Work Text:
Nicholas finds the yellowing, corners-crumbling wad of paper shoved in behind a tidy row of file folders in one of the less-used hardcopy storage cabinets.
It's a sleepy afternoon in the Hub -- nothing going, nobody doing -- so he's come down to do a bit of catch-up work. Like Ianto, he finds the quiet of the archives soothing rather than unnerving (Jack and Tosh won't go into the archives alone unless they have to, and then they make a racket so Nicholas always hears them coming. Owen just plain won't go into the archives at all, but that is perhaps because he is a lazy bastard).
Nicholas sets down the file he's holding and carefully lifts the sheaf of paper out of the drawer, easing it past the tags on the folders in front of it. Mindful of his training, he clears a space on the workbench, lays down a sheet of acid-free paper, and sets the book down to examine it. He pulls on a pair of white cotton gloves and carefully lifts the blank outer cover.
His eyes widen slightly. Then, when he turns the page, they go huge.
Five minutes later, sans gloves and carrying the book in a plain paper wrapper, he stands in Jack's office. Jack is working; he can wait patiently, though he feels the unusual urge to fidget.
Jack finishes his typing with a flourish and looks up. "What, no coffee?"
"I think you'll find this more interesting, sir."
"Oooh, the official Butler Voice," Jack replies, holding out a hand. "It's not going to zap, incapacitate, poison, or otherwise inconvenience me, is it?"
"Probably not," Nicholas hands him the book carefully. Jack opens the paper, looks down at it, and bursts into a roar of laughter.
"I've been trying to find where Eugenia hid this for years!" he says delightedly. "Where was it?"
"Back of a file cabinet."
"Oh, wow," Jack flips through it with careless abandon. Nicholas winces slightly. "Did you read it?"
"Only the first few pages. I wasn't actually quite sure what it was."
"The Rules of Social Conduct," Jack says with relish. "Torchwood's own how-to manual for pesky things like love and sex. I think I've broken every rule in here. I was the reason for some of them."
"Even the ones regarding comportment of women, sir?"
"Yeah, well, there was an accident with the Tiresias Device -- long story, no need to get into it," Jack says hurriedly. Nicholas is already making a mental note to check the database. "This is classic. We got rid of them years ago, very very non-PC. This was my copy, I compiled it specially, but Eugenia...I haven't thought of her for ages."
"Eugenia Clarke?" Nicholas asks. "She was eighties, yes?"
"She was a dragon. Head of Torchwood during the late Thatcher administration. It showed. Ahahaha," Jack goes off into a more subdued but still uproarious gale of laughter. "The fifties, they were awful. You thought the Victorians were bad. Have you shown anyone else?"
"Not yet."
"What were you planning on doing with it?" Jack asks, an evil glint in his eye.
"Well, procedure for Torchwood proprietary documents is to scan the original and then place it in controlled storage. A PDF to be made of the scan, one hardcopy printed out for ordinary storage, and the digital copy suitably archived on the server."
Jack looks up from the book. "I love it when you go all librarian on me, Nicholas."
"We aim to please, Captain."
"Mm. Well, I'll have to examine it thoroughly first," Jack continues. "I'll have it ready for you first thing tomorrow."
Nicholas knows which battles to pick. "Of course. In the meantime, coffee?"
Jack nods, then goes back to reading. For the rest of the afternoon, there are occasional chortles from his office. The next day, Jack returns it to him in an offhanded sort of way, and Nicholas settles in at his workbench with the scanner.
It really is very interesting reading. Particularly the checkmarks, in a variety of ink tones and thicknesses, next to each rule.
***
Employee fraternisation is not to be expressed on Torchwood property or during work hours.
-- 1989
"I'm sorry about this," Nicholas says, settling down at Gwen's kitchen table, Rhys on the other side. It's not even a week past the battle in the slaughterhouse, but Nicholas and Ianto put their heads together and came up with a suitable post-"employee reveals stuff to their boyfriend and Jack lets them get away with it" debriefing. Granted, towards the end, they'd both had a bit to drink, but Nicholas can wing it. "It's only that we felt given everything it'd be best if both...you, and we, were clear."
"You mean Torchwood's going to tell me what I can and can't do," Rhys retorts.
"No! That's the thing, don't you see. Given your situation, it's important that we understand your expectations as well."
Rhys looks only slightly mollified.
