Chapter Text
Ianto woke up.
There was a brief moment, barely a second where everything was okay. His head was swimming with something just to the left of a hangover – must have been a good night. He could still smell Jack, as if he were in the room over and had only just left, he could still feel his thumb brushing tenderly over his cheek, careful to avoid the gash that barely had time to stop bleeding before he died.
The barely-second was over and suddenly he was gasping, bolt upright, clawing desperately at his throat, trying to find a pulse. The absolute absurdity of checking his own pulse, still not quite sure what was going on, snapped him out of his panic and he froze.
He had died. He had died in Jack’s arms of an alien virus. He had died, and he wasn’t in the room with the 456, or a temporary morgue, or an actual one, or a hospital. The long gone civilian part of him wants to keep on panicking but, even through the grogginess, his years at Torchwood were taking over.
Step one: check for injuries. In the absence of another human everything would have to come with a pinch of salt, there was a distinct possibility that this was all some sort of dead dream or virus induced pre-death fever.
He started with his extremities, wiggling his fingers and toes, working upwards and inwards. He felt good, better than good, in fact he wasn’t sure he’d felt this good since before Torchwood. That had to be a bad sign. He ran his hands over his skin next: no tenderness or visible bruising, no wounds to speak of. This was, notably, also a bad sign. The cut on his cheek was gone, so he had probably been unconscious for weeks. Or he was dead.
Step two: try and work out where the bloody hell he was and why.
He started with himself. The ruined suit he had died in was gone and replaced with pyjamas – his own – which is a point for being dead, but he’s never seen this room before. He thinks back to before everything went to shit, working late at the hub and the conversation had drifted to dreams.
“I think the whole concept of analysing dreams is ridiculous, right up there with all that crystal shit.” Owen huffed, trying to throw ball after ball of paperwork at Tosh, who was resolutely ignoring him and definitely not smiling.
Gwen regretted starting this conversation but she wasn’t going to back down now. “But they’re so random sometimes – why am I dreaming that Colin Firth is in my childhood kitchen if that doesn’t mean something?!”
“We dream whilst sorting memories. You probably watched something with him in, and heard something that reminded you of your childhood. That’s why we only ever dream faces and places we know, because we are processing what we’ve seen.” Tosh explains, not even looking up from the – did she get another one? – seven screens flashing in front of her.
Another point for being dead. If Tosh was right, which she usually was, then this couldn’t be a dream.
He analysed the room next. It was cosy, almost too perfect: the double bed he was in had a mattress that felt like a cloud, a thick duvet pooling around his waist, and the pillows must’ve been some sort of alien shit that fell through the rift – cold on both sides and exactly the right shape. Some things were so good you couldn’t dream them – his new working theory was kidnapped, possibly by some sort of eccentric maniac looking for a pet. If the threat of danger wasn’t so pressing he would’ve gone right back to sleep.
The rest of the possible cell was similarly decorated: to his right was a wardrobe and chest of drawers, which he instinctively knew were filled with his clothes – not replacements, his clothes from his flat. To his left was a desk set up, his chair from the hub tucked neatly under the desk, the wear and tear lit up by the soft glow of a desk top, the Torchwood logo pulsing softly. There was a bookshelf next to it, almost empty, only some of his favourite books – a couple of murder mysteries and the collected works of Wilfred Owen. He kept that hidden away, something of a guilty pleasure, alongside his journal. The journal itself was on the bedside table, laid square with a single photograph.
He hadn’t seen that photo in a long time. It was taken a few months after Gwen had joined, some team bonding thing after one too many close calls. Gwen was in one corner, arm out stretched taking the picture. She was grinning; she hadn’t smiled like that in a long time – this was before she had seen the depths that aliens and humans could sink to, before she had realised that whilst her skin was thick and her will was strong, she couldn’t fix everything, no matter how hard she tried. Owen was behind her rolling his eyes, one arm around her and the other around Tosh. She was looking at him like he hung the moon. Ianto had tried not to think about them after they had died, but he had found some peace in the fact they had died together, and he hoped they had too. Owen could be a prick, and he had hurt Tosh, but here he could see a glimpse of something they never got to finish. Jack and Ianto were in the other corner, so wrapped up in each other that they didn’t even realise Gwen was taking a picture.
