Five Days to Absolution - Part 2
Title: Five Days to Absolution (2/4)
Word count: This chapter: 4,817
Characters: Captain Jack Harkness (and his various demons), Alice Carter, imaginary Ianto Jones, OMC, references to Jack/Ianto
Rating: R
Spoilers: Adam, DW: Last of the Time Lords, Children of Earth
Disclaimer: The BBC are the cruel masters of Torchwood and Doctor Who.
Warnings: This fiction is very dark and contains scenes that some may find disturbing/upsetting. Extreme angst, dark thoughts, self-harm and repeated suicide
A/N: This is set post-Children of Earth, and follows the canon therein.
What did Jack do in the first few weeks that followed Children of Earth: Day Five? And when it all becomes too much to bear... who will rescue him now?
There is some comfort in this chapter, as I could never be as cruel to Jack as the real writers are.
"I'm a hallucination, Jack. Everything I'm saying is already in your own subconscious. You know what I say is true. You just made the words come out of my mouth, that's all. Because you don't believe in yourself anymore."
"Such a nice mouth you have too," said Jack, a little dreamily.
Ianto smiled. "You're incorrigible, you are. You even flirt with your own imagination."
Day Three
Jack cleaned himself thoroughly, splashing cold water onto his face and neck until his erection waned, untouched.
He thought he knew what to do today. He would take time to think about each of the sacrificed one by one and ask for their forgiveness, before he punished himself for his sins against them.
He needed some sort of... direction. A ritual. Yeah. That might be what he needed.
Jack was so hungry and thirsty. He glanced at the tap on the kitchen sink. There was no food in the fridge, but he could drink water if he wanted to.
Three days without water, and it was beginning to affect him. When he died, his body regenerated itself of tissue damage, but the lasting effects of his deaths stayed with him for a while, depending on the injury. He could die of severe dehydration, and he would wake up healthy, but the ravaging thirst would still be there.
He still felt the bruising of the rope that he'd tightened around his neck two nights ago. Still felt the sharp sting of the razor cutting open his flesh the day before.
Today, he had a bad headache, so bad he could hardly open his eyes. It would get worse, he knew. Hypotension was setting in; he felt dizzy if he moved his head too quickly.
Better do it now, while he was still lucid.
Jack walked over to the shelf and picked up the gun. He loaded it with six bullets, and then sat cross-legged on the floor, facing the bookshelf. His eyes slid to the coiled up tie for a moment, but then he looked away. It wasn't Ianto's turn yet.
Jack's sins started a long time ago. Maybe too long ago to still dwell on, but he had to start somewhere. And so he began with the first terrible mistake he'd made.
Jack closed his eyes and concentrated as he cast his mind back to a time that, for him, was millennia ago.
Hot day, dazzling sunshine. The sun always seemed to be shining when he was a child. He loves to play in the sand with Gray. They run amongst the dunes, perspiration making their simple tunics stick to the soft skin of their backs.
"Bam, bam!" says Gray, grinning, an imaginary pulse rifle pointed at his big brother.
"Time Agents don't use guns like that," says Jack, scornfully. Not that his name was Jack, back then. It was so long ago, he can hardly remember anyone calling him by his real name.
"So what do they use?" says Gray, squinting in the sun.
"They have secret devices," Jack says knowingly. To tell the truth, he doesn't really know what weapons Time Agents carry. "I'll show you, when I join up."
"I'm joining too," says Gray, "when I'm big, like you."
"You mean I have to put up with you forever?" Jack laughs and picks up his little brother, swinging him in the air and sending him crashing into a soft dune. Gray laughs, picks himself up and chases Jack, promising revenge.
Gray never cries, not even when his big brother is a bit too rough with him. He's a tough little guy.
They run and play and laugh, but then suddenly there are strange, shrill cries coming from the skies; the predatory howling of unfamiliar, terrible creatures. The next moment there are dark shadows swooping, people running from their houses, screaming… his neighbours are lying on the ground, dead. Their father is running towards them, his noble face twisted with fear and panic.
Dad tells him to take Gray's hand, don’t let it go. They have to run; he has to look after his little brother. They'll hide, and then they'll be safe. Dad has to go and fetch their mother, and then they'll all be together, and everything will be alright.
Everything is going to be okay. For a few moments, Jack truly believes that.
Jack remembers running, his feet slipping in the hot sand, sweat pouring down his back. His hands are clammy with sweat and fear, and Gray's small hand in his feels like a hot, slippery fish.
So slippery, his hand must have slipped out of Jack's. When he looks back and sees that Gray isn't there, he can't believe it.
"Gray? Gray!" Jack yells, a cold knot of fear in his stomach. He scans the landscape anxiously for the small boy with curly hair, but he can't see him anywhere. Oh gods… all those people, face down in the sand. They're all dead…
"Gray," Jack said, back in the present, his voice a harsh whisper. "I should have kept looking back as we ran. Should have let you run in front of me, so I could keep my eye on you..."
"Always so selfish," Gray said inside Jack's head; the voice of the child, not the man. "Only ever thought about yourself and what a big man you were going to be when you finally left the Peninsula. Your only thought was of saving yourself!"
"No, that's not true," said Jack, brokenly. "I didn't know… it was so hot, my hand was slippery with sweat… I was holding your hand so tight; I could still feel it inside mine, even after it had slipped out…"
"What do you know," hissed the lost boy. "All you cared about was running away, saving yourself! Too much bother to have to look after me too…"
"I loved you," whispered Jack, insistent. "I loved you so much! I didn't know. I didn't know you weren't right behind me. It all happened so fast…"
"It's all your fault." Gray's voice sounded older now; deep and bitter, the voice of the brother who'd grown up in a world of pain and fear. "You left me behind in hell. I screamed in the dark, begging for death, and it never came. You never came for me… I trusted you! You were meant to be my guardian, my saviour!"
"I'm sorry," Jack said, the tears rolling down his face. "You suffered so much, and it was all my fault…"
And now Gray was truly dead. Surely, in the explosion at the Hub, the vaults would have been destroyed. Gray's body in suspended animation would have perished, along with all the other bodies stored down there.
"You suffered so much…" Jack repeated. "And now you're gone. And I just keep on living… no wonder you hate me."
