Cursed

Jack buried his shock and leaned away from Ianto again, trying to do so slowly enough that Ianto did not feel any sort of rejection.  He was further shocked when he caught the defiant look in his lover’s eyes.

“Thought that might make you want to go,” he said, giving Jack another push.

Jack frowned but held on.  Then he realized what Ianto was doing.  If he could drive Jack away, that meant he had some control over what he saw as inevitable.  He wouldn’t have to sit and wait for the abandonment that he knew would happen.  He wouldn’t have to wait for the rug to be pulled out from under him. 

Again.

Jack sighed sadly, hoping this was something Ianto would be able to release, once they talked it through.

“I’m not going anywhere, Love.”  He leaned in and kissed the frown from Ianto’s brow.  “But I think maybe this is one of those things that we need to talk about, so you can process it.  Can you tell me what happened?”

Jack blinked away the tears as Ianto looked utterly baffled.  Then he frowned and began recounting the story.

“Martha found us in the Himalayas before the Toclafane could.  Used your wrist strap to get us back to the hub, and we locked it down.  She told us the story.  I shared with them some things, as well.  Lost a lot of blood, just to tell them I’d been through a war, knew how to fight, at least on a small scale.  Once we sent her on her way, we worked together, to form the resistance.”

“You were amazing,” Jack nodded, smiling.  The Master had not expected resistance.  Those who rebelled were a constant source of annoyance to him.  His plans would certainly have been carried out before the Year was up, if not for the sabotage and mayhem the rebels caused.  They also formed the network that kept Martha safe, as she travelled.

“About ten months in, Rhys was captured.  Gwen was beside herself.  She wanted to go after him.  We all decided it was too risky.  So she stormed off.  When she came back, she was way too calm, and I thought…” he sighed.  “It felt strange.  So on a whim, I changed the mission we were planning.  I cut it from ten people down to two and made it a reconnaissance mission.  And they were ambushed.”

“I don’t believe it,” Jack said hotly, though he didn’t turn Ianto loose.

“I didn’t want to, either,” Ianto said, his face showing his anguish at Jack’s disbelief.  “But I had to be sure.  So I planned another mission.  At the last minute, cut it down, again.”  He grew quiet, for a moment.  “You learn a lot about yourself, in moments like that.  Who do you send out, almost certain that it’s a trap, and they’ll die?  How do you choose?”

“How did you choose?” Jack asked, his voice gentle.  He hated that Ianto remembered these things.

“They were people I knew would back Gwen, if she tried to make a power play.”

Jack winced.  Strategically, it was absolutely the right move.  But it was also one of those brutal realities of leadership that he knew first hand could be difficult to live with.  “And what happened?”

“They died,” Ianto shrugged as though it were obvious.  “So I put Gwen on the guard detail, and then quietly put it around that there might be an imminent attack.  Spoke to everyone individually, telling them not to share the intel, because there might be a mole.  Then I had Owen watch to see what she would do.”

“What happened?” Jack asked, feeling a knot in his gut. 

“Two days later, she altered the detail without clearing it, and there was a massive hole in our defenses that hadn’t been there before.  The Master’s red caps came pouring through.  Fish in a barrel, really,” he added, almost thoughtfully.  “We took out one of their elite forces, that day.  But we had to decamp.  Find a new place.  Set up new defenses that would keep the Toclafane out.”

“Toshiko?”

“She was amazing, Jack,” Ianto smiled, though it was a sad expression. 

“How did you deal with Gwen?”

“Owen tranq’d her when it all kicked off, and kept her out until we were in the new location.  When she came around, we acted like nothing was off.  Watched her, hoping she’d stop.  But she slipped our perimeter and snuck off again.  We were ready for the next attack, but…” he shook his head.  “Toshiko was killed.  I didn’t think twice.  Once the battle was done, I confronted Gwen.  She did that big-eyed, ‘But Rhys!’ thing, but didn’t deny her betrayal.  If she’d been conflicted, or sorry, I might have reacted differently, but she just sat there and told us how her personal agenda was more important than defeating the Master.”

“She wasn’t…?” Jack frowned.  He would have at least expected a show of regret.

“I dragged her by the hair over to Tosh’s body and asked her if she had any remorse, knowing she might as well have pulled the trigger, herself.  Do you know what she said?”

Jack shook his head.

“She said she was indispensable to the cause, and Rhys was indispensable to her, so any sacrifice was acceptable.”  He shook his head.  “She’d gone round the twist, and we hadn’t even noticed.  No one was indispensable.  Maybe Tosh, because losing her was the beginning of the end.”

Jack made a sympathetic noise.