The picture was right before they decided to give them a proper go, and all Ianto could think about was how much he missed that time. Ianto had never taken a second of it for granted, but right at the end, when he was dying in Jack’s arms, he wished he had been bolder, made a move sooner so they could’ve had more time together.
“There’s no point dwelling on what-ifs,” he muttered, sliding out of the bed, “someone might be holding your ghost prisoner.”
As soon as his feet hit the floor – of course his slippers were right there, because where else would they be – he heard footsteps outside the door. They didn’t stop or slow, just carried right on past.
He crept slowly towards the door, tapping the doorknob once, twice, to make sure it wasn’t boobytrapped – he didn’t fancy getting electrocuted – and turned it.
Unlocked.
“None of this makes sense.” He looked through the crack in the door. He was expecting guards or bars, even a security camera, but there was nothing. From what he could see there was a perfectly normal hallway, with some perfectly normal doors, and not a single trap in sight.
He clicked the door shut again and looked around. Despite the dwindling possibility that he was in danger, he still wanted a weapon. Unfortunately none of his collection had made it into this mockery of his old life. A lamp would have to do. And some clothes. It wouldn’t do to fight for his life in his pyjamas.
He had been right about the wardrobe. He recognised the first suit – the last one he had worn – it was clean and mended, but he couldn’t bring himself to wear it, lest he tempted fate. He settled on the next one he saw and a deep purple shirt that Jack liked. Even then, when he was about to face god knows what, he still thought of Jack first. He tried to push the pathetic feeling down and focus on knotting his tie. The red silk slipped through his fingers like blood.
He steadied his breathing and opened the door again, listening first and then peering cautiously through the gap as he pulled it wide enough to slip through. There was still no one there and he hadn’t heard the footsteps again.
Ianto decided to go right, back to the wall, head on a swivel. The only noise was his shoes tapping on the hard floor and his heart beat pounding in his ears. The further he went, the more doors he saw, each one a slightly different colour than the next but nothing else to distinguish them, and no end in sight. New theory: trapped in a maze from a budget slasher film.
That would make sense with the singing that had just started up. It was distant and definitely off tune, but he could just make it out to be something familiar. He kept following the voice, slowly inching along the wall until, without warning, he was in some sort of control room. One last look behind him showed a wall where the hallway had been.
“Onwards it is.” He whispered, stepping cautiously forwards.
The singing stopped just as it was getting to the bit Ianto recognised and a surprisingly British voice sounded instead. “Yes! Onwards! Quite right, Ianto, because if you go backwards then physically you would be inside the wall, and chronologically you would be dead! But you aren’t! Love the suit and tie, very smart, though I’m more of a bowtie man myself. Bowties are cool. So, hungry? Thirsty? I’m not sure how you humans heal, especially with that little friend you picked up.”
Ianto blinked. A tall man, or not a man, if he used phrases like ‘you humans’, had just climbed out from underneath a glass floor filled with wires. He was indeed wearing a bowtie, straightening it primly as he spoke. He was somehow the most eccentric, endearing, and ridiculous not-man Ianto had ever seen.
“What the fuck.”
The stranger fidgeted closer, wringing his hands together, and even under the orange glow of the lights he looked as pale as Ianto felt. He looked suspicious, like he was hiding something important and wasn’t sure how it would be received.
“Right, yes, an explanation. Where to begin?” He was pacing back and forth, flicking switches and pulling levers as he went. Ianto watched him warily, fingers flexing uselessly around the lamp every time he paced too close.
“Did Jack talk about me at all? This will be so much easier if he knows I exist at least.”
He was talking to himself. Ianto got the feeling he did that a lot, but he needed answers and he needed them now. “If you tell me your name then I can answer that. How do you know Jack? What do you want with me?”
The man stopped pacing, his almost boyish features smoothly schooling into a look that, quite frankly, scared the shit out of Ianto. The air shifted and it suddenly became very clear that he was in danger: this not-man was dangerous.
“I’m the Doctor. Jack and I go way back, and forwards if you think about it. Time is such a wibbly-wobbly, sort of…” The look was gone as quickly as it came and he waved his hands around vaguely. Dangerous and definitely a few sandwiches short. Brilliant.
