Thank you to those who took time out of this frantic part of the year to comment on the first chapter. I hope you enjoy this next bit, in which such plot as there is begins to emerge.
(btw: If you're as confused as Jack by the kangaroos you might need to revisit 'I'll be home for Christmas'.)
Jack expected things to become somewhat routine after what he considered his epiphany, but in fact the date was the only thing which didn't change. And even that was dependent on using the Old Earth calendar.
Getting into the right room proved to be a challenge in itself. Every year there was a new concierge to raise his/her/its/their eyebrows – or equivalent – while checking the register. And every year, Jack smiled his most winning smile and explained that, Yes please, he did want exactly the same room, which was why he'd gone to the trouble of booking it so far ahead. And thank you but No, he wasn't interested in any of the special offers available to such a valued guest. If Housekeeping hadn't been in he was happy to wait, but not for too long, and surely you're mistaken about a reserved room being in the middle of renovations? Because naturally the point of pre-booking a room was to have it ready for him when he arrived, wasn't it? Oh, and nice try, but he'd specified spatially the same room, regardless of whatever bout of renumbering/renaming/relocating the hotel underwent.
Oh, they'd tried them all, they had. Jack enjoyed many a complimentary drink in the cocktail lounge while this year's supposed mix up was rectified. Curiosity, it appeared, wasn't restricted to those of feline descent. 'What the hell is this man up to?' had become a game, one that even Jack enjoyed until the novelty waned. Somewhere in this complex, he was sure, were the records pertaining to what had to amount to a substantial bounty for the first staff member who worked out what exactly was the deal with this recurring booking stretching backwards and forwards over the years.
Jack seriously considered buying the hotel - hell, the whole damned asteroid it was built on - just to avoid the ongoing aggravation. But then again, he knew from experience that there was nothing to equal the curiosity of your own staff when it came to ferreting out your secrets.
The room itself was usually different, too, once Jack finally gained access and dispensed with the inevitable inquisitive staff member who'd escorted him. Redecorated, refurbished, flooring, even walls had been replaced on one memorable occasion. Never had a room been so thoroughly or regularly upgraded. Jack himself had become curious as the reasoning behind it all, only to laugh himself somewhat stupid on uncovering the persistent belief that there was a fortune concealed somewhere in the room, to which Jack helped himself on an annual basis. Jack wondered if the person who'd finally twigged to the significance of the date got a payout for it.
Thank all the fates, or perhaps just Thank St Nicholas, no-one had ever scanned for temporal anomalies.
Ianto changed, too.
That was probably inevitable.
Sometimes Jack thought that Ianto was the biggest change of all.
-XXX-
The changes started small, and began with a mellowing of attitude of which Jack could only approve.
"Did you know you're my longest relationship?" Jack asked lazily, sitting back on his knees – and Ianto's as it happened.
Ianto swatted him weakly with one hand, but otherwise didn't move from his prone position in the middle of the bed. "Hardly," he scoffed.
Jack took a moment to admire the effect of his massage skills before deciding he ought to respond. "It is though. Fifty years we've been doing this. Do you really think I've made it that far with anyone else?"
Ianto rolled over, dislodging Jack and leaving them in a tangle of limbs which neither was in a hurry to unwind. "Fifty days," he corrected. "Well, fifty nights, I suppose. Less than a year, really. But," he added, smiling as Jack pouted, "I prefer to think of it as fifty amazing one-night stands." His smile turned pensive. "Sometimes I feel bad about you cheating on whoever you're with through the year."
Jack bit his lip, chewing it over. This was exactly the type of conversation which used to land him up to the eyebrows in the smelly stuff. But he didn't want to lie, either.
"I'm cheating on you, not them," he said eventually.
Ianto gazed at him intently for an endless moment, then pounced. In a good way.
-XXX-
"Fifty days plus the two years in Cardiff," Jack persisted. Later. When they'd both got their breath back.
Ianto propped himself up on Jack's chest. "You were with Hart for five years," he countered, driving his point home with a pointy finger in the ribs.
Jack pulled Ianto off his chest and into his side. "You are my heart," he said lavishly, dropping equally lavish kisses onto the thick brown hair. "And if that's your benchmark, well you'd better remember this conversation, Jones, Ianto Jones, because we'll be having it again," he paused to jab at his wristband, "one thousand and forty-four years from now."
Ianto's lips moved, tickling Jack's shoulder, as he ran through the calculations himself. "With you on the thousand, but I get forty-three," he mused.
"You forgot to allow for a leap year," Jack explained, taking smirk to an unheard of level.
"So I did," Ianto agreed, after reviewing the data. He sighed theatrically. "Name your forfeit."
Jack's face lost all levity. "Don't forget to be here in a thousand years."
Their eyes met, remembering, renewing. "Never could," Ianto agreed solemnly.
They weren't traditional vows, but they'd do nicely.
-XXX-
"You do enough," Nick said, for the umpty-seventh time in as many years.
Ianto did, indeed, do enough already, and persisted in taking on more without authorisation, bless his little red socks. Nick himself was guiltily aware of being little more than a figurehead leader nowadays – and it showed.
