Fandom: Torchwood

Characters: Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Owen, Tosh 

Author: m_findlow

Rating: PG

Length: 2,334 words

Content notes: none

Author notes: Written for Challenge 333 - Amnesty, Challenge 1 - The Lost Hour, and juliet316's prompt "Author's choice, author's choice, time's up!" at fic_promptly 

Summary: A night of naked hide and seek takes a weird temporal twist.

Jack checked his watch and noted that the allotted ten minutes were up. He grinned naughtily as he murmured the words “ready to not, here I come, or at least I will when I win.” It was hard not to smile at his own double entendre, one of the main reasons he loved playing naked hide and seek, even if the concept for the game and all its many rules were solely Ianto’s creation. Who knew his lover had such a wickedly dirty mind. Jack had no idea where it came from. He was always so prim and proper around everyone else, a stickler and some might even say a bit precious. Would that they could see him after hours though. That man was an insatiable sex beast and Jack loved it.

Jack could never tell whether Ianto genuinely tried to win the game he’d invented. The trouble was that the prize for winning tended to benefit them both, with the winner getting to have their way with the loser. Even Ianto wasn’t so evil as to take advantage of winning and making Jack do boring things like chores. There was one time he’d made Jack clean the SUV but he’d still had to do it naked whilst Ianto watched, and in the end they got more soaped up than the car did, Jack being something of a chamois across the hood as Ianto could no longer resist just being a spectator. Jack knew all the right moves to ensure that his cleaning duties would be short-lived. Nobody knew how to shake their butt in time to their scrubbing strokes like Jack did. Two could play at that game.

Tonight thought there was no risk of Jack losing. Ianto had gone five rounds in quick succession without a win and now he was down to only his socks and jocks. They weren’t necessarily easy things for Jack to find, which is why he still had them, but it wasn’t going to be long at this rate before Jack had those too. He felt good about his chances at locating them, having already picked up one sock within the first twenty seconds of searching. The others wouldn’t be far away unless Ianto had made a run for it, hoping to hide them after he’d put a bit of distance between them. That would be just like him, trying to lure Jack into a false sense of security by making the first one really easy to find.

Not tonight, Mister Jones, Jack vowed. He wasn’t prepared to throw even a single round to prolong the game. Seven rounds of naked hide and seek was about as much foreplay as Jack could handle. Who knew what tomorrow might bring – or even tonight if their luck was really bad – but he wanted a decent shag and then some cuddle time afterwards before Ianto was too sleepy to stay awake any longer, knowing at least one of them needed four or five hours rest in order to be able to function on the morrow.

Please be under the boardroom table, Jack prayed, still looking for the other items of clothing. The game wouldn’t be over unless he claimed them all before finding his lover. He didn’t think he could go another two rounds, and it had been ages since they’d had a good shag under the boardroom table, or even on top of it. Both were excellent, and made the next few days meetings pleasantly enjoyable, thinking about it when he should be concentrating on other things.

Jack looked high and low for the other sock and the pair of underpants, desperate just to have the game over with. He’d given up on the game before but Ianto always sulked in the days afterward, claiming Jack wouldn’t have won if they’d just kept playing. And there was the not so small matter of personal pride. Jack was, even without cheating, the master of naked hide and seek. Another proven victory would just be the icing on the cake.

He was desperately rifling through cupboards and drawers when his vortex manipulator beeped at him, signalling that his twenty minutes were up. That was another one of Ianto’s rules, added to the game after Jack had once thought it exceedingly clever to hide himself in the boot of Ianto’s car. And it had been clever indeed until he’d run short on air and passed out inside long before Ianto eventually found him. Twenty minutes was the limit and after that, both of them had to reconvene and declare the round over. It was a bonus, Jack supposed, in that it made the game go quicker, and you couldn’t just sit hiding all night. For this purpose, watches didn’t count towards the clothing tally.

Jack conceded defeat for now and returned back to his office to await Ianto’s return. He’d be off collecting the remaining clothes he’d hidden before meeting back here to gloat.

When ten minutes went by and Ianto hadn’t returned, Jack began to wonder what was taking him so long. Surely he hadn’t managed to cover that much ground. He gave it another ten and when there was no sign of his lover he began to worry. What if, like him, Ianto had finally found the ultimate hiding spot and gotten in trouble on account of it. His mind drifted to locked cupboards and morgue drawers, before trying to calm himself and reassure his own mind that Ianto could have very well just curled up somewhere and fallen asleep. It was getting late after all. Even a tired Welshman might not hear the faint beep from his own digital watch.

Jack flipped a switch on the wall and spoke into it. It was an all hub broadcast system, able to relay his voice. It wasn’t perfect since there were lots of parts of the hub that didn’t have speakers installed, but it hit most of the main areas and was a good start. “Ianto Jones, wakey wakey if you’re asleep, and if not, then get your butt back here. Times up!” He gave it another five minutes and when that didn’t garner any results, he went straight into the hub’s security systems and pulled up the life signs detector, doing a thorough sweep of the hub, looking for heat signatures.

There were several all over the place and Jack had to mentally remember which ones to discount. Some were easy. Myfanwy up in her nest was the first one scratched off his list, double checking first that she wasn’t secretly harbouring a second smaller life sign up there with her. The cells were trickier, trying to remember just how many creatures they currently had in residence, and how many were warm blooded and would show up on his systems. After satisfying himself that they had the right number of prisoners down there, he broadened his search further afield.

Ah ha. Bingo. One life sign down in a secluded little part of the hub on sub-level six, but quite a ways distant. It seemed to be coming from an odd little storeroom that Jack had basically forgotten was there. Shrugging on his coat, he made his way down there to go and retrieve his lover.

