I still can't bring myself to call the Captain anything but 'Sir' to his face. I can write 'Jack,' I can refer to 'Jack.' I just can't seem to say 'Jack' to Jack. Still practicing.
I presented my Brecon Beacons research to Jack (calling him Sir the entire time, of course.) I was able to find reports of 17 missing persons in the last 5 months, all within a 20 mile radius. Before that, the last missing person report filed had been almost a year prior and it wasn't even a person. Someone had actually filed a police report on a missing goat. To be fair, they had waited the mandatory 72 hours before declaring the goat as missing. Anyway, the last person to be reported was just 4 days ago, an Ellie Johnson. Disappeared on the road, mid-call to her dad. A vehicle matching the description, license tag # KT55LDC, was found at a used car lot in Swansea that was known to deal in stolen vehicles.
I had worked-up charts that showed relative positions of last known locations, times of day and days of the week. Cross referenced to season, lunar cycle and tides. I noted that there were no apparent patterns found in age, race, gender, height, weight, hair or eye colour, orientation or economic situation. And I put it all together in a nice tidy binder. Jack just closed the cover and looked at it for what must have been a full minute. Then he started to look like he was going to laugh. He just sat there with a strained look on his face. Then he did. He laughed at me, at my report. I was stunned. I'd always been praised for the thoroughness of my reports back at the Tower (those that Alonso hadn't lost, that is.) Never had I had a supervisor laugh. I must have looked hurt; when Jack looked at me he tried to stifle the laughter again, so it came out as a kind of sniggering snort. I thought I'd spend the rest of the day in the Tourist Office. I could feel Owen's stare through my back as I left the Captain's office and headed up the stairs. The Captain had settled down to a quiet kind of snickering by now, that one that always makes his eyes tear-up.
Just as I finished writing that, he came upstairs. He still had tears in his eyes from laughing too hard. I think my face was as red as my tie, but I wasn't embarrassed now, so much as angry. Make eye contact and smile. "Something you needed, Sir?" Then, as easy to predict as ever, Captain Jack Damn-smart-ass Harkness gives me that bigger than life grin of his and says, "Damn! You're good at this!" I must have looked as confused as I felt, 'cause he continued, "Government, U.N.I.T., police, I read a lot of reports. And I do mean a lot! But you! You are good. It makes me wonder what other talents you're keeping hidden, Ianto Jones. Get packed. Road trip!" He was half-way back through the door before I managed to get out a strangled, "Sir?" I could hear his boots receding down the hall as he yelled back, "I said, get packed. You're coming with us… And don't call me 'Sir.'"
When Jack said 'get packed,' I should have known what I was in for. He hasn't told the rest of the team yet, but the plan is to drive out into the middle of the Brecon Beacons and look for the cause of all these disappearances, from a campsite. Not a hotel room, a conference center, a police station. No, a campsite. Jack likes to camp. Jack wouldn't like camping so much if he knew how much work it was. Torchwood has all the equipment. Sure it does, it was all bought surplus after WWII (or was that WWI? The tents smell like WWI.) I've had to inventory everything, buy what was missing, as well as pack the SUV. This is going to get cramped. I actually had to remove some of the computer equipment, just so a fifth passenger can fit. I tried to tell Jack, but he said that he'd prefer to have me than a computer any day. I wasn't sure if I should feel honored, or harassed. With Jack, I guess it's a bit of both.
It's just dawn the morning of my first field mission with the team. Is this my first mission? How involved will I be expected to be? Better not forget my gun. Where is my gun? I think it's still in the shoebox under the Tourist Office desk. Will I even need my gun? If the team leaves, do I go with them? Or do I stay behind and watch the camp, like I watch the hub? I'll just have to wait and see what Jack wants from me when the time comes. First mission or no, what do I wear? Since I was hired, I've only worn suits. Jack still complements them fairly often, but I think I'd really feel the odd-man-out sitting around the campfire in a suit. Maybe if I dressed more like the rest of the team… I don't think I own a black leather coat.
There were only three tents in the Torchwood supply room. Granted, they are large tents, but there are 5 of us and I wonder how Jack plans on distributing us. I assume that the ladies will share and that Jack will have his own, but that would leave me with… Owen. I really don't want to share a tent with Owen. Anyone but Owen. Maybe I'll sleep in the SUV. I could say I snore and don't want to disturb him. I still have that old tent, maybe I should have brought it along. Still, that wouldn't be very team-like, in my own little tent off to the side. The tents are quite large; maybe I could bunk with Tosh and Gwen. We'll just have to wait and see what Jack has in mind for the sleeping arrangements.
Waiting at the hub. Waiting. Waiting. Everything is ready and packed. I have Thermos… Thermoses… Thermosi? Full of everyone's favourite coffees. I made breakfast sandwiches for everyone. The sun is up and still we wait. We wait for Owen.
Gwen looks grumpy. Apparently not a morning person. I wonder if I should point out to her that her socks don't match. The way she just snapped at Jack, I'm thinking, nope, her socks are fine just as they are.
Poor Tosh, she looks like she had a rough night. I hope Owen cuts her some slack when he finally does arrive. I wonder if he'll ever notice the way she looks at him. Anyone who can't see when someone likes him that much must be blind, or a little bit thick.
