Coming Home from Hell
A/N This story came about because I really liked a scene in x-athenea-x's new story I am betaing "Dreams Are Made of Tears". This fits into my Homecoming series, but not necessary to have read any of those.
It made me think about how the events in KKBB would have felt to Jack after all that he's just been through in his travels with the Doctor. She wrote it beautifully and then moved onto something much more. Me, I just wanted to wallow in the angst. With Athenea's permission, that's what I've done.
I don't know when Tears will be finished, we're a bit slow, the pair of us, but you are going to like it.
There is also a slight borrowing of LoveSlashAngst's zephyrid fern – because I loved that. Every greenhouse should have one.
There is probably a little bit more to come on this, but I've decided to post it anyway. It feels finished as it is. I am doing the NaNo 50000 word novel challenge this month, and it isn't a Torchwood story. I can't have this hanging over me, I'll try and get the last bit done later.
Major Jack Angst. Hurt/comfort
Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, post episode, spoiler Torchwood up until then, Dr Who to Last of the Time Lords.
Rated T (my first that is less than M) (although the final bit might not be – if it ever gets written)
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Owen and Jack entered the hub through the cog door, the building silent and empty. Jack checked his watch. 'We've got… huh,' he grinned, 'exactly an hour to get out of here before we bring John in here after the bar. Think you can manage?'
Owen had his hand pressed to his side, blood seeping from under the dressings. 'Should be fine,' he muttered. 'I just need a good dose of painkillers, then I can dress this properly and we can go.'
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Jack sat at his desk and ran his hands across its smooth surface. The desk was completely clear, no paper work, no piles of files. The room too was bare; the clutter packed away, his things packed away. He shivered and pulled his coat closer around him, emotion threatening to overwhelm him. They'd packed his things away. They hadn't expected him to come back.
He supposed they'd had no reason to think that he should. He'd even said as much to Ianto once. He was waiting for someone and when he came, he'd go. That conversation seemed so long ago now and he couldn't believe that it had taken something as bad as the last year to make him see what had been under his nose all the time. He had a home; he didn't need to go anywhere. This was home. These people were his family and now finally he was back. He really was here.
And God damn it. He couldn't stay.
He looked longingly at the hatch in the floor by the desk. More than anything he wanted to lift the lid, drop down there and go to sleep on his own bed. Exhaustion threatened to derail him, break his resolve to do the right thing. He had been longing for his own bed for so long. In his dreams of coming home he had always seen himself, the first night back, sending everyone home, having a whiskey in his office then going down to his den and lying, spread out, comfortable, on his bed. Ianto had been somewhere in those imaginings too, warm, loving, and pleased to have him back. He'd been so looking forward to that, the thought of it had helped, helped through all the long hours dozing, resting as best he could, upright, in chains. Yet because of bloody John, his ex-lover, ex-partner, the murdering bloody psychopath he couldn't. Couldn't stay in the Hub, couldn't seem to break through to Ianto. Gwen was engaged. Nothing was as it should be.
Mind you his pratish behaviour in that office hadn't exactly helped with Ianto, even if he had finally agreed to a date. He sighed. It was a start.
He'd shown a lot of pratish behaviour tonight hadn't he? Most of it was because he was nervous. He hadn't known how to approach the team, was scared of how they would treat him, what they thought of him. He'd been worried about how they'd coped without him and actually they seemed fine. The crack about a power struggle resolved by naked wrestling had been pure nerves talking. They really didn't seem to need him and he should be proud. Instead he looked around the empty office and felt unwanted. He shivered. If he hadn't come back, would John have stuck around, involved them in his scheme? He shifted in his chair, trying to ease the pain in his back. Probably, he thought sadly. John needed someone with knowledge of alien tech or his scam wouldn't have worked. So just possibly his being here had actually saved them, although it seemed to him that it was Gwen, Ianto and Owen who needed to take the most credit. And it had been Gwen and Owen who had nearly paid the ultimate price.
He checked his watch. He and Owen had precisely forty three minutes to get out of here and away before their earlier selves would be bringing John in here. Right now they were all in a bar hearing about fragmenting grenades. Jack could just kick himself for being so exhausted he hadn't caught on in time to just what it was that John was up to. He knew he was up to something of course, knew the story wasn't kosher, but it had just enough ring of truth for him to go along with it, thinking he could find out what was going on before John did any damage. Well he'd been wrong about that.
Jack had left the Tardis that morning full of optimism and hope. It hadn't lasted long. He'd said goodbye to the Doctor and Martha, delighted that the Doctor genuinely wanted him to stay and yet so sure that he knew where he belonged now. He was home. He'd felt some sadness at the farewell, tried to hide it with an inane comment about his looks, but really it had been fine.
Fine until he heard the noise of the Tardis dematerialising and his world had came crashing down. That sound and his deep seated memories of what it meant - abandonment, loss and an aching emptiness inside, momentous change and despair - it had all flooded back and overwhelmed him. He had never imagined that that sound could make him feel like that again. Totally bereft he'd fallen to his knees in the middle of the Plas and howled with pain. The Doctor had been right when he'd told him he wasn't ready to come back.
An elderly woman had come to his assistance. He'd half expected one of the team to have appeared. The woman had asked if he was all right, and if she didn't quite believe his story of stomach cramps, she was too polite to say so. She'd helped him get to his feet and he'd assured her he was going home. Only then, tears in his eyes and arm wrapped around his belly because he really did have a pain, he realised he couldn't. He couldn't go in and face the team, his team, like this. He just wasn't strong enough. He was suddenly terrified of facing them. They must think he had abandoned them.
He had. He'd only barely resurrected after facing down Abbadon, they'd been traumatised by the rift events, grieving for him, overjoyed at his survival and then he just… gone. They had every right to be angry.
