Fic: "65 Million Years Off"
Sep. 8th, 2009 12:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cyusTitle: 65 Million Years Off
Characters: Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness, Gwen Cooper
Rating: PG
Length: 1000 words
Summary: Ianto, Jack and Gwen spend their stolen moments in their own private places.
Notes: written for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
writerinadrawer. Beta'd by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
51stcenturyfox
Ianto Jones was building a spaceship. Deep in the bowels of the Hub, past the sixteenth shelving unit whose wheels screeched when you slid it open by Victorian magic and manpower, and past that into the secret tunnel, and past that down into the sewers and up from there to dryness and electricity and one of those hidden rooms.
A room like Jack's, which buried all its secrets in that small hole and shut the lid air-tight.
Ianto Jones was building a spaceship.
Whenever Lisa moaned for too long and he couldn't take the raspiness of her breath anymore, whenever his fingers clenched into fists and fingers itched to turn it all off and bury her alive or half-alive, when she was out of it and he was going crazy. It gave him something to do with his hands, to create something that could take him away.
Hunched in the cardboard box, he thought himself galaxies away.
He painted his spaceship blue, like the bed sheets of his eleven-year-old self, flying science fiction monsters in garish print, aliens juggling with bananas and toasters.
Lisa died, and he forgot about the room and the wonders of the universe.
Jack left, and he slept in his blue cardboard prison, wishing himself to London one moment, to a place alien and light years away the next. Then Tosh and Owen- and he set his spaceship aflame. It never took him away.
"Where have you been?" Jack asked, tasting the smoke, maybe.
Ianto didn't answer, but when he squeezed his eyes closed in the embrace he was spinning both of them into outer space.
*
Jack Harkness was building another companion. It couldn't be a robot made of metal and grease because Cybermen were hardly his friends and Daleks still gave him the jitters.
He used to cut his companions out of newspapers, but he grabbed Ianto's diary for his paperman companion and thumbed open the pages on years ago, those secrets that were hardly secrets anymore but still made Ianto the man he was. He cut human figures out of the pages, added layers whenever he thought to and bound them with glue; it was half an inch high.
If Ianto had noticed the man-shaped cut-outs he hadn't said anything.
Jack Harkness was building a companion, because Ianto Jones would die. He had this one for Ianto, and one for Estelle and a muted collection of thirty-two, thirty-three others since the 1890s. They were bound by string, and he was sentimental enough to keep them in his pocket to fondle them for a quick thought to the slices of life in them.
"What's this then, Jack?" Estelle had asked and traced their outline with a fingertip.
"Just something I do," he'd answered, laughed and tucked her paperfigure of two fingers thick back into his pocket.
They weren't memories for eternity, they were memories for the moment he thought to add a layer, the newspaper of Tuesday the 17th of July 1924 and Marcus' visit to the zoo that brought him face to face with an elephant.
They were the people he loved.
Jack Harkness was building this companion for himself when Ianto Jones slept. He was gluing a cut-out from the page of Ianto's diary from October the 6th 2001 and his first stroll along the Thames to the half-a-finger-thick man. Ianto turned on the bed, stretched, as Jack fitted the arm of the layer to the arm and the head to the head, sealing this in memory.
Jack Harkness was building paper companions; they were his diary for the moment.
*
Gwen Cooper was building a life. With a husband and a child and a broken city at her feet, she wandered the parks sometimes, amongst the mothers still looking over her shoulders, and whenever there was a thought of looking back or looking away, she set her eyes on a future that didn't involve other heroes when she could be a goddamn hero herself. And no-one had ever asked her; the world had just dropped it in her lap.
She wished for a spaceship sometime, to take her away, paint it in blue and explore the stars now that Jack had fucked off to leave them behind in this mess.
She wished for her own space for memories sometimes, something she could lock away and shut down, so it wouldn't grab her at random moments and rob her breath.
But Gwen Cooper was still alive, and still walking Cardiff's streets, her hand in that of the man she loved as much as she had Jack, as much as she had Ianto and Tosh and Owen; like a lover, like a brother.
Gwen Cooper was building a life.
She was still waiting for Jack to come back, she was still waiting for Ianto to be alive, a mysterious fix-it. A hello, and a it was only a dream, and a dance on top of the Millennium Centre with Jack and a shared pizza and laugh with Ianto on the ratty sofa while Jack was watching them with amused eyes. She was waiting for Jack to remember her here and for Ianto to have found a way to escape and find a way back.
But Gwen Cooper was building a life now. Sometimes she wondered if Jack was happy, if Ianto had been happy. Sometimes she wanted to have a way to simply ask.
Her child gurgled laughter, baby teeth barely denting a carrot, drool running down and the broadest grin.
That's when she snapped out of it, bent down and waggled a teddy bear. She joined in the laughter and touched a furry paw to tiny fingers, then followed that with her own fingers, a press of her lips. Sometimes she didn't find words, but her child was forgiving.
