"Jones. Ianto Jones."
When it came down to it, Ianto Jones joined Torchwood London more or less on a whim. There were perhaps a couple more reasons behind the decision. One was obviously Rupert Howarth. Or rather, Rupert Reynolds as was his alias when Ianto thought he was a normal pharmaceutical scientist in need of some temporary research assistance. But a chance event of Ianto returning to the office to fetch his missing wallet led to him discovering Howarth's actual job. As well as the alien specimen Howarth was collecting a sample from. The alien wasn't too happy about it and Ianto's well timed swing with the fire extinguisher saved Howarth his arm. The Torchwood scientist could have just erased Ianto's memory of the entire incident, but he'd taken a liking to the young man and saw a certain quality in him.
"Torchwood hires 'the best of the best,' " Howarth related, his voice going half an octave higher toward the end, indicating he was quoting someone. Most likely a woman and not terribly flatteringly. "We get in these brilliant minds every month or so. Truly young men and women of genius. Nobel prize material, really."
"I'm…not really that, sir," Ianto said.
"You know what the problem is with young men and women of great genius?" asked Howarth. "They lack potential. They're so used to being the cleverest that at the first sign of hardship, they burn out. My research division's gone through about six of these prodigies in the last four months. What I need and certainly what Torchwood needs is a staff that has a potential to grow. To become more than what they are now. Which is exactly what you have. Potential. Great potential."
The last person to have told Ianto he had potential to become more than what he was had been his father. Over the several months after his passing, Ianto had more or less forgotten that statement amidst a sea of self-imposed temporary jobs. And hearing Rupert Howarth repeat those words to him, Ianto suddenly felt a stab of guilt for ever forgetting.
Prompted by the emotion, he took the job.
"Meeting Lisa. Falling in love."
The day Ianto met Lisa, they destroyed half a lab together.
Lisa worked in the analysis department of Torchwood London, specializing in mathematics. She'd delivered a set of calculations to Ianto with which he went by to scan a new piece of alien tech recently scavenged. He had gotten through one scan before the oblong shaped instrument blew up in an impressive shower of purple and red liquid.
Ianto was dreading how he was going to explain why most of the lab along with the two of them, were now covered in what looked like a Teletubby's insides. Lisa was trying hard not to cry. With laugher. She finally gave up when Ianto unconsciously straightened his now drenched tie.
"Glad you find this so amusing," he groused.
"Oh god, sorry," Lisa gasped, bent over with chortles. "It's just…your expression!" After a few moments, she calmed down enough to take stock of her own appearance. "Shame, I liked this blouse," she said, studying her ruined silk shirt.
"Rupert liked this lab," Ianto bemoaned, surveying the damage. "He's going to have my head."
"No, he'll have mine. I gave you the calibration numbers for the scan," Lisa pointed out. She tried to maneuver over the pools of purple and red, nearly skidding across the floor had Ianto not grabbed her flailing arm. "We'll clean it up," she decided. "If we can at least sort out some of it, I reckon he'll be less furious. I'll help you," she continued, over Ianto's protests he could do it himself.
An hour later when Rupert returned, the only evidence anything had gone wrong was the sight of Lisa and Ianto, still covered in shades of purple and red. And the missing artifact. He only yelled about it for ten minutes.
The next day, Lisa got to her desk and found a package waiting for her. Inside was a new silk shirt. She laughed at the fact that it was purple. She smiled when she tried it on to find out the size was perfect.
"It fits me like a glove," she said to Ianto when she called to thank him. "How'd you know my size?"
"I eyeballed it," he replied, sounding half pleased with himself. "I took a guess from some video footage."
"You've been stalking me on the CCTV?" Lisa couldn't help asking with a grin.
"Think of it as extreme consideration in picking out a gift."
"Coffee?"
"Sorry?"
"Coffee. Now. Downstairs. Us two? You can see how I look in it."
"And you always keep your promises."
The first time Ianto kissed Lisa, he was slightly drunk. But strangely about five seconds before he moved in to press his mouth to hers, he felt himself sober up. In fact, by the time he felt her against him, his mind was so sharp that years later he could still remember with great clarity the softness of her lips, the warmth of her fingers curled into his hair and the god awful pop song blaring inside the pub.
After a year, he knew he loved her.
But he'd never been in love before and in his slight panic about it, over thought the implications of such a feeling. He'd always made decisions, big or small, more or less by instinct or impulse. This was different. This mattered. He'd been at Torchwood London for a year now and still it could feel like a temporary job for him, despite all the strings and red tape involved. But Lisa…he could see a permanence with Lisa. And after being rootless for so long, it was frightening.
So while he knew he should have been asking her to move in with him, to marry him, to be with him forever, he let himself get distracted by random details and various scenarios. He continued on like that right up until the day Torchwood London fell in a blaze.
After that, Ianto decided deep contemplation was overrated. He promised himself he'd never do it again. Deep contemplation led to absolutely nothing other than him being too late. But he'd fix it.
After pulling Lisa's half-converted form to safety, he silently told her he'd do everything and anything to help her. He wouldn't think. He'd just do it. He'd get another chance to commit.
"He could size a man's inside leg measurement by his stride across the shop threshold."
