Waking to Live
Chapter 21
by Gracefultree
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A/N: Thank you everyone for reading! Here's the next chapter. Enjoy!
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"What on God's green earth possessed you to do something so fucking stupid?" Owen shouted, spittle flying from his mouth to land on Jack's cheek as he confronted the older man. "You could've sent him right back into another cascade! For all we know, that's what's happening!"
"You said his vitals were fine!" Jack shouted back, nostrils flaring.
"That doesn't mean he's ok! What the fuck were you thinking?"
"He asked! He deserves to know!"
"Not now! Not when his brain is a fragile mess of recovered memories!"
"He knows what he needs," Jack protested. "He wouldn't have asked if he didn't think he could handle it."
"How do you know that, huh? You've known him less than a day. All you've done is fuck and deal with this memory shit. You don't know what his coping skills are. You don't know what he's really able to handle and not handle."
"I know enough!" Jack yelled. "He needs to integrate the old memories with the new ones. He needs to mesh his experiences with what the retcon took. Seeing my side of the trigger memory will help him do all that!"
"Or, it might send him into shock," Owen countered. "He passed out, Jack. He passed out as soon as the memory was done. That tells me he wasn't ready to deal with it."
"He was ready!" Jack protested. "And it wasn't the first thing we did."
"Yeah, you fucked first. We know. You think we couldn't hear you? That's why we left the flat!"
Jack seemed to deflate. "You heard us?"
"Ianto's not exactly quiet," Owen muttered. "Robin declared that if he was feeling good enough to be doing that, she was leaving. Me and Tosh followed, figured we'd give you an hour, then come back. Damn good thing we did, too."
"I know. Thank you."
Owen ran his hand over his face in frustration. "You'd do it again, wouldn't you? If he asked?"
"Yes."
"At least do it supervised next time, all right? Have me and Robin there. Don't play doctor on your own. Can you promise me that much?"
Jack frowned. "Fine," he muttered petulantly, crossing his arms over his chest.
"I want him healthy as much as you do, Jack," Owen added in a softer, kinder voice. "But you can't do shit like this and expect good results."
"Maybe he just needs to sleep, let the memories settle?" Jack suggested, uncrossing his arms, trying to sound hopeful. "Maybe that's why he's sleeping."
"Maybe," Owen allowed. They both glanced up as Robin entered the room, closing the bedroom door behind her. "How is he?"
"If I didn't know what's been going on, I'd say he's in a recovery coma after an acute psychic attack," she said. "He's stable, but we're going to have to be extra careful when he wakes up. He might have integrated all the memories and have them within easy recall, be totally fine, ready for the next part of the cascade, or he might have them floating around, overloading him when they force their way into his consciousness. Time will tell."
"But you've seen this kind of thing before?" Jack asked, concern taking over. "Which do you think is more likely?"
"Hard to say. How did he seem before you gave him that memory?"
"Fine. He was a little upset when I told him about the feedback loop and that I saw all his memories, and a little jealous that he didn't see any of mine, but nothing that warned me away from doing what I did. I thought it would help."
Robin sighed and walked around the men to get a glass from the cabinet. She filled it with water from the tap. "What you don't understand, Jack, is that Ianto's very capable of seeming fine when internally he's not. Even before he met you he had very advanced skills in believing that the act he performed was real. He might have been dying inside, and he didn't even know it half the time. That's what happens with some trauma survivors. That's how he stayed with Lisa as long as he did."
"Just yesterday you said he was stronger and healthier than I thought!" Jack protested.
"I know, I know, but we hadn't actually done the cascade yet."
"So I'm not supposed to trust what he says?" Jack asked. "How do I know what to do?"
"I'm not saying that. I'm saying that you need to keep in mind that he's much more fragile emotionally that he thinks he is, as well as stronger. It took him a year to decide to come meet you. Not because he didn't want to, but because he knew he wouldn't be able to handle the consequences."
"I don't understand."
"In our first session, Ianto told me that his goal was to be able to be in a relationship with you. As far back as then, that was his goal. But as we've worked together and he's pieced together what his father did to him as a child, he lost the confidence to be with you."
"Because I'm a man."
