Renewal: Chapter 49 - Birthday

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IANTO'S JOURNEY, PART III, RENEWAL
TITLE: Chapter 49 - Birthday
AUTHOR: Aviv_b
RATING: Chapter 49 - PG- 13 language, and some sexual references
CHARACTERS:  Ianto, Gwen, Owen, Tosh. Martha, OC - Brigadier Hamilton
DISCLAIMER:  Not mine; Aunty B's and RTD's
WORDS: ~ 2035
SUMMARY:  Ianto celebrates his 25th birthday. Jack is nowhere to be found. Martha's revelation changes everyone's future.

Title is from: Live as long as you may. The first twenty years are the longest half of your life. Robert Southey

 

Ianto celebrated his 25^th birthday quietly without a lot of fuss. Jonathan, Stephen and Aaron had invited him for the weekend, in the end Ianto decided he would rather not go through the hassle of traveling to London.  He spent Saturday at his sister’s along with Owen. While Rhiannon, Johnny and Mum knew a little about Jack’s disappearance, but the children did not. The family thought that Jack had been called away on assignment and hadn’t discussed it with Ianto beforehand. They certainly weren’t told anything about The Doctor or flying police call boxes or Jack’s immortality.

The day passed pleasantly for the most part. There was an awkward moment when Mica asked where Ianto’s boyfriend was. Ianto told her that he had important business out of town. 

“Well, he better take you out to a fancy dinner when he gets back,” she insisted, “or he’s not a good boyfriend.” Everyone laughed, but it didn’t go unnoticed that Ianto closed his eyes for a moment to keep his emotions under control after she said that.

They had ice cream and a cake that Mica and Mum had made and just enjoyed the afternoon. Ianto had been insistent that there be no presents, but Rhiannon had picked up nice bottle of wine for him and presumably Jack to share. Owen nicely covered the moment by letting everyone know that he would be helping Ianto drink the wine.

David was now twelve and had matured remarkably since the previous Christmas. He had grown several inches and seemed more thoughtful and polite, but still snarky. Just like his Uncle, Rhiannon pointed out. At one point Ianto was alone with David talking to him about school when he remarked, “Ok, spill. Did you and Captain Jack break up? What did he do?”

Ianto was a little surprised. He didn’t think that David really understood the nature of his relationship with Jack and certainly hadn’t anticipated David being upset about them not being together. Maybe a bad gay joke, now that he would expect, but sympathy? He really didn’t know what to say.

‘David, honestly, I’m not sure. He went off in such a rush that he didn’t say anything to anyone about the trip. But looking back, we can all see that this had been in the works for a while. So we’re all upset about it.’

David snorted. “Yeah, but Owen wasn’t dating him, was he? So I’d think you be a lot more pissed off than him.”

Ianto had to smile. ‘Are you the same kid I met last Christmas? What happened to that little brat who was picking on his sister and smart mouthing everyone?’

“Dunno, guess he grew up some. But I swear Uncle Ianto, if he hurt you, he better not show his face around here.” 

Ianto shushed him. ‘Yeah, I’m hurt, but I don’t honestly know how this is going to all work out.’

***

Sunday was his actual birthday and Gwen and Rhys hosted a little party for him with just the Torchwood Team and P.C. Andy. Jack’s absence hung like a veil of sadness over the whole day; it was obvious that Ianto was pushing himself to be cheerful and lighthearted but was actually very depressed. Still, no one mentioned Jack, and everyone got pretty drunk.

Gwen, in particular was very funny when she had too much too drink. ”Yeah, that bitchy boss will probably suspend us all if we come in hung over.”

“Uh Gwen,” Owen pointed out, “that would be you.”

Gwen looked puzzled for a minute and everyone started laughing again. “Oi, don’t laugh, I’ll suspend me as well if I have to. And I don’t care what she says; you can come in anytime you want tomorrow.”

In reality, they knew they would all be in early.   They had been working flat out and were exhausted and Jack had been gone less than three weeks.  No one said anything, but they knew something was going to have to give.

Several weeks later the team decided that they had to let UNIT know what was going on. Not that Jack was with the Doctor, but that he had left on a temporary mission for an indefinite period of time and they needed some backup. Owen spoke to the Brigadier while Ianto spoke to Martha.

The Brigadier promised to get them a couple of temporary staff members without raising a lot of fuss or making anyone else realize that Jack might be gone for a while.

Ianto wanted to find out if Martha had any thoughts from her travels with The Doctor that might help the team to determine how long Jack might be gone. She wasn’t able to provide much insight however one thing she said in her phone call with Ianto changed all of their lives forever.

“So have you heard from Jack?” she asked Ianto. Ianto didn’t know what to say.

“Yeah I got a call from The Doctor,” Martha continued, “about a week after he and Jack took off. Sounded like they were having a grand time.”

‘Martha, you heard from The Doctor? From the Tardis?’ Martha confirmed that she had. ‘Martha, I’ll have to call you back in a minute, my phone’s going dead.’ He hung up and signaled to Owen to come over to his work area.

‘Call Martha. Apparently The Doctor found time to call her, but Jack couldn’t be arsed to call us. I’ll be in the archives if anyone needs me.’ Ianto turned and walked away and headed down to the lower levels.