He'd thought he was ready but he wasn't. He'd realised that what he'd told himself wasn't true. He wasn't coming back for them at all, he was being purely selfish, he was back because he needed them. He had stumbled away from the Plas, down to the waterfront, and then because he didn't want to be anywhere where any of them might stumble across him, he walked miles along the canal paths and breakwaters away from town. He found an oil storage tank with a view of the Bay from its top and spent most of the day sitting, legs pulled up to his chest looking out to sea.
The sea air, the ozone and the feeling of home that the sea always brought him calmed and soothed him. It wasn't his home, it wasn't anything like his home world, but the sea, it smelt the same. By late afternoon he was feeling a little foolish. He climbed down from the tank and made his way back into town. He was starting to feel hungry so stopped at a café for a steak sandwich and coffee. It was good, he was still getting used to eating good food again. While the food was most welcome the coffee made him long for Ianto. And he realised, he didn't have to long for him anymore. Ianto was here, less than a mile away. Squaring his shoulders he walked out into the dusk. He was as ready as he was going to get.
He found the tourist shop locked, but it was after five. He let himself in and stood there smiling. Nothing had changed. He half expected Ianto to appear from behind the bead curtain.
He didn't.
With a sigh he let himself into the passage and took the lift down. As the cog door opened he schooled his face into a happy smile. 'Hi kids,' he called brightly. 'Did you miss me?'
But no one greeted him.
'Hello?' he called again.
There was no one there. The place was empty.
Deflated he wandered around. He found indications of rift activity, alien alerts and a police report of a fish driving a sports car on Tosh's monitor. It was recent. He'd probably only just missed them. He called up the tracker on the SUV and saw that it was out roaring around in the suburbs. The com control indicated four units in the vehicle. He thought about calling them up but thought better of it. This needed to be done face to face.
They'd be back as soon as they'd found this fish like alien.
He wandered around looking at things, touching things, drinking it in. He really was here, this wasn't a dream. There were alien artefacts on the testing table he was itching to get his hands on, some strange glowing goo in a jar in the fridge and a cell next to Janet crawling with creatures that looked like a cross between mice and spiders. They freaked him out. He hated things with too many legs. He hated them singularly and he really hated them when they came in something like plague proportions, which they were in the cell. Janet did not seem too impressed to see him.
He left the cells and continued his tour. Some things hadn't changed, kitchenette, morgue, and mortuary looked just the same. Thankfully the mortuary didn't contain any new human bodies. Some things had changed. The conference room seemed to have become a green house with lots of alien plants. Was that a small zephyrid fern? Surely not. But then as he stood looking at it the tendrils started to move slightly, reached up as though to caress him. Yep, it was. Semi sentient, empathetic and one of the most fun ways of experiencing bondage that there was. Where had that come from? Surely it hadn't been one of the many plants on Tosh's desk? Grow quickly little plant, he thought towards it. Had a whole alien garden centre come through the rift?
Wandering further he discovered that what had been a room of miscellaneous tat, actually it had been Alex' office years before but Jack could never bring himself to use it, had been refurbished as a slightly larger and very stylish new conference room. He didn't really like it. He wasn't particularly keen on the aesthetics of this era.
His office however was empty, completely empty. The furniture remained but everything of his was gone. Suddenly he didn't want to go down the hatch and find out whether his room had been cleaned out too.
They'd given up on him.
He didn't want to stay here anymore, he wanted to find his team.
Taking a spare tracking monitor with him he went up top to call a taxi.
He'd found them all in a standoff with that gun totting alien and his entrance was everything he could have wanted it to be. 'Hi kids. Did you miss me?' It had sounded good. Trouble was, if he'd had his wits about him the way he should have in a situation like that he would have realised that that fish thing had known way too much about his team. John had done a lot of homework.
Things had gone downhill ever since.
John appearing had seemed wonderful – in the same sort of way that a tsunami was a wonderful force of nature. His fragile mental state really wasn't up to coping with John. Not when he was trying to reconnect with his team. They were quite cold towards him, not hostile really, just … he didn't know what. They were pleased to have him back, but he got the feeling they were waiting for him to prove himself, he had to win their trust again and that was fair enough, but he couldn't tell them where he'd been or what had happened, it was too raw, too painful. They didn't know anything about that year and they didn't need to, not ever. He couldn't bear to think about it himself. They were hurt and angry with him and he didn't blame them, especially Ianto, and yet he'd seemed the calmest of them all. But he wasn't rushing to enfold him in his arms, the one thing that Jack really wanted to happen. He'd not known what to do, tried a tentative overture of asking for a date and even though Ianto said yes, it still felt like a rejection, a - let's humour him and he might leave me alone - sort of yes.
And John had added himself to the mix.
Then John had thrown him off a building.
Dear God. That really hurt.
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John….
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Jack and his team had stood on the carpark roof top watching Captain John Hart disappearing into the golden light of the rift. They were pleased, they were all of them pleased to see him go. He'd crashed into their lives and used them like no alien threat ever had. He'd proven himself to be completely untrustworthy, dangerous and insane, yet confusingly there wasn't a one of them that hadn't also been pleased when he had survived the bomb tied to his DNA. Well except for maybe Ianto.
Jack had been pleased to see that Ianto still had his stopwatch. That was one thing that hadn't changed.
Jack of course had been the most conflicted by John's survival, he had loved John once. Then he had thrown out his parting words and Jack's carefully held together psyche had shattered. Gray. He hadn't meant it. Had he? Surely he just said it to mess with his head one more time. Well it was working. And it wasn't as if his head wasn't messed enough right now either, thank you.
The others were watching Jack, saw his shock at John's words. 'Who's Gray,' someone asked.
Jack was rocked to his core, didn't think he could answer. The small hand sliding out of his, the despair, the pain, his anguish at losing his brother. Gray. He answered automatically. 'It's nothing.' In the past, over, gone.
