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Captain Jack Harkness was in his office when Ianto Jones gently rapped on the door. He needed no invitation and entered, bringing with him his trademark coffee which Jack gratefully received. As he savoured the beverage, he noticed Ianto was not comfortable.
“Out with it,” Jack said between sips. At Ianto’s continued silence, Jack raised an eyebrow.
“I’d like to say it’s nothing, but I’ve been watching the monitors and the Doctor is standing by the water tower trying to use the invisible lift.”
“What?” Jack said, pausing in his sups.
“I don’t know what’s so important that he has to visit in person,” Ianto half muttered, failing to hide his jealousy. “I assume he has a phone.”
Coffee and conversation forgotten, Jack was out of his office and standing at the bottom of the invisible lift taking off the deadlock. Sure enough, the Doctor foiled the remaining locks with ease and descended on the slab platform.
The men levelled their eyes at one another with considered gazes. Then the one in the blue pinstripe broke into a huge grin and opened his arms wide. Jack followed suit, jumping onto the concrete to complete the embrace. The Doctor draped his arms around Jack’s broad shoulders while Jack splayed his hands across the back of the Doctor’s thin frame.
“Jack!” the Doctor exclaimed. “It’s so very good to see you.” From the firm grip, Jack suspected it had been longer since the Doctor had seen him than vice-versa.
“To what do we owe the pleasure?” Jack grinned against the Doctor’s ear, expecting a brief on the next task in Earth defending. The Doctor pulled his head back but kept a loose hold with his arms, which Jack didn’t expect but wasn’t complaining. He thought the same about the glance to his lips and the kiss that followed, until he gave up coherent thought and succumbed to the sensation.
Somewhere in the background was a cough.
Jack came back to cognition, and reluctant as he was to remove the Doctor’s hands from his buttocks, hand holding was more prudent with an audience. The Doctor sighed as their lips parted, leaving Jack wondering about his mental state.
“What about Rose?” Jack almost whispered, hoarse from the depth of tongue exploration but also being tactful about potentially delicate relationships.
“Rose calls it my inner-Donna.” The Doctor beamed in reply, before catching a glimpse of Ianto standing behind them, coffee mug in hand.
“You must be Jones, Ianto Jones,” the Doctor casually said.
“Your ‘inner-Donna’?” Jack kept the conversation, knowing how quickly the subject could move on.
“My inner-Donna. The Donna in me,” the Doctor confirmed. After a beat he added, “The human instinct. Well, the man fancying instinct. Maybe just the Jack fancying -”
“You’re… the human Doctor,” Jack interjected.
“Couldn’t you feel the single heartbeat against your own?”
Jack found himself lost for words, defeated in his flirting talents by stunned surprise.
“One life, and I’m making the most of it,” he said in a satisfied way. “Well, I’d like to have more life, who wouldn’t?” Realising who he was talking to, he amended, “Well, maybe not you, Jack.” He took a big sigh, “Grass is always greener on the other side. That’s true even of parallel worlds.”
“Parallel worlds?” Jack asked, unsure of the relevance.
“Of course! You’d left the TARDIS with Martha and Mickey before Rose and I were trapped in Pete’s world by the man in the brown pinstripe suit. Poor Rose, travelled all that way to find him, only for him to dump her back where she started. In his rush to leave, he’d forgotten Rose’s stubbornness, my Time Lord brain and the Donna human gut instinct. Surprisingly effective combination for fixing dimension cannons and blasting through the walls between realities. Mind you, the walls seem to be thinning out again, so no doubt the universe is in big trouble again soon.”
In the pause of verbal thought, Jack hopefully asked, “You travelled between parallel worlds to reach me?”
“Yes and no,” he conceded. We figured you’d stay on Earth, so it’s easier to aim the cannon at you. Fixed point in time and all that. The romantic intention is Rose’s, for the man in brown. I’ve come for the teleport on your vortex manipulator. It’s safer to jump after him in this dimension’s vortex.”
Feeling slightly dejected, Jack tried to salvage some pride, “And the kiss?”
“I don’t see why Rose should have all the fun,” he waggled his eyebrows. “I’m embracing the here and now.”
“Quite literally,” Ianto’s voice chimed in.
“I see you’ve got a thing for pinstripes, Jack,” the Doctor noted Ianto’s waistcoat.
“I had a thing for leather, first,” Jack retorted.
“Your manipulator?” the Doctor breezed. Upon Jack proffering his wrist, he continued, “We have a few errands to run first.”
The Doctor entered a complicated code and they disappeared into the vortex, leaving Ianto holding the mug of still warm coffee.
***
It appeared that the man in the brown pinstripe suit was also taking life into his own hands. It was an improvement on the lonely survivor’s guilt he’d previously worn, but there was a masterful glint in his eyes that threatened the universe rather than being self destructive.
“He’s got to be willing. It has to be free choice,” the blue suited man explained as they watched their target enter the TARDIS.
“Once he sees Rose, I’m sure he’ll follow her very willingly,” Jack commented, checking his gun. “Even if it means getting shot at by Daleks again.”
