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Bedroom Factotum	By : RowenRaven Category: S through Z > Torchwood Views: 4859 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Torchwood as it belongs to BBC, nor do I make any profit out of this or any story.

Chapter List
- 7
- 8
Bedroom Factotum 8
By the end of the 4th day a disgruntled Owen marches into Jack’s office. The medic stands, hands on hips and eyes narrowed glaring at the captain. Jack looks up at him from the report he is working on and raises a puzzled brow; at a lost as to what has got the irritable man so grumpy.
“How long will he be gone?” he states without preamble.
“Two weeks,” Jack answers impassively.
“What! Ten more days of this,” –what ‘this’ is Jack isn’t sure but has an educated guess- “that’s low even for you Harkness,” Owen scorns slouching in a chair in front of Jack’s desk.
Yup Jack surely knows what he means by that. In giving Ianto suspension he is punishing the rest of the team first. Depriving them of coffee and making them take turns in doing the numerous tasks that belong to the archivists. Which include but are not limited to, feeding weevils, cleaning their cells, as well as Mayfawn and her nest, research, filing, clean-up and cover-up operations, ordering take out and generally tiding up after them. The Welshman’s punishment would begin once he returned and had two weeks’ worth of reorganizing the archives and cleaning the hub into some semblance of order suited to his OCD tendencies.
“I don’t believe I need to discuss disciplinary actions to with you Owen, all you need to know is that it’s justified,” the immortal says tersely, Owen snorts.
“Oh please! Come off it Harkness, Gwen told us what happened,”
“What?!”
“That’s right, your Flat Holm Island little secret is out. So I suggest you prepare either a tour or a very detailed briefing about the place,” the doctor says casually.
“Then you know and understand that Ianto disobeyed a direct ordered and ignored the chain of command,” Jack’s patience is being tried.
Owen snorts again, if amused or disgusted is something Jack hasn’t learn to discern yet.
“Since when has that meant anything around here? Aside from making you king of piss contest if only by the size –Jack gives him a lewd smile, Owen’s eyes narrow in warning- of your ego. I can’t and don’t want to attest to and refuse to believe rumors about the size of your dick,”
“Jealous?” Jack teased.
“You wish!” then he regards the captain seriously again. “We’ve all crossed that line and you never did anything about it, why set an example with tea boy?”
“It’s the third time he’s stabbed me in the back,” Jack reasons.
Owen rolls his eyes. “You are a real git, that’s unfair and you know it. This doesn’t compare. Yeah he hid his cyber psycho girl in the basement, and even so all he did was sucker you one –which was a rather impressive right hook- but he’d never harm us, all he did was plea, begged for your help to save Lisa. We’ve all done the same or worse, Tosh for Mary, Gwen for Rhys on numerous occasions, and I for Diane, and the second one it was a mutiny led by me so you can’t blame that on him,” Owen reminds the ex-time agent about their worst transgressions.
“I know this is not in the same scale, but still he demined my decision,” Jack insists, though he admits to himself he sounds like a broken record.
“So what? Gwen and I challenge your self- proclaimed authority on daily basis, she has clashed with you and acted against your orders; getting herself or someone else hurt or almost killed, more times than anyone cares to count, including this time around. Besides tea boy might as well outrank us all, God knows he bloody well runs the damn place,” he adds nonchalantly with a shrug.
Jack doesn’t know if he refers to the Hub or to Flat Holm, but the statement might be true in both cases, he can’t continue to argue against a fact that even Owen accepts.
“You just want out off of weevil duty,” Jack says knowingly.
“Damn right I do, and some descent coffee,” he admits unabashedly, Jack laughs agreeing. “So call Ianto back, you pin the blame on him, but Gwen disobeyed your order to stop digging for the Johna boy first. She got what was coming to her in a way,” the smaller man said without remorse.
“It wasn’t his decision to make,” Jack rebukes, all humor gone.
“Stop kidding yourself Harkness. You know what I think this is about?” Owen has had enough of the captain self-righteousness when it comes to Ianto. “It’s about your damn prideful ego,” the medic spat at him.
“What?” Jack blurts, just what the hell Owen means by that.
“The truth is you like your shags docile and pliant, the kid grows a pair and you run him out and put him in time out to put him back in line. I personally like them feisty. That is the difference between us, the reason you went after Ianto and never put the moves on Gwen as I did. It was not out of respect to her relationship with old Rhys. It’s because she is too fierce, too independent for your alpha tendencies,” he states like it was a well-known fact that only Jack was stupid enough to miss.
