aviv_b_artwork | Rift Gifts (A Schmoop Bingo story)

Author: Aviv_b
Fandom: Torchwood
Schmoop: Shopping
Title: Rift Gifts
Words: 2335
Warnings: Possible abuse of readers' good will
Rating: PG-13
Summary: When Gwen leaves on her honeymoon, the rift sends the team some unexpected visitors.

A/N: I was reminiscing with a friend of mine a few days ago about popular songs when we were in kids, which led to a discussion that included 60s TV commercials, old novelty songs, Woodstock, drug use, and a wise doctor we used to listen to on the radio on Sunday nights. And to the discovery that Lucky Charms doesn't have yellow moons in it anymore! And there's a web site for things you can make with Pop Tarts.

Quite to my surprise, no matter what I tried to write, all these thoughts kept finding their way into the story. I tried scrubbing them out, soaking them out, and still ended up with....a silly, silly story of dubious artistic merit that's has schmoopy shopping in it, along with a little smut.

The week that Gwen and Rhys went on their honeymoon the team discovered that the Rift had a sense of humor. A sick and twisted sense of humor.

In the first three days after the happy couple left for Capri, they had had their usual batch of Weevils, a few Hoix, and one returnee from 1969 who seemed so high they couldn’t determine if he was damaged from the rift or from all the acid he said he dropped at Woodstock.

“Oh wow,” the young man in bell bottoms and a headband said as he looked around the Hub. “Like this is a groovy stage, man. When is Hendrix playing? I didn’t miss him, did I? I don’t remember anything after Richie Havens came on stage."

While he was friendly and harmless, they couldn’t just turn him loose on the streets of Cardiff; so in the end they bundled him off to Flat Holm for evaluation.

The next three days were worse. In addition to more Weevils and Hoix, the rift spit out a troop of warriors from the army of Genghis Kahn, followed by four ancient Hittites, and finally sixteen singing mice the size of spaniels. Singing spaniel mice who sang silly songs from the sixties and seventies.

“Get over here you bugger,” Owen shouted as he chased one the creatures into a cell phone store.

‘Hello Mudda, hello fadda, here I am at Camp Grenada…’ the mouse sang as he ran around the store. Fortunately, the customers were so preoccupied on their phones they didn’t even notice Owen as he tackled the mouse.

Ianto was having no better luck having cornered a mouse near the railway station. “Come here little guy, I’m not going to hurt you,” Ianto said crouching down so as to not frighten him.

‘Fish heads, fish heads, Roly poly fish heads, Fish heads fish heads, Eat them up yum.' The mouse gave him a raspberry and dashed away with Ianto in hot pursuit.

By the time they had rounded up all the giant furry mice and got them safely contained at the Hub, (and having enduring innumerable choruses of “The Monster Mash, Dead Puppies, and The Time Warp) everyone was exhausted.

Driving back to Ianto’s house, Jack was irritatingly cheerful. “Well you don’t see that everyday,” Jack snickered. Ianto grunted. “Yeah, the last time I came across singing rodents, they were singing Klingon Opera. Ever hear the famous aria, 'I’m Having a Good Death Today?' Goes something like…”

“DON’T. Please Jack, just don’t.”

Jack looked very hurt.

“Sorry, I’m tired and hungry and grouchy. And my head hurts from all the noise those mice were making.”

They rode the rest of the way home in silence. Ianto was ravenous and of course there was no food in the house. The refrigerator was nearly empty and the pantry was in much the same condition.

“We’ve got mayonnaise and mustard and bread. What happened to the cold cuts?”

Jack sheepishly admitted that he had eaten the half pound of ham as well as the pound of pastrami and all the pickles as late night snacks.

“Jack, don’t you remember that I bought that so we’d be able to make quick meals when we got home this week.”

“I’m sorry. But look, there are two apples,” Jack happily announced holding up two shriveled up pieces of fruit.”

“Those have got to be months old, might as well throw them in the bin. Let’s go grab takeaway from the Chinese place down the street and then we’ve got to go grocery shopping.”

Ianto figured they’d do a quick in and out, getting a few things to tide them over to the end of the week. But he had forgotten about Jack’s fascination with grocery stores.

“Look, its cereal on sale, five boxes for ten pounds,” Jack cried excitedly.

“We don’t eat breakfast at my flat, Jack.”

“Well we could,” Jack said giving Ianto a sad puppy dog look.

