The Thing About Facts 2/2
Fic: The Thing About Facts
Author: wmr
Characters: Tenth Doctor, Jack
Rated: PG-13
Spoilers: All the way to Last of the Time Lords
Disclaimer: Not mine. Otherwise LotTL would have been very different...
Summary: That's the thing about facts. They're always there. Always fixed. Never changing.
Set the day after LotTL ends, but ignores the Titanic-interruptus. With many thanks to
dark_aegis for BRing.
Chapter 1: Jack
Chapter 2: The Doctor
Jack’s gone by the time he’s on his feet, regained his balance and turned to follow. Well, that went well, didn’t it? Rose would punch his arm and call him insensitive right about now. He’d deserve it, too.
What he’s been doing is so obvious now. He’s been acting as if he’s the only victim here, hasn’t he? Far from the truth, that.
Trouble is, recognising that means facing a few other things he knows he’s been avoiding. That’s the hard part. Facing down Daleks, Cybermen, even the Beast? No problem. Facing the consequences of his own mistakes, particularly as they affect his friends? Daleks any day.
Jack expects him to leave, though. And it’s that, the realisation that the man he has the nerve to call his friend just doesn’t believe him capable or willing of even trying to make up for his sins, that stops him heading for the TARDIS immediately and fleeing to the other end of the galaxy.
Back in the main underground level, he lurks in a quiet corner and waits. Just a few yards away, Jack’s deep in conversation with one of his team, a young man he noticed earlier on their way through the Hub - and who looks vaguely familiar.
“... let’s get one thing clear here, Ianto. I don’t care what the old directive was. Torchwood One doesn’t exist any more. I’m in charge now. Got that?”
“Course I do, Jack.” The younger man - Ianto - sounds sullen. And now he knows where he recognises him from. Torchwood One.
“Well, make sure you remember that. Because, whatever lunatic ideas Yvonne Hartmann had, that man’s saved this planet and everyone on it more times than you can ever imagine. It’s thanks to him you and millions of others are alive today.”
Such loyalty, and from a man who has little reason to feel it.
Oh yes, he’s the Doctor, the great saviour of the world. But he’s also the man who lets his friend die to help him do it, and he’s the man who then leaves that same friend behind because he’s changed in some essential element.
Wrong, he told Jack he was. Prejudiced, Jack accused in retort. And, yes, he was. He is. Why else run away? Yes, Jack shouldn’t be like he is. Fixed points in time and space shouldn’t exist. They’re dangerous; they’re paradoxical; they’re wrong.
But Jack’s not a thing. He’s a person. A friend. And, from what he can tell, Jack’s done a good job of not causing paradoxes. He’s been careful with timelines, taken heed of history, done his best to ensure that what he is remains as much of a secret as possible.
This is a man who can’t die. Who doesn’t age, either, or barely; one hundred and forty years, and he doesn’t look a day older, despite his quip about grey hairs. A man who’s facing... what, exactly? An eternity of living and dying and living, of seeing everything and everyone he knows wither and die before his eyes.
Of being, some day, the very last person left alive in the universe.
Or, alternatively, and he really can’t decide which is worse, of being, some day, a disembodied head in a jar.
It could be, couldn’t it? The Face of Boe, when he imparted his final message, called him old friend. Yet they’d met - what? Three times? But it still doesn’t make sense. Rose commanded Jack to live, and that’s what the Vortex did: made him unable to die. Made him immortal and, apparently, unageing. How could Jack possibly go from that to a pickled head in a jar?
No, that doesn’t make sense. Because, as he said, Jack’s a fact. And that's the thing about facts. They're always there. Always fixed. Never changing.
Oh, this, this is why he ran, and continued running. Because this is Jack’s future. It’s also his fault - Rose did it, but it was his TARDIS, and he’s the one who told her about the ship’s Heart. He’ll save the universe, but he’ll condemn his friend to this fate and run away rather than acknowledge what he’s done and help Jack understand it.