"It's just a series of questions, along with a few general guidelines. Promise," Nicholas holds up his hands to forestall Rhys's objections. "All negotiable. Do you have any questions, before we start?"
Rhys shifts from foot to foot. "Only a general sort of thing."
"Might as well have it out now."
"It's just, you know. Torchwood. It's a bit...blokey, isn't it? Lots of handsome young men. Not that I don't trust Gwen, mind..."
Nicholas sighs inwardly. Ianto, ordinarily the soul of discretion, once made a catty remark about Gwen and Owen and Nicholas has got a few things out of Tosh, too. Enough to know that Rhys can probably trust Gwen now, as long as Gwen doesn't have a sudden attack of conscience.
"That's Jack, I think," he says with a smile. Rhys smiles back, sudden and illuminating.
"Fancies handsome young men, then, does he?"
"He fancies handsome young anythings. Point is, though, that he wouldn't step in on you and Gwen, would he? He's proper about that, and anyway he's got lots of options. And you and Gwen are really what we're here to discuss."
Not Jack and Ianto, nor Gwen and Owen. Besides, Gwen doesn't need Owen, because she doesn't need someone to tell. She has Rhys for that now.
"Oh and..." Nicholas grins at him. "Jack said to tell you the one non-negotiable point is you absolutely can't make a scrapbook."
Rhys makes it about two seconds before he snorts with laughter.
Nicholas hopes Gwen knows what she's got, because men like Rhys aren't exactly a dime a dozen.
***
Agents engaging in fraternisation with civilians outside of the Institute are to retcon any partner or partners they do not wish to engage with a second time.
Oral birth control is mandatory for all female employees.
-- 1965
"The sixties were great," Jack says, leaning back in his chair. The chair really sort of dominates the room, upholstered in knobbly bright orange and big enough to fit two of Jack. Figures he'd pick it.
"You aren't going to smoke that, are you?" Ianto asks from his position behind the avocado-green bar. He has a truly staggering array of illegal drugs laid out before him. Next to him, Owen is busily testing them all to determine just what they are. The joint Jack is holding up is pretty obvious. "You've no idea what it's laced with or what Rift energy does to marijuana."
"Never got a taste for it," Jack admits. "And life at Torchwood is weird enough without LSD."
"Which is what's all over these," Owen indicates a pile of psychedelic blotter paper. Gwen, sitting on the large circular bed, has found a shoebox of photographs. She cracks up laughing as she holds one up -- obviously a clothing-optional swingin' party.
The room just appeared in the Hub one day, after a serious Rift spike. No occupants, nothing alien, just a room from the sixties. The lava lamp was still going when Tosh finally located it.
Nicholas, inspecting the wardrobe and nightstand, feels just a little anxious about all this. "Are you certain it's not going to snap back in time suddenly?" he asks. "I'm sure the sixties were far-out, Jack, but I'd rather not experience them first-hand if it's all the same to you."
"Rift monitor says no," Tosh says. She's scanning the walls. "No activity in this location for another few years at least."
"Groovy," Jack replies.
"I always suspected the sixties were alien-influenced," Owen says, passing a box to Ianto. Ianto notes its contents ("Psilocybin cubensis - Magic Mushrooms") and bags it. "You know, some kind of taste-removal ray."
"Could've been," Jack allows. "It was a great time, though."
"Avocado and burnt orange," Ianto remarks, apparently to no-one. "Faux-wood paneling."
"But the girls! And the boys! Free love! For about five years it was just like being home again. Miniskirts," Jack says with relish.
"I feel objectified," Tosh says to Gwen.
"Who says I was talking about women in miniskirts?" Jack replies easily. He sets the joint down on the arm of the chair and gets to his feet, crossing to lean on the bar. He points to the alcohol in the rack behind it. "You know how to make a martini, Ianto."
"I'm not making Rift martinis," Ianto answers without looking up from his inventory sheet. Owen, next to him, sketches "square" in the air with his fingers and snaps on a new pair of gloves. Nicholas opens the bottom drawer on the avocado-green nightstand and makes a strangled noise of surprise. Gwen leans around him and echoes it.
"Whatcha find?" Jack asks, still leaning on the bar. Nicholas reaches in and carefully lifts out one of the many objects in the drawer.
"Ianto, how would I catalogue this?" he asks, holding it up.
"Vibrator, electric power, 1967," Jack says immediately. Ianto is mostly gaping. "Three speed or five?"
