FIC: Five Nights in the TARDIS (Doctor Who: Ten/Jack, Eleven/Jack) [PG-13]
Some housekeeping: reposting this here, now that the fest is over with.
Title: Five Nights in the TARDIS
Pairings: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness; Eleventh Doctor/Jack Harkness
Characters: Ninth Doctor, Tenth Doctor, Eleventh Doctor, Jack Harkness
Rating: PG-13
Summary: He wanted to hold on to it just a little longer - hold on to the laughter and the music and the brightness of it all. ~6,000 words.
A/N: Written for monkiainen as part of public_call 2014. Set after The Doctor Dances, during Last of the Time Lords, End of Time and Eleventh Hour, and after A Christmas Carol.
Originally posted here at AO3.
~*~
The Doctor's grin didn't fall when the doors closed. His cheer didn't fade, hearts still buoyed and skipping along to the faded music's familiar rhythm and tune. It had been surprisingly fun - dancing with Rose, teasing the Captain, refusing to let him cut in until several refusals had failed to draw anything other than a good-natured response. After that it had been a free-for-all, and that had been a different kind of fun. The Doctor had let himself get carried along with the playfulness and the laughter, and it was still carrying him.
He wasn't sure what to make of his new passenger aboard the TARDIS yet, but Captain Jack Harkness had an unexpected capacity for joy undaunted by his evident cynicism, by the Time Agency's betrayal, by the loss of two years of memories. The Doctor barely knew him, but well enough already to envy him.
There was more, though. Sometimes, just out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor thought he saw something - a shadow or an echo in Jack's timeline. Something he couldn't quite put his finger on. Making things up, he told himself firmly. Dyin' for a mystery, are you? Enough of those around without inventing new ones.
For now, Rose and Jack were falling asleep, or would be soon. They'd both been flagging when they'd finally called it a night. The Doctor wasn't going to go to bed himself, of course, not any time soon. Who needed beds, anyway? 'course, he had one of those somewhere - he'd probably even find it without the TARDIS's help if he really tried. But lying down and closing his eyes, letting his subconscious take over, knowing what lurked inside it - what was supposed to be tempting about that?
Besides, his mood was good, for once - and for a reason: everybody had lived; the conman had turned out to have a conscience; and the Doctor had watched a man sacrifice himself, but then he'd saved him, too. He wanted to hold on to that just a little longer - hold on to the laughter and the music and the brightness of it all.
If only he knew how.
The Doctor stood in the middle of the corridor, head bowed, nervous fingers scratching at the base of his skull. He could feel it slipping from his grasp already, watched that potential timeline scatter in favour of one where the corners of his mouth were drifting down and the hours he'd lived just now felt a lifetime away.
Familiar notes, a familiar opening theme and an echo from only hours ago drifted toward him from the direction of the console room, and the Doctor's head came up, his eyes widening, then blinking hard. The TARDIS, taking care of him in her own way. He leaned heavily against the corridor wall, then slid down to the floor. The Doctor's lips curled up again, a smile more wistful than before, and he remained sitting where he was, his back against the wall, his eyes closed and his face lifted into the air. Listening to a melody and a memory.
~*
The Doctor walked away from the still-burning pyre, from the Master's dead body. Every part of him felt raw and sore. His head ached. His very bones ached. Some rest would be the right thing, wouldn't it? He stopped inside the TARDIS doors and tried to picture himself lying down, or even just sitting somewhere warm and comfortable, a place safe to close his eyes and recuperate. He flinched away from the thought, from the very idea. Courting unconsciousness, with everything it might bring - no. No. Even less today than any other day.
He forced his thoughts away from nightmares and memories and - worse - good dreams, and walked up to the central column, brushing his hands over the control console. "Sorry," he murmured. "I'm so, so sorry." The TARDIS had been outwardly restored from what the Master's violation had done to her, but she was far from recovered, and it was all his fault. She should never have fallen into the Master's hands. No "sorry" could make up for it.
Good excuse for tinkering with her, though. Something to do.
The Doctor flinched at his own thought, but didn't let himself pretend he hadn't had it. Not exactly new, is it? he reminded himself bitterly.
He sat down heavily on the metal grating next to the console, brown coat pooling around him, and brushed his hand through his spiky hair. Something to do, he thought again. He buried his hands in console's innards, and his thoughts in the delicate task of tuning the temporal synchronisers. Fingers on the modulator, eyes closed and mind focused on the present timeline - the real one, shutting out everything that had been or might have been, or might yet be. He usually let the TARDIS take care of that, but she was hurt, and anyway, he needed it more. It was just mindless enough a task, and took up just enough of his concentration, to blot out everything else.
Everyone else.
Until suddenly he became aware of another presence in the control room. Must be Martha, come back to the TARDIS now. How long had it been? He didn't know, and didn't care to find out. The Doctor let his focus slip, let his perception of the timeline fade into the background, turned his head - and nearly jumped. Not Martha: Jack was just inside the TARDIS threshold, leaning back against the closed door, grey-faced and exhausted.
The Doctor's mouth shaped a silent What?, and he rubbed his fingers over his forehead, trying to clear his thoughts. Never mind that he hadn't heard the door open. This was Jack, fixed point in space and time and a presence constantly grating against his time sense - and he hadn't even noticed him right there in the room with him. The Doctor blinked. Wasn't that a first.
The TARDIS hadn't reacted to Jack, either. That was good, he supposed.
He tried to summon some sort of expression on his face, and managed a scowl. "Looking for something?"
Jack's eyes snapped open, his entire body tensed, and his spine straightened. Then he seemed to realise where he was, and slumped back again. "Just some peace and quiet," he muttered, and added a tired snort.
"Captain Jack Harkness, looking for peace and quiet? I should be scanning you for alien parasites," the Doctor quipped, aiming for lightness, a sense of normalcy. From Jack's frozen expression he suspected he'd merely managed tactless.
"Shows what you know," Jack said, voice tightly controlled and body tense once more. He turned, and reached for the door handle.
"Jack. Wait." The words were out of his mouth without thought. But he couldn't muster the energy to regret them.
Jack didn't turn back to him, but he did stop short of opening the door. "Done enough waiting in my time."
Oh, he was going there, was he? Fine. Fine. "120 years," the Doctor said softly. Dangerously. "And in the end you didn't even get what you wanted. Regret going after me now?"
"Didn't I?" Jack half turned toward the Doctor without letting go of the door handle, but he didn't rise to the bait, merely shook his head tiredly. "What do you want, Doctor?"
The Doctor blinked. Wasn't that the question. What did he want, now? What was left to want? "Just some peace and quiet," he said eventually, tilting his head back to look at the ceiling, trying to appreciate the irony. "Just some peace and quiet, Jack."
And that, after all, did what the attempt at banter hadn't - Jack's expression softened, and he stepped away from the door. His eyes sought the Doctor's, unsure of his welcome. The Doctor managed a tired come on wave, and for a moment, a smile flickered over Jack's face.
Jack came over slowly, perhaps a little tentatively, taking his time from door to console. He sat down next to the Doctor and peered into the opened maintenance panel. His eyes widened.
"You're doing the temporal synchronising by hand?" Jack sounded equal parts appalled and impressed, which was probably appropriate.
"Keeps me busy," the Doctor said, wryly. But he didn't go back to the task, just sat on the floor, the harsh metal grating cushioned only by his coat, and wondered when he'd stopped being bothered by the impossible temporal Fact that was Jack.
Some time during that year on the Valiant, apparently, and he hadn't even noticed.
