Atonement
by Soledad
Author's note: For disclaimer, rating, etc. see the Introduction.
I don't even pretend to understand the semi-science of the Whoniverse. I'm making all this up as I go – as long as it works for the story. Also, the backgrounds of Archie and Colonel Oduya are completely my doing.
Chapter 04 – Discussing Timelines
After the shared dinner of the Torchwood leaders Rhys left for home, taking Emma with him. So did Mickey, having finished feeding the inmates – including Adam, who got the leftovers and seemed happy enough with them.
"Hunger is the best cook," Ianto commented. "We need to integrate him better than that, though."
"What for?" Jack asked with a shrug. Ianto rolled his eyes.
"He'll be living with us for years, for God's sake! Do you want to watch out for a resentful prisoner falling into our backs all the time? I prefer to have here someone who's useful – and enjoys being so."
"He'll definitely need a bigger room," Tosh said thoughtfully. "With at least a wash-basin in it, so that he won't have to jog down the corridor to the shower room every time he wants a glass of water or needs to wash his hands. A desk, too; perhaps a little fridge, for snacks and soft drinks."
"Why don't we get him a telly, too?" Jack suggested. "Against boredom; he can't work all day."
"No need for that," Tosh said. "A laptop will be enough. He can watch TW on the screen and even do something creative in his spare time."
"Make sure he'll be kept out of Mainframe, though," Ianto warned. "And instruct her to keep watch on his internet traffic. I don't trust his sincerity – not yet."
"And I doubt that I ever will," Jack said grimly. "That stunt he pulled – he could have changed the future, destroyed everything we know."
Trevor, who'd just been debriefed about the recent events, having come in for the night shift, frowned.
"Don't be so dramatic, Captain, that doesn't work backwards."
"Usually, it doesn't," Tosh agreed. "But you must consider the fact that Jack comes from the fifty-first century. Any changes between our time and his would have influenced his life greatly. His colony on Boeshane Peninsula might never be founded. He might not even be born; or born to a very different person, leading a different life. And considering his important role in the shaping of Torchwood Three for a century and a half, this branch would have developed differently, too. I may still be rotting in that UNIT prison, you'd be bored to death in some office, and Ianto… had Canary Wharf happened in that changed timeline, too, who knows where Ianto would be now?"
"Dead, most likely," Ianto said. "I'd have lost Lisa much earlier without the facilities here that helped to keep her alive… alive being relative, of course. And so early on after Canary Wharf, I wouldn't have wanted to live without her," he gave Jack the ghost of a smile. "Not without somebody giving me the reason to do so."
They were treated to the extremely rare sight of Jack being stunned speechless but all pretended not to notice it.
"Still, everyone deserves a second chance," Lloyd, who'd just emerged from her lab, ready to leave, said. "Yes, the boy acted irresponsibly and stupidly, but he was also punished for it with a cruelty I wouldn't want on anyone. Let's hope he's learned from it, and we can use his talent."
"What talent?" Jack asked. "Everyone with two brain cells firing at the same time can catalogue and label artefacts. Even alien ones, as long as it isn't required to recognize them for what they are."
"That's not what I meant," Lloyd said. "He spoke about a black market for alien artefacts, correct? One that would hold online auctions."
"So what?" Jack shrugged. "We know it exists. We even get things through eBay sometimes."
"Yes, but we don't watch the market continually," Ianto said. "I think Lloyd is on something here. Adam knows the market better than anyone from us. We can have him monitoring it; and if something shows up that better shouldn't get into the wrong hands, we can step in and take it in time. I don't want a Dalek end up in private hands ever again."
"Neither do I," Jack agreed. "I'd like to know how the one Van Statten had – well, still has at the moment – got to Earth in the first place, though."
"The Doctor never told you?" Tosh asked in surprise.
Jack shook his head. "He never told me much about anything. I wasn't his first choice as a companion, you see. And for some reason Rose never spoke of this incident – or about Adam – either."
"Considering the stupidity of her actions it isn't really surprising," Ianto commented dryly. "But perhaps she told Mickey something. He used to be her boyfriend, after all, and he worshipped the ground she walked on. She could be reasonably sure that he wouldn't judge her. Not back then anyway."
"It's worth a try," Tosh agreed. "Jack, you should talk to him man to man; or ex-companion to ex-companion. You're the one who's travelled with him and Rose in the TARDIS; he'll probably tell you."
