Gwil's Guide to Growing Up Torchwood: Year 3, Chapter 3

[amuly]

Title: Gwil's Guide to Growing Up Torchwood: Year 3, Chapter 3
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Word Count: 2,579
Rating: PG
Summary: When a seven-year-old boy falls through the Rift, Ianto and Jack decide to adopt him. This is the story of his life at Torchwood.
Chapter Summary: Gwen discovers she's pregnant, Ianto makes arrangements.
Warnings: none
A/N: With all this fluff, you guys do know I'm just preparing you for a terrible drop, right? :P Also: my friend shojokakumeii00  thinks River Song is Captain Jack, a theory I just adore, and so I kind of incorporated that into this, if you feel like squinting and standing on your head to see the reference.

 

Previous Chapters:

               Prologue          |          The First Year:          |          The Second Year:          |          The Third Year:
                   1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10         1, 1.PWP, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7              1, 2
11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17               8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13      

 

 

Gwen burst through the tourist office doors, brown hair whipping across her face in the wind from outside. Her eyes were wide, almost frightened. Automatically Ianto reached for the sidearm he kept under the desk for emergency, thumbing the safety off. “What's-”

But Gwen was waving, slightly out of breath. “It's nothing, Ianto, dear.” She slammed the door shut behind her, hurrying in. “Who's our doctor today: Martha or Owen?”

Ianto didn't even have to check the rota posted on the side of his computer. “Both. Why? Were you injured?”

Gwen waved her hand again, blustering past Ianto and through the secret entrance to the Hub. Ianto stared after her, perplexed. After a moment's quiet contemplation, he put up a “back in 15 minutes” sign on the Tourist Office door, locked it, and hurried downstairs after Gwen.

He walked through the cog door just in time to see Gwen hauling out the full-body scanner, talking to Martha in hurried whispers. Martha's eyes were wide, but she didn't seem scared. On the contrary: a grin was starting to tug at her lips as she and Gwen stared up at the display on the wall.

“What the hell do the girls think they're doing?” Ianto turned to Owen, who was strolling over to him, eating a bag of crisps. Ianto shrugged.

“Gwen came in looking for Martha. Wouldn't say why.”

Owen squinted at the display, and Ianto followed his gaze. The medical scan had started pulsing slightly, a small red dot focused on Gwen's... stomach? Did she have a tumor? But no, it was lower than that. Almost in...

“Holy bleeding fuck!” Owen shot past Ianto, heading for the medical bay. “Looks like Rhys was taking full advantage of your extra days off, huh?”

Ianto's eyes widened, mouth falling open. Oh. Oh.

He hurried over to the medical bay, joining Owen on the observation level. Martha was chattering excitedly. “-beats having to wee on a stick!”

Ianto wrinkled his nose. At least that was something he and Jack would never have to worry about. He paused, thinking about some of Jack's off-handed remarks in the past. He hoped it was something they'd never have to worry about. He pulled out his PDA and wrote a quick note on it. Jack -> Contraceptives? Then he turned his attention back to the medical bay.

Gwen was standing with her hands over her mouth, eyes wide as she stared up to the display. “But... we weren't trying...” Abruptly she spun around, eyes searching until they landed on Ianto. “Ianto? Could we chat? In private?”

Ianto nodded, pushing past Owen and offering Gwen a hand as she hurried up the stairs. “We'll just step into my office,” he teased as he led her to the cog doors, up the lift to the Tourist Office. In the Hub, Owen's trainers stomped over the metal grating. The last thing Ianto heard was Owen's shouts for “Harkness! Get your arse in here!”

Safely ensconced in the Tourist Office, Ianto set about making Gwen comfortable. With the excitement of the discovery wearing off, shock seemed to be setting in, her face going pale as her eyes continued to to bulge out of her head. They'd dry out at this rate if she wasn't careful.

“I think this might be call for tea,” Ianto suggested lightly. He headed into the backroom the Tourist Office, where he kept an electric kettle and biscuits for just such an emergency. A minute later he was bringing Gwen a plateful of biscuits and a steaming hot cup of tea, which she accepted gratefully.

He waited for her to take a big gulp from her cup and munch her way through two and a half biscuits before venturing a question. “So. What brought this on?”

Gwen laughed around a mouthful of biscuit. “I suppose the usual sort of thing, Ianto. You must be familiar with it?”

Ianto rolled his eyes, but smiled. If Gwen was making jokes about it, then perhaps she wasn't quite as delicate about this as she seemed. “I meant,” he corrected, “why'd you come back from the Rift alert down in Penarth certain you were pregnant?”