Jack didn't interrupt his thoughts again, leaning his head against the central column and closing his eyes. The Doctor watched the lights from the time rotor playing over his face. Eventually, through the quiet, a strand of music carried across the TARDIS's telepathic field and teased at the Doctor's brain, familiar and -
He flinched, clenching his eyes closed, and the music scattered into a burst of mental static and died. Too late. She meant well, his TARDIS, but it was the last thing he needed now, the memory of a day when everything had gone right, when everyone had lived.
Too late: the memory was there, stark and vivid, inescapable.
They'd come so close, this time, too - the timeline reset; so many horrors, so many deaths undone. But not the nightmare of a year aboard the Valiant, for those who'd been there. And not the Master's death.
The Doctor's eyes flickered toward Jack. So many deaths there. Fact or no, it had changed Jack, too. The memory of Jack as he'd been only made it more painful to look at him now. Joy? Jack didn't look like someone who still knew what that was.
To be fair, the Doctor wasn't sure he could still recognise it himself.
But he didn't mind Jack's presence, and that ... was something. Something. He could stand having someone here with him who should be long-dead but wasn't, while the Master would never be anywhere again. And Jack? Jack hadn't flinched away in revulsion at the Doctor's grief. And he could still relax in a Time Lord's presence, despite it all.
Perhaps a little peace and quiet wasn't so bad, now, for the two of them here in the TARDIS. Just for a little while.
~*~
The Doctor saluted across the crowded bar, and after a moment, Jack returned the gesture. The Doctor smiled to himself, and took a deep breath to brace himself against the progressing sickness coursing through his body. Back to the TARDIS, now; he had more good-byes to say.
He'd always shied away from that before, from the finality of good-bye. He had a time machine, after all. Nothing was final until he made it so. Well, not nothing - just very few things; hardly any of them, really. It was just bad luck that he kept running into fixed points in time. Anyway - time machine, yes. Even if he left, he could always still be there right the very next moment, whenever he chose. Even if he knew he never would. Nothing was truly over so long as he still could, so why say good-bye and close that door, admitting he wouldn't?
Well. He was doing it now, for one.
But that was different. Now, he was dying, perhaps for the last time or perhaps not, but either way - it felt final, the ending of this particular regeneration. You're being ridiculous, he told himself. And then returned with a, Well, I've earned it, haven't I?
Don't answer that, self. Don't answer that.
The Doctor's mouth twisted into a wry grin. Hell of a thing, dying, when you had advance warning. Not something he'd ever experienced before. Soon, now. And all these people, his friends, living on when he wouldn't ... There was a strange satisfaction to it, almost - a bitter sort of relief, knowing he would be the first to go.
The Doctor pulled his TARDIS key from the inner pocket of his coat. Yes, he'd have his good-byes, just this once.
"Oh no, you don't."
Jack's voice startled the Doctor out of his thoughts, and as he turned around, Jack added, "You're not just taking off like that."
The Doctor's eyes met Jack's. Something tense and powerful flickered between them, holding them both in place for a long moment. Finally, the Doctor broke the spell. "How do you think you'd stop me?"
Jack shook off the moment, too, and came closer, his smile undercut by the seriousness of his eyes. There were wrinkles on his brow that hadn't been there before, not from age so much as habit. But whatever had put Jack here, drinking alone in a crowded bar, frowning into his drink - he'd clearly set it aside to come looking for the Doctor. It clenched the Doctor's hearts.
"Couldn't, probably," Jack said, dead serious. "It's not going to stop me from trying."
"Why? Shouldn't you be chatting up young Alonso right about now?" The Doctor had meant the remonstration to sound impatient, but it came out petulant instead. One point to Jack, then.
"Oh, please." Jack came a little closer and opened his mouth, but the rest of his words faded into the roiling blackness welling up around the Doctor as his body betrayed him. Convulsions pulsed through him, spikes of lightning in the amorphous dark, and despite his respiratory bypass he gasped for breath.
He came back to the here-and-now raw and wrung out, coughing and gasping, and it took him a long moment to understand why he wasn't curled up on the floor. Jack's arm around his back was holding him up, and when he blinked the water from his eyes, Jack's face was right in front of him, peering down at him full of concern.
The Doctor coughed, and wiped tears and spittle from his face with the sleeve of his coat. "It's nothing," he said, attempting a careless wave of the hand. "I just have a bit of a case of ..."
"Dying?" Jack interrupted him, drily. And far too perceptively; damn him.
The Doctor took a deep, steadying breath and braced himself, then pulled himself up with Jack's help. "How'd you guess?"
Jack had the audacity to roll his eyes. "I can recognise a grand final gesture when I see one, you know." His voice was light, but the worry behind it palpable nonetheless.
The Doctor ran a shaky hand through his hair, then rolled his shoulders a little, settling into himself, enough of his strength returned for the moment to let him move unassisted. "You know I only regenerate."
"Hmmm." Jack's lips pursed, and his eyes narrowed at the Doctor. "Do you, though?"
Ah. Well. "Caught me there," he muttered, under his breath, half hoping Jack wouldn't hear him, half knowing that he would.
"In that case ..." A trace of something indefinable flickered in Jack's eyes, and before the Doctor could react to it, Jack had already moved closer, had already brushed his lips against the Doctor's. And moved back again.
Jack's brief touch hummed against his lips; surprise flashed through his body. He gaped, and grimaced. "What?" tumbled out of his mouth, and a second "What?", until he managed to catch himself.
Jack merely looked at him, eyes heavy with meaning. "I'm not sorry," he said.
"Don't think you ever are when you get to kiss someone." The Doctor hesitated. "You can't stay. You should go back to Alonso."
"You mean you don't want me to."
"I mean I don't want anyone to watch me die, but particularly not someone who'll live forever!" The Doctor's breath had turned harsh. He tried to ignore Jack's flinch, and the shutters that went up behind Jack's eyes. He failed. "Sorry. Sorry, that was uncalled for."
Jack's face had closed. "I'll go."
"Don't. Yet."
Jack tilted his head, eyes sharp and penetrating. Challenging. "Make up your mind, Doctor."
After a long, frozen moment, the Doctor did.
Their first proper kiss was desperate, grasping and clinging, needy in a way the Doctor had never wanted to be needy. But he'd already let himself be self-indulgent, just this once, saying good-byes. Why not one more indulgence?
He pulled Jack into the TARDIS and closed the door behind them, pushing Jack up against it, pressing in close. One hand wrapped around Jack's neck, the other slid over his shoulder, under his coat. Jack's own hands were framing the Doctor's face, warm and firm, while Jack's teeth trailed little bites over the Doctor's chin.
Jack's coat was heavy enough to cushion them on the floor as they wrapped themselves around each other, skin against skin and despair against despair. Jack was careful with him, gentle in a way that ached, that burnt.
"I won't break," the Doctor complained. "Not yet."
Jack didn't flinch this time, not visibly. "You should be ashamed of yourself," he said, and managed a smirk.
Pleasure teased out of oversensitive skin, warmth wrapped around the advancing cold of the Doctor's sickness. It all hurt, and it all clenched his hearts, and when he came, he felt turned inside out, wrung out and used up and sore. He wouldn't have given up a second of it for anything.
Well, nearly anything. He could think of a thing or two.
"I have to go," the Doctor said, later, apologetically. "Things to do before I ..." He winced.
Jack brushed his fingertips across the Doctor's cheek as if he were touching something precious. "Yeah," was all he said. His eyes were dark, and he didn't look away from the Doctor for more than a moment, drinking him in. Maybe Jack wasn't so sure the Doctor would regenerate, after all.
