Title: Tail Play
By: Jessie Blackwood
Pairing: Jack/Ianto
Rating: R16
Standard disclaimer: I do not own Torchwood or anything to do with it, it remains in the copyrighted hands of Mr Davies and the BBC. Tigger is the property of Disney although the mention of him is very brief... I'm not earning anything from it, I'm simply having fun with it and thank you for the opportunity. Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
A/N: This is a little crack but then, it came from some rather crazy role play discussion my mate and I got into late one night. It comes from the simple fact that Jack has to be a Tigger (well, there's only one of him, he's bouncy, he's irrepressible, irritating but well meaning, among other things and adorable too of course) and a tigger has a tail. So, what if the humans of Boeshane were not entirely human by the time the 51st Century came round? What might they have added in there...
Warning for Smut... But then, this is the boys... what else do you expect?
Summary: An alien artefact tumbles through the Rift and causes a little problem with Jack's DNA. A cracky little fic, the result of a humorous discussion one night concerning the introduction of Alien DNA into 51st Century humans.

"Well, I told you 51st century humans no longer had pure human DNA..." Jack was on the steps outside the boardroom, hands planted on his hips, looking fierce. Which must be hard to do under the circumstances, Ianto thought, trying to suppress a smile.

"Yes, I know you told us," he replied, "but really, Catkind?"

"Only 1.874%..."

"It still shows. Explains a lot, to be honest." Ianto stopped and turned to look at the Captain as he stood uncertainly on the gantry steps above him. It explained his aloofness, his independence, his disdain, his ability to find the warmest spot in the bed, or in the Hub for that matter. Also explained his laziness too. Ianto couldn't remember having seen Jack lick his own balls but there was always a first time and frankly he was flexible enough... Ianto dragged his thoughts back to the matter in hand with difficulty. "So, tell me, how long will this last?"

"I don't know. Unless Tosh can get her head around how to reverse the DNA enhancer I'm not sure I'll be able to get rid of it..."

"There's always surgery..." Owen sounded entirely too eager.

"Hell, no, I am not having this removed," Jack said indignantly. "Not like that anyway."

The alien artifact that had fallen through the Rift that morning had scrambled the DNA of a nice old lady from Penarth into nothing more than a primordial soup. Unfortunately the thing had been badly damaged as it crashed through her roof, rendering it unstable to say the very least. It had succeeded in interrupting a whist drive and the old lady's friends had needed to be heavily retconned into forgetting the nasty mess she had made on the Persian rug. They had all been taken home believing she had died of a stroke, after collapsing and crashing through her glass coffee table. Some trump card that had been.

Jack had been the one to pick the thing up and quickly drop it into a containment box, citing the danger to the rest of the team as his reason, but even he wasn't quick enough to avoid the resulting zap which had rendered him unconscious for three whole hours. He had woken up a changed man. At least as far as Ianto was concerned he was exactly the same, still the flirting and insufferable man who loved him. The only thing about him that was different was that now he was sporting a tail; a long, prehensile—and, Ianto had to admit, rather sensuous—tiger-striped tail.

"Well, I like it," Gwen said defensively. "It's rather...interesting."

"You would," Ianto snarked. "How do you propose to hide it, Jack? Tucked into your trousers? I think you'll find it makes driving a little difficult..." Jack looked a little crestfallen.

"It wasn't my fault, Ianto," he said quietly.

"Bollocks, Jack, you picked the thing up."

"I picked it up because of what it did to Mrs Parry. If any of you had touched it, it would have done the same. Your DNA is pure human, nothing to enhance, nothing to change..." He looked bleakly at Ianto. "I had no desire for it to make you into a puddle of goo..." Ianto regarded Jack silently for a moment; he expected some quip and he wasn't disappointed. "But that's my job," Jack added with a smirk. Ianto had been about to relent and stop making Jack feel guilty but on hearing that he rolled his eyes at the comment and went to make some coffee, shaking his head in exasperation as he went.

"So, Jack...," Ianto paused in the office doorway, a little taken aback as his brain registered what Jack was about. "What are you doing?" he asked, Jack's coffee in hand. Jack was sitting in his chair wielding scissors, which was never a good thing. He was also holding his trousers.

"I have a tail, Ianto, it needs somewhere to go..."

"You're putting a hole in your trousers?"

"Well, what do you suggest? As you pointed out, I can hardly keep it tucked down my trouser leg, can I? It is rather obvious and it's in the wrong place to draw admiring remarks. Anyone seeing that would think I was just plain strange..." Ianto forbore to tell Jack some people probably thought he was strange anyway.

"Should have thought of that before you touched the damn artifact..." Ianto muttered and placed the mug on the table.

"Ianto, why the snark? Seriously, there wasn't much I could do. And besides, I didn't know it would give me a tail."

"That's the point, Jack. You never know what it will do. It might have killed you."

"One thing I don't have to worry about..."

"Jack, I know what that does to you."

"So do I and we've been over this ground before. Nothing changes."

"There should be a punchline there somewhere," Ianto mused. "Something about contradicting yourself. Be thankful it didn't give you furry ears and whiskers or you would have been joining the cast of Cats and singing Memory under the bloody fountain..." Ianto glared at him. "Look, Jack, while I can appreciate your selfless actions in trying to protect us, there was another way. You maybe should have picked it up with tongs or something? You know, worn protective gear? God forbid you ever wear goggles. Look, I know it doesn't look 'cool' for the dashing Captain to be seen wearing protective gear but there is such a thing as safety these days. We're not operating in the 1940s any more, even if you are. You know, health and safety would have a field day if they ever got in here."

"And we'd have to retcon them to within an inch of their lives..." Jack shook out the trousers and poked his finger through the hole. "Is this big enough, do you think?"

"Only one way to find out."

"Yeah, right." Jack tugged them on and tried to guide his wayward new appendage through the newly created hole. He wasn't used to it yet and it eluded him, snaking away and down his trouser leg again. "Oi! You happen to belong to me, so why are you not doing as you're told?" Jack complained.

"It obviously reflects its owner," Ianto smirked. "Maybe..." Ianto captured the tail, smoothed the fur down along its length—not missing Jack's physical reaction as he did so—and guided it through the hole, allowing Jack to pull his pants up and fasten them securely. "Maybe you need therapy...you know, like rehabilitation after an injury. You need to learn how to function properly with it." The tail wrapped itself around his wrist, sensuously snaking along his arm. Jack's expression was intense.

"I could think of plenty of ways of getting practice," he suggested. "What you did just then... it felt rather good." This was a man who could think up more than 104 ways of using a stopwatch during sex and hadn't stopped counting yet. Of course he would be able to think of multiple ways of introducing this new-found piece of his anatomy into his love-life. It seemed to be prehensile too, he could—when it was cooperating—wrap it round things and hang on. An image imprinted itself on Ianto's brain then, the Captain sitting there in his chair, naked, tail wrapped around... stroking... Ianto cleared his throat and straightened his tie. His trousers were suddenly a little tight and it was ages before clocking off time. Bloody typical, he thought savagely and dragged himself from the room, putting as much distance between himself and Captain Innuendo as he could. Just like a cat, Ianto thought, no thought for anyone except himself...

***

Next story in series - Tail Play 2