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fandomweekly2020-07-03 03:44 pm
badly_knitted) wrote in fandomweekly2020-07-03 03:44 pm
Entry tags:
[#058] Into The Past (Torchwood)
Theme Prompt: #058 – Prehistoric
Title: Into The Past
Fandom: Torchwood
Rating/Warnings: PG
Bonus: Yes.
Word Count: 999
Summary: Jack is loose in the Cretaceous and Ianto’s concerned for the safety of the poor dinosaurs; they won’t know what hit them!
Jack couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“You mean to say in all those months you and our TARDIS were travelling around together before you caught up with me, you never did the time travel thing?”
“Of course we did!” Ianto exclaimed indignantly. “We went back to earth in the Sixties, and forward a couple of hundred years, and we travelled back a few months to save the Megilly ship--”
Jack snorted. “Those little hops don’t count.”
“Well excuse me for having priorities other than taking pleasure jaunts to the past and future! I was busy looking for you in the present!”
That sobered Jack up; it had only been a few months since their joyful reunion and he was beyond grateful for Ianto’s single-minded determination to track him down.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to…” He trailed off with a vague wave of his hand. “Can we start over? I don’t like fighting with you.”
Ianto sighed. “We weren’t fighting, just… disagreeing. Look, we were both new to everything and we’ve had nobody to show us the ropes. Perhaps we’ve been a bit overcautious but we’re still learning, and time travel isn’t as straightforward as space travel. Besides, where would the fun have been in adventuring through time without you?”
“That’s true, wouldn’t want you having all that fun without me.” Jack winked.
“Perish the thought. So. Time travel?”
“Only if you want to. I mean we don’t have to if you’re not ready.”
“It’s hardly up to me, is it? I wouldn’t be the one doing all the work.” In his head, he added, ‘What do you think, beautiful?’
The TARDIS spoke aloud, gentle amusement in her tone. “It would not be so great an effort as you might believe, Ianto, merely a matter of careful calculation. I should be interested to visit another time period. Do you have one in mind?”
“Dinosaurs!” Jack butted in before Ianto had a chance to reply. When Ianto looked at him with a raised eyebrow he grinned disarmingly. “Come on, Ianto, didn’t you ever want to see real live dinosaurs?”
“Already have, back in Cardiff if you recall,” Ianto replied, smirking.
“Well yeah, but they weren’t in their natural habitat, they just got accidentally dumped there by the Rift, and we sent them back. We should visit the Cretaceous, lots of dinosaurs there. Earth, somewhere around… oh, let’s say a hundred million years ago. Don’t want to go back too far.”
“Right, because a hundred million years is just a little hop backwards.” Ianto rolled his eyes.
“I just thought we’d want to see a wide variety of dinosaurs and other creatures. If we get there too early some of them might not have evolved yet.”
“Weren’t you stranded in prehistoric times once?”
“Yeah, but that was just after the end of the Cretaceous and the dinosaurs were all barbecued. Cooked dinosaurs make for good eating, but they’re not very interesting to look at.” Jack gave Ianto a pleading look. “Please?”
“Well, I suppose it’s as good a time as any for out first jaunt into the distant past. Alright, but I’d suggest between seventy-five and eighty million years ago.” Ianto smiled. “I always wondered whether or not Pteranodon lived in flocks. Might be fun to find out for sure.”
Jack beamed. “Maybe we could find a young one, call it Myfanwy the second. You’d better make sure you’ve got plenty of dark chocolate with you!”
“It’s the Prehistoric, not an exotic pet shop, Jack!”
“Surely they wouldn’t miss just one.”
As they talked, the TARDIS was already feeling her way along the timelines into earth’s past and as soon as she had the exact location set, she made the jump.
“Plant earth, the Cretaceous period, seventy-eight point five million years into your past,” she informed them, opening her doors onto a wide, green valley bordered by tall cliffs.
“We’re there already?” Ianto moved towards the door, staring out across an unfamiliar landscape. A distant silvery sheen marked the presence of a lake, or perhaps a wide river. The ground cover looked strange, made up largely of horsetails rather than the familiar grass of his own time, and while there were some vaguely familiar looking trees, something like oaks, alder, and laurel, there were also tall tree ferns and palms.
He could see grazing herds in the distance and even as he looked, something he thought was possibly a large, lumbering Parasaurolophus trundled past, ripping a mouthful of fronds from one of the nearby tree ferns.
“Now that’s what I was talking about!” Jack said, joining his husband in the doorway. “Wild dinosaurs!”
“Technically, all dinosaurs are wild since there weren’t any humans around to domesticate them,” Ianto pointed out. “Although, I’m not sure how you’d go about domesticating something that big.”
“We should go talk to it!” Jack lunged out the door before Ianto could stop him.
“Good thing he’s immortal, because if that thing accidentally steps on him he’ll be flattened; I’m not sure how good their eyesight is. Oh for heaven’s sake! Now he’s climbing up the tail!”
Jack was indeed attempting to scramble up the dinosaur as if its tail were a slanting tree trunk, but a quick flick of the muscular appendage shook him off.
“Are you insane?” Ianto darted out of the TARDIS as Jack picked himself up off the ground.
“It was right there; I had to try! Who wouldn’t want to ride a dinosaur? Maybe we should’ve gone to the Jurassic; climbing a Stegosaurus would be a lot easier, they come equipped with handholds.”
Ianto facepalmed. “What am I going to do with you?”
Jack didn’t reply; his attention was already elsewhere. “Ooh, look! Is that a Triceratops?” He headed off though the trees.
“Probably not,” Ianto sighed as he followed his husband, hoping to keep Jack out of trouble. “It’s a bit soon for those; more likely a Styracosaurus.” He smiled wryly; he wasn’t sure Prehistoric earth was ready for Jack!
The End
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“Surely they wouldn’t miss just one.”
Oh my god I LOVE THEM.
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Thank you!
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Ianto is definitely the adult in this relationship.
Thank you!