"I do hate you, brother. There's only one thing you can do. And you'd better do it over and over…"
"I will," said Jack. "I'll keep repenting, I'll suffer only a fraction of what you did, but it's all I can do."
Jack thought back, for a moment, of his time as a prisoner on board the Valiant. A whole year, most of it spent alone and shackled and filthy, being tortured and killed over and over again for the Master's amusement.
He wished himself back there now; he wished to be back in chains, hanging by his bloodied wrists from the ceiling, screaming until his throat was raw. He wished he was caught in the blast of the Master's laser screwdriver, the device set to shred every nerve ending in his body until the shock of enduring such prolonged agony made his heart give out.
Jack tightened his grip on the revolver, slipped off the safety catch, and pointed the barrel a few inches away from his navel. He knew enough about the human body to miss any vital organs. He couldn't die too quickly… that wouldn't be sufficient.
Jack shot himself in the stomach, the silencer ensuring that the sound of the blast was muted enough to raise no attention from his neighbours.
He gritted his teeth, bit back a scream, and lay back weakly on the linoleum, the gun slipping from his hand onto the floor with a loud, metallic clunk. He said sorry to Gray over and over, lips moving silently, as though in soundless prayer. Tears of pain and remorse ran down his cheeks and dripped onto the floor at either side of his head. Dark blood pooled around his torso.
It took him over an hour to die, and every second was excruciating.
And it was all Jack deserved.
Jack revived, whooping in breath after rattling breath, his body heated and sticky with blood. He ran a trembling hand over the nauseating, aching place in his gut. The wound had healed itself completely, but he still felt an echo of it.
Jack got up, and went to clean the blood from his body. Then he got the mop and bucket, and wiped the mess from the floor, leaving a depressingly clean patch in the worn lino.
Hardly any point cleaning up between the different stages of the ritual, he thought, but it was what Ianto would have wanted.
Jack sat cross-legged on the floor again, with the lingering, mingled scent of blood and bleach making his eyes water.
He closed his eyes, thought back to a cold evening in Scotland, 44 years ago.
Oh yes, he'd made a lot of mistakes during his life. He'd done a lot of bad things, but to Jack, it seemed as though all his recent transgressions had started with that dark night in 1965.
They wanted him to do it, to deliver the children to the aliens. Not because there was a risk that any other Torchwood operative might be killed, but because they needed someone who didn't care.
He'd been a little stung at that remark at the time, he remembered, but if that was how the others perceived him, he wasn't going to argue the toss.
They didn't understand, that was all. To him… a normal human life was momentary. He'd loved people, and watched them wither and slip away from him, time and time again. Life was fleeting. He could see the bigger picture, and they had their noses pressed so close to it, they just couldn't see things the way he could.
Twelve lives, to save millions? It seemed like a good deal to him at the time.
"We were just children!" said the voices in his head, the frightened mewling of innocents.
"I know," Jack said, rocking back and forth.
"We trusted you! You lied to us, and then you herded us towards the light like lambs to the slaughter!"
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered, a tear rolling down his face.
"Uncle Jack, you made us call you. You said it was an adventure…"
"I had to! Or else you wouldn't have gone. You'd have been scared. It was better that, than soldiers picking you up and forcing you to go to them… I could see that. Couldn't you see that?" Jack wiped at his face.
"We were innocents. We trusted you. We believed in you!"
"I should have found another way," Jack whispered. "I should have said no… if I'd have said no… oh God. Maybe… none of this would have happened. If we'd have fought them back then… they might not have come back. All those people…"
"All because of you… it's all your fault!" chanted the voices, and Jack knew they were right.
"I know. I'm sorry… and I don't know your names. If I knew your names, I'd honour you now, one by one. Clem MacDonald… you’re the only one I can name. Clem… and the others. I am so sorry…"
Jack cocked the gun and held it up, his arm trembling.
Jack had lied to them all. He'd made them trust him, made them think they were heading for a treat. He'd made those poor children feel safe… and then he'd fed them to the lions. Lies and falsehoods had spilled from his lips… and so this was a fitting punishment.
Jack put the gun into his mouth, feeling the cold steel clink sickeningly against his teeth.
He closed his eyes, and pulled the trigger.
The next bullet was for Suzie, Toshiko and Owen. He'd taken them into Torchwood. He'd let them see the wonders of the universe, but all that had all been just a con, too. He told them that there was so much more out there to discover. More than just this little planet filled with normal people living ordinary lives.
But he didn't tell them that out there in the universe, it's hard and pitiless. Becoming a part of Torchwood means nothing more than a headfuck and an early death.
He'd led them all to the slaughter, just as deviously as he'd gained the trust of twelve innocent children and forced them into the light to face God knows what.
He'd been stupid, he told himself. Not cruel, not malicious. He'd loved them all, in his own way. They were his team, his friends.
But he'd been so thoughtless. He'd kidded himself that he was saving them, giving them a better life. But in the end, he'd just sealed their fates. And that was his fault too.
Maybe not cruel then, but stupid. And ignorance is no mitigation; not in law, and not in the judgment of his own sins.
So Jack raised the gun for the third time that day, said sorry aloud to his fallen comrades, and fired a bullet into his thoughtless, foolish brain.
Day Four
Jack revived, and whimpered. His head was exploding, surely. It felt like a metal clamp was being tightened around his skull. There was a dull ache in his gut.
Three bullets, sleep deprivation, acute hunger and dehydration. It wasn't enough, but he didn't know how much more he could take. He felt so tired and weak. He turned his head with difficulty, and glanced at the gun lying inches from his outstretched hand.
Three bullets left.
One for Alice. Alice was still alive, but he was dead to her now, Jack knew that.
And the fifth bullet was for Stephen.
"Look, Dad. Here he is. Your grandson!"
Jack tries not to pull a face. He'd never imagined he'd become a grandfather, of all things. How old does that make him feel?
Jack smiles down at the squirming, day-old infant in Alice's arms. His son-in-law is out with his friends, wetting the baby's head. As though he ever needs an excuse to go out and get drunk.
"Isn't he beautiful, Dad? We're going to name him Stephen."
Jack nods. It all feels a bit surreal. "Yeah. He is. As beautiful as you were, when you were born. Good name, too."
