Preparations, Ten/Jack, PG-13 (Blood)
Pairing: Ten/Jack
Challenge: 21 Blood
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Timey-wimey future!fic. Implied character death.
Spoilers: Up to and including “Journey’s End”, to be safe
Preparations
It’s a no-name bar in a no-name town on a no-name planet in some century or other. The where doesn’t matter. It is the who the Doctor is after. That is, he wants to go somewhere where no one will care who he is. So he is here, wherever that is, and he is savoring a rather tasty alcoholic beverage. People are chattering all around him. Smiling, laughing, barking, and shouting. Some are fighting. Some are flirting. Some are brooding by their lonesome. He watches the people with a pleasing sense of satisfaction and, for once, he feels like this is one of those days where he can actually have One of Those Days. Nothing is going to go wrong. He’s just going to sit here for the remainder of the day (or night, he can’t tell; the windows are tinted) and watch the people be people. He’s going to enjoy his drink and he’s going to just be.
Those kinds of thoughts always ruin any possibility of that ever happening.
He is not surprised when a figure breaks away from the crowd and sits down across from him. The Doctor smiles because he has to. Jack does not smile. He looks old. It’s not because of the wrinkles around his eyes, or the slightly grey roots. It is the way he’s sitting. The Doctor straightens, kicking his mind into gear. In a few seconds, he recalls that he is in the sixtieth century, relative Earth time. He is far from Earth, however. From the looks of things, Jack has taken the slow path to today’s date.
Jack smiles back with the same sincerity the Doctor had given him.
“So.” The Doctor shrugs. “I was just leaving.”
Jack clasps his hands together and moves closer. “No, you weren’t.”
“No. I wasn’t.” Jack’s got more direct with age, and it throws him. It occurs to the Doctor that there is a great probability that Jack is crossing a time line. Just because he doesn’t pop in often doesn’t mean that he hadn’t any intentions of never checking in on the good Captain ever again. Forty centuries is a long time.
“Tell me about it,” Jack laughs mirthlessly, then apologizes. “It’s too easy to . . .” He gestures to the Doctor’s head, “Slip in, for lack of a better metaphor.”
The Doctor raises his eyebrow. He hadn’t felt any sort of psychic infiltration, and he knows he hasn’t had enough alcohol for his senses to be numbed. “Do you . . . ‘slip in’ often?”
Jack simply grins at him. Still the same old Jack, then. “Spoilers, Doc.” He winks, and then the jovial expression fades. He shifts bodily as he’d shifted in tone. “You told me to come here.”
“I did?” The Doctor begins to feel uneasy. Jack nods. “Me me, or your me?”
“Mine.”
“And by ‘yours,’ you mean your contemporary or . . .” The Doctor trails off.
“Or.” Jack nods. “Definitely or.”
They lapse into silence and the waitress brings back his drink. He orders something for the Captain who appears lost in thought. It’s a distraction, surely, meeting someone you know at a time when they know more than you do - he really hates it when that happens! - but at least there’s no running. At least he’s still sitting down in a nice, comfy booth, enjoying a drink and enjoying the people. Jack will talk when he wants to talk, just as the Doctor will listen when he wants to listen.
The Doctor is busy eavesdropping over a juicy bit of gossip involving the Third Imperial Duchess and Charles Dickens (no relation) when Jack clears his throat and apologizes. “I don’t really know why I’m here.”
“You told me I told you to come here.”
“Yeah, but . . .“ Jack shakes his head. “It’s the ‘why’ that throws me. Why tell me to come back here and see you again?”
“What did I say exactly?”
“Spoilers,” Jack whispers.
“Please tell me I don’t say that too often. It’s ghastly after a while.”
Jack finally recognizes his drink in front of him. He twirls his finger around the rim, smiling in a contained way that the Doctor has never seen before. “She . . . made quite the impression on you. I think we all do, in our own way.”
“You do.” He has the sudden urge to snap his fingers.
“You are so young.” Jack lifts his head. “Look at you. You’re wonderful. Right out of my mind, just the way I remember you. That suit. That tie. That coat, oh the coat! Hair’s a bit tame today, though. I liked that hair. Still skinny as a rail.”
He doesn’t know exactly where this is going, but wherever it is headed, it is in a direction that is slightly unnerving.
