A/N Just so you know I finally have a detailed plan for their future, past and present. I'm so proud ^.^ Also I just realized that I pay too much attention to what has happened and the present, which should actually be as important even a little more, is neglected. So don't worry, I'll fix it... next chapter.

Sometimes I Wish You Would Have Died In My Arms

There were a lot of things Ianto hated about this Jack. He was a flirt, he would drool over everything that moved and had a hole, and some of the ones that didn't but that was too disturbing to even think. The times the Welshman had witnessed his boss trying to get a thing that looked like a human only in a pitch-black room were numerous and he still refused to admit that it bothered him even in the slightest. He was bossy. of course, that was his job, but he was the biggest control-freak Ianto had met. Telling him what to do when they were fighting aliens was one thing and ordering for the whole team when they were out, entirely different. And if that wasn't enough to send a grown man run for his life Jack was also a pompous dick. He didn't think the sun shone from his ass, oh no, he believed his ass was the reason the universe hadn't collapsed yet. But on top of the list was and would ever be the fact that he died.

A lot.

And Ianto was left wondering if that was the day Jack Harkness would finally close his eyes for the last time. The day that his heart would stop and beat no more. Because that day would come, he knew it. He had seen it. It was just a matter of time.

Not that he would ever focus on that thought. It was one of those fleeting ones that came and went as they pleased, whispering nonsense that you knew deep inside of you that were true and left you broken and clutching the nearest surface.

But really, right now he was too busy drowning the need to rush to the immortal's side as he felt down with a shout for the second time this week, put his head in his lap and hold him close until he wakes up and even after that. The very reminder that he couldn't do it was killing him. As if he wasn't worthy to help, as if he was nobody and he was. To them.

It didn't help at all that he knew what was Jack going through. The pain then the sudden numbness then the nothing. Darkness and coldness that enveloped you so tightly that it was suffocating. His Jack had told him everything. And now... it was a part of him.

Yet he couldn't do anything but turn around, act like he had some work to do, wait with bated breath for any sign that Jack would live and biting back sobs when he received one.

The first time is always the worst, people say. Eventually you get better at accepting it, the pain fades away until it's just a gnawing feeling at the back of your heart. You know what to expect so why hurt, anyway, right? It was a lie, of course. If Ianto knew something it was that time didn't heal the wounds, it just made them easier for other people to ignore.

He remembered the first time it happened as if it had been yesterday. After all he had dreamed it when Jack died the last time.

"Tell me about Torchwood," Ianto demanded, laughing. He wasn't drunk, he really wasn't. The fact that he had to lean on Jack and they were walking arm in arm was just a stra... strateg... a smart move. He swayed forward and Jack immediately caught him with a chuckle.

"I'd have to kill you if I tell you."

Even the voice was teasing and there was no way the Welshman was believing that.

He snorted. "As if. You would miss this too much." He tried to gesture his figure but all he did was slap his hips and almost fall again. Okay so he was maybe just a little bit tipsy. It was entirely Jack's fault, though, for forcing him to drink so much, saying it would be entertaining. Woah, big word there. He patter himself on the back mentally. Or at least he thought it was mentally but in reality he actually reached for his back and when Jack stopped him he just giggled.

The Welshman didn't know how long they have been walking as he spent most of the time thinking about how nice it was to have someone to take care of you, even if they had been the one to cause you trouble. The warm body that was burning his own wasn't something he was complain about, either. It was pure bliss and Ianto was thinking that he should get drunk more often when Jack suddenly stopped and the Welshmen was violently reminded that the other was dragging him forward and he was in no condition to reverse their places.

He gave up trying to continue walking with a lover who was holding him back, and doing it with all his strength, and looked around. Ianto was expecting to see some gang headed their way, each member with muscles that weighted as much as he did and a metal bar in their hand. Or maybe a dead body lying on the asphalt. But everything was quiet and peaceful. The lamps were glowing softly, some stray cat was mewling in the distance. Typical night.

Well, maybe except of the huge thing that was standing a few meters away from them. It looked a little like a human, it even had some hair on its head. If it wasn't for the lack of a nose and the wrinkles around the eyes and the barred sharp teeth he would be a very handsome man, Ianto was sure. He was also certain that it was a hallucination so he paid it no mind. He had seen it bef... Hm? What was that again? Anyway, it would be so funny to find out what Jack's eyes were tricking him to believe was true.

