So, I was wrong about only one chapter being left. (Don't you love it when these things run off and write themselves?) One more chapter, plus epilogue, but the good news is that it should be up by tomorrow.
Thank you to everyone who has been so encouraging. Hope you enjoy.
Scattered cheers broke out as the trainee reindeer team struggled into the sky, thrashing hooves finally gaining purchase on empty air. Jack joined in the applause, breaking off to wave wildly as Ianto raised an arm in farewell and triumph before gentling the team with reins and voice and turning them to launch into the velvet skies of the midday night.
Having spent a large proportion of his life in space, the concept of midnight sky before lunchtime was one of the few things about the North Pole that didn't boggle Jack's mind, so he was able to watch in quiet contentment until the sleigh was just another speck of light amongst the stars.
Prompted by a bout of blatantly unnecessary throat-clearing, he glanced aside to see St Nicholas in all his fatherly glory, brow raised in the unmistakeable 'I can wait as long as it takes, young man,' expression.
Jack sighed. "I'm guessing it's that 'later' you mentioned."
Nick jerked his head towards the empty skies. "He'll be a while, and judging from that takeoff he'll need you with a clear mind when he gets back."
Jack inclined his head with exaggerated courtliness. "Lead on, oh wise one."
The corridors they traversed became progressively less redolent of Yuletide and elves thereof, which was definitely a plus in Jack's mind. Not a working area, he concluded, which made it feel much less as though he was about to be hauled over the coals by the boss, but increased the likelihood that he was getting torn a new one by his father-in-law instead. Jack's stomach twisted.
They approached a majestic wooden door, all iron bands and big-headed nails but neither doorknob nor lock. Jack knew he shouldn't be surprised when it swung open as they approached. When had Santa ever needed a key?
Once inside, Jack peered around with open curiosity. He'd never been in Nick's private quarters before. The room they'd entered was spacious, but comfortably cluttered with furniture and an assortment of knick-knacks which Jack's fingers itched to inspect. The decor echoed the corridors outside, with a marked lack of holly, tinsel or any of the other Christmas-themed furnishings which proliferated throughout the rest of the Pole, including the suite where Jack lived with Ianto.
Jack wondered if Ianto had ever been here, and whether he could be convinced to follow suit. It'd be nice to relax somewhere that was less obviously part of Ianto's workplace. Which was probably exactly what Ianto had thought all that time Jack was living in the Hub. Jack felt a fleeting sense of respect for the patience of karma.
"Guilt," Nick announced, settling into the middle of an ancient sofa and waving Jack to another.
Jack blinked himself back to the present and sat where indicated. "Where?" he enquired. "Or should I say Who?"
"Ianto's motivating factor," Nick explained. "Guilt. And you, my friend, were supposed to be doing something about that, had you pulled your head out of what I'm assured is a very fine ass – his words, not mine – for long enough."
Jack stared at his old friend, sufficiently bewildered by the sudden attack to feel firmly on the defensive. It wasn't as though he hadn't noticed, but Ianto had been driven by one sort of guilt or another since well before Jack had ever met him.
Yeah, he probably should have done something about it, at that.
Nick flung both arms into the air. "Don't give me the innocent look, Jack. I know he's as much to blame as you are and I am so very close to being out of patience with the pair of you," he announced. "You've been together for centuries, lad. Do you never talk, for goodness sake?"
"We had less than twelve hours a year," Jack retorted, hackles well and truly risen. "One night out of three hundred and sixty five – or six – confined to a hotel room. An annual booty cool, courtesy of you, Dear Santa, and don't get me wrong, we were grateful for it. But if you wanted us to focus on conversation, Nick, somewhere with furniture other than a bed might have helped."
Nick glared at him through narrowed eyes. Really, really not his look, and all the scarier for it. He even raised a fist, which Jack watched with the intensity of a snake with its charmer.
"So you want to go with deflection then? Fine, we'll deal with that first. One." The fist uncurled, index finger waving. Jack nearly smiled. Numbering, not punching. Of course. What was he thinking? Santa didn't punch. However tempted.