"Yes. He got scared. He worried that it would be like what happened with his father."
"But this morning, we did that thing —" Jack broke off, realizing Owen was there and he was about to share a very personal moment. He clamped his lips shut.
"Yes. He wanted it. He wanted to reclaim his sexuality that his father took by raping him. That's been a lot of our work. Dealing with the trauma and finding a way for him to feel comfortable sexually with a man. With you."
Jack frowned. "So you're saying that by showing him my version, my memory of that night, I could have undone a year's worth of therapy and recovery?"
"We won't know until he wakes up and can talk to us."
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The bedroom was empty when Ianto woke, feeling groggy and slightly too hot. He threw off the covers and detoured to the bathroom before going into the main part of the flat. Memories floated in his head, but they weren't as bad as before, when he'd been sick. He took that as a good sign. He thought of the look of embarrassment on Jack's face in the alley. He hadn't meant to hurt him. Hadn't hurt him, actually. It was the memory of his father doing it that was the problem, not Jack. It was the feeling, the tactile sensation of what happened that was the problem. He'd probably never be able to let Jack do that to him ever again.
He thought Jack would be ok with that arrangement. More than ok. Jack would want to do anything to help him, and if taking one thing off the list of sexual activities would do it, Jack would do it gladly. Hell, he'd said so himself earlier.
Robin sat on the sofa, going over a report of some kind, her face knitted in concentration as she read. She looked up to smile at him.
"Ianto, how do you feel?"
"Fine. Where's Jack?" He looked around, not seeing his lover or any of the Torchwood people.
"He had to go to work," she explained. "Took off as if a demon were chasing him. He left you a note," she said, rummaging on the table for it.
"Ianto, I love you. I'm coming back. J." Ianto read aloud. "That's a bit odd."
"He's worried about you. We all are."
Ianto felt himself blushing and sat down across from her. "This is weird. Being here. You being here. You're my therapist, and you're in my house."
"Not ideal, I know, but necessary. We couldn't leave you alone. Owen and Tosh left for work an hour before Jack."
"Have you, um, talked to him?" Ianto asked, wondering if he sounded as awkward as he felt. "You know, about me? Or him? Do you know things now that you're not supposed to? Will you get in trouble, or something?"
He felt a wash of calm as she eased his anxiety. "You think of this as your house, now?"
"I'll be living here with him soon enough," Ianto said.
"That's what you said yesterday."
"What did you talk about with him?" Ianto asked.
"I'm not going to get out of that, am I?" she responded with a small smile. It was a measure of how close they'd become in their work together that he felt comfortable pushing her sometimes, like she pushed him. He shook his head. She paused, looked around the room for a moment, got her thoughts in order. "He was worried that you'd leave him because you remembered that incident in the alley. That you'd associate him with your father and not be able to be with him."
Ianto tilted his head, his eyes slightly out of focus as he thought. "Oh. That's not what I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"Not that." He shrugged. "Ah, well, time to figure out where he went." He looked around again and located a laptop on the dining room table. He walked over and powered it on. Jack hadn't logged out, so Ianto was able to open the last file he looked at, a CCTV screen capture of a blue police box sitting on the Plass next to the watertower sculpture.
"The Doctor," he whispered, covering his mouth with his hand. "He went to find the Doctor."
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"Before we go any farther, Jack, I need to tell you that I don't hold with the usual Torchwood policy towards the Doctor. Few of us in the Archives did, for that matter. We know he's saved the planet on countless occasions, and if I ever have the honor to meet him, I'll thank him for doing it. I also know that you've traveled with him. The records about him are extensive, and I've seen pictures of the two of you in Cardiff together," Ianto said, his voice serious.
It was difficult to pick his words, since this was a topic that would make or break any chance for Jack to trust him, but it was also something they needed to discuss. He needed Jack to think he was better than the usual Torchwood London grunts who were all about the 'if it's alien, it's ours' bullshit. He needed Jack to know that he wouldn't betray him, so that he could betray him later on. This was the plan, and he needed to stick to it, despite the misgivings he was starting to feel.
