Hidden Past
Title: Hidden Past
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: Ianto/Jack, Ianto/past!Jack
Rating: Adult
Warnings: torture, hints of non-con
Wordcount: 2,876
Summary: Jack's past makes an appearance.
Spoilers: general for S1 of Doctor Who and S1 and 2 of Torchwood, but nothing specific; set after "Exit Wounds."
“He grabbed them, both of them, Mr. Davidson’s sister was visiting, I didn’t see how he got in or anything, but he came out carrying Mr. Davidson, and dragging the sister along, poor thing was screaming...”
The woman was crying as Ianto and Gwen walked up next to the officer taking her statement. “He had a gun, there was nothing I could do, I couldn’t...”
“You did the right thing,” Andy assured her. “We’ll get our best people on it, right away?”
“What’s happened?” Gwen asked, as Andy turned aside from the woman.
“You lot got here quickly,” Andy replied. “We only just got the call ourselves.”
“We weren’t here because of the call, there was...” a rift flare, Ianto finished Gwen’s sentence mentally, but Andy wouldn’t understand that. Jack walked up behind them; the woman who’d apparently reported the incident turned, and saw him - and screamed.
“That’s him, that’s the man that took Mr. Davidson and his sister!” she said.
“I beg your pardon?” Jack asked.
“What’s happened here, Andy?”
He pointed to an open door across the hall. “Someone broke into that flat, apparently knocked out the resident and took him and his sister off somewhere, pointed a gun at the lady down the hall on his way out.”
Jack was intent on his wrist strap - he’d started doing something with it as soon as the woman had recognized him. He raised his head back to them, expression grim. “We’ll cover this one, Andy. Thanks.” He stalked off back to the SUV.
Gwen and Ianto followed, not sure what else to do. Jack climbed into the passenger seat, leaving Ianto to drive. “Turn left up ahead,” Jack instructed.
“Where are we going?” Ianto asked.
Jack tapped his wrist strap. “Wherever this tells us to,” he said. “I did a scan for other wrist straps in the area, and found one.”
“Any idea whose it is?” Gwen asked.
“Mine.”
“Yours? You mean it is you she saw? You that we’re chasing after now?”
“Probably.”
Ianto concentrated on driving, following Jack’s directions. Finally, they pulled up outside a hotel. “That’s Mr. Davidson’s car,” Gwen recognized as they pulled in - she’d spent the trip over looking up any information she could find.
“Stop here,” Jack instructed. “I think we’re close enough that I can tap into his wrist strap as a listening device...” He trailed off, concentrating on his own wrist strap.
“He’s in the hotel?” Ianto asked. Jack nodded. “Where?”
“Second story, near the front.”
Ianto fished a pair of binoculars out of the glove compartment. “Can you be more specific?” He began scanning the windows. Then he stopped, catching sight of a familiar profile. “Never mind.”
“Let me see?” Jack asked. Ianto moved aside, keeping the binoculars in place; Jack looked through them. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
“What?”
“It’s...well, it’s a long story. A long time ago...before I met the Doctor, before I became immortal, back when I was working for the time agency. There’s two years that I have no memory of. If I’m judging his age right based on the haircut and fashion sense, he’s me, sometime during those two years.”
“And this is a problem?” Ianto asked.
“I’m not particularly proud of that part of my life,” Jack answered. “And that’s just the parts I can remember.
“So see if you can get that sound thing working, figure out what he’s up to.”
Jack nodded, and pressed a few buttons on his wrist strap. Voices filtered in through the car speakers.
“There’s something I’m looking for,” the younger Jack was saying. “It’s small, just a little orange box, and it would have appeared out of nowhere, a few weeks ago. I think you know where it is, and I think you’re holding out on me...” There was a pause; Ianto, still looking through the binoculars, saw the other Jack lift a wallet and flip it open. “John Davidson.”
“I d-don’t know, please...”
There was a buzz, and a short scream. “Electrical shock,” Jack said softly; Ianto wondered how he’d gotten familiar enough with the sound to recognize it so easily, but didn’t ask - now wasn’t the time.
“Please, just let my sister go, she’s got nothing to do with this...”
“Of course she doesn’t,” the other Jack said, laughing - not his Jack’s pleasant laughter, though; this was a colder sound that Ianto didn’t care for at all. “She’s just here to keep me amused while you decide to cooperate.”