Fuck John!
The group were grousing about where to go and what to do until the time line caught up.
He took a large shaky breath. John was gone and he was back, he was their leader. He was home, back with his team, where he wanted to be. It had been a hell of a homecoming.
'Gwen,' he said. 'Book us into a hotel somewhere. Somewhere nice. If we're going to have to avoid ourselves for the next twenty four hours we may as well be comfortable.' He had a thought. 'Make it somewhere really expensive. The government is going to pick up the tab. They owe me big time.' He didn't notice the looks the others exchanged. 'A big suite, big TV. Get whatever you want, room service, movies, new toothbrush,' he laughed, 'new clothes. No one is to go home or anywhere you might usually go. You know the drill.'
Owen looked at him with a less than happy look on his face. He was very angry with Jack for leaving, hadn't known quite how much until he arrived back last night, cool as bloody cucumber. "Hi kids, did you miss me?" Jesus! 'Yes Jack, we know. We can cope without you, you know.'
'I can see that.'
'Look, it's going to be more than an hour until we leave that bar and go back to the hub with Captain Psycho,' Owen lifted his hand from his side and examined the blood stain from his wound. 'I need some proper dressings. I've got time to go back to the hub. I promise I'll get out in time.'
'I'll come with you,' Jack said. 'Give you a hand.'
Owen gave him an assessing look. 'Okay,' he said. 'Thank you.'
'At least there's one thing,' Jack said with a grin. 'We get to play with this car for another whole day.'
Too fucking cool by half, Owen thought sourly.
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Jack carefully got up from the desk. The adrenaline was leaving him now and he was starting to realise just how very sore he was. Being flung across the carpark by the bomb hadn't helped things. He could not believe that John had actually tried to kill him. His relationship with John had been so far in his past he'd nearly forgotten him. But then, last night, to see him again… He'd felt so roused, so excited, so passionate. The memories had come flooding back… and the feelings. John was a trickster, a conman. He knew that. He was expecting a con. Hadn't even been too surprised that he'd tried to hurt his team but he'd never expected that John could throw him off a building. He really had tried to kill him and that really hurt. Jack took some satisfaction from the shock John had shown when he saw him alive. He grimaced, that had been one hell of a fall.
And that fucking bench!
He tried to put his hands back to feel the bruises but he couldn't get his shoulders to move that far. His back really really hurt. He knew what the problem was of course, in all that dreadful time on the Valiant he'd died so often that although he resurrected his body didn't completely heal. Things had been pretty bad on the Valiant towards the end, in constant pain from wounds that didn't heal. Exhaustion and despair had taken their toll. Coming back to life on that bench tonight had been pretty horrific too, he certainly hadn't expected to die again today. Knowing that John was going after his team had got him moving and kept him going, but now the threat was gone and he hurt so badly he could hardly move.
He couldn't stop now though, not quite. He needed to get himself and Owen out of here and back to the hotel Gwen had booked. Then he could lock himself in his room and go to pieces. But not yet.
He stood over the hatch grill. It was terribly tempting to just drop down there and hide away. He hadn't been down there last night, this night. He could be down there and no one would ever know. He sighed. He knew he couldn't, he couldn't risk it. They had half an hour to get out or the timelines would cross and everything would go to shit. In the meantime, maybe Owen could give him something for pain.
Owen was just finishing up, making sure he was putting everything back the way it had been when they arrived. He didn't think he'd have noticed if there was a stray pair of forceps on the bench but he couldn't risk it. He felt much more comfortable now, a dose of morphine was giving him a nice floaty feeling. That disappeared when he saw Jack. 'I thought you were coming with me to help,' he groused. 'It isn't easy dressing your own wound. And yes,' I'm putting everything back in the right place. And we'll be out of here in plenty of time.'
Jack limped down the stairs. 'Owen?'
'What Jack?' He wasn't sure quite what he'd been going to say next but whatever it was it died when he looked up at the Captain. He looked terrible. 'Jack?'
'I think I need some help,' Jack said gripping the railing for all he was worth. The pain was so bad his legs stopped working. He felt a cold sweat wash across his body and a brown fog rose over him. He fought to stay conscious and was vaguely aware of being lowered to the steps.
'Shit!' Owen swore grabbing at his boss. 'Ow. Fuck.' His injured muscles tore. He hurt too much for this. He couldn't hang on to him and roughly lowered him to the step. If he could have he would have dragged him down to the floor, lain him down but he couldn't. 'Jack!' A moan told him that Jack wasn't completely out. That was something, but something pretty bad had to be happening to make him faint like this. Shit, Jack was mister in-fucking-vincible. What the hell was wrong?
And Christ, how much time did they have to get out of here?
'Jack!'
Jack dragged his eyes open, fought the pain and the weakness. Hell he'd had worse, much worse and they couldn't stay here.
'Good,' Owen said in his professional voice as Jack focussed on him. 'That's good,' but the look in his eyes was one of serious concern. 'Are you hurt? What's wrong?'
'My back.' He tried to shift position but found he couldn't. 'I need something for pain,' it came out as a cry.
Owen looked at him, took his pulse, assessing. He wasn't kidding. The pallor, sweat and rapid respirations and pulse rate certainly indicated severe distress. It wasn't the way he usually went about things but Owen couldn't move him on his own, couldn't examine him properly on the stairs and couldn't afford the time to do things the correct way. He filled a syringe with 10mg of morphine, wrapped a tourniquet around Jack's arm and injected the contents of the syringe directly into his vein.
Moments later Jack found he could move again. He let Owen help him up and although both of them were a little shaky they got down the last few stairs where Jack slid his butt onto the autopsy table. 'Right,' Owen said, 'we've got about twenty minutes. Let's make this quick. What the hell is wrong with you?'
