Late Night Loss Chapter 4

[galadriel1010]

Ianto couldn’t sleep. It wasn’t because he had unresolved issues, or because he was scared of having nightmares or anything like that; it never would be as long as he had Jack. It was caffeine, pure and simple. After a quiet day and many, many cups of introductory coffee with Mickey, then that last cup before bed, sleep was a long way out of reach tonight.

The young man squirmed slightly and swore silently to himself. He’d stayed still for as long as he could to avoid waking Jack, but the other problem with the amount he’d drunk was that, eventually, it had to work its way through his system.

He managed to pull away, extricating his arm gingerly, without waking his lover. Jack still didn’t sleep regularly, and he had been able to tell during the last couple of days that he hadn’t slept for a while, choosing instead to watch Ianto sleep, or watch the stars, or do whatever it was he did when Ianto dozed awake to find him not in the bedroom. The young man enjoyed the opportunity to watch his lover sleeping, a rare chance, slight laughter lines around his eyes showed a life he’d enjoyed to the full before becoming unchanging, whilst his face was blessedly clear of the troubled, worried look that Torchwood burdened him with.

Ianto padded silently around the house, going from the bathroom down to the kitchen. He went in the freezer and retrieved the ice cream, stealing a cheeky spoonful before putting it back and suppressing a swear word as the cold hit a particularly sensitive tooth. Back in the bedroom he grabbed his copy of Lord of the Rings from the bookcase and crawled back into the warm bed with Jack. Still fast asleep, the captain moaned and rolled over closer to him, reversing their earlier positions with Jack’s head on Ianto’s stomach and his arm holding tightly onto the young man.

Butterflies fluttered in Ianto’s stomach as he leant back against the headboard and ran his fingers through Jack’s soft, still slightly damp hair. After a couple of minutes of just watching Jack sleep he reached for his book and delved into a tale of elves and wizards, wizards and hobbits in an attempt to get off to sleep.

Jack woke up and was surprised to find himself alone in the bed. He stretched and his fingers brushed against a book beside him. Picking it up he scanned the cover and slipped a bookmark into the right page, surprised that Ianto had left it out, although that probably meant that he wouldn’t be gone long. He put it on the table by Ianto’s side of the bed and flopped back, spreading his arms wide to fill the whole bed.

When ten minutes had passed and his lover still hadn’t returned he hauled himself out of bed and pulled on a pair of trousers to look for him. He shoved his hands in his pockets, instinctively using his years of Torchwood training to clear all the rooms on the first floor before moving to the more obvious locations on the ground floor. When Ianto wasn’t in the kitchen he started to worry, but kept a lid on it. When he wasn’t in any other room and his car keys and shoes were still in the hall he was really panicking. He rushed through the house again, calling out for Ianto, but he knew that he wasn’t there. There was only one person in this house, and that scared him. He took deep breaths, trying to calm himself so that he could think straight, but it wasn’t working. Ianto was missing, he hadn’t left the house but he wasn’t in it. It made no sense, nothing made any sense at the moment. He needed Ianto, he needed…

Finally, realising that he was going into shock and needed help, he reached for his phone and dialled on instinct.

Roughly five thousand miles away, and two hours earlier, Greg Sanders and Jasmine Donovan were in the break room of the Las Vegas Police Department, drinking coffee and praying for their second shift of the night to end. No such luck however, “Jasmine, there’s a scene that they think is a bit… Up your street. Take Greg, you’ll both like the lack of paperwork I suspect.” With that, Grissom vanished again, leaving the two CSIs watching each other resignedly

“Just because we don’t create paperwork for him…” Jazz rolled her eyes, “God, I sound like Ianto. Come on, you get to watch my backside again I guess.”

“You mean watch your back?” He asked, draining the last of his coffee and putting it on the side as he followed her out the door.

“I mean exactly what I said.”

Before very long they were staring in confusion at a blowfish with a bullet hole in his head. Jazz tilted her head on one side and sighed sadly, “They tend to be nice guys when you get to know them, they just always pick the wrong crowd. Normal procedure Greg, we’ll just send the information to Liberty Towers instead.”

“Yeah.” He was clearly ignoring her, “Jazz, take a look at the windowsill.”

She flicked her torch beam up to meet his automatically and frowned, “Footprints. In or out.” Crossing the room gingerly she checked the print, “Out.” After dusting for prints she pulled the window open and leaned out, looking both ways along the roof.

“I’ll do the room shall I?” Greg asked with a wry smile. Jasmine had been with them for a couple of months now, ever since aliens started turning up in Vegas, and was working partly as a CSI and partly as an alien investigator under both the Torchwood and Liberty Towers banners. The alien part of her job often meant that she had to drop the CSI part at a moment’s notice, but Grissom put up with it because she was the only person with CSI training prepared to take on the Weevils that had landed on their doorstep recently.

She was a laugh, taking over a lab all to herself for her ‘weird shit’ and blasting her music at a level to rival the level Greg’s had once been. Her apartment was as kooky and as comfy as she was and the door, as long as she was in, was always open.

