Disoriented Cosmos {A Torchwood Story} [COMPLETED]

21. What's Up With That Jack?

Since I opened up the Rift manipulator to look at the heart of the Rift about a month ago, Jack's been wary about me. Like he doesn't know who I am. Well, ditto - you'd think after almost a year of working with him I'd know my boss, but seems I still don't.

We've since closed the hatch and decided after some tests that whatever is the Rift and I are telepathically linked in some way, although God knows how. Perhaps it's something residual left in me from my days as a drug mule? We don't have the equipment to determine for sure yet, but rest assured I've given something new for Jackie Boy to try.

Today, seeing as Tosh is at her mother's birthday, Suzie is at her mother's funeral (bit of a stark contrast in their activities), and Owen is hungover, I'm the only one that Jack can enlist to help him contain a man who seems to have fallen through the Rift from - judging by his clunky taste in clothes and his choice of a bow and arrow instead of a Tesco bag like most people - around the Middle Ages. And I can tell he doesn't like it one bit. Captain Jack Harkness, real life enigma, hates not knowing things; who knew?

I begin skipping alongside him, waiting til he gets irritated that I'm not focusing for me to open my mouth and ask, "So... what do you think about the readings the Rift has given lately? Especially since we can read them clearer now, seeing as I'm able to communicate with it, as it turns out?"
"I know that you're trying to antagonize me, Evelina," Jack replies grumpily, like a father whose kids are asking are they there yet in a car ride. "Just focus on the job, please."

Now we're cooking with grease. "But I'm genuinely asking, what do you think of the readings now that I'm able to telepathically understand the Rift? Don't you think it's weird?"
"I think that you shouldn't exist," he says angrily with hints of anger and confusion, and stops to look at me. I look back at him defiantly.

"Why?"

"Because there are some things on this world that just shouldn't be, and a scrawny brunette woman with no memory who used to be a drug mule shouldn't be telepathically linked with a rift in time and space," he protests, and I shout back, "What do you know about what should and shouldn't be? I don't know anything about you, why should I believe you when you imply I'm wrong?"

"Because I'm-"

Out of the blue an arrow splits through Jack's chest, and he looks down at it and falls to the floor, instantly dead.
I scream. I can't help it; I've seen too many people dying in my life, I don't want it to be even more. I snap my head to the historical guy who snuck up on us whilst we were fighting and fired it, and before he can fire another I run and tackle him, bending his arms back so that I can throw the bow away and secure him in the inflatable cell I carry around with me. Completely against the code of not taking things from the office, but what's a few pens when your mate just got murdered?

With the guy secure I creep over to Jack, who is lying face down on the ground with an arrow sticking out of him. I kneel down, pluck the arrow out, and place a hand on the back of his head, feeling his hair between my fingers and mourning the loss of a friend.
Oh, Jack. You were always so fucking charismatic and careless. That got you in the end, didn't it? Despite everything, I'm gonna miss you: the jokes, the innuendos I was always irritated at you for making, the smile that always got me smiling too...

And then he wakes up, and naturally I go apeshit.

"WAAAHH! WHAT THE FUCK?!" I cry as he takes a deep breath like he's been underwater, and when he moves to stand up I just barely restrain from hitting him over the head.
He looks to me, eyebrows still drawn from our argument. "What?"
I move my hands from where I unknowingly placed them over my mouth and say, "...you just died."

He tilts his head: "And?"
I widen my eyes in horror. "So you should be dead?! How come you're alive? What are you?"
I ask the last question in genuine terror, and he looks over to the guy in the cell and simply raises an eyebrow at me before going over to him.

I stare after him, finally getting it. "That's why I always feel that you're wrong. That's why I've always had this kind of sense around you, that you were different and dangerous and not to be fully trusted. You're not human... are you?"
"Of course I'm human," he replies with an irritated eyeroll, and I widen my own eyes further to get him to continue. "I'm immortal."

I simply blink rapidly as he claps cuffs on the guy and gets him into the SUV, and I'm left alone for a few moments thinking over everything I know about Captain Jack Harkness.

Immortal?
But how?
And an immortal human? That's wrong, plain and simple - I don't know how to explain it, but deep down inside of me there's something plainly wrong I can feel about him, like he's not meant for any time, he's just meant to be here forever but... not.

"You coming?" he shouts exasperated from the driver's window, and I nod numbly. As he drives us back to the Hub I watch him and wonder how he is so wrong, and how I know by heart how wrong he is.

~∆~

When we get back to the Hub and put the historical guy in a cell, before Jack can go and look up what era he's from I grab his arm. I want to know more.
"You're immortal? How? Why? When?"

"Why do you need to know?" Jack retorts, and tries to pull away. I pull him back.
"Because you're my fucking boss, Jack! I need to know who I'm working for! Am I working for the good guy? Or the bad guy?"
"Why would I be the bad guy?"
"Why would you be immortal?!" I counter at the top of my lungs. I'm fed up with this - why won't he tell me about himself?

Jack opens his mouth to remonstrate me, but sees the determination in my eyes and takes a deep calming breath in. He does this a lot when dealing with me.
"Okay," he begins quietly, "extremely long ago, I met a man. He was a really extraordinary man: he knew anything and everything in the universe, and fought and made peace with so many different beings and worlds; then afterwards he would get in his magic blue box that was bigger on the inside than the outside, and fly off to help more. And he met me when I was in need. And when I died, he helped me again."

My eyes widen. "You died?"

"Yeah," he continues with a sigh that hints at a past too shrouded to uncover. "A very long time ago, and so far away, I died, and he brought me back to life. But something went wrong, and he brought me back to life forever; every time I die, I come back to life."

I'm rooted to the spot. I feel like my legs are weights. I'm too shocked to move.
Jack registers my shock and sighs in defeat. "Don't tell the team. Please. I don't... I don't want anyone to know."
I'm still in shock. "You don't want your coworkers to know anything about you?"
"No," he sighs again. "It's better for everyone that you don't know who I am."

"But why?" I persist, but he's already waved me away like an annoying bug and is walking to sit down in his office to work.
I stand, waiting for him to sit, waiting to see his face.

His expression is tired, as tired as mine used to be; the corners of his mouth are dropped down almost to his chin, and although he's visibly trying to remain composed, I can see that he's hurting.

I shouldn't have brought whatever it is he's remembering up. But then again, he should've told me about his past.

Any relationship should be based on trust - what do I do when, once again, someone I'm close to won't let me into their lives?