“I’m sorry,” Jack ducks his head again. “I’m upsetting you, I know. I’m sorry. But I’m trying to piece this all together.”
“That would help. Why don’t we call it a threat to space-time continuum and part ways.”
Jack exclaims loudly against that, even rising from his seat as the Doctor turns. His hand latches on to the Doctor’s shoulder. His grip is firm, but he lets go soon enough. “I’ve had enough parting.”
The Doctor sits down, now watching Jack carefully.
“It was New Year’s. You were a bit over your limit and generally in love with your life when you told me -”
“You shouldn’t tell me this, Jack.”
“What does it matter? It’s gonna happen some day.”
“But it doesn’t have to. History is constantly in flux. Anything can change at any moment. One day . . . a weapons factory and the next a banana grove. Things change. They change all the time. Just because you say that today doesn’t mean it’ll happen tomorrow. Just because you know my past doesn’t mean you know my future.” The Doctor leans over the table and lowers his voice. “What game are you playing?”
“Your future is my past.”
“Which is why we shouldn’t be having this conversation in the first place!”
“But we are.” Jack squirms uncomfortably in his seat. “For a while, you know, I thought you couldn’t bleed. I never saw you bleed before, not even a paper cut, all those years I’d known you.”
He stares at Jack for while, then, so quiet he was almost whispering states, “You know better than this.”
Jack shakes his head. He extends his hand to touch the Doctor’s cheek and smiles. The Doctor recognizes that smile, too. “It doesn’t matter what we know,” Jack says, “It’s what we feel that makes us act the way we do. The plight of being human. Even that is something you fall prey to, every so often. Sometimes you say things so you can feel them again.”
Jack’s hand is still on his cheek, but the Doctor isn’t thinking of him. He’s remembering a certain archeologist with a blue-faced journal, the last time timelines crossed. It never ends well.
“Sometimes,” Jack continues, “We’re spoiled for something we have to be prepared for. It reminds us of . . . inevitability. 'The Face of Boe’s dying words.' There’s something you don’t expect to hear when you can’t die. And I’m telling you now, you knew a little too much in the beginning for us to be starting on the same page.”
Jack pauses, as if something has just occured to him. He leans back. "I think I get it now. And I know I understand why it has to be now."
He stands and walks over to the Doctor’s side of the booth, crouching down. He places his hands on the Doctor’s knees. "I took the pain, the tears, the utter helplessness, but the blood, Doctor. Nothing prepares you for the blood. I think you’d understand if I told you I can still see every drop that has ever spilt on me, and with each vision comes a memory. And what I’m remembering right now,” Jack’s hands move to his face. “Is a beautiful man with a beautiful way of living. Looking at you, that's what I see whereas, before I came here . . . I lost sight of you. I only saw the blood. There is so much more to you, to us, than that."
The Doctor is silent.
"Let me kiss you,” Jack whispers.
Alarm bells are going off in his head, and the urge to run is blaring full-force. “What exactly are you preparing me for, Jack? If it's the kiss . . . You’ve already done that, remember? Game Station, bunch of Daleks. 'See you in hell.' No point in preparing me for something that’s . . .” He trails off, realizing the severity of Jack’s gaze.
They both wait in silence. The Doctor knows Jack can wait as long as he can. What is the harm? It will happen one day. It happened for this Jack, anyhow. Because this is One of Those Days, he allows Jack a kiss. Che sara, sara.
The kiss is, he feels, unfair for both parties. It tells him far too much (and leaves him so much more to contemplate) and gives Jack something the Doctor is afraid is already gone. Why is it that his kisses are never simply kisses? Why must there be something else always attached to them? In a brief moment of self-defiance, the Doctor finds himself kissing Jack back, not as he might, but as Jack’s Doctor might, he imagines. It occurs to him again that he is not yet The Doctor, not as River Song knew, and not as this Captain Jack Harkness knew. How much will he change? And how much will he stay the same?
“I’m sorry.” The Doctor says.
“Ashes to ashes.” Jack shakes his head. “I’m not sorry at all.”
Jack nods, once, then winks, bringing a smile to his face. “Consider yourself warned, old friend. You’ve got a proper love life coming your way.”
“And what do you have?”