Right now, however, she was leaning out of the window and her attention had clearly been caught by something, “Jazz, be careful. If you die you’ll contaminate the crime scene.”

She ignored him, “There’s someone out there, I’ll be right back.” And before he could stop her she’d swung herself out, grabbing the edge of the roof to pull herself up.

“Jasmine!” He swore and went to the window, searching around until he found her padding along the apex of the roof, “Jasmine!”

Suddenly she was moving faster, pulling her gun out and haring off in pursuit of a dark shadow. He swore silently as he realised that he’d inadvertently alerted whoever she was chasing and debated what to do for a moment, eventually settling on finishing with the scene.

Jasmine dropped and rolled as he threw the gun at her, now empty, and bagged it, suppressing a laugh at the CSI instinct. “Look, you’ve thrown your weapon at me, now will you please stop? I have better places to be than a windy rooftop in Vegas.” He looked scared, just a kid (compared to her at least) and she had him trapped between the edge of the roof and safety. He shook his head wildly. “Oh come on, give us both a break. I just want to talk to you, and get you to stop shooting at me would be nice too, but I’m fairly easy on that one. I want to find out how the alien ended up here.”

“I don’t know!” He yelled desperately

The officer sighed and put her hands on her hips, “Come down! It’s bloody freezing up here.” As soon as he was close enough she cuffed him and guided him with firm but gentle hands, replacing the balance he’d lost with his arms out of action.

Her phone rang as she pulled him up onto a higher roof with access to the building and she swore, pulling it out of her back pocket with one hand and flipping it open, “Donovan, on a rooftop.” She shot a warning glare at the kid in front of her, whose name she had learned was Paul.

“Jazz?”

Her heart froze when she heard Jack’s tone, he sounded distraught about something, “Jack, what’s the matter? Do you need me back?”

“It’s Ianto…” God please no, “He’s gone… I don’t know, he’s missing. He’s not in the house but he’s not left it.”

“OK.” She switched into Torchwood mode instantly and nudged Paul towards the door less gently than before, “Get to the Hub, I’ll meet you there as soon as I can, we’ll get the whole team on it. We’ll find him Jack.”

“I know.” He whispered, “God Jazz, I’m so scared.”

“I know. I’ll see you as soon as. Get to the Hub, set the scans running, and keep your mind occupied until someone’s there with you, yeah?” As soon as Jack had given her his promise she was flying, sending off an alert to the Cardiff Torchwood family to get them all to the Hub, one to Liberty Towers informing them that a suspect would be at the Las Vegas Crime Lab for their questioning (not giving them too much information, she didn’t want to make life too easy for them) and one to her errant boyfriend, telling him to drag himself out of whichever casino he was in and take her home.

Greg noticed the difference in her posture and attitude immediately. She wasn’t any more professional, but less relaxed, closer to tears. “Hey, you OK?” he asked gently

She shook her head and stared at the phone in her hand for a moment before she met his eyes again, “Not really, Ianto’s missing. Just disappeared.” She worried at her bottom lip with her teeth.

“Ianto who came over here to help us?” When she nodded he sucked in a sharp breath and matched her worried look, “How’s Jack taking it?”

“He’s borderline, I need to get back there as soon as.”

“Yeah, of course.” He nodded, “Well I’m finished here, and I’m assuming that that’s our suspect.”

She smiled, “It’s name’s Paul, and it does speak.”

“Hey!” He objected quietly

“Better, glad to have you with us dear.” She turned back to Greg, “I also have a gun to give to ballistics, which he threw at me by the way. And I’ve informed Liberty Towers, they’re on their way for the whole lot.”

“Oh goody, what will happen to him?”

“Also wondering the answer to that question. It’s all up to LT now, which isn’t the best position to be in. Better than the Men in Black though.” She admitted, “Come on, we’ve got to get back, John’s coming for me, I hope. Paul…” She pulled a lopsided smile, “Not a good idea throwing evidence at me, and it’s never a good idea trying to shoot me. It annoys me and doesn’t look good on your record…” The young commander fell silent and let Greg drive, concentrating on controlling operations in Cardiff via her Blackberry.

CSIs Sanders and Donovan were signing over the evidence, body and suspect to the agent from Liberty Towers when a worried looking John Hart burst through the revolving doors towards her. He glared briefly at Agent McGoldrick, with whom he didn’t exactly see eye to eye, before ignoring her completely and wrapping his arms around his girlfriend and holding her close, “You ready to go baby?”

She nodded and pulled away to hug Greg close, “Give my love to everyone, especially Nick. I wish I could say goodbye, but I promise I’ll get back to do the goodbyes. You never know, I might even get back to work, but I don’t really know. I hope I can…”

John took her hand and placed it on his wrist strap, then wrapped the other arm around her waist to support her, “We’ll see you around.”

“Find him.” Greg blinked back tears

“We will.”