three, a shadow agency that could do what UNIT couldn't. When they saw the black SUV pull up, the soldiers nearest the road snapped to attention.
"What do I do if they salute me?" Ianto asked Gwen.
"Smile and nod," she said. "Think Royal Family, visiting the troops."
Jack left the car parked in front of a no-parking sign and jumped out, grinning.
"I love a man in uniform," he said, as they walked towards the pair of soldiers. "Or a woman in uniform. Or out of a uniform. Good morning," he said to the taller of the two. "Captain Jack Harkness."
"Yessir," the man said. "Colonel was expecting you at ten, sir."
"Good traffic," Jack answered. "Don't spoil the surprise. The colonel loves to be surprised."
Both men looked uneasy, but Jack clapped one of them on the shoulder and gestured for Ianto and Gwen to follow.
The Egg that had come through in London wasn't hard to locate. It was sitting on a strange plinth of bricks and concrete rubbish in the middle of a flower patch, covered in a sheet of khaki oilcloth. Jack tossed a scanner to Gwen and walked up to a man in the centre of a knot of red-beret'd soldiers.
"So," he said, crossing his arms. The man turned. "Think you could make that thing a little more visible, Colonel? If you really put in some effort, I mean."
"Harkness," the man answered, looking not a whit put out. "Thank god."
"If I had a penny for every time I heard that," Jack said with a slight grin. "Where's your reconnaissance?"
"We're just assembling it -- "
"Well, lead the way. You know how much I love raw data."
The colonel looked uncertain, but Jack just kept smiling away until finally he turned on his heel and led them towards a military jeep on the far side of the Egg. Ianto felt deeply unnerved as a trio of soldiers fell in behind him in lockstep.
"They like to put on a show for us," Jack said in an undertone, as they walked. "Torchwood -- our Torchwood -- used to tap agents from UNIT. They all say it's a good gig if you can get it."
"You must have amazing powers of propaganda," Ianto replied.
"Have we met? I'm Captain Jack Harkness."
"Point."
There were three UNIT jeeps parked together in one corner of the paved walkway, and spread out across the bonnet of one of them were a series of printouts, a pair of laptops, and a handful of paper coffee cups filled with stones, weighing down the paper against the breeze. Jack picked up the nearest paper and turned it sideways, studying it.
"Mass-spec," he said. "How'd you get a sample?"
"We didn't," the colonel replied. "We ran the dirt through on the off-chance."
"Yeah, I see, dirt," Jack stabbed a finger at part of the chart. He set it down, re-weighted it, and glanced at Ianto. "This is gonna take a while. See if Gwen needs help."
Ianto was about to answer when Jack leaned close.
"Listen to everything," he whispered. "Be my ears."
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied.
"You, go with him," Jack pointed at random to a UNIT soldier. She jumped to obey. "Whatever he needs, you give him, got it?"
She saluted. Ianto tried not to laugh. He was turning to walk back to the Egg when Jack caught his arm.
"Not that way," he said. "Go around."
Ianto looked down. What he'd taken for textured metal plating, a few feet ahead, was actually a plaque -- an enormous plaque, filled with columns of writing, a narrow aisle next to each column. There were flowers scattered here and there.
Names.
Oh. Right. This was the memorial park for the victims of Canary Wharf.
They'd said in the report Jack gave him that it was listed publicly as a terrorist bombing, with some nonexistent cult taking credit for it. The nonexistent cult had been captured by nonexistent troops and nonexistently executed after a trial with no cameras, classified under Official Secrets.
Ianto turned carefully and walked around the broad, flat plaque, trailed by the UNIT soldier.
"What's your name?" he asked, as they walked.
"Corporal Ganton, sir."
"You don't have to call me sir. I'm not in your chain of command."
"With all due respect, that's because you're above it. Sir. You're Torchwood."
Ianto glanced sidelong at her.
"You're Ianto Jones," she added.
"Yes."
"I've seen your name on reports from Cardiff. Your team does good work."
"Thanks."
"Reckon you'll take the UPO with you back to Cardiff?"
"UPO?" he asked, and she coughed, trying to hide a smile.
"Sorry, sir. Term the others came up with. Unidentified Plummeting Object."
Ianto bit his lip, hiding his own laugh. "No, that's good. We call it the Egg. I don't know about taking it yet. Up to Captain Harkness. Gwen," he called, as they reached the little cleared area where the Egg was standing. "Jack sent me. Anything interesting?"
She offered him the scanner. "Residual Riftlike traces -- doesn't quite read the same. Tosh would have known more," she added wistfully. "Definitely came through something like the Rift, anyway. Everyone I talked to says it fell out of the sky. They're getting footage from the CCTV."
The ghost shift had been caused by a weakness over Torchwood Tower, a weakness in space-time that put out a tremendous amount of energy. That much was in the reports. Supposedly it had been sealed up, but you could paint over rotting wood and it'd still rot.
"Do we know how far it fell?" he asked. She shrugged.
"How tall was Torchwood Tower? We should find out where the -- "
"Breach was measured at six hundred and four feet above sea level," Ianto said promptly. "Five hundred and two feet aboveground spanning to five hundred and twenty feet aboveground at highest recorded point, locally."
Then he closed his mouth.
Gwen was staring at him. So was Corporal Ganton.
"How do I know that?" he asked.
Gwen gave him a reassuring smile that did not in fact reassure him in the slightest. "Perfect recall, I expect."
"But it wasn't in the -- "
"Ianto," Gwen said firmly, cutting her eyes to the corporal, who stiffened and looked away. "Here, take this," she added, and pressed a second scanner into his hand. "We'll try bouncing it around a little, see if it's permeable."
They worked that way for a while, Ianto keeping one eye on the scanner and one on Jack, who was still studying readouts and talking to the soldiers nearby. He was smiling a lot. Eventually Ianto handed the scanner to Corporal Ganton, who looked like he'd just given her a chunk of gold.
"Help Gwen out," he said. "And point me to the coffee."
There were three young -- very young -- men standing around a folding table with a coffee carafe and a large box on it, filled with odd packets. They fell silent when he approached and poured himself a cup.
"Have you lot been out here since three?" he asked, and they nodded. "Boring, eh?"
"Not really," the boldest of the three said.
"Oh yeah?"
"Well," the man said, faltering.
"Listen, I'm not your boss," Ianto told him. "I'm the office boy. Nobody's going to report you. Just trying to make conversation. I'm bored."
This did the trick, and two of them were now smiling at him.
"Well, we got to secure the area and watch the brass drop a brick," the bold one said. His namebadge said Karls. "Then the looky-loos came around and we ran them off. Then we got word you lot were coming up and the officers went off their heads again."
"Nice to know we have cred," Ianto said, sipping his coffee.
"Loads," Karls assured him. "Then you actually did come up and we drew lots to see who got to guard the car."
"It's a brilliant car," the second soldier said. "All the bells and whistles."
"And bits and bobs, too," Ianto answered. They grinned.