“Yes, he mentioned you. He was waiting for you, did you know that? We all were. The way he talked about you…” Ianto was seething and seriously considered lobbing the lamp at the Doctor’s head. After everything, the Doctor had decided to show up now, after everything was over and the dust had settled, to what, exactly? Prance around like he couldn’t have stopped it?
“Well, I’m flattered, Jack always was-”
“Don’t be flattered. It’s not a compliment. He barely talked about you, but when he did, especially after The Year, he made you sound like an all powerful being, some sort of God that would come and stop the 456. But you didn’t come. You didn’t come and he held me whilst I died. So whatever you’re planning, I want no part of it. I won’t help you.”
The Doctor studied him, his stupid fringe flopping down into his eyes, and smiled a little. “I can see why he likes you so much. You’re loyal, loyalty is important. Which is why I’m helping you, and him, not asking for your help. Jack has been a loyal friend to me for… oh, must be about two hundred years now, give or take. I couldn’t come and help with the 456. The universe is a big place, and the 456 had to happen. You had to die. There was another,” he grimaced slightly, “event a year or so later that was a fixed point in time. You couldn’t be there for that either.” He was pacing again, pulling a screen a hair's breadth from his face and then spinning it away from himself.
“Did you help with that?”
“I couldn’t. I can’t interfere with fixed points, the universe gets terribly upset and she can be cruel. Anyway! I actually owe you and Jack a favour, have since in about thirty years, so this is me repaying it.” He grinned, all sunshine and rainbows and Ianto felt sick.
There were so many questions: what were fixed points and how were they determined? How was the universe cruel to the Doctor? How did he owe a favour thirty years in the future? He left it for now, asking instead the first one he’d had when he woke up. “What did you do to me?”
“I didn’t do much, just pulled you out of a morgue, brought you to the Tardis. Let you sleep it off.” The Doctor was clearly being evasive, eyes flickering around and looking anywhere but Ianto.
“You have my things, my clothes, my books. This is literally the lamp from my flat.” He waved it above his head to emphasise his point. He was distantly aware how ridiculous he looked, but he wasn’t the one wearing a bowtie.
“Ah, that was all the Tardis. She’s taken a liking to you. I’m a bit jealous, really. She hides my things from me.” He pouted, rolling his eyes when the room started humming angrily. “Yes, you do hide them! I leave things where I can find them!”
He talks to himself and he talks to his- “The Tardis is what, exactly? A woman? Is it- she sentient?”
The Doctor rubbed his hand lovingly along the edge of the controls, gazing into the glass column in the middle. “In a manner of speaking. Tardis stands for time and relative dimension in space, essentially a time machine and a space ship had a baby and she is magnificent.”
Since entering the room, Ianto’s main focus had been the Doctor. The orange lights and the control panel were hard to miss, but now he had a proper look around. The room itself was massive and had several staircases and corridors. The stairs seemed to lead to upper and lower floors at the same time, depending how he looked at them. Then he remembered the hall, how long and full it had been. “Magnificent and huge – how big is the Tardis, exactly?”
The Doctor's eyes lit up, “There’s nothing exact about it, it’s always changing, growing and shrinking, but it’s always bigger on the inside.” He gestured to the door. “Have a look.”
Ianto edged slowly towards the door, keeping his back to the wall – he felt a little safer knowing he was with the Doctor, he trusted him as an extension of Jack’s trust – but the lamp was still shaking uselessly in his sweaty palm when he cracked the door open.
The sunlight hit him first. Wherever they were, it was early morning, the sun cutting over the horizon, almost blinding him to the buildings that it was peeking out from behind, scattering like glitter over the dew coated grass. His eyes slowly adjusted to the brightness and the more he saw, the more familiar it felt, until it clicked. He was home. He was at the top of a hill just outside of town, one where he and Jack had gone star gazing, and he could hear children laughing in the distance, somewhere on the other side of the police box.
“I’m in a police box. How am I in a police box? How are you in a police box? Do they even make these anymore?”
He walked slowly round the outside, one had trailing along the wood, until he came back to the door where the Doctor was leaning, still grinning, “Cool, isn’t it?”
“I’m going to need a lot more than ‘cool’ if you want me to… what exactly do you want?”