The Doctor waited, but the question didn't come. Jack just kept looking at him, memorising, and didn't ask for a promise. Didn't ask the Doctor to come back, afterwards, if he regenerated - didn't ask him to let him know.
The Doctor would have liked to pretend he'd do that. Just for the moment. But Jack clearly knew better than to believe it.
Better this way. Better not to make false promises. Instead, the Doctor nudged Jack with his shoulder to make him move, and then stood up and began to dress.
If it took them both rather long to put all their clothes on, if their hands kept straying to brush over skin or hair - well, that was just part and parcel of it all. Good-bye, Jack. I'm so, so sorry.
~*~
"I don't like bananas any more." The words tumbled out of the Doctor's mouth in a startled rush. He hadn't meant to say anything - hadn't meant to be here at all. The TARDIS was a meddler. Sexy, beautiful, and a damned meddler.
He'd just been restless, sitting in the TARDIS here on top of the Rift in 32nd Century Cardiff, waiting for the engines to recharge after her recent regeneration. And it was late at night; he'd not expected to meet anyone when he'd decided to go out for a stroll.
But he'd opened the TARDIS door and had stumbled right into him: Jack.
His fingers plucked at his bow-tie, and he looked at Jack through the hair falling over his forehead into his eyes.
Jack's face was frozen, stunned into silence, for only a moment longer. "Bananas," he repeated. "No bananas, check. You got a craving for some other kind of fruit, Doctor?" And he winked, because - well, probably because he wouldn't be Jack if he didn't.
Entirely against his will, the Doctor's memory brought up every instance he'd witnessed of Jack very much not in the mood for winking - more of them than he'd have thought; more of them than he wanted to think about. He brushed it all away.
"Well, I don't know, do I?" the Doctor said. "New mouth and all. Well, not apples - apples are vile now." He grimaced, and watched amusement and relief and gladness grow in Jack's face.
"You regenerated," Jack commented, entirely needlessly, because that much was obvious, wasn't it? "Looking younger, too."
"Am I?" The Doctor looked down at himself, then studied his hands - they were the only part of himself he could see clearly, not covered by clothes and all. They didn't look that young, did they? Hands, who cared about hands anyway?
"Yep." Jack reached out then, brushing the Doctor's cheek with the tips of his fingers. He sighed, and the humour in his eyes went out. "The TARDIS picked the time and place, didn't she?"
The Doctor stilled, and thought about denying it. Instead, he looked down, studying his new shoes - answer enough.
It wasn't cruel, he told himself, not too much. He'd have told Jack eventually. Why the rush?
Moments passed, and more moments, and still Jack didn't say anything. No reaction to the wordless confession. No complaint - of course no complaint, but nothing else, either. The Doctor looked up.
"What are you doing here, anyway?" he blurted out, trying not to examine the emotion behind Jack's eyes too closely. "You were a few centuries, not to mention light years, from here only a month ago. And it's the middle of the night."
"You can talk! And ..." Jack shrugged, a slightly embarrassed lift of one shoulder. "The Rift's acting up again in this century. I thought I'd take a look. Needed something to do."
The Doctor nodded, thoughtfully. "And you're not ready to let go of those memories."
Jack snorted. "Could still go back." Wryly, "Time machine." He gently patted the Vortex Manipulator on his wrist.
They looked at each other, and their lips started twitching at the same time.
No, there wasn't any judgment in the complex mix of whatever Jack was feeling. Anger, perhaps. Disappointment, perhaps. But Jack understood far too well. The Doctor quelled the impulse to turn around and shut the TARDIS door in Jack's face, in the face of that unwanted understanding.
"Anyway," he said instead, "regeneration! What do you think? Oh, wait until you see the TARDIS!" He hadn't meant to say that, either.
"She's changed too?" Jack sounded wistful, but rallied quickly. "Well, let's see it, then."
The Doctor didn't move. The TARDIS was right behind him, but he hadn't meant that invitation, had he?
The TARDIS nudged him through their telepathic connection, and weaved a strand of music into his thoughts. Oh no. No, no, no - not that, not now. He shook the notes out of his thoughts. Inveterate meddler. Damn you.
He didn't mean that, either.
He'd hesitated too long; Jack's expression was turning resigned.
"Anyway!" he said again. The word felt wrong in his mouth. He chewed his lips for a moment, bit the inside of his cheek, ran his tongue over his lips. Mouth ...
He hooked a hand behind Jack's head, pulled him in for a kiss. Not a long one, or a particularly passionate one, just a taste of him, just a small one.
Still, Jack's hands pushed him back sooner than he was ready.
"What's that about?" Jack's voice was hoarse.
"What?" The Doctor shrugged his shoulders under Jack's grasp, and grasped for an explanation. "I had to know what you taste like now! New taste buds, remember?"
Jack huffed a laugh. It sounded pained. "That so?"
"What else?" The Doctor considered for a moment. "It's different, but still you."
At that, something in Jack seemed to soften, and his hold on the Doctor's shoulders loosened. No longer keeping him at a distance. Softly, "I could say the same."
"Yes. Well." The Doctor bit his lower lip. "Well, if you've got nothing better to do in the middle of the night ..." And he pulled Jack with him, the few steps back to the TARDIS and right through the doors. Jack let himself be pulled.
Jack's bemusement was cute, the Doctor decided. He liked surprising Jack. He didn't like so much what he could see beneath the bemusement. Well, he didn't mind the loneliness - that went without saying - but there was a tentative hope laced with bitterness, and he didn't want to see that at all. He ignored it, and didn't give Jack the chance to appreciate the TARDIS's new look properly, either. Later, later.
He pulled Jack against him, hands grasping, Jack's bunching under his fingers. A few more stumbling steps, a coat discarded, and he ended up on the floor again, Jack's body covering him. Better than metal grating, this. He'd have to remember that.
Neither of them were quite hard yet, but almost. Soon. He shifted his hips, squirming. His hands flailed, a bit uselessly - so many things he wanted to do, places he wanted to touch. He barely knew where to start.
Jack, contrary as usual, pulled away - knelt up, straddling the Doctor's legs, and caught the Doctor's wrists with both hands. Held them, and didn't let go, not moving at all. The Doctor blinked up at him, scrunched up his nose. "I know for a fact you don't need a manual."
A surprised snort of laughter went through Jack's entire body, pushing him against the Doctor. Yes.
"Okay," Jack breathed, "okay." And he lowered himself down again, slowly, slowly, until he was braced on his elbows, still holding the Doctor's wrists, pinning them down besides the Doctor's head.
"Okay," the Doctor echoed, inanely, and didn't try to pull free. Did nothing but watch and feel - Jack's hips surging down, Jack's cock hard against his, Jack's fingers tight around his wrists, Jack's eyes clenched closed and something indescribable on his face -
He had to close his own eyes then, and wrapped his legs around Jack, pulling him in closer, meeting his frantic, helpless rhythm. The kind of urgency Jack had held back from the last time, the Doctor realised. But he wasn't dying now, and Jack wasn't holding back.
It didn't last long, then. A few more thrusts, and Jack was coming, coming, until he collapsed, the strings of his urgency, of his despair cut. And that - that -
With a shudder, a gasp, and a last helpless thrust upward, the Doctor came, just as Jack slumped down bonelessly on top of him.
The Doctor sent a silent apology toward the TARDIS. He didn't regret being here, after all. She gave him a wordless gloat in return.
But the moment was over, consigned to memory now. Jack rolled away, and they sat up quietly, got dressed quietly. The Doctor watched Jack from beneath his eyelashes, tried to find the right words to say. Any words to say.
What came out was, "I sent you away last time."