"You taking it back with you, then?" Karls asked.
"The UPO? Might do. Up to the captain."
"Don't suppose you need armed escort?"
"Are you asking for a trip to Cardiff?" Ianto raised his eyebrows.
"Just putting my name in the hat, sir."
"I'll let the captain know. Who got it covered up once it was off the ground?"
"Me, sir," said the second one. "Well, me and three of the others."
"Anybody touch it?"
"Not bloody likely. First rule of training: don't touch it."
"Second rule, don't lick it," Karls said, and they laughed. Some kind of UNIT in-joke, apparently.
"Words to live by." Ianto glanced past them. Jack was watching him. "Boss looks hungry."
He poured out two more cups of coffee and lifted a packet out of the box, studying it. Hamburger and beans.
"Dare I ask?" he said, offering it to them.
"ORP, sir," Karls said. "Breakfast of champions."
"Is there a breakfast of hungry bastards who don't like military rations?" Ianto inquired.
"What you see is what we got."
"All right." Ianto studied the packet as he carried a coffee to Gwen (who declined the rations) and then took the other up to Jack at the jeep. He ripped the ORP open, put the sack of food inside the chemical heating bag, and set it on the car hood.
"Rations," Jack remarked. "God, I hated rations. You know in an American ration pack they used to include cigarettes?"
"I wouldn't have high hopes for the coffee," Ianto said, offering it to him.
"Hear anything interesting?" Jack asked, leaning against the jeep.
"Nobody's touched it. Everyone thinks we're taking it with us. Volunteers have stepped forward for armed military escort."
Jack's lips twitched.
"Oh, and I know the precise height and location of the dimensional breach that used to exist over London," Ianto added. "Which was a surprise to me."
"Muscle memory?"
"The brain is not a muscle."
Jack looked troubled. "Are you having flashbacks?"
"No, just random moments of information."
"Martha's back on Monday, we can have her run some more scans. Actually, she's in London somewhere if you want us to go bother her now."
"Somehow I don't think Saturday morning is a very appropriate time to demand an alien brain scan."
"It's not an appropriate time to be digging an alien egg beacon out of the Canary Wharf memorial, either. Or eating..." Jack tore open the bag of food as it began to inflate with steam. "Hamburger and beans. Can I tempt you?"
"Anytime, sir," Ianto replied.
"Mmh. I like that in an employee," Jack replied, taking the plastic fork Ianto offered and sampling the food. "Not bad. Gotten better," he said. Around a mouthful of food. Ianto gave up.
"I have Torchwood's purchase card. We're not in the back of beyond. I can get real food," Ianto offered. Jack washed the concoction down with a sip of coffee and a grimace.
"What's Gwen say?"
"She'd rather eat Weevil."
"Weevil chow?"
"No, actual Weevil."
"Okay. Provide succor," Jack said, with a slow grin.
"Anything for you?"
"Get me some drinkable coffee. I think we're almost done here."
Ianto found a chain coffee-shop not far from the memorial park, crammed with people. He waited patiently, asked for a muffin for Gwen and a danish for himself, got Jack's hopefully-drinkable coffee, and passed over his card.
"Doing good business today," he said idly, as the barista ran the card.
"Lots of tourists," she said. "Guess something happened down by the wharf."
"Vandalism, I heard, at the memorial," said the man in line behind Ianto. "Crying shame, that. Nothing's sacred anymore."
"Have a nice day, sir," the barista said, handing him his card back. He nodded and left the cafe, hurrying back towards the park.
Jack wasn't at the jeep when he returned. Ianto stopped and swept the grounds, finally locating the blue greatcoat in a crowd of black-clad soldiers. At Jack's word they dispersed, and Jack seemed to look around him to see if anyone was watching before he reached into his pocket and took something out. It looked like a pair of small rocks, but then again this was Jack. They could be anything.
Ianto watched, unseen behind the jeep's chassis, as Jack walked to the edge of the memorial plaque and paced along it until he came to an aisle between names, apparently the one he wanted. He stepped onto the plaque and idled along it, head down, turning the stones-or-maybe-not-stones over and over in his hand.
He stopped two thirds of the way down the aisle and crouched, the edges of his coat pooling around his feet. He touched a finger to his lips and then to a name on the plaque, then placed a stone next to it with his other hand. After a brief contemplation he walked to the edge of the plaque and found another aisle, far off from the first, and repeated the gesture with a second name.
Jack must have known people who worked in London, Ianto realised. Even if he broke with London he would have known people and lost people too.
He waited until Jack had disappeared in the direction of the car before hurrying over, up the first aisle Jack had taken, the name easy to locate with the little stone to mark it.
Rose Tyler.
Meant nothing to him, hadn't been in any of the reports. He moved back and tried to locate the other one -- there, that was the stone he'd placed on the other na --
Lisa Hallett.
Oh god.
"It's an old tradition, leaving stones for the beloved dead," someone said, and he whirled in surprise. Jack was standing there -- how did he do that? -- hands in his pockets, looking grave. "Jewish, originally. After humanity gets to the stars, flowers are in short supply for a while, but every colony planet has rocks, every spaceship has spare chunks of metal or plastic. Stones are best, though, I think."
"Who was Rose Tyler?" Ianto asked, not really expecting an answer.
"She was a friend. We traveled together for a while. She saved my life a couple of times. For years I thought she'd died here. Turns out she just got sucked into another dimension. Torchwood, huh? Never a dull moment," Jack said, with a fake smile. "She'd have liked you a lot."
"I'm sorry, Jack."
"Well, she's alive, and hopefully happy. Lisa's dead, but we're not. So, we go on." Jack jerked his head back the way they'd come. "Come on, they're loading the Egg into the SUV. We have work to do."
***
Things changed quickly at Torchwood. Ianto was grasping this. Yesterday their boss had been Harkness, now he was Jack. Two days ago the most important thing in the world was to know why four years of his life had been taken from him -- why he'd given them up -- and now it was to know what the Eggs were. Four days ago in his personal timeline he'd been packing to move to London, and today he was chasing alien artefacts around Cardiff at three in the morning.
A week ago in realtime he'd been wearing business suits. Now he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Two years ago in realtime he'd had a dying girlfriend. Now...he was wearing Jack's t-shirt.
Four hours ago he'd been standing in London staring at the Egg that had dropped out of the sky from a breach in time-and-space that was supposed to be closed tight and now he was standing in a containment cell in the Hub, staring at two gigantic Eggs. The heat coming off them was evident in the small room, and he and Gwen were both sweating. Jack was merely...glowing. It really wasn't fair.
"I feel all paternal," Jack said. "I hope whatever hatches from them is fluffy and needy."
"They're not actually eggs, Jack," Gwen said. "No life signs inside."
"They'd make one hell of an omelette." He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. "It'd be a lot easier to figure out if they were eggs."
"So...what do we know?" Gwen asked, as Jack walked out of the cell. Ianto locked it behind them.
