Jack Harkness had never been a religious man.
Obviously, he had no reason to be; he had certainly died enough times to know that nothing but an oppressing darkness awaited one in the afterlife, or perhaps Saint Peter was holding out on him because he knew he'd just wake up in a couple of minutes, good as new.
But right now, he was praying.
And wasn't that just the damned greatest? Experiencing the horror and anguish of being burned and buried alive, hanged, electrocuted, blown to bits, stabbed in the gut; the list went on and on.
And the worst—outliving everyone one loved.
Usually, he could blame it on this, this…curse. Seeing many lovers lowered into the cold, hard earth as the result of the inevitable was one thing. Watching them die far before their time as a result of his carelessness was another thing entirely.
The worst part about all this, Jack thought, as he held a quivering man breathing his last breaths, was that it really was all his fault.
It wasn't the fault of his immortality, or of some freak accident.
It was his fault.
Jack blinked back tears that stubbornly leaked from his shining eyes anyway, trailing down his cheeks and staining dark splotches on his lover's pinstripe coat.
"No! No, no, no, no, no. No! Ianto, no. It's all my fault…"
He was sobbing now, clutching the other's shoulders like a lifeline, feeling the vibrant heat quickly diminishing from Ianto's body.
"I love you, I…"
No, no. No.
Those were parting words, they were words Jack couldn't hear right now. Too much.
He felt his heart burst inside his chest.
It was worse than being blown to bits and growing his skin back slowly. It was worse than being buried alive in the ground and choking hundreds of times as he woke up and died again. It was worse than being sealed in a cement block.
And when Ianto's lifeless form finally fell against his arms, his expression finally relaxed, dark eyelashes brushing his cheeks, Jack realized that none of it could compare. And honestly, hadn't he known that all along? It never could.
He was only vaguely aware of the 456 telling him he would die. He felt numb, the familiar sensation of life draining out of him as he pulled away from Ianto.
Right now, Jack, the immortal man—was praying.
He knew it was impossible.
He knew there was no way.
But for some reason, he just had to.
He prayed that he wouldn't wake up this time.
He prayed that he could die, just this once, along with his lover. The point of his existence dwindled just a bit more every time he lost a lover, the hopelessness cascading over him in agonizing waves.
And as he fell to the floor, curled around Ianto's lifeless form, he prayed as hard as he could that it would be the last time, and there would just be darkness, darkness forever, because what was the point? If this wasn't the worse pain he could experience, then what was?
And when he awoke in the auditorium filled with macabre, corpses surrounding him on all sides, he felt a scream gurgle up in his throat, trapped hopelessness.