Your Face Is Turned, 4/9

[sam_storyteller]

Title: Your Face Is Turned
Part: 4 of 9
Rating: R
Summary: Lo Boeshane has a promising career ahead of him as he enters his first year of Fleet Officer Training, but the war is still with him and life at Quantico Station can be difficult. Meanwhile, Ianto Jones is just trying to figure out why the Doctor kidnapped him to the fifty-first century and why Jack abandoned him at a school for the Fleet's military elite. He suspects it may have something to do with Lo, but his attempts to help the troubled young veteran may damage his own timestream beyond repair.

CHAPTER FOUR

Once he felt like he'd found his feet with the students, Ianto tried being more...well, sociable seemed to have such loaded meaning in this particular day and age, but he got out more than he had when he'd first come to the station. He ate at least a few meals a week in the mess, usually sitting with some of the faculty members, apart from the hundreds of Skins and Twos who had to eat there and the upperclassmen who chose to.

He often sat with Kraf, the five-legged, be-eyestalked alien who was the only non-human on the station, or at least the only visibly non-human person. The other faculty, bewilderingly, were more wary of Kraf, who was of their time and training, than they were of Ianto, whose experience was far stranger to them.

"It's cultural," Kraf said, when Ianto asked. He looked annoyed, but Kraf always looked vaguely annoyed -- something to do with the shape of his face, Ianto thought.

"That's hardly an excuse," Ianto pointed out.

"Perhaps, but I don't blame them. Well, I do blame them, but one understands. Humans -- pardon the generalisation -- are like children who got bullied on the first day of school. Everyone who looks like a bully is suspect. My people are mainly peaceful, but humanity hasn't had a good first impression of the Other."

Ianto thought about his own first impressions of the Other. He had to admit Kraf might have a point. Between Cybermen, Daleks, and the bloody Doctor, he didn't have very good context himself.

On the other hand, here he sat, sharing his Brrvida with the alien. (Brrvida was some kind of protein. He'd decided not to ask any further. It was delicious, and he didn't want to know what went into making it.)

Kraf seemed to sense his hesitation. Maybe Kraf was psychic. It had been known to happen.

"Yes, you do seem to be an outlier among them," he said. "Less context, perhaps?"

"Actually, I met quite a few aliens in my last job," Ianto said. "Most of them wanted to kill me."

Kraf grunted. "You're disproving my theory, then? That's annoying."

"Well, most people didn't know aliens existed. So most people didn't spend their time saying I had to be afraid of them. I think it's a good theory. As good as any."

One of Kraf's eyestalks extended slightly, studying him. "You must have had a rather unique position, before coming here, if you were aware of non-human races so early."

Ianto shrugged. "I worked in research and defence."

Kraf blinked. Well, winked, but when you had independent eyeballs, it was a similar sort of gesture. "You -- didn't work for the Torchwood Archive, did you?"

Ianto paused. "The what?"

"The Torchwood Archive? They were founded around your time, if I'm remembering Earth history properly. They have an outpost near my home planet. Lots of scientists. Research and Defence is their motto. Which I find a little offensive, but they know we could blow them up if they looked at us wrong, so it's all one."

"Torchwood still exists?" Ianto asked. Jack had not mentioned this.

"So you did work there?"

"Well, it wasn't called the Torchwood Archive when I worked there," Ianto said. "It was just Torchwood. I can't believe -- three thousand years and it still exists? How did I not hear about this?"

"They keep it quiet. Torchwood does not publish. Famous saying. By a Director Jones, as I recall, sometime last century. Maybe a relative of yours. Did you spawn before you came here?"

"What -- no!" Ianto said, then thought about it. "Well. Not that I know of. There are a lot of Joneses. Excuse me," he added, standing and setting down his spork (sporks: the cutlery of The Future!). "I need to go."

"Suit yourself," Kraf replied, pulling over the remaining tray of Brrvida. "See you tomorrow."

"Yes, tomorrow," Ianto said distractedly. He was already planning a research approach, mentally compiling all the databases that might contain information on the Torchwood Archive and its history.

He was halfway to the library before his thoughts were interrupted by noise: the sound of shouts and catcalls, echoing down the hall from one of the communal bathrooms. Students at play, no doubt, except that some of the shouting sounded a bit more frantic, almost panicked --

Then he heard the unmistakable sound of someone in pain, a quick yelp hurriedly hushed, and he broke into a run.

When he reached the doorway, he found a scuffle going on. At first it looked like a three-way battle between two large Cadets, three Senior Cadets, and one naked prisoner. As he watched, however, everyone in clothing seemed to coalesce into a single side, most of them holding the limbs of the naked boy, trying to restrain him. The boy was thrashing against them and doing a fairly good job of trying to escape, but one of the Senior Cadets had a knife.

No, not a knife -- a straight razor, of all the bizarre things to find on a space station in the 51st century.

"What the hell is going on here?" he demanded. Everyone, including the naked boy, froze.

"Just a bit of fun, sir," said the Senior Cadet with the razor. She gave him an insolent look that clearly said she didn't think much of a librarian interrupting their fun. Ianto wished for his sidearm. "Teaching one of our boys his place."