'You mean besides me having gone away and deserted you without a word.' Jack tried to slide his coat off but even with the morphine he couldn't move enough to do it.
'Yeah,' Owen grabbed at the coat and pulled it off his shoulders. Jack shouted with pain and he felt a little bit bad about his roughness, but he was so mad at Jack. 'Aside from that.'
'John tried to kill me,' Jack said. His fingers struggled to undo the buttons on his shirt. It was a new shirt. All his clothes were new, manufactured by the Tardis. He hadn't had anything fit for wearing by the time they got back to her.
'I gathered that,' Owen said tersely, although he had enjoyed the Time Agent's shock on seeing the resurrected Jack. 'You looked fine when you came back into the Hub.' He slipped the braces off his shoulders and eased Jack out of his shirt, being a little more gentle than he had with the coat. There was a bloody patch across the centre of the back of the shirt.
'He threw me off a fucking building. One hundred and thirty three feet. I landed on my back across a fucking bench.'
'Ouch.'
'Yeah.' Jack pulled his bloody tee shirt out of his pants but there was no way he could lift his arms enough to pull it over his head.
'It's all right Jack.' Owen grabbed a pair of scissors and proceeded to cut the tee shirt off him. Apologies for wrecking the shirt died on his lips when he saw Jack's back. 'Oh my God!' Jack was one solid bruise, purple and black, his back swollen and misshapen. No one else could look like this without severe spinal damage or worse. 'Jesus Christ!' There was an open wound, like a deep graze running from side to side from the bottom of his ribs to his waist. It had started to scab and stuck to the tee. Ever so gently, one hand on Jack's shoulder to keep him still and offer support he palpated the mess. Jack hissed with pain. Moving up he tested the ribs for integrity and found them sound. They had to have been broken which meant he had managed some healing. It seemed to be just the soft tissue damage that was taking its time. He wondered about the state of his kidneys. Christ, with the level of trauma he'd had, all his internal organs would have been damaged, he just had no idea how much they had actually healed.
He really needed him monitored, on an IV, and thoroughly scanned. Mind you, Owen reminded himself, he can't actually die. But he'd never seen him like this before either. 'What the hell's happened to you?' he breathed.
'We've only got about fifteen minutes,' Jack reminded him. 'Get me patched up and grab some supplies, we've got to get going.'
'Okay.' Owen wrenched out a dressing kit and did a quick rough wound clean followed by slapping as many non stick pads as he had on the raw area. Jack wasn't talking and Owen didn't think it was just because what he was doing hurt so much that he couldn't. There weren't enough non stick pads for such a large area but he used all he had. He did have enough gauze to cover it all and covered that with thick absorbent pads which he held in place with copious amounts of elastoplast tape. Where the hell had Jack been while he was away and what the hell had happened to him to stuff up his freakish ability to heal quickly? Granted he could still recover from death. He threw all the rubbish into one of the morgue cupboards and raced around collecting more dressings, saline, IV equipment just in case, antibiotics, and most importantly morphine and syringes. He threw it all into his backpack while Jack struggled back into his shirt. With a quick check that everything looked undisturbed they were ready.
'Which way did you come in last night?' Jack asked. He was carrying his coat. He didn't have time to struggle into that as well.
'Through the tourist office.'
'Okay, we'll go out through the car park.'
'The car!' Owen said. 'It's up by the tourist office.' He looked at his watch, 'Six minutes.'
They looked at each other alarmed. 'Go,' Jack shouted. 'I'll meet you in the car park.' Slowly and carefully he started climbing the stairs as Owen shot away.
He heard the cog door closing behind Owen as he made his way across the Hub to the exit up to the car park. It was so tempting just to wait here, give it ten minutes and shoot John between the eyes. No one would be expecting it, let alone himself. Would that make the pain go away he wondered? But in reality he knew it would create such a fracture in time the rift would behave like it had before he left with the Doctor. Something like those events would happen again. You didn't mess with time!
Holding on to the wall for support Jack had just reached the end of the corridor and was about to press the button for the lift when back in the Hub he heard the cog door alarm followed by the voices of the team. He hoped like hell that Owen had managed to get the car out of there without being seen, although he must have done because he wasn't hearing any sounds of alarm.
Sadly he realised he couldn't call the lift because it would ding when it arrived and someone might hear it. He started climbing the stairs.
There were four flights of stairs up to the carpark because it was underground. There were six flights to the tourist office. That meant with twenty four steps per flight there were ninety six steps in all. He was struggling by the top of the first flight. Ianto would know the exact number of the step he was on at all times he thought inanely. He made it to the top of the second flight. Ianto, he wanted to come home and go to bed with Ianto. Just to sleep. He was panting as if he'd run up 20 flights. Dragging one foot in front of the other- fucking John, he swore – he pulled himself hand over hand up the railing his coat trailing behind him - ruined everything. He managed to get nearly to the top of the third flight. He couldn't breathe. Ianto wasn't happy when John said they were partners in all senses of the word. Couldn't get air. He leant against the wall, god he couldn't get in enough air, fighting the blurring vision, air hunger and the pounding of his heart. Fuck he felt bad. That's where Owen found him.
Jack was barely conscious as Owen threw his arm over his shoulder and in spite of the pain it caused both of them dragged him up the last thirty one Himalayan sized steps to the carpark. Owen was panicking because he'd just remembered that between them arriving at the Hub and Jack coming in with Captain John Ianto had raced out and brought the car around to unload the body of the blowfish. He didn't know how long he had but it wasn't long.
Jack was sick on the twenty ninth step.
He hung off Owen's shoulder retching painfully. 'Oh fucking brilliant,' Owen muttered as vomit spattered their shoes. 'I get shot, but Captain-fucking-Courageous has to go one better.' He barely waited until Jack had stopped heaving before wrenching him the last few yards out of the stairwell to where he'd parked the sports car. 'Come on, Ianto's going to be driving in here any second.'