Nicholas examines it delicately. "Five."
"1968, then. Those were a classic."
Nicholas catches Ianto's eye, glances at Owen, and sees Tosh and Gwen exchanging looks. This is one of the many things to happen in Torchwood that they will never, ever talk about.
"You want some help cataloguing the rest of that?" Jack asks, with more than strictly necessary enthusiasm.
***
Discrimination or harassment on the basis of gender or sexual orientation is expressly forbidden.
-- 1998
"This is very delicate," Jack had said to him. "There's a lot of politics involved."
"It's a three-day trip to Glasgow," Nicholas objected.
"It's three days I'm not here. It's the first time I've left since..." Jack waved a hand. "There's going to be some stress."
"Nothing we can't handle, I'm sure."
"I didn't mean for Torchwood."
"Oh, for god's -- just take him with you, then."
"Nope." Jack said. "Ianto's got to learn that from now on, when I go, I come back."
"He's a grown man, Jack, not a puppy. He knows you're coming back."
"All the same. Stick near him. If he needs help, help him. I'm counting on you."
This is probably not what Jack had in mind. Then again, if he'd just wanted someone to be there for Ianto to lean on, he could have asked Tosh and been secure in the knowledge that both Tosh and Ianto would be horrified by the idea of sex with each other.
It's the second day of Jack's absence and Ianto's been nervous all day -- not showing it, he'd never show it, but Torchwood attunes you to the fine indicators of mood. Owen knows it and has kept well away; Gwen knows it and has kept a bit closer than she usually does, which is really not helping. Tosh went out to lunch with him, which did help. Nicholas isn't really sure whether he's helping or not by doing all his normal things.
"All right?" he asks Ianto, towards the end of the day, as Tosh and Owen are settling in for an evening shift on the Rift and Gwen is getting ready to go home.
"Course," Ianto gives him a smile. "Shouldn't I be?"
"You've been pacing."
"I was hoping we were pretending not to notice that," Ianto admits.
"Come on. Buy you a drink."
Ianto drinks scotch for preference, possibly because it makes him seem older than he is. He looks like a businessman, in his suit with his drink in his hand. Women make eyes at him, though a couple notice how intently he and Nicholas are talking and stop with a sigh.
"I know it's just three days and it's not as if it's some kind of...hormonal thing," Ianto says, between sips. "I mean I do have some self-control."
Which is the understatement of the year.
"I don't think anyone assumes that's the problem," Nicholas says carefully.
"I just want him to come back." Ianto laughs a little. "Christ, how pathetic."
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure I got this job after Jack Harkness shoved his tongue in your mouth and then disappeared for eight weeks," Nicholas replies. "Mixed message, aye?"
"Little bit." Ianto's glass is empty. Nicholas puts his hand over it before Ianto can signal for another.
"Let's go," he says.
Outside, in the cool clear drizzle, Ianto shoves his hands in the pocket of his coat and hunches over. Nicholas frets a little.
"I keep wondering," Ianto says, as they walk. "I keep thinking, what if something happens in Glasgow and he disappears again? Which is just stupid. I don't think that when he's in Cardiff and Cardiff's a lot more likely place for it to happen."
"He's not going to, you know."
"I know."
"You just have to -- "
"Oh, do tell me what I have to do," Ianto says, sharply. "Do, Nicholas, tell me what I have to do."
Nicholas just stares at him.
"Tell me," Ianto repeats, stepping closer, until Nicholas backs away -- into a wall, the back wall of the pub. In the dark. Oh, god.
"Go on then," Ianto leans close. "What do I have to do, Nicholas?"
It occurs to Nicholas that maybe Ianto really is asking, that he really doesn't know but can't quite admit it, but that's in the two seconds between the question and the moment they go for each other.
Ianto doesn't so much kiss as bite, and in the few times he's imagined this it's not how Nicholas thought it would go at all, but Jack did say that he should be there for Ianto.
"Jack put me at your disposal," Nicholas manages, as Ianto bites the soft skin below his ear.
"I know," Ianto says against his skin. Nicholas slides a hand up his shoulder, into his hair. Ianto's hands are on his hips, pinning him down. "He told me."
"Giving permission?"
"Jack doesn't give permission. Or ask it." Ianto slides one hand across his stomach, down, cupping him through his jeans. Nicholas moans and his fingers twist in Ianto's hair.