"Do you want to hold him?"
Jack bites his lip. "No… I'd better not."
"Dad, he's your grandson."
"I know! I'm just a bit…"
freaked out
"…scared of dropping him. I'm not good with babies."
Alice nods, her eyes a little dark. "You could hardly bring yourself to even hug me when I was a child, why should I be surprised?"
"Alice…"
"I'm tired, Dad. Maybe you should go now."
Jack presses a wad of cash into Alice's hand, smiles down at the baby, and then leaves. He winks lasciviously at the pretty blond nurse on his way out of the maternity ward.
He doesn't look back at his pale, angry daughter, or at the dozing child in her arms.
Jack crawled towards the bookshelf, his knee slipping on a smear of blood on the floor that he knew he should wipe up, but didn't have the energy to.
He knelt up, clutching at the wooden shelves for support, until he could reach his mobile phone.
Jack managed to turn himself around and pressed his red-streaked back against the bookcase, feeling the hard wood dig into his aching flesh. Panting, he pressed the power switch of the phone with the pad of his thumb until it spluttered to life. Jack tipped his head back and closed his eyes as it booted up with a jaunty little tune. After a second, he heard it bleep and forced himself to look at the screen through a blurred haze.
2 missed calls: Gwen Cooper it said.
"Leave me alone, Gwen," Jack murmured. "Please… just… forget you ever knew me."
He imagined, for a moment, how Gwen would bite her lip at that if she were here, and how she would put her arms around him and hold him tightly, despite what he'd said.
Oh… to be held. Just for a second. Jack sniffed and wiped at his face wearily. Then he held his phone close to his face so that he could see, and dialled Alice's number from memory.
This was a new phone, a different number; she wouldn't recognise the caller ID. If he could just hear her voice… just get her to listen to him. Just for a minute.
It rang, once… twice… three times. Then there was a click.
"Hello," said a weary-sounding female voice. Jack closed his eyes and felt fresh tears make their slow descent down his cheeks.
She sounded like a zombie. Probably sedated, Jack thought. He tried to speak, but his jaw felt like it had seized up.
"Hello?" Alice said again. She sounded like she'd aged ten years.
Jack opened his mouth but just inhaled a deep breath.
"Jack… is that you?"
Jack. Not 'Dad'.
"What the hell do you want?" Alice sounded… not angry. Frightened. Sickened.
"Alice…" Jack tried.
"Don't you dare…" her voice shook. Now she sounded angry. "Don't you dare dial this number again, you sick, murdering… " There was a desperate sob, and then Jack heard a dull thump as Alice dropped the phone. He heard her crying, muffled in the background.
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered. There was no way Alice would be able to hear him, but he said it anyway. "I didn't have a choice… don't you see? It was Stephen, or millions of kids."
Jack closed his eyes in pain. A good deal, wasn't it? One child, to save millions?
"Alice… pick up the phone. Please… I just want to hear your voice. I just want to tell you I'm sorry…" He kept muttering, but all he heard in response was the desperate sound of his daughter sobbing her broken heart out.
Then there was a fumbling sound, and Alice picked up the phone.
"Don’t ever try to ring me again, do you hear me?" Her voice was a furious snarl.
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered again. He'd said that word so many times, it didn't even sound like a real word to him anymore.
"Oh, you're sorry… yeah. I'm sorry too, Dad." The word 'dad' was a harsh syllable. "I never want to hear from you again. I have no father. Do you understand me?"
Jack pressed the button to end the call.
She was the only one left, the only one who was alive to listen to him… to hear his pleas for forgiveness.
"But the fourth bullet is for you…" Jack said. All the talking in the world wouldn't help, when she wasn't prepared to listen. Jack dropped his phone carelessly to the ground, and picked up the gun.
Jack pressed the business end of the gun against the soft area beneath his jawbone. He swallowed hard, feeling his flesh move against the cold metal. He gritted his teeth and tightened his finger on the trigger…
Then with a scream of rage and impotence, he held the gun out in front of him, and fired twice into the wall. The bullet for Alice and the bullet for Stephen both thudded into grimy plaster, instead of into his flesh. They missed the scrupulously clean cooker by three, and five inches respectively.
What a pathetic coward he was.
Jack's head was spinning. He had terrible muscle cramps in both of his arms. Felt his heart beating too slowly. He could hear the blood pumping loudly in his ears.
The white noise in his head was loud. There was another sound, coming from the litter-strewn Courtyard a few levels below his flat; an eerie sound that Jack would have recognised, if he'd been listening.
But Jack wasn't listening. He was too busy sinking willingly into the blessed gloom of oblivion.
Jack didn't know how long he'd been unconscious. He was aware that he was back in the middle of the room again, lying on his stomach on the floor, and not leaning against the bookshelves. Maybe that good old human survival instinct had kicked in, and his body had tried to propel him towards the kitchen so that he could take a drink of water. He'd obviously collapsed halfway there.
The gun was laid a couple of feet away from him, on the floor. He glanced up and saw the two bullet holes in the wall, and for some reason he found the sight hilarious. He cackled, and the laughter being forced out through his dry, raw throat sounded like rustling paper.
There was one bullet left. He rolled over, with some difficulty, onto his back. He didn't need to be sitting up to shoot himself with the last bullet; all he had to do was shuffle over far enough to reach the gun.
"That one's in my honour, is it?" said Ianto. Jack opened his eyes wearily and looked over at the handsome young man sitting on the closed-up sofa bed a few feet away. He was perched stiffly on the edge, as though reluctant to get his clothes dirty.
"Hey, Ianto. Looking good," Jack murmured.
"Thanks," said Ianto. He was. The wound on his cheek had gone; his dark hair was neatly brushed and his suit looked nicely pressed and clean. He was sporting the purple and silver tie, the one he'd died wearing, which matched perfectly against his dark grey suit and the lilac shirt that he didn't wear often enough. Jack liked that lilac shirt.
Jack glanced over to the shelf. The real tie was still there, coiled up.
Jack chuckled dryly. "I must say, this is a bit different. I hear the voices of the sacrificed in my head, but I can't usually see them."
Ianto smiled.