Jack is baffled and reeling, surely he couldn’t be serious, and one thing had nothing to do with the other, had it?
“If now that tea boy has bared his fangs you don’t want him I could take him off of your hands,” he offers.
Jack can’t tell if Owen is just teasing him, but it sounds all too serious to his liking, his glare shows Owen exactly what he thought of the –in the captains mind- inappropriate suggestion.
“What? He is not hard on the eyes,” Owen defends innocently; before a mischievous grin splits his face “and I am curious as to what makes him such a great shag,” he adds in a tone so lewd it reminds Jack of John Hart when he called Ianto ‘eye candy’.
“What makes you believe he is?” Jack challenges, bristling at the implications Owen is making, his tone low and terse.
“The fact that you haven’t dropped him like an old sock is proof enough,” the Welsh doctor says simply.
Jack glares.
“You and I know you never stick it in the same hole more than twice, a handful of times if they are really good or clingers hard to get rid of. But not tea boy, he has you coming back time and time again. He must be amazing, is he all moans and groans or is he a screamer? He likes you to go at him for hours driving him slowly mad, or does he like you to take him hard and fast like a rodeo?” Owen taunts, his voice husky, the look on his eyes predatory as if he could see Ianto doing all those things right then and there.
It takes all of Jack’s self-control not to fall for the rise and not punch Owen’s face inside out.
“You are not his type,” the immortal says confidently and menacingly.
“No, I suppose I’m not; he shags with you after all,” he says standing and walking to the office door then he looks back and shrugs “ still nothing two paints of beer and a Red Bull vodka can’t work around,” he adds cockily with a wink and a grin leaving a stunned and annoyed Jack behind.
A few hours of thinking –sulking- on a roof top later, Jack goes to Tosh. The tech geek is sitting at her desk working in some program or other; she’s the only one left in, Owen and Gwen have gone home for the day.
“Hey Tosh, I was wondering if you, by any chance, know Ianto’s address?” the captain tries nonchalantly.
“I do,” the Asian woman replies apprehensively.
“I need to talk to him in person, and as you know he won’t be in for a while…” why does he sound like a kid making up an excuse?
To her credit Tosh gives him the address without reprimands other than to herself, as she dictates the address she mutters she shouldn’t be giving out personal information.
“It’s not wrong Tosh; he shouldn’t have left it out of his personal file. I need to know this things in case of emergencies and all that,” he assures her, another excuse to cover up the fact that he hadn’t care enough to ask, nor observant enough to notice in the first place.
“Jack, I know it’s not my place but, you are not going to reprimand him again, are you?” she asks shyly, her nervous glance darting around to anything but Jack’s face.
Jack smiles at the solidarity. “No Tosh I just need to clear some points with him.” She seems to think it over a moment, biting her lips, then something clicks in her mind, Jack can see it and her demeanor changes completely.
“You know Jack, of all of us he is the most devoted to you and to the team, even or more so after Lisa. He saved me at the Beacons, even with no field experience he did what he had to so I could escape and almost died for it. When Mary and the pendant…” she takes off her glasses, her slanted eyes focus on the captain’s blue ones with steady resolve. “I heard his thoughts, he never asked and I never told anyone, it was not my place; but I can tell you he was not well, far from it. Still he found it in himself to comfort me, even when he couldn’t console himself.”
Jack can see the sympathy in her eyes; it had been a very trying time for the team’s dynamics when they discovered the quiet Japanese woman had heard their thoughts and secrets.
“He understood me; it was the first time he took me to his flat. Ianto made me the most delicious and spoiling cup of coffee,” a sad but grateful smile tugs at her lips as she recalls the found memory. “And then he apologized to me, Jack. He said he was sorry, that he had wanted to help me save Mary from Torchwood, but that just like Lisa it couldn’t be done and that he was sorry I had to go through something like that. He even let me cry all over his favorite suit the night Tommy went back. I can’t imagine runny makeup and snot are easy to clean off silk ties.”
“I am aware of his selflessness and kindness, Tosh,” the pseudo American says.
