| Date: 29 December 2007
Characters: Jack Harkness, The Ninth Doctor Location: hotel bar, a TARDIS Link to IJ: thread #21594 |
 Once he was finished talking with Susan, Jack only had one thought in his mind. The Doctor. His Doctor was here, somewhere here, and probably the only person in all of space and time that might possibly be able to tell him what the hell had happened to him.
Why he couldn't die. If there was anything he could do to change that. Hell, it's enough to send his feet in the direction of the bar. Might even be enough to have him break his habit and even drink something with alcohol in it. The sight of a very familiar, and much missed back covered in a very familiar leather jacket, and the back of a head sporting very familiar ears standing near a much (or at least frequently) missed dartboard stopped his heart and breath for a moment, settling a low ache in his chest. Definitely something with alcohol in it. Shit, this place was going to be hell on his carefully maintained liver. Collecting a beer from the bar and resisting the urge to ask if they knew how to mix a decent pan galactic gargle blaster, he made his way over to the dartboard and took a seat safely out of the line of fire. |
 The Doctor took his shot (missed) then collected the rest of his darts, turning around once he was done and catching sight of Jack. He smiled, bright and encompassing. "Hullo, Jack." |
| Jack nodded, unable to return that smile, studying every detail of the face he'd not seen in reality for over a century. "Doctor. Your granddaughter told me you were here." |
| "Susan knew I was playing darts?" He frowned, more that Jack wasn't smiling than that Susan knew where he was. "Were you looking?" |
| "Here as in this town here." The frown was more familiar, and oddly more reassuring than the smile. He'd seen the smile used as deflection too many times. "Once I'd talked with her...yeah, you could say I was looking. Never knew you played darts."
But then, that's hardly the biggest secret the Doctor's kept from him. |
| "Probably because I'm not very good at 'em," he admitted, tilting his head a bit at Jack, "You're not my Jack then. He knew he was here." He, honestly, leaned in a bit and sniffed Jack, then nodded, satisfied "I don't remember what happened to you, but I asked."
Because, really, that was the only thing he could think of that would make a Jack look for him. That's all the other one wanted to know. |
| "I know I'm here," Jack retorted, a little nettled. "I didn't know you were."
And if the Doctor didn't remember, he was pretty much screwed, and not in the fun way. "You don't remember?" |
| "Hasn't happened yet," he leaned against the bar slightly, studying Jack, "Haven't even met you. But I asked my older self. Do you want me to tell or do you want him to?" |
| "Shit," Jack commented eloquently, and turned to look across the bar. Because if the Doctor hadn't...but he knew. "D'you know the whys and wherefores well enough to tell?" Older self. Shit. His own older self had mentioned there were other versions of the Doctor here, and he wasn't sure how he'd deal with that one.
At least, if this Doctor didn't remember, then this Doctor had never left him for dead on a deserted station in the depths of space, hundreds of thousands of years away from anything he knew. |
| "Yeah," he said after a moment, then held his hand out to Jack. Softer, warmer than he was with Jack, even when he'd liked the other man. "Let's get out of here and go talk." |
| Jack stared at the hand in silence for a moment. From what he remembered, the Doctor being this nice generally meant there was something seriously wrong, and he wasn't entirely sure he was ready for that.
Eventually, he nodded, and took the outstretched hand, abandoning his untouched beer with little regret to follow the Doctor with an odd feeling of deja vu. |
| He led the way silently out of the bar and into the sunlight, then down the road aways to a blue box under a streetlamp. He unlocked the door, then guided Jack in before finally asking, "When is it for you?" |
| The TARDIS. Hell, he'd not even thought that the Doctor might have the TARDIS with him, and Jack lit up in a genuine smile, running one hand fondly over the panels of the door before turning to take in the full impossibility of her interior. "Hey, sweetheart," he murmured softly, reaching out hesitantly in silent, mental greeting, and waiting for her acknowledgement before turning back to the Doctor. Maybe he hadn't happened yet to this Doctor and his TARDIS, but at least she recognised something in him.
"Two thousand seven," he said, after a brief pause for consideration. "I've been living linear over a century, Cardiff's changed a lot." Understatement, but it'd do. |
| "Keeps coming back to Cardiff," he shook his head and wrinkled his nose, going to the Captain's chair and sprawling a bit. "You were on the Satellite with me, and Rose?" |
| "Interesting place, Cardiff. There's a rift running through it." Not that Jack had any clue why the rift was in Cardiff, though he'd spent a few decades trying to find out. To the best of his knowledge, it just liked it there.
