Points of clarity

Disclaimer/ AN: I don't own Dr. Who. I'm just someone who keeps being hit by plot bunnies. I don't know Torchwood very well so if I good up on Jack I'm sorry, but I hope you like this one shot.

Jack flopped down on his bed. The day was not a good one. Torchwood One was destroyed, most of the staff were dead. The reports on the dead were slowly coming in. The local news station was continually updating the list of the civilan dead.

He had been holding it together pretty well, considering everything. He was not the highest ranking Torchwood agent still alive. He was now calling all the shots. It was a large responcibilty that was thrust upon his shoulders, but he could handle it, he hoped. It wasn't the responcibilty that was making him want to crawl into the nearest hole and die, it was the report that was clutched in his hand.

A report that had managed to get out of Torchwood One listed the names of those who were in the gate room when all went to hell; all were presumed dead. The report listed 'The Doctor' as dead, but given the references he found to him in the late 1960's with brown hair, he doubted that the Doctor himself was dead. It was his companions that made his heart break. Listed in the report were two names, Rose Marion Tyler and Jaquiline Tyler, both were in the control room, and both were either dead or pulled into the void.

"How could Rose be dead? How could sweet bubbly, wonderful Rose be dead? He had watched her grow up into the cheeky wonderful person that met the Doctor in March of 2005. How could the girl he danced with to Glen Miller in the middle of the London bliz be dead? This didn't make sense." A steady string of thoughts ran through Jacks mind.

He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a photograph. It had been given to him on January 1st 2005, with simple the word 'Hope', and three names written on it. This was suppose to give him hope. It was just a scaple tearing open his wound of looseing Rose. "How could these sweet faces live if their mother was gone? They would never be born with their Mother gone. Adam never would have come here to rescue Evee if…."

Jack sat up in confusion. Aloud into the darkness of his room, "How COULD Evee be alive if Rose was dead?" Jack got up a paced a little, "Either Adam lied and she wasn't Roses daughter, OR Rose IS alive, somewhere." Yes the photo was hope. Adam could be lieing, it was possible, but there was that slim HOPE that she was still alive. He had a sliver of hope in that slim piece of paper.

The Doctor had just dropped off Jack, Mickey and Martha. All of them were still sailing on the adrenaline of what had just happned. All were just happy to be alive and home. As they really didn't have any place to go at the moment they stopped for food. Mickey had insisted that they return to a hole in the wall curry place. He had been craving their curry since he stayed in Pete's world.

The adrenaline managed to carry them until they sat down at their table.

"What do you suppose is going to happen now?" Martha asked as she loaded up her fork with rice and curry.

"Like I told the Boss, I knew where he was going. He's taking them home."

"To the parallel world?" Jack asked.

"Jackie has Pete, and Toni back home –that's Rose's little brother by the way- and I couldn't see the Doctor keeping a family apart." Mickey continued to savor his food.

"I wouldn't either." Martha took a bite of her food, "At least he has Rose back, yeah?" She gave them a hopeful smile but Mickey frowned. "What's wrong?"

"He's going to leave her isn't he?" Jack said bitterly.

"What?" Martha looked between the two men, "The Doctor wouldn't leave… I mean I've seen him with out Rose. He wouldn't just…" She tried to get them to contradict her.

"Oh come on Martha you know better than anyone she couldn't stay with him." Mickey glared at Martha.

"But he has a second chance; he could finally be with Rose." She tried to convince them. "He loves her… both of you could see that."

"You would have to be blind not to but…" Jack swirled his beer. "He can't give her the life she wants."

"Like or not he is going to have to make a choice." Martha started to rant.

"He made his choice already." Mickey stirred his soda. "He is giving her up."

"Why, the blood hell, not?" Martha asked. "The man deserves some happiness."

"Martha, the Doctor could never have a life with Rose. He could never settle down, have a wife, children, a family, not for anyone, even for someone like Rose." Jack swirled the dregs of his beer.

"But he could…" She looked Mickey to refute Jack, but saw him frowning.

"Jack is right." Mickey sighed, "The Doctor couldn't settle down, that isn't him. He couldn't do that. By leaving Rose with her family she could have a life there. She could find someone else, raise a family with them."

"I still say it's the wrong choice." Martha grumped.

All three were silent, toying with their food. Jack leaned back and felt a new hole open in his heart. He never told anyone about Adam. To himself he thought,"I mean who would believe you that he helped a guy from a parallel world save Rose's daughter….Rose's brown eyed daughter, which had a bookish older brother with hair that stuck up every which way just like…" Jack sat up straighter with each thought.

"Something wrong Jack?" Mickey asked.

"Maybe… maybe not," Jack searched his coat pockets, finding what he was looking for he pulled out a laminated photograph. Looking at it, he smiled.

"What is that Jack?" Martha asked.

"That Miss Martha is hope." He handed her the photograph.

"Oh they are so adorable." Martha showed the picture to Mickey.

"They yours?" Mickey asked.

"No," Jack looked down at his half eaten curry. "The youngest, Evee, was kidnapped by an alien back in 2005. I helped rescue her."

Martha looked at the picture closely, "The boy, he almost looks like a little Doctor." Martha laughed until what she said sunk in. "Jack, you can't be serious."

Mickey took the picture back, "Jack, the littlest girl…"

"Evee" Jack filled in.

"She reminds me of Rose when she was little." He handed the picture to Jack. "Are you telling us?"

Jack slipped the picture back into his coat, "I'm not telling you anything."

