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tampered2009-07-24 11:21 pm
handsomejack.livejournal.com) wrote in tampered2009-07-24 11:21 pm
Log: Complete
When; Friday Evening
Rating; PG-13 for graphic images
Characters; The Doctor![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sciencegeekchic and Captain Jack Harkness handsomejack
Summary; Jack has returned to the City after the events of CoE. Please be aware there are spoilers for CoE in this log
Log;
The Hub was gone.
Ianto was gone, Tosh and Owen. Stephen and Alice. Knowing Gwen was alive and well, with Rhys and expecting a baby was a small comfort but one that seemed so very distant that Jack could barely feel it except when he focused very hard.
And recently, he'd tried to do anything except focus.
Being back in the City, should have meant more to him than it did but even the familiar carousel, the soft ticking of the clock had done little to stir him from the cold numbness that had become his familiar companion. Despite the heat of summer, Jack's overcoat was buttoned up to the chin, belted tight and as closed off as the man himself.
The chill of Time and space was hard to shake off.
Without much thought, Jack began to walk. It didn't dawn on him until he was half way there, that he was searching out the location of the TARDIS as best he could remember, though the Doctor always seemed to draw him, like a beacon. Going to the beach house didn't even enter into his cold, still thoughts.
Kyle.
Memory rose and like a flash of fire in a snowstorm, it was ruthlessly snubbed out. Jack didn't stop walking until he came upon the familiar blue police box, standing there for what might have been minutes or hours, he'd stopped bothering to keep track of Time.
Wordlessly, he put his hand against the door.
The TARDIS let the Doctor know that Jack was near before the other man reached the door. Jack was a fixed point, an anomaly, and the TARDIS was sensitive to such things. From what he had learned from Gwen, Jack had gone through some horrible things and considering where the man was the last time they had talked, he was probably in a bad place.
The Doctor opened the door and offered his friend a small, sincere smile rather than the one of pure glee that he normally might have offered. As he suspected, Jack looked... if he had to put a word to it he would say "empty".
"Hello, Jack," he said.
Empty was a very good way to put it, Jack certainly felt hollow inside. He felt like he'd gone through every emotion possible, searching for something to take root but even rage and anger had failed to fill him.
The Doctor's small smile cut and soothed at the same time. It was the first bit of familiarity Jack had allowed himself in what felt like years, though it had most likely only been months. He wanted to reach out and gather the Time Lord close, hug something solid and real but like the Doctor's expressions of pure glee, that over abundance of touchiness was missing from Jack.
"Hello, Doctor," he said, the eerie calmness of his own voice alien to him. "Wouldn't happen to have some tea, would you?"
"I'm sure we've got some tea or something very close to it," he said, stepping aside to let the other man in. It pained him to see Jack like this, a man as full of life and excitement as himself, hollowed out until he was a husk of his former self.
The Doctor couldn't help but feel a tiny flash of guilt at that. If he hadn't dragged Jack into all this, then the man might be happier. He knew the dangers of thinking that way, because if he hadn't done what he had, Jack might be even worse off. Besides, he didn't want to focus on his own guilt at the moment.
"You left Earth then?" he asked, trying to get a fix on when Jack was coming from.
In the beginning Jack had railed against what the Doctor had done to him but over time that anger had faded away till it would genuinely bemuse Jack to learn that the Time Lord himself still carried the guilt. Stepping past the man and into the TARDIS, Jack paused at the end of the gangway and looked at the center console with it's familiar hums and lights and he waited to feel the familiar exhilaration that always came upon him when he was inside the police box.
...
Nothing.
Exhaling a long breath, Jack began to undo his coat, shrugging out of it and still, briefly looking over his shoulder for Ianto to take it. Of course, Ianto wasn't there and instead Jack folded it over his arm and walked on up the gangplank towards the console.
"A while ago," he said, walking around and idly reading the gauges and dials. "Depending upon what reference of time you want to use I suppose I've been gone from Earth for months or decades or milliseconds."
Fingers resting lightly on a battered dial, Jack looked up and over at the Doctor.
"Haven't really bothered to keep track, you know?"
The Doctor nodded and just observed Jack, growing more and more worried as he watched. There was no anger, no frustration, just nothing at all. That scared the Doctor. Sometimes Jack was as close to a kindred spirit as the Doctor thought he would encounter these days and for someone like them to feel nothing was a tragedy in itself.
"Where did you go?" he asked as he lead the way into the kitchen. He wished that he could help Jack, but he wasn't sure where to start. Especially not with where he was in his own musings. Donna or Rose or Martha would have been better, but he knew that they could never really understand.
Following the Doctor, Jack pursed his lips and then gave a bit of shrug.
"Went after the 456 home world," he said as if stalking an entire species was normal practice. "Was going to lay every single one of them to waste. Who needs a race of drug addicts anyway. Had it all planned, down to the last bit and I got there and I realized that even my hatred for them had just gone. What good is vengeance if you don't even feel the rage for it anymore?"
Once in the kitchen, Jack carefully folded aside the coat and then picked an out of the way spot to stand until the Doctor was ready.
"Instead I crippled their ability to go into space. Broke into the intergalactic database and re designated them a 'developing do not disturb' planet. Maybe a few decades spent rebuilding their systems will dry them out and they can stop ... doing to other species what they did to Earth."
The Doctor listened to what Jack was saying and he was proud of what Jack had done. Even if he hadn't spared the 456 because of any altruistic or moral principles he knew that not taking revenge was never an easy thing. The Doctor know what what it was like to commit xenocide and it wasn't a burden he would wish anyone to carry.
He busied himself with making tea while Jack talked. It was probably the first time he had told this to anyone and he wanted to let him get it all out.
Hands in his pockets, Jack stared at the TARDIS floor before sharing his next words.
"You knew, about Ianto. Didn't you? Did Gwen tell you about my grandson? That I ..." here, finally Jack paused and a hint of emotion crept into the stillness of his voice. "That I killed him, to stop the 456 on Earth?"
"I heard," he said with a small nod. He wanted to tell himself that it wouldn't have been what he had done, that he would have found another way, but the image of the destruction of his entire race came to mind. He had killed his entire family to stop the Daleks. Wife, children, grandchildren, great grandchildren... he might have found another way to stop the 456 but he knew that if he hadn't...
"I'm sorry, Jack," he said, moving to the other man. "I'm so sorry. No one should have to do that."
It seemed like the appropriate moment, and the Doctor clasped the man in a hug, although he wasn't sure if it was for Jack's sake or his own.
It was the first time anyone had gotten that close to him since Ianto had died. Even though Gwen had fiddled with his lapel, even she had maintained a respectful distance. Leave it to the Doctor to careen into personal space without pause.
It was one of the many reasons Jack cared so deeply for the Time Lord.
