Protector 1/1
Story: Protector
Author: wmr
Characters: Rose Tyler, Jackie Tyler, Jack Harkness
Rated: PG13
Spoilers: Doomsday, Utopia
Disclaimer: Oh, so many reasons why they're not mine...
Summary: But I do know him. Used to terrify me, he did.
With, as always huge thanks to
dark_aegis for BRing, and thanks also to
aibhinn, who read the first few pages and encouraged me to continue.
Protector
“You’ve got this place looking really nice, Rose.” Mum walks through the flat, for once not commenting that it could do with a good hoover or that the skirting-boards are all dusty. Not that she ever noticed stuff like that when we lived in the Powell Estate.
But she’s right, all the same. I like this flat. It’s mine, and for the first time I have somewhere I can make mine. No having to cram all my stuff in just one bedroom. No fitting in with someone else’s tastes everywhere else.
I’m about to say I’ll put the kettle on when I notice Mum picking up a picture in the living-room. It’s one of two I’ve only just got properly framed. The other one’s the Doctor - my second Doctor - and me, a picture Mum took with my phone one time when we were home. I did have lots of other photos of the two of us, but they all got left behind, either in the flat or on the TARDIS. This is the only one I’ve got left. Dad got the techs at Torchwood to enhance it so it’d look decent in an eight by ten.
The one Mum’s holding is even more precious, because that’s the two who died on me: Jack and my first Doctor. Jack had lent me his wrist computer and he and the Doctor were kidding around, shoving and arm-wrestling each other, laughing themselves silly, and I just snapped them. The Doctor growled but, after Jack printed a copy for me, he transferred it to a memory card so I could keep it. And that was still in my wallet, one of the very few things I had with me when I came through.
“Who’s that, then?” Mum sounds suspicious. “Hang on, I know ‘im!”
“You do?” She never met Jack, though. “You can’t do. That’s Jack, Mum. He...” I have to swallow. “He died. Back when the Doctor regenerated. He never came back to the Estates with us, so you never met him.”
“But I do know him.” Mum’s shaking her head, insistent. “Ooh, must be years back. When you were growing up. How old were you... oh, I think you must’ve been about thirteen last time I saw ‘im. Used to terrify me, he did.”
“What?” It couldn’t be. Not Jack.
“Weird thing is,” Mum continues, still staring at the photo of Jack, “he didn’t look any younger then than he does here. And that would’ve been... what, six years before this photo?”
But Jack would’ve still been in the Time Agency then. Although it’s not impossible that he could have been in London in her time. It could have been a mission of some sort. But not looking any younger?
Though I’m not thinking. Jack was always a time-traveller. It could’ve been after he left the Agency. Of course it could. It could’ve been just before he met the two of us during the Blitz.
“Saw him three or four times, actually. And that was weird too. It was years apart. I mean, the first time I remember seeing him, you were about seven. But he never seemed to get any older.”
I shrug. “He was a time-traveller, Mum. For all you know, it could all’ve been the same afternoon for him.”
“S’pose so.” She puts down the photo. “The other odd thing was what he wore. Every time I saw him, he had the same coat - this long, heavy blue thing, like your granddad had from when he was in the Air Force in the war.”
It’s like a kick to the gut. I remember him in that coat... oh, god, he looked so dashing. So handsome, and didn’t he know it.
But... “Blue? You sure? Cause he did have a coat like that, only it was grey. Dark grey.”
Mum’s shaking her head. “Definitely blue. An’... I dunno, maybe it could’ve been all the same day for him, but I’m sure he had different stuff on under it. Different shirts.”
Blue? That doesn’t make sense. And why would Jack have worn a coat like that when he was a Time Agent? He was always so insistent on blending in. He’d never have worn that to visit the turn of the twenty-first century.
And anyway, why the Powell Estates? Why come back there several times in the space of six or seven years? What would he have been doing there?
Come to that, why didn’t he ever mention it? He knew that’s where I lived. He heard me mention it enough. Me and the Doctor. So if he was there all those times Mum says, why didn’t he say?
“It doesn’t make sense.”
“I know what I saw, Rose! An’ it was definitely him. American accent, right?”
