A story I started before I saw the last episode of season 3 and what that revelled about Jack (I won't say so i don't ruin it for my poor Doctor deprived American readers. So I'm sticking to the 'Jack living forever as he is' theory ok? And basically Jack never met Ten in those last few episodes but Torchwood went as planned. Phew. Okie dokie now you're all caught up!
Its pretty dark though, you have been warned. Please read and review!
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing I just play here!
Caring
The year is three billion six hundred thousand four thousand seven hundred and something. Jack gave up counting a long time ago. He shuffles his back further against the wall and wrinkles his nose at the muck he is sitting in. He shivers and pulls his old grey great coat tighter around his body with his filthy hands and wonders how it survived this long. It is a bit threadbare in places, darned and repaired in others. He sighs and reaches for the small bottle in his pocket. Just a few drops of Pax will help him. Make his whole body and mind deliciously numb for about six hours. Three bitter drops under his tongue once every six hours, so he can forget for a little while. He likes forgetting. Forgetting time and people most of all. He has lived far too long. Seen civilisations come and go. Empires fall and rise. And still humans carry on. But everyone he cared about is dead. He couldn't save mankind, he couldn't save the world. Hell he couldn't even save his own team. So he decided to just stop caring.
He'd been married once. For six years, before he walked out because he couldn't bear to tell his wife the truth. He was a coward. He couldn't bear the 'freak' label he feared would come from her lips. He didn't want to see her die. Didn't want her to get old and blame him while he stayed stuck in time. Mrs Emma Harkness. A human from the twenty eighth century who loved him. And he had a daughter. Well did have, she was long dead. Probably grandchildren, great great great grandchildren somewhere but he would never meet them. All lost in the great human soup that covered the universe. He doesn't like to think of Emma or little Rose Gwen Toshiko Harkness because it hurts too much. Emma had questioned him about the names he insisted upon and he had just told her that they were people who meant a lot to him but that was a long time ago. Several lifetimes in fact, but he doesn't tell her that. In his head she is still the four-year-old dark haired little girl staring up at him with big blue eyes and saying; "What time will you be home daddy? I want to play tea parties with you." He'd lied. Said later darling. Hugged her and told her he loved her very much and to be a good girl for mummy. Confused Emma by saying he loved her more than anything and crushing her against his chest in a hug, before kissing her like the world was ending. Then he walked out and had never gone back. Walked down the road with tears streaming down his face with nothing but the coat on his back, and the few possessions that he couldn't part with and a handful of photographs, some recent, some so old that they were faded and cracked, all stuffed in his coat pockets. He had just disappeared and hated himself for years.
He is fed up with life. Fed up with seeing them all die. So he cut himself off and wandered the universe. Fat lot of good not being able to die had done him. Left him alone and living on the streets in the bottom of a city that has long since been built over by higher newer better buildings. No one comes down here unless they want to hide. Or die. Jack isn't sure which he wants more. Not anymore.
Then he discovered Pax. Illegal of course but easy enough to buy. Jack has done some terrible things to earn enough money to get his fixes but he has to. Otherwise he can hear their voices laughing in his ears. See their smiles. So naïve. They thought they were immortal and of course they never were. All so human. Rose. Gwen. Owen. Ianto. Toshiko. Emma. They lived and loved and laughed and cried and he saw it all. He remembers it all. And they all died eventually. Some sooner than they were meant to. He winces as he remembers what befell Ianto. It had been his fault. And Ianto never blamed him when he'd bled to death in Jack's arms. Just looked at him with his beautiful eyes and made Jack cry like a baby.
Gwen had left Torchwood and died an old lady. Jack had watched her age and it broke his heart to see her spirit crushed by the world around her. He never visited her.
Owen died in a car crash aged forty and Jack still can't suppress the anger that wells inside him when he thinks about the drunken driver who killed him. He was too young.
Tosh succumbed to cancer after fighting against it for so long. In the end she told him that she wanted to die, wanted it over. He'd stood beside her and held her hand while she slipped away. What use was living forever? You just watched everyone die.