Ianto looked at the boy, whose eyes were rolling in fear. There was blood running down his temple where apparently he hadn't taken kindly to the idea of a shave.

"Funny, you don't look like a teacher," Ianto said. The woman with the razor narrowed her eyes.

"He slept with my girlfriend," she said.

"And here I thought this century was enlightened about that kind of thing," Ianto retorted. "Out, all of you, now. Let him go."

The others looked to the Senior Cadet with the blade.

"I gave the order, not her," Ianto said sharply. "Let him go or I'll make sure you get the strips you deserve for this."

The woman snapped the blade into its casing sharply. Ianto stepped into the bathroom and jerked his head at the door. Almost everyone bolted, except for her and the naked boy. She sauntered out, giving him one last look as she went. Ianto stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

"The razor," he said. She snorted and dropped it into his outstretched hand, and he let her leave.

The boy they'd been about to -- shave, or castrate, or something -- was picking himself up off the tiled floor, studying the cut on his face in the mirror. With a clearer view, Ianto could see he was one of the library regulars, the tense boy, the Ghost.

"Thanks," the Ghost said, glancing at him in the mirror.

"Anytime," Ianto replied. "Have you got any clothing?"

The Ghost gestured at a crumpled pile in the corner. Ianto picked up the shirt; it'd been sliced off him.

Classy all the way, these Fleet cadets.

"Well, it's better than nothing. You'll want that looked at," he said, offering the boy his trousers back.

"It's fine," the boy said, tucking the trousers under his arm.

"It's really not," Ianto replied. "Put them on. You're going to Medbay or I'll give you strips as well."

The boy smiled a little as he pulled the trousers over his hips. The flies had been cut away, but he held them up with one hand easily. "You can't give strips."

"I have influential connections," Ianto informed him. "I'll say you were shouting in the library."

The boy's smile turned into an open, engaging grin. "Maybe they'll shave my head as punishment."

Ianto offered him the ruined shirt. "Come along."

They didn't encounter anyone else on the silent walk to the Medbay; everyone was at dinner or studying, which presumably was why the others had chosen this moment to torment the Ghost. When they arrived, the desk nurse deeply over-reacted, at least Ianto thought so; the boy's eyeroll when he was marched to a chair and immediately squirted with disinfectant and skin bond seemed to indicate he agreed.

"So," Ianto said, sitting with the boy as he held the bond-adhesive to the wound and waited for it to dry, "apparently some people take infidelity very seriously in this century. Was she worth it?"

"I didn't know she had a girlfriend," the boy complained. "It's not like she's in any trouble."

"Oh, I reckon she's in plenty," Ianto replied. "That's why I took the razor."

"Some people are crazy and clingy," the boy said. He offered his hand. "Cadet Lo Boeshane."

"Librarian Ianto Jones," Ianto replied, shaking his hand. "You'd better tell me everything."

"Why?" Boeshane asked. Ianto considered this. He didn't actually have a reason, other than the somewhat tautological Because someone ought to be told.

"Nosiness," he tried. Boeshane nodded.

"Okay," he said. "I did something stupid and Senior Cadet sent her Skin girlfriend to mock me. We ended up having sex in a bath. Word got around to Senior Cadet, who's been after me for two weeks. She said if I fuck Skins I should look like one since I'm not a real Cadet anyway, which I think is stupid because she's the one who's all crazy over a Skin, and anyway they grabbed me and were going to shave my head. Which is the last thing I need these days, lemme tell you."

"I can imagine," Ianto said gravely. He did look young to be a Cadet; it was the first thing that had drawn Ianto's attention to him.

"Also it wasn't like that anyway," Boeshane said. "I just did something nice for her because she was nice to me. It was only once."

He looked like the shock of what had happened to him was finally settling in, but he was managing it with a rather eerie calm.

"So she sent someone to make fun of you, and you had sex with her girlfriend. I think you win," Ianto said. Boeshane smiled, sat in silence for a little while before he turned back to Ianto.

"Can I ask you something?" he said. Ianto raised an eyebrow. "What happened to your face?"

"I was shot," Ianto replied.

Boeshane seemed to be waiting for something. Finally, he grinned again -- that same charming, brilliant smile.

"You're shorter on words than me," he pointed out.

"Do I get a prize?" Ianto asked.

"My good gracious," someone said, and Ianto looked up to see the Chaplain of the station standing in front of them in one of his horrible Hawaiian shirts. "Mr. Jones, tell me you didn't get into a fight with a Cadet."

"No," Ianto said. Boeshane gave him an imploring look. "Found him in the shower. Looks like he fell and cut himself."

The Chaplain looked deeply unconvinced. "Lo?"

Boeshane tested the bond-adhesive, then let go of his face. "You remember I told you about Debra?"

The Chaplain nodded.

"Her girlfriend found out."

Ianto watched as the man sighed. He looked like he was used to dealing with Boeshane's antics; perhaps this wasn't the first time the boy had caught trouble. Then the Chaplain looked at Ianto pointedly.

"Innocent bystander," Ianto said, raising his hands.

"Neither of you will tell me what happened, will you?" the Chaplain asked.

"Not my place," Ianto said. Boeshane looked sullen.