“How d’you know that?” Though I must have told her Jack’s accent sounded American. Or maybe Mickey did.
“Spoke to ‘im, didn’t I? Last time I saw him. He never came back after that.”
“Frightened him off, did you?” I don’t believe this. Why did Jack never mention it?
It takes me a moment to notice that Mum’s gone quiet, and she’s picked up the photo again. “Mum?”
“What?” Am I imagining it, or does she look a bit guilty?
“You did, didn’t you? Told ‘im off for hanging around, or something?” Or... no. No, it’d’ve been worse than that. What was I thinking? Yeah, Mum was always protective of me, but Jack... well, he was such a good-looking bloke. She’d have fancied him like crazy. Probably propositioned him. Or... oh, god, maybe it was even worse. Maybe she actually slept with him.
Oh, god. Jack shagged my mum. No wonder he never told me.
I can’t stop myself. The words spill out. “You shagged ‘im, didn’t you?”
“Rose Tyler!” Mum’s looking furious - but not guilty. No. They didn’t. God, what a relief!
“Okay, okay.” I hold my hand up before she can tear a strip off me. “Can’t blame me for thinking that, can you? You know what it was like when I was growing up. An’ I’m not judging you, Mum. You know I’m not. ‘S just... well, it wouldn’t’ve been completely unlikely, yeah?”
“Well, I didn’t.” She’s embarrassed now, and offended because of it. And, even though I had to ask, had to know, I can’t help feeling guilty. I know she’s ashamed of what she was like all those years, and of some of the blokes she brought home. Now she’s got my dad, I know she doesn’t like to think about what she did then.
We got drunk together one night, a few weeks after we ended up over here and things were sort of shaking out, settling down - she and Dad were working things out, seeing if they making a go of it as a couple even if he wasn’t her Pete and she wasn’t his Jackie. She told me she hadn’t told Pete everything about those years when she was bringing me up as a single mum. And for the first time she told me why she had all those boyfriends when she’d never loved any of them. Not that she needed to - I think I’d always understood - but it felt like she had to say it. I know she regrets most of them, but most of all she hates what it did to her.
Never stopped me loving her, though. Told her that. Told her Dad wouldn’t care, if she wanted to tell him the truth.
“Sorry,” I tell her. “I had to ask, yeah? Cause... well, he was a friend of mine.” And suddenly I have to swallow. “A... really good friend. Of both of us. No, I never shagged ‘im!” I find myself protesting suddenly at the look on her face. “He was a friend.” And I loved him.
I turn away, pretending to straighten my hair, and then, calmer, turn back. “So, what? You told ‘im to stop hanging around?”
“Sort of,” she admits. “But it wasn’t like you’re thinking. Not really.”
God, it’s like getting blood from a stone! “How was it, then?”
Mum sighs and puts the photo down again. “See, I remembered ‘im, right? An’ there he was again, lookin’ just the same as before, all distant an’ unapproachable, walkin’ with his hands in the pockets of that long coat, and starin’ at you.”
Unapproachable? Jack? But he was the friendliest bloke I ever knew! Well, except for when he knew someone was an enemy. In battle he was ruthless. But otherwise... god, he flirted with everything. That smile of his would blind you. And when he decided to turn on the charm - well, he made me go weak at the knees at least three times a week.
“Doesn’t sound like Jack,” I comment.
She shrugs. “That’s how he always was. Anyway, I wasn’t exactly happy to see ‘im again. You were thirteen by then - you were just startin’ to develop, and who knew what he might’ve had in mind? An’ all those other times too?”
“Jack wasn’t a paedophile!”
“How was I supposed to know whether he was or wasn’t? Okay, he’d never done more than look, but even that had me worried. An’ he kept coming back, Rose. Never stayed more than about ten minutes, but he always watched you the whole time. Just you. Can you blame me for being worried?”
No, I suppose not. If I’d been Mum, and this stranger’d been watching my daughter...
But why? What was he doing there? And watching me? He didn’t know me then! We’d never met before he saved my life in the Blitz. I’m positive of that. Jack could be a good actor at times, but I’d swear he wasn’t that good.
