Martha arrived quickly, but it wasn't a single pair of shoes Jack heard, but three, and when the door to the infirmary swung open again, Martha wasn't the one he saw.

"Oh. My. God." Gwen's eyes were wide as she took in the sight before her. Jack still held Ianto, who had quieted to the occasional weak whimper as the pain spiked.

To her credit, though, she recovered quickly and hurried inside, allowing Martha to follow her and, to Jack's surprise, Rhys. "I called her on the way," Martha explained as she made it to the other side of the bed. "I thought she would want to know."

Jack nodded, and then set about getting Ianto ready for what was sure to be the most unpleasant doctor's visit of his life…well, lives. "Hey, Yan, look who's here," he said gently as he started to loosen his hold on him.

Ianto had other things in mind, though, curling in tighter to Jack with a desperate and pitiful sound. His shaking intensified, and though Jack got the feeling a lot of it was nerves, Ianto had only just started to warm up.

"Rhys, do me a favor. Run into my room and grab my great coat off the hanger."

Rhys nodded and disappeared, only to reappear seconds later, out of breath, but heavy one great coat which he quickly passed on to Jack. Jack favored him with a nod, and then pulled the great coat around Ianto's shoulders.

"I remember this coat," Ianto muttered softly, and Jack watched as he curled his fingers in the thick wool.

"He can keep that on while you get started, can't he?" Jack asked as Martha pulled out her stethoscope. He supposed it made sense – first thing to do when a dead guy comes back to life is listen to his heart. Jack was glad to report that, as he had felt numerous times, there was a heartbeat to speak of.

"Of course he can," Martha said with a gentle, pleasant smile. "Can I?" The last was directed to Ianto, whose wide eyes darted to Jack quickly, as if seeking reassurance. In all honesty, he wasn't sure if Ianto was ready for much of anything – he knew how jarring it was to come back to life, and he was used to it.

"Go ahead," he told her. Gwen and Rhys were keeping a safe distance as Martha began her examination.

It wasn't entirely surprising when Ianto jumped as the stethoscope touched his chest, but it still made Jack's heart ache. He kept a hand on Ianto's, and gave it a reassuring squeeze.

The testing continued for a while, with Ianto ending up lying down on the bed. His ribs were hurting him, and he was incredibly weak. After the blood test, too, he just couldn't hold himself up. Finally, though, nearly an hour later, Martha stopped.

"I've got some good news and some bad news."

"Good news first," Jack said immediately. Things had suddenly taken a turn for the better, and Jack wasn't willing to give that up just yet.

Martha nodded. "Well, as far as I can tell, Ianto Jones is a hundred-percent alive and kicking."

"That's bloody excellent news!" Rhys exclaimed from behind her, only to subside as Gwen rested a hand on his elbow.

"What's the bad news?" she asked.

Jack felt as much as saw Ianto tense beside him, and before anyone could protest, he gently lifted Ianto and slid into the bed beside him, holding him against his chest. He didn't think it hurt him too badly, and he'd found Ianto valued the contact. His arms around Ianto's slender shoulders, he nodded to Martha.

"Well," she began to Ianto, almost apologetically, "as you probably noticed, love, I'm afraid you've got yourself some pretty severe injuries. Now that you're al-…with us, we're going to have to see to them."

Jack cringed for Ianto. He'd thought about that some time ago, but now that it had come to it, he was dreading it.

"You're going to need surgery, so I'm going to need to put you under for a bit," she said. Jack looked at her nervously, and she walked over to him, leaning to whisper in his ear, soft enough that the shaking patient in his arms couldn't hear, "I'm almost positive he'll come out of it, Jack – he really is alive. Not all that bruising is just surface, though. He's got internal bleeding; he's anemic already. I have to operate, or his internal organs will shut down."

When put in those terms, it didn't seem they had a choice, and as Martha set about preparing the sedatives, Jack set about telling Ianto.

"What did she say?" the younger man asked weakly, craning his neck as far as he could manage.

Jack smiled as reassuringly as he could manage. "You'll be just fine, you've just got some things that she needs to fix. You'll be all right, but I promise you that you don't want to be awake for it."

Despite his words, Ianto suddenly panicked. "Jack, no," he breathed, his eyes huge as his breathing quickened. "I don't want it. I'll be fine as I am; I don't want it."

"Yan, we've got to," Jack said as he slid out from behind him to stand next to the bed. He didn't want to, but Martha gave him the look as she approached the other side of the bed with the tray of IV supplies.

"No!" Ianto screamed as soon as he saw the needle lying on the metal tray, and then all hell broke loose. With renewed energy, Ianto pushed himself up, obviously planning to make an escape.

Jack was ready, though, and pulled him back down from behind, taking up post at the head of his bed. "Gwen, Rhys, I think we're going to need some help over here," he called, before turning his attention back to the man on the bed. He stared down at him, watching the panic grow in those gorgeous blue eyes as Ianto started to thrash.