"Speaking of the Dalek, there's another thing we may need to consider," Lloyd said. "We know it will awaken in a couple of years and massacre two hundred or so people. We also know that it's gonna be destroyed shortly thereafter, so the only changes that would come from the incident would be the ones in the management of GeoComTex. Are we just gonna lean back and let it happen?"
"What's more, are we just gonna let Canary Wharf happen?" Trevor asked. "I was there when Mickey accidentally opened that Void Ship by a single touch, releasing thousands of imprisoned Daleks – apparently the same way Rose had woke up the one in Van Statten's collection. We could save hundreds of lives… starting with that of Doctor Singh," he added with a quick glance in Tosh's direction.
"I'm afraid it isn't that easy," Jack said. "Van Statten's Dalek was an isolated incident; the fact that it reacted to Rose's touch has no real significance for what's happened at Canary Wharf. Yes, the outcome of that battle was horrible, but can you tell me that if we'd taken the Daleks out of the equation it would have truly helped? The Cybermen were in every house, all over Earth; did they not have to fight the Daleks first, the carnage might have been a lot worse."
"Besides," Tosh added, "what happened at Canary Wharf had shaped the future too much to risk tampering with it. The Doctor told me that certain events are fixed in time and must not be changed, or the outcome would be catastrophic."
"She's right," Ianto said grimly. "As much as I'd like to save our friends and colleagues from One, tampering with those events is something we cannot, must not do."
"Perhaps not," Lloyd still didn't seem convinced. "But does it also mean that we can't try to save all those people at GeoComTex? Jack says it was an isolated incident."
"Yet one with Rose as the key figure where the Dalek was concerned," Jack returned. "Just like at Canary Wharf. Just like on Satellite V, during the big showdown with the Daleks. No. We can't take that risk; or the risk of Van Statten continuing as he was doing things – as he still is doing things right now."
"Can you tell me for sure that this Goddard woman would be any better?" Lloyd asked doubtfully.
"No," Jack admitted. "But we know it will happen this way. And I happen to know that Goddard Enterprises will become the leading company for computing products in the twenty-second and twenty-third centuries. With a seat in Utah, they'll develop the first worldwide information system – sort of a global network that will combine the best characteristics of television and the internet, just on a much higher technology level, and own the entire electronics market for more than two centuries. The next phase of space exploration will be based on the technology they will develop. So no, we can't afford to tamper with anything related to them."
"Jack's right," Tosh said quietly. "It's so very hard to watch terrible things happen when we might have the chance to prevent them, but we must. The risk of causing much greater harm is simply too grave."
They remained in unhappy silence, until Sally Jacobs came up the stars leading to the main working area with a frown.
"Ianto, everything's been prepared for your video conference with Sir Archibald," she reminded him. "He's already in position and waiting. You said twenty-fifteen. It's twenty-fourteen now; you'll be late."
Ianto sighed and grabbed his cane. "Tell him I'll be there in a moment," he rubbed his eyes with his free hand. "God, I need coffee the worst way…"
"What you need is sleep," Jack corrected. "Want me to join you in the conference? Archie can be really long-winded sometimes, but I know how to make him get to the point."
Ianto shook his head. "I doubt that you could fake any interest for the digital cataloguing of the archives in Torchwood House. And any distraction from your side would only make this meeting longer. I can deal with Sir Archibald. You could deal with some of the paperwork for me in the meantime."
Jack pulled a face, but as he watched Ianto hobble over to the conference room, he grudgingly admitted that at the moment dealing with the accumulated paperwork would be the best way to help. With great reluctance, he went to the office, slumped onto the chair behind the desk and pulled the closest heap of papers before himself. He was empowered to sign a lot of thins for Ianto – and so was Tosh, but she was too busy with research most of the time to deal with administrative stuff – and sitting behind the desk and dealing with paperwork (and hating it!) was a bit like in old times.
For a supposedly decadent nobleman in his late forties, Sir Archibald McAllister, the leader of Torchwood Two, seemed almost inordinately chipper at such a late night meeting. Of course, the one-man Glasgow branch never had to face the same challenges as the Cardiff one. All Sir Archibald call-me-Archie had to do was to supervise the Secondary Archives hidden under his own mansion, watch over the Loch Ness monster and occasionally visit Torchwood House, where some of the most dangerous and secret stuff was stored.