Gwen waved her hand excitedly in front of her face, swallowing down her biscuit. “It was them! The trader aliens. Well, not them. Their pets. They didn't look like dogs, in fact, more like pointy flowers, but they started sniffing at me – maybe sniffing? It's what it seemed like – and then their master is telling me I'm about to 'sire offspring'! I thought maybe I was just on the rag, but then I remembered that I hadn't had it this month. And then I realized I couldn't remember the last time I'd had it. And now I'm apparently eight weeks!”

Ianto blinked, taking this in. “And the traders...?” he prompted.

“Oh, oh, they're fine. They thought we'd already made contact, I told them nope, not yet, and they took off straight away. Lovely, obliging people. Er... aliens. You know.”

Ianto nodded. He'd bother her for the actual report later. When she wasn't in such a... delicate state. “So you wanted to speak to me?”

Gwen nodded, sipping her tea. “Maternity leave. You mentioned a while back we actually have a policy for it?”

Pulling the desktop keyboard closer to him, Ianto nodded. “Yup. Torchwood is surprisingly progressive when it comes to women in the workplace. They had policies in place going back to before Jack first showed up.” Ianto furrowed his brow as he clicked through the Torchwood mainframe to find the appropriate forms. “In fact,” he smiled at Gwen, eyebrows twitching confidingly, “there were two women in charge when Jack first signed on as an independent contractor.”

Gwen grinned, wiggling her fingers suggestively. “I bet there's a story behind that.”

The proper forms appeared on the computer screen. Ianto clicked 'print' and strolled into the backroom, waiting for them by the printer he kept back there. “Actually, no. Apparently they were in quite the serious relationship.” He paused for dramatic effect, only continuing once he had the forms in hand and stepped back into the main office. “With each other.”

“Ah,” Gwen smiled. “I doubt that stopped him from trying.”

“Oh, of course,” Ianto agreed with a smile. “Well, here they are.” He passed the forms to Gwen, slipping a hand into his pocket as he watched her scan them. “Really, the tangible changes will be you and Andy switching jobs: he'll be on active field duty, while you'll stay behind and act as support and an administrative assistant.”

Gwen grinned. “So does that mean I get to help you with the coffee? Or the archives?”

Ianto hesitated, a cold fist of fear gripping his heart. “Er...”

“Only teasing!” she slapped his arm. “Honestly, Ianto: the look on your face.”

“Right.” He took a breath, in an attempt to calm his racing pulse.

Gwen was nodding to herself as she looked down at the forms, eyes skimming over the fields should would have to fill out and the duties she could no longer perform for the duration of her pregnancy. She looked up at Ianto again, smiling nervously. “A kid in Torchwood,” she marveled. “I would have never thought it possible, before you and Jack got Gwil. But you two do so splendidly with him, so I suppose it'll be alright, yeah?”

Ianto hesitated. “Well... Gwil's older,” he reminded her gently. “It takes a lot of the strain away, having him at an age where he can fend for himself: get his food out of the fridge if there's a crisis; watch telly while Jack and I aren't around; put himself to bed at night, if need be. With a baby, you'll have to actually be there for it, every second. There's no leaving it in its crib while you dash off to save the world.”

When Gwen looked terrified, Ianto stepped forward, hurrying to reassure her. “But you've got Rhys!” he offered.

Gwen's panic subsided, smile blossoming on her face at the mention of her husband's name. “Yeah,” she mused. “And he'll make a great tad, don't you think?”

“Absolutely,” Ianto said without hesitation. “He comes from good Welsh stock, after all.”

They shared a grin, Gwen breaking eye contact to sip her tea. While she was looking down, Ianto allowed a small flicker of concern to pass over his face before smoothing back to a placid mask. If he was being honest – and perhaps the tiniest bit judgmental – he'd argue that he had much less concern over Rhys making a great tad than he did over Gwen being of the motherly disposition. She didn't seem very... nurturing.

But then again, women seemed to have that instinct built into them. Perhaps it would just take the pregnancy to bring it out in Gwen. 

“You know,” Ianto leaned forward confidingly, attempting to draw his mind away from its petty place, “speaking of how independent Gwil is: he doesn't follow the route to school I laid out for him.”

Gwen frowned. “What? Why not?”

Ianto made a big show of glancing around, causing Gwen to giggle and lean closer. “I think he has a girlfriend.”

“No!” Gwen laughed. “No! He can't! He's so young!”

Ianto nodded mock-seriously. “Yup. He altered his route so they could walk to school together. I've never caught them doing anything more than a quick hug, but...”

Gwen clapped her hands together. “Oh, this is going to be so much fun!” she exclaimed. “Gwil growing up, turning up the Harkness charm-”

“God forbid,” Ianto teased.

