Ch 5: The Center Of My Rage by fireworks8725

I curled up on the gurney trying to hold tight to my stomach that felt like it was ripping me apart from the inside out. I rolled off and onto the floor, the impact of my weight hitting the floor felt like agony, the kind of agony I had never experienced up until this point. My eyes followed a path of blood coming from my mouth, my ears and my nose. It was hard to tell where each bit came from, I was like a faucet. I couldn't control it anymore and I finally gave in, my eyes rolling into the back of my head and my life slowly leaving my body. I left myself behind a cold corpse on the gravel road.

X

I stormed into the cabin with a rage usually reserved for foreign dictators and missing Doctors. I felt like I was on fire, the anger eating away at me. I was fully prepared to start off screaming at Ianto about the injustice of it all-so much good I could have done, the people I could have helped-if not for this damn alien plague epidemic! I couldn't control it and that was my JOB! If I couldn't do that, if I couldn't even help the people in the line of fire, without getting myself infected and useless, what was the point of me? I was so caught up in my rage, running around at full speed, knocking things off counters and shelves it barely registered at first. Ianto was nowhere to be seen.

"Ianto?" I asked gingerly, realizing myself, and starting to be concerned. I always had a fear that one day I would die an Ianto wouldn't be there. Was this is? I took the coffee machine on the floor as a sign that today was not the day I would continue the rest of my life without Mr. Jones.

Shame filled up inside me as I bent to my knees and picked up the machine and the mess I made.

"Ianto, I'm sorry….where are you?" I whispered, as if lowering my voice now would erase all the pompous yelling I had come into his quiet lonely world with. He was taking the long way around and I had the nerve to come in here and complain to him? I was an asshole.

I tidied up best I could before wandering around past the coffee room. I had never wandered this far before. I was intrigued to find a small closet room, with a cot bed along the wall. It was bare except for that and mostly empty except for a few books I recognized from the times Ianto and I had discussed novels he liked. Why didn't he have anything else?

"Ianto? I need you, where are you?" I whispered again, turning to leave the small are with the cot.

"I'm here Jack, I'd never leave you." A voice came from behind me.

I spun around on the spot and discovered Ianto laying casually sprawled out on the cot behind me.

"Oh thank GOD!" My voice rose up again but this time it was filled with pure relief. "Oh my Ianto!" I practically flew myself over to him and was laying on top of him in ten seconds flat. I could feel him smiling as I smothered him with longing kisses.

"I was so afraid you had gone!" I said finally, holding him closely as if he could disappear again any moment.

"I often also have a fear sir, that you will never come back here to me, and in essence be gone." He said calmly. Clearly this was something he had given quite some thought to in my long absence.

"Was it my fault? I was angry. I…" I started, trying to find a way to explain myself without causing him grief. He always felt pain when I described my deaths.

"The cabin hid me. Your rage overshadowed your need for me at this time."

"I didn't want you to see me that way. I just couldn't help it."

"I love every piece of you, sir. Even the dark and angry parts. " Ianto said softly before kissing my cheek.

"Don't. You shouldn't love me, Ianto. You're such a sweet boy, and I…well, I don't know what I am anymore. A monster, definitely."

He ran his hands through my hair as we cuddled. It was soft, calming and nice. But I had a pit growing in my stomach, I knew I would have to go back and how I would feel, vile and angry. I didn't want to take it out on Ianto, but what choice did I have? I had no one else, living or dead to talk to. He was my only one.

"What do you do when I'm not here Ianto?" I asked, trying to defer the subject from my self-pity party.

"I sometimes read, I pace, I quite good at that. Also, I prepare the coffee and keep things in tip top shape." He sounded proud; perhaps when he was alive he was some kind of caretaker. He took such pride in that kind of work.

"But it's such a long time to sit and wait." I said.

"Yes, it is." He said it matter of factly, without any regret or sadness.

"Why don't you have more things here for yourself?"

"The only items here in this space are what you have imagined, or placed here with your mind. I have no power here. " Ianto stated.

"Why didn't you ever ask me to give you anything Ianto?" I was panicked now; this was my fault once again. Here he was waiting for me every time, here just to make my transitions from death and back into life easier, and I hadn't given a moment's thought to how he passed his time when I was alive and far far away from him.

"I didn't want to be a bother sir. We have such a short time in which to be together each time. " He kissed my forehead, the time crunch still looming over our heads every moment.

"I love you Ianto, so much, and you will never be a bother to me. I want you to have everything you have ever dreamed…" I started, trying to think up a way to make this room give him what he needs.

He looked at me hard, his eyes welled up with tears refusing to fall. I knew what he was thinking. Me. I was his dream, he wanted me. The one thing I couldn't leave behind for him and it broke my heart.

"I want there to be a room, a giant room, bigger on the inside, filled with books, every kind of book ever written. I want a room filled with games and movies and all kinds of music and most importantly I want you to have a beautiful bedroom with all your favorite colours and the softest bedding, fit for a king."

I had gotten so worked up we barely heard the knocking in the distance had been going on. Insistent and annoying.

"Thank you sir." Ianto said softly to me.

I took his hand in mine and held it firmly.

"I won't ever let go of you." I said, as I watched the tears finally fall down his face. The single most painful thing my eyes would ever witness.

"I will wait for you…Jack…"

X

I woke up in a cell block surrounded by plastic sheets. Some kind of quarantine and I was grouped in with the deceased. I panicked, I did NOT want to recatch that crazy alien diease! I started hollering as loud as my newly awakened lungs could yell.

My face was wet and I couldn't understand why, I assumed the bodies had been hosed down at some point. Maybe.