"Are you in danger, Lo?" the Chaplain asked. "This girlfriend, I don't suppose she's satisfied?"

"I'll work around it," Boeshane told him. "If they hadn't jumped me all at once I'd have been fine. She'll forget about it. Probably. I'm used to watching my back."

"You should make a report," the Chaplain insisted. "I know, I know, it's not fair play to tattle, but this looks like assault to me. An inquiry could get them reprimanded, maybe expelled."

"Great," Boeshane muttered. "That's what I need."

"Does this Debra -- does she know?" Ianto asked. Boeshane frowned.

"Don't think so," he said. "It's the first time they tried anything."

"Well, instead of watching your back, you might consider telling her," Ianto suggested. The other men looked at him like he was insane. "Clearly she has some influence with this Senior Cadet."

There was a long silence, and then Boeshane laughed -- a startling noise, sudden and sharp, but with real pleasure behind it.

"I'd like to see that," he said, mouth wide in a grin. "Skin Debra taking the hide off her Senior Cadet. That's a genius idea. Sir," he added belatedly.

"It shows a certain amount of lateral thinking," the Chaplain allowed.

"You don't need to call me Sir," Ianto told Boeshane.

"Look, even Chaplain approves," Boeshane said, ignoring him, standing and making for the doorway. "Listen, the skin-bond's dry, I'm going to go find some new clothes. And pay a call to the barracks. Thanks, sir!" he called back over his shoulder, to Ianto. Ianto stood up, straightening his collar.

"That one," the Chaplain said. "He's going to be trouble if he ever starts thinking like you do."

"Efficient solutions a specialty," Ianto said.

"That's the first time I think he's laughed since he came on board," the Chaplain continued. "First time I've seen him, anyway, and I've been keeping an eye on him. You know he's a war veteran?"

"I'd heard," Ianto replied. "He seems friendly enough with his classmates."

"Yes, well. Boeshane becomes what others want to see," the Chaplain said. "Or at least what he thinks others want to see."

Ianto looked thoughtfully at the door. "Yes, I know that feeling," he remarked quietly.

***

When Lo told Debra what had happened, and showed her the slice on his face, her lips thinned into a firm, narrow line.

"I knew she was trouble," she said. "She's not like you, she was raised on Earth."

"What does Earth have to do with anything?" he asked, leaning against the corridor wall outside the barracks.

"Things are different down there -- all around here, really," Debra said. "It's not like in the colonies and on the stations -- well, maybe parts are, but there are a lot of conservatives down there. People left Earth for a reason. She's very...monogamous."

"Monowhat?" Lo asked. Debra looked at him, then laughed. He smiled.

"I'll handle her," Debra said. "Thanks for telling me. She won't bother you again."

"I appreciate it. Sorry to cause you trouble."

Debra shook her head. "I'm not going to blame you too. You should scram before someone sees you malingering with the Skins."

"Scramming," Lo agreed, while Debra went back inside, presumably to prepare to rip her girlfriend -- probably her ex-girlfriend -- a new one. He walked back to his quarters and settled down on the bed to study, but his mind drifted.

That was two strikes against him with the Senior Cadets. First his stunt with the flight sim, which would have died down pretty quickly, though he wasn't about to tell anyone he passed his clearance with a perfect score. Then the mess with Debra, which had meant a gang of senior students gunning for him for at least ten days before he let his guard down and they almost shaved his head. If the librarian hadn't come along when he did...

But he had, and Lo was grateful. He wasn't in the business of being saved, but he didn't mind being rescued by a cute civ with a surprisingly commanding tone of voice. He ought to go by the library tomorrow and say thank-you in a more complete way. That was only good manners.

Not santete, though. He'd heard scuttlebutt that Jones was celibate, or at any rate didn't care to accept when one of the Senior Cadets tried it with him. Something about pining for a boyfriend back in his home time. Besides, Lo was newly cautious of santete with strangers. He didn't really have anything to offer; Jones had free range of data, access to all the ship's entertainment files, and anyway he wouldn't know where to start. His credit was only good at the Quantico shop. He wasn't a very good cook...

For lack of anything better to do, he searched out the Wik entry on the twenty-first century, skimming the text for something interesting. The images were more entertaining than the text: people in strange clothing, odd ballistic weaponry, bizarre food. His eyes lighted on some kind of primitive craft, and he paused. Not a car, not by his definition of the word, and not a spaceship. Sleek, though, and apparently very common in the twenty-first. Four wheels, internal-combustion engine, limited terrain capabilities, and the thing must have been a monster to pilot. Manual everything. Still, there was something appealing about it. Better yet, they made toys of it, just like the toy spacecraft they used to put inside Kanteregg sweets when he was a child.

He didn't have the capability to buy one, and authentic antiques were far, far out of his price range on the market, but he'd be willing to bet someone would know how to get their hands on one.

Mind made up, he stepped out into the corridor and nipped down to Myles' room. She was doing some kind of stretching exercise when he knocked on the open door. She collapsed in a heap and grinned up at him from the floor.

"Need something?" she asked. "Don't tell me you want to go over the flight plan for tomorrow."

"Memorised it," he said, waving it aside. "Myles, I need a favour."

