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In all of his long years and his numerous travels, the man who called himself Captain Jack Harkness had never been surprised by a kiss.

That is, until the Doctor kissed him.

***

As Jack made his way to the Hub that morning, he discovered the Doctor's face peering out at him from the Torchwood SUV's dashboard monitor. His eloquent response to this was: "Whoa. Hey. Doctor!"

He hadn't expected to see the Doctor so soon after the Year That Never Was. Part of him had half-expected never to see the Doctor again.

"Captain!" The Doctor echoed Jack's tone. His mouth quirked slightly.

"Long time no see," Jack joked.

"Is it? Yes, well. Not long enough, I suppose." The Doctor seemed distracted, glancing periodically to his right. "I hate to bother you--no, I really, really do--but you wouldn't happen to have, oh, a spare mem-field converter lying around, would you?"

"A mem-field converter?" Jack searched his mental inventory. "I could look. We did take apart a Porthorix shield generator recently--"

"Of which a mem-field converter is a crucial part! Perfect! Wonderful! Brilliant." The Doctor leaned in towards the monitor. "And, ah, would you mind bringing it by the TARDIS?"

"Don't want to stop by and see my place?" Jack knew what the answer would be, but he couldn't help himself. The Doctor didn't disappoint, however. Or rather, he did, but Jack expected him to.

The Doctor's eyebrows raised and his smile flattened out. "Ah. Well. You see, I can't exactly leave the TARDIS right now..."

"Of course you can't," Jack said, letting him off the hook. "Where are you?"

The Doctor told him, and despite Jack's recent vows and firm convictions, he dug up the part in the Torchwood vaults and made it to the Doctor's location in record time. He told himself he'd just be in and out; the team was already giving him constant sideways glances since his return, and Ianto seemed to be able to sniff out if he even so much as looked at another man in an interested way. Jack was getting tired of being served cold coffee vengeance in the mornings.

But things were never in-and-out with the Doctor, not in Jack's case, at least (much to his chagrin). Handing off the converter, he glanced past the Doctor into the TARDIS, and saw that the Doctor was alone.

"Where's Martha?"

The Doctor fixed him with a clear, don't even ask look, and moved as if to close the TARDIS doors on him. Jack raised his eyebrows. He had asked about Martha because he would have liked to see her again, but he hadn't been especially curious. After the Doctor's reaction, however...

Jack stopped one of the doors with his knee and pointed at the converter.

"So, you need a hand installing that thing?"

The Doctor scowled down at Jack's knee, but then he relented, nodding. "I might," he said, cautiously. He looked up as he stepped out of the TARDIS, his eyes searching the sky; Jack followed his line of sight, but saw nothing. "But no more questions."

"What if I just want to know--"

The Doctor cut him off with an upraised hand. "Ah! No!"

"--what we're fixing?"

"Oh, all right. I'll answer that one. But no more." The Doctor shook his head. "It's an emmaline net projector. Casts an energy net suitable for holding vaporous life forms, designed by Emmaline IX of Abraxis III."

"I've never worked on one of those before." Jack clapped his hands together and grinned. "Let's do this!"

He cheerfully ignored the Doctor's sigh and went to work.

Three hours later he was still there, arguing the advantages of laser digital vs. subaudible wingnut binders. Just when he was sure he'd conclusively proved his point, the Doctor seized his shoulders, muttered something incoherent, and then mashed their lips together, hard.

***

The kiss was not exactly the best kiss that Jack had ever received, nor the worst, but it was certainly nice. Jack might have overreacted a little: his knees went weak, his stomach did a dolphin leap, and his tongue attempted to sneak into the Doctor's mouth before the Doctor finally released him.

Somehow, he managed to catch his breath and gasp out, "If I'd known talking about tools was all it would take to--!"

The Doctor cut him off with a sharp "Don't!" followed with a stern, schoolmaster-like, "What did I say?"

Jack blinked. "What? What did you say?"

