TW Fic: Stones and Ripples
Oct. 9th, 2007 11:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
out_thereTitle: Stones and Ripples
Fandom: Torchwood
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit.
Summary: Considering that it appeared to be run by a man with no consideration of paperwork, bureaucracy or meticulous thinking, Torchwood Three was the most logical place to hide.
Notes: Set pre-S1. The quote comes from Ani DiFranco’s song, Studying Stones, which was listened to many times while writing this and remains a perfect angsty-Ianto song. Thank you to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
gothams3rdrobin for the Britpick and ekaterinn for offering to poke me with a stick to get this finished (and for having a great sense of pacing).
Continued from Part 1.
***
Jack insists on showing Ianto the weevil. Ianto doesn't see the point in it, honestly -- the alien threat has been captured and subdued, the citizens of Cardiff are safe once more -- but Jack places a hand on Ianto's elbow and leads him firmly towards the holding cells. While they were out, Ianto took a break between arranging filing cabinets to refresh his memory on weevils so while he nods along to Jack's voice, none of the information is new to him.
At first glance, the weevil makes Ianto think of a bad science fiction film, something B-grade and cheap where they could only afford to give the monster bad gloves and a cheap mask. Then it growls -- a low animal sound that makes the hairs on the back of Ianto's neck stand up -- and shows yellowing, pointed teeth. Suddenly, it doesn't look so fake.
Jack's still talking, saying that they live in the sewers, that they've been spotted on the streets more often but they don't know why. As he speaks, the weevil twists its head to follow the sound of Jack's voice. It bears its teeth and snarls, bringing palms up to the door, clenching fingers and dragging claws against the glass. The claws are dirty and ragged, a smudged mustard colour on top, black filth underneath, but they're nearly an inch long and they're sharp.
The glass screeches as the talons leave scratch marks.
Ianto looks at the silhouette of the creature: the height of it, the neck so thick seems like an extension of the wide shoulders, the bulk of its torso, the size of its biceps. The flat, triangular feet that end in three long toes, talons attached to the end of each. He has no doubt that it is deadly.
"Do you need some more time?" Jack asks with one hand heavy on Ianto's shoulder.
Ianto shakes his head. "No." He doesn't want to spend any more time down here than necessary.
***
Most of the first week goes fine. The last truck comes, leaves boxes of filing, and goes again. The others ask occasional questions and Ianto answers carefully, quickly, story already prepared. When they ask about his girlfriend, he says, "She's still in London at the moment, waiting for a transfer," when they ask about his background, his life before returning to Cardiff, he says, "I'm an only child, me. Grew up about an hour west of here. Came to Cardiff to finish up school, then London for University and then got hired by Torchwood. It's a short story."
Things go as expected, apart from three things.
Firstly, he thought that the knot of tension in his stomach and the constant fear over Lisa's welfare would subside once he had her safely stowed away. It doesn't. He stands in the tourist office, hands out flyers, makes cups of coffee, washes the dishes, does the filing. And while he does it, he can't forget that three floors below him, Lisa lies hooked to machines that breathe for her, pump her heart, keep her in a dozy state of drugged sleep. He got her out of Torchwood Tower, he got her here and now he has to work out how to save her. How to fix her.
The thought keeps him awake at night. He spends so many hours staring at his ceiling in the dark -- listening to the wind outside his window and the distant tick of the cheap clock on his kitchen wall, head going round in circles -- that he starts to dread his flat. He hates the way that time drags there, minutes turning into hours, the way that he feels so completely useless (incompetent) waiting for his morning alarm to sound. He doesn't know how he's going to bear this for weeks, for months, for however long it takes Lisa to get well again, but he has to.
The second thing to surprise him is Suzie.
He runs into her one morning in the sub-basement corridor. It's before eight -- the others aren't in, he hadn't expected her to be in -- and it takes him by surprise. In the dark, she's leaning against the wall, arms folded, shoulders curled forward, back flat against the cold brick. In that moment, she looks surprisingly delicate and vulnerable, though Ianto would never think there's anything vulnerable about Suzie Costello.
"I don't care," she says, looking up to pierce him with that gaze, seeing right through him. "Whatever secrets you're hiding down here, whatever secrets you brought with you from London, I don't care. I'm not looking for them."
He nods because there isn't anything he can say that won't give him away, one way or the other. He can't afford to give anything away.
"This place," she continues, looking up, smiling toward the roof, "this place is made for secrets. It's made of secrets, layers and layers of them stacked on top of each other until they formed rooms. It's what we do, keep secrets from all those people out there who wouldn't be able to deal with what's really possible."
"Someone has to protect them." He's not sure if he means the population or the secrets need protection but Suzie nods as if she understands.
"Someone has to," she says, pushing herself off the wall, "and we're the only ones who understand why."
She doesn't bring it up again. Despite an entire day of nervously waiting for her to make comment to Jack, Suzie doesn't mention anything about the sub-basement to the others.
Ianto makes sure to find out how she likes her coffee and always make her one first thing in the morning. It's not quite the same as having an ally -- he doesn't fool himself that there's any security or protection there -- but it's something.
***
The third surprise comes on the seventh day. The others are out eating lunch. (They've already fallen into the habit of only calling Ianto for directions, never to ask him to come along.)
Ianto pops an "Out for lunch" sign on the tourist office door and heads downstairs. He takes an armful of filing on his way (for a secret organisation they create a lot of paperwork), sets it down in the archive room and then goes to check on Lisa. She's half-conscious, mumbling incoherently, eyelids open a fraction, so Ianto checks the drip and the levels of narcotics in her system. He increases it slightly and stays by her side as she settles once more.
