300 Torchwood Drabbles (Set 2)

[nothing_rhymes_with_ianto]

Title: 300 Torchwood Drabbles (Set 2)
Pairings/Characters: Any and all pairings, any and all characters
Spoilers/Warnings: Basically, proceed with caution. Lots of spoilers, not many warnings.
Summary: 50 out of my 300 drabbles of either 100, 150, or 200 words. All drabbles are 100 words unless otherwise indicated. Each drabble was inspired by a single word prompt given to me by random followers on Tumblr.

51 Rain (Double-drabble)

Ianto sat in his flat and watched the rain. He started at a knock on the door, but didn’t make a move to get up. Which was fine, because whoever was at the door had a key.

Owen strode in, dripping on the carpet, and shook himself like a dog. Ianto said nothing. The medic slipped off his shoes and stood in front of him, hand outstretched. Ianto looked at the hand. A beer was in it. He took the bottle. Owen sat down beside him. Their shoulders barely brushed.

“I know how you feel. I know what it’s like. It hurts, it really does. I lost my…my fiancée. Katie. Lost her to Torchwood. Alien in her brain. I felt like this for months. Like my heart had been ripped out of my chest. Like I was empty, floating, full of pain.”

A sob tore through Ianto’s throat even as he tried to hold it back. Silence reigned; there was nothing but Ianto’s soft hitches of breath and the pounding of rain on the roof and windows. He turned to face Owen. The medic’s eyes glistened with tears.

“How long before it stops hurting.”

Owen grimaced, closing his eyes. “I let you know when it happens.”



52 Contemplate

Back when he first joined Torchwood, after Katie, when everything just looked so bleak, he would sometimes sit and think about exactly how he might kill himself, if things never looked up. He’d think about the people who’d need to be told, who he owed money to. He’d think about how he’d do it and where and when, what kind of note he’d leave.

And then some days, when things were looking up, he sit and think about the adventures he and Toshiko Sato and Captain Harkness could have together, driving around Cardiff after an alien some wet autumn night.



53 Subterfuge

Owen’s sarcasm and acerbity is simply a ruse. Yes, he can truly be that way at times, but it is really just a mask to keep people away, to keep people from hurting him, purposefully or accidentally.

It’s a threatening mask that everyone believes, which Owen is glad for. He doesn’t want to have to try at something harder, or attempt blankness like Ianto. He likes that people don’t try to get to know him.

The mask achieves his goal.

Even if some people manage to see through the deceit to the kind, gentle, lovesick, grief-stricken, lost, hurting man underneath.



54 Inveigle

Ianto was glad there was a massive file on Jack Harkness at Torchwood London, and even more grateful for the ridiculous amount of gossip that flitted around the building. It made everything so much easier.

He knew it would take some work; Harkness was a stubborn bastard. But he knew Jack would bed anything attractive, he knew that flattery would get him everywhere, he knew he was hot as hell in black pants and a studded belt, and he knew his coffee was heavenly.

He only needed that information and his own innate wiles to coax the job out of Jack.



55 Nonsensical

It was bad enough having to hear Gwen yammer on in Welsh to Rhys. Listening to Jack speak his native language was even more dizzying to Owen. He hated it. It didn’t sound like any 21st century Earth language.

He wanted to ask Jack to stop, to tell him the nonsensical syllables were giving him a headache. He had no idea what Jack was saying. He didn’t know if he liked that. But then he stopped thinking and just listened to the sounds, fluid, hypnotizing, lilting and slightly musical, Jack’s adopted American accent completely absent. And he found it beautiful.



56 Pedantic

Owen is convinced that Ianto’s pedantic nature is just another symptom of his extreme anal retentive-ness. The man reads up on everything, he knows every piece of information one could ever need.

And yet, it does some good. Whenever Owen needs to know something about the weather, the alien he’s autopsying, the metal he’s looking for, the kind of fucking scalpel he’s trying to locate, Ianto has the information.

