Fic: Never Giving Up
Title: Never Giving Up
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Gwen, Rhys, Ianto, his TARDIS.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Jack has lost hope following the events of Children of Earth, but Ianto is determined to find his lover again, and he will never give up.
Word Count: 1260
Written For: Prompt 212 - Hope at fandomweekly.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
A/N: Set in my Through Time and Space ‘Verse.
The night he left earth, standing at the top of a hill outside Cardiff in the chill of early spring, Jack was out of hope, out of just about everything. All he knew was that he couldn’t stay; there was nowhere on the entire planet that the pain and the memories couldn’t find him. He doubted he’d find any such place out among the stars either, but leaving was marginally better than hanging around like some kind of restless ghost.
He felt almost nothing as he said goodbye to Gwen and Rhys, nothing but the same cold, hollow emptiness he’d been feeling for the last six months. He never expected to see them after this, and that was fine; they’d be better off without him, no matter what Gwen might think. Part of him hated them, in a distant, distracted way, for being alive and with a baby on the way; they had it all, while he’d lost everything that mattered to him. It wasn’t even a question of fairness or the lack thereof, just another one of the universe’s cruel tricks played on an immortal man who had no right to exist, but hadn’t been given any choice in the matter. Perhaps this was no more than he deserved for being a freak, and for failing so spectacularly.
Oh, he’d found a way to defeat the 456, and had saved earth’s children, all except one. He’d sacrificed his only grandson so that no one else on the planet would have to endure having their own children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews wrenched from their arms and handed over to a bunch of drug addicted aliens who intended to use them to get high. Maybe, just maybe, he could have coped with losing the man he’d loved if he hadn’t been forced to destroy his daughter’s life by turning her son into a weapon, but… It seemed Ianto had been right all along when he’d called Jack a monster.
If he could have found some other way to deal with the alien threat, then he would have, but thanks to the government sending out a kill squad to prevent Torchwood from interfering with their plans, there simply hadn’t been time to look for alternatives. The constructive wave had been the only option, the signal had needed to be passed through a child, and Steven had been the only child he’d had access to; there hadn’t been time to find another. Still, Jack hated himself for what he’d done, and he couldn’t understand why Gwen would want him to stay. Didn’t she realise how dangerous he was to be around? If he stayed it would only be a matter of time before he got her killed as well, and probably her husband and child too.
So he left in a brilliant flash of light, not with any expectation of finding anything out there in the vastness of space, but only with the intention of losing himself amongst the stars, because he couldn’t die and yet he had nothing left worth living for. His continuing existence would be his penance for all the harm he’d done, all the lives he’d failed to save over his too-long existence. Not just Steven and Ianto, but Tosh, Owen, Suzie, Alex, Greg… Too many to count. He didn’t want to add to their number by destroying more lives.
OoOoO
As Jack teleported up to the cold fusion cruiser somewhere out on the edge of earth’s solar system, Ianto Jones, restored to life by a strange convergence of events he didn’t fully understand, stood aboard his TARDIS and cursed the limitations the universe had seen fit to force on his new existence. If he and the TARDIS could have intercepted the matter stream, Jack would be with him now, and Ianto could have helped him begin healing from all that he’d endured. But it looked like he’d have to track his lover down the hard way, follow the ship Jack was on, and intercept him when he disembarked.
Well, that would simply have to be good enough. The ship couldn’t keep going forever, sooner or later it would have to dock somewhere to refuel or take on supplies; if nothing else, Ianto would surely be able to get a message to Jack when it did. Even if by chance they lost track of the ship while travelling through the vortex, he had a TARDIS, which meant he could, at least in theory, travel through time as well as space. No matter how far Jack travelled, or how long it took, Ianto knew that eventually he’d track his lover down. With a bit of luck, it wouldn’t take more than a few weeks, but if it took longer… Well, he was immortal now; he could spare the time. He hadn’t travelled all the way back to earth just to give up at the first hurdle; he was Welsh, and they were a stubborn people.