"One," Nick repeated. "You chose the venue, I just brought Ianto there," he corrected. "Two, you and he have been living in the same quarters, with all sorts of furniture, might I add, for months." He paused, raising a slightly fluffy eyebrow. "Three. Sorry, is there a three? Line them up, son; I'm waiting to hear how you've not managed to have a serious conversation in all the time you've been here."
"The prospect of elves popping in unannounced at any given moment tends to discourage open and honest communication," Jack snapped back. "Especially when up 'til this morning I was kinda convinced that one or both of them were Ianto's elves-with-benefits."
Slightly horrified at having let that one past his lips, Jack bit them.
A low chuckle rose from the opposite sofa. "Progress, at last, and all it took was poking your last nerve." Nick raised his eyes to the ceiling. "I should be sorry, I know. But truly, the pair of you would try the patience of a saint, and I know what I'm saying here. Getting anything meaningful from either of you is harder than getting the stripes out of a candy cane."
Jack's pout inched back towards a smile. Nick grinned in return. "In that chest over there," he said, waving a beefy hand, "you will find beer, of which I have amassed a very substantial supply over the years because they would keep leaving it out for me, the little loves, and even I can't drink that much alcohol in one night. Get one for me and yourself and we'll start sorting out this mess."
It wasn't a good idea to argue with Santa just before Christmas, so Jack did as he was told, with an emotion fluttering within his ribs that felt very much like hope.
"Jealousy," Nick began, before Jack was quite back in his seat, "Is a destructive emotion, as you've no doubt said many times yourself."
Jack nodded very briefly before attempting to hide behind his beer, blessing the generations of Welsh kids who'd kept Santa so very well supplied with Brains.
"And in this case wildly inappropriate," Nick continued, "Given that Ianto isn't so much smitten with the elves as intimidated by them."
Jack placed his bottle carefully onto the table between them and leaned closer to Nick. "That's ridiculous," he said. "They fawn all over him." He frowned. "And from what I've seen, he fawns right back, pretty much."
Nick shrugged. "Ridiculous, but true. History, you see. Theirs, and Ianto's history with them." Nick paused for a deep swallow of his beer. "The elves weren't as welcoming as they should have been when Ianto arrived, out of some foolish notion of loyalty to me, if you can believe that, which I didn't for far too long. I had to speak with them all in the end, quite firmly, as I recall, so there might be some residual resentment after all. Has Ianto really not told you any of this?"
Jack frowned. "He might have mentioned something," he conceded, remembering a wistful comment just that morning and wondering how many others he'd brushed off.
"Potted history, then," Nick said briskly. "Right, well you have to understand that the elves hadn't served a Father of Christmas before me. The fellow I took over from popped back with them when war broke out in the dimension he'd retired to. Dragons and dwarves and goodness knows what else, and you want to get the children away, don't you? Well he did, and I was glad to have them, especially when they got old enough to start helping."
Jack rubbed the spot between his eyes, where a steady ache was beginning to form. "This predecessor of yours, his name wasn't Gandalf, by any chance?" he asked, smiling when Nick's mouth fell open. He wasn't even particularly surprised. It was only this morning that he'd wondered about Jingle and co having inspired Tolkien, after all.
"After Dumbledore, I've just decided to assume every elderly wizard I've ever heard of was one of your predecessors," Jack explained. No doubt one day soon he'd meet Merlin.
Nick's eyes twinkled. "And some you haven't," he agreed. "Anyway, seems the elves decided to support me by giving Ianto the sort of welcome better suited to the real Arctic than this one, and by the time I'd sorted it out, the damage was done. So there you have it. Ianto, being Ianto, remains convinced they still resent him, hence the silly lad works from your living room instead of what should now be his office. The elves, for their part, are going a tad overboard to prove otherwise, not to mention trying to impress him by winning you over as well, at which they seem to be failing quite epically."
Jack pointed an accusing finger. "Tell them to stay out of our bedroom and they'll be halfway there."
"Those," Nick said with a smile, toasting Jack with his empty bottle, "Are not the words of the Jack I knew and despaired of, and I'm glad of it. You've grown, son, and I don't mean physically."
Jack thought he might be blushing, and that they needed more beer.
"Moving on," Nick announced, once bottle caps had been dealt with. "We also have the guilt associated with all those Santa supplied booty calls, as you so tenderly described them, you romantic soul, you."