(He'll have to look into options for medication. The doses aren't working as well as they did a week ago, and he can't keep increasing it. Luckily, he has hours of sleepless nights that he can use to research these things.)
He stands by her bedside, wondering if it's worth bringing a chair down here. Some days, the others spend more time away from the hub than in it and this space could stand to be a little more comfortable.
As he wonders about moving a chair down -- maybe a lamp, too --the lights flicker and die. His panicked, instinctual reaction is to grab for Lisa, to feel for a pulse, but the beeping of equipment only pauses for a moment and then her back-up generator kicks in. He watches the monitor for her heart-rate, makes sure she's okay, before worrying about the rest of the hub.
The generators are in the floor above, he thinks. Something must have gone wrong. He should have a look at them.
He stays for a few more moments, watching the steady, slow lines on the monitor crest and fall, crest and fall, then feels for his way out of the room. The LCD monitor, the little green light on the respirator, the tiny red points on the other equipment seem bright in the total darkness but they barely light the way to the door.
Running his hand along the damp, slimy wall, Ianto traces his steps back upstairs. He gets to the basement level and hears the sound: a low, grinding snarl, the ugly noise of a hungry predator. It makes him think of lions on the savannah, of documentaries that made the animals look lean and vicious, nothing like the sleek well-fed animals at the zoo.
Still thinking of the zoo, it takes him to the count of three to remember the weevil in its cage. It takes another two heartbeats to run to the basement cells, to find the heavy metal door open.
He's not sure if Jack closed it or not. He might not have.
Ianto steps inside, telling himself that he's over-reacting in the dark, that sounds are echoing in the unfamiliar shadows. He has to feel for the first cell -- the weevil's cell is somewhere in the middle -- slide his fingers over the cool glass, across the air holes. When he gets to the edge of the door, he can feel it open under the slightest pressure. It doesn't even creak as it swings open.
Ianto blinks. Ianto breathes.
Ianto really hopes he was right about that not believing in god thing, because if he's wrong, he should be praying right now.
Then he pulls himself together and walks back through the metal door. In the corridor, the sound reverberates, coming from all directions at once. He's almost certain it's not coming from behind him, which is hardly a reassuring thought. It's black in front of him and if that thing is waiting ahead, Ianto won't see it coming.
But Lisa is downstairs, defenceless behind one locked door.
Swallowing, Ianto steps forward. Within a few steps his slow walk has edged into a jog, panic building as he takes the stairs up. The light here is better, emergency lights glowing red, throwing bloody shadows across the furniture and floor.
Lisa's downstairs in the gloom. Lisa needs protection but he can't protect her without a weapon. The armoury's upstairs, kept behind an electronic lock...
A lock that runs on electricity. The thought hits him as he crosses the hub, nearly stumbling over the slightly uneven metal flooring.
It has a back-up system, he's sure. Toshiko mentioned something about it. It needed a swipe-card for normal activation, but if there was a disruption to the power... He can't remember. He can't remember if it needed a password, if it even had a back-up system. It's on the far side of the water tower, a steel wall of high-tech guns sitting two foot behind the glass doors.
He gives it an experimental kick and the hard jolt of impact travels straight back up his leg. He tries ramming it with his shoulder, puts all of his weight behind it, throws himself at it. The bang of him hitting it is loud but the glass only shudders a little.
It's only glass, he's sure. He could break it, if he had something heavy enough. A metal rod, a gun, an office chair, maybe. He's halfway up the spiralling steps to the workstations when he hears the growl again. In a cavern this large, the echoes are distant, faint, like a hundred weevils are baying for blood miles away.
He drags air into his lungs and forces his feet to move, but the growl happens again. This time, he can hear the source. It takes one glance over his shoulder to confirm it.
The weevil is loping towards him, long, easy strides covering the distance too easily.
Ianto runs. Up the stairs, past the workstations, straight to Jack's office, yanking the door closed behind him. He pushes it, hears it snip closed as the weevil bounds up the stairs. It takes the creature four strides to get to the door; it takes Ianto half that time to lock it. The weevil doesn't even slow as it approaches, it just continues to bear down, pulling its chin against its chest and head-butting the door with a deafening crack.
Ianto's leaning his full weight against the door, so it holds. It shakes in the frame, the force of it sending spikes of pain through Ianto's wrists and elbows, but the door holds.
Taking a step back, the weevil tilts its head -- a surprisingly familiar gesture, making it look curious and almost human -- taps its claws against the glass and then makes a low choking sound in the back of its throat. Another odd little grunt and then it steps away.
Ianto breathes, gasping in relief, until he notices it's not going away. It's backing up for another run at the door.
It walks past Toshiko's workstation, past Owen's, to the couch and then paws at the ground, trying to scratch the concrete with those three-toed feet. Leaning back on its hunches it curls up like a marathon runner, and Ianto has just enough time to brace himself against the door before it runs straight at him. It slams into the glass and this time there's an ominous cracking sound. In the centre of the pane, there's a small splintering fracture.
Dragging a claw along the glass, the weevil pauses when it touches the fracture and then draws its talon along the white line of broken glass. Then it turns and moves back to the couch.
Eventually, the glass will shatter. If Ianto's bracing it when it happens, he'll be sliced into strips or crushed under the force of a stampeding weevil. Neither option is particularly appealing, Ianto thinks, hearing the slightly hysterical tone of his thoughts. Then again, he's about to be crushed by a charging alien, less than a week into a new job, a job he only took to protect his half-mechanical nearly-comatose girlfriend. This is the right time for hysteria.