'Ianto?' Jack said stupidly.
'Yes, you know, Ianto. Cute Welsh kid, been through a hell of a lot in the last few years, long skinny legs and a nice arse. At least you seemed to think so. Except you went and ripped his heart out and just when he's starting to get himself back together you swan back in with a psychopathic partner on your tail and knock his feet back out from under him.' But he might as well have saved his breath because Jack was beyond hearing him.
He threw Jack into the passenger seat where of course he couldn't sit comfortably. He couldn't lean back. No time for this. Owen jumped in the driver's seat and floored it up the ramp to the road hoping like hell he wouldn't meet the SUV coming down it. Jack braced himself against the dash, he couldn't fold forward either. After making the street Owen turned right away from the Plas and took off. Three blocks away he stopped, as much to let his heart rate settle as to try and make Jack more comfortable. He'd seen the nose of the SUV turning the corner behind them as he'd left the street. He tipped the passenger seat back and curled Jack on his side. Sports cars weren't made for someone his size. He really wished he hadn't given himself such a large dose of morphine, it made thinking really difficult.
Now he could relax about timelines he could worry about Jack and he really needed to get him to the hotel and into bed. He was physically shocked. Internal bleeding and injuries had dropped his blood pressure to a level where it was barely adequate to perfuse his brain or any other organs. Lack of red blood cells meant that what circulation he had wasn't carrying enough oxygen to his cells. Of course he was faint and sick. His body needed to be lying down to have a chance to restore itself. It wouldn't take much more before his autonomic nervous system would take the obvious step to make that happen and he'd pass out completely.
'We're off to the Hilton,' Owen told him tucking his coat around him. 'Gwen took you at your word so I hope you were right about who's paying for this. I don't fancy having my pay docked to cover it.'
Jack just grunted.
Owen but the car's top up and cranked up the heater, Jack needed all the warmth he could get. 'So why does the government owe you big time?' he asked. He looked at the sick man on the seat beside him. 'Where have you been Jack?'
Jack just looked at him dumbly, his eyes full of pain. Owen reached out to put a hand on his shoulder and was surprised when Jack flinched at the unexpected touch. 'Shh,' Owen tried to soothe and drive at the same time. He reached out again, stroked Jack's shoulder and then ran his hand over his head.
Jack found himself closing his eyes leaning into the touch. For so very long the only time someone had touched him was to hurt him. He gave a sob. Tish had tried to give him comfort, to touch him in a caring way when she could, but the Master had quickly put a stop to any overt physical contact, she wasn't supposed to do anything for him other than spoon feed him the slops they called meals. Not being touched had been one of the hardest things. It was going to take him a long time to get used to ordinary kindnesses. And now… he couldn't hold back the tears. He was completely undone.
'Oh sweetheart,' Owen murmured. 'Someone has really hurt you haven't they?'
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The clock by the bedside said 11.03 pm when Ianto first walked into his plush room at the Hilton. It didn't matter what the time was because he felt like it was about 8 am and he knew he'd been awake now for something like twenty six hours. In a way, time going back like that gave him, gave them all, a day to rest and start to process the last twelve hours.
What with Jack coming back like that.
Jack, and his murdering psychopathic ex partner in all senses of the word.
Ianto growled at the memory. Right now he didn't know which way was up. No explanation, no apologies, just a bizarre invitation on a date. But Jack had been really nervous, Ianto at least thought he knew him well enough to recognise that prattle about offices was Jack covering his nerves. "I came back for you," he'd said and Ianto had been ready to believe him, in the nano second before he'd included the entire group in that statement.
Jack had told him once, back when they first really got together, that he would go away one day. And then he had. Ianto just hadn't expected it to be without any goodbye. Or quite so soon. It was the no goodbye that hurt the most. He thought he'd meant something to Jack.
But he had slowly started to live with it. He was actually quite proud of how well he'd managed to cope, in public at least. There had been a few very messy moments in private once his disbelief had worn off and he'd realised that Jack really was gone – and that it appeared that he was never coming back. When had been gone a full eight weeks and Gwen had asked him if he could get Jack's things together to put into storage, well that had been his only public breakdown.
Recently however his public persona had become so good that he'd actually find that even he nearly believed it, that he could be okay at times, he even found that he could still enjoy things like roaring around the city in the SUV chasing aliens while Owen climbed out the window and shot at things. Yeah, he really did quite enjoy that. It also stopped him having to go home at night. It was lonely at home. He thought about getting a new flat, somewhere that didn't have memories of Jack, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He had packed Jack's things away at the Hub, but there was still one of his bathrobes hanging behind the bathroom door at home and his toothbrush was still beside the sink. When he'd been forced to change the sheets on his bed before they took on a life of their own he had cried as he lost the scent of Jack from his bed, even though in reality it hadn't actually been there for quite a long time.
He looked around the opulent room. Gwen had done exactly what Jack had told her and booked a suite. They had a huge lounge area, with grand piano. All their rooms, there were six so there would be one spare, opened off the lounge. The whole thing was bigger than the house he'd grown up in. His flat would nearly fit in the lounge alone. He snagged a whiskey out of the mini bar and wandered back out, he didn't want to be alone. There was no one there, the girls must have gone to bed. Well of course they had. Everyone had been up over twenty four hours, they'd been shot, in Gwen's case poisoned, and traumatised and everyone was exhausted. He drained the miniature and coughed, wandered back into his own room. He really didn't know what to do, what to think.
Checking out the lavish bathroom he decided to shower, but grabbed another whiskey first. It wasn't helping anything much but it did make him feel a little more warm, from the inside out. A scalding shower later, using some of the exquisite toiletries he nearly thought he could sleep. He slid between the lovely high thread count sheets enjoying the sensuous feel on his skin. He was working so hard to keep from thinking of anything other than his immediate surroundings. He didn't usually get to appreciate the finer things in life. He stroked the pillow. His mind flashed, Jack across from him, head on the pillow, gorgeous good morning smile on his face.
