m_findlow

Title: Making things work
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 2,283 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 93 - Technique at beattheblackdog
Summary: Jack's newest employee is subjected to trial by fire.

Jack watched with a bemused expression as Ianto inspected their kitchenette. He'd been giving him the fifty cent tour, but so far, nothing he'd shown Ianto had seemed to impress. It irked slightly, since watching the looks of shock, amazement and astonishment gave him such a buzz. It had been a long time, but finally this place felt like his domain. This was his office, his team, his pièce de résistance. And for someone already familiar with Torchwood, he wanted it to impress even more. He'd never liked London, and even though they were gone now, he still wanted to prove that his Torchwood base was better than theirs.

'Do you use this kitchen much?' Ianto asked.

'All the time,' Jack replied. Didn't the pile of dirty cups and plates in the sink give it away?

There was a tired little sigh. It must have been the twentieth Jack had heard so far. The fastidiousness of the suit should have been the first warning sign that his newest recruit was a bit of a stickler for neatness. He'd been hoping a little bit that the first incarnation, the one with the sexy jeans and grunge look, was the more easy going side, which would manifest itself once Jack showed him that they did things a little differently around here. Not so. Ianto kept himself calm and professional throughout. Jack knew that every word he said was being diligently committed to memory.

'Well, uh, that about wraps things up,' Jack said, watching as Ianto knelt and inspected one of the kitchen cupboards. What to do with his new charge next? It wasn't as if they had an employee handbook he could sit down and read. Their other new addition, what had Ianto named it? Myfanwy? was still downstairs being checked over by Owen. Probably not a good idea to leave him alone on his first day with a grumpy, sleep deprived creature. And a dinosaur.

'Okay,' Ianto said. 'Do you mind if I?' He already had a bin liner in hand.

'Knock yourself out. I'll be in my office. Please just sing out if you need anything at all. Everyone's very friendly. Well, I mean, Owen's a bit of a grump, but everyone else...'

'I'll be fine,' Ianto assured him. 'Looks like I have my work cut out.' He tried his utmost not to sound condescending as he said it. 'Maybe I could make coffee once I'm done?' he said, eyeing off the large silver machine. It was the first time Jack could see that Ianto was genuinely impressed by something. What a shame he had to go and ruin it.

Oh, yes. He'd almost forgotten about that incredible coffee. If he could replicate that effort here, Jack would never let him leave. 'That'd be great, only don't rest your hopes on that thing,' he said. 'Hasn't worked for years.'

'It's broken?'

Jack pulled a face. 'Not as such.' Or maybe it was. Maybe that's why the damn thing had never worked. He couldn't bring himself to confess he'd been the one to buy it. Tosh had readily agreed with him that it would save them a lot of money on their essential morning coffee run, and all the ones thereafter. The guy in the shop had made it look so easy. Insert piece A into slot B and voila, coffee. Even Tosh hadn't figured out how to get the thing going and she'd built a sonic disruptor from plans that didn't even work.

'Uh, there's an instruction manual around here if you're brave enough to attempt it,' Jack said. He pointed awkwardly to the dusty booklet wedged under the back lefthand corner of the machine. 'Used to rattle on the bench something awful back when the rift machine was a little twitchy,' Jack explained, trying to justify it. 'Solid as a rock, now.' A useless, very expensive rock.

He took one look at the booklet and knew that there was no way he would be able to prise it out now, assuming it was still legible. 'I'm sure I'll manage,' Ianto said. 'It's only a coffee machine.'

Jack couldn't help but laugh. If only he knew! He'd learn soon enough. 'Better luck taming a lion with a swizzle stick than bringing this beast to bear, but today's looking like a quiet day, so... Probably got a French press around here somewhere, actually. Or a cafetiere. I could get Suzie to take a look down in the archives. No idea where, but there'd be at least one I'm sure.'

'So long as you're not in a rush,' he replied, having gotten a glimpse of the mess down there. Suzie might never find her way back if she ventured too far into the jumble. Maybe once he'd sorted out the mess up here, they might let him tackle the one downstairs. It wouldn't be dissimilar to the work he'd been doing in London, and he did love trawling through all the old files, reading about all the impossible things that Torchwood had dealt with.

'Take your time,' Jack said, oblivious to the insinuation.

'Oh, and sir?'

Gods he loved it when Ianto called him sir. 'Yes?'

'A French press and a cafetiere are the same thing.'

'Oh. So what's that Italian metal one called? You know, the one that looks like a kettle?'

'A moka pot.'

'Oh. Well, there you go. Bet we've got one of those somewhere, too.'

'And lots of other important work to do as well,' Ianto replied.

Jack grinned and took the comment as his cue to leave. Cheeky and dedicated. A good combination.

Ianto set to work, cleaning and tidying the immediate area. He quickly ran out of supplies, having thrown most things out from the cupboards and fridge. The bag of coffee tucked away in the furthest corner of the cupboard was four years old and well and truly rancid. Half the things in the fridge might have once been food, or could have been alien medical experiments. He erred on the side of caution and checked with Owen before turfing anything that might have been work-related, and binning the rest. Jack had quickly handed him a credit card and told him to buy whatever he needed. He could have filled four trolleys but held himself back, not wanting to make a scene on his first day, settling on just a few bags of the basics. There'd be time enough to slowly acquire everything else, and to sneak in a few things of his own.

