Title: Fluffy Things of Doom
Author: sqyd
Characters: Jack, Ianto, Owen
Rating: R
Warnings: junk science
Spoilers: none
Word count: 2,900
Disclaimers: I don't own Torchwood or any of the characters. If I did, I'd take better care of them.
Summary: Ianto is acting strange, and Jack's worried.
Beta: The fabulously naughty Rootesie. I kept tweaking it, of course. All mistakes are mine.
Notes: This is probably the last installment of my Holiday Fluff and Smut Series. Many TW fans more dedicated than myself have given themselves splitting headaches trying to establish the TW time line. I'm myself not a stickler for canonicity; won't sweat over something that the paid writers clearly didn't. Still, more by accident than design, the Holiday Series pretty much adheres to established canon time lines. This means, that this current story takes place very shortly before the events of Fragments and Exit Wounds - because at Torchwood you can't even write light-hearted fluff without some foreboding. (FU RTD.)

**********************

A casual observer of the Hub - if there was such person present - might guess that it's Easter. Myfanwy is gleefully gulping down a chocolate bunny (snatched from Gwen's desk), wrapper and all, while Jack is picking on his own Cadbury's egg in a far less cheerful mood. Except for the two of them, the Hub is empty. Jack has been left alone for the second night this week, and there is something very disagreeable about that. The first thing that is wrong is that it even bothers him. He has spent many solitary nights in the Hub before, but as of late somehow, without realizing it, he has gotten used to the almost constant presence of his archivist, and without him suddenly the Hub feels very empty.

Ianto showered and changed before he left. Donning the jeans and the thick turtleneck jumper was like a reverse-superman-transformation: from serious and deadly in dark pinstriped perfection to a regular - albeit delectable - young bloke who wouldn't know the business end of a stun gun. When he kissed Jack goodnight he exuded the smell of soap and aftershave, and the scent of a healthy young male underneath, and Jack didn't want to let him go. Yet off he went with a smile and the promise of seeing Jack next morning. Jack pretended it didn't bother him.

Now he is glaring in disgust at the latest inch-thick UNIT missive on his desk. He has read the first few pages at least a dozen times, but has no idea what they are about. His mind keeps wandering. Last Saturday Ianto took off too, for the whole day, with claims of personal errands to run, leaving Jack behind. It was dark out by the time Jack's self-restraint crumbled away, and found an excuse to casually drop by Ianto's flat - only to find it empty. Confounded, he stayed, but Ianto only returned late at night, considerably inebriated. Jack wrestled him into bed and stripped his clothes off, and then let him sleep. Ianto then smelled of sweat, cigarettes and alcohol, and all the stale smells of a pub, but not of sex - not that Jack was inspecting him. He couldn't help that he possessed advanced 51st century olfactory senses. (They gave him an unfair advantage in Naked Hide and Seek.) At least that's what he told himself.

It's not like either of them ever demanded any sort of exclusivity, or even broached the subject, but ever since Jack's return there had been no others for either of them - except of course, with the full consent and active participation of both of them. So what was this all about? Ianto was up to something, and not long ago that would have seriously worried Jack, but they are past that. He knows Ianto, he knows how intensely private the young man is, how well he camouflages, he even knows how some of his stories about his background aren't entirely true, however he doesn't doubt his loyalty. He's concerned however, because something is off.

There is a tracer in Ianto's mobile, in all of their mobiles - standard protocol ever since that time when Gwen got herself kidnapped. His self-control has so far kept him from checking on it, but it loses out to the urge to know, and he flicks the computer on. He frowns. Ianto's at Owen's. What are those two up to?

It doesn't make a whole lot of sense. He's never fully learned what happened within the team during the time he was gone with the Doctor, but when he came back he found them and the way they interacted with each other subtly different. For one thing, Owen and Ianto got along far better than a casual observer would have thought. Still, Jack didn't figure them to be bosom buddies, or to have a torrid affair - especially now that Owen was mostly dead.