He was the only Torchwood leader who'd ever taken the job out of boredom, some twenty years earlier, as his considerable wealth allowed him to lead a cushioned life of his own choosing. Originally, he'd studied British history, focusing on peculiar legends about his own country, and that was how he'd stumbled over the werewolf stories surrounding Torchwood House.
He'd kept digging with he typical stubbornness of a blue-blooded Scotsman, and as it would have raised uncomfortable questions if he'd suddenly lost his interest and a good deal of his memories concerning the topic, Her Majesty – or some influential person close to her – decided to offer him a job instead. Sir Archibald had promptly accepted, and both sides had been happy with the solution ever since.
The video feed displayed on the big screen of the conference room showed him in his library: a spacious, vaulted room, each wall of which lined with old shelves, beautifully carved of dark, polished wood. Each shelf was laden with books of various sizes and ages – from hand-written medieval codexes that had been in the possession of the McAllister clan for centuries to the newest editions. The latter ones were all about history or such practical topics as digital cataloguing or the best way to conserve old books and archaeological founds.
Sir Archibald might be slightly eccentric, to put it mildly, but he knew his stuff, and Ianto happened to know that he was very good with computers. Not on Tosh's level, of course, few people could reach that, but way better than the average. He didn't develop new programmes himself, but he could use the ones handed him by geniuses like Tosh at peak efficiency.
Currently, he was sitting in a heavy, throne-like armchair with carved legs and armrests at the fireplace, wearing a kilt with a long-sleeved black shirt and knee-length socks to his dress shoes, drinking tea. At least Ianto thought it was tea, based on the cup in his hands – an early 19th century Spode cup, decorated in rich Imari colours and gilded in the so-called dollar pattern and presumably expensive, too.
Sir Archibald was a great defender of tradition and would never drink anything but tea from a delicate cup like that. Ianto suppressed a smile. He liked the eccentric Scotsman, despite the age and class difference between them.
"Greetings, Sir Archibald," he said. "I apologise for the delay. We had an unexpected situation at our hands."
"Aye, I know it, laddie," the Scotsman replied. "I was talkin' to The Brig just a wee hour ago."
Ianto nodded. He'd expected Captain Magambo to report everything to Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. And since the great old man of UNIT was Sir Archibald's godfather, the two families having been befriended for at least two hundred years, it was only logical that the Torchwood Two leader would learn anything the brigadier knew.
"The… situation as ye're callin' it, is a delicate one," Sir Archibald continued. "Ye're already hidin' someone UNIT would just love layin' their hands on. Y'all are takin' an awful lot of risk by puttin' up with that lad Erisa has found."
"I know," Ianto sighed. "But I can't afford him to fall into UNIT's hands. He comes from the near future; and he'd be easy to break. Not to mention the… erm… sensitive equipment he has access to."
Not even through this doubly-secured channel did he dare to speak about Adam's implant openly, and Sir Archibald nodded in agreement, his normally watery blue eyes darkening in concern. He'd clearly been given sufficient details by the brigadier.
"That could become a problem," he said. "I cannae shake the impression that Colonel Oduya would dearly love UNIT takin' over Torchwood's role completely. He's been askin' an awful lot of questions: about yerself, about Jack… has even dug out somethin' about Toshiko."
"I thought Jack had Tosh's record wiped," Ianto said with a frown. Sir Archibald nodded.
"Aye, that he has. But ya know as well as I do that nothin' once recoded can be deleted for good. In fact, even if somethin' hadnae been recorded any other way but by omission can be used against ya."
Ianto's frown deepened. "What do you mean, Sir Archibald?"
"Jack hasnae reported anythin' about the reason of yer suspension a year or so ago," the Scotsman replied grimly. "But there is a remark about yer havin' been suspended for four weeks. And now Colonel Oduya is lookin' for the reason."
"Then we'll have to forge something plausible," Ianto said with a shrug.
"Be sure ye'r doin' a thorough job," Sir Archibald warned. "Oduya's like a bloodhound; and ya know that – unlike Her Majesty – the Prince of Wales isnae a friend of Torchwood."
"Fortunately for us, both his sons are," Ianto replied.
"Aye, but their father is the heir apparent," Sir Archibald reminded him, "and Torchwood is answerin' to the Crown directly. It's a good thing that we've been regroupin' founds ever since ya took over, so that we'll be able to run things on our own, at least financially, for the next hundred years. But losing our facilities wouldnae make it easy."