After listening to his (very condensed) story, she gave him the information he needed. He crossed through the station to the industrial sector, found a fabrication classroom half-full of Twos working overtime for their engineering electives, and asked around until he found a young woman whose eyes lit up at his proposition. He bartered her down to eight bottles of too-sweet drinks from the station shop plus half his private data stash on the server, gave her a good-faith payment of a tin of shoe polish on the spot, and left her to her work, a spring in his step as he returned to his own room.

The following afternoon, once his flight class was finished and he'd had a bath (glorious baths; he was always sweaty after flight) he walked into the library and directly up to the big central desk where the librarian was assisting a pair of his classmates. He waited, impatient, until they were done and then pushed past them up to the counter.

"Hello again," Mr. Jones said with a smile. "Sort everything out?"

"Remains to be seen," Lo told him loftily. "Nobody bugged me today."

"Your shaving cut looks better," the librarian observed.

"Makes me look rakish," Lo said. And then, unable to contain his glee, "I brought you something."

"Brought me something?" Mr. Jones asked.

"Yup." With flair, Lo took the databox out of his pocket and placed it on the counter. It was small, about the size of his thumbnail, with silver wires and glass beads adorning the outside. Mr. Jones looked at it, confused.

"It's a pretty little thing," he said, bending down to study it. He looked up at Lo. "What is it?"

Lo stared at him. "Turn it on."

"I haven't a clue how," Mr. Jones said, prodding it with a finger. Lo realised, belatedly, that he probably hadn't encountered a databox before.

"It's a toy," he said, feeling foolish. "Push the little button."

"This one?" Mr. Jones asked, pointing to the switch on the side. Lo nodded encouragingly. Mr. Jones looked slightly anxious, like he was worried it would explode, but he nudged the button with his fingertip.

Immediately the tac-holo flickered to life. The box disappeared, replaced by a tactile projection -- visually stunning, solid to the touch. The Two he'd paid to make it had done excellent work, down to the details on the wheels. Mr. Jones's mouth opened in surprise.

"Is it the right century?" Lo asked, as Jones reached out to touch it. The tac-projector would ensure it felt as real as any toy would; he seemed startled when he made contact, then rolled it back and forth with a finger. "I wasn't sure."

"It's a twentieth-century car," Mr. Jones murmured.

"Oh," Lo said, disappointed. "Sorry."

"Don't be," Mr. Jones replied, and Lo realised he'd been speaking softly out of -- wonder, perhaps. Not dismay, anyway. "This is James Bond's car."

"Whose?" Lo asked.

"An Aston Martin DB III," Mr. Jones said. He picked it up carefully and spun one of the wheels around. "It's the car James Bond drove in Goldfinger."

"That's good?"

"It's a beautiful car," Mr. Jones said.

"Was Goldfinger a country?" Lo asked. Mr. Jones narrowed his eyes slightly.

"You're going to fail history," he said.

"Am not."

"Goldfinger was a book. Popular literature. James Bond was the hero. He drove a flash car like this," Mr. Jones informed him, setting it down and making it roll gently along the desk. "Thank you. How did you find this?"

"Wik," Lo said. "And I paid someone to make the databox. If you want to switch it off just poke this part -- " he was about to turn it over and flick the off-switch on the underside, but Mr. Jones pulled the little toy away from him possessively. Lo grinned. "Or not. It runs on a kinetic battery. Just shake it a little to recharge."

"Thank you, Boeshane," Mr. Jones said. "You didn't have to. It's my job to keep students from killing each other."

"I wanted to," Lo said. "You must miss home."

"Don't we all," Mr. Jones said, still playing with the car, moving it from hand to hand. "So you looked up my century, did you?"

"Yep. The clothes were weird," Lo said. "And they had these old weapons, like, explosive things you held in your hand. Really dangerous stuff. Light-carrier guns are much cleaner. Sonic are best, but they're illegal this close to the home planet."

"We worked with what we had," Mr. Jones said.

"Did you ever see one?"

"I owned four."

"No, not really?" Lo asked, fascinated. "Four? Why did you need four?"

"Regular, backup, small calibre, and spare," Mr. Jones said.

"How did you keep from blowing your own hand off?"

"Frequent cleaning and extensive training," Jones said, and his pretty blue eyes dimmed for a moment. Then he looked back down at the car and a smile broke over his face again.

"Did you drive one of these ever?" Lo said, pointing to the car.

"Not this one, but a sort, yes," Mr. Jones said, and set his porterminal down on the counter, calling up the image library. "Here, this one," he said, spinning it so that Lo could see. A big black thing, not nearly as slick as the toy on the counter. It did look powerful, though. Like it could take on most of what got in its way.

"It looks like you'd need three hands," Lo said.

"It's a matter of habit. You couldn't pay me to try out one of your space-ships," Mr. Jones told him.

"Do you miss it?" Lo asked. Mr. Jones glanced away. "You miss your boyfriend?" That earned him a sharp look, but he just shrugged. "Word gets around."

"Word or not, that's nobody's business," Mr. Jones said, clearing the image off his porterminal. A datafile popped up, and Lo caught a glimpse of it as Mr. Jones stashed it carefully.

"What're you working on?" he asked.