He’s dead. I’m never going to know. Just like I’ll never see the Doctor again. And what I can’t change I just have to live with - I know that now. Spent the last couple of years working it out, didn’t I? And I’m doing okay.
So I smile, remember my Jack the way he was when the three of us were together, remember running away from danger with him and the Doctor, holding both their hands and laughing, full of exhilaration and happiness. “Okay, so what happened? How come you spoke to him?”
Mum turns away from the photo. “You got a kettle in this place? ‘Bout time you made your mum a cuppa.”
***
He’s back again.
It’s been at least two years. She’d seen the back of him, she thought - and now he’s here again. And, yes, not taking his eyes off Rose, over there sitting on the old roundabout, Shireen and Keisha with her.
God, and if she hadn’t been coming back this way with the shopping he could’ve done anything. Kidnapped her. Raped her. Murdered her, even.
She should’ve called the police on him years ago. Almost did once, the second time she saw him watching Rose, but he walked away and, when she ran after him, he’d just disappeared. When he didn’t come back, she’d decided that was it; she’d scared him off.
The next time she saw him, he’d not stayed long. Oh, he’d watched Rose again, actually smiling as she ran around in circles pretending to be an aeroplane, but when she looked around at him again all she saw was the back of his coat flapping as he strode quickly away.
Now he’s back, leaning against the rusty old railing, just watching.
Good-looking bloke. Looks like a movie star, or someone from the cover of a magazine. Perfect chin, hair that falls over his forehead just right, sparkling blue eyes and white, even teeth. He must have women falling at his feet, so why the hell is he stalking little kids?
She’s rummaging for her phone - this time she’s calling the police, no doubt about that - when movement catches the corner of her eye. He’s vaulted over the railing.
Oh, shit. Shit!
Shaking hands press the keypad of her mobile as she tries to clamber over the railing after him. But she must’ve pressed the wrong keys because all she gets is silence. Damn! She hits cancel, and she’s about to try again when what she’s seeing makes her stop dead.
The man - the stalker in the blue coat - has another man pressed against the wall of the old community centre, his hand pressed to the other bloke’s throat. The second bloke’s choking and tearing at the hand, kicking out and struggling, but the stalker’s way too strong for him.
“Oi!” She thumps Blue Coat on the back. “What the ‘ell d’you think you’re doing?”
“What am I doing?” He turns around, gives her an incredulous look, then ignores her and carries on strangling the second man. “Look on the ground. See what he was up to.”
Look on... Oh. There’s a camera there, and a Boots wallet. Photos spill out as she picks it up, and after a moment she wants to throw up. Pictures of little kids, some fully dressed, some naked, and all different kids. Kids playing in parks like this, or walking to and from school, or just sitting around talking. Kids of all ages, from four or five to around Rose’s age. Just photos, and they could be innocent enough, but for what’s written on them.
“You pervert,” she shouts at the man Blue Coat’s keeping pinned to the wall. “You bloody pervert!”
“You know, calling the cops might be more useful here,” Blue Coat points out. “Maybe I’m scaring him enough so he won’t do it again, but you wanna take that chance?”
His accent takes her aback, now that she notices it; she hadn’t expected him to be American. But why not? With those teeth, she shouldn’t really be surprised.
She does as he says, though, and calls the police. Somehow, she suspects he’s used to having his orders followed.
Rose and her friends have wandered off by the time the police arrives. Just as well; the last thing she wants is Rose knowing about this. Her little girl’s far from innocent, but she doesn’t need to know some pervert was taking pictures of her. Blue Coat takes over, handling most of the stuff with the police, finally giving them a business card as they leave. Whatever’s on it, he must be important judging by the way they look at him.
“You okay?” he asks as the police drive off. She nods. “Good. Time I was gone, then.”
She halts him, hand on his arm. “I’ve seen you here before. Was going to warn you to keep away from my daughter if you knew what’s good for you.”
He blinks. “Guess it does look a bit suspicious, guy my age watching a little kid.”
“Bloody well does. But you...” She swallows. “If it hadn’t been for you...” Who knows what could have happened? Okay, the bloke was just taking pictures, but what if he didn’t stop at that?
