Cursed

“Tosh, he’s having a panic attack,” Owen said, his voice low and calm.

“Ianto?” Tosh was now holding him by both of his upper arms.  “Ianto, breathe!”

In the next moment, Jack crashed into the space, running full pelt.  Toshiko took the gown and body bag from Ianto’s hands and stepped away just as Jack skidded to a stop in front of the younger man and pulled him, with great care and deliberation, into his arms.  Ianto was shaking with fear, fatigue, and pain, unable to mask the dread that was creeping though his very being at the thought of never being his lover’s first choice.

Jack could feel the dread as his own, and he was baffled.  He thought they had dealt with this back at St. Mungo’s as Ianto had released all of that darkness.  They had talked so much; Jack had been hopeful that he had finally regained Ianto’s trust.  But now, he realized that this was not old darkness so much as renewed insecurities; because the gift of Ianto’s trust was as fragile as it was beautiful, and until it could grow, it could be far too easily damaged.

He reached up and plucked the comm from Ianto’s ear, and pulled his own out, as well, handing them both to Toshiko, nodding his thanks as she left them.  She was heartened to hear, before she was out of earshot, Jack murmuring reassurances to his young lover.

“You know that’s not true, Ianto.  C’mon, Love.  It’s been a shit day, and an even worse night.  You know why I acted like I favored Gwen over you, but that was before.  We’ve talked that all through, remember?  I know what happened yesterday probably hurt you an awful lot, but that was down to the alien’s influence.  You know that, don’t you?”

“I…” Ianto looked confused and distressed and sad and upset.  “I don’t…” he sobbed, and Jack pulled him back into his embrace.  Ianto buried his face in Jack’s neck, breathing in the older man’s pheromones and trying to calm himself.  “I don’t know anything anymore, Jack,” came the quiet confession.  “I’m so sorry,” he choked.

“Oh, my Love,” Jack crooned.  “You’re tired and overwhelmed, and you’ve had a terrible time of it.  And I know me caving in to the alien’s influence and Gwen’s demands undid a lot of the work we’ve spent the past five weeks doing…”

“No,” Ianto sobbed again, clinging to Jack even more tightly.  He didn’t want to give up on what they had started to build, but he was just so frightened.

Jack felt the fear and drew in a deep breath.  “You told me how you felt, and I tried to explain about Gwen, and we had put all that behind us, and then that damned alien helped her to undo all that we’d done.  But please hang onto the fact that it was the alien that had me caving to her demands, not how I felt about her.  Ianto, I was ready to retcon her and send her home to Rhys, after the way she behaved at lunch.  That’s what was real!”

Ianto sniffed and nodded.  “I know.  I just…” he shook his head.  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me!”

“Nothing is wrong with you,” now Jack was holding him by his upper arms, tilting his head to try to catch Ianto’s downcast eye.  Ianto looked up, and Jack’s heart broke at how ill his lover looked.  Ill, exhausted, afraid.  “You’ve just overdone it, that’s all.  But please know this – nothing has changed.  Everything we’ve built between us is still there.  You’re just having a tough time feeling it, at the moment.  But it’s there, I swear to you.”  He embraced Ianto again.  “You’ll get back to it.  But in the meantime, can you just hold on?”

“I’ll try,” Ianto said, his voice quiet.

“But?” Jack asked, sensing his lover’s hesitancy.

“But,” Ianto drew in a deep breath.  Now or never.  “Even if I’m wrong about the shiny happy Gwen replacements…”

“Which you are,” Jack cut in.

“I’m not wrong about the Doctor, am I?”

Jack blinked as the whole world came to a screeching halt.

Damn.

“I’ve always seen myself as your third choice, after the Doctor and Gwen.”

“What?” Jack was appalled.

“We’ve talked about Gwen,” Ianto went on as though Jack hadn’t spoken, “and now she’s gone.  And if you’re not going to replace her in that way, that’s good.  But that still means I’m a distant second choice, for you.”

Jack drew Ianto back into his arms and held him tight, closing his eyes and feeling the tears he had been holding back until now begin to fall.  He had caused so much pain, and he had been deluding himself to think he and Ianto had worked past all of it in those few short weeks where the young wizard had been forced to contend with so much more than just his trust issues with Jack.  And now, too much had happened, and Ianto was too overwhelmed and exhausted to process the unaddressed pain that had clearly been so close to the surface.

He felt Ianto begin to relax in his arms and vaguely wondered when he had started singing to the younger man.  It had been such an automatic thing, the Boeshanian lullaby something that had calmed Ianto when the nightmares became too much.  They were swaying back and forth, and Jack was relieved that his lover was beginning to calm, though he still felt a heaviness and sense of sorrow and resignation along the bond that made his heart ache.  He realized he had not yet addressed Ianto’s concerns, and his silence was being interpreted as agreement with that appalling statement.

Jack tamped down his own sorrow and opened up every psychic channel, sending all the love and joy and wonder he had been feeling these last few weeks as they had grown closer and admitted (even if not always or entirely aloud) how they felt about one another.  Ianto gave a small gasp when he felt those feelings along their bond, and Jack began to speak.