"What do you need?" Nicholas asks, though he's pretty sure he knows and he's already trying to get Ianto's hand out of the way so he can rub up against him, get body-contact. Ianto makes a noise -- Ah! -- and twists into it.
"Connection," he grunts. "Someone who won't leave -- "
They're interrupted, quite suddenly, by footsteps nearby; Nicholas freezes, and Ianto turns his head to one side. There's a woman standing under the streetlight, looking at them without shame or fear.
"Perverts," she pronounces, and walks on.
Nicholas meets Ianto's eyes, and it's about two seconds before they both burst out laughing. Ianto rests his forehead against Nicholas's.
"We're not going to do this, really, are we?" Nicholas asks.
"No, I don't think so," Ianto answers.
"Just as well. I didn't know you were a biter."
Ianto laughs again. "Come on. Walk you home."
***
Male employees wishing to pursue romantic relationships with female employees are required to submit a written statement of intent to presiding Head of the Institute.
-- 1954
"You know," Nicholas says to Tosh, from his perch on the spiral staircase, "I know people."
Tosh arches an eyebrow at him.
"I'm only saying, I could set you up with someone. Someone who really does understand what we do. Owen's not entirely accurate, after all; UNIT knows what we do, and so do some sectors of law-enforcement," he continues. "Because really, Tosh, Owen? Honestly? Really?"
Tosh sighs and looks down at the carton of food in her hands. Owen is crashing around in his medical bay, swearing at things and generally being unpleasant.
"I'm sorry, I just don't get the appeal."
Tosh shrugs. "He's smart. And funny when he wants to be."
"And completely oblivious."
"We don't choose who we love, Nicholas."
"No, but we choose who we walk away from."
She looks away, towards the medical bay. "I don't want to walk away. Someday he's going to realise that punching the world in the face isn't going to stop it hurting him, and he's going to fall to pieces. It's not easy to watch, but it'll be good to be there to help after."
"Tosh, you can't live your life on someday."
Tosh smiles at him. "Course I can. We do it all the time in Torchwood."
Nicholas begins a very subtle training program whereby on any day Owen is a bastard to people, his coffee is slightly too cold or too hot or he gets the biscuit-plate last or his sandwich isn't the way he wanted it. On days when he is nice -- preferably to Tosh, but really to anyone -- Nicholas helps him clean and sterilise his tools.
It's probably pointless, but Nicholas hasn't got someone to hope for. At least he can help out Tosh, who does.
***
Employees are not to become pregnant or father children except within the bounds of Torchwood-approved marital arrangements.
Employees found to be pregnant will be stripped of field duties for the duration. Male employees found to have fathered a child will be required to either marry the mother or remove all memory and provide a suitable stipend.
Female employees choosing to raise children may be retained by the Institute in a secretarial capacity only.
Male employees choosing to raise children may be retained by the Institute with limited duties only.
-- 1942
"Aha!" Nicholas gives a little triumphant cry. "Got it. "
"What's that then?" Ianto glances at his computer monitor. "What're you doing?"
"Bit of cleaning. Well. That's what I've told Jack," Nicholas says.
"Cleaning?"
"Old cached files, temp files, stuff that's cluttering up the servers. Interesting reading. Lots of this has been classified since and..." he triumphantly prints out a page, "this is one of them. Hard time digging it up. Jack mentioned it, I got curious."
"The Tiresias Device," Ianto reads, then whistles low. "Fertility device for unknown alien race, DNA rewiring, fatal to humans..."
"Except one," Nicholas taps halfway down the page. Ianto's jaw drops. It's always gratifying to get one up on Ianto and it almost never happens.
"Jack?" he asks, and Nicholas hushes him. "Captain Jack Harkness, freelance agent, encountered the device and experienced temporary gender modification...oh god."
"Gets better," Nicholas points to the screen. A gorgeous woman in a tailored forties-era suit smiles charmingly for the camera. "That's him."
"Bugger me," Ianto says. "I'm seeing Jack in all kinds of new lights. When was this?"
"1946. Er. There's another photo but you probably don't want to see that one."
"Why? Is he naked?"
"It's a medical documentation photo...it's just, he couldn't really keep it in his pants, apparently. Even if he didn't have an it anymore," Nicholas says carefully. "And it took them a while to get the machine working after he shorted it out...and birth control not being what it is now -- "
"Jack got pregnant. He always said he was never doing that again...I thought it was a joke." Ianto's brow is furrowed in perplexed horror.
