Fic: Sphere of Influence 5/6
Story: Sphere of Influence
Author: wmr / wendymr
Characters: Ninth Doctor, Jack Harkness, Rose Tyler
Rated: PG13
Summary: He’s like a magnet. A gravity well, sucking in everything within his sphere of influence, drawing them to him whether they like it or not.
Written for space_monkey52 in return for an extremely generous donation to the Queensland flood appeal. Thank you SO much for your generosity. Many thanks also to dark_aegis for BRing.
Chapter 1: Clean-up Duty l Chapter 2: Amusements l Chapter 3: Drop-off Point l Chapter 4: Search and Recovery
Chapter 5: Leading the Blind
The Doctor’s silence tells him everything he needs to know. He is blind.
It’s only about five seconds, though it feels like much longer, before the Doctor does speak. “Lights are on, lad. Thing is, I didn’t see any damage to your eyes.”
“Can’t see-” He breaks off; there’s some kind of strange obstruction in his throat. “-a fucking thing,” he manages to finish after a moment.
“All right.” He has a feeling that the Doctor’s deliberately trying to sound as calm as possible. “Stay where you are. I can run some more scans, try to find out what the problem is.”
Scans? What, is the guy really a doctor?
“Yes, I have medical qualifications,” the Doctor says, his tone long-suffering. “Already had to convince Rose, too.”
Shit, the guy reads minds as well?
“No, I don’t read minds,” the Doctor comments dryly, and he removes his hand from Jack’s shoulder. “Don’t need to. Not when it’s written all over your face.”
He can hear footsteps, then the sound of metal on metal, and then more footsteps. “Gonna examine your eyes, lad. I’ll be holding your eyes open an’ shining a torch into them. All right?”
“Yeah, fine.” What choice does he have?
Gentle fingers press down on his eyelids, holding them apart, and then there’s heat on his eyeball. But no light; not even a pinprick.
He feels moisture welling up in his eyes. He tells himself it’s from the torch.
There’s an irritating buzzing sound, and then the Doctor’s fingers move to his other eye. Jack takes a deep breath, drawing on the relaxation techniques he learned all those years ago in Time Agency training, forcing his attention away from his lack of sight. So he’s blind. Deal with that later. What else? Inventory.
He flexes the muscles in his legs, only to be hit by the kind of pain that sweeps breath away.
“Easy, lad,” the Doctor says, letting go of his eyelids and laying a hand against his head, pressing briefly. “Got a hairline fracture in your lower leg. Would’ve warned you, but got distracted.”
Shit. “What else?”
Matter-of-factly, the Doctor lists his injuries. “Three broken ribs, broken wrist, stitches in several places, blood loss - you’ve got a drip running blood into your arm, so don’t move that if you can help it - and fluid loss. There’s a saline drip too. So don’t move,” the Doctor adds. “Spent a lot of time gettin’ you patched up. Would prefer not to have to do it again.”
Right. He didn’t really need the reminder that he’s here on sufferance, did he? Of course patching him up wouldn’t have been top of the Doctor’s list of preferred activities. Of course, he shouldn’t even have been here still. He was leaving-
“Why didn’t you leave me on Fy Ndu?” he asks, genuinely bewildered.
It makes no sense. The place is a civilised colony. Of course there’s decent health and emergency care facilities there. There had to have been emergency medical personnel available at the collapse site - there were injured people, after all. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to hand him over to the care of doctors there.
The Doctor doesn’t answer for a few moments, and Jack starts to wonder whether he’ll get an answer. But then he does. “Not a human colony. Humanoid, yeah, but different physiology. They didn’t have the drugs and plasma you’d need. Easier just to bring you back here.”
Right. To patch him up and then send him on his way. Of course, the Doctor didn’t expect to end up stuck with a handicapped guy on his hands. Sure, he saved Jack’s life when his ship was blowing up, but that doesn’t mean he had any intention of being responsible for Jack indefinitely - and certainly not in current circumstances.
Okay. There’s a simple answer to that: the Doctor won’t be. Blind or not, as soon as he’s able to get back on his feet Jack will be on his way, regardless. He’s already long outstayed whatever grudging welcome he’s had, after all.
***
Voices.
Voices. It’s not just the Doctor she’s hearing. That second voice is definitely Jack, even if he does sound groggy.
He’s awake. She speeds up her steps, practically running the rest of the way to the med-lab.
As she hurries in, Jack turns his head towards her. It’s final proof that he’s awake and aware of his surroundings. “Jack!” The Doctor moves towards her, but she brushes past him. “We thought you were dead! Don’t ever do anything that stupid again.”
“Rose.” The Doctor’s voice is sharp, and his hand around her upper arm, stopping her from getting to Jack, is tight. “The lad’s hurt. Leave him be.”
Now, that’s different. She stares at the Doctor for a moment, reading the worry and regret on his face, before looking back at Jack. He doesn’t seem to be as bad as she feared. Yes, his leg’s in some kind of a light cast, and she knows about the ribs and his wrist, but there’s no sign of a head injury and all the scanning equipment’s been removed. Really, considering what they thought, it looks like he was incredibly lucky.
It must be bad, though. The Doctor couldn’t wait to get rid of Jack before, talked about him as if he was a waste of space. Of course Jack’s proved he’s not, no matter how stupid it was to go into that building the way he did - but there’s more to the Doctor’s reaction than that.
“What is it?” she asks, gently brushing a hand against Jack’s shoulder. He’s not making eye contact with her, she notices, even though she’s smiling at him, searching for that lively expression of his in return. It’s as if he can’t...
“I can’t see,” Jack says, his voice flat.
Something runs cold inside her. “You can’t...?” Oh, god. Oh, poor Jack. All he did was save someone’s life, and now he’s...
She whirls around to look at the Doctor. He can fix it, right? There has to be something he can do.
But the grim look in his eyes and the way his lips are pressed together tells her the truth. The Doctor can’t do anything. Jack’s blind.
***
He sends Rose away, telling her that Jack needs to rest. It’s true, up to a point, though the real truth is that Rose’s distress will upset Jack and get in the way of his healing. The lad might not be able to see the tears in her eyes, but he’ll notice her silence, all right.
