Title: Hot and humid
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,163 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 506 - Amnesty using Challenge 28 - Warmth
Summary: The hub is freezing but Ianto has found the perfect spot for making it through cold winter days.



Jack was bored, and Jack hated being bored. He preferred action or having something interesting on his plate. When nothing at all was happening it made him fidgety, not least because a complete lack of anything happening was bound to mean that something totally cataclysmic was just around the corner. As much as he loved action, he could do with a little less world ending peril in his life. There was a happy medium to be found between exciting and deadly.

Today however, he blamed the weather. Cardiff was putting on one of its usual miserable winter days, or should he say winter weeks, perhaps even winter months. Outside it was barely ticking over single digits and at night it was even colder, dropping below zero and threatening snow, ice and everything else of a frozen nature.

The simple fact was when it was this cold nobody was out doing anything. Even the aliens couldn't be bothered when it was like this. If there were aliens in Cardiff at the moment they were holed up somewhere a whole lot warmer, and possibly considering why on Earth they'd ever come here thinking they could take over the place. Why would anyone want to take over the icy tundra of Wales? They could have invaded anywhere. Tahiti at this time of year would probably be nice, and a much better launch pad for starting an invasion. Funny how they were never aliens in Tahiti, Jack thought.

He supposed the Rift had something to do with it, but with the Internet there was so much information out there that surely any alien worth its salt could have done a bit of research and decided that there much better places with far better weather, more fruity cocktails and more scantily clad people based on the climate alone.
Their loss, Jack supposed. Right now he would have given anything to have joined them in Tahiti. For someone who had grown up by the beach on a desert world, even a century of living in Wales was bound to test even the hardiest native. You just couldn't escape the cold this time of year no matter how you tried.

He was sick of looking at his emails and rifling through the little pieces of paper that Ianto had left on his desk listing all of the phone calls that he had been meaning to return but couldn't find the will to do so. He was bored but not that bored. Where was Ianto anyway? Where was Gwen for that matter? He hadn't seen hide nor hair of either of them since first thing this morning when they'd all gathered around to gratefully accept their first coffee of the day, wishing it came in bigger mugs and stayed hot longer, but as it was they drank them quickly, keen to capitalise on the maximum heat value that it offered.

He pushed away from this chair and decided it was time to go looking for co-workers, if only to get himself moving. The hub was particularly freezing with the change in the weather up overhead. He knew Ianto was making sure their power bills were being paid, but the heating didn't seem to be making one shred of difference. He pulled up the collar on his coat and shivered involuntarily. Maybe there was more to this sudden cold snap than he was giving credit. Ah well, he’d worry about that once he found his team. They could look into it for him.

‘Gwen! Ianto!’ Jack yelled both their names, waiting for an answer. They couldn't be far away. Not unless they’d gone downstairs and become frozen popsicles, unable to move or even speak. Okay, maybe that was just crazy talk settling in, but the thing Jack hated more than boredom was not having an audience when he wanted one.

‘Ianto!’ he yelled again. Gwen might ignore him occasionally, but never his right hand man.

‘Up here,’ came the faint reply.

Jack craned his neck and managed to spot a tiny hand moving through the windows of the hothouse. He grinned and jogged across the hub, taking the stairs two at a time, bursting through the hothouse doors. ‘Ianto Jones! Thought I'd lost you.’

‘Nope. I was always here,’ he said, pausing the tapping on the laptop in front of him.

‘Whatcha doing up here?’

‘Keeping warm,’ he said. ‘This is literally the only place in the hub where the temperature is something above freezing. In fact it’s quite pleasant in here.’

‘We could have stayed at yours if you were that bothered by the cold.’

‘I don't think so,’ Ianto said, face scrunching up as if he were thinking about the cold. ‘My pipes are frozen, just like everybody else's. If we don't get some milder weather soon, we're going to have a city-wide crisis on our hands when everyone has been unable to shower for a week. They'll call it the Great Stink of 2008.’

‘Well, you smell fine to me,’ Jack replied, making sure he inhaled deeply before he said it just in case Ianto was hiding it under a heavy layer of cologne. He didn't exactly love Ianto's choice of aftershave. It was a little too “everybody” for his taste. Ianto needed a signature scent. Maybe that was one for the Christmas gift list.

‘That's because I used the showers here this morning,’ Ianto said. ‘Somehow we’ve got enough antifreeze running through the pipes to keep the water flowing, even if it isn’t as hot as it normally would be. When I told Gwen she rushed off to have a long shower herself.’

‘So…’ Jack said, letting the moment sink in. ‘It's just you and me for now?’ Jack asked, feeling some warmth return to his own body as the humid air inside the hothouse began to work its magic on him. He reached out, resting a hand on the back of Ianto's neck, feeling the warmth of the skin for the first time in about a week. Everywhere Ianto had been lately had included a coat, scarf and gloves. He'd been rugged up to the point where Jack was sure if he thought a balaclava was attractive he'd be wearing one of those as well.

‘At least until Gwen finishes showering and blow drying her hair,’ he replied.

‘We should make the most of it,’ Jack suggested, shrugging off his coat and dumping it on Gwen's abandoned chair.

‘Don't go getting too excited, Captain,’ Ianto warned him. ‘It's warm enough to not need a coat up here, but not warm enough to remove the rest.’

‘You doubt my abilities, Ianto Jones. By the time I'm done with you, you’re going to be so hot and sweaty you’re going to need another shower.’

‘Are you threatening me with a good time?’ Ianto's smirk was all Jack needed to see to know that he would be hoping winter continued to be bitterly cold for as long as it liked.