Jack turned to him, wary. "I remember." Tentative, and - not hopeless, exactly, but without much hope, all the same.
The Doctor looked at him, intently, holding his gaze. "I won't ask you to come with me this time, either."
Jack was the first to look away. "Didn't think you were."
"But," the Doctor continued, averting his gaze as well, "I would if I didn't already know you'd say no."
Jack said nothing, for far too long, and the Doctor had never been patient enough to wait him out. His eyes flickered up, and were caught by the shock on Jack's face, eyes wide with surprise. Jack's lips were slightly parted, as if he meant to say something but couldn't quite find the words.
"Maybe next time," the Doctor blurted out. He hadn't meant to say that, either, although it was true. Always a next time. With lives like theirs, how not?
Jack's eyes went even wider, his mouth opened - and then he was pulling the Doctor close again, burying his face in the crook of the Doctor's neck, pressing an open-mouthed kiss against his skin.
After a moment, Jack let go. He moved back, took a deep breath. "Sorry," he said. "Sorry."
And that ... that just wouldn't do at all. So the Doctor kissed him again, thoroughly and deeply, and with intent.
When they came apart, Jack was smiling.
And when they parted at the TARDIS door, Jack was still smiling. A sloppy salute, a waggling of fingers, and he was gone.
"Until next time, Jack Harkness," the Doctor said to the closed doors.
~*~
And then the TARDIS was empty. The honeymoon was over; Amy and Rory were back on Earth, as they should be. And the Doctor was on his own, another lonely night in the TARDIS.
Where to, next? He scratched his head, and poked a bit through a list of recent mauve signals, strange temporal readings, and other reasons to perhaps go somewhere. None of them stood out, and he was almost ready to set the TARDIS to random and let her choose when the console flashed, and the display changed.
Rather than the previous messages in Gallifreyan script, it now showed sheet music in Terran notation. A familiar opening movement, a piece of music the TARDIS had pushed at him before.
One she'd comforted him with before.
The Doctor stared at the console for a long moment. "Why are you bringing that up now?" He tried to switch back to the list of alerts, to see if perhaps one of them might have some connection to Jack, but the display didn't respond.
"Oh, come on!" - Nothing.
"Please?" - The TARDIS still refused. She'd given up on subtle suggestions, it seemed, and was now bludgeoning him with a brick.
The Doctor grimaced, felt his fingers clench into a fist, and unfolded them with an effort. The monitor before him was still flashing the same display at him.
Why? With Jack, there was always time - nothing but time. Always time for a next time, and no rush at all. He'd seen plenty of Jack, hadn't he? And would see plenty of him, some other time.
He swallowed, ready to work up a good sulk, and - Jack's eyes wide with surprise, Jack burying his face in the Doctor's shoulder ...
Jack didn't like to be needy, any more than he did. He'd never have shown that, given his druthers. It was enough to run away from. Enough to come back to.
Why now? - Perhaps the real question was, why not now?
"Fine," he said, grumpy and graceless in defeat. "Have it your way."
In moments, they were hurtling through the Vortex. Something like anticipation built inside him; something like dread. Did he really want this?
Yes. No.
Jack, he thought, would have understood. Wouldn't have liked it, 'course not, but would have understood.
The materialisation sequence completed sooner than he was ready. The Doctor didn't bother to check where he'd landed, just threw the door open and strode out before he could change his mind. And came to an abrupt halt.
Light spilled out from the TARDIS doors onto an open space surrounded by a high guard rail. A quick look around, up at the sky, down beyond the rail: it was a rooftop garden, just after sunset, empty of people in the cool of late autumn. Potted plants, not yet taken in for winter. Round café tables and deck chairs standing empty on the gravelled surface.
Empty, but for one. Jack hadn't risen from his seat, but the Doctor could feel his eyes on him.
The Doctor made an impatient gesture. "Well?" he called over to Jack. "Not even going to say hello?"
Jack stood up slowly and strolled over. His pacing was leisurely, but every movement looked intent, deliberate. Honing in on a target.
"Hello, Doctor." There was warmth in his voice, and less hesitation than there had been. The control room's orange light highlighted Jack's features, every dimple and frown line, every wrinkle laughter and worry had carved into his skin. Beautiful.
"Hello, Jack." The Doctor couldn't help it; he was beaming. Yes, he'd made the right decision. He made a vague gesture toward the open door behind him. "You didn't look at her properly, last time - how about a tour?"
Jack's eyebrows went up. "Lead the way."
The Doctor walked back inside, feeling Jack's presence behind him. He spread his arms, turned around in a circle, once, twice. "You never said last time. What do you say?"
"Glorious," Jack said quietly, head tilted back and eyes raking over the TARDIS's interior. "She's glorious."
Jack's delight was less effusive than it might have been, once upon a time - than it might be again, in time. It was infectious nonetheless. The Doctor stood beaming, and went along as Jack walked around the control room, down the stairs and up, took a circle around the central column.
Out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor saw one display still flashing music at him, stubbornly, obstinately. His eyes caught on it.
A reckless impulse flashed through him, through his nervous system, jerking his arm into motion without consulting his conscious will. In a moment, second thoughts would get the better of him. Just in time, he made up his mind, turned around and turned impulse into action, holding out his hand to Jack.
Whatever Jack had expected, it wasn't this. Well, he could probably guess what Jack had expected, considering the way their last two encounters had gone. Not that there was anything wrong with how those had gone, but ...
Well.
Jack blinked. "What?"
The Doctor pouted. "That's my line." He felt a wistful smile form on his face, and tried to wipe the feeling from his consciousness. "Never mind," he said, and then hesitated.
Hesitated too long, until delight drained out of Jack's face, leaving fond wariness in its place.
"Want to tell me what this is about, Doctor?"
The Doctor let his hand sink. His mouth opened, but he couldn't think of any words.
"No?" Jack studied him for a long moment. "Thank you for letting me look at her properly, Doctor." A moment's hesitation, and he turned to leave again.
The Doctor's lips pressed tightly together. He wasn't going to say anything. What had he been thinking, anyway? Running away was always better. Look at Jack, who'd clearly learned that himself by now. Now there was a painful thought. Should it hurt that much?
Probably.
Jack was nearly at the door. The Doctor looked down at the display before him. Last chance. At the last moment, he let impulse take him again. He slapped his hand on the control, setting the music to play.
Jack jerked to a standstill at the first notes, and spun around as the music started to build, staring at the Doctor.
The Doctor could see the stunned recognition, the memory of a different control room a long time ago, all corals and green light, a different Doctor and a different time. The same music.
The Doctor held out his hand again. Jack kept staring, made no move to accept the tacit invitation.
"Well?" Impatient.
Jack swallowed visibly. "You're serious."
"It's just a dance," the Doctor said, exasperated.
A wry smile started crinkling the skin around Jack's mouth. "With you, it's never just anything." He took a hesitant step forward.
The Doctor felt an answering smile grow on his own face, almost against his will. He waved his hand impatiently. "Come on, Captain! What are you waiting for?"
Jack blinked, and huffed a brief laugh. "... Nothing, apparently." He closed the distance between them, and took the Doctor's hand.
They let the music carry them, let their feet and arms and hands follow the pattern laid out for them, every step and spin, every smile and laugh a new memory built and grown from the old.
"Want to come along for a trip?" the Doctor asked.
No shocked surprise, not this time, just slightly startled laughter. "Why the hell not?" Jack said, and sent the Doctor into another spin.
Music and dancing were temporal arts - no matter how much you improvised, you still proceeded note by note, step by step toward an inevitable ending. Endings always loomed large. But you could play it again, and there could be another dance.