"No visible surface interfaces. Mass spectrometer readings can't identify it, at least not from the little that came off the one in London. Survives a drop from six hundred feet without significant damage. Unknown power conversion mechanism. Advanced light and heat management. Some method of communication."
"And we have two of them," Ianto said.
"Did I award you the gold star for counting already?" Jack asked, leading them up to the conference room.
"Point being," Ianto continued, "When was the last time two identical things fell through the Rift? At separate times?"
"We have ninety-two mismatched alien socks," Jack pointed out. "They're in a box in the archives. Filed under 'socks, probably'."
"Mismatched, and that's over the course of a hundred and thirty years," Ianto replied. "And ten of them arrived together in a sack. Filed in the archives under 'sack, socks, for the containment of'."
Jack and Gwen both looked at him.
"Perfect recall," he reminded them. "I've been reading the database. Funny stuff. Archivists have a sense of humour."
"Could be more of them coming," Gwen said. "If we could get a precise time of arrival next time, we might start to get a pattern."
"The Rift is random," Jack said. "And the breach over London's been sealed for two years."
"Then it might be intentional. Some kind of message. Maybe even for us," Gwen replied.
"They couldn't phone?" Jack sighed. "We have recorders on the heat fluctuations. I'll try to run Tosh's translation program on them, but it was set up for text."
"We could try to get another sample," Ianto suggested.
"I don't want to hit it with hammers. The amount of power they draw, it might level Cardiff. I hate it when we level Cardiff," Jack added. He put his hands flat on the table. "Okay. If they're coming through in a pattern then we'll probably have another one at three tomorrow morning, because aliens aren't really up on the whole 'Sabbath day' concept. Gwen, talk to UNIT, tell them to keep a lookout. Ianto, stock the SUV and set up monitors on the Royal Observatory email network, let's see what they're saying. Then go home, both of you."
"It's hardly afternoon," Ianto said.
"We've been up at three a couple days running. Go home, drink something herbal, get some sleep."
"Fine by me," Gwen said, and Ianto could see she was envisioning a long night at home with Rhys. He waited until she'd left the conference room and tilted his head at Jack.
"Coming home too?" he asked quietly. Jack glanced up at him.
"Might be better if I didn't."
"For who?"
"There's slow, and there's slow, Ianto. Take the night. Think about what you're doing. I've got all of time. I can wait a day." Jack stood and kissed him, which seemed a contradiction, but Ianto wasn't going to argue against Jack's lips.
"You said you missed me," Ianto answered when they were done. It sounded petulant even to him.
"But now I know," Jack murmured, fingers stroking his cheekbone, like brushing away dust that wasn't there. "I know you're here. Maybe not the same place as me, but the same general area. And you need rest."
"Don't you?"
"Ever heard the expression, I'll sleep when I'm dead?" Jack asked. He laughed and tapped him on the cheek and pulled back. "Go home and get some sleep. Don't forget to stock the SUV first."
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied, twisting the sir just a little to make it something private, intimate. He wondered where he'd even learned how to do that.
"And send Martha an e-mail about Monday," Jack yelled down the hall after him.
"Yes, sir," Ianto yelled back, rolling his eyes.
Ianto set his alarm for two-forty-five, though when it woke him the next morning there was no call from Jack or from UNIT. He made himself a cup of coffee -- god, why? Lisa Hallett must have been pretty goddamn amazing to make him drink this for her -- and sat up until four. When his eyelids began to droop and there was still no call, he went back to bed.
There was nothing when he woke at seven or when he arrived at the Hub at seven-fifty. There was nothing at eight, when Jack caught the smell of coffee and emerged half-naked from his office, pulling a shirt on and calling, "Ianto?"
There was nothing at eight-fifteen when Myfanwy demanded a game of keep-away with the basketball, or at eight-thirty when Gwen arrived.
By ten, all of them were rechecking the figures on the Eggs and scanning and re-scanning the Observatory's computers for any sign of disturbances in Great Britain's night skies. By eleven, Jack was restless, his fidgeting making them both insane, and Gwen made Ianto take him out of the Hub.
Use any excuse, I don't care.
Ianto got to ride on the invisible lift for the first time, which was fun.
At eleven-fifteen, as they were walking along Mermaid Quay, Ianto's phone rang.
"Ianto Jones," he answered. Jack looked like he wanted to eavesdrop.
"Aw, Jesus, who is it this time?" said an American voice on the other end of the line. "I'm trying to reach Harkness. Captain Jack Harkness. Do you know the guy? Do you know someone who knows the guy?"
"Yes, sir," Ianto replied, catching Jack's eye. "I'm his assistant. How can I help you?"
"Well, thank fuck for small favours. Put him on."
"I'll see if he's in. Can I give him your name?"
"For the love of -- Statten. Henry van Statten."
"One moment, sir." Ianto muted the phone. "An American named Henry van Statten wants to talk to you."
Jack tapped his comm. "Gwen?"
"Yes Jack?" Gwen's voice came over both their comms.
"Look up a guy named Henry van Statten. American. See what UNIT has on him."
"On it..." a brief pause. "Henry van Statten, American, millionaire -- some kind of pharmaceuticals tycoon. Lives in Utah. There's a flag on his file from Area 51, they've got their eye on him."
"Huh. Could be interesting," Jack said. "Pass him over."
Ianto took the mute off and handed him the phone. Jack winked at him and held it to his ear.
"Captain Jack Harkness," he said. "Yeah, my assistant -- really. Well I'm flattered. Who'd you call? No, they wouldn't. What can I do for you?" A long pause. "I see. When did it -- I see. And you -- okay. So it's out. Yeah, I'm familiar." He chuckled. "Mr. van Statten -- can I call you Henry? Henry, I'm in Cardiff." A pause. Jack looked annoyed. "It's in Wales. Great Britain. You're going to have to give us...you do. Sure. How long? Wow. No, this number. We can talk about payment later. All right. See you in Utah." He hung up the phone. "What an asshole."
"What'd he want?" Ianto asked.
"At around three o'clock this morning, local time, an Egg appeared in the middle of the desert outside Salt Lake City. Apparently this guy van Statten beat Area 51 to it. He called around, someone gave him my name as a consultant. He's sending a jet for us."
"He's sending a jet?" Ianto asked.
"Yup. We're going to the States. Gwen!"
"Here, Jack," Gwen's voice came over the comm.
"Get on the phone to Area 51, see why they have him flagged."
"There's an Egg in Utah," Ianto said.
"The crow flies at midnight," Gwen replied. Ianto snorted.
"Can you hold down the Hub while I'm gone? I'm taking Ianto, because he can't," Jack said.
"Oh thanks," Ianto said.
"Well, you can't."
"How long?" Gwen asked.
"Wednesday at earliest, I should think," Ianto said, doing timezone maths in his head. "Nine hours to get here and another nine to get us there -- "
"Uh," Jack said.
"What?"
"He's sending a Concorde."
"The Concorde isn't even -- "
"Apparently he owns one."