“Ok fine, just put it in the cart…could we get something besides Count Chocula...no Cocoa Krispies doesn’t count…Ok fine, just put it in the cart. Yes, Jack, I know that Lucky Charms are magically delicious…no I don’t think Leprechauns are sexy. No really I don’t.” Still the box of cereal ended up in their cart.

By the time they made it back to Ianto’s flat, two hours had passed, three shopping cards had been filled and almost 250 pounds had been spent, mostly on junk food.

As they put the groceries away, Ianto was just grateful that Jack hadn’t gotten them arrested in Tescos. Ianto wasn’t sure if it was exhaustion or the giant bag of M&M’s Jack had consumed as they shopped, but Jack had bounced between a childlike fascination with items and making lewd suggestions about their possible use.

“Mmmm, chocolate sauce, lots of things you can do with chocolate sauce.”

Ianto was so tired he couldn’t find the energy to argue with Jack. So he decided to just let Jack get what he wanted. “Good idea.”

“Oh and look, there’s whipped cream in a can. We could…”

Ianto had a pretty good idea where Jack was going and prevented further discussion by kissing Jack deeply. “Great idea,” he agreed, “can’t wait.”

He did draw the line at the candy necklaces. “Oh look,” Jack whispered, “they could be used as beads…” Ianto had no idea what Jack was talking about. “Anal beads,” Jack explained saying the word ‘anal’ a little too loudly. An older woman turned and looked at Jack with concern.

“I know your hemorrhoids are bothering you, sweetheart, but the Preparation-H is in the pharmacy area,” Ianto said as he rolled his eyes dramatically for the woman’s benefit.

They compromised on licorice whips. “Yes I will let you spank me with them,” Ianto teased as he tossed the package in the cart.

“You’re the best, Ianto,” Jack said nibbling on Ianto’s ear.

The produce aisle was the tipping point.

“Look,” Jack said excitedly, “That horseradish root could be big fun.” Ianto winked at him and nodded.

“Yeah it would sting a bit wouldn’t it,” Ianto replied. Jack got a dreamy look on his face. Ianto found himself getting a little turned on as they continued the banter over carrots, green beans and finally turnips.

They finally got home close to midnight. All Ianto wanted to do was to put the groceries away and go to bed. Jack however, had other ideas.

“Let’s have cereal.”

“Jack it’s midnight. We need to be at the Hub early to sort out what we are going to do with the mice let alone deal with anything else the rift decides to spit out.”

Jack didn’t care. “You go on to bed; I’ll just have my cereal and join you in a few minutes. Ianto had learned his lesson about unsupervised kitchen use by Jack. The last thing he wanted was to have to clean milk off the ceiling tomorrow morning.

“No that’s OK; I’ll just sit here while you have your cereal.”

Jack opened one of the boxes, poured out a huge bowl of cereal and enthusiastically poured in milk which splashed over the sides of the bowl. Ianto sighed. Great, now he could clean that mess up as well.

As he scooped up some cereal on his spoon, Jack looked over at Ianto and suddenly noticed how tired he was. Tired and cranky and just worn out. He immediately felt guilty. It was easy to forget that Ianto was mortal. And that they had all been running flat out at work just to keep everything under control.

“Ianto,” Jack said quietly. “I’m sorry I took so long in the grocery store.”

“’S fine Jack. Just tired.”

Jack moved over a seat at the kitchen table so he was sitting next to Ianto. “You know I’d give you the moon and the stars, don’t you.” Ianto nodded, as he began to doze off at the table. Jack lifted Ianto’s chin. “No really, I would,” he said as he held up a milk soaked marshmallow blue moon and orange star.

Ianto leaned over and let Jack put them in his mouth.

“And look it’s a four-leafed clover! That will bring us good luck tomorrow,” Jack said as he popped the green marshmallow into Ianto’s mouth. “Oh and a pink heart for you because you are my very own Ianto. Let’s see what else is in here,” Jack said as he began to poke through the cereal box.”

Ianto knew that if he didn't stop Jack, he would eat all the little marshmallow bits and then there wouldn't be any left for him. He managed to wrestle the box of cereal from Jack and coaxed him to go to sleep.

The next day the rift was relatively quiet. They were contacted by an intergalactic cruise ship about the missing mice. It turned out that they were a highly prized musical ensemble that had a nightly show on the main stage.

The ship’s captain was quite grateful for their return. “They are immensely popular on our health and wellness cruise,” he explained as he sat drinking tea with Jack and Ianto.