Jack swallowed painfully. God, his throat was dry. His tongue felt swollen, too. "So what are you, a ghost?"
Ianto pulled his 'as if' face. "Don't be silly. I'm a hallucination. You haven't eaten or drunk anything for four days. Acute dehydration causes headaches, muscle cramps, hypotension, dizziness, bouts of unconsciousness and, of course, delirium."
"Now you sound like Owen," Jack complained.
Ianto got off the couch and came to sit on the floor by Jack, cross-legged. "This place is horrible," he said, looking round with an expression of distaste on his face.
Jack nodded, with difficulty. Oh, his head hurt. "It's all I deserve," he explained.
"So what are you going to do with the last bullet in your gun?" Ianto spoke softly.
"I'm going to shoot myself through the heart," said Jack, flatly. "It doesn't matter, does it? My heart's already broken, after all."
"Ooh. That's poetic, Jack. Very symbolic. Did you think that one up all by yourself?"
"Oh, how I've missed your sarcasm," said Jack hollowly.
He really did miss it, though. Ianto's face crumpled with dismay as Jack began to cry again. "Don't cry, Jack," said Ianto, his voice breaking. "You've cried enough."
"I'm sorry, Ianto…" said Jack, feeling the warm tears roll down his face and pool onto the floor. "It was all my fault…"
Jack felt his head being tugged upwards and rested on a warm lap. "No, it wasn't, love," said Ianto. His warm, affectionate fingers stroked at Jack's face; ran through his hair soothingly.
"It's all my fault. All of it. I have to suffer for my sins… I have to suffer for everyone I've hurt…" Jack said, his voice hitching between sobs.
"No, Jack. Stop this now." Ianto sounded forceful, even a little angry. He sounded like he had a few weeks ago, telling the 456 that they couldn't have any more children, not one.
"It's all I deserve," Jack repeated.
"Please. Stop doing this to yourself," Ianto said, his voice softening.
"The voices… in my head. They all hate me… they blame me. What else can I do?" Jack sounded so lost, so broken.
"Gray was taken as a child by monsters. He lived a terrible life, Jack. It was horrific, but you were only a kid yourself when they took him."
"Gray said it was my fault," said Jack. Arguing with his own subconscious seemed vaguely ridiculous, he decided.
"Gray was traumatised. Who wouldn't be? He needed to blame someone. And all he could fixate on was you, can't you see that? It wasn't your fault. And he knew that, deep down. We all try to find someone else to blame when something terrible happens."
Jack nodded. Ianto's fingers on his scalp felt so nice.
"And Suzie… Owen. Tosh… you know they'd never have blamed you for what happened to them. Well… Suzie, maybe. But she was a bitch."
Jack choked out a tiny snort of laughter through his tears.
"And those kids…" Ianto said. His voice was so soothing. Jack missed him so much. Fresh tears rolled down his cheeks.
"The children, in 1965. They wouldn't blame you, either. They were too young to blame anyone."
"I gave them to the 456. Handed them over like they were nothing but currency!" Jack spat angrily.
"And if it hadn't been you, someone else would have done it."
"They picked me, because they needed someone who didn't care," sobbed Jack. "Is that how they perceived me, Ianto? Like some cold, heartless bastard?"
"They picked you, because no-one else had the balls," said Ianto firmly. "Nobody else had the guts to make that kind of hard decision and live with it. That's why."
"What are you, the voice of reason?"
"I'm a hallucination, Jack. Everything I'm saying is already in your own subconscious. You know what I say is true. You just made the words come out of my mouth, that's all. Because you don't believe in yourself anymore."
"Such a nice mouth you have too," said Jack, a little dreamily.
Ianto smiled. "You're incorrigible, you are. You even flirt with your own imagination."
"What about Alice?" Jack said suddenly. "She hates me. She blames me. She says she has no father. I've lost her, Ianto. I sacrificed my own flesh and blood! What kind of monster does that?"
"You had no choice," said Ianto simply.
"He'd have done something else…" Jack muttered. "He'd have found another way."
Ianto didn't reply. Jack looked up into the kind blue eyes of the man he'd loved.
Ianto smiled. "I knew you loved me," he said gently. "Why were you so scared of it? And you knew that I loved you. Why couldn't you let me say it? Why couldn't you just talk to me, you bloody idiot?"
Jack shook his head. "Loving me never did anyone any good, Ianto. I've proved it time and time again. And everyone… mostly everyone I ever loved… I lost them. I lose them all, in the end. So I try not to love. If you hadn't loved me, maybe… maybe you'd have been safe."
"That's stupid."
Jack put both hands over his face. "Please…" he choked. "Please just leave me alone, Ianto."
Ianto's fingers continued to soothe him; soft, long fingers brushed the sweat-stiffened hair away from his grimy forehead. "I love you, Jack," said Ianto quietly.
"Shut up!" said Jack angrily, from behind his hands.
"Jack… stop doing this to yourself. Please. For me?"
Jack closed his tired eyes as his lead-heavy arms lost their strength and his hands slipped away from his face. He couldn't feel his body anymore. He was numb. Everything was going dark.
"Tell me you love me, Jack."
"I think I'm dying," said Jack, out loud.
Ianto leaned over and pressed his lips to Jack's mouth. Jack couldn't feel Ianto's lips, because they weren't real. But the thought of it warmed his heart.
And it didn't matter now, anyway. "I love you, Ianto," Jack whispered. He smiled properly, for the first time in weeks.
Hey. Hadn't been that difficult, after all.
Jack looked up through a blur of tears into Ianto's face. Ianto was smiling. He was radiant. He shone, like an angel.
"For everyone… for everything. I forgive you," said Ianto. He leaned over and kissed Jack softly on the forehead.
Jack felt Ianto's lips press against his heated flesh. Really felt it.
"Thank you…" Jack slurred.
And then everything went black.
It was a while before Jack realised that he'd regained consciousness. The echo of his delirium must still have been rolling around his mind, Jack thought, because he could still feel his head being cradled in someone's lap. A man's lap.
A real lap.
His eyes snapped open. He looked up into sad, brown eyes, looking back at him beneath a tousled, spiky shock of light brown hair.
"Hello, Captain," said the Doctor.
