Torchwood Sketches

[outflewtheweb]

Title: Jack and Ianto's Relationship
Word Count: 918
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Janto
Fandom: Torchwood, which I don't own.
Author's Notes: Spoilers for Something Borrowed.
Summary: Ianto at Gwen's wedding.
Beta: elodicressida - my awesomeness sister.

            It’s quite well-lit in the reception room, easy to see every nuance of expression and movement. Ianto watches Jack dance with Gwen, smile at Gwen, staring into her eyes with a possessive, loving look. Like she’s most important. She looks back with the most trust Ianto has seen on any of their faces since they started the job, her belief that he’ll shelter her from all the horrors and dangers of the job and life in general completely unshakable. She is, in a sense, his beloved little sister that he has to protect at all costs from everything, from herself. Sometimes, Ianto wonders if it’s because of Jack’s mysterious past – he has failed someone before, perhaps, certainly.

He checks the team, almost subconsciously – his job, whether they know it or not, is to keep tabs on everyone and everything, efficiently prodding the whole unruly entity of Torchwood into order, or at least enough order to function. Owen is by the punch bowl, looking like he wishes he could drown his sorrows. He’ll probably try it before the end of the night – Ianto is not looking forward to cleaning up the mess that will result, but he’d do a lot for Owen and right now not complaining that Owen knew perfectly well that drinking didn’t work for him is what he can do.

Tosh is leaning against a pillar, looking incredibly gorgeous and entirely oblivious to the looks she’s getting, which is all Tosh – for her, it’s been Owen since the day she saw him and he doubts that will ever change. He thinks that she probably has a lost causes complex, and feels sorry for her – it can’t be easy to be in love with a dead man, especially one as vituperative as Owen is. Nonetheless, she’ll never give up, and it might actually be a relief for her to not have to deal with the mess of a physical relationship after the disaster with Mary (and Adam, although everyone else has forgotten it; he wishes he could, but if wishes were horses, all beggars would ride). Tosh looks towards their dancing teammates and frowns a little. It’s doubtless that she thinks Jack is pining for Gwen, gives that look a less fraternal twist. It isn’t, but would it matter if it were? Not really. He watches them dance, and he smiles a little, because Jack can look all he wants. He can flirt and pine all he wants (although in this case, he isn’t). Given a choice, Jack will always pick Ianto.

            Not that Ianto intends to give him the choice. The man might be getting on in years, but apparently centuries of life had not added centuries of maturity. Maybe being immortal slowed development to some extent – maybe you learned faster when you knew that life was always, always closer to not being there. No, Jack is still quite immature. He wants someone to take him in hand, to tell him no, to give him a raised eyebrow and a sharp command. He needs structure to his life, to reassure him that the people in it aren’t going to leave him. Ianto intends to give it to him. When he let Jack have the choice, Jack left; played the noble martyr, saw how far he could get without any boundaries to hold him back. He asserted his freedom to leave, to be careless of Ianto’s feelings, to hold him up and stand him up and abandon him, despite the undeniable fact that neither of them wanted it.

            Now, though, Ianto has the control, makes Jack do tricks for his treats like an unruly puppy, allows him some leeway but always with this sardonic look that makes it perfectly clear that this is an indulgence. Jack wants a framework, a box of rules and strictures to assure him that he is loved and wanted, that no one will leave him, and Ianto knows Jack will never risk that framework now he has it. Jack felt safe, and because he’d made Jack feel safe, Ianto was safe too. There wouldn’t be another lover who left him and never came back – never again.

            Ianto crosses the dance floor and cuts in, cuts Gwen out and sends her off to Rhys without even looking at her. Jack wraps his arms around Ianto, although Ianto feels his glance towards Gwen across the room, tracking her until he’s certain she’s safe with Rhys and hasn’t been waylaid or some such, unlikely as that is (despite the earlier disturbance). Ianto knows this is a hard day for him – he’s not Gwen’s first and only protector anymore. Rhys was always there, even before Jack, true, but until now it wasn’t official. This day, this ceremony, is a symbol that she isn’t his to protect, that he has to let her go, that it is someone else’s privileged responsibility to care for this girl who, compared to the rest of them, always seems so young.

            Jack, Ianto thinks, is brooding too much. He slides a hand slowly down Jack’s back, calling his attention to his present company, and smirks a little as Jack immediately focuses on him, diverts that protection to him. He doesn’t really need it, but it makes Jack feel better to give it to him. Besides, it doesn’t matter if he needs it; it’s good to feel treasured and protected. As long as Jack knows that in a crisis he must treat Ianto like the competent person he is, it’s welcome warmth.

Title: Time Agents
Word Count: 375
Rating: PG
Pairing: none
Fandom: Torchwood, which I don't own.
Author's Notes: Spoilers for season two.
Summary: Behavioral patterns of Time Agents, who are apparently really messed up in any number of ways.
Beta: elodicressida - my awesomeness sister.

            It’s ironic, that upon the completion of training, the time agency wipes the memories of everyone the new agent’s ever known, ever spoken to: a perverse congratulation, a malicious gift. It’s a lot more advanced than retcon – they scan the memories of everyone in the world hourly, and then they wipe all those memories of anything that even hints at your existence. It’s a shock, the first time new time agents goes into their favorite bars and the bartender, who they’ve been baring your soul to the last few years, doesn’t have any idea who they are.

            Few time agents have families when they join – no one has any family after.

            Being a Time Agent is a dangerous job; any mission, any action, is quite possibly the last. Not one trusts his fellow time agents with anything, not his life, certainly – they’ll kill anyone at all to rise through the ranks (the time agency tends to hire those with flexible morals and a poor work ethic) – nothing but memory. They’ll remember their colleagues, they’ll write names on bathroom stalls, they’ll pass the knowledge of their existence on, and that’s more important than an agent’s life, because if no one knows you exist, do you? Did you ever?

            It’s something every time agent wonders, and it can’t be answered. Because of this, in every time they visit they leave a memento, leave their name on someone’s lips. Every house they live in, even if it’s only for a day, they draw a scratch down the lintel of the front door. They were there. They left a mark. Even if no one knows who did it, as long as someone sees it, it proves that they existed.

            For this, they become flamboyant personalities, leaving an impression. No one introduces himself once - they always repeat their names. ‘It’s Jack, Jack Harkness. I’m John, Captain John Hart.’ Remember me, remember me, I exist, remember me. They smile and everyone remembers that smile; it’s not the charm, although that’s an easy explanation. It’s the desperation that’s underneath. Remember, remember?

            Behind every time agent is another, and although they’re supposed to erase any ‘inadvertent’ remnants of another agent’s passing, they never do. As long as there’s something left, they’re alive.