Disclaimer: I don't own anything in the Who-verse. That honour belongs to RTD and the mighty and glorious BBC.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, alerted, favourited, and just plain read the story. It means a lot. Thank you too, as always, to Orion Lyonesse for giving up some of her precious writing time to beta my attempts at fiction.

If you enjoy the chapter, or even if you don't, I would love to hear from you, so please review. xxx


Jack wasn't going to make it. Gwen knew the instant she saw him running towards Ianto as though pursued by the hounds of hell. He was twenty metres away. And Ianto was just staring at him. Staring at Jack and that shimmer. Why are you just standing there? Gwen thought desperately. Hit the floor. That was what Jack had said. Hit the floor if so much as a leaf moved. And this was a goddamned shimmer. It was the Mericae and Ianto was directly in the firing line. If he didn't move he would die. She would lose another friend. Why won't you move? No. No way. She was not losing Ianto. Not today. Not ever. She was closer than Jack, ten metres closer. If she was lucky, very, very, lucky...

She began to run, her own hounds of hell in hot pursuit.

The distance between them dropped away. Gwen kept her eyes fixed on Ianto's motionless form. To her left, from the corner of one eye she could see Jack, still desperately trying to reach Ianto's side. He hadn't seen her; he didn't have eyes for anyone but Ianto. Suddenly she saw the shimmer give way to a flash of bright light, scorching white. At the same moment she saw Jack launch himself between the flash and Ianto. Instinctively she dived, arms outstretched, and rugby-tackled Ianto, slamming into his back, arms wrapped around his waist, sending them both crashing to the ground in a tangle of limbs. Immediately she rolled to one side, coming to rest beside the young man, one arm stretched across his back, pinning him to the ground. Then she flung her other arm over his head, pushing his face into the grass, burying her own face into his shoulder as the searing blast of UV radiation passed harmlessly over their heads.

Beside her, Gwen could hear Ianto moaning Jack's name over and over in a broken voice. Suddenly he gave a start, pushing his shoulders up, trying to break free. She pushed down. Hard.

"Stay down, you bloody idiot," she hissed, feeling the intense heat of the UV across her own shoulders. "He'll be fine." He wouldn't, of course. She knew she was lying, spouting meaningless platitudes. As she crashed into Ianto, she had seen the light envelop Jack. He had taken the full force of the blast. Face on. To save Ianto.

Gwen didn't know whether Ianto believed her lie, or whether he had admitted defeat, knowing that it was too late to save his lover, but for whatever reason Ianto had stopped struggling. The only sign of life was Jack's name, still falling in a constant monotone from his lips. At least he was alive.

At the thought, Gwen's stomach heaved. It had been so close. Even through her closed eyes she felt the world spin around her. She found herself gulping for air in a desperate attempt not to faint.

After what seemed like an eternity, but in reality couldn't have been more than a few seconds, Gwen felt the heat across her back dissipate, until all that remained was the damp, oppressive warmth of the day. Cautiously she opened one eye, looking up tentatively. All she saw was the bright white blankness of clouds. It was over. She rolled away from Ianto until she lay on her back looking up at the sky, waiting for her breath to steady. It was over, but not for long. Even now she could see the misty orb of the sun finally beginning to break through the cloud cover. It wouldn't take long for the Mericae to recharge.

Gwen sat up slowly, taking a couple of calming deep breaths before scrambling to her feet. The plan. She had to stick to the plan. She knew where the Mericae was now. All she had to do was deploy the capsule cell. She could do the rest on her own, couldn't she? She glanced at Ianto, still motionless on the grass. Why was he still lying there? She'd never seen him fall apart like this. Not ever. Not even with Lisa, and that had been the worst. Was this what loving Jack did to you?

Jack! Oh, god. Where was Jack? She spun around, all thoughts of the Mericae forgotten. Her eyes fell on the hunched figure of Jack curled in a ball on the pristine fairway grass. As she watched, he turned his face towards her. It was unrecognisable, a bloody pulp. With a cry of horror, she began to run towards him. Even as she reached him, she saw his body slump, the last remaining spark of awareness leaving his eyes.