TO BE CONTINUED
<< Chapter One
>> Chapter Three
>> Chapter Four
...
Word count: This chapter: 4,817
Characters: Captain Jack Harkness (and his various demons), Alice Carter, imaginary Ianto Jones, OMC, references to Jack/Ianto
Rating: R
Spoilers: Adam, DW: Last of the Time Lords, Children of Earth
Disclaimer: The BBC are the cruel masters of Torchwood and Doctor Who.
Warnings: This fiction is very dark and contains scenes that some may find disturbing/upsetting. Extreme angst, dark thoughts, self-harm and repeated suicide
A/N: This is set post-Children of Earth, and follows the canon therein.
What did Jack do in the first few weeks that followed Children of Earth: Day Five? And when it all becomes too much to bear... who will rescue him now?
There is some comfort in this chapter, as I could never be as cruel to Jack as the real writers are.
"I'm a hallucination, Jack. Everything I'm saying is already in your own subconscious. You know what I say is true. You just made the words come out of my mouth, that's all. Because you don't believe in yourself anymore."
"Such a nice mouth you have too," said Jack, a little dreamily.
Ianto smiled. "You're incorrigible, you are. You even flirt with your own imagination."
Day Three
Jack cleaned himself thoroughly, splashing cold water onto his face and neck until his erection waned, untouched.
He thought he knew what to do today. He would take time to think about each of the sacrificed one by one and ask for their forgiveness, before he punished himself for his sins against them.
He needed some sort of... direction. A ritual. Yeah. That might be what he needed.
Jack was so hungry and thirsty. He glanced at the tap on the kitchen sink. There was no food in the fridge, but he could drink water if he wanted to.
Three days without water, and it was beginning to affect him. When he died, his body regenerated itself of tissue damage, but the lasting effects of his deaths stayed with him for a while, depending on the injury. He could die of severe dehydration, and he would wake up healthy, but the ravaging thirst would still be there.
He still felt the bruising of the rope that he'd tightened around his neck two nights ago. Still felt the sharp sting of the razor cutting open his flesh the day before.
Today, he had a bad headache, so bad he could hardly open his eyes. It would get worse, he knew. Hypotension was setting in; he felt dizzy if he moved his head too quickly.
Better do it now, while he was still lucid.
Jack walked over to the shelf and picked up the gun. He loaded it with six bullets, and then sat cross-legged on the floor, facing the bookshelf. His eyes slid to the coiled up tie for a moment, but then he looked away. It wasn't Ianto's turn yet.
Jack's sins started a long time ago. Maybe too long ago to still dwell on, but he had to start somewhere. And so he began with the first terrible mistake he'd made.
Jack closed his eyes and concentrated as he cast his mind back to a time that, for him, was millennia ago.
Hot day, dazzling sunshine. The sun always seemed to be shining when he was a child. He loves to play in the sand with Gray. They run amongst the dunes, perspiration making their simple tunics stick to the soft skin of their backs.
"Bam, bam!" says Gray, grinning, an imaginary pulse rifle pointed at his big brother.
"Time Agents don't use guns like that," says Jack, scornfully. Not that his name was Jack, back then. It was so long ago, he can hardly remember anyone calling him by his real name.
"So what do they use?" says Gray, squinting in the sun.
"They have secret devices," Jack says knowingly. To tell the truth, he doesn't really know what weapons Time Agents carry. "I'll show you, when I join up."
"I'm joining too," says Gray, "when I'm big, like you."
"You mean I have to put up with you forever?" Jack laughs and picks up his little brother, swinging him in the air and sending him crashing into a soft dune. Gray laughs, picks himself up and chases Jack, promising revenge.
Gray never cries, not even when his big brother is a bit too rough with him. He's a tough little guy.
They run and play and laugh, but then suddenly there are strange, shrill cries coming from the skies; the predatory howling of unfamiliar, terrible creatures. The next moment there are dark shadows swooping, people running from their houses, screaming… his neighbours are lying on the ground, dead. Their father is running towards them, his noble face twisted with fear and panic.
Dad tells him to take Gray's hand, don’t let it go. They have to run; he has to look after his little brother. They'll hide, and then they'll be safe. Dad has to go and fetch their mother, and then they'll all be together, and everything will be alright.
Everything is going to be okay. For a few moments, Jack truly believes that.
Jack remembers running, his feet slipping in the hot sand, sweat pouring down his back. His hands are clammy with sweat and fear, and Gray's small hand in his feels like a hot, slippery fish.
So slippery, his hand must have slipped out of Jack's. When he looks back and sees that Gray isn't there, he can't believe it.
"Gray? Gray!" Jack yells, a cold knot of fear in his stomach. He scans the landscape anxiously for the small boy with curly hair, but he can't see him anywhere. Oh gods… all those people, face down in the sand. They're all dead…
"Gray," Jack said, back in the present, his voice a harsh whisper. "I should have kept looking back as we ran. Should have let you run in front of me, so I could keep my eye on you..."
"Always so selfish," Gray said inside Jack's head; the voice of the child, not the man. "Only ever thought about yourself and what a big man you were going to be when you finally left the Peninsula. Your only thought was of saving yourself!"
"No, that's not true," said Jack, brokenly. "I didn't know… it was so hot, my hand was slippery with sweat… I was holding your hand so tight; I could still feel it inside mine, even after it had slipped out…"
"What do you know," hissed the lost boy. "All you cared about was running away, saving yourself! Too much bother to have to look after me too…"
"I loved you," whispered Jack, insistent. "I loved you so much! I didn't know. I didn't know you weren't right behind me. It all happened so fast…"
"It's all your fault." Gray's voice sounded older now; deep and bitter, the voice of the brother who'd grown up in a world of pain and fear. "You left me behind in hell. I screamed in the dark, begging for death, and it never came. You never came for me… I trusted you! You were meant to be my guardian, my saviour!"
"I'm sorry," Jack said, the tears rolling down his face. "You suffered so much, and it was all my fault…"
And now Gray was truly dead. Surely, in the explosion at the Hub, the vaults would have been destroyed. Gray's body in suspended animation would have perished, along with all the other bodies stored down there.
"You suffered so much…" Jack repeated. "And now you're gone. And I just keep on living… no wonder you hate me."
