| Date: 6 January 2008
Characters: Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness Location: hotel lobby Link to IJ: thread #26701 |
 Ianto left Owen to his own devices for the moment, despite his concern, focused more on finding someone who might be able to clarify a bit of the conversation. Was it possible to send someone into this place?
He stopped at one of the shops first, for a biro and paper, the encryption taking a moment as he wrote the report, but he couldn't risk this more than he already was by committing it to paper. This report had to be sent when he returned, he could not take the time to write it or type it once he stepped back through that door. Scan it and fax it to the Master, especially if he found it was possible. Folding the report carefully, he tucked it into the pocket of his waistcoat. Now, all he had to do was find out the rest of the information. He chose a seat in the hotel lounge where he had a decent view of the lobby as well, and settled down to wait. He had an idea of who to look for - the Master, or the Doctor, or Jack - but he wasn't certain who he'd run across first. He ignored the one Jack, noting peripherally that he was dealing with Owen, waiting for the next person whose face was familiar to cross his path. |
 Life was, for once, going pretty well for Captain Jack Harkness. He was still immortal, but at least he knew why, and for now, didn't object in the least. Still hadn't seen any of his team, but he was pretty comfortable in the theory that he'd get back to them at the time he left, and if any of them were here, he was pretty sure they could take care of themselves.
Which made the sight of Owen curled on a couch in the lobby more than a little disturbing, even with a very familiar man crouched next to him. And then Ianto, at least, apparently Ianto, across the other side of the lobby. Two versions, he reminded himself silently, and approached carefully. From appearance, Ianto was fine, and a quick greeting and then he could find out what the hell was wrong with Owen and what he could do about it. |
| Ianto watched Jack as he crossed the lobby, carefully keeping his hands on the table. "Jack," he said quietly, once he'd come within speaking distance. "Can we talk?" |
| So maybe not fine. Jack paused, slid hands into his pockets, and looked at Ianto. Never could read the man. Which was, of course, why he'd hired Ianto in the first place. To make use of that inscrutability, and to try and crack through it.
"Never a promising start," he commented. |
| Ianto shrugged. "Perhaps not." He glanced sideways towards where Owen sat, before looking back at Jack. "Do you think it's possible that all of us have been sent here?" He injected a slightly concerned tone into the question, and let a hint of skepticism show on his face. Concerned, but unconvinced. |
| Not exactly the kind of greeting Jack would expect from any member of his team seeing him in this place for the first time, and it set his hackles up instinctively. "Lot of things are possible, Ianto Jones. Feeling lonely?" |
| "Not exactly." Ianto fiddled with his tie a moment, straightening it and smoothing it. "A little concerned for Owen." He nodded towards the couch where Owen and another Jack were. "And curious. Just trying to figure out how we get here the first time. I'm a bit at a loss for that at the moment." |
| "Not so concerned for Owen that you're over there with him." Jack might have been a lot of things, but stupid definitely wasn't one of them. "The first time? How many times have you been here?" |
| "Eight." Ianto shrugged. "The first time it took me a week to find the way back out. It's easier after that. But I still don't know how I got here the first time. It wasn't a door that time. At least, not a door that was where no door should be. But I don't know how other people got here, or how they get back. If they do it consciously or not. Especially that first time." He studied Jack a moment. "How did you get here? To this isolated dimension?" |
| Eight. Which meant that either Ianto back in his dimension and team was better at keeping secrets than Jack had previously suspected, or that this Ianto was a different version of Ianto.
"I was in a club," he offered. "Following up on Tosh's reports, met a guy who'd dropped through from somewhere else, when we got out, it was here." And no chance that he'd be letting on how long he'd been there or that he'd not found a way back until he knew more about Ianto. |
| "Through a door," Ianto murmured. "Most people appear to have arrived through a door. Why that particular interface?"
At least, most that he'd talked to, and had mentioned how they'd arrived had come through a door. He didn't respond to the information about Jack's reality, though he filed it away for later addition to the archive file. Not the Jack from his reality, certainly. |
| "Oh, come on, Ianto, you know that one. How long have you worked for Torchwood, and you've still not figured out psychic perception filters?" |
| "They are why the Doctor's TARDIS is generally overlooked, and why the Cardiff Hub has an invisible lift. Ineffective on cameras, and the door never appears on any of the video archive when I know it has been there." Ianto gave Jack an irritable look. "I understand it makes a reasonably consistant interface, but it's not fully consistant. There are those who were traveling, and other methods of bringing them there were employed. It doesn't fit." |
| Jack sighed. "Think, Ianto. You've got a good brain, use it! Human psychology, you're transiting from one environment to another, the door is the most common and widely recognised portal - so whatever it is, your mind is going to present it as a door. It's how it can project into your dimension - it's got to obey the rules of your reality." Whatever it was.
He ignored the others. For those who didn't come through a door, he was willing to bet that it was a familiar portal. TARDIS or otherwise. |
| "Yes, but what is 'it'?" Really the question that was bothering Ianto, even if he took a roundabout way to get to it.
"Why the particular people who are here, from the timelines they're from? Why the particular points in time that they're taken from? Are they really taken, or are they sent, or do they come here knowingly? There's no connecting factor between all of them." He paused, considering. "Connecting a number of them, yes, but not all of them. And you're the most common connecting factor. The Doctor, as well, I suspect." |
| "Hey, I know I'm multiple," and he couldn't stop the automatic association his mind made with orgasms, "but I'm pretty sure there are more connections to the Doctor here than to me."
Avoiding the subject of 'it', because he really didn't have a clue. |
| "Yes, but he doesn't connect all of them. Lisa... I don't think she knew the Doctor." Ianto pressed his lips together, thinking of how he'd run into the varient of his girlfriend who was here. He really hoped she hadn't returned to where and when she came from.
"Though she's the only one I've met who I'm not certain knows the Doctor. And I have met another version of you already, sir." He straightened his jacket again, not particularly inclined to share the details of that. "The connection doesn't give much insight into why the particular people, why the points on their timelines, and the particular realities that they come from." He sighed softly, looking up at Jack, his face tilted slightly down. "It's all very frustrating for me, sir. To have some of the pieces, but not all of them." Because he was used to being the one with the whole puzzle, holding pieces back from those looking for them. That was what he did: Torchwood Archivist, the one everyone went to for information on aliens and alien technology. |
| "Lisa?" The name was unfamiliar, and so was the look in Ianto's eyes. At least, unfamiliar in Ianto's eyes. He'd seen it in others over the years, and it wasn't one he was pleased to see.
Ianto's behaviour wasn't consistent, and that was setting off all sorts of alarm bells. The flashes of the sharp intellect that Jack knew that Ianto had, and mostly kept hidden, combined with the submissive show. Fiddling, and body language, and Jack would have bet three deaths that the body language was as carefully calculated as the theories of connection. "Who's Lisa?" |