“She’s fine. That’s all that matters. She never saw a thing.” His tone’s bracing. “As for me - I could never hurt her, I swear.”
“Why, then? Why are you so interested in her?”
He looks into the distance, his eyes suddenly bleak. “She reminds me of someone I used to know.”
A child? Well, a teenager, but still. Rose is thirteen and looks it. Not like some of those girls in her school who could pass for eighteen the way they dress and use make-up.
Maybe he had a daughter. That could be it. He’s old enough. Oh, if he had a little girl and she died... Poor bloke.
“I’m sorry,” she murmurs. He nods, then turns on his heel and strides off.
***
“That was the last time I saw him,” Mum finishes, and drains her tea.
“Jack didn’t have kids,” I point out - well, at least he never mentioned any. And he would have said, wouldn’t he? Though the Doctor never did. Not until the day we met Chloe Webber, and he never said anything more than that he was a dad once. Blokes can be so secretive.
Mum shrugs. “Well, whatever. That’s what he said.”
It’s still not making any sense. Jack, all unapproachable and sad and brooding, and coming back to watch me time after time... yet he’d never even met me. Not then.
“There’s something else I remember,” Mum says, and she’s frowning. “Just thought of it now. When he said you reminded him of someone, he had an old pocket watch in his hand - you know, the sort on a chain. A gold one. I remember it cause it was odd - I mean, what bloke his age has a watch like that? Though I s’pose it went with the coat. An’ he was holding it so tight his knuckles were white. That was weird, but each to his own...”
Mum’s still talking, but now I’m the one gripping my cup so tightly my fingers are white.
Jack got that watch on Cronius Major. We all went there together a couple of weeks after he joined us, and for once it really was a day out. We were tourists, wandering around, exploring, having fun, a really perfect day. And Jack found that watch. I saw the way he looked at it. He wanted it, I knew he did, but he didn’t have any money. I’d have bought it for him, but I didn’t have any either. The Doctor’d have bought it if it was me who wanted it, but Jack... well, he only just about seemed to tolerate Jack.
But he did buy it. Later that night, back in the TARDIS, he just slid it across the table while we were eating. Told Jack it was a souvenir. And, when Jack opened the watch up to examine it properly, his face already alight with pleasure, a key fell out. A TARDIS key.
God, I thought he was going to kiss the Doctor. He settled for hugging both of us instead. And that was the start of the three of us being completely inseparable, the best of friends.
If Jack had that watch... then he must’ve gone to the Powell Estates after that day. But he was with us all the time, right up to when we got separated on Satellite Five, and he got killed.
And that means... oh, god, it means Jack can’t have died.
Jack lived. Somehow, Jack lived. And we left him behind.
But he’s alive. Somehow, he made it to my time, my planet, my country. And he came to see me... he watched me grow up, he watched over me, protected me.
And he never said a word. Never spoke to me, never came to find me when I was already travelling with the Doctor and we visited home. Because he’s an experienced time-traveller, a trained Time Agent, and he knows the danger of messing with established timelines. And how could I ever forget what happens when you do that?
He watched me grow up. But what happened to him? Unapproachable, Mum said. Sad and bleak when he said I reminded him of someone. Was he alone? Stranded on Earth, maybe? Thinking we’d abandoned him and didn’t care whether he was dead or alive?
Oh, Jack.
There’s nothing I can do for him. I know he didn’t die like the Doctor said, but it’s not as if I can go and find him, or get the Doctor to find him. But Mum mentioned a business card, so it sounds like he made some sort of life for himself. But then Jack would. He’d always find a way of surviving. Whether he was happy or not... well, that’d be a different story.
Still, he’s alive. And in the same universe as the Doctor. Maybe some day they’ll find each other. That way neither of them will be alone. If I can’t be with them, it’s the next-best thing, isn’t it?
And, if one impossible thing can happen, maybe another can. But even if it can’t... well, I have a good life here now, with better to come. And lots of wonderful memories to look back on.
I smile through my tears as I get up to put the kettle on again, and then start to tell Mum all about Captain Jack, my other hero. My protector.