Perhaps they could both believe in that, if only for the duration of the dance.
~end~
Title: Five Nights in the TARDIS
Pairings: Tenth Doctor/Jack Harkness; Eleventh Doctor/Jack Harkness
Characters: Ninth Doctor, Tenth Doctor, Eleventh Doctor, Jack Harkness
Rating: PG-13
Summary: He wanted to hold on to it just a little longer - hold on to the laughter and the music and the brightness of it all. ~6,000 words.
A/N: Written for monkiainen as part of public_call 2014. Set after The Doctor Dances, during Last of the Time Lords, End of Time and Eleventh Hour, and after A Christmas Carol.
Originally posted here at AO3.
~*~
The Doctor's grin didn't fall when the doors closed. His cheer didn't fade, hearts still buoyed and skipping along to the faded music's familiar rhythm and tune. It had been surprisingly fun - dancing with Rose, teasing the Captain, refusing to let him cut in until several refusals had failed to draw anything other than a good-natured response. After that it had been a free-for-all, and that had been a different kind of fun. The Doctor had let himself get carried along with the playfulness and the laughter, and it was still carrying him.
He wasn't sure what to make of his new passenger aboard the TARDIS yet, but Captain Jack Harkness had an unexpected capacity for joy undaunted by his evident cynicism, by the Time Agency's betrayal, by the loss of two years of memories. The Doctor barely knew him, but well enough already to envy him.
There was more, though. Sometimes, just out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor thought he saw something - a shadow or an echo in Jack's timeline. Something he couldn't quite put his finger on. Making things up, he told himself firmly. Dyin' for a mystery, are you? Enough of those around without inventing new ones.
For now, Rose and Jack were falling asleep, or would be soon. They'd both been flagging when they'd finally called it a night. The Doctor wasn't going to go to bed himself, of course, not any time soon. Who needed beds, anyway? 'course, he had one of those somewhere - he'd probably even find it without the TARDIS's help if he really tried. But lying down and closing his eyes, letting his subconscious take over, knowing what lurked inside it - what was supposed to be tempting about that?
Besides, his mood was good, for once - and for a reason: everybody had lived; the conman had turned out to have a conscience; and the Doctor had watched a man sacrifice himself, but then he'd saved him, too. He wanted to hold on to that just a little longer - hold on to the laughter and the music and the brightness of it all.
If only he knew how.
The Doctor stood in the middle of the corridor, head bowed, nervous fingers scratching at the base of his skull. He could feel it slipping from his grasp already, watched that potential timeline scatter in favour of one where the corners of his mouth were drifting down and the hours he'd lived just now felt a lifetime away.
Familiar notes, a familiar opening theme and an echo from only hours ago drifted toward him from the direction of the console room, and the Doctor's head came up, his eyes widening, then blinking hard. The TARDIS, taking care of him in her own way. He leaned heavily against the corridor wall, then slid down to the floor. The Doctor's lips curled up again, a smile more wistful than before, and he remained sitting where he was, his back against the wall, his eyes closed and his face lifted into the air. Listening to a melody and a memory.
~*
The Doctor walked away from the still-burning pyre, from the Master's dead body. Every part of him felt raw and sore. His head ached. His very bones ached. Some rest would be the right thing, wouldn't it? He stopped inside the TARDIS doors and tried to picture himself lying down, or even just sitting somewhere warm and comfortable, a place safe to close his eyes and recuperate. He flinched away from the thought, from the very idea. Courting unconsciousness, with everything it might bring - no. No. Even less today than any other day.
He forced his thoughts away from nightmares and memories and - worse - good dreams, and walked up to the central column, brushing his hands over the control console. "Sorry," he murmured. "I'm so, so sorry." The TARDIS had been outwardly restored from what the Master's violation had done to her, but she was far from recovered, and it was all his fault. She should never have fallen into the Master's hands. No "sorry" could make up for it.
Good excuse for tinkering with her, though. Something to do.
The Doctor flinched at his own thought, but didn't let himself pretend he hadn't had it. Not exactly new, is it? he reminded himself bitterly.
He sat down heavily on the metal grating next to the console, brown coat pooling around him, and brushed his hand through his spiky hair. Something to do, he thought again. He buried his hands in console's innards, and his thoughts in the delicate task of tuning the temporal synchronisers. Fingers on the modulator, eyes closed and mind focused on the present timeline - the real one, shutting out everything that had been or might have been, or might yet be. He usually let the TARDIS take care of that, but she was hurt, and anyway, he needed it more. It was just mindless enough a task, and took up just enough of his concentration, to blot out everything else.
Everyone else.
Until suddenly he became aware of another presence in the control room. Must be Martha, come back to the TARDIS now. How long had it been? He didn't know, and didn't care to find out. The Doctor let his focus slip, let his perception of the timeline fade into the background, turned his head - and nearly jumped. Not Martha: Jack was just inside the TARDIS threshold, leaning back against the closed door, grey-faced and exhausted.
The Doctor's mouth shaped a silent What?, and he rubbed his fingers over his forehead, trying to clear his thoughts. Never mind that he hadn't heard the door open. This was Jack, fixed point in space and time and a presence constantly grating against his time sense - and he hadn't even noticed him right there in the room with him. The Doctor blinked. Wasn't that a first.
The TARDIS hadn't reacted to Jack, either. That was good, he supposed.
He tried to summon some sort of expression on his face, and managed a scowl. "Looking for something?"
Jack's eyes snapped open, his entire body tensed, and his spine straightened. Then he seemed to realise where he was, and slumped back again. "Just some peace and quiet," he muttered, and added a tired snort.
"Captain Jack Harkness, looking for peace and quiet? I should be scanning you for alien parasites," the Doctor quipped, aiming for lightness, a sense of normalcy. From Jack's frozen expression he suspected he'd merely managed tactless.
"Shows what you know," Jack said, voice tightly controlled and body tense once more. He turned, and reached for the door handle.
"Jack. Wait." The words were out of his mouth without thought. But he couldn't muster the energy to regret them.
Jack didn't turn back to him, but he did stop short of opening the door. "Done enough waiting in my time."
Oh, he was going there, was he? Fine. Fine. "120 years," the Doctor said softly. Dangerously. "And in the end you didn't even get what you wanted. Regret going after me now?"
"Didn't I?" Jack half turned toward the Doctor without letting go of the door handle, but he didn't rise to the bait, merely shook his head tiredly. "What do you want, Doctor?"
The Doctor blinked. Wasn't that the question. What did he want, now? What was left to want? "Just some peace and quiet," he said eventually, tilting his head back to look at the ceiling, trying to appreciate the irony. "Just some peace and quiet, Jack."
And that, after all, did what the attempt at banter hadn't - Jack's expression softened, and he stepped away from the door. His eyes sought the Doctor's, unsure of his welcome. The Doctor managed a tired come on wave, and for a moment, a smile flickered over Jack's face.
Jack came over slowly, perhaps a little tentatively, taking his time from door to console. He sat down next to the Doctor and peered into the opened maintenance panel. His eyes widened.
"You're doing the temporal synchronising by hand?" Jack sounded equal parts appalled and impressed, which was probably appropriate.
"Keeps me busy," the Doctor said, wryly. But he didn't go back to the task, just sat on the floor, the harsh metal grating cushioned only by his coat, and wondered when he'd stopped being bothered by the impossible temporal Fact that was Jack.
Some time during that year on the Valiant, apparently, and he hadn't even noticed.
