Daine woke that morning to a shout, which echoed through the tower and into their room. Numair murmured a protest against her hair and tugged her closer to his chest, trying to burrow farther under the covers.
There was another shout and Jack's voice, hurting and furious, carried through the walls.
"Don't you EVER use that man's face again, ARE WE CLEAR? And NO, that is NOT a favor, that has nothing to do with anything but I do not care, YOU DO NOT TOUCH MY MEMORIES! Especially Ianto! Ianto is off-limits! If I dream of Ianto, I want them to be my damned dreams, not some fantasy induced by MEDDLING GODS!"
Meddling gods?
Numair's eyes had opened, and he was looking at Daine in surprise. She blinked back at him, equally bemused, before turning to look at the door to their room, as though she could see Jack though it. Now fully awake, Numair nodded derisively to himself before pulling back the covers. Daine hummed in wordless agreement and got up with him, dressing quickly. They hurried down the hall to Jack's room, where Daine could hear him pacing within. She knocked on the door.
"Jack? Are you alright?" she asked at the keyhole.
Jack cursed loudly enough for them to hear him. The door wrenched open violently; Jack was standing in the threshold, clad only in his new breeches. His face was red and his blue eyes furious, his breath coming with harsh, heartbroken gasps. "What?" he snapped.
"You were shouting," Daine told him, taken aback by the emotion on the man's face. "Are you okay?"
"I was s—" Jack repeated, disbelieving, and then roared, "Of course I was shouting!"
Startled at his tone, Daine made to take a step back but Numair, standing behind her, blocked the way. "What happened, Jack?" he asked, laying a protective hand on Daine's shoulder.
"You tell your gods to stay out of my head," Jack seethed, storming away to snatch up his new tunic. He tugged it over his head and then swung his coat ridiculously around it.
"Gods?" Daine asked, baffled. "Why are the gods in your head?"
"Gainel, the badger said," Jack snarled, his back to them.
"You've been talking to the badger?" Daine spluttered. When did that happen? The hand on her shoulder tightened and she looked up at Numair, who winced down at her.
"I forgot to tell you that, didn't I?" he said sheepishly.
Daine glared at him. "He told you—"
"I struck a bargain with your damned badger," Jack spat, hugging his coat tightly around himself as though for protection. "And apparently this gives your dream god the right to frolic in my head and twist my memories for the night."
"Twist your— No, Jack, that's not—" Numair started, but flaming blue eyes locked with his, and the mage was glared silent.
"If this dream god of yours thinks that it might soothe me to bring dead people back for the night, he is very much mistaken!" Jack snarled, but his face was red and blotchy, his eyes glassy. He looked like he was on the verge of tears.
Daine approached him as she might approach a frightened animal. She tried to lay a hand on his arm but Jack skittered back, away from the comfort, looking lost. "Jack. You're misunderstanding. Who was Ianto?"
He made a harsh sobbing sound at the name, and it took him a moment to gather himself. "How," he asked very slowly, "am I misunderstanding?"
"Gainel can control dreams in the Divine Realms," Numair said, low and soothing. "He can only direct them in the mortal realms. If you dreamed of your friends, then it was your dream, and Gainel only focused it."
Jack swallowed. "I don't care," he choked. "I want these gods out of my head. There are too many things there that I don't want to think about." His blue eyes snapped back to them, guarded and wary.
"Of course," Daine murmured compassionately. She kept herself still even though she wanted to go over to the clearly grieving man. There was a moment of silence.
Jack rubbed a hand across his eyes and took a deep breath. "Aren't we going to Pirate's Swoop today?" His voice was weak.
"Jack," Daine scolded. Jack shook his head violently, wiping his eyes.
Daine walked over again this time he let her touch him. She rubbed his arm, and in return she let him change the subject. Numair walked over as well and put a hand supportively on his other shoulder. The man tensed, clearly nervous about having Daine at one side of him and Numair on the other. She hadn't realized that he was this skittish. "Come on, then," Daine said and tugged his arm gently. "Let's get some food in you. Numair, I think we should stay an extra day."
Jack, starting to follow but moving like a marionette, hesitated and shook his head again. "Don't be ridiculous," he whispered, eyes lowered to Daine's feet. "There're w-weevils running about. We haven't got time for me to fall apart."
"Of course we do," Numair reassured him. "One extra day isn't going to hurt."
"With weevils around? Of course it does. They'll kill, and they'll do it quickly if they're not controlled." Jack visibly collected himself. "Besides, I made a bargain with your badger, and I'm not about to back out now."
Daine and Numair shepherded their friend down to the dining room, where Numair prepared breakfast. By the time it was ready, Jack was dry-eyed and composed.