Rupert Howarth had been right: Ianto Jones had a great potential as a researcher. And the potential was finally becoming realized as the survivor of Canary Wharf got his hands on any information he could about Captain Jack Harkness. The task wasn't easy considering Torchwood London was now gone and even before then facts about the enigmatic leader of Torchwood Cardiff had been scarce. But Ianto upturned every last scrap of data he could and slowly, through the bits of old field reports and a couple of first person accounts, he began to put together an assessment of Captain Harkness.
Later, after he'd met him in the flesh and finally secured the needed job, Ianto thought he'd assessed the captain fairly accurately in terms of likes and dislikes. He only wished he'd been a little more accurate about his assessment of himself.
But that was over contemplation. And he'd promised never to do that again.
So the day after the pterodactyl, he put on a different suit and tie and reported for work. As he made what would be the first cup of coffee in a very long line of cups, he didn't think about how much he mortifying it was to being able to fool Captain Harkness so easily. He didn't think about what his father would have said to him if he'd lived to see his only son be so treacherous. He didn't think about how when he'd laughed in that warehouse with Harkness, it had been a genuine laugh. The first one since Canary Wharf.
"My condolences."
After Jack pulled the SUV up to a halt in front of his building, Ianto guessed he'd driven him back to his flat to execute him there. Ianto was about 20 percent sure that he didn't want to die, but he could easily work those numbers down to zero before Jack put a bullet in his head.
But Jack didn't turn off the engine.
"I'm going to give you a night to think about it," said Jack. He kept his hands on the wheel and continued to stare at the empty street in front of him. "Tomorrow you tell me if you want to keep your job. If it's yes, you can come back after a time of suspension. If it's no, I'll wipe your memory and put you back where Howarth found you."
Ianto stared at him dumbly. At the silence, Jack finally turned to give him a bitter smile. "Consider it a courtesy for all your hard work," he stated. Tilting his head, he indicated for Ianto to get out of the car. The SUV peeled off as soon as the door closed, leaving Ianto standing outside the building, cold, his hands still covered in dried blood.
Walking inside his flat, Ianto realized Jack hadn't issued any sort of warning about not committing suicide or going on the run. He supposed both were one and the same thing anyway. If he ran now, Jack wouldn't have much of a choice but to find and end him. If he killed himself…well, it would save Jack the trouble of having to hunt him down first. Only, he knew he wasn't going to do either. Because that 20 percent had now crept up to 21 percent. And Ianto hated himself a quite a bit for it.
Stumbling over to his barely used sofa, he fell onto it, blood-stained suit, shoes and all. As he slowly ruined the furniture, his mind scrambled over all the memories he had of Lisa, starting from that day in the lab to the last time he'd seen her as herself. Along the way, he remembered waking up in bed with her for the first time; the warmth that had cocooned him and the very first inklings that if he could do this every day, he would die happy. He recalled the Bonfire Night several months back and could feel the familiar tug on his hands as she'd pulled him toward the roof of her building to see the fireworks. He saw Lisa in her favorite sweater. He saw Lisa drinking coffee from her favorite mug. He saw Lisa smiling, laughing, kissing, breathing, crying, begging, screaming, killing…
If he agreed to leave Torchwood Cardiff, all these memories would be gone. He would have only one more day with them and then he'd wake up and no longer feel the guilt, the sadness and the utter rage of having done everything so very wrong. He'd be free.
The notion was unthinkable.
He stayed awake the rest of what was left of the night, going through his mental home movies. When Jack came in the morning, he told him he wanted to keep the job.
The look Jack gave him straddled the line of sympathy and cruelty. Ianto would keep his memories and in payment every day he'd have to face the people he'd nearly gotten killed. He'd have to clean up their messes, serve them coffee and take whatever hostility and patronizing sympathy came his way from them. Because he deserved it. And perhaps there was a small glint of satisfaction in Jack's eyes at the prospect.
It didn't really matter. It was time for Ianto to lie down on the bed he'd made. He'd do it for Lisa. To keep what was left of her.
"You shouldn't be here."
Ianto wondered when having sex with Jack became less about alleviating guilt and more about having fun. Granted, sex with Jack was always fun. But there was fun and there was fun. There was probably something wrong about that.
But he was dangerously close to over contemplating again. And Ianto still didn't think over contemplation did much good. So he didn't. And instead reached over Jack's shoulder to snag the stopwatch where it had slid under a wayward file.
"I won't do it. You can't make me."
Ianto figured that after Jack had returned from his trip with the Doctor, it seemed to the casual observer that he had finally let Lisa go. Only he hadn't. He still had all of Lisa's things in boxes in his closet at home. He still thought of her first when Gwen exchanged vows with Rhys. He still woke up on her birthdays and wished her a happy one to the empty air.
It didn't really seem to matter how obvious it was to him that he was fallen a bit for Jack. Because Ianto soon realized that the average human heart was absolutely crap at staying completely true to just one person. And for all his realized potential as a Torchwood operative, Ianto knew that when it came to basic emotions, he was very much average. This would never change.
So he'd never ask the same of Jack. He'd never ask the captain to promise to stay at Torchwood Cardiff. Nor would he ever ask him to choose him. To become romantic and committed to him. To give him something other than the patent Harkness charm that was oh, so powerful enough to inspire love, even if it didn't always reciprocate.
He wouldn't ask Jack to change because even if Jack told him tomorrow that he'd love Ianto and no other if only Ianto would finally exorcise Lisa, he never would.
So it was probably best that Jack didn't say anything at all.
THE END