Gwen fell to her knees beside Jack's now prostrate body. She knew he was dead. One glance at the bloody blistered mess of his once perfect face, and the white milky eyes fixing her with a sightless stare, left her in no doubt that he was dead. But she had to touch, to feel the absence of his pulse beneath her fingers to believe it. She rolled the body over, swallowing hard at the sight of charred material fused to flesh around what was left of his neck and throat. Her fingers hovered over his throat but there didn't seem to be anywhere left to press. After a long moment she reached down and carefully raised one wrist instead, clasping her fingers around skin that was red and burnt but still essentially intact. She counted. Nothing.

As she counted, she became aware that the silence of the fairway had been broken by the low, piteous, keening wail of a soul in torment. She kept her eyes focused on Jack's wrist. She didn't need to look to know what, or rather who, was making that sound. It could only come from Ianto. When she finally raised her head, she found Ianto exactly where she had left him, only now he was sitting up, his knees were drawn up high in front of him, clasped tight by one arm, his other hand balled in a fist and jammed in his mouth, smothering a scream. He rocked backwards and forwards, his eyes fixed unwaveringly on Jack's body.

"Ianto," she said gently, not wanting to startle him. One wrong word and the scream he was fighting so hard to keep suppressed would be unleashed in all its torment. "This is Jack, remember. He'll come back to us. To you." Gwen swallowed. Looking at Jack now it was hard to believe he could survive this. She couldn't remember seeing his body so badly damaged before. All the gun shots, stab wounds and Weevil bites seemed like mere scratches by comparison. "It'll just take time. Time for him to heal. Time for him to come back to us."

Ianto didn't appear to have heard her. Still rocking back and forth, his face was now white, and there was a clammy sheen to his skin. Gwen saw his shoulders shake with an involuntary shiver. He was in shock, she realised, and full-blown shock at that. She remembered snatches from the police first-aid training video. Shock was a killer. If she didn't do something to snap Ianto out of it soon, he would die, just as surely as if he'd been hit by the UV blast in the first place.

"Ianto!" Gwen commanded, forcing her voice to sound harsh and strident. "On your feet. We still have to catch this thing,"

Ianto stilled, looking up at the sound of her voice, but his eyes were dead, not really seeing her.

"Go away," he said dully, his eyes returning to Jack. "Before I get you killed too." The rocking began again. Gwen could see waves of shivers wracking his body. He was shutting down and she was running out of time. A few more minutes and his organs would begin to fail. She bit her lip and took a deep breath, hating what she was about to do.

"Get off your fucking arse, tea boy!" Gwen yelled, her voice filled with contempt. "God, you're a sad fuck. I can't imagine what Jack sees in you. You're useless. Look at you, sat pining over someone who'll be bouncing around again in a matter of hours. It's fucking pathetic. He'd have been much better off with me..." There was movement at her feet.

"Fuck you, Gwen Cooper," Ianto shouted, jumping to his feet. His face was angry and red, the shivers transformed into ones of anger. "Jack wouldn't fucking touch you in a million years..." His voice faded away uncertainly as he saw Gwen grinning at him, her eyes teary. She took two steps towards him, pulling him into a fierce hug.

"Don't you ever scare the crap out of me like that again, Ianto Jones," she choked into his hair. "I'm sorry I had to say those things...you know I didn't mean them, right?" The apology was a mumbled plea for understanding and forgiveness.

After a moment, Ianto awkwardly returned the hug.

"I know," he reassured her. "I'm sorry too. I didn't mean what I said," he continued with mounting embarrassment.

"Yes, you did." Gwen said, with a soft understanding smile. "And you're right, Jack wouldn't touch me in a million years. Not as long as you and Rhys are around, at least. I know my place, and that's with Rhys. You don't have anything to fear from me."

"But you do love Jack?" Ianto asked, finally putting into words the question that had hung between them for so long.

"I won't lie to you. I did, for a while," Gwen confessed. "And I almost threw everything with Rhys away because of it. But I realised I could never be to Jack what you clearly are..."

"And what's that? A fuck buddy?" Ianto didn't know why he said it. The obscenity felt wrong on his tongue. He knew he and Jack were more than that, he just couldn't put a name to it. Lovers? Certainly. Partners? Maybe. A couple? A horrid label, best consigned to oblivion. Boyfriends? Almost as bad.

Gwen looked shocked, and Ianto knew it wasn't because of the swearing.

"You don't mean that? Do you?"

"No," Ianto admitted, "but honestly, Gwen, I don't know what Jack and I are."

"You're soulmates, Ianto," she said simply.

It was Ianto's turn to looked shocked. "Soulmates?" he repeated disbelievingly. "Are there such things?"