"Hold on, Jack, you just said the Doctor would never settle down, yet you have a photograph of three children that clearly look like Rose and the Doctor."

"But the Doctor isn't their father." Jack signaled for another beer.

"I'm calling bull crap on that one." Martha huffed. "If those are not the children of the Doctor I knew, I'll be a monkey's uncle."

"I'm telling you what Adam, that's the guy who helped save her, told me. They are not the children of the Doctor, but they ARE the children of Rose and her Doctor."

"That doesn't make sense."

"Didn't to me either, until today." Jack smiled as he took a snip of his new beer.

"If they are Rose's children, but not of the Doctor, then who is their father; because those kids are the Doctor's children." Martha tapped on the table.

Mickey was silent through the whole argument until he looked at Jack. "Jack, you are kidding me? The Doctor didn't…"

"He didn't do what Mickey?" Martha asked him annoyed.

Jack couldn't help grinning. "Martha, there isn't just THE Doctor anymore there are…"

"Two… My God his clone, twin, metacrisis, his whatever he is. He is half human." Martha put her hands over her mouth.

"And we can't very well have two Doctor's running around." Mickey smirked.

"My guess is that the Doctor left his 'brother' with Rose. That way at least a part of himself could stay and be with her." Jack swirled his beer and drank again, if a bit sadly.

"He left Rose with a half human version of himself in Pete's World." Mickey popped a piece of chicken in his mouth. "To be honest that sucks." He tossed a napkin down on his plate.

"If he can't be with Rose at least a part of him can spend the rest of his life with her, and give her the life he always wished her to have." Martha sighed, and pushed her food away. He murmered, "Poor Doctor…."

Jack reached into his pocket again, pulled out the picture and sat it on the table in front of them, "Adam said that this picture would give me hope, and it has. A paradox wasn't created when I saw Rose had been 'killed' at Canary Warf, so it gave me hope that she was safe, somewhere. And now," He tapped it, "It tells me that she is happy. She has a good family, and if Adam was right, a good LONG happy life."

"Then a toast," Martha said trying to keep tears from falling, "To friends we shall never meet again, may they have a long happy life, and to the Doctor the one who brought us all together." Martha raised her glass.

"To friends, and to the Doctor." Mickey and Jack said together, and clinked glasses with the other.

Jack wiped his face , and reached down between his elbows to take a sip of the drink before him. His world had ended. Everything he had worked for ; everything he cared about was gone. He was alone.

To himself he thought, "So much for hope," He pulled out the photograph given to him all those years ago. He still carried it. If anything he knew a piece of the Doctor and Rose still lived on, even if they were in another universe. He slid it back into his pocket and took another drink.

The bar tender came up to him and tossed a note in front of him, "This is from that guy over there."

It was sometime later before Jack let himself think again. Alanzo and he had a lot more in common than he thought. The Doctor knew that, and was trying to help. Jack wasn't a fool he knew why the Doctor showed up out of the blue. The Doctor was dying. Jack had not been there when the regeneration from his 9th big eared self into number 10's bouncey self but had seen that look in his eyes before. He saw it on Station 5 before he sent Rose away in the Tardis. He had seen the look of the Doctor facing his death.

Reaching over Jack pulled the photograph from his coat pocket. The Doctor was dead, but the half human Doctor still lived on. He lived on with Rose, and their children. Something that the Doctor himself knew he couldn't do for Rose.

It meant a lot for the Doctor to come say goodbye but it was sad. If he had come to him, then he must have gone to the other's Mickey, Martha, Sarah Jane, everyone, except… Rose. Rose had been with him from the moment he entered her life until Canary Warf. He couldn't go and say good bye to her. At least Jack had been lucky. He had been able to pop into the Powelle estate and catch glipses of Rose as she was growing up. She didn't know him but he could still see her, and know she was safe for now. Then it occurred to him, 'If I could see her before she met the Doctor why couldn't he?'

Jack looked down at the photograph at Evee. Adam's warnings rang though his head. "Donna Noble's time line must NOT be disturbed at any cost". That Jack understood. If Donna Noble had not met the Doctor the ramifications would have been dire. "We can not disturb what is to happen in the Powell Estate. What happens there MUST happen." Realization and fury rose in Jack as the threw the photograph across the room. "Adam you bastard." For a moment he thought he woke his companion, but he merely snorted in his sleep and rolled over. Jack got up and went into the toilet so not to disturb him. He continued to speak to himself, "Adam how could you do that to me?"

"He was there. He was dying and you didn't even tell me. I could have done something. I could have helped him." Jack leaned against the wall and slowly sank to the floor arms on his knees, head on his knees. On that night in 2004 his team had picked up an extra signal in the Powel estate that matched to a biological relaitive of Evee. They had brushed it off to a fluke; that a realative of Jackie's had shown up to visit, but no that wasn't who it was. It had been the Doctor. He had come to see Rose, to say goodbye to her. That is why Adam had kept him away. The Doctor himself, or maybe even the half Doctor had warned him to make sure that Jack didn't show up there as well. One of the people he cared about most in the world was dying and he could be there for them. Jack couldn't hate Adam for what he had done. Jack would have done the same thing if roles had been reversed but that didn't mean it didn't hurt. All Jack could do was sigh. Aloud he said, "At least we all got to say goodbye."

A/N: I was stuck cleaning the house having season 1 episodes playing and this one shot wouldn't leave me alone. Hope you enjoyed.