Owen is extremely grateful for Ianto’s extensive knowledge. Grateful for the young man’s wit that is equal to his own. It doesn’t hurt that the man’s a damn good lay, too.



57 Nefarious (You get a cookie if you can guess what show I stole this scenario from.)

“Owen?”

“What? I’m trying to work!”

“No you’re not, you’re playing video games. I can see you on the CCTV up here. You should really be autopsying that man.”

“Oh, fine. So, what do you want, then?”

“There’s a lorry full of fridges waiting outside the tourist centre. Said you rang the other night and ordered them.”

“Oh, okay….they did?”

“Were you drunk again?”

“No, it’s all part of my nefarious plot to take over the world with frozen foods and ice cold beverages and make all of Britain fat pigs. Of course I was drunk!”

“You’re paying for them.”



58 Fever (Triple drabble and a half as a present to someone)

Ianto groaned. He felt like shit. His whole body ached and all he was doing was sitting at a desk in the archives doing filing. He looked at the clock. Time for another round of coffee.

As he handed Owen his mug, the medic frowned and looked closer at him.

“Are you all right? You look like shit. In fact, you look like you’re about to keel over.”

“I don’t know. I think I’m a little sick.”

The medic narrowed his eyes, grabbed a thermometer and stuck it forcefully in Ianto’s mouth. A few seconds later he grabbed it and looked at it.

“A little sick? You’ve got a fever of 39 degrees. Let me take you home before you fall over and die.”

Ianto was about to protest, but a wave of dizziness hit him and Owen had to steady him with hands on both of his shoulders. He took the Welshman by the arm and lead him up the stairs towards the cog door. Suddenly he felt worse than ever.

“Ianto’s sick, Jack. Fever. I’m taking him home.” Owen called. A sound of consent drifted from Jack’s office.

The ride home was quiet. Ianto dozed restlessly in the passenger seat, leaning his forehead against the cool window. Owen glanced at him periodically, frowning.

Back in Ianto’s flat, Owen gently manhandled the Welshman, who was limp as a doll, out of his clothes and tucked the younger man into bed. Moments later he came back with some water and Tylenol. He held Ianto’s head tenderly as he had the man swallow the pills and tilted the glass against his lips. Ianto sighed at the cool water sliding down his throat.

“You’re going to sleep. I’ll be here for as long as I can, unless Jack calls me back. Just call out if you need anything.”

Ianto nodded weakly and closed his eyes, pulling the blankets closer in. He wasn’t sure if he imagined Owen’s hands brushing across his forehead and through his hair, but then he could hear the Londoner leaving the room. Moments later he sank into sleep.



59 Inevitable (Based on GDL's Torchwood comic Shrouded.)

Ianto sighed. It pained him to know what he knew. He hated that Mairwyn had shown him his death, that she’d put that knowledge in him, the knowledge that he’d leave Jack alone, that his last words would be something like that.

It hurt him to see Jack’s pain, Jack hurting, unable to respond to his declaration because he refused to believe he was dying. He couldn’t know about his own death. He couldn’t change the fixed future. He didn’t know what the outcome would be, but helping Mairwyn couldn’t come to good.

He swallowed the Retcon without looking back.



60 Symphony

Every night, Jack fell asleep to the sounds of the Hub. After living there for so many long years, it was no longer annoying. Now it was a lullaby, a reassurance that everything was still fine, he wasn’t alone, lulling him to sleep.

The hum of computers, the leathery flapping of Myfanwy’s wings, her screech as she passed overhead, the groaning and growling of the Weevils in the cells, the sounds of water sliding down the column, the clink and creak of metal as the structures shifted slightly. It was all a beautiful symphony to him. The symphony of home.



61 Prayer (Double-drabble)

As he drove towards Turnmill, Ianto sent a prayer to a god he didn’t even believe in that Owen had not been in any pain when he died. He’d come to think of Owen as a brother, as a best friend, rather than an annoying colleague.

Once the power had been brought back to the building, the Turnmill employees had somehow pumped the radioactive material back to the original chamber. At Torchwood’s request, they had not entered the emergency chamber yet.