Jack didn't interrupt his thoughts again, leaning his head against the central column and closing his eyes. The Doctor watched the lights from the time rotor playing over his face. Eventually, through the quiet, a strand of music carried across the TARDIS's telepathic field and teased at the Doctor's brain, familiar and -
He flinched, clenching his eyes closed, and the music scattered into a burst of mental static and died. Too late. She meant well, his TARDIS, but it was the last thing he needed now, the memory of a day when everything had gone right, when everyone had lived.
Too late: the memory was there, stark and vivid, inescapable.
They'd come so close, this time, too - the timeline reset; so many horrors, so many deaths undone. But not the nightmare of a year aboard the Valiant, for those who'd been there. And not the Master's death.
The Doctor's eyes flickered toward Jack. So many deaths there. Fact or no, it had changed Jack, too. The memory of Jack as he'd been only made it more painful to look at him now. Joy? Jack didn't look like someone who still knew what that was.
To be fair, the Doctor wasn't sure he could still recognise it himself.
But he didn't mind Jack's presence, and that ... was something. Something. He could stand having someone here with him who should be long-dead but wasn't, while the Master would never be anywhere again. And Jack? Jack hadn't flinched away in revulsion at the Doctor's grief. And he could still relax in a Time Lord's presence, despite it all.
Perhaps a little peace and quiet wasn't so bad, now, for the two of them here in the TARDIS. Just for a little while.
~*~
The Doctor saluted across the crowded bar, and after a moment, Jack returned the gesture. The Doctor smiled to himself, and took a deep breath to brace himself against the progressing sickness coursing through his body. Back to the TARDIS, now; he had more good-byes to say.
He'd always shied away from that before, from the finality of good-bye. He had a time machine, after all. Nothing was final until he made it so. Well, not nothing - just very few things; hardly any of them, really. It was just bad luck that he kept running into fixed points in time. Anyway - time machine, yes. Even if he left, he could always still be there right the very next moment, whenever he chose. Even if he knew he never would. Nothing was truly over so long as he still could, so why say good-bye and close that door, admitting he wouldn't?
Well. He was doing it now, for one.
But that was different. Now, he was dying, perhaps for the last time or perhaps not, but either way - it felt final, the ending of this particular regeneration. You're being ridiculous, he told himself. And then returned with a, Well, I've earned it, haven't I?
Don't answer that, self. Don't answer that.
The Doctor's mouth twisted into a wry grin. Hell of a thing, dying, when you had advance warning. Not something he'd ever experienced before. Soon, now. And all these people, his friends, living on when he wouldn't ... There was a strange satisfaction to it, almost - a bitter sort of relief, knowing he would be the first to go.
The Doctor pulled his TARDIS key from the inner pocket of his coat. Yes, he'd have his good-byes, just this once.
"Oh no, you don't."
Jack's voice startled the Doctor out of his thoughts, and as he turned around, Jack added, "You're not just taking off like that."
The Doctor's eyes met Jack's. Something tense and powerful flickered between them, holding them both in place for a long moment. Finally, the Doctor broke the spell. "How do you think you'd stop me?"
Jack shook off the moment, too, and came closer, his smile undercut by the seriousness of his eyes. There were wrinkles on his brow that hadn't been there before, not from age so much as habit. But whatever had put Jack here, drinking alone in a crowded bar, frowning into his drink - he'd clearly set it aside to come looking for the Doctor. It clenched the Doctor's hearts.
"Couldn't, probably," Jack said, dead serious. "It's not going to stop me from trying."
"Why? Shouldn't you be chatting up young Alonso right about now?" The Doctor had meant the remonstration to sound impatient, but it came out petulant instead. One point to Jack, then.
"Oh, please." Jack came a little closer and opened his mouth, but the rest of his words faded into the roiling blackness welling up around the Doctor as his body betrayed him. Convulsions pulsed through him, spikes of lightning in the amorphous dark, and despite his respiratory bypass he gasped for breath.
He came back to the here-and-now raw and wrung out, coughing and gasping, and it took him a long moment to understand why he wasn't curled up on the floor. Jack's arm around his back was holding him up, and when he blinked the water from his eyes, Jack's face was right in front of him, peering down at him full of concern.
The Doctor coughed, and wiped tears and spittle from his face with the sleeve of his coat. "It's nothing," he said, attempting a careless wave of the hand. "I just have a bit of a case of ..."
"Dying?" Jack interrupted him, drily. And far too perceptively; damn him.
The Doctor took a deep, steadying breath and braced himself, then pulled himself up with Jack's help. "How'd you guess?"
Jack had the audacity to roll his eyes. "I can recognise a grand final gesture when I see one, you know." His voice was light, but the worry behind it palpable nonetheless.
The Doctor ran a shaky hand through his hair, then rolled his shoulders a little, settling into himself, enough of his strength returned for the moment to let him move unassisted. "You know I only regenerate."
"Hmmm." Jack's lips pursed, and his eyes narrowed at the Doctor. "Do you, though?"
Ah. Well. "Caught me there," he muttered, under his breath, half hoping Jack wouldn't hear him, half knowing that he would.
"In that case ..." A trace of something indefinable flickered in Jack's eyes, and before the Doctor could react to it, Jack had already moved closer, had already brushed his lips against the Doctor's. And moved back again.
Jack's brief touch hummed against his lips; surprise flashed through his body. He gaped, and grimaced. "What?" tumbled out of his mouth, and a second "What?", until he managed to catch himself.
Jack merely looked at him, eyes heavy with meaning. "I'm not sorry," he said.
"Don't think you ever are when you get to kiss someone." The Doctor hesitated. "You can't stay. You should go back to Alonso."
"You mean you don't want me to."
"I mean I don't want anyone to watch me die, but particularly not someone who'll live forever!" The Doctor's breath had turned harsh. He tried to ignore Jack's flinch, and the shutters that went up behind Jack's eyes. He failed. "Sorry. Sorry, that was uncalled for."
Jack's face had closed. "I'll go."
"Don't. Yet."
Jack tilted his head, eyes sharp and penetrating. Challenging. "Make up your mind, Doctor."
After a long, frozen moment, the Doctor did.
Their first proper kiss was desperate, grasping and clinging, needy in a way the Doctor had never wanted to be needy. But he'd already let himself be self-indulgent, just this once, saying good-byes. Why not one more indulgence?
He pulled Jack into the TARDIS and closed the door behind them, pushing Jack up against it, pressing in close. One hand wrapped around Jack's neck, the other slid over his shoulder, under his coat. Jack's own hands were framing the Doctor's face, warm and firm, while Jack's teeth trailed little bites over the Doctor's chin.
Jack's coat was heavy enough to cushion them on the floor as they wrapped themselves around each other, skin against skin and despair against despair. Jack was careful with him, gentle in a way that ached, that burnt.
"I won't break," the Doctor complained. "Not yet."
Jack didn't flinch this time, not visibly. "You should be ashamed of yourself," he said, and managed a smirk.
Pleasure teased out of oversensitive skin, warmth wrapped around the advancing cold of the Doctor's sickness. It all hurt, and it all clenched his hearts, and when he came, he felt turned inside out, wrung out and used up and sore. He wouldn't have given up a second of it for anything.
Well, nearly anything. He could think of a thing or two.
"I have to go," the Doctor said, later, apologetically. "Things to do before I ..." He winced.
Jack brushed his fingertips across the Doctor's cheek as if he were touching something precious. "Yeah," was all he said. His eyes were dark, and he didn't look away from the Doctor for more than a moment, drinking him in. Maybe Jack wasn't so sure the Doctor would regenerate, after all.
The Doctor waited, but the question didn't come. Jack just kept looking at him, memorising, and didn't ask for a promise. Didn't ask the Doctor to come back, afterwards, if he regenerated - didn't ask him to let him know.