There was an awkward pause as if Jack was trying to remember how to return the embrace and then his arms went around the Doctor and he did something that he normally wouldn't have ever considered. He clung to the Doctor. Burying his face against the Time Lord's thin shoulder, Jack clenched his teeth against tears that he was so certain he had cried out and shook his head.
"I screwed up," he whispered. "I thought I could do it, Doctor. I thought I could be the 'dashing hero' have a life there, save the Earth, be brilliant and all I did was bring death and misery to all of them."
"Noooo," the Doctor said, still holding to Jack tight and soothing him as he would a child. It was perhaps more like that than either of the men would ever admit, not all of the Doctor's family was loomed, after all. In a way he felt like all of them, all of his companions, were his children. And the Doctor was a very proud father.
"You can't blame yourself for what others force you to do," he said. "Taking responsibility isn't the same as taking blame, Jack. If you did what you thought was the right thing to do at the time, if you were forced to do something horrible to save others, if you had no other choice... then it's not your fault. You have to hold on to the fact that so, so many more would be dead if you didn't do what you'd done and that if you could have taken their place, you would have."
Wasn't that what Davros had called them? The Doctor's 'Children of Time'. Jack wasn't inclined to move away from the comfort of the Doctor's embrace. It had been so long since touch had been anything but a burning reminder of loss.
"I was arrogant," he choked out. "All along, Doctor I was so arrogant and I got complacent and cocky. Tosh and Owen both of them died as a result of my actions, of my failure to act. Ianto, I walked into that building knowing what we were facing and yet I let him walk in there with me because I believed nothing could touch us."
Swallowing tightly, Jack rocked his face against the Doctor's shoulder.
"Stephen looked at me to fix things. Uncle Jack, always fixing things. He stood there, looking at me all the time, Doctor, his face so innocent and so confused when the pain started and I didn't make it stop. How could I do that him? What sort of monster am I?"
The Doctor winced a bit at Jack's retelling of the story. To have to do something like that to your own grandchild and look them in the eye while you did it? It was no wonder Jack had torn himself apart.
"Monster's don't hate themselves for what they do," the Doctor reassured him.
And without prompting the tears that he'd thought he'd already shed came again as Jack held the Doctor close.
"Alice, my daughter, was just outside the door, banging on it and begging me to stop. When it was all over she was crying, desperate for someone ... desperate for me to fix him. All I could do was stand there."
Jack shook his head, his knees felt weak and he might have stumbled against the Doctor's strength.
"I was so arrogant, Doctor. I thought I could do it all. Be Torchwood and have a real life. I'm a freak, even you and the TARDIS ran away from me. Why, why didn't I learn from that? If I just ... "
Here the words trailed off because even with the time he'd spent away from Earth, Jack hadn't been able to answer the simple question.
What could he have done differently?
"Jack, you're not a- wellll, alright, you are a freak," the Doctor admitted. "But that's not your fault, and it doesn't make you a monster. It makes you unique. Incredible. Special. It doesn't make you a monster."
He wished he had words that would make it better, that would ease Jack's pain and his guilt, but he knew from personal experience there weren't any. The only thing that could help were time and people, and when people were the problem...
When people were the problem...
Jack couldn't help but feel he'd failed everybody. Tosh, Owen, Suzie, Ianto, Steven, Alice even Gwen at the end and most of all the Doctor himself. Speaking of the Time Lord, Jack had a death grip of the back of the Doctor's suit coat.
"I left Earth," he whispered, though he knew on some level that the Doctor was already aware of that. "In the end, I even failed Gwen. I failed them all, Doctor. I loved them so much and I failed all of them, how is that possible?"
"You didn't fail them, Jack," he said, still holding on to his friend. "You outgrew them or they outgrew you or you outgrew each other, but you didn't fail them. You can't stay forever, you can't. Eventually you leave or lose everyone."
It was hard but Jack made himself let go of the Doctor. It was that or take the man down to the floor with him, because Jack had to sit down.
"I wasn't ready," he said softly, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "After I left with you and came back, I thought 'this is it, this is where I'm meant to be'," Jack looked up at the Doctor.
"But that's not possible, is it?"
"It could have been where you belonged at the time," the Doctor said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and looking down at Jack. There was no way to know with absolute certainty, not even for a Time Lord, to know if you were in the right place at the right time.
"If you were able to help at that time and place, that's where you were meant to be," he said.
"Help or rain more fire and death down upon innocents, I don't know anymore," Jack admitted and it was obvious that he'd been wrestling with this for awhile now.
"Gwen told me I couldn't run away but I did. The planet for all it's wonder, Doctor it was nothing more than a graveyard and I tried," he looked up at the Time Lord, desperate for understanding, for the forgiveness he couldn't give himself. "I tried to shake it off but all the traveling on that little, tiny planet couldn't shake the dirt from my feet."
Jack gave his head a small shake.
"I left it all in her hands. She must hate me but truthfully, Torchwood should have been her's from the beginning. It should have been run by someone who ran the same risks as the people who served it. The stakes were never the same, I asked more of my people then I myself could ever give. Their lives."
"You would have, Jack, I know," the Doctor said. "I saw you give your life once before for that planet, before when you were able to die. I know you Jack, and just because you couldn't give your life doesn't mean you wouldn't."
The Doctor paused for a moment, wondering if he should tell Jack what he knew of his future.
"New Earth," he finally said. "There were so many people trapped underground, they were going to die if the tunnels weren't opened up. Martha and I were there. But we didn't have any power, nothing to power the machines that would open the tunnels. But you were there. Ohhh, it's a long, long time from now. But you were there, powering the systems to keep them alive. And you did it, you expended that last bit of energy, the last of your life force, to open those tunnels and free all those people. You gave your life for them, Jack. You saved New Earth. You."
It was almost unheard of for the Doctor to share those bits of the future that he alone carried the weight of knowing and Jack listened, attentive as the Time Lord talked. For the first time a hint of something flickered in empty blue eyes and Jack almost looked hopeful.
"So, there is an end?" He whispered, unable to help thinking about how desperately he'd wanted to just be able to sleep since Ianto and Stephen died. Sleep and not wake up to the nightmare that was his life at this point.
"A good, end?" It was a rhetorical question, Jack didn't expect the Doctor to repeat himself, he was just mulling over the idea that there was going to be a purpose to all of this.
Of course, chances were, when he left the City he'd forget what the Doctor had just told him but for now it helped make the barest crack in the icy numbness that Jack had built around himself since those horrible five days back on Earth.
The Doctor saw a bit of relief in Jack's eyes and knew that he'd made the right decision. Contrary to what he portrayed, he didn't always have all the answers to everything. Just most of the answers to most things.
"Let me share something with you, Jack," the Doctor said, sitting himself down to Jack's level.
Don't tell Jack that, he liked to believe that the Doctor had the answers to everything. It gave him something to believe in, when he'd lost faith in himself.