There was another scream - a woman’s scream, this time. The other Jack disappeared into the depths of the room, out of sight of the window; Ianto was grateful - his imagination could fill it in well enough, given the woman’s screaming and pleading, Jack’s low chuckle, and the sound of ripping cloth.
“What do we do?” he asked Jack - his Jack, the current Jack, the real Jack.
Jack flinched away, though; he turned, refusing to look at Ianto or Gwen. “I - I don’t know.”
“Well, obviously we can’t kill him,” Gwen said. “He’s still mortal, and if we kill him, we mess up your history, and who knows what else.”
“I can’t get too close to him, either,” Jack added. “If I touch him, the universe is in danger of implosion.”
“But we can’t just do nothing...” Gwen said, though she clearly had no further suggestions on what they could do.
“Okay,” Ianto said, taking a deep breath and unbuckling his seatbelt.
“Ianto, what...?” Jack asked.
“Distraction,” Ianto said. “We can’t kill him, so knocking down the door and pointing our guns at him is too risky. I go in first and distract him. You and Gwen act as backup - you said this was wiped from your memory, so it’s not as if there’s any danger of you messing up your own timeline too badly. We either convince him to leave, or take him prisoner.”
“Ianto, you don’t know what he can do,” Jack warned. “Hell, I don’t know what he can do, and he’s me.”
“If he’s in any serious danger of killing me, I’ve got you two to rush to my rescue,” Ianto said. “And anything else, I can handle.”
Jack closed his eyes and considered for a minute. Ianto waited, hand on the door handle. “Okay.”
Ianto didn’t hesitate, stopping only to reach into the car and grab the thermos of coffee. He ran up the room, taking only a second to catch his breath before he knocked on the door - wouldn’t do to look as if he’d run all the way here. “Room service,” he called.
“I didn’t order room service,” other-Jack called back. The door opened anyway; Ianto held out a steaming cup of coffee.
“Courtesy of an old friend,” he said. Jack reached for the cup, and Ianto hid a smile; he clearly hadn’t entirely meant to reach for it - but Jack could never resist a cup of coffee, certainly not Ianto’s special blend. He let their fingers brush as Jack took it; this may be a distant past version of his lover, but he was willing to bet some things never changed, like that sensitive spot on his wrist...he touched it, casually, seemingly unintentionally.
“Do you have a name...friend?” past-Jack asked, the flirtatious, seductive tone sounding unpolished. He’d thought his Jack lacked subtlety; apparently he was a good bit better than he used to be.
“Ianto,” he answered. “You?”
“Not important.” Jack’s hand closed around Ianto’s wrist. “Coming in?”
And Ianto had thought it was bad the way his Jack had a habit of propositioning people he’d known for less than five minutes. His patience, too, had apparently grown since his younger days.
Ianto leaned forward to kiss Jack, setting the thermos of coffee aside. He ignored the noise Jack made - equal parts startled and pleased - as he wrapped his arms around him, pushing him back into the room. One hand made a frantic motion behind Jack’s back, in the general direction of the woman, who seemed at least to not be tied up - he just hoped she understood the instruction and was in some shape to do something about it. She was; her eyes went wide, then she slid off the bed and set about untangling her brother from the mess of electrodes and ropes holding him to the chair. Ianto walked further into the room, carefully turning so Jack’s back stayed turned towards the other two. He was sure Jack would realize what was going on at any minute, but he didn’t - didn’t even notice as his two prisoners walked out of the room. Well, perhaps he’d been caught off guard by the way Ianto was using every trick he knew to turn Jack’s knees to jelly - that had been the intention, certainly.
It wasn’t infidelity if it was with a past version of your lover...was it? Besides, Jack had different notions about fidelity than most people in this time did anyway, and it was in the line of duty...right?
Past-Jack didn’t even notice when Ianto slid the handcuffs out of his pocket and fastened them around his wrists, securing his arms behind his back. Ianto pulled back, grabbing Jack by the arm and marching him out of the room before he had a chance to protest.
“Hey, wait a minute, where are we going?” Ianto didn’t answer, though, just led him downstairs and out the door, towards the SUV, vaguely aware of his Jack and Gwen dealing with the questions of various onlookers - mainly hotel staff. He bundled past-Jack into the back of the SUV, slipping a sack over Jack’s head - one of the ones that usually got used on weevils.