Before she leaves, though, she pushes past him again and goes to Jack’s side, taking his uninjured hand in hers and then bending to kiss his cheek.
Once she’s gone, the Doctor moves closer to the examination bed again. “She’s right, Captain. It was a stupid thing to do. Brave, but still stupid.”
“Did she make it?” The anxiety in Jack’s voice is surprising, given what the lad’s still assimilating.
“She’s fine. Got taken off to hospital, but the medics on site said the leg wasn’t broken. Probably be home already.”
“Good.” Jack’s face is turned straight up towards the ceiling. “Least it wasn’t a complete waste.”
“No,” he agrees, resting a hand lightly on Jack’s shoulder. “You nearly died. Was it really worth that risk?”
Jack’s laugh is bitter. “You tell me. You’re the one who said I’d better be.”
Better be? Ah. Bigger on the inside.
The Doctor forces himself to take a deep breath before answering. “Hope that’s not why you did it. Bein’ stupid’s one thing, but I can’t stand bloody show-offs.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Jack tries to roll over and force himself upwards, but the Doctor increases the pressure of his hand on the man’s shoulder.
“You’ll only do more damage if you try that. And what I’m talking about is whether you went inside that building to impress me.”
“What?” There’s no doubt that the incredulity in Jack’s tone is genuine. “What the fuck would I do that for? We were going our separate ways, remember? That’s what we were doing on Fy Ndu in the first place.” Jack rubs his good hand over his eyes, then grunts in frustration. “Truth is, I didn’t even think about it. I heard her yell for help and I ran.”
“All right.” He releases Jack and goes to get the optical scanning tool. “Going to try to find out what the damage is to your eyes.”
“Okay.” Jack lies still, neither moving nor speaking as the Doctor runs the tool over Jack’s eyes and around the sockets, briefly shining a light into his eyes as well. Jack’s pupils are reactive, dilating and constricting in response.
“No obvious damage to the retina or pupils,” he concludes. There are many more possible explanations, both permanent and temporary, and before he starts doing anything more invasive he’d prefer to see if a few hours’ rest would make any difference. “Think it’d be a good idea if you slept for a bit, give your body a chance to start healing.”
It’s not just Jack’s sight that’s damaged, after all. His other injuries need time to heal, time when the lad’s not doing something stupid like trying to stand up or move broken bones.
Oh, he’d love to have been able to spare the time to give Commander Marga a piece of his mind over her appalling slowness in making the building safe for search and rescue crews. Or that paramedic at the scene who refused to do anything for Jack. Or, actually, whoever was responsible for allowing that building to get into such an unsafe state in the first place. Poor building regulations? Negligent contractors or building inspectors? Whatever the cause, if he ever comes face to face with those responsible they’ll learn what it’s like to face the Oncoming Storm.
Jack reaches out with his hand, groping at the air, shifting his hand erratically as he searches for the Doctor. He curls his fingers around the lad’s. “What is it?”
“I’m-” Scared? Looks like it, and he wouldn’t blame Jack. “Doctor, is there anything...? Am I gonna be blind for the rest of my life?”
“Too soon to say.” Which it is, and that’s all he’s going to say for now. It’s not fair to give the Captain false hope by mentioning the possibility that it could be temporary; after all, it could just as easily be permanent.
They’ll see in a few hours. Most temporary vision problems clear up within a couple of hours anyway. Pressure on the optical nerve is one very possible cause; after all, it’s clear that Jack sustained a blow to his head. If that’s what it is, then once the swelling goes down Jack’s vision should return - it might be blurry for a day or two, but there should be no permanent damage.
“Sleep,” he says, and rests his fingers briefly against Jack’s temples. If the lad won’t rest willingly, he’ll just have to make sure he does.
***
“Shit.”
He’s spilt food down himself again. He knows, not just because there’s virtually nothing on the spoon, but also because he can feel the weight on his chest of the warm lump of whatever part of the stew he dropped.
God. He’s like a baby, having to learn to eat all over again - but with the embarrassment of knowing that he’s being watched. Rose won’t just leave him alone to get on with it, because she’s afraid he’ll hurt himself somehow.
At least she’s stopped trying to feed him herself. That really did make him feel like a helpless infant.
It’s been three days now since he woke up to complete blackness, and nothing’s changed. He’s still every bit as blind as he was at first, and any hope that he might regain his sight’s vanished. The Doctor thought it could be temporary, some kind of trauma from his head injury, or so the guy finally deigned to tell him when he woke up for the second time. But that kind of traumatic blindness is often not total, and usually reverses itself after a few hours. Not three days.
At least he’s not quite as helpless now as he was at first. During those first couple of days, particularly with his wrist and leg injury as well as being blind, he was dependent on the Doctor and Rose for everything. Rose fed him and, once the Doctor allowed him to walk short distances with the use of a cane, she led him on short circuits around the TARDIS hallways. The Doctor helped him up and down from the bed in the infirmary where he was confined at first, helped him to shower and dress, and even to use the bathroom. God, that was humiliating.
Now, he’s trusted to wash and use the toilet on his own, and he’s eating unaided as well - but not unaccompanied. No matter how quiet she is, he always knows when Rose is in the room with him, and she won’t take the hint that he’d prefer to be alone. It’s not that he doesn’t like her company. He just hates the thought of either of them - those fit, healthy and not handicapped people in whose ship he’s an unwanted guest - seeing him so incapable of performing the simplest tasks for himself.
Though it could be worse. The Doctor’s downloaded a map of the TARDIS into his wrist computer - a map which, somehow, changes as the TARDIS layout changes - and it gives him voice prompts to help him move around. He can tell the device where he wants to go, and every step and turn is counted out for him. The computer can also tell him when there’s an obstacle in his path, another little utility the Doctor set up, and that’ll be invaluable once he’s off this ship and trying to cope on his own in an unfamiliar place.
Something he’s less grateful for, but acknowledges he does need, is an emergency call signal. He can call for help and the computer sends a signal that the Doctor can hear. The same happens if he falls and doesn’t get back up again within a few seconds. He’s had to use the signal a couple of times - an accident in the bathroom, and the time he got too sure of himself and ignored the computer’s instructions, ending up walking smack into a door.