"I do hate you, brother. There's only one thing you can do. And you'd better do it over and over…"
"I will," said Jack. "I'll keep repenting, I'll suffer only a fraction of what you did, but it's all I can do."
Jack thought back, for a moment, of his time as a prisoner on board the Valiant. A whole year, most of it spent alone and shackled and filthy, being tortured and killed over and over again for the Master's amusement.
He wished himself back there now; he wished to be back in chains, hanging by his bloodied wrists from the ceiling, screaming until his throat was raw. He wished he was caught in the blast of the Master's laser screwdriver, the device set to shred every nerve ending in his body until the shock of enduring such prolonged agony made his heart give out.
Jack tightened his grip on the revolver, slipped off the safety catch, and pointed the barrel a few inches away from his navel. He knew enough about the human body to miss any vital organs. He couldn't die too quickly… that wouldn't be sufficient.
Jack shot himself in the stomach, the silencer ensuring that the sound of the blast was muted enough to raise no attention from his neighbours.
He gritted his teeth, bit back a scream, and lay back weakly on the linoleum, the gun slipping from his hand onto the floor with a loud, metallic clunk. He said sorry to Gray over and over, lips moving silently, as though in soundless prayer. Tears of pain and remorse ran down his cheeks and dripped onto the floor at either side of his head. Dark blood pooled around his torso.
It took him over an hour to die, and every second was excruciating.
And it was all Jack deserved.
Jack revived, whooping in breath after rattling breath, his body heated and sticky with blood. He ran a trembling hand over the nauseating, aching place in his gut. The wound had healed itself completely, but he still felt an echo of it.
Jack got up, and went to clean the blood from his body. Then he got the mop and bucket, and wiped the mess from the floor, leaving a depressingly clean patch in the worn lino.
Hardly any point cleaning up between the different stages of the ritual, he thought, but it was what Ianto would have wanted.
Jack sat cross-legged on the floor again, with the lingering, mingled scent of blood and bleach making his eyes water.
He closed his eyes, thought back to a cold evening in Scotland, 44 years ago.
Oh yes, he'd made a lot of mistakes during his life. He'd done a lot of bad things, but to Jack, it seemed as though all his recent transgressions had started with that dark night in 1965.
They wanted him to do it, to deliver the children to the aliens. Not because there was a risk that any other Torchwood operative might be killed, but because they needed someone who didn't care.
He'd been a little stung at that remark at the time, he remembered, but if that was how the others perceived him, he wasn't going to argue the toss.
They didn't understand, that was all. To him… a normal human life was momentary. He'd loved people, and watched them wither and slip away from him, time and time again. Life was fleeting. He could see the bigger picture, and they had their noses pressed so close to it, they just couldn't see things the way he could.
Twelve lives, to save millions? It seemed like a good deal to him at the time.
"We were just children!" said the voices in his head, the frightened mewling of innocents.
"I know," Jack said, rocking back and forth.
"We trusted you! You lied to us, and then you herded us towards the light like lambs to the slaughter!"
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered, a tear rolling down his face.
"Uncle Jack, you made us call you. You said it was an adventure…"
"I had to! Or else you wouldn't have gone. You'd have been scared. It was better that, than soldiers picking you up and forcing you to go to them… I could see that. Couldn't you see that?" Jack wiped at his face.
"We were innocents. We trusted you. We believed in you!"
"I should have found another way," Jack whispered. "I should have said no… if I'd have said no… oh God. Maybe… none of this would have happened. If we'd have fought them back then… they might not have come back. All those people…"
"All because of you… it's all your fault!" chanted the voices, and Jack knew they were right.
"I know. I'm sorry… and I don't know your names. If I knew your names, I'd honour you now, one by one. Clem MacDonald… you’re the only one I can name. Clem… and the others. I am so sorry…"
Jack cocked the gun and held it up, his arm trembling.
Jack had lied to them all. He'd made them trust him, made them think they were heading for a treat. He'd made those poor children feel safe… and then he'd fed them to the lions. Lies and falsehoods had spilled from his lips… and so this was a fitting punishment.
Jack put the gun into his mouth, feeling the cold steel clink sickeningly against his teeth.
He closed his eyes, and pulled the trigger.
The next bullet was for Suzie, Toshiko and Owen. He'd taken them into Torchwood. He'd let them see the wonders of the universe, but all that had all been just a con, too. He told them that there was so much more out there to discover. More than just this little planet filled with normal people living ordinary lives.
But he didn't tell them that out there in the universe, it's hard and pitiless. Becoming a part of Torchwood means nothing more than a headfuck and an early death.
He'd led them all to the slaughter, just as deviously as he'd gained the trust of twelve innocent children and forced them into the light to face God knows what.
He'd been stupid, he told himself. Not cruel, not malicious. He'd loved them all, in his own way. They were his team, his friends.
But he'd been so thoughtless. He'd kidded himself that he was saving them, giving them a better life. But in the end, he'd just sealed their fates. And that was his fault too.
Maybe not cruel then, but stupid. And ignorance is no mitigation; not in law, and not in the judgment of his own sins.
So Jack raised the gun for the third time that day, said sorry aloud to his fallen comrades, and fired a bullet into his thoughtless, foolish brain.
Day Four
Jack revived, and whimpered. His head was exploding, surely. It felt like a metal clamp was being tightened around his skull. There was a dull ache in his gut.
Three bullets, sleep deprivation, acute hunger and dehydration. It wasn't enough, but he didn't know how much more he could take. He felt so tired and weak. He turned his head with difficulty, and glanced at the gun lying inches from his outstretched hand.
Three bullets left.
One for Alice. Alice was still alive, but he was dead to her now, Jack knew that.
And the fifth bullet was for Stephen.
"Look, Dad. Here he is. Your grandson!"
Jack tries not to pull a face. He'd never imagined he'd become a grandfather, of all things. How old does that make him feel?
Jack smiles down at the squirming, day-old infant in Alice's arms. His son-in-law is out with his friends, wetting the baby's head. As though he ever needs an excuse to go out and get drunk.
"Isn't he beautiful, Dad? We're going to name him Stephen."
Jack nods. It all feels a bit surreal. "Yeah. He is. As beautiful as you were, when you were born. Good name, too."