Jack's expression softens. He touches his lips. “Memories.”
Challenge: 21 Blood
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Timey-wimey future!fic. Implied character death.
Spoilers: Up to and including “Journey’s End”, to be safe
Preparations
It’s a no-name bar in a no-name town on a no-name planet in some century or other. The where doesn’t matter. It is the who the Doctor is after. That is, he wants to go somewhere where no one will care who he is. So he is here, wherever that is, and he is savoring a rather tasty alcoholic beverage. People are chattering all around him. Smiling, laughing, barking, and shouting. Some are fighting. Some are flirting. Some are brooding by their lonesome. He watches the people with a pleasing sense of satisfaction and, for once, he feels like this is one of those days where he can actually have One of Those Days. Nothing is going to go wrong. He’s just going to sit here for the remainder of the day (or night, he can’t tell; the windows are tinted) and watch the people be people. He’s going to enjoy his drink and he’s going to just be.
Those kinds of thoughts always ruin any possibility of that ever happening.
He is not surprised when a figure breaks away from the crowd and sits down across from him. The Doctor smiles because he has to. Jack does not smile. He looks old. It’s not because of the wrinkles around his eyes, or the slightly grey roots. It is the way he’s sitting. The Doctor straightens, kicking his mind into gear. In a few seconds, he recalls that he is in the sixtieth century, relative Earth time. He is far from Earth, however. From the looks of things, Jack has taken the slow path to today’s date.
Jack smiles back with the same sincerity the Doctor had given him.
“So.” The Doctor shrugs. “I was just leaving.”
Jack clasps his hands together and moves closer. “No, you weren’t.”
“No. I wasn’t.” Jack’s got more direct with age, and it throws him. It occurs to the Doctor that there is a great probability that Jack is crossing a time line. Just because he doesn’t pop in often doesn’t mean that he hadn’t any intentions of never checking in on the good Captain ever again. Forty centuries is a long time.
“Tell me about it,” Jack laughs mirthlessly, then apologizes. “It’s too easy to . . .” He gestures to the Doctor’s head, “Slip in, for lack of a better metaphor.”
The Doctor raises his eyebrow. He hadn’t felt any sort of psychic infiltration, and he knows he hasn’t had enough alcohol for his senses to be numbed. “Do you . . . ‘slip in’ often?”
Jack simply grins at him. Still the same old Jack, then. “Spoilers, Doc.” He winks, and then the jovial expression fades. He shifts bodily as he’d shifted in tone. “You told me to come here.”
“I did?” The Doctor begins to feel uneasy. Jack nods. “Me me, or your me?”
“Mine.”
“And by ‘yours,’ you mean your contemporary or . . .” The Doctor trails off.
“Or.” Jack nods. “Definitely or.”
They lapse into silence and the waitress brings back his drink. He orders something for the Captain who appears lost in thought. It’s a distraction, surely, meeting someone you know at a time when they know more than you do - he really hates it when that happens! - but at least there’s no running. At least he’s still sitting down in a nice, comfy booth, enjoying a drink and enjoying the people. Jack will talk when he wants to talk, just as the Doctor will listen when he wants to listen.
The Doctor is busy eavesdropping over a juicy bit of gossip involving the Third Imperial Duchess and Charles Dickens (no relation) when Jack clears his throat and apologizes. “I don’t really know why I’m here.”
“You told me I told you to come here.”
“Yeah, but . . .“ Jack shakes his head. “It’s the ‘why’ that throws me. Why tell me to come back here and see you again?”
“What did I say exactly?”
“Spoilers,” Jack whispers.
“Please tell me I don’t say that too often. It’s ghastly after a while.”
Jack finally recognizes his drink in front of him. He twirls his finger around the rim, smiling in a contained way that the Doctor has never seen before. “She . . . made quite the impression on you. I think we all do, in our own way.”
“You do.” He has the sudden urge to snap his fingers.
“You are so young.” Jack lifts his head. “Look at you. You’re wonderful. Right out of my mind, just the way I remember you. That suit. That tie. That coat, oh the coat! Hair’s a bit tame today, though. I liked that hair. Still skinny as a rail.”
He doesn’t know exactly where this is going, but wherever it is headed, it is in a direction that is slightly unnerving.