Three days and nothing’s changed. Time to accept that nothing will and start making plans for his future. He can’t stay here indefinitely - of course he can’t. Apart from anything else, he can’t possibly expect the Doctor and Rose to accept him as their responsibility on a permanent basis. Why should they? He’s nothing to them.
Second, he’s nothing but a burden to them. They’ve changed the pattern of their lives for him at the moment, and that can’t continue. Rose has told him, during some of the long hours she’s spent keeping him company, talking to him to stop him going off his head with boredom, that they travel around through time and space with a different destination almost every day. Yet since his accident they’ve stayed in the Vortex, going nowhere. Sooner or later, they’ll get fed up with that and want to explore again, but he’d be a liability. They’d have to focus on taking care of him, or else leave him behind on the ship.
So it’s time to leave, but where can he go? What can a blind ex-time traveller and soldier do? He can’t fight, and he’d be useless as a crew member on a ship. What the hell else is there?
He’s got to figure something out soon, though. Can’t leave it until the Doctor loses patience with him and asks him straight out what his plans are.
What’s most frustrating of all, though, is the nagging thought that won’t go away: the recognition that the Doctor might be right. No matter how spur-of-the-moment his actions felt, he can’t be sure that some small part of his decision, even sub-consciously, wasn’t intended to show the Doctor that he really is bigger on the inside.
And if that’s true, he deserves all he got.
***
The Doctor turns a corner and comes within a hair’s breadth of colliding with Jack. The only thing that’s prevented it is Jack stepping awkwardly to one side, his cane rattling against the wall in the process. Either his wrist device alerted him, or the lad’s hearing is already starting to improve in compensation for the loss of sight.
“Sorry. Should be more careful,” he says. After all, he’s the one who can see.
“You shouldn’t have to apologise for walking around your own ship.” Jack’s tone is defensive - and bitter. Not all that surprising, of course.
Best ignored, though. “Since you’re here, might’s well get the tests over with.”
The tests are part of their daily routine now. Range of motion tests and strength-building exercises for Jack’s wrist and lower leg, as well as a variety of tests on the Captain’s eyes. Pupil sensitivity: so far, still reactive to light and darkness, but Jack can’t see anything.
Every day, he can see the lad tense as they begin that particular series of tests. It’s obvious that Jack’s hoping today will be the day that something changes, that a tiny pinprick of light will make it through - but nothing happens.
Today’s no exception. Jack’s good hand curls around the examination table, his knuckles turning white as the Doctor runs the tool around his eyes. “Anything?” the Doctor asks, though it’s an unnecessary question. If there were any change, Jack would have said something by now.
“Face it, Doctor, my sight’s not coming back.” Jack starts to slide off the table. “We need to give up this pointless ritual and just accept the truth.”
“Not accepting anything.” His tone’s more curt than he intends, but the Captain’s hit a nerve. “Was hoping it was something as simple as pressure that’d reduce of its own accord over time, but it’s not looking like that now.”
“No fucking kidding.” Jack exhales slowly. “Sorry. It’s just... Never mind. What else could it be?”
“From the accident? Irreparable nerve damage, for one.” He starts to pace; easier to focus on these kind of hard facts when he’s not standing right next to Jack. “Course, it could have nothing to do with the collapse. Could be something that was already there - ever had severe headaches? Blurred vision? Periods of temporary blindness, no matter how short?”
He’s glanced over at Jack as he asked the question, so sees the abrupt shake of Jack’s head. “Nothing like that. Not ever.”
The Doctor nods, remembering too late that Jack can’t see him. “Another possibility’s psychological. Could be psychosomatic,” he explains as Jack’s expression clouds over with confusion.
“You mean it could be all in my head?” Jack shakes his head, disbelief written all over his face. “Why would I do that to myself?”
“Doesn’t work that way.” He can switch into lecture mode now, and that feels much better. “The brain’s a very powerful organ. You know that, Jack. I know you’ve had some medical training.”
“Mostly emergency stuff.” It’s disconcerting watching Jack now. The lad’s looking in the right direction, but his gaze is levelled just to the left of the Doctor’s face. “Just enough to get by in the field, that’s all. I could set your leg if you broke it, and use a bone regenerator if I had one, and I can recognise signs of internal bleeding. But something like this? No idea.”
“The mind can affect the senses as a protective measure.” He’s getting more comfortable now; less reluctant to keep looking at Jack. “Can happen after a traumatic event, for example.”
“Right. So...” Jack drums the fingers of his good hand on the table. “What? We just wait to see if my brain decides I’m not traumatised any more?”
The Doctor hesitates. This is something he hasn’t done in a long time, and it really isn’t something he wants to do now - but it’s not fair to Jack not to offer. “Can find out, if you want. Telepathic, me. Can take a look inside your head, see if that’s what it is.”
By the look of Jack’s expression and the way his knuckles turn white, he wants it even less. But it takes him only a second or two to make up his mind. “Thanks. Yes, please.”
The Doctor steps closer. “All right. I’m gonna be pressing my fingers against your temples. Try to stay as still as you can.” He moves his hands into place, index and second finger of each hand on the pressure-points of Jack’s temples, and immediately feels the instinctive recoil, both mental and physical.
“Relax, okay? Won’t be able to see anything if you’re all tensed up like that.” He breathes calmly, in long, slow breaths; Jack will hear it and, he hopes, subconsciously mimic it. “Whatever you don’t want me to see, imagine it behind a locked door, okay?”
Jack mutters something that sounds vaguely affirmative, and abruptly multiple doors slam. Plenty to hide, then. No matter; that’s not what he’s here to see. He follows the neural pathways he’s looking for, searching for signs of trauma, fear, protectiveness... and finds a little, but nothing sufficient to explain Jack’s blindness.
It’s not psychomatic.
He withdraws silently and removes his fingers. “Nothing. It’s not your mind doing it.”
Jack swears. “I don’t know which is worse: being blind or not having a clue why I’m blind.”
Frustration gets the better of him, and he snaps, “I’m trying to find out!”