"I know," Ianto sighed. "That's why I've been following up on our earlier idea of relocating some of the really sensitive stuff to other places. Both Torchwood House and your own mansion are too well-known, to friend and foe alike. I've already started looking for secure storage places through third parties that can't be tracked back to Torchwood. Hopefully we'll be able to stay a step ahead of Colonel Oduya and his supporters."
"Someplace where Torchwood hasnae been active before would be preferable," Sir Archibald suggested, and Ianto nodded in agreement.
"I was thinking of Ireland, for starters," he said. "Although establishing several such storages would be even better. We can't risk putting all our eggs in the same basket. And moving at least part of the sensitive stuff out of the UK, yet close enough to gain access to it if necessary, might be an advantage."
"Or a risk of equal measure," Sir Archibald muttered unhappily. "Still, it's worth tryin'. I presume ye're thinkin' of Dublin?"
Ianto nodded. "H. C. Clemens used to have a really big warehouse there. UNIT had it cleaned out a year or so ago and put it on sale. We've managed to persuade the transport firm Harwood's to buy it. They're genuinely using the upper levels, without knowing about the secured and sealed sublevels. We can start from there and expand if necessary."
"I dunno," Sir Archibald said doubtfully. "How are ya plannin' to access the sublevels without drawin' attention?"
"We'll use the lorries of Harwood's," Ianto explained. "The wife of their manager works for us… well, she officially runs the tourist information shack for the Welsh Tourist Board. The husband hasn't got a clue what she's really doing here; the paper trail is absolutely waterproof. We can rent the lorries through third parties – they deliver all over the British Isles – and then Retcon the drivers afterwards. Only very mildly, mind you, so that they wouldn't remember where the warehouses had been."
"Still risky," Sir Archibald commented.
Ianto sighed. "I know, but that's the best we can do right now. Which brings me back to the topic of Torchwood House. How's the cataloguing going?"
"Slowly," Sir Archibald admitted with some reluctance. "I didnae found the right people for the job, so I'm workin' on it meself, whenever I've got the time. Which isnae as often as I'd lie. 'Specially since the curator of the House died last year. I've been doublin' for him, too, and gonna have to till the successor arrives."
"Do you know who it will be?" Ianto asked. Sir Archibald shook his head.
"Nay; they're very hush-hush about it."
"That's not good," Ianto was thinking furiously. "We'll have to speed up things at our end, just in case it would be someone we couldn't work with. Listen, what about sending you our two recent… guests? Jenny is good with… sensitive equipment by default, being who – and what – she is, and Adam has done similar work in the States for years. They could be a great help."
"Aye, but are they trustworthy, too?" Sir Archibald asked.
"I'm reasonably sure that Jenny is," Ianto replied, "and I had Adam equipped with a subcutaneous tracking implant. He can't go anywhere without us knowing it. Of course, keeping track of him when he's in Torchwood House would be a little more complicated, but I'm sure our technicians can come up with something."
"Well I sure could use the help," Sir Archibald admitted. "But let's think about the details before makin' any decisions. We should discuss this again in what? Two days?"
Ianto nodded. "That will suffice. Good night, Sir Archibald."
"Laddie, I already told you a hundred times to call me Archie," the Scotsman scoffed.
Ianto gave him a bland smile. "And I still don't think it would be appropriate. See you in two days."
Sir Archibald's news didn't serve to calm Ianto's nerves, although, as usual, he showed no sign of concern when he left the conference room. He couldn't fool Jack, though. Not anymore. Not since they'd had that telepathic encounter during his coma.
"Is something wrong?" Jack asked quietly.
"I'm not sure," Ianto limped over to Sally's workstation. "What can you tell me about Colonel Oduya?"
"You mean career-wise, not his private life, right?" Sally clarified.
Ianto nodded.
"Not much," she admitted. "He's not very popular among his fellow officers – or among the simple soldiers, for that matter – and has never done anything that would justify his current position. They say, however, that he's got some very powerful supporters at the Home Office, although nobody seems to know who those people are. He and Colonel Mace used to compete with each other ever since joining UNIT, with Mace clearly winning – until that unfortunate scandal with him and Captain Price. Oduya only started to rise in the ranks after The Brig's retirement. The Brig didn't like him at all; and now he's retaliating by removing all of The Brig's protégées from their positions."
