Ficlet: No More
Nov. 21st, 2025 05:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
badly_knittedTitle: No More
Author:
badly_knittedCharacters: Ianto, Jack, Lisa.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 774
Spoilers: Small ones for Cyberwoman.
Summary: Ianto had given up hope of ever being a dad after Lisa had died, but now he and Jack were parents, and… It was a lot harder than he’d expected.
Written For:
miss_ingno’s prompt ‘Any, Any m/m, having children’, at ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
threesentenceficathon.Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
All those years ago, when he’d been with Lisa, Ianto had been so head over heels in love with her that he’d spent every moment he could spare daydreaming about someday marrying her, having a family with her, but… Well, thanks to the massacre at Canary Wharf, and Lisa’s partial conversion that had turned out to be far more advanced than he’d believed, all his plans and dreams had come to nothing. He’d had to accept that marriage and a family simply wasn’t meant to be, not for them, and after her final death he’d stopped thinking about having children at all.
It had seemed even less likely when his and Jack’s ‘friends with benefits’ deal had unexpectedly evolved into something deeper and more permanent. Even though Jack claimed that by the fifty-first century many men had become capable of getting pregnant, with both of them working for Torchwood, the very idea had seemed impractical, and yet… A few years later, he’d found himself having to to reevaluate his expectations for his future all over again.
Ianto thought he’d taken it pretty well when Jack had dropped the bombshell; at least he hadn’t fainted, as he’d half expected to. But he had lamented the fact that the Torchwood employee manual didn’t have a policy for their situation, and that because he was the one who did most of the admin for the team, he’d be stuck with the task of creating something suitable. Including provisions for pregnant men and their partners to take paternity leave had been right at the top of the list of things he needed to include.
It had taken a while for the reality of the situation to fully sink in, at which point Ianto had retreated to the archives to have a nervous breakdown in private. Even if it was perhaps a little self-indulgent, he’d felt he deserved that much. Nevertheless, once he’d pulled himself together again, he reminded himself that not so long ago he’d thought he’d have to give up any hope of becoming a dad, so he really should be happy about the news instead of panicking.
Alright, male pregnancy wasn’t exactly normal, not in the twenty-first century, but Jack wasn’t exactly normal either. Ianto needed to be a properly supportive partner, no matter what; after all, it was his baby too. Surely everything would be fine, he’d told himself, even if Owen was less than enthusiastic about handling pre-natal care for a man, never mind carrying out the delivery.
Fortunately for everybody involved, everything WAS fine, and a few months later he and Jack became the proud parents of a healthy baby girl. Despite parenthood being exhausting, it also proved unbelievably rewarding, so that when, a few years later, Jack discovered he was expecting twins, Ianto was confident he and his husband could cope with the new additions to their family…
Hah. As if! To Ianto’s dismay, it turned out that twins were about ten times more difficult to take care of than a single baby, and he quickly came to the conclusion that if he and Jack hadn’t been immortal, they probably wouldn’t have survived the first month. Meriel had been such a good, happy baby, but right from birth, the twins seemed determined to outdo each other in every respect. Worse, they had apparently decided that both of them sleeping at the same time was to be avoided at all costs, which meant the frazzled parents were permanently on duty, having to take turns at snatching naps just to keep themselves from losing their minds completely.
“They’re monsters,” Ianto complained, collapsing back into bed, having fed and changed the second twin shortly after Jack had dealt with the first. “Evil fiends in baby form, determined to sap our will to live. What on earth possessed us to think we could cope with three children as well as our jobs?”
“We were spoiled with the first one,” Jack said wearily from the other side of the bed. “We thought the twins would be as easy as their big sister was.”
“Well, we were wrong. Meriel must have inherited all our best qualities while the twins got the worst ones from both of us. We’re not having any more, and that’s final. Three is already two too many. Tomorrow you’re going on birth control.” The look Ianto gave his husband made it clear, even in the darkness of their bedroom, that he meant what he said. Why had he even wanted children in the first place? If he'd known when he was younger what he knew now, he never would have had sex in the first place, not with anyone!
