Fandomweekly Challenge 48 - The awful truth

[m_findlow]

Title: The awful truth
Fandom: Torchwood
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG.
Length: 1,000 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for Challenge 48 - Too much information at fandomweekly
Summary: Ianto has only begun to scratch the surface of the rift's secrets.

Ianto felt a slight twinge of relief as the boat pulled away from Flat Holm Island, leaving their victim of the rift in the hands of the carers who hid beneath the island's shabby, abandoned World War Two bunker installation. All of this had been here years and he'd never known about it, when he'd been convinced he knew everything there was to know about Torchwood.

Jack had been sullen and businesslike the entire time, comforting the frightened young man, but almost completely ignoring Ianto as they settled him in. Ianto took Jack's lead and kept his mouth shut, taking it all in visually. He doubted he could have verbalised his astonishment in any case.

Once they were well out into open water, he finally found the courage to ask the question that plagued him more than any. 'Why did you show me this? Why not one of the others?'

Jack’s expression was deadly serious as he made to reply. 'Because you’ve proven you’re good at keeping big secrets.'

He felt suitably chastised by the remark. Even after everything they’d been through since, the rebuke stung just as much. Yes, he could keep a secret. His whole life had felt like nothing but one big secret these days. First hiding a cyberman in the basement of the most technologically advanced place on earth, and now having to hide the fact that he and Jack had started something that could undermine the entire team dynamic. He liked having Jack to himself, and not having to worry about everyone else passing judgement on whether it was right, wrong or otherwise. Mostly it was to protect himself from being told it was wrong. As long as it didn’t bother Jack, that was all that mattered, and if it did end badly, there’d be no one to say I told you so.

But being told to keep his mouth shut about this secret trumped all of them.

'As your boss I’m ordering you never to mention this to anyone else,' Jack said, making his position undeniably clear.

'Got it.' He knew what would happen if he didn’t. Death or retcon. Neither was a good alternative.

Jack frowned as he studied Ianto’s face. He tried to school it so that Jack couldn’t read any one particular emotion. 'Why only mention this now? You could have told me ages ago. Given it a chance to sink in before hauling me out here.'

'Well, you never asked. Where did you think all that Earth-related crap that gets dumped by the rift originally came from?' Ianto couldn't tell if Jack's angry tone was directed at him for asking too many questions, or simply because he was frustrated by the situation.

When he didn’t reply, Jack set a hand on his shoulder. His expression softened just a touch. 'You look a little pale. Why don’t you go sit out on the stern if you’re feeling seasick.'

Ianto took it as an excuse to leave. His complexion had nothing to do with oceanic turbulence. He also got the distinct impression that Jack didn’t want to talk about it anymore.

He sat there on the back ledge, watching the boat churn up the water in its wake, leaving a trail of white as the island grew ever smaller in the distance. Jack had been right. Why hadn't he ever stopped to wonder more about the rift and how it worked? It made far more sense that it went both ways, but that left him with only more questions. If it had taken half a dozen people and dropped them back, what was to stop it from doing it again?

By the time they'd reached port and then returned to the hub, Ianto's head was stuffed so full of questions he thought it might explode, and still Jack didn't look in the mood for answering any of them.

'Shall it write up the report for you, sir?' He tried to make it sound as nonchalant and matter of fact as possible.

The cold, icy Jack returned. 'No report. Not a word about this, understand?'

'Not even for your Captain's Log?' Only Jack would have access to that. He surely had to have some kind of record somewhere. This was a big deal after all.

Jack turned and stalked towards his office, leaving Ianto in no doubt as to the answer. Jack wanted it erased from all memory.

He left Jack alone to brood, preferring to escape to the archives where he could work through his own feelings on the matter. Let the others deal with Jack's mood when they arrived. He tried to pick up from where he'd left off yesterday, but he found he couldn't concentrate on the task. Everything he'd seen and experienced last night kept playing through his photographic memory - the fear, the worry, the cold dankness of Flat Holm's facilities, the unwavering tenderness of the people who worked there, the screams from one room in particular that lasted for hours. It was like something out of a nightmare.

Instead he sat down at his computer and began pulling up records of all the negative rift spikes from their historical database for the past year. He expected to see the half dozen that had taken their victims out at Flat Holm, before dumping them back home again, damaged and broken. The search ticked over before producing a line graph that appeared spiked sixty two times. His stomach churned as he widened the search to ten years, twenty, then a hundred. His mouth went dry as the spikes on the screen became so compressed he couldn't pick them apart. The screen became a blur of white parallel lines zigzaging endlessly. Thousands of negative rift spikes throughout the past century, each capable of snatching a person irrevocably from their own timeline. Jack's anger and conviction that no one should ever know about this all suddenly made sense. This was no once in a blue moon event.

'Oh my God,' he breathed.