"For someone who's left UNIT over a year ago you're amazingly well-informed," Jack said. Sally shrugged.
"I still talk to people over there. And Private Jenkins is the biggest gossip on the planet. With his connections he's in the known of most things, too."
"Jenkins?" Jack said with a frown. "I thought you had a thing with PC Andy."
"We still have… sort of," Sally replied. "We've put our relationship on a hiatus, though. It was becoming too much, too close, being together all the time… I could barely breathe anymore. So we decided to see other people for a while, with the possibility to get back together again."
"And for you other people means Private Jenkins?" Ianto asked; not judgementally, just surprised. He hadn't seen that coming, not that the private life of his colleagues would be his business.
Sally grinned. "We're just friends. We both like computer games and gossip, so it's fun. But nothing else."
"As long as you both enjoy it," Ianto paused. "Do you think he could find out more about Colonel Oduya? Can you ask him to do so? Or should I speak with him personally?"
Sally shook her head. "No; he doesn't react well to authorities, and let's face it, you are authority. Even though he actually likes you. I'll ask him to find us more details without getting caught."
"And he'll be willing to do so?" Ianto asked doubtfully. Sally nodded.
"Oh, yes. It will be a challenge, and he loves challenges. Besides, even if he does get caught snooping around, Oduya can't touch him. His family's connections reach too far for that."
"Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I thought they disowned him," Ianto said. Sally laughed.
"Oh, they did all right. But family honour wouldn't allow having a little upstart like Augustus Oduya go against even a disgraced member of such an illustrious family. It's all a matter of principle, after all. Don't worry; he'll be safe, and so will we. Nobody would suspect that he's spying for us. Not with him serving under Colonel Mace."
"Thank God for small favours," Ianto leaned on his cane heavily; his leg was on fire again and his vision blurred. "Now, Jack, if the offer to drive me home still stands, I'd be happy to accept."
Jack nodded and put aside the paperwork; he'd made an impressive dent in it while Ianto had talked to Sir Archibald.
"Sure," he said. "Do we take your car or the SUV?"
"It may be reckless of me to allow you to drive my car, but I might need it tomorrow, so the Audi it is," Ianto replied tiredly. "Can you bring it around to the Plass? I think I'll take the lift. I don't feel like climbing all those sodding stairs; I'd rather pay the fee for parking where we shouldn't."
Jack nodded again and hurried off to get the car. Ianto hobbled over to the invisible lift and was mildly surprised when Sally stepped up the slab next to him.
"You're dead on your feet," she said with a kind smile. "I can't let you fall off the platform; Jack would skin me alive."
Ianto was too exhausted to protest, and so she supported him while the lift ascended with them towards the ceiling.
There was practically no traffic at this time of the night, so the drive to Ianto's place took less than twenty minutes. He still lived in the bleak little flat rented when he'd first moved back to Cardiff with he half-converted Lisa hidden in the van he'd borrowed from the UNIT troops cleaning up after the Battle of Canary Wharf. It wasn't much, but it was his, and he preferred it that way.
Jack had repeatedly tried to talk him into moving in with him into the penthouse previously belonging to Owen, but Ianto found the place too fancy. Besides, as he'd pointed out several times, if Owen wasn't allowed to live in such a… tempting place, due to suppressed suicidal tendencies, then he, Ianto, shouldn't be, either. Like all survivors of Canary Wharf, he was still on suicide watch, too. Even if it only meant that he and Trevor looked after each other, and together they looked after the others. Like Jeannie.
They were the ones with the best prognosis, but that didn't mean they were completely beyond danger. And his current encounter with the telepathic hithon assassin hadn't helped things. It certainly hadn't helped the nightmares – added a few new ones to the collection, in fact.
Not that nightmares would have been something new for him. He always had them, long before Canary Wharf; ever since his childhood. Ever since his Mam had died in Providence Park and his Tad started drinking heavily, unable to cope with the dual loss of his wife and his small business. A master tailor, forced to eke out a meagre living making alterations at Debenham's? Small wonder he couldn't deal with it; but understanding the reasons now didn't help the child Ianto had been then.
That was when the nightmares had started. His Tad, a gentle and considerable man and doting father while sober, always became a nasty and violent drunk. He'd only lasted four years after his wife's death, but those had been the longest four years in Ianto's life. They had also been the reason why Rhiannon would marry Johnny Davies in such a hurry. Even if it meant giving up school and any chance for a better education. Everything was better than watching their Tad drinking himself into an early grave.