The Doctor would have liked to pretend he'd do that. Just for the moment. But Jack clearly knew better than to believe it.
Better this way. Better not to make false promises. Instead, the Doctor nudged Jack with his shoulder to make him move, and then stood up and began to dress.
If it took them both rather long to put all their clothes on, if their hands kept straying to brush over skin or hair - well, that was just part and parcel of it all. Good-bye, Jack. I'm so, so sorry.
~*~
"I don't like bananas any more." The words tumbled out of the Doctor's mouth in a startled rush. He hadn't meant to say anything - hadn't meant to be here at all. The TARDIS was a meddler. Sexy, beautiful, and a damned meddler.
He'd just been restless, sitting in the TARDIS here on top of the Rift in 32nd Century Cardiff, waiting for the engines to recharge after her recent regeneration. And it was late at night; he'd not expected to meet anyone when he'd decided to go out for a stroll.
But he'd opened the TARDIS door and had stumbled right into him: Jack.
His fingers plucked at his bow-tie, and he looked at Jack through the hair falling over his forehead into his eyes.
Jack's face was frozen, stunned into silence, for only a moment longer. "Bananas," he repeated. "No bananas, check. You got a craving for some other kind of fruit, Doctor?" And he winked, because - well, probably because he wouldn't be Jack if he didn't.
Entirely against his will, the Doctor's memory brought up every instance he'd witnessed of Jack very much not in the mood for winking - more of them than he'd have thought; more of them than he wanted to think about. He brushed it all away.
"Well, I don't know, do I?" the Doctor said. "New mouth and all. Well, not apples - apples are vile now." He grimaced, and watched amusement and relief and gladness grow in Jack's face.
"You regenerated," Jack commented, entirely needlessly, because that much was obvious, wasn't it? "Looking younger, too."
"Am I?" The Doctor looked down at himself, then studied his hands - they were the only part of himself he could see clearly, not covered by clothes and all. They didn't look that young, did they? Hands, who cared about hands anyway?
"Yep." Jack reached out then, brushing the Doctor's cheek with the tips of his fingers. He sighed, and the humour in his eyes went out. "The TARDIS picked the time and place, didn't she?"
The Doctor stilled, and thought about denying it. Instead, he looked down, studying his new shoes - answer enough.
It wasn't cruel, he told himself, not too much. He'd have told Jack eventually. Why the rush?
Moments passed, and more moments, and still Jack didn't say anything. No reaction to the wordless confession. No complaint - of course no complaint, but nothing else, either. The Doctor looked up.
"What are you doing here, anyway?" he blurted out, trying not to examine the emotion behind Jack's eyes too closely. "You were a few centuries, not to mention light years, from here only a month ago. And it's the middle of the night."
"You can talk! And ..." Jack shrugged, a slightly embarrassed lift of one shoulder. "The Rift's acting up again in this century. I thought I'd take a look. Needed something to do."
The Doctor nodded, thoughtfully. "And you're not ready to let go of those memories."
Jack snorted. "Could still go back." Wryly, "Time machine." He gently patted the Vortex Manipulator on his wrist.
They looked at each other, and their lips started twitching at the same time.
No, there wasn't any judgment in the complex mix of whatever Jack was feeling. Anger, perhaps. Disappointment, perhaps. But Jack understood far too well. The Doctor quelled the impulse to turn around and shut the TARDIS door in Jack's face, in the face of that unwanted understanding.
"Anyway," he said instead, "regeneration! What do you think? Oh, wait until you see the TARDIS!" He hadn't meant to say that, either.
"She's changed too?" Jack sounded wistful, but rallied quickly. "Well, let's see it, then."
The Doctor didn't move. The TARDIS was right behind him, but he hadn't meant that invitation, had he?
The TARDIS nudged him through their telepathic connection, and weaved a strand of music into his thoughts. Oh no. No, no, no - not that, not now. He shook the notes out of his thoughts. Inveterate meddler. Damn you.
He didn't mean that, either.
He'd hesitated too long; Jack's expression was turning resigned.
"Anyway!" he said again. The word felt wrong in his mouth. He chewed his lips for a moment, bit the inside of his cheek, ran his tongue over his lips. Mouth ...
He hooked a hand behind Jack's head, pulled him in for a kiss. Not a long one, or a particularly passionate one, just a taste of him, just a small one.
Still, Jack's hands pushed him back sooner than he was ready.
"What's that about?" Jack's voice was hoarse.
"What?" The Doctor shrugged his shoulders under Jack's grasp, and grasped for an explanation. "I had to know what you taste like now! New taste buds, remember?"
Jack huffed a laugh. It sounded pained. "That so?"
"What else?" The Doctor considered for a moment. "It's different, but still you."
At that, something in Jack seemed to soften, and his hold on the Doctor's shoulders loosened. No longer keeping him at a distance. Softly, "I could say the same."
"Yes. Well." The Doctor bit his lower lip. "Well, if you've got nothing better to do in the middle of the night ..." And he pulled Jack with him, the few steps back to the TARDIS and right through the doors. Jack let himself be pulled.
Jack's bemusement was cute, the Doctor decided. He liked surprising Jack. He didn't like so much what he could see beneath the bemusement. Well, he didn't mind the loneliness - that went without saying - but there was a tentative hope laced with bitterness, and he didn't want to see that at all. He ignored it, and didn't give Jack the chance to appreciate the TARDIS's new look properly, either. Later, later.
He pulled Jack against him, hands grasping, Jack's bunching under his fingers. A few more stumbling steps, a coat discarded, and he ended up on the floor again, Jack's body covering him. Better than metal grating, this. He'd have to remember that.
Neither of them were quite hard yet, but almost. Soon. He shifted his hips, squirming. His hands flailed, a bit uselessly - so many things he wanted to do, places he wanted to touch. He barely knew where to start.
Jack, contrary as usual, pulled away - knelt up, straddling the Doctor's legs, and caught the Doctor's wrists with both hands. Held them, and didn't let go, not moving at all. The Doctor blinked up at him, scrunched up his nose. "I know for a fact you don't need a manual."
A surprised snort of laughter went through Jack's entire body, pushing him against the Doctor. Yes.
"Okay," Jack breathed, "okay." And he lowered himself down again, slowly, slowly, until he was braced on his elbows, still holding the Doctor's wrists, pinning them down besides the Doctor's head.
"Okay," the Doctor echoed, inanely, and didn't try to pull free. Did nothing but watch and feel - Jack's hips surging down, Jack's cock hard against his, Jack's fingers tight around his wrists, Jack's eyes clenched closed and something indescribable on his face -
He had to close his own eyes then, and wrapped his legs around Jack, pulling him in closer, meeting his frantic, helpless rhythm. The kind of urgency Jack had held back from the last time, the Doctor realised. But he wasn't dying now, and Jack wasn't holding back.
It didn't last long, then. A few more thrusts, and Jack was coming, coming, until he collapsed, the strings of his urgency, of his despair cut. And that - that -
With a shudder, a gasp, and a last helpless thrust upward, the Doctor came, just as Jack slumped down bonelessly on top of him.
The Doctor sent a silent apology toward the TARDIS. He didn't regret being here, after all. She gave him a wordless gloat in return.
But the moment was over, consigned to memory now. Jack rolled away, and they sat up quietly, got dressed quietly. The Doctor watched Jack from beneath his eyelashes, tried to find the right words to say. Any words to say.
What came out was, "I sent you away last time."
Jack turned to him, wary. "I remember." Tentative, and - not hopeless, exactly, but without much hope, all the same.