No more running. He might not be able to fix Jack, but he can be a better friend than he’s been so far.
A few minutes later, a call comes in and immediately the team is running, heading for an exit door at the other side of the Hub. An emergency of some sort. Of course, there’s the impulse to follow them, to find out what’s going on and if his help is needed - but that’s not what he’s here for. Anyway, this is Jack’s patch. And isn’t he trying to show that he trusts Jack? Though he already exhibited a distinct lack of trust by disabling the time-travel and teleportation features of Jack’s wrist computer.
Silence falls over the Hub, and it’s his chance. Easy now to make his way back to Jack’s office, and he can even pause on the way to inspect some of the alien and future tech lying around. Not too dangerous, most of it, and he quells the instinct to remove or destroy it. Again, this isn’t his business. He doesn’t have the right to interfere.
He’s prepared to wait in Jack’s office, but the manhole in the floor is intriguing, and seconds later he’s down in the lower level, poking around there, too. What he finds, what he deduces, sends another chill through him.
Jack, he thought, was reasonably happy with the life he’s built for himself here in the early twenty-first century. A job, people to work with, carrying with him the trappings of a normal human life - such as a bunch of keys. At least one of those keys, he’d assumed, belonged to a house. Or a flat. Maybe even one of those posh apartments that surround the waterfront in Cardiff. A home, wherever it was.
He didn’t expect Jack’s home to be this dank, dark, windowless cellar, his bed a narrow camp-bed underneath ancient piping and shelves. There can be no mistake; a rail nearby holds clothing, some items of which he recognises.
Happy with his life? Fitting in - belonging? Hardly, when he hides himself away in a place like this. When he doesn’t actually remember Jack - unlike other companions - mentioning friends, people he socialises with. True, they didn’t have much time for general conversation in the year that never was, but there was some, in the hours before and the days after their imprisonment on the Valiant.
Serves him right for assuming. Wanting to assume, really. Because then he could walk away believing that everything was fine. That the ‘Jack problem’ he’s been avoiding for the past couple of years is sorted; that Jack’s reconciled to what’s been done to him and is content with his life.
It really is about time he stopped closing his eyes to things he doesn’t want to see.
Taking his coat off, he throws it onto the bed and prowls about the room, exploring, as he waits for Jack. A glass-fronted, backlit cupboard against the back wall catches his eye; it’s full of alien artefacts. Some are weapons, some different kinds of technology, and some are simply works of art. All carefully preserved and neatly shelved, here in this underground chamber where, he assumes, no-one other than Jack will ever see them.
The cupboard’s locked, but that’s no barrier to the sonic screwdriver and he’s still examining them some time later when a soft but threatening voice comes from behind him.
“Unless you want me to pull this trigger, put that down right now and turn around. Slowly.”
Slowly, he turns, the Groxlar carving still in his hand. “You’d really shoot me, Jack? Now, I know I might’ve been a tad insensitive - just a tad, mind you - but is that really necessary? Thought you liked this regeneration!”
A whooshing breath escapes Jack, and he lowers his gun. “Thought you were long gone.” And not coming back, he’s sure; how little reason he’s given Jack to believe in him. How he abused the faith the other man had in him once.
“As I recall, you were the one who left.” He smiles faintly. “And with quite a blistering parting shot, too.”
Jack slides his gun back into its holster. “Ignore that. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“No?” He holds Jack’s gaze, refusing to allow the other man to look away. “Can you really tell me you’re not still angry that I left you behind? Or that I can’t fix you? Or, maybe, that you think if it’d been Rose who’d become immortal I’d have done anything different?”
“Well, wouldn’t you?” Belligerence enters Jack’s tone, and he stands, hands on his hips.
“To be honest...” The Doctor rubs his left eye. “I don’t know, Jack, and that’s the truth. I’m right, though,” he adds. “You did think that.”
“I’ve thought lots of things, Doctor. It’s been a long time.” Jack relaxes his stance and leans against a support-beam. “Why are you still here, anyway?”