Gwen drove back to the Hub; Ianto stayed in the back seat with past-Jack. Jack - the current one - sat in the front passenger seat, completely quiet.
Ianto led the prisoner down to the interrogation room, settling him into the chair before he took the sack off his head. He tied his ankles to the chair legs, and made sure his arms were secure behind his back. Then he stood in front of him, hands in his pockets, self-consciously aware of Jack and Gwen watching from above. “What are you doing here?”
“Where have you taken me?” Jack asked. “Who are you?”
“Your worst nightmare,” Ianto answered softly. “Someone who knows you.” He stepped forward, and sat down on Jack’s lap, one arm around the man’s shoulders for balance. “What are you doing here? Did the time agency send you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.” Ianto cupped Jack’s face in one hand, stroking his cheek and leaning closer. “This isn’t your time, or your place. What are you doing here?”
“It’s not for the time agency,” past-Jack answered. “It’s just a...a little something on the side. A bit of treasure I’m trying to track down.”
“Ah.” Beyond that, Ianto didn’t really care about the details. “You know,” he said, keeping his tone light, almost flirtatious, despite the seriousness of his words, “it’s not nice to torture people. You’ve been a very bad boy.”
“Yeah? What’cha gonna do about it?”
Ianto stood, and slammed Jack forward against the table. He was stopped short by the chains holding him to the chair, but not short enough to keep him from getting a few bruises from the impact.
“Tell me,” he commanded. “Tell me how many people you’ve hurt. How many you’ve killed.”
Past-Jack laughed. “More than I can count.”
“Why?”
“Because they were in the way. Because they didn’t matter. No one matters, they all die anyway.”
“Hm.” Ianto didn’t give any further reply, just walked out of the room. That was more than enough of this for now.
Jack was waiting for him upstairs; Gwen was nowhere to be seen.
“What do you think?” Ianto asked.
“I think I’m scared of you,” Jack joked. Ianto’s lip twitched in a half-smile. “I...Ianto, I can’t ever remember being that...that uncaring. I’ve done things I’m not proud of, I’ve made mistakes, especially back then, but...I don’t remember being like that.”
“What were you like, Jack? Before the two years you lost, and...after?”
“Before...I was in a bit of a bad place; it was right after I got stuck in that time loop with...Captain John...I’d thought we’d built some sort of partnership during that, but then after, he just walked out, left me in the middle of a mission, not even a backwards glance. I was pretty much just throwing myself into whatever the time agency asked me to do, trying to shut off my brain as much as possible - it felt like everyone I cared about just left, so I was trying not to care.”
“I can see how that might lead to you becoming something like...him,” Ianto said, with a nod towards the prisoner below them. “What about after?”
“After...I was pretty sure it was the time agency that’d wiped my memories, though I never had proof of that. I went rogue, started trying to con them whenever I could, get in their way as much as possible - after I woke up with no memory of where I’d been for the last two years, I realized that I really didn’t like what they stood for, didn’t like a lot of the things they’d told me to do. It wasn’t too long after that that the Doctor found me, and everything changed.”
Ianto nodded. “Sounds like losing your memory was really for the best, then, sir.”
“I think I see where this is going to end.”
Ianto did too, but he wouldn’t suggest it - it was one thing if it was Jack’s idea, since it was his past they were dealing with; it wouldn’t seem right, coming from Ianto. “Do you?”
“We retcon him. Us, not the time agency. Then we send him back through to his own time.”
Ianto nodded. “That does sound like it would be for the best.”
“There are a few questions I wouldn’t mind having answered before we do, though,” Jack said. “About...what happened during those two years.”
“What sort of questions?”
“Mostly just one, actually,” Jack said. “I don’t think I want to know about most of it, but...there’s this scar, on my lower back; I got it sometime during those two years, and I have no idea how. I can get rid of the memories, but the scar’s still there, still part of me - I’d sort of like to know what that part’s history is.”
“I’ll ask him, then. Get the retcon ready?” Ianto asked. Jack nodded.
Ianto walked down into the room, standing next to the chained Jack. “We’re about ready to send you on your way,” he said, “but first, there’s just one thing we’re curious about.” He unclipped the handcuffs from the chair, but left the hands bound, and pushed Jack forwards, so he was laying bent over the table. He reached to untuck Jack’s shirt from his pants, pausing as he saw his Jack standing on the stairs, frozen.
