Ianto's head hurts. Which makes sense cause now it's filled with everything. Not just some things, but everything. It feels like the whole time vortex has been shoved in into his brain. Maybe it has. He is apparently a Timelord and all. Timelord. Lord of Time. It's a pompous and useless name. Ianto likes it. He likes it a lot. Ianto likes time. He has his stopwatch, and now he can feel it. He feels the tickticktickticktick of the watch through his bloodstream….mental synapses…..it tugs his soul.
Ianto Jones once was a lot of things. Now he's even more things, and he can't even begin to wrap his mind around it. Which is funny, cause his mind feels so much bigger now. It's filled with so much more. Everything, he reminds himself. It's filled with everything.
Jack is shocked. Jack stumbles to a chair after Ianto releases his hands. Ianto stumbles after him and doesn't make it to a chair, trippingfallinglanding in a tangled mess in front of Jack. Jack. He's found Jack. He's found Jack. He's been looking for Jack. But now he's a Timelord. He's 842 (+26) years old and he's a Lord of Time. Jack says nothing, but pulls Ianto to his knees. The irony is not lost on the newold Timelord. It is lost on Jack though. Everything is currently lost on Jack. Jack is currently lost.
Ianto looks at Jack and his headache grows anew. Jack is wrong! Jack is wrong! Jack is WRONG! It repeats like a metronome in his head. Almost losing meaning but not quite. The brain of a Timelord means that most things won't ever lose meaning. But Jack is wrong. He sees it now. He understands. And he hates it. He rebels. Jack is stationary, never changing never moving never dying never going anywhere. But that's wrong too because Jack is motion. Kinetic energy. Life. Jack is life. And Ianto the man knows this. He has to teach Ianto the Timelord.
Seconds pass. Nanoseconds, so brief he almost misses them. But just as he misses one, another happens then another then another. And Ianto knows that this is how time goes. He will keep looking for the lost seconds forever. Because Ianto Jones knows all. And now, that isn't a lie, it's not on the bottom of the screen. It's in his brain. It's HIM. Ianto really does know all. Ianto remembers watching stars be born and planets die. He remembers people and things and things that are people too. He remembers Galifrey. And blinks.
Jack looks at him. Looks away. Looks at him again. Takes his hand and looks at it. Traces the lines and the tickles the tiny hairs. It twitches under his ministrations. Jack lets go of Ianto's hand and places both of his own onto Ianto's chest. He has to confirm. Ianto did too. There they are … both of them. One... two… one … two. Beating in perfect rhythm. Jack looks into the eyes of the man he thought he'd lost. (the man he has lost?) He looks into them … and he sees Ianto Jones, but Ianto Jones is so much more now. It's like … Jack mentally sighs. It's like looking into the eyes of the Doctor merged with the eyes of Ianto. And that's going to get confusing.
"Why didn't you change?" Jack asks the question that Ianto's been avoiding thinking about. He doesn't know. He should have changed. He's a Timelord, and when Timelords regenerate they change their faces. Come to think of it, there's a lot of questions Ianto's not thinking about. In fact, in all if Ianto's vast brain, he's not using a single part of it except the part that's looking at Jack.
And its still hurting his head. He looks resolutely at Jack. And realizes that Jack is waiting for an answer. "I don t know."
Wait. That's all his Timelord megabrain can come up with? Isn't there supposed to be some sort of technobabble? Or something? Ianto's not sure how this works anymore. He's been 'not a timelord' for so long. So many questions. Oh the questions. He wracks his brain to try to remember all of the things he's supposed to remember, and they're all in there, but they're all jumbled up. Like the answer to 'where's my TARDIS' is NOT 42. This is going to take some getting used to and he really really just needs to calm down and stop thinking. Cause he realizes that he's been doing that again. For almost 45 seconds he's allowed his mind to wander. And wander it has. Wandering like he's supposed to. Wandering like a timelord.
Timelordtimelordtimelord. Ianto repeats it in his head trying to come to terms with the fact. He's wondering why he's having such a hard time with it. Wonders what did this to him and why he hid his identity for so long, from himself and everyone else. Was he there at the fall of Galifrey? Too many questions. And now he's thinking again. Shouldn't this be easier? Weren't Timelords minor Gods?
Jack. Yes. Look at Jack.
He looks at Jack. OHGODITHURTS.
"Ianto?"
"Jack… it hurts."
And he takes Jack's temples in his hands, and he pulls their foreheads together. And he shows Jack.
He shows Jack what he sees when he looks at the WRONG thing. When he looks at the thing-what-should-not-be. The fixed point in time and space that is Captain Jack Harkness. He shows him the pain that happens. And Jack walks right up to it (in the metaphorical sense, of course) and he glares at it. And he does what he does to everything else in Ianto's life…. He fights it and then fixes it. He soothes and eases the pain in Ianto's brain. Because a door once opened may be stepped through in either direction. And when they pull apart, slowly and not completely, and Ianto looks at Jack it's all better. No pain. No wrongness.
Ianto smiles. And it's one thing in his head that is better. Jack takes Ianto's hands again. Looks at him like he's something amazing-wonderful-never-seen-before. (Ianto realizes that at least he's beginning to punctuate. It's a start) "A Timelord. Another Timelord... Can you feel him?" He looks at Ianto hopefully. Ianto-the-man would have been jealous. Ianto-the-Timelord understands though. Cause now he's been in Jack's head. A little. And Jack has soothed his tired-scared-very full-slowly healing-beginning to punctuate-brain.
Hmm. Good question though. He's not even sure where to begin. He closes his eyes and searches. He thinks 'Doctor' and somewhere… somewhere deep inside his soul-brain-heart(s) he feels it. Something responds. A… another. He can feel the Doctor, and at that moment, knows the Doctor can feel him too. Knows he'll be coming. Dreads it. Hides. Pulls himself into himself into his mind into Jack. Jack holds him tightly and whispers nothings. Sweet? Maybe.
Ianto mumbles into Jack's chest (where only one heart beats. But it beats forever), "I found him. I feel him… and he's coming."