Jack’s head dips. “I know you are. Wasn’t complaining about you.”
He doesn’t challenge Jack, though he knows the bloke’s thinking he should have been able to do more. But there isn’t anything more he can do. He’s tried everything.
Though that’s not strictly true. There are other things he could do. Specifically, he could take Jack to the hospital in New New York - or to any one of half a dozen similar establishments - and the lad’d be healed within days. Trouble is, he’s got scruples. Jack’s from the fifty-first century, albeit a time-traveller. That kind of medical technology is far, far into the future from Jack’s time. Who knows what the consequences might be of meddling that much with Jack’s place in the flow of time?
Sure, he takes people to different points in time as a matter of routine, and he can’t possibly argue that they don’t affect timelines when they’re there - even if it’s just through the mere fact of observing. This is different. It would be deliberately setting out to insert Jack into a future timeline in order to change him.
All the same, if Jack had the means to do it, he has no doubt that the Captain would be off to an advanced medical facility as soon as he could. And he wouldn’t have any right to stop the bloke, whatever his opinion on the matter. So why not...?
No. Not yet. Maybe in a week or two, if there’s still no change, it could be time to consider it.
In the meantime... He drums his fingers on the counter as he thinks through all the other possible causes of blindness. There’s... wait! Why didn’t he think of it before?
“Blindness or visual impairment with no obvious cause. Pupils and retina still reacting as normal to light and dark. No visible damage to the optic nerve. Head wound and coma caused by trauma to the skull and being trapped in a confined space for hours. Reduced oxygen supply to the brain, leading to cortical blindness, got to be.”
“Cortical blindness,” Jack repeats. “You’re sure?”
He shrugs. “Sure as I can be. There’s no clear diagnosis for cortical blindness. You get to it by ruling other stuff out. Full blindness is rare, too, so it wasn’t exactly obvious. But it seems to fit.”
Jack exhales slowly, relief pouring out of him. “Okay, so we have a diagnosis. What can you do about it, Doctor? How do we fix it?”
It’s his turn to breathe out slowly. “Nothin’. There’s no cure for cortical blindness. It either reverses itself on its own, or doesn’t. An’ if it does, there’s no guarantee you’d get all your sight back anyway. Could still end up with permanent damaged vision.”
Jack doesn’t say a word. His face pales and the knuckles of his good hand turn white again. Then he slides off the examining table and grabs his cane, then, using his wrist computer, carefully points himself towards the door and leaves the room, closing the door quietly behind him.
***
“There must be something you can do!” Rose’s eyes are moist, and her voice shakes as she faces him.
The Doctor turns away. His own frustration at his slowness to find out what caused Jack’s blindness, and now his inability to do something about it, is bad enough. Worse still to have Rose pointing out his failure.
He reacts more viciously than he intends. “If there was, don’t you think I’d have done it?”
She doesn’t flinch. Instead, she comes closer and slides her hand into his. “I know. ‘S just... it’s so hard seeing him like this.”
He nods, and his hand tightens around hers. It is. It’s not that Jack’s helpless; actually, the bloke’s doing a pretty good job of coping, all things considered. It’s been a week, and he’s managing to find his own way around the TARDIS, as well as taking care of his personal needs without assistance. Course, the TARDIS helps, not that he’s told Jack that. But his ship does, as much as possible, make sure that Jack gets where he needs to go.
And she also helps him to stay hidden when he wants, it seems. He hasn’t seen Jack since the lad left the infirmary earlier, and it’s been several hours. One step forward - a possible diagnosis - but many steps backwards in that there’s no clear hope of a cure. No, he doesn’t blame Jack for keeping to himself.
It really is time for the hard decisions now. Is it time to set aside his scruples and take Jack to the hospital in New New York? Because what else can he do? Jack’s a man of action: a former soldier, most likely a mercenary as well, a doer rather than a thinker. What’s open to him now? Yes, he’s getting used to finding his way around the TARDIS, and he can find things to occupy his time, but he’s not going to want to stay here for ever. And the kind of occupations that are open to a blind man, even with all the assistive technology that’s available by Jack’s time, aren’t anything he’d be interested in.
He pulls Rose closer to him and wraps his arms around her. She returns the gesture, hugging him around the waist. “It’s not fair. He saved Sal’s life, and this is what he gets.”
Life’s not fair, he could say, but that achieves nothing. No. Scruples be damned. He pulls back and looks down at Rose. “There are places-”
“Doctor?”
He turns at the sound of Jack’s voice, still holding Rose. The Captain’s standing just inside the console room, one finger on the screen of his wrist computer. “Yeah, we’re here. Rose an’ me.” As he speaks, Jack begins walking across the room, clearly using his voice as a guide. To help the lad, he continues talking. “We’re by the console. North-north-east of you. Steps are just two paces away.”
“Got it,” Jack says as his computer beeps as well in warning. He walks up the steps with apparent confidence, limp barely in evidence now, and only the unfocused stare of his eyes any clue that he can’t see where he’s going. “Glad you’re both here. It’s time we talked about my future.”
“Ah.” He shouldn’t be surprised that Jack’s brought this up. From what he’s seen of the Captain, he’s not one to let himself be simply swept forward by events. Well, it’s timely, anyway - after all, he’d just about come to a decision about the New New York hospital.
Before he can say anything, Jack’s speaking again, with what sounds like complete self-assurance. “You’ve been more than generous, bringing me back here and caring for me, both of you. I appreciate it more than I can say. But I can’t expect you to take responsibility for me indefinitely.”
“What are you-” Rose interrupts, but he hushes her with a gesture. He’ll handle this.
He holds up a hand to signal to Jack that he’s got something to say, remembering too late that the lad can’t see it. And before he can say anything, Jack’s forging on, not a hint in his voice now of the frustration and fear that was there earlier.
“Apart from anything else, before this happened, I was leaving. I’ve given it a lot of thought. Doctor, do you think you can take me to the capital of the Proxan colony any time around the late fiftieth century? It’s a major trade centre, and I’ve got ID that’ll work there. I’m guessing I should be able to find some kind of work, something simple in clerical or labouring. I’m ready to go now, if that’s okay with you.”