“There aren’t any Daleks,” the Doctor stated. “It seems his foray into lording it up is what’s upsetting the fabric of reality. It wouldn’t surprise me if he carried out the Master’s plans and started New Gallifrey where Earth used to be.” As explanation to his insight, he tapped his temple with his index finger. “Humans are just little people to him now.”
“That’s not the Doctor.”
“I keep telling people that he’s stolen my body,” the Doctor said in a slightly raised tone, indicating he’d said it many times before.
“It’s time to get it back then,” Jack asserted, and he strode into the open and toward the TARDIS. He put the Yale key into the lock and turned it, releasing the catch on the door. The brown suited Doctor seemed unaware of him entering as he tended to the console.
“Hey, Doc.”
“Jack?” the question belied nothing of his mental state. After a pause others might have missed, he returned his attention to the time rotor.
“How are things?” Jack tried to keep a light conversation.
“Never better,” the Doctor briskly replied.
“What have you been up to?”
“Fun stuff.”
“Such as?”
At that, the Doctor looked at him. There was a maniacal flash across his features.
“Oh, you’d be proud of me, Jack. I got married, but that didn’t agree with me. Took a shot at Queen Bess. Well, she shot first,” the tone wasn’t apologetic or even reactionary; he’d meditated on the action. “But then the idea struck me – having sex with women to see who they would be most compatible with in marriage! I make a good Casanova,” he declared with satisfaction, “no disease and no pregnancy with me if I choose it.”
Jack was appalled at what he was hearing, “That sounds like the old me, before I grew up by following your example.”
“Oh, come now, Jack –,” he coerced.
“What does Rose think?” Jack hit out.
The Doctor closed off and looked at the monitor, “I’m sure idle chat isn’t why you’ve come to me.”
“No, it’s not,” Jack agreed. “I’ve come to ask for something life changing.”
“Jack, I’ve told you before. I can’t fix you,” he said dismissively.
“It’s not about me, nice as it would be to not outlive Ianto by a large margin,” Jack admitted enough to make the parallel. “I imagine it’s like you with Rose.”
The pause in the Doctor’s thoughts was apparent.
“I’ll never know,” he said quietly. “She chose the other me.”
“How free was this choice?”
“She kissed him,” the Doctor’s speech and movement picked up speed, but Jack wasn’t going to let him move away.
“I kissed you, once. You still abandoned me. You’d still probably be running from me if I hadn’t sought you out.”
“He wouldn’t leave her.” Perhaps realising the emotion in the assertion, he added, “The walls are closed.”
“Just because you put things how you want them, doesn’t mean they are going to stay that way,” Jack said, drawing on centuries of experience.
Jack’s words sparked something terrible in the Doctor.
“I am the last of the Time Lords. The laws of time obey me. How I see things, that’s how they are. That’s how they should be. That’s how they will be. The Time Lord Victorious over time.”
“Until you die,” Jack finished.
Seemingly unfazed by this truth, the Doctor confidently assumed, “I will have as much life as you, Jack.” With a craving look at Jack, he continued, “In fact, I’ll have -,”
Jack had heard enough. “You sound just like the Master.”
Fuelled by the memories of a forgotten year, Jack pulled out his Webley gun and shot the Doctor squarely in the chest.
At the TARDIS door, there were four knocks.
***
***
He looked like death.
He felt like death, too. The bullet laced with anaesthetic had skilfully bypassed his ribcage and lodged itself in his heart. He had stopped it beating to manage the pain; slowed down his physical function in order to delay the inevitable. As he lay crumpled on the floor, he realised that this was it. No second heart, no regeneration. He was going to die looking like this, just as the man in the blue pinstriped suit standing in the doorway would.
Everything he’d done was unravelling. All the people he’d put in safety boxes, to protect them from him and what he had inevitably become. He’d gone power mad with the strain of being the last, pushing everyone away because he feared they would leave him alone. Like the Master, he hoped the madness would go away with death.
“I think I’ve finally fulfilled what Rose brought me back for,” Jack said, re-holstering the gun.
“Protected from the false God,” the blue suited man echoed from long ago.
With hand on heart to stem the blood loss, he choked out, “Why did you leave her?”
It was surreal having his expression of a quirked eyebrow directed at him, “I could ask you the same thing.” The human him stuck his hands in his pockets and sauntered over. “I had no reason to stay.”
“But you lo-,” he struggled to say.
“Ah,” he started. “That’s how we differ.” Derisively he continued, “It would help if you hadn’t kept all the love in you.”
Even so close to death, he winced at how casually his feelings had been admitted. Amid shallow breaths he stressed, “But you said… on the beach.”
“I have the memories, you idiot,” he said, leaning over him. “Just not the feelings. Not for Rose, at least.” At this he glanced at Jack, before returning his gaze to emphasise the point. “She’s been fixating on those words since the first time she lost you, so naturally her human emotions took over when she heard them. You were too busy running away to notice her running after you, Time Boy.”