"He owns a Concorde?" Gwen asked.
"I don't even know how to calculate for that," Ianto said.
"Give it five hours. Ten and we'll be in Utah. Depending on how fast we can get him to give us the Egg, say a day. Five hours back," Jack said. "Accounting for time zones, we should be back just in time for Tuesday's Egg-drop, if this keeps up. What?" he asked, as Ianto stared at him. "You think you're the only person in this burg who does math? Okay -- Gwen, make the call on Martha if you think you want her there for Monday's drop, wherever the hell it's going to be. If not, let her know to come down on Tuesday instead, give her another day with her boy. Call UNIT if you need backup."
"Ask for Ganton and Karls and anyone Ganton thinks is good," Ianto added.
"It's a shame I'm so competent and well-trained, I could be taking a Concorde to Utah," Gwen replied.
"All in good time, gorgeous," Jack said, and flicked off his comm. "Let's go see what we can find out about van Statten."
As it turned out, what they could find on van Statten wasn't much. Area 51 knew he was a crackpot alien-chaser, always poking around where he wasn't wanted. He was rumoured to have some artefacts but, the few times they'd sent someone in to investigate, van Statten had laughed their agents out of his house. He had museum experts and astrophysicists on his personal staff. Considering how many new drugs he put out on a yearly basis, the research division at his biotech firm was really tiny.
"Sloppy," was Jack's verdict, when they presented their findings. "The way he's parading around, they should be coming down on this guy like a load of bricks. Instead he's stealing their march. Area 51 isn't coping. Remind me when this is over to go to DC and knock a few heads together."
"Do you have that kind of power?" Ianto asked.
"No, but he'll have fun trying," Gwen sighed. "You should get going, the plane'll be here soon."
"I'd take you, but it's going to be boring and someone has to sit on the Rift," Jack said, looking contrite. "As soon as we re-staff, schedule yourself a vacation."
"That always works out so well," she said, but she looked pleased.
Ianto went home to pack and change, and took a call that the jet was arriving at the airport while he was still en route. He called Jack, who was already there, and got directions to the private side. When he stepped out of the cab, Jack wolf-whistled.
"Didn't I say you look good in a suit?" Jack asked. Ianto fidgeted with the hem of his waistcoat. "Trying to impress the millionaire?"
"Never know, he might offer me a job at higher pay."
"We did say you could get a job anywhere by looking ornamental and being willing to shoot things. Come on. Ever been on a Concorde?"
"Never been on an airplane," Ianto replied. Jack glanced at him, a shadow flitting through his eyes.
"You have, actually," he said quietly. Ianto thought for a minute.
"Ah. We went to CERN," he said. "Read about that."
"You'd seriously never been on an airplane before?"
"Dad didn't like them. We did train holidays."
"You're gonna enjoy this, then," Jack said, as a young man in a sober blue uniform took their bags and led them up a rolling stairway to the airplane.
Inside there were benches along the windows and two tables near the back. Behind one table was a well-secured bar, done in mahogany and brass. There was a stereo system too; Jack immediately went to it and began fiddling until he found the rack of CDs nearby.
"Swing," he said, a profound expression of glee on his face. He popped the CD into the changer and turned the volume up.
Fats Waller, Ianto thought absently. Very Jack. If I go to church on Sunday and a cabaret on Monday, tain't nobody's business if I do...
"Swanky place," Jack said, sitting down opposite him on another bench. Ianto felt strange and awkward wearing a suit jacket, compared to Jack in his worn blue Oxford. "Teaches us a thing or two about van Statten, too."
"Such as?" Ianto asked.
"He doesn't go to people. They come to him. Otherwise he'd have flown out here to meet us. And he's a show-off, because if he doesn't use this himself then it's purely for other people's comfort...I used to be a pilot," he added randomly. "Nothing like this. Recon, fighters, bombers." He looked distant for a second, then sat back, relaxing. "Strap in. They won't stay on the ground long. And remember, when you start to panic, we're not actually in trouble unless I'm panicking too."
"Who says I'm going to panic? Did I panic last time?"
"There was a certain tension," Jack replied.
Ianto very carefully did not tighten his hands on the bench or watch Jack incessantly during takeoff, because Jesus Christ machines like this were never meant to get airborne, they couldn't be...
"Good job," Jack said, when they were finally levelled off again and Ianto relaxed. "Brought you something, by the way." He passed across a cheap bound book, stuffed here and there with paperclipped receipts and bits of card.
"What's this?" Ianto asked, opening it. His own handwriting on the front page: a date, a sketch, a few sentences.
"Your diary. Until we...talked, I couldn't give it back to you."
"I keep a diary," Ianto said.
"Diligently, until a few weeks ago."
"I am judging myself so much right now," Ianto said, paging through it.
"It's interesting reading."
"You read it?"
"You left it out. Months ago, don't look at me like that. I put sticky-notes on the interesting parts," Jack added helpfully. Ianto looked down. There were narrow yellow post-it edges sprouting like weeds from the later pages. Ianto turned to one of them, read the writing, tried to hide the horrified look on his face, and glanced at Jack.
"You really need to learn how to convert inches to centimetres," Jack was trying not to laugh. He undid the seatbelt he'd worn for takeoff and slipped across to Ianto's bench, touching the book. "This is your record. There's not much you in it, but it's what you thought was important to remember."
Ianto flipped a few pages along. "Cinema tickets?" he asked, studying the torn stubs stapled to a page.
"We went to the movies."
"Why are there three tickets to one film on three separate nights?"
"You missed the ending the first two times."
Ianto frowned.
"I was distracting you," Jack said in his ear. Ianto closed the book gently.
"I did go home and think last night," he said. He could feel Jack tense, though he didn't move much.
"And?"
"I think I'd like to go to the cinema with you again," Ianto said, giving him a small smile. Jack beamed. "Besides, clearly I'm going to have to take new measurements..."
That got him a laugh. "Read your book."
"And you will be...?"
"Brooding on Eggs and admiring the way you wear a waistcoat."
Ianto looked down at the waistcoat in question. "I honestly wore one of these every day? Did people not stare at me as if I were an arse?"
"They stared at your arse instead. Trust me." Jack patted him on the leg and darted across again, digging in his bag. He took out his laptop, flicked it on, and (presumably) dove into the latest readings off the Eggs.
Ianto didn't mean to get engrossed in reading his own diary, because that was just narcissism on top of self-indulgence and he would have liked to talk with Jack some more once Jack was finished with his work. After a few pages, however, the hum of the airplane and the clack of Jack's fingers across the keyboard and the jazzy horn music all faded out.
It was interesting stuff: accounts of their finds, hastily scrawled supply-lists, notes, sketches. Jack was right, there wasn't much about him in it, and thank god for that to be honest. It was mostly cases they'd worked. The generalities didn't vary that much from the official reports he'd read, but there were anecdotes that weren't in the reports, copied-down remarks that Jack or the others had made, sly observations about the people he'd worked with. On one page there was a chart mapping out the time and location of Owen Harper's coffee demands from day to day, apparently as an attempt to establish a pattern. Finally, at the bottom, he'd written "Ask Tosh to hook Owen up to the computer and see if he can be used as a true random-number generator."