"In yours and Jack's case, clearly there are. That's why I couldn't ever be a threat to you. There are some things you just don't mess with." She grinned. "And now we really need to find that Mericae thing before it discharges again."

Ianto blinked at the sudden change in topic, but looked past Gwen at Jack's lifeless body. "I killed him you know," he said flatly.

"No, you didn't," Gwen said patiently. "The Mericae did. And I'm sure you have a million arguments as to why it's still your fault..." Gwen moved, obscuring Ianto's line of sight to Jack, and looked him straight in the eye. "And later I'll listen and try to talk you out of them. Right now, though, please, can it wait until we have that creature trussed up good and tight and out of harm's way?"

Ianto managed a dry smile, cocking his head to one side. "Were you always this bossy, or has Torchwood made you this way?"

"I have always been this bossy, just ask Rhys. Which reminds me..." Gwen fished her mobile from out of her jeans pocket and dialled. After a moment, Ianto heard Rhys' anxious voice on the other end of the line, oddly tinny in the silence.

Gwen let him talk for a moment and then interrupted. "I'm fine, love. Yes, honestly. Look, love, give us fifteen minutes, then bring up the truck. Take a left through the clearing and you'll see us on the fairway. We'll be the ones with the invisible monster." She snorted a laugh and hung up.

"So, what's the plan now?" Ianto asked, now trying to avoid looking at Jack. The scream was still bubbling so near to the surface, burning his throat, and every glance at Jack's burned, shattered body brought it closer to his lips. He swallowed hard, forcing it down. He couldn't afford to fall apart again now. Gwen needed him. She might not have put it into words, she might even have shared a laugh with Rhys, but her eyes were frightened. He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. She was frightened. He'd failed Jack already today, and. he wasn't about to let himself fail Gwen as well.

"Plan B," Gwen answered grimly, striding across to the SUV. She flung open the passenger door and started rummaging around in the footwell.

Ianto's eyes followed her curiously from where he stood. "Plan B?" he queried. "I didn't know we had a plan B."

"I always have a plan B," Gwen countered. She gave a small cry of triumph and pulled free what, to Ianto, looked like a white plastic bucket. Pulling a key from her pocket she started to pry off the lid.

"What's that?"

"Jasmine Silk," Gwen replied as the lid finally came free. She picked up the bucket and carried it over to where Ianto stood. She turned and faced outward, her back to Ianto and Jack. "I should duck now," she said. Giving him a knowing nod, she hoisted the bucket high above her head with both hands. Ianto took one look at the bucket and the determined set of Gwen's features, and hit the ground.

With all the strength she could muster, Gwen brought the bucket round in a long, sweeping arc. A thick, pale creamy-yellow liquid, looking for all the world like cold congealed custard, sprayed out from the rim of the bucket, splattering across the dark green grass. Except in one location. Five metres in front of Jack's body, the yellow liquid never made it to the ground. Instead it clung crazily in mid-air, running slowly down unseen facets, picking out edges and crevices before finally dripping to the ground.

Gwen made a second sweep, and a second viscous trail of liquid landed and oozed down the previously-unseen Mericae. Gwen sat the bucket on the grass and turned to Ianto, eyes shining.

"Plan B," she announced smugly.

"Jasmine Silk?" Ianto deadpanned, although his lips were twitching with suppressed laughter.

"What?" Gwen looked affronted. "I was touching up the hallway. We're selling the flat. Anyway it could have been worse." She raised her eyebrows and shot him a cheeky glance. "It could have been Magnolia".

Ianto looked at the paint dripping down the creature. Clearly magnolia was going under a whole new set of names these days, including Jasmine Silk. He shook his head. Why ruin the moment? There would be plenty of time to tease later...

"So, what did we do with the capsule cell?" he said.

"Here." Gwen tossed him a small disc-shaped object. "Like to do the honours?"

"God, yes," he replied.

"Be careful. It still might go off again," Gwen warned, casting a wary eye at the paint-smeared creature.

"If it does, there isn't a right lot I can do about it," Ianto said philosophically with a small smile. Remembering Jack's orders, he cautiously stepped forward, hunching over and staying as near to the ground as he could manage. Better late than never, he thought sadly. After a few steps, he was in touching distance of the creature, and he carefully and precisely laid the disc-shaped object at the foot of the Mericae, just touching the yellow-smeared crystal. He fingered a small protuberance on the disc's edge and pulled back hastily, as a curtain of crackling blue energy flowed up and around the Mericae, enveloping it. As Ianto watched, the curtain of energy deepened in colour until it was almost black, obscuring the paint-defined lines of the creature.

