Title: Remembrance
By: lilithangel
Pairings: Jack/real Jack Harkness
Rating: PG
Warnings: contains references to death.
Summary: Jack wore a poppy for all those lost. Not for remembrance because he could never forget, but for love.

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There weren’t many left who remembered a less benign red decorating the landscape. Few who could recall the blossoms of blood on the breasts of their comrades or the sound of screaming slowly choked off and still had the stench of death in their nostrils.

Jack could never forget, didn’t want to ever forget. It was the same memories he saw in the original Jack’s eyes, the reason he felt more comfortable around soldiers than anyone. Even his team in Torchwood who had seen so much, suffered so much, couldn’t understand, didn’t hear the death of thousands every night.

Jack had been in Flanders, helped bury the lines of the dead that he could never join. He might have even met John McCrae but all the faces were grey and haunted there and he only really saw the dead.

Being back in the forties put him back with others who shared those memories and it was like coming home. His Jack watched over the youngsters with the same sad regret as he had, knowing the reality of what they were doing would tear them apart soon enough. That knowledge drew them together just as much as animal attraction or his guilt at what the morning would bring.

Many found comfort from the screams and the blood in the warmth and need of a stranger’s arms. Truth was found on the edge of death and Jack found that in the kiss of the man whose name he stole.

Jack wore a poppy for all those lost. Not for remembrance because he could never forget, but for love.

END

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