The Doctor's brows drew down as he scowled. "Weren't you listening? No, what am I saying! Of course you weren't. I said this doesn't mean anything, so no smart remarks!" The Doctor's scowl deepened. "And was that your tongue...?" He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and frowned at it.

"I couldn't help myself." Jack grinned. "So why did you--"

He caught the Doctor's stare past his shoulder and then the Doctor was kissing him again, clinging to double fistfuls of his lapels as he swung them both around so that the Doctor's back was against the TARDIS. Jack interrupted the kiss with an "oof, hey!" before he was pulled right back into it again.

"Did it work? Did they smell us? Are they gone?" The Doctor let Jack go so suddenly that he fell back half a step.

"Who?" Jack turned, craning his neck to see around the end of the alleyway. "I don't see anyone." He gave the Doctor a knowing smile. "Look, Doctor, you don't have to go making excuses. We've both been around the galaxy a bit--"

"Stop that! I'm not making excuses. Those Imperine Vapors--"

Jack scoffed. "Imperines! On Earth? Imperines need a nitrogen-argon atmosphere."

"You're thinking of Impeerins." The Doctor stared down the alley. "Imperines don't care what kind of atmosphere they're in."

Jack's loopy grin faded a little. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Completely."

"So why did you need to--" Jack pointed to his mouth when the Doctor glared at him.

"I was hoping the reek of your fancy fifty-first century pheromones might cover up the much more appealing scent of Time Lord. And it appears to have worked."

Jack caught the insult a little late. "Hey!" He paused, following after the Doctor as he stepped lightly down the alley. "Wait. Couldn't you have just--hugged me or something? Why the--" he pointed at his mouth again. "Unless you've been waiting all this time just to--"

"Don't," the Doctor repeated, but less sharply than before. "I had to get your pheromones up to a higher level. Which meant--" The Doctor wrinkled up his nose and lifted his lip and made a few vague gestures in place of words. "More likely to confuse their senses that way."

Jack couldn't help it. He laughed. "That is even weaker than the excuse Ianto gave me when he first--"

"Shhh!" The Doctor jerked back against the wall, hauling Jack back with him. "Five of them. Very large."

Jack reached into his jacket and pulled out his gun. The Doctor raised an eyebrow.

"Still so very Torchwood, I see. And what good is that going to do? They're vapors."

"Uh, maybe they've got some sort of localized atmosphere generator I could knock out?"

The Doctor shook his head.

"Well I gotta do something."

"No. Absolutely not. You... do nothing. You're too unpredictable." The Doctor's eyes flashed sideways at Jack, bringing on an expression Jack was too familiar with: dismissive, vaguely repulsed, almost perplexed.

Jack couldn't swallow his angry reaction. "If I'm that bad, Doctor, why kiss me?"

"I've already explained." The Doctor pushed away from the wall, locating his sonic screwdriver and adjusting the settings. He paused, sniffed himself, and nodded. "Just. Stay here. Think you can manage that?"

"Yes, sir." Jack couldn't keep the sullenness out of his voice, but the Doctor hardly noticed as he dashed around the corner and out into the street.

Jack attempted to do nothing, he really did. In fact, he managed to count to sixty before he was around the corner himself with his gun out and his jacket blowing behind him. But there was nobody there, not even the Doctor. Certainly no Imperine Vapors. Jack dropped his gun arm and shook his head. "I knew it!" he said. "I knew it was all just an--OOMPH!"

Jack met pavement. The Doctor was on top of him, brief and awkward before he rolled off. "I told you to stay put!" He seized Jack's wrist and hauled him to his feet. "Now run!"

"From what?" Jack said, glancing back as he was pulled after the Doctor.

"The Imperines!"

"I don't see--"

"Just run!"

Jack pelted down the street, always a half-stride behind the Doctor. They blew past a gawking couple. Jack jerked a thumb back. "Doctor! What about them?"

