Fic: The Sum of its Parts
Title: The Sum of its Parts
Summary: A man is the sum of his memories, a former Time Agent even more so.
Fandom(s): Torchwood/Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, Ten, John
Spoilers: Vague hints for DW 4x12 The Stolen Earth and TW 2x13 Exit Wounds
Rating/Warnings: Vaguely PG
Word count: 3138
Note 1: Betaed by the awesome unfeathered, providing much needed handholding. Look at me, I'm writing plot! Hold me! Still unsure about that, so comments and concrit are love.
Note 2: Orignally written for the wintercompanion challenge 'Amnesia', but as I'm terribly slow, I'm entering it for the 'Enemies' challenge now.
Fic Masterlist: Here.
A thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us
- Friedrich Nietzsche
"You live in the office? Literally?" The tea tasted funny, but the Doctor wouldn't ever tell the Captain that his attempt at brewing it had once again ended in a huge catastrophe and a horrible fluid that made him crunch his face whenever the human wasn't looking. It would wound his quite impressive pride, and he hadn't come here to fight. Instead the Doctor watched as Jack poured himself a cup of coffee, sitting back behind his desk, putting his feet up, but carefully avoiding the paperwork cluttered everywhere.
"Hey, you were the one saying I shouldn't alter history. What if I rent a flat that's been destined for the next Einstein's time at Cardiff University?" Jack asked, obviously expecting a conclusive answer.
"But," the Time Lord gestured at the manhole, "a hole in the ground?"
"Now don't get cocky, you live in a phone box!" Jack grinned in return, and it took all his Time Lord authority to supress the laugh and instead glare threateningly at the human who mocked his ship. The Doctor gazed into his cup. He'd really missed their banter.
The silence between them stretched without becoming uncomfortable, which was the main reason the Doctor loved to come visit the Hub while the TARDIS was refuelling upstairs. It could get lonely out there. And since Jack's team had also taken him off the 'dangerous' list (though he assumed he still fell in the 'mostly harmless' category), the chances of running into mortal danger in the middle of a workday in Cardiff were minimal. Well, for now. He was seriously contemplating trying to create some danger, just so he could avoid another cup of the horrible tea.
"Where's your team then?" He definitely would've loved to sneak another look at that Ianto.
"Out running scans," Jack waved off. "And I just wanted some company," he grinned, but sobered up quickly. "Thanks for coming anyway."
The beacon had been a surprise, but the Doctor had been in the mood for pleasing the immortal for once. Jack smiled wistfully as if reading his thoughts before he put his drink down to watch him intently.
"What?" The Doctor ran a hand over his face and then through his hair, testing if he had attracted oil stains again (no need to give the human another reason to lick his face), his senses strangely sluggish to react.
"Doc, I'd like you to meet John." A hand was extended in invitation, pointing at the doorway behind him. The Doctor looked over his shoulder to stare at the man with the katana and the uniform (Napoleonic? Definitely something close) standing there. He was dizzy, but the Artron energy coming off the stranger and his wriststrap told more than he wanted to know.
He tried to get up, but his feet didn't obey. He gazed in surprise at his teacup as it slipped from his grasp to shatter on the floor, recognizing the funny taste now. Something was very, very wrong. Fear made his hearts beat faster as he stared back at Jack in horror, who hadn't moved, still watching him dispassionately.
"It's all right, love," the Time Agent behind him said and patted his shoulder before the Doctor's mind had even formed the relevant questions. Time was slipping away from him faster now, the chemicals in his blood playing havoc with his senses.
"I always like to meet the exes," the stranger grinned, and the Doctor watched, perplexed, as the two Time Agents kissed vigorously, his body and mind lost in the grip of the drug coursing through his veins.
He was unconscious before he could even ask what was happening.
***
He woke up to the darkness and cold of a prison cell. Torchwood's prison cell, he added glumly when the room stopped spinning. On the other side of the transparent wall he could just make out the form of the man who had once promised him that he'd never wake in here.
