While Jack, Tosh and Owen were all loath to leave the hospital, it became apparent less than twenty-four hours later that it just wasn't feasible for them all to stay.
Rift and Weevil activity didn't stop just because they were a man down.
Suzie had called in over the comm. late the following afternoon. There had been a Rift spike a couple of miles outside of Cardiff, and it looked bigger than she could handle on her own.
Reluctantly, Jack and Tosh had left Owen to watch over the patient, and gone to help Suzie. When they returned a few hours later, they looked at Owen hopefully.
Owen shook his head. No change.
Between the three of them, they made sure that Ianto was never alone.
The Rift wasn't making things easy, and one or two of them were often being called away to deal with some new incident, but they refused to all leave at the same time.
Ianto's condition seemed to have stabilised, but there weren't any signs of him awakening. They all knew that the longer the coma continued, the smaller the chance there was of Ianto waking up.
Still, they refused to give up hope, and there was someone at his bedside twenty-four seven. If – no, when Ianto woke up, he wasn't going to be alone.
As two days turned into three, and three into four, it started to become harder and harder to be quite so confident.
Tosh resorted to pleading with Ianto's unconscious form to wake up, hoping that the doctors were right when they said he might still be able to hear them. Jack tried everything from flat out ordering him to open his eyes to waving a cup of poorly made coffee beside his head.
They even had Lisa record an audio message for him, in the hopes that he might show some response. Telling Lisa about the attack, and Ianto's injuries, had been hard. Convincing her that it wasn't her fault had been harder still.
Jack knew that as tough as this was on the team, it had to be even worse for Lisa. Having a loved one so seriously ill and being completely incapable of being there with them, of watching over them with your own eyes, had to be torture.
Very early on the sixth morning, Jack was slumped in the hard plastic chair next to Ianto's bed, attempting to make his way through a budgeting report. He'd been taking the majority of the overnight 'shifts', letting Tosh and Owen get some sleep.
He was puzzling over an expenditure figure when he thought he caught a movement from the corner of his eye. Dropping the report to the floor beside him, he shot to his feet, resting one hand on the bed.
"Ianto?"
There was no response.
He swept his hand across the edge of the bed, taking Ianto's hand in a loose grip.
"Ianto, if you can hear me, try to squeeze my hand."
He stared down at Ianto, his gaze switching between his face and where their joined hands lay, willing there to be a response.
What seemed like an interminable wait later, there was a very faint fluttering of Ianto's fingertips against Jack's palm.
"Ianto!"
He waited, not even daring to move, to see if it would happen again. A few minutes later, they fluttered again, this time a little stronger.
With his free hand, Jack stretched across to hit the call button. Ianto's fingers tightened almost imperceptibly around Jack's hand just as the nurse came in.
"He squeezed my hand a little," Jack told the young man hopefully. "That's a sign he's waking up, right?"
The nurse smiled but was clearly trying not to give Jack false hope. "It can be, but even if it is, it could still be some time before he's actually awake."
Jack nodded, but reached for his comm. anyway, slipping it over his ear and hitting the call button. "Owen? Tosh? Are you there yet?"
Despite the early hour, two groggy responses came back.
"You might want to come to the hospital. I think Ianto may be waking up." He could hear muffled sounds as both of them obviously started rushing around to get ready to leave.
Muting the comm., Jack looked back down at Ianto. His eyelids were flickering, ever so slightly.
He bent down a little. "Ianto? You with us?"
Ianto's eyes fluttered open, and he looked around, clearly disoriented.
"Wh…" His voice ground to a halt almost immediately.
The nurse handed Jack a paper cup of water with a straw, and helped him raise the head of Ianto's bed a little so he was in a semi-sitting position.
"Here…" Jack held it out for Ianto, who took a long sip.
"Where am I? What happened?" Ianto's gaze flickered around the room, struggling to focus on anything.
"You're in the hospital. You had a bit of an… accident," Jack told him, mindful of the nurse still standing by.
Ianto's eyes finally settled and focused on Jack.
"Sorry… do I know you?"