Ianto donned a protective suit and ventured inside the tiny room. The bright white lighting was tinged with red. Machines and wires dangled helplessly along the walls.

He almost choked on his own breath when he found Owen’s body. The skin that wasn’t black from decomposition was an angry red. But he knew it was Owen. He called to one of the employees for backup. Reverently, choking back tears, he and the other man lifted Owen’s body and placed it in the body bag.

Once he was back in the SUV, with Owen’s body in the boot, Ianto drove down the streets until his vision blurred too much and he had to pull over. He put his head in his hands and cried for his doctor, his colleague, his brother, his friend.



62 Corsage

Owen pinned the corsage handed to him to his t-shirt. He wasn’t a fan of weddings. Even when he was alive, they’d made him feel sad, made him remember his own wedding that never happened. It hurt.

He remembered Katie’s overjoyed tears when he’d proposed to her. Her excitement as she began to plan the wedding, the love for her that had swelled inside him as her face lit up whenever it was mentioned. He missed her so much sometimes, enough to make him ache inside.

But now there was Toshiko to be nice to and to dance with. Anything to push his pain away.



63 Ravenous (Based on Life Lived Without Thinking by pocketmouse)

After that first time, Ianto felt hungry for it, wanting it all the time. He wanted those extreme sensations, the feeling of finally feeling. And Owen, he wanted Owen again. He wanted that tenderness he’d felt as the medic’s fingers had curled over the back of his neck.

He craved the feeling of being alive, of not being alone, of being cared for.

After his death, Owen was trapped. Trapped in his body without sense or sensation. And he craved that room. He craved the ability Ianto’d had to feel, to put his senses on overdrive.

He was stuck in that room with no way out.



64 Tendencies

As he slides Suzie’s body into its place in the morgue wall, he wishes he’d seen her homicidal tendencies earlier. She would often come up to the tourist centre and sit with him. They’d talk about all sorts of stuff as they played chess. They’d been tied when she killed herself.

But he hadn’t seen the damage the Glove had done to her. Holding the metal gauntlet in his hand, he could feel its power, its negative force. But he hadn’t seen its effect on Suzie.

He just hopes there are no other gloves around to do that to anyone else.



65 Overconfidence

Ianto knew that Jack’s displays of giddiness and overconfidence were often a mask. He knew Jack rarely felt that way, that he was often plagued with nightmares, regrets, and the knowledge that everyone he loved would leave him one day.

He tried as hard as he could to comfort Jack. The others assumed he and Jack were sleeping together, but their relationship was less about sex and much more about emotional connection, the fact that they understood each other through loss.

He wanted Jack to forget his regrets and feel the way he pretended to be. Jack should be happy.



66 Hindsight

He realizes now how much of an ass he was not to say it back, how horrible that was. And now it plagues him, that regret. It hurts, pulses in the back of his mind like a constant headache, throbs as he travels the world because everything reminds him of him.

So when he learns of Syriath and the House of the Dead, the last night, the calling of the dead ones, the coming of the spirits, he hopes maybe he’ll see some remnant of Ianto there, some shadow of him, a memory. Just so he can say it properly.



67 Implosion

You hate this feeling, this pulsing tension from too many secrets. You hate having to hide from this team you’ve grown to love, grown protective of. Even though they often ignore you, you love them for their unique personalities, their humanity.

You hate feeling uncertain about Lisa, about whether she’s still the woman you love or if she’s changed, and if Jack is slowly taking her place in your heart.

You hate this feeling like you’re going to implode from all the emotions and the secrets and the hiding. You don’t want to do this any more. But you promised her.



68 Quintessential (Drabble and a half)

The RAF coat. It was quintessential Jack Harkness.

But now Jack could barely stand to have the heavy wool upon his shoulders. He wore it anyway, because it was expected of him. But it hurt.