The weevil rams the door again and this time, the pain spikes all the way up to Ianto's shoulders. The white fractures are spreading across the pane, stretching almost the width of the door. He needs to tell Jack to buy a better door, Ianto thinks as the weevil saunters away.
Jack. The thought of Jack brings another thought to mind: Jack's gun.
Jack had put it down on his way out, had slid it into his top desk drawer when Ianto came down to collect his dirty cup. Ianto looks up -- the weevil is hunched over, pawing at the ground -- and then time slows. Ianto moves to Jack's desk, feeling like he's dragging his arms and legs through treacle, fumbles with the drawer handle as the weevil pushes off with one powerful leg and pulls out the gun. He clicks the safety off, aims through the glass and the weevil crashes through the door.
Shards sprinkle everywhere, catching the red light, glinting like Christmas ornaments, shimmering to the ground. The weevil is still moving forward, a black shadow amongst the sparking red spray. Ianto fires the gun, all six rounds in quick succession, but the weevil keeps moving on unsteady legs, lumbering forward until it hits Jack's desk and topples over it.
It's at that moment that the lights come back on. The stark fluorescent brightness is almost blinding after the ruby darkness, washing out the colour of his skin to white, the grey of the gun just a black shape in his hand.
***
Ianto cleans up as best he can. He finds a brush and shovel and sweeps up the broken glass. He can't do anything about the jagged shards still in the door frame, but he leaves the door open with newspaper underneath to catch any pieces that fall.
He places the gun back in Jack's top drawer. He has to move the weevil's arm to do it, to get the drawer to open and close, but he does it.
The body weighs more than he would have imagined. He ends up using Owen's workstation chair. He pulls it into the office, drags the weevil body onto it, and then pushes and pulls the chair awkwardly to the autopsy room. He nearly loses control when the chair wheels roll over the edge of the stairs, and the thing clatters down, only staying upright through sheer luck. Once its down there, he doesn't know what to do with it, so he leaves it spread upside-down over the chair, head tilted back, nearly lying on the floor, legs bent over the chair's back, arms hanging loosely at its sides. It's not a dignified position for a corpse.
A dead animal isn't a corpse, he thinks, it's a carcass. He doesn't know what a dead alien is.
Next he checks on Lisa. The door was still locked -- not forced -- so he makes sure she's back to using the main power supply. Makes sure the back-up generator is still in perfect working order. Then he presses a kiss against her cold, slack lips and goes to find gloves and disinfectant.
There's a trail of dark brown blood from the weevil's carcass to Jack's office. Ianto starts in the autopsy room, spraying and scrubbing, wiping down each surface until it's clean, then he works his way along the stone and concrete floors. On his hands and knees, he cleans the floor in Jack's office and then the desk. Apart from a few splatters on otherwise clean pages -- pages that he separates into a pile to be reprinted or copied -- and the broken door, there's no sign left.
Ianto sits down on the floor behind Jack's desk. His hands inside are sticky inside the thick gloves, sweaty from the rubber, and he pulls them off one by one, placing them beside him, next to the spray bottle. Then he pulls his knees to his chest, braces his elbows against his thighs, and covers his face with his hands. His fingers are cold against the backs of his eyelids, soothing as he tries to breathe. But the breath comes in shuddering, shuddering like that damn glass door, and he can still feel the ache in his wrists and his elbows.
He doesn't mean to cry, but he can't stop himself.
Because this is his life is now -- one dreadful, horrible moment followed by another, followed by another -- this is when the rest of them return. The deathly quiet where all he could hear was his own shaking breaths is gone, replaced by voices calling out, by Jack yelling, "Hey, Ianto, are you up here?" and Tosh talking to Suzie.
Ianto should get up, should tell them that he's fine, should explain about the weevil, but that will all have to wait until he can stop the tears running down his face. Right now, the best he can do is hold his breath and hope that he's not noticed.
"Bloody hell!" he hears Owen shout. "I wanted to study that one alive, not perform another autopsy. What the hell happened?"
Jack calls out Ianto's name once, then there are rushed footsteps, then, "Ianto?"
This time Jack sounds worried and a lot closer. Ianto curls up tighter, pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes as if pressure will help him get some control over this, will stop him sobbing like a child. If anything, it makes it worse, makes the gasping breaths louder.
"Ianto?" Jack repeats and now there are hands on his wrists, pulling his hands away from his face. Ianto has no choice but to look up and see Jack squatting in front of him, watching him carefully. "Are you hurt?"
Ianto shakes his head. He couldn't force words if he tried. He can't even force himself to stop gasping, to stop wheezing and gulping his breaths. Every time he tries to stop it, it just gets worse, and he needs more time. He needs more time. He can't be who he's supposed to be, he just can't. Not right now.
He just needs a little time, and then he can pull himself together, and then he can do this. He can be twenty-six and fighting aliens and running for his life and everything else, if they can just give him another few minutes to get himself together.
"Shhh," Jack says, and Ianto realises he's muttering, but Jack's sitting down beside him, back braced on the wall, pulling Ianto against his shoulder. "It's okay. You're going to be okay."
There's a strong arm around Ianto's back and a wide hand stretched across his cheek, fingers curled behind his jaw, the heel of the hand pressed lightly against his lips. Jack holds him tight and Ianto gives up, gives in, lets himself cry. Lets himself cling to Jack, hands bunching the front of his shirt, cotton caught inside his fists.