“Just for you to listen. I’ve been really quite clever and would love to tell you about it.”
Everything he could see looked right. It wasn’t just what he wanted to see, it was real, everything in its right place. Ianto was back home and he just wanted to sit with it. So he did. He sat down right there, back against the Tardis, letting the morning sun wash over him as he picked idly at the grass. The Doctor watched him for a minute before sitting next to him, limbs folding awkwardly as he settled.
“Obviously I was aware of what was going on. The Tardis showed me. And I got there after they had opened Thames house back up, just in time to see Jack and the scary woman leaving.”
“Where did they go?”
“I’ll let them tell their part of it.” He reached over, plucking a daisy from the ground. “They had presumably been saying their goodbyes to you. It wasn’t right though, you were laying there, in a room full of bodies, obviously that isn’t right, but you weren’t dead. The xcyntylite, clever little bugger, kept you alive. So I just popped in, picked you up, and brought you here until it decided it was safe again. I wasn’t sure how long it would take, could’ve been days, could’ve been months, but obviously the Tardis did something right because here you are, thirteen hours later!”
“None of that helped, but thanks. I think.”
“So you don’t know? Fascinating. But it does beg the question: where did you pick this up, you would’ve shown symptoms at first, and I’m surprised Jack didn’t pick up on it. He's seen them before.”
“Has anyone ever told you that you make no sense? At all.” He deadpanned.
“Frequently. The xcyntylite is a teeny tiny little alien organism. Think… chia seed. Teeny tiny chia seed sized alien. Very step-on-able, scared of everything and everyone. So, in order to survive they take a host. They don’t want to control the host, or lay eggs or anything at all, they’re just along for the ride. They don't grow or die. They just… observe.”
“That’s slightly horrifying. What does that have to do with me surviving?”
“Simple. The xcyntylites main objective is survival, so when it or its host is under threat it hibernates, or plays dead. It almost completely shuts down all systems, breathing, circulation, everything. If I wasn’t me, you would’ve woken up there.”
“So, hold on. There's an alien-”
“A teeny tiny one.” The Doctor interrupted, his focus not moving from the flowers he had picked.
“Yes, right, a teeny tiny alien living inside me, and it’s not going to try anything funny, it just wants a safe place and a tour guide?”
“Simply put, yes! They’re fascinating little creatures and they're cute, too. If you have the opportunity to see one under a microscope then you’ll see they have these extra teeny tiny googly eyes on stalks, like a snail, like a really cute snail. And they really do love the little tours they go on, so they live for ages. Absolutely iron clad immune system.”
“This is so weird. And I've seen a blowfish joyriding a sports car.”
“Oh, I love those guys! Here for a good time, not a long time.”
Ianto didn’t respond. For every part of this that was real, there was so much that wasn’t, that couldn’t possibly be. It was so much information, and it was just the wrong side of ridiculous.
The Doctor handed off the flower crown he had made to a little girl running past them – she didn’t even glance at the Tardis – and stood, brushing grass from his trousers. “Why don't you go and get some rest, process and what not. I can answer any questions you have later. I’ll get some food. Fish fingers and custard? That always makes me feel better.”
“I’ve had enough shocks for one day, thank you. I’ll be alright – not really hungry.” He accepted the Doctor’s extended hand and straightened his tie, “Where exactly is my room?”
“Straight back down the corridor, oh, no that’s gone. Hm. If you ask nicely, hopefully the door will appear somewhere helpful.”
“Right you are.” Ianto walked back into the Tardis and looked around again. It looked almost exactly the same as when he had left, except one of the corridors was more brightly lit than the rest. It seemed as good a place to start as any. The lamp was swinging by his side, the wire dragging along the floor. It was a short corridor, just one door at the end instead of the gradient there had been before, which, thankfully, led straight into his room.
He did have a rest. A rather long rest that definitely wasn’t a nap because he was an adult and didn’t take naps. When he was finished resting (not napping), he had the worst headache known to man, alien, and everything in between. It was a lot to process and now that he knew there was an alien inside him, he couldn’t shake the feeling that it was crawling around. Did it crawl? Would it move around trying to get a better look at its surroundings, or did it live inside his eye?