***
tbc in Chapter 6: Pride Goes Before
Author: wmr / wendymr
Characters: Ninth Doctor, Jack Harkness, Rose Tyler
Rated: PG13
Summary: He’s like a magnet. A gravity well, sucking in everything within his sphere of influence, drawing them to him whether they like it or not.
Written for space_monkey52 in return for an extremely generous donation to the Queensland flood appeal. Thank you SO much for your generosity. Many thanks also to dark_aegis for BRing.
Chapter 1: Clean-up Duty l Chapter 2: Amusements l Chapter 3: Drop-off Point l Chapter 4: Search and Recovery
Chapter 5: Leading the Blind
The Doctor’s silence tells him everything he needs to know. He is blind.
It’s only about five seconds, though it feels like much longer, before the Doctor does speak. “Lights are on, lad. Thing is, I didn’t see any damage to your eyes.”
“Can’t see-” He breaks off; there’s some kind of strange obstruction in his throat. “-a fucking thing,” he manages to finish after a moment.
“All right.” He has a feeling that the Doctor’s deliberately trying to sound as calm as possible. “Stay where you are. I can run some more scans, try to find out what the problem is.”
Scans? What, is the guy really a doctor?
“Yes, I have medical qualifications,” the Doctor says, his tone long-suffering. “Already had to convince Rose, too.”
Shit, the guy reads minds as well?
“No, I don’t read minds,” the Doctor comments dryly, and he removes his hand from Jack’s shoulder. “Don’t need to. Not when it’s written all over your face.”
He can hear footsteps, then the sound of metal on metal, and then more footsteps. “Gonna examine your eyes, lad. I’ll be holding your eyes open an’ shining a torch into them. All right?”
“Yeah, fine.” What choice does he have?
Gentle fingers press down on his eyelids, holding them apart, and then there’s heat on his eyeball. But no light; not even a pinprick.
He feels moisture welling up in his eyes. He tells himself it’s from the torch.
There’s an irritating buzzing sound, and then the Doctor’s fingers move to his other eye. Jack takes a deep breath, drawing on the relaxation techniques he learned all those years ago in Time Agency training, forcing his attention away from his lack of sight. So he’s blind. Deal with that later. What else? Inventory.
He flexes the muscles in his legs, only to be hit by the kind of pain that sweeps breath away.
“Easy, lad,” the Doctor says, letting go of his eyelids and laying a hand against his head, pressing briefly. “Got a hairline fracture in your lower leg. Would’ve warned you, but got distracted.”
Shit. “What else?”
Matter-of-factly, the Doctor lists his injuries. “Three broken ribs, broken wrist, stitches in several places, blood loss - you’ve got a drip running blood into your arm, so don’t move that if you can help it - and fluid loss. There’s a saline drip too. So don’t move,” the Doctor adds. “Spent a lot of time gettin’ you patched up. Would prefer not to have to do it again.”
Right. He didn’t really need the reminder that he’s here on sufferance, did he? Of course patching him up wouldn’t have been top of the Doctor’s list of preferred activities. Of course, he shouldn’t even have been here still. He was leaving-
“Why didn’t you leave me on Fy Ndu?” he asks, genuinely bewildered.
It makes no sense. The place is a civilised colony. Of course there’s decent health and emergency care facilities there. There had to have been emergency medical personnel available at the collapse site - there were injured people, after all. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to hand him over to the care of doctors there.
The Doctor doesn’t answer for a few moments, and Jack starts to wonder whether he’ll get an answer. But then he does. “Not a human colony. Humanoid, yeah, but different physiology. They didn’t have the drugs and plasma you’d need. Easier just to bring you back here.”
Right. To patch him up and then send him on his way. Of course, the Doctor didn’t expect to end up stuck with a handicapped guy on his hands. Sure, he saved Jack’s life when his ship was blowing up, but that doesn’t mean he had any intention of being responsible for Jack indefinitely - and certainly not in current circumstances.
Okay. There’s a simple answer to that: the Doctor won’t be. Blind or not, as soon as he’s able to get back on his feet Jack will be on his way, regardless. He’s already long outstayed whatever grudging welcome he’s had, after all.
***
Voices.
Voices. It’s not just the Doctor she’s hearing. That second voice is definitely Jack, even if he does sound groggy.
He’s awake. She speeds up her steps, practically running the rest of the way to the med-lab.
As she hurries in, Jack turns his head towards her. It’s final proof that he’s awake and aware of his surroundings. “Jack!” The Doctor moves towards her, but she brushes past him. “We thought you were dead! Don’t ever do anything that stupid again.”
“Rose.” The Doctor’s voice is sharp, and his hand around her upper arm, stopping her from getting to Jack, is tight. “The lad’s hurt. Leave him be.”
Now, that’s different. She stares at the Doctor for a moment, reading the worry and regret on his face, before looking back at Jack. He doesn’t seem to be as bad as she feared. Yes, his leg’s in some kind of a light cast, and she knows about the ribs and his wrist, but there’s no sign of a head injury and all the scanning equipment’s been removed. Really, considering what they thought, it looks like he was incredibly lucky.
It must be bad, though. The Doctor couldn’t wait to get rid of Jack before, talked about him as if he was a waste of space. Of course Jack’s proved he’s not, no matter how stupid it was to go into that building the way he did - but there’s more to the Doctor’s reaction than that.
“What is it?” she asks, gently brushing a hand against Jack’s shoulder. He’s not making eye contact with her, she notices, even though she’s smiling at him, searching for that lively expression of his in return. It’s as if he can’t...
“I can’t see,” Jack says, his voice flat.
Something runs cold inside her. “You can’t...?” Oh, god. Oh, poor Jack. All he did was save someone’s life, and now he’s...
She whirls around to look at the Doctor. He can fix it, right? There has to be something he can do.
But the grim look in his eyes and the way his lips are pressed together tells her the truth. The Doctor can’t do anything. Jack’s blind.
***
He sends Rose away, telling her that Jack needs to rest. It’s true, up to a point, though the real truth is that Rose’s distress will upset Jack and get in the way of his healing. The lad might not be able to see the tears in her eyes, but he’ll notice her silence, all right.