He tries to explain but the words get broken by sobs, by gasps. "It's too much-- And I can't, and I'm not-- It's not fair, I'm twenty-six-- I should be getting married and having kids, not-- I can't do this."
He loses the rest in hiccoughing, wracking huffs, and doesn't get a chance to say he can't do this, he can't be the one thing protecting Lisa, because he'd nearly died. He'd nearly died and if he had, what would have happened to her? There's no-one else, there's nothing else he can do, but he doesn't think he can do this.
He can't be this. This isn't supposed to be his life.
Ianto thinks if Jack would just ask him the right question, he'd tell him everything. Every detail. He'd let it be someone else's problem, someone else's decision.
If Jack would just keep holding him like this, warm and close and alive, and tell him everything's going to be okay, and ask him the right questions, Ianto would tell him everything.
But Jack doesn't.
Jack says, "It going to be okay," and, "You'll be fine."
Jack says, "It's just the after-effects of adrenaline. After a good night's sleep, it won't seem so bad."
Jack doesn't ask.
***
Jack was right, though. A good night's sleep -- helped in part by the tablets Owen had handed him on his way out the door -- and it felt possible again.
He could sit down at the conference table and talk about what had happened calmly, one step at a time. He could keep a bland smile on his face while Tosh promised to get him a swipe card for the armoury and Suzie talked about fixing the cell doors ("If we can't rig the cell doors to stay locked without power, we need to make sure those metal doors lock down automatically. You can't fix a power outage with weevils at your throat.").
He could tell Owen about the creature's movements, the systematic way it attacked the door.
And afterwards, when the others had gone out to explore some unusual readings, he could go down to Lisa, plan where he'll put a lamp and deck chair, and hold her chilled hand in his.
Fandom: Torchwood
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit.
Summary: Considering that it appeared to be run by a man with no consideration of paperwork, bureaucracy or meticulous thinking, Torchwood Three was the most logical place to hide.
Notes: Set pre-S1. The quote comes from Ani DiFranco’s song, Studying Stones, which was listened to many times while writing this and remains a perfect angsty-Ianto song. Thank you to
gothams3rdrobin for the Britpick and ekaterinn for offering to poke me with a stick to get this finished (and for having a great sense of pacing).Continued from Part 1.
***
Jack insists on showing Ianto the weevil. Ianto doesn't see the point in it, honestly -- the alien threat has been captured and subdued, the citizens of Cardiff are safe once more -- but Jack places a hand on Ianto's elbow and leads him firmly towards the holding cells. While they were out, Ianto took a break between arranging filing cabinets to refresh his memory on weevils so while he nods along to Jack's voice, none of the information is new to him.
At first glance, the weevil makes Ianto think of a bad science fiction film, something B-grade and cheap where they could only afford to give the monster bad gloves and a cheap mask. Then it growls -- a low animal sound that makes the hairs on the back of Ianto's neck stand up -- and shows yellowing, pointed teeth. Suddenly, it doesn't look so fake.
Jack's still talking, saying that they live in the sewers, that they've been spotted on the streets more often but they don't know why. As he speaks, the weevil twists its head to follow the sound of Jack's voice. It bears its teeth and snarls, bringing palms up to the door, clenching fingers and dragging claws against the glass. The claws are dirty and ragged, a smudged mustard colour on top, black filth underneath, but they're nearly an inch long and they're sharp.
The glass screeches as the talons leave scratch marks.
Ianto looks at the silhouette of the creature: the height of it, the neck so thick seems like an extension of the wide shoulders, the bulk of its torso, the size of its biceps. The flat, triangular feet that end in three long toes, talons attached to the end of each. He has no doubt that it is deadly.
"Do you need some more time?" Jack asks with one hand heavy on Ianto's shoulder.
Ianto shakes his head. "No." He doesn't want to spend any more time down here than necessary.
***
Most of the first week goes fine. The last truck comes, leaves boxes of filing, and goes again. The others ask occasional questions and Ianto answers carefully, quickly, story already prepared. When they ask about his girlfriend, he says, "She's still in London at the moment, waiting for a transfer," when they ask about his background, his life before returning to Cardiff, he says, "I'm an only child, me. Grew up about an hour west of here. Came to Cardiff to finish up school, then London for University and then got hired by Torchwood. It's a short story."
Things go as expected, apart from three things.
Firstly, he thought that the knot of tension in his stomach and the constant fear over Lisa's welfare would subside once he had her safely stowed away. It doesn't. He stands in the tourist office, hands out flyers, makes cups of coffee, washes the dishes, does the filing. And while he does it, he can't forget that three floors below him, Lisa lies hooked to machines that breathe for her, pump her heart, keep her in a dozy state of drugged sleep. He got her out of Torchwood Tower, he got her here and now he has to work out how to save her. How to fix her.
The thought keeps him awake at night. He spends so many hours staring at his ceiling in the dark -- listening to the wind outside his window and the distant tick of the cheap clock on his kitchen wall, head going round in circles -- that he starts to dread his flat. He hates the way that time drags there, minutes turning into hours, the way that he feels so completely useless (incompetent) waiting for his morning alarm to sound. He doesn't know how he's going to bear this for weeks, for months, for however long it takes Lisa to get well again, but he has to.
The second thing to surprise him is Suzie.
He runs into her one morning in the sub-basement corridor. It's before eight -- the others aren't in, he hadn't expected her to be in -- and it takes him by surprise. In the dark, she's leaning against the wall, arms folded, shoulders curled forward, back flat against the cold brick. In that moment, she looks surprisingly delicate and vulnerable, though Ianto would never think there's anything vulnerable about Suzie Costello.