“Unfinished business.” He turns and replaces the carving in the cupboard, locking it again with the screwdriver.
Jack’s sigh is audible. “Doctor, it’s been a long day. I’m tired. Is there a point to this?”
“You, tired? I distinctly remember you saying - boasting, actually, and on several occasions - that you don’t sleep. Don’t need sleep, you said. You were on camera; didn’t you realise?”
“Handy trick, wasn’t it, with the Master threatening any time he got bored that he’d just wait till I fell asleep to cut off my head to see if I’d still come back to life.” Jack shrugs, then rakes a hand through his head. “I do sleep sometimes, though. Like now.”
In one smooth movement, he discards his shirt, then pulls off the T-shirt he wears beneath. That’s a bluff, the Doctor knows; a move designed to make him retreat.
“Oh, don’t mind me.” He waves a hand towards Jack. “Can still talk even if you’re in bed.”
Suddenly, there’s a grin from Jack. “Hate to break it to you, Doctor, but when I’ve got company in bed talking’s not exactly at the top of my agenda.”
He smiles back. “Oh, I’m sure it’s not, Jack. And if you’d ever actually bought me that drink...”
Jack’s returning smile is reluctant, and it’s almost like a lightning strike when the reason for that occurs to him. Flirting in fun’s one thing, and the two of them have a history of that. But, while he’s never even thought of following through - or not seriously, anyway - it’s entirely possible that Jack has. More than possible, judging by Jack’s expression right now. He’s in danger of making exactly the same mistake he made with Martha: disregarding feelings, acting exactly as he pleases and ignoring the rather obvious crush she had on him.
Time to change the subject and get to the point of why he’s here.
He straightens, his expression serious, and holds his friend’s gaze. “If you could have anything you wanted, Jack, what would it be?”
It’s as if the air’s been knocked out of his lungs. Jack turns away, suddenly very interested in a spot on the wall. “Always asking the difficult questions, Doctor.”
“And I’m sure you’ve got answers. So let’s hear them.” He strolls over to Jack’s bed, taking a seat to send the message that he’s in no hurry.
“Anything I want...” Jack’s moving around the room now, finishing up leaning against the wall where the two of them can see each other, but aren’t in direct lines of vision unless they want to be. “It’s a long list, Doctor. Not sure even you have a magic wand powerful enough to give me all of it.”
“Not sure I can give you any of it,” he admits. “Still want to hear it, though.”
Jack folds his arms. “I want... Not to have been left behind. I want my memories back - those two years the Time Agency stole? I want Estelle alive again.” Estelle? He’ll have to ask Jack about her later. “I want not to have been a conman. I want to have sex in every century, in every corner of the universe.” His lips twist in a parody of a smile.
The Doctor nods. “Go on.”
“I want Rose back in this universe. I want to be travelling on the TARDIS with the two of you - only not you. I want the other you back.” He winces, even though he knows Jack doesn’t really mean it; it’s said to wound, but only because Jack’s hurting.
“I want to be able to die. I want to know that I’m not going to be wandering around the universe for eternity, the last living being left before all the lights go out and I get sucked alive into the last black hole.”
Oh, Jack. He shudders, sickened, horrified by the fate that awaits his friend. The fate he knew awaited Jack, and which he ignored. Ignored Jack, too, because as long as he didn’t have to see or hear from Jack Harkness he could pretend that none of it had happened.
I’m sorry. There’s a lump in his throat preventing him from saying the words aloud. I’m so very sorry.
“I want to be able to love people - even just have friends - who won’t get old and die and leave me alone again.”
Oh, he so knows how Jack feels on that one. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Go on.”
“I want to kiss you without it being goodbye. I want - ”
He’s surged to his feet because here, at last, is something he can do for Jack. Everything else on his wish-list is either impossible or very, very difficult. This, though...