"Jack?" The Doctor rubbed his aching head, staring at his former companion through the (no doubt strengthened) barrier of his cell, the human lurking in the shadows as if only waiting for him to wake.
He tried to get up, but the drug in his blood had muddled with at least with 6 of his senses, so he opted to crawl over to the nearest wall and lean against the solidity it offered until his knees were strong enough to carry him again. Dread solidified in his stomach, his unaffected senses telling him of possible futures he really didn't like.
"You always say that a man is the sum of his memories," the human finally stated, squatting down to look at the slunk Time Lord face to face. "But what I was when I met you," Jack continued, shaking his head, "let's say I didn't add up correctly. And how could I?" A fake laugh echoed through the underground corridor, "I didn't have all the numbers!" The intensity of the hatred burning in Jack's eyes wasn't weakened by the grimy glass that separated the captive from his hunter.
"Two years missing," Jack tapped a finger against his skull, "can turn you into someone you would never have been otherwise. And you knew."
The Doctor stared back, frantically searching for a solution to what had obviously happened here. For now, he placed a carefully expressionless mask in front of his reeling emotions. His friend had vanished inside that shell of hatred his missing years had brought back, the soldier apparently firmly back in his old uniform.
Desperation drove the Doctor to his feet, clinging to his last ounce of strength as he held himself up against the glass.
"Do you remember anything? Anything at all? The Daleks, the Valiant?" What had happened to 'Never doubted him, never will'?
"You see, that was the old me," Jack smiled like he had done on the first night they had met, the conman pretending to be harmless while his eyes barely hid the fire underneath.
"You can't just have forgotten everything that happened since I met you, since you lost those memories!" The Doctor was pleading, he knew, but anguish made him search this stranger for some tiny part of the old Jack.
"I'm still me, Doc." The soothing voice was the same as before, but the eyes held more coldness than he'd ever seen. "My memories just gave me back some perspective. Don't worry," he grinned, straightening his jacket as he got up again, "I don't hold any grudges. Well, not many," he laughed. "I bet a Time Lord is just the right present to get me my old life back. See it as penance when they cut you open. No hard feelings, eh?"
The Doctor breathed in sharply. He could just about imagine what the Time Agency would do to him or his ship. "And what about our friendship?"
"Friendship? I've always been an asset for you, nothing more. A pawn in your games. It's time you return the favour." The Captain opened the latch of his WristComp, pressing a series of buttons. In response, several air vents in his cells sprung into life, pumping an odourless gas into the tiny cell, making the Doctor's eyes water. He coughed, recognizing the burn in his lungs immediately. He held his breath, but he could feel the fog settle on his skin, entering his bloodstream. Jack wagged a finger at him admonishingly as he watched him sliding down the wall, losing his balance. "Now don't start with that respiratory bypass. I'm not a beginner when it comes to you."
With his last conscious thought, the Doctor realized that in a universe without any Time Lords, his former companion might indeed be his worst adversary.
***
He woke, arms and feet chained to each other as his captors dragged him down one of the Hub's many corridors. Sniffing the air told his sluggish senses that he'd been unconscious for nearly five hours (so much for thinking of escape plans) and that his two guards had obviously used that time for more recreational purposes than his nose had ever wanted to know. He coughed, trying to expel the numb feeling the gas had left in his windpipe, only to breathe in the cold dampness of the underground tunnel.
"Sunshine's awake at last," the stranger - John, he remembered vaguely - grinned. "Your timing's great."
The Doctor glared at Jack, but the human had only eyes for his partner.
"Wouldn't want to give them faulty merchandise, would I?" He patted the Doctor's head and the Doctor's hopes sank, his chances of escape getting slimmer with every moment.
