Don't own Torchwood! -sigh- It'd be going a different way...
WARNING: Spoilers for Doctor Who Episodes Utopia, Sound of Drums, and The Last of the Timelords. ALSO, minor spoilers for Torchwood: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and Adam
Jack was always tired the night he died. He used to resist it, drinking a lot of coffee, doing things that would keep his brain going, and then Ianto came around. He remembers the first night when it happened, Jon had pushed Jack off a roof, and after dealing with him, the team had gone back to their flats, keen on avoiding themselves for a day or two. Jack slept in the Hub, and therefor had no where to go. He had dropped everyone but Ianto off, leaving just him and the Welshman in the car.
"Jack, where are you going to go?"
A bar. "Oh I don't know, hotel maybe."
"Why don't you...why don't you stay at my place? We don't have to do anything...you must be tired. I am, tired I mean."
That was one thing Jack avoided, staying over night. Waking up next to someone does something to you, and he was already far too attached to Ianto. Their situation was different, though, something Jack hadn't experienced in a while. He'd actually asked Ianto on a date, he'd done something he hadn't done in a long time. Jack sighed, all his efforts to not get attached seemed to be going out the window. "Um, yeah, okay sure. Saves the government some money."
Ianto chuckled and rolled his eyes, knowing of Jack's habit of charging Torchwood related expenses to the government.
"I know you don't sleep most of the time, but it must be tiring, coming back from the dead. Do you sleep on those nights?"
"Well..."
"Jack-"
"You know I don't sleep."
"Everyone needs sleep! Even you, the immortal Captain Jack Harkness."
Jack parked on the curb and turned to look at the younger man. "Look, Ianto, I don't sleep. I get enough of that when I'm dead. Now if you don't want me up there tonight, I can always go to a bar."
Ianto sighed, "No, let's go up."
Jack followed him up the stairs to the third floor flat that didn't seem to fit Ianto at all. When Jack looked closer, he noticed it was the perfect place. The flat was comfortable and small, only having a living room, a kitchen, a bedroom, and a bathroom. The walls were gray with a few pictures, in all of them Ianto was smiling, in most of them he looked younger. Except for one, in one he was with the rest of Torchwood Three, Jack included. No one really remembers who brought a camera to work that day, but someone had, and they had played around with it all day. Ianto had gotten the pictures developed and they'd divvied them up among themselves, the best on was hanging above his couch.
The kitchen was small, full of stainless steel appliances and a little white table with two chairs in the corner. The living room had a couch and a comfy looking chair with a medium sized TV. A bookcase sat against a wall of the bedroom. It was all very Ianto.
"It's very you."
"Well, with work I'm not home often, but when I am, I like to be comfortable."
"I'm glad..." He trailed off, looking around the bedroom.
"Are you afraid to sleep Jack?"
He sighed, sitting on the edge of the bed. "It's just darkness Ianto, just like I'm dead or it's nightmares, reminders of past lives gone wrong. There's never a happy medium, why should there be? I don't deserve one."
Ianto frowned, "Who are you Jack?"
"Jon and I were Time agents in the year 5032. One morning, I woke up and I didn't remember the last two years of my life, the agency had taken my memories, and I wanted them back." Jack smirked, "For some reason, they didn't take my wrist strap, so I used it to my advantage. I became conman, using the skills I'd learned at the agency to travel through time, selling pieces of trash to unsuspecting agents. One of my targeted times was the London Blitz, it was easy, to see a piece of trash in war zones, because you could set it up somewhere that it would get destroyed before the agent got a chance to look at it. I was carefully monitoring the time vortex, waiting for an agent to fly through. When I spotted an agent, I 'threw' an empty alien ambulance at it. Turns out I threw it at the Doctor."
"Who?"