His old coat, the one that had been destroyed along with the Hub, had held memories. He’d slept in that coat for warmth on different planets. There was a stain on the sleeve from when he met Estelle, a tear from an incident with Ianto, another from a rowdy party with Stella, scents from all the places he’d been and people he’d loved had lingered in that coat. That coat had held moments and memories he would never relive, but could always remember just by looking at or feeling or smelling the fabric.

This coat had no memories. None but that of Ianto’s death and the death of Steven. None but that of his failure.



69 Acrid

The acrid smell of death and destruction and rubble and lasers lingered in Ianto’s nostrils for weeks after Canary Wharf. The screams of his colleagues and Lisa’s agonized cries echoed in his ears. Visions of Daleks and Cybermen haunted his nightmares. He couldn’t get the tension knot of fear out of his stomach.

Only when Lisa was killed and he was suspended did he finally relax. It felt like a huge weight had been lifted from his shoulders. The tension was suddenly gone, the ringing in his ears suddenly stopped, the fear had disappeared. He was ready to start healing.



70 Drabble (Drabble and a half)

One day, a letter came in the post to the Tourist Centre. Ianto’s name was on the front, written in what he recognized as Jack’s neat, flourishy handwriting. He frowned and opened it. The card was beautiful. Inside was a drabble of a note, the ink a glowing, supernatural blue.

“Dear Ianto,
It’s been over two thousand years since I left earth and I still have not forgotten you. I know you’ve always wanted to see the stars, even after the Battle. So I decided to send some to you. I’m in the Fylqazx galaxy. At least, that’s how you’d spell it in English. I just want you to know that, though I can’t say it when I’m with you then, I do love you. Have a piece of the stars. It’s in the envelope. Some rock of the Rielai star. In Fylqazxic, “Rielai” means love.
I won’t forget,
Jack”



71 Anthem

For a while, during bouts of extreme boredom, Owen tried to figure out what Torchwood’s theme song would be. He knew it would be either something depressing or something badass. He just didn’t know exactly what.

First it was Eye of The Tiger. Then it was Search and Destroy by the Sex Pistols. He briefly considered O Captain! My Captain! by Walt Whitman, but then he learned that Jack couldn’t die.

He eventually decided Torchwood had no anthem. They were indefinable, amorphous, strange. They hurt and took and helped and gave no matter what and that was all that mattered.



72 Smoke (Drabble and a half)

They’d gotten two young girls killed and nearly been unable to save a third. Owen had patched the little girl up, handed her over to the paramedics, and stormed away across the road. Ianto found him leaning against a wall in an alley, hand rubbing his forehead, his other hand fumbling in his pocket.

Ianto slouched beside him. Owen finally got the pack out of his trousers and stuck a cigarette in between his lips. Ianto took the proffered pack and selected his own cigarette. He flicked his own lighter and lit his and Owen’s. They took alternating drags, watching the smoke drift out across the night air.

“We almost fucking lost her.” Owen kicked at the ground.

“But we didn’t. You saved her. You saved her.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Owen. You did good. Jack has to be proud of you. I know I am.”

“Thanks, Ianto.”

“It’s my job.”



73 Dew

Ianto groaned helplessly as he watched dew form on the grass around him. He couldn’t move. Having a leg impaled on broken rebar will do that to you. His comm was somewhere out of reach in the grass about two meters away. It had fallen out as he was running.

And now he was stuck here, in the middle of some ruins. The team was further off in the forest. He was rather glad that he was quick-witted and had managed to tie off a tourniquet quite fast.

He just hoped Jack’s dashing heroics would come save him in time.



74 Oil (Drabble and a half)

“Are you really going to give me a fucking massage?”

“Are you really going to question my motives as a doctor? All I did was put my hands on your back and I could feel the knots there. Now take your damn shirt and trousers off and lie on your stomach.”

Ianto did so, tensing up as Owen straddled his hips to get the best leverage and poured the cool oil onto his skin. But after a while, as the medic began working out the knots in his upper back, he relaxed, making happy little grunting and moaning noises into the pillow.

“What?”

Ianto turned his head. “I said, if Jack was still gone I’d let you fuck me.” A sharp inhale of breath from above made him tense up again. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to assume.”

