Author's Notes: Okay, this is… short, and dark, and angsty, and definitely not something I wrote easily. I hope you like it, though, so let me know what you think.
The text in the beginning is by HURTS.
I don't mind if your hand's a little cold
'Cause I'm alive but I've got nowhere to go
When Jack got up from the floor, Gwen was still by Ianto's side, her entire body shaking with the pained sobs that echoed in the vast room. His own eyes were painfully dry and he desperately wanted to be able to cry. Maybe it would hurt less if he could pour it out.
He rather envied Gwen right now. She'd lost all semblance of control and had lain on the floor next to Ianto, clutching to him as the tears disappeared into the fabric of his waistcoat. Jack could understand that perfectly well; the desperate thought that, if he didn't let him go, he would be gone – not now, not ever again.
Gwen's phone rang and as she raised her head Jack could see the fury in her eyes at the noise imposing on her grief. She hung up and tried to put herself together before she leant down and pressed a quick kiss against Ianto's lips.
"It's not working," Jack said. He hadn't talked since before his death, when he'd given a promise he would never forget. "Kissing him," he clarified. "It's not working. I've already tried. He's dead." It was just out of his reach; the inevitable breakdown that was going to shatter him completely. "I should have never let him in."
"What?" Gwen's voice was still hoarse and Jack dropped back on the floor next to her.
"If I'd never hired him, Lisa would have died in less than a month. He's adaptable; he'd have found a new job – possibly something in UNIT, given the credentials he'd have – then he'd have found a nice girl and settled down."
"Ianto was terrified of settling down, Jack," Gwen said quietly and he scoffed.
"He was twenty-five, Gwen! He had no idea what it would have been like."
"Ianto made his own choices." Gwen's voice was still quiet but there was enough strength in it to make her words reach Jack's brain. "He lived for this; for the thrill of it all. He knew he'd die young and he welcomed it. He was scared of boredom and monotony. What you just described would have been a nightmare." When Jack made to protest, she turned around to face him. "And if you think anything else, you didn't know him at all. Which would have been a terrible shame."
Jack's words died in his mouth. She was right, of course, but he'd been too busy drowning in his own misery to think. "You're right," he said softly. "I want to– I thought I could–" It felt cruel, somehow, to take away from her the last she had from her friend, but he couldn't help it. "Would you mind if I was alone with him for a moment?"
"No, of course not," Gwen said quickly. Jack could see that she was one the edge of losing the control over herself once more and was trying to keep busy to prevent it. "You go ahead."
"I'm sorry," he said earnestly. "I just–"
"It's fine, Jack," she cut him off. "You loved him."
"You did, too," he countered. "You have every right to be here."
"If you want to talk to him, Jack, that's okay." She didn't object to his earlier statement, but she seemed to be only further upset by it. "As long as you leave me with him later as well."
"I will," he reassured. "Thank you."
As soon as Gwen was out of the room, Jack reached for Ianto's hand and idly caressed it with his thumb. His skin was cold, but there wasn't much of a difference. Ianto had always been cold, and now Jack didn't find it hard to ignore. It was just Ianto, cold as ice, just like usual. A corpse in the making since the very beginning.
"You know, I don't get it," he said. His voice was quiet but it still stood out in the silence that reigned around him. "I've lost so many people. So many lovers. And yes, it was always sad and tragic and all of that, but I accepted it. I always did.
"And here you are now. And, no matter how hard I try to remind myself that this is it, that it's over, I still expect you to just stand up and keep going. And that's never happened before."
He reached up to trace Ianto's cheekbones, fingers trembling over his skin – even paler than it had been before. Really, Jack would have thought that he was asleep if he wasn't so still. A sleeping Ianto was a lively being; he moved about, talked in his sleep and even fell off the bed occasionally when he was especially restless. He made adorable little grimaces that always tempted Jack to kiss him, no matter how much Ianto complained that he'd woke him up.
Now he wished he'd done it more often. The most beautiful thing he could imagine was Ianto opening his eyes again.
"When they poisoned the air," he started, voice thick with tears, "I offered them to take what they wanted in exchange for you. I don't doubt for a second that they would have if they had an antidote, and I could just excuse myself with the stress and the shock. But you know what the worst of it all is? I'd do it again. If they offered me what I wanted from them, right now, I'd say yes. And that scares the shit out of me."
He kept trailing his fingers absently down Ianto's face. "You know," he went on. "If you were still alive, you'd have hated me for that. You would have never been able to look me in the eye again if you knew what I'd done to save your life." Jack laughed mirthlessly. "And the worst of it all? I wouldn't care. I would do anything, no matter how much it would make you hate me, as long as you could live again."
He gripped Ianto's hand once more; nothing more than a quick squeeze as if he was trying to reassure him. "I love you," he said, mother-of-fact. "I wish I could deserve the love you give me in return, but since I can't aim that high, just know that I've loved you for longer than I could possibly imagine. Hell, even that first time we met – well, third time, actually, the warehouse – there was something that made me stop you from leaving. Some gut feeling, perhaps, that told me, You can be good for each other. You can fix yourselves together. Keep him, keep him. And I did. I thought I could at least try to have you for myself.
"And then you betrayed me – twice – and I tried to see the best part of it. I would never be vulnerable in front of you again." With a sigh, he lay down on the floor with his hands under his head and looked sideways at Ianto as if they'd gone out to see the stars. He knew that if anyone was watching him now, they'd see it as something perverse, but it seemed to be the only thing that could keep him sane – to imagine that Ianto had just closed his eyes and was still listening to him; still paying attention. "But you didn't stop there. You didn't even know you were doing something. I just watched you and fell further and further in love with you and, by the time I realised that you'd break my heart, I had fallen so far that I couldn't even see the surface anymore."
Silence welcomed those words as well. Jack tried to pretend that he hadn't expected anything else. "I need you to tell me what to do, Ianto," he said quietly. "It was always something you did just like that, but all of this – your death, the 456, everything – is because of the people waiting for me outside and I have no idea what I'm capable of. Which means that you've either just ended the world or saved it." He finally managed a genuine, if slightly manic, smile. "And isn't that just the story of your life?"