Late Night Loss Chapter 25

[galadriel1010]

“Mrs Dashwood!” John swept towards a well dressed lady who appeared to be directing the servants in laying out pastries, cakes and tea and coffee urns in preparation for the meeting. The central hub of Jurisfiction operations was the ballroom at Norwood Park, a beautiful and elegant room cluttered with heavy dark wood desks, comfortable sofas, book cases and generally books everywhere. It actually looked much like a Restoration styled version of most of the offices at Torchwood London, where Jasmine’s open-plan designs left everyone free to work pretty much where they liked, to the extent that two of her girls were invariably found sitting on their desks and the youngest member of the team worked from the top of a filing cabinet. It seemed to work here as well as it did there; there was a sense of bustle and productivity and at the same time relaxation.

Mrs Dashwood looked up in surprise as John, ever more confident and outgoing and with a rapidly thickening American accent, bore down on her an bent low to kiss one of her hands, treating her to his first truly Jack grin, “Mrs Dashwood it is a pleasure to see you, I do hope we are not late?”

Gareth rolled his eyes sympathetically at the amused and slightly stunned woman and she smiled back at him warmly, “No dear, you are not late. Although I notice that there are rather more of you than I expected.”

“One of you is more than I expected.” A voice grated from behind them and they looked around into the eyes of PC Andy Davidson, but a clearly fictional version of him, “I heard you’d got into trouble with Big Tony John, I was just about to report your demise to Jurisfiction and hope I could get one who can stick to the plot this time. Unless these are your replacements?”

Ianto stopped Jack from stepping into the altercation so that they could let Gareth and John deal with it, John was fuming and placed himself between his lover and the man he was supposed to be with, the man he was written to be with, the man he had never wanted anything to do with. “It’s got nothing to do with you. As long as I can pretend to love you for the first three chapters then anything we do in the back-story, anything we do here doesn’t matter. And unless we get a plot, none of it will matter anyway.”

Andy’s jaw clenched, “I’m going to talk to Thursday about this, you don’t care about the plot, you don’t care about anything but yourselves.”

“We care about each other.” Gareth corrected him, “Something we wouldn’t expect you to understand.” He’d stepped forwards to take John’s hand and they faced the other man shoulder to shoulder. Jack and Ianto couldn’t see their expressions, but from the familiar tensions they could tell that they were scared of something.

The man glared at them a moment longer before turning on his heel and stalking off. Mrs Dashwood had disappeared rapidly, probably to get someone to smooth things over, and the two couples were alone in the antechamber. John sighed as he turned around, “It’s…”

“This is getting ridiculous.” Gareth burst out, “They can’t keep replacing us because of the way we’re written, not when we’re unpublished. The book’s only been in progress for a year and we’re the fourth set of John and Gareth’s there’s been.”

”What do you mean?”

He growled, but at the situation, not at Jack who had asked the question, “We’re written to be in love with each other eventually, we know that and we know that we want to be together. Hell, we’re in love form the start, but we have to pretend we’re not for the first few chapters. After that we can be together as Jack and Ianto, but not as Gareth and John and then by the end of the book we can be together in every way. But outside the plot, it doesn’t matter what we do, but three times our characters have tried to change it so that they can be together from the start, and they’ve been replaced and separated. And we couldn’t stand if that happened to us, so we put up with it and shut up, but Andy’s starting to insist that John be with him in the back story as well as when the plot’s on them.”

“He hasn’t got a leg to stand on guys, don’t worry.” Thursday’s voice drifted across the room to them as her footsteps echoed of the intricately decorated walls, “As you say, you’re unpublished and soon it won’t matter.” There was a hint of warning and sadness in her tone, but she moved on from the topic and approached Jack with a smile, “Glad to see you made it Jack, and this must be Ianto?” She greeted them both with a handshake, “You’ve had an interesting trip I understand?”

“Very.” He laughed, wrapping an arm around Ianto’s shoulders, “Ianto, meet Thursday Next. Thursday, my partner, Ianto Jones.”

”I would never have guessed.” She smirked, “You coming to the Jurisfiction meeting? We’ll be considering your apprenticeships by the way guys.” The last comment was directed at John and Gareth, “I have it on good authority that it will be approved though.”

They grinned at her in relief, “Thanks Thurs. We… Oh you know.”

“Yeah, I know. We’ll sort something. No matter what happens I’m not going to let you be split up again.” She took a deep breath, “God, I’m getting sentimental in my old age. Come on, let’s get this meeting started.”

It droned on, and on, and on, about matters that went straight over Jack’s head most of the time. He and Ianto had resorted to spotting their favourite characters around the room and were currently trying to decide if that really was Mrs Tiggy-Winkle. They knew it was, but it didn’t stop them arguing the point. Finally a prod from John brought them back to the point in hand, “Item twenty seven, I’ve been asked by Thursday to bring this up especially. It’s a current work in progress that is posing serious problems at the moment, but apparently shows great potential. Now she, and some of its occupants, believes that it can only be saved by a major reworking.” John and Gareth’s faces paled, they hadn’t really let themselves believe that the case was so desperate. “Now, Thursday, what are your proposals?”

She stood up and her voice rang out clearly, “I propose an internal reworking. No outside influence, apart from that they request.” She spared Jack and Ianto a smile, “I believe they have the best possible help to make this a successful novel and provide us with at least two, if not a whole team of extremely able Jurisfiction agents.”

“All in favour of that proposal?” It was simple and required little intervention, so it was passed almost unanimously. “OK, Thursday, you’re nominally in charge. Good luck. Next item, related, proposed apprenticeships of John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd, from the book in discussion. Proposer for John?” Thursday raised her hand, “Good, and seconder?”

