Princes and Pawns Prologue

[teachwriteslash]

Prologue


He eyed the younger man critically as he frowned over the incoming transmission. He’d lost weight over the past year. All the puppy fat was gone from his body and it made him look older than his years.


“That’s it then,” his companion sighed, tossing the shortwave headset on the makeshift desk and uttering an expletive. They were alone in the underground base; they’d sent the few remaining others into hiding before Martha Jones had returned to the United Kingdom. They’d carefully orchestrated all of it to ensure that some part of the resistance remained even if Martha failed.


He unfolded his lanky frame and moved to massage the taut muscles of his lover’s neck. “They’ve taken her as planned?” he asked, feeling some of the knots unwind under his skilled hands.


“Saxon himself took her to the Valiant, but we lost Tom Milligan,” the other man reported. “Saxon killed him,” he added in a hollow voice. It was just another loss among too many in the past year.


“Come away from there,” the older man ordered, holding out his hand. “We’ve done everything we can. It’s up to Martha – and if she’s to be believed this Doctor of hers – now.”


“Jack believes in him, too,” his companion replied, rising and intertwining their fingers. He looked hesitant. “When this is over ...”


“We worry about that when it happens,” the other man reminded him. “That’s the deal we made, and we’re sticking to it. This is now; that is then.”


“Always so pragmatic,” his lover said with a smile, tracing a single finger along the high cheekbones he’d come to love. “You set the alarms?”


“Yep,” came the husky reply. “They’ll wake us in time for us to look like idiots chanting, ‘Doctor. Doctor’.”


“Dignity rarely survives these things intact,” the younger man retorted, and then looked around a little lost. “There’s nothing left to do,” he observed quietly. “For the first time in a year, all we can do is wait.”


“Oh, I have a better way to spend what might be our last hours,” the familiar voice purred. “Come to bed.”


“I think I can agree with that plan,” the younger man replied smoothly, his voice smoky with lust.


As they made their way to the small bedroom they shared – a former storage room that they had converted months ago – the thinner man stopped his lover. He kissed him tenderly – a complete anathema to the frantic, grief-driven fumbling that they’d started with when sex had been a way to soothe the pain of losing everyone and everything that mattered. “I just need to say one thing. We can forget it tomorrow, pretend it never happened, or act on it. I don’t care, but if the world’s going to end in a few hours, I need to tell you that I love you, Ianto Jones.” He looked into the stormy blue eyes with a mixture of defiance and hope.


Ianto paused, feeling his breath catch, and then he smiled softly and nodded. “I love you too, Methos.” He drew him close and the rest of the world – what was left of it – ceased to exist for them for a few hours.


The next day, time re-wound and Ianto Jones never remembered meeting a man named Methos. The reverse was not quite true.


~



Next Part

Comments here .