Title: Precious gift
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 873 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 434 - Precious
Summary: Ianto has given Jack the most precious gift of all.



Jack's eyes momentarily slipped shut and he bolted up, realising how close he'd come to falling asleep with a newborn baby still cradled in his arms. He looked down at the tiny infant, so impossibly small, readjusting the tiny yellow cap on its head. It was one of his baby daughters, though he couldn't say which. All he could remember in the blurred rush of adrenaline and excitement was that the pale green capped baby was a boy and the other two in lavender and buttercup were girls. They didn't even have names yet, still barely hours old. There would be plenty of time later for names. They didn't even have a short-list. It had simply been decided that the names would become obvious once they were born.

Beside him in the hospital bed was his husband, who had, unlike Jack, not resisted sleep when it came to claim him. He was curled on his side, one hand extended across and hanging over the edge of the bedside crib, knuckles just brushing the closest flannel swaddled infant. Even asleep there was a protectiveness in the gesture, as if he wasn't quite ready to relinquish the closeness that they'd shared for the last nine months.

Jack could hardly blame him for giving into the temptation of sleep. After all, he'd been the one to go through the long process of giving birth to triplets, enduring the hours of labour it took to bring three healthy babies into the world. Jack had just been a spectator, albeit as involved as he could be. If he felt exhausted by it, he could only begin to imagine what it was like for his lover. Now was the perfect time to sleep. There'd be precious little of it from this point onwards. Blessedly though, just for the moment, all three tiny humans were napping in silence before the inevitable round of cries would start up, announcing a need for them to be fed.

Jack had been anxious all the way leading up to the birth, but not for the reasons Ianto had assumed, always trying to wrap him up in cotton wool and stop him from living life as normally as possible. Jack’s anxiety was two-fold. Firstly, he loved Ianto with every fibre of his being. Given that, he feared that when he saw his children for the first time he wouldn't feel anything for them. He'd had children before and whilst it had been a happy moment, it had been mixed in with some reluctance. He'd never been good at committing to anything long term, except for his centuries long wait for his Doctor. Everything else seemed fleeting and trivial by comparison.

But he'd committed to loving his husband, not only because they had such a deep connection, but because Jack could rest easy knowing that it would not be as short-lived as his other loves. Ianto was, now, immortal like him. The TARDIS had seen something in what they had, gone and checked all of time and space, and seen that there was an infinite time in which they would be together. Even that was a heady emotion to wrap his head around. The idea that someone would be with him, loving him with all their heart for millions of years, made him giddy. Ianto would be there by his side for longer than anyone deserved to live. The least they might do with that time together was commit as fully as two people could.

Jack had always assumed that having children would be through adoption, or at worst, going through the process of pregnancy himself. He'd never imagined Ianto might end up being the miraculous bearer of children. The first in his own timeline of humanity to do so, even if the practice for men would become feasible and commonplace many thousands of years from now.

Jack’s worry was that he loved his husband too much to be able to find anything left over for children. He’d discovered that fact many times over in past lives, loving someone but not loving them enough to share that love around with an extended family. When he looked down at the three tiny children in their crib though, he knew he had been wrong about that. He felt so much love for them that he wondered why he’d ever doubted it. His other concern was that in loving them, his love for Ianto might diminish. After all, there was only so much emotional energy one person could produce, but watching his husband rest after having given him the greatest gift of all, there was just as much, if not more adoration for the man he loved more than life itself. All the love he’d felt before had not divided four ways but doubled twice over, filling him so full of happiness that he might just burst from it.

He wished he could wake Ianto up and tell him just how happy he was. They had three precious gifts that belonged to them and them alone which would never have come into being if they hadn’t fallen in love with one another, and three gifts that would keep on bringing them joy for a whole lifetime yet to unfold.