Owen gently worked a knot lower in his back. “You didn’t assume wrong.”



75 Empathy

“I know you changed your file to get in.” Jack told Ianto softly as they sat together on Ianto’s sofa. He didn’t sound accusing, just curious. “What else did you lie about?”

“I really was a junior archivist. I liked it. But they wanted me to be an interrogator. Because I’m an empath. They tested me and apparently I’m stronger than usual. I refused to be an interrogator, though. It felt wrong to me.”

“Is that why you always know what we want before we say anything?”

“Yes. I like it, though. I like taking care of people.”

“I know.”



76 Secret (Drabble and a half)

It was easier to keep a secret when another person knew it. Although he’d been forced to tell Gwen. She’d seen him in action.

But he hadn’t expected Ianto to find out.

The Welshman was waiting for him with a glass of scotch and a hand to hold when Jack finally drove the SUV back to the Hub at a snail’s pace.

“Why did you have to kill yourself, Jack?” Ianto asked, his voice sad and weary, eyes miserable. “You don’t…want it…do you?”

For a moment, Jack was filled with fear that Ianto would run away from him. He didn’t want him to leave. Sighing, he pulled Ianto into a hug and buried his face in the younger man’s hair.

“Sometimes I do, very much. And sometimes not at all. But I can’t stay dead. There’s nothing for you to worry about.”

“I’ll still worry. And I’ll still be here.”



77 Masked

The costumes they’d shown up in were magnificent. Jack was getting all the attention. Gwen was checking out all the fine young men. Ianto was a little jealous, but there was no time for that. He had to be looking for their suspect.

Ah! He found her, laughing with some young blonde man. He slid through the crowd over to her. She smiled at him, eyes glinting unnaturally violet behind the mask. The blonde wandered away. She smiled again, fluttered her fan.

In one smooth move, she was sedated and he was carrying her outside like a hero in an old swashbuckling film.



78 Desire

“Do you think I…”

“Raped them, like Suzie said?” Ianto frowned at Owen. “No. I’ve looked it up in the archives. That cologne works the same way Jack’s pheromones do, only much stronger. It just makes you seem much more attractive than you actually are.”

“Are you sure?” Owen looked terrified. Ever since Suzie had whispered to him, quiet over the comms as she sat in helpless the wheelchair, he’d thought about it. He couldn’t bear the thought of hurting someone innocent.

“Yes, I’m sure. If I wasn’t, I would’ve told Jack, and he would’ve done worse to you.”

“God…”



79 Exploration

Ever since he’d seen Ianto down in the communal showers (it was the Welshman’s job to clean up the muck from the residents), he’d wanted him. Hell, he’d wanted him since that night with the Weevil. The man looked delicious in tight black clothes.

He wanted to explore every inch of Ianto’s body, to taste every piece of skin, to feel him everywhere. He wanted to look at those blue eyes while inside him. He wanted to kiss those pouting lips, to hear that deep Welsh accent moan his name.

He wanted the mysterious Welshman who’d charmed his way into his life.



80 Quixotic

In the back of his logical mind, he’d always known it was stupid and hugely unrealistic to believe Diane was the one who would save him. He’d hoped, he’d dreamed. She fascinated him, she surprised him, and she was gorgeous and smart and he’d staked everything on her. He’d imagined that she’d love him as much as he loved her, that she’d stay with him but stay the amazing independent woman she was.

He imagined that she’d somehow give him back the happiness he’d lost when Katie died. That she’d somehow fill the emptiness and loneliness that left his nights so dark.

He imagined that she’d save him.



81 Sunshine

Owen stretched out on the lawn, basking in the warm sunshine. Katie giggled beside him and poked his belly.

“Oi!” But he was smiling. He grabbed her hand gently and brought it to his lips. Her hair fell into her face, shading it. Reaching up, he brushed it away from her eyes with a grin. “You’re so beautiful.”