The Doctor barely glanced back before increasing his speed. "They'll be fine!"

"But--!"

"They'll be fine!"

Jack opened his mouth to push the point and found his senses suddenly overwhelmed by the reek of floral perfumes and incense. "What the--"

"In here!" The Doctor seized his wrist and pulled him towards a red-painted door, unlocking it hurriedly with his sonic screwdriver. Jack coughed as they went inside and the heady scent increased. The Doctor jerked him sideways into a crouch behind a cluster of something red.

Jack sneezed into his elbow, bumping the clothes rack in front of them and causing the lingerie to rattle their hangers. "This is--" He eyeballed the row of artesian glass phalli behind him.

"The smelliest place I could find in a hurry," the Doctor finished for him. His expression dared Jack to say otherwise.

"What about those people out there?"

"Imperines feed on--for simplicity's sake, call it scent--suck you into a little dry odorless husk, quite unpleasant--but they have no interest in human scent. Which is why I hoped your smell would cover my own. But it seems--" The Doctor stopped and looked uncomfortable.

Jack couldn't help himself. "You smell too delicious?"

"No!" The Doctor paused and considered. "Well, possibly. I don't know."

"Or maybe you don't have enough of me on you." Jack raised an eyebrow and leered.

"Don't start!"

"We could really roll around together..." Jack waggled both his eyebrows. The Doctor gave him a death glare.

"Don't, just don't!" The Doctor pushed Jack back with one finger. "Even were I willing--which I'm not--it could be that fifty-first century humans, with their modified pheromones, are appealing to the Imperines as well."

"Aw, Doctor, you could just say I smell really nice." Jack paused. "But when you kissed me--" He ignored the Doctor's wince-- "they went away, you said."

The Doctor sighed. "They were clustered around the TARDIS before you arrived. And dispersed when you turned up, at least for a little while. Which is why I--tried what I did. I was hoping we could repair that emmaline net, mount it on the TARDIS-- that way I could take them off world with me, but..."

Jack nodded. The mem-field converter he'd brought had fixed the net, but when he and the Doctor tried to mount it, they'd run into problems. That was when their argument over which tool to best address the problem had cropped up. "We should have just tried the laser binder--"

"That could have damaged the TARDIS hull! I'm not willing to--"

"But the subaudible is slow and might never even--"

"I am not getting into this again! Not while we're here, and they're there, between us and the TARDIS. I told you to stay put! If you'd just stayed put--"

"Then you'd be out there running for your life smelling like some delicious, delicious... I don't even know, what smells really good? Pie?" Jack shrugged and shook his head. "Anyway, if they don't feed on the scent of humans, what's the problem? Why not just let them wander around until they starve? And if we're that repulsive, why are they even here?"

The Doctor scoured the view beyond the lingerie with disapproving eyes. "Me, of course!"

"They followed you here? So why didn't you just turn around in the TARDIS and lead 'em off somewhere else?"

The Doctor turned his gaze to Jack. "Because humans, out of all the smelly beings in the universe, are the only smelly beings Imperines aren't interested in. Imperines find them quite unpalatable, in fact. Hence my brilliant plan. Come to Earth where there's only me that's tasty, and repair the emmaline net, and give the Imperines a nice new home in the Weirminir Nebula. Full of things that Imperines are supposed to nibble on. And quite enjoy, actually. Like putting a child in a room full of candy. Everybody's happy."

Jack leaned back against the table full of sex toys and sighed. "Y'know, Doctor, I'm really disappointed this isn't all just some elaborate set up to get me to go home with you."

Jack expected the Doctor to come back with another sharp "don't!" but the Doctor only shook his head. Jack didn't like the look of resignation that lingered behind his dark eyes. He knew he shouldn't, but he drew his knees up to his chest and he said, "You still haven't told me. What happened with Martha?"

"We're not talking about that, Jack."

"Why not?"