Following the Time Lord's eyes as the man moved down to his level there was, perhaps, a frightening amount of trust in Jack's own expression as he nodded.
"Of course."
The Doctor slowly reached out and took hold of Jack, gently taking the other man's head in his hands. The touch wasn't always necessary, but it helped, and with a mind like Jack's it might actually be necessary.
"I'm going to share memories with you," the Doctor said, slowly opening up the telepathic link between them. "I'm going to share every good memory I have of people. Every happy moment I've had with my companions and family."
The Doctor didn't mention it would be a two way door and he would feel those same things from Jack. The other man probably already knew that. He also didn't say that he hoped this would help himself as much as it would Jack.
In the 51st Century the human brain was as evolved as the body that encased it. Though Jack was not considered particularly strong in the area of psychic awareness, he had enough empathic sensitivity to make him reactive to events on Earth and particularly receptive to the Doctor in particular.
There was little to no resistance when the Doctor's mind touched Jack's own, though in that first brush, it might have been hard for the Doctor to move past the current maelstrom of loss that echoed in Jack's conscious and subconscious mind. With the loss of Ianto and of Stephen, all the losses that came before them had shifted away from the realm of memories of loved ones, to guilt over the way they had died.
-Estelle, so vibrant and alive, dead because the fairies wanted to send Jack a message.
-Suzie, so passionate and driven, destroyed by Torchwood and Jack's inattentiveness.
-Gray, so innocent, lost to a horrible fate because Jack had failed to simply keep hold of his hand.
-Tosh, brilliant, brilliant Tosh, dead because of Gray's insanity and Jack's failure.
-Owen, his cranky genius doctor, shot when Jack was too slow to recognize the threat and then resurrected by Jack's arrogance, forced to suffer a second death and a living hell.
-Greg, taken and destroyed by Billis to punish Jack for his impudence in the future.
-Alex and the team, dead ... he should have been able to die with them, not give Alex the escape to kill all those brilliant people and himself because Jack would be the future.
-Ianto ... loyal, loving, incredible Ianto, dead because Jack got too cocky and was blinded by his own belief in his own heroism.
-Stephen ... innocent, trusting Stephen. His grandson a child who had never looked upon him with anything other than utter love and faith. Who had stood there in the center of that cold tangle of wires and stoic faces, cut off from his mother, looking into the broken and distant face of his grandfather as he suffered a death that was both drawn out and painful.
There were so many others, soldiers who died under Jack's command, friends who had died while Jack survived the mission, lovers who had outlived him grown old and withered before his eyes, wives who had grown to hate him as they aged and he didn't. His own daughter, who had stood and watched as he destroyed her son ...
It was almost impossible for Jack to grab on to anything good he'd done in his life, every attempt slipped and was washed away by the battering storm of guilt and loss that the mortal human mind had never been designed to withstand.
And there they were, all the good memories from both of them, flashing back and forth across their minds. All the family members they had loved and the times they had enjoyed together. The lingering of loss was there too but it was overwhelmed by the sheer number of good times. Times they had saved a life, saved a city, saved a world, or saved the universe.
Telepathy, the speed of thought, was fast. Entire conversations could happen in the blink of an eye but both the Doctor and Jack were old. They had a lot of memories to share, a lot of happy times, a lot of loved ones. It took several minutes, but they finally went through all of them. When the Doctor disconnected the link the memories already started to fade. They'd each remember them as if they were scenes from a movie.
"There," the Doctor finally whispered, tears streaming down his cheeks.
The Doctor wasn't the only one with tears on his cheeks but at least now, the blue eyes held more than that stark emptiness that had been then when he'd first arrived at the TARDIS. Reaching up, this time it was Jack who reached out and touched the cheek of his old friend, understanding and gratitude in the light caress.
"It's not a measure of weights," he said, meaning that neither of them could go through their existence trying to weight the deaths against the lives. "But we ... keep trying, right?"
"Always got to keep trying," he said, giving one of Jack his broad smiles before standing up, once again finding the strength to keep the melancholy at bay. It never did to dwell on that sort of thing for long.
"And you actually got married more than once?" the Doctor said.
"I never was good at learning my lessons," Jack said, his tone rueful but with a layer of the genuine affection he'd felt for both women.
The melancholy at bay, that was a good term for it especially given the load of memories the Doctor was carrying, a hint of which were still sticking with Jack even now as he watched his old friend move back. Reaching out, he caught at the Doctor's wrist, looking up at him.
"We keep repeating what we believe are the same mistakes but what if they aren't, Doctor? What if we let the loss kill the desire to connect in us, then what do we become?"
It was a genuine question because Jack had felt himself disconnecting, was struggling to reconnect and he got a sense from the shared memories that this was a place and a struggle that the Doctor was also wrestling with.
The Doctor thought on that question for a moment, because it was what he himself had been struggling with. And it wasn't the first time, either. He remembered after the Time War he was so full of anger all he wanted was for someone to pay.
And then he had met Rose. And Jack. And Reinette. And even Mickey. And Sarah Jane again. And Martha. And Rose again...
"Maybe it's not up to us to fix ourselves," the Doctor said softly, staring off a bit, as if he was looking at something only he could see. "Maybe we can't. Maybe we just have to keep going until the universe throws someone or someones at us that does the fixing."
There were a few more moments of silence before he snapped back to the present.
"Anyways, tea you said?"
For Jack the urge to have someone pay hadn't even been able to outlast the numbness of ever repeating loss. He wasn't sure that he wanted a 'someone' or a 'someones' to come into his life and fix things only to break them apart when they left again.
But the memories, the memories were so good...
"Yeah, tea." He said, looking up at the Doctor and letting go of the Time Lord's wrist.
Water was boiling a moment later and the Doctor took out two mugs, poured the water, and opened up a drawer that extended out far longer than the depth of the counter. The Doctor had a lot of different teas. Finally selecting one, he dropped the bag into the mug and handed it to Jack.
"What are you going to do in the City?" he asked.
Taking the mug with a word of thanks, Jack moved to a chair and sat down. Playing the merry dance of 'dunk the teabag' in the water, he pursed his lips and then shook his head.
"I don't know," he said honestly. "Need to find a job, I suppose. Maybe a place to live."
Having come straight from the center of the City to the TARDIS, Jack did not yet know that Ianto had come back to the City before him.
"You're always welcome to stay here," the Doctor said. Between Donna, Reinette, Romana and Clyde (was Clyde still here?) and possibly Jack, the TARDIS was going to be crowded. Well, as crowded as the TARDIS could be, considering its immense size.
Looking up and around the familiar space, Jack gave the Doctor a half smile.
"If you wouldn't mind? Till I get my bearings," figured out what was going on in the City, where things stood and then, Jack would try to decide what to do next.
"Of course," he said with a nod. "There's lots of room here. Not entirely sure just how much room, honestly."
