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fan_flashworks2022-07-10 02:37 pm
m_findlow) wrote in fan_flashworks2022-07-10 02:37 pm
Entry tags:
Torchwood: Fanfic: Feeling blue
Title: Feeling blue
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Author: m_findlow
Rating: PG
Length: 1,626 words
Content notes: Post CoE.
Author notes: Written for Challenge 376 - Blue at fan_flashworks
fan_flashworksSummary: Ianto can't shake the feelings of utter hopelessness of having survived the battle with the 456.
Ianto knew what it was to feel grief and sadness. He'd experienced it any number of different ways, from the gut wrenching nausea that ate away at him when he'd lost Lisa, either unable to stomach the sight of food or otherwise compulsively driven to gorge himself on whatever junk food he could get his hands on; to the twisting guilt of knowing he'd never see Owen and Tosh again, unable to go more than a hour in his day without thinking of them, feeling the hot tears pricking behind his eyes, trying to force their way out at the edges; to the deep emptiness of watching his mum being lowered into the ground after a bitterly short fight against cancer. With each new piece of grief his world became smaller, the number of people he trusted to understand him shrinking to an impossibly tiny circle, until he knew that one day it would wink out of existence altogether. He hoped he'd die before it came to that. He didn't think he could go on alone.
This was different though. Grief was an old friend to him, but now he felt nothing at all. The complete absence of sadness stretched out in its vastness before him, like a deep chasm that he was about to fall into, or simply get sucked into by its overwhelming gravity. He'd fought it for as long as he could but the fight was just so exhausting. Instead he'd allowed himself to be pulled into it and the complete absence of feeling was a blessed relief. Here he could just be without being. He could be at one with feeling blue without all the hurt and pain it had caused.
And pain was in plentiful supply. The world had shown itself to be cruel and unwieldy. When it came to the absolute last stand of humanity against its biggest threat, it had proven that it didn't want him to fight against it. It wanted to capitulate in whatever way would protect the interests of those with the most power. It disregarded the lives of the many, of the lesser, and of the ones that wanted more than anything to protect it. It cared not for the cost that it exacted upon them. If anything it had shown that their lives were worthless.
He should have been dead, and Jack's own grandson was dead because of it, as were so many other innocent people. He might have preferred if he had died in Thames House; then he wouldn't be here having to face up to the fact that perhaps humanity wasn't worth saving. He hadn't even asked anyone what other nation's governments had decided to do - whether they agreed with the British government's way of dealing with the crisis, or were just being dragged along without a voice. All he knew was that the COBRA team had decided people like him were expendable. People like his niece and nephew were expendable. They weren't the best or the brightest or the wealthiest or the most connected. That made them acceptable losses. Until the 456 came back for more. That the government would sacrifice even a single innocent life appalled him. That Jack had been a part of it from the beginning eroded his confidence that there was any other solution. That he'd ended up paying the ultimate price himself only made the outcome even more painful to accept.
Those thoughts were never far from his mind in the days and weeks that followed. Even though he'd been reunited with his family in Cardiff, and in time with Jack, who had discovered he wasn't dead, he couldn't get rid of the sense that his whole world had been shaken to its core, and that life was an even more fragile and delicate thing than he'd thought. The betrayal and the futility of fighting against it all slowly consumed him to the point where he just wanted to give up.
He spent his days on his sister's sofa just staring blankly at the television, chewed unenthusiastically at the table when his family forced food upon him, and became Jack's silent companion, barely registering Jack's presence there at his side at all. That was why Jack had decided that they needed to leave Cardiff for a while. He'd just packed up their small belongings and loaded them, and Ianto, into a nondescript white sedan and hit the road. A change of scenery would do him good, Jack told him. He hadn't replied, thinking that there was nowhere on earth they could possibly escape. He simply let the Welsh countryside scroll past the window, eventually closing his eyes and sleeping through the rest of it.
There were no green hills when he woke, only a curving stretch of seaside ensconced by a neat row of two up, two down houses pressed cheek by jowl along the coast in every hue of pastel there was. Their car stopped in front of a pale turquoise one, halfway along the beachfront.
'Honey, we're here,' Jack said as he pulled open the passenger side door. He rested a gentle hand on Ianto's shoulder as he said it. It was such a telling gesture that things weren't how they should be. Jack was always so aloof with him when it came to proper affection. He didn't use pet names or say things like "I love you." There was always a part of himself he held back as if investing in anything too much might cost him so much more when it would all inevitably end.
Even when he'd been lying in Jack's arms dying he still couldn't say the words. Now he treated Ianto with overbearing kindness and warmth. He'd lost Ianto for a few hours, thinking him dead, and now he was beginning to make up for what he'd never expressed. Ianto, on the other hand, felt less alive now than he had when he'd been dying. Jack's overt declarations of love didn't make his heart flutter like they should.