Captain Jack Harkness is not a person who can resist a mystery. He has to get to the bottom of this one. An excited grin spreads on his face as he shrugs into his greatcoat.

********************

Owen's expression, on the other hand, is displeased at finding him at his door.

"Pizza's here," Jack grins far too widely, holding out the cardboard box he charmed off the delivery boy a minute before, with a big smile and an even bigger tip.

Owen stares at him, disbelieving at first, but then something else crosses over his face, and he just turns wordlessly and heads into the living room. Jack shuts the door behind him and follows him. In there it's Ianto's turn to stare at him incredulously. Then Ianto's eyes turn to Owen and a long look passes between them.

"Can we have a minute?" He finally asks Owen, who shrugs and leaves the room.

Jack deposits the pizza box on the table. Ianto is staring at him, with his hands on his hips, and that's never a good sign. Jack decides that the best defense is an offense.

"You have a boys night in, and don't invite me?" Jack says with pretend disappointment in his voice, except it's not all pretend after all.

Ianto's exasperated look softens a little.

"Did you follow me?"

"There's a tracker in your mobile, remember?"

"Ah." Ianto's looking him over like he's trying to decide if he should get angry or not.

"You were acting strange, I was worried." Jack cautiously moves closer, knowing very well that close physical proximity can turn the tide in his favour. "You could've been possessed by an alien," he adds with a pout.

"We're watching classic Star Trek. You hate it."

"I do not!"

"Remember how insufferable you were when we watched that Star Wars movie, complaining about inaccuracies the whole time?" Ianto reminds him quite accurately.

"I can leave, if you want me to," he says sulkily, but Ianto gets hold of his arm.

"No, don't," Ianto relents. "Stay."

"I promise to behave." He brightens up. "And just so you know, I love those sexy Star Trek uniforms."

The eye-roll tells Jack that he's forgiven. He leans in, and Ianto returns the kiss, but then he pulls away. Jack notices Owen in the doorway.

The coffee table is stacked with DVDs with the familiar "spaceship" on the cover. That thing would never fly. As soon as they turned on the engines, it would just flip over, he thinks, but he wisely holds his tongue. On the large flat screen there is the frozen image of a young and not bad looking Captain Kirk. It all makes perfect sense to Jack now; Ianto takes care of them, always has since his first day. He does all those little things that are so easy to miss, but make all the difference between a contentedly humming Hub and a cantankerous one. Dead Owen, cut off from all the physical pleasures, must have been a difficult challenge for him. Yet Ianto found a way to cheer him up, and do it in secret.

He and Ianto Settle on the sofa, Owen on a chair. They eat greasy pizza - he and Ianto anyway, Owen just slumps back into the chair, watching them with half-lidded eyes. They watch the show, and they all make fun of the silly technology and Shatner's acting. At one point Owen and Ianto shout in unison - with McCoy onscreen - "I'm a doctor, not a bricklayer!" Pretty soon Owen proposes a drinking game. Of course, only Jack and Ianto can play, but Owen's providing the booze, and it's a very fine 25-year old single malt whiskey.

"I didn't have the heart to throw it out." He explains.

Jack hasn't drunk alcohol in public since 1869. That was the year he got "recruited" into Torchwood, and there was a direct correlation between the two facts. Getting drunk, losing control in public made him extremely vulnerable. However, now he is in a private setting, with two of his own trusted people. Torchwood is his now, different from back in those days, and he has the best team in a century. They are his people, who after all their ups and downs formed into a cohesive team, working like a well-oiled machine. He can afford to relax for a moment.

The rules of the game are simple, but the occasions to drink are many. Ianto and Owen exhibit a mocking reverence towards the old TV show, and Jack's beginning to join in. The alcohol and watching Ianto's grinning face gives him a warm and fuzzy feeling. Even the habitually crotchety, and irrevocably (un)dead Owen seems to be having a good time. The guffaws and lewd remarks pour out of all three of them at a particularly campy scene.