Buoyed up by hope, confident that everything would work out in the end, Ianto urged his TARDIS into the vortex in hot pursuit of the ship carrying his Captain.
OoOoO
Even though things didn’t go exactly to plan, over the next weeks, and months, and even years, Ianto Jones never gave up hope, certain that the universe would never be so cruel as to keep him and Jack apart forever. Perhaps there were other things going on that he didn’t know about, things that needed to happen before he and Jack could finally find each other again, but he had no doubt that the reunion would happen, when the time was right. He just needed to be patient, and let events unfold as they would. If the universe could bring him back from the dead, make him immortal, and provide him with the perfect form of transport, not to mention companionship, for his travels, surely anything was possible.
OoOoO
Sometimes, Ianto thought afterwards, you just had to trust in fate, the universe, the creator, or whatever you believed in, and keep going, no matter what. Through all kinds of adventures, some of them fun and others terrifying, he’d kept moving forwards, except for that one small detour into the recent past to save a shipload of people from a cruel fate. And the twisting, turning path he’d followed had eventually led him to a small spaceship, adrift in space and almost out of power. There, almost inevitably, he’d found Jack, still broken but gradually beginning to heal. Perhaps that was the way of the universe; no matter what you were searching for, you always found it in the last place you’d think of looking.
The future, and indeed all of time and space, stretched out before them now, filled with almost limitless possibilities, and thrilling adventures as yet undreamed of. The biggest problem facing them right now was what they should do first, and where they should go; their choices were limitless.
Jack smiled softly at his lover; the universe had taken everything from him, but against all odds, it had given one of the most precious back to him. He was still grieving, might never fully recover from having to sacrifice Steven, but he was no longer sunk in despair, because now he didn’t have to be alone. At last he could look at eternity stretching out before him with a sense of hope for all the wonders he had yet to see, and the adventures yet to come, all of which he would share with the man he loved. Even eternity might not be long enough.
The End
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Jack, Gwen, Rhys, Ianto, his TARDIS.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Jack has lost hope following the events of Children of Earth, but Ianto is determined to find his lover again, and he will never give up.
Word Count: 1260
Written For: Prompt 212 - Hope at fandomweekly.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters. They belong to the BBC.
A/N: Set in my Through Time and Space ‘Verse.
The night he left earth, standing at the top of a hill outside Cardiff in the chill of early spring, Jack was out of hope, out of just about everything. All he knew was that he couldn’t stay; there was nowhere on the entire planet that the pain and the memories couldn’t find him. He doubted he’d find any such place out among the stars either, but leaving was marginally better than hanging around like some kind of restless ghost.
He felt almost nothing as he said goodbye to Gwen and Rhys, nothing but the same cold, hollow emptiness he’d been feeling for the last six months. He never expected to see them after this, and that was fine; they’d be better off without him, no matter what Gwen might think. Part of him hated them, in a distant, distracted way, for being alive and with a baby on the way; they had it all, while he’d lost everything that mattered to him. It wasn’t even a question of fairness or the lack thereof, just another one of the universe’s cruel tricks played on an immortal man who had no right to exist, but hadn’t been given any choice in the matter. Perhaps this was no more than he deserved for being a freak, and for failing so spectacularly.
Oh, he’d found a way to defeat the 456, and had saved earth’s children, all except one. He’d sacrificed his only grandson so that no one else on the planet would have to endure having their own children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews wrenched from their arms and handed over to a bunch of drug addicted aliens who intended to use them to get high. Maybe, just maybe, he could have coped with losing the man he’d loved if he hadn’t been forced to destroy his daughter’s life by turning her son into a weapon, but… It seemed Ianto had been right all along when he’d called Jack a monster.