"Nothing," Mr. Jones said. "Research. A private project."

"The Torchwood Archive," Lo whispered. "You shouldn't mess with them."

"You know about them?" Mr. Jones asked. "What've you heard?"

"Nothing," Lo said. He didn't dare tell him -- hadn't even told Admiral Levy -- about the Torchwood Archivist who had visited him on the trip to Earth. He'd been an eerie pale-haired man who'd made Lo recite everything he knew about the Flyers, noted it all down, told him he was a service to his species, and disappeared so efficiently that there weren't even any flight logs of his departure. Lo had checked. "But you should steer clear."

"I'll take that under advisement," Mr. Jones told him. Lo took it for the gentle dismissal it was, gave him a smile, and withdrew to his favourite corner. He had work to do, studying and reading and several messages in memobase to answer, but every once in a while he looked up to find Mr. Jones studying the toy car, or idly playing with it while he answered questions. And, just as the library closed for the day, he saw Mr. Jones slip it carefully into his breast-pocket before shooing everyone out to dinner.

***

Ianto ate dinner on his own that night, not feeling like company. He'd spent all day researching the Torchwood Archive and had come up with frustratingly little. The Torchwood Archive existed, and a few political bloggers had posted lists of their outposts; one of them had once posted a listing of staff, but apparently he'd been forced to pull it down by his local planetary authority. It seemed to be a large, sprawling organisation, working directly with regional law. Much like his own Torchwood, it was protected by the superior governing authorities and the Fleet, but not restricted by either one. One of its past directors had indeed been a Jones, about a hundred years ago, some kind of gentleman-adventurer of the future who had died in a territory skirmish on a colony planet (though what he was doing there, nobody could say).

Its current director was unlisted.

He was struggling to uncover what Torchwood really did. Research and Defence, fine, but researching what? And humanity had the Fleet to defend it. There were sixteen known alien races, two of them apparently extinct, and rumours of ten more (though Ianto knew there was a database of at least five hundred in his Torchwood's archives). Humanity was at peace -- or at least at unarmed tension -- with all but the Flyers, and the Flyers were in retreat. It wasn't like Torchwood was keeping the secrets of the galaxy. Not those secrets, anyway. They were loosely allied to the Time Agency, but there was even less information available about the Time Agency than there was about Torchwood.

For the hell of it, he'd tried logging into the Torchwood Archive Secure Servers with his old employee ID and dual passkeys. It had accepted the first passkey, which shocked him, and then rejected the second. Curiouser and curiouser.

He turned away from his porterminal, frustrated, and his eyes fell on the little Aston Martin that Lo Boeshane had brought him. The young Cadet couldn't have known about this particular car; he'd probably seen it on Wik, which detailed the popular culture of the day and might have featured Bond's cars. But Boeshane had been thoughtful enough to look up some artefact, a touchstone from Ianto's own time, and devious enough to find a way to gift it to him.

He missed Earth, his Earth, deeply. He tried not to think about it. When it was at the back of his mind it didn't hurt, but when he tried to think about it there was an ache, like the loss of a limb. Sometimes, a nameless feeling just passed over him, a yearning for an unidentifiable home, a place he felt secure. He'd felt it in Cardiff after Lisa died, lost in fathomless and unsolvable grief. It would fade, and he would go back, Jack had promised him that, but that didn't help in the here-and-now.

Ianto cleared away his dinner and undressed, throwing the clothing in the sonic washer -- incredibly convenient, he hoped one would fall through the Rift one day -- and pulled on the loose, shapeless Fleet-issue pyjamas that he'd been provided with as part of his living allowance on the station. He settled into a chair, propped his feet so that he could balance the porterminal on his knees, and accessed the entertainment database.

They had three James Bond films, but all were from well past his time. There was no classic Sean Connery at all; apparently those had been lost in the digital dark ages of the third millennia. He'd watched a documentary on the meticulous research and reconstruction that had gone into recovering "pre-millennia" media, amused by how valuable people found things like 1980's pop music, 19th century pornographic etchings, and recipes for pie crust from the middle ages. They estimated they'd got back about 80% of what had been lost; Ianto knew that it was closer to fifty, but he didn't want to spoil anyone's fun.

He messed around in twenty-first century media for a while (they did have Sherlock Holmes, which he'd wanted to see at the cinema, but he'd wait until he got back, save it as a treat) before he stumbled into twentieth-century music.

Hm. They'd recovered most of Madonna, all of the Beatles and the Pogues, a ton of emo, a decent selection of classic rock -- and a huge database of early twentieth swing and jazz. Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong, Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Earl Hines. All the music Jack loved. Showtunes, good god, Jack couldn't be parted from his showtunes. Ianto wondered if he still liked this music, or if he even remembered it existed.

He picked Begin the Beguine -- Artie Shaw, not Cole Porter -- started it playing, leaned back, and closed his eyes.

Maybe he should take Blithe up on her offer, or even Haverson up on his. Sitting in the dark listening to three-thousand-year-old music that he wasn't even all that into, that couldn't be healthy. He was fairly certain Jack wouldn't care if he did take up with someone, and Jack had got him into this mess in the first place.