He took a deep breath and continued. "I want you to be able to trust me, Jack, whether it's as an employee or as something else. I will gladly keep whatever secret you see fit to tell me. And I'll keep the secrets you haven't told me that I already know about you."
Jack's sudden panic almost overwhelmed him. Jack was terrified that someone knew about him, about his inability to die that was part of the Torchwood rumor mill. Ianto hadn't really believed it until he felt and saw Jack's reaction. It had to be real, if he reacted this strongly. His guess paid off. Now he had to do some damage control to convince Jack he was trustworthy.
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He blinked, another memory about the Doctor flitting forward.
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"I don't travel in time anymore," Jack said in response to Ianto's questioning look. "I used to travel with the Doctor, but that was lifetimes ago."
"Would you go with him again?" Ianto asked, uncertainty in his voice. The thought of Jack leaving him hurt, somehow, even though they'd only just met again. He didn't want to be left behind by Jack for some mythical Time Lord from Jack's past.
"Someday," Jack answered. "I have questions that only he can answer, but I promise you, Ianto Jones, if I'm in a relationship with you, I will either take you with me when I go, or wait for him to come back again after you're gone, if he doesn't stay to talk with me for some reason."
Ianto breathed a sigh of relief. Jack wasn't going to abandon him. Not like he'd been left by the Doctor. How he knew that the Doctor left Jack he wasn't sure, but it sounded right.
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"I remember talking about him with Jack," Ianto said. "When we were in the Hub for the first time. The Torchwood base," he explained. "We talked about him again yesterday."
"How does the memory feel?" she asked, standing. She took a seat across the table from him.
"Fine. It feels like any of the others. Right after the cascade, when I broke the link, I felt like there were hundreds just floating around, and they're still there, but it's not as bad. They come at me, surprise me, but not as thoroughly as before."
"Good. Good. How do you feel about what Jack showed you?"
Ianto paused in thought, his hands hovering over the keyboard, still. "I make him lose control of himself," he said out loud. "Sexually. He's not sure if he likes it or not. Sometimes, his brain just stops, and all he can see is me."
"How do you feel?" she asked again.
"It's — it's odd, being in someone else's head, in their memory. He doesn't think the way I do. He doesn't remember things the way I do. It's like he's flipping pages of a book. It was distracting to me. I'm not sure how he manages it, but he does. He was always thinking, always looking at memories and comparing things, people. And he's always thinking about sex. Always. But he's thinking about other things, too. Like he can think of several things at once, and be totally focused on all of them." He paused. "He kept sizing people up on a shaggability scale, and noting that if I weren't there, he might do them, but I was there, and he put them all off because of me. He only really wanted me."
"Ianto, how do you feel?" Robin pressed. "I'm not going to let you avoid this. We need to know how this affected you and whether or not we can continue with the cascades safely."
Ianto put his hands in his lap, staring into space for a moment. "I feel —" He broke off, his cheeks becoming pink. "Proud that I can affect him like that," he whispered. "That he only wanted me when there were so many other people around he'd consider. I feel like he knows me in this deep way, and that he doesn't want to hurt me, and I believe it. I believe him. He can smell my emotions before I know I'm feeling them!" he added, excited. "It was wild. He knew when I was feeling jealous before I did!"
"You were jealous?"
"Yeah, we went to this nice restaurant. The one I picked for our date that caused this whole thing, you know. He flirted with everyone, and I was getting jealous, especially when he was checking out this really hot woman. It turns out he was more interested in a threesome than her alone, because he couldn't imagine not being with me. But how was I supposed to know that? I remember getting jealous, but he knew before I did. I smelled like anise, and I guess that's jealousy."
"Hmm. And what about —"
"He didn't mean to come on my face. He was mortified that it happened, actually. He was worried that he'd hurt me, and upset that he hadn't been able to control himself. And it was nothing like what my father did. It was an accident. My father aimed."
Ianto considered his next comment. Robin, used to the contemplative look on his face, waited.
"He's insecure, underneath all the bravado and bluster. Just as insecure as I can be. He just doesn't show it. We're both a little fucked up." He chuckled. "A lot fucked up. But that's ok. Seeing into his head, it made me realize how suited to each other we are. We might think in different ways, remember in different ways, have different ways of dealing with our feelings and our pasts, but it basically comes down to one thing. We're both lonely. We can help each other deal with that loneliness, with that fear of the future."