Jack reached over and unclipped Ianto's seat belt, like he was a child. He didn't fight Jack in coaxing him out of the car, slowly and without any patronising words, simply keeping a hand always connected to his body, hip, shoulder, arm, guiding him slowly towards the door.
'It's ours for as long as we want it,' Jack said, referring to the seaside house as he twisted the key in the lock, letting them inside. Even as he said it, there was an undercurrent of hope that suggested it would only be a few weeks at most.
He left Ianto standing by the windows for a moment whilst he went back outside to gather the rest of their luggage, quickly hauling it up the stairs and dumping it somewhere. It would be crushed in their holdall bags but Ianto didn't care. He was past caring about crumpled clothes. Instead he stared vacantly at the flat grey expanse of water. It didn't engage his senses at all.
'Right, that's all done for now,' Jack said as his footfalls thumped back down the stairs to rejoin him. Jack pulled him down onto the sofa next to him. Ianto complied, leaning his body into Jack's as he slumped there. Jack's arm went around his shoulder, thumb brushing back and forward along his bicep in a reassuring and metronomic fashion.
'This is nice, isn't it?' Jack asked. 'Quiet little village by the sea side. Just us.'
Ianto didn't reply. He didn't think Jack really expected him to anyway. Maybe. Probably. Did it really matter if it was nice or not? Once up one a time his heart would have ached for all the effort Jack was making to try and do this for him, but now he just couldn't find the energy to care. Wherever they went, it would never be far enough away to feel safe. The government had wanted them dead, rather than interfering in alien matters. They hadn't wanted Torchwood deciding that the death of everyone on the planet might be better than giving an alien threat what they wanted, knowing they'd only come back again for more. Sometimes humanity needed to make a stand or die trying. Isn't that what they'd done every single day? Fight or die trying.
He didn't want to fight anymore. Fighting had brought him nothing but heartache and misery. He just wanted to shut the world out and detach from it. Now he only wished Jack would stop trying as well, so that he no longer had to.
After a long while of sitting there in silence Jack rubbed his shoulder and planted a kiss in his hair. 'It's been a long day's drive,' he said, shuffling out from under Ianto's leaden body. 'Why don't you grab some rest. I'll just pop out for a bit to get us some basics from the shops. I'm sure I saw a grocer just around the corner from here. Won't be long, I promise.'
Ianto leaned into the cushions left underneath the now absent Jack, lying down on them and closing his eyes, more so that he didn't have to look at Jack's face than because he was tired. He didn't want to see that piteous expression that was utterly torn between giving him space and showering him in relentless love. He didn't have the energy for any of it.
Jack was probably feeling a similar sentiment, anxious to escape from this dreary existence. If Jack walked out that door and didn't come back, he wouldn't have minded. He'd just stay here, lying and staring at the walls without really noticing them at all, and know that he was in the one place where none of it mattered anymore.
Ianto knew what it was to feel grief and sadness. He'd experienced it any number of different ways, from the gut wrenching nausea that ate away at him when he'd lost Lisa, either unable to stomach the sight of food or otherwise compulsively driven to gorge himself on whatever junk food he could get his hands on; to the twisting guilt of knowing he'd never see Owen and Tosh again, unable to go more than a hour in his day without thinking of them, feeling the hot tears pricking behind his eyes, trying to force their way out at the edges; to the deep emptiness of watching his mum being lowered into the ground after a bitterly short fight against cancer. With each new piece of grief his world became smaller, the number of people he trusted to understand him shrinking to an impossibly tiny circle, until he knew that one day it would wink out of existence altogether. He hoped he'd die before it came to that. He didn't think he could go on alone.
This was different though. Grief was an old friend to him, but now he felt nothing at all. The complete absence of sadness stretched out in its vastness before him, like a deep chasm that he was about to fall into, or simply get sucked into by its overwhelming gravity. He'd fought it for as long as he could but the fight was just so exhausting. Instead he'd allowed himself to be pulled into it and the complete absence of feeling was a blessed relief. Here he could just be without being. He could be at one with feeling blue without all the hurt and pain it had caused.
And pain was in plentiful supply. The world had shown itself to be cruel and unwieldy. When it came to the absolute last stand of humanity against its biggest threat, it had proven that it didn't want him to fight against it. It wanted to capitulate in whatever way would protect the interests of those with the most power. It disregarded the lives of the many, of the lesser, and of the ones that wanted more than anything to protect it. It cared not for the cost that it exacted upon them. If anything it had shown that their lives were worthless.
He should have been dead, and Jack's own grandson was dead because of it, as were so many other innocent people. He might have preferred if he had died in Thames House; then he wouldn't be here having to face up to the fact that perhaps humanity wasn't worth saving. He hadn't even asked anyone what other nation's governments had decided to do - whether they agreed with the British government's way of dealing with the crisis, or were just being dragged along without a voice. All he knew was that the COBRA team had decided people like him were expendable. People like his niece and nephew were expendable. They weren't the best or the brightest or the wealthiest or the most connected. That made them acceptable losses. Until the 456 came back for more. That the government would sacrifice even a single innocent life appalled him. That Jack had been a part of it from the beginning eroded his confidence that there was any other solution. That he'd ended up paying the ultimate price himself only made the outcome even more painful to accept.