"What kind of bargain?" Daine asked him then, once he seemed ready to speak. She was bursting with curiosity over this Ianto of his, but she could also see, quite clearly, that if she asked the wrong question Jack would run away so fast that they would not be able to tell which direction he went through the dust of his departure.
Jack sighed and pinched his nose wearily. "It said you two would help, so I suppose I'll tell you."
"Of course we'll help," Numair told him, placing a plate of fruit in the table.
Jack gave him a disbelieving look. "You've known me for all of a week," he said, "And already you're agreeing to help me, even not knowing what I'm doing?"
"I trust the badger," Daine said, "And you're on the road to earning my trust, yourself."
Jack looked away, shoulders tense.
Numair nodded in agreement, mouth full. Swallowing, he asked, "What is the bargain?"
"Apparently their Guardian of the Gates has gone missing," Jack replied reluctantly. "Have you ever heard of him?"
Daine and Numair exchanged a glance. "No," Numair murmured, sounding intrigued. "I studied in Carthak for years. Never heard of such a thing. Then again, some of the Immortals that came through when the Barrier fell surprised me, so I suppose I can't know everything." He leaned forward and Daine hid a smile. Numair loved to learn new things. "Tell us, then."
Jack took a deep breath, as though preparing himself. "It's a bit of a story."
"We're going to be on the road for a while, if we leave today," Daine assured him. "We'll have time."
"Your funeral," Jack muttered under his breath, before taking a bite of breakfast.
.
.
Where were his filters?
Captain Jack Harkness, you are a wreck, Jack scolded himself furiously as they finished breakfast and began to pack for the journey. Daine and Numair planned to stop in town, and then head down to Pirate's Swoop before going towards Galla.
Jack had not meant to fall apart over Ianto. He'd already fallen apart. He'd taken his memories of Ianto, and hidden them behind a door in his mind: out of sight because they hurt, but never forgotten. Those dreams had dredged them up, and Jack woke reaching for his lover, to find the bed empty, and Ianto dead.
It was a suicide mission, he'd remembered painfully, guiltily, lying there in bed with one arm outstretched, hand grasping for someone who wasn't there. That bastard alien had locked down the building, and killed everyone inside with an airborn virus. Jack, of course, had come back to life. Ianto didn't.
Jack took a deep breath, and put his clothes into the saddlebags that Daine had given him for Red. He really had to control himself. People always died. That was the curse of being immortal. People died, and they didn't come back.
Red, as though sensing his distress, pressed his nose into Jack's shoulder.
"You've been ratting on me to Daine, haven't you?" Jack whispered, giving him a carrot. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't." The horse regarded him solemnly with his warm brown eyes. "No hard feelings, you understand," Jack continued. "But you're supposed to be a safe outlet. You can't talk back to me, so I can talk to you, you get it?" Red tilted his head to one side, considering. Jack smiled weakly and offered him a bit, which he took daintily. There was no need for cross-ties in this little barn. Jack gestured and Red followed. There was definitely something to be said for Daine's powers.
"Ready?" Numair asked unnecessarily when they walked out of the barn.
Jack mounted up. "Off we go," he agreed and took his reins.
Daine, sitting on a saddle for once, took the lead on Cloud. "It'll take us about an hour to get to town at this pace," she said. "So tell us about the Guardian."
No beating around the bush for this one, Jack thought unhappily. This explanation was going to be more revealing than he would like. He hoped these two had open minds. "Right. I told you that I was a traveler, right?"
"Yes," Numair said. The mage sat up straight on his black and white horse's back, watching Jack keenly. He was nearly vibrating with excitement, and Jack would've thought it funny, if he still had a heart.
"Well," Jack started, taking a deep breath for luck, "Would you believe me if I said I came from beyond your planet, from somewhere up in the stars?" He grimaced at how that must sound, and then looked uneasily at his two companions.
Way back when, this sort of thing was heavily frowned upon. Jack was giving them information that was highly beyond their society, and telling them facts that their science hadn't reached yet. There were laws about this sort of thing, but the Time Agency could go hang itself for all Jack was concerned. This would be easier if he was honest, and he had the gods here on his side.
Jack was tired of conning people.
His two companions were staring at him in disbelief. "You're not a god," Daine said derisively. "I know a god when I see one, and you're—"
"No," Jack interrupted, although he huffed a laugh. Him, a god? The thought was absurd. "I'm not a god, I'm a traveler. Just a traveler." Saying that he was a mortal would, Jack thought, be like a sick joke. "I'm just as human as you and Numair." Well, he amended to himself, almost.
The mage had a thoughtful look on his face. He looked up at the blue sky, and then said quietly, "The stars…" He paused and then his face cleared in a delighted smile that Jack immediately recognized: an academic and a closet explorer, who just had his theory proved. "There's a school of thought that the stars are like our sun, only immeasurably far away. Is this what you mean?" His eyes glittered.