God damn!
He actually had nodded off when his phone rang.
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Oops.
Oops?!
OOPS???
John? – FUCKING OOPS?
NONONONONONO. All he could think of was that this wasn't supposed to happen. He wasn't supposed to die today.
I thought you loved me John.
Jack knew he was millimetres away from suffering a complete breakdown. He was physically and mentally at the end of what he could cope with. There was too much happening when he was already so fragile. John and Gray and leaving the Doctor and dying. Dying and dying and dying and the Master and pain and dying. His mind was flitting through it all, backwards and forwards, round and round, not settling, too distressed to think things through. He was sick and he hurt and he couldn't cope.
He'd had a thorough melt down, broken down completely on the third day of the clean up week on the Valiant. He'd thought he was good, in control. It was all over, he had a job to do. The crew had to be sorted and dealt with. The war criminals separated from the innocent cooks and crew. The innocent ones were retconned and relocated. The others, well Jack wasn't sure what was going to happen to them, but UNIT and the Doctor were in disagreement over it.
Then Jack had spotted the guard he'd dubbed Kebab. He'd given him that name because of the way he delighted in skewering Jack with any handy metal rod, sword or piece of pipe he could lay his hands on. As Jack was hanging in chains most of the time he could do nothing to protect himself - or remove whatever was impaling him. He'd be stuck there, in agony, until someone came along who would take pity on him and remove it, sometimes kindly, sometimes not. Sometimes it killed him, sometimes it didn't. Kebab seemed to have more fun when it didn't, leaving him hanging in pain.
When he spotted Kebab, lined up there with the other staff he'd lost it. All of the Doctor's fine words had meant nothing. He'd thrown himself at the man, propelling them both into the wall and lost in a red haze of anger had beaten the guy's brains out against the floor. He was still bashing the well dead and very bloody corpse when someone had hit him with a blast from a stun gun. It had been the only way they could get him off.
He'd come round to find himself in his bunk in the Tardis. From a red haze his mind was now surrounded by a soft sky blue fog. Tendrils of it seemed to infiltrate all the crannies of his brain, cushioning and soothing. It extended out through his body and surrounded him in a warm ocean of caring. If he wanted to he could leave it, could make himself aware of his surroundings, feel the bedding over him, his body resting on the mattress, Martha caring for him, but otherwise he was just … there … warm and safe … in the blue fog.
He suspected he was in the blue fog for a long time, but had no idea just how long. When he came out of it he was scared to ask. However he discovered that Martha's family had already returned home and there were just the three of them in the Tardis. He learnt that Martha had decided to go back home to her family. He suspected she'd waited on to care for him. The doctor did volunteer that the Tardis' brand of healing was tailored to each individual passenger. Obviously he'd needed a lot more of it than the others. He and Martha spoke about it one day and she admitted that her fog was pink, the same colour as a plush toy rabbit she'd had as a child. It only occurred to him now to wonder if the Doctor had a fog.
But now the Tardis was gone, he had nothing and no one to hold him together. He couldn't bear it that he'd died again so soon. His body obviously couldn't cope either. He was anchorless, alone, his team, who he was so looking forward to seeing again, so wanted to be with were angry and hostile. Gwen was getting married, Ianto was cool towards him. Owen was being nice. Everything was all wrong.
The car pulled to a stop and he forced his eyes open. Nearly there he told himself, just get up stairs and then you can collapse. Rest and recover. He could do this, he wasn't that bad, things on the Valiant had been much worse, but on the Valiant he hadn't been hurt by someone who he thought had loved him. The pain was intense as he tried to pull his legs around, to get ready to get out of the car. He couldn't stop the tears that had started when Owen touched him. He was rapidly losing it. He desperately wanted to be back in the Tardis, warm and safe and wrapped in his blue fog.
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Ianto was extremely pleased he'd bothered to dress properly before answering Owen's SOS. It made it much easier to act officious in front of the concierge and hotel night manager, the latter who was attempting to lever an extremely distressed looking Jack out of the car at the door. 'There you are Sirs,' he said as he excited the main doors, taking in Owen's white face and stiff posture. 'I think you will find that everything is ready for you upstairs.' His eyes locked with Owen's. What the hell was happening? Owen looked pale but Jack? He had way surpassed that state. He looked as unpleasantly concrete grey as he had done when he was dead after Abaddon, only now as well as pale his face had an unhealthy sheen of sweat. His shirt was mis-buttoned and his braces hung down his side. He was also tearstained, snotty and smelt of vomit.
'I'll call the doctor,' the concierge said.
'No thank you,' Ianto replied, 'we have our own doctor on staff. If you Gentlemen will follow me,' he physically moved the night manager out of the way and eased his shoulder under Jack's arm. He got an arm around him and hauled him up. Jack jerked and cried out. So something was hurting him then? 'Captain Harkness and his colleague have both been injured. If you could just assist me in getting them upstairs, then we'll take it from there.' He tightened his grip on Jack as he sagged, nearly dead weight. The manager stepped in on his other side. 'Thank you.' Ianto herded them towards the lifts.
'Oi,' he heard Owen behind him. 'I am quite capable of walking on my own thank you.'
Ianto tried not to grin. 'Are you coming Dr Harper. Perhaps the young man could carry your bag and bring the Captain's coat.
'Come on Sir,' he encouraged Jack. 'You can lie down in a minute.' He had nothing on him to tip the help and rudely left them standing at the door of the suite. As soon as the door shut Jack started to crumple. Owen raced in and they dragged him through the open door into Ianto's room dropping him on the unmade bed. He hit the bed with a cry of pain and sprawled helpless, eyes shut. 'Owen, what's happening? What's wrong with him?'
