Fic: Box Of Treasures
Mar. 13th, 2026 05:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
badly_knittedTitle: Box Of Treasures
Author:
badly_knittedCharacters: Ianto, Jack.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1558
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Ianto finds a very strange delivery on his doorstep.
Written For: Weekend Challenge: High Concept at
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
1_million_words.Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
Living in a city that had a rift in space and time running right through it inevitably meant dealing with a certain amount of weirdness. That was true even for people who didn’t happen to work for Torchwood, the only secret organisation that everybody and their brother knew about. So, Ianto was familiar with weirdness, ran into it daily, and got paid well in compensation, which was fortunate considering how many bespoke suits had fallen prey to his job; many shirts, ties, and shiny shoes had been sacrificed too. Looking as good as he did tended to be costly, so much so that a few months ago, Jack had started giving him a clothing allowance on top of his wages. Ianto now bought three of everything; that way, if a jacket, or a pair of trousers, or a single shoe got ruined, he had replacements. For a while, at least.
But the ruined suits were things he’d had to throw out, when they’ve been damaged beyond repair; they didn’t count among the things he’d lost. The contents of this box, on the other hand…
It was sitting outside his backdoor when he got up this morning; he only noticed it because Cat was sitting there miaowing to be let out instead of using the cat door, which, as it turned out, was blocked by a large cardboard box. It was a good thing it wasn’t raining, or the box and its contents would have been drenched.
Suspicious boxes required a certain amount of caution, of course; everyone who walked for Torchwood understood that. As a rule, it wasn’t wise to simply pick such things up and take them indoors, not until you had some idea of what was in them. This one, Ianto quickly discovered when he scanned it using the app Tosh had created and installed on the team’s phones, was drenched in Rift energy.
That was a first. Usually, the Rift liked to drop its gifts in the most awkward and inaccessible places it could find: On rooftops, in trees, in the middle of a lake, or a bramble thicket, behind a heavy dumpster, under a pile of junk… He’d never had a doorstep delivery before. Well, unless you counted the gigantic egg he’d found in one of his planters one morning, but he wasn’t convinced that had been delivered by the Rift. For one thing, it had still been in one piece, and Rift deliveries were usually far from gentle. In was more likely that the parent bird had been sucked through the Rift and decided that Ianto’s planter made a suitable nest. What had happened to the bird after that was anybody’s guess.
Having determined that the box was unlikely to explode, and that it wasn’t contaminated with anything dangerous, Ianto flipped the lid open and took a quick look. It was crammed full of random odds and ends. Sighing, he carried it through the house and left it by the front door to take with him to the Hub, then went back to his breakfast of toast and coffee.
OoOoOoO
“What’ve you got there?” Jack asked a while later as Ianto lugged the surprisingly heavy box into the main Hub.
“Rift Gift, judging by the amount of Rift energy it’s giving off. Figured I’d just take it straight down to the archives for cataloguing.”
“What is it?” Jack reached for the top and tried to peer into the box.
“What it looks like: A box full of random junk.”
Jack’s eyebrows went up. “It came like that?”
“Yes, Jack. What did you think?”
“That something came through the Rift and you put it in the box to carry it.”
“Oh.” That did make sense, now Ianto thought about it. “No. I just opened my backdoor and there it was, a box full of… things.”
“It was outside your door?”
Maybe Ianto had still been half asleep when he found the box, because the more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed. “Yes, right on my doorstep. Didn’t you get a Rift alert?”
“Not unless one came through when I was in the shower.” That was about the only time Jack took his Vortex Manipulator off. He flipped it open now and pressed a few tiny buttons. “Huh.”
“What?”
“There was a… blip. Not a proper alert, more like a momentary hiccup. No wonder it didn’t register.”
The two men looked at each other, both of them frowning, then, with Jack close behind, Ianto headed for the kitchenette, where he set the box on the small table.
“I suppose we’d better take a look at what the Rift left for me.” He opened the lid and began lifting things out.
Inside, there was a pair of sunglasses with blue plastic frames, the kind a small child would wear. A single small, red mitten. A battered, well-thumbed paperback copy of Casino Royale. A wooden ruler with a name scratched into it. A school pullover, and three school ties from the comprehensive Ianto had attended in Newport. A big, shiny marble. Another pair of sunglasses, this time metal framed, the kind a teenager might wear if he was trying to look cool. A skull earring with tiny garnets for eyes. A small plush dog with threadbare paws and one ear missing… There was more, but Ianto had stopped digging through the box, staring at the dog in his hands. “These things are all mine!”
“What d’you mean, they’re all yours?”