She smiled at him again, her eyes lighting up. The sun shone through her blonde hair, giving her a halo of gold. There was colour high on her cheeks from her sunbathing. She looked delighted. He wanted always to see her like this.



82 Congregate

Sometimes, on late nights, Owen, Ianto and Suzie would congregate in the meeting room and play card games. Or, sometimes, boardgames like Taboo or Trivial Pursuit. After a little while, it became a weekly thing. They’d play every Tuesday night for as long as they could. Some things, like poker, Owen was better at. Suzie was better at Taboo and Ianto at Trivial Pursuit. Everything else they were equally proficient in. They loved those friendly breaks in the monotony.

Until the Glove arrived.

After Suzie’s death, Owen and Ianto were ashamed that they had not seen the change in her.



83 Vienna (Drabble and a half. Based on I Had No Idea I Had Been Travelling by kalichan)

Ianto had gone up through Austria on his way to the Netherlands. And though he’d not met people as amazing there as he did in Amsterdam, Vienna’s palpable history and beauty had fascinated and enchanted him. He’d wanted to see everything, but time was short and he’d wanted to go everywhere. As he rushed to the train, he’d kissed his fingers and touched buildings just as he had in Paris, promising them he’d be back one day.

Jack wandered the sunset-golden streets of Vienna. He remembered Ianto’s glowing face as he relayed fond memories of the place to Jack as they sat in his office. He’d always said he wanted to go back. He never got the chance.

Jack kissed his fingers gently and touched the side of a building as he wandered toward the train station.

For a moment he imagined Ianto’s tender kisses touching him once again.



84 Denouement

He watched, standing stunned beside Mairwyn, as she showed him Tosh’s death, Owen’s. Poor, brave, wonderful Tosh. Poor, sad, strong Owen.

He wanted so badly for this all to end well for him. It was greedy, but his intentions were better than one would think. He hurt not for himself, but for Jack. He didn’t want Jack to be alone, with the deaths of his employees on his shoulders.

As he stood with Mairwyn on the rubble of the Hub, he wished for this story to end with something, anything, good for Jack. But he knew it wouldn’t be that way.



85 Cartographer

Owen sometimes felt like a cartographer, mapping out the bodies of the women he fucked, kissing down their skin and running his hands across the paths of their bodies.

But there was only one map which he knew was complete. He knew the minute distance between Katie’s eyes, the length of her from toe tip to top of the head. He knew each one of her teeth when she smiled and the texture of every finger. He knew the centimeters the beats of her heart drummed out. He knew her for miles.

He just wished he could get the chance to travel her paths again.



86 Lullaby

Ianto is curled up in Owen’s lap, shivering through a fever dream, though his brow is hot to the touch. The Welshman is skinnier than Owen has ever seen him. He pushes the hair from Ianto’s face and puts a hand to his cheek.

They’ve been stuck in the Himalayas for months now. Gwen is gone. Tosh is weak, but she sits across the tent, closer to the door, keeping watch, pretending not to notice the tears in the medic’s eyes as he watches Ianto breathe.

Owen leans over and begins to sing a lullaby to Ianto, easing him away.



87 Cats

“Jack, do you know what happened to Puska?”

“Who?”

“What do you mean who? That cat!”

“The one you dropped into the Hub.”

“And onto my own face. Karma’s already got me. I’m scarred for life. Where is she?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, she ran away after that thing attacked you. I want to find her before Myfanwy eats her or at least so I can get her outside somewhere.”

Gwen came down from Myfanwy’s aerie, eyebrow raised, holding some tufts of fur.

“Myfanwy may have beat you to it.”

Ianto and Jack looked at each other sheepishly, heads bowed.



88 Alice (Drabble and a half)

Eight years after Steven’s death, Alice got out of her car and walked up the street to her house. A black shape stood just outside the gate. Freezing, she drew her gun.

“Who are you?”

The figure moved into the light, and Alice bit back a gasp. Her father looked more broken than she’d ever seen. The ruin in his face shaded everything. His despair was palpable, and she could see the self-loathing, the guilt in his eyes from her position several paces away.

