Fic: Dulce et Decorum Est 1/1

[wendymr]

Story: Dulce et Decorum Est
Author: wmr wendymr 
Characters: Tenth Doctor, Jack Harkness
Rating: PG13 - for descriptions of battlefield scenes
Disclaimer: I asked for them for Christmas, but Santa said I wasn't good enough
Summary: On an infamous battlefield, the Doctor finds someone he left behind.

My thanks to un_sedentary and dark_aegis for BRing.

Comments

[neadods]

This is one of those stories that I'd like to see onscreen, because the Doctor needs to see this, to witness one of Jack's deaths, to understand exactly what it is he's condemning him for. To know how wrong it is to diss Jack as "wrong."

Or maybe we need to, because for all we know it was a nightly show with a Wednesday matinee during the year that never was.

[wendymr]

The Doctor has seen at least a couple of Jack's deaths, apart from anything that happened on the Valiant; he saw Jack lying dead on the surface of Malcassiro, and then dying when he held the cables together in Yana's lab. He seemed at least in some degree affected the first time; the second time less so, or at least he wasn't showing it. Having said that, yes, I'd love him to see a lingering, very painful death. I think that might make him think differently. Jack's recitation of his deaths in the radiation room did make him think a bit, it seemed.

And thank you :) To do any kind of justice to the battlefield of Passchendaele would make pretty gruesome TV, of course, though they did manage a couple of trench moments in Family of Blood.

[faustian]

Wow. Powerful.

It just makes me even more angry at the Doctor for leaving him. Poor Jack. :(

[wendymr]

Thank you. And, yes, I'm still angry with him for leaving Jack too, and even more so for never even mentioning him during S2 :(

[taffimai]

Wow. The Doctor is ... *frustrated noise*

[devilishdestiny]

what does UST mean?

[taffimai]

Unresolved Sexual Tension.

[wendymr]

Yeah. He is, isn't he? He was being a coward; he just didn't want to confront what he'd done by running away, or that Jack's a far nobler person than he is.

Thanks for commenting :)

[nyaaaaaauuuuuuu]

I always thought the Doctor was blaming an awful lot on the TARDIS during Utopia. The TARDIS had a hand in making Jack the way he is, Rose being so human nonwithstanding...she can do anything. I think the Doctor panicked and then was scared to go back, to find Jack changed. Now (after S3, I mean) that the Doctor's realized he can live with Jack's "wrongness" in close proximity, he's not so scared. He asked him to come with, in LotTL, after all.

Poor Doctor. He can be a bit of a coward sometimes, but we all have our moments. I guess his fears and failures just tend to be a bit more epic in scale, though, eh?

[wendymr]

Oh, I think he was completely blaming the TARDIS for his own shortcomings :( I agree: I think he panicked too, and once he'd run it was difficult, if not impossible, for him to go back. He never does go back. Never explain, never apologise - if he can help it, anyway. He never went back for Sarah-Jane either, after all.

And, yes, given his capacity to travel in time and space and the complicated messes he involves himself in, his failures do tend to be somewhat more spectacular ;) Thanks for commenting!

[torn_eledhwen]

I loved this, though it was also very moving and sent tingles up my spine somehow. Excellent.

[wendymr]

Thank you! I'm actually really glad that it had that effect on you :) Moving is what I was aiming for.