Oddly though, or maybe not so oddly, given those uniforms, Jack is getting quite randy. He slips one hand on the thigh of Ianto who tenses for a moment and casts a glance towards their host, but then relaxes, and even leans against Jack. By the time they get to Troubles with Tribbles the two of them are sitting close, one of Jack's arms around Ianto, the other alternating between his glass and suggestive squeezes on Ianto's thigh.

"Have you ever shagged an Orion?" Owen asks him out of the blue.

"The real Orions look more like giant moths." He replies.

"My question stands."

"Once." He admits.

Ianto and Owen snigger.

Owen throws a look at Ianto.

"Doesn't Kirk remind you of someone?"

Ianto raises one eyebrow.

"Shags his way across the Universe," Owen goes on.

"Frequently loses parts of his clothing." Ianto replies.

"Cocky."

"An utter ham."

"Hey!" Jack tries to object, but he's being ignored.

"Do you think..." Starts Owen looking at Ianto, "...that you are sublimating your crush on Kirk by shagging Jack?"

"Maybe I identify with Spock - the only sane person in a crew of lunatics. Thanks for the deep insight, Doctor Harper." Ianto scoffs at him.

"Hey, I'm a physician, not a psychologist!"

Oops! Time to drink!


He is at least behaving himself concerning the show, but there is a point when he just can't hold back.

"That's totally inaccurate!" He cries out.

"What, the Tribbles?" Ianto sniggers. "You don't say?"

"Yeah! You can't poison them that easy. They are immune to any known poison."

"Harkness, are you telling us that Tribbles are real?" Owen stares at him unbelieving.

"Sure they are! They look a lot like that too, just even more cuddly."

"You're joking." Ianto squeezes Jack's knee.

"Nu-oh," he shakes his head. "Of course, they are not called Tribbles. They have many names, some of them quite long. The Macra call them cute-and-fluffy-retribution-of-vengeful-g ods. They are feared as much as Daleks."

"I can never tell if you are telling the truth, or just making stuff up." Ianto sighs, but his lop-sided grin says that he doesn't really care. "We should be going anyway, it's late." He moves to stand, but is a bit wobbly.

"Woah, woah, slow down!" Owen interjects. "You're drunk, you're not driving anywhere. You neither," he adds looking at Jack. "Your driving is dangerous enough when you're sober."

"We can call a cab." Says Ianto.

"You could sleep it off here," Owen replies, in an uncharacteristic turn.

There it is again, that look between the two of them. A wordless exchange, a dispute even. Jack is fascinated by it, even through the haze of fine scotch. There is something between those two, and Jack thinks his best chance of finding out what is by going with the flow. So when Owen - the apparent victor of the silent exchange - turns to him Jack schools his features into into clueless ignorance.

"You can crash there," Owen goes, jerking his head towards the bedroom. "I don't sleep any more. Just keep the damn noise down."

They are an interesting tableaux, slightly out of sync, Owen somehow softer than usual, Ianto with that reckless glint in his eyes that he gets when under the influence of alcohol (and/or Jack's pheromones). This could be a promising set-up if only Owen was a little less dead. Well, no use crying over spilt milk. With a shrug he ushers Ianto into the bedroom. Through the door he can hear the muffled babble of the TV.

This would be a good time for interrogation, but Ianto molds against him, lips on his, sloppy, but exuberant. Long fingers push his braces down, and tug at his shirt. Jack's hands slide between the jumper and the jeans, while slowly backing him towards the bed. They end up on the bed still mostly dressed, kissing and rubbing. Ianto pushes him gently, but insistently, and Jack gets the message; he slithers down on his lover's body, tugs the jeans and briefs down just enough. He swipes a slobbery lick down his lover's cock, and doesn't let up till Ianto comes bucking and groaning. Jack grins indulgently, even though he is still rock hard.

