Notes

/“I know his type, Ianto, he’s a heart-breaker.”/ (- Shrouded)

The words stay heavy in his head. He goes inside, he smiles for Rhiannon and spins Mica around in a hug. He pretends he hasn’t just seen his own death, seen his friends die. He’s quiet, but he’s always quiet, so no one notices the difference.
Life goes on. He feels like a blank slate, most days. Just like that pleasant placid person he becomes when he doesn’t want anyone to notice him. That person he was before he’d found new purpose in his life, that person he was when he was whatever anyone wanted him to be, that person he was before he’d come to know Jack.
Or he thought he knew Jack. He just wished he knew Jack. He’d been gone, he would never tell them exactly where. He would never tell them a lot of things. Ianto was never quite sure if the secrets were meant to spare them the burden of knowing, or to spare Jack from having to admit them. He supposes it blends together in many cases. He knows the feeling.
That moment plays over and over again behind his eyes. Seeing Jack curled over his body, begging, pleading with some monstrous alien in a glass box to sacrifice the world if they would just spare Ianto.
It couldn’t be real, not Jack. Jack would always do whatever was necessary to save as many people as possible. He wouldn’t let one person get in the way of that… Would he? He knew what that felt like too. Loving someone so much that you would burn the world just to have one more day by their side, and if Jack would do that for him… Thinking about it for too long made Ianto feel sick.
/“I love you.”/ He had heard his own voice say, words drifting from his own lips. And all Jack gave in return was a choked, /“don’t.”/ As if stopping Ianto would keep this from being goodbye. As if not saying it back might keep Jack from feeling it. Or maybe he was commanding him not to love him, spare Jack Harkness one more heart placed in his hands. Those warm steady hands, that had lived a thousand lives already, saved so many people and destroyed just as much in return.
He wouldn’t dream of confessing those words to Jack. Of course, Ianto wasn’t so foolish he didn’t realize he was already in love with him. But he couldn’t ever bring himself to say it, certainly not now. Not after seeing what he got for his pains. /“I came back for you,”/ was probably the closest Ianto would ever get to hearing that sentiment from him.
And the worst part is, she was right, it breaks his heart. It breaks his heart every day. Knowing that /forever/ Jack Harkness will keep on living and Ianto Jones will be long gone, a speck in eternity. A blip in time.
But he already knew, someday he would die, and Jack would just keep on living. Lonely as always. Seeing it happen is just a harsh reminder.
For days he finds he can barely look at Owen, rarely rises to the bait of his banter in those times. Wants to cry when Tosh thanks him for the coffee as she does every day, that that sweet smile over the rim of her mug.
And worst of all when Jack kisses him, he can’t stop thinking about that one last kiss on Ianto’s dead lips.
Jack notices because of course, he notices, but he never sees enough.
“You alright?”
He takes in a steadying breath, he’s prepared to lie, he’s always prepared to lie. “Yes, yes, Jack. Just tired, that’s all,” he dismisses, curling his lips just for Jack, that clever smile the man will always fall for.
He smooths a hand down the hair at the nape of Ianto’s neck, looking over with those weathered blue eyes. His brow creases just slightly.
“Well, why don’t you go get some sleep, I know it’s been a long day. A lot of clean-up on this one.” That hand curls around the back of his head, pulling Ianto into a light embrace, Jack sways them a little, almost like they’re slow dancing.
“You could even stay here with me, if you want,” he suggests softly into the fabric of Ianto’s collar.
“Oh, /yes/, because my time with you is always so /restful/,” he responds flatly, knowing banter is what’s expected, just brush Jack’s attention away from his state of mind.
He can feel the man’s cheek shift against his own as he smiles, head still bowed towards Ianto’s shoulder. Jack shifts then so that his breath ghosts the shell of his ear, he doesn’t intend the way he shivers at the sensation.
“I meant to /sleep/,” he teases, breathing the words directly into Ianto’s ear, and for all that his voice goes husky and rough around the edges, Ianto knows that he means it. He knows that if Ianto let him, Jack would lead him to the porthole, down the ladder and guide him into his bed. He would make him comfortable and curl around Ianto and make him feel safe, or let Ianto curl around him as he was wont to do on nights when he needed to assure himself Jack was still here. In his arms.