'Captain John threw him off a building?'
'But that was hours ago. He was all right before.'
'No he wasn't. He was just compensating because he had to.' Owen gave a snort. 'But he can't do it any longer.' He sat down beside his patient feeling close to the end of his own endurance. He'd been shot god dammit. Why the hell did he have to look after bloody Harkness when he needed to be resting and recovering himself?
Ianto suddenly grabbed Jack's coat from where Owen had dropped it on the bed. He smelt it then looked at it closely. He turned it around in his hands examining the seams and the hem. Then he bent down and studied Jack. He sniffed at him too. Owen watched him puzzled and then slightly frightened by the look in his eyes. 'What?' he asked.
'Owen,' Ianto's voice was very quiet. 'Are we sure this really is Jack?'
'What do you mean?' He looked down. He looked like Jack, sicker than he was used to seeing him, but even so…
'He doesn't smell right.' Ianto looked seriously disturbed. 'And this isn't the same coat.'
'Okay, now you're scaring me.' Owen met Ianto's eyes. 'This is the bloke that's been with us all day, I can guarantee that. Captain John did think he'd killed him and was very shocked to see him back so we can guess he really did die and revive. Unless there's two of them,' he added under his breath.
Ianto looked at him.
'Okay, that's just silly. He just hasn't healed as well or as fast as usual… and that is odd…' Owen realised he didn't actually know, couldn't tell if this was really his boss or not, but Ianto could, couldn't he?
Ianto was turning the coat over and over in his hands. 'This coat is new, the fabric is new. It is the right fabric to be a period item but it's new, unworn. The other one was at least forty years old and showed it.'
'It is new,' said a hoarse voice from the bed. Jack snuffled. 'My clothes were ruined. The Tardis made me new ones.' He was crying. 'Of course I'm me. Who else would I be? Yan…' His hand reached out and Ianto instinctively grasped it tightening his grip when Jack squeezed.
'You could be another alien trying to fuck us up, or another one of Captain John's buddies in disguise,' Owen said. 'I wouldn't put it past him. And what the fuck is the Tardis?'
Jack just lay there looking at him, too exhausted to defend himself. The cold lonely feeling he'd had all day deepened inside him. He was already crying, he didn't think things could get worse. He shut his eyes, not wanting to see them watching him. 'The Tardis is the Doctor's ship,' but he wasn't sure if he actually spoke or not. He felt their hands on him as they started to undress him. Then there were hands around his wrists. He felt the hand on his right arm still, then someone was moving his wrist strap to look at his left wrist. He knew what they'd see there. Scars from the manacles, worse on the right where he hadn't had the strap to give some protection. He felt sick. He hadn't developed any long lasting scars since becoming immortal, until now. The pain stabbed him, as real as if the wounds were still open weeping sores and no way to escape or ease the pain. He gave a gasp and tried to pull his arms back but he was held in a vice like grip. He panicked. A year hanging in chains meant that even on reviving from death he was hanging from manacles. The wounds on his wrists hadn't healed for all of the second half of his captivity.
Now he was being held and he was back there, hanging, held, sick and in pain and so frightened. They'd got him, they'd got him again, he hadn't got away at all and it was all going to happen again. He screamed and fought, terror momentarily overcoming the pain of his back and propelling him off the bed and across the floor. He fetched up against the far wall where something, maybe the feel of carpet under his legs, or the warm voice calling his name pulled him back to the real world. Things slowly came into focus and breathing hard he realised the man in front of him was Ianto, not a guard, not the Master, not someone trying to hurt him. Behind Ianto was Owen looking very concerned. 'It's me,' he said inadequately, before his stomach roiled and he was sick all over himself.
'Can prove it's me,' he gasped, fighting for breath between the retching that just wasn't going to stop.
'You've got….' God this hurt. Couldn't draw breath. This could kill him. Death by vomiting, that was a new one. No not funny, really not funny.
Ianto and Owen hovered over him anxiously. 'What's happening?' Ianto asked. 'Why is he so sick?'
Jack's stomach muscles were convulsing. His whole body was involved. He soiled his pants and didn't even care. He wanted to scream, couldn't. Fuck! This really wasn't stopping. He began to think he really might die. He was still heaving and it really hurt, turning inside out. Jaw muscles, his back and all his core muscles were screaming in agony. He couldn't breathe, was hurting deep inside. His vision was going grey and the iron taste of blood mingled with greasy bile.
He felt Owen fumbling with his arm, putting in an IV.
'There,' Owen said as he injected an anti-nausea drug. He was seriously worried. He hoped it would work; this drug wasn't really designed for what he needed it for now but it was all that he had. He didn't have the range of drugs he would have at a hospital and right now he was thinking hospital might be the smart option. He added a dose of morphine. 'That should stop the vomiting and help the pain as well.' Jack really was in a bad way. Automatically he made soothing movements across his shoulders feeling the tension leave him as thankfully the retching eased. 'All right Jack?'
Jack was gulping down huge lungfuls of air, fighting residual dry heaves, close to collapse. 'You've got a mole…' he choked out, '… on your left… your left buttock cheek.'
'No I haven't,' said Ianto.
Owen wanted to slap him. Trust Jack. 'I have,' said Owen. 'It's me.' He held his hand up. 'Yan mate, it is so not what you think.'
Ianto gave him a filthy look. 'Later,' was all he said.
Jack concentrated on keeping breathing. Somewhere during their efforts to clean him up he realised that the others did believe him. As Ianto stripped his clothes off Owen checked him out and ran the scanner over him. He heard Ianto's gasp of horror when he saw his back. They then both got flannels and towels and gently washed him. He lay limp, barely conscious, letting them do what they needed.
'Jack. Can you hear me?' Owen asked. He tucked a soft bath robe around him.
He moaned in reply. He was nearly asleep.