Before she leaves, though, she pushes past him again and goes to Jack’s side, taking his uninjured hand in hers and then bending to kiss his cheek.
Once she’s gone, the Doctor moves closer to the examination bed again. “She’s right, Captain. It was a stupid thing to do. Brave, but still stupid.”
“Did she make it?” The anxiety in Jack’s voice is surprising, given what the lad’s still assimilating.
“She’s fine. Got taken off to hospital, but the medics on site said the leg wasn’t broken. Probably be home already.”
“Good.” Jack’s face is turned straight up towards the ceiling. “Least it wasn’t a complete waste.”
“No,” he agrees, resting a hand lightly on Jack’s shoulder. “You nearly died. Was it really worth that risk?”
Jack’s laugh is bitter. “You tell me. You’re the one who said I’d better be.”
Better be? Ah. Bigger on the inside.
The Doctor forces himself to take a deep breath before answering. “Hope that’s not why you did it. Bein’ stupid’s one thing, but I can’t stand bloody show-offs.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Jack tries to roll over and force himself upwards, but the Doctor increases the pressure of his hand on the man’s shoulder.
“You’ll only do more damage if you try that. And what I’m talking about is whether you went inside that building to impress me.”
“What?” There’s no doubt that the incredulity in Jack’s tone is genuine. “What the fuck would I do that for? We were going our separate ways, remember? That’s what we were doing on Fy Ndu in the first place.” Jack rubs his good hand over his eyes, then grunts in frustration. “Truth is, I didn’t even think about it. I heard her yell for help and I ran.”
“All right.” He releases Jack and goes to get the optical scanning tool. “Going to try to find out what the damage is to your eyes.”
“Okay.” Jack lies still, neither moving nor speaking as the Doctor runs the tool over Jack’s eyes and around the sockets, briefly shining a light into his eyes as well. Jack’s pupils are reactive, dilating and constricting in response.
“No obvious damage to the retina or pupils,” he concludes. There are many more possible explanations, both permanent and temporary, and before he starts doing anything more invasive he’d prefer to see if a few hours’ rest would make any difference. “Think it’d be a good idea if you slept for a bit, give your body a chance to start healing.”
It’s not just Jack’s sight that’s damaged, after all. His other injuries need time to heal, time when the lad’s not doing something stupid like trying to stand up or move broken bones.
Oh, he’d love to have been able to spare the time to give Commander Marga a piece of his mind over her appalling slowness in making the building safe for search and rescue crews. Or that paramedic at the scene who refused to do anything for Jack. Or, actually, whoever was responsible for allowing that building to get into such an unsafe state in the first place. Poor building regulations? Negligent contractors or building inspectors? Whatever the cause, if he ever comes face to face with those responsible they’ll learn what it’s like to face the Oncoming Storm.
Jack reaches out with his hand, groping at the air, shifting his hand erratically as he searches for the Doctor. He curls his fingers around the lad’s. “What is it?”
“I’m-” Scared? Looks like it, and he wouldn’t blame Jack. “Doctor, is there anything...? Am I gonna be blind for the rest of my life?”
“Too soon to say.” Which it is, and that’s all he’s going to say for now. It’s not fair to give the Captain false hope by mentioning the possibility that it could be temporary; after all, it could just as easily be permanent.
They’ll see in a few hours. Most temporary vision problems clear up within a couple of hours anyway. Pressure on the optical nerve is one very possible cause; after all, it’s clear that Jack sustained a blow to his head. If that’s what it is, then once the swelling goes down Jack’s vision should return - it might be blurry for a day or two, but there should be no permanent damage.
“Sleep,” he says, and rests his fingers briefly against Jack’s temples. If the lad won’t rest willingly, he’ll just have to make sure he does.
***
“Shit.”
He’s spilt food down himself again. He knows, not just because there’s virtually nothing on the spoon, but also because he can feel the weight on his chest of the warm lump of whatever part of the stew he dropped.
God. He’s like a baby, having to learn to eat all over again - but with the embarrassment of knowing that he’s being watched. Rose won’t just leave him alone to get on with it, because she’s afraid he’ll hurt himself somehow.
At least she’s stopped trying to feed him herself. That really did make him feel like a helpless infant.
It’s been three days now since he woke up to complete blackness, and nothing’s changed. He’s still every bit as blind as he was at first, and any hope that he might regain his sight’s vanished. The Doctor thought it could be temporary, some kind of trauma from his head injury, or so the guy finally deigned to tell him when he woke up for the second time. But that kind of traumatic blindness is often not total, and usually reverses itself after a few hours. Not three days.
At least he’s not quite as helpless now as he was at first. During those first couple of days, particularly with his wrist and leg injury as well as being blind, he was dependent on the Doctor and Rose for everything. Rose fed him and, once the Doctor allowed him to walk short distances with the use of a cane, she led him on short circuits around the TARDIS hallways. The Doctor helped him up and down from the bed in the infirmary where he was confined at first, helped him to shower and dress, and even to use the bathroom. God, that was humiliating.
Now, he’s trusted to wash and use the toilet on his own, and he’s eating unaided as well - but not unaccompanied. No matter how quiet she is, he always knows when Rose is in the room with him, and she won’t take the hint that he’d prefer to be alone. It’s not that he doesn’t like her company. He just hates the thought of either of them - those fit, healthy and not handicapped people in whose ship he’s an unwanted guest - seeing him so incapable of performing the simplest tasks for himself.
Though it could be worse. The Doctor’s downloaded a map of the TARDIS into his wrist computer - a map which, somehow, changes as the TARDIS layout changes - and it gives him voice prompts to help him move around. He can tell the device where he wants to go, and every step and turn is counted out for him. The computer can also tell him when there’s an obstacle in his path, another little utility the Doctor set up, and that’ll be invaluable once he’s off this ship and trying to cope on his own in an unfamiliar place.
Something he’s less grateful for, but acknowledges he does need, is an emergency call signal. He can call for help and the computer sends a signal that the Doctor can hear. The same happens if he falls and doesn’t get back up again within a few seconds. He’s had to use the signal a couple of times - an accident in the bathroom, and the time he got too sure of himself and ignored the computer’s instructions, ending up walking smack into a door.