Cupping Jack’s face between his palms, he lowers his lips to his friend’s and brushes a gentle, tender kiss across the Captain’s mouth.
Jack’s arms come around him, needy and desperate, his body shaking, and now he’s the one trying to offer his friend comfort in an embrace.
But, ultimately, what comfort can he offer, when out of everything he wants a kiss is the only thing he can give Jack?
***
“I can’t undo your past, Jack. I can’t go back and stop you becoming a conman. I can’t change what I did on Satellite Five - though if there’s one thing I regret about my recent past it’s that. Should never have left you.”
They’re standing together now, not touching, leaning against the wall of the underground room.
“I can’t change history,” he continues. “Well, I can, but you and I both know the consequences of that. Can’t risk it. I can’t go back and save your Estelle for you. Or give her a longer life to match yours. I can’t stop you outliving everyone you love.” His mouth turns down at the corners. “If I knew how to do that... Anyway.”
Jack says nothing. He’s just staring down at the floor, fists clenched, a muscle ticking in his jaw.
“Sex in every corner of the universe? Every century? Could give you that, I suppose. Or make it possible. I could fix your Vortex manipulator again and trust you to use it responsibly - or take you in the TARDIS. Your choice, if it’s something you really want.” It’s not, he knows. Jack only said it for effect.
“Can’t get Rose back for you. Not even for myself. The walls have closed. And even if I could get through, anyway... well, it’s the past, Jack. It’s over. She’s got a life there now, her family, a job... I can’t take her away from that. And what if I did? If I could bring her back to this universe, what’s she got? She’s officially dead here. Oh, she could stay with me - with us, if you wanted - in the TARDIS, but what about when she’s had enough of it? Or when she’s too old to do it any more? What then?” He shakes his head. “Wouldn’t work. Wouldn’t be fair. Besides, you and me not ageing while she does? Can’t see Rose liking that.”
“Guess not.” Jack’s tone is rueful.
“Can’t change back, either. Rose asked me that too, you know. This is me, at least until I regenerate again. Your memories? Maybe that’s possible. Should’ve done something about that before, really. Don’t know why I never did. Do you want me to help get them back?”
Jack exhales slowly. “I don’t know. Maybe. It’s so long ago now, it’s hard to remember a time when that was all I cared about.”
“Up to you. If you decide you want to...” He reaches for Jack’s wrist with one hand, fumbling for the sonic screwdriver with the other. A few adjustments later, he glances up at Jack again. “There. Synchronised with the TARDIS’s communication circuits. Bit like an intergalactic mobile, only in reverse - call the TARDIS no matter where I am. Or when.”
Silence fills the room again. Jack stares down at his wrist computer for a long moment before snapping it shut. His only acknowledgement is a nod.
Finally, the Doctor speaks again, getting to the bit he’s been putting off. “I can’t make it possible for you to die, Jack. Had a lot of time to think about it over that year - the year that never was, as you put it. There’s nothing...” His voice fades away into the darkness of the room. “I can’t undo what she did,” he adds softly.
He’s lying, though. The thing is, there’s probably a way he can undo it; what he can’t do is modify it. Undoing it would mean Jack would die. Immediately, permanently. He can’t take away Jack’s immortality and leave him to age normally. And, since Jack’s already said he doesn’t want to die... well, it’s just not an option, is it? Even if his own selfishness wasn’t already stopping him from contemplating it.
“I know,” Jack whispers.
“Can’t do anything, really. Which seems to make me pretty useless, doesn’t it?”
Abruptly, Jack turns towards him, the Captain’s face inches from his own. “No. It doesn’t. Not this time.”
He frowns. “What’s different about this time?”
Jack’s hand steals across the narrow gap between them and covers his own. “You didn’t run away.”
***
“Hell of a pair, aren’t we?” Jack’s grin is rueful as he moves away from the wall and picks up his shirt.
“Like Laurel and Hardy? Mutt and Jeff? Shiver and Shake?”
“More like a Maronite and a Trappist, don’t you think? Only immortal, of course.”
