Chapter Fifteen:
Day Two, Part Five
"Faith is the strength by which a shattered world shall emerge into the light."
Helen Keller
"What is this place?" Mickey asked, handing the binoculars from his field kit back over to Ianto. The three of them were laying prone on a small hill that over looked the facility.
"I dunno, I just know Jack's in there somewhere."
"What are they doing?" Nerys asked as the cement truck manoeuvred into place over what might have been a bunker or maybe a storage unit.
Ianto swallowed, but the cold lump in his throat wouldn't go down. They couldn't…no one could be that cruel…but a moment later the screams, impassioned pleas, rang out over the compound and he knew. He was too late.
"Yan…?"
"Jack." He answered without looking at her. It had taken them hours to track him, he must've come back. But what state had he been in when he had… "They can't kill him. So instead…" he felt sick. "So instead they're going to bury him alive inside a concrete block."
The colour drained from his sister's face. "How could someone do that? They can't be human."
"Sometimes human beings are the biggest monsters of them all," he told her.
…………………………………………………….
Abby hung up the phone. "All I got was voicemail," she told Tim, her frustration evident. She'd been trying to get in touch with Bobby and Wendy for the last fifteen minutes. She needed to know if they'd gotten copies of the tests the hospital had run on the kids over the last day and a half, and if they could fax them to her, because besides trying to figure out who had blown up the Hub, that was the only thing important enough to keep her from running back home and looking for her friends. Her team.
"I'm sure it's nothing," McGee lied. He'd had a bad feeling starting the first time neither Bobby nor Wendy picked up their phones. They were set to rendezvous at midnight, in D.C. "Maybe they're on the road already and can't get a signal," he suggested.
"Maybe," Gibbs said in all too casual a tone as the four armed guards came into the lab. He pushed himself off the table he'd been leaning against and put down his coffee cup. "Something we can do for you?" he asked in the same casual tone.
The first guard in ignored him. "Mr McGee, Ms Scuito, Director Vance would like to see you in his office. Now."
Abby and Tim exchanged glances.
The second guard turned to Gibbs. "I'll be happy to escort you out of the building, sir," she said in a calm tone. Gibbs didn't miss the flicker of nervousness in the young woman's eyes or the way the other two looked just a little twitchy, like they were expecting something.
"No problem," Gibbs smiled, without so much as a glance towards McGee; he hoped that whatever it was he did for this Torchwood Institute, he hadn't forgotten everything he'd learned from him…
Ten minutes and a brief scuffle later, Abby was pulling the guns from the hands of two of the unconscious men.
"Good thinking," Gibbs told her. He was doing much the same with one of the other two. "Now. Where did you learn moves like that?" he wanted to know. McGee was already checking the hallway to see if the coast was clear.
"Jack's a good teacher. And I am an excellent student," she smirked. She looked to Timmy. "What's the plan?"
"Stick to the schedule," he told her.
"Do you think…?"
"I think if anybody went after Martha, Bobby and Wendy, they're in for more than they bargained for," he told her honestly. "We're just going to have to find another way out of the country. I don't think trying to book a commercial flight is such a good idea any more."
"As soon as we get out of here, I'll make a few calls," Gibbs volunteered.
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Cold air rushed into Jack's lungs and his eyes snapped open. Above his head….sky! Clear blue sky!
He took another deep breath, grateful for the air as he tried to get his bearings. The last thing he remembered was that woman… she was standing over him, she knew he couldn't die, but she'd figured out a way to keep him contained. Concrete filled his nose…his mouth…his lungs… pressing down… he suppressed a shudder… another sob.
Another memory.
A bomb going off in the Hub.
Ianto.
Ianto, Gwen, Sara… had any of them made it out? Please…
The sound of a vehicle approaching brought a fresh wave of panic. He crawled to his feet, still shaking.
…………………………………………………………….
Nerys felt her jaw go slack when she saw Jack standing there. Naked. She didn't see the expression on his face for what it was, she was too overwhelmed at seeing him alive and seemingly well to realize how terrified he was as he wondered what next…
Mickey pulled the jeep to a stop a few yards from him; Ianto slid out before it was even in park. Rhys and Gwen were just behind them, in a stolen pick up truck from the construction site above. Good thing for them there wasn't a vehicle on the market he couldn't hot wire.