“Fine,” Jack mumbled, pulling the covers over himself and inadvertently leaving his husband half uncovered. “Not that it’s necessary; I’m far too tired to even think of doing anything.”
So was Ianto, but he didn’t even hear Jack’s reply because he was already asleep.
The End
It had seemed even less likely when his and Jack’s ‘friends with benefits’ deal had unexpectedly evolved into something deeper and more permanent. Even though Jack claimed that by the fifty-first century many men had become capable of getting pregnant, with both of them working for Torchwood, the very idea had seemed impractical, and yet… A few years later, he’d found himself having to to reevaluate his expectations for his future all over again.
Ianto thought he’d taken it pretty well when Jack had dropped the bombshell; at least he hadn’t fainted, as he’d half expected to. But he had lamented the fact that the Torchwood employee manual didn’t have a policy for their situation, and that because he was the one who did most of the admin for the team, he’d be stuck with the task of creating something suitable. Including provisions for pregnant men and their partners to take paternity leave had been right at the top of the list of things he needed to include.
It had taken a while for the reality of the situation to fully sink in, at which point Ianto had retreated to the archives to have a nervous breakdown in private. Even if it was perhaps a little self-indulgent, he’d felt he deserved that much. Nevertheless, once he’d pulled himself together again, he reminded himself that not so long ago he’d thought he’d have to give up any hope of becoming a dad, so he really should be happy about the news instead of panicking.
Alright, male pregnancy wasn’t exactly normal, not in the twenty-first century, but Jack wasn’t exactly normal either. Ianto needed to be a properly supportive partner, no matter what; after all, it was his baby too. Surely everything would be fine, he’d told himself, even if Owen was less than enthusiastic about handling pre-natal care for a man, never mind carrying out the delivery.
Fortunately for everybody involved, everything WAS fine, and a few months later he and Jack became the proud parents of a healthy baby girl. Despite parenthood being exhausting, it also proved unbelievably rewarding, so that when, a few years later, Jack discovered he was expecting twins, Ianto was confident he and his husband could cope with the new additions to their family…
Hah. As if! To Ianto’s dismay, it turned out that twins were about ten times more difficult to take care of than a single baby, and he quickly came to the conclusion that if he and Jack hadn’t been immortal, they probably wouldn’t have survived the first month. Meriel had been such a good, happy baby, but right from birth, the twins seemed determined to outdo each other in every respect. Worse, they had apparently decided that both of them sleeping at the same time was to be avoided at all costs, which meant the frazzled parents were permanently on duty, having to take turns at snatching naps just to keep themselves from losing their minds completely.
“They’re monsters,” Ianto complained, collapsing back into bed, having fed and changed the second twin shortly after Jack had dealt with the first. “Evil fiends in baby form, determined to sap our will to live. What on earth possessed us to think we could cope with three children as well as our jobs?”
“We were spoiled with the first one,” Jack said wearily from the other side of the bed. “We thought the twins would be as easy as their big sister was.”
“Well, we were wrong. Meriel must have inherited all our best qualities while the twins got the worst ones from both of us. We’re not having any more, and that’s final. Three is already two too many. Tomorrow you’re going on birth control.” The look Ianto gave his husband made it clear, even in the darkness of their bedroom, that he meant what he said. Why had he even wanted children in the first place? If he'd known when he was younger what he knew now, he never would have had sex in the first place, not with anyone!
“Fine,” Jack mumbled, pulling the covers over himself and inadvertently leaving his husband half uncovered. “Not that it’s necessary; I’m far too tired to even think of doing anything.”
So was Ianto, but he didn’t even hear Jack’s reply because he was already asleep.
The End
(no subject)
Date: 2025-11-24 11:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2025-11-24 11:43 pm (UTC)Thank you!