He paused a bit before adding, "Are you going to see them soon?"
Sitting forward, Jack cradled the mug of tea in his hands and looked down at the floor. For perhaps the first time in their acquaintance, he might have looked frightened to the Doctor, stripped of the bravado and swagger that normally shielded Jack from showing such emotions.
It was actually how Jack had felt since Ianto and Stephen's deaths. Gwen had said to him, just before he left, that they were dead and he couldn't just run away, after all Jack had held his ground through the loss of Owen, Tosh, Estelle, Suzie and so many others what had made this so different? The immortal hadn't exactly put a finger on that yet, all he knew was that the pain hurt this time, in a way he couldn't handle.
"I don't know," Jack whispered. "I don't know, Doctor."
Looking up at his old friend, Jack's expression was full of naked confusion.
"I've been traveling, trying to figure out what made this instance so different from the others. I've stood over so many graves, said goodbye to so many good people, lived through my own painful deaths thousands of times but this time ... it's like something broke."
Exhaling, Jack looked away for a moment, torn between shame and confusion.
"Before I left, Gwen was railing at me that they were dead but she was still there, Earth was still there and that I couldn't run away. Everything she said was right words I've said hundreds of times before but this time, Doctor I just couldn't do it. It all just hurt too much."
He looked back, eyes moist though the tears had not yet fallen.
"I hurt too much."
Unspoken was a beseeching plea what do I do, old friend. I'm lost.
"Then just rest," the Doctor encouraged him. It was one luxury the Doctor had never really permitted himself. Ohhh, he would take vacations but they always ended up as some sort of crisis or something. He never just stayed in the TARDIS and allowed himself time to heal. Maybe that's what he was missing. But he could at least offer that to Jack.
"You tried running, now try resting."
Blink.
So simple and yet why did it seem to so difficult?
"I can't remember resting since he died," Jack said softly. He knew he must have had to, maybe while on the cold fusion ship? He just couldn't remember it. "When the conscious world is as nightmarish as the subconscious, I think you lose track."
Which had, at times made Jack fear for his sanity.
Still, the Doctor was right. He needed to make a conscious effort to actually rest and where safer than the TARDIS?
"I don't need much, Doctor. A cot?"
"We'll find you something more proper than that," the Doctor assured him. Really, this was the TARDIS, there were plenty of rooms for Jack to stay in. The man needed to stop punishing himself.
"But, from my estimations, you won't even make it to a cot before you're out," the Doctor said.
Give him a horsehair shirt and a closet and you wouldn't see Jack for a month!
"Wha..." Jack began when his tongue seemed to get tied and he quickly lost track of what he was about to ask.
He'd been about to ask something, he was certain of it but now it suddenly seemed to much trouble to bother and when had that Doctor gotten fuzzy around the edges? Jack peeked suspiciously at the mug that was dangling dangerously lose in his hands.
"Huh," he made a noise that was part irritation but mostly affection as he looked back up at the tricksy Doctor.
The Doctor gave him a half mischievous, half smug grin as he set his mug of tea down. The sedative wouldn't last very long, but he suspected that the few hours of mental down time would do his friend some good.
"Come on," he said, moving closer to Jack and putting an arm around him. No need to have Jack collapse and hit his head on the floor. "Time for you to get some rest."
Bizarre factoid? If Jack fell, hit his head and died, he wouldn't even have a headache. However, if he fell, hit his head and lived he'd be moaning about a headache for a couple of hours.
Jack was going to protest that he could walk, that if he fell over he'd squish the smaller Time Lord, that a Doctor who would drug your tea was mischievous indeed but it all seemed like more trouble than it was worth. That and his old friend's arm was a comfort.
Still the immortal put his concentration into getting to his feet, staying on his feet and making them move obediently in the direction the Doctor lead.
"No writing on my forehead with a Sha... Sharpie," Jack's words slurred a little.
"Alright, to a room we try and make it," the Doctor said, supporting Jack's weight as they moved out of the kitchen. They may or may make it to someplace more comfortable, but it would really be inconvenient to anyone who wanted to use the kitchen if they had to step around Jack.
"Besides, I'd use psychic ink, much more amusing."
Jack muttered something that was an alien rudeness along the lines of a loving 'bastard' and reached out towards the wall to help get himself down the hallway. He was hoping the room was going to come up fairly soon because he definitely felt the need to lay down and passing out in the hallway would certainly earn him ribbing upon waking up.
"Alright, here we go, made it to a room," the Doctor said as he half lugged Jack through the doorway. Thankfully it really was a room and not a broom closet or something like that. A few steps further and the Doctor helped Jack make it to the bed.
"Just a few hours rest," he told the other man.
A broom closet would have been a step up from a couple of the places Jack had set himself down in the past few months. As it was, the comfortable firmness of a bed was surprisingly welcome and Jack leaned down to undo his shoes and then shrug out of his RAF greatcoat.
Still as he turned his head and looked at the pillow, cast in shadows by the quiet darkness of the room, he felt himself recoil from the memories of the last time he'd laid his head down and who wasn't going to be there when he opened his eyes. Vacillating over his next words for a few breaths, Jack gave the Doctor a half glance, before speaking.
"Would you," he began, stopped and then started again. "Just, stay for a bit, till whatever it is you gave me..." takes over?
At one time, it would have been an awkward request, sounding too much like a really badly played pick up line -okay it probably would have been a really badly played pick up line- but now, Jack didn't care if the Doctor stood in the doorway, sat in a chair, hung upside down from the roof. He just didn't want to have to try to fall asleep alone.
"I won't go anywhere, Jack," the Doctor reassured him as he sat down at the head of the bed, by the pillow. He knew how comforting just the presence of someone was, knowing that you weren't going to be all alone. The Doctor knew how much harder being lonely made things.
Jack struggled for a minute against the sudden surge of self protective instincts that made him push everyone back and away. The fears of more pain, more loss because surely he would see the day when even the Doctor was taken from him, the thought wedging an almost suffocating sort of panic in Jack's throat before he swallowed and forced it down.
He'd tried hiding, being alone and rather than bringing any sort of solace, it seemed to focus all the hurt into a frightening sense of numbness and even if Jack wasn't ready to jump right back into the game of living, he was at least peeking from the sidelines.
Exhaling a long breath, Jack rolled up on the bed and carefully arranged himself with his head resting up against the Doctor's thighs. The Time Lord was still here, was still that comforting and familiar presence that Jack had known for so many years and the next sigh that came from the immortal was much more relaxed as Jack gave in and let the drug do it's job.
The Doctor didn't say anything, not wanting Jack to fight the effects of the sedative. With the other man's strange metabolism, there was no telling if it would have time to take effect in that case.
Reaching out he placed a comforting hand on Jack's head. He remembered years ago doing this to his children and grandchildren to help them sleep if they had a nightmare. He wished that with Jack this was the case. Unfortunately real life could be far worse than any nightmare.
