Title: Buried in red tape
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Gwen, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,550 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Written for Challenge 515 - Avalanche
Summary: Gwen needs to find something in the archives, but of course, it has to be somewhere hard to reach.



‘Thanks for helping me find what I need,’ Gwen said, walking side by side with Ianto as they navigated the dark maze of the archives. All around them the shelves towered over them, stuffed to the brim with boxes and crates, much of which was still unknown or had been lost to the decades of non-existent record keeping that was slowly, and painstakingly being restored.

Ianto's torchlight swung left and right in a slow metronomic rhythm as he lit that way down into the depths of shelving where no foot had tread for years. ‘If it's not down here I'm going to be disappointed.’

Gwen arched an eyebrow at him. ‘Disappointed? Not completely unshocked?’

‘Maybe a bit of both,’ he confessed. ‘I'll be an old man by the time I get down to this bit of the archives to sort it out. If I make it to being an old man I'll be even more shocked.’

‘It could happen,’ Gwen replied. She didn't like talking about things like that. They knew the job was dangerous, but it served no one to think about their luck running out.

‘I need a minion,’ Ianto joked. ‘Someone I can train to understand the system and work on it when I'm not here.’

‘Jack would love that,’ Gwen said, trying to divert the conversation to more positive thoughts. ‘More time for the two of you to spend together.’

She caught a smirk tug at the corner of his mouth. ‘That's a good way to sell it.’ He paused and looked up at the junction of four tall sets of shelves, considered for a moment and then turned left. He counted his steps out loud and then stopped again, pulling his small notebook from a breast pocket and flipping it open to consult the words scribbled on the most recent page. He looked up again. ‘This should be it,’ he said.

‘I'm glad you think so,’ Gwen replied. ‘This place is a maze. I'd need a map, satellite imagery and a direct line to Houston to find it on my own.’

He shrugged. ‘You get used to it eventually. And if you do get lost, just keep walking straight and eventually you'll run into a wall you can follow back.’ He checked his notepad again and then craned both his neck and his torchlight upwards. He sighed. ‘Yep, thought so.’

‘What?’

‘The box you want? It's all the way up there. Top shelf.’

‘Of course it is! And how do we get it down here?’

Ianto's torchlight ran along the virtually pitch black corridor. ‘There,’ he said, the light landing on a ladder with wheeled legs. ‘You never have to look too far for one of those.’ He walked down the aisle and pushed it back towards the spot where he'd left Gwen, set the ladder next to her and then gave it an experimental shake. ‘A fair few of these aren't in great shape,’ he warned her. ‘A century of damp and darkness will do that.’ He gave it another tug and then placed a foot on the lowest rung, bouncing on it a little bit to test it. ‘Should hold with a bit of luck,’ he said.

He was about to start climbing when Gwen put a hand on his shoulder. ‘I'll go.’

‘It's a long way up, he warned her. ‘And I know how much you love heights.’

‘And a long way down as well,’ Gwen reminded him. ‘If you're worried about the ladder holding weight…’

Ianto’s eyes narrowed at her. ‘I feel like I'm being told I'm fat.’

Gwen grinned. ‘I'm lighter than you and we both know it.’

‘Alright. But be careful. If it feels like it's going, don't grab the shelves. They're a bit fragile and likely to take you down with them.’

‘Got it. And I've got you to break my fall.’

Ianto rolled his eyes. ‘Now I know why you wanted to be the one to go up.’

‘Shouldn't have had that pastry for breakfast,’ Gwen teased, grabbing both sides of the ladder and hoisting herself up, one rung at a time.

Ianto held the side rails as she climbed, keeping the rickety old ladder sturdy whilst bracing his torch against it, lighting the way upwards. Gwen's feet could feel the slight juddering of the woodwork as her weight leaned into each rung. Ianto hadn't been wrong, it wasn't terribly reliable, yet it seemed like it would hold, if only just.

She reached the top shelf, looping an arm around one ladder rung and pulling her torch from her back pocket to light up the area in front of her. There were several identical looking boxes wedged side by side like soldiers. Their tops were coated in inches of thick dust, grey and heavy as it sat undisturbed.

‘Is it up there?’ Ianto called out.

Gwen carefully prised the lid backwards, feeling the weight of all that dust slowly slide off, creating a plume that became illuminated by the light. No sense lugging down a box only to find it wasn't what she was looking for. Inside though, she found a bundle of leather bound journals, more papers in a fragile state, held together with ribbon and twine, a smaller box of slides and lithographic plates. This had to be it. ‘Yup,’ she called back. ‘Got it.’ She flicked off her torch and pocketed it, knowing she'd need both hands. She lifted the lid fully vertical, shaking off the remaining dust before dropping it back on top and began sliding it forward off the shelf, slowly assessing its weight. As it came free from its tight space she took it in hand, resting it in the crook between her elbow and shoulder.

No sooner than the full weight of it was comfortably in her grief then she felt the ladder rung underneath her foot crack. Instincts took over and the box slipped out from her arm, tumbling to the ground below. There wasn't time to yell “look out!” but she heard Ianto's yelp, and the box go crunch into the concrete floor. It sounded like he'd dodged it as it came flying down. Gwen's now free hand immediately went to clutch the edge of the shelf as the rung snapped in two and her foot dropped, fortunately finding the next rung down which held despite the sudden impact.

The shelf however did not. It began to tip forwards, boxes sliding forward towards her. She let go and grabbed the ladder as tightly as she could as she curled into a ball and braced for being knocked from it, knowing there was a fifteen foot drop underneath her. Somehow the boxes missed her entirely, but their lids fell first and then along with them, a literal avalanche of papers and journals, manila files and photographs. A second shelf underneath them, caught the edge of the boxes and sent even more things tumbling down. All Gwen could do was hold tight to the ladder and pray it didn't break on her.

After what felt like an eternity, she sensed the complete cessation of motion, and a silence descended, even as the last few pages continued to flutter down. She opened her eyes and chanced a look down, seeing mess everywhere, a sea of paper in the muted darkness, and down there, at the bottom, Ianto, pulling himself free from all of it, barely lit by the fallen torch that was now mostly buried under a mountain of archival documents.

Gwen gingerly made her way back down the ladder, holding firm just long enough for her to descend. ‘Ianto, are you okay?’ she said, reaching over to push away a now empty box.

He coughed, brushing himself down in a plume of dust and disintegrated flecks of paper. ‘A few bruises and a lot of inhaled particles, but otherwise, I think I managed to miss getting hit by anything major,’ he replied. ‘Remarkable, really,’ he added. ‘The archives usually aren’t so forgiving.’ He brushed more dust from his sleeves, fossicked about for a moment and retrieved his torch, using it to scan the scene around them. ‘Well, we certainly know how to make our lives harder, don’t we? No telling what’s come from which box, assuming it survived the fall.’ He picked up a piece of paper that was no longer standard size and the reminder crumbled between his fingers. ‘I’d say handle with care but I think we may be beyond that.’

‘I’m sorry,’ Gwen apologised.

‘Don’t be. I shouldn't have let you climb that ladder in the first place. I had no idea it was in such bad condition. Luckily we didn't send the entire shelf collapsing on top of us. There wouldn't be much of a Torchwood left if we’d gotten crushed to death.’

Gwen bent over and carefully picked up a few of the escaped papers and gently placed them in the empty box by her feet. ‘This is going to take absolutely ages to sort.’

Ianto shrugged. ‘Well, you did say it was a cold case you were looking into. I suppose a few more weeks won’t hurt anyone. Coffee first. Then we can deal with the paperwork. If Jack can put off doing his for a week, I think we can take our time.’