"I don't care," she says, looking up to pierce him with that gaze, seeing right through him. "Whatever secrets you're hiding down here, whatever secrets you brought with you from London, I don't care. I'm not looking for them."
He nods because there isn't anything he can say that won't give him away, one way or the other. He can't afford to give anything away.
"This place," she continues, looking up, smiling toward the roof, "this place is made for secrets. It's made of secrets, layers and layers of them stacked on top of each other until they formed rooms. It's what we do, keep secrets from all those people out there who wouldn't be able to deal with what's really possible."
"Someone has to protect them." He's not sure if he means the population or the secrets need protection but Suzie nods as if she understands.
"Someone has to," she says, pushing herself off the wall, "and we're the only ones who understand why."
She doesn't bring it up again. Despite an entire day of nervously waiting for her to make comment to Jack, Suzie doesn't mention anything about the sub-basement to the others.
Ianto makes sure to find out how she likes her coffee and always make her one first thing in the morning. It's not quite the same as having an ally -- he doesn't fool himself that there's any security or protection there -- but it's something.
***
The third surprise comes on the seventh day. The others are out eating lunch. (They've already fallen into the habit of only calling Ianto for directions, never to ask him to come along.)
Ianto pops an "Out for lunch" sign on the tourist office door and heads downstairs. He takes an armful of filing on his way (for a secret organisation they create a lot of paperwork), sets it down in the archive room and then goes to check on Lisa. She's half-conscious, mumbling incoherently, eyelids open a fraction, so Ianto checks the drip and the levels of narcotics in her system. He increases it slightly and stays by her side as she settles once more.
(He'll have to look into options for medication. The doses aren't working as well as they did a week ago, and he can't keep increasing it. Luckily, he has hours of sleepless nights that he can use to research these things.)
He stands by her bedside, wondering if it's worth bringing a chair down here. Some days, the others spend more time away from the hub than in it and this space could stand to be a little more comfortable.
As he wonders about moving a chair down -- maybe a lamp, too --the lights flicker and die. His panicked, instinctual reaction is to grab for Lisa, to feel for a pulse, but the beeping of equipment only pauses for a moment and then her back-up generator kicks in. He watches the monitor for her heart-rate, makes sure she's okay, before worrying about the rest of the hub.
The generators are in the floor above, he thinks. Something must have gone wrong. He should have a look at them.
He stays for a few more moments, watching the steady, slow lines on the monitor crest and fall, crest and fall, then feels for his way out of the room. The LCD monitor, the little green light on the respirator, the tiny red points on the other equipment seem bright in the total darkness but they barely light the way to the door.
Running his hand along the damp, slimy wall, Ianto traces his steps back upstairs. He gets to the basement level and hears the sound: a low, grinding snarl, the ugly noise of a hungry predator. It makes him think of lions on the savannah, of documentaries that made the animals look lean and vicious, nothing like the sleek well-fed animals at the zoo.
Still thinking of the zoo, it takes him to the count of three to remember the weevil in its cage. It takes another two heartbeats to run to the basement cells, to find the heavy metal door open.
He's not sure if Jack closed it or not. He might not have.
Ianto steps inside, telling himself that he's over-reacting in the dark, that sounds are echoing in the unfamiliar shadows. He has to feel for the first cell -- the weevil's cell is somewhere in the middle -- slide his fingers over the cool glass, across the air holes. When he gets to the edge of the door, he can feel it open under the slightest pressure. It doesn't even creak as it swings open.
Ianto blinks. Ianto breathes.
Ianto really hopes he was right about that not believing in god thing, because if he's wrong, he should be praying right now.
Then he pulls himself together and walks back through the metal door. In the corridor, the sound reverberates, coming from all directions at once. He's almost certain it's not coming from behind him, which is hardly a reassuring thought. It's black in front of him and if that thing is waiting ahead, Ianto won't see it coming.
But Lisa is downstairs, defenceless behind one locked door.
Swallowing, Ianto steps forward. Within a few steps his slow walk has edged into a jog, panic building as he takes the stairs up. The light here is better, emergency lights glowing red, throwing bloody shadows across the furniture and floor.
Lisa's downstairs in the gloom. Lisa needs protection but he can't protect her without a weapon. The armoury's upstairs, kept behind an electronic lock...
A lock that runs on electricity. The thought hits him as he crosses the hub, nearly stumbling over the slightly uneven metal flooring.
It has a back-up system, he's sure. Toshiko mentioned something about it. It needed a swipe-card for normal activation, but if there was a disruption to the power... He can't remember. He can't remember if it needed a password, if it even had a back-up system. It's on the far side of the water tower, a steel wall of high-tech guns sitting two foot behind the glass doors.
He gives it an experimental kick and the hard jolt of impact travels straight back up his leg. He tries ramming it with his shoulder, puts all of his weight behind it, throws himself at it. The bang of him hitting it is loud but the glass only shudders a little.
It's only glass, he's sure. He could break it, if he had something heavy enough. A metal rod, a gun, an office chair, maybe. He's halfway up the spiralling steps to the workstations when he hears the growl again. In a cavern this large, the echoes are distant, faint, like a hundred weevils are baying for blood miles away.
He drags air into his lungs and forces his feet to move, but the growl happens again. This time, he can hear the source. It takes one glance over his shoulder to confirm it.
The weevil is loping towards him, long, easy strides covering the distance too easily.