“Here old chap.” It was Commander Bradshaw

“Excellent references there John, welcome to the team, you’ll be apprenticed to Miss Next. And for Gareth, same again?” The Commander and Thursday nodded their assent and the Bellman rang his bell with a note of finality, “That’s sorted then, and you’re OK to take them both on as apprentices Thursday?”

“It would be a pleasure.” She grinned across at them

“Any objections?” Andy made a move to raise his hand, but seemed to think better of it when no one else did. He scowled at them as the Bellmaker smiled a greeting at them, “In that case, would everyone please welcome the two newest members of our team, John Barrowman and Gareth David-Lloyd, and best of luck to the pair of you in getting your novel sorted out.”

“Next, item twenty-nine. The National Novel Writing Problem, affectionately termed NaNoWriPro. Once a year, several hundred thousand people all descend on their computers and start novels, most of which end up not fully developed and very, very few end up moving up to the Library proper. Now, the number of novels being constructed at this time of year is getting to the stage, in fact has reached the stage, where we cannot sustain it all at one time. Any proposals?”

“Construct through the year and keep them in storage?” Someone suggested, “Deliver as plot bunnies in advance.”

“That’s one good idea, but we still need more builders. St Tabitha’s constructors course has just produced its first graduates, but there aren’t enough generics taking the course. Can we ask minor characters to do apprenticeships in plot building?”

The matter was approved, the next was set aside for future discussion, and so the meeting went on. Jack had zoned out completely by the time John grabbed his arse to get his attention. “You were miles away.” He laughed

“Yeah, just a bit. Do that again and you will get jumped by the way.”

“You think I’ll complain?”

They both glared at Ianto and Gareth, who had burst out laughing, “OK, so we think the same, we look the same…”

“I just want to find out if he shags as well as you.” Ianto commented

The conversation was stalled by Thursday’s arrival, “Come on guys, we’ve got a plot to reconstruct, remember?”

Two days later:

Noise and light blared from one of Cardiff’s many nightclubs as the figures ran through the door. One of them stopped by the door, calling out in an American accent, “Get back all of you.” Shots rang out down the street and most of the revellers were eager to follow his orders.

One of the bouncers stopped him with a hand and a glare, “What do you think you’re playing at?”

Captain Jack Harkness was in no mood to argue, “Chasing a weevil. Tall thing, leather skin, sharp teeth, really bad dress sense.” He said the last thing as if it was the most important, but as if it had only just occurred to him, or was confusing him.

“The heck are you?”

“Captain Jack Harkness, Torchwood.”

“Gwen Cooper,” a woman approached putting something in her back pocket, “We catch aliens.”

“Ianto Jones,” said a second man, dressed inexplicably in a suit, “And we need to catch this one before…” he broke off and stared in the direction of the screaming that had just started.

The woman set off running with the others close behind, “Over there, by the fire exit, come on!”

The American called out over the screaming of the crowd, simultaneously trying to elbow his way through the crowd to the weevil and get them away from it. He was in the lead as they burst through the fire exit, looking both ways down the street, trying to find the escaped alien when his phone rang, “You two carry on.” He called to Gwen and Ianto, acknowledging their replies with a nod as he answered the phone, “Hello?”

By the bar, two men sipped their drinks and smiled to themselves as their protégés launched into their first story; a true story, but not one that anyone would believe. Well hopefully anyway.

They finished their drinks in the peace and quiet, enjoying each other’s company in a familiar place, unable to deny their longing for home. It was time to leave. Before very long the team slipped back into the club and got themselves drinks, toasting a successful start to the novel whilst Gareth, now Ianto, ordered the flights on his PDA. “You’re off then?” John/Jack asked with a smile

Jack nodded sadly, “Yeah, we have to get back to our Cardiff. Our team are waiting for us.”

“We are your team.” Gareth pointed out

“One of them.” Jack put his glass down and stood up, Ianto following him. The others followed too and no one seemed very surprised when he pulled Gareth close and kissed him gently, “But not the same.” He did the same with John, who groaned into the kiss and laughed, “A man after my own heart. Look after him John.”

“And you.”

Jack nodded and took Ianto’s hand, pulling out the sheet he’d written so long ago that it seemed like a dream. “It’s time to go home.”

“The Hub was never silent; computers whirred and beeped constantly, watching over the world from this underground base in Cardiff, and water dripped in the base. On the upper level, glass walls separated Jack’s office, the hot house and the boardroom from the main Hub. Vegetation pressed against the walls of the hot house, shielding it from prying eyes, a fact that he and Ianto had used to their advantage on more than one occasion. His office was more open, but still offered some security and sanctuary when they wanted to be alone together. The boardroom was completely exposed, sheet glass all the way from floor to ceiling with the Torchwood logo printed in the centre.

Metal railings ran around he edge of the walkway connecting the three upper rooms and the small kitchenette, set back into the very structure of the Hub, and ran on, almost meeting but not quite. On the lower level, the huge, metal pillar and its water filled basin formed the focus, with the Rift manipulator attached. Around it stood workstations with computers humming to themselves, papers in various states of disorder and photos of family and friends dotted around. The cog door was sealed half a level below the workstations, its lights and sirens inactive and half a level above the stations the lift was at its lower position.

At the far side of the Hub, two sets of stairs descended. One led to the autopsy bay where the table was clear and sterile and the instruments were set tidily aside. The drawers were all closed and neatly labelled, those little paper ones that slipped out and back in whenever they needed to be changed, which was frequently.

The other set of stairs led to the lower levels, the archives, laboratories and cells of the centuries old organisation. The vaulted brickwork passages stretched for miles under Cardiff bay, full in places of records and in other places completely empty, just echoing, echoing tunnels.”

The looked around and hugged each other tightly, they were home.