“Jack?” he asked. “Something wrong?”
“Nothing,” Jack said, moving forwards again. “Just a...flash of memory, almost.”
“Getting the memories we’re about to erase back?” Ianto asked.
“Not all the way, they’re too deeply buried. It’s almost more a physical memory than anything else...something about this...it seems familiar. Something about...you.”
Ianto pushed the shirt up out of the way, ignoring the way the prisoner was straining to lift his head and get a look at his future self - this was the first time he’d heard Jack’s voice.
“Jack?” Ianto said, quietly. “There’s no scar.”
“No?” Jack asked. “There has to be, it was there when I woke up...”
“How fresh was it?” Ianto asked.
“It - now that you mention it, it was pretty fresh.”
Trying to keep his hand from shaking, Ianto pulled his pocket knife from his pants pocket and opened it, resting it against Jack’s bare skin.
“What’s this?” the chained Jack asked.
“A reminder,” Ianto said, pressing the blade down. For a moment, he giddily wondered what would happen if he got it wrong - wondered if he even could get it wrong, since the design he was copying it from was itself.
Jack screamed - both of him. Ianto finished - it was a simple enough shape, didn’t take long to cut - and looked up at his Jack. “You okay?”
“I - yeah - I just...” He drew a shaky breath. “That brought it all back. Seeing it - I told you it was a physical memory; just the pain - but it triggered the rest of it, I remember it all now.”
“Do you wish you didn’t?” Ianto asked.
“I - no...I don’t think so. If I’d kept the memories then, I would have kept following the same path I was on, and I don’t like where that was leading - but now that I’ve got a few lifetimes of being a better man between them and me...it’s good to know. Where I come from, what I’m capable of.” He sat down across the table from the prisoner, resting his head in his hands. “Just send him back through - I can’t touch him, just...” Jack held up his own wrist strap, pointing out a sequence of buttons; Ianto picked up the prisoner’s wrist, and pressed them, dropping his hand before he disappeared in a red glow.
Fandom: Torchwood
Pairing: Ianto/Jack, Ianto/past!Jack
Rating: Adult
Warnings: torture, hints of non-con
Wordcount: 2,876
Summary: Jack's past makes an appearance.
Spoilers: general for S1 of Doctor Who and S1 and 2 of Torchwood, but nothing specific; set after "Exit Wounds."
“He grabbed them, both of them, Mr. Davidson’s sister was visiting, I didn’t see how he got in or anything, but he came out carrying Mr. Davidson, and dragging the sister along, poor thing was screaming...”
The woman was crying as Ianto and Gwen walked up next to the officer taking her statement. “He had a gun, there was nothing I could do, I couldn’t...”
“You did the right thing,” Andy assured her. “We’ll get our best people on it, right away?”
“What’s happened?” Gwen asked, as Andy turned aside from the woman.
“You lot got here quickly,” Andy replied. “We only just got the call ourselves.”
“We weren’t here because of the call, there was...” a rift flare, Ianto finished Gwen’s sentence mentally, but Andy wouldn’t understand that. Jack walked up behind them; the woman who’d apparently reported the incident turned, and saw him - and screamed.
“That’s him, that’s the man that took Mr. Davidson and his sister!” she said.
“I beg your pardon?” Jack asked.
“What’s happened here, Andy?”
He pointed to an open door across the hall. “Someone broke into that flat, apparently knocked out the resident and took him and his sister off somewhere, pointed a gun at the lady down the hall on his way out.”
Jack was intent on his wrist strap - he’d started doing something with it as soon as the woman had recognized him. He raised his head back to them, expression grim. “We’ll cover this one, Andy. Thanks.” He stalked off back to the SUV.
Gwen and Ianto followed, not sure what else to do. Jack climbed into the passenger seat, leaving Ianto to drive. “Turn left up ahead,” Jack instructed.
“Where are we going?” Ianto asked.
Jack tapped his wrist strap. “Wherever this tells us to,” he said. “I did a scan for other wrist straps in the area, and found one.”
“Any idea whose it is?” Gwen asked.
“Mine.”
“Yours? You mean it is you she saw? You that we’re chasing after now?”