"The Doctor. The Doctor and Rose. They saved the world that night, again. Turns out the ambulance I sent down had hit a kid, and there had been these little creatures called nanobots inside it. Nanobots can repair damage, but sometimes they get it wrong. They thought that the little kid with the gas mask on, and the collapsed lung was what all humans looked like. Soon, people all over London had the same injuries. I didn't even know about it, I had no idea I had anything to do with it. I could've ended the human race right there, but The Doctor figured it out, he always does. Ended up saving my life in the end, too. I traveled with them for a little while after that, had the time of my life. I saw some crazy things. Everything comes to an end though, I learned that with the Doctor. Turns out, these disgusting creatures called the Daleks had been controlling the human race, about a hundred years in your future. They're evil things, Daleks, they aim to destroy anything different, anything special. The Doctor sent Rose home, and he was working on a way to knock out the Dalek forces, and I lead the defenses. I was the last thing between the Daleks and the Doctor, and I lost."
Ianto waited, Jack wasn't done yet, and he was afraid if he interrupted, Jack would stop opening up all together.
"I wasn't immortal then, I was really dead, but all of a sudden, I woke up. The Doctor had left without me. Teleported back in time on this thing," He pointed to his wrist. "I was off in my calculations, got sent back to the 1800s, so I gave up. Then I died, and I died again, and I kept dying and waking up, and I was so confused. My only option was to hope the Doctor could fix me. So I went to Cardiff, we'd stopped in here when we were traveling together, he refuels his ship on the Rift, and I waited." Jack sighed, "They were at Canary Warf you know, sucked all the Cybermen and the Daleks into the Void. Rose got trapped in another dimension. By then, it was a different Doctor though, he can do this thing, where he changed his entire self, all to cheat death. Rose stayed with him though, even after he changed. The Doctor loved Rose, he loved her so much, though I doubt he'll ever admit it...anyway, that hand I had? That's the Doctor's hand, it was cut off in a sword fight with a Sycorax, remember them? When you guys went off for coffee, it started bubbling. I didn't even think, I just grabbed the hand and ran. What do I find on the Plass? His ship, coming to refuel just like I knew it would. I jumped on the outside of it and held on while it flew through the Vortex. Apparently, it doesn't like me very much, it flew all end of the universe, the year six hundred trillion, just to try to shake me off. We stayed there for a little, the Doctor leave anywhere without meddling a little. We helped the humans, escape to this place called 'Utopia' although it turned out 'Utopia' didn't exist. They needed something to help them hope though, the Universe was ending. The stars had gone out. We helped the rocket take off, and met a man named Professor Yana. Now, the Doctor is a Timelord, the last of them, his entire race died in a war. Professor Yana was a Timelord that escaped from the war by disguising himself as a human. The thing was, that when a Timelord changes himself like that, they forget they were ever anything different. All their memories go into a fob watch. Yana opened the watch and remembered who he was, the Master. He hijacked the TARDIS and left us there to die. Thankfully, the Doctor fixed my wrist strap, and we went back to the twenty first century, present day for Martha Jones, his current companion, and for me I suppose, turns out the Master had implanted himself as Harold Saxon."
"Saxon sent us on a fruitless mission through Himalayas!"
"He knew about me, he knew about my team, he knew everything. He needed to make sure there was no way anyone could bring him down. The Doctor and I were trapped on the Valient with him for an entire year, watching as he destroyed the Earth. He had gone back to 'Utopia' and had used the people there as his soldiers. He created a paradox, and used the Doctor's ship to keep it from reversing itself. There was a whole year Ianto that you don't remember, because now it's never happened. It was Martha in the end, she had escaped, and travelled the world, devising a solution to the problem. She saved the Doctor, and released her family and I. I destroyed the paradox machine, and the paradox fixed itself, reverting back a whole year."
"The year that never existed."
"The year that never existed. I had a lot of time to think. I thought about the team, I thought about you. So many people died, Ianto, more than you can imagine, entire countries were wiped out. I wondered..I worried. Afterwards, the Doctor proposed I travel with him, but all I wanted to do was come home, and save the world in my own way. The Doctor, he travels to different times, different places, saving the future, saving the past, but since he's so busy doing that, someone needs to save the present. So I came back."
"You still left us Jack! Even if it wasn't for that long, for us at least, you left us, defenseless."
"I thought he could fix me Ianto, but all he could tell me was that I'm a fact in time, and, apparently, facts can't go away. I needed closure."
Ianto sat next to him on the bed, "Did you die?"
Jack nodded, "More times than I could count. The Master aged the Doctor years, enslaved Martha's family, killed me for sport. He kept me chained up in a boiler room on the Valiant."