If he could have found some other way to deal with the alien threat, then he would have, but thanks to the government sending out a kill squad to prevent Torchwood from interfering with their plans, there simply hadn’t been time to look for alternatives. The constructive wave had been the only option, the signal had needed to be passed through a child, and Steven had been the only child he’d had access to; there hadn’t been time to find another. Still, Jack hated himself for what he’d done, and he couldn’t understand why Gwen would want him to stay. Didn’t she realise how dangerous he was to be around? If he stayed it would only be a matter of time before he got her killed as well, and probably her husband and child too.
So he left in a brilliant flash of light, not with any expectation of finding anything out there in the vastness of space, but only with the intention of losing himself amongst the stars, because he couldn’t die and yet he had nothing left worth living for. His continuing existence would be his penance for all the harm he’d done, all the lives he’d failed to save over his too-long existence. Not just Steven and Ianto, but Tosh, Owen, Suzie, Alex, Greg… Too many to count. He didn’t want to add to their number by destroying more lives.
OoOoO
As Jack teleported up to the cold fusion cruiser somewhere out on the edge of earth’s solar system, Ianto Jones, restored to life by a strange convergence of events he didn’t fully understand, stood aboard his TARDIS and cursed the limitations the universe had seen fit to force on his new existence. If he and the TARDIS could have intercepted the matter stream, Jack would be with him now, and Ianto could have helped him begin healing from all that he’d endured. But it looked like he’d have to track his lover down the hard way, follow the ship Jack was on, and intercept him when he disembarked.
Well, that would simply have to be good enough. The ship couldn’t keep going forever, sooner or later it would have to dock somewhere to refuel or take on supplies; if nothing else, Ianto would surely be able to get a message to Jack when it did. Even if by chance they lost track of the ship while travelling through the vortex, he had a TARDIS, which meant he could, at least in theory, travel through time as well as space. No matter how far Jack travelled, or how long it took, Ianto knew that eventually he’d track his lover down. With a bit of luck, it wouldn’t take more than a few weeks, but if it took longer… Well, he was immortal now; he could spare the time. He hadn’t travelled all the way back to earth just to give up at the first hurdle; he was Welsh, and they were a stubborn people.
Buoyed up by hope, confident that everything would work out in the end, Ianto urged his TARDIS into the vortex in hot pursuit of the ship carrying his Captain.
OoOoO
Even though things didn’t go exactly to plan, over the next weeks, and months, and even years, Ianto Jones never gave up hope, certain that the universe would never be so cruel as to keep him and Jack apart forever. Perhaps there were other things going on that he didn’t know about, things that needed to happen before he and Jack could finally find each other again, but he had no doubt that the reunion would happen, when the time was right. He just needed to be patient, and let events unfold as they would. If the universe could bring him back from the dead, make him immortal, and provide him with the perfect form of transport, not to mention companionship, for his travels, surely anything was possible.
OoOoO
Sometimes, Ianto thought afterwards, you just had to trust in fate, the universe, the creator, or whatever you believed in, and keep going, no matter what. Through all kinds of adventures, some of them fun and others terrifying, he’d kept moving forwards, except for that one small detour into the recent past to save a shipload of people from a cruel fate. And the twisting, turning path he’d followed had eventually led him to a small spaceship, adrift in space and almost out of power. There, almost inevitably, he’d found Jack, still broken but gradually beginning to heal. Perhaps that was the way of the universe; no matter what you were searching for, you always found it in the last place you’d think of looking.
The future, and indeed all of time and space, stretched out before them now, filled with almost limitless possibilities, and thrilling adventures as yet undreamed of. The biggest problem facing them right now was what they should do first, and where they should go; their choices were limitless.
Jack smiled softly at his lover; the universe had taken everything from him, but against all odds, it had given one of the most precious back to him. He was still grieving, might never fully recover from having to sacrifice Steven, but he was no longer sunk in despair, because now he didn’t have to be alone. At last he could look at eternity stretching out before him with a sense of hope for all the wonders he had yet to see, and the adventures yet to come, all of which he would share with the man he loved. Even eternity might not be long enough.
The End