“Probably.”
Ianto concentrated on driving, following Jack’s directions. Finally, they pulled up outside a hotel. “That’s Mr. Davidson’s car,” Gwen recognized as they pulled in - she’d spent the trip over looking up any information she could find.
“Stop here,” Jack instructed. “I think we’re close enough that I can tap into his wrist strap as a listening device...” He trailed off, concentrating on his own wrist strap.
“He’s in the hotel?” Ianto asked. Jack nodded. “Where?”
“Second story, near the front.”
Ianto fished a pair of binoculars out of the glove compartment. “Can you be more specific?” He began scanning the windows. Then he stopped, catching sight of a familiar profile. “Never mind.”
“Let me see?” Jack asked. Ianto moved aside, keeping the binoculars in place; Jack looked through them. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
“What?”
“It’s...well, it’s a long story. A long time ago...before I met the Doctor, before I became immortal, back when I was working for the time agency. There’s two years that I have no memory of. If I’m judging his age right based on the haircut and fashion sense, he’s me, sometime during those two years.”
“And this is a problem?” Ianto asked.
“I’m not particularly proud of that part of my life,” Jack answered. “And that’s just the parts I can remember.
“So see if you can get that sound thing working, figure out what he’s up to.”
Jack nodded, and pressed a few buttons on his wrist strap. Voices filtered in through the car speakers.
“There’s something I’m looking for,” the younger Jack was saying. “It’s small, just a little orange box, and it would have appeared out of nowhere, a few weeks ago. I think you know where it is, and I think you’re holding out on me...” There was a pause; Ianto, still looking through the binoculars, saw the other Jack lift a wallet and flip it open. “John Davidson.”
“I d-don’t know, please...”
There was a buzz, and a short scream. “Electrical shock,” Jack said softly; Ianto wondered how he’d gotten familiar enough with the sound to recognize it so easily, but didn’t ask - now wasn’t the time.
“Please, just let my sister go, she’s got nothing to do with this...”
“Of course she doesn’t,” the other Jack said, laughing - not his Jack’s pleasant laughter, though; this was a colder sound that Ianto didn’t care for at all. “She’s just here to keep me amused while you decide to cooperate.”
There was another scream - a woman’s scream, this time. The other Jack disappeared into the depths of the room, out of sight of the window; Ianto was grateful - his imagination could fill it in well enough, given the woman’s screaming and pleading, Jack’s low chuckle, and the sound of ripping cloth.
“What do we do?” he asked Jack - his Jack, the current Jack, the real Jack.
Jack flinched away, though; he turned, refusing to look at Ianto or Gwen. “I - I don’t know.”
“Well, obviously we can’t kill him,” Gwen said. “He’s still mortal, and if we kill him, we mess up your history, and who knows what else.”
“I can’t get too close to him, either,” Jack added. “If I touch him, the universe is in danger of implosion.”
“But we can’t just do nothing...” Gwen said, though she clearly had no further suggestions on what they could do.
“Okay,” Ianto said, taking a deep breath and unbuckling his seatbelt.
“Ianto, what...?” Jack asked.
“Distraction,” Ianto said. “We can’t kill him, so knocking down the door and pointing our guns at him is too risky. I go in first and distract him. You and Gwen act as backup - you said this was wiped from your memory, so it’s not as if there’s any danger of you messing up your own timeline too badly. We either convince him to leave, or take him prisoner.”
“Ianto, you don’t know what he can do,” Jack warned. “Hell, I don’t know what he can do, and he’s me.”
“If he’s in any serious danger of killing me, I’ve got you two to rush to my rescue,” Ianto said. “And anything else, I can handle.”
Jack closed his eyes and considered for a minute. Ianto waited, hand on the door handle. “Okay.”
Ianto didn’t hesitate, stopping only to reach into the car and grab the thermos of coffee. He ran up the room, taking only a second to catch his breath before he knocked on the door - wouldn’t do to look as if he’d run all the way here. “Room service,” he called.
“I didn’t order room service,” other-Jack called back. The door opened anyway; Ianto held out a steaming cup of coffee.
