remindmeofthe | (no subject)

Right! So. One or two of you may remember the Owen in the recent past 'verse that I was happily drabbling away with before deciding to turn it into a real fic. Well, it is progressing. Slowly, but it's going. It keeps evolving in my head and is highly unlikely to be the three-part epic I envisioned in what was probably caffeine-fueled, heart-palpitation-ridden insanity. At this point it's looking more like a two-part - the recent past part and the aftermath of Owen's return to his own present, with the year that wasn't dealt with in flashbacks, mostly because I simply don't have enough material to make it an entire part on its own and I'm not convinced it would fit anyway.

But I did promise to post bits. So here is a bit, if only to assure people (including possibly myself) that it's not dead.

Spoilers through Torchwood 2x07.

There's a wing full of furnished, if heavily dusty, bedrooms on the floor above Lisa; Ianto explains matter-of-factly that, once upon a time, Torchwood employees were "encouraged" to live on the premises, but that stopped back in 1963 when an alien virus wiped out almost the entire staff.

"I love our job," Owen says in response to this. Whatever Ianto's reply was going to be gets lost when he takes a breath to speak and immediately sneezes four times in a row.

"Perhaps," he says when he's finished, pulling out an immaculate handkerchief, "we should start cleaning up in here."

"Just bring down the stuff and I'll do it," Owen answers. He hates cleaning and he's so hopeless at it that Ianto will probably end up doing it himself anyway out of some uncontrollable neat freak urge, but if he's going to be stuck with Ianto as his only human contact for the better part of a year then he'd just as soon start things off on the right foot.

Ianto raises his eyebrows. "I think I know why you don't want Jack to find you. You've had a personality transplant, haven't you?"

Owen laughs, not without an edge to it. "Something like that."

Ianto slides him a look. "Best get things taken care of, then."

Ianto's efficient nature, which Owen has taken for granted more often than not in the past - or the future, or both, god, this is going to be nine straight months of headaches - is a godsend now. The room is an inhabitable space within two hours, with Ianto lasting an impressive twenty-five minutes before he takes the dustrag away from Owen. The CCTV cameras on this floor are disabled and the footage they'd already taken deleted, Ianto has solved more mundane problems like clothing and keeping clean, and he's even remembered that Owen will go mad with boredom without anything to occupy his attention.

"I'll bring you some books," Ianto says, "and I've got this." He presents Owen with a sleek laptop. In the back, plugged in where the power adaptor should go, is a small round piece of equipment, metallic green and about three centimeters across. Ianto taps it. "It's alien, came through the Rift about three years ago. It can hijack just about any signal within ten miles or so. You can use it to ring my mobile if you need to, watch telly, or download whatever sort of appalling pornography is no doubt to your taste."

Owen takes the laptop and grins. The Internet isn't exactly his idea of a social life, but it'll be better than relying on Ianto to keep him abreast of what's going on outside. "Ianto, you're brilliant."

Ianto smiles, pleased, but keeps going. "I believe I've worked something out for food storage -"

Owen winces. He can't believe he didn't see this coming. Ianto sees the expression and falls silent. Owen casts about for the least suspicious way to put it, then decides that there is no least suspicious way for a human being to explain that he won't need feeding any time soon and simply plunges on ahead.

"No need," he says. Ianto frowns.

"'No need'?"

"No need. Don't waste your time." He fixes Ianto with a serious look. "There are certain things you are going to have to trust me on, Ianto. This is one of them. And don't give me that Torchwood look, if I had any sort of nefarious plan, I'd bloody well pretend to be normal as possible, wouldn't I?"

Ianto keeps the look on him for another few seconds, but apparently can't find anything in his logic to object to, because he finally says, "Then if we're done here for now, I have other business to see to."

Owen nods. "Tell Lisa I said hi." Of course, he thinks. Ianto has no choice but to trust him for the time being. He won't want Jack poking around down here.

Which, if Owen is remembering correctly, gives him about three days to prove to Ianto that he can be trusted for the next nine months.