Rating; PG-13 for graphic images
Characters; The Doctor
sciencegeekchic and Captain Jack Harkness handsomejackSummary; Jack has returned to the City after the events of CoE. Please be aware there are spoilers for CoE in this log
Log;
The Hub was gone.
Ianto was gone, Tosh and Owen. Stephen and Alice. Knowing Gwen was alive and well, with Rhys and expecting a baby was a small comfort but one that seemed so very distant that Jack could barely feel it except when he focused very hard.
And recently, he'd tried to do anything except focus.
Being back in the City, should have meant more to him than it did but even the familiar carousel, the soft ticking of the clock had done little to stir him from the cold numbness that had become his familiar companion. Despite the heat of summer, Jack's overcoat was buttoned up to the chin, belted tight and as closed off as the man himself.
The chill of Time and space was hard to shake off.
Without much thought, Jack began to walk. It didn't dawn on him until he was half way there, that he was searching out the location of the TARDIS as best he could remember, though the Doctor always seemed to draw him, like a beacon. Going to the beach house didn't even enter into his cold, still thoughts.
Kyle.
Memory rose and like a flash of fire in a snowstorm, it was ruthlessly snubbed out. Jack didn't stop walking until he came upon the familiar blue police box, standing there for what might have been minutes or hours, he'd stopped bothering to keep track of Time.
Wordlessly, he put his hand against the door.
The TARDIS let the Doctor know that Jack was near before the other man reached the door. Jack was a fixed point, an anomaly, and the TARDIS was sensitive to such things. From what he had learned from Gwen, Jack had gone through some horrible things and considering where the man was the last time they had talked, he was probably in a bad place.
The Doctor opened the door and offered his friend a small, sincere smile rather than the one of pure glee that he normally might have offered. As he suspected, Jack looked... if he had to put a word to it he would say "empty".
"Hello, Jack," he said.
Empty was a very good way to put it, Jack certainly felt hollow inside. He felt like he'd gone through every emotion possible, searching for something to take root but even rage and anger had failed to fill him.
The Doctor's small smile cut and soothed at the same time. It was the first bit of familiarity Jack had allowed himself in what felt like years, though it had most likely only been months. He wanted to reach out and gather the Time Lord close, hug something solid and real but like the Doctor's expressions of pure glee, that over abundance of touchiness was missing from Jack.
"Hello, Doctor," he said, the eerie calmness of his own voice alien to him. "Wouldn't happen to have some tea, would you?"
"I'm sure we've got some tea or something very close to it," he said, stepping aside to let the other man in. It pained him to see Jack like this, a man as full of life and excitement as himself, hollowed out until he was a husk of his former self.
The Doctor couldn't help but feel a tiny flash of guilt at that. If he hadn't dragged Jack into all this, then the man might be happier. He knew the dangers of thinking that way, because if he hadn't done what he had, Jack might be even worse off. Besides, he didn't want to focus on his own guilt at the moment.
"You left Earth then?" he asked, trying to get a fix on when Jack was coming from.
In the beginning Jack had railed against what the Doctor had done to him but over time that anger had faded away till it would genuinely bemuse Jack to learn that the Time Lord himself still carried the guilt. Stepping past the man and into the TARDIS, Jack paused at the end of the gangway and looked at the center console with it's familiar hums and lights and he waited to feel the familiar exhilaration that always came upon him when he was inside the police box.
...
Nothing.
Exhaling a long breath, Jack began to undo his coat, shrugging out of it and still, briefly looking over his shoulder for Ianto to take it. Of course, Ianto wasn't there and instead Jack folded it over his arm and walked on up the gangplank towards the console.
"A while ago," he said, walking around and idly reading the gauges and dials. "Depending upon what reference of time you want to use I suppose I've been gone from Earth for months or decades or milliseconds."
Fingers resting lightly on a battered dial, Jack looked up and over at the Doctor.
"Haven't really bothered to keep track, you know?"
The Doctor nodded and just observed Jack, growing more and more worried as he watched. There was no anger, no frustration, just nothing at all. That scared the Doctor. Sometimes Jack was as close to a kindred spirit as the Doctor thought he would encounter these days and for someone like them to feel nothing was a tragedy in itself.
"Where did you go?" he asked as he lead the way into the kitchen. He wished that he could help Jack, but he wasn't sure where to start. Especially not with where he was in his own musings. Donna or Rose or Martha would have been better, but he knew that they could never really understand.
Following the Doctor, Jack pursed his lips and then gave a bit of shrug.
"Went after the 456 home world," he said as if stalking an entire species was normal practice. "Was going to lay every single one of them to waste. Who needs a race of drug addicts anyway. Had it all planned, down to the last bit and I got there and I realized that even my hatred for them had just gone. What good is vengeance if you don't even feel the rage for it anymore?"
Once in the kitchen, Jack carefully folded aside the coat and then picked an out of the way spot to stand until the Doctor was ready.
"Instead I crippled their ability to go into space. Broke into the intergalactic database and re designated them a 'developing do not disturb' planet. Maybe a few decades spent rebuilding their systems will dry them out and they can stop ... doing to other species what they did to Earth."
The Doctor listened to what Jack was saying and he was proud of what Jack had done. Even if he hadn't spared the 456 because of any altruistic or moral principles he knew that not taking revenge was never an easy thing. The Doctor know what what it was like to commit xenocide and it wasn't a burden he would wish anyone to carry.
He busied himself with making tea while Jack talked. It was probably the first time he had told this to anyone and he wanted to let him get it all out.
Hands in his pockets, Jack stared at the TARDIS floor before sharing his next words.
"You knew, about Ianto. Didn't you? Did Gwen tell you about my grandson? That I ..." here, finally Jack paused and a hint of emotion crept into the stillness of his voice. "That I killed him, to stop the 456 on Earth?"
"I heard," he said with a small nod. He wanted to tell himself that it wouldn't have been what he had done, that he would have found another way, but the image of the destruction of his entire race came to mind. He had killed his entire family to stop the Daleks. Wife, children, grandchildren, great grandchildren... he might have found another way to stop the 456 but he knew that if he hadn't...
"I'm sorry, Jack," he said, moving to the other man. "I'm so sorry. No one should have to do that."
It seemed like the appropriate moment, and the Doctor clasped the man in a hug, although he wasn't sure if it was for Jack's sake or his own.
It was the first time anyone had gotten that close to him since Ianto had died. Even though Gwen had fiddled with his lapel, even she had maintained a respectful distance. Leave it to the Doctor to careen into personal space without pause.
It was one of the many reasons Jack cared so deeply for the Time Lord.
There was an awkward pause as if Jack was trying to remember how to return the embrace and then his arms went around the Doctor and he did something that he normally wouldn't have ever considered. He clung to the Doctor. Burying his face against the Time Lord's thin shoulder, Jack clenched his teeth against tears that he was so certain he had cried out and shook his head.