“You, Ianto Jones, are my first, last, and only choice.  I’m sorry I haven’t been completely clear about that, before now.  It’s just that I’m so used to you being so clever and knowing everything.”  He chuckled when Ianto gave a huff of annoyance at how his little quip during the case with the sleeper cell had become a source of much teasing.  “No, but really.  There are things I told you, and then expected you to make leaps of logic you were too exhausted to make, just so I wouldn’t have to say it out loud.  I’m sorry for that.”

Ianto stopped swaying in Jack’s arms and leaned back to look at him, curious.  Unable to resist, Jack leaned in and gave Ianto a tender kiss, his heart breaking anew at the taste of blood still on his lover’s lips.  He drew in a breath and deepened the kiss just enough to pass along a bit of vortex to Ianto, hoping to bolster him.

“What leap of logic?” Ianto asked when their lips parted, his voice quiet.  Jack felt the first tendrils of hope along their bond, along with annoyance.  Ianto knew all too well that hope could turn to heartbreak in an instant, and he didn’t want to trust.  Not yet.  Perhaps not at all, after the events of the past twelve hours, or so. 

Then he shook his head as it began to clear with the infusion of vortex.  That was unfair.  They had been doing fine – better than fine – until Gwen and that bloody alien had interfered.  But the Doctor had been looming over them, an unacknowledged yet omnipresent pall since Jack had returned, and Ianto wanted an answer.

“I told you that he ran from me,” Jack began, the words difficult to say but the necessity of saying them finally outweighing his reluctance.  “We ended up at the end of the universe.  That’s how the Master broke free.  The Doctor hadn’t left me by accident.  Wasn’t glad to see me.  Let the TARDIS run and unleashed that hell…”  He stopped for a moment, unable to continue but surprised that it no longer felt like the memory would level him.

“Jack,” Ianto whispered, placing a hand on Jack’s cheek.  Jack leaned into the touch and drew strength and comfort from the warmth of his lover’s hand.

“He called me wrong,” he whispered.

Jack had told Ianto all of this already, but he had left out one very important detail.  “When it was all done, he invited me to travel with him.  More out of guilt than loyalty, I’d guess.  But I turned him down,” he hesitated, seeing the surprise on Ianto’s face.  Why hadn’t he told him this already?  “I said I just wanted to come home.  To you.”

“To the team,” Ianto corrected him, and once more, Jack regretted that moment of panic he’d felt when Ianto’s expression had blanked after he’d said he’d come back for the Welshman.  “To Gwen,” he added quietly, then shook his head.  “I know you said you were still raw, still reeling, but…  I’m sorry, Jack.  It still hurts.  I’m trying to get past it, and I think I will, but…”

“But the alien didn’t help,” Jack sighed.  “I know you will.  I think we’ve worked through most of our Gwen issues, and when this latest hurt settles, we can move on from it.”  He took Ianto’s hand and kissed it.  “But what I was trying to say was that I turned the Doctor down.  It wasn’t just that I wanted to come home.  It was also because I wanted to get away from him.  I…  I don’t trust him anymore, Ianto.”

Ianto frowned, not understanding.

“I mean, I trust him to save the planet, if that’s what’s needed.  But he will never be what he once was, to me.  He made me a better man.  Made me want to be a better man.  Saved me from going down a path I could never have come back from.  And that will always be true.  But he destroyed the trust and friendship that I’d thought we had.

“And while we were at St. Mungo’s, while you were fighting for your life, I realized.  You would never treat me that way.  Could never.  And I think in making that comparison, I realized.  Ianto, there’s no competition.  Any choice between you and the Doctor?  I will always choose you.”

Ianto was staring at him, wide-eyed, and he knew he had to tell him the rest, before he lost his nerve.  It would probably hurt, but it needed to be said. 

“But?” Ianto anticipated him.

“If he needs me, needs my help to save the planet, I will go with him.  But never to stay.  I will go, do what’s needed, and then come right back.  To you, Ianto.  I will always come back to you.”

Jack was still broadcasting love and joy and hope and wonder and sincerity, and Ianto had no choice but to believe him.  He leaned in and kissed Jack, a soft kiss full of love and acceptance, before hugging him close.  Jack returned the embrace, mindful of Ianto’s still-healing injuries.

“I’m sorry,” Ianto whispered, embarrassed by his ridiculous insecurities and guilt-ridden for allowing them to make him question Jack’s devotion.

“Hey,” Jack replied, pulling back so he could look Ianto in the eye, “it is no hardship to reassure you when you’re exhausted, overwhelmed, and injured.  Just as it would be no hardship to reassure you when you’re in perfect health.  We all have our moments.  I know you won’t begrudge me mine.  We’re in this together, yeah?”

Jack felt the shift in his lover before he could reply.  It felt as though the dissonance of the past twelve hours had finally resolved, and they were once more in harmony with one another.

“Together,” Ianto smiled, and Jack thought it might be the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

***