Are You Coming or Not?

[Jelloicious]

Because I miss miss miss Torchwood, before they killed it.

*********

Jack pressed the base of his palm firmly against the bridge of his nose, but the sneeze came anyway.  HCK-shhhhh...

He didn’t really think too much of it.  More than 100 years on this planet had given him ample experience (and immunity) to most bugs circulating here.  He hardly ever fell ill. But an under-utilized immune system does get bored now and then, and he’d come to expect the odd bout of hay fever, and the occasional reaction to something Owen cultivated in the hot house.  He assumed this was, as it was November, the latter.  HTCH-shhhhh!

So it was when the rift alarm sounded, he sighed happily at the prospect of relief from whatever alien irritant might be wafting about the hub, grabbed his coat and kit and headed for whatever awaited with a tiny bit of spring in his step. 

The Cardiff weather was chill and damp, which is a fair description of the weather most days of late.  The rift was unpredictable and unforgiving (which was a fair description of the rift, most days of late, too), but Jack positively thrived on adrenaline, and 3 straight hours of alien wrangling was, for him, just a warm up.  The three hours of damage control and clean up, Torchwood style, were somewhat more tedious, and the early morning damp had worked itself up into a slow, cold and persistent rain that soaked Jack’s hair and trickled down the back of his neck, chilling him to the bone.  He began to think fondly of a return to the hub.  ihhhhHITChhhh! HahShuhhh!  HTCH-shhhhh!! He sneezed harshly into a crumpled, sodden paper napkin, and considered the possibility that he might actually be starting his first head-cold of the new millennium.

By mid afternoon, three weevils, two rift spikes and one mildly radioactive alien weather balloon later, he was quite sure of it, but he did his best to keep that to himself, as he barked orders through his com, careful to close the channel before giving himself away by sneezing.  The rift was on something of a roll and at the current rate, it did not appear likely that they would see the inside of the Hub again before dusk.   He was rather proud of himself that he had so far been able to hide the fact that he was not at his best. To be fair, the team was well and truly preoccupied with the job, the rain, and rift.  Then again, Ianto was back at the hub coordinating.  He was less sure he could get one by on Ianto.

It was nearly half-seven by the time Jack, Gwen, Owen and Tosh, made it back to the hub, grumbling, sodden and chilled and exhausted as they squelched wetly through the cogwheel door.  Ianto greeted his team with mugs of hot coffee and with surprisingly welcome tray of warm towels.  Jack buried his head gratefully in the fluffy warmth, and could have hugged Ianto on the spot.  Instead he dismissed the team to go home as he scrubbed at his damp hair, wrangling Tosh away from her work station over her protests that, she just wanted to check on the progress of a calculation that had been running in her absence.  Gwen and Owen did not need to be told twice.  Jack wearily dragged himself up to his office as Ianto methodically and efficiently ran through the protocols to shut down the hub for the night.

Jack dropped into the chair behind his desk, thinking vaguely that he should have hung up his coat, and wondering where he left his coffee down in the central hub.  He wondered if it would be cold by the time he worked up the wherewithal to go back down in collect it.  He tried to remember the last time he’d had a head cold and whether it had been this draining and his head this fuzzy.

The cogwheel alarm dropped into silence as the last of his team left, and Jack scrubbed at his face with the towel, no longer warm and now somewhat damp.  He felt the sneezes building, as he wondered where Ianto kept the stock of tissues, as a quick check of his desk drawers revealed none.   ihhhhHITChhhh, He sneezed wetly into the towel, which he supposed would serve the job, and in the privacy of the empty hub, allowed the sneezes to just come.  hahhh-AShuhhhh! Hahh… Hahhh-ACHShuhhhh!!

“Bless,” came Ianto’s warm baritone, startling Jack.  Ihhhhhschhh!  He’d been sure the whole team left.  Ianto chuckled softly at Jack’s surprise, as he gently set a tray with two steaming mugs and a stack of soft linen handkerchiefs down on Jack’s desk.  Jack accepted the warm mug Ianto pressed into his hands, and said pointedly, almost accusingly, “I thought you left with the others.  I thought I told you all to stand down”.