"You were there, when the American president was assassinated?"
Jack nodded, "That was as far as the paradox rewound. It was after that, when everything went to the dogs, of course only those on the Valiant know that. The Master's dead though, dont have to worry about him anymore."
Ianto looked at Jack, he looked tired, even more so than usual. He tried his best to fake a yawn, "Mind if we go to bed? I'd let you stay up and about, but the way my flat is set up, every little sound hits the bedroom, and someone needs to get sleep around here."
Jack looked a little taken aback at Ianto's bluntness, but he agreed anyway, and stripped down to his boxers and undershirt, Ianto changed into sweatpants and a t-shirt.
"Hm, didn't know you owned anything besides dress pants."
He looked down at his clothing, "What, you think I normally sleep naked?"
"You always have with me," Jack replied with a wink.
Ianto rolled his eyes and crawled into bed, Jack followed. He had forgotten what beds do to him, because of his general lack of sleep, he eyes were closing the second his head hit the pillow. Ianto smiled gently, "Jack it's okay, just try to sleep."
Jack was so close to doing just that, he forgot to be afraid of what was coming next.
"Jack! Jack you have to wake up, it's only a dream!"
The immortal gasped awake, not unlike he gasped awake after dying, and looked around frantically, sweat streaking down his face. Jack stopped himself from lying back down and jumped out of bed. He was half dressed when he remembered where exactly he was. "Sorry about that, bad dream, I really should get back to the Hub...paperwork to do." He rubbed his face and stepped out of the bedroom.
Ianto frowned, he should've expected this. "Jack," he began, getting out of bed and following his boss into the kitchen. "Jack...that's not where the coffee is."
"Where is it then? I need a good cup before I go back to work."
"You can't go back to the Hub yet and you know that. What you really need is more sleep."
"Since when did you become my mother? I got all the sleep I need."
"You only got two hours worth. Please, Jack? You still owe me a date, and I don't want you falling asleep in the movie I have yet to pick."
"I don't ever remember saying you could pick..."
"I can't believe you would ever think I would trust you with a choice like that, it's our first date Jack, and that sets the tone for-"
"The whole relationship? I didn't know we were on the same page with that, Ianto."
The younger man blushed, "Well...we should try to get some sleep."
"I told you, I don't need any more sleep."
He put his hands on his hips, "Jack, don't be a child."
"There's a difference from being a child and being logical. I'll just be restless, you can't go back to sleep after...have you ever had such vivid nightmares, that you even say to yourself in the dream, 'Oh, this must be a nightmare?' That's what my dreams are like, every time I fall asleep. The things I've seen...Ianto, you haven't done anything in your life to deserve to hear what my dreams are about, and waking up alone in the dark Hub doesn't help either."
"Would you sleep if you knew you weren't going to wake up alone?"
"Ianto, I don't think I follow."
"I mean, would you feel better if you knew you were waking up to a familiar face...like mine maybe?"
"Are you saying-"
"I'm saying Jack, that if you'd like, I don't necessarily have to leave after we have our...fun, and maybe some nights we could come here, if it would make you feel better, I mean, you aren't the only one who has nightmares, it might help us both."
Jack nodded, he remembered one night, before he left, where Ianto had fallen asleep at the Hub and had a nightmare. Jack had woken him up, and they had sat there in silence, before Ianto had mumbled about getting something at his flat, and left. "Um, I...I guess it'd be nice to have a chance to sleep."
"Right, we should get back to that then...sleeping I mean."
They didn't have to get up early, Jack had given the team the day off, just to be safe. Ianto woke up around nine, and found Jack snoring lightly. He smiled, off all people, he never expected to wake up next to his boss. Jack shifted and frowned, Ianto froze, he hoped he wasn't having another nightmare. Taking a chance, he took Jack's hand, and the immortal's face relaxed.
Ianto sighed, "It's okay Jack, I'll be here when you wake up, I always will be."
I can never seem to get these guys right, there's always a little awkwardness in there...hope you got passed it! :D This is a two parter, it'll probably be up tomorrow and I'm telling you in advance, its quite dark...poor Ianto
Please review!