“But the songs, why those songs?” Ianto inquired.

“I’m surprised you aren’t aware of the healing properties of those songs. Aren’t they from your time?”

“A few decades earlier actually.”

“Well, that’s very odd. How could you not know about their benefits if we do?”

Jack and Ianto had no answer for the captain.

“Best be beaming them back to the ship. The show starts in a few hours and I’ll have a riot on my hands if they aren’t able to perform.”

The captain followed Jack and Ianto down to the cells where the mice were happily munching on cheesy poofs (one of the five bags that Jack had bought on sale) and playing cards.

“I’m sorry about keeping them locked up, but we couldn’t have them running around scaring people,” Jack explained.

“No that’s fine. They are mischievous creatures when they are not performing.” Turning to the mice the captain told them in a stern voice, “You have been very naughty running off like that. Now we’re going upstairs and beaming back to the ship. And I expect all of you to behave.”

If he hadn’t seen it for himself, Ianto would never have believed that the mice all simultaneously rolled their eyes.

Jack led the way with the captain up from the cells with Ianto taking up the rear. As they went through the main area of the Hub, the captain stopped. “Now you apologize and say goodbye to these nice people.”

“Sorry, sorry, please excuse, mia culpa, my bad, pardon moi,” they all chorused.

As they started to leave the Hub, they all began to sing:

“So long, farewell, auf weidersehen, goodbye
We wish we’d got to eat some pizza pie.”

“That’s enough,” their captain admonished. They led the mice out of the Hub to where Owen and Tosh were helping to set up the tractor beam. As they all crowded onto a small platform, the captain again thanked the team for not harming the mice.

Just as they began to dematerialize, the smallest one looked at Ianto, gave him the finger and blew a raspberry at him.

Tosh noticed a small plastic item sitting where the beam had been. It looked a lot like a CD case. There was a note attached which she read aloud. “Earthlings used to know that laughter is the best medicine. This rare healing disc was discovered on a distant planet far into the future and transported through time to the present where it has become revered for its medicinal properties. Inside was a Dr. Demento 20^th Anniversary CD.

The team spent the rest of the afternoon listening to the CD and laughing at all the silly songs.

“I have to admit, I do feel better after listening to that,” Owen said surprising everyone. “I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time. We don’t do that enough around here.”

“You’re right,” Tosh agreed. “Everything is so serious here. Defeating the aliens and saving the world doesn’t leave a whole lot of time for laughter.”

Jack smiled. “And there’s beauty in the world that we need to take time to stop and look at or listen to, even if it’s only the beauty of a Tom Lehrer song.

“I didn't know you were familiar with Tom Lehrer...don't tell me...you shagged him as well," Ianto realized.

“Ah, the sixties, Berkeley; how I miss those days," Jack said nostalgically.

Ianto sighed. “Well Gwen will be back tomorrow and we’ll get to hear about lovely Capri and tell her all about the silly singing mice.”

“She’s never going to believe us,” Owen pointed out.

Tosh had the answer. “I’ve got the CCTV feed to prove it, including their rendition of Tip Toe Through the Tulips.” Jack and Ianto had missed that so Tosh played back the feed for everyone. But even after watching the feed several times, they still couldn’t figure out where the tiny ukuleles had come from.

As they got ready to head home from the Hub Owen asked if anyone was up for a round of drinks. Tosh said she would go but Ianto and Jack declined.

“We’re going to have dinner at home for once,” Ianto told them. “A real home cooked dinner, no more fast food.”

“And I’m making dessert,” Jack said proudly.

“I really don’t need the details, Jack,” Owen snarked.

“What? We bought Pop Tarts in three different flavors, blueberry, raspberry, and apple strudel. I’ll put some ice cream on top and a quick zap in the microwave and it will be better than homemade.”

Tosh and Owen burst out laughing. “Oh, that’s brilliant Jack, just brilliant. Why would anyone want deep dish apple pie when they can have Pop Tarts and ice cream.”

“Oh but it’s the second dessert that’s really special,” Jack said with a twinkle in his eye. Whipped cream Ianto and..”

“Time to go,” Ianto said, interrupting Jack.

As they headed out the cog door, Ianto whispered something to Jack who nodded. They turned back to Owen and Tosh singing:

“So long, farewell, we're glad this week is done
We’re going home to have some schmoopy fun”

The tiny ukulele Owen threw at them missed them by inches.