Ianto runs. Up the stairs, past the workstations, straight to Jack's office, yanking the door closed behind him. He pushes it, hears it snip closed as the weevil bounds up the stairs. It takes the creature four strides to get to the door; it takes Ianto half that time to lock it. The weevil doesn't even slow as it approaches, it just continues to bear down, pulling its chin against its chest and head-butting the door with a deafening crack.
Ianto's leaning his full weight against the door, so it holds. It shakes in the frame, the force of it sending spikes of pain through Ianto's wrists and elbows, but the door holds.
Taking a step back, the weevil tilts its head -- a surprisingly familiar gesture, making it look curious and almost human -- taps its claws against the glass and then makes a low choking sound in the back of its throat. Another odd little grunt and then it steps away.
Ianto breathes, gasping in relief, until he notices it's not going away. It's backing up for another run at the door.
It walks past Toshiko's workstation, past Owen's, to the couch and then paws at the ground, trying to scratch the concrete with those three-toed feet. Leaning back on its hunches it curls up like a marathon runner, and Ianto has just enough time to brace himself against the door before it runs straight at him. It slams into the glass and this time there's an ominous cracking sound. In the centre of the pane, there's a small splintering fracture.
Dragging a claw along the glass, the weevil pauses when it touches the fracture and then draws its talon along the white line of broken glass. Then it turns and moves back to the couch.
Eventually, the glass will shatter. If Ianto's bracing it when it happens, he'll be sliced into strips or crushed under the force of a stampeding weevil. Neither option is particularly appealing, Ianto thinks, hearing the slightly hysterical tone of his thoughts. Then again, he's about to be crushed by a charging alien, less than a week into a new job, a job he only took to protect his half-mechanical nearly-comatose girlfriend. This is the right time for hysteria.
The weevil rams the door again and this time, the pain spikes all the way up to Ianto's shoulders. The white fractures are spreading across the pane, stretching almost the width of the door. He needs to tell Jack to buy a better door, Ianto thinks as the weevil saunters away.
Jack. The thought of Jack brings another thought to mind: Jack's gun.
Jack had put it down on his way out, had slid it into his top desk drawer when Ianto came down to collect his dirty cup. Ianto looks up -- the weevil is hunched over, pawing at the ground -- and then time slows. Ianto moves to Jack's desk, feeling like he's dragging his arms and legs through treacle, fumbles with the drawer handle as the weevil pushes off with one powerful leg and pulls out the gun. He clicks the safety off, aims through the glass and the weevil crashes through the door.
Shards sprinkle everywhere, catching the red light, glinting like Christmas ornaments, shimmering to the ground. The weevil is still moving forward, a black shadow amongst the sparking red spray. Ianto fires the gun, all six rounds in quick succession, but the weevil keeps moving on unsteady legs, lumbering forward until it hits Jack's desk and topples over it.
It's at that moment that the lights come back on. The stark fluorescent brightness is almost blinding after the ruby darkness, washing out the colour of his skin to white, the grey of the gun just a black shape in his hand.
***
Ianto cleans up as best he can. He finds a brush and shovel and sweeps up the broken glass. He can't do anything about the jagged shards still in the door frame, but he leaves the door open with newspaper underneath to catch any pieces that fall.
He places the gun back in Jack's top drawer. He has to move the weevil's arm to do it, to get the drawer to open and close, but he does it.
The body weighs more than he would have imagined. He ends up using Owen's workstation chair. He pulls it into the office, drags the weevil body onto it, and then pushes and pulls the chair awkwardly to the autopsy room. He nearly loses control when the chair wheels roll over the edge of the stairs, and the thing clatters down, only staying upright through sheer luck. Once its down there, he doesn't know what to do with it, so he leaves it spread upside-down over the chair, head tilted back, nearly lying on the floor, legs bent over the chair's back, arms hanging loosely at its sides. It's not a dignified position for a corpse.
A dead animal isn't a corpse, he thinks, it's a carcass. He doesn't know what a dead alien is.
Next he checks on Lisa. The door was still locked -- not forced -- so he makes sure she's back to using the main power supply. Makes sure the back-up generator is still in perfect working order. Then he presses a kiss against her cold, slack lips and goes to find gloves and disinfectant.
There's a trail of dark brown blood from the weevil's carcass to Jack's office. Ianto starts in the autopsy room, spraying and scrubbing, wiping down each surface until it's clean, then he works his way along the stone and concrete floors. On his hands and knees, he cleans the floor in Jack's office and then the desk. Apart from a few splatters on otherwise clean pages -- pages that he separates into a pile to be reprinted or copied -- and the broken door, there's no sign left.
Ianto sits down on the floor behind Jack's desk. His hands inside are sticky inside the thick gloves, sweaty from the rubber, and he pulls them off one by one, placing them beside him, next to the spray bottle. Then he pulls his knees to his chest, braces his elbows against his thighs, and covers his face with his hands. His fingers are cold against the backs of his eyelids, soothing as he tries to breathe. But the breath comes in shuddering, shuddering like that damn glass door, and he can still feel the ache in his wrists and his elbows.
He doesn't mean to cry, but he can't stop himself.
Because this is his life is now -- one dreadful, horrible moment followed by another, followed by another -- this is when the rest of them return. The deathly quiet where all he could hear was his own shaking breaths is gone, replaced by voices calling out, by Jack yelling, "Hey, Ianto, are you up here?" and Tosh talking to Suzie.
Ianto should get up, should tell them that he's fine, should explain about the weevil, but that will all have to wait until he can stop the tears running down his face. Right now, the best he can do is hold his breath and hope that he's not noticed.