"That's the UV shielding," Gwen said. "It's safe now." She let out a relieved sigh, releasing the breath she hadn't realised she'd been holding, and sank to the grass wearily, suddenly drained. She looked around her at the paint-splattered grass and barked an abrupt laugh.

"The groundsman really isn't going to be happy now," she commented dryly. There was silence.

She turned around, finding Ianto once more crouched over Jack's inert body. He was holding one of Jack's hands between his own and great silent sobs wracked his frame. Gwen leapt to her feet and rushed over to him, collapsing to the ground. She gently circled his heaving shoulders and pulled him to her side, squeezing tightly.

"Ianto, love, he's going to be all right. You know that. This is what Jack does."

Ianto didn't respond, his sobs coming harder and louder . She sat beside him in silence, holding his shoulders with what she hoped was reassurance. After several minutes, Ianto's sobs subsided, replaced by silent tears punctuated by occasional gulps of air. Behind her, Gwen heard the dull rumble of an approaching engine. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw a Harwood's truck pull through the trees onto the rough ground at the top of the fairway. She didn't want Rhys to see Ianto like this, or Jack, for that matter. Rhys had seen a lot of things in his dealings with Torchwood, and more than his fair share of dead bodies, but he'd never witnessed anything on the scale of what was in front of Gwen at that moment. She raised the arm that was clasped around Ianto's shoulders and waved it in the air in a stop motion. Rhys immediately pulled to a halt and switched off the engine, and for the thousandth time Gwen was reminded how lucky she was to have Rhys Williams.

Turning her attention back to the grieving Ianto, she asked, "What's this all about, Ianto?" With some effort, she kept her voice quiet and calm. "You've seen Jack die before, and I've never seen you like this. Please tell me what's wrong. I can't help you if I don't know what's wrong."

Ianto finally raised his eyes, turning his head to look at Gwen. He hiccupped. "It's my fault," he said quietly, so quietly that Gwen had to strain to hear him.

"Ianto, love," Gwen reasoned, "you said that before. It's not your fault. Jack knew what he was doing. Jack always knows what he's doing."

Ianto shook his head vehemently. "Not this time, he didn't. He wasn't thinking straight. He was trying to save me. He knew what was going to happen."

Gwen frowned, not understanding. "What do you mean?" she said. "How could Jack know? You mean he had a gut feeling?"

"No," Ianto shook his head again. "That wasn't it. Yesterday when we were at Professor Merchant's..." He paused, struggling to find the words. Finally, in a small scared voice, he said, "I promised Jack I wouldn't tell you."

A knot of fear formed in Gwen's stomach. "Tell me what, Ianto? You have to tell me, you know that. We're a team. We don't keep secrets from each other. I'm sure Jack had his reasons, but that was before this happened. You have to tell me now. Jack will understand." There was a long silence. Gwen didn't push it, letting Ianto find his way through his doubts.

Eventually he spoke, his voice still barely audible. "Jack had a vision. Of the Mericae killing me."

Gwen suppressed the urge to give a snort of disbelief.

"But Ianto, sweetheart," she argued gently. "Jack doesn't believe in visions."

"He believed this one," Ianto said. "He told me he's had them twice before. Always the same. Someone he cares about, in peril, dying a horrible death. And whatever he does to try and change that, it's always come true. He wouldn't give me the details. No, that's not right. I didn't ask him for details about the first two times. He was scared, Gwen. I've never seen him so scared. You know Jack. He can always find a way, no matter what. But this time? It was as though he'd admitted defeat before he'd even left the Hub. He threw himself in front of the Mericae to save me. Because he couldn't find another way. That's why it's my fault."

Gwen was stunned into silence. Pulling her arm free of Ianto, she let it drop into her lap. There was no doubting Ianto's sincerity, nor his belief that Jack had sacrificed himself to save him, and Gwen realised that the fact that Jack was immortal made no absolutely no difference. Even if Jack had had a life to lose, he would have done exactly the same thing. She shook her head in denial, reaching to hug Ianto to her again.

"It's still not your fault, Ianto," she said. "It was still Jack's choice. Nothing you could have done or said would have made any difference." Ianto looked up, meeting her eyes. She was shocked at the bleakness she saw there.