"I was making a point," Jack mumbled, definitely blushing. "Badly. But, Nick, why would he feel guilty about those? They were...good." More than good. They were the series of best nights Jack remembered since he'd left Torchwood. They were the precious memories that had gotten him through the months between. They were the reason Jack had finally come to turns with his own immortality. The idea of Ianto regretting them chilled Jack more thoroughly than the snow outside.
Nick reached across to pat Jack's knee. "He doesn't regret them, you ninny," he reassured, demonstrating his unerring ability to read Jack's mind as though his thoughts were written across his forehead. "But they are the very heart of his guilt." Still bent awkwardly across the coffee table, the old man pinned Jack with eyes which had lost their merry. "You know, don't you, that we age outside the Rift, Ianto and I? That he aged a day for every night he spent with you?"
Jack nodded, straightening in his seat in a futile attempt to escape that searing gaze. "That was one of the reasons I came here instead," he said, more weakly than he'd intended.
"Indeed." Nick pondered for a while as he relaxed back onto his seat. "I gave those nights as a gift, to both of you," he said eventually. "A much needed and well deserved gift. And truth be told, I kept them going long past the time I should have retired myself. Wanted to give you both just one more year, then another. Wanted it for myself, too. Overdid it, in the end, as you probably recall."
"I do," Jack agreed, eyes unfocused as he watched the memories scrolling behind his own eyelids. "Don't take this the wrong way, Nick, but you looked worse every year. And I remember Ianto saying you tried to do another, and couldn't." He fixed Nick with a piercing gaze of his own. "That's why you're still here, isn't it? Why you haven't retired somewhere like all the others. You've got no time left."
Nick fiddled with the neck of his beer bottle. "I'll recover enough, eventually, build up cosmic credit or some such, but to be honest, Jack, it was never an issue for me. I've never wanted to be anywhere else." He sighed. "But then we come back to the guilt, again. Ianto thinks he was squandering time with you when he should have been delivering gifts instead of me, and that it's trapped me here, or whatever other fool notion he's got happening in that head of his, which you should know better than me only it's painfully obvious you don't."
Jack thought that was uncalled for, even if possibly true, but was too busy putting it all together to be offended.
"That's why he's obsessed with weeding every spare second out of the flight plan?" he exclaimed, as the pieces fell into place. "He's making up for the time he spent with me?"
Nick laid a finger alongside his nose. "And he's done a sterling job so far. More deliveries in less time than I ever managed, but..."
Jack shook his head, beer bottle dangling from his fingers, forgotten in the wash of understanding. "It's more work for the reindeer, right?" he finished. "And Ianto adores them, so what, icing on the guilt cake?"
"Now you've got it," Nick agreed. "And finally, the answer to the question you asked so very petulantly out in the stable. The old boys don't age as we do, but even they can't keep up the pace they've been working at, and it's starting to show. For which Ianto blames himself. So, second team."
Jack frowned. "It took them three tries to launch," he said worriedly. "There's no way they'll be ready for Christmas, not this year at least."
The two men regarded each other with identical expressions of concern.
"I used to be Air Force, did you know?" Jack said, into the silence. "A pilot."
Nick tipped his head to the side. "Captain Jack," he agreed.
"Should have been me poring over the flight plans with him," Jack continued.
Nick grinned. His usual grin, back on his face where it belonged. "Did you think I brought you here just to warm his bed?"
Jack let that one pass because Nick was grinning, his usual jolly smile back on his face where it belonged. Everything was where it belonged, or it would be, when Jack finished pulling his head out of his very fine ass – Ianto's words, not his.
"What would those elves know about efficient flight plans?" Jack scoffed. "They've only ever travelled by Santa."
"They do their best," Nick pointed out. "But you know that saying about good intentions..."
Jack looked across with a grin. "I'll take the flight plans, you take the elves," he suggested, and before Nick could nod his agreement he was left with two damp rings on his coffee table and the breeze from the closing door. The lockless, handle-free door.
Nick checked the time. The elves were sticklers for the record books, so they'd want to make note of the moment Jack Frost came into his own.
Thank you for reading this belated Christmas story. More tomorrow.