“I mean, we all had terrible choices and sacrifices to make.  And every day, he would do something terrible to you and broadcast it.  There were so many days that Owen had to patch me up.”

“What?  Why?”

“I cut myself every time he televised torturing or killing you,” Ianto whispered, and Jack started crying, again.  “Nothing terrible, just small cuts.  But… after a while, I started running out of space.”

“Ianto,” Jack sobbed.

“My point is, we all lost our minds, a little bit.”

Jack took a moment to calm, then asked, “So what happened, with Gwen?”

“We were all still in the middle of the compound, everyone preparing to bug out, again.  Her lack of remorse was against her.  Owen was beside himself, still trying to save Tosh, who had a hole in her chest the size of my fist and was staring at nothing.  Something had to be done.  You have to understand.”  He looked desperate for Jack to see that he’d had no choice.

“I do, Ianto.  I’ve been in that position before, as well.  Tell me.”

Suddenly, all of the angst and desperation were gone.  Ianto’s affect was dull and listless as he explained, “There was a standing order not to waste ammunition.  So I cut her throat.”  There was no waver in Ianto’s voice.  He knew he had done the right thing.  But he was trembling, nonetheless. 

“Ianto,” Jack said, his voice gentle.

“I suppose you’ll be wanting to go, now.”

“Ianto, listen to me.”

Ianto began disentangling his legs from Jack’s.  “I’m sure someone will take you back to the hub, Sir.”

“You did the right thing, Ianto.”

Ianto’s eyes snapped to Jack’s, his look guarded.  “Weren’t you listening?  I killed Gwen.”

“I know.  And based on what you’ve told me, I believe you when you say you had no choice.  I would have done the same, in your position.  In a war, it’s about the cause, not the individual.  You did the right thing.”

“But…  It was Gwen.  I killed Gwen!”

“And if I know you, up until that moment you had been doing everything in your power to keep her alive, for me.”

Ianto stared dumbly at Jack’s insight and merely nodded.

“Oh, Ianto,” Jack pulled him close and held him there as he began to sob.  “You had to kill your friend.  That can’t have been easy.”

“I thought you’d wonder if I did it out of jealousy,” Ianto confessed.

“Never.”

“I wondered, myself.”

“And what did you conclude?”

“I don’t know what else I could have done.  But I’m afraid that I would have looked harder for another solution, if…”

“If?”

“If I thought for even a minute that you would ever choose me, over her.”

“Oh, my Love,” Jack closed his eyes in dismay.  Ianto had been torturing himself over this, he knew.  “My beautiful Love, there is no world in which I would ever choose her, and certainly never over you.  You are my only choice.”

“Jack,” Ianto was shaking his head, once again incapable of hearing those words from his lover, much less believing them.

“You did what you had to do, Ianto.  End of story.  If that had been Toshiko, or Owen, you would have done the same.  It would have broken your heart, but you would have done it.  Because you’ve learned the hard way that there are some things that can’t be left undone.

“This wasn’t about jealousy, or revenge, or anything so petty.  She was responsible for betraying not only you, but everyone you were responsible for.  Don’t think I missed what you haven’t said.  You were in charge of that camp.  You were in charge of the resistance, weren’t you?”

“The four of us were…”

“No, Ianto.  You knew what to do.  You had done it, before.  You let them co-lead, but you were the one calling the shots.  Weren’t you?”

Jack wasn’t certain why it was important for Ianto to admit this, but he knew in his gut that it was crucial.

Ianto nodded into his chest, and he felt the younger man let go of the tension he was holding.  And then he crumbled.  All of the horror of that Year, the things he had been forced to do, the grisly death he had suffered at the Master’s hands, all of it was slowly bleeding away.  Jack could practically feel it being drawn from Ianto, like a poison.

Jack held onto Ianto and cried with him, telling him about how the Year had gone, from his perspective.  He didn’t hold back on any of the things he had worked so hard to keep from his team.  There was no need.  Ianto already knew.  And he knew it would help Ianto to know he was not the only one who remembered.  At times, the isolation of that was almost as hard to bear as the memories, and Jack felt a profound sense of relief at having that isolation end.

They cried together for a long while, and it was only much later that Jack realized he had been dosed with the healing potion, as well.  He and Ianto had both processed a good portion of the horrors they had suffered during the Year, and they were both lighter for having let go of that particular burden.

It was mid-morning by the time the storm had passed.  Healers arrived to give them potions and food, but the latter was ignored as both men processed the traumas they had endured and comforted one another in their grief.  They were both resting in the wake of the pain and tears when Ianto murmured something into Jack’s chest.

“What was that, Love?” Jack asked.

“I want my mam,” Ianto whispered, sounding broken as he pressed more closely against Jack.

***