'That's good.' Owen patted his shoulder. 'Jack you're very ill. You're not healing at your usual rate. You're not healing at all. Anyone else and you'd be in intensive care. With you well…' He paused. The concern in his voice made something break in Jack's chest. 'It's bad. Your electrolytes, your metabolites and fluid balance are completely scrambled. Incidentally that's why Ianto thinks you smell wrong. You do. It's to do with anaerobic respiration in your cells. You haven't got enough red blood cells left in your system to get oxygen around.
'Jack,' he said gently, stroking his hair. 'You may still be bleeding. You need better treatment than I can give you. I want to get you into hospital with the right sorts of drugs and care. You need blood, oxygen. We'll worry about covering up any weirdness when you're better. All right?'
'Nooo.' It came out as a moaning noise. He fought for control. 'No!' That was much better, much more emphatic. He shifted around looked up. 'No. I've had much worse. I'll be all right in time.' He took a deep breath.
'Jack,' Ianto said warningly.
'No! I can't go to hospital. You know that.'
'Jack, we only want what's right for you.'
'Then don't. Please. Just do what you can. Put me to bed,' his appeal lost a lot of its emphasis when he started to cry again. 'I'll get better… Shit.' He sniffed. 'Just let me rest. I need to rest.' Not fair, not fair, not fair.
'I'm guessing that rest is something else that's been in short supply for you recently isn't it.' Owen muttered. 'You've been tortured. Haven't you?' Owen always was too clever for his own good. Jack froze. 'You've been killed too. A lot.' Jack whimpered and Ianto shushed him and stroked his face. 'Is that a yes Jack? Because that might explain why you're having such a hard time recovering from this death. Even your body must get worn out.'
Jack opened his eyes and looked up at Ianto's anxious blue eyes peering down at him. Ianto's sky blue eyes. He felt a moment of recognition. The healing fog had been the exact same colour as Ianto's eyes right now. His grip on Ianto's hands loosened as he felt himself drifting into his gaze.
'Jack,' Ianto said gently. 'Sweetheart. Have you been killed a lot?'
Jack looked everywhere but into Ianto's eyes. 'Yes.'
'It's all right. You're not going to die again. Not if I can help it. I'll keep you safe now.'
'I know.'
Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
In the end it was Owen's exhaustion that swung things. If he called an ambulance he'd have to come up with a cover story to explain Jack's injuries, go with him to the hospital to explain what he'd already done and what Jack needed. It would be hours before he could get to bed himself. Plus he'd have to hold himself together enough to not get admitted himself and that could be hard.
Ianto gathered Jack into his arms and with as much help as Owen could manage, which wasn't much, levered Jack off the floor and onto the bed. He straightened out his limbs and tucked the sheet and duvet around him while Owen jury rigged an IV stand out of a standard lamp. He couldn't help feeling tender and caring which didn't sit well with the deep anger he'd been harbouring towards his lover. Or was that ex lover now?
'Where do you think he's been?' he asked quietly.
'I don't know, but where ever it was it was bad.' Owen looked down at his patient. 'Some one hurt him really bad and they did it for a long time. I think he's been gone for a longer time than just a few months. He is completely worn out.'
'I think there's an emotional element to how he recovers from a death.' Ianto sat on the edge of the bed gently running his fingers over Jack's unconscious face. 'Sometimes if he's killed by a weevil or when… when Lisa shocked him, he just shakes it off.' Ianto was still very uncomfortable with that memory. 'When you shot him he was very weak and sore for quite a while.'
'Yes, well thanks for reminding me of that.'
'I'm just saying. Being killed by someone you care about must be harder than just a random killing.'
'I think they all hurt him.'
'I know they do!'
'Yes, all right!' Owen gritted his teeth. He didn't want to get into any sort of conversation. 'Are you all right with him then? Can I go to bed now?'
'Yeah.' Ianto deflated. 'You get off. I'll call you if I need you.'
'Please don't.'
Ianto grinned. 'Sleep well.'
'Yeah.'
When Owen had gone Ianto undressed again and climbed into bed. Being very careful of his back he pulled Jack into his arms. His skin was cold and slightly clammy, not at all Jack's usual power house of heat. It emphasised how very ill he was. Jack settled against him with a little sigh, his hands curled against his chest and his head tucking in under Ianto's chin. Ianto kissed the top of his head. 'Oh Jack.' He was sorry Jack was hurt, sorry someone had hurt him when he was away, but even so he was so conflicted about his being back. He felt angry, he felt hurt. He was… annoyed. He'd just started to find some equilibrium and now he was all up in the air again. In spite of what his head was feeling his body easily moulded around Jack. Jack back in his arms felt wonderful. 'This isn't what I imagined but welcome home.'
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Jack woke to a feeling of momentary terror as he felt something over his face. He didn't know where he was. The terror quickly eased as he processed the fact that he was lying in a bed and the bed had sheets. He reached a hand to his face and he wasn't restrained. The thing on his face turned out to be an oxygen mask. He tried rolling over and stopped short. He hurt. He hurt a lot. Then he remembered.
John!
'Jack.'
Ianto?
Oh thank god. Relief washed over him, it wasn't a dream. He really was back. John had killed him, but Owen… and Ianto.
Ianto – alive, well, caring for him. He tried to say hello but it came out as a sob.
'Hey,' Ianto said, coming into his field of view. 'Are you all right?' He took the mask away and wiped his face with a flannel. 'Are you in pain?'
He shook his head. He was if he moved, but it wasn't too bad. He'd had much worse. He managed a watery smile but he couldn't stop the tears. He was back, he was safe. He didn't have to die again today. His body dissolved with relief.
Ianto climbed onto the bed and gathered him into his arms. He was home. Here, in Ianto's arms, regardless of where he was he was home.
He slipped back into a healing sleep.