He was startled out of his memories when Jack opened the door of his flat and deftly maneuvered him inside. Ianto hobbled along the hall, grateful that his place was tiny and he didn't have to walk far, and collapsed on the sofa.
"You need a long, hot shower and your bed," Jack said. "Actually, a bath would be even better."
"I don't think I can manage," Ianto replied, without opening his eyes.
Jack snorted. "Nonsense. I'll carry you to the bathtub if I have to, but you're not going to bed with all those knotted muscles. Your leg must be a mess by now."
"You just want to see me naked," Ianto still refused to open his eyes.
"That, too," Jack admitted unrepentantly, "but tonight only for medical purposes. Wait here. I'll start running that bath; then I'll come back and help you."
Roughly an hour later, after a lengthy, hot bath and another one of Jack's skilled massages that always left him in a near-gelatinous state, Ianto felt marginally better. He was lying in bed, comfortably ensconced in the duvet… and Jack, who was spooned up behind him, pressing against his back as was his wont ever since he'd come back and they'd worked out their most serious issues.
Jack seemed to carve human touch since his return, and knowing a little of what'd happened to him during the Year That Never Was, it didn't truly surprise Ianto. Jack had always been affectionate and more touchy-feely than most men (especially British men), coming from a time where people were less repressed, but since his return he'd been positively clinging sometimes.
Like now.
"What's wrong?" Ianto murmured, half-asleep.
He needed sleep the worst way, almost as badly as he craved coffee, but he had figured out in the recent months that when Jack was this clingy, it always meant that something had upset him. Something personal, not just the usual crap that counted as normal for an average day at Torchwood.
For quite some time Jack said nothing, and Ianto began to worry. Whenever Jack was reluctant to answer, it never meant good. They'd been working on the not communicating thing since they'd got together again, but Jack, used to deal with things on his own for too long, still had difficulties with opening up.
Finally, when Ianto had almost given up on the topic, at least for tonight, he could hear Jack's low voice vibrating against his back.
"If you could do something to prevent what happened at Canary Wharf, would you do it?"
It was Ianto's turn now to wait with an answer, cos honestly, could you tell what he would do in the unlikely case the chance would offer itself?
"I don't know," he finally said, and that was the most truthful answer he could possibly give. "All my instincts scream at me to say yes; after all, hundreds of people died, and not just my colleagues in the Tower, but… knowing what I do now about the butterfly effect, I'm not sure I'd dare to intervene."
"Not even if you could save Lisa?" Jack murmured against his back, and Ianto smiled in the darkness of his bedroom, finally understanding what was wrong.
What was truly wrong.
Few people would believe that Jack Harkness had his own set of insecurities, just like everyone else, cos he screened them so well behind that loud, obnoxious, flirtatious persona he showed to the rest of the world. Only when they were alone and unobserved did he sometimes allow his very human weakness to show. Those moments were extremely rare, and Ianto cherished them more than anything; cos they showed Jack's trust towards him.
"I loved Lisa very much," he said simply, cutting to the core of Jack's fear. "You know what I've risked in a futile attempt to save her… and how that ended. But I'm no longer the young, carefree… and horribly naïve person that used to be so happy with her. Too much has happened since then, Canary Wharf being just the beginning. I couldn't go back to that person, even if I wanted."
"You don't want to?" Jack murmured. Ianto laughed quietly.
"Oh, I'd be happy not to be responsible for Torchwood and all that crap that comes with the job," he said. "But otherwise? I'm content with what I have – whom I have. Let's sleep."
Jack made a noise of agreement and was quiet for a while. But when Ianto had almost fallen asleep, he started speaking again.
"Do you remember what we talked about after Rhys and Emma's wedding?"
Ianto snorted. "Yep. You offered to bear my children. Jack, must we really discuss this when all I want is to sleep?"
"I just wanted to tell you that the offer still stands," Jack murmured.
"Duly noted," Ianto tried to keep hold on his exasperation. Jack seemed to have one of his vulnerable moments, so he had to tread carefully. "But you should finally realize that you don't have to fight against Lisa's memory."
"If you're sure about that…"
"I'm very sure. Just let me have some sleep, please? I'm passing out as we speak."
~TBC~