Torchwood: Fanfic: Left behind

[m_findlow]

Title: Left behind
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 952 words
Content notes: none
Author notes: Written for juliet316's prompt "Any, any, how soon they forget" at fic_promptly and Fffc May Special Daily Challenge - May 4th - He had hoped that he would never have to see this place again
Summary: Ianto is forced to confront his past.

Ianto had hoped that he would never have to see this place again. It was a stupid thing to think. He could hardly avoid coming to London for the rest of his life, even if it was only the parts that held all the bad memories. He could avoid the street where his old apartment had been. The landlord would have eventually changed the locks and drawn up a new lease after he'd cleared out and never come back. He'd paid the rent up to date but he'd never bothered to let them know he'd moved on. He had too many other things to worry about than whether the landlord would be upset that he still had the keys.

Harder to avoid was the old Canary Wharf precinct. All big businesses were moving their offices down there. It was the place to be - all trendy and new - full of fancy restaurants and posh chocolate shops. He remembered taking Lisa there on days when he'd saved up enough to splash out. She thought he was becoming some posh upper class snob, dressed in his suits and knowing how to pronounce the French words on the menus. They'd taken walks down along Westferry Circus and South Dock on their lunch breaks when the weather had been kind, eating baguettes and staring out across the Thames. They both thought they'd finally made it, landing a job in a swanky part of town like this. It didn't matter that they were still living in a crappy flat in a not so great part of town. If they just kept plugging away, they'd be able to make a decent life for themselves. Torchwood was just the beginning. He never expected it would be the end.

He hadn't really wanted to accept the task of coming to London, but Jack had been on his knees, begging not to have to be dragged into UNIT affairs. The meetings themselves had been fine. What he hadn't expected was that they would want to go out for lunch afterwards, treating him to one of those self same French restaurants that he'd once aspired to dining in on a regular basis.

He'd picked at his food, listening to conversations more than engaging in them. Being here felt wrong. He was the outlier, though they treated him cordially enough. Anything to improve relations between the two organisations. No, it was more about the reason he was here than the company. He was a lone survivor, flaunting that fact by coming here, wining and dining with the people who should have kept a closer eye on Torchwood back when he'd worked here. Perhaps if they had, none of them would be here now.

Once lunch was over, they made their goodbyes and left. He stepped out into the overcast daylight, steel and glass buildings towering overhead. He couldn't explain why his feet took him a block west when he should have headed east for the tube. Somewhere in the back of his subconscious, he had to see it again just so he could put it behind him.

There it was, still standing there. No longer Torchwood Tower, not that it had ever been officially called that. Now it had some big insurance company logo emblazoned on it. It looked just the same on the outside as he remembered it. Inside would be a different matter altogether. They would have torn up the carpets, knocked out walls, put in nice new offices to replace the ones that had been destroyed. All the blood and the bodies would be long gone. Perhaps some offices remained just as they were, those at the very top where the fighting had been almost nonexistent. He wondered if Yvonne's office was still there, all white leather and glass. How would she feel knowing some bigwig insurance company CEO was sitting there now?

The more he looked around, the more he noticed that nothing had changed. Two years ago, this had been the epicenter of carnage and death, and there wasn't the slightest trace of it now. How soon they forget, he thought, watching Londoners and tourists alike, carrying on as the British were so well known for doing. There wasn't even a plaque to remember those whose lives had been lost. He thought of all the friends he'd had at Torchwood, whom he'd never see again. He didn't even know what had happened to half of them. Had they been killed by the Daleks, or had they been tortured and converted into those horrible Cybermen?

It was just like Torchwood to have buried the truth, he thought angrily. All those innocent people had died for nothing, and there wasn't even the tiniest thing for people to observe so that they'd know how much they'd suffered. Their names had been slapped on an internal list of the dead and that was that. Anyone who didn't report in was presumed dead. For a long while he'd been on that list himself, at least until he'd made himself known to Captain Jack Harkness. A little bit of research into his background and he'd had to take his name off the list. He couldn't have Jack think he was dead. Ianto Jones had to exist if he had a hope of getting into Torchwood Three.

Seeing it now all so perfect and ordinary made him angry rather than sad. It was one thing to rebuild and carry on, but it was another thing entirely to have it all covered up like none of them had ever existed. Perhaps that was what it was to work for a secret organisation. Perhaps you gave up your right to exist. That didn't mean he wouldn't remember them, though.

Comments

[bk_forever]

That had to be hard for Ianto. Being in London would have been bad enough, but to see the Tower and surroundings unchanged would have been a betrayal of everyone who'd lost their life there.

[m-findlow.livejournal.com]

Obviously some of it has to stay secret but it doesn't make it any easier to reconcile that with a feeling that it's all just been swept under the rug. Ianto needs to keep going as a mark of respect for all the people who can't.