She was still here, and she didn't need to flee into outer space or memories. She was building a life.
Characters: Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness, Gwen Cooper
Rating: PG
Length: 1000 words
Summary: Ianto, Jack and Gwen spend their stolen moments in their own private places.
Notes: written for
writerinadrawer. Beta'd by 51stcenturyfoxIanto Jones was building a spaceship. Deep in the bowels of the Hub, past the sixteenth shelving unit whose wheels screeched when you slid it open by Victorian magic and manpower, and past that into the secret tunnel, and past that down into the sewers and up from there to dryness and electricity and one of those hidden rooms.
A room like Jack's, which buried all its secrets in that small hole and shut the lid air-tight.
Ianto Jones was building a spaceship.
Whenever Lisa moaned for too long and he couldn't take the raspiness of her breath anymore, whenever his fingers clenched into fists and fingers itched to turn it all off and bury her alive or half-alive, when she was out of it and he was going crazy. It gave him something to do with his hands, to create something that could take him away.
Hunched in the cardboard box, he thought himself galaxies away.
He painted his spaceship blue, like the bed sheets of his eleven-year-old self, flying science fiction monsters in garish print, aliens juggling with bananas and toasters.
Lisa died, and he forgot about the room and the wonders of the universe.
Jack left, and he slept in his blue cardboard prison, wishing himself to London one moment, to a place alien and light years away the next. Then Tosh and Owen- and he set his spaceship aflame. It never took him away.
"Where have you been?" Jack asked, tasting the smoke, maybe.
Ianto didn't answer, but when he squeezed his eyes closed in the embrace he was spinning both of them into outer space.
*
Jack Harkness was building another companion. It couldn't be a robot made of metal and grease because Cybermen were hardly his friends and Daleks still gave him the jitters.
He used to cut his companions out of newspapers, but he grabbed Ianto's diary for his paperman companion and thumbed open the pages on years ago, those secrets that were hardly secrets anymore but still made Ianto the man he was. He cut human figures out of the pages, added layers whenever he thought to and bound them with glue; it was half an inch high.
If Ianto had noticed the man-shaped cut-outs he hadn't said anything.
Jack Harkness was building a companion, because Ianto Jones would die. He had this one for Ianto, and one for Estelle and a muted collection of thirty-two, thirty-three others since the 1890s. They were bound by string, and he was sentimental enough to keep them in his pocket to fondle them for a quick thought to the slices of life in them.
"What's this then, Jack?" Estelle had asked and traced their outline with a fingertip.
"Just something I do," he'd answered, laughed and tucked her paperfigure of two fingers thick back into his pocket.
They weren't memories for eternity, they were memories for the moment he thought to add a layer, the newspaper of Tuesday the 17th of July 1924 and Marcus' visit to the zoo that brought him face to face with an elephant.
They were the people he loved.
Jack Harkness was building this companion for himself when Ianto Jones slept. He was gluing a cut-out from the page of Ianto's diary from October the 6th 2001 and his first stroll along the Thames to the half-a-finger-thick man. Ianto turned on the bed, stretched, as Jack fitted the arm of the layer to the arm and the head to the head, sealing this in memory.
Jack Harkness was building paper companions; they were his diary for the moment.
*
Gwen Cooper was building a life. With a husband and a child and a broken city at her feet, she wandered the parks sometimes, amongst the mothers still looking over her shoulders, and whenever there was a thought of looking back or looking away, she set her eyes on a future that didn't involve other heroes when she could be a goddamn hero herself. And no-one had ever asked her; the world had just dropped it in her lap.
She wished for a spaceship sometime, to take her away, paint it in blue and explore the stars now that Jack had fucked off to leave them behind in this mess.
She wished for her own space for memories sometimes, something she could lock away and shut down, so it wouldn't grab her at random moments and rob her breath.
But Gwen Cooper was still alive, and still walking Cardiff's streets, her hand in that of the man she loved as much as she had Jack, as much as she had Ianto and Tosh and Owen; like a lover, like a brother.
Gwen Cooper was building a life.
She was still waiting for Jack to come back, she was still waiting for Ianto to be alive, a mysterious fix-it. A hello, and a it was only a dream, and a dance on top of the Millennium Centre with Jack and a shared pizza and laugh with Ianto on the ratty sofa while Jack was watching them with amused eyes. She was waiting for Jack to remember her here and for Ianto to have found a way to escape and find a way back.
But Gwen Cooper was building a life now. Sometimes she wondered if Jack was happy, if Ianto had been happy. Sometimes she wanted to have a way to simply ask.
Her child gurgled laughter, baby teeth barely denting a carrot, drool running down and the broadest grin.
That's when she snapped out of it, bent down and waggled a teddy bear. She joined in the laughter and touched a furry paw to tiny fingers, then followed that with her own fingers, a press of her lips. Sometimes she didn't find words, but her child was forgiving.
She was still here, and she didn't need to flee into outer space or memories. She was building a life.