Jack spied on him whist he worked, using a network of internal CCTV cameras mounted around the hub. Why he'd ever had one installed in the kitchen was a mystery until now. The intensity with which Ianto worked was a curiosity, and that he was easy on the eyes wasn't a bad concession, either. He watched as Ianto carefully decluttered the mess that had accumulated around the large machine, wiping it down until it gleamed like new. He fiddled with buttons and dials, though Jack had no idea what any of them did. Water was sent through it, cleaning the internal mechanisms, before it was filled again over and over until the water ran clear. There were frowns and deep looks of concentration as he inspected different bits, and a jolt as steam caught his hand by surprise, coming out of somewhere it shouldn't. At that point Jack would have given up, given the thing a sharp belting for its insolence and walked away. Ianto simply ran the burn under cold water and kept going.

Jack became obsessed with watching, to the point where he ignored everything else. There was battle going on, right under their noses, and he was the only one who knew about it. The rest of the team thought Jack had gone mad, bringing in this obsessive compulsive stranger. To Jack though, it almost felt like a test. Playing decoy to capture a prehistoric lizard, and taking on a weevil with nothing but a stick was one thing, but how would he handle the pressure of being confronted by technology that refused to work?

All the while he watched, the instruction manual remained firmly fixed under the back corner of the machine. If his new employee had any intention of referring to it, he made no move to do so. He didn't strike Jack as the type to wing it. He was definitely a rule follower.

It was reluctantly that he was pulled away from his distance spectating as Suzie came reporting a rift spike in Splott that needed their attention. Oh well, he'd probably still be at it by the time they got back, he thought, already addicted to his new past time.

When Jack did get back it was late enough that everyone else had gone home. He'd dropped Suzie off on his way, and the large alien power transformer that they'd found wedged in a tree could wait until tomorrow for Tosh to pull it apart and make sure it was still in working order. Something like that would come in handy if it was in good condition.

It was the sudden movement out of the corner of his eye that caught his attention. There was Ianto, cleaning up around the desks of his new teammates, careful not to move anything he shouldn't. He was clearly too polite to attempt it whilst they were here in case they took offense. He didn't have qualms about being blunt with Jack about the state of the place, but it seemed he'd already pegged Jack as the thick skinned type.

'The others told you that you were allowed to go home, didn't they?' Jack asked, leaning back against Tosh's desk, hoping not to startle the young man. He'd rip Owen a new one if he'd told Ianto otherwise. It was hard enough to kick Tosh out of here most nights.

'They did, sir. But I wanted to finish things first. Never leave a task half done.'

Jack wanted to laugh. When didn't he leave things half done? That should have been his motto in life. Put off today what you can continue to put off tomorrow.

'Almost done then?' Jack asked.

'Almost. Can I get you a drink, sir? The coffee machine is operational and I expect you skipped dinner.'

Jack leant forward. 'It is?'

'I wasn't sure I should subject any of your team to it before I checked with you that it was okay.'

'I don't think they'd complain if you made them coffee, Ianto. No need to hold back on my account.' He'd remembered how good that first cup had been, and everything he'd drunk since tasted like pig swill. It couldn't be any worse than that.

Ianto nodded, tying off the black bag and walking it over to the bin, before stepping up to the gleaming silver machine. Cups sat neatly on its top now, the grinder on the side filled with beans. As the machine ground down the roasted blend, Jack could already smell it. He'd watched Ianto tinker with the thing all day, convinced it was flogging a dead horse, but watching him making it work now as like watching an illusionist. His hands danced from one nozzle to the next, black liquid spilling from one, white from another.

'How do you like it?' Ianto asked, not taking his eyes off the machine for a moment. 'Your coffee, I mean.'

'Any way you give it to me,' Jack replied, ignoring the clarification to the question.

There was another one of those little sighs, but Jack smiled at it, knowing Ianto hadn't taken offense to the innuendo-laced banter. Oh, yes, he'd enjoy teasing this one.

'Hot and strong,' Jack replied. 'But sweet.' Just like his Welshman.

'I thought as much,' Ianto replied, having watched Jack hoover three biscuits in quick succession from the newly filled jar that sat next to the machine.

He placed the filled mug on the bench. Jack reached across, invading Ianto's personal space.

'Does it taste as good as it looks?' he said, not taking his eyes off Ianto's. They were so beautifully blue, and those lips looked pretty good, too.

'How it smells is the better indicator,' he replied, his nostrils assaulted by Jack's own unique scent, unable to force himself to step away and reinstate the requisite amount of space between them.

Jack took a large mouthful and made an obscene sound that nearly made Ianto buckle at the knees. For just a moment, he couldn't be sure if he'd pleased or poisoned.

'Sweet goddesses, that's honestly best thing I've ever tasted! And I've sampled a lot of things.'

Ianto blushed slightly at the admission, and Jack found it adorable. 'I'm glad you like it, sir.'

Jack took another few mouthfuls, torn between wanting to guzzle it and ask for more, or to drink it slowly to savor It. 'I think we've uncovered your talent, Mr Jones,' he said. 'Unless there's other things you're still hiding?' He quirked an eyebrow at him but Ianto kept his expression neutral.

'Coffee is something of a passion, sir. It took a while to get her going, but I think it was worth the effort.'

Was it ever? Jack thought. 'I've fixed crashed alien spaceships missing half their parts, but that thing had left me for dead,' he said, eyeing off the machine. He still liked taking a spanner to things, even now, making them sing where before they'd only rattled and clunked. He was convinced he'd been a mechanic in a previous life. Perhaps Ianto had been, too. 'Tell me, Ianto Jones, what's your magic technique?'

'Patience.'

Huh. Well, that explained everything.