END
Author: wmr
Characters: Rose Tyler, Jackie Tyler, Jack Harkness
Rated: PG13
Spoilers: Doomsday, Utopia
Disclaimer: Oh, so many reasons why they're not mine...
Summary: But I do know him. Used to terrify me, he did.
With, as always huge thanks to
dark_aegis for BRing, and thanks also to
aibhinn, who read the first few pages and encouraged me to continue.
Protector
“You’ve got this place looking really nice, Rose.” Mum walks through the flat, for once not commenting that it could do with a good hoover or that the skirting-boards are all dusty. Not that she ever noticed stuff like that when we lived in the Powell Estate.
But she’s right, all the same. I like this flat. It’s mine, and for the first time I have somewhere I can make mine. No having to cram all my stuff in just one bedroom. No fitting in with someone else’s tastes everywhere else.
I’m about to say I’ll put the kettle on when I notice Mum picking up a picture in the living-room. It’s one of two I’ve only just got properly framed. The other one’s the Doctor - my second Doctor - and me, a picture Mum took with my phone one time when we were home. I did have lots of other photos of the two of us, but they all got left behind, either in the flat or on the TARDIS. This is the only one I’ve got left. Dad got the techs at Torchwood to enhance it so it’d look decent in an eight by ten.
The one Mum’s holding is even more precious, because that’s the two who died on me: Jack and my first Doctor. Jack had lent me his wrist computer and he and the Doctor were kidding around, shoving and arm-wrestling each other, laughing themselves silly, and I just snapped them. The Doctor growled but, after Jack printed a copy for me, he transferred it to a memory card so I could keep it. And that was still in my wallet, one of the very few things I had with me when I came through.
“Who’s that, then?” Mum sounds suspicious. “Hang on, I know ‘im!”
“You do?” She never met Jack, though. “You can’t do. That’s Jack, Mum. He...” I have to swallow. “He died. Back when the Doctor regenerated. He never came back to the Estates with us, so you never met him.”
“But I do know him.” Mum’s shaking her head, insistent. “Ooh, must be years back. When you were growing up. How old were you... oh, I think you must’ve been about thirteen last time I saw ‘im. Used to terrify me, he did.”
“What?” It couldn’t be. Not Jack.
“Weird thing is,” Mum continues, still staring at the photo of Jack, “he didn’t look any younger then than he does here. And that would’ve been... what, six years before this photo?”
But Jack would’ve still been in the Time Agency then. Although it’s not impossible that he could have been in London in her time. It could have been a mission of some sort. But not looking any younger?
Though I’m not thinking. Jack was always a time-traveller. It could’ve been after he left the Agency. Of course it could. It could’ve been just before he met the two of us during the Blitz.
“Saw him three or four times, actually. And that was weird too. It was years apart. I mean, the first time I remember seeing him, you were about seven. But he never seemed to get any older.”
I shrug. “He was a time-traveller, Mum. For all you know, it could all’ve been the same afternoon for him.”
“S’pose so.” She puts down the photo. “The other odd thing was what he wore. Every time I saw him, he had the same coat - this long, heavy blue thing, like your granddad had from when he was in the Air Force in the war.”
It’s like a kick to the gut. I remember him in that coat... oh, god, he looked so dashing. So handsome, and didn’t he know it.
But... “Blue? You sure? Cause he did have a coat like that, only it was grey. Dark grey.”
Mum’s shaking her head. “Definitely blue. An’... I dunno, maybe it could’ve been all the same day for him, but I’m sure he had different stuff on under it. Different shirts.”
Blue? That doesn’t make sense. And why would Jack have worn a coat like that when he was a Time Agent? He was always so insistent on blending in. He’d never have worn that to visit the turn of the twenty-first century.
And anyway, why the Powell Estates? Why come back there several times in the space of six or seven years? What would he have been doing there?
Come to that, why didn’t he ever mention it? He knew that’s where I lived. He heard me mention it enough. Me and the Doctor. So if he was there all those times Mum says, why didn’t he say?
“It doesn’t make sense.”
“I know what I saw, Rose! An’ it was definitely him. American accent, right?”