"Do you want to hold him?"
Jack bites his lip. "No… I'd better not."
"Dad, he's your grandson."
"I know! I'm just a bit…"
freaked out
"…scared of dropping him. I'm not good with babies."
Alice nods, her eyes a little dark. "You could hardly bring yourself to even hug me when I was a child, why should I be surprised?"
"Alice…"
"I'm tired, Dad. Maybe you should go now."
Jack presses a wad of cash into Alice's hand, smiles down at the baby, and then leaves. He winks lasciviously at the pretty blond nurse on his way out of the maternity ward.
He doesn't look back at his pale, angry daughter, or at the dozing child in her arms.
Jack crawled towards the bookshelf, his knee slipping on a smear of blood on the floor that he knew he should wipe up, but didn't have the energy to.
He knelt up, clutching at the wooden shelves for support, until he could reach his mobile phone.
Jack managed to turn himself around and pressed his red-streaked back against the bookcase, feeling the hard wood dig into his aching flesh. Panting, he pressed the power switch of the phone with the pad of his thumb until it spluttered to life. Jack tipped his head back and closed his eyes as it booted up with a jaunty little tune. After a second, he heard it bleep and forced himself to look at the screen through a blurred haze.
2 missed calls: Gwen Cooper it said.
"Leave me alone, Gwen," Jack murmured. "Please… just… forget you ever knew me."
He imagined, for a moment, how Gwen would bite her lip at that if she were here, and how she would put her arms around him and hold him tightly, despite what he'd said.
Oh… to be held. Just for a second. Jack sniffed and wiped at his face wearily. Then he held his phone close to his face so that he could see, and dialled Alice's number from memory.
This was a new phone, a different number; she wouldn't recognise the caller ID. If he could just hear her voice… just get her to listen to him. Just for a minute.
It rang, once… twice… three times. Then there was a click.
"Hello," said a weary-sounding female voice. Jack closed his eyes and felt fresh tears make their slow descent down his cheeks.
She sounded like a zombie. Probably sedated, Jack thought. He tried to speak, but his jaw felt like it had seized up.
"Hello?" Alice said again. She sounded like she'd aged ten years.
Jack opened his mouth but just inhaled a deep breath.
"Jack… is that you?"
Jack. Not 'Dad'.
"What the hell do you want?" Alice sounded… not angry. Frightened. Sickened.
"Alice…" Jack tried.
"Don't you dare…" her voice shook. Now she sounded angry. "Don't you dare dial this number again, you sick, murdering… " There was a desperate sob, and then Jack heard a dull thump as Alice dropped the phone. He heard her crying, muffled in the background.
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered. There was no way Alice would be able to hear him, but he said it anyway. "I didn't have a choice… don't you see? It was Stephen, or millions of kids."
Jack closed his eyes in pain. A good deal, wasn't it? One child, to save millions?
"Alice… pick up the phone. Please… I just want to hear your voice. I just want to tell you I'm sorry…" He kept muttering, but all he heard in response was the desperate sound of his daughter sobbing her broken heart out.
Then there was a fumbling sound, and Alice picked up the phone.
"Don’t ever try to ring me again, do you hear me?" Her voice was a furious snarl.
"I'm sorry…" Jack whispered again. He'd said that word so many times, it didn't even sound like a real word to him anymore.
"Oh, you're sorry… yeah. I'm sorry too, Dad." The word 'dad' was a harsh syllable. "I never want to hear from you again. I have no father. Do you understand me?"
Jack pressed the button to end the call.
She was the only one left, the only one who was alive to listen to him… to hear his pleas for forgiveness.
"But the fourth bullet is for you…" Jack said. All the talking in the world wouldn't help, when she wasn't prepared to listen. Jack dropped his phone carelessly to the ground, and picked up the gun.
Jack pressed the business end of the gun against the soft area beneath his jawbone. He swallowed hard, feeling his flesh move against the cold metal. He gritted his teeth and tightened his finger on the trigger…
Then with a scream of rage and impotence, he held the gun out in front of him, and fired twice into the wall. The bullet for Alice and the bullet for Stephen both thudded into grimy plaster, instead of into his flesh. They missed the scrupulously clean cooker by three, and five inches respectively.
What a pathetic coward he was.
Jack's head was spinning. He had terrible muscle cramps in both of his arms. Felt his heart beating too slowly. He could hear the blood pumping loudly in his ears.
The white noise in his head was loud. There was another sound, coming from the litter-strewn Courtyard a few levels below his flat; an eerie sound that Jack would have recognised, if he'd been listening.
But Jack wasn't listening. He was too busy sinking willingly into the blessed gloom of oblivion.
Jack didn't know how long he'd been unconscious. He was aware that he was back in the middle of the room again, lying on his stomach on the floor, and not leaning against the bookshelves. Maybe that good old human survival instinct had kicked in, and his body had tried to propel him towards the kitchen so that he could take a drink of water. He'd obviously collapsed halfway there.
The gun was laid a couple of feet away from him, on the floor. He glanced up and saw the two bullet holes in the wall, and for some reason he found the sight hilarious. He cackled, and the laughter being forced out through his dry, raw throat sounded like rustling paper.
There was one bullet left. He rolled over, with some difficulty, onto his back. He didn't need to be sitting up to shoot himself with the last bullet; all he had to do was shuffle over far enough to reach the gun.
"That one's in my honour, is it?" said Ianto. Jack opened his eyes wearily and looked over at the handsome young man sitting on the closed-up sofa bed a few feet away. He was perched stiffly on the edge, as though reluctant to get his clothes dirty.
"Hey, Ianto. Looking good," Jack murmured.
"Thanks," said Ianto. He was. The wound on his cheek had gone; his dark hair was neatly brushed and his suit looked nicely pressed and clean. He was sporting the purple and silver tie, the one he'd died wearing, which matched perfectly against his dark grey suit and the lilac shirt that he didn't wear often enough. Jack liked that lilac shirt.
Jack glanced over to the shelf. The real tie was still there, coiled up.
Jack chuckled dryly. "I must say, this is a bit different. I hear the voices of the sacrificed in my head, but I can't usually see them."
Ianto smiled.