“Things I lost, some of them twenty or more years ago!” He held the dog out to Jack. “My grandma gave me Dog for Christmas, I think, when I was a baby. Took him everywhere with me until I lost him on a camping trip when I was five. I cried for days.” He picked up the marble. “Lost this, my favourite marble, down a drain in the school playground when I was… Oh, nine, I think. The earring fell out at a Goth club when I was seventeen, and I lost the book when I was twelve, or maybe thirteen. I was on the bus, and it must’ve fallen out of my schoolbag…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Okay, I don’t care what you say, this proves the Rift is sentient. It’s collected everything I’ve lost since I was a baby…” He plucked a child’s rattle from the box. “Packed it all together, and delivered it to my door, miles away from where I used to live. If it’s not sentient, then how d’you explain that?”
“I don’t think I even want to try.” Jack frowned into the box. “It must really like you; it’s even returned your lost socks.”
“Which are of no use to me whatsoever,” Ianto pointed out.
“I know, but you know what socks are like. It must really have had a job tracking those down to give them back.”
“Oh, this is just what I need! Bad enough that I get love letters from tourists, but now the Rift is sending me random gifts!
“Not random, not really. It’s just returning your lost property.”
“And what, exactly, does that mean? That it’s seen the error of its ways, that it’s turning over a new leaf and deciding to be helpful for a change? Why would it do that?”
“Who knows? Maybe it has a crush on you.”
Ianto stared at Jack, horror-struck. “That… is a scary thought.”
“Not that I’d blame it if it does. I mean, who wouldn’t? You’ve stolen the hearts of more than a few tourists, not all of them human.”
“If that’s supposed to make me feel better…”
“I’m just saying, it’s understandable.”
“It’s weird!”
“But very Torchwood.”
Which was, unfortunately, true.
“And what am I supposed to do with all this?”
“Keep what you want and file the rest?”
“Even the odd socks?”
“Probably best not to throw any of it away. The Rift might not take kindly to that. If I were you, I’d take the most important things home, and keep the rest in the box in your office downstairs. That way, the Rift will feel its gift was appreciated, you’ll stay on its good side. It might even start leaving other items where you can get at them more easily.”
Ianto nodded slowly. “That makes a kind of sense. Perhaps I should display a couple of items on my desk.” Ianto dropped the marble and the earring in his breast pocket, so he wouldn’t lose them again; it was actually rather nice to have them, and Dog, back in his possession. He picked up the ruler, with his name carved into it. “This is going in my desk drawer. Always good to have a ruler, and wooden ones are so much better than plastic. I wonder if the fountain pen I lost in London is in here somewhere.”
“You’ll find out.”
“I will.” Dropping most of the items back in the box, Ianto picked it up. “I’ll take this downstairs to my desk so I can finish going through it when I have more time. Revisiting old memories shouldn’t be rushed. I just hope the Rift isn’t expecting anything in return.”
“It can’t have you,” Jack said, scowling. “You’re mine!”
Smiling to himself, Ianto headed for the stairs down to the archives. Only Jack could consider the Rift as a rival!
The End
But the ruined suits were things he’d had to throw out, when they’ve been damaged beyond repair; they didn’t count among the things he’d lost. The contents of this box, on the other hand…
It was sitting outside his backdoor when he got up this morning; he only noticed it because Cat was sitting there miaowing to be let out instead of using the cat door, which, as it turned out, was blocked by a large cardboard box. It was a good thing it wasn’t raining, or the box and its contents would have been drenched.
Suspicious boxes required a certain amount of caution, of course; everyone who walked for Torchwood understood that. As a rule, it wasn’t wise to simply pick such things up and take them indoors, not until you had some idea of what was in them. This one, Ianto quickly discovered when he scanned it using the app Tosh had created and installed on the team’s phones, was drenched in Rift energy.
That was a first. Usually, the Rift liked to drop its gifts in the most awkward and inaccessible places it could find: On rooftops, in trees, in the middle of a lake, or a bramble thicket, behind a heavy dumpster, under a pile of junk… He’d never had a doorstep delivery before. Well, unless you counted the gigantic egg he’d found in one of his planters one morning, but he wasn’t convinced that had been delivered by the Rift. For one thing, it had still been in one piece, and Rift deliveries were usually far from gentle. In was more likely that the parent bird had been sucked through the Rift and decided that Ianto’s planter made a suitable nest. What had happened to the bird after that was anybody’s guess.
Having determined that the box was unlikely to explode, and that it wasn’t contaminated with anything dangerous, Ianto flipped the lid open and took a quick look. It was crammed full of random odds and ends. Sighing, he carried it through the house and left it by the front door to take with him to the Hub, then went back to his breakfast of toast and coffee.
OoOoOoO
“What’ve you got there?” Jack asked a while later as Ianto lugged the surprisingly heavy box into the main Hub.
“Rift Gift, judging by the amount of Rift energy it’s giving off. Figured I’d just take it straight down to the archives for cataloguing.”
