There was darkness, that much was clear. The sort of all-encompassing darkness that only death could bring. Jack knew it well, he had embraced it countless times in his never ending life. Yet this time, it was a different sort of darkness. Still enveloping, yet cold. He knew he had never been able to feel in his state of death. That was what it made it so terrible. No sight, no sound, no taste, no touch, no sense of time. Death was the nothingness that his consciousness drifted through until he was inevitably dragged back into the realm of the living. So to feel so cold, so hollow, brought a whole new level of terror into the never ending nightmare. Jack wanted to scream, he knew that it was an impossible thing to do, yet he tried. Much to his surprise, something akin to the feeling of a scream ripped through his being. It echoed around the empty nothingness, striking against the invisible edges of the void and doubling back for him. Another sound, something so familiar, yet so strange, rippled just outside the edge of his grasp. The Immortal had no idea what it was, but some piece of his being recognized that to grasp that would bring him to the surface.
The light was blinding, so unlike anything that Ianto had ever been forced to endure. It tore at him, prying fingers ripping at everything that he was, every fiber of his being. Perhaps this was what death was. Not a white light that you fade into slowly, but a shear sort of blinding light that had no color, or form. Ianto had faced death numerous times. Looked it in the eyes and readied his arms to welcome it, only to be yanked back to the surface. He had only embraced it once, all that time ago, to awake gasping for air with Jack's face just above his. But then it had been so different. It had been so dark and oppressive. He had heard someone, something, calling to him in the darkness. Something that he had dreaded with every fiber of his being. Now, it was here, ripping at him, shredding everything that he was until nothing remained. Yet, as if by sheer will, a sound pierced the light. Familiar, yet foreign. Ianto could not recognize it, nor could he contemplate what it meant. But a primal part of him, the pure instinct of the soul, told him that the sound was his salvation. Ianto fought, desperate to hold onto that last fiber of existence before the light destroyed him completely. One solemn word, with no dicernable meaning or importance, escaped from his being.
"Jack."