All of them were mentioned in some respect, Tosh more than the others at first -- well, if you didn't count Jack, who was on every page. Jack says, Jack told us, Jack found, Jack thought, Jack did, Jack went, Jack asked. Then lots of Tosh, offhanded remarks about getting coffee together or having her show him some computer tricks. Gradually there were more mentions of Gwen and Owen, and other names -- Rhys, Andy, Martha.
One page gave him pause. It was blank, except for a date and a single sentence: Leave well alone.
"Do you know what this is about?" he asked, holding it out to Jack. Jack looked up, studied it, shook his head.
"You remember the date?" Jack asked.
"It's one of the two days you say we lost."
"Ah," Jack said noncommittally.
"We don't know anything about that loss? Nothing at all?"
"Only that all the deletions were digitally signed by me, and that's hard to forge considering my digital signature requires a retinal scan. And that's the way I feel when I think about it." Jack pointed at the page. "Leave well alone."
"Captain Harkness," the young man from earlier said -- to Jack, because Ianto was, as far as Henry van Statten knew, just the PA. "We'll be serving lunch in a moment, if you'd like to move to the table."
Jack pressed his tongue between his teeth, thinking. "We're running on Utah time?" he asked finally.
"We've found it's easiest to acclimate to the jet lag that way," the man said apologetically.
"Works for me. We'll touchdown at what, two or so?"
"Yes, Captain."
"Remind me to call my girlfriend around eight-thirty tonight, Ianto," Jack said. Ianto tilted an eyebrow but didn't say anything. Eight-thirty in Utah was three-thirty in the morning for Cardiff. Gwen would have Egg News by then.
They really had to start calling them something else. Also, he couldn't have said 'sister'?
Jack spoke about nothing in particular as he ate, messy and unself-conscious as ever. Mostly he talked about Cardiff, dancing around Torchwood on the whole. He mentioned the rebuilding efforts in the city, speculated about the politics of the grant for a new hospital, theorised about water-current patterns in the bay and where they were likely to wash up debris. Ianto couldn't puzzle it out, but he didn't have to. He was learning that he would be told when the time was right. All he had to do until then was cope and try not to make too many assumptions. It felt passive, but then there was only so much activity you could get up to, sometimes. And once he had just a little more information he could stop waiting so much and --
Well, Jack had answered some questions. He'd told Ianto more than he'd been asked, about Rose Tyler. Maybe he'd answer more, if Ianto knew the right questions to ask.
They touched down in Utah a little ahead of schedule, at a private airstrip. Two people were waiting for them -- a middle-aged woman carrying a folder and a youngish man who practically screamed Private Assistant, in the way Ianto probably currently was as well.
"Captain Harkness, Mr. Jones," the woman said, shaking hands. "My name is Bonnie Smith, I'm head of research for Mr. van Statten's private collection. This is Richard, his assistant. Welcome to Utah."
"Nice landscape," Jack replied, but he was looking at the pair of them as he said it. Ianto suppressed the urge to roll his eyes so hard he'd sprain something. "Always thought Utah'd be pretty."
"If you've never been, I can see that you're given some sightseeing brochures," Richard said, as Bonnie handed Jack the folder in her hands.
"I don't think we'll be here long enough for that, but you never know your luck," Jack said with a wink. Richard coloured; Bonnie smiled.
"Mr. van Statten's very eager for you to examine his new acquisition, but he understands you've just jumped seven time zones in five hours. If you'd like to be shown to your suite, we can arrange for you to meet Mr. van Statten later tonight."
Jack cut an almost imperceptible glance at Ianto, who nodded slightly.
"We're good, I think," he said. "If you can get us some coffee we'll push through. Shame to make Henry send a Concorde and then waste all that time sleeping. Keep up, Ianto," he added, apparently for show, since Ianto wasn't trailing more than a step behind.
They were led into a small building at one end of the airstrip, down three flights of stairs, into a lift that seemed to hum and descend forever, and out into --
A museum.
High ceilings, decorative support beams, the works. Objects in glass cases all around them. Ianto felt his jaw drop. Jack whistled low.
"Impressive, isn't it?" said a voice, and a well-dressed man -- built on large lines, radiating smugness -- appeared at the far end of the room. "You must be Captain Jack Harkness," he said, walking forward.
"Either that or you paid a lot of money for an impostor," Jack answered, meeting him halfway. Van Statten grabbed his hand, clapped him on the arm, and ignored Ianto completely.
"I'm Henry van Statten. Good to meet you. Flight all right? She's something, isn't she, my jet?"
"Beautiful piece of work, Henry," Jack answered, flashing his perfect white teeth.
"Yeah, and I got her for a steal. Come on, let's get to business, then you can get some shuteye," van Statten was already steering Jack away. "I hate jet lag. Captain Harkness, huh? What are you captain of, by the way? All I know is, everyone I talked to said you were the one to ask about this -- thing."
"Former pilot," Jack said. "Kept the title."
They passed a glass case with a hairy stuffed arm in it. Just an arm. Ianto swallowed.
"Suits you! Like that coat, too. Retro style. Bonnie, did you give him -- "
"Yes, Mr. van Statten," Bonnie replied, as they followed Jack and van Statten like ducklings. Another case, this one with a set of small metal discs mounted on felt -- Ianto recognised them from the Torchwood database. Alien earrings. Made for alien ears.
"Great. This is everything we've got on the object," van Statten said, tapping the folder in Jack's hands. "We're calling it the Dragon's Egg."
"Catchy name," Jack remarked. He was oozing charm out of every pore, matching van Statten point for point in sheer...American-ness. "This should be interesting. I've never seen one in person."
They passed a plinth with a vase on it. It didn't look alien, but it did have teeth in the top.
"You've seen records, though, right? Pilot, huh? That code for military intelligence or something?"
"I got around, in the service," Jack replied. "Guess you figured out how to switch it off."
"Get it out of the ground? Yeah. Haven't been able to crack it open though."
Another case, a strange lacquered helmet shaped like a bird's head -- either that or it was some alien bird on display...
"Try a diamond saw?"
"Yep, no dice. Lasers too. Here we go..." van Statten stopped in front of a heavy door, keying a code into the lock on the wall. "And listen, if you've got the time and you do good work on this, I've got like two dozen other things you could have a look at."
"Sounds great," Jack said. The door slid aside and van Statten waved Jack in. Bonnie put a hand on Ianto's arm to stop him from following. Jack noticed the movement and leaned back out. "It's okay," he said, upping the wattage on the grin. "He's with me."
"Your eyes only, Captain Harkness," van Statten said.
"Call me Jack. Sorry, but some of my stuff's a two-man operation. He's gonna have to see it sooner or later if you want accurate readings."