"I screwed up," he whispered. "I thought I could do it, Doctor. I thought I could be the 'dashing hero' have a life there, save the Earth, be brilliant and all I did was bring death and misery to all of them."
"Noooo," the Doctor said, still holding to Jack tight and soothing him as he would a child. It was perhaps more like that than either of the men would ever admit, not all of the Doctor's family was loomed, after all. In a way he felt like all of them, all of his companions, were his children. And the Doctor was a very proud father.
"You can't blame yourself for what others force you to do," he said. "Taking responsibility isn't the same as taking blame, Jack. If you did what you thought was the right thing to do at the time, if you were forced to do something horrible to save others, if you had no other choice... then it's not your fault. You have to hold on to the fact that so, so many more would be dead if you didn't do what you'd done and that if you could have taken their place, you would have."
Wasn't that what Davros had called them? The Doctor's 'Children of Time'. Jack wasn't inclined to move away from the comfort of the Doctor's embrace. It had been so long since touch had been anything but a burning reminder of loss.
"I was arrogant," he choked out. "All along, Doctor I was so arrogant and I got complacent and cocky. Tosh and Owen both of them died as a result of my actions, of my failure to act. Ianto, I walked into that building knowing what we were facing and yet I let him walk in there with me because I believed nothing could touch us."
Swallowing tightly, Jack rocked his face against the Doctor's shoulder.
"Stephen looked at me to fix things. Uncle Jack, always fixing things. He stood there, looking at me all the time, Doctor, his face so innocent and so confused when the pain started and I didn't make it stop. How could I do that him? What sort of monster am I?"
The Doctor winced a bit at Jack's retelling of the story. To have to do something like that to your own grandchild and look them in the eye while you did it? It was no wonder Jack had torn himself apart.
"Monster's don't hate themselves for what they do," the Doctor reassured him.
And without prompting the tears that he'd thought he'd already shed came again as Jack held the Doctor close.
"Alice, my daughter, was just outside the door, banging on it and begging me to stop. When it was all over she was crying, desperate for someone ... desperate for me to fix him. All I could do was stand there."
Jack shook his head, his knees felt weak and he might have stumbled against the Doctor's strength.
"I was so arrogant, Doctor. I thought I could do it all. Be Torchwood and have a real life. I'm a freak, even you and the TARDIS ran away from me. Why, why didn't I learn from that? If I just ... "
Here the words trailed off because even with the time he'd spent away from Earth, Jack hadn't been able to answer the simple question.
What could he have done differently?
"Jack, you're not a- wellll, alright, you are a freak," the Doctor admitted. "But that's not your fault, and it doesn't make you a monster. It makes you unique. Incredible. Special. It doesn't make you a monster."
He wished he had words that would make it better, that would ease Jack's pain and his guilt, but he knew from personal experience there weren't any. The only thing that could help were time and people, and when people were the problem...
When people were the problem...
Jack couldn't help but feel he'd failed everybody. Tosh, Owen, Suzie, Ianto, Steven, Alice even Gwen at the end and most of all the Doctor himself. Speaking of the Time Lord, Jack had a death grip of the back of the Doctor's suit coat.
"I left Earth," he whispered, though he knew on some level that the Doctor was already aware of that. "In the end, I even failed Gwen. I failed them all, Doctor. I loved them so much and I failed all of them, how is that possible?"
"You didn't fail them, Jack," he said, still holding on to his friend. "You outgrew them or they outgrew you or you outgrew each other, but you didn't fail them. You can't stay forever, you can't. Eventually you leave or lose everyone."
It was hard but Jack made himself let go of the Doctor. It was that or take the man down to the floor with him, because Jack had to sit down.
"I wasn't ready," he said softly, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "After I left with you and came back, I thought 'this is it, this is where I'm meant to be'," Jack looked up at the Doctor.
"But that's not possible, is it?"
"It could have been where you belonged at the time," the Doctor said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and looking down at Jack. There was no way to know with absolute certainty, not even for a Time Lord, to know if you were in the right place at the right time.
"If you were able to help at that time and place, that's where you were meant to be," he said.
"Help or rain more fire and death down upon innocents, I don't know anymore," Jack admitted and it was obvious that he'd been wrestling with this for awhile now.
"Gwen told me I couldn't run away but I did. The planet for all it's wonder, Doctor it was nothing more than a graveyard and I tried," he looked up at the Time Lord, desperate for understanding, for the forgiveness he couldn't give himself. "I tried to shake it off but all the traveling on that little, tiny planet couldn't shake the dirt from my feet."
Jack gave his head a small shake.
"I left it all in her hands. She must hate me but truthfully, Torchwood should have been her's from the beginning. It should have been run by someone who ran the same risks as the people who served it. The stakes were never the same, I asked more of my people then I myself could ever give. Their lives."
"You would have, Jack, I know," the Doctor said. "I saw you give your life once before for that planet, before when you were able to die. I know you Jack, and just because you couldn't give your life doesn't mean you wouldn't."
The Doctor paused for a moment, wondering if he should tell Jack what he knew of his future.
"New Earth," he finally said. "There were so many people trapped underground, they were going to die if the tunnels weren't opened up. Martha and I were there. But we didn't have any power, nothing to power the machines that would open the tunnels. But you were there. Ohhh, it's a long, long time from now. But you were there, powering the systems to keep them alive. And you did it, you expended that last bit of energy, the last of your life force, to open those tunnels and free all those people. You gave your life for them, Jack. You saved New Earth. You."
It was almost unheard of for the Doctor to share those bits of the future that he alone carried the weight of knowing and Jack listened, attentive as the Time Lord talked. For the first time a hint of something flickered in empty blue eyes and Jack almost looked hopeful.
"So, there is an end?" He whispered, unable to help thinking about how desperately he'd wanted to just be able to sleep since Ianto and Stephen died. Sleep and not wake up to the nightmare that was his life at this point.
"A good, end?" It was a rhetorical question, Jack didn't expect the Doctor to repeat himself, he was just mulling over the idea that there was going to be a purpose to all of this.
Of course, chances were, when he left the City he'd forget what the Doctor had just told him but for now it helped make the barest crack in the icy numbness that Jack had built around himself since those horrible five days back on Earth.
The Doctor saw a bit of relief in Jack's eyes and knew that he'd made the right decision. Contrary to what he portrayed, he didn't always have all the answers to everything. Just most of the answers to most things.
"Let me share something with you, Jack," the Doctor said, sitting himself down to Jack's level.
Don't tell Jack that, he liked to believe that the Doctor had the answers to everything. It gave him something to believe in, when he'd lost faith in himself.
Following the Time Lord's eyes as the man moved down to his level there was, perhaps, a frightening amount of trust in Jack's own expression as he nodded.