Owen quickly gathered Tosh and Gwen and they called Martha back from the conference room. She was puzzled why Ianto had been so brusque with her. Once they explained she felt terrible. “Oh no, I had no idea he didn’t tell you all beforehand.”  Then it hit her. “Shite, he didn’t say anything to Ianto ahead of time, did he…I don’t know what to say.”

Owen thought, ‘Really, Martha, you’ve said more than enough already,’ and then chided himself for blaming her. They told Martha not to worry and that they were sure everything would be fine.

Owen rolled his eyes as they ended the call with Martha. Gwen suggested that they have a conference call with The Brigadier and one was set for the next morning. They’d have to find an excuse to get Ianto out of the Hub, and Gwen asked that everyone make a list of supplies they needed so that she could send Ianto to pick stuff up during the conference call.

“I could kill that son of a bitch,” Owen said angrily. “Bad enough he leaves us in a fix, but he doesn’t tell Ianto, that’s unforgivable.”

Gwen worried her bottom lip. “I don’t know what to think. Everything that’s happened over the last few weeks seems so wrong. Was I just imagining it or did they seem to have a real romance going?” 

“Looked like they were pretty well smitten with each other,” Tosh offered. “Jack was over at Ianto’s practically every night, and I know we all saw them gazing at each other across the Hub.”

“Yeah, something was going on, but on a practical note, you do realize that if Ianto quits right now, we’re in big trouble,” Owen pointed out. “What a fuckin’ mess.”

***

The next morning Ianto was in first, made coffee, and went down to the archives. He put his usual note on the coffeemaker letting everyone know where he was.

Gwen was in next, she had hardly slept trying to figure out how to keep the team going without putting Ianto in the field. ‘And what about Ianto’s emotional well-being?  Is he going to be able to keep working here knowing that Jack chose not to contact him?’

Once the rest of the team was in, Gwen called Ianto up from the archives. She had combined everyone’s needs into one gigantic list. Ianto was glad to be asked to go and get supplies for the Hub. Even when hiding himself down in the archives, he was finding the lingering aura of Jack oppressive. 

‘You know, this will probably take me the better part of the morning to make all these stops.’

“I’m not surprised,” Gwen answered truthfully. “I figured it would be more efficient to have you take one morning every few weeks to get stuff then to be constantly chasing around for single items. I’m going to start keeping a list in the kitchen that everyone can add to as needed.” Ianto nodded in agreement. She handed him the keys to the SUV and he got ready to leave. He could sense that something else was going on, but Gwen was better at shielding her thoughts than he would have given her credit for.

Once he was gone, they gathered in the conference room and called The Brigadier.

“Martha told me what happened. Bit of a cock-up really,” The Brigadier offered. “How’s he doing, Owen? Is he OK, or are we looking at him having real difficulties coping?”

“He actually doing OK for now,” Owen told him. “I think he knows the team is depending on him so he’s just pushing through what needs to be done. But it can’t be good for him to have to work and live everyday with Jack’s absence front and center.”

“I have been giving this considerable thought. It seems to me that the first issue concerns being able to man a field team,” the Brigadier surmised. “Since Ianto can’t be in the field, his presence or absence doesn’t affect this problem. So first we need to get you an additional field agent. You may have heard Martha mention him, but Mickey Smith would fit in quite well with your group. He’s very tough and smart and has been of great assistance to us at UNIT for the last year or so.”

“But wasn’t he a companion of The Doctor’s?” Gwen asked. “That would really be rubbing Ianto’s face in it, don’t you think?”

The Brigadier sighed. “Yes, of course. So here’s the second part of my proposal. You probably haven’t heard but there is discussion of rebuilding Torchwood One.”  Everyone gasped. “Not like the old One, but not a field operation like Torchwood Three. Something in-between really. A taskforce is being formed and Jack was going to be asked to be on it. But it seems logical that given Jack’s absence, that Ianto take his place. After all, who knows better than Ianto not only the vital role that One played, but the terrible mistakes that could have been avoided.”

Tosh interrupted. “So assuming that he agrees, how does that help Ianto?”

The Brigadier explained that this taskforce was a full time commitment. “He’d have to relocate to London for 3 to 6 months. That gets him away from the flat and the Hub and all the reminders of Jack and gives him something challenging to focus his energies on. I’ll be honest with you, if he does well on the taskforce there’s a good chance that he’ll be offered a high level position at a new Torchwood One or even UNIT. And really, that might just be the best thing for everyone’s sake.” 

The team members looked at each other not wanting to acknowledge the truth of what The Brigadier was saying. They might be saying goodbye to Ianto permanently.

“Additionally, UNIT can supply you with a fully trained archivist from our own staff. We’ve been using the Torchwood software since it was recovered from backups and this archivist is very competent.”

“It’s a great idea Brigadier, but what if Ianto refuses,” queried Owen. 

“You leave that to me.” With your approval, I’d like to talk to him directly about this later today. I think it will go down much better if I’m seen as stealing him away from you rather than you pushing him off to UNIT.” 

The Team agreed that this made sense. “And do me a favor, all of you, do not say one word to him until he or I say something to you. He may want some time to think about it, and I don’t want him to feel like he’s being manipulated 

Chapter 50 here:   http://aviv-b.livejournal.com/25540.html