Van Statten looked torn. He obviously didn't like not calling the shots.
"He's confidential, don't worry. Ianto, tell Henry about the Slitheen."
"What's a Slitheen?" Ianto asked.
"See?" Jack turned to van Statten. "Silent as the grave. Scout's honour. He's Welsh, they don't talk at all unless you make them. Don't make me pout, Henry."
That seemed to amuse van Statten. He cocked his head and waved Ianto through with an aw-shucks smile.
The room was low-ceilinged and plain, lit with fluorescents, quite a difference from the elegance of the museum. The Egg sat on a cup-shaped stand in the middle of it. There were what looked like electrode patches attached to it at various intervals. Ianto drifted over to the computer monitors on one side, working to get a handle on the readouts van Statten was taking.
Van Statten's PA, Richard, had disappeared without them noticing, and now reappeared with coffee that Ianto had to admit was a fair substitute for his own. It gave him the necessary edge of wakefulness; it was good to be alert when Jack was playing a dangerous game and depending on Ianto to play along without knowing all the rules.
Jack immediately spread out along a workbench to one side of the Egg, sorting the papers van Statten had given him and setting out a handful of tools -- a metal pick, a switched-off scanner, his mobile phone, a ballpoint pen, a small torch, a tuning fork. This was a performance, Ianto realised, a sleight-of-hand where only Jack knew what he was palming.
"Oh, x-rays, nice," Jack said, holding them up to the light. They showed nothing. "Uh huh. Did you do a spectral analysis while it was still going?"
"Second from the bottom," Bonnie leaned forward slightly. Jack raised his head and smiled at her.
"You're thorough," he said.
"We aim to please, Captain Harkness."
"You have very good aim. Okay. Henry, how'd you like to help with a little experiment?"
"My hands are yours," van Statten said proudly. Ianto fought to keep the resigned annoyance off his face, only to find that Richard was looking every inch the way he felt. Jack caught their exchanged glance as he was giving van Statten the tuning fork.
"Ianto, why don't you run along and play with Henry's kid for now? I'll get your help when we get to the scanners."
"Yes, sir," Ianto murmured. Richard waved him through the door and then followed him. Once outside, Ianto loosened his tie and exhaled in relief.
"Pretty impressive, eh?" Richard said. "Your boss have any idea what it is?"
"Dunno yet. Might do, soon."
"Where's he work?"
"Not usually under an airstrip in Utah."
They looked at each other, but Richard broke first; he laughed and cocked his head at a doorway across the wide display room. "Come on. Have a seat, take a load off."
"Your boss wants you to pump me about my boss," Ianto said, as they walked into a small office kitchen, complete with cheap plastic chairs and a vending machine. And there was a display-case here, too, a small taxidermied lizard, labeled "TARKASIAN - 1849".
"Like yours doesn't want the same thing from me?" Richard asked.
"He just wanted a look at the museum, I reckon. And the Egg."
Richard nodded. "You likely to actually tell me anything else?"
"Are you?"
The other man leaned back in one of the chairs, tipping it on two legs. "I don't know a lot. He buys this stuff up from whoever's selling, doesn't care if it's real or not. Bonnie authenticates it if she can. I mean that Egg is alien, right?"
"I think so. It's certainly not someone's idea of a joke."
"Well, so..." Richard waved a hand. "He's got tons of crap like that."
"Must be interesting work."
"Yeah, if you like constantly dancing on the edge of termination. Plus..." Richard leaned forward. "Between you and me and the Tarkasian, I think he's losing it."
"Losing it?" Ianto asked in a hushed voice.
"He's stepping up his security, inch by inch, not because he needs it -- he's just paranoid he's going to. He heard a rumour that there's a machine that can wipe memories, he's gonna find it so he can wipe anyone he's fired. Which means firing a lot more people, lemme tell you. He's expanding the bunker downwards, way further than it needs to go, for no real reason I can see except 'we could be safer'. Seriously, the minute that mindwipe thing shows up, I'm outta here. The benefits aren't that good."
Ianto nodded. "I know what you mean. Better than you think."
"So, come on, quid pro quo me a little here, Ianto Jones."
Ianto laughed. "Fair enough. Captain Harkness freelance consults. I think he saw a lot of things he isn't talking about when he flew. Keeps his lips sealed, y'know? MI-5 might be after him."
"No way."
"Mm." Ianto sipped his coffee and set it down. He was...enjoying this, in a peculiarly perverse way. "He keeps a low profile. I guess he probably likes your boss's style. They seemed..."
"Friendly. Though it looks like Captain Harkness gets friendly with pretty much everyone."
"Lonely childhood, I expect," Ianto said. Richard laughed.
There was a rap on the door and Jack put his head in. Richard was instantly on his feet. Ianto gave him a dry look and stood.
"Need you," Jack said. "Hop hop."
"If Captain Harkness wants you, Mr. van Statten will want me," Richard said, following him through the door and back out into the museum. It really was amazing, a beautiful cavern tucked away from prying eyes, much nicer than the Hub, but at the same time...well, Torchwood didn't lock something away if it was useful, only if it was dangerous. And if they found a dead body they at least locked it in the morgue away from view, instead of chopping it up for a display.
"Set this up over here," Jack said, handing him a scanner as he stepped inside. "Power source," he added to van Statten. He plugged a USB cable into a port Tosh had modified for it (Ianto had read the specs -- fascinating stuff) and ran the cord around the other side of the Egg, fitting it into a digital camera mounted onto a pole. Strapped between camera and pole was a small ratchet device.
"We need to calibrate the scanner and let it run for a few hours," Jack was saying, poking the camera as if it was going to do something supernatural. Ianto fiddled with the "power source".
"Can I watch?" van Statten asked.
"Yeah, but it's going to be really boring," Jack said, offhanded. "Listen, this is a good thing. Give me some time to get online, talk to some contacts, get my head down for the night."
"Okay then. Richard?" van Statten prompted.
"Driver waiting for you, Captain Harkness, he'll take you into town. We've set up a suite for you and a room for Mr. Jones. I have dinner recommendations as well," Richard said promptly.
"Watch out, Ianto, I might trade you in," Jack remarked. He turned the camera on and pushed a button on the ratcheting device. It began to twitch and move, ever so slowly. "That's that. See what we have for you in the morning, okay?"
Van Statten looked delighted -- and not a little avaricious, his eyes glittering in the fluorescent light.
"These contacts -- "
"Eh," Jack held up a hand. "Gotta keep some secrets or I'd be out of a job. Your kid said something about a hotel?"
Richard escorted them back into the lift and took them up. True to his word, there was a large sedan with a driver, waiting for them at the top. Jack's gentle pressure on Ianto's arm as he climbed into the car told him they weren't quite out of the woods yet.
"What'd you think of van Statten?" he asked, as they sped along towards Salt Lake City.
"He seems very efficient," Ianto replied.