Human comfort would be nice; something simple, bodies together, losing oneself in another person -- something less complicated than he'd had. Blithe had made it clear that with her there were no strings attached, and Haverson had made it more than clear.

He wondered if Kraf's people had sex. Jack was always going on about sexy aliens.

Then he laughed.

"You've conditioned me, Jack," he said to the empty room. "Jazz comes up and all I can think about is shagging. Well done."

He switched off the music and pulled up a film instead: an uncomplicated action flick, one of a thousand disposable, unmemorable movies that were now considered historical documents.

He wished they had popcorn in The Future.

***

Lo realised, in the days that followed, that he was fast becoming the station's unofficial expert on their chrono-displaced librarian. It wasn't through any intent; he just stopped at the library desk whenever he was there to study, and apparently he was the only one with guts enough to ask Mr. Jones about his past (their past, really; the past). Even Haverson, who'd tried to get a leg over, hadn't really ever talked much to him. People saw Lo talking to the librarian and decided he must have some special touch, some skill at eliciting information.

He let fall little gossippy details here and there, nothing that could harm Mr. Jones, and only when it was to his advantage to tell someone. Lo knew the power of information on an enclosed station, and he used it. He didn't see it as particularly wrong; he knew full well Mr. Jones had probably talked to Kraf and the Chaplain about him, and maybe to the Steward too. Perhaps it wasn't really that Mr. Jones was shy at all. Perhaps it was just that he liked to get to know a person first before they slept together. Lo didn't have to understand it, he decided.

"This was what I carried," Mr. Jones said, when Lo asked him about his guns again. He showed Lo in the database the gun he meant, a wicked-looking black number with an awful lot of moving parts.

"Seriously, I'm shocked you haven't lost a finger," Lo said. Mr. Jones chuckled.

"They're very precise instruments. They almost never blow up. I'd show you, if they made them anymore," he said. "And if letting off ballistics in a space station wasn't an insanely bad idea."

"I've got my first shore leave on Earth soon," Lo said. Mr. Jones raised an eyebrow.

"If you get your hands on one, which would not surprise me, I want you to swear you won't fire it without training."

"No fear," Lo said. "You know we have a gun range on the station."

"Light-carriers," Mr. Jones shrugged. "I wouldn't know how to work one."

"It's pretty basic. You point it at what you want to kill and then you push the button," Lo told him. "I could show you."

"I know for a fact you can't possibly be licenced to instruct me in gun safety," Mr. Jones told him.

"I carried one for years. Standard issue in the 43rd," Lo said proudly. "And when I was flying rustbuckets that's what we fought with. Front-mounted dual-action light-carrier gatlings, they'll take down anything smaller than a shuttle in about four seconds."

"And anything bigger than a shuttle?"

"Well, a little bit longer," Lo said, and then shut his mouth sharply. He hadn't meant to talk about the 43rd, not to a civ for sure; what was more, he'd just talked about it without feeling the usual tightness, the dizzy panic that sometimes accompanied it when he talked about it to the Chaplain.

Mr. Jones just watched him thoughtfully for a while, then bent back to the porterminal screen, clearing the image of the gun away. "No reason a librarian would need a light-carrier," he remarked.

"You never know," Lo answered lightly. "Seriously. If I can get the arms master to say yes, can I teach you?"

Mr. Jones seemed to stop and consider it. Lo waited eagerly.

"If you get permission," Mr. Jones said, and Lo's smile broke wide.

"Deal," he answered, offering his hand. Mr. Jones took it across the library counter, and Lo impulsively pulled Mr. Jones's hand up to his lips, bending his head, and kissed it quickly.

"Troublemaker," Mr. Jones said, grinning as he pulled his hand back. Lo glanced around to see several Skins and a few Cadets watching them. "No more of that. Go on now."

Lo ran off to his corner -- everyone else knew better than to even try to sit there now -- and threw himself into his chair. He called up MemoBase on his porterminal first thing, and sent a quick message to the arms master to see if he could get permission to teach Mr. Jones to shoot a light-carrier. The man was bound to say yes; he said Lo was a natural shot, and Lo knew he thought Mr. Jones was hot and wouldn't deny himself a chance to see their 21st-century guest handling a gun.

***

"So," Blithe said to Ianto, the morning after Boeshane had offered to teach him to handle a light-carrier, "I hear you're going shooting."

Ianto laughed. "Word travels. Yeah, I was thinking of it. Boeshane suggested it."

"He fancies you," she told him, tucking a strand of blonde hair behind her ear -- she was one of the few people on the station with hair below their collar, and one lock of it always fell forward. Ianto supposed it gave her something to do with her hands.

"I don't think so. He's just bored here," Ianto told her. "Quantico doesn't impress him."

"But you do," Blithe said.

"I interest him. Different beast." Ianto sipped his coffee. "By the way, this is the last of the twenty-first-century coffee."

"Shedding your bitter-coffee ways?" she asked.

"I ran out."

"I'll have to stock you up with the modern stuff," Blithe mused. "I'll show you how to brew it, too."

"I'd like that. Actually..." Ianto set his cup down carefully, studying it. "I've been thinking I should...try to adapt more."

"So you decided shooting was a good start?" Blithe asked, lifting an eyebrow.