Jack swallowed painfully. God, his throat was dry. His tongue felt swollen, too. "So what are you, a ghost?"
Ianto pulled his 'as if' face. "Don't be silly. I'm a hallucination. You haven't eaten or drunk anything for four days. Acute dehydration causes headaches, muscle cramps, hypotension, dizziness, bouts of unconsciousness and, of course, delirium."
"Now you sound like Owen," Jack complained.
Ianto got off the couch and came to sit on the floor by Jack, cross-legged. "This place is horrible," he said, looking round with an expression of distaste on his face.
Jack nodded, with difficulty. Oh, his head hurt. "It's all I deserve," he explained.
"So what are you going to do with the last bullet in your gun?" Ianto spoke softly.
"I'm going to shoot myself through the heart," said Jack, flatly. "It doesn't matter, does it? My heart's already broken, after all."
"Ooh. That's poetic, Jack. Very symbolic. Did you think that one up all by yourself?"
"Oh, how I've missed your sarcasm," said Jack hollowly.
He really did miss it, though. Ianto's face crumpled with dismay as Jack began to cry again. "Don't cry, Jack," said Ianto, his voice breaking. "You've cried enough."
"I'm sorry, Ianto…" said Jack, feeling the warm tears roll down his face and pool onto the floor. "It was all my fault…"
Jack felt his head being tugged upwards and rested on a warm lap. "No, it wasn't, love," said Ianto. His warm, affectionate fingers stroked at Jack's face; ran through his hair soothingly.
"It's all my fault. All of it. I have to suffer for my sins… I have to suffer for everyone I've hurt…" Jack said, his voice hitching between sobs.
"No, Jack. Stop this now." Ianto sounded forceful, even a little angry. He sounded like he had a few weeks ago, telling the 456 that they couldn't have any more children, not one.
"It's all I deserve," Jack repeated.
"Please. Stop doing this to yourself," Ianto said, his voice softening.
"The voices… in my head. They all hate me… they blame me. What else can I do?" Jack sounded so lost, so broken.
"Gray was taken as a child by monsters. He lived a terrible life, Jack. It was horrific, but you were only a kid yourself when they took him."
"Gray said it was my fault," said Jack. Arguing with his own subconscious seemed vaguely ridiculous, he decided.
"Gray was traumatised. Who wouldn't be? He needed to blame someone. And all he could fixate on was you, can't you see that? It wasn't your fault. And he knew that, deep down. We all try to find someone else to blame when something terrible happens."
Jack nodded. Ianto's fingers on his scalp felt so nice.
"And Suzie… Owen. Tosh… you know they'd never have blamed you for what happened to them. Well… Suzie, maybe. But she was a bitch."
Jack choked out a tiny snort of laughter through his tears.
"And those kids…" Ianto said. His voice was so soothing. Jack missed him so much. Fresh tears rolled down his cheeks.
"The children, in 1965. They wouldn't blame you, either. They were too young to blame anyone."
"I gave them to the 456. Handed them over like they were nothing but currency!" Jack spat angrily.
"And if it hadn't been you, someone else would have done it."
"They picked me, because they needed someone who didn't care," sobbed Jack. "Is that how they perceived me, Ianto? Like some cold, heartless bastard?"
"They picked you, because no-one else had the balls," said Ianto firmly. "Nobody else had the guts to make that kind of hard decision and live with it. That's why."
"What are you, the voice of reason?"
"I'm a hallucination, Jack. Everything I'm saying is already in your own subconscious. You know what I say is true. You just made the words come out of my mouth, that's all. Because you don't believe in yourself anymore."
"Such a nice mouth you have too," said Jack, a little dreamily.
Ianto smiled. "You're incorrigible, you are. You even flirt with your own imagination."
"What about Alice?" Jack said suddenly. "She hates me. She blames me. She says she has no father. I've lost her, Ianto. I sacrificed my own flesh and blood! What kind of monster does that?"
"You had no choice," said Ianto simply.
"He'd have done something else…" Jack muttered. "He'd have found another way."
Ianto didn't reply. Jack looked up into the kind blue eyes of the man he'd loved.
Ianto smiled. "I knew you loved me," he said gently. "Why were you so scared of it? And you knew that I loved you. Why couldn't you let me say it? Why couldn't you just talk to me, you bloody idiot?"
Jack shook his head. "Loving me never did anyone any good, Ianto. I've proved it time and time again. And everyone… mostly everyone I ever loved… I lost them. I lose them all, in the end. So I try not to love. If you hadn't loved me, maybe… maybe you'd have been safe."
"That's stupid."
Jack put both hands over his face. "Please…" he choked. "Please just leave me alone, Ianto."
Ianto's fingers continued to soothe him; soft, long fingers brushed the sweat-stiffened hair away from his grimy forehead. "I love you, Jack," said Ianto quietly.
"Shut up!" said Jack angrily, from behind his hands.
"Jack… stop doing this to yourself. Please. For me?"
Jack closed his tired eyes as his lead-heavy arms lost their strength and his hands slipped away from his face. He couldn't feel his body anymore. He was numb. Everything was going dark.
"Tell me you love me, Jack."
"I think I'm dying," said Jack, out loud.
Ianto leaned over and pressed his lips to Jack's mouth. Jack couldn't feel Ianto's lips, because they weren't real. But the thought of it warmed his heart.
And it didn't matter now, anyway. "I love you, Ianto," Jack whispered. He smiled properly, for the first time in weeks.
Hey. Hadn't been that difficult, after all.
Jack looked up through a blur of tears into Ianto's face. Ianto was smiling. He was radiant. He shone, like an angel.
"For everyone… for everything. I forgive you," said Ianto. He leaned over and kissed Jack softly on the forehead.
Jack felt Ianto's lips press against his heated flesh. Really felt it.
"Thank you…" Jack slurred.
And then everything went black.
It was a while before Jack realised that he'd regained consciousness. The echo of his delirium must still have been rolling around his mind, Jack thought, because he could still feel his head being cradled in someone's lap. A man's lap.
A real lap.
His eyes snapped open. He looked up into sad, brown eyes, looking back at him beneath a tousled, spiky shock of light brown hair.
"Hello, Captain," said the Doctor.
TO BE CONTINUED
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>> Chapter Four
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