He pulls away, out of that embrace, out of those arms. If he lets him do this, it might break him, he might buckle, admit something he shouldn’t, show some pain he doesn’t mean to. It’s too much, Jack is so much. Jack means so much to him. He means too much, too close, too important, too painful.
“I think I’d rather get back to mine,” he says, it’s a total farce, like so many things he is.
Jack doesn’t look disappointed, but something softens in his eyes. “I’ll drive you, then,” he decides, before promptly turning to grab his coat off the hook.
“Jack, you really don’t have to,” he tries, but Jack is already shrugging it on. And usually, Ianto is helping it on him, settling him into that familiar article. He loves that coat.
“As if I’m letting you walk in this weather, it’s freezing out there,” Jack scoffs, and for once, he’s not exaggerating. It was autumn edging into winter and the rain Cardiff was unforgiving.
Jack loops his hand into the crook of Ianto’s elbow, taking his arm with no prompting, “c’mon, let’s get you into bed,” he urged with a grin, then broke off thoughtfully, “you know, I usually have a different sort intention when I say that.”
Ianto smiles for him, he can’t really help it, and lets Jack take him home.

The next day is longer, he mostly stays in the hub, working on creating new records, correcting identities, erasing and rewriting lives. It’s the drudging, tedious sort of work that Jack loathes. Most days, Ianto finds it soothing. Today it’s sickening, to know he’s adjusting people’s histories, filling in gaps that go unmourned, forgotten, swept away by the never-ending movement of the universe. Normally he would be nearly done by the time the others return, today, he’s barely gotten halfway through.
The entrance alarm blares as the cog door rolls open. He turns his head to see Jack and Gwen supporting Tosh on either side. Owen slips around them, rushing to the autopsy bay. There’s blood, soaking through the silky pink of her blouse around her stomach. His heart lurches. Her hands, stained with her own blood, are clutching at a wad of gauze over the wound.
Ianto stands sharply, “what happened, why didn’t you tell me Tosh was--!?” He can’t quite seem to finish the sentence.
“Alien had an EMP brought down our comms,” Jack grunted, still helping her shift towards the medical area where Owen was efficiently preparing to treat her, gathering supplies as he darted around the space.
“And every other bloody piece of equipment we had-- /aah!/” Tosh struggled out the words in frustration. as they made it down the first step.
“Don’t talk, sweetheart, ok, don’t hurt yourself,” Gwen advised, voice gentle and calm for all that her expression gave away her fear, eyes too wide and her mouth pressed thin.
What if it was right now? What if this was how Tosh dies, and he doesn’t even know what had happened to her. Why? Why couldn’t they prevent it? Why couldn’t he save her?
Ianto is quick to make his way down to the medical bay, reaching out to help as they lay Tosh back on the autopsy table. Flat and cold, laid out peacefully just like he’d seen. But Tosh is still grimacing in pain, hands clenched and chest huffing unyielding breaths and she is still so very much alive.
They know to give Owen space as he pulls away the gauze and her shirt, wiping away the blood and sterilizing the area before quickly giving her an injection to help with the pain.
“Gonna need stitches, but the blade was short enough it didn’t graze anything vital.” He looked down into her eyes, corners of his lips lifting ever so slightly, “and we’re bloody grateful for that,” he tells her with an earnest sort of happiness before moving back and getting to work on closing the wound. It’s amazing watching Owen work to heal someone. He’s always so genuine in a way you don’t ever see otherwise. It’s something about having a patient to work with, he knows exactly how to reassure people in dire situations, as much as he likes to pretend he doesn’t have a caring bone in his body.
“Yes we are,” Jack adds, looking down at Toshiko significantly.
Tosh tries to smile at them, Jack has stayed close enough to grip her hand through all of it as he often does for them. Physical touch has always been his favorite method of communication.
“Just breathe slow,” Owen advised as his hands moved steadily over her abdomen, sewing the flesh back together.
Jack looked up then, to catch Ianto’s eye now, “there’s a body in the back of the SUV, think you could go ahead and get it into cold storage?” It sounds like a suggestion, but really, it’s an order. Ianto would do it, even if it wasn’t. Because it’s Jack asking.
