Author's Notes: I'm very, very sorry for the delay! Life was quite hectic in the last few days and I know that I'm probably rushing this story a bit, but I think that it would be more realistic that way – after all, Jack and Ianto aren't exactly known for holding a grudge when it comes to one another.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this! The next chapter will most likely be the final one and, of course, feedback is always appreciated!

"It's strange," Jack said, staring down at his hands. "It's like I'm talking to someone else entirely."

Clara nodded in understanding and Jack felt a bit as if he was talking to his therapist. They were sitting by the console in the control room in the near-darkness. There was no one else; they'd actually started talking when she'd asked him - in a rather too forward manner - who he was exactly and what the deal with him and Ianto was.

"He's just so distant," he continued now. She'd offered to listen and he'd taken her up on it, because no one else would. The Doctor was still insistent that Ianto would forgive him on a look and Gwen didn't seem to want to talk about it – she was too happy to have her friends back and the Universe in front of her to think that things could possibly be wrong. 'He'll come around,' she's said, but he had yet to do it. "He wouldn't talk to me, no matter what I try to say. It's just one word sentences and nothing substantial."

It was the truth. A week or so – it was hard to tell in the TARDIS – had passed since Jack had come on boards and Ianto had barely said a word to him. He was always friendly with Clara, Gwen or the Doctor (even if he still kept a tactful but noticeable distance between himself and the Time Lord) and he seemed to feel at home here, but his coldness when it came to Jack had yet to falter. And it wasn't just Jack that suffered from it; the Doctor tried to make things better and most decidedly did not, Gwen got upset and even River (whose place in the Doctor's life Jack had yet to figure out) who came by every now and then briskly told Ianto to stop acting like an asshole because it just wasn't him. It was as if Jack's problem was suddenly everyone else's and he was still irritated by it, no matter how much he tried not to be.

All in all, it was torture.

It was only made worse by the fact that deep down, Jack was just so happy. He had Ianto back and, as if that wasn't amazing enough, he'd get to keep him. He knew that they wouldn't be able to be around each other forever, but they'd always be there for one another. They could be lovers or enemies or both, but they were always going to be the closest they had to an other half, because they'd both last for eternity. And he wouldn't have to be all by himself now; not ever again.

"Did you try to get Gwen to speak to him?" Clara asked, pulling him out of his thoughts.

"Oh, she talked and talked." Jack's laugh was bitter. "And nothing. He always changes the topic. He's just so– frustrating. Different, and yet just the same person down below."

"He is," a new voice said and Jack looked up to see Gwen by the door. She was dressed in a t-shirt and a pyjama bottom, which made him think that she'd just got out of bed as well. "It's as if he doesn't know me anymore. The way he talks, the way he looks at everything... there's something about it that just gives me the chills. I've never seen him like that before."

There was a brief moment of silence before Jack got out a quiet, "He's not even Ianto anymore."

"Yes, he is," Clara said all of a sudden and they both looked at her, surprised. "Look, I don't know what he was like before, but I know that he came back damaged. And if you really want him back, I think you should make sure he remembers what you mean to him."

"I don't think that's much of a possibility," Jack objected. "He won't even listen to me when I try to speak."

"I can see the way he looks at you," Clara said gently. "Just try to show him how to see it too."

o.O.o

Jack patiently waited, having sat himself on the edge of Ianto's bed half an hour ago, and watched him. It was pathetic, really; given that all he got from the man was snide comments and the occasional lash out, he still couldn't get enough of just looking at him.

The room wasn't big and the bed took up the bigger part of it – it was large with a mattress that felt soft as a cloud. Almost every object around him was made either of dark, heavy wood or leather and brass, as were Ianto's clothes and Jack vaguely wondered if that was what his room had been like this. He knew about the clothes – Gwen had told him that Ianto had mentioned something about it being the fashion in the parallel world.

Ianto looked so peaceful when asleep – and without the aforementioned clothes that made him seem considerably older and not as gentle. All the anger and resentment of the day, all of the bitterness and the toughness he'd forced on himself had left his face and made him look even younger than he actually was and so, so innocent; almost angelic. The worry and exasperation that seemed to constantly haunt him had been stripped off, making place for the ghost of the man Jack still loved so much.

Clara had been right, he decided. Somewhere deep inside this troubled, damaged man, Ianto was still there. He had to be. Because Jack really wasn't sure what he'd do if it turned out that this part of him had been lost along the way.

As Jack got further lost in thought, he barely noticed that Ianto was waking up. The Captain watched, mesmerised, as his eyes opened like petals, wide and bluer than anything and Jack's heart melted.

It took a few seconds for Ianto to focus on him and then he sat up in the bed abruptly. "What are you doing in my room?"