"So where are you taking me?" He had no strength to start his usual innocent prattle, and it wouldn't work to confuse someone who knew him as well as Jack anyway. How could the immortal have changed so much? How could two years make such a difference? He hung his head, trying to remember when things had gone wrong.
"The Time Agency offered quite a huge reward for your capture."
That made him raise his head and a questioning eyebrow. As far as he knew, he was still a myth to most of this galaxy. "You told me the Time Agency closed down!" When had all that deception started? Before the Daleks? Before the Valiant? How had he never noticed?
"And the universe thinks Time Lords never existed. Isn't life funny?" Jack hoisted him up, dragging him through a steel door and into the large area of the Hub that held the water fountain. It was empty, of course, and the Doctor spared a guilty thought for Jack's former team members, wondering what fate Jack had chosen for them.
The Hub's darkness was only disturbed by the lights of computer screens and scanner readouts, the gently moving water bathing the room in the odd glow of the fountain.
Suddenly the air in front of its silvery surface shimmered, depositing two humans in front of it through what looked like inter-temporal teleport. They didn't waste any time, their aimed blasters and the black leather uniforms immediately confirming the Doctor's fears.
"How do we know he's the real deal?" The taller of the two Time Agents looked dubiously at the Doctor as Jack roughly shoved him forwards until he was standing between the two groups. The classical enemy agent handover procedure, the Doctor thought, making a mental note to sneak a look at the real deal on the Berlin Wall if he ever got out of this.
"His ship is parked outside, and I have a key." Jack didn't even acknowledge the Doctor's furious stare but continued, "And you could scan him, of course."
The other man, his hair falling into his eyes opened his WristComp. "Two hearts," he nodded, but the first shook his head.
"I'm still not convinced." He got off the walkway and pulled the Doctor closer to look him in the eye. "Are you a Time Lord?" His grip bruising the Doctor's arm, but he hid the pain behind a confused frown.
"A what?" It was worth a try. "Never heard of them."
"Oh stop it, Doctor," Jack snapped, pulling his Webley from his holster. The two Agents moved back with trained speed, two blasters aimed at Jack and his companion. John was slowly edging to stand behind Jack for cover, but Jack's weapon, the Doctor realized with a jolt, wasn't pointed at the Agents, but at him. The feeling of disappointment made his weak body dizzy and nearly stagger, and for a millisecond he thought he saw Jack falter, but it was gone when the taller brute bellowed for the primitive projectile weapon to be lowered.
It wasn't.
"Look," Jack sighed, as if bored to explain the simplest things over and over again. "You want to know if he's real, I want my life back. So you can either take him away for testing, which will no doubt take a while and I might never see you again, or - " his stare focussed on the Doctor, "I shoot him with this, the wound is severe enough to kill him and you'll get your proof by witnessing a regeneration."
The Doctor didn't dare to breathe. "Jack I -" he started, but the murderous look in the immortal's eye made him stop.
"You have a point," the long-haired one said and holstered his weapon, beckoning his partner to do the same and step to the side, out of the Webley's path.
Jack took aim, and in the split second before he pulled the trigger, the universe held its breath.
The Doctor didn't close his eyes as two shots rang through the underground tunnel, hitting their targets spot on.
Two dead bodies thudded to the ground, the hands of the Time Agents not even close to their guns as they hit the floor.
The Doctor watched them and the pooling blood in fascination before his senses returned to the present and realized that Jack was now wrestling with John, who seemed closer to him than he liked. The Webley was lying uselessly on the ground, and a shot from John's blaster hit Jack's shoulder as they struggled to aim the gun in John's hand away from their heads, but a perfectly aimed kick ended the struggle as quickly as it had started.
Jack took a step back as the other Agent doubled over in pain, and grabbed his gun in one fluid motion before pointing it at John's head. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" John yelled, sparing his two dead colleagues a desperate look. "We could've gone back, don't you see? I thought I was doing you a favour!"
Jack held his bleeding shoulder, but despite the obvious pain his aim wasn't wavering. "Please don't ever do me a favour again."