"What are you seeing?" he turned toward the other man with a smile which disappeared as fast as the worried look on Jack's face when he realized he was being watched. But Ianto had seen it. He turned his eyes toward the creature again, noted the way it was breathing heavily and the puffs that were forming before his mouth. His eyes widened and he moved his gaze to his lover. This time Jack didn't hide his distress and the Welshman didn't know whether to be glad or freaked out. "T-this is real?!"

"I'll explain later. You have to run!" instead replied Jack.

His eyes were darting nervously but never really letting the monster out of his eye-sight. He let go of Ianto's hand and pushed him back and away.

"Like Hell I'm leaving you alone with some... thing!" That would have sounded far more convincing if his words weren't slurred. To his credit though he was quickly sobering up and that was showing from the fact that he was standing upward, the shaking of his legs a distant memory. "I'm helping."

Jack spared him a single glance and an upward curling of the corner of his lips that could or maybe should have been a smile. And then he lurched forward. Ianto froze, everything happening so fast it became blurry. Jack and the creature were wrapped around each other, twisting and turning, the thing's teeth so close to the column of his lover's throat and the Welshmen gulped because he had imagined tonight would end with his lips on his date's skin not some monster's.

Jack screamed after, as it seemed from this angle, the creature sunk its teeth in him and that spurted Ianto in action. He ran toward the fighting couple, took the nearest hard object he could find, which luckily was a stone, could you imagine him hitting the thing with a cat for example, and dropped it on the freak's head. There was a long second in which he thought he had screwed up and the creature would get up and go after him, and that wasn't so bad, really, but instead the thing collapsed on top of Jack.

Ianto shoved him away and crouched down next to his lover. His eyes were closed, he noticed after a one-look examination, and there were bruises in the shape of fingertips around his throat that were shining more brightly by the second on that pale skin. Too pale skin. Shock and dread took a hold of his mind as he himself paled. That couldn't be true.

Jack wasn't dying because of a creature as if come from a nightmare. It was a dream, it had to be. One of those silly things people had that came in key moments in their lives to show them what they really wanted from the world.

He pressed his hands on Jack's chest and pushed. He had been on a course for this, he would manage this!

He had so many things to do with Jack. He hadn't even slept with him! He hadn't told the other man that he loved him. He hadn't introduced him to his parents. He hadn't showed him his secret receipt for coffee. They hadn't watched the new Harry Potter movie!

Jack's lips were turning blue. The Welshman stopped trying to make his heart beat again, because it had stopped he could feel it. He wouldn't believe it, thought. Ianto moved toward his lips and began forcing breath in his lungs. It was going to work. It had to.

Jack had to live because Ianto loved him.

But Jack wasn't breathing. The adrenaline that had been the only reason he was moving vanished from his body and he fell backward. Trembling all over, he fished the phone from his pocket and just looked at it. Tears were rolling down his sides and the dinner was rising in his throat. Dinner he had had with Jack. He sobbed and buried his head in his hands. This was all a dream.

It couldn't be real.

The wind caressed his shoulders, imitating a hand that he knew so well, and his sobs got even louder.

"Everything is going to be alright," it whispered in his ear and he shook his head. He would never see him again, how was that even bearable to think?

"I'm sorry," it tried again and Ianto could feel its pain.

"He did it to save me," the Welshmen whispered in his hands and he was sure the wind hadn't heard him because it continued to brush his shoulders gently. That great man had died to protect him. Some boy that came from nowhere, was going nowhere and was nothing. The wind curled around his chin and lifted it.

Except it wasn't the wind. It was Jack Harkness, in flesh and blood, skin yellow in the lamp's light. And breathing. Ianto shook his head, cried even harder, chuckled, choked on his own tears and shook his head again. He was losing it.

And Jack's ghost was trying to push something in his mouth.

"Everything will be better once you take it," he whispered, the hand on the other's shoulder never stopping.

Not one to trust ghosts so easily, especially when seconds ago he had realized they existed, he took the thing but spew it out instead of gulping it down.

And his blood ran cold when he saw it. Oh. They had been attacked by a Weevil. Jack had explained to him what these things were after the first time they had been attacked. He remembered now. Nice. And Jack had died. Good, good. And Ianto's next stop was the madhouse. Brilliant.

He stood up, wiping his tears, fixed his gaze on Jack, who looked a bit concerned and a lot horrified. The ground was dangerously close again but he batted the hand the other man offered him for help and stood up again.

"You have a lot of explaining to do."