"Of course."
The Doctor slowly reached out and took hold of Jack, gently taking the other man's head in his hands. The touch wasn't always necessary, but it helped, and with a mind like Jack's it might actually be necessary.
"I'm going to share memories with you," the Doctor said, slowly opening up the telepathic link between them. "I'm going to share every good memory I have of people. Every happy moment I've had with my companions and family."
The Doctor didn't mention it would be a two way door and he would feel those same things from Jack. The other man probably already knew that. He also didn't say that he hoped this would help himself as much as it would Jack.
In the 51st Century the human brain was as evolved as the body that encased it. Though Jack was not considered particularly strong in the area of psychic awareness, he had enough empathic sensitivity to make him reactive to events on Earth and particularly receptive to the Doctor in particular.
There was little to no resistance when the Doctor's mind touched Jack's own, though in that first brush, it might have been hard for the Doctor to move past the current maelstrom of loss that echoed in Jack's conscious and subconscious mind. With the loss of Ianto and of Stephen, all the losses that came before them had shifted away from the realm of memories of loved ones, to guilt over the way they had died.
-Estelle, so vibrant and alive, dead because the fairies wanted to send Jack a message.
-Suzie, so passionate and driven, destroyed by Torchwood and Jack's inattentiveness.
-Gray, so innocent, lost to a horrible fate because Jack had failed to simply keep hold of his hand.
-Tosh, brilliant, brilliant Tosh, dead because of Gray's insanity and Jack's failure.
-Owen, his cranky genius doctor, shot when Jack was too slow to recognize the threat and then resurrected by Jack's arrogance, forced to suffer a second death and a living hell.
-Greg, taken and destroyed by Billis to punish Jack for his impudence in the future.
-Alex and the team, dead ... he should have been able to die with them, not give Alex the escape to kill all those brilliant people and himself because Jack would be the future.
-Ianto ... loyal, loving, incredible Ianto, dead because Jack got too cocky and was blinded by his own belief in his own heroism.
-Stephen ... innocent, trusting Stephen. His grandson a child who had never looked upon him with anything other than utter love and faith. Who had stood there in the center of that cold tangle of wires and stoic faces, cut off from his mother, looking into the broken and distant face of his grandfather as he suffered a death that was both drawn out and painful.
There were so many others, soldiers who died under Jack's command, friends who had died while Jack survived the mission, lovers who had outlived him grown old and withered before his eyes, wives who had grown to hate him as they aged and he didn't. His own daughter, who had stood and watched as he destroyed her son ...
It was almost impossible for Jack to grab on to anything good he'd done in his life, every attempt slipped and was washed away by the battering storm of guilt and loss that the mortal human mind had never been designed to withstand.
And there they were, all the good memories from both of them, flashing back and forth across their minds. All the family members they had loved and the times they had enjoyed together. The lingering of loss was there too but it was overwhelmed by the sheer number of good times. Times they had saved a life, saved a city, saved a world, or saved the universe.
Telepathy, the speed of thought, was fast. Entire conversations could happen in the blink of an eye but both the Doctor and Jack were old. They had a lot of memories to share, a lot of happy times, a lot of loved ones. It took several minutes, but they finally went through all of them. When the Doctor disconnected the link the memories already started to fade. They'd each remember them as if they were scenes from a movie.
"There," the Doctor finally whispered, tears streaming down his cheeks.
The Doctor wasn't the only one with tears on his cheeks but at least now, the blue eyes held more than that stark emptiness that had been then when he'd first arrived at the TARDIS. Reaching up, this time it was Jack who reached out and touched the cheek of his old friend, understanding and gratitude in the light caress.
"It's not a measure of weights," he said, meaning that neither of them could go through their existence trying to weight the deaths against the lives. "But we ... keep trying, right?"
"Always got to keep trying," he said, giving one of Jack his broad smiles before standing up, once again finding the strength to keep the melancholy at bay. It never did to dwell on that sort of thing for long.
"And you actually got married more than once?" the Doctor said.
"I never was good at learning my lessons," Jack said, his tone rueful but with a layer of the genuine affection he'd felt for both women.
The melancholy at bay, that was a good term for it especially given the load of memories the Doctor was carrying, a hint of which were still sticking with Jack even now as he watched his old friend move back. Reaching out, he caught at the Doctor's wrist, looking up at him.
"We keep repeating what we believe are the same mistakes but what if they aren't, Doctor? What if we let the loss kill the desire to connect in us, then what do we become?"
It was a genuine question because Jack had felt himself disconnecting, was struggling to reconnect and he got a sense from the shared memories that this was a place and a struggle that the Doctor was also wrestling with.
The Doctor thought on that question for a moment, because it was what he himself had been struggling with. And it wasn't the first time, either. He remembered after the Time War he was so full of anger all he wanted was for someone to pay.
And then he had met Rose. And Jack. And Reinette. And even Mickey. And Sarah Jane again. And Martha. And Rose again...
"Maybe it's not up to us to fix ourselves," the Doctor said softly, staring off a bit, as if he was looking at something only he could see. "Maybe we can't. Maybe we just have to keep going until the universe throws someone or someones at us that does the fixing."
There were a few more moments of silence before he snapped back to the present.
"Anyways, tea you said?"
For Jack the urge to have someone pay hadn't even been able to outlast the numbness of ever repeating loss. He wasn't sure that he wanted a 'someone' or a 'someones' to come into his life and fix things only to break them apart when they left again.
But the memories, the memories were so good...
"Yeah, tea." He said, looking up at the Doctor and letting go of the Time Lord's wrist.
Water was boiling a moment later and the Doctor took out two mugs, poured the water, and opened up a drawer that extended out far longer than the depth of the counter. The Doctor had a lot of different teas. Finally selecting one, he dropped the bag into the mug and handed it to Jack.
"What are you going to do in the City?" he asked.
Taking the mug with a word of thanks, Jack moved to a chair and sat down. Playing the merry dance of 'dunk the teabag' in the water, he pursed his lips and then shook his head.
"I don't know," he said honestly. "Need to find a job, I suppose. Maybe a place to live."
Having come straight from the center of the City to the TARDIS, Jack did not yet know that Ianto had come back to the City before him.
"You're always welcome to stay here," the Doctor said. Between Donna, Reinette, Romana and Clyde (was Clyde still here?) and possibly Jack, the TARDIS was going to be crowded. Well, as crowded as the TARDIS could be, considering its immense size.
Looking up and around the familiar space, Jack gave the Doctor a half smile.
"If you wouldn't mind? Till I get my bearings," figured out what was going on in the City, where things stood and then, Jack would try to decide what to do next.
"Of course," he said with a nod. "There's lots of room here. Not entirely sure just how much room, honestly."
He paused a bit before adding, "Are you going to see them soon?"