The silence between them was filled with harsh breathing, John staring defiantly at the gun. "You gonna shoot me now?"
Jack lowered his gun. "I still owe you. If you ever come back, I will kill you, though."
With an exasperated flourish, the other man reached for his wrist, and Jack watched until his former partner had vanished in a blaze of bluish time energy, only then lowering the Webley to look at the confused and still bound Time Lord in the middle of his Hub.
***
"John came here three days ago, with an offer from the Time Agency." He handed the Doctor another cup of tea before he sat down on the stairs in front of the water fountain.
"Me in exchange for your memories." The Doctor nodded and stared into his mug, the tea definitely improved without additive chemicals in it.
Jack didn't look at him, his eyes fixed on his hands. "A small cell survived, rogues clinging to the old establishment." He sighed. "They knew I could never resist. But they didn't know I'd never betray you."
The Doctor nodded, but remembered guiltily how convinced he'd been of Jack's betrayal just an hour ago. The silence between them stretched until it became uncomfortable.
"I was able to convince them to give me back my memories first, which also erased all their doubts about any kind of loyalty I might have to you," Jack laughed mirthlessly. "They thought I'd change right back into their obedient little soldier if I would only remember my time with them."
"But you didn't." The Doctor sipped his tea, watching the water run down the metal structure of the fountain.
"Someone very old, but probably not always very wise," Jack winked, the carefree, old Jack back for a millisecond, "once said to me: Live in the present." He sighed. "And I try to, but my past always catches up with me."
The Doctor nodded wistfully. That was a feeling he only knew far too well. Other people usually paid the price. "Your team?" he asked, fearing the answer.
"Wild goose chase up in Glasgow," Jack glanced at a monitor with a blinking red light on a map, and the Doctor let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.
"It had to look convincing," Jack pinched the bridge of his nose, still not meeting his eyes. "Even for you. If you'd known, it would never have worked."
"You were quite convincing." The Doctor squinted into the dark, trying to see the possible time lines he'd watched in horror just hours ago. They had vanished completely. Of course they had.
"Intention -" Jack started, but the Doctor broke him off, " - creates futures, yes I know. Do they still teach you that? I might have a word with your professors. I don't like my head being nearly blown off by people eager to change their destiny."
He was rambling, but that was better than contemplating the alternatives. To appear completely convincing to the Time Agents and their scanners, the human had created traceable ripples of unrealised realities in the space-time continuum. That wasn't uncommon in itself, but it also meant that he'd at least seriously considered going through with the fake plan. It took some utter strength of will to create these diverging futures, but he guessed Jack was old enough to manage it by now. It was a thought that made him fall silent again.
"I'm sorry." The human still didn't look at him. "For the things I said, the things I did." Jack dabbed at his ruined shirt, testing if the blaster wound had already healed. It was disconcerting to watch him poke the bloody fabric. "They would've kept coming after you," he sighed. "I had to take them out when I had the chance."
He got up, tiredly mounting the steps towards his office, not even waiting for a reply. He was expecting him to disappear, the Doctor realized, to run as he'd done so many times before. He abhorred violence and killing, after all, and from every other human, he would've run as fast as he could after a day like this.
He shook his head and trailed after Jack, letting himself fall onto one of the chairs in his office with great flourish before putting his feet on the desk.
"Tea," he said, when Jack looked at him surprisedly. "Well, more tea," he scratched his head when he realised he'd left his cup behind downstairs. "Poisoning always makes me desperate for a cuppa," he explained when the surprise on the immortal's face didn't fade.
"Just-" Jack rubbed his face, clearly lost what to say. He breathed in deeply. "Just let me change out of this shirt, okay?" He smiled at him thankfully before opening the hatch in the ground.
The Doctor leant back and crossed his arms behind his head, listening to the noises of the Hub and the rustle of fabric from underneath.