The Doctor shook his head again. "Why Torchwood had to have the only mem-field converter on the whole planet...."

Jack stared out the store window between the gaps in the rack of lingerie. People walked past, oblivious to whatever invisible alien vapors were waiting for them out there, some casting giggling looks at the storefront window, some steadfastly ignoring it. A troupe of young women paused and engaged in the former quite enthusiastically before moving on.

Jack watched them go by in all their unaware, stinking-human glory.

He sat up straight.

"What if...."

"Now is not the time or place," the Doctor hissed.

Jack felt in his jacket pockets. He still had the dead mem-field converter that they'd replaced. He glanced at the Doctor. "Give me a minute. Just a minute." When the Doctor opened his mouth to protest, Jack shook his head. "Please. Trust me."

He hurried out of the store and towards the women, who were now looking in the windows of the next shop. "Ladies," he said, using every ounce of charm good living and lucky genetics had given him. "I have a favor to ask."

"I bet," one of the women said. Her friends laughed behind her. Some of their faces were friendlier than others.

Jack resisted the overwhelming urge to lose a lot of time flirting. "My friend and I are shooting a little movie. An indie thing, you know, but we hope it'll turn out bigger. We have this scene... he's playing a rock star, and we just need some people to sort of mob him and walk down the street. Would you ladies be interested?"

The women exchanged looks.

"You're American, aren't you?" asked a curvy, ginger-haired woman. She summed him up with a quick-up-and-down glance that made Jack feel delightfully naked.

"From Hollywood?" Another of the women, a rail-thin blonde, looked hopeful.

"Not yet," Jack said, padding this with a charming grin.

"We'd get paid?"

Jack winced. "Well, we don't have much of a budget."

"Where's your camera?"

Jack produced the dead mem-field converter.

"That's a camera?"

"It's new," Jack said. He put his hand through one of the bracings and held it up; it did bear a passing resemblance to a minicam, to the uneducated. There was even a pair of "lenses"--plasma converters, actually, but he doubted anyone from the twenty-first century could tell.

"It's not some creepy sex film, is it?"

"No!"

"As if he'd tell us." The curvy ginger scowled at him.

Jack tried to look as mom-and-apple-pie as he possibly could. He very nearly gleamed. "It's not. I swear."

"It'll be famous?" A tall brunette craned her neck to see the "camera."

Jack smiled, turning up the wattage as high as it would go. "If you ladies are in the film, definitely."

"Cheeky!" But she laughed. "Just a bit of shouting and walk down the block?"

"That's all."

The women put their heads together; a moment later, the curvy ginger woman turned to him and nodded. "All right. But you try anything funny and there are seven of us against the two of you."

Jack beamed. "Great. Just--here's what I want you to do..."

He pulled them into a huddle, told them, and then went back into the shop.

The Doctor regarded him with some suspicion. "What? Were you flirting with all seven of them?" Jack laughed, seized the Doctor's arm and yanked him to his feet.

"If only. Come on, Doctor."

"But the Imperine--"

Jack ignored the Doctor's protests and hauled him towards the exit. He took a deep breath, muttered, "here goes," and then flung open the doors.

The Doctor scanned the street and shook his head. And then spotted the women, who had begun shrieking as if the Doctor were Elvis. A slightly wild, horrified look entered the Doctor's eye. Jack shoved him forward, and remembering himself, raised the "camera."

"Move," he whispered. "Head for the TARDIS."

Mobbed by the women, the Doctor made slow, oft-molested progress down the street. Jack wished he could see the Imperines, but the Doctor was still whole and un-husked, so he assumed they were staying away. They eventually made it to the TARDIS, where, as Jack had hoped, the Doctor hurried inside and slammed the door behind him.

Jack lowered the mem-field converter and applauded. "That's a wrap!"

The women fell back, still giddy and happy with themselves. Jack grinned to see them so excited. "Thanks, ladies, that was perfect!"