“How d’you know that?” Though I must have told her Jack’s accent sounded American. Or maybe Mickey did.
“Spoke to ‘im, didn’t I? Last time I saw him. He never came back after that.”
“Frightened him off, did you?” I don’t believe this. Why did Jack never mention it?
It takes me a moment to notice that Mum’s gone quiet, and she’s picked up the photo again. “Mum?”
“What?” Am I imagining it, or does she look a bit guilty?
“You did, didn’t you? Told ‘im off for hanging around, or something?” Or... no. No, it’d’ve been worse than that. What was I thinking? Yeah, Mum was always protective of me, but Jack... well, he was such a good-looking bloke. She’d have fancied him like crazy. Probably propositioned him. Or... oh, god, maybe it was even worse. Maybe she actually slept with him.
Oh, god. Jack shagged my mum. No wonder he never told me.
I can’t stop myself. The words spill out. “You shagged ‘im, didn’t you?”
“Rose Tyler!” Mum’s looking furious - but not guilty. No. They didn’t. God, what a relief!
“Okay, okay.” I hold my hand up before she can tear a strip off me. “Can’t blame me for thinking that, can you? You know what it was like when I was growing up. An’ I’m not judging you, Mum. You know I’m not. ‘S just... well, it wouldn’t’ve been completely unlikely, yeah?”
“Well, I didn’t.” She’s embarrassed now, and offended because of it. And, even though I had to ask, had to know, I can’t help feeling guilty. I know she’s ashamed of what she was like all those years, and of some of the blokes she brought home. Now she’s got my dad, I know she doesn’t like to think about what she did then.
We got drunk together one night, a few weeks after we ended up over here and things were sort of shaking out, settling down - she and Dad were working things out, seeing if they making a go of it as a couple even if he wasn’t her Pete and she wasn’t his Jackie. She told me she hadn’t told Pete everything about those years when she was bringing me up as a single mum. And for the first time she told me why she had all those boyfriends when she’d never loved any of them. Not that she needed to - I think I’d always understood - but it felt like she had to say it. I know she regrets most of them, but most of all she hates what it did to her.
Never stopped me loving her, though. Told her that. Told her Dad wouldn’t care, if she wanted to tell him the truth.
“Sorry,” I tell her. “I had to ask, yeah? Cause... well, he was a friend of mine.” And suddenly I have to swallow. “A... really good friend. Of both of us. No, I never shagged ‘im!” I find myself protesting suddenly at the look on her face. “He was a friend.” And I loved him.
I turn away, pretending to straighten my hair, and then, calmer, turn back. “So, what? You told ‘im to stop hanging around?”
“Sort of,” she admits. “But it wasn’t like you’re thinking. Not really.”
God, it’s like getting blood from a stone! “How was it, then?”
Mum sighs and puts the photo down again. “See, I remembered ‘im, right? An’ there he was again, lookin’ just the same as before, all distant an’ unapproachable, walkin’ with his hands in the pockets of that long coat, and starin’ at you.”
Unapproachable? Jack? But he was the friendliest bloke I ever knew! Well, except for when he knew someone was an enemy. In battle he was ruthless. But otherwise... god, he flirted with everything. That smile of his would blind you. And when he decided to turn on the charm - well, he made me go weak at the knees at least three times a week.
“Doesn’t sound like Jack,” I comment.
She shrugs. “That’s how he always was. Anyway, I wasn’t exactly happy to see ‘im again. You were thirteen by then - you were just startin’ to develop, and who knew what he might’ve had in mind? An’ all those other times too?”
“Jack wasn’t a paedophile!”
“How was I supposed to know whether he was or wasn’t? Okay, he’d never done more than look, but even that had me worried. An’ he kept coming back, Rose. Never stayed more than about ten minutes, but he always watched you the whole time. Just you. Can you blame me for being worried?”
No, I suppose not. If I’d been Mum, and this stranger’d been watching my daughter...
But why? What was he doing there? And watching me? He didn’t know me then! We’d never met before he saved my life in the Blitz. I’m positive of that. Jack could be a good actor at times, but I’d swear he wasn’t that good.