"Well -- no -- I thought, actually..." Ianto glanced up from his coffee at her. "I think I've come to 'yet'. At least, I want to. I'd like -- to see you some evening."

She smiled. "You sound so old-fashioned."

"But you're still interested?" Ianto asked.

"Very much so," she assured him, and cupped his jaw with her free hand, thumb brushing over his cheekbone. Her hand was small and warm. "I just don't want to startle you. I thought you'd come around on your own, given time."

"Points for effort?" Ianto said, leaning into the caress, eyes closed.

"You understand what I'm offering and looking for, right?" she asked. "Just -- I want to be clear. I don't do single relationships. Sex, and a good time, because I like you. But I'm not going to be Your Girl and I'm not going to expect you to be My Boy."

"That...sounds sort of like...what I'd like, really," he answered, opening his eyes. Blithe smiled at him. "I don't want to be your boyfriend."

"Good. Tell you what, shore leave's soon," she said. "Why don't we make a day of it? We can catch a lift down to Earth, I'll show you around, nice dinner, drinks...sometimes it's fun to make a production out of it. Ianto Jones loses his fifty-first century virginity," she said, and Ianto laughed.

"Crude," he told her.

"Just wait till you hear me during sex." She leaned forward on the counter, at the perfect angle for him to bend slightly and kiss her. "Promising start," she said, into his mouth.

Ianto spared a moment to wonder what in god's name he thought he was doing, but most of him was focused on Blithe -- warm, coffee-tasting, so small even without comparison to Jack, and so carelessly affectionate, as if it didn't matter who knew that she liked him. Maybe it didn't.

"See you for shore leave?" he asked, nipping her bottom lip.

"Hmm, can't do coffee tomorrow; yeah, that'll be about it," she replied, leaning back. "Find someone who'll shuttle us down to Earth, would you? One of the Cadets -- get your pal Boeshane to give you a lift. I hear he's suspiciously smooth with a control yoke."

"I'll do that," he said. Blithe patted his hand and walked out of the library, and Ianto had to lean against the counter and let out a slow breath.

***

Lo was having one of his bad days -- nightmares the night before, and everything and everyone seemed washed out to him -- when he got Mr. Jones's memo in the middle of his afternoon History unit. He opened it, expecting it to be some dull all-hands message about library resources, the kind that seemed to go out from all the service ports about once a month. Instead it was a letter to him, personally, and he smiled for the first time all day.

Boeshane: I need a favour. Ride for me and a friend down to Earth for leave tomorrow. Interested?

He glanced at the professor, who was busy expounding on some boring 22nd century revolution he'd never heard of -- and keyed an answer back casually, as if he were just taking notes.

I haven't filed my flight plan yet. Where were you thinking? Myles hasn't got any plans.

He could almost hear the dry drawl of Mr. Jones's voice in reply.

The whole world to roam and no plans? Fairly unimaginative.

So what's your big idea? Lo challenged.

There was a certain pause between the send and the reply, which could have been caused by a student needing help but sounded, to Lo, like hesitation.

Haven't got one. I haven't seen much of Earth lately.

Lo snorted. I haven't seen it at all. You have to have come from Earth. Want to see what's happened to the old home town while you were adventuring in time?

I doubt Cardiff exists anymore. Haven't the oceans risen?

"Boeshane!" the professor called, and Lo looked up from his Porterminal. "What did I just say?"

"The diaspora of the nine independent colonies of New America spread their cultural beliefs over thousands of other states and countries," Lo recited. The professor looked annoyed that his students could multitask.

"Cultural beliefs such as?"

"Probably food and manners, sir," Lo said indifferently.

"Are you guessing?"

"Yes, sir."

"Based upon?"

"Every other cultural diaspora we've studied, sir," Lo sighed. A few of the other Cadets snickered.

"No points for presentation, but your accuracy is noted," the professor said, and continued on with his lesson. Lo bent back to his porterminal.

Cardiff's the capital of the Welsh States. Even I know that. It has a base, too, which suits me. Why not go there?

Mr. Jones replied quickly. You're going from a station to a base? Very independent living, Boeshane.

Lo glanced at Myles, who was sitting across the room, twiddling a stylus between her fingers. Cardiff could be a good time.

I'm on scholarship, so my credit's only good on base, he wrote, looping Myles in on the message. Myles? Cardiff? I hear there are beaches. Beaches mean cookouts and that means free food. Come with me and eat high.

He saw Myles bite her lip to keep from laughing when the message came through.

I'm in, she wrote. Who's your friend, Mr. Jones?

Steward and I are going down, Mr. Jones said. Myles, Lo saw, was stifling another laugh.

Well, I always like to hear who's going down, she wrote back.

I'll file the plan, Lo sent, before Mr. Jones could dig himself deeper. Tomorrow at 1400. I'm on a 24 hour leave so, day after, be back at the base port at the same time.

I'm holding you to the promise of seafood. Myles said, and Lo cleared his screen just in time for the professor to walk down his row, inspecting what he was working on.