Then there's Jack, what can one say about Jack? Apparently nothing, because Owen's finally strolled in complaining about something or the other, and now we can get going.
No, apparently we can't get going until we get it sorted who is sitting where. Jack's behind the wheel slowly banging his forehead on the top of it. Owen keeps offering the front to Tosh. Tosh wants the back, says she gets carsick up front on long trips.
In the end, when I offered to sit up front, Gwen grabbed me by the arm and said we don't talk enough and dragged me into the backseat with her. She then pointed-out that due to Tosh's sensitive stomach, she had better join us in the back. I'm beginning to think that she just didn't want to spend several hours jammed-in next to Owen (and that Tosh did.) Is this how all Torchwood missions begin? In any case, after one short stop for some burgers, we've arrived and made camp. That is to say that we arrived, and some of us made camp. Well, I say 'some,' I mean 'Tosh and I.' In all fairness, Gwen did try to help. She was just rather awkward and after she hit my hand with the mallet, rather than the tent peg, for the fourth time, we set her to sorting the supplies. Owen spent so much time complaining about camping, Tosh and I had the other two tents up and done (even with Gwen's 'help') before he had even gotten the third out of the SUV. Then he had the gall to accuse me of not packing all the parts!
I hope I left enough food and water for Moses the cat.
As I was setting up the cots, I could hear the 'snog' conversation develop. I thought about going for a walk, switching all of the equipment from one tent to the other, pretending not to hear, or just plain hiding. But I was distracted by Tosh's apparent jealousy over some kiss that Owen and Gwen had shared. (Aggressive for Tosh, that comment about Gwen getting her feet under the table, added to what she had said to Owen earlier about helping him get his tent up. I've heard Tosh say some things that would make a sailor blush, but only between us, not in front of the rest of the team, and especially not in front of Owen.) Then lighten the mood: its Jack's turn. But surprise! Jack never answers. He deflects, "Are we including non-human life-forms?" No one ever expects a straight answer from Jack, and Jack doesn't disappoint. I almost deflect the conversation myself. I consider questioning who really was Jack's last kiss, or drawing attention back to Tosh's attraction to Owen. Either would distract the attention away from me, and my inevitable answer. Neither is something I would do. I fear the answer to the first and the second would just be un-gallant. Instead I press on. Much as it hurts, I take my turn. I'm part of the team now. Aren't I? I don't hide myself from them, not anymore. The unease on their faces begins to show as they remember what my answer must be.
Eye contact. Smile.
I say what they all know; the last person I kissed was Lisa. Unless, that is, I wasn't dreaming and the last person Jack kissed wasn't alien, just Welsh.
The wind sounded louder. Deafening. It was the only sound now as no one knew what to say. I was actually grateful to Owen for breaking it by going to get firewood, and for taking Gwen with him. (I have always gotten the sense that Owen has as much experience defusing tense situations as he does with creating them. He must have had an interesting childhood.) Tosh just stared at the horizon. I knew we'd talk later, when it was quiet, and just the two of us. Jack, the Captain, just looked at me. I think maybe he was trying to judge me, or my feelings. He was trying to look at me and see how I felt now, about what had happened back then, about the past. He looked like he was trying to decide if I'm worthy of his trust yet (or ever?) He seemed to be measuring me… but for what? He has a certain level of intensity. Whatever it was, I had to look away.
While looking for wood, Owen and Gwen have discovered a body. We're going to investigate. 'We' are going to investigate. At first I wasn't sure if that meant me. I must have stood there a minute or so until Jack turned and asked me if I were waiting for an engraved invitation. I've got to get any equipment together that might be needed. Anticipate the team's needs. What we might need. We. Who ever thought I'd be in the field?
Tosh is unconscious still, but she's breathing. I turned and she was gone. I don't know where… Okay. Focus. Start at the beginning: We were taking care of the crime scene. There was a body without flesh or skin or organs. It was just left there in the forest. While we were investigating, someone or something took the SUV, wrecking the camp in the process. Maybe they don't have cars on whatever planet they're from. Certainly not the best drivers. We set off after the SUV. Because I had the signal tracker, the team… the rest of the team followed me. Then, as we were walking, Jack's boot caught on a loose rock and he stumbled. I caught his arm and kept him from falling. He said "See, I knew you'd be useful." It was an odd sensation. I felt useful. The tracker led us to a small village. A really small village. Jack sent Tosh and me after the SUV while the rest of the team would check-out the village. I didn't think splitting-up was a good idea, but a junior on his first mission doesn't question the Captain, so off we went. Next time, if there is a next time, I am going to question… a lot.