"Healthy baby girl, born in early 1947. She'd be past sixty now. Records say Torchwood placed her with a local Cardiff family at Jack's request."
Ianto looks at Nicholas.
Nicholas looks at Ianto.
"Race you," Ianto says, and they both turn to the computers bank. Glancing over, he sees Ianto taking the adoption route -- hacking the government files, searching for girls placed with families at that time, forged birth records, falsified documents. Nicholas dives back into Torchwood's own records and starts looking for evidence of the creation of the kind of thing Ianto's looking for.
"There!" Ianto crows, triumphantly. "Mary Grant. Got to be her. Look at that face," he adds, pointing to a baby photo of Mary Jacqueline Grant, which even in miniature shows unmistakable signs of being Jack's child -- a certain jut of the chin and set of the eyes. Nicholas immediately starts searching town-hall records, tracing her through school and change-of-address and all the rest to be certain he has the right Mary Grant when he finally hits her marriage licence. Then he pauses.
"Ianto," he says.
"Mm?" Ianto looks up from his google-search for Mary Grants in Cardiff. "Find something?"
"Jack's got a granddaughter."
"Does he really? She'd be about our age, yeah? Unless Mary Grant was precocious. Knowing Jack..."
"No, I don't think you get it," Nicholas points to the wedding licence. Mary Grant, to Geraint Cooper. "Where've we heard those names recently?"
Ianto is silent for a long time. Nicholas hesitantly calls up hospital records and finds, a year after Mary Cooper's marriage, her daughter's birth certificate.
"Do you reckon Jack knows about this?" Nicholas asks in a very small voice.
"I don't see how he can't know." Ianto enters a few commands, over Nicholas's shoulder, and calls up an access log for the digital record of Gwen Cooper's birth. Torchwood's IP is listed several times, including one several years before Gwen came on the payroll. "He knows. Well. That...clears up quite a few things."
Nicholas thinks back, and yes, it does; not just about how Jack treats Gwen -- favoured child, though still...well, as a child sometimes -- but how Gwen interacts with the world. She's got charisma, Nicholas will give her that, and now it's becoming evident where at least some of it came from.
"He knows, but I bet she doesn't," Nicholas remarks. "God, we can't tell her."
"The way I see it, we have two options," Ianto says, after they both contemplate the history of Jack and Gwen in silence for a while. "Secrecy on pain of death, or Retcon."
"Secrecy?"
They shake on it, and Nicholas carefully wipes all evidence that they'd been looking.
"Drinks?" Ianto suggests.
"Good christ yes," Nicholas agrees.
A few weeks later, Ianto and Gwen come stumbling into the Hub, Ianto soaking wet, Gwen furling an umbrella. It was only supposed to be a coffee run, but rain comes sudden in Cardiff.
"I've got to get this off," Ianto gasps, shedding his suit jacket and loosening his tie. "Wool and rain don't mix."
"I told him he could have the umbrella," Gwen says to Jack, while Ianto tries to wring water out of too-short hair. "He wouldn't take it."
"Ianto's a gentleman," Jack answers. "I'd have taken you up on the offer."
But Nicholas sees how Jack looks at her, the love in his eyes bizarrely sexless, and knows Jack is telling a little white lie.
***
Employees of the Institute are not to fraternise with multiple partners either within or outside of the Institute, singly or in concert.
Female employees are to remain temperate at all times.
-- 1883
Nicholas and Owen have gone out occasionally on the pull, because frankly nobody else in Torchwood will go with them -- Gwen's with Rhys, Tosh and Ianto aren't interested, and Jack doesn't go pulling with employees (if indeed he goes pulling at all).
They've never gone after the same girl before, though.
It happens quite naturally -- Nicholas is talking to her while he waits for Owen to show up, and then when Owen shows up Nicholas is getting drinks from the bar and he returns to find Owen talking to her. She's pleased they know each other. Nicholas, who has manners, pulls back to let Owen have his fun, but the girl's having none of it.
At first he thinks she just doesn't want to commit to a bloke for the evening, but then he realises she's whispering in Owen's ear and Owen's nodding and both of them are looking speculatively at him. And nobody's precisely sober.
Which is how Nicholas ends up in bed with Owen, and a girl, and Owen might profess to a certain degree of heterosexuality but Nicholas made no such promises and besides Owen's just a little bit of a slut.
