At first it's so he doesn't forget. He promised he'd never forget, promised he'd always remember him, but thousands of years later, just as he'd said, he's forgetting. The first time it happens, he panics. He can't recall his name. He can't forget him, never him. He promised he wouldn't, and besides, he doesn't want to. He can't remember his name, so he forces himself to. He forces himself to remember, goes deep into his memories, and he remembers. He can't forget again, so he won't. He makes himself remember, and he carves the name onto the only canvas that will stay with him through his eternity. That name, that one name, stands out clearly on his arm, written in flesh and blood and blade.

'Jones, Ianto Jones.'

'Nice to meet you, Jones, Ianto Jones.'

A distant memory, one that happened thousands upon thousands of years ago. Their first meeting, the start of the whirlwind that was them. Meeting, attraction, working, lust, danger, love, the end of the world, and death. Everything at once, starts, stops, ends and then he's not there anymore and he falls into a pit of loneliness and grief and mourning and remembrance. He can't let him, 'Ianto. Ianto Jones,' go. He won't.

The next thing he forgets is Ianto's eyes. What color were his eyes again? He thinks they might have been blue, but then, they might have been gray or a color in between. He dredges up a memory of a perfect face, one with a look of adoration, one that he misses so much the cavern that was once his heart aches and aches and he feels like crying because of it. Blue. Sometimes blue, and sometimes gray, and always, always open, no matter how much Ianto tried to keep them closed off. Beneath the fading name, he should rewrite it, he knows, because he can't let it fade, he can't forget, he writes the color with a steel pen in dripping crimson ink on his soft, pale canvas. Then he rewrites the name in shaky letters. They don't line up, the old writing and the new, but his name is still legible so he can live with imperfect letters so long as he can remember.

He forgets Ianto's favorite device next. He can't believe he let himself forget this, because he can remember that Ianto always looked so happy with it in his hand and on his person. He always loved using it, the thing he can't remember, and he hates himself for forgetting what always made his Ianto so gleeful. As he shoves his hands in his old army coat, the one that Ianto got for him at the end of the world, 'he always did like the coat,' his fingers meet a round, metal object. He pulls it out, feeling the slight weight of the little thing, and he can remember again. Ianto's stopwatch.

'If you interested, I've still got that stopwatch.'

'So?'

'Well, think about. Lots of things you can do with a stopwatch.'

He carves that next to the name and the color. A stopwatch. Ianto always looked so gleeful when he had the object in his hand.

'Actually, nine minutes. Fifty... forty-nine... forty-eight... always at the ready!' And he looks so gleeful as he calls out the time left using his stopwatch. He can't remember why Ianto was counting down, he can only remember the look on his face. He feels like it was important, at the time, but now all that's important is his lover and remembering. He can't break his promise, not to Ianto. Not to his lover who he hurt so much.

Next he forgets the way Ianto sounded when he called him 'sir', with that beautiful Welsh accent, and he hates himself even more because he can't carve the way his voice sounded onto his canvas. For that lost memory, he rewrites Ianto's name, over and over and over again until his canves is a mess of crimson and his head spins and his vision darkens and he's finally at peace, however brief it may be. And as his world fades into darkness and his heart stops and his breath leaves him and his warmth escapes and the crimson keeps running down down down flooding drowning running covering him up, he's thrilled to see the face of his Ianto. He doesn't want to wake up. He never wants to wake up.

'Jack. Wake up. It's not your time yet, Jack.'

'I don't wanna go.'

'You have to. You can't die yet.'

'No. Please, no. Don't make me leave.'

'You have to, sir.'

'I'm forgetting you. I'm sorry, Ianto. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I can't remember, and I promised I would. I don't wanna forget you! I don't wanna leave!'

Screaming, he wakes with a gasp and finds himself covered in his own blood. His arm is healed and scarred over, but his name isn't legible anymore. He screams with sobs, rocking back and forth, keening, wailing, hurting, he hates this life, he hates it, he can't stand it, he just wants it all to end, he just wants to die.

'It's not your time yet, Jack.' Those beautiful Welsh vowels, shaping his own name. He holds onto that voice with everything he has, running it through his mind over and over again. He can't die yet. Not until Ianto says he can. He has to live for Ianto, and how ironic is that, to live for a dead man?

His attention turns to his arm. Ianto's name is an illegible mass of scar tissue that he'll never be able to read. He can't forget though, not again, never again, so he carefully rewrites it next to its former place and he vows to rewrite it again and again until it's permanently a part of him.

He painstakingly lives for millenia more. Year after year after year, forgetting other little details of his Ianto, ones that he carves into his flesh over and over so he won't forget. And with each passing year, he breaks a little more at a time and the only thing that runs through his mind is a continuous chant: Ianto, Ianto, Ianto. That one name, over and over again, the one name that keeps him alive, that he clings to. And so enwrapped in that name is he that he never notices he's changing. He's losing shape, losing his ability to write those little details about Ianto over and over again so he never forgets, and he hates it so much but he can't do anything about it.

And then, he can't write anymore. And out of the darkness that is his mind comes the bright golden light of time that is the Doctor and Bad Wolf, who he would recognize anywhere. And though his minds still screams that one name over and over and over and over again, he wakes up from his haze a bit, takes notice of the world around him, the way the timelines are moving, And he lives a bit more, but part of him is trapped in his memories, trapped with Ianto.

And then, finally, years upon years upon years in the future, he's free. The Doctor stands before him, the Doctor and a dark-skinned companion, and then he's free.

Those thousands upon thousands upon thousands of years of pain and longing and desperation and forgetting and remembering and carving and he's free. Finally, gloriously free from his curse, and he dies one final time, and he's happy for the first time since Ianto died. And as his mind drifts away, he can see that perfect face with those sometimes blue somtimes gray eyes and that dark brown hair that's almost black and curls slightly over his forehead, and he can hear that lovely voice and those beautiful Welsh vowels, and Ianto's there, and he's not going away, not this time.

And Ianto looks so horribly devastated at the state he's in, scars and forgetfulness and hatred and age and pain, but he can't bring himself to talk about it because Ianto's there and all he can see feel hear smell is Ianto and he refuses to let that go.

A/N: I feel like this wasn't that good and I tried to make it stretch too long, and I'm really not that happy with it, but here it is. Also, I know I've been absent for a very long time, but I've kind of lost a lot of inspiration for writing, so I'm really glad that I managed to get this up. I'll try to start writing more, but I make no promises. As always, please read and review. I always appreciate your input and thoughts.