"But don't you see, Gwen, if he hadn't cared for me, he wouldn't have had to make a choice. I put him in danger. I put all of us in danger."

Gwen knew what was coming next. Ianto was going to say that it would be better for all of them if he left the team and removed the distraction. She shook her head. "We're always in danger, Ianto. That's what being in Torchwood means. Your relationship with Jack doesn't alter that. If anything, your relationship makes the team stronger. You've always been the glue that holds Torchwood together..."

"That'll be my coffee," Ianto said weakly, and Gwen was relieved to see he could still make a joke, even a poor one.

"Maybe, but that coffee kept Owen civil, Tosh brilliant and Jack happy. And let's not underestimate the effect of the threat of decaf..." Gwen waggled her eyebrows at him, remembering her last brush with Ianto's discipline decaf. "What I'm trying and failing miserably to say is, you make Jack happy. And when Jack's happy, Torchwood works. Without you, there is no reason for Jack to go on with this..." She smiled sadly.

"That's not true," Ianto protested. "He'd keep going for you."

"No, he wouldn't," she argued. "I'm not enough. I have Rhys, and I think Jack would use any excuse to get me out of this life." The smile grew, if anything, sadder.

As she was speaking, Gwen became aware that Ianto no longer seemed to be paying attention. Instead, he was looking past her, back towards the capsule cell, and the imprisoned Mericae.

"I'm sorry I'm boring you," she said cuttingly, irritated.

Ianto didn't reply, he didn't even seem to have heard her. As she watched, his expression changed, becoming more horrified with every passing second.

"Gwen, I think we have a problem," he said slowly, shuffling backward and pointing past her.

Gwen twisted round, her eyes following Ianto's outstretched finger. He was pointing at the Mericae. The curtain of blue-black had faded to a pale blue shimmer, the paint-smeared crystalline form inside clearly visible.

"What the hell is that?" Gwen asked worriedly. "Could the battery be going flat?"

Ianto shook his head. "No. If the specs you showed me are right, it should be good for another hour and a half at least. I think we've got a bigger problem."

"Which is?"

"Do you remember you suggested the Mericae was capable of absorbing rift energy?" Ianto prompted, with a grim smile.

"Yeah." Gwen nodded, but the confused look remained on her face.

"Well, I get the feeling that's not the only sort of energy it can absorb..." There was a look of dawning realisation in Gwen's eyes, her gaze fixing on the wavering blue of the steadily depleting shield.

"And what happens when it discharges?" she asked haltingly, dreading the inevitable answer.

"Well," Ianto said frowning "I'm guessing that, when the energy shield collapses, we get a death ray that makes the previous one look like a bargain basement torch."

"And if the energy shield doesn't collapse?" Gwen's eyes were hopeful.

"Then the discharged energy will bounce back off the energy shield into the Mericae and we get a very, very, big bang."

"Ah."

"Ah, indeed." Ianto arched an eyebrow meaningfully. "Either way, the last place we want to be right now is here."

Gwen looked about her for a means of escape, her eyes falling on the Range Rover.

"What about the SUV?" she asked quickly.

Ianto nodded his head towards the glowing capsule cell. "Do you really want to go past that thing? It could go any second." His voice was hurried, the words running into each other.

As if to give credence to his warning, the blue curtain of light flickered, turning still paler. Gwen bit her lip. "No."

"Thought not. I think we need to run now."

Gwen leapt up and set off up the slope at full pelt, away from the capsule cell and towards Rhys in the waiting Harwood's truck. As she ran, she waved her hands at Rhys, gesturing for him to reverse the truck back into the relative safety of the trees.

Behind her, Ianto bent down and grabbed Jack's wrists. The rising tide of fear was making his hands sweat, which mingled with Jack's congealed blood, making his finger's slippery, Jack's wrists falling repeatedly from his grasp. Inch by determined inch he hauled Jack slowly up the fairway, away from the capsule cell.

Gwen was thirty metres ahead before she realised Ianto wasn't at her heels. She slowed and turned to see him still only metres away from the now almost totally transparent energy shield. They couldn't have more than a few seconds left.

"Ianto, what the hell are you doing?" she screamed. "Run!" Inside the capsule cell a white glow began to emanate from the crystalline structure of the Mericae.

