Torchwood: Fanfic: Desperate measures

[m_findlow]

Title: Desperate measures
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Ianto, Jack, mentions Gwen
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,220 words
Content notes: Spoilers for CoE
Author notes: Written for m_findlow's prompt "Any, any, not the time for goodbye" at fic_promptly
Summary: Saving Jack is the only thing that matters

Alarms were ringing everywhere but all that was tumbling around in his head was the thought that this couldn't be happening. It just wasn't possible. He looked at the images from the scanner and still couldn't believe his eyes. A bomb. A bomb inside Jack. It was unthinkable.

Less than sixty seconds to detonation.

He rushed over to the banks of computers. He had to do something. Forget Gwen, and forget the hub, all that mattered right now was saving Jack.

Alarms continued to blare out loudly, pronouncing the demise of the hub. Jesus, not just the hub, if this was anything to go by, but the entire bay area. There was no question that it had to be stopped.

He worked single mindedly on the problem, oblivious to the chaos, feeling the countdown clock on the screens around him mocking his efforts. Somewhere in the back of his mind, alarms were still ringing, and Gwen and Jack were shouting at each other, but it was all white noise to him. There was a bomb inside Jack going to blow him to tiny pieces and he had to stop it. Surely somewhere in this vast database full of alien technology and know-how there must be a way to determine what it was and how to stop it.

What the hell was it? Why couldn't the scanners figure it out? The whole database had been searched and nothing. An alien bomb of unknown origin? Could that be it? How would they be able to stop that? What would it do to Jack?

He couldn't leave things the way they were; couldn't leave Jack still angry at him for calling them a couple, and couldn't leave him seething with the thought that Ianto considered all of this to be strange and new to him. They'd been together for the better part of two years. It was only his own stupid twenty first century brain and upbringing that told him that it was still weird to be in a relationship with another man. He couldn't hold that against Jack when Jack had been nothing but kind and giving, accepting of whatever Ianto was prepared to give him. What the hell did it matter what other people thought of them being together? It all seemed so ridiculously stupid now when they were about to be blown apart.

He watched as three more precious seconds slipped away on the clock realising that he was wasting time fretting about Jack and their relationship status. He needed to focus. He rushed through a few more keyed commands, opening up the search to a wider field. A result pinged.

Oh, no. Origin. Earth.

It wasn't alien. It was made here, on Earth. Who? Why? How? All the questions in the world seemed to race through his mind as the sickening realisation hit him that it wasn't alien, and therefore there was going to be no clever way to deactivate it. No magic computer code, no telepathic signals, no ultrasonic lasers beams. Good old fashioned Earth technology could only be destroyed one way. Dismantled by hand. And here the blasted thing was inside Jack. How the bloody hell had they gotten it inside him?

Wait. The hospital. Someone had killed him at the hospital. They must have planted it then. If they'd wanted him dead, why not just kill him and take him? No, they wanted the rest of them dead too. Destroy the hub and destroy Torchwood.

Just as the realisation was dawning on him, he felt strong arms grabbing him, pulling him away from the screen as it counted down to nineteen seconds.

'Ianto, you too!'

No, no, no, no, no. It wasn't going to end like this. He couldn't leave; not now. He had to figure out a way to save Jack. There just had to be something! This wasn't how it ended.

His struggles were met with firm resistance, feeling Jack's powerful arms practically dragging him across the hub as he kicked out in protest. No, he wasn't going anywhere. If they couldn't solve this then there was no going back. He wouldn't let Jack stay here and meet his fate alone. He owed him that much, and there would be no point in his going on without Jack. He couldn't bear it.

'There'll be nothing left of you!' he screamed. Jack wasn't coming back from this. The damage would be too extensive, even for him, of that much he was certain.

'I can survive anything!'

Not this, Ianto thought. Not this. Please let me find a way to save you, he begged.

Jack, as if sensing his thoughts, pulled him in for a kiss. Wherever had happened this morning no longer mattered, and he poured ever fibre of his being into the act. Ianto knew what it meant, feeling time almost come to stop, praying it would stop, just to have this moment last forever, and yet feeling the weight of time ticking by inexorably towards that moment when he knew there'd be no going back. They both knew this was the point of no return, and that the bomb was going to go off no matter what happened next. The only question would be how much damage it would cause, and who would be there, standing in its direct path of destruction.

Jack pushed him away, and he felt the jolt of the ground underneath him. The invisible lift.

Jack had no intention of letting him stay here with him to join him in death. He meant to save Ianto, even though it was Ianto who desperately wanted to save him.

He locked eyes with Jack, determined not to let him out of his sight for even a second, trying all the world to tell Jack what he meant to him in that singular look. How could he ever expect to convey a lifetime of feelings in just a few fleeting seconds?

Jack's words promised he'd be back, but his eyes said this could very well be their last moment together. Ianto's mind refused to accept the idea. This was not the time for them to say goodbye. They still had so much they hadn't yet done and said. Short as he expected his life to be, working for Torchwood, this was not the moment when it was all supposed to end.

The lift continued to rise, but surely they were out of time. They'd left it too late.

Even as it continued upward, he heard the mechanics of the rooftop door sliding open but never let his gaze leave Jack. Whatever seconds were left to them now mattered not, when all that lay ahead of them was hopelessness and the bitter pill of certain death.

Upward and upwards. They only had mere seconds left, and yet they seemed to stretch on for an agonising eternity, condemned to be apart in the hour they needed each other the most.

As Jack's image faded to a tiny speck many hundreds of feet below, Ianto imagined he could still see the look of panicked anguish etched on its face. If he survived this, he vowed his only task would be to avenge the death of the man he'd come to love more than life itself.

There was a loud boom, everything shook violently, and then nothing.

Comments

[bk_forever]

*wibbles* There were so many plot holes in CoE, not least the sheer stupidity of the bomb inside Jack, but seeing Jack push Ianto onto the invisible lift and send him to safety, or at least out of immediate dange, is heartwrenching =(

Very well done.