"Let me go!" Ianto shouted, but as he went to lash out at his captor, he found his arms restrained. Martha had one, and quickly pulled the restraints over his wrist, as Gwen did the other. The latter kept her hold on his hand, though, as Rhys took his legs and Martha set about securing those to the table. Ianto cried out at that, a mix of pain and terror.

"Mind his left leg," Martha said quickly as she pulled a strap across his waist.

"Jack, make them stop," Ianto begged, staring up pleadingly at Jack. Not that he could look anywhere else; Jack kept a hand under his chin, holding his head still.

"It's okay, Yan, we're not going to hurt you," Jack told him, using his free hand to brush some of Ianto's hair back off his forehead.

The gesture, which had so often soothed the younger man after nightmares or rough days, didn't seem to work at all. Ianto twisted, his eyes straining down to see what was being done as Martha secured the last restraint. "You don't know what you're doing!"

"Ianto, sweetheart, we're going to take care of you," Gwen told him, her hand still held in his as he twisted and squirmed against them.

"Please!" Ianto screamed, as Martha appeared beside Jack with a mask in her hands. Ianto saw it, and reared his head back against the pillow, his eyes wide and frenzied. "What is that?"

"It's just some nitrous oxide. It's just going to make you relax," Martha told him.

If possible, Ianto's eyes widened further as they turned upwards to Jack, tears streaming fervently down his face. "Please don't, Jack," he begged. "I can't go back there! Please don't make me go back to the dark!"

Jack just hushed him, stroking his thumb down the side of Ianto's face, wiping away one of the tear tracks that marred his terrified face. "You're just going to go to sleep, Yan. You'll wake up, and you won't be hurting anymore. Won't that be good?" he asked, his voice shaking as he managed a smile for Ianto's sake, despite the burning in his own eyes.

He really believed that; he trusted Martha. But Ianto was just so scared...knowing that he was part of his young lover's torment was breaking his heart.

"Please," Ianto sobbed, blinking as too much salty moisture blurred his vision. "You know what it's like there, Jack. You can't send me back!"

"You won't even know you're sleeping, sweetheart," Gwen assured him, and Martha nodded quickly.

"Next thing you know, you'll be waking up right as rain to old Jack here." And with that, she pressed the mask over Ianto's face.

Ianto screamed. He tried desperately to turn his head away from it, but Jack held his chin still, shushing him softly as he stroked his fingers through Ianto's hair. And when he couldn't scream anymore, he held his breath, because he knew he had to breathe for it to work, and surely Jack wouldn't let him suffocate!

"He's choking himself, he is," Rhys said, but he seemed far away.

"It's all right, Ianto, just breathe. Just breathe," Martha told him, rubbing his arm reassuringly.

And when he couldn't hold his breath any longer, when his lungs were screaming and his ribs were crying out in agony, Ianto gasped. He hadn't wanted to, and as soon as he did, a look of horror spread across his face as though he'd just been consigned to death. In his mind, as far as he knew, he had.

Jack smiled wider, even though it physically pained him. "There you go, Yan," he said, "just calm down and breathe." He wasn't breathing, though, not until necessity again forced him to take in a breath, and then another, and another.

"All right, Ianto, you're just going to feel a little pressure in your arm, alright? It's just an IV. It's not going to hurt you," Martha said, and made quick work of placing and taping the IV in the vein of Ianto's left elbow.

"Jack," Ianto whimpered, his voice muffled by the mask as he realized there was nothing he could do to escape his fate.

"Shh." Jack brushed the tears from Ianto's face, only to watch as more fell in their stead. "You're just gonna go to sleep. I won't let you go back to that place again."

Ianto's eyes bored into his, and the scared, injured man – barely old enough to be called that – gave a few last futile bucks to try to free himself before going still. It didn't take long for the medicine to work its magic, especially on someone as weak already as Ianto. No, not weak, Jack amended. Ianto was never weak.

Eyes starting to flicker closed, Ianto's face flashed with panic as he stared up at Jack pleadingly. He couldn't speak anymore, his tongue too heavy from the medicine and his head to distorted from the fear.

"That's good," Jack told him, leaning down to press a kiss to Ianto's forehead before brushing that same spot with his thumb gently. "I've got you. Just close your eyes and breathe."

Ianto made a noise in the back of his throat as his eyes started to roll in his head. Even nearing unconsciousness as he was, the distress in the soft cry was clear to everyone in the room. They all shared a glance; all save Jack, whose only focus was the young man on the bed in front of him.

"It's okay," Jack said, and despite his best efforts, a tear slipped and fell onto the plastic mask over Ianto's face. Seeing Ianto so scared was tearing at him like nothing he'd seen in his centuries of life. "I'm right here."

Finally, no longer able to fight it, Ianto let his eyes slide closed. His breath quickened for the briefest of moments, but as Jack stroked his fingers through Ianto's hair and whispered ever so softly to him, the rise and fall of his bruised chest evened out.

Ianto was asleep.

"Sleep well, Yan," Jack whispered, kissing Ianto's head as the tears began to fall freely. There was nothing he could do to stop them, and he didn't try. "I'll be right here when you wake up."

And he was waking up. Jack wasn't going to have it any other way.