“I’m sorry,” Jack ducks his head again. “I’m upsetting you, I know. I’m sorry. But I’m trying to piece this all together.”
“That would help. Why don’t we call it a threat to space-time continuum and part ways.”
Jack exclaims loudly against that, even rising from his seat as the Doctor turns. His hand latches on to the Doctor’s shoulder. His grip is firm, but he lets go soon enough. “I’ve had enough parting.”
The Doctor sits down, now watching Jack carefully.
“It was New Year’s. You were a bit over your limit and generally in love with your life when you told me -”
“You shouldn’t tell me this, Jack.”
“What does it matter? It’s gonna happen some day.”
“But it doesn’t have to. History is constantly in flux. Anything can change at any moment. One day . . . a weapons factory and the next a banana grove. Things change. They change all the time. Just because you say that today doesn’t mean it’ll happen tomorrow. Just because you know my past doesn’t mean you know my future.” The Doctor leans over the table and lowers his voice. “What game are you playing?”
“Your future is my past.”
“Which is why we shouldn’t be having this conversation in the first place!”
“But we are.” Jack squirms uncomfortably in his seat. “For a while, you know, I thought you couldn’t bleed. I never saw you bleed before, not even a paper cut, all those years I’d known you.”
He stares at Jack for while, then, so quiet he was almost whispering states, “You know better than this.”
Jack shakes his head. He extends his hand to touch the Doctor’s cheek and smiles. The Doctor recognizes that smile, too. “It doesn’t matter what we know,” Jack says, “It’s what we feel that makes us act the way we do. The plight of being human. Even that is something you fall prey to, every so often. Sometimes you say things so you can feel them again.”
Jack’s hand is still on his cheek, but the Doctor isn’t thinking of him. He’s remembering a certain archeologist with a blue-faced journal, the last time timelines crossed. It never ends well.
“Sometimes,” Jack continues, “We’re spoiled for something we have to be prepared for. It reminds us of . . . inevitability. 'The Face of Boe’s dying words.' There’s something you don’t expect to hear when you can’t die. And I’m telling you now, you knew a little too much in the beginning for us to be starting on the same page.”
Jack pauses, as if something has just occured to him. He leans back. "I think I get it now. And I know I understand why it has to be now."
He stands and walks over to the Doctor’s side of the booth, crouching down. He places his hands on the Doctor’s knees. "I took the pain, the tears, the utter helplessness, but the blood, Doctor. Nothing prepares you for the blood. I think you’d understand if I told you I can still see every drop that has ever spilt on me, and with each vision comes a memory. And what I’m remembering right now,” Jack’s hands move to his face. “Is a beautiful man with a beautiful way of living. Looking at you, that's what I see whereas, before I came here . . . I lost sight of you. I only saw the blood. There is so much more to you, to us, than that."
The Doctor is silent.
"Let me kiss you,” Jack whispers.
Alarm bells are going off in his head, and the urge to run is blaring full-force. “What exactly are you preparing me for, Jack? If it's the kiss . . . You’ve already done that, remember? Game Station, bunch of Daleks. 'See you in hell.' No point in preparing me for something that’s . . .” He trails off, realizing the severity of Jack’s gaze.
They both wait in silence. The Doctor knows Jack can wait as long as he can. What is the harm? It will happen one day. It happened for this Jack, anyhow. Because this is One of Those Days, he allows Jack a kiss. Che sara, sara.
The kiss is, he feels, unfair for both parties. It tells him far too much (and leaves him so much more to contemplate) and gives Jack something the Doctor is afraid is already gone. Why is it that his kisses are never simply kisses? Why must there be something else always attached to them? In a brief moment of self-defiance, the Doctor finds himself kissing Jack back, not as he might, but as Jack’s Doctor might, he imagines. It occurs to him again that he is not yet The Doctor, not as River Song knew, and not as this Captain Jack Harkness knew. How much will he change? And how much will he stay the same?
“I’m sorry.” The Doctor says.
“Ashes to ashes.” Jack shakes his head. “I’m not sorry at all.”
Jack nods, once, then winks, bringing a smile to his face. “Consider yourself warned, old friend. You’ve got a proper love life coming your way.”
“And what do you have?”
Jack's expression softens. He touches his lips. “Memories.”