“I-- I can help with that,” Gwen volunteers shakily, looking pale where she stands arms crossed over her chest, eyes on Toshiko, but it seems more like she’s staring through her.
Ianto catches Jack’s gaze again, he sees the concern there, the hint that he should refuse her.
“Don’t worry about it, Gwen, I’m more than fine on my own,” he tells her, trying for something reassuring in his smile. It takes her a moment before she even looks at him, but when she does she gives him a hesitant smile back, something grateful in her eyes.

Ianto later learns that the mottled blue and green body he hauls out of the SUV onto one of the carts they have for just that purpose and into cold storage was the alien that broke their tech and stabbed Toshiko, who had been the one who’d encountered and tried to subdue him before he ran. Gwen had been forced to gun the bastard down in the street to prevent him from escaping (impossible to tail him on foot, this species can run up to 50mph on flat ground compared to a human’s 15-20mph). He knows Jack had been screaming at her to pull the trigger from where he ran several meters behind her, out of range, having been searching the other end of the street for the alien beforehand. And he knows that the clean shot to the shoulder and through the abdomen had brought it down quick enough with no other casualties. But he also knows that her hands shook when he handed her a fresh cup of coffee.
Jack drives Tosh home early, and while Owen starts dissecting the corpse, and Gwen stares at the wall and doesn’t drink her coffee, there’s nothing left to bar Ianto from his thoughts.

He gives up on the clean-up work quickly, starts watching back through old security footage, it’s an old habit from when he always needed to know the schedules, habits, and particulars of every Torchwood team member. To make sure they never saw something they shouldn’t. It’s more of a sentimental ritual now, watching over Jack and Tosh laughing together, Gwen handing him a pastry one particular morning when she walked into the tourist office. Owen bobbing his head to music in earbuds as he works, before being interrupted by Tosh and the camera is at the perfect angle to see the screen as he quickly changes the song away from bubbly pop.
He goes back, he goes far enough back to watch Jack walk into the hub for the first time in months stepping with them as if he’d never been gone at all.
He’s watching Jack and Gwen talk, a stolen moment that wasn’t his. He tells Gwen something he hasn’t said Ianto. Of course, Ianto hadn’t asked, knowing Jack would avoid the answer. But Gwen wasn’t like him. She would push and shove and demand what she wanted.
He doesn’t like hearing about Jack dying, it brings an ache to his chest he can’t seem to get rid of, imagining what Jack must go through. But he wishes he could ease some of that pain. If he knew, every time it happened, maybe Ianto could comfort him after the fact. The barest of consolations, but it was something. Maybe Ianto didn’t like asking because he knew Jack didn’t want to answer, and maybe Ianto didn’t like asking because he also didn’t want to know.
The end of the world. Ianto doesn’t think Jack would say it lightly, not when he admits he’s been through pain. Ianto can only guess what he might mean.
/“What kept me fighting was the thought of coming home to you,”/ he grabs Gwen’s hand. The consistency of his reasons are comforting, not that he thinks Jack has ulterior motives for being back here, other than genuine attachment. He could have the stars, but he’s here, Ianto tries to hold onto that fact when it feels like his world is drifting. Like right now.
/“... We should get back to work…”/ It’s a little cosmically amusing that Jack interrupts himself right there, just in time to tell Ianto to do just that.
“Ianto!” He pulls the laptop shut at the sound of his name, hiding away what he’s been doing. Old habits die hard.

/“I don’t know what I’d do without you.”/

The bay is beautiful at sunset. He and Jack had walked back from their date, ambling along the beach with the orange glow of the sun dipping into the sea as their backdrop. While Jack had swung their hands between them and tugged him close enough to kiss when there was no one else around, Jack knew that he felt more at ease when they were alone.
He watches the light fade as he waits for her. He knows Jack would be furious if he knew. Not because of what Ianto is planning to do with her. He knows she plans to seduce him and he needs her to think she’s succeeded, needs her to lower her guard. Jack would surely do the same. But he would never agree with the rest of it, because he’s going to use it again. Ianto needs to see more, he needs to know more. That can’t be all there is.