Ianto shrugged.  “You look rather like you should stand down, too, Jack.  Thought you could use some tea, and something a little gentler on your nose.”  Ianto cocked his head slightly, and continued, “Looks like you could also use some assistance in changing into something warm and dry.”

Jack scowled, passing on the opening Ianto left him.  Ianto was right, of course.   Jack cupped his hands around the mug, willing the warmth into his still chilled body.—he hated being ill.  He took a cautious sip, winced as it burned down the back of his throat and then sighed deeply as it left a warm, soothing trail all the way down.  Tea.  With Lemon.  And Honey.  And…whiskey?  He took a deeper swallow and felt the warmth seeping through him. 

Ianto placed his own mug on the desk.  “Come with me.  The hub is a miserable place to be ill and alone”.

“I’m fine,” Jack started to protest, was interrupted by another sneeze, this time into a soft handkerchief.  He sniffed heavily, sneezed again and blew his nose.  The soft cloth felt heavenly on his nose.

“I can see that,” Ianto responded with a lifted eyebrow.  The corner of his mouth absolutely did not quirk at all.

Jack cleared his throat and tried again.  “I’m fine, Ianto, it’s just a head cold”.  Ianto rolled his eyes.  “You’re NOT fine.  You’re ill and miserable and have spent the past 12 hours in the field in the cold and damp,  and a camp bed in a concrete bunker is no place to be.  You’re sitting here in wet clothes instead of warm dry pajamas and… do you even own pajamas?  Come home with me.  You’ll be warm and dry, instead of chilled, miserable and alone.”

To say Jack was tempted would have been an understatement.  It sounded nice; it really did.  It sounded heavenly…but, “I don’t want you to catch my cold” Jack said, shaking his head, resolutely foreclosing the option.  He folded a handkerchief over, in preparation for the next sneezes he could feel building.

Ianto rolled his eyes.  “Right, because you alone would be the reason I would possibly ever catch a cold in November in Cardiff”.   Ianto reached over, took Jack’s hand and pulled him firmly in for a kiss.  Jack made to push Ianto away but was off-balance and Ianto was warm and strong and suddenly Jack was kissing him back, without ever having intended to.  Ianto tasted deliciously of the whiskey he’d added to the tea and…Jack pulled back suddenly and just barely managed to direct a mighty sneeze over Ianto’s shoulder. HaaCHShhhhhhhoooo!!! Jack was mortified.

 “There,” Ianto laughed.  “Doesn’t matter now, does it?  You coming or not?”

 

[AngelEyes]

Squeeeee!!!!!! Torchwood!!!!!!! I love it!!!!!!! I am massively obsessed with them at the moment. Jack and Ianto are the best! This is great!

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

He sneezed harshly into a crumpled, sodden paper napkin, and considered the possibility that he might actually be starting his first head-cold of the new millennium.

Oh dear.

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

He was less sure he could get one by on Ianto.

Probably not.

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

Ianto cocked his head slightly, and continued, “Looks like you could also use some assistance in changing into something warm and dry.”

Oh Ianto...

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

Jack scowled, passing on the opening Ianto left him. 

He must not be feeling good. That's not like him!

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

“I can see that,” Ianto responded with a lifted eyebrow.  The corner of his mouth absolutely did not quirk at all.

LOL. I can totally see his look.

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

You’re sitting here in wet clothes instead of warm dry pajamas and… do you even own pajamas?

Probably not, he sleeps naked!

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

Jack made to push Ianto away but was off-balance and Ianto was warm and strong and suddenly Jack was kissing him back, without ever having intended to.

He's kind of irresistible.

 

9 hours ago, Jelloicious said:

 “There,” Ianto laughed.  “Doesn’t matter now, does it?  You coming or not?”

LOL. Way to take control Ianto!

I'd love to read more!!!!

[2SHY222]

Torchwood 😱😍 this is heaven! Please write more💕

[Jelloicious]

Thanks, guys!   That's all I've got for this one.   Just missing these guys.  Nice to know other people still do, too.  Wish there were more Torchwood stories out there.