He rolls off the bed to properly shed his clothes and looks down at Ianto,  jumper pushed up on his chest, jeans pulled down halfway his thighs, his cock softly resting on his stomach. In his half-clad state he looks far more indecent than he would completely naked. Ianto smiles at him, stretches with the sleepy content of a cat, not bothering to adjust his clothing either off or on. Damn tease. Jack bends down and tugs the jeans and briefs off, he makes Ianto sit up, then straddles him and pulls off the jumper too. At the back of Ianto's neck his fingers brush over something small, but foreign; something that doesn't belong. He freezes and a thousand scenarios run through his mind in a panicky second. Ianto's lips curl into a silent 'O' and turns crimson. Jack's alarm lets up just a bit.

"Something you need to tell me?" He asks, suddenly much more sober, but thanks to the adrenaline, just as aroused.

"It's harmless, I swear," Ianto rushes guiltily. "Opteric Psychometric Transducer. Owen dug it up in the archives. He's wearing the other one."

"You let him in the archives?" It probably shouldn't be his first question, but the statement shocks him more than the fact that Ianto is using alien technology without his knowledge.

"Yeah, well, since he's been dead and doesn't need sleep it's hard to keep him out. He was bored and got into some complex research, and that's how he came across the Transducer."

"They don't work on humans." Jack is vaguely familiar with the technology.

"Not with normal humans. As Owen found out, having died changes the brain patterns just enough."

"But you're not dead."

"I was once. Remember? Lisa killed me. I was really dead, not just one of those near-death experiences. You brought me back. When Owen ran scans on all of us, he found that the he and I have the same slight brain wave anomaly. He could adjust the device to work for the two of us."

Jack feels a wee bit annoyed by things going on behind his back (again), but also curious. (Also, still horny, but he can multi-task.)

"So how does it work?"

"It creates kind of a telepathic link, transmitting physical sensations from one brain to the other. Owen disabled sight and sound, so it's mostly just touch and taste."

"Thoughts, emotions?"

"God no! Well, mood a little, like a background noise."

"Does it go both ways?"

"No, one way only."

"Why did you keep it secret?"

"Taking alien tech out of the Hub for personal use is against the rules. I didn't think you'd approve."

"But you did it anyway?"

Ianto hangs his head. "Owen doesn't have much going for him these days, I tried getting him movies and books, but he misses all the things that come with being alive. I thought going out for a dinner, a couple of drinks wouldn't be the end of the world."

Jack curls his finger under Ianto's chin and forces him to look him in the eyes.

"Like last Saturday?"

"We were pub hopping, getting smashing drunk. Owen trying to convince me to pick up some bird." Ianto says with an uncertain little smile.

"Why not just both go on your own ways, and do your own things?"

"The device has a very short range, barely fifty feet."

"So you decided to watch Star Trek and eat pizza?" Jack asked confounded.

"We did the fancy French restaurant thing the other night, but Owen was craving pizza." Ianto's looking at him woefully. "I'm sorry Jack."

"Where would I be without you disregarding my orders for the greater good? Still, you'll have to keep this device in the Hub, you understand?"

"Yes, Jack."

A thought strikes him.

"Hey, wait a minute, did I just give Owen a blow job?"

"I don't know, he can take off his device whenever he wants." Ianto chuckles.

"Well, in case he hasn't, let's give him a real show. Turn around." He gives Ianto a stern look and a smack on the bum, while lifting his weight off. Ianto's eyes widen, and then he obeys the order.

********************

When Jack wakes up it's dark and quiet. His stomach is grumbling. He carefully slides out of the bed, so as not to wake Ianto and pads into the other room. He finds Owen on the sofa, lying still, eyes closed. For someone who doesn't need sleep he looks pretty out of it. Jack smirks and grabs a slice of cold pizza. (Midnight snack of champions.) He's pleased with himself.

Fin


A/N: I have soft spot for Owen, and just wanted to give him something in parting.