Hermits, just as he joked to Professor Yana... and he flinches inwardly at the memory. Professor Yana, who was the Master. Hermits, yes, but Jack’s carefully chosen his examples. Hermits based practically at opposite ends of the planet. Seems like Jack really thinks they’re not destined to have much to do with each other in the future.
“Oh, I don’t know.” Casually, with a light smile that’s more for show than anything else, he shrugs. “I’ll probably find someone else to travel with. Always seem to, even when I say I won’t. And you... well, you’ve got your team here. The team that meant so much to you that you wouldn’t come with me. And I suppose,” he adds, strolling to the bed to reach for his coat, “when they’re gone - retired, dead - you’ll have new people by then, a whole new generation of Harkness-trained defenders of the Earth. Right?”
“I guess,” Jack says, and the trademark crooked grin’s back. “Thanks for coming back, Doctor. I know you can’t do anything for me, but that’s okay. I guess only time will tell whether I’m like this for eternity, or if I will age, just slowly.”
“Yeah.” He hesitates, coat half-on. “I wasn’t going to ask, but... I have to know. Jack... The Face of Boe?” He’s trying not to show the fear he feels, but even his poker-face doesn’t work all the time.
And, suddenly, Jack bursts out laughing. “Come on, you didn’t actually believe me, did you?”
“What?” His arms drop to his sides, and his coat slides to the floor.
Jack shakes his head, clearly holding back laughter. “I was winding you up. Oh, come on,” he adds, as the Doctor gives him an indignant, wounded glare. “It was funny. Your faces!”
“Jack -”
“Look, okay, I heard Martha remind you about that prediction. And I’d heard of the Face of Boe - course I had. I’m a time-traveller, or at least I was. And I really was born on the Boeshane Peninsula - not that I think there’s any connection with the names. Came up with the idea during that year on the Valiant, and I just couldn’t resist using it.”
He shakes his head. “As I said, you’re an impossible thing, Jack.” But, still, it’s good. That Jack can joke, and that he can still laugh about it now, despite the fate he knows is ahead of him.
Jack will be fine. He’s stronger than most, and very resilient. If this absolutely had to happen to one of his companions, Jack’s probably the one who could cope with it best.
Coat on, he’s all business now. “Time to go. Just... oh, might as well, I suppose.” He holds Jack’s gaze, hoping that Jack can see the sincerity there. “Change your mind? Come with me?”
Jack blows out a breath, and he knows he’s not imagining the brief hint of temptation in his friend’s eyes. “I can’t. I’m needed here. You know that, Doctor. You know what’s coming in this century.”
“And that’s the biggest reason why you shouldn’t be here.” There’s a sharp tone in his voice. “History’s fragile, Jack. You can’t risk changing timelines.”
“Have I changed them yet? Been here over a hundred years, remember. You’ve changed twentieth-century history more than I have, Doctor.”
He’s got a point there. “Yep. Well, it was worth a try.”
Jack smiles, then salutes. “Take care, Doctor. And, by the way...” On his way to the exit, the Doctor pauses. “You know what Rose told me was the only thing that terrified her about our life?”
“What?” Jack’s never mentioned this before. Neither did Rose. “That she’d die and Jackie’d never know what happened?”
“Don’t think that bothered her so much. Seemed like she trusted you to let her mom know if something like that happened. No, it was the thought of you being alone. Not just without her - without anyone.”
“Right. Right.” He nods. It makes sense. Rose’s distress at the thought of him travelling alone, when they talked on the beach, comes to mind. “I’ll find someone. And, Jack?”
“Yeah?”
He points a finger directly at Jack. “Don’t be a stranger. And... well, if you ever do decide you’ve had enough of living -” He blows out a breath. “Maybe there’s something I can do to make death final for you. Haven’t really tried yet. Could, though... if you want.”
Jack nods, completely the captain now. “Understood.” Though there’s a surprised look in his eyes, as well there might be given the only answer he gave Jack before, twice, was that there was nothing he could do to help the Captain.