"It was fun," the thin blonde told him. "But your friend isn't much of an actor, is he?"

The curvy ginger looked apologetic, hissing her friend's name. "Thanks for that, it was a laugh."

"No, thank you." Jack tipped her a wink.

"Can we watch more of the filming?"

Jack made a slightly disappointed face. "Afraid not. You guys just helped us wrap up."

"Care for a drink, then?" the ginger woman asked. Jack cursed his good looks and his bad timing. Any other night...

"I have to get this back to the studio... Maybe later?" He searched his pockets, came up with one of the dummy business cards he carried as cover. "Give me a call."

He watched them go on their way, then rapped on the TARDIS doors. The doors opened just a crack.

"Are they gone?"

Jack nodded.

The Doctor's eye appeared in the crack. His gaze took in Jack, then some distance behind him. "But they're back. Seem to be staying away from you, though. If I come out--"

Jack put his hand on the door. "Don't. I can finish this up for you--get the net up and mounted. Give me the laser wingnut binder."

"But you'll--"

"I swear I won't put a scratch on her."

"Jack--"

"Doctor. Didn't I just save your ass a minute ago?"

The Doctor pressed his lips together. A moment later a silver object came arcing out of the gap between the TARDIS doors. Jack caught it, and grinned. "Thanks. Let you know when I'm done."

Wrangling some boxes left in the alley into a temporary step ladder, Jack climbed up, and set the emmaline net projector above the plaque that said "POLICE BOX". He used the binder to seal the projector down, double-checking the joins to make sure they were firm, triple checking the power connection. He worked fast, but he was true to his word; he was careful. He knew he was done when the projector faded out of sight, incorporated into the TARDIS's camouflage.

He hopped down off the pile of boxes and admired his handiwork. It felt good, Jack realized, to be helping the Doctor out again like this. To have the Doctor trust him with something. He missed it. He would always miss it, he knew.

He touched the doors of the TARDIS with his fingertips before knocking on them.

"All set, Doc!" he called.

The Doctor stepped out, tugging on the bottom of his suit jacket. He nodded to Jack, then moved him back with a sweep of one arm. Jack couldn't help but admire his confidence; they hadn't even tested the emmaline net. He watched the Doctor move to the middle of the alleyway, spreading his arms wide.

"All right, you vapors," the Doctor called out, "Supper's on! Here, Impy-impy-imperines! Come and have a nibble!"

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the air above the Doctor's head exploded with a purple light. Jack fell a half-step back, but the Doctor never flinched.

"Here we go," the Doctor said, softly.

Jack's jaw dropped as the purple glow expanded down the alleyway, flashing here and there as another Imperine was captured. Once, twice, and then again and again and again. At last the spreading stopped; the alley was filled with a purple, flickering light. It was beautiful, in a way.

"Brilliant," the Doctor breathed, his upturned face lit by the glow of the emmaline net.

"Think it'll hold?"

"Oh, absolutely." The Doctor turned halfway, gaze still fixed upwards, and Jack saw the corner of his mouth tug into a smile. "A rather clever friend of mine set it up. I haven't been too sure about him, but even I'm wrong now and then."

The Doctor looked towards Jack, hands in his pockets, still smiling. Jack hovered where he was, uncertain. He cleared his throat.

"So. Off to the candy store now?"

"Yes," the Doctor said, nodding. He walked towards the TARDIS, and Jack moved to get out of his way. The Doctor caught his forearm. "But first--"

He pulled Jack in close, cupped his face in both hands, and kissed him. It was not just a good kiss; it was a fantastic kiss. A brilliant kiss. It made Jack realize just how little the Doctor had wanted to kiss him before--and how much he meant to kiss him now.

And then it was over. The Doctor held him at arm's length, murmured "Well done, Captain," and moved past him, into the TARDIS. Jack turned in time to see the TARDIS fading from view, the noise of it echoing off the alleyway and pressing in on his ears.

Jack touched his lips and smiled.