He really quite liked it here.
Summary: A man is the sum of his memories, a former Time Agent even more so.
Fandom(s): Torchwood/Doctor Who
Characters: Jack, Ten, John
Spoilers: Vague hints for DW 4x12 The Stolen Earth and TW 2x13 Exit Wounds
Rating/Warnings: Vaguely PG
Word count: 3138
Note 1: Betaed by the awesome unfeathered, providing much needed handholding. Look at me, I'm writing plot! Hold me! Still unsure about that, so comments and concrit are love.
Note 2: Orignally written for the wintercompanion challenge 'Amnesia', but as I'm terribly slow, I'm entering it for the 'Enemies' challenge now.
Fic Masterlist: Here.
A thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us
- Friedrich Nietzsche
"You live in the office? Literally?" The tea tasted funny, but the Doctor wouldn't ever tell the Captain that his attempt at brewing it had once again ended in a huge catastrophe and a horrible fluid that made him crunch his face whenever the human wasn't looking. It would wound his quite impressive pride, and he hadn't come here to fight. Instead the Doctor watched as Jack poured himself a cup of coffee, sitting back behind his desk, putting his feet up, but carefully avoiding the paperwork cluttered everywhere.
"Hey, you were the one saying I shouldn't alter history. What if I rent a flat that's been destined for the next Einstein's time at Cardiff University?" Jack asked, obviously expecting a conclusive answer.
"But," the Time Lord gestured at the manhole, "a hole in the ground?"
"Now don't get cocky, you live in a phone box!" Jack grinned in return, and it took all his Time Lord authority to supress the laugh and instead glare threateningly at the human who mocked his ship. The Doctor gazed into his cup. He'd really missed their banter.
The silence between them stretched without becoming uncomfortable, which was the main reason the Doctor loved to come visit the Hub while the TARDIS was refuelling upstairs. It could get lonely out there. And since Jack's team had also taken him off the 'dangerous' list (though he assumed he still fell in the 'mostly harmless' category), the chances of running into mortal danger in the middle of a workday in Cardiff were minimal. Well, for now. He was seriously contemplating trying to create some danger, just so he could avoid another cup of the horrible tea.
"Where's your team then?" He definitely would've loved to sneak another look at that Ianto.
"Out running scans," Jack waved off. "And I just wanted some company," he grinned, but sobered up quickly. "Thanks for coming anyway."
The beacon had been a surprise, but the Doctor had been in the mood for pleasing the immortal for once. Jack smiled wistfully as if reading his thoughts before he put his drink down to watch him intently.
"What?" The Doctor ran a hand over his face and then through his hair, testing if he had attracted oil stains again (no need to give the human another reason to lick his face), his senses strangely sluggish to react.
"Doc, I'd like you to meet John." A hand was extended in invitation, pointing at the doorway behind him. The Doctor looked over his shoulder to stare at the man with the katana and the uniform (Napoleonic? Definitely something close) standing there. He was dizzy, but the Artron energy coming off the stranger and his wriststrap told more than he wanted to know.
He tried to get up, but his feet didn't obey. He gazed in surprise at his teacup as it slipped from his grasp to shatter on the floor, recognizing the funny taste now. Something was very, very wrong. Fear made his hearts beat faster as he stared back at Jack in horror, who hadn't moved, still watching him dispassionately.
"It's all right, love," the Time Agent behind him said and patted his shoulder before the Doctor's mind had even formed the relevant questions. Time was slipping away from him faster now, the chemicals in his blood playing havoc with his senses.
"I always like to meet the exes," the stranger grinned, and the Doctor watched, perplexed, as the two Time Agents kissed vigorously, his body and mind lost in the grip of the drug coursing through his veins.
He was unconscious before he could even ask what was happening.
***
He woke up to the darkness and cold of a prison cell. Torchwood's prison cell, he added glumly when the room stopped spinning. On the other side of the transparent wall he could just make out the form of the man who had once promised him that he'd never wake in here.