“Courtesy of an old friend,” he said. Jack reached for the cup, and Ianto hid a smile; he clearly hadn’t entirely meant to reach for it - but Jack could never resist a cup of coffee, certainly not Ianto’s special blend. He let their fingers brush as Jack took it; this may be a distant past version of his lover, but he was willing to bet some things never changed, like that sensitive spot on his wrist...he touched it, casually, seemingly unintentionally.
“Do you have a name...friend?” past-Jack asked, the flirtatious, seductive tone sounding unpolished. He’d thought his Jack lacked subtlety; apparently he was a good bit better than he used to be.
“Ianto,” he answered. “You?”
“Not important.” Jack’s hand closed around Ianto’s wrist. “Coming in?”
And Ianto had thought it was bad the way his Jack had a habit of propositioning people he’d known for less than five minutes. His patience, too, had apparently grown since his younger days.
Ianto leaned forward to kiss Jack, setting the thermos of coffee aside. He ignored the noise Jack made - equal parts startled and pleased - as he wrapped his arms around him, pushing him back into the room. One hand made a frantic motion behind Jack’s back, in the general direction of the woman, who seemed at least to not be tied up - he just hoped she understood the instruction and was in some shape to do something about it. She was; her eyes went wide, then she slid off the bed and set about untangling her brother from the mess of electrodes and ropes holding him to the chair. Ianto walked further into the room, carefully turning so Jack’s back stayed turned towards the other two. He was sure Jack would realize what was going on at any minute, but he didn’t - didn’t even notice as his two prisoners walked out of the room. Well, perhaps he’d been caught off guard by the way Ianto was using every trick he knew to turn Jack’s knees to jelly - that had been the intention, certainly.
It wasn’t infidelity if it was with a past version of your lover...was it? Besides, Jack had different notions about fidelity than most people in this time did anyway, and it was in the line of duty...right?
Past-Jack didn’t even notice when Ianto slid the handcuffs out of his pocket and fastened them around his wrists, securing his arms behind his back. Ianto pulled back, grabbing Jack by the arm and marching him out of the room before he had a chance to protest.
“Hey, wait a minute, where are we going?” Ianto didn’t answer, though, just led him downstairs and out the door, towards the SUV, vaguely aware of his Jack and Gwen dealing with the questions of various onlookers - mainly hotel staff. He bundled past-Jack into the back of the SUV, slipping a sack over Jack’s head - one of the ones that usually got used on weevils.
Gwen drove back to the Hub; Ianto stayed in the back seat with past-Jack. Jack - the current one - sat in the front passenger seat, completely quiet.
Ianto led the prisoner down to the interrogation room, settling him into the chair before he took the sack off his head. He tied his ankles to the chair legs, and made sure his arms were secure behind his back. Then he stood in front of him, hands in his pockets, self-consciously aware of Jack and Gwen watching from above. “What are you doing here?”
“Where have you taken me?” Jack asked. “Who are you?”
“Your worst nightmare,” Ianto answered softly. “Someone who knows you.” He stepped forward, and sat down on Jack’s lap, one arm around the man’s shoulders for balance. “What are you doing here? Did the time agency send you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.” Ianto cupped Jack’s face in one hand, stroking his cheek and leaning closer. “This isn’t your time, or your place. What are you doing here?”
“It’s not for the time agency,” past-Jack answered. “It’s just a...a little something on the side. A bit of treasure I’m trying to track down.”
“Ah.” Beyond that, Ianto didn’t really care about the details. “You know,” he said, keeping his tone light, almost flirtatious, despite the seriousness of his words, “it’s not nice to torture people. You’ve been a very bad boy.”
“Yeah? What’cha gonna do about it?”
Ianto stood, and slammed Jack forward against the table. He was stopped short by the chains holding him to the chair, but not short enough to keep him from getting a few bruises from the impact.
“Tell me,” he commanded. “Tell me how many people you’ve hurt. How many you’ve killed.”
Past-Jack laughed. “More than I can count.”
“Why?”
“Because they were in the way. Because they didn’t matter. No one matters, they all die anyway.”
“Hm.” Ianto didn’t give any further reply, just walked out of the room. That was more than enough of this for now.
Jack was waiting for him upstairs; Gwen was nowhere to be seen.
“What do you think?” Ianto asked.
“I think I’m scared of you,” Jack joked. Ianto’s lip twitched in a half-smile. “I...Ianto, I can’t ever remember being that...that uncaring. I’ve done things I’m not proud of, I’ve made mistakes, especially back then, but...I don’t remember being like that.”