In perfect timing, Rose entered the TARDIS.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” the guilt and shame ran through him as the blood poured out. Part of him didn’t want to face her or put her through seeing him in such a state. But part of him was overjoyed that she’d never given up on him, when he’d given up on himself. All the better things he’d wished for her that he couldn’t give her, she didn’t care for. It wasn’t what he looked like on the outside; she wanted to be with the man inside. She strode over and without hesitation took his hand in hers. She smiled deeply, smoothed his wild hair back from his forehead and he curled into her warm embrace.
“I’m sorry, Rose, I’m dying,” he confessed mournfully, as if the ever growing red stain on his shirt indicated otherwise.
“Yes, you are,” the human him chimed in. “And you’re going to the afterlife. Or Pete’s world as those in the know call it.”
At his words, he pulled out a fob watch etched with Gallifreyan symbols and dangled it enticingly over him.
“W-where did you get that?” he squeaked.
“Remember Nurse Redfern, when we were human and forgetful?” he began. “She has a granddaughter who inherited the fob watch you gave to Tim Latimer. Obviously, seeing me looking like you wasn’t in my favour. I told her that her grandmother hated the Doctor because he brought death and destruction to the places he visits and people he touched. I explained the fob watch could put him in a place where he’ll never harm anyone again. Naturally, she asked why she should believe me. I told her you’d stolen my life from me, at which point she had the obligatory feel for my single heartbeat.”
The human him paused for breath.
“Jack chimed in his abandonment story, too. Always prudent to take a charmer with you,” he paid Jack a coy glance. “And then, we paid Donna a visit.”
The Doctor’s eyes went wide with alarm.
“Yes, Donna Noble. Thankfully I take after her rather than you. There you were, calling me dangerous, and you left her as a ticking time bomb! It’s a good job we got to her before anyone else did. Not me specifically, obviously. Again, it’s prudent to take a charmer with you. He managed to get Donna’s memories into the fob watch and then into me, the similar mental biological receptacle. This way, Donna gets to travel with me forever, like she always wanted to.”
The Doctor started hiccoughing as his life ebbed away from him. He’d been a fool to think he could carry on as the last of the Time Lords. He’d closed himself off to the prospect that anyone else could shoulder the responsibility, and yet here was the perfect solution: A Time Lord brain with human compassion, adopting the Earth as his home instead of clinging to a planet long since gone.
Seemingly sensing his thoughts, the human him asked, “Are you ready to die?”
He looked at Rose. Long ago, she had chosen to live as a mortal and not die trying to be a God. He realised it was okay to leave the universe in his family’s capable hands. He wanted nothing more than to be with the woman who held him, freely captivated.
“Yes.”
It was the most peaceful he’d felt in years. Rose never let go of his hand while the two men carefully lifted him from the grated floor and onto the careworn flight seats. When the watch cradle was on his head, she continued to smooth back his hair.
“Right then,” the human him bounced. “We should be able to fit both of our brains in there, given most of the memories are identical. The TARDIS will know which set should go where.”
He lost consciousness.
***
When he came to, he felt cramped, like he didn’t fit in his body anymore. This was strange, different to the usual regeneration adjustment, as the external dimensions were the same and physically there was less on the inside. But his mind pushed against its sensory limitations. So much sensory input seemed to be missing, but what he did have flooded the gaps.
He wasn’t in pain. Rose wasn’t holding his hand anymore, and this concerned him. He opened his eyes to see his former body sprawled out on the jump seat. Rose was standing in the space between them.
“Rose,” he breathed, amazed at the ardour he couldn’t conceal in this form. “I missed you.”
Nothing else needed saying. Instantly she was by his side. Fuelled by fervour, he carried her momentum and kissed her.
In the background, Jack laughed.
“Me, too, Jack,” the new owner of the brown suited body said.
Jack readily complied, leaning down and kissing the prone body. From the look on Rose’s face it was clear this is what she thought Jack had been brought back for.
Jack stepped back to join him and Rose. The Doctor’s body glowed with golden light, and the bullet clinked on the metal floor before disappearing into the heart of the TARDIS. There was an explosion of light and sound, and in his place a new body stood.
“You look like a kid,” Jack commented of the Doctor’s new appearance.
After a quick check of his voice, he replied, “I think that kiss did more than restore my remaining regenerations. That may have given me another set. Starting again.”
“Any time,” Jack smirked.
“Any time after Ianto,” the new Doctor clarified. “I understand human commitment in the twenty first century, thanks to Donna,” he explained. “There’s probably a pot of decaff waiting for you, Jack,” he commented.
The new Doctor glanced at him and Rose. “Besides, there’s a whole universe of exploration for me, while you lot are coupling up.”
He continued, “Now you’ve given up your Time Lord Victorious ways, the walls between realities will reseal themselves. Time for everyone to go home, where they belong.”
The one adventure he always wanted. The adventure he always gave to his companions. Now he could choose it for himself. It was terrifying and exciting.
As it should be.
~~~~~