And what about Jack? And Gwen? Where were they now? Presumably they were both alive, that probably would’ve come up, but were they safe, happy? What about Gwen’s child?
All semblance of rest was quickly disappearing, all he could think about were the questions he had, and there were a lot of them. But the Doctor seemed like the type to have all the answers and only be slightly insufferable about it, so off he went once again, this time without the lamp.
The Doctor was back under the control tower, so Ianto walked quietly. Part of him didn’t want to disturb the doctor, he was nothing if not courteous, but the other part wanted to watch him, to try and work out what made him so special to Jack.
The sound of metal on metal grew louder with each passing second, along with what Ianto could only assume was some very colourful swearing in an alien tongue.
“Yowzah! Ianto, come and have a look at this!”
So much for stealth. He descended the slope, spiralling inwards until he stood beside an opening, looking down on the doctor, who was sitting on a swing, and wearing huge, steampunk-esque goggles. This man could not be real.
“It looks very impressive, Doctor.” Ianto smiled politely, the same way he would smile at Tosh when she was explaining something way beyond his technical knowledge.
“It does, doesn’t it? She’s not been listening to me, so I thought I'd give the old ears a clean. She’s probably just being stubborn, but it might get me back on her good side.”
Ianto sat at the bottom of the slope. “Definitely worth a try.”
“Now, which question do you want to start with?” The doctor said, still tinkering away, swinging gently back and forth.
He wanted to start with the Tardis, outer space and time travel. He didn’t feel like it was the time to satisfy his curiosity. He needed to be practical. “What happened to the 456?”
“I still don’t think that’s my story to tell, but I will say that it’s gone and no children were sent off with it. Torchwood saved the world. Again. You are rather good at that, aren’t you?”
“It’s a team effort. Am I immortal?”
“Not exactly. Xcyntylites don’t normally take human vessels, so there isn’t much to go on but like I said, it loves sight seeing, so you probably won’t get ill, and most wounds will probably heal quickly, but I wouldn’t go testing the limits.”
Ianto isn’t sure what he wanted to hear, but that would do. Immortality wouldn’t have suited him, he would get bored eventually, bouncing from country to country. The only way immortality would suit him was if he could have a companion, much like the Doctor did. He wouldn’t want just anyone, though. Of course he wouldn’t. He probably wouldn’t get what he wanted.
“Where’s Jack?”
The Doctor paused, only for a second, and then carried on using a wrench to hammer two wires together. “Pass.”
“What do you mean ‘pass’?”
“I mean I can't answer that. I don't know exactly.” The Doctor waved the wrench around in a way that said ‘it’s too wibbly-wobbly to explain’.
Ianto swallowed roughly. “Is he alive?”
“Last I heard.”
That's a start, Ianto admitted begrudgingly, pointedly ignoring the pitying eyes behind stupid goggles.
“What about Gwen?”
“Alive, well. Beautiful little girl, Anwen. Rhys is doing well too. I think you’d like what they’ve been building.” He had this glint in his eye, one that said he knew something Ianto didn’t, and that he knew he was right. Which was probably true – him and Jack must’ve been quite a pair. Smug bastards.
“Are you going to tell me what that is?”
“What do you think?”
“I think it’s not for you to tell.”
The doctor tapped his nose and sprung to his feet.
“Are you ready, then?!” He laughed, jumping over Ianto.
“Oh god, you're not going to fly this thing are you?”
“What? No. Don’t be absurd.” He practically skipped over to the door and flung it open. The sun had started to set now, the Tardis casting a long shadow, almost a path, right back into Ianto’s life. “Are you ready to go back?”
He hadn’t really thought that far ahead but, at the suggestion, he could feel it settling over him, familiar and warm, new and exciting. “I think so. No, wait. My sister.”
“Still at the same address. Children and husband in one piece. I can drop you there if you want.”
“No, thank you. I think the walk will be good.”
He took one step, then another, half expecting the floor to collapse out from under him.
“Ianto.” The doctor called, just before he stepped out from the Tardis’ shadow, “For all intents and purposes, you were dead. Your family mourned you, your life as you knew it is over. Right now you are walking into a new life. Use it wisely.” He adjusted his bowtie and stood a little taller. “Or don’t. It is your life, after all.”