“What is it?” Jack reached for the top and tried to peer into the box.
“What it looks like: A box full of random junk.”
Jack’s eyebrows went up. “It came like that?”
“Yes, Jack. What did you think?”
“That something came through the Rift and you put it in the box to carry it.”
“Oh.” That did make sense, now Ianto thought about it. “No. I just opened my backdoor and there it was, a box full of… things.”
“It was outside your door?”
Maybe Ianto had still been half asleep when he found the box, because the more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed. “Yes, right on my doorstep. Didn’t you get a Rift alert?”
“Not unless one came through when I was in the shower.” That was about the only time Jack took his Vortex Manipulator off. He flipped it open now and pressed a few tiny buttons. “Huh.”
“What?”
“There was a… blip. Not a proper alert, more like a momentary hiccup. No wonder it didn’t register.”
The two men looked at each other, both of them frowning, then, with Jack close behind, Ianto headed for the kitchenette, where he set the box on the small table.
“I suppose we’d better take a look at what the Rift left for me.” He opened the lid and began lifting things out.
Inside, there was a pair of sunglasses with blue plastic frames, the kind a small child would wear. A single small, red mitten. A battered, well-thumbed paperback copy of Casino Royale. A wooden ruler with a name scratched into it. A school pullover, and three school ties from the comprehensive Ianto had attended in Newport. A big, shiny marble. Another pair of sunglasses, this time metal framed, the kind a teenager might wear if he was trying to look cool. A skull earring with tiny garnets for eyes. A small plush dog with threadbare paws and one ear missing… There was more, but Ianto had stopped digging through the box, staring at the dog in his hands. “These things are all mine!”
“What d’you mean, they’re all yours?”
“Things I lost, some of them twenty or more years ago!” He held the dog out to Jack. “My grandma gave me Dog for Christmas, I think, when I was a baby. Took him everywhere with me until I lost him on a camping trip when I was five. I cried for days.” He picked up the marble. “Lost this, my favourite marble, down a drain in the school playground when I was… Oh, nine, I think. The earring fell out at a Goth club when I was seventeen, and I lost the book when I was twelve, or maybe thirteen. I was on the bus, and it must’ve fallen out of my schoolbag…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Okay, I don’t care what you say, this proves the Rift is sentient. It’s collected everything I’ve lost since I was a baby…” He plucked a child’s rattle from the box. “Packed it all together, and delivered it to my door, miles away from where I used to live. If it’s not sentient, then how d’you explain that?”
“I don’t think I even want to try.” Jack frowned into the box. “It must really like you; it’s even returned your lost socks.”
“Which are of no use to me whatsoever,” Ianto pointed out.
“I know, but you know what socks are like. It must really have had a job tracking those down to give them back.”
“Oh, this is just what I need! Bad enough that I get love letters from tourists, but now the Rift is sending me random gifts!
“Not random, not really. It’s just returning your lost property.”
“And what, exactly, does that mean? That it’s seen the error of its ways, that it’s turning over a new leaf and deciding to be helpful for a change? Why would it do that?”
“Who knows? Maybe it has a crush on you.”
Ianto stared at Jack, horror-struck. “That… is a scary thought.”
“Not that I’d blame it if it does. I mean, who wouldn’t? You’ve stolen the hearts of more than a few tourists, not all of them human.”
“If that’s supposed to make me feel better…”
“I’m just saying, it’s understandable.”
“It’s weird!”
“But very Torchwood.”
Which was, unfortunately, true.
“And what am I supposed to do with all this?”
“Keep what you want and file the rest?”
“Even the odd socks?”
“Probably best not to throw any of it away. The Rift might not take kindly to that. If I were you, I’d take the most important things home, and keep the rest in the box in your office downstairs. That way, the Rift will feel its gift was appreciated, you’ll stay on its good side. It might even start leaving other items where you can get at them more easily.”
Ianto nodded slowly. “That makes a kind of sense. Perhaps I should display a couple of items on my desk.” Ianto dropped the marble and the earring in his breast pocket, so he wouldn’t lose them again; it was actually rather nice to have them, and Dog, back in his possession. He picked up the ruler, with his name carved into it. “This is going in my desk drawer. Always good to have a ruler, and wooden ones are so much better than plastic. I wonder if the fountain pen I lost in London is in here somewhere.”
“You’ll find out.”
“I will.” Dropping most of the items back in the box, Ianto picked it up. “I’ll take this downstairs to my desk so I can finish going through it when I have more time. Revisiting old memories shouldn’t be rushed. I just hope the Rift isn’t expecting anything in return.”
“It can’t have you,” Jack said, scowling. “You’re mine!”
Smiling to himself, Ianto headed for the stairs down to the archives. Only Jack could consider the Rift as a rival!
The End