"I'm...not…leaving...him...behind," Ianto panted, as he struggled with Jack's dead weight.

"He's already dead," Gwen pleaded. "He's not going to get any deader. You have to leave him. Please, Ianto."

"No!" Ianto yelled angrily. "You go. I'm staying with Jack. I'm not abandoning him!"

Gwen ran back to him grabbing his arms and forcing him to let go of Jack and face her. Tears of fear were streaming down her face, her eyes wild and pleading.

"Ianto, if you stay here you will die. Jack died so you would survive. Are you going to throw that sacrifice back in his face? Because that's what you're doing. If you die now, Jack's death will have been for nothing. And I don't want to be the one to tell him that you're dead because of a misplaced sense of guilt." He looked blankly at her, her pleas not registering. She couldn't force him to come with her, and she didn't want to die here, not with Rhys looking on. With a sob of frustration, she dropped his arms and walked away, hesitantly at first, but picking up speed with every step.

Ianto blinked, watching Gwen's retreating back. Then he looked down at Jack's body. Lifeless white eyes stared back at him. Oh God. He didn't want his last memory of Jack to be looking into those white orbs. He couldn't. He wanted more than anything to look into their shining blue depths again. To feel Jack's arms around him once more. He bent down and rolled Jack onto his face, hoping the few extra feet and the grass might afford his damaged body some protection.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I love you." Ianto stood, took one last look at Jack, then he turned and ran.


They were a hundred metres away when it blew. There was a deafening crack, louder than any thunder, as though the very sky had fractured, a beat of silence, and then... Whoomph. The explosion knocked them off their feet, the pressure wave rolling over the fairway, followed swiftly by sweeping winds and blistering heat. Face down in the cool grass, Gwen and Ianto covered their heads as the wind swept over them. They could feel the hairs on the back of their hands singe in the heat, but before doing any real damage, the wind and heat passed, leaving nothing but a strange roaring sound echoing across the golf course.

Ianto rolled onto his back and sat up cautiously, looking down to where the capsule cell stood. A beam of light lanced up into the clouds, the heat burning away the vapour and leaving a perfectly round hole cut into the cloud cover, a white-hot searchlight visible for miles around, even in the bright daylight. The shield had held: the discharged energy had found the weakest point of the energy shield, the apex where the curtains of energy met, and forced its way out.

Eyes dazzled, Ianto shielded them with one hand, trying to look at the capsule cell itself, but it was like looking at a miniature sun. When he closed his eyes, the image was imprinted on his retina. He felt Gwen's arm pulling on his as she sat up beside him.

"Are you alive?" he heard her ask, the words almost drowned out by the roar of the escaping energy.

"Last time I checked," he shouted back.

The roaring shut off as though someone had flicked a switch, leaving behind a sudden loud silence, the glare fading almost as quickly. After several seconds, Ianto risked opening his eyes once more. The light and the capsule cell had vanished. All that remained was a black crater a metre deep and twenty metres across, centred where the capsule cell once stood. At the edge of the crater, just beyond the black scorching, was Jack's body. Ianto scrambled to his feet and ran down towards the crater, ignoring Gwen's calls to wait.


Ianto fell to his knees besides Jack. Apart from some scorching of the pale blue cotton of Jack's shirt, there didn't appear to be any sign that the explosion had touched him. Ianto carefully rolled Jack's body face up, scrutinising every square centimetre for signs of additional damage. Nothing. In fact, Ianto could detect the beginnings of Jack's rejuvenation. New skin was already showing at the edges of the burns and, most heartening of all, the pale white orbs now showed tinges of faintest blue. Ianto breathed a relieved sigh, sitting back as Gwen came to rest beside him.

"I think he's going to be all right," he said shakily, pointing at the newly forming skin.

Gwen put a hand on his arm and squeezed reassuringly. "Of course he is. This is our Jack we're talking about. It'll take more than some alien death-ray-spouting cow to keep him down." She looked over to the crater. "Speaking of the Mericae, what became of our UV-blasting friend?" They both stood and cautiously stepped down into the crater, looking incredulously at the blackened raw earth

"And we thought the groundsman was going to be mad before?" Gwen commented with a snorting laugh. "He's going to have a shit-fit when he sees this. How are we going to explain a twenty metre hole in the ground?"

"Unexploded World War II bomb left over from the bombing of Cardiff that missed its target," Ianto said confidently, reaching the centre of the crater and crouching down. "Standard cover up for Torchwood-associated explosions. Works equally well for Torchwood One, Three and Four. They had to be a bit more inventive at Two, I believe."