"He's a good guy. Always thinking. Inquisitive. Wants to know how things work," Jack agreed. This was a show -- probably for the driver. "American spirit, Ianto. It's why we've still got our empire."
Ianto smirked. "An example to us all."
"Don't get smart with me, I pay your salary."
Jack drifted off into an easy monologue about America, which lasted them until they reached the hotel and there were bags and bellhops to be dealt with.
Ianto was shown briefly to a pretty standard hotel-room: king bed, dresser, telly, bathroom. He stayed long enough to set down his bag and then followed the voices down the corridor to Jack's suite, which was about as far from standard as it was possible to be. There was a tastelessly enormous atrium filled with plants and furniture, with stairs on one side leading up to a loft bedroom overlooking it all. There was a kitchen involved somehow. Ianto didn't dare look in the bathroom.
"I could get used to this," Jack said, sprawling on a sofa and narrowly avoiding knocking over an enormous vase of ivy. "Unpack me, huh?"
Ianto raised an eyebrow, but Jack put a finger to his lips and opened the catch on his wrist-strap, tapping a sequence into it with his right hand. The television blared on and off again quickly; something hissed in the kitchen. Then, to Ianto's concern, there was a fizzling noise in the ceiling and a brief puff of smoke.
"Van Statten's been bugging us," Jack said. "He's been listening in on us since we left Cardiff."
"That's why you put the music on in the jet," Ianto said, realisation striking.
"Yep. He wants to hear what we're saying, and now he doesn't get to. There's probably some in your room too. We should leave those on, he'll think it's a short in the wiring around here. Not to malign the guy who's keeping me in splendour, but I stand by my previous assessment of asshole."
"You seemed to do well, though."
"I was great," Jack said. "Sometimes I miss the con game."
"Con game?"
"Long time ago. Different life. Still, good to know I haven't lost it. Stop unpacking," Jack said, lifting his eyebrows, "and come here and unpack."
"That was beneath you," Ianto said firmly.
"You'll find there's almost nothing beneath me."
"Food first."
Jack moaned. "You're right. What time is it really?"
"Five-thirty."
"In Cardiff."
"Just past midnight."
"Okay," Jack said. "Restaurant around here somewhere. Steak. Gravy. French fries," he said, his American accent deepening and thickening.
"Heart attack."
"Immortal."
"Rub it in," Ianto rolled his eyes.
"I'd like to, but you're insisting I buy you dinner first."
"Well, if you buy me a drink you might find I put out."
Jack pushed himself off the couch and -- there was no other word for it, he stalked forward.
"Are you suggesting I get you drunk and debauch you?" he asked.
"I'm suggesting that after tolerating your act for van Statten, I need a drink," Ianto said. He pulled his tie off and shed his jacket, rolling his sleeves, breathing with relief as he unbuttoned the collar of his shirt.
"You're not helping," Jack said quietly.
"Food," Ianto insisted.
***
"So," Jack said, when they were settled at a table in the hotel's reasonably classy restaurant, waiting for their food, "what'd you learn from princely Richard?"
"Van Statten's indiscriminate. Doesn't know much. I imagine he gets fooled a great deal. The woman, Bonnie, she's the brains when it comes to the artefacts, but van Statten runs the show. Richard thinks he's going mad."
"Really," Jack drew the word out, interested.
"Paranoia, unpredictability -- he's manipulative, likes power. Apparently," Ianto said, "he's also looking for a machine that wipes memories. So he can fire with impunity."
Jack paused, a water glass halfway to his mouth. Ianto knew what he was thinking, what they both were. He pressed on.
"He's not an idiot, Richard. Says when that comes along he'll bugger off. Nice bloke."
"And what did he learn from you?"
"That you're a freelance consultant, possibly a criminal, probably on the run from MI-5." Ianto sipped his pint and gave him a smug look.
"Dangerous to know."
"Something like that."
Jack smiled on him -- pleased, but also affectionate. "Great work."
"I do my best."
He leaned forward. "I promise, when this is over, I'll explain the Retcon."
"I'm sure you will. Torchwood isn't a museum run by a small-minded man who never gets to show off his toys," Ianto replied. "The similarities are superficial at best."
"I like the way you say superficial."
"I'll make sure to call you that frequently," Ianto replied, as their food arrived. He was silent for a few minutes, giving Jack a chance to eat, enjoying the food. When Jack had finally slowed down enough to chew, Ianto took another sip of beer and put his fork down.
"Van Statten's not going to give us the Egg, is he," he said.
"No," Jack replied. "I don't think we could buy it from him even if we tried."
"What do we do, steal it?"
"We could. I don't think we should. I'm not scared of van Statten, but he could cause us more trouble than he's worth. He struck me as vengeful."
"And clever."
"Ignorant but not stupid, I got that from him," Jack replied.
"So what do we do, Jack?"
"Check in with Gwen. See what she's got. Stall for time. If these things just keep falling, sooner or later we're gonna have to do something."
"Why did it show up in Utah, of all places?"
Jack shrugged. "There's no Rift here. On the other hand, there's a huge concentration of alien devices in that museum. Temporal resonance, maybe. In that one part alone there were at least five things that shouldn't exist yet. Might be creating a hot spot."
"By that logic, the Hub should be a likely target."
"Bite your tongue," Jack said, but he smiled as he said it. "We'll see in a few hours. There's something...weird about the museum."
"Aside from the underground bunker full of alien devices?"
"Yeah, like...a memory I can't quite catch. Like I've heard of van Statten before. It'll come, I guess," Jack said thoughtfully.
They lingered once the food was done, speculating about the Eggs and about van Statten's collection. Ianto didn't see why they couldn't send the Army in; Jack was more reluctant. He brought up Mr. Parker, the strange old collector in Cardiff, who had essentially held the longest running cold war with Torchwood in the organisation's history but was effectively harmless, so long as someone kept an eye on him.
It was evident that it hurt Jack to talk about Dr. Harper, who had been lead agent when they finally had to confront Parker. Ianto wasn't certain he ought to ask, but he got the sense that Jack had been more father than boss to Owen. He wasn't best at identifying what Jack was to each of them, but every ounce of information he managed to wrench out of the captain helped in one way or another. Father-figure for Owen, Toshiko's...friend, perhaps even confidante, a challenge for Gwen, a brother-in-arms for Martha...
Which left him. And the thing they'd never put a label on.
Maybe Jack was a challenge for him, too. That would explain a lot -- the flustered tension between Jack and Gwen, the reason Gwen seemed to hold tight to Ianto. Some incredibly dysfunctional connection all three of them shared. But Gwen was married and he was the one in Jack's bed -- in Jack's bed a lot, apparently.
"Ianto," Jack said, waving a hand in front of his face. "Come back."
Ianto smiled and nodded. "Sorry. Jet lag, maybe."
"Then we should go to bed," Jack suggested, his voice dropping low. Ianto wondered idly if that trick had ever fooled him. Maybe he'd wanted to be fooled, a little.