“And my baby growing up with him. It'll be like he has a baby brother or sister! Oh, and maybe he could even babysit, when he gets older! I could give him a tenner for every hour...” Gwen sighed, smiling. “It's going to be alright,” she asserted. “I can tell. This'll all work out just fine.”

Ianto was saved having to turn the subject away from his own doubts on the matter by the secret door to the Hub bursting open, Jack bounding in and looking around, big grin filling his face. “So is it true?”

Gwen bobbed her head viciously in response, jumping up from her seat.

“Is it Rhys'?”

“Jack!”

“Jack!”

Jack held his hands up in defense of the two-person reprimand from Gwen and Ianto. “I mean it's not another Nostravite, is it?”

Gwen punched him in the shoulder. “No! Martha already checked it out. I'm eight weeks, and everything is looking perfectly normal. A practically mundane pregnancy.”

“Except that you found out you were pregnant because an alien race's flower-dogs smelled it on you, then you came back to your underground base and used an alien medical scanner to ascertain if it was true.” Jack and Gwen glared at Ianto, who shrugged unapologetically. “Just trying to put it in perspective.”

Gwen and Jack ignored him, opting instead to scoop each other up into a bone-crushing hug. When the broke apart, a wicked smile crossed Jack's face. “Wait, so you just found out now, right?” Gwen nodded. “Have you told Rhys yet?”

“Haven't had the second!” Gwen exclaimed, even as she fumbled for the Tourist Office phone.

Jack laughed. “You told me before you told him! He is going to love that.”

Gwen batted a hand at Jack as she dialed Rhys' work number. “He doesn't have to know that, does he?” She fell silent, listening to the phone ring. “Rhys? No, no: everything's fine. Well...” She came to an abrupt stop, eyes wide as she fumbled what to say. She glanced at Ianto imploringly, before placing her hand over the receiver. “What do I say?” she hissed.

Ianto shrugged. “Just tell him.”

Gwen bounced at the desk, clenching and unclenching her free hand uselessly as she deliberated with the receiver pressed against her face. “Well... love...”

She paused, and Ianto thought he could hear Rhys say something like “scaring me” over the line.

“No, no, everything's fine. I swear.” She paused a beat, then squeezed her eyes shut and said in a rush: “Fine if you like babies.” Ianto watched as she cracked an eye open slowly, smile spreading across her face as she listened to Rhys. “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, me. … Yes!”

Ianto and Jack exchanged a grin as Rhys' whoops and cries could be heard over the phone. After another minute of hurried reassurances and breathlessly happy laughter, Gwen put down the phone and turned to Jack. “Do you mind...”

“Go,” he said, waving a hand. “Celebrate with the hubby. Just don't do anything I wouldn't do!”

Gwen swept Jack up into a hug, planted a kiss on Ianto's cheek, then raced out of the Tourist Office, aglow.

Ianto leaned against his desk, taking in the quiet. He turned to Jack, raising an eyebrow. “Is Andy ready for duty as a full-time field agent?”

Jack shrugged, striding over to join Ianto in his position leaning against the desk. Their shoulders bumped, and Ianto leaned into the contact. “He's going to have to be, now.” When Ianto looked worriedly at Jack, he waved a hand. “He's fine. He's been with us more than a year, and he's never had any problems in the field. We'll manage.”

Ianto nodded. He had no doubt they'd manage. Their team was big enough to handle temporary rearrangements like this. And even with Gwen working exclusively as support staff, and Ianto on restricted active duty, they still had six active field agents – two more than when Ianto had first joined. He might doubt Gwen's maternal instincts, but when it came to Torchwood being fully staffed, they'd be just fine.

“So,” Ianto turned to Jack, serious expression belied by his playful tone. “Gwen's realization made me think: should we be using contraceptives?”

Jack squinted at Ianto. “Is... is there something about twenty-first century men I should know? That you're hiding from me?”

Ianto couldn't help the full-body shudder that imagery elicited in him. “No, no. Definitely not,” he reassured Jack. “But you're not a twenty-first century man. And you have made comments in the past...”

Jack laughed: a full belly laugh, filling the Tourist Office. He wrapped his arm around Ianto, pulling him even closer. “Oh. No! Thank goodness. Definitely no need to worry about getting me pregnant, Ianto.” He paused, and Ianto waited for the inevitable other shoe to drop. “Now, in the fifty-first century, when you could trade your body in for a new one, well...”

Ianto smiled as he listened to Jack's story, not caring if it was true or not. Everything should work out fairly smoothly, adjusting around Gwen's pregnancy. And Gwen was right about one thing: it might do Gwil some good, to be able to mentor a little “cousin”. Overall, it certainly wasn't a disaster on the level of anything even approaching a normal day at Torchwood.



Continue on to Chapter 4.