He’s dead. I’m never going to know. Just like I’ll never see the Doctor again. And what I can’t change I just have to live with - I know that now. Spent the last couple of years working it out, didn’t I? And I’m doing okay.
So I smile, remember my Jack the way he was when the three of us were together, remember running away from danger with him and the Doctor, holding both their hands and laughing, full of exhilaration and happiness. “Okay, so what happened? How come you spoke to him?”
Mum turns away from the photo. “You got a kettle in this place? ‘Bout time you made your mum a cuppa.”
***
He’s back again.
It’s been at least two years. She’d seen the back of him, she thought - and now he’s here again. And, yes, not taking his eyes off Rose, over there sitting on the old roundabout, Shireen and Keisha with her.
God, and if she hadn’t been coming back this way with the shopping he could’ve done anything. Kidnapped her. Raped her. Murdered her, even.
She should’ve called the police on him years ago. Almost did once, the second time she saw him watching Rose, but he walked away and, when she ran after him, he’d just disappeared. When he didn’t come back, she’d decided that was it; she’d scared him off.
The next time she saw him, he’d not stayed long. Oh, he’d watched Rose again, actually smiling as she ran around in circles pretending to be an aeroplane, but when she looked around at him again all she saw was the back of his coat flapping as he strode quickly away.
Now he’s back, leaning against the rusty old railing, just watching.
Good-looking bloke. Looks like a movie star, or someone from the cover of a magazine. Perfect chin, hair that falls over his forehead just right, sparkling blue eyes and white, even teeth. He must have women falling at his feet, so why the hell is he stalking little kids?
She’s rummaging for her phone - this time she’s calling the police, no doubt about that - when movement catches the corner of her eye. He’s vaulted over the railing.
Oh, shit. Shit!
Shaking hands press the keypad of her mobile as she tries to clamber over the railing after him. But she must’ve pressed the wrong keys because all she gets is silence. Damn! She hits cancel, and she’s about to try again when what she’s seeing makes her stop dead.
The man - the stalker in the blue coat - has another man pressed against the wall of the old community centre, his hand pressed to the other bloke’s throat. The second bloke’s choking and tearing at the hand, kicking out and struggling, but the stalker’s way too strong for him.
“Oi!” She thumps Blue Coat on the back. “What the ‘ell d’you think you’re doing?”
“What am I doing?” He turns around, gives her an incredulous look, then ignores her and carries on strangling the second man. “Look on the ground. See what he was up to.”
Look on... Oh. There’s a camera there, and a Boots wallet. Photos spill out as she picks it up, and after a moment she wants to throw up. Pictures of little kids, some fully dressed, some naked, and all different kids. Kids playing in parks like this, or walking to and from school, or just sitting around talking. Kids of all ages, from four or five to around Rose’s age. Just photos, and they could be innocent enough, but for what’s written on them.
“You pervert,” she shouts at the man Blue Coat’s keeping pinned to the wall. “You bloody pervert!”
“You know, calling the cops might be more useful here,” Blue Coat points out. “Maybe I’m scaring him enough so he won’t do it again, but you wanna take that chance?”
His accent takes her aback, now that she notices it; she hadn’t expected him to be American. But why not? With those teeth, she shouldn’t really be surprised.
She does as he says, though, and calls the police. Somehow, she suspects he’s used to having his orders followed.
Rose and her friends have wandered off by the time the police arrives. Just as well; the last thing she wants is Rose knowing about this. Her little girl’s far from innocent, but she doesn’t need to know some pervert was taking pictures of her. Blue Coat takes over, handling most of the stuff with the police, finally giving them a business card as they leave. Whatever’s on it, he must be important judging by the way they look at him.
“You okay?” he asks as the police drive off. She nods. “Good. Time I was gone, then.”
She halts him, hand on his arm. “I’ve seen you here before. Was going to warn you to keep away from my daughter if you knew what’s good for you.”
He blinks. “Guess it does look a bit suspicious, guy my age watching a little kid.”
“Bloody well does. But you...” She swallows. “If it hadn’t been for you...” Who knows what could have happened? Okay, the bloke was just taking pictures, but what if he didn’t stop at that?