"Jack?" The Doctor rubbed his aching head, staring at his former companion through the (no doubt strengthened) barrier of his cell, the human lurking in the shadows as if only waiting for him to wake.
He tried to get up, but the drug in his blood had muddled with at least with 6 of his senses, so he opted to crawl over to the nearest wall and lean against the solidity it offered until his knees were strong enough to carry him again. Dread solidified in his stomach, his unaffected senses telling him of possible futures he really didn't like.
"You always say that a man is the sum of his memories," the human finally stated, squatting down to look at the slunk Time Lord face to face. "But what I was when I met you," Jack continued, shaking his head, "let's say I didn't add up correctly. And how could I?" A fake laugh echoed through the underground corridor, "I didn't have all the numbers!" The intensity of the hatred burning in Jack's eyes wasn't weakened by the grimy glass that separated the captive from his hunter.
"Two years missing," Jack tapped a finger against his skull, "can turn you into someone you would never have been otherwise. And you knew."
The Doctor stared back, frantically searching for a solution to what had obviously happened here. For now, he placed a carefully expressionless mask in front of his reeling emotions. His friend had vanished inside that shell of hatred his missing years had brought back, the soldier apparently firmly back in his old uniform.
Desperation drove the Doctor to his feet, clinging to his last ounce of strength as he held himself up against the glass.
"Do you remember anything? Anything at all? The Daleks, the Valiant?" What had happened to 'Never doubted him, never will'?
"You see, that was the old me," Jack smiled like he had done on the first night they had met, the conman pretending to be harmless while his eyes barely hid the fire underneath.
"You can't just have forgotten everything that happened since I met you, since you lost those memories!" The Doctor was pleading, he knew, but anguish made him search this stranger for some tiny part of the old Jack.
"I'm still me, Doc." The soothing voice was the same as before, but the eyes held more coldness than he'd ever seen. "My memories just gave me back some perspective. Don't worry," he grinned, straightening his jacket as he got up again, "I don't hold any grudges. Well, not many," he laughed. "I bet a Time Lord is just the right present to get me my old life back. See it as penance when they cut you open. No hard feelings, eh?"
The Doctor breathed in sharply. He could just about imagine what the Time Agency would do to him or his ship. "And what about our friendship?"
"Friendship? I've always been an asset for you, nothing more. A pawn in your games. It's time you return the favour." The Captain opened the latch of his WristComp, pressing a series of buttons. In response, several air vents in his cells sprung into life, pumping an odourless gas into the tiny cell, making the Doctor's eyes water. He coughed, recognizing the burn in his lungs immediately. He held his breath, but he could feel the fog settle on his skin, entering his bloodstream. Jack wagged a finger at him admonishingly as he watched him sliding down the wall, losing his balance. "Now don't start with that respiratory bypass. I'm not a beginner when it comes to you."
With his last conscious thought, the Doctor realized that in a universe without any Time Lords, his former companion might indeed be his worst adversary.
***
He woke, arms and feet chained to each other as his captors dragged him down one of the Hub's many corridors. Sniffing the air told his sluggish senses that he'd been unconscious for nearly five hours (so much for thinking of escape plans) and that his two guards had obviously used that time for more recreational purposes than his nose had ever wanted to know. He coughed, trying to expel the numb feeling the gas had left in his windpipe, only to breathe in the cold dampness of the underground tunnel.
"Sunshine's awake at last," the stranger - John, he remembered vaguely - grinned. "Your timing's great."
The Doctor glared at Jack, but the human had only eyes for his partner.
"Wouldn't want to give them faulty merchandise, would I?" He patted the Doctor's head and the Doctor's hopes sank, his chances of escape getting slimmer with every moment.
"So where are you taking me?" He had no strength to start his usual innocent prattle, and it wouldn't work to confuse someone who knew him as well as Jack anyway. How could the immortal have changed so much? How could two years make such a difference? He hung his head, trying to remember when things had gone wrong.