“It’s not just that,” she says a little exasperated. “You two have much more in common than you realize. He is not afraid to be the bad guy for the greater good; he will do what has to be done when no one else will. He shot Owen to defend your command. He stood queer barbs from a sassy clerk to get Gwen’s wedding dress. He was so worried about us and angry at himself when we got trapped with the alien wale he stunned a man point blank between the eyes.”
Jack looks surprised, clearly there had been some editing done in Ianto’s official report. “Why angry at himself though?” he asks not understanding the logic behind that.
“He believed it is his fault it got out of hand, that if he had been more careful we wouldn’t have been discovered and Rhys wouldn’t have been shot. If he had reacted faster, or subdued the tugs better, the wale wouldn’t have been shot in the struggle and not gotten loose, and it wouldn’t have forced Owen to kill the poor thing. He knows how much Owen hated it and gave him special coffee for a month as an apology,” she explains shaking her head in dismay.
“But it wasn’t like that, the plan was half assed, it was bound to go wrong, it was no one’s fault,” Jack says like it’s the most absurd thing he has ever heard.
“Have you told him that?” she asks point blank. “The point is, Jack, he would never do anything to endanger the team or the organization; even if it means breaking some rules or some heads including your own. You should have more faith in his reasoning and actions. He more than anyone is on your side,”
Then the moment is lost and Tosh reverts to her introverted quiet self and gives Jack shy, embarrassed smile. Jack smiles reassuringly back and sends her home for the day, not without giving her a peck on the cheek and a soft ‘thank you’ before he watches her depart trough the Cog Wheel. She is such a sweet girl, Ianto is lucky to have her friendship, as she is to have his.
When Jack arrives at Ianto’s flat he is surprised to Gwen exiting the apartment. She stands at the portico, Ianto holding the door for her. Their demeanor is not tense, if only a bit awkward but always polite as they chat for a bit. So Jack doesn’t think they’ve had a fall out hopefully. To the captain’s surprise Gwen stands on her tip toes and gives Ianto a quick peck on the cheek, he smiles albeit shyly as she leaves and he closes the door. The Welshwoman spots the conspicuous black SUV and makes a beeline for it.
“Fancy finding you here,” she says conversationally leaning in through the rolled down window.
“I could say the same thing. How’d you found his place?” he says a bit brusquely.
“Same way you did, Tosh,” she replies flippantly and climbs into the vehicle.
“What were you doing in there? Why’d you see him?” he asks.
Gwen regards him with a raised brow, and then she shrugs. “He rang Rhys at work. He wanted to check on me he said, but he couldn’t because he is suspended. The met for lunch –did you know they are mates, ‘cause I sure didn’t- Ianto apologized to Rhys, for hurting me he told him. When Rhys told me I thought it odd, it’s not like he doesn’t have my number, so why call Rhys and not me. So I figure we needed to talk and that I owed him my thanks and an apology. Since he was avoiding me at least by phone I believed it was best to discuss things with him in person. Bless him he was so ashamed of himself,”
“Ashamed? Why?”
“He went against you to do what he believed was right, what he thought was the right course of action; you made him second guess himself,”
Jack is not sure if the statement is accusatory or not.
“But I agree with him Jack and I am grateful he thought me strong enough to understand the importance of Flat Holm. And after the shock I do understand Jack, what you and Ianto do for those poor people.”
Jack is relieved, here is the Gwen he knows, the strong cheerful woman not the sad despondent girl that came back from the island; relieved to see that glimmer in her eyes when she looks at him. The one that says he is a hero to her; tells him he’s back in the good grace of her worshiping pedestal. And he realizes what Ianto had meat about his sensibilities being hurt.
“I want to be part of it, like Ianto is. Now that I understand what is needed to be done I want to help. It’s too heartbreaking a task for just the two of you,” she says and there is compassion in her tone, not only for the rift victims, but for Jack and Ianto for dealing with the horrors alone.
Jack nods “I will discuss it with Ianto. I’m sure he will find a way to include you in the process, he will be grateful to have you involved,”
“He already did” she says but doesn’t elaborate.
“Great foresight of him, huh? He knows everything doesn’t he?” the captain jokes.
Gwen laughs and climbs out of the SUV. “He also knows something else,”
“Oh, what is that?” he asks intrigued.
“He knows you are here,” she announces with a rueful smile and walks away.
Well time to man up, drop all pretenses and find out what is truly underneath. Jack swears to himself, damn conspicuous, flashy SUV.
- 7
- 8
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Bedroom Factotum