A quick wave of farewell in Jack’s direction then, and he’s climbing the ladder out of the cellar. Less than five minutes later, he’s back in the TARDIS and dematerialising.
***
You are not alone.
The Face of Boe was right after all - actually, more right than he could have known. Yes, another Time Lord survived but, really, what did that mean? Did he really feel any less alone during that year when he was one of two?
Yes, there wasn’t silence in his head any longer. But empathy? Meeting of minds? A sense of belonging? Oh, he wanted all of that, dreamed of it, wished for it, but it was never there, and was never going to be. Yet he had all of those all along - just with people who aren’t Time Lords.
Jack. Martha. Rose. Mickey. Jackie, even. Reinette, in a way. With dozens of people whose lives he touched briefly. And, of course, all those he knew and travelled with even before the Time War.
No; he’s not alone and never has been, really. Last of his kind, yes, but never alone.
And he won’t be now, either. It’s never really happened that way. Chance, or fate, or the actions of the TARDIS - who knows? - but he always seems to end up with someone. It’s just a surprise when that someone, this time, turns out to be Donna.
Donna. Who slapped him, twice, when he met her before. And he was actually trying to help her! But she’s calmed down now, more interested in learning about the world around her, and the universe, too. He runs into her completely by accident, and when she asks if she can take him up on his offer he’s hesitant, but then nods, smiling. After all, what can go wrong?
Well, lots can, but that’s another story. And when his phone rings one day and it’s Martha Jones, asking for his help with a little problem she’s stumbled across, he ends up with two companions again. Two women who seem to have decided it’s their role in life to reform him - but, while he protests and resists loudly in front of them, in private he can’t help laughing.
Because it is funny, really. And because he’s learned one thing about humans, especially humans who are his friends: they only do it because they care.
As does he. Which is why, one day a year or so later, when Donna’s gone back to train as a tour guide, and Martha’s applied for a postgraduate course in medicine in combat zones, he knows it’s time to implement a decision he made a while ago.
I have responsibilities. This planet needs protecting. You know what’s coming in this century.
Oh, yes, he does indeed. This century; the twenty-first. But there’s the twenty-second, and the twenty-third, and all the hundreds and thousands of centuries to follow, with Jack alive, well, striding across the universe, a fixed point in time and space. And the Earth growing, maturing, learning how to defend itself, negotiating treaties and building relationships with other worlds, other species.
There’s only so much that one man can take on his own shoulders, after all.
***
It’s a summer’s day in 2176 when he sets the TARDIS down in Roald Dahl Plass again, immediately instructing the console computer to search out Jack’s wrist computer. Synchronisation of communication circuits works in both directions, doesn’t it?
Ten minutes later, he’s strolling into the Hub, which, apart from some advances in technology, really hasn’t changed a lot in over a century and a half. Nor has the man standing with his back to him, still wearing a dark blue greatcoat that, anachronistic it may be, just seems to work.
“Hello, Jack.”
The Captain spins on his heel, turning to face him. “Doctor!” Shaking his head, Jack adds, “You’ve really gotta stop crashing my security features.”
“Make them a bit more difficult and maybe I won’t be able to.” He grins, then adds, as Jack moves away from the young woman he was giving some instruction or other to, “Nice work over the last hundred and a half years, by the way. Couldn’t have done better myself. Well, I say that - not much, anyway.”
“Still modest as ever, I see.” But there’s genuine pleasure in Jack’s eyes. “So, is this just a social call, or was there something you wanted?”
“Well, I dunno...” He pauses, holds Jack’s gaze, then continues, his tone light but his expression anything but. “I thought, now things are a bit quieter around here, maybe you might like to buy me a drink?”
***
When the TARDIS leaves Cardiff the following evening, Jack’s at the controls beside him.
That’s the thing about facts. They’re always there - solid, dependable, reliable and just... right.
END