"Bloody hell!" he hears Owen shout. "I wanted to study that one alive, not perform another autopsy. What the hell happened?"
Jack calls out Ianto's name once, then there are rushed footsteps, then, "Ianto?"
This time Jack sounds worried and a lot closer. Ianto curls up tighter, pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes as if pressure will help him get some control over this, will stop him sobbing like a child. If anything, it makes it worse, makes the gasping breaths louder.
"Ianto?" Jack repeats and now there are hands on his wrists, pulling his hands away from his face. Ianto has no choice but to look up and see Jack squatting in front of him, watching him carefully. "Are you hurt?"
Ianto shakes his head. He couldn't force words if he tried. He can't even force himself to stop gasping, to stop wheezing and gulping his breaths. Every time he tries to stop it, it just gets worse, and he needs more time. He needs more time. He can't be who he's supposed to be, he just can't. Not right now.
He just needs a little time, and then he can pull himself together, and then he can do this. He can be twenty-six and fighting aliens and running for his life and everything else, if they can just give him another few minutes to get himself together.
"Shhh," Jack says, and Ianto realises he's muttering, but Jack's sitting down beside him, back braced on the wall, pulling Ianto against his shoulder. "It's okay. You're going to be okay."
There's a strong arm around Ianto's back and a wide hand stretched across his cheek, fingers curled behind his jaw, the heel of the hand pressed lightly against his lips. Jack holds him tight and Ianto gives up, gives in, lets himself cry. Lets himself cling to Jack, hands bunching the front of his shirt, cotton caught inside his fists.
He tries to explain but the words get broken by sobs, by gasps. "It's too much-- And I can't, and I'm not-- It's not fair, I'm twenty-six-- I should be getting married and having kids, not-- I can't do this."
He loses the rest in hiccoughing, wracking huffs, and doesn't get a chance to say he can't do this, he can't be the one thing protecting Lisa, because he'd nearly died. He'd nearly died and if he had, what would have happened to her? There's no-one else, there's nothing else he can do, but he doesn't think he can do this.
He can't be this. This isn't supposed to be his life.
Ianto thinks if Jack would just ask him the right question, he'd tell him everything. Every detail. He'd let it be someone else's problem, someone else's decision.
If Jack would just keep holding him like this, warm and close and alive, and tell him everything's going to be okay, and ask him the right questions, Ianto would tell him everything.
But Jack doesn't.
Jack says, "It going to be okay," and, "You'll be fine."
Jack says, "It's just the after-effects of adrenaline. After a good night's sleep, it won't seem so bad."
Jack doesn't ask.
***
Jack was right, though. A good night's sleep -- helped in part by the tablets Owen had handed him on his way out the door -- and it felt possible again.
He could sit down at the conference table and talk about what had happened calmly, one step at a time. He could keep a bland smile on his face while Tosh promised to get him a swipe card for the armoury and Suzie talked about fixing the cell doors ("If we can't rig the cell doors to stay locked without power, we need to make sure those metal doors lock down automatically. You can't fix a power outage with weevils at your throat.").
He could tell Owen about the creature's movements, the systematic way it attacked the door.
And afterwards, when the others had gone out to explore some unusual readings, he could go down to Lisa, plan where he'll put a lamp and deck chair, and hold her chilled hand in his.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 02:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 02:17 am (UTC)If it makes you feel any better, just remember that eventually -- after panic and melodrama and BBQ sauce -- Ianto lands the hot captain and has many nights of ridiculously hot sex with him.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 02:43 am (UTC)Seriously, you just rock!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 03:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 06:18 am (UTC)You've created just the right amount of meticulous detail to fill in that how-did-he-ever-get-her-there? hole in Ianto's history - but better than that, for me, is how every bit of character here rings so true. Ianto's relentless attention to detail, that works so well for him when he has time to plan, but lets him down when he's dropped head-first into pure, brute danger. Jack's exceptional shrewd intelligence, underpinned by just enough human weakness to have him miss the last small details that might clue him in... Owen and Tosh and Suzie all feel spot-on, too. And those fragments of Ianto's life before Cardiff, all so very believable. Not least Lisa - you make her real and make sense of Ianto's driving determination to safeguard her above everything.
Really, I love this. It's intelligent and also emotionally resonant, it fits canon faultlessly, there's that sense of the irresistible subtext starting up between Ianto and Jack. Everything I want in an excellent Torchwood story, in fact!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-10 12:12 am (UTC)*BEAMS* That is a wonderful thing to hear. Thank you.
I love backstories that fit into canon, and that's really what I wanted this piece to do: I wanted it to work with what we know about the characters, not add anything shockingly new.
Ianto's relentless attention to detail, that works so well for him when he has time to plan, but lets him down when he's dropped head-first into pure, brute danger.
I hadn't thought of it in those terms, but you're right. Ianto's strengths are in research and planning, pattern-recognition to a great extent, but in the midst of danger... well, he handles it relatively well (read: better than I would) but he doesn't get the same buzz of almost-enjoyment that the others do.
Jack's exceptional shrewd intelligence, underpinned by just enough human weakness to have him miss the last small details that might clue him in...
*nods* I hadn't considered it human weakness so much as a harshness towards other people that is very clear at the start of TW S1. Jack seems to have become blase to other people, has stopped looking too closely at his team -- as long as they do what he wants, as long as the team works and does it's job, he doesn't look any closer and doesn't want to see the ways they start to fall apart.
