Torchwood: Fanfic: Tech support

[m_findlow]

Title: Tech support
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 300 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for badly_knitted's prompt "Torchwood, Ianto, intelligent cactus " at fic_promptly
Summary: IT troubles have an unlikely solution

Ianto settled down at his desk with a cup of fresh hot coffee. The others were out for the morning checking out reports of ghosts inhabiting the cloak room at City Hall, leaving him alone in the hub. He didn't mind. He had a stack of work to catch up on, and a few hours of peace and quiet would be nice.

He cast a glance at the tiny cactus plant on Gwen's desk, sitting in its brightly coloured pot. It had been a gift from him and Jack, something of a joke, to remind her that she could be prickly sometimes, but that inside she was all soft and gooey. She knew they meant it in a nice way.

He clicked open a program on his computer but nothing happened. He clicked again, and still nothing. Wretched computers. Never worked when you need them to, he thought. If Tosh had been here, she'd have fixed it in a jiffy. It was just another harsh reminder that she was gone.

'Hello,' came a voice.

He looked around, confused.

'Hello?' he called back tentatively.

'Have you tried hitting shift F10?' the voice asked.

'Er, no,' he said, still looking around for the source of the sound. Perhaps there were ghosts here too.

'Try it.'

He was still perplexed, but stranger things had happened. He did as instructed, thinking how he was going to explain to the others that he was doing what the voices told him to do. Amazingly, the program rebooted itself and began working.

'Thank you,' he called out, 'but who are you?'

'I'm right here, just to your left.'

He looked across and saw only Gwen's cactus plant.

'A cactus is talking to me?'

'Yes,'

'Why haven't you say anything before?'

'You didn't need any help before.'

'Oh.'

Comments

[bk_forever]

Heeeee! I love cacti, Ianto had better make sure this one is cared for properly, they might need its assistance again! I can just see Ianto chatting with the cactus as he works, whenever the others are out. Maybe it's Tosh reincarnated!

Thanks for the fill =D

[m-findlow.livejournal.com]

He's certainly going to have second thoughts about the nursery where he and Jack bought it from. There could be other sentient plants there that need rescuing.

[bk_forever]

Oooh yes, send them on a mission to rescue the others!