This is my first Torchwood fic. I got the dreaded Plot Bunny and just had to get it out. Basically, it's just a fluffy Janto piece about Jack musing on his relationship with Ianto during "The Last of the Time Lords" of "Doctor Who." Cute and sweet. I hope you enjoy!

Disclaimer: I am as poor as two…very poor things. I own nothing, especially not Gareth David-Lloyd, a fact that sends me to sleep crying every night.

It was a funny old thing, death. The first time he'd died, it had been the most difficult thing to do in the entire world. When he'd woken up, disoriented and confused, he'd had the unique experience of all his preconceptions about life being shattered at once. Not comfortable by any means.

From then on, though, it had gotten easier, until the act of dying became simply a nuisance. It was one state of being from which he'd quickly pass, and after taking the job with Torchwood (or being forced to take the job with Torchwood), he'd gotten into the habit of performing a quick mental check of himself and his surroundings whenever he woke up in the morning to see whether he'd been sleeping or, you know…the other thing. It was a 50-50 shot.

Of course now…now, locked up by a maniacal Time Lord with little hope and no freedom, it was a completely different matter. Death wasn't any more permanent than it had been before, but it felt as though it was because every time he woke up, he found himself wondering, How many more? How many more lives had been lost as he wasted his time with failed escape attempts and doomed bids for liberty? How many children had died while he lay helpless and lifeless on the floor, no matter how temporary the state might be for him?

And the thought that most frequently crossed his mind (and he felt slightly ashamed for admitting this because one life shouldn't be worth more than another) was, is he still alive?

Before he'd met the Doctor, he'd never have dwelt on the wellbeing of anyone, least of all an innocuous nobody like Ianto Jones. But it all seemed so important now. At the end of the world, dying day after day, his priorities were thrown into sharp relief from the mundane nothings of day-to-day life. And one of those priorities was definitely Ianto.

"Would you ever leave us?" The younger man's husky voice had been quiet as he lay still, chin tucked up against Jack's bare chest. Jack chuckled, running his hand through Ianto's hair.

"You mean, will I ever leave you," he corrected. Ianto shifted to look up at him, blue eyes meeting blue, his intense gaze and Jack's laughing one.

"No," Ianto said. "Would you ever leave us. The team. Torchwood."

Despite his cocky attitude, Jack felt a little hurt by Ianto's demanding—and distinctly impersonal—question. It had not been what he'd expected from him, but then over the past few weeks he'd been learning that Ianto Jones was full of surprises, not the least of which being a hidden Cyberwoman-girlfriend in the basement.

"You know I'm waiting for someone to fix me," Jack said, hauling himself into a sitting position so that Ianto was forced to draw back and sit up as well. Rather than remain by Jack, Ianto stood and began to get dressed, his back towards his lover. Jack was overwhelmed with a sense of guilt that he didn't quite comprehend. "The Doctor. If he comes, I might have to go away with him. I don't want to go on like this forever."

"How d'you mean?" Ianto asked without turning around. "Immortal?"

"Yeah," Jack whispered, running a hand through his hair. "But it's more than that. Hey—look at me." He reached out and placed a hand on Ianto's shoulder, forcing him to turn around. The younger man did so reluctantly, meeting Jack's eyes with his own, and Jack couldn't help noticing the fiery spark that he'd come to grow so fond of glowing bright and fierce in Ianto's frustrated gaze.

"As long as I can never die," he said, "then I can never love. I can't afford to." Ianto rolled his eyes and let out his breath in an angry sigh. "You have to understand me. Just because my body can't die doesn't mean that my soul can't either. Every time I love someone, and then have to leave them, it's like a little piece of me is dying for real."

Over this year, he'd died more deaths than he ever had before, and every time he woke up to the sounds of that one conversation echoing through his skull. I can never love. I can never love. I can never love. He'd said that he couldn't, but he'd known that he was lying the moment the words escaped his lips and Ianto looked at him with those hurt blue eyes and he'd felt his heart—so old, so battered, so torn, so aching—beating just a little faster. And with all this time and distance between them, he saw things clearer than he ever had before.

Somehow, he was going to go back. He'd find his way back if it killed him.

God, I love writing this stuff. And hopefully you love reading it. Don't forget to leave a token of your appreciation by reviewing, please and thank you!