In Cyberwoman, both Jack and Ianto are right. Ianto has been hiding, he purposely came into TW3 lying about who he was and why he was there. But I don't think Jack really asked a lot of him. I think Jack made his mind up about who Ianto was, what sort of person he was, very quickly and never looked any further than the suits and politely offered coffees.
I'm not implying it was Jack's fault -- Ianto's actions were considered and deliberate -- but an organisation like Torchwood needs close supervision of its employees for their own health (ie. Suzie and the glove, Owen and the weevil fights, Tosh and Mary, etc). And if Jack wants to play the leader and run it with a tiny team, then he needs to take on that responsibility for his subordinates (which he does as TW S1 goes on).
no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 07:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 11:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 06:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-09 11:37 pm (UTC)Stones and Ripples feedback (TW)
Date: 2007-10-10 02:16 am (UTC)Re: Stones and Ripples feedback (TW)
Date: 2007-10-10 03:29 am (UTC)Really? Oh, then I'm so glad you liked it.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-10 04:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-10 06:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-09 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-11 01:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-19 08:23 am (UTC)Your Ianto was great, tortured yet very efficient and cunning. I can't believe he managed to live with the pressure of keeping this secret for ten months, it seems incredible.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-19 09:03 pm (UTC)Thank you! There's something so amazing to me that Ianto managed this, that he was -- in his grief and his shock and his misguided devotion -- capable of this. It's fascinating (and I can understand why it would fascinate Jack, too).
no subject
Date: 2008-03-16 12:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-16 07:56 pm (UTC)Thank you! Halfway through writing this I had issues with the pacing and had to pull myself back to get it done, so I'm really glad that worked for you.
no subject
Date: 2008-04-01 06:19 am (UTC)poor ianto
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Date: 2008-04-01 07:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-09 04:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-09 06:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-25 12:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-27 07:35 am (UTC)Mainly because you left nice words on my favourite self-written TW story (okay, clearly I'm also not big with the sense-making tonight) and the only one that's been definitely, indesputedly jossed by canon.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-22 04:53 pm (UTC)because, honestly, you rock. this is a fantasic story, everything you've written that i've read so far is awesome.
i'm was seriously curled up in my chair reading this, completely worried about what was going to happen next, even knowing that everything turns out the way it does.
really, really well done!
no subject
Date: 2008-05-22 11:27 pm (UTC)Thank you!
i'm was seriously curled up in my chair reading this, completely worried about what was going to happen next, even knowing that everything turns out the way it does.
That's a fantastic sign!
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2008-06-15 10:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-15 10:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-18 12:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-18 11:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-09 10:54 pm (UTC)This is awesome backstory for him, and I thought it hit just the right notes -- he's so messed up, but so very forcibly buttoned-down, and so very competent. (Mmm, competent Ianto... ::happysigh::) You write a scary Weevil, too.
Conclusion: you and Ianto *both* get cookies.
no subject
Date: 2008-10-09 11:33 pm (UTC)he's so messed up, but so very forcibly buttoned-down, and so very competent.
Really, that's a perfect summary of Ianto in early S1. And nothing is sexier than competance.
no subject
Date: 2008-10-30 11:54 pm (UTC)Also, damn. Ianto crying in a totally real, devastated way, kind of broke me more than a little.
Anyway. This is awesome, as are you. *trundles off to see if I've missed any more of your TW stories*
no subject
Date: 2008-10-31 02:39 am (UTC)Awwww, thank you! I was slightly miffed when canon decided to joss this (although, on the other hand, there was so many moments of Ianto flirting outrageously with Jack that I loved it too) so I'm thrilled this still worked for you, despite that.
Ianto crying in a totally real, devastated way, kind of broke me more than a little.
Ianto totally cires in canon, so I was allowed to break my "never make them weep" rule. He's such a total woobie at times, I have to say. *g*
no subject
Date: 2008-10-31 01:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-31 02:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-01 07:49 am (UTC)This is Ianto's courage: to keep getting up and finding a way to go on.
I really wished Jack had asked him. I wonder if afterwards, Jack remembers this moment and wishes it too.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-01 08:45 am (UTC)That's it exactly. For all we can look at Ianto's actions and know they were misguided, I have to give the guy points for trying, for being determined enough to keep trying something that everyone else thought was impossible.
I really wished Jack had asked him. I wonder if afterwards, Jack remembers this moment and wishes it too.
Hmmmm. I wished Jack had asked him too, because it would have made the whole thing a lot easier for Ianto (on the other hand, there's a good chance that since Jack didn't know Ianto very well, he would have just retconned Ianto, dealt with Lisa, and to me, that feels worse than letting Ianto go through the pain and growth of losing Lisa and grieving for her).
In hindsight, Jack might pick up on it, but I bet he wouldn't. I think he'd put it all down to Ianto getting shaken up by the Weevil and wouldn't know that was the moment when Ianto nearly surrendered (could have, would have if Jack had asked) unless Ianto told him.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-25 01:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-27 01:28 am (UTC)I'm actually thrilled to hear that. This was written before Fragments was done, and I have to admit I was a little sad that it stopped this story from working within canon. (On the other hand, we got to see lots of Ianto flirting with Jack, so I honestly can't complain. *g*)
I like all the details you give about Ianto's past job and his reaction to killing the weevil.
Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2009-06-07 08:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-06-07 10:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-26 04:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-26 10:29 pm (UTC)Thanks for commenting. I'm still ridiculously fond of this story, even though it's since been jossed by canon.
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2010-01-29 01:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-29 04:12 am (UTC)Thank you! *g*