"Yes," Jack said gratefully, glad that he did not have to explain that much. Best to keep it simple. "Most of the stars are like your sun, but they're like snowflakes, really, no two are the same." He smiled a little at the mage's delighted expression.
"Traveling amongst the stars," Numair murmured dreamily, accepting Jack's explanation with a surprising speed. "And how did you end up here?"
"I hitched a ride with a few bad apples," Jack said darkly, not wanting to go into the organ harvesters. "People travel in the space between worlds in these vessels – you can think of them like boats, like space ships. I was a stowaway, but if I was found by these guys, all hell would've broken loose. I needed to get away, and fast. I ended up here."
"How?" Daine asked. She still sounded skeptical. "They'd notice if you landed here. We'd notice."
She was a sharp one.
"Short-range teleport," Jack told her reluctantly, after a moment. "There was one on the ship. I used it." This was a lie—he'd used his wrist strap and he had more control than he was letting on. In a place like this, such a piece of technology could be a disaster. Jack was being truthful about who he was, but there was no way they would get a piece of anachronistic technology out of his hands.
"Telly—" Numair started.
"Teleport," Jack corrected. "You disappear from one place, and reappear in another. It's hard to explain without—" without particle physics, Jack didn't finish, because that was a whole other can of worms.
"Your people have the power to do that?" Numair breathed. "That's amazing. Truly. How does it work?"
Jack smiled to himself at Numair's curiosity. Perhaps he was not giving them the entire truth, after all. "I don't really know," he said ruefully, but it was another lie. He recognized the look in Numair's eye – technology was the shiniest toy in the bin. "There's rules to this stuff, and only a select few specialists know how to build them." That was half a lie. A layman of Jack's time wouldn't know how to build one, but Jack was no layman. "Things like that… it can destroy a world. These things can cause wars. It's like…" He searched around for an appropriate metaphor.
"Like a ship," Daine supplied slowly. They both looked at her. "Like a ship that brings in animals that don't belong, and they take over. You can't fault them for living, but all the other animals still die."
The badger was right. She was smart. "It's exactly like that," Jack told her. "We call those invasive species, where I'm from."
"Here as well," Numair agreed. "But you still haven't told us about this Guardian."
"Your planet," Jack started, grateful that he'd gotten past the hard part, "Is in a—well, it's called a pocket universe or a closed system, but I don't imagine that'll mean anything to you. It's isolated, anyway. You can't communicate with the rest of the universe. Nothing can come out, and nothing can come in – apparently this is the Guardian's job. According to the badger, the Guardian's gone missing. He wants me to either find him and bring him back, or close the Gates."
"Before more people like you fall in," Numair deduced. "Because I'm sure there's a profit somewhere in starting a war over a piece of technology."
"I know people who would love nothing better," Jack agreed darkly, thinking of another man with many names: John Hart, Vera Sooth and Mahael Todd. He was a friend and a good one—for a given definition of good—but the man was a loose cannon.
"That's how these weevils got in, isn't it?" Daine asked.
Jack nodded. "I suppose so. The badger said you would help me, which is why I'm telling you this. I would appreciate it, however, if you kept it between us." He shifted uncomfortably on Red's back. This smacked a little like Torchwood, which made him nervous, but what else could he do? He did need help, because he didn't know the inner workings of this planet. He didn't even know how the so-called magic worked here, or how it could be ruled by gods.
"We'll help you," Numair said derisively. "But I disagree. I think that we should tell the king."
Jack suppressed a shudder. He'd been afraid of that. Torchwood One in London had made employees swear an oath to Queen and Country. When Jack had taken over Torchwood Three in Cardiff, he'd done away with that little ritual. Queen and Country had done him no favors, especially after—
"I've had a few bad experiences," Jack stated flatly, "with kings and queens."
"We won't tell him about the—the telly-port," Daine said. "We can just tell him about the planets, and the Guardian."
"We'll see," Jack mumbled.
They rode in silence for a while, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, Numair laughed. Daine and Jack looked at him.
"It's amazing!" the mage said. "Stars like our sun. Other worlds. The space between worlds. Have you been to many, Jack?"
"I've seen a few," Jack smiled. Numair's joy was infectious, and doing wonders to burn away the misery that had lingered from his dreams. "You should've seen…" Jack's voice faded, but then he shrugged to himself. Where was the harm? These memories were good ones, and the journey to Pirate's Swoop was long; there would be time for stories. "A while back I met a man called the Doctor," he began after a moment's hesitation. "He wasn't human, something called a Time Lord – last of his kind. I used to travel with him, way back when. He had this ship called a TARDIS—"