He wondered suddenly, and for the first time, if maybe Rose was around, too, or if she couldn't exist in the same reality as Rowan. Or unreality. "Yeah. Damn place got a bad infestation of Daleks, and you got yourself a conscience." |
| "Really?" he looked interested, "In Cardiff of all places- right." he shook his head, focusing, "Theory goes, I don't really have one of those. And it's a damned shame, because I wasn't the one who did it. Couldn't. Your Rose did." |
| "You don't have a conscience, a Cardiff, a rift or a Dalek?" Jack queried, walking slowly across, touching every strut, every wall, every bit of console he passed. He was pretty much hoping that the Doctor didn't have a Dalek, because fuck if he was ever going to like those things. |
| "Any of the above," the Doctor watched Jack, fingers twitching a little bit as his spaceship all but purred. |
| "Let me be grateful for three out of four," Jack commented dryly, pausing to caress one of the struts - his favorite. There was just something about the sinuous curve that was really kind of hot.
"What didn't you do?" |
| "Pour the time vortex into you." he said bluntly, narrowing is eyes at the stroking. |
| Jack's hand paused for a few heartbeats, and then resumed, slower, less steadily. The time vortex. In him.
Hell if that didn't explain a lot of things. Not everything, sure, but a lot. And was that even possible? "How the hell does a human girl do that?" Jack had every faith in Rose as a vibrant, intelligent, capable, beautiful woman, but she was still a twenty first century human, and they couldn't handle the time vortex, or any kind of vortex energy - could they? |
| "Don't know," he shrugged, "Can't say I'd recommend it." |
| "But, she did it." |
| "Brought you all the way back. Killed the Daleks. Stuck you in time." |
| "Stuck me?" |
| "Stuck you," he repeated, "Constant in time and space." |
| Jack considered that for a moment, hand tightening on the strut until a faint mental protest had him relaxing his grip, soft stroke of apology. "Shit," he said, feelingly. |
| "Be gentle with my girl," he warned voice low, but not unsympathetic. |
| "Sorry." The apology was automatic, but sincere, and Jack leaned in to kiss the strut gently. It probably wasn't the time to mention the times the TARDIS liked it rough.
And he did have some level of discretion. Or possibly self-preservation. "Time vortex. In me." And that little side-matter of killing the Daleks, but considering the events of Canary Wharf, Rose had been a whole heap more thorough on him than on the Daleks. |
| "Poured it right into you," he nodded, "Keep you alive. Keep you constant." |
| "Right." Right, yeah, because that kind of stuff happened every day, right, some poor sap ending up full of the fucking Time Vortex and stuck in time.
Stuck was sounding a hell of a lot like 'trapped'. "Isn't there..." Jack pushed away from the strut, unable to stay still. "I mean, is it...permanent?" |
| "No," he said sarcastically, "Because Time, you know, stops and starts and ceases to be all the time." |
| Oh yeah. Trapped, and too close to panic for Jack's liking, and fucking stuck in time, and the last thing he needed was some wise-ass version of the Doctor that he apparently hadn't even met yet getting sarcastic at him.
Jack stared in disbelief for a couple of erratic heartbeats, and then let instinct take over and channel some of that panic and frustration in a single, powerful punch aimed directly at the Doctor's prominent jaw. |
| His head snapped back and he grabbed his jaw but didn't try to hit back, "Ow!" |
| "Ow?" Jack echoed incredulously, nursing his knuckles. That jaw was every bit as hard as it looked. "You tell me the impossible's happened, that I'm stuck, get sarcastic at me, and all you've got is 'ow'?"
Turning away, he dropped his hand, shoulders falling, and let some of the desperation into his voice. "So I can't die, and I'm never going to be able to die?" |
| "Well, you keep hitting me!" He stood then, putting his hand between Jack's shoulder blades, warm and solid, "No." |
| "Once is not keep," Jack retorted, before that 'no' sank in.
No. Never dying. Living to the end of time, and...then what? Never dying. |
| "The other you," he shook his head, "Turn around, Jack. I've got you." |
| Got him. Got which version of him, though? Jack wasn't certain, himself, any more.
Several versions of him, all unable to die. Too tired to fight against it, and reassured by the gentle pressure against his back, Jack turned around. |
| He pulled Jack in towards him, warm, solid, and surprisingly sympathetic, holding Jack against him loosely. Not trapping, just solid warmth. |
| The loose embrace did more to convince Jack of the truth of the Doctor's assertions than anything else could. The Doctor was being...nice.