They avoid each other for a few days after.
Jack, who gets the story out of Nicholas eventually, is gleeful.
"That's my boys," he says proudly.
***
Interoffice fraternisation is to be undertaken only with permission from the presiding Head of the Institute.
-- 1916
Interoffice fraternisation is expressly forbidden.
-- 1920
"Jack, I'm sorry, it's just an archivist's curiosity," Nicholas says, pointing at the computer screen. Jack leans over, one hand on Nicholas's shoulder.
"Gerald Carter," Jack says softly.
"I just don't understand. Here he seems -- well, permissive for that era, anyway," Nicholas indicates one of the rules. "And then down here, he does this really sudden about-face. Suddenly nobody can..."
"Fraternise," Jack makes the word sound filthy.
"...right, with anyone else from Torchwood. So what happened?"
Nicholas tilts his head up to study Jack's face. It's open and sad, but a sort of distant sadness. Like he's remembering something that doesn't quite touch him anymore.
"Harriet died," Jack says.
***
Sexual inversion of any kind is expressly forbidden.
Premarital sexual relations with members of the opposite sex are expressly forbidden.
-- 1954
Nicholas has walked in on Ianto and Jack before, which you'd think would make them more careful, but apparently not. You'd think, he imagines wryly to himself, that it would make him more careful as well, but it's not like there was a door to knock on this time.
It's Christmas eve, and Nicholas does have a party to be getting to. He's made sort-of friends with some of the people in the Mayor's office and they've asked him along on a holiday pubcrawl, single men and women who work too hard and socialise with each other because they're the only people they see with any regularity. It sounds sad, but they all seem to have chosen service over social life, and they're fun people to have a drink with.
He's almost done with the nightly rounds -- making sure Myfanwy is settled, that the Hub is as tidy as it ever gets and all unnecessary machinery has been powered down. He comes up from locking the archives and leans in the doorway, looking out on the dimly-lit Hub. His eye catches movement -- Ianto, sitting on the sofa, his hands moving in the air as he talks. Jack is sitting next to him, turned towards him, his smile indulgent and amused. Whatever Ianto's saying, he's enthusiastic about it. His tie is off, and the first few buttons of his shirt are undone. Jack's overshirt is off, and his braces hang on his trousers casually.
Nicholas watches from the shadows as Jack reaches up and gently presses his thumb to Ianto's lips, stopping his mouth. Ianto smiles under it, and then they're kissing, and Nicholas isn't certain he should watch. On the other hand, the only way out is past the sofa.
And it's good, isn't it, just to see -- to see Ianto happy, because when Nicholas was new and Ianto was Mr. Jones he was so sad, so lonely. It's Christmas; Ianto should have everything he wants, and so should Jack. If what they want is a quiet evening in the Hub, with each other, then it's good that they get it.
Nicholas makes his decision and "accidentally" slams a door shut nearby. Neither man starts; Ianto does raise his head, and Nicholas lets himself out into the Hub proper, head down, for all the world as if he's studying his PDA with intent concentration.
"Nicholas," Ianto calls. Nicholas looks up, smiles.
"Just finishing up," he calls back, circling across the fountain's walkways. "Thought I'd bolt for the night, if it's all right."
"Big plans?" Jack asks languidly.
"Pubcrawl," Nicholas shrugs his coat on. "Lots of mistletoe jollity and drunken snogs, I should think. Anything you need before I leave?"
Ianto glances at Jack. Jack's grin is lazy, and not a little bit dirty.
"I can think of a few things," he says. Nicholas knows Jack likes to make him blush. "Sure you wouldn't rather have a quiet night in?"
"In what, Captain?" Nicholas asks innocently. Ianto snorts.
"Well, that'd be up to you, I imagine."
"I'm afraid they'll be asking after me if I don't show soon. Happy Christmas, sirs," Nicholas salutes them and departs. As he leaves, he hears Ianto laugh low and pleased, and Jack reply, a hint of petulant in his voice.
Up on the Plass, Nicholas inhales the crisp cold air with a certain degree of satisfaction. Tosh's family is in town to see her; Owen no doubt has his pick of parties; Gwen and Rhys are in Newport visiting her parents. Ianto and Jack have each other. It's good. His family is happy.
***
Heads of the Institute are expressly forbidden from fraternisation with subordinates.
-- 1984
Ianto is special.
Nicholas is not.