“What were you like, Jack? Before the two years you lost, and...after?”
“Before...I was in a bit of a bad place; it was right after I got stuck in that time loop with...Captain John...I’d thought we’d built some sort of partnership during that, but then after, he just walked out, left me in the middle of a mission, not even a backwards glance. I was pretty much just throwing myself into whatever the time agency asked me to do, trying to shut off my brain as much as possible - it felt like everyone I cared about just left, so I was trying not to care.”
“I can see how that might lead to you becoming something like...him,” Ianto said, with a nod towards the prisoner below them. “What about after?”
“After...I was pretty sure it was the time agency that’d wiped my memories, though I never had proof of that. I went rogue, started trying to con them whenever I could, get in their way as much as possible - after I woke up with no memory of where I’d been for the last two years, I realized that I really didn’t like what they stood for, didn’t like a lot of the things they’d told me to do. It wasn’t too long after that that the Doctor found me, and everything changed.”
Ianto nodded. “Sounds like losing your memory was really for the best, then, sir.”
“I think I see where this is going to end.”
Ianto did too, but he wouldn’t suggest it - it was one thing if it was Jack’s idea, since it was his past they were dealing with; it wouldn’t seem right, coming from Ianto. “Do you?”
“We retcon him. Us, not the time agency. Then we send him back through to his own time.”
Ianto nodded. “That does sound like it would be for the best.”
“There are a few questions I wouldn’t mind having answered before we do, though,” Jack said. “About...what happened during those two years.”
“What sort of questions?”
“Mostly just one, actually,” Jack said. “I don’t think I want to know about most of it, but...there’s this scar, on my lower back; I got it sometime during those two years, and I have no idea how. I can get rid of the memories, but the scar’s still there, still part of me - I’d sort of like to know what that part’s history is.”
“I’ll ask him, then. Get the retcon ready?” Ianto asked. Jack nodded.
Ianto walked down into the room, standing next to the chained Jack. “We’re about ready to send you on your way,” he said, “but first, there’s just one thing we’re curious about.” He unclipped the handcuffs from the chair, but left the hands bound, and pushed Jack forwards, so he was laying bent over the table. He reached to untuck Jack’s shirt from his pants, pausing as he saw his Jack standing on the stairs, frozen.
“Jack?” he asked. “Something wrong?”
“Nothing,” Jack said, moving forwards again. “Just a...flash of memory, almost.”
“Getting the memories we’re about to erase back?” Ianto asked.
“Not all the way, they’re too deeply buried. It’s almost more a physical memory than anything else...something about this...it seems familiar. Something about...you.”
Ianto pushed the shirt up out of the way, ignoring the way the prisoner was straining to lift his head and get a look at his future self - this was the first time he’d heard Jack’s voice.
“Jack?” Ianto said, quietly. “There’s no scar.”
“No?” Jack asked. “There has to be, it was there when I woke up...”
“How fresh was it?” Ianto asked.
“It - now that you mention it, it was pretty fresh.”
Trying to keep his hand from shaking, Ianto pulled his pocket knife from his pants pocket and opened it, resting it against Jack’s bare skin.
“What’s this?” the chained Jack asked.
“A reminder,” Ianto said, pressing the blade down. For a moment, he giddily wondered what would happen if he got it wrong - wondered if he even could get it wrong, since the design he was copying it from was itself.
Jack screamed - both of him. Ianto finished - it was a simple enough shape, didn’t take long to cut - and looked up at his Jack. “You okay?”
“I - yeah - I just...” He drew a shaky breath. “That brought it all back. Seeing it - I told you it was a physical memory; just the pain - but it triggered the rest of it, I remember it all now.”
“Do you wish you didn’t?” Ianto asked.
“I - no...I don’t think so. If I’d kept the memories then, I would have kept following the same path I was on, and I don’t like where that was leading - but now that I’ve got a few lifetimes of being a better man between them and me...it’s good to know. Where I come from, what I’m capable of.” He sat down across the table from the prisoner, resting his head in his hands. “Just send him back through - I can’t touch him, just...” Jack held up his own wrist strap, pointing out a sequence of buttons; Ianto picked up the prisoner’s wrist, and pressed them, dropping his hand before he disappeared in a red glow.