tw_wotd fic: "The Right Kind of Doctor"
Title: The Right Kind of Doctor
Author: aibhinn
Summary: Sometimes Jack felt sick with the need to see him again. To look into those clear blue eyes, and see the love and compassion that he knew would be there.
Characters: Jack, Doctor
Spoilers: DW Parting of the Ways, TW End of Days
Disclaimer: Not mine, I'm afraid, unless you count naked photographs.
Author's note: Written for the Torchwood Word-of-the-Day community. Prompt: idee fixe. Many, many thanks to joely_jo, rabid1st, and larielromeniel for beta reading.
He would come. Jack knew it, had always known it. Had known it since he'd discovered he couldn't die. The Doctor would return for him.
He told himself that on his way down to the ravaged Earth from what was left of Satellite Five; he told himself that on the ride he hitched from that Earth to an Earth he knew better, round about 1900; he told himself that all through the achingly long twentieth century.
He won't leave me alone forever.
There was no room for doubt, no room for questions. It wasn't quite an obsession, he thought, even though he moved to Cardiff because the TARDIS might need re-fuelling again. It was only hope: a hope he clung to as he'd never been able to cling to any hope before. His own personal Second Coming, which would save him just as surely as the more widely-accepted one would save its adherents. To be with another who had seen centuries pass and loved ones die. To no longer be alone, trapped, as all of humanity was trapped-stuck inside the gravity well of a mediocre star in a nondescript arm of the galaxy, hamsters on a planet-sized exercise wheel, going round and round forever.
Sometimes Jack felt sick with the need to see him again, to give over the responsibility and the fear and the anger and the pain, even just for a moment, and feel those wise arms wrap around him comfortingly. More than once, in the long empty nights alone in the Hub, he'd sat on his bed and stared at the TARDIS key-the one thing he'd managed to keep with him through the decades since that horrific day. It glinted in the dim lamplight, but never glowed. It warmed to his touch, but never grew hot. And in the end, every time, he'd put the key away and leaned his head against the stone wall and thought, Not tonight.
But soon. Soon.
***
It was there.
The hand had glowed; a wind had picked up; the familiar grating, pulsing music had filled his ears. And as he stared in utter disbelief, a great big blue box with a light on top materialised, right in the middle of the Hub. The door opened, and a strange man filled the doorway. Lean, lanky, and young; thick brown hair; freckles. Blue suit, white Converse. Nothing at all like the Doctor he'd known. He hesitated.
It was the smile that convinced him. Not the same smile-not the same anything!-but the love and joy behind it were just the same. "Welcome home, Jack," the Doctor said, and stepped back into the TARDIS, leaving the door open.
Come away, O human child…
Heart brimming, Jack went.
Author: aibhinn
Summary: Sometimes Jack felt sick with the need to see him again. To look into those clear blue eyes, and see the love and compassion that he knew would be there.
Characters: Jack, Doctor
Spoilers: DW Parting of the Ways, TW End of Days
Disclaimer: Not mine, I'm afraid, unless you count naked photographs.
Author's note: Written for the Torchwood Word-of-the-Day community. Prompt: idee fixe. Many, many thanks to joely_jo, rabid1st, and larielromeniel for beta reading.
He would come. Jack knew it, had always known it. Had known it since he'd discovered he couldn't die. The Doctor would return for him.
He told himself that on his way down to the ravaged Earth from what was left of Satellite Five; he told himself that on the ride he hitched from that Earth to an Earth he knew better, round about 1900; he told himself that all through the achingly long twentieth century.
He won't leave me alone forever.
There was no room for doubt, no room for questions. It wasn't quite an obsession, he thought, even though he moved to Cardiff because the TARDIS might need re-fuelling again. It was only hope: a hope he clung to as he'd never been able to cling to any hope before. His own personal Second Coming, which would save him just as surely as the more widely-accepted one would save its adherents. To be with another who had seen centuries pass and loved ones die. To no longer be alone, trapped, as all of humanity was trapped-stuck inside the gravity well of a mediocre star in a nondescript arm of the galaxy, hamsters on a planet-sized exercise wheel, going round and round forever.
Sometimes Jack felt sick with the need to see him again, to give over the responsibility and the fear and the anger and the pain, even just for a moment, and feel those wise arms wrap around him comfortingly. More than once, in the long empty nights alone in the Hub, he'd sat on his bed and stared at the TARDIS key-the one thing he'd managed to keep with him through the decades since that horrific day. It glinted in the dim lamplight, but never glowed. It warmed to his touch, but never grew hot. And in the end, every time, he'd put the key away and leaned his head against the stone wall and thought, Not tonight.
But soon. Soon.
***
It was there.
The hand had glowed; a wind had picked up; the familiar grating, pulsing music had filled his ears. And as he stared in utter disbelief, a great big blue box with a light on top materialised, right in the middle of the Hub. The door opened, and a strange man filled the doorway. Lean, lanky, and young; thick brown hair; freckles. Blue suit, white Converse. Nothing at all like the Doctor he'd known. He hesitated.
It was the smile that convinced him. Not the same smile-not the same anything!-but the love and joy behind it were just the same. "Welcome home, Jack," the Doctor said, and stepped back into the TARDIS, leaving the door open.
Come away, O human child…
Heart brimming, Jack went.