He pulls his coat tighter around his shivering body and looks through his too-long fringe of grubby hair hanging in front of his eyes at the greasy rain that is falling from the far above sky. He was happy once. But that was a long time ago. He can feel the numbness spreading up from his toes and part of him relishes the feeling while the other part detests himself for what he has become. Just another skinny junkie sitting on the side of a street, the kind of person the long-distant Jack used to step over as he walked past. A sudden rush of wind blows round the corner and blows dirty papers around him. He eyes them disgustedly but can't be bothered to brush them away.
"Wow you sure know how to show a girl a nice time!"
He looks up sharply at that voice. It can't be. She is long dead. So many years ago. Its must be a drug induced hallucination. Some people went mad on the Pax. Sometimes he wishes he were one of them. Jack peers through his hair as two people step round the edge of a building.
"I told you to pump that lever," retorts the man. "This," he makes a pumping gesture in the air, "is not pumping. This is pumping!" he repeats the gesture more vigorously.
Rose raises an eyebrow with a knowing smile. The man looks at his hand and the rather obscene gesture he is actually making and lowers his arm. "You have a dirty mind Rose."
"And you love me for it Doctor," she grins over her shoulder as she dodges round a foul smelling puddle of something and jumps onto the next kerb.
Doctor. Oh. Jack attempts to push himself to his feet, and falls back to the pavement as he legs are numb. He grits his teeth and with effort pushes himself shakily to his feet. That man is the Doctor? It can't be. And Rose Tyler is alive. He fights the spreading numbness and stumbles towards the couple.
"So where exactly are we?" Rose asks.
"I don't know. Bit further in the future than I planned too. It isn't Barcelona at any rate. "
"Are you ever actually going to get me there?"
The Doctor shrugs good-naturedly. "You'll have to stick around and find out won't you Miss Tyler!"
"Rose," Jack's voice comes out a little more than a croak having been underused for years. He clears his throat. "Rose!"
They both look round and Rose frowns momentarily at the man stumbling towards them.
"Jack?" she finally gasps incredulously.
"You're alive." Jack grabs hold of her and pulls her into a tight hug. She struggles to pull her nose free of the stench of his coat.
"What happened to you?" she demands holding him at arms length and staring at him. Jack's face is dirty and his hair too long and his clothes are tattered, and he stinks. His eyes are haunted but bright. Almost too bright.
"Life. I can't die." He turns to the Doctor who has been impassively silent the whole time. "Is this what its like to be you? Watching everyone you love…wither and die?"
The Doctor's brow is furrowed. "You can't die? Since when?"
"Gamestation."
Rose's eyes go wide. "Oh then I brought you back to life forever?"
Jack stares at her. "You? I thought the Doctor…the other Doctor…he…who are you?"
"I am the Doctor. I regenerated. It's a long story."
Jack grabs his shoulders and shakes him roughly. "Did you know? Everyone I loved is dead! My friends, my family, my daughter. What's the point Doctor when you know everyone will die?" he points at Rose. "She's going to die. You're going to lose her. What will you do then?" his voice is bitter. "She might go saving the world but is it worth it? Worth losing her to that battle? To them?"
Rose looks scared. "What is he talking about Doctor?"
The Doctor looks fierce and angry, his eyes hard. "Be quiet Jack."
"No! I won't." he turns to Rose. "You die Rose. I know. I've lived it. There is a battle – an end of the world type battle – and you die, and your mum. I went to the memorial service Rose. He takes you there and you will die!"
Rose turns frightened eyes to the Doctor. "Is this true?"
"I don't know," the Doctor says quietly, the tiniest trace of worry in his voice.
Jack looks softly at Rose. "I've lived a long time Rose. Far longer than you ever will and I want to make sure you don't go before your time. Don't let him take you to Canary Wharf when the ghosts come!"
"What?" she stares between his hard blue eyes and the Doctor's brown ones. "Jack you're scaring me."