Three days and nothing’s changed. Time to accept that nothing will and start making plans for his future. He can’t stay here indefinitely - of course he can’t. Apart from anything else, he can’t possibly expect the Doctor and Rose to accept him as their responsibility on a permanent basis. Why should they? He’s nothing to them.
Second, he’s nothing but a burden to them. They’ve changed the pattern of their lives for him at the moment, and that can’t continue. Rose has told him, during some of the long hours she’s spent keeping him company, talking to him to stop him going off his head with boredom, that they travel around through time and space with a different destination almost every day. Yet since his accident they’ve stayed in the Vortex, going nowhere. Sooner or later, they’ll get fed up with that and want to explore again, but he’d be a liability. They’d have to focus on taking care of him, or else leave him behind on the ship.
So it’s time to leave, but where can he go? What can a blind ex-time traveller and soldier do? He can’t fight, and he’d be useless as a crew member on a ship. What the hell else is there?
He’s got to figure something out soon, though. Can’t leave it until the Doctor loses patience with him and asks him straight out what his plans are.
What’s most frustrating of all, though, is the nagging thought that won’t go away: the recognition that the Doctor might be right. No matter how spur-of-the-moment his actions felt, he can’t be sure that some small part of his decision, even sub-consciously, wasn’t intended to show the Doctor that he really is bigger on the inside.
And if that’s true, he deserves all he got.
***
The Doctor turns a corner and comes within a hair’s breadth of colliding with Jack. The only thing that’s prevented it is Jack stepping awkwardly to one side, his cane rattling against the wall in the process. Either his wrist device alerted him, or the lad’s hearing is already starting to improve in compensation for the loss of sight.
“Sorry. Should be more careful,” he says. After all, he’s the one who can see.
“You shouldn’t have to apologise for walking around your own ship.” Jack’s tone is defensive - and bitter. Not all that surprising, of course.
Best ignored, though. “Since you’re here, might’s well get the tests over with.”
The tests are part of their daily routine now. Range of motion tests and strength-building exercises for Jack’s wrist and lower leg, as well as a variety of tests on the Captain’s eyes. Pupil sensitivity: so far, still reactive to light and darkness, but Jack can’t see anything.
Every day, he can see the lad tense as they begin that particular series of tests. It’s obvious that Jack’s hoping today will be the day that something changes, that a tiny pinprick of light will make it through - but nothing happens.
Today’s no exception. Jack’s good hand curls around the examination table, his knuckles turning white as the Doctor runs the tool around his eyes. “Anything?” the Doctor asks, though it’s an unnecessary question. If there were any change, Jack would have said something by now.
“Face it, Doctor, my sight’s not coming back.” Jack starts to slide off the table. “We need to give up this pointless ritual and just accept the truth.”
“Not accepting anything.” His tone’s more curt than he intends, but the Captain’s hit a nerve. “Was hoping it was something as simple as pressure that’d reduce of its own accord over time, but it’s not looking like that now.”
“No fucking kidding.” Jack exhales slowly. “Sorry. It’s just... Never mind. What else could it be?”
“From the accident? Irreparable nerve damage, for one.” He starts to pace; easier to focus on these kind of hard facts when he’s not standing right next to Jack. “Course, it could have nothing to do with the collapse. Could be something that was already there - ever had severe headaches? Blurred vision? Periods of temporary blindness, no matter how short?”
He’s glanced over at Jack as he asked the question, so sees the abrupt shake of Jack’s head. “Nothing like that. Not ever.”
The Doctor nods, remembering too late that Jack can’t see him. “Another possibility’s psychological. Could be psychosomatic,” he explains as Jack’s expression clouds over with confusion.
“You mean it could be all in my head?” Jack shakes his head, disbelief written all over his face. “Why would I do that to myself?”
“Doesn’t work that way.” He can switch into lecture mode now, and that feels much better. “The brain’s a very powerful organ. You know that, Jack. I know you’ve had some medical training.”
“Mostly emergency stuff.” It’s disconcerting watching Jack now. The lad’s looking in the right direction, but his gaze is levelled just to the left of the Doctor’s face. “Just enough to get by in the field, that’s all. I could set your leg if you broke it, and use a bone regenerator if I had one, and I can recognise signs of internal bleeding. But something like this? No idea.”
“The mind can affect the senses as a protective measure.” He’s getting more comfortable now; less reluctant to keep looking at Jack. “Can happen after a traumatic event, for example.”
“Right. So...” Jack drums the fingers of his good hand on the table. “What? We just wait to see if my brain decides I’m not traumatised any more?”
The Doctor hesitates. This is something he hasn’t done in a long time, and it really isn’t something he wants to do now - but it’s not fair to Jack not to offer. “Can find out, if you want. Telepathic, me. Can take a look inside your head, see if that’s what it is.”
By the look of Jack’s expression and the way his knuckles turn white, he wants it even less. But it takes him only a second or two to make up his mind. “Thanks. Yes, please.”
The Doctor steps closer. “All right. I’m gonna be pressing my fingers against your temples. Try to stay as still as you can.” He moves his hands into place, index and second finger of each hand on the pressure-points of Jack’s temples, and immediately feels the instinctive recoil, both mental and physical.
“Relax, okay? Won’t be able to see anything if you’re all tensed up like that.” He breathes calmly, in long, slow breaths; Jack will hear it and, he hopes, subconsciously mimic it. “Whatever you don’t want me to see, imagine it behind a locked door, okay?”
Jack mutters something that sounds vaguely affirmative, and abruptly multiple doors slam. Plenty to hide, then. No matter; that’s not what he’s here to see. He follows the neural pathways he’s looking for, searching for signs of trauma, fear, protectiveness... and finds a little, but nothing sufficient to explain Jack’s blindness.
It’s not psychomatic.
He withdraws silently and removes his fingers. “Nothing. It’s not your mind doing it.”
Jack swears. “I don’t know which is worse: being blind or not having a clue why I’m blind.”
Frustration gets the better of him, and he snaps, “I’m trying to find out!”
Jack’s head dips. “I know you are. Wasn’t complaining about you.”