Those thoughts were never far from his mind in the days and weeks that followed. Even though he'd been reunited with his family in Cardiff, and in time with Jack, who had discovered he wasn't dead, he couldn't get rid of the sense that his whole world had been shaken to its core, and that life was an even more fragile and delicate thing than he'd thought. The betrayal and the futility of fighting against it all slowly consumed him to the point where he just wanted to give up.
He spent his days on his sister's sofa just staring blankly at the television, chewed unenthusiastically at the table when his family forced food upon him, and became Jack's silent companion, barely registering Jack's presence there at his side at all. That was why Jack had decided that they needed to leave Cardiff for a while. He'd just packed up their small belongings and loaded them, and Ianto, into a nondescript white sedan and hit the road. A change of scenery would do him good, Jack told him. He hadn't replied, thinking that there was nowhere on earth they could possibly escape. He simply let the Welsh countryside scroll past the window, eventually closing his eyes and sleeping through the rest of it.
There were no green hills when he woke, only a curving stretch of seaside ensconced by a neat row of two up, two down houses pressed cheek by jowl along the coast in every hue of pastel there was. Their car stopped in front of a pale turquoise one, halfway along the beachfront.
'Honey, we're here,' Jack said as he pulled open the passenger side door. He rested a gentle hand on Ianto's shoulder as he said it. It was such a telling gesture that things weren't how they should be. Jack was always so aloof with him when it came to proper affection. He didn't use pet names or say things like "I love you." There was always a part of himself he held back as if investing in anything too much might cost him so much more when it would all inevitably end.
Even when he'd been lying in Jack's arms dying he still couldn't say the words. Now he treated Ianto with overbearing kindness and warmth. He'd lost Ianto for a few hours, thinking him dead, and now he was beginning to make up for what he'd never expressed. Ianto, on the other hand, felt less alive now than he had when he'd been dying. Jack's overt declarations of love didn't make his heart flutter like they should.
Jack reached over and unclipped Ianto's seat belt, like he was a child. He didn't fight Jack in coaxing him out of the car, slowly and without any patronising words, simply keeping a hand always connected to his body, hip, shoulder, arm, guiding him slowly towards the door.
'It's ours for as long as we want it,' Jack said, referring to the seaside house as he twisted the key in the lock, letting them inside. Even as he said it, there was an undercurrent of hope that suggested it would only be a few weeks at most.
He left Ianto standing by the windows for a moment whilst he went back outside to gather the rest of their luggage, quickly hauling it up the stairs and dumping it somewhere. It would be crushed in their holdall bags but Ianto didn't care. He was past caring about crumpled clothes. Instead he stared vacantly at the flat grey expanse of water. It didn't engage his senses at all.
'Right, that's all done for now,' Jack said as his footfalls thumped back down the stairs to rejoin him. Jack pulled him down onto the sofa next to him. Ianto complied, leaning his body into Jack's as he slumped there. Jack's arm went around his shoulder, thumb brushing back and forward along his bicep in a reassuring and metronomic fashion.
'This is nice, isn't it?' Jack asked. 'Quiet little village by the sea side. Just us.'
Ianto didn't reply. He didn't think Jack really expected him to anyway. Maybe. Probably. Did it really matter if it was nice or not? Once up one a time his heart would have ached for all the effort Jack was making to try and do this for him, but now he just couldn't find the energy to care. Wherever they went, it would never be far enough away to feel safe. The government had wanted them dead, rather than interfering in alien matters. They hadn't wanted Torchwood deciding that the death of everyone on the planet might be better than giving an alien threat what they wanted, knowing they'd only come back again for more. Sometimes humanity needed to make a stand or die trying. Isn't that what they'd done every single day? Fight or die trying.
He didn't want to fight anymore. Fighting had brought him nothing but heartache and misery. He just wanted to shut the world out and detach from it. Now he only wished Jack would stop trying as well, so that he no longer had to.
After a long while of sitting there in silence Jack rubbed his shoulder and planted a kiss in his hair. 'It's been a long day's drive,' he said, shuffling out from under Ianto's leaden body. 'Why don't you grab some rest. I'll just pop out for a bit to get us some basics from the shops. I'm sure I saw a grocer just around the corner from here. Won't be long, I promise.'
Ianto leaned into the cushions left underneath the now absent Jack, lying down on them and closing his eyes, more so that he didn't have to look at Jack's face than because he was tired. He didn't want to see that piteous expression that was utterly torn between giving him space and showering him in relentless love. He didn't have the energy for any of it.
Jack was probably feeling a similar sentiment, anxious to escape from this dreary existence. If Jack walked out that door and didn't come back, he wouldn't have minded. He'd just stay here, lying and staring at the walls without really noticing them at all, and know that he was in the one place where none of it mattered anymore.