I planned to turn this into a series about Eleven and his companions encountering our favourite immortal all across time and space, all out-of-order. No matter how much I love Harkness in his own show, his immortality is just so much fun and I wished Doctor Who got the chance to really use it to its full potential within its own story. It's quite possible that I still might, depending on the response (but I'm not going to lie, more on whether or not I really feel like it). But upon looking at it again, I realized that it could sit pretty well as a stand-alone. For now, this will be marked as complete, but if I get the inspiration and dedication, I might change that and turn it into a series of encounters.
I really liked the narrative voice here— more stylistic than I usually lean towards. Frankly, no piece I write uses the same narrative voice, but that's neither here nor there. The characters are a little off, I think… Jack has an excuse and I did it on purpose with him. If it became a series, it was meant for his character development to be shown but be completely out of order. The Doctor is being a little chatty, but Eleven does talk a lot more than the others and his talking about the future here is done in pretty non-conclusive ways. Amy might be a little over-attached, but I think she really was in early season five, if only because she was probably expecting the Doctor to disappear on her again.
Wow this note is getting quite long for me. I'll shut up now.
Encounter
Amelia Pond didn't know what to think of this stranger who called himself Jack Harkness, but he wasn't welcome. Not at all.
The Doctor called it, "the best restaurant on this side of the multiverse and because we could never visit the other sides of the multiverse, that essentially makes it the very best restaurant in all of space and time".
Amy had just asked for a breakfast that wasn't fish fingers and custard. She wouldn't have cared if he dropped in the fifteenth century and stole a few eggs to fry in the TARDIS kitchen. But he decided to show her the best places to eat in the galaxy. Apparently, the best burgers were next on the list.
They'd just settled into their Not-Chicken Eggs and Alien Bacon— Amy did, the Doctor had, though a series of manipulative rants, managed to acquire himself some gourmet Not-Quite-Fish Fingers and Almost-Custard ("Because what else does the Doctor do when he goes out for a meal but order the same ridiculous food he eats every single day?")— when something unexpected happened.
Something unexpected always happened when Amy least expected it. Expecting something unexpected to happen, unfortunately, did not resolve the universe's need to catch them off guard. It just kept throwing different kinds of unexpected at her. For example, in this case, she expected the food to start talking to her and then come to life and start killing patrons, because that's the kind of thing that happens around the Doctor. But she expected an apocalypse, so the universe brought her something completely different.
"Doctor!"
A human-looking (Amy could never tell with humanoids) man with an anachronistic jacket and eyes she could get lost in forever, looking at the Doctor like he had built the stars in his toolshed and hung them just for him.
Amy didn't like him. She didn't like him one bit. The Doctor might have built the stars and hung them in the sky, but he did that for her.
The Doctor bounced up and spun around, arms swinging widely. "Jack!" he exclaimed. "This is Amy." He pointed to her. "She's off limits. So stop it."
"I haven't started yet," said Jack. To Amy, he said, "I'm Captain Jack Harkness," and gave her a crooked, inviting smile. "Okay," he looked back to the Doctor. "Now you can tell me to stop it."
"Stop it," the Doctor chimed dutifully.
Amy tapped her fingers against the table impatiently.
The Doctor pulled a chair from the neighbouring table, pushed it towards theirs, grabbed onto Jack, and pushed him into a chair. He flopped into his own seat, grabbed a Not-Quite-Fish Finger, dipped it in the Almost-Custard, and held it to Jack. "Join us? Because I have all new taste buds since we've last met, and this is delicious. Not quite as good as the real thing, though, because it's only just barely fish fingers and custard—" And on he went, babbling like he always did, Jack grinning at him the entire time.
Jack took the Not-Quite-Fish Finger covered in Almost-Custard and took a bite.
In that moment, Amy hated Jack. A little bit of her hated the Doctor, as well. It was as if they'd been not only approached by his ex while on a date— metaphorically, of course— but he then proceeded to share some sort of friendly and familiar banter, babbled nervously like a teenage girl with a crush, sat him down at their table, and invited him to share their song. If it was an actual date, she would have walked out on him then and there.
But he was the Doctor.
Which meant he was her only ride back to her home planet and time.
"So," said Jack, his eyes locking onto her own glaring ones for a short moment before, for lack of a better description, checking out the Doctor. "I take it this is the first time you've met me with that face."
"Ah," said the Doctor. "I take it that's why you recognized me even though I regenerated."
Amy was lost.