He slips out of the bed silently and pulls on his trousers. He puts it on again, prepared to see his own death once more, to look further, see what happens to Jack, what happens to the world.
But the visions that find him this time are far, far worse.
Children being marched off and surrendered to aliens planning to numb them and keep them chained forever, women enslaved and any rebelling populations suppressed.
She’s with him again, Beatrice, Mairwyn, however many names she would don. Speaking into his ear, telling him to come with her. He refuses her and she knocks him out of the visions with a jarring punch to the jaw. The device falls to the ground as he stumbles backwards to grab purchase on the wall.
“There is no fixing this, Ianto. You have no choice. Help me get what I want and share the wealth, or be a prisoner on your own planet for the rest of your days. Your choice.” She moves steadily closer as she speaks. The irony doesn’t escape him, telling him he has a choice between being a prisoner and being a prisoner. But she wasn’t right the first time around either, there’s always a choice. He watches Jack make choices even when it seems there are none over and over, no matter how hard it is. How scary, how awful, how painful.
“This is your last chance to feel true happiness, true freedom. Break from that worn-out shell and be. Be whatever you want. Live your dreams. Think of what we could become. The universe our playground. King and queen of the sky.” She’s touching his face now, leaning in close.
He thinks of those visions. Of Lisa, as she had been, once, when they were happy and whole. Telling him he had no choice, he had to open the rift. He resents that desecration of her memory. Seeing her had made him so desperate, so sure there was only one way out of this.
He thinks of Jack. /“There’s always something left to lose, Ianto!”/ Jack had said it on that night, that night when he held a gun to Ianto’s head, when he’d seethed, they’d fought bloodied. When they’d /hated/ each other. There’s always something left to fight for.
“You’re right,” he says, letting his voice stay plain as calm as always.
“I know,” she says, and con artists always are so bloody smug.
“You’re here to save me,” he adds on, he knows that these avant-garde types enjoy feeling like dashing heroes, despite the disaster they leave in their wake.
“Yes, I am.” She kisses him. One hand is on his cheek, guiding his face to her. He has one on her hip, ready to twist that gun she’s got behind her back out of her grip. The other slips the knife out of its sheath, the one hidden just next to the seam of his slacks. Small and discreet, one of Jack’s old numbers, it fastens to the belt and goes unnoticed unless you’re looking. And well, she hadn’t been looking at his clothes.
He jabs the blade forward firmly, right into her gut, and twists the handle enough to stun her with the pain.
“I didn’t need saving,” he tells her as she falls backward, gun falling uselessly to the floor.
He barely hears her as she wheezes out her last words, something about the pain. A gun to the head would have been quicker but of course she had said she preferred the intimacy of the blade. He was nothing if not polite.
His brows knit together, “So,” he says to himself, “how do I fix this?”

Finding Rhys and Hart again is a simple matter of letting them find him. He waits around the bar. It’s only half an hour later that they show up, respectable speed.
John orders him another pint. Ianto gives him a sharp look.
The man raises his hands in surrender, “it’s the least I could do,” he says, raising himself up onto the stool beside Ianto. Rhys watches them nervously. Hart faces towards the bar, but side-eyes Ianto, “considering what you’ve seen,” he adds darkly.
“How did you know?” Ianto asks cool as he reaches into one of the hand-stitched concealed pockets inside his suit jacket. He removes the device, setting it down just in front of himself.
“You have this /distortion/ around you,” he waves a hand vaguely towards Ianto’s face, “time stuff, we time agents are sensitive to it, I can tell you’re about to put one big dent in the timeline, knowing what you do.”
His breath catches, “then Jack knows too?” he asks, eyes narrowing. Jack hadn’t given any indication of knowing. Why would he feign ignorance over this? The importance in the stability of the timeline was something Jack was always cautious about. There were stronger reasons than just painful memories for some things he never told them.
But Hart just shakes his head, “no, I was lookin’ for it, but he’s just lookin’ at you, Eye-candy. Wouldn’t see a thing.” There’s something wistful in his voice. Ianto wonders what it must be like, to have had Jack Harkness, to have loved him. Then to only be able to watch him from afar for the rest of your days, right there and still out of reach. Ianto supposes he’ll never have to learn what that feels like.