Nice was always a sign that the shit had seriously hit the fan. Jack held himself carefully away, hands by his sides, not letting himself lean. Never die. He'd suspected it, but somehow, this confirmation was harder to accept. There'd been the vague expectation, almost hope, that one day, one day it would run out. |
| "Breathe, Jack," The Doctor said very softly, "It's not going to kill you, it's just going to make you uncomfortable if you don't." |
| "Might kill me temporarily," Jack retorted, but it was half-hearted, hollow, and breathing sounded dangerously close to a sob, rough and uneven.
Still not leaning. |
| "Would that really help?" |
| No. Of course it wouldn't help, nothing would help, the Doctor had just confirmed that.
Besides, suffocation wasn't the most comfortable way to die, and even knowing he couldn't stay dead, there was no way to combat the physical instincts that fought for life. Not trusting his voice, Jack shook his head. Just once. |
| "Jack," the Doctor said quietly, trying to get him to relax, "Let go." |
| "Would that really help?" Jack shot back immediately, cursing his voice for sounding so fucking weak. |
| "Might," he slid one hand up around the back of Jack's neck, cupping it. |
| Jack wasn't going to be able to hold back much longer, hands fisting at his sides, creasing wool as his fingers curled tight. Two options. Get the fuck away from the man with a familiar face who wasn't his Doctor yet, or give in to the illusion, to the warm hand at his neck, to the unexpected patience.
Illusions weren't so bad. Temporarily. With one more deep, uneven breath, Jack gave in, and wrapped his arms around the Doctor, tight, head dipping to hide his face in the familiar cool, bitterrich smooth leather of jacketed shoulder. |
| "Jack," he said softly, careful with him like he was broken or Rose or both. Holding onto Jack like Jack was his.
He wrapped his arm around Jack's waist, hand still warm on the back of his neck, jacket sliding against Jack's skin as he moved, cool. |
| Jack focused on breathing, slow, steady, controlled, scent of leather filling his nostrils, steady warmth of the Doctor's body against his, and it was easy, so fucking easy to believe in the illusion. Hell, he should know, he'd traded in enough of them. Created a fair few.
"I know you're not him," he whispered, careful, not lifting his head. "I know you're not." |
| "I'm not not him, either," he offered. |
| No way Jack was letting himself fall that far for the illusion. "No, you're definitely are not him," he replied, soft but certain. "Just by doing this, by meeting now, before you know me, you're not him." |
| "I know Jack though." |
| "Which Jack?"
Since apparently there was a choice. Definitely a choice. Jack wondered how many choices. |
| "How the hell are we differentiating?" |
| "Beats me, I've only met one of them." Jack considered for a moment, not moving away. Not moving closer. "And me." |
| "Okay, one of the ones that aren't you." he said snarkily. |
| "So I'm not him and you're not him." The bite to the Doctor's tone was at least familiar. Even if nothing else was. "What the hell are we doing, then?" |
| "Tell me if the situations were reversed you wouldn't be right where I am," he dared. |
| "If I had a fucking clue what your situation was I might try it," Jack shot back. |
| He grinned, "And I thought you were smart for a human." |
| "You never were a good liar, Doctor." |
| "I am too!" He sounded offended. |
| "No, you're not." Jack stepped back, surveying him. "You do that...twitchy thing." |
| "I do not twitch," he protested, twitching a bit and crossing his arms over his chest. |
| "Oh, you do." Jack grinned, on more comfortable ground. "You go all stiff, and you stop meeting my eyes, and you twitch."
He paused, looking thoughtful. "You know, I used to know a Davanbryltar who twitched every time I -" |
| "Do I want you to finish that sentence?" he asked pointedly. |
| "...sang," Jack finished, with a pointed look. "Why does everyone always assume it's going to be something x-rated? Actually, speaking of twitching, has this version of you met your granddaughter here yet?" |
| "You've met Susan?" He smiled suddenly, "Isn't she brilliant?" |
| "She's fantastic." Jack smiled, warm and genuine. "I could live without the poking thing, but she's amazing. Takes after you." |
| "Poking thing?" he asked. |
| "Oh, yeah. You mean she doesn't do that to you?" Well, probably not, to family, and possibly some kind of respect for her ancestor. "She kept poking my nose." Jack rubbed the offended article. |
| "...That's sorta sweet," he beamed a bit proudly. |
| "Sweet?" Jack echoed incredulously. |
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