It was, really, the highlight of his day. He felt tired and worn down, but he clung to the thin thread of pleasure that tomorrow he'd be taking Mr. Jones and the Steward down to Earth, and he and Myles could run around Cardiff and still have barracks beds open to them on the local base. There were bound to be dozens of things he could do with no money, in a big city like that, and he could think of a few ways to make some quick money too if it came down to it. He knew from a few brief leaves in his past with the 43rd that soldiers tended to drink for free.

The next day he skipped lunch completely in favour of going over every inch of the ship he'd been assigned for his leave -- he'd requested a four-occupancy ship when he filed his flight plan and undoubtedly the Steward had given him a bump to the top of the line. It wasn't exactly sleek but it was pretty good as shuttles went, and he wanted to be sure he knew everything about it before the others came on board. That was where Myles found him for the preflight, and where Mr. Jones and Steward found them both when they arrived -- Mr. Jones with a small bag slung over his shoulder, Steward with one under her arm.

"All in?" Lo asked, as they tossed their bags in the back. "Myles?"

"There's some whine on the aft gyro," she said. "I'll yell at the engineering Skins when we get back. Inconvenience, not dangerous," she added, as Mr. Jones turned a little pale. "In you go. Rookie picks the music," she added to Lo.

"Rookie my cock," he replied amiably. "Civs pick the music."

"He's been here less time than I have," Steward said. "Come on, Ianto, you pick a song."

"That's not going to distract you?" Mr. Jones asked carefully.

"It's an easy run," Lo said.

"If you heard what he talks about in flight class you'd be thankful for the music," Myles added.

Mr. Jones frowned, then leaned around them and plugged his porterminal into the console, scrolling through the entertainment database. He settled on a song just as Lo was going through final check with the docking authority, and they eased their way out of the bay to the opening chords of --

Well, of something.

"What is this?" Steward asked, sounding delighted.

"Embarrassing popular music," Mr. Jones replied. Myles, next to Lo, was drumming one hand on the console as she worked the other over the sync input. "It's from home. My time, I mean."

"It's...loud," Lo observed. Someone was saying something, but he couldn't understand the words. "What's it about?"

"It's in Late English," Myles exclaimed, glancing back at Mr. Jones. "Translate it for us!"

"Eh?" Mr. Jones looked at them, confused, and then seemed to realise something. "You can't understand the language, can you?"

"Not a word," Steward said. "Who cares? I like it."

"I think Lo's regretting letting me pick it," Mr. Jones said, but he was smiling. "It's about a man talking to a woman he used to know at school, and how they planned to meet up when they were grown -- that's the line, there -- Let's all meet up in the year two thousand."

"Two thousand," Myles said. "Wow."

"Anyway, he finds out she's married, but he still wants to meet with her," Mr. Jones finished. "It's about...time passing. I just thought, you know...it's a fast car sort of song."

Lo saw Steward twine her fingers with Mr. Jones's, when he looked back, and turned away again. He focused on piloting, breaking through Earth's atmosphere just as the song ended. Mr. Jones and Steward were talking, heads close together, so Lo stopped Myles from pestering them and tuned in a local broadcast with music he liked better anyway.

Mr. Jones did look amazing with a high flush on his cheeks, eyes dark as he spoke quietly with Steward. She was beautiful too, a little softer somehow, with some of her usual authority left behind at Quantico. Lo was well-pleased with all of it -- the prospect of fresh food, a city to play in, and the vague sense that he was sharing in something nice, something uncomplicatedly pleasant.

After they'd landed and Lo had run through security protocols with the Cardiff port, he popped his door and climbed out, inhaling the more humid, richer planetary air. Myles was standing, basking in the real solar light on the landing platform, and Mr. Jones and Steward already had their bags. It had been years since he'd stood on a planet.

"See you tomorrow, then?" Lo asked, winking at Steward.

"Don't get into trouble," Mr. Jones said, and passed him something flat and square, wrapped in a bit of paper (Mr. Jones used more paper than anyone Lo knew).

"What's this?" he asked, unfolding the paper. There were two small credit chits inside.

"Tipping the drivers," Mr. Jones said. "Planetary credits, I'm told they're good anywhere. It's a twenty-first century custom. Very rude not to accept."

Lo passed one to Myles, who saluted Mr. Jones sharply, so Lo did the same. Mr. Jones laughed.

"Go," he said. "Blithe?"

"Show me Cardiff," Blithe said, wrapping an arm around Mr. Jones's waist as they walked off. He thought he heard a reply, something about not knowing anything about this Cardiff actually. Myles, next to him, crossed her arms as they watched the others depart.

"They are going to have so much sex," she said approvingly.

"It's about time," Lo agreed, turning to go. "Who would you pick?"

"Steward," she said, as they walked towards the base to check in for their bunks. "I bet I could lift her one-handed."

"She'd probably enjoy that," Lo grinned.

"What about you? I hear you kissed Mr. Jones."

"Just his hand. I wouldn't want to choose. I'd ask them both."

"Cheating. And anyway I bet Mr. Jones wouldn't go in for that. Twenty-first century morals and all."

"He could be convinced," Lo answered. "Anyway. We have twenty-four hours and credits in hand, thank you twenty-first-century morals. Let's make trouble."

"You're all right, for a kid," Myles told him, and he cuffed her ear and then ran ahead as she cursed and tried to catch up.

Chapter Five

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