“If I forget,” he starts, hand curling around the mostly-empty glass, “will it preserve the timeline?”
“Theoretically,” Hart shrugs mildly. Ianto supposes that’s the best he’ll get.
“Retcon it will be, then,” Ianto decides dryly. He lifts his drink to his lips, draining the last of his beer. The pint gets replaced, on Hart’s tab, and Ianto leaves the beer untouched, sliding the device towards Hart.
“How much would a piece of equipment like that fetch?” he asks passively, but he keeps his hand on the object as he speaks.
“A lot. Why?” Hart’s eyes dart over to him, “you thinking of starting a business?” His voice sounds coy and light, but his face is still intensely serious.
“Just curious,” Ianto answers, pulling his hand away. He’d wanted to know why it was worth it. Everything that one device almost risked. And whatever amount Hart considered to be a lot must be nothing to sniff at, but Ianto couldn’t imagine anything could be worth that. Seeing the future seemed more of a curse than anything.
Hart takes the device, turning away from the bar to tuck it in his jacket. Rhys takes the chance to lean towards him urgently. “You sure this will work?”
“Has to,” Ianto says simply because it’s true.
“If it doesn’t, what are we going back to?”
Ianto doesn't give himself time to contemplate the future he had seen, the one with kids raised like livestock, the less privileged purged and never allowed to grow up, to live their lives.
“It has to work,” he replies firmly. He has to fix this, what else can he do?
“I never really got to know you,” Rhys starts to admit, a somber note creeping into his voice, eyes darting away from Ianto’s face, “not even after this. Before you…” /Died./
“No one will,” Ianto assures him, and it may be the most truthful thing he’s said about himself in quite some time.
Rhys looks pained by the words, the reason Ianto so rarely tells the truth, lies put people at ease. He just nods and steps away from the bar though, leaving Ianto to his drink, leaving Ianto to his fate.
They start to head out but Hart is the one to stop and glance over his shoulder, “well…” he starts, “good luck, Ianto.” The only time he’s ever called him by his first name. Ianto takes it as a sign of respect.
“... Be careful, John,” Ianto responds in turn, calling him by his name, or at least the name he was using. He’s using it as a sign of trust.
They leave without another word, best to have the least amount of interference possible. And Ianto is left alone with his beer and his thoughts, he runs his fingers along the rim of the glass but doesn’t drink.

Ianto brings him his coffee in the morning as always. The routine of it is soothing, the others aren’t even here yet, it would almost be nice, if not for the things he knew. Maybe that should make it nicer, maybe he should hang onto this little island of peace even tighter, dig his fingers in and never let go. But, he’s not going to remember any of it in a few hours, so what difference will it make?
Jack groans into the mug, voice rumbling happily as he grins up at him over the steaming liquid. He does this everyday, it never gets old, Jack never does. “Ianto, those hands of yours, they’re /magic/.”
Ianto lets himself chuckle fondly, “thank you, Sir.”
His eyes narrow, “the name’s ‘Jack’, you forget it?” he counters sharply.
“I believe it would be impossible to forget you, /Jack/,” Ianto tells him truthfully, emphasizing the name. “You leave quite the impression.”
His smirk curls back into place, eyes turning dark with mirth, “oh, you leave /quite/ the impression too, Ianto Jones.” the captain tells him, setting down his mug and leaning forward conspiratorially, “I always feel it in my thighs afterwards,” he says wickedly.
He always knows how to get to Ianto, heart pounding now, as a warm blush creeps up his neck as he forces his expression to maintain neutrality. “Noted,” is the only thing he can bring himself to say, “anything else you need?” he tacks on as an afterthought, knowing it’s practically an invitation for more.
“Oh, I can think of quite a few things,” Jack responds, his smile still perfectly in place and leaning his chin into one hand now as he looks Ianto over.
“You might make a list then,” Ianto suggests, and turns on his heel to leave the office before Jack can say more, and something fond curls up to make a home in his chest as he hears Jack’s laughter echoing behind him.