Sitting forward, Jack cradled the mug of tea in his hands and looked down at the floor. For perhaps the first time in their acquaintance, he might have looked frightened to the Doctor, stripped of the bravado and swagger that normally shielded Jack from showing such emotions.
It was actually how Jack had felt since Ianto and Stephen's deaths. Gwen had said to him, just before he left, that they were dead and he couldn't just run away, after all Jack had held his ground through the loss of Owen, Tosh, Estelle, Suzie and so many others what had made this so different? The immortal hadn't exactly put a finger on that yet, all he knew was that the pain hurt this time, in a way he couldn't handle.
"I don't know," Jack whispered. "I don't know, Doctor."
Looking up at his old friend, Jack's expression was full of naked confusion.
"I've been traveling, trying to figure out what made this instance so different from the others. I've stood over so many graves, said goodbye to so many good people, lived through my own painful deaths thousands of times but this time ... it's like something broke."
Exhaling, Jack looked away for a moment, torn between shame and confusion.
"Before I left, Gwen was railing at me that they were dead but she was still there, Earth was still there and that I couldn't run away. Everything she said was right words I've said hundreds of times before but this time, Doctor I just couldn't do it. It all just hurt too much."
He looked back, eyes moist though the tears had not yet fallen.
"I hurt too much."
Unspoken was a beseeching plea what do I do, old friend. I'm lost.
"Then just rest," the Doctor encouraged him. It was one luxury the Doctor had never really permitted himself. Ohhh, he would take vacations but they always ended up as some sort of crisis or something. He never just stayed in the TARDIS and allowed himself time to heal. Maybe that's what he was missing. But he could at least offer that to Jack.
"You tried running, now try resting."
Blink.
So simple and yet why did it seem to so difficult?
"I can't remember resting since he died," Jack said softly. He knew he must have had to, maybe while on the cold fusion ship? He just couldn't remember it. "When the conscious world is as nightmarish as the subconscious, I think you lose track."
Which had, at times made Jack fear for his sanity.
Still, the Doctor was right. He needed to make a conscious effort to actually rest and where safer than the TARDIS?
"I don't need much, Doctor. A cot?"
"We'll find you something more proper than that," the Doctor assured him. Really, this was the TARDIS, there were plenty of rooms for Jack to stay in. The man needed to stop punishing himself.
"But, from my estimations, you won't even make it to a cot before you're out," the Doctor said.
Give him a horsehair shirt and a closet and you wouldn't see Jack for a month!
"Wha..." Jack began when his tongue seemed to get tied and he quickly lost track of what he was about to ask.
He'd been about to ask something, he was certain of it but now it suddenly seemed to much trouble to bother and when had that Doctor gotten fuzzy around the edges? Jack peeked suspiciously at the mug that was dangling dangerously lose in his hands.
"Huh," he made a noise that was part irritation but mostly affection as he looked back up at the tricksy Doctor.
The Doctor gave him a half mischievous, half smug grin as he set his mug of tea down. The sedative wouldn't last very long, but he suspected that the few hours of mental down time would do his friend some good.
"Come on," he said, moving closer to Jack and putting an arm around him. No need to have Jack collapse and hit his head on the floor. "Time for you to get some rest."
Bizarre factoid? If Jack fell, hit his head and died, he wouldn't even have a headache. However, if he fell, hit his head and lived he'd be moaning about a headache for a couple of hours.
Jack was going to protest that he could walk, that if he fell over he'd squish the smaller Time Lord, that a Doctor who would drug your tea was mischievous indeed but it all seemed like more trouble than it was worth. That and his old friend's arm was a comfort.
Still the immortal put his concentration into getting to his feet, staying on his feet and making them move obediently in the direction the Doctor lead.
"No writing on my forehead with a Sha... Sharpie," Jack's words slurred a little.
"Alright, to a room we try and make it," the Doctor said, supporting Jack's weight as they moved out of the kitchen. They may or may make it to someplace more comfortable, but it would really be inconvenient to anyone who wanted to use the kitchen if they had to step around Jack.
"Besides, I'd use psychic ink, much more amusing."
Jack muttered something that was an alien rudeness along the lines of a loving 'bastard' and reached out towards the wall to help get himself down the hallway. He was hoping the room was going to come up fairly soon because he definitely felt the need to lay down and passing out in the hallway would certainly earn him ribbing upon waking up.
"Alright, here we go, made it to a room," the Doctor said as he half lugged Jack through the doorway. Thankfully it really was a room and not a broom closet or something like that. A few steps further and the Doctor helped Jack make it to the bed.
"Just a few hours rest," he told the other man.
A broom closet would have been a step up from a couple of the places Jack had set himself down in the past few months. As it was, the comfortable firmness of a bed was surprisingly welcome and Jack leaned down to undo his shoes and then shrug out of his RAF greatcoat.
Still as he turned his head and looked at the pillow, cast in shadows by the quiet darkness of the room, he felt himself recoil from the memories of the last time he'd laid his head down and who wasn't going to be there when he opened his eyes. Vacillating over his next words for a few breaths, Jack gave the Doctor a half glance, before speaking.
"Would you," he began, stopped and then started again. "Just, stay for a bit, till whatever it is you gave me..." takes over?
At one time, it would have been an awkward request, sounding too much like a really badly played pick up line -okay it probably would have been a really badly played pick up line- but now, Jack didn't care if the Doctor stood in the doorway, sat in a chair, hung upside down from the roof. He just didn't want to have to try to fall asleep alone.
"I won't go anywhere, Jack," the Doctor reassured him as he sat down at the head of the bed, by the pillow. He knew how comforting just the presence of someone was, knowing that you weren't going to be all alone. The Doctor knew how much harder being lonely made things.
Jack struggled for a minute against the sudden surge of self protective instincts that made him push everyone back and away. The fears of more pain, more loss because surely he would see the day when even the Doctor was taken from him, the thought wedging an almost suffocating sort of panic in Jack's throat before he swallowed and forced it down.
He'd tried hiding, being alone and rather than bringing any sort of solace, it seemed to focus all the hurt into a frightening sense of numbness and even if Jack wasn't ready to jump right back into the game of living, he was at least peeking from the sidelines.
Exhaling a long breath, Jack rolled up on the bed and carefully arranged himself with his head resting up against the Doctor's thighs. The Time Lord was still here, was still that comforting and familiar presence that Jack had known for so many years and the next sigh that came from the immortal was much more relaxed as Jack gave in and let the drug do it's job.
The Doctor didn't say anything, not wanting Jack to fight the effects of the sedative. With the other man's strange metabolism, there was no telling if it would have time to take effect in that case.
Reaching out he placed a comforting hand on Jack's head. He remembered years ago doing this to his children and grandchildren to help them sleep if they had a nightmare. He wished that with Jack this was the case. Unfortunately real life could be far worse than any nightmare.
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