They had done it again. Torchwood had saved the world, and once again, nobody knew of the huge sacrifice they had had to make to do so.
Gwen seemed to be handling it well. She still had her child and Rhys by her side while she mourned, but Jack had no one left. Besides, Gwen had already had to mourn Owen and Tosh. It wasn't like she didn't know how to do it.
Although, Gwen and Ianto had grown extremely close after losing Owen and Tosh and maybe his death would be harder on her than Jack had been expecting, but it was something that she would be able to get over eventually.
But Jack would never get over it.
The last few years had been full of so many loves lost for Jack. He'd lost both of his Doctors, his Rose, Mickey the idiot, Owen, Tosh, his daughter, his grandson and now Ianto.
He wasn't handling it very well.
He mostly blamed himself for Ianto's death. He could have just gone into Thames House alone. He should have known what was going to happen. He could have prevented all of this mourning. But he had been stupid and allowed Ianto to help him.
"Careful, that's harassment, sir."
Jack frowned as he landed in Germany. Travelling the world was supposed to help him forget about everybody he had lost, not remind him. But everything he saw made him think of Ianto, or his Doctor or Rose. He had even seen a kid in Russia that had looked like his grandson.
Sometimes Jack wondered what the new Doctor looked like. Whether he would ever meet him. Was he young? Old? He had regenerated into a girl this time? Was he finally ginger? Did he still remember him?
"You like to think you're a hero, but you're the biggest monster of all."
New York was loud. All of the people that stopped and stared at him as he walked past was still not enough to distract him.
As he glanced around at all of the buildings and the people, Jack realised that Rose would have loved it here. She would have loved all of the people and she would drag Mickey and the Doctor around to show them a new building or interesting person that she had found.
Mickey would complain about the Doctor being there and the Doctor would call him Ricky, mostly just to annoy him. Rose would yell at them both and tell them to stop fighting and the day would end with the three of them back in the TARDIS laughing about something that the Doctor did.
"Well, think about it...lots of things you can do with a stopwatch."
Australia made him think of his daughter. She would liked it here. His grandson would have loved it too. They would have climbed the bridge and patted the koalas and kangaroos. Jack would have come with them. It would have been a great holiday.
They would have all laughed together and taken so many photos and they would have been just like any other family. But now Jack wasn't going to have that. She was never going to talk to him again and his grandson…
"Coming here, it gave me meaning again."
Owen and Tosh. Jack had always thought that they would end up together. He knew them both just as well as he knew Gwen and Ianto and he had always assumed that they would. He had never thought that they would die together without ever getting the chance to have what he and Ianto had had.
They would have been married. Probably had a couple of kids. Tosh would spend the day yelling at Owen about how one of their kids was becoming just like him. They would have gone on a honeymoon to somewhere like Africa where they could look after sick children or something equally charitable.
But now they never would and that was all Jack's fault.
"World's always ending. And I have missed that coat."
Ianto had always wanted to go back to London again. Jack had always promised Ianto that he would take him back there again and Ianto was going to show him where he and Lisa used to live and they would mourn her together at what used to be the Torchwood base.
They would have made a weekend of it and gone out for dinner. They would have probably had as much sex as they could before they went back to the office. It wasn't like they didn't have sex in the office, but the other three really didn't need to see that.
"I love you."
Staring at the remains of the Torchwood base in London, a tear rolled down Jack's cheek. He imagined what life would have been like for Ianto and Lisa here. They were probably going to get married. They were going to have kids and live happily ever after.
But now…
"I love you, Ianto. I think I always did."
And he was sorry. So very sorry that he had destroyed Ianto's life.
"Don't forget me."
Gwen was so worried about him when he returned. But she needn't be. He was going to start living a new life, like he always did when everybody he loved died.
But forget? That was something that he could never do.
His Doctors. Rose. Mickey. Tosh. Owen. Steven. Alice. Ianto.
He would never, ever forget.