This is a birthday gift for the lovely PhoenixDragonDreamer—hope you enjoy, dear! Hence the Jack/Eleven. That fic is actually ridiculously close to all the themes from her wonderful stuff, as I'm not too familiar with the pairing myself, haha. Well, I can only hope it's still pleasant. Enjoy!
The hand on his shoulder lies heavy and warm.
He shifts.
Jack in the half-gloom is filling his vision, leaning on one elbow, reclining so near him. The touch of him hovers between oppression and relief, as some paradoxal gravity he didn't expect to fall into. Still, in the ways of the universe, what is to be expected? He didn't expect River. He didn't expect the Ponds, or Donna—demanding stolen bride or friend met twice—, or another Time Lord's return, or Martha or someone, anyone after the war, anyone the likes of Rose Tyler. He didn't expect Grace, life and death, oblivion and belonging, lost and found. He didn't expect Ace. Or Mel, Peri, Adric, all of them reaching further and further back, piles of names and flashes of faces. Humanity, if he's being honest—the wonderful imperative pull of them on his hand, their grasp upon his hearts. It all started with two schoolteachers, so many lifetimes ago. Barbara, and Chesterton it was—yes, Chesterton—brave, strong Ian.
Tiny grand beings wandering into his box, time and time again. They drift, come and go—he hovers into space. So does the Captain, and yet not. Jack builds and then loses. He doesn't know how he bears it. Jack bares himself with a smile.
That eternal, alluring smile.
He doesn't speak, just sighs in the darkness. A quiet old sigh, accepting and warm through the weariness.
This time, the Doctor made no attempt to avoid him. This time he hung around, finding a smile at the playful jibes about the newest makeover—feeling it drop at the mention of baby faces, then catching it again. Jack saw, the flash in his eyes was of concern. Still, he later leaned in too close, after one adventure or two or three, teasing, expecting friendly rebuffal. Gravity gave the pull that had their lips falling together. Lost in space, two great time events caught together in a dance of an orbit. Merging together, if in momentary release.
Codependency, he muses. Jack's astonished little squeak as he kissed back, before heat and fierceness took over coherent thought. From the slick, experienced captain, it could have made him laugh.
He didn't laugh then and he doesn't laugh now. He bit, albeit gently. Shudders responding to shudders, in the great unfolding of something powerful.
Still.
"She was like Rose, wasn't she?"
He looks at him. Jack's face is solemn and soft. Speak to me, whisper his kind eyes and firm jaw and the tiny lines of too much time just brushing him by.
"Who?" he asks.
Jack simply snorts. "If you don't want to talk about her, just say it outright."
"It was different. A different story. But yes, in the end, the same."
"Same loss," Jack states like he knows the exact crushing weight of that word. And oh, how he does.
The Doctor nods. His eyelids drift shut.
Jack kisses him like warmth can suffuse from his lips and all the way through the Time Lord, coax him to the sun again. And in a way it does.
Yes, the Doctor thinks, digging his fingers into the man's shoulders. In a way he does it.
He does this for him, if for a shared breath, if for two heartbeats.
"Thank you."
"Anytime."