"The Time Agency offered quite a huge reward for your capture."
That made him raise his head and a questioning eyebrow. As far as he knew, he was still a myth to most of this galaxy. "You told me the Time Agency closed down!" When had all that deception started? Before the Daleks? Before the Valiant? How had he never noticed?
"And the universe thinks Time Lords never existed. Isn't life funny?" Jack hoisted him up, dragging him through a steel door and into the large area of the Hub that held the water fountain. It was empty, of course, and the Doctor spared a guilty thought for Jack's former team members, wondering what fate Jack had chosen for them.
The Hub's darkness was only disturbed by the lights of computer screens and scanner readouts, the gently moving water bathing the room in the odd glow of the fountain.
Suddenly the air in front of its silvery surface shimmered, depositing two humans in front of it through what looked like inter-temporal teleport. They didn't waste any time, their aimed blasters and the black leather uniforms immediately confirming the Doctor's fears.
"How do we know he's the real deal?" The taller of the two Time Agents looked dubiously at the Doctor as Jack roughly shoved him forwards until he was standing between the two groups. The classical enemy agent handover procedure, the Doctor thought, making a mental note to sneak a look at the real deal on the Berlin Wall if he ever got out of this.
"His ship is parked outside, and I have a key." Jack didn't even acknowledge the Doctor's furious stare but continued, "And you could scan him, of course."
The other man, his hair falling into his eyes opened his WristComp. "Two hearts," he nodded, but the first shook his head.
"I'm still not convinced." He got off the walkway and pulled the Doctor closer to look him in the eye. "Are you a Time Lord?" His grip bruising the Doctor's arm, but he hid the pain behind a confused frown.
"A what?" It was worth a try. "Never heard of them."
"Oh stop it, Doctor," Jack snapped, pulling his Webley from his holster. The two Agents moved back with trained speed, two blasters aimed at Jack and his companion. John was slowly edging to stand behind Jack for cover, but Jack's weapon, the Doctor realized with a jolt, wasn't pointed at the Agents, but at him. The feeling of disappointment made his weak body dizzy and nearly stagger, and for a millisecond he thought he saw Jack falter, but it was gone when the taller brute bellowed for the primitive projectile weapon to be lowered.
It wasn't.
"Look," Jack sighed, as if bored to explain the simplest things over and over again. "You want to know if he's real, I want my life back. So you can either take him away for testing, which will no doubt take a while and I might never see you again, or - " his stare focussed on the Doctor, "I shoot him with this, the wound is severe enough to kill him and you'll get your proof by witnessing a regeneration."
The Doctor didn't dare to breathe. "Jack I -" he started, but the murderous look in the immortal's eye made him stop.
"You have a point," the long-haired one said and holstered his weapon, beckoning his partner to do the same and step to the side, out of the Webley's path.
Jack took aim, and in the split second before he pulled the trigger, the universe held its breath.
The Doctor didn't close his eyes as two shots rang through the underground tunnel, hitting their targets spot on.
Two dead bodies thudded to the ground, the hands of the Time Agents not even close to their guns as they hit the floor.
The Doctor watched them and the pooling blood in fascination before his senses returned to the present and realized that Jack was now wrestling with John, who seemed closer to him than he liked. The Webley was lying uselessly on the ground, and a shot from John's blaster hit Jack's shoulder as they struggled to aim the gun in John's hand away from their heads, but a perfectly aimed kick ended the struggle as quickly as it had started.
Jack took a step back as the other Agent doubled over in pain, and grabbed his gun in one fluid motion before pointing it at John's head. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" John yelled, sparing his two dead colleagues a desperate look. "We could've gone back, don't you see? I thought I was doing you a favour!"
Jack held his bleeding shoulder, but despite the obvious pain his aim wasn't wavering. "Please don't ever do me a favour again."