“She’s fine. That’s all that matters. She never saw a thing.” His tone’s bracing. “As for me - I could never hurt her, I swear.”
“Why, then? Why are you so interested in her?”
He looks into the distance, his eyes suddenly bleak. “She reminds me of someone I used to know.”
A child? Well, a teenager, but still. Rose is thirteen and looks it. Not like some of those girls in her school who could pass for eighteen the way they dress and use make-up.
Maybe he had a daughter. That could be it. He’s old enough. Oh, if he had a little girl and she died... Poor bloke.
“I’m sorry,” she murmurs. He nods, then turns on his heel and strides off.
***
“That was the last time I saw him,” Mum finishes, and drains her tea.
“Jack didn’t have kids,” I point out - well, at least he never mentioned any. And he would have said, wouldn’t he? Though the Doctor never did. Not until the day we met Chloe Webber, and he never said anything more than that he was a dad once. Blokes can be so secretive.
Mum shrugs. “Well, whatever. That’s what he said.”
It’s still not making any sense. Jack, all unapproachable and sad and brooding, and coming back to watch me time after time... yet he’d never even met me. Not then.
“There’s something else I remember,” Mum says, and she’s frowning. “Just thought of it now. When he said you reminded him of someone, he had an old pocket watch in his hand - you know, the sort on a chain. A gold one. I remember it cause it was odd - I mean, what bloke his age has a watch like that? Though I s’pose it went with the coat. An’ he was holding it so tight his knuckles were white. That was weird, but each to his own...”
Mum’s still talking, but now I’m the one gripping my cup so tightly my fingers are white.
Jack got that watch on Cronius Major. We all went there together a couple of weeks after he joined us, and for once it really was a day out. We were tourists, wandering around, exploring, having fun, a really perfect day. And Jack found that watch. I saw the way he looked at it. He wanted it, I knew he did, but he didn’t have any money. I’d have bought it for him, but I didn’t have any either. The Doctor’d have bought it if it was me who wanted it, but Jack... well, he only just about seemed to tolerate Jack.
But he did buy it. Later that night, back in the TARDIS, he just slid it across the table while we were eating. Told Jack it was a souvenir. And, when Jack opened the watch up to examine it properly, his face already alight with pleasure, a key fell out. A TARDIS key.
God, I thought he was going to kiss the Doctor. He settled for hugging both of us instead. And that was the start of the three of us being completely inseparable, the best of friends.
If Jack had that watch... then he must’ve gone to the Powell Estates after that day. But he was with us all the time, right up to when we got separated on Satellite Five, and he got killed.
And that means... oh, god, it means Jack can’t have died.
Jack lived. Somehow, Jack lived. And we left him behind.
But he’s alive. Somehow, he made it to my time, my planet, my country. And he came to see me... he watched me grow up, he watched over me, protected me.
And he never said a word. Never spoke to me, never came to find me when I was already travelling with the Doctor and we visited home. Because he’s an experienced time-traveller, a trained Time Agent, and he knows the danger of messing with established timelines. And how could I ever forget what happens when you do that?
He watched me grow up. But what happened to him? Unapproachable, Mum said. Sad and bleak when he said I reminded him of someone. Was he alone? Stranded on Earth, maybe? Thinking we’d abandoned him and didn’t care whether he was dead or alive?
Oh, Jack.
There’s nothing I can do for him. I know he didn’t die like the Doctor said, but it’s not as if I can go and find him, or get the Doctor to find him. But Mum mentioned a business card, so it sounds like he made some sort of life for himself. But then Jack would. He’d always find a way of surviving. Whether he was happy or not... well, that’d be a different story.
Still, he’s alive. And in the same universe as the Doctor. Maybe some day they’ll find each other. That way neither of them will be alone. If I can’t be with them, it’s the next-best thing, isn’t it?
And, if one impossible thing can happen, maybe another can. But even if it can’t... well, I have a good life here now, with better to come. And lots of wonderful memories to look back on.
I smile through my tears as I get up to put the kettle on again, and then start to tell Mum all about Captain Jack, my other hero. My protector.
END