The North Pole had always been something of a 'seat of your pants' organisation under Nick's regime. Things were done when they got done, and in the end it all worked out, which probably owed more to luck than judgement, not to mention a large helping of the magic of Christmas. But it did work. The presents were always delivered on time, so Santa himself had never seen the need to tinker with anything much. Until Ianto arrived and start tweaking.
Which, now Nick thought about it, was probably exactly how it should be. Just far in advance of all expectation.
Nick had suspected what the Universe was up to when it dropped Ianto on him like so much bedraggled tinsel. No-one stumbled into this version of the North Pole by accident, not even via Rift. But the boy was so sad, so worn and dispirited by the life he'd led and lost; Nick assumed it would take a century or so to ease him into the right frame of mind.
Of course, that was before he'd brought Jack back into the picture. Brilliant idea of his that had been, reuniting those two. In hindsight, he should have expected that to speed things along. But there was the sticking point, too. Nick had been determined that the boys should have plenty of time together before having to shoulder additional burdens.
But Ianto had put his hand to the reins, literally and figuratively, and nowadays the North Pole ran like superior clockwork at the twitch of those guiding eyebrows. They still did everything they used to do, but somehow it all happened at a more regular, less frantic place. Even the last-minute wrapping frenzy was a distant disturbing memory.
It was a magic all of its own, in Nick's opinion, which again was exactly as it should be. The elves had never had so much free time and were all the more troublesome for it, and what a joy that was to see after their millennia of toil. The reindeer would be fat as well as lazy except that Ianto had arranged an exercise program for them – the fabled Reindeer Games - which kept the elves entertained in their new leisure time, and which the animals themselves took to like the empty-headed exhibitionists they were.
As for those kangaroos - well Nick tried not to think about them too much. He'd never really warmed to the blessed things, nor they to him, not that he could fault their effort or obedience. Still, the snow-white macropods were Ianto's innovation through and through, and Nick was glad to say he didn't have much to do with them except shake the reins.
Hmmm. Now there was a thought, and it had benefits all around.
Nick raised a finger to halt the flow of increasingly frustrated assurances. "How about you take those bouncing things of yours off my hands?" he offered. "Drive them yourself, I mean."
Ianto smiled so widely Nick almost feared for the stability of his ears. "Are you sure?" he asked, as though he hadn't been haranguing Nick to delegate for the last hour.
Nick smiled, his trademark smile but sincere for all that. "It always did feel like I was stealing your thunder when I took them out," he admitted freely, his smile broadening further as Ianto began bouncing very subtly on his toes.
"But you'll need something a bit more substantial than your suit jackets," he cautioned, when the lad showed signs of running off just as he was. "You might be landing in the tropics but it gets cold up amongst the clouds." Nick paused, examining the words on the tip of his tongue before releasing them. "Why don't you get the elves to run you up something?"
And just at that moment the North Pole held its collective breath.
Ianto froze midstride, frowning. "Not furs," he said thoughtfully. "Not for the tropics."
And not for you, Nick thought. Just as it should be. Once upon a time he'd considered the brown robes of a saint too dull. Each to his own. This was the way these things worked, even if his opinion they shouldn't be working quite this soon.
"Go see the elves," Nick repeated, and hoped the Universe was proud of itself.
-XXX-
"Love the coat," Jack said, arching an eyebrow from the bed. "Getting competitive, are we?"
Ianto stepped fully out of the golden glow of the Rift portal, brushing his hands self-consciously along the sides of something long, reddish, and every bit as imposingly flappy as Jack's own. It even had a cape-like addition around the shoulders, which Jack couldn't help but view as a challenge to his own epaulettes. Good colour, though. Not the traditional Santa-red Jack was accustomed to see tumbling out of the Rift at this time of year, but a more subtle variation leaning towards the orangey-end of the spectrum.
Ianto promptly flushed redder than the coat. "Australian stockmen used to wear these," he explained. "The elves thought it would work well with the kangaroos."
As an explanation, it didn't. Jack could only blink. "Kangaroos?" he repeated, in a tone of enquiry he would later regret, given that Ianto promptly launched into a somewhat garbled but highly enthusiastic description of the team who weren't reindeers, whom Ianto personally had selected and trained and now – just this year, Jack! – only just sent them back this very moment – drove himself, covering the tropics and the deserts and all those other regions so warm that reindeer really shouldn't be expected to handle them in the first place.
It was enchanting seeing Ianto so enthusiastic, so much so that Jack couldn't bring himself to protest the intrusion into his own personal Ianto-time. It took less than an hour for Ianto to talk himself out, and Jack had always loved listening to him talk anyway, even if the subject matter was somewhat indecipherable.
Besides, they always had next year. And always would.
Jack didn't believe in much, but he believed in this. He believed in Christmas. He believed in Santa and reindeers and that great suffering resulted in great reward. And that this was his reward, which he'd earned and was entitled to enjoy.
Jack believed in Ianto.
Ianto's coat is a 'Driz a bone', in case you were wondering. Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for reading.