Tosh and I headed off alone. I wondered if she was bothered to be paired with the 'tea boy' (Owen certainly would have been.)When we got to the row of brick houses set back in the middle of nothing, Tosh retrieved the tracker from me. I was amazed she hadn't taken it back earlier, still it was funny. Sweet as Tosh is, she is very possessive of her 'tech stuff.' I hope she didn't resent me having it. I hope she doesn't resent being paired with me. When I turned around and she was gone, I was sorry that she'd been paired with me, stuck with me. Would Owen have lost her? I wasn't trained for this. They knocked me down from behind. Maybe if I had a clue, if I knew what I was doing, they wouldn't have gotten behind me. Now we're here, Tosh and I, in this cellar, this dark pit. Alone. Where's Jack? Why isn't he here? To do all the right things, to save us all? But he isn't here. So okay, now what? How do we get out? Follow protocols. Find our strengths. Discover their weaknesses. Make a plan. First things first, Tosh needs to wake-up.
Owen told me I've a concussion and to take it easy for a while. He said that some patchy memory loss is common and not to worry. I do worry. I worry that I'll remember more. Some of it is already starting to come back. A refrigerator full of… a locked steel door, shoes, Tosh being brave and trying to distract me, trying to help me feel brave too. Tosh. She seems so quiet and shy. I wish I had her strength, her convictions, her confidence when things go weird.
Tosh tells me I sacrificed myself so she could escape, to get away to get help. She tells me I was heroic. I don't remember heroic, I only remember scared.
I do remember wanting Tosh safe, wanting that monster to stop touching her. I couldn't stop him from going after her, from chasing her. I remember what he wanted to do to her, to all of us. Food. Us. To eat us. Eye contact. Smile.
I remember pain and fireworks inside my head. Yelling, laughing, pain again (or still?) a knife at my throat. I have a small cut there, so some of all this must be true, must've happened. And the Captain, our Captain with a shotgun… or was it that revolver of his? I'm not sure. At that point it all went dark again.
As I'm writing this, on the tailgate of the SUV (that was found right where Tosh's tracker said it would be) the sun is shining, birds are singing, I feel a new kind of pain that may never go away. I realize that of all the horrors we have faced, and those yet to come, this is worse. All those creatures out there who would come to do damage, come to destroy, or to enslave, would they come if they knew? If they knew what kind of monsters are already here? And would people commit this sort of horror if they knew what was waiting in return, out in the universe? I had to go back into that cellar to get my backpack. I almost left it there, but it had my diary in it, the last thing Lisa had ever given me, and I couldn't leave it. I couldn't leave it there. Now all the windows are open and it is full of crime scene investigators in their paper clothes and rubber gloves, it didn't look so terrifying. Now that we know it was people who did all this, however, it's even more horrific. I remember it all now, and I have new horrors to be added to my arsenal of nightmares.
Owen called from the hospital. Gwen is fine and he'll be taking her home soon. Tosh slept in the backseat all the way home. What horrors could she have already faced that she could sleep so soundly after a night like we just had? Neither Jack nor I spoke a single word the entire time. As I sat starring out the window, I think I felt him look in my direction more than once. We dropped Tosh at her place and that left Jack and me to take the SUV back to the hub.
Now we're back in the hub I took a shower and changed. It helped. A little.
Last night, after I changed back into my normal work clothes, I stood. I don't know how long, but I stood looking at the hub. I thought of the job and what it takes from you. I thought about what Tosh had said, that it's worth the risk, to protect people. Maybe she's right. I think about all those people, every ten years (for how long?) who didn't have someone to rescue them from the horror. Who didn't have a Captain Jack Harkness in his long coat and his gun blazing. I realized I wasn't Jack, could never be like Jack, but maybe in time, I could help. But I also realized that I'm not quite ready. He came and stood behind me, his hands on my shoulders. He spoke quietly, and I closed my eyes to feel him there with me as much as I could. He asked me if I wanted to take some time off, or at least take a long weekend away. I really didn't think that staying home or going on a trip would do any good for the way I felt. I told Jack that I thought it might be best if I took a little time before attempting any more fieldwork. He tried to convince me to keep at it. He told me that I hadn't done badly and that I had 'strong' potential. I asked if it could just stay 'potential' for a little while longer. Jack turned me to face him and smiled. He told me "Just let me know when you're ready. For you, I can wait."
I don't know how to describe what happened next. Jack took me by the hand and led me to the couch. There he took my jacket and tie off before gently guiding me to sit. I really didn't know what to do or say as he bent down and took off my shoes as well. I remember an image flashed before by eyes of all the shoes in the cellar. But it faded as quickly as it had appeared when Jack sat on the other end of the couch. He looked at me again with one of those measuring stares, but this one wasn't intimidating. Then he smiled. It wasn't that big Harkness grin, it was one I'd never seen before, and it was much, much better. I looked away, not sure what to say or do, or what was happening. That's when I felt him pull me over, off balance, so now I was laying on my side on the couch.
Laid there, my head resting on his leg, his hand in my hair, I found it so easy to talk to him. Relaxed for the first time in nearly two years, I could tell him how I worried for him. How I… What I… Things I can't even bring myself to write now. Jack listened. Then it was his turn. He didn't joke, he didn't tease, he didn't deflect. He told me how he felt. How he felt about me. How he'd felt for quite a long time. Looking back now, I'm not sure it wasn't just a dream, because that's how I fell asleep last night; on the couch with Jack, his hand playing with my hair. And the last thing I remember, or the first thing I dreamed, was him whispering "You can sleep now. I won't let anything happen to you, Ianto."