"And Amy, too." Jack looked to her. "Sorry for that, by the way."
"For what?" she asked.
He grinned. "For what I say to you the first time I meet you. You're a wonderful girl, great fit as a companion. Don't let me tell you otherwise. You might not save the world on your own, but he comes back for you, and that means something."
"What?" said Amy.
"Stop it," said the Doctor, his voice suddenly a lot more serious than before. "Nobody should ever know too much about their own future."
"Should I leave then?" asked Jack.
The Doctor immediately grabbed onto his wrist and held it as if he would otherwise disappear. "No!" he yelled.
Jack grinned. "Missed me?"
"Stop it," said the Doctor. "I'm off limits, too." He had the decency to look a little ashamed at his outburst. Amy didn't think he had it in him to be ashamed. "I just…"
"Said goodbye?" finished Jack. "Didn't expect me to show up, blabbering like I know a secret you don't, at the greatest restaurant in the universe?"
"I—"
"You've already explained yourself to me," he interrupted. "But Doctor, you travel through all of time and space, and I'm doing the same, only linearly. Did you really think, for one moment, that we'd never run into each other ever again?"
"I knew you'd meet me again," said the Doctor, as if that answered the question. For all Amy knew, it might've, but the look in Jack's eyes told her otherwise. She thought he might call the avoidance, but the look faded quickly, as if he hadn't really expected anything else but avoidance anyway.
Jack leaned forward. "Ohh," he said, wiggling his eyebrows. "You mean I get another adventure with Suit-and-Trainers? I've missed that you. You were a lot better at being scary, then. Had the whole Oncoming Storm look mastered. Not that you're all that bad at intimidating monologues either, Bowtie. I'd face off against Daleks with you, anytime. But I think Leather-Jacket will always be my favourite."
That left so many questions that Amy didn't know where to start asking. But the Doctor just said, "You label me based on my favourite clothing?"
Jack shrugged. "It's easier than numbering."
"Well, you'll see him again, too. Leather-Jacket, I mean. And Rose."
There was as long silence. Jack looked almost like he didn't know what to say, and the Doctor seemed to be trying not to say anything more. And then:
"You're living linearly?"
"More or less."
"It's the fiftieth century."
"Almost home."
"I'm sorry," said the Doctor. "I am so, so sorry."
"I forgave you a long time ago, Doctor," said Jack. "But know this: all these years, there are two things that keeps me from sitting down in the road and letting everyone run over me while I feel sorry for myself. The first is that maybe around the next corner I'll find my next family, a place to rest a little while. People to show me that I can love again. The other is that I might find you, waiting for me in your TARDIS, to show me how to be brave again. And," he reached over and poked the Doctor in the chest, "don't you ever take that away from me." He paused. "Even when I ask you to stop, don't you ever. Promise me."
The Doctor looked him in the eye and said, "I promise."
Rule One: the Doctor lies, Amy's brain recited smugly.
"But don't tell Younger-Me about that," added Jack. "He'll be really embarrassed that I spilled my guts to you like that. It took centuries and an incident involving attempted suicide via black hole to learn to talk about feelings."
"You're welcome to come with us," said the Doctor, and for a moment, Amy wanted to strangle him.
Jack shook his head. "I've got an appointment right now, and I don't trust your driving skills."
"Oh." The Doctor was crestfallen. "Another time, then."
"I'll hold you to that." He stood up, but then leaned over and kissed the Doctor lightly on the cheek. Turning to Amy, he said, "It was a pleasure seeing you again, Mrs. Williams." He took her hand and pressed his lips to it, winked, and then sauntered off.
Amy looked to her Doctor and asked, "What is he?"
"He's Captain Jack Harkness." The corners of his lips turned upwards, almost involuntarily. "He's the only one of his kind in the entire universe."
"That doesn't help me at all."
The Doctor poked her in the forehead. "Do you know how long it took me to unravel the mystery of Jack Harkness? And then he pulls this on me and pushes me back to the start, I hate it when people do that, change without telling me, I mean. One day, he will be the greatest mystery in the universe. No way are you going to get the answer that quickly." He smiled so widely, it looked almost comical. "Amelia Pond, why don't you try figuring it out on your own?"
Amy wasn't intrigued by that. She wasn't intrigued at all. She hated Captain Jack Harkness— wished she didn't know she'd see him again. The Doctor was hers, and Amy didn't like sharing. She didn't like sharing at all, and not even a little bit of her was curious enough about Jack Harkness to want to see him again.
Not at all.