"There's not a scratch on him," Nerys breathed, "not even a scar." The rational part of her mind wanted to believe that it had been some other person's arm she'd seen pulled from the wreckage.
"He has scars," Mickey told her in an uncharacteristically sombre tone. "Just not the kind what you can see."
She swallowed. He was right. How could Jack not have scars after…
"Jack," Ianto's voice was soft, steady. Calm. It didn't look as if the other completely believed what he was seeing—or that maybe he was afraid to believe the nightmare was really over, he was finally safe. "Jack?"
He swallowed. Took a step forward on shaky legs. He tore his gaze from that beautiful Welsh face just long enough to confirm the identities of the people behind him.
Gwen. Rhys. Mickey. Nerys? What was Ianto's sister doing there?
"Sara?" he asked hopefully.
"She made it out of the Hub," Ianto told him. "I sent her to take your mother and the kids to Sarah Jane."
Sarah Jane. Sarah Jane Smith. "How long?" how long had he been gone.
"Since yesterday," he held out his hand. "I'm sorry, Jack. I'm sorry I wasn't here sooner. I'm sorry you had to go through that alone."
"You're here now," he said, accepting his hand…it felt so good. So warm. So real. He didn't realize how hard, how desperately, he was clutching onto him.
He let himself be led back to the jeep, slid into the back seat. Ianto slid in next to him, wrapped his arms around him, held him… he felt so warm.
He wanted to close his eyes and lose himself to it, but he couldn't; if he closed his eyes it would be dark.
The memory of two thousand years buried alive… dirt and stone pressing down, suffocating… drowning in concrete, not knowing if anyone would ever find him … Ianto…Jason…Seren…they could be dead by the time he was found, dug out of that block of cement.
"I've got you," Ianto whispered, running fingers through his hair while Mickey drove them out of the construction site. Nerys was up front, Gwen and Rhys following behind in the truck. He leant down and pressed a soft kiss to the Jack's temple. "I'm here, Cariad. I will always be here."
He shuddered. He wouldn't always be there. Someday he would die. Someday he would be alone again.
"Shhh…Jack, I promise, I will always be here for you."
"Don't make promises you can't keep," he managed. His voice was ragged. He'd died and come back so many times, he shouldn't feel so raw inside.
The younger man pulled him in tighter. "I'm not. You just watch me, Jack Harkness," he told him. I will be there when the last star goes out.
Jack smiled, just a little. Enveloped in the fierce warmth of an impossible promise, he stopped shaking. He let himself be held, just like all those nights Ianto had held him after…Gray…
"The Hub?" he whispered, his voice cracking under the strain of too many emotions. Gray was in the vaults. He'd changed the lockdown protocol, but had it been enough?
"I don't know," his Welshman seemed to understand the question—the real question. "I'm sorry."
He shook his head. There was nothing for him to be sorry for, nothing to be done. Later…maybe later… but right now…
Tenderly, Ianto stroked his cheek. Softly, he kissed him. He held him. He told him again that he loved him. Jack closed his eyes and allowed himself to rest, knowing that he was safe.
Ianto slid his wedding ring back onto his finger. "Forever, Jack," he whispered. "I'll love you forever."
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Abby flung her arms around Bobby, nearly bowling him over when they finally arrived at the rendezvous point, a truck stop just outside D.C. Then she hugged Wendy and then Martha. Then she introduced them to Leroy Jethro Gibbs. Then she finally let somebody else talk. She'd had six cups of coffee since they'd gotten there.
"Have you guys heard from anybody?" Bobby asked. He wasn't ready to believe that they were it, the only ones left except for Jack, but he knew they had to face the possibility.
"We'll hear from them," said Abby; her confidence seemed genuine.
"Well first we have to figure out a way to get back…" Martha began.
"I've got that covered," Gibbs told her with a sideways smile; it reminded her of one of Jack's half-grins. "As long as you don't mind flying 'coach.'"
"It can't be any worse than some of the places I've ended up," she answered without missing a beat.
A/N:
I had to tweak the vehicle situation a bit… six people do not fit in a jeep (at least not comfortably)! So just a bit of artistic license there.
And I am SO glad to be past this part, because watching Jack getting drown in cement like that, having him trapped in that block, after he'd come back like he had while they just WATCHED him scream (sick bastards)… it broke my heart. It was as hard to watch as anything they threw at us in Days Four and Day Five.
