Fffc Bingo Card - Mister Fixit

[m_findlow]

Title: Mister fixit 
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Ianto, Jack
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: none 
Author notes: Written for Bingo Card Prompt 66 - Empty at fffc
Summary: Jack is determined to teach Ianto all about alien spacecraft. 

To say that Jack got excited by an abandoned alien spacecraft was like saying a child got excited about being in the lolly aisle at the supermarket. Perhaps the toy aisle of a department store was a more appropriate analogy, but the way Jack's mouth watered at the sight of a piece of broken technology always made Ianto think of lollies. 

As Jack did a quick reconnaissance around the stricken vessel, running his hands over it even as it sat there smoking at the bottom of a dip in a farmers paddock, the rest of them looked positively bored, except perhaps for Tosh. Her interest was solely on the internal workings which she couldn't yet get her hands on. She wanted to know all about the systems that made it capable of navigating through infinite space, power utilisation for hyperspeed, shielding and teleport systems and the anti gravity core. The mechanical side didn't bother her so much. It was like suggesting that a computer nerd should also be a car enthusiast. 

‘We should be able to fix her back at the hub,’ Jack declared, which was to say he was going to fix it. It was the perfect excuse to avoid everything else he should have been doing. 

‘Is it just me,’ Ianto began, ‘or is anyone else troubled by these ships that keep coming through the rift with no passengers.’ Had they all abandoned ship? And how did you abandon ship in the middle of deep space? You couldn't exactly just slip on a life jacket and jump off. What did an alien life raft look like, assuming you could carry one? And what happened to all those ships that got abandoned in space? Were there tow trucks that came and picked them up, or were there salvage crews that trawled around space looking for junk to collect that could be sold off?

‘It was probably empty to start with,’ Jack replied. 

‘What, they just parked it and popped off to the shops only to come back and find it gone?’ 

‘More likely it was in a sale yard.’

‘Intergalactic used cars?’ 

Jack gave him a look. ‘Is that so weird?’ 

‘S’pose not.’ Space was meant to feel more modern and futuristic but consumerism lived on.

The sound of a lorry broke the quiet night air as Rhys appeared with their method of getting the thing back to the hub. Jack was very quickly barking orders on how they should go about the task and just like that, today was just another day at Torchwood. 

When they finally got it stowed down in one of their large containment rooms, it was all Ianto could do to convince Jack to come to bed for a few hours sleep rather than start fiddling with their latest acquisition. Christmas had come early but Ianto held firm. Sleep now and you can play with your toys later. 

He didn't end up getting much sleep. Jack was too eager to make a start so he resorted to double strength coffee, having to cart it all the way down to the containment room where Jack had already set himself up. 

‘Thank you,’ he said, taking the mug from Ianto. ‘Drink that down and then we'll make a start.’ 

‘We?’ 

Jack shrugged as if his request wasn't at all strange. ‘I thought you could help me.’ 

‘I have other work to do.’ 

‘It can wait.’ 

Ianto narrowed his eyes at Jack. ‘Why?’ 

‘Why not?’ 

‘Isn't this more Tosh's thing?’ 

‘Tosh knows how a basic spaceship works already. You don't.’ 

‘Neither do Gwen or Owen.’ 

Jack shrugged off the comment. He seemed interested only in having Ianto help him, which was odd. It wasn't like Ianto would ever need to know how to fix a ship. He scarcely left the hub let alone go anywhere further than the shops. 

He sighed, giving in. ‘You're the boss.’ 

If he expected to be Jack's servant, passing him tools and fixing him cups of coffee he was sorely mistaken. Jack was instructing him carefully on every aspect of the ship's inner workings, showing him what was what, which bits were broken, what to look for if something wasn't doing what it should, and how to fix all of them. It was fine for the first hour or two but then Ianto's mind felt overloaded with information. He couldn't have fixed his car if it broke down but Jack was hell bent on him knowing how to repair an alien spaceship with just the bare essentials you'd find in a standard toolbox, which wasn't much more advanced than a bundle of wrenches and screwdrivers he might find in a hardware store. 

After four days of being up to his elbows in grease, Jack declared that they had reviewed every system and fine tuned the ship to perfection. Ianto took his word for it. If he had to do it again on his own, he didn't think he'd know where to start, but he appreciated that Jack had taken so much time out of his schedule to teach him regardless. It was nice just to spend time together on something that wasn't paperwork or about to kill them in the next ten seconds. 

‘Wanna take her for a spin?’ Jack asked, rubbing his hands off on a towel and grinning. 

‘This was your cunning plan all along, wasn't it?’ 

‘I just figured you'd appreciate it more if you were part of it.’ 

Ianto rolled his eyes. ‘Okay.’ He did deserve some kind of reward, he just hoped Jack wasn't also about to give him his first flying lesson. 

They boarded and sat down in the two main piloting chairs in front of the console. Jack grinned and hit the power button but nothing happened. ‘Huh. That should have worked.’ 

Ianto studied the console and found one dial that read zero. ‘You know, it occurs to me that there's one thing you didn't have us check.’ 

‘What's that?’

‘Whether we had any fuel.’