Really he was amazing, Gwen thought with amusement. Once he was convinced Jack was going to be all right, the usual efficient Ianto Jones, tea boy and fix-it man extraordinaire, was back in business.

"So what have we got?" she asked crouching beside him. She looked past his pointing finger at a circular disc of a black, glassy substance, about the size of a dinner plate. At one end she could just make out the fused remains of what only minutes ago had been a fully functioning capsule cell. She extended a finger to touch the disc but Ianto knocked her hand away.

"It'll still be hot," he warned. "The temperatures needed to melt a crystal like the Mericae are probably in the hundreds of degrees. I prefer you with five fingers." He turned and grinned, the first natural smile she'd seen in what seemed like a very long time.

She returned a wide gap-toothed smile and hugged him. "Nice to have you back," she said. Ianto hugged back.

"Oi, get your hands off my wife!" Rhys called good-naturedly as he strode up. "You all right, love?" His tone, although light, was tinged with worry.

Gwen bolted up and ran to Rhys, wrapping her arms around him and kissing him enthusiastically.

"I'll take that as a yes," Rhys muttered, red-faced, as he came up for air a full two minutes later. "Where's this Mericae thing, then?"

"It...melted," Gwen explained sheepishly, pointing to the cooling disc of glass.

Rhys looked at it in confusion, then back over his shoulder at the Harwood's truck parked at the fringe of the trees. "So, you don't need the truck, then?" He looked disappointed. He loved being called up to do 'Torchwood stuff', not that he would ever tell Gwen that. She'd never let him near a case again.

Gwen took in his crest-fallen expression. Rhys was such a big kid, thinking she didn't know how much he loved being involved in her world. It was one of the many reasons she loved him so much. Suddenly it seemed very important that she tell him that, preferably with demonstrations.

"I tell you what, love," she proposed. "Let me square things with Andy, and then why don't you and your truck give me a hand getting these lights back to the tanning salon? And then we can take the evening off. I think we've earned it. Ianto can get Jack and what's left of the Mericae back to the Hub." She looked to Ianto for confirmation, and he nodded his assent.

Rhys' face brightened but, at the mention of Jack, his eyes fell to the body laid a few metres away. He'd been aware of it on his way down, but his attention had been focused entirely on reaching his wife. Now, he studied the body with sadness, and some curiosity. It was the first time he'd seen Jack dead. It seemed wrong that they were treating Jack's death so lightly, but neither Ianto nor Gwen seemed overly concerned. Maybe that was what facing death everyday did. Made you unconcerned with its finality. Well, for everyone apart from Jack, of course.

Gwen saw him staring and rushed to reassure him. "He's going to be all right, Rhys. His body is already beginning to repair itself. In a few hours, he'll be as good as new." Her voice was soft and sincere. "I promise you."

"Doesn't it scare you that one day he won't come back?" he couldn't help asking, still staring intently at Jack's corpse.

It was Ianto who answered. "It scares me so much I can't breathe. Every single time."

Rhys looked quickly at Ianto, seeing the barely suppressed fear in his eyes. Turning to Gwen, he saw the same fear, this time in the tense set of her shoulders, and he realised that each loss they suffered was as painful as the first. And for some reason he found that comforting.


There was an instant of awareness. A flicker of knowing before the first breath. And it was filled with despair. His prayers had been ignored. The universe had brought him back. Back to a life where he was now truly alone. Back to a life without Ianto. Back to an endless existence where he would have to live with the knowledge of his failure. In that instant, he wished he was still buried in the grave Gray had given him beneath Cardiff, doomed to die and be reborn for eternity. It had been a fitting punishment for his failure of his brother. How much more fitting was it as penance for failing the love of his life, someone he should have been able to save.

His body spasmed, drawing in that first breath of life with a loud, shuddering gasp.

With the first breath came the physical pain: the pounding of blood in his temples, beating a hollow tattoo behind his eyes; his skin crawling as though riddled with maggots; his muscles burning, thronged by stabbing pains inflicted by a million daggers. More often than not, his resurrections were more painful than his deaths. He had never told anyone the full extent of the pain. Not even Ianto. But somehow the young man had known. And so, whenever Jack revived, he invariably found his head resting on Ianto's lap, his lover's arms wrapped tightly around him, helping him back to life, whispered words of comfort muttered into his hair in soothing Welsh tones.