When he pushed open the door, he expected to be confronted by an unconscious, or, if he was lucky, sleeping Ianto. Instead he was sitting there perched on a crate in all his naked glory, biding his time with what looked like a double checking of inventory, because he had a clipboard and pen in hand.

‘Sorry, was I boring you?’ Jack asked, part relieved that Ianto was totally fine and part miffed that he simply hadn’t bothered to come back or let Jack know.

Ianto looked utterly surprised. ‘You cheated! I can’t believe you!’

‘I didn’t cheat!’ Jack protested. ‘You must have. It’s barely been five minutes. There’s no way you could have found me down here that quickly unless you cheated.’ He huffed out an annoyed sound. ‘Honestly, I don’t know why I play with you sometimes.’

Jack frowned. ‘Ianto, what are you talking about? Five minutes? You’ve been gone over an hour. I was worried sick wondering why you hadn’t come back.’

It was Ianto’s turn to scoff. ‘Don’t be stupid. It has not been an hour. Look,’ he said, showing Jack his watch. ‘Eight minutes past midnight.’

Jack shook his head and showed Ianto the time display from his own vortex manipulator which even he couldn’t tamper with. ‘Try one thirty in the morning, Ianto.’

Ianto studied the holographic display and then checked his own watch again. ‘It hasn’t stopped. It’s still ticking. I know I love paperwork but even I would notice if a whole hour had gone by. I ran all the way down here and I’ve only just gotten my breath back. I swear to you it’s been just a few minutes since I left your office to go hide.’

It all sounded very odd to Jack, but it would have been odder still for Ianto to lie about it. And his watch was showing the wrong time, after all. He supposed he’d just have to put it down to an honest mistake, or a watch that needed a new battery. God forbid how Ianto would cope without his watch. Punctuality was everything to him. ‘Alright,’ Jack said. ‘I guess we just put this down to one of those things, and be grateful that you’re okay.’

Ianto raised an eyebrow at him. ‘You really were worried about me?’

‘Of course I was! How could I not worry about you?’

Ianto beamed at him. ‘That’s very sweet. He wrapped his arms around Jack’s neck and gave him a proper long, all consuming kiss as a reward, which Jack decided wasn’t so bad considering how squeamish he was talking about feelings. Kissing though, that he could do for hours without any shame at all, and Ianto was one of the best kissers in the business.

Ianto finally broke off the kiss several minutes later and gave a little sigh. ‘I don’t suppose we might call the game a draw for tonight? I think I’d much rather get on with what usually follows afterwards. Just… maybe not here in a storage room. Somewhere a little more comfy, with blankets and pillows.’

‘Sounds like a plan,’ Jack said. ‘Though I think we can safely say that I was the winner, or would have been if things had been allowed to run their natural course.’

Ianto pecked him on the cheek again. ‘If it makes you happy to think you’d have won.’ He took Jack’s hand and the pair of them sauntered happily back upstairs, each feeling they’d gotten their own version of victory.

As they pushed open the door to the main hub there was a loud groan.

‘Jesus, that is way more than I need to see at this hour,’ Owen complained, getting an eyeful of a very naked Ianto. ‘My breakfast hasn’t even gone down. Seriously, what is wrong with you two? This is a workplace you know, not some creepy shag pad where it’s just all sex all the time.’

‘Don’t mind Owen,’ they heard Gwen call out from behind her computer screen. ‘He’s just grumpy because it’s been an hour and he hasn’t had any coffee yet.’ She paused and tilted her head sideways to look at them, trying to keep her gaze fixed on Jack. ‘You are fixing some coffee soon, aren’t you sweetheart?’ she asked, directing the comment at Ianto.

‘I vote for coffee,’ Tosh chirped, hidden behind her own computer.

Jack felt Ianto quickly cover himself and Jack unconsciously opened up his coat for Ianto to crawl inside, though it still left a good amount of cheeky butt cheeks visible, which Jack didn’t try too hard to pull the coat any tighter around them. ‘Um, what are you all doing here?’

Gwen gave him a curious look. ‘Oh. Were we supposed to have the day off? I must have missed the memo.’

Owen snorted, chewing the end of his pen as he rested a sneaker up on his desk. ‘Not likely with Captain Slavedriver at the helm.’

‘It’s the middle of the night!’ Jack cried, thinking this was a vastly complicated practical joke and his much effort Ianto must have gone to in pulling it off.

‘No, it’s not,’ Gwen said. She pulled back the sleeve of her leather jacket, consulting the time. ‘It’s ten past nine. Are you having a laugh?'

Jack exchanged glances with Ianto, before flipping open his wrist strap and checking the time once more. Gwen was right. It was morning. Ianto looked equally confused. ‘Uh, I think maybe that storeroom has a weird temporal bubble forming inside it.’

Ianto raised his eyes to meet Jack’s, which wasn’t hard given how pressed up against Jack he was. ‘You think?’

It was a fair point. Jack had only been down there with Ianto twenty minutes and somehow they’d now lost over eight hours. ‘We should probably move everything out of there and seal it off. And make sure it isn’t spreading. That’d be all we need. A pity time isn’t moving slower in there. That might actually be handy.’

‘Sure,’ Ianto agreed. ‘I’m all for stopping rifts in time happening inside the hub but maybe I could borrow your coat and get some clothes first?’

Jack chuckled and did a quick magician’s flick of his coat, whipping it off and around Ianto before anyone could get more than a split second view of his magnificence, which was kind of a shame. ‘Just don’t take too long.’

‘Oh, har har. No clothes, no dignity left, no sleep, no breakfast, no coffee…’ Jack heard Ianto muttering as he trundled off to find some fresh clothes for the day.

‘Don’t forget no sex!’ Jack called loudly back, not caring who heard him.

‘Just when I thought my day couldn’t start off any worse!’ he yelled back.