“How long has it been?”

“Four and a half earth years.”

She beckoned him to follow her. In the light of the porch, she examined him as she unlocked the door. The collar of his coat was stained with red, and she wondered how many times he’s killed himself since he left earth.

“It’s all right, Dad. Even when I hated you, I still loved you.”



89 Sherd

“This was all that fell through the Rift, I think. What is it?” Ianto handed Jack the broken bits.

Jack peered closely at them, turning them over in his hands. After a few moments of inspection, he smiled brightly.

“I think they’re pieces of pottery from the Ssuroa galaxy. They’re probably worth millions in Ssuroan currency. They take pride in their art.”

“Then how’d it get here?”

“Smugglers or thieves, probably.”

“And they broke a beautiful piece of art.”

“Just be grateful that there’s a galaxy out there that appreciates art and emotional expression even more than the human race.”



90 In Situ (Drabble and a half)

“The bodies on floor fourteen, they’ve not been moved?” The police officer sounded stern.

“No, ma’am.” The young cop said.

“Good.”

She signaled a coroner and his assistant. “Floor fourteen has not been handled. Take one of them—” here, she gestured toward the group of young police officers with cameras round their necks. “And go up there. Have them photograph the scene before you move anything. Then you can load the two bodies on that floor.”

All three men gasped softly as they entered the room. A large blue-tinged tank stood there. Something was inside it, but it was silent. They stood reverently over the two men wrapped around each other.

All three of them had mostly become unaffected by and hardened to deaths, but these two welled up tears in all of them. This was something they rarely saw. Love of the sweetest kind, protection of another in death.



91 Debitage

After the sex alien had been destroyed, Owen went back to the site to bring back the asteroid so they could incinerate it. As he picked up the pieces from where he’d chipped at the rock a day earlier, he thought back to Ianto’s reaction to his walking up to the main Hub stark naked and hard.

The Welshman hadn’t been remotely surprised or disgusted, or even angry. In fact, he seemed slightly interested. Maybe it was the aftereffect of being horny as hell making him think that way, but he wasn’t sure he wouldn’t enjoy a tryst with Ianto.



92 Gorget

When Jack learned that Ianto was into leather (kinky as well as smart, and a history buff to boot, Jack loved that) he knew exactly what to get him. Because the Welshman already had the black leg-hugging trousers and the skintight black shirt and the gorgeous jacket and the laced boots and the studded belt.

No, Jack got him a gorget, a wide leather collar that wrapped round his throat and extended down along his shoulders and chest. It was black with metal studs and buckles where it attached.

When Ianto put it on for the first time, Jack had to rip it off immediately and lick and bite all along his neck. Then it went back on, and Ianto tantalized him with it for the rest of the night, forcing him to taste leather and sweat and skin each time he went in for a kiss.

Goddamn sexy Welshmen.



93 Quixotic

Sometimes Ianto dreamed he went gallivanting around with a normal group of detectives, investigating routine murders and robberies on Cardiff’s streets.

Sometimes he dreamed he was back at the estate, like Rhiannon, living there with a house and kids of his own. In some dreams, Lisa was alive and married to him. In others, it was Jack who was raising the children.

Sometimes he dreamed he’d never left Uni, and was still stuck learning about psychology and anthropology.

Then he’d awake from the quixotic, absurd visions and lounge, imagining they were real, until Torchwood seeped into his brain again.



94 Jaded

Owen and Ianto were the perfect match. Both lost, both too young for the amount of darkness they’d seen, both angry, both jaded about relationships of any sort.

Ianto knew that Owen responded to equality, not coddling. He knew that the man didn’t do romance and that he would only allow himself to be vulnerable alone, in the dark, when his partner was just as exposed.

Owen knew that Ianto was stronger than he seemed, that he thrived on knowledge, that he didn’t do romance, and that he was willing to open up and be vulnerable if he needed to be.

They were perfect for each other.



95 Irrelevant (Drabble and a half)

Personal life should be separated from professional life, Owen was always told. Personal life and past should be irrelevant in the workplace.