"I wanted to talk to you." Maybe it was better to be blunt, Jack decided. They'd danced around this – whatever it was, anger and pain and revenge that didn't taste as sweet as it was supposed to – and it was time to come clean.

"Oh. So you decided you could just invite yourself in?"

"Sort of," Jack confirmed. The sheet Ianto had covered himself with prior to waking up had slid down to his waist and the Captain couldn't take his eyes off him. The skin was just as pale and smooth as he remembered it, along with the light definition of muscles and the delicate valleys of his collarbones. Ianto was looking at him from underneath his long, dark lashes and dishevelled hair and Jack couldn't help but lose himself in it all. He looked like he'd been cut out of marble; cold and unreachable and yet with the fine, fragile beauty of stone and immortality and it almost hurt to look at him. "It was important."

"Always is with you," Ianto hummed. "Well, what is it?"

"When I came here, I thought it was to apologise," he admitted. "But now, as I watched you– Look, I understand if you hate me. I won't pressure you to do anything you don't want to; I won't tell you to forgive me. There's only one thing I want to ask of you."

"Go ahead," Ianto said, voice quiet but even and Jack knew that he'd caught his attention.

"If you're going to just– carry on the way you are, then please tell me so I can go." Ianto looked up, shock painted all over his features, and Jack locked their eyes together. "You tell me, and I'll leave. All I'm asking is for you to not make me see it. Let me remember my Ianto; the man I knew and loved and lost time and time again. Give me this much, please."

He paused to take a breath and saw something shift and melt in Ianto's eyes, almost unnoticeable and yet enough for Jack to cling on to. He made to speak again and the air from his lungs left them in a gasp when Ianto pressed them together in a hug.

"There was a girl," he mumbled into Jack's shoulder. "Back in the other world. Lyra, she was called. She knew about my- condition and she always got irritated when I worried too much about her. 'It'll all be all right,' she always said, but it wasn't. It wasn't. How could it be fine when she could hurt herself or God knows what else at any given moment? And then I finally got it." He pulled back to face Jack. "I understood how you felt before and I hated you for it. I hated you so much, Jack, because it meant that all my loved ones would die and I would be the only one to remain. And what then? What will happen to me - and you, for that matter - after the Universe runs out of time? And then I realised that it didn't matter how much I thought about it, it's going to happen anyway and the only thing I can do was stop dwelling on it." His lips stretched into a smile; sad and broken and still somehow hopeful. "I'm sorry, Jack. I shouldn't have been so harsh to you."

"It's fine," Jack hurried to assure him and finally dared to reach up and caress his cheek. "Everything's all right, Ianto." He didn't care how desperate it looked; not when he could so easily accept an apology that would get Ianto to open up once more.

It would probably still take time and he realised it. But a small step was still better than nothing.

"I'm glad to hear it."

The kiss, when it came, was unexpected enough to make Jack clasp Ianto's face in his hands to steady them both. He could taste warmth and tears and something like pain in it; just on the edge between the frantic passion of lovers on the brink of death and the everlasting kiss they'd actually get to have.

"A Universe and half a galaxy away," Jack whispered against his lips as Ianto wrapped his arms around him and turned them both around, pushing Jack down onto the bed, "and yet you managed to find me."

"Always, Jack," Ianto vowed between feverish kisses. "No matter what happens, I'll always find you when you need me."

Jack whimpered under the onslaught as Ianto's mouth latched onto his neck – the gesture so painfully familiar and so very much him that it hurt – and would have been embarrassed by it if he hadn't been so preoccupied with everything else.

God, he'd missed this. He'd missed this so much. Six years and various species and yet there was nothing that could replace Ianto's signature on him; the power he had once he took it in his hands and the strange combination between frenetic tenderness and controlled insistence that he always displayed when they'd been separated for too long or had been caught up in a life or death situation. Except it wasn't like that now, not at all. Jack would never have to worry about him dying again; he'd never have to look at Ianto and imagine all sorts of things happening to be. The silky, smooth skin under his fingers that clearly couldn't be scarred by anything ever again would remain like that forever and Jack kept sobbing out his name, more of a prayer than anything else as he surrendered himself to Ianto's undivided attention.

"Open your eyes, Jack," his lover said and the Captain obliged, staring up and straight into the crystal clear blue eyes he'd been dreaming of for so long. "Look at me."

"I love you," Jack whispered and it was messy and hurried and absolutely not how he'd planned on making Ianto believe it, but it didn't matter. "You never trusted me on that, but I do. More than everything."

"I know," the younger man murmured, voice infinitely gentle despite his burning eyes and frantic touches. "I know."

And with that, Jack closed his eyes again and let Ianto claim him completely.