"That's a powerful realization," Robin murmured, not commenting that she'd said something similar a few minutes ago about Jack's insecurity. This was part of therapy, letting her patient make his own conclusions.
"Yeah, and that's why I have to find out what happened with the Doctor." Ianto turned back to the computer. Robin walked over to peer over his shoulder as he located the CCTV replay. They watched as Jack appeared on screen, running towards the box. It dematerialized before he got close enough to touch the wood. Ianto looked at Robin and back at the screen.
"I wonder what that means."
"It means he left me behind again," Jack said from behind them, throwing his greatcoat over the sofa and falling into it with an audible huff. Neither of them heard him come in. "It means that it wasn't a mistake the first time. I knew he saw me just now. I could tell by how quickly he left."
Ianto got up and walked over to Jack. He got to his knees in front of him so he could look up at him. "Are you ok?"
"Sure, fine," Jack answered flippantly. "Never better."
"Jack."
Jack closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting it out with a sigh. "I'll deal with it. I have a lot of years ahead of me. I'll track him down eventually." He reached out and ruffled Ianto's hair. "And you? Did I traumatize you by showing you that memory?"
Ianto snorted. "Hardly. What do I smell like?"
"Right now? Sage, rosemary and —" Jack paused. "Anise." He raised a questioning eyebrow.
"The Doctor," Ianto said.
"Ah." Jack glanced over at Robin. "I never slept with him. What we had was never sexual."
"Doesn't mean I'm not jealous," Ianto muttered. Jack leaned forward and kissed his forehead.
"You have nothing to be jealous about," he murmured, before he leaned back and said in a louder voice, "What do you think, Robin? Another cascade?"
"I'd want Owen here," she said.
Ianto yawned suddenly, feeling tired. "I'm not sure I could do one so soon," he admitted. "I'm knackered." He glanced sheepishly at Robin. "Sorry." She shook her head, dismissing it as a problem.
"How long have you been up?" Jack asked, looking between them.
"Half an hour," Ianto answered. "Maybe an hour." He yawned again, his jaw cracking. "I'm back going to bed." He stood, kissed Jack on the cheek, and disappeared into the bedroom, shutting the door behind him.
"That's normal for someone who's been through the emotional and psychic shock he's been through," Robin told Jack before he could voice his concern. "I wouldn't expect him to wake up and stay awake longer than a few hours before morning."
"I guess I'll release you from my services for the day, now that we know I didn't undo all of your work last year," Jack said with a tense smile on his face. "Go spend down your expense account, or something. I'll call if he wakes up and needs something."
"My expense account?" she asked, puzzled.
"Fiscal year ends on the 30th. You might want to use your budget. UNIT has a way of slashing it if you don't use it. You've still got quite a bit in there."
"You know what my budget is? Should I be worried?"
"Naw. I just wanted to see where you were in terms of UNIT's hierarchy. It came up when I looked through the files on you."
"And you didn't think to ask me?" Robin wondered, slightly annoyed.
"Not my style. This was more fun. That ex-husband of yours sounds like an asshole."
Robin stood with her mouth hanging open. "You know —"
"I won't tell Ianto, of course. That's none of his business and might get in the way of your work. But I needed to make sure I could trust you with knowing what you do about Torchwood."
"So you looked into my personal life?"
"I look into everyone's personal life if they're connected to me or Torchwood. And you're taking care of my lover, so, yes, I looked into your history. As soon as I knew your name. Deal with it."
Robin smiled thinly. "You can be worse than my boss," she declared.
"Rick? Yes, I can be. But I'm better looking." He winked, and she laughed, and somehow, it didn't seem as intrusive to know that he'd looked into her background as it had the moment before. Just a part of working for Torchwood, she supposed. There was a lot about Torchwood, Jack's Torchwood, that was unconventional, even for the usual unconventionality of how the London office had been run.
"I'll see you tomorrow, Captain."
"I'll look forward to it, Dr. Bartlett," he answered, escorting her to the door.
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tbc