It’s an uneventful day, which is good, considering he won’t remember it. He hadn’t quite been able to bring himself to retcon himself that very night, but the next day would work too. He finishes the clean-up work, tedious and stomach churning as remaking lives was. The email to Rhiannon is almost an afterthought, the draft still there from the day Owen had spotted it, the day Ianto had met Rhys and Hart at the bar. He needs her to know at least, just this one thing. Just the same as he knows he’ll say it to Jack, make sure he knows.
“Ianto, I need you,” Jack calls out to him from the catwalk above. Just as always, Jack seems to have the most perfect dramatic timing.
“We’ll see,” he murmurs to himself, before putting the pills in his mouth. He reaches up to click send. Then lifts his mug to his lips, swallowing down the pills with the smooth warmth of coffee to accompany it.
“Ianto, I could really use that lovely head of yours, /right now/!” Jack calls again impatiently.
“Coming, Sir,” he yells back, turning to jog up the stairs.
“/Jack/,” He corrects as Ianto reaches him.
“I believe that’s your name, Sir,” Ianto informs him gravely.
“Ha. Ha.” Jack gives him a flat look, clearly not appreciating the joke.
“What is it, Jack?” Ianto prompts, softening his voice now.
That smile returns to the man’s face. The one that’s all pleased and sunshine and genuine for Ianto. “What I said. I need that beautiful brain of yours,” Jack spoke, herding him towards his office, maybe they had a case that was in his area of expertise: coffee, filing, office work, body disposal, pterodactyl feeding. Or maybe Jack had some paperwork and he was hoping flattery would finish it for him.
“I believe your exact words were, ‘lovely head’ so my expectations may have become a bit skewed,” he jokes.
Jack laughs delightedly, “well, we can do that too if you want, but I was thinking more of a meeting of the minds.”
“My mind may be a bit preoccupied at the moment,” Ianto admits, eyelids beginning to feel heavy, his feet dragging just a bit.
“By what?” Jack asks voice hard, turning to him instantly, holding him out at arms length to inspect him over, eyebrows furrowed, a frown taking place of that smile. Something must have been strange in his delivery, for Jack to react so strongly. Ianto hadn’t meant for that, The retcon was working more quickly than he’d like.
“I’m so tired, Jack,” he confesses, giving in to him this time. Even if he wanted to, he hardly has the will left to pull away, and he doesn’t want to. He never wants to.
“Are you hurt? Did someone drug you?” Jack was asking so urgently.
“No, no, that’s not it.”
“Did you hit your head?” he asks sternly, “is it a fever?” he adds, as he lifts a hand to feel for a temperature.
“No, I’m just tired is all,” Ianto speaks, trying for a smile. Jack’s arms are holding him up now and it makes it that much easier to just surrender to sleep.
“Have you been sleeping?” Jack asks, voice softer now, Ianto rests his cheek against his shoulder, leaning against him heavily and normally Ianto wouldn’t touch Jack like this in front of the others, even though they all know. It’s not that he’s ashamed, but he’s not the type for that sort of vulnerability, certainly not a work. But Jack is so warm, and solid, and familiar.
“No,” he answers, keeping his voice low. It’s a truth and a lie. Those are the best kind, the most believable. He hasn’t been sleeping much at all lately, but that’s not the reason for this. Though the reason for that may be why he has to do this. It’s all becoming tangled in his head.
“Alright, you should sleep. Then Owen is going to have a look at you,” Jack tells him in that strong voice of his, meaning it’s an order. His arm is looping around Ianto’s waist to help keep him steady as they move forward, towards Jack’s office. “Think you can make it down the ladder?”
“Yes,” he mumbles, nodding wobbly.
Jack is undressing him now while Ianto sits on the bed. He’s folding his clothes neatly out of the way. And this is exactly what Jack would have done that night, had Ianto let him. He finds himself smiling softly at the thought.
“Sleep,” Jack commands, his harsh tone belied by the gentle pressure of his hand on his chest, easing him back into the mattress, his lips are soft too as he leans over to press a kiss to his forehead. What a shame he won’t remember that, Ianto thinks, and obeys his Captain, shutting his eyes, he lets the darkness take him. It always comes sooner or later.