The Doctor looked at him, intently, holding his gaze. "I won't ask you to come with me this time, either."
Jack was the first to look away. "Didn't think you were."
"But," the Doctor continued, averting his gaze as well, "I would if I didn't already know you'd say no."
Jack said nothing, for far too long, and the Doctor had never been patient enough to wait him out. His eyes flickered up, and were caught by the shock on Jack's face, eyes wide with surprise. Jack's lips were slightly parted, as if he meant to say something but couldn't quite find the words.
"Maybe next time," the Doctor blurted out. He hadn't meant to say that, either, although it was true. Always a next time. With lives like theirs, how not?
Jack's eyes went even wider, his mouth opened - and then he was pulling the Doctor close again, burying his face in the crook of the Doctor's neck, pressing an open-mouthed kiss against his skin.
After a moment, Jack let go. He moved back, took a deep breath. "Sorry," he said. "Sorry."
And that ... that just wouldn't do at all. So the Doctor kissed him again, thoroughly and deeply, and with intent.
When they came apart, Jack was smiling.
And when they parted at the TARDIS door, Jack was still smiling. A sloppy salute, a waggling of fingers, and he was gone.
"Until next time, Jack Harkness," the Doctor said to the closed doors.
~*~
And then the TARDIS was empty. The honeymoon was over; Amy and Rory were back on Earth, as they should be. And the Doctor was on his own, another lonely night in the TARDIS.
Where to, next? He scratched his head, and poked a bit through a list of recent mauve signals, strange temporal readings, and other reasons to perhaps go somewhere. None of them stood out, and he was almost ready to set the TARDIS to random and let her choose when the console flashed, and the display changed.
Rather than the previous messages in Gallifreyan script, it now showed sheet music in Terran notation. A familiar opening movement, a piece of music the TARDIS had pushed at him before.
One she'd comforted him with before.
The Doctor stared at the console for a long moment. "Why are you bringing that up now?" He tried to switch back to the list of alerts, to see if perhaps one of them might have some connection to Jack, but the display didn't respond.
"Oh, come on!" - Nothing.
"Please?" - The TARDIS still refused. She'd given up on subtle suggestions, it seemed, and was now bludgeoning him with a brick.
The Doctor grimaced, felt his fingers clench into a fist, and unfolded them with an effort. The monitor before him was still flashing the same display at him.
Why? With Jack, there was always time - nothing but time. Always time for a next time, and no rush at all. He'd seen plenty of Jack, hadn't he? And would see plenty of him, some other time.
He swallowed, ready to work up a good sulk, and - Jack's eyes wide with surprise, Jack burying his face in the Doctor's shoulder ...
Jack didn't like to be needy, any more than he did. He'd never have shown that, given his druthers. It was enough to run away from. Enough to come back to.
Why now? - Perhaps the real question was, why not now?
"Fine," he said, grumpy and graceless in defeat. "Have it your way."
In moments, they were hurtling through the Vortex. Something like anticipation built inside him; something like dread. Did he really want this?
Yes. No.
Jack, he thought, would have understood. Wouldn't have liked it, 'course not, but would have understood.
The materialisation sequence completed sooner than he was ready. The Doctor didn't bother to check where he'd landed, just threw the door open and strode out before he could change his mind. And came to an abrupt halt.
Light spilled out from the TARDIS doors onto an open space surrounded by a high guard rail. A quick look around, up at the sky, down beyond the rail: it was a rooftop garden, just after sunset, empty of people in the cool of late autumn. Potted plants, not yet taken in for winter. Round café tables and deck chairs standing empty on the gravelled surface.
Empty, but for one. Jack hadn't risen from his seat, but the Doctor could feel his eyes on him.
The Doctor made an impatient gesture. "Well?" he called over to Jack. "Not even going to say hello?"
Jack stood up slowly and strolled over. His pacing was leisurely, but every movement looked intent, deliberate. Honing in on a target.
"Hello, Doctor." There was warmth in his voice, and less hesitation than there had been. The control room's orange light highlighted Jack's features, every dimple and frown line, every wrinkle laughter and worry had carved into his skin. Beautiful.
"Hello, Jack." The Doctor couldn't help it; he was beaming. Yes, he'd made the right decision. He made a vague gesture toward the open door behind him. "You didn't look at her properly, last time - how about a tour?"
Jack's eyebrows went up. "Lead the way."
The Doctor walked back inside, feeling Jack's presence behind him. He spread his arms, turned around in a circle, once, twice. "You never said last time. What do you say?"
"Glorious," Jack said quietly, head tilted back and eyes raking over the TARDIS's interior. "She's glorious."
Jack's delight was less effusive than it might have been, once upon a time - than it might be again, in time. It was infectious nonetheless. The Doctor stood beaming, and went along as Jack walked around the control room, down the stairs and up, took a circle around the central column.
Out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor saw one display still flashing music at him, stubbornly, obstinately. His eyes caught on it.
A reckless impulse flashed through him, through his nervous system, jerking his arm into motion without consulting his conscious will. In a moment, second thoughts would get the better of him. Just in time, he made up his mind, turned around and turned impulse into action, holding out his hand to Jack.
Whatever Jack had expected, it wasn't this. Well, he could probably guess what Jack had expected, considering the way their last two encounters had gone. Not that there was anything wrong with how those had gone, but ...
Well.
Jack blinked. "What?"
The Doctor pouted. "That's my line." He felt a wistful smile form on his face, and tried to wipe the feeling from his consciousness. "Never mind," he said, and then hesitated.
Hesitated too long, until delight drained out of Jack's face, leaving fond wariness in its place.
"Want to tell me what this is about, Doctor?"
The Doctor let his hand sink. His mouth opened, but he couldn't think of any words.
"No?" Jack studied him for a long moment. "Thank you for letting me look at her properly, Doctor." A moment's hesitation, and he turned to leave again.
The Doctor's lips pressed tightly together. He wasn't going to say anything. What had he been thinking, anyway? Running away was always better. Look at Jack, who'd clearly learned that himself by now. Now there was a painful thought. Should it hurt that much?
Probably.
Jack was nearly at the door. The Doctor looked down at the display before him. Last chance. At the last moment, he let impulse take him again. He slapped his hand on the control, setting the music to play.
Jack jerked to a standstill at the first notes, and spun around as the music started to build, staring at the Doctor.
The Doctor could see the stunned recognition, the memory of a different control room a long time ago, all corals and green light, a different Doctor and a different time. The same music.
The Doctor held out his hand again. Jack kept staring, made no move to accept the tacit invitation.
"Well?" Impatient.
Jack swallowed visibly. "You're serious."
"It's just a dance," the Doctor said, exasperated.
A wry smile started crinkling the skin around Jack's mouth. "With you, it's never just anything." He took a hesitant step forward.
The Doctor felt an answering smile grow on his own face, almost against his will. He waved his hand impatiently. "Come on, Captain! What are you waiting for?"
Jack blinked, and huffed a brief laugh. "... Nothing, apparently." He closed the distance between them, and took the Doctor's hand.
They let the music carry them, let their feet and arms and hands follow the pattern laid out for them, every step and spin, every smile and laugh a new memory built and grown from the old.
"Want to come along for a trip?" the Doctor asked.
No shocked surprise, not this time, just slightly startled laughter. "Why the hell not?" Jack said, and sent the Doctor into another spin.
Music and dancing were temporal arts - no matter how much you improvised, you still proceeded note by note, step by step toward an inevitable ending. Endings always loomed large. But you could play it again, and there could be another dance.
Perhaps they could both believe in that, if only for the duration of the dance.
~end~