But you don't actually have to be special to ping Jack's radar. Not that this is news.
The point, Nicholas supposes, is that nearly anyone who crosses Jack's path is fair game for a flirt. Or a fuck, once upon a time, but not so much anymore. Because Ianto isn't a flirt or a fuck, he's something else to Jack, and he's the only one who will be something else to Jack for as long as they have together, Nicholas suspects. Jack doesn't like to say "no", but he knows how to, and with Ianto around it's his default answer to anyone else.
Except Jack doesn't seem to be thinking no, sometimes. When Nicholas brings him coffee or a report one of the others sent up, or when Nicholas sits across from Ianto (therefore next to Jack) at lunch, Jack seems to be thinking Yes. All the time. At him. And it's very unnerving.
Boxing Day. Aliens don't rest just because it's the holiday season. Nicholas is woken at seven by his mobile, and by three in the afternoon Torchwood has Saved The World Once Again, May We Have Some Coffee Now Please. They don't go into detail (he can read the reports later) but Ianto is nursing a wide gash in his shoulder and Gwen has some nasty burns on her left arm. Some kind of robot, Nicholas gathers. He'd like just once for robots to be nice, instead of homicidal.
Owen bandages Gwen and Ianto while Jack sends Tosh home to scrub the grease out of her hair. Nicholas offers her a bottle of Murphy's Oil Soap, which will also make her smell pleasantly of pine, and she laughs and kisses his cheek. Gwen drives Owen home on her way back to Rhys. Nicholas scrubs up the greasy footsteps all over the medical bay, and by the time he's done Ianto's painkillers have kicked in and he's cheerfully glassy-eyed, sitting in a low chair at Nicholas's workbench.
"Where's Jack got to?" Nicholas asks, washing his hands at the sink.
"Dunno. There," Ianto says, pointing vaguely in the direction of his office. "Why?"
"Curiosity. Want me to drive you home, or is he staking his claim?"
Ianto seems to find this amusing. "Think he wants me to stay here. He said, sit here," and Ianto's impersonation of Jack is so flawless that Nicholas laughs.
"Well, not a bad place for a rest. Drink some water," Nicholas offers him a bottle from the fridge. "Food?"
"I had an apple. You could stay," Ianto adds randomly.
"Hm?"
"At the Hub. No need to go if you haven't anywhere to be."
Nicholas smiles on him. "You must really be stoned."
"Probably," Ianto agrees. "Jack fancies you, you know."
Nicholas stares at him and then bursts out laughing again. "Jack fancies everyone, Ianto."
"No, no, as in..." Ianto focuses. "It's just you're being very frustrating."
"Frustrating!"
"He keeps asking you and you keep ignoring him. He really doesn't like being ignored. Really good way to tick him off. Done it myself," he adds proudly.
"Listen, mate, you should lie down and probably not talk anymore," Nicholas says. "Come on, I'll take you to the sofa."
"The thing is, right," Ianto says, as Nicholas gets a shoulder under his good arm and helps him to his feet, "he never actually asks for anything outright, because then if he doesn't get it he can pretend he didn't want it. It's part of his allure."
"So stoned," Nicholas replies affectionately.
"It's true. You're frustrating because he keeps asking you sidelong and you just never answer. Very frustrating to me, too. I should dock your salary."
"I'm fairly certain that really is harassment."
"Are you saying you aren't interested?"
Nicholas eases Ianto onto the sofa. "It doesn't matter. I wouldn't do that to you."
"Who says I don't want it myself?" Ianto asks. Nicholas cocks his head.
"Do you fancy me, Ianto?" he asks neutrally.
"Not fair interrogating a suspect under the influence." Jack's voice. Nicholas turns.
"He started it," he points out.
"Taking advantage?" Jack asks, slinging an arm around Nicholas's shoulders, pinning him down.
"Ianto was just saying you fancy me," Nicholas replies boldly, because really this isn't his fault and maybe he'll make Jack uncomfortable enough to let him go.
He keeps forgetting nothing ever makes Jack uncomfortable.
"And...?" Jack prompts. Nicholas looks at him blankly.
"And...I said you fancy everyone?"
"See?" Ianto says to Nicholas. "You just did it again."
Jack's arm slides down Nicholas's back, wrapping around his waist and then pulling him forward, until he's standing in front of Ianto and Jack is standing behind him and oh -- he remembers this feeling from the firearms training Jack gave him.