The silence between them was filled with harsh breathing, John staring defiantly at the gun. "You gonna shoot me now?"
Jack lowered his gun. "I still owe you. If you ever come back, I will kill you, though."
With an exasperated flourish, the other man reached for his wrist, and Jack watched until his former partner had vanished in a blaze of bluish time energy, only then lowering the Webley to look at the confused and still bound Time Lord in the middle of his Hub.
***
"John came here three days ago, with an offer from the Time Agency." He handed the Doctor another cup of tea before he sat down on the stairs in front of the water fountain.
"Me in exchange for your memories." The Doctor nodded and stared into his mug, the tea definitely improved without additive chemicals in it.
Jack didn't look at him, his eyes fixed on his hands. "A small cell survived, rogues clinging to the old establishment." He sighed. "They knew I could never resist. But they didn't know I'd never betray you."
The Doctor nodded, but remembered guiltily how convinced he'd been of Jack's betrayal just an hour ago. The silence between them stretched until it became uncomfortable.
"I was able to convince them to give me back my memories first, which also erased all their doubts about any kind of loyalty I might have to you," Jack laughed mirthlessly. "They thought I'd change right back into their obedient little soldier if I would only remember my time with them."
"But you didn't." The Doctor sipped his tea, watching the water run down the metal structure of the fountain.
"Someone very old, but probably not always very wise," Jack winked, the carefree, old Jack back for a millisecond, "once said to me: Live in the present." He sighed. "And I try to, but my past always catches up with me."
The Doctor nodded wistfully. That was a feeling he only knew far too well. Other people usually paid the price. "Your team?" he asked, fearing the answer.
"Wild goose chase up in Glasgow," Jack glanced at a monitor with a blinking red light on a map, and the Doctor let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.
"It had to look convincing," Jack pinched the bridge of his nose, still not meeting his eyes. "Even for you. If you'd known, it would never have worked."
"You were quite convincing." The Doctor squinted into the dark, trying to see the possible time lines he'd watched in horror just hours ago. They had vanished completely. Of course they had.
"Intention -" Jack started, but the Doctor broke him off, " - creates futures, yes I know. Do they still teach you that? I might have a word with your professors. I don't like my head being nearly blown off by people eager to change their destiny."
He was rambling, but that was better than contemplating the alternatives. To appear completely convincing to the Time Agents and their scanners, the human had created traceable ripples of unrealised realities in the space-time continuum. That wasn't uncommon in itself, but it also meant that he'd at least seriously considered going through with the fake plan. It took some utter strength of will to create these diverging futures, but he guessed Jack was old enough to manage it by now. It was a thought that made him fall silent again.
"I'm sorry." The human still didn't look at him. "For the things I said, the things I did." Jack dabbed at his ruined shirt, testing if the blaster wound had already healed. It was disconcerting to watch him poke the bloody fabric. "They would've kept coming after you," he sighed. "I had to take them out when I had the chance."
He got up, tiredly mounting the steps towards his office, not even waiting for a reply. He was expecting him to disappear, the Doctor realized, to run as he'd done so many times before. He abhorred violence and killing, after all, and from every other human, he would've run as fast as he could after a day like this.
He shook his head and trailed after Jack, letting himself fall onto one of the chairs in his office with great flourish before putting his feet on the desk.
"Tea," he said, when Jack looked at him surprisedly. "Well, more tea," he scratched his head when he realised he'd left his cup behind downstairs. "Poisoning always makes me desperate for a cuppa," he explained when the surprise on the immortal's face didn't fade.
"Just-" Jack rubbed his face, clearly lost what to say. He breathed in deeply. "Just let me change out of this shirt, okay?" He smiled at him thankfully before opening the hatch in the ground.
The Doctor leant back and crossed his arms behind his head, listening to the noises of the Hub and the rustle of fabric from underneath.
He really quite liked it here.