He doesn’t challenge Jack, though he knows the bloke’s thinking he should have been able to do more. But there isn’t anything more he can do. He’s tried everything.
Though that’s not strictly true. There are other things he could do. Specifically, he could take Jack to the hospital in New New York - or to any one of half a dozen similar establishments - and the lad’d be healed within days. Trouble is, he’s got scruples. Jack’s from the fifty-first century, albeit a time-traveller. That kind of medical technology is far, far into the future from Jack’s time. Who knows what the consequences might be of meddling that much with Jack’s place in the flow of time?
Sure, he takes people to different points in time as a matter of routine, and he can’t possibly argue that they don’t affect timelines when they’re there - even if it’s just through the mere fact of observing. This is different. It would be deliberately setting out to insert Jack into a future timeline in order to change him.
All the same, if Jack had the means to do it, he has no doubt that the Captain would be off to an advanced medical facility as soon as he could. And he wouldn’t have any right to stop the bloke, whatever his opinion on the matter. So why not...?
No. Not yet. Maybe in a week or two, if there’s still no change, it could be time to consider it.
In the meantime... He drums his fingers on the counter as he thinks through all the other possible causes of blindness. There’s... wait! Why didn’t he think of it before?
“Blindness or visual impairment with no obvious cause. Pupils and retina still reacting as normal to light and dark. No visible damage to the optic nerve. Head wound and coma caused by trauma to the skull and being trapped in a confined space for hours. Reduced oxygen supply to the brain, leading to cortical blindness, got to be.”
“Cortical blindness,” Jack repeats. “You’re sure?”
He shrugs. “Sure as I can be. There’s no clear diagnosis for cortical blindness. You get to it by ruling other stuff out. Full blindness is rare, too, so it wasn’t exactly obvious. But it seems to fit.”
Jack exhales slowly, relief pouring out of him. “Okay, so we have a diagnosis. What can you do about it, Doctor? How do we fix it?”
It’s his turn to breathe out slowly. “Nothin’. There’s no cure for cortical blindness. It either reverses itself on its own, or doesn’t. An’ if it does, there’s no guarantee you’d get all your sight back anyway. Could still end up with permanent damaged vision.”
Jack doesn’t say a word. His face pales and the knuckles of his good hand turn white again. Then he slides off the examining table and grabs his cane, then, using his wrist computer, carefully points himself towards the door and leaves the room, closing the door quietly behind him.
***
“There must be something you can do!” Rose’s eyes are moist, and her voice shakes as she faces him.
The Doctor turns away. His own frustration at his slowness to find out what caused Jack’s blindness, and now his inability to do something about it, is bad enough. Worse still to have Rose pointing out his failure.
He reacts more viciously than he intends. “If there was, don’t you think I’d have done it?”
She doesn’t flinch. Instead, she comes closer and slides her hand into his. “I know. ‘S just... it’s so hard seeing him like this.”
He nods, and his hand tightens around hers. It is. It’s not that Jack’s helpless; actually, the bloke’s doing a pretty good job of coping, all things considered. It’s been a week, and he’s managing to find his own way around the TARDIS, as well as taking care of his personal needs without assistance. Course, the TARDIS helps, not that he’s told Jack that. But his ship does, as much as possible, make sure that Jack gets where he needs to go.
And she also helps him to stay hidden when he wants, it seems. He hasn’t seen Jack since the lad left the infirmary earlier, and it’s been several hours. One step forward - a possible diagnosis - but many steps backwards in that there’s no clear hope of a cure. No, he doesn’t blame Jack for keeping to himself.
It really is time for the hard decisions now. Is it time to set aside his scruples and take Jack to the hospital in New New York? Because what else can he do? Jack’s a man of action: a former soldier, most likely a mercenary as well, a doer rather than a thinker. What’s open to him now? Yes, he’s getting used to finding his way around the TARDIS, and he can find things to occupy his time, but he’s not going to want to stay here for ever. And the kind of occupations that are open to a blind man, even with all the assistive technology that’s available by Jack’s time, aren’t anything he’d be interested in.
He pulls Rose closer to him and wraps his arms around her. She returns the gesture, hugging him around the waist. “It’s not fair. He saved Sal’s life, and this is what he gets.”
Life’s not fair, he could say, but that achieves nothing. No. Scruples be damned. He pulls back and looks down at Rose. “There are places-”
“Doctor?”
He turns at the sound of Jack’s voice, still holding Rose. The Captain’s standing just inside the console room, one finger on the screen of his wrist computer. “Yeah, we’re here. Rose an’ me.” As he speaks, Jack begins walking across the room, clearly using his voice as a guide. To help the lad, he continues talking. “We’re by the console. North-north-east of you. Steps are just two paces away.”
“Got it,” Jack says as his computer beeps as well in warning. He walks up the steps with apparent confidence, limp barely in evidence now, and only the unfocused stare of his eyes any clue that he can’t see where he’s going. “Glad you’re both here. It’s time we talked about my future.”
“Ah.” He shouldn’t be surprised that Jack’s brought this up. From what he’s seen of the Captain, he’s not one to let himself be simply swept forward by events. Well, it’s timely, anyway - after all, he’d just about come to a decision about the New New York hospital.
Before he can say anything, Jack’s speaking again, with what sounds like complete self-assurance. “You’ve been more than generous, bringing me back here and caring for me, both of you. I appreciate it more than I can say. But I can’t expect you to take responsibility for me indefinitely.”
“What are you-” Rose interrupts, but he hushes her with a gesture. He’ll handle this.
He holds up a hand to signal to Jack that he’s got something to say, remembering too late that the lad can’t see it. And before he can say anything, Jack’s forging on, not a hint in his voice now of the frustration and fear that was there earlier.
“Apart from anything else, before this happened, I was leaving. I’ve given it a lot of thought. Doctor, do you think you can take me to the capital of the Proxan colony any time around the late fiftieth century? It’s a major trade centre, and I’ve got ID that’ll work there. I’m guessing I should be able to find some kind of work, something simple in clerical or labouring. I’m ready to go now, if that’s okay with you.”
***
tbc in Chapter 6: Pride Goes Before