This time there was nothing. No warm arms or soothing words, just the hard ground and only the ragged sound of his own breaths in his ears. But that was how it would be from now on. Because Ianto was gone. Grief exploded in Jack's chest, flowing through every fibre of his being. Grief robbed his limbs of the will to move. Grief soldered his eyes shut. His mind screamed in anguish, He's dead. I don't want a life without him. Why won't you bastards let me die? Only his own screams echoed back.

"Jack."

A voice, a voice that couldn't be real. So, this was to be his fate, haunted...no, tortured by the voice of the man he had loved and lost. An eternity of insanity. Moaning, Jack pulled his knees to his chest, oblivious to the pain wracking his body, and huddled in a ball, willing the voice to cease.

"Cariad."

The voice came again, broken and aching with longing. It sounded so close, so real, but Jack knew it couldn't be. He knew that if he opened his eyes, all he would see would be the shattered, burned remains of his lover, just as he had seen in his vision. He couldn't bear it. Wouldn't bear it. He screwed his eyes even more tightly closed.

"Jack, please..." A desperate plea.

So, this was to be his punishment, to face the consequences of his failure. It wasn't enough that the powers-that-be make him live for an eternity in the knowledge that he had failed Ianto; no, they wanted him to have the image of Ianto's destroyed once-blue eyes imprinted on his memory for all time.

At last, defeated and determined to finally get on with his penance, Jack rolled onto his back and hesitantly opened his eyes, preparing to wince at bright sunlight. There was darkness, a blue-black sky punctuated by faint points of lights canopied above him. A thin sliver of moon cast a pale eerie glow across the landscape. He had been dead for hours. His injuries must have been severe, he realised absently, for so much time to have passed. With a groan of pain he pulled himself up until he was sitting, legs stretched out in front of him. He looked to his left, seeing the dark outline of the SUV silhouetted against the night sky. He was still on the golf course, then. Where was the Mericae? Where was Gwen? With a shiver of fear, he wondered if the Mericae had taken Gwen as well. Before the thought had even fully formed, he heard the voice again.

"Jack."

It was time to face his daemon. Slowly he turned his head in the direction of the voice, his eyes falling to the grass, looking for the outline of Ianto's broken body. Instead, clearly visible even in the pale moonlight, he could see the young man sat, crossed-legged, a few feet away. Face pale, his dark blue eyes, almost black in the moonlight, stared unblinking at him. A ghost. Jack's heart stopped. He couldn't move. He couldn't look away. He knew if he did, the ghost would vanish forever.

"Ianto?" The question caught in his throat. Ianto's mouth twisted. Jack could see moonlit tears glistening on his cheeks.

"Why did you do that?" Ianto asked, his quiet voice loud in the silent night. "Why did you throw yourself in front of the Mericae? You got yourself killed because of me."

Whatever question Jack had been expecting, that wasn't it. Where were the accusations of failure? He frowned in genuine confusion.

"I...I wanted to save you," he answered haltingly. "I wanted to save the man I love. And I would do it again if I got the chance." He felt a sob rise in his chest. "But I won't get another chance, will I? I failed. I wasn't able to protect you. I failed you. And I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, Yan. I'm sorry. I'm sorry." The words spilled out, a litany of helplessness and grief. Jack's sight blurred with tears, the figure of Ianto lost amongst them.

And then, wondrously, warm arms were clasped around him, Ianto's own tears falling warm and wet on his cheeks. Lips pressed tenderly to his forehead and cheeks before searching out his mouth in a long kiss filled with hope and love. Jack's arms searched out Ianto, pulling the young man to him, his hold fierce and possessive, his hands tearing at Ianto's shirt, desperately needing the reassurance of the warm skin beneath.

With a moan of desire and longing, Ianto pushed Jack back onto the grass, his hands responding in kind, burying themselves beneath the tattered remains of Jack's shirt. After a moment, his mouth lifted from Jack's to follow the path of his hands, teasing Jack's chest with his tongue while his hands continued their journey downwards, pausing only to deftly unbutton the charred remnants of Jack's pants. Ianto smiled against Jack's stomach as he felt Jack buck against his hand at his first touch. He had his lover back. His soulmate.

Ianto lifted his mouth from Jack just long enough to whisper, "You didn't fail me, cariad, you saved me."