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It wasn’t the first time Jack asked him to do it, and as Ianto raised the gun, he knew it likely wouldn’t be the last.
He almost wanted to turn the gun around and pull a Suzie instead of complying with Jack’s order.
“Do it, Ianto,” Jack said, his voice strong but strained. “Come on. We don’t have much time.”
“I know.” Ianto swallowed. He still didn’t pull the trigger.
Jack laid his head back on the ground with a groan. His left arm had already been consumed to the elbow, and his right was quickly catching up. His legs gave out a while ago, and his trousers were now sunk in in multiple places. The fact that Jack was still conscious and not screaming in pain was astounding.
He had launched himself in front of Ianto the moment they entered the warehouse and he realised what was happening. It was some sort of microbe, Jack explained before everything started, that fed on organic material. If there was any way to kill Jack, it was to consume him until there was nothing left.
So it was better that Ianto shoot him, and the microbe be destroyed as Jack’s body regenerated.
“Ianto, please.” One of Jack’s legs was completely gone now, The trousers laying flat on the ground. Jack was biting his lip, eyebrows furrowed and eyes shut tight, clearly holding back screams for Ianto’s benefit.
He really, really didn’t want to.
He held the gun with both hands even though it was a one-handed pistol, trying his best to stop the shaking. He didn’t want to cause Jack any more pain than was strictly necessary.
His mind would stop playing through all the times he saw Jack die. Even worse, it played through all the times Jack died at his hand, again and again and again. Jack lying on the floor of the Hub, by the Rift Manipulator, after Lisa had deleted him. Jack lying behind the work stations after Ianto decided not to stop Owen from shooting him. Jack lying in the morgue after he had run out to save them all.
Jack lying on the ground, just like now, after having his leg blown off and half his ribs broken, too weak to raise his own gun to his head and do it himself. The perfectly circular hole in his head, the blood leaking out around it. The way he got up only a minute later to shoot down the things that had done that to him.
His left shoulder was gone now, and Jack was choking on something inside. It wouldn’t kill him, not yet, not fast enough. He opened his eyes, tear-filled and desperate, and looked at Ianto, begging.
Ianto pulled the trigger and shot him dead.
Later, after everything was dealt with, Jack hugged Ianto close, pressing Ianto’s head to his chest. They did this often, every time Jack died and Ianto needed confirmation he was alive, needed to hear his heart beat.
The others thought they went to have sex, Ianto knew. They did, sometimes, but usually all they did was this, holding each other against the pain of loss. One day they wouldn’t be able to do this anymore.
For now, Ianto simply tightened his hold.