"I'm not exactly built for monogamy," Jack says in his ear, one hand splayed over his stomach. "Though I do make the effort. It's just that once in a while, it makes Ianto blush when I suggest we take this girl or that boy back to his and do kinky things with them. Funnily enough, when I suggested you, blushing wasn't quite the reaction I got."
Oh god. Oh, god.
"I'm not suggesting anything drastic," Jack is still speaking in a low, easy tone. Nicholas feels as if he's being put on display, but he can't find it in him to complain. "Just a little fun. Completely optional, of course, but -- this is me asking, Nicholas."
Ianto's eyes are wide and dazed. Nicholas can relate. Jack's managed to work his hand into Nicholas's trousers, which means that this isn't No, this is most definitely Yes, and Ianto's clearly part of that Yes.
"Well," Nicholas murmurs, as Ianto stands unsteadily and rests a propietary hand on the side of his face. Ianto has always owned him. "This is me answering."
***
Sexual deviance of any kind is not to be expressed or flaunted on Torchwood property.
-- 1937
Jack's bed barely fits two grown men, let alone three, and Nicholas and Ianto are both practical people. It's inelegant to take a break in the proceedings in order to get to Ianto's flat but, in the end, well worth it.
The next morning, Nicholas leaves them still asleep -- Jack collapsed over Ianto, Ianto flat on his back to protect his shoulder -- and makes breakfast, presenting them with hot toast and boiled eggs and sausages just as Jack is snuffling awake. Ianto's slightly dazed smile is even better than Jack's enthusiastic and extremely naked appreciation of his cooking.
Nicholas prefers to serve, in all things.
***
Employees of the Institute may not consume alcohol within twelve hours of active duty.
-- 1918
It's a rough few weeks, right around New Year's -- long shifts, all hands at the ready, and nerves beginning to fray. When Tosh finally sits back and announces in an exhausted voice that the Rift Predictor indicates a quiet weekend with 99% accuracy, there's a round of applause.
Jack breaks out the good whiskey and pours drinks for everyone, then lifts his to salute them.
"To surviving the year," he says. "May next year be...more peaceful?"
"Less turbulent," Ianto suggests.
"Abundantly lacking in anything with tentacles," Tosh offers.
"Don't knock 'em till you've tried 'em," Jack shoots back, and Tosh laughs. Jack fixes them with an affectionate, relaxed gaze that's been all too infrequent of late, and they warm under his smile.
"To Owen, who patches us up, Gwen, who reminds us to be kind, Tosh, who protects us, Ianto, who keeps us going, and Nicholas, who has almost mastered Ianto's coffee," Jack says, his grin widening.
"To Captain Jack," Gwen adds.
"To Captain Jack," they all echo, and they drink. Jack doesn't, but then he rarely does. Instead he sets his glass down and reaches into a desk drawer, drawing out several identical paper packets. Nicholas knows what they are; he typeset and bound them, at Jack's request.
"Presents for all," Jack remarks, passing them out. "Read it, remember it, live by it."
Gwen rips into hers like a kid, and thus is the first one who actually gets the book open; she looks down, giggles, and then shrieks indignantly as she turns the page.
"Our predecessors have put these laws in place," Jack intones, "for our social guidance and the elevation of our consciences."
"Employees of the Torchwood Institute shall remain modest, fully clothed, and temperate in public," Owen reads, horror rising in his voice. "Good Christ."
"Yeah, that one's my fault. Well, sort of. I mean it's not my fault the pictures got out. Actually it's a funny story," Jack begins, and one by one they take their seats around him, listening and laughing and joking, reading off item after item on the list. Gwen catches hell for Willful Insolence; Ianto gets a jab in the ribs from Tosh for Fraternising with Superiors; Owen is censured for Bad Comportment and Tosh for Unladylike Dress (trousers). Nicholas is summarily sacked for Sexual Inversion, though Jack didn't let that one go without a fight. Jack himself is removed from active duty for Consorting Socially with Individuals of Low Character.
"I like this one, though," Ianto says, and the others fall slient. "Employees of the Torchwood Institute shall at all times recall the dignity of their position and the gravity of their duties and shall act in accordance with the infallible moral dictates of their souls."
"Hear hear," Gwen echoes.
"I like how he says 'act in accordance', don't you?" Jack asks Tosh. "Okay, go home and recall the dignity of your position while you get a good night's sleep. Moral sermon over; amen."