But he can’t help it. He can’t help knowing, understanding every one of those kids that comes in bruised and broken and angry, saying softly that they “just fell down,” because he was one of them once. And his mum didn’t care what her boyfriend did. She didn’t. So he got out.

So now he can’t help coming to them when no one else is around, smiling gently into frightened, hardened eyes, telling them he understands, he was like that once, that it’ll be all right, that all they have to do is wait till they can get out, and then it’ll be fine. That they’ll turn out okay, in the end. It will, and they will, really.

He doesn’t tell them that they might turn into him.



96 Sensitize

Owen was slightly apprehensive. But he knew the good it had done for Jack, and so he’d let Ianto do this.

Blindfolded, his other senses were heightened. He could hear Ianto moving about the room. He could taste arousal in the air.

Hands touching him made him jump, but he relaxed. Soon, a gentle tongue lapped along the contours of his ribs. He was quickly growing hard.

His stomach muscles jumped as cool ice skittered across his abdomen, then relaxed as melted wax soon followed. This assault on his senses made Owen moan, he could feel himself coming undone. He was letting go, losing control.

It was just what he wanted.



97 Insidious (Double-drabble)

“You saved us, didn’t you?”
“And I began to like it. And look what I became.”

It wasn’t until he’d left Europe that Jack realized what he’d turned into. He hadn’t realized until then that he’d forgotten that everyone else was mortal, really, truly mortal. He’d forgotten that his team could die, and that sending them in before him simply for the fun and adventure of saving them and getting them out of tight situations was a bad idea.

Because that’s what happened, didn’t it? He didn’t care that he was the immortal one. He liked showing off his dashing hero persona, his cleverness. He was like Peter Pan, always beating the bad guys, always saving the Lost Boys. The insidious addiction of always being rescuer, the brave one, the hero, creeping closer into his heart and spreading ignorance throughout him.

He’d been willing to sacrifice his team because he thought he could save them again. He became the harbinger of his own downfall, he’d lead the charge to his own employees’ deaths. All because he was too proud to try to treat them as equals, to try to treat them like they’d die someday, to realize how precious they were, how much he needed them.

He enjoyed the horrible dashing heroics, and look what he became.



98 Homunculus (Drabble and a half)

Ianto remembered, in dreams, infiltrating the Valiant, hiding behind masks, becoming one of the rotating guards of Jack’s boiler room cell. He’d wake up gasping.

He remembered watching helplessly as Jack screamed, cried, died, was stripped of all dignity, never touched by a gentle hand for a year, unendurable agony, and still he protected them. He’d wake up, pillow wet, face anguished.

In his dreams, Jack changed, tearing into his own flesh, sinking into himself, into something larger, smarter, stronger. But he knew this to be his own wishful mind. Because upon waking, clutching at the sheets, he could remember the day UNIT and their infiltrators fled, just before the reverse of the year, and he remembered Jack’s weak, tear-stained, damaged expression, and how he longed to just kiss him once, help him a little, reassure him. It could not be so.

He’d wake up devastated and torn apart, aching.



99 Decorum

Jack wondered if Ianto’s sense of decorum and propensity toward dignified manners was an attempt to break away from his upbringing. He knew that the Welshman’s claim that his father was a tailor was a lie. He knew the young man’s father had worked at Debenham’s.

But he respected Ianto’s wish to get as far away from his childhood as possible, he knew what it was like. And he knew how easy it was to fall into the protection of soldier-like decorum, politeness and dignity. He knew how much one fell in love with the blank mask of a warrior.



100 Time

It was all right. Like he’d told Tosh, really, it was all right.

He’d not been himself, not been right since Jack had brought him back. Hell, even before then he’d thought maybe it would be better to die. The struggle of emotion inside him had been too much to bear.

So now, though he’d raged against it only moments ago, he stood to meet death head on, a small, relieved smile on his face as he realized it was his time, and maybe he’d finally get the peace he’d been looking for since the loss of his wonderful Katie.




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