Jack smiles suddenly but sadly. "I'm sorry Rosie. I just don't want to mourn you." He strokes his hand down the side of her face tenderly. "I love you." He looks like he might cry.
Rose suddenly frowns thinking back to something he said earlier. "Wait a minute…Daughter? When?"
"Fourth of March 2746," Jack replies instantly. "My little Rose's birthday. I haven't seen her since she was four. Long dead now.
Rose turns to the Doctor. "I knew it wasn't a coincidence!"
"What?" Jack sounds incredulous.
"Rose Harkness! Looked like you," Rose feels tears welling in her eyes. "The Doctor said it was just a fluke of the universe."
Jack's legs buckle under him and he sits heavily on a kerb. "My little Rose…" he looks up at Rose eyes shining. "Was she..? Did she?"
"She was beautiful. Maybe twenty-two when we met her. Dark hair, blue eyes. Your eyes. Sounded like you, an American accent was very distinctive in that future." Rose smiles. "Very charming too. As the Doctor found out."
Jack stares at him. "With my daughter? You…you…cradle robber!"
The Doctor holds out his hands. "Nothing happened! And I didn't know she was your daughter…and this is a very strange conversation!"
Jack leans over and coughs hard, holding his chest. Rose drops into a crouch beside him.
"Jack? What is it?" She grabs his hand.
"I can't feel my legs."
"What?"
The Doctor stares down at him, glances round the street once, takes in a faded scrawled poster on the wall and returns his gaze to Jack. "What did you do?"
Jack coughs again and with effort lifts his head. "I wanted to forget."
The Doctor holds out his hand. "Give it here. Now!"
Jack's fingers fumble numbly in his pocket as he pulls out the Pax, and he drops the vial onto the pavement. Rose retrieves it and hands it to the Doctor.
"Pax! Jack this is banned on four hundred civilised worlds! How did you afford this?"
"By doing terrible…terrible things that you shall never know about."
"What is it?" Rose asks as Jack wheezes more and holds his chest. His grip on Rose's hand is going slack.
"Pax is a neurotoxin. It builds up in the body. Eventually one hit poisons your entire system. Everything goes numb," the Doctor says solemnly. "He's dying Rose."
Jack wheezes and puts his head between his knees, wondering if he might be sick.
Rose's hand rubs up and down his back. "Doctor, help him," her voice is a desperate plea.
"I'm so sorry Jack." The Doctor crouches in front of his friend. "I can't stop this."
Jack forces his head back up and grins past the dirt. "S'all right Doctor. She lived." His voice is slightly slurred. "I love you Rose."
"Doctor!"
The Doctor shakes his head at her but keeps his eyes on Jack. Rose sees a muscle in his cheek twitch as he reaches out a hand and takes Jack's. She feels her lower lip trembling.
"Love you too Doctor…" Jack says weakly.
"Don't you dare die!" Rose says sternly as the tears come to her eyes, and she throws her arms around him tightly.
"Doesn't matter." Jack raises the ghost of a smile. "I'm ready. I love you. I…I…got to…warn you…about Canary Wharf. Daleks…" He sees the Doctor's eyes go wide at the word as his own vision swims. "Be happy together." The Doctor squeezes his hand. "Hold on tight to his hand…" He trails off and sighs contentedly as the blackness comes.
Jack wakes up with rainwater dripping down his neck and the Pax bottle still gripped tightly in his hand. It hadn't been real. He hadn't really warned her. She was still dead. That man with the boyish smile and the brown hair was a stranger. And Jack was still alone. He sits up a bit straighter and pulls the collar of his coat up round his neck. He shivers and digs a hand in a pocket, pulling out a photograph. Rose Tyler smiles up at him, the Doctor – the old Doctor – hovers uncertainly in the background. Jack wonders where he is. Why the never came for him? They left me to die and never even looked back. Jack casts his eyes heavenwards and prays for someone to answer him. Maybe he does still care after all. He just wished he could have warned her.
The End