In the elevator, Jack rested his hand in the small of Ianto's back, guiding him past an elderly couple and a young tourist. He kept it there for about two seconds, then slid it down to his arse. Ianto thought about hip-checking him, but suspected that would only make him grab. As it was, the slide of his palm along the light wool trousers was tantalising. The message was clear: work time's over.
They were barely through the door into the suite's atrium before Jack got an arm around his waist and pulled him backwards until their bodies were flush, kicking the door shut with his foot. His other arm came around and opened the strap on his wrist again to scan for repairs to the bugs. The telephone on the side-table near the door shorted out.
"Shame," Jack said. "Could have given them a show."
"Next time, maybe," Ianto replied. Jack bit his earlobe.
"If you want to," he whispered, fingers working at the buttons on Ianto's waistcoat. "I won't object."
Ianto tilted his head, smoothing a palm over Jack's busy hands.
"Though, what I'd really like is to have you on every horizontal surface we can find," Jack continued in the same filthy voice. "I don't think you get what the suits do to me."
Ianto leaned back against him as he got the waistcoat undone. The shirt underneath was tugged free and Jack's other hand worked his belt-buckle slowly.
"Sometime I'll tell you what we did with two of your neckties and a waistcoat," Jack continued.
"A waistcoat?" Ianto asked, alarmed.
"You'll have fun. Right now, I'll settle for something a little less complicated. Fine by you?" Jack asked.
"Fi -- " Ianto stifled a moan with an indrawn breath. "Fine."
Jack was about to say something else when Ianto felt something buzz against his hip; they both started, and then Jack tightened his arm, trapping him there as he pulled the mobile out of his pocket.
"Gwen," he said, looking at the caller ID.
"Oh god," Ianto replied.
Jack answered it anyway. He'd managed to get the belt buckle undone and apparently decided to prove he could multitask. His fingers were drawing small circles on Ianto's stomach, warm against his skin.
"News?" Jack asked, holding the phone to his ear. Ianto could hear Gwen's voice, but not what she was saying. "Uh huh. Okay, tell me..."
He went very still; his hand stopped, halfway down Ianto's trousers, and Ianto swallowed a whine of frustration.
"It did," he said. Ianto turned his head, nosing along Jack's cheek. Jack's arm tightened. "No, I think that's good. It'll help us out here. Really. I remember that thing. Box, right?"
His hand began to inch lower again. Ianto pressed silent, dry kisses against his jaw, hips jerking against Jack's arm.
"Go ahead and find it. That's what I thought. And did we get a new Egg? The -- oh, Gwen," and Jack's voice was rich with amusement. "I'm sorry. No, I'm not laughing."
Ianto twisted his fingers in the material of Jack's trousers. Jack bumped his knee against Ianto's in warning.
"Go for it. Unless you think it's dangerous, get some sleep and call me tomorrow. I'm tied up at the moment. Well. Hope to be soon."
Ianto huffed air against his skin.
"Absolute torment. Yep. Okay."
Jack hung up the phone and tucked it back in his pocket. "Gwen says," he said, cupping Ianto's cock lightly, "that the Egg hatched."
"What?" Ianto asked stupidly.
"The outer shell dissolved. It was cycling down energy. It's wood underneath," Jack murmured. He twisted his wrist slightly. Ianto moaned. "Good boy," he added.
"What -- what's she going to -- "
"She remembers something that came through a while ago. She's going to find it. And more importantly," Jack added, "it leaves us the rest of the evening free, barring disaster. Enjoying that?"
"Yes, but the..." Ianto couldn't think, could hardly breathe, but this was work and probably important.
"Gwen's on it. Another Egg came down in the bay. She got it out, it's contained. They work in water, too. Briefing over," he announced, and turned Ianto to kiss him thoroughly -- messy, dirty, intense. Ianto spared a quick sympathetic thought for Gwen, hauling one of those things out of Cardiff bay, but he couldn't hold onto it. Not with Jack undressing them both now, deft and sure.
"Gentleman's choice," Jack added. "Couch? Bed? Kitchen counter?"
"Cold," Ianto said. "Bed?"
"Bed."
They kissed their way up the staircase, Jack's shirt catching on the banister as he discarded it, Ianto losing track of his trousers somewhere near the top. Jack pushed him down on the bed and propped himself over him on his elbows, beaming.
"Hi," he said. "Wanna fuck me?"
Ianto gaped.
"Do we do that?" he blurted.
"Do you really think there's much we don't do?" Jack asked. He twisted his hips enticingly.
"I just assumed..."
"As I think we've established, I'm easy," Jack said. "Whatever you want. But it's good, that way." He bent his head, sucked on Ianto's throat. "I want to show you everything," he said against his skin.
"I, yes," Ianto babbled, as Jack straddled him. "Yes, please, show me, I can, yes, how -- "
There was a clatter from the floor nearby as Jack's phone buzzed again. Both of them looked up. Jack dropped his head, thudding it against Ianto's chest.
"Gwen," he mumbled.
"Probably," Ianto gasped.
"I can -- "
"No, answer it -- might be important."
Jack groaned and rolled off him, catching the phone on the fourth ring.
"Please go to bed," he said, in greeting. He was silent for a while. "Okay. But it was classified harmless, right? Yeah, well, someone found it and catalogued it. No...not tonight. Go to bed, Gwen. Call me..." he ran a hand through his hair.
"Noon," Ianto offered.
"Call me at noon Cardiff time. Goodbye, Gwen. Goodbye."
He set the phone on the nightstand next to the bed and ran his hands through his hair, obviously thinking.
"What was it?" Ianto asked.
"Unimportant. Tell you tomorrow," Jack replied, crawling across the bed and kissing him.
"But -- "
"Tomorrow," Jack insisted.
Perhaps it made him a bad person, or at least a bad employee, but he found as Jack took his hand, kissed him, showed him how to open him up (gently, so gently, as if Jack might break), that he didn't care what Gwen had uncovered. He didn't want to think about it, not when Jack was making soft, sharp cries in his ear, not when Jack was straddling him again and easing down. Not when Jack was tipping his head back and undulating his hips, sheened with sweat, moaning filthy encouragements and chanting Ianto's name.
His last rational thought before it all got swept away was that there were worse jobs than being Jack Harkness's very personal assistant -- than being Jack's 'unlabeled'.
***
Then
"What the hell can I say to you that's not going to freak you out?" Jack asked, turning sideways from the camera to look at Ianto, leaning in the doorway.
Ianto shrugged. "Tell me the truth."
"Would you have been okay with the truth when you were twenty?"
Ianto smiled. "Twenty-one. I was...a lot less intense when I was twenty-one."
"Oh, I can't wait to see that," Jack muttered. Ianto turned to leave -- Gwen was waiting for him outside, with handcuffs, ready to take him back to the cell -- but then he paused.
"I was an arsehole sometimes. Maybe a lot of the time. Go easy on me," he said over his shoulder.
"Come back to me," Jack replied. "I'll figure you out as I go."
***
Chapter Five
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